Poe may have based the story on the "Bal des Ardents" at the court of Charles VI of France in January 1393. At the suggestion of a Norman squire, the king and five others dressed as Wild Men in highly flammable costumes made with pitch and flax. Four of the men died in the fire, and only Charles and the fifth man were saved. Citing Barbara Tuchman as his source, Jack Morgan, of the University of Missouri–Rolla, author of "The Biology of Horror", discusses the incident as a possible inspiration for "Hop-Frog".