Documentos de Académico
Documentos de Profesional
Documentos de Cultura
In the second edition of his Questions sur l'Encyclopdie (French for "Questions on the Encyclopedia"), published in 1771, the writer and philosopher Voltaire claimed that the prisoner wore an iron mask and was the older, illegitimate brother of Louis XIV. In the late 1840s, the writer Alexandre Dumas elaborated on the theme in the final installment of his Three Musketeers saga: here the prisoner is forced to wear an iron mask and is Louis XIV's identical twin. What facts are known about this prisoner are based mainly on correspondence between his jailer and his superiors in Paris.
L'Homme au Masque de Fer (The Man in the Iron Mask). Anonymous print (etching and mezzotint, hand-colored) from 1789. According to the caption on the original (not seen here) the Man in the Iron Mask was Louis de Bourbon, comte de Vermandois, an illegitimate son of Louis XIV.
The prisoner
Arrest and imprisonment
The first surviving records of the masked prisoner are from late July 1669, when Louis XIV's minister the Marquis de Louvois sent a letter to Bnigne Dauvergne de Saint-Mars, governor of the prison of Pignerol, then part of France. In his letter, Louvois informed Saint-Mars that a prisoner named Eustache Dauger was due to arrive in the next month or so. Louvois instructed Saint-Mars to prepare a cell with multiple doors, one closing upon the other, which were to prevent anyone from the outside listening in. Saint-Mars himself was to see Dauger only once a day in order to provide food and whatever else he needed. Dauger was also to be told that if he spoke of anything other than his immediate needs he would be killed, but, according to Louvois, the prisoner should not require much since he was "only a valet". Historians have noted that the name Eustache Dauger was written in a handwriting different from the rest of the text, suggesting that, The town of Pinerolo while a clerk wrote the letter under Louvois's dictation, a third party, very likely the minister himself, added the name afterwards.
Man in the Iron Mask The man himself was arrested by Captain Alexandre de Vauroy, garrison commander of Dunkirk, and taken to Pignerol, where he arrived in late August. Evidence has been produced to suggest that the arrest was actually made in Calais and that not even the local governor was informed of the event Vauroy's absence being explained away by his hunting for Spanish soldiers who had strayed into France via the Spanish Netherlands. The first rumours of the prisoner's identity (as a Marshal of France) began to circulate at this point. According to many versions of this legend, the prisoner wore the mask at all times.
Illustration c.1872
Man in the Iron Mask After Fouquet's death in 1680, Saint-Mars discovered a secret hole between Fouquet and Lauzun's cells. He was sure that they had communicated through this hole without detection by him or his guards and thus that Lauzun must have been made aware of Dauger's existence. Louvois instructed Saint-Mars to move Lauzun to Fouquet's cell and to tell him that Dauger and La Rivire had been released. In fact they were held in another cell in another part of the prison, their presence there being highly secret.
Other prisons
Lauzun was freed in 1681. Later that same year Saint-Mars was appointed governor of the prison fortress of Exiles (now Exilles in Italy). He went there, taking Dauger and La Riviere with him. La Riviere's death was reported in January 1687 and in May Saint-Mars and Dauger moved to Sainte-Marguerite, one of the Lrins Islands, half a mile offshore from Cannes. It was during the journey to Sainte-Marguerite that rumours spread that the prisoner was wearing an iron mask. Again, he was placed in a cell with multiple doors. On 18 September 1698, Saint-Mars took up his new post as governor of the Bastille prison in Paris, bringing the masked prisoner with him. He was placed in a solitary cell in the pre-furnished third chamber of the Bertaudire tower. The prison's second-in-command, de Rosarges, was to feed him. Lieutenant du Junca, another officer of the Bastille, noted that the prisoner wore "a mask of black velvet". The prisoner died on 19 November 1703, and was buried the next day under the name of Marchioly. All his furniture and clothing were reportedly destroyed afterwards, the walls of his cell scraped and whitewashed and everything of metal which the man had possessed, or used, melted down.
le Sainte-Marguerite Fortress of Exilles
In 1711, King Louis's sister-in-law, Elizabeth Charlotte, Princess Palatine, sent a letter to her aunt, Sophia, Electress of Hanover, stating that the prisoner had "two musketeers at his side to kill him if he removed his mask". She described him as very devout, and that he was well treated and received everything he desired. It might be noted, however, that the prisoner had already been dead for eight years and that the Princess had not necessarily seen him for herself; thus she was quite likely reporting rumours she had heard at court.
