Jan van Eyck and Portugal's "Illustrious Generation": Volume I: Text 1904597653, 9781904597650

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JAN VAN EYCK AND PORTUGAL’S “ILLUSTRIOUS GENERATION” Vol. I

JAN VAN EYCK AND PORTUGAL’S “ILLUSTRIOUS GENERATION” Vol. I Barbara von Barghahn

The Pindar Press London 2013

Published by The Pindar Press 40 Narcissus Road London NW6 1TH · UK

Copyright © 2013 The Pindar Press All rights reserved

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978-1-904597-65-0

Obra publicada com o apoio do Instituto Camões — Portugal (Published with the support of Instituto Camões — Portugal).

Printed by Samper Impresores Carretera de San Vicente 13, 48510 Valle de Trápaga Vizcaya, Spain This book is printed on acid-free paper

Contents Prefacev 1

Introduction: Jan Van Eyck Circa 1425–1427  Historical Prologue: The Hague and Flanders  Jan van Eyck’s 1425–1426 “Secret Journey” The 1427 “Secret Voyage” To Aragon

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1 23 44

The 1428–1429 “Secret Voyage” to Portugal A Mission on Behalf of the Duke of Burgundy 49 Polemical Portraits of the Infanta  53 Jan’s Grand Tour: Lisbon to Porto 66 Houses of Guimarães and Braga’s Monte Espinho 83 Parenthetical Thoughts about Jan van Eyck’s Diplomatic Excursions 103

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The Fountain of Life (1429) and the Avis Dynastic House Portraits of King João I and Lusitania’s Princes 110 The Wing Panels of the Fountain of Life: Jan van Eyck’s Diptych of the Crucifixion and the Last Judgment 134 The Chivalric Orders and the Defense of the Faith 148 The Portuguese Elevation of Charlemagne 161 Reflections upon the New Jerusalem  163

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The Lisbon of King João I and Sintra, the “Queen’s Estate” The Monarch’s Palaces in Lisbon The St. Martin Palace of Prince Duarte Prince Henrique’s Houses near St. Vincent Behind the Walls 

173 180 184

Prince Pedro’s Estaus Palace 185 The Houses of Princes João and Fernando 188 The Residence of Count-Duke Afonso 192 The Avis-Lancastrian Palace of Sintra: Templar and Arthurian Ideals 193 The “Swan Hall” or Sala dos Infantes 206 The “Magpie Hall” and Alchemical Emblems 214 A Royal Chapel for Crusader Knights: Pageants and the Complexion of Society 225 The Winds of Pentecostal Spirit: Sintra’s Royal Apartments  235 5

Isabel of Portugal and the Lion of Flanders Departure from Portugal: An Infanta’s Reception in Flanders 247 Festivities in Bruges 249 1430 and the Brabantine Inheritance of Philip the Good 262 A “House of Marvels” in Artois: Hesdin and Jan van Eyck’s “Ducal Hunts” 265 The Versailles Hunting Party 281 Thoughts about Poetry and Music 302

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The Ghent Altarpiece (1432) Medieval Ghent, A City of Political Islands 318 Philip the Good’s Castles at Ghent 322 Sint-Janskerk and its Patrons: The Ghent Altarpiece and its Specters335 The Exterior Panels of the Ghent Altarpiece: A “Tabernacle of God” with Man 368 Windows unto Ghent 382

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The Grail Quest and Chivalric Ideals: Counts of Flanders and Paladins of Lusitania Throne for the “Dayspring on High”: Adoration of the Lamb The Tree of Knowledge The Cavalcade of Just Judges The Cavalcade of Holy Knights: The Princes of Ceuta In the Company of Royal Warriors Holy Hermits and Pilgrims Imitating the Heroes of Camelot The Cistercian Ideal of the Grail Knight in Portugal

388 398 407 412 421 432 437 447

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Circa 1437 — Portugal and Jan Van Eyck’s “Secret Mission”  The Templar Citadel of Tomar: Romanesque unto Renaissance 468 King João I’s Batalha Abbey 1429–1450 484 St. Barbara with her Tower: Batalha’s Capelas Imperfeitas and a View of Lisbon497 Tangier and the Sword of St. Catherine: The Dresden Triptych  506 A Setting for an Ex-Voto Triptych: The Chapel of St. Michael in the Lisbon Castle of St. George 527

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“Our Lady’s Knights” and the House of Avis Prince Henrique the Navigator, the Moroccan Campaign and Franciscan Spirituality  534 Prince Pedro, the Kingdom of Aragon and St. George the Dragon Slayer 545 Crucible of Wisdom: King Duarte and the Diptych of the Madonna in a Church555 The Lisbon Cathedral of Santa Maria and the Chapel of St. Vincent 570

10 Miscellanea: Reflections within a Dark Glass  A Lost Triptych and the Lomellini of Lisbon and Madeira 577 Philip the Good’s Mappamundi 587 The Ghent “Hell” Altar Frontal and the Passion Panels of Lodewijk Allyncbrood 596 A Portuguese Disciple of Jan van Eyck in Bruges  625 Holy Kinship, Holy Face: Imaging an Icon for the Avis Court  637 Ecclesia-Eleousa and a Metaphorical “Cloth of Honor”: Magnifying Feminine Virtú 644 11 Conclusion: Ecclesia and an Age of Crusaders Shield, Spurs and Sword for La Sainte-Église: Revisiting the Theme of the Grail Banquet and Knightly Entrêmets666 The 1454 “Feast of the Pheasant” marking the Birthday of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy 681 In the Company of St. Thekla: A Last Glimpse of the Portuguese Infanta697 Select Bibliography715 Index807

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everal recent studies of Jan van Eyck’s art have concerned his realistic imagery, his religious ideology, his technical facility, working methods, congruence of style with his contemporaries and followers, interpretation of new documents relating to his life, his patrons and their environment. Important questions have been raised in recent exhibition catalogues devoted to the fifteenth-century Mediterranean world, and these issues alone underscore a basic premise that further scholarship remains to be completed in Northern Renaissance art. The purpose of this book has been to analyze Jan van Eyck as a diplomat-painter, particularly with regard to his interaction with the Avis court of Portugal. Jan van Eyck was a first-generation Northern European artist who attained an international reputation for his meticulous application of the brush and his technical virtuosity in the use of glazes, thin transparent oil layers that resulted in a translucent enamel-like surface of his wood panels (Figs. P.1–P.2). During his lifetime he undeniably was aware of his reputation as an outstanding exponent of the new Flemish style. His persistent use of pseudo-Greek letters as a signature device intimate his persistent desire to equate his artistic dexterity with that of the titan Apelles. Jan van Eyck was appointed valet de chambre in Bruges on May 19, 1425 to Philip the Good, and his employment papers mention the Duke of Burgundy was informed by members of his court about Jan’s skill when he previously was patronized by the Count of Holland at The Hague. Writing a decade later, the same Duke whose own identification with Alexander the Great is of record, confirmed in a letter of March 13, 1435 that he “could find no other painters equal to his taste or so excellent in art and science”1 (Fig. P.3–P.4). W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), XXXVI–XXXVII, Document 24. 1

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The year 1425, which witnessed the arrival of Jan van Eyck to the Burgundian court of Philip the Good, also was a watershed year for Italy, where the humanist study of nature and scientific measurement had led to the application of linear perspective in painting. Despite such an innovative treatment of compositional space in Florence, Jan van Eyck and his immediate followers ignored such mathematical precision. Even so, these Northern masters achieved greater fame for their panoramic landscapes that instead blended intuitive perspective with atmospheric or aerial effects. Michelangelo’s frequently cited conversation with the learned noblewoman and poet Vittoria Colonna (1490–1547) in Francisco de Holanda’s treatise Da Pintura Antigua (1548) provides a quasi-complimentary Italian perception about the nature of Northern painting. Responding to the statement by the Marchioness of Pescara that Flemish art was “more devout” than art in the Italian manner, Michelangelo declared: Flemish painting … will generally speaking, Signora, please the devout better than any Painting of Italy, which will never cause him to shed a tear, whereas that of Flanders will cause him to shed many; and that not through the vigour and goodness of the painting but owing to the goodness of the devout person. It will appeal to women, especially to the very old and the very young, and also to monks and nuns and to certain noblemen who have no sense of true harmony. In Flanders they paint with a view to external exactness or such things as may cheer you and of which you cannot speak ill, as for example saints and prophets. They paint stuffs and masonry, the green grass of the fields, the shadow of trees, and rivers and bridges, which they call landscapes, with many figures on this side and many figures on that. And all this, though it pleases some persons, is done without reason or art, without symmetry or proportion, without skilful choice of boldness and finally, without substance or vigour. Nevertheless there are countries where they paint worse than Flanders. And I do not speak so ill of Flemish painting because it is all bad but because it attempts to do so many things well (each one of which would suffice for greatness) that it does none well.2

Francisco de Holanda, Da Pintura Antigua, 1548, translation in E. G. Holt, Literary Sources of Art History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947), 208–9. 2

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Francisco de Holanda (Lisbon 1517–1584) was the son of Antonis of Holland (ca. 1485–1557/58), a Netherlandish manuscript illuminator and portraitist patronized by King Manuel I and his intellectual sister, the Dowager Queen Leonor (Figs. P.5–P.6). Like Jan van Eyck, his career was that of an artist-diplomat, and similarly, he was an adept painter of both miniatures and panels. Francisco de Holanda also was a proficient draughtsman in the representation of topography, as proven by a royal commission he received in late 1537. In that year the twenty-one year old master was sent by King João III “to see Italy and make drawings of the fortresses and other notable and important things there.” 3 Traveling overland to Valladolid in order to visit with Empress Isabel, the sister of João III, he continued east to Barcelona, where he met her husband, Charles V, King of Spain (Fig. P.7). In the company of the Holy Roman Emperor, Holanda sailed along the Mediterranean coast to Italy, arriving in Rome by August or early September. Among the dignitaries he met was the Sienese envoy to Pope Paul III and his “grande patrone,” Lattanzio Tolomei.4 The humanist scholar Tolomei provided an introduction to Michelangelo and according to Holanda’s Diálogos de Roma, Part II of his magnum opus Da Pintura Antigua completed on October 18, 1548, they met three times: with Vittoria Colonna at San Silvestro in Quirinale on two consecutive Sundays, October 13 and 20 of 1538; and on the Sunday of November 10, a gathering not attended by the illustrious patroness of the arts 5 (Figs. P. 8–P. 9). Holanda saw “nobres desenhos” in pencil by Michelangelo and was pleased to comment he received praise for his own sketches and watercolours, presumably studies of Roman monuments and art belonging to his travel album As Antigualhas (Escorial Palace-Monastery), but perhaps drawings of sacred themes.6 While Holanda remarks about informal meetings

Francisco de Holanda, Da Pintura Antigua, ed. Joaquim de Vasconcellos (Oporto: 2 ed. 1930), 58–59. 4 J.B. Bury, “Francisco de Holanda and His Illustrations of the Creation,” Portuguese Studies, I (1985–1986): 15–47, at 17–18. Bury, 15–34, provides a concise and history of Holanda’s life and work, with many citations. 5 The fourth dialogue concerned a meeting with Giulio Clovio and Valerio Belli on November 11, 1538. Ronald W. Sousa, “The View of the Artist in Francisco de Holanda’s Dialogues: A Clash of Feudal Models,” Luso-Brazilian Review, XV, Supplementary Issue (Summer, 1978): 43–58; Robert J. Clements, “The Authenticity of de Hollanda’s Diálogos em Roma, Modern Language Association, LXI, No. 4 (December, 1946): 1018–1028. 6 Da Pintura Antigua, 179. 3

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with Michelangelo “in the Papal palace or in the street’ and ‘two or three times en route from the church of St. John Lateran,” 7 clearly he had the opportunity to frequent the personal apartments of Michelangelo before he left Rome for southern Italy in 1540. That same year Holanda returned to Lisbon, after attempting to meet Titian in Venice. 8 Lisbon was promoted to be a second Rome during the entire reign of King Joao III (1521–1557) and his queen, Catherine of Austria, Charles V’s youngest sister (Figs. P.10–P.11). The imperial ambitions of a maritime nation underlie Holanda’s “dialogues” in which the Roman High Renaissance is compared with Roman antiquity. These discussions about artistic theory are supplemented by Holanda’s treatise Do Tirar polo Natural (On Taking Portraits from Life), which was concluded on January 3, 1549 and contained ten dialogues that magnified the superiority of Italianate style in portraiture. A Spanish translation of this exceptional text, as well as a translation of Holanda’s Da Pintura Antigua were completed on February 28, 1563 by Manuel Dinis (b. Viseu 1540), painter in Castile to Dona Juana of Austria, mother of Prince Sebastião (heir to the Avis throne under the regency of Dowager Queen Catherine of Portugal), and sister of King Philip II of Spain.9 Despite Holanda’s elevation of the painterly Italianate style, both the Avis and Hapsburg courts of the Iberian Peninsula preferred realistic Flemish portraiture, as attested by the numerous panels of Anthonis Mor and artists of his circle documented in the royal collections.10 The reason for such a sustained admiration of Flemish art may be attributed to the impact of fifteenth-century Northern Renaissance art beginning with the diplomatic visits of Jan van Eyck to the Mediterranean. Da Pintura Antigua, 163, 179, 236. Sylvie Deswarte, “Francisco de Hollanda et les études vitruviennes,” A Introdução da Arte da Renascença na Península Ibérica, Simpósio International (Coimbra, 1981): 229, 237–38. 9 John Bury, “The Use of Candle-Light for Portrait Painting in Sixteenth-Century Italy,” The Burlington Magazine, CXIX, No. 891 (June, 1977): 434–37. The discussion between Holanda and an aristocrat from Oporto, Braz de Pereira Brandão, presents a theoretical and practical analysis of portraiture, and is the earliest treatise on the subject. Dr. Bury kindly sent me his unpublished translation of the text, with notes and critical analysis following the APHA conference at Lisbon in 1992. 10 Joanna Woodall, Anthonis Mor. Art and Authority (Zwolle: Waanders BV, Uitgeverij, 2007); Maria Kusche, Retratos y Retratadores, Alonso Sánchez Coello y sus Competidores Sofonisba Anguissola, Jorge de la Rúa y Rolán Moys (Vallehermoso-Madrid: Fundación de Apoyo a la Historia del Arte Hispánico, 2003). 7 8

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Michelangelo’s critique recorded by Francisco Holanda applies aptly to the art of Jan van Eyck whose “perfection of art” and handling of landscape was lauded in 1456 by the Ligurian scholar Bartolommeo Facio (1400–1457), secretary in Naples to King Alfonso V of Aragon. While Facio referred to “Jan of Gaul” in his treatise De viris illustribus (Book of Famous Men) as a “prince of painters,” 11 it was the Florentine Giorgio Vasari in his Lives of the Artists (1550) who inaugurated the popular belief that Jan van Eyck invented painting with oil pigments. 12 Not all praise lavished on the Flemish master Johannes of Bruges stemmed from Renaissance Italy. Albrecht Dürer — goldsmith of Nuremberg, Hapsburg painter and draughtsman extraordinaire — traveled to the Flemish commercial center of Ghent in 1521 13 (Figs. P.12–P.13). As recorded in his diary of April 10, the German artist visited the Chapel of Jodocus Vijd in Sint-Janskerk, where he intently studied Jan van Eyck’s most famous polyptych, which was opened at Easter. Dürer was impressed by the pictorial power of the altarpiece’s brilliantly painted interior and especially the Deëisis above the celestial landscape of the Adoration of the Lamb. Emperor Charles V in 1550 ordered the cleaning of the Ghent Altarpiece by Lancelot Blondeel of Bruges and Jan van Scorel of Utrecht in anticipation of the 1556 meeting of the Knights of the Order of the Golden Fleece to be presided over by his son Philip II (1527–1598). This imperial order resulted in the discovery of a quatrain inscription which fortuitously gave the date of the painting’s dedication, May 6, 1432. The same carved inscription also designated the polyptych was a work of collaboration between Hubert van Eyck, the commission’s initial artist, and Jan van Eyck, “his brother, second in art.” The Pandora’s box of stylistic issues remains an unresolved problem due to the lack of works attributed to the ubiquitous Hubert, whose death occurred prior to September 18, 1426. By 1426 Jan van Eyck had spent a year in service as the valet de chambre of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, having worked as “meyster Jan de Michael Baxandall, “Bartholomaeus Facius on Painting: A Fifteenth-century Manuscript of De viris illustribus,”  Journal of the Warburg & Courauld. Institutes, 27 (1964): 90–107; Roberto Weiss, “Jan van Eyck and the Italians,” Italian Studies 11 (1956): 1–15. 12 Giorgio Vasari, Le opere (1568; 2nd edition), 2 vols. (Florence: G. Milanesi, 1878– 1906), II, 565. Hubert van Eyck’s name is absent in the first edition of Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori. Da Cimabue insino a’ tempi nostri (Florence: 1550). 13 Albrecht Dürer, Diary of his Journey to the Netherlands, 1520–1521, eds. J.-A. Goris & G. Marlier (Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, Ltd., 1971). 11

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maelre” for Jan of Bavaria, Count of Holland, at The Hague between October 24, 1422 and September 11, 1424, and perhaps earlier employed by the Count’s brother Willem VI circa 1415–1417. Transferring to Lille by May of 1425, Jan van Eyck between 1426 and 1430 made several diplomatic missions on behalf of his ducal patron: a “distant and secret journey” in 1426; a voyage by sea to the Kingdom of Aragon in 1427; and another crossing in 1428–1429 to the Iberian Peninsula, specifically to the Court of King João I to negotiate a Burgundian-Portuguese marriage, with documented audiences before Juan II of Castile and Sultan Muhammad VIII of Granada and visits to “distant lands.” Returning to Bruges in October of 1430, Jan van Eyck witnessed the wedding festivities of Philip the Good and Infanta Isabella of Portugal on January 7, 1430, which coincided with the founding of the new chivalric Order of the Golden Fleece on January 12. Jan moved his household from Lille to Bruges soon after the panoply of events and apparently worked for about two years completing the Ghent Altarpiece (Fig. P.14). This masterwork unquestionably presents elements of the Flemish style elucidated by Michelangelo, a “view to external exactness,” and within its multi-figured landscape, the display of “masonry, the green grass of the fields, the shadow of trees, and rivers and bridges.” Innumerable studies in Flemish art over the course of the past few decades have shed light on the complexion of Northern Renaissance style. As a consequence, Michelangelo’s succinct comments to Vittoria Colonna recorded by Francisco de Holanda provide a rather limited view of what essentially is a corpus of art more layered in meaning and scope. Recent conservation of Jan van Eyck’s works, including the application of spectrographs detecting under drawings, dendrochronological examination of panels, discoveries of documents, and theological investigations, have reversed many initial arguments regarding the artist’s career and work. Each of these remarkable efforts has built upon our knowledge of the Flemish master and his world. This book does not seek to engage in scholarly polemic, but rather, the aim has been to present another dimension of Jan van Eyck as a painter-diplomat. Scrutinizing the vast amount of past and present art historical literature, I initially pondered several obscured facets of his career. Chief among the issues that presented a formidable problem were the replicas of major lost works and the unusual provenance of certain paintings. In the course of my study, even the identification of portraits in key commissions became another avenue of exploration.

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I did not begin my work as a monograph on Jan van Eyck, because either luminaries of Flemish art have accomplished such a macrocosmic analysis or scholars at the forefront of the Northern Renaissance field are engaged in recasting the traditional scholarship into a more generally informative mold. Instead, it was for pleasure that I began to work on a series of Eyckian “puzzle” sketches, not realizing that theoretical pieces would coalesce to form a larger and more complete picture. After spending nearly a decade on this avocation, the thesis of this book could be reduced to a relatively straightforward statement: Jan van Eyck was patronized in greater measure by the Portuguese royal family as by the Duchy of Burgundy. Recognizing that some facets of the arguments in this book still need polishing, I have presented the material in seriatim — to paraphrase Jan’s personal motto — Als ich chan (as the best that I am capable of doing). As mentioned above, Jan van Eyck in October of 1428 was enlisted as a member of the Burgundian embassy sent to Portugal by Philip the Good to negotiate a marriage with Infanta Isabella, daughter of King João I and Queen Philippa of Lancaster (Fig. P.15). By February of 1429 he dispatched two portraits of the princess to the North. Immediately after sending the small works, the Burgundian ambassadors made a pilgrimage to Galicia’s center of Santiago de Compostela. Thereafter, the diplomats visited Castile, Granada and other lands. Returning to Portugal by early July, the delegation received Philip the Good’s approbation at the Avis summer residence of Sintra. Not until October of 1429, however, did the ambassadors sail for Bruges. The Fountain of Life, known by two replicas which both have a history with the Iberian Peninsula, presents a composition that generally has been dated to circa 1429, about the time of Jan van Eyck’s second documented diplomatic mission to the Iberian Peninsula (Fig. P.16). Scholars have noted the sectional partitioning of the work is reminiscent of the Ghent Altarpiece and they also have debated the theological iconography of the subject. However, no one really has addressed the question of what happened to the lost original. Secular portraits in the left portion of the panels have been argued as “generic” figures signifying the “Church” and more specifically as King Juan II of Castile and the Burgundian ambassadors. The individuals are significant because their physiognomies are strikingly similar to the younger warriors in the Ghent Altarpiece’s panel of the Holy Knights (Fig. P.17). In 1428–1429, Jan van Eyck was introduced to the six princes of the Avis royal house: Duarte, Pedro, Henrique, João, Fernando and their half-brother, Afonso, then Count of Barcelos. On August 15, 1415 Duarte, Pedro, Henrique

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and Afonso won the spurs of their knighthood in an unprecedented expedition to North Africa which involved the Portuguese taking of the Moroccan port of Ceuta. This engagement I believe is acknowledged by the portraits provided in both the Fountain of Life and the Ghent panel of the Holy Knights. Insofar as the lost original, I have argued that Jan van Eyck’s panel was installed in the Lisbon Castle of St. George and lost in the cataclysmic earthquake of November 1, 1755 (Fig. P.18). This catastrophe destroyed innumerable monuments and treasures, and unfortunately, also historical records. Paramount among the documents were inventories that identified objects displayed in the royal residences and princely estates of the city. Among the few accounts that survived the tidal wave and ensuing fires in Lisbon was the inventory taken of the dowry belonging to Princess Beatrix (1504– January 8, 1538), younger daughter of King Manuel I (r. 1495–1515) and Queen Maria of Aragon, who in 1522 married Charles III, Duke of Savoy (1486–1553). Their son, Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy (1528–1580), served Emperor Charles V at Pavia (1525) and at Hesdin (1553) before his appointment as Governor of the Netherlands (1555–1559). On August 10, 1557 Emmanuel Philibert led Philip II’s troops to victory in Northern France at San Quentin. Subsequently with the Treaty of Câteau-Cambrésis in 1559, the Savoy lands lost since 1536 were restored to his possession. The dowry inventory of Princess Beatrix identifies a few rare reliquaries, including one that illustrated the themes of a “Calvary” and “Last Judgment.” Jan van Eyck’s Calvary-Last Judgment Diptych in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Fig. P.19) generally has been dated to 1429, and the panels have been suggested to have been purchased in Spain during the nineteenth century. Possibly the diptych was sent by Beatrice of Savoy to her elder sister, Isabel of Portugal. Emperor Charles V’s beloved wife died in a convent of Toledo on May 1, 1539. My belief is that the reliquary panels initially either were the wings of the lost Fountain of Life altarpiece, dismantled in the making of replicas, or a reliquary diptych painted to contain supplementary portraits of members of King João I’s family: Queen Philippa of Lancaster as the Cumaean Sibyl; Infanta Isabella as St. Mary Magdalene; Dom Afonso, son of the Count of Barcelos as the rider with a blue chaperon, who has been proposed as the patron; and the younger Avis Princes João and Fernando. When Infanta Isabella sailed for Bruges in October of 1429, she was accompanied by her younger brother Fernando. There is good reason to believe, the Portuguese galleons also transported an artist by the name of João Eanes, who likely was dispatched by King Joao I to acquire knowledge

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about Northern techniques. Jan van Eyck’s Hunting Festivity of Philip the Good at Hesdin is a second composition with grouped figures known only by replicas (Fig. P.20). The history of the original masterpiece completed in 1432 is documented. Listed in the 1569 inventory taken of the king’s apartments in the Pardo Palace, a hunting lodge near Madrid built by Emperor Charles V in 1547 and decorated under his son Philip II, the work over a mantelpiece of a cabinet room perished in a fire of March 1604. Like the Fountain of Life, the composition of which I have related to Palermo’s Norman castle of Ziza, the Hesdin Festivity in two sixteenth-century replicas presents a vertical arrangement of space. I have analyzed the copies in France, and suggested a hypothetical identification of the secular figures assembled, including the Duke and Duchess and members of their family. I additionally have proposed the original painting presented a self-portrait of Jan van Eyck, his wife Margaret, and brother Hendrick, a master falconer. In 1432 Jan van Eyck was called to Hesdin by Philip the Good to evaluate the frescoes by Colart de Voleur. I have discussed this assignment in light of his past experience at The Hague and purported visit to Italy in 1425, and have related Jan’s opinion work to the allegorical meaning of the Hunting Festivity. By May of 1434 when Jan van Eyck completed the famous Ghent Altarpiece, he clearly was adept in the representation of group compositions. While I recapitulate scholarly arguments of interpretation, my analysis branches out to provide a new identification of portraits. I believe Duchess Isabella of Burgundy, Infanta of Portugal, was the muse behind the masterwork in Sint-Janskerk because the panels acknowledge the English and Portuguese lineage of her newborn son Josse. The infant who was baptized in the church on May 6, 1432, the day Jan’s altarpiece was unveiled, could boast of having Charlemagne as a remote ancestor. More immediate, Josse shared the same bloodline as England’s chivalric warriors Edward III and John of Gaunt, as well as Portugal’s most renowned rulers of the Reconquest and military orders, King Afonso Henriques and King Denis. Portraits of these historical figures are postulated in the panel of the Holy Knights. Above all, the sacred figures on horseback, Sts. Martin, George and Sebastian, are respectively identified as the brothers of the Duchess, the Avis princes who took Ceuta — Duarte, Pedro and Henrique. Behind these heroic figures are two individuals, one bearing a crown and another portrayed with a deep blue chaperon. I have suggested they might be identified as King João I and his illegitimate eldest son Dom Afonso, whose Barcelos herald is distinguished by its deep ultramarine color.

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The Ghent polyptych’s Adoration of the Lamb equally presents biblical prophets, Early Christian apostles, martyrs, hermits and pilgrims, and also ecclesiastical leaders and authors of the Pauline Church. Within the setting of a sacred and ever verdant plateau, the pagan authors carry important meaning with respect to the laurel crowns worn by the Portuguese Princes Duarte-Martin, Pedro-George, and Henrique-Sebastian. These scions of the Avis house were called the “illustrious generation” not only for their exploits in battle, but also because they were educated authors of considerable reputation. They were weaned on classical texts in their youth, and moreover, they were fascinated with Arthurian lore (Fig. P.21–P.22). The cavalcade of the righteous Counts of Flanders and noble Lancastrian-Avis warriors converge in the context of a Pentecostal procession before the Apocalyptic Lamb of God to revive concepts of the Grail quest (Fig. P.23–P.24). Jan van Eyck is documented to have made a final mission for Philip the Good in 1436, and while the destination remains unknown, the cost of his travels nearly equipoised the amount for the 1428–1429 excursion to the Iberian Peninsula. The chapters that concern this mission can stand on their own as an independent study, but they provide an historical perspective not considered by past scholarship. In April of 1433 King João I held a family council in Santarém to plan an expedition against the Merinides of Morocco, and possibly a collaborative venture with King Juan II of Castile against the Nasrids of Granada. Following João I’s death on August 14, Prince Henrique took the lead in championing a crusade to take Tangier but not until March of 1436 did he obtain King Duarte’s support. A copious number of galleons were required to secretly transport men of arms. Portugal would have looked to Flanders for assistance. Jan van Eyck in 1429 must have completed topographical studies of Andalusia, as suggested by the vegetation of the Ghent Altarpiece. If as conjectured in this text, he visited North Africa, as well as Granada, the coastal sketches of the Mediterranean ports would have vitally useful. Only the inscription of Jan van Eyck’s Portrait of Margaret van Eyck establishes his certain presence in Bruges by 1439. A perception of Jan van Eyck’s brand of topographical sketching appears in his drawing of St. Barbara with her Tower (Fig. P.25). Completed in 1437, the work has been discussed in this book with regard to the medieval Templar site of Tomar. Under Prince Henrique, the titular head of Portugal’s military Order of Christ, Tomar contained a Chapel of St. Barbara which stood near a Romanesque tower constructed to simulate the Holy Sepulchre. Scholars have looked in vain for the precise locale of Jan van Eyck’s St.

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Barbara. I have argued the background views are actual locations, Lisbon viewed from across the Tagus Estuary and the building activity at Batalha’s Abbey’s Pantheon of King Duarte. Moreover, St. Barbara is suggested as a portrait of King Duarte’s Aragonese queen, Dona Leonor, whom Jan van Eyck had met in 1428. The same graceful female type appears as St. Catherine in the dexter wing of Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych, also dated to 1437 (Fig. P.26). The male donor of the opposite wing has never been identified. In a dispatch of March 1438 to the Benedictine Abbot Gomes Eanes of the Florentine Monastery of La Badia, King Duarte discussed the ill-fated September–October 1437 attack on the garrison of Tangier and the Portuguese surrender of Ceuta. The monarch commented that ships chartered in England and Flanders had not materialized due to the conflict between the countries, and equally Castilian ships did not sail because of diverse problems. The 1437 Moroccan expedition resulted in the unfortunate capture of a royal, Prince Ferdinand. The same youth who had participated in the venture to win his knightly spurs in 1429 had accompanied his sister Isabel to Bruges for her marriage to Philip the Good. The Dresden Triptych is argued to have been commissioned as a portable altarpiece for Prince Ferdinand, whose patron saint was the Archangel Michael. The hall church depicted in the center panel displaying the Virgin and Child also had been advanced as an actual location, the royal chapel of St. Michael belonging to the Castle St. George of Lisbon. Prince Ferdinand died in captivity in Morocco. Before his death at Fez in 1443 the destitute Prince sold his cache of devotional objects to Genoese merchants. Another late painting by Jan van Eyck having a provenance in Genoa, is his Madonna of the Church, created as the left panel of a diptych (Fig. P.27–P.28). Despite its “Burgundian” stylistic complexion, the advocational image of the nurturing Virgin Mary is particular to Portugal and is identified as the Virgin of Nazareth, whose apparition is recorded in the chivalric history of the nation’s Reconquest. I believe the Madonna of the Church provides an accurate view of the Romanesque Cathedral of Lisbon before the 1755 earthquake destroyed the choir and sections of the interior, including the roodscreen and important reliquary chapel of St. Vincent of Saragossa. Jan van Eyck’s diptych was replicated by Jan Gossaert in 1508. While Jan’s donor portrait is lost, Gossaert’s panel presents a kneeling patron accompanied by St. Anthony Abbot. Augustinian monks charged with the care of the Lisbon Cathedral, a monument which stood directly opposite the Parish Church of St. Anthony of Padua, venerated the Abbot known as the “father

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of monasticism.” Jan van Eyck’s original donor panel likely provided a portrait of the kneeling King Duarte, whose white horse would have alluded to St. Martin, his spiritual alter-ego. Jan van Eyck created two versions of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata circa 1438–40: The Philadelphia St. Francis (Fig. P. 29–P.30) measures (12.4 x 14.6 cm), painted on vellum and attached to a panel which dendrochronological examination reveals was of the same wood as the Bardouin de Lannoy and Giovanni Arnolfini portraits; and the Turin St. Francis (29.2 x 33.4 cm). St. Francis in both small works exhibits an orans gesture identical to that displayed by the donor of the Dresden Triptych, and their physiognomies are similar, sufficient to suggest a familial relationship. The effigies have been compared in this text to the gisant of Prince Henrique in the royal pantheon of Batalha Abbey, which significantly was carved with an orans gesture. If Henrique the Navigator identified with the crusading ideals of the poverello St. Francis of Assisi, his brother Pedro likely commissioned the lost painting of St. George spearing the Dragon, which passed to the collection of King Alfonso of Aragon in Naples. Prior to its destruction by fire, the panel was replicated by Pere Nisart (Fig. P.31). This work is discussed as a probable portrait of Prince Pedro and his Aragonese wife Isabel as the princess rescued by St. George. The realistic depiction of the port of Mallorca, then under Aragonese control, is scrutinized as a probable place Jan van Eyck visited in 1427–1429. Besides Mallorca and Sicily, Jan van Eyck probably visited another island, Madeira. The Annunciation Triptych with donor wing panels with Sts. Christopher and John the Baptist has been analyzed as a commission not from Italy, but from the Lomellini merchants of Portuguese Madeira (Fig. P.32). In my book I felt it compelling to provide an idea of the places Jan van Eyck lived and visited (Figs. P. 33–P.34). While the text informs about the Flemish centers of Bruges, Lille and Hesdin, as well as Portugal’s Lisbon, Sintra, Tomar, Batalha, my initial chapters on Santiago de Compostela and Granada were discarded because they pertained to Jan’s travels and influences from Spain. These sites are the subject of a separate completed study that centers upon significant works by Jan van Eyck not covered in this book, such as his Arnolfini Portrait, the Rolin Madonna, and the Washington DC Annunciation. Professional photographers and travel photographers have been most generous with their digital images, and they have been credited where requested. Otherwise images are from my archives or from public sources

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such as Wikipedia Commons. Acknowledgments to scholars, institutions and individuals are provided in the citations of each chapter. I am grateful to the Embassies in Washington, DC, especially those of Portugal, Belgium and Spain. Additionally, I thank the Instituto de Camões de Portugal for their support. My initial fascination for Jan van Eyck’s diplomatic missions began at the University of Iowa under Charles Cuttler, and accelerated under Charles Sterling and Colin Eisler at New York University, Institute of Fine Arts. However, as in the case of many academic careers, these preliminary general interests were supplemented by more specialized work. For many years at George Washington University I have taught not only Northern European art, but also the art history of Spain, Portugal and their colonial dominions. These courses, which have stressed the ideological and stylistic crosscurrents between European courts, were the testing ground for some of the arguments presented in this book. So then, I have appreciated the constructive comments of my students in class lectures and also use of travel pictures collected by Jacqueline Burns, Claire Dermond, Angela Dawn Kempf, Sam Markowitz, Hayley Mirek, Naveen Philip, Karthik Ramineni and his kind friends in Lille, Melanie Samper, Daniela Wancier, Stephanie Schott and Robert Fraser. A few individuals have been the wind beneath the wings, and to them I give immense thanks: Liam Gallagher, editor of Pindar Press, for his faith in the project; António Dias dos Reis and Marc Willems, for their kind offering of extensive photographic archives; Andrea Gallelli Huezo for her considerable assistance in a final editing and creation of the index; Jeanne Schnitzler for her informative comments on late Gothic costume and armour; Menachem Wecker for sharing his knowledge in Hebraic texts and inscriptions; and Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, Lilo Jordan, Lilien Robinson, Paul Reuther, Judith Hancock Sandoval, Marilyn Stokstad, Elizabeth Weber and Rafael Moreira for their personal encouragement. The generous grant by the Instituto CamÕes towards publication of this book is greatly appreciated. Above all, I want to mention Frederick Calvetti, whose constant support over many years made the research possible. Barbara von Barghahn

1 Introduction: Jan Van Eyck circa 1425–1427 Historical Prologue: The Hague and Flanders

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he greatest Flemish titan of the International Style, Jan van Eyck (c. 1385–1441) signed the majority of his extant paintings with the PseudoGreek words, ALC IXH XAN S ICH CAN (As I Can/To the Best of my Ability).1 A Man in a Red Turban (Figs. 1.1–1.2) is a supposed “self-portrait” en buste which bears the artist’s famed motto, in addition to a signature and date: Joh[ann]es de Eyck me fecit anno 1433 21 Octobris. Illuminated from the left in three-quarter view, the face of Northern Europe’s most renowned 1 Robert Walter Scheller, “Als Ich Can,” Oud Holland LXXXIII (1968):135–39; Gustav Künstler, “Jan van Eycks Wahlwort ‘Als Ich Can’ und das Flügelaltarchen in Dresden,” Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte XXV (1972): 107–27; Dieter Jansen, Similitudo : Untersuchungen zu den Bildnissen Jan van Eycks [Dissertationen zur Kunstgeschichte, 28 (Cologne-Vienna: Böhlau, 1988); idem., “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis – der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 37; Lorne Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1990), 12, 148–49; Lorne Campbell et al., “The Methods and Materials of Northern European Painting 1400–1500,” in National Gallery Technical Bulletin XVIII (1997): 6–55, at 19, 38; S. Duban, “Authorizing Identity in Fifteenth Century Bruges: the Case of Jan van Eyck’s ‘Man in a Red Turban,’” Chicago Art Journal IV, No. 1 (1994): 24–34; Craig Harbison, “Realism and Symbolism in Early Flemish Painting, Art Bulletin LXVI (1984): 588–602, at 601–2; Raffaello Brignetti and Giorgio T. Faggin, L’Opera completa dei van Eyck (Milan: Rizzoli, 1968); idem, The Complete paintings of the Van Eycks, with an introduction by Robert Hughes (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1970); Albert Châtelet and Giorgio T. Faggin, Tout l’oeuvre peint des frères van Eyck (Paris: Flammarion, 1969). For a discussion about Jan’s inscriptions, see Maurits Smeyers, “Jan van Eyck, Archaeologist? Relections on Eyckian Epigraphy,” Archaeological and Historical Aspects of West-European Societies. Album Amicorum André Van Doorselaer (Acta Archaeologica Lovaiensia, Mongraphie

2

Renaissance master is set off by a finely woven scarlet chaperon and fur-lined houppelande, apparel which indicates his high courtly status.2 Little personal information is known about the artist who gazes in such a penetrating and astute manner towards the viewer, yet Erwin Panofsky aptly states that Jan van Eyck was the first early Flemish master to sign his works and adopt a motto like the nobility, in which “pride is so inimitably blended with becoming humility.” 3 Jan van Eyck is thought to have been born in the vicinity of Maeseyck, where his early training in the Meuse River valley presumably was as a manuscript illuminator.4 “Meyster Jan de maelre” is first documented at The Hague between October 24, 1422 and September 11, 1424, in service to John of Bavaria, former Prince-Bishop Elect of Liège and VIII, ed. Daniel Poiron and Nicole Freeman (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991): 25–43; Nigel Guy Wilson, “Greek Inscriptions on Renaissance Paintings,” Italia medioevale e umanistica XXXV (1992): 215–52. 2 Jan van Eyck’s Portrait of a Man in a Red Chaperon, was sold at Christie’s on July 31, 185, lot 79, as “Van Eyck, 1435 [sic] Head of the Artist, in a Red Turban. From the Arundel Collection. A little work of the highest interest.” The work came from the estate of George Alan Brodrick (1806–1848), 5th Viscount Midleton, who resided at Peper-Harrow Park in Surry and who died childless. Jan’s Man in a Red Turban was sold to Henry Farrer in 1851 and purchased in the same year. See Lorne Campbell, National Gallery Catalogues, The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Schools (London: National Gallery Publications and Yale University Press, 1998), 212–17; J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Technical Aspects of Some Eyckian Portrait Paintings,” Werk: opstellen voor Hans Locher (Groningen: 1990): 8–12. A totally different identification of the sitter is proposed by Antoine Moulonguet and Pierre Bouche, Maître Eckhart peint par Van Eyck (Paris: Éditions du Regard, 2001). 3 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 rpt. of 1953 edition, Harvard University ), I, 179. See Jozef Duverger, “Jan van Eyck as Court Painter,” The Connoisseur CXCIV (March, 1977): 172–79. Regarding Jan van Eyck, oil painting and verisimilitude, see Pim Brinkman, Het geheim van Van Eyck: aantekeningen bij de uitvinding van het olieverven (Zwolle: Waanders, 1993); Dieter Jansen, Similitudo: Untersuchungen zu den Bildnissen Jan van Eycks (Cologne: Böhlau, 1988); Ed. Bontinck, Traité de peinture à l’ huile à l’usage de l’artiste (Louvain: A. H. Reekmans, 1952). 4 A solitary document refers to Jan van Eyck as an illuminator, and it is the March 20, 1524 letter from Pietro Summonte to Marcantonio Michiel. See Fausto Nicolini, L’Arte Napoletana del Rinascimento e La Lettera di Pietro Summonte a Marcantonio Michel (Naples: 1925), 162; Elisabeth Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedraal te Gent. Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oostvlaanderen VI (Ghent: Bestendige Deputatie van de Provinciale Raad van Oostvlaanderen, 1965), Documenten, 15. The master’s familiarity with the medium is suggested by the some of the miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours, folios given to Hand G which bear hallmarks of his style, and compositions by Hand

1 introduction; JAN VAN EYCK ca. 1425–1427

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Count of Holland (1419–1425).5 Prior to this appointment, Jan might have one of several anonymous artists in the courtly circle of Willem IV (1365– May 31, 1417), the Duke of Bavaria, Count of Hainaut, and brother of John of Bavaria. The scope of Jan’s early activities remains enigmatic, though he probably worked at Binnenhof Castle in The Hague (Figs. 1.3–1.9), where renovations had been constant since the fourteenth century.6 Artists and artisans employed by John of Bavaria would have provided secular murals, paintings on linen, statuary, ceremonial objects, and illustrated manuscripts. Jan van Eyck has been linked with the greatly debated Turin-Milan Hours, a dismantled French manuscript which was completed by illuminators in Holland. Commissioned originally by Jean, Duke of Berry (1340–1416) and brother of King Charles V of France, the Très Belles Heures de Notre Dame was begun about 1389 by a disciple of the Parement Master and the miniatures by the School of Paris have been variously ascribed to Jean d’Orléans, the Limbourg Brothers, and their relations Herman and Willem Maelwael, who were influenced by André Beauneveu.7 The prayer book was H, a close associate. Regarding his heritage, the dialect of annotations in Jan’s 1435 drawing of Cardinal Albergati in Vienna have been studied. See Alfons Lieven Dierick, “Jan van Eyck’s Handwriting,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 79–82, at 79; Leo van Puyvelde, “De Taal van Jan van Eyck,” Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie voor Taal en Litterkunde, Verslagen en Mededelingen (1955): 213–23; Albert Ampe and J. Goosens, “Taal en herkomst van Jan van Eyck,” Wetenschappelijke Tijdingen (1970): 81–91. 5 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), xxxi. Document 1 records the payments to Jan van Eyck at the “Palace of The Hague,” October 24,1422 to September 11, 1424. He was paid 8 lions a day, and his apprentices earned 2 lions a day. The fact that he had apprentices would appear to indicate a master’s status. Weale’s information is from the Royal Archives of The Hague. For the entire text of documents pertaining to Jan van Eyck, consult W.H. James Weale, Hubert and John van Eyck. Their Life and Work (London-New York: John Lane Company, 1908, XXXVII–XLVII. See also H. van Nierop, The Nobility of Holland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Max J. Friedländer, The van Eycks – Petrus Christus, I, from Early Netherlandish Painting [Die Altniederländische Malerei, 1924–1937, 14 vols., (Berlin: Paul Cassirer, I–XI–Leiden: A.W. Sijthoff, XII–XIV], with comments and notes by Nicole Veronee-Verhagen, translated by Heinz Norden (New York: Praeger Publishers, Inc., 1967). 6 Jacques Gelaude, Binnenhof (Deurle-Leie: Colibrant, 1965). Hendrik Enno van Gelder, Het Haagsche binnenhof, een nationaal monument (Antwerp: De Sikkel, 1943); Leo Tasseron, Twaalf eeuwen Binnenhof (‘s-Gravenhage: A. A. M. Stols, 1956). 7 Milliard Meiss, “Preface,” in Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (London: Thames & Hudson, 1993 rpt. of 1st ed. 1969),

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still unfinished in 1413 when it was recorded in an inventory compiled by Robinet d’Étampes. Thereafter, the manuscript was separated into two parts. The finished portion, which Robinet retained is in Paris, divided between the Bibliothèque Nationale and the Louvre; and the rest passed to John of Bavaria after the death of Jean de Berry (June 15, 1416).8 In the modern era his portion was divided as well. One section went to Turin, where in 1902 it was catalogued and photographed before its destruction by fire two years later. The other, formerly in Milan, passed to Turin in 1935 and survives. Among the more revolutionary miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours which were completed in the Low Countries, those attributed to “Hand G” have been singled out as subjects designed by Jan van Eyck, but their 8–19. See Eberhard König, Les Très Belles Heures de Notre Dame des Herzogs von Berry [Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale MS. Nouv. Acq. Lat. 3093, reproduced in facsimile with commentary] (Lucerne: 1992); and the Louvre (RF 2022–2024). Also consult: Francoise Lehoux, Jean de France, duc de Berri. Sa vie. Son action politique (1340–1416), 4 vols. (Paris: A. et J. Picard et Cie, 1966–68); Pierre Duhamel, Jean de Berry: le frère du roi, with a preface by Jean-Yves Ribault (Paris: Royer, 1996); Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye (ed.), Les Princes des fleurs de lis. La France et les arts en 1400 (Paris: Éditions RMN, 2004); Frédéric Pleybert (ed.), Paris et Charles V: Arts et architecture, with the collaboration of Arnaud Alexandre et al. (Paris: Action artistique de la ville de Paris, 2001); Inès Villela-Petit, Le gothique international. L’art en France au temps de Charles VI (Paris: Coédition Hazan-Musée du Louvre, 2004); Françoise Autrand, Jean de Berry. l’art et le pouvoir (Paris: 2000); 195–211; idem., Charles V: le Sage (Paris: Fayard, 1994); idem., Charles VI: la folie du roi (Paris: Fayard, 1986); François Avril, L’enluminure à la cour de France au XIVe siècle (Paris: 1978); idem., Manuscript Painting at the Court of France: The Fourteenth Century, 1310–1380 , translated by Ursule Molinaro and Bruce Benderson (New York: George Braziller, 1978); idem., L’enluminure à l’ époque gothique: 1200–1420 (Paris : Bibliothèque de l’image, 1995); Charles Sterling, La peinture médiévale à Paris, 1300–1500, 2 vols. (Paris: Bibliothèque des Arts, 1987 and 1990). Hippolyte Fierens-Gevaert, Les Tès Belles Heures de Jean de France, Duc de Berry (Brussels: Ouevre Nationale pour la Reproduction de Manuscrits à Miniatures de Belgique, 1924). 8 John of Bavaria’s portion was later divided. One section was destroyed in a fire of 1904 at the Royal Library of Turin, though some reproductions were published by Paul Durrieu, Heures de Turin; quarante-cinq feuillets à peintures provenant des Très belles heures de Jean de France (Paris: Typ. P. Renouard, 1902), reissued by Albert Châtelet with commentary, Heures de Turin. Quarante-cinq feuillets à peintures provenant des Très belles heures de Jean de France, duc de Berry (Turin: Bottega d’Erasmo; Off. graf. ing. G. Molfese, 1967). The remainder survives as the Heures de Milan in the Museo Civico, Turin. Consult: Albert Châtelet, “Les enluminures eyckiennes des manuscrits de Turin et de Milan-Turin,” Révue des Arts VII (July-August, 1957): 155–64; idem., Jan van Eyck Enlumineur. Les Heures de Turin et de Milan-Turin (Strasburg: 1993); Georges Hulin de Loo, Heures de Milan; troisième partie des Très-belles heures de Notre-Dame, enluminées par les peintres de Jean de France, duc

1 introduction; JAN VAN EYCK ca. 1425–1427

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dates have ranged broadly from 1420–25 to as late as 1440.9 The Voyage of St. Julian (f. 55v), known only by a black and white photograph taken in Turin before 1904, appears to reflect personal experience as a traveler along de Berry et par ceux du duc Guillaume de Bavière, comte du Hainaut et de Hollande; vingthuit feuillets historiés reproduits d’après les originaux de la Biblioteca Trivulziana à Milan, avec une introduction historique (Brussels: G. van Oest & cie, 1911; Maurits Smeyers, Bert Cardon, S. Vertongen, Katherina Smeyers and Rita van Dooren (eds.), Naer natueren ghelike: Vlaamse miniaturen vóór Van Eyck (ca. 1350–ca. 1420). Catalogus (Louvain: Cultureel Centrum Romaanse Poort-Peeters, 1993); Anne van Buren-Hagopian, James H. Marrow and Silvana Pettenati, Heures de Turin-Milan, Inv. No. 47, Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, Torino, Kommentar-Commentary-Commentaire (Lucerne: Facsimile Verlag, 1996); James H. Marrow, “History, Historiography, and Pictorial Invention in the Turin-Milan Hours,” In Detail. New Studies of Northern Renaissance Art in Honor of Walter S. Gibson, ed. Laurinda S. Dixon (Brussels: Brepols Publishers, 1998), 1–14; idem., “Une page inconnue des Heures de Turin,” Revue de l’Art CXXXV (2003): 67–78; Maurits Smeyers, “A MidFifteenth Century Book of Hours from Bruges in The Walters Art Gallery (Ms. 721) and its Relation to the Turin-Milan Hours,” Journal of the Walters Art Gallery XLVI (1988): 55–75; idem., “Answering Some Questions about the Turin-Milan Hours,” Les dessin sousjacent dans la peinture, Colloque VII, 17–19 Septembre, 1987, ed. Roger van Schoute and Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1989): 55–70; James Snyder, “The Chronology of Jan van Eyck’s Paintings,” Albumn Amicorum, eds. Jan Gerrit van Gelder, Joshua Bruyn, Jan Ameling Emmens, Eddy de Jongh, D.P. Snoep (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1973): 293–97; L.M.J. Delaissé, “The Miniatures Added in the Low Countries to the Turin-Milan Hours and their Political Significance,” Kunsthistorisches Forschungen Otto Pächt zu Seinem 70. Geburtstag, ed. Artur Rosenauer and Gerold Weber (Salzburg: Residenz Verl, 1972): 135–49; Rosy Schilling, “Das Llangattock-Studenbuch — Sein Verhältnis zu van Eyck und dem Vollender des Turin-Mailänder Studenbuches,” Wallraf-RichartzJahrbuch XXIII (1961): 211–36; Eberhard König, Gabriele Bartz, Angelo Giaccaria and François Huot, O.S.B., Les Feuillets du Louvre et les Heures de Turin disparues (Lucerne: 1994). 9 I have tended to take the earlier dates of 1420–24 preferred by Charles Sterling when he lectured at New York University, Institute of Fine Arts. Based upon a study of the costumes, the Count has been identified as John of Bavaria. The Hand G Baptism as a bas-de-page to The Birth of St. John the Baptist includes a procession of contemporary figures from the court of John of Bavaria, whose patron saint is highlighted. Because of a similar interest in water reflections, the Voyage of St. Julian also seems to fall within this group of “Holland” miniatures. The Turlin-Milan Hours was acquired by the Duke of Burgundy in 1433 when he obtained Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland. Those later miniatures of the manuscript by Hand H, variously dated by scholars, must have been created by a talented artist affiliated with Jan’s workshop between 1430 and 1440, perhaps his brother Lambert van Eyck. See Anne van Buren-Hagopian, “Jan van Eyck in the Hours of Turin and Milan, Approached through the Fashions in Dress,” Masters and Miniatures, Proceedings of the Congress on Medieval Manuscript Illuminations in the Northern Netherlands, Utrecht, 10–13 December, 1989, ed. Koert van der Horst and Johann Christian Klamt (DoornspikjNetherlands: Davaco, 1991): 221–43.

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the waterways of Holland (Fig. 1.11). The legend of Julian the Hospitaller (fd. February 12) was recounted by Vincent de Beauvais in the thirteenth century and his vita also appears in the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus de Voragine. A former hunter and nobleman who was knighted by a foreign king, he slew his parents in error. The bas-de-page by Hand G depicts Julian hunting deer with his greyhounds. The historiated initial shows Julian in a bedroom killing his father whom he mistook for a lover of his innocent wife. The main narrative subject of the folio presents the saint’s penance. In expiation for his sin, Julian and his wife not only built a hospice for the poor, but they also left their castle to ford pilgrims across a river. Like St. Christopher, Julian was popularly venerated in the Netherlands as a patron of travelers and spiritual guide for ferrymen and itinerant musicians. The painted world of The Voyage of St. Julian is one of remarkable verisimilitude. Reflections of light on the waves of the river provide an unprecedented sense of movement. The windswept waters create the illusion of a broad vista having with no boundaries. Hardly any foreground space is visible, and this augments the feeling of instability as the viewer can almost experience the vulnerability of the travelers crossing choppy waters. The lines of the boat’s white sail lead the eye to a distant shore where a castle looms as the “safe harbor.” The same allusion to the security of a “just” realm and the benefits accruing from peace are insinuated in still another miniature (Fig. 1.12) ascribed to the hand of Master G, the Prayer on the Shore (f. 59v). Mounted on a white horse by the water’s edge and experiencing a vision, the lead equestrian amidst a courtly retinue presumably is a Count of Holland. As suggested by the arms displayed by the standard-bearer, the rider could be John of Bavaria. Based upon dendrochrological examination, a Berlin portrait of a Man with a Pink (Fig. 1.13) has been dated to the end of the fifteenth century and the panel is believed to be an enlarged copy of a painting executed by Jan during his Hague period.10 Depicted in a deep rose robe beneath a grey houppelande edged at the collar and cuffs with brown marten, the sitter has a matching broad brimmed hat similar to that Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 15 Centuries, 69; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Collège Érasme, VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-laNeuve: 1987): 29–40, at 31–32; Herbert Lepper, “Kunsttransfer aus der Rheinprovinz in die Reichshauptstadt,” Aachener Kunstblätter LVI–LVII (1988–1989): 183–342, at 233, 238–39, 247, 269. 10

th

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of the equestrian Count in the Prayer on the Shore. He also wears a silver chain with a pendant of a T-cross with a bell, the insignia of the Order of St. Anthony Abbot. Instituted in 1382 by Albert of Bavaria, Count of Holland, Zeeland and Hainaut, the Antoinine Order was recast as a religious brotherhood by John of Bavaria. The Berlin sitter holds three carnations in his right hand. Though the Late Gothic “pink” was a traditional emblem of love, the number of blossoms might allude to a personal devotion to the Holy Trinity. Because the Berlin sitter has been recognized in two paintings of the Epiphany in Cologne, an identification of the Berlin “Man holding Carnations” with John of Bavaria is plausible.11 During the period Jan was in The Hague, the Order of St. Anthony was not confined to aristocrats, but only a person of high status would have had the means to commission the works in Cologne. Despite the revolutionary approach to realistic effects of light, space and movement taken by “Master G” of the Turin-Milan Hours, without further documentation, the nature of Jan Van Eyck’s work at The Hague remains enigmatic, though probably it was in the service of John of Bavaria that he acquired some knowledge in the fine art of drap peint, or painting on linen. Such decorative hangings were owned by the Counts of Hainaut, and Van Eyck is suggested to have painted on cloth, notably a lost altar frontal to the Ghent Altarpiece that depicted “Hell” in watercolor.12 Following the death in 1417 of his brother Count Willem VI, John of Bavaria had wrested the county of Holland from Willem’s rightful heir, his niece Jacqueline of Hainaut (1401–October 9, 1436). The Hunting and Fishing Party, an early sixteenth-century colored drawing in the Louvre (Fig. 1.14), captures the grounds of Binnenhof Castle during the period of Van Eyck’s employment. It is an engaging miniature showing courtiers and ladies enjoying a life of otium. The drawing might replicate a mural or linen painting of the residence which was commissioned by John of Bavaria soon after he left the Bishopric Giorgio T. Faggin, L’Opera completa dei van Eyck, Presentazione di Raffaello Brignetti. Apparati critici e filologici (Milano, Rizzoli, 1968); Till-Holger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting. 1430–1530, translated by Ted Alkins, Caroline Beamish, Alayne Pullen, Julie Martin (London-New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), Catalogue No. 35, 238. First published as Jan van Eyck, de Vlaamse Primitieven en bet Zuiden, 1430–1530 (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges-Stedelijke Musea, Bruges, 2002). 12 Diane Wolfthal, The Beginnings of Netherlandish Canvas Painting: 1400–1530 (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 9–11. 11

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of Liège for Holland in 1417. Anne Hagopian van Buren has called the Louvre watercolour the first extant Dutch group portrait.13 Two groups of figures dominate the Louvre composition, which appears to have been left incomplete as indicated by the fact that portions of the drawing remain in grisaille. Among the nine men standing on the right side of a brook, the most prominent figure wears a black and gold silk chaperon. The brooch attached to one of the flaps, as well as a heavy gold necklace, suggest a nobleman of considerable wealth and power. Willem VI would have belonged to the Order of St. Antoine but he additionally was a knight of England’s Order of the Garter. Equally indicative of his Willem’s high status is his scarlet woolen houppelande, which is embroidered with gold and white flowers and trimmed in brown marten fur, and his white linen surcoat with long scalloped sleeves. The surrounding men are finely attired too, wearing fur-lined houppelandes, shorter haincelains, and fanciful headdresses. John of Bavaria traditionally has been identified as the gentleman with a fur hat whose advance into the foreground space casts shadows unto the lighter ground. Peregrine falcons held by four of the men, as well as the small greyhounds, suggest they are resting from hunting fowl. Directly opposite Willem VI and represented in three-quarter view is Margaret of Bavaria (1374–1441), dowager countess of Willem VI. Behind her is a female with a bourrelet and white veil. The only woman shown frontally in the composition, she probably is Elisabeth of Görlitz, wife of John of Bavaria and granddaughter of Emperor Charles IV of Bohemia († 13 Prior to the research of Anne van Buren-Hagopian, most scholars identified the Count in the Louvre watercolour as William VI. Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 271, reproduces the sixteenth-century inscription and its listing in the “1619 Imperial Inventory.” See Otto Kürz, “A Fishing Party at the Court of William IV, Count of Holland, Zeeland, and Hainaut – Notes on a Painting in the Louvre, Oud Holland 71, Nos. 1–4 (1956): 117–31; Gustav Glück, “Rubens Liebesgarten,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien 35 (1920–21): 49–98 at 49–54; Stephen N. Fliegel and Sophie Jugie (eds.) L’art à la cour de Bourgogne, Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur (1360–1420), with the collaboration of Virginie Barthélémy, Agnieszka Laguna-Chevillotte, Marie-Laure Grunewald, Catherine Tran et al. (Dijon-Cleveland: Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon-Cleveland Museum of Art, 2004–2005), Catalogue 27, “La Partie de pêche,” by Sophie Jugie, 88. On a band above are letters in gold: VETERVM BVRGVNDIAE DVCVM CONJVGVMQVE FILIORVM FILARVMQUE HABITVS AC VESTITVS. The picture which measures 22.9 x 37.5 cm is first documented in the 1619 inventory of Mathias of Austria, and recorded in 1784 in the Imperial Gallery of Paintings, Vienna.

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1378), Duke of Luxembourg. The daughter of John, Duke of Görlitz and Governor of Luxembourg († 1396), died in 1451 sine prole (without issue), and encumbered by debts, she ceded the strategically important territory of Luxembourg to Philip the Good in 1441. Her portrait establishes a parameter for dating the Hunting and Fishing Party to circa 1440. Elizabeth’s niece, Jacqueline of Bavaria, extends a fishing pole over the stream. Set within the undulating hills and forests of Binnenhof Castle, the Louvre Fishing Party seems to have its fons et origo in Medieval Romances describing the “fishing for love.”14 This amorous subject in turn could derive from an opulent banquet on the Nile River described by Lucan in his De Bello Civili (X, 155–71: dated 62–63 A.D). Plutarch (45–120 A.D) in his Parallel Lives mentions the same feast in which the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra ordered a diver to attach a huge salted fish to Anthony’s line. He comments in his introduction that the “most glorious lives” did not furnish the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men, and that often less momentous acts, an “expression or a jest” were more informative about character. The Fishing Party is a Flemish Plutarchian allegory paralleling Jacqueline of Bavaria with Egypt’s renowned queen. Just as Cleopatra had three husbands (Ptolemy, Julius Caesar and Marc Anthony), Jacqueline of Hainaut similarly achieved notoriety for her multiple marriages.15 Her husbands have been identified 14 If the Louvre drawing is based upon a lost Eyckian prototype, it is impossible to know if the model illustrated an ancient theme or a popular variation of the “Romance of the Rose,” such as courtly ladies fishing on the “Island of Love.” Such a subject appears in King René of Anjou’s (1409–1480) Le Coeur d’Amor Épris (Vienna, Bibliothèque Nationale, Codex Vindobonensis 2597, 1460–65), f. 55. Marie-Thérèse Gousset, Daniel Poirion, Franz Unterkircher, Le coeur d’amour épris [facsimile edition of the miniatures in the Codex Vindobonensis 2597 of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Vienna], (Paris: Philippe Lebaud Editeur, 1981); Otto Pächt, “René d’Anjou et les Van Eyck,” Cahier de l’Association Internationale des Études Françaises VIII (1956): 41–51; Pierre Carré, “Le Roi René prisonnier du Duc de Bourgogne à Dijon et son oeuvre de peintre,” La Revue du Louvre et des Musées de France II (1964): 67–74. A woodcut of the Grand Jardin d’Amour (Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett) does in fact show the entourage of Jacqueline of Bavaria and Frank van Borselen in such a chivalric setting. Henry P. Rossiter, “The Little Garden of Love,” Bulletin – Museum of Fine Arts, Boston LXIII (1965): 196–202; Guillaume de Lorris [fl. 1230] and Jean de Meun [† 1305], Le Roman de la Rose, ed. Daniel Poirion (Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1974); Daniel Poirion, Le Roman de la Rose (Paris: Hatier, 1973). 15 Franz von Löher, Jacobäa von Bayern und ihre Zeit, 2 vols. (Nördlingen: Beck, 1862 and 1869); idem., Beiträge zur Geschichte der Jacobäa von Bayern, 2 vols. Abhandlungen der historischen Classe der königlich bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften X (1867): 1–111 and 207–336; E. Le Blant, Les Quatre Mariages de Jacqueline Duchesse en Bavière

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among the four men on the opposite shore, the last spouse being Frank van Borselen, who she secretly wed in the summer of 1432, the year he was elevated as the Count of Ostrevant. Frank is recognizable as the prominent figure with a black chaperon who stands to the left of John of Bavaria. Jacoba, daughter of Willem VI and Margaret of Bavaria, was first married in 1402 when she was only three, and her husband, Jean de Touraine was eight. Based upon a drawing in the Recueil d’Arras, Jean de Touraine can be identified as the figure standing behind Willem VI in the Louvre drawing. Jean and Jacqueline of Bavaria lived at the Château du Quesnoy under the protection of Willem VI. When Jean’s brother, the Duc de Guyenne died on December 14, 1415, he became dauphin. Jean departed for Compiègne on December 26, 1416 but died from a sudden illness on April 5, 1417. Jacqueline then was betrothed in 1417 to Jean IV, Duke of Brabant (1403– 1427), and did not wed her cousin until April 4 of 1418 (Easter) at the Hague, after the death of Willem VI. In the Louvre drawing, a nobleman kneels by the stream beneath Jacqueline and extends a fishing pole. Garbed in a white notched chaperon and a scarlet, fur-lined heuque, his tunic opens on both sides to reveal his large green sleeves and scalloped linen surcoat. This finely dressed individual is no mere fisherman, but likely Jacqueline’s betrothed, the Duke of Brabant. Though he was nephew of the astute John the Fearless (1371–1419), Jean IV lacked the same acumen as the Duke of Burgundy for governing vast estates.16 With the Treaty of Maartensdijk signed in April of 1420 at Tholen, he actually cost Jacqueline her inheritance when he consigned the governing of Holland and Zeeland to John of Bavaria. Furious with this empowerment to her uncle, Jacqueline sought the assistance of King Henry V and fled on April 11, 1420 with her mother to London from her husband’s court at

(Paris: 1904); Johannes Godefridus Frederiks, “Het geheim huwelijk van Gravin Jacoba,” Bijdragen voor vaderlandsche geschieDinis en oudheidkunde 3, VIII (1894): 47–70; Anselme Decourtray and Léopold Devillers, Particularités curieuses sur Jacqueline de Bavière, comtesse de Hainaut, 2 vols. (Mons: E. Hoyois, Société des Bibliophiles Belges, 1838 and 1879); Frans de Potter, Geschiedinis van Jacoba van Beieren, XXXI, 8 série (Mémoires de l’Académie Royal de Belgique: Brussels: 1881). 16 André Uyttebrouck, “Les origines du conseil de Brabant: la chambre du conseil du duc Jean IV,” Revue Belge de Philologie et d’Histoire XXXVI (1958): 1135–72; Edmund de Dynter, Chronique des ducs de Brabant, ed. P. de Ram, 3 vols. (Brussels: Commission Royale d’Histoire, Hayez, 1854–57).

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Brussels.17 In 1422 she married Duke Humphrey (Humfried) of Gloucester, one of the several sons of King Henry IV. They divorced in 1426. Humphrey might be identified in the Louvre drawing as the falcon-bearer who stands between Willem VI and John of Bavaria. A second man beside Willem VI holds a créance or filière, a rod with a long cord used to retrieve falcons. Outfitted in a scarlet chaperon and yellow hancelain, he may be Albert of Bavaria, whose notorious affair with Agnes Bernauer († 1435), a woman of low birth, is documented. Based upon their attire, two additional men have been tentatively identified in the Louvre drawing as political opponents of Willem VI. Outfitted in black with a solitary golden pin, Jan van Arkel’s rounded yellow hat with a black band is head gear that signifies the rebellious Cabelijou faction. Wilhelm van Arkel, Jan’s heir, likely stands beside him garbed in scarlet. Loved by Jacoba, Wilhelm van Arkel was killed at the Battle of Gorichem on December 1, 1417 (Figs. 1.15–1.16). The 1420 inventory of Jean the Fearless’s collection of tapestries records eleven panels that illustrated the Duke and Duchess Margaret of Bavaria participating in a plover hunt.18 This set which included equestrian figures seems to accord with a pictorial tradition in palatine decoration — the painting of frescoes that combined family history in the form of grouped portraits with secular activities which highlighted the status of the sitters. The Louvre watercolor often is cited with regard to the early work of Jan van Eyck at the Binnenhof Palace in The Hague. However, the work is unusual because it is partly in grisaille. Conceivably the artist elected to portray the group of eight women in night light as the moon was associated by the late Gothic aristocracy with the vicissitudes of fortune, even “lunacy,” of courtship. A bipartite representation of a landscape lighted by the moon and sun to denote sexual differences—the dreamy approach of woman versus the pragmaticism of men – would be quite novel, though Barthélemy d’Eyck’s Le Livre du Cuer d’Amours Épris, ca. 1457–1475 contains a folio which illustrates women fishing at night on an “island of love.” By contrast with this subject, the Louvre watercolour seems to be less a nocturnal theme as an uncompleted scene of courtly figures flanking a brook in daylight.

Georges Gysels, “Le départ de Jacqueline de Bavière de la cour de Brabant, 11 Avril 1420,” Miscellanea Historica in Honorem L. van der Essen (Brussels: 1947). 18 Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries, 47, refers to the 1420 inventory and listing of nine large panels and two smaller ones of the bird hunt. 17

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Why would a sixteenth-century master complete half his composition in grisaille? Was he confronted with a mural that was left unfinished? Was the original by the hand of an artist so highly regarded by the court of Burgundy that no follower was asked to color in the under drawing? Was the panel based upon a fresco in the Coudenberg Palace in Brussels which Philip the Good acquired in 1430? (Figs. 1.17–1.21). The portraits in the Louvre drawing combine to date the composition circa 1440, that is, just after the installation of the new ducal logis at the residence, a project which has been dated to the years 1431–1436. Philip the Good’s restoration of the Brabantine Coudenberg Palace culminated in the decade-long building of a huge Great Hall which commenced about 1451 and was completed in 1463.19 A fire on February 3, 1731 destroyed most of the Baroque Imperial 19 Alphonse Wauters and Alexandre Henne, Histoire de la Ville de Bruxelles, 3 vols. (Brussels: Perichon, 1845; and augmented edition, 1968–69, 4 vols. Edited by Mina Martens, Brussels, Éditions “Culture et civilisation”); Edgard Goedleven, La Grand-Place de Bruxelles: au coeur de cinq siècles d’ histoire (Bruxelles: Editions Racine, 1993); Dom Joseph Kreps, “Bruxelles, Residence de Philippe le Bon,” Bruxelles au XVe Siècle (Brussels: exhibition catalogue, 1953): 155–63; Antoine Guillaume Bernard Schayes, “Analectes. XVI. Incendie du palais ducal et des gouverneurs-généraux, à Bruxelles, en 1731,” Annales de l’Academie Royale d’Archéologie de Belgique IX (1852): 87–92; idem., “Analectes. XXXI. Documents inédits sur les travaux exécutes au château des ducs de Brabant et à son parc, à Bruxelles pendant les XVe et XVIe siècles,” Royale d’Archéologie de Belgique XI (1854): 315–38; idem., Histoire de l’architecture en Belgique: depuis les temps les plus reculés jusqu’ à l’ époque actuelle, 2 vols. (Bruxelles : 1853, 2nd ed); Placide Fernand Lefèvre, L’Organisation Ecclésiastique de la Ville de Bruxelles (Louvain, Bibliothèque de l’Université, 1942); Paul Saintenoy, Les Artes et les Artistes à la Cour de Bruxelles, II (Brussels: 1934); Louis-Prosper Gachard, Inventaire des archives des chambres des comptes, 5 vols. (Bruxelles: M. Hayez, 1837–1979); and reprint edition, Inventaire des archives des chambres des comptes : précédé d’une notice historique sur ces anciennes institutions, 7 vols. (Bruxelles : Archives générales du Royaume, 1996); Krista de Jonge, “Het paleis op de Coudenberg te Brussel in de vijftiende eeuw. De verdwenen hertolijke residenties in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden in een nieuw licht geplaatst,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art LX (1991): (A), 5–38; idem., “De Europese context,” in Arlette Smolar-Meynart et al., Het Paleis van Brussel. Acht eeuwen kunst en geschiedinis (Brussels: 1991): (B), 161–72; Krista De Jonge, “Estuves et baingneries dans les résidences flamandes des ducs de Bourgogne”, Bulletin Monumental CLIX, 1 (2001): 63–76, at 70–73 (Coudenberg Palace); Jozef Duverger, De Brusselsche Steenbickeleren, Beeldhouwers, Brouwmeesters, Metselaars, enz. du XIVe en XVe eeuw (Ghent: 1933); idem., Brussels als Kunstcentrum in de XVe en de XVIs eeuw (Antwerp: StandaardBoekhandel, 1935); P.-P. Bonenfant, “Les restes tangibles de l’Aula Magna de Philippe le Bon,” in Arlette Smolar-Maynart and André Vanrie, Le Quartier Royal , Brussels (1998): 96–113; Werner Paravicini, “Die Residenzen der Herzöge von Burgund, 1363–1477,” Werner Paravicini and Hans Pätze, eds. Fürstliche Residenzen im spätmittelalterlichen Europa

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Palace, including Philip the Good’s Renaissance logis. This sector of the residence would have been used for courtly audience prior to the building of the Great Hall and likely it would have been decorated with art that affirmed the duke’s right to rule. The detailed study of the “Fishing Party” alludes to the integration of Jacqueline of Bavaria’s heritage within Philip the Good’s Burgundian dominions. If the Louvre work is regarded as a vestige of a lost set of frescoes by Jan van Eyck, the picture should not be associated with the beginning of his documented career in Holland. Rather the watercolor hints at the final creative activity of a diplomat-artist who served the Duke of Burgundy until his death in 1441. John the Fearless, who held the dual titles of Count of Flanders and Duke of Burgundy, was assassinated in September of 1419 at Montereau by Armagnac henchmen of the French Dauphin Charles VII.20 Subsequently, Philip the Good (1396–1467), Count of Charolais, became the third Duke of Burgundy and twenty-sixth Count of Flanders (Fig. 1.22).21 Soon after his father’s death, Philip had attempted in Ghent to reconcile Jacqueline and (Vorträge und Forschungen des Konstanzer Arbeitskreises für mittelalterliche Geschichte, XXXVI) (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1991): 207–63. 20 Albert Mirot, “Charles VII et ses conseillers assassins présumés de Jean sans Peur,” Annales de Bourgogne XIV (1942): 197–210; Jacques, Comte d’Avout, La querelle des Armagnacs et des Bourguignons. Histoire d’une crise d’autorité (Paris: Gallimard, 1943); Bertrand Schnerb, Les Armagnacs et les Bourguignons: la maudite guerre (Paris: Libr. Académique Perrin, 1988); idem., L’Etat bourguignon, 1363–1477 (Paris: Perrin, 1999); Jean Favier, Colette Beaune, et. al., XIVe et XVe siècles: crises et genèses (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1996); Thomas Basin (1412–1491), Histoire de Charles VII, edited and translated by Charles Samaran, 2 vols. (Paris: Société d’édition “Les Belles lettres”, 1933 and 1944); Jean Chartier, Chronique de Charles VII, roi de France, 3 vols. edited by Vallet de Viriville (Paris: P. Jannet, 1858); G. Du Fresne de Beaucourt, Histoire de Charles VII, 6 vols. (Paris: 1881–91); Johan Huizinga, “La Physionomie Morale de Philippe le Bon,” Annales de Bourgogne IV (1932): 101–29, reprinted in Verzamelde Werken II (Haarlem: 1948): 216–37; idem., “L’État bourguignon, ses rapports avec la France et les origins d’une nationalité néerlandaise,” Le Moyen Âge XL (1930): 171–93 and XLI (1931): 92–93; Yvon Lacaze, “Le role des traditions dans la genèse d’un sentiment national au XVe siècle. La Bourgogne de Philippe le Bon,” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartres CXXIX (1971): 303–85. 21 M. de Barante (Amable-Guillaume-Prosper Brugière, Baron de Barante: 1782– 1866), Histoire des ducs de Bourgogne de la Maison de Valois, 1364–1477, ed. Louis Prosper Gachard, 12 vols. (Paris-Brussels: Dufey, 1837–38); Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, Histoire de Flandre, 6 vols. (Brussels: 1857–50); Walter Prevenier and Willem Pieter Blockmans, The Burgundian Netherlands, translated by P. Kin and Y. Mead (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986); Otto Cartellieri, The Court of Burgundy, translated from German by Malcolm Letts (London-New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1929); idem., Am Hofe der

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her uncle. However, the terms of the Duke’s peace settlement greatly favored John of Bavaria, and they summarily were rejected by Jacqueline. By 1422, the year she obtained a divorce from Jean IV of Brabant, Philip the Good had solidified an English alliance to fight the Dauphinist legions of Charles VII.22 The succession to Holland, Hainaut and Zeeland still was disputed, however, and the Low Countries remained in a state of civil unrest. In 1423 by sanction of the anti-pope Benedict XIII at Peñiscola, Jacqueline wed Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester (1391–1447). During the spring of that same year, he claimed the triple title of Count to the counties of Holland, Hainaut and Zeeland. Humphrey and Jacqueline raised an army, crossed Herzöge von Burgund (Basel: 1926); Louis Cloquet, Les Maisons anciennes de Belgique (Ghent, Impr. V. van Doosselaere, 1907); Dom Urbain Plancher [1667–1750], Histoire générale et particulière de Bourgogne [Dijon: A. de Fay-L. N. Frantin, 1739–1781] with an introduction by Jean Richard, 4 vols., reprinted (Farnsborough, Hantshire: 1968) and (Paris: Éditions du Palais Royal, 1974); J.L. Bazin, “La Bourgogne de la mort du duc Philippe le Hardi au traité de Arras, 1404–1435,” Mémoires de la Société d’Histoire, d’Archéologie et de Litérature de Beaune (1897): 51–269; Ernst von Basserman-Jourdan, Die Standuhr Philipps des Guten von Burgund (Leipzig: 1927); Paul Bonenfant, Philippe le Bon (Brussels: La Renaissance du Livre, 1943 and 1955, 1958); idem., “L’Origine des surnoms de Philippe le Bon,” Annales de Bourgogne XVI (1944): 100–103; Remmet van Luttervelt, “Les Portraits de Philippe le Bon,” Les Arts Plastiques V (1951): 182–96; Henri Pirenne, Histoire de Belgique, II. Du Commencement du XVe siècle à la mort de Charles le Téméraire (Brussels: H. Lamertin, 1900; rpt. 4th ed. 1947); Lucien Febvre, “Les ducs Valois de Bourgogne et les idées politiques de leur temps,” Revue Bourguignonne XXIII (1913): 27–50; Claude Courtépée [1721–1781] and Edme Béguillet, Description Générale et Particulière du Duché de Bourgogne, 7 vols. (Paris: 1775–85), reprinted in 4 vols, 3rd ed. with preface, notes and corrections by M. Pierre Gras and Jean Richard (Paris: Horvath-Avalon, FERN, 1967–68); Jacques Duclercq (Seigneur de Beauvoir en Ternois, b. 1420), Mémoires sur le Règne de Philippe le Bon, ed. Baron de Reiffenberg (Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand Thomas), 4 vols. (Brussels: 1823; 2nd ed. J.M. Lacrosse, 1835–36); idem., Mémoires sur le Règne de Philippe le Bon (1448–1467), ed. Jean Alexandre C. Buchon, Choix de Chroniques et Mémoires sur l’Histoire de France (A. Desrez, 1836; rpt. 1938), 1–318; Antoine Zoete, De beden in het graafschap Vlaanderen onder de hertogen Jan zonder Vrees en Filips de Goede (1405–1467) (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1994); Bernard and Henri Prost, Inventaires mobiliers et extraits des Comptes des Ducs de Bourgogne de la Maison de Valois (1363–1477), 2 vols. (Paris: 1902–1908); Sylvain Laveissière, Dictionnaire des artistes et ouvriers d’art de Bourgogne (including documentation by Bernard Prost and Paul Brune (Paris: F. de Nobele, 1980). 22 Paul Bonenfant, “Actes concernant les rapports entre les Pays-Bas et la Grande Bretagne de 1293 à 1468 conservés au château de Mariemont,” Bulletin de la Commission Royale d’Histoire CIX (1944), 53–125; idem., Du meurtre de Montereau au traité de Troyes (Brussels: Palais des Académies, 1958); Alphonse Bossuat, “Le Parlement de Paris pendant l’occupation anglaise,” Revue Historique CCXXIX (1963): 19–40; Joseph Calmette and

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the English Channel to Calais. By autumn of 1424 the couple had assumed control of most of Hainaut, establishing their headquarters at Mons.23 While Philip the Good had persuaded Philip, Count of St. Pol (1404– 1430) and brother of Jean IV, to join in Burgundian-Brabantine union of arms against the English aggressors, the death of John of Bavaria at Delft on January 6, 1425 gave the Duke of Burgundy the title of governor to the lands which were so hotly contested. While her husband was mustering troops in England, Jacqueline was taken prisoner at Mons. Imprisoned at the ducal castle of Ghent, she managed to escape to Gouda, from where she assembled partisan forces from the region of Utrecht. Her martial power, however, ended with the decimation of her navy at Zevenbergen on April Eugéne Déprez, Europe occidentale de la fin du XIVe siècle aux guerres d’Italie, 2 vols. (Paris: Les Presses universitaires de France, 1937 and 1939), I (1937): La France et l’Angleterre en conflit. Histoire générale. Moyen Âge, ed. G. Glotz; Edward Scott and Louis Gilliodts van Severen, eds. Le Cotton manuscrit Galba B. I. Transcrit sur l’original. Documents pour servir à l’ histoire des relations entre l’Angleterre et la Flandre (Brussels: Hayez, impr., Commission Royale de Histoire, 1896); John Silvester Davies, ed. An English chronicle of the reigns of Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V, and Henry VI written before the year 1471; with an appendix, containing the 18th and 19th years of Richard II and the Parliament at Bury St. Edmund’s, 25th Henry VI and supplementary additions from the Cotton. ms. chronicle called “Eulogium,” 3 vols. (London: Camden Society, 1856; edition New York: AMS Press, 1968). James Hamilton Wylie and William Templeton Waugh, The Reign of Henry V, 3 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914–29). Nelly Johanna Martina Kerling, Commercial Relations of Holland and Zeeland with England from the late Thirteenth Century to the close of the Middle Ages (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1954); J. W. McKenna, “Henry VI of England and the Dual Monarchy: Aspects of Royal Political Propaganda, 1422–1432,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XXVIII (1965): 145–62. 23 Kenneth Hotham Vickers, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester (London: A. Constable and company, Ltd., 1907). Philip the Good challenged Humphrey to a duel at Bruges to settle the dispute over Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland. See Vickers, 1667–67; Jozef Duverger and J. Versyp, “Schilders en borduurwerkers aan de arbeid voor een vorstenduel te Brugge in 1425,” Artes Textiles II (1955): 3–17; Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 5. The four letters are in London (British Museum, MS. Add. 21357, f. 7–10). Also consult Roberto Weiss, “Humphrey Duke of Gloucester and Tito Livio Frulovisi,” Fritz Saxl, 1890–1948. A Volume of Memorial Essays, 2 vols. (London: Warburg Institute, University of London, 1957): 218–27. Regarding Burgundian relationships with the Church during the fifteenth-century, consult: Adriaan Gerard Jongkees, Staat en Kerk in Holland en Zeeland Onder de Bourgondische Hertogen (1425–1477) (Groningen: J.B. Wolters, 1942); Édouard de Moreau, Histoire de l’Église en Belgique,IV [L’Église aux Pays-Bas sous les ducs de Bourgogne et Charles Quint, 1378–1559] (Brussels: l’Édition Universelle, 1945–49); idem, Histoire de l’ église en Belgique des origines aux débuts du XIIe siècle, 2 vols. (Bruxelles: l’Édition Universelle, 1940).

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11, 1427.24 Jean IV of Brabant died on September 3, 1427, yet the final blow to Jacqueline’s ambitions was delivered by Pope Martin V, who ruled her union with Humphrey of Gloucester to be invalid on January 9, 1428. With the loss of anticipated English support, she signed the Treaty of Delft on July 3, 1428, which basically designated Philip the Good as heir-apparent to Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland and co-equal shareholder of their revenues. A proviso of the document assured the Duke’s immediate control of the three counties if Jacqueline wed again without his approval.25 On August 4, 1430, Phillipe of St. Pol, then Burgundian governor of Paris, died childless, and as his heir Philip the Good acquired Brabant and Limbourg. In October of 1430, Philip leased the administration of Holland in return for a portion of the revenues for a period of eight years to the lords of Borselen — Frank, Filips and Floris. Jacqueline secretly wed Frank van Borselen, former treasurer of John of Bavaria. When her marriage to the Zeeland nobleman was revealed in the summer of 1432, Philip the Good invoked the Treaty of Delft. By April of 1433, he achieved his goal of becoming the absolute ruler of the Low Countries.26 The Duke of Burgundy maintained several grand houses. The Hôtel de la Salle in Lille was renovated at the time of his marriage to Infanta Isabel of Portugal (January 7, 1430) but rebuilt substantially between 1453 and 1473 on J.J. Lambin, “Reddition de Zevenbergen à Philippe le Bon, duc de Bourgogne,” Messager des Sciences et des Arts de la Belgique V (1837): 13–16; K. Burman, ed., Utrechsche jaarboeken van vijftiende eeuw, 1402–1481, 3 vols. (Utrecht: 1750–54). 25 Philip the Good’s territorial expansion and conflicts with Jacqueline of Bavaria are discussed by Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 29–53. Also consult Pierre Cockshaw, Les Chroniques de Hainaut, ou, Les ambitions d’un prince bourguignon, ed. Christiane Van den Bergen-Pantens (Brussels-KBR, Turnhout: Brepols, 2000); idem., Le personnel de la chancellerie de Bourgogne-Flandre sous les ducs de Bourgogne de la maison de Valois (1384–1477) (Kortrijk-Heule, Belgium: UGA, 1982). 26 Philippe of St. Pol had inherited Brabant from Jean IV of Brabant in 1427 who died without issue. Bernard Édouard de Mandrot, “Jean de Bourgogne, duc de Brabant, comte de Nevers et le procès de la succession,” Revue Historique XCIII (1907): 1–45. Sigismund, King of Hungary, attempted to obtain Brabant but to no avail. See Louis Jean Guillaume Galesloot, “Revendication du duché de Brabant par Ll’Empereur Sigismund, 1414–1437,” Bulletin de la Commission Royale d’Histoire, 4, V (1878): 437–70; Franz von Löher, “Kaiser Sigmund und Herzog Philipp von Burgund,” Müncher Historisches Jahrbuch für 1866 (1866): 305–419. Regarding Holland during the period of Jan van Eyck’s patronage by Philip the Good, consult: Petrus Johannes Blok, “Holland und das Reich vor der Burgunderzeit, Nachrichten von der Königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen. Philologischhistorische Klasse (1908): 608–36; idem., “Philips de Goede en de hollandsche steden in 24

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the Place Rihour (Figs. 1.23–1.28).27 The quadrangular residence comprised wings around a central courtyard with attendant corner staircase towers. The Duke’s quarters were situated close to the chapel and the ceremonial stairway, which are the only surviving remnants of the residence. The lower chapel, salle de gardes, today is a tourist office, while the upper chapel with its two oratories has trefoil windows and vaulted ceilings. Rihour’s Great Hall designed for entertainment, occupied nearly the entire southern wing, and opposite it was the Aile des Dames, which contained the quarters of the Duchess of Burgundy. As discussed by Krista de Jonge, who has extensively studied the evolution of Burgundian ducal houses, there were no constraints 1436,” Mededelingen der Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen, Amsterdam. Afdeling Letterkunde LVIII, B2 (1924): 33–51; idem., Eene Hollandsche stad onder de BourgondischOostenrijksche heerschappij (‘s Gravenhage: M. Nijhoff, 1884). Raimond van Marle, Le comté de Hollande sous Philippe le Bon (The Hague: 1908); Theodorus Helenus Franciscus van Riemsdijk, “De oorsprong van het Hof van Holland,” Geschiedkundige opstellen aangeboden aan Robert Fruin (The Hague: 1894): 183–208; idem, De opdracht van het ruwaardschap in Holland en Zeeland aan Philips van Bourgondië (Amsterdam: Verhandelingen der Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afdeling Letterkunde VIII, 1906): 1–82. Johan Carel Marinus Warnsinck, De zeeoorlog van Holland en Zeeland tegen de wendische steden der duitsche Hanze, 1438–1441 (The Hague: 1939); Taeke Sjoerd Jansma, “Philippe le Bon et la guerre hollando-wende, 1438–1441,” Revue du North XLII (1960): 5–18. 27 Auguste Leman, “La cour des ducs de Bourgogne à Lille,” Les Faculté Catholiques de Lille XIII (1922–23): 293–306; Max Bruchet, “Notice sur la construction du Palais Rihour à Lille,” Bulletin de la Commission Historique du Département du Nord XXXI (1922): 209–99 (264 for the Great Hall 1453–1463); Francis Salet, “Le Palais Rihour à Lille,” Congrès Archéologique de France CXXe session, Flandre (Paris: 1962): 175–85; Georges Hulin, “Guy Guilbaut, conseiller, trésorier et gouverneur-général de toutes les finances de Philippe le Bon, et premier maître de la chambre des comptes de Lille, Bulletin de la Société d’Histoire et d’Archéologie de Gand XIX (1911): 329–41; Histoire de Lille – I. Des Origins à Avènement de Charles Quint, ed. Guy Fourquin (Lille: 1970), especially essays by Gerard Sivery, “Histoire Economique et Sociale,” 111–270; Henri Platelle, “La vie religieuse à Lille,” 309–417; Jacques Gardelles, “L’Art à Lille – Les Monuments,” 421–56; Jacques Gardelles, “Un grand édifice disparu: la collégiale Saint-Pierre à Lille,” Bulletin Monumental CXXVI (1968): 325– 44; Édouard Hautcoeur, Histoire de l’Église Collégiale et du Chaître de Saint-Pierre de Lille, 3 vols. (Lille-Paris: A. Picard, 1895); Jean-Marc Soyez and Jacques Gardelles, “L’Activité artistique à Lille dans la première moité du XVe siècle – (d’après les archives de la Chambre des comptes et de la Collégiale Saint Pierre),” Revue du Nord LII (1970) 455–61. My thanks are given to Krista De Jonge for her clarification of the architectural projects of Philip the Good. See Krista De Jonge, “Bourgondische residenties in het graafschap Vlaanderen. Rijsel, Brugge en Gent ten tijde van Filips de Goede”, Handelingen der maatschappij voor geschiedenis en oudheidkunde te Gent, [Gent], nieuwe reeks, LIV (2000): 93–134, at 95–109 for Rihour, inclusive of photographs.

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of a pre-existing residence at Lille, and for this reason Rihour was an ideal modern palace which established a precedent for aristocrats who built their own lavish town mansions during the mid to late fifteenth century.28 In Bruges, the Cour de Princes, or Prisenhof Palace (Fig. 1.29), was refurbished by Philip the Good for the wedding ceremonies of 1430. At that time, the ducal apartments were situated in a fourteenth-century tower which provided access to an audience room.29 But the residence was augmented considerably in 1446–1449 when the Hôtel Vert was created as part of a private sector. During this period, Isabel of Portugal erected a new storey above the fourteenth-century hall. Her new apartments challenged Philip to expand his own quarters above the old kitchens overlooking the garden between 1456 and 1459. His apartments were raised a storey to accord with those of his wife. As noted by De Jonge, the upper level of the two ducal apartments had parallel pitched roofs which were joined by a transversal corridor (allée).30 The Duke kept this private corridor of communication Krista De Jonge, “L’Architecture de Cour a l’Époque de Marguerite d’York: Nouvelles Tendances,” Publication du Centre Europeen d’Études Bourguignonnes (XIVe–XVe s.), Rencontres de Malines (25 au 27 septembre 2003), “Marguerite d’York et son temps,” XLIV (2004): 103–12, on Rihour as model for noble houses of the Burgundian elite. 29 J.A. van Houtte, Bruges. Essai d’Histoire Urbaine (Brussels: La Renaissance de livre, 1967); Adolphe Julien Duclos, Bruges. Histoire et Souvenirs (Bruges: K. van de Vyvere-Petyt, 1910); Jean-Jacques Gailliard, Revue Pittoresque des Monuments qui décoraient autrefois la Ville de Bruges et qui n’existent plus aujourd’ hui (Bruges: 1850); Francis Salet, “Les tombeaux de Bourgogne à Notre Dames de Bruges,” Congrès Archéologique de France CXX (1962): 45–54; Louis Gilliodts van Severen, ed., Coutumes des pays et comté de Flandre, 2 vols. (Brussels: Fr. Gobbaerts, 1874–75); idem., Inventaire des Archives de la Ville de Bruges, 13e – 16e Siècle, 7 vols. (Bruges: 1871–78); A. van Zuylen van Nyevelt, Épisodes de la vie des ducs de Bourgogne à Bruges (Bruges: 1937). 30 De Jonge, “Bourgondische residenties in het graafschap Vlaanderen. Rijsel, Brugge en Gent ten tijde van Filips de Goede”, 109–26. See also De Jonge, “Estuves et baingneries dans les résidences flamandes des ducs de Bourgogne”, 67–71 for the Prisenhof at Bruges, inclusive of bibliography. Luc Devliegher, “Demeures gothiques de Bruges,” Bulletin de la Commission royale des monuments et des sites, nouv. Sér., IV (1974): 64–65. Also consult: Monique Somme, “Femmes et espaces féminins à la cour de Bourgogne au temps d’Isabelle de Portugal (1430–1471),” in Jan Hirschbiegel and Werner Paravicini, Das Frauenzimmer. Die Frau bei Hofe in Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit. 6 Symposium der ResidenzenKommission der Akademie der Wissenchaften in Göttingen (Stuttgart: 2000): 61–66. For the Great Gallery of 1467–1468, see Francis Salet, “Le fête de la Toison d’Or de 1468,” Annales de la société royale d’archéologie de Bruxelles LI (1966): 5–29; idem., “La fête de la Toison d’Or et le mariage de Charles le Téméraire, Bruges, mai-juillet 1468,” Handelingen van het genootschap voor geschiedenis Brugge CVI (1969): 5–16. 28

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locked because it was designed as a repository for his treasures, including a mappa mundi, clocks and other precious objects. The double-storied halls created at the Prisenhof typically contained a large fireplace in the middle of a dividing wall and vaulted ceilings supported by arcades. Octagonal tower staircases served as a means of access to the less private spaces of the residence. One such turret was situated near the entrance front gate in the Noordzandstrate, and it communicated with a new long dining hall built in 1467–1468. Philip the Good also created a new chapel at the Prisenhof. Installed between 1448 and 1452, the edifice rose alongside the ducal apartments. Philip the Good frequented Ghent, Mons, Ardilly, Turnout, Sluis, Louvain, Limbourg and a host of other towns in Burgundy only occasionally.31 Two or three months of the year he spent at Lille, Bruges and Brussels and he made frequent excursions to the constellation hunting lodges near the towns. Due to conflicts with the Dauphinists, Philip the Good never used the residences in Paris (Figs. 1.30–1.31) he inherited from John the Fearless. The Hôtel de Bourgogne, purchased in 1363 by Philip the Bold (1342–1404) and enlarged, was rarely visited after 1380. The huge Hôtel d’Artois, with its surrounding gardens and separate buildings lodging officials of the court, fell into neglect. The same fate was shared by the Hôtel de Conflans outside Paris.32

Albert van de Walle, “Le Château des Comtes de Flandre à Gand,” Congrès Archéologique de France CXX (1962): 101–7; Edward van Even. Louvain Monumental ou Description Historique de Tous les Édifices Civile et Religieux de la Dite Ville (Louvain: 1860); idem, Louvain dans le passé et le présent. Formation de la ville, événements mémorables, territoire, topographie, institutions, monuments, oeuvres d’art (Louvain: Auguste Fonteyn, 1895; rpt. Louvain: Frankie, 1967). 32 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Bold. The Formation of the Burgundian State (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962), 39 and note 1; idem., John the Fearless. The Growth of the Burgundian Power (New York, Barnes & Noble, 1966); idem, Valois Burgundy (London: Allen Lane, 1975); Also consult Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye (ed.), Paris 1400. Les Arts sous Charles VI, with contributions by François Avril et al.(Paris: exhibition catalogue, Musée du Louvre, Éditions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, Fayard, 2004), which contains a comprehensive bibliography on the epoch of Charles VI and the International Style. For Burgundy under the predecessors of Philip the Good, see L’Art à la cour de Bourgogne. Le mécénet de Philippe le Hardi et Jean sans Peur (1360–1420) (Dijon- Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, 2004); Ernest Petit, Histoire des ducs de Bourgogne de la race Capétienne, avec des documents inédits et des pièces justificatives, 9 vols. (Dijon: Impr. Darantière, 1885–1905); idem., Itinéraires de Philippe le Hardi et Jean sans Peur, ducs de Bourgogne 1363–1419 (Paris: Collection de documents inédits sur l’histoire de France, 1888); idem., La Collection de 31

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Despite his political break with Valois France, Philip the Good did spend time at Dijon (Figs. 1.32–1.35), where his grandfather had built a pantheon for the Dukes of Burgundy at the Carthusian Chapterhouse of Champmol (1394–1400).33 In the medieval town, he ordered several additions to the ducal residence between 1450 and 1455, notably the Salle des Gardes and the Tour de la Terrasse.34 The first chapter meeting of the Philip the Good’s new Order of the Golden Fleece was held in 1431 at Lille on November 30, the feast day of St. Andrew, but knights of the institution met annually thereafter at Bruges, Dijon, Brussels, Arras, St. Omer, Ghent, Mons and

Bourgogne à la Bibliothèque Nationale,” Mémoires de l’Académie des Sciences, Arts et Belles Lettres de Dijon (1895–1896): 325–430; Barthélemy Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, “Les Chefs des finances ducales de Bourgogne sous Philippe le Hardi et Jean sans Peur (1363–1419),” Mémoires de la Société pour l’ histoire du droit et des institutions des anciens pays bourguignons, comtois et romands IV (1937): 5–67; idem., “Les Dons du roi aux ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Hardi et Jean sans Peur (1363–1419),” Mémoires de la Société pour l’ histoire du droit et des institutions des anciens pays bourguignons, comtois et romands VI (1939): 113–144; VII (1940–1941): 95–129. 33 Henri David, Philippe le Hardi, duc de Bourgogne et co-régent de France de 1392 à 1404; le train somptuaire d’un grand Valois (Dijon, Impr. Bernigaud et Privat, 1947); idem., Claus Sluter (Paris : P. Tisné, 1951); idem., “Philippe le Hardi au début de XVe siècle, “ Annales de Bourgogne XVI (1944): 137–57, 201–28; Patrick M. de Winter, The Patronage of Philippe le Hardi, Duke of Burgundy (1364–1404) (New York: Ph.D. Dissertation, New York University, 1976). For the Carthusian complex in general see: Cyprien Monget, La Chartreuse de Dijon d’après les Documents des Archives de Bourgogne, 3 vols. (Montreuil-sur Mer-Tournai: 1898, 1901, 1905); William Tyler, Dijon and the Valois Dukes of Burgundy (Norman: 1971); Pierre Quarré, La Chartreuse de Champmol. Foyer d’Art au Temps des Ducs Valois (Dijon: Palais des Ducs de Bourgogne, 1960); idem., “Les Caveaux des Ducs de Bourgogne à la Chartreuse de Champmol,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art XXII (1953): 115–21; “La Chartreuse de Champmol, centre d’art européen,” Publications du Centre Européen d’Études Burgondo-médians (III (1961): 72–79; Hendrik Jacobus J. Scholten, “De Chartreuse bij Dijon en haar Kunstenaars 1379–1411,” Oud Holland LXXXI (1966): 119–44; Jacques Dupont, “Les peintures de la Chartreuse de Champmol,” Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire de l’Art Français (1937): 155–57. 34 Henri Chabeuf, “Notes pour servir à histoire du palais ducal – La Salle des Gardes, Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Départment de la Côte-d’Or XIII (1895–1900), 25–32; Pierre Gras, “L’Hôtel de Philippe le Bon à Dijon,” Bulletin de la Société des Amis du Musée de Dijon (1955–57): 31–34; Arthur Kleinclausz, “L’Hôtel des Ducs de Bourgogne à Dijon,” La Revue de l’Art Ancien et Modern XXVII (1910): 179–90; 275–86; idem., “Les peintres des Ducs de Bourgogne,” La Revue de l’Art Ancien et Modern XX (1906), 161–76, 253–68; idem., “Les architects des Ducs de Bourgogne,” La Revue de l’Art Ancien et Modern XXVI (1909): 61–74; Salomon Reinach, “Three Panels from the Ducal Residence at Dijon,” The Burlington Magazine L (1927): 234–45.

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The Hague.35 In January of 1432 the official seat of the chivalric order was established in Dijon’s church of Sainte-Chapelle which until the French Revolution stood beside the ducal residence.36

Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 161, who also states that in 1435 a decision was made to hold the chapter meetings in the spring or early summer, because November was deemed too short for festivities. For the Order of the Golden Fleece see: Pierre Cockshaw, Christiane Van den Bergen-Pantens, E. Beltran, et al, L’ordre de la Toison d’or : de Philippe le Bon à Philippe le Beau, 1430–1505 : idéal ou reflet d’une société? (Bruxelles : Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, Turnhout : Brepols, exhibition catalogue 1996); La Toison d’Or. Cinq Siècles d’Art et d’Histoire, Bruges exhibition (Brussels: 1962); Vicomte Charles de Terlinden, “Les origines religieuses et politiques de la Toison d’Or,” Publications du Centre Européen d’Études Burgundo-Médianes V (1963): 35–46; idem., Der Orden von Goldenen Vlies (Vienna-Munich: 1970); Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand Thomas Baron de Reiffenberg, Histoire de l’Ordre de la Toison d’or, depuis son institution jusqu’ à la cessation des chapitres généraux; tirée des archives mémes de cet ordre et des écrivains qui en on traité (Bruxelles: Fonderie & imprimerie normales, 1830). Henri Marie Bruno Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, La Toison d’or. Notes sur l’institution et l’histoire de l’ordre (depuis l’année 1429 jusqu’à l’année 1559), (Bruxelles, G. van Oest & cie, 1907, 2nd ed.); Luc Hommel, L’Histoire du noble ordre de la Toison d’Or (Brussels: A. Goemaere, 1947); Charles Arthur John Armstrong, “La Toison d’Or et la loi des armes,” Publications du Centre Européen d’Études BurgondoMédianes 5 (1963): 71–77; Victor Tourneur, “Les orgines de l’Ordre de la Toison d’Or et la symbolique des insignes de celui-ci,” Academie Royal de Belgique.Bulletin de la Classe des Lettres et Sciences Morales XLII, 5 série (1956): 300–23; George Dogaer, “Des anciens livres des statuts manuscrits de l’Ordre de la Toison d’Or,” Publications du Centre Européen d’Études Burgondo-Médianes 5 (1963), 65–70; Julius von Schlosser, Der Burgundische Paramentenschatz des Ordens von Goldenen Vliesse (Vienna: 1912); Francis Salet, “La fête de la Toison d’Or de 1468,” Annales de la Société Royale d’Archéologie, Bruxelles LI (1966): 5–29; idem., “La ‘Croix de serment’ de l’ordre de la Toison d’Or,” Journal de la Savants (June 1974): 73–94; Antoon Viaene, “De Orde van het Gulden Vlies laatste Ridderparade van het westen,” West-Vlaaderen 65, XI (1962): 352–67. 36 Pierre Quarré, “La chapelle du duc de Bourgogne à Dijon ‘lieu, chapitre et collège’ de l’Ordre de la Toison d’Or,” Publications du Centre Européen d’Études Burgondo-médianes V (1963): 56–64; idem., La Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon. Siège de l’Ordre de la Toison d’Or (Paris: Hachette, Dijon exhibition catalogue, 1962); idem.,”Six fragments de vitraux provenant de la Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon,” Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Départment de la Côte-d’Or XXV (1959–62); idem.,”Deux panneau de l’armorial de la Toison d’Or de la Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon,” Bulletin de l’Institut Royal du Patrimoine Artistique XV (1975): 318–25; idem., “La Toison d’Or,” L’Oeil XLIX (January, 1959): 14–23, 70; Jules d’Arbaumont, Essai Historique sur la Sainte Chapelle de Dijon (Dijon: 1863); Pierre Gras, “Les armoires des chevaliers de la Toison d’Or à la Sainte Chapelle de Dijon,” Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Départment de la Côte-d’Or XXIII (1947–53): 241–51; F. Marion, “Quelques vitraux de la Sainte-Chapelle de Dijon,” Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Départment de la Côte-d’Or XXI (1936–39): 258–60. 35

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From 1425 until 1428 the war in Holland, in great measure a civil battle, had occupied Philip the Good and taxed his revenues. By contrast to Jacqueline’s feudal support, the Duke of Burgundy was buttressed by his merchants, particularly those in the commercial center of Bruges, where there rose several “houses” of foreign nations.37 Still it was a long and costly conflict. Philip’s optimistic attitude towards the outcome is revealed by his taking time in the midst of a serious campaign to consider the refurbishing of his palatine estates. Jan van Eyck had remained at The Hague until the death of his patron John of Bavaria in January of 1425. The Duke of Burgundy summoned him to the Prisenhof in Bruges unquestionably because of his artistic experience at the Hague.38 Jan was appointed Philip the Good’s 37 Philip was supported by Burgundian nobility in the 1420s. See Paul Renoz, “Une assemblée de nobles bourguignons pour la défense duché, 1426,” Mémoires de la Société pour l’Histoire du Droit et des Institutions des anciens pays bourguigons, comtois et romands XXII (1961); 125–33; idem., La chancellerie de Brabant sous Philippe le Bon, 1430–1467 (Bruxelles, Palais des académies, 1955). Following the sublimation of Jacqueline, Countess of Hainaut, he secured capital from Italian bankers. The scope of this study of Jan van Eyck does not encompass economic conditions in Burgundy, but information about Philip the Good, the merchants of his municipalities, and the diverse nations which had commercial centers in Bruges can be found in the following: Armand Grunzweig, ed. Correspondance de la filiale de Bruges des Medici (Brussels: Commission Royale d’Histoire: 1931); idem., “Un plan d’acquisition de Gênes par Philippe le Bon, 1445,” Le Moyen Âge XLII (1932): 81–110; P. Dancoine, L’Évolution des Finances Bourguignonnes (University of Lille: Thesis, 1957); John Bartier, Légistes et gens de finances au XVe siècle. Les conseillers des ducs de Bourgogne, Philippe le Bon et Charles le Téméraire (Brussels: Palais des Académies, 1955–57); Louis Lièvre, La monnaie et le change en Bourgogne sous les ducs Valois (Dijon: Imprimerie veuve P. Berthier, 1929); Peter Spufford, Monetary Problems and Policies in the Burgundian Netherlands, 1433– 1496 (Cambridge: Thesis, 1963), published (Leiden: Brill, 1970); idem., “Coinage, taxation and the Estates General of the Burgundian Netherlands,” Anciens Pays et Assemblées d’États XL (1966): 61–88; idem., Power and Profit: The Merchant in Medieval Europe (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2003); R. de Rover, Money, Banking and Credit in Medieval Bruges (Cambridge: Mass: Cambridge University Press, 1948): Jules Finot, “Étude historique sur les relations commerciales entre la Flandre et la République de Gênes au moyen âge,” Annales du Comité Flamand de France XXVIII (1906–7); idem, Étude historique sur les relations commerciales entre la Flandre et la république de Gênes au moyen âge (Paris: A. Picard, 1906); idem., “Relations commerciales et maritimes entre la Flandre et l’Espagne au moyen âge, Annales du Comité Flamand de France XXIV (1898), 1–353, reprinted as Étude historique sur les relations commerciales entre la Flandre et l’Espagne au moyen âge (Paris: A. Picard, 1899); Charles Verlinden, À propos de la politique économique des ducs de Bourgogne à l’égard de l’Espagne,” Hispania X (1950): 681–715; Michel Mollat, “Recherches sur les finances des ducs Valois de Bourgogne,” Revue Historique CCXIX (1958): 285–321. 38 The artistic environment of Bruges is discussed by Jozef Duverger, “Jan van Eyck as Court Painter,” The Connoisseur CXCIV (1977): 172–79; idem., “Brugse Schilders ten

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valet de chambre the week of May 19–25 of 1425 and given an annual wage of 100 livres parisis, lodgings in Lille, and tax exemptions. Dovetailing his appointment was the command “to execute paintings whenever the Duke wished.”39 Jan van Eyck’s 1425–1426 “Secret Journey” Marcus van Vaernewyck (1518–1569) in his Spieghel der Nederlanscher Audtheyt (1568) states that Jan became a “confidential advisor to Philip of Burgundy, who much valued his constant company and presence.”40 tijde van Jan van Eyck,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique IV (Brussels: 1955): 83–120. 39 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), XXXI–XXXII. Document 3 (August 2, 1425) records payment of 20 livres from the accounts of the Duke of Burgundy to “Iohannis de Heecq, varlet de chambre et paintre de mon dict seigneur” to cover moving expenses from Bruges to Lille. Mention is made of letters patent dated May 19, 1425 appointing Jan the official painter of Philip the Good. The document is in Lille, Archives of the Department of the North, B 1931. In 1426 (after March 9: Weale, Document 6, XXXII) three payments of 50 livres each are designated to “Jehan de Heick, jadiz pointre et varlet de chambre de feu monseigneur le duc Jehan de Bayvière.” This document in Lille (Archives of the Department of the North) brackets Jan’s salary from “Midsummer, 1425, to December, 1426.” He typically was paid in two half-yearly moieties. For a information about Burgundian currency, see Vaughan, Philip the Good, The Apogee of Burgundy, xvii, who states that gold coins in Burgundy were “partly French, partly Burgundian and partly Rhenish or imperial. Of French coins, the two most important were the crown or écu à la couronne, valued at £1 2s 6d of Tours or 40 groats, and the salut, valued at 48 groats. Which was the standard gold coin of Lancastrian France….The pound of Tours (livres tournois) was four-fifths of the pound of Paris (livres parisis). Vaughan amplifies about the systems of money, but documents indicate Jan van Eyck was paid with livre parisis. Also consult: Anatole de Barthélemy, Essai sur les monnaies des ducs de Bourgogne. Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Départment de la Côte-d’Or (Dijon: 1849); Françoise DumasDubourg, Le monnoyage des ducs de Bourgogne, 1363–1477, Positions des thèsis soutenus à l’École des Chartres (1957), 57–64, published (Louvain-la-Neuve: Université catholique de Louvain, Institut supérieur d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art, Séminaire de numismatique Marcel Hoc, 1988); Hendrik Enno van Gelder and Marcel Hoc, Les monnaies des Pays-Bas bourguignons et espagnols, 1434–1713 (Amsterdam: J. Schulman, 1960); Alphonse de Witte, Histoire monétaire des Comtes de Louvain, Ducs de Brabant et Marquis du Saint Empire Romain, 2 vols. (Antwerp: 1896). 40 Leo van Puyvelde, “Les Reis van Eyck naar Portugal,” Koninklijke Vlaamsche Academie voor Taal-en Letterkunde — Verslagen en Mededeelingen (1940), 17–27, at 20–26. Despite Van Eyck’s proficiency as an illuminator, there are no books illustrated by his hand in the

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Documents in Lille do not inform about Jan’s initial artistic work for the Duke of Burgundy, which had to be negligible as no mention is made relating to his activity at any of the ducal estates which were being remodeled and augmented. Accounts do reveal, however, that he was called to a different type of service, that of a traveling diplomat. From the beginning of his employment at Bruges, Jan was sent abroad as Philip the Good’s honored representative. He made three diplomatic trips in 1425–1426, 1427 and 1428–29, and a fourth in 1436. The voyages of 1427 and 1428–29 were to the Iberian Peninsula, and they involved the Duke’s quest for a third wife. As “Count of Charolais,” the teen-aged Philip in June of 1409 married Michelle (b. 1395) the daughter of King Charles VI of France (Fig. 1.36). Following her sudden death on July 8, 1422 and burial in the Old Abbey of St. Bavo at Ghent, Philip remarried on November 30, 1424. His second wife, Bonne d’Artois, was the widow of Philippe, Count of Nevers and Reuthel (1389–1415). Like her predecessor, Bonne died prematurely without providing an heir. Due to his conflict with the Dauphinists, Philip did not seek a new bride from the ducal houses of France. There were no prospects in Bohemia. Elizabeth (1409–1442), daughter of King Sigismund, in 1421 became the wife of Albert II, Duke of Austria (1397–1439). On August 26, 1426, the Lille documents record: Payment to Iohannes de Eick of 91 livres 5s of 40 groats Flemish to the pound for a certain pilgrimage which the Duke had ordered him to perform in his name and on account of a secret journey which

collection of Philip the Good, aside from the debated folios of the Turin-Milan Hours. See Georges Dogaer and Marguerite Debae, La Libraire de Philippe le Bon (Brussels: exhibition catalogue, Bilbiothèque Royale de Belgique, 1967). For manuscripts acquired by Philip the Good’s prececessors, see Pierre Cockshaw, “Mentions d’auteurs, de copistes, d’enlumineurs et de libraires dans les comptes généraux de l’État bourguignon (1384–1419),” Scriptorium XXIII (1969): 122–44; Bernard Bousmanne and Céline van Hoorebeeck, La librairie des ducs de Bourgogne: Manuscrits conservés à la Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, 2 vols. (Turnhout: Brepols, 2000–2003). Jan van Eyck appears to have been engaged as a palatine decorator and painter of small panels. Secular murals or paintings on linen for the Duke of Burgundy do not survive. However, Jan is documented in 1432 at Hesdin Castle, where his opinion was sought regarding the work in progress, a cycle of frescoes pertaining to Jason, which were completed by Colard le Voleur and his assistants between 1431 and 1433. See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxv, Document 17 (Lille: Archives of North, B, 1942).

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he had ordered him to make to certain distant places of which no mention was to be made.41 Between September of 1425 and March of 1426 Jodocus Vijd of Ghent served as a member of an embassy sent to Holland and Zeeland by Philip the Good.42 Though this delegation which included Jan’s patron of the Ghent Altarpiece was dispatched to handle political matters, they would have returned with news about any viable candidates for marriage. Jan van Eyck had traveled with the Burgundian embassies in 1427 to Aragon and in 1428–29 to Portugal for the specific purpose in each case of providing a realistic likeness of a prospective bride for Philip’s consideration. Because Bonne d’Artois had died on September 17, 1425, his polemical earlier voyage of 1425–26 also may have involved some preliminary reconnoitering for potential brides. More likely, however, Jan was dispatched to draw topographical views of strategic sites which would be critical to have if the political ambitions of the Duke were to be realized. Municipal records in Ghent for March 9, 1426 substantiate that Jan’s brother, “Master Hubrechte,” the “painter” was finishing work in the church of Saint Sauveur in accordance with the will of Robert Poortier and Avezoete, his wife, dated March 9, 1425. For their tomb in the “Chapel of Our Lady” Hubrechte had installed an altarpiece capped with a statue of St. Anthony [Abbot].43 Town archives of Ghent also indicate the death of Jan’s brother occurred about September 18, 1426.44 What work Hubrechte completed on the Ghent Altarpiece commissioned by Jodocus Vijd for his chapel in SintJanskerk was left unfinished. Even if Jan did not travel with him to Utrecht, Duke Philip would have been sufficiently indebted to Vijd to loan his court painter after 1430 to the ongoing project in Ghent.45 The Lille document attests that Jan van Eyck did not merely undertake a “secret journey” to 41 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art , xxxii–xxxiii (Document 7), the Department of the North, B 1933. 42 Elisabeth Dhanens, VI. Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen (Ghent: Bijlagen, 1965), 87. The document was discovered and published in 1957 by Jozef Duverger. 43 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxii (Document 5), Ghent: Town Archives. 44 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art , xxxiii (Document 8): Ghent Town Archives. Record of a receipt by municipal treasurers of “6s. gr. from the heirs of Lubrecht van Heyke, tax on the property of the deceased.” 45 Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art 33 (1976), 7–82, at 28.

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“distant places,” but also that he made a “pilgrimage.” Therefore, it may be useful to review some of the documented missions which were funded by the Duke of Burgundy. Philip the Good’s sustained interest in Asia Minor which began during his youth. On September 25 of 1396, the year of his birth, an ill–fated crusade to Nicopolis was led by his father, John the “Fearless” when still Count of Nevers (Figs. 1.37–1.38). The Ottomans under Sultan Bayezid I defeated the Burgundian army of Duke Philip the Bold.46 The story of the conflict must have been repeated often during the years Philip the Good grew to maturity. Almost immediately after the assassination of his father in 1419, he envisioned a second crusade, one which he would lead in alliance with England.47 Philip the Good’s plans were the basis for the reconnaissance travels of Guillebert de Lannoy, the porte-bannière of the Duke. Guillebert left Sluis in May of 1421, crossed Prussia, Poland, the Ukraine and the Crimea, before visiting Constantinople, Rhodes, Jerusalem, Cairo and Crete. Returning by way of Venice in 1423, he composed an account of his voyage which he delivered in London.48 46 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Bold. The Formation of the Burgundian State (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962), 59–78; Aziz Suryal Atiya, The Crusade of Nicopolis (London: Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1934; reprinted New York: AMS Press, 1978); Nicolae Iorga, Notes et extraits pour servir à l’ histoire des croisades au XVe siècle, 6 vols. (Paris, E. Leroux, 1899–1916), especially volume three (1902). At age five, Philp the Good played in the parkland of Hesdin dressed as a Turk. For this anecdote, see Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 268. 47 Sterling,“Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 29. Regarding the English alliance, he cites Margaret Wade Labarge, Henry V, the Cautious Conqueror (London: London : Secker and Warburg, 1975), 100ff. Philip the Good clearly hero-worshipped his father, as indicated by a comparative study of their patronage, interests and aspirations. See Carl Nordenfalk, “Hatred, Hunting and Love. Three Themes relative to some Manuscripts of Jean sans Peur,” Studies in Late Medieval and Renaissance Painting in honor of Milliard Meiss, 2 vols. ed. Irving Lavin and John Plummer (New York: New York University Press, 1977); Henri David, “Jeunesse de Jean, second duc valois de Bourgogne, le double mariage de Cambrai (12 Avril 1385),” Miscellanea Prof. Dr. D. Roggen (Antwerp: 1957): 57–76; Léon Mirot, “Jean sans Peur de 1398 à 1405 d’après les comptes de la chambre aux deniers,” Annuairebulletin de la Société de l’Histoire de France (1938): 129–45. 48 Charles Potvin, ed. Oeuvres de Ghillebert de Lannoy [1386–1462], voyageur, diplomate et moraliste (avec des notes géographiques et une carte par J.-C. Houzeau) (Louvain: Impr. de P. et J. Lefever, 1878), 160–61, 196–97; Oskar Halecki, Gilbert de Lannoy and his discovery of East Central Europe,” Bulletin of the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences in America II (1943–44): 314–31; Erich Maschke, “Burgund und der preussische Ordenstaat. Ein Beitrag zur Einheit der ritterlichen Kultur Europas im späteren Mittelalter,” Syntagma Friburgense.

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Guillebert de Lannoy also was called upon to negotiate another more urgent problem closer to home, one with occupied the attention of Duke Philip between 1422 and 1431. In 1428–29 Philip sent Guillebert to Germany (Fig. 1.39), ostensibly with the purpose of talking directly with Sigismund of Luxembourg (1368: r. 1411–1437) (Fig. 1.39) about the heretical followers of John Hus (c 1369–July 6, 1415), theologian of the University of Prague (1409). Hus had ignited a revolution against the Church in Bohemia, and though Philip and Sigismund had corresponded about an expedition against the Hussites in 1422 and again in 1427, a grander plan had evolved. In this campaign, the Duke of Burgundy was to lead a contingent of 15,000 troops with the support of the Dukes of Brabant, Brittany, Savoy and the Bishop of Liège. Their armies were to be bolstered by support from England in the form of 4000–6000 archers dispatched by Philip’s brother-in-law, John of Lancaster, (1389–1435), the Duke of Bedford.49 Plans for a Burgundian expedition to Bohemia continued until 1431, but the expedition never materialized because the Hussites’ power had dissipated by 1433.50 The 1421 and 1428 travels of Guillebert de Lannoy essentially were directed towards obtaining information which would be crucial for military stratagems of Philip the Good’s army. On still another Historische Studien, Hermann Aubin zum 70. Geburtstag dargebracht (Constance: 1956), 147–72. Guillebert was the brother of Hue de Lannoy, Lord of Santes, and councilor of Philip the Good in the 1420s, as well as stadholder of Holland in 1433. See Bernard Moreau (with the collaboration of Edmont Derreumaux), Histoire de la ville de Lannoy (Lys-lez-Lannoy: Editions Cercle d’études historiques de Lys-Lez-Lannoy, 1995). Concerning pilgrimages to Jerusalem, see Beatrice Dansette, “Les Pèlerinages occidentaux en Terre Sainte: Une pratique de la ‘Dévotion Moderne’ à la fin du Moyen Age? Relation inédite d’un pèlerinage effectué en 1488’, Archivum Franciscanum Historicum LXXII (1979): 106–33 and 330–428; Francis Rapp, “Les Pèlerinages dans la vie religieuse de l’Occident médiéval aux XIVe et XVe siècles,” Les Pèlerinages de l’antiquité biblique et classique à l’occident médiéval, ed. Freddy Raphaël et al. (Paris: P. Geuthner, 1973): 117–60; Jonathan Sumption, Pilgrimage: An Image of Mediaeval Religion (London: Faber & Faber, 1975); idem., The Age of Pilgrimage: The Medieval Journey to God (Mahwah, NJ: HiddenSpring, 2003). 49 Burgundy was to contribute 1000,000 crowns per month, 3–4000 gentlemen-ofarms, and 4000 archers and crossbowmen. About 4–6,000 archers were to be provided by Henry of Beaufort († 1449), second son of John of Gaunt, and bishop of Winchester. See Eberhard Windecke, Denkwüdigkeiten zur Geschichte des Zeitalters Kaiser Sigmunds, ed. W. Altmann (Berlin: 1893), 160–61; Yvon Lacaze, “Philippe le Bon et le problème hussite: Un projet de croisade Bourguignon en 1428–1429,” Revue Historique CCXLI (1969): 69–98; and Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 68–70 and 68 note 3. 50 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 70.

