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Illustrated portrait of Aramis

A character in The Three Musketeers

Aramis

A musketeer of twenty-two or twenty-three who intends to become a priest, keeps a servant dressed in black, and receives letters from a duchess.

What they want

To take holy orders one day, and, until that day, to be loved by a woman of rank without anyone knowing her name.

The book

Cover of The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
The Three MusketeersAlexandre Dumas, 1844

Four swordsmen, a queen's twelve diamonds and a branded woman, told to Paris in daily newspaper parts in the spring of 1844.

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At a glance

Age
Twenty-two or twenty-three
Lodging
The Rue de Vaugirard
Servant
Bazin, a Berrichon, always in black
Correspondent
A duchess in Tours, never named by him; the narrator names Madame de Chevreuse

Who they are in the book

Spoiler-free

Aramis has an open, ingenuous face, a mild black eye and cheeks as rosy as an autumn peach. He speaks little and slowly, laughs without noise and pinches the tips of his ears to keep them pink. He is a musketeer for the time being and means to take orders; his servant Bazin already wears black in preparation. He lodges in the Rue de Vaugirard.

The women in his life are never named and always noble. A dropped handkerchief with a coronet starts his quarrel with d'Artagnan, and a letter from Tours, where Madame de Chevreuse is in exile, is enough to make him drop a thesis on theology and call for wine. The book treats his vocation as real and his worldliness as equally real.

How Aramis Is Portrayed

Appearance, manner, and tone — as the book sketches them, in our words.

  • The portrait, Chapter IIA stout young man of twenty-two or twenty-three with an open, ingenuous face, a black mild eye and downy rosy cheeks. His thin moustache is a straight line; he holds his hands up so the veins will not swell and pinches his ear-tips to keep them pink.
  • The handkerchief, Chapter IVHe stands on a richly embroidered handkerchief with a coronet in the corner. D'Artagnan, meaning to be polite, pulls it out from under his foot, and the musketeers around them draw their own conclusions about the lady. The duel is fixed for two o'clock.
  • Bazin in black, Chapter VIIHis servant is a Berrichon of thirty-five or forty, always dressed in black because his master hopes to enter the Church, who reads pious books and cooks a dinner of few dishes but excellent.
  • The thesis, Chapter XXVIWounded at Crèvecœur, he is found arguing a thesis for his ordination with a curé and a Jesuit. A letter from Tours ends the argument, and he sends the theology to the devil and calls for wine.
  • The prie-dieu, Chapter LXVIID'Artagnan finds him kneeling at a prie-dieu with his head on an open prayer book. He refuses the lieutenancy because the late adventures have disgusted him with military life; after the siege he will enter the house of the Lazarists.
  • The convent, epilogueAfter a journey into Lorraine he disappears and stops writing to his friends. Madame de Chevreuse tells two or three intimates that he has retired into a convent, though nobody knows which.

Aramis quotes

Lines spoken by or about Aramis, each verified verbatim against the text and located in the book.

All for one, one for all.
— d'Artagnan, then all four together (dialogue) · Alexandre Dumas, The Three Musketeers (1844), anonymous nineteenth-century translation
Their ending, and the commentary — spoilers aheadHow the book leaves them, what happened after, and what the record says. Open when you're ready.

He judges Milady and pronounces her death with Porthos. In the epilogue he retires into a convent, and Bazin becomes a lay brother.

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