Duelling – Once It Was Banned in France, It Became the Favorite Way to Settle Disputes

Le Vrai et ancien usage des duels... (Paris, 1617) is a book about duels written by D’Audiguier, who was assassinated in Paris a few years later. Our copy looks like it’s been through a few fights itself during the last 400 years—it wears the fascinating scars of time, indeed. But unlike so many young French men it tells about, it survived.

Books about duels are quite sought-after. This particular one was only offered six times for sale since 1963 (the rarebookhub research...) and the last one went for around $1,000—with a nice provenance. It’s a thick in-8° volume published by Pierre Billaine, and never reprinted. The author is sometimes mistaken with his Nephew, Pierre d’Auguier, and he made a name for himself by giving a good translation of Cervantes—but he had some enemies. The colourful Feller writes about him (Dictionnaire historique—Liège, 1790): “Audiguier. A bad poet, and a bad writer, murdered around the year 1630.” Beg your pardon? Murdered? The poet Guillaume Cottelet (1598—1659) revealed 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, by the hands of men who should forever be despised by mankind. 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 the same moment, some satellites came from behind a tapestry and swarmed him. He used a stool as a shield to defend himself for a while, but he couldn’t manage his enemies—especially since they’d previously taken his sword that he’d left on a bed. He was pierced several times and eventually perished under the assaults of those tigers, who couldn’t quench their rage but by his death. It happened at the Faubourg Saint-Germain, around the year 1624—he died at age 55.” Tell you—those were dread times!

Books about duels are always full of fascinating adventures, but most of all, they relate the deeds of people absolutely out of their minds! D’Audiguier explains: “We’re so eager to run to a field on the faith of a lackey, or of a note written by our enemy! And we do it dressed in a simple shirt, driven by no other guide but fury and passion.” And at the turn of the 17^th century, no one was more willing to die for almost nothing than the French, to such an extent that “foreigners say it’s pointless to kill a French, as the French are so heartedly killing each other.” Duels were yet strictly forbidden since the regrettable death of La Chataigneraie in 1547. The King liked him so much, he decided he’d never allow another duel to take place. “This decision,” D’Audiguier underlines, “opened the door to all the duels that have taken place ever since.” That’s the point of his book. Duels multiplied as soon as they got banned—without a higher authority to direct them, they soon got out of control. Yet, the King forbade them, and the Church wouldn’t even bury those who died while fighting duels: “according to the constitution of the Church, those who died in that way are considered as murderers of themselves.” Indeed, it was quite suicidal to accept a duel, Audiguier warns us. If he relates some famous fights, “it’s not so they could be imitated, or praised; but hated, and avoided.” Of course, of course... But, “dear hypocrite reader”, let’s see now how these guys exactly cut each other’s throats over literally nothing.

FIRST EDITION of d'Audiguier's rare treatise on fencing and duels. d'Audiguier's translations of Cervantes and Lazarille de Tormes enjoyed some success during his lifetime; he was killed over a gambling debt in the Faubourg Saint-Germain around 1624. Cockle Addenda 4; Pardoel 2042; Thimm p.20.

Ceux-là violèrent les droits des duels, qui défendent aux assistants non seulement de parler, mais aussi de faire signe, voire de tousser, & de cracher..

Les religieux (...) lui refusèrent la sépulture, selon les constitutions de l’Eglise ; celle-ci estime ceux qui meurent en cette sorte meurtriers d’eux-mêmes.

... La Buisse disait qu’il n’y voulait pas être autrement, & que celui qui va en telle occasion pour être seulement spectateur, a faute d’affection ou de courage. Ce sont les raisons qui font battre aujourd’hui les seconds, fussent-ils les plus grands amis du monde. Les combattants toutefois ne le voulurent jamais permettre, & fut dit qu’ils ne se mêleraient point de la décision de leur combat. (...) il est toujours moins blâmable de se perdre seul, que de traîner ses amis dans sa perte, & est chose honteuse d’engager à la protection de son honneur autre valeur & force que la sienne.

La châtaigneraie : le roi marri “jura par serment solemnel qu’il n’en donnerait jamais. Ce qui a ouvert la porte à tous les duels qui se sont faits depuis en France.” Les téhologiens lui auraient affirmé que Dieu s’offusquait de cette permission entre Chrétiens.

... “sétrangler à notre mode derrière un buisson.”

“Je ne sais pourquoi les Français méprisent les armes défensives, vu qu’elles ont toujours été en estime parmi toutes les plus guerrières nations du monde, & qu’eux-mêmes se chargent des plus pesantes qu’ils puissent trouver, quand il est question d’aller à la guerre.

“bien qu’il y ait de la valeur en nos duels, si est-ce qu’il y a plus de fureur & de témérité que de courage, plus de passion & de brutalité que de raison, & plus de fortune que de jugement, ni de conduite.”