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voyage, however, Lannoy combined his diplomatic reconnaissance with a pilgrimage on behalf of his lord (Fig. 1.40). On March 4, 1431 he sailed to Great Britain, though the specific nature of his journey is unknown. Guillebert’s itinerary in 1431 is documented through ducal expense accounts. From Calais he sailed to Sandwich and then proceeded to London. He then traveled north to Scotland, where he met with King James I (1394: r. 1406– 1437) and Queen Joan (m. 1424; † 1445), daughter of John of Beaufort, the Count of Somerset. Docking at Dunbar, he passed to Edinburgh and Stirling castles before riding south to the port of Dumfries. On May 27 Guillebert’s ship sailed for Ireland, where he made a pilgrimage for his lord at the famed shrine of St. Patrick’s Isle in Lough Erne.51 Conceivably the purpose of Guillebert’s trip was to resolve trading issues which had been the focus of a delegation which sailed to Scotland in 1426, a joint embassy sent by Philip the Good and the Four Members of Flanders.52 The date of this embassy’s voyage coincides with Jan’s “secret journey,” and there were pilgrimage sites in England, such as Glastonbury. Despite the EnglishBurgundian alliance, the notion that an artist would join the Burgundians on their trip to Scotland seems implausible. The mission, after all, pertained to matters of “commerce.” In any case, Jan had the opportunity to briefly visit London on his return to Flanders from Portugal in 1429, when the Lusitanian fleet was compelled to dock in England. Philip the Good typically dispatched representatives to make a holy pilgrimage in his name. Bertrandon de la Broquière (Figs. 1.41–1.42), Andrieu de Toulongeon, Lord of Mornay and Geoffrey de Thoisy appear to 51 Oeuvres de Ghillebert de Lannoy, 166–73; 205–7; Vaughan, Philip the Good, 110–111 and 110 note 2. 52 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 110 and note 2. He cites: André Joseph Ghislain Le Glay [1785–1863] et al., Lille, Inventaire-sommaire des Archives départementales antérieures à 1790, Nord. Archives civiles, Série B, Chambre des Comptes de Lille, 10 vols. (Lille, Impr. de L. Danel, 1865–1906), I, 376; Louis Gilliodts van Severen, Inventaire des archives de la ville de Bruges, 13e – 16 e siècle, 7 vols. (Bruges: 1871–1878), IV, 485; Octave Delepierre and Félix Pierre Jean Priem (eds.), Précis analytique des documents que renferme le dépôt des archives de la Flandre-Occidentale à Bruges (Bruges: Vandecasteele-Werbrouck, Ie sèrie, 3 vols., 1840– 42 and 2e sèrie, 9 vols. , 1845–58), II, 29–30; 40; Frans van Mieris, Groot charterboek der graaven van Holland, van Zeeland en heeren van Vriesland, 4 vols. (Leyden: P. van der Eyk, 1753–56), IV (1756). Also consult Chrétien César Auguste Dehaisnes [Canon], Documents et extraits divers concernant l’ histoire de l’art dans la Flandre, l’Artois et le Hainaut avant le XVe siècle, 2 vols. (Lille: L. Quarré, Mémoires de la Commission Historique du Département du Nord, documents inédits, 1–3, 1886).

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have had the sanction of the Duke of Burgundy, when they left Venice on May 8, 1432 bound for Jerusalem. When the nobles arrived back to Burgundy in July of 1433, Bertrandon appeared before Philip the Good at Pothières garbed as a “Saracen.” He gave the exotic outfit to his lord, along with a copy of the Qur’an and the horse which he had ridden from Damascus.53 The outfit resurfaced as one of the costumes worn by a performer in a famed banquet at Lille held on February 17, 1454. Philip the Good’s crusading aspirations were highlighted in the “Feast of the Pheasant” wherein Hance, the court giant appeared as a “Saracen of Granada.” 54 In 1425 Philip’s bastard brother, Guyot of Burgundy, was sent to Jerusalem in the company of his councilor and chamberlain, Jehan de Lannoy, the Lord de Roubaix and Herzeele. They were joined by four additional seigneurs.55 In his discussion of the trips made by Jan van Eyck before 1432 on behalf of Philip the Good, Charles Sterling finds the terminology of the ducal accounts to be perplexing. He notes the absence of the word “secret” in the ducal records pertaining to Guillebert de Lannoy’s travels to Germany (1421) and the two pilgrimages to Jerusalem by Guyot of Burgundy (1425) and Bertrandon de la Broquière (1432).56 Bertrandon de la Broquière received 200 livres for his expenses to the Holy Land.57 If Jan van Eyck traveled to Jerusalem with Guyot of Burgundy in 1425–26, and was allotted the lesser sum of 91 livres, this discrepancy can be explained. The journey’s expenses would have been borne by Philip the Good’s brother and Jehan de Lannoy, a prominent nobleman who had known the Duke since his youth and owned vast estates in Flanders. Both would have contributed donations to places of pilgrimage in the Duke’s name. 53 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 270 and note 1. He cites: Lille: Archives départamentales du Nord, B1948, f. 162b. See Charles Henri Auguste Schefer and Henri Cordia (eds.), Le voyage d’outremer de Bertrandon de La Broquière: Recueil de voyages et de documents pour servir à l’ histoire de la géographie, XII (Paris: E. Leroux, 1892; reprinted Farnborough: Gregg, 1972). 54 Henri Beaune et J. d’Arbaumont (eds.), Mémoires d’Olivier de La Marche, maître d’ hôtel et capitaine des gardes de Charles le Téméraire, 4 vols. (Paris: La Société de l’Histoire de France, Librairie Renouard, 1883–88), II, at 368 (account: 340–81). 55 Léon de Laborde (Marquis), Les ducs de Bourgogne, Études sur les lettres, les arts et l’ industrie pendant le XVe siècle et plus particulièrement dans les Pays-Bas et le duché de Bourgogne, 3 vols. (Paris: Plon frères, 1849–1852), I, 234. Vaughan, Philip the Good, 270 and note 1. 56 Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 29. 57 Schefer (ed.), Le Voyage d’outremer de la Broquière, vol. XII, xvii.

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Scholars have speculated that Jan was sent to the Holy Land, and moreover, that he visited Italy (Fig. 1.43). If he accompanied Guyot of Burgundy, the ostensible purpose of the delegation’s trip was a holy pilgrimage. Traveling with Guyot’s retinue, Jan perhaps left the party on reconnoitering excursions to create topographical sketches of strategic harbors and terrain for the Duke. Such expeditions certainly could be termed “secret.” Geoffrey de Thoisy, former companion of Bertrandon de la Broquière made a second voyage for Philip the Good when he was appointed captain of the newly-formed ducal grande nave (1438) sent to Rhodes on March 25, 1441.58 His nave and three additional large galleons, probably supply ships, departed Sluis on May 8. They sailed across the Bay of Biscay to Lisbon, Ceuta and Barcelona, before docking at Villefranche near Nice. From that base, Thoisy continued onto Rhodes to fortify the Hospitallers against Egyptian attack.59 Traveling by sea was perilous, and even in 1441 Philip was sufficiently concerned about his nave to dispatch a caravel to the Bay of Biscay a few weeks after Thoisy sailed to inquire about his expedition.60 Guyot of Burgundy in 1425 likely took a conventional overland route followed since the Crusades by numerous Flemish pilgrims to Palestine. Riding on horseback via Vézelay to Lyons, he would have crossed the French Alps to Milan or Genoa, procured a vessel in Venice or Naples, and sailed to Jerusalem.61 Escorted by Franciscans to the most sacred sites of Christendom, his ducal embassy would have returned 58 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 270 and note 3. He cites Hubert Nelis, Catalogue des chartres du sceau de l’Audience, I (Brussels: G. Van Oest et cie,1915), 11; Le Glay et al. Inventaire sommaire des archives départementales du Nord, Série B, VIII, 17. 59 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 270 and note 3; Lille: Archives départementales du Nord, B1972, f. 92; Le Glay et al. Inventaire sommaire des archives départementales du Nord, Série B, VIII, 18. 60 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 270. 61 In the Musée d’Art et Archéolgie of Laon is a wing of an altarpiece commissioned in 1410 by Pierre de Wissant (ca. 1340–1420) for the Chapel of Mary Magdalene in the Cathedral of Laon. The reverse side of the panel is missing its paint along the left side, but it displays five apostles standing in a vaulted chamber: John the Evangelist, James the Minor, Bartholomew, Matthew, James the Major and Matthias. Below them is an arched gallery containing the figures of five prophets holding scrolls. The front side of the altarpiece panel contains the Annunciate Gabriel with a kneeling Canon Wissant being introduced by St. Mary Magdalene. The lost wing of the retable would have displayed the “Annunciate Virgin Mary” and the remaining six apostles and prophets on the reverse side. Considering the early date of 1410 assigned to this work, and the unusual representation of the prophets (close in aspect to the pair in the Ghent Altarpiece), it might be pondered if Jan van Eyck visited Laon on his 1425 pilgrimage on behalf of Philip the Good. The panels of Canon Pierre de Wissant have been attributed to Colart de Laon (active 1377–1411), based upon

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to Italy by way of Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete and Sicily. 62 Reaching the port city of Ostia, they logically toured Rome, before traveling northwards along established trade routes through commercial centers. Traversing the French Alps, they would have returned overland to Flanders ideally before the onset of winter. the master’s only secure work, a posthumous portrait of Louis d’Orlèans in the Convent of the Célestines. Some attempt has been made to link the artist of the Wissant Wing with the Master of Rohan (Grandes Heures de Rohan, Bibliothèque Nationale, Manuscrit Latin 94710). Commissioned by Yolande of Aragon, widow of Louis II of Anjou, the Rohan Hours has been redated to circa 1430, due to affinities in style with other works among them, St. René and a Portrait of Louis II d’Anjou, folio 51 of the Heures de René de Anjou (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Lat. 1156A); and three folios from a Book of Hours purportedly owned by Yolande of Aragon (Cambridge: Fitzwilliam Museum, MS. 62), that capture her likeness at the time of her second marriage in 1431 to François, the first Duc de Bretagne. The late dating of the Rohan Hours may preclude identification of the manuscript’s chief artist as Colart de Laon. Considering the Rohan Master was active in Paris as early as the English occupation of 1415, perhaps the primary master sprang from Colart de Laon’s atelier. See catalogue entries by Inès Villela-Petit, Paris 1400. Les Arts sous Charles VI, ed. Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye, with contributions by François Avril et al.(Paris: exhibition catalogue, Musée du Louvre, Éditions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, Fayard, 2004): Catalogue No. 202 “Volet du retable de Pierre de Wissant,” 322–23; idem, Catalogue No. 232, “Grandes Heures de Rohan,” 371–73; Millard Meiss et Marcel Thomas, Les Heures de Rohan (Paris: Draeger frères, 1973); Millard Meiss, French painting in the Time of Jean de Berry: The Limbourgs and their Contemporaries, 2 vols., with the assistance of Sharon Off Dunlap Smith and Elizabeth Home Beatson (London: New York: Thames and Hudson, 1974), 256–77, 272–74 (Wissant Wing), 352–53. For Colart de Laon, consult: Philippe Henwood, “Peintres det sculpteurs parisiens des années 1400: Colart de Laon et les statues de 1391,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXXIII, No. 6 (October, 1981): 95–102; Ulysse Robert, “Documents inédit sur Colart de Laon,” Nouvelles Archives de l’Art Français (1880–1881): 18–19. For the portraits of Louis I and Louis II of Anjou, see Jean-Bernard de Vaivre, “Représentations de Louis Ier d’Anjou et portraits de Louis II,” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (1984): 722–45. 62 Francis E. Peters, Jerusalem: The Holy City in the Eyes of Chroniclers, Visitors, Pilgrims and Prophets from the Days of Abraham to the Beginnings of Modern Times (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985); Joshua Prawer, The Latin kingdom of Jerusalem: European Colonialism in the Middle Ages (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1972); Louis Hughes Vincent, Jérusalem de l’Ancien Testament. Recherches d’archéologie et d’ histoire, 2 vols. (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1954–56); idem., Bethléem, le sanctuaire de la nativité (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1914); Louis Hughes Vincent and Félix Marie Abel, Jérusalem Recherches de topographie, d’archéologie et d’ histoire, 2 vols. (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1914), II, “Jérusalem Nouvelle”; Jonathan RileySmith, The Knights of St. John in Jerusalem and Cyprus, 1050–1310 (London-New York: Macmillan-St. Martin’s Press, 1967); Theodericus of Würtzburg, Libellus de locis sanctis [Description of the Holy Places], translated by Aubrey Stewart (London: 1896; 2nd ed., with new introduction and bibliography by Ronald G. Musto, New York: Italica Press, 1987).

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General scholarly consensus postulates that Jan van Eyck visited Italy prior to the painting of his Ghent Altarpiece of 1432 (Fig. 1.44).63 As evidence for a stay in Florence in 1426, Charles Sterling has pointed to Jan’s Zachariah and Micah, who witness the Annunciation below from arched recesses. He identifies Italian counterparts in the Adoration of the Magi Altarpiece by the Umbrian artist Gentile da Fabriano (1370/85–1427) (Fig. 1.45).64 Similarly shown with scrolls, Gentile’s prophets appear in the frame of the retable, beneath roundels of Archangel Gabriel and the Annunciate Virgin. Created in 1423 for the wealthy Florentine banker Palla Strozzi, the painting of the Epiphany illustrates a magnificent courtly cortege within which a knight’s accoutrements are highlighted, a sword and spurs. Strozzi belonged to the Order of the Golden Knights.65 He appears to have sought to record his chivalric membership when he commissioned Gentile’s painting for the sacristy–family pantheon of the Santa Trinità Church. Gentile’s processions between Jerusalem and Bethlehem are remarkably kindred to Jan’s “Adoration of the Lamb,” where legions of worshippers foregather from distant points to celebrate the adventus of a Messiah. Van Eyck may have met Gentile da Fabriano before January of 1427, the commencement date of his frescoes in the nave of San Giovanni in Laterano (Figs. 1.46–1.47). Gentile’s half-length biblical figures in grisaille are seated within aeduclae having stone ledges. Their scrolls unfurl beneath the socles. Derived from ancient Roman funerary reliefs, Gentile’s classical murals no longer survive, but they were copied by Francesco Borromini (1599–1664) before their destruction. Though the frescoes must be dated later than Jan’s “secret journey,” he might have seen preparatory drawings in Florence. Jan’s earliest

63 Millard Meiss, “’Highlands’ in the Lowlands, Jan van Eyck, the Master of Flémale and the Franco-Italian Tradition,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts, LVII, No. 6 ( May–June, 1961): 273–314; Lotte Brand Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 171, 205–6; Elisabeth Dhanens, The Ghent Altarpiece (London: Allen Lane, 1973), 103–12; Monika Cämmerer-George, “Eine Italienische Wurzel in der Rahmen-Idee Jan van Eycks,” Kunstgeschichtliche Studien für Kurt Bauch zum 70. Geburtstag von seinen Schülern, eds. Margrit Lisner and Rüdiger Becksmann (München, Berlin: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1967): 69–76; idem., Die Rahmungen der toskanischen Altarbilder im Trecento (Strasbourg: 1966); Kurt Bauch, “Bildness des Jan van Eyck,” Studien zur Kunstgeschichte (Berlin: 1967, originally published in 1961): 79–122, at 109ff. 64 Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 31. 65 Alison Cole, Art of the Italian Renaissance Courts (London: George Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd., 1995; 2nd ed. 1997), 21.

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portraits show sitters before stone parapets and with scrolls which echo Gentile’s illusionism. 66 Van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece panels of the Cumaean and Erythraean Sibyls do not seem to have a clear prototype in Flanders. Portrayed with scrolls, his paired oracles do resemble, however, the wise matrons in the fresco of Christian Wisdom in the Spirit of St. Thomas Aquinas in the Church of Santa Maria Novella (Figs. 1.49–1.50).67 Created between 1365 and 1377 by Andrea Bonaiuti (Andrea da Firenze) for the Dominican Cappelione degli Spagnoli, fourteen aristocratic maidens personifying the sacred and profane sciences sit within niches above a row of equally numbered men signifying diverse professions. One damsel is portrayed with a phylactery. The infusion of divine wisdom is a thematic refrain of the Ghent Altarpiece. Jan van Eyck’s Sibyls are shown above Jodocus Vijd, town mayor. Though he was not depicted with emblems signifying his municipal appointment, his upward gaze insinuates his guidance by the Holy Spirit. Equally, the centerpiece panel of the Adoration of the Lamb shows golden rays extending from the Pentecostal dove to the most learned men of earth’s history — pagan authors, biblical prophets, holy disciples, and exegetes of the apostolic Church. Bonaiuti’s Triumph of the Church in the same chapel reveals a paratactic disposition of ecclesiastical and secular figures. The realm of Ecclesia Triumphans is portrayed behind the community of the righteous on earth. Above the landscape of the heavenly Jerusalem is the Apocalyptic

Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 33. Noting Jan van Eyck was the only Flemish painter to sign and date his works, Sterling, 31, remarks that Gentile has left six signed works, and that Jan would have seen the signed Uffizi Adoration of the Magi and Quaratesi Polyptych. See Keith Christiansen, Gentile da Fabriano (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982); Andrea De Marchi, Gentile da Fabriano: un viaggio nella pittura italiana alla fine del gotico (Milan: Federico Motta, 1992); Charles Sterling, ”Un tableau inédit de Gentile da Fabriano,” Paragone CI (1958): 26ff. 67 For information about the Spanish Chapel in Santa Maria Novella see: Richard Offner and Klara Steinweg, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting (New York: College of Fine Arts, New York University, 1979), Section VI, Vol. VI: Andrea Bonaiuti; G.A. Schüssler, “Zum Thomasfresco des Andrea Bonaiuti in der Spanischen Kapelle am Kruezgang von Santa Maria Novella,” Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz XXIV (1980): 251–74; Alexander Perrig, “Painting and Sculpture in the Late Middle Ages,” The Art of the Italian Renaissance, ed. Rolf Toman (San Diego: Thunder Bay Press, 1995), also published as Die Kunst der Italienischen Renaissance (Cologne: Könemann Verlagsgesellschaft mbH: 1995), at 80–84 (36–97: entire essay). 66

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Christ enthroned over a sacrificial altar with the Lamb of God. The Ghent Altarpiece does not duplicate the compositions of Bonaiuti’s lunettes in the Spanish Chapel, but Jan may have been inspired by his riveting imagery. Like his “Sibyls,” Jan’s figures of “Adam and Eve” (Figs. 1.51–1.52) occupy niches in the Ghent Altarpiece, and Milliard Meiss has compared them with the paintings on the entrance columns of the Brancacci Chapel: Masolino’s (1383–ca. 1440) Temptation of Adam on the right; and Masaccio’s (1401–ca. 1428) Expulsion on the left.68 Constructed in the church of Santa Maria del Carmine by the Florentine silk merchant Pietro Brancacci, the chapel’s frescoes magnify St. Peter the Apostle as revealer of God’s plan of the Redemption.69 Masolino was employed by Felice, Pietro’s grandson, in 1424. Masaccio joined him a year later. If Jan van Eyck toured the Brancacci Chapel in 1426, he would have seen a work in progress and had the opportunity to meet Masaccio, but perhaps not Masolino, who had left Florence in the summer of 1425. Jan may have studied Masaccio’s Pisa Altarpiece completed in 1426 for Giuliano di Colino degli Scarsi da. S. Giusto (Fig. 1.53). If he did not see the work or its preliminary studies in Florence, he might have visited Pisa’s Church of the Carmine where the polyptych was installed in the patron’s family chapel. The centerpiece Madonna and Child presents a naturalistic infant sitting securely on his mother’s lap and gobbling grapes. Though Van Eyck resurrects Massacio’s image of a solid matron in his Rolin and Lucca Madonnas, a greater sense of decorum governs his representation of the infant Christ, who even is portrayed reading. Jan also seems to have admired Taddeo Gaddi’s 1337–38 trompe l’oeil in the Florentine church of Santa Croce (Figs. 1.54–1.56) as his still life recollects the fresco of a painted trefoil niche with a paten, pyx and flasks. Masaccio’s Calvary (Naples: Capodimonte Museum) which once was above his Madonna and Child, has been discussed by Charles Sterling with respect to similar Eyckian subjects (Figs. 1.57–1.59): a Calvary in Venice (Galleria Giorgio Franchetti alla Cá Milliard Meiss, “Jan van Eyck and the Italian Renaissance,” Venezia e l’Europa, Atti del XVIIIo Congresso Internazionale di Storia dell’Arte (1955) (Venice: 1956): 58–68. 69 Luciano Berti, Masaccio (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1967), Luciano Berti and Rossella Foggi, Masaccio : catalogo completo dei dipinti (Florence: Cantini, 1988); Umberto Baldini, Masaccio (Firenze : Edizioni d’arte Il Fiorino, 1990; idem, Masaccio (Milano : Electa, 2001); Umberto Baldini and Ornella Casazza, La Cappella Brancacci (Milan : Olivetti : Electa, 1990) and English edition, The Brancacci Chapel Frescoes (New York: Abrams Publishers, 1992); Paul Joannides, Masaccio and Masolino. A Complete Catalogue (London-New York: Phaidon Publishers and Abrams Publishers, 1993); Andrew Ladis, The Brancacci Chapel, Florence (New York : George Braziller, 1993). 68

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d’Oro) which has a provenance in Padua from the mid-fifteenth century; a Berlin-Dahlem Calvary, the Crucifixion of the Metropolitan Diptych; and illumination of Calvary ascribed to Hand H in the Turin-Milan Hours (Museo Civico).70 What most engaged Sterling’s attention was Masaccio’s portrayal of an anguished Mater Dolorosa almost completely enveloped by her heavy blue mantle like a Franco-Flemish pleurant, and Jan’s consistent depiction of an emotive Mary Magdalene, like the Pisa Magdalena with her back to the viewer and upraised arms. Though Masaccio’s Pisa Altarpiece has been related to the diverse Eyckian “Crucifixions,” an even closer parallel may be found in the Paduan Church of S. Antonio (Fig. 1.60). The Capella di S. Giacomo (Chapel of St. James the Elder) was built in 1372–76 by the Venetian architect and sculptor Andriolo de’Santi. Fourteenth-century Padua had been governed by condottierri of the powerful Carrara family and when S. Giacomo was built, it was ruled by the enlightened Francesco I Il Vecchio (1325: 1355–1388). During the concurrent expansionist wars against Venice in 1372–73 and 1378–81, Francesco I was advised by Bonifacio Lupi di Soragna. A courtier of high standing, he funded the building and decoration of the Capella di S. Giacomo.71 Adjoining the church of St. Anthony on the right transept, the chapel of St. James was decorated with frescoes between 1376 and 1379 by Altichiero da Zevio (c. 1330–after 1390), an artist from Verona72 (Figs.

Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 31, 80 note 83 (Masaccio’s Pisa Altarpiece) and 45–52 (Eyckian “Calvaries”). Regarding the “double versions” of the “Calvary” theme, they are believed to have been created in Jan van Eyck’s workshop after a lost prototype by the master. Probably by a copyist, rather than an artist in Jan’s atelier, the Crucifixion in Padua (Museo d’Art Medievale e Moderna) essentially replicates the Venice Crucifixion (Galleria Giorgio Franchetti alla Cá’d’Oro). See Till-Holger Borchert, “Introduction.Jan van Eyck’s Workshop,” The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert (London: Thames & Hudson, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges, 2002), 24–25; Catalogue No. 34 (Cá’ d’Oro Crucifixion, dated 1440–1450), 238; and Catalogue 85 (Padua Museo d’Art Medievale e Moderna Crucifixion; dated to 1460–1470). 71 Perrig, “Painting and Sculpture in the Late Middle Ages,” The Art of the Italian Renaissance, 93. 72 For Altichiero see Francesca Flores d’Arcais, Altichiero e Avanzo. La cappella di San Giacomo (Milan: Electa, 2001); Hanno-Walter Kruft. Altichiero und Avanzo (Bonn: 1966); M. Plant, “Portraits and Politics in Late Trecento Padua: Altichero’s Frescoes in the S. Felice Chapel, S. Antonio,” Art Bulletin LXIII (1981): 406–25. Perrig, “Painting and Sculpture in the Late Middle Ages,” The Art of the Italian Renaissance, 93–96. 70

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1.61–1.62). The Crucifixion (840 x 280 cm) painted largely in earth tones has been discussed as a precursor of panoramic pictures. Jan’s interest in sweeping panoramas and architectural illusionism may originate with this exceptional painting (Fig. 1.63).73 S. Giacomo’s interior has been compared with Venice’s Palazzo Ducale. At the bottom of the Crucifixion mural and running between genuine red columns of the chapel is an illusionistic balustrade, which functions to isolate the space of Golgotha. The false railing cleverly establishes the spectator’s point of view as the balcony of Pontius Pilate’s praetorium. Pilate’s judgment hall would have been analogous to Padua’s assembly hall in the Palazzo Raggione built in 1305, one of the largest of its kind in Western Europe. A real altar in front of the Crucifixion gives Altichiero’s fresco the veneer of a “triptych.” The altar is both a symbol of divine sacrifice and in the context of other sarcophagi in the chapel, an allusion to the Holy Sepulchre and Christ’s triumphant Resurrection.74 In projecting Van Eyck’s trip to Italy circa 1425–26, the inspiration he seems to have drawn from Altichiero’s frescoes is significant. Next to Francis of Assisi, Anthony of Padua was the second most important male saint of the Friars Minor. If Jan visited Anthony’s tomb, as appears to be the case, such a visit amplifies about the nature of the trip taken by Guyot of Burgundy and his fellow travelers on Philip the Good’s behalf. They were to make a pilgrimage to the primary shrines of the Franciscan Order in Italy and in Palestine. In the crusading spirit of his time, St. Francis of Assisi had twice attempted to convert the Saracens. In 1212 he was shipwrecked and when he tried again the subsequent year, he fell ill. Finally in 1219 his missionary goals were realized when he sailed east with a few friars and met with Malek al-Kamil in Damietta. Though he failed to convert the Sultan of 73 Albert Châtelet, Les Primitifs hollandais. La peinture dans les Pays-Bas du Nord au XVe siècle (Fribourg: Office du livre, 1980), 49; idem, Early Dutch painting: Painting in the Northern Netherlands in the Fifteenth Century, translated by Christopher Brown and Anthony Turner (New York: Rizzoli Publishers, 1981); Paul Durrieu, “Les Van Eyck et le Duc Jean de Berry,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXII, ser. 5, I (1920): 77–105, especially 100. 74 Charles Coüasnon, The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, translated from French by J.-P. B. and Claude Ross (London: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 1974). John Wilkinson, with Joyce Hill and W.F. Ryan, Jerusalem pilgrimage, 1099–1185 (London: Hakluyt Society, 1988); Braulio Manzano Martín, Iñigo de Loyola, peregrino en Jerusalén (1523–1524): según la “Autobiografía” del santo, los tratados de los franciscanos Medina y Aranda y las monografías de Fussly, Hagen, el marqués de Tarifa y de otros peregrinos españoles y europeos (Madrid: Encuentro Ediciones, 1995); Henri Victor

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Egypt in 1223, Francis returned from the Holy Land with a singular honor. He and his friars were the appointed custodians of Christ’s Sepulchre. The ancient citadel of Jerusalem is illustrated in the background landscape of the Eyckian replicas of Christ on the Way to Golgotha (Budapest: Musée des Beaux-Arts) and Calvary (Venice: Cà d’Oro). It also is visible in the Crucifixion of the Metropolitan Diptych. While Jan’s vistas appear to be more generic than specific, and even include architecture which seems more Flemish than Palestinian, the Holy Sepulchre, Mosque of Omar, and Tower of David are recognizable landmarks which are not found in Altichiero’s Crucifixion (Figs. 1.64–1.66).75 When in the Holy Land, Jan must have sketched several historical structures, the surrounding terrain, and undoubtedly exotic strollers which struck his fancy. Like most pilgrims touring Jerusalem, he would have realized immediately that the sites of the Passion mentioned in the bible were obscured by buildings erected in the wake of Constantine and Queen Helena. He and his companions were escorted by the Friars Minor who, since 1300, had been charged with the task of guiding visitors to the sanctuaries. When the Burgundian delegation departed Palestine, a sizable donation would have been given in the name of Philip the Good. In 1437 the Duke covered the expenses for the installation of stained glass window with his coat-of-arms in the Church of Our Lady of Mount Sion near Jerusalem.76 Several sites in Italy were associated with Francis il poverello. Michelant and Gaston Raynaud, Itinéraires à Jérusalem et descriptions de la Terre Sainte, rédigés en français aux XIe, XIIe [et] XIIIe siècles (Paris: Réimprimé de l’edition, 1882; rpt. Osnabrück: Zeller, 1966). 75 The Budapest Way to Calvary is generally attributed to the workshop of Jan van Eyck. See Henri L.M. Defoer, Vrijgevige herders of op sensatie beluste boeren? Een laatmiddeleeuwse beeldengroep uit de Noordelijke Nederlanden,” Antiek XIX (1985): 353–56; Zsuzsa Urbach, “Research Report on Examination of Underdrawings in Some Early Netherlandish and German Panels in the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts, Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VIII, 8–10 Septembre, 1989, ed. Hélène VerougstraeteMarcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1991): 77–93, at 83–86. For the New York Crucifixion, see Hans Belting and Dagmar Eichberger, Jan van Eyck als Erzähler: frühe Tafelbilder im Umkreis der New Yorker Doppeltafel (Worms: Werner’sche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1983); Dagmar Eichberger, Bildkonzeption und Weltdeutung im New Yorker Diptychon des Jan van Eyck (Wiesbaden: L. Reichert, 1987); Adam S. Labuda, “Jan van Eyck, Realist and Narrator: On the Structure and Artistic Sources of the New York Crucifixion,” Artibus et Historiae XIV, No. 27 (1993): 9–30. 76 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 117, discusses the Duke of Burgundy’s patronage of Eastern religious establishments, including the chapel on the purported site

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Besides Assisi, there was the Convento di Fonte Colombo southwest of Rieti in Latium. With a grotto where the saint fasted and beheld the infant Christ in a tree-trunk, an apparition not unlike that experienced by Philip the Good when fighting the Dauphinists at Mons-en-Vimeu (Abbeville) on August 31, 1421, a vision which led him to found the Franciscan Order of the Dry Tree.77 The nearby Convento di Greccio was at the summit of a cliff over two thousand feet in height, and St. Bonaventura (1221–1274), biographer of St. Francis, had dwelled in one of the monastery’s cells. Decorated with frescoes by Giotto, its “Chapel of the Crib” was famed for the first Nativity crèche made by Francis in 1223. Legend relates that when he offered Christmas Mass, the statue of Christ in the manger came alive. At Assisi, the Burgundians would have visited the basilica of San Francesco, which was believed to mark the crypt of St. Francis (Fig. 1.66). Jan would have seen Simone Martini’s fresco cycle of the “Life of St. Martin of Tours” and a host of other Late Gothic works which paid tribute to the memory of Francis.78 Other shrines visited by the Burgundians would have been Santa Chiara, which was raised between 1257 and 1265, with its reliquaries and tomb of St. Clare and the Duomo San Rufino, site of Francis and Clare’s baptism. On the fringe of Assisi, a little over a mile away was the Convento di San Damiano, where Francis was inspired by a “speaking” crucifix to found his Order and where Clare lived until her death in 1253. The basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli was situated three miles west of Assisi. Clare professed her vows in the small ninth-century chapel called Porziuncola. In its hospital for pilgrims, Francis died on October 3, 1226. To visit the place where Francis received the marks of the stigmata on September 14, 1224, Jan and his companions had to travel north to Arezzo as La Verna is situated nearly thirty miles from the town (Figs. 1.67–1.70). The most conclusive proof of the Pentecost which was built with Burgundian funding and decorated with stained glass and tapestries. He cites A. Couret, L’Ordre du Saint Sepulchre de Jérusalem depuis Ses Origines jusqu’a nos Jours (Paris: 1905). 77 Alphonse de Schout, “Confrère de Notre-Dame de l’Arbre Sec,” Annales de la Société d’Émulation de Bruges, 4e sèrie, 28 (1876–77): 141–87, at 142–44 (Origin of the Confraternity). 78 Adrian S. Hoch, Simone Martini’s St. Martin Chapel in the Lower Basilica of San Francesco, Assisi (Philadelphia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1983); Andrew Ladis, Franciscanism, the Papacy, and Art in the Age of Giotto (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998); Kenneth Baxter Wolf, The Poverty of Riches: St. Francis of Assisi Reconsidered (Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press, 2003); Albert Lecoy de La Marche, Saint Martin (Tours: A. Mame, 1881).

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of Jan’s pilgrimage can be found in his two versions of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata (Turin: Galleria Sabauda; Philadelphia Museum of Art). The striated rock formations of the chalky cliffs and vegetation comprising the “bed of St. Francis” divulge a first-hand acquaintance with the topography of La Verna. Jan’s devotional panels have been juxtaposed with a photograph of the site and reasonably compared with St. Francis in Ecstacy painted ca. 1475–80 by the Venetian Giovanni Bellini (New York: Frick Collection).79 A provenance with the Adornes family in Bruges has been suggested for Jan’s “Stigmatization” pictures based upon a will executed by Alselm Adornes (1424–1483) on February 10, 1470.80 According to this testament, two panels of sinte Fransoys by meester Jans handt van Heyck were bequeathed to Anselm’s daughters Margaret and Louise. The document further stipulates that each painting be given little shutters (duerkens) to close off the little paintings (tavereelkins) painted with “good likenesses” of Anselmo and his wife.81 This addendum suggests the Adornes works were of a small scale. The Philadelphia St. Francis (12.4 x 14.6 cm) on vellum and the Turin St. Francis on panel (29.2 x 33.4 cm) will be scrutinized further in this study, but both attest to Van Eyck’s certain knowledge of the Friars Minor sanctuary at La Verna.82 Jan’s suggested trip to Italy in 1425–26 would have exposed him to monumental imagery, but apparently he was not seduced by what he saw. Besides volumetric form, Van Eyck equally must have seen Italian innovations in the representation of space. However, his stay in Florence would have been all too brief to acquire a true mastery of Brunelleschian principles underlying Tuscan experiments in illusionism. Realistic detail predominates over la grande manière even in his larger paintings of the Madonnas for Chancellor Rolin (1434–35) and Canon van der Paele (1436– 37). Concurrently with these commissions for private chapels, he created Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 29–31. Alphonse de Poorter, “Testament van Anselmus Adornes, 10 febr. 1470 (n.st.),” Biekorf 37 (1931): 225–39. The document is in Brussels, Koninklijk Institut voor Kunstpatrimonium, B132567. 81 Noël Geirnaert, “Anselm Adornes and his Daughters, Owners of Two Paintings of Saint Francis by Jan van Eyck,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 163–68, at 163. 82 Catherine Reynolds, “The King of Painters,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 1–16, at 4–5. 79

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exquisite devotional panels which can best be described as miniatures. With respect to Italian chiaroscuro, Jan’s command of light and shadow was unsurpassed, reflecting his expertise in the oil medium and his inherent understanding of natural illumination. His oeuvre persistently reveals an abiding concern for accurate simulation of interior environments, landscape, and atmosphere. Jan van Eyck’s imitation of sculpture does evidence his interest in sotto in sú, the unusual effect rendered by linear perspective of causing the viewer to look up. His “Adam” of the Ghent Altarpiece stands with his foot protruding from the base of his niche, a peculiarity which may stem from his observation of Nanni di Banco’s all’antica Four Crowned Martyrs (1410– 13) who converse in a semicircle on the façade of Florence’s Or San Michele. In Venice Jan also would have seen the The Temptation of Adam and Eve by Filippo Calendario which adorns a corner of the Doge’s Palace. These carvings, in addition to Calendario’s Expulsion from Eden on the corner between the Molo and the Piazetta and his Drunkenness of Noah on the corner nearest the Ponte della Paglia, are recalled in the historiated capitals of Jan’s Madonna of Chancellor Rolin (Figs. 1.71–1.72). Similar to Altichiero da Zevio’s fresco of the Crucifixion in the basilica of S. Antonio in Padua, Jan’s panel of 1434–35 has a distinctive panoramic vista, and significantly, the mountain range depicted in the landscape perspective has been suggested to be the Alps. Jan’s stunning portrait of Philip the Good’s astute chancellor has been generally dated to the signing of the 1435 Treaty of Arras, as Rolin was a primary negotiator of the Flemish peace accord with France. Jan might have viewed the conflict between the Burgundians and Armagnac Dauphinists as similar to the discord which once existed between Padua and Venice. A second fresco by Altichiero in the Capella di S. Giacomo (Fig. 1.73) on the west wall above the choir stalls is even more iconographically complex than his Crucifixion. It presents an unprecedented analogy between Padua and Spain’s kingdom of Asturias, equating the Venetian Wars with the Christian Reconquest. Altichiero’s mural honors the chapel’s patron St. James, whose remains were discovered at Compostela in the early ninth century. The composition divides neatly into three sections like consecutive stage sets of a theatrical play. On the far left St. James appears in a dream to the slumbering Ramiro I, king of Asturias (842–850), urging him to fight the Moors. The middle ground as a “second act,” illustrates Ramiro I’s meeting with his counselors of the Cortes to obtain their approval for a military campaign. As the climax to the story, the landscape on the far right

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shows Ramiro I assembling his troops in expectation of a miracle at Clavijo, eight miles south of Logroño (La Rioja Province). James already has made a theophany, as he destroys the walls of the enemy castle in the distance. Legend relates that the Christians were victorious in 844 because James descended from heaven upon a white horse brandishing a sword and holding a white banner with a red cross. In the wake of Clavijo, the battle cry of the Reconquest was “Santiago Matamoros” (St. James the Moor slayer). The chivalric Order of Santiago de la Espada, with its distinctive red cross which resembled a sword blade, was founded in 846 as a brotherhood. In 1175 the rule of St. Augustine was adopted officially under Pope Alexander III (1159–1181). Uniquely incorporating married knights not just as confrères, but as full members, it had the two-fold goal of protecting pilgrims traveling to the shrine of Compostela and defending the boundaries of Christendom against Moorish invasions.83 Alexander Perrig has perceived that Altichiero’s representation of King Ramiro’s “throne room” is the “oldest surviving group portrait of a court.”84 Because the baldachin was adorned with the lily standard of Anjou, he suggests the bearded ruler can be identified as Louis I “the Great” of Hungary (1342–1382). Louis became deeply embroiled in the political affairs of Northern Italy and Naples, and in Padua’s conflicts with Venice, he lent his support to Francesco I in large measure due to Bonifacio Lupi. Perrig identifies four important figures in the throne room of the “King Ramiro”: Bonafacio Lupi on the left, whose helmet is inscribed with the word amor; Francesco I of Padua, who faces him on the right as the only figure in profile; the humanist poet Francesco Petrarch (1304–1374) of Arezzo, who sits full-front with a book, perhaps his Il Trionfi; and beside him, Lombardo della Seta, Paduan jurist and antiquarian who had advised Bonafacio in legal issues pertaining to the Cappela S. Giacomo.85 The Angevin Charles Robert (1301–1342) of Naples was the father of Louis of Hungary. After Charles had established the main seat of the Anjou kings at Visegrád, Louis rebuilt and enlarged the royal palace between Desmond Seward, The Monks of War. The Military Religious Orders Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, Ltd., 1995 rpt. of 1st ed.,1972), at 151–52. 84 Perrig, “Painting and Sculpture in the Late Middle Ages,” 93. 85 Ibid., 93–94. The presence of the poet and jurist, Perrig states (94): ”transforms this council of war (as it was in the legend) into a council of peace in the humanist spirit, debating diplomat ways of avoiding war rather than strategies of victory.” He also suggests that the two men might have played an important role in the “conception of the chapel’s decoration.” 83

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1350 and 1360 (Fig. 174). Visegrád was occupied until 1408, when King Sigismund of Luxembourg (1387–1437) transferred the court to Buda. In 1385 he had married Maria (1370–1395), daughter of Louis the Great. Unlike Buda, Louis’ late fourteenth-century palace still stands.86 With regard to Altichiero’s palatine architecture, it may have been designed to suggest Visegrád. But the triple-arched throne room and “bedchamber of honor” reached by a flight of steps, seems to reflect some familiarity with building projects of Ramiro I in Oviedo, specifically his palatine complex of Santa María de Naranco (Figs. 1.75–1.76). Rising two stories in height and built according to a rectangular plan, the piano nobile of Santa María de Naranco opens on either side with a triple-arcade which functions as a mirador in the classical tradition of scenic belvederes in villas described by Pliny in his Historia Naturalis. Within Ramiro’s former palace is a barrel-vaulted Great Hall, eleven by four meters, with lateral arcades. A double staircase on the north end provides access to the upper storey’s vestibule or aula regia, a reception chamber unique to Europe in the ninth century, but found at Charlemagne’s palace at Aachen (792–805). Just as Charlemagne’s Palatine Chapel was connected by a covered passageway to his palace, San Miguel de Liño (Fig. 177) originally was a tall, triple-aisled church dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and it stood in the shadow of Santa María de Naranco.87 What van Eyck might have taken from Altichiero fresco is its spatial arrangement which elicits the possibility of movement through the Júlia Kovalovszki, “The Age of the Anjou Kings (14th Century),” Historical Exhibition of the Hungarian National Museum. Guide 2. 11th to 17th Centuries, ed. Judit H. Kolba (Budapest: Magyar Nemzti Múzeum, Helikon Books, Ltd., 1996), 17–22, at 17. Also consult Stéphanie Méséguer, ed., L’Europe des Anjou. Aventure des Princes Angevins du XIIIe au XVe Siècle (Paris: Somogy éditions d’art, exhibition catalogue Abbaye royale de Fontevraud, 2001), especially the essay by Sándor Csernus with the participation of NoëlYves Tonnerre, “Charles-Robert (1308–1342) et Louis le Grand (1342–1382),” 155–67. 87 John F. Moffitt, The Arts in Spain (London: Thames and Hudson, 1999), 40–44 (Oviedo and Ramiro I as builder). For Asturian architecture also see John P. O’Neill, The Art of Medieval Spain, AD 500–1200 (New York: 1993); Pedro Palol and Max Hirmer, Early Medieval Art in Spain (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1967). For Aachen see Ludwig Falkenstein, Der Lateran der karolingischen Pfalz zu Aachen (Cologne: Böhlau, 1966); idem., Karl der Grosse und die Entstehung des Aachener Marienstiftes (Paderborn: Schöningh, 1981); Ernst Günther Grimme, Der Aachener Domschatz, with an introduction by Erich Stephany (Düsseldorf: L. Schwann, 1972; idem., Der Dom zu Aachen: Architektur und Ausstattung (Aachen: Einhard-Verlag, 1994); idem., Der Karlsschrein und der Marienschrein im Aachener Dom (Aachen: Einhard, 2002). 86

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composition. The theatrical tableaux of King Ramiro in S. Giacomo evoke the locus amoenus of a villa-palace: a “bedchamber of estate”; reception hall; and adjoining courtyard where men-of-arms would wait attentively for their lord. Jan’s devotional paintings reveal a kindred delight in playing with the flow of architectural space. Altichiero did not portray Ramiro I in the physical act of bringing the Madonna’s image to his reception hall as St. James commanded. However, he highlighted the ruler’s Marian devotion by the small icon of the “Virgin and Child” which is depicted among the appointments adorning the most private room of his palace. The arcaded throne room of Altichiero’s metaphorical portrait of Louis the Great contrasts with the intimate setting of a royal bedchamber. Louis is on public display, as are the councilors of his court, whose wise advice is sought to resolve the conflict between Padua and Venice. As noted by Alexander Perrig, the impression is more that of a “council of peace” than one of “war.” No group portrait by Jan van Eyck is known to have been painted showing the family of Chancellor Rolin or for that matter, Philip the Good in a formal audience before members of his court, though the Versailles Hunting Festival of Philip the Good (Figs. 1.78–1.82) has been discussed as a lost Eyckian replica revealing the influence of murals painted between 1400 and 1407 for the Castello del Buonconsiglio in Trent.88 The panoramic effect of landscape is limited only by the poles which separate the labors associated with the twelve months. The same intense realism of the flora and fauna in the Eagle Tower resurfaces in Jan’s Ghent Altarpiece. A visit to Italy in 1426 would have afforded Jan van Eyck the opportunity to travel to important pilgrimage centers of southern France, including not only Vézelay but also Autun, the hometown of Chancellor Nicolas Rolin. The cathedral of Autun which was reputed to have contained the relics of St. Lazarus had a magnificent roodscreen with stone statues which may have been created by some of the sculptors responsible for the Burgundian mausoleum at Dijon. St. John the Baptist from Autun’s lost jubé is not far removed from Jan’s Ghent image of the saint in grisaille.89 88 Otto Pächt, Van Eyck. Die Begründer al altniederländischen Malerei, ed. Maria Schmidt-Dengler (Munich: Prestel-Verlag. 1989), 115–16. See also Otto Pächt, Van Eyck: and the Founders of Early Netherlandish Painting, with a foreword by Arthur Rosenauer, ed Maria Schmidt-Dengler, translated by David Britt (London: Harvey Miller, 1994). 89 An even closer correspondence exists between the Ghent St. John the Evangelist and an alabaster statue of the apostle attributed to the workshop of Antoine le Moiturier in the Augustinian church of Saint-Jean at Bar-le-Régulier in the Côt-d’Or. Founded by

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As will be discussed, replicas after Jan van Eyck’s lost Fountain of Life display a similar interest in sculpture, demonstrated by a rood screen decorated with turrets of chanting angels and an intricately carved canopy over the hieratic Christ in Majesty. With their foreground figures of the Church and the Synagogue, the compositions also reveal some familiarity with Alichiero’s quasi-secular frescoes. As a footnote to the Altichiero’s “Petrarch,” the heavenly elect of the Ghent Altarpiece include ancient Roman poets and Hebrew philosophers. But also sacred warrior-princes crowned with laurel are represented, and they are identical to the contemporary royals portrayed in the structured “group portrait” of the Fons Vitae.90 For too long the replicas of the Fountain of Life have remained in the shadow of the Ghent polyptych. To understand Jan van Eyck the artist encompasses an analysis of his courtly position as ambassador extraordinaire. This study seeks to reveal that the premier painter of Bruges was patronized as assiduously by the Avis family of Portugal as Duke Philip the Good. The 1427 “Secret Voyage” To Aragon Following Jan van Eyck’s return to Bruges after his 1425–1426 “secret journey” and pilgrimage, he probably did not even have time to dip his brush in pigments before he was called upon to make another trip on his lord’s behalf. This second excursion, however, seems to have been marked by a profound change in status. The suggestion has been made that he traveled to Italy and Jerusalem in 1425 as a companion of Guyot of Burgundy and Jehan de Lannoy. Because Jan would have just entered the service of Philip the Good when he left Flanders, whatever reports communicated by the élite familiar about the artist following their trip must have been highly favorable. This, combined with the Duke’s pleasure over the sketches Jan would have done abroad, are factors which might clarify his meteoric rise in social standing. From being an accompanying member of a Burgundian retinue on pilgrimage, within a year he is appointed to the position of an

the counts of Nevers, the institution had been under the dominion of the bishop of Autun since 1336. 90 As noted by Perrig, “Painting and Sculpture in the Late Middle Ages,” 93: “In Padua, where the historian Titus Livius (59 BC–AD 17) was revered like a saint, a poet was crowned in the ancient Roman style, in 1315, the first time this had been done since antiquity.”

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ambassador sent to negotiate with the ruler of an important European kingdom which traded extensively with Italy. According to the Cour de Comptes of Lille, on October 27, 1426 Jan received a substantial amount of money as an advance, three times the amount of his annual salary. The document pertaining to this diplomatic excursion in 1427 states: Payment to Iohannes de Eick of 360 livres of 40 groats Flemish to the pound, in settlement of amount due to him for certain distant secret journeys made by order of the Duke.91 The purpose of the voyage was to negotiate a marriage contract between Philip the Good and Isabel (1409–1443), the eldest daughter of Jaime II, the Count of Urguell (Figs. 1.83–1.85). At the beginning of July 1427, Jan set sail for Catalonia in the company of Baudouin de Lannoy, Lord of Molenbaix, and Jehan de Lannoy, Lord of Roubaix. Dropping anchor at Barcelona on July 27, they were greeted with the news that Alfonso V, King of Aragon and Sicily (1394: r. 1416–1458) had transferred his court to Valencia to escape recent earthquakes. They joined the monarch in the second capital of the kingdom, spending the months of August and September with the court. During that time Jan van Eyck must have created a portrait of Isabel de Urguell and completed sketches of Valencia and its environs, as well as works of art which he found interesting. An Epiphany of the Altarpiece of the Virgin of Pobla Llarga is exemplary of the naïve Flemish realism which characterized the art of Aragon after 1430 (Fig. 1.86–1.88). Painted about 1430, the anonymous work may depict the terrain of Valencia and appears to illustrate Aragonese royalty. Attired in a mantle of cloth-of-gold, King Ferdinand I (1380: r. 1412–1416), kneels before the infant Christ. Beside him on the ground is his golden crown which rests on a red velvet balzo. The middle Magus might be identified as Juan II (1397–1479), Ferdinand’s son, who ascended the throne of Navarre in 1425. Wearing a green velvet silk houppelande with ochre scalloped collar, his gold-embroidered white undergarment is visible beneath long sleeves trimmed with brown marten fur. Juan II’s brother, Alfonso V (1394–1458), is portrayed with a crown resting on a balzo tinctured rust orange. Even

91 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), xxxiii (Document 9), Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, B 1935.

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more resplendent in his long azure houppelande lined with ermine pelts, he is the only Magus to display a pearl and ruby necklace.92 Valencia is situated close to the Mediterranean on the right bank of the Turia River and its port of El Grao is about two miles east of the city center. The Epiphany shows two palaces (Figs. 1.89–1.90). The royal house situated near the golden star of Bethlehem could be might be Romanesque palace of Estrella, the city selected in the twelfth century by the Kings of Navarre as their center. On the Ega River, Estrella was named by pilgrims traveling to Santiago. Legend relates that on May 25, 1085, shepherds were guided by falling stars to a statue of Our Lady of the Hill. The Epiphany palace on the right may be the administrative seat of the Aragonese Crown in Valencia which stood on the site of a Moorish alcázar. In 1238 Jaime I of Aragon ousted the powerful ruler Muhammad ibh Sâ’id, and his successors modified the Arabic palace (Figs. 1.91–1.92).93 For information about the Valencian altarpiece, consult: Fernando Benito Doménech and José Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos (Valencia: Museu de Bellas Artes, 2001), 176–79; C. Rodrigo Zarzosa, “En torno al Retablo de Puebla Larga,” Archivo de Arte Valenciano (1991): 31–34. Both Melchior and Baltazar are prominently depicted in the Epiphany, but Juan II did not become king of Aragon until the death of Alfonso V in Naples on June 27, 1458. Concerning the Neapolitan Portrait of Alfonso V which was painted in 1455, and measures 59 x 45 cm, see Everett Fahy, “Alfonso V de Aragón,” El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e Itinerarios de Obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el Siglo XV, ed. Mauro Natale (Madrid-Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and Museu de Bellas Arts de València, 2001), No. 90, 527–29. See also: Napoli e le rotte mediterranee della pittura da Alfonso il Magnanimo a Ferdinando il Cattolico, Naples exhibition catalogue (Bologna: 1977), 105–108, 112, 239. Indispensable material on the rule of Alfonso V is provided by Alan Frederick Charles Ryder, Alfonso the Magnanimous: King of Aragon, Naples, and Sicily, 1396–1458 (Oxford-New York: Clarendon Press-Oxford University Press, 1990); idem, The Kingdom of Naples under Alfonso the Magnanimous. The Making of a Modern State (Oxford-New York: Clarendon PressOxford University Press, 1976). 93 Ambrosio Huici Miranda, Historia musulmana de Valencia y su región. novedades y rectificaciones, 3 vols. (Valencia: Ayuntamiento de Valencia, 1969–70); idem., Las grandes batallas de la Reconquista durante las invasiones africanas (almoravides, almohades y benimerines) (Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1956); idem., Historia política del Imperio Almohade, 2 vols. (Tetuán: Editora Marroquí, 1956–57); Ambrosio Huici Miranda and María Desamparados Cabanes Pecourt, Documentos de Jaime I de Aragón, 5 vols. (Valencia: Anubar, 1976–1988); Pierre Guichard, Les musulmans de Valence et la Reconquête: XIe–XIIIe siècles, 2 vols. (Damas: Institut français de Damas, 1990–1991); Francisco Elías de Tejaday Spínola, El concepto del reino de Valencia en don Jaime I el Conquistador (Valencia: Círculo Cultural Aparisi y Guijarro, 1978); Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, The Spanish Kingdoms, 1250–1516, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon 92

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Jan van Eyck had brought with him a portrait of Philip the Good to Valencia, which was given to Alfonso V and taken by that monarch to Naples where it was copied by the Neapolitan artist Colantonio (active 1440–1460). Neither the original portrait nor its replica are extant.94 Jan likely carried a portfolio of drawings to Catalonia and Aragon, but the brevity of his excursion, a mere two months, would not have permitted an opportunity to paint. Jan’s visit to Catalonia and Aragon was all too cursory in 1427 for there to be any decisive imprint upon his art, other than an interest in local flora which seems to surface in the landscape of his Ghent Altarpiece. The Aragonese marriage negotiations in 1427 floundered, likely over the issue of dowry, and Philip the Good’s ambassadors departed Valencia on October 1, 1427. The embassy probably sailed directly from Valencia to Barcelona and then Genoa, returning overland to Flanders. At some point on their diplomatic mission they may have visited the Balearic island of Mallorca. The Burgundian diplomats arrived to Lille sometime before October 17, the date the magistrates of Tournai hosted a reception for the Lords of Molenbaix and Roubaix.95 On October 18, the feast day of St. Luke, Jan van

Press, 1976–1978). Between 1492 and 1498, however, the residence was rebuilt as a new and grander commercial exchange for Valencia’s silk merchants. La Lonja rose in a Flamboyant Gothic style on the edge of the Plaza del Mercado near the town market and its great hall still stands with its decorated portals, star-vaulted ceiling, twisted pillars supporting ogival arches and bays with window traceries. Little remains, therefore, of the palace in Valencia where Alfonso V would have welcomed the Burgundian diplomats. 94 Penny Howell Jolly, Jan van Eyck and St. Jerome: A Study of Eyckian Influences in Colantonio and Antonello da Messina (Philadelphia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1976), 83–86. Concerning Alfonso V as patron, also see: M.A. Skoglund, In Search of the Art Commissioned and Collected by Alfonso I of Naples, Notably Painting (Columbia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Missouri, 1989); Joanna Woods-Marsden, “Art and Political Identity in Fifteenth-Century Naples: Pisanello, Cristoforo di Geremia and King Alfonso’s Imperial Fantasies,” in Charles M. Rosenberg, ed., Art and Politics in Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Italy 1250–1500 (Notre Dame IN: University of Notre Dame Press 1990), 11–37. 95 Jacques Paviot, “La Vie de Jan van Eyck selon les documents écrits,” Revue des Archéologues et Historiens d’art de Louvain XXIII (1990): 83–93, at 86 and note 24, for Jan’s visit to Tournai in 1427 (Tournai Comptes d’entremise of 1427, wine given to Johannes peintre on the feast of St. Luke) and his return a year later on March 23, 1428. For information about the kingdom of Aragon and count-kings during the Middle Ages consult Thomas N. Bisson, The Medieval Crown of Aragon. A Short History (Oxford-New York: ClarendonOxford University Press, 1986); idem, Cultures of Power: Lordship, Status and Process in Twelfth-century (Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995).

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Eyck is documented as receiving vin d’ honneur, a ceremony which logically took place in the house belonging to the Guild of Painters. Upon the return of his emissaries, Philip the Good would have been fully informed about the meetings in Valencia. He also must have received news that Alfonso V’s sister, Leonor (1400?–1445), already had been pledged to Prince Duarte of Portugal. Named for her Portuguese mother, Leonor de Albuquerque (1374: m. 1393–1435), the daughter of Pedro I of Portugal, Princess Leonor wed Duarte at Coimbra in 1428. The Flemish ambassadors might have urged their Lord to consider the hand of Duarte’s sister, Isabel. Though the Infanta was thirty years of age, she was of eminent royal status, and considering the Burgundian-English alliance, her matrilineal bloodline was of the house of Lancaster. For a ruler contemplating a crusade to eradicate the memory of Nicopolis, a marriage to the daughter of the Avis King João I offered Lusitania’s ships and men-of-arms. Beyond that, the resources of the maritime Kingdom also included wool, which could be exported to the weaving centers of Flanders. Nearly a year would pass after their return from Aragon before Jan van Eyck and the same dignitaries would set sail for Lisbon. Their 1428–29 voyage brought a learned princess to Flanders, the daughter of Philippa of Lancaster, who was as well-versed in literature and the arts as her brothers. Jan van Eyck retained a high stature at court throughout his documented career and he appears to have enjoyed the patronage of both Burgundy and Portugal. Philip the Good’s esteem for the diplomat-painter is proven by his generous stipends, but particularly by a letter dated March 13, 1435 in the Lille Archives. The dispatch bearing the ducal monogram sharply rejects an exchequer’s plan to reduce the artist’s stipend as an economic measure. Tripling Jan’s salary to 360 livres parisis, the Duke additionally remarks that another painter could not be found “equally to his taste nor of such excellence in his art and science.”96

96 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, XXXVI–XXXVII, Document 24. Writing to officers of the Chamber of Accounts at Lille, Philip the Good verified the registration of “Jehan van Eyck’s” letters patent granting a life pension. The letter is in the Lille Archives of the Department of the North, Parchment B 1955. According to Weale, 18, the life pension marked an enormous increase in salary. In lieu of the annual 100 livres parisis paid in two installments, Jan received 360 livres of 40 groats Flemish currency.

2 The 1428–1429 “Secret Voyage” to Portugal A Mission on Behalf of the Duke of Burgundy

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an van Eyck arrived in Portugal on December 16, 1428 as a member of a diplomatic retinue charged with the mission of arranging a marriage between Philip the Good of Burgundy and Princess Isabel, daughter of King João I (1357–1433). At the time of his visit to the Avis court, Van Eyck had held the prestigious position of valet de chambre for three years.1 An official account of the embassy names the prestigious delegates sent on the Duke’s behalf. Heading the group was Jehan de Lannoy, Lord of Roubaix and Herzeele, councilor and first chamberlain, who had traveled a year earlier with Jan to Aragon. Another former traveling companion to Spain was Baudouin de Lannoy (b. 1386/7). Called “Le Beghe,” the Lord of Molenbaix (Molombaix) and Governor of Lille, held a distinguished place in the entourage. In 1433, shortly after his return to Flanders, he was appointed chamberlain by Philip the Good. Jan van Eyck’s portrait of Baudouin de Lannoy, dated about 1436–38, reveals his high status and affluence (Fig. 2.1–2.2).2 Around his neck is the distinctive collar of the 1 Amaury Louys de La Grange, Baron, “Itinéraire d’Isabelle de Portugal..., “Annales du Comité Flamand de France, LXII (1938), 13ff; J.G. Lemoyne, “Autour du voyage de Jean van Eyck au Portugal in 1428,” Cahiers de Bordeaux (1954), 17ff; César Pemán y Pemartin, Juan van Eyck y España (Cadiz: Museo Provincial de Bellas Artes de Cadiz, 1969); Charles Arthur John Armstrong, “La Politique matrimoniale des ducs de Bourgogne de la Maison de Valois,” Annales de Bourgogne XL (1968): 5–58; 89–139; Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art 33 (1976), 7–82, at 33–37. 2 Angelica Dülberg, Privatporträts: Geschichte und Ikonologie einer Gattung im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Mann, 1990), 218; Dieter Jansen, “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis –

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Order of the Golden Fleece founded by Philip the Good on January 10, 1430. His purple-brown heuque, worn over a wine-red long sleeved garment, is of silk velvet and is trimmed in the same brown fur as his tall hat.3 Though the fabric is woven in one height of pile, not the two-pile type known as velours sur velours, it is brocaded with gold thread to simulate vegetal motifs which shimmer as brightly as his collar.4 Andrieu de Toulongeon (André de Thoulongeen), Lord of Mornay, and Jan van Eyck enjoyed the same status and received the same travel stipend as Bardouin de Lannoy. The four diplomats were accompanied by “numerous gentlemen,” including chamberlains and councilors under Toulongeon’s aegis; Master Gille (Giles), a learned Doctor of Canon Law and provost of Harelbeke (Harlebek), charged with the supervision of a councilor (Constable); and Baudouin d’Oignies (Baoudouin d’Ongnies), squire and steward of expenses, who was assisted by a clerk. Identified members of the retinue also included: Master Jean Hibert, the Secretary; four attendants — der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 45–46; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Collège Érasme, VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: 1987): 29–40, at 31–32. 3 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 rpt. of 1953 edition, Harvard University ), I, 197, comments: “Baudouin de Lannoy and Jan van Eyck lived in Lille up to the end of 1429. Both were members of the missions to the Iberian peninsula, and Sir Baudouin wears a cloak made of twelve ells of purple gold brocade (drap d’or violet-cramoisy) which he had received as a present from Philip the Good in 1427.“ 4 Lisa Monnas, “Silk Textiles in the Paintings of Jan van Eyck,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 147–62, at 149. In comparing the ambassador’s velvet with that of Chancellor Rolin in the Louvre Madonna of Chancellor Rolin (1434), she notes: “The pattern worn by de Lannoy is smaller in scale that that of Nicolas Rolin’s velvet: the larger the pattern repeat, the more expensive the cloth…The textile worn by Nicolas Rolin has brown silk velvet pile woven in two heights. In the lower register of pile, there are small flecks of highlights which denote metal loops woven among the pile to look as though they have been scattered….This was a type of velvet known in Italy as allucciolato or lit up.” She also points out that the velours sur velours noir tissu d’or were velvets purchased by Philip the Good in 1432–33, which cost more than the standard velours sur velours brochié d’or because they probably “incorporated effects of bouclé gold wefts.” Also see Lisa Monnas, “’Tissues’ in England during the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries,” Bulletin du Centre Internationale de Textiles Anciens (1998), 63–80; Lisa Monnas and A. Vial, “Developments in Figured Velvet Weaving in Italy during the 14th Century,” Bulletin du Cieta (1986): 63–112.

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Jean de Baisse, Oudot Brain, Héctor Sacquepées; Pierre de Vaudrey, a “cupbearer”; and two lawyers, Renty and Portejoie.5 The Burgundian envoy left the Duke’s palace in Lille with a generous stipend for travel. Embarking on two Venetian galleys at Sluis, they departed from the port on October 19, 1428 and arrived the next day in England. They remained in Sandwich until November 13, awaiting the arrival from London of two additional Venetian ships. The embassy was compelled by adverse weather to dock at Camber and Plymouth, before docking at Falmouth on November 25. The vessels left on December 2, sailing through the Bay of Biscay and disembarking at Bayonne (Bayona) on December 11. Departing from the southern Galician port on the 14th, the fleet drew anchor two days later at Cascais, six leagues from Lisbon, where they arrived on December 18 (Fig. 2.3). The electric atmosphere of the Avis court is reflected in the chronicler’s account of the reception provided the Burgundian envoy by royal family and members of their household.6 The description given by the Flemish chronicler recounting the festive ceremonies and grand tours of 1428–1429 reads as follows: At that time the king of Portugal was in a town called Estremos (Fig. 2.4–2.8), three or four days’ journey from Lisbon, with his children, including my lady the infanta [Elizabeth]..., and a large gathering of lords, knights, squires, ladies, and people of all estates, at a celebration which was about to begin for the reception of Madam Leonor, infanta of Aragon, wife of my lord the infante Duarte, eldest son of the said king of Portugal. So the ambassadors immediately sent Flanders King-of-Arms to the king of Portugal with letters explaining their arrival and its cause... When the king of Portugal received the ambassadors’ letters, he wrote and invited them to come to see him and, as soon as they were able to provide themselves with horses, they set out towards him. But when they were only three or four leagues from the place where he was, he wrote asking them to delay their arrival till further notice, since he wanted to have his children, who had W.H. James Weale, Hubert and John van Eyck. Their Life and Work (London-New York: John Lane Company, LV–LXXII; Pemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 30. 6 All quotations of the account are from Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 178–84. See Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, CC 132, folios 157–166 and Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Ms. Portugais 20. 5

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recently departed, with him. So they waited at a place called Reols [Arraiolos] until 12 January [1429], when the king sent for them. On that day, the ambassadors left Reols and arrived at a town called Aviz [in the historical province of Alentejo], where the king was, being honourbly met by some princes of the royal house and other gentlemen and notables in number, who gave them a magnificent and joyous reception.7 The Burgundian retinue had observed Christmas at Arraiolos, a town just south of Évora (Figs. 2.9–2.10), and would have stayed in the fourteenth-century fortress, massive ruins of which still exist. After riding north, the diplomats reached Aviz’s “Castle of the “Knights of São Bento” (1214), which overlooked the junction of the Sêda and Avis Rivers (Figs. 2.11–2.13). The chronicler’s account relates: Next morning, 13 January, after mass, the king sent for the ambassadors, who presented him with letters from my lord of Burgundy and made the customary reverences and salutations. The king received them kindly and joyfully and agreed to hear their credentials after dinner that day; at which time the said ambassadors appeared before the king in his council chamber in the presence of Dom Pedro, Dom Henrique and Dom Fernando, his children, the count of Barcelos [Afonso, illegitimate son of João I and Ines Pires] and other notables. The main reason why my lord [the Duke] of Burgundy had sent them was then notably expounded, in Latin, through a doctor, his councilor, that he was well pleased with their arrival and that he would take advice on what they had said and expounded on behalf of my lord of Burgundy and would then reply. At this point, the ambassadors withdrew to their lodgings. On the same day, towards vespers, the king sent word to them that, since he was very busy and could not therefore easily attend to their business in person, he had asked my lord Duarte and his other sons to act for him in this matter. On the next day and the days following the affair was further discussed with them or some of them, and in conclusion, a document was drawn up in writing. At the same time, the ambassadors arranged for a valet de chambre

7

Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 179–80.

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of my lord of Burgundy named Jan van Eyck, who was an exquisite master of the art of painting, to paint my lady the infanta Elizabeth from life; and they also diligently informed themselves in various places through various people of the reputation, bearing, and health of that lady...8 On February 12, one painting of Princess Isabel was sent to Flanders by sea with Pierre de Vaudrey, squire and cup-bearer of the Duke, and a “pursuivant of arms” called Renty. A second portrait was taken overland in the care of Jehan de Baissy, squire, and Portjoie, another “pursuivant.” Each messenger from Lisbon carried summaries of the negotiations for the Portuguese marriage.9 Polemical Portraits of the Infanta In 1429 Jan van Eyck seems to have rejected the profile portrait to explore the three-quarter view. Not only did this approach revealed more of a face, but also tonal modulations enhanced three-dimensionality and provided a more realistic likeness. Though both his portraits sent from Avis to Flanders are lost, a seventeenth-century pen and ink drawing of Infanta Isabel on bluish paper (34 x 23 cm/13¼ x 9") was published by Louis Dimier about 1922 (Fig. 2.14).10 Sold in Paris from the London Parsons collection three years later, this drawing in the Eyckian manner was observed by Kurt Bauch Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 180. Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 180. For general information, consult: W. Devreker, “Isabella van Portugal,” Nationaal Biografisch Woordenboek (1977): 406–14; Camille Looten, “Isabelle de Portugal, Duchess de Bourgogne et Comtesse de Flandre,” Revue de Litterature Comparée 18 (1938): 5–22; Jane Friedman, “A New Look at the Imagery of Isabelle of Portugal,” Source: Notes in the History of Art 1, No. 4 (Summer 1982): 9–12.Luis ReisSantos, Obras-primas da pintura flamenga dos séculos XV e XVI em Portugal (Lisbon: 1953); idem., Masterpieces of Flemish Painting of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries in Portugal (Lisbon: 1962), 15–16; Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, “D. Isabel de Portugal, duqueza Borgonha: Notas documentos para a sua biographia e para a historia das relações entre Portugal e a côrte de Borgonha,” Archivo Historico Portuguêz 3 (1905): 81–106. 10 Louis Dimier, “Dessin du portrait d’Isabelle de Portugal par Van Eyck,” Bulletin de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France (1921): 116; idem, “Un portrait perdu de Jean van Eyck,” La Renaissance de l’art français et des industries de luxe V (Paris, 1922): 541–42, ill.). Also consult: Salomon Reinach, “Un Portrait d’Isabelle de Portugal,” Revue Archéologique 5, vol. XV (1922): 174. 8 9

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as late as 1960 in southern Germany.11 The drawing affirms Jan’s interest in a naturalistic setting, as he presents a shadowy window parapet that obscures the divisions between the imaginary and real worlds. The four sides of the outer frame of the portrait bear the inscription: Cest la pourtraiture qui fu envoiie a Philippe duc [top] de bourgoingne et de brabant de dame ysabel fille de Roy Jehan [right] de portugal et dalgarbe [Algarve], seigneur de cepta [Ceuta] par lui [bottom] conquise qui fu depuis femme et espeuse de desus dit duc Philippe. [left] At the top of the inner frame the sitter is further identified with the words:

LINFANTE DAME ISABIEL. Additional decoration includes paired squares

at the corners of the outer and inner frames of the Golden Fleece insignia, the flint and firestone. Bisecting both frames on all sides are emblematic initials, PY , which denote “Philippe et Ysabel,” and were emblazoned also on the wedding gown worn by the Princess in Flanders. Van Eyck portrayed Dona Isabel with a sense of self-assurance seated within a strongly lighted niche behind a stone windowsill. Suspended from her necklace of gold is a “baroque” pearl and gemstone pendant, which undoubtedly was selected to compliment her turban. Set jaunty on her head, it was constructed of a stiffened foundation of linen covered in gold silk or velvet. The large dome was covered with a reticulated network of raised gold mesh accented at intervals with hundreds of pearls and, a gold, pearl encrusted head band. The drawing of the Infanta Isabel has been compared with the Erythraean Sibyl in the Ghent Altarpiece (213.5 x 36.1 cm), who also displays a pearled turban inspired by Islamic design (Fig. 2.15).12 The Ghent oracle wears a voluminous velvet houppelande with short sleeves bordered by a wide mink collar and deep cuff bands of the same fur. Beneath her houppelande, she 11 Kurt Bauch, “Bildnisse des Jan van Eyck,” in Sitzungsberichte der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften. Jahresheft. 1961/62 (Heidelberg, 1963): 96–142 (especially 85–91 for the Portrait of Isabel of Portugal), reprinted in Studien zur Kunstgeschichte (Berlin: 1967): 79–122 (at 85–87, 89–91, Figs. 20 and 28, he discusses the Dimier Drawing, Tymotheos and the Ghent Altarpiece). Also consult Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” La Revue des Arts 33 (1976), 7–82, at 33–34. 12 Kurt Bauch, “Bildnisse des Jan van Eyck,” 90, Fig. 21. The Ghent Sibyl wearing red robes and an exotic white turban headdress was called the “Erythraean Sibyl” by Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, I, 240. However, a persuasive argument for re-identifying the figure as the “Cumaean Sibyl” was provided by Dagmar Eichberger, Bildkonzeption und Weltdeutung im New Yorker Diptychon des Jan van Eyck (Wiesbaden, 1987), 80–81. The same red-robed woman with a white turban

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wears a long-sleeved velvet robe décolleté trimmed across the square cut neckline with a delicate embroidered band that bears an inscription in old Gothic letters. The word METAPARO (metaphor) appears across the band of her royal blue velvet bodice. Wilhelm Stein, the first to identify the Ghent Sibyl with a pearl headdress as Isabel of Portugal, also related the inscription of her banderole to the birth of an heir to the dynastic House of Burgundy: REX ADVENIET PER SECULA FUTURUS SCILICET IN CARNE .13 The scroll provides a compelling allusion to the ducal scion as a Cristomimetes. The general consensus is that Jan van Eyck painted two identical likenesses of the Infanta which were dispatched to Duke Philip by sea and overland. The portrait transported by horseback would have had to been a miniature or a painting on linen. The second work transported on a Portuguese galleon might have been a panel, but more likely it was executed in the same medium. Challenging the authenticity of the inscription of the Dimier portrait drawing, Elisabeth Dhanens has proposed that Van Eyck instead painted at Avis a lost archetype of the Louvre portrait traditionally identified as Isabel of Portugal (Fig. 2.16).14 Housed since 1951 in Dijon (Musée de Beaux-Arts: 29.5 x 22.6 cm/11¾ x 9"), this painting provides a three-quarter view of the Princess, which accentuates the soft contours of a youthful face, delicately formed rosebud mouth and demure demeanor of the deep set, downcast eyes. She wears a gown tightly fitted across the deep bodice that terminates in a square Renaissance neckline which is ever so slightly arched across the bosom and displays a decisive familiarity with prevailing French fashion modes of the period. Completing the formal attire, Isabel’s outer red velvet gown with voluminous sleeves is bordered in brown marten fur. Princess Isabel’s tall dark brown henin is covered with a beautiful cut and voided brick-red silk velvet, brocaded in gold threads and accentuated the appears beside the mourning Virgin Mary in the Crucifixion panel of the New York Diptych. Eichberger identified her as the Cumaean Sibyl based upon her prophecies of Christ’s Passion and his Apocalyptic return to earth. As observed by Adam S. Labuda, “Jan van Eyck, Realist and Narrator: On the Structure and Artistic Sources of the New York Crucifixion,” Artibus et Historiae XIV, No. 27 (1993): 9–30, at 12, the representation of the Erythraean Sibyl near the Virgin at Calvary extends the theme of prophecy to the pendant panel of the Last Judgment. 13 Wilhelm Stein, “Die Bildnesse von Rogier van der Weyden,” in Jahrbuch der Preuszischen Kunstsammlungen XLVII (Berlin, 1926): 1–37. 14 Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 132–33.

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length of the center panel with a stuffed roll of matching fabric. Descending from the seam lines of the center panel is an ornate band of gold braid, encrusted with grey-blue pearls, rubies and hanging droplets that frames her ears and encircles the back of the neckline and head. The dome shaping her head is a complex design with the lines of seed pearls bisected at intervals by four pearls clustered around a ruby. These pearl clusters are evocative of the five shields on the Portuguese coat-of-arms. The heraldic shields signify the five Moorish kings vanquished in the Reconquest by King Afonso Henriques I (1094: r. 1139–1185), founder of the nation of Portugal. Based upon his legendary vision of the crucified Christ on the eve of his victory at Ourique (July 25, 1139) against the Muslim governor of Santarém, the bezants within each shield further symbolizes the five wounds of Calvary.15 Mounted atop the architectonic headdress that rises majestically off Isabel’s forehead is a cloth fall of matching patterned fabric piped in gold and edged in pearls, which drapes gracefully around her back, shoulders and arms. The single most striking accessory is the heavy gold plaque necklace that encircles Princess Isabel’s throat. Each plaque linked in sequence has been set with a domed pearl held fast in a bezel setting and further ornamented with pendants of the Burgundian fleur-de-lis. The pendants, in fact, replicate the shape of those found on the escutcheon of King João I, which are blue and located in the cross points of the outer red band (Fig. 2.17). Suspended from the center concentration of pearls in Isabel’s necklace is a longer golden pendant distinguished by a setting of three large pearls with golden tassels terminating in three smaller pearls. While there is definite correlation with the general line and silhouette in the feminine mode of French fashions during the first half of the fifteenth century, Isabel’s dress is basically 15 José Mattoso, Identificação de um País. Ensaio sobre as origens de Portugal (1096–1325), 2 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Estampa, 1985; 5th ed. 1995); idem., Nobreza Medieval Portuguesa. A Família e o Poder (Lisbon: Editorial Estampa, 1981); Antonio Brandaõ [1584–1637], Crónica de D. Afonso Henriques, with an introduction by Artur de Magalhães Basto (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1945); Mário Gonçalves Viana, D. Afonso Henriques (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1938); Mário Domingues, D. Afonso Henriques. Evocação histórica (Lisbon: R. Torres, 1970); Duarte Galvão [1446–1517] Chronica de el-rei D. Affonso Henriques, ed. Gabriel Pereira (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1906); Alfredo Pimenta, Ainda a batalha de Ourique (Lisbon: Edição do autor, 1945); Joaquim Verissimo Serrão, Ensaio histórico sobre o significado e valor da tomada da Santarém aos Mouros em 1147, no 8.o centenário, 1147–1947 (Santarém: 1947); Jean-Pierre Leguay, Antonio Henrique de Oliveira Marques, Maria Angela Beirante, Portugal das invasões germânicas à “reconquista” (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1993).

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reflective of the strong mudéjar influences that permeated the character of the fabrics, color, and selection of garments worn in the court of Portugal from the early years of the Renaissance and extended into the next century. The rapidly compounding sense of individuality and understated elegance that dominated the mode of dress on the Iberian Peninsula was destined to leave an indelible mark in the history of costume that would have a widespread influence on the direction of European dress for several centuries yet to come. Besides the Louvre panel portrait, there are two additional representations of the Infanta wearing an identical henin. One is a drawing dated 1560 in the Brabants Wapenboek (Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek Albert I, 285 x 240 mm), which carries an identifying inscription, “Isabella, fille du Roy Jehan de Portugal” (Fig. 2.18). 16 The other in Ghent (Museum voor Schone Kunsten, 22 x 29 cm) faces a likeness to the right of Philip the Good en buste (Fig. 2.19). Between the figures are their respective armorials of Portugal and Flanders. This work and two other double portraits in the same venue, Jean the Fearless and Margaret of Bavaria and Charles the Bold and Isabelle of Bourbon, are early sixteenth-century copies after a lost series of the “Valois Counts and Countesses.” 17 Princess Isabel of Portugal met Philip the Good’s retinue in a blue brocaded cloak opens at both sides. Her headdress of blue velvet was so extraordinary that the embassy took her for a knight.18 Her velvet headdress would have been a turban like the one in the Dimier drawing, and magnificently embellished with pearls. The envoys found the Infanta’s sense of style to be somewhat eccentric by Burgundian standards, but their misidentification of the daughter of King João I does reveal her proclivity

16 Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale, MS. III 878 C, folio 33, dated to the end of the sixteenth century and published by Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 132–33, ill. 85. 17 Ghent, Musée des Beaux-Arts, No. S–98. See Georges Hulin de Loo, “Le Portrait d’Isabelle de Portugal au Louvre,” in Bulletin de la Société d’histoire et d’archéologie de Gand XI (Ghent, 1903): 241–43. See Micheline Comblen-Sonkes, “Le Portrait d’Isabelle de Bourbon (?)”, Le Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, with the collaboration of Nicole Veronee-Verhaegen, No. 139 (Brussels: Centre national de Recherches “Primitifs flamands,” 1986): 1–20 and plates, at 12–17. Rather than Duchess Isabel, she identifies the Louvre-Dijon and Ghent portraits as Isabelle of Bourbon (1435–1455). Her attribution is based upon the gisant of Charles the Bold’s second wife in the Cathedral of Antwerp, not only her costume but also her penchant for heavy necklaces. 18 William Tyler, Dijon and the Valois Dukes of Burgundy (Norman: Oklahoma University Press, 1971), 68.

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for dramatic attire. Dona Isabel, who sustained a taste for opulent fabrics in the 1440s, may have ushered in a vogue for the henin. She liked low and open necklines, as proven by the Ghent Altarpiece Erythraean Sibyl and the Dimier drawing, and she continued to prefer such décolletage as she advanced in age. By 1457 the Duchess of Burgundy has distanced herself from her husband, retreating to her castle at La-Mote-au-Bois (Fig. 2.20) where she adopted the Clarissa habit. The courtly account of Aliénor de Poitiers documents the drastic alteration of Isabel’s appearance after her retirement from public affairs. Observing the Duchess had worn expensive silks with a long train in 1445 when she met Marie of Anjou (1404–1463: m. 1422), wife of King Charles VII (1403–1461), Aliénor remarks Isabel had abandoned trains and silks at the baptism of her granddaughter (Mary of Burgundy: 1457–1481).19 The Ghent panel of Philip the Good marks a departure from his usual black attire which he preferred after the 1419 assassination of his father, John the Fearless. The Duke of Burgundy’s robe in this double portrait is of gold and scarlet brocade and the neckline is bordered in marten fur. His attire is clearly celebratory, and certainly appropriate for the dual commemoration of a formal ducal marriage at Sluis (January 7, 1430) and the founding of his order of the Golden Fleece (January 10, 1430). The colors of that institution, red and gold, are suggested by his luxurious robes, and he displays the gold collar of the chivalric order around his neck. The July 1420 inventory of the Philip the Good’s wardrobe mentions a silk hat with flowers, gold spangles and peacock feathers decorated with rubies and pearls, each valued at 50,000 crowns. A ducal hat with an ostrich feather was admired by a visitor to the Coudenberg Palace of Brussels in the winter of 1465–66, who was sufficiently impressed to note its worth at 110,000 crowns.20 The headgear of the Duke in his Ghent portrait, however, is a basic black chaperon adorned with an agrafe in the form of a gold cross inset with pearls, a fastener which signifies his title as Lord of Burgundy. No other replicas exist showing Philip 19 Margaret Scott, The History of Dress Series. Late Gothic Europe 1400–1500 (London: Mills and Boon, Ltd., 1980), 163; idem., Medieval Clothing and Costumes: Displaying Wealth and Class in Medieval Times (New York: Rosen Publishing Group, 2004). See Aliénor de Poitiers, “Les Honneurs de la Cour,” in La Curne de Sainte-Palaye, Mémoires sur l’Ancienne Chevalerie, ed. M. Ch. Nodier, II (Paris: 1826): 171–267. 20 Malcolm Henry Ikin Letts (ed.), The Travels of Leo of Rozmital through Germany, Flanders, England, France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy, 1465–1467 (Cambridge: Publications of the Hakluyt Society, Second Series, CVIII, 1957), 28. The hat was evaluated at 60,000

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the Good in a red and gold houppelande, though he wore cloth of gold and in 1432–33 purchased a velvet known in Italy as allucciolato and velours sur velours noir tissu d’or in the North, a rich double pile velvet with small loops of gold woven in the lower register.21 Because several portraits of Isabel survive showing her in the same sumptuous henin, perhaps all descend from a lost prototype as suggested by Elisabeth Dhanens. On February 12 of 1429, however, Jan van Eyck may not have sent identical paintings from Avis to his illustrious patron. Rather, he might have forwarded two distinct portraits: one of the Infanta with a pearl-studded turban; and the other showing her with a henin.22 Both ornate headdresses would have been part of her dowry. The Louvre henin is distinguished by a lavish display of not only gold, but also numerous rubies and pearls. If King João I wanted to impress a suitor with the wealth of his nation, then certainly two different portraits of his daughter in costly raiment would have served the purpose. The Dimier drawing of Infanta Isabel may have been only a vague copy after Jan van Eyck’s original portrait, but it reveals his abiding interest in masonry. The compositional placement of the sitter within a shallow niche conforms with Jan’s portraits circa 1432 in the closed panels of the Ghent Altarpiece, and especially to his Tymotheos of Miletus. Isabel sits before an open parapet of the medieval Avis Castle and rests her hands upon the stone moulding. The niche behind her is mostly crowns and the ostrich feather attachment on the hat at 50,000 crowns. From Bohemia, the traveler Leo of Rozmital and his German companion Gabriel Tetzel were given a tour of the cabinets of gold, silver and jewels.They were informed by the Duke Philip’s keeper that it would take three days to view the treasures. See Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 151 and note 1. For the July 1420 Inventory, see Lille, Archives départamentales du Nord, Inventaire Sommaire des Archives Départamentales du Nord antérieures à 1790, Sèrie B, Chambre des Comptes de Lille, ed. Le Glay et al, Série B, 10 vols. (Lille: 1863–1906), VIII, 161–64. For reasons this inventory was taken in 1430–32, consult Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 334. Also review consult Jeffrey Chipps Smith, “The Practical Logistics of Art: Thoughts on the Commissioning, Displaying, and Storing of Art at the Burgundian Court,” In Detail. New Studies of Northern Renaissance Art in Honor of Walter S. Gibson, ed. Laurinda S. Dixon (Brussels: Brepols Publishers, 1998), 27–48, at 41–42. 21 Monnas, “Silk Textiles in the Paintings of Jan van Eyck,” 149. See also Kurt Zangger, Contribution à la terminologie des tissus en ancien français attestés dans les textes français, provençaux, italiens, espagnols, allemands et latins (Zurich: Arts Graphiques Schüler, 1945); Gaston Migeon, Les arts du tissu (troisième partie) (Paris: H. Laurens, 1909) reprinted and augmented in 2nd ed., 1929. 22 Weale, Hubert and Jan van Eyck. Their Life and Work, 177–78.

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in shadows, save for an odd spotlighting of the wall near her left shoulder. Could this area have been altered from the original? While the posing of the Infanta’s hands focuses attention upon bejeweled fingers, her right hand extends, not quite resting upon the left, but more braced. This same right hand might easily have held the roll stick of a banderole unfurling in the space of the spotlight. Among the Castilian courtiers within the inner circle of the Hapsburgs, Diego de Guevara († 1520) had served as chamberlain to Philip the Fair before entering the service of his sister, Margaret of Austria, governess of the Spanish Netherlands between 1507 and 1530. Guevara bequeathed Jan van Eyck’s Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife to Archduchess Margaret.23 Additionally, according to the 17 July 1516 inventory of her paintings at Mechelen (Malines Castle between Antwerp and Brussels), Guevara gave his patroness a portrait described as follows: A small panel with the face of a Portuguese which Madame was given by Don Diogo. Made by the hand of Johannes, and it is made without oil and on linen, without cover or thin veneer.24 This same work was described in an inventory taken at Malines between July 9, 1523 and April 17, 1524: Another panel of a young woman, dressed in the mode of Portugal, her robe of deep red trimmed with marten fur, holding in her right hand a banderole with a little St. Nicolas at the top, called the beautiful Portuguese.25 What precisely was the Portuguese “mode” if not the highly unusual headdresses, like the pearl-netted turban and the crested helmet of velvet 23 Jan Karl Steppe, “Mêcénat espanol et art flammand au XVIe siècle,” Splendeurs d’Espagne et les ville belges, I (Brussels: 1985), 247–82 at 254–55. Jozef Duverger, “De Werken van ‘Johannes’ in de Verzamelingen van Margareta van Oostenrijk,” Oud Holland XLV (1928): 210–20. 24 “Ung moien tableau de la face d’une Portugaloise que Madame a eu de Don Diogo. Fait de la main de Iohannes, et est fait sans huelle et sur toille, sans couverte ne feullet” (Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, Inventaire des Peintres, etc. de Marguerite d’Autriche dressé en 1516, B 3507). See André Joseph Ghislain Le Glay, Correspondance de l’empereur Maximilien Ier et de Marguerite d’Autriche ... de 1507 à 1519, 2 vols. (Paris: J. Renouard et cie, 1839), II, 468–89. 25 “Ung aultre tableau de une jeusne dame, accoustrée à la mode de Portugal, son habit rouge fouré de martre, tenant en sa main dextre ung rolet avec ung petit sainct Nicolas en

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which so fascinated the Burgundian embassy? These inventory descriptions provide some relevant information. First, the work in question was done on linen, a medium which would have been easily transported by horseback by the messengers dispatched to Flanders from Avis castle. Second, to judge by the extant portraits of Infanta Isabel, she ostensibly preferred fabrics of gold and crimson colors trimmed in fur. Third, Jan van Eyck depicted her as the Erythraean Sibyl holding a metaphorical scroll in the Ghent Altarpiece. If the Portuguese woman in the Malines portrait can be identified as the Infanta Isabel, what transparent meaning would Saint Nicholas have had for the Avis court and how was this fourth-century bishop relevant to the dynastic marriage being arranged? Regarding the lost painting from the Archducal Castle of Malines, one aspect of the story of Nicholas has some bearing upon the selection of the saint’s image for the scroll held by Infanta Isabel, namely, his rescue of three girls from prostitution by throwing three bags of gold as dowry into their window at night (Figs. 2.21–2.22).26 This tale which accounts for Nicholas’ emblematic “three balls,” and the traditional numerical association of three with the Holy Trinity, also may explain the tripartite pearl design of the heavy gold pendant attached to the necklace worn by the Princess in the Louvre-Dijon portrait. Isabel’s favorite gold-crimson robes are redolent of the Pentecostal colors. St. Nicholas was revered at the lofty shrine of Montserrat in Catalonia, a Benedictine citadel nestled within serrated mountaintops (Figs. 2.23–2.24). During August and September of 1427, when the Lords of Molenbaix and Roubaix attempted to negotiate a marriage contract at the court of Alfonso V of Aragon (r. 1416–1458), Jan van Eyck might have visited the famous pilgrimage site of Montserrat. The Catalonian sanctuary in the early fifteenth century already had achieved fame for its relics from hault, nommée La belle Portugaloise” (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, Collection Colbert: Inventaire des Peintures, etc. de Marguerite d’Autriche, dressé en son palais de Malines, le 9 Juillet, 1523). This reference was provided by Weale, Hubert and Jan van Eyck. Their Life and Work, 177–78, who also commented, “A copy of this portrait is said to be in the collection of M. Abbegg at Mannheim.” For the 1523–1524 inventory of the Coudenberg Palace in Brussels, consult Heinrich Zimerman and J. von Fiedler, “Urkunden und Regesten aus dem K. und K. Haus-, Hof-, und Staats-archiv in Wien,” in Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses 3 (Vienna, 1885), No. 2979: XCII–CXXIII. 26 Edward G. Clare, St. Nicholas. His legends and iconography (Florence: L.S. Olschki, 1985); L. Petzold, “Nikolaus von Myra (von Bari),” in Lexikon der christlichen ikonographie, eds. E. Kirshbaum and Wolfgang Braunfels, VIII (Rome-Freiburg-Basil-Vienna: 1976), cols. 45–58.

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the Holy Land, in particular, the Holy Sepulchre. Despite these sacred objects, the most cherished treasure which attracted numerous pilgrims from afar was a dark statue of the Virgin Mary (La Moreneta) housed in a Romanesque shrine. According to pious legend, the image had been carved by the Evangelist Luke and given by St. Peter to Eterius, the first bishop of Barcelona. When the Moors conquered the region in 717, the statue was sequestered in a cave where it remained until its location was revealed in the ninth century. Music and mystical light attracted three shepherds tending their flocks at sunset on the banks of the Llobregat River near Olesa. Returning to the site at the same time with a crowd of villagers, they witnessed the same phenomenon for four consecutive Saturdays. The final evening a beam shone on a particular crag, and the next day the statue was discovered.27 Portuguese Hospitallers sustained nearly as strong devotion to the Virgin of Montserrat as their Benedictine counterparts in Catalonia. Moreover, the coastal towns of both kingdoms held St. Nicholas in great esteem as a protector of sailors. Portrayed often with a ship or an anchor, and even in the act of calming a storm, the saint who was said to have attended the Council of Nicea (325) had special relevance for a seafaring nation whose founder, King Afonso Henriques I, had experienced a Constantinian vision (Fig. 2.26). Portugal’s identity as a Marian nation began with the ruler who united the regions from the northern center of Guimarães to the Alentejo, the land south of the Tagus known in antiquity as Trastagana. In the wake of each successful engagement with the Moors, Afonso Henriques I had erected churches and shrines to thank the Virgin Mary for her intercession. This practice was continued by King João I, who dedicated his Batalha Abbey to Our Lady of Victory after the battle of Aljubarrota (August 15, 1385). Fifteenth-century Portugal asserted devotion to the Immaculate Conception with great fervor, the feast of which had been observed in AngloSaxon monasteries since 1128 due to the influence of the Benedictine St. Anselm (1033–1109; cd 1720). Infanta Isabel’s mother, Queen Philippa of Lancaster (1360–1415), had introduced the Salisbury rites to the Avis court. As proven by Prince Duarte’s Book of Hours in Lisbon’s Torre do Tombo, the feast of St. Nicholas (December 6) was commemorated by the Royal Isabel Allardyce, Historic Shrines of Spain (Quebec-New York: Franciscan Missionary Press, 1912, 45–69 (“Our Lady of Montserrat at Barcelona”). 27

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House of Avis. It marked the vigil of the even more important holy day of the Immaculate Conception (December 8).28 Regarding the representation of St. Nicholas on the banderole held by la belle Portugaloise , the saint from Asia Minor has a certain relationship with the oriental Sibyls of the Ghent Altarpiece depicted above the subject of Gabriel’s salutation to the Virgin Mary. His December feast coincides with the beginning of the four week liturgical season of Advent which culminates in Christmas. Jan van Eyck’s visit to Portugal occurred just after the marriages of Infanta Isabel’s two oldest brothers Duarte and Pedro. Prince Duarte (31 October, 1391 at Viseu–1438) wed Leonor (1400?–1445), the sister of Alfonso V of Aragon in September of 1428. Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra and Lord of Montemor (9 December, 1392 at Lisbon–1449), had just returned from a lengthy trip to attend Duarte’s wedding festivities in Coimbra, and en route had arranged his own betrothal in Valencia to Isabel of Urguell (1409–1443). When Philip decided against Isabel of Urguell, her portrait was dispatched by King Alfonso V to Lisbon by the painter Lluis Dalmáu.29 The availability of the daughter of Jaime II must have been communicated to Pedro by correspondence, as in 1427 he was in the Balkans with Emperor Sigismund.30 The marriages between the houses of Portugal and Aragon have certain relevance for vernacular devotion not only to St. Vincent of Zaragoza, but also to St. Encratis. The cult of the Early Christian D. Guéranger, The Liturgical Year, translated by Dom Laurence Shepherd (Westminister, MD: Newman Press, 1949); Frederick George Holweck, Calendarium liturgicum festorum Dei et Dei Matris Mariae, collectum et memoriis historicis illustratum (Philadelphia: American Ecclesiastical Review, 1925). Like Nicholas, the English theologian Anselm shared the attribute of a ship, and he too was venerated as a patron of sailors and merchants. An even stronger connection between the two saints is worthy of comment. Prior to his appointment to the archbishopric of Canterbury (1093), Anselm had attended the Council of Bari (Apulia) to resolve issues raised by the Greeks concerning the Holy Spirit. There, that same year of 1087, some merchants had enshrined the reputed relics of St. Nicholas which they purloined from Myra in Lycia. 29 Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 32–33. See César Pemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 33–34, 56–62. 30 Eberhard Windecke, Eberhard Windeckes Denkwürdigkeiten zur Geschichte des Zeitalters Kaiser Sigmunds, ed. Dr. von Hagen (Leipzig: 2nd ed. 1899), 160–61; Docsachi Hurmuzachki (Baron), Documente privitóre la Historia Românilor, 3 vols. (Bucharest: 1895–97); Nicolae Iorga, “Un prince portugais croisé en Valachie au XVe siècle,” Revue Historique du Sud-est Européen III (1926): 8–13; idem., Histoire des Roumains et de la Romanité orientale, 10 vols. in 11 (Bucharest: 1937–1945): IV, 26–33; Mário Gonçalves Viana, As viagens terrestres dos Portuguêses (Oporto: 1945): 155–57; Frei Domingos Maurício Gomes dos Santos, “O 28

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virgin martyr had flourished in Aragon and southern France, where her feast day was celebrated as April 16. By the late fifteenth century she was identified as the Portuguese princess Engracia, who, en route to wed a prince of Roussillon, passed through Spain. According to her hagiography in the Peristephanon by Aurelius Prudentius, she and her fourteen attendants were tortured and killed in 304 by Dacianus, the Roman proconsul, for refusing to worship pagan gods.31 The best known representation of St. Engratia is a panel that once formed the central section of an altarpiece created about 1475 by Bartolomé Bermejo, an artist from Córdoba who worked in Aragonese centers between 1468 and 1484 (Fig. 2.27).32 Bermejo’s effigy of St. Engracia has all the hallmarks of a royal portrait because the virgin martyr is magnificently attired to reflect high status. Her dark blue cape is lined with green brocade, which also forms the collar, and it is bordered with gold embroidery and jewels. Engracia wears a rich surcoat of cloth of gold over a burgundy cotta. Her jacket of the same wine-red color is edged in ermine. Set against a wooden throne carved with flanking reclining lions and decorated with eight-pointed geometric Moorish designs, she holds a martyr’s palm and the spike which was driven into her skull. Her relics were discovered at Saragossa in 1389.33 Engracia’s flaxen hair is plaited in two braids on either side of Infante D. Pedro na Áustria-Hungria,” Brotéria LXVIII (January-June, 1959): 17–37. Francis M. Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1961), 40–45, cites several additional sources, and mentions, 40–41, that Sigismund issued an order from Often (Buda) to Prince Pedro in Cologne on October 18, 1426, forbidding any exchange with the “Lands of Duke Philippe of Burgundy as well as with Holland, Zeeland and other places illegally seized by the Duke.” Rogers, 322 note 14, cites Bruno Kuske (ed.), Quellen zur geschichte des Kölner handels und verkehrs im mittelalter, 4 vols. (Bonn, P. Hanstein, 1917–34), I (1923), 248. At that time Sigismund was attempting to wrest control of Holland, Zeeland and the Hainaut. See Franz von Löher, “Kaiser Sigmund und Herzog Philipp von Burgund,” Münchner Historisches Jahrbuch für 1866 (1866): 304– 419 and Bertalan Kéry, Kaiser Sigismund. Ikonographie (Vienna: A. Schroll, 1972). 31 Martín Carrillo (1561–1630), Historia del glorioso San Valero, obispo de la ciudad de Çaragoça, con los martyrs de San Vicente, Santa Engracia, San Lamberto y los inumerables martyrs naturales patrones y protectores de la Ciudad de Çaragoça (Zaragoza: 1615). 32 For information concerning Bartolomé Bermejo, also called Bartolomé de Cárdenas (ac. 1468–1495), consult: Judith Berg-Sobré, “S. Engracia Revisited,” Fenway Court (1980): 34–42; Judith Berg-Sobré and Lynette M. F. Bosch, The Artistic Splendor of the Spanish Kingdoms: The Art of Fifteenth-Century Spain (Boston: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, exhibition catalogue, 1996), 14–18; Ana Galilea Antón, “Bartolomé Bermejo y el retablo de Santa Engracia. Estado de la cuestión,” Urtekaria Anuario (1989): 15–31; Eric Young, Bartolomé Bermejo (London: Paul Elek, 1975): 17–21.

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her face. Bound under her chin, a transparent veil secures her headdress and covers her forehead. The similarity of her headdress with those of the Erythraean Sibyl in the Ghent Altarpiece and Infanta Isabel in the Dimier drawing suggests that the pearl-studded balzo was a specifically Portuguese type of headdress. Engracia’s has a centerpiece, a square-cut emerald set within a golden triangle. Capping the headdress is a crown, consisting of golden oak leaves with alternating cabochon ruby and emerald flanges topped by pearl finials. In another extant panel of the dispersed altarpiece, The Capture of St. Engracia, the virgin martyr is portrayed with a less ornate headdress, but riding a grey horse adorned with a livery of the same Avis green as her cape (Fig. 2.28). When creating his sacred “portraits,” Bermejo may have had access to the actual robes and headdress worn by Leonor of Aragon upon her marriage. Following the death in 1438 of King Duarte, his queen returned to Spain, where she died in 1445. Though Leonor’s remains were later transported from Toledo to Batalha Monastery, her household effects would have remained in Spain. The wedding dowry of the younger daughter of Ferdinand I is evoked by the pearls, square-cut emeralds and double ruby clusters of Engracia’s cape, her tall crown with finials fashioned like the fleur-de-lys arms of the Avis cross, necklace of interlocking gold rings that replicates the gold patterns of her pearl headdress, and ruby and gold betrothal rings. The Burgundian embassy of Philip the Good had arrived too late to attend the Coimbra wedding of Prince Duarte and Leonor of Aragon. However, they did attend royal celebrations of their marriage at Arraiolos Castle and witnessed the grand entry of Leonor on horseback into Lisbon in late May of 1429 after returning from a three-month sojourn to Spain (Figs. 2.29–2.30).

Judith Berg-Sobré and Lynette M. F. Bosch, The Artistic Splendor of the Spanish Kingdoms, 14, state St. Engracia’s skull with its nail hole was preserved in Zaragoza’s Benedictine convent of San Engracia, which was built on the site of an Early Christian oratory. 33

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Jan’s Grand Tour: Lisbon to Porto From February until May of 1429, the Burgundian delegation had embarked on a grand excursion of Portugal and Spain. The chronicler’s account of the embassy’s journey to Galicia, Castile and Andalusia is tantalizingly laconic, particularly when the topography of Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece reveals how much this voyage impressed him. The scribe merely states: While they were waiting to hear from my lord [the Duke] of Burgundy in reply [to the portrait and letters sent February 12], some of the ambassadors, that is to say the lord of Roubaix, Sir Baudouin de Lannoy and Andrieu de Toulongeon, together with the above mentioned Baudouin d’Oignies, Albert, bastard of Bavaria ... and other gentlemen and familiars, traveled to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, and thence went to see the duke of Arjona, the king of Castile, the king of Granada and several other lords, countries and places.34 The majority of present-day roads in Portugal and Spain lie on a network of commercial routes established by the Romans. Those trading routes of Lusitania, running essentially north and south near the Atlantic coast, can be traced with greater ease. Portuguese conviviality, so integral an aspect of the nation’s character, assure a premise that the Burgundian embassy was escorted to the most important centers of the realm. From Avis Castle, Jan van Eyck and his companions followed a fairly direct route to Santiago de Compostela. Prior to leaving the Alentejo region, they might have visited the walled citadel of Crato, the main headquarters of the Hospitaller Order of St. John the Baptist (Fig. 2.31). The Burgundians would have lodged at nearby Flor da Rosa, the spacious residence of the sixth Grand Prior of Crato whose monks followed the Benedictine rule. Leaving Crato the diplomats would have traveled northeast to Abrantes and stayed at the thirteenth-century fortress overlooking the town before proceeding to Tomar. From the citadel, which will be discussed later, the Portuguese escorts likely proceeded to Ourém (Figs. 2.32–2.33), where the Burgundian delegates would have been quartered in the large castle of Afonso, Count of Barcelos (1370–1461). The estate once belonged to King João I’s closest ally and advisor, Dom Nuno Álvares Pereira (1360–1431). Prior to professing the vows of a Carmelite, 34

Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 180.

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the venerable nobleman gave his titles and estates to his daughter’s husband Afonso, the monarch’s illegitimate eldest son. Their heir, also named Afonso (1402–1460) was given the title of Count of Ourém, and he rebuilt the old castle as his family seat. The next important town visited by the embassy was about thirty miles away, the royal estate of Leiria, which was frequented by the Avis family during the summer and throughout the winter hunting season (Figs. 2.34– 2.36).35 Perched on a hilltop overlooking the confluence of the Liz River and its tributary, the Rio Lena, the Castelo de Leiria had been a favorite “queen’s estate.” In early summer of 1388, shortly after her marriage, Queen Philippa was given her first tour of her castle by King João I, who also escorted her to nearby monuments. Presumably, the Burgundian delegation replicated the same circuit. As in the case of Philippa’s tour in 1388, the Burgundian diplomats would have been provided accommodations at Leiria Castle while they were escorted to João I’s Batalha Abbey and the Church of Santa Maria Vitória. Like most royal houses remodeled in the fifteenth century, the oldest sections of Leiria’s stronghold rest on the foundations of a castellum built by the Romans and modified by the Moors as a bastion for defense. Situated high above the town originally called “Collipo,” the castle had been taken by Dom Afonso Henriques in 1135 and the keep he erected became part of a chain of forts used to protect the southern border of Portugal. Despite the rebuilding of walls in 1190 by Sancho I, “o Povoador” (the townmaker), the lofty keep lay dormant until the fourteenth century when King Dinis (1279–1325) gave the pine-forested estate of Leiria on July 4, 1300 to his queen, St. Isabel (1271–1336).36 These sovereigns restored areas of the redoubts (masonry fort), but virtually nothing remains of their favorite 35 For information concerning the fortress-castles of Portugal, consult: Mário Jorge Barroca, “Castelos Románicos Portugueses (Séc. XII e XIII),” El Arte Románico en Galicia y Portugal. A Arte Románica em Portugal e Galiza (Madrid-Lisbon: Fundación Pedro de la Maza and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Alva Gráfica, S.L., 2001), 88–111 (English translation: 242–47); idem., “Do castelo da Reconquista ao castelo românico (Séc. IX a XII),” Portugalia, Nova Série, XI–XII (1990–91): 89–136; idem., “Castelos medievais portugueses. Origens e evolução (Séc. IX–XIV),” La Fortaleza Medieval. Realidad y Símbolo (Alicante: 1998): 13–30. 36 Antonio Brandão [1584–1637], Crónicas de d. Sancho I e d. Afonso II, with an introduction by Artur de Magalhães Basto (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1945); Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Chronica de el-rei D. Sancho I, ed. Gabriel Pereira (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 Rua dos Retrozeiros, 1906); Mário Domingues, D. Dinis e Santa Isabel: evocação histórica (Lisbon: R. Torres, 1967); Mario Gonçalves Viana, Rei D. Deniz (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1937).

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residence located in the town below.37 In 1388 Dom João I and Queen Philippa would have occupied their town house. When Leiria became an Episcopal city in 1545, the Crown’s property was demolished and in its place rose an Episcopal palace which still adjoins the Romanesque church of São Pedro (ca. 1176).38 Jan van Eyck and his companions may have been given accommodations in the town residence, but more likely they quartered in the higher castle that was renovated by the time of their visit. According to an old stone inscription, Dom Dinis had ordered the construction of a torre de menagem within the high battlements of Leiria on May 8, 1324.39 The tower was completed during the reign of King Fernando I (1345: r. 1367–1383) and his consort Leonor (m. 1371; d. 1386). When Fernando convened the Portuguese Côrtes at Leiria between 1372 and 1376, the torre de menagem became a repository for royal treasures. Although he has been credited with 37 Mário Jorge Barroca, “Castelos Románicos Portugueses (Séc. XII e XIII),” 106–9, informs that the keep built on a high mound was introduced into Portugal about 1160 by the Knights Templar, who sought to imitate the defense stratagems of Crusader castles in Latin states of the Levant. Nearly all were square or rectangular in plan, three-four stories in height with no windows at the ground level and surrounded by outer walls built as alambors, or sloped battlements. Though towers were common in rural forts as early as the tenth century, due to Almohad influence, turrets were assimilated in the Christian fortifications erected during the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Also consult Mário Jorge Barroca: “A Ordem do Templo e a arquitectura militar portuguesa do séc. XII,” Portugalia, Nova Série XVII–XVIII (1996– 97): 171–209; idem., “D. Dinis e a arquitectura militar portuguesa,” Revista da Faculdade de Letras – História, IIa Série XV (1998): 801–22; R. Durand, “Guerre et fortification de l’habitat au Portugal aux XII et XIII siècles,” Castrum III – Guerre, Fortification et Habitat dans le Monde Mediterranéen au Moyen Age (Madrid: 1988): 179–87. 38 Lucília Verdelho da Costa, Leiria (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1989), reproduces the Doação de Leiria à Rainha Isabel from Leiria Illustrada (July 5, 1906), 16, and mentions the Episcopal palace, 15. The celebrated Pinhal de Leiria established by King Dinis in 1290 consists of 2000 hectares of pine woods planted between Leiria and the ocean. Consult Domingos de Pinho Brandão, Epigrafia Romana Coliponense (Coimbra: Impressão de Coimbra, Lda., 1972); João Cabral, Anais do Município de Leiria, 2 vols. (Coimbra: : Impressão de Coimbra, Lda., 1975); Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Inventário Artístico de Portugal – Distrito de Leiria (Lisbon: 1955). 39 For the date of the tower see Lucília Verdelho da Costa, Leiria, 15, who refers to Frei António Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana, 8 vols. (Alcobaça: Impressa no insigne mosteiro de Alcobaça, 1597–1727, composed by Brother Bernardo de Brito [1569–1617]; rpt. Lisbon, 1980), IV. A revision of the Roman calender occurred in Portugal in September, 1422. Thirty-eight years and twenty-five days constituted the difference then between calender time and elapsed time. Therefore, Brandão’s date of 1362 for the beginning of the construction actually should be 1324.

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the spectacular palace crowning Leiria’s keep, that honor probably should be reserved for João I, whose brasão de armas appears on a northeastern wall of the town’s second royal residence. Besides this visual testament, there is the church of Nossa Senhora da Penha (Our Lady of Sorrow; Figs. 2.37– 2.38), which was founded about 1400 within the perimeter of the towering fortifications. Situated near the torre de menagem, the chapel which was built to serve the new residence is a roofless shell. What remains of its dark granite interior, however, closely approximates Gothic monuments erected during João I’s reign.40 Leiria castle hangs almost vertically above the town. Situated between two towers, the main part of the residence is a stone rectangle (33 x 21 meters/108 x 68´) which rises three levels (Fig. 2.39).41 An exterior staircase provides access to the vestibule of the upper floor and its primary hall. This expansive chamber (16 x 18 meters/52 x 68´) opens to a balcony with eight archs resting on double columns. The capitals of the terrace columns, like other pillars flanking the doors of interior galleries, are incised with vegetative designs in the Moorish manner. Their visual effect of the balcony’s archs is that of a leafy bower. From stone seats, the royal family could enjoy gentle breezes while gazing down upon the town and River Liz. The lower second level of Leiria Castle has an identical arrangement of rooms, including another great hall, perhaps used for dining. Servants occupied the ground level where the wine cellars, kitchen area and storage chambers were located. Within Leiria’s two side towers are three rooms, which constituted the separate apartments of João I and the Avis Infantes. The fourth floor of the towers held six additional six rooms, which might have functioned in 1429 as guest quarters for the Burgundian embassy. The eighteen rooms and two great halls which constitute Leiria Castle once were opulently adorned, certainly with linen canvases and tapestries. One José Barboso, Catalogo Chronologico, Historico, Genealogico, e Critico, das Rainhas de Portugal, e seus filhos, Ordenado por D. José Barbosa (Lisbon: 1777), I, 343. The south portal, apse and early sixteenth-century Manueline choir still survive, as does the bell tower. On April 29, 1411, King João I charged Gonçalo Lourenço de Gomide with the task of establishing Portugal’s first paper factory at Leiria. See Damião Peres, D. João I (Porto: Vertente, 2nd ed. 1983 of first publication in 1917), 170. 41 António Henrique R. de Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1971), 106, who describes the interior of Leiria castle. The main study of the castle is by Ernesto Korrodi, Estudos de Reconstrucção sobre o Castello de Leiria – Reconstituição graphica de um notável exemplo de construção civil e militar portuguesa (Zurich: Instituto Poligraphico, 1898). 40

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of the town’s oldest churches, São Francisco, was established soon after the arrival of Friars Minor in 1232.42 Frescoes have been discovered recently in the building, which have been deemed too difficult to restore with current technology. Evidence of murals in other historical locations provide visual evidence that a school of fresco painters was active in Portugal at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit. The drap peint technique of painting on linen in a manner analogous to fresco was practiced in Portugal too, and certainly occasional residences like Leiria had their share of linen hangings which were easily portable. What must have intrigued Jan van Eyck even more would have been the vivid tiles adorning the walls and floors of the castles he visited. The combination of Arabic and Gothic elements at the hilltop palace of Leiria suggests the probable intercession of King João I’s mudéjar architect, Juan Garcia de Toledo. Queen Philippa had taken an active interest in her husband’s latest building projects, though her tastes were shaped by an English aesthetic tradition. This is proven by a dispatch she sent to King Richard II following the 1388 tour of Batalha Abbey. In her letter she urged her cousin to send Henry Yevele or one of his best disciples to Portugal. Whether or not Richard acceded to her request remains unknown.43 In any case, the queen had been enthusiastic about renovating the “estates” under her patronage and attempted to provoke a transformation of Lisbon’s medieval strongholds into larger and more comfortable residences. Her premature death in 1415 unquestionably left their decoration uncompleted. During their stay at Leiria, the diplomats of Philip the Good would have been escorted to the Dominican Monastery of Batalha, which, as a primary building project of the Crown, will be discussed in a subsequent chapter. Yet another stately abbey was located about a day’s ride from the site of Leiria, the great Cistercian complex of Alcobaça, and logically the Burgundian ambassadors would have stayed at either the medieval residence of King Dinis or at the nearby Castle of Porto-do-Mós (Figs. 2.40–2.41). Alcobaça, the impressive headquarters of the order founded by the crusadermonks St. Bernard of Clairvaux, had been founded in 1153 by King Afonso Henriques I in fulfillment of a vow made when the Moors were defeated at The Franciscans arrived with a papal approval signed by Pope Gregory IX in 1232. Thomas William Edgar Roche, Philippa. Dona Filipa of Portugal (London and Chichester: Phillimore, 1971), 65. Master Afonso Domingues was succeeded in 1402 by David Huguet. In 1388 the sovereigns visited the battlefield of Aljubarrota, two miles south of Batalha. 42 43

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Santarém. Construction of the monastery began in 1178, but the church and dormitory were not started until 1223.44 One of Alcobaça’s two main cloisters was ordered by the medieval King Dinis (1261: r. 1279–1325) and completed by Domingo Domingues and Master Diogo between April 6, 1308 and September 11, 1311. Besides this Claustro do Silêncio (Figs. 2.42– 2.43), the refectory and sala capítulo (chapter house) also seem to date from the fourteenth century.45 According to Manuel Luis Real, the abbey’s layout, specifically the inverted position of the cloister and placement of the monastic quarters with regard to the church, is generally based upon Clairvaux III. He mentions, however, that the architect of the Gothic cloister was from Coimbra, and craftsmen from the town appear to have been active in the second phase of the church’s construction. Accordingly, their presence may account for the regional veneer which overlays the French plan, particularly the high aisles of the church and its surrounding battlements 46 (Figs. 2.44–2.45). In 1388 King João visited the Abbey with Dona Philippa, and pointed out the sepulchre of his father, Pedro I (1320: r. 1357–1367) in the Cistercian church (Figs. 2.46–2.48). Dom Pedro’s tomb monument, which faces that of his beloved assassinated queen, Inês de Castro (1320–1355), would have been studied by Jan van Eyck. The placement of their gisants,

Maur Cocheril, Routier des abbayes cisterciennes du Portugal (Paris: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Centro Cultural Português, 1978); idem Alcobaça: abadia cisterciense de Portugal, edited by Andrée Mansuy Diniz Silva with the collaboration of José Manuel Natividade Sanches Coelho (Lisbon: : Impressão Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1989); Artur Nobre de Gusmão, A Expansão da Arquitectura Borgonhesa e os Mosteiros de Cister em Portugal (Lisbon: 1956); idem, A Real Abadia de Alcobaca, estudo histórico-arqueológico (Lisbon: Editora Ulisseia, 1948; 2nd ed. Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 1992); José Mattoso, “Cluny, Crúzios e Cistercienses na formação de Portugal,” in Portugal Medieval. Novas Interpretações (Lisbon: 1985): 101–21. 45 Pedro Dias, “Domingos Domingues, Arquitecto Régio do século XIV,” Mundo da Arte 5 (Coimbra, 1982b); idem, “Domingos Domingues. Arquitecto Régio do Século XIV,” Arte Portuguesa. Notas de Investigação (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, Instituto de História da Arte. Faculdade de Letras, 1988), 9–24 (which also includes a discussion about the Convento de Santa Clara-a-Velha in Coimbra, the retreat of King Dinis’s queen, St. Isabel of Aragon); António Nogueira Gonçalves, “Epítome cronológico dos primeiros tempos de Alcobaça,” in Vergílio Correia, Obras, V, Estudos monográficos (Coimbra : Por ordem da Universidade, 1978): 228–233. See also António Nogueira Gonçalves, O gótico vila-realense do séc. XV (Coimbra: Coimbra Editora, 1941). 46 Manuel Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” El Arte Románico en Galicia y Portugal. A Arte Románica em Portugal e Galiza (Madrid-Lisbon: Fundación Pedro de la Maza and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Alva Gráfica, S.L., 2001), 30–48 (English translation: 229–33), 43. 44

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both flanked by three pairs of mourning angels, symbolically anticipates a glorious embrace by the ill-fated lovers at the Last Judgment.47 From Leiria, the Burgundian retinue would have departed to Coimbra, and they probably stopped at the Templar Castle at Pombal and the Castle of Montemor-o-Velho, a fortress holding under the aegis of Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra and Count of Montemor (Fig. 2.49). Coimbra on the Alcaçova Hill was founded by the Romans as the town of Aeminium, and its history is interwoven with that of the Reconquest (Fig. 2.50). Wrested from Moors in 878, only to be captured in the tenth century, the citadel above the Mondego River, was freed from Arabic rule in 1064 by Ferdinand the Great of Castile. In 1139 the nation’s founder, Afonso Henriques I, had shifted his capital from Guimarães to Coimbra. Established in 1131, Coimbra’s Augustinian church of the Mosteiro de Santa Cruz (Figs. 2.51– 2.52) was named for the cross of the Constantinian vision Afonso Henriques I experienced on the eve of his famous victory 1139 (July 25) at Ourique. His mother Dona Teresa had favored the founding of the institution, but persistent conflicts with her son suggest she was no St. Helen in his estimation and he initially resisted patronizing the new monastery. It took the combined efforts of João Peculiar, the bishop of Coimbra, and a favorite nobleman, Dom Telo, to persuade Afonso Henriques to donate lands of the Islamic baths in the environs of Coimbra for the building of Santa Cruz between 1137 and 1139.48 Under the auspices of St. Theotonius, the first prior, and Canon Pedro Salomão, a scriptorium was begun for the copying of manuscripts. This enterprise greatly contributed to the international status of Santa Cruz. Not surprisingly it was to this monastery which reconciled “Mozarabic tradition and the Gregorian reforming spirit” that the renowned bibliophile 47 Mário Domingues, Inês de Castro na vida de D. Pedro. Evocação histórica (Lisbon: Romano Torres, 1953. 48 Santa Cruz de Coimbra : A cultura portuguesa aberta à Europa na Idade Média (Santa Cruz de Coimbra: The Portuguese culture opened to Europe in the Middle Ages, exhibition catalogue (Porto: Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto, 2001); António Cruz, Santa Cruz de Coimbra na cultura portuguesa da Idade Média. (Porto: 1964). Eulogius Austin O’Malley (Brother), Tello and Theotonio, the Twelfth-Century Founders of the Monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1954). Timoteo dos Martires (Padre: † 1686), Crónica de Santa Cruz (Coimbra, Biblioteca Municipal, 1955); Sousa Viterbo, O mosteiro de Sancta Cruz de Coimbra (Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 1914, augmented 2nd ed). Santa Cruz de Coimbra, do século XI ao século XX: Estudos no IX Centenário do Nascimento de S. Teotónio, 1082–1982 (Coimbra: Gráfica de Coimbra, 1984).

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Dom Gomes Eannes retired.49 After twenty-two years of service at the Benedictine Monastery of La Badia in Florence, he returned to Portugal in 1441 to preside as abbot of Santa Cruz (Figs. 2.53–2.54).50 Gomes Eannes’s sepulchre in the Chapel of St. Andrew (1458) no longer survives, but the chancel of the Igreja Santa Cruz houses the sepulchre of Afonso Henriques I. Carved by the Burgundian sculptor Nicolau Chanterène the Renaissance wall sepulchre of Afonso Henriques I was installed in the chancel in 1520.51 Prior to that date, however, the remains of the warrior king and his son Sancho I probably were laid to rest in free-standing stone tombs (Fig. 2.55). Jan van Eyck and his Burgundian companions would have been escorted through the Augustinian complex in 1429 to see the famed scriptorium. Unquestionably they visited the kingdom’s first Royal Pantheon too, and in the funerary ante-church they would have seen a most important treasure of Santa Cruz, the stone reliquary of the “Five Franciscan Martyrs of Morocco” (cd. 1481: feast day January 16) (Figs. 2.56–2.57).52 In 1219, Francis of Assisi had sent Berard, Otho, Peter, Accursio and Aiuto to Coimbra, where they were warmly greeted by Queen Urraca,

49 Aires Augusto Nascimento and José Francisco Meirinhos (eds.), Catálogo dos códices da Livraria de mão do Mosteiro de Santa Cruz de Coimbra na Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto (Porto: Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto, 1997); Maria Adelaide Miranda, “Imagens do Sagrado na Iluminaria e Ourivesaria Románicas em Portugal,” El Arte Románico en Galicia y Portugal. A Arte Románica em Portugal e Galiza (Madrid-Lisbon: Fundación Pedro de la Maza and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Alva Gráfica, S.L., 2001), 184–213 (English translation: 264–71), at 186 and 264 (quote) but the entire essay provides information about the monastery and manuscripts; idem., A iluminura de Santa Cruz no tempo de Santo Antonio (Lisbon: Inapa,1996); António Cruz, Crónicas e memórias avulsas de Santa Cruz de Coimbra (Porto, 1968); idem., Santa Cruz de Coimbra na cultura portuguesa da Idade Média, Part I, “Observações sobre o “scriptorium” e os estudos claustrais”; D. Nicolau de S. Maria, Crónica da Ordem dos Conegos de S. Augustino (Lisbon: 1668), 2nd Part, Ch. 17, cited by Guido Battelli, “L’Abate Don Gomes Ferreira da Silva e o portoghesi a Firenze nella prima metà del quattrocento,” Relazioni storiche fra l’Italia e il Portogallo: Memorie e documenti (Rome, 1940), 149–163, at 162. 50 Eduardo A. B. Nunes, Dom Frey Gomez. Abade de Florença. 1420–1440, Volume I (Braga: Livraria Editora Pax, 1963). 51 Pedro Dias, Nicolau Chantèrene, escultor da Renascença (Lisbon: Publicações Ciência e Vida, 1987). 52 Jorge Rodrigues, “A Arte Religiosa no Románico Português e as suas Relações com a Galiza: Poder e Espiritualidade,” El Arte Románico en Galicia y Portugal. A Arte Románica em Portugal e Galiza (Madrid-Lisbon: Fundación Pedro de la Maza and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Alva Gráfica, S.L., 2001), 132–55 (English translation: 251–57), 149.

