What is Paris famous for? Louvre, Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe. But there is a "attraction" in Paris, which is not written about in the guidebooks. This is the Red Man, a ghost roaming the avenues of the Tuileries Garden. For 300 years, he appeared at night to the next French king to predict his imminent death.
The royal palace with its own ghost
In 1564, Queen Dowager Catherine de 'Medici commissioned the famous architect Philibert Delorme to build a palace for herself, his beloved, near the Louvre and lay out a park with it. The palace was named Tuileries, acquired a servant, furnishings, and soon, thanks to the same Catherine de Medici, and its own ghost.
Catherine de Medici.
Catherine de Medici retained influence on the political life of France until the last days of her life. Francis II, Charles IX and Henry III, who reigned in turn, were under the strong influence of their mother, on her advice they made important political decisions, chose allies, determined opponents.
Not everyone liked such a lack of independence of kings, it is not surprising that the dowager queen had enemies. Catherine pulled them over to her side by bribery, blackmail, and for the most intractable she had Jean-Flayer.
Undercover agent of the French queen
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Jean, who was listed as a royal butcher, also carried out secret assignments of Catherine de Medici. Usually the queen lured a person she disliked to the Tuileries palace for a confidential conversation, and when leaving, Jean-Flayer was waiting for the poor man in the park. Only the butcher and the marble statues of the Tuileries garden knew where this or the queen's guest had gone.
But the moment came when Catherine thought that Jean knew too much and "ordered" him himself. The new secret agent of the queen had not yet filled his hand, and the bleeding Jean-Flayer, before dying, managed to say: "I'll be back!" He returned, and very soon.
Return
The killer saw the ghost first. This happened the very next day, and then the ghost of Jean-Flayer began to appear regularly in the corridors of the palace and in the adjacent park. The blood-drenched ghost became known as the "Red Man". In 1570, he appeared to the court astrologer Cosmas Rugieri and announced that the queen would "die near Saint Germain."
The astrologer warned the queen, and she began to avoid anything that had anything to do with Saint-Germain. Towns, villages, parks, rivers and lakes with this name, she bypassed the tenth road. She never visited the royal residence in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and the Tuileries palace itself became forgotten, since it was located on the territory of the parish of Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois.
Of the queen's ten children, three died in infancy. Subsequently, Catherine survived the death of three more sons and two daughters. Before the death of each of them, the queen was visited by a ghost and warned of imminent misfortune. In 1589, in Blois, 69-year-old Catherine sensed the approach of death. Usually, the chaplain who accompanied her was not around, and the servants called the first monk they saw. This minister of the church was called Julien de Saint-Germain.
Curse of the kings of France
After the death of Catherine de Medici, the Red Man disappeared from the castle. He returned 20 years later to become a messenger of death for the kings of France. In 1610, on the night of May 13-14, he "visited" Henry IV of Bourbon. The next day, the king of France was killed.
In 1792, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette lived in the Tuileries as prisoners. Once the queen saw in the mirror a bloody man standing behind her. She turned around screaming - needless to say that there was no one in the room except the ladies of the court? The next day, the royal family was transported to Temple. Louis ascended the scaffold on January 21, 1793, and his wife on October 16 of the same year.
Napoleon, becoming First Consul, made the Tuileries an official residence. Before the campaign in Russia, the Red Man appeared to Napoleon and predicted that the campaign would end in defeat. But Bonaparte believed more in his military genius than in spirits and did not cancel the campaign. He soon had to repent of his rashness.
In 1820, the Red Man warned of the imminent death of the Duke of Berry, the son of the future King Charles X, and in 1824 he "pleased with the visit" of Louis XVIII, who soon died of gout.
Tuileries Park ghost
In 1871, supporters of the Paris Commune set fire to the palace, the Tuileries burned down. Today in its place is a public park with an area of 25.5 hectares. But the ghost hasn't gone anywhere. Park attendants claim that many of them saw the Red Man in the late evening on deserted alleys. And although the ghost did not predict an imminent death to any of the servants, none of those who met him expressed a desire to meet the Red Man again.
Author: Klim Podkova
