Featured Signed Red Wax Seal Henri V of France

Now that you've seen the last letter as 'c', I can see the name as Mafriac. There is a place with that name:

https://books.google.com/books?id=V...lcQ6AEwDHoECAMQAQ#v=onepage&q=mafriac&f=false

 

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/S_long

 

Fid's post explains the use of the long S, when there were two s, the first one was a long!
I think Mafriac is a misspelling in the page you shown, should read MaSriac, and no place exists with this orthograph So, must be MaSsiac as I thought

Aahhh! Good link for the explanation of this strange shape of antique s letters, and the use of it
Another new thing I learned today on Antiquers
THANKS Fid

 

Well, I did say in my first post that I was not sure whether the third letter was an f or an s. The book at the link has been scanned in, so Mafriac is not an optical character recognition error, as abound when OCR is used to convert this sort of thing to plain text. The 'f' used in the book, with all parts above the line, is the non-finial 's', so that 'six' looks like 'fix'. The true 'f's have the tail below the line, as in Mafriac. However, there is no Massiac in the book, and both 'Mafriac' and Massiac are in the Departement du Cantal, so think you are correct. Compare the fourth letter of M. le Comte's name to the 'r' in Henry.

There was a Marquis de Massiac, well before the time of Henry V. (Why would a French king wannabe sign 'Henry' and not 'Henri'?) If there was a 19th century Comte, he did not leave enough of a mark to make Wikipedia.

 

It looks like here is a dot above the "y" in Henry. I think it is signed HENRI and what looks like a Y is just a flourish.

 

before more precious "Hirnschmalz" (noodles) get lost, please allow me a few remarks. There was no Henri V and there was no Comte de Massiac.
Henri d'Artois or "de Chambord" was a theoretical pretender to the throne. as were many others - to this day.
at the moment there are two main pretenders - Henri Philippe Pierre Marie d’Orléans as Henri VII. and Louis Alphonse Gonzalve Victor Emmanuel Marc de Bourbon, duc d’Anjou. and another few jokers from other lines...
they lived and live in a parallel universe, being addressed and addressing each other by useless titles and giving others titles that are - you guess it - complete BS as well.
same here with the Comte de Massiac; that could have been the mayor or the swineherd of the countryside that supported the royal cause.
the different forms of the long s will stay a problem as long as the books, documents etc. will be scanned by companies that have no historical interest and knowledge. even in English there are a few letters that are not used anymore, ð etc. and simply replaced by sensless cribbles.

to the value of such items. they get lower and lower even in France. the circles that may be interested mostly consist of "vegetables" that don't know what the internet is.
best would be to send a mail with sharp, clear pics to Drouot in Paris and ask if there is any interest.

 

Sorry I haven't replied I didn't expect such a rich discussion I've taken some better photos and threw a filter or two over the difficult to read sentence. But now given all the context of this thread it's obvious it says ("Henry V of France / Legitimist Pretender") which makes sense thank heavens

Henri V was the last in a male line of descendants from the House of Bourbon going back to Louis XV of France who died in 1774. The French Revolution of 1830 saw the House of Bourbon dethroned and the National Assembly of France voted and placed Louis Phillip, Duke of Orlean as monarch. The members of the House of Bourbon were referred to then on as Legitimist Pretenders and the House of Orleans as Louis Phillipes side came to be called were referred to as Orleanists. One of the House of Orleans parent families is actually the House of Bourbon so that makes it even more confusing.
Henri was supposed to become monarch in 1830 when he was 10 but the revolution halted this.

 

So ("FIDES / SPES") checks out as ("FAITH / HOPE") on the seal

I'm assuming the blackest text says signature acquired or was at Frohsdorf with a long s and crazy archaic flourish because why not.

Just the recipient left unknown, the M stationary stamp does lead you to believe he was partially recognised as such. This was a time of more genuine pretendership and I'd assume this man is probably genuine as far as names and silly titles go haha

 

I'm still wondering how the Order of the Garter comes into it:



This line from Wikipedia may be a clue: The motto in fact refers to Edward's claim to the French throne, and the Order of the Garter was created to help pursue this claim.

 

the English always had an affinity for such guys. the French lad stayed in England for a while and was obviously looked upon as some kind of French king by the English ruler. why not asking Dan Brown ? a new book which ends by Trump being the nephew of Merkel, which by herself is the illegitimate great-great-great-grand- daughter of the the last Duke of Lorraine; in the end the world is safed by Emmanuele Macceroni, who is the direct pretender to the throne of France via his ancestors from Parma which drank too much Bourbon and started with the habit of marrying their garndmothers...

 

In the weird way of the world, before this thread, I had never heard of Henri, Count of Chambord. Today I am holding on to a cameo portrait of his mother-in-law (Maria Beatrice of Savoy) for a European friend. (I act as his American poste restante.)

 

and: she was a very good example of inbreeding, she married her uncle...
no wonder certain royal families look a bit "funny" these days.

 

With special dispensation from the Pope. That caught my attention too. The cameo is inscribed on the front: M. Beat. Vit. History is not my thing, but Googling Maria Beatrice Vit... quickly got her. As well as an inbred looking descendant.