Interest
The fate of the mysterious prisoner and the extent of apparent precautions his jailers took created much interest and many legends. Many theories are in existence and several books have been written about the case. Some were presented after the existence of the letters was widely known. Later commentators have still presented their own theories, possibly based on embellished versions of the original tale. Theories about his identity made at the time included that he was a Marshal of France; or the English Richard Cromwell, son of Oliver Cromwell; or Franois, Duke of Beaufort. Later, many people such as Voltaire and Alexandre Dumas[1] put forward other theories about the man in the mask.
Man in the Iron Mask It has even been suggested that he was one of the other famous contemporary prisoners being held at Pignerol at the same time as Dauger.
Candidates
The King's relative
Voltaire claimed that the prisoner was a son of Anne of Austria and Cardinal Mazarin, and therefore an illegitimate half-brother of King Louis XIV, the sincerity of this claim is uncertain. Alexandre Dumas used this theory in his book, The Vicomte de Bragelonne, but made the prisoner an identical twin of Louis XIV. This book has served as the basis even if loosely adapted for many film versions of the story. Hugh Ross Williamson argues that the man in the iron mask was actually the father of Louis XIV. According to this theory, the 'miraculous' birth of Louis XIV in 1638, after Louis XIII had been estranged from his wife for over twenty years, implies that Louis XIII was not the father. The suggestion is that the King's minister, Cardinal Richelieu, had arranged for a substitute, probably an illegitimate son or grandson of Henry IV, to become intimate with the Queen, and father an heir. At the time, the heir presumptive was Louis XIII's brother Gaston d'Orlans, who was also Richelieu's enemy. If Gaston became King, Richelieu would quite likely have lost both his job as minister and his life, so it was in his interests to thwart Gaston's ambitions. Louis XIII also hated Gaston and might thus have agreed to the scheme. Supposedly the father then left for the Americas, but in the 1660s returned to France with the aim of extorting money for keeping his secret, and was promptly imprisoned. This theory would explain both the secrecy surrounding the prisoner, whose true identity would have destroyed the legitimacy of Louis XIV had it been revealed, and (because of the King's respect for his own father) the comfort of the terms of his imprisonment and the fact that he was not simply killed.
The general
In 1890 Louis Gendron, a French military historian, came across some coded letters and passed them on to Etienne Bazeries in the French Army's cryptographic department. After three years Bazeries managed to read some messages in the Great Cipher of Louis XIV. One of them referred to a prisoner and identified him as General Vivien de Bulonde. One of the letters written by Louvois made specific reference to de Bulonde's crime. At the Siege of Cuneo in 1691, Bulonde was concerned about enemy troops arriving from Austria and ordered a hasty withdrawal, leaving behind his munitions and wounded men. Louis XIV was furious and in another of the letters specifically ordered him "to be conducted to the fortress at Pignerol where he will be locked in a cell and under guard at night, and permitted to walk the battlements during the day with a 330 309". It has been suggested that the "330" stood for masque and the 309 for "full stop". However, in 17th-century French avec un masque would mean "in a mask". Some believe that the evidence of the letters means that there is now little need of an alternative explanation for the man in the mask. Other sources, however, claim that Bulonde's arrest was no secret and was actually published in a newspaper at the time and that he was released after just a few months. His death is also recorded as happening in 1709, six years after that of the man in the mask.[]
The valet
In 1801 revolutionary legislator Pierre Roux-Fazillac stated that the tale of the masked prisoner was an amalgamation of the fates of two separate prisoners, Ercole Antonio Mattioli (see below) and an imprisoned valet named "Eustache D'auger". Andrew Lang, in his The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories (1903), presented a theory that "Eustache Dauger" was a prison pseudonym of a man called "Martin", valet of the Huguenot Roux de Marsilly. After his master's execution in 1669 the valet was taken to France, possibly by capture or subterfuge, and imprisoned because he might have known too much about his master's affairs.
