Stuff You Should Know - The Improbable Story of Martin Guerre

Episode Date: February 22, 2022

Like most 16th-century French peasants, Martin Guerre’s life seemed likely to be lost to history. But a strange series of events took place that would so cement the legend surrounding him that we’re talking about him still today, 450 years later. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. And a different hot sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, yeah, everybody about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm Munga Chauticular and it turns out astrology is way more widespread than any of us want to

believe. You can find in Major League Baseball, International Banks, K-pop groups, even the White House. But just when I thought I had a handle on this subject, something completely unbelievable happened to me and my whole view on astrology changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, give me a few minutes because I think your ideas are about to change too. Listen to Skyline Drive on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and this is Stuff You Should Know featuring Yeri. That's right. Interesting history, a dish.

Yes, man. I remember hearing this story back as an undergrad. Okay. A hot, sexy undergrad. Boy, were you? In learning my history? Yeah. I can't remember what class. It must have been a European history class, but this book just always stuck with me. The Return of Martin Garre by Natalie Zeeman Davis. Did you read it back then? Yeah, yeah. It was assigned as part of the class. It was a great, great book. But did you read it? Yes. Okay. I was a very eager, hot, sexy, undergrad history major. Well, I mean, that's why I majored in English because I like to read. So anytime I assigned a reading assignment, I was like, great, I can do that. Yeah, that was one reason I chose history is because I really enjoyed reading history stuff. So I was like, well,

if that's what we're going to be sitting around doing, let's do it. I don't know what I'll do with it afterward with that degree, but we'll roll the dice and find out. You envisioned a future career where two lung heads with no previous broadcast experience could become, dare I say, noteworthy by talking into a can. Yeah. I was gambling on lucking out to an astounding degree. Yeah, me too, sort of. Isn't that weird? Yeah. It's funny how life works. Well, it all worked out. And here we are all these years later to tell the story of Martin. Is it pronounced a gear? I've always pronounced it Martin gear, but we're talking, we're going to go to 16th century France. So it's probably Martin gear. Okay. But we're not going to say it like. But not Richard gear.

No. Which is ironic. Yeah. Because Richard gear. Right. Was the lead in the movie summers be. Yes, and which was, see, look at your improv skills. Yes, ending me. Right. It was sort of a, not necessarily a remake, but an adaptation on the story of Martin gear and the movie that starred Gerard Depardieu from the early 1980s. Yes, and I think that's it. No, but is that we end? Yeah. Had you heard this story before the story of Martin gear? Yeah, a little bit. I certainly didn't know it like I know it now, but I did see the movie summers be back then. I knew it was kind of based on that. And, you know, there've been other versions of stories like this. I mean, not the least of which is a story told in animation form about

a man, young man off to war named Armin Tanzarian. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I didn't even put two and two together. Sure. When Principal Skinner took someone's identity during the war. And it's sort of a common story, but this is, I think, the OG. Yeah. Thanks for that too, because we would have gotten myriad emails telling us what other failures we are in life for missing that Simpsons reference. Yeah, that was his name, right? Armin Tanzarian? Totally. Man, can you imagine how fun the writer's room was that day trying to come up with what his real name would be? That's right. You know, I've said it before, I'll say it again, that's Matt Groening's least favorite Simpsons episode. No. It was at the time years ago. Yeah, for some reason he dated that one.

I don't know why. All right. I love it too. It's good. So we're talking about a man named Martin Gehr who was born a peasant in 16th century France in the Long Dock region in this little area just above Spain, just below Toulouse, if that makes sense for you. And typically, Chuck, when people live and die in areas like this, unless they do something spectacularly interesting or noteworthy or important, they just kind of get lost to history. Sure. And this guy, Martin Gehr, actually didn't do anything spectacularly interesting or important or noteworthy. And yet we're still talking about him like 450-ish years more than that later because his life, something happened to his life that was so interesting that it's worth doing an

entire podcast episode about all these years later. Agreed. He was born in Spain to a Basque family and pretty quickly as a toddler was brought over to France to, how would you pronounce that? Artigate or artigate or is it got? I think got. Okay. Yeah, because cake is gâteau and it begins with G. Oh, look at you. All right. So Artigate and his family got there and they got to work pretty quickly, setting themselves up in different trades like farming, eventually tile making and merchanting. Nice. And did okay. They didn't have any kind of money, but they worked hard and sort of rose through that lower tiered status to the point where they could marry off young Martin to another family, the DeRolls family, who I think Dave Ruse, our buddy who put this

together for us. He said that they were well off, but I think they were well off for their lower class though, right? Yeah, they were up and coming, he puts it. And I think they were peasant farmers figuring out how to enter the merchant class, which at the time was the very beginning of the middle class. Okay. All right. Well, that makes sense then. Yeah. So they were working their way up into the middle class. So it was kind of a coup I take it for the Gare family to marry off Martin to Bertrand DeRolls. When they were young. Because their family was a little better off. But yeah, they were really young. Apparently later on Bertrand recalled that they were married at age like nine or 10. Apparently that doesn't add up and that was probably more like 13 or 14. So

