PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy: Text, Image, Performance M ICHAEL M EERE W ESLEYAN U NIVERSITY It should come as no surprise that French-language theatre, and particularly tragedies, of the early seventeenth century imitated one of the foundational characteristics of the human experience: interpersonal violence. Indeed, from Antiquity and into the Middle Ages, in Europe at least, serious drama (such as tragedies and mystery plays, respectively) included some form of violence or another, whether recounted in narrative form or displayed on the stage. This tension between what to show and what not to show continued in France into the sixteenth century, as theoreticians and playwrights were experimenting with the newly rediscovered genre of tragedy (Meere, Onstage Violence). Yet, as Christian Biet and others have amply demonstrated, the tragedies of the early seventeenth century across Europe embraced the violent spectacle and pushed it to its limits (Biet 75). What is less clear, however, is how actors performed this violence and what kinds of violence spectators and/ or readers of tragedy might have expected, for few documents exist that directly relate the acting styles, the special effects, and the impact that this violence may have had on an audience. In this article, my aim is to attempt to answer these questions by examining the anonymous tragedy Axiane ou l’amour clandestin, printed in Rouen by Louis Costé le Jeune. There is no date on the title page, but the last page of the printed edition claims that the play (or its performance, it is unclear) was “[e]nregistrée le huictiesme iour de Decembre, mil six cens treize” (56). Thanks to the existence of woodcuts—or “quaint illustrations” (Lancaster 1: 85)—that accompany the printed edition of the play, as well as the observations recorded in the journal of William Drummond of Hawthornden (1585-1649) who attended a performance of this tragedy in Bourges in 1607, I propose a method of analysis that consists in “triangulating” onstage violence from these three vantages—text, image, and performance (via Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 254 Drummond’s commentary). This methodology bridges the bifurcated schema proposed by Guy Spielmann, that is to say the “approches textocentrées/ allographiques” and the “approches performatives/ autographiques.” According to Spielmann, theatre criticism has traditionally skewed toward the former and analyzed the literary text’s impact in literary and dramatic histories, yet the latter has merit insofar as it allows us to develop ways to consider both the general conditions of performance (troupes, audiences, costumes, décor, etc.) as well as the specificity of a particular performance, or what he calls the “événement-spectacle” (22). Inspired by Spielman’s multipronged framework, this article first provides a brief overview of theoretical writings on onstage violence prevalent at the turn of the seventeenth century. Then, after a presentation of the text and images within the printed edition of Axiane, the study concludes by demonstrating how Drummond’s observations complicate our established notions concerning the performance of violence in French tragedy of this period. While the analyses contained in this article focus on the performance of violence, other avenues of critical inquiry will also emerge. Onstage Violence in Theory Pierre de Laudun d’Aigaliers famously writes in his Art poëtique françois (1598): Plus les Tragedies sont cruelles, plus elles sont excellentes [...] Horace en son Art poëtique dict qu’il ne faut pas tousjours representer les horreurs de la Tragedie devant le peuple : Ne pueros coram populo Medaea trucidet, Aut humana palam coquat exta nefarius Atreus. Aut in avem Progne vertatur. Comme de faire demembrer un enfant, cuire les entrailles, et autres choses. La raison est pource que l’on ne peut pas faire, car comment pourra-on demembrer un homme sur le Theatre ? L’on pourra bien dire qu’on le va demembrer derriere, et puis venir dire qu’il est demembré, et en apporter la teste ou autre partie. Je diray icy en passant que la moitié de la Tragedie se jouë derriere le Theatre : car c’est où se font les executions qu’on propose faire sur le Theatre. (204-5). The “executions” to which Laudun refers appear to be “batailles, meurtres, viollement de filles et de femmes […] et autres matieres semblables” (Art poëtique 202). In theory, Laudun only disapproves of spectacles of violence that are impossible to stage convincingly, such as dismemberment or the cooking of entrails, but he seems to condone other, more “representable” Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 255 forms of violence, such as battle scenes. In so doing, Laudun departs from Horace’s tolles ex oculis principle, often repeated by humanist theoreticians such as Jacques Peletier du Mans, according to which any dramatic action that is overly horrific, bloody, shocking, or physically implausible should not be performed directly on stage in the sight of the audience. Moreover, unlike Jean de La Taille’s treatise, “De l’Art de la Tragédie” (1572), what is “suitable” (commode) or “decent” (honneste) is not mentioned at all by Laudun, thereby omitting any