by Michael Hone
What happened next is found in Erlanger’s book but in no recent histories. Cinq-Mars decided he would weaken the king’s faith in Richelieu to the extent that he, Cinq-Mars, would be able to assassinate the cardinal without incurring Louis’ wrath. He therefore told Louis that the reason there was no peace with Spain was that Richelieu did everything he could to prevent it in order to prolong his indispensability to Louis. When Louis expressed his doubts, Cinq-Mars suggested he send a messenger to Philip himself and find out. Cinq-Mars even had the perfect messenger in mind: de Thou. For the first time ever, Louis tried to trip up his minister by doing what Cinq-Mars suggested. With such serious doubts in Louis’ mind, the killing of Richelieu would pass easily, thought Cinq-Mars.
On the way to Perpignan, in the town of Briare, hot-blooded Cinq-Mars decided to murder Richelieu himself, but failed for unknown reasons. In Lyon he tried again, with the aid from childhood friends from neighboring Avignon, where he had seen the first light of day. But here he decided, at the last minute, to refer to Gaston first, Gaston who bowed out. As stated earlier, Richelieu, as perhaps the least idiotic person on earth, was protected by soldiers and a hundred of his own personal guard, which would have made anyone think twice.
An army officer, Aymar de Chouppes, knew Richelieu well and was fond of Cinq-Mars. He was aware of the contention between the two and offered his services. He suggested that the boy ask Richelieu for forgiveness, but Cinq-Mars told him Richelieu never forgave nor forgot anything. De Chouppes went to Richelieu to plead for the boy and was assured, by Richelieu, that Richelieu could arrange things in Cinq-Mars’s favor. When told, Cinq-Mars replied that it was too late.
Louis wasn’t in good health and Richelieu came down with a strange arm infection. Their doctors suggested that both retire to a more healthy place to care for themselves. Richelieu went to Tarascon near Avignon, Louis went to a site nearby, Montfrin. As he was in bad temper, the king refused to see Cinq-Mars, a way perhaps of dampening the boy’s ever increasing arrogance. When Cinq-Mars showed up at Louis’ apartments and the guard at the door refused him entry, Cinq-Mars sat and read novels so that the court would think he’d been received by the king, and so was still in Louis’ heart. As Louis refused to see Richelieu too, Richelieu, suffering greatly from his arm, wrote that if the king wanted him back he would publicly declare his trust in Richelieu. Louis immediately sent him a letter reiterating his love.
The document offering Spanish help following Richelieu’s demise was signed, sealed and forwarded to Gaston. How it fell into Richelieu’s hands is one of those historical enigmas that historians have tried to resolve for 400 years. The document would lead to the suffering and death of many people, beginning with Cinq-Mars and de Thou.
With the proof in hand, Richelieu arranged a meeting with the king at Richelieu’s quarters. Two beds were placed side by side as at Versailles, in front of the immense fireplace, and both men spent hours in fraternal conversation.
During the trial of Cinq-Mars Louis had sent a letter to chancellor Séguier, in charge of the proceedings, an incredible document that proves that he had known all along what Cinq-Mars had been up to.
In addition, Cinq-Mars had told his jailors that the king had been aware of his plans from the very outset. The king had also ordered that the boy not be tortured, not out of love for him but through a tacit understanding that Cinq-Mars would not make the king’s role in the affair public in exchange.
In the Mémoires left to us by Montglat (see Sources) he writes that Cinq-Mars had told Louis that a way out of all his problems would be Richelieu’s death, but Louis had answered that he would be excommunicated if he killed a cardinal. (Anyway, in bed boys and men say many silly things they don’t mean.)
Richelieu and Louis met back in Fontainebleau. Richelieu had to be held up by servants so he could greet the king properly. He congratulated him on having recovered his senses by ridding himself of his infatuation with Cinq-Mars. We don’t know Louis’ reply but it was said both men had tears in their eyes, so choked up were they in each other’s presence. Two old, empty, dying men gladdened by a lad’s death.
