Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod (born Zelle; 7 August 1876 – 15 October 1917) was a Dutch exotic dancer and companion. She was better known by her stage name, Mata Hari, which means "sun" in Indonesian, or "eye of the day." Mata Hari was convicted of spying for Germany during World War I. She was executed by a firing squad in France.

The idea of a beautiful dancer using her charm to spy made Mata Hari a famous example of a "femme fatale," a term for a woman who uses her beauty to trick others. Her story has inspired books, films, and other works. Later biographers say she was convicted because the French Army needed someone to blame for their problems. They also claim the documents used to prove her guilt contained false information. Some people believe she was not a spy and was innocent.

Early life

Margaretha Geertruida Zelle was born on August 7, 1876, in Leeuwarden, a town in northern Netherlands. Her parents were Antje van der Meulen (1842–1891) and Adam Zelle (1840–1910). She had three younger brothers: Johannes Hendriks, Arie Anne, and Cornelis Coenraad. Her family called her "M'greet." Some people believed Mata Hari, her later name, had Jewish, Malay, or Javanese (Indonesian) ancestry, but scholars say she had no such heritage. Both of her parents were Dutch. Her father owned a hat factory and shop, invested in the oil business, and became wealthy enough to provide Margaretha and her siblings with a comfortable early life, including private schooling until age 13.

In 1889, Zelle’s father went out of business. Her parents divorced, and her mother died in 1891. Her father remarried on February 9, 1893, to Susanna Catharina ten Hoove (1844–1913). After these events, the family separated, and Zelle moved to live with her godfather, Mr. Visser, in Sneek. She studied to become a kindergarten teacher in Leiden, but the headmaster of her school began to flirt with her openly. Her godfather removed her from the school. A few months later, she fled to her uncle’s home in The Hague.

Dutch East Indies

At the age of 18, Zelle responded to an ad in a Dutch newspaper placed by Rudolf MacLeod, a captain in the Dutch army who lived in the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) and was looking for a wife. Zelle married MacLeod in Amsterdam on July 11, 1895. MacLeod was the son of Captain John Brienen MacLeod, who was from the Gesto branch of the MacLeods of Skye, which is why he had a Scottish last name, and his wife, Baroness Dina Louisa Sweerts de Landas. The marriage allowed Zelle to join the upper class in the Netherlands and gave her a stable financial situation. She moved with her husband to Malang, on the east side of the island of Java, traveling on the ship SS Prinses Amalia in May 1897. They had two children: Norman-John MacLeod (1897–1899) and Louise Jeanne MacLeod (1898–1919).

The marriage was not happy. MacLeod drank alcohol heavily, physically hurt Zelle, and blamed her for his lack of career advancement. He openly had a mistress, which was a practice accepted by society in the Dutch East Indies at the time. When MacLeod was sent to Medan, Zelle and their children stayed in Toempoeng with the family of Mr. van Rheede, a government official. Friends in the Netherlands remembered Zelle writing to them around this time, saying she had started using the name Mata Hari, which means "sun" in the local Indonesian language (literally, "eye of the day").

At MacLeod’s request, Zelle returned to him, but his behavior did not improve. In 1899, their children became very sick from complications linked to syphilis they had gotten from their parents, though the family claimed an angry servant had poisoned them. Jeanne survived, but Norman died. Some sources suggest one of MacLeod’s enemies may have poisoned their meal to harm the children. After returning to the Netherlands, the couple officially separated on August 30, 1902. Their divorce was finalized in 1906, and Zelle was given custody of Jeanne. MacLeod was required by law to pay child support but never did. Once, when Jeanne visited Rudolf, he refused to return her to her mother. Zelle did not have the means to fight this and accepted it, believing that although Rudolf had been an abusive husband, he had been a good father. Jeanne later died at age 21, possibly from complications related to syphilis.

Career

In 1903, Zelle moved to Paris. There, she performed as a circus horse rider under the name Lady MacLeod. This choice upset the Dutch MacLeods. To earn money, she also worked as an artist’s model.

By 1904, Mata Hari became well-known as an exotic dancer. She was a contemporary of dancers Isadora Duncan and Ruth St. Denis, who were leaders in the early modern dance movement. This movement looked to Asia and Egypt for artistic ideas. Gabriel Astruc became her personal booking agent.

Mata Hari was known for being flirtatious and showing her body openly. She won the attention of audiences after her first performance at the Musée Guimet on March 13, 1905. She became the long-term lover of Émile Étienne Guimet, who had founded the Musée. At the time, entertainers often made up stories about their past. Mata Hari claimed to be a Javanese princess born into a priestly Hindu family, saying she had studied sacred Indian dance since childhood. She was photographed many times during this period, often nude or nearly nude. Some of these photos were found by MacLeod and helped his case for custody of their daughter.

