The Bronze Bulge of Victor Noir

a four. It's probably not cyn aesthesia. It's probably just thirty plus years of associating the month, but that number, it's obviously it sounds right. It would be weird if it didn't sound arouse. Like, you know, April feels like an eight to me, but October feels like a four. I can't tell you why October should feel like an eight. I mean, it's right there, but it does feel like at ten. I don't know, but it's April, April Fool's Day.

Apparently this episode is coming out on so oh well, we didn't even plan a joke for all, or did we? Did we? You'll never know. I'm actually Diana doing an impression of Eli right now, and vice versa. We fooled you. Everyone knows that's not true because my impressions are not good. That give the give the listeners your impression of me. Oh, let's let's what do you think I sound like Diana? What do you think I sound like Diana? Oh? That sounded so mean? That sound like that? I think you

sound like Um. It's very hard. I feel like I should be able to do you the best because we're around each other all the time. But it's almost making it harder because I know so many nuances of your person's here. It's tough. Okay, here we go, Here we go. Here's this is eli. Okay, hey babe, Um, what do you want for breakfast this morning? Eggs? Okay? Okay, okay,

how how do you want your eggs? Like I ask you every morning and you just pay eggs and like, I don't know how you want to cut because sometimes you want to scramble and sometimes you want to find. I was just want to say that, like, if you just tell me how you want your egg just that's the only thing I ask. That's a direct quote. That's pretty good. That's pretty good. I mean I don't think I got your intonation very good. But the energy behind the words. I think I really nailed it. Sounded more

frustrated than I intended to sound. I think sometimes you just frustrating. It was the same level of frustration that I was feeling. So it can't you can't. Your communication was good then, because it came across I'm just saying. I ask you every day what you want for breakfast, and your answer is always eggs, And I'm like, I know that. That's the easy part. That's the one I

didn't even have to ask. Well, sometimes I don't know how I want them yet, I think I just think of the egg and insistency that I wanted my mouth right. I think it was because today you said eggs and I just said m and I waited, and then you went to the other room and you sat down on the couch answer the question over here. That was pretty good. That was pretty good. Can I hear your impression of my impression of you? My heart can handle it. Uh yeah,

um m m. That's not that's what I hear. How is that not what you think you sound sound like? To you? Oh man? All right, legit, all right, here's my impression of you. Um And then she's like looking at her phone. She never answers the question. It's like I'll say, hey, what do you want to do and you'll say um, and that's the last I'll hear you say for the next forty five minutes. I'll say, hey, remember when I asked you what you want to do? And you're like, oh, yeah, I forgot um. So you

can't see the look that I'm giving him. I promise you that it is withering to feel withered, that's for sure. But oh, come on, enough about us, right, Yeah, that sounds good. I'd like less of that one that was We're you know, we're We're not the ridiculous romance you came here to hear about. No, Today, we have a very interesting story. This episode was suggested to us by Samantha M on Instagram. Uh, your handle is at sam c Colmes. So thank you Samantha for this little rabbit

hole down. This is a nice one to get to ease back into our biographies, to write tell a historical tale that's, you know, somewhat centered around romance in its own special way. Well, and funnily enough, we did not plan this, but this happens to be also about a big slap that was heard about the world. So it definitely is playing into some topical things. Yeah, sure, this story is about Victor Noir and more importantly, his grave. So Victor Noir was just a journalist in eighteen sixty

nine France. He was writing for a republican newspaper who criticized Bonaparte rule and in life just kind of a regular guy. In death, he became a revolutionary symbol. But it was after he was buried that really cemented his place in history and got him an episode on Ridiculous Romance. So let's hear about how this average everyday journalist became an enduring fertility symbol. Hey, their French come listen. Well, Elia and Diana got some stories to tell. There's no matchmaking,

a romantic tips. It's just about ridiculous relationships, a love. It might be any type of version at all, and that's drive cons concrete wall. But if there's a story where the second clinch ridiculous roles a production of I Heart Radio. So let's start with a little bit about the French Revolution. Like, we can't get on this show without talking about the French Revolution. Every five weeks, you know how how often it hits Like even Governor Morris

was had some French Revolution in it. So many of our episodes. Look, I'll tell you it's it's we try to like really spread ourselves across the world and hit different cultures and different ideas and stuff like that. But at the end of the day, you cannot talk about absurd romantic stories without being heavily involved with the French. Very true, Yeah, extremely true. So we're just gonna keep coming back here. I love it, I know, right, So, yes,

