Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and Aaron Minky. Listener discretion is advised. Since it's the
Speaker 1: week of Halloween, Let's start with a scary story. This
Speaker 1: is one called The Leather Funnel, written by Sir Arthur
Speaker 1: Conan Doyle. It was written during one of the many
Speaker 1: periods in his life he was exhausted with writing stories
Speaker 1: about his famous detective Sherlock Holmes, and somewhat resentful of
Speaker 1: how successful that one character had become. Like all good
Speaker 1: scary stories, this one begins with a visitor coming to
Speaker 1: stay at the mysterious residence of a distant, eccentric friend.
Speaker 1: As soon as the guest arrives, Thost apologizes profusely he
Speaker 1: doesn't have a spare bedroom, but he does have a wide,
Speaker 1: comfortable couch in his library. Our guest is, of course
Speaker 1: enchanted by the idea of an evening company by a
Speaker 1: low crackling fireplace and the warm parchment smell of books,
Speaker 1: and he readily agrees. But as soon as the men
Speaker 1: enter the library, the guest realizes that there are more
Speaker 1: than just books there. As it turns out, the host
Speaker 1: is a collector and his library is where he displays
Speaker 1: his treasures, strange and maccabbre historical objects, most of which
Speaker 1: the guest can't even identify. One such object in particular,
Speaker 1: catches his interest a large, dark funnel constructed of leather
Speaker 1: with brass accents, maybe a foot long at its widest diameter.
Speaker 1: At the tapered side, the tube had deep notches in it,
Speaker 1: like it was whittled away by a very sharp knife.
Speaker 1: The host catches the guests staring ah. He says, I
Speaker 1: see you've noticed my funnel. I've been wondering about this thing.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what. Why don't you sleep with it
Speaker 1: next your head and see if you can glean anything
Speaker 1: about it from your dreams. Our host was not just
Speaker 1: a collector, but also a student of the occult and
Speaker 1: the paranormal workings of the mystical arts. The guest agreed
Speaker 1: and went to sleep on the couch in the library that,
Speaker 1: for all of its strange objects, still did have a warm,
Speaker 1: glowing fireplace and the familiar and wonderful smell of books.
Speaker 1: As it so happened, that night, the man had a dream.
Speaker 1: He dreamt he was in a French prison cell where
Speaker 1: a woman in a white night dress was being tortured.
Speaker 1: The woman's body was bent over something that looked like
Speaker 1: a wooden beam, just taller than her hip. She was
Speaker 1: pulled over it backwards, so that her head was pulled
Speaker 1: down to the floor and her belly was thrust upwards.
Speaker 1: Her ankles and wrists were chained to the ground while
Speaker 1: a nervously murmuring pre east watched on. The prison guards
Speaker 1: took a funnel, the same leather funnel, and forced it
Speaker 1: into her mouth. In his dream, the guests saw the
Speaker 1: massive jugs of water set nearby. Surely they can't be
Speaker 1: planning on forcing her to drink those. He thought, she'll drown,
Speaker 1: her stomach will burst. But to his horror, the guards
Speaker 1: in the dream picked up the first jug of water
Speaker 1: and poured it into the funnel. The woman flailed and recoiled,
Speaker 1: rattling the chains and thrashing violently. The priest left the room,
Speaker 1: horrified and seeing that there still remained another jug full
Speaker 1: of water to torture the woman with. The man awoke
Speaker 1: from his dream with a start, soaked with sweat, as
Speaker 1: though he had been the one doused with water in
Speaker 1: the morning. The host asked if he had any dreams. Dutifully,
Speaker 1: the man recount did everything he had seen the night before,
Speaker 1: the woman, the wooden beam, the jugs of water, the priest.
