Well, no man aside from the reflection of my shirt.

And you thought that Alexandre Dumas was taking literary liberties. Mais non. Iron masks really were used as an additional form of punishment in this jail. This one dates from 1860.

As we saw in image 13193, prisoners in solitary confinement often had to wear calico masks to separate them from other prisoners and quite possibly their own humanity. Why would an iron mask be imposed on them instead? That, I have not been able to determine. But there is no doubt that wearing one of these would have been an order of magnitude worse than wearing a calico one. It would be heavier – a LOT heavier – and in the summer heat it would have been horrendous, trapping all the heat inside. It's a wonder that prisoners didn't die from it.

Of course, it's possible that some did.