The article explores the uses and significances of the notion of notable in the social history and political sociology about political élites in France since the beginning of the 19th century. In contrast to a restrictive conception of the term, used to describe the social and economic élite which monopolized the political power during the first half of 19th century, it is argued that the modernisation of French politics, in the course of the Third Republic, not necessarily leads to the "end of the notables". Part of the new republican élite adopted practices of the old notables (patronage, personalized relationships with their electors, mediation between their territory and the state administrations). The notables as a homogeneous social group certainly disappeared; but modes of exercising the power close to those of the notables was adapted to the new political configuration and maintained since the contemporary times.