Tourtoirac (France) (AFP)
A village of Dordogne revives every summer in August the memory of the ephemeral French "king" of Araucania (southern Chile), halfway between the crazy story of a Perigord adventurer of the 19th century dubbed by the Mapuche Indians, and the very present struggle of this ethnic minority.
A Mass for St. Rose of Lima (First Holy of the Americas), a visit to the "Museum of the Kings of Araucania and Patagonia" of Tourtoirac, a wreath on his bust, his grave: Antoine de Tounens (1825-1878), was celebrated Saturday in this village of 650 inhabitants by a handful of faithful of the "kingdom", and some enthusiasts.
"The reality of his story goes beyond fiction: a true western ... If he had been an American or an Englishman, Hollywood would have already made a dozen films about him!", Says Jean-François Gareyte, amateur historian who devoted two books, dozens of trips to Chile, immersing themselves as much in the military archives, judicial, press, as in the Mapuche communities. Where in places survives orally - very unequally, it is appropriate - the memory of the "French".
-A "madman" who worried-
Caught in the young Chile in search of adventure, political or commercial, De Tounens, an avowed Freemason of Périgueux was, at the bend of political jolts, mixed with the Mapuche. And in 1860, a consensus of caciques Mapuches saw him designated "Orélie-Antoine 1st, king of Araucanía and Patagonia".
In a region then in latent conflict, De Tounens is in 1862 taken prisoner by the Chileans, presented as crazy, expelled. He will return there at least three times, before dying, sick at Tourtoirac. Soon, Araucania and Patagonia would switch under Chilean and Argentine tutelage.
"Bouffonnerie", "gasconnade" of a "provincial mythomaniac", - as mocked the Parisian press at the time? Or improbable fate of a chivalrous adventurer, arrived "first to a combination of historical circumstances"?
What the archives of Santiago attest, assures Mr. Gareyte, is that the Chile of 1860-70 took seriously the coming and going (and imported weapons) of this stirring French in a Araucanian then far to be "pacified". And wondered about his possible support in Paris, because it was at the time of the French expedition to Mexico (1861-67).
Since 2018, Frédéric Luz, a Tarnese heraldry of 55 years, is the official successor of Orélie-Antoine, "prince of Aracaunie and Patagonia", elected by a "council of regency", after the death at the end of 2017 of his predecessor .
But here stops the tartarinade. For the council of the "kingdom" sit Mapuche, such as Reynaldo Mariqueo, a leader based in the United Kingdom of the NGO Auspice Stella, which since 2013 has special consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC). And the "Royal House" via the NGO, helps materially, lobbying - recently a letter to the International Criminal Court - for the rights of the Mapuche people still in struggle - sometimes violent, and repressed - for their rights and land ancestral.
All this - as well as the + dynastic quarrel + which sees the legitimacy of Frederick challenged by two pretenders - passes a little above the heads of the people of Tourtoirac. Where, if we co-financed the stele, chartered the museum, we see above all "a nice local history, part of the heritage, which we have heard about since our youth.No mockery, nor a state affair ", explains Mayor Dominique Durand.
--No folklore, "sound box" -
"Frédéric 1er" notes with satisfaction that the memory of Antoine recently "away from a counterproductive folklore, attracts fewer smiles mocking" or even generates interest in the South American press. Which coincides with increased visibility of the Mapuche cause since 15-20 years in Chile. In 2017, then President Michelle Bachelet officially asked "forgiveness" for "historical errors and horrors" towards the community.
This "convergence" does not turn the head of the prince, who also has no crown. "We are not a micro-nation operetta, we do not play + not to create a state, it is out of the question to claim any territory," said AFP Frederic I. Rather, he sees in the Royal House a "historico-cultural entity", both to "perpetuate the memory of Orélie-Antoine", and especially a "sounding board to help the Mapuche in the defense of their traditions, their rights ".
Because beyond the romantic fascination for De Tounens, "the main actor of this story is not him," says M. Gareyte, "it is the Mapuche people, their struggle for independence, and At one point in his history, he decided to play this (De Tounens) map ".
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