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the wife of Afonso II.53 Receiving support for their crusade to preach in the lands held by the Muslims, the monks began their mission with the Moors in Seville. Imprisoned and then expelled from the city, they sailed to Marrakech in Morocco. Berard, who knew Arabic, and his companions began to overtly condemn Muhammad. They were ordered beaten and put to death by Sultan Miramolim in 1220 54 (Fig. 2.58). The relics of the first martyrs of the Franciscan order were collected by the exiled brother of Afonso II, Dom Pedro Sanches, and sent to Coimbra.55 A manuscript dated 1476, entitled Passio Sanctorum Martirum. Quinque Fratrum Minorum, from the Monasteiro de Santa Cruz, recounts the history of the holy quintet and includes the Vita Sancti Theotonii, a brief hagiography of the life of St. Teotónius, one of the founders of the monastery and a canon regular of Regule Beati Augustini, to whose order the Monastery of Santa Cruz was entrusted. The Tratado da Vida e Martíro dos Cinco Mártires de Morrocos commissioned by Prior Jorge Barbosa about 1568 provides a translation of this Latin text in the Monastery of Santa Cruz. Though its prologue records miracles attributed to the saints between 1423 and 1530, the codice mentions a reliquary created at the request of Infanta Dona Sancha, sister of 53 In 1216 Friar Zacarias and Friar Gualter arrived in Portugal, sent by order of St. Francis of Assisi. Under the protection of Queen Urraca, they subsequently founded monasteries at Coimbra, Lisbon and Guimarães. Upon the request of Afonso II’s sister, Dona Sancha, Friar Zacarias established a monastery at Alenquer. By 1224 the Friars Minor had settled in Évora and in 1232 they expanded to Leiria. Due to some persecution by other established religious institutions in Porto, the disciples of St. Francis encountered difficulties in founding a chapter house in that city. In 1224 land was donated in a place called Redondela on the north side of the hill adjacent to Miragaia. However, only in 1245 was the monastery of Porto begun. 54 P. de Conival, «La mission franciscaine du Maroc,» in Henri Lemaître et Alexandre Masseron, Saint François d’Assise; son oeuvre, son influence, 1226–1926 (Paris, E. Droz, 1927); Antonio Gomes da Rocha Madail, “Os códices de Santa Cruz de Coimbra,” Boletim biográfico da Biblioteca da Universidade de Coimbra, 8–11 (Coimbra: 1927–1933); idem., “Inventário do Mosteiro de Santa Cruz de Coimbra à dada da sua extinção,” O Instituto (Coimbra: 1928); idem., Tratado da vida e martírio dos cinco mártires de Marrocos (Coimbra: : Impressão da Universidade, 1928); Mário Martins, S.J., “Peregrinações e libros de milagros na nossa Idade Média,” Brotéria 2 (Lisbon: 1957): 175–79; Aires Augusto do Nascimento and José Francisco Meirinhos (coordinators), Catálogo dos códices da Livraria de mão do Mosteiro de Santa Cruz de Coimbra na Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto (Porto: Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto, 1997). 55 Passio Sanctorum Martirum. Quinque Fratrum Minorum, Biblioteca Pública Municipal de Porto: Santa Cruz, 29.MS52, fifteenth century, 360 mm. In 1427 St. Daniel and six Italian Franciscan friars died at Ceuta in Morocco after refusing to accept Islam (feast day: October 10).

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King Afonso II.56 A rough stone chest dated to the fourteenth century from the Cistercian Monastery of Lorvão and now in the Museu Nacional de Machado was the repository for the sacred remains. Carved with minarets, the six archs of the chest contain the figures of Sultan Miramolim and the five Franciscans (Fig. 2.58).57 In 1220 Fernando Martins, better known as St. Anthony of Padua, attended the solemn entrance of the relics to Coimbra’s Santa Cruz as a canon regular of the order of St. Augustine. The experience inspired him to join the Friars Minor at Assisi.58 In 1429 the Burgundians would have visited the Cathedral of Coimbra, the Sé Velha (Figs. 2.59–2.60), a Romanesque structure built before the middle of the twelfth century under two architects. The first and most original master builder, Bernardo, is thought to have been French and his successor, Master Roberto, appears to have been or Norman origin. Among the artisans employed at the Sé Velha was a Spanish mason named Soeiro.59

56 Tratado da Vida e Martírio dos Cinco Mártires de Morrocos was written by João Álvares in Coimbra. The manuscript on paper, 175 x 125mm., is in the Biblioteca Central do Liceu José Falcão, Coimbra. 57 A. A. Gonçalves, Estatuaria lapidar (Coimbra, 1923); F.A. Gonçalves, “A representação artistica dos Mátires de Marrocos. Os mais antigos exemplos portuguêses,” Museu (Porto), 2a. série, 6 (December, 1963). The casket in Coimbra’s Museu Nacional de Machado is Inv. 578. 58 Vida de Santo António de Lisboa, MS. Thirteenth-fourteenth Century, Livraria de Alcobaça, 200 mm., 63 folios. See also Mário Gonçalves Viana, Santo António de Lisboa (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1938); Jacques Toussaert, Antonius von Padua, Versuch einer kritischen Biographie (Cologne: Verlag J.P. Bachem, 1967). Head abbot of the Benedictine La Badia Fiorentina since 1420, the Portuguese ecclesiastic Dom Gomes Eanes left Florence to preside over Coimbra’s Monastery of the the Holy Cross, a position he held until his death on April 20, 1459. Under his aegis the “Chapel of St. Andrew” was consecrated on December 10, 1458 to serve as the repository for a relic of the Apostle he had obtained in Florence as a gift from Pope Eugene IV. Abbot Gomes ordered a silver and richly tooled coffer for this relic, and at the same time commissioned a second silver container to replace the stone casket with the bones of the Franciscan martyrs. A fifteenth-century manuscript from Santa Cruz, Milagros feitos pelos Cinco Mártires de Morrocos (Biblioteca Pública Municipal de Porto: Santa Cruz, 38, MS770, 380 mm.) refers to the re-enshrinement of the relics of the “Five Martyrs” in another location within the monastery. That they were housed near the remains of King Afonso Henriques I is suggested by an accompanying annotation which praises the achievements of the heroic twelfth-century ruler who had expelled the Moors from Portugal. The contents of St. Andrew’s chapel, along with the remains of the “Five Martyrs” were looted by French soldiers during the Napoleonic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula. 59 Manuel Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” El Arte Románico en Galicia y Portugal. A Arte Románica em Portugal e Galiza (Madrid-Lisbon: Fundación Pedro de la Maza and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Alva Gráfica, S.L., 2001),

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The imposing structure at Coimbra has neither an ambulatory nor radiating chapels, and its stately square piers with arcades have been justifiably compared with Galicia’s Church of Santiago in Compostela. The portal, interior tribunes and acanthus carvings by Roberto and his four assistants testify to Coimbra’s synthesis of architectural style — French, Galician, Islamic—which came to characterize the Portuguese Romanesque. The Sé at Coimbra witnessed the coronation of Sancho I in 1185, and its austere cloister dates to 1218, although like the church, it bears hallmarks of Manueline renovations during the early sixteenth century. On the north aisle of the church (Fig. 2.61) is the tomb of Dona Vataça Lascaris (1268– 1338), the Italian daughter of Guillermo Pietro I, Byzantine Greek Count of Ventimiglia and Lord of Tenda. When the Aragonese St. Isabel of Portugal (1271–1336) married King Dinis of Portugal in 1288, Dona Vataça served as the queen’s lady-in-waiting. She additionally tutored Isabel’s only daughter Constance, and accompanied the princess to Castile when she wed King Ferdinand IV. 60 Coimbra’s Franciscan Convent of Poor Clares, called Santa Claraa-Velha, was rebuilt by the widowed St. Isabel as a retreat (Fig. 2.62).61 Following her death at Estremoz, the queen’s body was shrouded in the habit of the Clares, wrapped in three sheets of fine linen, coarser fabric and cotton, and placed in a cowhide covered wooden casket over which a purple cloth was attached. It was then borne in solemn procession to Coimbra’s

30–55 (English translation: 229–33), 231–32. Coimbra’s Soeiro possibly was the same Soeiro Anes, a master mason who worked at the Cathedral of Porto, where Islamic ornamentation may be observed in the pilasters and capitals. 60 Pierre David, A Sé Velha de Coimbra, das origens ao século XV (Porto: 1943); Antonio Nogueira Gonçalves, Novas hipóteses àcerca da arquitectura românica de Coimbra (Coimbra: Gráfica de Coimbra, 1938), idem., A Sé-velha conimbricense e as inconsistentes afirmações histórico-arqueológicas de m. Pierre David (Pôrto: Tip. Empreza Guedes, lda, 1942); António Garcia Ribeiro de Vasconcelos, A Sé Velha de Coimbra, 2 vols. (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1930–1935; rpt. Facsimile edition, Arquivo da Universidade de Coimbra, 1993); Pedro Dias, A arquitectura de Coimbra na transição do gótico para a Renascença, 1490–1540 (Coimbra: Edições Portuguesas de Arte e Turismo, 1982); idem., Coimbra, arte e história (Coimbra: Instituto de História da Arte, Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra : Distribuição Livraria Minerva, 1988, 2nd ed. amplified). Antonio Cardoso Borges de Figueiredo [1792–1878], Coimbra antiga e moderna (Coimbra : Almedina, 1996, facsimile edition). 61 Maria Martins, Fernando de Azevedo, Pedro Dias, Convento de santa clara-a-velha em Coimbra: tempo submerso (Amadora: Bertrand Editora, 1997).

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convent church (Fig. 2.63).62 Because of continued flooding from Mondego River, the nuns eventually were forced to abandon their property and St. Isabel’s casket was re-enshrined in Santa Clara-a-Nova (1649–1677). The old Gothic church which is under restoration, would have been visited by the Burgundian delegation. Though it was a cloistered convent, the complex of Santa Clara-a-Velha had served as the venue for the wedding of Prince Duarte (Figs. 2.64–2.65). Viewing the deposits of silt and ruins standing in water it may seem difficult to imagine the former beauty of Queen Isabel’s church, which originally had a high vaulted interior like Alcobaça. A description of Duarte’s lavish marriage ceremony in Coimbra, however, was provided by Prince Henrique in a dispatch to King João I. The document captures the appearance of Santa Clara-a-Velha circa September of 1428, and even more importantly, attests to the type of textiles which were in the Portuguese royal collections. As has been observed, no painting before the Ghent Altarpiece makes such a distinction between different kinds of silks, woolen fabrics and velvets.63 For an artist whose oeuvre was distinguished for its scope of magnificent textiles, the imported and indigenous carpets and ceremonial cloths of Lusitania would have commanded Van Eyck’s attention. Prince Henrique’s pride in the luxurious textiles of the realm is palpable as he writes about the Coimbra wedding of Prince Duarte and Leonor of Aragon. He states: And Tuesday evening it was decided that their marriage should take place on Wednesday, And the manner in which it was performed, with the blessing which you bestowed on the Prince my Lord, on this first evening, the decoration was in this manner: a large part of the cloister of Santa Clara, through which her ladyship the Princess had to pass, was adorned and carpeted with rugs, and at the door of the Church, which is within the nuns’ choir, was a rich length of scarlet brocade which covered the place where the blessings were to be given; and the bolts of cloths crossed the whole church just

62 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 271–72, 311 note 6, and António Garcia Ribeiro de Vasconcelos, Evolução do culto de Dona Isabel de Aragão…, I (Coimbra: 1894), 42–44; idem, Dona Isabel de Aragão: a Rainha Santa, with a preface and introduction by Manuel Augusto Rodrigues (Coimbra: Arquivo da Universidade de Coimbra-Castoliva Editora, 1993). 63 Monnas, “Silk Textiles in the Paintings of Jan van Eyck,” 147.

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as through a street; it went up a stairway to the choir where Queen Isabel lies, and this whole way was adorned and covered like this completely with carpets, and the choir was completely decorated with Arras tapestries, both the part inside the church as well as the part outside and completely covered with carpets all the way from the altar, and a length of velvety blue satin laid on top of the carpets ran through beneath the nuptial bed, and went up to the wall and was ten lengths wide; and the front and the canopy of the altar were of very sumptuous scarlet brocade, and the covering of the bed and the dorsal which was above was also of quite splendid scarlet brocade. The cushion on which they had to kneel was wholly of gold cloth without other needlework, and the altar was quite beautifully adorned of silver just like yours as well as the other one here, and the bishop performed the service with your mitre and crosier, so that thanks be to Heaven, everything was well arranged. And the Princess was in the chapter[house], and the Prince my Lord came from his lodgings on a horse, handsomely dressed, wearing a very rich embellished houppelande and an emerald as a brooch, and my brothers Prince Pedro and Prince Fernando walked on one side of him and I and my brother the Count walked on the other, on foot, and in like manner, many other nobles. And we proceeded in this way to the doors; and there the Prince dismounted and went on foot to the choir, and Prince Fernando and the Count were there with him, while Prince Pedro and I went for the Princess. And we brought her to where the vows were made; and my Lord the Prince came, and the chanter of Évora made a small bow and received them and performed the service. The Princess was splendidly dressed. Torches were carried by Fernando, Sancho, Duarte, Fernando de Castro, and the other illustrious young lords were there. And then the mass was prayed by the deacon and subdeacon and everything was done as pontifically as if it had been sung; and two hundred dobras were the offering. And by the end of the service, the Princess was so tired because of her houppelande, which was very heavy, and from the oppressive heat generated by all those good men who were there, and the torches which were so intense, that when we began to leave she fainted. And we dashed some water on her face and she awoke. And all the men left there, but the women stayed. The best man was the Count and

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the bridesmaid, the Countess. And Lady Guiomar carried the trains of the gowns. The Prince returned in the manner in which he came, and when night came, we went for the Princess in the monastery because she had eaten there, for it to appear that she had married from the house of Queen Isabel and thus was of Aragon; and everyone understood from the saintliness of the aforesaid Queen Isabel that this was done very well and honorably for her house. And the Princess rode and my brother Pedro and I held the reins at the neck of the horse, and we both were on foot, as were Prince Fernando and the Count and all the other nobles all the way to her house. And she rode on a dovegray horse with the golden ornaments that the Prince sent her which your Grace saw; and there were some sixty torches which squires carried; and in her train came, also on foot, the Countess and Isabel de Ataide and other ladies and maidens. And after she was left in the chamber, we danced and sang a little while in the palace, and the Prince came there and had his footstool and the cloth for the footstool. And the hall was completely decorated. And he was served wine and fruit by all of us; Prince Pedro brought the cloth, and I the sweets, and Prince Fernando the fruit, and the Count the wine; and after he drank, we said goodnight to him and withdrew to our own rooms. And as the final touch to the writing of this letter, I understand that some little while now her grace the Princess has been your daughter completely.64 The Burgundian embassy would have toured the convent-residence of St. Isabel of Portugal (Figs. 2.66–2.67), and resided during their stay in Coimbra at the royal house, later absorbed by the university founded by King Dinis in 1290, an institution that had vacillated in location until moved 64 Provas da História Genealógica da Casa Real Portuguesa, ed. António Caetano de Sousa, 2nd ed., 12 vols.(Coimbra: 1946–1954), vol. VI, Pt. II, 9–10. Passage from Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, and translation by S.S. Wyatt, 170–72, 301 note 38. Oliveira Marques also mentions, 90, a very large emerald which King Dinis wore around his neck which was passed from father to son in the royal family. Considering the association of green as the Avis heraldic color, perhaps the emerald agrafe worn by Prince Duarte and represented in the Eyckian replicas of the Fountain of Life, was refashioned from Dinis’s pendant. The medieval jewel may have been a wedding present from João I to his heir. Like Dinis, Prince Duarte married an Aragonese princess.

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from Lisbon in 1537 (Figs. 2.67–2.69). While largely remodeled during the eighteenth century, the old residence originally comprised some of the old galleries surrounding the Pátio das Escolas, and logically Manuel I’s Chapel of St. Michael begun in 1517 with its portal by Marco Pires († 1521) which rests on the site of an earlier Gothic church. The impact of Coimbra upon Jan van Eyck may not seem apparent at first glance. However, the Apostles in the Ghent Altarpiece who foregather to venerate the sacrificial “Lamb of God” are all cloaked in light brown robes, apparel resembling Franciscan habits. As missionaries and martyrs of the Early Christian Church, the twelve Apostles and St. Paul particularly evoke the crusading ideals of Francis of Assisi and the holy quintet he sent to Coimbra who died in Morocco. From Coimbra the Burgundian diplomats would have traveled on a direct route north to Aveiro rather than through the Bução Forest, which still contains innumerable species of flora. The shady paths with grottoes, cascades, and chapels of a via sacra are a delightful haven for present-day tourists, but in 1429 passing through several hundred acres of forest would have avoided by any rider, especially accompanied by carts laden with provisions. Until storms silted Aveiro’s harbor in 1575, the town was a prosperous center for salt production and a thriving port. The ambassadors perhaps lingered a few days in the town before pressing on to Porto, capital of the region between the Minho and Douro Rivers (Fig. 2.70–2.71), where the Phoenicians first and then the Romans, had established trading communities on either side of the Douro Estuary. These centers, Portus and Cale, combined to provide a kingdom’s name after Afonso Henriques I expelled the Moors. The Burgundians would have been greeted with the sounds of Portugal’s second largest city, the shouts of sailors along the waterfront and merchants debating the prices of goods (Fig. 2.72). At the docks of the Ribeira (Riverbank) they would have viewed uncountable galleons and smaller naus. Culturally speaking, there is much to see in Oporto, where a plentitude of monuments reflects the splendors of the later Renaissance and Baroque.65 However, little remains which predates the reign of King João I. Vestiges of the stone walls built by King Ferdinand I (r. 1367–1383) are on Penaventosa Hill, which because of its elevated position, had served as a military stronghold for the Romans and then the Visigoths and Arabs. Following the tenth-century Reconquest, a church was Manuel Monteiro, Igrejas medievas do Porto (Porto: Marques Abreu, 1954); M. A. Miranda, Igrejas medievais do Porto (Porto: 1954). 65

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attached to the remodeled Romanesque fortress, which subsequently was rebuilt in the second quarter of the twelfth century as Oporto’s Cathedral. The fortress surrounded by Fernardine walls was demolished for a bishop’s house. Presumably the royal residence still stood at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit and provided lodgings for the embassy.66 The delegates would have attended Mass in the Sé crowning Penaventosa Hill and seen the thirteenth-century stained glass rose window which survives today on its western façade (Figs. 2.73–75). The Cathedral also retains a beautiful fourteenth-century cloister entered from the south transept. Another monument of Porto which might have been toured by the delegation was the Church of São Francisco and its adjacent monastery (Figs. 2.76–2.77), a complex destroyed in 1832 for the building of Oporto’s Bolsa (commercial exchange). On February 14, 1387 King João I and Queen Philippa had exchanged their marriage vows in São Francisco. Reconstructed between 1383 and 1410, this edifice and its monastery concluded in 1425, was one of the first architectural projects sponsored by the Avis king, whose son Henrique was born in Porto on March 4, 1394, supposedly in the Casa do Infante on the waterfront. The external façade of the church is an austere contrast to its gilded Baroque interior. The walls and ceiling São Francisco were overlaid in the eighteenth century with opulent Baroque gilded woodwork, yet a solitary fresco of the fifteenth century survives (Figs. 2.78–2.79). The Madonna of the Rose, on the Gospel side near the entrance to the church, has been attributed to “Antonio Fiorentino,” a master whom Francisco de Holanda referred to as Master Jácome (Giacome), premier court artist of King João I. This master arrived to Lisbon from Florence in the company of Dom Gomes Eanes, when the Abbot of La Badia visited his homeland in 1424. Master Jácome Antonio came at the request of the King of Portugal, and was in service to the Crown until his death in 1439.67

66 Manuel Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” 231, informs that work was interrupted on the nave and resumed in the early 1180s, by which time the workers were from Coimbra. Heading the team as master mason was Soeiro Anes, who had received the patronage of Miguel Salomão, deceased bishop of Coimbra. To the hand of Anes is given the western portal and nave capitals. Luis Real states that very little remains from the first phase of contruction, but a chapel survives which opens to the south transept and its stonework betrays the intervention of a French mason from Limousin. 67 Battelli, “L’Abate Don Gomes Ferreira da Silva e o portoghesi a Firenze nella prima metà del quattrocento,” 151.

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The mural shows King João I and his deceased wife Queen Philippa venerating the Virgin and Child.68 Behind them are Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist, the witnesses of Christ’s earthly ministry and Apocalyptic return. The Baptist extends his hands to touch the king’s shoulders because he was João’s patron saint. Seated under a latticed alcove, the Virgin Mary holds a white rose, emblem of her purity as the red rose was a token of the English House of Lancaster. To the left of the Virgin and Child stands St. Bonaventure (1221–1274: cd 1482), minister-general of the Friars Minor in 1257, “Seraphic Doctor” of the University of Paris, and reformer of the Franciscan order. A fourth figure in the composition seems to have been destroyed when gilded molding was installed during the eighteenth century. The Oporto church was dedicated to Francis of Assisi, and therefore, the missing foreground saint would have been the poverello.69 If the later golden woodwork of São Francisco was a replacement for an early cycle of frescoes pertaining to the vita of Francis, then possibly the history of the five Friars Minor sent to Morocco also would have been portrayed.70 Their memory was revered by King João I, who, following his conquest of the North African port of Ceuta (August 14, 1415) hastily rebuilt the Moslem mosque as the Franciscan church of the “Virgin Mary of the Assumption.” Shortly before the Lusitanian expedition, Queen Philippa had died on July

Battelli, 151–52, suggests João I and Queen Philippa are portrayed. José de Figueiredo argues for Dom Duarte and Queen Leonor in his «Introduction» to an essay about «Pintura quinhentista em Portugal,» Boletim de Arte e Arqueologia 1 (Lisbon, 1921): 9–18. For additional information about the fresco, consult: Vergílio Correia, A pintura a fresco em Portugal nos séculos XV e XVI. Memória apresentada ao 1.o Congresso de historia de arte de Paris (Lisbon: Imprensa Libanio da Silva, 1921), 12–15; A. de Gusmão, “Os primitivos e a Renascença,” in J. Barreira, A arte portuguesa. As artes decorativas (Lisbon: Edições Excelsior, 1950), 14; Fernando de Pamplona, “A pintura no século XV,” in Aarão Lacerada, História de arte em Portugal, 3 vols. (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1942–53 [1947–56]), II (1948), 178. 69 Otília Almeida, «Breves Notas sobre a Attribução, A um Mestre Português, Dos Frescos do Claustro degli Aranci, Da Badia de Florença,» Boletim do Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga IV, 1 (1959): 33–42, at 34. 70 As mentioned, devotion to the five martyrs was particularly strong in Coimbra, where their stone sepulchre was housed in the Augustinian Monastery of the Holy Cross. Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 220, mentions that during a plague in 1423 Vicente Martins o Grangeeiro and his sons began the practice of making an annual pilgrimage from the monastery of São Francisco da Ponte to the Mosteiro de Santa Cruz. See Fortunato de Almeida, Historia de la Igreja em Portugal, 4 vols. (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1910–1926; rpt. Oporto, 1967), II (1910–12), 479. 68

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19 in the Convent of the Poor Clares at Odivelas.71 Posthumously depicted in the mural at Porto, Philippa wears the habit of a Franciscan tertiary. Perhaps because the missionary goals of Francis of Assisi had been inspired by the militant crusading ideals of the Cistercian Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), João I had directed by his testament of 1426 that his body be clothed in the robes of a Cistercian monk.72 When “Master Jácome-Antonio” executed his fresco in Oporto, João I would have been at least sixty-eight years old. His portrait, however, corresponds more precisely to the age he would have been when Ceuta was conquered.73 The exceptional artist praised by Francisco de Holanda as the outstanding master of the Avis court would have been engaged as a decorator in royal projects during his fourteen year period of artistic residency in Portugal. One of them, the Ducal Palace of Guimarães, assuredly was visited by the Burgundian embassy en route to Viana do Castelo on the Lima estuary near the border of Spain. Houses of Guimarães and Braga’s Monte Espinho The Ducal Palace of Guimarães stands apart from other royal palaces in Portugal, the architecture of which reveals a blending of Romanesque, Gothic and Mudéjar styles (Fig. 2.80). The residence of Afonso (1370–1461), the eighth Count of Barcelos, King João I’s son by Inês Pires and also the

71 A section of the wall on the Epistle side of São Francisco was decorated in the eighteenth century with a Baroque sculptural ensemble, «The Execution of the Five Franciscan Martyrs.» Of polychromed and gilded wood, this masterpiece by Felipe da Silva and António Gomes is situated across from The Madonna of the Rose fresco. 72 See Roche, Philippa, 95, who states that when João I’s health began to fail in the spring of 1433, doctors advised him to rest at Alcochate in Ribateja, where the air was better than Lisbon. The monarch preferred, however, to end his days at Acobaça Palace. He died on August 14, the eve of the feast of the Assumption and the anniversary of his greatest victory at Aljubarrota. The royal obesquies are described by Ruy de Pina, Chronica do Senhor Rey D. Duarte, Inéditos de Historia Portugueza, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1790), II, Ch. 1, 72. See also Damião Peres, João I , 195–97, who reproduces Pina’s account, “Da Morte del Rey Dom Iohão e como seu corpo foi deposit ado na Sé de Lisboa, e do pranto, e exequias, que se lhe fizeram.” King João I’s body temporarily was interred before the Altar of St. Vincent in the Capela-Mór of the Lisbon Sé (Cathedral). As dictated by the instructions in his 1426 will, his remains and those of Queen Philippa were transferred exactly a year later, August 14, 1434, to limestone tombs in the newly completed “Founder’s Chapel” at the western end of Batalha Abbey.

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first Duke of Bragança (1442), stands at the base of a sacro monte marking the birthplace of King Afonso Henrique I. Jan van Eyck and his companions would have ascended the grassy knoll and encountered the stone chapel of São Miguel do Castelo. Set amidst an olive grove, the chapel served in 1111 as the venue for Afonso Henrique’s baptism fourteen days after his birth.74 Seeing the old gravestones of knights aligned on the floor of São Miguel might have been a little chilling (Fig. 2.81), but the delegation would have had a splendid view of the estate from the turrets of the Romanesque ruins which still loom beside the chapel. Guimarães originally may have been a Celtic-Roman site, as suggested by the hill’s Latin name, latitio (hidden), and the settlement’s ancient name of Araduca, which combines ara (altar) and ducere (to command). The name of Villa Vimaranis, given by the town’s legendary mid tenth-century founder, Dona Mumadona Dias, translates from via mare , meaning “passage to the sea.” Guimarães rose as a stronghold in Northern Portugal because it was ideally located for commerce between the coastal Oporto and the agricultural towns of the Douro Valley.75 The town of Guimarães evolved around a monastery and convent inaugurated by Dona Mumadona Dias on January 26, 929, which were affiliated with the church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira.76 She ordered the building of a castle keep at the top of the sacra monte to protect the church on December 4, 930 (Figs. 2.82–2.84). The fortress stand on a foundation G. G. Coulton, Two Saints: Saint Bernard and Saint Francis (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1932). 74 Barroso da Fonte, A Igreja de S. Miguel do Castelo (Onde foi baptizado D. Afonso Henriques) (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga, 1992). 75 This discussion on Guimarães draws widely from texts by Barroso da Fonte: Paço dos Duques de Bragança (Lisbon: Instituto Português do Património Arquitectónico e Arqueoltgico, 1994); Aspectos menos conhecidos do Paço dos Duques de Bragança (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga), 1993 rpt. of 1st ed. 1992); O Castelo de Guimarães (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga, 1995 4th ed. of 1992 book). Also consult: António José Ferreira, Guimarães, apontamentos para a sua História (Lisbon: 1945); Boletim da Direcção-Geral dos Edifícios e Monumentos Nacionais (DGEMN), Paço dos Duques de Guimarães, 102 (Lisbon: 1959). For information about ancient Portugal, see: Gerhard N. Graf, ed. in collaboration with José Mattoso and Manuel L. Real, Portugal Roman, 2 vols. (Paris: Zodiaque, 1986–1987) and Jorge Alarcão, Portugal Romano (Lisbon: Editorial Verbo, 1983, 3rd. ed.). 76 Barroso da Fonte, Mumadona — a fundadora de Guimarães (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga, 1992); Afonso Henriques — Português de Guimarães (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga, 1992); Boletim da Direcção-Geral dos Edifícios Nacionais (DGEMN), Igreja de Nossa Senhora da Oliveira, Guimarães, 128 (Lisbon: 1981). 73

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of colossal stones and it has subterranean passages. Afonso Henriques I probably saw his first light within the inner keep while his parents, Count Henrique of Burgundy and Dona Teresa Tareja, were engaged in building a larger castle at the foot of the hill. The new palace of Afonso, Count of Barcelos, likely was constructed between 1422 and 1438 on the foundations of the Romanesque castle erected by Count Henrique (Figs. 2.85–2.86). The time of its building coincides with the visit of the Burgundian embassy in 1429. A document dated May 15, 1460 and the name of “Master Antom” was discovered by Alfredo Guimarães, who stated that the new palace was “undoubtedly due to a foreign master, possibly a Norman who lived among us.”77 Rogério de Azevedo, the architect who supervised its extensive restoration (1937–1959) following a long period of use as French and Portuguese military barracks (1807–1935), studied all extant accounts and made several important observations.78 He was the first to suggest the former house of Count Henrique was demolished to its foundations by the Duke of Barcelos. He additionally perceived that a similar transmutation in architectural style from Romanesque to Gothic occurred during the reign of King João I at the town church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira. The Colegiada, the convent church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira, which would have been toured by the Burgundian retinue in 1429, is situated on the eastern side of the main square of Guimarães, the Largo da Oliveira (Fig. 2.87–2.88). The church’s dedication to “Our Lady of the Olive Tree” derives from a legend concerning the Visigoth ruler Wamba, who had declined the title of king until the olive wood shaft of a spear he drove into the ground budded as a sign of divine favor. In front of the church is a fourteenthcentury canopy-shrine, the Padrão do Salado, which houses a cross. The unusual baldachin commemorates the naming of the square. Legend relates that about 1342 an olive tree died which had been transplanted to Nossa Senhora da Oliveira to provide oil for the temple lamps. A Norman merchant, Pedro Esteves, affixed a cross to the withered limbs of the tree and it miraculously sprang to life. In 1385 João I had set out from this shrine to meet the Castilian forces at Aljubarrota, and he vowed to restore the Romanesque church upon his 77 Alfredo Guimarães, Mobiliário Artístico Português: Elementos para a sua história (Oporto: Porto, M. Abreu, 1924; facsimile edition, Porto: Sòlivros de Portugal, 1989) and A Propósito do Paço dos Duques en Guimarães, Estudos Históricos, XIX (Guimarães: 1942). 78 Rogério de Azevedo, O Paço dos Duques de Guimarães. Preâmbulo à Memória do Projecto de Restauro (Oporto: 1942).

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return. His entire army sang the Salve Regina prior to battle. In the wake of victory, the Portuguese ruler made an ex-voto pilgrimage to Guimarães, where he approached the church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira on his knees.79 About 1387 Juan Garcia de Toledo, mudéjar court architect of King João I, was in northern Portugal, where he had been charged with the task of renovating the church of Nossa Senhora da Olivieria in Guimarães.80 In 1402 the edifice was consecrated. Soon after completing this commission, the architect traveled south to Sintra Palace, where he was employed by Queen Philippa to expand and renovate Sintra Palace. The estate of Sintra, which will be discussed in greater detail, has an architectural complexion far removed from the Ducal Palace of Guimarães. Azevedo attributed the design of the new great castle at Guimarães to the combined efforts of “Master Antom” and his overseer “Johane Steuez” (Figs. 2.89–2.90). In his analysis of the construction he astutely perceived the harmony of Gothic elements which was both Portuguese in character and derivative of monumental French houses of the Loire Valley.81 These “foreign” formal elements should be considered in light of the arrival of Master Jácome-Antonio to Portugal circa 1424 and his tenure as court artist of King João I until 1439. This talented artist who arrived with Abbot Gomes Eanes from Florence perhaps was Jacques Coene of Bruges, a manuscript illuminator, architect-engineer and specialist in the peint-drape technique.82 The Book of Numbers 17:1–11 describes the sacerdotal elevation of the Tribe of Levi by Aaron’s flowering rod that produced almonds. An adaptation of the story appears in the Apocryphal Protoevangelium of St. James, which describes the selection of St. Joseph among the Virgin Mary’s suitor’s by the mystical sprouting of lilies from his staff laid in the tabernacle. For information about Marian advocations, consult: Mário Martins, S.J., Peregrinações e livros de milagres na nossa Idade Média (Lisbon: Brotéria, 1957, 2nd ed.); Alberto Pimentel, História do culto de Nossa Senhora em Portugal (Lisbon: Livraria Editora Guimarães Libanio, 1899). 80 Vitor Serrão, Sintra (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1989), 30. 81 In 1942 Rogério de Azevedo had a heated debate with Alfredo Pimenta, who refuted the role of “Master Antom” and argued the builder was Portuguese. Pimenta also denied the uniqueness of the “Northern” architectural style. Barroso da Fonte in his summary of the Azevedo-Pimenta polemic, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994: 59–63), discounted Pimenta’s criticisms. See Alfredo Pimenta, A propósito do Paço dos Duques em Guimarães, Estudiós Históricos, XIX (Guimarães: 1942). 82 Information about Jacques Coene is provided by Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry, The Boucicaut Master (London: Phaidon Press, 1968), 60–62. As Meiss observes (French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry, The Boucicaut Master, 15), the Boucicaut Master was a “great pioneer” in aerial perspective, and his folios with “distant forms blurred by atmospheric haze,” like those of Giovannino, display burnished gold and silver, 79

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On July 28, 1398 Jacques Coene was in Paris, when he is documented by Jean Aucher (Johannes Alcherius) as having dictated to him an account of pigments, “de coloribus ad pingendum.” Coene’s myriad formulae published in Aucher’s De Coloribus Diversus in 1411 primarily concern illumination. However, additional instructions are included for adapting the recipes to panel painting, parchment drawings, and linen (tela linea). Coene apparently left Paris a year later. Based upon the recommendation of Jean Aucher, the Council of the Fabbrica in Milan on April 13, 1399, had appointed Coene to the position of ingegnere of the Duomo begun in 1386. This legal document states that “Jacobus Cova” was a Flemish painter who dwelled in Paris “with his two disciples” (cum duobus discipulis suis) and designates his fixed salary at 24 florins a month. The same document records a second appointment of another engineer at the Cathedral, who would be a traveling companion, the Parisian painter Jean Mignot (Johannes Mignotus). The salary of Mignot and Coene’s disciples was set at 20 florins each. The group left Italy on July 20 or 21, 1399 and arrived in Milan on August 7. Coene’s chapter contract dated July 20, 1399 calls him the designare ecclesiam de fundamento usque ad summitatem (“designer of the church from foundation to summit”). Coene perhaps had been called to Milan as a replacement at the Cathedral for the recently deceased Giovannino de’ Grassi (1340–1398), sculptor and capomaestro. Grassi’s talents encompassed a range of artistic activities, but it was as an illuminator that he attracted the interest of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, the Duke of Milan.83 Grassi had acquired a reputation for an original technique of applying rose/green glazes over metal to create the the result of which is an “interplay of painted and actual reflected light of glazed metal and ‘counterfeited’ translucency.” He further notes that the effects resembled the enameled joyaux of the period. “Orfèvrerie was a highly developed and greatly esteemed art in this period of lavish princely patronage, and illuminators attempted to emulate it. A generation later Jan van Eyck, when painting panels as well as miniatures, still felt its spell.” See Bernard Guineau and Inès Villela-Petit, “Couleurs et technique picturale du Maître de Boucicaut,” Revue de l’Art CXXXV (2002): 23–42; Inès Villela-Petit, Le gothique international: L’art en France au temps de Charles VI (Paris: Hazan-Musée du Louvre, 2004); François Delamare and Bernard Guineau, Les matériaux de la couleur (Paris: Gallimard, 1999); idem., Colors: The Story of Dyes and Pigments (New York: H.N. Abrams, 2000). 83 See Millard Meiss and Edith W. Kirsch, The Visconti hours, National Library, Florence (New York, G. Braziller, 1972); Elisabeth Pellegrin, La bibliothèque des Visconti et des Sforza, ducs de Milan, au XVe siècle (Paris: Centre Nationale Réchereches Scientifique, 1955); Paola Venturelli, Smalto, oro e preziosi. Oreficeria e arti suntuarie nel Ducato di Milano tra Visconti e Sforza (Venice: 2003).

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effect of varying depths in nature, and his innovative approaches would have riveted the attention of Coene, who experimented with pigments. If indeed he was the artist of the Boucicaut Hours,84 (Fig 2.91) which was executed by a skilled colorist also talented in the application of gold, Coene’s engineering experience acquired in the Low Countries, France and Lombardy also might explain the “unprecedented measure and scale” of architecture in certain folios of the manuscript. Coene’s name cannot be traced in Northern documents after 1407, though he has been linked by Millard Meiss with the Boucicaut Master and by Erwin Panofsky with the “Golden Scroll” style which characterizes Prince Duarte’s Book of Hours (Lisbon, Torre do Tombo Archives, 1428), a manuscript which was illuminated in Portugal 85 (Fig. 2.92). Drawings in the Uffizi (Fig. 2.91) attributed to Jacques Coene are hauntingly close to the Annunciate Virgin and Archangel Gabriel depicted Concerning Maréchal Jean le Maingre, see Théodore Godefroy [1580–1649], Le livre des faicts du bon messire Jean Le Maingre, dit Boucicaut, mareschal de France et gouverneur de Gennes (Paris: 1818–1829); Jean Joseph François Poujoulat and Joseph Michaud, Le Livre des Faicts du bon Messire Jean le Maingre dit Boucicaut, maréchal de France et gouverneur de Gennes (Paris: 1836) published as Nouvelle collection des mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de France II (Geneva: D. Lalande, 1985): 203–332 (Textes littéraires français, 331). His friendship with Louis d’Orléans, whose wife Valentine was a Visconti, is documented by an exchange of lavish gifts in 1389. See Henri Herluison, “Diptych d’or émaillé et gravé offert par Louis d’Olréans au duc de Bourgogne,” Nouvelles Archives de l’Art Français XXV (1889): 215–16. For the artistic patronage of Valentine, see J. Damus, “La Venue en France de Valentine Visconti, duchesse d’Orléans et l’inventire de ses joyaux apportés de Lombardie,” Miscellanea di Storia Italiana (Turin: 1898), V, series 3; É. Collas, Valentine de Milan, duchess d’Orléans (Paris: 1911); Frances Marjorie Graves, Quelques pièces relatives à la vie de Louis I, duc d’Orléans, et de Valentine Visconti, sa femme (Paris: H. Champion, 1913); idem., Deux inventaires de la maison d’Orléans (1389 et 1408) (Paris: H. Champion, Bibliothèque du XVe siècle, 31, 1926). Not only did Louis designate the chevalier Boucicaut with the title of “Lieutenant of Guyenne,” his intervention has been credited with the Maréchal’s 1401 appointment as the Governor of Genoa. Jean le Maingre worked on Louis’s behalf to secure French power in Pisa and Leghorn, but his brother Geoffroy was attached to the household of Philip the Bold. Jean le Meingre was taken prisoner by Henry V at the English victory of Agincourt (August 14, 1415), and he died in London in 1421. 85 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, see 54, 122 and 381–82 note 1. Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry. The Boucicaut Master, with the assistance of Kathleen Morand and Edith W. Kirsch (London: Phaidon Press, 1968), 60–62; Paul Durrieu [Count], “Jacques Coene,” Les Arts Anciens de Flandie II (1906–7): 5–22; idem., “Le Maître des Heures du maréchal de Boucicaut,” Revue de l’Art Ancien et Moderne XIX (1906): 401–15; XX (1906): 21–35; idem., “Les Heures du maréchal de Boucicaut du musée JacquemartAndré,” Revue d’Art Crétian LXIII (1913); LXIV (1914). Recent studies on the Boucicaut Master and the “Golden Scroll” Masters comprise: Gabriele Bartz, Der Boucicaut-Meister: ein 84

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in the Boucicaut Hours and the Hours of Prince Duarte (Fig. 2.93).86 The unstable political climate following the French defeat at Agincourt in 1415 (October 25) perhaps caused Coene to gravitate to Florence where illuminators were patronized by Abbot Gomes at La Badia’s scriptorium. If, as is proposed, Master Jácome-Antonio worked at Guimarães as the mestre de obras for Count of Barcelos, he would have retained his appointment as King João I’s court artist. At the time of the visit of the Burgundian ambassadors, he would have been in residence, actively supervising a team of masons and carpenters, and perhaps even a small atelier of manuscript illuminators. In Portugal Jan van Eyck would have had the opportunity to personally meet with an artist who worked in the “Boucicaut style.” Albert Châtelet has identified Coene as the illuminator of Giovanni Boccaccio’s Des Cleres et Nobles Femmes and the Coronation of the Virgin, a frontispiece from a French edition of the Legenda Aurea (Figs. 2.94–2.95).87 Among the few documents pertaining to Coene’s activity is a reimbursement of May 22, 1407 for miniatures he completed for a Latin Bible moralisée commissioned by Philip the Bold and given to Jean, Duke of Berry.88 The payment to Jacques Raponde is significant. The Burgundian agent gave Boccaccio’s Cleres et Nobles Femmes on January 1, 1403 to Duke Philip. He also presented Philip with the Fleur des Histoires begun that same year by unbekanntes Stundenbuch, with an introduction by Eberhard König (Ramsen [Switzerland]Rotthalmünster: Antiquariat Bibermühle-Heribert Tenschert, 1999); Christian de Mérindol, “Les Heures du maréchal de Boucicaut, mise au point et nouvelles lectures,” Flanders in a European Perspective: Manuscript Illumination around 1400 in Flanders and Abroad, Actes du Colloque International, Louvain, 7–10 September 1993, ed. Maurits Smeyers and Bert Cardon (Louvain: Peeters, 1995): 61–74; Bert Cardon, Robrecht Lievens and Maurits Smeyers, Typologische taferelen uit het leven van Jezus : a manuscript from the Gold Scrolls Group (Bruges, ca. 1440) in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, Ms. Morgan 649: An Edition of the Text, a Reproduction of the Manuscript, and a Study of the Miniatures (Louvain: Peeters, 1985). 86 For the past five years my research has included the Horas de Dom Duarte, and this material will be presented at a later date. A folio bearing a date of 1436 was added to the manuscript, although the majority of the illuminations were created before Duarte ascended the throne in 1433. Consult Mário Martins, S.J., Guia geral das Horas del-rei D. Duarte (Lisbon: Editorial Brotéria, 1971). 87 Albert Châtelet, L’Áge D’or du Manuscrit à Peintures en France au temps de Charles VI et Les Heures du Maréchal Boucicaut (Dijon: Institut de France, Editions Faton, 2000), 105–10. He also illustrates the Creator Blessing with the Tetramorphs, from a Missal with a provenance from the College of Clermont. 88 John Lowden, The Making of the Bibles Moralisées, 2 vols. (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000).

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assistants in the circle of the “Coronation Master.”89 There is an undeniable affinity between the Duarte Hours miniatures and those illuminations which to date have been identified as possible works by Jacques Coene. The 1407 reimbursement to Jacques Raponde names the illuminator Ymbert Stanier as a member of Coene’s workshop. The name of Johane Steuez seems to reflect a Northern origin. There is a slight homophonic resemblance between the surname of Stanier and that of Steuez, the assistant of Master Antonio at Guimarães. Examining late Gothic Portuguese calligraphy, little distinguishes z and an s, which appears with a vertical flourish at the end of words. The letters u and n also are similarly represented. “Stenes,” thereofore, might easily be misread as Steuez.” Painters, illuminators and architect-masons in Lisbon with the surname of Enes or Eanes frequently can be tracked to Bruges, the natal city of Coenes. In an age when the names of masters consistently fluctuated in spelling from one document to another, it might be pondered if Coene’s colleague traveled with him to Florence after the 1415 battle at Agincourt and then to Portugal. According to Count Afonso’s biographer, Dom António Caetano de Sousa (1739–48), the new ducal residence at Guimarães was begun with income from his property, with possessions he obtained when his own three children were still minors, with the dowry given to his second wife by João I, and “thanks to the aid given by his father” (Fig. 2.96–2.97). When João I died in 1433, the Count was said to have lamented that he had lost his “greatest laborer.” These biographical facts seem to corroborate that King João I had more than a superficial interest in his son’s building projects. The king was his greatest supporter, morally and financially.90 Knighted at Tuy (1398), a town just over the border in Galicia, Dom Afonso, Count of Barcelos on November 8, 1401 married Brites, the only daughter of Nuno Álvarez Pereira and Leonor Alvim of Barroso91 (Fig. 2.98). Dona Brites Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry. The Boucicaut Master, 61 and 141(1407 document: Archives de la Côte-d’Or, B.1547, fol. 142v). 90 Consult: António Caetano Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica da Casa Real Portuguesa, 6 vols. 1739–1748, (Lisbon: 1933), vol. 1, Books I–III; Abel Gomes da Costa, O Perfil Do oitavo Conde de Barcelos (Lisbon-Barcelos: 1980); José Timoteo Montalvão Machado, D. Afonso, 8.o Conde de Barcelos, Fundador da Casa de Bragança (Guimarães: 1963); idem, Dom Afonso. 1.o Duque de Bragança (Lisbon: 1964). 91 The wedding service was attended by Queen Philippa and Prince Henrique, then seven years old. King João I gave his eldest son the title of «Duke of Bragança.» As stated by Roche, Philippa, 77, the title of “duke” was new to Portugal and it had been suggested by John 89

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brought vast lands to the union, which were supplemented by gifts of estates by King João I. No mention is made of Guimarães at the time of Dom Afonso’s marriage, so perhaps he was granted this estate earlier at Tuy, when he was legitimized and knighted at the age of twenty-eight.92 In autumn of 1404 Dom Afonso escorted his sister Dona Brites (Beatrice) from Bruges to England for her marriage to Thomas Fitzalan, the Earl of Arundel and Warenne At the time of his departure, he was residing between two seats, Chaves and Barcelos, properties which legally were to revert to his wife in case of his death. His pilgrimage to the Holy Land and visits throughout the citadels of Europe must have instilled a desire to erect a grand scale palace. But several events postponed this project. 93 João I may have been planning an invasion of North Africa while the Count of Barcelos was on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. His decision to secure the port of Ceuta was predicated upon his desire to insulate the Iberian Peninsula from invasion by the Merinides of Morocco and provide security for Portuguese commerce in the Mediterranean, but equally he wished to establish a Lusitanian stronghold in North Africa before the kingdom of Castile. On July 25, the feast day of Santiago, 200 galleons with about 50,000 men set sail from Restelo on the Tagus. Anchoring at Lagos on July 27 for restocking, the fleet did not arrive to Ceuta until August 21.94 The citadel was taken by the Portuguese after a day of intense fighting. Dom Afonso had sailed to North Africa with his father, his half-brothers, Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique, and Constable Nuno Álvarez Pereira. The younger Princes were knighted on August 25 and returned to Lisbon on September 2. As a reward for his heroism in the fray, the Count of Barcelos was given the Palace of Algezira (Çala-ben-Çala) to pillage. That Dom Afonso appreciated Arabic ornamentation is proven by the effort he made to save rather permanent appointments from fire. He quickly charged teams of carpenters and masons with the Herculean task of stripping intricately of Gaunt. See Mafalda Soares da Cunha, Linhagem, parentesco e poder : a casa de Bragança, 1384–1483 (Lisbon: Fundação da Casa de Bragança, 1990). 92 Barrosa da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança, 18–20. 93 Francis Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass: Cambridge University Press, 1961), Ch. I, 6–7. 94 Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, Documentos sôbre a expansão portuguêsa, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Gleva, 1943–1956), I (1943), 44–67. (Ceuta). Bailey W. Diffie and George D. Winius, Foundations of the Portuguese Empire 1415–1580 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Europe and the World in the Age of Expansion Series, Vol. I, 1977), 53–54 (Bailey W. Diffie: statistics).

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carved wooden panels from the ceilings. Seventy marble and jasper columns were removed from the patio and transported to Portugal. Eight of the marble pillars survive and they flank the chapel portico at Guimarães Palace.95 Upon his return to Lisbon in 1420, the Count of Barcelos acquired even more holdings: Neiva, Aguiar da Beira, Penafiel and Couto da Várzea. A year before his engagement at Ceuta, Dona Isabel Pereira had died at Vila Viçosa giving birth to a daughter, Isabel. Dom Afonso’s union with the Constable’s only daughter had produced three children. However, he married again on July 23, 1420 at Sintra Palace at the age of forty-one. His bride was Dona Constança de Noronha (1395–26 January, 1480), the Spanish-born daughter of the Count of Gijon and his niece Isabel. The beautiful sixteen-year-old bride was given a dowry by King João I of 13,000 doublons and the income from the land surrounding Guimarães. In the event of Dom Afonso’s death, she was to inherit the deed of the town. Dona Constança had no children, and intensely pious, she adopted the tertiary habit of the Franciscan Poor Clares at the age of twenty-five. Still, she shared her husband’s concern for constructing a new palace at Guimarães, a residence which would showcase the house belonging to the wealthiest lord in Portugal, who after all, owned about a third of the kingdom’s territory.96 The ducal palace of Guimarães was begun about 1422–1425 (Fig. 2.100). The master builder must have been given a generous stipend as he assembled teams of experienced artisans. A “book of specifications”(caderno de encargos) does not survive, but such records generally listed the workers at the site (masons, stonecutters, carpenters, bricklayers, blacksmiths, glaziers, and ceramicists), as well as their salaries, and expenses stage by stage until the building was raised. Documents concerning Guimarães Palace once were kept in the archives belonging to the Bragança family. Retained in the Casa do Infantado established on August 11, 1654 by King João IV, the records were destroyed in the November 1, 1755 earthquake at Lisbon.97 Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 22–24. Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 24–25. For additional information on Dona Constança de Noronha, see Barroso da Fonte, Aspectos menos conhecidos do Paço dos Duques de Bragança, 40–44. 97 Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 46. In his Aspectos menos cohecidos do Paçp dos Duques de Bragança, 13, he mentions two documents written at Guimarães which seem to indicate Dom Afonso and Dona Constança were living in the 1430s within at least a part of their new palace; one record dated January 31, 1438 written by the Abbot of Tagilde; and an even earlier document of May 19, 1433, found by Rogério de Azevedo. As Barroso da 95 96

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Nearly square, the ducal palace measures 52½ rods on the north and west, 52 on the south and 53 on the east. According to a “Survey and Evaluation” documented on February 4, 1666 by the Town Council of Guimarães, there were more than 500 large and small doorways in the residence and more than 70 flues, many of them having high brick chimneys, and the spacious interior rooms were made of stone and mortar.98 Windows with stone mullions were a pseudo-military feature because their cruciform design evoked the herald of Portugal’s military “Order of Christ.” The towers crowned with machicolated battlements especially sustain the visual impact of a palace that is much more a chivalric “fortress” than a noble’s rural retreat. The martial aspect of the exterior most distinctly serves to recall the memory of a nation’s warrior-founder, Afonso Henriques I. The north and west sides of the courtyard once had “verandas” which rested on stone pillars and were roofed with tiles. They were decorative but also functional, serving as protection in inclement weather. These tiled porches which extended the length of an entire façade, stemmed from a Lusitanian architectural tradition. Similar models characterize the buildings of the Minho region. Together with these native elements which conferred the aspect of a fortress-retreat, the palace was unusual in its large dimensions, cylindrical brick chimneys, and steeply sloping roofing, all of which are facets shared with Northern European manor houses of the period.99 Clearly no expense was spared to provide a comfortable and well-lighted ambiance, and this fascination for elegance was unprecedented

Fonte informs, Rogério de Azevedo believed that Master Antom would have been thirty years in 1422, when the work commenced and aged seventy in 1461, when Dom Afonso died. The documented death of Master Jácome-Antonio in 1439 suggests that he was older than thirty when he came to Portugal. Portuguese engineers logically concluded sections of the palace according to his plans. The residence was still incomplete when Dom Afonso died. 98 Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 55–56. 99 Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 58–59. For information about architecture in northern Portugal, consult: Carlos Alberto Ferreira de Almeida, “Castelos Medievais do Noroeste de Portugal,” Finis Terrae. Estudios en lembranza do Prof. Dr. Alberto Balil (Santiago de Compostela: 1992): 371–85; idem., “Castelos e cercas medievais (séculos X a XIII),” História das fortificações portugueses no mundo (Lisbon: 1989): 38–54; idem., Castelologia medieval de Entre-Douro-e-Minho: desde as origens a 1220 (Porto : C.A.F. de Almeida, 1978), and his essay concerning the character of Romanesque style in Portugal, “Primeiras impressões sobre a arquitectura românica portuguesa,” Revista da Faculdade de Letras, Série de História II (1971): 65–116.

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in Portugal (Figs. 2.101–102). The rectangular seigniorial palace with massive corner towers and grand entrance portico, had a straightforward organization of space. Rising three levels with more than forty chambers, the edifice boasted a two-storied kitchen with windows facing the inner central quadrangle. Fresh rainwater was piped through drains in the walls to the kitchen that serviced the main banqueting hall. Although many brick chimneys connecting to hearths provided warmth during winter, tapestries also were a form of insulation. Dom Afonso’s collection included sets from Paris and Arras which illustrated the histories of Hannibal, Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great, Theseus, Hercules, and the Trojan War.100 Though all are lost, Jan van Eyck would have seen them, if not at Guimarães Palace, then at Lisbon or the northern estate of Barcelos. The Gothic Chapel on the principal floor, was built sometime after 1431, and this fact assures that Count Afonso’s residence was incomplete at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit (Figs. 2.103–104). In any case, probably a goodly portion of the house was raised and certainly the dignitaries would have been accorded fine rooms for their stay. The Norman elements of the architecture were complimented by a grand staircase below the chapel (Fig. 2.105), which no longer stands. A drawing by Rogério de Azevedo, however, reconstructs the appearance of the internal passageway. It corresponds with the inventive placement of courtyard staircases in fifteenth-century French civil architecture.101 By contrast with the majority of architects employed

100 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 121 (comforts of the estate) and 133 (Dom Afonso’s tapestries). For the woven panels which must have been imported, Oliveira Marques cites Alfredo Guimarães, “Couros policromados de Córdova,” in Um Retrato de Nuno Gonçalves e outros Estudos (Oporto: Estudos do Museu Alberto Sampaio, 1944), II, 48–51, at 51 note 1. 101 Barroso da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (1994), 55 and 59, reproduces the plans of the palace and Azevedo’s reconstruction sketch of the staircase. Simultaneously with building of Guimarães Palace, “Master Antom” could have overseered the construction of the town’s Church of São Francisco. Dona Constança appears to have professed the vows of a Franciscan tertiary in 1429 at the age of twenty-five. Subsequent to the death of Dom Afonso in 1461, she used the Guimarães residence as an infirmary and hospice for the poor until she died in 1480. By that time the sons of the Duke of Bragança preferred living in the south, and with the political debacle which led to the beheading of Dom Ferdinando II (1430–1483) and the Crown’s consfication of Guimarães, the heirs shifted their loyalty to the estate of Vila Viçosa. The palace declined thereafter, due in no small measure to the lack of interest by the Spanish Hapsburgs who controlled Portugal between 1582 and 1640 and continued to be a threat during the reigns of King João IV (1640–1656) and Afonso

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by Dom João I, whose style was an amalgam of diverse indigenous sources, chiefly Arabic and Gothic, Master Jácome-Antonio brought to Lusitania certain Northern Renaissance elements of design. His brand of palatine architecture had little, if any, impact upon subsequent builders in Portugal, conceivably because his work might have been regarded as too foreign and untraditional. The ubiquitous “Master Jácome-Antonio” had been recommended by Abbot Gomes of La Badia Fiorentina to King João I about 1424. Before his recorded death in 1439, his work in Portugal must have encompassed a range of artistic activities for the Crown, including not only the illumination of manuscripts, but also the painting of frescoes. In the Minho region north of Braga near Ponte de Barca is the Romanesque church of São Salvador at Bravães (Figs. 2.106–107), originally founded by the Benedictines between 1080 and 1125. Based upon an epitaph of the southern portal bearing the name of prior Egeas Menendiz, Augustinians supervised the construction in 1187 of the present single-aisled rectangular church with a wooden ceiling. The church is best known for its tympanum of “Christ in Majesty with Angels” and ornamentation of the eight columns which flank the entrance. Besides two large statue-columns displaying the Annunciate “Senhora do Ó,” and Archangel Gabriel, carvings also consist of animals which define the ambiance of Eden — monkeys, birds, serpents and oxen. 102 São Salvador additionally contains murals which have been dated to the early sixteenth century, but besides Porto’s Church of São Francisco which contains the solitary example of Master Jácome-Antonio’s art, only vestiges of Late Gothic frescoes have been identified in other Portuguese monuments.103 VI (1656–1667). Beginning with the Poor Clares in 1611, and reaching a zenith with the Capuchins in 1666, the exterior stonework of the property was removed and carted away for new building projects. 102 M.J. Pérez Homem de Almeida, “La Iglesia de San Salvador de Bravães: su filiación estilística en el marco galaico-portugués,” Lucerna II (1987: II série), 332; idem., “Aportación al estudio de las estatuas-columnas en el Norte de Portugal,” Actas del II Coloquio GalaicoMinhoto, 2 vols. (Santiago de Compostela: 1985), II: 127–35; Jorge Rodrigues, “A Arte Religiosa no Románico Português e as suas Relações com a Galiza: Poder e Espiritualidade,” 141–42. 103 Pedro Dias, Arte Portuguesa. Notas de Investigação (Universidade de Coimbra. Instituto de História da Arte. Faculdade de Letras, 1988), 53–64, at 62 (São Salvador). Also consult Vergílio Correia, Pintores portugueses dos séculos XV e XVI (Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 1928); idem., A pintura a fresco em Portugal nos séculos XV e XVI. Memória apresentada ao 1.o Congresso de historia de arte de Paris (Lisbon: Imprensa Libanio da Silva, 1921), who

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Though more will be said about Jan van Eyck’s meeting with King João I’s court architect and painter, in 1429 he and his fellow Burgundian diplomats must have felt quite at home in such a French environment as Guimarães Castle. They perhaps lingered awhile enjoying the luxurious accommodations. What lay ahead was an precipitous ascent to a mountainous sanctuary in imitation of the Via Crucis, an act of devotion which they would have undertaken to spiritually prepare for the final stage of journey to Santiago de Compostela. From Guimarães, the delegation probably passed to Braga (Fig. 2.108), one of Portugal’s most important ecclesiastical seats. Modeled after the French church of Sainte-Foy in Conques (Figs. 2.109–2.112), the late eleventh-century cathedral of Braga initially was designed to rival Compostela as an epicenter of the faith. Conflicts between those factions which sought to assert Braga in the Iberian northwest and the nobility who maintained strong ties with Galicia and León led to the destruction by 1110 of the Sé’s apse and altar.104 The portal of the rebuilt cathedral, far more modest in scale than originally envisioned, betrays Benedictine Clunaic influences. Manuel Luis Real amplifies concerning the impact of the Clunaic order by referring to the early history of Portucalensis under Henrique, Count of Burgundy105 (Figs. 2.13–2.14). Seeking to obtain independence from León, Henrique had sought papal approbation of his territory by maintaining diplomatic ties with Cluny. Because his uncle, Henri de Sémur, had patronized the abbey of La Charité-sur-Loire, Henrique donated two churches to that priory, S. Pedro de Rates and S. Justas at Coimbra (Fig. documents several frescoes of the fifteenth century in northern and central Portugal. Dias mentions, 63–64, an important discovery of murals in the Colegiada of Guimarães, a royal building under the protection of King João I. The murals were found during the 1978–79 restoration of the Colegiada by the “Monumentos Nacionais” undertaken by Luís Teixeira, Pedro Barbosa and Horácio Bonifácio. Painted on wood on the framework of an old cover, the works have been dated to the first decades of the fifteenth century. Coimbra’s Monastery of Santa Cruz once had a tower which was painted. The lost murals are known only through a drawing made of the high section of the tower before it collapsed. See António Nogueira Gonçalves, Inventário Artístico de Portugal. Cidade de Coimbra, A.N.B.A. (Lisbon: 1947), 58, who dates the frescoes to the end of the thirteenth or beginning of the fourteenth century. 104 For additional information about the noble houses of Portugal during the epoch of the Reconquest, consult José Mattoso, Ricos-homens, infanções e cavaleiros : a nobreza medieval portuguesa nos séculos XI e XII (Lisbon : Guimarães & C.a Editores, 1982); Idem., Religião e cultura na Idade Média portuguesa (Lisbon: : Impressão Nacional, Casa da Moeda, 1982). 105 Manuel Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” 32–34.

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2.115). His widow Teresa (m. 1096), daughter of King Alfonso VI of León and Castile, gave S. Maria at Vimiero to the mother house at Cluny.106 According to Jorge Rodrigues, Count Henrique had been entrusted with his holdings by Alfonso VI and that he was “the fourth son of the powerful Duke Henry of Burgundy, a great-grandson of Robert I of France, a nephew of Queen Constance of León and grand-nephew of Saint Hugo,” the Cluniac abbot who supervised construction of Cluny III, consecrated in 1095.107 In 1096, the same year Count Henrique wed Teresa, Gerald of Moissac was appointed archbishop of Braga. Gerald, as noted by Manuel Luis Real, was “a native of Cahors who was educated in the monastery of Sainte-Marie de La Dourade in Toulouse,” and his “native town was very close to Rouerge/Conques, where the pilgrimage church of Sainte-Foy was being built.”108 Therefore, the almost complete lack of Compostelan influences in ecclesiastical architecture of the region around Braga may be attributed to several factors: the intense rivalry between aristocratic factions in Lusitania; Count Henrique’s strong ties to Burgundy and his desire to have his kingdom recognized by Rome (a feat his son Afonso Henriques I achieved); and a decided allegiance to Cluny sustained by the archbishops of Braga who followed in the wake of Gerald de Moissac.109 Despite the absence of a Compostelan stamp upon the region of Braga, the agnus dei commonly represented in Galician sculpture resurfaces in the diocese’s monuments, either within tympana of portals or as plinths carved for gable crosses110 (Fig. 2.116). The Iberian association of the “Lamb of God” with 106 Friar Avelino de Jesus da Costa, A ordem de Cluny em Portugal (Coimbra: Edições Cenáculo, 1948); Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, L’Abbaye de Cluny (Paris: Caisse Nationale des Monuments Historiques et des Sites, 1981). 107 Jorge Rodrigues, “A Arte Religiosa no Románico Português e as suas Relações com a Galiza: Poder e Espiritualidade,” 133. 108 Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” 33 and 229. 109 Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais,” 36 and 230, remarks: “As for the diocese of Porto, it was not definitely restored until the 12th century with the appointment of Bishop Hugo, a former canon at Compostela and personal advisor to Diego Gelmirez. Hugo enjoyed the support of Queen Teresa, and his appointment can be seen as a victory for the pro-Galician faction. Teresa thus succeeded in gaining control over a diocese which was strategically located relative to Braga, a rival of Santiago de Compostela and co-aspirant to the coveted status of metropolitan see.” 110 Luis Real, “O Románico Português na Perspectiva das Relações Internacionais, 231. He notes, 38–39 and 233: “The agnus dei now in Coimbra’s Museu Nacional Machado de Castro has its match in the lamb cradled by John the Baptist in the Pórtico de la Gloria

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the notion of holy pilgrimage has relevance for Jan van Eyck’s selection of the motif as the central thematic image of his Ghent Altarpiece. In fact, east of Braga was the pilgrimage site of the Monte Espinho founded in 1373 by a Brotherhood of Franciscan tertiaries belonging to Braga’s church of the Holy Trinity (Figs. 2.117–2.119).111 The hermitage of the Holy Cross at the summit of the “Mount of Thorns” probably was dedicated to Francis of Assisi, whose vita so perfectly conformed to that of Christ he was marked with the stigmata in 1224. In his biography of the saint dated 1247, Tommaso de Celano records an event of Francis’s youth, the giving of his cloak to an impoverished knight. He praised the Franciscan as a new St. Martin of Tours.112 Devotion to the fourth-century Roman warrior Martin was especially strong around Braga. Known in antiquity as Bracara Augusta, Braga once was imperial Rome’s primary judicial seat. However, before the Pax Romana of Augustus Caesar, the Lusitani — warriors of Celtic descent — had been fiercely resistant to Imperial colonization and they supported Carthage during the Punic Wars. The mountain-dwelling chieftain-shepherd Viriatus achieved outstanding military success about [Santiago de Compostela], or in a boss which closes the vault in the tribune of the cathedral. This last example is particularly interesting, as here the agnus dei is framed in a scalloped motif which later influenced the Coimbran craftsman in his carvings in the tympanum of S. Martinho de Cedofeita. In its general composition, this motif has its roots both in ancient Rome and oriental art, and can be seen in Romanesque capitals as far apart as …Languedoc and Palencia.” The pilgrim’s shell encasing an agnus dei, a patent emblem of baptism, is comparable to the Eucharistic fons vitae which Jan van Eyck represented in his Ghent Adoration of the Lamb. 111 George Kubler, “Sacred Mountains in Europe and America,” Christianity and the Renaissance, ed. Timothy Verdon and John Henderson (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1990): 423–44; Barbara von Barghahn, “The Sacred Parnassus,” Struggle for Synthesis. A Obra de Arte Total nos Séculos XVII e XVIII. The Total Work of Art in the 17th and 18th Centuries, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Ministério da Cultura, tInstituto Português do Património Arquitectónico, Actas, Simpósio Internacional, Braga, 1999), II (Espaços Profanos. Espaços Abertos, Arte Efémera), 403–18. 112 Tommaso de Celano, Vita Secunda S. Francisci Assisiensis-Legendae S. Francisci Assisiensis saeculis XIII et XIV conscriptae (II.5) in Analecta Franciscana sive chronica aliaque varia documenta ad historiam Fratrum Minorum (Florence: Collegio di San Bonaventura, Quaracchi, 1985–1941), X, 127–268, at 133; P. Hermann, “Second Life of St. Francis” in St. Francis of Assisi : Writings and Early Biographies: English Omnibus of the Sources for the Life of St. Francis, edited by Marion Alphonse Habig, translations by Raphael Brown et al (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 4th revised ed.1983), 365. See Adrian S. Hoch, “St. Martin of Tours, His Transformation into a Chivalric Hero and Franciscan Ideal,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte (Deutcher Kunstverlag München: 1987): 471–82.

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141 B.C. (Fig. 2.20). His stratagems for attack were so varied that Rome was compelled to recognize Lusitania as a territory distinct from Hispania. Early Christians invested the tale of Viriatus’s betrayal and death by his own generals with Christological significance. In 468 Lusitania was assailed by east Germanic invaders. St. Martin of Tours, who exemplified the heroic ideal of virtú, was responsible for not only the conversion of Gaul, but also Portugal.113 He emerged in the sixth century as the new Viriatus of Lusitania when his cape was brought from France and used at Braga to cure the son of the pagan King Chararic. The entire court of the Visigoth ruler embraced Christianity. St. Martin, who had refused to fight with weapons, declaring he was a “soldier” of Christ and needed only the sign of the cross, was represented by Jan van Eyck in his panel of the “Holy Knights” of the Ghent Altarpiece, a work permeated with Pauline spirituality. During the fourteenth century Braga’s Monte Espinho was designed as a surrogate for the Via Sacra at Jerusalem and small garden niches were designed as Stations of the Cross to be followed by devout pilgrims. An ascent of the hill in incremental stages, was perceived as a means by which the penitential could obtain “hidden wisdom” or philosophical revelation. The gardens of Bom Jesus had the didactic purpose of defining the nature of “contemplative life” as the essential balance to “active life.” Braga’s sacred hill was transformed into a Baroque Mount Zion between 1722 and 1740 with an imposing staircase and side chapels of the Passion, the sculpture of which reflects the impact of Jesuit humanism. Despite the metamorphosis of the sanctuary, Ignatius of Loyola relevantly called Francis of Assisi a “knight of God” in his Autobiography, a text compiled between 1553 and 1555 with the aid of his Portuguese secretary Luís Gonçalves da Câmara. Inspired by the “Five Franciscan Martyrs of Morocco,” St. Anthony of Lisbon (Padua) traveled from Coimbra to join St. Francis’s apostolic cause (Fig. 2.121). After arriving at Assisi, he was assigned to the hermitage of San Paolo, whose monks were advised by Francis to emulate the domestic household of Martha and Mary at Bethany. Accordingly, a few friars were instructed to

113 Manuel Justino Maciel, “Arquitectura Paleocristã em Contexto Suévico. Algumas reflexões,” Câmara Municipal de Viana do Castelo (1991): 1–11 (Comunicacão at VI Colóquio de Arqueologia, October 1987); idem., Antiguidade tardia e paleocristianismo em Portugal (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 1996). Consult Margaret B. Freeman, The St. Martin Embroideries. A Fifteenth-century Series illustrating the Life and Legend of St. Martin of Tours (New YorkGreenwich, CN: Metropolitan Museum of Art-New York Graphic Society, 1968).

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meditate while their companions attended the household, vegetable gardens and domestic animals.114 Two of Bom Jesus’s earliest hermitages were dedicated to the fourthcentury Lusitanian virgin-martyr Eulalia of Mérida, whose attribute was the Pentecostal dove of the Holy Spirit (1494); and Mary Magdalene (1522), whose ointment jar alluded to her charity (Figs. 2.122–2.123). These Renaissance ermitas with grottoes may have replaced Gothic structures honoring the female saints. 115 Another later hermitage which may have risen over the site of an earlier chapel was that of John the Baptist (circa 1629). The late fourteenth-century Franciscan Brotherhood of Bom Jesus performed mystery plays at Bom Jesus, where the feast day of John the Baptist (June 24) was commemorated by religious processions. The saint also was the patron of King João I, who actively supported the Friars Minor and Poor Clares. Records of the confraternity establish that prior to the Jesuit transformation of the site, there were four garden niches designed specifically for meditating upon four events which followed Christ’s Passion and death at Calvary (Figs. 2.124–2.125): The Descent from the Cross, Entombment, Resurrection and Ascension. The subjects of these niches suggest they were situated at the summit of the Mount and site of a “Holy Sepulchre.”116 St. Francis in his Letter to the Entire Order referred to the goal of being “interiorally enlightened and inflamed by the Holy Spirit … to follow in the footprints of Jesus Christ.” 117 At the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit to Braga, the gardens of Mount Espinho celebrated Christ as a noble warrior with a righteous mission. His For the Rule of Hermitages (Assisi Codex 338) written about 1217, consult Regis J. Armstrong, O.F.M. CAP. and Ignatius C. Brady, O.F.M., Francis and Clare. The Complete Works (New York-Ramsey-Toronto: The Paulist Press, 1982), 146–47; Kajetan Esser, O.F.M., “Die ‘Regula pro eremitoriis data,’ des hl. Franziskus von Assisi,” Franziskanische Studien (1962): 383–417, at 44; Oktavian Schmucki, O.F.M., “Luogo di Preghiera, Ermo, Solitudine, Concetti e Realizazioni in San Francesco d’Assisi,” Le Case di Preghiera nella Storia e Spiritualitá Franciscana, Studi Scelti di Francescanesimo (Naples: 1978): 33–53, at 7. See Margaret B. Freeman, Herbs for the Medieval Household : for cooking, healing, and divers uses (New York : Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997, 2nd ed.). 115 Kenneth Baxter Wolf, Christian martyrs in Muslim Spain (Cambridge [Cambridgeshire]New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988). 116 The most comprehensive discussion of Monte Espinho’s evolution is provided by Mónica F. Massara, Santuário do Bom Jesus do Monte, Fenómeno Tardo Barroco em Portugal (Braga: Confraria do Bom Jesus do Monte, 1988). 117 Armstrong and Brady, Francis and Clare, 13. 114

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active life was his ministry, which he began at his baptism by the Jordan River. His contemplative life was his Passion which ended at Calvary. The arduous ascent to the high Sanctuary of the Holy Cross reflects the influence of the fourteenth-century Carthusian Ludolph of Saxony (ca. 1300–1378). Using the Pseudo-Bonaventure Meditationes vitae Christi as a primary source, he recommended the “application of the Senses” while meditating in his Vita Jesu Christi. The five corporeal Senses especially were to be applied in contemplating the lance and nail wounds of the crucified Christ.118 Enlightened former soldiers were exalted at the sanctuary of Braga, primarily Sts. Longinus, Paul, Martin and Francis. Jan van Eyck’s experience of ascending the sacro monte of Bom Jesus was recollected not only in the Ghent Altarpiece’s pendant panels of “Knights” and “Holy Hermits and Pilgrims” but also in the realistic rocky terrain they transverse to reach the altar of the sacrificial Lamb of God. Northern Portugal retains Romanesque sanctuaries which might have been toured by the Burgundians en route to Galicia. Prince Henrique (r. 1095–1112, Count of Portugal, and his wife Teresa, who favored French Clunics, made a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in 1098. Popular legend suggests the father of Afonso Henriques I subsequently traveled to Jerusalem, where his arrival is recorded in 1103. The Count’s absence from Guimarães may explain the 1102 raid of the town of Braga by Don Diego Gelmírez. This militant archbishop of Santiago absconded to Compostela with several treasures from the Cathedral of Braga.119 Among

118 The Meditationes vitae Christi once was attributed to St. Bonaventure but now is believed to have been composed about 1300 by his Franciscan confrere Giovanni de Caulibus. Ludolph of Saxony’s Vita Jesu Christi was the first book published in Portuguese by Valentim Fernandes in 1495 as an initiative of Dona Leonor (1458–1525), dowager queen of João II (r. 1481–1495). Consult: [Ludolf von Sachsen: 1300–1377], La Vita Christi de Ludolph le Chartreux [Vita Christi], ed. L.M. Rigollot (Paris: G. Hurtel, 1870); Emmerich Raitz von Frentz, “Ludolphe le Chartreux et les Exercises de S. Ignace de Loyola,” Revue d’Ascétique et de Mystique XXV (1949): 375–88; Ludolphus de Saxonia, Vita Christi, ed. Bertrand Étienne (Paris: 1497). 119 M. Monteiro, A escultura românica em Portugal. Sé de Braga (Porto: 1938). Manuel d’Aguiar Barreiros, A Catedral de Santa Maria de Braga (Braga: Sòlivros de Portugal, 1989); IX centenário da dedicação da Sé de Braga : congresso internacional : actas (Braga: Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Faculdade de Teologia-Braga : Cabido Metropolitano e Primacial de Braga, 1990). Rodrigo da Cunha [1577–1643], Primeira [e segunda] parte, da Historia ecclesiastica dos arcebispos de Braga, e dos santos, e varoes illustres, que florecerão neste arcebispado (Unpublished text: Washington, D.C., Library of Congress).

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the prized reliquaries taken to Galicia were caskets containing the bones of : St. Victor of Marseilles (d. 290), a Roman warrior martyred in Gaul during the reign of Emperor Maximian; and St. Fructuosus (d. 665), who was born in Spain to a royal Visigoth house, but rejected his father’s profession as a military officer to become a Benedictine monk and then archbishop of Braga (Fig. 2.126). Following the raid of Braga, letters of complaint were sent to Rome by Bishop Gerard, a Cluniac from St. Pierre de Moissac. As recompense, metropolitan Braga received formal papal recognition. Its ecclesiastical seat was given jurisdiction over other western sees as far south as Coimbra, but Santiago de Compostela remained autonomous from Lusitanian control.120 Prior to leaving northern Portugal for their pilgrimage to Compostela the Burgundian embassy might have visited the Castle of Barcelos (Fig. 2.127). This medieval stronghold of King Dinis (until 1298) was one of the many estates which belonged to Nuno Álvarez Pereira in 1385.121 When Dona Beatriz, daughter of the seventh count of Barcelos, married in 1401, the vila condal passed to João I’s son Afonso. The ruins of this grand estate acquired by the eighth count of Barcelos are directly south of the church of Santa Maria Maior de Barcelos (Figs. 2.128–129). Afonso ordered extensive remodeling. Similar to his estate at Guimarães, the residence appears to have contained spacious galleries with numerous windows overlooking the Cávado River and the surrounding countryside (Figs. 2.130–133). The 1428–29 journal of the Burgundian travels does not indicate how the embassy reached Santiago de Compostela Although the retinue might have sailed to northwest Galicia, they would have needed horses to travel through Spain. King João I likely selected fine steeds for the Burgundians to ride and also ordered a select escort to guide them through Portugal to Viana do Castelo. Crossing the border to Vigo, they would have passed directly to Compostela on the slopes of Monte Pedroso. Completing a pilgrimage to the famed sanctuary of the Apostle St. James at Compostela, Baudouin de Lannoy in his official role as the leader of a ducal delegation would have 120 Harold Victor Livermore, A New History of Portugal (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966), 45. 121 Carlos Alberto Ferreira de Almeida, Barcelos (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, Cidades e Vilas de Portugal, 1990), 7–15. See also: Francisco de Azeredo, O Paço dos Condes-Duques de Barcelos (Porto: 1954); Abel Gomes da Costa, O Perfil Do oitavo Conde de Barcelos (Lisbon: 1980); António Martins Magalhães, Barcelos, Verde Minho (Barcelos: 1987); Ernesto de Amorim Magalhães, Barcelos No Pasado E No Presente (Barcelos: 1958).

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presented the shrine of Santiago with a substantial gift on behalf of Philip the Good (Fig. 2.134–2.135). Unfortunately there are no extant sketches by Jan van Eyck of the Basilica of Compostela. However, he appears to footnote the Galician sanctuary randomly in his art. The famous Porta de Gloria by the Romanesque sculptor Master Mateo (Figs. 2.136–2.143) must have astonded the Flemish delegation, particularly Jan, whose interest in carving is apparent in subsequent public and private commissions. Angels of heaven and demons of hell, divine reward and punishment, Apocalyptic prophecies concerning the “Son of Man,” adoration and musical jubilation, all converge in the puertas of the Galician basilica of St. James the Apostle. Although the north and south side portals and original choir of the great shrine are considerably altered from the fifteenth century, sufficient reliefs and images survive. Created during an age when faith was proven by arduous travel and demonstrated by “gifts” in the manner of the Magi, these fragments from Compostela merit greater scrutiny with regard to Jan van Eyck’s singular iconographic vocabulary. His magnificent polyptych for Sint-Janskerk in Ghent, drew deeply from the well of inspiration at Compostela, perhaps because ultimately its symbolic messages were directed to those travelers who had returned from pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (Figs. 2.44–2.47). Parenthetical Thoughts about Jan van Eyck’s Diplomatic Excursions During an age of courtly protocol, however, arrangements must have been made in advance for a contingent of Castilian nobles to accompany the Flemish entourage through the kingdom of King Juan II (1404–1454) (Figs. 2.149–2.150) The monarch moved about his realm in a general circuit which included lengthy visits at castles in Valladolid, Burgos, Salamanca and Toledo, as well as frequent occupancy of the Alcázar of Segovia during the hunting seasons. Due to the peripatetic nature of the Castilian court, the precise location of Juan II at the time of Jan van Eyck’s journey remains speculative, though likely the king was in Segovia.122 Regarding the purpose of the Burgundian visit to Castile, the diplomatic mission likely involved commercial negotiations, such as the export of wool from Spain to Flanders. 122

Pemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 87–88.

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Evidently a cotillion of Castilian cavaliers dispatched to Compostela also served as escort to Andalusia, because the 1428–1429 chronicle specifically mentions the Duke of Arjona, Grandee and caballero of the Order of Santiago. On September 9, 1427, Don Fadrique de Castro y Castilla had received his title “Lord of Arjona and Arjonilla” from his nephew, King Juan II. The Duke’s vast holdings were clustered around Jáen in southern Spain.123 The Burgundian chronicler was very precise about listing the sequence of the Burgundian itinerary: “[They] traveled to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, and thence went to see the duke of Arjona, the king of Castile, the king of Granada and several other lords, countries and places.”124 This sequence, and the fact that the Duke of Arjona possessed substantial holdings in southern Spain, suggests that the Burgundian embassy departed for Al-Andalus immediately after their audience with Juan II.125 En route to the Alhambra (Figs. 2.151–2.152), the ambassadors must have sought shelter at royal forts or castles owned by important lords of Castile. The 1428–1429 chronicle clearly documents a meeting with the Nasrid Sultan Muhammad VIII (1417–1419; 1427–1430). While the manuscript provides no information regarding the excursions to “other countries and places,” the Burgundians would have had to travel by water. Only a year before, between October of 1427 and February of 1428, Jan van Eyck and Baudouin de Lannoy had sailed to Valencia but their negotiations with Alfonso V, king of Aragon, halted when Philip the Good decided against a marriage with Isabel of Urguell, eldest daughter of Count Jaime II, who wed Prince Pedro of Portugal.126 Perhaps the embassy returned to Valencia with the aim of restoring diplomatic relations. Had Carlos de Arce, Quien es Quien en la Nobleza Española? (Barcelona: Editorial Mitre, 1985), 26, 93. 124 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 180. 125 Hernando de Baeza, “Las cosas que pasaron entre los reyes de Granada desde el tiempo del rey Juan de Castilla, segundo de este nombre, hasta que los Católicos Reyes ganaron el reyno de Granada,” in Relación de algunos secesos de los últimos tiempos del reino de Granada (Madrid: Sociedad de Bibliófilos Españoles, III, 1868). 126 Leo van Puyvelde, “De Reis van Jan van Eyck naar Portugal,” in Koninklijke Vlaamache Academie voor Taal-en Letterkunde – Verslagen en Mededdlingen (1940): 17–27; Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” La Revue des Arts 33 (1976), 7–82, at 32–33; Urbain Plancher, Histoire générale et particulière de Bourgogne, with an introduction by Jean Richard, 4 vols. (Dijon : A. de Fay - L. N. Frantin, 1739–1781; Paris: Éditions du Palais Royal, 1974), IV, 134 (rpt. Farnsborough, Hantshire, 1968); Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 222 and note 26. 123

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they passed beyond Mallorca, then under Aragonese control, to regions in Italy, the chronicler logically would have noted the names of familiar centers. Following their visit to the exotic “Red Castle” of Granada might not Baudouin de Lannoy and his fellow companions been galvanized to further explore Andalusia, and even consider a trip to North Africa? After all, Genoese merchants were competitors in commercial trade with Flanders and they, the Portuguese and the Spaniards plied the routes of the ancient Phoenicians. Málaga, a trading center acquired by Scipio Africanus following his victory over Carthage at Alcalá del Río during the end of the Second Punic War would have been the Burgundian departure point for any travel to “other countries and places.” Abandoned by the end of the third century, the Roman municipium of Malaca had been conquered in 551 by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (527–565) and sacked in 570 by the Visigoth Leovigild (569–586).127 Though little is known of the earliest Arabic occupation of Málaga, the town was taken by the Zirids of Granada in 1056, and following the collapse of their dynasty in 1090, the port was successively ruled by the Almoravids and Almohads. When Córdoba was recaptured in 1236 by King Ferdinand III of Castile, the Nasrids of Granada absorbed the center into their kingdom. Only in 1487 did Málaga fall to the Castilians. Málaga, the primary port of the Sultan of Granada, was situated about fifty-five miles directly south of Córdoba.128 In 1429 the Burgundian

127 Luís Baena del Alcázar, Catálogo de las esculturas romanas del Museo de Málaga (Málaga: Servicio de Publicaciones, Diputación Provincial de Málaga, 1984). 128 Christian Ewert, “Spanisch-islamische Systeme sich kreuzender Bögen: II, Die Arkaturen eines offenen Pavillons auf der Alcazaba von Málaga,” Madrider Mitteilungen VII (1966): 232–53; Rafael Puertas Tricas, La cerámica islámica de cuerda seca en la Alcazaba de Málaga (Málaga: Excmo. Ayuntamiento de Málaga, 1989); idem., Excavaciones arqueológicas en Lacipo, Casares, Málaga: campañas de 1975 y 1976 (Madrid : Ministerio de Cultura, Dirección General de Bellas Artes y Archivos, Subdirección General de Arqueología y Etnografía, 1982); Jorge Lirola Delgado, El poder naval de al-Andalus en época del Califato Omeya (Granada: 1993); Pierre Guichard, Al-Andalus : 711–1492 (Paris : Hachette Littératures, 2000); idem., La España musulmana: al-Andalus omeya. siglos VIII–XI (Madrid: 1995); Eduardo Manzano Moreno, La frontera de al-andalus en época de los Omeyas (Madrid: 1991); Roger Collins, Spain: An Oxford Archaeological Guide (Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1998), 175–77; idem., The Arab conquest of Spain, 710–797 (Oxford-New York: B. Blackwell, 1989); idem., Medieval Spain : Culture, Conflict, and Coexistence : Studies in Honour of Angus MacKay , edited by Roger Collins and Anthony Goodman (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire-New York: Palgrave-Macmillan, 2002).

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diplomats would have arrived to the town’s main gate with letters of escort provided by Mohammed VIII, who resided only twenty-five miles away. Málaga has two Nasrid forts on its eastern side, one perched above the other. Passing through a set of ramparts surrounding the lower Alcazaba, they would seen a small residence in the center. This palace which dates from the period of the Hammūdids (1010–1056) was remodeled substantially by Yusef I (1333–1354). It still retains its huge fortified entrance, gates with horseshoe arches on slender columns, and pavilions overlooking a rectangular pool. The Ambassadors might have ascended along parallel ramparts to the second tier of fortifications and the Castillo de Gibralfaro. Only walls of the “Castle Hill of the Lighthouse” remain, and though this upper fortress has no buildings, its Torre de Homenaje dates to the period of Abd al Rahman I (756–880). The proximity of Málaga to the Strait of Gibraltar which Tarik ben Ziyad crossed in 711 to invade the Iberian Peninsula, is noteworthy as Morocco lies on the opposite shore.129 The promontory near Ceuta which forms the northwestern extremity of the African coast is one of the “Pillars of Hercules,” the Abyla to Gibraltar’s Calpe (Figs. 2.153–2.154). Ceuta had been settled first as a Phoenician colony around “Mount Acho.” When the Romans conquered Carthage they gave the name of Mauretania to Morocco, and called its primary port facing Gibraltar Septum Fratres (Seven Brothers) because of the seven hills which lay within its walls. Later brought under the scepter of the Byzantine Empire, the town was taken by the Moors and renamed Sebta. Hercules’s famed “Pillar” was transmuted to Jebel Musa, the “Mount of Moses.” The Idrisid Kingdom of Morocco claimed Ceuta before the Almohads of Córdoba and it continued to be fought over by ruling dynasties of Spain and Morocco before its conquest by Portugal in 1415. Despite the turmoil, the port traded actively in the Mediterranean Basin and coral from its reefs was prized highly in Europe. Vessels from Genoa, Pisa, Marseilles, Georges Marçais, Manuel d’art musulman – l’architecture: Tunisie, Algérie, Maroc, Espagne, Sicile, Vol. I, Du IXc au XIIe siècle, 2 vols. (Paris: A. Picard, 1926–27); idem., Algérie médiévale : monuments et paysages historiques (Paris : Arts et métiers graphiques, 1957); François Auguste de Montêquin, “Persistance et diffusion de l’esthétique de l’Espagne musulmane en l’Afrique du Nord,” The Maghreb Review X, No. 4 (1985): 88–100; Charles Andre Julien, Histoire de l’Afrique du Nord: Tunisie, Algérie, Maroc, 2 vols. (Paris: Payot, 1951–52; 1st ed. 1931); idem., History of North Africa: Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco. From the Arab Conquest to 1830, edited and revised by Roger Le Tourneau, also edited by C. C. Stewart and translated by John Petrie (London-New York: Routledge & K. Paul-Praeger, 1970). 129

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Seville and Lisbon, docked at the Ceuta on a frequent basis. For this reason, the Burgundian embassy easily could have boarded a Portuguese galleon at Málaga heading for the garrison which functioned as a relatively prosperous commercial center under Lusitanian control. The town of Ceuta with its whitewashed houses silhouetted against the sober grey of the Atlas Mountains was a crucible for many customs and cultures. Minarets still stand in the Almina, or Moorish sector. Jews lived in a separate quarter, the Mellah, but they also traded actively in the lower sector of the town.130 The marketplace provided a plethora of North African products which would have interested the agents of Philip the Good: carpets, embroidered fabrics, painted tiles, embossed leather, hammered ironware, marquetry inlaid with ivory or colored wood, and metalwork. Western Europe also valued exotic spices such as saffron, pimentón (paprika), cumin seeds and coriander. The smells must have been colorful as tuna, bonito and sardines were brought from the harbor and outdoor vendors sold cooked mutton with couscous, aromatic vegetables, and diverse sweetmeats. Ceuta was approximate to ports along the coast of Morocco — Tangier, Arzila, Azamor, Mazagão and Safim. Van Eyck and his companions would have toured the walled city and absorbed the atmosphere of a constant file of people: white-robed townsfolk and tribesmen in boldly colored djellabs with hooded soulhams, most armed with jeweled daggers; veiled women selling bread; donkeys laden with goods; merchants riding fine horses; and Portuguese soldiers sallying forth from their stations after guard duty. Walking through a labyrinth of narrow streets with suspended balconies, the embassy would have resided at the house of the alcaide. In dazzling sunlight, the private patio with citrus trees and central fountain must have provided a tranquil respite from the cacophony and bustle of Ceuta’s marketplace. In the same church of São Francisco where the sons of King João I were knighted in 1415, the Burgundians would have attended Mass, perhaps leaving an offering upon their departure in honor of the “Five Franciscan Martyrs” who had died two centuries before at Marrakech. Departing from North Africa in a trading vessel, Van Eyck could have sailed through the Strait of Gibraltar and perhaps stopped at the old Moorish keep on the Rock. The ship probably was bound for Cádiz, the Phoenician “Gadir” of the kingdom of Tartessos, Henry H. Hart, Luis de Camoëns and the Epic of the Lusiads (Norman: University of Oklahama Press, 1952), 58–64 on “Ceuta.” 130

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and then Sanlúcar de Barrameda at the mouth of the Guadalquivir. The river flowed northeast to Seville, a mere twenty-five miles or so away. Spain’s principal port was a magnet for commerce, and tiles with geometric designs in tin-glazed colors were imported to Portugal during the fifteenth century. The ambassadors would not have missed Seville. Whether the Burgundians returned to Lisbon overland from Seville or continued to travel by sea is impossible to determine (Fig. 2.155). There were four possible routes to follow, and two were overland: riding from Seville to Badajoz, a distance of 90 miles, and from the frontier town to Lisbon another 118 miles; and a shorter route from Seville to Beja, about 150 miles, and then another 95 miles to Lisbon. They also might have sailed from Seville along the Guadalquivir River to return to the coast, then proceeded west to Huelva, crossed the border to Spain and docked at Vila Real de Santo António at the mouth of the Guadiana below Castro Marim. Sailing north along this immense river and its tributaries to Mértola, they would have been in the Alentejo and in the vicinity of Beja and Évora, respectively about ninety and seventy miles from Lisbon. However, the Burgundians just may have decided to continue sailing along the Atlantic coast from Vila Real de Santo António. King Afonso III had established the boundaries of continental Portugal when he wrested the southern region from the Moors between 1248 and 1278. The two main coastal ports of the Algarve were Faro, situated at the edge of a lagoon, and Lagos, a harbor with a large bay by the promontory of Ponta da Piedade and the Bensafrim River (Figs. 2.156–2.157). The travelers would have found the waters calm and clear as they passed sandstone cliffs and empty ochre beaches populated by flocks of rock doves and peregrine falcons.131 Winds along the Cabo de São Vicente (Fig. 2.158) of the Sagres Peninsula may pick up the fragrance of the gum citrus trees which thrive on this part of the coast, but it is difficult sailing alongside the layers of jagged David J.J. Evans and Kamin Mohammadi, Portugal: The Algarve (London: Cadogan Books, 1996). Charles E. Wuerpel, The Algarve : province of Portugal : Europe’s South-west Corner (Newton Abbot -North Pomfret, VT: David & Charles, 1974); Alberto Iria, O Algarve nas côrtes medievais portuguesas do século XV : subsídios para a sua história (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da História, 1982 and rpt. 1990); idem., Da importância geo-política do Algarve na defesa marítima de Portugal nos séculos XV a XVIII (Lisboa: Academia Portuguesa de História, 1976). David John Mabberley and P.J. Placito, Algarve Plants and Landscapes: Passing Tradition and Ecological Change (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1993); Carlos Pereira Callixto, Castelos e fortificações marítimas do Concelho de Lagoa (Faro: Algarve em 131

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black slate and limestone. Cape St. Vincent is the Sacrum Promontorium of Strabo and Ptolemy. Rounding the Cabo which marked the western limit of the world, the voyagers would have heard the tale about the relics of St. Vincent of Saragossa, who suffered martyrdom under Diocletian and was praised by Prudentius and St. Augustine. His remains had been sequestered from the Moors at the Cape and transferred by Afonso Henrique I to the Sé of Lisbon about the time that his son Sancho I had led Portuguese forces up the Guadalquivir River to Seville (1176–1178). Continuing along the Atlantic shoreline of the Alentejo to the Lisbon coast, the ambassadors would have docked at Setúbal, Portugal’s third largest port on the estuary of the Sado River and former Roman settlement, before rounding the Caba Espichel to arrive in the Tagus estuary by late May of 1429. Despite questions of route after the Burgundian visit to Granada, the 1428–1429 chronicle which speaks of “other countries and places,” must be deemed accurate. The nearest foreign kingdom to the Sultan of Granada indubitably was Morocco. The greatest impact of Jan van Eyck’s Mediterranean travels, therefore, may have been a visit to the Lusitanian fortress-city of Ceuta, where King João I and the Avis Princes had defended the Holy Grail and exemplified most graphically the crusading ideals of their nation.

Foco Editora, 1991); Hugo Cavaco, “Visitações” da Ordem de Santiago no sotavento algarvio: subsídios para o estudo da história da arte no Algarve (Vila Real de Santo António: Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombe, 1987); Maria da Graça Maia Marques, O Algarve da antiguidade aos nossos dias: elementos para a sua história (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 1999).

3 The Fountain of Life (1429) and the Avis Dynastic House Portraits of King João I and Lusitania’s Princes

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fter a three-month sojourn of the Iberian Peninsula, which began in late February of 1429, Jan van Eyck and members of his embassy returned to Lisbon at the end of May in time to see the “first entry and joyous reception into the city of Dona Leonor, the Aragonese bride Prince Duarte married at Coimbra on September 22, 1428 (Fig. 3.1). The Burgundian account mentions opulent cloth-of-gold and tapestries displayed along the processional route through the town. The cortege perhaps began at the southern Gate of St. Catherine of Alexandria near the Bragança Palace and it concluded at Duarte’s northern residence of St. Martinho. Through the document, the splendor of an epoch can be glimpsed. Jan van Eyck and his companion diplomats unquestionably were accorded a place of honor at the royal viewing stand, but the author of the Burgundian account evidently walked the parade route, for he records: [Lady Leonor] was led by two of the brothers of the infante on foot, one on each side [probably Princes Pedro and Henrique].... Above her, a large piece of cloth-of-gold, supported on poles carried by princes of the blood royal [Fernando and João] and others of the most notable knights and lords of the kingdom of Portugal, on foot, served as [bearers of] the canopy. My lords the brothers of the said lady had been waiting some time in the fields. As soon as they saw her they dismounted and, bowing, kissed her hand according to the custom of the country. Many well-mounted knights and squires also

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rode to meet her, together with the burgesses and noble merchants of Lisbon. The Jews and Saracens of the said place came separately, dressed in their own way, singing and dancing as was their custom. Thus was the lady led through the town to the infante’s palace [St. Martinho], with great joy and solemnity. There were many trumpets, musicians, and players of organs, harps and other instruments and the town was hung and decorated in many places with tapestries and other cloths and with branches of May.1 Following the entry of Dona Leonor into Lisbon, Jan van Eyck and his Burgundian companions departed for Sintra where they awaited news from Philip the Good at King João I’s summer estate. By mid July, word was received to proceed with a proxy marriage and the court left Sintra for the Lisbon Palace of Alcaçova. According to their chronicler’s account: The Sunday after this [signing of the marriage contract 24 July, 1429], at seven in the morning of 25 July in the royal palace at Lisbon, at the request of the king and his children, the lord of Roubaix, in the name of and acting as proctor of my lord of Burgundy, and having from him sufficient power and procuration, took and received my lady the infanta Elizabeth as wife and spouse of my lord of Burgundy, present the king, my lord Duarte, his eldest son, Dom Henrique, Dom João and Dom Fernando, his children ... and a large number of people of all estates. From this time on the ambassadors did their best to expedite the journey of my lady to Flanders, where the king was in honour bound, by the terms of the treaty, to transport her at his expense and deliver her to my lord of Burgundy. According to the promise of the king and my lord the infante his eldest son, my lady’s departure would take place before the end of September, except if prevented by contrary winds, or by the death or illness of herself or the king.2 Probably in the Royal Chapel of Alcaçova Palace, the Duke’s proxy, Jehan de Lannoy, Lord of Roubaix, wed Dona Isabel par parolle de present before “a great number of persons of all estates”.3 During the remain1 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 180–81. 2 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 180–81. 3 See W. H. James Weale, Hubert and Jan van Eyck: Their Life and Work (London: John Lane Company, 1908), lxii, lxxi–lxxii, cited by Edwin Hall, The Arnolfini Betrothal.

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der of his stay in Portugal, Jan van Eyck and his Burgundian companions were entertained with festive banquets, dances and jousts. Therefore, from late June until the last week of September 1429, the embassy remained in Lisbon, where Jan probably was granted studio space in the Alcáçova Palace. The peripatetic nature of his travels through northern Portugal, Galicia, Castile and Andalusia precludes an opportunity to paint such a complex theme as his Fountain of Life. On the other hand, he would have had ample time in Lisbon to have created a retable for King João I. Jan’s lost Fountain of Life has been proposed to be a Spanish commission given by Juan II of Castile, based upon the provenance of a replica in the Prado Museum (Fig. 3.2). The only documentation concerning the copy is in the provincial library of Segovia. An old book about the history of the Hieronymite Monastery of El Parral records a gift from Enrique IV, King of Castile (1439–1474): a painting described as a “dedication of the Church.” The donation must have occurred about 1459, when the Monastery of El Parral was completed.4 The Madrid Fountain of Life , generally dated about 1454, and even attributed to Petrus Christus.5 Another replica of the Fountain of Life is in the Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, Ohio (Fig. 3.3). The painting also has a Spanish provenance, as it was described in 1783 by Antonio Ponz. The work was displayed then in an oratorio of the Chapel of St. Jerome in the Cathedral of Palencia.6 A technical analysis of the Oberlin replica establishes that the panel is of soft pine wood indigenous to the Iberian Peninsula and it has a gypsum ground. By contrast, the Madrid painting is on oak panel with a chalk ground, suggesting the artistic practice of a Flemish master. Stylistically there is a difference between the Medieval Marriage and the Enigma of Van Eyck’s Double Portrait (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 79 and 156 note 61. 4 Pedro de Madrazo, “El Triunfo de la Iglesia sobre la Sinagoga, cuadro en tabla del siglo XV atribuido a Juan van Eyck,” Museo Español de Antigüedades 4 (Madrid: 1875): 1–40; Joshua Bruyn, Van Eyck Problemen (Utrecht: Haentjens Dekker & Gumbert, 1957); Elisa Bermejo Martinez, “Influencia de Van Eyck en la pintura española,” Archivo Español de Arte LXIII (1990): 555–69, at 564. 5 Dirk de Vos, “La Fontaine de Vie” [Imitateur de Jan van Eyck, copie d’après Petrus Christus?],” La peinture flamande au Prado, edited by Arnout Balis, Matías Díaz Padrón, Carl van de Velde, Hans Vlieghe (Antwerp: Fons Mercator, 1989): 42–45. Also see the Spanish edition: “Fuente de Gracia,” La Pintura Flamenca en el Prado (1989), 42–45. 6 Antonio Ponz [1725–1792], Viage de España, en que se da noticia de las cosas mas apreciables, y dignas de saberse, que hay en ella, 18 vols. (Madrid: Viuda de Ibarra, hijos, y compañía, 1784–94), see rpt. editions: (Madrid: 1983), XII, 154ff. and (Madrid: M. Aguilar, 1947), edited by Casto María del Rivero, 992ff.

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two versions of the Fountain of Life. The Madrid panel is characterized by subdued colors and muted tones by comparison with the Oberlin’s vibrant palette and luminosity.7 The middle of the fourteenth century marked the beginning of real splendor and luxury in European dress which reached the pinnacle of expression in courtly fashions. With a meticulous eye for detail and consummate command of painterly technique, van Eyck captured the magnificent ceremonial robes and strong religious affiliation which characterized the level of cultural status, economic stability and political importance that the Avis dynasty held among European counterparts in the fifteenth century. Although van Eyck’s original painting of the Fountain of Life is no longer extant, the Oberlin and Prado copies have preserved to a somewhat lesser degree, the wealth of information which the great Flemish master incorporated into his work. King João I (August 14, 1357: r. 1385–1433) and four of his sons (Fig. 3.4) kneel in dignified solemnity and deference behind an impressive assemblage of individuals whose garments define a broad representation of the various divisional branches and structural system of hierarchy that formed the foundation of the universal church. Details of both the courtly attire and liturgical garments reflect the prevailing social and philosophical attitudes, aesthetic criterion and affirmation of wealth that influenced the Gothic and Renaissance mode. The texture, quality, quantity, and color of the garments of one’s costume were crucial components of self-expression in which cloth became the determinate in art and fashion.8 Joshua Bruyn, “A Puzzling Picture at Oberlin, ‘The Fountain of Life’,” Allen Memorial Art Museum Bulletin, vol. 16 I (Fall, 1958): 4–17. Christine Mack, Acting Assistant Registrar of the Allen Memorial Art Museum, kindly provided information concerning the Oberlin Fountain of Life. Mr. Richard D. Buck completed a technical investigation of the work. 8 Michèle Beaulieu and Jeanne Baylé, Le Costume de Bourgogne de Philippe Le Hardi à la mort de Charles Le Téméraire (1364–1477) (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1956); Jules Étienne Joseph Quicherat, Historie de costume en France depuis les temps les plus reculés jusqu’ á la fin du XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Hachette et Cie, 1875); Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval española (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1956); idem., Trajas y modas en la España de los Reyes Católicos, 2 vols. (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1970); François Boucher, Histoire du costume en Occident de l’Antiquité à nos jours (Paris: Flammarion, 1983 rpt. of 1st ed. 1965); Negley B. Harte and Kenneth George Ponting (eds.), Cloth and Clothing in Medieval Europe, Essays in Memory of E.M. CarusWilson, ed. (London: Heinemann and Pasold Research Fund, 1982); idem., Textile history and economic history; essays in honour of Miss Julia de Lacy Mann (Manchester: Manches7

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Flemish wool was essentially heavy in texture and weave by nature, and was particularly adaptable to exploring and emphasizing the decorative effects of drapery. By draping the body in a complex of folds with a concern for their heights, depths, intersections, and their effects of light and shade, an additional significance seems to have been imparted to the wearer. The body might disappear within the folds of an enveloping robe, but the wearer would commands an aspect of dignity, majesty and stature. In early fifteenth-century art, women equally assumed a more graceful character, their beauty heightened by the magnificence of materials they selected for even the most somber of ceremonies. The more patrician and wealthier the wearer, the richer was the fall of the draperies and the more dramatic the colors—that was the first principle of dress.9 The history of Flanders is inexorably intertwined with the history of its cloth making industry (Fig. 3.5).10 ter University Press, 1973); Negley B. Harte (ed.), The New Draperies in the Low Countries and England, 1300–1800 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997); Agnès Page, “Vêtir le Prince. Tissus et couleurs à la cour de Savoie (1427–1447) VIII Cahiers Lausannois d’Histoire Médiévale (Lausanne: Section d’Histoire, 1993); Michèle Beaulieu, Les tissus d’art (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1953; 2nd ed. 1965). Françoise Piponnier, Costume et vie sociele. La cour d’Anjou, XIVe – XVe siècles (Paris-The Hague: Mouton, 1970); idem., “Le Costume nobiliaire en France au bas Moyen Âge,” Adelige Sachkulture des Spätmittelalters (Vienna: Ősterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften: 1982): 343–63; Perrine Mane and Françoise Piponnier, Se vêtir au Moyen Âge (Paris: Adam Biro, 1995); Dress in the Middle Ages, tr. Caroline Beamish (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1997); Margaret Scott, The History of Dress Series: Late Gothic Europe 1400–1500 (London: Mills and Boon, Ltd., 1980; idem., A Visual History of Costume: The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries (London: Batsford Publishers, 1986); Odile Blanc, Parades et parures: l’ invention du corps de mode à la fin du Moyen Âge (Paris: Gallimard, 1996); Antoine de Schryver, “Notes pour servir a l’histoire du costume au XVe siècle dans les anciens Pays-Bas et en Bourgogne,” Annales de Bourgogne XXIX (1957): 29–42; Marie Schuette and Sigrid Müller-Christensen, The Art of Embroidery, translated by Donald King (New York: Praeger, 1964); Kay Staniland, Medieval Craftsmen; Embroiderers (London: British Museum Press, 1991); A. Chevalier, “Medieval Dress,” Ciba Review LVII (June, 1947): 2061–2075. 9 Guy De Poerck, La Draperie médiévale en Flandres et en Artois. Technique et terminologie, 3 vols. (Bruges: De Tempel, 1951); Gustavo Matos Sequeira, Historia do trajo em Portugal (Porto: Livraria Chardron, 1900); Olga Sronkovà, Gothic Women’s Fashion (Prague: Artia, 1954). 10 H. Wescher, “Cloth Merchants of the Renaissance as Patrons of Art,” Ciba Review XLVII (1943): 1694–1724; Carla Rahn Phillips, “Spanish Merchants and the Wool Trade in the Sixteenth Century,” Sixteenth Century Journal XIV, 3 (1983): 259–83; Georges Espinas and Henri Pirenne, Recueil de documents relatifs à l’ histoire de l’ industrie drapière en Flandre (Brussels: P. Imbreghts, 1906); A.L. Gutmann’s articles in the Ciba Review XIV (October, 1938): “Flanders” 466–71; “The Influence of Cloth-Making on Flemish History”:

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Key factors were a direct result of the superior methodology used in the preparation of the raw materials (namely wool and linen): the high level of skill demanded of the weavers; and the extraordinary standards of technical proficiency maintained in the process of dyeing.11 Flemish cloth displayed a range of colors unsurpassed in Europe and it was sought by the wealthy patrons even as far away as Imperial China. By virtue of its textile industry’s renown, Flanders gained a position of eminence which surpassed European counterparts for almost two centuries. Fashion, and the important arts of tapestry and painting, were motivated and nurtured by the manufacture of textiles. The flourishing industry left an indelible mark on the future direction of Western art.12 472–76; “The Social Organization of Cloth-Making”: 477–83; “Distribution of the Flemish Textile Industry”: 481–83; “Flemish Cloth in Art and Fashion”: 488–90. 11 André G. Ott, Études sur les couleurs en vieux français (Paris: E. Bouillon, 1899); Lucien Gerschel, “Couleur et teinture chez divers peuples indo-européens,” Annales ESC, 21e année, 3 (1966): 608–31; Michel Pastoureau, “Ceci est mon sang. Le christianisme médiéval et la couleur rouge,” Le Pressoir mystique (Paris: Du Cerf, 1990): 43–56; idem., Figures et couleurs. Études sur la symbolique et la sensibilité d’ histoire médiévales (Paris: Léopard d’Or, 1989); idem, Traité d’ héraldique, with a preface by Jean Hubert (Paris: Picard, 1979; rpt. 1993); idem., Le Vêtement: histoire, archéologie et symbolique vestimentaires au Moyen Age (Paris: Léopard d’Or, 1989). Robert Delort, “Fibres textiles et plantes tinctoriales,” L’ambiente vegetale nell’alto Medioevo, XXXVI settimane di studio sull’alto Medioevo di Spoleto (Spoleto: 1990): 821–61; M.C. Neuburger, “Medieval Dyeing Techniques,” Ciba Review X (June, 1938): 337–40; A.L. Gutmann, “Technical Peculiarities of Flemish ClothMaking and Dyeing,” Ciba Review XIV (October, 1938): 484–87; H. Weschler, “Fabrics and Colours in the Ceremonial of the Court of Burgundy,” Ciba Review LI (July, 1946): 1850–1856. Wolfgang Born’s articles in Ciba Review IV (December, 1937): “Purpura Shell Fish”: 106–10 and “Purple in the Middle Ages,” 119–23; Alfred Leix, ”Medieval Dye Markets in Europe,” Ciba Review X (June, 1938): 324–29, and his articles in Ciba Review I (September, 1937): “Dyeing and Dyers’ Guilds in the Medieval Craftsmanship”: 10–16, and “Dyes of the Middle Ages”: 19–21; “Oriental Dye Markets of the Middlge Ages”: 330–34; Kenneth George Ponting, A Dictionary of Dyes and Dyeing (London: Mills and Boon, 1980; François Delamare and Bernard Guineau, Colors: The Story of Dyes and Pigments (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2000); idem., Les matériaux de la couleur (Paris: Gallimard, 1999). 12 The literature on late Gothic tapestries is too vast to cite, but Guy Delmarcel, Flemish Tapestry (New York-London: Harry N. Abrams, Inc–Thames & Hudson, 2000); rpt. of 1st ed. 1999 (Tielt, Belgium: Lannoo Publishers), contains a comprehensive bibliography of primary monographs and exhibition catalogues. Also consult: H. Wescher’s articles in Ciba Review LI (July, 1946): “Burgundy in the Middle Ages”: 1831–1834; “Foundations of the wealth of the Dukes of Burgundy”: 1835–1840; “Fashion and Elegance at the Court of Burgundy”: 1841–1848; “The Dukes of Burgundy as Patrons of Pictorial Tapestry Weaving”: 1858–1865; and his articles in Ciba Review XLI (October, 1941): “Embroidered and Woven

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Flanders had reached the acme of perfection in the production of textiles during the closing years of the thirteenth century when the medieval mood of spiritual elation was at its most fervent level of expression. With newfound emphasis on secular power, material success, and luxury, interest was kindled in the kinds of fabric for apparel, textures of the cloth, and accessories to affirm status.13 As cosmopolitan tastes accelerated in Europe, fashion dictated the wearing of velvet, brocades, silks and taffeta, and cloth worked in silver and gold threads, as well as fine linen and cambrics. The production of linen was introduced during the latter half of the fifteenth century and primarily established as an industry in cloth manufacturing under the patronage of Philip the Good.14 Furs also became a major commodity in the Flemish markets, particularly at trade fairs beginning with the Duke’s immediate predecessors, Philip the Bold and John the Fearless. Some furs such as rabbit and squirrel were common and their colors accorded with the season, ranging from summer’s reddish brown (vair) to winter’s grey (gris). Other pelts acquired to adorn the raiment of the nobility included sable, marten, otter, ermine, weasel and fox. Flanders’ affiliation with the Hanseatic League insured a much wider variety and ample, year round supply in exchange for cloth and raw supplies of wool imported to Burgundian ports from England, Portugal and Spain15 (Fig. 3.6–3.7). Portraits”: 1492–1497); “Herdsmen, Peasants, and Labourers on Woven and Embroidered Tapestries of the Gothic Period”: 1498–1504. 13 Robert Baldwin, “Textile Aesthetics in Early Netherlandish Painting,” Textiles of the Low Countries in European Economic History, Session B–15: Proceedings, Tenth International Economic History Congress, Leuven, August 1990, ed. Erik Aerts and John H. Munro (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1990): 32–40; Marc Boone and Walter Prevenier (eds.), La draperie ancienne des Pays-Bas: débouchés et stratégies de survie, 14e –16e siècles: Actes du Colloque, Ghent, 28 avril 1992/ Drapery Production in the Late Medieval Low Countries: Markets and Strategies for Survival, 14th–16th Centuries: Proceedings of the Colloquium Ghent, April 28th 1992 (Louvain-Apeldoorn: Garant, 1993). 14 Françoise Piponnier, “Linge de maison et linge de corps au Moyen Âge d’après les inventaires bourguignons,” Ethnologie française 3 (1986): 239–48; idem.,“Matières premières du costume et groupes sociaux. Bourgogne, XIVe – XVe siècles,” Inventaires aprèsdécès et ventes de meubles (Louvain-La-Neuve: 1988): 271–90. 15 Robert Sabatino Lopez and Irving W. Raymond, Medieval Trade in the Mediterranean World (New York: Columbia University Press, 1955; rpt. 2001); Elspeth Mary Veale, The English Fur Trade in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1966); Anthony R. Bridbury, Medieval English Clothmaking. An Economic Survey (London: Heinemann Educational, 1982); Eileen Power, The Wool Trade in English Medieval History (LondonNew York: Clarendon and Oxford University Press, 1941; 2nd ed. New York: Greenwood Press, 1987); Henri Pirenne, Medieval Cities: Their Origins and the Revival of Trade, tr. from

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Heirs to the legacy of a proud and cherished textile tradition, Jan van Eyck focused upon capturing elegant folds, gemstone colors, and a sumptuous array of textures. Simulating damask and intricate embroidery, he articulated costumes with jeweled borders and trimming which had been introduced into the fashionable mode of Renaissance dress. Like other contemporary court artists, he did not work in the seclusion of a monastic cell, but in direct contact with his patrons and in the bustle of daily life where differences in social rank were revealed by the nature of one’s apparel. Therefore, surrounded by the finest silks, velvets, brocades and linens of his day, he had a surfeit of materials available for his perusal. Only a small percentage of his works are extant. However, the few autographed paintings on panel which he created between 1432 and 1441 reveal his constant delight in imitating the texture of fabrics and furs, as well as his selective eye for extrapolating what he wished the viewer to see. Throughout most of the Gothic and Renaissance periods, Flemish artists customarily depicted sacred figures in altarpieces as wearing robes fashioned in plain flowing cloth. Perhaps it was believed that the strong plastic expression achieved by heavy falls of drapery best conveyed a sense of divine serenity, absolute purity and spiritual impact. In paintings of the Passion, particularly, the ungarnished and bulky mantles cascading over the shoulders of despondent witnesses heightened the emotive qualities and served to underscore the full weight of human sorrow. On the other hand, many saints were depicted wearing the newer fabrics that marked the pride and glory of Renaissance achievement. Of course, secular manuscript illuminations and tapestries which illustrated subjects of ancient history and mythology manifest the fifteenth-century attraction for latest vogue in fashion. Eschewing French by Frank D. Halsey (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1946); Robert Delort, “Les Animaux et l’habillement,” L’uomo di fronte al mondo animale nell’alto Medioevo, XXXI settimane di studio sull’alto Medioevo di Spoleto (Spoleto: 1983): 673–700; idem., Le Commerce des fourrures en Occident à la fin du Moyen Âge: vers 1300–vers 1450. École Française de Rome, 2 vols. (Rome: Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises d’Athènes et de Rome, 236, 1978); Walter Prévenier, “Les pertubations dans les relations commerciales anglo-bourguignonnes,” Économies et Sociétés au Moyen Âge. Mélanges offerts à E. Perroy (Paris: Sorbonne, 1973); Marie-Rose Thielemans, Bourgogne et Angleterre, Relations politiques et économiques entre les Pays-Bas Bourguignons et l’Angleterre, 1435–1467 (Brussels: Presses Universitaires de Bruxelles, 1966); Alfred Leix, “Trade Routes of the Middle Ages,” Ciba Review X (June, 1938): 314–23; “The Sociological Basis of Mediaeval Craftsmanship, Ciba Review I (September, 1937): 3–9: António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, Hansa e Portugal na Idade Média (Lisbon: A. Tomás dos Anjos, 1959.

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classical drapery, the artists represented ancient heroes and heroines in the au courant dress of the Burgundian court. With the ongoing solidification of territorial boundary lines and emergence of nations which shaped the physiognomy of modern Europe, the Renaissance elite devised a number of ornamental wraps for their ceremonial occasions. Garments illustrated in the Fountain of Life provide concrete testimony to the multiple features of Byzantine, Judaic, Flemish, Italianate and Lusitanian origin that were incorporated into the distinctive mode of dress that characterized the era. Under the domination of Byzantine rule the style of liturgical dress for both the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox branches of the Church had been standardized between the fourth and eighth centuries and in essence became the visual expression of the Christian dogma and teachings. Due to increasing trade with Constantinople, major components of the Byzantine style also exerted a strong influence in the courtly dress of medieval Europe.16 Beginning with the reign of Emperor Charlemagne, a number garments and accessories adopted at the time of the Carolingian supremacy became traditional attributes of ceremonial attire until the late fifteenth century, at which time the fundamentals of style underwent a metamorphosis resulting in even more extravagant fashions.17 One costume combined the beauty of all’antica drapery with the luxuriant heavy silks, damasks, 16 Eliyahu Ashtor, Studies on the Levantine Trade in the Middle Ages (London: Variorum Reprints, 1978); idem., East-West Trade in the Medieval Mediterranean, ed. Benjamin Z. Kedar (London: Variorum Reprints, 1986); idem., Levant Trade in the Later Middle Ages, ed. Benjamin Z. Kedar (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983); idem., Technology, Industry, and Trade: The Levant versus Europe, 1250–1500 (Hampshire, GB–Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1992). 17 Louis Halphen, Charlemagne et l’empire carolingen (Paris: revised edition A. Michel, 1949; 1st ed. 1947; rpt. 1995); Eginhard, Vie de Charlemagne, ed. Louis Halphen (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1938); Jean Hubert, Jean Porcher, Wolfgang Fritz Volbach, L’Empire Carolingien (Paris: Gallimard, 1968; rpt. London: Thames & Hudson, 1970, translated from the French by James Fymons, Stuart Gilbert and Robert Allen); Robert Folz, Le souvenir et la légende de Charlemagne dans l’Empire germanique médiéval (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1950); idem., The concept of empire in Western Europe from the fifth to the fourteenth century; translated from the French by Sheila Ann Ogilvie (London, Edward Arnold, 1969); Aziz Suryal Atiya, Crusade, Commerce and Culture (London-Bloomington, IN: Oxford University Press, 1962); Derek Baker, Relations between the East and West in the Middle Ages (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1973); Jean Ebersolt, Orient et Occident: recherches sur les influences byzantines et orientales en France avant et pendant les Croisades, 2 vols. (ParisBrussels: Éditions G. van Oest, 1928–1929); H.V.J. Hazard (ed.), A History of the Crusade, 3 vols. (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1975), III, The XIVth and XVth Centuries;

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brocades and cloth of gold distinctive to the Orient; in a brilliant galaxy of color accented by embroidered and jewel-encrusted borders and girdles. To this mode secular clothing also appropriated some obvious influences introduced by the invading barbarians such as the custom of lining garments with fur and the concept of bifurcated garments in male attire used both with and without the combination of a skirt (bases). All of these factors are important for an analysis of the ceremonial attire worn by King João I and two of the Avis princes in the Fountain of Life. While each royal figure wears a voluminous outer robe, their respective garments fall into different categories of personal adornment and different types of luxurious fabric. The Fountain of Life was painted at the conclusion of negotiations establishing a Burgundian-Lusitanian dynastic and commercial alliance. King João I, his three eldest legitimate sons’ Princes Duarte, Pedro, and Henrique—and their half-brother, Afonso, the Count of Barcelos (1380– December, 1461), are portrayed to the left of the Fons Vitae. Their dextra position unequivocally proclaims the royals to be the defenders of the universal Ecclesia.18 A fortiori a Portuguese origin for the Jan van Eyck lost masterpiece, it follows that the crowned sovereign with an ermine cloak would be King João I, who, in 1429 would have been seventy-two (Fig. 3.8). The monarch’s likeness is known from his gisant in the royal pantheon of Batalha Monastery, which will be analyzed later (Figs. 3.9–3.12). The stone effigy strongly resembles the ruler in Van Eyck’s replicas of the Fountain of Life. In 1391 João I had legislated on the subject of dress, stating that only members of the upper class were entitled to fine tunics and surcoats, fur, gems and gold or silver adornments. His regulation even prohibited everyone who was not a knight from wearing hose which was “printed, painted, or striped in Wolfgang Born, “Textile Ornaments of the Post-Classical East and of Medieval Europe,” Ciba Review XXXVII (January, 1941): 1331–1346. 18 César Pemán y Pemartin, Juan van Eyck y España (Cadiz: Museo Provincial de Bellas Artes de Cadiz, 1969), 88–92, has attempted to identify the secular figures as John II of Castile and Burgundian diplomats of Philip the Good. If the embassy were depicted, it seems odd that Van Eyck would not have included a “self-portrait.” Worthy of pondering is a reason for depicting the Burgundian delegates to the exclusion of high-ranking Castilian grandees. Consult Joaquim Pedro Oliveira Martins, Os filhos de d. João I [1891] (Lisbon: Parceria A.M. Pereira, 1936, 6th ed.). 19 António Henrique R. de Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1971), 58, 76, states the laws of João I were reaffirmed fifty years later by Dom Afonso V. He cites the Ordenaçoens do Senhor Rey D. Affonso V (5 vols.), V, title XLIII (Coimbra: 1792), 154–57.

