The Charolais originated in west-central to southeastern France, in the old French provinces of Charolles and neighboring Nievre. The exact origins of the Charolais are lost to us but it must have been developed from cattle found in the area. Legend has it that white cattle were first noticed in the region as early as 878 A.D., and by the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were well and favorably known in French markets, especially at Lyon and Villefranche. Selection developed a white breed of cattle which, like other cattle of continental Europe, were used for draft, milk and meat.

The cattle were generally confined to the area in which they originated until the French Revolution. But, in 1773, Claude Mathieu, a farmer and cattle producers from the Charolles region, moved to the Nievre province, taking his herd of white cattle with him. The breed flourished there, so much so that the improved cattle were known more widely as Nivemais cattle for a time than by their original name of Charolais.