moral judgment concerning violence on stage. In his own tragedies (1596), for which to date no proof of performance has been found, Laudun includes a detailed battle scene, a homicide by sword, and death by thunderbolt (Horace, acts 4 and 5) and two suicides by dagger (Dioclétian, act 5). While Laudun was concerned with how to show violence on stage in a credible way, other playwrights considered the unbelievability of certain violent acts as an asset to this new form of serious drama. For example, Pierre de Nancel, whose three biblical tragedies were performed in 1607 in the great amphitheatre of Doué-la-Fontaine in western France (Dina ou le ravissement, Josué ou le sac de Jéricho, and Débora ou la délivrance), included a “Récit pour l’entrée des jeux” in which he argues vigorously in favor of violence on stage: Nous représenterons toute la catastrophe, Ores que les auteurs de la meilleure étofe Semblent le reprouver, comme ne jugeant pas Qu’on doive ensanglanter l’échafaud de trépas. Mais c’est la loi du lieu, du temps même où nous sommes, Nous défrayons [distrayons, amusons] et l’œil et l’oreille des hommes ; […] Or nous tirons au jour ces actions sanglantes, Car elles fi[e]rent plus, et sont plus violentes, L’oreille et le rapport nous piquent beaucoup moins, Que ne font pas les yeux quand ils en sont témoins. Au reste nous croyons que ces peuples farouches [les Anciens], Qui dans leurs Jeux communs se paissaient d’escarmouches, Et du meurtre et du sang d’un barbare tournoi, Se moquant de la feinte, avoient fait cette loi [Horace’s tolles ex oculis precept]. Mais nous d’un meilleur temps, notre nature douce Qui cette barbarie et cette horreur repousse, Pour un peu d’aguerrir aux combats de la main, Et pour se retâter, se contente du vain. (lines 97-102; 109-20, emphasis added) Though Nancel does reiterate the common Horatian theme of combining instruction and pleasure (“sa fin [de la tragédie] est instruire et plaire tout ensemble” [line 49]), like Laudun he does not support Horace’s tolles ex oculis principle. Rather, Nancel promotes an entirely different didactic strategy and theatrical aesthetic than those found in writings by followers of the Pléiade Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 256 such as Jean Vauquelin de La Fresnaye, whose Art poetique françois of 1605 (but written as early as the 1570s) denounces the staging of violence, based on the same banal (and no doubt outdated) poetics of violence on stage as that presented by La Taille. Vauquelin writes, for instance: Ainsi il faut cacher, et par discours prudents Faut conter aux oyants ce qui s’est fait dedant : Et ne montrer la mort, aporté sur l’Etage, Qui caché des rideaux aura receu l’outrage : Car cela se doit dire : et plusieurs faits ostez Hors de deuant les yeux sont mieux apres contez (54). Conversely, Nancel justifies the representation of physical violence in his era because, unlike the Ancients, the French audiences of 1607 did not attend spectacles featuring real violence. According to him, the Ancients condemned staged violence “pour de faux” (or feigned violence) because they were accustomed to seeing real violence for entertainment, such as in the gladiatorial arenas. However, Nancel asserts that the French live in a “meilleur temps” and possess a “nature douce.” Thus, he argues that staged “vaine” (or feigned) violence benefits the French public: these spectacles not only toughen them (“aguerrir”), but also provide them with pleasure (“nous défrayons”), for they allow the audience to examine and reflect (“se retâter”) on the action unfolding before them. As Fabien Cavaillé has pointed out, “l’orginalité de Nancel se situe dans l’articulation entre l’efficacité émotionnelle du spectacle sanglant et la nature artificielle, truquée, de celle-ci” (102), suggesting that, for Nancel, “le fait que le spectacle violent repose sur un trucage n’est pas un défaut du théâtre et ne provoque pas la déception du spectateur” (103). Indeed, Nancel’s tragedies make the most of the grand amphitheatre at Doué and include large-scale violence on stage, such as the sack of Sichem in Dina (act 5), the spectacular fall of Jericho in Josué (act 4), and the battle between the Israelite army against their enemies Jabin and his military commander Sisera in Débora (act 4), as well as smaller-scale scenes of violence, for example the stoning of Akân in Josué (act 5). Tensions thus emerge when comparing ideas about staging violence by the likes of Vauquelin, Laudun, and Nancel. Should violence be eliminated from the stage entirely (Vauquelin)? Or should only violence that can be believable be admitted to the stage (Laudun)? Or should playwrights and actors embrace the artificiality of staged violence, which would in turn remove many of the constraints about what kinds of violence one can show and how to perform it (Nancel)? There is of course no simple answer to these questions, and playwrights and actors alike chose to follow the routes that they found the most appealing or necessary for their art. For instance, Claude Billard would follow the first path, as his plays do not contain any kind of Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 257 onstage violence, while a poet such as Nicolas Chrestien