I have the same problem - which is why I snorted when I saw that later (i.e. writing about 60 years or so later) chroniclers accused Henry IV HRE of them as the explanation why his second wife left - , but to be fair, in the case of the Affair of the Poisons you have multiple witnesses saying La Voisin with the help of the two defrocked priest G. organized them. What is particular gruesome in her case is the claim that little babies were sacrificed in some cases (and that this is what became of some of the unwanted illegitimate children, those she couldn't otherwise sell). (Remember, sometimes it just was too late for an abortion, but her higher born female clients still could not officially be pregnant if the husbands were elsewhere or if there was no husband.) Now, witches sacrificing babies etc. is a standard trope in any longer series of witch trials. But at the same time, given what we know today of child abuse rings, I sadly can't exclude the possibility, and it's worth pointing out that while La Voison and the other women were referred to as "sorceresses", they weren't accused of witchcraft in their trials. They were executed for murder (both via poison and the abortions), not as heretics or witches etc. Also, the way La Reynie finally reported on La Voisin's career isn't by accusing her of becoming a satanist out of conviction, but simply for profit. To quote wiki's summary which is way shorter than the very long ones I've read elsewhere and thus handier to quote:
Her business as a fortune teller gradually developed into a business of professional alleged black magic. During her activity as a fortune teller, she noticed similarities among her clients' wishes about their future: almost all wanted to have someone fall in love with them, that someone would die so that they might inherit, or that their spouses would die so that they might marry someone else.[
La Voisin decided to profit financially from her clients' wishes by offering services of purported magic to make their wishes come true. Initially, she told her clients that their wish would come true if it was also the will of God. Secondly, she started to recommend to her clients some action that would make their dreams come true. These actions were initially to visit the church of some particular saint; then she started to sell amulets, and gradually, she recommended more and more alleged magical objects or rituals of various kinds.
For those clients who wished for someone to fall in love with them, she manufactured love powders: the bones of toads, the teeth of moles, Spanish fly, iron filings, human blood and mummy, and the dust of human remains were among the alleged ingredients of the love powders concocted by La Voisin.
Finally, her most radical and expensive recommended practices were the black mass, which she arranged for clients for profit, during which the client could pray to Satan for their wish to come true. During some of these masses, a woman performed as an altar, upon which a bowl was placed: a baby was held above the bowl, and the blood from it was poured into the bowl. Whether the baby in question was actually killed on this occasion, or whether the baby was already dead by natural causes, such as being stillborn, could vary.
And because greed for money and fleecing the nobility are the suggested motives, I can't dismiss it the way I would if she'd been accused of doing it for Lucifer's sake. It was an extremely superstitious age, she saw a market, and there are more than enough examples of people doing absolutely ghastly things for money, plus it's the gradual radicalisation of means that doesn't sound impossible. She and the other sorceresses were abortionists and midwives for unwanted pregnancies, they thus had fetuses and babies at hand, there were exposed unwanted babies in front of churches galore - how much opportunity does it take before someone with a lot of greed and ruthlesssness thinks, hmmmmm?
Conversely: because they were abortionists, it's of course also true that vilifying them would be open season for the police in their interrogations and reports. And again, torture or threat of torture just isn't a reliable truth finder in any circumstances. I mean, all the "someone wanted to poison the King!" stuff for example really sounds artificially inserted simply to justify more investigation, because in the end, who would want to, and why? At this point? (Versailles the tv show has William of Orange as one early assassination attempt financier. William of Orange wants you to know he certainly wanted Louis dead, but he wouldn't have known how to approach Parisian quacks to go about it, not to mention it was more fun outwitting and beating Louis anyway.) All the noble clients named, if they didn't want family members dead in order to inherit, wanted Louis' favor. They certainly didn't want him dead. But like I said earlier - if you can make yourself a witness need for such an investigation, you buy yourself some more life and a chance for a pardon, even, if maybe the King does believe you saved his life.
Antonia Fraser in "Love and Louis XIV" argues for Madame de Montespan's innocence (except for her buying a love potion/powder, she thinks that's possible), though her arguments are a bit elastic:
1) Athenais de Montespan was a deeply pious Catholic. Yes, she was also an adulterer, but to have an affair with the King is still way different from being willing to have a Black Mass read on your naked body, which Marguerite Voisin (i.e. the daughter) said she did, and note La Voisin herself did not make this claim.
2.) If Louis had believed her to be guilty of such a thing , he would have reacted far more harshly than pensioning her off with Olympe Mancini's old office and then gradually freezing her out of court life till she withdrew entirely.
(Counterargument here: she was the mother of seven of his children. Never mind prison, if he'd banished her, with or without taking away some of her worldly goods, it would have confirmed everyone's suspicions.)
The Oracle Glass: here is my write-up for Judith Merkle Riley's novels, this one included. I can really reccommend it.
And because greed for money and fleecing the nobility are the suggested motives, I can't dismiss it the way I would if she'd been accused of doing it for Lucifer's sake. It was an extremely superstitious age, she saw a market, and there are more than enough examples of people doing absolutely ghastly things for money, plus it's the gradual radicalisation of means that doesn't sound impossible. She and the other sorceresses were abortionists and midwives for unwanted pregnancies, they thus had fetuses and babies at hand, there were exposed unwanted babies in front of churches galore - how much opportunity does it take before someone with a lot of greed and ruthlesssness thinks, hmmmmm?
That... does make sense, and is rather more believable to me than what I was thinking, which was more a "for Lucifer's sake" sort of thing.
