Lied, by Eugne Lomont, c. 1895. A 1306 royal decree based on ancient precedent allowed the duel as a last resort for nobles involved in capital casese.g., murder, treason, and rapebut by now judicial duels were extremely rare. (Rapists sometimes escaped punishment by marrying their victims.) Her father had sided against the king twice, and. Carrouges died roughly a decade after the duel, falling in combat against the Ottoman Turks. When Marguerite adamantly refused his offer, saying she had no wish for his money, the violence escalated. Note: The following article contains discussion of rape that some readers may find upsetting. Dust off your 14th-century French history books, folks. After Marguerites rape, Carrouges petitions the French court to try Le Gris through judicial combat. Of the judicial duels that actually took place, few ended in death. Marguerite had no one who could confirm her story: her husband Jean de Carrogues (played by Matt Damon) had set out on a journey to Paris to collect some desperately needed funds and the. Later encyclopedia entries echoed this view, seemingly solidifying the question of Le Gris innocence. The contest between Carrouges and Le Gris would turn out to be the last judicial duel sanctioned by the Parlement of Paris. A seasoned warrior with more fighting experience than Le Gris, Carrouges quickly rebounded from his injury, gaining the upper hand and pushing his opponent to the ground. In 1384, Carrouges and Margueriteencountered Le Gris at a mutual friends party. Le Gris final moments appear to have been grisly even by the standards of the day: The monk of Saint-Denis, who served as Charles VIs official historian, reported that Carrouges killed his enemy with great difficulty because he was encased in armor. In accordance with tradition, authorities dragged Le Gris body to the gallows and hung him as a final insult to his sullied reputation. [2][3], Shortly after his marriage, Carrouges revealed another motive for the union. Other accounts provide more technical detail, even suggesting that Le Gris slipped on his opponents blood. Apart from the dubious, sketchy, and inconsistent reports in the two chronicles, no external evidence for this hazy legend has ever been offered in support of the oft-told tale of a last-minute confession by the true culprit. Eventually, you have the two men on the ground, fighting with hand weapons rather than lances.. Marguerite said no. From an absolute philosophical point of view, nobody but Jacques Le Gris and Marguerite and those who were in the room know the truth, Jager says. de Carrouges knows that even the King is biased against him, and decides to ask for a trial by duel, in which God decides the outcome by letting the liar die. If the case is not proven, then [the woman] doesnt just get to walk away, says Skoda. Get our L.A. In Jagers book, the detailed description of the duel between Le Gris and Carrouges, held on Dec. 29, 1386, was drawn from several sources. But the doubts greeting Marguerites scandalous story, the initial rejection of her claims in court, and the shadow cast over her reputation by the later chronicle accounts are not so different from the skepticism and prejudice faced by more recent victims of sexual assault. Jager counts the film as at least 75 percent historically accurate, maybe more, noting that while evidence may not exist for specific moments, there is a general record that supports the re-creation. And in fact it was a code, a manner of behavior that denied womens basic humanity.. Like, I couldnt have gotten there. Recognizing the courtier, who claimed to have come to ask a favor and warm himself by the fire, she allowed him to enter the house, at which point he turned the conversation to Le Gris, saying, The squire loves you passionately, he will do anything for you, and he greatly desires to speak to you. Alarmed by the sudden shift in tone, Marguerite attempted to rebuke Louvel, only to turn around and see Le Gris, whod snuck in through the unlocked door. French law stipulated that noblemen appealing their cause to the king could challenge the accused to a judicial duel, or trial by combat. Much like Jagers book, the film doesnt offer a sympathetic portrayal of either of its leading men. And even if the assailant, as Pintoin claims, had actually (and contra the actual testimony) made his visit late in the day, its wholly unlikely that Marguerite, who must have been very familiar with her husbands complaints against the squire, would have offered a meal and overnight lodging to her husbands rival (or to a man she mistook for the same), especially during her husbands absence. The knights victory saved both him and his wife, earning the formerly notorious couple wealth and prestige. Toward a history of creativity and beef. Marguerite, who