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Pierre Le Fruitier ,, that Pierre Salmon [ first ] , is a political and writer who lived under the reign of Charles VI (end of XIV It is -Debut of XV It is century), advisor and familiar with the king.

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He is the author of a collection of texts in French medium entitled (in the Crapelet edition) The requests made by King Charles VI, touching his condition and the government of his person, with the responses of Pierre Salmon, his secretary and familiar , or more simply Dialogues by Pierre Salmon and Charles VI . This work exists in two somewhat different versions, preserved in two contemporary manuscripts richly illuminated [ 2 ] : the first, dating from 1409, in French 23279 (known as “Paris manuscript”), with a miniature representing the author offering the king the splendid volume; The second, dating from 1412/15, in a manuscript of the Geneva Library [ 3 ] , the manuscript of the Geneva Library, ms. Fr. 165 (known as “Geneva manuscript”) [ 4 ] .

The work is made up, in the second version, of four parts. The first two parts are identical in the two versions: the first, in the form of requests on the part of the king and responses from his advisor, deals with the duties of the king and his servants (it is a text representing the medieval genre of the Princes mirror ); The second is a series of questions and answers on theological subjects [ 5 ] . The third part, the most precious for historians, includes the account of the facts to which Salmon had attended during his missions (since 1396), as well as the transcription of letters sent or received by him on these occasions (these are kinds of political memories, preceded by the letter by which the king asked him for this story). The Paris manuscript ends abruptly with a letter from the Duke of Burgundy Jean without fear to Pope Alexandre V (1409). The Geneva manuscript begins with the resumption of the story by Salmon in 1407 and the letters reproduced proceed from a selection from those which appear in the first version; On the other hand, the narration continues until 1411. This version is also endowed with a fourth part, as long as the other three reunited, which is a pastiche in French means of the Philosophy consolation Boethus.

The biography of Pierre Le Fruitier is essentially known by what he himself says, therefore for the period 1396-1411, in a sometimes questionable story. Only a few punctual external documents are added to it. The difficulty of identifying it is aggravated by the fact that there is at least a contemporary homonymous (“Pierre Salmon”), a religious Cordelier who appears on several occasions, and perhaps others.

In England and the Netherlands [ modifier | Modifier and code ]

His story begins at the time of the marriage of Isabelle de France with King Richard II of England, celebrated in the Saint-Nicolas church in Calais (early November 1396). The young queen obtains from her new husband to keep a few French people with her, and Salmon is one of them. So here he is in England, at the courtyard of Richard II who uses him as a messenger with Charles VI and his uncle, the Duke of Burgundy Philippe Le Hardi. One day, the King of England takes him apart in his oratory and asks him if it is the Duke of Orleans his brother who holds the King of France ” in such subject and so shameful (Allusion to Charles VI mental illness); Salmon is satisfied with a prudent and ambiguous response (saying that it is not him to answer this question) [ 6 ] .

He left the Court of England and returned to Paris in 1398 (hastily, because an agent of the Duke of Burgundy threatened him to tell his boss that he ” Machinoi [t] in England a grant badly against the person of Roy and the Kingdom of France »). Having no money for the trip, he “borrowed” from the Queen’s confessor a small gold lantern to pledge it, but he is accused of also used in the jewels of the sovereign. Very bored, and anxious to exonerate himself, he returns to the path of England, but by making a hook by Notre-Dame de Hal to accomplish a wish that he had neglected until then. It is in this place that a ” White vestu monk Who is responsible for transmitting to Charles VI certain secrets, and to prove that he deserves a claim predicts him the fall of Richard II and the violent death of the Duke of Orleans [ 7 ] .

When he returned to London in 1399, this is the time for the final confrontation between Richard II and Henri de Lancastre. He then embarked in the company of a squire from the Archbishop of Cantorbéry, Thomas Arundel, who is in exile in Utrecht. The archbishop leaving for Rome, Salmon stays in Utrecht for some time. The mysterious white monk appears to him a second time, to press him to accomplish the mission he entrusted to him with Charles VI. In fact, Salmon is above all without the penny: he wrote three letters to the king, the chancellor and Michel de Creney (bishop of Auxerre and confessor of the king) to point out to them that heaven has responsible for an important mission with of the sovereign and that he needs money to execute it.

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He receives a sum sent by the Chancellor, rushes to Paris, but is imprisoned there, he does not say why. Returned in the hands of the bishop of Paris, he is soon released, but sick, and withdraws ” a grant time ” in L'” hostel From his parents to recover. He then went to the court to deliver his mysterious message to the King, returned to Notre-Dame de Hal to wear thanks to thank you on the part of the sovereign, and then frequented the court, as an adviser to the king and his brother him Duke of Orleans, who visibly gives him much less attention.

In the following years, there are a trace of two trials lost by “Pierre or Perrin Le Fruitier, known as Salmon”: one in 1402/03 at the requests of the King’s Hotel, where he asked that his rights are recognized on the Office of the Bailiwick of Amiens [ 8 ] ; Another in 1406 in Parliament where he demanded a canon prebend in Soissons [ 9 ] . In 1406, a “stone salmon”, described as advisor to the king and general visitor of his domain and his buildings, was ennobled [ ten ] .

