[Pg i]
[Facsimile of the entry in the Registers of the[Pg ii]Church of Saint-Paul at Paris, recording the death of the Man with theIron Mask.]
THE
MAN WITH THE IRON MASK.
By MARIUS TOPIN.
TRANSLATED AND EDITED
By HENRY VIZETELLY,
AUTHOR OF
“THE STORY OF THE DIAMOND NECKLACE.”
“No one must know what has become of this man.”
Order of Louis XIV.
LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER AND CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE.
1870.
[Pg iii]
[Pg iv]
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.
M. Topin’s L’Homme au Masque de Fer, of which the present volumeis a translation, has met with considerable attention in France, onthe part both of historical students and the reading public; severaleditions of it having been called for in the course of a few months.
That a work which professes to give an authentic account of this almostlegendary character, after having discussed in an exhaustive fashionthe various theories that have been broached during a century and aquarter respecting his mysterious identity, should have been receivedwith so large an amount of favour, is not surprising, for the storyforms perhaps the most romantic episode of a reign more than ordinarilyrich in dramatic incidents. But the extent of M. Topin’s historicalknowledge, the painstaking nature of his researches, the subtlety ofhis reasoning, the skill[Pg v] which he has displayed in the grouping ofhis materials, combined with his life-like pictures of events far fromcommonly familiar, not only render his work highly amusing reading,but entitle it to take its place in the library, both as an historicalstudy which has resolved beyond all doubt a problem that had longperplexed some of the acutest minds, and as a valuable contributiontowards the history of Europe during the latter part of the seventeenthcentury.
During the progress of the translation M. Topin’s text has beencarefully revised, and a few errors have been corrected. Additionalnotes, too, have been given whenever the subject-matter seemed torequire elucidation, or where individuals little known to Englishreaders make their appearance on the scene.
H. V.
Paris, April, 1870.
[Pg vi]
AUTHOR’S PREFACE.
If this book had been intended merely to satisfy a vulgar andcommonplace curiosity, it would only have consisted of a few pages.My aim has been a loftier one. I have endeavoured, while concerningmyself with the most famous and romantic of State-prisoners, to writethe history of the principal individuals in whom people have be