Mata Hari brought a bold and carefree style to the stage. Her most famous act involved slowly removing her clothing until she wore only a jeweled breastplate and some arm and head ornaments. She never showed her chest because she was self-conscious about having small breasts. Early in her career, she wore a bodystocking that matched her skin tone, but she later stopped wearing it.

Her act was successful because it made erotic dance more acceptable and helped create a new style of entertainment that Paris later became famous for. Her style and confident attitude made her popular. She also wore revealing clothing and performed in provocative photos. Many Europeans were unfamiliar with the Dutch East Indies, so Mata Hari was seen as exotic, and her stories were believed. A French journalist wrote in a Paris newspaper that Mata Hari was “so feline, extremely feminine, majestically tragic, the thousand curves and movements of her body trembling in a thousand rhythms.” A journalist in Vienna wrote that she was “slender and tall with the flexible grace of a wild animal, and with blue-black hair” and that her face “makes a strange foreign impression.”

By about 1910, many copycats had appeared. Critics began to say that Mata Hari’s success was due to cheap exhibitionism and not artistic value. Although she continued to attend important social events in Europe, serious cultural institutions looked down on her as a dancer who did not know how to dance properly.

Mata Hari’s career declined after 1912. On March 13, 1915, she performed in the last show of her career. She had started dancing later in life and had gained weight. By this time, she was known more for her sensuality and eroticism than for her beauty. She had relationships with high-ranking military officers, politicians, and others in powerful positions across many countries. These relationships often took her to different countries. Before World War I, she was generally seen as an artist and a free-spirited person. However, as the war approached, some people began to view her as a promiscuous and dangerous seductress.

Espionage

During World War I, the Netherlands did not take sides in the war. As a Dutch citizen, Zelle was allowed to travel across countries without restrictions. To avoid areas where fighting happened, she moved between France and the Netherlands through Spain and Britain. Her travels caught the attention of others. During the war, Zelle was involved in a very strong romantic and sexual relationship with Captain Vadim Maslov, a 23-year-old Russian officer in the French army who worked with the 1st Special Infantry Regiment. Maslov was part of a large group of Russian soldiers sent to the Western Front in 1916.

In April 1916, Maslov was hurt during the Nivelles Offensive, a battle to capture a German-controlled mountain area. He lost sight in his left eye. Zelle asked for permission to visit Maslov at a hospital near the front. Because she was from a neutral country, she usually would not be allowed near the front. Zelle met with agents from the Deuxième Bureau, a French intelligence group, who offered her a chance to see Maslov if she agreed to spy for France.

Before the war, Zelle had performed as Mata Hari in front of Crown Prince Wilhelm, the eldest son of Kaiser Wilhelm II and a German general on the Western Front. The Deuxième Bureau believed she could gather information by seducing the Crown Prince. However, the Crown Prince had little real power in the German military. German propaganda promoted him as a strong leader, but he was actually known for partying, spending time with right-wing politicians, and avoiding serious responsibilities.

The Deuxième Bureau believed Zelle could get valuable information from the Crown Prince and offered her one million francs if she succeeded. Zelle’s contact with the Deuxième Bureau was Captain Georges Ladoux, who later accused her of spying.

In November 1916, Zelle was traveling from Spain on the steamship Zeelandia. When the ship stopped at the British port of Falmouth, she was arrested and taken to London. She was questioned by Assistant Commissioner Sir Basil Thomson of the Metropolitan Police. Sir Basil wrote about this in his 1922 book Queer People, saying Zelle admitted to working for the Deuxième Bureau. She was briefly held at a police station before being released and staying at the Savoy Hotel. A full record of the interview is stored in Britain’s National Archives and was later shared on radio. It is unclear if Zelle lied or if the French used her for their own purposes.

In late 1916, Zelle traveled to Madrid, where she met a German military attaché named Major Arnold Kalle. She asked Kalle to arrange a meeting with the German Crown Prince. During this time, Zelle apparently offered to share French secrets with Germany in exchange for money, though it is unclear if this was due to greed or an attempt to meet the Crown Prince.

In January 1917, Kalle sent coded messages to Berlin describing a German spy named H-21. The messages matched Zelle’s background so closely that the French identified H-21 as Mata Hari. The messages were in a code the French had already broken, suggesting the Germans may have planned for Zelle to be caught.

General Walter Nicolai, a top German intelligence officer, became frustrated with Zelle because she provided little useful information and instead shared gossip about French officials. He decided to expose her as a German spy to the French.

In December 1916, the Deuxième Bureau allowed Zelle to obtain the names of six Belgian agents. Five were suspected of working for Germany, and one was suspected of being a double agent. Two weeks after Zelle left Paris for Madrid, the double agent was executed by the Germans, while the others continued their work. This proved to the Deuxième Bureau that Zelle had shared the names of the spies with Germany.

