Fiction in the Archives

This book is an account of life and death in early modern France. It is an analysis of the crime stories which men and women told their judges in order to try to save themselves from the gallows. To receive a royal pardon for murder in 16th century France, a supplicant had to tell the king a story. Thousands of such stories are found in the French archives, providing evidence of the narrative skills and life conditions of peasants, artisans and the well-to-do. Many of the pardon tales are accounts of murder for sexual motives and thus reveal something of the sexual conventions of the time and the inequalities between men and women. The author examines the different ways in which men and women, and especially husbands and wives, told their murder stories and the differing ways in which their explanations and excuses were received. This work is a blend of history, literature and law and should be of interest to students of early modern European history, Renaissance literature, the history of criminal law and women's studies.