Collectors, Commissioners, Curators: Studies in Medieval Art for Stephen N. Fliegel 9781501514845, 9781501521102

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Collectors, Commissioners, Curators

Early Drama, Art, and Music

Series Editors Katie Brokaw, University of California, Merced Erith Jaffe-Berg, University of California, Riverside Jenna Soleo-Shanks, University of Minnesota Duluth Christopher Swift, New York City College of Technology Andrew Walker White, George Mason University

Collectors, Commissioners, Curators Studies in Medieval Art for Stephen N. Fliegel Edited by Elina Gertsman

The publication of this book was financially supported by the Department of Art History and Art at Case Western Reserve University.

ISBN 978-1-5015-2110-2 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-1-5015-1484-5 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-1-5015-1485-2 Library of Congress Control Number: 2022952390 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover image: Saint Stephen (1502–1508) by Tilman Riemenschneider, Lindenwood with polychromy and gilding, The Cleveland Museum of Art, © Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund Typesetting: Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd. Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

Acknowledgements The publication of this book in brilliant color was made possible by the generous subvention from the Department of Art History and Art at Case Western Reserve University. I am particularly grateful to my research assistants, Reed O’Mara and Marina Savchenkova, for their superb editing, excellent organizational skills, and unwavering good cheer.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-202

Contents Acknowledgements

V

List of Illustrations

XI

Elina Gertsman Preface 1

Part I: Curating Fragments: Itineraries / Reconstructions Paul Williamson Chapter 1 Saint Stephen in Stone

9

Lloyd de Beer Chapter 2 An English Alabaster Altarpiece of Christ’s Passion Reunited Roger S. Wieck Chapter 3 A Fugitive Parliament of Heaven Returns Home

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Part II: Curating Burgundy: Artists / Patrons Sophie Jugie Chapter 4 When Theory Influences the Gaze: On a Recently Restored Fifteenth-Century Burgundian Virgin from the Louvre 59 Elizabeth Morrison Chapter 5 “None touches it”: The Library of Anthony of Burgundy

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Contents

Stefan Krause Chapter 6 The Ceremonial Armor for the Young Emperor Charles V in Vienna: The German Empire, Burgundy, and a Failed Plan for a Habsburg-Tudor Alliance 107

Part III: Curating Cleveland: Acquisitions / Display Donald J. La Rocca Chapter 7 The Völs-Colonna Armor for Man and Horse in the Cleveland Museum of Art and Its Matching Shield in the Metropolitan Museum of Art 133 C. Griffith Mann Chapter 8 In and Out of Fashion: Jan Crocq’s Saint John the Baptist and Saint Catherine 147 Gerhard Lutz Chapter 9 A Mosan Madonna in the Cleveland Museum of Art Reconsidered

Part IV: Curating Artists: Names / Attributions Maria Vassilaki Chapter 10 The Name of the Artist: Do Names Matter?

191

Sandra Hindman Chapter 11 The Case for Simon Marmion – Once Again

213

Till-Holger Borchert Chapter 12 The Workshop of Van Eyck, the Master of Covarrubias and the Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna 233

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Contents

Curriculum vitae of Stephen N. Fliegel Notes on Contributors

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257

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List of Illustrations Figure 0.1

Figure 0.2

Figure 1.1

Figure 1.2

Figure 1.3

Figure 1.4

Figure 1.5 Figure 1.6

Figure 1.7 Figure 1.8 Figure 2.1 Figure 2.2 Figure 2.3 Figure 2.4

Figure 2.5

Figure 2.6

Table Fountain, Paris (France), ca. 1320–1340, gilt-silver and translucent enamels, 33.8 × 25.4 × 26 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of J. H. Wade, 1924.859 2 Attributed to Angelos Akotantos, Icon of the Mother of God and Infant Christ (Virgin Eleousa), Crete, ca. 1425–1450, tempera and gold on wood panel, 96 × 70 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund, 2010.154 5 Tilman Riemenschneider, Saint Stephen, Würzburg (Germany), ca. 1502– 1508, lindenwood with polychromy and gilding, 93.5 × 35 × 23.5 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund, 1959.43 10 Figure of St. Stephen (trumeau), from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 140 cm. Paris, Musée de Cluny, inv. no. Cl. 18646. © RMN-GP/cliché Franck Raux 12 Head of a Bishop Saint, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 32 cm. Paris, Musée de Cluny, inv. no. Cl. 18932. © RMN-GP/cliché Franck Raux 13 Head of a Young Saint, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 27 cm. Paris, Musée Carnavalet, inv. no. A. P. 205 14 Side view of Fig. 1.4 14 Head of a Young Saint, probably St. Stephen, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 28 cm. London, private collection 15 Three-quarter view of Fig. 1.6 16 Side view of Fig. 1.6 17 The Flagellation of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author 22 The Crucifixion, England ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author 22 The Entombment of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author 23 The Betrayal of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. Glasgow, The Burrell Collection, Gift of Sir William and Lady Burrell to the City of Glasgow, 1944. Photo: author 24 The Resurrection of Christ (after conservation treatment), England, ca. 1400– 1425, alabaster, gold, polychromy, 53.9 cm × 26 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Bashford Dean, in memory of Alexander McMillan Welch, 1949, acc. No. 49.120.1. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art 25 The Resurrection of Christ (prior to conservation treatment), England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster, gold, polychromy, 53.9 cm × 26 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Bashford Dean, in memory of

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-204

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Figure 2.7 Figure 3.1

Figure 3.2

Figure 3.3

Figure 3.4

Figure 3.5

Figure 3.6

Figure 3.7

Figure 3.8

Figure 3.9

Figure 4.1

List of Illustrations

Alexander McMillan Welch, 1949, acc. No. 49.120.1. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art 25 The Pietà, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. Denmark, Thorning parish church. Photo: author 33 The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Parliament of Heaven, Virgin Mary Reading, Luke Writing, Limbo, single leaf from a Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1207. Purchased on a grant provided by the Bernard H. Breslauer Foundation and with a gift from Marguerite Steed Hoffman, member of the Visiting Committee to the Department of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts, 2017 38 The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Herod Interviewing the Magi, Journey of the Magi, and Matthew Writing, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 16. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979 39 The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Ascension and Mark Writing, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 18v. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979 40 The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Last Supper, Judas Departing, Synagoga and Ecclesia, and John Writing on Patmos, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 13. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979 42 The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Annunciation, with Roundels of the Virgin Entering the Temple, the Virgin Weaving, and the Marriage of the Virgin, and Patrons, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 31. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979 43 François le Barbier père, Parliament of Heaven and Annunciation, Book of Hours, Paris (France), ca. 1475. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.73, fol. 7. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902 46 François le Barbier fils, Feast of Dives, Death of Lazarus; Dives in Hell, Limbo of the Unbaptized or Uncircumcised; Purgatory, and Limbo of the Just, Book of Hours, Paris (France), 1480–1500. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.179, fol. 132. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902 50 Hell, Limbo of the Unbaptized or Uncircumcised, Purgatory, and Limbo of the Just, Speculum humanae salvationis, probably Nuremberg (Germany, Franconia), 1350–1400. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.140, fol. 30v, detail. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902 52 Jean Colombe, Purgatory, Hell, and Limbo, Hours of Anne de France, Bourges (France), ca. 1473. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.677, fol. 250v. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1867–1943) in 1923 53 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, from Montigny-surVingeanne (France), ca. 1415–1425, stripped limestone, remnants of modern

List of Illustrations

Figure 4.2

Figure 4.3

Figure 4.4 Figure 4.5

Figure 4.6

Figure 4.7

Figure 5.1

Figure 5.2

Figure 5.3

Figure 5.4

Figure 5.5

Figure 5.6

Figure 5.7

Figure 5.8 Figure 6.1

polychrome at the back. Paris, The Louvre Museum, RF 1433. Photo: I RMNGrand Palais (The Louvre Museum), Tony Querrec 60 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, from Montigny-surVingeanne (France), ca. 1415–1425, stripped limestone, remnants of modern polychrome at the back. Paris, The Louvre Museum, inv. no. RF 1433, detail. Photo: author 61 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, ca. 1412, stone. Auxonne (Côte-d’Or), collégiale Notre-Dame. Photo: © phot. JL DUTHU / Région Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Inventaire du patrimoine, 2004 66 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child (detail), ca. 1412, stone. Auxonne (Côte-d’Or), collégiale Notre-Dame. Photo: GO69 (Wikimedia) 67 Claus de Werve, Angel from the Right Side of the Tomb of Philip the Bold, from the Charterhouse of Champmol, 1406–1410, polychromed alabaster. Dijon, The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, CA 1416. Photo: The Musée des BeauxArts de Dijon, François Jay 68 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, 1415–1430, polychromed stone. Meilly-sur-Rouvres (Côte-d’Or). Photo: © phot. JL DUTHU / Région Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Inventaire du patrimoine, 1981 69 Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child (the Bulliot Virgin), from the church of Notre-Dame du Chatel d’Autun, ca. 1430, polychromed stone. Autun (Saône-et-Loire), The Musée Rolin. Photo: The Musée Rolin 69 Follower of Willem Vrelant, Hector Receiving the Book from Othea before the Ducal Family, from Christine de Pizan, L’Épître d’Othéa, ca. 1460. Cologny (Geneva), Foundation Martin Bodmer, Cod. Bodmer 49, fol. 7 85 Workshop of Lieven van Lathem, Four Scenes of the Judicial Duel between Gillion’s Sons, from Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies, 1463. Private collection, fol. 177 87 Lieven van Lathem, The Siege of Nicopolis, from Jean Froissart, Chroniques, 1468–1469. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Preuβischer Kulturbesitz, Breslau 1, vol. 4, fol. 229v 92 Master of Margaret of York (?), Anthony Receiving the Collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece, from Diego de Valera, Traité de noblesse, ca. 1470. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. II 7057, fol. 1 94 Master of the Chronique d’Angleterre, The Roman Senators Meet to Banish Evil-Doers to an Island, from Chroniques de Pise, ca. 1470–1480. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 2797, fol. 9 96 Master of the Chroniques de Pise, The Roman Senators Meet to Banish EvilDoers to an Island, from Chroniques de Pise, ca. 1475. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 9041, fol. 5v 96 Follower of Jean Fouquet, Presentation Scene with Anthony of Burgundy, from Julius Caesar, Commentaires de César, after 1485. Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Ms. Pluteo 62 Cod. 8, fol. 1 98 Follower of Jean Colombe, from the Hours of Anthony of Burgundy, ca. 1480. Private Collection (Christie’s, London, May 25, 2016, lot 20), fol. 163 100 Konrad Seusenhofer, Ceremonial Armor of Archduke Charles, Innsbruck, 1512–1513. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. A 109. © KHM-Museumsverband 108

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Figure 6.2

Figure 6.3

Figure 6.4

Figure 6.5 Figure 6.6

Figure 6.7

Figure 6.8

Figure 7.1

Figure 7.2 Figure 7.3

Figure 7.4

Figure 7.5

Figure 7.6 Figure 7.7 Figure 7.8 Figure 8.1

List of Illustrations

Hans Rabeiler, Unfinished Armor of Archduke Charles. Innsbruck, 1511– 1512. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. A 186. © KHM-Museumsverband 116 Jörg Kölderer, Two Landsknechts, detail from the Zeughausbuch of Emperor Maximilian I, vol. on the Tyrol, Innsbruck, ca. 1512–1517. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. KK 5074, fol. 63v. © KHM-Museumsverband 119 Hans Burgkmair the Elder, Funeral of a Famous Prince, proof copy of Weißkunig, Augsburg, after October 1514. Vienna, Albertina inv. DG2012/129/ 159 (Cim. II/6, fol. 143r). © Albertina, Vienna 121 Surcoat from the Ceremonial Armor of Archduke Charles (see Fig. 6.1). © KHMMuseumsverband 122 Steel Surcoat, workshop of Kolman Helmschmid (?), Augsburg, ca. 1520– 1525. Prague, Museum of Decorative Arts, Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook, vol. 1, fol. n.74r, sig. 2-GK 11.572_000b_P66b. © Prague, Uměleckoprůmyslové museum v Praze. Illustrated in Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook 123 Master of the Joseph Sequence, Philip the Fair (1478–1506) as Duke of Burgundy, left panel of the Zierikzee triptych, 1505–1506. Brussels, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, inv. no. 2405. © Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium 124 Jan van Battel, Detail of the Central Panel of the Triptych Depicting Charles V as King of Spain, 1517–1518. Mechelen, Museum Hof van Busleyden, inv. no. S0010. © Museum Hof van Busleyden 124 Armor for Man and Horse with Völs-Colonna Arms, Milan, ca. 1570–1580, steel, gold, copper alloy, leather, textile. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, The John L. Severance Fund, 1964.88 134 Völs-Colonna Armor for Man, as photographed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art prior to 1960 136 The Völs-Colonna Armor as it was displayed during the Exposition Militaire, part of the Exposition Universelle (World’s Fair), held in Paris in 1889. Photo: courtesy Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art 137 Shield from the Völs-Colonna Garniture, Milan, ca. 1570–1580, steel, copper alloy, leather, horsehair (?), textile. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of William H. Riggs, inv. no. 14.25.768. Photo: Stephen Bluto 140 Cuirass of the Völs-Colonna Armor, showing the infantry or light cavalry breast plate, as photographed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art prior to 1960 142 Detail of heraldry on the shield (see Fig. 7.4). Photo: Stephen Bluto 143 Detail of the etched decoration on the shield (see Fig. 7.4). Photo: Stephen Bluto 143 Reverse of the shield (see Fig. 7.4), showing the arm pad and strap. Photo: Stephen Bluto 144 Attributed to Jan Crocq, Saint John the Baptist, ca. 1500, tonnerre limestone, 163 × 59 × 40 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art. Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund, 2017.54 148

List of Illustrations

Figure 8.2

Figure 8.3

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Figure 8.7

Figures 9.1a and 9.1b

Figure 9.2

Figure 9.3

Figure 9.4

Figure 9.5

Figure 9.6a and 9.6b Figures 9.7a and 9.7b

Workshop of Jan Crocq, St. Catherine of Alexandria, France (Lorraine), ca. 1475–1525, limestone, 156.2 × 57.2 × 36.2 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Purchase from Rogers Fund, 1907, acc. no. 07.197. © The Metropolitan Museum of Art 150 Brummer Stock Card P5733-recto, Statue of St. John in stone. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Joseph and Ernest Brummer Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives 154 Lion, Greek, 325 BCE, pentelic marble, 113 × 204.5 × 57.8 cm. Kansas City, Missouri, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 33–94 156 Sarcophagus, Roman, 150–180 CE, carrara marble, 54.6 × 215.9 × 59.7 cm. Kansas City, Missouri, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 33–38 157 Attributed to Jean Crocq, Virgin, from the ancient church Saint-Epvre de Nancy (54), 1475–1525, limestone. Dépôt de la Ville de Nancy, inv. D.95.5.2. © Palais des ducs de Lorraine – Musée lorrain, Nancy / Photo: Philippe Caron 166 Rogier van der Weyden and Workshop, The Exhumation of Saint Hubert, late 1430s, oil with egg tempera on oak, 88.2 × 81.2 cm. London, National Gallery, NG783 167 Virgin and Child, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), Liège (?), ca. 1270–1280, oak with polychromy and gilding, 83 × 24 × 20 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2014.392. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art 172 Virgin and Child, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), Liège (?), ca. 1270–1280, oak with polychromy and gilding, 83 × 24 × 20 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2014.392. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art 175 Virgin and Child, from the Abbey of Marche-les-Dames, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), ca. 1250–1270, oak with polychromy and gilding, height: 84 cm. Namur, Collection Société archéologique de Namur, inv. B027. A découvrir au TreM.a – Musée des Arts anciens de Namur. Photo: Société archéologique de Namur 177 The Virgin from St. Phollien in Liège, called Notre Dame des Écoliers, ca. 1280–1290 (stolen). Photo: Robert Didier, Mater Dei: A propos de quelques sculptures de la Vierge, Feuillets de la Cathédrale de Liège. Liège: Fond. Saint-Lambert, 1993, p. 6 178 Madonna with the Rock Crystal, Cologne, ca. 1186–1200, walnut (polychromy and gilding: early 1300s), height: 57.5 cm. Cologne, Museum Schnütgen, inv. no. A14. Photo: Rheinisches Bildarchiv, rba_d023488_01 180 (a) St. Jacob Minor, Cologne, ca. 1280–1290 (?), tuff stone, height: ca. 170 cm. Cologne Cathedral Choir. Photo: © Creative Commons (b) Detail of Figure 9.6a. Photo: LVR-Amt für Denkmalpflege im Rheinland, Viola Blumrich 181 Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist from a Triumphal Cross Group, Lake Constance area, ca. 1330, willow with polychromy and gilding, Mary: 185 × 48 × 40 cm, St. John: 195 × 48 × 44 cm. Landesmuseum Württemberg, inv. nos. E 512 and E513. Photo: Landesmuseum Württemberg 182

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Figure 9.8

Figure 10.1

Figure 10.2

Figure 10.3 Figure 10.4 Figure 10.5

Figure 10.6

Figure 10.7

Figure 10.8 Figure 10.9 Figure 11.1

Figure 11.2

Figure 11.3

Figure 11.4

List of Illustrations

Virgin and Child. Sweden, early 1300s, alder with fragments of polychromy and gilding, height: 95.5 cm. Stockholm, Statens Historiska Museum no. 14648. Photo: Ola Myrin, The Swedish History Museum/SHM (CC BY) 184 Silvestros Desos, Christ and St. Phanourios, first half of the seventeenth century, 73 × 66 cm. Photograph taken in 2011 when the icon was in the possession of Hubert de Chanville, Paris, inv. No. RFML.PE.2019.21.1. Photo: Guillaume Benoit 193 Angelos Akotantos (ca. 1425–1450), Christ and St. Phanourios, the front side of the two-sided icon, egg-tempera on wood. Crete, Valsamonero monastery, now kept in the Vrondissi monastery 195 St. Phanourios, the rear side of the two-sided icon (see Fig. 10.2). Crete, Valsamonero monastery, now kept in the Vrondissi monastery 196 Inscription with the name of the painter Silvestros Desos, infrared photograph of the icon in Fig. 10.1. Photo: Dean Yoder 198 Andreas Ritzos (? doc. 1451–1492), The Holy Mandylion on the wing of the triptych, Candia (Crete), egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai, inv. no. 1566 200 Workshop of Andreas and Nikolaos Ritzos, An Angel Holding the Holy Mandylion on the wing of the triptych, Candia (Crete), 1480–1500, egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai, inv. no. 1574 201 Emmanouel Tzanes, The Virgin and Christ Child Seated on a Cloud and Surrounded by Prophets, seventeenth century, egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai 203 Georgios Klontzas, Transfiguration and Scenes of Monastic Life, sixteenth century, tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai 205 Angelos Akotantos, St. John and Prochoros, Candia (Crete), egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai 206 Common of Confessors with Full Illuminated Border, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, acc. no. 1975.1.2477 (recto). Robert Lehman Collection, 1975. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art 216 Simon Marmion, The Holy Virgins Greeted by Christ as They Enter the Gates of Paradise, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, acc. no. 1975.1.2477 (verso). Robert Lehman Collection, 1975. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art 217 Simon Marmion, The Martyrdom of Saint Denis, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2005.55 (recto), John L. Severance Fund, 2005. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art 218 Feast of Saint Denis from the Proper of Saints with Full Illuminated Border, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2005.55 (verso), John L. Severance Fund, 2005. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art 219

List of Illustrations

Figure 11.5

Figure 11.6

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Figure 12.2a

Figure 12.2b Figure 12.3

Figure 12.4

Figure 12.5a

Figure 12.5b Figure 12.6

Figure 12.7

Figure 12.8

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Hoopoe Bird, origin unknown, ca. 1500, tempera on parchment. Collection of Nature Studies a.o. by Dutch, German, and Italian Artists, 1500–1599. Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, inv. no. E 8206D POR MAG, cod. min. 42, fol. 55r. Photo: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek 224 Saint Catherine before the Emperor, Valenciennes, ca. 1468–1477, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS fr. 28650, fol. 34. Photo: Bibliothèque nationale de France 226 Jan van Eyck, The Mass of the Dead, Turin-Milan Hours, ca. 1435–1440, tempera on parchment, 28 × 20.2 cm. Turin, Palazzo Madama – Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, MS. 0467/M, fol. 116r. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be © KIK-IRPA Brussels. By courtesy of Fondazione Torino Musei 235 Master of Covarrubias, Madonna and Child, ca. 1445–1450, oil on panel, 46.5 × 35 cm. Burgos, Colegiata San Cosma y Damian, Museo de la Colegiata, Covarrubias. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels 238 Master of Covarrubias, Madonna and Child, ca. 1445–1450, infraredreflectogram. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels 239 Jan van Eyck, The Madonna in the Church, ca. 1439, oil on panel, 31 × 14 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, Kat. Nr. 525C. Photo: Jörg P. Anders 240 (a) Anonymous Master from southern Germany (?), Annunciation, ca. 1450, oil on panel, 80 × 31 cm. Modena, Galleria Estense, inv. 226. Su concessione del Ministero della Cultura – Archivio fotografico delle Gallerie Estensi. Photo: V. Negro; (b) Anonymous Master from southern Germany (?), Annunciation, ca. 1450, infrared-reflectogram, GICAS Ghent. Montage: Maximiliaan P. J. Martens 242 Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin, Virgin and Child, ca. 1450, oil on panel, 51 × 60.5 cm. Bruges, Musea Brugge, Groeningemuseum, inv. no. 2019GRO000O2.I. Photo: Dominique Provost; © Art in Flanders 244 Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin, Virgin and Child, ca. 1450, infraredreflectogram. Bruges, Musea Brugge. Montage: Guenevere Souffreau 245 Master of the Llangattock Hours, The Circumcision, ca. 1450, tempera on parchment, 26.4 × 18.4 cm. Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS. Ludwig IX 7, fol. 92v 246 Jan van Eyck, Virgin and Child (The Lucca Madonna), ca. 1435, oil on panel, 65.7 × 49.6 cm. Frankfurt am Main, Städelmuseum, inv. no. 944. http://clos ertovaneyck.kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels 248 (a) Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna, Madonna at the Fountain, ca. 1450–1460, oil on panel, 57 × 41 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, Kat. Nr. 525 B; (b) Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna, Madonna at the Fountain, infrared-reflectogram 252

Elina Gertsman

Preface Some years ago, I had the good fortune of co-curating a centennial focus show at the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA). The driving force of the exhibition—its real architect—was Stephen N. Fliegel, then the museum’s Robert P. Bergman Curator of Medieval Art. The show coalesced around the famous Gothic fountain, the only extant object of its kind, complex and breathtakingly gorgeous (Figure 0.1). Even amid some truly spectacular loans (Jan van Eyck’s Madonna at the Fountain and the Grandes chroniques de France, to name just a couple), it shone, figuratively but also literally, light bouncing off its intricate polished surfaces, its enamels as gleaming and changeable as sea water, its small bells stilled but pregnant with the expectation of movement. The fountain seems to embody some of the key things that Stephen loved about being a curator. One, it came to us with an excellent, if improbable, mystery story: found, allegedly, in a ball of earth in an Istanbul palace garden. Two, although the fountain was likely created in Paris sometime between 1320 and 1340, it gestures both to the lavish entremets treasured in a Burgundian milieu and to monumental fountains like Claus Sluter’s Well of Moses, another Burgundian tour de force; Stephen’s love of Burgundian splendor was patently on display in his breathtaking show “Dukes and Angels: Art from the Court of Burgundy, 1364–1419.” Three, it is a Cleveland object par excellence: spectacular, refined, rare, and undergirded by an unlikely curatorial triumph—refused by the Louvre when still partially encased in dirt, it was subsequently snagged by William Milliken (who helmed the department of decorative arts at the time) to become a centerpiece of the museum’s medieval collection. Four, its shield-shaped escutcheons emblazoned with eight-pointed stars raise all manner of thorny, and therefore challenging and exciting, questions about attribution, patronage, and dating. The present collection loosely follows these four paths of inquiry. The first part of the book features essays that explore complicated itineraries of objects, querying issues of reconstruction, reunification, and reappraisal. All three, in a way, unfold as investigative stories. In a brief vignette, “St. Stephen in Stone,” which opens the book with an appropriate nod to Stephen’s namesake, Paul Williamson seeks to reunite the body of a sculpted St. Stephen with its long-lost head, knocked off during the French Revolution and only recently rediscovered. At the end of his essay, Williamson offers a succinct reflection on the curatorial choice of displaying severed heads and decapitated bodies in museum settings, suggesting that they acquire new lives as objects of a peculiarly modern kind of contemplation. In the essay that follows, Lloyd de Beer reunites not heads and bodies but https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-001

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Figure 0.1: Table Fountain, Paris (France), ca. 1320–1340, gilt-silver and translucent enamels, 33.8 × 25.4 × 26 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of J. H. Wade, 1924.859.

alabaster panels from a long-disassembled altarpiece. Building his case from the ground up and paying particular attention to the panels’ style, carving technique, size, and current condition, de Beer concludes his painstaking inquiry with a spectacular reconstruction of the original altarpiece, emphasizing the enormous value of considering a vast corpus of objects, long seen as disparate and fragmentary, holistically. Such holistic analysis also frames Roger Wieck’s bracing narrative that

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traces the peregrinations of an elusive fifteenth-century folio featuring the Parliament of Heaven. In service of understanding where the leaf really belongs, Wieck parses its iconography, contextualizing the folio within its cultural, visual, and theological milieus. If St. Stephen’s head remains detached from its body, and the alabaster altarpiece remains split in (at least) five disparate pieces, Wieck’s folio— which, at some point, comes close to rejoining its original Book of Hours only to escape curatorial grasp—by a stroke of good fortune and dint of unlikely circumstance, finally regains its home. The vicissitudes of fortune similarly undergird the subject of Sophie Jugie’s essay, which opens the second part of the book dedicated specifically to the arts of Burgundy. Jugie focuses on a stunning sculpture of the Virgin and Child, now attributed to one of the luminaries of Burgundian art, Claus de Werve. Repainted several times, then whitewashed, and subsequently stripped of polychrome altogether, the sculpture was misdated and ignored by generations of art historians; Jugie, through a deft historiographic tour de force, returns the object to its rightful place in the Burgundian corpus, demonstrating how deeply ingrained scholarly views can interfere with our ability to really see a work of art. In the following essay, Elizabeth Morrison, by exploring the library of Anthony of Burgundy, likewise upends prevailing academic opinions—this time by memorably suggesting that Anthony’s books should not be “treated as clinical data points to be gathered in a post-mortem inventory.” Instead, Morrison proposes to explore these manuscripts chronologically, as the building blocks of Anthony’s biography that reflected his changing interests, concerns, anxieties, and ambitions. This kind of approach, characterized by a careful tracing of historical vagaries and dynastic connections, also informs the essay by Stefan Krause, which brings us into the sixteenth century when the Hapsburgs received the so-called “Burgundian inheritance.” Krause analyzes the ceremonial armor for Archduke Charles that stands at the nexus of intrigue, political haggling, and social ceremony, in which Burgundy played a major role—a testament to a failed alliance and a triumph of armorer’s art. Chivalric art of the highest caliber is on full display in the Völs-Colonna ensemble, the woefully understudied centerpiece of the CMA’s collection of arms and armor, and the focus of Donald La Rocca’s essay that opens the third part of the book, a section dedicated specifically to Cleveland objects. La Rocca traces the armor’s provenance and composition, while paying particular attention to centuriesold collecting practices, and signaling this ensemble’s place in the intertwinement of the curatorial decisions of the CMA and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MMA). The relationship between these two great American institutions as reflected in the history of their objects is similarly the topic of Griffith Mann’s essay that explores the historical ties that bind two sculptures, St. John the Baptist at the CMA and St. Catherine at the MMA, both attributed to the Netherlandish sculptor Jan Crocq. Mann

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focuses not only on the medieval but also on the modern history of the two sculptures, which, over the years, have fallen in and out of favor in tandem with changes in art historical methodologies and fluctuating art market trends. Crocq’s St. John the Baptist stands as a key witness to Stephen’s curatorial acumen, amply demonstrated in scores of object purchases the CMA completed under his guidance; few are more striking than the marvelous Mosan Madonna, explored in Gerhard Lutz’s contribution. Paying particular attention to the sculpture’s polychromy and use of colorful cabochons (now lost), Lutz contextualizes the Madonna and Child within the sculptural production around the year 1300, drawing parallels with contemporaneous objects all across Europe and reaching up to Scandinavia. This sculpture is particularly dear to me: it was one of the first objects to which Stephen offered me a sneak peek, before it was officially announced to the public, and I clearly remember Stephen’s infectious enthusiasm with which he introduced the sculpture to my students just as soon as it was installed in the gallery. Whatever delight Stephen experienced with the Mosan Madonna, it paled in comparison to what he considered then, and considers still, to be his most beloved acquisition, the icon of the Virgin Eleousa attributed to Angelos Akotantos (Figure 0.2). When I asked him to reflect on it, Stephen admitted that he “was emotionally vested in the icon like none of the others.” Until the object came to the CMA in 2010, the collection had no painted icons—a tremendous gap in its holdings, and one that Bob Bergman, then the museum’s director, charged Stephen with filling as far back as 1993. Stephen said that he “came close on several occasions, but something was always missing—condition, quality, an appropriate subject, provenance.” When he learned about the Akotantos icon that was for sale by a private collector, it took him months of difficult negotiation as well as several trips to Rome to strike the deal. “I was exhausted at the end,” Stephen said, “but I felt the perfect icon for Cleveland had been found.” After a complicated conservation process, the icon was put on display in 2012, quite appropriately, in the Robert P. Bergman Memorial Gallery of Byzantine Art, where it now accompanies another icon, the New Testament Trinity, that Stephen helped acquire just a few years later. The two icons serve as the starting point of Maria Vassilaki’s essay, which opens the final section of the book where three scholars reflect on one of the oldest curatorial conundrums: the thorny issue of attribution. In her article, Vassilaki brings up an astonishing case of a group of Sinai icons, including one by Akotantos, that were overpainted as well as supplied with arbitrary dates and signatures by a Cretan artist who came to stay at the monastery sometime at the end of the eighteenth century. Vassilaki cautions us against trusting artist signatures on icons, pointing out their unreliable evidentiary nature. But if a corpus of Byzantine icons suffers from spuriously imposed names, then contemporaneous Western medieval objects often suffer from an inverse problem: a complete absence of necessary signatures. Such is

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Figure 0.2: Attributed to Angelos Akotantos, Icon of the Mother of God and Infant Christ (Virgin Eleousa), Crete, ca. 1425–1450, tempera and gold on wood panel, 96 × 70 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund, 2010.154.

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the case of Simon Marmion’s oeuvre, for instance, which has to be reconstructed and restructured again and again—and this, indeed, is the project of Sandra Hindman, whose identification of two Simon Marmion folios, one of which graces the collection of the CMA, has recently been challenged. Revisiting her previous arguments and studying the Cleveland leaf anew, Hindman pushes against the challenge, nimbly weaving an argument that confirms Marmion’s authorship of the unsigned leaves. In turn, Till-Holger Borchert relies on infrared reflectography to study a series of underdrawings that connect Netherlandish artists and workshops in the long fifteenth century. In this case study, he focuses on the multifarious practices of Jan van Eyck’s workshop in Bruges, whose output informed a broad range of painters long after the master’s death. Borchert’s essay serves as a fitting conclusion to the volume inasmuch as it circles back to the themes articulated throughout the book: the exciting and yet painstaking work it takes to reunite a fragmentary oeuvre into a coherent corpus of work; the necessity of close looking and the value of exhaustive conservation studies; and, of course, the curatorial decisions inherent in questions of attribution, dating, collecting, and naming. The broad range of media that form the backbone of this book’s essays, the wealth of topics of interest to curators and academics alike, and the distinguished roster of contributors to this volume not only bear witness to the broad range of Stephen’s curatorial affinities but also testify to his exceptional professional accomplishment. He served the Cleveland Museum of Art for thirty-seven years, retiring in 2019 as the Robert P. Bergman Curator of Medieval Art, and in the course of his career published several important books and catalogues, and penned numerous scholarly articles focused on the museum’s collection. He has made a range of key acquisitions for that collection and was responsible for reinstallation of both the medieval galleries and the Armor Court over the past two decades. But among his greatest accomplishments, no doubt, are the extraordinary exhibitions he curated for the museum: The Caporali Missal (2013), Arms & Armor from Imperial Austria (2008), Dukes & Angels: Art from the Court of Burgundy, 1364– 1419 (2004–2005), African Zion: The Sacred Art of Ethiopia (1995–1996), The Decorated Letter and the Illuminator’s Art (1993), and many more. Stephen retired before he could complete the Philip the Good show on which he worked for several years, but his curatorial imprint will surely be felt when the exhibition finally arrives in Cleveland. Our centennial show on the Valois fountain—which Stephen has characterized as a captivating and “truly special object emblematic of the CMA’s medieval collection”—provided a fitting coda for his illustrious career. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be able to dedicate this book to him.

Part I: Curating Fragments: Itineraries / Reconstructions

Paul Williamson

Chapter 1 Saint Stephen in Stone It is happily apposite that I am able to present to Stephen Fliegel—a valued colleague of long standing—a short study dedicated to a previously unpublished sculpture connected to his saintly namesake. I have no doubt that the recipient of this Festschrift has always been especially knowledgeable of and engaged with representations of the celebrated protomartyr, especially as images of him abound in medieval and Renaissance art.1 In his own museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art, perhaps the most striking sculpture of the saint is Tilman Riemenschneider’s polychrome limewood figure of ca. 1508 (Figure 1.1).2 Here he can be recognized by the attributes of his martyrdom, the stones gathered together in the folds of his dalmatic, but his thick curly hair and rugged good looks hardly suggest his role as a deacon, and if the head alone survived there would be little to guide us in identifying it. St. Stephen’s vocation is more clearly evident in earlier representations, especially those of the thirteenth century, where he is often shown with a neatly trimmed tonsure. Exemplary in this regard are the two stained glass panels now in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, one a composite image and French, of ca. 1220, the other Lower Rhenish and of ca. 1260–1280.3 In thirteenth-century sculpture, the obvious point of reference is the portal dedicated to St. Stephen on the south transept of Notre-Dame in Paris, where the tympanum is given over to the story of the saint’s life, illustrating his disputation, sermon, trial, stoning, and burial, and where the trumeau showed his standing figure.4

 Wolfgang Braunfels, ed., Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie, vol. 8 (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1976), 395–403.  Julien Chapuis, ed., Tilman Riemenschneider: Master Sculptor of the Late Middle Ages (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1999), cat. no. 32A.  Paul Williamson, Medieval and Renaissance Stained Glass in the Victoria and Albert Museum (London: V&A Publications, 2003), cat. nos. 12, 20.  Willibald Sauerländer, Gothic Sculpture in France 1140–1270 (London: Thames and Hudson, 1972), 488–89, pls. 267–69; and Stephan Albrecht, “Das sichtbar werdende Unsichtbare: Das Südquerhausportal der Kathedrale von Paris,” in Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln, ed. Michael Grandmontagne and Tobias Kunz (Berlin and Petersberg: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016), 33–57. The recent publication of Die Querhausportale der Kathedrale Notre-Dame in Paris: Architektur, Skulptur, Farbigkeit, ed. Stephan Albrecht, Stefan Breitling, and Rainer Drewello (Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2021) appeared only after submission of the present article. I am grateful to Charles T. Little for several useful discussions on the portal and its sculptural program. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-002

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Figure 1.1: Tilman Riemenschneider, Saint Stephen, Würzburg (Germany), ca. 1502–1508, lindenwood with polychromy and gilding, 93.5 × 35 × 23.5 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund, 1959.43.

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Thanks to a carved inscription on the doorway and the careful research of Dieter Kimpel and others, the chronology of the Notre-Dame St. Stephen portal has been fixed in the years immediately following 1258.5 Alas, this doorway, like much of the sculptural decoration of Notre-Dame, suffered gravely from the revolutionary iconoclasm of 1793–1794, when the trumeau figure and the jamb figures were torn down and decapitated. The headless bodies of these apostles and saints were subsequently found in 1839 in the rue de la Santé, and are now in the Musée de Cluny.6 One of these, holding a book before him in both hands (Figure 1.2), is certainly the St. Stephen from the trumeau, and acted as the model for AdolpheVictor Geoffroy-Dechaume when he came to carve the replacement figure now in situ, as part of the restoration campaign under Viollet-le-Duc.7 One of the heads belonging to these life-size figures was thought to have been recorded as being recovered with them in the rue de la Santé: this is the head of a bishop saint, also now in the Musée de Cluny (Figure 1.3).8 Another head, of a young tonsured saint, now in the Musée Carnavalet in Paris, has also with good reason been associated with the doorway (Figures 1.4 and 1.5).9 This connection was arrived at on stylistic grounds by Kimpel (who was put in mind of the young St. John the Evangelist by its physiognomy), and was tentatively accepted by Alain

 Dieter Kimpel, “Die Querhausarme von Notre-Dame zu Paris und ihre Skulpturen” (Ph.D. diss., Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, 1971), 30. The inscription reads: +ANNO. DNI. MCCLVII. MENSE. FEBRU/ARIO. IDUS. SECUNDO (H)OC. FUIT. INCEPTUM. CHRISTI. GENIT(RI)CIS. HONORE: KALLENSI. LATHOMO. VIVENTE. JO/HANNE. MAGISTRO (the date given here, February 1257, should be read as 1258 in the new style).  Alain Erlande-Brandenburg and Dominique Thibaudat, Les sculptures de Notre-Dame de Paris au musée de Cluny (Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1982), 97–104. See also Dieter Kimpel, “Le sort des statues de Notre-Dame de Paris: Documents sur la période révolutionnaire,” Revue de l’art 4 (1969): 44–47; Alain Erlande-Brandenburg and Dieter Kimpel, “La statuaire de Notre-Dame de Paris avant les destructions révolutionnaires,” Bulletin Monumental 3 (1978): 236–37, figs. 27–28; and Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, “Les sculptures de Notre-Dame de Paris découvertes en 1839,” La Revue du Louvre (1979): 83–89.  Erlande-Brandenburg and Thibaudat, Les sculptures, cat. no. 269; De Plâtre et d’Or: GeoffroyDechaume, sculpteur romantique de Viollet-le-Duc (Nesles-la-Vallée: Musée d’art et d’histoire Louis Senlecq, L’Isle-Adam, and Château de La Roche-Guyon, 1998), 96, figs. 2–3; and Xavier Dectot, Sculptures des XIe–XIIIe siècles, Collection du musée de Cluny, https://sculpturesmedievalescluny.fr/collection/bras-sud-du-transept-notre-dame.php.  Erlande-Brandenburg and Thibaudat, Les sculptures, cat. no. 268, but see now Dectot, Sculptures. Although the identification of this head as the one found in 1839 is questioned, it is not doubted that it must be dated to ca. 1260 and is closely related to the Notre-Dame transept sculptures.  Inv. A.P. 205; and Jean-Pierre Willesme, Sculptures médiévales: XIIe siècle–début du XVIe siècle, Catalogues d’art et d’histoire du Musée Carnavalet, I (Paris: Musée Carnavalet, 1979), cat. no. 90.

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Figure 1.2: Figure of St. Stephen (trumeau), from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 140 cm. Paris, Musée de Cluny, inv. no. Cl. 18646. © RMN-GP/cliché Franck Raux.

Erlande-Brandenburg, who suggested it came from the St. Stephen torso.10 Like the head of the bishop saint, it has received blows to the nose and chin and is weathered, but it appears to have been separated from its body, at the neck, with considerable care. Up until now, these two heads were the only candidates to be seriously considered for the St. Stephen portal. The heads are characterized by a carving technique typical of the classic or so-called “precious” style current in Paris in the middle of the thirteenth century. This developed out of the sculptural innovations worked out earlier in the century on the west portals of Notre-Dame, and is also seen in a slightly different form on the heads associated with the north transept portal, carved immediately

 Kimpel, Die Querhausarme, 183, 283; Erlande-Brandenburg and Thibaudat, Les sculptures, 98, n. 7. See also, most recently, Florian Meunier, “Sculptures et décor de Notre-Dame de Paris au musée Carnavalet,” Bulletin de la Société nationale des Antiquaires de France (2014): 99–123, esp. 113–15 (including a photomontage of the Carnavalet head with the Cluny torso at fig. 34); I am very grateful to Damien Berné for this reference and other helpful advice.

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Figure 1.3: Head of a Bishop Saint, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 32 cm. Paris, Musée de Cluny, inv. no. Cl. 18932. © RMN-GP/cliché Franck Raux.

before those of the south transept. Both heads, which may be linked to several of the voussoir figures on the St. Stephen portal, share distinctive features such as the double-hooded eyelids, almond-shaped eyes, and furrowed brows, and their size—32 cm and 27 cm—accords well with the dimensions of the now headless figures. It remains unclear, however, whom the head of the bishop saint represents, even though it appears to have provided the inspiration for that on the nineteenth-century figure of St. Dionysius (Denis) now on the left lateral wall, standing between his companions Rusticus and Eleutherius. Likewise, the Carnavalet head could represent St. John the Evangelist, St. Stephen, or even another youthful saint. To this pair may now be added a third detached head with a strong likelihood of the same original location, and perhaps a competing claim to be that of St. Stephen (Figures 1.6, 1.7, 1.8). This head of a young man, in a private collection in London, is shown gazing ahead with a frontal stare, and is so close in style to the Carnavalet head that it is likely to be by the same hand. Carved from the same type of limestone—identified in the case of the new head as Lutetian limestone

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Figure 1.4: Head of a Young Saint, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 27 cm. Paris, Musée Carnavalet, inv. no. A.P. 205.

Figure 1.5: Side view of Figure 1.4.

from the north of Paris—it is 28 cm in height.11 Unlike the Carnavalet head it has received some restoration in fine cement around the lips and nose, and a light colored skim with painted highlights on the cheeks, but otherwise shares the same weathering and extent of damage. The facial features—the mouth, nose, and eyes—are directly comparable and the hair is treated in the same way, with gently curling and twisted locks. Most telling, however, is the unusual, highly distinctive, and detailed treatment of the ears on both heads, with the helix curling back into the concha, revealing a sophisticated interest in this particular feature (Figures 1.5 and 1.8); this element, almost a stylistic signature, is also found on the head of the bishop saint in the Musée de Cluny.12 It follows that if a Notre-Dame

 The stone was identified by the geologist Annie Blanc in a letter of November 2, 2010. It has not yet been sampled for neutron activation analysis (NAA), for which see Charles T. Little, “Searching for the Provenances of Medieval Stone Sculpture: Possibilities and Limitations,” Gesta 33, no. 1 (1994): 29–37; and Georgia Wright and Lore L. Holmes, “The Limestone Project: A Scientific Detective Story,” in Set in Stone: The Face in Medieval Sculpture, ed. Charles T. Little (New Haven, CT and London: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2006), 46–49 and cat. nos. 15–16.  Visible most clearly in Kimpel, Die Querhausarme, fig. 208.

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Figure 1.6: Head of a Young Saint, probably St. Stephen, from the south transept portal, Notre-Dame cathedral, Paris, ca. 1260, height: 28 cm. London, private collection.

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Figure 1.7: Three-quarter view of Figure 1.6.

Chapter 1 Saint Stephen in Stone

Figure 1.8: Side view of Figure 1.6.

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provenance is accepted for the Carnavalet and Musée de Cluny heads then the same is likely to obtain for their closest cognate. But can the London head be confidently placed anywhere on the St. Stephen portal? It indeed seems possible that it is actually the head of St. Stephen himself, from the trumeau, and its size would not preclude its attachment to the now incomplete figure in the Musée de Cluny (Figure 1.2). Its dignified, serene gaze, directed forward from the center of the doorway, echoes the iconic quality of the trumeau figures of the saint on the portals at Sens and Meaux.13 If this is so, the Carnavalet head must be another saint, as suggested above. In an ideal world, the decapitated body of St. Stephen and the London head should be brought together to test this suggested affiliation, and it is the hope that such a juxtaposition can one day be arranged. The recently discovered head was acquired on the London art market in 2018, having been in an English private collection from about 2000, and was previously with an American dealer in Brooklyn.14 It is likely to have arrived in the United States, from Paris, in the first half of the twentieth century, perhaps through the offices of the dealers Demotte or Joseph Brummer, although confirmation of this has yet to emerge. After the French Revolution it might have been hidden or buried, like the figures of the rue de la Santé, and then presumably passed into private possession. As a detached head, divorced from its original setting, it gains a singular strength of attraction. Released from its body, as if guillotined in the revolutionary fervor of late eighteenth-century Paris, the head allows a closer engagement for the viewer.15 Just as the decapitated torso of St. Stephen in the Musée de Cluny assumes a fragmentary power that in its incomplete form and damaged appearance encourages comparison with Roman statues (emphasized by its modern display in the Thermes of the museum building), so the head—in its present condition—has a wistful bearing reminiscent of classical prototypes. Its brooding, numinous, quality is embodied in its almost ethereal state, floating in space. This is the case with most detached heads, of course, whether Roman, medieval, Renaissance, or Baroque. As entities in their own right, detached heads such as this have taken on a new, second, life, as objects which can be admired for their aesthetic qualities alone, as beautiful and transcendent works of art. Their past is not buried by this act of admiration, and their history inevitably informs and shapes our responses, both intellectual and visceral.

 Sauerländer, Gothic Sculpture, pl. 62, ill. 40.  Purchased from Sam Fogg, London, and included in the online catalogue Sam Fogg, 30 Heads: Stone Heads from the 12th to the 15th Century (introduction by Jana Gajdošová), 42–44. For the avoidance of doubt, it should be stated that the head is not in the Wyvern Collection in London. https://www.samfogg.com/usr/documents/exhibitions/list_of_works_url/12/30-heads-2018.pdf.  The apt guillotine analogy for other heads attacked at the time of the French Revolution was made by Stephen Scher in “Iconoclasm: A Legacy of Violence,” in Little, Set in Stone, 19–20.

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Bibliography Albrecht, Stephan. “Das sichtbar werdende Unsichtbare: Das Südquerhausportal der Kathedrale von Paris.” In Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln, edited by Michael Grandmontagne and Tobias Kunz, 33–57. Berlin and Petersberg: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016. Albrecht, Stephan, Stefan Breitling, and Rainer Drewello, eds. Die Querhausportale der Kathedrale Notre-Dame in Paris: Architektur, Skulptur, Farbigkeit. Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2021. Braunfels, Wolfgang, ed. Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie. Vol. 8, Ikonographie der Heiligen: Meletius bis zweiundvierzig Martyer. Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1976. Chapuis, Julien, ed. Tilman Riemenschneider: Master Sculptor of the Late Middle Ages. New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1999. De Plâtre et d’Or: Geoffroy-Dechaume, sculpteur romantique de Viollet-le-Duc. Nesles-la-Vallée: Musée d’art et d’histoire Louis Senlecq, L’Isle-Adam, and Château de La Roche-Guyon, 1998. Dectot, Xavier. Sculptures des XIe–XIIIe siècles, Collection du Musée de Cluny. https://www.sculpturesme dievales-cluny.fr/. Erlande-Brandenburg, Alain. “Les sculptures de Notre-Dame de Paris découvertes en 1839.” La Revue du Louvre (1979): 83–89. Erlande-Brandenburg, Alain and Dieter Kimpel. “La statuaire de Notre-Dame de Paris avant les destructions révolutionnaires.” Bulletin Monumental 3 (1978): 213–66. Erlande-Brandenburg, Alain, and Dominique Thibaudat. Les sculptures de Notre-Dame de Paris au musée de Cluny. Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1982. Fogg, Sam. 30 Heads: Stone Heads from the 12th to the 15th Century. https://www.samfogg.com/usr/ documents/exhibitions/list_of_works_url/12/30-heads-2018.pdf. Kimpel, Dieter. “Die Querhausarme von Notre-Dame zu Paris und ihre Skulpturen.” Ph.D. diss., Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, 1971. Kimpel, Dieter. “Le sort des statues de Notre-Dame de Paris: Documents sur la période révolutionnaire.” Revue de l’art 4 (1969): 44–47. Little, Charles T. “Searching for the Provenances of Medieval Stone Sculpture: Possibilities and Limitations.” Gesta 33, no. 1 (1994): 29–37. Meunier, Florian. “Sculptures et décor de Notre-Dame de Paris au musée Carnavalet.” Bulletin de la Société nationale des Antiquaires de France (2014): 99–123. Sauerländer, Willibald. Gothic Sculpture in France 1140–1270. London: Thames and Hudson, 1972. Scher, Stephen. “Iconoclasm: A Legacy of Violence.” In Set in Stone: The Face in Medieval Sculpture, edited by Charles T. Little, 18–20. New Haven, CT and London: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2006. Willesme, Jean-Pierre. Sculptures médiévales: XIIe siècle–début du XVIe siècle, Catalogues d’art et d’histoire du Musée Carnavalet, I. Paris: Musée Carnavalet, 1979. Williamson, Paul. Medieval and Renaissance Stained Glass in the Victoria and Albert Museum. London: V&A Publications, 2003. Wright, Georgia, and Lore L. Holmes. “The Limestone Project: A Scientific Detective Story.” In Set in Stone: The Face in Medieval Sculpture, edited by Charles T. Little, 46–49. New Haven, CT and London: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2006.

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Chapter 2 An English Alabaster Altarpiece of Christ’s Passion Reunited In 2015 three medieval English alabaster panels from a private collection were brought to my attention by their owner.1 They were purchased several years before, described by the London-based dealer Richard Philp who sold them, as having originally come from the same altarpiece: a narrative sequence of Christ’s Passion showing the Flagellation, Crucifixion, and Entombment (Figures 2.1, 2.2, 2.3). As with similar sculptures appearing on the art market, the provenance of these three quickly ran cold; they were bought as a group by Philp in April 1998 from Piasa auction house in Paris and any further details are not currently known.2 After first viewing the carvings I assumed that a further two panels once existed but had since been lost, or were now separated from the group. As will be explained, a five-panel arrangement was the commonest format of English alabaster Passion altarpieces. Not long after first encountering the three privately owned alabasters I came across two further carvings, a Betrayal of Christ in the Burrell Collection (Figure 2.4) and a Resurrection in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Figures 2.5 and 2.6), which I recognized as possible candidates for the first and final scenes from the incomplete altarpiece. This short essay sets out the reasons for thinking they constitute an original ensemble.

 I am grateful to the owner of the three alabasters for providing access to the sculptures and for being enthusiastic about my research. Thanks to Sandy Heslop and Naomi Speakman for their comments, to Griffith Mann and Pierre Terjanian for facilitating access to the Metropolitan alabaster, and to James Robinson for help with the Burrell carving.  Sold at Piasa Auction House, Paris, lot 72, April 3, 1998. The sale catalogue states that the sculptures came from a private collection, presumably in France. My sincere thanks to Richard Philp for his help in trying to track down further provenance information. For English alabasters in France generally, see: Abbé Bouillet, “La fabrication industrielle des retables en Albâtre,” Bulletin Monumental 65 (1901): 45–62; Gorguet Pascale, “Répertoire des albâtres anglais du XIVe au XVe siècle dans le Sud Ouest” (Ph.D. diss., Université Toulouse Le Mirail, 1984); Christine Prigent, Les sculptures anglaises d’Albâtre au Musée National du Moyen Âge Thermes de Cluny (Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 1998); Laurence Flavigny, D’Angleterre en Normandie, sculptures d’Albâtre du Moyen Âge (Rouen: Musée des Antiquités, 1998). https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-003

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Figure 2.1: The Flagellation of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author.

Figure 2.2: The Crucifixion, England ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author.

The Panels: Description and Condition First, in order to proceed with the case that the Burrell and Metropolitan alabasters are the missing pieces of the puzzle, it is necessary to consider the evidence for the other three panels belonging together.3 Measuring 55 cm (H) × 26 cm (W), the Entombment panel is the largest of the group, with the other two measuring 43 (H) × 26 cm (W). An 11 cm discrepancy in height is due to the survival of an  In the past some collectors and dealers combined panels from separate altarpieces to make them appear as if they were original ensembles. Groups like this have been sold on the art market as recently as 2016, see Sotheby’s, Old Master Sculpture and Works of Art Including Splendours from a Mantuan Palazzo, London, 5 July 2016 (London: Sotheby’s, 2016), lot 6. For another example see: William Henry St. John Hope, ed., Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition of English Medieval Alabaster Work (London: Society of Antiquaries, 1913), 32–33. These three panels were acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art as a complete altarpiece from William M. Laffan in 1906; acc. nos. 06.321a, 06.321b, 06.321c.

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Figure 2.3: The Entombment of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. London, private collection. Photo: author.

integral carved canopy for the Entombment, whereas the upper sections of the other, now smaller panels, have suffered damage and were subsequently neatened up with a simple faceted design. Surviving architectural features, in the form of thin pilasters at either side of the panels on both the Flagellation and Crucifixion, confirm they once also had integral carved canopies like the Entombment. It is worth noting that canopies like these—that is to say, a canopy carved as part of the same alabaster slab comprising the narrative scene—are rare in the surviving corpus. There are, of course, many panels with simple embattled canopies, often argued to date to the late fourteenth century, or ca. 1400, but the design for the Entombment is more complex with a combination of both an embattled and arched canopy, detailed cusping and foliation on the arches, pierced lancet tracery, crocket gables, and small decorative flourishes such as lion’s-head label stops.4 Most panels, especially those produced during the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, were made with detached canopies; carved separately but fixed into place above the narrative panel in order to give the impression of

 Philip Nelson, “English Alabasters of the Embattled Type,” Archaeological Journal 75, no. 1 (1918): 310.

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Figure 2.4: The Betrayal of Christ, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. Glasgow, The Burrell Collection, Gift of Sir William and Lady Burrell to the City of Glasgow, 1944. Photo: author.

having being made from a single piece of alabaster. A reason for this division of sculptural production is down to the fragile nature of the stone, which is liable to crack and break when being worked. Even the crudest canopies required some rough drilling and chiseling to create an openwork effect. Breakages must have been common, and, by separating out the production of canopies from narrative scenes in the workshop, the sculptors were showing their economic acuity, surely reducing the number of whole alabaster slabs ruined by an unfortunate slip of the hand. What then to make of the carvings under discussion here? The sculptor responsible for them was either confident that he would not make an error, or was in no rush to produce a large number of panels quickly and thus took time during their production. Due to the inclusion of integral canopies these panels are much taller than most other English alabasters. Of the ninety-eight known carvings showing the Entombment, this is one of only three with a height exceeding 50 cm.5

 Francis Cheetham, Alabaster Images of Medieval England (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2003), 129–30.

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Figure 2.5: The Resurrection of Christ (after conservation treatment), England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster, gold, polychromy, 53.9 cm × 26 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Bashford Dean, in memory of Alexander McMillan Welch, 1949, acc. No. 49.120.1. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Figure 2.6: The Resurrection of Christ (prior to conservation treatment), England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster, gold, polychromy, 53.9 cm × 26 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Bashford Dean, in memory of Alexander McMillan Welch, 1949, acc. No. 49.120.1. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Originally all three sculptures would have been brightly colored, but much of the medieval paint has been lost, except for a few tiny fragments, such as a small quantity of blue pigment, possibly ultramarine, concealed in the Entombment scene under Mary Magdalene’s ointment jar. From the surviving polychromy there is little hope of recreating, or comparing, the original appearance of the different panels. The alabaster itself is uniformly damaged, marked by cracks, chips, and small breaks, with the arms of two of Christ’s tormentors involved in the

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Flagellation, and the forearm of Joseph of Arimathea, or Nicodemus, in the Entombment, having fractured. As a result of possible exposure to a heat source, the surface of all three alabasters has a desiccated appearance. This damage, which might have taken place over a relatively lengthy period of time, depending on how and where the panels were stored or displayed in the past, probably also accounts for the loss of paint. There are, however, major instances of repair and intervention with the Crucifixion panel being the most severely treated. The entire upper part of this scene above and behind the head of Christ, including his halo, arms, and part of the cross, appears to have been remodeled or repaired with plaster. The head of an angel on Christ’s left has broken off and been replaced; its lumpy and poorly carved features bear little resemblance to the fine skilled work apparent elsewhere on the panels. Apart from visible rough saw marks, the reverses of the three carvings are flat and mostly plain, except for several small drilled holes filled with lead and elements of broken wire. These remnants once helped fix the alabasters securely into place in a wooden frame, which no longer exists.6 The three sculptures are remarkably similar in terms of style and technique. They share an unusual feature: individual eyelids have been carved for all of the figures, when elsewhere, in most other instances, they were left uncarved and subsequently painted on. The garments of several male figures, particularly the short-sleeved cloaks worn by Christ’s tormentors in the Flagellation, and those of the centurion and soldiers gathered at the foot of the cross in the Crucifixion, hang loosely with excess drapery drooping in vertical folds.7 All are clearly work of the same hand, a gifted sculptor, confident in the shaping and undercutting of alabaster in order to produce dramatic effects. For instance, one of Christ’s tormentors, situated to the lower right of the Flagellation, is carefully depicted midway through the act of removing his cloak. As he lays it on the ground, he twists his head to look back obliquely towards Christ, perhaps inviting the viewer to consider his role, and potentially his viewpoint, as he participates in this gruesome violent act. But why remove the cloak? Has he grown hot and weary from his labor, or has he only just arrived and is disrobing in order to join the fray? A

 There are no surviving wooden frames dating to the fourteenth century. One of the earliest, and dated ca. 1400, is the altarpiece from Munkaþverá, Iceland, now in the National Museum of Denmark: Francis Cheetham, English Medieval Alabasters: With a Catalogue of the Collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum (Oxford: Phaidon-Christie’s, 1984), 22.  For similar skilled work of the same period see two English panels of ca. 1400 showing the Nativity and the Resurrection at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, inv. nos. 49.26.9a and 49.26.10. See also a panel of the Resurrection: St. John Hope, Illustrated Catalogue, 52, cat no. 6, plate X.

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similar attention to detail is on display in the Entombment panel. With his left hand, Joseph of Arimathea, or Nicodemus, gathers up the side of a portion of cloth lying over the rim of Christ’s tomb, the lower part of which falls into a sharp but elegant switchback fold. The effect here is one of gentle, soft movement, the solemn lowering of Christ’s body into the tomb, a gesture surely intended to be contrasted visually, and ultimately mentally, with the powerful force of his corporeal resurrection from the very same sepulcher. These subtle visual flourishes stimulated engagement with the terrible but salvific sacrifice of Christ’s Passion and demonstrate an imaginative mind behind their creation. Given their similarities in size, condition, and style, there is little room to doubt that these three panels were made by the same sculptor and once formed part of a larger altarpiece with two or more carvings now missing. Exactly how many sculptures were included originally is complicated by a lack of provenance, but, by looking at the available data for the format of English alabaster ensembles more generally, some conclusions can be drawn. In Alabaster Images of Medieval England, Francis Cheetham helpfully provided a series of indexes related to surviving panels, including a breakdown of iconographic types with the number of known carvings supplied alongside.8 Cheetham’s lists help to clarify several things. First, the greatest number of panels relate, unsurprisingly, to the Life of Christ and the Virgin. For Christ’s Passion the most popular scenes, in order of narrative, are: the Betrayal (107 surviving panels), the Flagellation (75), the Crucifixion (127), the Deposition (31), the Entombment (98), the Resurrection (143), and the Ascension (46).9 Other Christological scenes included by Cheetham, and ones that were represented with great popularity by sculptors and painters elsewhere in Europe, such as the Last Supper (7), the Harrowing of Hell (8), the Three Maries at the Sepulcher (4), Noli me tangere (6), or Doubting Thomas (7), were simply not produced in large numbers by English alabaster sculptors. From Cheetham’s lists it is clear that there was no set format, and the total number of panels in an altarpiece could vary from one to as many as nine or fourteen. For instance, an ensemble with scenes from the life of St. George, now in the Musée d’Évreux, France, numbers thirteen large panels, with several other smaller subsidiary sculptures displayed alongside.10 However,

 Cheetham, Alabaster Images, 179–82. These numbers are not definitive, but they provide a relatively solid framework from which to proceed.  There are more surviving alabasters for the Resurrection than any other scene as these were sometimes placed as the central panel in altarpieces of the Joys of the Virgin. See, for example, the Munkaþverá altarpiece, Cheetham, English Medieval Alabasters, 22.  Samantha Riches, “The La Selle Retable: An English Alabaster Altarpiece in Normandy” (Ph.D. diss., University of Leicester, 1999); Samantha Riches, “An Alabaster Altarpiece of St. George,” in The History of British Art 600–1600, ed. Tim Ayers (London: Tate, 2008), 76–77.

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from surveying the data, it is possible to conclude that the most popular arrangement for a Passion altarpiece by far appears to be a five-paneled arrangement comprising scenes of the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Crucifixion, the Entombment, and the Resurrection. Some of these sculptures, most of which are in diaspora, must surely originate from the same altarpieces. It is surprising that no scholars have, as yet, attempted to reconstruct them; a point to which I will return below.

Missing Panel One: The Resurrection In 1949 a medieval English alabaster showing the Resurrection of Christ was donated to the department of Arms and Armor at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Figure 2.5).11 Its acquisition by Arms and Armor, rather than the department of Medieval Art and the Cloisters, might seem curious but was typical of the time. It was not acquired for display, as an example of English medieval sculpture, but instead as a document for study, a representation of early fifteenth-century armor worn by the knights surrounding Christ’s tomb.12 Beyond the 1949 date of donation there is currently no further provenance information for how and when it arrived in the United States. Measuring 54 cm (H) × 26 cm (W) the panel is roughly the same size as the Entombment alabaster discussed above, and, likewise, has an integral carved canopy complete with a combination of crenellations and arches, detailed cusping and foliation, pierced lancet tracery, crocket gables, and lion’s-head label stops. Both canopies are identical, and uniquely so in the surviving corpus, but, it is their similar sizes that adds considerable weight to them being from the same altarpiece.13 At 54 cm the Resurrection panel is, like the Entombment, significantly larger than the majority of its iconographic counterparts. Of the 143 surviving panels showing  The panel, inv. no. 49.120.1, was the gift of Mary Alice Dykeman Dean (Mrs. Bashford Dean) in memory of Alexander McMillian Welch. Mary Dean was the wife of Bashford Dean, a Metropolitan Museum curator, who had a major role in putting together its collection of arms and armor. Bashford Dean had owned the alabaster previous to it being donated. See: Augusta S. Tavender, “Medieval English Alabasters in American Museums—Pt I,” Speculum 30 (January 1955): 64.  For similar Resurrection panels of the same date see Cheetham, English Medieval Alabasters, 274–76, cat. nos. 201, 202, and 203; Victoria and Albert Museum’s inv. nos. A.154–1946, A.81–1946, A.175–1946.  Other rare panels with integral canopies, of which there are only a handful, are simplified forms of those seen in the Entombment and Resurrection, and, prior to their damage, the Flagellation and Crucifixion. See, for instance, an alabaster of the Trinity at the Victoria and Albert Museum, inv no. A1-1952 and Cheetham, English Medieval Alabasters, 309, cat. no. 235. See also, an alabaster showing a Sign of the Last Judgement, British Museum, inv. no. 1910,1208.2.

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Christ’s Resurrection, the example at the Metropolitan is one of only nine that exceeds 50 cm in height. It is also remarkably similar in style to the alabasters described above. All the depicted figures have their eyelids carved, a feature shared with the previously discussed panels, and the iconography matches the most common arrangement for a sequence of five scenes as laid out in detail above. Where the Resurrection panel differs, however, from those already surveyed, is in its condition. In contrast to the almost complete lack of color on the previous alabasters, there is much surviving polychromy. Christ’s tomb, for instance, complete with raised gilded edges, retains its dusty pink-brown color. Elsewhere, specific details have been painted on or gilded, such as the mail aventails worn by the knights, the hemlines of their cloaks and armor, as well as the hair, beard, and cross of Christ. The background of the panel is gilded and decorated with a repeating reticulated pattern of flowers arranged in individual lozenges: a rare design in the corpus of English alabaster sculpture.14 The surface of the panel is smooth in comparison to the desiccated appearance of the other three alabasters, but it, too, has suffered severe damage over time, having fractured into four parts. There is a major break running through the middle of the tomb and another behind Christ’s head directly across his halo. Other damage includes Christ’s lower leg, for instance, which has broken off completely, as well as several fingers now missing from his right hand. Recently, however, the panel has, for the first time since its acquisition, been through a thorough conservation treatment prior to display in the newly renovated British Galleries of the Metropolitan Museum. This work, which included the reattachment of Christ’s broken leg, has vastly improved the panel’s condition, revealing the underlying quality that was otherwise obscured by post-medieval damage (Figure 2.6). By consolidating the fragmented pieces, the conservation treatment also allowed for the sculpture to be safely turned over and for the reverse to be photographed, showing that, like the previous three panels, it too displays remnants of small drilled holes filled with lead and wire for attaching the alabaster to a wooden frame.15

 For a similar gilded background, see: Cheetham, English Medieval Alabasters, 259, cat. no. 186, inv. no. A.49–1946.  A photograph of the reverse of the panel can be found online: https://www.metmuseum.org/ art/collection/search/27632?searchField=All&sortBy=Relevance&ft=alabaster+resurrection&offset= 0&rpp=20&pos=2 (accessed September 9, 2021).