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back.19 The display of fine scarlet was limited to the royal family. The woolen cloth was woven in Bruges, Ghent and other textile centers in the North, and colored with a costly red dye made from the eggs of the insect kermes vermilio, which thrived on Mediterranean oak.20 João I owned a Lombard vermillion mantle embroidered with gold which opened on the right side and was lined with ermine.21 King João I in the Eyckian replicas of the Fountain of Life wears an elegant capa, or mantle, made of a rich blue/green velvet fabric and lined in white fur, perhaps vair, the choice pelt obtained from the bellies of squirrels. Over the mantle is an ermine chapeirão (chaperon), ornamented with black tails that encircles the shoulders and forms a draped cowl around the neckline. His heavy mantle opens to reveal a long silk tunic, that is reminiscent of the exquisite ceremonial sakkoz (dalmatics) imported from Constantinople by Byzantine emperors. The garment is made of deep green cut velvet patterned in threads of gold and lined in brown sable, a portion of which forms a narrow cuff at the base of he long sleeves. On his head is an elaborate gold crown worked in relief designs of repoussé, accented with bezel set stones and pearls, and bordered top and bottom by an ornate band carrying domed pearls also held fast in bezel settings. In 1428 Prince Duarte (October 31, 1391–September 13, 1438), João I’s eldest son, is documented as having worn as a wedding gown in Coimbra “a very richly embellished houppelande,” a voluminous coat decorated with fur and having long sleeves that often were slashed along the sides (Figs. 3.13–3.15).22 Jan van Eyck appears to have represented the thirty-eight year old heir to the throne in his marriage attire, a full-length circular cut green velvet mantle that features a capelet about the shoulders that is scalloped around the lower edge, and is longer at the back of the garment than across

Also consult: António de Sousa Silva Costa Lobo, Historia de sociedade em Portugal no século XV (Lisbon: Imprenta Nacional, 1903). 20 J.H. Munro, “The Medieval Scarle and the Economics of Sartorial Splendor,” Cloth and Clothing in Medieval Europe, ed. Negley Harte and Kenneth George Ponting (1983): 53–63. 21 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 66. Fernão Lopes [b. 1380], Crónica de D. João I, ed. António Sérgio, 2 vols. (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1945–49), I, Chapter LIV, 107–8. 22 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 64. For Duarte’s reign, see Humberto Baquero Moreno, Itinerários de el-rei D. Duarte (1433–1438) (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da História, 1976).

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the front of the figure.23The shade of green in Duarte’s houppelande is a particularly striking moss green, not a clear emerald green. The rich bronze tonality of this shade recalled a reference in which Guillaume le Martin, the court tailor for John the Fearless, records having made the Duke a halflength houppelande of a “fine green brown” fabric.24 This must have been a very distinctive and highly prized color for male attire. Even more, green was the color of the chivalric Order of Avis. Duarte’s entire mantle and capelet have been lined in marten pelts that lavishly fall to the hemline of the garment along the full length of the deeply slit side seams. Beneath his robe the prince appears to be wearing a long, dark emerald green under tunic with a standing collar and moderately full bag sleeves gathered into a cuff band about the wrist. The fabric of this under tunic drapes softly and appears to be silk velvet. Perhaps to symbolize Prince Duarte’s humility as a Christomimetes and destiny to accept the Portuguese crown, he was not provided with a hat.25 His hair has been styled in the fashionable Renaissance mode worn by younger men, that is, cut in medium to longer lengths which taper gradually from below the ears in front to about the shoulders in back with the ends shaped in curls. Duarte’s personality seems to have been written in the facial features which suggest a very gentle and philosophical spirit at odds with the ambitious realism of his age. There is wonderful dignity in his bearing, and true grace to his mien. His physiognomy, notably the high cheekbones and square jaw, compare favorably with a portrait miniature accompanying the Crónica das Feitos da Guiné authored by the court historian Gomes Eanes de Zurara. Though this portrait traditionally has been purported to be that of Henrique the Navigator, Dagoberto Markl has presented compelling arguments to re-identify the frontispiece as a likeness of King Duarte added to a compilation of manuscripts ordered by his son Afonso V (January 15, 1432; r. 1450–August 28, 1481).26 Yoshiko Tokui, “Usage et symbole du costume de couleur verte dans la France médiévale,” Bulletin de la Société franco-japonaise d’art et d’archéologie 6 (1986). 24 Ciba Review (Basle: 1843): 1939. 25 Ernst Kantorowitz, The King’s Two Bodies. A Study in Medieval Political Theology (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957) analyzes the concept of the ruler as imitator of Christ. 26 Dagoberto L. Markl, O Retábulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os Documentos (Lisbon: Editorial Caminho, 1988). See the Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné by Gomes Eanes de Zurara [1410–1473] in Vida e obras de Gomes Eanes de Zurara, ed. António Joaquim Dias 23

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Kneeling in front of his elder brother Duarte, Prince Pedro (December 9, 1392– May 20, 1449) is dressed in a carefully tailored full-length scarlet zornea (Figs. 3.16–3.17). This striking version of an outer robe was the male equivalent of the female gamurra and enjoyed great popularity in Italy and Spain during the fifteenth century. The garment was cut similar to a full cape but was worn belted at the waistline and had long, flowing sleeves that hung to the hemline. Many beautiful adaptations of this generously proportional outer robe are seen in Italian cinquecento art. Worn in both long and short versions, this garment combined the features of the surcoat and the houppelande as one into a singular garment. Italian silks worn by the upper class were imported to Flanders and England, but the Florentines, Milanese, Lucchese and Genoese merchants also were active in Portugal.27 Judging by the fall and layering of crisp-edge and carefully rolled cartridge pleats about the waist, Dom Pedro’s zornea appears to be fine wool. Most probably the fabric is the much-coveted Brussels cloth rather than velvet. The cloth is gathered at the waist with a heavy gold belt composed of indiDinis, 2 vols.(Lisbon: Divisão de Publicações a Biblioteca, Agência Geral das Colónias, 1949). Also see Gomes Eanes de Zurara, The Chronicle of the Discovery and Conquest of Guinea, translated by Charles Raymond Beazley and Edgar Prestage, 2 vols. (New York: B. Franklin, 1963) and the Chronique de Guinée, 1453, de Gomes Eanes de Zurara, edited by Jacqueline Paviot, translated and annotated by Léon Bourdon with the participation of Robert Ricard et al (Paris: Editions Chandeigne, 1994). 27 Rosita Levi-Pisetzky, Storia del costume in Italia (Milan: Istituto Editoriale Italiano, 1964), II–III; Elisa Monas, “Contemplate What Has Been Done: Silk Fabrics in Paintings by Jan van Eyck,” HALI 60 (December, 1991): 101–13; idem., “Silk Textiles Purchased for the Great Wardrobe of the Kings of England 1325–1462,” Ancient and Medieval Textiles. Studies in Honour of Donald King, ed. Lisa Monnas and Hero Granger-Taylor (ca. 1992), 283–309; Raymond de Roover, “La communauté des marchards Lucquois à Bruges de 1377 à 1404,” Annales de la Société d’Émulation de Bruges (1949): 23–89; Sophie SchneebalgPerelman, “”Le Rôle de la banque de Medicis dans la diffusion des tapisseries flamandes,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art XXXVIII (1969): 19–41; Jean Lestocquoy, “Financiers, Courtiers, Hautelisseurs d’Arras aux XIIIe et XIVe siècle,” Revue Belge de Philologie et d’Histoire XVII (1938): 911–22; Paul M. Kendall and Vincent Ilardi (ed.), Dispatches with Related Documents of Milanese Ambassadors in France and Burgundy, 1450–1483, 3 vols. (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1970; rpt. 1981). The silk trade flourished in the Iberian Peninsula prior to Renaissance. See Maurice Lombard, Études d’ économie médiévale. Les textiles dans le monde musulman de VIIe au XIIe siècle (Paris-The Hague-New York: Mouton, 1978; Florence Levis May, Silk Textiles of Spain. Eighth-Fifteenth Century (New York: Hispanic Society of America, 1957). Some of the finest fabrics survive in Burgos as the Cistercian Convent of Las Huelgas. See Concha Herrero Carretero, Museo de tela medievales. Monasterios de Santa María la Real de Huelgas Burgos Madrid: Editorial Patrimonio Nacional, 1988).

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vidual plaques worked in relief and hinged together to form a solid band. The wool garment is snugly fitted around the neckline and shoulders and hangs in generously draped folds which terminate in deeply dagged panels around the entire circumference of the hemline and cape-like treatment of the sleeves. A lining of silver blue squirrel has been extended to form a narrow fur border that outlines each of the beautifully proportioned falling panels. The standing collar and narrow sleeves of his dark purple doublet are barely visible beneath the enveloping outer robe. Prince Pedro was a man of girth. His round and fleshy face with its hard set features, is clean shaven, and his hair is tightly curled in a fashionable shoulder-length bob. His low crowned, pill-boxed, hat of beaver fur (beauvoir) extends into a duckbill with a shaped brim at the front which has been fastened upward. The same type of fur hat is worn by some of the “just judges” and knights in Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece. While the hat bears some resemblance to the Italian low velvet black biretta, which was of a similar shape, the biretta featured full-round split brims customarily turned up about the low crown. An anonymous Flemish portrait in Berlin has been proposed to be a likeness of Jehan de Lannoy, the Burgundian diplomat who traveled to Lisbon in 1429. The sitter, however, has a countenance which is nearly identical with that of Pedro in the Fountain of Life. Between 1425 and 1428, the thirtytwo year old Portuguese prince had traveled abroad to gain experience in international affairs. Originally Prince Pedro had intended to visit the Holy Land, but this pilgrimage was cancelled upon receiving news of Duarte’s impending marriage, scheduled for September of 1428 (Fig. 3.18).28 Pedro departed for England in the summer of 1425 and arrived around September 29 (Michaelmas). He and his retinue visited Oxford before leaving at the end of December, possibly from Dover. They arrived at Ostend on December 21 and were in Oudenburg by the next day. After spending the night in the Abbey, Pedro visited the Coenobium and Church. He then began a circuit 28 The entire account of Prince Pedro’s voyage is summarized from Francis Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass: Cambridge University Press, 1961), particularly Ch. II, “Preparations for Departure,” 20–30 and Ch. III, “The European Tour,” 31–58. Also consult: Humberto Baquero Moreno, O Infante D. Pedro, duque de Coimbra: itinerários e ensaios históricos (Porto: Universidade Portucalense, 1997); Mário Domingues, O regente D. Pedro, príncipe europeu (Lisbon: Empressa Nacional de Publicidade, 1964); Nicolae lorga, Tara latina cea mai departata în Europa: Portugalia (Bucharest: Editura Casei scoalelor, 1928).

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of the important centers of Flanders. On December 23 he arrived in Bruges and then proceeded to Ghent, Brussels, Liége and Louvain. Sometime between Christmas and early February of 1426 he likely commissioned the Berlin portrait as a souvenir of his trip.29 Next on Prince’s flexible itinerary was Germany. Certainly his entourage passed through Aachen because of its proximity to Cologne.30 Records substantiate that Prince Pedro entered Cologne on February 24, 1426, where he visited the “Shrine of the Holy Three Kings” on the feast day of St. Matthias. From Cologne, he traveled to Nuremberg and Regensburg. By late winter of 1426 Pedro had reached the Austrian cities of Linz and Vienna. Documents indicate that “a Prince of Portugal” during the first half of 1427 served in the armies of Sigismund, second son of Charles IV of Luxembourg and king of Hungary (1368: r. 1387–1437) (Fig. 3.19). Eberhard Windecke, Sigismund’s contemporary biographer, mentions that a “son of the King of Portugal” participated in the campaign in Romania against the Turks, a fray which had begun in 1426.31 During the eastern campaign of 1426–1428, Dom Pedro accompanied the “King of Hungary” to the towns of Buda, Belgrade and Bucharest.32 While in Transylvania, sometime in March of 1428, the Prince must have received word about his brother’s forthcoming marriage. Abandoning plans to visit Jerusalem, the Portuguese advanced towards to Trieste. They arrived in Venice about April 5, 1428 and then departed for Florence on April 22. Passing quickly through Padua, Ferrera and Bologna, they reached their destination on April 25. By early May, Pedro was in Rome. In order to avoid crossing France, he decided to press on to the port city of Livorno. Reaching Barcelona either July 2 or 8, 1428, Pedro then sailed for Valencia, arriving on July 24 at the court of Alfonso V of Aragon, where he requested Doña Isabel of Aragon-Urguell’s hand in marriage. Strict etiquette governed weddings between European dynastic houses. While a conPemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 89–90 and Pl. 66. Charles Zika, “Hosts, Processions and Pilgrimages: Controlling the Sacred in Fifteenth-Century Germany,” Past and Present CXVIII (1988): 25–64. See Henk van Os, The Way to Heaven: Relic Veneration in the Middle Ages (Baarn: De Prom, exhibition catalogue Museum Catherijneconvent, Utrecht, 2000); Brigitte Corley, Painting and Patronage in Cologne 1300–1500 (London: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2000). 31 Eberhard Windecke, Eberhard Windeckes Denkwürdigkeiten zur Geschichte des Zeitalters Kaiser Sigmunds, ed. W. Altmann (Berlin: 1893); 2nd ed. Dr. von Hagen (Leipzig: 1899). 32 [Historisch Museum Boedapest], Royal Palace and Gothic Statues of Medieval Buda (Budapest: exhibition catalogue, 1990). 29

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ventional betrothal ceremony transpired in Valencia, Prince Pedro would have arranged for nuptials of a more formal nature to occur in his homeland. An Aragonese delegation accompanied the Portuguese on their return. Among them was Lluis Dalmáu, the pintor de cámara of Alfonso V, who in 1431 was sent to Flanders.33 The entourage passed swiftly through Castile and León: Aranda de Duero (August 24), Roa (August 28), Valladolid (September 1), Zamora (September 5), Salamanca, Ciudad Real and Ledesma. Pedro arrived just in time to participate in the late September wedding of Prince Duarte at Coimbra. His own marriage to Isabel of Urguell occurred nearly a year later, on September 13, 1429. As a repercussion of his success voyage abroad, Prince Pedro became one of the twenty-six knights of the Order of the Garter on April 22, 1427. His brother Duarte did not become a member until the death of King João on August 14, 1433. In the Fountain of Life Prince Pedro does not wear the necklace of the Garter, but an unusual collar with a continuous series of small stubs. It is nearly identical to the collar worn by the youngest Magus in the Epiphany folio of the famous Book of Hours of Maréchal Boucicaut (Figs. 3.20). Guyot de Villanueve in 1889 traced the origin of the Order of the Knoestigen Stok (knotty staff) which was founded in 1406 by Duke Louis II d’Orléans (1371–1407), leader of the Armagnacs, an anti-Burgundian faction in France.34 The batôn noueux (knotty staff) terminating in the ecu d’or (golden shield) insignia had been adopted in 1403. In his discussion of the Boucicaut Epiphany, Milliard Meiss postulated that the collar 33 After attending the marriage ceremony of Prince Pedro, the Aragonese delegation must have departed immediately in order to celebrate the feast of Christmas at home. The fact that Lluis Dalmáu received payment as a “court-painter” in Valencia on December 3, 1428, would seem to belie any meeting with Van Eyck in Portugal. See Chandler Rathfon Post, A History of Spanish Painting, 14 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1930–1966), VII, Part I, 10–11. On September 6, 1431, Alfonso V provided Dalmáu with funding for travel to Flanders. Departing with Guillaume d’Uxelles, a tapestry specialist, Dalmáu perhaps was commissioned to study the manufacturing techniques in the Low Countries with an aim for establishing a royal tapestry factory in Aragon. Since he did not return to Valencia until about 1436, when he signed receipts on July 7 for a few paintings, Dalmáu resided in Flanders for a sufficient duration to have assimilated Eyckian style. 34 Jan Six, «De Orde van den knoestigen Stok en van de Schaaf,» Mededeelingen der Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen. Afdeeling Letterkunde LVIII, serie B, No. 3, (1924): 53–65. See Pemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 90 and Enguerrand de Mostrelet, Histoire de Bourgogne. Chroniques 10297, ed. L. Douët d’Arcq (Paris, 1857); Colette Beaune, “Costume et pouvoir en France à la fin du moyen âge: les devises royales vers 1400,” Revue des Sciences Humaines LV (1981): 125–46.

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worn by the Magus alluded to the assassination of Louis II d’Orléans on 23 November 1407, based upon the emblematic “Eagle” in the Maréchal’s prayer book.35 The heraldic bird which appears in an initial miniature opening the Office of the Dead, is perched on a golden knotted stick glazed in rose. The stubby collars worn by both Prince Pedro in the Fountain of Life and the Magus in the Epiphany, however, pertain to an entirely different chivalric order. Jean le Maingre, the Maréchal Boucicaut, had fought with Philip the Good’s father, Jean the Fearless, in the most ambitious of the century’s crusades, the Nicopolis expedition of 1396.36 This campaign occurred in response to the advance of Ottoman Turks in the Balkans, which threatened the seaports of the Adriatic. Between 1392 and 1394 diplomatic discussion centered on a two-part crusade, an initial broach in 1395 to be commanded by John of Gaunt, Philip the Bold and Louis of Orléans, to be followed with a joint attack led by Charles VI of France and Richard II of England. By the winter of 1395–96, the royal princes had withdrawn from the planned advance. While Philip the Bold intended to lead the crusade as late as May of 1395, he ultimately relinquished command to his eldest son John, then age twenty-four and Duke of Nevers. Departing symbolically from the capital of the Duchy, Dijon, on April 30, 1396, the Duke of Nevers and his confraternity of select knights foregathered Montbéliard before marching to Regensburg.37 Sailing down the Danube to Vienna, they arrived in June at Buda where they were joined Bernard Guenée, Un meurtre, une société: l’assassinat du duc d’Orléans, 23 novembre 1407 (Paris: 1992). For heraldic devices of Louis d’Orléans and Jean sans Peur, consult Éva Kovács, “Le collier Hohenlohe,” L’Âge d’Or de l’Orfévrerie Parisienne au temps des princes de Valois, with a preface by Danielle Gaborit-Chopin, ed. Jean-Claude Garreta (Dijon-Budapest: Éditions Faton-Szépmüvészeti Müzeum, 2004), Ch. X, 195–217, especially 199–203; P. Muner, Le Collier de Jean-sans Peur,” Souvenir de la Flandre-Wallone I (1861): 98–107. 36 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 59–78. Among several useful texts he cites are: Aziz Suryal Atiya, The Crusade of Nicopolis (London: Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1934; reprinted New York: AMS Press, 1978); idem, The Crusade in the Later Middle Ages (London: London, Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1938), 519–528 (2nd ed. New York: Kraus Reprint Co., 1970). 37 Henri David, Philippe le Hardi, duc de Bourgogne et co-régent de France de 1392 à 1404. Le train somptuaire d’un grand Valois (Dijon: Impr. Bernigaud et Privat, 1947), 144–48 (final arrangements in Maris on March 28, 1396) and 737–38 (Preparations by Jean the Fearless for the voyage, which included the acquisition of spectacular green satin tents, heraldic banners embroidered in gold and silver, and apparel for his retinue). See Richard Vaughan, John the Fearless. The Growth of Burgundian Power (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1966); idem., Valois Burgundy (Bristol: Western Printing Services, Ltd., 1975). 35

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by Emperor Sigismund and international contingents of soldiers. Despite initial victories in the Danube valley, the Western crusade suffered an overwhelming defeat on September 25 south of the Bulgarian town of Nicopolis. Sigismund was able to elude capture by Sultan Bayazid I “the Thunderbolt,” but only 300 troops survived from the Franco-Burgundian army. John the Fearless had contributed about 150 men-at-arms of his personal company to the crusade, and he was imprisoned with several of his “knights of honor.” Among them was the Maréchal Boucicaut, who had volunteered seventy of his own men to the fray. Ransomed for nearly 200,000 golden francs raised by Philip the Bold, the prisoners made a grand entry into Dijon on February 22, 1398.38 In the wake of this great crusade, on January 1, 1403 Philip the Bold founded the new chivalric Order of the Golden Tree, the emblem of which consisted of a “golden tree with an eagle and a lion enameled in white.” The institution became the precedent for the Order of the Golden Fleece.39 As attested by the emblematic eagle initial in the Boucicaut Hours (Paris, Musée Jacquemart-André, MS. 2), the crusading Maréchal was a member of this institution which exalted the memory of Nicopolis. The youngest Magus in the Epiphany miniature (f. 83v), who wears the necklace of the Order of the Golden Tree, quite plausibly is a portrait of Jean “Sans Peur”40 38 A Burgundian embassy which included Jehan de Vergy, governor of Burgundy, and Gilbert de Leuwerghem, sovereign-baliff of Flanders, departed on January 20, 1397 with costly gifts to present on Philip the Bold’s behalf to Sultan Bayazid. The diplomats negotiated the ransom on June 24 of that year. See Vaughan, Philip the Good, 72 and David, Philippe le Hardi, Duc de Bourgogne, 38–40. According to Vaughan, after nine months in captivity at Gallipoli and Bursa, John of Nevers and his companions spent July and August of 1397 at Mitylene and then stayed with the Hospitallers at Rhodes before reaching Venice in October. They passed the winter at Treviso and departed for Burgundy on January 23, 1398. 39 Joseph Louis Antoine Calmette, The Golden Age of Burgundy. The Magnificent Dukes and their Courts, tr. Doreen Weightman (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1962), 60, reprinted from 1st ed., Les Grandes Ducs de Bourgogne (Paris: Albin Michel, 1949). Consult the comprehensive study by Carol M. Chattaway, The Order of the Golden Tree. The Giftgiving Objectives of Duke Philip the Bold of Burgundy (Turnhout: Brepols. Burgundica XII, 2006), especially Chapter 3, “The Iconography of the Order,” 33–47, and Chapter 4, “The Meaning of the Motto, ‘en loyaute,’ 49–62. 40 Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry. The Boucicaut Master, with the assistance of Kathleen Morand and Edith W. Kirsch (London: Phaidon Press, 1968), 10–11, Plate 33. Also consult Albert Châtelet, L’Âge d’Or du Manuscrit à Peintures en France au Temps de Charles VI et Les Heures du Maréchal Boucicaut (Paris: Institut de France,

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(Fig. 3.21–3.22). Only through the intervention of Philip the Bold’s son, did Sultan Bayazid spare Jean le Maingre from decapitation. Jean’s black attire might be explained if this miniature of the Boucicaut Hours alludes to a son’s official mourning. Philip the Bold died at the Stag Inn in Hal near Brussels on April 27, 1404 and was buried in the Burgundian mausoleum of the Chartreuse de Champmol at Dijon.41 In the Royal Pantheon of Santa Maria da Vitória, erected at Batalha concurrently with Champmol, the sarcophagus of Prince Pedro and Doña Isabel of Aragon-Urguell is carved with their escutcheons (Fig. 3.23–3.24). The heralds are pertinently surrounded by gnarled oak branches that signify the “Golden Tree.”42 Pedro must have received the collar of the “Order of the Golden Tree” when he passed through Flanders en route to Transylvania. He probably was honored similarly at Buda Castle with the “Order of the Dragon” by Emperor Sigismund, who had been installed as a knight of the Blue Garter while visiting London in 1416. Kneeling between King João I and Prince Pedro in the Fountain of Life is Prince Henrique the Navigator (4 December 1394–November 13, 1460), the Duke of Viseu and Lord of Covilhão43 (Fig. 3.25). Elevated to the position of “Grand Master of the Order of Christ” in 1420, Prince Henrique evidently preferred subdued heavy black velvet cloth garments. Though his attire is typical of the fashion which distinguished the privileged classes of Editions Faton, 2000): 203–4 (Nicopolis); 296–97 (Epiphany Miniature). Jean Le Maingre founded the Order of the Green Shield with the White Lady (Emprise de l’Escu Vert à La Dame Blanche) comprising twelve knights in 1399. The institution was dedicated to the protection of women, especially widows. 41 See Richard Vaughan, Philip the Bold. The Formation of the Burgundian State (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962), 101; 240 (1st ed., London: Longman, 1962). 42 For sepulchral reliefs of the sons of João I, see Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, “O Homem e a Hora São um só,” (Lisbon: XVII Exposição Europeia de Arte, Ciêcia e Cultura, Presidência do Conselho de Ministros, 1983): 244 and Pl. 11 (Pedro); 242 and Pl. 9 (Henrique); 243 and Pl. 10 (Fernando); 245 and Pl. 12 (João). 43 Consult: Alberto Iria, Estudos Henriquinos (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da História, 1989); António Joaquim Dias Dinis, O.F.M., Estudos Henriquinos, I (Coimbra: Acta Universitatis Conimbrigensis, 1960); idem, ed., Monumenta Henricina, 15 vols. (Lisbon-Coimbra: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Aniversário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1960–1974); Francisco Fernandes Lopes, A figura e a obra do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Portugália Editora, 1960); Vitorino Nemésio, Vida e obra do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Centenário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1959); João Silva de Sousa, A Casa Senhorial do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 1991). Mario Gonçalves Viana, Infante D. Hen-

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the Renaissance period, it presents a stark contrast to the jewel-like colors and flowing lines of the robes of state worn by Princes Duarte and Pedro. Enrique wears one of the high crowned stiff, broad brimmed top hats which had become such a popular accessory in Flanders. This style of hat was made in a variety of materials, such as velvet silk or finely braided straw, the sheen of which gave the appearance of velvet. Prince Henrique in the Fountain of Life appears to be wearing a modified version of the côte-hardi which displays a narrow standing collar and fastens up the front to form a doublet, one of the earliest versions of a jacket in men’s attire. Barely visible at the top of the neckline is a linen undershirt or camica. Over the shirt and doublet is a long black velvet gown with slit sleeves, and lined in a rich brown sable that borders the neckline and the edges of the full-length slits in the sleeves. Prince Henrique’s garments reflect the height of early Renaissance fashion, but unlike the extravagant sophistry of other members of the court on this grand occasion, his costume is appropriate to any ceremonial, state, or diplomatic event. As the “Grand Master of the Order of Christ” in Tomar, Henrique was accustomed to the company of learned scholars in theology and science. His attire, which evidences less concern with exorbitant display, seems to indicate a practical, perfunctory, and unpretentious nature, in keeping with a prince who attained a reputation for his temperate and prudential disposition. Standing behind Prince Duarte in the Fountain of Life (Fig. 3.26) is his half-brother, Dom Afonso (1377–December 1461), who possessed several titles: the 8th Count of Barcelos (1401); the Count of Ourém and Arraiolos (1422); and 1st Duke of Bragança (1442). The illegitimate son of King João I and Dona Inês Pires, whose paternal lineage was Jewish, Afonso was born in Vieiros Castle in the Alentejo when his father was still only “Master of Avis.” At the age of eleven he resided in the castle of Leiria, the seat of the royal treasury, where he was tutored by Gomes Martins de Lemos, a counselor to João I. Afonso later appointed Gomes Martins the “Master of Oliviera,” a title linked with the northern Portuguese town of Guimarães. João I ascended to the throne of Portugal on April 6, 1585, with the approval of the Côrtes at Coimbra. When his half-brother Fernando died in October of 1383 without a male successor, Fernando’s daughter Brites (Beatrice) was the heir apparent. Because she had married Juan I of Castile (1358: r. 1379–1390), Lusitanian opposition against Brites’s succession led to martial conflict between the kingdoms of Castile and Portugal. With the support of English allies, João I won a decisive victory against Castile and French

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troops at Aljubarrota on August 14, 1385 (Fig. 3.27), effectively securing his claim to the Crown.44 Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira (1358–1431), chief commander of the king’s battles and his staunchest supporter, subsequently secured immense wealth, rewards, and privileges (Fig. 3.28). However, he wanted his estates and fortune to remain separate from the Crown. Afonso was legitimized and knighted at Tuy (1398), having fought valorously against the Castilian army. So enhanced was his status in the royal circle that he, after due consideration of Prince Duarte’s suit, was selected to marry the only daughter of Nuno Álvares Pereira and Dona Leonor Alvim of Barroso. Afonso’s marriage to Dona Brites Pereira Alvim on November 8, 1401, celebrated with tournaments and jousts, directly resulted from Nuno Álvarez Pereira’s desire to establish a great dynastic house.45 On November 1, a week before the wedding of his daughter, the Constable relinquished his title of “Count of Barcelos” to Dom Afonso. Dona rique (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1937); Mário Domingues, O Infante D. Henrique. o homen e a sua época: evocação histórica (Lisbon: Romano Torres, 1957); Peter Edward Russell, Prince Henry “the Navigator”. A Life (London-New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000); idem., Prince Henry the Navigator. The Rise and Fall of a Culture Hero (New York: Oxford University Press, 1984). 44 Manuel Sílvio Alves Conde, 1383/85 (Lisbon: Conselho Directivo da F.L.L., 1978); idem., Horizontes do Portugal medieval: estudos históricos (Cascais: Patrimonia, 1999); Manuel Sílvio Alves Conde and Miguel Rodrigues, 1383, no contexto da Europa do seu tempo (Lisbon: Conselho Directivo da F.L.L., 1978). 45 For information concering Nuno Álvares Pereira, see: Chronica do Condestabre de Portugal Dom Nuno Álvarez Pereira, ed. Joaquim Mendes dos Remédios (Coimbra: F. França Amado, 1911); Antonio Rodrigues de Costa [1656–1732], De vita, et rebus gestis Nonni Alvaresii Pyreriæ, Lusitaniæ comitis-stabilis. Olisipone occidentali, apud Paschalem á Sylva, regis, ac regiæ Academiæ typographum (Lisbon: 1723; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress); Domingos Texeira [† 1626), Vida de D. Nuno Alvares Pereyra, segundo condestavel de Portugal ... progenitor da casa real ... Novamente composta pelo M. R. padre Fr. Domingos Teixeyra ... offerecida á Magestade de el rey D. Joaõ V...(Lisbon: Occidental, Officina da musica, 1723; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress); Augusto Fernandes Pereira, O Condestável (Salto: 1991); Mário Gonçalves Viana, Nuno Álvares Pereira. Figuras Nacionais (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1938); P. Valério A. Cordeiro, A Vida do Beato Nuno Álvares Pereira (Lisbon: 1921); Mário Domingues, A Vida do Grande Condestável (Lisbon: 1966); Oliveira Martins, A Vida de Nuno Álvares Pereira, 9th ed. (Lisbon: 1984); Barroso da Fonte, Leonor Alvim — alicerce da Casa de Bragança (Guimarães: Editora Correio do Minho/SM Braga, 1994); António do Carmo Reis, Introdução ao pensamento político de Nun’Alvares (Vila do Conde: Edições Linear, Cooperativa Editorial, 1982); Adelino de Almeida Calado, Estoria de Dom Nuno Alvrez Pereyra: edição crítica da “Coronica do condestabre” (Coimbra: Por ordem da Universidade, 1991).

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Brites brought considerable land to the marriage: the town and castle of Chaves, the judicial district of Montenegro with its castle-fortress, the settlements of Barroso, Baltar Paços, and Barcelos. To these dominions King João gave: Neiva, Aguiar de Neiva, Parque, Parelhal, Faria, Retes and Vermoin. Of course, these estates included all the surrounding land, churches and privileges. Afonso probably had been given the estate of Guimarães in 1398, when he was knighted at the age of twenty-eight, and his splendid residence at the site was erected just prior to Jan van Eyck’s visit (Fig. 3.29).46 The stance and positioning of Dom Afonso in the Fountain of Life seem to imply that he was at the end of the chain of command after Prince Henrique, but it also is equally apparent that Van Eyck needed the height of his standing figure and weight of his dark robes to balance the composition. Afonso was portrayed by Jan van Eyck in a floor-length black wool houppelande fitted across the shoulders. The fullness of the garment has been concentrated into pleats at the front and back so that the line falls in a smooth column of fabric down the sides of the figure. The sleeves of the gown are moderately full and turned back into a cuff exposing the long, tight undersleeves of the garment beneath. Under his houppelande, the Count is wearing either a doublet or jerkin, or both, complimented by skirts (bases). In the narrow opening of the neckline, only a small portion of the chemise is visible, just below the ample folds of flesh in his aging neck. His standing collar is ornamented with gold braid and embroidery that encircles the neckline and extends along the front opening. His chaperon and roundet was a style of headgear worn in both northern and southern Europe during the Renaissance. A cappuchin, or hood, with or without a lirepipe, was attached to the doughnut-shaped hat. Following the custom of the day, it became de rigueur to drape the surplus fabric of the hood over the stiffened frame in a series of carefully placed cascading pleats known as a cockscomb effect. Of the royal princes, Afonso probably was the most traveled. In autumn of 1405 he escorted his sister Princess Brites (1382–October 25, 1439) from Bruges to England for her marriage to Thomas Fitzalan, the 12th Earl of Arundel and Warenne.47 (Fig. 46 Barrosa da Fonte, Paço dos Duques de Bragança (Lisbon-Mafra: IPPAR, Instituto Português do Património Arquitectónico e Arqueológico, ELO Publicidade Artes Gráficas, Ltd., 1994), 18–20. Also consult Barrosa da Fonte, O castelo de Guimarães (Guimarães : Editora Correio do Minho, 2nd ed. 1993). 47 Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal , 6 and 307 notes 10–11, cites several sources, including: José Soares da Silva, Memorias para a historia de Portugal, que

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3.30) The wedding occurred on November 26, the feast day of St. Catherine of Alexandria, in the Archbishop’s manor of Lambeth in the diocese of Winchester. According to Peter Church, clerk of Norwich, Thomas, the lord Archbishop of Canterbury, officiated.48 At that time of Afonso’s departure he was residing between two seats, Barcelos and Chaves (Fig. 3.31), properties which legally were to revert to his wife in case of his death. After attending the wedding of Dona Brites, the Count of Barcelos embarked upon a pilgrimage to Palestine. Accompanied by his envoy of comprehendem o Governo del Rey D. Joaõ o I., [from 1383 to 1433], 4 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, Officina de J.A. da Silva, 1730–34; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress), I, 246–50, and IV, 76–83; James Hamilton Wylie, History of England under Henry the Fourth, 4 vols. (London: Longmans, Green, 1884–98), II, 334–38 (1969 edition: New York, AMS Press); Pedro de Azevedo, ed., Documentos das Chancelarias Reais anteriores a 1531 relativos a Marrocos, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1915–1934), I, 549–551; Luís Chaves, “O século do Tosão-deOuro em Portugal. Primeira parte: Aspectos históricos,” Arqueologia e História IX (1930): 7–39, at 16 (Count of Barcelos accompanying Brites to Flanders). Rogers informs, 307, that Thomas Fitzalan was elevated to the Order of the Garter in 1400 and Dona Brites became a Lady of the Garter in 1413. See Edmund H. Fellowes, The Knights of the Garter 1348–1939: With a complete list of the Stall-Plates in St. George’s Chapel (London: Published for the dean and canons of St. George’s chapel in Windsor castle by the Society for promoting Christian knowledgde, 1939), 62 (Thomas) and 109 (Brites). Brites was the illegitimate daughter of King João I and Dona Inês Pires. 48 Thomas William Edgar Roche, Philippa: Dona Filipa of Portugal (London and Chichester, Phillimore, 1971), 78. The Clerk of Norwich additionally records that the Archbishop of Canterbury was assisted by Henry, Bishop of Winchester, Richard of Worcester, Robert of Chichester and Henry of Bath. Peter Church describes in detail the wedding service in the Lambeth chapel. Besides dukes, earls, ecclsiastics and nobility, he relates the Anglo-Portuguese service was attended by Henry IV, “King of England and France,” the “Queen of England” (Joan, m. 1403: 1370–1437), and the “Prince of Wales” (Henry V, 1387–1422). Roche provides this information and refers to José Soares da Silva, Memorias para a historia de Portugal (Lisbon, 1731), IV, 76, and Fernão Lopes, Chronica del Rey Dom João I (Lisbon: 1644), III, 205. See facsimile edition, Crónica del rei dom Joham I de boa memoria e dos reis de Portugal o decimo, 2 vols., (Lisbon: Arquivo Histórico Português, 1915) prepared by Anselmo Braamcamp Freire with a preface by Luís Filipe Lindley Cintra, reprinted and edited by William James Entwistle (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1977). King João I provided a generous dowry of “12,500 marks in English money.” Roche discusses the marriage as a “political match,” stating that the Earl of Arundel had sought the hand of a lady. Because she lacked property and position, to marry her he paid a substantial fine to the Royal Exchequer. Henry IV promised to return the fine, but reneged. Only after Philippa wrote to her brother from Luxbonne on November 4, 1405 did he remit the sum to the Earl. The queen’s correspondence in French was executed in large italic script. See Roche, 115, who reproduces the letter: British Museum Cotton Vespasian MS F111 93 f.8b (no. 98).

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about 150 nobles and servants, he sailed to Scotland and then to Bruges, before traveling overland through Germany (Augsburg), Poland and Hungary (Buda). From Treviso, Dom Afonso made his way to Venice, where he was warmly received in early August of 1406. From the Adriatic port he sailed for the Holy Land and toured the most sacred sites of Christendom. By January of 1408, he was in Ferrera and passed to Rome and Florence. The final phase of his voyage took him to Provence, Auvergne and Franche Comté.49 Afonso patently would have visited the pilgrimage shrines in these regions, especially the important cathedrals along the route to Santiago de Compostela. Because he returned to his homeland by way of Aragon, Navarre and Castile, he logically concluded his travels abroad with a final pilgrimage to the famous sanctuary of St. James the Apostle in Galicia (Fig. 3.31). When Jan van Eyck’s visited Lisbon, the Count of Barcelos was one of the wealthiest noblemen in Portugal. The cosmopolitan knight would have entertained the Burgundian embassy lavishly in his Lisbon mansion, and offered lodgings at his northern estates for the delegation’s own pilgrimage to Compostela. As a measure undertaken to cement familial ties between the Avis house and the lineage of the house of Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira, King João I approved the marriage in 1424 of his son João, the Duke of Beja and Aveiro (January 13, 1400 at Santarém–October 18, 1442) to Dona Isabel (1402– 1465), the daughter of Count Afonso de Barcelos. Prince João’s lands were in the south of Portugal, in the Lower Alentejo (Fig. 3.32–3.33). The ducal seat of Beja on the Sado River once was named Pax Julia to commemorate Julius Caesar’s peace with Lusitania and in antiquity it was a commercial metropolis populated by traders. Numerous olive groves in the fertile plain between the Rivers Sado and the Guadiana explain the regional cults of the agricultural goddess Cybele and the solar Mithras until the Visigoth period. Occupied by invading Moors and recaptured by Christian knights 49 Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, 6–7. He cites many documents, but most informative is M. Margaret Newett, Canon Pietro Casola’s Pilgrimage to Jerusalem In the Year 1494 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1907), 46–47, who describes the visit of Dom Afonso in Venice and references the dates of August 6 and 26 of 1406. Newett, 47, mentions an October 5, 1410 document concerning the Venetian reception, and acknowledges its discovery by Visconde de Lagoa, “Estímulo económico da conquista de Ceuta,” Congresso do Munto Português: Publicações (Lisbon: 1940), vol. III, tome 1: 55–77. See also Nicolae Iorga, Notes et extraits pour servir à l’ histoire des croisades au XVe siècle, vols. IV–VI (Bucharest: 1915–1916), IV, 12 (Afonso in Ferrera).

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in 1162, the castle of Beja which began as a Roman garrison for defense lies at the edge of a medieval town which prospered because of its trade in olive oil. King Dinis remodeled the fortaleza of Beja in the fourteenth century into an impenetrable, stone bastion with a courtyard surrounded by walls measuring over forty meters in height. The forty crenellated turrets which once encased the castle were demolished in the eighteenth century, but the keep of Prince João and Isabel de Barcelos still retains its Gothic windows. On one side of the fortress is the old church of Santiago (St. James), once frequented by knights of the Ordem da Espada, the chivalric order of the Reconquest. The younger son of King João I would have been twenty-nine at the time of Jan van Eyck’s trip. During their stay in Portugal, the Burgundians probably were escorted to several sites near Lisbon. Besides the hunting retreat of Santarém, forty miles to the northeast, there was the ecclesiastical seat of Évora, about seventy miles to the southeast, and Beja lay only twenty-five miles south of this important center (Figs. 3.34–3.37). The Wing Panels of the Fountain of Life: Jan van Eyck’s Diptych of the Crucifixion and the Last Judgment Secular portraits of the two youngest Avis princes are missing from the Fountain of Life replicas and this discrepancy seems odd in view of the important positions they held at court: Prince João, Duke of Beja and Grand Master of Santiago and Prince Fernando (1402–1443), the Grand-Master of Avis. Also conspicuously absent is a likeness of their sister, Princess Isabel, the bride of Philip the Good. For that matter, in such an Apocalyptic subject a posthumous portrait of the matriarchal Queen Philippa would not have been incongruous. Was the lost Fountain of Life designed as a triptych with wing panels which would have contained these remaining members of King João’s immediate family? The deësis in Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life shows an atypical substitution of John the Evangelist for John the Baptist, the Apocalyptic intercessor for humanity perhaps because the subject, as will be discussed later, was intended to represent the post-Judgment “paradise” of the New Jerusalem. If so, then the wing subjects might have provided complimentary themes. The lost Fountain of Life logically was created for Lisbon’s Alcáçova Palace, and therefore, would have been destined for the residence’s royal Capela de Sao Miguel, which had been founded by King

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Dinis in 1299 and was affiliated with the Augustinian parish church of the Holy Cross (Igreja de Santa Cruz).50 Jan van Eyck’s famous diptych of The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment has been dated to about 1430 and the panels have a provenance from a monastery in Burgos (Fig. 3.38).51 Prior to 1841 the works in the collection of Ambassador Tatistcheff, Russian dignitary assigned to Spain, supposedly had been mounted as a triptych with a centerpiece Epiphany. Different original centerpieces have been proposed for the wings which still retain their original frames inscribed with biblical quotations. The diptych panels measure 22¼ x 7¾˝ (56.5 x 19.7 cm). The Madrid Fountain of Life is 71¾ x 45⅔˝ (1.81 x 1.16 cm), nearly an identical size to the Oberlin replica, 73⅓ x 45½˝ (185.5 x 115.5 cm). Van Eyck’s original may have been considerably smaller, that is, 22¼ x 27½˝ (56.5 x 39.4 cm). No scholar advocating a Castilian provenance for Van Eyck’s lost painting has offered any explanation for its disappearance.52 50 Afonso Henriques, first king of Portugal, was baptized in the Chapel of São Miguel at Guimarães Castle. He dedicated the private chapels of the royal palaces of Coimbra and Santarém to Archangel St. Michael. Prince Pedro, whose emblem was a pair of scales with the motto «désir,» may have displayed his replica of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life in the Chapel of São Miguel belonging to his ducal residence in Coimbra. See catalogue entry by José Teixeira, Circa 1492. Art in the Age of Exploration, ed. Jay A. Levenson, New HavenLondon, 1991, 142 (polychromed stone statue of St. Michael attributed to João Afonso (1402–1443), private collection, Portugal). 51 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953), I, 237–40, 242, 269, 309, 456; Anne Simonson Fuchs, The Netherlands and Iberia: Studies in Netherlandish Painting for Spain, 1427–55 (Los Angeles: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California at Los Angeles, 1977), 15–17. 52 Hans Belting and Dagmar Eichberger, Jan van Eyck als Erzähler: frühe Tafelbilder im Umkreis der New Yorker Doppeltafel (Worms: Werner’sche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1983); Dagmar Eichberger, Bildkonzeption und Weltdeutung im New Yorker Diptychon des Jan van Eyck (Wiesbaden: L. Reichert, 1987), 13–35; Stephanie Buck, “Petrus Christus’s Berlin Wings and the Metropolitan Museum’s Eyckian Diptych,” Petrus Christus in Renaissance Bruges: An Interdisciplinary Approach, ed. Maryan W. Ainsworth (New York-Turnhout: The Metropolitan Museum-Brepols, 1995): 65–83; Adam S. Labuda, “Jan van Eyck, Realist and Narrator: On the Structure and Artistic Sources of the New York Crucifixion,” Artibus et Historiae XIV, No. 27 (1993): 9–30; Heinz Peters, “Zum New Yorker ‘Diptychon’ der ‘Hand G’,” Miniscula Discipulorum (Kunsthistorisches Studien Hans Kauffmann zum 70. Geburtstag 1966 (Berlin: 1968): 235–46; Otto Pächt, Van Eyck: and the Founders of Early Netherlandish Painting, with a foreword by Arthur Rosenauer, ed. Maria Schmidt-Dengler, translated by David Britt (London: H. Miller, 1994), 190–95; Reiner Haussherr, “Spätgotische Ansichten der Stadt Jerusalem (oder: war der Hausbuchmeister in Jerusalem?),”

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Published by António Caetano de Sousa [1674–1759], an inventory of the dowry of Infanta Beatrice (Fig. 3.39), daughter of King Manuel I (1469: r. 1495–1521) and his second Spanish-born queen Maria (1482–1517: m. 1500), was taken at Turin on April 15, 1522, a year following her marriage to Charles III, Duke of Savoy (1486–1553). Among the works of art listed in this document from the Archives of the Tojal Family is a gold reliquary with “the Crucifixion with Mary, Longinus, and St. John the Evangelist and The Deësis on the verso.” By the date of Beatrice’s marriage, the medieval Alcáçova castle had fallen into disuse because King Manuel I had constructed the Lisbon “Riverbank Palace” (Fig. 3.40) and many treasures were moved to the new residence built between 1505 and 1515.53 Recent technical examination of the New York diptych panels has revealed that the upper portion of The Last Judgment, with the exception of the figure of Christ, were executed by an assistant.54 If Jan van Eyck intended the Metropolitan Museum panels to have formed the wings of a Fons Vitae altarpiece, perhaps due to constraints of time, he was forced to leave the remainder of the work to a skilled illuminator of the Portuguese court. The finished wing panels might not have been attached to the original centerpiece but instead fashioned into a diptych or encased into a reliquary. Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life, whether it remained at the Alcáçova “Chapel of St. Michael,” or was transJahrbuch der Berliner Museen XXIX–XXX (1987–1988): 47–70, at 52; Christiane Lukatis, “Ein verlorenes Weltgerichtsretabel aus dem künstlerischen Umfeld des Jan van Eyck? Mit einem Tafelbild des Germanischen Nationalmuseums auf Spurensuche,” Anzeiger des Germanischen Nationalmuseums (1992): 175–93; Charles Sterling, “L’influence de Konrad Witz en Savoie,” Revue de l’Art LXXI (1986): 17–32, at 22; idem., “Charles VII vu par Jean Fouquet, L’Oeil CCCLXXXIX (1987): 34–41, at 37; Katharine Baetjer, European Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists born before 1865: A Summary Catalogue (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art-Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1995), 242–43. 53 Antonio Caetano de Sousa, História genealógica da casa real portuguesa. Provas, 20 vols. (Coimbra: Atlântida, 1946–1958), II, Part II, 27–81 (Dote de Duqueza Infante D. Beatriz, tirado da conta dada naquelle tempo por Alvaro do Tojal, seu Thesoureiro, do original artigo, que conserva seu quarto neto, Francisco do Tojal, Juiz de Balanca de Casa de India, officio que então foy dado ao dito Alvaro de Tojal). Also see Annemarie Jordan [Gschwend], Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey, M.A. Thesis, George Washington University, 1985), Appendix A. 54 Maryan W. Ainsworth and Keith Christiansen (eds.), From Van Eyck to Brueghel. Early Netherlandish Painting in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art–Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1998: Catalogue No. 1, “Jan van Eyck: The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment, about 1430” (Maryan W. Ainsworth): 86–89, inclusive of bibliographical sources and the Diptych’s frame inscriptions in Latin and English.

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ferred by Manuel I to the royal chapel belonging to the new Paço da Ribeira, perished with innumerable treasures in the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755. The Madrid and Oberlin replicas survived in Spain. Beatrice of Savoy’s “reliquary” is briefly described in the 1522 inventory of her dowry. The document mentions “4 gold reliquaries,” but only provides fuller description of three reliquaries, two of which seem to have been diptychs: One with the Virgin Mary One with the Crucifixion with Mary, Longinus and St. John the Evangelist with the Deësis on the verso One like a retable with two panels: the Virgin Mary on one and St. John on the other In courtly documents the term “reliquary” frequently was applied to a portable altarpiece which served as a suitable backdrop for an array of small relic boxes. Dona Beatrice’s sister Isabel in 1526 became the empress of their first cousin Emperor Charles V (Fig. 3.41). Portraits of both princesses were completed about 1521, when Beatrice married Charles III of Savoy, and presumably these miniatures were created by Francisco de Holanda. With regard to the history of the New York Diptych, Beatrice’s son, Emmanuele Filiberto (1529–1580), had served as regent in the Spanish Netherlands and commanded the Hapsburg army against the Valois Constable Anne de Montmorency at the victory of San Quentin (August 11, 1557). A confidant of his first cousin Philip II (1527: r. 1555–1598), Emmanuele Filiberto, Duke of Savoy since 1553, held the prestigious office of grand master of the Order of St. Maurice. He may have given his mother’s “reliquary” of The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment to Philip II, a collector of sacred relics and an admirer of Northern Renaissance masters, particularly Hieronymus Bosch, whose oeuvre encompassed subjects of hell and divine justice. However, Van Eyck’s New York Diptych has a provenance in a convent of Burgos, and not with the Escorial Palace-Monastery where Philip II kept his most treasured relics. This institution in Burgos was probably the Cartuja de Miraflores (Fig. 3.42) founded in 1442 by Juan II of Castile (1405–1454) and endowed by that monarch and his successors.55 The Carthusian complex built by the 55 Francisco Tarín Juaneda, La Real Cartuja de Miraflores (Burgos). Su historia y descripción [1896] (Burgos: Hijos de Santiago Rodríguez, 2nd ed. 1931); Anonymous Carthusian Monk, Santa Maria de Miraflores (Burgos: Caja de Ahorros Municipal, 1989).

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German Simón de Colonia in 1488 would have been an appropriate destination for a gift from Beatrice of Savoy to her older sibling. Its church contains the tomb of their Portuguese great-grandmother, Isabel of Portugal (1428–1496: m. 1447) for whom the Empress was named (Fig. 3.43). Beatrice in turn was named in honor of the Castilian queen’s sister, Brites of Bragança († 1506), the sagacious Duchess of Viseu (1452).56 Carved between 1489 and 1493 by the Lower Rhenish sculptor Gil de Siloé (ac. 1480–1504), the free-standing alabaster tomb of Juan II of Castile and Isabel of Portugal is situated in front of a spectacular gilded and polychromed altarpiece of the Holy Trinity and the Passion by Siloé and the Rhenish painter Diego de la Cruz (Figs. 3.44–3.45). Presupposing The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment were designed as the wings of Van Eyck’s lost Fountain of Life, a centerpiece smaller in size than the Madrid and Oberlin replicas; there are cogent reasons for identifying the remaining members of the Avis family in the diptych panels. Among the foreground figures in The Crucifixion is a white-turbaned woman in a red robe standing to the far right (Figs. 3.46–3.47). This enigmatic female of Calvary, who resurfaces in the Ghent Altarpiece, has been discussed as the Erythraean Sibyl. Recent scholarship, however, has identified her instead as the Cumaean oracle who forecast Christ’s Passion as well as his second coming, and proposes the Erythraean to be the red-turbaned woman with her back to the viewer at the far left of the composition.57 The Erythraean Sibyl’s prediction of the Armageddon and Christ’s return to earth iconographically relates to the theme of the Fountain of Life. Her divinations also were recognized by St. Augustine, who believed she lived at the time of the Trojan War. In his De Civitate Dei Augustine paraphrased the early fourthcentury Lactantius: This Sibyl, whether Erythraean or, as some prefer to believe, Cumaean, has nothing in her whole poem ... which is connected

56 Among recent texts about Queen Isabel of Castile who was influenced by Dona Brites of Bragança, consult Pedro Navascués Palacio (ed.), Isabel la Católica. Reina de Castilla (Barcelona: Lunwerg Editores, 2002), which includes an English translation by William Truini and Paul David Martin and provides lavish illustrations of the monastic Church of Miraflores. 57 Lotte Brand Philipp, The Ghent Altarpiece (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 186 note 363. The Sibyls of the Ghent Altarpiece will be addressed in a subsequent chapter of this manuscript with additional citations.

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with the worship of false or fictitious deities. On the contrary she even speaks against them and their worshippers. Therefore, it seems that she ought to be reckoned in the number of those who belong to the City of God.58 The latest edition of Lactantius’s Divinae Institutiones, a massive corpus of Christian apologetics, had been dedicated to Constantine the Great. In his oration Ad Sanctum Coetum, which Eusebius appended to his biography of the Emperor, Constantine referred to the Erythraean Sibyl as a priestess of Apollo born in the sixth generation (century?) after the Deluge who was divinely inspired to reveal the story of Christ’s coming. He then quoted the thirty-three verses from Oracula Sibyllina (Book 8) which described the “Day of Judgment.” The initial letters of these passages comprised an acrostic reading “JESUS CHRIST SON OF GOD SAVIOR CROSS.”59 The female seer of the Metropolitan Crucifixion wears a turban of white silk patterned with black and teal blue stripes, a bouffant affair which rests upon a long scalloped veil of golden silk. Julius Held identified the Erythraean Sibyl

58 Augustine, De Civitate Dei 18:23. See Herbert Williams Parke, edited by B.C. McGing, Sibyls and Sibylline Prophecy in Classical Antiquity (London and New York: Routledge, Chapman and Hall, Inc., 1988), 170 and 173 note 33; Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, I, 240; Alexandre Laborde (Comte de), Les manuscrits à peintures de la Cité de Dieu de Saint Augustin, 3 vols. (Paris: Société des Bibliophiles François, É. Rahir, 1909) James Dougherty, “The Sacred City and the City of God,” Augustinian Studies X (1979): 81–90, asserts that Augustine’s description of civitatis peregrina was not a “pilgrim city” as often translated, but a community in exile, dwelling within an earthly environment and “constituted on an eschatological sense of time, its imagination fixed upon that city at the end of history, of which the psalmist’ Jerusalem was the sacred type, as Virgil’s Rome was the secular.” (88–89). See Vernon Joseph Bourke (ed.), The Essential Augustine (New York: New American Library, 1964): 1974 edition, 204, who refers to Augustine’s comments (De Civitate Dei, XIX, 17) about the “multilingual band of pilgrims” which the “heavenly city does not repeal or abolish” providing that “they do not impede the religion whereby the one supreme and true God is taught to be worshipped.” Also see D. Martens, “Les ‘Trois ordres de la chrétienté” de Barthel Bruyn et l’iconographie de saint Renaud de Dortmund,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte LVIII (1995): 181–206, at 186–87. 59 Constantine, Ad Sanctum Coetum 19. See Parke, Sibyls and Sibylline Prophecy in Classical Antiquity, 164–65 and 172 notes 23 and 24. Constantine also was the first Christian Emperor to interpret Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue of the Aeneid as a Messianic prophecy of the Incarnation based upon the divinations of the Cumaean Sibyl. This observation has relevance for Jan van Eyck’s placement of the Erythraean and Cumaean oracles over the subject of “The Annunciation” in the Ghent Altarpiece, as well as his inclusion of Virgil among the Elect of the City of God in the panel of the “Adoration of the Lamb.”

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of the Metropolitan Crucifixion as Margaret of Bavaria (1363–1423), the wife of John the Fearless (Figs. 3.48–3.49).60 The appearance of Philip the Good’s mother is known by: her polychromed gisant on the sepulchre of her husband in Dijon (Musée des Beaux-Arts); and a portrait in Lille in which she wears a similar henin. The physiognomy of the Metropolitan Museum Cumaean Sibyl does not seem to match the delicate features of the Duchess. Margaret’s bust-length portrait reflects the Franco-Flemish high fashion of the early 1400s. Embroidered with gold acanthus leaves studded with pearls, her dress has a circular neckline edged in lace. Her heart-shaped henin is adorned with gold threads and pearls, as well as a centrally-placed oval gold and ruby pin, which is articulated by pearl stems of an abbreviated fleur-delis. Complimenting the intricate workmanship of Margaret’s headdress, her necklace is composed of simulated blossoms having bezeled centers of rubies and pearl leaves, which alternate with pearls in round settings of gold. Such jewelry reveals the Burgundian court taste for designs that imitated nature in a fanciful manner. Queen Philippa was blue-eyed and blond, more plain than beautiful (Fig. 3.50).61 Her actual likeness is known only by her gisant in Batalha Abbey, though her image is captured in an early sixteenth-century genealogical tree by Simon Bening of Bruges and in the fresco of the Madonna of the Rose in the Church of São Francisco at Porto (Fig. 3.51). The fanciful turban headdress of the prophetess in the Metropolitan Crucifixion can be associated with the prevailing “Portuguese mode.” Van Eyck twice illustrated the Infanta Isabel of Portugal in a Lusitanian turban composed of gold filigree and pearls: a lost portrait sent to Philip the Good, replicated in the Dimier drawing; and the panel of the Erythraean Sibyl for the Ghent Altarpiece. If the latter oracle has been deemed a realistic likeness of Infanta Isabel, then the Cumaean Sibyl, whose features are as meticulously described, should also be considered a viable portrait. The hands of Simon Bening’s “Philippa” are positioned similarly to the hands of Jan’s older Ghent Altarpiece sibyl. A fortiori the Cumaean Sibyl of the Ghent Altarpiece is designated as Philippa

60 See Julius Held’s Review of Erwin Panofky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character in the Art Bulletin (1955): 205–34, at 224 and note 1. This reference is provided by Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 184–86 and note 48. 61 Roche, Philippa, 57.

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of Lancaster, the female seer in the Metropolitan Crucifixion would retain the same identity. She wears the same puffy headdress with gold silk veil, black shoulder shawl, and fine pearl earrings of a bluish-grey hue. The Metropolitan Museum Cumaean Sibyl (Fig. 3.52–3.53) is dressed in a long sleeved robe and tunic of gold-embroidered scarlet, a color sanctioned only for Portuguese royalty. The placement of Dona Philippa near the “Mater Dolorosa” is particularly poignant. The Queen’s first two children did not live to maturity. Branca, named for her English grandmother Blanche of Lancaster, was born at Alcaçova Castle in Lisbon on July 31, 1388 and she survived a mere eight months. Afonso was born at Santarém on July 30, 1389 and he died in 1391. Both infants were buried in the Cathedral of Lisbon.62 “Erythraean” in Greek translates as “red,” an eponym which possibly traces the seer’s place of origin as the area of the “Red Sea,” which according to the Book of Exodus, was parted by God and traversed by the Tribes of Israel under the guidance of Moses and protection of Joshua. Possibly the Metropolitan Museum Erythraean Sibyl provides an allegorical portrait of the first Duchess of Bragança, Dona Beatrix Pereira de Alvim (1380–1414), the only daughter of Nuno Álvares Pereira and his wife Leonor de Alvim. The banderole of the Cumaean Sibyl in the Ghent Altarpiece reads: “Not offering human words, you are inspired [breathed upon] by the divinity from on high.”63 Though this words taken from Virgil’s Aeneid (VI: 50–51) are addressed to the Annunciate Virgin, the salutatory gesture must be scrutinized. Her right hand is inclined towards the Erythraean Sibyl as if to insinuate a successor of equal inspiration. When Jan van Eyck visited Sintra Palace in the summer of 1429, he would have been informed about the historical importance of the residence as the venue for the annual commemoration of the feast of Pentecost. Since the period of St. Isabel of Portugal (1271–July 4, 1336), the queen traditionally presided over such festivities which included a solemn municipal procession concluding at the royal chapel. Van Eyck would have been informed of Queen Philippa’s devotion to the Holy Spirit even as he attended mass in the chapel, the high walls of which still retain their tessellation of red and black squares framing the repeated motif of the white dove. 62 63

Roche, Philippa, 66, 70.

NIL MORTALE SONA[N]S AFFLATA…ES NUMINE CELSO. See Elisabeth Dhanens,

Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York–Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.–Mercatorfonds, 1980), 374.

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Following the death of her mother on July 19, 1415, Princess Isabel continued her matriarchal role at Sintra and she continued to endow the nearby Convent of Pena Longha after she became the Duchess of Burgundy. Due to a plague which swept Lisbon Philippa of Lancaster died in autumn of 1415. On October 15, 1416, her remains were taken from the Franciscan convent of Odivelas in solemn procession to Batalha Abbey where they rested in the church until the completion of the royal sepulchre about 1426. Jan van Eyck could have seen her gisant or studied a portrait of the queen created during her lifetime. In the composition of Calvary, the Cumaean Sibyl has a calm demeanor amidst the turmoil around her. She is distanced psychologically from the bereaved Mary Magdalene who kneels before her. Seen in profile from the back, the poignant Magdalene wears a mantle of Avis green trimmed in ermine over a red gown. Plausibly, this emotive figure who achieved renown for her beauty and penitential nature can be identified as Princess Isabel. In his representation of a volkreiche kalvarienberg, Van Eyck depicts the Virgin Mary fainting amidst holy women. This collapsing of Mary, symbol of the passio Patris (anguish of God), derives from Franciscan devotional literature, specifically the narrative accounts of the Crucifixion by PseudoBonaventure and the Carthusian Ludolph of Saxony (ca. 1300–1378). Draped in voluminous folds of cloth, the face of the Virgin Mary can barely be seen. This same sense of anonymity is shared by the figures clustered in her intimate circle, with the exception of a single female whose entire face is visible beneath a white wimple. Like the Cumaean Sibyl, she is emotionally distanced from the anguished figures beside her. As Mary Cleophas and Mary Salome weep, she quietly contemplates with clasped hands. Her sober attire is evocative of the austere brown habit and black mantle of a Poor Clare. Late Gothic and Renaissance wills often contain statements indicating a request to be shrouded in Franciscan, Benedictine, or Cistercian robes. St. Isabel of Portugal (Figs. 3.54–3.55), the dowager queen of King Dinis, was buried in a wooden casket at Santa Clara-a-Velha in Coimbra. Nuns dressed her body in conventual attire before wrapping it in three sheets of fabric, fine linen, coarse cloth and heavy cotton.64 Philippa of Lancaster also 64 Widowed in 1325, Queen Isabel de Aragón emerged from seclusion only to intervene as peacemaker between Alfonso XI of Castile and her son, Afonso IV. While she was not canonized until 1626, she became a model for royal deportment. See António Garcia Ribeiro de Vasconcelos, A Evolução do Culto de Dona Isabel de Aragão esposa do rei labrador

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was buried in Franciscan robes, and after 1457 her daughter also adopted the habit of the Poor Clares. The frames of the New York panels are original and their Latin inscriptions in a “proto-humanist” script provides evidence that whoever commissioned the New York panels must have been an erudite member of the court. The Last Judgment provides an unusual array of temporal kings and court figures in the realm of the Just (Fig. 3.56). Despite this anomaly, none of these figures beneath St. John the Baptist can be identified securely as portraits. They are as generic as the members of the clergy who appear opposite them on the side of the Virgin Ecclesia. Van Eyck left his Last Judgment incomplete because an illuminator’s hand has been discerned in the opaque colors of the upper zone.65 There is, nonetheless, a resemblance between the arrangement and Master Mateo’s Portico of Glory (ca. 1170–1188) at the pilgrimage site of Santiago de Compostela. Both the painted and carved hieratic figures of Christ in Majesty extend their hands forward in order to display the wounds of the Passion. The Oberlin replica of the lost Fountain of Life bears a monogram, which has been read as a variant of “Belasco” and identified with an unknown Spanish artist named Velasco.66 The brilliant colors of this replica perhaps may be explained by its author being a specialist of painting on vellum. A Portuguese illuminator named Vasco Fernandes de Casal (Vasco Manoel) is documented in 1445 as a court artist of King Afonso V (1438–1481). 67 Dom Denis de Portugal (a Rainha Santa), 2 vols. (Coimbra: 1894). Santa Clara-a-Velha, rebuilt by Dona Isabel as a retreat, suffered by constant flooding from the Mondego River and it was abandoned in 1677. In 1695 the body of the queen was transferred to the new convent of Santa Clara-a-Nova, erected by João Turriano on higher land between 1649 and 1677. The silted ruins of Santa Clara-a-Velha now are being restored. 65 Anna Eörsi, “From the Expulsion to the Enchaining of the Devil. The Iconography of the Last Judgment Altar of Rogier van der Weyden in Beaune,” Acta Historiae Artium XXX (1984): 123–59, at 147, 152, and notes. 66 Pemán, Jan van Eyck y Epaña, 72–73 and Bruyn, “A Puzzling Picture at Oberlin,” 13. The latter states the biographical data of several artists named Velasco does not correspond with any “Castilian” painter working around 1500. The monogram’s “L” could be a rubric signature for “Manoel”, with the remaining letters constituting the artist’s surname, Basco (Vasco). 67 Dalila Rodrigues, “Vasco Fernandes e a Oficina de Viseu,” Grão Vasco e a Pintura Europeia do Renascimento (Lisbon: Galeria de Pintura do Rei D. Luís, Secretaria de Estado da Cultura. Instituto Português do Património Cultural. Instituto Português de Museus, Publicações Alfa, 1992), 77–216, at 34, cites Francisco de Sousa Loureiro, Discourso da sessão pública trienal, da Academia de Bellas Artes de Lisboa (December, 1843). Also consult

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Wearing a green tunic, the Archangel Michael of the Last Judgment displays magnificent peacock wings with scarlet-tinged under feathers that match his short skirt, boots and even a ruby-studded shield.68 Among the royals of the heavenly Elect is a young prince who lifts his hands in praise. Attired in a green tunic trimmed in marten fur and belted in gold, he also wears scarlet stockings articulated by a garter decorated with roses and thistles. This youth may be a generic type as his garter insignia alludes to John of Gaunt’s Lancastrian “Order of the Flower and Leaf.”69 If some of the women who foregather on Jan’s Mount Golgotha can be identified as Portuguese royals, then perhaps the two younger sons of King João I might be situated in the tableau vivant. Nuno Gonçalves’ St. Vincent Altarpiece (Fig. 3.57) was begun by João Eanes and completed after 1471 for a chapel dedicated to the Saragossan martyr in the Cathedral of Lisbon. The famous retable contains sixty portraits, and while the roster of personalities has been debated, a few figures might be compared with the suggested portraits of Avis royals in the Prado and Oberlin replicas of Jan van Eyck’s Fons Vitae. In both versions of the Fountain of Life João I’s eldest son Afonso (1377–1461), the Count of Barcelos and 1st Duke of Bragança (1443), walks in the company of his three half-brothers Duarte, Pedro and Henrique (Figs. 3.58–3.60). He has aged about thirty years in the St. Vincent Altarpiece, but still is recognizable in the Panel of the Fishermen. The Fernão Lopes, Crónica del rei dom Joham I de boa memoria e dos reis de Portugal o decimo, facsimile edition of the Arquivo Histórico Português (1915), edited by Anselmo Braamcamp Freire and William J. Entwistle, with a preface by Luis F. Lindley, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional–Casa da Moeda, 1977), I. Rainaldo dos Santos, “As iluminuras da Crónica de D. João I de Fernão em Madrid,” Colóquio (Lisbon: I.a série, 29 June, 1964): 41–50, has identified Álvaro Pires as the artist of Lopes’s manuscript (Madrid Biblioteca Nacional, MS. vir, 25–8). Pires worked in the Arquivo Real between 1509 and 1527. 68 When João, Duke of Beja, died in 1442, Afonso, Count of Ourém, became the Master of the Order of Santiago. Prince Fernando was taken prisoner in North Africa in an ill-fated siege of Tangier in 1436 and he died in captivity at Fez in 1443. Thereafter, he was hailed by the title Santo Fernando. The upper zone of the Last Judgment also shows the leading “Holy Virgin” and the mediator John the Baptist wearing Avis green. 69 George L. Kittredge, “Chaucer and Some of His Friends,” Modern Philosophy 1 (1903): 1–3. I thank Tammy Sritecha, M.A. art history graduate of George Washington University, for drawing my attention to this source. Prince Fernando (1402–1443) was born on the September 29 feast day of the celestial warrior St. Michael. Though more will be said about this Prince who participated in an expedition to Tangier in 1436 and died as captive in Morocco, his sarcophagus which contained his remains after 1471 is carved with wild roses.

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narrow painting pays tribute to the house of Bragança as Afonso’s father-inlaw, Nuno Álvares Pereira (1340–1431), the Holy Constable who became a Carmelite in 1423, is depicted in humble prostration. The Count-Duke’s elder son and namesake, Afonso (1400–1460), the Count of Ourém, the Marquis of Valença and Master of Santiago in 1442, attended the Council of Basel in 1436 and visited Cologne during the summer of 1437 before he embarked upon a pilgrimage to Jerusalem as his father had done about 1406–9. Several secular figures witness the execution of Christ in Jan van Eyck’s Crucifixion (Fig. 3.61), and some have exaggerated facial expressions which border on caricature, but others are portrayed as solemn witnesses. One of them, an ostentatious equestrian, has been singled out by scholars as a probable patron of the diptych. Dressed in a green gown and ultramarine mantle trimmed with ermine at the collar and sleeves, his matching blue chaperon is quite grand. This so-called “donor” (Figs. 3.62–3.63) might be juxtaposed with the probable likeness of the Count of Ourém in the Fishermen’s Panel. Shown beside his father in the St. Vincent Altarpiece, the visage of the Count of Ourém near age sixty is an older version of the “patron” with a blue chaperon in Jan van Eyck’s Calvary of 1429. With its distinctive atmosphere of deep ultramarine, the Bragança heraldic color, the Oberlin replica of the Fons Vitae perhaps was requested by the Count of Barcelos in 1429. Dom Afonso, one of the wealthiest aristocrats in Portugal, recently had constructed a grand palace at Guimarães, but he also occupied a stately residence in Lisbon near the Monastery of São Francisco. The date when the Oberlin work passed to the Cathedral of Palencia is impossible to securely determine without further documentation. However, the town of Palencia is located strategically between Burgos and Valladolid, and during the Gothic age it was the seat of the Castilian Cortes and residence of the kings of Castile. In 1447 the granddaughter of Dom Afonso, Isabel de Bragança (1428–1496), married King Juan II of Castile (1405–1454), and possibly the Eyckian replica numbered among the works of art belonging to her dowry. With respect to possible portraits of King João I’s two younger sons in the New York Crucifixion, Prince João, Duke of Beja (January 13, 1400–1442) and Master of the Order of Santiago, could be portrayed as his patron saint, John the Evangelist (Figs. 3.64–3.65), who comforts the bereaved Virgin Mary. Again, his likeness might be compared with another portrait in the Fishermen’s Panel of the St. Vincent Altarpiece. The Duke of Beja, also Lord of Reguengos, Colares and Belas, in 1424 married his

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niece, Dona Isabel of Bragança (1402–Arévalo 26 October, 1465), the only daughter of Afonso, the 8th Count of Barcelos and 1st Duke of Bragança. The two Holy Women in the company of the Virgin Mary and Saint John the Evangelist may have been regarded as metaphorical counter-portraits of Leonor of Aragon (1402–Toledo, February 19, 1445), Duarte’s wife on September 22, 1428 or Isabel of Urguell (1409–1443), the bride of Prince Pedro on September 13, 1429. Conceivably the female suggested to be an allegorical portrait of St. Elizabeth of Portugal presents the likeness of the royal who was named for the holy queen, Isabel, Duchess of Beja. With so importance given to the noble house of Bragança at the court of Avis, Beatrix Pereira de Alvim (1380–1414) even might appropriately have been a symbolic substitute for the Erythraean Sibyl. The only child of the Holy Constable and daughter-in-law of King Joao I died a year before Queen Philippa. The younger son of Dom Afonso and Beatrix Pereira de Alvim, Fernando I (1403–1478) became the 2nd Duke of Bragança in 1461. He and Prince Fernando (1402–1443), who held the title of Grand Master of Avis, are difficult to place in the New York Crucifixion. However, a few riders within the Calvary group are depicted with fashionable “Burgundian” wool chaperons dyed royal scarlet and they wear lavish fur trimmed blue velvet tunics. Due to his higher status at the Avis court, King João I’s youngest son Fernando may be the equestrian portrayed nearest to Christ’s cross (Fig. 3.66). Garbed in a deep azure houppelande with collar and cuffs of brown marten, he gazes upwards in awe and his intense expression is a psychological antithesis to the jubilance of the cavalier beside him. Another majestic rider, seen from the back with a sumptuous cape of Avis green, approaches the blue-turbaned equestrian, and possibly he is Dom Fernando of the Bragança house (Fig. 3.67). Prince Pedro is documented as having acquired in Padua an important relic, a fragment of St. Anthony’s cranium (Fig. 3.69). Possibly he requested the Madrid replica, which was painted by a different hand on oak rather than pine, for the chapel of his own Estaus Palace in Lisbon. When King Duarte died on September 9, 1438, his widow Leonor had hoped to be recognized as regent of their six year-old son, Prince Afonso (Afonso V). Fearing political interference by Alfonso V, king of Aragon (1416–1458) and Leonor’s brother, the Portuguese Côrtes opposed her aspirations. Prince Pedro was appointed the sole regent in December of 1439. The dowager queen Leonor fled to Castile and died on February 19, 1445

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in Toledo.70 Prince Pedro was killed on May 24, 1449 at Alfarrobeira by the combined armies of his nephew, King Afonso V, and his half-brother, Afonso, the 1st Duke of Bragança. Following the conflict, the property of Prince Pedro was absorbed by the Crown. His son and tutelary heir Pedro (1429–1466) was denied the office of Constable and remained in exile in Castile until 1461. His daughter Isabel (1432–1455) married Afonso V in 1448. King Afonso’s sister Joana (1439–1475) in 1455 wed the King of Castile, Enrique IV (1425–1474). The Madrid Fountain of Life, therefore, could have been included in Joana’s dowry and given by her and Enrique IV to Segovia’s Monastery of El Parral prior to 1459.71 In short, despite the respective provenances of the Eyckian replicas of the Fountain of Life in Spain, the original altarpiece was a Portuguese commission. The altarpiece created by Jan van Eyck in 1429 was inherited by Prince Duarte when his father João I died on August 14, 1433 (Fig. 3.70–3.71).

70

66ff.

Matias Vielva Ramos, Monografía acerca de la catedral de Palencia (Palencia: 1923),

Humberto Baquero Moreno, A Batalha de Alfarrobeira: antecedentes e significado histórico, 2 vols. (Coimbra: Biblioteca Geral da Universidade, 1979–1980; idem, Os itinerários de el-Rei Dom João I, 1384–1433 (Lisbon: Instituto de Cultura e Língua Portuguesa, Ministério da Educação, 1988). A technical analysis of the Oberlin panel has yielded the information that the two coats-of-arms were added sometime after the work was painted. Stating the Oberlin replica was created about 1500, Joshua Bruyn, “A Puzzling Picture at Oberlin: The Fountain of Life,” 12–13, has recognized the escutcheon of flames and checkered border as arms belonging to the Castilian Girón family. His attribution has been accepted by César Pemán, Juan van Eyck y España, 73–74. The identification of the second herald has been debated. Joshua Bruyn relates the crest, a shield with five red roses and fleur-de-lys in a blue border, to Fray Alonso de Espina, the confessor of Enrique IV in 1455 and Franciscan authority of the Inquisition from 1487 until 1492. He bases his opinion upon the fact that Espina retired to the Palencian Monastery of San Francisco. However, Pemán, op. cit., upholds that the herald was adopted by a branch of the Loaisa family, whose holdings around 1500 were in Pascualete near Trujillo. See Atanasio López, “Descripción de los manuscritos franciscanos existentes en la Biblioteca Provincial de Toledo, II,” Archivo Iberoamericano XIII (1926), 358–59, 373ff. (Alonso Espinos in Palencia); Condesa de Quintanilla, La historia de Pascualete (Barcelona: 1964), 72, for arms of the Loaisa family. The Madrid replica lacks any heralds, but the panel has been cut down on both sides of the fountain pinnacle. The lost original created in 1429 by Van Eyck may have contained royal escutcheons. In a consideration of the panel as a commission originating with Portugal, the importance of arms on the replicas really does not signify. 71

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The Chivalric Orders and the Defense of the Faith In all his portraits Philip the Good is adorned with the necklace of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Fig. 3.72).72 As the Duke of Burgundy he governed a disparate ensemble of territories, separated by languages and social traditions. With the goal of forging a Burgundian council of select nobility under his aegis who would support him in diplomatic matters of state, he inaugurated the Order of the Golden Fleece on January 10, 1430 to coincide with his January 7 marriage to Princess Isabel of Portugal.73 The institution with its twenty-five knights was modeled after the Order of the Garter and the Order of the “Golden Tree,” both of which were relatively new institutions by comparison to Portugal’s Order of Christ and Order of Santiago. The “Golden Fleece” insignia had a meaning connected with the weaving industry in cities of the Netherlands over whom the Duke politically governed. In the Fountain of Life replicas, a “lamb” reclines prominently before Christ’s throne. Beyond its traditional meaning associated with sacrifice and redemption, the lamb may be perceived as a metaphorical symbol for the Order of the Golden Fleece. The gilt frame of the New York Crucifixion is inscribed with relevant passages from Isaiah 53:6 and 9, 12: And the Lord has laid on him the inequity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth ... Stricken for the transgression of my people. They made his grave with the wicked and his tomb with the rich in his death ... and he was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.74 Royalization of the Military Orders distinguished the reign of King João I of Avis after his successful campaign in 1415 to Ceuta, the Moroccan 72 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Character and Origins, 2 vols. (New York: Harper and Row, 1971 rpt. of Harvard University Press, 1953 edition), II, Pl. 377. 73 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 54–57; Calmette, The Golden Age of Burgundy, 148, 288– 89, 315. 74 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), The Old Testament, 853.

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port which guarded the eastern end of the Straits of Gibraltar (Fig. 3.73).75 An initiative attributed to his sons, Duarte, Pedro and Henrique, João may have been planning his invasion of North Africa while Dom Afonso, Count of Barcelos was abroad between 1406 and 1409. The king’s Franciscan confessor, Frei João de Xira, attended the Council of Pisa (March 25–August 7, 1409) before traveling to the Holy Land as a companion of the Archbishop of Lisbon, Dom João Afonso de Azambujato. João de Xira served as chaplain to the Lusitanian army at Ceuta. The expedition to Morocco was endorsed by the pope, who gave a plenary indulgence to participants in the new holy crusade.76 Preparations for galvanizing Lusitanian naval forces had begun in secret as early as 1412 and it took three years to muster troops and a fleet of 200 ships. Several of the ships were caravels, lateen-rigged to sail close to the wind, and naus, supply vessels. Dom Henrique was dispatched to the north to build vessels and raise forces (Figs. 3.74–3.76). As testament of Henrique’s conviction the Avis campaign was a holy crusade is the fact that he convinced the town of Porto to abstain from meat for an entire year so the Lusitanian armada would be supplied with salted beef. Catching the Nortada winds six days after Queen Philippa’s death (July 19), King João elected to depart Lisbon’s Tagus estuary on a propitious date, 75 See Vasco de Carvalho, La domination Portugaise au Maroc du XVemeau XVIIIeme siécle (Lisbon: Editions SPN, 1942); Charles Ralph Boxer, The Portuguese Seaborn Empire, 1415– 1825 (London: Hutchinson, 1969); Bailey W. Diffie and George D. Winius, Foundations of the Portuguese Empire, 1415–1580) (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977); António Henriques R. de Oliveira Marques, History of Portugal, 2 vols. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1972). 76 Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta por El-Rei D. João I, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Lisbon, 1915), Ch. 62; idem., Crónica da tomada de Ceuta, introdução e notas de Reis Brasil (Mems Martins Codex, Portugal: Publicações EuropaAmérica, 1992). See António Pereira de Figueiredo [1725–1797], Portuguezes nos concilios geraes: isto he, relacao dos embaixadores, prelados, e doutores portuguezes, que tem assistido nos concilios geraes do occidente, desdos primeiros Lateranenses ate’ o novissimo Tridentino (Lisbon: Na officina de A. Gomes, 1787; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress), 40 and Fortunato de Almeida, História da Igreja em Portugal, 4 vols. in 8 (Coimbra: Imprensa Académica, 1910–1924), II, 459; see also the rpt. edition edited by Damião Peres (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1967–1971). Citing these texts, Rogers, Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, 7–8, states that the indulgence was granted by either Alexander V or John XXIII. The Avis court supported both Pisan popes. For further reading on the political and commercial developments which set the stage for the “Age of Explorations,” consult Bailey W. Diffie, Prelude to Empire: Portugal Overseas Before Henry the Navigator (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press: 1960).

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July 25, the feast of Santiago. The Boreas and Aquilo are northly winds, the fury of which is described in the Argonauticon of Valerius Flaccus.77 With the King sailed Constable Nuno Álvarez Pereira, Dom Afonso de Barcelos, and Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique.78 The Portuguese attacked Ceuta the morning of August 21, and by evening they had thoroughly routed the Moors. Under the direction of the appointed chaplain of the port, Frei João de Xira, the Muslim mosque was hastily remodeled into an appropriate Christian sanctuary for the acknowledgment of divine intercession.79 In the new church of São Francisco, Mass was offered on August 24. On the same day as the solemn feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary and the thirtieth anniversary of the Portuguese victory at Aljubarrota, King João I knighted the three Avis Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique. Their ceremony of investiture significantly was staged to also coincide with the eve of St. Louis IX’s feast day (August 25). Personifying the ideal Christian ruler, the French king had led the Crusade to the east in 1248 and died in Tunis (1270). On September 2 the Portuguese trips returned in triumph to Lisbon. As a reward for his heroism in the fray, the Count of Barcelos was given the Palace of Algezira (Çala-ben-Çala) to sack, though certainly Duarte was given a share of the spoils. With regard to Princes Pedro and Henrique, the two newest knights of the realm were accorded the respective titles, Duke of Coimbra and Duke of Viseu. The victory at Ceuta was hailed by Christian Europe as the doors were open to expansion beyond the Pillars of Hercules, and the siege continued to be celebrated well into the sixteenth century, when indeed, Lusitania took a commanding lead in maritime exploration. To circumvent a Muslim coalition that sought to reclaim the port, Henrique returned in 1419 to bolster the Portuguese garrison.80 As a reward for his valiance, he was appointed “Master” of the Valerius Flaccus, Argonauticon, I, 597ff. See Leonard Bacon, tr., The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões (New York: The Hispanic Society of America, 1950), 242. 78 For the conquest of Ceuta see the historical accounts of Fernão Lopes (Crónica de Dom João I) and Gomes Eanes Zurara, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta por El-Rei D. João I. 79 Edgar Prestage, The Portuguese Pioneers (London: A. & C. Black Ltd., 1933), 15–34, discusses the Ceuta expedition, and at 17, states that in 1413 João I had obtained papal permission to appoint “the Queen’s confessor as Bishop of Morocco, as though in anticipation of the conquest he had planned.” 80 José Manuel Garcia and Rui Cunha, Sagres (Lisbon, 1990), 14–15; Monumenta Henricina, ed. Manuel Lopes de Almeida et al., I–VI (Lisbon: 1960); Rui de Pina [1440– 1521], Chronica d’el-rei D. Duarte, G. Pereira (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1901); idem, Chronica d’el-rei D. Duarte (Porto: Edição da Renascença portuguesa, 1914). 77

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military Order of Christ in 1420.81 This act taken by the Crown gave him substantial power in political and ecclesiastical circles. Under the crusading tradition of this prestigious Order, Portuguese caravels at the time of Van Eyck’s visit already had begun overseas expansion. Expeditions were sent from the Algarve coastline to colonize the islands of Porto Santo and Madeira in 1420, the Grand Canary in 1425, and the Azores archipelago in 1427. King João I’s youngest sons also were assured of pre-eminent courtly positions. Prince João was appointed the Master of Santiago and “Constable of Portugal” and Prince Fernando was given the title of Master of the Order of Avis.82 The Fountain of Life iconographically stresses Portuguese ideals of chivalry which are embodied in the Livros de Linhagens. The genealogical treatises upheld that a common brotherhood of knights united the king and aristocrats of the realm.83 Such ideology began with King Dinis, who promoted justice, encouraged trade, and resolved problems with the papacy (Fig. 3.77).84 Under King Dinis, control of the spiritual and temporal administration of the Order of Santiago in Portugal was wrested from Cas81 Prince Henrique was appointed director of the Order of Christ on May 20, the feast day of St. Bernardino of Siena (1380–1444). Born of a noble family, the Franciscan friar traveled throughout Italy as a preacher. Not only did he invoke the name of Christ to perform miracles, he also used as a badge the monogram IHS, from the Greek letters of the Nomen Dei. 82 Maria Cristina Pimenta, «A Ordem de Santiago em Portugal,» Oceanos (Julho, 4, 1990): 56–63; João Álvares [15th Century], Crónica do Infante Santo Dom Fernando, ed. Mendes dos Remedios (Coimbra: F. França Amada, 1911); idem., Trautado da vida e feitos do muito vertuoso Sor. ifante D. Fernando, ed. Adelino de Almeida Calado (Coimbra: Por ordem da Universidade, 1960). 83 António Caetano de Sousa [1674–1759], Historia genealogica da casa real portugueza, desde a sua origem ate’o presente, com as familias illustres, que procedem dos reys, e dos serenissimos duques de Bragança, 12 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, Na officina de J.A. da Silva, 1735–48; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress); idem., História Genealógica de Casa Real Portuguêsa, ed. Manuel Lopes de Almeida and César Pegado, I–XII (Coimbra: 1946–1954); idem., Memorias historicas, e genealogicas dos grandes de Portugal, que contém a origem, e antiguidade de suas familias: os estados, e os nomes dos que actualmente vivem, suas arvores de costado, as allianças das casas, e os escudos de armas, quelles competem, até o anno de 1754, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Na Regia Officina Sylviana and of the Academia Real, 1755; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress). 84 Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Chronica d’el-rei D. Diniz (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 Rua dos Retrozeiros, 1907); idem., Crónica de D. Dinis [Códice Cadaval 965], ed. Carlos da Silva Tarouca (Coimbra: Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, Instituto de Estudos Históricos Dr. António de Vasconcelos, 1947).

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tilian jurisdiction. His reign witnessed the founded of the Order of Our Lord Jesus Christ on March 14, 1319 by John XXII’s papal bull AD EA EX QUIBUS. The “Military Order of Our Lord Jesus Christ” incorporated the property of the Knights Templar and was dedicated to protecting the Portuguese frontiers against the Moslems.85 The angels who grace the stone towers of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life and the hortus conclusis of a New Jerusalem may allude to King Dinis. The sovereign’s patron was St. Denis of Paris, a bishop martyred by a Roman prefect in the third century. Since the Middle Ages, his identity was linked with Dionysius the Areopagite (Acts 17:34). Yet St. Dinis also was conflated with the fifth-century Pseudo-Dionysius, author of De Hierarchia Celesti, The manuscript defined the celestial orders that guarded the citadel of the Maiestas Domini. Because the Catalan writer Ramón Llull (1234–1316) had proposed the recovery of the Holy Land with the union of the Templar and Hospitaller Orders under the control of a “King of Jerusalem” in his Llivre de fine, his texts were greatly admired by the court in Lisbon.86 The fact that Llull had served as a missionary in North Africa, where he debated with the Moors before being martyred in Bougie, is consequential in view of the fall of Ceuta.87 Llull’s Book of the Order of Chivalry (Llibre del Orde de la The white habit of the “Order of Christ» pertinently alluded to St. John the Evangelist’s description of the Opening of the Fifth Seal, and the rewarding of the just souls of those slain for the word of God: “And white robes were given, to everyone of them.» (Apocalypse 6: 9–11). The insignia selected for Real Ordem dos Cavaleiros de Nosso Senhor Jesus Cristo was a red Maltese cross inscribed with a white cross. 86 Prince Duarte in Ch. XXXVI of his Leal Conselheiro describes the obediance and reason manifested by Ramón Llull’s disciples whom he called “Os Reymonystas.” See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro o qual fez Dom Duarte. Rey de Portugal e do Algarve e Senhor de Cepta, ed. Joseph Maria Piel, (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand, 1942), 141 and note 3. Also consult: Livro dos conselhos de el-Rei D. Duarte: (livro da cartuxa), transcribed by João José Alves Dias with contributions by António Henrique de Oliveira Marques and Teresa F. Rodrigues (Lisbon: Ed. diplomática, Editorial Estampa, 1982); Leal Conselheiro, with an introdução and notes by Maria Helena Lopes de Castro and a preface by Afonso Botelho (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1999). For information concerning the reign of Duarte, see: Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Chronica d’el-rei D. Duarte (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1901); Martim de Albuquerque and Eduardo Borges Nunes (eds.), Ordenações del-Rei Dom Duarte (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1988); João José Alves Dias (ed.), Chancelarias portuguesas. D. Duarte, with the participation of António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Centro Estudos Históricos, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1998–1999). 87 Ramón Llull, Obras literarias, ed. José María Castro y Calvo (Madrid, 1955); Allison E. Peers, Fool of Love: The Life of Ramón Llull (London: 1946); Sebastián Garcias Palou, 85

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Cavallería) was admired by the Franciscans, who advocated the establishment of a Llullist school in Lisbon. The book of chivalric theory and practice consists of a dialogue between a young squire and hermit-knight living in a forest. Using planetary metaphors to describe the macrocosmic order of God’s realm, the old knight advocates that the ideal Christian knight should lead a noble, virtuous and just life in service to the commonwealth.88 An anonymous Côrte Imperial, dating from the end of the 14th or the beginning of the 15th century, reflects the impact of Llullian theory (Fig. 3.78). The allegorical treatise centers upon Christ, heavenly emperor, who reunites the courts of the world in an Apocalyptic New Jerusalem. Flanked by a Triumphant Church (a bride) and the Militant Church (a Catholic Queen), the Lord of Judgment confides to them the manner by which Christian doctrine should be defended against arguments by Muslims, Jews, pagans and schismatic Christians. The treatise culminates in recognition of the superiority of Christian Truth and the Catholic Faith.89 Ramón Llull y el Islam (Palma de Mallorca: 1981); Hugues Didier, Raymond Lulle : un pont sur la Méditerranée (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 2001); Anthony Bonner and Lola Badia, Ramon Llull: vida, pensament i obra literària (Barcelona : Empúries, 1988); Miquel Batllori, Ramon Llull i el lul·lisme, with the participation of Eulàlia Duran and Josep Solervicens and a prologue by Albert Hauf (Valencia: E. Climent, 1993); Sebastián Garcías Palou, El Miramar de Ramón Llull (Palma de Mallorca : Diputación Provincial de Baleares, 1977); Dominique de Courcelles, La parole risquée de Raymond Lulle : entre judaïsme, christianisme et islam (Paris : J. Vrin, 1993). 88 Ramón Llull, Book of the Ordre of Chyvalry, tr. and printed by William Caxton (1483–1485), ed. A.T.B. Byles, (London: Early English Text Society, 1926. 89 The treatise in the Mosteiro de Santa Cruz, Coimbra has been dated by Márío Martins [S.J.] to date before 1438. Consult his Alegorias, símbolos e exemplos morais da literatura medieval portuguesa (Lisbon: Edições Brotéria, 1975), 207–12; idem, A Bíblia na literatura medieval portuguesa (Lisbon: Instituto de Cultura Portuguesa, Presidência do Conselho de Ministros, Secretaria de Estado de Cultura, 1979), 47–50; idem, Estudos de literatura medieval (Braga, Livraria Cruz, 1956), 307–16, 395–416, 417–22; idem, A sátira na literatura medieval portuguesa (Lisbon: Instituto de Cultura Portuguesa, M.E.I.C., Secretaria de Estado da Investigação Científica, 1977), 117–28; idem, “A literatura árabe e a Corte Imperial,” Brotéria 26 (Lisbon: 1938): 61–68, and in the same issue, his “Originalidade e ritmo na Corte Imperial,” 368–76; idem, “A literatura judaica e a Corte Imperial, Brotéria 31 (1940): 15–24; Joseph F. O’Callaghan, A History of Medieval Spain (Ithaca–London: Cornell University Press, 1975), 637, mentions the Corte Imperial in context of Llull’s influence in Portugal. See J. Pereira de Sampaio, O Livro de Corte Imperial (Porto, 1910), Manuscritos inéditos, I. A Livro da Corte Imperial is recorded in the library of King Duarte: MS. 3390, Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, folio 163, Estes são os Livros que tinha El Rey Dom Duarte under the heading Titulo dos Livros de lingoajem do claro Rey D. Duarte. See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Maria Piel, 415.

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With respect to the figures personifying the “Synagogue” in the Eyckian Fountain of Life paintings, their representation may be related to the conciliatory debate that Pope Benedict XIII organized at Tortosa (near Barcelona) (Fig. 3.79).90 The meeting had followed the destruction of the Jewish community of Seville in 1391 and the diaspora of Jews to Portugal. Delegations of learned Jews led by Rabbi Joseph Albo of Daroca and ecclesiastics from Catalonia met at the Pope’s residence between February of 1413 and April of 1414 to discuss religious doctrines. Despite the stalemate that resulted from the disputation, the council was measured as a triumph for Christianity due to the numerous conversions of Jews. The principal Christian spokesman at the Tortosa debate was Jerónimo de Santa Fé (Hieronymus de Sancta Fide). This Aragonese Jewish botanist and scholar, called Joshua Halorki (Joshua de Lorca) before his conversion, had been a disciple of St. Vincent Ferrer.91 The Jews at Tortosa could not accept the Christian belief that Christ was the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies. The throne of the hieratic Christ in the Eyckian paintings of the Fountain of Life is pertinently ornamented with sixteen statues of Hebrew prophets. Yet within the group of the “Synagogue,” the blindfolded high priest could not provide a portrait of Joseph Albo of Daroca because it would have been sacrilegious to depict a rabbi as a kohen gadol (high priest), especially as the Talmud informs the position was at one time bought by unworthy people who were punished by God for their actions. Possibly the high priest is Aaron reinstated at the coming of the Messiah. O’Callaghan, A History of Medieval Spain, 607–8. Besides Fortunato de Almeida’s História de Igreja em Portugal. (Coimbra: 1910–1926), consult Antonio Pacios López, La Disputa de Tortosa, 2 vols. Madrid: 1957): I, Estudio historico-critico-doctrinal, Vol. II, Actas. This connection between Tortosa and the Fountain of Life also has been observed by Luc Dequeker, “Jewish Symbolism in the Ghent Altarpiece of Jan van Eyck (1432),” Dutch Jewish History. Proceedings of the Symposium on the History of the Jews in the Netherlands (November 28–December 3, 1982, Tel Aviv-Jerusalem), ed. Jozeph Michman and Tirtsah Levie (Jerusalem: Tel-Aviv University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Institute for Research on Dutch Jewry, 1984), Seventh Session, Chairman: M. Eliav), 347–62. Donald McCall of the Oberlin Allen Memorial Art Museum kindly forwarded a copy of this essay in September of 1996. See also Luc Dequeker, Het sacrament van mirakel: jodenhaat in de middeleeuwen (Louvain: Davidsfonds, 2000); Luc Dequeker and Werner Verbeke (eds.), The Expulsion of the Jews and their Emigration to the Southern Low Countries: (15th–16th Centuries) (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1998). 91 As related by Dequeker, “Jewish Symbolism in the Ghent Altarpiece of Jan van Eyck (1432),» 362 and note 31, Joshua de Lorca prior to his conversion, wrote a book in Arabic 90

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The kohen gadol possessed two sets of vestments: the bigdei zahav, golden vestments, in which four of the eight garments contained gold; and the bigdei lavan, white vestments, because four of the garments were made of white linen. The white vestments were worn annually on Yom Kippur, during critical portions of the service during which the high priest sought forgiveness. The color white denoted humility and pure linen was thought to be the raiment of angels. Jan van Eyck’s blindfolded high priest is garbed in golden garments (bigdei zahav) distinguished by a breastplate (ephod) with twelve stones the coat (me’eel) and the belt (avnet), and a traditional biblical miter. The high priest typically wore a sash attached to this crown which read kodesh ladonai (holy to God), so perhaps the blindfold may be linked to this practice. However, the kohen gadol is not portrayed within a Temple, where he maintained the tabernacle, the mishkan, or place of “divine dwelling.” Flavius Josephus records in the Antiquities of the Jews, Book XI: Chapter 8: 4–6, the entry of Alexander the Great into Jerusalem. After laying siege to Damascus, Sidon and Tyre, the Macedonian sent an epistle to the Jewish high priest Jaddua requesting auxiliaries and provisions to assist the Greek army in their conflict with the Persians. Jaddua refused to assist, replying he had pledged his oath to King Darius to not bear arms against the Persians. Alexander began an expedition to punish the Jews. As Gaza was taken by the Macedonian troops, the high priest Jaddua was warned by God in a dream that he should take courage and adorn the city, and open the gates of Jerusalem to Alexander the Great. He was instructed to have the citizens of the city process in white garments, but that he and the priests should meet the conqueror in the bigdei zahav. Therefore, Jaddua met Alexander in a scarlet on the medicinal uses of herbs and plants which was translated into Hebrew, Gerem haMa’alot (Vienna, MS. 154). As a Christian he compiled a treatise Contra Judaeos (Maxima Bibliotheca Veterum Patrum, Lyon, 1677, T. 26, 528–54). Dequeker states that another Totosa-protagonist was Joshua de Lorca’s master, Paulus de Sancta Maria, the apostate Jewish physician Salomon ben Levi. He also states that Contra Judaeos was influenced by the late thirteenth-century manuscript Pugio Fidei adversus mauros et iudaeos, authored by the Spanish Dominican Ramón Marti (Raymundus Martinus; † 1286). Published in Paris in 1651, Marti’s treatise was written in the wake of the 1236 dispute between Christians and Jews in Barcelona. Joshua de Lorca affirmed in his writing that his spiritual guide in converting to Christianity was the Dominican theologian St. Thomas Aquinas. Consult Adolfo Robles Sierra, Fray Ramón Martí de Subirats, O.P. y el diálogo misional en el siglo XIII (Caleruega, Burgos: OPE, 1986). Ursula Ragacs, “Mit Zaum und Zügel muss man ihr Ungestüm bändigen” Ps 32, 9 : ein Beitrag zur christlichen Hebraistik und antijüdischen Polemik im Mittelalter (Frankfurt am Main-New York: P. Lang, 1997).

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and purple vestment with a miter and ephod — attire appropriate to his status, but forbidden outside the Temple. As the high priest beseeched Alexander not to sack Jerusalem, the warrior listened because he was impressed with the raiment which he himself had beheld in a dream when he was in Macedonia. Proceeding to the Temple, Alexander was directed by Jaddua in offering libations and sacrifice to God. He additionally was shown the Book of Daniel, which forecast a Greek would destroy the Persian Empire. Delighted with this prognostication, Alexander departed Jerusalem, promising the Jews could continue to enjoy the laws of their forefathers and be exempt from tribute every seven years. Bearing in mind Philip the Good’s plans for territorial expansion in the Netherlands and his marriage negotiations to solidify Portuguese support in those endeavors, the allusions to Alexander the Great in the Fountain of Life are pertinent and they indicate a positive cast to the “Synagogue” depicted by Jan van Eyck. During the reign of King João I Jews frequented the royal palace. Many were skilled in astronomy like Guedelha Ibn Yahya. Also known by his sobriquet “Judas Negro” (Black Hair), he wrote a royal augury in 1415, four verses which predicted the Portuguese victory in the campaign at Ceuta.92 Medicine and alchemy were professions dominated by the Jews, who also were the primary dyers and color-makers of Lisbon. Not until 1435, however, was a royal dye-works established.93 Jews additionally were employed as copyists of manuscripts, illuminators and record-keepers. Hebraic characters provided a code for the protection of trade secrets. The Burgundian ambassadors of Philip the Good in 1428–29 would have met some of the most influential Jews of Lisbon, who were entitled to own property and horses. King Joao I’s mistress Inês Pires, the mother of Afonso and Brites of Bragança, was the daughter of a Jewish cobbler, and while the Jews did not Anne F. Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery. The Veneration of St. Vincent (Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1979), 101, who cites names and statistics from the Anselmo Braancamp Freire, Archivo Histórico Português (Lisbon, 1904), III. Consult Meyer Kayserling, Geschichte der Juden in Portugal (Leipzig: O. Leiner, 1867) reprinted as História dos judeus em Portugal, translated by Gabriele Borchardt Corrêa da Silva and Anita Novinsky (São Paulo: Livraria Pioneira, 1971). The text of this modern edition, particularly 41–68, addresses the social conditions and important Jews in fifteenth-century Lisbon. Also see Kayserling, Sephardim. Romanische poesien der Juden in Spanien. Ein beitrag zur literatur und geschichte der spanisch-portugiesischen Juden (Leipzig: H. Mendelssohn, 1859) reprinted (Hildesheim-New York: G. Olms, 1972). 93 Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery, 111, who also states that Prince Henrique established a dyeing industry in 1445. 92

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have heralds, they were permitted to wear expensive silk and carry gilded swords. The Hebrew personae of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life are not drawn from his imagination, but realistically captured in traditional attire.94 Jan probably visited the Jewish quarter and alchemical district to acquire art supplies during his stay in Lisbon. Likely his knowledge of Hebraic lettering can be credited to contact with learned scribes of João I. He selected esoteric Hebrew verses. While they were codified in the bibles that would have been circulated, they were not popular passages in Jewish prayer. The phylacteries might be regarded as a Medieval archaism, but Jan also may be demonstrating his familiarity with Kabbalistic amulets, which often were scrolls, or the Hebraic scroll placed within the mezuzah, a small case affixed to the right entrance door post of a devout Jewish house. The practice of displaying the mezuzah derived from Passover of Exodus, specifically Moses’s instructions to brush the house lintels and posts in Egypt with lamb blood to protect the Jews from the angel of death. Tightly rolled to display the word shaddai (“sustainer”), the parchment proclaims the “Shema Yisrael”: “Hear O Israel, The Lord our God, The Lord is One.” (Deuteronomy 6:4–9 and 11: 13–21). The same verse is repeated in the scrolls within the Hebrew tefillin, a frontlet bound by black leather straps above the hairline and centered to align with the spot between the eyes (earlier Sadducees who followed strict biblical interpretation, placed the tefillin between the eyes). One box contains four compartments, so besides the “Shema Yisrael” text, there are three other scrolls. The Book of Job (37:6) informs that the divine Throne of Glory sits over snow and the Kabbalistic Zohar relates that God, who reflects all wisdom and guidance, wears a perfectly white tefillin.95 The blindfolds that Jan van Eyck depicts in his paintings of Calvary and the Fons Vitae are not disparaging symbols, but a means of illustrating spiritual insight and enlightenment. When Moses asked to see God’s “glory” (Exodus 33: 18–23), he was told, “my face you cannot see, for no man sees me and still lives.” God directed Moses to the cleft of a rock and covered (kisa) Moses’s eyes with His hand so that only His back could be viewed.96 Alfred Rubens, A History of Jewish Costume (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1967). Thanks are given to Rachel Weinberg, an undergraduate student in my Northern Renaissance class for drawing my attention to the Orthodox use of the tefillin, and to the Hillel Center of George Washington University. 96 Moses also covered his face with his hands when he beheld the Burning Bush (Exodus 3:6). I am grateful to Menachem Wecker, MA candidate at George Washington University, who is completing research on the iconography of Moses in Northern art. His 94 95

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Hebrew inscriptions (Fig. 3.80) in the Fountain of Life derive from the Davidic Psalms. The scroll that unfurls at the feet of the High Priest reads: “[Remembrance: zecher] He has made for his miracles. Merciful and kind (v’rachum) [is] God. Food he gave [to those who fear him].” (Psalm 111: 4–5). The phylactery that opens before an enraged man bears words which promise an end to discord: “More than at the time their grain and their wine (daganam and v’tirosham) abound. In peace together...” (Psalm 4: begins mid-verse in verse 8–9). This passage accords with the Shema text of the mezuzah that mentions God taking grain and wine from sinning Jews. The Rabbi’s broken pennant compliments these symbols of divine grace, which are invested with Eucharistic meaning in the service of the Mass. The pennant’s inscription has its source in Psalms that assure God’s abiding love for Israel: “Give thanks to the Lord for he is good; for endures forever his steadfast love” (Psalms 106: 1, 107: 1, 118: 1, 29: 136: 1).97 When Jan van Eyck visited Lisbon, Jews in service to the Crown were invited to attend Christian services and ceremonies in the royal houses and churches of Lisbon. For this reason, his portrayal of the “Synagogue” was entirely positive. Within the context of the eschaton, the Apocalyptic return of Christ, Van Eyck shows the passionate reaction of the Synagogue at the exact moment the promised Messiah is recognized. The redemption of the “Chosen People” is poignantly affirmed by the deliberate balancing of Gentiles and Jews, who are united within the setting of a new Eden. Pauline ideology seems to dictate the unusual imagery in van Eyck’s Fountain of Life. By its location near the pennant, a scroll held by a singing angel in a tower (Fig. 3.81) serves to link the Davidic hymns of praise with the Solomonic Canticum Canticorum (Song of Songs). The Latin verse (4:15) is read as: FONS [H]ORTORUM PUTEUS AQUARUM VIVENCIUM (Fountain of the gardens, well of living waters). A dialogue between King Solomon and his bride, the Song of Songs provides a foundation for interpreting the recondite imagery of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life. The Evangelist St. John described good suggestions have amplified my original discussion about Jan van Eyck’s “Synagogue.” Cisut eynayim, the covering of eyes, in Genesis 20:16 serves as a metaphor for safety to Sarah, Abraham’s wife. This passage was cited to me by Wecker, who also informs when present day priests (kohanim) bless congregations, the congregants cover their eyes and do not look at the priests. Normally the priest sees and the Jews cover. The Fountain of Life reverses this. Fra Angelico depicted the flagellated Christ with a blindfold, certainly a positive aspect of covered eyes. 97 Bruyn, “A Puzzling Picture at Oberlin,” 17 note 1.

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“the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (John 21:2).98 Prognosticating the second coming of Christ, the Apostle John accentuated the role of the Virgin Mary, “bride” of Christ and the Church.99 Painted to commemorate royal marriages at the Portuguese court, Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life magnified the sanctified mission of João I, whose royal house, like that of King David, produced an heir of exceptional wisdom. Within the Medieval tradition of speculum principis (mirror of princes), the bridegroom Prince Duarte, must be perceived as a Solomonic imitator. While he was born on October 31 (1391), the Gregorian “Vigil of All Saints,” Prince Pedro’s birth date, December 9 (1392), marked the second day within the octave commemoration of the “Virgin’s Conception” established by the Franciscan Pope Sixtus IV. These feast days unquestionably are insinuated by Van Eyck’s Solomonic hortus conclusis and dramatis personae, who evoke the righteous brethren of an allerheiligenbild. The wellknown passage in the Apocalypse (12:7–9) about the “war in heaven” contributed to the Church’s elevation of St. Michael as the leader of the angelic host and protector of Christian knights. St. John’s description of God’s militant angels would provide another reason for the installation of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life in the Chapel of São Miguel at Alcáçova Palace. A polychromed statue of “St. Michael vanquishing Lucifer” is documented among the Chapel’s appointments.100 St. Augustine’s De Civitate Dei defined the Emperor as the defender of the terrestrial city of God. His book had been Bruyn, “A Puzzling Picture at Oberlin,” 15, cites this Apocalyptic reference. Louis Bouyer, The Seat of Wisdom; An Essay on the Place of the Virgin Mary in Christian Theology, translated by A. V. Littledale (New York: Pantheon Books, 1962; Ilene Haring Forsyth, The Throne of Wisdom (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972); A. Dean McKenzie, The Virgin Mary as the Throne of Solomon in Medieval Art, Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: New York University, 1965); C. Michna, “Das Salomonische Throne-symbol auf Ősterreichische Denkmäler,” Alte und Moderne Kunst (Vienna: 1961), VI, 2–543; idem., Maria als Thron Salomonis, Ph.D. Dissertation (Vienna: 1950); Ferdinand Piper. “Maria als Thron Salamonis und ihre Tugenden bei der Verkűndigung,” Jahrbűcher fűr Kunstwissenschaft V (1873): 116–21; René Laurentin, Maria, Ecclesia, Sacerdotium, 2 vols. (Paris: Nouvelles Éditions Latines, 1953. 100 Pope Pius V sent Cardinal Alexandrino to Lisbon in 1571 to enlist support against the Turks in anticipation of the Holy League’s naval engagement at Lepanto. Giovanni Battista Venturino, the Cardinal’s secretary, recorded that tapestries of the “Conquest of India” were displayed in the Capela de São Miguel during the reign of King Sebastião. See Alexander Herculano, Opusculos (Lisbon, 1897), VI, 96. 98

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greatly admired by Charlemagne who saw his imperium as a civitas terrena where divine justice prevailed over the Saracens.101 Unquestionably the text which influenced Prince Duarte in his writing of the Leal Conselheiro, was a literary source for Van Eyck’s masterpiece of 1429. Among the manuscripts listed in the library of books King Manuel I inherited from King Duarte were: a “manuscript on vellum by St. Augustine in Latin with a blue velvet cover and copper clasps”; and the “meditations by St. Augustine.”102 The Chapel of St. Michael in the Lisbon Alcáçova Palace belonged to the Augustinian parish church of the Holy Cross. The cross of the Portuguese Order of Christ appears as a germane leitmotif (Figs. 3.82–3.84) within the sacred architecture in the Fountain of Life, specifically in roundels of the flanking towers and the terminating spires decorating Christ’s throne. The gilt frame of the New York Last Judgment is inscribed with several passages drawn from Revelations, but especially pertinent to the imagery of the Fountain of Life are the words of the “voice from the throne” describing the New Jerusalem (Apocalypse 21: 3,4): Behold, the tabernacle of God with men; and he will dwell with them. And they shall be his people; and God himself with them shall be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; 101 Einhard, Life of Charlemagne, ed. Heathcote William Garrod and Robert Balmain Mowat (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1925); Augustinus Aurelius, City of God, translated by Marcus Dods, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: 1913); idem., Expositions on the Book of Psalms, translated by Arthur Cleveland Coxe (New York: 1888), abbreviated from the Oxford edition. Charlemagne was thought to have visited the Iberian Peninsula. See José María Lacarra y de Miguel and Miguel Sancho Izquierdo, La expedición de Carlomagno a Zaragoza y su derrota en Roncesvalles, discurso [y] contestación, 3 de diciembre de 1980 (Zaragoza: Real Academia de Nobles y Bellas Artes de San Luis, 1980). 102 Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, A livraria real especialmente no reinado de d. Manuel (Lisbon: Por ordem e na Typogrphia da Academia, 1901) had identified some of the manuscripts listed in the “Incomplete Wardrobe of Manuel I in the National Archives of the Torre do Tombo (Nucléo Antigo, #789, 1521). See also Anselmo Braancamp Freire, Archivo Histórico Português (Lisbon, 1904), II, 381–417; Annemarie Jordan [Schwend], Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey, M.A. Thesis (Washington, DC: The George Washington University, 1985), 172–75, 177–79 (inventory of books). Consult Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon, 1942). Piel provides a list of the books in King Duarte’s library, 414–16, documented in MS. 3390 of the Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa (folio 163): “Estes são os Livros que tinha El Rey Dom Duarte.” The inventory records two tomes that were inherited by Dom Manuel I: a Livro das Meditações de S.to Agostinho, e das Confissões, #43; and Hum Livro das Meditatações de S.to Agostinho, que treladou o moço da Camera, #73.

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and death shall be no more; nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more; for the former things are passed away.103

The Portuguese Elevation of Charlemagne Jan van Eyck portrayed King João I kneeling in holy alliance beside the Holy Roman Emperor who achieved the goal of a world-realm and universal Church (Fig. 3.85). Charlemagne’s continental empire «gave Western Europe a single leader, the Pope, a single social framework»—based on the feudal seigniorial system—»the clergy, a single private law derived from canon law, a single morality, that of Christ, and through the church, a single culture with distant bonds with the humanism of the ancient Greco-Roman world.»104 From the union of João I and Queen Philippa at Porto in 1387, the Portuguese could trace their family tree to Emperor Charlemagne, the first to plot the provinces of Belgium, and the epoch of les chansons de geste.105 Philippa’s genealogy is traced in a folio of a manuscript commissioned by Infante Dom Fernando of Portugal, brother of João III (r. 1521–1557). Dated 1530–34, the unfinished book by António de Holanda and Simon Bening (Bruges) attests to the Lusitanian fascination for heraldry and prestigious lineage. On Christmas Day in 800 at the Basilica of St. Peter’s, Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III. Remnants of fabric said to have been preserved from the coronation robes are still extant at Aix-la-Chapelle. The tiny samples of frayed, faded and brittle silk are composed of a delicate weave brocaded in gold silk threads that form the raised motif of a double eagle in continuous sequence across the entire body of the fabric. Van Eyck pictured Charlemagne with long hair and beard and clothed in a flowing outer robe. He preferred to show the most extravagant use of cloth that might be conceived in Renaissance fashion. The Holy Bible. Douay Version, Rheims (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1960; rpt. of 1 ed. 1956), New Testament, Part II, 347. 104 Jacques Pirenne, The Tides of History (New York: E.P.Dutton & Co., 1963), II, 67. 105 André Bernard de Mandach, Naissance et développement de la chanson de geste en Europe, I – La geste Charlemagne et de Rolandi (Geneva: E. Droz, 1961). The Livraria of the Monastery of Alcobaça contains a copy of the Vita caroli magni et Rolandi, which dates to the end of the twelfth century. See Biblioteca Nacional, Inventário dos códices alcobacenses (Lisbon, 1932), IV, 307–9 (Entry 334, f. 186v–211v) and Marío Martins, S.J., “A gesta peninsular de Carlos Magno em galaico-português,” Brotéria 74 (Lisbon: 1962): 283–92. 103

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Charlemagne’s apparel seems to be somewhat removed from the far more simplistic dress which the Carolingian court adapted from the more ornate garments accessible in Byzantium. It consists of a deep violet/sky blue giornea or montiline composed of two voluminous long panels slit the length of the side seams and draped into angular and undulating folds which settle on the floor. The beautifully modulated creases of the weighty fabric are highlighted by a glowing sheen which suggests a material made of satin weave or tightly woven silken threads. The lining is made of a short-haired, smooth dark brown fur which also has been exposed in the turned back cuffs of the under tunic. Beneath the montiline Charlemagne wears a garment cut in the shape of a classic dalmatic which featured long sleeves that flared at the wrist in excess of ten inches, and draped the figure in a continuous line from the shoulders to the ankles. In forming the garment, van Eyck discarded the bulky silken damasks, brocades or cloths of gold traditionally exhibited in Byzantine court dress. He selected instead a heavily patterned fabric which was contemporary with the fourteenth and fifteenth-century silken velvets produced in Italy. The goldsmiths of Renaissance Europe created exquisite adornments to satisfy the seemingly insatiable desire of the nobility to show their wealth and power. The only actual jewelry displayed by Charlemagne is confined to decorative accessories of his ornate crown and multiple rings worn on the little finger and top joint of the middle finger of his right hand. The towering sculptural masterpiece conceived as the Emperor’s crown stands as a magnificent example of the imagination reserved within design dictates of rhythm, balance of mass, color and shape that characterized Renaissance aesthetics. At first glance, it is obvious that the basic components of the design were steeped in the tradition of the eight plaque hinged crown surmounted by crossed bridges which Charlemagne had fashioned after the Emperor Justinian prototype, introduced to the Byzantine court during the fifth century. The crown pictured on the figure of Charlemagne, neither Byzantine nor Medieval, is a creation by van Eyck which utterly conforms to the sophisticated tastes of a cosmopolitan and intellectual Renaissance court. A superbly proportioned foundation of gold, ornamented in gold filigree, repoussé and cabochon rubies, sapphires and emeralds, rises at carefully alternated intervals into decorative peaks that support the intersecting arched bridges which are mounted by a finial of precious stones. The resulting effect is one of elegance and airy grace which defines the elevated stature of the dynamic historical emperor, whose universal vision was so admired by King João I.