you know, that's fine. Right. Still very young, but this is the 16th century after all. So they got married and you know, when you get married back then you want to start having babies pretty quickly. And they had a hard time having babies because for the first eight years of their marriage, they did not consummate their marriage. And no one knows exactly why there were rumors maybe that Martin wasn't or Martin just wasn't into it. They were 13 after all. So maybe, you know, they were normal children who kind of thought that wasn't the thing to do yet. I don't know. Oh, he was like, how do I work this? He just sounded like David Byrne once in a lifetime. Right. Some people blamed it on a witches curse. They eventually consulted with a wise woman

who said go to these series of masses at church because mass is always guaranteed to make you randy and eat a special cake that would sort of get him going downstairs. And apparently it worked. Crazy. Because they had a baby that had a little son. Like right afterward, it was a cake made of fireplace ashes I saw. But you know, they're in the early 20s at this point, by the way. Yeah. Like the appropriate age for that kind of thing. Right. It makes you wonder though, like was it self, you know, self-imposed and like he was able to feel like this curse or whatever was lifted off of him from eating that cake. But regardless,

it happened like almost immediately Bertrand got pregnant and they had a son named Sanxi who was the same name of Martin's father. So Martin said, hey, this is really amazing. I've really turned a new corner in life. I'm really interested to see what life brings me now and just got back to work with now with a son and wife. Right. Yeah. But here's the thing. And I think there's really no other way to describe Martin. Everything I read, basically it sounds like he was a real a-hole. Yes. That was the impression I had too. He was not a nice guy. He was not a nice husband. I didn't see anything necessarily about like overt abuse, but he just seemed like a real jerk, sort of to his family and around town.

And he was kind of looking to get out of town and his father accused him of stealing grain from the family stores and then selling it for a profit, which was not cool, even if it's your own family. It's probably more uncool. Right. That it's your own family. Never trust family, Chuck. Never trust family. That's on the shirt. But instead of saying like, wait a minute, I want to defend myself. He just took off and he's like, sorry, wife and young son, but I don't really like you guys that much anyway, so I'm out of here. I see him as like an early 20s Gen X or it's like, whatever, man. Right. I can't deal with this at all. I'm out of here. And you get the impression that he was just looking

for a reason to leave and he did. He got it. He didn't defend himself, which I mean in 16th century France or Basque culture, that is something you would want to do if your honor was being impugned. That was one of the few currencies you had. So you would want to defend yourself. So I think it says a lot about somebody at that time who didn't even bother defending himself. He just left and he left his wife and child without providing for them in any way. Like sure they had like his inheritance, his money, his share of whatever the family owned, but he didn't like set them up in any way before he left. He just put down his plow chair, put down his tile making tongs and just left. That's right. He ended up in Spain,

he went back to Spain, settled in B-U-R-G-O-S Burgos and became a servant for a noble family and they noticed like, hey dude, you're a pretty good fencer. You're good with the sword. Right. You should get you armied up. So he joined the Spanish army who was at war with France at the time and he fought for five years before, and this is a very key detail, I think, before we go into our first break, that he was hitting the leg with a bullet and had his leg amputated. Yes. So we'll take a break, hang on to that, put a pin in it, and we'll be right back. In this situation, if you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. This,

I promise you. Oh god. Seriously, I swear. And you won't have to send an SOS because I'll be there for you. Oh man. And so, my husband, Michael. Um, hey, that's me. Yep, we know that Michael. And a different hot sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life step by step. Oh, not another one. Kids, relationships, life in general can get messy. You may be thinking, this is the story of my life. Oh, just stop now. If so, tell everybody, yeah, everybody about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm Mangesh Atikular, and to be honest,

I don't believe in astrology. But from the moment I was born, it's been a part of my life. In India, it's like smoking. You might not smoke, but you're going to get second hand astrology. And lately, I've been wondering if the universe has been trying to tell me to stop running and pay attention. Because maybe there is magic in the stars, if you're willing to look for it. So I rounded up some friends and we dove in and let me tell you, it got weird fast. Tantric curses, major league baseball teams, canceled marriages, K-pop. But just when I thought I had to handle on this sweet and curious show about astrology, my whole world came crashing down. Situation doesn't look good. There is risk to father.

