Bluebeard was a wife murderer in Charles Perrault’s 1679 novel Conte du Temps.
The nickname has since been applied to many real-life killers of women.
The most famous was Frenchman Henri Desire Landru (1869-1922), who over a period of five years killed 10 women after proposing marriage to them.
Gilles de Rais, who was a 15th-century aristocrat and prolific serial killer, has been suggested as the source for the character of Bluebeard.