Man in the Iron Mask, French prisoner
The Man in the Iron Mask (French L'Homme au Masque de Fer; c. 1640s? – 19 November 1703) was an unidentified prisoner who was arrested in 1669 or 1670 and subsequently held in a number of French prisons, including the Bastille and the Fortress of Pignerol (modern Pinerolo, Italy). Known for remaining unidentified due to the veil worn over his face throughout his time in prison, he was held in the custody of the same jailer, Bénigne Dauvergne de Saint-Mars, for a period of 34 years. He died on 19 November 1703 under the name Marchioly, during the reign of King Louis XIV of France (1643–1715).
No one is known to have seen his face, as it was hidden by a mask of black velvet cloth, later misreported by Voltaire as an iron mask, and the true identity of the prisoner remains a mystery. His identity has been extensively debated by historians, and various theories have been expounded in numerous books and films.
Among the leading theories is one proposed by the writer and philosopher Voltaire, who claimed in the second edition of his Questions sur l'Encyclopédie (1771) that the prisoner wore a mask made of iron rather than of cloth, and that he was the older, illegitimate brother of Louis XIV. What little is known about the historical Man in the Iron Mask is based mainly on correspondence between Saint-Mars and his superiors in Paris. Recent research suggests that his name was Eustache Dauger, a man who was involved in several political scandals of the late 17th century, but this assertion has not been proven.
The National Archives of France has made the original data available online relating to the inventories of the goods and papers of Saint-Mars (one inventory, of 64 pages, was drawn up at the Bastille in 1708; the other, of 68 pages, at the citadel of Sainte-Marguerite in 1691). These documents had been sought in vain for more than a century and were thought to have been lost. They were discovered in 2015, among the 100 million documents of the Minutier central des notaires de Paris. They show that some of the 800 documents in the possession of the jailer Saint-Mars were analysed after his death. These documents confirm the reputed avarice of Saint-Mars, who appears to have diverted the funds paid by the king for the prisoner. They also give a description of a cell occupied by the masked prisoner, which contained only a sleeping mat, but no luxuries, as was previously thought.
The Man in the Iron Mask has also appeared in many works of fiction, most prominently in the late 1840s by Alexandre Dumas. A section of his novel The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later, the final installment of his D'Artagnan saga, features the Man in the Iron Mask. In it, the prisoner is forced to wear an iron mask, and is portrayed as Louis XIV's identical twin. Dumas also presented a review of the popular theories about the prisoner extant in his time in the chapter "L'homme au masque de fer" in the sixth volume of his non-fiction Crimes Célèbres.