Since that time, letters purportedly sent by Saint-Mars, which earlier historians missed, indicate that Mattioli was only held at Pignerol and Sainte-Marguerite and was not at Exiles or the Bastille and therefore it is argued that he can be discounted.
Disgrace
In April 1659, Eustache and Guiche were invited to an Easter weekend party at the castle of Roissy-en-Brie. By all accounts it was a "debauched" affair of merry-making, with the men involved in all sorts of "sordid" activities, including attacking a man who claimed to be Cardinal Mazarin's attorney. It was also claimedWikipedia:Manual of Style/Words to watch#Unsupported attributions, among other things, that a black mass was enacted, and that a pig was baptized as "carp" in order to allow them to eat pork on Good Friday. Other activities, such as homosexual sex, may also have taken place. When news of these events became public an enquiry was held and the various perpetrators jailed or exiled. There is no record as to what happened to Dauger, but in 1665, near the Chteau de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, he allegedly killed a young page boy in a drunken brawl involving the Duc de Foix. The two men claimed that they had been provoked by the boy who was drunk, but the fact that the killing took place near a castle where the King was staying meant that this was not a good enough explanation and, as a result, Dauger was forced to resign his commission. Dauger's mother died shortly afterwards. In her will, written a year previously, she passed over her eldest surviving sons, Eustache and Armand, leaving the bulk of the estate to their younger brother Louis. Eustache was restricted in the amount of money to which he had access, having built up considerable debts, and left with barely enough for "food and upkeep". As titular head of the family, he had come into some small estates, but gave these up to Louis, who provided him with an additional annual payment.
Dauger in prison
However, evidence has emerged that Dauger de Cavoye actually died in the Prison Saint-Lazare, an asylum run by monks which many families used in order to imprison their "black sheep". Documents have survived indicating that Dauger de Cavoye was held at Saint-Lazare in Paris at about the same time that Dauger, the man in the mask, was taken into custody in Pignerol, hundreds of miles away in the south. These include a letter sent to Dauger de Cavoye's sister, the Marquise de Fabrgues, dated 20 June 1678, which is filled with self-pity as Eustache complains about his treatment in prison, where he has been held for 10 years, and how he was deceived by their brother Louis and Clrac, their brother-in-law and the manager of Louis' estate. A year later, he wrote a letter to the King, outlining the same complaints and making a similar request for freedom. The best the King would do, however, was to send a letter to the head of Saint-Lazare telling him that "M. de Cavoye should have communication with no one at all, not even with his sister, unless in your presence or in the presence of one of the priests of the mission". The letter was signed by the King and Colbert. A poem written by the Comte de Brienne, himself an inmate at the time, indicates that Eustache Dauger de Cavoye died as a result of heavy drinking in the late 1680s. Historians consider all this proof enough that he was not involved in any way with the man in the mask.
