A lock of Napoleon I’s hair for sale in Monaco
A From Sunday and over four days, the Monte-Carlo Auction House (HVMC) is organizing its traditional auction. The last of the year. And on Wednesday, from 2 p.m., HVMC will hold the one dedicated to furniture and works of art. “Usually we organize it in November but this time we joined it with the other salessays Franck Baille, director of the Monte-Carlo auction house. In this sale we will have a fairly large collection of paintings that come from Parma (Italy) with some emblematic names Italian painting like (Giovanni) Boldini(Philip) From Pisis. There is a large part of old paintings, a part of Asian furniture arts.”
A wick at 4,000/6,000 euros
But among the 399 lots that will be put up for sale on Wednesday, it is probably number 208 that should be the talk of the town. Because it is simply a lock of Napoleon Bonaparte’s hair. “It is a wick given by Valérie Masuyer who was a lady-in-waiting to Queen Hortense, herself daughter of Joséphine de Beauharnais, first wife of Napoleon 1stsays Franck Baille. It was the valet de chambre, who was called Marchand, who, when Napoleon’s doctor made his death mask cast, cut off the locks to be able to apply the plaster and the cast. Marchand piously collected them.”
The lot is also made up of two scraps of fabric: a fragment of a flannel waistcoat from the former chefEtat as well as a piece of curtain from one of his pain beds in St Helena.
As for the provenance of such a piece, almost two hundred years later, the current owner, who is in the region “held it by his family from the Comte d’Eschoiard who owned the castle of Puligny Montrachet in Burgundy”adds Franck Baille.
The price of the lot is between 4,000 and 6,000 euros. SI dream of offering you but that you lack the money, know that a public exhibition is organized at the Monte-Carlo auction house each day of the sales.