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Missing Panel Two: The Betrayal of Christ In 1955, just a few short years before he passed away, William Burrell acquired an English medieval alabaster of the Betrayal of Christ from London-based dealer S. W. Wolsey (Figure 2.4).16 Burrell, a wealthy shipping magnate, donated his entire collection to the City of Glasgow in 1944 with the view to building a new museum, a project not fully realized until 1983 with the opening of The Burrell Collection in Pollock Country Park.17 Up until his death in 1959, Burrell added new acquisitions to the collection, such as the Betrayal alabaster, which were then taken to a storage facility in Kelvingrove to await future display. Unfortunately, like the panels described above, there are no further provenance details for the carving beyond the date of purchase by Burrell from Wolsey. Measuring 37.4 cm (H) × 25.7 cm (W) the Betrayal is the smallest of the entire group having suffered a significant break to the upper half of the panel. Up to a third of the sculpture is now lost, including the head of Christ’s disciple Peter, who is shown drawing his sword, and, unfortunately, almost all trace of an integral carved canopy. Yet, to the right of the panel, behind the head of the soldier grasping Christ’s arm, a small fragment of an architectural pilaster survives confirming that a canopy was once present there. Taking into account the size of the Entombment and Resurrection canopies, both of which are around 16 cm in height, we can surmise that the Betrayal must have originally measured approximately 55 cm, almost exactly the same as the others. The alabaster would, therefore, have been, when complete, one of only four out of 107 surviving scenes exceeding 50 cm in height. It too bears all the hallmarks of the same sculptor’s work: carved eyelids, loose-fitting cloaks for the soldiers, and a great deal of attention paid to the depiction of certain figures. Malchus, shown at the base of the scene, is a case in point. He is positioned almost prostrate, but twists the upper half of his body around, turning his head and eyes to look obliquely towards Christ’s outstretched hand held in blessing. The reverse of the panel, like its counterparts, is flat and plain except for several small holes, two of which retain remnants of lead and wire. In his unpublished catalogue of medieval sculpture in the Burrell, Richard Marks noted the significance of the Betrayal scene: “despite its damaged condition, this panel is one of the finest alabasters in the Burrell Collection. The faces of Christ and the apostle who clings to Him are of exceptional quality; their smooth and delicate modelling forms a stark contrast with the rough visages of

 William Burrell Purchase Book, 1955, The Burrell Collection Archive, p. 13.  For Burrell’s life and the history of his collection see: Richard Marks, Burrell: A Portrait of a Collector (Glasgow: R. Drew Pub, 1988).

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the soldiers.”18 As with the Resurrection panel, there is much surviving paint and gilding, and, apart from the significant break to the upper part of the carving, it is in good condition. The alabaster is unmarked by cracks and chips and retains a polished, waxy appearance. It is, in terms of its condition, most similar to the Resurrection panel. However, a further clue confirms the Betrayal’s place in the group: two tiny patches of gilded background survive, located behind Christ’s head and next to the architectural pilaster, decorated with the same reticulated pattern as found on the Resurrection.

Ensemble: Discussion and Conclusion Exactly how, and when, the five alabasters were separated from each other is unclear—the three central panels somehow remained together while the others did not—and unless further provenance details come to light this will remain the case. They have clearly had different histories, surviving in varying states of preservation, and those that retain their canopies, paint, and gilding help in imagining what the altarpiece looked like originally when complete. But one question lingers: are there any further sculptures from the ensemble surviving elsewhere that are as yet unrecognized? There could potentially have been other scenes, but, in my opinion, the original altarpiece was made up of only these five panels. Marks, in the notes for his unpublished catalogue, dated the Betrayal panel to 1400–1425, characterized by what he terms the “international gothic” style of the carving. With few securely datable English alabasters, accuracy remains a challenge, especially for developing a stylistic trajectory. Still, a date at the beginning of the fifteenth century would place the group at a transitional point in the production of English alabasters, from an earlier period, around ca. 1350 to ca. 1400, when more bespoke products were being made on a smaller scale, to a later period, from ca. 1400 onwards, when a growing international mass market for the carvings was gathering pace. Many of the largest altarpieces, that is, ones with more than five panels, date from the later period. It is, therefore, unlikely, given the size, iconography, and potential date of the sculptures, that any further panels remain undiscovered. There are, however, two similar alabasters, which I argue can be attributed to the same sculptor. The first is a figure of St. Thomas, incorrectly catalogued as St. Jude, in the Metropolitan

 Notes from Richard Marks’s unfinished sculpture catalogue, inv. no. 1.11 object file, The Burrell Collection Archive.

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Museum of Art.19 It measures 26.4 cm (H) × 7.6 cm (W), less than half the height of the panels above, suggesting it was a subsidiary sculpture, probably a bookend figure to an altarpiece. There is every chance that this figure might have come from the same altarpiece as the other panels discussed above, but there is, as yet, insufficient evidence to be conclusive. The other panel is a remarkable sculpture now in Thorning parish church, Denmark, showing the Pietà (Figure 2.7). Its location, in central Jylland (or Jutland), might seem surprising, but a small number of other English alabasters can be found nearby and attest to the early international success of their trade.20 The Pietà measures 66 cm (H) × 32 cm (W), its dimensions immediately marking it out as too big for the Passion altarpiece. Its iconography, that of the Virgin’s lamentation over Christ’s dead body, also suggests it potentially functioned as a single image, housed alone in a wooden tabernacle, rather than part of a larger altarpiece.21 It is unlike any of the other twenty-seven surviving alabaster images of the Pietà, and is, therefore, worth briefly describing.22 Below the integral carved canopy, God the Father is shown between two angels, all of whom hold scrolls. Underneath the Virgin and Christ is a recumbent figure, nude but with his hands covering his genitals, who lies inside the open mouth of Hell. His body is surrounded by prayer scrolls: the first is located near his mouth and the other near his groin. The nude figure probably represents that of a soul asking the Virgin and Christ to intercede on its behalf, but, despite much surviving original

 Richard Marks came to the same conclusion that the closest comparison for the Betrayal alabaster, stylistically, is the small figure of St. Thomas also from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. See: inv.1.11 object file, The Burrell Collection Archive. For the alabaster of St. Thomas see: Metropolitan Museum of Art acquisition number: 10.62.  Lloyd de Beer, “Recycled Sculptures, Reburied Bodies: Jørgen Rosenkrantz and the Reframed Alabaster Altarpiece in Hornslet Church,” Art History 43, no. 2 (April 2020): 412–31. See also: Francis Beckett, “Engelske Alabasttavler i Danmark,” Tidsskrift for Industri, parts 1 and 2 (1905): 19–24. The Danmarks Kirker project has not yet covered the churches of Viborg amt, and thus a full investigation of Thorning church remains to be done. For the trade in alabaster see: Kim Woods, “The Supply of Alabaster in Northern and Mediterranean Europe in the Later Middle Ages,” in Trade in Artists Materials: Markets and Commerce in Europe to 1700, ed. Jo Kirby, Susie Nash, and Joanna Cannon (London: Archetype, 2010), 86–93; Kim Woods, Cut in Alabaster: A Material of Sculpture and its European Traditions 1330–1530 (London: Harvey Miller Publishers, an imprint of Brepols, 2018).  See, for instance, the Pieta in the Chazen Museum of Art at the University of Wisconsin, inv. no. 69.9.1. See also, Cheetham, Alabaster Images, 93–94.  Cheetham, Alabaster Images, 93–94. It is mentioned by Richard Marks, Image and Devotion in Late Medieval England (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 2004), 134.

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Figure 2.7: The Pietà, England, ca. 1400–1425, alabaster. Denmark, Thorning parish church. Photo: author.

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polychromy on the alabaster, none of the text painted on the scrolls survives.23 Such a combination of scenes is, as far as I am aware, without parallel in medieval art and deserves a fuller treatment elsewhere. Such a visual flourish, akin to those present in the other panels, suggests an imaginative mind behind the sculpture’s creation, certainly one interested in invention and the power of images.

Conclusion Art historians have, on the whole, devoted little attention to trying to match up any of the surviving English alabaster carvings in order to reassemble their original groupings, with some actively arguing against it. Marks, for instance, considered this approach “akin to attempting a jigsaw puzzle with 99 per cent of the pieces missing.”24 For Marks it was the quality of the alabasters—those surviving in England, often in very poor condition—which dissuaded him, as it had many others, from devoting too much time to thinking about their formal similarities. Over time many alabaster panels have been destroyed or seriously damaged and, as is the case with the Passion altarpiece above, entire groups have become separated with seemingly little possibility of reuniting them. In England, no alabaster altarpiece remains in situ, and what has survived usually amounts to a battered panel or a collection of broken pieces mounted on a wall somewhere in a church. Almost all of these fragments were uncovered during refurbishment works, having been reused as building material, or deposited under floors, inside walls or niches to protect them from destruction.25 As fragmented as they are, these sculptures remain, at least, in the buildings for which they were probably first acquired. Conversely, many of the alabasters in museums and private collections across the world are now divorced from their original context, sometimes with scant provenance to help identify where they came from. The challenge to future scholars of English alabaster carving, especially those who might seek the reunification of separate panels, appears insurmountable: Cheetham alone recorded

 It could also potentially represent Adam, shown in limbo, and is therefore also a reference to Christ’s Harrowing of Hell, a popular scene in alabaster.  Marks, Image and Devotion, 2. Marks’s comments were not specifically related to alabasters, but all “three-dimensional images” made in England. Phillip Lindley has questioned Marks’s comments, see: Philip Lindley, “The Visual Arts and their Functions in the Pre-Reformation Church,” in Art Re-formed: Re-assessing the Impact of the Reformation on the Visual Arts, ed. Tara Hamling and Richard L. Williams (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007), 15.  William Anderson, “Re-discovery, Collecting and Display of English Medieval Alabasters,” Journal of the History of Collections 16, no. 1 (2004): 47–58.

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over 2500 sculptures located across twenty-four different countries. The majority of English alabasters thus remain in limbo, seemingly defying the possibility of reconstruction, and valued primarily as examples of various iconographic types. Despite the challenges involved, reconstruction provides a valuable, and as yet little used, method to reposition alabaster panels—not as isolated pieces organized by iconography, but as parts of a whole. It is the persistence of their separateness, their singular repetitiveness, that helps perpetuate what is now a firmly held belief that English alabasters were churned out in large numbers by unthinking craftsmen via a process of mass production akin to nineteenth-century methods of industrial replication.26 Moving forward there is a need to nuance this view. In this short essay I have argued for something simple—the reconstruction of an altarpiece from separate panels—but I have also hinted at the thoughtful sculptor responsible for them. Without a wider sense of the oeuvre of this particular individual, his alabaster carvings, and the majority of others like them, will remain isolated. By attending to their particular characteristics, a much clearer sense of the overall development and the contribution of distinctive artists to the broader story can be traced. Their reunification is a step towards a better understanding of the corpus of surviving English alabaster sculpture, one of the most significant, but poorly understood, artistic outputs of late medieval England.

Bibliography Anderson, William. “Re-discovery, Collecting and Display of English Medieval Alabasters.” Journal of the History of Collections 16, no. 1 (2004): 47–58. Beckett, Francis. “Engelske Alabasttavler i Danmark.” Tidsskrift for Industri, parts 1 and 2 (January 1905): 19–24. Bouillet, Abbé. “La fabrication industrielle des retables en Albâtre.” Bulletin Monumental 65 (1901): 45–62. Cheetham, Francis. Alabaster Images of Medieval England. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2003. Cheetham, Francis. English Medieval Alabasters: With a Catalogue of the Collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Oxford: Phaidon-Christie’s, 1984. de Beer, Lloyd. “Reassessing English Alabaster Carving: Medieval Sculpture and Its Contexts.” Ph.D. diss., University of East Anglia, 2018. de Beer, Lloyd. “Recycled Sculptures, Reburied Bodies: Jørgen Rosenkrantz and the Reframed Alabaster Altarpiece in Hornslet Church.” Art History 43, no. 2 (April 2020): 412–31.

 This idea was first suggested by Edward Prior, see: Edward Prior, “The Sculpture of Alabaster Tables,” in Hope, Illustrated Catalogue, 16–50. For a discussion of Prior, see: Lloyd de Beer, “Reassessing English Alabaster Carving: Medieval Sculpture and Its Contexts” (Ph.D. diss., University of East Anglia, 2018), 16–29.

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Flavigny, Laurence. D’Angleterre en Normandie, sculptures d’Albâtre du Moyen Âge. Rouen: Musée des Antiquités, 1998. Hope, William Henry St. John, ed. Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition of English Medieval Alabaster Work. London: Society of Antiquaries, 1913. Lindley, Philip. “The Visual Arts and their Functions in the Pre-Reformation Church.” In Art Re-formed: Re-assessing the Impact of the Reformation on the Visual Arts, edited by Tara Hamling and Richard L. Williams, 15–45. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007. Marks, Richard. Burrell: A Portrait of a Collector. Glasgow: R. Drew Pub, 1988. Marks, Richard. Image and Devotion in Late Medieval England. Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 2004. Nelson, Philip. “English Alabasters of the Embattled Type.” Archaeological Journal 75, no. 1 (1918): 310–34. Pascale, Gorguet. “Répertoire des albâtres anglais du XIVe au XVe siècle dans le Sud Ouest.” Ph.D. diss., Université Toulouse Le Mirail, 1984. Piasa. Art сhretien d’Orient et d’Occident, antiquités classiques, curiosités, 3 April 1998. Paris: Piasa, 1998. Prigent, Christine. Les sculptures anglaises d’Albâtre au Musée National du Moyen Âge Thermes de Cluny. Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 1998. Prior, Edward. “The Sculpture of Alabaster Tables.” In Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition of English Medieval Alabaster Work, edited by William Henry St. John Hope, 16–50. London: Society of Antiquaries, 1913. Riches, Samantha. “An Alabaster Altarpiece of St. George.” In The History of British Art 600–1600, edited by Tim Ayers, 76–77. London: Tate, 2008. Riches, Samantha. “The La Selle Retable: An English Alabaster Altarpiece in Normandy.” Ph.D. diss., University of Leicester, 1999. Sotheby’s. Old Master Sculpture and Works of Art Including Splendours from a Mantuan Palazzo, London, 5 July 2016. London: Sotheby’s, 2016. Tavender, Augusta S. “Medieval English Alabasters in American Museums—Pt I.” Speculum 30 (January 1955): 64–71. William Burrell Purchase Book, 1955. The Burrell Collection Archive. Woods, Kim. Cut in Alabaster: A Material of Sculpture and its European Traditions 1330–1530. London: Harvey Miller Publishers, an imprint of Brepols, 2018. Woods, Kim. “The Supply of Alabaster in Northern and Mediterranean Europe in the Later Middle Ages.” In Trade in Artists Materials: Markets and Commerce in Europe to 1700, edited by Jo Kirby, Susie Nash, and Joanna Cannon, 86–93. London: Archetype, 2010.

Roger S. Wieck

Chapter 3 A Fugitive Parliament of Heaven Returns Home In 2015, two dealers, a husband-and-wife team, emailed me a scan of a single leaf they were researching (Figure 3.1).1 The pair did not deal in manuscripts, and they felt a bit out of their element with an illumination, which they were selling for a friend. I recognized the text: “In illo tempore: Missus est a[n]gelus Gabriel a Deo” (At that time the angel Gabriel was sent by God). It was the start of Luke’s Gospel Lesson that traditionally appears towards the front in most Books of Hours, the second of the customary four New Testament readings. Indeed, Luke is depicted, along with his ox attribute, at the bottom right. I also recognized the artist—the Master of Jacques de Luxembourg—who is named after the patron of a Book of Hours in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.2 Thought to have worked in Paris, northeastern France, or, possibly, Flanders, he is recognizable by his narrative style and earthy sense of detail (particularly in his landscapes and architecture), a style indebted to Flemish art. He is recognizable, too, from the sometimes quirky expressions he gives to faces. Many of these traits are found in the miniatures from the Getty’s eponymous codex. The Morgan Library also happens to own a wonderful example of the artist’s work, MS M.1003, a Book of Hours given to the Morgan in 1979 by Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr. (Figures 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5).3 The book, I recalled, was missing a few miniatures. A quick check revealed that indeed the miniature for Luke’s Lesson was lacking, as was the first half of the text. The text on the front and back of the leaf was exactly what was missing from the Morgan book. The dimensions of the leaf matched those of the book, as did the measurements of its text block, number of lines, and the style of its decorative borders. All this confirmed what I had

 It is a pleasure to offer this essay in honor of Stephen Fliegel, longtime friend, colleague, and fellow curator. I would like to think that it is just the sort of story he would enjoy.  MS Ludwig IX 11, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; for online miniatures from this manuscript, see http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/artists/659/master-of-jacques-of-luxembourgfrench-active-about-1460-1470/.  The Morgan’s online catalogue, Corsair, contains a description of MS M.1003, its illuminations, and its current bibliography, see: http://corsair.themorgan.org/vwebv/holdingsInfo?searchId= 652&recCount=50&recPointer=0&bibId=76920. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-004

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Figure 3.1: The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Parliament of Heaven, Virgin Mary Reading, Luke Writing, Limbo, single leaf from a Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1207. Purchased on a grant provided by the Bernard H. Breslauer Foundation and with a gift from Marguerite Steed Hoffman, member of the Visiting Committee to the Department of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts, 2017.

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begun to suspect. The dealers’ leaf was, without any doubt, indeed from our MS M.1003.4 I shared this with them, to their obvious delight, since I was giving the dealers much more information than they had hoped for. I also asked that they, in return, give the Morgan first refusal to buy it.

Figure 3.2: The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Herod Interviewing the Magi, Journey of the Magi, and Matthew Writing, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 16. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979.

 The leaf with the Parliament of Heaven originally fell between fols. 14 and 15 in Morgan’s MS M.1003. The other three missing miniatures are: St. John and the Virgin, with three border roundels, for the “O intemerata,” originally between fols. 24–25, Inv. MP 999.1.226, collection A. Maignan, Musée de Picardie, Amiens (see Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Jan Fabre: Chalcosoma [2006–2012], Hommage à Jérôme Bosch au Congo [2011–2013], Illuminations, Enluminures: Trésors enluminés de France [Lille: Éditions invenit, 2013], 198, no. 7); Flight into Egypt, for Vespers of the Hours of the Virgin, originally between fols. 97–98, untraced; Trinity, for the Seven Requests to Our Lord, originally between fols. 217–18, private collection, New York.

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Figure 3.3: The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Ascension and Mark Writing, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 18v. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979.

Ultimately, the Morgan was able to purchase the leaf: this article is the story of the acquisition. In Books of Hours, the four Gospel Lessons are normally illustrated with portraits of their authors, writing their texts: this is the custom, for example, followed by the Luxembourg Master in the Getty Hours. There was a second tradition with the Gospel Lessons, although it was not as popular as the portraits. In this convention, the Lessons were illustrated with significant events from the lives of the authors. For John’s Lesson, for example, the event often chosen was Emperor Domitian’s attempt to kill him by boiling him in oil, an ordeal the evangelist miraculously survived. Finally, and what might strike us today as odd, there was a third—and the least common—tradition for illustrating the four Lessons. In this custom, the miniatures depict events actually narrated in the texts. The Morgan Hours partakes of this rare third tradition. The Lesson from Matthew—an excerpt that was read during Mass on the Feast of Epiphany—tells the story of the journey of the Magi and their witnessing the Christ Child. The miniature in the Morgan Hours

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illustrates, at the bottom, their journey, and at the top, Herod’s interview with the three kings in which he asks them to report back to him about this so-called king they are seeking (Figure 3.2).5 The Lesson from Mark—an excerpt read at Mass on the Feast of the Ascension—tells the story of the resurrected Christ’s meeting the apostles and his return to Heaven, which is exactly what is illustrated in the Morgan Hours (Figure 3.3).6 John’s Gospel Lesson—which was read at the third, main, Mass on Christmas—begins with the famous line, “In principio erat verbum” (In the beginning was the word). This Lesson, unlike the others, is not narrative. Rather, it ruminates on mankind’s need of redemption and God’s willingness to provide it. The Lesson mentions Christ’s divinity, John the Baptist, the Jews’ rejection of Christ, Christians as the new children of God, and the Incarnation. This jumble of ideas would challenge any artist. The Luxembourg Master decided to illustrate Christ’s instituting the Eucharist at the Last Supper, inspired, no doubt, by such phrases in the text as “In him [Christ], was life, and the life was the light of men” and “As many as received him, he gave them power to be made sons of God” (Figure 3.4). The Jews’ rejection of Christ is alluded to by the collapsing and blind Synagoga at the far left and by Judas who, money-bag in hand, warily eyes the figure of Ecclesia as he leaves the building. Luke’s Gospel Lesson, read at Mass on the Feast of the Annunciation, tells the story of Archangel Gabriel’s appearance to the Virgin Mary when he tells her she has been chosen to be the mother of the Savior. A depiction of this event is found in the Morgan Hours; it appears, as was traditional, at Matins in the Hours of the Virgin, the start of a traditional eight-part cycle illustrating the Infancy of Christ (Figure 3.5). In the Morgan Hours, the scene of the Annunciation is augmented with roundels illustrating earlier events from the Virgin’s life, her back story. Reading from the top we see Mary entering the temple, her weaving (as an angel delivers her food), and her marriage to Joseph. This last roundel is flanked by portraits of the couple who commissioned the manuscript, a commission perhaps occasioned by their marriage and their hopes to conceive a child of their own. The Luxembourg Master, faced with illustrating a Lesson whose subject he knew he would paint within the Hours of the Virgin, thus must have felt a little challenged. What to depict? His solution was to do something similar to his treatment of the borders of the Annunciation. He told the event’s back story (Figure 3.1). In so doing, he created the most interesting miniature in the book.

 At the lower left, the artist mistakenly gave Matthew the lion of Mark.  At the bottom, Mark was mistakenly given Matthew’s angel.

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Figure 3.4: The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Last Supper, Judas Departing, Synagoga and Ecclesia, and John Writing on Patmos, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 13. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979.

The text opens, as mentioned earlier, “Gabriel was sent by God.” What the artist depicted, however, is what happened in Heaven before God dispatched Gabriel, a scene called the “Parliament of Heaven.”7 At the top sits an enthroned God the Father flanked by two female personifications of the Virtues of Justice and Mercy. Justice, on the left, holds a sword. Mercy, on the right, a lily. They have been debating the topic, “Should God give humankind another chance?” After Adam and Eve disobeyed God in Eden and partook of the apple, they were cast from terrestrial paradise and they and their descendants condemned to hard lives on earth and, after death, an eternity spent apart from God. Mercy favors

 The Parliament of Heaven is also known as the Reconciliation of the Heavenly Virtues and the Trial of Paradise (Procès de Paradis in French). For the iconography, see Samuel C. Chew, The Virtues Reconciled: An Iconographic Study (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1947) and Émile Mâle, Religious Art in France: The Late Middle Ages. A Study of Medieval Iconography and its Sources (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986), 36–43.

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Figure 3.5: The Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Annunciation, with Roundels of the Virgin Entering the Temple, the Virgin Weaving, and the Marriage of the Virgin, and Patrons, Book of Hours, northeastern France or Paris, ca. 1465. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.1003, fol. 31. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne, Jr., 1979.

a second chance; Justice argues that God condemned Adam and his race to die and this sentence of condemnation should continue. God concedes that both are correct. But he reconciles their positions by decreeing that humans will continue to die, but death will be vanquishable—but at a cost. The cost is God’s son, who must be sent to earth, assume flesh, and be sacrificed. A rather dubious looking Jesus sits at the foot of his father’s throne clutching a cross—he knows his future. At the bottom of the stairs kneels Gabriel, his back to us, listening to God’s command to go down to earth, to Bethlehem, and find a female descendant of the House of David. At the lower right sits the Virgin, quietly reading, completely unaware of her forthcoming celestial visitor and her role in the history of Salvation. Below her is Luke, author of this Gospel excerpt. At the bottom left is a room that looks like a jail cell. Behind bars, naked people stand in a dark room. The man at the left turns his gaze toward Heaven, his plea written on a scroll, “Come, Lord, give us freedom.” This is Adam; next to him is Eve. The crowned man is King David. These are the just folk of the Old Testament. Indeed, they are in a state of

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arrest, a kind of jail: they are in Limbo. If Adam’s heavenward gaze is to be believed, however, they are content; after waiting thousands of years for their freedom, they only have nine months and thirty-three more years to go. The iconography of the Parliament of Heaven, as recently discussed in an article by Jessica Savage and in a blog by Nicholas Herman, has ancient roots.8 It springs from Psalm 84, verse 11: “Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed.” While there are early examples of the visualization of this verse in art, it is only in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries that the subject truly blossoms. Its popularity at the end of the Middle Ages was inspired by the episode’s inclusion in staged Mystery plays, especially the Mystère de la Passion by Arnoul Gréban, performed widely in the fifteenth century.9 In Paris it was staged as early as 1452.10 The scene of the Parliament was enacted at the end of the play’s prologue, bridging the story of the Fall and that of the Annunciation. The play also included Limbo, from which the actors playing the parts of patriarchs and prophets entreat God to send the promised Savior. The personifications of the Virtues make a reappearance at the end of the drama. In manuscripts, the theme of the Parliament was famously championed by the Parisian illuminator once known as Maître François but now identified as François le Barbier the Elder.11 I became familiar with the iconography through its depiction in the Wharncliffe Hours in the National Gallery in Melbourne, explicated in two

 Jessica Savage, “Before the Parliament of Heaven: Visualizing the Reconciled Virtues of Psalm 84:11,” in Tributes to Adelaide Bennett Hagens: Manuscripts, Iconography, and the Late Medieval Viewer, ed. Pamela A. Patton and Judith K. Golden (London: Harvey Miller, 2017), 213–25; and Nicholas Herman, “The ‘Parliament of Heaven’: Tracking a Theatrical Iconography,” Fifty-Two Discoveries from the BiblioPhilly Project 20, no. 52 (August 9, 2019), http://bibliophilly.pacscl.org/ the-parliament-of-heaven-tracking-a-theatrical-iconography/. I benefited much from these articles for the present essay.  Jean-Pierre Bordier, “Le procès de Paradis dans la littérature dramatique et didactique de la fin du Moyen Âge (XIV–XV siècles),” in L’intime du droit à la Renaissance, ed. Max Engammare, Alexandre Vanautgaerden, and Franz Bierlaire (Geneva: Droz, 2014), 363–96; Hope Traver, The Four Daughters of God: A Study of the Versions of this Allegory, with Special Reference to those in Latin, French, and English (Bryn Mawr: Bryn Mawr College, 1907); and Hope Traver, “The Four Daughters of God: A Mirror of Changing Doctrine,” Publications of the Modern Language Association 40 (1925): 44–92. Also see Savage, “Before the Parliament of Heaven,” 223–25, for further discussion, with citations, of the Parliament in medieval drama. Gréban was the choirmaster at Notre-Dame in Paris, 1450–1455.  Margaret M. Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours: A Study of a Fifteenth-Century Prayerbook (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1972), 18; or Margaret M. Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours (London: Thames and Hudson, 1981), 15.  Mathieu Deldicque, “L’enluminure à Paris à la fin du XVe siècle: Maître François, le Maître de Jacques de Besançon et Jacques de Besançon identifiés?,” Revue de l’art 183, no. 1 (2014): 9–18.

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monographs by Margaret Manion.12 The Morgan has a Book of Hours illuminated by le Barbier père around 1475 that has a close variant of the Australian composition and is typical of his treatment of the subject (Figure 3.6).13 God, as part of the Trinity, has rendered his decision. At left, Mercy and Truth join hands. At right, Justice and Peace embrace. Gabriel faces the Trinity, awaiting his marching orders. At bottom he reappears, brandishing a scroll toward the Virgin that reads “Adorna thalamum et suscipe regem,” a phrase derived from an ejaculation from the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin.14 “Adorn the chamber and receive the king” alludes to the Virgin’s womb where the Savior will be conceived.15 When le Barbier the Elder died, his son, François le Barbier fils inherited his style, his shop, and his models. He, too, enjoyed incorporating the Parliament of Heaven into the manuscripts he illuminated, taking the theme beyond the Horae context favored by his father. He included the Parliament in a Golden Legend from the 1480s and again in a Missal from around 1492.16 His nearly operatic treatment of patient

 Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours: A Study, and Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours. The author revisited the manuscript in Margaret M. Manion and Vera F. Vines, Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts in Australian Collections (London: Thames and Hudson, 1984), 187–98, no. 78; and in Margaret M. Manion, The Felton Illuminated Manuscripts in the National Gallery of Victoria (Melbourne: Macmillan Art and National Gallery, 2005), 290–375.  The Morgan’s online catalogue, Corsair, contains a description of MS M.73, its illuminations, and its current bibliography, see: http://corsair.themorgan.org/vwebv/search?searchArg=ms+m.73&search Code=GKEY%5E&setLimit=10&recCount=50&searchType=1&page.search.search.button=Search.  In the liturgy for the feast, the ejaculation is recited as a response at Matins in the Divine Office and as an antiphon in the processional hymn that precedes the Mass.  François le Barbier the Elder was quite fond of the theme of the Parliament of Heaven and often included it in the Books of Hours he illuminated. In addition to the Melbourne and New York miniatures already mentioned, further examples include 1) Egerton MS 2045, fol. 25, British Library, London; see Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours: A Study, pl. 11a; Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours, fig. 35; Manion and Vines, Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts, fig. 126; or Manion, The Felton Illuminated Manuscripts, fig. 9 on p. 338; illuminations are online at: http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/record.asp?MSID=8515; 2) MS Canon. Liturg. 43, fol. 24, Bodleian Library, Oxford; see Otto Pächt and Jonathan J. G. Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, vol. 1: German, Dutch, Flemish, French and Spanish Schools (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969), pl. LVIII, no. 748; illuminations are online at: https://digital.bod leian.ox.ac.uk/objects/3bc0356d-2c5a-4a91-a4cc-e423b50b4853/; and 3) Inv. LA147, fol. 13, Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon; see Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours: A Study, pl. 11c; Manion, The Wharncliffe Hours, fig. 34; Manion, The Felton Illuminated Manuscripts, fig. 4 on p. 299; or European Illuminated Manuscripts in the Calouste Gulbenkian Collection (Lisbon: Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, 2020), 194–99, no. 20, ill. 20c.  The miniature in the (first of a two-volume) Golden Legend is MS fr. 244, fol. 107, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; see François Avril and Nicole Reynaud, Les manuscrits à peinture en France, 1440–1520 (Paris: Flammarion and Bibliothèque nationale, 1993), 258–59, no. 136, ill.

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Figure 3.6: François le Barbier père, Parliament of Heaven and Annunciation, Book of Hours, Paris (France), ca. 1475. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.73, fol. 7. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902.

expectation in the Missal was appropriately placed at the Mass of the First Sunday of Advent that, commencing the liturgical year, opens the Missal. The folio is framed with compartments of waiting people, including one that shows folks in Limbo. p. 257; and Hilary Maddocks, “The Master of Jacques de Besançon and a Fifteenth-Century Parisian Missal,” in Art of the Book: Its Place in Medieval Worship, ed. Margaret M. Manion and Bernard Muir (Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1998), 235–36, fig. 67; the complete codex is online at: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8442920n.r=%22francais%20244%22?rk=21459;2; the miniature in the Missal is MS 412, fol. 1, p. 27, Bibliothèque Mazarine, Paris; see Avril and Reynaud, Les manuscrits à peinture, 259–61, no. 139, ill. p. 254; and Maddocks, “The Master of Jacques de Besançon,” 235–36, pl. 6; the complete codex is online at: https://mazarinum.bibliotheque-mazarine.fr/ viewer/2875/?offset=#page=27&viewer=picture&o=bookmark&n=0&q=.

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Depictions of the Parliament, however, are not unique to le Barbier father and son. It was taken up by Jean Colombe, for example, in the Hours of Louis de Laval. This famous manuscript, painted in two campaigns (first in the early 1470s and then in the late 1480s), contains some 1234 miniatures! It is a veritable encyclopedia of late medieval iconography. The Parliament, juxtaposed with the Annunciation, is found at the customary place at the start of the Hours of the Virgin.17 God, flanked by Mercy and Justice, is attended by choirs of angels, both in front and behind the throne. At right, Gabriel has reached Bethlehem and makes his announcement to Mary, who prays before a Gothic portal adorned with statues. Through the portal we see those who necessitated God’s decision and Gabriel’s journey: Adam and Eve. Another artist—the illuminator, graphic designer, and publisher Jean Pichore—employed the subject in both his manuscript and printed Books of Hours.18 Outside of a Book of Hours, the Parliament occurs in a primer that Queen Anne de Bretagne commissioned for her five-year-old daughter, Claude, around 1505.19 To teach the young princess to read and to pray, the primer commenced with an ABC followed by the basic prayers all Christians memorized as children, starting with the Pater noster. The primer’s historiated borders illustrate, among other stories, two episodes of the Parliament, the complex theology of which we  MS lat. 920, fols. 51v–52, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; see Avril and Reynaud, Les manuscrits, 328–32, no. 179; and Jean Colombe, Libro de horas de Luis de Laval (Burgos: Siloé Arte y Bibliofilio D.L., 2013); the complete codex is online at: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/ btv1b52501620s/f1.item.r=%22latin%20920%22.  MS Barberini, lat. 487, fols. 23v–24, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City; see Eberhard König, Das Barberini-Stundenbuch für Rouen: Cod. Barb. lat. 487, Ein Meisterwerk französischer Buchkunst um 1500 (Stuttgart: Belser, 1994); Caroline Zöhl, Jean Pichore: Buchmaler, Graphiker und Verleger in Paris um 1500 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), Abb. 66; and Herman, “The ‘Parliament of Heaven’”; the complete codex is online at: https://digi.vatlib.it/view/MSS_Barb.lat.487. For reproductions of Pichore’s treatment in print form, both colored or uncolored, see Zöhl, Jean Pichore, Abb. 140; Savage, “Before the Parliament of Heaven,” fig. 1; and Herman, “The ‘Parliament of Heaven.’” Other examples of the Parliament by French illuminators at the Morgan Library include MS M.12, fols. 5v–6, illuminated in Tours ca. 1500 by an artist influenced by Jean Bourdichon and Jean Poyer, see Savage, “Before the Parliament of Heaven,” fig. 5; MS M.179, fol. 38, illuminated in Paris ca. 1480–1500 by an artist influenced by François le Barbier fils; and MS M.1080, fol. 25, illuminated in northern France ca. 1490. Images of these can be found attached to their records in the Morgan’s online catalogue, Corsair.  MS 159, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; see Roger S. Wieck, Cynthia J. Brown, and Eberhard König, Die Fibel der Claude de France/The Primer of Claude de France: MS 159, The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (Lucerne: Quaternio, 2012); and Stella Panayotova, with the assistance of Deirdre Jackson and Paola Ricciardi, eds., Colour: The Art and Science of Illuminated Manuscripts (London: Harvey Miller, 2016), 28, 123, 124 ill. 7.3, 163, 172–73 ill. 8.10, 174 ill. 8.9, 190–91, 195, 197, 227, Cat. 39, ills.

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might think beyond the capabilities of a toddler, but apparently Queen Anne did not. At top of page six, Seth, having been sent by his dying father to seek forgiveness from Eden, returns too late to offer Adam seeds from the Tree of Forgiveness that he had obtained; instead, he tosses them into his father’s grave (the tree that sprouts from these seeds, according to medieval legend, will later provide the wood of the Cross). Below this vignette, Adam can be spotted kneeling in a gloomy Limbo. Adjacent to this, the Parliament of Heaven is in session. God the Father sits among the arguing figures of Peace and Truth, Mercy and Justice, the latter red-faced in her indignation. At the top of the next page, Peace and Justice reconcile; the story continues with Gabriel’s arrival on earth. On page thirteen, the primer’s last text page, the historiated borders end with the Annunciation to and Adoration of the Shepherds. Here, as in Gréban’s Mystère de la Passion, special attention is given to the antics of the shepherds at the Nativity, figures of comic relief in the play. The border’s final vignette returns to Limbo where the white figure of Peace visits the patient souls to whom she delivers the good news that their wait is nearly over. In an early sixteenth-century Parisian Book of Hours in Madrid associated with Emperor Charles V, the Parliament found an appropriate placement at the Advent variations of the Hours of the Virgin.20 In the top miniature, illuminated by the Master of the Chronique scandaleuse, God the Father and God the Holy Spirit look on from their throne as Christ, in a gesture signaling acceptance of his fate, hands Gabriel a scroll inscribed with the words with which the archangel will greet Mary. At the left are Justice (again red-faced) and Mercy and, at the right, Peace and Truth. At the bottom of the page, below the four lines of text, the Virgin awaits. The placement of the Parliament at the Advent variations necessitated altered iconography in the pair of facing miniatures that opens Matins.21 In the left miniature, painted by a follower of Jean Pichore, the Erythraean Sibyl foretells the Annunciation, an image of which she points to in the sky. The Cumaean Sibyl prophesizes the Savior’s birth, and she points to a Nativity over her head.22 In discussion in the foreground are the Prophet Isaiah and the Evangelist Luke. The prophet’s reference to the “Radix Jesse,” the Root of Jesse, was interpreted as a prediction of the arrival of the Savior from the House of David. As

 Vitr. 24.3, p. 168, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid; see Anna Muntada Torrellas and Elisa Varela Rodríguez, Libro de horas de Carlos V: Biblioteca Nacional, Vitr. 24.3 (Madrid: Club Bibliófilo Versol and Biblioteca Nacional, 1999); the complete codex is online at: http://bdh-rd.bne. es/viewer.vm?id=0000051953&page=1.  Vitr. 24.3, pp. 44–45.  Sibyls had become popular subjects in late medieval French art, helped, indeed, by their appearance in Mystery Plays.

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already mentioned, it was Luke’s narrative of the Annunciation that was read on the Feast of the Annunciation and that was included in Books of Hours.23 Facing this image, a traditional Annunciation, painted by a follower of Jean Poyer, marks the start of the Hours of the Virgin. God the Father dispatches the Holy Spirit, followed by Christ, again with a Cross over his shoulder. Less traditional, however, is the scene below, Limbo, visually placed as if it might be located in Mary’s basement. To the usual Adam, Eve, and David, Abraham, holding the soul of Lazarus, has been added. The place is rocky and dim, but it is not on fire. Because the errant leaf from Morgan MS M.1003 (Figure 3.1) included Limbo, I became more and more interested in depictions of this strange place. Another Book of Hours associated (in this case with no evidence) with Emperor Charles V, and illuminated by, among others, the shop of le Barbier fils, marks the start of the Hours of the Virgin with facing miniatures that also combine the themes of learned discussion, Annunciation, and Limbo.24 In roundels on the full-page miniature, those in discussion include, again, Isaiah in the upper left and Luke in the lower right, with Sts. Basil, Hillary, Thomas, and Ciprian in between. At the top of the page, God the Father prepares to dispatch Christ, again with a Cross, the Holy Spirit, and Gabriel to the Virgin waiting at the bottom of the page. Facing this is a half-page miniature of Limbo. To the usual suspects of Adam, Eve, David, and Abraham, Moses has been added. Although a hellmouth looms before the group, the inhabitants of this dark, cave-like Limbo are shielded from its flames by a protective rock wall. If Limbo, as a concept and a place, baffled theologians, it also confused artists.25 In depictions of the so-called Harrowing of Hell, Limbo can appear dark and stony, but without torment, or as a kind of foyer to Hell, filled with much fire and heat. Outside the iconography of the Harrowing, however, Limbo takes on a variety of guises. Its depiction in a late fifteenth-century Parisian Book of Hours illuminated by (among others) François le Barbier fils, is quite unusual (Figure 3.7). The complex miniature—one of two marking the start of the Office of the Dead—needs to be read from the bottom up. The scenes commence with the Feast of Dives and the Death of Lazarus. In the middle range the larger compartment houses a fiery Hell where

 The sibyls, prophet, and evangelist, and their topics of prophecy and discussion, can all be traced back to a suite of miniatures in the Hours of Louis de Laval, a manuscript already touched on.  MS 411, fols. 17v–18, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven; see Roger S. Wieck, et al., Libro de horas de Carlos I (emperador Carlos V) al uso de Roma: Edición facsímil íntegra del manuscrito 411 de la Biblioteca Beinecke, Universidad de Yale, Connecticut (Estados Unidos de América) (Madrid: Edilán-Ars Libris, 2003–2007); the digitized manuscript is online on the library’s site at: https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/2029198.  On the development of the concept of Limbo, see Jacques Le Goff, The Birth of Purgatory, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984).

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Figure 3.7: François le Barbier fils, Feast of Dives, Death of Lazarus; Dives in Hell, Limbo of the Unbaptized or Uncircumcised; Purgatory, and Limbo of the Just, Book of Hours, Paris (France), 1480–1500. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.179, fol. 132. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902.

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Dives, tormented by demons, points to his mouth, asking for a single drop of water. Above Hell, in a small compartment, is a fiery Purgatory. The other two compartments, one on top of the other, are both dark, rocky, and gloomy, but without flames. In the top left zone we recognize the innocent naked soul of Lazarus sitting in the bosom of Abraham (it is to Lazarus that Dives appeals for that drop of water) and the naked pair of Adam and Eve. In art, Abraham, holding Lazarus, is often shown in Heaven, but surely this shadowy cave cannot be Paradise but is Limbo instead. But what about the other cave below it, the one filled with naked people? What place is this? Are there two Limbos? The mystery can be solved with the aid of the Speculum humanae salvationis (Mirror of Human Salvation; Figure 3.8). Its rendering of the geography of the underworld shows, at bottom, the fiery zone of the damned and demons—that is, Hell. Next is the zone inhabited by the naked souls of unbaptized or uncircumcised boys; their nakedness signals that they will not be leaving at any time. Above them is Purgatory, where the souls are clothed since they will, eventually, leave. At top is the area of the souls of saints, labeled “limbo or the bosom of Abraham”; clothed, they too will be leaving. This vignette from the Speculum illustrates how Limbo is occupied by two different sets of people at two different times. It was first the home of the good and just of the Old Testament (limbus patrum) who were liberated by Christ when he descended into “Hell” (as the Apostles’ Creed calls the area) the day after his Crucifixion. After that emptying, the place was filled with those who died unbaptized or uncircumcised and who will remain there throughout eternity (limbus infantium or puerorum).26 They are deprived of the Beatific Vision, but are spared the flames. Inspired no doubt by an illustrated Speculum, as were many illuminators of this era, le Barbier fils thought to show off his superior knowledge of the topography of the underworld by including both Limbos in his miniature (Figure 3.7). In doing so, however, he made a theological muddle of things. Le Barbier fils was not the only artist to be challenged when attempting to illustrate the underworld. For the Hours of Anne of France from around 1473, Jean Colombe—the illuminator of the Hours of Louis de Laval mentioned earlier—was faced with the test of coming up with over 100 large miniatures relating to the themes of (mostly) the Psalms within the Hours of the Virgin and Office of the Dead. In Vespers of the Office of the Dead, the opening words of Psalm 129 (De profundis), “Out of the depths I have cried unto Thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my voice,” inspired Colombe to paint an image of the underworld, but one, significantly, not

 P. J. Toner, “Limbo,” in The Catholic Encyclopedia 9 (New York: Encyclopedia Press, 1913), 256–59.

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Figure 3.8: Hell, Limbo of the Unbaptized or Uncircumcised, Purgatory, and Limbo of the Just, Speculum humanae salvationis, probably Nuremberg (Germany, Franconia), 1350–1400. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.140, fol. 30v, detail. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913) in 1902.

dominated by Hell (Figure 3.9). The miniature is dominated by a fiery tower burning with hellish flames; this is not Hell, however, but Purgatory, for we can see at the tower’s top angels releasing from the flames souls who have completed their sentences. The foreground of the miniature features a large pit filled with souls and from which smoke rises; this would be Limbo, where souls experience discomfort but no flames. These souls all have the round chubby faces of toddlers—so they would be the unbaptized and the uncircumcised. Finally, attacked by demons at the base of Purgatory’s tower, burning, almost unseen, at the far right, and floating in an icy lake in the background are the damned souls of Hell. God will not hear their voice. The iconography of the errant leaf was especially appealing to me as a curator because it contained so much: a majestic depiction of the Parliament of Heaven, an awaiting Mary, a writing Luke, and Limbo! Datable to around 1465, the Parliament

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Figure 3.9: Jean Colombe, Purgatory, Hell, and Limbo, Hours of Anne de France, Bourges (France), ca. 1473. New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.677, fol. 250v. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (1867–1943) in 1923.

was also earlier than the compositions by le Barbier the Elder. I was keen to acquire the leaf. There were, however, two problems. The first was cost. My honesty in supplying the dealers with the leaf’s subject, artist, date, and parent manuscript resulted in a price that I judged to be about three times the leaf’s worth. Second, the leaf had provenance issues. Its latest tangible provenance was its sale in Bern at Kornfeld & Klipstein on June 16, 1965 (lot 52). Prior to that, it was auctioned in Leipzig, at C.G. Boerner, May 9–10, 1930 (lot 254). Between Germany in 1930 and Switzerland in 1965 the leaf had a provenance gap for the years surrounding World War II. Such gaps, of course, sprout huge red flags for curators. The dealers, when I asked them if they could fill the lacuna, could not. Regretfully we had to decline buying the miniature. Two years pass and the dealer Jörn Günther emailed me a scan of the leaf on September 8, 2017. “Very recently I have bought a very fine miniature,” he wrote,

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“which belonged formerly into one of your manuscripts.” He had been told that. He had not, however, been told about the two auction sales that left the troublesome gap in the provenance. I alerted him to the lacuna in the provenance, and said that if he could document the leaf’s whereabouts during those critical thirty-five years, we would love to buy it. Miraculously, he filled the gap. With better contacts than the dealer couple, Jörn discovered that in 1930 the leaf was bought by somebody named “Trier,” and in 1965 it was sold by somebody named “Trier.” Same person, possibly, same family, definitely. The hole in the provenance plugged, the Morgan acquired the leaf. Patience rewarded: not only did I get the leaf, I got it for free.27

Bibliography Avril, François, and Nicole Reynaud. Les manuscrits à peinture en France, 1440–1520. Paris: Flammarion and Bibliothèque nationale, 1993. Bordier, Jean-Pierre. “Le procès de Paradis dans la littérature dramatique et didactique de la fin du Moyen Âge (XIV–XV siècles).” In L’intime du droit à la Renaissance, edited by Max Engammare, Alexandre Vanautgaerden, and Franz Bierlaire, 363–96. Geneva: Droz, 2014. Chew, Samuel C. The Virtues Reconciled: An Iconographic Study. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1947. Colombe, Jean. Libro de horas de Luis de Laval. Burgos: Siloé Arte y Bibliofilia D.L., 2013. Deldicque, Mathieu. “L’enluminure à Paris à la fin du XVe siècle: Maître François, le Maître de Jacques de Besançon et Jacques de Besançon identifiés?” Revue de l’art 183, no. 1 (2014): 9–18. Herman, Nicholas. “The ‘Parliament of Heaven’: Tracking a Theatrical Iconography.” Fifty-Two Discoveries from the BiblioPhilly Project 20, no. 52 (August 9, 2019). http://bibliophilly.pacscl.org/ the-parliament-of-heaven-tracking-a-theatrical-iconography/. König, Eberhard. Das Barberini-Stundenbuch für Rouen: Cod. Barb. lat. 487. Ein Meisterwerk französischer Buchkunst um 1500. Stuttgart: Belser, 1994. Le Goff, Jacques. The Birth of Purgatory, translated by Arthur Goldhammer. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts. Jan Fabre: Chalcosoma (2006–2012), Hommage à Jérôme Bosch au Congo (2011–2013). Illuminations, Enluminures: Trésors enluminés de France. Lille: Éditions invenit, 2013. Lisbon, Calouste Gulbenkian Museum. European Illuminated Manuscripts in the Calouste Gulbenkian Collection. Lisbon: Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, 2020. Maddocks, Hilary. “The Master of Jacques de Besançon and a Fifteenth-Century Parisian Missal.” In Art of the Book: Its Place in Medieval Worship, edited by Margaret M. Manion and Bernard Muir, 225–51. Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1998. Mâle, Émile. Religious Art in France: The Late Middle Ages. A Study of Medieval Iconography and its Sources. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986.

 The complete purchasing funds were generously provided by the Bernard H. Breslauer Foundation and by Morgan supporter Marguerite Steed Hoffman.

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Manion, Margaret M. The Felton Illuminated Manuscripts in the National Gallery of Victoria. Melbourne: Macmillan Art and National Gallery, 2005. Manion, Margaret M. The Wharncliffe Hours. London: Thames and Hudson, 1981. Manion, Margaret M. The Wharncliffe Hours: A Study of a Fifteenth-Century Prayerbook. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1972. Manion, Margaret M., and Vera F. Vines. Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts in Australian Collections. London: Thames and Hudson, 1984. Muntada Torrellas, Anna, and Elisa Varela Rodríguez. Libro de horas de Carlos V: Biblioteca Nacional, Vitr. 24.3. Madrid: Club Bibiófilo and Biblioteca Nacional, 1999. Pächt, Otto, and Jonathan J. G. Alexander. Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Vol. 1: German, Dutch, Flemish, French and Spanish Schools. Oxford: Clarendon, 1969. Panayotova, Stella, with the assistance of Deirdre Jackson and Paola Ricciardi, eds. Colour: The Art and Science of Illuminated Manuscripts. London: Harvey Miller, 2016. Savage, Jessica. “Before the Parliament of Heaven: Visualizing the Reconciled Virtues of Psalm 84:11.” In Tributes to Adelaide Bennett Hagens: Manuscripts, Iconography, and the Late Medieval Viewer, edited by Pamela A. Patton and Judith K. Golden, 213–25. London: Harvey Miller, 2017. Toner, P. J. “Limbo.” In The Catholic Encyclopedia 9, 256–59. New York: Encyclopedia Press, 1913. Traver, Hope. “The Four Daughters of God: A Mirror of Changing Doctrine.” Publications of the Modern Language Association 40 (1925): 44–92. Traver, Hope. The Four Daughters of God: A Study of the Versions of this Allegory, with Special Reference to those in Latin, French, and English. Bryn Mawr: Bryn Mawr College, 1907. Wieck, Roger S., Cynthia J. Brown, and Eberhard König. Die Fibel der Claude de France/The Primer of Claude de France: MS 159, The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Lucerne: Quaternio, 2012. Wieck, Roger S., et al. Libro de horas de Carlos I (emperador Carlos V) al uso de Roma: Edición facsímil íntegra del manuscrito 411 de la Biblioteca Beinecke, Universidad de Yale, Connecticut (Estados Unidos de América). Madrid: Edilán-Ars Libris, 2003–2007. Zöhl, Caroline. Jean Pichore: Buchmaler, Graphiker und Verleger in Paris um 1500. Turnhout: Brepols, 2004.

Part II: Curating Burgundy: Artists / Patrons

Sophie Jugie

Chapter 4 When Theory Influences the Gaze: On a Recently Restored Fifteenth-Century Burgundian Virgin from the Louvre Since 1906, the Louvre has had, among its remarkable collection of fifteenth-century Burgundian sculpture, a Madonna and Child of fine size and quality (Figures 4.1 and 4.2). Its restoration in 2016 gives us an opportunity to better appreciate its stylistic characteristics and to ask why, until recently, it was poorly dated and misattributed, and ultimately given little consideration by art historians. The Virgin stands leaning on her right leg, swaying slightly. Her face is tilted toward the Christ Child whom she holds in her arms directly in front of her. The Child is positioned nearly horizontally. The Virgin wears a dress, a mantle that covers only her shoulders, and a veil topped with a crown; the Christ Child is wrapped in the sides of this veil. The statue rests on a polygonal pedestal. The object is sculpted completely in the round, including the back. One of two openings on the back has a remnant of flat iron with a quadrangular section, which must have been used to fix it to the wall or in a niche.

Study and Restoration The sculpture is in good structural condition despite some nicks and losses. The fingers of the Christ Child’s right hand are missing, and drilled holes for studs indicate that those fingers must have been previously restored and then lost again. The crown of the Virgin is not original to the sculpture. It is cut of a different stone and was inserted with recuts, then sealed with plaster. The work, once polychromed, has been completely stripped of paint, with a remnant of whitewash noticeable on the reverse. This procedure was carried out with chemicals and metal brushes, the traces of which are still visible. This treatment predates the sculpture’s acquisition by the Louvre, and the statue has not been the subject of any fundamental intervention since. Dirt was very deeply encrusted as the stone had been exposed and made porous by the stripping. An

Translation: Lauren Maceross, with Elina Gertsman https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-005

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Figure 4.1: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne (France), ca. 1415–1425, stripped limestone, remnants of modern polychrome at the back. Paris, The Louvre Museum, RF 1433. Photo: I RMN-Grand Palais (The Louvre Museum), Tony Querrec.

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Figure 4.2: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne (France), ca. 1415–1425, stripped limestone, remnants of modern polychrome at the back. Paris, The Louvre Museum, inv. no. RF 1433, detail. Photo: author.

intervention was necessary since the very pronounced and heterogeneous soiling was detrimental to the appreciation of the statue. The preliminary study and the restoration have yielded interesting observations. The stone, very white and soft, can be easily identified as limestone (specifically, stone from Tonnerre or Asnières-lès-Dijon) which is entirely in accordance with those used by fifteenth- century Burgundian sculptors. Due to the numerous traces of recutting and scraping, it is quite difficult to spot the original tool marks. However, small chisel and drill marks in the hair of the Virgin and Child correspond well to the sculptural work expected for this period. The polychromy has almost entirely disappeared from the visible surfaces of the sculpture. The only traces are tiny bits of gilding on a reddish mixture found

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on strands of hair. Additional traces on the reverse provide us with only partial glimpses of the original paint. The filler was yellow-orange, applied to the whole sculpture. Remnants of a dark red layer are present on the underside of the veil. Vestiges of gold trim also appear visible on the reverse. Remains of a dull blue color laid directly on the filler can be seen on the mantle. In the back, there are still traces of the two layers of repainting that pre-date the scraping. The first can be seen on the veil over the original red layer. It consists of a rather thick cream ground and a brown layer with black grains. On the topcoat the brown layer is thicker and seems to constitute a real color or a sublayer, because we find above it a blue of a shade greener than the original blue and gold in the mixture. The blue and gilding are too worn to determine whether either was present in an extensive or patterned form. The second repainting, visible across the entire back, is an oily, bluish whitewash with a golden decoration on the edge of the mantle and crown, to which traces of a mixture seem to correspond. Bearing in mind this condition, the restoration performed in 2016 mostly consisted of cleaning. This operation was carried out primarily by chemical means, supplemented occasionally by microblasting finishes. On the reverse, the remains of whitewash were partially removed with a scalpel. A resin-based wedge was used to help straighten the sculpture.1

Different Opinions on Dating and Attribution The work was purchased by the Louvre in 1906 on the Parisian art market (from the dealer Louis Cornillon), out of arrears from the Paul Auguste François Bareiller bequest.2 The seller had indicated that it came from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne (Côte-d’Or). It was immediately published by Paul Vitry, then curator of the Sculpture Department, who thought that it postdated both the sculptures of Champmol and the Virgin of the rue Porte-aux-Lions from Dijon, and that it was carved around the same time as the Sepulcher of Semur-en-Auxois; for him, the sculpture demonstrated “both the persistence of the Burgundian drapery imagined by Marville and Sluter and a certain search for gentleness that heralds the sixteenth cen-

 Amélie Méthivier, Musée du Louvre, Département des Sculptures: Vierge à l’Enfant, Pierre calcaire, restes de polychromie, RF 1433. Rapport d’intervention, November 2016.  On the Bareiller bequest: Michel Laclotte, Annie Caubet, and Pierre Rosenberg, eds., Les donateurs du Louvre, exh. cat., Paris, Louvre Museum, 4 April 1989–21 August 1989 (Paris: RMN, 1989), 14.

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tury.”3 Vitry reiterated this analysis in the compendious catalogues of 1907 and 1922, which date the statue to the end of the fifteenth century.4 This assessment has been accepted by all subsequent curators in the Sculpture Department. In 1950, Marcel Aubert and Michèle Beaulieu also dated it to the end of the fifteenth century, and considered that “the artist who carved the figure of the Virgin, wrapped in a large mantle placed over her hair, evokes the admirable technique of the workshops at the turn of the century,” but noted a change in drapery style, which becomes “much more close-fitting, tightened . . . with its elongation of proportions, that characterizes this period of ‘relaxation’ of French art in Burgundy.”5 In 1996, without justification, Françoise Baron extended the dating to the second half of the fifteenth century in her summary catalogue.6 The entry of the work into the Louvre had not gone unnoticed in Dijon, as the policy of acquiring Burgundian sculptures by the national museum was a sensitive subject for local scholars. The purchases by Louis Courajod, curator of the Sculpture Department, of the tomb of Philippe Pot in 1889 and then of the Virgin of the rue Porte aux-Lions in 1893, had caused resentment in Dijon, which remains to this day. L. Morillot reports the acquisition before the Commission des Antiquités du Département de la Côte-d’Or on June 1, 1907. He dates the sculpture to the end of the fourteenth century, estimating that “it is a work of great style, far superior to the Virgin of the rue Porte-aux-Lions that the Louvre had already taken from us.”7

 Paul Vitry, “Une nouvelle Vierge bourguignonne du XVe siècle,” Musées et Monuments de France (1906), 153: “Cette Vierge montre à la fois la persistance du drapé bourguignon imaginé par Marville et Sluter et une certaine recherche de douceur qui annonce le XVIe siècle.”  André Michel and Paul Vitry, Musée national du Louvre: Catalogue sommaire des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes. Supplément (Paris: Libraires-Imprimeries réunies, 1907), cat. no. 900; Paul Vitry, Musée national du Louvre: Catalogue des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes (Paris: Musées nationaux, 1922), cat. no. 215.  Marcel Aubert and Michèle Beaulieu, Musée national du Louvre: Description raisonnée des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes, vol. 1, Moyen Âge (Paris: Editions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1950), cat. no. 335: “l’imagier qui a taillé la figure de la Vierge, enveloppée dans un grand manteau posé sur les cheveux, se souvient de l’admirable technique des ateliers du début du siècle, mais le vaste tablier, tendu devant le corps et suspendant à chaque avant-bras un groupe de plis, est remplacé par une draperie serrée beaucoup plus étroitement qui, avec l’allongement des proportions, caractérise en Bourgogne cette période de ‘détente’ de l’art français.”  Françoise Baron, Musée du Louvre: Sculpture française, vol. 1, Moyen Âge (Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1996), 192.  “C’est une œuvre d’un grand style, bien supérieure à la Vierge de la rue Porte-aux-Lions que le Louvre nous a déjà enlevée.” L. Morillot, “Une Vierge bourguignonne de la fin du XIVe siècle,” Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Département de la Côte-d’Or 15 (1906): LXX.

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Curiously, for a statue exhibited without interruption in the sculpture galleries of the Louvre since 1906, historians of Burgundian sculpture did not analyze the Virgin of Montigny-sur-Vingeanne until years later. Henri David, who was the first to offer in the 1933 De Sluter à Sambin a detailed synthesis of Burgundian sculpture, reproduced the work in his chapter “L’apaisement du style. Dernier tiers du XVe siècle,” but without commentary: it is relegated to a footnote concerning the iconographic characteristics of the Virgin and Child.8 In 1946, in his Histoire de la sculpture française du Moyen Âge, Aubert mentions the sculpture as an example of softening of the “extreme” style of its Netherlandish predecessors: We cannot yet speak of “the relaxation of French art,” but the lines are simplified, the fabrics fall straight, a certain gentleness is manifested on the faces of the Virgins carrying the Christ Child; for example those of Aizeray, Meilly-sur-Rouvre, Viévy, and Montigny-surVingeanne today in the Louvre, or the one who breastfeeds the Christ Child at the musée de Dijon.9

Theodor Müller was maybe the first to truly emphasize the object’s quality in 1966, in his vast survey of fifteenth-century sculpture: Perhaps the purest example of this Late Burgundian style is the stone Virgin in the Louvre which is from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne (Côte-d’Or). The sculptural autonomy and the perfect display of this figure show most clearly how Late Burgundian sculpture—without concessions to the decorative dynamism of Late Gothic—already approximates to certain essential features of Renaissance Sculpture.10

Despite this recognition, Pierre Quarré, curator of the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Dijon, used the Louvre statue neither in any of the exhibitions—which, from 1972 to 1976, advanced our knowledge of fifteenth-century Burgundian sculpture—nor

 Henri David, De Sluter à Sambin: Essai critique sur la sculpture et le décor monumental en Bourgogne au XVe et au XVIe siècles, vol. 1, La Fin du Moyen Âge (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1933), 57, n. 1, and 56, fig. 17.  Marcel Aubert, La sculpture française du Moyen Âge (Paris: Flammarion, 1946), 385: “On ne saurait encore parler de ‘détente de l’art français’, mais les lignes se simplifient, les étoffes tombent droites, une certaine douceur se manifeste sur les visages des Vierges portant l’Enfant; par exemple celles d’Aizeray, Meilly-sur-Rouvre, Viévy, Montigny-sur-Vingeanne aujourd’hui au Louvre, ou celle qui allaite l’Enfant du Musée de Dijon.”  Theodor Müller, Sculpture in the Netherlands, Germany, France and Spain 1400 to 1500 (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1966), 137.

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in his 1978 synthesis.11 Perplexingly, Pierre Camp also ignored it in his monumental work Les Imageurs bourguignons.12

Resituating the Sculpture On the other hand, Jacques Baudoin was the first to place the sculpture correctly in the oeuvre of Claus de Werve, comparing it to the Virgin and Child now in Auxonne (Figures 4.3 and 4.4): Despite a long mantle, which wraps her tightly from head to toe, the Virgin of the Ursulines of Montigny-sur-Vingeanne cannot be considered separately from the Virgin of Auxonne. The tilted head with lowered eyelids has the same features, but the Virgin of Montigny is crowned and she cradles the Christ Child comfortably stretched out in her arms. Because of its refined appearance, the statue was attributed to the end of the fifteenth century. This opinion must be revisited, demonstrating, once again, that Claus de Werve played an important role in calming the Sluterian style.13

Finally, Véronique Boucherat confirmed this analysis in 2004 in comparing the Virgin and Child to other works by de Werve completed between 1415 and 1425, including an alabaster sculpture from the tomb of Philip the Bold (Figure 4.5). In particular, she points to the dynamic quality of the sculpture, where “the play of drapery and Mary’s gaze guide the viewer’s attention to the Christ Child. There, the naturalistic contortions of the Newborn, his way of gripping his mother’s hand and the degree of

 Pierre Quarré, ed., Jean de La Huerta et la sculpture bourguignonne au milieu du XVe siècle, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1972); Antoine Le Moiturier: le dernier des grands imagiers des ducs de Bourgogne, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1973); La sculpture bourguignonne en Auxois et en Autunois à la fin du XVe, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1974); Claus de Werve et la sculpture bourguignonne dans le premier tiers du XVe siècle, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1976); Pierre Quarré, La sculpture en Bourgogne à la fin du Moyen Âge (Fribourg: Vilo, 1978).  Pierre Camp, Les imageurs bourguignons de la fin du Moyen Âge (Dijon: Association pour le renouveau du Vieux-Dijon, 1990).  Jacques Baudoin, La sculpture flamboyante en Bourgogne et Franche-Comté (Nonette: Créer, 1996), 144, fig. 232 and 232 bis.: “Malgré un long manteau qui l’enveloppe étroitement de sa tête aux pieds, la Vierge des Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne est inséparable de la Vierge d’Auxonne. La tête inclinée aux paupières baissées en reproduit les même traits mais la Vierge de Montigny est couronnée et elle berce l’Enfant douillettement allongé dans ses bras. A cause de son allure affinée, la statue était attribuée à la fin du XVe siècle. Cette opinion doit être révisée, démontrant, une fois de plus, que Claus de Werve a pris une part importante dans l’apaisement du style slutérien.”