And my whole view on astrology, it changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, I think your ideas are going to change too. Listen to Skyline Drive and the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. So let's zero in on Bertrand for a little while, shall we? The wife, if you don't remember, is Bertrand. Yes. Bertrand de Roles, who became married to Martin Garret, maybe aged nine to 14, depending on who you ask. Yes. Seemed like a savvy young woman. Yes. Now, this is new. We got to say this. So like Natalie Zeeman Davis,

you mentioned that film, The Return of Martin Garre, starring Gerard Depardieu, that Summersbee was partly based on, right? Correct. She was the consultant on that, the historical consultant on that film. And she was so put off by the retelling of the story that she published her book two years afterward. Part of that book, part of her big contribution. She made tons of contributions to the historical record, turned up a lot of great documents and everything. But subjectively, her big contribution was completely altering the way people saw Bertrand. Up to this point, she was a loyal, chaste, devoted wife who would end up being duped, you could say, as we'll see very soon.

And under Natalie Zeeman Davis' reading of her, she was a very shrewd woman who figured out how to navigate within the confines of a male-dominated, middle-age French society. Yeah. And one of the first things that we can bring up to sort of support this, and I kind of like this narrative a lot, by the way, is the fact that she got married when she was, let's say, 13, just meet there in the middle. And, you know, he had, Martin had problems, you know, having sex for eight years. And so she was, it's speculated from Davis at least that she was kind of like, hey, this isn't so bad. I don't want to be doing that anyway, especially with this kid who's a jerk. And I don't want to have a kid. I'm 13 years old. So by the time, you know,

she's got four sisters. I really love them. He's, you know, his family seems to be doing okay. My family's doing okay at the time. That was a big deal. And so the fact that she had to wait till she was in her early 20s to finally to, you know, I expect to lose her virginity to Martin and then have this kid, wasn't so bad after all. Yeah, because she could have asked for the marriage to be annulled after three years passed without it being consummated by under French law at the time, I think French Catholic law. And she didn't. So yeah, that definitely substantiates Zemann Davis's claim that like, she was just kind of rolling with it. She was like, okay, I'm kind of happy with this.

And she didn't try and get married when he left either. There were a lot of strict laws about remarrying, like if the husband disappears or something, you had to have proof of death with witnesses and all that stuff. And she was basically like, hey, I'm kind of a widow here. His uncle Pierre is married to my mom now, they're taking really good care of me, got a lot of help with my baby. So I'm pretty cool to just chill here. Yeah. So in this, in this reading, she's saying Natalie Zemann Davis is saying like, she didn't have a choice. Like again, under French Catholic law at the time, like it says, not even when a husband has been absent 20 years or more can a wife remarry,

unless she has proof of his death. And it's got to be like, like irrefutable proof that this person has died, their husbands died. She didn't have the irrefutable proof, but she didn't also, she didn't, she didn't like go like take lovers. She didn't ask to have an exception made for her. And so it painted her, her, her image among the townsfolk and among her family that she was a chase devoted wife who was just going to wait for her lousy husband for as long as it took. And then also check on that converse side of that. That just goes to show you just how fully and selfishly, um, Martin abandoned her knowing full well that she couldn't remarry because she wouldn't have any proof of his death. So he left her in limbo like even more.

It wasn't even like a, I'm leaving. Good luck with your life. You do what you want with it. It was, I'm leaving. You have to stick around and wait until I decided to come back if ever. That's right. Uh, so things are going along like this. She's living her life. Again, has plenty of help with her baby. And then one day in town at a hostel, a man wanders in and says, hi, I'm Martin Gare. Uh, and I'm back. Everybody check it out. It's been a while. The innkeeper says, you know, oh my God, your wife Bertrand and your son, it's so exciting to be reunited. And he, he breaks down crying. And everyone of course in town comes running up and to see who this person is, including his, uh, his wife. And they all went, huh,

you look a little different, Martin. I think that's how they initially approached it. Well, because he did, apparently he'd gotten shorter, heavier, his nose had changed. His lip wasn't as droopy. Let's read that. There's a description from later court records that would happen of, um, what Martin Gare supposedly looked like. Can I read this? Please. Martin Gare was taller and darker than this man who showed up. He was a man thin in body and legs, a little bent, carrying his head between his shoulders, the chin cleft like Huey Lewis, a little thrust forward, whose lip, lower lip drooped a little, having small teeth, a large and flattened nose and ulcer on his face and a scar on his right eyebrow.

This person was short, thick set, strong of body, having a heavy leg, does not have a flat nose, nor has bent, nor has any of said scars. So an entirely different looking person showed up and was like, Hey, everybody, remember me? Martin Gare. Right. Uh, and it's important to note here that no one in town knew that Martin had lost his leg in the war. Yeah. Uh, so that was obviously it would have been the biggest red flag, but this guy comes back and he doesn't look like him, but he knows all the stories. He's saying like, Hey, remember when we did this? And we, he would hang out the townspeople and he'd say, God, remember that time we did that? And this, this great time we had over here doing this and everyone's just like, Oh my gosh, like he knows all the stories.

