Redacted passages of secret correspondence between Marie-Antoinette, under house arrest with Louis XVI at the Tuileries, and the Count of Fersen, were able to be deciphered at the end of highly technical work. Most of this correspondence, which lasted more than a year, has been kept since 1982 at the National Archives and was already deciphered.
But there were lines censored with clever redaction, so that we could not read them. At that time, the queen was under surveillance after the calamitous episode of the flight and arrest of the royal family in Varennes in 1791, during the French Revolution.
During the month of June, the @ArchivesnatFr retrace the history of #LouisXVI and #MarieAntoinette from Austria through large documents. Good discovery ! #UnJourUneHistoire https://t.co/6ZugA77OH9 pic.twitter.com/o6CH5FPyjH
- National Archives (@ArchivesnatFr) June 2, 2020They "express themselves in love terms"
The Archives keep 25 letters from Marie-Antoinette, written on a paper with straight edges, without holes or tears, without traces of mold, remind the promoters of the project in a press release. Four are original autographs, the others being copies made by Fersen or his secretary. Among them, seven have redacted passages. Also kept are 29 letters from Fersen, eight of which are censored.
“Marie-Antoinette and Fersen express themselves in romantic terms, although most of the content of the correspondence is political in nature. For the first time we can read in Fersen's pen unambiguous sentences about the feeling he had for the queen and which had been carefully hidden ”, note the National Archives. Thus, stereotypical formulas like "I live and exist only to love you" are to be compared with other tender formulas used by Marie-Antoinette, for example in her correspondence with the Princess of Lamballe.
95 working days
To carry out this project as part of the REX project, the National Archives, the Center for Research on Conservation (CRC) and the Laboratory of Heritage and Cultural Dynamics (DYPAC) have joined forces. The redacted passages were brought to light thanks to "X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF)". A total of 95 working days were required.
The content of the redacted parts of eight letters out of the fifteen examined could be revealed. For the others, the analyzes showed that the composition of the underlying and redaction inks was identical, which prevents any disclosure of the hidden content. According to the press release, "the main conclusion of the REX project is less in shattering revelations on the nature of the relationship between Marie-Antoinette and Fersen, than in the highlighting of the expression of feelings of hope, concern, of confidence, of terror, in a particular context of forced confinement and estrangement ”.
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