So the French Revolution began in eight nine. They overthrew King Louis, who met his end by the guillotine along with his Queen Marie Antoinette, and we have had several requests for a King Louis Marie Antoinette episode. We're definitely gonna have to tackle this history a little more fully when we do that couple. We will, we will, because obviously very much affected their lives. But just quickly we'll say,

just sketch it out for you here. France became heavily bankrupted because they assisted the American Revolution oopsie, sorry, but also because of the profly gets spending by the king, so not just our fault. Heavy taxes were imposed on the working class to make up for this. But they didn't get any relief or assistance for their money, so they got super piste, like we all do when we

have we're in the bad end of a bed. You're telling me the French government, any government, went out spent a bunch of money on a war they practically had no business getting involved with, and then and then tax the people for it, and they got mad that they put the whole bill on them. Yeah, I've never heard such a thing, and they got mad about it. I've never heard such nonsense. I barely believe it. My head is spinning. So yeah, they're all piste, working classes, piste.

All these royal advisors saw how bad it was getting, so they got together and they're like, the coming theres are getting angry is that we are taking all their money but giving nothing in re turnes. The coming hours. They are so petty. And there's one thing poor people like to do. It's complained about being poor. Alright, come on, it's like we get it already, get over it. Well, we must do something. What if we get the money we need from people who have money to spare? You

mean tax so wealthy? Oh you're so crazy. I love it. Let's do it, Melcy. But of course the actual wealthy French people did not respond like that. They responded more like, he wait a minute, just because I am raping the benefits of living in this country, and this country is in that our need of financialistic stars right now, and I have more money than I know what to do with. Why should I be the one to step up? Seems very wood Yes, So what is this communist country of

some sort? I mean, soon there's the government, there's out of cheddar let's meetre. Nobody's gotten in trouble for saying something like that before in France, so King Louis basically he was getting shipped from rich and poor like. So they tried to place this land tax on the wealthy. The wealthy were like no, now, so anyway, he wants everyone to pay. Nobody wants to pay tailors old. Yeah, nobody is happy when the government's taking their money, surprise, surprise.

And eventually this all came to a head, so to speak, with a lot of murders of royalty and nobility, Yes, a lot, many many men, a lot of murders. But of course a revolution, you know, they're messy, it's not a it's not a quick clean act. As we've seen, power loves a vacuum. So once there was no king, um, once the crown had been removed, so to speak, and

what kind of government did the French people want? Right at first they thought that we were going to be totally cool with a constitutional monarchy, which is where you have a king or queen said on the throne. But they have to co rule with a constitutionally organized government that was more representative of the people. Yeah, it kind of sounds like the Queen of England sort of yeah, yeah, like you're here, but it's not like you can just waive your scepter and things happen for you. You've got

to deal with representatives as well. So after killing just an absolute ton of people, a boatload, a bit, well a big boat, over seventeen thousand people were tried and executed in only a ten month period, and this is what's now called the Reign of Terror. But after this, a five member directory was created and these directors were

appointed by Parliament. But of course these directors were inept and corrupt, and they relied pretty hard on the army, which was led by a young general named Napoleon Buonaparte, and they used him to maintain their power. But eventually, unsurprisingly, Napoleon was probably looking around like, hmm, it seems like I'm the real power here, right, so he went ahead at stage Acuta appointed himself France's first consul and then

created France into an empire and crowned himself emperor. And this was the start of imperial rule in France, and a bunch of people were not cool with is because imperial rules a lot like a monarchy, not much different one guy with a scepter. Okay, so kind of were like get melted down all the scepters, sort over the scepter, look going for a different esthetic now. And the thing is, you see, every time someone becomes emperor, they always crowned themselves.

It's never like a group decision to have an emperor. It's always one guy saying, yeah, I'm going to do this now. So obviously some people are upset about it. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, these folks that did not get to say, I imagine and who got to be emperor or whether there even was one. They were still hoping to establish

France as a republic of the people. You know, and this clash eventually led to a Second French Revolution in eighty eight, when King Louis Philippe, the first constitutional monarchy was overthrown and Napoleon Bonaparte's nephew, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, was elected president. Okay, so Louis Bonaparte, this guy was popular, he had some good ideas, but you know, power went to his head. He kind of turned himself into an authoritarian president. But he wasn't even happy with that level

of power. So not long after his election, he just like his uncle, launched a coup d eta, reformed the constitution and crowned himself Emperor of France, Napoleon the Third. Him, oh, Napoleon the Third. If you remember from our brief little episode about Maximilian and Carlotta of Mexico, not in depth at all, he's the one who sent them over to rule Mexico as an empire. Now, plenty of people who had previously supported Prince President Louis Napoleon Bonaparte did not

approve of Emperor Napoleon the Third. They were like, you want to be a prince, you want to be a president? Great, we love that, Oh, you want to crown yourself emperor A not so sure as his views a little like something I do not like. Bit dicey. Right, So how did these people express their displeasure? Well, the best way

you could back then with newspapers. The Fourth of the States sounds like we're mocking the press and actue appreciate, but kind of like now, I guess you could say, or any time in history, there's plenty of newspapers that had very, very skewed bias in their news. Yeah, and there were two such newspapers. They were radical Republican newspapers called La Ravanche and La Marseilles. They were owned by