des Croix seems to adhere to Laudun’s advice in his tragedies. The mysterious playwright M.H.L., whose Charite (1624) opens with seven main characters, five of whom die on stage at the end of the play, following a fatal ambush and a possible castration in act 3, and, in act 5, an eye-gouging, two stabbings, and two suicides, appears to have taken to heart Nancel’s arguments. A more prolific playwright like Alexandre Hardy could operate at one extreme or the other: his Panthée (performed c. 1604-10, printed in 1624) includes no onstage violence save the eponymous heroine’s suicide at the end (act 5), yet in his Alcméon, ou la vengeance féminine (performed c. 1615, printed in 1628), Alcméon kills his two sons (act 3) and also provokes a fatal sword fight with his two brothers-in-law (act 4); when his wife Alphésibée discovers the three corpses on stage, she commits suicide (act 5). Questions remain, however, as to how these scenes might have been performed, for, even if we are certain that these tragedies (at least those written by Hardy) were played, we lack any kind of description from the actors or audiences who might have attended them. In the remaining pages, therefore, I will home in on one tragedy for which we do have some testimony regarding its performance: Axiane, ou l’amour clandestin. As we will see, Axiane puts violence on the stage that is not only believable but also easily transportable for itinerant professional theatre troupes that would have limited special effects at their disposal. Axiane in Print: Text versus Image The printed tragedy begins with Axiane confiding in her nurse, lamenting her brother’s recent death and expressing her fear that her father, the king, will never approve of her love for the Duke of Medina. Meanwhile, the king is indebted to the Duke of Saxony for a decisive military victory and grants the duke his chosen reward. Saxony requests Axiane’s hand in marriage, but Axiane, seeking to stall, requests a one-year mourning period for her late brother (act 1). The conflict then escalates rapidly: Saxony soon discovers Axiane’s secret love for Medina and angrily reports the affair to the king (act 2); a duel between the two rival dukes is scheduled (act 3), only to be “remplacé par une issue beaucoup plus funeste et surtout moins héroïque (Louvat-Molozay 78). Axiane decides to give Saxony a chain as a (feigned) token of her love for him. Medina asks Axiane to borrow the chain, only to poison it, unbeknownst to her. The king enters the stage to recount a dream, which foreshadows the deaths of Axiane, Saxony, and Medina; the act ends with Medina giving the poisoned chain to the nurse (act 4). To open the fifth and final act, Saxony has received the chain and goes to Axiane’s door to ask her to seal the gift with a kiss. She accepts, and Saxony kisses the chain Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 258 several times when he begins to feel the effects of the poison and dies onstage in front of Axiane, her nurse, and his page. Axiane calls for her father, in front of whom she also dies an agonizing death. The king compels the nurse to reveal Medina’s treachery, after which Medina arrives on stage, confesses to the poisoning, and kills himself with his own dagger. The play ends with the king mourning the death of his daughter and her suitors, begging the “destins ennemis” “qu’auec eux ie suis mis […] et qu’vn iour ma pauure ame / Les puisse voir en bref, enclos sous mesme lame” (Axiane 56; act 5). The material conditions of the printing of Axiane remain unknown. There is no author mentioned and, according to the records held at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Axiane is the only tragedy printed by Louis (Lovys, or Loys) Costé le Jeune (also referred to as Louis II Costé, 1585? -1632). The play, printed in duodecimo format, might have been a pirated edition, produced with or without the consent of the poet. Knowing who might have penned the play could be helpful, as it would allow us not only to contextualize it within the theatrical production of the author but also to consider it alongside the performance practices associated with the troupes with whom he collaborated. One hypothesis is that it could be one of Alexandre Hardy’s plays that he never had printed under his name. After all, Hardy was affiliated with La Porte’s theatre troupe as early as 1600 and provided Valleran’s troupe with plays between 1606 and 1611 (Howe, 34, 36), and he may have been in Bourges with them in 1607 where William Drummond saw it performed (see below). The play very well could have been written by any number of other poets, however, such as Pierre Mainfray, whose plays were also printed anonymously. More in-depth textual analysis comparing plays printed contemporaneously with Axiane—by developing a machine learning framework, for instance—would be required before making any final determination about the authorship of the tragedy. The full title reads: Axiane, ov l’amovr clandestin. Tragedie. Ou se remarque la ruze d’vn Amant, qui achapte la mort de sa maistresse, au prix de la uie de son Rival. Autant admirable en ses effects, que ingenieuse en l’inuention de ces vers. This long, descriptive subtitle not only informs us that