In popular culture
Literature Alfred de Vigny, "The Prison" [3] Alfred de Vigny, the great French writer, composed in 1821, a lengthy poem which purports to tell events which occurred at the death bed of the Man in the Iron Mask. An aged priest is called to offer the last rites of the Catholic Church to a mysterious prisoner. The poem begins with the bitter complaint of the priest who has been delayed an hour blindfolded before he is taken by a circuitous route to the prisoner. Eventually they arrive at a dungeon where the blindfold is removed, and in the dim light the priest sees an old dying man. The jailer respectfully addresses the prisoner as "Mon prince" and announces the arrival of the holy man. "What do I care?" replies the prisoner. The priest calls upon him to repent his sins. The prisoner declares at length that he has been imprisoned since he was a child, and effectively has had no life. In the dim light the priest realizes with shock that he cannot see the face of the prisoner, since it is covered by an iron mask. At this point the priest remembers from his youth being told of a state prisoner, who succeeded in casting off his mask and attempting to flee. Those around caught a glimpse of a handsome young man bearing a resemblance to the king of France. He was quickly subdued. A young entrant to a convent testified that he was guiltless, and wrongly sentenced. The priest tells the prisoner that God himself suffered terribly on the cross, and the prisoner's sorrows would open the gates of heaven to him, would he just accept God. The priest fails. The prisoner becomes delirious, and dies unshriven. The priest is desolate, and stays on praying to God to forgive him for his failure. The poem ends with the priest seeing with horror that the outline of the mask projects through the shroud, and even in death the prisoner has no release. Alexandre Dumas, pre, The Vicomte de Bragelonne Henry Vizetelly, The Man With the Iron Mask Juliette Benzoni, Secret d'etat Louis-Csar, Cassandra Palmer series Films and television 1909: La maschera di ferro Italian silent film 1923: Der Mann mit der eisernen Maske German silent film 1929: The Iron Mask An American silent film starring Douglas Fairbanks 1938: The Face Behind the Mask An American short film directed by Jacques Tourneur
Man in the Iron Mask 1939: The Man in the Iron Mask American black and white film directed by James Whale, starring Louis Hayward, Joan Bennett, Warren William and Alan Hale, Sr. (as "Porthos") 1952: Lady in the Iron Mask American color film starring Louis Hayward, Patricia Medina and Alan Hale, Jr. (as "Porthos") 1962: Le Masque de fer Italian/French film, starring Jean Marais 1968: The Man in the Iron Mask British TV series (9 episodes) 1970: Start the Revolution Without Me 1977: The Man in the Iron Mask (1977) British TV movie with Richard Chamberlain, Patrick McGoohan, Louis Jourdan, Jenny Agutter, Ian Holm, Ralph Richardson and Vivien Merchant 1979: The Fifth Musketeer also known as Behind the Iron Mask Austrian/West German film directed by Ken Annakin, with Ursula Andress, Beau Bridges, Cornel Wilde, Lloyd Bridges, Jos Ferrer, Olivia de Havilland, Rex Harrison and Alan Hale Jr. (as "Porthos"); remake of the 1939 film 1985: The Man in the Iron Mask Australian animated TV film 1987: Three Musketeers Japanese anime TV series, included the character of The Man in the Iron Mask depicted as a Doctor Doom-like villain. 1998: The Man in the Iron Mask British/American film directed by Randall Wallace, with Leonardo DiCaprio, Jeremy Irons, John Malkovich, Grard Depardieu and Gabriel Byrne 1998: The Man in the Iron Mask also known as The Mask of Dumas American film, directed by William Richert, with Edward Albert, Dana Barron, Rex Ryon and Timothy Bottoms 2007: Revenge Is a Dish Best Served Three Times - 18th season of The Simpsons animated television program. 2014: "The Musketeers" (BBC 2014 adaptation) Series 1 Episode 6 Music 1992 "The Iron Mask" - A CD by gothic rock band Christian Death. 2006 Tilting the Hourglass - A song released by rock band Alesana on their debut album On Frail Wings of Vanity and Wax, in which the imprisonment and feelings of the prisoner are portrayed in song.
Notes
[1] Gutenberg.org (http:/ / www. gutenberg. org/ etext/ 2751) [2] George Agar Ellis, The true history of the State Prisoner commonly called the Iron Mask, here identified with Count E. A. Mattioli, extracted from documents in the French archives (London, J. Murray, 1826) [3] fr.wikisource.org/wiki/La_Prison_(Vigny)
External links
The Mystery of the Iron Mask (http://www.cadytech.com/dumas/related/the_mystery_of_the_iron_mask.php) The Man in the Iron Mask at Project Gutenberg Who was the "Man in the Iron Mask"? (http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mmaninmask.html) at the Straight Dope
License
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/