Francois Villon

Toreador -P- Paris -P- The History of the Clan of the Rose in Paris

Sobriquet: Votre Altesse...

Appearance: A dashing, well tanned Caucasian in his late 30s. Raven black hair , brown eyes, always wearing immaculate suits and flamboyant neckties (from his jongleur heritage). He smokes, with a cigarette holder.

History: Mortal Years

François de Montcorbier was born in 1431 in a poor family. Soon, fatherless, he is adopted by the chaplain Guillaume de Villon, teacher of Canon Law. François will receive from his more-than-father his name, Villon, a cultural, social and religious education. In 1443, he enters the Faculté des Arts, where he will become bachelier (Student who received his Baccalauréat diploma) in 1449. In 1452, Villon receives his Licence and Mastery in Art. As a student, between 1453 and 1455, he will participate in fights and raggings against the police.

In june 1455, François Villon, after being attacked by Phillipe Sermoise, priest, hurt him mortally. He will obtain in 1456 remission letters for his murder. After his house-breaking in the Navarre collegium, he will tell he composed, this night, to give himself an alibi, the Lais, also known as the Petit Testament (Little Testament). He will quit Paris in the beginning of 1457. An inquiry is opened in May and he will be betrayed by one of his accomplices. He will continue, then, to live an life of errand. He will be accepted in the courts of Charles d'Orléans, at Blois, where he will compose Je meurs de soif aupr�s the la fontaine (I die of thirst near the fountain). At this time of his life, he will be in relation with a gang of criminals, the Coquillards, and he will create in their cant poems full of linguistic games.

In 1461, he will be jailed in Meung-sur-Loire, and will be tortured by the bishop Thibaud d'Aussigny. The real reasons behind this are unknown, but this period will be created a lot of poems, like the Epître à ses amis, and the Débat du coeur et du corps. He will be freed by the coming of Louis the Eleventh in the city. He will start the writting of the Testament, to which he adds ballads the following year. In november 1462, he is accused of theft, jailed in the Châtelet, and then set free. In the same month, he will be caught in a fight against Ferrebouc, a pontifical notary, and will be jailed once more, tortured and condemned to be hang out where he write the Epitaphe Villon (also known as the Ballade des Pendus).

In january 1463 a new judgement will only condemn him to exile for 10 years from the city of Paris. He disappears, supposedly caught up by his violent past... He appears as the first modern french lyric poet...

Villon's Embrace, Anarch

He was, in fact, discovered by Helena, Fourth Generation Toreador, and searching for any clue about Meneleus's secret whereabouts. Charmed by the passion and violence of the mortal, she Embraced him and soon after disappeared in Portugal. She hoped Villon would prove a thorn to Alexandre, who had attacked the Toreador of Paris without any real provocation. Villon soon joined the Anarchs, where he met Ivan, against Alexandre's and Saviarre's rule.

He soon became leader of the Anarchs, and under his rule, the Anarch won their greatest victory the night Alexandre and Saviarre were destroyed in the Parisian uprising of 1481. Soon after, Beatrix stepped in and declared herself Prince of Paris, and started one of the first attempt to make peace with the Anarchs. Strangely, even if the Anarchs were losing grounds everywhere else in Europe, they still were quite powerful in Paris (some wondered if they had some Camarilla's help, and looked Beatrix with a suspicious eye...).

Feeling the change, Villon accepted the peace in exchange of the Convention of Thorns (1493), which gave the Anarchs the right to organize and defend themselves from Elder's attacks. As a proof of her sincerity, she made Villon her own Chamberlain, even if the Ventrue wanted his head for the crimes he committed! (Another proof of Villon's secret alliance with Beatrix?)

Working in Beatrix's shadow, he helped her keep the control of Paris from Ventrue's grasp.

While Beatrix organized the active resistance against the Ventrue Protestant forces, Villon worked his new project: making France the center of the world culture and art: He looked Paris as a new Alexandria. But For this, France would have to become under the only control of the Toreador Clan. So he worked hard to intrigue the incapacitation of any other Clan's mortal pawns, and so remove much of their influence. He will have to take over La Rochelle, a Major Ventrue/Protestant city, and destroy the Prince and his Bloodline there (1628)...

Beatrix, suffering the natural Paranoia of the Elder in position of power, decided to move away from Paris, always fast and deadly in its uprisings. Villon gave her the idea of moving the King and all the mortal court where they would be of no real danger. With her personal education and some intrigues, the King would become strong enough to take absolute power in France.

In 1661, Louis the Fourteenth, known as the Sun King, takes the absolute power of France. In 1682, he moves in the newly constructed Palace of Versailles, along with all the weakened Noblesse. In the same year, Villon takes the secret control of Louis XIV's armies and, as Beatrix declares the Toreador Hegemony, he uses the army to threaten the Princes of every important french city, reminding them of the La Rochelle example.

The Toreador Hegemony is accepted by the Princes of France, and they become Marquis. Villon is given the Louvre Palace Elysium by Beatrix.

But by advancing in his project, Villon lost his past Anarch ideals and became an effective and merciless Ancillae.

Ancillae

In 1694, he meet a young bourgeois 13-years-old girl he will fall in love with. He will educate her in the Kindred ways, preparing her to become one of the Kindred. In 1701, he asks Beatrix the right to Embrace the twenty-years old young woman in the night of her birthday. Beatrix accepts out of love for Villon hoping he will discover soon enough Elle is only a beautiful Poseur, and destroy her... But even as his love for her will cool down with the decades, he will discover she made of Intrigue a kind of art that would serve well her Clan...