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Figure 4.3: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, ca. 1412, stone. Auxonne (Côte-d’Or), collégiale Notre-Dame. Photo: © phot. JL DUTHU / Région Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Inventaire du patrimoine, 2004.

illusionism in his appearance encourage one to linger in contemplation of the motif and to move around the work.”14  “Parmi les œuvres attribuables à Claus de Werve et réalisées à la même période [1415–1425], figure la Vierge de l’église de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne, au visage encore une fois étonnamment proche de celui de l’ange droit du tombeau princier et du saint Michel de Baume-les-Messieurs. Dans cette statue, le jeu des drapés et le regard de Marie guident l’attention du spectateur vers l’Enfant. Là les contorsions naturalistes du Nouveau-né, sa manière d’agripper la main maternelle et le degré d’illusionnisme de son apparence incitent à s’attarder dans la contemplation du motif et à se déplacer autour de l’œuvre – démarche d’ailleurs encouragée par la découverte de

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Figure 4.4: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child (detail), ca. 1412, stone. Auxonne (Côted’Or), collégiale Notre-Dame. Photo: GO69 (Wikimedia).

Of course, we can only agree with this analysis. We must definitively reintegrate this remarkable sculpture in the production of Claus de Werve. It belongs to a group that includes the Virgin of Brétigny-sur-Norges and Meilly-sur-Rouvres (Figure 4.6), as well as the Bulliot Virgin from the Musée Rolin, probably commissioned by Nicolas

vues inédites et plaisantes.” Véronique Boucherat, “Nouveaux éclairages sur l’œuvre de Claus de Werve,” in L’art à la cour de Bourgogne: Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur (1364–1419), ed. Sophie Jugie and Stephen Fliegel, exh. cat., Dijon, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 28 May–15 September 2004; Cleveland, Cleveland Museum of Art, October 24, 2004–January 9, 2005 (Paris: RMN, 2004), 317–28, 245 (fig. 2, p. 245) and 323 (fig. 7, p. 322).

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Figure 4.5: Claus de Werve, Angel from the Right Side of the Tomb of Philip the Bold, from the Charterhouse of Champmol, 1406–1410, polychromed alabaster. Dijon, The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, CA 1416. Photo: The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, François Jay.

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Rolin for the church of Notre-Dame-du-Chatel in Autun (Figure 4.7)—all works that Quarré had already correctly identified in the catalogue for the exhibition Claus de Werve.15 They are all characterized by their calm comportment, naturalistically falling drapery, and often by very specific details of their attire. The tenderness between

Figure 4.6: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child, 1415–1430, polychromed stone. Meilly-sur-Rouvres (Côte-d’Or). Photo: © phot. JL DUTHU / Région Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Inventaire du patrimoine, 1981.

Figure 4.7: Attributed to Claus de Werve, Virgin and Child (the Bulliot Virgin), from the church of Notre-Dame du Chatel d’Autun, ca. 1430, polychromed stone. Autun (Saône-et-Loire), The Musée Rolin. Photo: The Musée Rolin.

 Pierre Quarré, Claus de Werve et la sculpture bourguignonne dans le premier tiers du XVe siècle, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée de Dijon, 1976), 11–12 (Vierge Bulliot), no. 62 (Meilly-sur-Rouvres), 66 (Auxonne), 68 (Brétigny), 74 (Bézouotte), 71 (Poligny).

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the mother and her son—whether he is represented as a small baby or a restless little boy—is communicated with true accuracy.

A Statue from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne It would be interesting to know more about the provenance of the work. If the dealer who sold the sculpture to the Louvre clearly indicated that it came from Montigny-sur-Vingeanne, which has always been repeated in the catalogues of the Louvre’s Sculpture Department, the curators have curiously neglected the information given by L. Morillot: This statue . . . comes from the liquidation of property that belonged to the Ursuline congregation of Montigny-sur-Vingeanne: it had been given to them, around 1830, by Mademoiselle Guilley. A Parisian amateur in whose study it had entered has just offered it to the Louvre.16

This latter information is erroneous, because the inventory of the department clearly indicates that the statue was purchased on the Parisian art market for a large sum, 7,000 francs, to be compared with the 15,000 francs spent for the tomb of Philippe Pot in 1889. We should follow this Ursuline trail, with the risk of a new dead end. An establishment for the education of young girls was indeed founded in 1815 in Montigny-sur-Vingeanne (Côte-d’Or) by Julie Quillot and joined the Ursuline order in 1828. The separation of church and state halted the community’s development, and it is likely that the sculpture was removed in this context. The educational institution ceased its activity completely in 1931.17 However, if it is correct that it was offered to the convent in 1830 by Mademoiselle Guilley, it will undoubtedly

 Morillot, “Vierge bourguignonne,” LXX: “Cette statue . . . provient de la liquidation des biens ayant appartenu à la congrégation des Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne: elle leur avait été donnée, vers 1830, par Mlle Guilley. Un amateur parisien dans le cabinet duquel elle était entrée, vient de l’offrir au musée du Louvre.”  On this establishment, see André Florin, “Les Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne,” Terroir, Bulletin de la Société historique et touristique de la région de Fontaine-Française, no. 50 (2e trim. 1969): 1–7; no. 52 (4e trim. 1969): 11–13; no. 53 (1er trim. 1970): 19–23; no. 54 (2e trim. 1970): 15–18; no. 55 (3e trim. 1970): 2–8; no. 56 (4e trim. 1970): 11–14; no. 67 (3e trim. 1973): 14–17, ill.; André Florin, “La petite sœur Saint Jean [Marie Truchot, 1859–1914], Ursuline de Montigny-surVingeanne,” Terroir, no. 64 (4e trim. 1972): 3–9, ill.; André Florin, “Quillot sur Vingeanne,” Terroir, no. 70 (1974): on Julie Quillot, foundress and mother superior (1792–1861), 12 (généalogie), 26 (portrait) and 36–37 (lettre); Jean Raillard, “Le pensionnat des Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne,” Terroir, no. 118 (1er sem. 1999): 16–21.

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be difficult to go back any further.18 In any case, it should be remembered that Montigny-sur-Vingeanne was probably not its original destination. It takes effort to imagine the original appearance of the work. The crown is obviously not original to it: it is not of the same stone as the statue, recuts were necessary to arrange for a rabbet to install it, and it is rather disproportionate. It is likely that the sculpture had a metal crown originally, perhaps like that of the Virgin of Chaux-des-Crotenay—which, separated from the statue, was identified as such in 2005.19 Therefore, the upper part of her head may not have been originally sculpted, as is the case with the Virgin of Meilly-sur-Rouvres (see Figure 4.6). Such a feature would have certainly been awkward, either for when the statue was used for worship in the Ursuline chapel, or when it passed into the art market. It is difficult to date the addition of this crown as well as the (at least) three stages of repainting evident from the close study of the sculpture, but one could suggest that the Virgin had undergone at least one recoloring before the Revolution, and that it was when it was offered to the Ursulines that she received her crown and the bluish whitewash with gold highlights at the edge of the mantle and on the crown. Lastly, it was probably during its passage to the art market that it was stripped, as was often the case to avoid an expensive and complex restoration, but even more so because of the relative lack of interest from collectors and museum curators in this fundamental aspect of medieval sculpture. We can only sadly note how the stripping of its polychromy does not do the sculpture justice. Even if the recent cleaning removed dirt that distorted the reading of its volumes, particularly of the white and raw surface of the stone that can be seen today, the appearance of the sculpture remains problematic, especially without traces of the filler, which sometimes provides an ocher tint that softens the surfaces of similar statues also deprived of their color. The remains of polychromy are too tenuous to attempt a reconstruction, but we have some clues: a blue mantle and a red veil with a gold edge (no such indications for the dress); the hair was golden, and, logically, the skin tones had to be natural. Regrettably, the Burgundian statues (and medieval sculptures in general) that have come down to us with their original polychromy are the exception: in the best case, they are covered with a

 I have not been able to delve into this part of the history of the work within the framework of this essay. It deserves further research.  Véronique Boucherat, “La Vierge de La Chaux-des-Crotenay: Un inédit de Claus de Werve,” in La création artistique en France autour de 1400, ed. Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye (Paris: École du Louvre, 2006), 305; Anne Dary and Véronique Boucherat, eds., La sculpture du XVe siècle en FrancheComté, de Jean Sans Peur à Marguerite d’Autriche (1404–1530), exh. cat., Dole, Musée des beaux-arts de Dole, 23 June–30 September 2007; Poligny, Collégiale Saint-Hippolyte et Chapelle de la Congrégation, 23 June–26 August 2007 (France: Édition des Amis des musées du Jura, 2007), cat. no. 8.

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modern polychromy, obscured by dark wash, or whitewashed like our Virgin was before a restoration made it possible to detect faint traces of color.20 More often than not they have been completely stripped of it, like the Virgin of Auxonne (see Figures 4.3 and 4.4), when they are still in churches and even more so when they pass through the art market. In the series of Virgins attributed to Claus de Werve from the years 1415–1430, only the Virgin of Meilly-sur-Rouvres and especially the Bulliot Virgin (Figure 4.7), whose refined polychromy was revealed by its spectacular restoration in the early 1990s,21 can help us imagine the original state of the oeuvre. Even in its current state, the Virgin of the Ursulines of Montigny-sur-Vingeanne is remarkable. The rendering of the fabric of the mantle is masterful in its flexibility and simplicity: at the left, it falls vertically, while at the right it is animated by the round, lightly marked folds. Although the figure is completely wrapped in this drapery, the Virgin’s body is clearly articulated underneath. The compact appearance of the mantle and veil, whose distinctiveness must have been perceptible if they were of different colors originally, focuses our attention on the beautiful, harmonious face of the Virgin, and on the Christ Child wrapped in a part of her veil. We are struck by the natural way he seems to sleep, like a sated infant whose hand instinctively clings to his mother’s fingers. But beyond the accuracy of this observation, we must guess the religious significance: the veil, especially if red and thus foreshadowing Jesus’s sacrifice, is both the swaddle that protects the sleeping Christ Child and the shroud that will envelop him, and it is indeed the foreknowledge of this destiny that marks the equally tender and pensive expression of the Virgin.

“Relaxation,” or How to Look at Something That Is Not Really Significant We must now return to the question that gave rise to this essay: why has this statue, despite its longstanding presence in the Louvre, been poorly dated and given such little consideration for nearly a century?

 Among examples with modern polychromy is the Virgin of the Founder; the Virgin and Child at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (inv. # 33.23) is covered with dark wash; and another instance of a formerly whitewashed sculpture is the Virgin of Bézouotte.  Jean Délivré, “La restauration de la Vierge Bulliot,” in La splendeur des Rolin: Un mécénat privé à la cour de Bourgogne. Table ronde 27–28 février 1995, ed. Brigitte Maurice-Chabard et al. (Paris: Société éduenne et Picard, 1999), 295–96, pl. IX, 85 and XL, 279.

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Let us reread the assessments of the sculpture by Vitry and Beaulieu. They clearly saw that the sculpture was related to the style of the workshops of the Chartreuse de Champmol (“the persistence of the Burgundian drapery imagined by Marville and Sluter,” “the admirable technique of the workshops at the turn of the century”), but they were especially struck by the characteristics that accompanied what they called the “relaxation . . . of French art in Burgundy.”22 It is indeed this notion of “relaxation” that must be questioned here. The term was proposed by Courajod, who was also the founder of the Chair of the History of Sculpture at the École du Louvre.23 The most significant part of his research on French sculpture concerns the end of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.24 Writing from a biased, obviously nationalist position25 that attempted to assert the precedence of a French Renaissance over the Italian Renaissance, Courajod—after having highlighted the importance of the “Franco-Flemish” sculpture of which Sluter was the promoter at Champmol at the end of the fourteenth century—identified in Touraine, at the end of the fifteenth century, “the relaxation of the Franco-Flemish style.” He defines this relaxation as a “return to the natural,” the Franco-Flemish style being “dead from its tension and its excess,” but also as “the watering down of the Franco-Flemish style under the influence of the Italian school, particularly in the Loire basin.”26 Courajod’s lectures marked several generations of art historians, particularly his successors in the Sculpture Department, André Michel (1896–1920),27

 Cf. notes 3 and 5.  Louis Courajod (1841–1896) joined the Sculpture Department, and Works of Art from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and Modern Times at the Louvre in 1874, before taking over its management in 1893. He also founded the Chair of the History of Sculpture of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance at the École du Louvre in 1887. See Geneviève Bresc-Bautier, ed., Un Combat pour la sculpture: Louis Courajod (1841–1896) (Paris: École du Louvre, 2003).  Louis Courajod, Les origines de la Renaissance en France au XIVe et au XVe siècle: École du Louvre. Leçon d’ouverture du cours d’histoire de la sculpture, le 2 février 1887 (Paris: Champion, 1888); Leçons professées à l’École du Louvre (1887–1896), vol. 2, Les origines de la Renaissance en France au XIVe et XVe siècle (Paris: 1901).  Benoît Mihail, Le passé flamand de la France et sa redécouverte de l’époque romantique au régime de Vichy (Saintes, Belgium: Éd. Labor, 2006); Geneviève Bresc-Bautier, “‘La bataille dure encore entre les Pontifes de l’Antiquité et les Paladins du Moyen Âge’: La querelle de la ‘Première Renaissance’ française,” in Histoire de l’Histoire de l’art en France au XIXe siècle, ed. Roland Recht et al. (Paris: La Documentation française, 2008), 69–93; Michela Passini, La fabrique de l’art national: Le nationalisme et les origines de l’histoire de l’art en France et en Allemagne, 1870–1933 (Paris: Éd. de la Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, 2012).  Courajod, Leçons professées à l’École du Louvre (1887–1896), vol. 2, especially 476–77.  André Michel, “La sculpture en France et dans les Pays du Nord,” in Histoire de l’art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu’à nos jours, ed. André Michel, vol. 3 (Paris: Librairie Armand Colin, 1907).

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Vitry (1920–1940),28 and Aubert (1940–1955),29 all authors of new syntheses on medieval art or sculpture, which remain faithful to his instruction. Despite the progress in our thinking and the fact that the nationalist perspective has of course been rejected in favor of a fruitful reflection on so-called “artistic transfers” (that is, movements of artists, objects, iconographies)30 this interpretive scheme of “tension/ relaxation” still undergirds some recent research in France,31 even as others have proposed other ways to read the sculpture of the fifteenth century.32 Courajod’s thinking on the importance of Burgundian sculpture has, directly or via Vitry and Aubert, left its mark on several generations of art historians. Vitry and Aubert encouraged new studies, including those of Henri David, a student of Michel, who dedicated a copy of his De Sluter à Sambin to Vitry.33 Aubert was an associate of Quarré, curator of the Dijon Musée des Beaux-Arts: he prefaced the catalogue of his first exhibition on Burgundian sculpture in 1949.34 Camp referred to Vitry as well as to Henri David in his foreword.35 Jacques Baudoin claimed Quarré as his teacher in the dedication of his work on the sculpture of Burgundy.36 Thus, for more than a century, this opposition between abundant drapery wrapped widely around the body, a legacy of the Claus Sluter style, and narrower drapery, falling more simply and associated with the “relaxation,” has been seen in terms of two successive and therefore incompatible moments—the approach that confused and complicated the analysis of certain works. Consequently, the Virgin of

 Paul Vitry, Michel Colombe et la sculpture française de son temps (Paris: Librairie centrale des beaux arts, 1901).  Aubert, La sculpture française au Moyen Âge.  Jacques Dubois, Jean-Marie Gillouët, and Benoît van den Bossche, eds., Les transferts artistiques dans l’Europe gothique: Repenser la circulation des artistes, des œuvres, des thèmes et des savoir-faire (XIIe–XVIe siècle) (Paris: Picard, 2014).  Sophie Guillot de Suduiraut, “Le flamboiement gothique (1400–1530),” in Histoire d’un art, la Sculpture, le grand art du Moyen Age du Ve au XVe siècle, ed. Georges Duby, Xavier Barral I Altet, and Sophie Guillot de Suduiraut (Geneva: Skira, 1989), reprint Paris 2013, 235–300, especially 247–48, 282–87; Jean-Marie Guillouët, “La sculpture en France (vers 1440–vers 1520),” in L’art du Moyen Âge en France, ed. Philippe Plagnieux (Paris: Citadelles et Mazenod, 2010), 471–99.  Roland Recht, “La sculpture,” in Albert Châtelet and Roland Recht, Le monde gothique: Automne et renouveau, 1380–1500, L’Univers des Formes series (Paris: Gallimard, 1988), 75–117; André Chastel, L’art français, vol. 2, Temps modernes: 1430–1620 (Paris: Flammarion, 1994), 9, 58–62, 90.  David, De Sluter à Sambin.  Pierre Quarré, ed., Chefs-d’œuvre de la sculpture bourguignonne du XIVe au XVIe siècle, exh. cat. (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1949).  Camp, Imageurs bourguignons, 14.  Baudoin, Sculpture flamboyante, 5.

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Chaux-des-Crotenay has long been associated with the beautiful saints of Auxois at the end of the fifteenth century due to the downward fall of her dress, when, on the contrary, it is her face that today invites an attribution to Claus de Werve, and a production date of around 1415–1430.37 Conversely, in the case of the Chalon Virgin with an Inkwell, one must examine her face for the traits that relate it to the works produced in southern Burgundy at the end of the fifteenth century, when the generous folds of her mantle placed the sculpture in the workshop of Jean La Huerta.38 What remains is the question of the judgment passed on the works with simple drapery and attached to Claus de Werve’s name. It is striking that the theory of “relaxation” persists here once again. Thus Quarré, in writing about the Bulliot Virgin (see Figure 4.7), again evokes and agrees with Vitry who juxtaposed the statue with “the harsh and violent spirit” associated with the “Burgundian School”: “This ‘delicate and touching grace,’ evident already in the angels from the tomb of Philip the Bold, this very maternal feeling of intimacy, clings, like the enveloping of the drapery, to what we now understand as the work of Claus de Werve.”39 Elsewhere, once more referring to the work of de Werwe and juxtaposing it with that of Sluter, he brings up “relaxation” and characterizes the angels from Philip’s tomb (see Figure 4.5) as expressing “a gentle calm that one finds in a fair number of objects made before 1430, which could have served as models for the sculptors until the end of the fifteenth century.”40 Jacques Baudoin echoes the sentiment: “Because of its refined appearance, [the Virgin of Montigny] was attributed to the end of the

 Camp, Imageurs bourguignons, 227–28; Boucherat, “Vierge de La Chaux-des-Crotenay,” n. 20.  Camp, Imageurs bourguignons, 128; Baudoin, Sculpture flamboyante, 243; Brigitte MauriceChabard et al., eds., Miroir du Prince: La commande artistique en Bourgogne et en Franche-Comté au XVe siècle, exh. cat., Autun, Musée Rolin, and Chalon-sur-Saône, Musée Denon, June 5–September 21, 2021 (Dijon: Éd. Faton, 2021), cat. 37 by Sophie Jugie.  Quarré, Claus de Werve, cat. nos. 11–12: “Une dernière question se pose à propos de la Vierge à l’Enfant d’Autun, dite ‘Vierge Bulliot,’ dont Paul Vitry disait avec juste raison qu’elle s’opposait à ‘l’esprit âpre et violent’ que l’on rattachait alors à l’École bourguignonne.’ Cette ‘grâce délicate et touchante’ qui apparaît déjà dans les anges du tombeau de Philippe le Hardi, ce sentiment maternel tout d’intimité semblent bien se rattacher, comme l’enveloppement du drapé, à ce que l’on peut maintenant connaître de l’œuvre de Claux de Werve.”  Quarré, La sculpture en Bourgogne, 15: “On a été conduit à considérer comme marquées par la ‘détente’ de la fin du XVe siècle des statues qui correspondaient en réalité au tempérament artistique de Claux de Werve, plus mesuré que celui de Sluter; les anges du tombeau de Philippe le Hardi expriment un calme plein de douceur que l’on retrouve dans bon nombre d’œuvres antérieures à 1430, qui ont pu servir de modèles aux imagiers jusqu’à la fin du XVe siècle.”

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fifteenth century. This opinion must be revisited, demonstrating, once again, that Claus de Werve played an important role in calming the Sluterian style.”41 We must therefore grant Claus de Werve his share of personal creativity: the sculptor was faithful, at times, to the large, generous drapery familiar from Champmol, whose now missing altar statue has presumably provided a model for the Virgins of Auxonne, Poligny, and Bézouotte, as well as for the Virgin that Jean de La Huerta sculpted for the Mâchefoing chapel in Rouvres-en-Plaine in 1448;42 and he was capable, at times, of imagining compositions as varied as they are original, like in the Virgins of Viévy, Brétigny-sur-Norges, Montigny-sur-Vingeanne, Meilly-sur-Rouvres, Chaux-des-Crotenay, or Autun. The real markers of his style include facial harmony, suppleness and elegance of drapery, and figures of the Christ Child rendered with an ever-renewed sense of observation and tenderness. It seems that it is time to seek new criteria to deepen our understanding of Burgundian sculpture, given that the writings of Quarré, Camp, and Baudoin have been noted for their inconsistencies and gaps—a frustrating side of the otherwise stimulating accounts.43 The exhibition L’art à la cour de Bourgogne: Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur, held in Dijon and in Cleveland in 2004–2005, was the occasion for a new reflection on Claus de Werve, and we can thus rely on the conclusions of Boucherat.44 La Huerta’s corpus, on the other hand, remains very confused partly with that of Le Moiturier, and we must continue the work of clarification already begun by Boucherat.45 The years 2000–2020 were exceptionally rich in studies of Burgundian patrons, and an exhibition in Autun and Chalon in 2021 presented these results and resituated many Burgundian sculptures in a much better understood context. Let us remember, above all, that by daring to challenge the views of the founders of the history of French sculpture, such as Courajod, Vitry, and Aubert, our writings are intended to be called into question themselves—a worthy pursuit nonetheless

 Baudoin, Sculpture flamboyante, 144: “A cause de son allure affinée, [la Vierge de Montigny] était attribuée à la fin du XVe siècle. Cette opinion doit être révisée, démontrant, une fois de plus, que Claus de Werve a pris une part importante dans l’apaisement du style slutérien.”  Quarré, Jean de La Huerta, cat. nos. 4, 5, and 43.  Sophie Jugie, “La sculpture bourguignonne: Construction d’un récit, un récit à déconstruire?,” in Geisteswissenschaftliche Spaziergänge, Festschrift für Renate Prochno-Schinkel, ed. Tanja Hinterholz and Romana Sammern (Ratisbonne: Schnell & Steiner, 2019), 32–35.  Boucherat, “Nouveaux éclairages sur l’œuvre de Claus de Werve,” see cat. no. 15.  Véronique Boucherat, “Jean de La Huerta et Antoine Le Moiturier, imagiers de Philippe le Bon: L’exemplarité d’un dossier opaque,” Annales d’histoire de l’art et d’archéologie 34 (2012), 7–30; Véronique Boucherat, “Nouveaux éclairages sur le style et l’œuvre d’Antoine Le Moiturier,” in Miroir du Prince: L’âge d’or du mécénat à Autun (1425–1510) (Snoeck: Musée Rolin and Musée Denon, 2021), 252–61.

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should they be able to stimulate research that advances our knowledge. This is largely what happened with the Chartreuse de Champmol, and which, unfortunately, prematurely aged the catalogue of our 2004–2005 exhibition.46 It must be noted today that from that show the Virgin of the Ursulines of Montigny-surVingeanne was missing—the sculpture that could have been exhibited to pay better homage to the genius of Claus de Werve.47

Bibliography Aubert, Marcel. La sculpture française du Moyen Âge. Paris: Flammarion, 1946. Aubert, Marcel, and Michèle Beaulieu. Musée national du Louvre: Description raisonnée des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes. Vol. 1, Moyen Âge. Paris: Editions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1950. Baron, Françoise. Musée du Louvre: Sculpture française. Vol. 1, Moyen Âge. Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1996. Baron, Françoise, Sophie Jugie, and Benoît Lafay. Les tombeaux des ducs de Bourgogne: Création, destruction, restauration. Paris: Somogy; Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, 2009. Baudoin, Jacques. La sculpture flamboyante en Bourgogne et Franche-Comté. Nonette: Créer, 1996. Boucherat, Véronique. “Jean de La Huerta et Antoine Le Moiturier, imagiers de Philippe le Bon: L’exemplarité d’un dossier opaque.” Annales d’histoire de l’art et d’archéologie 34 (2012): 7–30. Boucherat, Véronique. “Nouveaux éclairages sur le style et l’œuvre d’Antoine Le Moiturier.” In Miroir du Prince: L’âge d’or du mécénat à Autun (1425–1510), 252–61. Snoeck, Musée Rolin and Musée Denon, 2021

 Michael Grandmontagne, Claus Sluter und die Lesbarkeit mittelalterlicher Skulptur: Das Portal der Kartause von Champmol (Worms: Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, 2005); Sherry Lindquist, ed., Agency, Visuality and Society at the Chartreuse de Champmol (Abingdon: Routledge, 2008); Susie Nash, “Claus Sluter’s ‘Well of Moses’ for the Chartreuse de Champmol reconsidered: Part 1,” The Burlington Magazine 147 (2005): 798–809; Part 2, 148 (2006): 456–67; Part 3, 150 (2008): 724–41; Françoise Baron, Sophie Jugie, and Benoît Lafay, Les tombeaux des ducs de Bourgogne: Création, destruction, restauration (Paris: Somogy; Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, 2009); Sophie Jugie, Les pleurants des tombeaux ducs de Bourgogne (Tielt: Lannoo, 2012); Michele Tomasi, “Matériaux, techniques, commanditaires et espaces: Le système des retables à la chartreuse de Champmol,” Netherlandish Yearbook for History of Art 62 (2012, 2013): 28–55; Sophie Jugie and Catherine Tran, eds., Les retables de la chartreuse de Champmol (Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Art de Dijon; Gand: Snoeck, 2014), 26–39; Susie Nash, “The Two Tombs of Philip the Bold,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 82 (2019, 2020): 1–111; Michel Lefftz, “Claus Sluter et son génial neveu Claus de Werve au Puits de Moïse. Communication du 5 février 2020,” Bulletin de la Société des Antiquaires de France, années 2020–2021, forthcoming.  I warmly thank Pierre-Yves Le Pogam, Véronique Boucherat, and Madeleine Blondel for the help and encouragement they gave me in the development of this essay.

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Boucherat, Véronique. “Nouveaux éclairages sur l’œuvre de Claus de Werve.” In L’art à la cour de Bourgogne: Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur (1364–1419), exh. cat., edited by Sophie Jugie and Stephen Fliegel. Paris: RMN, 2004. Boucherat, Véronique. “La Vierge de La Chaux-des-Crotenay: Un inédit de Claus de Werve.” In La création artistique en France autour de 1400, edited by Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye, 295–314. Paris: École du Louvre, 2006. Bresc-Bautier, Geneviève. “‘La bataille dure encore entre les Pontifes de l’Antiquité et les Paladins du Moyen Âge’: La querelle de la ‘Première Renaissance’ française.” In Histoire de l’Histoire de l’art en France au XIXe siècle, edited by Roland Recht et al., 69–93. Paris: La Documentation française, 2008. Bresc-Bautier, Geneviève, ed. Un combat pour la sculpture: Louis Courajod (1841–1896). Paris: École du Louvre, 2003. Camp, Pierre. Les imageurs bourguignons de la fin du Moyen Âge. Dijon: Association pour le renouveau du Vieux-Dijon, 1990. Chastel, André. L’art français. Vol. 2, Temps modernes: 1430–1620. Paris: Flammarion, 1994. Claus de Werve et la sculpture bourguignonne dans le premier tiers du XVe siècle, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1976. Courajod, Louis. Leçons professées à l’École du Louvre (1887–1896). Vol. 2, Les origines de la Renaissance en France au XIVe et XVe siècle. Paris, 1901. Courajod, Louis. Les origines de la Renaissance en France au XIVe et au XVe siècle: École du Louvre. Leçon d’ouverture du cours d’histoire de la sculpture, le 2 février 1887. Paris: Champion, 1888. Dary, Anne, and Véronique Boucherat, eds. La sculpture du XVe siècle en Franche-Comté, de Jean Sans Peur à Marguerite d’Autriche (1404–1530), exh. cat. France: Édition des Amis des musées du Jura, 2007. David, Henri. De Sluter à Sambin: Essai critique sur la sculpture et le décor monumental en Bourgogne au XVe et au XVIe siècles. Vol. 1, La fin du Moyen Âge. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1933. Délivré, Jean. “La restauration de la Vierge Bulliot.” In La splendeur des Rolin: Un mécénat privé à la cour de Bourgogne. Table ronde 27–28 février 1995, edited by Brigitte Maurice-Chabard et al., 295–96. Paris: Société éduenne et Picard, 1999. Dubois, Jacques, Jean-Marie Gillouët, and Benoît van den Bossche, eds. Les transferts artistiques dans l’Europe gothique: Repenser la circulation des artistes, des œuvres, des thèmes et des savoir-faire (XIIe–XVIe siècle). Paris: Picard, 2014. Florin, André. “La petite sœur Saint Jean [Marie Truchot, 1859–1914], Ursuline de Montigny-surVingeanne.” Terroir, no. 64 (4e trim. 1972): 3–9. Florin, André. “Quillot sur Vingeanne.” Terroir, no. 70 (1974): on Julie Quillot, foundress and mother superior (1792–1861), 12 (généalogie), 26 (portrait), and 36–37 (lettre). Florin, André. “Les Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne.” Terroir, Bulletin de la Société historique et touristique de la région de Fontaine-Française, no. 50 (2e trim. 1969): 1–7; no. 52 (4e trim. 1969): 11–13; no. 53 (1er trim. 1970): 19–23; no. 54 (2e trim. 1970): 15–18; no. 55 (3e trim. 1970): 2–8; no. 56 (4e trim. 1970): 11–14; no. 67 (3e trim. 1973): 14–17. Grandmontagne, Michael. Claus Sluter und die Lesbarkeit mittelalterlicher Skulptur: Das Portal der Kartause von Champmol. Worms: Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, 2005. Guillot de Suduiraut, Sophie. “Le flamboiement gothique (1400–1530).” In Histoire d’un art, la Sculpture, le grand art du Moyen Age du Ve au XVe siècle, edited by Georges Duby, Xavier Barral I Altet, and Sophie Guillot de Suduiraut, 471–544. Geneva: Skira, 1989, reprint Paris, 2013. Guillouët, Jean-Marie. “La sculpture en France (vers 1440–vers 1520).” In L’art du Moyen Âge en France, edited by Philippe Plagnieux, 471–99. Paris: Citadelles et Mazenod, 2010.

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Jugie, Sophie. “Artistes et ateliers: Les tailleurs d’images au service des grands dignitaires bourguignons.” In Miroir du Prince: La commande artistique en Bourgogne et en Franche-Comté au XVe siècle, exh. cat., edited by Brigitte Maurice-Chabard et al., 240–47. Dijon: Éd. Faton, 2021. Jugie, Sophie. Les pleurants des tombeaux ducs de Bourgogne. Tielt: Lannoo, 2012. Jugie, Sophie. “La sculpture bourguignonne: Construction d’un récit, un récit à déconstruire?” In Geisteswissenschaftliche Spaziergänge, Festschrift für Renate Prochno-Schinkel, edited by Tanja Hinterholz and Romana Sammern, 32–35. Ratisbonne: Schnell & Steiner, 2019. Jugie, Sophie, and Catherine Tran, eds. Les retables de la chartreuse de Champmol. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Art de Dijon; Gand: Snoeck, 2014. Laclotte, Michel, Annie Caubet, and Pierre Rosenberg, eds. Les donateurs du Louvre, exh. cat. Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1989. Lefftz, Michel. “Claus Sluter et son génial neveu Claus de Werve au Puits de Moïse. Communication du 5 février 2020.” Bulletin de la Société des Antiquaires de France, années 2020–2021 (forthcoming). Lindquist, Sherry, ed. Agency, Visuality and Society at the Chartreuse de Champmol. Abingdon: Routledge, 2008. Maurice-Chabard, Brigitte et al., eds. Miroir du Prince: La commande artistique en Bourgogne et en Franche-Comté au XVe siècle, exh. cat. Dijon: Éd. Faton, 2021. Méthivier, Amélie. Musée du Louvre, Département des Sculptures: Vierge à l’Enfant, Pierre calcaire, restes de polychromie, RF 1433. Rapport d’intervention. November 2016. Michel, André. “La sculpture en France et dans les Pays du Nord.” In Histoire de l’art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu’à nos jours, edited by André Michel, vol. 3. Paris: Librairie Armand Colin, 1907. Michel, André, and Paul Vitry. Musée national du Louvre: Catalogue sommaire des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes. Supplément. Paris: Libraires-Imprimeries réunies, 1907. Mihail, Benoît. Le passé flamand de la France et sa redécouverte de l’époque romantique au régime de Vichy. Saintes, Belgium: Éd. Labor, 2006. Morillot, L. “Une Vierge bourguignonne de la fin du XIVe siècle.” Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Département de la Côte-d’Or 15 (1906). Müller, Theodor. Sculpture in the Netherlands, Germany, France and Spain 1400 to 1500. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1966. Nash, Susie. “Claus Sluter’s “‘Well of Moses’ for the Chartreuse de Champmol reconsidered: Part 1.” The Burlington Magazine 147 (2005): 798–809; Part 2, 148 (2006): 456–67; Part 3, 150 (2008): 724–41. Nash, Susie. “The Two Tombs of Philip the Bold.” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 82 (2019, 2020): 1–111. Passini, Michela. La fabrique de l’art national: Le nationalisme et les origines de l’histoire de l’art en France et en Allemagne, 1870–1933. Paris: Éd. de la Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, 2012 (collection Passages, no. 43). Quarré, Pierre, ed. Antoine Le Moiturier: Le dernier des grands imagiers des ducs de Bourgogne, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1973. Quarré, Pierre, ed. Chefs-d’œuvre de la sculpture bourguignonne du XIVe au XVIe siècle, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1949. Quarré, Pierre. Claus de Werve et la sculpture bourguignonne dans le premier tiers du XVe siècle, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée de Dijon, 1976.

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Quarré, Pierre, ed. Jean de La Huerta et la sculpture bourguignonne au milieu du XVe siècle, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1972. Quarré, Pierre, ed. La sculpture bourguignonne en Auxois et en Autunois à la fin du XVe, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1974. Quarré, Pierre. La sculpture en Bourgogne à la fin du Moyen Âge. Fribourg: Vilo, 1978. Raillard, Jean. “Le pensionnat des Ursulines de Montigny-sur-Vingeanne.” Terroir, no. 118 (1er sem. 1999): 16–21. Recht, Roland. “La sculpture.” In Albert Châtelet and Roland Recht, Le monde gothique: Automne et renouveau, 1380–1500, 75–117. L’Univers des Formes series. Paris: Gallimard, 1988. Tomasi, Michele. “Matériaux, techniques, commanditaires et espaces: Le système des retables à la chartreuse de Champmol.” Netherlandish Yearbook for History of Art 62 (2012, 2013): 28–55. Vitry, Paul. Michel Colombe et la sculpture française de son temps. Paris: Librairie centrale des beaux arts, 1901. Vitry, Paul. Musée national du Louvre: Catalogue des sculptures du Moyen Âge, de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes. Paris: Musées nationaux, 1922. Vitry, Paul. “Une nouvelle Vierge bourguignonne du XVe siècle.” Musées et Monuments de France (1906): 153.

Elizabeth Morrison

Chapter 5 “None touches it”: The Library of Anthony of Burgundy The library of Anthony of Burgundy, illegitimate son of Philip the Good, is widely recognized as one of the largest and most lavish collections of a Burgundian nobleman.1 His motto “Nul ne s’y frotte” (“None touches it”)2 appears frequently in the margins of his often-oversized tomes, along with his device, arms, and other references to his high status in courtly circles.3 Yet although Anthony’s library has been painstakingly reconstructed,4 his collection’s importance is largely overshadowed by the concept that this library was somehow simply a faint echo of those of his father and brother, the Dukes of Burgundy. In the scholarly literature,

 In 2003, I was fortunate to be involved with the J. Paul Getty Museum’s exhibition Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe, while just over a year later, Stephen Fliegel was the curator for Cleveland Museum of Art’s ambitious Art from the Court of Burgundy: The Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless. Our shared interests in the arts of the Burgundian court make it fitting that my contribution to this volume engages with a field of study that continues to inspire us both.  In Hanno Wijsman, Luxury Bound: Illustrated Manuscript Production and Noble and Princely Book Ownership in the Burgundian Netherlands (Turnhout: Brepols, 2010), 272, the translation is “no one can touch it.” In Lorne Campbell, “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne’ and his Portrait by Rogier van der Weyden,” in Cambridge and the Study of Netherlandish Art, ed. Meredith McNeill Hale (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016), 54, the translation is “no-one rubs itself against it” or “let none touch.”  This article was originally intended to examine a number of Anthony of Burgundy’s individual manuscripts that became impossible to see personally because of the advent of COVID-19 in 2020 and the inability to travel. I hope that this article will be the beginning of a longer study of Anthony’s manuscripts by myself or others. I thank Lucien Dugaz for providing me with photographs of no. 7, and Christine Reno who kindly visited the Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België and photographed a number of manuscripts for me. I also thank Gregory Clark and Anne Margreet As-Vijvers for consulting with me on illuminators of Anthony’s manuscripts, as well as Thomas Kren for reading a draft of this essay.  This paper is largely indebted to the work of Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens in “Héraldique et bibliophile: Le cas d’Antoine, Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne (1421–1504),” in Miscellanea Martin Wittek: Album de codicologie et de paléographie offert à Martin Wittek, ed. Anny Raman and Eugène Manning (Louvain: Peeters, 1993), 323–53; Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens, “Antoine, Grand Bâtarde de Bourgogne, bibliophile,” in L’ordre de la Toison d’or, de Philippe le Bon à Philippe le Beau (1430–1505): Idéal ou reflet d’une société?, ed. Pierre Cockshaw and Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens (Turnhout: Brepols, 1996), 198–200. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-006

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his library has tended to be treated as a unified whole, often with statistics tabulated as to number, type, artist, and textual content.5 However, Anthony’s collection did not simply appear all at once at the end of his life as a fait accompli. He commissioned and acquired the individual manuscripts over the course of a long, eventful, and well-documented lifespan. Previous lists of Anthony’s collection have always been arranged by current holding institution. In this article, I propose to see what can be revealed by examining a chronological listing of Anthony’s manuscripts (see Appendix). Granted, many of his books cannot be assigned an exact date, but even the date ranges available to us based on style and internal information provide a strong guide to what he considered important at various stages of his life.6 This rearrangement will help show what particular texts appealed to him at given points and how the illuminations may have played a key role in bolstering his personal agenda. Admittedly, the preliminary conclusions in this article will be hypothetical in many cases, but by exploring this biographical approach to manuscript collecting, we may begin to see how Anthony’s manuscripts, rather than simply being treated as clinical data points to be gathered in a post-mortem inventory, can serve instead as vital indicators of his political and social ambitions over the course of a lifetime. Anthony of Burgundy, comté de La Roche (Ardenne), de Sainte-Menehould, de Guines, and de Steenberghe, seigneur de Beveren, de Tournehem, and de Vassy7 was the second son of Philip the Good, born to his father’s mistress Jeanne

 See Amédée Boinet, “Un bibliophile du XVe siècle,” Bibliothèque de l’École des chartes 67 (1906): 255–69; van den Bergen-Pantens, “Héraldique et bibliophile”; van den Bergen-Pantens, “Antoine, Grand Bâtarde de Bourgogne”; Wijsman, Luxury Bound, 271–77; Campbell, “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” 53–54; and Nina Zenker, Der Breslauer Froissart: Im Spiegel spätmittelalterlicher Geschichtsauffassung (Petersburg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2018), 17–20.  The approach in this article was influenced by a 2005 article by Frima Fox Hofrichter, “An Intimate Look at Baroque Women Artists: Birth, Babies, and Biography,” in Framing the Family: Narrative and Representations in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods, ed. Rosalyn Voaden and Diane Wolfthal (Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2005), 139–58, in which the author looks at the detailed biographies of individual Baroque women artists in an effort to see how events in their lives may have influenced their artistic output. A comment by Lorne Campbell in “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” about Anthony perhaps concentrating on his manuscript collection while recovering from a broken leg (see footnote 26 below) led me to consider that analyzing more aspects of Anthony of Burgundy’s life might be a fruitful approach to understanding his collecting habits.  There are many resources devoted to the biography of Anthony of Burgundy, many of which can be found in van den Bergen-Pantens, “Héraldique et bibliophile,” 323n2. Additional resources include Campbell, “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” 47–53, and Zenker, Der Breslauer Froissart, 16–17. Because many facts about Anthony’s life are so well known, only those details that are disputed, harder to find, or are interpretations of a given event will be cited in this article.

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de Presles around 1421.8 He married in 1446 Jeanne de La Viesville, daughter of Philip the Good’s chamberlain Pierre de Preure.9 Anthony had four children by Jeanne, along with at least two illegitimate offspring outside of his marriage.10 In April 1452, just before the siege of Audenarde, he was knighted. Months later in June, his elder illegitimate brother Corneille was killed during the Battle of Rupelmonde, whereupon he inherited all of Corneille’s titles and possessions. In the 1450s and 1460s, Anthony actively fought alongside his younger half-brother, his father’s legitimate heir, Charles the Bold, in the various wars that were part of the plan instituted by his father to create a vast and independent Burgundian state. His tournament valor was celebrated as well, written about glowingly in several contemporary works, including by Georges Chastellain and in the Chroniques scandaleuse.11 It was also during the latter part of this period that Anthony of Burgundy began to build an ambitious personal library of manuscripts. Serving as an inspiration to Anthony was the Burgundian ducal library of over 900 volumes. The ducal library helped to legitimize the Burgundian independent state by harnessing the possibilities of cultural warfare to match the actual combat for land.12 By connecting themselves to historical examples of great leaders and examples of empire-building, the Burgundian dukes could clothe their own ambitions in the guise of historical continuity and destiny.13 Many of the texts and artists patronized by the ducal family were also evident in Anthony’s

 Campbell (“Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” 47) has recently put forward a strong argument for a birth date for Anthony closer to 1428, but it has not been universally accepted.  For a theory about a second wife, see James Robinson Planché, “Portrait of Anthony of Burgundy,” Archaeologia 27 (1838): 429 (see note “r”).  Marcel Bergé, “Les Bâtards de la maison de Bourgogne et leurs descendance,” L’Intermédiaire de Génealogistes 60 (1955): 361–63.  Aly Commies, “Nul ne s’y frotte: Een biografische schets van Anton, Bastaard de Bougondië,” in Excursiones mediaevales: Opstellen aangeboden aan Prof. A.G. Jongkees (Groningen: H.G. Schulte Nordholt, 1979), 73.  Much has been written about the Burgundian ducal library: Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick, eds., Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Trust, 2003); Claudine Lemaire, “The Burgundy Library,” in Art from the Court of Burgundy, 1364–1419, ed. Stephen Fliegel, Sophie Jugie, et al., (Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2004), 100–102; Wijsman, Luxury Bound; Bernard Bousmanne and Thierry Delcourt, eds., Miniatures flamandes, 1404–1482 (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2011); Anne Margreet As-Vijvers and Anne Korteweg, eds., Splendours of the Burgundian Netherlands: Southern Netherlandish Illuminated Manuscripts in Dutch Collections (Zwolle: WBOOKS, 2018); Bernard Bousmanne and Elena Savini, eds., The Library of the Dukes of Burgundy (London/Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2020).  See Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 60–78; Bousmanne and Delcourt, Miniatures flamandes, 103–10.

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collection. Although an anonymous artist carries the name Master of Anthony of Burgundy after a series of manuscripts painted for Anthony, less than half a dozen of Anthony’s manuscripts can be attributed to him (nos. 8, 17, 22), and this artist was also patronized by Philip the Good, Charles the Bold, Anthony’s fellow courtier and knight Louis de Gruuthuse, and others among the Burgundian nobility.14 Manuscripts commissioned by Anthony either served as an exemplar for (no. 3) or were copied from (no. 18) those found in the celebrated collection of Louis de Gruuthuse.15 Almost all of the historical works owned by Anthony are also found in Louis’s library,16 but one interesting aspect of their respective collections is that although many of their texts overlap, very few of their individual shared titles were illuminated by the same artist. Anthony’s collection was dominated by historical works and those concerning the concept of chivalry, whereas the romances, literary, theological, and didactic works that balanced the collections of other noblemen of the period were largely absent in his library. It seems that Anthony began collecting manuscripts in earnest around 1460. A copy of Christine de Pizan, L’Épître d’Othea, dating to around 1460 (no. 2), is one of the earliest personalized volumes in Anthony’s collection. The text opens with a frontispiece showing Hector receiving the book from Othea (Figure 5.1). Hector is dressed in a high-necked houppelande with dagged sleeves, an outdated style that may serve as a signal to the reader that he comes from a time period removed from the four figures behind him who are dressed in contemporary fashions. Those four figures have been identified as Philip the Good (front right), and three of his sons: Charles the Bold (front left), Anthony of Burgundy (back left), and David of Burgundy (back right).17 Philip, Charles, and Anthony all wear golden chains that could refer to their status as knights of the Order of the Golden Fleece.18 The family portrait here makes eminent sense, as the text is essentially a

 See Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 264–65; Ilona Hans-Collas and Pascal Schandel, Manuscrits enluminés des ancient Pays-Bas méridionaux: Manuscrits de Louis de Bruges (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2009), 90; Bousmanne and Delcourt, Miniatures flamandes, 311–13.  On the collection of Louis de Gruuthuse, see Hans-Collas and Schandel, Manuscrits enluminés.  Two historical works not found in Louis’s collection date to the period after Anthony defected to France (nos. 33 and 34 discussed below). Another exception is no. 8, which was Anthony’s only Latin historical manuscript and to which his arms were only added later.  See the Foundation Martin Bodmer site: http://dx.doi.org/10.5076/e-codices-cb-0049; Martha Breckenridge, “Christine de Pizan’s Livre d’Epitre d’Othea à Hector at the Intersection of Image and Text” (Ph.D. diss., University of Kansas, 2008), 130–54, especially 145.  The coat of arms with the collar of the order of Saint Michael that appears in the bottom border indicates that it was likely further personalized after 1477, which will be discussed at the end of this article.

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Figure 5.1: Follower of Willem Vrelant, Hector Receiving the Book from Othea before the Ducal Family, from Christine de Pizan, L’Épître d’Othéa, ca. 1460. Cologny (Geneva), Foundation Martin Bodmer, Cod. Bodmer 49, fol. 7.

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mirror of princes, with advice and historical examples emphasizing the merits and duties of a good Christian knight. It seems fitting that this, one of the earliest in Anthony’s collection,19 shows him as a dutiful son within the context of his grand Burgundian family, and on whose behalf he was actively fighting to increase its dynastic legacy. The earliest volume in Anthony’s library that is clearly dated and commissioned by him is a copy of the Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies, from 1463 (no. 3). It stands alone in his collection as the only romance. The soap-opera-like story concerns a knight named Gillion de Trazegnies, who journeys to the Holy Land on a vow and comes to be involved in a series of military engagements. The story has clear Crusading overtones and coincides with Anthony’s own Crusading interests. In 1454, Anthony had taken the vow of a Crusader at the Feast of the Pheasant, an event that served as a form of nation-building for the Burgundian state to force recognition of its independence as a great realm.20 In 1464, Philip appointed Anthony as the head of his army setting off on Crusade. Philip himself desperately wanted to fulfill his Crusading vow personally, but his health and his worries about the state of Burgundy at the time prevented it. If he were to send a proxy, Charles the Bold would have been the logical choice to burnish the continuing Burgundian tradition of Crusading, as he too had taken the Crusading vow at the Feast of the Pheasant. It was Anthony, however, who was given the honor of commanding the army. The prospect of a successful Crusade would have bolstered Anthony’s place within the family as a victorious Burgundian prince. For both the Burgundian state and for this ducal son, legitimacy was a key concept associated with the venture. Anthony’s prominent role in this endeavor would have distinguished him as an independent conqueror capable of adding incomparable luster to the Burgundian dominion. Zrinka Stahuljak has posited, in fact, that Anthony’s copy of the Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies focuses the viewer’s attention on the twin sons of Gillion, Jean and Gerard, as potential stand-ins for Charles the Bold and Anthony. Although Jean is the elder and thus the heir, the artist consistently favors the younger and more daring Gerard. In one image, Stahuljak points out, the artist even shows the elder

 It is possible that this manuscript was actually commissioned by another member of the ducal family and later gifted to Anthony. A close examination of the coat of arms and collar would perhaps provide clues, but Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens (in “Héraldique et bibliophile,” 353) indicates that they are overpainted.  See Marie-Thérèse Caron, Les Voeux de Faisan noblesse en fête, esprit de Croisade: Le manuscrit français 11594 de la Bibliothèque nationale de France (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003); Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good: The Apogee of Burgundy (London: Longmans, 1970), 268–72, 296–99, 358–72; Rolf Strøm-Olsen, “Political Narrative and Symbolism in the Feast of the Pheasant (1454),” Viator 46, no. 3 (2015): 317–42.

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Figure 5.2: Workshop of Lieven van Lathem, Four Scenes of the Judicial Duel between Gillion’s Sons, from Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies, 1463. Private collection, fol. 177.

twin submitting to the younger, even though the text explicitly states the opposite (Figure 5.2).21 At the end of the story, Jean returns to Hainaut to govern his father’s lands as successor, but it is Gerard who accompanies his father to engage the infidel and win acclaim, just as Charles the Bold stayed in Burgundy to serve as his father’s heir, while Anthony set out on Crusade on behalf of his father.

 Elizabeth Morrison and Zrinka Stahuljak, The Adventures of Gillion de Trazegnies: Chivalry and Romance in the Medieval East (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Trust, 2015), 76.

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Anthony’s manuscript is not only lavishly illuminated, but it also contains his arms in the border of each illuminated page. An incipit and an explicit at the front and end of the volume proudly proclaim Anthony’s ownership and celebrate his virtues of nobility and valor. The incipit reads: “Anthoine, bastard de Bougoigne, seigneur de Bevre, de Beuvry, et de Tournehem, lequel, comme victorieux et noble prince, ayant entre plenté de belles histoires esquelles il est moult enclin.” In a similar vein, the explicit recounts, “Cy fine la vraye histoire du preu chevalier messier Gillion de Trazegnies laquelle a este grossee et historiee et de tous poins ordonee comme il appert par le commandement et ordonnance de tres redoubte prince Anthoine, bien ame bastard de Bourgoigne.”22 It is remarkable that these bookend encomia emphasize the role of the patron in the making of the manuscript, including its illumination. The manuscript’s text and images were a perfect vehicle for Anthony’s ambitions. Is it possible that this first known foray into commissioned illuminated manuscripts could be seen as a political ploy to his father’s judgment? The text itself was dedicated to Philip, and Anthony engaged David Aubert, his father’s clerk and scribe who traveled with him constantly, to write out his manuscript.23 There is no way in which Philip could have been ignorant of his son’s commission, and he would almost certainly have seen the final result. In this way, the manuscript could not merely serve as a reflection of Anthony’s current interests, but as a kind of visual job pitch intended to win his father’s appointment as commander of the Crusading army, and his chance at fame and glory. Although the Crusade ended soon after Anthony set out when the pope died, he did successfully raise the siege at Ceuta before returning to Burgundy. Before Anthony had left, Philip had rewarded him with a large sum to offset his expenses and with the Comté of La Roche, which became Anthony’s favored title.24 Despite the actual events of the abortive Crusade, Anthony himself may have regarded his first known manuscript commission as an unmitigated success in providing him with prestige as a leader with a Crusading pedigree and encouraging him to find further ways to utilize manuscripts to forward his personal agenda. Anthony seems to have increased the pace of his acquisitions in the 1460s, especially in the years around 1470 (nos. 4–22). Fully twelve of these works are historical (nos. 5, 6, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14, 17, and 19) or chivalric in nature (nos. 7, 15, and 18). A further two relate to the concepts surrounding his rights, privileges, and duties as a landholder (nos. 16 and 21). It is also within this time period that marks of  Stéphanie Vincent, Le roman de Gillion de Trazegnies (Turnhout: Brepols, 2010), 105–6.  Vincent, Le roman de Gillion, 109–10, 97.  Weston S. Walford, “Examples of Medieval Seals,” The Archaeological Journal 15 (1858): 348. See the discussion of no. 13 below.

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ownership seem to multiply in his manuscripts. In the Gillion manuscript, the rather compact and discreet coat of arms was almost lost among the exuberant flowers and tendrils of the side borders (see Figure 5.2). In manuscripts of the 1460s, his arms, often enlarged by the addition of helm, crest, and supporters, become prominently featured at the bottom center of the page, while his motto and device, a barbican, can be found liberally sprinkled through the full borders around the miniatures and text. As Anthony’s personal power and influence at the court increased, so too, seemingly, did his confident declaration of his identity through manuscripts. It was around 1468 that Anthony seems to have turned his attention in earnest to commissioning manuscripts with lavish and personalized decorative programs over a relatively short amount of time (nos. 12–22). The collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece also first appears around his arms in many of these manuscripts, despite the fact that he had been named a knight of that prestigious order more than ten years previously in 1456.25 This perceptible increase in patronage coincides with a number of important events in Anthony of Burgundy’s life. The years from 1467–1468 were exceptionally active ones for Anthony. In 1467, he traveled to England to negotiate the marriage of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York with King Edward IV. While there, he took part in a celebrated tournament against the brother-in-law to Edward. His father’s death on June 15, 1467 interrupted Anthony’s stay in England, and he returned rapidly to Burgundy to attend to the obsequies. Although he maintained a close connection to his younger half-brother Charles, the new duke, Philip’s death must have caused a rearrangement of relationships and provided new opportunities and visibility for his sons. In July 1468, Charles the Bold married Margaret of York, and Anthony gained fame in the Pas de l’Arbre d’Or tournament that took place in celebration, where he broke his leg—an event that perhaps, as Lorne Campbell has posited, gave him more time to think about intellectual pursuits.26 In 1468, Charles appointed Anthony as his First Chamberlain, and Anthony became one of the wealthiest courtiers of his day.27 Meanwhile, just a couple of months before the wedding in 1468 an incident transpired that must have been a check to his other successes. At the May chapter of the Order of the Golden Fleece, Anthony was seriously reprimanded for fornication and adultery, behavior unbecoming the standards expected of the Order’s knights.28 One can only imagine how flagrant his infidelity must have been to be addressed in such a forum. These various    

Nos. 2 and 8 contain collars, but they were both added at a later date. Campbell, “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” 54. Commies, “Nul ne s’y frotte,” 63. Campbell, “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’” 51.

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events may have conspired together to convince Anthony that he was entering a new phase in life, one of greater importance and riches, but also one where he would need to preserve all the connections he could in order to forward his place at court and his standing within his own family. Perhaps the most lavish manuscript that Anthony ever commissioned was a four-volume copy of Froissart’s Chroniques (no. 13), with over 200 miniatures, dated in the manuscripts’ colophons to 1468–1469.29 The excess of arms, crests, collars, supporters, mottos, initials, banners, and devices in the borders that decorate every folio with a double-column miniature is almost vehement in appearance. The prominence of these features in the borders often seems to overwhelm the miniatures themselves, especially given their size compared to the figures in the illuminations and the fact that they are in full color instead of the semi-grisaille of the miniatures. Not only does the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece around his arms make a consistent appearance, the banners in the borders are also often emblazoned with his device of the barbican surrounded by individual links of the collar itself. Anthony had not advertised his being a knight of the Order in the over a decade since he was inducted, but in this manuscript and a number of others from this period and moving forward, the collar plays a conspicuous role. It seems possible, then, to link its appearance to this specific period in his life. The chastisement he had received at the Order’s chapter, an order founded by his recently-deceased father, may have induced him to reevaluate the value of the Order’s ability to influence his prospects and status, and he may have determined that visible demonstrations of his pride in the honor were politically savvy. All of the various ownership marks in the borders attested to Anthony’s dedication, nobility, chivalry, and fighting prowess in a manuscript whose chronicling of the events of the Hundred Years War concerned battles for power among the European nations, a historical precursor of the contemporary struggles in which he took an active part. One particular instance of the combination of these elements elucidates how they could be used in concert with a miniature to provide a visual gloss. In volume 4, fol. 229v contains a miniature depicting the 1396 battle of Nicopolis, originally intended to be a forerunner to relieving Constantinople (Figure 5.3). This Crusade was led by John of Nevers, eldest son of Burgundian Duke Philip the Bold, likely less because of a strong desire to repel the Ottomans, and more in an effort to shed luster on the House of Burgundy and build its power. The result was an unmitigated disaster, with the European forces soundly defeated. When John returned to Burgundy, he did not do so in shame; instead, he was greeted by

 On this manuscript, see Zenker, Der Breslauer Froissart.

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parades and cheers, and his actions earned him the epithet, John the Fearless.30 In the miniature, the tabard of John the Fearless emblazoned with the arms of the ducal family, slightly left of center, provides a colorful focal point amid a sea of grisaille. He seems to single-handedly battle the seething hordes around him. In the center of the bottom border, where most of the pages featuring doublecolumn miniatures have Anthony’s arms,31 this folio instead literally brings his arms to life. The lion, which usually is one of two supporters for his arms, now appears as a surrogate for Anthony himself, complete with helm, crest, and collar, and holding his shield and a banner with his device and motto in his left paw. His right holds a sword raised in assault while two armed soldiers attack from either side. The face of his shield, of course, mirrors almost exactly the arms of his forebear depicted in the miniature above. His personified arms actively engaging in a fight that echoes the actions of the main character above was decidedly purposeful.32 Both John the Fearless and Anthony of Burgundy were eldest sons put in charge of a Crusade at the behest of their Burgundian Duke fathers that ended prematurely, nevertheless bringing prestige to the Burgundian House. Indeed, at the end of the second volume, the colophon reads: “Cy prent fin des quatres volumes que complila iadis sire ieh(an) Froissart le second. Lequel par lordo(n) nance et commandement de tresexcellen(nt) prince et mon tresdoubte seign(eu)r monseign(eu)r anthoine bastard de Bourg(oi)gne Conte de la roche en ar(n)ne et ceter(a).”33 The Comté de la Roche, Anthony’s only title mentioned by name here, was the honor bestowed on Anthony in honor of his departure on Crusade.34 Clearly, to Anthony, his status as a Crusader honoring his vow and as a Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece were elements that highlighted his status as a son (albeit illegitimate) of the Duke of Burgundy, and that he felt could be emphasized to his benefit.

 Hubert Carrier (“Si vera est fama: Le retentissement de la bataille d’Othée dans la culture historique au XVe siècle,” Revue historique 303 [July/September 2001]: 660–68) argues that the epithet derives from both the battle at Nicopolis and the battle at Othée.  In vol. 2, fol. 327v features instead his barbican in this position. In vol. 4, fols. 134v, 309v, and 315v follow a different format whereby the lower border is not interrupted by a gap allowing for decoration to intrude into the text columns. Given that the folio under discussion can be found in the middle of this dissimilar set, it brings even greater attention to its role.  For a similar purposeful use of the personified lion in Louis de Gruuthuse’s copy of the Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies, see Morrison and Stahuljak, The Adventures of Gillion de Trazegnies, 79.  Zenker, Der Breslauer Froissart, 10.  See footnote 24 above.

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Figure 5.3: Lieven van Lathem, The Siege of Nicopolis, from Jean Froissart, Chroniques, 1468–1469. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Preuβischer Kulturbesitz, Breslau 1, vol. 4, fol. 229v.

One other manuscript from this period sheds additional light on his selfperception within the ducal family. It is a copy of the Traité de noblesse (no. 18), dating to around 1470. The treatise, originally written in Spanish and then becoming

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popular at the Burgundian court in French translation, is concerned with the nature of nobility. It addresses both hereditary nobility and the nobility of office. Then it turns to the responsibilities of soldiers along with their emblems and coats of arms.35 In the first section, one entire chapter is devoted to the birthright of illegitimate sons: “tous filz bastars des princes qui ont puissance d’anoblir et donner dignitez a autres sont hors de ceste doubte et question. Car il se doit entendre que cellui qui a puissance de donner noblesse et dignite a aucun pour seulement estre plaisant a son regart, chose plus raisonnable est qu’il vueille plus anoblir pour estre parfait ce qui par de lui.”36 Anthony must have taken heart in these words, that his princely father could pass on his noble qualities despite the circumstances of his birth. In the manuscript’s sole illumination, the Duke of Burgundy bestows the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece on a knight kneeling before him during a ceremony of the chapter (Figure 5.4). Given the presence of the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece around Anthony’s arms directly below the figure, it is doubtless the ceremony of his father inducting Anthony into the Order.37 The portion of the text dealing with bastards must have worked together with the illumination to mollify Anthony’s feelings about his illegitimate status. This is one of the few volumes that shares a text and an illuminator with a manuscript in the collection of Louis de Gruuthuse (London, British Library, Add. Ms. 18798), the Master of Margaret of York.38 However, Louis’s manuscript features a different scene, with both himself and his wife kneeling before Philip amid a group of noble men and women, whereas Anthony takes part in an official ceremony alone.39 In addition, Anthony’s arms are an integral part of the decorated border, while Louis’s appear added on, below the border. It seems certain that this volume and its contents had particular meaning for Anthony. Although Anthony’s collecting seems to have dramatically increased in the years surrounding 1470, there were also a number of significant commissions in the years following that continued to relate to significant events in his life. In the decade of the 1470s, Anthony not only continued to support Charles in his military endeavors, but also became increasingly utilized as a diplomat, being sent to the King of

 Arie Johan Vanderjagt, “Qui sa vertu anoblist: The Concepts of Noblesse and Chose publique in Burgundian Political Thought” (Ph.D. diss., Rijksuniversiteit te Groningen, 1981), 230–34.  I am deeply grateful to Christine Reno for photographing this manuscript in Brussels on my behalf and for drawing my attention to this portion of the text, fols. 44–44v (Vanderjagt, “Qui sa vertu anoblist,” 259–60).  Vanderjagt, “Qui sa vertu anoblist,” 111–12.  Hans-Collas and Schandel, Manuscrits enluminés, 321.  For a reproduction of Louis’s manuscript, see Maximilian Martens, Lodewijk van Gruuthuse: Mecenas en Europees Diplomaat, ca. 1427–1492 (Bruges: Stichting Kunstboek, 1992), 179.

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Figure 5.4: Master of Margaret of York (?), Anthony Receiving the Collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece, from Diego de Valera, Traité de noblesse, ca. 1470. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. II 7057, fol. 1.

England, the Duke of Brittany, the kings of Sicily, Portugal, Aragon, and Naples, and to Venice and the pope. As the crowning achievement of his Italian tour, on May 25, 1475, Pope Sixtus IV legitimized Anthony, according to a contemporary account, having “removed from him all illegitimacy and spuriousness, and legitimized and ennobled him, making him an acceptable nobleman because he was noble in morals, behavior and deeds.”40 Perhaps of equal or even greater importance, the pope

 Richard Vaughan, Charles the Bold: The Last Valois Duke of Burgundy (London: Longmans, 1973), 237.