It doesn't look like him, but you know what? This guy's kind of fun and awesome and nice. Yeah. And I don't know what happened to him in the war, but like we'll take him. Yes. So eight years had passed and he apparently physically changed drastically, but also most notably his personality had changed distinctly for the better. He was a charmer now. And like you said, he remembered all of these stories. So everybody said, let's, uh, let's see where this goes basically. Yeah. And there's another key move here we need to point out. Um, right away, he didn't just go back to the, to family farm and to the family house with everyone. He said, you know what? I have the pox. I'm not feeling so great. So let me stay here at the hospital for a little bit and recover,

which turned out to be a very sort of savvy key move. Yes. One of the other, one of the other things that he did too, that definitely convinced Bertrand, um, and others who were, who were there, he said, by the way, I'm going to stay here and recover until I'm done with this pox. Um, but can you go fetch my white stockings, my white hoes from this particular drawer in this particular chest where I left them eight years ago? Yeah. And she went back and went to that particular chest and drawer and found his white socks were there just as she remembered him leaving them there eight years ago. So like that and a bunch of other stuff that he seemed to remember that only Martin would know, um, really convinced everybody that, nope, this is Martin. He's a

little different, but we like him even more now and we're going to get along with him just fine. Right. And Bertrand also was like, and the other thing is, uh, when you left, you were not very interested in sex from me. Right. And you seem to be really into that now. And so I'll take that as well. Uh, and in fact, I will give Bert to two daughters in return. Uh, sadly, only one of them survived infancy and her name was, uh, is it Bernard or Bernarda? Bernard. Okay. I didn't know that could be a little girl's name back then. I think when you add an E on the end, it curls it up. Okay. But you don't, uh, you don't pronounce E. No, no, it's all, it's all just for looks. Okay. All right. So to catch up, he's back in town. Everyone likes the new and improved

martin gear. Uh, he has another daughter and he's having sex with his wife and everything's going great, uh, until who becomes his main foil gets involved. And that would be his uncle Pierre. And remember, so Pierre, he's a, he's another main character in this. He, by this time after Martin left married Bertrand's mother. So now he's Bertrand's uncle in law and father in law or step father. So uncle in law and stepfather. That's right. And at first he welcomed this new improved martin back in it with open arms. He, he was credulous at first and then he won him over with some memories the new martin did. And, um, and so Pierre said, okay, let's go with it. And everybody was kind of going along and getting along. And then I guess one day,

Martin said, um, Hey, by the way, Pierre, you remember my inheritance, my part of the land and my part of the wealth that I left behind that you've been managing? Well, I know you made a bunch of money off of it. I feel like that's my money. So can I have my money, Pierre? Can I please? And Pierre didn't like that idea at all. And it's not clear whether he just didn't like that idea or whether he didn't like that idea because he didn't think this was martin after all. And this guy was overstepping his bounds. I don't know. But one of the things that he did was assemble his sons to try to beat Martin to death on the road. And had it not been for Bertrand throwing herself on top of martin's body, um, they probably would have succeeded in murdering him.

Yeah. I mean, he, it's interesting. Like I fill in a little bit of the narrative blanks just as, you know, someone who's into movies and literature and stuff. It seems to me like Pierre was kind of like, Hey, everyone seems to like this guy. So I'm not going to be the one to stand in the way. Uh, who am I to rock the boat? He didn't want to rock the boat until this money thing came up. And that's, uh, Martin actually took him to court. And that's when things really changed. And that's when Pierre started talking to anyone who would listen and saying, you know what, he's Basque and he doesn't understand these Basque phrases. This dude was a great fincer. He's, this guy's no fincer. He's not even into it at all. He doesn't look anything like his son.

And I think this guy is a fraud. And it's interesting that the town, like it seems to be, and we'll get to the court case, but it seemed to be almost divided whether or not people said, no, we think it's him and it's all good. And people said, no, I think he is a fraud. Uh, and it just goes to show sort of the power of those stories because at the time in 16th century France, how else would you explain something like, you know, hey, remember that time we went and pushed over that cow and I, and I did a dance on him on his belly. Right. Like, you know, that's a powerful thing back then when you don't have photographs and any other kind of shared recollection that you can easily point to. So, you know, he fooled a lot of people. Yeah, he definitely did.