married Carrouges in 1381, was the only daughter of Robert de Thibouville, who had once committed an act of high treason Jacques Le Gris Le Gris is most famous for being. According to Pintoin, Marguerite and her assailant dined together before the attack, and it was while showing him to his room for the night that he assaulted her. Born into a noble Norman family around the 1330s, Carrouges met Le Gris, a lower-born man who rose through the ranks by virtue of his own political savvy, while both were serving as vassals of Count Pierre. It states that Le Gris innocence was later recognized by all, for a man condemned to death by the law confessed to having committed the heinous crime. She has to relive it over and over againand she gets it right.. The fate that awaited Marguerite if her husbands attempts failedbeing burned at the stake for bearing false witnessrepresented an extreme example of the potential repercussions faced by accusers. Born in 1388, two years after the fatal duel, Juvnal, a bishop, wrote at an even greater remove in time and may have been influenced by Pintoins account. ), Whether Carrouges and Le Gris actually ended their quarrel at this point is debatable. Jean Froissart, writing after the duel, describes Marguerite praying as she watched the fight, adding, I do not know, for I never spoke with her, whether she had not often regretted having gone so far with the matter that she and her husband were in such grave danger., Elemas interpretation of the sources differs from Jagers comparatively colorful recounting. The movie does follow the true story rather closely, and with a runtime of two and a half hours, we'd hope so. I know that was the same for everyone who was coming toward this project.. The movie ends with Marguerite playing with her son, seemingly at peace with her life. Scott rightly ends The Last Duel on a triumphant note. According to testimony later provided by Carrouges and Marguerite, she heard a knock on the door and opened it to find Louvel. As it turns out, the description of the event in Eric Jager's book The Last Duel is rather different from the five surviving medieval accounts of the fight. She gave birth to a son, Robert, shortly before Le Gris trial by combat. Jean de Carrouges stabbed him through the throat with a 6-inch blade, killing his arch-nemesis immediately. Drivers final line, where, as Le Gris, he declares his innocence, is in the historic record. An intensely personal rivalry, exacerbated by a series of failed legal cases brought by Carrouges, emerged between the onetime friends. The film is based on the true story of the last legally permitted duel (hence the title) fought in France. Jager chronicled how the former friends relationship devolvedand the woman and rape allegation at the center of the conflictin the 2004 nonfiction book The Last Duel. As she argues, Instead of a duel that was long and drawn out and involved many different weapons and a whole variety of exciting scenarios, it seems to have been a very short affair that shocked the audience., Two likely eyewitnessesthe author of the Chronicle of the Monk of Saint-Denis and Le Coqagree that Le Gris landed the first blow, piercing Carrouges thigh with his sword. Le Gris window arrived on January 18, when Marguerite happened to be left alone with just one maidservant. In January 1386 while Jean de Carrouges was away traveling, Marguerite claimed she . Its a moment that underscores the timely nature of the films message: that we cannot be blind to the perspectives of others. Women of that status, on these feudal estates, were in charge of a lot of things, especially when their husbands were away at war or on important business. Knights were one step above squires, but men of both ranks often served as vassals to higher-ranking overlords. All who loved him were in a great fright, adds the chronicler in what is the narrative equivalent of a cinematic reaction shot. Ultimately, that [would have been] a movie about a courtroom evidence drama, Affleck explains. Eric Jager is a professor of English at UCLA and the author of four books, including The Last Duel and Blood Royal. The duel itself was very violent, as it was in the film. This happened, she said, in the morning hours at the modest chteau of her widowed mother-in-law, Nicole de Carrouges, on a remote Normandy estate known as Capomesnil, about twelve miles southwest of Lisieux. If your husband hears of it, he may kill you. Marguerite is the most important and most heroic person in the story, make what happens to her after the duel . More. Barred from bringing a case against Le Gris herself, Marguerite had to rely entirely on her husband to mount legal action. I thought I was going to suffocate, and soon I couldnt fight them anymore. Nearly everyone believed then