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further decreed that Anthony would enter the line of succession for the duchy, and would inherit it if Charles’s daughter, Mary of Burgundy, died without children. This must have been a triumph for Anthony and a realization of all his ambitions preceding this moment. Obviously the pope overlooked Anthony’s indiscretions on the marital front and his illegitimate children; Anthony’s accomplishments on the battlefield, in the tournament lists, and on the diplomatic front outweighed any issues in his personal life. Back in Burgundian lands, in 1476, he was made commander of the advance guard and general marshal of the army. This period of his life ended with the death of Duke Charles the Bold and his own capture during the battle of Nancy in 1477. The manuscripts he commissioned during these years underscored the increasing recognition he was gaining in terms of status during the period, mostly focused on battles, leadership, and the life of a nobleman, and filled with references to his personal ownership. His emblems all have a military flair: the flaming barbican of protection, the thorns that sometimes surround his arms, the motto that stresses his invincibility, and even the fierce lion supporters that bravely guard his arms. The arms themselves served as a constant reminder of his noble heritage, while the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece was an honor only given to the most worthy—in Anthony’s case, breaking the rules of its own statutes against inducting illegitimate sons as an exception that proves the rule. One manuscript of the period may provide insight into Anthony’s frame of mind is his copy of the Chroniques de Pise (no. 26), dated to around 1475. This Italian history was originally written between 1467 and 1477 and dedicated to Charles the Bold, and had a limited diffusion with only six copies spread among the Burgundian nobility.41 The iconographic program of Louis de Gruuthuse’s copy (Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 2797) is similar to Anthony’s manuscript. The frontispieces both concern a meeting of the Roman senators who are banishing a group of evil-doers to an island (Figures 5.5 and 5.6). In Louis’s frontispiece, the leader of the senators sits on a throne surrounded by his courtiers. He wears a distinctive piece of headgear, with a sort of wimple made of ermine attached to a regal ermine-trimmed hat. Louis’s arms appear in the bottom border, but no other marks of ownership appear on the page. Anthony’s version is much the same iconographically, but numerous changes were made to the leading senator. The man now wears a typical contemporary surcoat and the distinctive headgear has been replaced by a tall hat resembling one that Anthony is seen wearing in portraits. He also wears a gold collar with a hanging pendant evocative of the Golden Fleece. This figure then, is likely intended as a portrait of Anthony. Even the lion-like dog added near his feet might be seen as a stand-in for the lion supporters that usually

 See Hans-Collas and Schandel, Manuscrits enluminés, 197–99.

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Figure 5.5: Master of the Chronique d’Angleterre, The Roman Senators Meet to Banish Evil-Doers to an Island, from Chroniques de Pise, ca. 1470–1480. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 2797, fol. 9.

Figure 5.6: Master of the Chroniques de Pise, The Roman Senators Meet to Banish Evil-Doers to an Island, from Chroniques de Pise, ca. 1475. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 9041, fol. 5v.

appear to either side of his arms. No fewer than six barbicans decorate the borders, and at the center of the bottom border, the collar that usually surrounds his arms is now found circling his helm. It would make sense that Anthony would celebrate his legitimacy by commissioning a manuscript of the history of the region that witnessed his coup, especially with the inclusion of Anthony himself and the insistent marks of his ownership in the frontispiece. Given the tentative dating of the manuscript to about 1475, it would correspond with the date of his legitimization by the pope. The last stage of Anthony’s life stretches from the time of his capture at Nancy in 1477 to his death in 1504.42 In this period, Anthony did not stop collecting

 McKendrick (in Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 255, 256 n. 10) had noted the overpainting of Anthony’s arms on two folios now in Oxford (no. 27), and Hanno Wijsman suggested that Anthony’s capture at the Battle of Nancy meant that he was never able to complete the commission (Wijsman, Luxury Bound, 273), another possible link between events in Anthony’s life and the manuscripts that reflect it.

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manuscripts, but his desire for manuscripts seems to have dropped off in its intensity, and there was a shift in his interests and commissions (nos. 28–34) largely based on his newfound allegiance to France. Instead of ransoming Anthony in 1477, Louis XI made a play for his loyalty as part of a plan to incorporate Burgundian territories by acquiring the fidelity of Burgundian nobles.43 The king showered Anthony with lands and offices, and granted him the Order of Saint Michael (the French king’s version of the Golden Fleece). After Mary of Burgundy, Charles’s widow, married Archduke Maximilian of Austria in 1477, Anthony swore fealty to Louis XI on August 15, 1478.44 The French came to rely on Anthony’s diplomatic skills much as the Burgundians had done. In 1482 he helped with diplomatic negotiations regarding the betrothal of the two-year-old Margaret of Austria to the dauphin of France, Charles, and in 1484 he returned to the Burgundian Netherlands to mediate between the Flemish regency council and Maximilian of Austria.45 On January 1, 1485, Anthony was legitimized again by Charles VIII and subsequently took his place among the princes of the blood. The three historical works acquired by Anthony during his French residency can be seen as a continuation of the many similar manuscripts he had patronized while in Burgundy. Two of them, Guillaume de Nangis’s Chroniques des rois de France and the Miroir historiale abrégé de France (nos. 33 and 34), clearly reflect his newly-established loyalties, and are the only two historical texts in French not found in the collection of Louis de Gruuthuse. The third historical work from this period, the Commentaires de César (no. 32), was painted by the workshop of Jean Fouquet, an artist who also worked for the kings of France. As in Burgundy, Anthony ensured his place at court partly by patronizing the texts and artists that could help him curry favor with the ruler. In the frontispiece, the King of France is enthroned and Anthony stands nearby in the collar of the Order of Saint Michael (Figure 5.7). The man kneeling before the king to present the book is identified in the incipit as Robert, general minister of the Order of the Holy Trinity, an order specifically dedicated to the ransom and redemption of hostages. Anthony himself had just been spared ransom as a hostage by declaring his loyalty to the French king. In the border, the collar of the Golden Fleece that had been found around Anthony’s arms has been replaced by the collar of the Order of Saint Michael. This emphasis on the honor of the Order of Saint Michael came at a cost. His desertion to the French side was viewed dimly by many on the Burgundian side. The

 Commies, “Nul ne s’y frotte,” 64.  José Clement, “Antoine de Bourgogne, dit le Grand Bâtard,” in Publication du Centre européen d’études bourguignonnes 30 (1990): 178.  Albéric de Crombrugghe, “Antoine dit le Grand Bâtard,” in Biographie nationale (Brussels: H. Thiry-Van Buggenhoudt, 1868), 842.

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Figure 5.7: Follower of Jean Fouquet, Presentation Scene with Anthony of Burgundy, from Julius Caesar, Commentaires de César, after 1485. Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Ms. Pluteo 62 Cod. 8, fol. 1.

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other Burgundian nobles who were captured at Nancy and awarded the Order of Saint Michael were expelled from the Order of the Golden Fleece, but perhaps in recognition of his importance, a decision about Anthony was always put off. Anthony continually told the Order of the Golden Fleece that he would return the Order of Saint Michael, but never did. His equivocation meant he could continue to enjoy the benefits of power and connections with both France and Burgundy, while also keeping the lands bestowed by both leaders.46 The other manuscripts Anthony acquired in his years in France have a moral or religious focus—something that was largely lacking in the manuscripts from the earlier part of his life (nos. 28–31). This period includes the only evidence of Anthony’s patronage of books centered on personal prayer. Two beautiful, though damaged, miniatures by Jean Bourdichon may have come from a book of hours or were intended as an independent diptych (no. 31).47 The arms were overpainted, but Anthony’s motto can still be found in the border. Another complete book of hours survives (no. 30). A number of its folios contain some combination of his emblems in the borders, particularly on folios with miniatures associated with the Virgin Mary. One other miniature of note accompanies the Office of the Dead (Figure 5.8). It depicts the corpse-like figure of Death draped in a burial shroud thrusting an arrow menacingly towards a falconing nobleman who shies away, likely also a depiction of Anthony.48 In the bottom border, his motto appears along with the barbican. It may be that Anthony was turning his thoughts towards the approach of old age, making an interest in personal salvation quite natural. In May 1504, Anthony died at Tournehem in the Pas-de-Calais. Anthony of Burgundy’s event-filled life capitalized on his family connections, martial prowess, and natural diplomatic skills, and we can look to his manuscripts not just as a reflection of his biography, but as key objects that helped him further his ambitions. There is no doubt that Anthony loved lavish manuscripts. He relied on many of his personal qualities—battle strategy, flair for diplomacy,

 Commies, “Nul ne s’y frotte,” 69–72. Unfortunately, only after this article was in proof did I find that Hanno Wijsman published on Anthony’s collecting habits after 1477 and was unable to incorporate his complementary conclusions into my text (Hanno Wijsman, “Dètecter les oppositions politiques dans les bibliothèques. Contenu et style des manuscripts,” in Contestations, subversions et altérités aux XIVe-XVIe siècles, ed. Alain Marchandisse et al. [Turnout: Brepols, Centre europèen bourguignonnes, 2020], 167–170).  Nicholas Herman, “Jean Bourdichon (1457–1521): Tradition, Transition, Renewal” (Ph.D. diss., New York University, 2014), 162–65.  I have argued elsewhere that Anthony might have also envisioned himself confronting death in no. 22, discussed in Elizabeth Morrison, “The Light at the End of the Tunnel: Manuscript Illumination and the Concept of Death,” in The Ivory Mirror: The Art of Mortality in Renaissance Europe, ed. Stephen Perkinson (Brunswick, ME: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 2017), 97–99.

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Figure 5.8: Follower of Jean Colombe, from the Hours of Anthony of Burgundy, ca. 1480. Private Collection (Christie’s, London, May 25, 2016, lot 20), fol. 163.

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and tournament prowess—to build his reputation and ensure his success. There is no doubt that his impressive library was another such tool that he both enjoyed and utilized to his advantage. With a father and brother so well-versed in the book arts, sharing such an interest must have forwarded their joint sense of family unity and comradery. At heart, Anthony’s identity revolved around his status as a member of the ducal family. After all, the only older manuscript to which he added the collar of the Order of Saint Michael after his defection to France was the copy of the Épître d’Othea illuminated around 1460 with a portrait of Philip the Good, Anthony, and his two brothers that was considered at the beginning of this article (no. 2, Figure 5.1).49 This evidence of family nostalgia in the final period of Anthony’s life serves as an example of the value of a biographical approach to his collection. By looking at both the texts and the illuminations that Anthony commissioned at various points, we can discern how individual manuscripts may have played a role in supporting or forwarding whatever particular objective was developing at that stage in his life. The motto that appears so frequently in Anthony’s manuscripts was in the end providential, for in terms of a library’s ability to match its owner’s ambitions, “None touches it.”

Appendix Manuscripts commissioned or owned by Anthony of Burgundy:50 1. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. II 2296: Enguerrand de Monstrelet, Chronique, vol. 1, ca. 1460, 1 miniature; ex-libris [XV] 2. Cologny (Geneva), Foundation Martin Bodmer, Cod. Bodmer 49: Christine de Pizan, L’Épître d’Othéa, ca. 1460, 100 miniatures; arms (with added collar of Order of Saint Michael), ex-libris [XLI] 3. Dülmen, Fam. Croÿ, Ms. 50: Roman de Gillion de Trazegnies, 1463, 30 miniatures; dedicatory prologue, arms, ex-libris [V]

 Anthony also had the Order of Saint Michael collar added to a copy of Boethius’s Consolation de la philosophie (no. 29), but this was an early fifteenth-century manuscript that he was gifted or acquired much later, with no personal ties like the family portrait in no. 2.  Based primarily on the work of Van den Bergen-Pantens (“Héraldique et bibliophile”), with her numbers in brackets following each entry (except for her no. XVII, which is a disputed receipt for a horse, and not included here). I have added the number of illuminations based on various catalogues, facsimiles, and online resources. In the below entries, the notation “collar” refers to the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece unless otherwise noted.

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4. Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 5126: La maniere de la fondation et augmentation de l’eglise Nostre Dame en Boullongne, ca. 1460–1470, 6 miniatures; arms impaled with those of his wife, ex-libris [XXII] 5. Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 5192: Giovanni Boccaccio, Des cas des nobles hommes et femmes, ca. 1460–1470, 178 miniatures; arms, device, motto, ex-libris [XXIII] 6. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. 9571–72: Guido della Colonne, Histoire de Troie, ca. 1460–1470, 1 quadripartite miniature; arms, device, motto, ex-libris [XIII] 7. Turin, Archivio di Stato, Ms. J B II 15: Christine de Pizan, Faits d’armes et de chevalerie, ca. 1460–1475, 2 miniatures; ex-libris [XXXV] 8. The Hague, Museum Meermanno, Ms. 10 A 21: Aegidius de Roya, Compendium historiae universalis, ca. 1464–1470, 13 miniatures; added arms (with collar), device, motto, ex-libris [XL] 9. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. 10213–14: Jacques de Guise, Les Chroniques de Hainaut, ca. 1465, unilluminated; ex-libris [XIV] 10. Turin, Biblioteca nazionale universitaria, Ms. L I 6 (vol. 1, ca. 1420); Turin, Archivio di Stato, Ms. B III 12 J (vol. 2): Saint Augustine, La Cité de Dieu, ca. 1466–1470, 12 miniatures; arms, device, motto, ex-libris [XXXIII] [XXXIV] 11. Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Ms. Palatina lat. 1995: Jacques Legrand, Livre des bonnes meurs, 1467, 5 miniatures; ex-libris [XLII] 12. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. 9055: Benvenuto da Imola, Romuléon, 1468, 81 miniatures; arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [X] 13. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Preuβischer Kulturbesitz, Breslau 1: Jean Froissart, Chroniques, 1468–1469, 224 miniatures; dedicatory prologue, arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [I] 14. Copenhagen, Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Ms. Thott 540 20: Quintus Curtius Rufus, Histoire d’Alexandre, ca. 1469, 9 miniatures; arms (with crest), device, motto, ex-libris [XVIII] 15. Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, s.n. 2616: Ordonnance touchant la conduit du premier escuier descuerie de Monseigneur le Duc de Bourgogne, 1469, 1 miniature; motto [IX] 16. Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Kupferstichkabinett, 15348, 15349 (2 detached leaves); Paris, Musée du Louvre, Cabinet des dessins, RF 1698 (detached leaf);

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Turin, Biblioteca nazionale universitaria, Mss. L II 4 and L II 5 (parent manuscripts): Jean Bouteiller, Somme rurale, 1469–1470, 3 miniatures; dedicatory prologue, arms (with collar), device, motto, ex-libris [III] [XXVI] [XXXVII] 17. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Preuβischer Kulturbesitz, Breslau 2: Valerius Maximus, Faits et dits memorables, ca. 1470, 90 miniatures; arms, ex-libris [II] 18. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. II 7057: Diego de Valera, Traité de noblesse, ca. 1470, 1 miniature; arms (with collar and crest), ex-libris [XVI] 19. Pommersfelden, Graf von Schönborn-Wiesentheidsche Schlossbibliothek, Ms. 310: Faits des romains, ca. 1470, 23 miniatures and 1 historiated initial; arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [VII] 20. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Ms. Gall. 28: Doctrinal du disciple de sapience (and others), ca. 1470, 3 miniatures; arms, ex-libris [VI] 21. Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 5064: Petrus de Crescentiis, Profits ruraux des champs, ca. 1470, 14 miniatures; arms (with collar and crest), motto [XXI] 22. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Smith-Lesouëf Ms. 73: Jacques Legrand, Livre des bonnes meurs and Dits moraux des philosophes, ca. 1470, 25 miniatures; arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [XXVIII]51 23. Turin, Biblioteca nazionale universitaria,, Ms. L I 1: Bible historiale, vol. 2, ca. 1470–1475, 57 miniatures(?); arms [XXXVI] 24. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. 9297–9302: Saint Augustine, Traités mystiques; Doctrinal du disciple de sapience (and others), ca. 1470–1480, 2 miniatures; arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [XII] 25. London, British Library, Harley Ms. 2967: Missal, ca. 1475, 9 miniatures, 1 historiated initial; arms (with crest and collar), device, motto, [XXIX] 26. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 9041: Chroniques de Pise, ca. 1475 (ca. 1460–1470?), 9 miniatures; arms (with collar and crest), device, motto, ex-libris [XXIV] 27. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud. Misc. 653 (10 detached leaves from vol. 2); The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, Ms. 133 A 7 (vols. 2, 3, and 5); Baltimore,

 Wijsman (Luxury Bound, 273 n. 81) gives the location of this manuscript that van den BergenPantens had identified as location unknown.

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Walters Art Gallery, Ms. W.201 (vol. 4): Jean de Wavrin, Les Chroniques d’Angleterre, ca. 1475–1480, 28 miniatures; arms (overpainted)52 28. Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 2001: Guillaume Durand, Rational de divins offices, ca. 1477–1500, 14 miniatures; arms (with collar of Order of Saint Michael), device, motto, ex-libris [XIX] 29. New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, Ms. M.332: Boethius, Consolation de la philosophie, early fifteenth century, 1 miniature and 5 historiated initials; acquired 1478 or after; arms (with crest and collar of the Order of Saint Michael), device, motto, ex-libris [XXVII]53 30. Private Collection (Christie’s, London, May 25, 2016, lot 20): Hours of Anthony of Burgundy, ca. 1480, 19 miniatures and 29 historiated initials; arms, device, motto [XXX] 31. Private Collection (Sotheby’s, London, December 6, 1983, lot 25): 2 detached leaves from a book of hours, ca. 1484–1487, 2 miniatures; motto54 32. Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Ms. Pluteo 62 Cod. 8 (parent manuscript); Paris, Musée Marmatton, Wildenstein Collection, no. 156 (detached leaf): Julius Caesar, Commentaires de César, after 1485, 8 miniatures; arms (with crest and collar of Order of Saint Michael), device [XXXII] [XXVIa] 33. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 17267: Guillaume de Nangis, Chroniques des rois de France, ca. 1400, 1 miniature, acquired after 1486; arms (with crest), ex-libris [XXV] 34. Private Collection (Christie’s, London, May 25, 2016, lot 21): Noël Fribois(?), Miroir historiale abrégé de France, ca. 1490, 5 miniatures and 3 dozen historiated initials; arms (with crest), motto [XXXI] Manuscripts acquired by Anthony of Burgundy at an uncertain date: 35. Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 2680: Brunetto Latini, Recueil, fourteenth century, unilluminated; device, motto, ex-libris [XX]

 Unknown to van den Bergen-Pantens. McKendrick (Illuminating the Renaissance, 256 n. 10, 280 n. 4) realized that ten loose illuminated folios in Oxford were once part of the manuscript at The Hague, which formed an incomplete manuscript set including the Baltimore volume.  Wijsman (Luxury Bound, 273 n. 81) gives the location of this manuscript that van den BergenPantens had identified as location unknown.  Unknown to van den Bergen-Pantens. Herman (“Jean Bourdichon [1457–1521]”), 162–65.

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36. Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek, Ms. Oc.49: L’Apocalipse de mon seigneur s. Jehan, ca. 1300–1350, 70 miniatures; ex-libris [IV] 37. Melbourne, Victoria National Gallery, Ms. Felton 411/4: Tite-Live, Histoires romaines, ca. 1400, 39 miniatures; ex-libris [VIII] 38. Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Ms. 9093: Bartholomaeus Anglicus, Livre des propriétés des choses, ca. 1410–1430, 23 miniatures; ex-libris [XI] 39. The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, Ms. 76 E 7: Bible moralisée, ca. 1455–1460, circle of Jacquemart Pilavaine, 45 miniatures; added arms (with collar), device, motto, ex-libris [XXXIX] 40. Turin, Biblioteca nazionale universitaria, Ms. L II 13: Miroir des vices, ca. 1450–1500, 1 miniature; arms, device [XXXVIII]

Bibliography As-Vijvers, Anne Margreet, and Anne Korteweg, eds. Splendours of the Burgundian Netherlands: Southern Netherlandish Illuminated Manuscripts in Dutch Collections. Zwolle: WBOOKS, 2018. Bergé, Marcel. “Les Bâtards de la maison de Bourgogne et leurs descendance.” L’Intermédiaire de Génealogistes 60 (1955): 316–408. Boinet, Amédée. “Un bibliophile du XVe siècle.” Bibliothèque de l’École des chartes 67 (1906): 255–69. Bousmanne, Bernard, and Thierry Delcourt, eds. Miniatures flamandes, 1404–1482. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2011. Bousmanne, Bernard, and Elena Savini, eds. The Library of the Dukes of Burgundy. London/Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2020. Breckenridge, Martha. “Christine de Pizan’s Livre d’Epitre d’Othéa à Hector at the Intersection of Image and Text.” Ph.D. diss., University of Kansas, 2008. Campbell, Lorne. “Antoine, the ‘Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,’ and His Portrait by Rogier van der Weyden.” In Cambridge and the Study of Netherlandish Art, edited by Meredith McNeill Hale, 46–67. Turnhout: Brepols, 2016. Caron, Marie-Thérèse. Les Voeux de Faisan noblesse en fête, esprit de Croisade: Le manuscrit français 11594 de la Bibliothèque nationale de France. Turnhout: Brepols, 2003. Carrier, Hubert. “Si vera est fama: Le retentissement de la bataille d’Othée dans la culture historique au XVe siècle.” Revue historique 303 (July/September 2001): 639–70. Clement, José. “Antoine de Bourgogne, dit le Grand Bâtard.” Publication du Centre européen d’études bourguignonnes 30 (1990): 165–82. Commies, Aly. “Nul ne s’y frotte: Een biografische schets van Anton, Bastaard de Bougondië.” In Excursiones mediaevales: Opstellen aangeboden aan Prof. A.G. Jongkees, 59–76. Groningen: H.G. Schulte Nordholt, 1979. De Crombrugghe, Albéric. “Antoine dit le Grand Bâtard.” In Biographie nationale, 838–42. Brussels: H. Thiry-Van Buggenhoudt, 1868. Foundation Martin Bodmer: http://dx.doi.org/10.5076/e-codices-cb-0049.

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Hans-Collas, Ilona, and Pascal Schandel. Manuscrits enluminés des anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux: Manuscrits de Louis de Bruges. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2009. Herman, Nicholas. “Jean Bourdichon (1457–1521): Tradition, Transition, Renewal.” Ph.D. diss., New York University, 2014. Hofrichter, Frima Fox. “An Intimate Look at Baroque Women Artists: Birth, Babies, and Biography.” In Framing the Family: Narrative and Representations in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods, edited by Rosalyn Voaden and Diane Wolfthal, 139–58. Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2005. Kren, Thomas, and Scot McKendrick, eds. Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Trust, 2003. Lemaire, Claudine. “The Burgundy Library.” In Art from the Court of Burgundy, 1364–1419, edited by Stephen Fliegel, Sophie Jugie, et al., 100–102. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2004. Martens, Maximilian. Lodewijk van Gruuthuse: Mecenas en Europees Diplomaat, ca. 1427–1492. Bruges: Stichting Kunstboek, 1992. Morrison, Elizabeth. “The Light at the End of the Tunnel: Manuscript Illumination and the Concept of Death.” In The Ivory Mirror: The Art of Mortality in Renaissance Europe, edited by Stephen Perkinson, 82–105. Brunswick, ME: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 2017. Morrison, Elizabeth, and Zrinka Stahuljak. The Adventures of Gillion de Trazegnies: Chivalry and Romance in the Medieval East. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Trust, 2015. Planché, James Robinson. “Portrait of Anthony of Burgundy.” Archaeologia 27 (1838): 424–33. Strøm-Olsen, Rolf. “Political Narrative and Symbolism in the Feast of the Pheasant (1454).” Viator 46, no. 3 (2015): 317–42. Van den Bergen-Pantens, Christiane. “Antoine, Grand Bâtarde de Bourgogne, bibliophile.” In L’ordre de la Toison d’or, de Philippe le Bon à Philippe le Beau (1430–1505): Ideal ou reflet d’une société?, edited by Pierre Cockshaw and Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens, 198–200. Turnhout: Brepols, 1996. Van den Bergen-Pantens, Christiane. “Héraldique et bibliophile: Le cas d’Antoine, Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne (1421–1504).” In Miscellanea Martin Wittek: Album de codicologie et de paléographie offert a Martin Wittek, edited by Anny Raman and Eugène Manning, 323–53. Louvain: Peeters, 1993. Vanderjagt, Arie Johan. “Qui sa vertu anoblist: The Concepts of Noblesse and Chose publique in Burgundian Political Thought.” Ph.D. diss., Rijksuniversiteit te Groningen, 1981. Vaughan, Richard. Charles the Bold: The Last Valois Duke of Burgundy. London: Longmans, 1973. Vaughan, Richard. Philip the Good: The Apogee of Burgundy. London: Longmans, 1970. Vincent, Stéphanie. Le roman de Gillion de Trazegnies. Turnhout: Brepols, 2010. Walford, Weston S. “Examples of Medieval Seals.” The Archaeological Journal 15 (1858): 346–51. Wijsman, Hanno. Luxury Bound: Illustrated Manuscript Production and Noble and Princely Book Ownership in the Burgundian Netherlands. Turnhout: Brepols, 2010. Zenker, Nina. Der Breslauer Froissart: Im Spiegel spätmittelalterlicher Geschichtsauffassung. Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2018.

Stefan Krause

Chapter 6 The Ceremonial Armor for the Young Emperor Charles V in Vienna: The German Empire, Burgundy, and a Failed Plan for a Habsburg-Tudor Alliance On March 12, 1512 the Raitkammer, the imperial accounting office at Innsbruck, wrote to Emperor Maximilian I (1459–1519) to inform him that it had finally, after some delay, received the “doublet and hose [Joppen und Hosen] of Duke Charles” and had immediately sent them to Konrad Seusenhofer, the leading armorer at the court armory in Innsbruck. The latter, they promised, would start work right away on the ordered armor for the young duke, using the sent clothes to gauge the size of the then twelve-year-old prince, the future Emperor Charles V (1500–1558)—“as desired by His Majesty,” as they put it.1 Today, the armor in question—the ceremonial armor for Archduke Charles produced in 1512–1513 (Figure 6.1)—is housed in Vienna.2 It represents a high point of early sixteenth-century armorer’s art in central Europe, and although the armor has repeatedly been the subject of scholarly research,3 no one has ever examined

 Quoted in David Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten aus dem K. K. Statthalterei-Archiv in Innsbruck,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses 2 (1884): LVII, cat. 1064.  Inv. no. A 109, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, Vienna; see Bruno Thomas and Ortwin Gamber, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien. Waffensammlung. Katalog der Leibrüstkammer, I. Teil: Der Zeitraum von 500 bis 1530 (Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Verlag Anton Schroll & Co., 1976), 216–17; Pierre Terjanian, ed., The Last Knight: The Art, Armor, and Ambition of Maximilian I, exh. cat. (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press; Verona: Trifolio, 2019), 172–75, cat. 82.  See Bruno Thomas, “Konrad Seusenhofer: Studien zu seinen Spätwerken zwischen 1511 und 1517,” Konsthistorisk Tidskrift 18 (1949): 39–42; Bruno Thomas, Gesammelte Schriften zur Historischen Waffenkunde, 2 vols. (Graz: Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt, 1977), 545–48; Claude Blair, “The Silvered Armour of Henry VIII in the Tower of London,” Archaeologia 99 (1965): 8–15. Acknowledgement I would like to thank Tobias Capwell, Donald La Rocca, Samuel Mareen, Stuart W. Pyhrr, Katja Schmitz von Ledebur, Pierre Terjanian, Alan Williams, and Robert Woosnam Savage; and Agnes Stillfried for translating the essay from German. Translation: Agnes Stillfried https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-007

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Figure 6.1: Konrad Seusenhofer, Ceremonial Armor of Archduke Charles, Innsbruck, 1512–1513. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. A 109. © KHM-Museumsverband.

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the central question of the reason or occasion for which it was commissioned. Why did Emperor Maximilian I order this exceptional armor—remarkable in form, shape, and decoration—for his young grandson Charles? This essay examines this question, arguing that the armor was commissioned in 1512–1513 in connection with the intensifying negotiations concerning the planned marriage of Charles and Mary Tudor (1496–1533), the sister of Henry VIII, King of England, and that it was designed to play a seminal role in this important, though ultimately abandoned, political-dynastic alliance—a pact that would have united the Habsburgs and the Tudors, the Holy Roman Empire and England, with Burgundy playing a pivotal role. The essay discusses the historical and diplomatic context in which the armor was commissioned, analyzes the extant sources on its production, and examines its exceptional form and decoration in detail.

The Armor of Archduke Charles and the Plans for a Habsburg-Tudor Alliance It seems there are no extant sources that unequivocally record where and when the young Archduke Charles (later Emperor Charles V) actually wore the armor made for him at Innsbruck in 1512–1513. But a wealth of surviving information on the life of the young Habsburg prince, Maximilian’s diplomacy, and the political situation in Europe in the early sixteenth century in general suggest that looking at other indicators will help us unravel the history of this remarkable armor. Four uncontested facts are important in this context: first, the armor can be dated with exceptional precision (Konrad Seusenhofer completed it in the spring/ summer of 1513); second, the armor was commissioned for a boy—the patron—that is, the Emperor—can only have intended it to be worn by his grandson (who would quickly outgrow it) during a narrow “window of opportunity”;4 third, the armor was designed for a festive court event—as evidenced by its form and shape, clearly inspired by textile models, which would make it unsuitable for tournament and war; and, fourth, when Maximilian ordered the armor from his court armory in Innsbruck, he also commissioned identical armor for Henry VIII, as a companion piece to Charles’s, so that the two formed a pair, clearly indicating a connection between this commission and the Emperor’s ties across the Channel. All this suggests that the armor produced for Archduke Charles in 1512/13 was commissioned in response to the ongoing, intensifying negotiations to arrange a

 See Terjanian, The Last Knight, 250–51.

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political-dynastic alliance between the Habsburgs and the Tudors, with the proposed marriage of state between Charles, Emperor Maximilian’s grandson and heir apparent, and Mary Tudor, Henry’s younger sister, functioning as its pivot or link. We may confidently assume that the Emperor envisaged his grandson sporting this magnificent armor either during the festivities planned to celebrate these nuptials or those commemorating the signing of the precontract. Such an Austrian-English alliance was first mooted in early 1506 when England was still ruled by Henry VII (1457–1509), the father and predecessor of Henry VIII; also involved in the negotiations was Philipp I of Castile (1478–1506), Charles’s father who died not long afterwards. The following years saw declarations of intent, meetings and resolutions, and in late 1508 the young couple were married per procurationem—that is, a proxy wedding was held in London where the still-minor groom was not physically present but was represented by high-ranking Burgundian envoys led by Jean III de Glymes, Lord of Bergen op Zoom (1452–1532). Mary and Charles exchanged letters, portraits, and presents (rings), and a visit by her to Burgundy was being planned. In 1511 the Emperor, trying to suppress the uprising led by the Duke of Guelders, was grateful when Henry VIII (who had succeeded his father in 1509) sent him a company of English longbowmen as a diplomatic gesture of good will. In the summer/fall of 1513 Henry, with his ally Maximilian at his side, invaded France, and, having spared no expense, won a limited victory. He laid siege to the small border fortress Thérouanne—with the minor Battle of the Spurs celebrated as a glorious triumph—capturing both it and the city of Tournai. At Tournai, and shortly afterwards at Lille, splendid victory celebrations were held in mid-October 1513, during which the date for the planned Habsburg-English wedding was fixed. It was to be performed at Calais (then in English hands) the following year, after Charles’s fourteenth birthday on February 24, 1514 but not later than July 15, 1514. What did those involved—the King of England and, crucial for the history of Charles’s armor, the Emperor—expect from this proposed Habsburg-English alliance? For Henry VII of England, who had first proposed such a pact in 1506, a connection with the House of Habsburg would help buttress his own, still new dynasty and its hold on the English Crown, which he had won in 1485 by defeating the House of York in the Wars of the Roses. He was therefore looking for support against a number of Yorkist pretenders, approval and acceptance by the Emperor, and a new wife for himself (Archduchess Margaret’s name was mooted but she declined).5 His son Henry VIII, his head filled with chivalric ideals and in possession

 See Hermann Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian I.: Das Reich, Österreich und Europa an der Wende zur Neuzeit, vol. 3 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1977), 288–89; Stanley B. Chrimes, Henry VII (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 289–94.

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of a full war chest, wanted to re-start the Hundred Years’ War, England’s fight for the French throne, and bring it to a (for him) victorious conclusion—that is, be crowned King of France. An alliance with the Habsburgs, a pact with the Empire against France, sealed with the marriage of his sister to the Emperor’s heir apparent, seemed like the ideal starting point to realize this plan.6 Maximilian entered the negotiations with very different aims. The Habsburgs were among Europe’s most powerful dynasties, long-established and highly respected, crowned rulers of the German Empire, their political power greatly enhanced by the recent Burgundian inheritance and the prospect of inheriting Spain. The Emperor also mistrusted the Tudors, having admired and loved his deceased stepmother-in-law, Margaret of York (1446–1503). In addition, he had entered into an alliance with France, England’s great enemy, in 1508. At the same time, however, his treasury was empty, depleted by the outbreak of a disastrous war over the supremacy over Northern Italy in 1509, initially directed against a rising, and dangerously expanding, Venice. And the League of Cambrai, the pact with France signed in 1508, was anything but stable; it was instead an alliance of convenience racked by mutual mistrust, only entered into in the hope of countering more effectively the common rival, Venice. In early 1512 Maximilian was faced with a major political and military decision: should he break with France and edge closer to England, among others? Two years earlier, in 1510, the pact that had brought together the imperial-French alliance and Pope Julius II in the Italian Wars, came to an end. Following their temporary victory over Venice, both the French and the Germans were, in the pope’s eyes, simply too powerful and too close for comfort, and he hoped to expel these “barbarians,” as he called them, from Italian soil for good. They responded with a menacing move against the pope, their new rival for power in Northern Italy, that saw the King of France and (with reservations) the Emperor in May 1511 calling for a “council” to be held at Pisa the following fall with but a single great aim: to depose Julius II. Thus, in the second half of 1511, the threat of a new schism loomed large. For the pope, forming an alliance to rescue the Church, a pact against France, was of vital importance, and in October 1511 he signed the Holy League with Spain and Venice to defend the Church; England joined not long afterwards. Plans were made for an invasion and the subsequent division of France; the English campaign of 1513, which ended with the conquest of Thérouanne and Tournai, was born of this plan.

 See John J. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII (London: Sussex Tapes; Wakefield: Educational Productions, 1968; new edition New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997), 21–40.

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At the turn of the year 1511/12, the big question was whether the Emperor too would join the Holy League—a step he took in early 1512. By the end of January 1512 he had informed King Louis XII of France (1462–1515) of his plans to quit the alliance signed in 1508 and instead join Julius II’s new anti-French League.7 Thus, in early 1512 Europe’s power structure underwent a dramatic change. The Emperor’s military focus shifted from Northern Italy, where a shaky peace with Venice now seemed possible, to the Low Countries, where France continued surreptitiously to urge on and support (this was an open secret) the revolt of the Duke of Guelders, thus seriously threatening the Habsburgs’ position in Burgundy. The plans for a dynastic alliance between the Habsburgs and the Tudors, the union of Archduke Charles and Mary Tudor first proposed in 1506, were dusted down, spurred on among other things by Henry’s preparations for a massive attack on France.8 And at this very moment, in February/March 1512—shortly after he had decided to join the Holy League—the Emperor commissioned two harnesses from Konrad Seusenhofer, his court armorer at Innsbruck: one for Henry VIII of England, now lost, and one for his twelve-year-old grandson, Archduke Charles—the ceremonial armor of 1512–1513 in Vienna.

Extant Sources on the Production of the Armor of Archduke Charles The earliest, unequivocal source on the production of the armor of Archduke Charles is the letter mentioned above that was sent by the Raitkammer at Innsbruck on March 12, 1512. It states that the Emperor had informed them a month previously, on February 13, that he would dispatch to Innsbruck the doublet and hose of young Archduke Charles that were to serve as models for the size of his new armor. These pieces of clothing had, however, only arrived “now”—that is, in the middle of March—but had immediately been sent on to Konrad Seusenhofer, who would begin work on the ordered armor without delay.9 Plans for the identical armor for Henry VIII date from the previous summer, at least from June 1511.10 But it seems that Seusenhofer only started work on this

 See Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian I., vol. 4 (1981), 97.  See Steven Gunn, The English People at War in the Age of Henry VIII (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), 5, 18, fig. 2.1; Charles G. Cruickshank, Army Royal: Henry VIII’s Invasion of France in 1513 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969).  See note 1; see also Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVII, cat. 1063.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIII, cat. 1028.

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commission in early 1512, together with Charles’s armor. Archival sources of the Raitkammer at Innsbruck, at least, suggest that we can trace the progress of work on these two harnesses together, as a joint commission, from the spring of 1512 to October 1514. The emphasis was clearly on Charles’s armor, with the Raitkammer stipulating that it “should be completed first.”11 It seems these ideal conditions ensured that the court armory worked flat out on the two armors. The Raitkammer, unusually, settled all bills for wages and materials without delay. In May 1512 the Emperor requested that additional armorers be taken on; all “extraordinariplattner” (additional armorers) should continue to be employed in order to avoid delays. He also ordered the workshop to be sent the required silver and gold, so that he, the Emperor, would not be spoken ill of (“nit zum schimpf gedacht”).12 In July 1512 an (anonymous) goldsmith at Augsburg was commissioned to execute the gilt silver decoration on both armors;13 the etched decoration was produced at Innsbruck.14 There followed additional orders for materials such as tin wire, lead, and copper, and especially more silver and gold, mainly because “the king has a long body” (“derselb kunig [Henry] von leib lang”)15—that is, his (bespoke) armor was exceptionally large. Other sources contain requests for the Raitkammer to assume the costs, and exhortations to the armorers to work faster. In October 1512 and again in May 1513 the sources speak of “finishing” (“vollenden,” “ausbereiten”) the armors. It seems that both were completed by spring/summer 1513, more or less ready for transport, ready to be worn by, respectively, the young Archduke and the King of England.16

 Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVIII, cat. 1075.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVII, cat. 1070.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVIII, cat. 1075.  See the foliage with pomegranates on the helmet, and the narrow decorative borders featuring circular, leaf-shaped, or scaly ornamentation on the arm and leg pieces. This decoration is the work of two, perhaps three separate artists. See the armor of Lang von Wellenburg, inv. no. A 244, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, Vienna; leg armor and the additions to the shoulder pieces of the armor of Emperor Maximilian I, ibid., inv. no. A 110; and the Hungarian targe, ibid., inv. no. A 344; see Thomas and Gamber, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 180–82, 209–10, 214–15.  Quoted in Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVIII, cat. 1075.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LVIII, cat. 1076, 1077, 1078, 1079, 1082, 1085; LIX, cat. 1087, 1096; LXI, cat. 1104. The imperial armory was simultaneously working on two armors for Sir Robert Wingfield, Henry’s ambassador to the imperial court, as well as two armors that Henry had apparently ordered from the imperial armory for himself. Wingfield’s armors were complete in the summer of 1511. Henry’s armors appear to have been delayed, only arriving in England in 1514 together with the Emperor’s costly gift; Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIII, cat. 1028 and LXVII, cat. 1177; Blair, “The Silvered Armour,” 9–10. In addition, Seusenhofer concurrently produced an armor for the Emperor “mit etlichen stucken”—that is, with numerous exchange pieces, probably for both jousting and war; Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIII,

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After this the sources on this joint commission dry up, and only resume in March/April 1514. In the spring of 1514, probably slightly later than originally planned, the armor for Henry VIII was packed and shipped. It seems this armor, presented to Henry sometime in the spring/summer of 1514, was stored at the royal armory at Greenwich but was already lost by the late sixteenth century.17 Its transport from Innsbruck to London in 1514 is recorded in the following extant sources: the order asking Seusenhofer to hand over Henry’s armor; the payment of traveling expenses to Hans Seusenhofer (1470/71–1555),18 Konrad’s brother and assistant charged with journeying to “the Low Countries, perhaps to England” (“in die Niederlande, eventuell nach England”); the traveling documents/pass for the transport boxes; and the approval of the Raitkammer to assume the costs of this trip.19 Finally, there are records of some individual payments to Seusenhofer in the fall of 1514, which for the accountants of the Raitkammer concluded this commission.20 Sadly, the sources remain silent about when (or even if) Archduke Charles actually took delivery of his armor. But in January 1514, Hans Pach, one of the Emperor’s armorers at Innsbruck, received his pay and “delivery money” for what is described as a “hard ride” (“einen schweren ritt”) he had undertaken “the previous year” (“im vergangenen Jahre”—that is, 1513) “to him [the Emperor] from the Tyrol to the Low Countries” (“zu ihm in das Niederland”), where he then waited for the arrival of his imperial master.21 The letter does not tell us what exactly Pach delivered from the Tyrol to the Netherlands in 1513, but it may well have been the armor for Charles and the armor “mit etlichen stucken” for the Emperor mentioned above. A detailed examination of the vizor of Charles’s armor supports this assumption: unlike all the other pieces comprising this armor the vizor was not made by the imperial court armory at Innsbruck. Its etched decoration identifies it as the

cat. 1028. Maximilian’s armor is repeatedly mentioned as in the imperial armory at Innsbruck in 1512, together with the gift-harnesses for Charles and Henry, and it seems to have been completed in early 1513, at the same time as the armor commissioned for Charles; Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIX, cat. 1096 and LVII, cat. 1070; LVIII, cat. 1075, 1076.  Probably lost except for parts of the helmet which are apparently preserved in the so-called “Horned Helmet,” Graeme Rimer, Thom Richardson, and John P. D. Cooper, eds., Henry VIII: Arms and the Man 1509–2009, exh cat., published to mark the exhibition Henry VIII: Dressed to Kill, at the White Tower, London (Leeds: Royal Armouries; London: Historic Royal Palaces, 2009), inv. no. IV.22, 166–67, cat. 19; for more information on the provenance see Blair, “The Silvered Armour,” 15–20.  See Terjanian, The Last Knight, 307.  See Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LXV, cat. 1151; LXVI, cat. 1155, 1159, 1060.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LXVI, cat. 1168; LXVII, cat. 1174, 1177.  Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LXIV, at. 1138.

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work of a contemporary Netherlandish armorer.22 But the vizor is not an arbitrary, later addition. Its forged shape and etched decoration are clearly informed by the helmet belonging to Charles’s armor produced at Innsbruck,23 indicating it dates from more or less the same time and was expressly produced for Charles’s armor, or at least adapted to match it, possibly by an armorer hard-pressed for time (it does not fit perfectly). All this suggests that Charles’s armor was transported from the Tyrol to the Low Countries in 1513 and there presented to the young Archduke. However, we will presumably never know why these changes were made in the Low Countries (perhaps the original vizor produced at Innsbruck was lost or damaged). But there is another important question we should examine in connection with the commissioning of Charles’s ceremonial armor, one that may help shed additional light on the reasons for this costly imperial order. In May 1511, six months before he charged Seusenhofer to produce our ceremonial armor, Maximilian had already placed an order for armor for his grandson with another armorer at Innsbruck, Hans Rabeiler;24 the design for this armor was also by Seusenhofer.25 Rabeiler did in fact begin work on this imperial commission and almost completed it. But in the meantime, in early 1512, the Emperor had commissioned the other armor for his grandson from Seusenhofer, and Rabeiler’s work remained unfinished; miraculously, it too has survived (Figure 6.2).26 We do not know what occasioned this change of plans in early 1512, why work on almost finished armor was stopped, and why the Emperor ordered another, completely new armor. It has been suggested that the project was stopped because Rabeiler worked too slowly, or that outstanding payments led to a delay and ultimately the termination of the contract.27 But Seusenhofer took much

 It differs from the etched decoration produced at Innsbruck that adorns the rest of the armor; see note 15. Instead, it has much in common with the decoration found on works by Netherlandish armorers from ca. 1500–1515; see the sword for boar hunting of King Philipp I of Castile, southern Netherlands, ca. 1495, inv. no. D 9, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, Vienna; see Thomas and Gamber, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 121–22; see also the saddle of Philipp I (?), southern Netherlands, inv. no. F.6, ca. 1500–1510, Real Armeria, Patrimonio Nacional, Madrid; see Terjanian, The Last Knight, 213–14, cat. 124.  The sculpted, knurled comb continues uninterrupted on the vizor. Motif-wise, the bands of etched foliage with pomegranates that frame the central crest are also identical but on the vizor they are much coarser than on the helmet.  See Terjanian, The Last Knight, 306.  See Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIV, cat. 1032.  Inv. no. A 186, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, Vienna; see Thomas and Gamber, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 215–16.  See the summary in Terjanian, The Last Knight, 170–72, cat. 81.

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Figure 6.2: Hans Rabeiler, Unfinished Armor of Archduke Charles. Innsbruck, 1511–1512. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. A 186. © KHM-Museumsverband.

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longer for his armor for Charles, around eighteen months. In addition, the financing of Rabeiler’s armor had been explicitly approved, and Seusenhofer received payments a full year after completing his commission.28 It is conceivable that Rabeiler’s project too was afflicted with two chronic problems of artistic production: a lack of money and time. Or perhaps this substitution reflected the patron’s desire to “upgrade” the proposed armor for his grandson and heir, occasioned by a significant change in the political situation. The Emperor commissioned Rabeiler in the middle of 1511. At that time he was allied with Louis XII of France, though there were some early signs of a rapprochement with the new ruler of England, Henry VIII, which added new luster to the old idea of a Habsburg-Tudor dynastic alliance.29 At the time, the court armory was overflowing with imperial commissions,30 which is why Seusenhofer produced the design for the armor but delegated its execution to another reliable workshop, that run by Hans Rabeiler. But six months later, in early 1512, the political landscape had been dramatically transformed. The Holy League had been concluded, and Maximilian was about to join England in this anti-French pact, making a dynastic alliance with the Tudors seem highly desirable. At that point, it seems, Maximilian changed his plans and shifted the commission of the armor to his court armorer Seusenhofer to produce a much more ambitious ensemble— the sumptuous ceremonial armor now in Vienna.

The Armor Charles’s armor is exceptional by any standard. Although it comprises all the required elements—helmet, gorget, breastplate, and backplate as well as arm- and leg armor—it also includes a skirt. But this flared, uniformly pleated skirt is made not of soft, pliable silk or wool but, like the rest of the armor, of cold, hard steel. In addition, the steel of the arm- and leg armor has been worked in such a way as to imitate elaborately puffed and slashed textiles. The wearer’s thighs seem to be encased in some “slashed fabric” that appears to be so heavy that gravity drags down its weighty folds, creating curved slashes through which we supposedly catch a glimpse of the cloth-of-gold of the tight-fitting hose worn underneath. In the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, armor was never just a form of steel protection worn for war and joust. It often also—or even primarily—functioned as a

 See Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LXVI, cat. 1168; LXVII, cat. 1174.  See Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian I, vol. 4 (1981), 84–89; Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, 27–28.  See Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LIII–LIV, cat. 1028.

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form of display and representation, for instance during formal entries, parades, political or diplomatic meetings, and coronations, and so featured both in the lists and on the battlefield. Its form and decoration therefore also reflect contemporary fashion and taste. But in exceptional armor like that made for Archduke Charles this relationship with textile fashion is much more intimate. In their conscious artistic play with contrasts between the materiality of steel and fabric, they brilliantly imitate fashionable attire in forged steel, integrating it into the structure of the armor. Armorers generally focused on selected individual motifs such as puffy sleeves, poulaines, or button fronts, but here the artist imitated textile fashion in a highly refined and truly remarkable way. Puffs and slashes, like those visible on the arms and legs of Charles’s armor, were ubiquitous in Renaissance fashion, and especially in southern Germany and Austria they proved an extremely popular form of embellishment.31 They were inspired by the extravagant, colorful, and often excessively puffed and slashed clothes sported by the Landsknechts, the period’s renowned mercenaries comprising mainly pike men and foot soldiers from southern Germany.32 It seems that this motif of puffed and slashed thighs in particular played a seminal role in Maximilian’s project of an armor for Archduke Charles, because we find almost identical details on both Seusenhofer’s armor (Figure 6.1) and its predecessor project, Hans Rabeiler’s unfinished armor which had been also designed by Seusenhofer (Figure 6.2). The immediate models were presumably found among the clothes sported by Landsknechts stationed at Innsbruck (Figure 6.3). Even more remarkable is the armor’s steel skirt. Only a handful of these made-to-measure armors inspired by the wide knee-length skirts then worn by fashionable gentlemen have survived, and all are exceptional artistic and technical masterpieces, reserved for important and discerning patrons, and executed by the select band of master-armorers who specialized in luxurious, bespoke harnesses. Most of them—besides Charles’s armor there is one made for the Duke of Liegnitz, formerly in Berlin but now in Moscow,33 and a fragment of one (a skirt)  See inv. no. A 28, The Wallace Collection, London; see James Mann, Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour. Text with Historical Notes and Illustrations, 2 vols. (London: Clowes and Sons, 1962), 26–27.  See Stefan Krause, Fashion in Steel: The Landsknecht Armour of Wilhelm von Rogendorf (Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017), 31–40.  Armor of Frederick II, Duke of Liegnitz (1480–1547), formerly Berlin, Zeughaus, inv. no. PC 215, today inv. no. ГИМ 82001 op. 14631/1–2, 14649/1–4, State Historical Museum, Moscow; see Anna A. Gerasimova, ed., Korolevskie igry [Games of the kings]. Zapadnoevropeiskoe oruzhie i dospekhi pozdnego Renessansa v sobranii Istoricheskovo Muzeja [European arms and armor of Renaissance and Mannerism in the State Historical Museum], exh. cat. (Moscow: State Historical Museum, 2016), 148–51, 348, cat. 42.

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Figure 6.3: Jörg Kölderer, Two Landsknechts, detail from the Zeughausbuch of Emperor Maximilian I, vol. on the Tyrol, Innsbruck, ca. 1512–1517. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, inv. no. KK 5074, fol. 63v. © KHM-Museumsverband.

in New York34—were produced in the imperial armory at Innsbruck (or at least its immediate circle) during the first half of the 1510s, which suggests the imperial court at Innsbruck functioned as a precursor, as a pioneer in developing the armor with pleated skirt. We also know that in 1514/15 Henry VIII commissioned similar armor from his court armory at Greenwich. This armor, the Silvered and Engraved Armor in the Tower of London,35 also features a pleated steel skirt. We may assume it was informed by Maximilian’s costly gift, the (now lost) armor produced in the imperial armory at Innsbruck in 1512–1513 that Henry VIII had received shortly before. We may therefore count it too—at least indirectly—among those conceived or “invented” at Innsbruck. The shape of the pleated skirts of these few extant armors from the 1510s is similar. All are angular, rectangular rather than circular, and all feature curved, semicircular openings on front and back that presumably allowed the wearer to mount his charger and made it easier for him to walk. On the only other extant

 Armored Skirt, inv. no. 14.25.790 a, b, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; see Terjanian, The Last Knight, 248–50, cat. 140.  Rimer, Richardson, and Cooper, Henry VIII, inv. no. II.5, cat. 21, 170–75; see Blair, “The Silvered Armour.”

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Renaissance armor with pleated skirt not yet discussed—that of Duke Albert of Prussia in Vienna36—the skirt-opening can be closed by attaching a metal plate. Does this mean that those produced in the 1510s—including Charles’s armor of 1512–1513—also once comprised such plates? This appears not to be the case: nothing on the skirts of the armors produced in the 1510s suggests they once featured similar plates, and no hooks, pins, or holes line the edges of the semicircular cutouts. It seems these skirts were always conceived as we see them today, with openings both front and back (Figure 6.4).37 However, Archduke Charles’s armor differs in one important respect from the other pleated-skirt armors produced at Innsbruck in the 1510s. The armorer created the illusion that Charles is wearing a very special piece of knightly attire—a surcoat, comprising a skirt and a tight-fitting, waisted jerkin with short, voluminous sleeves (Figure 6.5). Its distinct decoration clearly differentiates this surcoat from the rest of the armor: everything comprising the surcoat—that is, skirt and short-sleeved jerkin but nothing else, is embellished with applications in gilt silver featuring the emblems of the Order of the Golden Fleece:38 Charles, the then still underage fifth Grand Master of the Order, is wearing the (steel) surcoat of a knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece over his harness. A sole comparable armor, a cuirass with steel surcoat, is documented in an illustration in the so-called Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook now in Prague. But this is a much later work, designed around a decade later, in 1520/25, in the workshop of Kolman Helmschmid at Augsburg (Figure 6.6).39

 Inv. no. A 78, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armory, Vienna; see Thomas and Gamber, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 218–19. Albrecht of Prussia’s armor was made much later than the armor produced at Innsbruck (it dates from ca. 1526, not from the early 1510s) and it originated not in southern but in northern Germany, presumably in Brunswick. In addition, its skirt has a different shape, it is not rectangular like the ones from Innsbruck but is instead uniformly circular. We may therefore assume that it belongs to a separate, later north German tradition of harnesses with pleated skirts; see also the armor for infantry on the painting The Battle of Orsha, ca. 1525, prob. ca. 1530, Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie, Warsaw; see Zdzislaw Zygulski, the younger, and Eva Zygulska, “The Battle of Orsha: An Explication of the Arms, Armour, Costumes, Accoutrements and Other Matters for Consideration Portrayed in the Approximately Contemporary Painting of a Battle Fought in Byelorussia in 1514,” in Art, Arms and Armour: An International Anthology, vol. 1, 1979–1980, ed. Robert Held, 108–43 (Chiasso: Acquafresca Editrice, 1979), 137, fig. 52; 141, fig. XIII; for the painting’s date see Dieter Koepplin, Neue Werke von Lukas Cranach und ein altes Bild einer polnischen Schlacht—von Hans Krell? (Basel: Schwabe & Co., 2003), 88.  See also the steel skirt in the Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook; see note 39 and Figure 6.6.  Miniature versions of these applications can also be found on the side wings of the armor’s poleyns.  Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook, vol. 1, fol. n74r, sig. 2-GK 11.572_000b_P66b, Uměleckoprůmyslové museum v Praze, Prague; see Pierre Terjanian, “The Art of the Armorer in Late Medieval and Renaissance Augsburg: The Rediscovery of the Thun Sketchbooks,” Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Museums Wien 13/14 (2011/12): 378–79, fol. n74r/Image 97.

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Figure 6.4: Hans Burgkmair the Elder, Funeral of a Famous Prince, proof copy of Weißkunig, Augsburg, after October 1514. Vienna, Albertina, inv. DG2012/129/ 159 (Cim. II/6, fol. 143r). © Albertina, Vienna.

A surcoat (French: cotte d’armes; German: Waffenrock) is a simply cut textile outer garment that can be traced back to the High Middle Ages; worn over the armor, it was girded at the waist with a belt and provided protection against inclement weather such as rain or too much sun.40 By the late Middle Ages and the early Renaissance surcoats had evolved and were also incorporated into civilian attire; elaborately tailored from exquisite fabrics, they were popular with members of the elite.41 The following episode from 1507 suggests that in Burgundy surcoats at times even assumed a quasi-regal and symbolic function: Philip the Fair’s

 See Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm, vol. 27. Digitized edition in: Wörterbuchnetz of the Trier Center for Digital Humanities, Version 01/21, https://www.woerterbuchnetz. de/DWB, col. 314.  See Jeremias Schemel, Book on Horsemanship and Jousting, inv. no. KK 5247, fols. 66v, 67v, 68v, 72v, Augsburg, ca. 1570, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Imperial Armoury, Vienna; see also the red satin surcoat, inv. no. 20a, Netherlandish, third quarter of the fifteenth century, Historisches Museum, Bern; see Annemarie Stauffer, in Susan Marti, Till-Holger Borchert, and Gabriele Keck, eds., Karl der Kühne (1433–1477): Glanz und Untergang des letzten Herzogs von Burgund, exh. cat., Historisches Museum, Bern; Bruggemuseum and Groeningemuseum, Bruges; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (Brussel: Mercatorfonds, 2009), 272, cat. 85.

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Figure 6.5: Surcoat from the Ceremonial Armor of Archduke Charles (see Figure 6.1). © KHM-Museumsverband.

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Figure 6.6: Steel Surcoat, workshop of Kolman Helmschmid (?), Augsburg, ca. 1520–1525. Prague, Museum of Decorative Arts, Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook, vol. 1, fol. n.74r, sig. 2-GK 11.572_000b_P66b. © Prague, Uměleckoprůmyslové museum v Praze. Illustrated in Thun-Hohenstein sketchbook.

insignia and badges of rank were carried in a funeral procession held for him at Malines on July 18/19, 1507. They included the ceremonial sword, coronated helmets symbolizing Austria and Castile, his crest, the order and collar of the Grand Master of the Order of the Golden Fleece—and his surcoat.42 The cortege wound its way to the Church of St. Rombaut, where the surcoat was duly deposited in the chapelle royale together with the crown and the collar of the order “posees sur la representation du sarcueil,”43 on the empty, symbolic sarcophagus of the king and duke who had died and been buried in Spain (Figure 6.7). Afterwards Philip’s son, the then seven-year-old Charles, was proclaimed the new (though still underage) Duke of Burgundy (Figure 6.8).44

 Quoted in Jean Lemaire de Belges and Anne Schoysman, Chronique de 1507 (Brussels: Académie royale de Belgique, 2001), 117–18, [400].  Quoted in Lemaire de Belges and Schoysman, Chronique de 1507, 122–23, [428].  Lemaire de Belges and Schoysman, Chronique de 1507, 126–27; see also Anna M. Schlegelmilch, Die Jugendjahre Karls V. Lebenswelt und Erziehung des burgundischen Prinzen (Beihefte zum Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 67) (Cologne: Böhlau, 2011), 360–65, esp. 362–63.

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Figure 6.7: Master of the Joseph Sequence, Philip the Fair (1478–1506) as Duke of Burgundy, left panel of the Zierikzee triptych, 1505–1506. Brussels, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, inv. no. 2405. © Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium.

Figure 6.8: Jan van Battel, Detail of the Central Panel of the Triptych Depicting Charles V as King of Spain, 1517–1518. Mechelen, Museum Hof van Busleyden, inv. no. S0010. © Museum Hof van Busleyden.

An armor with a gilt steel surcoat decorated with the emblems of the Order of the Golden Fleece and worn by the young Archduke Charles—a steel GoldenFleece-surcoat for the Grand Master of the Burgundian order of chivalry—must have been more than a mere fashion statement. It was clearly commissioned for a special event that demanded exceptional royal symbolism. As noted elsewhere, even though there are no sources that tell us where and when Charles wore his armor of 1512–1513, it is clear that its splendor would befit festivities to celebrate the signing of a dynastic alliance. In 1514–1515 Maximilian commissioned two more child-sized armors from Konrad Seusenhofer. Those, as a March 1515 statement of costs compiled by the imperial

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armory informs us, were to be produced “nach Massgabe,” after the model of the recently finished harnesses for Charles and Henry.45 Their intended recipients were Archduke Ferdinand (1503–1564), Charles’s younger brother, then aged eleven, who would eventually succeed him as Emperor Ferdinand I, and the then eight-year-old King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia (1506–1526). This commission also occurred— and we may assume this is no coincidence—during a period of intense preliminary negotiations for another of the Emperor’s dynastic alliances (this one did in fact materialize), the First Congress of Vienna—the signing of a mutual-succession and marriage treaty between the Habsburgs and the Jagiellonians, the rulers of Austria and of Hungary and Bohemia. Concluded in the summer of 1515 and marked by lavish festivities, it formed the foundation of the Habsburgs’ subsequent centuries-long domination of central Europe. In the course of these celebrations young Prince Louis of Hungary and Bohemia was betrothed to Archduchess Mary, the sister of Charles and Ferdinand, and Louis’s sister Anna was betrothed to a to-be-determined Habsburg prince—that is, she would marry either Charles or Ferdinand; in the end it was the latter who in 1521 walked down the aisle.46 Charles’s armor of 1512–1513, like those commissioned for Ferdinand and Louis in 1514–1515, was conceived as a bridegroom’s armor or wedding armor, produced at a time when preparations for an alliance between the Habsburgs and England, for the marriage of Charles and Mary Tudor, were still in full flow. But did Charles actually wear this armor? What came of the negotiations for an alliance between the Habsburgs and the Tudors and for the marriage of Archduke Charles and Mary Tudor? Before the treaty could have been signed and the marriage could actually have taken place, the tide began to turn. Intrigues woven by opponents of this alliance, foremost among them from Spain, started to gain traction. France and the pope, until then bitter enemies in the North-Italian theater of war, signed a peace agreement. Henry’s French campaign of 1513 had depleted the English treasury. And, last but not least, the Emperor grew increasingly annoyed by gossip linking Charles Brandon (ca. 1484–1545), later the Duke of Suffolk, with his own daughter, Margaret of Savoy (1480–1530), the regent of the Netherlands. In the end, the Habsburg-English alliance was abandoned, and on October 15, 1514, Mary Tudor wed not the young Archduke Charles but Louis XII, the aged King of France, the very ruler against whom the proposed imperial-English alliance had been directed—a perfect example of the diplomatic moves and counter-moves

 See Schönherr, “Urkunden und Regesten,” LXIX, at. 1190; see also LXVII, cat. 1169, 1173.  See Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian I., vol. 4 (1981), 181–204.

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typical of the complex power structure of Renaissance Europe. Though engaged from 1506 through 1514, Charles and Mary never met during these eight years.47 Charles’s and Mary’s wedding planned for the summer of 1514 never took place. But an equally important, highly political public event that, unlike the nuptials, was in fact held were the lavish festivities that accompanied the signing of the precontracts in October 1513 at Tournai and Lille—which Charles attended as the highest-ranking Habsburg participant. The festivities at Tournai and Lille lasted from October 11 through 17, 1513 and comprised jousts, banquets, dances, Masses, and accolades,48 marking the apex of the rapprochement between the Habsburgs and England. Henry VIII was intoxicated by his successful invasion of France, believing it to be a glorious first step on the road to winning the French Crown. For Maximilian, the French campaign offered much-needed relief for his efforts to see off French meddling in Burgundian politics; in addition, and not without sentimentality, he could also look back to the beginning of his military career, to his brilliant victory over Louis XI of France in the Battle of Thérouanne and nearby Guinegate, won in August 1479 at this very spot. The razing of the walls of the border fortress Thérouanne following Henry’s victory in 1513 meant Maximilian had achieved one of his foremost goals, the weakening of French power and influence along his borders, and by the end of September, shortly after the storming of Tournai and even before the celebrations mentioned above had commenced, he had already left the camp to return to the Empire—an early sign of his coming change of heart regarding the English alliance.49 Archduke Charles, however, left Malines, where he then resided, and traveled to Tournai50 to attend the festivities commemorating the Habsburg-English victory and alliance, formally and triumphantly entering the city on October 10 as the leading Habsburg representative, as a bridegroom, as the guarantor of the future of this vaunted alliance. “The Prince of Castile, a boy of great promise, was received into

 See Mary Anne E. Green, Lives of Princesses of England, from the Norman Conquest, vol. 5 (London: H. Colburn, 1854), 3–33; Wiesflecker, Kaiser Maximilian I, vol. 3 (1977), 288–96 and vol. 4 (1981), 96–153; Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, 50–56; Schlegelmilch, Die Jugendjahre Karls V. Lebenswelt, 144–51.  See Manuel de Foronda y Aguilera, Estancias y viajes del emperador Carlos V, desde el día de su nacimiento hasta el de su muerte: Comprobados y corroborados con documentos originales, relaciones auténticas, manuscritos de su época y otras obras existentes en los archivos y bibliothecas públicos y particulares de España y del extranjero (Madrid: Suc. de Rivadeneyra, 1914), 52–53.  See Victor von Kraus, Itinerarium Maximiliani I. 1508–1518. Mit einleitenden Bemerkungen über das Kanzleiwesen Maximilians I (Vienna: Gerold, 1899), 67.  See Foronda y Aguilera, Estancias y viajes, 51–52.

