# Duellum · Duel

Les Fleurs du mal · Charles Baudelaire · Spleen and Ideal

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/duellum. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/duellum.json.

**1** Deux guerriers ont couru l'un sur l'autre, leurs armes  
Two warriors have rushed upon each other, their weapons
> «l'un… l'autre» (reciprocal): «l'un sur l'autre» = 'one upon the other' — the reciprocal construction «l'un… l'autre» expresses that the action is mutual: each warrior charges at the other. Here it sets the two combatants as mirror images locked in a single mutual assault.

**2** Ont éclaboussé l'air de lueurs et de sang.  
have spattered the air with flashes and with blood.
> éclabousser: «éclabousser» = 'to splash, to spatter' (as mud or liquid flung up). Pairing «lueurs» (glints of steel) with «sang» under one verb makes light and blood splash together — the sparks of the blades and the gore become a single spray.

**3** Ces jeux, ces cliquetis du fer sont les vacarmes  
These games, this clashing of steel are the uproar

**4** D'une jeunesse en proie à l'amour vagissant.  
of a youth in the grip of love still wailing in its cradle.
> vagir / vagissant: «vagir» is the verb for the cry of a newborn; «vagissant» = 'wailing like an infant'. Calling this violent love «vagissant» makes it brand-new and helpless — a love so young it still cries in the cradle, even as it arms itself for combat.


**5** Les glaives sont brisés! comme notre jeunesse,  
The swords are shattered! — like our youth,

**6** Ma chère! Mais les dents, les ongles acérés,  
my dear! But the teeth, the sharpened nails,

**7** Vengent bientôt l'épée et la dague traîtresse.  
soon avenge the sword and the treacherous dagger.
> traître / traîtresse: «traîtresse» is the feminine of «traître» ('treacherous, traitor'), agreeing with «la dague» (the dagger). The adjective makes the broken blade itself faithless — and as the weapons fail, teeth and nails take up the quarrel in their place.

**8** — Ô fureur des coeurs mûrs par l'amour ulcérés!  
— O fury of hearts ripened, ulcerated by love!
> An adjective and a past participle on one noun: «mûrs» is the masculine plural of the adjective «mûr» (ripe, mature) — not a past participle (which would be «mûris»). «ulcérés» is a past participle meaning 'ulcerated, made raw', with «par l'amour» ('by love') as its passive agent. The two words both modify «coeurs», but only «ulcérés» takes «par l'amour» as its agent. Love both ripens and festers these mature hearts — the same force that brings them to fullness also leaves them as open sores.


**9** Dans le ravin hanté des chats-pards et des onces  
In the ravine haunted by wildcats and snow-leopards
> chat-pard / once: «chat-pard» (from «chat» + «pard», leopard) is an archaic name for a spotted wildcat — a leopard-like cat, not the «guépard» (cheetah); «once» is an archaic word for the snow leopard (cf. English 'ounce'). The rare, feral beast-names make the gully a wild, predatory place, fit for the savagery the two lovers are about to act out.

**10** Nos héros, s'étreignant méchamment, ont roulé,  
our heroes, clutching each other viciously, have rolled,
> Reflexive «s'étreindre» as reciprocal: «s'étreindre» = 'to embrace / grip each other'; the present participle «s'étreignant» here reads reciprocally — 'clutching one another'. The same verb covers a lover's embrace and a wrestler's grapple, so the embrace and the death-grip are one and the same gesture.

**11** Et leur peau fleurira l'aridité des ronces.  
and their skin will bring the barren brambles into flower.
> «fleurir» used transitively: «fleurir» normally means 'to bloom' (intransitive), but here it takes a direct object, «l'aridité des ronces» — 'their skin will flower the barrenness of the brambles'. Their torn flesh makes the dry thorns blossom: the wounds become the only flowers this wasteland will bear.


**12** — Ce gouffre, c'est l'enfer, de nos amis peuplé!  
— This abyss is hell, peopled with our friends!
> Inverted past participle «peuplé»: Normal prose order would be «peuplé de nos amis» ('peopled with our friends'). Baudelaire fronts the complement — «de nos amis peuplé» — for rhyme and emphasis, throwing the chilling phrase 'our friends' into the middle of the line: hell is already crowded with the people we know.

**13** Roulons-y sans remords, amazone inhumaine,  
Let us roll into it without remorse, inhuman amazon,
> Imperative + adverbial «y»: «Roulons» is the first-person-plural imperative of «rouler» ('let us roll'); the attached «y» = 'there / into it', pointing back to «ce gouffre» (this abyss). The pronoun clings to the verb in the imperative — 'let us roll down into it' — turning the fall into hell into a shared, willed plunge.

**14** Afin d'éterniser l'ardeur de notre haine!  
so as to make eternal the ardor of our hatred!
> «afin de» + infinitive (purpose): «afin de» + infinitive expresses purpose: 'in order to…'. The goal of the willed plunge into hell is «éterniser l'ardeur de notre haine» — 'to make our hatred's ardor eternal'. The final twist: damnation is embraced not to end the strife but to keep it burning forever.

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Source text: public domain (Charles Baudelaire, d. 1867). English translation: © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC — original draft, pending editorial review.