Speaker 1: The host's eyes lit up, and he raced back to
Speaker 1: a bookshelf to pull out a book. After a few
Speaker 1: moments of frantic flipping, he found what he had been
Speaker 1: looking for, a chapter about Madame de Brinvillier, a marquise
Speaker 1: who had been found guilty of poisoning her brothers and
Speaker 1: her father, and who had been tortured into confession with
Speaker 1: what was ironically called the water cure. You see, the
Speaker 1: host explained, what you saw in your dream actually happened,
Speaker 1: and this is the very funnel they used to inflict
Speaker 1: her torture. But what have the knife marks around the mouthpiece,
Speaker 1: the guest asked, Ah, said the host, The Marquise fought
Speaker 1: like a tiger. It seems like she had the teeth
Speaker 1: to match. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's st worry is fictional,
Speaker 1: as is the power of dreams to reveal unknown truths, probably,
Speaker 1: but the story Doyle was referencing is absolutely true. The
Speaker 1: Marquise de Brinvilliers is one of history's most famous poisoners,
Speaker 1: a woman who's often painted as either evil or beautifully
Speaker 1: mad with love or both. It's impossible to know now
Speaker 1: the full extent of her crimes. What we can know
Speaker 1: is that she was a woman confident that she would
Speaker 1: get away with them, and the funny thing is she
Speaker 1: almost did. I'm danis sports and this is noble blood.
Speaker 1: If you had to be born a girl in sixty
Speaker 1: you couldn't hope to be born much better than Marie
Speaker 1: Meline Marguerite Debre, the future Marquise de Brinvilliers. Her father
Speaker 1: was a prominent Parisian bureaucrat, himself the son of a
Speaker 1: much respected treasurer. The family was incredibly well connected and
Speaker 1: also very rich, which meant that Marie's two brothers would
Speaker 1: each come into a sizeable inheritance, and that there was
Speaker 1: no reason in the world to think that their sister
Speaker 1: wouldn't marry extremely well and live in comfort for her
Speaker 1: entire life. Marie was the family's eldest child. No one
Speaker 1: would describe her as beautiful, maybe striking was a bit closer.
Speaker 1: After meeting her, her general appearance would fade from your memory,
Speaker 1: but specific features would be tattooed onto your brain. Extraordinarily thick,
Speaker 1: brown hair, bone, white, nearly translucent skin, blue eyes. She
Speaker 1: was better than her brothers at her letters, spelling words
Speaker 1: easily and writing with thick, clean, bold, firm lines that
Speaker 1: made her tutors press their lips together in pleasure her
Speaker 1: and made her parents worry. Her siblings and playmates thought
Speaker 1: she came across as haughty and distant at best, or
Speaker 1: maybe slow in the head, even for her unwillingness to
Speaker 1: join them in silly games. But the truth was Marie
Speaker 1: was just uncommonly observant. She preferred to watch and to learn.
Speaker 1: Even as an adolescent, The future Marquise de Burunvillier was
Speaker 1: shrewd and sharp as a fresh cut blade. Studious as
Speaker 1: she was, she refused to learn her prayers or waste
Speaker 1: her mornings in church unless absolutely forced. She was bored
Speaker 1: and disinterested by religion, which seemed in her youth as
Speaker 1: just a minor defect of an aristocratic woman. But looking
Speaker 1: back on the woman that she became, maybe it was
Speaker 1: a sign from the beginning. Maybe there is always a
Speaker 1: certain wickedness that lingered beneath her skin that repelled her
Speaker 1: from studying the Holy scripture, the same way a demon
Speaker 1: news to pull itself away from holy water at age
Speaker 1: twenty one. In sixteen fifty one, Marie got married to
Speaker 1: a titled nobleman and twine, gou Blond de Brunevillier, a
Speaker 1: marquis and a baron. Love might have been too much
Speaker 1: to ask for from the much older man, who, even
Speaker 1: from their wedding night, seemed to prefer the company of
Speaker 1: mistresses to his new wife. But the Marquis treated Marie
Speaker 1: with something even less than affection, less than mild interest,
Speaker 1: something worse even than outright hatred, because at least hatred
Speaker 1: has a spark of passion to it. The Marquis treated
Speaker 1: the Marquise with complete and utter indifference. He left his
Speaker 1: wife alone while he spent evenings in smoke filled parlors,
Speaker 1: sipping champagne and tasting sweets and oranges, racking up gambling
Speaker 1: debts and new women to take home. The Marquise, who had,
Speaker 1: above all else in childhood hated boredom, was left to
Speaker 1: fend for herself. Well, that's not entirely true. The Marquis
Speaker 1: did give his wife one kindness. He introduced her to
Speaker 1: one of his young military friends, a tall and handsome
Speaker 1: young officer the marquis own age named Gaudine de Saint Croix.