Henri Rochefort and edited by Pascal Gruse. And fun fact, Pascal Gruse actually wrote sci fi novels, including one about like how they wanted to they were launching a mission to like bring the moon closer to the Earth or something. I didn't even think of that, but I love that. In the eighteen you know of sixties, he's I guess there was actually after this was probably eighteen eighties, eighteen nineties. He's thinking all these same kind of things about space,

and that's really cool. He collaborated with Jules Verne quite a lot. He was the first to translate Treasure Island into French. So kind of a cool guy. But at this point in history, he's like editing these radical newspapers. He's trying to influence politics and get away from an imperial government. And one of the newspapers employees was a writer named Victor Noir. Victor was born even Salmon in northeast France in eighteen forty eight. He was the son

of a Jewish cobbler who had converted to Catholicism. So wait, this guy's name was Evan Salomon, and he thought, no, no, man, I need a cooler name than that. What about Victor Noir? I know, right, like in the dit in the shadows, like he's like a batman, right, he's doing like a deep throat thing. Or No, it's said that he liked to stand so that half his face was always the whole. Wow, Victor,

find your light? No. When he decided to become a writer after first trying and failing to be a watchmaker and then a florist, which I wanted, how you failed at being a florist? Look, I would fail at being a flora. I have tried just to be a florist at home. That's so true, you know. You say that, and you're absolutely right. I have no greens on myself, so maybe he just killed all plants like um. So, anyway, he decided I'm going to become a writer. He chose

the pen name Victor Noir after his mother's maid a name. Yeah, but he still thought that's name Victor. So anyway, A lot of Marseilles was Victor Noir's first apprenticeship as a journalist, and apparently it wasn't really much of a revolutionary or republican like. I don't think he really cared about politics at all, either in word or action. He was just but he was paid basically just like you know what, a job's a job. Whoever wants to hire me, I'm

here to check. So. In December of eighteen sixty nine, La Ravone published an article railing against the imperial rule of Napoleon the Third and of Napoleon the First, and of basically just about everything that's happened since the First Revolution,

on the website Marxist dot org. Prosper Olivier la Sagaret wrote that the bourgeois of France quote allow Napoleon the third, to plunder France, make her the vassal of Rome, dishonor her in Mexico, ruined her finances, vulgarized, debaucherie, harsh indeed, And these aren't words from the actual piece in La Ravanche. This was again written later, um, but we kind of chose these because they sort of contextualized the fight that was going on, the kind of tone that was going

on in the newspaper at the time. These were the complaints that the revolutionaries had against Napoleon the Third. So the piece in La Ravanche was inspired from afar by Pascal Grouse was probably just like, hey, you know, read a piece about Napoleon sucks. And one of the writers was like, I'm on it. Oh, I'm ready, I'm sharpening my pen nibs right now. That publish that. Well, as usual, not everybody liked this little op ed, least of all a guy named Prince Pierre Bonaparte maybe why that's that

old name there. Pierre was the pompous nephew of Napoleon the First, He was the cousin of Napoleon the third, and at least at first he had actually been on the side of the Republicans. He was not very supportive of Emperor Napoleon, not down with this whole empire thing. No, as a as a politician, when he was active in politics, he actually was like, oh, that coup was not cool.

He voted with the socialists. He was just very much about the Republic of France, very publicly, and apparently that kind of helped Napoleon's presidential campaign for for his you know, relative to be out there being like, yeah, part rule, but as a president republic, everything's going to be great. Yes. And then as soon as Napoleon was like, actually I'm gonna be an emperor Napoleon the Third, Pierre was like boo,

not cool. But then Napoleon the Third went over to Pierre and was like, hey, um, what about if I made you a prince? And suddenly Pierre's politics took a giant swing in another direction unknown reasons. I'm sure actually I was wrong. It turns out that the Emperor Napoleon is a great idea. Everybody'll be on board. By the way, call me prince turns out being a monarch pretty cool. So yeah, they reconciled. Pierre accepted the title of prince.