I wonder how much he was playing on people's propensity to not want to admit a mistake or that they were wrong. Yeah, that plays into it. I'm sure it's got to. But like you said, the town was divided and it was divided between Pierre and then this new Martin and very crucially on the side of this new Martin was Bertrand. She threw, she cast her lot with him and said, no, this man is Martin Gare. I will, um, anyone who is mad enough to say otherwise, I will make him die. Yeah. Which is a weird way to create a death threat, but it was, it was a death threat, nonetheless. But, um, this was despite Bertrand's mother, who was Pierre's wife, coming to her and being like, look, you need to get with Pierre here. He's, he's on the side of right. And, um,

she still said no. So, um, Pierre also, he had, there were people who backed him up, like the, the shoemaker, right? Yeah. There was a little matter of the fact, and this was in summer's me too, that he, he came back from the war with a different foot size. That's a big change. That's a very drastic change. It is. And technically he did come back with a different foot size, but in a radically different way. Well, yeah, because everything changed in 1559. Uh, he'd been back a few years at this point, and a Spanish soldier wanders through town and heard about this story of Martin Gere and said, Hey, wait a minute. I knew that guy during the war and he's only got one leg. And it's like, that's when it's like Mike Brady throwing the,

the briefcase in the courtroom. Wow. It's just a hush falls over the crowd. Yeah. And he said, no, this effect is, uh, an imposter, an interloper. And I believe he is Arnaud Dutille and he is a Spanish man of ill repute. Yes. So Pierre, um, like got word out to nearby villages and, and confirmed this, that it probably was a guy named Arnaud Dutille, uh, who was from a town about 30 miles away called Sahas, S-A-J-A-S, I think. I think probably you're right. That's about a day or two of travel from Artigate. Um, so it's far enough away, but close enough that you could get, you could, you could confirm or deny whether somebody was someone from that town, right? Yeah. And this guy, you know, he's a bit of a roughhouser. He drank a lot and he gambled and

he bedded down with sex workers and had a big appetite. I mean, Gerard Despardeux played this guy for God's sake. So that kind of tells you all he need to know. All right. So, uh, this guy, all of a sudden, uh, is seemingly, um, found out. But the story is, is that he went off, joined the French army, uh, this Arnaud guy. Uh, and the question is like, did he meet Martine on the battlefield? What we ended up finding out much later is that a couple of old friends of Martine actually mistook him for Martine, uh, initially. And then we're like, you look just like our friend, this guy back in, uh, small town France, who's actually got a pretty good, um, doubt, not dowry, but a pretty good prospects, monetarily waiting for him back home and this pretty good looking

wife. And all of a sudden the wheels start turning in Arnaud's mind. Right. Uh, it's not clear whether those two ended up becoming accomplices or else if he was just able to kind of like work info out of them over time. But that is, that does seem to be, I think he's, he later admitted that's where he got the idea. He's like, how much do I look like him? Right. Exactly. Oh, spinning image men. Oh goodness. He also was like really, um, really clever in that, like he stayed behind at that hostel. Like he first appeared at the hostel rather than showing up in town. That was a big one. He stayed behind with the pox. I made scare quotes. Um, he, uh, so he could gather more information just slowly, but surely he just seemed like the type who could get something out of you

without you realizing it because you were just having a good time hanging out with him. Right. Like, I wonder if he was like, yeah, because remember that time we pushed over that cow? And the guy's like, oh, you mean the horse that time when we did this? He's like, oh yeah, that was totally it. Totally. I was so drunk. I remember being a cow and everybody starts laughing. Right. But you didn't drink much back then. Well, I drank on the side. You didn't know. It was secret. Right. I was also on Zappils. That was German. Yeah. You're really all over Europe right now. So then this is where Natalie Zeeman Davis comes in. Like it's, it's clear that this guy was really good at getting information from people without them realizing that he was

extracting information, using that information with his very, very good memory to lull you into a sense of security or trust for him that he was to overcome your instincts against trusting that he was who he said he was, but that no amount of preparation and research in the 16th century setting could have helped him get away with this so thoroughly without the help of Bertrand. That's Natalie Zeeman Davis is like her thesis is like, there's no way that Bertrand was a dupe that she wasn't complicit in that, you know, she probably it's tough to blame her because her life improved dramatically after this guy showed up. Yeah. I mean, if she would have caused a stink like Pierre did early on as the wife, it would have been a much, much different deal,

I think, than her completely defending him. And Day points out, we're never going to know, like, he's in the, in the town going to the pub and he's talking with people about the stories, but she's with them as wife full time behind closed doors. And we'll never know what went on there. But in my mind, in the movie version, there's a scene at some point where she goes, hey, listen, I know you're not him, but it's okay, because you're actually a nice guy. And I can make this work. Yeah. I think that Jody Foster's famous line is, hey, Bubs, let's cut the S. Misa chikamai. Naitaipo now. I haven't seen Nell in so long. I never have. I'm just putting mine together from

previews I saw like 25 years ago, I think. Yeah. I don't think it was a very good movie, or maybe I'm misremembering, or maybe I'm remembering exactly. I think we have to watch it. Oh boy. I want to watch this instead. So this whole idea that Bertrand is complicit. It's a new idea. It's a modern take. For centuries, she was, in the storytelling, she was duped. Like, that's how good and wily this Arnaud Dutille was at being an imposter. He duped the man's wife. That's how good he was. And when you hear that, and then you hear Natalie Zima and Davis' take, you're like, that's a pretty ridiculous idea. But that's how it was. And as we'll see, Bertrand was never persecuted or prosecuted for her role in it. She got out of it