and believes now that Marguerite was raped. Marguerite de Carrouges, descended from an old and wealthy Norman family, had claimed that in January of that year she had been attacked and raped at her mother-in-laws chteau by a squire (the rank below knighthood) named Jacques Le Gris, aided by one of his closest companions, one Adam Louvel. Mother of Robert De Carrouges. Saturday October 16 2021, 12.01am BST, The Times R idley Scott's spectacular new film begins with a Norman noblewoman, Marguerite de Carrouges, being robed in black, fettered to a scaffold in. ), the duel began as a joust on horseback, with lances. While this should have added weight to Marguerite's claim, it did not. A large and powerful man, Le Gris was well educated and very wealthy, though from an only recently ennobled family. This question, posed to Marguerite de Carrouges . In court, he also claimed to have seen Marguerite only twice in his entire life: during the Parlements official inquiry, and also not less than two years earlier at a social gathering at the home of a mutual friend, Jean Crespin, where Carrouges and Le Gris apparently put aside their recent quarrels and Carrouges ordered his wife to kiss Le Gris as a sign of renewed friendship. Marguerite de Carrouges accused Jacques Le Gris of rape, [5] [6] leading to one of the last judicial duels permitted by the French king and the Parliament of Paris (the actual last duel occurred in 1547 [7] opposing Guy Chabot de Jarnac against Franois de Vivonne). No one really knew the truth of the matter. Marguerite claimed that Nicole took with her nearly all of the household servants, including a maidservant whom Jean had specifically instructed never to leave Marguerites side, thus leaving Marguerite virtually alone.. . Smithsonian magazine participates in affiliate link advertising programs. And the lords of France delighted to see it, for they had come to watch the two men fight. Besides the resolution to a deadlocked legal case, the duel also provided eagerly anticipated blood sport for the nobility. Marguerite testified repeatedly under oath that on a certain day in January 1386Thursday the eighteenthshe was attacked by the two men, Le Gris and Louvel. Say nothing, and I will keep quiet, too. In response, Marguerite said, I will keep quiet. Though the film portrays Jacques le Gris as guilty of raping Marguerite de Carrouges, this was never definitively proven and the facts of the case remain a topic of heated debate to this day. Warning: This post contains spoilers for The Last Duel. The penalty for bearing false witness is that you are to be burned alive, an official tells Marguerite in the movies trailer. In his book Tales of the Marriage Bed from Medieval France, R.C. The article offers a garbled, error-strewn version where, in 1385, Le Gris was accused of attacking the lady by night, with his face masked, as she awaited her husbands return from the Holy Land. But then, just moments after Carrouges has killed Le Gris on the battlefield, a dusty courier rides up with the astounding news that another man has confessed to the crimenews that is now too late to save the innocent Le Gris. We wanted to examine that. In the film, it is revealed mid-trial that if de Carrouges loses at the hand of Le Gris, Marguerite will also be killed by being stripped naked, put in an iron collar and set on fire. Despite the threat of public humiliation and potentially deadly outcome of disclosing ones rape, women like Marguerite spoke out, perhaps as a way of working through their trauma or simply refusing to passively accept [what had] happened to them, says Skoda. Le Gris quickly turned violent, forcing her upstairs and enlisting Louvel to help restrain her as she desperately fought back. But Marguerite certainly made an impression on Le Gris, who likely still held a grudge against his litigious former friend: After running into the newly knighted Carrouges in January 1386, Le Gris sent a fellow courtier, Adam Louvel, to keep an eye on Marguerite, whod been left behind with her mother-in-law while Carrouges traveled to Paris. Matt Damon as Sir Jean de Carrouges in 20th Century Studios The Last Duel., Matt Damon as Jean de Carrouges and Jodie Comer as Marguerite de Carrouges in The Last Duel., Adam Driver as Jacques Le Gris in The Last Duel., Adam Driver, left, as Jacques Le Gris, and Matt Damon, as Jean de Carrouges, face off in The Last Duel., Jodie Comer as Marguerite de Carrouges in The Last Duel., Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Halloween kills at the box office with a new horror record, as Last Duel gets slayed, Review: Ridley Scotts epic The Last Duel rebukes the patriarchy in every era, The Scream 6 publicity stunts hit closer to home, prompting 911 calls in Sonoma, Review: Andrea Riseborough and campy