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Reflections upon the New Jerusalem In imitation of Charlemagne, whose age was renowned as the setting for heroic deeds, João I, Prince Duarte and Prince Pedro encouraged translations of works by such classical authors such as Plato, Aristotle, Plutarch, etc.106 These ancient texts elucidated the virtues necessary for an ideal sovereign to cultivate and for his knightly orders to emulate. But above all, Duarte expressed his admiration for the De regimine principium. This treatise had been written in 1285 by the Augustinian doctor fundatissimus et theologarum princeps Aegidius Romanus (1247–1316) at the request of Philip the Fair. The chronicler Rui de Pina states that Pedro completed a Portuguese translation, and Duarte possessed both Latin and vulgar editions in his library.107 The manuscript De regimine principium, which advanced the O’Callaghan, A History of Medieval Spain, 641–42. The incomplete Inventory of the Wardrobe of Manuel I (inherited from King Duarte) includes: two books of Plutarch’s Lives bound in red leather, a copy of Titus Livy’s Decades, a “small book by Virgil,” a “small book by Ovid, a text entitled Espelho de Conscienca (Mirror of Conscience), and a Historia de Troya (by Guido Colunna, 1280). Prince Duarte had a History of Troy in his library (MS. 3390, Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, # 74): “Historia de Troya, per aragões” (“History of Troy by an Aragonese”). Consult Alphonse Bayot, La Légende de Troie à la Cour de Bourgogne (Bruges: 1908); Hugo Buchthal, Historia Troiana. Studies in the History of Mediaeval Secular Illustration (London: Warburg Institute, University of London, 1971). For additional information about the cultural and political milieu of the Portuguese court, consult António José Saraiva, História da cultura em Portugal, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Jornal do Foro, 1950, 1955, 1962); Francisco Elías de Tejada y Spinola, Las doctrinas políticas en Portugal. edad media (Madrid: Escelicer, 1943). 107 Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, A Livraria Real, especialmente no reinado de D. Manuel (Lisbon: 1904), states that De Regimine Pincipium by Gilles de Rome [Aegidius Columna, Gil de Colonna, Frei Gil de Roma, Frei Gil Correado, Egidio Romano] came from the library of João I. The volume described as the “Regymento dos Pryncipes” by “Frey Gil de Roma” in the Leal Conselheiro appears twice in the inventory of Duarte’s library (MS. 3390): Regimento de Princepes, picado d’ouro nas taboas, e as cobertoiras vermelhas, #13; and “Regimento de Princepes,” #34. See Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Crónica de D. Afonso V, Ch. 125 in the Collecçaõ de livros ineditos de historia portugueza, dos reinados de D. Joao I., D. Duarte, D. Affonso V., e D. Joao II, 5 vols. (Lisbon: Pub. de Ordem da Academia Real das Sciencias de Lisboa, ed. José Corrêa da Serra, 1790–1824; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress). Rui de Pina states with respect to the oras da confissom owned by Dom Pedro: “elle tirou de latym em linguajem o Regimento dos Pryncipes que Frei Gil Correado compos, e assy tirou o lyvro dos Offycios de Tullio e Vegecio de Re Militari, e compos o livro que se diz da Virtuosa Bemfeytorya com huma confyssam a qualquer Christão muy proveytosa.” See Joseph Piel (ed.) Leal Conselheiro, 110 note 3, who also also remarks, 124– 106

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concept of two powers, was based in part on the writings of the Dominican St. Thomas Aquinas.108 Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life presents a similar duality of State and Church in the personal of ecclesiastics and temporal rulers. These defenders of Christian Truth mirror the powers of the ChristRedeemer, both rex and sacerdos. The writings of St. Gregory the Great (540–604) also were admired greatly by the Portuguese court.109 Duarte discusses the Dialogues of St. Gregory at length in his treatise Leal Conselheiro (Loyal Counselor). One of the oldest books in the Roman liturgy is the Gregorium Sacramentary, a book of formulae pronounced by the priest when administering the Eucharist. Charlemagne took an interest in Church reform. His Romanization and unification of the liturgy was based upon Gregorian prototypes. Moreover, St. Gregory’s feast day, March 12, is close to the commemorative date of the founding of the Military Order of Our Lord Jesus Christ in 1319, March 14. Despite the fact that the “Synagogue” in the Fountain of Life may 25, that the Prologue of the Crónica de Dom Pedro by Fernão Lopes was in great measure translated from De Regimine principium and that Duarte referred to the text in Chs. XXXII, XXXVI, L, LI and LXXXI of his Leal Conselheiro. 108 Thomas Aquinas is mentioned often in Prince Duarte’s Leal Conselheiro, Chs. XLVII and LXVIII. An “opus Aure” by St. Thomas, perhaps his incomplete Summa theologica of 1266–64, was in the Wardrobe of Dom Manuel I. A Suma de Theologia, Livro I by St. Thomas (late thirteenth or early fourteenth century) is in the Monastery of Alcobaça. See Biblioteca Nacional, Inventário dos códices alcobacenses, VIII, 239–40 (Entry 269). The Libraria de Alcobaça houses a version of Duarte’s Sobre a maneira de ler os Evangelhos. This didactic text was included at the beginning of a Portuguese translation of the Collationes Patrum XXIV of Giovanni Cassiano. See Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), XLIX: 593–94 and 597–600. Duarte discusses Giovanni Cassiano in Ch. XLI and XLII of his Leal Conselheiro. The Livro das Colações e Estabelecimentos was commissioned by Abbot D. Estavão de Aguiar from Friar Nicolau, a monk of Alcobaça between 1431 and 1446. Consult Antonio Joaquim Anselmo, Os códices alcobacenses da Biblioteca Nacional, V, “Inventário...Codices Portugueses” (Lisbon: Ofícinas gráficas da Biblioteca nacional Lisbon, 1926), 361–63, Nos. CCLVII–CCLIX (384–86) and CCLXXIV (212). 109 Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Piel, Chs. VII, LXXXIX, XC. The “Dialogues of St. Gregory” (Regula Pastoralis), appears in the 1521 Inventory of King Dom Manuel I’s Wardrobe. See Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, A Livraria Real, especialmente no reinado de D. Manuel (Lisbon, 1904). The text may be the one listed in Duarte’s library (MS. 3390) as a Pastoral de letra antiga, #14. Prince Fernando also owned a copy of St. Gregory’s Moraes. For the Regula Pastoralis, consult J.P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, LXXVII. See Robert Austin Markus, Gregory the Great and his World (CambridgeNew York: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

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allude to the 1414–1415 disputation at Tortosa, Pope Benedict XIII could not be the pope represented by Van Eyck. The same year that Jews and Christians debated, another great meeting occurred to resolve the schism of the papacy that had existed between Rome, Pisa and Avignon. The Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund invited all rulers and prelates to the General Council at Constance held in 1415. As a result of the conclave, John XXIII of Pisa was deposed and the Roman pope Gregory XII, who had been supported by João I, was forced to abdicate. The Fountain of Life, therefore, may contain veiled allegorical portraits of Emperor Sigismund as Charlemagne and Pope Gregory XII as St. Gregory.110 The Pope is poised at the edge of the fountain, and points towards the watery depths with a hand covered by a white satin gauntlet. The liturgical glove is jeweled and features a flaring circular cuff which is heavily embellished with gold braid and rubies. As dictated by protocol on this auspicious occasion, he is attired in full ceremonial regalia. On his head is a triple papal tiara. Three golden crowns in graduating size, decorated in repoussé and filigree, and set with cabochon rubies, are mounted in succession atop a scarlet red foundation. Lappets, also encrusted in gold, descend from the base of the tiara and extend over the shoulders. The Pope is draped in a magnificent red papal mantle, lined in green, and clasped together across the chest by a richly ornamented and jeweled morse that enjoins with the orphrey encircling the neckline and extends along the front opening of the mantle. Details of the decoration displayed on the orphrey exhibit the superb level of technical facility and craftsmanship that characterized this art during the Medieval and Renaissance periods. The long band of fabric has been divided into a continuous series of rectangular panels, each of which carries the image of a religious figure worked in appliqué and heavily embroidered couched gold threads and jewelry. The sixth-century St. Gregory, patrician, prefect of Rome and papal delegate in Constantinople, successively served as abbot, bishop, cardinal and pontiff. Van Eyck might have alluded to the legacy of the Latin Doctor of the Church by the alignment of the ecclesiastics in his Fountain of Life.111 In designated order of rank, a cardinal, whose position of importance in O’Callaghan, A History of Medieval Spain, 546. Louis Trichet, Le Costume du clergé: ses origines et son évolution en France d’après les règlements de l’Église (Paris: Du Cerf, 1986); J. Mayo, A History of Ecclesiastical Dress (London: Batsford Publishers, 1984). 110 111

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the hierarchical structure of the Church is identified by the traditional lowcrowned, broad-brimmed style and color of his red hat. Van Eyck’s cardinal wears a cloak which turns back at the neck in broad, standing white reverse and underneath he wears a white soutane or dalmatic. Standing adjacent to the cardinal is an archbishop, who has an elegant cape of heavy silk brocaded in large scale patterns of green and gold threads. His raiment suggests a Florentine or Venetian origin. On his head is an aurifrigiata mitre of white silk decorated with heavily encrusted embroidered orphreys worked in raised threads of silver and gold and set with precious gems. Infulae, which also have been heavily embellished with gold embroidery, extend from the back of the tall conical headdress. In his left hand the archbishop carries a crosier, which terminates at the top in a pelican bent crook elaborated into golden tendrils. In their interpretation of Psalm 102:6 (“I am like a pelican of the wilderness), Medieval exegetes equated Christ’s charity for mankind with the pelican piercing its breast to nurse its young. Besides serving as adornment for the archbishop’s crosier, the pelican distinctly appears as a stone carving of the centerpiece octagonal basin of “everlasting waters.”112 Yet another bird also ornaments the fountain, a bound sacrificial dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit.113 St. Gregory in his Regula Pastoralis (Pastoral Care) defined the office and responsibilities of the bishop: “Power is granted from on High ... so that the earthly kingdom shall be at the service of the Kingdom of Heaven.” The Ron Baxter, Bestiaries and their Uses in the Middle Ages (London: Sutton Publishing, 1998), 29–31 (Greek Physiogus); Louis Charbonneau-Lassay, Le Bestiare du Christ, translated by D.M. Doorling, New York: Parabola Books, 1991), 258. 113 See Paul Atkins Underwood, “The Fountain of Life in Manuscripts of the Gospels,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers V (Washington, D.C., 1959): 81–89. After his accession to the throne in 1481, João II (1455–1495) took the pelican as his empresa, as can be demonstrated by a relief from the Convent of Madre de Deus in Lisbon. An illumination from the Book of Privileges concerning the Order of Santiago (Livro dos Privilégios concedidos a Ordem de Santiago), popularly known as the Livro das Espadas, presents the escutcheon of Senhor Dom Jorge, Master of the Order of Santiago and illegitimate son of João II. Consult Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, “O Homem e a Hora São um só,” A Dinistia de Avis (Lisbon: Presidência do Conselho de Ministros, 1983), 239 and Pl. 6 (escutcheon of João in Madre de Deus); 237 and Pl. 4 (escutcheon of Dom Jorge). See Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Crónica del Rei Dom João II, ed. Alberto Martins de Carvalho (Coimbra: Atlântida, 1950; modern edition of the manuscript written by the monarch’s secretary and first published in 1792) and García de Resende [1470–1536], Chronica de el-rei D. João II [1545] with Miscellania based upon an edition of 1622, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1902). 112

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abbot, deacon of the Church, holds a crosier as the insignia of his office and the pastoral staff is less elaborate than that held by the archbishop. He is dressed entirely in black, perhaps a short cape with a soutane underneath. He also wears an early form of the biretta, a ridged cap particular to the clergy. It had a center tuft, like the modern beret and like it, was susceptible to arrangement. Out of this headgear developed the present-day stiff pinched shape. Beside the abbot is a monk, who has a tonsured head and wears the undyed cloth of the Friars Minor, a flowing habit cut in the form of a generous dalmatic. Worn over the habit and of the same dusky brown color is a cowl (cucullus) to which typically was attached a small hood. Van Eyck’s setting of a radiant “New Jerusalem” conjures a tableau vivant courtly pageantry that typically recast a messianic expectation for the successors of a sovereign. While the Portuguese preferred to engage in trade following their colonization of exotic lands, the red cross of the Knights Templar displayed on their caravels attests to a sustained belief in the medieval equation of the just ruler with a chivalric crusader. An impetus to Renaissance exploration was the search for the legendary Christian kingdom of Prester John.114 The earliest fourteenth-century Portuguese versions of Demanda do Santo Graal and Amadis de Gaula concentrate upon the theme of the intrepid quest and provide archetypes of religious knighthood.115 While the valiant skill of Perceval in his quest for the Holy Grail Padre Francisco Álvares, Verdadeira informação das terras do preste João das Indias [1540], ed. Augusto Reis Machado (Lisbon: Divisão de publicações e biblioteca, Agência geral das colónias, 1943); idem., Verdadeira informação sobre a terra do Preste João das Indias (Lisbon: Publicações Alfa, 1989); Charles Fraser Beckingham and George Wynn Brereton Huntingford (eds.), The Prester John of the Indies, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1961); Lars Ivar Ringbom, “Gralstempel und Paradies; Bezieungen zwischen Iran und Europa im Mittelalter,” in Kungl. Viatterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademiems Handlinger, Part 73 (Stockholm: 1951), 427ff. identifies the Christ of the Madrid Fountain of Life and the Ghent Altarpiece as Prester John. Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting (1971 ed.), I, 446 and 215 note 4, refutes this hypothesis. Prince Pedro supposedly encountered Prester John, the great Christian leader in Asia, on his voyage to the Holy Land. The 1521 Inventory of the Wardrobe of Dom Manuel records a “large book by Josephus in Latin bound with blue leather,” Flavius Josephus’s De Bello Judaico (Antiquités Judaïques). 115 The 1521 Inventory of the Wardrobe of Manuel I lists “one book on Florisande and Amadis de Gaula,” a description that does not correspond with the 1511 Sevillian publication by Gracia Ordoñez de Montalvo, The Four Books of Amadis de Gaula. See Jordan, Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey, 179. The Portuguese A Demanda do Santo Graal in the Hofbibliothek, Vienna (MS. 2594) was created in the fifteenth century, although the earliest version of the romance dates from 114

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was mentioned by Llull in his Order of Chivalry, a fourteenth-century French Romance of Perlesvaus recounts the hero’s dauntless struggle to impose the New Covenant of Christianity in place of the Old. This aspect of the Perceval epic adventure is important in the Fountain of Life. In a setting of the civitas terrena, where a fountain recalls the Greek word for baptism, “illumination,” an “epiphany” of the adult “King of Kings” is staged before high priests of Mosaic Law (Fig. 3.86).116 The “Golden Shrine” and flanking Gothic towers represented in the Madrid and Oberlin replicas of the Fountain of Life are undeniably Flemish. The Chapel Reliquary of Charlemagne (1360) shows angels supporting tiered levels of sacred architecture.117 While the work is exemplary of the Northern goldschmiedekunst known to Van Eyck (Fig. 3.87–3.89), in Portugal he also would have had the opportunity to study exquisitely tooled gold monstrances that adhered to the popular “Burgundian” style. Gil Vicente’s Custódia de Belém, designed for King Manuel I in 1506 and a Custódia the fourteenth century. The Viennese text was one of a trilogy that included: Merlin (the translation of which is lost); and O Livro de José de Arimateia (a sixteenth-century copy of a 1314 work by João Sanches of Astorga is in the Convento de Cartuxa, Évora). Consult: Manuel Rodrigues Lapa, La Demanda do Santo Graal. prioridade do texto português (Lisbon: 1930); idem., Dom Duarte e os prosadores da Casa de Aviz (Lisbon: 1940); Mário Martins, Estudios de Literatura Medieval, 34–47; Henry Hare Carter, The Portuguese Book of Joseph of Arimathaea (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1967). The treatise Confessio Amantis by the Englishman John Gower († 1408) was translated into Portuguese by order of King João I. The celebrated allegorical poem, which was transcribed by Roberto Payn, a canon of the Cathedral of Lisbon, is lost. See Dom Duarte Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Piel, 7 and note 1. However the Libro do Amante is recorded in the inventory of King Duarte’s library under the title O Amante, # 30 (see Piel, 415, Inventory of Dom Duarte’s manuscripts, MS. 3390, Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa). From this tome, a Castilian translation was made, probably at the instigation of Philip II (1555–1598), which is in the Palace-Monastery of the Escorial (MS. g–ij–19). 116 Consult: Ursula Nilgen, “The Epiphany and the Eucharist: On the Interpretation of Eucharistic Motifs in Mediaeval Epiphany Scenes,” Art Bulletin XLIX (1967): 311–16; Peter Browe, Die Verehrung der Euchariste im Mittelalter (Rome: 1967); idem, Die Eucharistischen Wunder der Mittelalters (Breslau: 1938). Carla Gottlieb, “The Living Host,” Konsthistorisk Tidskrift XL (1971): 30–46. 117 Ernst. G. Grimme, “Der Aachener Domschatz,” Aachener Kunstblaetter XLIV (1973), 91, Pl. XIII; idem, Aachener Goldschmiedekunst im Mittelalter, (Cologne, 1957); Goldschmiedekunst im Mittelalter Form und Bedeutung des Reliquiars von 800–1500 (Cologne, 1972). If drawings of Charlemagne’s Chapel at Aachen were consulted in the building of the Capela Imperfeita at the east end of Batalha’s Santa Maria da Vitória, conceivably the Chapel Reliquary of Charlemagne was known to the Portuguese court. Drawings of Aachen and its treasures doubtless were lost in the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755.

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of 1527 from the Tesouro de Sé (Cathedral) in Coimbra, commissioned by the Count-Bishop Dom Jorge de Almeida, attest to a sustained tradition for creating Eucharistic containers that suggested sacred architecture.118 Complementary to the inventive representation of the “New Jerusalem” as a Eucharistic custódia in the Fountain of Life, is Van Eyck’s selection of different embroidered fabrics to distinguish each heavenly dais. Sumptuous textiles behind Christ, the Virgin Mary and St. John resemble the silk brocades of vestments used in the Latin rite of the Mass: green for the liturgical season of Advent culminating in Christmas; and red for Pentecost, the feast commemorating the birth date of the Church. Emerald and ruby, not coincidentally, were the colors respectively associated with Portugal’s chivalric orders of Avis and Santiago. The replicas of Jan van Eyck’s Fountain of Life with their identical tiered levels of reality may reflect his fascination for the terraced palatine gardens of Portugal, like the private Moorish patios with walled basins that still survive at Sintra Palace.119 The most approximate compositional source may have been the Palace of Al-Aziza at Palermo (Fig. 3.90). The Muslim legacy in Sicily was considerable under Norman rule.120 In 1154 William I (1154–1166) began his summer residence in the center of Genoardo Park in Palermo, and the structure was completed by his successor in 1182. Erected according to a rectangular plan, the edifice rising three storeys resembled a massive castle keep, the exterior characterized by tiered windows and blind arches. At the opposite short ends of the palace were symmetrical wings, each of which contained a suite of three chambers that were half the height of the main hall. Called an iwan under Islamic rule and an aula by the Normans, the main audience hall, the “Gallery of the Fountain,” was named for its water conceit. The back wall with its elevated stone throne had a high canopy fashioned of muquarnas which was complimented by mosaics See “Abre-se a Terra em Sons e Cores.” Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimiento (Lisbon: Presidência do Conselho de Ministeros, Conselho da Europa, XVII Exposição de Arte, Ciência e Cultura, 1983), 177 (No. 140, Custódia de Belém) and 181 (No. 146, Custódia de Coimbra). 119 An «Audience Courtyard» adjoins the Sala de Cisnes at Sintra and it still retains its glazed tile seat used by João I for informal meetings en plein air. The larger “Waterspout Courtyard,” which also connects to the “Swan Room,” is a Moorish patio garden on two levels. More will be said about Sintra in a subsequent chapter of this manuscript. 120 J. D. Breckenridge, “The Two Sicilies,” Islam and the Medieval West, ed. Stanley Ferber (Binghamton: State University of New York at Binghamton, exhibition at the University Art Gallery, April 6–May 4, 1975,): 39–66. 118

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of archers and paired peacocks flanking a date palm. From the throne wall water flowed down to a marble canal that ran the length of the gallery. The channel connected with three square pools and then passed to a large reservoir at the entrance of the palace. The reservoir was the setting for an island containing a domed mirador. Jan van Eyck may have visited Sicily before he traveled to Portugal or even after his visit to Granada in 1429. He could have seen similar hydraulic systems at the Alhambra destroyed by Emperor Charles V in the renovations of the Sabika Hill circa 1526 or he might have studied Islamic houses that no longer stand in Portugal. Even so, Al-Aziza’s aula with its stepped throne and conduit leading to a garden of pleasure should be perceived as a likely inspiration for the Fountain of Life with its vertical ascent to a “closed garden.” The grass is dappled with columbine and daisies, flowers commonly planted in private gardens of a medieval castle but also blooms that signify regeneration by the Holy Spirit. The ground also is covered with dense clover, the trifoliate leaves of which are symbolic of the Holy Trinity. Jan van Eyck’s tiered garden levels are the perfect setting for the “New Adam.”121 From the divine throne of the “Lord of Judgment” mystical water flows into a walled basin, and sacred hosts float upon the sparkling surface to recall Psalm 30:9: “For with thee is the fountain of life; in thy light shall we see light.” Music-playing angels clustered on the verdant meadow undeniably allude to the harmony of God’s brilliant empyrean.122 Flanking towers house celestial singers who chant St. John the Evangelist’s description of Christ as the rock from which issues the “pure river of life’s waters, clear as crystal.”123 The four rivers of Paradise that sprang from a single source 121 Regarding “Adam Mysticism,” consult: Ernst Hartwig Kantorowicz, Frederick II, translated by Emily Overend Lorimer (New York: R. R. Smith, Inc., 1931), 258ff. Also consult Ernst Gulden, Eva und Maria (Graz-Cologne, 1966) and Mirella Levi d’Ancona, The Iconography of the Immaculate Conception in the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance (New York: College Art Association of America– Art Bulletin, 1957). The Council of Basel (1436) played a significant role in the Church’s perception of the Virgin Mary as “Immaculate,” that is, she was conceived without trace of original sin. 122 Frank Crisp, Mediaeval Gardens; Flowery medes and other arrangements of herbs, flowers, and shrubs grown in the Middle Ages, with some account of Tudor, Elizabethan, and Stuart gardens [1924], ed. Catherine Childs Paterson (New York: Hacker Art Books, 1966). 123 The 1521 Inventory of Manuel I’s Wardrobe records “a book about the nature of angels.” Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo has identified it as Friar Francisco Ximinez’s Natura Angelica, a text published in Burgos by Fradique de Basilia (October, 1490). See Jordan, Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580), 174. It also could have been a copy of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite’s De Hierarchia Celesti.

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traditionally have been equated with the four gospels flowing from Christ (Fig. 3.91). The octagonal basin of water beneath tetramorphs in the replicas of the Fountain of Life, therefore, symbolizes the baptism of the world and purification of mankind by the Apocalyptic Lamb’s blood.124 Van Eyck’s octagonal marble basin alludes to baptism in the Pauline sense of initiation. According to Paul (I Corinthians 12:13), baptism incorporates the catechumen into the Body of Christ and forms one in his likeness. Through the Holy Spirit, the baptized share in the priestly function of Christ, particularly the offering of the Eucharist. The Didache, a late firstcentury manual, prescribed immersion of the catechumens in “living water.” This practice had its genesis in the mikva’ot, Jewish ritual baths. According to the tractate of the Mishnah, the earliest halakhic (rabbanic) code of law (200 C.E.), a solitary mikveh used for full-body immersion or the purification of sacred vessels had to contain about sixty gallons of “living water,” that is water which either originated from a spring or a river or was drawn from rainwater flowing to a pool. The sacred acropolis of Zion, where Adam and Eve were buried according to Jewish tradition, was the source of the four sacred rivers that watered the four corners of the earth. The soil supposedly was watered by freshwater which would “well up from the ground and water the whole surface of the soil.” (Genesis 2:6). One of the named paradisiacal rivers, the Gihon Spring was believed to be the main water source for Jerusalem, the city of David, the Kidron Valley to the east and the Hinnom Valley to the west. It was David who moved the Ark of the Covenant, which was lodged in Kireath-Jearim on the western border of his kingdom into a tent-shrine prepared for it on the site of the Gihon Spring. His transfer to Jerusalem of such a sacred object was accomplished only with the sanction of Yahweh, whose choice of Zion as a home signified divine approbation of the dynastic House of David. Hebrew merchants, scientists, dyers, and illuminators were an essential component of a prosperous society in King João I’s Lisbon (Fig. 3.92). Neither the Avis court nor Jan van Eyck sustained a negative impression of the Jews. Psalm 36: 8–9, which alludes to Jerusalem as the Eden of Yahweh and also mentions the “Fountain of Life,” seems critical for understanding the

124 Jan Karl Steppe, «De echo van het `Lam Gods’ van gebroeders van Eyck in Spanje,» Het Lam Gods: een recent onderzoek met verrassende resultaten (Ram-Rapport IV) (Maaseik, 1990): 3–63.

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prevailing belief that righteous Jews were to be included among the Elect invited to the Apocalyptical banquet: [The Israelites] feast on the rich fare of your Temple; You [Yahweh] give them drink From your abundant streams, For with you is the Fountain of Life, In your light we see light.125

125 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition, 595. Consult Roch A. Kereszty, Wedding Feast of the Lamb: Eucharistic Theology from a Historical, Biblical and Systematic Perspective (Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 2004).

4 The Lisbon of King João I and Sintra, the “Queen’s Estate” The Monarch’s Palaces in Lisbon

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he Lisbon of the present is greatly altered from 1429 as the majority of buildings were destroyed by the earthquake of November 1, 1755, and the giant tidal wave and fires which followed (Fig. 4.1). Over 30,000 people lost their lives. Thousands of structures, including more than 100 churches were leveled the morning of All Saints Day.1 Despite this catastrophe, Lisbon still retains its intimate character in the narrow streets of the older sector. It is easy to imagine Jan van Eyck visiting at leisure the merchants’ square by the river, the artists’ district, the alchemical street of goldsmiths, and vendor stalls stocked with azulejos and ceramics. The large Alcáçova Castle of King João I, also known as Castelo São Jorge, once rose on a hill above the Tagus estuary. Its original appearance is known primarily through a few panoramic views which date from the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, and an even scarcer number of travelers’ accounts. Vestiges of “St. George Castle” still provide spectacular views, but few looking down from the ramparts realize that other royal mansions once graced Lisbon. A brief summation of the main palatine estates of King João I and the Avis princes paints a picture, however indistinct, of Lisbon’s configuration during the fifteenth century when Jan van Eyck and the Burgundian embassy resided several months in the city.

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Thomas Downing Kendrick, The Lisbon Earthquake (London: Methuen, 1956).

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Lisbon’s history essentially began with the Christian Reconquest. An engraving of 1716, which probably was based on a twelfth-century drawing (Figs. 4.2–4.3), captures the appearance of the town about October 25, 1147, the date of its liberation from Moslem control. Surrounding Moorish battlements with ten major gates, the ships and encampments of English, Burgundian and German Crusaders are represented. After the victory, several foreign knights elected to remain in Portugal, including Gilbert of Hastings, who became Archbishop of Lisbon and helped plan the construction of the city’s famous Cathedral.2 As shown in the eighteenth-century print, the keep of the Moorish governor was situated on a lofty hill and surrounded by walls with four large circular turrets and two massive square towers.3 To the southeast was another quadrangular defense post with four corner turrets, which was entered by an arched portal. Because Lisbon still was situated uncomfortably at the edge of combat zones, King Afonso Henriques I shifted the capital of Portugal from Guimarães only as far south as Coimbra. Lisbon was established as the administrative seat of the kingdom in 1255 when more territory was secured under Christian control. King Afonso III (1210: 1248–1279) began the task in 1264 of transforming the Moorish alcãçares of Lisbon into royal residences. Surrounded by battlements, his Romanesque Alcáçova Castle was enlarged further by King Dinis (1261–1325), king of the Algarves (1263) and Portugal (1279). From that point on, it served as the administrative seat of Lusitanian monarchs. Fernando I (r. 1367–1383) was born in the palace in 1345, and in the wake of the Castilian burning of Lisbon in 1369, he built a new wall. Called the “Cerca Fernardina” (1373–1375), it circumscribed new areas of the 2 António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, “Depois da Reconquista. A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” Livro de Lisboa, ed. Irisalva Moita (Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 1994), 89–113, illustrates the engraving at 89. The engraving was published in El Alphonso del cavallero Don Francisco Botello de Moraes y Vasconcelos dedicado a la Magestad de Don Juan V… (Lisbon: Gabinet de Estudos Olisponenses, 1716). Consult: Júlio de Castilho, Conquista de Lisboa aos Mouros (1147) Narrações pelos cruzados Osberno e Arnulfo, testemunhas presenciais do cêrco, translated from the Latin by José Augusto de Oliveira with a preface by Augusto Vieira da Silva (Lisbon: S. Industriais da C. m. L., 1936, 2nd ed); idem., Lisboa antiga (Lisbon: Antiga Casa Bertrand, J. Bastos, 1902, 2nd amplified ed.; reprinted Lisbon: Oficinas Gráficas da C. M. L., 1954). 3 The disposition of Lisbon’s towers and walls typifies Islamic strongholds in Portugal. See Basilio Pavón Maldonado, Ciudades y fortalezas lusomusulmanas: crónicas de viajes por el sur de Portugal (Madrid: M.A.E., Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional, Instituto de Cooperación con el Mundo Arabe, 1993).

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expanding city.4 During the reign of João I (1385–1433), Lisbon numbered around 20,000 inhabitants. By the early sixteenth century, the Alcáçova (Fig. 4.4) had evolved in an arbitrary manner to comprise a cluster of three to four building blocks which were irregularly disposed due to the limitations of land, a little over two acres. Although the palace had no uniform architectural style because of its disparate components, its massive bulwarks with stone chemises and several towers of varying heights (Fig. 4.5–4.10), formed a landmark distinctively recognizable to foreign ships docking along the banks of the Tagus estuary. The seismic effects of the Lisbon earthquake in 1755 (November 1 at 9:40 in the morning) on All Saints Day destroyed Alcáçova completely. Only a courtyard of Gothic arches belonging to the “Ogival House,” survives within the restored sector (Fig. 4.11). None of the panoramic views of Lisbon precisely capture the layout of former citadel of King João I, but two cityscapes particularly are important. One is an engraving titled Olissipo from Volume I of the Civitates Orbis Terrarum by George Braun and Frans Hogenberg, published in Cologne in 1598 (Fig. 4.12). Created in copperplate probably between 1570 and 1580, the engraving has 140 map-key numbers and legends across the bottom and top right corner which securely identify the majority of Lisbon’s major landmarks, including churches, castles, streets, squares and commercial districts. A second critical perspective is found in an anonymous sixteenth-century drawing with Portuguese inscriptions which is in the library of Leyden University5 (Fig. 4.13–4.14). The legend of the Braun-Hogenberg map of Lisbon identifies a “circuit,” or main road, to the Alcáçova Palace by the number 18 (Fig. 4.15). The same key designates number 1 as the Paços de Castello (Palaces of the Castle). 4 For information about the Paço da Alcáçova consult: Manuel Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, Palácios reais de Lisboa. Os dois pacos de Xabregas, o de S. Bartolomeu e o da Alcácova (Lisbon: Editorial Império, 1949; see 2nd ed. with contributions by Maria Abel and Carlos Consiglieri, Lisbon: Vega Limitada, 1990), 107–44. Also consult Lisbon Quinhentista. A Imagem e a Vida da Cidade, ed. Irisalva Moita (Lisbon: Museu da Cidade/Museus Municipais de Lisboa, 1983); Oliveira Marques, “Depois da Reconquista. A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” Livro de Lisboa, 101 and 112 notes 112 and 113; idem., Côrtes portuguesas: reinado de D. Fernando I (1367–1384), edited with Nuno José Pizarro Pinto Dias (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1990). 5 Georgius Braunius Agrippinensis, Olissipo, sive ut pervetustae Lapidum Incriptiones habent, Ulysippo vulgo Lisbona florentissimum Portugaliae Emporium, from the Civitatis Orbis Terrarum liber primus, Vol. 1 (Cologne: 1598). See Jeffrey S. Ruth, Lisbon in the Renais-

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Notations in the Leyden drawing more specifically indicate that Alcáçova consisted of two separate complexes. A Paço del Rey (King’s Palace) to the east is distinguished from a Castelo Velho (Old Castle) to the west. Perhaps the Lisbon fire of 1369, which provided an opportunity to erect the “Cerca Fernardina,” also compelled the rebuilding of the main towers constituting the Castelo Velho. Two huge square turrets of the quadrangular Castelo Velho were to the north. Depicted in the 1716 engraving of the troop disposition at Lisbon in 1147, they were a vestige from the old Moorish stronghold. The two tallest towers of the quadrangle were on the south side. Both the Leyden drawing and the Braun-Hogenberg map corroborate that the westernmost one, probably an old donjon reserved for storing treasures, was connected to a third square turret. This turret is believed to have been the Abarrã or Tombo, which functioned as the royal chancery. The Braun-Hogenberg engraving indicates that a corridor, or elevated terrace, united the donjon with the old “Torre do Tombo,” and it also shows a wooden bridge above the barbican of the Castelo Velho on the east side. The bridge which provided access to the entrance with its portcullis no longer stands, but the walls between the northern and southern towers of the reconstructed castle evoke the memory of the citadel’s lofty bulwarks. By comparison with the old fortress castle of the Alcáçova complex, which appears to have been used for the administration of the realm, the Paço del Rey served as the actual residence of the Avis monarchs. Its parish was the Augustinian Church of the Holy Cross, which originally stood on the eastern side of a huge square. The Igreja de Santa Cruz, is depicted in the Braun-Hogenberg map opposite the Martim Monis Gate (No. 49). The Antiga Praça (Old Plaza) faced the Paço del Rey’s northern façade, and therefore, the primary entry point would have been situated on this front. The Braun-Hogenberg engraving indicates the presence of a large tower in front of the square, and like Santa Cruz, the structure displays a royal banner. Visitors to the Paço probably ascended a wide stone staircase to enter this tower, which provided access to the principal level of a three-storied building to the south. Adjoining this sector to the east were at least three pointed Gothic towers of varying heights. The eastern Paço del Rey and western Castelo Velho must have been connected by passageways to form one grand sance. Damião de Góis. A New Translation of the Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio (New York: Italica Press, Inc., 1996); Damião de Góis, Urbis Olisiponis descriptio, Damiani Goes, Equites Lusitani (Évora: printer André de Burgos, 1554) and translated by Raul Machado, Lisboa de Quinhentos – Descrição de Lisboa (Lisbon: 1937).

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royal house, Alcáçova Castle. Sometime after he was installed as a knight of the English Order of the Garter (1400), King João I renamed the entire complex “St. George’s Castle.” The best description of the Paço de São Jorge is a traveler’s account written by Giovanni Battista Venturino, the secretary of Cardinal Michele Bornello Alexandrino who visited Portugal in 1571 on behalf of Pope Pius V.6 Venturino was suitably impressed by the Royal Chapel, which was dedicated to the Archangel St. Michael and belonged to the parish of the Augustinian church of Santa Cruz.7 He also describes a maze of staircases, corridors, and galleries, but he is very specific about entering the residence by a wide staircase. From a round vestibule, he walked to a principal wing which contained about a dozen rooms. These included not only the royal suites of the king and queen, but also guest quarters. The apartments of the king were on an upper floor, as they were reached by ascending a staircase to a terrace. They would have included a large room for bodyguards, antechamber, office, bedroom, oratory and wardrobe. Escorted through a labyrinth of halls, Cardinal Alexandrino was received by King Sebastião 6 Viaggio del Cardinal Alexandrino legato apostolico alli Ser.mi re di Françia, Spagna, Portogallo, Relazione del Viaggo fatta dall ill.mo e Rev.mo. Fr Michele Bornello Cardinale Alessandrino del tit. D.S. M.a sopra Minerva nepote di Pio V Legato alli Sereni.mi Re di Francia, Spagna e Portugallo colle annotazione della Citta, terre e luoghi descritto da Mes.t Gio Battista Venturino da Fabriano [1571]. A copy of this account is in the Lisbon Biblioteca da Ajuda (col. Rerum Lusitani Carum vol. III). For the original text in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (Codice No. 1. 607), see Alexandre Herculano, “Viagem do Cardeal Alexandrino — 1571,” Opúsculos, ed. Jorge Custódio and José Manuel Garcia, 6 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1987), VI, 64–97. 7 António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, ed. Irisalva Moita (Lisbon: Departamento de Intervenção Urbana da Sociedade Lisboa 94, Livros Horizonte, 1994), 99, states that Alcáçova’s chapel belonged to the parish of Santa Cruz near the palace. He cites Miguel Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, A freguesia de Santa Cruz da Alcáçova de Lisbôa (Lisbon: Câmara Municipal de Lisbôa, 1954), 21–34. According to Jeffrey S. Ruth, Lisbon in the Renaissance. Damião de Góis, 49 note 62, the Augustinian church was located behind the Alcáçova Palace to the north. The 1495 coronation ceremonies of King Manuel I occurred in the capela-mór of São Miguel. See Damião de Góis [1502–1574], Chronica d’el-Rei D. Manuel [1558–1567] (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1909), Part I, Chapter XLVI. Undoubtedly, because João I had called Alcáçova Palace, the “Palace of St. George,” there were carvings of the dragon slayer in the royal chapel. Giovanni Battista Venturino described a fine anonymous statue in the chapel of the “Apocalyptic St. Michael spearing the Dragon.” Because Manuel I instituted the “Order of the Wing,” the carving probably should be dated to the first decade of the sixteenth century. Tomar’s old “Chapel of Angels,” however, suggests the Order of Christ had fostered

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(1554: r. 1557–1578) in a Sala Grande measuring 36 x 13.5 meters (118 x 44 feet). This reception hall was divided by columns into a central nave and an indeterminate number of aisles. Venturino was impressed by the luxurious Flemish tapestries and Cloths of Gold which lined the walls, but he additionally commented about the unusual grotesques adorning the ceiling.8 He also confirms there were steps to an antechamber, which functioned as a waiting room for nobility and dignitaries. The ceiling of this smaller gallery was carved with pinecones reminiscent of mudéjar honey-combed vaults. While the Sala Grande was used for royal audiences, it would have served as an occasional banqueting room. The kitchens may have been situated in the Castelo Velho because of their proximity to the vegetable gardens and the fact that their drains emptied at the upper west gate of the old Moorish wall. At the time the Burgundian delegation of Philip the Good in 1428– 1429 traveled to Lisbon, St. George’s Palace did not have a large chamber for entertaining, and consequently, the Sala Grande has been proposed as a renovation undertaken by King Manuel I (r. 1495–1521). Two reading rooms in the Castle of St. George were used between 1475 and 1485 for the copying of chronicles written by Gomes Eanes de Azúrara.9 Perhaps the Sala Grande of St. George’s Castle was not a Manueline project, but an initiative of King João II. The marriage of Crown Prince Afonso (1474–1491) to the Spanish Infanta Isabel (1470–1498), daughter of the Catholic Monarchs, such cult devotion. One of the important churches of Lisbon was that of Nossa Senhora dos Anjos (Our Lady of the Angels). A famous thirteenth-century statue of Nossa Senhora dos Anjos was housed in Lisbon’s Gothic church of São Francisco, which stood near St. Catherine’s Gate and the town residence of the Duke of Bragança, and approximate to houses occupied by the city’s artists. See Frei Agostinho de Santa Maria [1642–1728], Santuario Mariano, e historia das imag~es milagrosas de Nossa Senhora, e das milagrosamente apparecidas, em graça dos pregadores, & dos devotos da mesma Senhora, 10 vols. (Lisbon: Officina de A.P. Galraõ, 1707–1723: copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress), I (1707), Livro II, título LXXVIII, 488–90, and Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 95. 8 António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, A sociedade medieval portuguesa: Aspectos de vida quotidiana (Lisbon: Sá da Costa, 1964) and 5th edition (Lisbon: 1987), 68, remarks there was no large banqueting hall to entertain foreign dignitaries during the reign of João I. See Annemarie Jordan [Schwend], Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey, M.A. Thesis (Washington, DC: The George Washington University, 1985), 18–21, who elaborates about the Arras and Flemish tapestries housed in Alcáçova. 9 Anne F. Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery. The Veneration of Saint Vincent (Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1979), 26.

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was celebrated in late November and early December of 1490 at Évora. To prepare for the event, King João II’s architects had worked feverishly to complete Évora’s palace and erect a wooden banqueting pavilion on the adjacent grounds of the Monastery of São Francisco. This residence, begun by King Duarte, had been an ongoing project during the reign of Afonso V, who inaugurated a library and “reading room” at the site. The transfer of Lisbon royal library to Évora’s São Francisco Palace may have been predicated with the intention of transforming the former “reading rooms” of the Paço de São Jorge into a greatly needed reception hall. To provide space for such a large chamber, the partition dividing the rooms must have been removed. In the absence of a supporting wall, columns were installed to brace the overhead floor. These pillars, which were described by Venturino in the Sala Grande, resulted in the chamber’s church-like appearance. The Sala Grande may have been the same “Hall of Lions” (Sala dos Leões) at St. George’s Castle which was used for the pledging of solemn oaths in autumn of 1513.10 Heraldic statues might have given this room its name. In 1494 Hieronymus Münzer toured the Lisbon palace, and praising the spacious rooms and their rich furnishings, he also remarked about a pair of resident lions.11 The leoneira must have been ensconced during the reign of João II in anticipation of the marriage festivities at Évora. A “fortress” housing lions provided the emblematic motifs of Spain’s herald, which was emblazoned with castles and lions to denote the respective kingdoms of Castile and León. Despite the lack of information concerning the Alcáçova, the two components of Lisbon’s royal estate—the western Castello Velho and the eastern Paço del Rey (King’s Palace)—coalesced to vibrantly display the wealth and power of one of Europe’s most important kingdoms. Jan van Eyck and other members of the Burgundian Embassy resided in the guest quarters of the Castelo São Jorge, where they had a spectacular view of Lisbon, similar to the panorama which still can be enjoyed from the ramparts of the restored fortress. Frei Luís de Sousa [1555–1632], Anais de D. João III [1631–1632], 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1951), I, Ch. III. 11  Hieronymus Münzer, Itenerarium sive peregrinatio excellentissimi viri artium ac utriusque medicinae doctoris Hieronimi Monetarii de Felkircen civis Nurembergensis [1494], and translations by Basílio de Vasconcelos: “Lisboa vista pelos estrangeiros. Século XV, Por Jerónimo Munzer. 1494 [Itinerário],” Olispo. 1 (Ano I, 1930): 21–22; Itinerarium do Dr. Jerónimo Munzer [“Itinerário” extracts] (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1931, 86 pgs). 10

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The St. Martin Palace of Prince Duarte The princes of the “illustrious generation” had their own houses in Lisbon, each attached to a significant town parish (Fig. 3.16). They were magnificently appointed. The Paço de São Martinho (No. 16 Braun Map) was the dwelling of Prince Duarte before 1433. Located in front of the parish church of St. Martin of Tours (No. 125) and near the Church of St. George (No. 91), it was the former royal residence of Lisbon before the raising of Alcáçova Castle. The grounds of the palace occupied the site of Lisbon’s second Moorish bastion, a fort which is illustrated to the southeast of the higher alcáçar in the 1716 engraving showing the disposition of the Christian troops which surrounded Lisbon in 1147. São Martinho traditionally was called the Paço dos Infantes (Palace of the Princes) perhaps to indicate its purpose as a designated domicile of the titular heir to the throne. Before Duarte, King Fernando (1345: r. 1367–1383) had resided in the Paço as a prince with his wife Leonor Telles (m. 1371–d. 1386) and his half-brothers, Dom João and Dom Luís, the sons of Inês de Castro (1320–1355) and King Pedro I (1320: r. 1357–1367). By the time Prince Duarte’s great house was illustrated in the Braun-Hogenberg map, it little resembled a Medieval alcázar. Rather, the structure loomed three stories high and the largest section was capped with a tetrahedral roof, suggesting the vault of a great hall. Indeed, the residence occupied by Duarte seems to have been nearly as grand as Alcaçova. Adjoining the palace was an equally tall edifice, which perhaps was the Casa de Moeda (House of the Royal Mint), which occupied a section of the Paço during the fifteenth century. The estate evidently retained a remnant of its Moorish past in its garden of citrus trees. When Manuel I built his new riverfront palace (Paço da Ribeira), he converted the Paço dos Infantes into a prison, which is named on the 1572 Braun and Hogenberg engraving as the “Lemon Tree Prison” (Cadeia de Limoeiro). No records survive which describe Duarte’s chambers in his Paço de São Martinho. Certainly the rooms were capacious and their walls would have displayed fine tapestries and frescoes, similar to St. George’s Palace.12 12 Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 101; idem. Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt (Madison: University of Milwaukee Press, 1971), 106. He cites Augusto Vieria da Silva, A Cêrca Moura de Lisboa: Estudo historico-descriptivo (Lisbon: Amigos de Lisboa, 1939, 2nd Ed), 168–70 and

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The 1428–1429 account provided by the anonymous chronicler of the Burgundian embassy describes lavish farewell diversions to honor Princess Isabel. As the date departure approached (October 8, 1429), Prince Duarte planned several festivities in honor of his sister and his father, including a large banquet which had to have been staged in his St. Martin Palace, the Paço dos Infantes. The account states: On Monday 26 September and the two following days jousts and entertainments took place and a supper was given at Lisbon in the Hall of Galleys, which was cleared for the occasion and hung with tapestries high on the walls, with variously-colored woolen cloths below them. The two rows of pillars in this hall were decorated likewise, and the floor was strewn with green rushes. Tables, magnificently adorned and covered with fine linen, were set up as follows. The king’s, at the far end of the hall and taking up most of its width, was on a wooden dais several steps high. The king’s place, in the centre of the table, was six inches higher than the rest and a canopy of cloth-of-gold was stretched over it. In front of this table, against a pillar, there was a platform for the Kings-of-Arms and heralds; at the other end, near the entrance to the hall, was another for trumpets and musicians. The other tables were arranged in three rows, down the center of the hall and along either side. There were six sideboards richly decorated and loaded with gold and silver-gilt plate of various kinds, and the hall was so well lit with torches and candles that one could see very clearly everywhere...13 The arrangement of the great hall was typical of Portuguese celebrations which were held in a similar manner through the sixteenth century. The king’s elevated table ran the short length of the gallery and people were seated according to their status, the highest ranking members of court being seated closest to the royals. While nobility occupied the middle of the Plate VII. According to Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 91, the parish church of São Martinho in 1323 possessed an orchard with houses and a public road which belonged to Prince Afonso, the future King Afonso IV (1291: r. 1325–1357). See Chancelarias Portuguesas. D. Afonso IV, 3 vols., organized by António Henrique de Oliveira Marques (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Cientifica, Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1990–1992). 13 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 182.

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room, the musical gallery was at the far end, probably in a balcony area over the entrance. The torches held in wall sconces along the side walls would have provided dramatic lighting for the six buffets below, each laden with costly gold and silver objects which glistened and were intended to impress, immense saltcellars, intricately tooled plates, Eastern-designed bowls and pitchers. Besides the “cloth of gold” hung behind King João I’s chair, the gallery must have provided a kaleidoscope of color with large tapestries beneath the cornice and fine woolen cloths below. The tapestries might have been from Arras, as panels from this famous center are mentioned in sixteenthcentury Portuguese inventories.14 Whether they depicted sacred or profane themes is not known. However, the Avis Princes sustained a great interest in classical literature and perhaps some of the panels concerned events of ancient history drawn from Homer, Virgil, Ovid, or Plutarch. The title of the banqueting chamber, “Hall of Galleys,” suggests the ceiling of the great hall was keel-shaped in the manner of Guimarães Palace’s Salão de Banquetes.15 (Fig. 4.17) Perhaps it also was named for its maritime decoration, as ships feature prominently in the stories of Ulysses, Aeneas, Jason, Alexander the Great. To these legendary heroes of virtú, might even be added the Arthurian Perceval and the Swan Knight. Such illustrious figures would have complimented the evening entertainment organized by Prince Duarte, which included knights in disguise. According to the account: When it was time for supper, which lasted a long time, certain entertainments took place which they call challenges. They happen like this. Knights and gentlemen, full armed and equipped for joust-

Luís Keil, Les Tapisseries de Flandre au Portugal pendant les XVe et XVIe siècles. Miscellanea Leo van Puyvelde (Brussels: 1949), describes several sets in the Bragança collection. The 1505 Inventory of Manuel I’s “Arms and Tapestries” list three Arras panels for a bedchamber, including one with “a ram in forest grove,” a silk hanging of a landscape with “a lake in the middle, a unicorn and two lions,” and another with a “beaded head” flanked by “two houses.” Consult João Martins da Silva Marquês, “Inventario de armas e tapeçarias, etc. da casa del Rei em 1505,” Publicações do Mundo Português, V. Congresso de Historia dos Descibrimentos, III (Lisbon: 1940), 564–605 (1505 Inventory of King Manuel: Nucléo Antigo, No. 2946–2948 [Inventario dos Livros e Maços e Documentos que se quardam no Real Arquivo da Torre do Tombo]. See Annemarie Jordan, “Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey (Washington, D.C.: M.A. Dissertation, George Washington University, 1985). 15 Francisco Nogueira de Brito, Caravlas, naus e galés de Portugal (Porto: Livraria Lello, Limitade, 1933). 14

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ing, enter on horseback accompanied as they please and approach the table where the lord of lady giving the feast is seated. Without dismounting, the knight bows and presents to his host a letter or piece of paper, fixed to a stick split at the end, in which it is stated that he is a knight or gentleman with such and such a name, which he had chosen, and that he comes from some strange land, such as “the deserts of India,” “terrestrial paradise,” “the sea,” or “the land,” to seek adventures. Because he has heard about this magnificent feast, he has come to court, and he now declares that he is ready to receive anyone present who wishes to perform a deed of arms with him. When the letter has been read out and the thing discussed, the host causes a herald to say to the gentleman, who is awaiting a reply in front of the table: “Knight, or lord, you shall be delivered.” Then, bowing again as before, he leaves, armed and mounted as before. One came all covered in spines, both he and his horse, like a porcupine. Another came accompanied by the Seven Planets, each nicely portrayed according to its special characteristics. Several others came elegantly dressed and disguised, each as he chose...16 The banquet in Prince Duarte’s residence was but a prelude to the actual pas d’armes (jousting tourneys) which took place the following day (Figs. 4.18–4.19) in the Rua Nova dos Mercadores (No. 13 Braun Map), the wide long avenue which ran parallel to the riverfront square where the city merchants actively traded. Probably the royal family and the Burgundian diplomats viewed the tilts from the “Gate of the Ribeira” (No. 69) which overlooked a square with the old pillory. The Burgundian account of the contests records: Next day, 27 September, after dinner, there was jousting in the Rua Nova in Lisbon, which was spread with a great deal of sand. There was a fence of stakes fixed into the ground at intervals, to joust along, which was hung with blue and vermillion woolen cloths. Some of the jousters came with their horses adorned with cloth-ofgold, embroidered and fur-lined; others were decked out in cloth embroidered with silver, or silk cloth ... and they jousted magnificently in front of the king and the lords and ladies who watched them from the windows of houses along the street. On the next 16

Vaughn, Philip the Good, 182–83.

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day, 28 September, likewise, solemn and impressive jousts were held there. 17 The tilts really marked the end of the marriage festivities in Lisbon. Infanta Isabel boarded her vessel two days after the tourneys. While awaiting the arrival of her fleet of thirteen ships, the Burgundian diplomats and royal family attended a final mass at the Romanesque Sé of Lisbon (Fig. 4.20–4.21). Prince Henrique’s Houses near St. Vincent Behind the Walls According to the Braun-Hogenberg Map of Lisbon (Fig. 4.22), Dom Henrique maintained three houses, a cloister and a quintal (plot of land) belonging to the parish of Santo Tomé (No. 97). These houses (No. 23) (Fig. 4.23) were situated next to the church of Santa Marinha (No. 99) and close to the old church of St. Vincent behind the Walls (No. 30). In 1431 he donated this estate on the Rua das Escolas Gerais to the University of Lisbon, which transferred to Coimbra in 1537. Prince Henrique’s property, called a Ginásio (elementary school) in Damião Góis’s Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio (1554), stood at least until 1862, when an engraving of its Patio de Quintalinhos was published. The property consisted of ten rooms, including a large Sala which is known to have been painted with frescoes of the “Seven Liberal Arts,” presumably represented as female personifications. The great hall also contained exponents of the Liberal Arts. Four have been identified: Aristotle

17 Vaughn, Philip the Good, 182–83. According to Vaughan (183 note 1), the contestants galloped at one another along either side of a partition erected down the center of the street, which prevented them from colliding. Though chivalric games have been thought to have originated with Juan II at Valladolid in 1428, they really must have their genesis with the Avis Princes who participated in the Portuguese expedition to Ceuta in 1415 and won their spurs in battle. Prince Duarte wrote a treatise on the Art of Riding Well (Livro da Ensinança de bem cavalgar toda sela). The manuscript was written before he ascended the throne in 1433. As early as 1414 Prince Henrique held grand jousts in Viseu in which Duarte and nobles participated. See Prince Duarte, Livro da ensinança de bem cavalgar toda sela que fez elrey dom Eduarte de Portugal e do Algarve e senhor de Ceuta, ed. Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand, 1944; rpt. Lisbon: Impressão Nacional–Casa da Moeda, 1986; Gomes Eanes de Zurara [1410–1473], Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta por El-Rei D. João I, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Lisbon: 1915), Ch. XXIII, 73.

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(Philosophy); a Physician (Astronomy: Isaiah); an Emperor (Constantine), a Pope (Gregory the Great), and the Holy Trinity (Theology).18 No date has been assigned to these lost frescoes of Henrique’s Lisbon palace. As a collective ensemble, however, the murals illustrated a syllabus of instruction to shape the mind of an erudite prince: the preparatory trivium of grammar, rhetoric and dialectic; and the quadrivium essential for philosophical training, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music. The cycle of paintings in Henrique’s Sala appears to have been inspired from an Italian prototype, for example, the “Seven Liberal Arts” by Andrea da Firenze (Andrea Buonaiuti: d. 1388) in the Dominican Spanish Chapel of Santa Maria Novella in Florence. Commissioned by the Guidalotti brothers and painted in 1367, the enthroned matrons of the “Liberal Arts” sit above historical exponents. If, as proposed, the frescoes in Henrique’s Sala were created prior to 1431, they plausibly would have been executed under the direction of a master who would have had the opportunity to study Andrea da Firenze’s work in Santa Maria Novella, perhaps Master Jácome-Antonio of Florence. Prince Pedro’s Estaus Palace No record exists concerning a Lisbon estate occupied by Prince Pedro, the Duke of Coimbra, and second in line to the throne of Portugal, so presumably he had chambers in Duarte’s town mansion because the Palace of St. Martin also was called the Paço dos Infantes. Later as regent of the young Afonso V between 1439 and 1449, he would have resided in Alcaçova Castle. Even so, he realized the royal residence was inadequate for accommodating

18 Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 102–3; idem, Portugal na Crise dos Século s XIV e XV (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1987), 411–12. The reason for Henrique’s transfer of property perhaps can be explained by the ongoing building projects at Tomar, which demanded his personal attention, and included renovation of the royal quarters. When visiting Lisbon, he would have stayed with Duarte in the Paco dos Infantes. With respect to the frescoes of the “Liberal Arts,” whether they are Joanine or Manueline, the team of artists responsible for them would have had their genesis in the workshop of Master Jácome-Antonio († 1439). Tomar’s Charola still retains a pre-Manueline mural of “St. Christopher.” By contrast to this fresco and the matrons “Liberal Arts,” most Manueline wall decoration was non-figural and confined mainly to classical motifs and heralds. Beyond this, the frescoes of Henrique’s Sala were a patent source for the library

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and entertaining important guests. A seasoned traveler, Pedro resolved to solve the problem by building upon property in Lisbon which must have been given to him by his father. The Paço de Estaus (Palace of Lodgings: No. [3] Braun Map) was begun as an initiative of Pedro in 1449 (Fig. 4.24–Fig. 4.25) to provide lodgings for ambassadors and other foreign dignitaries.19 The quadrangular structure with corner towers was situated on the north side of the Rossio Square (No. [11], Braun Map), and it continued to be used by royalty until 1571. The adjacent Convento de São Domingos (1242–1249: No. 28 Braun Map), which first served the property of Prince Pedro and then the Paço de Estaus, was built by King Afonso III (1210: r. 1248–1279). The sepulchre of Prince Afonso (1263–1317), King Dinis’s younger brother, and Senhor de Portoalegre, rested inside the royal chapel. Conforming to a Latin cross plan, with a nave and two aisles opening to lateral altars, São Domingos contained an altarpiece of The Adoration of the Kings. This retable must have commissioned by King Dinis because the Virgin and Child provided portraits of Queen St. Isabel (1271–1336) and Prince Afonso (1291–1357), the future King Afonso IV (1325).20 In accord

of the Spanish Monastery-Palace of the Escorial built by Philip II (1527: r. 1555–1598), who became king of Portugal in 1581. See Barbara von Barghahn, Age of Gold, Age of Iron. Renaissance Spain and Symbols of Monarchy (The Imperial Legacy of Charles V and Philip II: Royal Castles, Palace-Monasteries, Princely Houses (Lanham, MD-London, University Press of America, 1986); Barbara von Barghahn and Annemarie Jordan, “The Torreão of the Lisbon Palace and the Escorial Library: an artistic and iconographic interpretation,” Arquivos do Centro Cultural Português XXII (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1986): 25–114. At the Escorial, matrons of the “Liberal Arts” with attributes are depicted in the vault frescoes of the library (1586–1592). On the side walls executed by Pellegrino Tibaldi and Bartolomeo Carduchi are narrative panels bordered by exponent figures. Aristotle, Constantine, and Gregory the Great are portrayed in the library’s murals. Isaiah is depicted in a narrative panel beneath Astronomy. Standing by the bedside of an infirm King Ezechias, the prophet promises the ruler fifteen additional years of life. 19 According to Damião de Góís, in his 1554 Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio: “A truly magnificent building, the Estaus Palace deserves to be seen for its admirable architecture, which Prince Pedro, son of King João I, ordered built with the nation’s treasures while regent of the kingdom in the name of King Afonso V, his nephew on the side of his father. In ordering it erected there his only intention was to offer lodging to ambassadors of foreign nations and their kings, who were received there at public expense with all high pomp and honors.” See translation by Jeffrey Ruth, Lisbon in the Renaissance. Damião de Goís, 26. 20 Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 94–95. He cites: an anonymous História dos Mosteiros, Conventos e Casas Religiosas de Lisboa na qual se dá notícia da fundação e fundadores das instituições religiosas, igrejas, capelas e irmandades

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with Early Christian analogies between the “Wise Men” and Christian monarchs, King Dinis presumably was portrayed as the Magus-King Melchior rather than St. Joseph.21 The retable’s accentuation of dynastic succession in a religious subject was rare for the early Gothic period. Jan van Eyck would have visited the Lisbon Church of St. Dominic and studied this lost altarpiece in sitú. The anonymous work may have been inspirational for his array of secular portraits in his Fountain of Life. The theme of the epiphany encompassed imagery of an affluent entourage of earthly kings who traveled from afar to bear gifts and venerate a superior “king.” The Apocalyptic procession in Ghent Altarpiece panels of the “Just Judges” and “Holy Knights” might be regarded as the pictorial Omega to the Alpha of the Adoration in Lisbon’s São Domingos. Not only are temporal leaders and chivalric knights converging to worship the sacrificial Lamb of God, opposite these equestrians is the colossal “Christ bearer” Christopher, the saint who sought to serve the most powerful master, and the patron of the Order of Christ founded by King Dinis.

desta cidade, I (Lisbon: 1950), 92–108 and 480–89; Frei Luís Cácegas [1540–1610] and Frei Luís de Sousa [1555–1632] Primeira- (quarta) parte da historia de S. Domingos, particular do reino e conquistas de Portugal, 4 vols. (Lisbon: 1866, 3rd ed), III, Ch. XVIII, 364–69 and Ch. XXVII, 399–402; Frei Agostinho de Santa Maria, Santuario Mariano, I, Livro I, título XIV, 108–112. 21 Vasco Fernandes (ca. 1475–1541/42) and his workshop created an altarpiece for the capela-mór of the Cathedral of Viseu between 1501 and 1506. Sixteen panels survive from the polyptych of eighteen works. Among them in the Museu de Grão Vasco at Viseu is an Adoration of the Magi with a Tupinambá Indian of Brazil as Baltazar, King Manuel I as Melchior, and the Christ Child holding a Manueline gold coin. The kneeling figure of Caspar has never been identified, although it appears to be a contemporary portrait. His identity has been suggested to be Pedro Álvares Cabral (1468–1519), whose fleet reached Brazil in 1500. However, Cabral was thirty-two years old at the time of the expedition. Dom Fernando (1433–1470), Duke of Viseu and King Manuel’s father, was relatively young when he died, as was João II (1455–1495), who adopted Manuel I as a son. Another possibility exists for the identity of the grey-haired Caspar, Henrique the Navigator (1394– 1460), who spearheaded the age of exploration with Lusitanian settlements in Africa and the Orient. The face of Caspar, with its age lines around the mouth, corresponds with that of Henrique’s realistic gisant at Batalha Abbey which supposedly was carved according to a mask. Henrique was Duke of Viseu and the mentor of Dom Fernando. Consult: Dalila Rodrigues, “Vasco Fernandes e a Oficina de Viseu,” 90–93; José Texeira, “Attributed to Vasco Fernandes, Adoration of the Magi,“ Art in the Age of Exploration. Circa 1492 , ed. Jay A. Levenson (New Haven–London: Yale University Press, National Gallery of Art, 1991), 152–53 (Pedro Alvares Cabral).

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The Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755 destroyed the royal chapel of St. Dominic with its altarpieces and reliquaries, as well as the Dominican convent and cloister to the south. The Paço de Estaus survived the cataclysm but it was devastated by fire in 1836. On its site stands the Teatro Nacional (1843–1846), a Neoclassical pavilion erected by Queen Maria II (1819: r.1826–1853). Two additional historical monuments near São Domingos also were leveled in 1755: the Convento do Carmo (No 26, Braun Map), the Carmelite church and monastery to the west (Fig. 4.26–4.28), which had been built between 1389 and 1423 by Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira (1360– 1431) and dedicated to the Virgin Mary; and the hospital of Todos-os-Santos, begun by King João II in 1492 and completed by Manuel I, which formed the eastern part of the Rossio Square (No. 10, Braun Map).22 The Houses of Princes João and Fernando Located to the far west of Lisbon’s Fernardine walls (1373), Santos-o-Velho was served by the Augustinian Convent of Santiago (Fig. 4.29–4.30).23 The association of Santos Velhos with the Order of St. James suggests it was the 22 Paulo Perreira, “O Convento do Carmo,” O Livro de Lisboa, ed. Irisalva Moita (Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 1994), 129–38; Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, O Carmo e a Trindade; subsídios para e história de Lisboa, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Publicações culturais da Câmara municipal de Lisboa, 1939–41); Irisalva Moita, “A Cidade e o Ambiante,” O Livro de Lisboa, 139–67. 23 The Palace of Santos-o-Velho is represented in the eighteenth-century tile panel of a View of Lisbon (sixty-six feet in length) which is in the Museu Nacional do Azulejos (Lisbon) with a provenance from the Palace of the Counts of Tentúgal. Consult Miguel Soromenho, “View of Lisbon,” The Age of the Baroque in Portugal, ed. Jay A. Levenson (New HavenLondon: Yale University Press–National Gallery of Art, 1993), 181–83, at 183; and Miguel Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, A Freguesia de Santiago. Subsídios para a história das suas ruas, edifícios e igreja paroquial, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1948–1949), II (1949), 132–35; idem, Palácios Reais de Lisboa, primarily his discussion on Xabregas, a forested valley to the east which extended to the waterfront. Also see Jordan Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580), 26. The name of “Santos” originated from the bodies of three indigenous saints venerated in the chapel, Verissimus, Maxima and Julia. Martyrs at Lisbon under Diocletian and the governor Dacian, they were beheaded by the Roman prefect in 302 A..D. They have an office in the Mozarabic breviary and their feast day is October 1. According to Jeffrey Ruth, Lisbon in the Renaissance. Damião de Góis..., 20 and 48 note 57 (Santos-o-Velho), Damião de Góis called Santos-o-Velho the “Old Palace” and remarked that it was a “huge, magnificent and very beautiful structure.” Góis also noted that “the beginning of Lisbon”

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designated seat of Prince João (1400–1442), the Duke of Beja, after 1418, the year he was elevated to the position of mestre of that chivalric institution.24 Evidence that the countryside palace of Santos Velhos served as a princely residence is provided by João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), who lived at the estate prior to ascending the throne. In 1490, the son of Alfonso V transferred the Augustinian convent to Xabregas valley in the eastern sector of Lisbon, where it subsequently was called Santos-o Novo. The Paço de Santos Velhos, continued to be frequented by royalty until it was converted to a parish in 1566. When he needed to be closer to Alcoçaba Palace, Prince João may have stayed at his brother Duarte’s spacious mansion of São Martinho (No. 16, Braun Map), also known as the “Palace of the Princes,”

was “along this southern edge.” According to Ruth, 22 and 48–49 notes 56 and 65, Góís completed his tour of Lisbon at the northernmost old Convent of Santa Clara close to the bank of the Tagus. He states that the chronicler’s progression was more realistically from west to east rather than from south to north, and that the distance between Santos-oVelho and Santa Clara measured 1.5 miles. Near Santos-o-Velhos was the Convent of Santa Maria de Esperança and further east was the hilltop Chapel of São Roque. During the reign of João III (1521–1557), the Jesuits were given São Roque. Rebuilt by Filippo Terzi, the church survived the Lisbon earthquake of 1755. Consult Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Igrejas e mosteiros de Lisboa (Lisbon: Câmara Municipal de Lisboa, 1963); Júlio de Castilho (Visconde), A ribeira de Lisboa, descripção histórica da margem do Tejo desde a Madre de Deus até Santos-o-Velho, amplified edition with annotations by Luiz Pastor de Macedo, 5 vols. (Lisbon: 1940–1944, 2nd ed); Júlio de Castilho (Visconde) and Francisco Gingeira Santana, Índice da Lisboa antiga e da Ribeira de Lisboa (Lisbon: Cámara Municipal de Lisboa, 1974). 24 For the following see Maria Cristina Gomes Pereira, “A Ordem de Santiago em Portugal,” Oceanos 4 (“A Ordem de Sant’Tago”: July 1990): 58–63. The Order of Santiago was founded by King Ferdinand of León in 1170 and sanctioned by a papal bull of Alexander III dated July 5, 1175. In Portugal, King Afonso Henriques I in 1172 established the first seat of the Order of Santiago de Espada at the town of Arruda. Three additional holdings were added in the twelfth century, Alcácer, Almada and Palmela. Still more towns were placed under the jurisdiction of the knightly institution during the thirteenth century. Among the most important were Aljustrel (1235), Sesimbra (1236), Mértola (1239), Tavira (1244) and Cacela (1255). Initially the order was governed by a comendador-mór (major knightcommander), whose status was just below that of mestre. A separation between the Spanish Order of Santiago and the Portuguese Order of Santiago occurred under King Dinis in 1288, a division sanctioned by Pope Nicholas V. By contrast with the Order of Avis and the Order of Christ, which followed the Rule of the Cistercian Order (Benedictine), the Order of Santiago was governed by the Rule of the Canons Regular of St. Augustine. The seat of the Order of Santiago was Palmela Castle. Consult: Joaquim de Vasconcelos, Castello de Palmela. A Arte e a Natureza em Portugal VIII (Porto: 1908); O castelo e a Ordem de Santiago na História de Palmela (Palmela: Exhibition Catalogue, C.M.P, 1990).

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(Fig. 4.31) which stood southeast of the parish church of Santiago (No. [93], Braun Map).25 The hermitages of S. Brás and Santa Luzia, adjacent to the Palace of Prince Duarte (No. 126, Braun Map), were attached to the parish of Santiago. These structures seem to have been enclosed by walls of what may have been an ancillary Islamic stronghold below the main alcáçer. The early eighteenth-century plan of “Lisbon circa 1147” indicates this second cluster of structures was situated in the same location as the hermitages of Sts. Blaise and Lucy. The Paço de São Bartholomeu perhaps was the Lisbon house of Dona Philippa’s youngest son, Prince Fernando, the mestre of the Order of Avis.26 The earliest occupant of the Paço de São Bartholomeu was Afonso III, when his eldest brother Sancho II (1207: r. 1223–1245) was king of Portugal. King Dinis had lived in this palace when he was Crown Prince. He gave the estate to João Afonso, his grandson and the offspring of his illegitimate son Afonso Sanchez. The transfer of property probably occurred as a result of a settlement reached in 1320 between Dinis and his heir apparent. The future Afonso IV (1291: r. 1325–1357) had rebelled against Dinis partiality for Afonso Sanchez and he forced the exile of his bastard brother from Portugal. The location of the Paço is difficult to determine because it is not marked on the Braun-Hogenberg Map of Lisbon. Ferreira de Andrade in his early study of the royal palaces of Lisbon provided a conjectural plan (Fig. 4.32) indicating the area occupied by the residence and its adjacent church of São Bartholomeu (No. 92, Braun Map) (Fig. 4.33). The Romanesque palace, designated with a “2” by Ferreira de Andrade, was situated close to the present-day Rua do Chão da Feira and directly south of the St. George and Dom Fadrique Gates which constituted the main entrance to the Castelo de São Jorge. The Paço de São Bartholomeu is known to have been joined to the church for which it was named by a subterranean passageway dating to the time of King Dinis. Conceivably this tunnel extended north to the main keep of the old Alcáçova Castle and south to the Moorish turrets of St. Martin’s Palace. 25 Miguel Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, A Freguesia de Santiago, I (1948), 19–20 and 115. See also Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 98–99, who cites this source and Júlio de Castilho, Lisboa antiga : Segunda parte, bairros orientais, 12 vols. (Lisbon: Impressão Municipal de Lisboa, 1935–1938, 2nd ed), XI, 258–61. 26 Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, Palácios Reais de Lisboa, 97–102; Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 102; Jordan, Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580), 24.

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Ferreira de Andrade determined the location of the old St. Bartholomew Palace by identifying a later Manueline residence to the west, the Paço de Santo Elói (Fig. 4.34) occupied by dowager Queen Leonor (1458–1525), sister of Manuel I and widow of Joao II. St. Eloi Palace, which he marked with a “1,” also had a subterranean passageway. The tunnel connected the Paço of Dona Leonor with the large Convento de Santo Elói dos Lóios of the Order of St. John to the south (No. 29, Braun Map). Ferreira de Andrade’s placement of the Paço de Santo Elói seems to conflict with the Braun-Hogenberg Map of Lisbon, which identifies instead a house on the Rua da Saudade beside the Church of St. Martin. The legend also refers to this structure (No. 4) as “Sancti Elói regia vulgo pacos de Santo Eloy” (St. Eloi royal palace commonly called the paços de Santo Eloy).The 1598 Braun-Hogenberg plan appears accurate with respect to the Lisbon sites it identifies, although several important buildings were not numbered like the Dom Pedro’s Estaus Palace bordering Rossio Square and the parish church of Santiago across from the Braun Paço de Santo Elói. Perhaps the Paço de Santo Elói (No. 4) originally was the town residence of Prince João, Duke of Beja. This property of the “Master of Santiago” would have passed to his daughter Beatrice († 1506), Duchess of Viseu and Dona Leonor’s mother. In 1569 the northern Manueline complex of Santo Elói near the Church of São Bartholomeu was sold by King Sebastian (1554: r. 1557–1578) to fund the refurbishing of the Alcáçova Palace. In 1584 the Paço São Bartholomeu also became private property. By the time of these transfers, the Braun house No. 4, in actuality a ducal Paço de Santiago, could have been renamed the Paço de Santo Elói. Southeast of this townhouse No. 4 was the monastery of Santo Elói dos Lóios (No. 29). Additionally, the Braun-Hogenberg Paço de Santo Elói was close to the alchemical district in the neighborhood of the Lisbon Cathedral, a fact which gains significance considering St. Eligius was the patron saint of goldsmiths and farriers. By the date of 1598, neither the northern Manueline Paço de Santo Elói nor Paço São Bartholomeu were designated on Braun-Hogenberg Map of Lisbon because these estates were no longer holdings of the Crown. Such also was the case for the Estaus Palace which was used until 1571 by King Sebastian. Ferreira de Andrade mentions still another royal house, the Paço de Galé (Galley Palace), which is recorded in the late-fifteenth Crónica de D. Duarte authored by Rui de Pina. In Chapter II of his history, the chronicler cites the residence in the context of a carta de doação of 1498 pertaining to King João II’s gift of land to Pedro de Alcáçova, specifically property north of the

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Alfofa Gate (“e,” Ferreira de Andrade Plan). The Paço de Galé has yet to be securely located, although Ferreira de Andrade has speculated it consisted of “some houses” which once belonged to King Dinis (1261: r. 1279–1325). The Leyden drawing illustrates two square towers (Fig. 4.35) with pennants behind the primary gates of St. George and Dom Fadrique on the Rua Chão da Feira. These towers would have had a commanding view of ships in the Tagus estuary, and for this reason, they perhaps came to be known as the “Galley Palace.” Adjacent townhouses in this sector of the Alcáçova would have quartered important nobles and ladies-in-waiting charged with administrative duties in the Avis household. The Residence of Count-Duke Afonso The remaining son of King João I, Dom Afonso, the Court of Barcelos and Duke of Bragança, also maintained a large house in the southern sector of Lisbon, the Paço de São Cristóvão (No. 134, Braun Map). Acquired by the Tello de Menezes family in 1584, the Bragança Palace (Fig. 4.36–4.37) was destroyed in the Lisbon earthquake of 1755, but at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit, it held a plethora of tapestries imported from Arras and Paris and must have rivaled in beauty the houses of the Avis princes. Within the walls of Dom Afonso’s St. Christopher Palace later occurred the marriage celebrations of King Duarte’s daughter, Dona Leonor (1434–1467), who wed the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III (1415: r. 1440–1493) by proxy on August 9, 1451.27 Close to the Churches of São Francisco (No. 25) and St. Mary of the Martyrs (directly south), the Bragança ducal house also was but a short distance from the town properties occupied by artists of the city. The painters’ houses and land east of St. Catherine’s Gate (No. 59) functioned as chemical laboratories. They were advantageously located near the city’s dung heap, the fires of which provided access to low, constant heat. Though a royal dye-works was not established until 1435, and Prince 27 Lisbon Quinhentista. A Imagem e a Vida da Cidade, 53, states that the Church of São Cristóvão was to the side of the fifteenth-century Bragança Palace, and that the 1428 wedding festivities of Prince Duarte and Dona Leonor occurred in the residence. See also José Mendes da Cunha Saraiva, Mémoria sobre um inventário artístico do ano de 1564 do paço dos duques de Bragança em Lisboa (Lisbon: Ministerio das Finanças, Archivo Historico, 1948) and Augusto Vieria da Silva, Os paços dos duques de Bragança em Lisboa (Lisbon: Amigos de Lisboa, 1942).

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Henrique established a dying industry in 1445, the names of Jewish dyers and color-makers appear in old accounts. Van Eyck would have obtained his gold for gilding, colors such as ultramarine, verdigris, carmine, rose, and saffron, as well as his linseed oil and panels from dyer merchants. The Jews of Lisbon occupied a sector of the Alfama southeast of the Cathedral near the shoreline of the Tagus and the commercial district of the city (Fig. 4.38).28 The Cathedral faced the Gothic Church marking the birthplace of the beloved Franciscan Saint Anthony of Padua. If, as suggested, Jan van Eyck made a pilgrimage to Assisi on behalf of Duke Philip the Good, he assuredly would not have missed an opportunity to attend services at both sanctuaries in the period of time the Burgundian diplomats were in Lisbon (Fig. 4.39–4.40). During the six-months (late May until late September of 1429), Jan van Eyck would have been a distinguished guest at the Alcaçova Palace where his quarters likely included well-lighted chambers for painting. He also had the occasion to stay at one of the most beautiful royal residences in Portugal, the estate of Sintra. While the great houses of Lisbon are no longer extant due to the 1755 earthquake, the popular summer palace of Sintra remains basically intact and it provides a singular glimpse of the fifteenthcentury court milieu that was known to Jan van Eyck and his companions.29 The Avis-Lancastrian Palace of Sintra: Templar and Arthurian Ideals On June 4, 1429, following their three month tour of the Castile and Andalusia (Fig. 4.41–4.42), the Burgundian emissaries of Duke Philip the Good: went to Cintra, five leagues [east] from Lisbon, to see the king of Portugal who had summoned them to visit him in the very pleasant palace he was staying in there. Towards vespers, while they were in their lodgings, the above-mentioned Pierre de Vaudrey, who had 28 Maria José Pimenta Ferro Tavares, Os judeus em Portugal no século XIV (Lisbon: Instituto de Alta Cultura, Centro de Estudos Históricos, 1970) and 2nd ed. (Lisbon: Guimarães, 1979); idem., Os judeus em Portugal no século XV, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, 1982–1984); idem., Los judíos en Portugal (Madrid: Editorial MAPFRE, 1992); idem., Os judeus na época dos descobrimentos (Lisbon: Edição ELO, 1995). 29 Albrecht Haupt, Lissabon und Cintra (Leipzig: E.A. Seeman, 1913).

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gone back to my lord of Burgundy by sea, arrived at Cintra with letters and news from the duke. The ambassadors went to announce this to the king and to my lady the infanta his daughter, who were very glad; and there was much rejoicing at court in the arrival of the said Pierre and the good news he brought. After this, the ambassadors, knowing the duke’s intentions, went ahead and negotiated the marriage-treaty with the king and some of his children. It was agreed to and concluded at Cintra on 11 June, and the contract was witnessed by a notary at Lisbon on 24 July 1429.30 During their stay in Sintra, the Burgundian ambassadors were provided accommodations in the old Moorish palace renovated by João I and Queen Philippa. Unquestionably, Philip the Good’s diplomatic envoy must have been impressed by the countryside estate, where they stayed for about a month. Sintra has an unparalleled mystique which still astounds visitors, so it is not difficult to imagine Jan van Eyck walking in the company of the Avis princes through its great halls. Chivalric iconography fostered by the Portuguese court manifests a unique blend of Lusitanian, Burgundian, and English ideology regarding the task of crusader knights. Sintra’s aura captures the spirit of a nation guided by chivalric ideals and on the brink of changing the medieval world picture. Standing as a silent sentinel above forested terrain, the summer residence of King João I has an impressive history. Named for the Celtic lunar goddess Cynthia, the Paço de Sintra is surrounded by megalithic ruins which attest to druidic naturalistic polytheism (Fig. 4.43). However, relics of a strong Roman presence in the region are the tholoi of Outeiro dos Mós (Praia das Maçãs) and mosaic floor of São Miguel de Odrinhas.31 Located a half-day’s ride from Lisbon, ancient Sintria held a unique position among Rome’s colonial centers. Far from functioning as an active trading settlement, the hilly terrain came to be venerated as a sacra monte. Sanctuaries devoted to the sun and moon once occupied the summit, Richard Vaughn, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 181. Raul Lino, Quatro palavras sobre os paços reais da vila de Sintra (Lisbon: V. de Carvalho, 1948); Vitor Serrão, Sintra (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1989), 23–29; Damião Peres, A gloriosa história dos mais belos castelos de Portugal (Porto: 1969); Júlio de Castilho (Visconde), O paço de Cintra (Lisbon: 1886). The countryside around Sintra was the venue for royal hunts, the subject of a hunting treatise by King João I. See the Livro da montaria, feito por D. João I, rei de Portugal, conforme o manuscrito n. 4352 da Biblioteca nacional de Lisboa, ed. Francisco Mara Esteves Pereira (Lisbon-Coimbra: Academia das Sciências de LisboaCoimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 1918). 30 31

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from which springs flowed to create secret grottoes in the valley below for purification rites relating to the Orphic Mysteries. Even today, Sintra with its Arabic terraces and surrounding forests evokes the diatae and vivarium venticum of antiquity. Small wonder that the topographical beauty of Sintra which so attracted the Romans also was a magnet to the Moors. Al-Baçr, a ninth-century Arab geographer in service to the caliph of Huelva was accustomed to the fine climate of Andalusia along the Gulf of Cádiz. But he praised Sintra’s weather by the sea when noting its proximity to Lisbon. Even more importantly, he documents the presence of “two castles which are very solid.” One of the fortresses is believed to have been situated high on the Sintra hills.32 The second alcáçar, perhaps a residence of the alcaide, or governor, became the royal palace so admired by visitors over the¸ centuries. When Afonso Henriques I wrested Sintra from the Moors in 1147, there were several Arab houses intra muros standing near the alcáçar to the southwest. In April of 1157 the ruler and his queen, Dona Mafalda, gave a praefectus domus at Sintra to Dom Gualdim Pais (d. 1195), the first Grand-Master of the Order of Knights Templar. While the specific walled houses occupied by the Templar Knights remains polemical, Francisco Costa attempted to locate their quarters according to José António de Abreu’s plan of Sintra’s environs dated 1850 (Fig. 4.44–4.45).33 Matilde Sousa Franco, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra – Residência Querida de D. João I e D. Filipa de Lencastre (The Royal Palace of Sintra – Favorite Residence of John I and Philippa of Lancaster), Palácio Nacional de Sintra (Sintra: The British Historical Society of Portugal, Lloyds Bank, 1987), 19. On one lofty peak overlooking Sintra is the “Castelo dos Mouros,” described by Al-Baçr in the ninth century. Within its walls are a Moorish cistern and Romanesque chapel in ruins. On a neighboring peak is the Palácio Nacional da Pena, which rests on the site of the old Conventinho de Nossa Senhora da Pena. About 1511 King Manuel I (1495–1521) ordered Diogo Boytac (Languedoc, ca. 1460–1528), early architect of Lisbon’s great pantheon-abbey of São Jeronimos, to renovate the Conventinho as a hermitage for the Hieronymite order. Only a cloister and small ogival chapel survive from the Manueline period. Most of the structure was demolished around 1839, when the German Baron von Eschwege began the Palácio da Pena for Ferdinand Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (1816–1885), the consort of Maria II (m. 1836: 1819–1853), queen of Portugal in 1826. See Serrão, Sintra, 45. 33 Francisco Costa [1900–1988], O Paço Real de Sintra. Novos Subsídos para a sua História (Sintra: Edições da Câmera Municipal de Sintra, 1980), 10–11, 19. The founder and first director of the Biblioteca Municipal de Sintra, Costa mentions that copies of Afonso Henrique’s original carta de doação in Tomar are in the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (Livro de Mestrados, fl. 66, and Ordem de Cristo cod. n.o 235, fl. 68v). The documents 32

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Abreu’s plan shows the structures around the large Praça da Vila (town square) which faces the main entrance of Sintra palace. Afonso Henrique I’s carta de doação of 1157 precisely states the praefectus domus, or “house of the superintendent,” was given as a recompense for Dom Gualdim Pais’s faithful service (pro beneplacito et fideli servitio quod nobis semper fecisti).34 Clearly the royal doação involved not only a residence for the Grand-Master, but also additional houses for the habitation of the Templar knights under his aegis. Evidence to support this hypothesis is provided by thirteenth-century documents pertaining to property in the Chão da Ovila owned by Dom João Peres de Aboim (also known as João de Portel). One of the wealthiest men of his age, he had served as the mordomo-mór (majordomo) of King Afonso III (1210: r. 1248–1279).35 In 1235 Dom João Peres had accompanied Dom Afonso to France to attend the Prince’s marriage to the Burgundian Countess Mathilde, the daughter of Renaud de Dammartin. On May 15, 1267 in the Templar castle overlooking the town of Castelo Branco (Beira Baixa), Grand-Master Gonçalo Martins honored Dom João Peres de Aboim for his “great service and assistance” by bestowing a gift of “some fine houses” in the town of Sintra, as well as other property, including some shops, two vineyards, a water mill, orchard and olive grove.36 The document further specifies that upon the death of the nobleman and his wife Dona Maria Afonso, the maisoni tenpli (Templar houses) and their real estate were to be returned to the Order of the Knights Templar. Prior to his death, which occurred about 1284–1285, Dom João Peres de Aboim and his wife appear to have returned some of their houses in Sintra to the Knights Templar. On May 12, 1270 they gave three residences to bear the date 1190, corresponding in fact to 1152 (based upon the revised Roman calender adopted by Portugal in 1422). Costa informs that scholarly opinion advocates dating the doação when Gonçalo de Sousa of the papal court confirmed the act (April, 1157). 34 The entire text is provided by Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix No. 1: Doação de Casas e Herdades por D. Afonso Henriques a Gualdim Pais, Mestre da Ordem do Templo, 57–58. 35 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, 13. 36 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix No. 3: Doação dos Bens da Ordem do Templo em Sintra a D. João de Portel, 68–70. The Livro dos Bens de D. João de Portel (Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Gaveta I, M.o 2, N.o 18, folio 39v: 1267 gift by the Templars), is undated but encompasses the years 1249–1284. Consult Anselmo Braamcamp Freire, Brasões da Sala de Cintra, 3 vols. (Lisbon: F.L. Glz., 1899–1901). See specifically the 2nd ed. 1921, I, 248–59, and the appendices of Luís Bivar Guerra in a more recent reprinting (Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional–Casa da Moeda, 1996).

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Frei Roy Soares, Comendador of the Order in Lisbon. Two houses belonged to the parish church of São Miguel de Alcaynça. The remaining dwelling, in Gemuleira, had been acquired from the estate of Pedro Romeu.37 Nine months before bestowing his gift, Dom João Peres purchased a property in the Chão da Oliva close to Sintra Palace from João Fernandes, a merchant. The carta recording this sale in September of 1269 includes pertinent landmarks of the town which facilitate an identification of the Templar possessions in Sintra.38 To the north (ad aquilonem) of Fernandes’s property was the domus milicie tenpli. This edifice must have been the domus praefectus which King Afonso Henriques and Queen Mafalda gave in 1157 to Dom Gualdim Pais (1118–1195). This exceptional Templar knight who fought at Ourique in 1139, sailed to Palestine and fought at Gaza before he was appointed to the position of fourth Grand-Master of the Order based in Braga. Within three years he transferred to Tomar, where in 1160 he supervised the building of the Rotunda and other Templar structures. The foundations of the Grand-Master’s residence at Sintra rest beneath the town’s Hotel Central. To the south (ad africum) of João Fernandes’s house was the street called Calçada da Pendoa and beside it, to the east (ad solanum), was a home owned by João Gonçalves, now the Café Paris. The casas de Templários, or quarters of the Knights Templar, likely were three houses situated southeast of these landmarks. These buildings included the town’s old prison, where the postal office presently stands and a house behind it which was destroyed in the Lisbon earthquake of 1755.39 Cataclysmic effects also had been felt in Spain. Al-Baçr’s Huelva on the Atlantic coast of Al-Andalus was nearly destroyed. The residence Dom João Peres de Aboim acquired in 1269, and that of his neighbor João Gonçalves, belonged to the parish church of São Martinho. Rebuilt after the 1755 earthquake, only the Gothic apse of the sanctuary survives. However, it was dedicated to the warrior saint of Roman Gaul, Martin of Tours, and most likely was patronized by the Templars and their benefactors. Knights of the Order probably acquired Gonçalves’s estate. A 37 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra , Appendix 5: Entrega de Bens em Sintra por Ordem do Donatário D. João de Portel, 72–73; Livro dos Bens de D. João de Portel, folio 61. 38 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra , Appendix 4: Venda de uma Casa em S. Martinho, confinante com as Casas do Templo por João Fernandes a D. João de Portel, 71; Livro dos Bens de D. João de Portel, folio 60v. 39 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, 14–18. This discussion of the buildings in the Chão da Oliva draws upon some of his conclusions.

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subterranean passageway, eight meters (26’) below the ground level, was discovered around 1972. It extends north from the Café Paris, the former site of Gonçalves’s house, in the direction of the Praça da Vila. The corridor bisects to form two passages. One leads to the domus of the Grand-Master (Hotel Central) and the other terminates at Sintra Palace in the vicinity of the stone staircase at the east corner of the arched entrance.40 King Dinis (1261: r. 1279–1325) substantially renovated the Moorish alcáçar, referring to the castle in a carta régia of August 18, 1281 as “mea palacia de Oliva.”41 In another carta issued from Coimbra and dated June 23 of 1287, the monarch gave his bride, St. Isabel of Aragon (1271–1336), the towns of Sintra, Óbidos, Abrantes and Porto de Mós.42 Renowned for her acts of charity, the pious queen rarely stayed at Sintra. However, she presided over the liturgical rites of Whitsunday in the royal chapel built upon the ruins of the Arab mosque and inaugurated a traditional celebration of the feast of Pentecost.43 Her son Afonso IV (1291: r. 1325–1357) enjoyed hunting in the forested terrain of Sintra. On May 24, 1334, the date he conveyed the town to his wife Dona Beatriz (1293–1357), he ordered that the site be protected by his chancellor, Dom Steuã Gonçalvez, the Master of the Order

Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, 18–19. Costa credits the speleologist Augusto Morgado (Época, 12 August, 1972). 41 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 6: Carta Régia de D. Dinis sobre Dereitos e Deveres dos Mouros Forros de Colares, 74–75, reproduced from the Chancelaria de D. Dinis, I.o I.o, folio 35, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo. 42 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 7: Donação de Sintra e outras Vilas pelo Rei D. Dinis à Rainha D. Isabel, 76–77 (Chancelaria de D. Dinis, I.o I., fl. 101–201v., Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo; and the Livro de Doações de El-Rei D. Diniz, folio 200). The towns, with all their revenues, were presented by Dinis as a nuptial gift. Just a few weeks prior, on June 9 of 1287, he gave Queen Isabel the harvests of the towns (Livro de Doações, folio 201). 43 António Maria José de Melo César e Meneses, the Conde de Sabugosa [1854–1923], O Paço de Cintra. Apontamentos históricos e archeológicos (Lisbon, Imprensa Nacional, 1903), 5, who states that King João II on May 27, 1484 issued a carta to the brotherhood of the Holy Spirit of Sintra (Confrades do Espirito Santo de Sintra) which mentions a “customary” festa in the Hall of Princes (Sala dos Infantes) at the Paço. For the description of these traditional feasts, he refers to Frei Manuel da Esperança, Historia Seráfica da Ordem dos frades Menores de S. Francisco na Província de Portugal (Lisbon: 1656–1666), Ch. 37, Book 1.o. See also Matilde Sousa Franco, “O Palácio Nacional de Sintra quer recriar as suas tradicionais Festas do Espírito Santo,” Jornal de Sintra, 4 (April, 1986) and Revista da Imprensa, of the Secretaria de Estado da Cultural (April, May, June, 1986). The Conde de Sabugosa’s O Paço de Cintra has been reprinted (Sintra: Câmara Municipal, Gabinete de Estudos Históricos e Documentais, 1989–1990). 40

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of Christ.44 This appointment, confirmed by a document of July 12, 1336, establishes that King Dinis’s new chivalric institution not only had supplanted the Templars, but also acquired their property in the Chão de Vila.45 The town of Sintra seems to have remained a queen’s estate as indicated by a doação on January 5, 1372 from King Fernando I (1345: r. 1367–1383) to his wife, Dona Leonor Teles de Meneses (1350–1386).46 The Paço de Sintra was donated by João I on December 4, 1385 to Don Henrique Manuel de Vilhena, Count of Seia and Lord of Cascais and Sintra. However, this nobleman passed to the service of King Juan I of Castile (1358–r. 1379–1390), and Sintra returned to the Avis Crown. No record exists of any doação to Queen Philippa. However, her attention to the construction of a grander palace seems all too apparent in view of João I’s disinterest for the estate prior to his marriage.47 Sintra’s location afforded a moderate climate, cool oceanic breezes, subtropical vegetation and a surfeit of game for hunting (Fig. 4.46).48 Forests Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 14: Doação da Vila de Sintra e de Outros Bens e Direitos por D. Afonso IV à Rainha Beatriz, 90–91 (Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Gaveta 13, m.o 5. no 13 and copies: Bens de proprios da Rainha, 1.o 2. fl. 36; Reforma dos docs. das Gavetas, 1.o 21, fl. 110). Costa, 28–40, discusses the royal supervision of Sintra between 1287 and 1334. 45 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 15: Posse de Bens da Ordem de Cristo em Sintra, por Morte da Rainha D. Isabel, Viúva de D. Dinis, 92–95 (Arquivo da Torre do Tombo, Colecção Especial, c. 92, m.o 1, n.o 25). 46 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 16: Doação da Vila de Sintra e de Outros Bens e Direitos pelo Rei D. Fernando I a D. Leonor Teles, 96–97 (Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria de D. Fernando, 1.o 2., folio 60, 2.a col). 47 Costa, O Paço Real de Sintra, Appendix 17: Doação dos Paços de Sintra por D. João I ao Conde D. Henrique de Vilhena, 98–99 (Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria de D. João I, 1.o 1, folios 164–165v). Matilda Sousa Franca, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra, 29, states Count Henrique Manuel was the “natural son of Dom João Manuel, Prince of Vilhena,” and that he “came to Portugal together with his sister Dona Constança Manuel, wife of King Pedro I.” João I rewarded the nobleman for his service by conferring his titles on April 6, 1385. Regarding the donation of Sintra to Dom Henrique Manuel, Sousa Franca comments: “This episoide shows the little interest that João I had at the start of his reign for Sintra and this lends credence to the theory that it was Philippa of Lancaster who became an enthusiast for this palace...”. 48 Another castle used for royal hunts was Santarém (Ribatejo). This town which overlooks the Rio Tejo (Tagus), once was a Roman Scallabis (administrative seat of Lusitania) and called Praesidium Iulium by Julius Caesar. Legend has it that Santarém was named for Santa Iria, the daughter of a Visigoth pagan lord of Nabância (Tomar). Her conversion and decision to profess the vows of a Benedictine nun so enraged Britaldo, a former 44

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encircling the hilltop palace have a profusion of evergreens, umbrella pines, oaks, eucalyptus, magnolia and cork trees. Woodland gardens provide myriad colors and scents, as they contain a variety of flora, inter alia, wild roses, camellias, azaleas, rhododendron, hibiscus, cinerarias, myrtle and rosemary. As so aptly described by the Romantic poet Lord Byron, the hilly preserve indeed was a “Glorious Eden.”49 Sintra even today retains its sense of solitude as a lofty retreat amidst verdant forests. The tranquil site, so long associated with the Templar Knights and the Christian Reconquest, came to be indelibly linked with the militant spirit of the Order of Christ and Portugal’s campaigns to conquer the Moors of North Africa. King João I had planned the 1415 campaign to Ceuta at Sintra Palace, studying with his sons and advisors maps of the Moroccan coast. He sought the final approval to launch Lusitanian ships from Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira and Queen Philippa.50 Tales of chivalric valor by the Avis princes at Ceuta must have suitor, that he ordered her execution. Iria’s body was thrown into the Nabão River but it resurfaced on the Tagus shore at Scallabicastrum. A Benedictine abbot, Célio, preserved the incorrupt body of the martyr, “Sancta Irena.” The conquest of the Moorish stronghold of “Xantarim” was achieved in 1147 by King Afonso Henriques with the aid of foreign crusaders. Following this victory, he initiated the building of the Cistercian complex at Alcobaça. In 1324 Dinis resided at Santarém, where his queen allegedly received a vision relating the location of St. Iria’s tomb and her relics. Throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Portugal’s royal Côrtes convened at Santarém, but unfortunately the castle of the town does not survive. Consult: Maria Angela V. da Rocha Beirante, Santarém Medieval (Lisbon: 1980); idem, Santarém quinhentista (Lisboa: Distribuidora, Livraria Portugal, 1981); Francisco Nogueira de Brito, Santarem. Estudo historicó-archeológico e artistico das egrejas de Santa Maria de Marvilla, Nossa Senhora de Graça, S. João de Alporão, S. Francisco, Ermida de N. Sa. do Monte, e Fonte das figueiras (Porto: Litografia nacional, 1929); Vérgílio Correia, Três Túmulos (Lisbon: 1924); Padre Avelino de Jesus da Costa, “Santa Iria e Santarém – revisão de um problema hagiográfico e toponímico,” Revista Portuguêsa de História XIV (1974): 1–63; Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Inventário Artístico de Portugal – Distrito de Santarém (Lisbon: 1949); Vitor Serrão, Santarém (Editorial Presença: 1990); Zeferino Sarmento, Miradouros de Santarém, opúsculo (Santarém: 1948); idem, História e Monumentos de Santarém (Santarém: 1993); Padre Inácio da Piedade e Vasconcelos, História de Santarém Edificada, que dá noticia da sua fundação, e das couzas mais notaveis nella succedidas (Lisbon: 1740); Joaquim Veríssimo Serrão, Ensaio histórico sobre o significado e valor da tomada da Santarém aos Mouros, em 1147. No 8.o centenário, 1147–1947 (Santarém: 1947). 49 Lord George Gordon Byron, Baron [1788–1824], Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, (London: Thomas Davison, White-Friars, 1812). See João de Almeida Flor, Sintra no Literatura Romântica Inglesa (Sintra: Câmera Municipal de Sintra, 1978). 50 Regarding this secred mission, see the Conde de Sabugosa, O Paço de Cintra, 21–22, and Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta por El-Rei D. João I, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Lisbon: 1915), Part III, Chs. 14 and 15.

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inspired King Afonso V (r. 1438–1481), the son of Prince Duarte. Born at Sintra in January of 1432, he led his own fleet to victory at Arzila and Tangier in 1471. The austere complexion of the medieval castle of Sintra changed markedly during the reign of João I, who enjoyed riding and hunting in the surrounding countryside during the summer months. Because the rural retreat was not far from Lisbon, a decision was made, undoubtedly prompted by Queen Philippa, to furnish the residence with more comfortable quarters. To accommodate not only the royal family, but also nobility and guests, new galleries were planned around the old central tower (Fig. 4.47). As suggested by Rafael Moreira, the grand scale project must have been directed by the king’s mudéjar architect, João Garcia de Toledo.51 Sintra is stamped with the mark of Moorish craftsmanship, from the tile work of its walls and floors to the wooden patterns defining its high ceilings. The GothicIslamic appearance of the main galleries suggests that the core of the castle was substantially built when Dona Philippa died on July 19, 1415. Some aspects of the palace reveal Lancastrian influence. The remarkable kitchen (Fig. 4.48), with mammoth louvers which taper to conical chimneys seen from afar, may have its ingenium in the Abbot’s Fish-House at Glastonbury, although other plausible prototypes have been advanced.52 Kitchens having a large central chimney were uncommon, and Sintra’s was rarer still, with its two grand chimneys of unequal height. One explanation given for the unique architecture is that the kitchen was constructed upon a doubledomed mosque of the Bursa type. In fact, the walls of one chimney were forced when the Royal Chapel was built53 (Fig. 4.49–4.50). Serrão, Sintra, 30, cites a lecture by Rafael Moreira, “O Paço de Sintra no Renascimento,” delivered at a conference on January 22, 1988 at the Palácio Nacional de Sintra. 52 Thomas William Edgar Roche, Philippa. Dona Filipa of Portugal (London and Chichester: Phillimore, 1971), 68–69, suggests the English architect Henry Yevele, or Ouguette, his disciple were invited to the Avis court by Dona Philippa. Roche also relates the kitchen was drawn by the queen with Dom Gonçalo Vasques Coutinho. See Matilde Sousa Franca, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra, 32, who mentions the Abbot’s Kitchen at Glastonbury, the monastic kitchen at Durham, and John of Gaunt’s Kitchen at Canford Magna (Manor) in Dorset. She cites additional examples of monastic kitchens: in Spain at Pamplona and Iranzu; and in France at Fontevrault, where Eleanor of Aquitaine is buried. 53 For information about the pre-existing mosque, see Matilde Sousa Franca, O Palácio de Sintra, 26 and 35. She refers to Professor Cevat Erder, Director of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) and António Borges Coelho, Portugal na Espanha árabe, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Seara Nova, 1972) and 2nd ed. (Lisbon: Caminho, 1989). 51

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Glastonbury’s great Benedictine abbey stands in ruins but it was founded as a religious house as early as the fifth century. Joseph of Arimathaea purportedly sailed from Jerusalem to England, and settled at Glastonia when his staff took root. The “holy thorn” of Wearyall Hill, believed to have grown from his staff, was destroyed during the Reformation. Pious legend relates Joseph of Arimathaea had used the chalice of the Last Supper to collect the blood from Christ’s lance wound at Calvary. He transported the “Holy Grail” to Britain, where it appears to have been buried beneath the Chalice Spring on the steep hill known as Glastonbury Tor.54 A medieval archaeological investigation of the Abbey in 1191 resulted in a claim by Giraldus Cambrensis (De Principis Instructione, 1193) that the grave of King Arthur had been located between two pyramids to the south of the Lady 54 Nicholas R. Mann, Isle of Avalon: Sacred Mysteries of Arthur and Glastonbury Tor (St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn, 1996); Rev. Lionel Smithett Lewis, Glastonbury, the Mother of Saints. Her Saints, A.D. 37–1539 (Bristol: St. Stephen’s Press, 1925); idem, St. Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury (London: A.R. Mobray, 1927; and 5th ed. 1941). James P. Carley, Glastonbury Abbey and the Arthurian Tradition (Cambridge–Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2001). Reginald Francis Treharne. The Glastonbury legends: Joseph of Arimathea, the Holy Grail and King Arthur (London: Cresset Publishers, 1967). Adrian Geoffrey Gilbert, Alan Wilson, and Baram Blackett, The Holy Kingdom: The Quest for the Real King Arthur (London: Corgi, 1999) and rpt. (Montpelier, VT: Invisible Cities Press, 2002). Old Glastonbury papers record the death of Joseph of Arimathaea on July 27, 82 A.D. St. Patrick was the first abbot of the fifthcentury abbey and St. Dunstan served in the same capacity between 940 and 940. The stone “Lady Chapel,” dedicated to the Virgin Mary, was constructed by order of Henry II after a fire in 1184. Among the manuscripts salvaged from the Abbey was a treatise by Gildas III describing Joseph of Arimathaea as a noble decurio, or “overseer of mines.” See Laurence Gardner, Bloodline of the Holy Grail (Shaftesbury, Dorset-Rockport, Mass: Element, 1996), 134–35, who provides the above information and suggests that Joseph’s mining interest explains the generous land grant of 120 acres in Somerset by King Arviragus of Siluria, brother of Caractacus the Pendragon. Joseph’s knowledge of meteorology also accounts for his importance to the Templar Knights and alchemical freemasons. Regarding the original wattle shrine superceeded by the “Lady Chapel,” the structure was built in 64 A.D. according to the scale of the Hebrew Tabernacle of Exodus. Gardner, 140, proposes the shrine had been dedicated to Mary Magdalene, who purportedly died in France at La Sainte Baume in 63 A.D. He also credits (370, note 5) William of Malmesbury [1090–1143], The Antiquities of Glastonbury, who records St. Augustine’s description (ca. 600) of the church founded in Glastonia. The Latin Doctor remarked that the edifice was “not made by any man...but prepared by God Himself for the salvation of mankind.” Augustine further expounded that the “Heavenly Builder” had consecrated the church “to Himself and to Holy Mary, Mother of God.” Consult: John Scott, The Early History of Glastonbury: an edition, translation, and study of William of Malmesbury’s De Antiquitate Glastonie Ecclesie (Woodbridge-Suffolk: Boydell Press, 1981; rpt., Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 2001).

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Chapel. Although a lead cross discovered in a coffin has disappeared, its inscription was recorded by John Leland, a Tudor historian: HIC IACET SEPVLTVS INCLITVS REX ARTVRIVS IN INSVLA AVALONIA (Here lies buried the famous King Arthur in the Isle of Avalon).55 Discounting later scholarly polemic regarding the validity of Glastonbury’s claim, Philippa of Lancaster would have identified the great abbey with the Holy Grail and the Celtic Avalon.56 Geoffrey of Monmouth, who gave the age of chivalry its most illustrious literary sources in his Historia Regum Britanniae (1136), had situated Arthur of Pendragon’s plenary court at Caerleon. On the Usk River in South Wales, Caerleon once was the ancient headquarters of the Roman Second Legion, the Augusta.57 When planning the renovation and expansion of Sintra Palace, Dona Philippa perhaps sought to give an Arthurian aura to the former stronghold of Templar Knights. If she deliberately modeled her kitchen after an archetype at Glastonbury Abbey, why would she not have recast a Lusitanian castle into a new Camelot? Sintra’s spacious halls, with their ogival portals and bipartite mudéjar windows (Fig. 4.51–4.52), herald a change in palatine architecture. Like the galleries of Guimarães, the well-lighted Joanine galleries were designed for affluent living and they seem to reveal the queen’s direct intervention.58 The daughter of Duke John of Gaunt (1340–1399), Dona Philippa had lived in several English Great Houses, including Savoy Palace by the Thames between London and Westminster and the Castles of Hertford, Tutbury, Kenilworth Michael Holmes, King Arthur. A Military History (London-New York: BlandfordSterling Publishing Company, 1996, 12. 56 Many of Glastonbury’s relics and manuscripts were lost in a fire of 1184. Joseph d’Arimathie by the twelfth-century Burgundian Grail chronicler, Robert de Boron, and the fourteenth-century Glastoniencis Chronica by John of Glastonbury, were early manuscripts which circulated Grail lore about Joseph of Arimathaea. Consult William James Entwistle, The Arthurian legend in the literatures of the Spanish Peninsula (London-TorontoNew York: J.M. Dent & Sons, Ltd.–E.P. Dutton & Co., 1925); idem., A lenda arturiana nas literaturas da Península Ibérica, translated by António Alvaro Dória (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, 1942) and reprinted in English (New York: Phaeton Press and Millwood, NY: Kraus Reprint Co., both editions in 1975). 57 Holmes, King Arthur. A Military History, 13. See Geoffrey of Monmouth [Bishop of St. Asaph: 1100–1154], History of the Kings of Britain (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1966). 58 The altar end of Sintra’s chapel has a floor composed of very old Moorish tiles which are set into a long rectangle reminiscent of an oriental carpet. The mosaic floor suggests the location of the original Chapel of Santa Maria which King Dinis built for his queen, St. Isabel. 55

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and Bolingbroke. Due to the tutelage of Katherine Swynford and Geoffrey Chaucer, she was an intellectual. While Dona Philippa attempted to learn the customs and language of Portugal, she wrote in French. Her fondness for chivalric literature and science was communicated to her sons, whom she personally taught.59 With regard to the interior decoration of Sintra, the names of two artists from the reign of João I are known, and both were court painters in the king’s service: Lourenço Martins, first documented in January 1, 1430, who worked at the residence until 1449; and Alvaro de Pedro, who completed the ceiling of the Sala dos Infantes and was employed until 1450.60 Count Atanazy Raczynski contended that all the rooms were painted under João I.61 Despite the retouching of ceilings beginning with King Manuel I (1495–1521), who imposed his own stylistic stamp on Sintra, the emblematic content reveals there influence of a personality intimately acquainted with chivalric lore and alchemical principles. Presupposing the chambers of Sintra palace were decorated to reflect a complex and unified iconographical scheme, an artistic coordinator must have worked closely with Lourenço Martins and Alvaro Pedro. About 1425, a few years before Jan van Eyck’s visit to Portugal, a “Master Antonio” arrived to Lisbon in the retinue of Gomes Eanes, Abbot of La Badia 59 Roche, Philippa, 1–18, and Geoffrey Chaucer, A Treatise on the Astrolabe, from The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer; ed. by Alfred William Pollard, H. Frank Heath, Mark H. Liddell, W.S. McCormick (London-New York: Macmillan and Co., 1903); Marijane Osborn, Time and the astrolabe in the Canterbury Tales (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002). Francisco da Fonseca Benevides, Rainhas de Portugal. Estudo histórico com muitos documentos, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Typographia Castro Irmão, 1879), I, 256–7 (November 4, 1405 Letter to Henry IV). For Philippa’s education of her sons, see Prince Duarte, O Leal Conselheiro [The Loyal Councellor] , ed. Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand, 1942), Ch. 98. 60 Braamcamp Freire, Brasões da Sala de Cintra, XXXV (Preambulo): ”Existiu em Cintra um pintor, que o foi de El-Rei, e se chamou Lourenço Martins. Encontrei o nome d’elle, com a classifição de pintor somente, em 1 de Janeiro de 1430...Reinava então D. João I. De 1449 ha uma escriptura de doação em que elle figura como ‘Pyntor d’El-Rei.” Regarding Alvaro de Pedro, consult: José da Cunha Taborda [1766–1836], Regras da arte da pintura, com breves reflexões criticas sobre os caracteres distinctivos de suas escolas, vidas, e quadros de seus mais célebres professores (Lisbon: Na impressão regia, 1815; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress), 145; Count Atanasy Raczynski, Dictionnaire historico-artistique du Portugal, pour faire suite à l’ouvrage ayant pour titre: Les arts en Portugal, lettres adressées à la Société artistique et scientifique de Berlin et accompagnées de documens (Paris, J. Renouard et Cie, 1847), 225. These sources are provided by the Count of Sabugosa, O Paço de Cintra, 11. 61 Count Atanazy Raczynski, Les arts en Portugal; lettres adressées à la Société artistique et scientifique de Berlin, et accompagnés de documens (Paris, J. Renouard et Cie, 1846), 205.

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Fiorentina. This master who settled at the Avis court appears to have been one and the same as the “Master Jácome, Italiano” mentioned by Francisco de Holanda in his Diálogos em Roma. Writing in 1548, Holanda designated “Master Jácome “ as a Renaissance “eagle” and referred to him as the painter of João I, the “King of Good Memory” (Boa Memória). If he was Jacques Coene of Bruges — architect, illuminator and painter — then the arrival of “Master Jácome-Antonio” occurred during a critical decade of Joanine building. Engaged by Duke Afonso as architect of the new Palace of Guimarães, “Master Antom” also might have supervised the enlargement and embellishment of the Brangança castle of Barcelos in the north between the Douro and Minho rivers.62 Portugal had a surfeit of promising apprentices, talented journeymen, and skilled masters who were readily available to facilitate the completion of large scale royal projects. Master Jácome-Antonio’s prior experience in France and Italy would have placed him at the vanguard of court artists employed by King João I. He knew what was au courant in European palatine architecture and decoration. Whether the enigmatic master so highly praised by Francisco de Holanda was the same artist who painted the famous Book of Hours for Jean Le Meingre II, Maréchal de Boucicaut, remains an unsolvable issue without additional documents. However Prince Duarte’s Book of Hours in Lisbon’s Torre do Tombo stylistically accords with the Boucicaut “Golden Scroll” style and it was completed by 1436, three years before the recorded death of Master Jácome-Antonio. Sintra’s main chapel and the royal apartments probably were painted in the late 1420s and may have been completed by the time Jan van Eyck and the Burgundian embassy were received at the complex by João I. The unique focus upon avian imagery in strategic chambers of the residence has its closest counterpart in heraldic borders of French late Gothic manuscript illumination. Of all the Avis houses, the Paço de Sintra was so important to Duarte that he made a personal inventory of the rooms for posterity, taking precise dimensions of even the dressing rooms. Considering his fascination 62 Francisco de Azeredo, O Paço dos Condes-Duques de Barcelos (Porto: 1954); idem., Casas senhoriais portuguesas (Rapperswil, Switzerland: Internationales Burgen-Institut, 1978); José Viriato Eiras Capela, A Câmera. A Nobreza E O Povo Do Concelho De Barcelos (Barcelos: 1989); João Macedo Correia, As louças de Barcelos (Barcelos: Museu Regional de Cerâmica, 1965); António Martins Magalhães, Barcelos, Verde Minho (Barcelos: 1987): Ernesto de Amorim Magalhães, Barcelos No Passado E No Presente (Barcelos: 1958); Carlos Alberto Ferreira de Almeida, Barcelos (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1990).

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for Sintra, where avian heraldry is a hallmark of the grand halls, it is intriguing that the “Boucicaut Master” was first known by the sobriquet, Maître aux Cygnes (Master of the Swans) due to his distinctive signature leitmotif on miniatures. The “Swan Hall” or Sala dos Infantes The paço of Sintra was a spacious complex for a rural estate.63 The layout of the rooms is known by an eighteenth-century document from the Carthusian Monastery of Évora, a copy of King Duarte’s listing of Sintra’s rooms and their measurements.64 Duarte began his inventory with the royal apartments located above the arched main entrance of the palace. From a tower terrace he entered the Sala Grande (Figs. 4.53–4.54), recording its length as 34 côvados, the equivalent of 24 meters (78’).65 From its inception, the hall functioned as a place for dining, feasts, and receptions. Called the “Hall of Princes” (Sala dos Infantes) during the reign of João II (1481–1495), it 63 At a conference in Sintra (January, 1988), Rafael Moreira (Universidade Nova de Lisboa) attributed the Gothic-Islamic character of the palace to the architect João Garcia de Toledo. King Manuel (1495–1521) directed attention to renovation and expansion of the residence as early as 1505, and his primary architect (1509–1518) was André Gonçalves. See Serrão, Sintra, 30 (Garcia de Toledo) and 40 (Gonçalves). Drawings of Sintra dated 1509 by Duarte de Armas are in the Arquivo National da Torre do Tombo. See João de Almeida, Reprodução anotada do Livro das fortalezas de Duarte Darmas [1489–1530] (Lisbon: Editorial Império, 1943), 451–57. For the Livro de D. Duarte (Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tomba), see Conde de Sabugosa, O Paço de Cintra, 219–20. 64 For the Livro de Cartuxa de Évora, see the Biblioteca Nacional of Lisbon (Mss. Cod. L, 6,45), Medição das Casas de Cintra. The Cartuxa, Évora’s seventeenth-century church and monastery, lies about a quarter of a mile northwest of the town. See Conde de Sabugosa, Os Paços de Sintra, Document I, 219–20, who states the Évora manuscript hardly differs from an even older copy of the late sixteenth century in the Arquivo Nacional do Torre de Tombo, MS. 1928, folios 177v–179v. For additional information on the compartamentation and measurements of the buildings at Sintra, consult Gabriel Pereira, Documentos históricos da cidade de Évora (Évora: Typographia de Casa Pia, 1885–87; and 2nd ed. 1891, Part 3, fasc. XXIII, 35. Also see reprint (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional–Casa da Moeda, 1998). 65 With regard to the côvado de medir panor, or archaic “ell” which varies from country to country, the Conde de Sabugosa gives Portuguese standard for 1903, that is, 66 centimeters. The measurement in England is 1.143 meters (45”). Comparing the current length of the Swan Hall, 24 meters, with Duarte’s 34 côvados establishes that 1 côvado equals 72 centimeters. The tower terrace which provided access to the Sala Grande measured 17 by 6 côvados (12 x 4 meters).

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later was named the “Swan Room” (Sala de Cisnes). Sintra’s tower terrace appears in a drawing of Sintra Palace by Duarte de Armas dated 1507.66 King Manuel I expanded the residence of Sintra to include a northeast wing, and therefore, he demolished the tower terrace to create a “Hall of Archers.” This modification necessitated the construction of a new eastern portal to the Sala Grande.67 The Swan Room still retains its eight bipartite windows from the Joanine epoch, but its fireplace and green tourmaline geometric tiles are Manueline. Despite retouching of the hall’s ceiling by Manueline and eighteenth-century artisans, the beauty of the polychrome and gilded wood has not been diminished. Twenty-seven swans have given the hall its toponym. Around the neck of each is a golden collar with bells. Set within octagonal moldings, the swans are in different positions and silhouetted against varying landscapes. A set of three tapestries illustrating the story of the “Swan Knight” was woven by Pasquier Grenier in Tournai and given in 1462 by Duke Philip the Good and Duchess Isabel to Jean Jouffrey, Cardinal of Arras and papal legate.68 A study of the two tapestries in Vienna and Cracow establishes their source as a Brabantine variation upon the story of Lohengrin. According to this account, Oriant, sovereign of the rich land of Lyleforte, and his queen, Beatrice, had seven children, each of whom were born with silver collars around their necks.69 Envious and disapproving of her daughter-in-law, 66 Duarte d’Armas, Livro das Fortalezas, annotated by João de Almeida and Alfredo Pimenta, Duarte Darmas e o seu Libro das Fortalezas (Lisbon: 1944). 67 Conde de Sagabuso, Os Paços de Sintra, 156. 68 Marian Morelowski, “L’Histoire du Chevalier au Cygne: tapisserie à l’église SainteCatherine de Cracovie,” Congrès d’Histoire de l’Art, Actes, II, pt. II (Paris: 1924): 672–82; Magdalena Piwocka, “Tapisserie à l’histoire du chevalier au cygne,” [with French Sommaire] Arras z Historia Rycerza z Labedziem (Cracow: 1968): 295ff.; Anthony Richard Wagner, “The Swan Badge and the Swan Knight,” Archaeologia XCVII (1959): 127–38. 69 For a more comprehensive analysis of the “Swan Knight” tapestries, see Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979),129–35, whose account is summarized here. He cites Thomas von Cramer, Lohengrin. Edition und Untersuchungen (Munich: W. Fink, 1971), 68–122 and provides several sources regarding the extant panels in Vienna and Cracow. For the French version of the story of the knight of the swan, see Baron de Reiffenberg, (Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand), ed., Le Chevalier au cygne et Godefroid de Bouillon, poëme historique, publié pour la première fois avec de nouvelles recherches sur les légendes qui ont rapport à la Belgique, un travail et des documents sur les croisades, 3 vols. (Brussels: M. Hayez, 1846–54); H. A. Todd, La Naissance du chevalier au cygne. An unedited French poem of the 12th century (Baltimore: Modern Language Association, 1889); Célestin Hippeau, La chanson du Chevalier au Cygne et Godefroid de Bouillon, Poëm Historique

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the dowager queen Matabrune coveted the precious metal and ordered her yeoman to remove the collars while her grandchildren played in a meadow. This act caused a transformation as they turned into swans and flew away from the forest. Only Helyas Graele, whose name conceivably derived from the Celtic eala (swan), escaped the fate of his five brothers and sister only because he had been taken by a holy hermit on an excursion to seek alms. Raised by the same hermit in the woods, eventually Helyas returns to court, proves his mother’s innocence from Matabrune’s false charges by defeating her champion Malguarri in a tournament list, and restores the collars to his siblings. All assumed their human form but a solitary swan, Gerhard. He remained unaltered because Matabrune melted down one collar to make a chalice. This mystical swan which glided across the river near the palace was Helyas’s conduit to further adventures. Drawing a skiff, the swan provided passage to Brabant and the court of Emperor Otto. Along the journey Helyas and his brother shared the sustenance of a consecrated wafer. Arriving at Nijmwegen (Cleves), the hero again participated in a tourney of honor. He defended Clarissa, the Duchess of Bouillon, who was wrongfully accused of poisoning her husband. By the Meuse River, Helyas engaged successfully in single combat against the Count of Frankfurt, claimant to the Duchy of Bouillon. Consequently, the grateful widow gave the victor her daughter Ydain in marriage. Mirroring Wolfram’s Parzival, curiosity is an integral aspect of the Brabantine tale of the Swan Knight. After several years of marriage Helyas’s inquisitive wife asks her lord his name and origin, thereby forcing him to leave Brabant never to be seen again. By then, the couple’s daughter had married Eustache, Count of Bologne and the son of Emperor

[Brussels: 1846–1848]), 2 vols. (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1969); French Anonymous, La Généalogie avecques les gestes et nobles faitz darmes du très preux et renomme prince Godeffroy de Boulion; et de ses chevalereux frères Baudouin et Eustace: yssus et descendus de la très noble et illustre lignée du vertueux Chevalier au Cyne (Paris: Jean Petit, 1504). The first thirtyeight chapters were partly transcribed by William Caxton, The Hystory of Hilyas Knight of the Swann, under the title The Last Siege and Conqueste of Jherusalem, with many histories therein comprised (Westmester: Wynkyn de Worde, 1512), f. 1480; and more completely translated by Robert Copland, Helyas Knight of the Swan (W. Copland, 1550), reprinted by W.J. Thorns, Early Prose Romances, 3 vols. (1858), III. Also see William, of Tyre, Archbishop of Tyre [1130–1190], Godeffroy of Boloyne, or, The siege and conqueste of Jerusalem [Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum], translated by William Caxton, edited by Mary Noyes Colvin (Millwood, NY: Kraus Reprint, 1987).

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Otto. When the swan-drawn boat departed for Helyas’s homeland, the warrior was accompanied by his three grandsons, Godfrey de Bouillon, Baldwin de Sebourg, and Eustace. Each of them fought valiantly in the First Crusade, but it was the eldest, Godfrey, who became King of Jerusalem. A near contemporary of Godfrey de Bouillon and his brothers was the Burgundian crusader Count Henrique (1069–1112), who settled at Guimarães and fathered Portugal’s first king, Afonso Henriques I (1094–1185). Like King Oriant, João I fathered seven children who lived to maturity. Four sons engaged in mortal combat at Ceuta, where three were knighted. The ceiling of the Sala Grande at Sintra logically evoked memories of the “Swan Knight” and visually proclaimed the Avis dynasty belonged to the family of the “Knights of the Grail.” Sintra’s Sala Grande also emblematically acknowledges the sustained friendship between the House of Lancaster and João I, Knight of the Garter Order of St. George. Sintra’s “Swan Courtyard” (Fig. 4.55) provides an entrance to the Sala de Cisnes and its large water basin, mudéjar in design, may have been built to accommodate a flock of swans sent as an engagement gift from Henry V (1387–1422) to his cousin Princess Isabel.70 While their union had received papal sanction on October 21, 1413, political events cancelled the betrothal arranged by Dona Philippa. The battle at Agincourt led to the English reconquest of Normandy (1415–1417) and the Treaty of Troyes (1420), in which Henry V instead wed Catherine (1401–1438), daughter of King Charles VI of France. Not until 1428 did Princess Isabel receive another offer of marriage, and to mark the occasion, Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, sent her some swans, then quite rare in Portugal.71 While the disport of these birds in the same water-course at Sintra assuredly delighted the Infanta, the bestowing of a gift of swans was a customary nuptial practice of European courts which signified a solemn pledge. In 1310 Jacques de Longuyon, a French jongleur, composed a courtly poem as a tangent to the Romance of Alexander. Entitled Les Voeux du Paon (Vows of a Peacock), the verses centered on the deeds of Porus, a knight who Longuyon affirmed fought more valorously than even the Neuf Preux, or Nine Worthies of old (Fig. 4.56–4.58).72 The nine noblest men were subRoger F. Pye, Uma Empresa Inglesa no Paço de Sintra (Lisbon: 1967), 38. Roche, Philippa, 92. 72 For relevant information about the “Worthies,” see: Robert L. Wyss, “Die neun Helden. Eine ikonographische Studie,” Zeitschrift für Schweizerische Archaeologie und Kun70 71

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divided into triadic groups: the pagan heroes, Hector, Alexander, and Julius Caesar; the great Hebrews, David, Joshua and Judas Maccabeus; and the Christian champions, Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey of Bouillon. The “Nine Worthies” were displayed in relief on two silver gilt flagons owned by Charles V (r. 1364–1380), who commissioned two tapestries of the theme in 1379–1380.73 The king’s admiration of the “Worthies” was surpassed by his brothers, Louis of Anjou (1339–1384) and Jean de Berry (1340–1416), both of whom owned sets of the subject by the master weaver Nicolas Bataille.74 Not to be outdone in the acquisition of art which drew such compelling

stgeschichte XVII (1957): 73–106; idem., “Die Caesarteppiche,” Jahrbuch des Bernischen Historischen Museums in Bern (1955–56): 103–232, reprinted as Die Caesarteppiche und ihr ikonographisches Verhältnis zur Illustration der “Faits des Romains” im 14. und 15. Jahrhundert (Bern: Kommissionsverlag von K.J. Wyss Erben, 1957); Horst Schroeder, Der Topos der Nine Worthies in Literatur und bildender Kunst (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1971) which contains 43 plates. Muriel Whitaker, Legends of King Arthur in Art (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1995; rpt. of 1st ed. 1990), 137–58, provides an analysis of King Arthur among the Worthies and she cites (137), a translation dated 1438 attributed to John Barbour [1325–1395], The Buik of Alexander [The Buik of the most Noble and Valiant Conquerer Alexander the Grit], ed. R.L.G. Ritchie (Edinburgh-London: Sottish Text Society–W. Blackwood and Sons , 4 vols. (1921–29), 12, 17, 21, 25. Also see John Barbour, The Buik of the most noble and vailzeand conquerour Alexander the Great (Edinburgh: Bannytyne Club Press, Ballantyne and Co, 1831; and rpt. New York: AMS Press, 1971). 73 Whitaker, Legends of King Arthur in Art , 138, and Jules Labarte, Inventaire du mobilier de Charles V, roi de France (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1879). 74 James Joseph Rorimer, The Cloisters (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1963), 76–83; and James Joseph Rorimer and Margaret B. Freeman, “The Nine Heroes tapestries at The Cloisters,” Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin VII (May, 1949): 243–60. Originally the Cloisters set consisted of three large tapestries, each focusing upon a group of Worthies and measuring about 21 by 16 feet. Only five heroes are extant (David, Joshua, Alexander, Julius Caesar, Arthur). This set of the “Worthies” seems to have been woven as a second set for Jean de Berry because they carry his ducal arms, a golden fleur-de-lys of France on an azure ground within an indented red border. See Jules Marie Joseph Guiffrey, Inventaires de Jean duc de Berry (1401–1416), 2 vols. (Paris: E. Leroux, 1894–96); idem., Nicolas Bataille, tapissier parisien du XIVe siècle. sa vie, son oeuvre, sa famille (Paris: 1884). According to the 1416 inventory of Jean de Berry’s treasures, he owned yet another “Heroes” tapestry from Arras. Consult: Paul Gauchery, Inventaires de Jean, duc de Berry (1401–1416), 2 vols. (Paris: 1894–1896) and Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 138–39, 140 and notes; Aulde Moreau, “Le formidable essor de la tapisserie au XIVe siècle,” Dossier de l’Art 31 (August 1996): 4–7, who at 6, mentions the “Heroes Tapestries” and Jacques de Longuyon. Rorimer has noted the resemblance of the Cloisters “Worthies” to

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analogies between princely power and the prowess of fabled heroes, Duke Philip the Bold joined his brothers, expending huge sums for his own splendid tapestries of the neuf preux and companion sets of the neuf preuses, virtuous women whose deportment exemplified chivalric ideals.75 Philip the Good, who manifested an especial interest in literature which equated his rule with that of Alexander the Great, commissioned at least three copies of Jean Wauquelin’s Histoire d’Alexandre (1448). One of them in the Dutuit Collection of the Petit Palais in Paris (MS. 456) illustrates contemporary

the Apocalypse Tapestries (1377–79) woven by Nicolas Bataille († 1400) for Louis I, Duke of Anjou. Louis possessed his own tapestries of the “Nine Heroes” which no longer survive. They likely were displayed at Saumur Castle, along with his other treasures inherited by his son, Louis II. Possibly some of the figures provided realistic portraits of the royal family. Consult Hubert Landais, Histoire de Saumur (Toulouse: Privat, 1997); idem., “Le château de Saumur résidence des ducs d’Anjou,” La noblesse dans les territoires angevins à la fin du Moyen Âge, Actes du Colloque, Université d’Angers, 3–6 Juin, 1998 (Rome: École Française de Rome, 2000): 189–203; Henri Moranvillé, Inventaire de l’orfèvrerie et des joyaux de Louis I, duc d’Anjou (Paris: E. Leroux, 1906).The architectural sandstone framework embraced by the master weaver Bataille reflects a fashionable penchant for adorning buildings with sculptural programmes of the Worthies. See Jean Adhémar, Influences antiques dans l’art du moyen âge français; recherches sur les sources et les thèmes d’ inspiration (London: Warburg Institute, 1939), who mentions that Duke Louis d’Orléans (1392–1407) ordered statues of the “Nine Heroes” placed on the towers of his Pierrefonds Castle (Oise). There were similar carvings installed by Guy de Dammartin at Jean de Berry’s residence at Maubergeon near Poitiers. Consult Diane Joy, “Le Palais de Poitiers, un exemple d’architecture d’apparat,” Dossier d’Art 107 (2004): 58–61; idem., “La statuaire de la tour Maugergeon au palais de Poitiers, Actes du Colloque. Le château en l’art à la croisée des sources (Mehun-sur-Yèvre, 25–28 November, 2001), at press. 75 “Ten Heroes” and “Nine Heroines” were ordered by Philip the Bold from Pierre de Beaumetz on July 19, 1388 and the weaver was paid 2500 francs upon their completion on April 7, 1390. The identity of the additional hero is polemical, but may have been Bertrand Du Guesclin. During the fourteenth century, his name appears in the company of the Medieval Christian “Worthies.” See Jean Mesqui, “Les châteaux de Louis d’Orléans. Architecture d’un jeune prince en devenir,” Dossier d’Art 107 (2004): 20–25, at 20, who illustrates a statue from the façade of Pierrefonds thought to represent Du Guesclin. Philip the Bold’s payment of 3400 francs on December 25, 1389 to Dourdin suggests the Duke obtained another set of “Nine Heroes” and “Nine Heroines.” Whitaker, The Legend of Arthur in Art, 138, observes the absence of Arthurian women among the “Worthies.” She mentions and a lost set of “Heroines”from the collection of Charles VI (1368–1422) was acquired in 1423 by John, the Duke Bedford. Consult Jules Marie Joseph Guiffrey, “Inventaire des tapisseries de Charles VI,” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartres XLVIII (1887): 90–91, 424. The nine Preuses were: Semiramis, Menelippe, Deisilla, Taucua, Tamaris, Deijemma, Lampedo, Penthesilea and Hippolyta.