Around the popes [ modifier | Modifier and code ]

In 1407, Salmon remembers that the white monk, during his last appearance in Utrecht, fixed him as next meeting place the Saint-Pierre basilica in Rome. He is anxious to find a way to restore the king’s health. He requests a leave and obtains it, and is at the same time loaded with a letter from the king to Pope Benoît XIII and another to Marshal Boucicaut, governor of Genoa and Savona, to organize the conference at best Scheduled in this second city between the two rival popes, Benoît XIII and Grégoire XII.

Salmon left Paris in August 1407 and arrived on the 28th of this month in Grasse (Benoît XIII then lived in a two -leagled castle from this city). He is received by the Pope, who testifies to a keen desire to end the schism, then he takes the direction of Monaco, where the Marshal Boucicaut stays. On the way, he met in Nice and Villefranche-sur-Mer of the ambassadors of King Charles VI who come back from Rome: Simon de Cramaud (Patriarch Latin of Alexandria) and the bishops of Beauvais (Pierre de Savoisy), Cambrai (Pierre d’Ailly) and de Meaux (Pierre Fresnel). He joined Boucicaut in Monaco, then they go to Saint-Honorat Island, where Benoît XIII settled. Four days later, the Pope and Boucicaut go together to Nice, and the Marshal, having to be absent, recommends that Salmon to make sure that Benoît XIII will come well to Savona. As soon as the thing seems decided, Boucicaut makes Salmon leave for Paris with letters containing the responses of the Pope to the King and the Duke of Berry.

Salmon is back in Paris the first is october. But shortly after arriving the news that the Savone meeting was finally canceled. THE , Salmon leaves with new letters for Benoît XIII and Boucicaut (meanwhile, the Duke of Orleans was murdered in Paris the ). He landed in Genoa the (“New style”, 1407 at the time), and went with the Marshal to Porto Venere where Benoît XIII is then located. The King and the Duke of Berry announcing in their letters that the subtraction of obedience will be pronounced in Paris, the audience goes very badly, and Salmon is subject to be ” badly happy with these two lords », The Pope and the Marshal.

Then Salmon, having fulfilled his mission, decides to head towards Rome, where he does not forget that the white monk set him an appointment. But arrived in Siena, he learns that the Latium is occupied by the troops of Ladislas of Naples. He then returned to Pisa, then to Lucca, where Grégoire XII is located and with him the ambassadors of Charles VI (the patriarch of Alexandria, Simon de Cramaud, the Archbishop of Tours, Ameil du Breuil, and the bishop of Meaux , Pierre Fresnel). He made the round trip several times between Lucca and Porto Venere to carry messages. But in the meantime he learns from a member of the Lucquoise Rapondi family [ 11 ] that there is a lombard monk having the means of cure Charles VI. Salmon goes there and finds the monk detained in prison, accused of magic. Having obtained to speak to him, he learns from him that Francesco Barbarava, the regent of Milan, has in his possession ” a silver ymage, which had been made to hold the roy in subjection; which Ymage said François had in guard by the Duke of Milan » [ twelfth ] . He then wrote to the Duke of Berry that he found a man capable of healing the king, that on the other hand he can also give him two very skilful workers in marquetry, but that all this assumes that the Duke opens to him, with Jean Bag, his Genoese banker, unlimited credit. The Duke makes him answer that he only has to advance the money, he will be reimbursed in full on his return.

In the meantime, Salmon tries to know where Francesco Barbarava is then: he is a prisoner of the Condottiere Facino Cane. He says that he has a friendly friend to the latter who obtains to be able to meet Barbarava, and brings him a letter written by the prisoner; But nothing is said of the content of the letter. Returning to France, he was entrusted with a letter from the cardinal of Saint-Ange, collaborator of Grégoire XII, and painfully obtains that Benoît XIII responds to the letter he transmitted to him.

He arrives in Paris on , but the , Pentecost day, he is ordered to go to the palace while he goes to mass, and he is arrested there and led to the Louvre fortress: we have just received (the ) Benoît XIII’s excommunication bubbles in the event of obedience subtraction, and exasperation is at its height; Everyone who is suspected of understanding with this pope have everything to fear. He remains imprisoned in the fortress until September, and is ultimately released only on the king’s intervention. Immediately free, he decides to move away from Paris, where the spirits are overheated, and having obtained from the king a safe conduct dated from the , he takes refuge in Avignon, where he arrives at the end of the month. The the , as a prayer in the chapel of Saint-Pierre-de-Luxembourg, it is rewarded for a third appearance of the white monk. Salmon then inserts in his story a series of letters which show his proximity to the Duke of Burgundy, Jean Sans Feat.

In August 1409, Salmon left Avignon to go to Pisa, where the third pope who has just been elected, Alexandre V. after a pontiff, he was looking for a certain Master Hélie, who has been located, It also seems to be a means of healing the king. He finds it, but the man hesitates to accompany him. Salmon then hurry to return to Paris, where the . In order of the king, he reported his mission to the Duke of Burgundy Jean without fear. He writes to Pope Alexandre V to thank him for his good processes and ask him to send him this master Hélie as soon as possible. It is on this letter that the text of the “Paris manuscript” ends abruptly.