Please Baby Please deconstruct gender and the 1950s, Bruce Willis steps out with friends after announcement of dementia diagnosis, Gayle King surprises Angela Bassett with her Whats Love Got to Do With It dress, Desperate mountain residents trapped by snow beg for help; We are coming, sheriff says, Hidden, illegal casinos are booming in L.A., with organized crime reaping big profits, Look up: The 32 most spectacular ceilings in Los Angeles, 19 cafes that make L.A. a world-class coffee destination, Newsom, IRS give Californians until October to file tax returns, Review: Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre is classic Guy Ritchie and not in a good way, Review: The teen drama Palm Trees and Power Lines tells a searing story of abuse, Review: The documentary Ithaka attempts a difficult defense of Julian Assange, Jonathan Majors dubs Michael B. Jordan Michael B. Handsome at Walk of Fame ceremony, Review: Natural beauty and a touching ecological tale center the female-forward Blueback. In the end the city expelled the contagion, and the body politic was cleansed. Halloween Kills, the latest entry in the blockbuster horror franchise, and period drama The Last Duel face different fates in theaters this weekend. Marguerites story must have seemed at least plausible to the magistrates who ordered the duel, something the Parlement had not done for over thirty years in a rape case. The two men seized her by the arms and legs, she testified, and dragged her up a nearby stairway, while she struggled and shouted for help. That resonates. More, On the use and misuse of civility. There were three chroniclers who gave detailed accounts of the sword phase of the fight, and they have slightly different accounts of how Carrouges managed to get Le Gris on the ground, Jager says. de Carrouges also says that she must have sex with him, as Le Gris can't be the last person to have 'known' her Marguerite is, effectively, raped again. According to court documents and testimony, Le Gris accomplice, Adam Louvel (Adam Nagaitis), participated in the rape. Really embracing the kind of freedom that gave her. Se trata del caballero Sir Jean. Yet the case does reveal the way in which scandal, as a cousin to the word slander (both derive from the Old French escandle), ultimately resides in the spoken or written word, whether in the gossip of neighbors or the hearsay of the chronicler. We gave this great filmmaker the opportunity to dramatize the essence of it and make it compelling to an audience, rather than do literally what happened.. It was a patriarchal and deeply misogynist [time]. Le Coq seems to have had some doubts about his clients truthfulness, while admitting that this was the thorniest of he said, she said cases. Many skepticsincluding chroniclers, historians, partisans, and even historical novelistshave cast doubt on the official verdict. While it adheres closely to Jagers book, with the script using actual lines and passages from his writing, the filmmakers did make some alterations in order to better shine a light on the concepts of consent and perspective. P.T. The entire royal court was gossiping about the rape, the trial, and the likelihood of a duel. As Jager explains, With a motive, revenge against the knight, and a means, the seduction of his wife, all [Le Gris] needed now was an opportunity.. 2023 Smithsonian Magazine I will have justice!. So there was just no doubt for me that this woman was telling the truth. The accused was Jacques Le Gris, who was said to have raped Jean de Carrouges's wife, Marguerite . The dominant belief that women had to enjoy sex in order to conceive further complicated matters, leaving those impregnated by their rapists on even shakier legal ground. She has nothing to gain. While this had no material bearing on the plot, it's an interesting detail given that in the film the queen was often panned to as the sole person to sympathise, however quietly, with Marguerite. [3] Still, the theory cannot plausibly account for Louvels having named Le Gris while in conversation with Marguerite. Marguerite de Thibouville, only daughter of the highly controversial Robert de Thibouville, married Jean de Carrouges in 1380. Privacy Statement According to Eric Jager's book The Last Duel, the alleged rape of Jean de Carrouges' wife Marguerite happened on January 18, 1386. Matt Damon, Adam Driver and Jodie Comer star in Ridley Scotts return to historical epic form, written by Damon, Ben Affleck and Nicole Holofcener. These events have gotten a cinematic depiction in Ridleys Scotts new medieval epic, The Last Duel, written by Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Nicole Holofcener and now playing in theaters nationwide. The pair of men tied Marguerite down and physically beat her. We dont have transcripts or