After that, Obviously, the radical Republicans were like, um, okay, they dropped this guy like a bad habit. He went on to lead kind of a hedonistic life. He wrote some mediocre poems. He did nothing of political importance at all except for what's about to go down. So let's find out more about that after a little break. Welcome

back to the show. Everyone. Okay, so are boy Pierre the cousin of Napoleon the third, but now prince He's pissed about this menal piece of writing about his family that's going around in law Vane right this this article it's written, that's totally decrying all of the imperial stuff that's been going on with the Bonapartes. So he decides to do some writing of his own. Time for a

strongly worded letters. He picks up a quill. A few days after love valance article came out, his response was published as a letter to the editor in the rival newspaper Levanier de la Course, which was loyal to the Emperor. He denounced the rights and the editors of La Vane as cowards and traders. Well, that, of course really piste off Pascal Grouse over at La Ravanche, and he demanded satisfaction,

he challenged Pierre to a duel. This is like if if I don't know, if like Dawn Lemon right and Sean Hannity and Sean Hannity, we're like, I challenged you to a duel. That's an overreaction. So Pierre was like, Okay, I'm down to fight somebody, but not Pascal. He wanted to face his fellow nobleman on Ri Rochefort would have been the guy, like the head hauncho over there, Yeah,

who owned the paper. So Pierre wrote in a letter to Rochefort, quote, after having outraged each of my relations, you insult me with the pen of one of your menials. My turn had to come only I having the advantage over others of my name of being a private individual while being upon the part, I therefore ask you whether your ink pot is guaranteed by your breast. I live not in a palace, but at fifty nine rude dotweel. I promise to you that if you present yourself, you

will not be told that I had left. Damn. So He's literally like, I want to make sure they you're asking cash that check? O't and I ain't no fancy, you know, emperor king up in a palace somewhere. Here's my address. Come see me. Guess what. I'm not gonna run. You're not gonna get there and find out that I'm Oh, he's out right now. He can't see you. He says, I'm going to meet you on the street. I'm ready

and waiting. Some harsh words. Harsh words. Well, Pascal was kind of like, you know what, I don't care you want to fight an I'm the one challenging you, and I'm still standing by my challenge. I will come to dotwheel up too sweet. So Pascal selected his seconds, Ulric defon Vier and Victor Noir. Victor Noir, that's our guy. And both these guys were employed at the newspaper, and they both clearly were in dire need of the linn. Manuel Miranda penned ten Dual Commandment song because they clearly

had no idea what they were doing. Those rules lay it out very clearly. It's true, and there's some accuracy in them from our research. True, there's actually way more than ten. By the way, many many more about all kinds of ways you can apologize, When to apologize, how to apologize and apology. It's very kind of takes the

fun out of it little bit. But if you're going to like use a gun to solve every imagined or real slight upon you or your family, I guess it makes sense to have a lot of roles about it. Rule number one, don't use a gun. I mean, okay, we talk it out, agree to disagree, agree to d so. One of the rules, one of the many rules of dueling, is that your seconds confer with the other guys seconds, and they try to solve the dispute without ever going

to the dueling fields. There's a reconciliation has to be worked on first, and that's kind of how most duels ended. Many duels never ended up actually being, you know, meeting on the field at sunrise and ten paces apart and all that. Ship. Mostly they ended with like, alright, fine, I'm over it was the time. Yeah, I mean, especially if you know you weren't sure about your skill versus the other guy, gil um. So. Yeah, most duels did not end very bloodily or anything like that. But Victor

and Ulric didn't conform to these rules. They skipped the seconds completely and they went straight to Pierre's house to talk to him personally. In Januar seventy. They confronted him directly at his home, and apparently they both showed up armed. Al Ric had a revolver and Victor had a sword cane, which is cool. According to Ulric de Fonvier, Pierre was offended that they weren't following the dueling customs, and he didn't want to deal with these menials as they were

calling them. But these these minions, so he was more than happy to duel his fellow nobleman Rochefort, as he said in his letter. But Cruse and the rest could get the funk out of here, right. I don't feel like dealing with you. You're nobody to me. I could kill all three of you, and I'm still not going to be satisfied. So why don't you just get out the way, Let the grown ups handle it. Y'all get out of here. So he then slapped the twenty two

year old Victor in the face and shot him dead. Now, according to Pierre, Vic Dirt was offended at being called a menial, and he slapped Pierre in the face, whereupon Pierre shot him dead in response. Now, this was the version that was eventually accepted by the court. And all we can think is that if only if only their slap had been as widely televised as another slap that we could say that was heard around the world, there would be so many terrible takes. Everybody would have published