We learn in the registers of the Paris Parliament (about a February-March 1411 trial) that ” Salmon dit Pierre FRUICTIER Had received from Pope Benoît XIII a canon prebend in Tournai, but that she was challenged because he was not clerk, and finally renounced it in 1410 for the benefit of another candidate chosen by the King [ 13 ] . In 1411, Salmon asked for leave from the king, demonstrating the desire to withdraw from the world. But it does not seem to have been carrying out this project. In March 1417, he appeared in the inventory of the property of the Duke of Berry, died the previous year, being returned a volume containing a French translation of City of God , that he had lent to this prince [ 14 ] . The (n. st.), a « Peter Solomon », Secretary of Jean de La Roccaillée, archbishop of Rouen, buys a volume in Florence and scored a note there [ 15 ] .

The text of the Paris manuscript was the subject of a meticulous study by Pierre-Charles Levesque in his Notices and extracts from manuscripts , etc., t. V (Paris, year VII, in-4). There was a first edition of the third part of the text by Jean Alexandre Buchon in his Collection of French national chronicles , following the Chronic by Jean Froissart, with the levesque notice (t. 15, at Verdière and Carez, 1826). Then, the first and third parts were published by Georges-Adrien Crapelet (Paris, 1833, with historical notes, and ten plates and facsimile).

  • Henri Moranvillé, “The chronicle of the religious of Saint-Denis, the Memoirs of Salmon and the Chronicle of the Death of Richard II”, Library of the Charters School , vol. 50, 1889, p. 5-40 [ 16 ] .
  • Brigitte Roux, The dialogues of Salmon and Charles VI , Notebooks of Humanism and Renaissance 52, Geneva, Droz, 1998.
  • Anne D. Hedeman, Of Councellors and Kings : The Three Versions of Pierre Salmon’s Dialogues , University of Illinois Press, 2001.
  1. ↑ Salmon is a syncopated form of Salomon . We also find the spelling Sandkem .
  2. ↑ In particular by the master of Mazarine and the master of the City of Dames. The Paris BNF (MSS.) Manuscript 23279 is considered one of the most beautiful illuminated manuscripts in XV It is century. The illustration of the Geneva manuscript is less rich (only three large vignettes), but also of high quality.
  3. ↑ This manuscript is part of the Lullin friend’s fund, legacies of a bibliophile which bought part of what remained of the old Petau collection in Paris. See a precise description of the manuscript in Hippolyte Aubert, “Notices on the Pétau manuscripts kept at the Geneva Library (Lullin Friend Fund)”, Library of the Charters School 70, 1909, p. 247-302, spec. 295-98.
  4. ↑ There is also the Paris BNF (MSS.) French manuscript 5032, unleashed autograph manuscript, and French 9610, a copy of the second version dating from 1500.
  5. ↑ These theological subjects are: God and the angels; The creation of man; The Nativity of Christ; the Eucharist; Purgatory, Hell and Paradise; the arrival and reign of the Antichrist; the resurrection of the dead and the last judgment.
  6. ↑ This story is after the assassination of the Duke of Orleans (November 23, 1407).
  7. ↑ This story is made, of course, after these two events.
  8. ↑ Bibl. Nat., French fund 23679, fol. 283 v °, 287, 291 v °, 304.
  9. ↑ Arch. nat., X 1A 53, fol. 204.
  10. ↑ Anoblisation extended to his posterity, his sister, his mother and his stepfather Guillaume Fouquet, sergeant of arms (Arch. Nat., JJ 161, fol. 7 v °).
  11. ↑ The family of Dino Rapondi (in France “worthy breath”), the famous Lucquois banker established in Paris, in particular banker of the Dukes of Burgundy.
  12. ↑ Francesco Barbarava, “Minister of Finance” of Jean Galéas Visconti, had been appointed by him president of the Council of Regency when he died in 1402. He was driven out by a popular uprising in 1403, then resumed power, before being again exiled by heir Philippe Marie Visconti. Jean Galéas Visconti, accused here of having captivated Charles VI, was the stepfather of the Duke of Orleans, brother of the king (married to Valentine Visconti).
  13. ↑ Arch. nat. X 1A 4789, fol. 69 v°.
  14. ↑ Léopold Delisle, The manuscript cabinet of the National Library , t. III (Paris, 1881), p.  180, n°115.
  15. ↑ ‘ This Formaria is my Peter Solomon, Secretary of Cardinal Rouen, Bought Florence, in the year of the year of the month of March … »(Léopold Delisle, Notice on manuscripts of the Libri fund, kept at Laurentienne de Florence , in Notices and extracts from manuscripts from the National Library t. 32, 1 re part, n ° 1717). Jean de La Rocheaillée was created Cardinal in May 1426.
  16. ↑ By comparison of the texts, this article argued that Pierre Salmon was none other than the anonymous author of the Latin chronicle of the reign of Charles VI , hypothesis which has been refuted in the following years.

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