Speaker 1: By any estimation, Sant Croix was not the sort of
Speaker 1: person a young, married aristocratic woman should be associating with.
Speaker 1: He was an officer, yes, but just a simple captain
Speaker 1: in the cavalry. His birth could virtuously be called dubious,
Speaker 1: although everyone knew he was probably just a bastard. But
Speaker 1: Sant Croix had a winning habit of smiling when he
Speaker 1: talked to people, acting as if he was including them
Speaker 1: in on a secret. He mirrored not only hand gestures
Speaker 1: back at people, but personalities. With vicars, he was pious
Speaker 1: and straight backed, with gamblers lush an indulgent, and with
Speaker 1: the Marquise de Burnevillier he was clever and patient and romantic.
Speaker 1: Far from being angry that his wife began in affair
Speaker 1: with one of his oldest friends, the Marquis was delighted
Speaker 1: it gave him more time to spend with his mistresses.
Speaker 1: Weeks would go by before the Marquis and the Marquise
Speaker 1: slept under the same roof. Husband and wife would occasionally
Speaker 1: lock eyes from across the rooms of salons and parties.
Speaker 1: Parties were the Marquis gambled and the Marquise glittered like
Speaker 1: a jewel on the arm of her lover, Sancroix. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: the marquise skill in picking up new mistresses was matched
Speaker 1: only by his skill in picking up new debts. And
Speaker 1: when every creditor in town began to send out collection notices,
Speaker 1: the nobleman ran, fleeing the country and leaving his wife
Speaker 1: in the capable hands of his former friend. The Marquise
Speaker 1: de Burnevilliers and Saint Croix were far from subtle. People
Speaker 1: began talking about the way the woman behaved, flaunting her affair,
Speaker 1: ignoring even the pretense of her marriage. It was almost disgraceful.
Speaker 1: And remember this was coming from people in France. Word
Speaker 1: got to Madame de Bernevillier's brothers about the way their
Speaker 1: sister was living in sin. They were outraged, and as
Speaker 1: a pair they arrived on the doorstep of her Paris
Speaker 1: home unannounced, to beg her to abandon Saint Croix in
Speaker 1: order to preserve the honor of the family. When she refused,
Speaker 1: their pleads turned to threats. They swore they would get
Speaker 1: a magistrate. The Marquise de Bernevilliers laughed in their faces.
Speaker 1: She wished them a good day, shut the door and
Speaker 1: returned to her lover in the foyer. Burning with humiliation,
Speaker 1: the marquise's brothers went to their father, the esteemed bureaucrat
Speaker 1: Drew d'lbrey. The pair told their father what their sister
Speaker 1: had been doing, how she had taken up with a
Speaker 1: common soldier, flaunting her disrespect of her marital vows. Their
Speaker 1: father took a deep breath, He rose and walked around
Speaker 1: to his desk, where he carefully dipped his favorite pen
Speaker 1: and ink and began to write. In silence, The brothers
Speaker 1: looked at one another, confused. For several silent moments, they
Speaker 1: watched their father write something on parchment, crossing out a
Speaker 1: word here there before Finally, he pursed his lips with satisfaction,
Speaker 1: dusted the ink to dry it, and sealed the letter
Speaker 1: with his personalized wax stamp. Finally, he spoke, I will
Speaker 1: take care of your sister. On a brisk day at
Speaker 1: the end of March, police stopped a carriage on a
Speaker 1: crowded street and pulled a man out. When the man
Speaker 1: demanded an explanation, the policeman brandished a letter from the
Speaker 1: King himself authorizing the arrest. Onlookers gawkeed the man agreed
Speaker 1: to go without struggle. But please, sir, he told the policeman,
Speaker 1: there's no need to scandalize the young woman. I'm riding
Speaker 1: with the crowds. Don't need to see her face. Take me,
Speaker 1: but please let the carriage continue its journey home safely.
