In the months of March-July in 1844, in the magazine Le Siecle, the first portion of a story appeared, penned by the celebrated playwright Alexandre Dumas. It was based, he claimed, on some manuscripts he had found a year earlier in the Bibliotheque Nationale while researching a history he planned to write on Louis XIV. They chronicled the adventures of a young man named D'Artagnan who, upon entering Paris, became almost immediately embroiled in court intrigues, international politics, and ill-fated affairs between royal lovers. Over the next six years, readers would enjoy the adventures of this youth and his three famous friends, Porthos, Athos, and Aramis, as their exploits unraveled behind the scenes of some of the most momentous events in French and even English history.
Eventually these serialized adventures were published in novel form, and became the three D'Artagnan Romances known today.
The last section of the novel is famous, in part, for building its plot around Dumas' hypothesis that the Man in the Iron Mask was Philippe, a twin brother to Louis XIV. Aramis plots a coup d’état to replace Louis with Philippe, whom he would obviously have some influence over (and hoping that Philippe in turn will assist in Aramis's own ambitions, to be a Cardinal and perhaps even Pope). Aramis entangles the trusting strongman Porthos in his scheme, although Porthos knows nothing beyond that he is taking orders from Aramis. Through subterfuge, he manages to switch the release orders for an innocuous prisoner for that of Philippe, and having gotten him out of the Bastille begins training him on how to act once he has exchanged places with the king.