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the city with great pomp,” recorded an eye witness, John Taylor, Clerk of the English Parliament.51 A “statelic inghecomen,” a festive entry, is what the Excellente Chronijcke van Vlaenderen (Antwerp 1531) called Charles’s first visit to Tournai.52 Unfortunately no other details about this royal entry into the city on October 10, 1513 have come down to us. However, I venture to suggest that this important celebration would have been an ideal event for Charles to show off his new bridegroom armor, Konrad Seusenhofer’s masterly Golden-Fleece-surcoat armor of 1512–1513. Archduke Charles’s armor of 1512–1513 is next listed in the Hapsburg inventories only a century later, in the early seventeenth century: in 1621 it entered Ambras Castle near Innsbruck as a gift from Archduke Charles (1590–1624), PrinceBishop of Wroclav, from the estate of Maximilian III (1558–1618), the younger son of Emperor Maximilian II (1527–1576), and brother of Emperor Rudolf II (1552–1612).53 Maximillian III may previously have stored it in the armory of his palace at Innsbruck.54 The armor remained at Ambras until the early nineteenth century, when, in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars, it was removed to Vienna for safety together with the remainder of the Ambras Collection; in the 1880s it was finally deposited in the Imperial Armory of the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna. This armor commission highlights the international connections of Burgundian politics, arts, and culture. The marriage of Maximilian I and Mary of Burgundy in 1477 not only tied Austria and Burgundy closely together with far-reaching political and social consequences, but also spurred on an intensified cultural and artistic exchange. Burgundian influence on Maximilian’s court endured, with Netherlandish artists traveling to southern Germany to work for Maximilian and, as in the present case, with the commissioning of the ceremonial (steel) clothing from a Habsburg workshop in Innsbruck for a highly notable political event in the Netherlands. Archduke Charles’s magnificent armor of 1512–1513 is a high point of the armorer’s art in the early Renaissance in southern Germany and Austria, but it is also, we

 “Henry VIII: October 1513, 22–20,” in Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, vol. 1, 1509–1514, ed. J. S. Brewer (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1920), 1055–1075. British History Online, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol1/pp1055-1075.  Dits die Excellente Chronijcke van Vlaenderen, Antwerp 1531, ch. 74 (fol. CCCr) (Hague: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 2015), https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_dit004dits01_01/_dit004dits01_01_0502.php.  See Alfred Auer, ed., “Das Inventarium der Ambraser Sammlungen aus dem Jahr 1621. I. Teil: Die Rüstkammern,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien 80 (1984): XLVII, cat. 138.  The armor cannot be identified with certainty in the inventory of the estate of Maximilian III. The archducal armory “up in the tower” of Innsbruck Castle housed, for example, “a white armor with etched and gilt lines” (“ein weisse Rüstung mit geötzt vnd vergulten Strichen”), quoted in Beda Dudik, “Des Hoch- und Deutschmeisters Erzherzog’s Maximilian I. Testament und Verlassenschaft vom Jahre 1619,” Archiv für Kunde österreichischer Geschichts-Quellen 33 (1865): 305.

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may presume, a monument to an important, though in the end abandoned, political project from circa 1513–1514—a dynastic alliance between the House of Habsburg and the Tudors.

Bibliography Auer, Alfred, ed. “Das Inventarium der Ambraser Sammlungen aus dem Jahr 1621. I. Teil: Die Rüstkammern.” In Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien 80 (1984): I–CXVIII. Blair, Claude. “The Silvered Armour of Henry VIII in the Tower of London.” Archaeologia 99 (1965): 1–56. Chrimes, Stanley B. Henry VII. London: E. Methuen, 1972; new edition New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999. Cruickshank, Charles G. Army Royal: Henry VIII’s Invasion of France in 1513. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969. Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm. 16 vols. in 32 books. Leipzig, 1854–1961. List of references Leipzig 1971. Digitized edition in: Wörterbuchnetz of the Trier Center for Digital Humanities, Version 01/21, https://www.woerterbuchnetz.de/DWB. Dits die Excellente Chronijcke van Vlaenderen, Antwerp 1531. Ch. 74 (fol. CCCr). The Hague: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 2015. https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_dit004dits01_01/_dit004dits01_01_0502.php. Dudik, Beda. “Des Hoch- und Deutschmeisters Erzherzog’s Maximilian I. Testament und Verlassenschaft vom Jahre 1619.” Archiv für Kunde österreichischer Geschichts-Quellen 33 (1865): 233–352. Foronda y Aguilera, Manuel de. Estancias y viajes del emperador Carlos V, desde el día de su nacimiento hasta el de su muerte: Comprobados y corroborados con documentos originales, relaciones auténticas, manuscritos de su época y otras obras existentes en los archivos y bibliothecas públicos y particulares de España y del extranjero. Madrid: Suc. de Rivadeneyra, 1914. Gerasimova, Anna A., ed. Korolevskie igry [Games of the kings]. Zapadnoevropeiskoe oruzhie i dospekhi pozdnego Renessansa v sobranii Istoricheskovo Muzeja [European arms and armor of Renaissance and Mannerism in the State Historical Museum], exh. cat. Moscow: State Historical Museum, 2016. Green, Mary Anne E. Lives of Princesses of England, from the Norman Conquest. 6 vols. London: H. Colburn, 1850–1855; reprint: London, 1857. Gunn, Steven. The English People at War in the Age of Henry VIII. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. “Henry VIII: October 1513, 22–20.” In Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII. Vol. 1, 1509–1514, edited by J. S. Brewer, 1055–1075. London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1920. British History Online. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol1/pp1055-1075. Koepplin, Dieter Neue Werke von Lukas Cranach und ein altes Bild einer polnischen Schlacht – von Hans Krell? Basel: Schwabe & Co., 2003. Kraus, Victor von. Itinerarium Maximiliani I. 1508–1518. Mit einleitenden Bemerkungen über das Kanzleiwesen Maximilians I. Vienna: Gerold, 1899. Krause, Stefan. Fashion in Steel: The Landsknecht Armour of Wilhelm von Rogendorf. Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017. Lemaire de Belges, Jean, and Anne Schoysman. Chronique de 1507. Brussels: Académie royale de Belgique, 2001.

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Mann, James. Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour. Text with Historical Notes and Illustrations. 2 vols. London: Clowes and Sons, 1962. Marti, Susan, Till-Holger Borchert, and Gabriele Keck, eds. Karl der Kühne (1433–1477): Glanz und Untergang des letzten Herzogs von Burgund, exh cat., Historisches Museum, Bern; Bruggemuseum and Groeningemuseum, Bruges; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Brussel: Mercatorfonds, 2009. Rimer, Graeme, Thom Richardson, and John P. D. Cooper, eds. Henry VIII: Arms and the Man 1509–2009, exh. cat. published to mark the exhibition Henry VIII: Dressed to Kill, at the White Tower, London. Leeds: Royal Armouries; London: Historic Royal Palaces, 2009. Scarisbrick, John J. Henry VIII. London: Sussex Tapes; Wakefield: Educational Productions, 1968; new edition New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997. Schlegelmilch, Anna M. Die Jugendjahre Karls V. Lebenswelt und Erziehung des burgundischen Prinzen. Beihefte zum Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 67. Cologne: Böhlau, 2011. Schönherr, David. “Urkunden und Regesten aus dem K. K. Statthalterei-Archiv in Innsbruck.” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses 2 (1884): I–CLXXII. Terjanian, Pierre. “The Art of the Armorer in Late Medieval and Renaissance Augsburg: The Rediscovery of the Thun Sketchbooks.” Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Museums Wien, 13/14 (2011/12): 299–395. Terjanian, Pierre, ed. The Last Knight: The Art, Armor, and Ambition of Maximilian I, exh. cat. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press; Verona: Trifolio, 2019. Thomas, Bruno. Gesammelte Schriften zur Historischen Waffenkunde. 2 vols. Graz: Akademische Drucku. Verlagsanstalt, 1977. Thomas, Bruno. “Konrad Seusenhofer: Studien zu seinen Spätwerken zwischen 1511 und 1517.” Konsthistorisk Tidskrift 18 (1949): 37–70. Thomas, Bruno, and Ortwin Gamber. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien. Waffensammlung. Katalog der Leibrüstkammer, I. Teil: Der Zeitraum von 500 bis 1530. Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Verlag Anton Schroll & Co., 1976. Wiesflecker, Hermann. Kaiser Maximilian I.: Das Reich, Österreich und Europa an der Wende zur Neuzeit. 5 vols. Munich: Oldenbourg, 1971–1986. Zygulski, Zdzislaw, the younger, and Eva Zygulska. “The Battle of Orsha: An Explication of the Arms, Armour, Costumes, Accoutrements and Other Matters for Consideration Portrayed in the Approximately Contemporary Painting of a Battle Fought in Byelorussia in 1514.” In Art, Arms and Armour: An International Anthology, vol. 1, 1979–1980, edited by Robert Held, 108–43. Chiasso: Acquafresca Editrice, 1979.

Part III: Curating Cleveland: Acquisitions / Display

Donald J. La Rocca

Chapter 7 The Völs-Colonna Armor for Man and Horse in the Cleveland Museum of Art and Its Matching Shield in the Metropolitan Museum of Art The Völs-Colonna armor for man and horse has been a well-known centerpiece of the arms and armor galleries at the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) since 1960 (Figure 7.1).1 Made in Milan ca. 1570–1580, this impressive ensemble takes its name from the identification of the coat-of-arms that is incorporated into the decoration of its principal elements. Despite its rarity and importance, however, the armor has yet to be published in any detail. As an initial step towards addressing this situation, the main goals of this essay are twofold: to review the amor’s unusually well-documented provenance and the light it sheds on collecting and cataloguing practices; and then to examine the composition of the armor itself and what the understanding of that aspect suggests about the original purpose of the armor and its subsequent uses. First, however, it is useful to briefly review how the armor came to be associated with the Völs-Colonna family. The heraldry on the armor was identified in the nineteenth century as the arms of Marcantonio Colonna. The attribution to Völs-Colonna seems to have first appeared in print in 1930.2 It is likely that this attribution originated in discussions between Anita Reinhard, Assistant Curator in the Department of Arms and Armor at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MMA), who was well versed in heraldry, and R. T. Nichol, a heraldry specialist who

 I am extremely grateful to my colleague Stuart W. Pyhrr for his many helpful suggestions and comments throughout the preparation of this article. Mr. Pyhrr, Pierre Terjanian, and Marina Viallon kindly reviewed my translations of the French manuscript documents cited below. Nevertheless, any remaining faults or omissions are entirely my own.  Bashford Dean and Stephen Grancsay, Handbook of Arms and Armor: European and Oriental (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1930), 142, 148, and 315. A related coat of arms, somewhat different from that on the armor but also identified as Völs-Colonna, is present on a fifteenthcentury crossbow in the Wallace Collection, no. A1032. About the arms on the crossbow, James Mann comments, “Like other Tyrolese families, including Trapp of Churburg, they [the Völs family] adopted as an augmentation the arms of Colonna of Rome without being related by blood.” See James Gow Mann, Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour, vol. 2, Arms (London: W. Clowes and Sons, 1962), 478. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-008

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Figure 7.1: Armor for Man and Horse with Völs-Colonna Arms, Milan, ca. 1570–1580, steel, gold, copper alloy, leather, textile. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, The John L. Severance Fund, 1964.88.

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frequently advised the department on this subject. Their ideas are recorded in the series of letters exchanged between May and June of 1930 (preserved in the departmental archives), in which several possible identifications were considered, with Völs-Colonna being among the last mentioned. In 1964, Dr. Helmut Nickel, then an Assistant Curator and later the Department Head, identified the arms as belonging to the Tyrolean families Eppan von Eppburg or Khuen von Khuenburg. In 1997, several years after his retirement, Dr. Nickel discussed these attributions with Jonathan Kline, then Research Assistant, Department of Medieval Art at the CMA, who had suggested that “this particular quartering of arms may represent the marriage, in 1574, of Karl von Völs-Colonna (d. 1585) and Dorothea von Thun zu Eppan.”3 This echoes a suggestion made more than sixty year earlier by R. T. Nichol that the arms indicate “one who had married an Eppan v. Eppburg.”4 The armor was purchased from the MMA in 1964 by the CMA after being on display as a loan in Cleveland for four years (Figure 7.2). It had been donated to the MMA in 1913 as part of a large gift from the private collection of William Henry Riggs (1845–1923), an American resident of Paris and one of the foremost arms and armor collectors of the period.5 While owned by Riggs, the armor was displayed in Paris to international audiences in at least three celebrated venues. During the exhibitions held in conjunction with the Paris Exposition Universelle (World’s Fair) of 1879 it was the centerpiece of salle XIII, a gallery in the Palais du Trocadéro devoted to the Riggs collection.6 The armor was again featured prominently, along with many other Riggs pieces, in the context of the Exposition

 Letters between Nickel and Kline dated September 8 and 14, 1997 and Kline’s file memo dated July 22, 1997, copies in the object files, Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Eppan von Eppburg or Khuen von Khuenburg attribution in a 1964 letter from Randolph Bullock (then curator in charge of Arms and Armor at the Metropolitan Museum of Art) to the Cleveland Museum of Art was, in fact, supplied by Nickel (Nickel to Kline, September 14, 1997).  Nichol to Reinhard, May 29, 1930.  The armor was formerly MMA accession number 14.25.708a-p. Regarding Riggs and his place in the context of the great arms and armor collectors of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, see Donald J. La Rocca, “Kienbusch Centennial: Carl Otto Kretzschmar von Kienbusch and the Collecting of Arms and Armor in America,” Philadelphia Museum of Art Bulletin 81, no. 345 (Winter 1985): 5–7, with further references, and fig. 3 in that article for a portrait photo of Riggs seated in front of the Völs-Colonna horse armor in his Paris home ca. 1912. The Riggs photo is also shown on p. 16 in Stephen Fliegel’s very useful overview of the CMA’s collection, Arms and Armor: The Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998).  As recorded in Philibert Breban, L’ exposition historique du Trocadéro (Paris: E. Denu, 1878), 76.

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Figure 7.2: Völs-Colonna Armor for Man, as photographed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art prior to 1960.

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Militaire de 1889, part of the Paris World’s Fair of 1889 (Figure 7.3) and again during the World’s Fair held in Paris in 1900.7

Figure 7.3: The Völs-Colonna Armor as it was displayed during the Exposition Militaire, part of the Exposition Universelle (World’s Fair), held in Paris in 1889. Photo: courtesy Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In a leather-bound manuscript catalogue of his collection, possibly written in about 1865, Riggs described the armor in the following way: 201. Magnificent field and parade armor for man and horse of Grand Duke Marcantonio Colonna, Duke of Palliano and Tagliacozzo and Grand Constable of the Kingdom of Naples

 I am indebted to Dirk Breiding and Stuart Pyhrr for bringing the 1889 photograph to my attention. Stuart Pyhrr further pointed out that an engraving of the photograph was published in E. Monod, L’Exposition universelle de 1889: Grand ouvrage illustré historique, encyclopédique, descriptif, vol. 2 (Paris: Libraire de la Société des gens de lettres, 1890), 73. For the inclusion of the armor in the 1900 World’s Fair, see E. Orville, Notice sur les armes et armures anciennes figurant a l’Exposition Rétrospective Militaire, Group XVIII: Armées de terre et de mer, Exposition Universelle International de 1900 (Paris, 1900), 23.

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in the sixteenth century. Born in 1535. The armor is engraved with individual longitudinal bands on a polished ground. They bear the coat of arms of the Colonna family surrounded by floral arabesques and cartouches with Roman emperors. The helmet has a neck defense of horizontal lames and a moveable visor; the man’s armor, in addition to being comprised of all original pieces, has its [matching] shield (Rondache No. 125). The horse armor comprises one piece for the haunches, with its [rideau-de-guerre], one piece for the chest, two side pieces, which are moveable, an armored saddle fitted with old textile in the Colonna colors, a spiked shaffron and its crinet piece, a throat guard of articulated lames, a bridle and an armored bridle guard. All of the elements are engraved and embellished in the same style, and in a perfect state of preservation. This remarkable object remained for nearly 150 years in a kind of armory of the city hall in Bolzano, in Tyrol, and was acquired from there personally by Prince Pierre Soltykoff in 1832, who had gone far out of his way in order to see it (Collection Soltykoff).8

Member of a renowned Russian noble family with extensive art collections, Prince Pierre Soltykoff [Petr Saltykov] (1804–1889) sold the Völs-Colonna armor, as part of a group of pieces, directly to Riggs in 1860, one year before selling the remaining majority of his arms and armor, 331 items, to Emperor Napoleon III (1808–1873).9  Riggs papers, archival correspondence files, Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 201. Magnifique armure de parade et de guerre d’homme et de cheval du Grand Duc Marc Antoine de Colonna, duc de Palliano et Tagliacozzo et Grand Connétable du royaume de Naples au 16e- siècle. Né en 1535. L’armure est gravée blanche à bandes longitudinales unies. Elles porte partout les armes de la famille Colonna entourées d’arabesques de fleurs et de cartouches d’empereurs romains. Le heaume est à gorgerin à bandes et à visière mobile, et l’armure d’homme outre toutes ses pièces originales a son bouclier (Rondache No. 125.) L’armure de cheval est composée d’une pièce de derrière, avec son rideau-de-guerre, d’une pièce de poitrine, de deux plaques de côtés, mobiles, d’une selle d’armes avec son ancienne garniture aux couleurs de Colonna, d’un chanfrien à pointe avec sa pièce de crinière, d’un garde cou à bandes articulées, d’une bride à main et d’une grande bride d’armes à plaques. Le tout est en acier gravé et orné de la même manière et d’une conservation parfaite. Cette pièce remarquable est restée près de 150 ans dans une espèce de salle d’armes de l’hôtel de ville à Botzen en Tyrol et était enlevée de là par le Prince Pierre Soltykoff en personne en 1832 qui est allé loin de sa route pour la voir. (Collection Soltykoff).  On the significance of Soltykoff as a collector see Christine Brennan, “The Importance of Provenance in Nineteenth-Century Paris and Beyond: Prince Pierre Soltykoff’s Famed Collection of Medieval Art,” in Collecting and Provenance: A Multidisciplinary Approach, ed. Jane Milosch and Nick Pearce (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019), 141–60. I am very grateful to Stuart Pyhrr for bringing this key reference to my attention and to Christine Brennan for providing a copy of it. For Soltykoff’s sale of his collection to the emperor see Mann, Wallace Collection, vol. 1, xviii. Riggs’s purchase of the Völs-Colonna armor from Soltykoff is documented by an original receipt dated October 26, 1860, for 5000 French francs, in the Riggs papers in the Department of Arms and Armor. Prior to this, in 1854, other items of arms and armor from the Soltykoff collection were sold at auction in Paris, several of which were acquired, either directly or subsequently, by Riggs: Anonymous and Prince Peter Soltykoff, Catalogue d’une nombreuse collection d’armes et

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Apparently stemming from an error by Riggs and otherwise unsupported, the provenance of the Völs-Colonna armor also included the famous collection of Ambras Castle near Innsbruck. The information is found in a later handwritten manuscript catalogue of the Riggs collection in the Department of Arms and Armor archives (comprising 142 numbered loose folio pages and compiled sometime prior to 1889, most likely in preparation for the Exposition Militaire). In this manuscript Riggs ends the entry for the armor by saying that prior to being in the City Hall of Bolzano, where it was found by Prince Soltykoff, the armor once had been part of the Ambras Collection (“Elle a été trouvée par le prince Saltikoff à l’hôtel de Ville de Botzen en Tyrol, et a fait jadis partie de la Collection de Ambras”). The “Heroes Armory” of Ambras Castle was formed by Archduke Ferdinand of Tyrol in the late sixteenth century, housed in purpose-built galleries, and was the subject of an extensive and well-illustrated bilingual (Latin-German) catalogue commissioned by Ferdinand and compiled by his secretary, Jakob Schrenck von Notzing, which is arguably the first museum catalogue of the early modern era. The catalogue, published in 1601 and 1603, is profusely illustrated with detailed woodcuts of famous individuals and their armors; the majority of those armors being identifiable in museum collections today. Uncharacteristically generic, however, is the armor in the woodcut of “Marcus Antonius Colonna,” of which there is no further trace in this otherwise very well documented collection, and nothing to indicate that this and the Bolzano-Soltykoff-Riggs armor are one and the same.10 The matching shield (Figure 7.4), referred to by Riggs as “Rondache no. 125” in his collection, was described by him in the same manuscript catalogue: 125. Magnificent Italian rondache of the 16th century, very richly engraved with acid etching on a black ground, embellished with charming designs intertwined by arabesques. It

armures européennes des XVe et XVIe siècles, Bonnefons de Lavaille, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, April 18–22, 1854, e.g., lots 263, 266, 268, and 563. A focused study of Soltykoff as an arms and armor collector remains to be written.  The purported Ambras provenance was published in 1890 by Monod (L’Exposition universelle de 1889, 78), following almost verbatim the Riggs manuscript catalogue. For the Colonna entry in Schrenck von Notzing see Bruno Thomas, Jacob Schrenck von Notzing, Die Heldenrüstkammer (Armamentarium Heroicum), Erzherzog Ferdinands II. auf Shloß Ambras bei Innsbruck: Faksimiledruck der latienischen und der deutschen Ausgabe des Kupferstich-Bildinventars von 1601 bzw. 1603 (Osnabrück: Biblio Verlag, 1981), 50; and on the significance of the Ambras catalogue in general see Pierre Terjanian, The Last Knight: The Art, Armor, and Ambition of Maximilian I (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2019), 276–77. Shortly after the Riggs gift to the MMA, the Ambras provenance for the armor was cited by Bashford Dean in his article, “Mr. Riggs as a Collector of Armor,” Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art 9, no. 3 (March 1914): 72.

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belongs to the armor for man and horse of Grand Duke Marcantonio Colonna and likewise bears his arms (Prince Soltykoff).11

Figure 7.4: Shield from the Völs-Colonna Garniture, Milan, ca. 1570–1580, steel, copper alloy, leather, horsehair (?), textile. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of William H. Riggs, inv. no. 14.25.768. Photo: Stephen Bluto.

 Riggs papers, archival correspondence files, Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 125. Magnifique rondache italienne du 16e- siècle très richement gravée à l’eau forte sur fond noir, ornée de jolies vignettes entrelacées en arabesques. Elle appartient à l’armure d’homme et de cheval du Grand Duc Marcus Antonius Colonna et comme elle porte ses armes. (Prince S. L. 135). In the later manuscript catalogue, mentioned above, Riggs cites the shield in his entry for the armor for man and horse by describing it as completing the armor and being decorated with the same heraldic designs (“Cette importante armure historique est complétée par sa rondache blasonnée”).

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When the armor for man and horse was lent and then sold by the MMA to Cleveland, its circular steel shield, for whatever reason, stayed in New York, where it remains today. The existence of the shield, called a rotella or brocchiere in Italian, and made for use on foot with infantry armor (corsaletto da piede), indicates that the Völs-Colonna armor for man and horse was originally not just cavalry armor but, rather, comprised a small garniture—that is, armor including a certain number of interchangeable elements that would enable it to be configured for various uses, and in this case for heavy cavalry and infantry, and possibly for light cavalry.12 As infantry armor, in addition to the shield, it would have included an open-faced helmet of the cabasset type (zuccotto aguzzo), worn with a cuirass (the breastplate of which would not have a lance-rest), along with arm defenses, and possibly leg defenses to the knees. The nature of the Cleveland armor as a garniture is confirmed not only by the shield but also by the fact that its breastplate lacks a lance-rest, indicating that either there was a separate reinforcing piece fitted with a lance-rest and worn over the existing breastplate, or that the extant breastplate is actually a second breastplate for the garniture, intended for infantry and possibly light cavalry use (Figure 7.5). Heavy cavalry armor of this type and this period would have been equipped with a lance-rest in one of these ways. It should be pointed out that it is not unusual for armor to have missing pieces or parts that are mixed up. In general, after armor became obsolete, many individual elements were lost, destroyed, or repurposed in various ways, and the remaining pieces were sometimes improperly combined or reassembled in later generations. In the case of the Völs-Colonna armor, it has been suggested that it was bequeathed to the city of Bolzano and worn periodically by a local patrician who performed the role of St. George slaying the dragon, a high point of an immensely popular and elaborate Corpus Christi festival that was held annually in Bolzano from the Middle Ages through the late Baroque period.13 The armor’s

 A concise discussion of armor garnitures is found in Lionello G. Boccia, Dizionari terminologici: Armi defensive dal Medioevo all’Età Moderna (Florence: Centro Di, 1982), 20. For a more extensive Italian garniture of the same period see the Dos Aguas armor, acc. no. 27.159.1a–p, Metropolitan Museum of Art, illustrated in Donald J. La Rocca, How to Read European Armor (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2017). For a detailed examination of Italian garnitures of the sixteenth century see Ortwin Gamber, “Der Italienische Harnische im 16. Jahrhundert,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien / Kunsthistorische Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses 54 (1958): 73–120, and for possible configurations relating to the VölsColonna armor in particular see pp. 99–104.  Walter von Walther, “Zur Wiederauffindung des Reiterharnisches des Landeshauptmanns an der Etsch Leonhard Freiherrn von Völs-Colonna,” Der Schlern, no. 32 (1958): 248. For references to Leonhard Völs-Colonna, his family, and their castles in the Bolzano area see Oswald Trapp, et al., Tiroler Burgenbuch, vol. 4 (1984) and vol. 8 (1989), passim.

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repeated use in this festival could explain why some elements of the garniture are missing and also why its remaining pieces, although slightly mixed up, were otherwise refurbished and in excellent condition when acquired by Soltykoff in 1832.14

Figure 7.5: Cuirass of the Völs-Colonna Armor, showing the infantry or light cavalry breast plate, as photographed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art prior to 1960.

While long overlooked, the Völs-Colonna shield should be recognized as an important and well-preserved part of the garniture, being particularly noteworthy for its large areas of crisp decoration featuring some of the clearest representations of both the heraldic insignia and the patterns of ornament that distinguish and define this armor. The main circular field of the shield is divided by the etched decoration into eight segments comprising four wider wedges alternating with four narrower wedges. Each of the wider areas features the Völs-Colonna coat of arms in an oval compartment framed by a cartouche and suspended by a ribbon that runs to the apical spike at the center of the shield (Figure 7.6). Each of the narrower wedges is

 A piece by piece assessment of the authenticity and restoration of the armor can be found in the appendix to this article.

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filled with a dense array of designs, the focal point of which is a classical hero or mythological figure set in a cartouche with a heart or spade motif at the center of the top and bottom of its frame. The figures in the cartouches depict two men on foot, perhaps Hercules and Atlas (Figure 7.7); and two on horseback, apparently loose renderings of Horatio at the Bridge and Marcus Curtius, both legendary Romans often presented as paradigms of heroism and self-sacrifice in the Renaissance. The space near the tip of each narrow wedge has a small arrangement of trophy motifs—also typical of the ornament vocabulary of the period—and the rest is filled with symmetrical displays of foliate scrollwork and mythological figures or animals. The sides of the wedge compartments are bordered by a narrow guilloche pattern with a polished band on either side. This same pattern also encircles the central field overall. The circular border around the perimeter of the shield is filled with a repeating design comprising eighteen profile busts (described by Riggs as Roman emperors, but more likely generic pseudo-classical portraits), each in a rectangular cartouche; the spaces between them are occupied by a design made up of two laterally addorsed heart or spade motifs, which devolve into symmetrical scrolls. The outer rim of the shield has a characteristic turned and roped edge. The

Figure 7.6: Detail of heraldry on the shield (see Figure 7.4). Photo: Stephen Bluto.

Figure 7.7: Detail of the etched decoration on the shield (see Figure 7.4). Photo: Stephen Bluto.

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fine linear quality of the heraldic designs, starkly set on a blank polished steel ground, is emphasized and strongly set off by the lush and florid effect of the pleasingly crowded designs in the narrow wedges. An arm pad, with the remains of a shoulder strap, or guige, is placed horizontally across the center of the back of the shield (Figure 7.8). The side of the pad facing the interior surface has a rectangular iron plate, held to the shield by four screws, the slotted heads of which can be seen on the shield’s exterior. The plate is wrapped in leather and stuffed with what may be horsehair. The plate, pad, and shoulder strap, if genuine and dating from the late sixteenth century, would be rare survivals. However, they may represent restorations or refurbishments, at least in part, if the shield was used, along with the armor, in the annual Corpus Christi festivals in Bolzano.

Figure 7.8: Reverse of the shield (see Figure 7.4), showing the arm pad and strap. Photo: Stephen Bluto.

The long and eventful history of the Völs-Colonna garniture can be followed, at least in outline, from its original purpose as an armor garniture of high quality made for use on horseback and on foot, to its possible later incarnation as the armor of St. George, then a proudly displayed historical memento in the city of Bolzano, a treasured acquisition by two of the foremost connoisseurs of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a featured work in three Parisian World’s Fairs, and finally a distinguished work of the armorer’s art cared for and prominently exhibited for the benefit of all visitors by two great museums from the early twentieth century to the present.

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Appendix Presumably the condition of the Völs-Colonna armor remained largely unchanged, in terms of restorations or material alterations, from the time of its purchase by Soltykoff in 1832 until it was lent to Cleveland in 1960. Sometime prior to 1960, as part of an overall assessment of the collections, the MMA’s Curator of Arms and Armor, Stephen V. Grancsay, and the department’s Armorer, Leonard Heinrich, made a list of what they perceived to be restorations to the armor. It is possible that most, if not all, of the work they list, if identified correctly, could have been done prior to 1832, while the armor was still in Bolzano, rather than when it was owned by Soltykoff from 1832 to 1860 or by Riggs from 1860 to 1913. The Grancsay/Heinrich assessment (Object files, MMA Department of Arms and Armor) is as follows: Suit – 14.25.708 Helmet, original, partly re-etched Colletin, original Breastplate, original, coat of arms re-chiseled and regilded Tassets, original Backplate, original, partly re-etched, coat of arms regilded Shoulders, right original, partly re-etched; left original except upper lame, partly re-etched Arms, original Gauntlets, right, knuckle and two adjoining lames original; cuff, two lames and plate of thumb modern; fingers modern, of different workmanship. Left, two lames of wrist and plate of thumb modern; fingers modern, of different workmanship. Thighs, old, show traces of former etching [i.e., suggesting the thighs are from another, unrelated armor] Greaves, original Sollerets, right, original except three lames near greave. Left, original except third, fourth and fifth lames from toe end. Horse Armor Chanfron 14.25.1648, original except plate between ears and two side wings above eyes Crinet, original, partly re-etched Throat, removed [because it was deemed a modern restoration] and filled with chain mail [cut from MMA mail shirt 31.35.4] Peytral, original Crupper, original, terminal at tail opening associated [i.e., from a different, unrelated armor] Flanchards, original

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Reins, modern Checkreins, modern Saddle, original Bit, original Stirrups, original, with lining [the stirrups, 14.25.708cc and .708dd, were kept by the MMA and replaced with another pair, 14.25.1745a,b]

Bibliography Anonymous, and Prince Peter Soltykoff. Catalogue d’une nombreuse collection d’armes et armures européennes des XVe et XVIe siècles. Hôtel Drouot, Paris, April 18–22, 1854. Boccia, Lionello G. Dizionari terminologici: Armi defensive dal Medioevo all’Età Moderna. Florence: Centro Di, 1982. Breban, Philibert. L’exposition historique du Trocadéro. Paris: E. Denu, 1878. Brennan, Christine. “The Importance of Provenance in Nineteenth-Century Paris and Beyond: Prince Pierre Soltykoff’s Famed Collection of Medieval Art.” In Collecting and Provenance: A Multidisciplinary Approach, edited by Jane Milosch and Nick Pearce, 141–60. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. Dean, Bashford. “Mr. Riggs as a Collector of Armor.” Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art 9, no. 3 (March 1914): 66–74. Dean, Bashford, and Grancsay, Stephen V. Handbook of Arms and Armor: European and Oriental. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1930. Fliegel, Stephen N. Arms and Armor: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998. Gamber, Ortwin. “Der Italienische Harnische im 16. Jahrhundert.” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien / Kunsthistorische Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses 54 (1958): 73–120. La Rocca, Donald J. How to Read European Armor. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2017. La Rocca, Donald J. “Kienbusch Centennial: Carl Otto Kretzschmar von Kienbusch and the Collecting of Arms and Armor in America.” Philadelphia Museum of Art Bulletin 81, no. 345 (Winter 1985): 2–24. Mann, James Gow. Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour. London: Printed for the Trustees by W. Clowes and Sons, and sold at Hertford House, 1962. Monod, E. L’Exposition universelle de 1889: Grand ouvrage illustré historique, encyclopédique, descriptif, Vol. 2. Paris: Libraire de la Société des gens de lettres, 1890. Orville E. Notice sur les armes et armures anciennes figurant a L’Exposition Rétrospective Militaire, Group XVIII: Armées de terre et de mer, Exposition Universelle International de 1900. Paris, 1900. Terjanian, Pierre. The Last Knight: The Art, Armor, and Ambition of Maximilian I. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2019. Thomas, Bruno. Jacob Schrenck von Notzing, Die Heldenrüstkammer (Armamentarium Heroicum), Erzherzog Ferdinands II. auf Shloß Ambras bei Innsbruck: Faksimiledruck der latienischen und der deutschen Ausgabe des Kupferstich-Bildinventars von 1601 bzw. 1603. Osnabrück: Biblio Verlag, 1981. Trapp, Oswald, et al. Tiroler Burgenbuch. Bozen: Verlagsanstalt Athesia; Innsbruck: Tyrolia-Verlag, 1972–2011. Walther, Walter von. “Zur Wiederauffindung des Reiterharnisches des Landeshauptmanns an der Etsch Leonhard Freiherrn von Völs-Colonna.” Der Schlern, no. 32 (1958): 248–52.

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Chapter 8 In and Out of Fashion: Jan Crocq’s Saint John the Baptist and Saint Catherine In 2017, the Cleveland Museum of Art acquired a near life-sized sculpture of Saint John the Baptist attributed to the Netherlandish sculptor Jan Crocq (active 1486–1510). Hewn from a single large block of Tonnerre limestone, the work presents Saint John holding the lamb of God (Figure 8.1). The lamb, its body perched on a closed book in the saint’s left hand, gazes upwards towards the saint’s face, which is both stern and serene. John the Baptist looks forward, the undulating lines of his long beard terminating in tight spirals above his exposed clavicle. As with scores of other Burgundian compositions, the now missing right hand of John the Baptist originally pointed back to the lamb, a reference to the saint’s exclamation from the Gospel of John (John 1:29): “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sin of the world.”1 A stump of broken stone nestled among the whorls of the Baptist’s camel-hair shirt marks the location of the support that once braced his right hand in front of his body. Crocq’s skill with the chisel animates the figure, lending it an imposing presence in the galleries. Building on Cleveland’s great strength in the arts from the courts of Burgundy, especially the material from the Chartreuse de Champmol, this acquisition added an important later medieval object to an already formidable area of the collection. Produced roughly a century after the death of Claus Sluter (ca. 1340s–1406), court sculptor to Philip the Bold, the Baptist testifies to the long legacy of the artist’s approach to the human figure, which he often covered in voluminous drapery that assumes its own expressive character. The saint’s body is almost completely enveloped by his clothing. The Baptist’s left leg presses tightly against his heavy over mantle, creating broken folds that cascade down towards his extended knee. The details of his fur-lined mantle, incised with fine lines along its hem over a swirling camel-hair fleece, showcase the variety of textures the sculptor produced with different chisels and drills. Such features also demonstrate the vitality and longevity of the virtuoso carving traditions associated with the courtly arts of the Burgundian

 See, for example, Saint John the Baptist with the Lamb of God on a Book, the leaf attributed to the Workshop of Master of the First Prayer Book of Maximilian (Flemish, active about 1475–1515) in the Spinola Hours, Ms. Ludwig IX 18 (83.ML.114), fol. 249v, ca. 1510–1520, Belgium, tempera colors, gold, and ink on parchment. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-009

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Figure 8.1: Attributed to Jan Crocq, Saint John the Baptist, ca. 1500, tonnerre limestone, 163 × 59 × 40 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art. Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund, 2017.54.

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territories. The sculpture seems a fitting capstone to a long line of medieval acquisitions made during Stephen N. Fliegel’s tenure at the Cleveland Museum of Art and builds on the legacy of his landmark exhibition Dukes and Angels: Art from the Court of Burgundy (1364–1419), presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art between October 24, 2004 and January 24, 2005.2 In announcing the purchase of John the Baptist, Fliegel connected the sculpture with a similarly-sized statue of Saint Catherine at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a work also published with an attribution to Crocq (Figure 8.2).3 These two saints often appeared together in French royal commissions, and their pairing features prominently on numerous works of art produced by painters, goldsmiths, and sculptors during the later medieval period.4 Given their similar dimensions—Saint John measures 163 cm and Saint Catherine 156 cm—the two might indeed have been commissioned together, perhaps as part of a larger ensemble of holy figures produced for the sculptural program of the Sainte-Chapelle in Dijon, seat of the storied Order of the Golden Fleece. While this possibility will be considered later, it is important to note now that these sculptures share more than an attribution to the same sculptor. Both objects were deaccessioned from their respective museum collections in the last decades of the twentieth century. John the Baptist, which once belonged to the Nelson Atkins Museum in Kansas City, re-entered the market through auction at Sotheby’s, New York on June 1, 1991.5 The Met’s Saint Catherine was deaccessioned in 1981, exactly ten years before the sale of John the Baptist. However, for reasons that are not entirely clear, the sculpture never left the Met for the art market. Instead, the statue was reaccessioned in 1987 and currently stands at the west end of the museum’s Medieval Sculpture Hall. This article considers the rationale for connecting these works to Crocq and explores their historical relationship to each other. Perhaps equally important, their shared history of deaccession also offers selected insights into the criteria and practices surrounding institutional

 For the catalogue that accompanied this exhibition, see Stephen N. Fliegel, Sophie Jugie, and Virginie Barthélémy, Art from the Court of Burgundy: The Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless 1364–1419 (Dijon: Musée des beaux-arts, 2004).  Stephen N. Fliegel, “Medieval Art,” Cleveland Museum of Art Members’ Magazine (March– April 2018): 20. For the figure of Saint Catherine, see William D. Wixom, “Late Medieval Sculpture in the Metropolitan: 1400–1530,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 64, no. 4 (Spring 2007): 43.  See, for example, the stunning gold and enameled reliquary triptych in the Rijksmuseum, which features the two saints on its outer wings (Anonymous, Reliquary in the Form of a Triptych, ca. 1400–1410, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, inv. no. BK-17045), and the figures of Saint John the Baptist and Saint Catherine that accompany the kneeling portraits of Philip the Bold and Margaret of Flanders from the portal at the Chartreuse de Champmol.  Sotheby’s, European Works of Art, Arms and Armor, Tapestries and Furniture (New York: Sotheby’s, 1991), New York, June 1, 1991, lot 18.

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Figure 8.2: Workshop of Jan Crocq, St. Catherine of Alexandria, France (Lorraine), ca. 1475–1525, limestone, 156.2 × 57.2 × 36.2 cm. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Purchase from Rogers Fund, 1907, acc. no. 07.197. © The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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collecting, and the intersections between medieval art, evolving scholarship, and the art market.

Changing Fortunes: Saint John the Baptist The Saint John has a fascinating modern history; among other things, it now has the distinction of having belonged to two American museums. Early records of the work offer a relatively complete picture of the sculpture’s journey from Europe to the United States, indicating that the limestone figure was part of a burgeoning international art market during the years between the First and Second World Wars. One of the biggest players in this transatlantic operation was the Brummer Gallery, which had branches in Paris and New York.6 The New York branch of the Brummer Gallery, which sold widely to American clients, first opened in 1914, when Joseph Brummer (1883–1947), the eldest of three brothers and founder of the business, left Pairs with his younger brother Imre (1889–1928) at the opening of the First World War. Their youngest brother Ernest (1891–1964) remained in Paris, serving in the French army and eventually returning to run the Paris branch of the gallery until the outbreak of the Second World War forced him to flee Europe for New York.7 Although the Brummers sold works of art across a wide range of fields, they quickly established themselves as among the most significant dealers of medieval art in the first half of the twentieth century, a moment when both collectors and museums were seeking medieval objects to add to their growing collections.8 The business records of the Brummer Gallery offer a remarkably detailed picture of how works of art moved between dealers

 For further information on the Brummer Gallery and its involvement with the trade in medieval art, see Caroline Bruzelius with Jill Meredith, The Brummer Collection of Medieval Art (Durham, NC: Duke University Press in association with the Duke University Museum of Art, 1991); and Christine E. Brennan, “The Brummer Gallery and the Market for Medieval Art in Paris and New York, 1906–1949” (Ph.D. diss., Bard Graduate Center, 2019).  Michael Carter, “The Brummer Gallery Records: A Fuller Picture,” October 31, 2018, https:// www.metmuseum.org/blogs/in-circulation/2018/brummer-gallery-records.  For more on the collecting of medieval art in the United States during this period, see Elisabeth Bradford Smith, ed., Medieval Art in America: Patterns of Collecting, 1800–1940 (University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1996); Christina Neilsen, ed., To Inspire and Instruct: A History of Medieval Art in Midwestern Museums (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008); “Gothic Art in America,” ed. Virginia Brilliant, special issue, Journal of the History of Collections 27, no. 3 (2015); and Kathleen Curran, The Invention of the American Art Museum: From Craft to Kulturgeschichte, 1870–1930 (Los Angeles: The Getty Research Institute, 2016), especially 213–27.

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prior to their eventual sale to private and institutional clients, and it is here that we find the earliest documented references to the sculpture of John the Baptist.9 The Brummer Gallery acquired the monumental statue as part of a larger lot that included at least four other works of art. The seller was a dealer named Béla Hein (1883–1931), who had opened a Paris gallery around 1923 specializing in “Haute Epoch” and African art.10 Hein would emerge as one of the most respected dealers and collectors of African art in early twentieth-century Paris, but also regularly collected and sold medieval objects. On August 14, 1928, Joseph Brummer paid 280,000 francs ($10,981) for John the Baptist, a Romanesque capital, a fourteenth-century head of a Virgin, a fifteenth-century English alabaster fragment featuring two saints, and a brass candlestick.11 Given the date of the sale, it seems likely that Joseph purchased these objects as part of a summer buying trip to Europe, a regular part of his business practice before the war. Surviving ship manifests indicate that Joseph traveled to and from Europe at least seventeen times between 1921 and 1939.12 His 1921 passport application indicates that he planned to visit the British Isles, Italy, Spain, Greece, and Switzerland, offering a glimpse of the wide variety of countries he traversed in his quest for appropriate material. Although sometimes the Brummers had specific clients in mind for their purchases, it seems likely that Joseph bought the figure of John the Baptist for stock, knowing that American clients were actively seeking large-scale works of art for their burgeoning collections. During the decades immediately following the First World War, private collectors were creating evocative installations in private residences and recently founded American museums were intensely focused on building collections with encyclopedic aspirations.13  The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired the Brummer Gallery records in 1980 and digitized them with support from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation starting in 2013. They are maintained online by The Cloisters Library and Archives: https://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collec tion/p16028coll9.  For more on Béla Hein, see Bernard de Grunne, Béla Hein: Grand Initié des Ivoires Lega (Paris: Adam Biro, 2001); and Brennan, “The Brummer Gallery,” 139.  Brummer object inventory card number P5109, which is associated with the Romanesque capital carved with a scene of the Last Supper, includes references to the other objects on its verso, where the total sale price for the group is also recorded. The other works of art are identified by their card inventory numbers: P5111, P5112, and P5145. Object Inventory Card No. P5109_verso, August 14, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  For further information on the Brummer Gallery and its involvement with medieval art, see Brennan, “The Brummer Gallery.”  For some of the early approaches to installations of medieval architecture in period installations in American museums between the First and Second World Wars, see Mary Shephard, “In All ‘Its Chaste Beauty’: Cloistered Spaces in Midwestern Art Museums,” in Neilsen, To Inspire and Instruct,

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Following its purchase in mid-August, the sculpture was shipped across the Atlantic by steamer, and is recorded as having arrived at the Brummer Gallery in New York on November 13, 1928.14 The stock card associated with the object included an image and described the sculpture tersely as a “Statue of Saint John in Stone. Life sized.”15 It is interesting to note that the card makes no reference to a specific attribution, date, or provenance, outside of its having been purchased from Hein (Figure 8.3). In contrast, a Romanesque capital acquired as part of the same lot is identified on its card as having come from “the vicinity of Foix (Ariège),” which suggests that provenance information was recorded on these cards when available.16 The same appears to have been the case for attributions. For example, when the Brummers purchased another monumental figure of Saint John the Baptist from the dealer Lucien Demotte on June 7, 1933, they described the statue as a “Life-size statue representing a saint. By Claus Sluter.”17 A similarly monumental figure of Saint James the Greater purchased at the same time from Demotte was listed as “Life-size statue of a saint. By Claus Sluter.”18 The descriptive titles assigned to these works suggest that the Brummers often recorded attributions on their stock cards at the time of purchase. Both of these sculptures were eventually sold to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the first in 1934 and the second in 1947.19 Given these practices, it is striking that the Brummer stock card associated with the Baptist purchased from Hein did not mention an attribution. This would surface later, presumably as Joseph Brummer presented the work to potential clients. In the meantime, the verso of the card, which bears the stamps of several year-end inventories conducted by the gallery, confirms that Saint John remained in the New York gallery for four years. The last inventory stamp is dated

87–98, and Sherry C. M. Lindquist, “A ‘Sympathetic Setting’ for Medieval Art in St. Louis,” in Neilsen, To Inspire and Instruct, 99–116. For the collecting of Burgundian material, see Stephen N. Fliegel, “The Collecting of Valois Burgundian Art in the United States,” in Fliegel, Jugie, and Barthélémy, Art from the Court of Burgundy, 21–23.  Object Inventory Card No. P5733_recto, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  Object Inventory Card No. P5733_recto, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  Object Inventory Card No. P5109_recto, October 16, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  Object Inventory Card No. N3125_recto, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  Object Inventory Card No. N3126_recto, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  Saint John the Baptist, Purchase, Joseph Pulitzer Bequest, 1934 (acc. no. 34.44) and Saint James the Greater, The Cloisters Collection, 1947 (acc. no. 47.101.17).

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December 31, 1932.20 The sculpture would leave New York early in the following year for Kansas City, where plans to open a new art museum were entering their final stages.

Figure 8.3: Brummer Stock Card P5733-recto, Statue of St. John in stone. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Joseph and Ernest Brummer Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives.

The Brummer Gallery sold John the Baptist to the William Rockhill Nelson Trust in the opening months of 1933, when the institution that would eventually become the Nelson Atkins Museum was approaching completion.21 The Kansas City architectural firm of Wight and Wight designed the elegant Beaux-Arts building after the example of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Construction commenced in 1930 on the grounds of Oak Hall, the former home of Kansas City Star publisher William Rockhill Nelson (1841–1915). The new museum, larger than the Cleveland structure that

 Object Inventory Card No. P5733_verso, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.  The museum, referred to initially as the Nelson Art Gallery or simply the Nelson Gallery, was actually two museums, the William Rockhill Nelson Art Gallery and the Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, until 1983, when the institution was formally renamed the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. For the history of the museum, see Kristie C. Wolferman, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A History (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2020).

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served as its source of inspiration, opened its doors on December 11, 1933. Joseph Brummer was among several notable dealers in attendance for the opening celebrations.22 In the run up to that moment, financial resources and curatorial energy were focused on building the museum’s nascent collection, thanks to bequests that provided significant resources for acquisitions. Dealers were aware that works of art, especially those that carried attributions to well-known artists, would appeal to institutions seeking canonical examples of objects from major art historical moments. As the country struggled through the Great Depression, Kansas City pursued its ambitious vision to create an encyclopedic museum that would rival those of other major metropolitan centers. Given this broader context, it is not surprising to discover that the sculpture Joseph originally acquired as “statue of Saint John” was eventually sold as “Claus Sluter.” The connection between the sculpture and the renowned Burgundian court artist surfaces for the first time, at least in the Brummer Gallery Records, as part of the documentation connected with works offered to the William Rockhill Nelson Trust. It appears as the final work in a longer list of objects with itemized prices quoted to the trustees in Kansas City. The sculpture is here identified simply as “Claus Sluter,” with an associated asking price of $6000. The curatorial staff at the time clearly accepted this attribution, and steps to publish the work must have been underway soon after its acquisition. The Baptist was illustrated as part of the handbook created for the museum’s inaugural year.23 The Brummer Archives provide a snapshot of the speed at which acquisitions were being proposed, reviewed, and finalized during the heady foundational years of the Nelson Atkins Museum’s first decade.24 On January 24, 1933, the trustees were considering a list from the Brummer Gallery that included seven works of art for purchase consideration: a monumental Greek lion, a Roman sarcophagus, a “Greco Roman portrait of a man,” a “boy’s head,” a “marriage vase,” a “Nike,” and “Claus Sluter.”25 The total asking price associated with these works of art, minus a 10 percent discount, amounted to $83,250. An additional six works, including a “Persian relief” and “Lifesize Bishop” were offered on April 24, 1933 for a total asking price of $55,600. The range of works then under consideration by the museum’s staff reveals a focus on works of art considered foundational to

 Wolferman, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 119.  Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City: Joseph D. Havens, 1933), 70, illustrated on 72.  For a broader consideration of the development of the collections of the Nelson Atkins Museum during its formative years, see Wolferman, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, especially 71–138.  Object Inventory Card No. N-06_recto, November 13, 1928, the Brummer Gallery Records, The Cloisters Library and Archives, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

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the institution’s European holdings, from antiquities to medieval objects. Whatever negotiations might have followed, the original list was eventually paired down, eliminating several works that were part of the earlier offer. The Brummer stock cards indicate that John the Baptist arrived in Kansas City together with two companions, the colossal figure of an ancient Greek lion (Figure 8.4) and a Roman sarcophagus (Figure 8.5), both of which remain at the Nelson Atkins Museum. The institution purchased these works of art in the opening months of the final year of construction of the Wright and Wright building. The Brummers recorded the sale as having been finalized on January 30, 1933. The museum agreed to purchase John the Baptist and the two antiquities on February 16, 1933 for a total price of $60,000, a reduction from the total of $78,000 quoted individually when the works were first offered in January. The sculpture was published as part of the Department of Decorative Arts in the first handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery, where it was described as “the rugged St. John by Claus Sluter which comes from the Hôtel de Ville of Dijon.”26 The John the Baptist would remain in the collection for roughly six decades, until the decision was made to deaccession the work in 1990.

Figure 8.4: Lion, Greek, 325 BCE, pentelic marble, 113 × 204.5 × 57.8 cm. Kansas City, Missouri, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 33–94.

 Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, 70, illustrated on 72.

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Figure 8.5: Sarcophagus, Roman, 150–180 CE, carrara marble, 54.6 × 215.9 × 59.7 cm. Kansas City, Missouri, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 33–38.

What precipitated the decision to sell the work? The publication records associated with the sculpture offer one indication of the changing scholarly attitudes towards the object. While early handbooks of the museum’s collection describe the figure as having been carved by Sluter, towards the end of the 1940s the attribution had shifted to the more generic “Burgundian School, late fourteenth century.”27 This attribution was maintained through the next decade.28 Even as museum staff revised the early attribution to Sluter, the sculpture’s late fourteenth-century date was maintained. The work remained on view as part of the permanent collection, but there are no records of the sculpture having been included in exhibitions during its tenure at the museum. By the end of the 1950s, the sculpture of John the Baptist had been joined by a more formidable trophy, the brooding image of Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness by Caravaggio (1571–1610). One of the defining works of European art in the collection, this painting was acquired in 1952 from the London-based dealer, Charles Agnew and Sons.29 The monumental figure of John the Baptist now lived in the shadow of Caravaggio’s seminal picture of the young saint, rightly celebrated as one of the few autograph works by Caravaggio in an American collection. It appears that by the later decades of the twentieth century, curators at the Nelson Atkins Museum had grown concerned about the sculpture’s authenticity and took steps to reconsider its dating. The paperwork prepared as part of the final recommendation for deaccession described the sculpture as a work of the nineteenth century: “The object is one of many that were made in the middle of the nineteenth century during the restoration of the exterior of the Hôtel de Ville in Dijon (a building

 The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, Kansas City, 3rd ed. (Kansas City, 1949), 112.  Handbook of the Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum, 4th ed. (Kansas City, 1959), 54.  For the complete provenance of the painting and associated bibliography, see the online collection of the Nelson Atkins Museum: https://art.nelson-atkins.org/objects/1130/saint-john-the-bap tist-in-the-wilderness.

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originally decorated by Claus Sluter and his workshop in the late fourteenth century).”30 Given the association with Dijon, it is understandable that the curators were concerned about the work’s relationship to sculptures carved in the nineteenth century. New “medievalizing” works were indeed being produced as part of the broader efforts to rebuild and refurbish monuments in Dijon that had been destroyed in the opening decades of the nineteenth century. The architect Claude Saintpère (1771–1854) was assigned the task of restoring the tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy, when they were relocated to the former guards’ hall of the Hôtel de Ville, which had been incorporated into the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon in 1787. The renovations, which included the production of new works to replace missing elements of the tombs of Philip the Bold (1342–1404) and John the Fearless (1371–1419) that had been removed from the Chartreuse de Champmol, were executed between 1820 and 1827. Saintpère assigned the sculptural campaign to Joseph Moreau (1797–1855), a Dijon-trained sculptor, who worked alongside another artist, Couchery, producing missing elements from the tombs.31 Here, the issue of the reputed provenance of John the Baptist emerges as an especially important consideration. At the time the deaccession papers were generated, staff in Kansas City still connected the sculpture with the Hôtel de Ville, Dijon.32 It seems likely that this association was originally asserted by Joseph Brummer, perhaps to support the attribution to Sluter, whose workshop was known to have produced work for the ducal palace during the last decade of the fourteenth century. These projects had their roots in the increased attention the city received during the reign of Philip the Bold, when he refashioned Dijon as a princely capital.33 Between 1391 and 1399, workers completed Dijon’s Saint-Chapelle, the private chapel of the Burgundian Dukes, as part of the larger palace complex at the heart of Dijon. The elegant chapel followed the high Gothic architectural formula established by the Sainte-Chapelle, Paris, and other closely related princely commissions like

 I am grateful to Dr. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Louis L. and Adelaide C. Ward Senior Curator of European Arts at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art for sharing a copy of the deaccession report prepared for the meeting of the Committee on the Collections on October 11, 1990. Nelson Atkins Museum curatorial files, accession number, 33–39.  Patrick de Winter, “Art from the Duchy of Burgundy,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 74, no. 10 (1987): 406–49, especially 420–21; and Kathleen Morand, Claus Sluter: Artist at the Court of Burgundy (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1991), especially 366–67.  Deaccession report prepared for the meeting of the Committee on the Collections on October 11, 1990, Nelson Atkins Museum, Kansas City, Nelson Atkins Museum curatorial files, accession number, 33–39.  Patrick M. De Winter, “Castles and Town Residences of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy (1364–1404),” Artibus et Historiae 4, no. 8 (1983): 95–118, especially 102.

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the Sainte-Chapelle at Bourges, built by Jean Duc de Berry (1340–1416).34 The Sainte-Chapelle in Dijon was demolished in 1803, although records of its appearance survive in archival documents and images.35 Given that the work was still associated with a late fourteenth-century date, it is not surprising that staff at the Nelson Atkins Museum struggled to reconcile the alleged provenance with projects documented as having taken place on the grounds of the Hôtel du Ville during this same period. Based on comments included in the deaccession papers, it seems that their attention was focused on exterior locations around the palace complex. Sluter is documented as having produced a sundial, ducal shield, and a sculpture of Saint John the Evangelist for the exterior of the Sainte-Chapelle.36 Because of the late fourteenth-century date assigned to the sculpture when it entered the collection, the lack of weathering visible on the surface of the object was clearly a source of concern: “That the Baptist in Kansas City, purchased in 1933 from a highly reputable New York dealer, cannot be an object from the 14th century is self-evident from its condition: no sculpture made from soft limestone would display so little weathering after five centuries of exposure to the Burgundian climate.”37 It was increasingly difficult to reconcile the condition of the sculpture with the presumed fourteenth-century date and the assumed outdoor context of the work’s original location. The fact that nineteenthcentury artists were known to have been enlisted to refurbish the physical fabric of the building added yet another layer of doubt. The papers assigned an estimated valuation of $8000–10,000, and the sculpture was consigned to Sotheby’s for sale. In the sale catalogue prepared for the June 1, 1991 auction, Sotheby’s listed the sculpture as “A Limestone Figure of Saint John the Baptist, in French 15th Century style.”38 Given that auction houses generally confer with museum staff on object descriptions before finalizing the sale catalogue, it seems likely that the auction house and curatorial staff were in agreement that the dating for John the Baptist should reflect their consensus that the work could have been sculpted in the early decades of the nineteenth century. The sculpture sold for a hammer

 For the Sainte-Chapelles, see Claudine Billot, “Les Saintes-Chapelles (XIIIe–XVIe siècles): Approche comparée de foundations dynastiques,” Revue d’histoire de l’Eglise de France 73 (1987): 229–48, and Claudine Billot, Les Saintes-Chapelles royales et princières (Paris: Ed. du Patrimoine, 1998).  Pierre Quarré, La Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon, siège de l’Ordre de la Toison d’or (Dijon: Musée des beaux-arts de Dijon, 1962).  Morand, Claus Sluter, especially 374–76.  Deaccession papers prepared for the meeting of the Committee on the Collections on October 11, 1990, Nelson Atkins Museum curatorial files, accession number, 33–39.  Sotheby’s, European Works of Art, lot 18.

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price of $9500.39 While this might not seem like a large sum for a medieval object, it is in line with expectations for works fashioned in a style connected with the medieval period and fell squarely within the estimate. Moreover, the curators at the Nelson Atkins Museum were undoubtedly confident that the sculpture no longer played an essential role in the collections, which had grown considerably since the work was originally acquired, especially through the 1940s, when several additional works of medieval art entered the collections. Purchased by a Belgian private collector, John the Baptist would not resurface until slightly more than a decade later, when it again appeared on the art market. During the years in which it remained in private hands, the sculpture received renewed attention. Towards the end of the 1990s, it was sampled and analyzed to identify the source of the limestone block. The results of this work were cited in the July 10, 2014 Sotheby’s, London sale catalogue, suggesting that the limestone was quarried at Tonnerre, near Dijon.40 It appears that work was also conserved at some point following its acquisition by the Belgian collector, when it likely received a light cleaning.41 These two factors serve an important reminder of the difference that scientific and technical analysis can make in adding to the information available about works of art. In the meantime, scholarly work on late Burgundian sculpture continued to develop, spurred by exhibitions and related publications.42 During this same period, the Metropolitan Museum of Art commenced the process of publishing selections of its own holdings of medieval sculpture, a project initiated by William D. Wixom, then serving in the role of Chairman, the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters. By the time John the Baptist reemerged on the market, this time at Sotheby’s, London, that sculpture’s attribution and dating had changed substantially. Assigned to Jan Crocq for the first time and given a date of ca. 1500–1510, the sculpture was auctioned with an estimate of £200,000–300,000. It sold for a price of £218,500. There was clearly renewed interest in the object, including its relationship to the Saint Catherine in New York, which had by that time been published with an attribution to Crocq and was cited extensively in the auction catalogue.43  Margaret H. Schwartz, Senior Vice President and Co-Worldwide Head, European Sculpture and Works of Art, Sotheby’s, email to author, September 16, 2021.  Francis Robaszynski, “Elements en vue de cerner l’origine de la pierre ayant servi à sculpter une statue de Saint Jean-Baptiste,” Faculté Polytechnique de Mons, Belgium, March 12, 1998, cited in Sotheby’s, Old Master Sculpture and Works of Art (London: Sotheby’s, 2014), July 10, 2014, lot 67.  Margaret H. Schwartz, Senior Vice President and Co-Worldwide Head, European Sculpture and Works of Art, Sotheby’s, email to author, September 16, 2021.  See for example, John Steyaert and Monique Tahon-Vanroose, Late Gothic Sculpture: The Burgundian Netherlands (Ghent: Ludion Press, 1994), especially 169–71.  Wixom, “Late Medieval Sculpture in the Metropolitan,” 43.

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Shifting Attitudes: Saint Catherine Understanding the changing fortunes of the Baptist and its relationship to the market requires a parallel consideration of the similarly shifting attitudes towards the sculpture of Saint Catherine, which was itself once put forward as a potential forgery several decades after its acquisition by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It appears that while curators in Kansas City were developing their own views on the sculpture of Saint John, curators in New York were also undertaking a similar reevaluation of selected sculptures in the medieval collections. Purchased during the first few decades of the twentieth century, the figure of Saint Catherine is especially notable for its early acquisition date, which preceded by several years the transformational gifts of the collections of J. Pierpont Morgan in the middle of the second decade of the twentieth century.44 Indeed, the figure of Saint Catherine stands out as one of the earliest monumental medieval sculptures to enter the Met’s collection, given that it was purchased when the holdings of the museum remained in their nascent stages. Acquired in 1907 from the Paris firm of Marx Freres for a sum of 35,000 francs, the figure of Saint Catherine was initially catalogued as French and assigned a date in the second half of the fifteenth century.45 At the time they were acquired, the sculptures of John the Baptist and Saint Catherine, so closely connected in style and carving technique, were assigned dates nearly a century apart. It appears, however, that the Saint Catherine was also viewed with some degree of suspicion by at least the middle of the twentieth century. By this time, the Met’s medieval holdings were firmly established, most notably by the gifts from the collections of J. Pierpont Morgan and the generous philanthropic support of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., whose funding established The Cloisters. By the middle of the century, Saint Catherine’s status in the collection had shifted from a singular example of Burgundian sculpture to one of several monumental works from the region, particularly the great limestone figures from Poligny connected to the workshops of Sluter and his nephew, Claus de Werve (ca. 1380–1439).46

 For J. Pierpont Morgan, his collecting, and its impact on the Metropolitan Museum of Art, see Jean Strouse, “J. Pierpont Morgan: Financier and Collector,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 57, no. 3 (Winter 2000): 4–66.  Purchase price cited in the “Recommendation for Deaccessioning” papers signed December 17, 1981 (copy of report in the files of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Object File, acc. no. 07.197).  These works include the majestic figure of the Virgin and Child attributed to Claus de Werve (acc. no. 33.23), and the standing figures of Saint John the Baptist (acc. no. 34.44), Saint James the Greater (acc. no. 47.101.17), and Saint Paul (acc. no. 22.31.1).

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In 1944, James Rorimer, then serving as the Curator of Medieval Art at the Met, expressed reservations about the work, publishing the sculpture together with other works of “doubtful authenticity.”47 In outlining the rationale for his opinion, Rorimer offered the following observations: “The facial expression is somewhat vapid; the flat tresses of hair almost inept and unconvincing; the hands awkward and lifeless, and the draperies mixed up.”48 Focusing more closely on the clothing and surface treatments, Rorimer continued: In fact, the sculptor has confused his draperies and orphreys to such an extent that it is impossible to single out which is the mantle, which the dress, and which is an undergarment. In some places, the fur lining of the overmantle is simulated by rough tooling, and in others the tooling is omitted altogether. The paint, where it appears, is not medieval and it, too, suggests that there was confusion as to which parts of the garments were to be one color and which another. There are no traces of old paint, and when the existing paint is flaked off the stone is almost as fresh as when it was carved.49

The Met’s curatorial files allow for a better understanding of how the sculpture fared in the decades following Rorimer’s publication. In the formal report recommending the sculpture for deaccession, Wixom characterized Rorimer’s remarks as “highly subjective and without convincing results.”50 He noted that subsequent scholars did not share Rorimer’s concerns about authenticity, but did express differing ideas about dating the work based on comparisons. For J. A. Schmoll, who examined the sculpture in 1962, Saint Catherine was not a forgery and could be dated to the end of the early sixteenth century. Related works from western Lorraine or eastern Champagne offered close stylistic connections, and two sculptures in the museum at Nancy were cited as comparisons. Later in that same decade, Helga Hofmann viewed the work as authentic, but suggested that the head could be a replacement. The Met’s curatorial files make it clear that the decision to deaccession Saint Catherine was motivated by considerations of quality and its relationship to the collection, rather than by concerns about its late medieval date. “This is a pleasing sculpture,” Wixom stated, “but there are numerous representations of St. Catherine and St. Barbara from France at the end of the 15th and early 16th century in our collection which are of greater interest, both in terms of the execution of drapery and in terms of the overall appearance.” Valuations of the work cited in

 James Rorimer, “Forgeries of Medieval Stone Sculpture,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 26 (1944): 210.  Rorimer, “Forgeries of Medieval Stone Sculpture,” 210.  Rorimer, “Forgeries of Medieval Stone Sculpture,” 210.  “Recommendation for Deaccessioning” papers signed December 17, 1981 (copy of report now in the files of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Object File, acc. no. 07.197).