a letter in response. Well, kind of like that, this

incident was immediately politicized. People were furious about a journalist being killed at the hands of an imperial prince, and Victor Noir became a symbol of revolutionary politics, like it basically became sort of mandatory, was like civic duty for any Republican to attend his funeral um, and there was apparently that like a funeral proSP sh of a hundred thousand or some sources say two hundred thousand people that like showed up to more in Victor Noir and his

martyrdom for the revolution. Right, And this was a guy who just happened to take this job. He didn't even care that much about the politics. But because of because a imperial prince shot him dead, he's he's this symbol without ever having meant to be. Yeah. Also, anytime a Republican stood for election, they basically had to say the slogan a combo Victor Noir, which means he was in Victor Noir's convoy and I think probably more accurate translation is like, you know, I was in the procession, I

followed Victor Noir. I'm a fan of Victor Noir. I stand with Victor Noir. Um, so yeah right away, like literally before he's cold. You know, he's a huge revolutionary symbol. They all had to put that hashtag in their Twitter bios, and when Pierre was ultimately acquitted of murder at his trial, there was a huge outcry and a number of violent demonstrations.

According to Andy Royston's piece Scandal in the Graveyard on jack quo dot com, the jury during this trial heard Victor Noir quote portrayed as a thug who assisted various Republican writers to go around and beat up opponents or people they disliked with impunity. Medical evidence showed that Noir, far from just slapping Prince Pierre, hit such a blow on his cheek as to cause it to swell, so maybe punched him rolled hard. So they dismissed the murder

charge as self defense. I don't know, it seems like if you're in self defense, like your defense should match the aggression that you're defending against instead of like, oh, someone slapped me, so I shot him dead that he's like noted he might have slapt me again. Then I would be slapt twice. I had to do whatever I could prevent that outcome. Outcome. Oh man, yeah, that's a lot. I also just like I'm seeing this slap, punch in the face and this prince just you. I've never why,

I never I'm going to shoot you? Did I don't know? Way's British all of a sudden, but what happened. It's just he slapped the French out of him. You slapped the French out of me, my goodness. So yeah, Pierre basically walks away free of charge, no problem for him. Meanwhile, La Ravange was seized by the government and Henri Rochefort

and Pascal Grouse both went to prison for six months each. Well, you know when your imperial government, when you're the Pere government, and one of your princes gets away with murder and then the newspaper that was speaking out against you gets shut down and its editors arrested. That's just that's the that's the system. That's fair legal system, fair trial. Clearly nothing going in anyone's favor on this one. No strings being pulled. What did they go to prison for? I

have to I'm like, for having a paper. Let's just kind of stuff. I guess they're like and re roach for particularly didn't have much of a part to play in this that this guy wanted to pick a fight with him. So I'm like, that guy was probably like hanging out eating dinner or something, and suddenly I watch.

What's funny about all this is that it kind of ended up not mattering very much because later in eighteen seventy, the Franco Prussian War led to the overthrow of Napoleon the Third They established the Third Republic, and that's kind of the end of the story until Victor Noir's body was moved to the pair l Ches Cemetery in eighteen nine. Do you want so, let's find out more about that after this short break. Welcome back to the show, everybody.

All right, well, we know what you're thinking here, right, Where the hell is the romance? I know, with a two commercial breaks and nothing sexy? Right, this is all just a bunch of dudes running around slapping each other. There's nothing sexy about that. Yeah, what's hot about that? All right? Okay, here it comes. This is where it gets good because in the Third Republic decided that they

needed to create a new monument to Victor's martyrdom. They're thinking, this is a guy who who died trying to stand up uh to imperial you know, to the to the to an imperial prince trying to push people around. You know, he's trying to stand up for freedom of speech, and he died in the process. So they built this new monument for him in pair La Chase Cemetery and this is going to be sculpted I Juse delu Jules decided

to cast Victor in bronze in a realistic style. He would be on his back as though he had just fallen on the street, dropping his hat beside him. Cool statues. He just didn't look like he had just been shot at right, really immortalized like his martyrdom, like the moment where it all happened, you know, and not just a guy standing there like any other dude, just standing there. But it's well made to a lot of good details,

close and everything and so hard. But a lot of times you make in these metal and rock these beautiful layers and clothes, like soft looking clothes and veils and stuff. It's very Sculpture is my my I get my favorite art form. I don't know. It's the one that consistently I am blown away by every piece of sculpture I've ever seen. It's seriously like if you have a piece of a rock or a piece of metal and you I mean paper clip animals and I'm like, wow, what

