ABSTRACT
Typically, there was remarkable unanimity of techniques across the party lines, both in relation to language and imagery used to describe the 'plot', and with regard to more subtle methods of asserting the certainty of what one was alleging. One of the major assertions made by both sides was that the Affair was a mere pretext produced by the other side in order to attack them. The major themes connected with the Syndicate were those of gold, of silver, of buying and selling, of treachery; the Dreyfusards were 'les vendus', 'les stiperi-dies du Syndicat de Trahison' The 'Syndicate' was merely one further aberration, a variant upon the obsessive myth of a Jewish plot. The belief in a ‘Jewish plot’ and a ‘Jesuit plot’ reflected, however, popular myths which were current throughout the nineteenth century, and which found their expression in the popular literature of the period.