Speaker 1: The policeman agreed, and so, even as the Marquise de
Speaker 1: Bourunevillier shouted from its window in protest and anger, the
Speaker 1: carriage continued on further and further away, until the sight
Speaker 1: of Sant Croix, her lover, being arrested and pulled to prison,
Speaker 1: disappeared in the chaos of the peristree. In between Notre
Speaker 1: Dame and the Palace of Justice on the Ille de
Speaker 1: la Cite, in the heart of Paris lies the city's
Speaker 1: oldest hospital, the Hotel Dieu. It was a grotesque place
Speaker 1: where nuns and priest doctors patrolled filthy hallways, three thousand
Speaker 1: patients waiting in varying proximity to death. The patients with
Speaker 1: skin diseases and contagious viruses lay next to mothers in
Speaker 1: labor beds contained six patients, three with their heads at
Speaker 1: one end and three with their heads at the other.
Speaker 1: Operations happened in the middle of wards, in the full
Speaker 1: view of other patients, and all of the wards were
Speaker 1: just feet from the hospital's dead house and dissecting rooms.
Speaker 1: The stench of death never left the place. Even so,
Speaker 1: the noble ladies of Paris came regularly to bestow their
Speaker 1: largesse upon the less fortune it. They arrived in small groups,
Speaker 1: clutching handkerchiefs to their noses to ward off the stench.
Speaker 1: Among the most dedicated visitors was the Marquise to Brunevilliers.
Speaker 1: Nearly every day, the Marquise arrived at the hospital bearing
Speaker 1: suits and wine and biscuits, treats that she distributed among
Speaker 1: the grateful and lonely sick who had been waiting in
Speaker 1: boredom and misery. The Marquise gave each a treat and
Speaker 1: a winning smile and a flick of her extraordinarily thick hair,
Speaker 1: and they wondered if she was an angel. Brinvillier's lover,
Speaker 1: San Croix, had been released from prison at the Bastille
Speaker 1: after three months, and since he returned home, the pair
Speaker 1: acted as the very models of Christian virtue. Brun Villiers
Speaker 1: made her daily hospital visits. Sant Croix went to confession
Speaker 1: and the two were never seen at clubs or parties together. Instead,
Speaker 1: they were staying home and working together side by side
Speaker 1: in the new laboratory the Marquise de Briunflier had paid for.
Speaker 1: In prison. Sant Crois roommate was a man named Exili,
Speaker 1: a mysterious Italian who had been arrested for coming into
Speaker 1: France while he was in the service of the eccentric
Speaker 1: Queen of Sweden. He was being detained while the French
Speaker 1: government figured out exactly what he was there to do
Speaker 1: and which of the stories from his past were true
Speaker 1: and which were mere rumors. People said that Axily was
Speaker 1: a magician and a poisoner, and that he had worked
Speaker 1: in Rome under the illustrious Madam Olympia, and that he
Speaker 1: had been responsible for the deaths of over one hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty people with the strange tonics and waters that
Speaker 1: he brewed. San Croix had always been a smart man,
Speaker 1: always knowledgeable about the clear, colorless liquids that could be
Speaker 1: tipped into a cup of wine, or the inheritance powder,
Speaker 1: as they called it, that could be sprinkled over a
Speaker 1: stew to haste in a wealthy relative's demise. But in
Speaker 1: his time in a cell with exili he became an expert.
Speaker 1: He learned about arsenic and belladonna, and vitriol, and aquato fauna,
Speaker 1: and in particularly noxious poison venen de cropas, or toad venom,
Speaker 1: which was brewed by boiling down the liquids of a
Speaker 1: dead toad and carefully distilling its essence. And when Saint
Speaker 1: Croix returned from prison, the Marquise de Burunevilier was still
Speaker 1: bubbling with anger towards her brothers and towards her father,
Speaker 1: the men in her life who had sold her to
Speaker 1: an indifferent husband and then denied her the only happiness
Speaker 1: she had ever known. What could she take from the
Speaker 1: men who had tried to take everything from her? With
Speaker 1: her brother's gone, the Marquise would inherit her father's vast estate.