historical records that say that on a given day [Marguerite] was doing this or something of that nature, but thats completely consistent with what such women did, the author confirms. Terms of Use Just in what they were wearing. The final chapter of the film, told from Marguerites perspective, refers to itself as the truth. But while that section of the story by necessity contains the most dramatization, Jager says he does support the filmmakers conclusion. In Marguerite's version, which the movie frames as 'the truth' (rather than the truth according to whomever) her protests are loud and clear as she screams for help. Image via 20th Century Studios. Because rape was viewed less as an act of sexual violence than a property crime against the victims husband or guardian, rapists often avoided harsh penalties by paying a fine to the man in question. But that doesnt mean that women were silenced. Still, The Last Duel does stick closely to historical fact. Readers in the US are encouraged to contactRAINN, or the National Sexual Assault Hotline on 800-656-4673. The film is told in three chapters, from the perspectives of Carrouges (Damon), Le Gris (Adam Driver) and Marguerite (Jodie Comer). To prove her claim true, Matt Damon's Jean challenges Le Gris to trial by combat. I will not be silent, she responds, teary-eyed but defiant. (Jager offered feedback on the films script, suggesting historically accurate phrasing and other changes.) Despite the claims of naysayers and novelizers, Marguerites testimony suggests that she was almost certainly not mistaken about the identity of her attackers. Comer brought that sense of history into her performance as well, recognizing what was and wasnt acceptable for women of the time. Medieval law treated rape as a horrific crime on par with other capital offenses. Not understanding the effect they were having on someone else. Meilan Solly Does he truly believe his innocence at the end? Affleck reflects of Le Gris. Schools educate you, and religious services deliver sermons, and movies at their best can generate empathy and generate compassion, says Affleck. She continued shouting for help, she says, until silenced by Le Gris hood. Skoda adds, Its all too tempting to talk about the Middle Ages as this horrible, misogynist, patriarchal, oppressive society, as a way of even implicitly just saying, Look how far weve come. Whereas to complicate what things looked like in the 14th century complicates what were doing now.. The actor continues, Its an anti-chivalry movie in some sense because the great illusion of chivalry is that it was about [protecting] the innocent female. Meilan Solly is Smithsonian magazine's associate digital editor, history. The Last Duel ending explained - how close is it to the true story of Marguerite de Carrouges? Shes going to face some kind of penalty. Instead of being executed, however, most women on the losing side of rape cases endured custodial or financial [punishment], which in medieval terms is kind of the end of everything anyway, according to Skoda. Fatality. In 1380 Carrouges married Marguerite de Thibouville (Jodie Comer), daughter of the controversial known traitor Robert de Thibouville who had sided against multiple French Kings in. I dont want your money! Marguerite replied. And one includes the ladys penitential retreat to a convent, while the other omits this finale. Pointing out that womens voices are actually loud and clear, albeit filtered through the court system and notaries, in many medieval documents, the historian explains, Its a really nice way of sort of flipping our stereotypes of the Middle Ages. Directed by Ridley Scott, the movie stars Matt Damon as Carrouges, Adam Driver as Le Gris and Jodie Comer as Carrouges' second wife, Marguerite. You are risking my life, so you can fight your enemy and save your pride. If Carrouges won the duel, the couple would go free, their claims vindicated. Marguerites father, Robert de Thibouville, had once betrayed the king of France, and some may have wondered whether this traitors daughter was in fact telling the truth. He likewise claims that Marguerite had been deceived about her attackers identity, although the supposed truth comes out under rather different circumstances: Later it was discovered that [Le Gris] had not really done it, but that it had been done by another, who died of illness in his bed and, at the moment of death, confessed before others that he had done the deed.. A feature film based on The Last Duel is scheduled to be released in 2021. The greatest departure from Jagers book comes during the rape itself. The last judicial duel in France hinged on whether a woman could be believed. According to Jager, Le Gris took an immediate liking to Marguerite when Carrouges introduced her to the court in 1384.