the subject is of the author’s invention—indeed, no source has yet been located, and the play does not appear to be adapted from another written text—but it also recalls popular literature typically associated with the burgeoning bibliothèque bleue (Andriès and Bollème, La Bibliothèque bleue). The Costé family (Louis I, Louis II, and the widow of the latter) tended to print this type of literature, including almanacs, humorous dialogues and other “joyeux devis,” and “chevalereux” romances (Mellot, L’Édition rouennaise 86-87). Similar titles of plays by other Normand authors such as Mainfray and the sieur Ville-Toustain exist, including the former’s Tragedie des forces incomparables, et amours du grand Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 259 Hercules. Où l’on voit artistement despeinct sa generosité, son trespas, et son immortalité, malgré l’envie de Junon sa marastre or the latter’s Tragédie de la naissance ou création du monde, où se void de belles descriptions des animaux, oiseaux, poissons, fleurs et autres choses rares, qui virent le jour à la naissance de l’univers. Thus Louis II Costé may have chosen to elongate the title to make it sound more appealing to readers. The printer also left his mark by including a series of woodcuts before each act that depicts a specific action or event to follow. It is not uncommon for a printer to include a woodcut on the title page of the play to illustrate the main action of the play; it is rare, however, for each act to include a separate woodcut. We do find another example in the anonymous Tragédie française d’un more cruel envers son seigneur nommé Riviery, gentilhomme espagnole, sa demoiselle et ses enfants, also printed in Rouen but by Abraham Cousturier (c. 1601-1610), and it is noteworthy that Axiane and the Tragédie française d’un more cruel have been bound together in a factitious collection at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Sybile Chevallier-Micki hypothesizes that the two printers collaborated, and that the engravings in the two plays might have been done by Cousturier (179-82), though we do find the initials “L.C.” on the engraved title page image of Les quatre fils Aymon, duc Dordonne, printed by Costé sometime between 1597 and 1620, which is very similar in style to the ones found in Axiane. The mystery surrounding the identity of the engraver notwithstanding, the woodcuts appear to have been made for Axiane. Following the advice of Jan Clarke and others, I am cautious to rely too heavily on iconography to illuminate the history of scenography or acting (“Problematic Images”). Indeed, I will not attempt to extrapolate how the stage might have looked or how the players might have acted based on the woodcuts. Moreover, these images do not always illustrate the plot of the play in a reliable way, either. Yet, despite the inconsistencies that muddle the interpretation of the action of the play, these images take on a dynamism of their own, and the choice of the printers-engravers to depict particular scenes of the play over others highlights what was for them (assuming either Cousturier or Costé were the engravers) important and compelling for audiences, readers and spectators alike. The first woodcut serves a double purpose: it is at once title page and illustration of an important scene in the first act, when the Duke of Saxony requests from the King his daughter Axiane’s hand in marriage. Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 260 Fig. 1: Title page of Axiane ou l’amour clandestin showing the Duke of Saxony (left) and the King (right). Source Gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France. This woodcut establishes the rank of the characters, as we see a knight on the left bowing to a king sitting on his throne, holding a scepter in his right hand and wearing a crown on his head. As mentioned in the summary, the play does not begin with this scene between the two men; rather, it is the princess Axiane who opens the tragedy with a lament, accompanied by her nurse. Iconographically, a depiction of two women may not have underlined the gravity of the subject matter and elevated it to the realm of tragedy, a genre that deals with “Rois, Princes, Empereurs, Capitaines, Gentils hommes, Dames, Roynes, Princesses et Damoiselles” (Laudun d’Aigaliers, L’Art poëtique, 202), despite the fact that an illustration of Axiane’s appearance on stage with the king and Saxony later in this same act could have served this same purpose and foregrounded Axiane on the title page. At the start of act 2, we see the following woodcut illustrating the two “co-rivals,” the Duke of Saxony and the Duke of Medina: Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 261 Fig. 2: Act 2 of Axiane showing the Duke of Saxony (left) and the Duke of Medina (right). Source Gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France. This scene likely represents Saxony’s confrontation with Medina and their verbal sparring over their love for Axiane. Given the first woodcut, which depicts the Duke of Saxony sporting a ruff, doublet, and peplum, we can deduce that Saxony is on the left and that the bearded man on the right is Medina, wearing breeches. It is noteworthy that this scene does not take