What makes a bebe a bebe?

WARNING:  this post will discuss the French and German bisque dolls that I'm currently obsessed with.  I know some of y'all aren't big fans of those.  For that reason, feel free to skip this post if you so wish.  I won't be offended.

Alrighty, time for a random post about something that has been bugging me but isn't really super-important.  As y'all may or may not remember, I'm the proud owner of three bisque dolls from the Victorian/Edwardian period.  Hattie and Mabel are both German, and Katsumi is Japanese.  Pardon the reused picture.

No French dolls in my group, as for some reason they are quite expensive.  Oh sure, I've got a little doll who was sculpted in the likeness of a French doll...

...but she's not the real deal.  I don't mind that Bru-Hilda here is not the real deal, but she did make me think.  At the library where I work there resides a huge coffee table book entitled simply The Doll.  All of the dolls featured in the book are vintage or antique, with a healthy proportion of them being German or French.  No Simon and Halbig dolls made an appearance (sad face), but what struck me was the way some of the bisque dolls were labeled.  Some of them were called "bebes."  The word "bebe" is French for "baby," and it and the word "poupee" were used to describe dolls back in the day.  Poupees were usually older girl and woman dolls, while bebes were smaller children.

Therein lies my quandary.  I've seen a great many child and baby dolls from the Victorian and Edwardian eras, but they're not all called bebes.  None of my three bisque dolls are bebes, even though "bebe" (pronounced "bey-bey") does mean "baby" and both Hattie and Katsumi are baby dolls.  I don't think a German doll could ever be considered a bebe since French terms usually weren't applied to German dolls, even though some German dolls looked a LOT like the French dolls.

Alrighty, so only the French dolls were bebes, I presume.  But...not all French dolls were bebes.  In addition to pictures, The Doll also includes commentary on the dolls in the pictures (or "plates," as the book calls them), and thus I know that the Jumeau girls in Plate 14 are bebes...

...as are all of the dolls in Plate 134 (they are all Jumeau as well).

I was beginning to think that one had to be a Jumeau to be a bebe, but then I ran into this mix of French girls in the final plate (numbered 191).  One is a Jumeau, one is a Bru, one is a Steiner, three are marked with initials from companies I've never heard of, and they're all labeled "bebes".  So much for my theory!  Dig the smallest girl's mittens, by the way.

Now...with one exception, these next dolls are not referred to as bebes, even though they are French and represent little girls.  In Plate 52 the brunette in the center, the one with her eyes staring goofily downward, is called a bebe in her description.  She is a little Steiner.  The long-faced doll on her left and the flirty-eyed girl on her right are both by Jumeau, and they are NOT listed as bebes even though they are the same size as the Steiner.  The larger doll in stripes and the two smaller dolls in the foreground are not listed as bebes either.

The Jumeau trio in Plate 130 are not called bebes either (I wish the one on the right was mine, LOL).

So...I haven't learned much!  I assume that in order to be a bebe one has to be a French bisque doll, but that's all I've managed to deduce.  Being a Jumeau clearly doesn't make one a bebe, nor does size, and the face doesn't appear to make one a bebe either.  Heck, all of these girls start to look alike after awhile, so who the heck knows???  Doll Reference, my usual go-to for any sort of information, was no help either, as nearly ALL of their Jumeaux were marked "bebe."  Most of the dolls in the entries for Bru and Steiner are the same way.  I don't know for sure if they really are bebes or if Doll Reference just labeled them as such.  OR...maybe my big book got it wrong, and ALL the little dolls in the pictures above really are bebes because they look like little girls?  Jeez, I don't know, and y'all probably don't know or give a crap (LOL).

Do any of y'all know for sure?  Is being a French child doll all it takes to be a bebe?  Or is there something else the doll needs?  Must they be marked as such, like the Eden bebe in this Theriault video?  If any of y'all have any solid answers I'll happily take them.

Much love and thank God tax season is coming to an end,
RagingMoon1987