What came next could have played out only by a mafioso threatening utter destruct on a rival capo di tutti capi. Richelieu wrote Louis nearly ordering him to cleanse the court by dismissing the captain of the musketeers, de Tréville, who had greatly appreciated Cinq-Mars and who had volunteered to murder Richelieu. When Louis, who had complete trust in de Tréville, refused, Richelieu let him known, by way of an envoy, Chavigny, that Cinq-Mars had told him things Louis was unaware of. He should know that it was he, Richelieu, who had spared Cinq-Mars from being tortured so that he would not declare what he knew to the public concerning Louis’ role in the scheme to kill Richelieu, things Cinq-Mars had also confessed to the priest Malavalette whom Richelieu controlled. Louis understood and still refused to let de Tréville go.
Chavigny returned to tell Louis that if de Tréville remained Richelieu would make it known to the entire court that he would see the king only in the company of an armed guard, so afraid was he of being assassinated.
Louis caved in. He wrote Richelieu telling him that de Tréville had been sent away. Then he added, incredibly, that Richelieu shouldn’t have believed anything Cinq-Mars had said to him, as Cinq-Mars had been nothing more than a malicious imposture.
The only question now was which of the two would be entombed first. Louis turned his back on the boy he’d loved in exchange for a few remaining months alongside an old man, one stinking from arm infections and a cancer-ridden prostate, the other from recurrent diarrhea; both in competition as to who hated the guts of the other more; both sealed in mutual need, like viruses that depended on a host’s blood.
A week later Richelieu coughed up blood and had difficulty breathing. Louis visited his bedside and personally fed him two egg yolks, promising to care for Richelieu’s family and to take Richelieu’s acolyte, Mazarin, under his wing. Louis left and Richelieu breathed his last.
As following the death of Luynes, Louis felt an immense liberation thanks to Richelieu’s passing. He could now be himself. He could now rule in his own name. He was king and absolute. But only in his head. In reality he had always been an empty hulk inhabited by others who had given him substance. Now more alone than ever, there was nothing left but to fill the emptiness until the final leap skywards. He filled it with Mazarin.
Mazarin entered the council with the order to keep things as they were, as Richelieu had organized them, because outside of Richelieu Louis lacked a single idea of his own, to the huge disappointment of the people who desperately wanted him to usher in a new age of progress.
Mazarin saw to it that Richelieu’s body was taken to the Sorbonne in a ceremony normally reserved for kings, accompanied by his pages in white, bearing white candles.
With death at his doorstep, Louis publicly asked pardon from all those he had harmed, placing the blame for his actions on years of Richelieu’s tyranny. Bassompierre was freed from the Bastille as was Baradas, and his brother César and Caussin were allowed to return to court. Only the Duchess of Chevreuse was left out in the cold. Louis met with Gaston in public, to the joy of the court, chiding him for having betrayed him six times, before offering him the kiss of peace on the mouth. Gaston declared that he had never fought his brother, but only the despicable Richelieu, which everyone feigned to believe.
Louis then fell more gravely ill with abdominal pains and diarrhea, hanging on for three long months until the inevitable, at age 42. He left the regency to Anne and to a council of seven that included Gaston, Mazarin, Condé and Séguier. Everyone was happy except for Anne who considered herself the next Richelieu. (As she now leaves these pages, her fate: she lived long enough to see the birth of her grandson, Louis. She retired to a convent where she died of breast cancer at age 65.)
Louis XIII had recalled Saint-Simon to his bedside and had given him instructions concerning his burial. Saint-Simon’s son, the great memoirist Louis, would
visit the tombs or both his father and Louis until his own death.
Moments before dying Louis asked for his boy to be brought to him. ‘’What’s your name, my son?’’ ‘’Louis XIV, dear Papa.’’ ‘’Not yet, but soon.’’ Louis XIV’s reign would be one of the longest in history, 72 years, far longer than that of Ramses II. The last word goes to a servant of Anne’s who declared that, when all is considered, ‘’Il ne s’aimait pas lui-même.’’ Louis didn’t even love himself.
‘’MY GOD, WHAT A WORLD!’’
After Cinq-Mars’s arrest, Gaston again begged for forgiveness. He promised Louis he would retire to his lands and never interfere again in the king’s governance, and that he would never again raise troops. Richelieu told Louis’ wife Anne that she could sleep tranquilly, as he believed that Louis would soon be dead and knew that Anne would be named regent until the 13th birthday of Louis XIV. The Duc de Bouillon saved his life, as said, by turning over all his properties to Louis. Richelieu himself met with Cinq-Mars in Tarascon where the boy denied everything. Were it not for Gaston who confessed Cinq-Mars’s role, the lad might have saved his head.