as well. Should we take a break? Yeah, let's. All right. We'll take our last break, and we'll talk about the first trial of Martine Guerre right after this. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast, Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. The hardest thing can be knowing who to turn to when questions arise or times get tough, or you're at the end of the road. Ah, okay, I see what you're doing. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help. This, I promise you. Oh, god. Seriously, I swear. And you won't have to send an SOS because I'll be there for you. Oh, man. And so,

my husband, Michael. Um, hey, that's me. Yep, we know that Michael and a different hot, sexy, teen crush boy band are each week to guide you through life step by step. Not another one. Kids, relationships, life in general can get messy. You may be thinking, this is the story of my life. Just stop now. If so, tell everybody, yeah, everybody about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm Mangesh Atikular, and to be honest, I don't believe in astrology. But from the moment I was born, it's been a part of my life. In India, it's like smoking. You might not smoke, but you're going to get second hand

astrology. And lately, I've been wondering if the universe has been trying to tell me to stop running and pay attention. Because maybe there is magic in the stars, if you're willing to look for it. So I rounded up some friends and we dove in and let me tell you, it got weird fast. Tantric curses, Major League Baseball teams, canceled marriages, K-pop. But just when I thought I had to handle on this sweet and curious show about astrology, my whole world came crashing down. Situation doesn't look good. There is risk to father. And my whole view on astrology, it changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, I think your ideas are going to change too. Listen to Skyline Drive and the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right. The first trial, I said of Martin Gar, but we're going to call it the first trial of Arnaud. He was put on trial in a town called R-I-E-U-X. He was put on trial specifically for stealing another man's identity, adultery, taking his property. And Dave points out very aptly that this is like, in the 16th century, how do you prove something like this? You could give a memory test, but we already know he has a great memory and did his homework. You could get villagers up there to testify, which they certainly did, but they're biased. You could compare them physically, which they did, but it seems like that didn't matter much because some people knew. For sure, you had different foot size. And also, they didn't have the kind of photographs and

handwriting comps and stuff like that. It was a lot easier to get away with something like this back then. Plus also, for just about everybody who said, oh, no, his nose was long and flat. Others would say, no, no, it was short and pointy. Like this guy. Right, exactly. Plus, I mean, you've got no fingerprinting, no DNA tests, not even standardized stuff like driver's licenses or passports. There weren't even wagon licenses at the time. So there really wasn't any way, but to hear as many people as possible and then just thoughtfully sort through their testimony. And that first trial at Ryu, Martin Gehr at a time, or I should say Arno Dutile, at a time when a lot of people would have shrunk at the challenge,

rose to the challenge, maybe more than anybody ever living would have. Like this guy defended his honor as much as the real Martin Gehr would have. Probably more, actually, as we'll see, as we saw. The other thing I wanted to bring up too is like, I would say so much of this was impacted solely on the fact that a lot of people like this guy. Yeah. You know, and they like the new Martin and they're not going to go in there in 16th century France and cause a big stink. They're going to say, no, I think it's him. He knew this story and he's got that. I remember that nose. Right. And what's the foot size anyway? Those feet can change sizes, right? What do we even know about that? Yeah, this is what this guy said. So he cross-examined witnesses against

him. And for that shoemaker in particular, he said, this man is a drinking companion of Pierre Gehr. Right. Let him show his records about the size of my feet. Right. He also confronted a man who was his uncle from Sahas who was Arnaud Dutille's uncle who said, yeah, that's Arnaud Dutille who's cross-examining me right now. He said, I've never seen this man before in my life and it's my uncle. Why can't he produce other members of my family that say so? That's what a confidence person does. Yes. The con man is like so adamant in their beliefs that that's what they used to trick you. Yes. And again, it wasn't just him. Bertrand was saying, this man is my husband. I would rather suffer a thousand cruel deaths than say otherwise.

His sisters did too, right? Yes. That was a big one. So all four of Martin Gehr's sisters came and testified at this trial that, nope, this is our brother. Like he's our brother. I don't know what else we can say. And yet despite the testimony in favor of him, the judge in Ryu said, no, I think you're an imposter and I'm going to find you guilty. That's right. Pay to a public apology and a ceremony. Pay your wife 2,000 francs. And this one other little tidbit, we're going to behead you and quarter you. Right. And he went, oh, how about we, is there such a thing as appealing to a higher court? And they said, well, unfortunately there is.

