Source:
Monarchs Retired from Business, volume 2, pages 267 to 272, by Dr. John Doran, 1857 (1902 edition)
WARNING: GRAPHIC DESCRIPTIONS OF VIOLENCE.
The account:
In November, the ex-Queen returned to Italy, wandering from city to city, till the entire cessation of the plague should enable her to re-enter Rome. The plague did not cease or it did not suit Christina to believe otherwise. In September, 1657, she expressed a desire to revisit France. Political and personal motives, no doubt, influenced her, but the only alleged cause was, that she ardently desired to see the King of France dance in a court-ballet. She reached Fontainebleau in the month of October. Within a fortnight she committed the great crime which excited the indignation of the civilized world, and which, in spite of all revelations, has remained a perplexity to succeeding generations.
Among the members of her suite was an Italian, Monaldeschi. He was bitterly jealous of another Italian gentleman, also in the suite of Christina, named Sentinelli. The former was a Marquis; the latter, a Count. Both were on the most intimate terms with their royal mistress.
It is uncertain whether Monaldeschi had betrayed the personal or the political secrets of the ex-Queen. She certainly suspected him of both treasons. The Marquis had endeavoured to throw suspicion on the absent Count, and in answer to a remark from Christina had confessed that the man who could betray her affection or her confidence was worthy of death. The ex-Queen calmly bade him remember *that*: the day would come when she might have to act upon his judgment.
Little more is known, save that the Marquis Monaldeschi had written some pungent pasquinades against Pope Alexander VII. Perhaps the Pontiff's sanction strengthened the hand of the angry woman and offended Queen.
Father Lebel, who was present at the terrible scenes by which this episode was concluded, has left a graphic detail of all he saw and heard. Upon that detail rests entirely the authority for what is asserted below.
On the 6th of November, at a quarter past nine in the morning, the ex-Queen, who had sent for the father, and expressed to him her confidence in a man who wore a religious habit, placed in his hands a packet of papers, adding that she would subsequently give him directions as to whom they were to be delivered, and enjoining him to mark the day and hour.
A few days only had elapsed when, on repairing to the Galerie aux Cerfs, at the Queen's command, Father Lebel found Christina there, in animated conversation with the Marquis. The door was made fast behind him, as he entered. Three other persons were present, one of whom stood close to the Queen. By order of the latter, Lebel gave up the papers confided to him. She opened them, and placing them before the eyes of the Marquis, demanded if he acknowledged his handwriting. Monaldeschi hesitated, turned pale, and confessing that the writing was his, implored pardon most piteously.
At this juncture, the three men whom Lebel found in the gallery, drew their swords. The Marquis, in extreme agitation, requested permission to justify himself. He drew Christina first to one side of the gallery, then to the other, and poured forth protestations into her ear, to all of which she listened, but with the coldest air of reserve. When Monaldeschi had ceased to draw her from one point to another, and to vehemently urge her to be merciful, she approached the father, and, leaning on an ebony cane with a smooth round head, she calmly bade him observe her calmness, how tranquilly and unimpassionedly she had listened to all which "that traitor" had set forth. She commanded the latter to give up certain keys and documents which he carried with him. When this was done, — and an hour had now been consumed since Lebel had entered the gallery, — Christina approached close to the priest and said, "Father I leave this man in your hands: prepare him for death, and have care of his soul."
Priest and destined victim, both equally terrified, fell at her feet, and implored mercy; but they implored in vain. "He has done that", she said, "for which he merits to be broken alive on the wheel. He has betrayed me; he who was trusted with my most important affairs and my most secret thoughts. I have treated him more kindly than if he had been a brother. His own conscience should be his executioner."
With these words, she left the gallery. Monaldeschi turned to implore Father Lebel; but the triad of armed men made a step forward, held their swords towards him, and recommended him to confess. The poor wretch however begged so piteously for mercy, that first, the chief of the three armed men, and then the father himself, proceeded to the Queen's cabinet, to beg her to be compassionate. She was so calmly obstinate, so coldly resolved he should die, that the intercessors had not the chance with her that they might have had with a furious woman. The priest, especially, implored her by Christ, by the offended majesty of the King, whose palace would be desecrated, and by the nation, who entertained such hopes from the negotiation which she was carrying on in France. She stood firmly on her sovereign right to punish a traitorous subject, and protesting that she had no personal hatred of Monaldeschi, repeated that he must die.