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dramatis personae and includes several folios (84–92v) pertaining to Jacques de Longuyon’s “vow of the peacock.”76 The memory of the “Worthies” consistently was evoked in courtly functions, in particular grand banquets where the ostensible goal was to impress guests with the wealth and majesty of the lord. The calendar page of January (Fig. 4.59–4.60) from the Limbourg Brothers’ Les Très Riches Heures (Musée Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy , 105–7, 354–55. Paul Durrieu, “L’Histoire du bon roi Alexandre – manuscrit à miniatures de la Collection Dutuit,” La Revue de l’Art Ancien et Modern XIII (1903): 49–64, 103–21. La Histoire de Bon Roi Alexandre contains 204 miniatures, the majority by Guillaume Vrelant († 1481/82) and his atelier in Bruges. According to Smith, 355, folios 87–92v were created by Lieven van Lathem, an illuminator who worked in Ghent (1456–59) and then Antwerp. Folio 8 concerns the wedding banquet of Macedonia’s King Philip and Olympia, the Epirote princess. Smith, 106–7, relates one of the guests to the famous “Feast of the Pheasant” held at Lille in 1454. She is the first to profess a vow, and on her white hat is written phesone (pheasant). The “Feast of the Pheasant” will be discussed later with regard to its entremets which allude to the “labors” of Hercules, another ancient hero admired by Philip the Good. In his vita of Alexander, Plutarch stated that “on his father’s side he was a descendant of Heracles through Caranus and on his mother’s side a descendant of Aeacus through Neoptolemus.” See Plutarch’s Lives, ed. Edward Capps, Thomas Ethelbert Page, William Henry Denham Rouse, translated by Bernadotte Perrin, 11 vols. (London-New York: The Loeb Classical Library, William Heinemann–G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1921), VII (Demosthenes and Cicero: Alexander and Caesar), II, 225. The maternal lineage of Alexander is very significant as the Trojan warrior Achilles was the son of Neoptolemus and grandson of Aeacus. In 1454 Philip the Good hosted an allegorical theatrical at Nevers, the performance of Georges Chastellain’s poem, Complainte d’Hector. Integral to the meaning of the play was the subject of Alexander mediating between Achilles and Hector, a thinly veiled allusion to the familial antipathy between the houses of Burgundy and Orléans. Witnessing the resolution of conflict in the play was Charles, Duke of Orléans (1391–1465), whose father Louis was assassinated in 1407 by henchmen of John the Fearless. Smith, 94–95, discusses the Nevers performance, which was produced by Olivier de la Marche and Chastellain with embroidered costumes by Simon de Briele. Louis d’Orléans (1372–1407) had been identified with Hector by Christine de Pisan (1364–1429). After 1405, the corpus of Christine’s literary works, including the Epître d’Othéa which concerns moral revelations to Hector, were assembled in a single manuscript (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Fr. 606). See Marcel Thomas, The Golden Age. Manuscript Painting at the Time of Jean, Duke of Berry (New York: George Braziller, 1996, 2nd ed. of 1979), 74, who states the book probably was created for Louis of Orléans. Following his death, it passed to Jean, Duke of Berry. See Sandra L. Hindman, Christine de Pizan’s “Epistre Othéa”: Painting and Politics at the Court of Charles VI (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1986); Georges Chastellain, Oeuvres, ed. Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, 8 vols. (Brussels: Académie Royale de Belgique, 1863–66) VI, 167–202 (Complainte d’Hector). My thanks are given to Erin Clay, MA graduate student at George Washington University, for her assistance on the Epistre Othéa. 76

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Condé, Chantilly, 1416–1418), despite its vibrant representation of festivities hosted by Jean de Berry, still provides only a fragment of the Renaissance social picture.77 The January calendar page illustrates the customary revelry marking the feast of the Epiphany (January 6) when presents would be exchanged between the Duke and members of his court.78 Upon the damask tablecloth is a golden saltcellar in the shape of a nautical vessel, a pertinent emblem for the “ship of state.” Described in the Duke’s inventory of 1416 as a salière du pavillon, this object must have resembled another elaborate golden nef once owned by Jean. Now lost, this vessel and a pair of golden basins in the Duke’s collection were ornamented in red enamel with the “Nine Heroes” and “Nine Heroines.”79 Jean de Berry’s châteaux contained a surfeit of tapestries, several sets of which were inherited by Philip the Good.80 Undeniably scenes of the Trojan War were among the subjects. The French royals delighted in tracing their remote ancestry to Clovis I (r. 481–511), the first Christian king of the Franks and Merovingian descendant of Priam the Younger, the son of Raymond Cazelles, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. Musée Condé à Chantilly, with an Introduction and Legends by Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, and a preface by Millard Meiss (London-New York: Thames and Hudson, Ltd.–George Braziller, 1969); see rpt. edition of 1993, 29–30 (bibliography) and 173 (“January”); Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean De Berry. The Late Fourteenth century and the Patronage of the Duke, 2 vols. (London: Phaidon Press, 1967); Patricia Stirnemann and Inés Villela-Petit, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry et l”enluminure en France au début de Xve siècle, with a preface by Françoise Autrand and with collaboration by Emmanuele Toulet (Paris: exhibition catalogue, Musée Condé, Château de Chantilly-Somogy Éditions d’Art, 2004), especially 36–48; and 80–81 (bibliography); Paul Durrieu, “Les petits chiens du duc de Berry,” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (1909): 866–75; Michael Bath, “Imperial renovatio Symbolism in the ‘Très Riches Heures’,” Simiolus XVII (1987): 5–22. 78 Brigitte Buettner, “Past Presents: New Year’s Gifts at the Valois Courts, ca. 1400,” Art Bulletin LXXXIII, No. 4 (2002): 598–625. 79 Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur, 139. Charles Chichele Oman, Medieval Silver Nefs (London: H. M. Stationery Office-Victoria & Albert Museum Monographs 15, 1963). For French silver, consult: Louis Douët-d’Arcq, Comptes de l’argenterie des rois de France au XIVe siècle (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France d’après des manuscrits originaux – J. Renouard et Cie, 1951); idem., Nouveau recueil de comptes de l’argenterie des rois de France (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France-Librairie Renouard, H. Loones, 1874). 80 Bernard Prost, “Les Tapisseries du duc de Berry (1416),” Archives historiques, artistiques et littéraires I (1889–1890): 385–92. According to Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 334, the collection inherited by the Duke of Burgundy included Jean’s secular subjects of Godefroy de Bouillon, Nine Worthies, Roman de la Rose, History of Fame, History of Begue de Belin and Garin de Lorraine. 77

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Anchises and brother of Aeneas.81 Despite the Duke de Berry’s fascination for the “Worthies” and ancient themes, the tapestry behind the fireplace in the January calendar page does not depict an historical event. Rather, the Limbourg Brothers illustrate a more contemporary conflict, Philip van Artevelde’s defeat at Roosebecke on November 27, 1382. This resounding victory over the Ghenter leader of a municipal rebellion of burghers was won by Louis II, Count of Flanders, only with the martial support of Charles VI. Under João I and Philippa of Lancaster, Sintra’s banqueting hall must have been as splendidly appointed as the great chambers decorated under Jean de Berry. While their Swan Gallery was used during the summer — a season when tapestries traditionally were stored — the Sala would have displayed magnificent gold and silver objects. Plausibly too, the walls once exhibited boldly patterned silks, or even painted linens that either replicated heraldic insignia or narrated heroic themes favored by a chivalric court. The “Magpie Hall” and Alchemical Emblems Wolfram’s Parzival describes the Fisher King Anfortas officiating at mass as a high priest in his castle at Munsalvaesche (Mount of Salvation). The Grail is depicted as a centerpiece of a courtly procession, a special stone which rests on green silk. The Lapis Elixir has the power to rejuvenate like the Phoenix bird. At the Fisher King’s mass, the Grail stone records the names and lineage of those called to service. As soon as the words are read, they disappear. This mystical description which conjures the alchemical 81 Marie Tanner, The Last Descendant of Aeneas. The Hapsburgs and the Mythic Image of the Emperor (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1993, 70–76. A seventh-century chronicle attributed to Fredegarius gives the earliest record for the Merovingian Trojan origins. See Fredegarius, Chronicarum Quae Dicuntur Fredegarii Scholastici. In Monumenta Germaniae Historia. Scriptorum rerum Merovingicarum, ed. Bruno Krush, II (Hannover: 1888). His chronicle commences with Adam, from whom descends a line of Judaic priestkings: Noah, Abraham, Boaz, David and Christ. Fredegarius established a parallel lineage of Roman emperors and Frankish kings, both of which originated with the Trojan Exodus by the two sons of Anchises, Aeneas and Priam the Younger. While Aeneas voyages to the land of the Latins, Priam travels to the Rhineland and his side journey to Macedon provided the raison d’ être for including Alexander the Great among the forebears of the Franks. According to the Liber Chronicum written by Hartmann Schedel and published in Nuremberg in 1493, Franco, the eponymous ancestor of the Franks, was the son of Hector, one of the neuf preux exalted in French art.

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“Philosopher’s Stone,” has been related to a passage from the Apocalypse 2:17: “To everyone who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone, and on the white stone is written a new name that no one knows except the one who receives it.”82 Wolfram, like Chrétian, accentuates the royal lineage of the Grail. The meaning of Anfortas’s name, “in strength,” is the same as that of Boaz, the grandfather of King David.83 The paradisiacal settings of Jan van Eyck’s Fountain of Life and Adoration of the Lamb are evocative of Munsalvaesche (Fig. 4.61). The throne of the earlier Fons Vitae is carved with images of the pelican and phoenix and articulated by cross emblems of the Portuguese Order of Jesus Christ. The Apocalyptic Redeemer with his sacrificial Lamb and basin of Eucharistic wafers substitutes for the priestly “Fisher King,” the “keeper of the Grail,” officiating at Mass.84 The Solomonic phylacteries and dynastic portraits of the Avis family, including their remote ancestor Charlemagne, intimate a Grail lineage. With respect to the “Synagogue,” which is paralleled with the “Church,” the French Romance Perlesvaus is mainly concerned with the fervor of Arthur and his knightly confraternity as they struggle to impose a New Law of Christianity. Perceval’s achievement of the Grail and Lancelot’s fragile victory over heathen islands are described in the culminating chapters of Perlesvaus.85 However, the wars in Eastern Europe between the Teutonic knights and the Ottoman Turks, as well as conflicts between Lusitania and the Arabs of North Africa, prove just how elusive was the goal of restoring the Grail castle. Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574) stated that Jan van Eyck “began to try out various kinds of colors and, being fond of alchemy, to play around with many oils in order to make varnishes and other things according to the fancy of such inquiring minds as his was.”86 Jacques Coene’s knowledge about pigments would seem to suggest he too regarded color in chemical The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Version. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), The New Testament, Part II, 246. See Gardner, Bloodline of the Holy Grail, 239–41. 83 Gardner, Bloodline of the Holy Grail, 176. 84 Antoine Faivre, Toison d’or et alchimie (Milan: Archè, 1990); idem., The Golden Fleece and Alchemy (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993). 85 Richard Barber, The Reign of Chivalry (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1980), 62. 86 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, Icon Editions, 1971, rpt. of 1st ed. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1953), I, 428, cites Giorgio Vasari, Le opere di Giorgio Vasari, 2 vols. (Florence: G. Milanesi, 1878–1906), II, 565. 82

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terms. For example, mine (red oxide), was created by heating white lead and vermillion, the most vibrant of reds, was made from mercuric sulfide (cinnabar) obtained by heating two parts sulphur with one part quicksilver.87 The arcane mysteries known to the savant Merlin are an essential aspect of Arthurian lore. Judging by a book titled Merlin in Prince Duarte’s library, the Avis court was intrigued by the life of the famous seer.88 As confirmed by the books in his library, Duarte was preoccupied by meteorology and astrology.89 Damião de Góis in his Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio (1554) states that the Rua Nova d’El-Rei (Fig. 4.62) in Lisbon near the great Cathedral was: ... replete with engravers, jewelers, gem-cutters, silversmiths, goldsmiths, goldplaters, and moneychangers. And bearing continually to the left one arrives at another “new street”, the Rua Nova de Mercadores, much wider than the others and adorned on both sides with exquisite buildings. Every day merchants representing almost 87 Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, with a preface by Millard Meiss, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (London: Thames and Hudson Ltd., 1993 edition), 27. 88 Francis Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass: Cambridge University Press, 1961), 306 note 8, who cites António Caetano de Sousa [1674– 1759], Provas da Historia genealógica da casa real portugueza, desde a sua origem ate’o presente, com as familias illustres, que procedem dos reys, e dos serenissimos duques de Bragança, 12 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, Na officina de J.A. da Silva, 1735–48); see rpt. (Coimbra: Atlântida, 1946–54), I, 544–46. Consult: Geoffrey, of Monmouth, Bishop of St. Asaph [1100–1154], Life of Merlin. Vita Merlini, edited by Basil Clarke with introduction, Latin and English translation, commentary, notes etc., of the Lailoken tales (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, Language and Literature Committee of the Board of Celtic Studies, 1973); Norma Lorre Goodrich, Merlin (New York: Franklin Watts, 1987); Alfred Owen Hughes Jarman, The Legend of Merlin; an inaugural lecture delivered at University College Cardiff: 10th March, 1959 (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1960); Robert J. Stewart, The Mystic Life of Merlin (London-New York: ARKANA, 1986); Robert J. Stewart and John Matthews (eds) with a foreward by David Spangler, Merlin through the Ages: A Chronological Anthology and Source Book (London: Blandford, 1995); Count Nikolai Tolstoy, The Quest for Merlin (LondonBoston: Hamish Hamilton–Little, Brown, 1985); idem., The Coming of the King: The First Book of Merlin (New York: Bantam Books, 1989). 89 Roche, Philippa, 98, states that Prince Duarte’s interest in meteorology was kindled by his mother, who in turn, had been stimulated by Geoffrey Chaucer. See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Piel, 416, Os Livros que tinha el Rey Dom Duarte (Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, MS 3390, folio 163) for two astrological titles in Duarte’s library: Livro dastrologia, encadernado e cubierto de couro branco (“Book of astrology, bound and covered in white leather”); and Outro dastrologia, encadernado e cuberto de couro preto (“Another of astrology, bound and covered in black leather”).

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every people and region of the world flock together here, joined by great throngs of people enjoying the advantages of business at the port.90 When Damião de Góis described Lisbon, the southern side of the “Merchants’ Street” opened to the Terreiro do Paço where the western end was occupied by Manuel I’s Riverbank Palace (Paço da Ribeira). The “Goldsmith Alley” was beside the Palace of Santo Eloi, which had been established as a residence by Queen Leonor (1458–1525), wife of João II. The Paço was joined by a passageway to the Convento de Lóios, or St. Eligius Monastery, whose chapel was dedicated to St. John the Evangelist. Duarte’s Paço de São Martinho was very near Santo Eloi and a stone’s throw from the Rua Nova d’El-Rei, where the metalworkers were clustered.91 Ruth, Lisbon in the Renaissance. Damião de Góis, 27. Lisbon’s church of Santo Eloi had been established at the end of the thirteenth century by Dom Domingos Jardo († 1293) and it belonged to the parish of Santo Bartolomeu. Called the Convento de Lóios, the monastery was connected by a subterranean passage to the Paço de Santo Eloi, a palace named for St. Eligius, patron saint of metalworkers. Santo Eloi was established by Dona Leonor (1458–m. 1471–1525), queen of King João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), perhaps from a subsidiary building belonging to Prince Duarte’s St. Martin Palace. The Braun-Hogenberg Lisbon map of 1598, probably engraved on copperplate a few decades earlier, marks the Paço de Santo Eloi as situated to the side of the Paço de São Martinho. Both houses were in the vicinity of Lisbon’s “Goldsmith Alley” and alchemical district. Concerning the Paço de Santo Eloi, see Vaz Ferreira de Andrade, Palácios Reias de Lisboa. Os Dois Paços de Xabregas, o de S. Bartolomeu e o de Alcáçova, 69–96. For Queen Leonor, consult Mário Gonçalves Viana, Raínha D. Leonor (Porto: Editora Educação Nacional, 1937). The Convento de Lóios was the main chapterhouse in Portugal for the Venetian Congregation of San Giorgio in Alga. This brotherhood sustained a strong devotion to St. John the Evangelist. Within the capela-mór of the single nave church of Santo Eloi, the founder’s tomb was placed. Between 1463 and 1474 a second nave was constructed, with a capela-mór dedicated to the “Virgin of the Assumption” (Nossa Senhora da Assunção/da Gloria). The sepulchre of Princess Catarina (1436–1463) was placed before the altar. The piety of King Duarte’s daughter was so acclaimed, she was considered for canonization and called a saint in Portugal. An historical account of Santo Eloi mentions a retable in her mausoleum: “an ancient painting and excellent; there could be seen realistic portraits of the Princess Catalina and of Cardinal Dom Jorge.” (“un pintura antiga e excelente; ali se estão vendo retratados ao natural a infanta Catarina e or cardeal D. Jorge”). See Oliveira Marques, “A Cidade na Baixa Idade Média,” O Livro de Lisboa, 95, 102 and 111 note 75–76, who cites the account in O ceo aberto na Terra. Historia das Segradas Congregações dos Conegos Seculares de S. Jorge em Alga de Venesa, & de S. João Evangelista em Portugal (Lisbon: 1697), 437. Dom Jorge, Duke of Coimbra and Aveiro, was born on August 6, 1481at Abrantes, the illegitimate son of King João II and Ana de Mendoça. Raised by his aunt, Princess 90 91

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Ancient hermeticism had survived during the Middle Ages in the builder’s crafts, the secrets passed down through mason guilds. Coene’s documented employment as an architect at the Duomo of Milan must have been predicated upon prior experience in “temple construction.”92 This activity and proven interest in color mixtures, compel a familiarity with alchemical processes. The work of alchemists, transforming lead to gold, involved a search to discover the underlying truths of the universe. The “Philosopher’s Stone,” identified by Wolfram with the Grail, could transform all base metals into gold, heal ills, and lead to spiritual perfection. Alchemists maintain that all substance is composed of quintessence, also known as astral light or ether. Altering the quantities of sulphur, mercury, and salt in ether was a process of transmutation which involved three basic stages, each of which was related to a specific color, element, fauna or flora.93

Joana (1455–1490), who had taken the habit of the Poor Clares, he was adopted by King Manuel I following the death of João II. Because Jorge died in 1550, the commemorative altarpiece likely was a commission dating from the reign of João III (1521–1557) and Queen Catarina (1507–1578), perhaps by Antonis Mor. 92 See the following texts: Henry Adams, Mont Saint Michel and Chartres (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Press, 1913); idem., Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres with an introduction by Francis Henry Taylor (New York: Limited Editions Club, 1957). Louis Charpentier, Les Mystères templiers (Paris: R. Laffont, 1967); idem, Les Mystères de la cathédrale de Chartres (Paris: R. Laffont, 1966) and rpt. The Mysteries of Chartres Cathedral, translated by Ronald Fraser in collaboration with Janette Jackson (Wellingborough Northamptonshire, England: Aquarian Press, 1972);. James Steven Curl, The Art and Architecture of Freemasonry (Woodstock, N.Y.: The Overlook Press, 1991); Alex Horne, King Solomon’s Temple in the Masonic tradition, with a foreword by Harry Carr (Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, England: Aquarian Press, 1988), rpt. Solomon’s Temple in the Masonic Tradition (Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1972); W. Kirk McNulty, Freemasonry (London: Thames and Hudson, 1954); Graça da Silva Dias, Os primórdios da maçonaria em Portugal, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1980); António Henriques de Oliveira Marques, História da maçonaria em Portugal, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1990). 93 William Leo, Alchemy (Los Angeles: Sherbourne Press, 1972), 48. Ullrich Markus Jentz, Benjamin West and the Hermetic Tradition (Washington, DC: M.A. Thesis, The George Washington University, 1997), 36–40, generously provided several critical sources for this discussion of the basic principles of alchemy. Consult: Brian P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a new English Translation (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Richard Grossinger (ed), Alchemy: Pre-Egyptian Legacy, Millennial Promise (Richmond, CA; North Atlantic Books, 1979); idem., The Alchemical tradition in the Late Twentieth Century (Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 1983); Desirre Hirst, Hidden Treasures. Traditional Symbolism from the Renaissance to Blake (London: Eyre and Spottiswolde, 1964); Martin Kemp, The Science

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The first stage marked the disintegration base metal, lead or copper into a black mass by heating. This step provided the symbolic “soil” for growth.94 Copper was a metal frequently related to Venus, ancient goddess of love. A whitening or silvering process characterized the second stage, when the black mass was mixed with mercury. Renaissance hermetics related the transmutation to Diana, the lunar goddess, and represented it emblematically with the swan.95 Recalling that Helyas’s siblings wore “silver” collars, it may be significant that in heraldic art of England and at Sintra’s Sala de Cisnes, golden chains adorn the swan collars. The alchemical final stage involved the heating of matter in a furnace. At a particular point, the high intensity of the fire which was to result in the gold of the sun-god Apollo. The Swan Knight-Grail myth irrefutably presents an allegory of deeper, veiled secrets. Correspondence in nomenclature even proves the point: the Greek Helios and the Brabantine Helyas; Cygnus, Phaethon’s friend who was part manpart swan (and the Northern Cross constellation); and the loyal, and collarless swan-sibling who drew Helyas’s boat. Believing color to be chemical property, hermetics called the “Philosopher’s Stone” a tincture as well as quintessence.96 The transformation of base metal to gold denoted by black, white and red governed the emblemof Art (London-New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990); J. Michell, Ancient Metrology (Bristol: Pentacle Books, 1981); Gareth Roberts, The Mirror of Alchemy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994); Herbert Silberer, Probleme der Mystik und ihrer Symbolik (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1969; 1st ed. Vienna, 1914), reprinted as Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts, translated by Smith Ely Jelliffe (New York: Dover Publications, 1971); John Maxon Stillman, The Story of Alchemy and Early Chemistry (New York: Dover Press, 1960); Marie-Luise von Franz, Alchemy: An Introduction to the Symbolism and the Psychology (Toronto: Inner City Books, 1980). 94 Frank Sherwood Taylor, The Alchemists (Melbourne: William Heinemann Ltd., 1951), 10. 95 Eric John Holmyard, Alchemy (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1968), 153; Carl G. Jung, Psychology and Alchemy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968, 230; Leo, Alchemy , 48–51. 96 Jentz, Benjamin West and the Hermetic Tradition, 37–38. Regarding Goëthe’s color theory published in 1791, he states that Goëthe drew his inspiration from earlier alchemical texts. On tincture, Jentz cites Ronald D. Gray, Goëthe the Alchemist. A Study of Alchemical Symbolism in Goëthe’s Literary and Scientific Works (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1952), 8. Another relevant publication is included in his bibliography: Alice Pearl Raphael, Goëthe and the Philosopher’s Stone (New York: Garrett Publications, 1965). See Robert H. Brown, “The “Demonic” Earthquake: Goëthe’s Myth of the Lisbon Earthquake and Fear of Modern Change,” German Studies Review, XV, No. 3 (October, 1992): 475–91.

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atic panels of another stately gallery at Sintra palace known as the “Magpie Hall.” (Figs. 4.63–4.64) According to Duarte, the Sala de Pegas measured 15 by 9 côvados, about 11 by 6.5 meters. He states that this chamber adjoined a camera de ouro, which perhaps was named for its light wooden paneled ceiling (Fig. 4.65). The “Golden Room” (Lions Hall: 13 by 10 côvados: 9 x 7 meters) must have been used by João I as a sala de conselho or office. Probably this chamber witnessed the planning of the 1415 campaign to Ceuta. The spacious Magpie Hall, which retains its original windows and doors, plausibly was used by João I as a main audience room. Not only did it open unto his office, but it had direct access to his private quarters. João’s bedroom is identified by Duarte as “the room where The King whom God pardons was sleeping” (a casa onde El Rey que Deos perdoe soya dormir) and the measurements of 9 by 6 côvados (6.5 x 4 meters) identify it as the narrow present-day “Caesar’s Room” (Fig. 4.66). Duarte lists the adjacent rooms in sequence with the following measurements: Guardaroupa, 6 x 6 côvados (4 meters square); closet (outra casinha), 6 x 5 côvados (4 x 3.5 meters); a privy (privada seguinte), 6 x 1 côvados; an oratory (casinho de resar) with a mijatorio (adjoining fountain, likely a holy water basin), 6 x 3 côvados (4 x 2.2 meters). Shown in the 1902 plan drawn to scale by José Antonio Abreu, the square guardaroupa is considered to be one of the oldest rooms of Sintra Palace. Next to a stone spiral staircase and the Moorish Sala de Arabes, the dressing room came to be called the Sala de Sereias (Hall of the Sirens: Fig. 4.67) due to its Baroque paintings of mermaids. The original paneled ceiling would have resembled that of the “Golden Hall.97 Adjoining the “Caesar’s Room,” the 1902 Sala de Corea (Crown Room) must have been the second closet (outra casinha) which provided access to his oratory, and to other private chambers used by the royal family (Fig. 4.68). A popular anecdote about the Magpie Room recounts that King João I commissioned the painting of its ceiling to satirize Queen Philippa’s gossiping ladies-in-waiting.98 João allegedly had stolen a kiss from Dona Mecia, During the reign of King João IV (1604: r. 1640–1656), five ceiling panels were painted with mermaids which named the Sala de Sereias. Four sirens play musical instruments (mandolin, harp, tambourine, and triangle and rod) and they surround a central rectangular panel of a mermaid with coral beckoning to a Portuguese galleon. 98 The story is related by Roche, Philippa, 69, who cites Francisco da Fonseca Benevides, Rainhas de Portugal, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1898 ed), I, and Joaquim Pedro Oliveira Martins, Os filhos de d. João I [1891] (Lisbon: Parceria A.M. Pereira, 1936, 6th ed). Matilde Sousa Franca, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra, 41–42, reproduces a famous narrative poem on 97

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one of the queen’s ladies, in a “chamber next to the royal-dressing room, with which it was connected by a low Gothic doorway at the head of some steps.” When Dona Philippa saw them she demanded an explanation, and the king responded with the words: por Bem, minha senhora (“for good intention, my lady”), a statement which indicated he merely was performing a courtesy.99 The king’s reply apparently was circulated by other court ladies, and their indiscretion so aggravated the monarch he ordered the room’s ceiling to be painted with magpies, their number determined by the precise number of ladies in the queen’s train, one hundred and thirty-six. Setting aside this quaint tale, the decoration of the chamber should be linked with that of the Swan Hall because its heraldic panels not only elicit the chivalric custom of pledging an oath upon a bird, but also reveal alchemical colors. The ceiling, which has been described as having the appearance of a “primitive illumination,” is divided into five sections with 136 triangles.100 Each triangle contains a single magpie grasping a red rose in its talons and holding a scroll in its beak inscribed with the motto of João I, Por Bem/Pour Bien. With regard to the five sectionals of the Sala de Pegas, medieval alchemical manuscripts stress the abstruse majesty of the quint, the quintessence, or “Philosopher’s Stone.” The number three equally has recondite association with the alchemical stages of transformation. For this reason, the triangular compartments encasing the magpies are as symbolical as the gilded octagonal panels which frame the birds in Sintra’s “Swan Room.” Marked by a “The Magpies of Sintra” by Almeida Garrett (1799–1854), translated by Manuela Mineiro Romano de Castro of Almeida. She states that the verses first were published in the journal Illustração,vol. II, No. 5 (August 1, 1846). See João Batista da Silva Leitão de Almeida Garrett [Visconde: 1799–1854], “Por Bem, As pegas de Sintra” in Romances Reconstruídos, Obras de Almeida Garrett, 2 vols. (Porto: 1966), I, 1923–30. 99 The Portuguese Por Bem and French Pour Bien appear in the ceiling, and Roche, Philippa, 69, translates the expression as “for honor,” perhaps in view of the English Garter motto, hony soit qui male y pense (Shamed be he who thinks ill of it). Reputedly Edward III said these words upon hearing derogatory remarks at a court ball (ca. 1344) whereupon he tied to his leg the garter belonging to his dance partner, Catherine Montacute (1304– 1349), the Countess of Salisbury, which had fallen to the floor. The phrase came to be applied to anyone who questioned the Crown’s authority. See William Arthur Rees-Jones, The Order of Saint George (London: The Churchman Publishing Company, Ltd., 1937) and D’Arcy Jonathan Dacre Boulton, The Order of St. George, or Society of the Garter, England, 1344/9 – Present, Knights of the Crown: The Monarchical Orders of Knighthood in Later Medieval Europe, 1325–1520 (Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 1987), 96–166. 100 Lino, Os Paços Reais da Vila de Sintra, 94, quoted by Matilde Sousa Franca, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra, 38.

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long, graduated tail and pied plumage, the magpie recalls the blackening and whitening agents of the alchemical process. The roses, insignia of the House of Lancaster, may signify João I’s fidelity to his beloved Philippa. The flower’s hue, however, are of the red color which denotes the final alchemical stage of refining gold.101 Magpies appear in borders of French manuscript illumination, but in the Limbourg Brothers’ Les Très Riches Heures commissioned by Jean, Duke of Berry they appear in two calendar folios (Fig. 4.69), the months of February and October. In each instance, the birds are portrayed eating grain. According to Genesis (1:28), God created the birds of the air on the Fifth Day of Creation, and the fowl were separated in Leviticus (11:13–21) into clean and unclean categories, the distinction being the basis of their diet. The clean ate seeds and the unclean consumed flesh. Besides the French golden fleurs-de-lys strewn on a blue ground, wounded swans and bears number among the Duke of Berry’s heralds in Les Très Riches Heures. Similarly bears, swans, and birds feature in the borders (Fig. 4.70) of Les Très Belles Heures de Nôtre Dame (Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ier, Ms. 11060–11061), illuminated by Jacquemart de Hesdin († 1409), a Northerner employed by the Duke of Berry at Bourges as early as 1384. Identified as motifs alluding to the Duke’s love for a lady called Ursine (ours: bear; cygne: swan), the habitat of the bear and swan connote the respective paired elements of earth/fire and air/water. Keeping in mind the passionate interest of the Duke was in rare gems, especially rubies, and orfèvrerie, or gold work, he must have been knowledgeable in the alchemical processes (Fig. 4.71).102 Jean Malouel, the uncle of the Limbourgs, was an Frances A. Yates, The Rosicrucian Enlightenment (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul), 1972. 102 Longnon and Cazelles, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 173. This text, 20, records precious gifts presented by Jean de Berry to Paul Limbourg of a “diamond mounted on a gold ring” and another golden ring, “on which an emerald bear lies on a bed of emeralds.” The green colors shown in the Très Riches Heures are quite distinctive. As mentioned by Longnon and Cazelles, 27, the leaves of the wild iris were crushed and mixed with massicot to make vert de flambe, but the darker green known as vert de Hongrie was made from the malachite crystal, a carbonate of copper. Alchemists associated the greenish patina of copper with blackening and the base matter of earth. White, suggested by a diamond, might have been related to the whitening process, a stage in the alchemical transformation of lead to gold. One of the Duke de Berry’s rubies was cut in the form of a rose, a favorite flower of alchemists who equated the rose with the final stage of refining gold. See Daniel Alcouffe, “Gemmes anciennes dans la collections de Charles V et de ses frères, Bulletin Monumental CXXXI (1973): 42–46; Daniel Alcouffe et al., Dix siècles de joaillerie française 101

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experienced goldsmith employed in 1397 by Philip the Bold, Jean de Berry’s younger brother. The Limbourgs obtained stunning effects in their miniatures by adding gilt emulsion to red, and they used silver glazed with green to capture the transparency of water. The same sophisticated combination of metals and pigments can be observed in the Boucicaut Hours.103 Perhaps a more correct reading of the combined bear (ours) and swan (cygne) insignia in the Duke of Berry’s manuscripts should be cygne d’or or “golden swan,” which would support interpreting the mysterious initials EV in border quatrefoils of Les Belles Heures as a Latin motto, such as “Eques Virtute” (Virtuous Knight). Magpies are featured in the history of the Macedonian Pierus, a ruler of Emathia near Olympus who introduced the cult of the Muses into his kingdom. The Pierides, his nine daughters, became so proficient in the arts that they challenged the Muses to a poetry contest on Mount Helicon. For their presumption, they were transformed into jackdaws when they lost. Sintra’s Magpie Hall may have been used as a salon for occasional literary recitations. Sintra’s main galleries overlooked the Swan Courtyard and the more sequestered “Patio of the Lions” (Fig. 4.72–4.73). Both retain their rectangular basins of water, though their aviaries no longer exist. The ceiling of the “Magpie Room” at Sintra Palace magnified Lusitanian hopes for peace and prosperity (Fig. 4.74). Augustus Caesar identified with the sun god Apollo, and according to Macrobius (Saturnalia 2.4.29–30), he was fond of birds that could talk, especially a magpie that greeted him as “our victorious commander.”104 Paragones exist between the allegorical imagery found in the emblematic decorations of the royal apartments at Sintra and the protean and multivalent iconography fostered by Augustus Caesar to define

(Paris: exhibition catalogue, Musée du Louvre–Ministère d’État Affaires Culturelles, 1962). Bernard Prost, “Achats de joyaux par le duc de Berry (1385–1386),” Archives Historiques, Artistiques et Littèraire II (1890/91): 409–16; idem., “Les Arts à la cour du duc de Berry, Gazette des Beaux-Arts XIV (1895): 254–64; 342–49. 103 Millard Meiss (Preface) to Longnon and Cazelles, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 11. 104 Barbara A. Kellum, “The Construction of Landscape in Augustan Rome: The Garden Room at the Villa ad Gallinas,” Art Bulletin LXXVI, 2 (June 1944): 211–224, at 211. Kellum also states that the flora establishes metamorphosis as an important theme in the Garden Room. Including the magpie among the birds denoting “conversions of humans to the constituents of the natural world,” she cites Ovid (Metamorphoses: 5.29ff). and relates Caesar Augustus also owned a raven and parrot (Pliny, Historia Naturalis: 10:117ff).

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his vision of the PAX ROMANA. Augustus’ villas were laid with groves, clipped boxwoods and water basins. Frescoes of the subterranean room of Empress Livia (Fig. 4.75) capture the beauty of these gardens described in ancient texts. To suggest the emergence of a second Golden Age as forecast by Virgil (Aeneid 8.337), Augustan murals display a variety of paradisiacal flowers and birds.105 Gaius Martius, the inventor of topiary, planned the ordered landscape to augment belief in the omnipotent authority of a “Sun King.” The name “magpie” may derive from the marguerite, a daisy which evokes the myth of Clytie, a nymph transformed by Apollo’s radiance to a sunflower. Augustus also owned a parrot and raven. 106 The tradition of keeping such loquacious birds perhaps originated with Alexander the Great. Plutarch in his Parallel Lives states that when the construction of Alexandria was being planned, Alexander was guided by a pair of ravens to an oracle on the island of Pharos. Addressing Alexander in a familiar manner, the Egyptian seer slipped in his pronunciation, hailing him as O Paidios instead of O paidion (O my son).107 And a story became current that the god had addressed him with “O pai Dios,” or Son of Zeus. We are told, also the he listened to the teachings of Psammon the philosopher in Egypt, and accepted most readily this utterance of his, namely that all mankind are under the kingship of God, since in every case that which gets the mastery and rules is divine. Still more philosophical, however, was his own opinion and utterance…that although God was indeed a common father of all mankind, still, He made peculiarly His own the noblest and best of them.108 105 Kellum, “The Construction of Landscape in Augustan Rome,” 211. She cites Pliny, Historia Naturalis: 12–13 (Augustus and Gaius Matius). Sintra’s “Magpie Room” functioned as an antechamber to the larger “Swan Room.” Considering an alchemical association of Apollo with gold, a relevant article which connects the swan to Augustus’s mythological alter-ego is Frederick Michael Ahl, “Amber, Avallon, and Apollo’s Singing Swan,” American Journal of Philology CIII, No. 4 (Winter, 1982), 373–411, especially 381–82. 106 Pliny, Historia Naturalis: 10:117ff. See Kellum, “The Construction of Landscape in Augustan Rome: The Garden Room at the Villa ad Gallinas,” 211. 107 Plutarch’s Lives, ed. Edward Capps, Thomas Ethelbert Page, William Henry Denham Rouse, translated by Bernadotte Perrin, VII (Demosthenes and Cicero: Alexander and Caesar), XXVII, 305. 108 Plutarch’s Lives, 305–6.

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Plutarch’s description of Alexander at Pharos has relevance in Lusitania, where João I was known within his intimate family circle as Pai. Setting aside Alexander the Great’s association with ravens, Queen Philippa’s preference for the French language in personal correspondence is as noteworthy as the selection of French chivalric maxims by the Avis royals. Beyond la pie (magpie), the adjective pie means pious and the expression oeuvre pie translates as “good work.” João I’s Por Bem literally translates as “For Good.” Additionally, the magpie belongs to the genus of pica, and perhaps it is no coincidence that a Portuguese seafaring expression, pica terra, meant to strike land. In hopes of spearheading a universal PAX CHRISTIANA, King João I on July 21, 1414 issued the order from Sintra to send a fleet to the Strait of Gibraltar. While the command was not realized until a year later, the conquest of Ceuta initiated Portuguese expansion to the continent of Africa and beyond. Prince Henrique, who recruited troops for his father from northern Portugal for the expedition, was knighted in the wake of the battle. He was chosen on May 25, 1420 to be the “Master of the Order of Christ.”109 Jan van Eyck depicts the Counts of Flanders as “Just Judges” in his Ghent Altarpiece. Riding in their company, the “Holy Knights” are the numerical equivalent of the “Nine Worthies” (Fig. 4.76–4.77). As will be discussed, three of the cavaliers provide portraits of the Avis Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique, and they wear Apollo’s laurel. On the sinister side of the Ghent “Adoration of the Lamb,” Van Eyck depicted flocks of birds in his panels of the “Holy Hermits” and “Pilgrims.” A Royal Chapel for Crusader Knights: Pageants and the Complexion of Society Although the flock of birds in the “Magpie Room” seem to display the livery colors of the Avis House, black, white and blue, they ultimately, like the swans of the Sala de Cisnes, must be related to the murals of the barrelvaulted Royal Chapel (Fig. 4.78).110 When the interior was restored in 1939, the whitewashed walls were cleaned to reveal hundreds of white doves. The frescoes assure the chapel’s original dedication to the Holy Spirit, as each 109 Bailey Diffie, Prelude to Empire: Portugal Overseas before Henry the Navigator (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1960). 110 Pye, Uma Empresa Inglesa no Paço de Sintra, 40.

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bird appears within a square tinctured the liturgical red of the Pentecostal season. Ornamental borders of the squares, in the alchemical colors of black and white, simulate ancient tesserae. Designs within these bands show the repeated motif of the cross, the emblem of the chivalric Order of Christ. The decoration of the Royal Chapel with its royal tribunal over the entrance likely was undertaken during the reign of João I. The olive branches borne in the beaks of multitudinous doves were not mere touches of pictorial fancy, but a meaningful token of the king’s great victory at Aljubarrota (August 24, 1385). From Nossa Senhora de Oliveira at Guimarães the Master of Avis had set out to engage the Castilian army and in fulfillment of his vow, the Romanesque shrine was restored. The floor of the Capela-Mór (Fig. 4.79) displays a “sacred carpet” of ceramic tiles which may have been recycled from the mosque when Sintra’s kitchens were installed. As the oldest alicatados of Sintra Palace, their intricate configurations subtly compliment the artesanado (inlaid wood) of the chestnut and oak ceiling.111 Born in North Africa at Tagaste, St. Augustine (354–430), expounded at length on the arcane nature of the Trinity, and he compared the Creator’s cosmic plan to a mosaic, the design of which was only partially seen by the mortal eye. Prince Duarte listing of books in his Leal Conselheiro includes two books by the Bishop of Hippo, a Livro das Meditações de S.to Agostinho, e das Confissões. Augustine’s De Ordine was composed as an informal colloquium between the author, his disciples, and St. Monica, his mother, whom he called a “lover of wisdom.” The colloquium is pertinent to the Arabic embellishment of the Chapel because it focuses upon order, beauty and harmony in the universe as expressed in numerical relationships.112 The original decoration of the high altar recently

111 João Miguel dos Santos Simões, Azulejaria em Portugal nos séculos XV e XVI: introdução geral (Lisbon: 1969), 57–58 (2nd ed. Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1990) dates the tiles of the Capela-Mór to the reign of Afonso V (1481–1495), but Matilde Sousa Franca, O Palácio de Sintra, 37, suggests that perhaps the floor is earlier in date. José Meco in his Azulejaria Portuguesa. Colecção Património Português (Lisbon: Bertrand Editora, Lda., 1985, 2nd ed), 8–11, also discusses the tile work at Sintra. He dates the Chapel floor to the fourteenth century, comparing the workmanship to the Moorish ceramic designs in the Alhambra Castle of Granada. Under King Manuel I, the walls of several Joanine rooms at Sintra were adorned around 1518 with tiles in geometric and leafy patterns imported from Seville. 112 Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Piel, 415. Consult Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae

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has been revealed (Fig. 4.80), a sculpture of the “Crucified Christ” affixed to a fresco of the cross. Looming over a panoramic view of Jerusalem, this image of the “mystical winepress” magnified a fundamental premise: the Portuguese military Order of Jesus Christ had been established by King Dinis to supplant the Knights Templeise, the priestly guardians of Jerusalem’s Sacred Mount and Holy Grail after the First Crusade. If the mural dates to the period of Sintra’s renovation under João I, as appears to be the case with the representation of aerial rather than mathematical perspective, the fresco was designed to enhance the avian decoration of the chapel. Recalling that the taproot of the alchemical tradition sprang from the medieval mason guilds, the “dove of peace” in the Royal Chapel, as in the Ghent Altarpiece, evokes the memory of Noah, who designed and built the ark (Fig. 4.81). Hugh, German-born “Master of Studies” at the Abbey of St. Victor in Paris about 1125 devoted two manuscripts to the arcane subject of the ark, De arca Noe morali and De arca Noe mystica.113 Like Noah’s ark, the Ark of the Covenant was a chest built with divine guidance to store knowledge. Richard of St. Victor, prior of the Abbey in 1162, was profoundly influenced by Hugh.114 His tropological interpretation of the Ark of the Covenant sought to give monks a discipline of prayer conducive to contemplation, and it strongly influenced Franciscan spirituality. Using the metaphor of the Israelites in Egyptian bondage journeying through the wilderness to a Promised Land, Richard of St. Victor defined the spiritual

Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), XXXII: 977–1020 (Augustine, De Ordine) and XXXIV: 245–286 (Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram). 113 Consult: Mary Carruthers, Book of Memory. A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1993); J.P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXXVI: 617–794; Hugo of St. Victor [1096–1141], Opera omnia tribus tomis digesta (Mogvntjae: 1617); Ludwig Ott, Untersuchungen zur theologischen briefliteratur der frühscholastik: unter besonderer berücksichtigung des Viktorinerkreises (Münster: W. Aschendorff, 1937); Jaime Lynn Smith, Reconstructing Noah’s Ark in Sixteenth-Century Germany: Mnemonic and Dynastic Themes of Boxes Designed by Nuremberg Goldsmith Wenzel Jamnitzer, M.A. Thesis (Washington, DC: The George Washington University, 1998), 12–13; Richard W. Unger, The Art of Medieval Technology: Images of Noah the Shipbuilder (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1991). 114 Grover Zinn, Jr., “Hugh of St. Victor, Isaiah’s vision and De Arca Noe,” Church and the Arts, Papers read at the 1990 Summer Meeting and the 1991 Winter Meeting of the Ecclesiastical History Society, ed. Diana Wood (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1992), 99–116.

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quest for God as occurring within the soul.115 Canons of the Abbey of St. Victor followed the rule of St. Augustine, who interpreted Noah’s coffin-like ark as a prefigurement of the tomb of the resurrected Christ. The Bishop of Hippo also equated the wood of the cross with that of the ark.116 Noah’s vessel allegedly held a mappa mundi and it was separated into quadrants by the arms of the cross, which in turn were divided by the winds into twelve compartments, corresponding to the points of the compass. Charlemagne’s palatine chapel at Aachen is believed to have originated from a design based

Richard of St. Victor, Twelve Patriarchs, The Mystical Ark, Book Three of the Trinity, translated and introduction by Grover A. Zinn, preface by Jean Châtillon (New York: The Paulist Press, 1979), 151–370 (The Mystical Ark); idem., Les douze patriarches, ou, Beniamin minor, translated by Jean Châtillon et Monique Duchet-Suchaux, ed. Jean Châtillon, with an introduction by Jean Longère (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1997). For a history of the Abbey which was at the forefront of creative theological developments in Paris, see Jean Châtillon, “Théologie, spiritualité, et métaphysique dans l’oeuvre oratoire d’Achard de Saint-Victor,” Études de Philosophie Médiévale 58 (Paris: 1969): 53–85; idem., Théologie, spiritualité et métaphysique dans l’oeuvre oratoire d’Achard de Saint-Victor, études d’ histoire doctrinale précédées d’un essai sur la vie et l’oeuvre d’Achard (Paris: J. Vrin, 1969); idem., Trois opuscules spirituels de Richard de Saint-Victor: textes inédits accompagnés d’ études critiques et de notes (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1986); Fourier Bonnard, Histoire de l’abbaye royale et de l’ordre des chanoines réguliers de St-Victor de Paris, with a preface by Mme Paul Tannery, 2 vols. (Paris: A. Savaète, 1904–08). Hugh of St. Victor died in 1141, and Richard arrived to the Abbey from Scotland in the early 1150s. For the latter’s biography, see Gervais Dumeige, Richard de Saint-Victor et l’ idée chrétienne de l’amour (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1952), 166–67, and for Richard’s influence on the Franciscan Bonaventure, see Grover A. Zinn, Jr., “Book and Word, The Victorine Background of Bonaventure’s Use of Symbols,” S. Bonaventure 1274–1974, 2 vols. (Rome: Grottaferrata, 1974), II, 145–46 and bibliography. 116 See Norman Rufus Colin Cohn, Noah’s Flood: The Genesis Story in Western Thought (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996), 28, and Don Cameron Allen, The Legend of Noah: Renaissance Rationalism in Art, Science, and Letters (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1949), 71. Jaime Smith, Reconstructing Noah’s Ark, 19, cites these sources and also mentions an Upper Rhenish liturgical box, ca. 1430, in the Nuremberg Germanisches Nationalmuseum. According to Smith, the lid is painted with the subject of Christ standing in his tomb, and the foreshortened image of the “Man of Sorrows” suggests the box is the Holy Sepulchre. When asked for a sign by some of the scribes and pharisees, Christ referred to an eighth-century prophet who preached atonement to Ninevah: “For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so for three days and three nights the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth.” The Israelite name of Jonah, who was delivered by God to dry land, means “dove.” See The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Version. Catholic Edition, (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), Part II, 13 (Matthew 38: 1–40, “The Sign of Jonah,” repeated in Luke 11:29–32. 115

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upon the wind-rose configuration.117 Einaud, an expert in architecture and mathematics, was charged by the Emperor with supervising the construction of Aachen’s basilica. Charlemagne’s future biographer significantly acquired the nickname of “Bezalel,” (Fig. 4.82) the master artist who worked on the Ark of the Covenant and sanctuary furnishings.118 According to the Book of Exodus (35: 30–35): Then Moses said to the Israelites: See the Lord has called by name Bezalel ... of the Tribe of Judah; he has filled him with divine spirit, with skill, intelligence, and knowledge in every kind of craft, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver, and bronze. in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood.... And he has inspired him to teach, both him and Oholiab ... of the Tribe of Dan. He has filled them with skill to do every kind of work done by an artisan or by a designer or by an embroiderer in blue, purple and crimson yarns, and in fine linen, or by a weaver...119 The seafaring nation of Portugal associated the cross with the cardinal points and wind-rose (Fig. 4.83). Through his marriage to Philippa of Lancaster, João I, Master of Avis, was able to claim dynastic lineage to Charlemagne. The Capela Imperfeita (Unfinished Chapel) of Batalha Abbey was begun by King Duarte about 1436 at the eastern end of the Dominican church of Santa Maria da Vitória erected by his father a decade earlier. The wind-rose plan of Duarte’s royal mausoleum is based upon the imperial chapel of Aachen.120 On the eve of his battle with the Moors at Ourique 117 Consult: Patrick Gautier Dalcè, La “Descriptio mappe mundi” de Hugues de SaintVictor (Paris: Etudes Augustiniennes, 1988), 1–23; Carruthers, Book of Memory. A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture, 210 and 232–37. Jaime Smith, Reconstructing Noah’s Ark, 94, compares the interior structure of the ark to Charlemagne’s wind-rose. She refers to the above sources as well as Percy Ernst Schramm, Beiträge zur allegemeinen Geschichte, Part One, von Spätantike bis zum Tode Karls des Grossen (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1968), 322–27, who speculated that the chapel at Aachen derived from a plan having a mathematical basis in the wind-rose. 118 Einhard [770–840], Vita Karoli Magni. The Life of Charlemagne, Latin text and English translation with introduction and notes by Evelyn Scherabon Firchow and Edwin H. Zeydel (Coral Gables: University of Miami Press, 1972), 14. 119 Einhard, Vita Karoli Magni, 121 note 2, refers to this passage and Exodus 31:2, which is similar. See The Holy Bible, The New Revised Standard Edition, Catholic Version, Old Testament, Part I, 82. 120 Elie Lambert, “Remarque sur le plan des églises abbatiales de Tomar et de Batalha,” in Congresso do Mundo Português, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1940), II, 585–603.

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near Beja in 1139, a fray which coincided with the July 25 feast of St. James, King Afonso Henriques I experienced a Constantinian vision of the crucified Christ (Fig. 4.84). The cross marked the insignia not only of the Order of the Knights Templar, but also the Order of Christ and the Order of Avis. A dying Queen Philippa gave her husband and three eldest sons a piece of the “Holy Rood” to protect them during the expedition to Ceuta.121 A magnificent “Ship of Faith” is described in a Vulgate edition of La Quête del Saint Graal, ca. 1316, in the British Library, London (Fig. 4.85). Built by Solomon’s command, the masts of the “supernatural” vessel constitute three typological spindles of the Redemption: one white to denote purity and the Tree of Knowledge; one green to signify procreation and the Tree of Life; and one red to symbolize spilt blood and the Tree of the Cross. Three symbolic artifacts are transported in the vessel. Besides a fine Solomonic bed of “prudence” for the last knight of a priest-king’s lineage, and a girdle fashioned from the hair of Perceval’s sister which alludes to knightly temperance, the royal barge holds David’s double-edged sword of justice and fortitude which the noble Galahad will wield.122 Medieval exegetes, like the Dominican St. Thomas Aquinas, linked the “ark of wisdom” with the Pauline definition of the Church Triumphant, the union of Christians in the mystical corpus of Christ. The Naves Petri (Ship of Peter: Fig. 4.86) was duly contrasted with Jason’s Argo, a pagan “Ship of State” manned by the Church Militant.123 The quest for the “Golden Fleece” was an analogous António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1971), 220. He cites (305 note 26) Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta por El-Rei D. João I, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Lisbon, 1915), Ch. XLI, 127. As stated by Oliveira Marques, Prince Henrique commented about the “Holy Rood,” stating that he had worn it always, with the exception of a single day when he removed it taking off a shirt. 122 London, British Library (MS. 14 E III, folios 51v. and 125v). See Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 49 and 91, who cites Frederick W. Locke, The Quest for the Holy Grail: A Literary Study of a Thirteenth-Century French Romance (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1960). In the context of the Graal story, following the “sacred” ship is one manned by the “secular” knights Perceval and Galahad, which also transports Bors and Perceval’s sister. 123 See Ernst Kantorowicz, The King’s Two Bodies: A Study in Medieval Political Theology (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957), 266 note 223, on St. Thomas Aquinas. In his 1468 treatise relating the history of the “Order of the Golden Fleece” founded January 10, 1430, Guillaume Fillastre compared Noah’s ark to the Argo and he also elevated Jason as Christomimetes. The viewpoint of Philip the Good’s chancellor assuredly stemmed from interpretations of the echatological prophecy in Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue of The Aeneid. See 121

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adventure to the search for the Holy Grail.124 In equal measure, João I’s expedition to Ceuta was in the tradition of revered sovereigns like Charlemagne and St. Louis IX of France, whose vitae were intertwined with heroic efforts to recover the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.125 Diverse types of hieroglyphs discovered on stone walls of Sintra Palace and Batalha Abbey have been identified as secret marks made by João I’s masons (Fig. 4.87). About 1903 a suggestion was proffered that Stephan Guillaume Fillastre [1400–1473], Le Premier Volume de la Toison d’Or, 4 vols. (Paris: 1516); Alfonse Bayot, “Sur l’exemplaire des Grandes Chroniques offert par Guillaume Fillastre à Philippe le Bon,” Mélanges Godefroid Kurth II (1908), 183–90; Georges Doutrepont, “Jason et Gédéon, patrons de la Toison d’or,” Mélanges Godefroid Kurth 2 (1908): 191–208; Marcel van Houtryve, “Het Gulden Vlies in de Bourgondische Literatuur,” West-Vlaanderen No. 65, XI (1962): 338–51; and Raoul Lefèvre [flourished 1460], L’Histoire de Jason. Ein Roman aus dem Fünfzehnten Jahrdundert, ed. Gert Pinkernell (Frankfurt-am-Maine: AthenäumVerlag, 1971). 124 Founded in 1352 by Jean II “le Bon” (1319: r. 1330–1364), the French “Order of the Star” was modeled after Arthur’s Round Table and consisted of 300 knights of the realm who were to assemble annually. See Frederick Sidney Shears, “The Chivalry of France,” Edgar Prestage, ed. Chivalry. A Series of Studies to Illustrate Its Historical Significance and Civilizing Influence (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928), 57–80, at 72, who cites the chronicler Jehan le Bel. Charles V (1338–1380), Jean II’s son, had several relevant manuscripts in his library at the Palais du Louvre: three histories of Arthur, five Lancelots, three romances of Perceval, four Merlins, eight Tristans, and five Arthurian compilations. Consult Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 59, who cites Léopold Delisle, Recherches sur la librarie de Charles V, 2 vols. (Paris: 1902). She also discusses the Burgundian interest in Arthurian manuscripts, 59–61, and states that Philip the Good in 1430 instituted his Order of the Golden Fleece “to embody the code of chivalry as it had been practiced by King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.” 125 Einhard, Vita Karoli Magni, 69 and 129, notes 4–6. King Harun al Rashid of Persia (786–809), the fifth caliph of Bagdad from the Abbasides family, permitted the King of Franks to make offerings at the Holy Sepulchre 799. The messengers returned to Charlemagne in 800 with the keys of the Holy Sepulchre and Mount Calvary. After giving Charlemagne jurisdiction over these sites, the Patriarch of Jerusalem sent ambassadors in 801, and rare treasures, including an elephant, waterclock, candelabra and tent. Einhard in his Vita, 55, documents that Charlemagne crossed the Pyrennes with his army to the Iberian Peninsula, capturing Basque towns and frontier castles. The biographer, however, makes no reference to the Emperor in Jerusalem. Only legend reputed that Charlemagne made such a pilgrimage. Five centuries later, Louis IX of France led a crusade and his last voyage in the Holy Wars was to North Africa, where he died in 1248 at Tunis. The literature on Louis IX is vast, but consult Gérard Sivéry, Saint Louis et son siècle (Paris: Tallandier, 1983); idem., Louis IX: le roi saint (Paris: Tallandier : Historia, 2002) and Daniel Weiss, Art and Crusade in the Age of Saint Louis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). The study by Weiss centers upon the building of Sainte-Chapelle in Paris and the significance of the Passion reliquary in the Capetian chapel.

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Stephenson, who belonged to the English lodge of Freemasons at York, had been invited by Queen Philippa to work at Batalha.126 Old alchemist signs had particular meanings. There were symbols for materials such as gold, silver, copper, wood, crystal, chalk, potash, ashes, vitriol, ginger, manure. Equally certain marks signified technical processes, like boiling, mixing, filtrating, taking ingredients, placing liquids in a retort, etc. Alchemicalmason hieroglyphs functioned as aides-mémoires Their presence at Sintra and Batalha Abbey may reveal the influence of a foreign freemason, but not necessarily one from England. The overall French aesthetic of the Ducal Castle at Guimarães raised by “Master Antom” has been mentioned. João I’s royal mausoleum at Batalha contains wall tombs with heraldic stone caskets which summon Victorine theology concerning “arks of wisdom”, but particularly the wind-rose plan of Duarte’s Capela Imperfeita may have been the ingenium of this ubiquitous master. Other key factors converge to impel Coene’s activity at the Avis court: his alchemical knowledge, suggested by his mastery of color formulae in the peint-drap technique and the metallic surfaces of illumination; the Book of Hours begun for Prince Duarte and completed in 1436 in the “Boucicaut” style; and the mnemonic ceilings of Sintra’s royal apartments that reflect the impact of Burgundian heraldry and allude to the Grail secrets of Templar origin. Sintra’s Royal Chapel consciously had been built on the foundations of a Moslem mosque and its Mecca Terrace (Figs. 4.88–4.89) once witnessed magnificent Pentecostal and Corpus Christi processions.127 Conventional arrangements for feast day processions varied among locales and monastic communities. By contrast, a formal etiquette governed civic pageants 126 Concerning Stephanson, see Conde de Sagubosa, Os Paços de Sintra, 210, who cites James Cavanah Murphy [1760–1814], Travels in Portugal; through the provinces of Entre Douro e Minho, Beira, Estremadura, and Alem-tejo, in the years 1789 and 1790, consisting of observations on the manners, customs, trade, public buildings, arts, antiquities, &c. of that kingdom (London: A. Strahan, 1795. The Conde de Sagubosa illustrates some but not all of the mason marks found at Sintra Palace, 209–12. He also refers to Joaquim Possidonio Narciso da Silva [1806–1896], Mémoire de l’archéologie sur la véritable signification des signes qu’on voit gravés sur les anciens monuments du Portugal (2nd ed., Congresso de Nancy, 1886), 8. Reprinted in 1995 with a prologue by André Jean Paraschi (Ericeira, Portugal: Sol Invictus), this study and a first edition (1868) provided 544 facsimiles of Siglas in diverse monuments. Due to the assistance of Elizabeth Weber, Ph.D. candidate at George Washington University (Tudor ephemeral art), it was possible to examine similar alchemical marks from the “Golden Lane” at Rudolphinian Prague. 127 Serrão, Sintra, 38–40.

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in which royalty, knights, and courtly officials participated. Corpus Christi, first observed under King Afonso III (1248–1279), typically was celebrated in May or June with a grand cavalcade in which all classes walked according to their status in society. Such protocol was sustained in annual commemorations (August 14) of João I’s victory at Aljubarrota and in the marches which occurred at Sintra.128 Jan van Eyck’s dexter side of the Fountain of Life with its secular and ecclesiastical portraits, and his groups of figures advancing towards the “Lamb of God” in the Ghent Altarpiece insinuate the notion of a Pentecostal Grail procession.129 Accounts of the liturgical and civic processions at Sintra do not survive. However, a Regiment in the archives of Évora dating from the beginning of the reign of King João II (1481–1495) gives some notion of the magnificent staging of such events by an earlier generation.130 João II’s preferred seat of residence was Évora, and Corpus Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 219. Nuno Gonçalves’ famous polyptych of the St. Vincent Altarpiece (Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga), completed about 1472–73 contains sixty portraits of royalty, nobility, knights and ecclesiastics, and consequently, the retable also celebrates the “Pentecostal Grail” procession. Central standing effigies of two panels have been identified as mirror images of St. Vincent of Saragossa. However, they more plausibly were intended to represent Saints Thekla and Vincent, both of whom were deacons of the early Christian Church venerated in the kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula. Thekla had cut her hair and dressed as a man to become a disciple of St. Paul, and in Byzantine art was portrayed with a book to indicate her status as a woman of authority. In the St. Vincent Altarpiece she holds a manuscript which is open to the Gospel of St. John (14:30–31),and specifically to a passage read in the Mass for Pentecost. See José Teixeira, “Nuno Gonçalves. Panel of the Infante. Altarpiece of the Veneration of Saint Vincent,” Circa 1492. Art in the Age of Exploration, ed. Jay A. Levenson (New Haven-London: Exhibition Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art, Yale University Press, 1991), Catalogue Entry 19, 136–38, at 138 (Gospel citation about the Ascension in the St. Vincent manuscript and its relevance for Pentecost); Jeffrey C. Anderson, “Anna Komnene, Learned Women, and the Book in Byzantine Art,” Anna Komnene and Her Times, ed. Thalia Gouma-Peterson (New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 2000): 125–56, at 134 and Fig. 5 (St. Thekla). 130 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 305 note 22, cites Gabriel Pereira, ed. Documentos historicos da cidade de Évora, 2 vols. (Évora: Typographia de Casa pia, 1885–91), II, 159–61. Also see rpt. (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional–Casa da Moeda, 1998). This text contains quotations from Alexandre Herculano, O monge de Cister, ou, A época de D. João I, 2 vols. [1840] ; rpt. with an introduction and revisions by Vitorino Nemésio and António C. Lucas (Amadora: Livraria Bertrand, 1977–1978), II, 83ff. João II’s birthday (May 4/5, 1455–1495) and that of his son Afonso V (May 18, 1475–1481), occurred in the same month as the feast of Corpus Christi. Jorge, João II’s illegitimate son by Ana de Mendoça was born on August 6, 1481, and he was named for St. George, whose feast day initially was celebrated in May by the English Order of the Garter. 128 129

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Christi marches traditionally ended at the town church of Nossa Senhora de Graça.131 The Regiment records the Joanine protocol which was sustained in the late fifteenth century. Gardeners, butchers, bakers, fishwives and vendors advanced at the front of the municipal train. They were followed sequentially by representatives of other professions: carters, innkeepers, cobblers, tanners and tailors. Next were the municipal archers, gunsmiths of the king, crossbowmen of the Royal Council and cavalry. They were followed 131 Due the reoccurence of plague in Lisbon, João II elected to reside at Évora Palace, which he expanded, and at Santarém. Coimbra and Porto were rarely visited, although the king did ride to the Convent of Poor Clares at Alveiro to see his sister Joana. See Elaine Sanceau, The Perfect Prince. A Biography of the King João II (Porto: Livraria Civilização Editora, 1959), 272. Also consult: António Borges Coelho, Príncipe perfeito (Lisbon: Caminho, 1988); Mário Domingues, D. João II, o homem e o monarca; evocação histórica (Lisbon: R. Torres, 1960; António Gomes da Rocha Madahil, Inconografia da infanta santa Joana (Aveiro: 1957); idem., Milenário de Aveiro; colectânea de documentos históricos (Aveiro: Câmara Municipal de Aveiro, 1959); Crónica da fundação do Mosteiro de Jesus, de Aveiro, e memorial da infanta santa Joana, filha del Rei Dom Afonso V (códice quinhentista), edited by António Gomes da Rocha Madahil (Aveiro: F. Ferreira Neves, 1939); Garcia de Resende [1470–1536], Chronica de el-rei D. João II, edited by Gabriel Pereira after an edition of 1622, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1902). Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Crónica de el-rei D. João II, ed. Alberto Martins de Carvalho (Coimbra: Atlântida, 1950); rpt. of 1st ed., Lisbon: Archivo Historico Portuguez, 1792), Ch. XIII, relates that Corpus Christi at Évora was marked by “bullfights” and “very joyous dances,” as well as “many other pleasures in the palace and town.” This source is given by Sanceau, 174. For Évora, consult: Maria Angela V. de Rocha Beirante, Évora na idade média (Coimbra: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Junta Nacional de Investigação Científica e Tecnológica, 1995); Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Évora (Lisbon: Emprêsa Nacional de Publicidade, 1932); Gabriel Pereira, Documentos historicos da cidade de Évora, 3 Parts (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional– Casa da Moeda, 1885–1891); idem., Estudos eborenses (Évora: Ediçoes Nazareth, 1947, 2nd ed); idem., Loios (antigo mosteiro ou casa de S. Joâo Evangelista) (Évora: Minerva Eborense de J. J. Baptista, 1886); O mosteiro de Nossa Senhora do Espinheiro (Évora: Minerva Eborense de J. J. Baptista, 1886). Regarding Évora’s church of Nossa Senhora de Graça, see Túlio Espanca (1913–1993), Évora (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1996; rpt. of 1st ed. 1993), 76–78. As he states, chronicles confirm a Gothic church stood at the site until 1511. Under King João III (1521–1557) and Queen Catherine (1507–1578), this structure was rebuilt in the Italian Renaissance style. The granite façade consists of a portico with Tuscan columns and classical pilasters. Miguel de Arruda, architect of the royal house, perhaps executed a plan for a new church in the late 1530s. The sculptor Nicolau Chantèrene, who completed the western portal of the famous São Jeronimos Church in Lisbon, ca. 1517, has been proposed as collaborating with Arruda. See Reynaldo dos Santos, A escultura em Portugal, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1948–50). A escultura em Portugal (Lisbon: 1948–50) and O estilo manuelino (Lisbon: 1952). According to Espanca, Elias Tormo y Monzó suggested the architect-manuscript illuminator Francisco de Holanda (1517–1584) contributed to the project. As late as 1590, the sculptor Mateus Neto completed the bell tower of the Augustinian church.

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by the “men at arms,” barbers, blacksmiths, armourers, cutlers, saddler, farriers, scabbard makers, spear makers. Then there were wool and silk weavers, cord makers, potters, tilers, brick makers, carpenters, masons, and other craftsmen. After shearers and candlestick makers came the wealthiest trades, goldsmiths and tinsmiths, rich merchants of linen cloth and silk leading horses, and merchants in woolen materials, or dyed cloth. Walking in their wake were scholars, scribes, apothecaries, judicial notaries, attorneys, aldermen, royal scribes, judges, and councilmen. Next in sequence came the monastic friars, and then knights of the orders of Christ, the Hospitallers, Avis, and Santiago, accompanied by their respective mestres and commendadores. The final cortege comprised the lay friars, servants of arms, court magistrates, officials of the Crown, the monarch and the bishop holding the Eucharistic monstrance.132 The Winds of Pentecostal Spirit: Sintra’s Royal Apartments According to Geoffrey de Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae (1136), when Arthur effected the unification of Britain and conquered Gaul, he publicly displayed his legitimate right to rule by a Pentecostal ceremony at the Roman town of Caerleon. The religious procession highlighted the display of crowns, regalia and heraldic blazons which denoted Arthur’s sovereignty. Four swords in the march perhaps alluded to the “cardinal virtues” described in Plato’s Republic (4: 427) as pre-requisites for citizens of an ideal city-state. Four doves also were featured, traditional emblems for concord, constancy, sapienta and chastity. The “Pentecostal crown-wearing proces132 This entire account is abbreviated from Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt, 217–19, who mentions several statues were borne on litters: the Three Magi (innkeepers); Eve and the Serpent (tailors); St. George slaying a Dragon with a Maiden and Page (armorers); St. Bartholomew (weavers); St. Sebastian (saddlers and dagger makers); St. Michael the Archangel expelling Lucifer (cord makers); St. Clare of Assisi and Two Companions (potters, tilers, brick makers); St. Catherine of Alexandria (carpenters and masons); St. John (the Evangelist: goldsmiths). Oliveira Marques, 189–90, gives his source, a Regiment entitled The Organization of the Processions of Évora, dating from the late 1400s. He cites (302 note 8): Documentos Historicos da Cidade de Évora, ed. Gabriel Pereira, Part 2, 159–61.

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sion” culminated in a grand banquet attended by a thousand noblemen offering food and drink. In like manner, the solemn feast of Whitsunday was commemorated by the Avis court at Sintra.133 Good winds were crucial to a seafaring nation, as demonstrated by João I’s decision to sail for Ceuta with the propitious arrival of the nortada, or northern winds. The descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles fifty days after Easter (Fig. 4.90) occurred with “a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting” (Acts 2:1–41). Tongues of fire then appeared over the Apostles’ heads, endowing them with the ability to speak in diverse languages. Perhaps because Pentecost had such a mystical association with the number five, the elements and the divine encoding of dialects, the Templar Knights were the first to commemorate the feast at Sintra. The Visconti Queste du Saint Graal, ca. 1385–1390, documented in 1426 at the ducal castle in Pavia, contains illuminations of the tourneying Galahad. Riding a white steed, he arrives at Arthur’s court to participate in the jousts of Whitsunday, suitably attired in a sendal côte-hardie tinctured Pentecostal red.134 The alchemical “Philosopher’s Stone” described in the Cistercian Queste was borne in a “Pentecostal” type of offering procession at Graal Castle. The words of St. Paul in his Letter to the Ephesians (2: 13–22) especially relevant to the metaphorical meaning of the stone beheld by Galahad: ... you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us ... So he came and proclaimed peace ... So then you are no longer strangers ... but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy 133 Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 4. She refers to other such ceremonies described in Martin Biddle, “Seasonal Festivals and Residence: Winchester, Westminister and Gloucester in the Tenth to Twelfth Centuries,” in Reginald Allen Brown, ed., Proceedings of the Battle Conference 1985, Anglo-Norman Studies VIII (Woodbridge: 1986): 51–72. 134 The Visconti Lancelot, Queste du Saint Graal, Tristan and La Morte le Roi Artu (Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, MS. fr. 343): Queste, folios 1–60, at folio 4–10v (Galahad’s Pentecostal attire and knightly instruments). See Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 71–72, and François Avril, Marie-Thérèse Gousset, and, Claudia Rabel, Manuscrits eluminés d’origine italienne, II, XIIIe Siècle (Paris: 1984), 98.

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temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God.135 Whitsunday coincided with Shavuot, the Hebrew one-day festival when offerings of the “first fruits of wheat harvest” were made in the tabernacle (Exodus 23:16). During the Hellenistic period, the Hebrew Shavuot underwent a transformation from being strictly an agricultural feast to one that commemorated the religious history of the Israelites. The Book of Jubilees, a pseudepigrapha document written in the second century, B.C. describes Shavuot as “first fruits” (22:1) and also identifies it with the covenant between God and Noah (6: 1–21). Following the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., the feast was observed as a thanksgiving for the Torah written by God in stone on Mount Sinai and stored by Moses in the Ark of the Covenant. An important Passion treatise was written in 1322 by Robert de Basevorn as a mnemonic aide to contemplating Christ’s five wounds136 (Fig. 4.91). Each affliction was equated with a Latin vowel which constituted the first letter of a verse from the holy scriptures. The vowels alluded to “Jehovah.” This hybrid name had evolved from a combination of the vowels of Adonai (Lord) with the tetragrammaton, the four Hebrew conso135 The Holy Bible, The New Revised Standard Edition, Catholic Edition, New Testament, Part II, 192–93. 136 See Carruthers, Book of Memory. A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture, 102–5, 314–15 note 92 and Jaime Smith, Reconstructing Noah’s Ark in Sixteenth-century Germany, 109–10, both of whom provide the basis for the discussion on Robert de Basevorn’s sermon. See Robert de Basevorn (fourished 1322), Three Medieval Retorical Arts, ed. James Jerome Murphy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971). On October 23–24, 1495 when the forty-nine year old João II (1455–1495) was dying at Alvor Castle in the Algarve, no family relations were with him. His wife Leonor was ill at Alcaçer do Sol, and attended by the king’s designated heir, Manuel I, then Duke of Beja. João II’s illegitimate son Jorge (b. August 6, 1481), future Duke of Coimbra, was at Portimão. See Sanceau, The Perfect Prince, 404–6, and Garcia de Resende [1470–1536], Chronica de el-rei D. João II (1902 edition), III, Ch. CCXI. Prior to his death, João II methodically signed his last orders and distributed final gifts. A poor fidalgo (member of the lesser nobility) implored the king by the “Five Wounds of Christ” to help him. João II not only gave the man a pension, but he granted him all the silver in Alvor Castle. Then he stated to his confidants: “Now I can disclose this...in all my life I never have been asked for anything in the name of the Five Wounds without granting it.” When João II died at sunset on October 25, his intimates, the Bishop of Tangier and Dom Diogo de Almeida, opened a private coffer to which only the deceased king had the key. The chest contained only penitential items: a confessional book, a scourge and a hair shirt. A Portuguese cult devotion to the “Five Wounds” seems to be proven by Resende’s account of João II’s final hours.

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nants YHWH designating the name of Israel’s God, which were deemed too sacred to speak.137 Basevorn assigned A and E to the nail prints in Christ’s hands, while O and U (undifferentiated from V) he reserved for the wounds in his feet. The Latin I, used either as a vowel or consonant, was printed as j in classical texts and early dictionaries, and pronounced as y.138 For this primary reason, Basevorn selected the vowel I, the first letter of the tetragrammaton, to signify the lance cut to Christ’s chest. Basevorn maintained that Christ cried out at Calvary upon receiving each affliction. Reduced to a mathematical configuration of 5 wounds x 5 vowels x 5 Passion themes, Basevorn’s mnemonic grid of 125 memory compartments recalls the ceiling division of Sintra’s “Magpie Hall” into five panels with 136 birds renowned for their mimicry Because his system was adapted to musical notes, it also has a certain relevance for the Royal Chapel which contained a choir near the royal tribunal. The Regiment of the Royal Chapel ordered by King Duarte (1433–1438) gave special notice to liturgical singing139 (Fig. 4.92–4.93). Basevorn’s “I” also constituted the first letter of the Latin Idus, the fifteenth day in the Roman month.140 Late Gothic Europe commemorated the idus Martiae, or fifteenth of March, as both the feast day of St. Longinus, the soldier who speared Christ, and the liturgical Feast of the Holy Lance. The piercing of Christ’s body was the most horrific of his five wounds, yet Medieval exegetes interpreted the thrust to his side as a mystical passage to the sacred heart. Basevorn actually compared the wound to the lateral door of the ark where Noah released the dove to search for land141 (Fig. 4.94). In a similar vein, the thirteenth-century theologian 137 Paul J. Achtemeier, ed., Harper’s Bible Dictionary (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, The Society of Biblical Literature, 1985), 1036. 138 D.P. Simpson, Cassell’s Latin Dictionary (New York: Simon & Schuster Macmillan Company, 1968 edition), 281, entry for “I,” used both as a vowel and consonant. 139 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Middle Ages, 210–11, 221–22. Noting that Queen Philippa’s sons followed the English Salisbury Liturgy, he refers to: Pierre David, “A diocese de Lisboa seguiu o costume litúrgico de Salisbury?” Liturgia I (April, 1947): 54–56; Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Piel, Ch. XCVI, 351–55. 140 Simpson, Cassell’s Latin Dictionary, 284. 141 Published in Antwerp by the Christopher Plantin Press in 1572, the Polygot Bible of Benito Arias Montano, librarian of King Philip II of Spain, illustrates the ark as the sepulchre with Christ’s body (L’Arche de Noé in Exemplar Sive De Sacris Fabricis Liber, Biblia Sacra, vol. VIII, Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, R15710). A door to the ark is open and a passageway leads to Christ’s pierced side. See Sylvie Deswarte, “Les ‘De Aetatibus Mundi Imagines’ de Francisco de Holanda,” extrait, 66, Monuments et Mémoires (Vendôme:

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Gerhard of Liège drew a correspondence between Christ’s chest wound and the rocky cleft where the dove of the Song of Songs finds sanctuary.142 In 1423, when the Avis Prince Pedro was fighting in the Balkans with Emperor Sigismund against the Ottoman Turks, the imperial relics, which included Longinus’s lance and pieces of the cross, were transported in chests from Prague to Nuremberg for safety.143 Prior to joining Sigismund, Prince Pedro had visited Cologne Cathedral, which housed the famous Reliquary of the Three Kings (Fig. 4.95). Undoubtedly, Pedro saw the imperial relics and regalia which had been transported for safety to Nuremberg and entrusted to the town council. Beginning in 1424, the treasures customarily were displayed on March 15, the feast day of the “Holy Lance,” in the Kirche St. Egidien. The eighth-century Giles (Egidien: feast September 1), to whom the church was dedicated, had been a charitable abbot of a Rhône monastery and he was venerated as a patron of beggars and blacksmiths. Artists generally portrayed Giles standing beside a hind with an arrow piercing his breast or leg. Sigismund founded his Order of the Dragon in 1408, the year the royal court moved from Visegrád Castle to Buda (Fig. 4.96–4.97). Its insignia included not only the scaly beast destroyed by St. George’s coup de grace, but also the mystical unicorn which was speared when captured and came to be identified with the slain and resurrected Christ.144 L’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Fondation Eugène Plot and Fondation Dourlans, Presses Universitaires de France, 1990), 175, Figs. 64 and 65. Deswarte relates the Polygot L’Arche de Noé to Holanda’s Christ in his Tomb, folio 51v of his De Aetatibus Mundi Imagines in the Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid. 142 Jeffrey Hamburger, Nuns as Artists: The Visual Culture of a Medieval Convent (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 159. 143 Alfred Wendehorst, “Nuremberg, the Imperial City. From its Beginnings to the End of its Glory,” Gothic and Renaissance Art in Nuremberg. 1300–1550 (New York-Munich: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1986), 14. On his return to Lisbon, Prince Pedro had obtained a fragment in Padua of St. Anthony skull. Nuno Gonçalves portrayed Pedro holding the relic in a panel of his St. Vincent Altarpiece of 1472–73 (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga). Erected over the birthplace of the Franciscan saint, the Lisbon church of Santo António faced the entrance of the Cathedral where Nuno’s work was displayed. As related to me in a conversation by Rafael Moreira, the polyptych was placed in the chapel of St. Vincent located in a Romanesque tower. Situated on the Epistle side of the Cathedral, this tower was destroyed in the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755. 144 Etele Kiss and Ágnes Ritoók, “The Age of Sigismund of Luxembourg and János Hunyadi (first half of the 15th century),” Historical Exhibition of the Hungarian National Museum. Guide 2, 11th to 17th Centuries, ed. Judit H. Kolba (Budapest: Helikon Books, Ltd., 1996), 26–27, 24, Plates 18 and 19 (carved ivory saddle).

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Contrasting with the traditional purpose of the spear as an instrument of destruction, Parzival’s lance effected the healing of the Fisher King’s groin wound (Fig. 4.98). The lance’s dual nature, therefore, most closely approximates the arrows of the ancient Apollo, sent either to destroy or to heal in the form of the sun’s rays. The golden arrow, which was associated with the English victories of Crècy and Poitiers, becomes an ubiquitous emblem of the Burgundian Order of the Golden Fleece. Medieval ceremonies of knightly initiation customarily included not only the girding of the sword and fastening of the spurs, but also the bestowing of the lance and shield.145 The chivalric investment may have had a quadripartite association with: Longinus, the soldier-martyr of Cappadocia, who revealed the sacred heart at Calvary; the virtuous Perceval, who attained Grail enlightenment; the heroic George, whose theophany aided the legions of the First Crusade; and the Apocalyptic Warrior-Christ, who came to embody the Church Triumphant of a new Jerusalem. Surrounded by white “doves of peace, the image of the “Crucified Christ” in Sintra’s Royal Chapel elevated above the site of the Holy Sepulchre drew an immediate mnemonic association with the Knights Templar and the Portuguese Order of Christ. In August of 1470 a new retable was installed as the high altarpiece (Fig. 4. 99). Obscuring the late Gothic wall, the lost painting of Pentecost must have proclaimed even more emphatically the power of the Holy Spirit, the apostolic mission of a maritime nation, and the sustained identification of the monarchy with the Grail lineage.146 Geoffrey de Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britannie (1136) described King Arthur’s preparations to attack the Saxon army in Somerset. He donned a golden helmet with the crest of a carved dragon, and he girded on his sword Caliburn (Excalibur) forged on the Isle of Avalon. His shield, Pridwen, was decorated with the image of the Virgin Mary and he held in his hand his long spear Ron. See Whitaker, The Legends of King Arthur in Art, 4, who cites Helmut Nickel “About Arms and Armor in The Age of Arthur,” Avalon to Camelot I, 1 (1983): 19–21. When Portuguese kings were interred at Batalha, their armaments were displayed as part of the royal exequies. Transported in solemn procession to the Dominican abbey by mourners bearing torches, the coffin of João II was placed in the church’s chancel and draped with hangings. His banner, shield and helm with which he jousted as the “Swan Knight” at Évora were hung. Also exhibited were objects associated with his valor against the Castilians at Toro (March 2, 1476), which included his lance, shield, and breastplate. See Sanpeau, The Perfect Prince, 411. 146 Nuno Gonçalves, who painted the famous St. Vincent Altarpiece, received payment on August 5, 1470 for his Sintra retable of Pentecost. This work was replaced in 1590 and subsequently lost. A polychrome wood carving of the Crucified Christ was attached to the painted cross of the fresco. Regarding Gonçalves, see José Saraiva, “Um belo libvro sobre 145

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King Duarte probably documented the interior rooms of Sintra just after the death of his father. After walking through João I’s apartments, he describes two rooms (Fig. 4.100). One was situated along the patio near the kitchens, and measuring 14 by 10 côvados (10 x 7 meters), it perhaps served as a ceremonial bedchamber of honor. The other gallery, 12 by 11 côvados (9 x 8 meters), which ran the length of the tower, should be identified as the “Arabs’ Hall,” a splendid antechamber which still retains its Moorish tiles.147 The tall tower which originally housed the Sala des Arabes is easily identifiable in the 1507 drawings by Duarte de Armas which show Sintra Palace from all directions (Fig. 4.101). From its tiled turret, a banner prominently displays the Portuguese coat-of-arms. The upper floors of the old tower perhaps were occupied by servants or occasional guests. King Duarte took an especial interest in the disposition of the basic compartments of a manor house in his Leal Conselheiro (The Loyal Counselor), composed about the same time he documented Sintra Palace’s interior. His manuscript mentions a great hall in which everyone enters, a more humble “chamber in which to wait,” and a “chamber for sleeping,” as well as a trescâmera, or inner room “where they are accustomed to dress,” and lastly the chapel.148 Walking from the Sala des Arabes, Duarte proceeded to document his own quarters located near Sintra’s Royal Chapel: a bedchamber, dressing room, oratory, and privy.149 os Painéis,” Jornal do Fundão (January 19, 1956); Adriano de Gusmão, “Nuno Gonçalves pintor de retábulo do Palácio de Sintra,” Seara Nova, No. 1317–1318 (April, 1956); Dagoberto L. Markl, O Retábulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os Documentos (Lisbon: Editorial Caminho, 1988); Vitór Serrão, “O retábulo da Capela do Paço Real de Sintra,” Sintria I–II (1982–1983), I, 693–728; António Quadros, “A Coroação do Imperador do Espírito Santo” and “Os Painéis de Nuno Gonçalves no Palácio de Sintra?,” (1986 Conferences at the Sintra Palace). 147 The “Arabs’ Room” had direct access to the guardaroupa of the king. As stated by Sanceau, The Perfect Prince, 273, during the reign of João II (1481–1495) when the court displaced itself to various castles, the royal bodyguards slept in the rooms of the guardaroupa close to the king’s bedchamber. The “Arabs’ Room” logically served as the station for João II’s guards. 148 Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 121. See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Piel, Ch. LXXXI, 303. 149 The Évora document records the following measurements: the passage before the Câmera, that leads to the chapel, where the King sleeps, 12 x 3 côvados (9 x 2 meters); the said câmera where the King sleeps, 12 x 9 côvados (9 x 6.5 meters); the guardaroupa and desembarguo (dressing room), 6 x 9 côvados (4 x 6.5 meters); the casinha de rezar (oratory), 4 x 3 côvados (3 x 2 meters); the privada (privy), 3 x 3 côvados (2 x 2 meters).

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Duarte then walked through a walled corridor of the battlement (adarbe) that linked his own apartments with the Casa de Meca.150 He directly entered a spacious chamber that measured 23 by 15 côvados (16.6 x 10.8 meters). This room probably was Sintra’s “Hall of the Columns” (Figs. 4.102–4.103), the apartments of his queen, Dona Leonor of Aragon (d. 1445). Leonor’s son, the future King Afonso V, was born in the Hall of Columns on January 15, 1432. Perhaps the gallery was a sector of the residence which originally constituted the apartments of Queen Philippa. From his wife’s chamber, Duarte walked to the Royal Chapel, where he recorded the measurements of the house used by the scribe Vicente, the length of the chapel to the capella-mór (choir), as well as the sizes of the transept, sacristy, treasury and choir. One of the most intriguing aspects of the Livro de Cartuxa de Évora register is Duarte’s sense of history. After visiting the Royal Chapel on the Terreiro da Meca, he ascended a staircase in the “corridor of the battlements” to inventory the “chambers in which the King [João I] first dwelled.” One of the rooms must have been a “Great Hall” in the Mecca House, as indicated by its size, 29 by 17 côvados (20.9 x 12.2 meters). This Sala must have been located directly above the Hall of Columns. Duarte de Damas illustrates the Mecca House in his drawings of 1507–1509 (Fig. 4.104). Shortly after he created his panoramic views, King Manuel I ordered Diogo Boytoc (ca. 1460–1528), a French architect from Languedoc to renovate his residence at Sintra. Demolishing the upper area of the Mecca House, Boytoc, the first builder of Lisbon’s famed São Jeronimos Monastery, replaced João I’s old Great Hall with a resplendent domed “Hall of Blazons” (Fig. 4.105). The immense gallery was completed about 1518 by the painter-gilded Gonçalo Gomes. Myriad escutcheons of the realm’s nobility borne by roebucks rise in double rows. Above octagonal panels of stags, the golden center of the vault displays Manuel’s arms encircled by eight heralds belonging to members of his family. The entire conceit which magnifies a realm’s heraldry marks a departure from the avian imagery of the Joanine halls at Sintra, though the hind had a pictorial tradition of being identified with the Christic mystical unicorn. The long antechamber 150 The corredoira do muro, which measured 6 by 4 côvados (4 x 3 meters), must be the same corridor which provides the only interior passage to the Manueline “Hall of Arms.” Sintra’s “Waterspout Courtyard” was created during the reign of João IV (1604: r. 1640– 1656), who added several chambers, including the “Galleys Room,” named for its ceiling paintings of Portuguese galleons. Therefore, until that expansion of the residence, the long corridor assuredly was part of the battlement walls.

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to the Hall of Blazons, which originally must have been the corridor of the battlements (Fig. 4.106), suggests that Manuel I designed his Sala as a coup de théâtre to astound guests of the court. When Jan van Eyck visited Sintra, the former Great Hall of the Mecca House would have occupied the equivalent space as the Sala de Brasões, and likely he saw a chamber with a royal dais and heraldic banners. The façade of the “Hall of Blazons” (Fig. 4.107) viewed from the “Basin Courtyard” (Patio de Tanquinhos) reveals the lines of the Manueline construction phase and rough surfaces of the old Gothic masonry. King João I’s former Great Hall must have had an analogous function as the Swan Room in the newer sector of Sintra, and it unquestionably continued to be used by the royal family for grand entertainments until its destruction in the early sixteenth century. The proximity of the Mecca Sala to the queen’s Hall of Columns suggests that the large hall functioned as a Galeria de Damas for dancing and musical performances. A comparable paradigm can be cited at Setúbal Palace on the Atlantic coastline, where King João II (1481–1495) in late August of 1484 attended an evening ball in the apartments of Queen Leonor (m. 1471, 1458–1525).151 A hall used for banqueting, mummeries, and dancing at Sintra must have contained bureaus laden with silver and gold, as well as imported Flemish or French tapestries of a secular or mythological theme.152 Sanceau, The Perfect Prince, 195, cites Garcia de Resende, Crónica de João II e Miscelâia (Lisbon: 1973 rpt), I, 80, who states that the king arrived to Setúbal on August 22. Legend recounts that the ancient town which was called “St. Yves” by French and English mariners was founded by Noah’s grandson on the right bank of the Sado River. The medieval walls of Setúbal were constructed between 1325 and 1375. With respect to the old royal residence frequented by João II, it was destroyed by the 1755 earthquake. According to Vieira da Silva, Setúbal was the seat of the military Order of Santiago de Espada between 1249 and 1482. The oldest Franciscan monastery and convent were established about 1410 outside the city walls. As an intiative of João II, enlargment of the monastery began in 1490. Diogo Boytac of Languedoc, architect of Manuel I, continued the expansion (1513), and his Igreja de Jesus is noted for its Arrábida marble columns, each comprising three twisted colunettes in the Manueline style. See José Custódio Vieira da Silva, Setúbal (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1990), 12–14 (Order of Santiago) and 55–61 (Franciscan Convento de Jesus). 152 Nuno Gonçalves’s famous “Arzila Tapestries” commissioned by King Afonso V and woven by the workshop of Pasquier Grenier have been the subject of considerable study by Jeanne Schnitzler, Professor Emeritus of California State University. The panels might have been destined for Sintra’s Galeria de Damas. The size of the Sala would have accommodated such large panels. Not only was their placement appropriate in a palace which already was linked with victory in North Africa, they would have hung in a space directly above the site of the monarch’s birth. A comparable series of Flemish tapestries was commissioned by Emperor Charles V (1500–1555) to commemorate his 1535 victory at Tunis over Kheir-el151

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Duarte’s account in the Livro de Cartuxa de Évora suggests he ascended to the third level of the Mecca House after he measured his father’s Great Hall, because he mentions a roof terrace room (9 x 3 côvados: 6.5 x 2 meters). King João’s I old apartments contained a camera (bedchamber: 8 x 12 côvadas: 6 x 9 meters), an adjoining room, probably a guardaroupa (6 x 3 côvados: 4 x 2 meters); an oratory (9 x 3 côvados: 6.5 x 2 meters) and a privy (2 x 3 côvados: 1 x 2 meters). The king’s office (9 x 7 côvados: 6.5 x 5 meters) was beside what appears to have been two terraced rooms used by his scribes and secretary, as they measured respectively 6 x 3 and 3 x 3 côvados. One remaining larger room on this floor, described by Duarte as a “room where mass was said” (10 x 8 côvados: 7 x 6 meters) may have been used while the Royal Church was being expanded and decorated. This “interim chapel” had access to additional chambers: the roof terrace room mentioned previ-

Barbarossa, Turkish admiral of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. The twelve panels were woven in Brussels by Willem Pannemaker between 1548 and 1554. Cartoons were executed in 1546 by Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen (1500–1599), who had accompanied the imperial troops. See Hendrik J. Horn, Jan Cornelisz Vermeyen. Painter of Charles V and his Conquest of Tunis, 2 vols. (Antwerp: Davaco Publishers, 1989); Basilio Pavón Maldonado, España y Túnez: Arte y arqueología islámica (Madrid: Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional, 1996). The Genovese admiral Andrea Doria and Charles V led the 1535 expedition, and they were joined by two important lords: Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, the third Duke of Alba, who the advised on military strategy; and Luis Hurtado de Mendoza, the third Count of Tendilla and second Marquis of Mondéjar, who commanded the cavalry. The Portuguese, whose knowledge of the North African coast was extensive, also contributed greatly to the Tunis campaign. The Ottoman Turks had threatened vital trade with Venice, the gate to the Levant. Venetian convoys regularly made bi-annual voyages to Flanders and the North. Their outward and returning galleons stopped frequently in Lisbon, where silks, brocades, perfumes, glass and spices were sold. See Sanceau, The Perfect Prince, 306–7. In 1535 Prince Luís of Portugal (1506–1555), son of King Manuel I and Charles V’s brotherin-law, sailed with Lusitanian troops to Barcelona where the armies mustered on April 2, before departing for La Goleta, Tunis’s port city. The tapestries woven by Pannemaker were designed to exalt the Hapsburg monarch as a second “Scipio Africanus.” During the reign of Philip IV (1621–1665), the panels hung in the “Gilded Hall” of the Alcázar of Madrid. The vast indoor space which rose two stories in height was described by the court architect Juan Gómez de Mora as a “Great Hall in which celebrations with plays and balls are held and in which the King and Queen dine in public on the wedding day of ladies who marry in the Palace.” See Steven Orso, “The Gilded Hall,” Philip IV and the Decoration of the Alcázar of Madrid (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 118–43, who cites Juan Gómez da Mora, Relación de las cassas que tiene el Rey en españa y de algunas de ellas se an eccho tracas que se an de ber con esta Relación Ano de 1626 (Rome: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1626), Ms. Barberini, Lat. 4372, folio 1.

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ously, which might have functioned as a sacristy: and a privy (3 x 1 côvados: 2 x .72 meters).153 Duarte does not mention the tower attached to the Mecca House which is visible in Duarte de Armas’s drawing (Fig. 4.108). The interior perhaps constituted quarters of courtly attendants. The tower once occupied a section of the Lindaraia, or Prince’s Garden (Fig. 4. 109). The formal parterres logically were overlooked by the apartments of King João I’s younger sons. During the early sixteenth-century renovations at Sintra, King Manuel I not only restructured the Mecca House, but he also situated his own royal quarters and those of Queen Maria (r. 1500–1517) to the east. Near the kitchen, these galleries also looked down on the Mecca Terrace. Duarte de Damas’ best known perspective (Fig. 4.110–4.112) establishes that Sintra’s present-day main arched entrance originally was flanked by two towers. The eastern one was incorporated into an Archers Hall that connects the Swan Gallery with the apartments of Manuel I (Fig. 4. 113–116). The spiral staircase adjacent to the Archers Hall was built during the reign of João II (1521 and 1557). The windows and doors of the Manueline wing are recognizable by their intertwining organic pillars and sculpted floral motifs which present a striking contrast with the late Gothic architecture of João I. However, all the primary galleries at Sintra drink deep from the well of Islamic design, Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 107, consulted the older version of the Livro da Cartuxa de Évora in the Torre do Tombo. He states: “The second floor was divided into more, but small, rooms. There were two large rooms, corresponding to the floor below, which measured, respectively 66.3 x 27.5 feet (20.3 x 8.4 meters) and 54.1 x 34.4 feet (16.5 x 10.5 meters). Four roomy quarters were adjoined to four chambers intended for the affairs of state — the chamber of dispatches, the “chamber where Vicente Donis writes,” “the little room of the scribes,” and “the little room for the secretary.” There were two chapels as well, a larger room where it was usual to say mass, a wardrobe closet, and four privies, one of which was only a “little closet in which to urinate.” Looking Duarte de Armas’s views of Sintra’s “Mecca House,” the structure had three levels. The measurements of the two large chambers described by Oliveira Marques differ slightly in the Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa document: the Galleria de Damas, 29 x 17 côvados: 20.9 x 12.2 meters; and the “Hall of Columns,” 16.6 x 10.8 meters. Regarding the chambers used for “affairs of state,” one of the rooms is described in the Biblioteca Nacional manuscript: No eirado seguinte de longo 9 cov. e largo 3 e meio (on the following terrace 9 côvados in length and 3 and a half in width). This description accords with the drawings by Duarte de Armas, ca. 1507, which show balcony extensions on the uppermost level of the Mecca House. According to the Biblioteca Nacional manuscript, Duarte recorded “the room where Vicente Donis writes” (casa onde Vicente donis escreve de longo 9 côvados e largo 3) prior to his taking measurements of the Royal Chapel, a sequence which suggests this scribe’s chamber was separated from the other chambers used for affairs of state. 153

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and this common admired source contributes to the uniformity of component parts of a residence that seemed to evolve as space was needed. King Duarte’s preoccupation with Sintra Palace compels a notion that he supervised the decoration of the heraldic halls around the tower of the Sala de Arabes after Queen Philippa died in 1415. It may have been at the Prince’s urging that Abbot Gomes Eanes brought a gifted artist from Florence to Lisbon about 1425. The coincidence of the building of the ducal palace of Guimarães, the adornment of Sintra with heremetic decorative programs, and the approximate 1436 dating of a Livro das Horas commissioned for Prince Duarte in the “Boucicaut” style, supports a Lusitanian connection with a master as skilled and multi-faceted as Jacques Coene. As Jan van Eyck arrived to Portugal in 1428, his exposure to the Flemish artist may have been more direct than previously supposed. This personal acquaintance might resolve some issues of his stylistic evolution which have been confounding.

5 Isabel of Portugal and the Lion of Flanders Departure from Portugal: An Infanta’s Reception in Flanders

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oy and solemnity” characterized the departure of Infanta Isabel in autumn of 1429 (Figs. 5.1–5.2). There must have been crowds of people along the riverbank during the final weeks. With so many vessels in the Tagus estuary, all flying heraldic banners, the sight must have created the impression of a spectacular regatta. The Burgundian chronicler records but does not adequately describe the fanfare of the occasion: On Thursday, 29th and penultimate day of the month [of September], which was the day planned by the king for the embarkation of my lady the infanta Elizabeth on her journey to Flanders, he led her in the morning on horseback from his palace to the cathedral church of Lisbon ... with the ambassadors and many lords, knights, gentlemen and others..., where mass was sung and divine service solemnly and magnificently accomplished. After which the king brought his daughter back to his palace.... He had planned to take her on board ship and dine there, but the weather was so bad and the water so rough, that this could not be done. The next day, last day of September, after dinner, when the weather was better, the king, accompanied by all his children, their wives, the ambassadors and many lords, knights, squires, ladies and others, led my lady his daughter to the ship which had got ready for her passage in the port of Lisbon. There she stayed, waiting for the other ships, and their

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crews, that were going with her, to be got ready, until Saturday, 8 October following. During this time she was frequently visited by her father the king, and by my lords her brothers and others. On the said Saturday, 8 October, my lady, with her brother the infante Don Fernando, the count of Orin her nephew, and several knights, squires, ladies and others of her company, to the number of 2,000 persons or thereabouts, in fourteen large ships well fitted-out, armed and provisioned, left Lisbon around vespers…1 Prince Fernando (29 September, 1402 at Santarém–1443), the youngest of the Avis princes, served as his sister’s escort to Flanders. En route, the fleet experienced inclement weather at Cascais on October 13 and lost nine vessels. The remaining galleons continued on to Porto and then docked on November 25 at Ribadeo (Galicia). Because of illness, Jehan, the Lord of Roubaix, transferred to one of two Florentine vessels bound for Flanders, and he was joined by Baudouin de Lannoy and some members of their retinue. Infanta Isabel’s five ships sailed with the Italian vessels across the Bay of Biscay, but became separated by stormy weather near the English coast. The convoy sought refuge at Plymouth on November 29, but Baudouin de Lannoy moved on. He arrived at Sluis, port town of Bruges, on December 6, and made haste to inform an impatient Philip the Good of his bride’s imminent arrival.

1 The account is transcribed by Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 183–84. The narration continues: [The ships] moved some distance from where they had been berthed. The next day, they moved on to a placed called Restel, where they remained until Thursday following, 13 October, on which day she and her company arrived off Cascais around vespers. There they anchored and waited a little; but they weighed anchor that same day and left to continue their voyage, sailing a good way, night and day, till the Saturday 15 October, when contrary winds forced them to return, and they arrived again off Cascais, anchoring there until Monday 17 October. They then departed and set sail, and continued on their way until once more, because of adverse winds, my lady had to abandon her voyage, and she entered the port of Vivero in Galicia on Saturday 22 October with only four sail of the fourteen she had set out with. Of the others, nothing was known for a long time, except for one of them, which made the port of Vivero four or five days later. My lady left this port on Sunday 6 November, but had to put into the port of Ribadeo, also in Galicia, on 9 November.

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Festivities in Bruges At noon on Christmas Day, the Portuguese docked at Sluis (Figs. 5.3–5.4), where Princess Isabel was greeted with a carpeted path to her lodgings for a fortnight in the stately residence of Godevaert Wilden. Four members of a Flemish deputation met with the Infanta in advance of the actual marriage ceremony which occurred on January 7, 1430.2 The solemn rites were performed at six in the morning in the intimate lodgings of the Princess, where the Bishop of Tournai presided over the Mass and the proxy vows of July 25, 1429 were repeated and witnessed by only a few.3 A week of festivities followed. As part of her dowry, Isabel brought numerous Portuguese and North African fabrics, which were transported on her ships from Sluis through the Speye Poorte where the goods were unloaded and borne in carriages to Prisenhof Palace. 4 Until the silting of the Zwin estuary, the Reie flowed north to join a sea reach, and Lusitanian galleons must have provided a festive sight as they glided with their pennants over the outer waterways 2 See Vaughn, Philip the Good, 184, for the concluding remarks about Infanta Isabel’s voyage: Now it happened that the lord of Roubaix, who had been ill for some days in my lady’s ship, was so enfeebled and sick that he had to disembark at Ribadeo. There, my lady had him transferred to one of two Florentine galleys, en route for Flanders, which had arrived by chance....He boarded this galley at Ribadeo on 25 November, together with Baudouin d’Oignies and some of his people, while others of his people, with others of the ambassadors, stayed in my lady’s ship. And the five ships which they now had left Ribadeo on 25 November in company with the two galleys, sailing together through the Bay of Biscay until 28 November when, late in the night, the galleys mistakenly parted company from [my lady’s] ships and hove to near Lizard Point [Laisart] at the extremity of England, in grave danger of shipwreck and drowning. My lady, with her ships, went on her way and reached Plymouth in England on 29 November. The galleys left their anchorage near Lizard Point on 1 December and arrived at the port of Sluis in Flanders on 6 December. The lord of Roubaix disembarked and at once let my lord of Burgundy have news of my lady his bride, of whom my lord of Roubaix had made enquiries en route and ascertained that she and her company were safe and sound at Plymouth....By the grace of God my lady and her company arrived safely at the port of Sluis on Christmas Day [1429], at about midday. 3 Edwin Hall, The Arnolfini Betrothal. Medieval Marriage and the Enigma of Van Eyck’s Double Portrait (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 79 and 156 note 61; W.H. James Weale, Hubert and John van Eyck. Their Life and Work (London–New York: John Lane Company, 1908), lxii, lxxi–lxxii (Isabel’s marriage ceremonies). 4 Alexandre Pinchart, Histoire générale de la tapisserie (Paris: Société anonyme de publications périodiques, 1878–85), III, Pays-Bays, completed by Jules Guiffrey, 28. As

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which were linked by smaller canals (Reien) to the heart of Bruges, the “city of bridges” (Fig. 5.5–5.7). For the staging of his marriage celebrations in the city, Philip the Good equally spared no expense. Fifteen wagonloads of tapestries were transported from Lille and Dijon, guarded by four-hundred men-of-arms. Also transferred were fifty cartloads of furnishings, including luxurious metal wares and jewels. A hundred wagons transported Burgundian wines and for the jousts, fifteen cartloads brought armour and arms made at Besançon.5 The most complete account of the wedding festivities was provided by Jean Le Fèvre de Saint Rémy, then ducal herald, and later King of Arms of the Order of the Golden Fleece.6 On January 8, 1430 Isabel made her entry Duchess of Burgundy, Isabel of Portugal continued to express an interest in collecting tapestries. In 1440 Charles, Duke of Orléans (1391–1465), son of Louis d’Orléans (1371– 1407), married Marie of Cleves (1426–1486), daughter of Marie of Burgundy, Philip the Good’s sister. Duchess Isabel ordered Jean Aubry († 1464), chief guardian of the tapestries in Arras from the late 1430s, to procure panels from Arras and the ducal castle at Aire. Aubry was assisted in transporting the tapestries to St. Omer by his assistant, the weaver Guillaume de Loire. Following the dispute over the regency of Portugal and the death of Prince Pedro (1392–1449), the chilldren of the Duke of Coimbra sought refuge in Flanders. In 1453 Isabel’s niece, Beatrice of Coimbra († 1462), married Adolphe II of Cleves (1425–1492), Lord of Ravenstein (1463) and son of Marie of Burgundy (c.1399/1400–1473), Philip the Good’s sister. Due to Duchess Isabel, the couple received a handsome set of tapestries from Bruges. See J. Versyp, De geschiedenis van de tapijtkunst te Brugge (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1954), 148 (Beatrice of Coimbra-Adolphe II of Cleves) and 146 (Marie of Cleves and Charles d’ Orléans), Document VII, (Brussels, Archives Générales de Royaume, CC, 46956, folio 197v). These citations are given by Smith, “The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 335 and note 9 (Beatrice and Adophe); 342 and note 29 (Marie and Charles). Smith additionally informs, 344, about Aubry and his son Regnault, who succeeded as guardian at Arras. Also see: Lucien Detrez, “Le Mariage de Charles d’Orléans et de Marie de Cleves à Saint-Omer (26 Novembre 1440) – d’après les Archives du Nord,” Annales du Comité Flammand de France XLV (1954): 329–40. 5 Vaughn, Philip the Good, 56. Among the tapestries displayed were: the Battle of Othea (allegory of Fortune) woven before 1420, the History of King Clovis of France, the History of Begon, Duke of Belin (probably hunting scenes pertaining to the brother of Garin le Lorrain in the Geste des Lorrains), and the History of Ahasuerus, which would have highlighted the virtues of Queen Esther. The chapel of the Prisenhof was furnished with a tapestry of the Passion. For the above see Jacques Paviot, “Burgundy and the South,” The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert (London: Thames & Hudson, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges, 2002), 166– 183, at 176. 6 Jean Le Fèvre de Saint-Rémy [† 1468], Chronique de Jean Le Févre, seigneur de SaintRemy, transcribed from a manuscript in the Bibliothèque de Boulogne-sur-Mer, 2 vols. ed.

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into Bruges on a gilded litter borne by four white steeds. On either side rode her brother Fernando and Jehan, Lord of Roubaix. At the Speyepoorte, Flemish nobililty would have joined the cortege, walking behind the litter along streets draped with crimson and cloth of gold. The procession lasted two hours, and it certainly comprised a cacophony of sounds, from the sharp blasts of seventy-six trumpets heralding the arrival of the new duchess at every corner to the shouts of enthusiastic well-wishers who numbered about 50,000.7 A miniature by Jean Fouquet in the Grandes Chroniques de France (Fig. 5.8), which illustrates a similar entry, one staged for Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg in 1378, shows the type of litter which would have been used for Isabel’s cavalcade in 1430. Charles V of France rides a black horse to the side of his nephew’s litter as it approaches the Cathedral of Saint Denis. Behind him are the Dukes of Burgundy, of Berry and of Bar, followed by

François Morand (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, Librairie Renouard, H. Loones, 1876– 1881), II (1881): 158–74. An account of the wedding festivities in Portugal of September 26–28, 1429 was in the possession of Jean Le Fèvre. He appears to have planned entrêmets (banquet performances) for the Bruges marriage celebrations, some of which were repeated in the famed “Feast of the Pheasant” held at Lille in February of 1454. For banquets, live animals and actors provided constant entertainment between the lavish courses continuously served on gold and silver plate. Several men were dressed as savages; some even rode roasted pigs which were brought into the dining hall on gilded carts. A large pie contained live sheep, their fleeces dyed blue and horns painted gold. These conceits, in addition to a young “virgin” with a “tamed” unicorn, were but a few of the extravagant delights contrived to amuse the guests mentioned by Le Févre, notable dames and chevaliers who brought their own households, banners, arms and rich robes de drap d’or. 7 For information about Bruges, Burgundian rule and society at the time of Isabel’s entry, consult Walter Prevenier, Willem Pieter Blockmans, et al., Le prince et le peuple: images de la société du temps des ducs de Bourgogne 1384–1530 (Antwerp: Fonds Mercator, 1998; Walter Prevenier and Willem Pieter Blockmans, with iconography by An Blockmans-Delva and an introduction by Richard Vaughan, De Bourgondische Nederlanden (Antwerp: Mercatorfonds, 1983); Willem Pieter Blockmans and Walter Prevenier, De Bourgondiërs: de Nederlanden op weg naar eenheid 1384–1530 (Amsterdam-Louvain: Meulenhoff-Kritak, 1997); idem., The Promised Lands: The Low Countries under Burgundian rule, 1369–1530, translated by Elizabeth Fackelman, translation ed. Edward Peters (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999; Dutch ed., In de Ban van Bourgondië, 1988); J. Gailliard, Bruges, son histoire, et ses monuments ou relations chronologiques des événements qui se sont passés dans la ville de Bruges, depuis les temps les plus reculés jusqu’à nos jours (Bruges: 1847); M. Vanroose, Enkele aspecten van de Brugse beeldhouwkunst tijdens de period 1376–1467 (Ghent: Thesis, Royal University of Ghent, 1970); Jean C. Wilson, Painting in Bruges at the Close of the Middle Ages. Studies in Society and Visual Culture (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998).

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Wenceslas, the King of the Romans and son of Charles IV, and the Abbé de Saint Denis. Assuredly the cavalcade of the Portuguese princess circuited the important monuments of the city, and unquestionably the smaller canels were filled with small barges and boats containing enthusiastic townsfolk (Figs. 5.9).8 At the Burg Square, the administrative and commercial heart of the city, Isabel would have seen only the two lower tiers of the Belfort, which have been dated to 1282–96 9 (Figs. 5.10–5.13). Not until 1483–87 was a wooden octagonal lantern added, and it was rebuilt in 1493 after being hit by lightening. Following another strike in 1741, the spire was not rebuilt. The town charters and privileges bestowed by the Counts of Flanders were kept in the Belfort’s tower room called the secreet comptoir (Figs. 5.14–5.15). Behind an iron grille made in 1290–92 was a chest fitted with locks which was opened by nine different keys, each key in the possession of nine officials of Bruges.10 At the base of the belfry was the Halle (Cloth Hall). Wings were added to the oldest section facing the Markt in 1363–65. Built in the thirteenth century and torn down in 1786, the Wasserhalle on a bridge over the canal was used for the unloading of imported wool from boats. Cloth dealers and grocers maintained stalls in the Hallen, the market halls under the Belfort. Lengths of cloth, hides and pots were sold under the arches of the Waterhalle (Figs. 5.16–5.18). To see some of the most impressive ecclesiastical treasures of Bruges, the Infanta merely had to pass to the northwest wing of the Burg (Figs. 5.19– 5.24). Baldwin Iron Arm, first Count of Flanders (862–879: Boudewijn I), 8 Consult Valentin Vermeersch, Bruges. Mille Ans d’Art. De l’époque carolingienne au néo-gothique 875–1875 (Antwerp: Fonds Mercantor, 1981), 15–48 (Roman and Carolingian Bruges), 49–108 (Gothic Bruges) and 108–207 (Bruges 1400–1500), a lavishly illustrated and informative monograph. Thanks are expressed to Andrea Murphy, Cultural Counselor for the loan of this book and useful historical maps from the library of the Embassy of Belgium in Washington, DC. See also the earlier studies by Valentin Vermeersch: Brugge, duizend jaar kunst: van Karolingisch tot Neogotisch 875–1875 (Antwerp: Mercatorfonds, 1981); Grafmonumenten te Brugge voor 1578, 3 vols. (Bruges: Raaklijn, 1976). 9 Wim Blockmans, “Bruges, a European Trading Center,” Bruges and Europe, ed. Valentin Vermeersch (Antwerp: 1992): 41–55; Valentin Vermeersch, Bruges and the Sea: from Bryggia to Zeebrugge, ed. by and in collaboration with Marc Ryckaert et al., with contributions by Brigitte Beernaert et al., foreword by Frank Van Acker, preface by Maurice Michiels and conclusion by Fernand Traen (Antwerp: Mercatorfonds, 1982). 10 Derek Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored. Bruges, Ghent, Antwerp, Mechelen, Leuven & Ostend (London: Pallas Athene, 1998 3rd Ed.), 36.

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had built a castle in 862 to protect Bruges from attacks by Norsemen. Begun in the tenth century by Count Arnauf I, the basilica of Sint-Donaas was dedicated to St. Donatian, fourth-century bishop of Rheims whose remains were transferred to Bruges during the ninth century. This first church of Sint Donaas was designed as a replica of the Carolingian palatine chapels. Following a fire in 1184, it was demolished and replaced by a Romanesque church. The grand structure which later contained the tomb of Jan van Eyck, no longer stands, but at the time of Isabel’s marriage it was a rich repository for reliquaries and devotional objects. From Sint-Donaas, Isabel would have walked south to the Helig Bloedbasiliek, (Figs. 5.25–5.30) which was begun in 1134 on the southwest corner of the Burg by Thierry (Dietrich) of Alsace-Lorraine, Count of Flanders between 1128 and 1157. Completed by 1149, the two-storied Romanesque structure contained a Lower Chapel (Figs. 5.31–5.33) dedicated to St. Basil the Great, whose four vertebrae had been acquired in Caesarea during the First Crusade by Robert II, Count of Flanders (1093–1111). The Upper Chapel was a repository for an even more important relic (Figs. 5.34–5.35), a phial of rock crystal said to contain Christ’s blood.11 Popular legend has maintained it was given to Dietrich (Thierry) of Alsace, Count of Flanders (1128–1157) by the Patriarch of Jerusalem in 1147 during the Second Crusade. Another theory proposes Jacques Toussaert, Le Sentiment religieux en Flandre à la fin du Moyen Age with a preface by Michel Mollat (Paris: Plon, 1963), 259–65. By the date of 1089 Bruges was the administrative seat of the Chancellery. As his predecessors, Count Dietrich (Thierry/Derrick) of Alsace maintained his residence in the Burg. Therefore, the “Chapel of St. Basil” built in the early twelfth century is believed to have originated as a countship chapel. The vertebrae of St. Basil purportedly arrived to Bruges in spring of 1100, and the bones initially were kept in Sint-Donaas. Though the upper sanctuary of the Holy Blood Basilica was largely destroyed during the French Revolution, the lower chapel with its nave supported by four huge pillars retains its austere appearance. Few windows penetrate the heavy walls that rise to semi-circular vaults. By contrast, the upper chapel is well lighted due to the stained glass, restoration of the fifteenth-century originals. During the Medieval period the Chapel of St. Basil was used as a chapel for the masons and candle-makers of Bruges, and it still retains a thirteenthcentury statue of the Virgin Mary and an exterior stone tympanum showing the Baptism of St. Basil. Since 1405 a Confraternity of the Precious Blood has organized the annual processions honoring the relic on the feast of the Ascension. The brotherhood maintains the upper chapel, where the three Romanesque arches open to the Chapel of the Holy Cross with its “Altar of the Precious Blood” and “Throne for the Relic.” The staircase connecting the two levels of the Holy Blood Basilica was built circa 1531–1532, about the time the Upper Chapel was renovated and concurrently with the designing of the Renaissance exterior entrance which today exhibits a panoply of bishops’ arms, municipal trade escutcheons and banners. 11

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the phial was among the objects taken from the chapel of the Buccoleon Palace in Constantinople after the capture of the city of the “Golden Horn” in June of 1203. Among the Byzantine relics of Christ’s Passion described by the French crusader knight Robert of Clari was a crystal with a large quantity of sacred blood. Baldwin IX, grandson of Thierry of Alsace and Count of Flanders (1195–1205) of Flanders, the newly appointed emperor of Constantinople (1204–5), conceivably sent the phial to his daughter Johanna, regent of Flanders in his absence and a patron of religious houses. To the left of the Holy Blood Basilica is the Stadhuis or Hôtel de Ville (Figs. 5.37–5.38). Capped with octagonal turrets, the town hall was built between 1376 and 1420 and its exterior was embellished with forty statues standing beneath baldachins which depicted the Counts and Countesses of Flanders. By contrast with the secular portraits, the consoles were carved with biblical figures. Jan van Eyck in 1434–35 designed and applied polychrome to eight portrait statues. However, all forty images were destroyed by the French in 1792–94. Jan’s statues have been identified as Margaret of Constantinople (1244–1279), Gui de Dampierre (1280–1304), Robert III de Bethune (1304–1322), Louis I de Nevers (1322–1346), Louis II de Mâle (1346–1384), Philip the Bold (1384–1404), Marguerite de Mâle (1384–1405) and John the Fearless (1404–1419). According to an eighteenth-century print, they once occupied the middle row of the façade.12 Ascending a stone staircase to the principal level of the Stadhuis (Figs. 5.39– 5.42), Infanta Isabel may have been greeted by the Estates of Flanders in the Great Hall which was decorated by order of Philip the Bold between 1385 and 1402 with a wooden and gilded double-arched ceiling. The ribs of the two vaults rise from corbels carved with personifications of the twelve months and four elements. The inner ribs join at vault keys and these bosses display biblical subjects. Seventeen nations were represented in Bruges and most of their Gothic trading houses have disappeared. Along Vlamingstraat and in the direction 12 See Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 148–54. Between 1376 and 1379 the sculptor Jean de Valenciennes created about twenty statues of prophets and princes for the Hôtel de Ville, and consoles were polychromed by Gilles de Man. Copies of works destroyed in 1792 are in the Bruges Musée Gruuthuse. See Valentin Vermeersch, Bruges. Mille Ans d’Art, 85–91, who also provides the names of two sculptors who in 1385–86 decorated the ceiling of the salle des échevins (Alderman Hall: salle gothique), Gilles van der Houtmeersch and Cornelis van Aelter. Pieter van Oost was another artisan documented in 1397.