place until the third act, and none of the actions in act 2 are visually depicted. For instance, the engraver could have included the scene in which Axiane and Medina profess their love while Saxony’s page eavesdrops on them (15-17; act 2), a captivating scene which Bénédicte Louvat-Molozay has stressed as being absolutely foreign to the Humanist tragic aesthetic (78). The engraver may have found the image of the Saxony confronting Medina even more compelling for his audience, as it depicts Saxony grabbing his sword with his left hand, still in its sheath, while Medina appears to be trying to calm Saxony’s aggression. (In the play, it is in fact Medina who declares “[l]’espée au poing, mon droict ie suis prest [à] maintenir” [28; act 3]). Despite this inconsistency, the image intimates potential violence of a duel that could erupt between the two rivals, but which does not come to pass in the end. Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 262 It is not until the third act that a woodcut portrays the eponymous heroine, Axiane: Fig. 3: Act 3 of Axiane showing Axiane (left) and the Duke of Saxony (right). Source Gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France. This scene does not appear in this act, either, but in the final one. Based on his clothing (ruff, doublet, peplum) and lack of facial hair, the character on the right is Saxony; on the left is Axiane. In this image, Axiane appears to be standing at Saxony’s door, handing him a necklace. In the play, however, it is Saxony who waits for Axiane at her door asks her to kiss the chain, for “n’ayant le credit de baiser ceste bouche / Ie l’aye de baiser au moins ce qu’elle touche” (47; act 5). Axiane may thus be handing the necklace back to Saxony after having kissed it, rather than presenting it to him as a gift. This ambiguity is essential, for if we are to understand that the image shows Axiane gifting the chain to Saxony, then it would contradict the plot of the play and, more importantly, it would imply that she is aware that the chain has been poisoned. Moreover, because this image appears one act before the chain is even mentioned (36; act 4), and two acts before Saxony receives the gift and has Axiane kiss it (45-47, act 5), the reader anticipates that the chain will be an important plot device. That she appears to be gifting the chain rather than handing it back to him after having kissed it prepares the reader for a particular action that will not in fact occur, as we have seen in Figure 2. Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 263 Thus, one must read (or watch) the play to know exactly how the action unfolds. The engraving at the start of the fourth act illustrates moments after Saxony has been poisoned by the necklace, a scene that (like Figure 3) occurs in act 5: Fig. 4: Act 4 of Axiane showing the Duke of Saxony (left) and Axiane (right). Source Gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France. In the woodcut, Saxony is lying on the ground and holding out his hand to Axiane, while she remains standing with her arms outstretched. This scene thus appears to correspond to the moment when Saxony first feels the effects of the poison, just before Axiane calls out to her nurse and the page for help: Saxe. […] Comme d’vn nouueau feu l’ame tu me recrée, Leur charme empoisonné n’est que charme et qu’apas, Mon corps debilité chancelle sous mes pas, Madame secourez autant que ie trespasse D’vn baiser à moy propre, hé ? secourez de grace. Axiane. Refrenez ie vous pry ces discours forcenez, De quelle sorte hélas ! les yeux vous contournez. Saxe. Ne pensez pas icy faire de la rebelle I’userai de mes droicts. Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 264 Axiane. O fortune cruelle, O estrange accident : Page, Nourrice, amis. Saxe. Ie le veux en despit de tous mes ennemis. Axiane. Secourez ce Seigneur qu’vn poison vient de prendre. (5, 47-48) Even though Saxony has just been poisoned, they both have ambiguous facial expressions in the image: one might think that Saxony is smiling, while the definition around Axiane’s mouth is unclear. Is her mouth agape or is she also smiling? The chain is also curiously absent, despite it being the cause of both characters’ deaths, provided this scene is indeed depicting their impending demise. Whatever might be taking place in this figure, if one encountered this image without knowing the plot of the tragedy, one could easily assume that this is a scene between two lovers, the man lying on the ground enticing his lady to join him. Yet again, the readers would be required to recalibrate their understanding of the plot should they rely first on the images to instruct them of the unfolding of the action. The woodcut for the fifth act shows three characters crammed together around and above Axiane’s corpse: Fig. 5: Act 5 of Axiane showing (from left to right) the Nurse, the Duke of Medina, Axiane, and the King. Source Gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France. Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 265 There are two female characters, Axiane dead on the ground and the nurse standing against the wall, watching the scene unfold. The two male characters are the king, pointing his scepter downward with his left hand and holding his right hand over his heart, thus indicating despair at the sight of his murdered daughter lying at his feet, and Medina, hunched over and holding a sword, likely the one with which he is about to kill himself. (Or is he poking at something on the ground, perhaps the necklace that has just killed Axiane? ) Saxony is not in this image, even though in the play the king remarks that Axiane is staggering “sur un corps trespassé [Saxony]” (49; act 5). This ultimate scene of the play is the most macabre—Medina’s suicide over the dead body of his beloved—and the most dynamic of the five images. The fact that these engravings do not always represent the action taking place in the act that follows is consistent with the aforementioned Tragédie française d’un more cruel, in which the first three engravings depict events occurring offstage, while the images preceding the fourth and fifth acts only illustrate the action taking place in the fifth act. As is the case for the Tragédie française d’un more cruel, the visually striking images in Axiane allow for the author, or the printer Costé, “d’accentuer l’imagination de l’action, sa projection, par ces images frappantes” (Biet et al., Théâtre de la cruauté 552). This is especially true for Figures 3-5, for they show the sequence of violent actions culminating in act 5: the poisoned necklace, the deaths of Saxony and Axiane, and Medina’s suicide. Contrary to the Tragédie française d’un more cruel, however, the woodcuts in Axiane do not always accurately represent the plot. The reader is thus misled, intentionally or not, and must reconfigure the information that the images provide. Most importantly, because the chain is the vehicle that provokes the deaths of Axiane and Saxony, and by extension Medina, this object and its handlers are essential plot points. In the play, Axiane kisses the chain, for she does not know it has been poisoned, yet, if we are to interpret Figure 3 as Axiane presenting the chain to Saxony, the woodcut seems to put the blame squarely on Axiane as if she were the one who intentionally poisons Saxony. Suggesting that Axiane is the mastermind behind Saxony’s death and the poisoned chain may seem unfounded, for why would Axiane kiss a chain that she knew to be deadly? This is where Drummond’s account of Axiane can be most instrumental. Axiane on stage: The Manuscript of William Drummond of Hawthornden Between 1607 and 1608, William Drummond—originally from Hawthornden, located about a dozen kilometers from Edinburgh, Scotland—came to the royal city of Bourges to study law. During his time in the Berry region, Drummond attended performances put on by Italian and French actors and Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 266 actresses: in early September 1607, he saw the troupes of Matthieu Lefebvre (known as Laporte) and Valleran le Conte, who appear to have temporarily merged to run a “season” that lasted several days; on September 21, 1607, he saw “tragicomedies” performed by an Italian troupe; finally, in November of the same year, he attended the public performance given by the Jesuit college Sainte-Marie to celebrate the start of the school year, during which a Neo- Latin tragedy titled Marcus Manlius Capitolinus was performed. Preserved at the National Library of Scotland in Edinburgh, Drummond’s manuscript (shelfmark Ms. 2059, titled “EPHEMERIS” by the author himself) is written in Middle Scots. Sixteen leaves remain—we count a total of at least twenty-six leaves, but ten have been cut, or even torn out of the bound book. Since the manuscript’s binding dates from the nineteenth century, carried out in 1856 by David Laing who found the leaves in disorganized bundles (“A Brief Account of the Hawthornden Manuscripts”), we can deduce with certainty that the missing leaves—still lost to this day—were cut out after binding. Apart from the Italian “tragicomedies”—whose trace is, unfortunately, quite limited in the manuscript—and the Neo-Latin tragedy, we find the following plays performed by the troupes of Laporte and Valleran le Conte: an earlier version of the aforementioned tragedy Axiane; an early version of Alexandre Hardy’s pastoral titled L’Amour victorieux ou vengé, printed only in 1628 in the fifth volume of the author’s works, but which can be dated to around the beginning of the seventeenth century; and the tragedy Pyrrhe by Jean Heudon, first printed in Rouen by Raphaël du Petit Val in 1598 (but which went through several editions until 1620), though it is not entirely clear whether Pyrrhe was performed at the same occasion as the other plays. The French troupes also performed “comedies” adapted from Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (Canto XXI concerning Filandro, Argeo, and Gabrina) and a novelle by Matteo Bandello (novella 44 of the second part), later adapted by Pierre Boaistuau (Sixth Story of the XVIII Histoires tragiques, 1578). In addition, Drummond records seven farces that the troupes performed at the end of almost every day, and he highlights the near-daily presence of prologues that appear to have been custom-written for the audience in Bourges. With regard to Axiane, after a description of the prologue who “presentit him selff vith a