In 1738, Alexis, who tried to further the Clan's intrigues in Russia, arrives in Paris. He will join Villon's coterie, composed by Villon, Arnaud, Elle, Ivan.

The French Revolution Will prove to be Beatrix final nights, and a great challenge for the Toreador rule over France.

He will remain in Paris until the declaration of the Republic, the 22 September 1792. He will come back in October 1795, and then will work hard to rebuild the Clan's influence in France.

Bonaparte was a young and ambitious general. Villon needed a pawn, and Bonaparte only needed a little help. After some investigations, Villon determined the respobsibilities of everyone involved in the Revolution: He framed first Madame Guil, who was discovered using the revolution to destroy Elders, whatever their Clans. Then he saw the hand of the Giovanni: His answer was to send Bonaparte destroy Venice. And then, he discovered the action of the Setite, and Bonaparte was sent in Egypt...

In the same time, a discussion between him and Alexis degenerated, and Alexis refused the position Villon had just asked him to take. Alexis removed himself from the parisian Kindred society, and used the Egypt Campaign as an excuse to quit Paris. Villon was eventually saddened, but he had still much to do to confort his position.

But even with his successes, his dream had still to come true: So he worked hard to get the power in Paris through his pawn, Bonaparte. In 1801, he met Raphael de Corazon, the Toreador Elder who helped create the Camarilla, and they shared the same vision about France. Raphael had come with a potential Childe he Embraced: Lazlo. Lazlo would remain in Paris, and take the abandonned position of Alexis.

Prince

In 1804, Bonaparte became Napoleon, Emperor of the French People. The next year, Villon becomes Prince of Paris.

There was only one slight inconvenience in the soirée or the Crowning: Saint Just was back, seemingly Embraced by Robin Leeland: He was the one who helped, through Madame Guil, Villon clean the Giovanni and Setite corruption of Paris...

But strangely, Villon started to give more and more responsibility to his lieutenants, who started to have a lot of power in the name of the Prince of Paris. Only Alexis, Elle, Ivan and Lazlo know about what happened to him, and what scheme he was now working on.

He succeeded in creating back the Toreador Hegemony after the Restauration: Villon received each Prince of all the French city, and had them drink some of his Blood as Allegiance. Failure to do so would lead to dire consequences: Each Prince, freshly freed from Beatrix' influence by the Revolution, accepted to become back Marquis as they still remembered La Rochelle.

The Toreador Hegemony was reborn.

He only awoke in 1871, while the Anarchs were fighting back the Camarilla forces in the Commune. The Anarchs burnt down buildings to destroy Elder Havens and delay the Elder army forces. They commited the major mistake of setting the Tuileries part of the Louvre on fire.

Villon's fury knew no bound! His own Art Library was destroyed in the fire, and for what reason? Just to delay some mortal armies! Because of their major involvement in the local Jyhad, because they violated an Elysium (the Louvre) and because they breached Villon's Edict about Art, A Great Blood Hunt was called against the Clan Brujah and the Anarchs of Paris.

To everyone's surprise, the Great Hunt was a success: Half the Brujah Elders remained in Paris, siding with Villon, and every Clan, from Ventrue to Nosferatu to Malkavian followed Villon's call...

Villon gave Labienus and his Bloodline the Palace of Versailles, the right to manage the Catacombs to the Nosferatu (but no one know about the reasons behind the help of the Malkavian...).

He officialized too the Cotterie of Ivan, called the Masques, who had served him well in the past and who will continue in the future, with a lot more of power and influence over the mortals and the Kindred or France. In the same time, the Veilleurs were created, too. If everyone believe Alexis asked Villon's permission to create them, the two are the only ones to know Villon asked Alexis to merge the occult knowledge he brought back from Egypt to find a solution about the growing Aura of Corruption. Then he went back to his own intrigues...

It was the War of Traditions which called him back: With the help of the Masques and the Veilleurs, he discovered the schemes of the Technocracy, and made an alliance with the Sons of Ether of Paris, thus reducing the Tremere and Order of Hermes influence in the french capital.

His next official decision was to declare a Blood Hunt on the Assamite (and everyone who used their services) in Paris for breaching the Sixth Tradition (One tried ot kill him in 1961), make a tentative alliance with the Setite and the Mamluk Prince of Cairo to help move the Temple of Abou Simbel from the flood of the new Nasser lake, and declare a Blood Hunt on the Giovanni in Paris because of the action of Pietro Giovanni in 1994.

But most important, he is finishing his Projet Grand Louvre, reconstructing large parts of his Haven and renovating others... When he can be seen, he is at the Cour, where his decision about what is gauche' and what is beau is usually final. While it is known that his seduction talent was null when alive, he haunts now the revues and the salons and other chic soirées where his success is unlimited. His own Herd is constitued by the most beautiful models in the world.

Personality: Generally maintain the "proper" front necessary for your position, but you were a rabble rouser in your mortal days and can look the other way concerning Anarch behavior as long as it is fairly amusing and not too blatant.

A great proponent of French superiority, your ballads helped define the French tongue and you will never speak another language, though you understand several.

You are pleasant and easy to get along with, and great fun at parties (occasionally, you can be persuaded to get out a stringed instrument and play), unless you perceive someone as a threat to you - then you will crush her like a bug. You have unpleasant memories of your exile from your beloved Paris and will not let anyone ever put themselves in a position of dominance over you again.

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