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the deaccession paperwork ranged from $20,000–$30,000. While there was consensus within the department regarding the proposal to remove the sculpture from the collection, the curators at the time were also open to the possibility that the work might be of interest to another museum. The work was formally deaccessioned, but never consigned to a sale. Four years later, on November 1, 1985, Wixom included the sculpture in an internal memorandum indicating that the “St. Catherine of Alexandria (07.197) will be reaccessioned at a later date.”51 It is relatively rare for museums to reaccession objects that had earlier been recommended for deaccession, and it is equally striking that Saint Catherine’s fortunes changed so dramatically within a period of only a few years. There was clearly continued interest in further study of the work, which by that time had been moved to storage. Even though the Met’s curatorial staff had recommended the work for deaccession, there must not have been a sense of urgency to get Saint Catherine to the art market. When Dany Sandron arrived in the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters from France to pursue his stagiaire, a three-month training period required as part of his advanced degree in art history, Wixom assigned him the task of researching the figure of Saint Catherine. After studying the work closely, Sandron suggested an attribution to Jan Crocq, apparently making the first connection between the sculpture and this artist. Technical analysis and additional consultation with colleagues followed. Wixom had evidently had a change of heart and recommended reaccessioning the statue to Philippe de Montebello, the Director of the Met at the time. In the memorandum outlining the rationale for this recommendation, Wixom stated: “This large work has been carefully reexamined by the Department and Objects Conservation. Contrary to earlier assertions, it is not ‘a re-worked core’ nor is it a forgery. Furthermore, there are no modern additions or areas of re-cutting.”52 The sculpture was elevated on a high pedestal to show the work to its best advantage. In this setting, Wixom, continued, “it has demonstrated its value as a fine and imposing example of northeastern French late Gothic style.”53 When Saint Catherine returned to the museum’s galleries, the

 Interdepartmental Memorandum from William D. Wixom to Ashton Hawkins, November 1, 1985 (copy of document now in the files of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Object File, acc. no. 07.197).  Interdepartmental Memorandum from William D. Wixom to Philippe de Montebello, September 18, 1987 (copy of document now in the files of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Object File, acc. no. 07.197).  Interdepartmental Memorandum from William D. Wixom to Philippe de Montebello, September 18, 1987 (copy of document now in the files of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Object File, acc. no. 07.197).

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work carried an attribution to Jan Crocq. Wixom later published Saint Catherine with this attribution and assigned the sculpture a date of ca. 1500.54

Saint John the Baptist and Saint Catherine: The Case for Jean Crocq The sculptures of Saint John and Saint Catherine share an unexpected modern history, having both been removed from museum collections only to find their way back through different paths. What remains to be determined is whether they can also be connected to a common origin in the late medieval artistic landscape of Burgundy. In addition to their closely corresponding scale, the two sculptures have many other features in common, particularly the repeated zig-zag fur lining inside their mantles, which break into comparable triangular folds around their bodies. The octagonal bases of the statues are also similarly scaled, allowing the saints’ feet and attributes—like the camel head of Saint John’s fleece and the Emperor Maxentius beneath Saint Catherine—to extend out into space. The tight, corkscrew locks of hair of the Baptist, the lamb, and Maxentius also seem closely related. Finally, both figures share a similarly mannered posture, their bodies tapering at the feet and head, with voluminous draperies pressing out into space as they descend towards the base of each statue. Because John the Baptist is known to have been cut from Tonnerre limestone, scientific analysis of Saint Catherine could help to determine if the sculptures can also trace their genesis to a common material. In making the case for the attribution to Jan Crocq, Fliegel suggested that both John the Baptist and Saint Catherine could have been commissioned by Crocq’s patron, René II (1473–1508), Duke of Bar and Lorraine and King of Sicily.55 René II led the army that defeated Charles the Bold at the Battle of Nancy, which ended the Valois dynasty’s domination of the Burgundian territories and fundamentally reshaped the map of Europe. The duke continued the Valois practice of recruiting both local and foreign artists to his court, using his commissions to project his political ambitions in the realm of art and architecture. While none of his documented works survives, Crocq appears in archival documents that demonstrate his status as a court sculptor favored by René II and his wife Philippe de Guelders. Among the works attributed to the artist, two sculptures offer tantalizing stylistic connections to both Saint John and Saint Catherine. Now preserved in the Palais des

 Wixom, “Late Medieval Sculpture in the Metropolitan,” 43.  Fliegel, “Medieval Art,” 20.

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Ducs de Lorraine – Musée lorrain at Nancy, an Archangel Gabriel and an Annunciate Virgin were likely commissioned as votives to honor the Virgin, whose divine assistance René II credited with his victory over Charles the Bold. When he took the field at Nancy, René II led his army under a standard featuring the Annunciation, placing himself under the protection of the Mother of God. As Pierre-Hippolyte Pénet has argued, René II commissioned these sculptures for a position on the exterior of the Porte de la Craffe, Nancy, where they were accompanied by the arms of René II and his wife Philippe de Guelders together with two inscriptions recalling the victory of the duke under the aegis of the Virgin.56 The garment of the Annunciate Virgin features the same beaded hems and zig-zag patterning emulating the fur-lined interior of the mantle that can be seen in the figure of Saint Catherine (Figure 8.6). Assuming that the sculptures of John the Baptist and Saint Catherine were indeed the products of a single commission, what are the most obvious candidates for the original setting for these two monumental figures? As Fliegel has argued, René II belonged to the Order of the Golden Fleece and is known to have commissioned work for the Sainte-Chapelle in Dijon, the seat of the storied Order. The chapel also housed one of the most important Passion relics in the newly consolidated Kingdom of France, which the victory at Nancy secured. The Bleeding Host of Dijon was presented to Philip the Good by Pope Eugenius IV in 1433, and subsequently placed into the Sainte-Chapelle, Philip’s holy chapel. Not only was Crocq’s patron René II a member of the Order of the Golden Fleece, his grandfather René, Duke of Anjou and King of Sicily (1434–1480) developed a fervent devotion to the relic during his stay in the city as Philip the Bold’s prisoner between 1435 and 1437.57 The Duke donated a perpetual mass in honor of the relic and included an image of the Bleeding Host of Dijon in his personal prayerbook.58 Rather than connect the sculptures to the early period in the chapel’s history, as had been assumed when John the Baptist carried the earlier attribution to Sluter in Kansas City, it seems possible to associate them with later embellishments to the interior. Following the model of the related chapels in Paris and Bourges, the  Pierre-Hippolyte Pénet, “Attribué à Jean Crocq, L’archange Gabriel et La Vierge Marie,” https://musee-lorrain.nancy.fr/fr/collections/les-oeuvres-majeures/l-archange-gabriel-et-la-viergemarie-162.  The Holy Host of Dijon was installed and preserved in the Sainte-Chapelle beginning in 1433. Jules d’Arbaumont, “Essai historique sur la Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon (fondée en 1172),” Mémoires de la commission des antiquités de la Côte d’Or 6 (1864), 64–184, especially 129–31.  See the Book of Hours of René, Duke of Anjou and King of Sicily, London, BL, Egerton MS. 1070, which features an image of the Bleeding Host on fol. 110v. See Quarré, La Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon, 11; and Roger S. Wieck, “The Sacred Bleeding Host of Dijon in Books of Hours,” in Quand la peinture était dans les livres: Mélanges en l’honneur de François Avril, ed. Mara Hofmann, Eberhard König, and Caroline Zöhl (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 392–404.

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Figure 8.6: Attributed to Jean Crocq, Virgin, from the ancient church Saint-Epvre de Nancy (54), 1475–1525, limestone. Dépôt de la Ville de Nancy, inv. D.95.5.2. © Palais des ducs de Lorraine – Musée lorrain, Nancy / Photo: Philippe Caron.

building is known to have housed clerestory sculptures mounted high on consoles around the apse. While the chapel itself does not survive, paintings like the Exhumation of Saint Hubert at the National Gallery, London suggest the general configuration, with standing figures mounted on consoles flanking the upper elevation around the sanctuary (Figure 8.7). Indeed, the hollowed-out backs of the figures of Saint Catherine and Saint John could be interpreted as part of an effort to reduce the weight of the limestone blocks from which they were hewn. While further work on the relationship between the figures of Saint John and Catherine is

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Figure 8.7: Rogier van der Weyden and Workshop, The Exhumation of Saint Hubert, late 1430s, oil with egg tempera on oak, 88.2 × 81.2 cm. London, National Gallery, NG783.

needed, future research should explore the possibility that these works were created by René II as part of his own efforts to embellish the Sainte-Chapelle, Dijon and to establish himself as a patron in the tradition pioneered by the Valois dukes of Burgundy. Although these works are bound together by a shared modern history, their historical relationship remains to be uncovered.

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Bibliography Asaert, Gustaaf. “Documenten voor de geschiedenis van de beeldhouwkunst te Antwerpen in de xvde eeuw.” Jaarboek Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten Antwerpen (1972): 43–85. Billot, Claudine. “Les Saintes-Chapelles (XIIIe–XVIe siècles): Approche comparée de foundations dynastiques.” Revue d’histoire de l’Eglise de France 73 (1987): 229–48. Billot, Claudine. Les Saintes-Chapelles royales et princières. Paris: Éditions du Patrimoine, 1998. Bouchot Julliette. “Jean Crocq, imagier lorrain: Nouvelles perspectives.” Le pays lorrain 108 (2011): 329–36. Brennan, Christine E. “The Brummer Gallery and the Market for Medieval Art in Paris and New York, 1906–1949.” Ph.D. diss., Bard Graduate Center, 2019. Brilliant, Virginia, ed. “Gothic Art in America.” Special issue, Journal of the History of Collections 27, no. 3 (2015). Bruzelius, Caroline,with Jill Meredith. The Brummer Collection of Medieval Art. Durham, NC: Duke University Press in association with the Duke University Museum of Art, 1991. Carter, Michael. “The Brummer Gallery Records: A Fuller Picture.” Blogs, In Circulation, October 31, 2018. https://www.metmuseum.org/blogs/in-circulation/2018/brummer-gallery-records. The Cloisters Library and Archives. The Brummer Gallery Records. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/ libraries-and-research-centers/watson-digital-collections/cloisters-archives-collections/thebrummer-gallery-records. Object Inventory Card No. P5109_verso, August 14, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. P5109_recto, October 16, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. P5733_recto, November 13, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. P5733_verso, November 13, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. N3125_recto, November 13, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. N3126_recto, November 13, 1928. Object Inventory Card No. N-06_recto, November 13, 1928. Curran, Kathleen. The Invention of the American Art Museum: From Craft to Kulturgeschichte, 1870–1930. Los Angeles: The Getty Research Institute, 2016. D’Arbaumont, Jules. “Essai historique sur la Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon (fondée en 1172).” Mémoires de la commission des antiquités de la Côte d’Or 6 (1864): 64–184. De Grunne, Bernard. Béla Hein: Grand Initié des Ivoires Lega. Paris: Adam Biro, 2001. De Winter, Patrick. “Art from the Duchy of Burgundy.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 74, no. 10 (1987): 406–49. De Winter, Patrick. “Castles and Town Residences of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy (1364–1404).” Artibus et Historiae 4, no. 8 (1983): 95–118. Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters. Object File, inv. no. 07.197. Interdepartmental Memorandum from William D. Wixom to Ashton Hawkins, November 1, 1985. Interdepartmental Memorandum from William D. Wixom to Philippe de Montebello, September 18, 1987. “Recommendation for Deaccessioning,” December 17, 1981. Fliegel, Stephen N. “The Collecting of Valois Burgundian Art in the United States.” In Art from the Court of Burgundy: The Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless 1364–1419, exh. cat., by Stephen N. Fliegel, Sophie Jugie, and Virginie Barthélémy, 21–23. Dijon: Musée des beaux-arts, 2004. Fliegel, Stephen N. “Medieval Art.” Cleveland Museum of Art Members’ Magazine (March–April 2018): 20.

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Fliegel, Stephen N., Sophie Jugie, and Virginie Barthélémy. Art from the Court of Burgundy: The Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless 1364–1419, exh. cat. Dijon: Musée des beauxarts, 2004. Handbook of the Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum. 4th ed. Kansas City, 1959. Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art. Kansas City: Joseph D. Havens, 1933. Hoffman, Helga. “Die Nederländer Jan Crocq Hofbildhauer in Bar-le-Duc and Nancy.” Aachener Kunstblätter 32 (1966): 106–25. Lindquist, Sherry C. M. “A ‘Sympathetic Setting’ for Medieval Art in St. Louis.” In To Inspire and Instruct: A History of Medieval Art in Midwestern Museums, edited by Christina Neilsen, 99–116. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008. Maxe-Werly, Léon. “Jean Crocq de Bar-le-Duc, sculpture et sa famille 1487–1510.” Mémoires de la Société des Lettres de Bar-le-Duc (1897): 7–70. Morand, Kathleen. Claus Sluter: Artist at the Court of Burgundy. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1991. Neilsen, Christina, ed. To Inspire and Instruct: A History of Medieval Art in Midwestern Museums. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008. Nelson Atkins Museum. Curatorial files, inv. no. 33–39. Deaccession report prepared for the meeting of the Committee on the Collections on October 11, 1990; Deaccession papers prepared for the meeting of the Committee on the Collections on October 11, 1990. Nelson Atkins Museum. Online Collection. https://art.nelson-atkins.org/objects/1130/saint-john-thebaptist-in-the-wilderness. Pénet, Pierre-Hippolyte. “Attribué à Jean Crocq, L’archange Gabriel et La Vierge Marie,” https:// musee-lorrain.nancy.fr/fr/collections/les-oeuvres-majeures/l-archange-gabriel-et-la-viergemarie-162. Quarré, Pierre. La Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon, siège de l’Ordre de la Toison d’or. Dijon: Musée des beauxarts de Dijon, 1962. Robaszynski, Francis. “Elements en vue de cerner l’origine de la pierre ayant servi a sculpter une statue de Saint Jean-Baptiste,” Faculté Polytechnique de Mons, Belgium, March 12, 1998, cited in Sotheby’s, Old Master Sculpture and Works of Art, 10 July 2014 (London: Sotheby’s, 2014), lot 67. Rombouts, Philippe, and Théodore Van Lerius. De Liggeren en andere historische archieven de Antwerpsche Sint-Lucasgilde (Antwerp/The Hague, 1864–1876). Rorimer, James. “Forgeries of Medieval Stone Sculpture.” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 26 (1944): 195–210. Shepard, Mary. “In All ‘Its Chaste Beauty’: Cloistered Spaces in Midwestern Art Museums.” In To Inspire and Instruct: A History of Medieval Art in Midwestern Museums, edited by Christina Neilsen, 87–98. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008. Simonin, Pierre. “Oeuvres de Jan Crocq: Sculpture neerlandais en Lorraine.” Le pays lorrain 84 (2003): 194–96. Smith, Elisabeth Bradford, ed. Medieval Art in America: Patterns of Collecting, 1800–1940. University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1996. Sotheby’s. European Works of Art, Arms and Armor, Tapestries and Furniture, June 1, 1991. New York: Sotheby’s, 1991. Steyaert, John William, and Monique Tahon-Vanroose. Late Gothic Sculpture: The Burgundian Netherlands. Ghent: Ludion Press, 1994. Strouse, Jean. “J. Pierpont Morgan: Financier and Collector.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 57, no. 3 (Winter 2000): 4–66.

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Wieck, Roger S. “The Sacred Bleeding Host of Dijon in Books of Hours.” In Quand la peinture était dans les livres: Mélanges en l’honneur de François Avril, edited by Mara Hofmann, Eberhard König, and Caroline Zöhl, 392–404. Turnhout: Brepols, 2007. The William Rockhill Nelson Collection. 3rd ed. Kansas City, 1949. Wixom, William D. “Late Medieval Sculpture in the Metropolitan: 1400–1530.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 64, no. 4 (Spring 2007): 3–50. Wolferman, Kristie C. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A History. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2020.

Gerhard Lutz

Chapter 9 A Mosan Madonna in the Cleveland Museum of Art Reconsidered In 2014, at the initiative of Stephen Fliegel, the Cleveland Museum of Art acquired a standing Virgin and Child from the second half of the thirteenth century, ostensibly made in the Meuse region (Figures 9.1a and 9.1b). The Madonna was purchased from a London art dealer, who in turn had acquired it in 2013 from the collection of Gustav Rau in Stuttgart.1 Rau bought the figure in the 1960s on the French art market. Here, unfortunately, the trail is lost, and so the provenance does not allow for any reliable conclusions about the possible origin of the Virgin. The work barely features in previous research on sculpture from around 1300, which is why the occasion of this Festschrift is particularly welcome to outline the broader research questions around this object, focusing on its precious polychromed surface with its cabochon insets. Like most medieval wood sculptures, this Virgin and Child is not preserved in perfect condition. The head and arms of the Child and the right hand of the Virgin are lost today. Originally, they were attached with dowels or joinery, evidenced by the remaining shaped recesses. Most of the gilding on the torso and the original cabochons have also been lost. Nevertheless, the finely painted surface of the figure is unusually well-preserved. Before turning to the qualities of the polychromy, we should look at the carved forms of the sculpture.

Carved Forms At first glance, the sculpture appears to be quite simple in design. Mary stands upright and seems to look straight at the viewer. With her left hand she holds the Christ Child, who, judging by the rotation of the upper body, was probably also  On the sculpture see Elina Gertsman and Barbara H. Rosenwein, The Middle Ages in 50 Objects (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), 34–37; Philippe George, Art et patrimoine en Wallonie des origines à 1789: Essai de synthèse à la lumière des collections américaines et européennes, Les Dossiers de l’IPW (Namur: Institut du Patrimoine wallon, 2017), 194. Note: For valuable suggestions, I would especially like to thank Colleen Snyder, Associate Conservator of Objects at the Cleveland Museum of Art, and Philippe George, Liège. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-010

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Figures 9.1a and 9.1b: Virgin and Child, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), Liège (?), ca. 1270–1280, oak with polychromy and gilding, 83 × 24 × 20 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2014.392. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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once facing the viewer more or less directly. At the feet of the Virgin is a green dragon, which refers to the role of Mary as the new Eve as well as the woman of the Apocalypse who triumphed over the devil. By and large, the sculpture’s basic motifs follow design parameters characteristic for the second half of the thirteenth century. Mary holds Christ with her left hand. The primary folds that structure the garment radiate from this hand and direct the viewer’s gaze towards the Child. In one instance, the typical V-shaped form of the pleats is additionally broken in the area of the thigh. This creates a double crease, and the fold disappears towards the right side of the body. Moreover, the folds are differentiated from one another in their dimensions, refining the sculptural effects of the Virgin’s garment. The garment suggests that the image was created to be seen not only from the front but also from the sides: for example, the unfolding drapery emphasizes the necessity to look at the sculpture from a particular angle, which would also assure that the worshiper had the best view of the Christ Child (see Figure 9.1b). Whether the effigy originally contained relics must remain an open question.2 The figure was made of what is estimated to be oak wood, then hollowed out on the back and carefully closed with a wooden board. It was then covered with canvas to prepare the final paint layers. This suggests that the figure may have originally been placed in an open shrine or in front of a column. Its height of 83 cm may indicate that the sculpture was carried in processions. Only upon closer inspection does the preciousness of the polychromy, intensified by the predominant use of gold, become apparent (Figure 9.2). Mary wears a gilded cloak adorned by decorative bands with various patterns. This elaborate work is best seen, for example, on a horizontal band on the lower part of the robe, which shows a griffin or dragon in addition to floral patterns. Particularly detailed are the hems of the robe, where the imitation of small beads and enamels can be seen in the use of built-up gesso dots, gilded and painted over with translucent green, red, and blue paints. Such border decorations were in most cases created by taking the glue and chalk gesso mixture and dropping small amounts by brush to create the beaded design, or by allowing larger amounts to drip and create the slightly raised hem. This surface was often coated with an egg white or animal glue sizing before being gilded.3

 The cavity has not been opened up yet, given that there is still intact canvas and paint on the back over the bottom of the seam.  Elisabeth Jägers, “Zur Polychromie der Kölner Skulptur vom 12. bis zum Ende des 14. Jahrhunderts,” in Schnütgen-Museum: Die Holzskulpturen des Mittelalters (1000–1400), ed. Ulrike Bergmann (Cologne: Schnütgen-Museum, 1989), 95. See also Myriam Serck-Dewaide, “The History and Conservation of the Surface Coating on European Gilded-Wood Objects,” in Gilded Wood: Conservation and

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Figure 9.2: Virgin and Child, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), Liège (?), ca. 1270–1280, oak with polychromy and gilding, 83 × 24 × 20 cm. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2014.392. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art.

In the Cleveland Madonna, even the belt, which is barely visible to the viewer, is differentiated by its red color. In addition, the mantle lining is painted blue and shows alternating gilded eagles and stars. Moreover, at the time of its creation, the statue must have been decorated with lavish cabochons on the edge of the Virgin’s blue and gold cloak and around her neck; today only the empty recesses remain. Such inset stones were often backed with colorful metal foil to imitate precious gems.4 Previous analyses attribute the sculpture to the second half of the thirteenth century in the Meuse region.5 However, there are not many examples with original polychromy from this area. A standing Madonna from the former Cistercian

History, ed. Deborah Bigelow (Madison, CT: Sound View Press, 1991), 67. Numerous examples in Michele D. Marincola and Lucretia Kargère, The Conservation of Medieval Polychrome Wood Sculpture: History, Theory, Practice (Los Angeles: Getty Conservation Institute, 2020), esp. 16–17, 42–46.  See note 3.  Gertsman and Rosenwein, The Middle Ages in 50 Objects, 34.

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convent of Marche-les-Dames, now in the Musée des Arts anciens du Namurois, is much simpler in its carved forms (Figure 9.3).6 While it would be problematic to establish a closer connection with the sculpture in Cleveland, parallels can be seen in the details of the polychromy, which draws on comparable motifs and which also formerly integrated cabochons on the collar.7 The Virgin from St.-Phollien in Liège, called Notre Dame des Écoliers, which is dated to around 1260 and is lost today, should also be mentioned (Figure 9.4). On the one hand, unlike the Cleveland Madonna, the St.-Phollien sculpture emphasizes more strongly the orientation of mother and child towards each other, as in the French examples modeled on the ivory Madonna from the Ste.-Chapelle from the 1260s; on the other hand, its drapery, with broken folds, is clearly reminiscent of the drapery of the Virgin and Child in Cleveland.8 Such drapery is typical, especially for works from the 1260s onwards. Later works from around 1300 show more regular forms, mostly with simple V-shaped folds. Overall, the origin of the sculpture in Cleveland in the third quarter of the thirteenth century seems plausible. But based on the limited number of comparative objects in the area of the former prince-bishopric of Liège, the exact localization of the workshop remains open.

Polychromy with Applications and Inlays On the following pages, I would like to focus specifically on the polychromy, which has several distinctive features: the robe patterns applied with the gesso, the cavities that originally housed cabochons, and the generous gilding. Altogether, one is reminded of a precious object of a goldsmith’s work. Not surprisingly, previous research has generally seen connections to enamels and delicately

 Jacques Stiennon, L’art mosan dans les collections de la Société archéologique de Namur: Guide du visiteur (Namur: Musée des arts anciens du Namurois, 2002), 31–33; George, Art et patrimoine en Wallonie des origines à 1789, 194.  A Madonna from the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection has clearer parallels to the Cleveland Madonna. Paul Williamson, The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection: Medieval Sculpture and Works of Art (London: Published for Sotheby’s Publications by Philip Wilson Publishers, 1987), 89–91, no. 15.  Robert Didier, Mater Dei: A propos de quelques sculptures de la Vierge, Feuillets de la Cathédrale de Liège (Liège: Fond. Saint-Lambert, 1993), 6. The comparison with the Madonna from the Ste.-Chapelle is instructive insofar as the design of this figure also shows the additional broken folds of the garment. Similarly, a Madonna in the Fondation Albert Vandervelden in Liège seems to follow more closely the type of the Parisian figures. George, Art et patrimoine en Wallonie des origines à 1789, 194. This is also the case with another sculpture in the Musées royaux d’art et d’histoire in Brussels. Williamson, The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, 89–91.

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Figure 9.3: Virgin and Child, from the Abbey of Marche-les-Dames, Mosan (Valley of the Meuse), ca. 1250–1270, oak with polychromy and gilding, height: 84 cm. Namur, Collection Société archéologique de Namur, inv. B027. A découvrir au TreM.a – Musée des Arts anciens de Namur. Photo: Société archéologique de Namur.

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Figure 9.4: The Virgin from St. Phollien in Liège, called Notre Dame des Écoliers, ca. 1280–1290 (stolen). Photo: Robert Didier, Mater Dei: A propos de quelques sculptures de la Vierge, Feuillets de la Cathédrale de Liège. Liège: Fond. Saint-Lambert, 1993, p. 6.

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executed metalwork of the Meuse region for this figure.9 But to what extent do such phenomena reflect geographically more widespread trends of the time? In many regions we know of only a few examples, most of which also lack sufficient remnants of the original polychromy, such as a figure of St. John the Evangelist in the Skulpturensammlung Berlin, which is thought to have been made in northern France in the last quarter of the thirteenth century and whose chest recess testifies to a cabochon lost today.10 Yet, there is a noticeable concentration of sculptures with a comparable technique of polychromy, created in the decades around 1300. While the tradition in the Meuse region is rather sparse, a large number of examples have survived from the Rhineland, such as the Madonna with the Rock Crystal in the Museum Schnütgen in Cologne (Figure 9.5). While the figure itself is dated to around 1220–1230, it is assumed that the excellently preserved second version of the polychromy was created in the first half of the fourteenth century.11 In addition to the rock crystals on the breast of Mary and the Christ Child, the decorations on the hems of the robes as well as on the throne, which are reminiscent of the Cleveland Madonna in its patterning, are especially striking. In Cologne, in particular, these techniques seemed to have been broadly popular: a good example is the Madonna in St. John the Baptist in Cologne, although it features a smaller band of decoration than the Cleveland Madonna.12 Furthermore, there are stunning connections to the polychromy of contemporaneous stone sculpture: for example, the apostle figures in the choir of Cologne Cathedral show motifs that are in part surprisingly similar to those of the Virgin in Cleveland, such as the apostle St. Jacob Minor

 Gertsman and Rosenwein, The Middle Ages in 50 Objects, 34–37. The association with goldsmith’s work appears as a short notice in scholarship see e.g. Stiennon, L’art mosan dans les collections de la Société archéologique de Namur, 32, but has not been understood as a larger phenomenon.  See Tobias Kunz, Bildwerke nördlich der Alpen 1050 bis 1380: Kritischer Bestandskatalog (Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2014), 203–7.  Ulrike Bergmann, ed., Schnütgen-Museum: Die Holzskulpturen des Mittelalters (1000–1400) (Cologne: Schnütgen Museum, 1989), 153–57, no. 15.  Hans Peter Hilger and Ernst Willemsen, eds., Farbige Bildwerke des Mittelalters im Rheinland: Gesamtkatalog zur Ausstellung des Landeskonservators Rheinland im Rheinischen Landesmuseum Bonn im Sommer 1967, Die Kunstdenkmäler des Rheinlandes; Beiheft 11 (Düsseldorf: RheinlandVerlag, 1967), 73–76, no. 7 and 78–81, no. 9. More examples in: Jägers, “Zur Polychromie der Kölner Skulptur,” 88–89.

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Figure 9.5: Madonna with the Rock Crystal, Cologne, ca. 1186–1200, walnut (polychromy and gilding: early 1300s), height: 57.5 cm. Cologne, Museum Schnütgen, inv. no. A14. Photo: Rheinisches Bildarchiv, rba_d023488_01.

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Figure 9.6: (a) St. Jacob Minor, Cologne, ca. 1280–1290 (?), tuff stone, height: ca. 170 cm. Cologne Cathedral Choir. Photo: © Creative Commons; (b) Detail of Figure 9.6a. Photo: LVR-Amt für Denkmalpflege im Rheinland, Viola Blumrich.

where the hems of the robe show the same imitation of small beads and enamels (Figures 9.6a and 9.6b).13 These distinct techniques of polychromy were more widespread. From the Lake Constance region,14 for example, come the figures of Mary and John now in

 Marc Peez, “Die Farbfassungen der Chorpfeilerfiguren des Kölner Domes,” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012), 192–231. On the dating of the cycle see recently Robert Suckale, “Datierungsfragen sind Verständnisfragen: Zur Einordnung der Kölner Domchorstatuen,” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012), 256–89 and Peter Kurmann, “Perfektion und Kostbarkeit: Die Chorpfeilerfiguren im architektonischen Kontext des Kölner Domes,” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012), 290–309.  The famous Visitation group from the Swiss monastery of St. Katharinenthal, now in New York, shows cabochons prominently placed in the center. Although the preference for sumptuously designed vestments is certainly common to the works in New York and Cleveland, a comparison is limited because the rock crystals in this case have a special meaning regarding the pregnancy of

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Figures 9.7a and 9.7b: Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist from a Triumphal Cross Group, Lake Constance area, ca. 1330, willow with polychromy and gilding, Mary: 185 × 48 × 40 cm, St. John: 195 × 48 × 44 cm. Landesmuseum Württemberg, inv. nos. E 512 and E513. Photo: Landesmuseum Württemberg.

the Landesmuseum Württemberg in Stuttgart, which date to the second quarter of the fourteenth century (Figures 9.7a and 9.7b).15 As in examples from Cologne,

the two ladies. In this case, we also know about the target audience, Cistercian nuns, similar to the case of the statue from Marche-les-Dames. See Jacqueline E. Jung, “Crystalline Wombs and Pregnant Hearts: The Exuberant Bodies of the Katharinenthal Visitation Group,” in History in the Comic Mode: Medieval Communities and the Matter of Person, ed. Rachel Fulton and Bruce W. Holsinger (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), 223–37, figs. 18.1, 18.2, 18.7; Gerhard Lutz, “Repräsentation und Affekt: Skulptur von 1250 bis 1430,” in Geschichte der Bildenden Kunst in Deutschland, ed. Bruno Klein (Munich, Berlin, London, New York: Prestel, 2007), 367, no. 120; Jeffrey Hamburger, Robert Suckale, et al., eds., Krone und Schleier: Kunst aus mittelalterlichen Frauenklöstern (Munich: Hirmer, 2005), 414, no. 314 (Robert Suckale).  Heribert Meurer and Hans Westhoff, Farbige Holzbildwerke des 14. Jahrhunderts (Stuttgart: Württ. Landesmuseum, 1983), 20–26, no. 5; Lutz, “Repräsentation und Affekt: Skulptur von 1250 bis 1430,” 371–72.

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here the narrower borders with inset glass and metal overlays without rock crystals were used. A reliquary bust of one of the eleven thousand virgins from the treasure of the Golden Panel in Lüneburg in northern Germany, today in the Landesmuseum Hannover, may have originated from a local carver’s workshop, and may serve as a testimony for the spread of these techniques in northern Germany. It, too, shows a rich border trimming with numerous colored stones.16 That these examples were also common in France is evidenced by a figure of the Virgin that probably comes from the Franciscan church in Salin-les-Bains (Jura) and may have been made in a Parisian workshop around 1310–1320.17 It is particularly rewarding to look at Scandinavia, where an unusually large number of medieval wooden sculptures have been preserved. For Sweden, two focal points for the use of gemstones on wooden sculptures can be identified: one, the third quarter of the twelfth century as exemplified by the group around the crucifix from Hemse on Gotland,18 and another, the decades around 1300, when we can find numerous such examples from local Scandinavian workshops. On these sculptures, often only fragments of the polychromy are preserved, as is the case with the enthroned Virgin from Edshult in Småland, now in the Statens Historiska Museum in Stockholm (Figure 9.8).19 Dated to the early fourteenth century, it is said to have been made in a local workshop. Only the indentations on the neck still bear witness to the original stone setting. Better preserved are the applied clothing ornaments on the enthroned Mother of God from Vägnhärad (Södermanland), now also in Stockholm.20 The St. Olof from the church in Väte on Gotland, also in the collections of the Statens Historiska Museum, shows that this motif is not unique to Madonna sculptures.

 Gert von der Osten, Katalog der Bildwerke in der Niedersächsischen Landesgalerie Hannover, Kataloge der Niedersächsischen Landesgalerie 2 (Munich: Bruckmann, 1957), 52, no. 31; Antje-Fee Köllermann and Christine Unsinn, eds., Zeitenwende 1400: Die goldene Tafel als europäisches Meisterwerk (Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2019), 171–72, no. 54 (Jan Friedrich Richter).  François Avril, ed., L’art au temps des rois maudits: Philippe le Bel et ses fils, 1285–1328 (Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1998), 76–77, no. 31 (Françoise Baron and Danielle GaboritChopin).  Peter Tångeberg, “The Crucifix from Hemse,” Maltechnik – Restauro 90, no. 1 (1984), 24–34; Peter Tångeberg, Mittelalterliche Holzskulpturen und Altarschreine in Schweden: Studien zu Form, Material und Technik (Stockholm: Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien, 1986), 59–62.  Aron Andersson and Monica Rydbeck, Medieval Wooden Sculpture in Sweden, vols. 4–5, The Museum Collection (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1964–1975), vol. 4, 66–67.  Andersson and Rydbeck, Medieval Wooden Sculpture in Sweden, vol. 4, 66–67; Tångeberg, Mittelalterliche Holzskulpturen und Altarschreine in Schweden, 61.

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Figure 9.8: Virgin and Child. Sweden, early 1300s, alder with fragments of polychromy and gilding, height: 95.5 cm. Stockholm, Statens Historiska Museum no. 14648. Photo: Ola Myrin, The Swedish History Museum/SHM (CC BY).

This brief overview of the surviving examples shows that a tendency to enrich polychromy with applied patterns and inlays is to be found not only in images made for cathedrals or monastery churches—that is, rather elite centers of learning —but also, and to a greater extent, in sculptures made for simple parish churches. Until now, however, these forms of design have not been perceived as a phenomenon of a broader piety, due, perhaps, to the fact that scholars have analyzed mainly examples in museum collections or spectacular works from monasteries. It is, in

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fact, the earlier, twelfth-century sculptures that were commissioned for prominent church buildings, while their popularity across less exalted sites, such as parish churches, experienced a certain peak around 1300 and declined again at the latest after the middle of the fourteenth century.21

Gilding and Precious Materials: Sculptures around 1300 Gilding is conspicuously dominant on most of the figures. Characteristically, gold leaf has been applied directly to the white ground layer without the addition of clay bole, creating a cool color effect.22 This was already observed in conservation research by Hans Westhoff, who called this “glue gilding,”23 and whose remarks were later supplemented by Elisabeth Jägers.24 This topic was not, however—at least to my knowledge—taken up by art historians, who have mainly focused their analyses on sculptural forms of these sculptures, barely, if at all, paying attention to questions of polychromy and gilding. Recent research, however, has shown how careful we have to be in parsing differences in medium in the decades around 1300.25 It is notable that the gold settings are reminiscent of precious figures covered with gold sheets, such as the Golden Madonna in the Hildesheim cathedral treasury,

 Hans Westhoff, “Typische Gewandsäume auf Skulpturen des 14. Jahrhunderts: Süddeutschland und angrenzende Gebiete,” Maltechnik – Restauro 89 (1983): 23–27.  Meurer and Westhoff, Farbige Holzbildwerke des 14. Jahrhunderts, 25; Jägers, “Zur Polychromie der Kölner Skulptur,” 94.  Hans Westhoff, Roland Hahn, and Markus Heberle, “Holzskulpturen des 14. Jahrhunderts und ihre Fassung,” Maltechnik – Restauro 89 (1983): 16–19.  Jägers, “Zur Polychromie der Kölner Skulptur,” 85–105.  Michael Grandmontagne, “In glänzender Erinnerung: Überlegungen zum Grabmal der Isabella von Aragón in Saint-Denis,” in Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln, ed. Michael Grandmontagne and Tobias Kunz (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016), 72–97. At this point, I will not elaborate further on the research questions concerning materiality. Specifically on the issues discussed here, see Magdalena Bushart and Andreas Huth, eds., Superficies: Oberflächengestaltungen von Bildwerken in Mittelalter und Früher Neuzeit. Interdependenzen 6 (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2021). For promising examples see Michael Grandmontagne and Tobias Kunz, Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin—Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016).

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which also has ornamental borders with precious stones.26 Did the commissioners and artists want to echo such precious pictorial works? The frequent use of this type of imitation on sculptures of the Virgin and Child may be an indication of such a reference. It should also be considered that the imitation of materials is not limited either to the years around 1300 or to the imitation of metalwork. For example, the polychromy of another enthroned Mother of God in the Museum Schnütgen in Cologne, which has been dated to around 1340, shows a remarkable resemblance to ivory sculptures.27 That this was not an isolated special case is shown by the Sacrament cabinet in the former Cistercian monastery church of Bad Doberan from ca. 1300, whose overall arrangement is reminiscent of ivory diptychs and whose figures robed in white seem inspired by ivory figures.28 ✶✶✶ The Cleveland Madonna, then, emerges as a sculpture of great importance for our understanding of a pivotal moment in late medieval sculpture carving. While the carving appears rather conventional in quality and type, and comparison with other pictorial works of the region is of limited informative value due to the lack of extant works, a look at the precious polychromy with its applications and hems makes the significance of the figure clear. It stands as a key example in which the polychromy, inlays, and gilding invite associations with precious cult images worked in metal. At the same time, it becomes clear that the diversity of sculptural production of this period can only be experienced if the art of the painters and gilders is studied in tandem.29

 On the Golden Madonna see Peter Barnet, Michael Brandt, and Gerhard Lutz, eds., Medieval Treasures from Hildesheim (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven, CT, London: Yale University Press, 2013), 42–43, no. 7 (Charles T. Little) and Michael Brandt, ed., Kirchenkunst des Mittelalters: Erhalten und erforschen. Katalog zur Ausstellung des Diözesan-Museums Hildesheim (Hildesheim: Bernward-Verlag, 1989), 37–84. For this association see also Westhoff, Hahn, and Heberle, “Holzskulpturen des 14. Jahrhunderts und ihre Fassung,” 17.  No. A 773. See Bergmann, Schnütgen-Museum: Die Holzskulpturen des Mittelalters (1000–1400), 291–95, no. 78.  Hartmut Krohm, “Bemerkungen zu Hochaltarretabel und Kelchschrank in Kloster Doberan,” in Entstehung und Frühgeschichte des Flügelaltarschreins, ed. Hartmut Krohm, Klaus Krüger, and Matthias Weniger (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin – Skulpturensammlung und Museum für Byzantinische Kunst, 2001): 157–75.  The inclusion of numerous new types of images around 1300, such as Visitation Groups, Christ and St. John or the Crucifixi dolorosi would go beyond the scope of this essay. See Lutz, “Repräsentation und Affekt,” 337–43. See also Grandmontagne and Kunz, Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln.

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Bibliography Andersson, Aron, and Monica Rydbeck. Medieval Wooden Sculpture in Sweden. Vols. 4–5, The Museum Collection. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1964–1975. Avril, François, ed. L’art au temps des rois maudits: Philippe le Bel et ses fils, 1285–1328. Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1998. Barnet, Peter, Michael Brandt, and Gerhard Lutz, eds. Medieval Treasures from Hildesheim. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven, CT, London: Yale University Press, 2013. Bergmann, Ulrike, ed. Schnütgen-Museum Die Holzskulpturen des Mittelalters (1000–1400). Cologne: Schnütgen Museum, 1989. Brandt, Michael, ed. Kirchenkunst des Mittelalters: Erhalten und erforschen. Katalog zur Ausstellung des Diözesan-Museums Hildesheim. Hildesheim: Bernward-Verlag, 1989. Bushart, Magdalena, and Andreas Huth, eds. Superficies: Oberflächengestaltungen von Bildwerken in Mittelalter und Früher Neuzeit. Interdependenzen 6. Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2021. Didier, Robert. Mater Dei: A propos de quelques sculptures de la Vierge. Feuillets de la Cathédrale de Liège. Liège: Fond. Saint-Lambert, 1993. George, Philippe. Art et patrimoine en Wallonie des origines à 1789: Essai de synthèse à la lumière des collections américaines et européennes. Les Dossiers de l’IPW. Namur: Institut du Patrimoine wallon, 2017. Gertsman, Elina, and Barbara H. Rosenwein. The Middle Ages in 50 Objects. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Grandmontagne, Michael. “In glänzender Erinnerung: Überlegungen zum Grabmal der Isabella von Aragón in Saint-Denis.” In Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln, edited by Michael Grandmontagne and Tobias Kunz, 72–97. Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016. Grandmontagne, Michael, and Tobias Kunz, eds. Skulptur um 1300 zwischen Paris und Köln. Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin—Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2016. Hamburger, Jeffrey, Robert Suckale, et al., eds. Krone und Schleier: Kunst aus mittelalterlichen Frauenklöstern. Munich: Hirmer, 2005. Hilger, Hans Peter, and Ernst Willemsen, eds. Farbige Bildwerke des Mittelalters im Rheinland: Gesamtkatalog zur Ausstellung des Landeskonservators Rheinland im Rheinischen Landesmuseum Bonn im Sommer 1967, Die Kunstdenkmäler des Rheinlandes; Beiheft 11. Düsseldorf: RheinlandVerlag, 1967. Jägers, Elisabeth. “Zur Polychromie der Kölner Skulptur vom 12. bis zum Ende des 14. Jahrhunderts.” In Schnütgen-Museum: Die Holzskulpturen des Mittelalters (1000–1400), edited by Ulrike Bergmann, 85–105. Cologne: Schnütgen Museum, 1989. Jung, Jacqueline E. “Crystalline Wombs and Pregnant Hearts: The Exuberant Bodies of the Katharinenthal Visitation Group.” In History in the Comic Mode: Medieval Communities and the Matter of Person, edited by Rachel Fulton and Bruce W. Holsinger, 223–37. New York: Columbia University Press, 2007. Köllermann, Antje-Fee, and Christine Unsinn, eds. Zeitenwende 1400: Die goldene Tafel als europäisches Meisterwerk. Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2019. Krohm, Hartmut. “Bemerkungen zu Hochaltarretabel und Kelchschrank in Kloster Doberan.” In Entstehung und Frühgeschichte des Flügelaltarschreins, edited by Hartmut Krohm, Klaus Krüger, and Matthias Weniger, 157–75. Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin—Skulpturensammlung und Museum für Byzantinische Kunst, 2001.

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Kunz, Tobias. Bildwerke nördlich der Alpen 1050 bis 1380: Kritischer Bestandskatalog. Berlin: Skulpturensammlung und Museum für Byzantinische Kunst, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin; Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2014. Kurmann, Peter. “Perfektion und Kostbarkeit: Die Chorpfeilerfiguren im architektonischen Kontext des Kölner Domes.” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012): 290–309. Lutz, Gerhard. “Repräsentation und Affekt: Skulptur von 1250 bis 1430.” In Geschichte der Bildenden Kunst in Deutschland 3, Gotik, edited by Bruno Klein. Munich, Berlin, London, New York: Prestel, 2007. Marincola, Michele D., and Lucretia Kargère. The Conservation of Medieval Polychrome Wood Sculpture: History, Theory, Practice. Los Angeles: Getty Conservation Institute, 2020. Meurer, Heribert, and Hans Westhoff. Farbige Holzbildwerke des 14. Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart: Württ. Landesmuseum, 1983. Osten, Gert von der. Katalog der Bildwerke in der Niedersächsischen Landesgalerie Hannover. Kataloge der Niedersächsischen Landesgalerie 2. Munich: Bruckmann, 1957. Peez, Marc. “Die Farbfassungen der Chorpfeilerfiguren des Kölner Domes.” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012): 192–231. Serck-Dewaide, Myriam. “The History and Conservation of the Surface Coating on European GildedWood Objects.” In Gilded Wood: Conservation and History, edited by Deborah Bigelow, 65–78. Madison, CT: Sound View Press, 1991. Stiennon, Jacques. L’art mosan dans les collections de la Société archéologique de Namur: Guide du visiteur. Namur: Musée des arts anciens du Namurois, 2002. Suckale, Robert. “Datierungsfragen sind Verständnisfragen: Zur Einordnung der Kölner Domchorstatuen.” Kölner Domblatt 77 (2012): 256–89. Tångeberg, Peter. “The Crucifix from Hemse.” Maltechnik-Restauro 90, no. 1 (1984): 24–34. Tångeberg, Peter. Mittelalterliche Holzskulpturen und Altarschreine in Schweden: Studien zu Form, Material und Technik. Stockholm: Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien, 1986. Westhoff, Hans. “Typische Gewandsäume auf Skulpturen des 14. Jahrhunderts: Süddeutschland und angrenzende Gebiete.” Maltechnik-Restauro 89 (1983): 23–27. Westhoff, Hans, Roland Hahn, and Markus Heberle. “Holzskulpturen des 14. Jahrhunderts und ihre Fassung.” Maltechnik-Restauro 89 (1983): 9–22. Williamson, Paul. The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection: Medieval Sculpture and Works of Art. London: Published for Sotheby’s Publications by Philip Wilson Publishers, 1987.

Part IV: Curating Artists: Names / Attributions

Maria Vassilaki

Chapter 10 The Name of the Artist: Do Names Matter? The Cleveland Museum of Art acquired in 2010 a Cretan icon of the Virgin Mary holding the Christ Child (Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund 2010.154).1 The panel is of substantial dimensions, 96 cm × 70 cm, which may indicate that it was destined as a despotic icon for the wooden templon (iconostasis) of a church. Its iconographic type can be described as that of the Virgin of Tenderness (Eleousa or Glykophilousa in Greek) because the Virgin’s left cheek touches softly the right cheek of her son (see Fig. 0.2).2 Though this icon does not bear any sign of an inscription with its painter’s name, soon after its purchase it was attributed to the Cretan painter Angelos Akotantos, who was active in Venetian Candia (modern Heraklion) in the years 1425–1450. Six years later, in 2016, the Cleveland Museum of Art acquired a second icon representing the Holy Trinity (Severance and Greta Millikin Trust 2016.32).3 It shows God the Father and Christ seated on a large wooden bench, while the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, is painted against the golden background between them on either side of their shoulders. Two hymnographers flank the composition, namely St. Kosmas the Poet on the left side and St. Joseph the Poet on the right side, each one suspending an open scroll from the arched window of an oblong building. The icon measures 35.5 cm × 62.5 cm, its width, therefore, exceeding its height. Its horizontal shape may suggest that it was originally intended to be placed above the Royals Doors of a church’s wooden templon. No inscription with

 Stephen N. Fliegel and Dean Yoder, “The Virgin Eleousa: An Extremely Rare Painted Icon Is Now on View after Painstaking Conservation,” in Cleveland Art 2012 Highlights, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, https://www.clevelandart.org/magazine/cleveland-art-2012-highlights/vir gin-eleousa. This icon is the reason that I first met with Stephen Fliegel back in 2010. Our meeting happened at the Benaki Museum, Athens during an exhibition The Hand of Angelos: An Icon Painter in Venetian Crete, dedicated to the painter Angelos Akotantos. As the curator of the exhibition, I took Stephen and his colleague, Dean Yoder, around the show, and while standing in front of each icon we talked for long hours about the painter Angelos and his contribution to Cretan icon-painting.  For the iconographic type of the Virgin of Tenderness in Cretan icons with a rich list of surviving examples, see Chrysanthi Baltoyianni, Icons: The Mother of God in the Incarnation and the Passion (Athens: Adam Publications, 1994), 17–31, 38–40, pls. 1–20, 33–37. The icon of the Cleveland Museum of Art is included among these examples, entry no. 2, 24–25, pls. 1–4.  Icon of the New Testament Trinity, ca. 1450, tempera and gold on wood panel, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2016.32. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-011

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its painter’s name has survived and no attribution to a specific painter has been proposed. This icon has been described as Constantinopolitan and given a date ca. 1450. No matter whether the icon of the Holy Trinity bears an inscription with its painter’s name or not, I think that this is also the work of a Cretan painter active around 1450, who was familiar with Constantinopolitan painting.4 In between these two purchases, one more Cretan icon came to the attention of Stephen Fliegel, who started considering its acquisition. The icon belonged to a private collector in Paris, Hubert de Chanville, to whose family it was bequeathed by his great grand uncle, Édouard Gauttier d’Arc.5 In 2010, at the time of the Hand of Angelos exhibition, de Chanville wrote to inform me that he had in his possession an icon whose subject matter was identical to that of an icon included in the show.6 He also informed me that it was by accident that he had found a copy of the Hand of Angelos exhibition catalogue in the bookshop at the Louvre. After the closing of the exhibition, I paid a special visit to Paris in order to see the icon with my own eyes, and was subsequently really happy to be able to exchange with Stephen my views about its iconography and style.7 In the end, the icon was not purchased by the Cleveland Museum of Art, but was acquired by the Louvre some years later, in 2019.8 I will focus on this icon as it helps me to explore one dimension of the question that the title of this paper is asking: do names matter? The icon measures 66 cm × 73 cm, and shows Christ and a young military saint (Figure 10.1). Christ occupies the left side of the composition, seated on an elaborate wooden throne. Turning towards the right he is conversing with a young military saint who stands opposite him. The saint’s name, Ο ΑΓΙΟC ΦΑΝΟΥΡΙΟC (= Saint Phanourios), is written in capital letters on the golden background on either side of

 Maria Vassilaki, “Byzantine Icon-Painting around 1400: Constantinople or Crete?,” in Byzantine Images and their Afterlives: Essays in Honor of Annemarie Weyl Carr, ed. Lynn Jones (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), 167–79.  Édouard Gauttier d’Arc (1799–1843) was a man of letters, the author of an impressive number of books, and a translator. He also had a remarkable diplomatic career. He served as consul general of France in Italy, Greece, Spain, and Egypt. When he was serving in Alexandria, Egypt he got an infection and after serious complications died in Barcelona while traveling back from Egypt to France. He was forty-four years old. An obituary written by Sainte-Croix Pajot in the Revue de l’Orient 1843, 230, gives a very detailed account of Édouard Gauttier d’Arc’s life and achievements.  Maria Vassilaki, ed., The Hand of Angelos: An Icon Painter in Venetian Crete, exh. cat., Benaki Museum 16 November 2010–31 January 2011 (Athens and London: Lund Humphries, 2010).  I want to thank deeply Hubert de Chanville and his wife Pascale (d. 2018) for all the kindness and hospitality offered to me during my visit to Paris.  Nicolas Milovanovic, “Une nouvelle icône crétoise pour le Louvre: Le Christ et saint Phanourios de Silvestros Desos,” Louvre. Acquisitions 2019, Peintures, 24. See also, Nicolas Milovanovic, “Les icônes peintes du Louvre. Histoire d’une collection,” Revue de l’art no 216.2 (2022): 35, fig. 28.

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Figure 10.1: Silvestros Desos, Christ and St. Phanourios, first half of the seventeenth century, 73 × 66 cm. Photograph taken in 2011 when the icon was in the possession of Hubert de Chanville, Paris, inv. No. RFML.PE.2019.21.1. Photo: Guillaume Benoit.

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his halo. St. Phanourios brings his left arm, bent at the elbow, in front of his chest, supporting a long spear that is placed diagonally on his left shoulder. Christ is blessing with his right hand and is holding in his left a wooden cross with a flaming candle on its top, offering it to St. Phanourios, who has just grabbed it with his right hand. In his left hand Christ also holds an open scroll with an inscription in capital letters that reads: Λάβε παρ’ ἐμοῦ | τ(ὴν) χάριν τ(ῶν) θαυμάτ(ων) κ(αὶ) τοῖς | σοὶ προστρέχου|σι γενοῦ προστά(της). | Αἰχμαλώτους | λύτρωσαι πικρᾶς δουλίας. | Κυβερνήτης φάνη|θι τ(ῶν) ἐν θαλάσσῃ. | Ρῶσιν χορή|γα τοῖς δεινῶς | ἀσθενοῦσι. | Ζημείας φανέ|ρωσιν τάχιστα ποίει.| Φανερούμενος τέρας | καί σημείοις. | Ὦ Φανούριε λαῷ | τῷ χριστωνύμῳ.

The inscription can be translated as follows: Behold from Me the grace of miracles; protect all who approach you. Relieve the captives of bitter bonds; lead all men who strive at sea; strengthen those who ail immensely. Reveal to men all that is lost, revealing signs and wonders, O Phanourios, to the People of the Lord.

This composition is identical in every single detail to that of a two-sided icon, which originally belonged to the monastery of Valsamonero in central Crete, but is kept today in the nearby monastery of Vrondissi. The Valsamonero icon shows Christ and St. Phanourios on one side (Figure 10.2), and St. Phanourios alone on the other (Figure 10.3).9 This icon was of a special importance for the monastery in Valsamonero, placed inside the chapel of St. Phanourios, which, according to its dedicatory inscription, was erected in 1426 and decorated with frescoes in 1431.10 In fact, it was originally the devotional icon of St. Phanourios placed inside his homonymous chapel on a wooden icon stand. As a two-sided icon, it was most probably taken in procession on the feast day of the saint, on August 27. The side with Christ and St. Phanourios originally had two horizontal zones on its upper and lower sides with scenes from the life and miracles of St. Phanourios, of which only the upper zone survives. The lower zone must have been cut off at a later stage, presumably in order to allow the icon to fit into the dimensions of the chapel’s wooden templon, to which it was adjusted. This cutting off also affected the rear side of the icon with St. Phanourios, who was originally shown full length

 Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, entry no. 21, 145–46 (Manolis Borboudakis).  Klaus Gallas, Klaus Wessel, and Manolis Borboudakis, Byzantinisches Kreta (Munich: Hirmer Verlag, 1983), 313–21; and Myrtali Acheimastou-Potamianou, Maria Bormpoudaki and Angeliki Katsioti, The Frescoes of the Valsamonero Monastery: Viewpoints and Beliefs in the Late Byzantine Painting of Venetian Crete (Athens: Research Center for Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Art at the Academy of Athens, 2020), 291–348, 484–93.

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treading on a dragon. As a result of the re-cutting, the saint’s legs from almost the knee level disappeared as did most of the dragon on which the saint was stepping; only a small part of the dragon’s raised black head has survived. Paint losses in big areas along the central axis and the right side of the composition have badly affected the overall appearance of the youthful soldier-saint.

Figure 10.2: Angelos Akotantos (ca. 1425–1450), Christ and St. Phanourios, the front side of the twosided icon, tempera on wood. Crete, Valsamonero monastery, now kept in the Vrondissi monastery.

The side with Christ and St. Phanourios is badly damaged too, with important paint losses occurring especially along the central axis and its left side. The figure of Christ is also heavily overpainted, as a result of which he is shown standing and not seated on the throne as he should have originally been. On the green foreground, to the right of St. Phanourios, the signature of the well-known painter Angelos (ΧΕΙΡ ΑΓΓΕΛΟΥ = the hand of Angelos), in black capital letters, has survived intact. Angelos was active in Candia, the capital city of Venetian Crete, during the second quarter of the fifteenth century. The role of the painter Angelos in giving St. Phanourios his facial characteristics and various iconographic attributes

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Figure 10.3: St. Phanourios, the rear side of the two-sided icon (see Figure 10.2). Crete, Valsamonero monastery, now kept in the Vrondissi monastery.

is undeniable.11 In this process Angelos must have collaborated closely with the abbot of the monastery of Valsamonero, Ionas Palamas, who initiated the veneration of the hitherto unknown St. Phanourios in Venetian Crete. At Palamas’s initiative, according to the surviving dedicatory inscription, a chapel dedicated to this saint was erected in 1426 to the west of the existing two-aisled katholikon of the Valsamonero monastery and decorated with frescoes in 1431, executed by the painter Konstantinos Eirinikos. This monastery, consequently, became the center of St. Phanourios’s cult in Crete. The icon in Paris not only allows us to reconstruct the badly damaged composition of the two-sided icon with Christ conversing with St. Phanourios, but also offers the key for a better understanding of the mechanism in the promotion of  Maria Vassilaki, “Saint Phanourios: Cult and Iconography,” Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 10 (1981): 223–39, repr. in Maria Vassilaki, The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), chapter 5, 81–110. See also, Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, entry nos. 17–24, 136–51.

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St. Phanourios’s cult in Venetian Crete in the first half of the fifteenth century. The text on Christ’s scroll enumerates a series of reasons thanks to which Phanourios is to become a saint. Christ is granting Phanourios the power to perform miracles while offering him his main attribute: that of a cross ending in a flaming candle. At first glance the icon did not appear to have any inscription of the painter’s name. The fact that there was an identical icon from Valsamonero with Christ conversing with St. Phanourios, bearing the signature of Angelos, made us believe that the icon in Paris could also be attributed to this painter. Moreover, Angelos used to repeat certain iconographic subjects and compositions more than once, as his icons not only of St. Phanourios, but also of the Embrace of the Apostles Peter and Paul,12 of Christ the Vine,13 and the Deesis14 seem to indicate. At the same time, the style of the icon in Paris follows closely the stylistic devices of Angelos. For example, the dark flesh underpaint for the faces of both Christ and St. Phanourios is lightened by highlights in the form of parallel white lines exactly in the way Angelos did. It was important, however, to be absolutely certain about such an attribution and dating. For this reason, we decided to carry out a technical examination on the painted surface of the icon. Dean Yoder, a conservator at the Cleveland Museum of Art, conducted this examination and, using infrared light, was able to see that an inscription with its painter’s name had survived intact on the lower right corner (Figure 10.4).15 It is written in capital letters and reads: ΧΕΙΡ CΙΛΒΕCΤΡΟΥ ΤΟΥ ΔΕCΩ (= the hand of Silvestros Desos). Silvestros Desos was an abbot at the monastery of Vrontissi between the years 1647–1650.16 An icon of St. Demetrios enthroned, preserved in the Byzantine and Christian Museum, Athens (BXM 2047) also bears the signature of Silvestros

 Maria Vassilaki, “A Cretan Icon in the Ashmolean: The Embrace of Peter and Paul,” Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 40 (1990): 405–22, repr. in Vassilaki, The Painter Angelos, chapter 6, 111–35. See also Maria Vassilaki, “Cretan Icon-Painting and the Council of Ferrara/Florence (1438/39),” Mouseio Benaki 13–14 (2013–2014): 115–27.  Apostolos G. Mantas, “The Iconographic Subject ‘Christ the Vine’ in Byzantine and PostByzantine Art,” Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 24 (2003): 347–60; and Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, entry nos. 28–30, 159–63.  Nano Chatzidakis, “The Deesis by the Painter Angelos in the Kanellopoulos Museum and the Use of its Anthivolon in the Fifteenth Century” (in Greek with an English summary), Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 27 (2006): 283–96; and Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, entry nos. 36, 46, 174–75, 194–95.  I want to thank Dean Yoder for sharing with me all the results of his technical examination.  Manolis Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi meta tin Alosi (1450–1830) [= Greek Painters after the Fall of Constantinople (1450–1830)], vol. 1 (Athens: Center for Neohellenic Research, 1987), 261.

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Figure 10.4: Inscription with the name of the painter Silvestros Desos, infrared photograph of the icon in Figure 10.1. Photo: Dean Yoder.

Desos in slightly different form: Σιλβέστρου του Δέσου (= by Silvestros Desos).17 One more icon signed by Silvestros Desos has survived in the church of St. Nicholas in the village of Kastania in Konitsa, Epirus.18 It shows the Adoration of the Magi and bears the signature: Χείρ Σιλβέστρου (μον)αχοῦ τοῦ Δέσω (= the hand of the monk Silvestros Desos). The icon of Christ conversing with St. Phanourios is, therefore, the third signed work by Silvestros Desos of which we are aware. The painter’s signature on the icon from Paris makes it absolutely clear that it dates to the first half of the seventeenth century during the lifetime of Silvestros Desos. We know exactly when Desos became abbot at the Vrondissi monastery— that is in the years 1647–1650—but we do not know whether he was a monk or an abbot at the time that he painted the icon of Christ with St. Phanourios. This could certainly give us a more precise date for the icon. The case of the icon with Christ and St. Phanourios has shown that there are occasions in which the name of a painter really does matter, not only because it offers firm grounds for its dating but also because it helps us refrain from adding spuriously attributed works to the oeuvre of particular artists based solely on  Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi, vol. 1, 261, fig. 135.  Panayotis L. Vocotopoulos, “Vyzantina, Mesaionika kai Neotera Mnimeia Ipeirou,” Archaiologikon Deltion 31 (1976), Chronika: 216–17, fig. 166a; and Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, 261, icon no. 3.

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their style or technique. There are other occasions, however, in which painters’ signatures can become very misleading in cases when they were added later. This takes me to a very interesting group of icons and triptychs preserved in the monastery of St. Catherine at Sinai, which bear inscriptions with painters’ names that were all added centuries later than the time they were painted. We are lucky to know that this is due to the activity of the Cretan painter, Ioannis Kornaros (1745–1821).19 Kornaros visited Sinai in 1775 after an invitation by the monastery’s abbot, Kyrillos II, who was also a Cretan. He must have stayed in Sinai for a considerable number of years, until about 1790. During his stay, he executed paintings such as the one with the view of the monastery of Sinai for the back of the abbot’s wooden throne inside the main church (katholikon), which bears the date 1778.20 But more than this, Kornaros overpainted a large number of icons and triptychs, adding on most occasions, arbitrarily, the names of Cretan painters and inaccurate dates. For example, the signature of the Cretan painter Victor, who was active in the second half of the seventeenth century, appears on the wing of a triptych (inv. no. 1566) in the form of ΒΙΚΤΟΡΟC ΚΡΗΤΟC ΑΧΝΑ (= by Victor the Cretan 1651).21 This wing shows the Holy Mandylion and is completely overpainted (Figure 10.5). The rest of the triptych’s wings include images of the Annunciation, the Dormition of the Virgin, the Burial of St. Catherine, and Moses before the Burning Bush. The triptych’s iconography and style are very close to the work of the Cretan painter Andreas Ritzos, who is documented in the years 1451–1492.22 Therefore, this is not a triptych of the second half of the seventeenth century, but has to be dated to the second half of the fifteenth century.23

 Manolis Chatzidakis and Eugenia Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi meta tin Alosi (1450–1830) [= Greek Painters after the Fall of Constantinople (1450–1830)], vol. 2 (Athens: Center for Neohellenic Research, 1997), 110–13.  Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, vol. 2, 112, fig. 58; For a color reproduction see Konstantinos Manafis, ed., Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery of Saint Catherine (Athens: Ekdotiki Athinon, 1990), pl. on p. 15.  On the artistic activity of the painter Victor, see Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi, vol. 1, 192–201. For the activity of Kornaros at Sinai, see Maria Vassilaki, Cretan Icons and Cretan Painters at Sinai (Athens: Academy of Athens, 2021).  On the artistic activity of Andreas Ritzos, see Mario Cattapan, “I pittori Andrea e Nicola Rizo da Candia,” Thesaurismata 10 (1973): 238–82; Manolis Chatzidakis, “Les débuts de l’école crétoise et la question de l’école dite italogrecque,” in Mnimosynon Sophias Antoniadi, ed. Manoussos Manoussakas (Venice: Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies, 1974), repr. in Manolis Chatzidakis, Études sur la peinture postbyzantine (London: Variorum Reprints, 1976), no. IV, 175–82; and Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, vol. 2, 324–32.  Maria Vassilaki, “Commissioning Art in Fifteenth-Century Venetian Crete: The Case of Sinai,” in I Greci durante la venetocrazia: Uomini, spazio, idee (XIII–XVIII sec.), Atti del Convegno Internazionale

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Figure 10.5: Andreas Ritzos (?, doc. 1451–1492), The Holy Mandylion on the wing of the triptych, Candia (Crete), egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai, inv. no. 1566.

There is a second triptych (inv. no. 1574), also in Sinai, with the signature ΧΕIΡ ΔΑΜΑCΚYΝΟΥ ΚΡΗ(ΤΟC) (= the hand of Damaskynos the Cretan). Michael Damaskinos was a well-known Cretan painter active in the second half of the sixteenth century.24 The front side of the triptych shows the Deesis in the middle, the Annunciation on the left wing, and the Dormition of the Virgin on the right. The triptych’s wing with the added signature of Michael Damaskinos appears on the rear side of the left wing, which remains visible when the triptych is closed (Figure 10.6). It shows an angel holding the Holy Mandylion. The rear side of the right wing represents the Burial of St. Catherine and Moses before the Burning Bush and receiving the Tablets of the Law. The iconography and style of this wing

di Studi, Venezia 3–7 dicembre 2007, ed. Chryssa Maltezou, Angeliki Tzavara, and Despoina Vlassi (Venice: Istituto Ellenico di Studi Bizantini e Postbizantini di Venezia, 2009), 746, pls. 3–4.  On the artistic activity of Michael Damaskinos, see Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi, vol. 1, 241–54.