Richelieu made his way to Lyon along the Rhône, his boat and those of his musketeers and servants pulled from the banks by horses, all of which were guarded by two full companies of men Richelieu dressed and fed like princes. Because he was in pain, Richelieu was transported from the boat on a full bed carried to houses, a wall of which had been removed so he could enter for the night. His guards were exemplary in their courtesy, never blaspheming, ‘’like virgins’’ Blanchard tells us, citing a source from the times.
Pierre Séguier, councilor of France and chief prosecutor, personally visited Cinq-Mars in prison. Perhaps honestly, perhaps genuinely, Séguier promised the lad that the king, who still loved him, would spare his life, and that the boy would face only a short imprisonment if he gave a complete confession. This Cinq-Mars gave, while denying his intention of wanting Richelieu dead. He also refused to give away the role of de Thou who had been arrested at the same time as Cinq-Mars, and against whom Séguier was having difficulty proving his involvement in the treason. Richelieu then personally sent a representative to Cinq-Mars who claimed, falsely, that de Thou had confessed all, the revelation of which spurred Cinq-Mars to denounce de Thou. Later, when Cinq-Mars was placed with de Thou, prior to their execution, de Thou forgave him, confirmed his love for him, and declared that they should both die together courageously and together enter Paradise.
That Louis was the unluckiest prince who ever lived doesn’t excuse his dismissal of Luynes with, ‘’I loved him because he loved me.’’ And how can one spend years with a lad, share his bed with the boy he was devoted to, in the most intimate embrace known to man, and end it all by taking the lad’s life? A golden imprisonment could have been envisioned, but not the taking of one’s unique existence.
Neither Cinq-Mars nor de Thou asked for Louis’ grace. The execution took place in a public square, the platform seven feet above a huge crowd come to see the king’s favorite put to death, the windows of the surrounding buildings rented out in exchange for coins of pure gold, the roofs overhung by masses as clinging as barnacles. Father Malavalette accompanied Cinq-Mars. The boy held himself straight and proud, saying only that he was in a hurry to know immortal life. At the block the priest undressed the neck and cut the lad’s locks. ‘’My God, what a world!’’, were the boy’s final words before the axe fell, taking his precious life. The executioner was then forced to finish the task by grasping the auburn locks in his left hand while sawing off the head with the right. Cinq-Mars was 22. Few men could claim to have lived so full and valiantly as this young Icarus, certainly not the two old desiccated reptiles, his murders, who would die within a year. De Thou died in an equally botched fashion, his neck hacked until the head fell away. On his way down from the scaffold the executioner was berated but left alive by the crowd sickened by the horrifying massacre.
Cinq-Mars and de Thou.
The death of Cinq-Mars was not enough for Richelieu. He deprived Cinq-Mars’s brother and sister of their lands and heritage and ordered Cinq-Mars’s chateau reduced to rubble and the neighboring woods cut down. He neglected only to sow the earth with salt.
PIER LUIGI FARNESE
1503 - 1547
The Farnese were condottieri who gained power through forming the right alliances. Niccolò Farnese, for example, helped Urban V in his war against Giovanni di Vico. In gratitude for his intervention, the Farnese were awarded Ischia di Castro, San Savino and Valentano, plus advancement into the nobility that saw one become a senator of Rome. Ranuccio Farnese was a commander of an army that fought for Siena, Pietro Farnese commanded Florentine troops in Florence’s never-ending combat to gain and retain Pisa, a city-state obliged to live under Florentine rule. Power came too through the thighs of Farnese girls and boys: Pier Luigi Farnese married into the family of Pope Boniface VIII and Giulia Farnese became the mistress of Pope Alexander VI. She convinced the pope to give her brother Alessandro, age 14, a cardinal’s hat, thanks to which he would eventually become the notorious homosexual pope Paul III. Because Alessandro was given a red hat exclusively thanks to his sister, the Romans changed his name from Cardinal Farnese to Cardinal Fregnese, ‘’Cardinal Cunt.’’ As usual during the Renaissance, Pope Paul had mistresses as well as boys, one of whom gave him a son, another Pier Luigi whom Paul made a gonfaloniere, a high magistrate, as well as naming him Duke of Castro, Parma and Piacenza, plus other lands.