And so now we will talk about the second trial. Yeah. This was like to the appellate court, this group of like the finest legal minds in France. They were called the, what were they called? The Parliament, the criminal chamber of the Parliament of Toulouse. Okay. So they were basically, like I said, the finest legal minds in France who were coming together to hear this story that was pretty much sweeping the, not just the nation, but like this part of Europe. That there's this guy who's being called an imposter is defending himself and this whole town is split about whether he is who he says he is. And one of the judges in the case was Jean de Corras, who went on to actually write the first and earliest account of this case. He

actually wrote two of them. He wrote a sequel that delved a little more into Arnaud Dutille's life. But the people who came together to hear this case basically got an even better version of what had happened in Ryu. That's right. And another example here early on in this trial of Bertrand being very savvy with her moves because she was basically like, hey, listen, I'm not going to say that this man is imposter. I think he is my husband. But if he's not, he sure fooled me. Right. Exactly. Not my fault. Yeah. He also, so this is another thing too. So the judges really wanted to this guy to be the real guy. Yeah.

De Corras says that they put more weight to the affirmative testimony because- Oh, they wanted him to be Martin? Yeah. Okay. They wanted him to be that. Yeah. They wanted him to not be an imposter. Because they put more weight into affirmative testimony because they felt that it was more positive than say like negative testimony, which was destructive, which makes sense in a legal, like a certain way legally. But more than that, the affirmative testimony also affirmed this marriage and this family and this household that was already intact and that didn't want to be split apart. It's not like Bertrand was saying, this man is not my husband. She was saying, he is my husband. Please leave us alone. Yeah. And the judges wanted to

support that. And Arnaud Dutille gave them heaping mountains fulls of stuff to go ahead and go along with this. And he actually, he stood up to all this testimony, did it again. He survived all these memory tests. Bertrand hung in there. He got so good, Chuck, that he on the stand said, I just want you to know, I forgive you for having to testify against me. I know you don't want to, but I forgive you. I don't hold it against you, dear wife. That's how much I love you. And those judges were like, swoon. I wish I was Bertrand. And he actually, he won them over, Chuck. And they were about to rule in his favor that he was Martin Gare and everybody just shut up about it from now on, except there was a twist that happened, huh? Yeah. And this would be great for an ad break,

but we've already done it. So we'll just say very simply, a man walks in with a wooden leg in the movie version. I'm sure in the movie version, it didn't happen quite like that, but the real Martin Gare, please stood up. And all of a sudden there he was. He's back. The real deal. No one knows why he came back exactly. The speculation is that he heard about this story because it traveled, like you said, kind of throughout, you know, this region of Europe. And that he was like, wait a minute, I'm a jerk and I'm not going to let this stand. Right. So he showed up like almost the last minute that he could have. I'm sure he'd shown up later. They would have reopened the case, but they hadn't yet ruled, but they were about

to rule in our node's favor. Like the gavel is up. Yes. Essentially. And this guy shows up and says, wait, I'm the real Martin Gare. Basically. And they treated him like he was potentially an imposter first too. They took him into custody. They questioned him separately and they questioned him and they questioned our node on the same old memories. And both of them responded like equally well. So the judges are like, oh my God, what is going on here? They'd never had a case like this before. But the thing that I think clinched everything is when, when he came to the court, when he was presented in court, his family all recognized him. His sisters all said, oh my God, we were wrong. This guy is the real, it's our real brother. And then Bertrand said,

she gulped very heavily, was maybe heard to say under her breath, well, I guess the jig is up and threw herself at the feet of Martin Gare and said, I have been duped. I'm so sorry. I can't believe that this imposter got me, but I was fooled. Please forgive me. Yeah. I was desperate. I wanted my husband back and this guy tricked me and I was willing to overlook the differences because I wanted you back so bad, my dear Martin. And it's really interesting. He said he was not, well, two things. First of all, during all this, Arnaud was like, he kept up that con man thing and like went on the attack against Martin, you know, like you're the imposter in a big, big way, which really helped. But then Martin was basically, you know, as far as Bertrand goes, he said, leave, and this

is a shortened quote, but leave aside these tears. The wife ought to know her husband. No one is to blame, but you. Yeah. So he wouldn't have in it. No, he was not having it. And the judges even said, well, hey man, maybe have a little heart. Like you're the one who left her eight years ago. Yeah, exactly. And Martin said, silence. That is not a crime. And the judges were like, that's true. It's not a crime. So you just go ahead and keep being a jerk, but we just wanted to put one in on your wife's behalf. But she got off. She did not, the judges did not rule against her. They just, they determined that she had been duped and that the entire blame was, was squarely on the shoulders of Arnaud Dutel, who would now, yes, be sentenced to death. Right. And not only was she let off,

but they were very kind to the daughter that she had with Martin initially, because technically, as far as the law was concerned, that would make her a bastard, or not a Martin, but Arnaud, right? Right. Yes. I'm all confused. Yeah. That would make her a bastard, which meant she couldn't get inheritance and stuff like that. But they said, no, at the time, she thought it was her husband. So we're going to make an exception here. So they really did her a couple of favors. But when it came to Arnaud, they really didn't know what to sentence, because they had never done anything like this before. So they said, well, I guess, let's kind of go with what the other people were saying. Let's, let's kill you. But we'll just hang