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Figure 10.6: Workshop of Andreas and Nikolaos Ritzos, An Angel Holding the Holy Mandylion on the wing of the triptych, Candia (Crete), ca. 1480–1500, egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai, inv. no. 1574.

allows us to attribute this triptych to the icon-workshop of Andreas Ritzos and his son Nikolaos and therefore date it in the last decades of the fifteenth century.25 Yet another triptych (inv. no. 1588) in Sinai also bears the signature ΧΕIΡ ΔΑΜΑCΚYΝΟΥ ΚΡΗΤ(ΟC) (= the hand of Damaskynos the Cretan). The central wing of the triptych shows the Transfiguration of Christ—a reference to the sixthcentury apse mosaic in the monastery’s main church (katholikon). The signature of Damaskinos appears on the rear side of the left wing, which shows St. Sisoes at the tomb of Alexander the Great. This side remains visible when the triptych is

 On the artistic activity of Nikolaos Ritzos, see Cattapan, “I pittori Andrea e Nicolao Rizo,” 252–53, 279–82; Chatzidakis, “Les débuts,” 182–83; and Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, 333–34.

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closed. The rest of the triptych’s wings on both its front and rear side are decorated with full length saints. There is one more icon in Sinai, on which Kornaros added the name of Michael Damaskinos: ΧΕΙΡ ΔΑΜΑCΚΥΝΟΥ ΚΡΗ(ΤΟC) (=the hand of Damaskynos the Cretan). On this occasion he also added the date ΑΦΟΑ (= 1571). It is an icon of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple, hanging on the western wall of the monastery’s main church (katholikon).26 Manolis Chatzidakis challenged the authenticity of Damaskinos’s signature on this icon in 1962. The signature of Michael Damaskinos, which appears on the triptychs and the icon mentioned above, is different from the signature that Damaskinos himself used.27 First, he always put his first name, ΜΙΧΑΗΛ (= Michael), before his surname. Second, he spells his surname not with a Y but with an H: ΔΑΜΑCΚΗΝΟΥ rather than ΔΑΜΑCΚΥΝΟΥ. For example, on the icon of St. Anthony in the Byzantine and Christian Museum, Athens, which is a genuine work of Michael Damaskinos, the inscription with the painter’ s name reads ΧΕΙΡ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΔΑΜΑCΚΗΝΟΥ.28 Second, he never put his place of origin, ΚΡΗΤΟC (= the Cretan), in any of his signed icons. Third, the lettering of the inscriptions in the works at Sinai is completely different from that of the genuine works of Damaskinos. Ioannis Kornaros added the signature of one more Cretan painter, Emmanuel Tzanes (1610–1690), to an icon with the Virgin holding the Christ Child: ΧΕΙΡ ΑΙΜΑΝΟΥΗΛ ΙΕΡΕΟC ΤΟΥ ΤΖΑΝΕ. ΑΦΝΑ΄ (= the hand of Aimanuel Tzanes. 1551) (Figure 10.7). The Virgin holding the Christ Child is seated on a cloud and surrounded by four prophets.29 It appears, however, that the painter of this icon is Emmanuel Tzanes, even though the date ΑΦΝΑ΄ (= 1551) is wrong. Tzanes was active in the seventeenth century and not in the sixteenth, as the date 1551 seems to indicate. If this icon ever had a date, this should have been ΑΧΝΑ΄ (= 1651).30 Ioannis Kornaros himself makes an appearance on this icon through an inscription, in which he presents

 Manolis Chatzidakis, Icônes de Saint-Georges des Grecs et de la collection de l’Institut Hellénique de Venise (Venice: Bibliothèque de l’Institut Hellénique de Venise, 1962), 196; and Nikolaos Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons (Cretan School),” in Manafis, Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery, 125–32, at 129–30, fig. 89.  Michael Damaskinos made use of a whole range of signatures, the type ΧΕΙΡ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΔΑΜΑCΚΗΝΟΥ being one of them. A list of all the signatures Michael Damaskinos used is to be found in Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi, vol. 1, 241.  Myrtali Acheimastou-Potamianou, Icons of the Byzantine Museum of Athens (Athens: Ministry of Culture/Archaeological Receipts Fund, 1998), entry no. 53, 178–79.  Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons,” 131, fig. 97.  Andreas Xyngopoulos had noticed, already in 1957, this discrepancy in the date of the icon. Andreas Xyngopoulos, Schediasma istorias tis thriskeftikis zografikis meta tin Alosi (Athens: Archaeological Society, 1957), 226, n. 3.

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Figure 10.7: Emmanouel Tzanes, The Virgin and Christ Child Seated on a Cloud and Surrounded by Prophets, seventeenth century, egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai.

himself as the one who, as he says himself, “renovated” it, and the year in which he did so: ΑΝΑΙΚΕΝΙΣΘΗ ΠΑΡΑ ΙΩ(ΑΝΝΟΥ) ΚΟΡΝΑΡΟΥ. 1778 (= renovated by Ioannis Kornaros. 1778). We do not know whether the icon of the Virgin was originally signed by Emmanuel Tzanes, and whether once the condition of its signature deteriorated, Kornaros overpainted an already existing signature. This also seems to be the case with one more icon in Sinai, placed on an icon stand inside the chapel of the Holy Fathers of Raithou and Sinai, located on the

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south-eastern corner of the monastery’s main church.31 The icon is divided into four zones; the uppermost zone shows the Transfiguration of Christ, and the rest represent scenes of monastic life (Figure 10.8). An inscription on the lower left side of the Transfiguration reads: ΧΕΙΡ ΓΕΩ(Ρ)ΓΙΟΥ ΚΛΟΝΤΖΑ ΤΟΥ ΚΡΗΤ(ΟC) ΑΧΓ (= the hand of Georgios Klontzas the Cretan 1603). The lettering and whole style of the inscription leave no doubt that it was written by Ioannis Kornaros. However, this icon must have been painted by Georgios Klontzas, as its iconography and style suggest. Klontzas was a well-known Cretan painter active in Venetian Candia in the sixteenth century (ca. 1530–1608).32 More icons by Georgios Klontzas have been preserved in Sinai, some of which also have problematic inscriptions. An icon which illustrates In Thee Rejoiceth, a hymn dedicated to the Virgin, is hanging behind the wooden templon of the main church.33 The inscription ΧΕΙΡ ΓΕΩΡΓΙΟΥ ΚΛΟΝΤΖΑ ΚΡΗΤΟC ΑΧΔ (= the hand of Georgios Klontzas the Cretan 1604) is identical to the one on the icon with the Transfiguration and scenes of monastic life, mentioned above. Once again, the iconography and style of this icon leave no doubt that it was painted by Georgios Klontzas, but the surviving inscription was written by Ioannis Kornaros. The latter also put his own name in an inscription on the left side of the ground of the lower right scene: ΑΝΑΝΕΩCΗC ΠΑΡΑ ΙΩΑΝΝΟΥ ΚΟΡΝΑΡΟΥ ΚΡ (ΗΤΟC) 1778 (= renewal by Ioannis Kornaros the Cretan 1778). My last example of Kornaros’s activity in Sinai concerns an icon in which he most probably overpainted an existing painter’s inscription, that of the painter Angelos with whose work this article began. It is an icon showing St. John the Theologian dictating the text of his Gospel to his disciple Prochoros (Figure 10.9),34 which hangs today on the walls of the monastery’s Skevophylakion (Sacristy). St. John the Theologian, on the left, sits at the opening of the cave dictating the text of his Gospel to his disciple Prochoros, who is seated on the right side. The scheme of this composition is based upon an iconographic convention, in which the cave of the Apocalypse on the island of Patmos is combined with the

 Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons,” 130, fig. 99; and Robert S. Nelson and Kristen M. Collins, eds., Holy Image, Hallowed Ground: Icons from Sinai, exh. cat, Los Angeles, The J. Paul Getty Museum, 14 November 2006–4 March 2007 (Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 2006), entry no. 42, 232–33 (Kristine M. Hess).  Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, vol. 2, 83–96.  Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons,” 130–31, fig. 98.  Kurt Weitzmann, Ikonen aus dem Katharinenkloster auf dem Berge Sinai (Berlin: Union Verlag, 1980), icon no. 20, pl. 22; Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons,” 127, fig. 80; and Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, entry no. 40, 182–83 (Maria Vassilaki).

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Figure 10.8: Georgios Klontzas, Transfiguration and Scenes of Monastic Life, sixteenth century, tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai.

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Figure 10.9: Angelos Akotantos, St. John and Prochoros, Candia (Crete), egg tempera on wood. St. Catherine’s monastery, Sinai.

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writing of John’s Gospel.35 The painter’s signature on the lower right side of the composition reads: ΧΕΙΡ ΑΓΓΕΛΟΥ ΚΡΗΤΟC (= the hand of Angelos the Cretan). This differs from the established signature of the painter Angelos, ΧΕΙΡ ΑΓΓΕΛΟΥ (= the hand of Angelos), which must have originally existed on the icon.36 Ioannis Kornaros added, therefore, the word ΚΡΗΤΟC (= the Cretan), as he also did in all the cases mentioned above. It looks that for Kornaros, a Cretan himself, it was important to add the painter’s place of origin—that is, Crete. Is this an expression of chauvinism from Kornaros’s side? I am afraid that it is, or at least this is what it looks like. The engagement of Ioannis Kornaros with works by the painter Angelos are also evident in an icon of the Virgin Hodegetria, which was preserved in the monastery of St. George in old Cairo, but perished in a fire. According to information offered by publications of the late nineteenth century, there was an inscription on the icon reading: ΧΕΙΡ ΚΥΡ-ΑΓΓΕΛΟΥ ΚΡΗΤΟC AXΔ (= the hand of kyr-Angelos the Cretan 1604).37 The date 1604 caused serious problems in twentieth-century scholarship for the following reasons. As there was no way to check the authenticity of the inscription and, consequently, the year 1604 written on it, it was taken for granted that Angelos was a painter active in Venetian Crete during the last years of the sixteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth.38 In 1981 I published a paper in which I showed that both Angelos’s signature and the date on the lost Cairo icon must have been fakes and were added by Ioannis Kornaros.39 I also suggested that the painter Angelos, whose first name only was known to us, should be identified with Angelos Akotantos, a Cretan painter of the first half of the fifteenth century,

 As is well known, it was the text of the Revelation that John wrote in the Patmos cave and not his Gospel, as this composition implies. Nancy P. Ševčenko, “The Cave of the Apocalypse,” in Praktika tou Diethnous Symposiou me thema: He Mone Hag. Ioannou tou Theologou – 900 chronia historikes martyrias (1088–1988) (Athens: Hetaireia Vyzantinon kai Metavyzantinon Meleton, 1989), 1–11, repr. Nancy P. Ševčenko, The Celebration of the Saints in Byzantine Art and Liturgy (Farnham: Ashgate/Variorum, 2013), chapter 15.  On the painter Angelos and his artistic activity in Venetian Candia (ca. 1425–1450), see Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos. See also Vassilaki, The Painter Angelos.  Gerasimos Mazarakis, Simeiosis peri ton en ti kata to palaion Kairon iera moni tou Agiou Georgiou evretheison archaeon ieron eikonon (Cairo: Greek Printing House of Gerasimos G. Mazarakis and Co, 1888), 272; and Joseph Strzygowski, “Die Gemäldesammlung des griechischen Patriarcats in Kairo,” Byzantinische Zeitschrift 4 (1895): 590–91.  Xyngopoulos, Schediasma istorias, 169; Manolis Chatzidakis, Icons of Patmos: Questions of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Painting (Athens: National Bank of Greece, 1985), 116–19. Chatzidakis accepted the redating of Angelos in the fifteenth century, Chatzidakis, Ellines zografoi, vol. 1, 147.  Maria Vassilaki, “O zografos Angelos Akotantos; to ergo kai i diathiki tou (1436),” Thesaurismata 18 (1981): 290–98, repr. in English, “The Painter Angelos Akotantos: His Work and Will (1436),” in Vassilaki, The Painter Angelos, chapter 1, 3–15.

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whose name is known from the autograph will he wrote on the occasion of a journey to Constantinople in 1436.40 That Angelos and Angelos Akotantos were one and the same was made evident by the correspondences between the known icons of Angelos and the contents of the will. For example, references in the will imply a close relationship between Angelos Akotantos, the monastery of Valsamonero, and its abbot, Ionas Palamas: the painter left money in his will for a memorial service to be performed by Ionas Palamas forty days after his death in Valsamonero. Angelos’s work was also directly associated with the monastery of Valsamonero and with its abbot, who initiated the construction and decoration of the chapel dedicated to St. Phanourios.41 Angelos had painted the icons for the wooden templon (iconostasis) in this chapel as well as the devotional two-sided icon with Christ conversing with St. Phanourios on one side and St. Phanourios alone on the other, discussed earlier in this paper. Angelos was also associated with Sinai and its metochion (dependency) in Candia. Icons painted by Angelos have been preserved on Sinai42 and there is an icon bearing his signature in the monastery of St. John the Theologian on Patmos with the Sinaitic theme of St. Catherine and the Virgin Kyriotissa as the Burning Bush.43 Akotantos left in his will money and his house to the monks of Sinai and their metochion in Candia. Finally, a decisive role in this identification was played by a tondo icon of St. Catherine located at Skradin, Dalmatia that can be attributed to Angelos.44 Indeed, a tondo icon of St. Catherine is mentioned in Akotantos’s will. It has been generally accepted today that Angelos and Angelos Akotantos were one and the same person, a Cretan painter, whose activity is placed in the years ca. 1425–1450, and who always used to sign his icons with his first name alone. It has thus become evident that Angelos was the leading artistic personality of the second quarter of the fifteenth century, and that his contribution to the evolution of Cretan icon painting was immense.

 The will of Angelos Akotantos was first published by Manoussos Manoussakas, “Le testament d’Ange Acotanto (1436), peintre crétois inconnu,” Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 2 (1960–1961): 139–51 (in Greek with a French abstract). Parts of the will, translated in English, are to be found in Cyril Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire: 312–1453. Sources and Documents (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1972), 258–59. For an English translation of the full text, Maria Kazanaki-Lappa, “The Will of Angelos Akotantos,” in Vassilaki, The Hand of Angelos, chapter 6, 104–13, esp. Appendix 111–13.  See above, note 10.  Drandakis, “Postbyzantine Icons,” 126–27, figs. 77, 78, 80, 81; Chatzidakis and Drakopoulou, Ellines zografoi, vol. 2, icon no. 21.  Chatzidakis, Icons of Patmos, icon no. 68, 116–17, pls. 49, 127.  Vassilaki, “The Art of Angelos,” 114, fig. 20. The icon is kept today in the Episcopal Palace of Šibenik, Croatia. I want to thank my colleague Zoraida Demori Staničić for providing me with the information about the present location of this icon.

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The title of this paper is asking whether painters’ names matter or not. The cases I have examined have shown that they do matter on certain occasions, as they can offer a firm ground for dating an icon, such as, for example, the icon with Christ and St. Phanourios signed by Silvestros Desos (see Figure 10.1). However, artists’ names inscribed on icons cannot be always taken for granted. One must be aware of troublemakers such as Ioannis Kornaros, who can make one’s life as an art historian very difficult.

Bibliography Acheimastou-Potamianou, Myrtali. Icons of the Byzantine Museum of Athens. Athens: Ministry of Culture/Archaeological Receipts Fund, 1998. Acheimastou-Potamianou, Myrtali, Maria Bormpoudaki, and Angeliki Katsioti. The Frescoes of the Valsamonero Monastery: Viewpoints and Beliefs in the Late Byzantine Painting of Venetian Crete. Athens: Research Center for Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Art at the Academy of Athens, 2020. Baltoyianni, Chrysanthi. Icons: The Mother of God in the Incarnation and the Passion. Athens: Adam Publications, 1994. Cattapan, Mario. “I pittori Andrea e Nicola Rizo da Candia.” Thesaurismata 10 (1973): 238–82. Chatzidakis, Manolis. “Les débuts de l’école crétoise et la question de l’école dite italogrecque.” In Mnimosynon Sophias Antoniadi, edited by Manoussos Manoussakas, 169–211. Venice: Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies, 1974. Reprint, Manolis Chatzidakis. Études sur la peinture postbyzantine, no. IV, 175–82. London: Variorum Reprints, 1976. Chatzidakis, Manolis. Ellines zografoi meta tin Alosi (1450–1830) [= Greek Painters after the Fall of Constantinople (1450–1830)], vol. 1. Athens: Center for Neohellenic Research, 1987. Chatzidakis, Manolis. Études sur la peinture postbyzantine. London: Variorum Reprints, 1976. Chatzidakis, Manolis. Icônes de Saint-Georges des Grecs et de la collection de l’Institut Hellénique de Venise. Venice: Bibliothèque de l’Institut Hellénique de Venise, 1962. Chatzidakis, Manolis. Icons of Patmos: Questions of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Painting. Athens: National Bank of Greece, 1985. Chatzidakis, Manolis, and Eugenia Drakopoulou. Ellines zografoi meta tin Alosi (1450–1830) [Greek Painters after the Fall of Constantinople (1450–1830)], vol. 2. Athens: Center for Neohellenic Research, 1997. Chatzidakis, Nano. “The Deesis by the Painter Angelos in the Kanellopoulos Museum and the Use of its Anthivolon in the Fifteenth Century.” (In Greek with an English summary). Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 27 (2006): 283–96. Drandakis, Nikolaos. “Postbyzantine Icons (Cretan School).” In Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery of Saint Catherine, edited by Konstantinos Manafis, 125–32. Athens: Ekdotiki Athinon, 1990. Fliegel, Stephen N., and Dean Yoder. “The Virgin Eleousa: An Extremely Rare Painted Icon Is Now on View after Painstaking Conservation.” In Cleveland Art 2012 Highlights, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, https://www.clevelandart.org/magazine/cleveland-art-2012-highlights/virgin-eleousa. Gallas, Klaus, Klaus Wessel, and Manolis Borboudakis. Byzantinisches Kreta. Munich: Hirmer Verlag, 1983.

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Kazanaki-Lappa, Maria. “The Will of Angelos Akotantos.” In The Hand of Angelos: An Icon Painter in Venetian Crete, edited by Maria Vassilaki, 104–13. Athens and London: Lund Humphries, 2010. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same title, organized by and presented at the Benaki Museum, November 16, 2010–January 31, 2011. Manafis, Konstantinos, ed. Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery of Saint Catherine. Athens: Ekdotiki Athinon, 1990. Mango, Cyril. The Art of the Byzantine Empire: 312–1453. Sources and Documents. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1972. Manoussakas, Manoussos. “Le testament d’Ange Acotanto (1436), peintre crétois inconnu.” (In Greek with a French abstract). Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 2 (1960–1961): 139–51. Mantas, Apostolos G. “The Iconographic Subject ‘Christ the Vine’ in Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Art.” Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 24 (2003): 347–60. Mazarakis, Gerasimos. Simeiosis peri ton en ti kata to palaion Kairon iera moni tou Agiou Georgiou evretheison archaeon ieron eikonon. Cairo: Greek Printing House of Gerasimos G. Mazarakis and Co, 1888. Milovanovic, Nicolas. “Une nouvelle icône crétoise pour le Louvre: Le Christ et saint Phanourios de Silvestros Desos.” Louvre. Acquisitions 2019, Peintures, 24. Milovanovic, Nicolas. “Les icônes peintes du Louvre. Histoire d’une collection,” Revue de l’art 216.2 (2022): 23–37. Nelson, Robert S., and Kristen M. Collins, eds. Holy Image, Hallowed Ground: Icons from Sinai. Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 2006. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same title, organized by and presented at the J. Paul Getty Museum, November 14, 2006–March 4, 2007. Ševčenko, Nancy P. “The Cave of the Apocalypse.” In Praktika tou Diethnous Symposiou me thema: He Mone Hag. Ioannou tou Theologou-900 chronia historikes martyrias (1088–1988), 1–11. Athens: Hetaireia Vyzantinon kai Metavyzantinon Meleton, 1989. Reprint, Nancy P. Ševčenko. The Celebration of the Saints in Byzantine Art and Liturgy, chapter 15. Farnham: Ashgate/Variorum, 2013. Strzygowski, Joseph. “Die Gemäldesammlung des griechischen Patriarcats in Kairo.” Byzantinische Zeitschriscrift 4 (1895): 590–91. Vassilaki, Maria. “Byzantine Icon-Painting around 1400: Constantinople or Crete?.” In Byzantine Images and their Afterlives: Essays in Honor of Annemarie Weyl Carr, edited by Lynn Jones, 167–79. Farnham: Ashgate, 2014. Vassilaki, Maria. “Commissioning Art in Fifteenth-Century Venetian Crete: The Case of Sinai.” In I Greci durante la venetocrazia: Uomini, spazio, idee (XIII–XVIII sec.) Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studi, Venezia 3–7 dicembre 2007, edited by Chryssa Maltezou, Angeliki Tzavara, and Despoina Vlassi, 741–48. Venice: Istituto Ellenico di Studi Bizantini e Postbizantini di Venezia, 2009. Vassilaki, Maria. “A Cretan Icon in the Ashmolean: The Embrace of Peter and Paul.” Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 40 (1990): 405–22. Reprint, Maria Vassilaki. The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete, 111–35. Farnham: Ashgate, 2009. Vassilaki, Maria. “Cretan Icon-Painting and the Council of Ferrara/Florence (1438/39).” Mouseio Benaki 13–14 (2013–2014): 115–27. Vassilaki, Maria. Cretan Icons and Cretan Painters at Sinai. Athens: Academy of Athens, 2021. Vassilaki, Maria, ed. The Hand of Angelos: An Icon Painter in Venetian Crete. Athens and London: Lund Humphries, 2010. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same title, organized by and presented at the Benaki Museum, November 16, 2010–January 31, 2011.

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Vassilaki, Maria. “O zografos Angelos Akotantos; to ergo kai i diathiki tou (1436).” Thesaurismata 18 (1981): 290–98. Reprint in English, Maria Vassilaki. “The Painter Angelos Akotantos: His Work and Will (1436).” In The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete, 3–15. Farnham: Ashgate, 2009. Vassilaki, Maria. The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete. Farnham: Ashgate, 2009. Vassilaki, Maria. “Saint Phanourios: Cult and Iconography.” Deltion of the Christian Archaeological Society 10 (1981): 223–39. Reprint, Maria Vassilaki. The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete, chapter 5, 81–110. Farnham: Ashgate, 2009. Vocotopoulos, Panayotis L. “Vyzantina, Mesaionika kai Neotera Mnimeia Ipeirou.” Archaiologikon Deltion 31 (1976), Chronika, 210–17. Weitzmann, Kurt. Ikonen aus dem Katharinenkloster auf dem Berge Sinai. Berlin: Union Verlag, 1980. Xyngopoulos, Andreas. Schediasma istorias tis thriskeftikis zografikis meta tin Alosi. Athens: Archaeological Society, 1957.

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Chapter 11 The Case for Simon Marmion – Once Again Je suis Symon Marmion vif et mort Mort par nature, et vif entre les hommes —Jean Molinet, Epitaph, 1489

This brief addendum follows my previous three contributions in 1977, 1992, and 1997 to the study of Simon Marmion (active 1449–1489), an artist working in Amiens and Valenciennes.1 The six-stanza epitaph that once hung over the tombstone of Marmion extols his art for its verisimilitude: “he imagined everything and painted everything that could be painted” (“tout painct et tout ymaginé” and later “toutte rien pingible”).2 Written by Jean Molinet, chronicler of the Burgundian court and canon of the Church of Notre-Dame de Salles in Valenciennes, the epitaph further tells us that his work was much admired at court by “emperors, kings, counts, and earls.” Molinet’s godson (nephew?), the Belgian poet and humanist Jean Lemaire called Marmion the “prince d’enluminure” in his Couronne margaritique in 1505, and earlier in his Plainte du désiré of around 1503 or 1504, ranked him alongside other famous artists, Jean Poyer, Jean Fouquet, Roger van der Weyden, and Hugo van der Goes.3 Marmion’s memory was still very much alive in 1552, when the local antiquarian Louis Wicart in his early history of Valenciennes praised the artist’s abilities with reference to his execution of the ducal portraits of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, likening him to the

 Sandra Hindman, “The Case of Simon Marmion: Attributions and Documents,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 40 (1977): 185–204; Sandra Hindman, “Two Leaves from an Unknown Breviary: The Case for Simon Marmion,” in Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, ed. Thomas Kren (Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992), 223–32; Sandra Hindman, “Simon Marmion,” in Illuminations in the Robert Lehman Collection, ed. Sandra Hindman, et al. (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997), 60–72, no. 8.  Quoted in Chrétien César Auguste Dehaisnes, Recherches sur le retable de Saint-Bertin et sur Simon Marmion (Lille: L. Quarré, 1892), 72–74, at 73. For analysis of the epitaph see: Abolala Soudavar, Decoding Old Masters: Patrons, Princes and Enigmatic Paintings of the 15th Century (London: Tauris, 2008), 20–25.  Jean Stecher, ed., Œuvres de Jean Lemaire de Belges (Louvain: J. Lefever, 1882), IV, 162. Note: I am grateful to Gregory Clark for sharing his unpublished material with me, Elliot Adam for helpful interventions, Peter Bovenmyer and Laura Light for editorial suggestions. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-012

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Greek painters Apelles and Zeuxis: “[the portraits are by] the entire hand of Simon Marmion, to whom, when he was alive, Apelles himself or Zeuxis would have ceded ground in the painterly art” (“summam manum Simonis Marmionis, cui, dum viveret, vel Apelles ipse aut Zeusis in arte pictoria herbam porrexissent”).4 In 1567, the Florentine merchant living in Antwerp, Lodovico Guicciardini held Simon Marmion in esteem as he referred to him several times in his description of the Low Countries: “Simon Marmion was a truly learned man and also an excellent painter” (“Simone Marmion huomo veramente dotto & poi eccellentissimo pittore”).5 Greatly admired in his own day, Marmion has understandably been the subject of repeated scholarly scrutiny for well over a century. Although earlier scholars were hindered in their efforts to construct an oeuvre for the artist by the absence of any signed works or documents definitively linked to extant works, they traced a reasonably convincing career based on circumstantial evidence. Alfred Michiels in his work on Flemish art published in 1865–1876 seems to have been the first to credit Simon Marmion with the well-known Altarpiece of Saint-Bertin divided today between the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin and the National Gallery of Art in London.6 The reconstruction of Marmion’s career began in earnest, however, in 1892 when Chrétien Dehaisnes firmed up this attribution of the Altarpiece of Saint-Bertin, painted between 1454 and 1459 for the patron Guillaume Fillastre, abbot of the monastery of Saint-Bertin in Saint-Omer, who maintained a close relationship with the Burgundian court. In 1907, not long after Dehaisnes’s monograph, the extensive surviving documents on the Marmion family of painters (the father Jehan, a brother Mille, and a daughter Marie, not mentioned in these documents) were published.7 Over the next hundred years, well over fifty works—panel paintings and manuscript illuminations—were organized into a relatively coherent timeline of his career. Although some works ascribed to Marmion during his “late” career have occasionally been removed from his accepted corpus and given to artists known as the Louthe Master and the Ghent Associates,8 the core body of works remains intact in spite of documentary lacunae.  Quoted in Maurice Hénault, “Les Marmion (Jehan, Simon, Mille et Colinet): Peintres amiénois du XVe siècle,” Revue Archéologique 9–10 (1907): 423; I am grateful to Christopher de Hamel for this translation.  Lodovico Guicciardini, Descrittione di tutti i Paes Bassi, altrimenti detti Germania Inferiore (Antwerp: Christofano Plantino, 1588), 378.  Alfred Michiels, Histoire de la peinture flamande depuis ses débuts jusqu’en 1864 (Paris: A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven et Cie, 1865–1869), vol. 3, 373–409.  Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 119–40, 282–304, 410–24, 108–24.  On the Ghent Associates see: Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick, eds., Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe (Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum,

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In about 1990, therefore, one could say that the Marmion oeuvre satisfied the “certitude morale” criterion advocated by Georges Hulin de Loo, Charles Sterling, Nicole Reynaud, and others,9 whereby, even without a single documented work, the name of an artist can be satisfactorily linked to an ensemble of work, by matching archival sources with extant anonymous works and supporting an identity not otherwise contested by an alternate attribution. It is worth remembering that this is not all that unusual. The accepted careers of many fifteenth-century French and Flemish painters, including Jean Malouel, Robert Campin (the Master of Flémalle), Barthélemy d’Eyck (the Master of Roi René), Colin d’Amiens (the Master of Cöetivy), Jean Hey (the Master of Moulins), and Jean Poyer, among others, rest on just such “certitudes morales.” Although most of the documents on Simon Marmion chronicle his life and not his art, three documents related to the commission of a Breviary begun in 1467 for Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy and completed in 1470 for Duke Charles the Bold and Margaret of York provide an unusually detailed description of a work of art and are thus of special significance for the Marmion question. In 1992 and again in 1997, I analyzed the published documents, arguing that two surviving single leaves come from the source Breviary, one in the Robert Lehman Collection of the Metropolitan Museum depicting the Holy Virgins (Figures 11.1 and 11.2) and the other, then in a private collection but subsequently shrewdly purchased by Stephen Fliegel for the Cleveland Museum of Art, depicting scenes from the lives of Saint Denis and his companions Rusticus and Eleutherius (Figures 11.3 and 11.4).10

2003), 179–89. On the Louthe Master see: Gregory T. Clark, “The Chronology of the Louthe Master and his Identification with Simon Marmion,” in Kren, Margaret of York, 195–208; and Antoine de Schryver, “The Louthe Master and the Marmion Case,” in Kren, Margaret of York, 171–80.  Georges Hulin de Loo, “Précédé d’une introduction sur l’identité de certains maîtres anonymes,” introduction in Exposition de tableaux flamands des XIVe, XVe et XVIe siècles (Ghent: A. Siffe, 1902), xv–lxvii; Charles Sterling, “Un nouveau tableau de Simon Marmion,” Revue d’art canadienne / Canadian Art Review 8 (1981): 3–18; Nicole Reynaud, “Les Maîtres à ‘noms de convention,’” Revue de l’art 42 (1978): 41–52; Nicole Reynaud, ed., Hommage à Charles Sterling: Des primitifs à Matisse (Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1992); Philippe Lorentz, “Les ‘Maîtres’ anonymes: Des noms provisoires faits pour durer?,” Perspective 1 (2007): 129–44.  Hindman, “Two Leaves,” 223–32; Hindman, “Simon Marmion,” 60–72; Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 105–6, 10a and 10b; Holger Klein, ed., Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007), 221–22, no. 82. According to Seymour de Ricci (Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada [New York: H. H. Wilson, 1935–1940], vol. 2, 1716) Robert Lehman acquired the second leaf from Rappaport in Rome, but this has not been further documented.

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Figure 11.1: Common of Confessors with Full Illuminated Border, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, acc. no. 1975.1.2477 (recto). Robert Lehman Collection, 1975. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Figure 11.2: Simon Marmion, The Holy Virgins Greeted by Christ as They Enter the Gates of Paradise, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, acc. no. 1975.1.2477 (verso). Robert Lehman Collection, 1975. Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Figure 11.3: Simon Marmion, The Martyrdom of Saint Denis, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2005.55 (recto), John L. Severance Fund, 2005. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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Figure 11.4: Feast of Saint Denis from the Proper of Saints with Full Illuminated Border, leaf from a Breviary of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York, Valenciennes, ca. 1467–1470, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2005.55 (verso), John L. Severance Fund, 2005. Photo: The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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The documents record payment to Simon Marmion for a Breviary that was a lengthy and unusually deluxe volume composed of at least 624 folios (seventyeight quires of eight folios each). It began with an illuminated calendar, adorned with both border decoration and miniatures (probably representations of the Zodiac Signs and scenes of the Labors of the Month); perhaps the calendar was in addition to the 624 folios, in which case the Breviary would have comprised 636 folios. It was also illustrated with eleven miniatures in “colors” and eighty-three “in other colors,” a total of ninety-four miniatures. Introducing these miniatures were 105 five-, six-, and seven-line initials.11 Within the text were 2500 two-line initials and 4859 one-line initials. In my previous analyses, I have shown that the two leaves conform to a great many features described in the document: full-page miniatures (already remarkable for a Breviary) for unusual parts of the text, such as the Common of the Virgins illustrated by the Lehman leaf; profuse secondary decoration even on the text pages such as occurs on the versos of both the Lehman and the Cleveland leaves; choice of text following the use of Paris (as is employed in another Breviary for Philip the Good); and an unusual iconography for the leaf depicting the Holy Virgins that befits the devout patronage of Margaret of York, wife of Charles the Bold. What is more, I have shown that the leaves are stylistically coherent with other works of art attributed to Simon Marmion, including the London wings of the Saint-Bertin Altarpiece, the Salting Hours (London, Victoria and Albert Museum, MS 1221), and the Visions of Tondal (Los Angeles, Getty Museum, MS 87.MN.141), the latter dated by colophon 1474, close in time to the completion of the ducal Breviary. I will return to this point and some additional correlations between the document and the leaves momentarily. Following my publications in the 1990s, scholars accepted the identification of these leaves as coming from the ducal Breviary virtually unanimously, and as a result the previously uncertain identity of Simon Marmion as the artist responsible for the body of works attributed to him was resolved. This unanimity concerning Simon Marmion’s identity and oeuvre has recently been questioned. My present intervention is prompted by an article generously shared with me before its publication by my esteemed colleague Gregory Clark entitled “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin (Madrid, BNE, Res. 149) and Simon Marmion: A Reconsideration.”12 In this article, Clark revisits the career of Marmion, based on an analysis of a group of ten Books of Hours attributed to the  My publications incorrectly stated four-, six- and eight-line initials (“The Case of Simon Marmion” and “Simon Marmion”); and three-, four-, and five-line initials (“Two Leaves”).  Gregory Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin (Madrid, BNE, Res. 149) and Simon Marmion: A Reconsideration,” in Lumières du Nord: Les manuscrits enluminés français et flamands de la

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artist, and summarily rejects the attribution to the artist of the Altarpiece of SaintBertin and, more importantly, the ducal leaves as follows: “the two leaves bear no marks of original ownership whatsoever, making it impossible to conclude with certainty that they came from the documented ducal breviary.”13 Clark goes on to make three somewhat startling proposals regarding the identities of Simon Marmion and his family. First, he suggests that Simon Marmion is identical with the Master of Mansel.14 Second, he postulates that the body of works attributed to Simon Marmion is instead by Marmion’s brother, Mille.15 Third, he speculates that the artist called the Collins Master is Marmion’s father, Jehan.16 I will not address here the proposed identity of the Collins Master with Jehan Marmion, which is based in part on a twofold reasoning: the first, on stylistic ticks Clark notices that the former shares with works attributed to Simon early in his career; and the second, on the Collins Master’s supposed activity in Simon Marmion’s hometown of Amiens in the generation just preceding him.17 Central to the “case” for Simon Marmion, however, is the novel suggestion that Simon Marmion and the Master of Mansel are “one and the same.” Three arguments are put forward in favor of this identification. The first is that Marquet Caussin, a second-string illuminator whose name was recently resurrected by Dominique Vanwijnsberghe and recorded in Valenciennes from the 1440s to the mid-1470s, does not appear to be familiar with the work of Simon Marmion, who arrives in Valenciennes in 1458.18 Caussin does, however, quote from the Mansel Master in his use of a particular hairstyle intricately described by Clark. The second is that no juvenilia are known for Marmion, whereas the youthful work for the Mansel

Bibliothèque nationale d’Espagne, ed. Anne-Marie Legaré and Samuel Gras (Lille: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 2022), 189–210.  Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin,” 189–90; see, however, most recently Lorne Campbell with a review of the attributions who concludes: “the circumstantial evidence [of the attribution] is strongly in its favour.” Lorne Campbell, The Fifteenth-Century Netherlandish Schools (London: National Gallery, 1999), 308.  Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin,” 193: “Simon Marmion and the Mansel Master are one and the same.”  Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin,” 193: “Mille Marmion is a much better fit for the body of work by the painter we now identify with Simon.”  Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin,” 194: “Might the Collins Master and Jehan Marmion be one and the same?”.  On the Collins Master, see: Susie Nash, Between France and Flanders: Manuscript Illumination in Amiens in the Fifteenth Century (London: British Library, 1999); and Susie Nash, “The Myth of Louis Alincbrot: Relocating the Triptych with Scenes from the Life of Christ in the Prado,” Boletín del Museo del Prado 50 (2014): 70–95.  Dominique Vanwijnsberghe, “Ung bon ouvrier nommé Marquet Caussin”: Peinture et enluminure en Hainaut avant Simon Marmion (Leiden: Brill, 2013).

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Master stretches back to the beginning years of Marmion’s documented activity. The third is a supposition that Marmion lived more off his rents in his later years than his art. Let me address these points in order. First, there are numerous cases of artists working contemporaneously in the same centers who share neither styles nor models. To mention only a few: in Bourges, there are the Master of Charles de France and Jean Colombe; in Troyes, the Master of Michel Jouvenel des Ursins and the Master of the Troyes Missal; in Lyons, the Master of the Alarmes de Mars and Jean Perreal; and in the larger center of Paris, the Master of Dreux-Budé and the Dunois Master.19 The observation, therefore, that Caussin seems to be at once unfamiliar with Marmion’s work but familiar with the hairstyles of the Master of Mansel’s figures is insufficient evidence for merging the identities of Marmion in his early period and the Mansel Master. Likewise, the second of Clark’s observations, that we have no early examples of Marmion’s style (born in around 1425, he would have long passed his period of apprenticeship in the early 1450s), is problematic. Other artists, even very significant artists, have come down to us without youthful works. We know, for example, little about Jean Fouquet (born ca. 1420) until the 1450s, when he was already a mature artist. Perhaps the lost portrait of Pope Eugene IV executed before 1447 may be Fouquet’s earliest known work. Finally, Clark’s assertion that Marmion lived off his rents more than his art in his later years, based on the many documents showing him as a landlord, is unprovable and possibly simply untrue. Payments for paintings by Simon Marmion continue in the documents, which are certainly lacunary, in 1471–1472, 1473, and again in 1484, five years before his death.20 Let us remember too that the Mansel Master has no known work after the 1450s, whereas Simon Marmion’s activity is documented from the 1450s to the 1480s.21

 On these artists, see: François Avril and Nicole Reynaud, Les manuscrits à peintures en France, 1440–1520 (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France; Flammarion, 1993).  In 1471–1472: “de faire de son mestier, aus comphanons fais en cest an de drap de Damas cramoisi, en quattre quarreaux, viij ymaiges estoffés richement et le résidu des quarreaulx parellement, comme il a fait seloncq la devise sur che faictes, avoecq che dorer de fin or brunti les bastars et potentez desdits comphanons,” quoted in Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 422, no. 47. In 1473: “En ceste page, estoit l’effigie dudit seigneur (Charles, duc de Bourgogne) et de Madame Isabel de Bourbon, sa compaigne, retirées sur loriginal tableau gardé chez les chanoines de la Salle en Valenciennes,” quoted in Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 423, no. 49. In 1484: “vng tablet de Nostre-Dame à 11 feullés en manière de vng épitaphe,” quoted in Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 110, no. 65.  Marc Gil, “Le Maître de Mansel,” in Miniatures flamandes, 1440–1520, ed. Bernard Bousmanne and Thierry Delcourt (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France; Brussels: Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, 2011), 389–93.

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If we reject—as I do—the assertion that Simon Marmion and the Mansel Master are “one and the same” and therefore retain intact the corpus of Marmion’s production, then it necessarily follows that the work ascribed to Simon Marmion simply cannot be by his brother Mille. In addition, there are plenty of other reasons to reject the Mille hypothesis. Mille has no documented oeuvre whatsoever after 1463 and little work before that date that could account for his supposed celebrity status. What is more, it cannot be, as Clark suggests, that the Marmion referred to by Lemaire is brother Mille, and not Simon. In the first place, Mille may still be alive when Lemaire is writing (he dies as late as 1505), and in the second, Molinet, Wicart, and Guicciardini all specifically refer to the artist’s first name, Simon, and not simply to his surname. One further point should be brought to bear in support of retaining the Simon Marmion name and oeuvre. Even if it is difficult to accept, as Otto Pächt forcefully contended, the wonderful watercolor drawing of the hoopoe bird in Vienna (Figure 11.5) as an autograph work by Simon Marmion, the drawing inscribed in Flemish in a Northern (probably Low Countries) semi-cursive early sixteenth-century hand “Simon Mormion myt der handt” still has documentary value that cannot be dismissed.22 Much like the many “false” Dürer annotations, the inscription accentuates the fame the artist enjoyed in the generation or so following his death. Simon, not Mille, was undoubtedly the “prince d’enluminure” capable of “toutte rien pingible.” Let us now return to Simon Marmion’s ducal Breviary to discuss specific correlations between the leaves and the descriptions furnished in three separate payment accounts. 1467. A Simon Marmion, escripuain, demourant à Valenchiennes, la somme de cent livres que mon dit seigneur luy a fait déliurer comptant, sur les ouuraiges et estoffes quil doit faire par l’ordonnance dicelluy Simon à ystorier, enluminer et mectre en fourme, vng bréuiaire que Mondit seigneur a fait faire pour seruir à dire ses heures . . . c. liures.23 1470. A Simon Marmion, enlumineur, la somme de 158 £ 15 s. dudit pris pour pluseurs parties d’istoires, vignettes, lettres et autres parties par luy faittes ou breviaire de mondit seigneur ainsi qu’il s’ensieult. Et premierement, pour avoir historié et vignetté le calendrier dudit breviaire et fait les signetz y partinens en chascun des douze mois de l’an, au pris de 24 s. pour chascun mois font 14 £ 8✶. Item pour soixante dix huit quayers, vignettez et furniz de histoires pour ledit breviaire, contenant chascun quayer huit feullez, au pris de 40 s. pour chascun quayer font 156 £✶. Item pour unze histoires de couleurs faittes oudit brevaire, au pris de 4 £ 10 s. chascune

 Otto Pächt, “Simon Mormion myt der handt,” Revue de l’art 46 (1979): 7–15. I thank Marc Smith for his help with the localization and dating of the inscription.  Lille, Archives départementales du Nord, Comptes de la Recette Générale, Inventaire sommaire, t. IV, série B, no. 2064, fol. 128v. Quoted in: Dehaisnes, Recherches, 138; and in Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 416, no. 27.

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Figure 11.5: Hoopoe Bird, origin unknown, ca. 1500, tempera on parchment. Collection of Nature Studies a.o. by Dutch, German, and Italian Artists, 1500–1599. Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, inv. no. E 8206D POR MAG, cod. min. 42, fol. 55r. Photo: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek. histoire font 49 £ 10 s✶. Item pour quatre vings trois histoires d’autres couleurs faittes oudit breviaire, au pris de 60 s. piece font 249 £✶. Item pour deux mil cinq cens lettres de deux poins faiz oudit breviaire, au pris de 6 s. le cent, font 7 £ 10 s✶. Item pour cinq mil huit cens cinquante neuf lettres d’un point faittes oudit breviaire, au pris de 4 s. le cent font 11 £ 14 s. 6 d✶. Et pour cent cinq lettres de cinq, six et sept poins servans emprez les histoires oudit breviaire, au pris de 6 d. chascune lettre font 52 s. 6 d✶. Montent ensemble toutes lesdittes parties a la somme de 490 £ 15 s. Sur quoy ledit Simon a receu en prest par les mains de dudit evesque de Salubrye venant dudit argentier ou mois de [blanc] l’an [blanc], la somme de 120 £✶. Et encoires par les mains de mondit seigneur et d’icellui evesque de Salubrye, 212 £✶. Font ensemble ces deux parties 332 £. Ainsi luy est demouré deu de reste ladicte somme de 158 £ 15 s.24 1470. Audit reverend pere en Dieu messire Enguerrant, evesque de Salubrye, conseillier et confesseur de mondit seigneur, la somme de 20 £ 10 s. dudit pris pour certainnes parties d’offrandes, sermons et autres par luy payees oudit mois de mars, du commandement de mondit seigneur ainsi qu’il s’ensieult . . . Et pour avoir fait relyer le breviaire de mondit seigneur, reparer les histoires et companiser les fuelletz dudit breviaire, par marchie fait

 Brussels, Archives générales du Royaume, Fonds de la Chambre des comptes du duc de Bourgogne, reg. no. 1925, fols. 474v–475r. Quoted in: Valérie Bessey, Véronique Flammang, and Émilie Lebailly, eds., Comptes de l’argentier de Charles le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne, vol. 3/2, Année 1470: Le registre CC 1925 des archives générales du Royaume, Bruxelles (Paris: Boccard, 2008), 575–76, no. 2119; also Dehaisnes, Recherches, 140–41; and Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 419, no. 35, I.

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avec l’ouvrier 18 £✶. Font ensemble toutes ces parties ladicte somme de 20 £ 10 s. Pour ce par sa quittance, laditte somme de 20 £ 10 s.25

The phrase “Item pour soixante dix huit quayers, vignettez et furniz de histoires pour ledit breviaire, contenant chascun quayer huit feullez, au pris de 40 s. pour chascun quayer font 156 £” in the second entry means that each leaf of all seventy-eight quires was decorated with floral borders and drolleries. Decoration this extensive occurs only in the most deluxe commissions, and it matches the fact that the Lehman and Cleveland leaves have borders on text pages, that is on pages that do not face full-page illuminations. The recto of the Lehman leaf ends a text that began on the facing (left-hand) verso. The verso of the Cleveland leaf, which is an incipit, has drolleries (the curious hybrid fish-man). The presence of a six-line initial on the Cleveland leaf, beginning the suffrage for the Feast of Saints Denis, Rusticus, and Eleutherius, matches the phrase in the second entry of the document, “Et pour cent cinq lettres de cinq, six et sept poins servans emprez les histoires oudit breviaire, au pris de 6 d. chascune lettre font 52 s. 6 d.” These 105 multi-line letters occurred in the Breviary only in conjunction with full-page miniatures, as here for the illumination of Saint Denis. We would expect to find another such initial on the missing facing page at the start of the Common of the Virgins. Finally, on both the Lehman and Cleveland leaves, the smaller one- and twoline initials are painted (instead of written in red like the rubrics) and are documented in the second entry as paid to Marmion (not the scribe): “Item pour deux mil cinq cens lettres de deux poins faiz oudit breviaire, au pris de 6 s. le cent, font 7 £ 10 s” and “Item pour cinq mil huit cens cinquante neuf lettres d’un point faittes oudit breviaire, au pris de 4 s. le cent font 11 £ 14 s. 6 d.” In 1992, I made two additional points about these leaves and the Marmion question. The first is the style of their border decoration, which I compared to works such as the Getty Visions of Tondal and The Vision of the Soul of Guy de Thurno as well as the Salting Hours. To these can now be added a companion volume to the two Getty manuscripts, the Life of Catherine of Alexandria acquired by the Bibliothèque nationale de France in 2008 (Figure 11.6).26 Moreover, it should be noted that the secondary illustration of the Lehman and Cleveland leaves—the

 Brussels, Archives générales du Royaume, Fonds de la Chambre des comptes du duc de Bourgogne, reg. no. 1925, fol. 454v. Quoted in Bessey, Flammang, and Lebailly, Comptes de l’argentier de Charles le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne, vol. 3/2, 550–51, no. 2021; also Dehaisnes, Recherches, 140; and Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 419, no. 35, II.  Bernard Bousmanne and Thierry Delcourt, eds., Miniatures flamandes, 1404–1482 (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2011), 397–98, no. 111.

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Figure 11.6: Saint Catherine before the Emperor, Valenciennes, ca. 1468–1477, tempera and gold leaf on parchment. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS fr. 28650, fol. 34. Photo: Bibliothèque nationale de France.

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tri-colored decorated initials including both the one-line and the multi-line initials—employs the same form and palette as occurs in these four manuscripts. Whereas the border decoration of the Lehman leaf is damaged because the sheet was once glued to a backing and subsequently removed, the acanthus of the Cleveland leaf with its combination of plump gold and blue-gray leaves set at the angles of the corners of the page, most closely resembles the style of the acanthus employed in the Tondal group of manuscripts, instead of the later, crisper, uniformly gray or silver and gold acanthus of manuscripts generally dated in the last decade of the artist’s career. In the same publication, I also wondered about the distinction in the document between the two types of full-page miniatures, those “in colors” and those “in other colors,” the latter, less expensive illuminations costing about three-quarter the price of those “in colors.” It is possible that the miniatures in “other colors” are in a sort of grisaille, even though grisaille itself appears to be referred to consistently in documents as “de blanc et de noir.”27 “In other colors” may actually signify the muted palette, with many figures painted in whites and pastels, that Marmion favored also in the Tondal group of manuscripts and in some other Books of Hours, especially in the Salting Hours, a palette we might call “semi-grisaille.” It is difficult to imagine what the full cycle of illuminations of the ducal Breviary consisted of, in part because there is little standardization in late Flemish Breviaries and no comparable examples of a Breviary close in date and localization to that ascribed to Marmion. But, if we judge from the deluxe Breviary of Isabelle of Castille (London, British Library, Add. MS 18851), dated 1497 and in part painted by artists who collaborated with Marmion such as the Master of the Dresden Prayerbook, the miniatures of the Common of the Saints and those for the Suffrages, such as the Holy Virgins and Saint Denis, would have come at the end and would have been less important (they are mostly one column in width instead of the two columns used for the more important illuminations in Isabella’s Breviary).28 Could our two leaves thus be those “in other colors” while the leaves at the beginning, which could have included the illustrations for the major feasts such as occur in the Breviary of  See: Elliot Adam, “‘De blanc et de noir’: La grisaille dans les arts de la couleur en France à la fin du Moyen Âge (1430–1515)” (Ph.D. diss., Sorbonne Université, 2023). On the use of the term in documents for the earlier period, see: Inès Villela-Petit, “Historié de blanc et noir: La tradition du ‘portrait d’encre’ dans l’enluminure parisienne des XIVe et XVe siècles,” in Aux limites de la couleur: Monochromie et polychromie dans les arts (1300–1600), ed. Marion Boudon-Machuel, Maurice Brock, and Pascale Charron (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), 25–34.  See: Nigel Morgan, Scot McKendrick, and Elisa Ruiz García, The Isabella Breviary: The British Library, London Add. Ms. 18851 (Barcelona: Moleiro, 2012); Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 214–21; Maurits Smeyers, Flemish Miniatures from the Eighth to the midSixteenth Century (Leuven: Brepols, 1999), 477, pls. 89, 90; Avril and Reynaud, Les manuscrits, 299.

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Isabella—for example, the Nativity, the Circumcision, a Miracles and Passion cycle, and so forth—were simply “in colors”? We cannot know unless another miniature from the Breviary turns up. The source manuscript was presumably water damaged, accounting for the compromised condition of the two extant leaves, but the fact that Robert Lehman seems to have purchased them from different dealers and in different locations sustains hope for the survival of other parts of this extraordinary Breviary. When I initially studied and published the Lehman leaf, I only saw color photographs of the Cleveland Saint Denis miniature, which was long inaccessible in a private collection and not acquired by the Cleveland Museum of Art until 2005. My recent first-hand examination of the Cleveland leaf has thus been revealing. Although there are losses of surface pigment and some flaking, the overall effect is breathtaking, especially viewed under high magnification, which gives a better sense of how the original miniature once appeared. There is no perceptible underdrawing even though the layer of paint is very thin; instead, the artist seems to have built up the surface, often with white paint, skillfully modeled sometimes on the tiniest surfaces. Miniscule brushstrokes define the faces, the dark pupils standing out against the stark whites of the eyes, the cheeks lightly grazed with white paint over which faint, closely spaced red strokes define the lower indentation toward the jaw. Only two areas of blue appear, on the soldier in the very center and in the sky above. In both areas, sparkles of lapis lazuli faintly dot the surface. What is most astonishing, however, is the use of gold. Liquid gold is employed everywhere as though it were fairy-dust—on the sleeves of the figures, as the barely visible thread-like ropes binding the hands of the prisoners, on the high boots of the soldier, as star-like motifs on the robe of the central figure who orders the execution, as flecks embedded in the stones of the buildings, and as the thin gold lines framing the entire page and also the separate episodes. On the beautiful angels in the sky, gold dots the very tips of their wings and shapes their elegant tiaras. Between the three white-clad angels, three other angels dimly emerge as though seen through a transparent curtain or scrim, their features also dotted with gold. These technical details and stylistic characteristics are found as well on the Lehman leaf, which should now be studied side by side with the Cleveland leaf.29 “Prince d’enluminure” he was indeed; the two miniatures bear witness to an extraordinarily accomplished painter at the very top of his game.

 I cannot agree with Thomas Kren in Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, 106: “The leaf with Saint Denis was certainly painted by Marmion, while the other [the Lehman leaf] may be only his invention.” In my opinion, both leaves reveal the hand of the master.

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With these observations in mind, even if there were no document for the ducal Breviary placing the completion of the leaves in 1470, comparisons would still lead us to date them no later than the first half of the 1470s. As mentioned earlier, the Visions of Tondal is dated 1474 by colophon, which also explicitly associates it with the patronage of Margaret of York: “the visions of a knight called Tondal written by command of the very exalted, most excellent, and very powerful princess Madame Margaret of York by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy.”30 Precisely during these years, probably by 1465, Marmion also painted the now-lost double portrait of Charles the Bold and his first wife Isabeau de Bourbon, copied by Hubert Cailleau and referred to in a document by Wicart,31 and sometime between 1468 and 1473, he painted a Lamentation (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Lehman Collection, 1975.I.128) accepted by Ainsworth among the core body of panel paintings attributed to the artist and adorned on the reverse with the initials “C” and “M” for Charles and Margaret.32 The presence in the ducal Breviary of the illumination of the Holy Virgins at the Common of the Virgins, a subject I have yet to find in any other extant Breviary, suggests that this unusual choice for an illumination may have been a special request on the part of Margaret of York as an expression of her intense piety. This series of works—paintings and manuscript illuminations—leads to the conclusion that at the height of his illustrious career the talented Marmion garnered special attention from the ducal couple, corroborating Molinet’s statement about his celebrity at court. Indeed, Charles the Bold, Margaret of York, and Simon Marmion were all present in Valenciennes in 1473 to attend the celebrations of the Golden Fleece. Monographs are not very fashionable in today’s discipline of art history. But, if this modest contribution rehabilitates Simon Marmion (once again), it signals the pressing need for a monograph on the artist.33 There is extensive new scholarship over the last few decades as well as new attributions. Marc Gil raised the hypothesis that Marmion had a workshop—indeed, he could hardly have painted the ducal

 Thomas Kren and Roger S. Wieck, The Visions of Tondal from the Library of Margaret of York (Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1990), 9.  Hénault, “Les Marmion,” 423, no. 49; Dehaisnes, Recherches, 96.  Maryan W. Ainsworth, “New Observations on the Working Technique in Simon Marmion’s Panel Paintings,” in Kren, Margaret of York, 243–55.  The last systematic study of the entire oeuvre, now outdated but still useful, is the unpublished dissertation by Edith Warren Hoffman, “Simon Marmion” (Ph.D. diss., Courtauld Institute of Art, 1958).

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Breviary by himself without helpers34—and, to be sure, as Gregory Clark and others have perceptively shown, there are certainly stylistic differences among works in the corpus, including in the problematic late work in the Ghent-Bruges style.35 A systematic examination of all the attributions has yet to be undertaken. Such a study would, in my opinion, necessitate placing the ducal Breviary and its two miraculously surviving leaves at the center of the corpus, providing the sure point from which we must work backward and forward. Indeed, though dead, Simon Marmion does, as his epitaph declares, still live “in the memory of men.”36

Bibliography Adam, Elliot. “‘De blanc et de noir’: La grisaille dans les arts de la couleur en France à la fin du Moyen Âge (1430–1515).” Ph.D diss. Paris, Sorbonne Université, 2023. Ainsworth, Maryan W. “New Observations on the Working Technique in Simon Marmion’s Panel Paintings.” In Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, edited by Thomas Kren, 243–55. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992. Avril, François, and Nicole Reynaud. Les manuscrits à peintures en France, 1440–1520. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France; Flammarion, 1993. Bessey, Valérie, Véronique Flammang, and Émilie Lebailly, eds. Comptes de l’argentier de Charles le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne. Vol. 3/2, Année 1470: Le registre CC 1925 des archives générales du Royaume, Bruxelles. Paris: Boccard, 2008. Bousmanne, Bernard, and Thierry Delcourt, eds. Miniatures flamandes, 1404–1482. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2011. Brinkmann, Bodo. “The Contribution of Simon Marmion to Books of Hours from Ghent to Bruges.” In Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, edited by Thomas Kren, 181–94. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992. Campbell, Lorne. The Fifteenth-Century Netherlandish Schools. London: National Gallery, 1999. Clark, Gregory T. “The Chronology of the Louthe Master and his Identification with Simon Marmion.” In Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, edited by Thomas Kren, 195–208. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992.

 Marc Gil, “Un livre d’heures inédit de l’atelier de Simon Marmion à Valenciennes,” Revue de l’art 121 (1998): 43–48; another candidate for a manuscript by the “workshop” of Marmion and with miniatures in “autres couleurs” is a Book of Hours possibly made, according to Gregory Clark, for the monastery of St. Jean-Baptiste de Valenciennes, where Guillaume Braque was abbot (and perhaps patron of the Book of Hours); see Roger Wieck, with Sandra Hindman and Ariane Bergeron-Foote, Picturing Piety: The Book of Hours, exh. cat., Le Louvre des Antiquaires, Paris, September 11–November 11, 2007 (London: Paul Holberton for Les Enluminures, 2008), 216–26, no. 22.  Bodo Brinkmann, “The Contribution of Simon Marmion to Books of Hours from Ghent to Bruges,” in Kren, Margaret of York, 181–94; Clark, “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin.”  “Vif entre les hommes,” Jean Molinet, Epitaph, 1489, quoted in Dehaisnes, Recherches, 73.

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Clark, Gregory T. “The Hours of Guillaume Rolin (Madrid, BNE, Res. 149) and Simon Marmion: A Reconsideration.” In Lumières du Nord: Les manuscrits enluminés français et flamands de la Bibliothèque nationale d’Espagne, edited by Anne-Marie Legaré and Samuel Gras, 189–210. Lille: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 2022. Dehaisnes, Chrétien César Auguste. Recherches sur le retable de Saint-Bertin et sur Simon Marmion. Lille: L. Quarré, 1892. Gil, Marc. “Un livre d’heures inédit de l’atelier de Simon Marmion à Valenciennes.” Revue de l’art 121 (1998): 43–48. Gil, Marc. “Le Maître de Mansel.” In Miniatures flamandes, 1440–1520, edited by Bernard Bousmanne and Thierry Delcourt, 389–93. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France; Brussels: Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, 2011. Guicciardini, Lodovico. Descrittione di tutti i Paes Bassi, altrimenti detti Germania Inferiore. Antwerp: Christofano Plantino, 1588. Hénault, Maurice. “Les Marmion (Jehan, Simon, Mille et Colinet): Peintres amiénois du XVe siècle.” Revue Archéologique 9–10 (1907): 119–40, 282–304, 410–24; 108–24. Hindman, Sandra. “The Case of Simon Marmion: Attributions and Documents.” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 40 (1977): 185–204. Hindman, Sandra. “Simon Marmion.” In Illuminations in the Robert Lehman Collection, edited by Sandra Hindman, et al., 60–72. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997. Hindman, Sandra. “Two Leaves from an Unknown Breviary: The Case for Simon Marmion.” In Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, edited by Thomas Kren, 223–32. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992. Hoffman, Edith Warren. “Simon Marmion.” Ph.D. diss., London, Courtauld Institute of Art, 1958. Hulin de Loo, Georges. “Précédé d’une introduction sur l’identité de certains maîtres anonymes.” In Exposition de tableaux flamands des XIVe, XVe et XVIe siècles, xv–lxvii. Ghent: A. Siffer, 1902. Klein, Holger, ed. Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007. Kren, Thomas, and Scot McKendrick, eds. Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003. Kren, Thomas, and Roger S. Wieck. The Visions of Tondal from the Library of Margaret of York. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1990. Lorentz, Philippe. “Les ‘Maîtres’ anonymes: Des noms provisoires faits pour durer?.” Perspective 1 (2007): 129–44. Michiels, Alfred. Histoire de la peinture flamande depuis ses débuts jusqu’en 1864. 10 vols. Paris: A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven et Cie, 1865–1869. Morgan, Nigel, Scot McKendrick, and Elisa Ruiz García. The Isabella Breviary: The British Library, London Add. Ms. 18851. Barcelona: Moleiro, 2012. Nash, Susie. Between France and Flanders: Manuscript Illumination in Amiens in the Fifteenth Century. London: British Library, 1999. Nash, Susie. “The Myth of Louis Alincbrot: Relocating the Triptych with Scenes from the Life of Christ in the Prado.” Boletín del Museo del Prado 50 (2014): 70–95. Pächt, Otto. “Simon Mormion myt der handt.” Revue de l’art 46 (1979): 7–15. Reynaud, Nicole, ed. Hommage à Charles Sterling: Des primitifs à Matisse. Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1992. Reynaud, Nicole. “Les Maîtres à ‘noms de convention.’” Revue de l’art 42 (1978): 41–52. Ricci, Seymour de. Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada. 4 vols. New York: H. H. Wilson, 1935–1940.

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Schryver, Antoine de. “The Louthe Master and the Marmion Case.” In Margaret of York, Simon Marmion, and the Visions of Tondal, edited by Thomas Kren, 171–80. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992. Smeyers, Maurits. Flemish Miniatures from the Eighth to the mid-Sixteenth Century. Leuven: Brepols, 1999. Soudavar, Abolala. Decoding Old Masters: Patrons, Princes and Enigmatic Paintings of the 15th Century. London: Tauris, 2008. Stecher, Jean, ed., Œuvres de Jean Lemaire de Belges. Louvain: J. Lefever, 1882. Sterling, Charles. “Un nouveau tableau de Simon Marmion.” Revue d’art canadienne / Canadian Art Review 8 (1981): 3–18. Vanwijnsberghe, Dominique. “Ung bon ouvrier nommé Marquet Caussin”: Peinture et enluminure en Hainaut avant Simon Marmion. Leiden: Brill, 2013. Villela-Petit, Inès. “Historié de blanc et noir: La tradition du ‘portrait d’encre’ dans l’enluminure parisienne des XIVe et XVe siècles.” In Aux limites de la couleur: Monochromie et polychromie dans les arts (1300–1600), edited by Marion Boudon-Machuel, Maurice Brock, and Pascale Charron, 25–34. Turnhout: Brepols, 2011. Wieck, Roger, with Sandra Hindman and Ariane Bergeron-Foote. Picturing Piety: The Book of Hours, exh cat.,. Le Louvre des Antiquaires, Paris, September 11–November 11, 2007. London: Paul Holberton for Les Enluminures, 2008.