The priest returned to the gallery with his message of inevitable death. He sank on a seat near the wall, and did his best to exhort the condemned criminal, who was led to the same seat, there to receive the last consolations of religion. It was a touching scene, for the priest was smitten with terror and pity, and the penitent was in an agony of fear, which rendered him almost speechless.
The Marquis however had stammered through a confused confession in Italian, French, and Latin, and the priest had commenced the absolution, when the ex-Queen's Almoner silently looked into the gallery. Monaldeschi at once rushed towards him; and so convulsively did he again beg and implore for life that once more the chief swordsman went out with the Almoner, to petition Christina to be merciful. They might as well have prayed to the statue of Phryne.
The swordsman returned alone. He wore such a look, that the priest turned his face to the wall. The grim messenger approached the Marquis, told him that he must finally be prepared to die, — and, pushing him, at the same time, towards a corner of the gallery, thrust his sword into the lower right side of Monaldeschi's body. The Marquis caught at the weapon, and as the stabber drew it away, it cut off three of the victim's fingers. The point was blunted, whereby discovery was made that Monaldeschi wore a coat-of-mail, nine or ten pounds in weight; thereupon his assailant cut at him across the face. The mutilated man screamed to the priest, and rushed into his arms. His murderers stood aside for a moment, while the father finished the absolution, and enjoined on Monaldeschi as a penance — patient endurance of the death to which he was condemned.
The victim staggered from the priest, fell on the floor of the gallery, and, as he fell, received a terrible down-cut from the sword of one of the executioners on his head, which was fractured by the blow. Retaining his senses as he lay, he made signs to them to finish by cutting his throat. At this sign, one of the assassins made two or three cuts at his neck, but the top of the coat-of-mail had risen above his pourpoint in the struggle, and the blows were ineffectual. The priest meanwhile exhorted him to suffer patiently. On this, the chief of the three asked the father if he should deal a death-blow. To which question the cautious minister very well replied that he had no counsel to give, and that his mission was to beg for mercy, not to enforce justice. The reply exacted as an acknowledgment that the question by which the answer had been elicited was a fool's inquiry, which demanded an apology.
Once more the door of the gallery opened, and the Queen's Almoner again looked in. The half-murdered Marquis turned on his stomach, dragged himself along the ground, pulled himself up by the wall, and clasping his hands together, seemed to implore again for mercy. The Almoner avoided him, gave some religious encouragement as he did so, and withdrew, as he said, to speak for him to the Queen. Whether he made any sign at the moment is not said, but it was then that one of the three suddenly passed his long narrow sword through the throat of the Marquis, whereby the latter was stretched senseless on the floor. The three men stood over during the quarter of an hour that he continued to breathe, while the priest knelt down and shouted into his ear the exhortations which the dying man could no longer hear. At a quarter to four he was quite dead. One assassin lifted an arm, a second a leg, the third unbuttoned his dress, and carried off the few things that were in the pockets. The priest recited the de profundis. Then all went to the strong-minded woman, to inform her that her commands had been fully accomplished. She had the grace to express her regret at having been compelled to execute God's justice on a foul traitor; and she took care to have him respectably interred. She thus murdered him on Saturday, the 11th of November. She allowed the body to lie above ground during the Sunday, but on the next day it was conveyed privately to the Parish Church, within which it was buried, near the door. Christina sent a hundred livres, to be expended on a Mass for the repose of his soul; and the ceremony was performed on the day after the funeral, with as much pomp and success as a hundred livres could furnish. This matter having been thus completed, Christina prepared for her trip to Versailles, to see the King of France dance in a ballet!
Whether Monaldeschi was a spy employed by Mazarin, or a jealous personage who, out of revenge for the royal favour exhibited for Sentinelli, published reports in Italy damaging to the reputation of the Queen, the act of murder was indefensible. It was in vain that Christina coolly asserted that when she had given up the crown she had reserved her royal prerogative and could therefore punish an offending subject, on whatever territory she happened to be, — she was not welcomed to Versailles. The Queen of France could not patiently utter her name. Christina found that she had not the slightest prospect of ever beholding the graceful Louis perform a pirouette. To avenge herself, she announced her intention to visit a greater man, — namely, Cromwell! The Protector did not encourage the idea; and if the story be true that good Mrs Cromwell was somewhat jealous of her husband's admiration of the qualities of this extraordinary unqueened Queen, it is probable that, from this time, the Protector's wife slept undisturbedly.
Above: Kristina.
_-_Gothenburg_Museum_of_Art_-_GKM_0066.tif.jpg)
Above: Kristina condemns Monaldeschi to die, painted by Johan Fredrik Höckert.
Above: Dr. John Doran.
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