Ranuccio Farnese
Pier Luigi’s mother was Silvia Ruffini who had three other children by Pope Paul, Constanza, Paul and Ranuccio. Pier Luigi and the others were legitimized by Julius II but the boy nonetheless suffered throughout all his life from being a bastard, especially at the hands of noble boys who wouldn’t let him forget the fact. In order to assure his son’s ascension, Paul III married him to Gerolama, an Orsini, an old and extremely powerful family, especially in Rome. Gerolama gave him five children during their loveless marriage and showed great dignity in enduring his excesses and brutality, the reason why I’ve included her picture.
Pier Luigi Farnese by Titian and Gerolama
The marriage between Pier Luigi and Gerolama was consummated in 1519 and in 1520 Pier Luigi, age 17, and his brother Ranuccio became condottieri in the pay of Venice. In 1527 Pier Luigi participated in the Sack of Rome under the aegis of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. Cardinal Alessandro (the future Pope Paul III) begged Pope Clement VII, locked away for his protection in the fortress Sant’Angelo, to forgive his son Pier Luigi for his role in the destruction of the city. This Clement did, despite the fact that he knew the boy to be primitive, decadent and ruthless, on several occasions even contemplating his excommunication. But the boy was also courageous and totally fearless, and therefore could be of future use to the pope and the papal army. When Pier Luigi’s father became Pope Paul III in 1534, Pier Luigi was immediately made a cardinal and captain of the papal troops. New lands were bestowed on him, as I’ve said, including Nepi, the fortress favored by Lucrezia Borgia.
In 1537 he was accused of what has come down in history as the Rape of Fano, the sodomy of a young bishop, Cosimo Gheri, sodomized literally to death, presumably from anal hemorrhaging. Nothing more is known about this incredible affair, except that the rape of the youth did take place, but that thanks to his influential father Pier Luigi was only a suspect. Chroniclers like Benedetto Varchi in his Storia fiorentina, Mario Masini and Giuseppe Portigliotte related the affair, as well as Pier Luigi’s attraction to male buttocks, well known to all at the time. They noted too his barbaric cruelty, without, alas, going into further detail.
His father upbraided him for taking his male lovers to foreign courts, especially that of Charles V, mores Charles was especially hostile to. A letter from a Florentine ambassador to Rome recounted that Pier Luigi was being made fun of at the moment because he was turning Rome upside down in an effort to find a boy who refused the honor of his
bed.
Pier Luigi had numerous lovers, one of which he wished to reward for his services by marrying the young lad into a good family. He expected that the lad would, in return, show his own gratitude by forking over the girl’s dowry to Pier Luigi. But the artist Cellini gummed up the works by killing the girl’s father. Pier Luigi engaged an assassin to kill Cellini. For unclear reasons, the two men met and the assassin was so charmed by the artist that he divulged the full plot. Pier Luigi then had his father the pope throw Cellini into prison where he tried again to kill Cellini by having a certain Lione add diamond dust to Cellini’s food in order for its trenchant angles to tear through his intestines and bowels. Cellini later believed that he had escaped a torturous death thanks to the gritty taste of the food. In reality Leone had kept the diamond for himself and had put splinters of rock in the food, hoping they would accomplish the same job. The feud between Pier Luigi would continue, as we see in the chapter on the great artist (and murderer).
In 1538 Pier Luigi’s own son Ottavio married the illegitimate daughter of Emperor Charles V, while his boy Orazio married the illegitimate daughter of Henry II, Diane, whom Henry dared name after his mistress Diane de Poitier, to the immense chagrin of his wife, the exceptional Catherine de’ Medici. Pier Luigi wedded his daughter Victoria to Guidobaldo II della Rovere, Duke of Urbino. And finally, his son Ranuccio was given a cardinal’s hat by his grandfather Paul III. These marriages, added to Pier Luigi’s tireless collection of works of art, have rewarded the Farnese with fame and prestige to our own day.