a bull. This was just a paper clip and now it looks like a giraffe. I am amazed. So Delu makes this sculpture. Andy Royston writes, quote, he was now a romantic heroic figure, quite unlike how he had been in real life. As we talked about like Pierre, you know, he wasn't even really trying to do anything. He just happened to get killed in such a way that made

him a martyr for the Republic. Now, this statue did have a unique feature because, for whatever reason, Jules Delu gave Victor a pretty sizeable bulge in the crotch of his pants. He's laying back, dropping his hat. He's presumably has just been shot a semi but but Victors, like, you know, let's give him a little boost here, let's give him a little reputational boost. I guess. Let me pull into speculation station, and I want to know. I want to speculate why he chose to give him a bulge.

Do you think he was just like really realistic and he's like, this is what it looks like when a man lays down. There's something his pants. Yeah, we all know that there's a bulge there. Whatever. Or do you think he was like, man, this guy was a real martyr. You know what, I want to give him some big dick energy. Hey, you know what I'm going to say. Jules Deliu himself was quite well endowed, and he didn't

know any better. He didn't know the difference. He was like, this is what it looks like when you lie down. I don't know, You've got this huge mountain of your pants and you cannot hide it. Victor in Death is like, wow, but thank you thanks to this defining feature of this sculpture. A myth kind of grew about his his monuments, his monuments, his monagement and this is this myth kind of maybe

started maybe around the nineteen seventies. Hard to peg peg They of dicks in the nineteen seventies, so of course every statue that they could find it like, how does he look? How is it? Oh, this one's pretty good compelling. So this myth grew that if women kissed his bronze lips and rubbed on his bronze bulge, uh, they would

get married within the year. And then that myth grew even further to include all kinds of good things that could happen, including getting pregnant, falling in love um or just having a blissful and idyllic sex life now on, just from rubbing this guy's I know, I'm like, what did Victor Noir have anything to do with sex at all? So funny, but this all happened because of this bulge. I guess everybody's eyes were just immediately drawn to this

one area of the sculpture. The story also goes that Victor was supposedly um supposed to get married the day after he was shot. Maybe that contributed, but I couldn't find any verification for that, so it might just be part of the whole fertility myths around it grew around it that that he was like, yeah, has some romance going on in his life or something like that. But again,

there's really not a lot to back that up. When you have kind of of a loosely formed story, you know, it's easy for other facts to kind of come in and penetrate it. They can really just like poke up out of nowhere. Um kind of surprise you. You can just insert anything into a pocket like that. Um. So. At any rate, this fertility myth has made Victor Noir's grave one of the most popular to visit in the Pairless Chase Cemetery, which is saying a lot considering the

amount of celebrities that are buried there. What is it? Morrison and Oscar Wilde. Women will visit and passionately kiss his mouth. They will get up on the statue and like grind up on him. They'll give the bulge a little caress just with their fingertips, maybe if they're shy, some women a little shyer than others, I imagine. And the rest of his statue is that gray green color, which, by the way, is a name. I didn't know this.

It's called vertegree. The color like the way the statue of Liberty looks now, used to be bronze, obviously a different color m but it gets oxidized it turned into this gray green color we're all very familiar with. So Victor's whole statue is this Vertegree color except for his mouth and his bulge, which are noticeably shinier than the rest from all of the contact with human hands. And this is just a funny thing about bronze statues. You

can find this. Statues of dogs particularly has this because people will pet their heads or their noses, which I think it's so cute. It's such a human thing to just be like, oh, a cute dog, even though it's not a real dog, just like pet him. And quite a few statues will have kisses on their lips or you can have any kind of sexual part. You can see what people like to touch on them. So this is happening to Victor's grave, and all the pictures are

just so obvious. It's very funny. And also, once you're satisfied visited Victor and you've rubbed up on him however you want, once Victor's given you all he can give, all he can give you, you are supposed to leave a flower in his hand or in his hat to thank him for his services. That's polite, isn't it. I think that's such a nice touch. You gotta show up with a flower. You're not just supposed to grind up

on a guy leave him feeling cheap. You gotta show appreciation. Um. So if you happen to go to pair Laches and there's a rose or two in Victor's hat, he got some that day, baby. Wow. I'm wondering about, uh, this is just women like you know, if I'm feeling frisky and I want to boost my sex life, can I can I go, uh give give myself a ride on on Victor's grave here's grave. I have to wonder that too, because I mean it does say women particularly um to

