Nicolò Giraud

Nicolò Giraud (c.1795-?) is known for his involvement with Lord Byron at the age of 15 or 16 as both a friend and as a possible lover. He met the poet during the latter's stay in Athens, probably around 1810. They spent a great deal of time together, riding and swimming at the Pireus every day. Although there is no actual evidence to prove the nature of the relationship, Byron and Giraud's relationship has become a topic of speculation amongst biographers and scholars of Byron.

Biography

Giraud, the brother-in-law of the Roman painter Giovanni Battista Lusieri, was born in Greece to French parents. He worked at a monastery and was assigned to teach George Gordon Byron Italian when he either 15 or 16. In a letter from August 23, 1810 to his friend John Hobhouse written at the Capuchin monastery of Mendele near Athens where he was residing, Byron states: "But my friend, as you may easily imagine, is Nicolò who by-the-by, is my Italian master, and we are already very philosophical. I am his 'Padrone' and his 'amico', and the Lord knows what besides. It is about two hours since, that, after informing me he was most desirous to follow him (that is me) over the world, he concluded by telling me it was proper for us not only to live, but 'morire insieme' " [die together] ." The latter I hope to avoid - as much of the former as he pleases." [MacCarthy 2002 p. 128] The two would spend their days with their studies, with swimming, and taking in the landscape.Longford 1976 p. 40]

After Byron sought medical advice from a doctor about problems Giraud suffered from, rumors were spread by a servant that two were in a relationship. These rumors were reinforced by accounts from Michael Bruce and Lord Sligo. In the 1810s, Giraud was made Byron's major-domo when they traveled to Peloponnese. When Byron became ill at Patras, Giraud became his care taker and eventually became sick himself. [MacCarthy 2002 pp. 128–129] After both recovered, Byron continued with Giraud until they parted ways in Valetta. It was then that Byron saw to Giraud's education by paying for his schooling in a monastery on the island of Malta. The two stayed in communication through letters, and after a year, Giraud left the monastery after telling Byron that he was tired of the company of monks. Shortly after, Byron drew up in his will a provision for Giraud to the sum of 7000 pounds sterling, but later took him out of his will.MacCarthy 2002 p. 135]

The two continued to stay in communication, and Giraud wrote to Byron January 1815:

My most precious Master, I cannot describe the grief of my heart at not seeing you for such a long time. Ah, if only I were a bird and could fly so as to come and see you for one hour, and I would be happy to die at the same time. Hope tells me that I shall see you again and that is my consolation for not dying immediately. It is two years now since I spoke English. I have completely forgotten it.

Relationship with Byron

Byron's early biographer, Thomas Moore, described the relationship between Byron and Giraud as:

During this period of his stay in Greece, we find him forming one of those extraordinary friendships - if attachment to persons so inferior to himself can be called by that name - of which I have already mentioned two or three instances in his younger days, and in which the pride of being a protector, and the pleasure of exerting gratitude, seem to have constituted to his mind the chief, pervading charm. The person, whom he now adopted in this manner, and from similar feelings to those which had inspired his early attachments to the cottage-boy near Newstead, and the young chorister at Cambridge, was a Greek youth, named Nicolo Giraud, the son, I believe, of a widow lady, in whose house the artist Lusieri lodged. In this young man he appear to have taken the most lively, and even brotherly, interest. [Moore 1835 p. 114]

Regardless of Moore's bias against the lower class and Byron's spending time with other boys during his times in Greece, Byron was close to Giraud while the two were together. [Knight 1953 pp. 71–72] Byron became protective over Giraud, as Byron was with all of the other children that he met during his travels. [Knight 1953 p. 77]

