How Far They Fall

Gilles, the Baron de Rais (c.1405 - 26 October 1440) was a French leader during the Hundred Years War. In 1429 he was made the Marshal of France (a distinction awarded for special achievement) after the military campaigns inspired by Joan of Arc.

When Joan first arrived at Chinon to speak to the Dauphin, Charles, Gilles was present. Gilles wrote to John V, Duke of Brittany, requesting support for Joan's planned attempt to raise the Siege of Orléans. On 25 April 1429, when Joan arrived at Blois, she found a well-supplied and well-armed contingent of soldiers headed by Gilles and the Marshal of Boussac, Jean de Brosse. There were additional soldiers paid by Gilles personally, who apparently had put great faith in Joan and her divine mission.

Gilles was also with Joan during the progress through the Loire, and the Battle of Patay in June of 1429. Their efforts helped put Charles on the throne. Gilles (and three other lords) carried the Holy Ampulla (a glass vial with the anointing oil) during the coronation of the Dauphin as Charles VII. Charles entrusted Jean de Brosse and Gilles to head the army against the Anglo-Burgundian alliance. At the Siege of Paris, Joan asked for Gilles to stay by her side, which he did all day. For his service, Charles allowed Gilles to add a border of flour-de-lis around his coat of arms, a distinction only shared by Joan herself.

The man had a darker side, however. Military failures and financial issues caused him to withdraw more and more from court and public life, and Charles was not happy with him. Supposedly, he looked for power in other directions.

According to the records of a trial against him in 1438, Gilles looked for people with knowledge of alchemy and summoning demons. He found an Italian cleric named François Prelati who claimed expertise in both. Gilles and Prelati conducted rituals to summon a demon in Gilles' Château de Tiffauges in the border lands between Brittany, Poitou, and Anjou. When no demon materialized after three attempts, Prelati claimed the demon required an offering of the body parts of a child. Gilles provided the required offering, but with no better result.

He may have wanted a demon's help in reclaiming some of his properties. He decided to reclaim by force a castle he had given to someone else; he was unsuccessful, and succeeded only in alienating his former comrades. In mid-May 1440, he ambushed a troop of men; he then entered a church, disrupting Mass and threatening the priest to leave. He physically abused servants and harassed clerics.

An ecclesiastical investigation was begun. Bishop Jean de Malestroit visited Gilles' local parish and began investigating tales of local children missing. Locals claimed that children entered the castle to beg for food and never emerged. Charges were brought against Gilles and Prelati for murder, sodomy, and heresy. The charges were also brought against a few servants and some local women who were accused of providing the children. Court records claim there were 140 or more.

Gilles confessed to the charges on 21 October 1440; his death sentence was declared on the 25th. He was simultaneously hanged while fire was set to brush piled around the gallows. His remains were cut down before being completely burned.

Some think he was the model for the tales of Bluebeard, the French folktale about a man who murders all his wives.

We need a palate cleanser after all the war and executions. Tomorrow let us see if there is anything interesting about a vial named the Holy Ampulla.