Eduardo de Valfierno Eduardo de Valfierno Eduardo de Valfierno (1850–1931), who posed as a "marqués" (marquis), was an Argentine con man who allegedly masterminded the theft of the "Mona Lisa" in 1911. In 1932 journalist Karl Decker published a story in the "Saturday Evening Post" claiming Valfierno paid several men to steal the work of art from the Louvre, including museum employee Vincenzo Peruggia. On August 21, 1911 Peruggia hid the "Mona Lisa" under his coat and simply walked out the door. Before the heist took place, Valfierno allegedly commissioned French art restorer and forger Yves Chaudron to make six copies of the
Paris in the 18th century were an estimated 8,500 Protestants in Paris in 1680, both Calvinists and Lutherans, or about two percent of the population. At Charenton, an act of religious tolerance was adopted by the royal government in November 1787, but it was opposed by the Catholic Church and the Parlement of Paris, and never put into effect. After the Revolution, the new mayor, Bailly, authorized Protestants to use the church of Saint-Louis-Saint-Thomas, next to the Louvre. The Jewish community in Paris was also very small; an estimated five hundred persons in 1789. About fifty were Sephardic Jews who had originally come from Spain