Papal Letter

This week i bought a new historical artifact for my personal collection, a letter from pope clement the 14th to Charles Antoine de La Roche-Aymon, the archbishop of Rheims in 1771, making him a cardinal. It sent me down a rabbit hole of research, this archbishop was the celebrant who officiated at the nuptial mass of the ill fated Louis the 16th and Marie Antioinette.

its strange handling this sort of thing, on the surface its just a piece of vellum with some rather fine calligraphy spelling out some Latin, but scratch the surface and history opens up, in under 20 years from this letter being written and delivered the french revolution was getting under way and would, before the end of it have claimed the lives of two people that this cardinal married.

How it has made its way from then to here is a complete mystery, what it has been through, who knows, was it in the collection of the archbishop of Rheims and taken by the revoloution? Was it given as a token by the cardinal? Did his successor, archbishop Talleyrand-Périgord, bring it over with him when he went into exile in England during the revoloution and from there folded into a book and given away and then through half a dozen people before i found it in the local auction or is it the ever present issue with antiques… is it a fake? I don’t think so, its too obscure.

I think this object has much more history to share as and when i have the time to look into it.