Pierre Plantard

Pierre Plantard de Saint-Clair
Born
Pierre Athanase Marie Plantard

18 March 1920
Paris, France
Died3 February 2000(2000-02-03) (aged 79)
Paris, France
NationalityFrench
Other namesThuradane Vrix (Hand of Sion)
OccupationArchitect
Known forFounder of the Priory of Sion, esotericist, medium, con artist

Pierre Plantard de Saint-Clair (born Pierre Athanase Marie Plantard, 18 March 1920 – 3 February 2000) was a French technical artist,[1] best known for being the principal fabricator of the Priory of Sion hoax, by which he claimed from the 1960s onwards that he was a male-line Merovingian descendant of Dagobert II and the "Great Monarch" prophesied by Nostradamus.[2] Today in France, he is commonly regarded as a con artist.[3]

  1. ^ Jean-Luc Chaumeil, "Les Archives du Prieuré de Sion" (Le Charivari, N°18, 1973)
  2. ^ Marie-France Etchegoin & Frédéric Lenoir, Code Da Vinci: L'Enquête, p.61 (Robert Laffont, 2004).
  3. ^ L'ABC de RLC – l'Encyclopédie de Rennes-le-Château, page 180: "Personnage emblématique de l'affaire de Rennes-le-Château, éminence grise et co-auteur de livres avec l'écrivain Gérard de Sède, dessinateur industriel, ésotériste et médium sous le nomen de Chyren, directeur, journaliste et gérant de la revue Circuit, mystificateur". (Marseille: Éditions Arqa, 2009). ISBN 2-7551-0031-1