Claude Frollo facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Claude Frollo
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame character
Claude Frollo holding infant Quasimodo on the steps of Notre Dame in 1480. Art by Luc-Olivier Merson.
Created by	Victor Hugo
Information
Occupation	Archdeacon of Notre Dame cathedral
Affiliation	Members of the church
Title	Dom Archdeacon Monseigneur
Family	Jehan Frollo (younger brother)
Children	Quasimodo (adopted son)
Religion	Catholic
Nationality	French

Monseigneur Claude Frollo is a fictional character and the main antagonist of Victor Hugo's 1831 novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (known in French as Notre-Dame de Paris). He is an Alchemist and Intellectual.

In the novel

Dom Claude Frollo is a pious and highly knowledgeable man who was orphaned along with his younger brother Jehan when their parents died of the plague. His studies led him to become the Archdeacon of Josas, which is his position during the events of the novel.

During a holiday at Notre Dame called Quasimodo Sunday, he rescues a deformed hunchback child whom he finds abandoned on the cathedral's foundlings bed. He adopts the boy, names him "Quasimodo" after the holiday, raises him like a son, and teaches him a sort of sign language when Quasimodo is deafened by the cathedral's bells. Frollo is a respected scholar and studies several languages, law, medicine, science and theology. He becomes infatuated with alchemy, however, which leads townspeople to spread the rumor that he is a sorcerer. He also believes strongly in fate. All this, along with his extreme and irrational fear of women, contribute further to his isolation from society.

Adaptations

Victor Hugo's novel has been adapted to film on numerous occasions. Due to policies of the NAMPI Thirteen Points, the filmmakers of the 1923 film adaptation would not portray a member of the Roman Catholic Church in a negative and controversial light. As a result, Claude Frollo (played by Nigel de Brulier) is not the villain, but instead a good-hearted archdeacon of Notre Dame, and the villain of the film is actually his younger brother Jehan (played by Brandon Hurst). The 1939 film had a similar change for the same reason due to policies of the Hays Production Code; the only difference is that Jehan (played by Sir Cedric Hardwicke) is portrayed as King Louis XI's Chief Justice of Paris, and Claude (played by Walter Hampden) is portrayed as the Archbishop of Paris. In Disney's 1996 animated film, Claude Frollo (voiced by Tony Jay) is Paris' judge/Minister of Justice and the villain as in the novel, the Archdeacon of Notre Dame is a separate character entirely (and voiced by David Ogden Stiers), and the character of Jehan is omitted.

Among the actors who played Claude Frollo over the years in each adaptation of the novel are:

See also

In Spanish: Claude Frollo para niños