Till-Holger Borchert

Chapter 12 The Workshop of Van Eyck, the Master of Covarrubias and the Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna Scientific methods of examining paintings such as x-ray, infrared-photography, and infrared-reflectography have made substantial contributions to art history in the past decennia. In particular, following the discovery of infrared-reflectography in the 1970s the study of underdrawing has not only helped establish hitherto unrecognized connections between artists but also fundamentally changed our understanding of workshop practices, especially of early Netherlandish painters and in northern Renaissance Art in general.1 The insights gained into the process of artistic creation and working methods, and those concepts about the organization of a workshop subsequently formulated, have cast doubts on the Romantic ideas that emphasized and glorified the individual artist and his artistic struggle. This essay focuses on Jan van Eyck’s workshop and explores the way that technical studies can elucidate the working principles of its dynamic environment When Elisabeth Dhanens published her monograph on the brothers van Eyck in 1980, she still adhered to those Romantic notions and ruled out categorically the possibility that Jan van Eyck would have ever repeated his own compositions or even reused single motifs, and consequently omitted works from his oeuvre that are today universally accepted as masterpieces by Jan van Eyck.2 Yet, despite the many controversies surrounding the artist(s), there is now consensus among scholars that Jan van Eyck was no exception to the common practice among early Netherlandish workshops in copying significant compositions and reusing specific poses and motifs. His workshops in Den Haag, Lille, and Bruges were dynamic places that occupied various assistants and collaborators at different times, and remained operational for several years after van Eyck’s death in 1441.3

 Molly Faries, “Technical Studies of Early Netherlandish Painting: A Critical Overview of Recent Developments,” in Recent Developments in the Technical Examination of Early Netherlandish Painting: Methodology, Limitations, Perspectives, ed. Molly Faries and Ron Spronk (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003), 1–37.  Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York: Tabard Press, 1980), 346–73, especially 346: “Jan van Eyck never copied or repeated himself.”  Till-Holger Borchert, “The Ghent Altarpiece and the Workshops of the Van Eyck Brothers,” in The Ghent Altarpiece: Reproductions, Interpretations, Scholarly Debates, ed. Stephan Kemperdick, https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-013

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Working in different media such as panel painting, canvases, murals, and book illumination, the master and his collaborators in- and outside his own workshop repeatedly relied on a repertoire of motifs—old and new—that was available in what must have been a systematic collection of model-drawings, studies, and, presumably, ricordi. This also meant that the artist and his assistants could, at any given moment, fall back on much older motifs for current commissions. This seems to have been the case with those panels that arguably were at least partly produced posthumously by the workshop, such as the Virgin of Jan Vos.4 How significant older models were for younger painters is amply demonstrated in the miniatures of the so-called Turin-Milan Hours: several generations of illuminators contributed to the decoration of this manuscript, including Parisian artists from the late fourteenth century and members of the workshop of Jan van Eyck in Bruges. The latter’s ingenious illustration of the Mass of the Dead (Figure 12.1) (Turin, fol. 116r), for example, served as a model for the following generation of illuminators who, while completing the unfinished manuscript, faced the challenge of depicting the interior of a church: the miniature painters in Georges Hulin de Loo’s so-called “hand K” group adapted the Eyckian prototype no less than four times throughout the manuscript.5 The manuscript seems to have served as a sort of

Johannes Rößler, and Joris Corin Heyder (Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2017), 158–61; TillHolger Borchert, “Jan van Eyck and His Workshop: Organization, Collaborators, Legacy,” in Van Eyck: The Ghent Altarpiece. Art, History, Science and Religion, ed. Danny Praet and Maximiliaan P. J. Martens (Veurne: Hannibal, 2019), 138–58, especially 144–48; see also Ludovic Balavoine, Jan van Eyck: Als Ich Can (Villeneuve-d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 2021), 212–29 and Jan Dumolyn, Susan Frances Jones, Ward Leloup, Toon De Meester, Mathijs Speecke, “Margaret van Eyck, a House Called ‘The Wild Sea’ and Jan van Eyck’s Posthumous Workshop,” The Burlington Magazine 164 (2022): 120–29.  Emma Capron, “Paintings, Prayers, and Salvation: The Jan Vos Virgins in Context,” in The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus and Jan Vos, ed. Emma Capron (London: D Giles, 2018), 13–49, especially 19–24; Maryan W. Ainsworth, “Attribution Mysteries of The Virgin and Child with St. Barbara, St. Elizabeth and Jan Vos” in Capron, The Charterhouse of Bruges, 71–89.  The Procession in a Church (Turin, fol. 42); The Trinity in a Church (Turin, fol. 43); A Donor Praying before God (Turin, fol. 46), and the Mass of Saint Hilaire (Milan, fol. 111r). The manuscript now exists in two volumes. One, formerly in the Trivulzio Library in Milan, is now in the Museo Civico d’Arte Antica of Turin (inv. no. 47); it is denoted as the Milan manuscript. The second was part of the Biblioteca Nazionale e Universitaria in Turin (Ms. K. IV. 29) and was destroyed by fire in 1904; it is denoted as the Turin manuscript. One finds additional leaves in the Louvre (inv. nos. RF 2022–2025) and in a private collection. On the different groups of illuminators identified in the Turin-Milan Hours, see Georges Hulin de Loo, Les Heurs de Milan (Brussels and Paris: Van Oest, 1911); Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting: Its Origins and Character (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1953), 233–46; Eberhard König, Die Très Belles Heures von Jean de France, Duc de Berry (Munich: Hirmer, 1998), 239–67.

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Figure 12.1: Jan van Eyck, The Mass of the Dead, Turin-Milan Hours, ca. 1435–1440, tempera on parchment, 28 × 20.2 cm. Turin, Palazzo Madama – Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, MS. 0467/M, fol. 116r. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be © KIK-IRPA Brussels. By courtesy of Fondazione Torino Musei.

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repository of Eyckian motifs, which were copied and then circulated among workshops of illuminators in Bruges and Ghent.6 The Eyckian miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours, despite the lasting controversies regarding their date, are of course of extraordinary importance for the understanding of the workshop in the aftermath of van Eyck’s death. Of special interest are those Eyckian contributors whose hands have tentatively been identified in paintings or book illuminations outside this manuscript.7 In particular, one artist, the so-called Master of Covarrubias, who contributed the now lost miniature representing the Lamentation (Turin, fol. 49v), deserves attention. This miniature is similar to a Lamentation by Petrus Christus and therefore might reflect a lost prototype by van Eyck.8 The painter is named after a Virgin and Child in the Colegiata San Cosme y San Damián in the eponymous city of Covarrubias (Burgos).9 The small panel depicts an enthroned Virgin and Child in a spacious interior (Figure 12.2a). The figures are disproportionately small in relation to the surrounding space and this quality relates less to van Eyck panels in which the figures are usually too big for their space than to his miniatures where this ratio is inversed. The painting in Covarrubias apparently reflects a lost work by van Eyck since its composition relates in significant detail to the so-called Ince Hall Madonna, attributed to an assistant in  See Lieve De Kesel, “Splendour and Brilliance Rediscovered: Jan van Eyck’s Legacy as Inspiration for Painters and Illuminators (ca. 1420–c.1540),” in Van Eyck: An Optical Revolution, ed. Maximiliaan P. J. Martens, Till-Holger Borchert, and Jan Dumolyn (Veurne: Hannibal, 2020), 333–63; see also Guido Messling, “Reflections, Models and Possible Functions,” in An Eyckian Crucifixion Explored: Ten Essays on a Drawing, ed. Albert Elen and Friso Lammertse (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2016), 71–78; Till-Holger Borchert, “Some Eyckian Drawings and Miniatures in the Context of the Drawing,” in Elen and Lammertse, An Eyckian Crucifixion Explored, 95–107, especially 102–7.  For the different proposal of identifying illuminators in the manuscript see König, Die Très Belles Heures, 261–67; Anne H. van Buren, “The Genesis of the Eyckian Book of Prayers and Masses,” in Heures de Turin-Milan: Inv. Nr. 47 Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, Torino, Anne H. van Buren, James H. Marrow, and Silvana Pettinati (Lucerne: Luzern Faksimile Verlag, 1996), 249–401, especially 346–48 and 386; and Albert Châtelet, Hubert et Jan van Eyck: Créateurs de l’Agneau mystique (Dijon: Faton, 2011), 191–203.  On Petrus Christus’s Lamentation, see Maryan W. Ainsworth, “The Art of Petrus Christus,” in Petrus Christus: Renaissance Master of Bruges, Maryan W. Ainsworth with contributions of Maximiliaan P. J. Martens (New York: Abrams, 1994), 35–37; König, Die Très Belles Heures, 122–23.  Salomon Reinach, “A Copy of a Lost Van Eyck,” The Burlington Magazine 43 (1923): 14–16; Georges Hulin de Loo, “Un portraitiste de style eyckesque vers 1440,” Apollo: Chronique des beaux-arts (December 1941): 8; Jozef Duverger, “Brugsche schilders ten tijde van Jan van Eyck,” Bulletin Musée Royaux des Beaux-Arts 1–3 (1955) (Miscellanea Erwin Panofsky): 83–120, here 102–5; Elisa Bermejo Martinez, La pintura de los primitivos flamencos en España, vol. 1 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1980), 54–56; see Susan Frances Jones, “Jan van Eyck and Spain,” Boletín del Museo del Prado 32 (2014): 30–49, especially 45–46.

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van Eyck’s workshop.10 Although heavily restored, the Covarrubias panel shows the painter’s first-hand encounter with works by van Eyck. The Master of Covarrubias depicts spiderwebs, which are a common feature on the Ghent Altarpiece and the Madonna in the Church (Figure 12.3); he also tries to emulate the naturalistic rendering of objects such as jars and vases, the suggestive use of light, and the creation of illusionistic space. The patterns of folds of the Virgin’s mantle are rendered in a manner that clearly serves to enhance their volume: like in his destroyed miniature, the painter did not highlight the lit parts of the garment but instead darkened the shadows of the receding folds. While it has been assumed that the artist may have been involved with van Eyck’s workshop for a while, his underdrawing is very different from that of the Bruges master (Figure 12.2b). Whereas van Eyck extensively models light and shade by means of hatching in the underdrawing stages, the Master of Covarrubias uses his brush-underdrawing primarily to indicate contours and the placement of folds.11 There are three inscriptions on the wall of the room: one next to the left corner of the room is illegible, as is the one on the opposite corner. The inscription above the shelves on the right wall is partly legible and seems to be written in a Germanic dialect: “war ich des sicher” (was I sure about it). This wording appears to echo Jan van Eyck’s personal motto “als ix xan”12 and has triggered speculations about possible German origins of the anonymous artists. Bodo Brinkmann attributed to the Covarrubias Master an intriguing group of panels from one or two altarpieces that are preserved in Modena, Venice, Frankfurt, and Liège.13 Also known as the “German-Netherlandish Altarpiece” the panels were assigned by Friedrich Winkler to an itinerant German artist who had visited the Netherlands as well as northern Italy. An abundance of motifs in the Birth of the Virgin panel, now in Liège, clearly relates to van Eyck’s miniature of the Birth of Saint John the Baptist (Milan,

 Till-Holger Borchert, The Age of Jan van Eyck: The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530 (London: Thames & Hudson, 2002), 237; see also note 19 for further reading.  The underdrawing is also remote from the more systematic graphic vocabulary of Petrus Christus.  The fact that there is a motto on the Covarrubias panel is quite remarkable. While van Eyck’s motto presumably relates to his status as Burgundian Court painter and is a singular phenomenon at this period, the context of such motto on the more modest painting in Spain remains unclear; on the inscription, see Jones, “Jan van Eyck and Spain,” 46.  Bodo Brinkmann, “Ein deutscher Maler in der Werkstatt Jan van Eycks,” in Begegnungen mit alten Meistern: Altdeutsche Tafelmalerei auf dem Prüfstand, ed. Frank Matthias Kammel and Carola Bettina Gries (Nuremberg: Germanisches Nationalmuseum, 2000), 61–76; Bodo Brinksmann’s entry on the master in Bodo Brinkmann and Stephan Kemperdick, Deutsche Gemälde im Städel 1300–1500 (Mainz: Zabern, 2002), 226–43, here 232–43; see also Till-Holger Borchert, ed., Van Eyck to Dürer (London: Thames & Hudson, 2010), 374–76.

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Figure 12.2a: Master of Covarrubias, Madonna and Child, ca. 1445–1450, oil on panel, 46.5 × 35 cm. Burgos, Colegiata San Cosma y Damian, Museo de la Colegiata, Covarrubias. http://closertovaneyck. kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels.

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Figure 12.2b: Master of Covarrubias, Madonna and Child, ca. 1445–1450, infrared-reflectogram. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels.

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Figure 12.3: Jan van Eyck, The Madonna in the Church, ca. 1439, oil on panel, 31 × 14 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, Kat. Nr. 525C. Photo: Jörg P. Anders.

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fol. 93), suggesting that the painter probably knew the composition and studied its motifs carefully. The Annunciation in Modena (Figure 12.4a), in contrast, includes details that relate to motifs in works attributed to the workshop of the Master of Flémalle (Robert Campin) such as the Mérode Altarpiece. Notwithstanding the fact that the panels of the “German-Netherlandish Altarpiece” are stylistically less homogenous than hitherto acknowledged—in the panel in Liège the figures’ head shapes, eyes, and the rest of their physiognomies are distinct from the other panels—all of them are substantially unlike the Madonna of Covarrubias. The painter of the panels in Modena displays an almost obsessive interest in rendering shades and highlights and, consequently, applied lighter glazes in the draperies.14 His technique therefore contrasts with that of the Covarrubias Master and this distinct approach is recognizable in the preparatory stage as well. In contrast to the latter’s linear type of underdrawing, the panels in Modena extensively use hatching to indicate receding folds (Figure 12.4b). In order to support his attributions to the Covarrubias Master, Brinkmann looked at parallel phenomena of the period—that is, illuminators who were also active as panel painters. He tried to identify another contributor of the TurinMilan Hours—the Master of the Llangattock Hours—with the artist of a panel painting, the so-called Simpson Carson Madonna (Figure 12.5a and 12.5b). First published in 1909 and acquired in 2019 by Musea Brugge, this panel also combines motifs from several paintings by van Eyck. As Joshua Bruyn and Georg Zeman recognized, it is closely related to van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych.15 The

 It may be possible to add another painting to the same workshop: the so-called DuxerMadonna from the National Gallery of Prague (on loan from the Church of Mary’s Assumption in Most). The panel has been attributed to the Westphalian Master of 1473 but its origins can be linked to Swabia, see Borchert, Van Eyck to Dürer, 236.  First published by W. H. James Weale, “A Fifteenth-Century Painting by a Follower of Jan van Eyck,” The Burlington Magazine 15 (1909): 48–50; and subsequently discussed by Joshua Bruyn, Van Eyck Problemen: De Levensbron het werk van een leerling van Jan van Eyck (Utrecht: Dekker & Gumbert, 1957), 121–22 as a copy after a lost pasticcio by an assistant; see also Georg Zeman, “Eine altniederländische Silberstiftzeichnung und ihre Bedeutung für Jan van Eycks Dresdner Marienaltar,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 65 (2002): 91–104. The painting (2019GRO0002.I) was brought to my attention by Simon Dickinson and Christopher Foley and was in January 2019 taken to Bruges to be examined. I presented preliminary thoughts about its relationship to the workshop of Van Eyck during a study day organized in the Museo Nacional del Prado on the occasion of the exhibition La Fuente de la Gracia: Una table del entorno de Jan van Eyck, January 24–25, 2019; see my more recent discussion of the painting and its underdrawing: Till-Holger Borchert, “‘Follower or Collaborator’: The Painter of the Simpson Carson Madonna Reconsidered,” in Tributes to Maryan W. Ainsworth. Collaborative Spirit: Essays on Northern European Art 1350–1650, ed. Anna Koopstra, Christine Seidel, and Joshua Waterman (Turnhout: Brepols, 2022), 53–73.

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Figure 12.4: (a) Anonymous Master from southern Germany (?), Annunciation, ca. 1450, oil on panel, 80 × 31 cm. Modena, Galleria Estense, inv. 226. Su concessione del Ministero della Cultura – Archivio fotografico delle Gallerie Estensi. Photo: V. Negro; (b) Anonymous Master from southern Germany (?), Annunciation, ca. 1450, infrared-reflectogram, GICAS Ghent. Montage: Maximiliaan P. J. Martens.

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Llangattock Master was an illuminator in Bruges who worked in the 1440s and had access to the models kept in the Eyckian workshop.16 Unaware of the panel’s whereabouts—it resurfaced only in the beginning of 2019—and therefore relying on old photographs, Brinkmann compared the “stereometrical simplifications of bodies and faces” and handling of faces of the Simpson Carson Madonna to miniatures in the Llangattock Hours. He pointed out similarities in the combination of bulky draperies and a delicate torso, and recognized parallels in the construction of the landscape and especially the trees.17 While landscapes with high horizons are prominently featured in the miniatures of the Llangattock Hours, the shape of trees and the way the foliage is painted are quite different in the panel: they are triangular in shape and have pointed tops, some sharper than others. The leaves are dotted with a brush using a dark green and occasionally lighter highlights. In the Annunciation and Visitation miniatures in the Llangattock Hours (fols. 53v and 68v), in contrast, treetops are round-shaped, while leaves consist of dark and light dots or even very short strokes. More importantly, the figures in the Llangattock Hours differ notably from the Simpson Carson Madonna not only in terms of drapery style, which is much more voluminous in the painting, but also in the way that figures are inscribed into their surrounding space. The Llangattock Master’s figures in the miniatures of the Circumcision (Figure 12.6) and the Funerary Mass (fols. 92v. and 131v) are clearly smaller in relation to the space surrounding them and therefore offer a more satisfying perspective. This is even more true for the miniatures of the Enthroned Virgin and Pentecost (fol. 37v and 43v) that another Bruges illuminator contributed to the Llangattock Hours. The Simpson Carson Madonna, in contrast, confines the enthroned Virgin within a narrow interior that is too small to accommodate her suggested physical presence. Notwithstanding the painter’s difficulties in creating a coherent perspective, it seems likely that the narrow room and the disproportionately large Virgin are features that were most likely derived from the original models by van Eyck that were used here. Van Eyck’s superb realism and his skills in creating depth and perspectival space disguise the fact that

 The illuminator is named after miniatures in a book of hours kept at the Getty Museum Los Angeles, MS Ludwig IX 7; see De Kesel, “Splendour and Brilliance Rediscovered,” 333–63, here 342; Thomas Kren, “Flemish Artists of the Turin-Milan Hours,” in Illuminating the Renaissance, ed. Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003), 83–84; see also the entry on the Llangattock Hours by Richard Gray in Illuminating the Renaissance, 88–89; Anton von Euw and Joachim M. Plotzek, Die Handschriften der Sammlung Ludwig, vol. 2 (Cologne: Schnütgen-Museum der Stadt Köln, 1982), 115–41 (where the manuscript is referred to as Hours of Folpard of Amerongen).  Brinkmann, “Ein deutscher Maler,” 73.

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Figure 12.5a: Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin, Virgin and Child, ca. 1450, oil on panel, 51 × 60.5 cm. Bruges, Musea Brugge, Groeningemuseum, inv. no. 2019GRO000O2.I. Photo: Dominique Provost; © Art in Flanders.

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Figure 12.5b: Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin, Virgin and Child, ca. 1450, infrared-reflectogram. Bruges, Musea Brugge. Montage: Guenevere Souffreau.

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Figure 12.6: Master of the Llangattock Hours, The Circumcision, ca. 1450, tempera on parchment, 26.4 × 18.4 cm. Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS. Ludwig IX 7, fol. 92v.

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in most of his surviving Marian paintings, figures are usually far too tall in relation to their surroundings. This is true for his Virgin in the Church where the figure of Mary extends almost up to the vaults of the nave as well as for the figures of the Annunciation of the Ghent Altarpiece where the ceiling is too low to accommodate the standing Virgin. The observation similarly concerns several other paintings by van Eyck: the Virgin of Nicolas Rolin and the Virgin of Joris van der Paele, for example, as well as the Arnolfini portrait and the Dresden Triptych. Despite the fact the Simpson Carson Virgin cannot be attributed to any of the Eyckian or post-Eyckian illuminators involved in the Turin-Milan Hours, the painter’s relationship to the van Eyck workshop deserves further attention. The room depicted in the Simpson Carson Virgin is as equally confined space as the interior of van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna (Figure 12.7). Both paintings convey Mary’s presence in a monumental way and place the throne with its baldachin-shaped cloth of honor before the rear wall of the room with a window to the left and a niche embedded in the wall to the right. Objects such as the brass bowl or the glass carafe in van Eyck’s painting reappear in the Simpson Carson Virgin as does the motif of the sitting lions on the throne. Even though it is quite likely that the Simpson Carson Virgin was not modeled directly after the Lucca Madonna, its prototype must have been a similar composition.18 Both the so-called Ince Hall Madonna as well as the Madonna of Covarrubias share several details with the Simpson Carson Virgin. The most notable common feature is a wooden bench that is situated below the windows on the left in all three depictions, although the position of the brass bowl is different in each painting. While the panel from Covarrubias shares a few motifs exclusively with the Simpson Carson Virgin such as the niche embedded in the right wall or the rosary and the position of the Virgin and Child, the majority of details—the trunk, the brass chandelier, the fruit on the window sills—appears also in the Ince Hall Madonna that most likely served as the prototype for the Covarrubias Virgin.19

 Jochen Sander, Niederländische Gemälde im Städel 1400–1550 (Mainz: Zabern, 1993), 244–63, here 261–62, lists Van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna as the source of numerous compilations.  On the Ince Hall Madonna, see Ursula Hoff and Martin Davies, The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (Les Primitifs Flamands. I. Corpus de la peinture des anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux au quinziéme siècle), vol. 12 (Brussels: Centre national de recherches Primitifs Flamands, 1971), 29–50, here 38–41; Hoff and Davies concluded that the Ince Hall Madonna was a copy after a lost Van Eyck but not painted by a Flemish painter; Otto Pächt, Van Eyck: Die Begründer der altniederländischen Malerei (Munich: Prestel, 1989), 87–88; a different view was taken by Hugh Hudson in his entry on the technical examination of the Ince Hall Madonna in Mauro Natale, ed., El Rinacimiento Mediterraneo (Madrid: Museo Thyssen Bornemisza, 2001), 267–69; see also Hugh Hudson, “Shedding Light on an Eyckian Virgin: The Infrared Reflectography of the Ince Hall Virgin and Child,” in Le dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture: Colloque XIV, ed. Hélène Verougstraete and

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Figure 12.7: Jan van Eyck, Virgin and Child (The Lucca Madonna), ca. 1435, oil on panel, 65.7 × 49.6 cm. Frankfurt am Main, Städelmuseum, inv. no. 944. http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be, © KIK-IRPA Brussels.

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Significantly enough, the scale of the figure and the proportions of the interior are conceived very differently in both the Covarrubias Virgin and the Ince Hall Madonna when compared to Jan van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna and the Simpson Carson Virgin. Whereas van Eyck habitually designed the figures first when working on a new panel painting and envisioned the surrounding space at a later stage during the production process, the Covarrubias Master and the painter of the Ince Hall Madonna seem to have worked the other way around. Their approach results in a more coherent spatial concept that is reminiscent of the Eyckian illuminations in the Turin-Milan Hours and can be compared to the working process of constructing space in the panels by Petrus Christus or Dieric Bouts.20 In contrast to the prominence that the Covarrubias Master assigns to the interior, the painter of the Simpson Carson Virgin follows the space represented in van Eyck’s panels more closely: the disposition of the Virgin and Child and the drapery folds are clearly related to the Dresden Triptych of 1437, while the interior resembles the undated Lucca Madonna. Most of the objects represented in the Simpson Carson picture appear in several compositions by Jan van Eyck and his workshop but there is no single painting known that features all of them. This suggests that the Simpson Carson Virgin is either a pastiche based on different Eyckian models or a copy after a lost work by van Eyck. There are arguments to support the first hypothesis. The anonymous painter would in this scenario have had access to van Eyck’s compositions, either because he saw the originals in different locations or, more likely, studied drawings or ricordi in the Bruges workshop. Significantly enough, the underdrawing of the figures in the Simpson Carson Virgin, which I discussed at length elsewhere, is reminiscent of those of van Eyck (see Figure 12.5b).21 It is detailed and applied using a liquid medium with brushes of different sizes in subsequent stages. In a first stage, the painter used a thin brush to outline contours and to place the main folds of the Virgin’s cloth. The draperies of the garment were drawn with a single line, sometimes reinforced by using a thicker brush. In a later stage, hatching was applied with a thin brush along the receding folds as a tool for modeling. While it looks

Roger Van Schoute (Leuven: Peeters, 2003), 260–72; and Hugh Hudson, Jan van Eyck: The Ince Hall Virgin and Child and the Scientific Examination of Early Netherlandish Painting (Saarbrücken: VDM Verlag Dr. Müller, 2009), 82–104, 124, 200–210, concluding that the painting is a faithful copy after a work by Jan van Eyck from ca. 1433.  Ainsworth and Martens, Petrus Christus, 43–49; Aimé and Henri Pauwels, “Dirk Bouts’ Laatste Avondmaal: Een belangrijk keerpunt in de evolutie van de perspectief in de schilderkunst van de Nederlanden,” in Dirk Bouts (ca. 1410–1475): Een Vlaams Primitief te Leuven, ed. Mauits Smeyers (Leuven: Peeters, 1998), 71–95.  Borchert, “‘Follower or Collaborator,’”, 52–73, here 70–73.

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random at first, a closer look reveals that it has been applied rather systematically to define light and shade. As in the case of van Eyck,22 the use of light is central to establishing the illusion of the figure’s plasticity. Some of the hatching was finally reinforced with a broad brush. Spontaneous brushstrokes that cross each other in various ways are a typical feature in van Eyck’s underdrawing; for him hatching was essential to indicate light and shade early on, which in turn established the three-dimensional qualities of the figures in the preparatory stage of the painting’s execution.23 The extensive and detailed underdrawing of the Simpson Carson Virgin’s cloth, however, contrasts with the sketch-like brushwork found elsewhere on the panel and in the landscape; the loose brushwork instead recalls underdrawing in southern German paintings around 1450.24 The style and function of the underdrawing suggest that the Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin was acquainted with the working methods of the van Eyck workshop. He must have experienced them long enough to understand their purpose and to integrate them in his own artistic practice. Furthermore, he was able to rely on pattern-drawings of the Bruges workshops since he clearly had access to some of van Eyck’s principal compositions, which he reused in his own painting. His remarkable interest in light and shade as a primary pictorial means, as witnessed in his treatment of the drapery folds, appears to be directly linked to his experience of van Eyck’s working methods and practice. It seems likely that the anonymous painter entered van Eyck’s workshop as a journeyman who had received his training elsewhere. Whatever role he may have played in the workshop, it is evident that he did not meet—or did not have to meet—the standards of the van Eyck workshop in his own work25 and that the  See Catheline Perier-D’Ieteren, “Le rôle du dessin sous-jacent et de l’ébauche préparatoire au lavis dans la genèse des peintres de l’Agneau mystique,” in Van Eyck Studies: Papers Presented at the Eighteenth Symposium for the Study of Underdrawing and Technology in Painting, Brussels 19–21 September 2012, ed. Christina Currie et al. (Leuven: Peeters, 2017), 121–35; see also Maryan W. Ainsworth, “Revelations about Jan van Eyck’s Virgin and Child with Saints Donatian and George, and the Canon Joris van der Paele,” in Verougstraete and Van Schoute, Le dessin sousjacent, 273–85; Ainsworth, “Attribution Mysteries,” 79–88.  Ainsworth, “Revelations,” 273‒85; Ainsworth, “Attribution Mysteries,” 80–83; Sander, Niederländische Gemälde, 245; Périer-D’Ieteren, “Le rôle du dessin sous-jacent,” 121–35.  During the exhibition Van Eyck to Dürer in the Groeningemuseum in Bruges, it was possible to document together with Prof. Dr. Maximiliaan Martens of Ghent University by means of IRR some of the Southern German Masters such as the Master of the Pollingen altarpiece whose nativity scenes from Kremsmünster show a similar approach in the underdrawing of the landscape.  The faces of the Christ Child and the Virgin have been altered by the painter and were overpainted in the sixteenth century; the removal of the overpainting before 1909 presumably impacted the surface of the fleshtones and amplified their somewhat plump character, see Borchert, “‘Follower or Collaborator,’”, 52–73, here 54.

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integration of Eyckian motifs—the landscape and the objects on the shelves—was sufficient to satisfy the client who commissioned the panel. From this point of view, the painting is comparable to the one in Covarrubias, the panels of the “German-Netherlandish Altarpiece,” and the work of mid-fifteenth-century southern German painters, all of which primarily relied on the use of specific Eyckian motifs and paid less attention to van Eyck’s technique.26 At least one additional work may have been painted by the Master of the Simpson Carson Virgin: now in Berlin, it is a larger version of Jan van Eyck’s Madonna at the Fountain of 1439, arguably his most often copied work.27 The panel in Berlin (Figure 12.8a) omits the angels and the cloth of honor of van Eyck’s original, and depicts exotic trees behind the hedge.28 The blue dress of van Eyck’s Virgin is altered to red, perhaps an indication that the artist saw and referred to a drawing rather than the painting. The transparent veil that covers the Virgin’s head is a later addition but distorts the painting’s stylistic coherence. The painter follows van Eyck’s draperies, but his folds are less elegant and appear heavier. The drapery folds are reminiscent of those in the Simpson Carson Virgin and are modeled in a similar way; the graphic vocabulary revealed in the underdrawing (Figure 12.8b) is also akin to that of van Eyck in its use of extensive thin hatching in brush along the folds and reinforced contours. Dendrochronology of the Berlin panel established that all three boards have a felling date between 1437 and 1444, making a date of 1450 or 1460 possible.29 Remarkably enough, both paintings consist of more planks than one would usually expect and, moreover, are made with pegs of similar shape. However, whereas the Berlin panel was not made from Baltic oak, as was customary in the Netherlands, but from trees sourced locally in

 Till-Holger Borchert, “Die Erneuerung der Malkunst: Überlegungen zur altniederländischen Tafelmalerei,” in Borchert, Van Eyck to Dürer, 19–33, here 32 and Till-Holger Borchert, “Reflecting Van Eyck: The Diffusion of an Optical Revolution in European Art around 1450,” in Martens, Borchert, and Dumolyn, Van Eyck: An Optical Revolution, 432–35; see also Ulrich Söding, “Realismus und Symbolik in der deutschen Tafelmalerei von 1430 bis 1450–1460,” in Vom Weichen über den Schönen Stil zur Ars Nova: Neue Beiträge zur europäischen Kunst zwischen 1350 und 1470, ed. Jiri Fajt and Markus Hörsch (Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2018), 361–94.  Berlin, Gemäldegalerie Inv. 525B.  Max J. Friedländer, Die Altniederländische Malerei, vol. 1, Die Van Eyck—Petrus Christus (Berlin: Cassirer, 1924), 163–65; Duverger, “Brugsche schilders,” 102–5; and Wilhelm Valentiner, “A Pupil of Jan van Eyck,” Art Quarterly 8 (1945): 297–302. I would like to thank Stephan Kemperdick for bringing this panel into the discussion when first shown the Simpson Carson Virgin in Bruges in 2019, and for subsequently providing infrared reflectographs and x-rays.  Many thanks to Prof. Dr. Peter Klein, formerly at the University of Hamburg, for making available the dendrochronological report and indicating that the panels were made from oak that grew in western Germany, the Ardennes, or locally in the Netherlands.

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Figure 12.8: (a) Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna, Madonna at the Fountain, ca. 1450–1460, oil on panel, 57 × 41 cm. Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, Kat. Nr. 525 B; (b) Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna, Madonna at the Fountain, infrared-reflectogram.

western Germany or the Low Countries, the four planks of oak of the Simpson Carson Virgin are of Baltic origin. Only one of them could be dated by means of dendrochronology, establishing a felling date of 1387 and thereby suggesting that the work was likely painted during the first half of the fifteenth century.30 A further examination of the painting in Bruges and in Berlin should look at the pigments used and study specific aging processes, which will undoubtedly allow us to clarify their relationship and provide additional insights into the reception of Jan van Eyck in the middle of the fifteenth century. Both the Master of Covarrubias and the Master of the Simpson Carson Madonna offer particularly interesting examples of the way that the workshop of Jan van Eyck functioned. In their individual responses to van Eyck’s innovation and

 Dendrochronological report kindly provided and discussed by Ian Tylers. The report is on file in the archive of the Groeningemuseum, Bruges. There is insufficient data available to determine factors such as the drying time that was customary before wood was processed as support for panel-painting. Most likely the duration varied; see Peter Klein, “Age Determinations Based on Dendrochronology” in Scientific Examinations of Easel Painting, ed. Roger van Schoute and Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq (Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 1986), 225–37.

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technique, they remind us that the Bruges workshop was not a static environment, but the kind that probably attracted experienced painters from the Low Countries and beyond who temporarily worked in Bruges as journeymen. The work of assistants and/or followers also provides us with a unique opportunity to understand how the contemporaries of van Eyck looked at his paintings—but it is only by means of technical studies that we can establish their direct encounters with the master and his workshop.

Bibliography Ainsworth, Maryan W. “The Art of Petrus Christus.” In Petrus Christus: Renaissance Master of Bruges, with contributions of Maximiliaan P. J. Martens, 25–67. New York: Abrams, 1994. Ainsworth, Maryan W. “Attribution Mysteries of The Virgin and Child with St. Barbara, St. Elizabeth and Jan Vos.” In The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus and Jan Vos, edited by Emma Capron, 71–89. London: D Giles, 2018. Ainsworth, Maryan W. “Revelations about Jan van Eyck’s Virgin and Child with Saints Donatian and George, and the Canon Joris van der Paele.” In Le dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture: Colloque XIV, edited by Hélène Verougstraete and Roger van Schoute, 273–85. Leuven: Peeters, 2003. Balavoine, Ludovic. Jan van Eyck: Als Ich Can. Villeneuve-d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 2021. Bermejo Martinez, Elisa. La pintura de los primitivos flamencos en España. Vol. 1. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1980. Borchert, Till-Holger, ed. The Age of Jan van Eyck: The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2002. Borchert, Till-Holger. “Die Erneuerung der Malkunst: Überlegungen zur altniederländischen Tafelmalerei.” In Van Eyck to Dürer, edited by Till-Holger Borchert, 19–33. London: Thames & Hudson, 2010. Borchert, Till-Holger. “‘Follower or Collaborator’: The Painter of the Simpson Carson Madonna Reconsidered.” In Tributes to Maryan W. Ainsworth. Collaborative Spirit: Essays on Northern European Art 1350–1650, edited by Anna Koopstra, Christine Seidel, and Joshua Waterman, 52–73. Turnhout: Brepols, 2022. Borchert, Till-Holger. “The Ghent Altarpiece and the Workshops of the Van Eyck Brothers.” In The Ghent Altarpiece: Reproductions, Interpretations, Scholarly Debates, edited by Stephan Kemperdick, Johannes Rößler, and Joris Corin Heyder, 158–61. Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2017. Borchert, Till-Holger. “Jan van Eyck and his Workshop: Organization, Collaborators, Legacy.” In Van Eyck: The Ghent Altarpiece. Art, History, Science and Religion, edited Danny Praet and Maximiliaan P. J. Martens, 138–58. Veurne: Hannibal, 2019. Borchert, Till-Holger. “Reflecting Van Eyck: The Diffusion of an Optical Revolution in European Art around 1450.” In Van Eyck: An Optical Revolution, edited by Maximiliaan P. J. Martens, Till-Holger Borchert, and Jan Dumolyn, 425–45. Veurne: Hannibal, 2020. Borchert, Till-Holger. “Some Eyckian Drawings and Miniatures in the Context of the Drawing.” In An Eyckian Crucifixion Explored: Ten Essays on a Drawing, edited by Albert Elen and Friso Lammertse, 95–107. Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2016.

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Borchert, Till-Holger, ed. Van Eyck to Dürer. London: Thames & Hudson, 2010. Brinkman, Bodo. “Ein deutscher Maler in der Werkstatt Jan van Eycks.” In Begegnungen mit alten Meistern: Altdeutsche Tafelmalerei auf dem Prüfstand, edited by Frank Matthias Kammel and Carola Bettina Gries, 61–76. Nuremberg: Germanisches Nationalmuseum, 2000. Brinkman, Bodo. “Meister der Madonna von Covarrubias: Ruhe auf der Flucht nach Ägypten.” In Deutsche Gemälde im Städel 1300–1500, Bodo Brinkman and Stephan Kemperdick, 226–43. Mainz: Zabern, 2002. Bruyn, Joshua. Van Eyck Problemen: De Levensbron het werk van een leerling van Jan van Eyck. Utrecht: Dekker & Gumbert, 1957. Capron, Emma. “Paintings, Prayers, and Salvation: The Jan Vos Virgins in Context.” In The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus and Jan Vos, edited by Emma Capron, 13–49. London: D Giles, 2018. Châtelet, Albert. Hubert et Jan van Eyck: Créateurs de l’Agneau mystique. Dijon: Faton, 2011. De Kesel, Lieve. “Splendour and Brilliance Rediscovered: Jan van Eyck’s Legacy as Inspiration for Painters and Illuminators (ca. 1420–c.1540).” In Van Eyck: An Optical Revolution, edited by Maximiliaan P. J. Martens, Till-Holger Borchert, and Jan Dumolyn, 333–63. Veurne: Hannibal, 2020. De Loo, Georges Hulin. Les Heurs de Milan. Brussels and Paris: Van Oest, 1911. De Loo, Georges Hulin. “Un portraitiste de style eyckesque vers 1440.” Apollo: Chronique des beauxarts (December 1941): 8–10. Dhanens, Elisabeth. Hubert and Jan van Eyck. New York: Tabard Press, 1980. Dumolyn, Jan, Susan Frances Jones, Ward Leloup, Toon De Meester, and Mathijs Speecke. “Margaret van Eyck, a House Called ‘The Wild Sea’ and Jan van Eyck’s Posthumous Workshop.” The Burlington Magazine 164 (2022): 120–129. Duverger, Jozef. “Brugsche schilders ten tijde van Jan van Eyck.” In Bulletin Musée Royaux des BeauxArts 1–3 (1955) (Miscellanea Erwin Panofsky): 83–120. Euw, Anton von, and Joachim M. Plotzek. Die Handschriften der Sammlung Ludwig, vol. 2, 115–41. Cologne: Schnütgen-Museum der Stadt Köln, 1982. Faries, Molly. “Technical Studies of Early Netherlandish Painting: A Critical Overview of Recent Developments.” In Recent Developments in the Technical Examination of Early Netherlandish Painting: Methodology, Limitations, Perspectives, edited by Molly Faries and Ron Spronk, 1–37. Turnhout: Brepols, 2003. Friedländer, Max J. Die Altniederländische Malerei. Vol. 1, Die Van Eyck – Petrus Christus. Berlin: Cassirer, 1924. Gray, Richard. “Willem Vrelant, Master of the Llangattock Hours, Master of the Llangattock Epiphanym Master of Wauquelin’s Alexander or Workshop, and Workshop of Master of Chevrot.” In Illuminating the Renaissance, edited by Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick, 88–89. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003. Hoff, Ursula, and Martin Davies. The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (Les Primitifs Flamands. I. Corpus de la peinture des anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux au quinziéme siècle), vol. 12. Brussels: Centre national de recherches Primitifs Flamands, 1971. Hudson, Hugh. Jan van Eyck: The Ince Hall Virgin and Child and the Scientific Examination of Early Netherlandish Painting. Saarbrücken: VDM Verlag Dr. Müller, 2009. Hudson, Hugh. “Shedding Light on an Eyckian Virgin: The Infrared Reflectography of the Ince Hall Virgin and Child.” In Le dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture: Colloque XIV, edited by Hélène Verougstraete and Roger Van Schoute, 260–72. Leuven: Peeters, 2003.

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Hudson, Hugh. “Taller de Jan van Eyck: La Virgen con el Niño de Ince Hall, ca. 1433.” In El Rinacimiento Mediterraneo, edited by Mauro Natale, 267–69, cat. no. 30. Madrid: Museo Thyssen Bornemisza, 2001. Jones, Susan Frances. “Jan van Eyck and Spain.” Boletín del Museo del Prado 32 (2014): 30–49. Klein, Peter. “Age Determinations Based on Dendrochronology.” In Scientific Examinations of Easel Painting, edited by Roger van Schoute and Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq, 225–37. Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 1986. König, Eberhard. Die Très Belles Heures von Jean de France, Duc de Berry. Munich: Hirmer, 1998. Kren, Thomas. “Flemish Artists of the Turin-Milan Hours.” In Illuminating the Renaissance, edited by Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick, 83–119. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003. Messling, Guido. “Reflections, Models and Possible Functions.” In An Eyckian Crucifixion Explored: Ten Essays on a Drawing, edited by Albert Elen and Friso Lammertse, 71–78. Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2016. Pächt, Otto. Van Eyck: Die Begründer der altniederländischen Malerei. Munich: Prestel, 1989. Panofsky, Erwin. Early Netherlandish Painting: Its Origins and Character. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1953. Pauwels, Aimé, and Henri Pauwels. “Dirk Bouts’ Laatste Avondmaal: Een belangrijk keerpunt in de evolutie van de perspectief in de schilderkunst van de Nederlanden.” In Dirk Bouts (ca. 1410–1475): Een Vlaams Primitief te Leuven, edited by Mauits Smeyers, 71–95. Leuven: Peeters, 1998. Périer-D’Ieteren, Catheline. “Le rôle du dessin sous-jacent et de l’ébauche préparatoire au lavis dans la genèse des peintres de l’Agneau mystique.” In Van Eyck Studies: Papers Presented at the Eighteenth Symposium for the Study of Underdrawing and Technology in Painting, Brussels 19–21 September 2012, edited by Christina Currie et al., 121–35. Leuven: Peeters, 2017. Reinach, Salomon. “A Copy of a Lost Van Eyck.” The Burlington Magazine 43, no. 244 (1923): 14–16. Sander, Jochen. Niederländische Gemälde im Städel 1400–1550. Mainz: Zabern, 1993. Söding, Ulrich. “Realismus und Symbolik in der deutschen Tafelmalerei von 1430 bis 1450–1460.” In Vom Weichen über den Schönen Stil zur Ars Nova: Neue Beiträge zur europäischen Kunst zwischen 1350 und 1470, edited by Jiri Fajt and Markus Hörsch, 361–94. Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2018. Valentiner, Wilhelm. “A Pupil of Jan van Eyck.” Art Quarterly 8 (1945): 297–302. Van Buren, Anne H. “The Genesis of the Eyckian Book of Prayers and Masses.” In Heures de TurinMilan: Inv. Nr. 47 Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, Torino, Anne H. van Buren, James H. Marrow, and Silvana Pettinati, 249–401. Lucerne: Luzern Faksimile Verlag, 1996. Weale, W. H. James. “A Fifteenth-Century Painting by a Follower of Jan van Eyck.” The Burlington Magazine 15 (1909): 48–50. Zeman, Georg. “Eine altniederländische Silberstiftzeichnung und ihre Bedeutung für Jan van Eycks Dresdner Marienaltar.” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 65 (2002): 91–104.

Curriculum vitae of Stephen N. Fliegel Robert P. Bergman Curator of Medieval Art (Retired) The Cleveland Museum of Art 11150 East Boulevard Cleveland, Ohio 44106

EDUCATION University of Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, B.A./M.A. Medieval English History/Art History, 1975/1977 Thesis: “The Library of Lincoln Cathedral under the Patronage of Bishop Hugh (1186–1200)” Research fields: 12th-century English manuscript illumination, English/French Romanesque sculpture University of Manchester, England, Museums Diploma, 1979 Hampshire County Records Office, Winchester, England Special subject certification, 1977: Medieval palaeography, codicology, manuscript illumination, bindings, incunabula, conservation techniques for medieval manuscripts The Winchester Cathedral Library, Winchester, England Special subject certification, 1977: Romanesque manuscript illumination and The Winchester Bible (12th century) The Fellows’ Library, Eton College, Windsor, England Special subject certification, 1976: Palaeography, codicology, manuscript illumination (technique), incunabula

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE Robert P. Bergman Curator of Medieval Art, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH, 2012–2019 Assistant/Associate/Full Curator of Medieval Art, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH, 1982–2012 Curatorial responsibilities: Early Christian/Byzantine, Western Medieval, and Renaissance collections (sculpture, painting, arms & armor, decorative arts, and illuminated manuscripts) Other responsibilities: acquisitions, scholarly research, publication, organization of exhibitions, lectures, installation and interpretation of permanent collection. Adjunct Assistant Professor of Art History, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, 1990–2010

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514845-014

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EXHIBITIONS “Myth and Mystique: Cleveland’s Gothic Table Fountain,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Co-curator with Elina Gertsman, Oct. 9, 2016–Feb. 26, 2017. “The Netherlandish Miniature, 1260–1550,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Dec. 21, 2013–Dec. 7, 2014. “The Caporali Missal: A Masterpiece of Renaissance Illumination,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Feb. 17–June 2, 2013. “The Glory of the Painted Page: Manuscript Illumination from the Permanent Collection,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Nov. 6, 2010–Apr. 17, 2011. “Arms & Armor from Imperial Austria,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Feb. 24–June 1, 2008. “Dukes & Angels: Art from the Court of Burgundy, 1364–1419,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Oct. 24, 2004–Jan. 9, 2005. “The Jeanne Miles Blackburn Collection of Manuscript Illuminations,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Dec. 19, 1999–Feb. 27, 2000. “African Zion: The Sacred Art of Ethiopia,” Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Nov.15, 1995–Jan. 7, 1996. “The Decorated Letter and the Illuminator’s Art,” The Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Sept. 21–Dec. 19,1993. “The Forge of Vulcan: European Arms and Armor,” The Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Nov. 24, 1992–May 30, 1993. “Scriptorium: The Illuminated Book in Medieval Art,” The Cleveland Museum of Art, Curator, Nov. 5, 1991–Feb. 2,1992. “Master Goldsmiths of the Renaissance: Their Models and Designs,” The Cleveland Museum of Art, Co-curator, with Patrick M. de Winter, Nov. 2, 1982–Mar. 20, 1983.

PUBLICATIONS (BOOKS AND EXHIBITION CATALOGUES) Myth and Mystique: Cleveland’s Gothic Table Fountain (with Elina Gertsman). Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2016. The Caporali Missal: A Masterpiece of Renaissance Illumination. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2013. Treasures from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2012, relevant entries. Glanz und Grösse des Mittelalters: Kölner Meisterwerke aus den grossen Sammlungen der Welt. Cologne: Schütgen Museum, 2012, contributing entries. A Higher Contemplation: Sacred Meaning in the Christian Art of the Middle Ages. Kent: Kent State University Press, 2011. Resplendent Faith: Liturgical Treasuries of the Middle Ages. Kent: Kent State University Press, 2009. Arms & Armor: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2nd revised ed. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007. Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007, contributor.

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Art from the Court of Burgundy: The Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless, 1364–1419 | L’art à la court de Bourgogne: Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur (1364–1419). Organized with Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon, Paris: RMN, 2004. Sacred Meaning in the Christian Art of the Middle Ages. Cleveland: Cleveland State University, 2004. The Jeanne Miles Blackburn Collection of Manuscript Illuminations. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999. Vatican Treasures: Early Christian, Renaissance, and Baroque Art from the Papal Collections. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998, contributor. Arms & Armor: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998. Glossary of Manuscript Terms. Exhibition guide to “The Decorated Letter and the Illuminator’s Art.” Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993. The Making of Armor. Gallery Guide, Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1992. Technique and the Medieval Book. Gallery Guide Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991. European Decorative Arts: 1400–1600, An Annotated Bibliography (with Patrick M. de Winter). Boston: G.K. Hall, 1988.

PUBLICATIONS (ARTICLES) “The Dream of Chivalry: Arms & Armor and its Appeal to the American Collector of the Gilded Age.” Journal of the History of Collections 27 (Nov. 2015): 363–374. “The Virgin Eleousa” (with Dean Yoder). Cleveland Art (Jan./Feb. 2012): 10–13. “A Chronicle of Book Arts.” Cleveland Art (Sept./Oct. 2010): 7–8. “Movable Pieces: Recent Additions to the Collection of Migration Art.” Cleveland Art (July/ August 2010): 24–25. “A Taste for Flemish Art.” Cleveland Art (November 2009): 6–8. “The Sacred Page.” Cleveland Art (September 2008): 6–7. “Arms and Armor from Imperial Austria.” Cleveland Art (February 2008): 3–5. “The Caporali Missal.” Cleveland Art (November 2007): 5–7. “A Masterpiece in Miniature.” Cleveland Art (December 2006): 5–7. “Reinventing the Middle Ages,”The Rowfant Club Yearbook (2006), pp. 1–19. “An Illuminated World.” Cleveland Art (December 2004): 6–7. “Patronage and the Burgundian Court.” The Magazine Antiques (October 2004): 142–151. “Piety and Power.” Cleveland Art (October 2004): 4–5. “The Art of War: Thirteenth–Century Arms and Armor.” In The Book of Kings: Art, War, and The Morgan Picture Bible, exh. cat. (Baltimore: The Walters Art Museum, 2002): 83–97. “An Elizabethan Silver Cup with Cover.” Cleveland Studies in the History of Art, 8 (2003): 34–43. “The Cleveland Table Fountain and Gothic Automata.” Cleveland Studies in the History of Art, 7 (2002): 6–49. “Wearable Wealth.” Cleveland Art (April 2002): 8–9. “Sailing to Byzantium.” Cleveland Art (October 2000): 4–5. “St. Luke in Ethiopia.” Cleveland Art (April 2000): 4–5.

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“Jewels of the Page.” Cleveland Art (December 1999): 8–9. “Armor in the Age of Shakespeare.” Spotlight (September 1998). “The Armor Court.” Cleveland Art (September 1998): 4–7. “Making a Manuscript, the Monk’s Art.” Nexus (1998): 27–28. “Between Romanesque and Gothic.” Cleveland Art (September 1997): 8–9. “A Much–Loved Collection.” Cleveland Art (December 1996): 8–9. “Ethiopia’s Sacred Legacy.” Cleveland Art (November 1995): 4–6. “The Cross in Ethiopian Art.” Cleveland Art (December 1995): 4–5. “Florentine Terracottas.” Cleveland Art (December 1995): 8–9. “An English Pikeman’s Armor from the Severance Collection.” Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art (September 1994): 252–267. “A Little-Known Celtic Stone Head.” Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art (March 1990): 82–103.

CONFERENCES AND COLLOQUIA (PARTIAL) “The Dream of Chivalry: Arms & Armor and its Appeal to the American Collector of the Gilded Age.” Paper presented at the “Medieval Art in the Gilded Age” symposium, Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, February 2010. “The Cathedral of Chartres.” Presented at The Intown Club, Cleveland, September 21, 2009. “Resplendent Faith: Liturgical Treasuries of the Middle Ages.” Presented at Lorain County Community College, April 24, 2008. “The Forge of Vulcan: Arms, Armor and European Culture.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art, April 20, 2008. “Portraiture and the Pictorial Representation of Armor in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.” Presented at The Cleveland Museum of Art, April 18, 2008. “Armor as Technology and Art.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art, April 15, 2008. “The Cathedral of Chartres.” Presented at Holy Trinity Church, Lorain, March 28, 2006. “The Church of Hagia Sophia, Istanbul.” Presented at the Holy Trinity Church, Lorain, March 21, 2006. “Gothic Automata and the Valois Courts of France.” Paper presented at the “La creation artistique en France autour de 1400 (XIX Rencontres de l’Ecole du Louvre)” colloquium, Ecole du Louvre, Paris, July 7, 2004. “Images of the Mother of God in Medieval Life and Art.” Presented at First Friday Forum, Lorain County Community College, April 2, 2004. “Gothic Art for the Industrial Age: Victorian Medievalism and the Pre-Raphaelites Revisited.” Presented at The Rowfant Club/ The Aldus Society, November 10, 2002. “Heaven on Earth: Early Christian and Byzantine Art at The Cleveland Museum of Art.” Presented at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland Heights, April 21, 2002. “Two Royal Books of Hours in The Cleveland Museum of Art.” Presented at The Cleveland Medieval and Renaissance Society, November 30, 2001. “A Sacred Patronage: Papal Manuscripts for Mass and Office.” Presented at The Rowfant Club, Cleveland, November 4, 2001.

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“The Realm of Angels: Sacred Meaning in the Christian Art of the Middle Ages.” Presented at Holy Trinity Church, Lorain, March 6, 2001. “Glassmaking in Renaissance Venice.” Presented at The Rowfant Club, Cleveland, October 6, 2000. “The Patronage of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy (1363–1404) and the Ducal Tombs at Dijon.” Presented at The Rowfant Club, Cleveland, December 11, 1999. “The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy (1363–1404) and the Ducal Tombs at Dijon.” Academic paper presented to the Medieval Society of the University of Sheffield, England, April 20, 1999. “Vulcan’s Forge: The Culture of Arms in Renaissance Europe.” Presented at The Cleveland Museum of Art, September 16, 1998. “The Culture of Arms: Art, Arms, and Armor in Medieval and Renaissance Europe.” Presented at The Cleveland Museum of Art, September 13, 1998. “The Dream of Chivalry and the Culture of Arms.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art, August 20, 1998. “The Glory of the Painted Page: Papal Manuscripts for Mass and Office.” Presented at the Vatican Treasures Exhibition Symposium, January 31, 1998. “Treasures of Tuscan Illumination at The Cleveland Museum of Art.” Presented at The Rowfant Club, Cleveland, November 19, 1997. “The Glory of the Painted Page: Manuscript Illumination in Medieval Life and Art.” Presented at the College of Jewish Studies, Beachwood, October 12, 1997. “The Art of Devotion.” Presented at St. James’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland, May 18, 1997. “Two Books of Hours of Royal Provenance from the collections of The Cleveland Museum of Art.” Presented at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland Heights, April 27, 1997. “The Culture of Arms: Art, Arms, and Armor in Medieval and Renaissance Europe.” Presented at Geauga County Library, October 6, 1996. “The Sacred Legacy of Ethiopia.” Presented at The Cleveland Museum of Art, November 14, 1995. “Medieval Visions of Death and Dying.” Presented at Folk Arte Gallery, Cleveland, October 13, 1995. “Medievalism and the Pre-Raphaelites.” Presented at The Cleveland Museum of Art, July 8, 1995. “Art, Arms, and Armor and the Emergence of a European Culture.” Presented at Roswell Museum and Art Center, Roswell, January 20, 1994. “The Art of the Armorer: History and Myth.” Presented at the Teacher’s Resource Center Workshop, Cleveland Museum of Art, April 21, 1993. “Court Patronage and the Hapsburgs: The Armor Workshops of Nuremberg and Augsburg.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art, March 24, 1993. “The Illuminator’s Art and the Medieval Book.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Print Club of Cleveland, December 1992. “Manuscripts of Royal Provenance from the Museum’s Permanent Collection.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Eye of the Beholder Series, May 1992. “Technique and the Medieval Book.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Teacher’s Resource Center Workshop, March 1992. “Three Manuscripts of Royal Provenance from the Permanent Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art.” Presented at The Rowfant Club, Cleveland, February 19, 1992.

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“The Gotha Missal: A Royal Codex from the Library of Charles V.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Eye of the Beholder Series, May 1991. “The Illuminator’s Art: Technique and Book Decoration in the Middle Ages.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Teacher’s Workshop Center, April 1991. “Iconography of the Crucifixion: Images of the Cross in Western Art.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Joint Colloquium, Anti-Defamation League and Cleveland Catholic Diocese, November 2, 1990. “Manuscript Illumination: Technique, Style, Codicology.” Presented at Cleveland State University, April 1989 and March 1990. “Sad Stories of the Death of Kings: Cleveland’s Medieval Collection.” Presented at the Cleveland Museum of Art Teacher’s Resource Workshop, October 1994.

ACQUISITIONS (PARTIAL) Purchase of 16th-century gold portrait plaque; 4th century Byzantine Imperial jeweled pendant Visigothic inlaid buckles; pair of Alemannic Fibulae; printed book of hours, Paris, 16th century; German stoneware; maiolica; a suit of Renaissance Armor by Pompeo della Cesa; 14th century leather casket, France, 15th century; Parade Staff Weapons of the Dukes of Brunswick-Luneburg; a 13th century French Gothic Bible from Toulouse; The Caporali Missal, 1469; Cretan icon by Angelos Aketantos, 15th century; Sedes Sapientiae, French, 12th century; Virgin and Child, Mosan, 13th century; Blackburn manuscript collection (gifted to the museum in 2000); Byzantine jasper Calyx, 10th century; a Seated Virgin and Child, alabaster, by Gil de Siloe; a Standing Figure of the Virgin and Child, Mosan, 13th century; Icon of the Holy Trinity, Constantinople, ca. 1450; the Collection of Jeanne Miles Blackburn (80 manuscript leaves).

PERMANENT GALLERY INSTALLATIONS Gallery reinstallation of CMA’s Renaissance sculpture and decorative arts (Galleries 216–219, 219A) of approximately 300 objects (1988–91). Reinstallation of CMA’s collection of German late Gothic sculpture and decorative arts (Gallery 215), February–May 1993: Reinstallation of CMA’s collection of early Gothic Art and International Style (Galleries 213–214), January–April 1994. Garden Court Loggia (Renaissance sculpture completed December 1995; Reinstallation of Arms and Armor Collection (1998); gallery of Early Christian/Byzantine Art (October 2000); Manuscript Gallery (April 2002); Collection of Early Christian/Migration/early medieval art (June 2010); reinstallation of Early Christian, Byzantine, medieval and early Renaissance galleries (2008–12); entire suite of medieval galleries (2005–12).

TEACHING EXPERIENCE CWRU Continuing Education Program (Senior Scholars) “Romanesque France” (October–November 2010) “Byzantium, 330–1453” (October–November 2009)

Curriculum vitae of Stephen N. Fliegel

“Gothic England, 1216–1547” (September–October 2008) “Liturgical Treasuries of the Middle Ages” (November 2008) “A History of Manuscript Illumination” (February–March 2007) “Paris, Burgundy, and the Artistic Patronage of the Early Valois (1328–1422)” (February–March 2006) CWRU Art History (Graduate Seminar) “Localization of Books of Hours” (1992) “Iconography and the Decorative Programs of French Books of Hours” (1992) “The Book of Hours in Medieval Art” (Spring 1990)

OTHER WORK “The Armor Court,” video tour of the CMA Armor Court, 1999. “The Armor Court,” televised documentary, WKYC TV-3, (Broadcast September 18, 1998). “The Decorated Letter,” Art Comment on WCLV-FM (Broadcast November 21, 1993). “The Royal Armouries at the Tower of London,” Art Comment on WCLV-FM (Broadcast May 16, 1993). “The Forge of Vulcan: European Arms and Armor,” Art Comment on WCLV-FM (Broadcast December 13, 1992). “The Hours of Isabel the Catholic: A Manuscript of Royal Provenance in the Permanent Collection,” Art Comment on WCLV-FM (Broadcast December 8, 1991). Various radio and television interviews/commentaries.

PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS Association of Art Museum Curators Medieval Academy of America International Center of Medieval Art Historians of Netherlandish Art Byzantine Studies Association

LANGUAGES French, Latin, Italian

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Notes on Contributors Lloyd de Beer is a curator of the medieval collections at the British Museum and director of the British Archaeological Association. His publications have focused on seal matrices, medieval reliquaries, tomb sculpture, and English alabasters. In 2021 he curated the exhibition Thomas Becket: Murder and the Making of a Saint and co-authored the accompanying catalogue. He is currently working on two projects: a monograph, English Alabaster Sculpture in the Middle Ages: Imagery, Trade, Iconoclasm, Reuse, as well as a three-year British Academy-funded fellowship exploring the material connections between England and West Africa in the Middle Ages and early modern period. Till-Holger Borchert is director of the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum in Aachen. Before he was director of Musea Brugge and of the Flemish Research Center for the Art in the Burgundian Netherlands. He curated exhibitions on Van Eyck, Memling, Charles the Bold, on Flemish influences in the Mediterranean and Central Europe and on Portraiture. He published on the fourteenththrough sixteenth-century arts, mostly in northern Europe, as well as on court culture, collection history, and the historiography of art history and conservation. An associate of the Royal Academy of Archeology of Belgium he taught art history in Germany and the United States. Elina Gertsman is Professor of Medieval Art and Archbishop Paul J. Hallinan Professor in Catholic Studies II at Case Western Reserve University. In addition to numerous articles, she has authored several award-winning books, including The Dance of Death in the Middle Ages: Image, Text, Performance (2010), Worlds Within: Opening the Medieval Shrine Madonna (2015), and The Absent Image: Lacunae in Medieval Books (2021). Among her edited projects is Myth and Mystique: Cleveland’s Gothic Table Fountain (2016), a collaboration with Stephen N. Fliegel. Her work has been supported by the Guggenheim, Kress, Mellon, and FACE Foundations as well as by the ACLS. Sandra Hindman is Professor Emerita of Art History at Northwestern University and Owner of Les Enluminures in Chicago, New York, and Paris. She is author, co-author, or editor of more than a dozen books and numerous articles mostly on medieval manuscripts and early printed books. These include Pen to Press: Illustrated Manuscripts and Printed Books in the First Century of Printing, with J. D. Farquhar (1977); Painting and Politics at the Court of Charles VI: Christine de Pizan’s Epitre Othéa (1986); and Sealed in Parchment: Rereadings of Knighthood in the Illuminated Manuscripts of Chrétien de Troyes (1994). She has also published on medieval rings, including Take this Ring: Medieval and Renaissance Rings from the Griffin Collection (2015). Sophie Jugie has been director of the Department of Sculptures at the Louvre, where she is in charge of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century French and northern European sculpture, since 2014. She was trained at the École Nationale des Chartes, the École du Louvre, and the Institut National du Patrimoine. Before coming to the Louvre, she was curator at the Musée national de la Renaissance in Écouen in 1988–1989, then at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Dijon in 1992, where she became director in 2004. She is currently leading a research program on late medieval alabaster in France. Her own work focuses on French fifteenth-century sculpture. Stefan Krause is Ronald S. Lauder Director of the Imperial Armoury at the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna. He studied Art History at the University of Vienna. In 2010 he was awarded an Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In 2014 he was Paul Mellon

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Visiting Senior Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC. His research focuses on art historical and cultural aspects of arms and armor in the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. He has published on the decoration of Renaissance armor, armor as fashion, the history of the Habsburg collections, and tournament manuscripts among many other topics. Donald La Rocca was assistant curator of the Kienbusch Collection of Arms and Armor and Medieval and Renaissance Decorative Arts in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1982–1988. He joined the curatorial ranks of the Department of Arms and Armor, Metropolitan Museum of Art, in 1988 and retired in 2020 with the title of curator emeritus. He is the author of more than forty scholarly articles, catalogues, and books on wide-ranging aspects of the subject of arms and armor, including Warriors of the Himalayas: Rediscovering the Arms and Armor of Tibet (2006) and How to Read European Armor (2017). Gerhard Lutz has been the Robert P. Bergman Curator of Medieval Art at the Cleveland Museum of Art since May 2020. Until 2020 he was curator and deputy director at the Dommuseum Hildesheim. He served twice as an International Associate of the International Center of Medieval Art ICMA, and is co-founder of the bi-annual conference series Forum Medieval Art. His research interests include medieval sculpture and metalwork. Among his latest publications are Christ on the Cross (2020) coedited with Shirin Fozi; Objekte und Eliten: Neue Forschungen zur Kunst im 12. und 13. Jahrhundert und ihrem Kontext (2022) co-edited with Wolfgang Augustyn; and Riemenschneider and Late Medieval Alabaster (2023). C. Griffith Mann has served as the Michel David-Weill Curator in Charge of the Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters since September, 2013. In this role, he is responsible for the medieval collections and curatorial staff in the Met’s main building, and for directing the staff and operations of The Met Cloisters, the branch of the Metropolitan Museum dedicated to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. Prior to working at the Met, Dr. Mann served as Deputy Director and Chief Curator at the Cleveland Museum of Art (2008–2013), and as Director of the Curatorial Division and Medieval Curator at the Walters Art Museum (2002–2008). Elizabeth Morrison is Senior Curator of Manuscripts at the J. Paul Getty Museum. During her over twenty-five years there, she has curated or co-curated numerous exhibitions, including Imagining the Past in France, 1250–1500 in 2010 and Book of Beasts: The Bestiary in the Medieval World in 2019, both of which were finalists for the College Arts Association award for outstanding exhibition catalogue. She has served on the boards of the International Center of Medieval Art and the Medieval Academy of America, and is currently the Vice President (Governance and Nominating) of the Association of Art Museum Curators. Maria Vassilaki is Professor Emerita in Byzantine Art History at the University of Thessaly, Greece, and a member of the Benaki Museum Board of Trustees. She received her Ph.D. from the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London (1986). Her published work focuses on the study of LateByzantine painting, and especially on Cretan icons with an emphasis on the status of icon-painters in society. She has carried out research on the technology of icons in collaboration with the Benaki Museum Department of Conservation. She recently started a collaboration with St. Catherine’s Monastery at Sinai aiming to catalogue and study the 1549 icons, housed in the monastery’s Eikonophylakion.

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Roger S. Wieck is the Melvin R. Seiden Curator and Department Head of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at The Morgan Library & Museum, where he has worked since 1989. Previously, he held curatorial positions at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore and the Houghton Library of Harvard University. In a career spanning over thirty-five years, he has curated fifteen major exhibitions of illuminated manuscripts. The topics of his numerous books and articles include Books of Hours, the Eucharist, and such artists as Jean Poyer and the Master of Claude de France. Paul Williamson is Keeper Emeritus and Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. His many publications include the Pelican History of Art volume Gothic Sculpture 1140–1300 (Yale University Press, 1995) and the V&A catalogues Medieval Ivory Carvings: Early Christian to Romanesque (2010) and Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200–1550 (with Glyn Davies, 2014). He is a past Vice-President of the Society of Antiquaries of London and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.