Conversely: because they were abortionists, it's of course also true that vilifying them would be open season for the police in their interrogations and reports.
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cahn
Re: Court of Louis XIV: The Affair of the Poisons: Sentences
Date: 2023-02-14 10:30 am (UTC)I have the same problem - which is why I snorted when I saw that later (i.e. writing about 60 years or so later) chroniclers accused Henry IV HRE of them as the explanation why his second wife left - , but to be fair, in the case of the Affair of the Poisons you have multiple witnesses saying La Voisin with the help of the two defrocked priest G. organized them. What is particular gruesome in her case is the claim that little babies were sacrificed in some cases (and that this is what became of some of the unwanted illegitimate children, those she couldn't otherwise sell). (Remember, sometimes it just was too late for an abortion, but her higher born female clients still could not officially be pregnant if the husbands were elsewhere or if there was no husband.) Now, witches sacrificing babies etc. is a standard trope in any longer series of witch trials. But at the same time, given what we know today of child abuse rings, I sadly can't exclude the possibility, and it's worth pointing out that while La Voison and the other women were referred to as "sorceresses", they weren't accused of witchcraft in their trials. They were executed for murder (both via poison and the abortions), not as heretics or witches etc. Also, the way La Reynie finally reported on La Voisin's career isn't by accusing her of becoming a satanist out of conviction, but simply for profit. To quote wiki's summary which is way shorter than the very long ones I've read elsewhere and thus handier to quote:
Her business as a fortune teller gradually developed into a business of professional alleged black magic. During her activity as a fortune teller, she noticed similarities among her clients' wishes about their future: almost all wanted to have someone fall in love with them, that someone would die so that they might inherit, or that their spouses would die so that they might marry someone else.[
La Voisin decided to profit financially from her clients' wishes by offering services of purported magic to make their wishes come true. Initially, she told her clients that their wish would come true if it was also the will of God. Secondly, she started to recommend to her clients some action that would make their dreams come true. These actions were initially to visit the church of some particular saint; then she started to sell amulets, and gradually, she recommended more and more alleged magical objects or rituals of various kinds.
For those clients who wished for someone to fall in love with them, she manufactured love powders: the bones of toads, the teeth of moles, Spanish fly, iron filings, human blood and mummy, and the dust of human remains were among the alleged ingredients of the love powders concocted by La Voisin.
Finally, her most radical and expensive recommended practices were the black mass, which she arranged for clients for profit, during which the client could pray to Satan for their wish to come true. During some of these masses, a woman performed as an altar, upon which a bowl was placed: a baby was held above the bowl, and the blood from it was poured into the bowl. Whether the baby in question was actually killed on this occasion, or whether the baby was already dead by natural causes, such as being stillborn, could vary.
And because greed for money and fleecing the nobility are the suggested motives, I can't dismiss it the way I would if she'd been accused of doing it for Lucifer's sake. It was an extremely superstitious age, she saw a market, and there are more than enough examples of people doing absolutely ghastly things for money, plus it's the gradual radicalisation of means that doesn't sound impossible. She and the other sorceresses were abortionists and midwives for unwanted pregnancies, they thus had fetuses and babies at hand, there were exposed unwanted babies in front of churches galore - how much opportunity does it take before someone with a lot of greed and ruthlesssness thinks, hmmmmm?
Conversely: because they were abortionists, it's of course also true that vilifying them would be open season for the police in their interrogations and reports. And again, torture or threat of torture just isn't a reliable truth finder in any circumstances. I mean, all the "someone wanted to poison the King!" stuff for example really sounds artificially inserted simply to justify more investigation, because in the end, who would want to, and why? At this point? (Versailles the tv show has William of Orange as one early assassination attempt financier. William of Orange wants you to know he certainly wanted Louis dead, but he wouldn't have known how to approach Parisian quacks to go about it, not to mention it was more fun outwitting and beating Louis anyway.) All the noble clients named, if they didn't want family members dead in order to inherit, wanted Louis' favor. They certainly didn't want him dead. But like I said earlier - if you can make yourself a witness need for such an investigation, you buy yourself some more life and a chance for a pardon, even, if maybe the King does believe you saved his life.
Antonia Fraser in "Love and Louis XIV" argues for Madame de Montespan's innocence (except for her buying a love potion/powder, she thinks that's possible), though her arguments are a bit elastic:
1) Athenais de Montespan was a deeply pious Catholic. Yes, she was also an adulterer, but to have an affair with the King is still way different from being willing to have a Black Mass read on your naked body, which Marguerite Voisin (i.e. the daughter) said she did, and note La Voisin herself did not make this claim.
2.) If Louis had believed her to be guilty of such a thing , he would have reacted far more harshly than pensioning her off with Olympe Mancini's old office and then gradually freezing her out of court life till she withdrew entirely.
(Counterargument here: she was the mother of seven of his children. Never mind prison, if he'd banished her, with or without taking away some of her worldly goods, it would have confirmed everyone's suspicions.)
The Oracle Glass: here is my write-up for Judith Merkle Riley's novels, this one included. I can really reccommend it.
Re: Court of Louis XIV: The Affair of the Poisons: Sentences
Date: 2023-02-21 05:39 am (UTC)That... does make sense, and is rather more believable to me than what I was thinking, which was more a "for Lucifer's sake" sort of thing.
Conversely: because they were abortionists, it's of course also true that vilifying them would be open season for the police in their interrogations and reports.
But yeah, this too :(