Everything about Vrain Denis-lucas totally explained
Vrain-Denis Lucas (
1818 -
1880) was a
French forger who sold counterfeit letters and other documents to French manuscript collectors. He even wrote purported letters from biblical figures using contemporary French.
Vrain-Denis Lucas was trained as a
law clerk, but by 1854 he'd begun to forge historical documents, especially letters. Lucas begun by using writing material and self-made inks from the appropriate period and forged mainly documents from French authors. He collected historical details from the Imperial library. As his forgeries were more readily accepted, he began to produce letters from historical figures.
In
1861 Lucas approached French mathematician and collector
Michel Chasles and sold him forged letters for
Robert Boyle,
Isaac Newton and
Blaise Pascal. In one of them Pascal supposedly claimed that he'd discovered the laws of
gravity before Newton. Since this would have meant that a Frenchman would have discovered the gravity before an Englishman, Chasles accepted the letter and asked for more. Lucas proceeded to sell him hundreds of letters from historical and biblical figures, using contemporary French.
Over 16 years Lucas forged total of 27,000 autographs, letters, and other documents from such luminaries as
Mary Magdelene,
Cleopatra,
Judas Iscariot,
Pontius Pilate,
Joan of Arc,
Cicero and
Dante Alighieri - written in contemporary French and on watermarked paper. The most prominent French collectors bought them, helping Lucas accumulate a significant wealth of hundreds of thousands of francs.
In 1867 Chasles approached the
French Academy of Science, claiming to have proof that Pascal had discovered gravity before Newton. When he showed them the letters, scholars of the Academy noticed that the handwriting was very different compared to letters that were definitely by Pascal. Chasles defended the letters' authenticity but was eventually forced to reveal that Lucas had sold them to him.
When Academy members complained about the anachronisms in the letters, Lucas had to forge more letters to explain away his earlier mistakes. Debate continued on to 1868 and the next year he was arrested for forgery. In the following trial Chasles had to testify how he'd been duped, how he'd purchased large numbers of other forged letters and how he'd paid total of 140,000-150,000 francs for them.
In February 1870, the Correctional Tribunal of Paris sentenced Vrain-Denis Lucas to two years in prison for forgery. He also had pay a fine for 500 francs and all legal costs. Chasles received no restitution for all the money he'd wasted on the Lucas forgeries. After his sentence Lucas disappeared from the public eye.
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