Sexuality, Magic and Perversion by Francis King Page B

neglected by the King and eventually persuaded to enter a nunnery. Nevertheless the King showed no sign of getting rid of his Queen and marrying Madame de Montespan and always the latter felt the fear of rival mistresses who might supplant her as she herself had supplanted La Valliere. In every crisis in her relationship with the King she resorted to magic. The Voisin girl stated that “every time that anything fresh happened to Madame de Montespan and she feared some lessening in the favour of the King she came running to my mother that she might provide some remedy; my mother at once called in one of the priests, whom she instructed to celebrate Masses, and then she gave her (La Montespan) powders that were to be administered to the King.” The powders in question, mixtures of real and supposed aphrodisiacs such as cantharides and dried cockerels’ testicles, had been consecrated by being passed under the Chalice at Amatory Masses.
    These Amatory Masses and aphrodisiac powders sufficed until 1673 when Madame de Montespan, alarmed by the King’s neglect, real or imaginary, resorted to stronger and darker magic. This time Guibourg officiated at the Mass, 8 the body of a masked, but otherwise naked, woman—probably Madame de Montespan herself—lay on the altar and a child was sacrificed. Details of the liturgy used are scant but it is clear that at the moment of Consecration a child’s throat was slit, following which its blood was drained into the Chalice (which stood on the pubic area of the woman on the altar) and the following prayer recited: “Ashtaroth and Asmodeus, Princes of Love, I beseech you to accept the sacrifice of this child which I now present to you so that I may receive the things I ask of you; that the love of the King may be continued … that the queen may become barren …”
    Following this prayer various gross sexual manipulations involving the Consecrated Elements took place—the host (the consecrated wafer of unleavened bread) was inserted into the vagina of the woman lying upon the altar and the genitals of Guibourg and the woman were washed with the mixture of wine and blood; some of this unpleasant confection was taken away by the woman in a glass vial in order thatit might be secretly administered to the King. Later the heart and entrails of the murdered child were returned to Guibourg for a second consecration; he was told that these were to be dried, powdered and, like the blood and the wine, given to the King in his food. 9
    In 1678 another series of Masses took place. The Voisin girl helped her mother prepare for the first of these; a mattress was laid on the altar, candlesticks with black candles stood on stools at its side. Guibourg wore a white chasuble embroidered with pine-cones—symbols of the god Dionysius—while Madame de Montespan lay naked on the mattress; the latter had proved too short and the favourite’s head dangled over the edge of the altar where it was supported by a pillow placed on a chair. A child was again sacrificed and the blood, said the Voisin girl, “was carried away with the wine and the wafer to be distilled”.
    All was in vain; Madame de Montespan slowly began to lose the King’s favour. Someone, just possibly de Montespan herself but more probably one of her ladies-in-waiting, decided to use magic not for love but for death—to celebrate a Mass designed to encompass the King’s destruction.
    This Mortuary Mass, celebrated by Guibourg at the home of La Voisin, involved even more sexual unpleasantness than the Amatory Masses. 10 Guibourg’s own account, given under interrogation, goes: “Clad in alb and stole I officiated at a conjuration at La Voisin’s in the presence of La des Oeillets, 11 who wanted to put a death charm upon the King and was accompanied by a man who supplied the rubric of the conjuration. For the rite it was required to have the sperm of bothsexes 12 but since des Oeillets was having her monthly period menstrual blood was