get married within the year. That's sort of where the story started. So I wonder if it's just yeah, if it's just about getting pregnant, you know, just very women based things. Well, but I think you're right. It's surely plenty of men would be interested in in an idyllic sex life. And of course we know not just women can get pregnant. So I suppose anybody can go have a ride, have a good time with Victor. I wonder if anyone's written this face and kissed his bolt, you know,

switched it up a little bit. I'm gonna I'm gonna say definitely, yes, you're probably right. If you can think, if you can dream, it's someone now, Okay, may be in all this you're like me and you're thinking, I don't why am I going to kiss the same statue that for decades now does hundreds, maybe thousands of people have been putting their lips on as well. Diseases, right, just just the transfer of saliva in general. Against in that respect, I am against it, but at least in

terms of the diseases. Fortunately, you may have learned this in recent years during the pandemic because I have copper and it's alloys bronze and brass are antimicrobial. They apparently kill nine percent of bacteria. But it does take within two hours for that to happen. So maybe if you're in line to give old Victorius smooch here on his face or bulge, maybe maybe give it a couple hours

before before the last the last person. Yeah, I imagine someone in line, like there's a big crowd, keep trying to well, I'll wait, I'll wait a minute. All sits up, and they're just there all night. Tend to get out there like waiting watching their cloth. I like this idea in our head that there is constantly like a ninety person line outside that's grave. It can't be that. I seriously doubt it. But in my mind, it's just an enormous crowd right every day since n just at least

fifty people crowding around. But then around two thousand four two thousand five, cemetery management got kind of over it. They were a little upset about all these women getting up and literally grinding on this tomb. So they put a fence around Victor's grave, along with a sign warning that they would prosecute any damage caused by quote indecent rubbing. So France's biggest buzz kills coming in and saying, stop

disgracing this poor man's grave. You know that grave? The grave maintenance workers just like God, damn it every time I try to go there, and the grass some crazy trying to have a good sex life. Meanwhile, if if desecrating a grave does matter to someone in the afterlife, I kind of wonder if Victor is not looking down and being like, no, take the fence down, are you kidding me? I've ever got He's like, this is amazing. Nobody wanted to grind on me in life. I've been

getting a steady trickle since trickle. But here's the kicker. A well known Paris TV reporter named Perry coshin lad this kind of tongue in cheek protest that allowed women to put their tongues on Victor's cheeks. And even though this was like actually something kind of a joke, like this protest wasn't really happening, it was sort of like a fake report about it happening, the cemetery took the fence down, which I love it. It's like all these

women are very upset about this and they're enraged. The cemeteries are okay, fine, take it down. What harm could it do? And I oh and famously Dita Vontiste did go visit Victor Noir as well. I guess after the fence came down. And there's lots of pictures of her, you know, sexily grabbing a space sexily, you know, sexily. That's a word, right, tells you a sexy sexually? I do think around here, say it to me sexily, Yeah,

that's about what it's like. Yeah, okay, fine, seductively grabbing his face and and jumping up on him and stuff like that. So if you want to see those, they're pretty hot. That's amazing. I can't believe we went to pair Leches and we didn't notice a guy with the gleaming bronze bulge. All right, as like, so, I wish we had on this podcast before we gone to Paralles because it would visit many different graves now than we did when we were there. Once again, we'll we'll just

have to come back. I'll have to petition the government of France to bring us over. So if you're in the government of France and you want to sponsor our trip to Paris, please contact us. I did. We did have one listener reach out and say something about how we should do a tour of France and French history, and I was like, please, that comessolutely amazing. The problem is we're going to have done all these episodes before we ever get there, so we'll just have to retell you.

So yeah, it's just so interesting. This story is fascinating because there was just this twenty two year old like whatever, trying to live his life and then now he's it's just gone. He's just had such a journey and death to becoming a revolutionary symbol that he never get really cared about fertility symbol that I mean, who knows actually like a player in life. We just don't know anything about what he was like. Yeah, he's been very obscured by this this, these myths that kind of sprung up

around him. I do know that he by the time he was twenty two, he was a failed watchmaker and florist, which is like, I mean, I know, you know, nineteenth century, you started things a lot earlier back then, but jeez, by twenty two, I hadn't even begun to decide a career for myself. I had yet to fail and started anything to fail. This guy's failed two things already. That's true. So did that speak to desperation or ambition? Oh? Good question? Or do you think he was just like I'm just