Speaker 1: She could take their fortunes, but the Marquise thought she
Speaker 1: could also take their lives, And so the Marquise and
Speaker 1: Saint Croix set to work mixing their own variation on
Speaker 1: the poison aquaitot fauna, which was already famous in the
Speaker 1: back alleys of Europe among women who want to taste
Speaker 1: in their widowhood. All the while, the pair behaved pious
Speaker 1: as Saints Saint Croix with his church going and confessions,
Speaker 1: and the Marquise de Burunevilliers with her regular hospital visits.
Speaker 1: And the Marquise had also been transformed into a dutiful daughter.
Speaker 1: Three years after Saint Croix had been sent to prison,
Speaker 1: the Marquise's father visited Paris. His daughter called on him,
Speaker 1: begging for his forgiveness for her youthful scandal and assuring
Speaker 1: him that she had all but forgot in his letter
Speaker 1: to the king. The two became so close that when
Speaker 1: her father began to feel ill and decided to retire
Speaker 1: to his country estate for some clean air, he invited
Speaker 1: his daughter to come be at his bedside. His mood
Speaker 1: lifted as soon as she arrived, and he jokingly chastised
Speaker 1: her for not coming sooner. But then her father's condition deteriorated.
Speaker 1: It was slow at first and then suddenly quicker. He
Speaker 1: called upon the best doctors, but in the end it
Speaker 1: was of no use. It was his daughter, the Marquise
Speaker 1: de Burnevillier, cooing at his bedside and wiping his forehead
Speaker 1: with a wet cloth to soothe him in his final
Speaker 1: moments before he died, and a similar fate befell the
Speaker 1: Marquise's two brothers. Strangely, their health began to worsen soon after.
Speaker 1: They hired a servant on their sister's recommendation. She assured
Speaker 1: them that there was absolutely no servant in Paris more loyal,
Speaker 1: and there wasn't. The servant filled their wine glasses with
Speaker 1: the dedication and precision of a man at the top
Speaker 1: of his profession, and as they became sicker, he never
Speaker 1: left their sides. He was at their bedsides day and
Speaker 1: night as they died, first one and then the other.
Speaker 1: The poisons had been masterfully brewed, slow acting and subtle,
Speaker 1: so that even to a well trained eye, it seemed
Speaker 1: as though the victims had merely taken ill and died
Speaker 1: of natural causes. Brinevilliers had become an expert. She had
Speaker 1: tested the doses dutifully. People didn't tend to pay attention
Speaker 1: to the noble woman making a charitable visit to a hospital,
Speaker 1: and people paid even less attention to the impoverished sick
Speaker 1: when they got even sicker. Who could have noticed the
Speaker 1: way that the patients all seemed to take a turn
Speaker 1: for the worse After the Marquise de Brinvilliers had come
Speaker 1: by to drop off one of her little treats. You see,
Speaker 1: it took years of trial and error to perfect the
Speaker 1: dosage of her poisons, but fortunately for the Marquise, she
Speaker 1: had found the perfect test subjects. For a decade, the
Speaker 1: Marquise de Brinvillier lived a quiet life. Her affair with
Speaker 1: Saint Croix had dampened as affairs are wont to do
Speaker 1: in the aftermath of homicide, and the two drifted out
Speaker 1: of touch, although Brinvilliers continued to pay for Saint croix laboratory,
Speaker 1: where he continued his experiments with poisons. That's where Saint
Speaker 1: Croix was found dead in sixteen seventy two, collapsed on
Speaker 1: the floor of his laboratory, next to the broken fragments
Speaker 1: of the glass mask that had been meant to protect
Speaker 1: him from the deadly fumes with which he was working.
Speaker 1: Saint Croix was no longer content with poisons made from
Speaker 1: liquid or powder. He was chasing the idea that an
Speaker 1: item could be so poisonous that merely touching it would
Speaker 1: kill someone. There were rumors that the elder brother of
Speaker 1: Charles the seventh had died after wiping his face with
Speaker 1: a poisoned napkin at a tennis match, and that Catherine
Speaker 1: de Medici had designed gloves that would kill the wearer.
Speaker 1: As san Croix worked on his own formula, his glass
Speaker 1: mask protected him from the fumes. At least it had
Speaker 1: until it fell off and broke. Sancroix died heavily in debt.