clok [cloak] efter the Grecian fashon,” making “a long oraison in prose of the praise of hope,” Drummond’s entry reads as follows: A yong princesse enterd on the stage taking counsel vith her nourse quhat to do vith her loues sche had set on the Duce of Medin quho promiset her al suld go ryt. therefter the king her father vith the Duc of Saxone quhom vpon he vald haue her maried. but sche obtend at her father and him the space of a yeir to lament her killit brother. the Nurce bringing the Duce of Medon, Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 267 quho vas enamured of her befor, concludit ther loues. but yat A page of the Duce of Saxon perceuit them quho recuntit al to his master. quhar at enragit he forgadrit the duce of Medin quho confessit it openlie. and schew him a ring he had resauit from her. quhar efter sum sporting of the corriuales the Duc of saxon retirit himselff to the king quho promisit al suld go ryt. The Duc of Medin forgathering his loue quho now of necessitie must be maried on the duke of Saxon deuisit a explot to stay the mariage vich suld be vith the death of Saxon So sche let him se a poissonit chain in a bust yat sche gaue him to deliuer to her nurce quho suld deliuer it to the Duce of Saxons page as a sing of her loue vich he resauing thinking himselff the hapiest in the vorld for yat he neuer resauit so much fauor as a kisse of his mastresse desyrit her to kisse the chaine that therefter he micht kiss it vith the greter plaisur vich sche making her to do presentit to him quhar at he glad cessit not to kiss that part of the chaine quhil the venome beginth to mak al things rune rund vith him so yat perceuing himselff killit by her gift embrasing her he vald neds haue her kissing him, of vich sche become infecit also. but befor this the king her father vas brocht on the stage schowing his dream of tuo lyons quhom he saw killit. and efter this entring he beginth to aske at his dochter quho had not yet yeldit her last braith the case of al, quho schew it vas done be a chaine vich by her nurce sche gaue to Saxon so the nurce delcarit al. and the duc of Medin perceuing his maistressis death efter he had kissit her killit himselff vith his awne dager for the catastrophe. (f. 69r-v) [A young Princess (Axiane) entered on the stage, taking counsel with her Nurse about what to do concerning her love for the Duke of Medina, who promised her that all should go as planned. Thereafter the King, her father, came on the stage with the Duke of Saxony, whom he would have his daughter marry. But she (Axiane) obtained from her father and him (the Duke of Saxony) one year to lament her dead brother. The Nurse, accompanied by the Duke of Medina, who was already in love with her (Axiane), concluded their loves. But a page of the Duke of Saxony was spying on them and related it all to his master. Enraged, the Duke of Saxony confronted the Duke of Medina, who confessed his relationship with Axiane openly and showed him a ring he had received from her. After some arguing between the co-rivals, the Duke of Saxony retired himself to the King, who promised all should go in his favor. The Duke of Medina, rejoining his love (Axiane), who now of necessity must be married to the Duke of Saxony, devised a plan to prevent the marriage, which should be with the death of Saxony. So she (Axiane) let him see a poisoned chain in a bust that she gave him to deliver to her Nurse, who should deliver it to the Duke of Saxony’s Page, as a sign of her love. The Duke of Saxony, receiving the chain, thought himself the happiest in the world, for he never received so much favor as a kiss from his mistress. He wanted her to kiss the chain so that thereafter he might kiss it with greater pleasure, which she, making herself do, presented to him. Whereat he, happy as could be, did not stop kissing that part of the Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 268 chain until the venom began to make all things run round with him (rune rund: to move around in an irregular manner). Perceiving himself killed by her gift, he forced her to kiss him, whereby she also became infected. But before this, the King, her father, was brought on the stage, relating his dream of two lions whom he saw killed. Afterward, he began to ask after his daughter, who had not yet yielded her last breath, and who showed that the cause of her death was the chain which she had her Nurse give to Saxony. So, the Nurse told the entire story. And the Duke of Medina, perceiving his mistress’s death, after he had kissed her, killed himself with his own dagger to end the play.] Among the violent scenes performed on the stage, which are consistent with the tragedy, Dummond highlights the poisoned chain that kills both the Duke of Saxony and Axiane, and the Duke of Medina’s suicide by dagger (act 5). The Saxony of Bourges also appears to have pretended to die an agonizing death, as Drummond highlights that “the venome beginth to mak al things rune rund vith him.” One could imagine the actor writhing in pain and then forcing himself on Axiane (“he vald neds haue her kissing him”). Drummond does not describe Axiane’s death in any detail, except that she admits fault in her own demise (which does not occur in the 1613 