On February 13, 1917, Zelle was arrested at the Hotel Elysée Palace in Paris. She was tried on July 24 and accused of spying for Germany, which was said to have caused the deaths of at least 50,000 soldiers. Although French and British intelligence suspected her of spying, they could not prove it.

Zelle’s main interrogator, Captain Pierre Bouchardon, later prosecuted her. He argued that the Mata Hari identity was fake and that Zelle was not a Javanese princess but a Dutch woman. Zelle admitted to receiving 20,000 francs from a German diplomat, which Bouchardon claimed was payment for spying. Meanwhile, Captain Ladoux, who had once worked with Zelle, tried to build a case against her by presenting her actions in a negative light.

In 1917, France faced major challenges, including failed military offensives and soldier uprisings. The government needed someone to blame for its problems, and Mata Hari became a target. French newspapers highlighted her case, making her seem more important than she was. Historians later said Mata Hari was not a significant spy and that France’s military failures were unrelated to her. They noted that her actions were not unusual and that she was chosen as a scapegoat because she was a woman from a neutral country with a history of dancing and relationships.

Zelle claimed she was innocent and wrote letters to the Dutch Ambassador in an attempt to clear her name.

Legacy

The Frisian Museum (Dutch: Fries Museum) in Leeuwarden, Netherlands, has a special room called the "Mata Hari Room." This room includes two of Mata Hari's personal scrapbooks and an oriental rug decorated with the steps of her fan dance. The museum is located in Mata Hari's hometown and is known for studying her life and work. In 2017, the largest Mata Hari exhibition ever opened at the Museum of Friesland, exactly 100 years after her death.

Mata Hari was born in the building at Kelders 33. This building was damaged by fire in 2013 but was later fixed. An architect named Silvester Adema studied old drawings of the building to rebuild it as it looked when Mata Hari’s father, Adam Zelle, owned a hat shop there. In 2016, an information center was added to the building to display items related to Mata Hari.

Mata Hari became famous for being an exotic dancer who was also said to be a secret agent. She used her charm to gain the trust of others and possibly steal military secrets.

Movies and plays about Mata Hari include:
– Mata Hari (1920)
– Mata Hari (1927), a German film
– Mata Hari (1931), a Hollywood film starring Greta Garbo
– Cafe Society (1939), where a character named Mattie Harriett works as a spy
– Mata Hari, Agent H21 (1964), with Jeanne Moreau in the lead role
– Casino Royale (1967), where a character named Mata Bond appears
– The Glass Bottom Boat (1966), where a character dreams of Mata Hari
– Operación Mata Hari (1968), a Spanish comedy
– Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp (1970), where a chimpanzee named "Mata Hairi" is a spy
– Up the Front (1972), where Zsa Zsa Gabor plays Mata Hari
– Mata Hari (1981), a television series
– Fantasy Island (1982), an episode titled Mata Hari; The Magic Camera
– Mata Hari (1985), a film starring Sylvia Kristel
– The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1993), where Mata Hari meets a young Indiana Jones
– Mata Hari (2016), a film
– Mata Hari (2017), a short film
– Mata Hari: The Naked Spy (2017)
– Mata Hari (2017), a Russian-Portuguese series
– The King’s Man (2021), where Mata Hari is played by Valerie Pachner
– Expedition Files (2025), an episode titled Behind The Myth that explores Mata Hari’s spy claims

Other works include:
– Mata Hari (1967), a play starring Pernell Roberts and Marisa Mell
– Mata Hari (1982), a musical performed in London
– Mata! (1995), a musical in Blackpool
– Mata Hari at the Moulin Rouge (2016), a musical in Seoul
– One Last Night with Mata Hari (2017), a musical in Canada
– A 2022 musical adaptation in South Korea

Songs and albums named after Mata Hari include:
– Norway’s 1976 Eurovision entry, Mata Hari, performed by Anne-Karine Strøm
– Azerbaijan’s 2021 Eurovision entry, Mata Hari, performed by Samira Efendi
– A 1982 song by Telex titled Birds and Bees
– A 1995 song by Ofra Haza
– A 2002 song by Warren Zevon
– A 2018 album by L’Impératrice
– A 2019 song by Frank Turner
– A 2020 song by Kovacs

Video games and other media featuring Mata Hari include:
– Mata Hari (2008), a spy adventure game
– Shadow Hearts (2001), where Mata Hari is a playable character
– Fate/Grand Order, where Mata Hari is a character
– Identity V, where a character is named after Mata Hari
– Reverse: 1999, where Mata Hari is linked to another character

Other references include:
– Mata Hari, a racehorse born in 1931
– A pinball machine named Mata Hari released in 1977
– A ballet titled Mata Hari premiered in 2016
– An opera titled Mata Hari premiered in 2017
– A 1940 comedy where Mata Hari is parodied as "Mattie Herring"
– A 1940 cartoon where a character named "Hatta Mari" appears.