trying to get paid. I don't care. I was watchmaker fucking sucked. I don't like gears, so I was like, oh man, I hate gears. How did I end up? I went to flowers they all died, so that I was like, what can anyone do I know write about politics? I can come up with some hot takes. So yeah, I thought I thought we could pull into speculation station and decide for everyone what kind of man this was. Yeah, we had like one source say that he was known

as a womanizer in life. Another source said there was nothing to indicate that he was any sort of stud in life. So those are very conflicting of information. Um. And then of course we have the trial saying that he was just this heavy that came into just intimidates Yeah for the writer, like maybe he wasn't even a writer at all. He was just there to be like hulking in the background, this guy like you better still in that statement, you know, so I don't know what

do you think do you think he was? Do you think he punched Pierre in the face? Do you think that he was this womanizer? We're in speculation station right now. I'm going to say definitively that, first of all, seems it's dubious or again the Imperial government at court to decide that this guy was some bruiser who went around beating people up for no reason. So I'm saying in terms of the punch, absolutely not. He had no idea what was happening Pierre, Like Pierre said, oh, look a

baguette and like them there and he turned around. Victor turned around and he said, I don't see a baggett. And we turned back around. Pierre punch sucker punched him right in the face and then shot him. Wow, that's what I'm saying happened. And then in terms of him being a lover boy, um, you know what, I like that. Uh, in the afterlife he's getting all this action at his

grave site. So I think I think he was not a stud I think he was just like a quiet, shy little dude, wrong place, wrong time, and now he's just gifted with getting grinded on. For I like that story. It's harder to think about a guy who would go around and intimidate witnesses and stuff. There was just kind of just some asshole who punched a prince in the face, got shot at the street. Now getting all these hot

French ladies, that's cool. Um, so I like that. Let's say definitively that Victor deserves this, this these tributes definitively speculatively speculative, that's our that's our answer. We're sticking to it, and the Noir estate is welcome to correct us. But bonapartes, we're not going to hear it, So you guys are too too shady, can't trust it. What's funny too is just this. I mean literally, these were guys just writing letters and they decided to save some really insane real

world consequences. They're saying just some strong words. But on the other hand, strong words are strong words. They do hurt, so you know, it's it's a lot like the slap we're all talking about. Now. When is it okay to be vile into or whatever? Yeah, yeah, I'm sure everyone in the world is is well qualified to chime in. Definitely, definitely well qualified. Here's what I want to hear from and and this this is probably homework for our listeners

out there. I want to know, of those folks who've been grinding up on this statue, what was the outcome? Did you all get married within the year? Did you have a crazy sex life from then on? Out? Do do you do? You walk into a bar and say, hey, I like to grind on statues and then you have like your pick. Everybody is like, well, whatever you want then, you know, because I mean, if you know, girl walked up to me and she was like, I mean, hell,

I'll just hump a statue. If it's in front of me, I'm going to at least follow up with a few questions. So he probably does improve your sex life to some degree? Right? Do people get pregnant from the statue? Has anybody had a little statue baby, a little bronze statue? Have they oxidized? Are they? Are they ver? Ver degree? Now? Look, these are the questions I need answers. Tis, if you've ever grinded up on Victor Noir, I want to know what

happened afterwards? Does it work? I feel like probably so many people do it just to do it. Yeah, So do you think you have to have the intention also in your mind? I think I think it's I think with magic like that, you can mess around. It's if you do it, it's going to happen. It'll happen. I'm gonna happen. Yeah. All right, Well, then we need to hear from you. If you've gone to paralyches and climbed up on this bulge. I want to know more. Yeah, so contact us. Our email address right now is ridic

Romance at gmail dot com. Right, you can find us on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at Oh great, it's Eli I'm at Dyanamite Boom and follow along the show at ridic Romance on both those platforms as well. We've got lots of fun memes announcements you're going to hear all about it. Don't forget to check out the brand new Ridiculous show Ridiculous News. Mark Kendall and Bill Warley to

amazing Atlantic comedians. Yes we know them a little bit personally and awesome people, super cool so make a lot of really great comedy as well, So check out their show, their videos, Mark Kendall's I think it's called Mark Kendall Comedy their channel, and it's very they're very good, it's amazing, very happy to have them in the Ridiculous family. That's right. Thanks again to at sam Seacombs Samantha M for this suggestion.

This was such a fun story to kind of dive into, so weird and funny and random, and I'm so glad we got to look at this and revisit our favorite place, parach So thanks Agains, Samantha, and thank you all for listening, and don't forget to tune next week we'll have some exciting new episodes and we'll catch it in love you bye, so long friends, it's time to go. Thanks so listening to our show tell your friends names, uncle's, and this to listen to what's so ridiculous? Well, yes,