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of the Markt, was the Beursplein, the Bourse quarter (Figs. 5.43–5.44), where representatives of Genoa, Florence, Castile and the Hanseatic League congregated. Antonius Sanderus in his book Flandria Illustrata (Cologne, 1641) depicts the Bourse square of merchant houses, where today the House of Genoa built in 1441 still stands (Figd. 5.45–5.46).13 The Castilian and Aragonese ships docked at the Spaanse Loskaai (Spanish Quay). Their merchants had several houses along Spanjaardstraat (Figs.5.47–5.48).14 The Franciscan Convent-Monastery of the Friars Minor was constructed in 1246. Partially destroyed by the Calvanists in the sixteenth century, it was totally destroyed under French occupation in the eighteenth century. The Florentines and Biscay merchants lent their support to the Friars Minor. Beginning in 1414, the Castilians also contributed to the Friars Minors. The Portuguese had a trading house after 1495 on Sint-Koninstraat, where it occupied the corner of a square that probably contained their older meeting place for business. The Lusitanian community nestled within a warren of narrow streets surrounding the square in the northern sector of the town. Close to Sint-Donaas and the Burg, the House of the Portuguese nation faced the western entrance of the Jesuit Sint-Walburgakerk built between 1619 and 1643 (Figs. 5.49–5.50). In 1493 the house of the nation of Portugal was situated on Riddersstraat, facing Sint-Walburga Church. The Old Dominican Convent-Monastery on Langestraat (Fig. 5.51) served as the meeting place for Portuguese merchants in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In 1413 the Portuguese installed a chapel dedicated to the Holy Spirit (Pentecost) in the Church of the Dominicans. Merchants of the Hanse favored the Carmelite Order, using the refectory of the Carmelite convent in 1334 as a meeting place. The Oosterlingenhuis (Fig. 5.52) was built 1478–1481 by the Bruges architect Jan van de Poele. Hanse Merchants did not draw up their statutes until October 28, 1347, which gave their organization a formal structure. Their first trading privileges in the Southern Netherlands had been awarded more than a century earlier in Bruges. Since the fourteenth century, there was an English public weighing station in the nearby Engelsestraat which enters into the Spinolarei, and English as well as Scottish merchants also maintained their own centers Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored, 53–59. Joseph Maréchal, “La colonie espagnole de Bruges du XIVe au XVIe siècle,” Revue du Nord XXXV (1953): 5–40; idem., Europese aanwezigheid te Brugge: de vreemde kolonies (XIVde–XIXde eeuw) (Bruges: Genootschap voor Geschiedenis, 1985). 13 14

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(Figs. 5.53–5.54). Next to the Biscay House and along the active SpiegelreiSpinolerei canal, was the Poortersloge, the town burghers house (Figs. 5.55– 5.61). For the ceremonial entry of the Infanta of Portugal, all the nations houses were festooned with garland, herald and banners. Princess Isabel of Portugal would have circuited around the commercial heart of Bruges to visit important sacred sites. The Onze-Lieve Vrouwekerk was a ducal church (Figs. 5.62–5.65) which had originated as a tenthcentury chapel of a Romanesque church dedicated to the Virgin Mary.15 It was amplified in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and continued to be modified until its north portal was completed in 1465. The two round towers of the western façade are eclipsed by the soaring brick spire built between 1250 and 1350. Extending to a spectacular height of 122 meters, the tower would have astounded the Portuguese princess and her entourage. Later, the Church of Our Lady which contained tombs of the most important merchants of the city, would serve as the final resting place for the Infanta’s surviving son Charles the Bold and his daughter, Mary of Burgundy (Figs. 5.66–5.67). Begun in the twelfth century, Sint-Salvatorskathedraal (Figs. 5.68–5.71) was substantially built in the thirteenth century, although it acquired its ambulatory with radiating chapels only in 1480. When the Portuguese Infanta made her entry, it was merely a parish church which was frequented by dyers and bleachers who settled in the south of Bruges at Verversdijk (Figs. 5.72–5.74). Eventually Infanta Isabel’s train arrived to the Prisenhof Palace located southwest of Sint-Salvator and the Onze-Lieve Vrouwekerk. Situated close to Sint-Jacobskerk (Figs. 5.75–5.76) the Gothic parish church of the town merchants in that district, the Prisenhof was destroyed by the French between 1794 and 1799 16 (Figs. 5.77–5.79). For the wedding festivities Philip the Good had employed several teams of architects to construct several temporary wooden structures in the residence’s largest plaza. One of them was a banqueting hall, spacious by Late Gothic standards, which measured one hundred and fifty feet in length. Its main façade was decorated with a polychromed wooden “Lion of Flanders” which dispensed wine from its 15 Hervé Stalpaert, Brugse devotieprenten van Onze-Lieve-Vrouw (Sint-Andries: Lege Weg 133, Heemkundige Kring Maurits Van Coppenolle, 1976). 16 Krista De Jonge, “Bourgondische residenties in het graafschap Vlaanderen. Rijsel, Brugge en Gent ten tijde van Filips de Goede,” Handelingen der maatschappij voor geschiedenis en oudheidkunde te Gent (Ghent), nieuwe reeks LIV (2000): 93–134.

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paw into a basin. Opposite stood another font, with a centerpiece stag and unicorn, emblems respectively of Philip and Isabel, which emitted hippocras wine and rose water. Surrounding the banqueting hall on its remaining sides were three kitchens, each furnished with an oven and six larders for soups, roasted and boiled meats, fruits, jellies and other condiments, and pastries.17 Entering the Great Hall, Princess Isabel would have seen a gilded tree adorned with the escutcheons of Philip the Good’s provinces and those of his most prominent lords. This conceit which reflects the Duke’s concern to display emblems of his lands before the Burgundian court has something in common with the genealogical trees created for Valois kings. Such French miniatures which exhibit dynastic couples in leafy bowers, often with heralds, underscored a monarch’s right to rule based on bloodlines. One such example by a Parisian illuminator was created in 1517 following the May 12 entry of Claude of France, daughter of Louis XIII and wife of François I (Fig. 5.80–5.81). Among the spectacles staged for the marriage celebrations in front of the Châtelet was a gilded tree showing the Duchess and François at the summit and their ancestors below.18 However, the Golden Tree of Philip the Good’s banqueting hall had especial meaning for the Duke, who had treasured the memory of his father’s valor in leading a Burgundian expedition to the orient. Bruges continues to hold processions du Saint-Sang every feast of Ascension Day when the Holy Blood reliquary is transported by religious brotherhood through the streets.19 An equally important pageant, the l’Arbre d’Or, occurs every five years in August and it commemorates the founding of the Burgundian Order of the Golden Tree after the Crusade to Nicopolis. Le Fèvre de Saint Rémy, Chronique, II, 172–74. Vaughn, Philip the Good, 56. Below the couple to the right in the “Golden Tree” miniature are Queen Anne of Brittany flanked by her first spouse Louis XII and her second, Charles VIII. Opposite them are Louis XI and Charlotte of Savoy. Then below to the right are Charles VII and Marie of Anjou. At the bottom on the left and right are Charles VI and Isabeau of Bavaria (ancestors of Claude) and Louis of Orléans and Valentine Visconti Sforza (ancestors of François I). Consult Colette Beaune, Les Manuscrits des Rois de France au Moyen Âge. Le Miroir du Pouvoir, with an introduction by François Avril (Paris: Bibliothèque de l’Image-Bibliothèque National de France, 1997), 144–45; idem, Le Miroir du Pouvoir, with an introduction by François Avril (Paris: Département des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Nationale-Éditions Hervas, 1989); idem, Naissance de la nation France (Paris: Gallimard, 1985); idem., The Birth of an Ideology: Myths and Symbols of Nation in Late-Medieval France, translated by Susan Ross Huston, ed. Fredric L. Cheyette (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991). 19 The annual omagame (procession) in Bruges began in 1281. The elite “Noble Brotherhood of the Holy Blood” was formed in 1405, and it generally has thirty-one men, with 17 18

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Situated above the main entrance of Philip the Good’s Great Hall was a minstrels’ gallery which accommodated not only sixty heralds, but also trumpeters and minstrels. Burgundian artists and engineers designed spectacular entrêmets for the dinners. These decorations were presented between the main courses of the meals to entertain honored guests. The Lord of Saint-Rémy described the memorable banquet held on January 8, the day of Isabel’s grand entry.20 The dinner began with women holding pennons bearing the ducal arms as well as images of unicorns and goats, conventional symbols of virginity and virility. One dish was introduced by automatons of savages and wild beasts shown with heralds and mounted on roast pigs. Another course was served with the tableau of a castle, perhaps a model of Prisenhof. Within the donjon was a wild man with a banner, while the two corner towers opposite the keep were occupied by women holding pennons of Philip the Good’s territories. An automaton of a helmeted rooster followed, an emblem of vigilance, which bore more escutcheons. Probably the most important entrêmet was one which alluded to Duke Philip’s new Order of the Golden Fleece, a huge pastry which opened to display a live sheep with azure tinctured wool and golden horns. From this grand pâté also emerged Hanse, a giant of the court. Disguised as a wild man, he sallied forth to wrestle with Madame d’Or. Seated among the guests, this “Lady of Gold” was described as a moult gracieuse folle (very attractive madwoman) of Philip the Good. Attending the banquet was an uncommon number of ladies, so perhaps the new Duchess was jestingly designated the Duke’s “Lady of Gold” (Fig. 5.82–5.83). At the 1409 wedding dinner of Antoine of Burgundy (1384–1415), Duke of Brabant and Élizabeth de Goerlitz (1390–1451), a polychromed statue of a woman sprayed white and red wine from her breasts.21 A similar automaton of “Venus” perhaps was displayed in the 1430 festivities at Prisenhof. Le Fèvre de Saint Rémy records the Counts of Flanders serving as honorary members. The confraternity was charged with care of the relic in the basilica chapel, as well as arrangements for the procession, which included theatrical vignettes of the Passion story. See Maryan W. Ainsworth and Keith Christiansen (eds.), From Van Eyck to Brueghel. Early Netherlandish Painting in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1998), 107–9. 20 Le Fèvre de Saint Rémy, Chronique, II, 168. Also see Agathe Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XV e siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454): Aspects politiques, sociaux et culturels (Montréal: Cahiers d’études mediévales, Université de Montréal, Les Éditions Bellarmin, 1984), 49–50; Vaughn, Philip the Good, 56–57. 21 Edmond de Dynter [1448], Chronica nobilissimorum ducum Lotharingiae et Brabantiae ac regum Francorum, ed. P. de Ram, 3 vols. (Brussels: M. Hayez, 1854–60), III (1857), 683.

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that Cupid, the “god of love,” went about the Great Hall with his bow, shooting darts festooned with roses. The frontispiece of Martin Le Franc’s Le Champion des Dames (Fig. 5.84) shows Philip the Good seated within the castle of the Order of the Golden Fleece surrounded by a border of his arms. To his right is Gideon kneeling before a dry fleece as an angel delivers Yahweh’s message (Judges 6:12): The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior.” As a compliment to the leader of the Israelites who defeated the Midianites, Jason is shown on the opposite side of the folio and his shoulder is draped with the Golden Fleece, the insignia of Philip’s new chivalric order. The hero converses with Medea seated in a turret of the Duke’s castle. Revisiting the German drawing purported to be after Jan van Eyck’s lost portrait of the Portuguese Infanta, her placement within a stone niche is significant when it is juxtaposed with the miniature showing Medea wearing a Burgundian henin and speaking with Jason from a castle tower. Perhaps one of the pictures sent by Jan van Eyck from Avis Castle to Philip the Good was an allegorical composition illustrating the subject of Medea “conversing” from her tower. In the miniature which celebrates the founding of a new knightly institution Medea is presented as a counterpart to Gideon’s angel. Physically removed from the hero by the confines of castle walls, she is elevated as his source of inspiration. A similar approach to the representation of chivalric love was taken by the master who illustrated Heinrich von Veldeke’s Eneide in the early thirteenth century (Fig. 5.85–5.86).22 Lavinia, depicted in a tower, had been warned by an oracle that she must wed a man from afar, and she is portrayed in the German miniature welcoming Aeneas as a noble candidate for her hand. As a consequence of their marriage, Aeneas ruled over the Latins and Trojans and Julius Caesar claimed descent from their lineage. Jan van Eyck’s portrayal of the Infanta Isabel before a tower window, therefore, may stem from a Northern tradition of depicting chaste love, which finds its ultimate expression in Shakespeare’s’ balcony vignette of Romeo and Juliet. Though a soothsayer is featured in the story of the Aeneas-Lavinia union, Ovid’s See Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 49 and note 61. 22 This miniature is discussed by Michael Camille, The Medieval Art of Love. Objects and Subjects of Desire (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1998), 34–35. He translates the text on the opposite page (34): “Lavinia was up in the tower. She looked down from a window and saw Aeneas, who was below. She gazed intently at him above all. There where she was standing in her chamber Love struck her with his dart. Now she had fallen into the snares of love; whether she wishes it or not, she must love.”

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description of Jason’s wife as a sorcerer in his Metamorphoses (7: 164–294) most directly relates to the Bruges entrêmets of 1430. Additionally, the Roman poet’s version of the tale of Jason seems to have relevance for Jan van Eyck’s conflation of Isabel’s portrait with the Erythraean Sibyl in an altarpiece which celebrates the resurrected “Lamb of God.” Medea’s destruction of King Pelias was achieved when she convinced his daughters of her powers by reviving a dead ram. Medea’s potion enabled Jason to attain the Golden Fleece, but when he subsequently abandoned her, she lost her reason and murdered their children, then killed Jason’s new wife and her father-in-law. Scrutinizing the legend more closely, Medea was hardly the stuff of heroines. If a Bruges wedding entrêmet designated Isabel of Portugal to be the gracieuse folle of Flanders’ “Lord of Gold,” she undoubtedly accepted the joke with good humor before the assembly. However, very soon after the Duke’s marriage, the spiritual Gideon supplanted the mythical Jason as symbol of the Order of the Golden Fleece. Formal etiquette traditionally governed the ducal banquets. Philip the Good and Isabel of Portugal were seated at a table of honor in front of a silk cloth of estate. Seated on tapestried benches, around the couple were members of the Duke’s family and Isabel’s brother, Prince Fernando (1402– 1443). Other tables were installed on platforms for Portuguese dignitaries and Burgundian lords and ladies. As a member of the delegation sent to Lisbon, Jan van Eyck would have attended the festivities in the company of his fellow ambassadors. In a reception hall bedecked with Arras tapestries, the wealth of Burgundy was further proclaimed by dressoirs set against the wall. The side buffets were laden with gold and silver treasures from Lille, as well as many costly items which Isabel transported from Portugal as part of her dowry. The Order of the Golden Fleece was established on January 10, 1430, only three days after Philip and Isabel formally exchanged vows at Sluis. The wedding banquet in the wooden pavilion of Prisenhof Castle marks the first Burgundian fête in which allegorical entrêmets expressed the chivalric aspirations of Philip the Good. As such, it presages an even grander occasion on February 17, 1454 at Lille Palace. Held on the birthday of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy, the “Feast of the Pheasant” involved the active participation of Golden Fleece chevaliers, including Jean Le Fèvre de Saint Rémy as King of Arms.23 23 Duchess Isabel of Burgundy was as well-read in classical literature as her brothers Duarte and Pedro, who both wrote treatises. For this reason, she should be credited with the

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As will be discussed later, the banquet of 1454 was distinguished by a more tightly knit iconographical programme of entertainments devised by Olivier de la Marche to celebrate Philip the Good as the Hercules-Argonaut of his age. Even so, the impression drawn from the 1430 account leaves no doubt that Philip the Good had established at least the microcosm of what would become a more macrocosmic aggrandizement of his ducal image. Clearly at the January 8 “Banquet of Madame d’Or” Philip had announced his intention to create his new Order of the Golden Fleece. The Burgundian counterpart to the English Garter was founded with twenty-four select knights of noble and legitimate birth.24 They were the antithesis of ”wild men” who were characters in many French entertainments and could not be beguiled by the enchantments of sorcerers like Circe.25 (Figs. 5.87–5.88) The same knights from Burgundy, Flanders and Artois were able to display their rational strategies and physical prowess almost immediately before the court. They participated in the series of jousts held in the marketplace of Bruges on successive days following the “Entry” banquet.26 As in the decoration of Prisenhof ’s wooden banqueting pavilion, talented artists painted colorful armorials and pennons for these spectacular public tournaments. During the panoply of events, Jan van Eyck was witness and onlooker, but not artisan. He may not have been an aristocrat, but he would accelerated Burgundian interest in allegorical ephemeral entertainments between 1430 and 1454. See Charity Cannon Williard, “Isabel of Portugal and the French Translations of the ‘Triunfo de las Donas,” Revue Belge de Philologie et d’Histoire XLIII (1965): 961–69; idem., “The Concept of True Nobility at the Burgundian Court,” Studies in the Renaissance XIV (1967): 33–48; “Isabel of Portugal. Patroness of Humanism?. Miscellanea di Studi e Ricerche sul Quattrocento Francese a Cura di Franco Simono (Turin: 1967): 517–44; Émile Varenberg, “Fêtes données à Philippe-le-Bon et Isabelle de Portugal à Gand, en 1457,” Annales de la Société Royale des Beaux-Arts et de Littérature de Gand XII (1869–72): 1–36. 24 Baron de Reiffenberg (Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand Thomas), Histoire de l’Ordre de la Toison d’or, depuis son institution jusqu’à la cessation des chapitres généraux; tirée des archives mémes de cet ordre et des écrivains qui en on traité (Bruxelles: Fonderie & imprimerie normales, 1830), xvii–xxiv. See Vaughn, Philip the Good, 57 160–61. 25 Folio 176r. of the Chroniques de France (MS. Fr. 2646: ca. 1450) in the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale illustrates a famous banquet of 1392 held in the Paris Hôtel de St. Pol. Charles VI danced as a “wild man” but his candle-laden costume caught fire. Jeanne d’Auvergne († 1424), Duchess of Berry, threw her cloak over the dauphin and was celebrated as a heroine. For Boccacio’s Des Cleres et Nobles Femmes, see Florence Callu and François Avril, Boccace en France: de l’humanisme à l’érotisme (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, 1975). 26 For information about Burgundian tournaments and armorials see: Robert Coltman Clephan, The Tournament: Its Periods and Phases (London: Methuen & Co., ltd., 1919), rpt. (New York: Dover Publications, 1995); Lucien de Roany, L’Épervier d’Or ou Description

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have enjoyed the high status of a Burgundian ambassador to Portugal. He also would have moved freely among Lusitanian convivial lords and ladies who had accompanied their Infanta to foreign shores. 1430 and the Brabantine Inheritance of Philip the Good The Brabant Counts had formed a cadet branch of the Burgundian family (Figs. 5.89–5.91). The history of the Valois Dukes of Burgundy begins with the death of Philippe de Rouvre (1345–1361), the last Capetian duke, whose direct lineage included kings of France, notably the crusader St. Louis IX. Philippe’s inheritance was divided between his wife Marguerite (1350–1405: m. 1356), the daughter of Count Louis III de Mâle, who acquired Franche Comté, Artois and Champagne, and his cousin, the French King Jean “the Good” (1319: r. 1350–1363), who secured the duchy of Burgundy.27 In November of 1363 Jean “Le Bon” promised Burgundy to his fourth son Philip the Bold, who in 1369 wed the dowager Marguerite of Flanders. When Louis III de Mâle died in 1384, Philip the Bold succeeded to the counties of Flanders, Nevers, Rethel and Franche Comté. Upon the Duke of Burgundy’s death in 1404, his holdings were split among his three sons. Burgundy and Franche Comté, the imperial county of Burgundy, Flanders and Artois passed to the eldest son, Jean the Fearless (1371–1419). However, Antoine (1384–1415), Count of Rethel for his lifetime, obtained the duchies of Brabant, Limbourg and the Lordship of Antwerp. His younger brother Philippe (1389–1415) received Nevers, Rethel and Champagne. Despite the tripartite division of Philip the Bold’s lands, due to random fortune the Historique des Joutes et des Tournois qui, sous le Titre de Nobles Rois de l’Epinette, se Célébrerent à Lille au Moyen-Âge (Lille: 1839); Jean-Claude Garreta, “L’Armorial de la Toison d’Or,” Dossier d’Art XLIV (December 1997–January 1998): 80–89 (manuscript of armorials illuminated by Loyset Liédet in the Paris Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, MS. 4790); Lorédan Larchey, Ancien armorial équestre de la Toison d’or et de l’Europe au XVe siècle (Paris: Berger-Levrault et Cie, 1890); Jean Le Fèvre, Seigneur de Saint-Rémy [† 1468], A European Armorial: An Armorial of Knights of the Golden Fleece and 15th Century Europe, ed. Rosemary Pinches and Anthony Wood, with an introduction to Polish heraldry by Bernard J. Klec-Pilewski (London: 10 Beauchamp Place, S.W. 3, Heraldry Today, 1971). 27 Jean Lestocquoy, Histoire de la Flandre et de l’Artois (Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1949; 2nd ed. 1966). Raymond Cazelles, Société politique, noblesse et couronne sous Jean le Bon et Charles V (Geneva: Droz, 1982); idem. Nouvelle histoire de Paris, de la fin du règne de Philippe Auguste à la mort de Charles V, 1223–1380 (Paris: Hachette, 1972).

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territorial package eventually was restored to his grandson Philip the Good, the only heir of Jean the Fearless. Antoine and Philippe died alongside the French knights who were defeated by the English King Henry V at Agincourt in 1415.28 In 1424 Philip the Good married Philippe’s widow Bonne d’Artois, who died a year later. She had two sons by the ill-fated Philippe: Charles (1414–1464), Count of Nevers; and Jean (1415–1491), Count of Rethel. In the wake of Agincourt, Antoine’s heirs inherited his properties and titles, Jean IV of Brabant (1403– 1427) and his younger brother Philippe of St. Pol, (1404–August 4, 1430). When his Jean IV died without issue on April 17, 1427, Philippe secured his substantial estates in Brabant, including the major city of Brussels.29 Yet he too left no heirs. Citing his testament of September 4, 1427, Philip the Good in autumn of 1430 persuaded the Brabantine Estates to accept his legitimate right to rule over that of Philippe’s widow, Margaret. He did have to concede that Brabant would remain autonomous from Burgundy in financial and commercial matters. A set of late fifteenth-century portrait drawings have been related to the pleurants of Louis de Mâle’s tomb in St. Pierre at Lille. Among them, Philippe St. Pol of Brabant, particularly seems unsuited for a funereal commission. Jauntily holding a fur hat in his right hand while proudly displaying a falcon with his left, the young Philippe would be better placed in a composition showing a courtly festivity. Plausibly the cycle of drawings have a genesis in lost murals of the Coudenberg Palace in Brussels. After inheriting the title of Duke of Brabant and Nevers in 1430 from his cousin, Philip the Good renovated the residence, adding a corps de logis (1431–1436) and a Great Hall (1451–1461), which was hung with tapestries during the sixteenth century. When the Duke of Burgundy occupied the Coudenberg, plausibly his logis was painted with murals to affirm his right to rule 28 Alfred Higgins Burne, The Agincourt War: A Military History of the latter part of the Hundred Years War, from 1369 to 1453 (Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1976; rpt., Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions, 1999); Gérard Bacquet, Azincourt (Auxi-le Château: G. Bacquet, 1977); Anne Curry, The Battle of Agincourt: Sources and Interpretations (Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK-Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 2000); Christopher Hibbert, Agincourt (New York: Cooper Square Press, 2000 ed.); Dominique Paladilhe, La bataille d’Azincourt: 25 octobre 1415 (Paris: Perrin, 2002); Margaret Wade Labarge, Henry V: The Cautious Conqueror (London: Secker and Warburg, 1975). 29 Alexandre Henne and Alphonse Wauters, Histoire de la ville de Bruxelles, 3 vols. (Brussels: Perichon, 1845); reprinted (Brussels: Éditions Libro-Sciences, 1968).

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Brabant, such as a genealogical cycle of secular portraits. Who better to have advised in the planning of such a project than Jan van Eyck? 30 Though Jan maintained a house in Lille before transferring his residence to Bruges after the marriage of his lord and Infanta Isabel, his position as court diplomat would have compelled traveling with the ducal household in 1430. Such a temporary transfer from a home base is rational to postulate, considering his next documented work, the 1432 altarpiece for Sint-Janskerk in Ghent, required discussion with the patron and an on-site inspection of the chapel. Municipal records establish that Hubert van Eyck, an artist identified as Jan’s older brother, had resided and was employed in Ghent, where he died in the autumn of 1426. As an important master in the city, Hubert would 30 Concerning the evolution of the Coudenberg Palace, consult: P.-P. Bonenfant, “Les restes tangibles de l’Aula Magna de Philippe le Bon,” in Arlette Smolar-Maynart and André Vanrie, Le Quartier Royal , Brussels (1998): 96–113; Werner Paravicini, “Die Residenzen der Herzöge von Burgund, 1363–1477,” Werner Paravicini and Hans Pätze, eds. Fürstliche Residenzen im spätmittelalterlichen Europa (Vorträge und Forschungen des Konstanzer Arbeitskreises für mittelalterliche Geschichte, XXXVI) (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1991): 207–63; Krista De Jonge, “Der herzogliche und kaiserliche Palast zu Brüssel und die Entwicklung des höfischen Zeremoniells im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert”, Jahrbuch des Zentralinstituts für Kunstgeschichte, V–VI (1989–1990; Munich): 253–282; idem., “Het paleis op de Coudenberg te Brussel in de vijftiende eeuw. De verdwenen hertogelijke residenties in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden in een nieuw licht geplaatst”, Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Oudheidkunde en Kunstgeschiedenis/ Revue belge d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art, LXI(1991; Brussels): 5–38; idem., “Le palais de Charles Quint à Bruxelles. Ses dispositions intérieures aux XVe et XVIe siècles et le cérémonial de Bourgogne”, in J. Guillaume, red., Architecture et vie sociale. L’organisation intérieure des grandes demeures à la fin du Moyen Age et à la Renaissance. Centre d’Etudes Supérieures de la Renaissance. Actes du colloque tenu à Tours du 6 au 10 juin 1988 (De Architectura) (1994; Paris): 107–125; idem.,“’t Hof van Brabant’ als symbool van de Spaanse hofhouding in de Lage Landen”, Bulletin van de Koninklijke Nederlandse Oudheidkundige Bond, XCVIII, 5–6 (1999; Zeist): 183–198; idem., “Hofordnungen als Quelle der Residenzenforschung ? Adlige und herzogliche Residenzen in den südlichen Niederlanden in der Burgunderzeit”, in Werner Paravicini, H. Kruse, ed., Höfe und Hofordnungen/Ordonnances de l’Hôtel (1200– 1600). 5. Symposium der Residenzenkommission der Göttinger Akademie in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Deutschen Historischen Institut Paris. Sigmaringen, 5.–8. Oktober 1996 (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1999): 173–218; idem., “La Corte de Bruselas bajo los Duques de Borgoña y la Casa de Austria(siglos XV–XVII)”, Reales Sitios XL, 158 (2003): 62–70 ; idem., “C.7. Brüssel (Bruxelles)”, in Werner Paravicini, Jan Hirschbiegel, J. Wettlaufer, ed., Höfe und Residenzen im spätmittelalterlichen Reich. Ein dynastisch-topographisches Handbuch (Adademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, Residenzenforschung, Bd. 15), Vol. 1 (Ostfildern: Thorbecke, 2003): 90–94. Krista De Jonge, ed. Charles van den Heuvel, Birgit Franke, Tine Meganck, Annemie De Vos, Philippe Bragard, “Building Policy and Urbanisation during the Reign of the Archdukes: the Court and its Architects”, in Werner Thomas, Luc Duerloo, eds., Albert & Isabella (1598–1621. Essays (Turnhout: Brepols, 1998): 191–219.

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have had a workshop which might have been available to Jan. For most of 1430 Duke Philip the Good was in the field with his troops defending his borders against French attacks. Therefore, Jan’s contact with the ducal house during this period primarily would have been with the Duchess, whose role as an administrator and art patron merits greater scrutiny. Before turning to Ghent, however, the subject of Jan’s secular work circa 1430–32 might be addressed. A “House of Marvels” in Artois: Hesdin and Jan van Eyck’s “Ducal Hunts” Seeking true diversion from affairs of state, Philip the Good often withdrew to his hunting boxes, particularly during spring and autumn, the ideal seasons for hawking and pursuing beasts of venery. Near Brussels was Tervuren (Fig. 5.92), a small lodge which was expanded in the early seventeenth century to serve the Spanish Archdukes. Paintings and engravings of the estate reveal it was constructed on a platform over water. Also near Brussels was Philip the Good’s hunting box of Genappe. This residence and his residence at Mâle, which was close to Bruges, also were stationed on ponds. The Duke’s favorite countryside residence of Hesdin was closer to Lille and situated north of the Roman trading center of Hesdinum, perhaps named for St. Helena who visited in 292 (Figs. 5.93– 5.94). Hesdin’s huge Romanesque castle was built in 1067 in the form of a defensive pentagram with massive towers at the angles, which were entered by double doors, one of which was a pont levée. Within the paved central courtyard, the tower keep measured twenty-five meters in diameter, and stood near the great chapel and the house of the châtelain. As early as the thirteenth century, the outlying gardens further to the north were famed for their divertissements made possible by the Canche and Ternoise Rivers. Automatons, called engiens d’esbattement, were first installed in the gardens by Robert II d’Artois (1240–1302), a nephew of St. Louis IX, who had governed Sicily between 1285 and 1289 31 (Figs. 5.95–5.96). The 31 Robert I (1216–1249) was the son of Louis VIII of France (1187–1226) and Blanche of Castille (1188–1252: m. 1200) He became the Comte d’Artois in June of 1237 when he received not only Hesdin, but also the wool-producing towns of Arras and Saint-Omer. In 1237 Robert I married Mathilde (1224–1288), daughter of Henri II (1207–1247), Duke of Brabant, and Marie de Hohenstaufen of Swabia (1201–1240). Their daughter Blanche

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architects Jean de la Coupelle and Master Guissin directed initial renovations to the castle, but Renaud Coignet de Barlète, became the master of works on February 25, 1295. He arrived from Sicily with Robert II, and undoubtedly was familiar with Norman architecture in Palermo inspired by Muslim automated hydraulic systems, such as the Al-Aziza Palace with its interior water conduits and spectacular island garden. The northern parkland which covered about 940 hectares was laid out between 1292 and 1299, and though a large section of the estate comprised forests for hunting (Vallée de la Ternoise), orchards and vineyards, small manor houses over water were constructed. The most famous of the aquatic structures was called the Pavillon du Marès (and later the Pavillon des Fontaines). Subsidiary houses were proximate to the Pond Pavilion: the stud grange, the governor’s house, the low lodge and the higher loger sur l’yiaue (l’eau), which was constructed on piles. By 1302 the Pavillon du Marès over an artificial lake had an interior bridge, and several automated figures stood around the manor. While Mahaut d’Artois, the daughter of Robert II, continued to expand the landscape conceits in 1321, work ceased when she transferred to Paris where she died in 1329. The Hundred Years War brought some devastation to Hesdin as Edward III of England pillaged the site. Several structures were damaged in the gardens, including those standing in the most beautiful section of the Vallée de la Ternoise. In 1384 Philip the Bold (1342–1404) and his wife Margaret of Dampierre (1350–1405: m. 1469), daughter of Louis de Mâle, Count of Flanders, acquired the property of Hesdin (Fig. 5.97). Repairs and additions were made in 1391–92 to the Pavillon du Marès by Melchior Broederlam (c. 1355–1411), who also painted some chambers for Philip the Bold, and he may have installed wooden trick statues along walkways of the estate which would drench unsuspecting visitors with water.32 While Jean the (1248–1302) wed Henri of Navarre, then Edmond of Lancaster. Robert II was knighted by St. Louis IX on June 5, 1267, when he succeeding to the title. His wife Amicie de Courtenay (1240–1275: m. 1262) gave birth to a daughter Mahaut (1265–1329), who wed Otho IV of Burgundy († 1303 Battle of Courtrai), and was a Countess of Flanders. My thanks are given to the Association des Amis du site historique du Veil Hesdin, and to Rob Zeldenrust of Oeuf-en-Ternois. 32 Laurent de Boulogne and his son Hue, worked at the site, as well as Pierre Dubois, the maistre des engins d’esbattement. See Michel Brunet, “Le Parc d’attractions des Ducs de Bourgogne à Hesdin,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXXVIII (December, 1971, No. 1235): 330–42; Jules-Marie Richard, Une petite-niece de Saint-Louis, Mahaut, Comtesse d’Artois et de Bourgogne (1302-1329) (Paris: 1887); B. Danvin, Vicissitudes, Heur et Malheur de Vieil-

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Fearless created a military garrison at the castle, which as early as 1295 was surrounded by walls with twelve towers and six gates, his son Philip the Good preferred to use Hesdin as a retreat (Fig. 5.98). By the early 1430s, when the Duke of Burgundy ordered the restoration of Hesdin, the castle contained about seventy-five chambers and cabinets. Several galleries were spacious to accommodate tapestries Philip the Good transported from storage in Arras. One long salle probably decorated under Robert II d’Artois displayed hunting trophies. The effigies of wild boars on the walls were animated by pulling cords. The eastern side of the pentagon comprised the apartments of the duke and duchess, a sector which overlooked a large fountain and aviary, both of which were encased within a walled rose garden called “le petit paradis.” The aviary had been created in 1304 and was called either “la gloriette” or “la volière.”33 An unsuspecting visitor could walk within the enclosure to view the birds or admire the painted walls and statue of a seated king. But as a plaisanterie, they might be sprayed by water jetting down from artificial bowers. Live turtledoves, parakeets, goldfinches and tarins were caught by more sinister humor, as they were trapped by glue brushed upon leafy branches. The cages also contained polychromed wooden mechanical birds in the style of the Levant, and they were illuminated in the evening by candlelight. In 1372 Margaret of Flanders, who enjoyed the Hesdin as a summer residence, employed a keeper to care for three parakeets, so the kiosk modeled after a similar gaïole at Al-Aziza in Palermo must have been entrusted to the supervision of the Countess d’Artois. A trellis covered avenue linked the gloriette with the castle and it was used in inclement weather. Margaret of Flanders may have planned a labyrinth for her children, as in 1395 a Maison Dédalus closer to the small village of Grigny was created, the walls of which were fabricated from vines. Conceivably at its center was an immense cadran solaire called Le Miedi. The lead sun dial was painted white and its face rested in a socle upheld by six seated lions and leopards which in turn were supported by six atalantid savages. A menagerie was situated northwest of the castle, and it must have been diverting for the younger Hesdin (St. Pol. 1866); Monique Somme, “Les déplacements d’Isabelle de Portugal,” Revue du Nord 52 (1970): 183–97, at 186–88 (Hesdin); Richard Vaughan, Philip the Bold. The Formation of the Burgundian State (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962), 205–6. 33 Marguerite Charageat, “Le parc d’Hesdin, création monumentale du XIIIe siècle, ses origines arabes, son influence sur les miniatures de l’épître d’Orthéa,” Bulletin de la Société Historique d’Art Français (1950): 94–106.

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members of the family, as well as guests. The zoo contained camels, Friesian cows, peacocks, porcupines, leopards, lions, a white bear and an elephant. Philip the Good so enjoyed his outside amusements that he ordered the construction of an outdoor dining chamber which measured seven meters in length and four meters in width. Called la Roulette, it was set on wheels and pulled by horses with a side removed in order to view the landscape. Hesdin’s Pavilion des Marès remains the most legendary structure in the Vallée de la Ternoise and adjacent to this guest house was a beautiful hermitage. Tall lancet windows must have graced its interior because it was called the “Chapelle de verre.” Direct access to the glass chapel and manor was provided by a bridge adorned with six groups of seated wooden monkeys covered with natural badger fur which were operated mechanically like marionettes. The pavilion contained two superimposed galleries, each thirty-three meters square. The upper apartment was used by important visitors and it contained a salle, a chambre aux écus, which was painted with heralds, and a dressing room. Below was a vestibule with a statue of a hermit, that led to two rooms: a small cabinet with a distorting mirror made of Abbeville glass and installed in 1312 by Mahaut d’Artois as a replacement for one created in 1308; and the large galerie des engins below the upper salle initially constructed by Master Guissin for Robert II d’Artois which held machinations that functioned with lead pipes and cords. The square gallery had a paneled vault with a polychromed angel carved at each clef. Eight nude statues of ancient gods that appear to have decorated the consoles were designed to jet water. Water also sprayed down from the central bosse of the ceiling and machines were installed in the attic area between the two storeys to simulate the sounds of thunder and lightening. The ducal salle of special effects was renovated by Melchior Broederlam of Ypres. The same Flemish master painted small “histories” in the Pavilion des Marès between 1385 and 1392, but his work may have been limited to the guest apartments or to the lower walls of the ducal salle, specifically the lambris which was painted illusionistically to resemble actual tapestries. Colart le Voleur has been credited as the metteur-en-scène (engineer) who in 1431–1433 refurbished the mechanical drolleries of the lower theatrical salle. He likely was the artist responsible for the frescoes painted in the arcaded space above the lambris.34 He also must have completed 34 Colard was the son of Jehan le Voleur, painter and valet de chambre of Duke Jean the Fearless. See Léon de Laborde (Marquis), Les ducs de Bourgogne, études sur les lettres, les

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work for Philip the Good within the galleries of the ducal castle. Although the remarkable curiosities of the pentagon fortress were destroyed when Emperor Charles V razed the site on July 28, 1553, an accounting record of Colard’s restorations in the Pavilion des Marès has been transcribed.35 (Fig. 5.99) The duke’s clerk, who must have personally witnessed the automatons of Hesdin in action, provides crucial information about the interior disposition of the Great Hall of amusements. His account about the ducal salle opens: … For painting the gallery of the castle in exactly the same style as before, ornately and with the best available materials. For making or refurbishing the three figures which can be made to squirt water at people … a contrivance at the entrance of the said gallery for wetting the ladies as they walk over it, and a distorting mirror; and for constructing a device over the entrance of the gallery, which when a ring is pulled, showers soot or flour in the face of anyone below … in the same gallery, a fountain from which water spurts

arts et l’industrie pendant le XVe siècle et plus particulièrement dans les Pays-Bas et le duché de Bourgogne, Seconde partie. Preuves, 3 vols. (Paris: Plon Frères, 1849–1852), I, 206, No. 697. Also consult Anne Élisabeth Cléty, “Les machines extraordinaires d’Hesdin aux XIVe et XVe siècles,” Sucellus –Dossiers archéologiques, historiques et culturels du Nord – Pas-de-Calais XLIV (1997), 60; François Duceppe-Lamarre, “Le parc à gibier d’Hesdin. Mises au point et nouvelles orientations de recherches,” Revue du Nord – Archéologie de la Picardie et du Nord de la France XLIII, No. 83 (2001): 175–84; idem., “Une économie de l’imaginaire à l’oeuvre. Le cas de la réserve cynégétique d’Hesdin (Artois, XIIIe–XVe siècles),” La Forêt en Europe (XIIIe–XXe siècle), 24es journées internationales d’histoire de Flaran, 6–8 Septembre 2002); B. Franke, “Gesellschaftspiele mit Automaten – ‘Merveilles’ in Hesdin,” Marburger Jahrbuch für Kunstwisschenscaft XXIV (1997): 135–58. See also Lille Archives de Nord B 387/17307, November 1544. 35 Anne van Buren-Hagopian, “Images monumentales de la Toison d’or: aux murs du château d’Hesdin et en tapisserie,” L’Ordre de la Toison d’or, de Philippe le Bon à Philippe le Beau (1430–1505): idéal ou reflet d’une société? (Brussels-Turnout: exhibition catalogue, Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ier-Brepols, 1996): 226–33; idem; “Le château d’Hesdin: son plan et sa décoration artistique, d’après les documents d’archives,” Commission d’histoire et d’archéologie du Pas-de-Calais (communication). Van Buren-Hagopian also has addressed the subject of Hesdin’s chapel: “Trois inventaires de la chapelle du château d’Hesdin (1384– 1469). Vêtements liturgiques, manuscrits et un reliquaire de saint Louis” (Rencontres de Fribourg du 14 au 16 Septembre 1984: “Activités artistiques et pouvoirs dans les États des ducs de Bourgogne et des Hapsbourg et les régions voisines”), Publications du Centre d’Études Bourguignonnes (XIVe –XVIe siècles) XXV (Bâle: 1985).

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and is pumped back again, and another contrivance, at the exit from the gallery, which buffets anyone who passes … on the head and shoulders.36 The three automatons which squirted water are not identified. However, because “hermit statues” are mentioned, they should be interpreted within the secular context of a medieval romance (Fig. 5.100). Chivalric literature centered upon the training of young knights. They often were educated by holy hermits in forests before embarking upon their adventures. The worldly trials which test a knight’s courage, virtú, and dexterity seem to be suggested by the diabolical tricks which awaited guests at Hesdin. Hidden conduits were timed to spray water and apparati were armed either to paint the faces of hapless victims with soot or flour or soundly thrash them. The clerk who describes Colard’s restorations, mentions the “room before the hermit” : Where water can be made to spray down just like rain, also thunder, lightening and snow, as if from the sky itself; and, next to this room, a wooden hermit which can be made to speak to anyone who enters … for paving the half of this room which was not previously paved, including the place where people go to avoid the rain, whence they are precipitated into a sack of feathers below.37 The vicissitudes of fortune may have been a theme of the Great Hall (Fig. 5.101–5.103). Superstitious guests were encouraged by a speaking hermit statue to move to a specific spot in the ducal salle, where they would be first inundated by rain, and then frightened by lightening and claps of thunder. As the air cooled, snow would fall. Advised to seek refuge, the same gullible visitors would be led to a sheltered area only to confront a precarious Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 138. See also Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 266 and note 132, who cites André Joseph Ghislain Le Glay [1785–1863] et al. Lille, Inventaire-sommaire des Archives départementales antérieures à 1790, Nord. Archives civiles, Série B, Chambre des Comptes de Lille, 10 vols. (Lille, Impr. de L. Danel, 1865–1906), IV (ed. Chrétien César Auguste Dehaisnes: 1877), 124; Laborde, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, No. 957 and No. 944–958 (1433 Account: Nord B 1948). 37 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 138. 38 Joseph Archer Crowe and Giovanni Battista Cavascalle, The Early Flemish Painters: Notices of Their Lives and Works (London: John Murray Publishers,1857), 2nd ed., 237–39, suggest the victims were court ladies. For the actual transcription, see Vaughan, Philip the 36

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pitfall into feathers.38 Water for the special effects apparently was stored in the attic between the floors. The clerk comments that in order to complete the renovation, Colart le Voleur had to reinforce the part “which produced the rain” and “had become too weak.” Concurrently with his restoration of the vaulted ceiling, the Duke’s engineer repaired a bridge in the same chamber, constructed in such an artful way that crossing men were caused to fall into the water of the moat below. Either sections of the woodwork were rigged to collapse upon contact, or the overpass had trap doors. The entire room was triggered to drench the unwary. The clerk continues: There are several devices in this room, which, when set off, spray large quantities of water … as well as six figures … which soak people in different ways. In the entrance, there are eight conduits for wetting women from below and three conduits which, when people stop in front … cover them all over with flour.39 The square hall’s fenestrations were rigged as well, as when they were opened, an automaton would appear, perhaps from behind draperies, to first spray the unsuspecting visitor with water, and then close the window. The clerk additionally mentions a “book of ballads” lying on a desk, which when Good, 138. The Book of the Ordre of Chyvalry by the medieval Catalan Franciscan Ramón Llull {† 1315) was translated into English by William Caxton in 1483–85. The text re-iterated ideas presented in Arthurian literature. Like Merlin, the solitary magician who teaches a young Arthur, Llull’s hermit instructs a squire in woodland. Placing chivalry in a cosmological context, the hermit compares God, the supreme monarch of the seven spheres, with the terrestrial Prince, around whom the knights revolve as planets. See Ramón Llull, The Book of the Ordre of Chyvalry, translated by William Caxton, ed. Alfred Thomas Plestad Byles (London: Early English Text Society, Oxford University Press, 1926), 1–2. It is interesting that Caxton sustained an interest in the chivalric account written by Christine de Pisan (1384–1431), Les faits d’armes et de chevalerie. See William Caxton, Boke of the fayt of armes and of chyualrye (Westminster: 14 July 1489, 144 folios; Washington DC, Library of Congress, Rare Book Collection). Also see Christine de Pisan, The book of fayttes of armes and of chyualrye, translated by Alfred Thomas Plestad Byles (London: Early English Text Society, printed by H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1932); idem., The Book of Deeds of Arms and of Chivalry, translated by Sumner Willard, ed. Charity Cannon Willard (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1999); idem., “The Concept of True Nobility at the Burgundian Court,” Studies in the Renaissance XIV (1967): 33–48; Richard Deacon, A Biography of William Caxton: The first English editor, printer, merchant, and translator (London: Muller, 1976). 39 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 138.

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tentatively touched would squirt soot, and when more intrepidly opened would spray water. By its description as a songbook, the trick manuscript may have symbolized the distractions facing a knight, the allure of sensual pleasures which would deflect a cavalier from his quest. This meaning to the ballad book seems to be confirmed by the devious placement of a mirror in the chamber. By contrast with the “distorting mirror” in the cabinet room, this was a ladies’ looking glass installed to attract those temptresses who were guilty of vanity. Invited to look at their disheveled reflected images, they would be showered with even more flour. Perhaps Mahaut d’Artois distorting mirror was broken in 1308 by a noblewoman lacking humor at being so thoroughly humiliated. After describing the “temptations” within the salle, the accounting clerk remarks further: “A wooden figure, which appears above a bench in the middle of the gallery announces, at the sound of a trumpet, on behalf of the duke, that everyone must leave the gallery.”40 Those vulnerable souls who still found the courage to linger were beaten by “large figures holding sticks” and drenched again. As they left the chamber, they would behold a daunting sight, an automaton making faces over a window. This mechanical figure was suspended above a box which emitted voices. After all the renovations, Duke Philip the Good still requested Colard de Voleur to add more diabolical waterworks in the chamber: to make conduits and suitable contrivances low down and all along the wall of the gallery, to squirt water in so many places that nobody in the gallery could possibly save themselves from getting wet, and other conduits and devices everywhere under the pavement to wet the ladies from underneath.41 The clerk’s account provides a fairly clear picture of the special effects in Hesdin’s Great Hall. But he only briefly mentions Colard de Voleur’s painting in the Great Hall: He has decorated the room in front of the hermit, where it can be made to rain, in good quality of oil colours of gold, azure, and so on…, and he has done the whole ceiling and paneling of this room in azure sewn with large stars picked out in gold.42 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 138–39. Vaughan, Philip the Good, 139. 42 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 139. 40 41

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Nothing remains of the Great Hall at Hesdin which so captivated William Caxton. Describing Philip the Good as the “firste fondeur” of the Order of the Golden Fleece, the late fifteenth-century author mentions the “chambre in the Castell of Hesdyn wherein was craftly and curiously depeynted the conqueste of the Golden Flese by the sayd Iason in whiche chambre I haue ben and seen the sayd historie so depeynted. & in remembraunce of Medea & of her connying & science.”43 Caxton relates the gallery simulated the changing weather, thunder and lightening as well as snow and rain. For this reason, any paintings designed as a tribute to the Burgundian Order of the Golden Fleece must have lined the upper walls of the Great Hall.44 According to financial accounts, Colart le Voleur and his assistants created murals of the History of Jason cycle for Hesdin’s Great Hall between 1431 and 1433.45 Five drawings for the project have been identified in Berlin (Figs. 5.104–5.105), 43 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 267, quotes Caxton. He cites, 267 note 3, Raoul Lefèvre {flourished 1460), Jason et Medée, translated as The History of Jason [Westminister: 1477] by William Caxton [1422–1491], ed. John Munro (London: Early English Text Society-K. Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd. and H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1913), 2 (Caxton: folio 2B). Smith credits (267 and note 4) Georg Troescher, Burgundische Malerei. Maler und Malwerke um 1400 in Burgund, dem Berry mit der Auvergne und in Savoyen mit ihren Quellen und Ausstrahlungen, 2 vols. (Berlin: Mann, 1966), I, 105–6, inventory no. 14721 a–e, with connecting Caxton’s description at Hesdin with the drawings. Raoul Lefèvre’s Jason et Medée (Paris: Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, MS. 5067) was illuminated by Loyset Liédet between 1460 and 1467. See Smith, 351. 44 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 268 and note 136, refers to a lecture in Chicago at College Arts Association delivered by Anne van BurenHagopian. Based upon documents and style, both independently reached the conclusion that Colard Le Voleur was the artist of the Berlin drawings even if Jean Mansel planned the iconography of the Great Hall. The narrative sequence of the drawings begins with the rarely depicted flight of Phrixis and Helle on a golden ram after their step-mother Ino ordered their sacrifice to Zeus. Helle falls into the sea but Phrixis endures to deliver the ram to Zeus, depicted in the Berlin drawing as Mars. For a fuller discussion of the themes in the Berlin drawings, and documents concerning Hesdin, see Smith, 268–70 and Anne van BurenHagopian, “Images monumentales de la Toison d’or: aux murs du château de Hesdin et en tapisserie,” in L’ordre de la Toison d’or : de Philippe le Bon à Philippe le Beau, 1430–1505: idéal ou reflet d’une société?, under the direction of Pierre Cockshaw and edited by Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens, Evencio Beltran, et al. (Brussels-Turnhout: Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique-Brepols, 1996, 226–33. 45 Gideon replaced Jason as figurehead for the order. Philip the Good in 1449 commissioned eight tapestries of The History of Gideon and the Golden Fleece. Jean Aubrey, guardian of the duke’s tapestries hired the Arras master Baudouin de Baillou to design the panels which were woven in Tournai by Robert Dary and Jehan de l’Ortie. They were displayed initially in 1456 at the Golden Fleece chapter meeting in The Hague and on

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and judging by their horizontal format and panoramic landscape views, they pertained to frescoes that indeed wrapped around the room. Whether the murals were accompanied by explicatory script is impossible to know, but such text would have been difficult to read if the paintings were disposed high on the walls. Judging by the illuminations of Christine de Pisan’s La Mutation de Fortune (Figs. 5.106–5.108), murals in the “Castle of Fortune” were accompanied by titles, so the viewer could better understand the sequential events of history and the capricious nature of fortune.46 Perhaps some of the scenes illustrating the versions of La Mutation de Fortune were based upon important ceremonial occasions. For a discussion of the Gideon tapestries, consult Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 149–59, who cites several sources but particularly (149–150 notes 71–72): Jean Lestocquoy, “L’Atelier de Baudouin de Bailleul et la tapisserie de Gédéon,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art VIII (1938): 119–35; Jozef Duverger, Laatmiddeleeuws tapijtwerk met de geschiedenis van Jasoon en Gedeon,” West-Vlaanderen 11, No. 65 (1962): 317–29; Georges Doutrepont, “Jason et Gédéon, patrons de la Toison d’or,” Mélanges Godefroid Kurth II (Liège-Paris: ChampionVaillant-Carmanne, 1908), 191–208. Sharing in the exploits of the Argonauts, Hercules supposedly was knighted by King Creon. See Raoul Lefèvre, Stair Ercuil ocus a bás. The Life and Death of Hercules, edited and translated by Gordan Quin (Dublin: Irish Texts Society, Educational Company of Ireland, Ltd., 1939). Lefèvre in his Recueil des Histoires de Troie (1464) composed for Philip the Good, states that Hercules elevated Jason to knighthood in the Order of the Golden Fleece. As Smith pertinently observes, 45, the bond between the heroes so admired by Philip the Good may have been the ”message of the complete Jason Cycle” at Hesdin. The Recueil des Histoires de Troie (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale, MS. 9261) was illuminated by Loyset Liédet. See Smith, 352. Also consult: Alphonse Bayot, “La Légende de Troie à la Cour de Bourgogne,” Société d’Émulation de Bruges I (Bruges: 1908); H. Oskar Sommer (ed.), The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye written in French by Raoul Lefèvre [1474], translated and printed by William Caxton [1422–1491], 2 vols. (London: D. Nutt, 1894), II, 312–16. Jacques Bacri, “L’Histoire d’Hercule – tapesserie du Musée des Gobelins,” Gazette des Beaux-Art XII (1934): 204–11; Alphonse Bossuat, “Les origines troyennes: leur rôle dans la littérature historique au XVe siècle,” Annales de Normandie (1958): 187–97; Constantin Marinesco, “Les origines de la Toison d’Or et du Voeu du Faisan, 1454,” Le Flambeau XXXIX (1956): 382–84; Jean Rychner, La littérature et les moeurs chevaleresques à la cour de Bourgogne (Neuchate: H. Messeiller, 1950). 46 Christine de Pisan, Le livre de la mutacion de fortune, ed. Suzanne Solente (Paris: A. & J. Picard, 1959). The comparisons between Hesdin and illuminations in manuscripts authored by Christine de Pisan [1363–1431], daughter of an Italian astrologer patronized by King Charles V of France, are provided merely to underscore the popularity at court of certain historical epics that aptly demonstrated fluctuations in temporal fortune. La Mutatión de Fortune by Christine de Pisan was written about 1400–November 1403, and it is largely autobiographical. A copy was given in 1404 to Philip the Bold (1342–1404), the second

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the guest apartments at the Pavilion des Marès, which assuredly contained decoration for the edification of visiting nobility.47 Tapestries would have been displayed at Hesdin Castle when Philip the Good frequented the estate. The July 1420 inventory of Philip the Good’s household treasures included several sets of weavings that were transported as the Duke traveled to his diverse residences.48 Excluding the sacred subjects, battle themes and subjects of French history, the inventory lists a few secular tapestries which would have complimented the chivalric mélange of automatons in the Great Hall of Conceits: The Nine Worthies, male and female, The Seven Sages, perhaps “ancient sibyls,” and individual panels of Jason, Stag-hunting, and Shepherds and Shepherdesses.49 As court artist of John of Bavaria between 1422 and 1425, Jan van Eyck might have created paintings on linen in The Hague, but there is no documentation to support activity as a grand-scale muralist then or later at the court of Philip the Good. Some have accepted Jan to be “Hand G” of

Duke of Burgundy (1363) and brother of Charles V. Replicas were illuminated about 1405– 10. See the manuscripts in: Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Fr. 603; London: British Museum, MS. 9508; Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, MS Gall. II. 47 The l’Epitre de Othéa à Hector which also concerns the vicissitudes of fortune, was compiled about 1399–1400. The manuscript in the Paris Bibliotheque Nationale (MS. Fr. 606) probably was composed for Christine’s son Jean and it was dedicated to Louis of Orléans (1371–1407), whose wife Valentina Visconti of Milan was a close friend. Also see Christine de Pisan, Letter of Othea to Hector, translated by Jane Chance (Newburyport, MA: Focus Information Group, 1990); idem, The Epistle of Othea, translated by Stephen Scrope, ed. Curt F. Bühler (London-New York, Oxford University Press, 1970); Gianni Mombello, La tradizione manoscritta dell’Epistre Othea di Christine de Pizan (Turin: Accademia delle Scienze, 1967); idem., Quelques aspects de la pensée politique de Christine de Pizan d’après ses oeuvres publiées (Turin: 1971); Sandra L. Hindman, Christine de Pizan’s “Epistre Othéa”: Painting and Politics at the Court of Charles VI (Toronto, Canada: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1986); Christine de Pisan, Les cent histoires de Troye: l’Epistre de Othea, deesse de prudence, enuoyee a lesperit cheualereux Hector de Troye, auec cent hystoires (Paris: Philippe Pigouchet, ca. 1499–1500; 52 folios); Joseph van den Gheyn, Christine de Pisan. Épître d’Othéa, déese de la prudence, à Hector, chef des Troyens [100 miniatures of MS. 9392 by Jean Miélot in the Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique] (Brussels: Vromant & Co., 1913). 48 For the inventory see: E. van Drival, Les Tapisseries d’Arras, Étude Artistique et Historique (Arras: A. Courtin, 1864), 124–32; Léon de Laborde (Marquis), Les ducs de Bourgogne. Études sur les Lettres, les Arts et l’Industrie pendant le XVe siècle, II, No. 4258–4311. 49 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 152. See George Doutrepont, Inventaire de la “librarie” de Philippe le Bon (1420), ed. P. Weissenbruck (Brussels: Commission Royale d’Histoire, Kiessling et Cie, 1906) and 2nd ed. (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1977).

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the Turin-Milan Hours, and pictured his art of the early 1420s as limited to manuscript illuminations and panels of a miniature nature (Fig. 5.109). In 1429 he creates the two portraits of the Portuguese Infanta Isabel, yet his versatility in working with multiple-figure compositions is suggested by the well-balanced Fons Vitae replicas and the Metropolitan Museum Diptych. A discrepancy in figure types, however, exists between the New York Calvary and Last Judgment and the Fons Vitae paintings, but then the latter are replicas of a lost original. As mentioned earlier, when Ambassador Tatistcheff acquired the wing panels of the Crucifixion and Last Judgment in Spain in 1845 they purportedly were shutters to an “Adoration of the Magi,” that had been stolen.50 This supposed centerpiece has never been found in Spain, which is odd, considering the sustained regard for Flemish art by the Catholic Monarchs and their Hapsburg successors.51 Drawings of the Epiphany theme in Amsterdam and Berlin (Figs. 5.110) have been discussed with reference to “Hand G” of the Turin-Milan Hours, yet both stylistically are quite remote from the Metropolitan Museum Diptych, particularly the more complete Berlin composition with its attenuated, almost ethereal, physical types.52 Ascribed to “Hand G,” is an anomalous kind of figure which has been recognized in the Metropolitan Museum Diptych. The same physical type resurfaces again, but only as a stylistic footnote in the Madonna of Chancellor Rolin, with its two courtiers standing on a background terrace (Fig. 5.111). Depicted on a small scale, all have the aspect of fluid contours, disproportionate anatomy, triangular faces, square jaws and distinctive features. These aberrant dramatis personae stand in marked contrast to the anatomically proportioned, defined figures with broader shoulders and rounded faces which in 1432

50 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), 153–57, at 153. W.H. James Weale, Jan and Hubert van Eyck.Their Life and Work, 201, pointed out the resemblance of the Metropolitan Diptych to miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours. 51 Sansovino in his Descrizione di Venezia of 1580 mentions an Adoration of the Magi by Jan van Eyck in the Venetian Church of Our Lady of the Servites. See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 201. 52 Ludwig Baldass, Jan van Eyck (New York-London: Phaidon Publishers, Inc., 1952), 95 (text) and 290 (catalogue): No. 77 (Berlin pen-drawing, 15 x 12.4 cm) and No. 78 (Amsterdam silverpoint drawing on green ground, 12.6 x 12.5 cm). Baldass states that both replicate lost works by the “Chief Master of the Turin-Milan Hours ,” and he further comments on the Amsterdam work that it “is hardly after the lost centre-piece” of the Metropolitan Diptych.

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populate the interior of the Ghent Altarpiece.53 The “Hand G” miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours manifest an incomparable sense of tactility compared to other illuminations by artists of the French school, save perhaps the folios of the Hours of Maréchal Boucicaut. Anecdotally dense in nature, the “Hand G” miniatures pictorially are arresting in their truncated fields of view which compel imagining what is not visible. Universally accepted as by Jan van Eyck, the folios of the Birth of St. John the Baptist, Arrest of Christ, Voyage of St. Julian, Mass of the Dead and Prayer on the Shore also manifest a novel approach to the treatment of atmospheric space, illusionist lighting, and an unprecedented verisimilitude in the representation of movement.54 Following his 1428–29 visit to the Iberian Peninsula, Jan appears to have abandoned his inventive exploration of movement, but he became even more preoccupied with atmospheric lighting effects. The Baptism of Christ in the Turin-Milan Hours honors the patron saint of John of Bavaria (Fig. 5.112), and the subject includes an inventive reference to the Holy Trinity which is analogous to the three carnations held by the Eyckian Man with a Pink identified with the Order of St. Anthony. The landscape additionally reveals a playful delight in replicating the appearance of reflections on water and the illusion of nature’s minutiae beneath the still surface of the Jordan River is captured. The bas-de-page Christ is deftly connected by the diagonal movement of the dove of the Holy Spirit with the historiated capital where God is revealed as the source of divine illumination. St. Elizabeth’s “bedchamber of honor” above the Baptism is a room abundant in paraphernalia. But it is significantly closed to natural light. Such is not the case in Van Eyck’s 1434 Portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife (Fig. 5.113), which presents a more mature treatment of light reflections. The Arnolfini mise-en-scène may be the same as that of the Baptist’s birth, but a window is included so that soft rays diffuse from the left to illuminate the couple’s apparel and the symbolic appointments within their space.55 Catherine Reynolds, “The King of Painters,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 1–16, at 9–10. 54 James H. Marrow, “History, Historiography and Pictorial Invention in the TurinMilan Hours,” In Detail. New Studies of Northern Renaissance Art in Honor of Walter S. Gibson, ed. Laurinda S. Dixon (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 1998), 1–14, especially 7–11. 55 Marrow, “History, Historiography and Pictorial Invention in the Turin-Milan Hours,” 9, elaborates on Elizabeth’s chamber which opens to other rooms of her household. He pertinently notes Jan’s manner of engaging the spectator by portraying the cat’s reaction. 53

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Jan’s preoccupation with lighting may be related to personal discussions with Master Jácome-Antonio, who built the ducal palace at Guimarães in a French aesthetic typified by an unprecedented schema of spacious, welllighted galleries, and who also was a specialist in the painting of frescoes. Documents in Lille establish that Philip the Good called Jan to Hesdin Castle in 1432.56 (Fig. 5.114–5.115) Because decoration of the residence had been ongoing for at least a year, Jan would not have visited as an iconographer or as an evaluator of a completed programme, but to render his opinion as a technical advisor. To have demonstrated his acumen on fresco projects at Hesdin in 1432, commenting in fact upon the skills of the renowned Colart de Voleur, Jan must have possessed superior technical knowledge of the medium. A trip to Florence in 1425–1426 would have exposed him to the art of Masaccio and his contemporaries, but in the company of a ducal retinue, time would have been limited for artistic exchange. In Portugal, however, Jan had several months to spend in the company of Jácome-Antonio, an artist who arrived to Lisbon in the company of Dom Gomes Eanes, the Abbot of La Badia Fiorentina and King João I’s “ambassador extraordinaire.” Whether or not his identity as Jacques Coene is accepted, Jácome-Antonio would have been fully informed about the latest decorative projects in Florence. Though the only fresco by his hand is the greatly restored Madonna of the Rose in Coimbra’s Church of São Francisco, he assuredly created other murals for the residences and chapels of the Avis court. If the Renaissance “Eagle” of João I so praised by Francisco de Holanda indeed was Jacques Coene, the illuminator-architect from Bruges already had achieved a reputation in Paris for his “color recipes” in linen painting. Having direct contact with an artist of Coene’s stature, Jan van Eyck would have assimilated the grander figural The feline alarm expressed in this miniature contrasts with the welcoming terrior in the Arnolfini double-portrait. Working centuries later, Diego da Silva Velázquez, familiar with Jan’s painting, placed a dog in his Las Meninas, to create the impression of incipient action. In this case, a large hunting dog is nudged by a court dwarf to move, as King Philip IV and Queen Mariana have just entered the artist’s studio. Similar to the Arnolfini interior, a mirror reflects the presence of these august visitors. Equally apparent too, is Velázquez’s commanding use of light which causes the viewer to travel through the atelier to the background steps where a chamberlain opens a door for the monarchs. 56 Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 264–70. See Weale and Brockewell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxv, Document 17, wherein payment to “Iohannes d’Eick, paintre” is made of 19l. for “having by order of the Duke, come to him at Hesdin from Bruges, and for his journey back.” Weale refers to the Lille Archives of the Department of the North, B 1942.

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scale which characterizes the fine art of fresco and peint drap. That he was still grappling with proportion is proven by the discrepancy in figure types which exists between the Fons Vitae and the New York Calvary and Last Judgment. An Otter Hunt by the hand of “Gianes de Brugia” was described in Padua by Marcantonio Michiel. Writing about 1520–1530, the author elaborates that the landscape illustrated “fishermen capturing an otter with two onlookers.” Painted on canvas, the work was viewed in the house of the humanist Leonico Tomeo on San Francesco Street.57 W.H. James Weale related the composition on linen to the four tapestries of an Otter and Bear Hunt from Devonshire dated about 1445.58 (Figs. 5.116–5.119) Elisabeth Dhanens additionally asserts that “traces of Jan’s work, both in style and content” can be found in two sketches of a Costume Book attributed to Peter Paul Rubens in the British Museum, folios 14v and 24.59 (Fig. 5.120–1.21) Though Rubens traveled to Padua, his Eyckian drawings which illustrate vignettes of falconry and boar hunting probably were not after the lost linen painting in Leonico Tomeo’s house. As diplomat to the Spanish Governors Albert and Isabel, Rubens had direct access to the Hapsburg collections in the Imperial Palace of Brussels and the archducal hunting retreats at Tervuren, Mariemont and Binche. The drawings of the hunt in the Costume Book suggest they were modeled after an archetype in one of the former residences frequented by the Duke of Burgundy. Emperor Charles V ordered the demolishing of Hesdin about 1550, and therefore, the sketches in Rubens’ Costume Book were not after works 57 Diane Wolfthal, The Beginnings of Netherlandish Canvas Painting: 1400–1530 (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989, 11 and 196 notes 51–56 (pros and cons for attributing the work to Jan van Eyck). She cites Marcantonio Michiel [1486– 1582], Notizia d’opere di disegna nella prima meta del secolo XVI, ed. D. J. Morelli (Bassano: 1800), 14 and note 28; [Marcantonio Michiel], The Anonimo: Notes on Pictures and Works of Art in Italy made by an Anonymous Writer in the Sixteenth Century, translated by Paolo Mussi, ed. George Charles Williamson (London: G. Bell and Sons, 1903), 18; Theodor von Frimmel, Der Anomio Morelliano (Vienna: Graeser, 1888); see rpt. edition, 1896, 16–17. 58 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 201 and note 3. Also consult George Wingfield Digby assisted by Wendy Hefford, The Devonshire Hunting Tapestries (London: H.M.S.O., 1971) for the panels attributed to Jean Wallois. He belonged to a family of weavers in Arras with a history of employment by John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy. Jean was actively patronized by Philip the Good. See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 335, 337–38 and notes. 59 Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 155–59, at 159 for the quote.

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at that castle.60 However, his vignettes perhaps were taken from a larger composition of the Festin des Ducs de Burgundy which once was displayed in the Coudenberg Palace. Lost in the fire of February 3, 1731, this work is elusive, as its medium is not indicated in extant records of the Imperial collections.61 However, the 1420 inventory of Philip the Good’s household does record a tapestry which seems to fit the subject of Rubens’ drawings: “nine large tapestries and two smaller ones, worked in gold, showing plovers, partridges and other birds, with the figures of the late Duke John [the Fearless] and my lady the duchess his wife [Margaret of Bavaria], both on foot and on horseback.”62 If the panels illustrated a ducal hunting party, would they not have included the Prince of Charolais? Rubens shows several couples, including two pairs of equestrians, whose high status is underscored by their elegant woolen houppelandes trimmed in fur, and their headdresses which consist of veiled bourrelets or chaperons. The costumes of the women in his sketches correspond to the type of courtly raiment worn by Queen Cliotilde in The Legend of King Clovis and the Fleurs-de-lys, from The Bedford Hours (Fig. 5.122). Commissioned by John of Lancaster, the manuscript in the British Library was illuminated soon after the May 13, 1423 marriage of the Duke of Bedford to John the Fearless’ daughter, Anne of Burgundy. In 1409 Philip the Good married his first wife, Michelle of France (1395– July 8, 1422).63 If she was depicted in the tapestry set of a “Ducal Bird Hunt” (Fig. 5.123), and shown in the company of Philip and his parents, the composition then would have corresponded with description of the lost Brussels Festin as illustrating at least two “Dukes of Burgundy.” Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 270. Marcel de Maeyer, Albrecht en Isabella en de Schilderkunst. Bijdragen tot die geschiedenis van de XVIIe eewse schilderkunst in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden (Brussels: Verhandlingen van der Koninklijke Akademie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten, 9, 1955), 467. Also consult Louis-Prosper Gachard, “L’Incendie du palais royal de Bruxelles (3 Fevrier 1731),” Bulletin de ‘Academie Royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique 2c série, 35 (1873): 109–48. 62 Vaughan, Philip the Good, 152. 63 Auguste Longnon, Paris pendant la dominition anglaise (1420–1436) (Paris: 1878); Janet Backhouse, The Bedford Hours (London: The British Library, 1990); idem., “A reappraisal of the Bedford Hours,” British Library Journal VII (1981): 47–69; B.J.H. Rowe, “Notes on the Clovis miniature and the Bedford Portrait in the Bedford Book of Hours,” Journal of the British Archaeological Association XXV, third series (1962): 56–65; AE.P. Spencer, “The Master of the Duke of Bedford: The Bedford Hours,” The Burlington Magazine CVII (1965): 495– 502; idem., “The Master of the Duke of Bedford: The Salisbury Breviary,” The Burlington Magazine CVIII (1966): 607–12; Klaus Günther Perls, “Le tableau de la famille des Juvenal 60 61

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The fact that Rubens provides color annotations and chiaroscural effects in his Costume Book is intriguing, as the markings and interest in shading suggest he was studying either a wall painting or a painting on linen. His figures lack the precise details which characterized Late Gothic tapestries like millefleurs, which were embroidered with literally hundreds of finely-worked tinctured threads. The Paduan Otter Hunt on fabric and the slightly later tapestries in Devonshire compel a notion that popular subjects were replicated in diverse media at the court of Philip the Good. Tapestries were the most costly items, followed by works on linen, murals, and panel painting. The expensive set of “Ducal Bird Hunt” tapestries must have been inherited by Duke Philip from John the Fearless, and they could have been replicated in peint drap by Jan van Eyck. His expertise in the medium is at least insinuated by inventory descriptions of a few works, which, due to the fragile nature of fabric, are lost. While Rubens’ drawings may capture the appearance of an original linen picture by Jan, they still remain mere fragments of a grander composition consisting probably of several panels painted on cloth. Even so, the hunting sketches with paired figures have traits in common with the anonymous frescoes of the Months of the Year commissioned by the Bishop of Trent about 1400–April 1407 for the Castello del Buonconsiglio. Otto Pächt pertinently compared the composition of June with an Eyckian “Hunting Party” which has been tracked to the Hapsburg collection of Archduchess Mary of Hungary.64 (Fig. 5.124) Had Jan van Eyck made a pilgrimage to Italy in 1425–26 on behalf of Philip the Good, he readily could have visited Trent and completed sketches after the murals in the “Eagle Tower.” The Versailles Hunting Party A Festivity at the Court of Philip the Good at Versailles (164 x 120 cm) universally has been accepted as a sixteenth-century replica of an Eyckian des Ursins: le Maître du duc de Bedford et Hancelin de Haguenau,” Revue de l’Art Ancien et Moderne LXVIII (1935): 173–80; Jenny Stratford, The Bedford Inventories: The Worldly Goods of John, Duke of Bedford, Regent of France, 1389–1435 (London: Society of Antiquaries of London, 1993); idem., “The Manuscripts of John, Duke of Bedford: Library and Chapel,” England in the XVth Century,” Proceedings of the 1986 Harlaxton Symposium, ed. D. Williams (Woodbridge: 1987). 64 Otto Pächt, Van Eyck. Die Begründer al altniederländischen Malerei, ed. Maria SchmidtDengler (Munich: Prestel-Verlag. 1989), 115–16.

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work (Figs. 5.125–5.126).65 Another version of the “Hunting Party” in Dijon has been dated to the seventeenth century and attributed to the French School.66 The lost original by Jan van Eyck traveled to Spain following the abdication of Emperor Charles V (1500–1558) on October 25, 1555. His sister, Archduchess Mary of Hungary (1505–1558), transported many objects from the imperial collection, culling the majority of treasures from two primary residences: the Castle of Mechelen (Malines) northeast of Brussels, the favored residence of Archduchess Margaret of Austria (1480–1530); and Binche in Hainaut, a Burgundian fortress rarely visited by Philip the Good, but Mary of Hungary’s preferred hunting box.67 King Philip II (1527: r. 1555–1598), who inherited his aunt’s magnificent 65 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 162–68, who states another version is at Azay-leRideau. A seventeenth-century replica attributed to the French School is in Dijon, Musée des Beaux-Arts (oil on canvas: 161 x 117 cm). 66 The Dijon painting measures 161 x 117 cm. The Versailles and Dijon paintings likely were created by Flemish painters at the archducal court of Brussels. The earlier Versailles picture, created after the Pardo original in the sixteenth century, would have served as the model for the Dijon painting, which was acquired by the museum in 1951. There are some minor variations, such as the capture of a swan which appears in the upper right landscape of the Versailles painting but is absent in the Dijon version. See François Duceppe-Lamarre, “La résidence ducale d’Hesdin et sa place dans l’art curial au temps des princes des fleurs de lis (1384–1419),” L’art à la cour de Bourgogne, Le mécénat de Philippe le Hardi et de Jean sans Peur (1360–1420), eds. Stephen N. Fliegel and Sophie Jugie, with the collaboration of Virginie Barthélémy, Agnieszka Laguna-Chevillotte, Marie-Laure Grunewald, Catherine Tran et al. (Dijon-Cleveland: Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon-Cleveland Museum of Art, 2004–2005): 160–63. 67 Alexandre Pinchart, “Tableaux et sculptures de Marie d’Austriche, reine douainière de Hongrie (1558),” Revue Universelle des Arts III (1856), (A): 127–46; idem., “Tableaux et sculptures de Charles Quint (1556),” Revue Universelle des Arts III (1856), (B): 225–39. Mary of Hungary spent her childhood at Malines (Mechelen), where she was educated by her aunt, Margaret of Austria. See Jane de Iongh, Margaret of Austria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1954); idem., Mary of Hungary, Second Regent of the Netherlands, translated by M.D. Herter Norton (New York: Norton, 1958); idem, Margaret of Austria, Regent of the Netherlands, translated by M.D. Herter Norton (New York: Norton, 1958); idem., Regentessen der Nederlanden I. De Hertogin Margaretha van Osstenrijk. Hertogin van Savooie (Amsterdam: 1981); Elsa Winker, Margarete von Österreich. Grande Dame der Renaissance (Munich: Callwey, 1966; Jean-Pierre Soisson, Marguerite: princesse de Bourgogne (Paris: Grasset, 2002); Françoise Baudson, Marguerite d’Austriche, Fondatrice de Brou 1480–1530 (Brou: exhibition catalogue, Musée de l’Ain, 1958); Ghislaine de Boom, Marguerite d’Austriche-Savoie et la Pré-Renaissance (Paris-Brussels, 1935); idem., Marguerite d’Autriche (Bruselles: Renaissance du Livre, 1946); E. van den Bossche, Margareta van Oostenrijk, Prinses van de Renaissance?,” Handelingen van den Koninklijke Kring voor Oudheidkunde, Letteren en Kunst van Mechelen LXXII (1972):

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collection of paintings and rare objects, installed most of Northern pictures in the Pardo Palace (Figs. 5.127–5.128), a residence near Madrid. Situated amidst a forest of holm oak which extended to the Guadarrama mountains, the Pardo began about 1405 as a late Gothic hunting box of the Trastámara kings of Castile. The fortress of Enrique III and Enrique IV with its large moat was extensively rebuilt by Charles V. Between 1540 and 1547, the architect Luis de Vega and master stonemason Juan de Vergara created a quadrangular structure with four corner towers. Faced with brick, with windows and doors framed in indigenous granite, the Pardo’s distinctive Flemish slate roof was added by Gaspar de Vega. About 1562 the lodge was decorated with frescoes, tapestries and panel paintings. The great fire of March 13, 1604 destroyed the main halls of the Pardo, save the ceiling of a tower, which still retains its panels of the “Legend of Perseus” by the Mannerist painter Gaspar Becerra.68 Writing in 1582 before the 1604 fire in the Pardo, Argote de Molina described the main galleries of principal level of the lodge. Near Philip II’s Chapel and “Hall of Portraits” was a Corridor del Campo, or walking gallery, which led to a square salon. Molina noted the ceiling of the aposento was painted with perspective views by a Master Pelegrin, mathematician and clockmaker. However, he mentioned only one painting above the fireplace. Having identified the subject as a “Hunt of the Grand Duke Charles of Burgundy,” he then embellished his entry by stating: “the duchess and her ladies and some knights” are “all dressed in white, with curious costumes and 61–86; Frederick Lyna and C. Gaspar, La Bibliothèque de Marguerite d’Austriche (Brussels: Exhibition Catalogue, Bibliothèque Royale, 1940); André Joseph Ghislain Le Glay, ed. Correspondance de l’empereur Maximilien Ier et de Marguerite d’Autriche ... de 1507 à 1519, published after original manuscripts by M. Le Glay, 2 vols. (Paris: J. Renouard et Cie, 1839), II, 468–89 (Inventory 1516); Heinrich Zimerman and Joseph Ritter von Fiedler, “Urkunden und Regesten aus dem K. u. K. Haus-, Hof- und Staats-Archiv in Wien,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses, Vienna, III (1885), No. 2979, XCII–CXXIII (Inventory 1523–1524); Van Orley et les artistes de la cour de Marguerite d’Autriche, Exhibition Catalogue, Musée de l’Ain: Brou (Bourg-en-Bresse: Le Musée, 1981); Guy Delmarcel, “De Passietapijten van Margareta van Oostenrijk (ca. 1518–1524). Nieuwe gegevens en documenten,” Revue de Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art LXI (1992): 127–60; Jozef Duverger, “Margareta van Oostenrijk (1480–1530) en der Italiaanse Renaissance,” Relations artistiques entre les Pays-Bas et l’Italie à la Renaissance. Études dédiées à Suzanne Sulzberger (Brussels-Rome: 1980): 127–43; [Stedelijk Museum Hof van Busleyden] Margareta van Oostenrijk (Mechelen: 1958); idem., De Habsburgers en Mechelen (1987). 68 Luis Calandre, El Palacio del Pardo (Madrid: Colección Almansa, 1953).

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headgear, in the fashion of that country.”69 Molina seems to have mistaken Charles, the Count of Charolais, for his father Philip the Good, but his precise description of a “hunt” attended by a duke and his duchess with everyone “dressed in white” establishes the Pardo panel was the model for the later French replicas in Versailles and Dijon. Whether Jan van Eyck’s archetype was a drawing or panel painting must remain an unresolved issue without further documentation. The Versailles Festivity is important not only because it presents another instance of Jan’s adroit facility to represent grouped portraits, but also the composition is nearly contemporary to the Ghent Altarpiece, which exhibits a similar inventive approach to a landscape populated by multiple clusters of figures. The uniform white apparel of the assembly has prompted a notion that the Versailles Festivity commemorates the marriage of Philip of Burgundy and Isabel of Portugal (21 February, 1397–1471).70 However, the scene has more the aspect of an outdoor fête in springtime, and therefore, does not 69 Louise Roblot-Delondre, “Argote de Molina et les tableaux du Pardo,” Revue Archéologique 16 (1910): 52–70; idem., “Portraits d’Infantes. XVIe Siècle (Étude Iconographique) (Paris-Brussels: Libraire Nationale d’Art et d’Histoire, G. van Oest & Cie, 1913), 202–3, full inventory, 199–206; idem., “Un ‘jardin d’amour’ de Philippe le Bon,” Revue Archéologique 17 (1911): 420–27. Also consult Anne van Buren-Hagopian, “Un Jardin d’amour de Philippe le Bon au parc du Hesdin: Le rôle de Van Eyck dans une commande ducale,” La Revue du Louvre et des Musées de France XXXV, No. 3 (1985): 185–92; idem., “Reality and Literary Romance in the Park of Hesdin,” Dumbarton Oaks Colloqium on the History of Landscape Architecture VIII: Medieval Gardens, ed. Elizabeth McDougall (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1986): 117–34; Jean-Bernard de Vaivre, Chasse à l’oiseau et cour d’amour. Note sur deux tableaux de Versailles et de Dijon, Journal des Savants (October-December, 1985): 313–39; Sophie Jugie, “Une fête champête à la cour de Bourgogne,” Bulletin des Musées de Dijon V (1999): 59–69; 76–77; Albert Châtelet, “Jardin d’amour ou commémoration?,” Bulletin des Musées de Dijon V (1999): 70–75, 77; Lorne Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1990), 46–47, 120; Maria Kusche, “Der Christliche Ritter und seine Dame” – das Repräsentationbildnis in ganzer Figur,” Pantheon XLIX (1991): 4–35, at 9; Lucie Ninane, “Un portrait de famille des ducs de Bavière, comtes de Hollande, Zééland et Hainaut,” Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Bulletin (Miscellanea Philippe Roberts-Jones) XXXIV–XXXVII, Nos. 1–3 (1985–1988): 63–74, at 70; Claudine Lemaire, Michèle Henry, and Anne Rouzet, Isabelle de Portugal, duchesse de Bourgogne, 1397–1471 (Brussels: exhibition catalogue, Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ier, 1991). 70 Paul Post, “Ein verschollenes Jagbild Jan van Eyck,” Jahrbuch der Preuszischen Kunstsammlungen 52 (1931): 120–32; Robert Mullally, “The so-called Hawking Party at the Court of Philip the Good. A Study of a Burgundian Primitive of 1431,” Gazette des BeauxArts 119 (October, 1977): 109–12.

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accord with the winter season of their formal union at Sluis.71 In actuality, the date of the event depicted should be advanced a year beyond the January 7, 1430 marriage of the Duke and the Portuguese Infanta. The ensemble comprises generic physical types, which would not have been the case in the original Pardo “hunting party.” Despite the generalized features of the dramatis personae shown in the Versailles Festivity, the identities of several members of Philip the Good’s court can be postulated based upon their placement in the landscape and the barest of hints provided by their attire (Fig. 5.129). Moving within the intimate circle of the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy, Jan van Eyck had access to a prominent cast of courtly individuals. Standing near a quartet of musicians, Duchess Isabel wears a bourrelet (Figs. 5.130–5.131), a padded form which rises vertically and splits into like horns. Her white veil is scalloped in a similar design as her extended sleeves, and her long necklace is a delicate strand of tiny delicate bells. To Isabel’s right is her youngest brother, Prince Fernando (1402–1443), whose gentle tug on her arm establishes his familial status. Fernando escorted his sister to Sluis in 1429, and though the date of his return to Lisbon is unknown, he probably lingered for a time in Flanders. The Avis Prince is portrayed with a lavalière showing the distinctive cross pattée of the Portuguese Order of Christ. Opposite Fernando, a woman places her right hand on Isabel’s shoulder, and this gesture insinuates her identity as confidant or family relation.72 Her golden bourrelet is capped with a diaphanous veil, and she wears a long coral necklace. Though she could be identified as Jeanne de Harcourt, the Countess of Namur, and chief Lady-in-Waiting to the Duchess, more likely she is Agnes of Burgundy (1407–1476). A small lamb slumbers upon her ermine-lined surcoat. Named for St. Agnes, whose attribute was a lamb, the sister-in-law of the Portuguese Infanta was the wife of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon (1401–1456). With a chaperon on his head, Philip the Good leans casually against a centrally placed polygonal table. He wears white hose and patens and attached to jesses wrapped about his left arm is a hawk. Speaking with the Duke, is a gentlemen whose legs are crossed in an equally redolent posture. Though his back is turned to reveal a cape embroidered with circlets of greenery, this figure might be Agnes’s spouse, Duke Charles of Bourbon.

Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 272. Regarding courtly gestures see Jean-Claude Schmitt, La raison des gestes dans l’Occident médiéval (Paris: Gallimard, 1990). 71 72

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Philip the Good had three other sisters, and they too appear in the Versailles Festivity. Three couples on the left side of the composition can be excluded from consideration. Walking in front of Duchess Isabel, Jacqueline of Bavaria and her third husband can be identified based upon their portraits by Jacques Leboucq in the sixteenth-century Recueil d’Arras.73 She wears a golden bourrelet and red gloves, while the portly Frank van Borselen, whom she wed in 1432, is portrayed with an imposing chaperon embellished with very large notched flaps. To their immediate left is a gentleman with a large black purse who accompanies a woman with a brimmed hat, and trailing behind them are strollers with their backs turned from the viewer. The figures in the rural landscape appear to imitate the measured steps of the late Gothic carole, a round dance of deduit (desire) performed by pairs in meadows. Flemish tapestries frequently illustrated the hunt as metaphor articulating the relationships between men and women. Often lovers were portrayed as both the stalker and the quarry.74 The three foreground couples might be identified as the sisters and brothers-in-law of Philip the Good. Directly in front of Duchess Isabel may be the Duke’s favorite sister Anne of Burgundy (1404–1432). Wearing a white bourrelet with shoulder-length veil consisting of separate scalloped panels, and golden belt, she lifts the long train of her woolen dress. Anne strolls in the company of her husband, John of Lancaster

73 Jacques Leboucq, Recueil d’Arras, Bibliothèque Communale, MS. 266. The drawings are illustrated by Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 166, who discusses them in the context of the Versailles Festivity. See also Lorne Campbell, “The Authorship of the ‘Recueil d’Arras,’” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XL (1977): 301–13. 74 Mira Friedman, “The Falcon and the Hunt: Symbolic Love Imagery in Medieval and Renaissance Art,” Poetics of Love in the Middle Ages: Texts and Contexts (Fairfax,VA: George Mason University Press, 1989): 157–75; Baudouin van den Abeele, La fauconnerie au Moyen Age: Connaissance, affaitage et médecine des oiseaux de chasse d’après les traités Latins (Paris: Klincksieck, 1994); idem, La fauconnerie dans les lettres françaises du XIIe au XIVe siècle (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1990); La chasse au Moyen âge: société, traités, symboles, ed. Agostino Paravicini Bagliani and et Baudouin van den Abeele (Florence: SISMEL : Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2000); Corinne Beck and Élisabeth Rémy, Le Faucon, favori des princes (Paris: Gallimard: Collection “Découvertes,” 1990); Pedro López de Ayala [1332–1407], El libro de las aves de caça, ed Duque de Alburquerque (Madrid: Impresa de M. Galiano, 1869); Pero Menino [fl. 1382–1385], Livro de falcoaria, ed. Rodrigues Lapa (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1931); Christian Antoine de Chamerlat, La fauconnerie et l’art, with a preface by Comte Charles de Ganay (Courbevoie, Paris: ACR; Paris: Vilo, 1986); idem., Falconry and Art, with a foreword by T.A.M. Jack (London-New York: Sotheby’s Publications-Harper and Row, 1987).

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(1389–1435).75 To the left of frolicking dogs is another woman wearing a gold belt. The only female in the composition shown with a bourrelet and wimple, she carries a red flower. This blossom may identify her as Anne’s sister Margaret (1393–1441), whose name evoked the indigenous field flowers called marguerites.76 In 1412 she wed Louis of Guyenne, Dauphin of France (1496–1415), and after the death of the heir to the French throne at Agincourt (hence the widow’s wimple), she remarried on October 10, 1423. To Margaret’s side is Arthur (1393–1458) of Brittany, the Count of Richemont.77

75 Ethel Carleton Williams, My Lord of Bedford, 1389–1435; being a life of John of Lancaster, first Duke of Bedford, brother of Henry V and Regent of France (London: Longmans, 1963); Pierre Champion and Paul de Thoisy, Bourgogne, France-Angleterre au traité de Troyes: Jean de Thoisy, évêque de Tournai (Paris: Éditions Balzac, 1943); Barthélemy A. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, “Anne de Bourgogne et le testament de Bedford,” Bibliothèue de l’École des Chartres XCV (1934): 284–326. Anne may have played a role in urging Philip the Good to take Isabel of Portugal as his bride. See Camille Looten, “Isabelle de Portugal, duchess de Bourgogne et comtesse de Flandre (1397–1471),” Revue de Littérature Comparée XVIII (1938), 5–22, at 7. This source is given by Francis M. Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1961), 37 and 322 note 9, who also suggests that Prince Pedro when visiting Burgundy discussed the marriage of his sister Isabel with Duke Philip. He refers to the same opinion shared by Jesús Ernesto Martínez Ferrando, Tragedia del insigne condestable don Pedro de Portugal (Madrid: Diana, Artes Gráficas, 1942), 52. 76 See E. Picard, “Le Château de Germoles et Marguerite de Flandre,” Mémoires de la Société Éduenne 40 (1912): 147–218. Marguerite Le Mâle (1350–1405), wife of Philip the Bold, spent her last years at Arras or Artois. Germoles, her favorite Burgundian residence, was renovated in the 1380s by Drouet de Dammartin of Paris, designer of the castle of Sluis. In 1383 Claus Sluter carved a bergerie showing Philip and Margaret sitting with sheep beneath an elm. In 1388 the chambre aux brebis was painted with a flock of sheep, murals which accorded with the rural ambiance of the countryside house. The walls may have been completed by Jehan de Beaumetz, who, in the 1380s was active at the Château of Ardilly. Sluter’s bergerie no longer survives, but one chamber at Germoles retains its decoration, the repeated motifs of an “M” initial and Margaret’s emblematic field daisies. Also see Jack Goody, The Culture of Flowers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993). 77 Eugène Cosneau, Le connétable de Richemont, Artur de Bretagne. 1393–1458 (Paris: A. Picard, 1886); Barthélemy A. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, “Le connétable de Richemont, seigneur bourguignon,” Annales de Bourgogne VII (1935): 309–36 and VIII (1936): 7–30 and 106–38; Achille Lucien Edmond Le Vavasseur (ed.), Chronique d’Arthur de Richemont, connétable de France, duc de Bretagne (1393–1458) par Guillaume Gruel [fl. 1458] (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, Renouard, H. Laurens, 1890). Jean Joseph François Poujoulat and Joseph Michaud, “Histoire d’Artur III, duc de Bretaigne, comte de Richemont,” Nouvelle collection des mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de France III (Paris: 1836): 185–235.

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Philip the Good’s remaining elder sister, Marie of Burgundy (c. 1399– 1400–1473), might be the woman standing in profile, wearing a golden bourrelet sans veil, strand of little bells, and long-trained white robe. Beside her is a youth too young to be her husband, Adolph (1373–1448), whom she wed in 1406.78 The Duke of Cleves, however, may be the nobleman with golden spurs who mounts a horse with a red harness. This equestrian in a white scalloped cape with strands of bells, has a matching, wide-brimmed hat with black feathers. In the company of Marie, the youth wearing an embroidered doublet fringed in golden bells would be her son, John of Cleves (1419–1481). The older woman beside him might be Margaret, Countess of Hainaut (1374–1441), mother of Jacqueline of Bavaria and the daughter of John the Fearless. Following the death of Philippe of St. Pol in August of 1430, the widow of Willem VI had attempted to secure Brabant by appealing to the Estates in Louvain. With the rejection of his aunt’s claim, Philip the Good made his grand entry into Leuven (Louvain) as the newly installed as Duke of Brabant. Once in possession of Brabant, he acquired the treasures of the Coudenberg Palace in Brussels, including its collection of fine tapestries.79 Several aspects of the Versailles Festivity suggest the original composition was created in 1431. Anne of Burgundy died on November 13, 1432 in Paris. The Duchess of Bedford was in Rouen, the English headquarters in France, when Joan of Arc had been tried as a heretic. In January of 1431 she and John of Lancaster (Fig. 5.132) transferred to Paris. Not until December 16 of that same year did the guardians of the ten-year-old Henry VI (1422–1471) witness his coronation in Notre Dame. After Henry VI’s return to England in February of 1432, the political alliance between Flanders and England slowly began to dissolve.80 Philip the Good did not attend the coronation Heinz Will, Maria von Burgund, Herzogin von Kleve (Kleve: Boss, 1967). Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good, 291, provides an excellent chart showing the marriage alliances of Cleves and Guelders which were arranged to suit the political needs of the Duke of Burgundy. 79 E. Poullet, Histoire de la Joyeuse Entrée de Brabant (Brussels: F. Havez, 1863). 80 Charles Arthur John Armstrong, “Le double monarchie France-Angleterre et la Maison de Bourgogne, 1420–1435. Le décline d’une alliance,” Annales de Bourgogne XXXVII (1965): 81–112; idem., England, France, and Burgundy in the Fifteenth century (London: Hambledon Press, 1983); Marie Rose Thielemans, Bourgogne et Angleterre. Relations politiques et économiques entre les Pays-Bas bourguignons et l’Angleterre. 1435–1467 (Brussels: Presses Universitaires de Bruxelles, 1966). Les Rélations Politiques entre Philippe le Bon et l’Angleterre et les Rapports Économiques entre l”Angleterre et la Flandre 1435–1455 (Brussels: Presses Universitaires de Bruxelles, 1967). 78

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in Paris. Because Anne is known to have interceded when conflicts arose between her brother and husband, she might have traveled to Bruges in spring of 1431 to resolve differences and urge Duke Philip’s attendance in Paris. The arms of Brabant and Limbourg are depicted prominently in the Versailles Festivity: on the banner of a trumpeter to the left of Duchess Isabel (Fig. 5.133); and over the main entrance to the background hunting lodge nestled amidst bracken. Philip the Good inherited the two duchies from his cousin, Phillipe of St. Pol (1404–August 4, 1430), and the arms were shown in formal entries at Leuven (Louvain) and Brussels staged in October of 1430.81 Despite the display of the new ducal escutcheon, Philip the Good in the Festivity does not wear the insignia collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece which he instituted on January 10, 1430. In November of 1431 the Bruges goldsmith Jean Peutin received payment for his collars that terminated in “Jason’s ramskin” and showed the flint-firestone motifs with alternating shooting flames.82 The date of their creation appears to be a terminus ante quem for the original painting of the Festivity: The Louvre painting logically shows an outing in early spring of 1431. Judging by the calendar pages in the Limbourg Brothers’ Très Riches Heures for the Duke of Berry (1415) and the Grandes Heures de Rohan (1430) of Yolande of Aragon, wife of Louis II of Anjou, the months of April and May were designated periods for hawking (Fig. 5.134–5.135).83 Though the 81 Paul Post, “Ein verschollenes Jagbild Jan van Eycks,” Jahrbuch der Preuszischen Kunstsammlungen LII (1931): 120–32; Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 273; Max Servais, Armorial des provinces et des communes de Belgique (Brussels: Crédit Communal de Belgique, 1955). 82 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 363–64. Jacques Laurent, “Le briquet de la maison de Bourgogne,” Revue Française d’Héraldique de Sigillographie, I (1938): 55–64; Jean Helbig, “Le Briquet de Bourgogne – a propos d’un ouvrage recent,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire XII (1940): 13–18. 83 For the Master of Rohan, see Millard Meiss et Marcel Thomas, Les Heures de Rohan [Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Manuscrit Latin 9471] (Paris: Draeger frères, 1973). Raymond Cazelles, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. Musée Condé à Chantilly, with an Introduction and Legends by Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, and a preface by Millard Meiss (London–New York: Thames and Hudson, Ltd.-George Braziller, 1969); see rpt. edition of 1993, 175 (April: setting Dourdan Castle, property on the Orge river, owned by the Duke of Berry from 1400) and 176 (May: setting identified by Cazelles as the environs of the Palais de la Cité in Paris). See also E. Morand, “La ville de Riom et la fête de Mai dans les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry,” Bulletin de l’Académie des Sciences, Belles-Lettres et Arts de Clermont-Ferrand (1954): 1–5, who argues the May background shows the capital of Auvergne, an appanage of the Duke of Berry.

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Valois court adhered to the display of diverse shades of green in their May revelries, the Rohan Hours establish there were exceptions to this customary display of color. Perhaps Duke Philip’s court is celebrating the feast day of his name saint, the Apostle Philip, which was annually commemorated then on May 1. The lords and ladies in his company have are portrayed in soft woolen garments. Some of their capes are embroidered with greenery and have cowls. Fur-lined surcoats and robes with heavy, voluminous sleeves, combine to suggest the climate is cool, which would be the case at the very beginning of May. The clashing troops in the distance may seem incongruous for a scene that centers upon a springtime outing, but this obtrusive element is evocative of the memory of an ancient commander the Duke of Burgundy sought to emulate in his campaigns against the French, Alexander the Great 84 (Figs. 5.136–5.138). Plutarch in writing his biography of history’s most exceptional soldier, not only recounts his martial prowess and heroic exploits, but also elaborates about his activity in “times of leisure”: … he would spend the day in hunting, or administering justice, or arranging his military affairs, or reading. If he were making a march which was not very urgent, he would practice, as he went along, either archery or mounting and dismounting from a chariot that was under way. Often, too, for diversion, he would hunt foxes or birds, as may be gathered from his journals ... in the matter of delicacies … he himself, at all events, was master of his appetite, so that often, when the rarest fruits or fish were brought to him from the sea-coast, he would distribute them to each of his companions until he was the 84 George Cary, “Alexander the Great in Medieval Theology,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtaud Institutes XVII (1954): 87–114; idem., The Medieval Alexander, ed. David John Athole Ross (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956), 33–34, rpt. (New York: Garland Press, 1987); Charles Arthur John Armstrong (ed.), Le Roman d’Alexandre. Version d’Alexandre de Paris, 2 vols. (Princeton: Elliott Monographs 37, 1937); David John Athole Ross, Alexander Historiatus. A Guide to Medieval Illustrated Alexander Literature (London: Warburg Institute, University of London, 1963); idem, Illustrated Medieval Alexander-Books in Germany and the Netherlands. A Study in Comparative Iconography (Cambridge: Modern Humanities Research Association, 1971); Paul Meyer, Alexandre le Grand dans la littérature française du moyen âge, 2 vols. (Paris: F. Vieweg, 1886) rpt. (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1970); idem., La littérature française au moyen âge (XIe–XIVe siècle) (Paris: Hachette et Cie, 1914; 5th augmented ed.). Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 104–6, 354–55, cites the above sources and others. He discusses the manuscripts acquired by Philip on the subject of Alexander. The best known, Jean Wauquelin’s Histoire d’Alexandre (1448),

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only one for whom nothing remained. His suppers, however, were always magnificent … 85 Standing beside Philip the Good is a squire who significantly holds his lord’s gilded sword upright by the hilt. This weapon may allude to the Gordian knot which was severed by Alexander. Legend related that the person who cut the cords about a chariot would “rule the world.” Alexander’s feat in the Phrygian city of Gordium, once the realm of King Midas, is consequential.86 St. Philip, the name saint of the Duke of Burgundy, preached Christianity in Phrygia and he died at Hierapolis. The ancient town is mentioned in Colossians (4:13) and Acts 19:10, and though Paul did not preach there, his influence was widely felt in the cosmopolitan city populated by Greek colonists of Macedonia. Like Hierapolis, which achieved renown as a center for dyes, Flanders was famous commercially for its fine woolen goods. The courtly figures in the Versailles Festivity may be clothed in the soft wool known as “scarlet.” Generally tinctured by crushing the eggs of the kermes vermilio, the luxury fabric in an undyed state was white. The same pristine white was reserved in the North for the Virgin Mary’s robe, the cloth of the Infant Christ, which accented his nudity, or Incarnate nature, the holy shroud, and the liturgical host signifying the Pentecostal Church. Because Christ’s Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes occurred near the feast of Passover, the miracle was interpreted as an act of mercy imbued with Eucharistic significance. All the gospels describe the event, but St. John’s account is the only one which mentions the Apostle Philip’s exclamation to Christ upon viewing an immense crowd of five thousand: “six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little” (John 6: 7).87 Supplies were crucial to combat, and the Duke of Burgundy’s armies was thrice copied, including a manuscript in the Petit Palais, Paris (Dutruit Collection: MS. 456) illuminated by Guillaume Vrelant, his atelier and Lievin van Lathem. That an analogy was intended between Philip the Good and Alexander the Great is proven by their representation of the classical figures in Burgundian attire and the contemporary chivalric cast which overlays their diverse tableaux. 85 Plutarch’s Lives, ed. Edward Capps, Thomas Ethelbert Page, William Henry Denham Rouse, translated by Bernadotte Perrin, 11 vols. (London-New York: The Loeb Classical Library, William Heinemann-G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1921), VII (Demosthenes and Cicero: Alexander and Caesar), XXIII, 289–90. 86 Plutarch’s Lives, XVIII, 273. 87 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), The New Testament, 97.

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evidently achieved victory with few provisions. To survive they had to thrash thickets to procure hidden animals in an analogous manner as the bird hunters in the Versailles Festivity. Covered partly by a white cloth, the Duke’s outdoor table is not laden with succulent dishes. There is only a gilded plate of pears, cherries and figs, though servants wash other costly plates at a stone font on the right. The artist may have intended an analogy between Philip the Good and Alexander the Great, whom Plutarch stated always was the last to eat at his banquets. Or, was a more sacred interpretation given to the fare atop the hexagonal table? Two ducal attendants stand behind it and there are only three beverage containers. Because the contents of these vessels could not possibly quench the thirst of such a large “hunting party,” perhaps they were placed to recall Philip’s words to Christ by the Sea of Galilee. The Duke of Burgundy may not wear a collar of the “Golden Fleece” but his robe is pinned with a small wreath of thorns, which just might be an emblem of Bruges’s “Confraternity of the Dry Tree” (Fig. 5.139). This brotherhood was associated with the Friars Minor as early as 1396, but it was given prominence by Philip the Good after his first personal victory against the French at Mons-en-Vimeu (Abbeville) on August 31, 1421.88 A year before this engagement, during the summer of 1420, the Duke had allied with the Lancastrians to assault Sens, Montereau and Mehun. Leaving the English to take the Dauphinist towns, Philip engaged in battle to defend his frontiers against the French, but he interrupted his campaign to meet with Henry V, whose large army had arrived at Calais. Following their council of war at Montreuil in June of 1420, Philip remained in Artois.89 There, prior to his engagement at Mons-en-Vimeu, he apparently experienced a vision of the Virgin and Child surrounded by tree branches.90 This siege may be commemorated in the background of the Versailles Festivity. 88 Alphonse de Schout, “Confrère de Notre-Dame de l’Arbre Sec,” Annales de la Société d’Émulation de Bruges, 4e sèrie, 28 (1876–77): 141–87, at 142–44 (Origin of the Confraternity). The brotherhood originally was founded with sixteen members. 89 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 10–11. 90 Schout, “Confrère de Notre-Dame de l’Arbre Sec,” 164–7. C.F. Curtis († 1752) relates the vision of the Duke of Burgundy. Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 12–14, recounts the Abbeville battle. Also see Ernest Prarond, Abbeville au temps de Charles VII, des ducs de Bourgogne, maîtres de Ponthieu, et de Louis XI, 1426–1483 (Paris: 1899); idem., Abbeville (Paris: H. Champion; 1886); Marquis de Beaucourt [Gaston Louis Emmanuel du Fresne], Histoire de Charles VII, 6 vols. (Paris: Librairie de la Société Bibliographique, A. Picard, 1881–91). Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 255– 56, elaborates about the three stained glass windows Philip ordered in 1450 for the apse of

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Two fruit trees flank Duke Philip the Good in the Festivity. Additional trees laden with fruit are depicted near the musical quartet and Marguerite of Burgundy. The living trees of the orchard are contrasted with those which are dead, suggested by several randomly placed stumps. The reason for this juxtaposition is given in a recent iconographical analysis of a work by a disciple of Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus.91 Painted in 1465, his Madonna of the Dry Tree has been related to a passage from Ezechiel 17:24: “And all the trees of the field shall know that I the Lord have brought down the high tree, have exalted the low tree, have dried up the green tree, and have made the dry tree to flourish.” An interpretation of this passage in Guillaume de Deguileville’s Pèlerinage de l’âme (1330) identifies the “green branch” as a graft from the Tree of Life used by God to invigorate Eden’s Tree of Knowledge which had withered after the sin of Adam and Eve. From the “green branch” flowered the Mater Maria Dei. Of the Gothic religious orders, the Friar Minors attached to Bruges’s Confraternity of the Dry Tree were the most ardent champions of the “Immaculate” nature of the woman born to a barren St. Anne. Petrus Christus illustrates fifteen “A” letters dangling from the branches around the Virgin Mary and Child. Though they stand for the initial letter of “AVE-EVA” and signify by their number the joyous, sorrowful and glorious “mysteries” to be meditated upon while reciting the rosary, they truly resemble the golden bells attached to the necklaces of the the Bruges Church of the Frairs Minor. Smith mentions that after his victory of 1421, the Duke of Burgundy traveled to the Shrine of Notre Dame at Boulogne, and he speculates whether Philip had a role in commissioning Petrus Christus’s painting or if the panel is based on an older prototype. He additionally cites, 256 note 105: Janet Shirley (ed.), A Parisian Journal 1405–1449, translated from the anonymous Journal d’un bourgeois de Paris (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), 163 (Boulogne Pilgrimage and the French ambush at Abbeville); Albert Benoit, “Les pélèrinages de Philippe le Bon à Notre Dame de Boulogne,” Bulletin de la Société d’Études de la Province de Cambrai XXXVII (1973): 119–23. 91 Maryan W. Ainsworth, Petrus Christus, Renaissance Master of Bruges, with contributions by Maxmilian P.J. Martens (New York-Ghent: exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Ludion Press, 1994), Catalogue No. 18, 162–65. See also Peter Schabacker, Petrus Christus (Utrecht: Haentjens Dekker & Gumbert, 1974); Joel Morgan Upton, Petrus Christus: His Place in Fifteenth-Century Flemish Paintings (University Park-London: 1990), 60–65; Joel Morgan Upton and Allen Rosenbaum, “Petrus Christus, Our Lady of the Barren Tree,” Old Master Paintings from the Collection of Baron Thyssen-Bornemisa (Washington, DC: exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Art, 1979), 107–9; C. Custis, ”Confrérie de l’Arbre Sec, à Bruges,” Annales de la Société d’Emulation de Bruges, 2nd series, I (1843): 379–85; A. de Schodt, “Confrére de Notre-Dame de l’Arbre Sec,” Annales de la Societé d’Emulation de Bruges XXVIII (1876–1877): 141–87.

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courtly women in the Versailles Festivity. Equally, the “green branch” seems to resurface in the embroidered patterns on the cape worn by Charles, Duke of Bourbon. The same design characterizes the doublet with a fringe of bells that is worn by the foreground youth tentatively identified as Jean of Cleves, Philip the Good’s nephew. Philip the Apostle occasionally was portrayed with a tau type of cross. A T-shaped staff also was an attribute of St. Anthony Abbot, in whose honor was founded in 1100 the Order of Hospitallers. The Medieval Hospitallers, instituted to care for pilgrims, begged alms by ringing small bells. Dated June 10, 1469, a Contract between the representatives of the Confraternity of Our Lady of the Dry Tree and the Franciscans of Bruges has been published because it contains the name of Petrus Christus. However, the document specifically mentions that the Dean and supervisors of the guild confraternity were obligated to provide yearly funds to cover the charitable work of the mendicant Friars Minor. The donations were to be given on three occasions: the first Midwinter (December 25), May 2, and on the third octave of the feast of the Assumption (September 5). In exchange, the convent offered masses on the five principal feasts of the Virgin Mary. Philip the Good speaks with several figures in the Louvre Festivity. Besides his squire holding a sword, and the gentleman proposed to be his brother-in-law, Duke Charles I of Bourbon, there are two couples. Though both noblemen are shown with wide-brimmed white hats, the one in black with a double strand collar of bells holds a piece of paper. Though the text is indecipherable, if the person were a jongleur he more reasonably would be located near the musical quartet like Gilles Binchois, whose portrait beside Jaqueline of Bavaria has been postulated based upon its similarity to Jan van Eyck’s Tymotheos (1432) in the London National Gallery. More will be said about Binchois, but within the context of an almsgathering event for the Confraternity of the Dry Tree, the paper held before Philip the Good might be an account record for donations. Perhaps Jehan de Lannoy, the Lord of Roubaix and Herzeele, is the individual reading the list, though it is undeniably is a generalized portrait. Beside Jehan de Lannoy logically stands Lady Roubaix, elegantly dressed with a veiled bourrelet and a long strand of coral. Jan’s 1436 Portrait of Baudouin de Lannoy normally would be a bench mark for certain identification of the Lord of Molenbaix in the Versailles Festivity. Though the remaining nobleman in the intimate circle of Philip the Good is shown in profile, Baudouin’s penchant for an ostentatious chapeau recommends assigning his identity to this ducal

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confidant in the painting.92 Depicted in a grand white cape, broad-brimmed hat articulated by greenery, and double-strands of bells, Baudouin was Philip the Good’s first chamberlain, and he served as the head of the diplomatic missions to the Iberian Peninsula (1426–1428).93 Seen from the back is a woman in a golden bourrelet without a veil, whose robes with scalloped sleeves are ornamented with bell necklaces. Lady Molenbaix’s shoulder is touched by her husband. Because Petrus Christus was a member of the Bruges Dry Tree Confraternity according to in the 1469 Contract, it would seem feasible that Jan van Eyck and members of his family in service to the Duke of Burgundy also participated in events sponsored by the ducal institution. An intriguing figure appears on the bottom right of the Versailles Festivity, a man who not only holds a pair of hawks, but also a red leash with two small dogs (Figs. 5.140–5.141). Documents establish that Jan van Eyck had a near-relation, a cousin named Hendrick who was an austringer (hawk trainer). Hendrick van Eyck similarly had been attached to the court of John of Bavaria at The Hague, where on February 25, 1425, he is mentioned as holding the office of Jaghermeester, or “master huntsman,” to John IV, Duke of Brabant and the second husband of Jacqueline of Bavaria. According to ducal accounts of December 24, 1426, he entered the household of Philip the Good as varlet des faulcons. His name appears in financial records between 1433 and 1436 with the titles of warden, garde de l’esprivier and espriveteur. Hendrick remained single until 1444, and Petrus Christus may have marked the

92 Abbe J.B.C. Boudrot, “Inventaire de l’Hôtel-Dieu de Beaune (1501),” Mémoires de la Société d’Histoire, d’Archéologie et de Littérature de l’Arrondissement de Beaune (1874): 117–204. 93 According to Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 141–42, the first chamberlain of the Duke of Burgundy was a court official of the highest status. Responsible for the administration of his lord’s household, his duties incapsulated “sleeping near the duke, carrying the ducal banner in battle, and supervising the purchase of cloth for the duke’s person.” Only the chamberlain at court was allowed to take meals privately in his lodgings, and Vaughan also notes that the ordonnances of 1438 specify that the chamberlain was to be served twice daily “a plate of meat, two quarts of wine, and four small white and six small brown loaves.” He cites, 141 note 2: Ghillebert de Lannoy [1386–1462], Oeuvres de Ghillebert de Lannoy, voyageur, diplomate et moraliste, ed. Charles Potvin with notes and a letter by J.-C.Houzeau (Louvain: Impr. de P. et J. Lefever, 1878), 51 and Archives départamentales du Nord, Lille, B1605, f. 189. Also see: G. Huydts, “Le premier chambellan des ducs de Bourgogne,” Mélanges d’Histoire offerts à Henri Pirenne (Brussels: 1926): 263–70; F. Vandeputte, “Droits et gages des dignitaires et employés à la cour de Philippe le Bon, 1437, et de Charles le Téméraire,” 1471,” Annales de la Société d’Émulation de Bruges XXVIII (1876–77): 1–24 and 188–92.

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occasion of his marriage with a drawing, by 1452 the couple was domiciled in Termonde where he served as town bailiff in 1462 until his death on November 11, 1466.94 Besides vénerie, the hunting of venison, fauconnerie was an avocation of the Duke of Burgundy, who is documented to have acquired prize falcons to accommodate his favorite pastime. Two peregrine falcons were purchased in 1419 and in 1442 the Duke was keen on obtaining a rare goshawk. These diurnal birds of prey often were imported from considerable distances. For example, in 1446–47, ten gryfalcons arrived from Norway. Judging by accounts for 1463, his household specialists in the art of falconry consisted of a “master,” who received an annual salary, in addition to three falconers, three attendants to care for sparrow-hawks, and an unspecified number of valets.95 They were distinct from the staff who attended the menageries installed by the Duke in the Warande parkland at Coudenberg Palace in Brussels and at Ghent Castle.96 Ducal peregrine falcons typically were outfitted with

See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 23–24 for Hendrick’s biography. Hendrick’s wife was Elizabeth Sallard, the daughter of Louis Sallard, master falconer of the Duke of Burgundy, who gave 100l. to Hendrick when he married. Hendrick in 1461 succeeded Sir William de Quienville as baillif of Termonde. He was a member of the confraternity of Notre Dame in the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, where the register lists him as spoerwarier myns heeren. Elizabeth died in 1505 and she was buried next to her husband. She bore Hendrick two children, John († 1523) and Katherine. The slab of Hendrick’s grave has a herald identified by Weale and Brockwell as, “Barry of eight or and azure, ensigned with a helmet; crest, a falcon” and his epitaph describes him as “sparewannier, councilor and chamberlain” of the Duke of Burgundy, as well as “high baillee of the county and territory of Termonde.” For the drawing by Petrus Christus, see Maryan W. Ainsworth, Petrus Christus. Renaissance Master of Bruges, with contributions by Maximiliaan P.J. Martens (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1994), 187–89, who provides a lucid commentary, and ample bibliography on the drawing’s attribution and discussions about the sitter’s identity. Regarding an identification of Hendrick van Eyck, see William Henry James Weale, Hubert and John van Eyck: Their Life and Work (London-New York, John Lane, 1908), 24–25. Consult Albert Cels, “’L’Homme au faucon’ et le lieu d’origine possible de Jean van Eyck,” Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts Bulletin VII (1958): 29–32, who comments about falconers in the house of Arendonck named Van Eyck. 95 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 150 and notes 1 and 2; Laborde, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, 482–91. See also Étienne Picard, “La vénerie et la fauconnerie des ducs de Bourgogne,” Mémoires de la Société Éduenne IX (1880): 297–418, reprinted separately La vénerie et la fauconnerie des ducs de Bourgogne (Paris: H. Chamion, 1881). 96 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 145 and note 1. See Labord, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, 216–17, 223 and 372. Among the animals were wild pigs, lions, bulls, monkeys and camels. Of course, the residences which had a surfeit of roe deer, also boasted aviaries. 94

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heraldic arms and they carried little bells. Andrieu de Toulongeon (André de Thoulongeen), Lord of Mornay, was a companion ambassador to Portugal with Jan van Eyck, Baudouin de Lannoy and Jehan de Lannoy. He perhaps is the man in a soft woolen tunic with a simple circular collar facing a woman with bell necklaces who rests her red gloved hand upon his shoulder as she has just dismounted from the same horse to be ridden by Adolph of Cleves. The remaining couple in the right foreground sits on white and grey steeds and they hold peregrine falcons. Could they provide a self-portrait of the artist Jan and his wife Margaret? (Figs. 5.142–5.144) The gentleman wearing a white chaperon is not that far removed from the 1433 Man in a Red Turban, which has been presumed to be a self-portrait. The date of Jan’s marriage to Margaret is unknown, but they might have been betrothed in 1431. Her known portrait in Bruges is dated 1439, but it is sufficiently close to the generic sixteenth-century woman riding sidesaddle to merit a tentative identification. If the lower group of the Festivity includes Jan van Eyck, then the artist provides a light touch of humor with the nearby man in red holding a club. Based upon a nearly identical portrait in Jacques Lebourq’s Recueil d’Arras of the mid-sixteenth century, he is Philip the Good’s court jester.97 The thrashing mechanisms in Hesdin’s Great Hall explain the inclusion of this “club-wielding” fool in the composition. The Versailles Festivity is more than a mere scene of a ducal “hunting party.” It appears to show a commemoration of two annual events which were important to the Duke of Burgundy: the feast day of the Apostle St. Philip (May 1) and the Confraternity of the Dry Tree fundraising (May 2). Philip the Good traveled extensively in 1431. August was spent at two hunting retreats: Tervuren, located between Brussels and Louvain; and Genappe, between Brussels and Namur. April and May, however were passed in Artois at his favorite estate of Hesdin.98 Based upon the combined evidence of anecdotal and emblematical detail, as well as the background 97 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 274, has identified the fool in the Versailles Festivity based upon the Recueil d’Arras, Bibliothèque Communale, MS. 266, folio 288. He notes variations in costume exist between the compositions, and also states Leboucq had access to the Imperial collections at Brussels because he served as the “herald and king of arms of Hainaut for Charles V and Philip II.” 98 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 273. See also Léopold Devillers, “Les Séjours des ducs de Bourgogne en Hainaut, 1427–1482,” Bulletin de la Commision Royale d’Histoire 4, VI (1879): 323–468 and Charles Hirschauer, Les États d’Artois de leurs origines à l’occupation française, 1340–1640, 2 vols. (Paris, É. Champion, 1923).

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battle which appears to commemorate Philip the Good’s victory at Abbeville on the Somme River near Artois, the setting for the Versailles Festivity must be identified as the grounds of Hesdin. This rural site, including the medieval pentagram-shaped castle with stone turrets, was demolished in 1553 by order of Emperor Charles V. The outlying garden pavilions had ready access to the Ternoise River, and the most fabled was the Pavillon du Marés (Pavilion of Ponds) situated directly north of the castle. Tervuren and Genappe near Brussels, Male which was situated southeast of Bruges, and even the later archducal hunting retreat of Mariemont, were all constructed by water. The Pavillon du Marés shared this feature common to Flemish hunting houses, but it specifically was created as an architectural conceit for aquatic amusements.99 The background “lodge” of the Versailles Festivity is too small for the figures, even the bird catchers in the distance (Fig. 5.145–5.146). This anomaly suggests that the building depicted in the composition may replicate a far larger structure. To illustrate the entire Pavilion of the Ponds in the landscape behind the white-robed merry-makers, the architecture of the manor house was kept to scale but reduced in size. Yet another aspect of the Versailles replica merits consideration. The Festivity has been discussed with relation to the early career of Jan van Eyck. If he designed the original “hunting party,” which was displayed at Binche until it passed to the Pardo Palace, then the Versailles picture essentially proves his true versatility in painting multi-figured compositions as well as single portraits. In terms of dating, the work of 1431 would have fallen between the alpha of the Fons Vitae and the omega of the Ghent Altarpiece. Despite its later date, what makes the Versailles Festivity replica so incredibly important is that it

99 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 273. Duceppe-Lamarre, “La résidence ducale d’Hesdin et sa place dans l’art curial au temps des princes des fleurs de lis (1384– 1419),” Catalogue No. 60, Fête champêtre à la cour de Bourgogne (Dijon, Musée des BeauxArts), 162, situates the topography of the Dijon painting in the Ternoise valley towards the west, with a view of the village of Grigny in the distance. He also cites archival descriptions of a “Pavillon du Marés” which stood in the northern sector of the game park in the fourteenth century. Hesdin comprised a castle and chapel, loge, pavilion of amusements, galleries, and smaller manorial structures. It additionally had a kitchen installed in 1378 which was well stocked due to the abundant game and nearby orchards (apple, pear and cherry trees). The “Festivities” of Versailles and Dijon Versailles likely illustrate Hesdin the “pavilion of ponds” because of the outdoor banquet. Costly vessels and tableware logically were stored within the castle and transported outside for the occasion by the kitchen servants.

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captures the ambiance of the court which Jan frequented in his dual role of peintre-savant and diplomat. The Festivity also reveals fundamental truths about the character of Jan’s patron. Philip the Good enjoyed allegorical art which extolled his devotion to the faith, charitable largess, and fidelity to his subjects. On a secular note, as fond as the Duke was of hunting, he was even more enthusiastic for ostentatious ceremony. The Versailles Festivity provides but an appetizer for the spectacular banquets which followed at the Burgundian court. The Pavilion of Ponds at Hesdin no longer exists, and its ephemeral festivities survive only in descriptive narrations. Still, the galleries and entertainments staged at this manor house frequented by Duke Philip the Good had a resonating impact upon sixteenth-century Hapsburg Burgundy. Binche Castle in Hainaut (Figs. 5.147–5.149) was the favorite hunting retreat of Mary of Hungary (1505–1558), the sister of Emperor Charles V and Archduchess of the Spanish Netherlands (1530–1555).100 Located 100 Ghislaine de Boom, Marie de Hongrie (Brussels: La Renaissance du Livre, 1956); Gernot Heiss, Königin Maria von Urgarn und Böhmen (1505–1558). Ihr Leben und ihre wirtschftliche Interessen in Österreich, Ungarn und Böhmen (Wenen: 1972); idem., “Politik und Ratgeber der Königin Maria von Urgarn in der Jahren 1521–1531,” Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung LXXXII (1974): 119–80; Jane de Iongh, Mary of Hungary, Second Regent of the Netherlands, translated by M.D. Herter Norton (New York: Norton Publishers: 1958); idem., Regentessen der Nederlanden II. De Koningen: Maria van Hongarije. Landvoogdes der Nederlanden (Amsterdam: 1966; rpt. 1981); Théodore Juste, Les Pays-Bas sous Charles-Quint. Vie de Marie de Hongrie (Brussels- Leipzig: C. Muquardt, 1858); Jacqueline Kerkhoff, “Het hof van de landvoogdes Maria van Hongarije in de jaren 1531–1555,” Ex Tempore. Historisch Tijdschrift KU Nijmegen X (1991): 23–33; J. Lefèvre, “Marie de Hongrie 1505–1558,” Revue Générale Belge (1954): 1191–1209; Wilhelm Stracke, Die Anfänge der Königin Maria von Ungarn, späteren Statthalterin Karls V (Göttingen: 1940); Jozef Duverger, “Marie de Hongrie, gouvernante des Pays-Bas, et la Renaissance,” Acts du 22s Congrès Internationale d’Histoire de l’Art. Budapest 1969, 2 (Paris: 1972, 1, 715–26; Daniel Robert Doyle, The Body of a Woman but the Heart and Stomach of a King: Mary of Hungary and the Exercise of Political Power in Early Modern Europe (Minneapolis: Doctoral Dissertation: University of Minnesota, 1996); Bob van den Boogert and Jacqueline Kerkhoff (ed.), Maria van Hongarije. 1505–1558. Koningin tussen keizers en Kunstenaars (Zwolle: exhibition catalogue Rijksmuseum Het Catherijneconvent, Utrecht-Noordbrabants Museum, ‘s-Hertogenbosch, 1993); Laetitia V.G. Gorter-Van Royen, Maria van Hongarije, regentes der Nederlanden: een politieke analyse op basis van haar regentschaps-ordonnanties en haar correspondentie met Karel V (Hilversum: Verloren, 1995); P. Rosenfeld, “The Provincial Governors of the Netherlands from the Minority of Charles V to the Revolt,” Standen en Landen XVII (1959): 1–63; James D. Tracy, Holland under Hapsburg Rule, 1506–1566.The Formation of a Body Politic (BerkeleyLos Angeles: University of California Press, 1990).

