Bal Des Ardents

Anyone interested in this should check out Froissart's Chronicles [0], written at the height of chivalric culture. Some of the imagery and descriptions of battle are astounding even today. The Bal des Ardents is the third image seen in [0].

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissart%27s_Chronicles

I always thought this was a failed assassination attempt: "Now, now, your highness, don't dwell on the fact that your mental illness has become a major liability to the nobility and just have fun tonight! And by "fun", I mean, allow me to sew you into this highly flammable costume and chain you up to these other dancers, also in highly flammable costumes. It's really the done thing, you know. You'll be fine unless your brother, who is next in line to inherit the throne, happens to show up and start poking a torch at the dancers."

French royal weddings seemed like a dangerous place to be. A few centuries later, over a hundred people died at the wedding of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI[1], trappled to death fleeing a fire started by a firework mishap.

[1]: https://findery.com/ChiefCurator/notes/tragedy-at-the-weddin...

Funny coincidence, I'm currently reading "de Bourgondiers"[0] and this event was just mentioned in the passage I read yesterday.

[0]: https://www.flandersliterature.be/books-and-authors/book/the...