Académie Royale de Danse other documents, however, it is clear the number is correctly stated. The identity of the omitted thirteenth member has long been a point of disagreement among dance historians. Gaston Vuillier forwarded Beauchamp as the missing member, while Régine Astier (Kunzel) unabashedly claimed it was Henri Prévost. Both were wrong. The original document signed by King Louis XIV was preserved in the French National Archives, and upon its close inspection in 1997 by scholar Maureen Needham, the thirteenth name was revealed to be “Molière.” Not to be confused with Jean-Baptiste Poquelin Molière (1622-73), the famous playwright of King Louis’ reign responsible
Jean-Baptiste Malter Jean-Baptiste Malter Jean-Baptiste Malter (6 November 1701 - 1746) was a French dancer and dance master, known under the names Aubin-Jean-Michel Malter, Jean-Baptiste or Jean-Nicolas. He was the son of Jean-Nicolas Malter, known as de Saint-Aubin, and of Madeleine Gosselin, and thus a member of the Malter family of dancers. He was born in Bordeaux, where he learned dance from his father, who was there received in the confraternity of dance masters on 29 December 1710. In Marseille on 19 June 1725, he married Catherine Dussoye, known as Labbé, a young dancer from Toulouse. The couple danced in Tours in