Martin Guerre was an otherwise unremarkable French peasant who lived in the mid 16th century and became famous to history as the center of a celebrated case of alleged identity theft and impersonation that occurred in the village of Artigat in the region of Gascony.
Born around 1524, Martin married a fellow peasant woman, Bertrande de Rols, in 1538 when he was around 14 years old. However, in 1548, Martin mysteriously vanished without a trace, leaving Bertrande and their young son behind. Eight years later, Martin suddenly returned to the village and resumed living with Bertrande, having two additional children with her and continuing his life as if nothing had happened.
However, trouble arose when Martin sued his uncle, Pierre Guerre, to secure his inheritance. Pierre counter-sued, claiming that Martin was an imposter who was impersonating the "real" Martin Guerre in order to steal the inheritance. When Bertrande stood by Martin, he was acquitted of the crime of imposture, but later Pierre and other relatives persuaded Bertrande into recanting her testimony, and Martin was re-tried and found guilty.
Martin appealed, however, and the case went all the way up to the high court at the Parlement of Toulouse, where Bertraned re-recanted her testimony to once again support Martin. At the trial, Martin represented himself, argued eloquently, described many events and incidents from the past that could have been known only to the real Martin Guerre with perfect accuracy and recall, and managed to convince the judges of his claim that Bertrande had been pressured into recanting her testimony by the greedy Pierre Guerre in order to keep Martin's rightful inheritance.
However, just when the judges were about to find Martin innocent, the real Martin Guerre, now possessing only one leg, having lost it fighting against the Spanish and the English at the Battle of St. Quentin in 1557, suddenly and dramatically appeared at the court to claim his identity back, and Bertrande was forced to recognize him as the real Martin Guerre.
Thereafter, the false Martin confessed that he was a peasant from a nearby village named Arnaud du Tilh, nicknamed "Pansette." He apologized to the court and especially to Bertrande for his deceptions but was sentenced to death for the crime of imposture, being hanged in front of Martin Guerre's house in Artigat on September 16, 1560.
The story of Martin Guerre later became the subject of a variety of scholarly and literary works, most notably the historical account The Return of Martin Guerre (1983) by Princeton University historian Natalie Zemon Davis, and the 1982 film of the same name starring Gérard Depardieu and directed by Daniel Vigne, which in turn received a 1993 American remake called Sommersby, set during the American Civil War and starring Richard Gere and Jodie Foster.