text), nor does Drummond depict Medina’s suicide besides adding that he kisses Axiane beforehand (which is also absent in the printed version). Robert H. MacDonald, basing his analysis on Henry Lancaster’s synopsis of the play, posits that “Valleran’s troupe made their Axiane the villainess,” making the Medina of Bourges “the dupe of a wicked woman,” whereas in the play Axiane is an innocent victim and Medina “is a ruthless murderer” (97). This analysis is debatable, however, as the Axiane of the printed play is not completely innocent. She does invent the ruse of the necklace to trick Saxony into thinking she is in love with him; even if she does not intend to kill Saxony, she is actively deceiving him and her father. Moreover, Drummond states that the Medina of Bourges wants to find a way to kill Saxony, and Axiane provides him with the necklace: both Medina and Axiane are wicked in Drummond’s retelling, and Axiane only perishes because Saxony forces her to kiss his infected mouth. Though Drummond does observe that Axiane kisses the chain, we could easily imagine that the actor playing Axiane only pretends to kiss it, since she knows it is poisoned. Drummond’s notes also elucidate the staging of sexual violence—the forced kisses—to which Saxony’s lines cited above refer only implicitly, and whose full potential readers may not grasp or understand due to the absence of external stage directions: “Madame secourez autant que ie trespasse / D’un baiser à moy propre, hé? Secourez de grace […] Ne pensez pas icy faire de la rebelle / I’userai de mes droicts […] Ie le veux en despit de tous mes ennemis. To Triangulating Onstage Violence in Early Seventeenth-Century French Tragedy PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 269 return to Figure 3, then, the suggestion that Axiane knowingly presents the poisoned chain to Saxony is not so far-fetched, for she may only have died because Saxony forces himself on her and spreads the poison through a kiss. We can thus wonder which version of Axiane the engraver might have seen, or which version he might have been told to make the image, for we cannot assume that he read the play at all. The play “registered” on December 13, 1613 might have been just one iteration of many versions of this play, just as the woodcuts provide us with one perspective from an engraver about the play and Drummond’s observations give us a glimpse of what a spectator saw, understood, and remembered to write down. Conclusion To explain the differences in characterization between the version Drummond saw and the printed text, MacDonald speculates that “the play was changed from year to year while it was in the repertory of the players” (97). This may be so, though we could even conjecture that the play changed more frequently than that. Performance assumes a certain amount of spontaneity and improvisation, and the players could manipulate the text to suit their acting styles and audience on any given day. The similarities and differences among the three vantages—the text, the images, and the performance as recorded by Drummond—are testament to the dynamic and ephemeral nature of theatre. We tend to have only the printed text at hand to analyze or speculate how a performance may have taken place, as so few eyewitness accounts of theatrical performances at this time were documented or have survived. Drummond’s account of this specific performance that took place in Bourges in September 1607 by these actors of these particular troupes, alongside the printed text’s accompanying woodcuts, however imperfect or incomplete they may be, allow theatre historians to keep in mind the multifarious possibilities that the performances of these texts offer. This proposed method, moreover, could be expanded to include not only contemporaneous observers’ accounts of early French plays, but also the ways in which makers of theatre stage and reimagine these plays today. For instance, to return to the Tragédie française d’un more cruel, one could consider how the text and the accompanying woodcuts are in transhistorical dialogue with the 2009 production directed by Jean-Philippe Clarac for Théâtre de Nanterre-Amandiers / TNBA, which has been recorded and thus exists in the audio-visual archive. These efforts may lead to an expansion of horizons for theatre scholars both to interrogate early modern theatre as a historically specific événement-spectacle and to Michael Meere PFSCL LII, 103 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0019 270 explore the ways in which this rich corpus connects across time and space to our contemporary moment. Works Cited Aigaliers, Pierre de Laudun d’. L’Art poëtique françois. 1598. Edited by Jean-Charles Monferran, Sociéte des Textes Français Modernes, 2000. ---. Les Poesies de Pierre de Laudun Daigaliers, contenant deux tragedies [Diocletian, Horace], la Diane, Meslanges et Acrostiches. D. Le Clerc, 1596. Andriès, Lise, and Geneviève Bollème. La Bibliothèque bleue: littérature de colportage. Bouquins, 2003. Axiane ou l’amour clandestin, tragédie où se remarque la ruze d’un amant, qui achapte la mort de sa maîtresse, au prix de la vie de son rival. Rouen: Louis Costé le Jeune, 1613. 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