you and burn your body. We won't quarter you and behead you. Right. Right. I also saw that he was sentenced to be hanged while barefoot and bareheaded. And I cannot for life, let me find what the problem was with that. I think it was just an insult, maybe, but probably, like see his face. Yeah, I guess, but also see his ugly feet too. Yeah. Well, his feet that are smaller now, and maybe it's also more, you need to look upon the people that you have betrayed. Right. Yeah, that's a good one. That's good. So he, his sentence was carried out in Artegot, and they actually built the gallows in front of Martin Gehr's house just to give him like a power move, really great view of the whole thing or something like that. He could, he could keep

working until the last minute making tiles and then come out and be like, all right, let's go. Right. And Arnaud was, was marched through town. And he, he finally now he was like, okay, I'm just going to take full credit for this and admitted everything, didn't he? Yeah, but you guys like me, right? Right. But he's like, good job. I got you guys so good. Yeah, pretty much. He commended the judges for their work. He, he walked through town with the noose around his neck is, you know, they made him carry his own noose around his neck. And I think at the end appealed to Martin like, hey, be nice to your wife, dude. Like I fooled her. She's a woman of honor. Like don't take this out on her.

Which is pretty great. Cause he could have out of spite or out of whatever. He, he could have like outed her or even not said anything, but he, from to the very end, he, he declared that she had no idea and had nothing to do with it. And if you go through, you know, Natalie Zeman Davis's lens, that was a really loving gesture. And it reminds you of like, these two were probably like deeply in love with one another. Yeah. And, and also like it's no short, it's no small thing, even like in the time of very high infant mortality rates, Chuck, that they lost a child together and that's surely bonded them even further. So like the loss that was created at the, the return of Martin Gaer, that with this marriage, this actual happy but imposter and

illegitimate marriage was torn apart by the legitimate version, but the, but how legitimate was it? You know what I'm saying? If it was that unhappy, like this, this man, the real man managed to interlope into something even more real than what he had created with his own life. Yeah. That's a very confusing statement, but I totally get it. And it also makes it really sad that he, that our node was, was executed and I'm sure Bertrand had to watch and pretend like she was happy about it. Yeah. No one really knows what happened in the end to Bertrand and Martin, the real Martin, not a lot of details, but they do know that there were three more sons. But, you know, I don't necessarily means, I don't think that necessarily

means a reconciled and we're happy. They, this was the 16th century. He could have forced himself upon her by all I know, you know, I guess, but they did stay together and I'm sure he could have gotten a divorce even in Catholic French law at the time, but that, so his, the illegitimate daughter, our node and Bertrand's daughter, she went to live with the very uncle that our node had said, he had never seen him in his life on the stand. Oh, really? Yeah. That's, that's who went and took care of her and Chuck, our version of the movie ends, I think, with little Bernard growing up a little bit and saying, uncle, can you tell me about my dad and the uncle and Bernard start walking back to the house from the barn and the uncle says, kid, you wouldn't believe it if I

tried. It's great. What did she think? Perfect ending. Okay, yeah. So, since Chuck said perfect ending, I think that means that it's time for listener mail. You know what, in lieu of listener mail, we do this couple of times of year when we rarely ask for support in helping to spread the word. Even here in year 13, we still want to grow the stuff you should know audience and make sure people are tuning in. So, tell a friend or a neighbor or a family member about stuff you should know if you would and review and rate us on iTunes because that always helps. iTunes, Spotify, wherever you find podcasts. Wherever you find podcasts, we always appreciate it. This is the show that grew very organically because of this kind of thing many years ago and we don't ask for

it much but we continue to count on that for growth. Yes. So, thank you to everybody who's ever rated or reviewed us and thank you just for listening to. We appreciate you guys listening even if you don't lift a finger. Amen. Well, since Chuck said amen, that's the end of this episode, which I think I've already done. I'm losing my mind and if you want to get in touch with us, you can send us an email to stuffpodcastatihartradio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts on my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hey, I'm Lance Bass, host of the new iHeart podcast Frosted Tips with Lance Bass. Do you ever think to yourself, what advice would Lance Bass and

my favorite boy bands give me in this situation? If you do, you've come to the right place because I'm here to help and a different hot sexy teen crush boy bander each week to guide you through life. Tell everybody, everybody about my new podcast and make sure to listen so we'll never, ever have to say bye, bye, bye. Listen to Frosted Tips with Lance Bass on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm Munga Chauticular and it turns out astrology is way more widespread than any of us want to believe. You can find in major league baseball, international banks, k-pop groups, even the White House. But just when I thought I had a handle on this subject, something completely unbelievable happened to me and my whole view on astrology

changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, give me a few minutes because I think your ideas are about to change too. Listen to Skyline Drive on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.