Speaker 1: Like the Marquise de Burnevillier's long disappeared husband, her former
Speaker 1: lover was addicted to the rush of gambling. When the
Speaker 1: financiers examined his home, claiming whatever looked like it could
Speaker 1: be sold, they came across a strange locked box. It
Speaker 1: was eighteen inches long, seemed to be wrapped in red
Speaker 1: dyed leather, and there was a letter across the top.
Speaker 1: I very humbly beg those persons in whose hands this
Speaker 1: casket may fall into, to be good enough to return
Speaker 1: to Madame the Marquise de Burnevilliers, as all that it
Speaker 1: contains concerns her alone, and in case she should have
Speaker 1: predeceased me, everything in it is to be burnt without examination.
Speaker 1: But unable to resist temptation, the magistrate pried open the
Speaker 1: lid and piqued inside. When word reached the Marquise de Burnevilliers,
Speaker 1: that Saint Croix was dead, and that the police had
Speaker 1: found in his possession a small red casket. The Marquise
Speaker 1: de Burnevilliers fled the country with whatever money she could gather.
Speaker 1: In a few hours, Burnevilliers escaped to London, then to Holland,
Speaker 1: and finally to Antwerp, where she found refuge in a convent.
Speaker 1: She lived in exile for almost three years, but the
Speaker 1: French police had not stopped looking for her. Inside that
Speaker 1: little red casket, the police had found tiny vials containing
Speaker 1: a white powder that, when thrown on a fire, made
Speaker 1: it burn blue arsenic. Also inside the casket, perfectly preserved,
Speaker 1: were letters detailing the exact formula for poison that the
Speaker 1: Marquise and her lover had spent years concocting. Letters written
Speaker 1: in the clean, bold, firm handwriting of the Marquise de Brinevilliers.
Speaker 1: She was found finally in that nunnery in Antwerp by
Speaker 1: a magistrate who disguised himself as a priest. As soon
Speaker 1: as she was caught, she broke a glass and tried
Speaker 1: to swallow the pieces to end her life. When they
Speaker 1: no longer allowed her glass, she tried to swallow a pin,
Speaker 1: but unable to kill herself. The Marquise de Brinvilliers was
Speaker 1: brought to Paris to be tortured into confession. Her body
Speaker 1: was bent backwards across a wooden beam, with her arms
Speaker 1: and legs chained to the floor. A funnel was shoved
Speaker 1: into her mouth, and the torturers forced down a full
Speaker 1: gallon of water. You're killing me, Brunevilliers sputtered. When the
Speaker 1: gallon was finished, they demanded that she name her accomplices.
Speaker 1: She claimed that she had none left. The torture continued.
Speaker 1: The Marquise de Burunevilier was carried off to her execution
Speaker 1: in a cart meant for livestock. Her hair was still
Speaker 1: brown and extraordinarily thick. Her eyes were blue. Her skin
Speaker 1: was bone white and almost translucent, and everyone could see
Speaker 1: her from the back of the cart. When she reached
Speaker 1: the execution platform a rough knife, sheared off her hair
Speaker 1: to give the blade a clear path to her neck.
Speaker 1: She was facing the sun when the executioner lowered a
Speaker 1: mask over her eyes. The marquis peace began to pray,
Speaker 1: but the axe cut her off mid sentence. Usually after executions,
Speaker 1: the corpses were stripped, but the Marquise's body remained clothed.
Speaker 1: A distant relative had bribed some one or another to
Speaker 1: preserve her dignity or the reputation of their family. In
Speaker 1: that one small, final way, the corpse, still fully clothed,
Speaker 1: was placed on a pyre and burned to ash. History,
Speaker 1: especially modern history, tends to have a problem with glamorizing
Speaker 1: female murderesses. Allow me to make it clear that I
Speaker 1: think the Marquise is a villain, But perhaps you'll also
Speaker 1: allow me to tell you the story, maybe apocryphal, of
Speaker 1: what supposedly happened when the magistrate had finally caught her
Speaker 1: in that nunnery, and Marquise immediately tried to swallow glass.
