
Bal Des Ardents - Thevet
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bal_des_Ardents
======
jihadjihad
Anyone interested in this should check out Froissart's Chronicles [0], written
at the height of chivalric culture. Some of the imagery and descriptions of
battle are astounding even today. The Bal des Ardents is the third image seen
in [0].

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles)

~~~
thrower123
I've always loved the illustrations from Froissart's Chronicles. I'd love to
find a full-color reproduction some day.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles#/medi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles#/media/File:BattleofSluys.jpeg)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles#/medi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles#/media/File:BNMsFr2643FroissartFol97vBatNevilleCross.jpg)

~~~
dole
Never read about the Battle of Sluys [1], what a blowout :o

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sluys](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sluys)

------
olooney
I always thought this was a failed assassination attempt: "Now, now, your
highness, don't dwell on the fact that your mental illness has become a major
liability to the nobility and just have fun tonight! And by "fun", I mean,
allow me to sew you into this highly flammable costume and chain you up to
these other dancers, also in highly flammable costumes. It's really the done
thing, you know. You'll be fine unless your brother, who is next in line to
inherit the throne, happens to show up and start poking a torch at the
dancers."

French royal weddings seemed like a dangerous place to be. A few centuries
later, over a hundred people died at the wedding of Marie Antoinette and Louis
XVI[1], trappled to death fleeing a fire started by a firework mishap.

[1]: [https://findery.com/ChiefCurator/notes/tragedy-at-the-
weddin...](https://findery.com/ChiefCurator/notes/tragedy-at-the-wedding-of-
marie-antoinette-louis-xvi)

~~~
leoc
It's a fun theory, but it doesn't seem as if the evidence quite supports it.
You'd have to be willing to kill several other powerful French noblemen at the
same time, a risky business. And that group includes the guy whose idea the
dance supposedly was.

------
janpot
Funny coincidence, I'm currently reading "de Bourgondiers"[0] and this event
was just mentioned in the passage I read yesterday.

[0]: [https://www.flandersliterature.be/books-and-
authors/book/the...](https://www.flandersliterature.be/books-and-
authors/book/the-burgundians)

