Duels, or the French art of killing one another

Found a copy of Le Vrai et ancien usage des duels... /Of The True and Ancient Use of Duels (Paris, 1617) that looks like it’s been through a few fights itself during the last 400 years. It wears the scars of time, indeed—but unlike the many young French men it tells about, it survived.

Bad and Murdered

Books about duels are sought-after. According to the Rarebook Hub Transaction History, this one, first and only edition, wasn’t offered for sale more than six times since 1963. In 2023, a copy with a nice provenance was sold for $1,000 in the Netherlands. The author, Vital d’Audiguier—not to be mistaken with his nephew Pierre—, made a name for himself by giving a good translation of Cervantes. In his Dictionnaire historique (Liège, 1790), L’Abbé Feller writes: “Audiguier. A bad poet, and a bad writer, murdered around the year 1630.” The poet Guillaume Cottelet (1598—1659) relates the circumstances of his death: “He was miserably assassinated in the house, and in the presence of some présidente, whose name I shall not disclose (...). He was driven into a game of ‘piquet’, and his opponent cheated so openly that d’Auguier had to say: you’re miscounting—the culprit denied, and at this precise moment, some satellites came from behind a tapestry and swarmed him. He used a stool to defend himself, but was soon outnumbered.” Fair Verona, where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.

... but hated and avoided

According to our modern standards, duellists were totally out of their minds. For the sake of honour, they’d “run to the field (...), clad in a simple shirt, driven but by fury and passion.” Defensive weapons were despised, and death was almost certain. Witnesses were required, who, at first, couldn’t intervene, “cough or spit”; but they ended up joining the fight, often dying over another man’s quarrel. “There might be some bravery in our duels,” d’Audiguier says, “but you’ll find in them more fury than bravery, more passion and brutality than reason, and more fortune than judgement.” Europe at large was concerned, but the French distinguished themselves to such an extent that “foreigners say it’s pointless to kill a French, as the French will heartedly kill each other.” Duels were officially banned in France since La Chataigneraie’s death in 1547 (www.rarebookhub.com/articles/1715). Without a higher authority to direct, and sometimes prevent them, duels quickly got out of hand. Religion itself was powerless although “the Church considers those who died in that way as murderers of their selves”—meaning no religious burial. It was indeed suicidal to fight a duel. So, hypocrite reader, before you start reading, remember that d’Audiguier doesn’t write about duels “so they’ll be imitated, or praised; but hated, and avoided.”

List of fools

The second part of d’Audiguier’s book is the most exciting. He relates a few duels that took place in ‘modern times’, piling the dead page after page.

Meet Riberac and Maugiron, who attend a duel opposing their respective friends. They’re not supposed to partake, but Maugiron “never came here to ‘enfiler des perles’ (waste time)” and the two decide to fight. Riberac suddenly runs to his enemy, “who received him with the same rage, and piercing each other at the same time, they both fell dead on the spot.” Next!

Meet Carency and Biron. One day, they meet “in a small corridor, and they started to shove each other.” The next thing, they’re on the field. “Carency hit so strong that his blade slided on Biron’s dagger, pierced his hand, then his forearm until it reached his elbow. Notwithstanding, Carency was killed in this fight, as well as two of his assistants.” Next!

Meet Clovis, the best soldier around. Orcellet is another soldier, and he wants to test Clovis’ reputation, so they resolved to fight. A few minutes later, they’re both so badly injured, that they decide to put an end to the duel. A few years later, Clovis wants his revenge and here they go again. This time, they face each other at close range, with a pistol in their hands. “Are you ready?” Orcellet asks, “and then fired his pistol at Clovis’ head”. He misses and “only curled Clovis’ hair.” Clovis then aims at his turn, but “God didn’t allow it to happen, as Clovis’ pistol misfired.” Both men are then forced to forget their quarrel—so, sometimes, they’d survive.

The book stops here, but duels went on. D’Audiguier urges the King to restore duels. “Sire,” he writes, “you can’t kill the sick who’ll never recover. It’s better to have a sick body than a dead man. If His Majesty restores the duels, we’ll have less of them in ten years than executions of people who’ve broken your edicts against duels.” France wasn’t ready, though. It took almost two more centuries for duels to go out of fashion. In 1783, Mercier writes in his Tableau de Paris: “The many edicts of Louis XIV, could never prevent a multitude of young men to cut each other’s throats on the field. But the words of the Philosophers, calling for reason and humanity, obtained it from those fierce men. We no longer fight when our sword touches another man’s in a corridor, or when someone steps on our shoe... Men are no longer those fierce beasts willing to kill each other for a yes or a no.” A small step for mankind, but a giant step for the French...