Critics, like Benita Eisler, speculate that Giraud was one of many of Byron's intended sexual conquests. Although, as Eisler claims, was at first unable to attain "that state of total and complete satisfaction" of a sexual relationship with Giraud, he would write to Charles Matthews that he would soon conquer any of the boy's remaining inhibitions. [Eisler 2000 p. 273] During Byron's illness, Byron boasted to Lady Melbourne that he would have sex and that he almost died during one such incident, and boasted to Hobhouse of having frequent sex. Although it is uncertain, according to Eisler, "Whether this surfeit of erotic fulfillment involved only Nicolo as partner, he does not say. He was still fond enough of the boy, but his sexual obsession, with its attendant scorekeeping, seems to have run its course." [Eisler 2000 p. 274] However, Nigel Leask believes that Hobhouse would have been disapproving of Byron's relationship with Giraud. [Leask 2004 p. 111]

Others, like Jay Losey and William Brewer, speculate that Byron's relationship with Giraud was modeled on a Grecian form of pederasty [Losey and Brewer 2000 p. 75] and homosexual studies scholar Louis Crompton believed that pederasty was a facet of Byron's life and that his letters hinted towards a sexual relationship between Byron and Giraud. [Crompton 1998 p. 148] Crompton also claimed that biographers like Leslie Marchand ignored the nature of Byron's relationship with Giraud. However, Paul Douglass points out that Crompton's approach to Byron has many dissenters and that Crompton's work, "Byron and Greek Love" "focuses Byron's life around a single issue, rather than attempting to create a larger view. Such studies prompt negative responses from those who feel the writer warps Byron to fit the theme, presenting a one-sided account". [Douglass 2004 p. 22]

Many critics disagree with the speculation over Giraud's and Byron's relationship. Elizabeth Longford disagrees with the claims that there was a physical relationship between the two and argues, "Byron's especial favorite among the 'ragazzi' was Nicolo Giraud. He had first taken up with Nicolo while Hobhouse was away in Euboea the year before, but there is no evidence that his feelings for Nicolo were anything but romantic and protective". Jerome Christensen argues that "we know little more than what Byron tells us". [Christensen 1993 p. 59] However, Christensen is quick to point out that "Although there is no evidence that Lord Byron, "padrone" and "amico", was ever so vulgar as to set an exact market value on his sexual arrangements in Greece, Nicolo Giraud, Eustathius's replacement in Byron's affections, was employed as 'dragoman and Major Domo', a position that almost certainly entailed payment in love "and" money". [Christensen 1993 p. 61] The early 19th century biographer, Ethel Mayne, points out both the commonality of such a relationship to Byron and the inherent ambiguity when she says, "His stay was also marked by one of those amibiguous friendships with a youth infinitely below him in rank which have already been seen to recur in his life... The patron was supposed to be learning Italian from [Girard] ; this made a pretext for giving him, on their parting at Malta in 1811...a considerable sum of money". [Mayne 1913 pp. 179–180]

Notes

References

* Christensen, Jerome. "Lord Byron's Strength". Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993.'
* Crompton, Louis. "Byron and Greek Love: Homophobia in 19th-century England". Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1998.
* Douglass, Paul. "Byron's life and his biographers" in "The Cambridge Companion to Byron", Ed. Drummond Bone, 7–26. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004
* Eisler, Benita. "Byron: Child of Passion, Fool of Fame". New York: Vintage Books, 2000.
* Knight, G. Wilson. "Lord Byron: Christian Virtues". New York: Oxford University Press, 1952.
* Leask, Nigel. "Byron and the Eastern Mediterranean: "Child Harold" II and the 'polemic of Ottoman Greece'" in "The Cambridge Companion to Byron", Ed. Drummond Bone, 7–26. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004
* Longford, Elizabeth. "The Life of Byron". Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1976.
* Losey, Jay and Brewer, William. "Mapping Male Sexuality : 19th Century England". Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2000.
* MacCarthy, Fiona. "Byron: Life and Legend". New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002.
* Mayne, Ethel Colburn. "Byron" New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1913.
* Moore, Thomas. " [http://books.google.com/books?id=nloLAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Thomas+Moore+Life+Byron#PPA114,M1 The works of Lord Byron : with his letters and journals, and his life] ". London : J. Murray, 1839.