Speaker 1: You wretched, The policeman shouted at her, you want to
Speaker 1: kill yourself. You already poisoned your father and your brothers,
Speaker 1: And the Marquise responded with a bon mo. So beautifully
Speaker 1: modern it seems impossible to believe, like it should be
Speaker 1: the final line in a Billy Wilder film. Supposedly, the
Speaker 1: magistrate confronted her with her murders, and the Marquise looked
Speaker 1: back at him, and she said, we all have our
Speaker 1: bad moments. That's the end of the Marquise de brine
Speaker 1: Villier's life. But it's not the end of the story.
Speaker 1: Keep listening after a brief ad break to hear how heard.
Speaker 1: Case shook the French aristocracy to its core. Enthralling as
Speaker 1: the Marquise de brine Villiers murders and gruesome as her
Speaker 1: torture and execution were, her life was nothing compared to
Speaker 1: the chaos that was about to hit the French court
Speaker 1: of Louis the four teeth, Because while Brinvillier was being tortured,
Speaker 1: she didn't give up the names of any co conspirators,
Speaker 1: but she did say something that left law enforcement reeling.
Speaker 1: Between bouts of water torture, while choking on the funnel
Speaker 1: they pulled from her mouth, Brinvillier managed to say something
Speaker 1: truly chilling. So many of us are doing it, she remarked,
Speaker 1: But only I get caught. The terrifying thing was she
Speaker 1: was right. The Affair of the Poisons, as this frenzy
Speaker 1: of enforcement would come to be known, led to three
Speaker 1: hundred and nineteen arrests and thirty six individuals sentenced to death. Poisoning,
Speaker 1: especially among the upper class, had become modus operandi for
Speaker 1: eliminating enemies and rival airs. Self styled witches ran back
Speaker 1: alley apothecaries where they made tonics and powders and potions
Speaker 1: to sell to women willing to pay any price. Once
Speaker 1: to woman, it seemed, was Madame de Montespa, the official
Speaker 1: mistress of King Louis. It isn't known for sure if
Speaker 1: Montespan bought poisons, although there are rumors that she attempted
Speaker 1: to do in the newer younger women that threatened to
Speaker 1: steal King louise attention away. What we do know is
Speaker 1: Madame de Montespan did almost everything else in her power
Speaker 1: to make sure that the King's attention didn't leave her.
Speaker 1: After all, losing her position as official mistress meant losing
Speaker 1: everything in the world. Montespas snuck love potions into the
Speaker 1: King's food and wine, drops of menstrual blood and sperm,
Speaker 1: iron filings, and the iridescent green wings of the Spanish
Speaker 1: fly beetles ground into fine powder, and, according to the
Speaker 1: most damning rumors against her, she engaged in black mass.
Speaker 1: They say she watched a baby butchered before her in
Speaker 1: a dim palace basement, and then extended her tongue to
Speaker 1: accept a communion waper dotted with the dead infants blood.
Speaker 1: When the affair of the poisons reached Madame de montespan
Speaker 1: Louis the fourteenth cooled down proceedings. He spared her a
Speaker 1: criminal investigation, but from that point on her position diminished,
Speaker 1: then dwindled, until she was left with nothing. For most
Speaker 1: of recorded history, women have been excluded from overt, mainstream
Speaker 1: political participation. They're shoved into drawing rooms and forced to
Speaker 1: steal whatever shreds of power they can with restrained smiles
Speaker 1: and unrestrained cunning. And it's no secret that people become
Speaker 1: desperate when they have no control, when their spectators to
Speaker 1: their own lives, seeing themselves becoming boxed in like human prey.
Speaker 1: For the cost of a small vial of powder and
Speaker 1: her soul, a woman could become the architect of her
Speaker 1: own life, or at least she could try to be temporarily.
Speaker 1: Noble Blood is a production of I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: Aaron Mankey. The show is written and hosted by Dana
Speaker 1: Schwartz and produced by Aaron Mankey, Matt Frederick, Alex Williams,
Speaker 1: and Trevor Young. Noble Blood is on social media at
Speaker 1: Noble Blood Tales, and you can learn more about the
Speaker 1: show over at Noble Blood Tales dot com. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.