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southeast of Mons, this former Gothic château was renovated and amplified between 1545 and 1549 by Jacques Dubroeucq (1505–1584).101 Binche’s Banqueting Hall was designed to astound. Though it lacked the water tricks of Hesdin, the chamber contained a “Helicon-Font” on its long side which was designed to imitate the hydraulic works of Heron of Alexandria.102 The wall fountain contrasted natural art with artificial nature as opposite the ars automatica were three dining tables which slowly revolved to display a delectable array of menus. A watercolor of Binche’s magical chamber circa 1549 does not illustrate the tapestries of the “History of Scipio Africanus” which were hung on the lower walls. However, a portion of the ceiling is Théophile Lejeune, Histoire de la ville de Binche (Binche: 1887); [Église SainteWaudru], Jacques Du Broeucq, sculpteur et architecte de la Renaissance, (Mons: Exhibition Catalogue, 1985), including the essays by: Marcel Capouillez, “Historique et description des châteaux de Boussu, Binche et Mariemont,” 177–90; Jacques Debergh, “Échos de l’Antiquité Romaine dans l’oeuvre de Jacques Du Broeucq,” 125–44; E. Devreux, “Les châteaux de Binche,” Annales du Cercle Archéologique de Mons LIV (1935–36): 3–21; idem., Les châteaux de Binche (Mons et Frameries: Union des imprimeries, 1930); Robert Hedicke, Jacques Dubroeucq vons Mons, ein niederländischer Meister aus der Frühzeit des italienischen Einflusses (Straasburg: Univ.-buchdr. von J.H.E. Heitz, 1904); idem, Jacques Dubroeucq vons Mons (Brussels: 1911), 400–1; D. Dehon, “Binche, sa fortification et ses châteaux,” Cahiers de’urbanisme XLIV (Namur, 2000): 36–46; Robert Wellens, Jacques Du Broeucq, sculptor et architecte de la Renaissance, 1505–1584 (Brussels: Renaissance du Llivre, 1962); idem., “Les travaux de restauration au château de la Salle à Binche sous Philippe le Bon et Marguerite d’York,” Annales du Cercle Archéologique de Mons, LXIII (1954–57): 131–36. Two other hunting retreats frequented by Mary of Hungary were Mariemont, which was enlarged by Archduchess Isabella Clara Eugenia, and Turnout. See [Musée Royal de Mariemont], Charles de Lorraine à Mariemont. Le domaine royal de Mariemont au temps des gouverneurs autrichiens (Morlanwelz: 1987); Robert Wellens, “Le domaine de Mariemont au XVs siècle,” Annales du cercle archéologique de Mons LXIV (1958–61): 79–172; Harry de Kok and Eugeen van Autenboer (ed.), Turnhout. Groei van een stadv (Turnhout: Brepols, 1983); Harry de Kok et al., Het kasteel van de Hertogen van Brabant: geschiedenis en restauratie van het gerechtshof te Turnhout (Turnhout : Brepols, 2000); A.F.J. de Laet, Turnhout de hoofstad der Kempen. Opzoekingen over der oorsprong, met korte historie en aanhangsel (Turnhout: Brepols, 1905). 102 W. Schmidt (ed.) Herons von Alexandria Druckwerke und Automatentheater (Leipzig: 1899). Thomas Henri Martin, Recherches sur la vie et les ouvrages d’Héron d’Alexandrie, disciple de Ctésibius, et sur tous les ouvrages mathématiques grecs, conservés ou perdus, publiés ou inédits, qui ont été attribués à un auteur nommé Héron (Paris: Imprimerie impériale. 1854); Aage Gerhardt Drachmann, Ktesibios, Philon and Heron. A Study in Ancient Pneumatics (Copenhagen: E. Munksgaard, 1948); idem., The Mechanical Technology of Greek and Roman Antiquity. A Study of the Literary Sources (Copenhagen-Madison: Munksgaard-University of Wisconsin Press, 1963). 103 Pierre Dumon, Binche 1549. De blijde intrede van prins Filips, toekomstig koning van Spanje (Brussels: 1985); Samuël Glotz,”Les ‘triomphes’ de Binche en aoüt 1549,” in [Église 101

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shown with its clouds, constellations, planet gods, and astrological signs.103 Binche’s “dome of heaven” simulated natural phenomena, and though the mechanical apparati are not apparent, tapestries functioned to showcase exploits of the ancient Roman commander who defeated Hannibal and leveled Carthage. Inspiration from Philip the Good’s ducal houses and the ymagiers-paintres in his service seems undeniable.104 Sainte-Waudru], Jacques Du Broeucq (Mons: Exhibition Catalogue 1985): 191–204; idem., (ed). “”Une relation allemande méconnue (1550) des fêtes données par Marie de Hongrie, à Binche et à Mariemont, en aoüt 1549,” Revue de la Société d’Archéologie et des Amis du Musée de Binche (1991): 5–13; Daniel Heartz, “Un divertissement de palais pour Charles Quint à Binche,” in Jean Jacquot (ed.), Les fêtes de la Renaissance, 3 vols. (Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1956–1975), II (1960), “Fêtes et Cérémonies au Temps de Charles Quint,” 329–42; A. van de Put and Arthur Ewart Popham, “Two drawings of the Fêtes at Binche for Charles V and Philip II, 1549”; “The Authorship of the Drawings of Binche,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes III (1939–40): 49–55, 55–57; Charles Louis Ruelens, Le siége et les fêtes de Binche (1543 et 1549)(Mons: Dequesne-Masquillier, 1878); Edward Peters, “1549 Knight’s Game at Binche. Constructing Philip II’s Ideal Identity in a Ritual of Honor,“ in Reindert Leonard Falkenburg et al., ed. Hof-,staats-en stadsceremonies/Court, State and City Ceremonies, Netherlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek XLIX (1998, Zwolle): 11–35, Krista De Jonge, “El emperador y las fiestas flamencas de su época (1515–1558), in A.J. Morales, ed., La fiesta en Europa de Carlos V (Seville: 2000): 48–71; Branden K. Frieder, Chivalry and the Perfect Prince: Tournaments, Art, and Armor at the Spanish Habsburg Court (Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Press, 2008), discusses the Hapsburg festivities at Binche. 104 Considering the wall fountains evoked Parnassus, musicians probably performed in the banqueting chamber of Binche. Mary’s passion for music and books was inherited from her aunt, Margaret of Austria (1480–1530), who preceeded her as archduchess of the Spanish Netherlands. See Glenda Thompson, “Music in the court records of Mary of Hungary,” Tijdschrift Vereniging Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis XXXIV (1983–84): 132–73; Paul Becquart and Henri Vanhulst (ed.), Musique des Pays-Bas anciens, musique espagnole ancienne (ca. 1450–ca. 1650): Colloquia Europalia III. Actes du Colloque Musicologique International, Brussels, 28–29 1985 X (Louvain: Peeters, 1988); Louis Prosper Gachard, “Notice sur la librarie de la reaine Marie de Hongrie, soeur de Charles-Quint, rêgente des Pays-Bas,” Compte-rendu des Séances de la Commission Royale d’Histoire, ou Recueil de ses Bulletins I (1845): 224–46; G. Cammaert, “De Muziek aan het hof van Margaretha van Oostenrijk,” Handelingen van de Koninklijke Kring voor Ouheidkunde. Letteren en Kunst van Mechelen LXXXIV (1980): 76–95; Marguerite Debae (ed.), La librairie de Marguerite d’Autriche. De Librije van Margareta van Oostenrijk [Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ier -Koninklijke Bibliotheek Albert I, 1987); Henri Michelant, Inventaire des vaisselles, joyaux, tapisseries, peintres, livres et manuscrits de Marguerite d’Austriche, régente et gouvernmente des Pays-Bas (1523) (Brussels: 1870). Mary of Hungary also augmented the Imperial Palace of Coudenberg, particulary the sector of her apartments overlooking the Warande parkland to the north. See Krista de Jonge, “Le palais de Charles-Quint à Bruxelles. Ses dispositions intérieures aux XV et XVe siècles et le cérémonial

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Thoughts about Poetry and Music Richard Vaughan has provided examples of Burgundian dining which prove how excessively rich were the menus of the court even during the liturgical season of Lent. To prepare a simple supper at Coudenberg Palace in Brussels on November 11, 1460, he lists the following provisions: seventy-four dozen rolls, cress and lettuce, six joints of beef, fortythree pounds of lard, twenty-one shoulders of mutton, six-and-a-half dozen sausages, three pigs, tripe and calves’ feet for making jellies, a bittern, three geese, twelve water-birds, four rabbits, twenty-two partridges, 159 chickens, sixteen pairs of pigeons, eighteen cheeses, 350 eggs, pastries, flour, cabbages, peas, parsley, onions, 100 quinces and 150 pears, cream, six pounds of butter, vinegar and oranges and lemons.105 de Bourgogne,” in Jean Guillaume (ed.) Architecture et vie sociale: l’organisation intérieure des grandes demeures à la fin du Moyen Age et à la Renaissance: Actes du Colloque tenu à Tours du 6 au 10 juin 1988 (Paris : Picard, 1994), 107–25. 105 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 142 and note 1. He states this banquet for ladies was attended by the Duke of Cleves, Jacques de Bourbon, Eberhard of Württemberg and other dignitaries and cites Henri David, “L’Hôtel Ducal sous Philippe le Bon,” Annales de Bourgogne 37 (1965): 245–53. This dinner could not be the entertainment captured in the Torchlight Dance, a late sixteenth-century painting, which until 1930 was in the collection of Dr. Albert Figdor (Vienna). Measuring 33.5 x 89 cm., the work is dated about 1463 by Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 275–78. Smith names some of the participants who are labeled in the painting: Jehanne de Croÿ, daughter of Jean de Croÿ, Count of Chimay (1395–1472), wife of Jehan de Lannoy, Duke Philip’s stadholder of Holland; Duchess Isabel of Portugal and Philip the Good; Jacques de Luxembourg, brother of Louis, Count of St. Pol; Charles the Bold, Lord of Charolais; Agnes of Burgundy, the Duchess of Bourbon, a resident of the court with her daughters from October 16 1462; Anthony the “Grand Bastard” of Burgundy, son of Philip the Good; Marie of Burgundy, Duchess of Cleves; Jean, Count of Étampes (Count of Nevers in 1464) and his Countess; and Philip, Lord of Hornes. Smith notes the political exclusion of such notable figures as Adolph and Jean of Cleves, Jacques of Bourbon and members of the Croÿ and Lannoy families. He suggests the subject may represent a dinner held on November 14, 1462 at the Imperial Palace in Brussels. For the Croÿ family consult: Marie Rose Thielemans, “Les Croÿ, conseillers des ducs de Bourgogne. Documents extraits de leurs archives familiales, 1357–1487,” Bulletin de la Commission Royale d’Histoire CXXIV (1959): 1–141; Lucie Régibeau, Le rôle politique des Croÿ à la fin du règne de Philippe le Bon, 1456–1465 (University of Brussels: Thesis, 1956).

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Such banquets often involved the collaboration of decorators who were skilled in the painting of heraldic table adornments, and goldsmiths. Based at Hesdin, Hue de Boulogne (ac. 1397–1451), Philip’s valet de chambre, achieved a reputation as specialist in entrêmets, or set decorations for tables. He also provided ducal pennants and arms for the diverse ducal houses, and even looked after the Duke’s aviary at Hesdin until 1446. His son Jean continued his artifices.106 Gold and silver plates typically were displayed in gala banqueting halls on side buffets and cabinets to underscore the wealth of Burgundy. Several costly items must have been crafted by Jean Peutin, the master goldsmith of Bruges. The majority of them, however, either were taken as booty by the Swiss after Charles the Bold was killed at the Battle of Nancy (January 5, 1477), or melted down by his Hapsburg successors to provide bullion to support the religious wars of the Counter-Reformation.107 The 1420 an inventory of the jewels and ornaments belonging to the household of Philip the Good lists a “gold goblet, with cover,” which was served daily

106 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 268–69 and note 1, wherein he mentions the account records and cites numerous entries given by Labord, Les Ducs de Bourgogne. Also consult Françoise Robin, “Le Luxe de la table dans les cours princières (1360– 1480),” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXXXVI (1975): 1–16; Peter Metz, “Ein Automatisches Tafelspielzeug der Renaissance,” Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen XII (1970): 5–33. As observed by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 143, Hue de Boulogne provided table decorations for a banquet in 1435 at Lille Castle which was held in honor of Charles, Duke of Bourbon, Arthur, Count of Richemont, and the captive René of Anjou, King of Naples and the Two Sicilies. A hawthorn tree with gold and silver flowers was set up on each of the main tables. The trees also bore five banners with the polychromed arms of France and the principal guests. The ducal herald appeared on eighteen smaller trees. A live peacock on a dish was encircled by ten gilt lions, each holding a banner with illustrating the escutcheons of Philip the Good’s lands. For the same banquet, Hue de Boulogne painted fifty-six wooden plates in black and grey with emblems of the Order of the Golden Fleece, a flint and steel with sparks and flames. Vaughan cites, 143 note 1, Labord, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, 348–49, and he also mentions, 137, Hue’s supervision of the Hesdin aviary. 107 Richard Vaughan, Charles the Bold. The Last Valois Duke of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble-Harper & Row, 1974); Cinq-centième anniversaire de la bataille de Nancy, 1477: Actes du Colloque organisé par l’Institut de recherche régionale en sciences sociales, humaines et économiques de l’Université de Nancy II, Nancy, 22–24 septembre 1977 (Nancy: L’Université, 1979); [Musée Historique Lorrain], La Bataille de Nancy 5 Janvier 1477 (Nancy: Exhibition Catalogue, 1977); Ferdinand de Lacombe, Le siège et la bataille de Nancy (1476–1477) (Nancy:Maubon, 1860); Florens Deuchler, Burgund. La Bourgogne (Nachfolger: H. Köster, 1970).

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to the Duke.108 The description accords with the type of wine container held by servants in the Versailles Festivity. Burgundian banquets were grand occasions for the display of a realm’s wealth, such as fine Franco-Flemish tapestries that mirrored the courtly theater of Late Gothic life (Figs. 5.150–5.152) and delighted the eye. Under the rule of the Duke of Burgundy, such events were characterized by a roster of performances contrived to amuse ducal guests. Besides dances and mimes, comedic interludes were orchestrated by Michault Taillevent, who was both a poet and joueur de farces.109 Scenic designers often were required to provide settings for more serious recitations. Poems and prose which concerned

108 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 151 and note 1, who states the inventory included “sixteen pieces of plate in solid gold, fifty-three of silver.” The document listed “hundreds of jewels,” some of which are describe by Vaughan, as well as a “vermilion robe,” which had to be made of the costly “scarlet” wool. Golden crowns and crosses of John the Fearless numbered among the items, which also included swords, reliquaries, tapestries and manuscripts. Regarding the ducal goblet and the inventory, he cites Lille, Archives départamentales du Nord, Inventaire Sommaire des Archives Départamentales du Nord antérieures à 1790, Sèrie B, Chambre des Comptes de Lille, ed. Le Glay, VIII, 161–64, and Florens Deuchler, Die Burgunderbeute. Inventar der Beuteatücke aus den Schlachten von Grandson, Murten und Nancy 1476/1477 (Bern: Stämpfli, 1963), 139–41. To have a perception of the fine enamel and gold work of this period, consult Éva Kovács, L’Orfèvrerie Parisienne au temps des princes de Valois (Paris: Éditions Faton, 2004); Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye, “L’éclat nouveau de l’orfèvrerie,” Dossier d’Art CVII (Dijon: Faton): 26–39. Also see Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye, “Vie de cour et vie artistique,” in Les Princes des fleurs de lis. La France et les arts en 1400, ed. Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye (Paris: Éditions RMN, 2004): 54–81; Fabienne Joubert, “Les arts de la couleur,” Paris et Charles V. Arts et architecture, ed. Frédéric Pleybert, with the collaboration of Arnaud Alexandre et al. (Paris: Action artistique de la ville de Paris, 2001): 166–85. For the tapestries of circa 1420 (Paris:Musée des Arts Décoratifs) illustrating scenes of romance in a landscape see Fabienne Joubert, “Peindre en 1400,” Dossier d’Art CVII (Dijon: Faton), 40–49 at 48–49 (1420 tapestries). For Burgundian acquisition of tapestries circa 1400, also consult Fabienne Joubert, La tapisserie médiévale (Paris: 3rd ed. revised and augmented with the collaboration of Viviane Huchard, Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 2002); idem., “Les ‘tapissiers’ de Philippe le Hardi,” X, Artistes, artisans et production artistique au Moyen Age: colloque international, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Université de Rennes II, Haute-Bretagne, 2–6 mai 1983, 3 vols. ed. Xavier Barral i Altet (Paris: Picard, 1986–1990), III (1990): Fabrication et consommation de oeuvre. 109 Michel Duchein, “Le poète Michault de Caron dit Taillevent,” Positions des Thèses soutenues à l’École Nationale des Chartres (1949): 49–52; Pierre Champion, Historique Poétique du XVe Siècle, 2 vols. (Paris: Champion, 1923), I, 285–338 (Poets employed by Philip the Good). These references are provided by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 157 note 3. See also Robert Deschaux, Un poète bourguignon du XVe siècle, Michault Taillevent Édition et Étude (Geneva: Droz, 1975); Michault de Taillevent, Le Songe de la Thoison d’Or, Collection de

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the exploits of epical heroes drew deep from the well of chivalric literature. In the French tradition of royal bibliophiles, Philip the Good assembled a library of about 1000 books, including 250 tomes inherited from his father.110 Many manuscripts were luxuriously illustrated romances, others were historical chronicles, and even more were translations of ancient and medieval manuscripts. Jehan Wauquelin in Hainaut (Brussels), Jehan Miélot in Lille and David Aubert, who worked between Bruges and Brussels, were among several writers employed by the Duke, whose activity as a collector increased dramatically after 1445.111 Poèsies, Romans, Chroniques publiées d’après d’anciens manuscrits et d’après des Éditions des XVe et XVIe siècle (13e Livraison) (Paris: 1841). Jean-Claude Mühlethaler, Poétiques du quinzième siècle: situation de François Villon et Michault Taillevent (Paris: A.-G. Nizet, 1983). 110 Georges Dogaer and Marguerite Debae, La Librarie de Philippe le Bon (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ie :1967); L.M.J. Delaissé, La Miniature Flamande a l’Époque de Philippe le Bon (Milan: exhibition catalogue, 1956; idem., De gouden eeuw der Vlaamse miniatuur, het mecenaat van Filips de Goede, 1445–1475 (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, 1959); Georges Doutrepont, La littérature française à la cour des ducs de Bourgogne: Philippe le Hardi, Jean sans Peur, Philippe le Bon, Charles le Téméraire (Paris: Champion, 1909 [Bibliothèque du XVe siècle, 8] and rpt. (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1970); Camille Gaspar and Frédéric Lyna, Philippe le Bon et ses beaux livres (Bruxelles: Éditions du Cercle d’Art, 1944); Paul Durrieu (Comte), La miniature flamande au temps de la cour de Bourgogne, 1415–1530 (Paris: l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (Fondation Piot), G. van Oest et Cie, 1921; 2nd ed. 1927); [Musée de Beaux-Arts], Manuscrits des Ducs de Bourgogne de la Bibliothèque Nationale (Dijon: 1950); Leon Glissen et al., La Librarie de Bourgogne et quelques acquisitions récentes de la Bibliothèque Royale Albert Ier – Cinquante Miniatures (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, 1970); Anne Hagiopan-van Buren, “Philip the Good’s Manuscripts as Documents of his Relations with the Empire,” Publication du Centre Européen d’Études Bourguignonnes (XVe– XVIe siècle), Rencontres de Nimègue (21 – 24 September, 1995), XXXVI (1996): 49–69; Patrick M. de Winter, La bibliothèque de Philippe le Hardi, duc de Bourgogne (1364–1404): étude sur les manuscrits à peintures d’une collection princière à l’époque du «style gothique international» (Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1985). 111 Robert Ranc, “La présentation des manuscrits à Philippe le Bon,” Gutenberg Jahrbuch (1961): 18–23; Pierre Cockshaw, “Mentions d’autours, de copistes, d’enlumineurs et de libraires dans les comptes généraux de l’État bourguignon (1384–1419),” Scriptorium XXIII (1969): 122–44; idem., “La famille du copiste David Aubert,” Scriptorium XXII (1968): 279–87; Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 104–6, 347–58. L.M.J. Delaissé, “Les principaux centres de production de manuscrits enlumines dans les états de Philippe le Bon,” Cahiers de l’Association Internationale des Études Françaises VIII (1956): 11–34; idem., Les ‘Chroniques de Hainaut’ et l’atelier de Jean Wauquelin à Mons dans l’histoire de la miniature Flamande,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique IV (1955): 21–56; Anne Hagiopan-van Buren, “New Evidence for Jean Wauquelin’s activity in the ‘Chroniques de Hainaut’ and the date of the miniatures,” Scriptorium XXVI (1972): 249–68. Philip the

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According to ordinances for 1426, 1433 and 1438, Philip the Good employed ten “trumpeters and minstrels” in his household.112 These instrumentalists and chanteurs of secular music were quite separate from the ducal chaplains who formed liturgical choirs. Gilles Binchois (ca. 1400– 1460) was a rhétoricien, innovator in the field of music, and from the year 1425, Philip the Good’s most important chaplain. Approximately fifty-four of his chansons survive.113 A native of Hainaut, Guilllaume Dufay (ca. 1400– 1474) also wrote several works for the Duke of Burgundy. Beginning his career at Cambrai, he composed music to celebrate the marriage in Rimini of Emperor Manuel Palaeologus and Cleophe Malatesta. From Byzantium, he transferred to the court of Pope Eugenius IV, traveling with the pontiff to Florence between 1428 and 1437. Following a few years in Savoy and a visit to England, he returned to Cambrai in 1445, where he became a canon not only in that center, but also in Bruges and Mons. His choir music composed for masses innovatively employed vernacular songs as cantus firmi. But Dufay also authored the text and melodies for many secular motets and ballads, and he especially was skilled in composing music for contemporary poetry by Charles d’Orléans, Christine de Pisan and others. Among his most acclaimed works for the Burgundian court, was the music he wrote to accompany the entertainments staged for the 1454 “Feast of the Pheasant” in Lille. Good employed Georges Chastellain as his historical chronicler. See Georges Chastellain, Oeuvres, ed. Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, 8 vols. (Brussels: Académie Royale de Belgique, 1863–66; Luc Hommel, Chastellain, 1415–1474 (Bruxelles: Renaissance du Livre, 1945). Smith singles out, 357, two important manuscripts transcribed for Philip the Good by Jean Miélot: the Speculum Humanae Salvationis authored by the Franciscan Ludolph of Saxony (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale, MS. 9249–50); and La Vie det Miracles de Saint Josse (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale, MS. 10958). See Paul Frédéric Perdrizet, “Jean Miélot, l’un des traducteurs de Philippe le Bon,” Revue d’Histoire Littéraire de la France XIV (1907): 472–82; idem., Étude sur le Speculum humanæ salvations (Paris, H. Champion, 1908). 112 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 140 and note 1. He provides a partial listing of the staff comprising the Duke’s household and for the ordonnances, cites the Archives départementales du Nord, Lille, B1603, fol. 91–7 (1426), B1605, fol. 181–90 (1433) and B1605, fol. 212–25b (1438). 113 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 160 and note 1. See Georges van Doorslaer, “La chapelle musicale de Philippe le Beau,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art IV (1934): 21–58 and 139–66; Charles van den Borren, Geschiedenis van de muziek in de Nederlanden, 2 vols. (Antwerp: Nederlandsche Boekhandel, 1948–51); Jeanne Marix, Histoire de la musique et des musiciens de la cour de Bourgogne sous le règne de Philippe le Bon (1420–1467) (Strasbourg: Heitz, 1939); idem., Les musiciens de la cour de Bourgogne au XVe siècle (1420–

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Philip the Good had established a choir school at Dijon and he personally selected the singers for his private chapels in Lille, Bruges, Ghent and Brussels. Presumably, his love of music was shared by Infanta Isabel of Portugal, whose brothers also manifested an exceptional interest in choirs, minstrels’ ballads, and stringed instruments. Gilles Binchois and Guillaume Dufay (Figs. 5.153–5.154) are known for ushering in a new polyphonic mode that consisted of distinctive melodies which perfectly harmonized when they were played simultaneously as a composition.114 Binchois perhaps holds such an original composition in Jan van Eyck’s earliest extant painting of Léal Souvenir. Considered to be an allegorical portrait of Gilles Binchois as the Hellenistic musician Tymotheos of Miletus, the panel carries a date and signature, ACTU ANO DNI 1432 10 DIE OCTOBRIS A JOH[ANNES] DE EYCK.115 Though Erwin Panofsky first postulated the sitter’s identify,

1467), ed. Louise B-M. Dyer (Paris: Éditions de l’Oiseau-Lyre, 1937) rpt. as Les musiciens de la cour de Bourgogne an XVe siècle, 1420–1467: messes, motels, chansons Gilles de Binche (Binchois) (New York: AMS Press, 1976); Erna Dannemann, Die spätgotische musiktradition in Frankreich und Burgund vor dem auftreten Dufays: mit zahlreichen notenbeispielen (Strassburg: Heitz & Co., 1936); C. Wright, Music at the Court of Burgundy 1364–1419. A Documentary History (Brooklyn-Henryville, 1979); Edmund Addison Bowles, “Instruments at the Court of Burgundy,” Galpin Society Journal, VI (1953): 41–51; idem., Musikleben im 15. Jahrhundert (Leipzig: Deutscher Verlag für Musik, 1977); idem., Haut and Bas: The Grouping of Musical Instruments in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, Mass.: Department of Humanities, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1955); Robert Wangermée, La Musique flamande dans la société des XVe et des XVIe siècles (Brussels: Arcade, 1965); Isabelle Cazeaux, French Music in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1975; Henri-Arnault of Zwolle [† 1466], Instruments de Musique du XVe siècle (Paris: A. Picard, 1932). 114 Rudolf Bockholdt, Die frühen Messenkompositionen von Guillaume Dufay (Tutzing: H. Schneider, 1960); Charles van den Borren, Compositions inédites de Guillaume Dufay et de Gilles Binchois (Antwerp: Imprimerie E. Secelle, 1922); idem., Guillaume Dufay; son importance dans l’évolution de la musique au XVe siècle (Brussels: Maurice Lamertin, libraireéditeur, 1926); idem., Guillaume Dufay, centre de rayonnement de la polyphonie européenne à la fin du moyen âge (Brussels-Rome, 1939); John Frederick Randall and Cecie Stainer, Dufay and his Contemporaries (London: Novello and Company, Ltd., 1898); William R. Tyler, Dijon and the Valois Dukes of Burgundy (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971), at 103, but also see 104–110 on Dufay and Burgundian music. 115 Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries, 69, 71; Dieter Jansen, “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis – der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 38–39, 43–47; Edwin James Mundy, “Porphyry and the ‘Posthumous’ Fifteenth Century Portrait,” Pantheon XLVI (1988): 37–43, at 37–38, 40; M. Fruhstorfer, “Fiktionssprünge in Van Eycks Bildnis des sogenannten Timotheos,” Oud Holland CI (1987):

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Alejandro Planchart has uncovered conclusive proof by his discovered of Binchois’s sepulchre with its gisant which strongly resembles Van Eyck’s realistic likeness. 116 The pensive young man depicted by Jan wears a fashionable chaperon and red wool tunic lined in sable. Square-jawed with a round-tipped nose, his physiognomy also is comparable to that of a gentleman in the Versailles Festivity (Fig. 5.155). Strolling to the left of Jacqueline de Hainaut and Frank van Borselen, this member of the “hunting party” is seen from the back with a large black purse draped about his heuque, a tunic open at the sides to reveal a surcoat.117 Though his right hand touches the hilt of a dagger, his 277–79; Guy C. Bauman, “Early Flemish Portraits 1425–1525,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin XLIII, No. 4 (1986): 1–64, at 35–36, 46, 48. 116 Erwin Panofsky, “Who is Jan van Eyck’s “Tymotheos’?,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 12 (1949), 80–90; idem, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 rpt. of 1953 edition, Harvard University ), I, 196–97. Panofsky mentions the great Flemish composer, Guillaume Dufäy, but deduced Jan’s portrait was of Binchois, as Dufäy was traveling abroad between 1428 and 1437. See his citation, 435–36 note 1. Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 108–10, discusses the Binchois portrait and refers to the research of the musicologist Alejandro Planchart which was presented in a symposium on Burgundy held at Vancouver in 1977. As noted by Smith, Philip the Good was in Bruges on October 10, 1432, and he conjectures the possibility of a “gift ceremony.” Also consult: Marix, Histoire de la musique et des musiciens de la Cour de Bourgogne sous le règne de Philippe le Bon (1420–1467) (Strasbourg: 1939), 176–89 (Binchois); W. Wood, “A New Identification of the Sitter in Jan van Eyck’s Timotheus Portrait,” Art Bulletin 60 (1978): 650–54; Zdzislaw Kepinski, “Jan van Eyck’s “T Y M ω Θ Ε Ο Ι”: portrait of Jean de Croy?,” Artium Quaestiones, ed. K. Kalinoswki and W. Suchocki (1979: Poznan Uniwersytet im A. Mickiewicza): 27–54; Jacques Paviot, “The Sitter for Jan van Eyck’s ‘Léal Souvenir’,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes LVIII (1995): 210–15. 117 In 1432 Lambert van Eyck signed a portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria a few weeks before Jan van Eyck painted his Léal Souvenir (London: Ntional Gallery). The panel contained the insciption: “Actum ao dñi. G 11J augusti a Lamberto de Eyck.” [Act done in the year of Our Lord 1432 August by Lambert de Eyck]. See Paviot, “The Sitter for Jan van Eyck’s ‘Léal Souvenir’,” 212 note 18. He cites Jan Karl Steppe, “Lambert van Eyck en het portret van Jacoba van Beieren,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLIV, No. 2 (1983) Academiae Analecta: 53–86. The work was mentioned in an inventory taken for Charles de Croÿ († 1612) at the Castle of Heverlee near Louvain. See Lorne Campbell, National Gallery Catalogues, The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Schools (London: National Gallery Publications and Yale University Press, 1998), 218–23 (Léal Souvenir, signed and dated 10 October 1432) and 222–223 note 30 (Lambert’s Portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria). For a Portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria in Copenhagen (Statens Museum for Kunst) see L. Ninane, “Un portrait de famille des ducs de Bavière, comtes de Hollande, Zééland et Hainaut,” Koninklijk Musea voor Schone

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left appears to be holding a scroll attached to a wooden support to facilitate unrolling. Jan’s “Tymotheos” holds a much smaller parchment scroll to signify his achievements as a composer. He also stands in front of a parapet which simulates ancient commemorative monuments Jan saw in Portugal or Spain. The stone is chiseled with the French motto LÉAL SOUVENIR (Loyal Memory).118 (Figs. 5.156–5.157) This antique niche clearly identifies the figure as the Milesian “musician who soothed the emotions of Alexander the Great.” As in the case of the Versailles Festivity, wherein Philip the Good’s sword recalls the legend of the Gordian knot, the panel of “Tymotheos” equally intimates that Van Eyck is the “Apelles” of a Burgundian Alexander.119 Working fully a century before Gilles Binchois, the French poet and musician Guillaume de Machaut (1284–1377) achieved renown at two splendid courts in Europe, Bohemia and France. Of noble birth in Champagne, Machaut in 1316 entered the service of John of Luxembourg in Prague (1296: r. 1310–1346). Employed as secretary for thirty years Kunsten van België. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Bulletin (Miscellanea Philippe Roberts-Jones), XXXIV–XXXVII, Nos. 1–3 (1985–1989): 63–74, at 69. 118 Regarding the Femish interest in ancient subjects, see Jacques Monfrin, “Le goût des lettres antiques à la cour de Bourgogne au XIVe siècle,” Bulletin de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France (1967): 284–89; Louise Roblot-Delondre, “Les sujets antiques dans la tapisserie de la Renaissance,” Revue Archéologique (1917): 296–309; (1918): 131–50; (1919): 48–63, 294–332. 119 See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), 91–108, for a discussion of Philip the Good as a “Second Alexander the Great,” particularly the “Alexander Tapestries.” Also consult: Marthe Crick-Kunstziger, “Note sur les tapisseries de l’Histoire d’Alexandre du Palais Doria,” Bulletin de l’Institut Historique Belge de Rome XIX (1938): 273–76; Jozef Duverger, “Aantekeningen betreffende laataiddeleeuwse tapijten met de geschiedenis van Alexander de Grote,” Artes Textiles V (1960): 31–43; Robert L. Wyss, “Drei Zeichnungen zur Geschichte Alexanders des Grossen,” Jahrbuch der Bernischen Historischen Museums in Bern XXXV–XXXVI (1955–56): 86–94. Jan van Eyck’s 1435 portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum) and its modello (Dresden, Kupferstichkabinett) which probably was executed in Bruges in 1431, have been related to the contested St. Jerome in his Study (Detroit Museum of Fine Arts). The first to perceive a veiled portrait of the Carthusian Albergati († 1443) as the Latin Doctor in the Detroit panel was Erwin Panofky, “A Letter to St. Jerome: A Note on the Relationship between Petrus Christus and Jan van Eyck,” Studies in Art and Literature for Belle da Costa Greene, ed. Dorothy Eugenia Miner (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954): 102–8. Also consult: Edwin C. Hall, “Cardinal Albergati, St. Jerome and the Detroit Van Eyck,” Art Quarterly 34 (1968): 2–34: idem, “More about the Detroit Van Eyck: The Astrolabe, the Congress of Arras and Cardinal Albergati,” Art Quarterly 37 (1971): 181–202; Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 281–91; Penny Howell Jolly, “Antonello da Messina’s St. Jerome in his Study,” Burlington Magazine 124 (1982): 27–29; idem., Jan van Eyck and St. Jerome: A Study of Eyckian Influence on Colantino

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until the King of Bohemia was killed at the battle of Crècy, he was given several benefices. In 1346 Machaut joined the household of his patron’s daughter Judith, who was educated in France. Better known as “Bonne” of Luxembourg (1315–1349), she married the Duke of Normandy in 1332, but died a year before he ascended the French throne as King Jean II “Le Bon” (1319: r. 1350–1364) (Fig. 5.158). Following Bonne’s death, Machaut became secretary and then royal notary of Jean II. A composer of poems in diverse literary genres, ranging from secular motets and chansons to sacred verse for liturgical choirs, Machaut composed the music for the Mass offered at the Cathedral of Rheims when Charles V was crowned. He moved in the highest courtly circles.120 Throughout the late Gothic period, music was an essential feature of gala dining, as proven by bagpipe players and trumpeters in the background of The Banquet, a miniature from Guillaume de Machaut’s Le Remède de Fortune.121 (Fig. 5.159) Though anonymous, the illumination was created about 1350–55 by a French artist of uncommon naturalism, perhaps a master in the orbit of Jean le Noir. and Antonello da Messina in Quattrocento Naples, Ph.D. Dissertation (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1976); Edgar Preston Richardson, “The Detroit St. Jerome,” Art Quarterly XIX (1956): 227–35; Paolo De Toeth, Il Beato Cardinale Niccolò Albergati e I suoi tempi, 2 vols. (Viterbo: 1934). Millard Meiss, “’Nicolas Albergati’ and the Chronology of Jan van Eyck’s Portraits,” Burlington Magazine XCIV (1952): 132–44; Antoine de La Taverne [† 1448], Journal de la paix d’Arras faite en l’abbaye de Saint Vaast entre Charles VII et Philippe le Bon [1435] ed. André Bossuat (Arras: Impr. de la Société anonyme l’Avenir, 1936). 120 Ernest Hoepffner (ed.), Oeuvres de Guillaume de Machaut, 3 vols. (Paris: Firmin-Didot et Cie, 1908–21); Ulrich Günther, “Chronologie und Stil der Kompositionen Guillaume de Machauts,” Acta Musicologica XXX (1963): 96–114; S.S. Williams, “An Author’s Role in Fourteenth-Century Book Production: Guillaume de Machaut’s ‘livre ou je mets toutes mes choses’,” Romania XC (1969): 433–54; Daniel Poirion, Le poète et le prince; l’évolution du lyrisme courtois de Guillaume de Machaut à Charles d’Orléans (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France-Faculté des lettres de l’Université de Grenoble, 1965); Adrien Jean Victor Le Roux de Lincy, La bibliothèque de Charles d’Orléans à son château de Blois en 1427 (Paris: Firmin Didot frères, 1843); Madeleine Pelner Cosman and Bruce Chandler (eds.), Mauchaut’s World: Science and Art in the Fourteenth Century (New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 1978); Kevin Brownlee, Poetic Identity in Guillaume de Machaut (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1984). William Calin, A Poet at the Fountain: Essays on the Narrative Verse of Guillaume de Machaut (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1974). 121 François Avril, Manuscript Painting at the Court of France. The Fourteenth Century (1310–1380), translated by Ursule Molinaro and Bruce Benderson (New York: George Braziller, 1978), 84–89; idem., “Les manuscrits eluminés de Guillaume de Machaut,” Colloque Guillaume de Machaut l’Université de Reims, 19–22 Avril 1978, with the participation of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Ministère de la Culture et de l’environnement-la Fondation d’Hautvillers (Paris: Klincksieck, 1982): 117–33. Lawrence Marshburn Earp,

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Though no works have been securely identified by Le Noir’s daughter Bourget, Female illuminators were actively patronized during the late Gothic period.122 In 1405 the poet and historian Christine de Pisan (1363– 1431) wrote her Book of the City of Ladies (Fig. 5.160. 5.161) for Queen Isabel of Bavaria (1369–1435: m. 1385), the wife of Charles VI (1368: r. 1380–1422).123 In her treatise Christine speaks about three classical artists, Scribal Practice, Manuscript Production and the Transmission of Music in Late Medieval France: The Manuscripts of Guillaume de Machaut (Ann Arbor: 1983); idem., Guillaume de Machaut. A Guide to Research (New York: Garland Publishers, 1995). 122 Prior to 1358 Jean Le Noir completed Les Heures de Yolande de Flandre. For information about Countess Yolande de Bar, vassel of Louis III de Mâle (1330–1384), Count of Flanders, consult Sydney Carlyle Cockerell, The Book of Hours of Yolande of Flanders (London: Chiswick Press, 1905). Jean Le Noir was patronized by Jeanne de Navarre (1311– 1349), the daughter of Louis X (r. 1314–1316) and Margaret of Burgundy (d. 1315). Upon Louis X’s death, Jeanne had a legitimate claim to the French throne but the Assembly of Paris favored her uncle Philip V (1316–1322) and later her cousin Philip VI. In 1329 she married Philip III, Count of Évreux (11301–1343), who became King of Navarre in 1336. Le Noir’s Heures de Jeanne de Navarre dates about 1336 (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Nou. Acq. Lat.3145). See H. Yates Thompson, Thirty-two Miniatures from the Hours of Joan III, Queen of Navarre (London: 1899). These early manuscripts for Countess Yolande and Queen Jeanne reflect strong influences from Jean Pucelle, who was patronized by Jeanne d’Évreux (1310–1371), third wife in 1325 of the French King Charles IV “the Fair” (1294: r. 1322– 1328). See Kathleen Morand, Jean Pucelle (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1962); James Joseph Rorimer, The Hours of Jeanne d’Évreux, Queen of France (New York: The Cloisters Museum, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1957); L.J. Randall, “Games and the Passion in Pucelle’s Hours of Jeanne d’Évreux,” Speculum XLVII (1972): 246–57. Le Noir’s later folios of Les Petites Heures (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Lat. 18014) manifest less influence from Pucelle. Begun about 1372–75 for Duke Jean de Berry, Les Petites Heures was left incomplete, and finished by Jacquemart de Hesdin and his workshop. Consult: Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry. The Late Fourteenth Century and the Patronage of the Duke, 2 vols. (London: Phaidon Press, 1967), I, 160–69; Victor Leroquais, Les livres d’heures manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Nationale, 2 vols. (Paris: Maçon, Protat Frères, 1927), II, 175–87; L.M.J. Delaissé, ”Remaniements dans quelques manuscrits de Jean de Berry,” Essais en l’honneur de Jean Porcher, ed. Otto Pächt (Paris: 1963): 129–33. 123 The bibliography on Pisan is immense, but see Charity Cannon Willard, Christine de Pizan: Her Life and Works (New York: Persea, 1984); Enid McLeod, Order of the Rose: the Life and Ideas of Christine de Pizan (Ottawa-London: Rowan & Littlefield, 1976); Andrea Hopkins, Most Wise and Valiant Ladies. Remarkable Lives. Women of the Middle Ages (London: Collins & Brown Ltd-Welcome Rain, 1997), 108–31; Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Women at Work in Medieval Europe (New York: Facts on File, Inc., 2000); Suzanne Solente (ed.,), Le livre des fais et bonnes meurs du sage roy Charles V, par Christine de Pisan (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France-Série antérieure à 1789, H. Champion, 1936). Concerning Queen Isabeau, see Sandra L. Hindman,“The Iconography of Queen Isabeau de Bavière (1410–1415): An

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Thamaris of Ephesus, Irene of Greece, and Marcia of Rome.124 She then mentions another female master who excelled in painting (Figs. 5.162– 5.163): I know a woman working today who is so good at painting decorative borders and background landscapes for miniatures that there is no craftsman who can match her in the whole of Paris, even though Essay in Method,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CII, No. 6 (1983): 102–10; Yann Grandeau, “De quelques dames qui ont servi la reine Isabeau de Bavière,“ Bulletin Philologique et Historique du Comité des Travaux Historiques et Scientifiques (1975): 129–238; idem., “Itinéraire d’Isabeau de Bavière,” Bulletin Philologique et Historique du Comité des Travaux Historiques et Scientifiques 1964 (Paris: 1967): 569–670; Auguste Vallet de Viriville, “La bibliothèque d’Isabeau de Bavière, reine de France” et “Notice d’un manuscrit qui paroit avoir appartenu à la reine de France Isabelle de Bavière,” Bulletin du Bibliophile (1858): 663–687 and 826–35; Marcel Thibault, Isabeau de Baviére reine de France. La jeunesse, 1370–1405 (Paris: Perrin et Cie, 1903); Auguste Vallet de Viriville, Documents relatifs aux joyaux de Charles VI roi de France, engagés par les suggestions de la reine Ysabelle de Bavière,” Revue Archéologique XIII (1858): 710–715; XIV (1857): 599–603; Arthur Piaget, “La Cour amoureuse dite de Charles VI,” Romania XX (1891): 417–54; Adrien Jean Victor Le Roux de Lincy, Les femmes célèbres de l’ancienne France (Paris: Le Roi, 1848; rpt. 1852). 124 See Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski (ed.), The Selected Writings of Christine de Pizan, translated by Blumenfeld-Kosinski and Kevin Brownlee (New York-London: W.W. Norton & Company, 1997), 118 and notes 3–4 (Christine’s literary sources). The majority of her stories were based upon the writings of the Paris-born Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). For her saints, Pisan referred to St. Vincent of Beauvais’ Speculum historiale (1258), which in the late 1320s had been translated into French. Consult Vincent of Beauvais, Miroir historial, translated by Jean de Vignay (Paris: Verard, 1495–1496). Boccaccio’s De Mulieribus Claris was translated into French by September 12, 1401, the date of a scribe’s colophon. See [Boccaccio], Concerning Famous Women, translated by Guido Guarino (New Brunwick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1963); idem., The Decameron [1348–1358], translated by George Henry McWilliam (Harmondsword, UK: Penguin Books, 1972). For additional information, see Brigitte Buettner, Boccaccio’s Des cleres et nobles femmes: Systems of Signification in an Illuminated Manuscript (Seattle: College Art Association-University of Washington Press, 1996); idem., “Il commercio di immagini: I mercanti, I Rapondi e il Boccaccio in Francia,” Boccaccio visualizzato. Narrare per parole et per imagini tra Medievo et Rinascimento, ed. Vittore Branca, 3 vols. (Turin: 1999), III, 19–28; Carla Bozzolo, Manuscrits des traductions françaises d’oeuvres de Boccace. XVe siècle [published under the aegis of the Paris Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Padua: Antenore, 1973); Carla Bozzolo and Hélène Loyau (eds. With drawings by Françoise Granges), La Cour amoureuse, dite de Charles VI, 3 vols. (Paris: Léopard d’or, 1982–1992); Marie-Hélène Tesnière, “I Codici illustrati del Boccacio francese et latino nella Francia e nelle Fiandre del XV secolo,” et “Notices des manuscrits français,” in Boccaccio visualizzato. Narrare per parole et per imagini tra Medievo et Rinascimento, ed. Vittore Branca, 3 vols. (Turin: 1999), III, 3–17 and 29–266; idem., “La réception des Cas des nobles hommes et femmes de Boccaccio en France au Xve siècle d’après l’illustration des manuscrits,”

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that’s where the finest in the world can be found. Only Anastasia can execute such delicate floral motifs and tiny details and she is so well regarded that she is entrusted with finishing off even the most expensive and priceless of books. I know all this from my own experience: as she has done some work for me which has been ranked amongst the finest creations of the greatest masters.125 The miniatures of Le Remède de Fortune and Le Dit du Lion, another poem within the same manuscript, divulge an extreme interest in details of courtly life and elegant fashion.126 They also manifest an exceptional delight Autori e lettori di Boccaccio: Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Certaldo, 20–22 Settembre 2001, ed. Michelangelo Picone (Florence: F. Cesati, 2002): 387–402. Regarding manuscript illumination, consult: Albert Châtelet, L’Âge d’Or du Manuscrit à Peintures en France au Temps de Charles VI et Les Heures du Maréchal Boucicaut (Paris: Institut de France, Editions Faton, 2000), Ch. V, “Christine de Pisan et les Artisans Parisiens,” 100–29, particularly on Jacques Coene and the 1402 Des Cleres et nobles Femmes of Philip the Bold (Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale de France, MS. Fr. 12.420)106–10, and the “Master of the City of Ladies,” 111– 15; Florence Callu and François Avril, Boccace en France: de l’humanisme à l’érotisme (Paris: exhibition catalogue, Bibliothèque Nationale, 1975). 125 Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies, translated and with an introduction and notes by Rosalind Brown-Grant (London: Penguin Books, 1999), 76–77 (Part I: 41). The manuscript (London: British Library, Harley 4431) was acquired between 1425 and 1430 by John, Duke of Bedford. By 1713 Le Livre de la Cité des Dames was in the collection of Edward Harley. Before Pisan’s discussion of famous women painters, she mentions not only the ancient painter Marcia, but also highlights Arachne, the inventor of dyeing wool and weaver of fine tapestries (Part I: 39: Brown-Grant, 73–74), and Pamphile, the dyer and weaver of silk (Part I:40: Brown-Grant, 74–75). Regarding the Book of the City of Ladies, see the following translations of the Livre La Cité des Dames by: Rosalind Brown-Grant (London-New York: Penguin Books, 1999); Earl Jeffrey Richards with an introduction by Marina Warner (New York: Persea Books, 1982) and rpt. edition of 1998 with an foreword by Natalie Zemon Davis; Eric Hicks and Thérèse Moreau (Paris: Stock, 1986). Also consult: Christine de Pizan [1364–1431: Livre de trois vertues]. A Medieval Woman’s Mirror of Honor: The Treasury of the City of Ladies, translated by Charity Cannon Willard, ed. Madeleine Pelner Cosman (Tenafly, NJ-New York: Bard Hall Press-Persea Books, 1989); Earl Jeffrey Richards, “Editing the Livre de la Cité des Dames. New Insights, Problems and Challenges,” Au Champ des escriptures, IIIe Colloque International sur Christine de Pizan, Lausanne, 18–22 Juillet, 1998 (Paris: 2000): 789–816. 126 The paintings in the Psalter (New York: Cloisters Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art ) are in grisaille. François Avril, Manuscript Painting at the Court of France. The Fourteenth Century (1310–1380), 35, dates the book to the end of Bonne’s life and states: “At one point they were attributed to Pucelle, but from a stylistic point of view they are related to the works of Jean Le Noir, although they lack the latter’s dramatic violence and virulent caricature. The almost feminine smoothness of the design and certain weakness of the composition…

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in flora and fauna which is kindred to the avian ornamentation of borders in the Psalter of Bonne of Luxembourg.127 When speaking of Anastasia, Christine de Pisan used technical terminology to describe her skill in the painting suggest that the execution may have been done, at least in part by Jean Le Noir’s foremost collaboration, his very own daughter, Bourgot, who is known to have been an illuminator and to have worked with her father.” The observation of a “feminine” approach to design is very important, though technical “weakness” seems an exaggerated means to distinguish hands. Even contemporary woman artists paint with bold brush strokes as frequently as men. See Florens Deuchler, “Looking at Bonne of Luxembourg’s Prayer Book,” Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum XXIX (1971): 268–78; Charles Vaurie, “Birds in the Prayer Book of Bonne of Luxembourg,” Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum XXIX (1971): 279–81; Dorothy Eugenia Miner, Anastaise and her Sisters: Women Artists of the Middle Ages (Baltimore: Walters Art Gallery, 1974). Perhaps Bourget established her own atelier before her father died (c. 1375). 127 Each bird of the illuminated borders of these prayer books undoubtedly carried symbolic meaning. See Brusdon Yapp, “Les oiseaux dans les Petites Heures,” Les Petites Heures de duc de Berry, Introduction au manuscrit lat. 18014 de la Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris, ed. François Avril (Lucerne: Éditions Facsimile, 1989): 167–205. Jean de Berry’s manuscript is populated with 1500 birds in the rinceaux of the borders, forty species in all, which include such popular birds as goldfinches, finches, robins, kinglets, crested hoopoes, ring-necked parakeets, bluejays, larks and linnets. The remote source for the birds perched in the leafy arabesques of manuscript borders would be Medieval bestiaries, such as Hugues de Fouilloy, Livre des Oiseaux (Troyes: Médiathèque de l’Agglomération, MS. 177) from the Cistercian Abbey of Clairvaux, dated to the last quarter of the twelfth century, wherein the peacock (f. 158v) is described as “terreur de mort” and the pelican (f. 144v) as the “Passion du Christ.” See MarieHélène Tesnière, “De Plus Puissant au plus parfait des animaux; Les Libres appelés Beastiales,” in Marie-Hélène Tesnière and Thierry Delcourt, Bestiaire du Moyen Âge. Les animaux dans les manuscrits (Paris-Troyes: Somogy Éditions d’Art-Médiathèque de l’Agglomération Troyenne, 2004), 45–53, at 48, Plates 40a and 40b. Discussing briefly the Livre des Oiseaux written by Hugues de Fouilloy, prior of Saint-Laurent-au-Bois (near Corbie), Tesnière, 48, provides his interpretation of the peacock, and the passage has relevance for Jan van Eyck’s depiction of a pair of peacocks in his Madonna of Chancellor Rolin (circa 1434): “The peacock has an alarming cry, a natural order, a head of snake, a sapphire chest; the feathers of its wings are a little red. Its cry is terrible, when the preacher threatens warns sinners of the inextinguishable fire of Hell. Its bearing is innate, each time that it does not swerve from humility in its actions. It has the head of a snake, when it holds its spirit under the guard of a prudent attention. The color sapphire of its chest symbolizes the spiritual desire of the sky. Its reddish feathers indicate the love of contemplation.” [“Le paon a un cri effrayant, une démande naturelle, une tête de serpent, une poitrine de saphir; les plumes de ses ailes sont un peu rouges…Son cri est terrible, quand le prédicateur menace les pécheurs du feu inextinguible de l’Enfer. Son allure est naturelle, chaque fois qu’il ne se départit pas de l’humilité dans ses actions. Il a la tête d’un serpent, lorsqu’il tient son esprit sous la garde d’une attention prudente. La couleur saphir de sa poitrine symbolise le désir spirituel du Ciel. Ses plumes roussâtres désignent l’amour de la contemplation.”].

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of vigneteures (vines) and champaignes d’istoires (landscapes of stories).128 Bonne’s prayer book which was created just before her death in September of 1349 has been suggested as a collaborative work between Jean le Noir and his daughter (Fig. 5.164). This would suggest that Bourget was a capable artist when her father entered the service of Jean II Le Bon in 1458, about the same time Le Remèdie de Fortune, Le Dit du Lion and the monarch’s Bible Moralisée were illuminated.129 Like Christine de Pisan, Machaut was a poet patronized by the house of Valois. Just as the Christine secured Anastasia to illustrate her literary works, Guillaume easily might have obtained his own artist from Le Noir’s workshop. Le Remède de Fortune has all the hallmarks of being autobiographical.130 In lengthy allegorical verse, the author describes the love of a poet-persona for a lady, presumably Bonne de Luxembourg. In the miniature of The Lover contemplating his Lady, the poet arrives at her grandiose residence with a companion (Fig. 5.165) but he is too timid to approach the physical barrier of her isolated world, with its curtain walls, crenellations and turrets. The poet can merely contemplate the beauty of his lady from afar. She is framed by the vaulted space of the building, and Machaut describes her body almost as he would a reliquary chapel, referring to “beautiful proportions, simple 128 Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski (ed.), The Selected Writings of Christine de Pizan, 140, provides a slightly different translation and refers to Christine’s technical terminology of vigneteures and champaignes d’istoires. Landscape is featured in the Songe de Vergier [Somnium Viridarii] of 1378, a manuscript in the London, British Library (MS. Royal, 19C.IV) which concerns a debate about worldly and spiritual power between an ecclesiastic and a knight. See Marion Schnerb-Lièvre, Le songe du vergier, 2 vols. (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1982); Jeannine Quillet, La philosophie politique du Songe du Vergier, 1378: Sources doctrinales (Paris: J. Vrin, 1977); idem., Charles V, le roi lettré: Essai sur la pensée politique d’un règne (Paris: Libr. académique Perrin, 1984). 129 Regarding the Bible Moralisé commissioned by Jean II at the beginning of his reign, the manuscript is in the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale (MS. Fr. 167). See François Avril, ”Un chef-d’oeuvre de l’enluminure sous la règne de Jean le Bon, la Bible moralisée, manuscrit français de la Bibliothèque Nationale,” Monuments et Mémoires de la Fondation Eugène Piot LVIII (1972): 95–125, especially 112–14; Paul Durrieu, “Manuscrits de lux exécutés pour les princes et grands seigneurs français,” Le Manuscrit II (1895): 103, 114–18; Alexandre de Labord (Comte), La Bible moralisée, conservée à Oxford, Paris et Londres [13th Century], 5 vols. (Paris; Pour les membres de la Société, 1911–27), V (Paris: 1927), 92–102. For information pertaining to the patronage of King Jean “the Good” of France (1319–1364), see Germain Bapst, Testament du roi Jean le Bon et inventaire de ses joyaux a Londres [National Archives] (Paris: Imprimerie Générale A. Lahure, 1884). 130 Avril, Manuscript Painting at the Court of France. The Fourteenth Century (1310– 1380), 76–79.

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and modest without irregularity.” 131 Even more important, Machaut sets his story between two locations, Hesdin Park and the lady’s stately home. Despite obvious inaccuracies in perspective, the illustrations of the lady’s castle in the manuscript appear to be based upon actual architecture. Though it is impossible to securely connect the imaginative towers, pinions, chimneys with a specific palatine monument, a germane clue regarding the castle appears within the verses accompanying the miniature of The Lover Sings as his Lady Dances (Fig. 5.166). The subject, which underlines a happy outcome in Le Remède de Fortune, is prefaced by a description of the poet sequestering himself in the “distant Park of Hesdin” to avoid telling his lady he wrote the ballad he was asked to narrate. Comforted by a woman personifying “Hope,” the poet is encouraged to return to his Michael Camille, The Medieval art of Love. Objects and Subjects of Desire (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1998), 27, quotes from Le Remède de de Fortune. Stating that Machaut’s poet only has visual access to his lady, he amplifies concerning the concept of love stimulated by sight. Regarding the “enclosure of women” and “love and vision,” Camille cites Carla Cassagrande, “La Femme Gardée,” Histoire des Femmes en Occident, II, Le Moyen Age, ed. Georges Duby and Michelle Perrot (Paris: 1991) reprinted as France in the Middle Ages 987–1460: from Hugh Capet to Joan of Arc, translated by Juliet Vale (Oxford-Cambridge: B. Blackwell, 1991); Ruth H. Kline, “Heart and Eyes,” Romance Philology XXV (1972: 263–97; A. C. Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur: Looking and Listening in Medieval Love-Narratives (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993). Jan van Eyck’s Berlin Madonna in a Church will be discussed later. However, this work which is thought to have formed a diptych, and subsequent Northern Renaissance devotional pieces showing male donors opposite the Virgin Mary, have as their topos late Gothic metaphors of love’s constancy. The donor of Jan’s lost dexter panel would have been portrayed contemplating his “lady,” and therefore, his interlocking glance with the Madonna is significant. According to Machaut, the longer the “lover-patron” gazed with deduit (desire), the more enraptured he became. Jan relevantly depicted the Virgin Mary as spatiallly bounded by the architecture of her divine citadel. She is physically separated but spiritually accessible to the patron. 132 Stags were a metaphor of love’s quarry. See Marcelle Thiébaux, The Stag of Love: The Chase in Medieval Literature (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1974). Hares in Old French were known as con, synonymous with the female reproductive organs, while squirrels were associated with male sexuality. See Camille, The Medieval Art of Love, 95–96 (hares), 103–4 (squirrels); 106 (griffen as symbol of unchastity and faithlessness). Also consult: Malcolm Jones,”Folklore Motifs in Late Medieval Art iii: Erotic Animal Imagery,” Folklore CII (1991): 192–219. Wolves, foxes and bears stalked game. Their guile, cunning and strength were related to the relentless pursuit of love. Birds of prey like falcons and hawks were the antithesis of plovers and songbirds, whose gentle mien and warbling would have been equated with chansons d’amour, and the allure of beauty. See Marie-Hélène Tesnière, “L’Animal Poétique,” in Marie-Hélène Tesnière and Thierry Delcourt, Bestiaire du Moyen Âge. Les animaux dans les manuscrits (Paris-Troyes: Somogy Éditions d’Art-Médiathèque de l’Agglomération Troyenne, 131

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love. The proximity of his hiding place to the lady’s residence suggests her rural estate was near Hesdin and the castle decorated for Robert d’Artois by Norman Sicilians. The miniatures of Le Remède de Fortune encapsulate the French aristocratic world of leisure, an equivalent to the classical otium or Aristotelian good life (eudamonia). Though the poet’s love story unfolds in the countryside of Artois, Hesdin’s magical aura truly is captured in the Enchanted Garden (Figs. 5.167–5.168), a miniature from Guillaume de Machaut’s poem Le Dit du Lion. Set in April of 1342, the tale opens with the poet as a guest in a castle, awakening to the cadence of nature. Looking out his window, he beholds a meadow carpeted with flora and populated by songbirds such as the nightingale, lark, goldfinch and linnet, hares, and a stag. This idyllic orchard is surrounded by water and accessible only by means of a boat which the poet comes upon. Reaching the garden, he encounters several wild animals, which are illustrated in the miniature. Conversing about love with a wolf, a fox and a bear, the poet meets a lion, medieval emblem of love’s constancy, who then guides him to his lady.132 The Enchanted Garden has been praised as one of the earliest examples of independent landscape in Renaissance Europe.133 If it depicts an actual forested garden of Hesdin, then the “speaking” animals in reality may have been the automatons installed in the parkland by the Norman Sicilians in the service of Robert d’Artois.134 The Eyckian Versailles Hunting Party, with its paired couples in a landscape, rightly should be interpreted within the literary tradition of Guillaume de Machaut. While the painting is but a replica, the overall scheme of the grouped portraits within an arcadian meadow sets the stage for the processional figures approaching the altar of the Lamb of God in Jan’s Ghent Altarpiece.

2004), 91–101, at 94–96 for Mauchat’s Le Dit du Lion. Regarding the humanized lion of the poem, she states, 94, that the beast recollects both Sir Gwain’s companion in Crétien de Troyes’s Le Chevalier au Lion, Yvain, and St. Jerome’s domesticated lion. 133 Camille, The Medieval Art of Love, 90–91. 134 Victor Henry Debidour, Le bestiaire sculpté du Moyen Age en France (Paris: Arthaud, 1961); Merriam Sherwood, “Magic and Mechanics in Medieval Fiction,” Studies in Philology XLV (1947): 567–92.

6 The Ghent Altarpiece (1432) Medieval Ghent, a City of Political Islands

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ituated at the confluence of the Leie and Scheldt rivers, and divided into twenty-six islands, Ghent like Bruges which was only twenty-six miles away, was a port dependent upon its canals and waterways (Figs. 6.1–6.2). Thirteenth-century Ghent was a town larger than Paris and the Liève canal to Bruges served as an active thoroughfare for commercial ships laden with woven goods.1 This prosperity led to an independent municipal spirit which was manifested in democratic elections of a Ghent Council. Formed in 1212, a Council of thirty-nine urban merchants originally governed the city. By 1297 the oligarchy was replaced by two boards, legal and estate, which consisted of thirteen members in each division appointed every August 15. The Counts of Flanders traditionally had granted the Ghenters charters of privileges, and they appointed the bailiffs and electors of the town. The guilds of Ghent, about forty-eight in number, were governed by Deans appointed to office, and the most important were those of the drapers (sellers of fine cloth), weavers and fullers. The complex political and economic situation of Flanders during this period has been studied comprehensively by David Nicholas, who succinctly simplifies the major issues: The counts held southern Flanders as a fief of the French crown. While north and east of the Scheldt river lay “imperial Flanders,’ 1 Victor Fris, Histoire de Gand (Brussels: Librairie Nationale d’Art et d’Histoire: G. Van Oest, 1913); idem., Bibliographie de l’histoire de Gand. Répertoire méthodique et raisonné des écrits anciens et modernes concernant la ville de Gand (Ghent: C. Vyt, 1907).

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dependent on the Holy Roman Empire, the political conflicts of the fourteenth century revolved around the French allegiance of the Flemish counts, who were unable to reconcile their loyalties as French vassals and their Francophile personal inclinations with the by then crippling dependence of Ghent, Bruges and Ypres on English wool. Even as they imported vast quantities of this wool, the aristocratic rulers of the Flemish cities during the thirteenth century shared the French culture of their count, while the lower orders, consisting largely of textile workers in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, came to view their Flemish ethnic heritage as both a cultural and a political identity.2 On April 3, 1302 the Flemish workers of Bruges, Ghent and Ypres joined forces in an uprising against King Philippe IV “le Bel” (1268: r. 1285–1314). Gui de Dampierre, Count of Flanders between 1280 and 1304, attempted to mediate but he was ineffective (Fig. 6.3). On May 19 the guards of the French garrison were killed by angry artisans led by Jan Borluut, a wool merchant of Ghent, and Pieter de Coninck, a weaver from Bruges. The sequel to this rebellion was an invasion by France. Under banners displaying St. George, Count Jean of Namur and Duke William of Juliers led the poorly equipped Flemish army of 25,000 which had only a few hundred horsemen. The majority of men were equipped merely with poles and iron boar spears. By contrast, the French army under standards of the Fleur-deLys was bolstered by allies from Hainaut and Brabant and leliaards, French sympathizers. Count Robert of Artois led a formidable contingent of 50,000 soldiers to a site east of Groeningelaan. His troops included seventy-five nobles, 100 knights and 3000 squires. Despite the odds, on July 11 of 1302, the Flemish klauwaards won the “Battle of the Golden Spurs,” so named for the 600 boot-jewels taken from the invaders who fell in swampy marshland beyond the walls of Kortrijk (Cortrycke). The spurs hung in Notre Dame at Courtrai, a center of the flax industry, have since disappeared, but for many decades they were a potent visual reminder of power wielded by the Flemish municipal centers. With the outbreak of the Hundred Years War (1338–1453), Louis II de Nevers (1304: r. 1322–1346), Count of Flanders, had sided with France against England. In 1320 he had taken a French bride, Marguerite (1310– David Nicholas, The van Arteveldes of Ghent. The Varieties of Vendetta and the Hero in History (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988), 2. 2

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1382), daughter of King Philippe V “Le Long” (1291: r. 1316–1322). In 1336 Edward III had attempted to force Count Louis to recognize his own claim to the French throne based upon his maternal parentage by placing an embargo on wool exports. The town burghers of Ghent wanted no interruption of their lucrative trade with England, whose sheep herders produced the highest grade of wool. Jacob van Artevelde (1287–1345), then president of the Ghent Council, assumed a commanding role in negotiations with England after he was appointed one of five “captains” of Ghent on January 3, 1338. Son of a father who was registered with the guild of brewers, Jacob was an affluent land owner (poorter) with an undeniable gift of persuasion. By October he had approached King Edward with the concerns of Ghent’s cloth merchants, and following an agreement reached on December 3, 1339, the English monarch made plans to travel to Flanders. Edward III arrived to Ghent on January 26 of 1340 (Figs. 6.4–6.7) and in a public ceremony in the Vrijdagsmarkt (Friday Market Square), Jacob van Artevelde proclaimed him “king of France.” Edward promised monetary subsidies and continued export of wool, and when he departed for England on February 20 to obtain the consent of Parliament, Queen Philippa of Hainaut remained in Ghent as hostage. She gave birth to Edward’s fourth son, John of Gaunt, in the guest quarters of Sint-Baafsabdij (St. Bavo Abbey). On June 24, 1340 the combined troops of England and Flanders were victorious at the battle of Sluis, and for the next five years France’s relations with the Netherlands continued to be strained. In 1345, however, Jacob, who sought ultimately to unite the congerie of Flemish cities into a nation or commonwealth, made the fatal mistake of advancing Edward the Black Prince (1330–1376), son of Edward III, as a new Count of Flanders. Following a meeting with Edward III at Sluis on July 12, guildsmen were informed in Ghent that Jacob had taken all his property and family with him on his journey. Suspicious of his plans, the aldermen of the city orchestrated his assassination. First, they requested his immediate return to Ghent on the pretext of needing advice, and persuaded him to decline a contingent of armed guards offered by Edward III. When Jacob returned on July 21 he went directly to his house on the Kalandenberg, where an angry mob of weavers confronted him. Retreating through a barn into the Paddenhoek, he was killed by one of the shoemakers occupying a rented shack in the Waalpoort, a poor district near the van Artevelde residence. At the time of Jacob’s assassination, there was widespread discontent over wages among the working classes of Ghent, which numbered roughly 50,000

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in a town population of 250,000 (Bruges had 100,000 inhabitants). By the mid-fourteenth century, Ghent had 4000 weavers and 1200 fullers.3 As the least prosperous of the textile group, the fullers depended upon the Counts of Flanders for protection, as did the merchants, importers of grain, corn, and other agricultural staples from France.4 The continued discord between aristocratic families who served feudal lords bound to the Crown of France and bourgeois merchants who championed the cause of cloth-workers relates somewhat to the ethnic divisions of Belgium. In Southern Flanders, where the people are of Gallic-Celtic stock, French is spoken and in the Teutonic North, the preferred language is Flemish or Dutch. The same “Castor-Pollux” dualism characterized the economic evolution of the country, as cloth, metal and other industries developed in Bruges, Ghent, Ypres and Antwerp by comparison to the south, where rich farmland contributed to the growth of important agricultural centers. Between the two regions was Brabant, where Brussels and its satellite towns blended of ethnic identities and elected to remain bilingual. Following the death of his father on August 26, 1346 at Crécy, the patrician Louis de Mâle continued to support the royalist forces (Fig. 6.8). In 1349 the sons of Jacob van Artevelde — James and John — and their uncle William went into exile in England, where Edward III took the family under his protection on September 12, 1350. The youngest son Philip (1340–1382), named for his godmother Philippa of Hainaut, and his sister Catherine, stayed with their widowed mother Catherine de Cooster, who returned to Ghent after a brief exile, remarried and left some property before her death about 1361. The adult Philip van Artevelde, the only one of Jacob the Elder’s sons to enter the political arena of Ghent, attempted to rally the merchants and weavers against Count Louis de Mâle. Despite a meteoric rise to power, he was killed on November 27, 1482 in a battle against the French troops of Charles VI at Westrozebeke, a small village southwest of Roeselare and located between Diksmuide and Courtrai. The Flemish defeat enabled Louis de Mâle to assert his authority in Ghent, and the English responded by voiding past agreements and halting further deliberations. When Count Louis died in 1384, his daughter Margaret, wife of Philip the Bold, acquired his holdings. Within a year of his father-in-law’s death, the Duke of Burgundy granted a general amnesty 3 4

Nicholas, The van Arteveldes of Ghent, 98 Nicholas, The van Arteveldes of Ghent, 6–7.

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to Ghent following the Treaty of Tournai.5 Disputes with Ghent’s prosperous merchants continued, however, even through the reign of Philip the Good, who ironically was the first “Count of Flanders” who sought to distance himself from France. Philip was residing in Ghent when he was informed of his father’s brutal killing by axe-wielding henchmen of the French dauphin Charles VII.6 Following the assassination of Jan zonder Vrees (John the Fearless) in 1419, Philip the Good shifted his court to Flanders and embarked upon a policy of expanding his lands to the north and east. By 1433 he was able to claim the official titles of Duke of Burgundy, of Lothair, of Brabant, and of Limbourg, Count of Flanders, of Artois, and of Palatine Burgundy, of Hainaut, of Holland, of Zeeland, and of Namur, Marquis of the Holy Empire [Lordship of Antwerp], Lord of Frise, of Salins, and of Malines. 7 Philip the Good’s Castles at Ghent Following the wedding festivities in Bruges, Philip the Good planned several municipal entries for his new duchess. Isabel of Portugal arrived at the Castle of Hof ten Walle in Ghent, the capital of East Flanders, on January 16, and she is documented at Courtrai and Lille on February 13 and 14, staying for a brief period before moving on to Brussels, Arras, Peronne and Malines. By Nicholas, The van Arteveldes of Ghent Ibid., 182–87 discuss the battle and aftermath. For a discussion about Portugal’s involvement with France during the rule of Philip the Good, see Joaquim Veríssimo Serrão, Relações históricas entre Portugal e a França, 1430–1481 (Paris: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian : Centro Cultural Português, 1975). 7 Pierre Cockshaw, Les Chroniques de Hainaut, ou, Les ambitions d’un prince bourguignon, ed. Christiane van den Bergen-Pantens (Brussels-Turnhout: KBR-Brepols, 2000). Wine continued to be a principal product of Hainaut. See Gérard Sivéry, Les Comtes de Hainaut et le commerce du vin au XIVe siècle et au début du XVe siècle (Lille: Centre Régional d’Études Historiques de l’Université, 1969); idem., Structures agraires et vie rurale dans le Hainaut à la fin du Moyen-Age, 2 vols. (Villeneuve-d’Ascq: Publications de l’Université de Lille III, 1977– 1980). Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 362 and in note 1, same page he informs that Philip the Good’s silver-bordered herald was divided into four quarters with the arms of: France at the upper left (dexter chief ) and lower right (sinister base), gold fleur-de-lis on blue ground; Burgundy, alternating gold and blue diagonal stripes; Brabant, gold lion on sable; Limbourg, red lion on white ground. The fess point (center) held the arms of Flanders, a black lion on white. Smith cites Max Servais, Armorial des provinces et des communes de Belgique (Brussels: Crédit Communal de Belgique, 1955), 214–32. 5 6

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March 16 the duchess was at the castle of Noyon, northeast of Compiègne. While she spent April and May in the town, conflicts with the French army of Jeanne d’Arc importuned Isabel’s return to Ghent in early June of 1430. With her caravan traveled forty carts laden with her goods, including her wardrobe, weavings, and liturgical vessels. She was accompanied by her brother, Prince Fernando, Jeanne de Harcourt, the Countess of Namur, and Philip’s ten-year-old nephew, Jean of Cleves. Additional attendants of the duchess’ household were her equerry and cupbearer Jacques de Villiers, her chef, Bocquet de Lattre, Paul Deschamps, her personal secretary and treasurer, two Castilian musicians, several ladies-in-waiting and mounted guards.8 During the rule of Philip the Good, Ghent contained two castles: ‘S-Gravensteen, the Château des Comtes and the Hof ten Walle (Hof ten Waele), later renamed Prinsenhof. ‘S-Gravensteen (Figs. 6.9–6.14) was raised by Philip of Alsace in 1180 on a feudal keep erected ca. 867 by Baldwin, lieutenant and imperial forester of Charlemagne and the first Count of Flanders.9 The eponymous origin of “Ghent” may derive from the warrior called “Iron Arm,” as Ganda means “glove.” Built to safeguard the town from invading Vikings, the old castle of the Graven van Vlaanderen (Counts of Flanders) with its elliptical exterior walls, twenty-four turrets and merlons still loom over the waters of the Liève which join the Leie. Aline S. Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy. The Duchess Who Played Politics in the Age of Joan of Arc, 1397–1471 (London-New York-Oxford: Madison Books), 36. The two blind musicians from Castile were Juan de Cordoal and Juan Fernández, who played the lute and viol. They performed at the marriage of Louis of Savoy and Anne of Cyprus at Chambéry, which was attended by Philip the Good and Jean Lefèvre de Saint-Rémy on February 7–11, 1434. The musicians re-enacted the meeting of two composers: Guillaume Dufäy († 1474) of Cambrai, who frequently traveled to Savoy and France; and Gilles Binchois († 1460) of Hainaut, whose portrait in the London National Gallery has been identified as Jan van Eyck’s Tymotheos of Miletus (1432). See Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 140 and note 1, who informs that Duchess Isabel in 1430 was provided a household on a smaller scale to that of Duke Philip the Good, which must have expanded over time. She was given a chevalier d’honneur in lieu of a chamberlain, and six attendants. She also was allotted two maîtres d’hôtel, each supplier of provisions serving alternately for six months, a secretary, three horses with two valets, a physician, a confessor, and her personal accounting office. 9 The Latin inscription over the entrance gate to the Count’s Castle reads “In the year 1180 … Philip Count of Flanders and of Vermandois, son of Thierry and Sibylla, had this castle built.” Consult: Laurens De Keyzer, The Count’s Castle, Ghent. Tales behind the Stones (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion, 2002), 10. Also see Joseph De Waele and Alphonse van Werveke, Château des comtes de Flandre à Gand. Guide du visiteur (Ghent: Ad. Hoste, 8

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The Liève canal (ketelkanaal), cut between 1251 and 1269 as a route to the Minnewater harbor in Bruges, created the island of Kuip, upon which the oldest part of Ghent stands. The gatehouse on Sint-Veerleplein has a round arched Romanesque portal and it provides access to the inner courtyard on the ground level. On the second floor is the Suikerlade. With its arcaded lateral walls and distinctive cross window, the long hall presumably once functioned as the chapel of the military garrison (Figs. 6.15–6.20). Below ground are tunnels, as well as the expansive crypt areas of the castle. Among them is a dark cellar supported by huge columns that is thought to have served as stables in inclement weather (Figs. 6.21–6.23). Like the gatehouse, the massive donjon of ‘S-Gravensteen was completed by Count Philip of Alsace prior to his death in 1191 at St. Jean d’Acre during the Third Crusade. This inner keep is more symbol of impenetrable bastion than aristocratic domain. Buttressing from the east side, the Castellan’s House appears to be a later Gothic renovation, as indicated by the greater number of windows piercing its walls. To the sides of the warden’s residence are architectural fragments of a former portcullis and ruins of the medieval kitchens (Figs. 6.24–6.27). The keep’s main chambers consist of long galleries. The vaulted Knights’ Hall is a great feudal ground floor gallery with large fireplaces designed for courtly ceremony and entertainment (Figs. 6. 28–6.29). Above the chamber is the upper level banqueting hall, which connects to a gallery with recessed alcoves and stone benches (Figs. 6.30– 6.32). A winding flight of stairs leads to the uppermost keep gallery and the roof. This lofty parapet of the citadel provides sweeping panoramic views of the Ghent landscape (Figs. 6.33–6.37). ‘S Gravensteen was amplified in the thirteenth century. The Counts’ Residence was built on the northwest side of the keep and the walls of this step-gabled structure are pierced with bottled glass windows, which indicate the late Gothic partiality for an increased number of fenestrations in domestic architecture (Figs. 6.38– 6.40). The audience gallery on the ground floor, with its supporting columns and cross-ribbed vault, is a commodious and well lighted chamber. It has a September, 1913); Geert van Doorne, Omtrent het Gravensteen in Gent. Monumenten ‘be’leven (Brussels: Koning Boudewijnstichting and Gemeentekrediet, 1992); Marie Christine Laleman and Patrick Raveschot, “Nieuwe bevindingen over de donjon van het Gravensteen in Gent,” Stadsarcheologie IV (July-September 1990): 86–94; R. van Elslande, “Kunstenaars werkzaam in de grafelijke residenties te Gent tijdens de 14e eeuw,” Ghendtsche Tijdinghem XXIV, No. 1 (1995): 325–34. Thanks are given to Steve Blyskal for forwarding numerous digital images of Gravensteen, photographs which especially captured the castle’s magnificent masonry.

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finely constructed stone and brick fireplace and window alcove (Figs. 6.41– 6.44). The Count’s quarters were located in the smaller rooms above, but the Countess and her attending ladies maintained separate appartments in an adjacent building (Fig. 6.45). Erected between 1349 and 1353 by Count Louis III Le Mâle (1330– 1384), the Hof ten Walle (later Prisenhof ) was an island residence (Figs. 6.46– 6.48). An engraving by Antonius Sanderus in Flandria Illustrata (Cologne, 1641) shows the Hof ten Walle and it provides and idea of the topographical disposition of the castle when it was occupied by Duchess Isabel in 1430. The residence once stood slightly to the northwest of ‘S-Gravensteen near the Rabot, a fortified river lock (Fig. 6.49). The sluice with its round flanking towers was constructed between 1489 and in 1491, but it occupies the ground where the Liève canal once abutted the former walls of the city. The Hof ten Walle in fifteenth-century documents is referred to as Ten Waele, the name by which the Gauls and Romans were called. Waelas, which linguistically is kindred to Wales, means “strangers.” Waelas combined with the word oon (meaning “one”) results in wallons, a term used to separate the French-speaking people of southern Belgium from the northern Flemings. Walloon patois still is spoken in the southern provincial areas of France and Germany which once were Belgian. The vast complex of Ten Weale no longer survives but it numbered about 300 rooms and had courtyards and formal gardens.10 The only remaining element of the estate is the Donkere Poorte (Dark Gate: Fig. 6.50) on Bachtenwalle across the bridge, a vaulted arch with two flanking towers. One of the lovely features of the residence was For information about the Hof ten Walle, a former residence of the Italian financier and politician Simon de Mirabello converted to a castle by Count Louis III Le Mâle, see Marie Christine Laleman and G. Stoops, “De Wal in de 13de en de 14de eeuw,” Het Prinselikj Hof ten Walle in Gent (Ghent: jubileumuitgave “Stadsarcheologie. Bodem en monument in Gent”; Gentse Vereiniging voor Stadsarcheologie, 2000): 13–23; and from the same edition, Krista De Jonge, “Organisatie van een Bourgondisch paleis,” 67–71, and Daniel Lievois, “Het hof ten Walle in Gent ten tijde van Karel V, 139–70. Also see Krista De Jonge, “Organisatie van een Bourgondisch paleis”, in D. Laporte, coord., Het prinselijk hof Ten Walle Gent (jubileumuitgave ‘Stadsarcheologie, Bodem en Monument in Gent’) (Ghent: Gentse Vereniging voor Stadsarcheologie, 2000): 67–71; idem., “Bourgondische residenties in het graafschap Vlaanderen. Rijsel, Brugge en Gent ten tijde van Filips de Goede”, Handelingen der maatschappij voor geschiedenis en oudheidkunde te Gent, [Gent], nieuwe reeks, LIV(2000): 93–134, at 127–31 for the Hof ten Walle; idem, “Estuves et baingneries dans les résidences flamandes des ducs de Bourgogne”, Bulletin Monumental CLIX, 1 (2001): 63–76, at 63–66 for the Hof ten Walle. 10

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its hexagonal island garden reached by small boats. Like the water castle of Tillegen Sint-Michiels (Fig. 6.51), the house had arcaded porticoes and many windows. Ten Waele especially resembled the Kasteel van Laarne, situated eight miles to the east, a twelfth-century fortress with grey stone walls surrounded by a moat (Figs. 6.52–6.56). Erected by Philip of Alsace to protect Ghent, Laarne’s turreted keep within a large courtyard is believed to have been connected by an underground tunnel with ‘S-Gravensteen. On the opposite bank of the Leie, the new residence would have offered more comfortable quarters than the dark feudal castle encased by stone walls having the aspect of cliffs. From 1350 onwards, however, ‘S-Gravensteen still functioned as an administrative seat for the Camere van den Rade. Not only did meetings with the Ghent Council occur in the Audience Room of the Count’s House, but on December 11, 1445 Philip the Good presided over the seventh Chapter of the Order of the Golden Fleece in the same Kasteel, where in the front court of St. Veele Square, the knights assembled before marching in procession to Sint-Janskerk (present Sint-Baafskatedraal). During the first year of his marriage, Philip the Good was compelled to join his army to protect the ducal borders of southern and western Burgundy against the French troops led by Jeanne d’Arc. An enceinte Isabel remained in Ghent, where she attempted to resolve internal conflicts in her husband’s absence. Artisans of the cloth industry sought to reduce rural competition that operated independently from the city guilds. Ghent weavers were aggravated by the importing of cheaper products made on English looms and demanded better prices for their goods from city merchants. In an effort to defuse rebellion by the discontented artisans, Isabel of Portugal met with advisors in the Ten Waele castle during the summer and fall of 1430. To better understand the economic challenges in the trading capital of Flanders, the duchess sought advice from the grand bailiff of Hainaut. Guillaume de Lalaing, Lord of Bugnicourt, stadholder of Holland, and former ambassador to London, informed her about English cloth imports and directed her to summon the leading merchants who represented the four primary Estates of Flanders — Ghent, Ypres, Bruges, and the Franc of Bruges (rural hinterland). Ghent’s Lakenhalle (Cloth Hall) was in the oldest sector of Ghent on the Kuip Island where the Leie flowed into the Scheldt. Begun in 1425, the Lakenhalle (Figs. 6.57–6.59) provides the only access to Ghent’s Belfort from its first-floor entrance. Ghent’s belfry was constructed between 1321 and 1380. Rising 298 feet, the corners of the Belfort once supported four

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statues of “wild men-at-arms” of which one remains. Its spire upholds a gilded copper dragon. Installed in 1913, the sculpture is a substitute for the medieval original still kept in the tower. Legend relates the Ghenters absconded with a dragon from Bruges, a treasure taken in 1204 from the Buccoleon Palace in Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade. From 1402 until 1550 the ground floor of the belfry contained a room called “The Secret.” Within the chamber was an iron chest of documents that related to privileges granted by the Counts of Flanders. Until the 1913 World Fair, the Belfort was surrounded by narrow streets. The tower stands between two important churches: Sint-Baafskathedraal, erected over the twelfth-century Sint-Janskerk; and Sint-Niklaaskerk (Fig. 6.60). The latter parish church was begun about 1150 by Sint-Pieters Abbey, a rival to Sint-Baafs Monastery in Ghent, and accordingly, it was a popular place of worship for Ghenters who had made a pilgrimage to St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome (Figs. 6.61–6.65). Sint-Niklaaskerk was incrementally built through the thirteenth century, with lateral chapels added in the Middle Ages by wealthy merchantile families. Houses erected along the western entrance and peripheral walls no longer stand, but probably several of the appendages were used for charity. Dedicated to Bishop Nicholas of Myra, favored saint of sailors and traders of commerical centers, the edifice exemplifies an indigenous style of flamboyant Gothic architecture known as Scheldt. The interior use of blue-black Tournai limestone is noteworthy, particularly in the tower rising above the western entrance, but the grey and dusky rose stonework of the nave is exceptionally imposing in chiaroscural effect (Figs. 6.66–6.68). The main altar is a totally Baroque affair, as this parish church, like the majority of Ghenter religious institutions, did not escape the Protestant Iconoclasm of 1566. Under current restoration, the apse of Sint-Niklaas — so distinctively a feature of Scheldt grandeur — has yielded vault frescoes of graceful music playing angels (Figs. 6.69–6.70). Sint-Niklaaskerk was patronized by grain merchants of the Korenmarkt and high officials belonging to the diverse trading guilds of the town. Unquestionably some parishioners of Sint-Niklaaskerk served on the Ghent Council. In 1430 Duchess Isabel of Burgundy met with the Ghent Council which exercised control over the municipal guilds only after she reviewed the city’s financial records. Following an analysis of civic accounts, she summoned the Ghent Council to the audience room at ‘S-Gravensteen castle. Pointing out the damage to the indigenous economy by the importation of foreign products, she urged the burghers to relax guild standards on wool to prevent

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the migration of artisans to the countryside. Informed about their revenues, Isabel postscripted her meeting with the high officials by admonishing them to provide her husband with the funding he needed for his campaign against the French. Though little was achieved with respect to resolving the economic issues in Ghent, a civil revolt was avoided and the city Council agreed to fund the Duke’s military ventures in Compiègne.11 On August 4, 1430, Philip St. Pol, Duke of Brabant, died. Leaving his army in France, Philip the Good traveled posthaste north to Brussels where he contested the dowager Duchess Margaret of Brabant’s claim as a legitimate heir. Citing Philip St. Pol’s testament of September 4, 1427, he persuaded the Brabantine Estates to accept his right to rule, with the concession that Brabant would remain autonomous from Burgundy in financial and commercial matters. On October 5, Philip the Good established his household in Coudenberg Palace, and sent a messenger to Ghent, a mere thirty miles away. Isabel joined him within three days. For her entry into the city she rode a white palfrey along a crimson-carpeted route. In the capital of Brabant Anthony of Burgundy was born on December 30, and baptized on January 16. He had three illustrious godfathers: Henry Beaufort († 1449), Cardinal of Winchester and Isabel’s uncle; Jean of Heinsberg, Bishop of Liège; and the count of Ulrich (brother of the empress of the HRE). Marie of Burgundy (1399/1400–1473), Duchess of Cleves and sister of Philip the Good, served as Anthony’s godmother, in addition to Jeanne de Harcourt, the Countess of Namur.12 Isabel and Philip spent the spring and summer of 1431 in Brussels, and by autumn, the Duchess was pregnant. Within days of her husband’s departure for the Burgundian administrative seat of Dijon on January 21, 1432, Isabel and her household left the Coudenberg to reside in Ghent. Between January 17 and February 7, 1430, Duchess Isabel had visited the center as one of several formal entries staged to celebrate her marriage to the Count of Flanders. Her second visit in 1432 also was politically motivated.13 Accompanying the duchess were Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 49–54 on the conflicts in Ghent circa 1430. Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 58. 13 Penny Howell Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” Oud Holland 101, No. 4 (1987): 237–53, at 244–45 and 252 note 24. She stresses Philip had resided as the Count of Charolais at Ghent, where he controlled Flanders and Artois, while his mother, Margaret of Bavaria, remained in Dijon or Rouvres, where she presided over the Duchy of Burgundy. She also notes Philip was at Ghent when he received news of his father’s death on September 14, 1419 and succeeded to 11 12

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three influential advisors: Jehan, Lord of Roubaix; Jean de Thoisy, bishop of Liège and president of the ducal council; and Anthony De Croÿ, the duke’s chamberlain. On January 19 Philip the Good had sent a letter to the Ghent Council authorizing Isabel to serve as administrator of the northern territories that winter. He dispatched a second letter from Valenciennes on May 8, 1432. Received by Savare, Isabel’s secretary, it also confirmed that Isabel was to “wield full ducal power.” 14 On February 11, she had been given the Great Seal of the Duchy of Burgundy by members of the Ghent Council. If Isabel experienced any pleasure at receiving princely power, it was tempered by intense sorrow following the sudden loss of her firstborn. Anthony had remained at the Coudenberg with several nursemaids when his mother departed for Ghent. Soon after arriving at the Hof ten Walle, Isabel dispatched Guillaume de Lalaing to report on her son’s health. On January 27, Guillaume le Zedelaire, a member of the Ghent Council, rode to Brussels and returned posthaste with news the infant was ill. A third nobleman sent the next day, Lancelot de la Viefville, returned to inform the court that Anthony had died on February 5. Additional information that the child had expired alone in his chamber must have devastated the duchess.15 During the past months Isabel had acquired many presents — Arras tapestries, fine linens, caskets of silver and gold objects. Philip had given her a gold cup inset with a huge cabochon ruby and seven large pearls to mark not only the feast of the Epiphany but also his founding of the Order of the Golden Fleece. When she conceived Anthony, the Duke gave her a double diamond ring to mark the occasion.16 the title of Count of Flanders (September 20). Following the murder of Jean sans Peur, Philip did not frequent the castle of Ghent, preferring the residences of nearby Bruges, Brussels and Lille, as well as Dijon (Burgundy) and Hesdin (Artois). Concerning Philip’s presence in Ghent after the death of Josse, see: Herman Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, duc de Bourgogne (1419–1467) et de Charles, conte de Charolais (1433–1467) (Brussels: M. Lamertin , 1940), 82; Amaury de la Grange, “Itinéraire d’Isabelle de Portugal,” Annales du comité flamand de France, LXII (1938), 5. 14 Monique Somme, Isabel de Portugal (Lille: Ph.D. Dissertation, Université de Lille, 1985), 694 (Letter dated May 8, 1432 to the Ghent Council from Philip the Good) and Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 61. Also consult Monique Somme, “Les déplacements d’Isabelle de Portugal et la circulation dans les Pays-Bas Bourguignone au milieu du XVe siècle,” Revue du Nord LII (1970): 183–97; Isabelle de Portugal, duchesse de Bourgogne: une femme au pouvoir au XVe siècle (Villeneuve d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 1998). 15 Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 62. 16 Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 57–58 mentions the ring in the context of Isabel’s pregnancy and describes the cup as a New Years gift from the Duke in 1430.

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Despite their beauty, the costly gifts would have provided little solace to the Duchess. Rather than withdrawing to secluded apartments as might be expected of a grieving mother, she instead dealt with her loss by actively engaging in work on behalf of her husband. She also was pregnant with a second child, and ongoing preparations for the birth additionally would have occupied her time. Jan van Eyck’s most famous Ghent Altarpiece was in the final stages of completion when Isabel served as regent of the Northern territories in Philip the Good’s absence. The polyptych commissioned by the town’s mayor Jodocus Vijd reveals some intervention by the duchess, who sought to magnify not only the Burgundian, but also the Portuguese-Lancastrian heritage of her second son. The site of Josse’s birth appears to have been determined to secure the loyalty of the Ghenters. The infant was born on April 23 between five and six in the morning, and Jan’s altarpiece was unveiled in the Church of Sint-Jans (John the Baptist, later Sint-Bavo) on May 6, 1432, the day of Josse’s baptism.17 Josse’s godfathers were: John II of Luxembourg (1392/5–1441), the Count of Ligny; and his brother, Peter I of Luxembourg (1390–1433), the Count of Saint-Pol. Josse’s godmothers were: Catherine of Cleves (1417–1479), the Duchess of Guelders, and Isabella, La Dame de Ghistelles († 1438) and third wife of Robert VIII de Bethune († 1408), Viscount of Méaux (Meeus). Duke Philip was in Dijon when his son was born, and so all arrangements for the baptismal ceremony were coordinated by the Duchess, whose advisor was the Bishop of Cambrai. Not until May 28 did Philip arrive to Ghent, soon after Josse’s death and burial in the Abbé Sint-Michiel, an institution affiliated with the Dominicans18 (Figs. 6.71–6.73). Domincan monks had first arrived to Ghent under the rule of Ferrand, Count of Flanders (1188–1233), the son of King Sancho I of Portugal (1154: r. 1185–1211) and husband of Johanna of Constantinople.

17 For the coincidence of Josse’s baptism and the dedication of the Ghent Altarpiece, see Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 162–63 and notes 3–5, and Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York–Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 48 (baptism of Josse) and 26–31 (quatrain); idem, “La Visite Organisée du Retable de Gand, XVe–XVIIIe siècles,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 89 (1977): 153–54. Also consult: Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, duc de Bourgogne (1419–1467) et de Charles, conte de Charolais (1433–1467), 100; Amaury de la Grange, “Itinéraire d’Isabelle de Portugal,” 13ff. 18 Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, 100.

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The Dominican priory called the “Het Pand” rose between 1228 and 1375 on the banks of the Leie (Fig. 6.74). When in 1432 Duchess Isabel buried her son Josse, the Dominican complex further embraced a cloister, library, refectory, chapter hall, dormitory, kitchen, brewery and hospital. Ghent University’s thirteenth-century conference facility “Het Pand” is situated behind Sint-Michielskerk, opposite the Graslei and Sint-Niklaaskerk. The oldest sector of the Dominican priory lies alongside the Leie river beside the fifteenth-century Sint-Michielskerk. The first Chapel dedicated to the Archangel St. Michael was built between 1240 and 1265 to the side of the Korenlei, and it likely was designed to serve the hospital. This structure was devastated by fire later in the century. The rebuilding of Sint-Michielkerk must have been initiated in 1440 as an ex-voto project by the Infanta Isabel (Figs. 6.75–6.78). The Dominicans were closely tied to Portugal. The Avis mausoleum at Batalha was under the supervision of the Order, and Lusitanian merchants in Bruges frequently met in the Dominican monastery until their nation’s commercial house was built in the late fifteenth century. The nave and choir of Ghent’s Sint-Michielkerk were not completed until 1530, and they reflect a Gothic Brabantine style contrasting native sandstone with a spectacular adaptation of brick in the vaults between crossed ribs. The Iconoclastic destruction of 1566 radically erased the interior altars of the church and resulted in the total destruction of the Dominican library by Calvanists, who tossed all books into the river. The Protestant reformers used the “Het Pand” as a university until 1584. By 1623 the five chapels radiating from the choir of Sint-Michielskerk had entirely a Baroque character. The church suffered another loss when the sacristy was demolished in 1903 to erect the SintMichiels-Helling over the Leie to provide better access to the commercial district of Sint-Michielsplein. By July 8 the Duke and Duchess were in Brussels (Fig. 6.79), and after a summer of pilgrimages to the Abbey of Ponthier and the shrines of St. Anthony in Boulogne and St. Josse at Montreuil-sur-Mer, they returned on August 12 to Ghent. The city was in economic turmoil due to the rebellion of the municipal weavers against the guilds. Jehan de Lannoy, Lord of Roubaix, interceded in preventing a further escalation of discord, but ducal relations with the Ghenters continued to be tense through the winter and spring. By mid-June of 1433, Isabel traveled to join Philip the Good in a circuit of his southern lands. The couple parted company at Chatillon-sur-Seine; Philip rode to the western borders to ward off a maelstrom of attacks by the

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French troops of Charles VII; Isabel entered Dijon with her household.19 On November 21 a third son was born and he did live to maturity — Charles, Count of Charolais and fourth duke of Burgundy. During the months prior to her son’s birth, Isabel was empowered by her husband with the administration of the Dijon Estates and charged with raising revenues for his military campaign, which indeed she did. She met with Amiot le Chisseret, director of the mint at Auxonne and Nicolas Rolin counseled her in the financial “affairs” of the “Lord of Burgundy” from June of 1433 until April of 143520 (Figs. 6.80–6.81). A review of the Burgundian clients of Jan van Eyck in the early 1430s — Jehan and Baudouin de Lannoy, Jodocus Vijd of Ghent, Chancellor Rolin — establishes they not only served Philip the Good but also in diverse capacities were advisors to Duchess Isabel. While the Duke of Burgundy has been credited as Jan van Eyck’s most important patron, his constant absence from Ghent and Dijon suggests that honor more rightly belongs to the Infanta whose own family had admired Jan’s brand of realism and continued to collect works by artists the master influenced. In her capacity as Duchess of Burgundy, Isabel would have sought to emulate the example of her predecessors, the Countesses of Flanders (Fig. 6.82–6.83). Margaret of Alsace (ca. 1135–November 15, 1194) married Baldwin VIII (1171–1205), the Count of Henegouwen, on April 28, 1169, and she was buried at Sint-Donaas in Bruges across from the Basilica of the Holy Blood endowed by her father, Count Thierry of Alsace (ca. 1099– 1168). Margaret had six children by Baldwin VIII. While their daughter, Isabelle of Hainaut, married the Capetian king Philippe-Augustus (1165: r. 1180–1223) on April 28, 1180, Flanders lost Artois to France, which was given as her dowry. On the other hand, Margaret of Alsace was the mother of Count Baldwin IX (July, 1171–11 June, 1205) (Fig. 6.84). After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Philip the Good came to identify with this Count of Flanders who participated in the Fourth Crusade and became Emperor of Byzantium in 1204.21 But perhaps even before 1453, the Duke had admired Taylor, Isabel of Burgundy, 64, on ducal pilgrimages. Also consult Henri Chabeuf, Dijon. Monuments et souvenirs, with an introduction by Yves Beauvalot (Marseille: Laffitte, 1977; idem., Dijon. Monuments et souvenirs, with an introduction by Yves Beauvalot and participation by M. Gras (Péronnas: Éd. de la Tour Gile, 1994). 20 Somme, Isabel de Portugal, 696. 21 Relevant background material is provided by: Daniel Poirion (ed.) et al., Jerusalem, Rome, Constantinople: l’image et le mythe de la ville au Moyen Age: colloque du Département d’études médiévales de l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne, Paris IV (Paris : Presses de l’Université 19

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the ruler who had sallied forth from Sint-Donaas in Bruges bound for Venice. Due to Baldwin IX, fleets of ships sailed from Flanders to the Bosporus, bringing exotic goods and spices from the Levant. Baldwin IX and his wife, Marie de Champagne, married in 1186 and they had two daughters who achieved fame as Countesses of Flanders for their involvement in municipal affairs. Both actively supported charitable institutions in Bruges and Ghent, particularly Beguinhofs, convents for single women and almshouses for widows of crusaders. The union of Philippe-Augustus and Isabelle of Hainaut led to the intervention of France in Flemish affairs. During Baldwin XI’s absence, his elder daughter Johanna († 1244) served as his regent (Fig. 6.85) and Philippe-Augustus used his influence to arrange her first marriage to a prince of Lusitania. In 1212 Johanna wed Ferrand of Portugal (1188–1233), Beginning with Baldwin “Iron Arm” (862–879), twenty-six rulers of two dynastic lines bore the hereditary title “Count of Flanders” before 1419. Evidently then, the successor of Baldwin IX was the grandson of an equally ardent defender of the faith — Afonso Henriques I, founder of the kingdom of Portugal and heroic warrior of the Reconquest. Johanna’s union with a prince of Lusitania is easily explained by an earlier marriage in her family. In 1183, a year after the death of his first wife Elisabeth van Vermandois, Philip of Alsace (Count of Flanders 1157–1191), son of Thierry of Alsace and uncle of Baldwin IX, wed the sister of Sancho I, Matilde Teresa of Portugal († 1218). Although their marriage produced no heirs, Philip and Matilde Teresa were the first rulers to occupy ‘S-Gravensteen in Ghent. The new Count Ferrand soon became a champion of the town cloth merchants, who obtained their finest wool from across the English Channel. As a result, almost immediately after his marriage he and Johanna were drawn into a military alliance with John Lackland of England, who fought unsuccessfully against Philippe-Augustus of France to keep his German nephew enthroned. Following the battle of Bovine in 1214, Otto IV of Brunswick relinquished the imperial throne to Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, an ally of the Capetian king. Though John is best known for his signing of the Magna Carta, his defeat cost England extensive holdings in Normandy and France was able to consolidate its position not only in Flanders but also in Lorraine, a German fief. Philippe-Augustus did not retaliate against the Count of Flanders, but de Paris-Sorbonne, 1986); Charles Verlinden, Les empereurs belges de Constantinople (Brussels: C. Dessart, 1945).

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in 1214 he arranged the marriage of Johanna’s sister Margaret to one of his loyal vassals, Guillaume de Dampiere. Johanna and Ferrand spent the next fourteen years improving the governance of Ghent. In 1228 they met with the newly formed Ghent Council of Thirty-Nine and in that same year founded an important Cistercian Abbey. Occupied by nuns who came from Nieuwenbosse southeast of Ghent, the convent originally stood on the site of the Bijlokemuseum (Goshuizenlaan 2). Destroyed by the Dutch between 1579 and 1585, the abbey was rebuilt in the seventeenth century. However, only the refectory and infirmary remain from the Gothic period. Johanna’s charitable work continued after the death of Ferrand in 1233. In 1237 she married Thomas of Savoy (Fig. 6.86). Both died in 1244, and Baldwin IX’s younger daughter became the next Countess of Flanders and Hainaut. Margaret of Constantinople lived until 1279, and she married twice: Burchard of Avesnes and Guillaume de Dampiere, vassel of PhilippeAugustus of France. Margaret’s elder son, Jan of Avesnes, became the Count of Hainaut (1218–1257) His brother, Gui de Dampiere, inherited the title of Count of Flanders (1280–1304), and it was during his rule that the independent spirit of the Flemish cloth-workers was first manifested at the “Battle of the Golden Spurs” in 1302. With such a heritage of illustrious Countesses — Margaret of Alsace, Isabel of Portugal, Margaret of Constantinople and particularly Johanna, Duchess Isabel must have been eminently aware of both her privileged status and legal authority to act as regent for her husband Philip the Good in governing the northern territories of Burgundy. The following discussion seeks to focus on the particular subject of imagery and ideas in the Ghent Altarpiece of Sint-Baafskathedraal which relate to the artist’s visit to Portugal and the interests of Infanta Isabel.22 Before presenting a case for her intervention in the painting of the For sources on the Ghent Altarpiece, consult Hélène Mund and Cyriel Stroo, Early Netherlandish Painting (1400–1500). A Bibliography (1984–1998). Contributions to FifteenthCentury Painting in the Southern Netherlands and the Principality of Liège VIII (Brussels: Internationaal Studiecentrum voor de Middeleeuwse Schilderkunst in het Schelde- en Maasbekken, 1998); Micheline Comblen-Sonkes, Guide bibliographique de la peinture flamande du XVe siècle/Bibliografische gids van de Vlaamse schilderkunst van de XVe eeuw/ Bibliographic Guide for Early Netherlandish Painting (Brussels: Centre National de Recherches “Primitifs Flamands”, 1984). For early literature see Victor Fris, “Bibliographie des Van Eyck,” Bulletin de la Société d’Histoire et d’Archéologie de Gand XIV (1906): 313–33; W.H.J. Weale, Hubert and Jan van Eyck: Their Life and Work (London: John Lane Company, 1908); Émile Renders, Hubert van Eyck, personnage de légende, with the collaboration of Joseph de Smet 22

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Ghent Altarpiece of 1432, some history about the commission and old issues concerning the origin of the masterwork need to be addressed, not with an aim of refuting previous scholarly research but with a desire to present a few new thoughts for consideration.23 Sint-Janskerk and its Patrons: The Ghent Altarpiece and its Specters Sint-Janskerk, the parish church of St. John the Baptist, rose over the site of a twelfth-century stone church, only the crypt of which remains beneath the chancel, and an even earlier wooden chapel consecrated in 942 by Bishop Transmarus of Tournai and Noyon (Figs. 6.87–6.89). One of the oldest ecclesiastical monuments of Ghent, wealthy benefactors contributed to its and René de Pauw (Paris-Brussels: Les Éditions G. van Oest, 1933); Émile Renders, Jean van Eyck, son oeuvre, son style, son évolution, et la légend d’un frère peintre (Bruges: C. Beyaert, 1935); idem., Jean van Eyck et le polyptyque; deux problèmes résolus (Brussels: Librairie générale, 1950); L. Scheewe, Hubert und Jan van Eyck. Ihre literarische Wüdigung bis in 18.Jahrhundert (The Hague: 1933); idem., “Die Van Eyck-literatur der beiden letzten Jahre,” Zeitschrift für Kunstegeschichte III (1934): 139–43; IV (1935): 256–59; VI (1937): 407–10; VII (1938): 107; Ludwig von Baldass, Jan van Eyck (London: Phaidon Publishers Inc., 1952); idem., “The Ghent Altarpiece of Hubert and Jan van Eyck,” Art Quarterly XIII (1950): 140–55, 182–95; Leo van Puyvelde, Van Eyck: l’Agneau mystique (Paris: Marion Press, 1946); idem., Van Eyck, The Holy Lamb, translated from the French by Doris I. Wilton (London: Collins, 1947); idem., L’Agneau mystique d’Hubert et Jean van Eyck (Brussels: Elsevier, 1959); Charles de Tolnay, Le Retable de l’Agneau Mystique des Frères van Eyck (Brussels: 1938). A select bibliography on the Ghent Altarpiece is provided by Dana R. Goodgal, The Iconography of the Ghent Altarpiece (Philadelphia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1981): 370–87. 23 Principal publications on the “Adoration of the Lamb”/Ghent Altarpiece include the following: Laurens J. Bol, Jan van Eyck, translated by Albert J. Fransella (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1965); Paul B. Coremans and Aquilin Janssens de Bisthoven, Van Eyck: L’adoration de l’Agneau mystique (Antwerp: Nederlandsche Boekhandel, 1948); Paul B. Coremans, Van Eyck: L’adoration de l’agneau (Antwerp: De Sikkel, 1951); Pim W.F. Brinkman, Het geheim van Van Eyck: aantekeningen bij de uitvinding van het olieverven (Zwolle: Waanders, 1993); Alfons Lieven Dierick, Van Eyck: L’Agneau Mystique, translated from Dutch Het Lam Gods by W. T. Blancquaert (Ghent: Éditions Daphne, 1958); idem., Van Eyck: The Mystic Lamb, translated from the Dutch by Monique Odent (Ghent: Daphne, 1961); idem., Van Eyck, L’Agneau Mystique, translated by J.P. de Smet (Ghent: Author, Hofstr., 103, 1967); Elisabeth Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedraal te Gent. Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oostvlaanderen VI (Ghent: Bestendige Deputatie van de Provinciale Raad van Oostvlaanderen, 1965); idem., Elisabeth Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, edited by John Fleming and Hugh Honour (London-New York: Allen Lane-The Viking Press,

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building and decoration from the fourteenth until the sixteenth centuries.24 The choir, five radiating chapels of the apse, vaults, and tall western tower date to the Gothic period. The soaring interior sandstone grey piers culminate in starry vaults contrasting masonry with dusky rose brick (Figs. 6.90–6.91). When Emperor Charles V in 1540 demolished the Benedictine Abdij Sint1973); idem., De kwartierstaat en het graf van Jan van Eyck (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1977); idem., De iconografie der Van Eycks (Bruges : Genootschap voor Geschiedenis, 1982); idem., “De meetkundige harmonie in de kompositie van het Lam Gos-retabel te Gent,” Gentse Bijdragen tot de Kunstgeschiedenis en de Oudheidkunde XX (1967): 23–54; idem., “Bijdrage betreffende het Lam-Godsaltar te Gent,” Festschrift für Wolfgang Krönig, Aachener Kunstblatter XLI (1971): 100–108; idem., “De wijze waarop het Lam-Godsaltar was opgesteld,” Gentse Bijdragen tot de Kunstgeschiedenis en de Oudheidkunde XXII (1969–1972): 109–50; Alfons Lieven Dierick, Joos vijds tafele: de retabel van het Lam Gods: Van Eycks meesterwerk in kleuren en op ware grotte (Ghent: Author, 1995); Ortwin Gamber, “Das Rätsel des Genter Altars,” Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien, LXXXVII (1991): 109–19; Irene Geismeier, “Ein Kunstwerk von Weltrang als Streitobjekt in zwei Weltkriegen,” Forschungen und Berichte – Staatliche Museen Berlin XXVIII (1990): 231–35; Jan Goris, Geheim van het Lam Gods ontsluierd (Kasterlee: Uitgeverij ‘De Vroente’, 1971); Volker Herzner, “Überlegungen und Beobachtungen zum Genter Altar,” Sitzungberichte Kunstgeschichtliche Gesellschaft zu Berlin XXXVI (1987–1988): 11–12; idem., Volker Herzner, Jan van Eyck und der Genter Altar (Worms: Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1995); Yves Pauwels, “Les paradoxes du réalism dans l’oeuvre de Jan van Eyck,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXXXVII, No. 126 (1995): 201–10, at 205–6 and 208–9 (Ghent); Harold van de Perre, Van Eyck: het Lam Gods: het mysterie schoonheid (Tielt: Lannoo, 1996); idem., Van Eyck. El Cordero místico. El misterio de la bellez, translated from Dutch by Víctor Gallego (Ghent-Madrid: Éditions Lannoo, Bélgica-Sociedad Editorial Electa España, S.A.., 1996); Heinz Peters, “Die Anbetung des Lammes, ein Beitrag zum Problem des Genter Altars,” Das Münster III, No.3/4 (March-April, 1950): 65–77: Lotte Brand Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971); idem., “Raum und Zeit in der Verkündigung des Genter Altares,” Wallraf-Richartz Jahrbuch XXIX (1967): 62–104; A. Pinet, L’Agneau mystique (Paris: 1987); J.M.F. van Reeth, “Het Lam Gods van Van Eyck en de Paleologen,” Millenium. Tijdschrift voor Middeleeuwse Studies II (1988): 47–69; idem., J.M.F. van Reeth, “Het Lam Gods van Van Eyck en de relatie Byzantium en Florence met onze gewesten,” Millenium. Tijdschrift voor Middeleeuwse Studies II (1988): 118–43; Peter Schmidt, Het Lam Gods [Adoration of the Lamb] (Louvain: Davidsfonds, 1995); idem., The Ghent Altarpiece (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion, 2001); N. Schneider, Jan van Eyck. Der Genter Altar. Vorschläge für eine Reform der Kirche (Frankfurt-am-Main, 1986); Siegfried Thalheimer, Der Genter Altar (Munich: Beck, 1967). 24 Kervyn de Volkaersbeke [Philippe Augustin Chrétien, Baron], Les Églises de Gand (Ghent: L. Hebbelynck, 1857–58); Firmin de Smidt, De Kathedraal te Gent, archeologische studie [Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie voor Wetenschappen Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse Schone Kunsten Verhandeling XVII] (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1962); Firmin de Smidt and Elisabeth Dhanens, De Sint-Baafskathedraal te Gent (Tielt: Lannoo, 1980).

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Baafs (St. Bavo’s Abbey) in the southern sector of Ghent to provide space for a new fortress, Sint-Jans was renamed Sint-Baafskerk (St. Bavo) and the monks, secularized since 1536, were permitted to relocate.25 On May 12, 1559, and at the request of Philip II of Spain, Pope Paul IV (1555–1559) established bishoprics in the Flemish centers of Bruges, Ypres, Mechelen, Antwerp and Ghent. Sint-Baafskerk concurrently was elevated to the status of a cathedral.26 Unfortunately, the 1566 Iconoclasm in Ghent destroyed much of the Gothic interior altarpieces of Sint-Baafskathedraal, and while panels of Jan van Eyck’s famous Ghent Altarpiece was sequested safely in the western tower, its original framework was lost.

25 Alexandre Henne, Histoire du règne de Charles-Quint en Belgique, 5 vols. (BrusselsLeipzig, É. Flatau, 1858–60); idem., Mémoires anonymes sur les troubles des Pays-Bas, 1565– 1580, with annotations by Jean Baptiste François Blaes (Brussels: Société de l’Histoire de Belgique, 1859–66); Théodore Juste, Histoire de la révolution des Pays-Bas sous Philippe II, 2 vols. (The Hague: M. Nijhoff, 1863–67); idem., Histoire du soulèvement des pays-bas contre la domination Espagnole (Brussels: Librairie de Decq, 1863); idem., Les Pays-Bas sous Philipe II. Histoire de la révolution du XVIe siècle, 2 vols. (Brussels: A. Jamar; Paris, Borrani et Droz, 1855). 26 Penny Howell Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” Oud Holland 101, No. 4 (1987): 237–53, at 252 note 29, informs Jodocus Vijd was appointed mayor of Ghent in August of 1433, an appointment which affirmed his prominent role in Ghent’s politics. For Vijd and the Ghent Altarpiece, see Johan Decavele and Roeland van de Walle, De beurs van Judocus Vijdt: kunstkapitaal in Gent, with a foreward by Jan Hoet (Ghent: Sint-Niklaas-Sedelijke Musea Gent, 1998). Johann Decavele, “Geld en geest. De beurs van Judocus Vijdt,” De beurs van Judocus Vijdt. Kunstkapitaal in Ghent, ed. Johann Decavele and Roeland van de Walle (Ghent: exhibition catalogue, 1998): 7–18; Elisabeth Dhanens, “De Vijd-Borluut Fundatie en het Lam Godsretabel: 1432–1797,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunste XX–XVIII, No. 2 (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1976); idem., Sint-Baafskathedraal, Gent (Ghent: Provinciebestuur van Oostvlaanderen, Kunstpatrimonium, Bisdomplein, 3, 1965); R. van Elslande, “De geschiedenis van de Vijt-Borluutfundatie en het Lam Gods,” Ghendtsche Tydinghen XIV, No. 6 (1984): 342–48; R. van Elslande, “De Beverenaar Joos Vyt, diplomaat van Filips de Goede,” Het Land van Beveren XXXI, No. 3 (1988): 98–112; Dana R. Goodgal, “Joos Vijd, donateur de l’Agneau mystique,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque V, 29–30 Septembre, 1983, ed. Roger van Schoute and D. Hollanders-Favart (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1985): 25–52; idem., The Iconography of the Ghent Altarpiece, 103ff.; M. Manderyck, “Enkele historische aspecten omtrent het Lam Godsretabel in de Sint-Baafskathedraal in Gent. Opstelling en Beveiliging in het verleden,” Monumenten en Landschappen V, No. 4 (1986): 12–20; Roger H. Marijnissen, “Judocus Vijdt en de kunsthistoriografie,” De Beurs van Judocus Vijdt. Kunstkapitaal in Gent, ed. J. Decavale and Roeland van de Walle (Ghent: exhibition catalogue, 1998): 19–24.

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The stone chancel of Sint-Baafskathedraal remained dedicated to St. John the Baptist and apparently, even from its inception, the lower crypt (Figs. 6.92–6.95) was compared with the Holy Sepulchre as Sint-Jans was the meeting place of devout citizens of Ghent who had made pilgrimages to Jerusalem.27 The Romanesque Sint-Jans acquired aisle chapels in the fourteenth century. The choir was expanded about 1420–1425 by five radiating chapels capped by a triforium. The Ghent Council contributed to the project in 1430–31 when Jodocus Vijd served as alderman. The wealthy donor covered the expenses for the first radiating chapel to the right of the ambulatory on the south side of the church. This chapel with keystones of the vaults bearing the Vijd-Borluut escutcheons still survives (Figs. 6.96–6.98). The family history of Jan’s patrons Jodocus Vijd and Elisabeth (Lysbet) Borluut (Figs. 6.99–6.100), traced by Elisabeth Dhanens, is one that is intimately interwoven with the Counts of Flanders. Jodocus descended from a house of lesser nobility who lived in the land van Waas, the region between Ghent and Antwerp.28 His father, Nikolaas Vijd, castellan of Beveren Waas in 1355, served Louis le Mâle for thirty years and supported the Count in Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 19–20. She adds that Sint-Nikolaaskerk was frequented by those who made pilgrimages to Rome and Sint-Jakobskerk was the meeting place for those returning from Compostela. See Elisabeth Dhanens, Sint-Niklaaskerk (Ghent: 1960). See Firmin de Smidt, De Sint-Niklaaskerk te Gent; archeologische studie (Brussels: Paleis der Academien, 1969); idem., De Sint-Jacobskerk te Gent (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1966). 28 Philippe de l’Espinoy [1552–1633], Recherche des antiqvitez et noblesse de Flandres. Contenant l’histoire genealogiqve des comtes de Flandres, auec vne description curieuse dudit pays. La svitte des govvernevrs de Flandres, des grands-baillys, maistres des eaves, & autres officiers principaux des villes. Vn recveil des nobles et riches chastellenies, baronnies, & infinité de belles seigneuries du ressort & district dudit pays, auec vne deduction genealogique de ceux qui les ont possedé. La police qvi y at esté observée en la condvitte & gouuernement de l’estat, & villes, avec vn abregé particulier de ceux qui ont esté commis aux magistrats de la tres-noble ville de Gand depuis trois siecles en ça, auec vne briefue description de leurs familles, & rapport succinct de ce qui s’est passé de memorable en aucunes années. Iustifiée par bonnes preuues tirées des chartes & tiltres conseruez aux archiues des comtes de Flandres, des abbayes, chapitres, & anciens registres de diuerses villes & communautez. Enrichie de plusieurs figures, & diuisée en deux liures (Douai: Marc Wyon, 1631; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress), 574, 609, 629, 639, 645. This reference is provided by Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 37–38 and 139 note 19, who also cites: Victor Fris, “De Onlusten te Gent in 1432–1435,” Bulletijn der Maatschappij van Geschied-en Oudheidkunde te Gent (1900): 163–73; idem., “Josse Vyt, le donateur de l’Adoration de l’Agneau Mystique,” Bulletijn der Maatschappij van Geschied-en Oudheidkunde te Gent (1909): 290; G. Kestens, “Joost de Vydt, Heer van Pamel,” Eigen Schoon en De Brabander X (1928): 203–4. 27

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the Ghent rebellion of 1381. Nikolaas was bailiff and chief alderman of the Land van Waas in 1385, and held several positions until his fall from power in 1390. Charged with embezzling ducal accounts, he retired to Ghent and died in 1412. Despite this fall from grace, Jodocus managed to carve out a prominent career. Inheriting his father’s title, Lord of the Manor of Pamele and Ledeberg, he served as a member of the Ghent Council in 1395–96, 1415–16, 1425–26 and 1430–31. Between 1433 and 1434 he was the leading alderman, a position basically the same as burgomaster or mayor. Jodocus served as churchwarden at Sint-Janskerk until March 31, 1439, the year of his death. Whether he was interred in the church is unknown. His father Nikolaas, a benefactor of the Carthusians at Rooigem was buried in their monastery near Ghent. Jodocus’ wife, Elisabeth Borluut, was a Ghenter.29 Her patrician descendant, Jan Borluut, was one of the principal figures in the 1302 battle of the Golden Spurs. The Borluutsteen, Elizabeth’s family residence (Figs. 6.101–104) is a thirteenth-century honey sandstone house which still stands on Korenmarkt (Nos. 6–7), the grain market square in Ghent. Elisabeth’s father, Geerom Borluut, like Jodocus, served several times as an alderman of Ghent. Elizabeth’s relatives were abbots of SintJanskerk where on December 18 of 1439 she is described as a widow.30 Elisabeth Borluut lived until May 3, 1443, and her grave is known to have been in the church of the Augustinian monastery in Ghent where other members of her family found repose. According to a deed dated May 13, 1435, the childless Jodocus Vijd and Elisabeth Borluut had founded their chapel for the “glory of God, His Blessed Mother and all His Saints, and they established funds for the offering of a daily mass at their chapel altar in perpetuity for the “salvation of their souls and those of their forebears.” 31

Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen VI, 27–32, 85–86 (Borluut family). 30 Kerveyn de Volkaersbeke, Histoire généalogique de quelques familles de Flandre [1847] (Ghent: 1874). 31 Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen , 89–93 and Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 24 and 138 note 6 and 139 note 14. She cites the Ghent City Archives, MS. Jaerregistre, 1434– 1435, f. 149v, published by Victor van der Haeghen, “Autour des van Eyck, Cartulaire,” Handelingen der Maatschappij van Geschied-en Oudheidkunde te Gent XV (1914): 1–68, at 51–55; Jozef Duverger, “De paramenten van de Joos Vydkapel van de Sint-Baafskerk te Gent,” Artes Textiles II (1955): 46; idem, “De navorsing betreffende de Van Eyck’s,” Het Oude Land van Loon IX (1954): 192–210. 29

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Since 1986, Ghent’s most famous polyptych has been displayed behind glass in the former baptismal chapel of the cathedral rather than the Vijd Chapel (Figs. 6.105–6.106).32 Funded at the expense of the Vijds and dedicated on May 6, 1432, the Ghent Altarpiece is a nearly contemporaneous commission as Van Eyck’s lost Fountain of Life completed for King João I in 1429. Lotte Brand Philip (Fig. 6.107) has advanced a reconstruction regarding the original appearance of the retable in the Vijd chapel before the 1566 iconoclasm that resulted in the dismantling of the framework.33 Her theory was inspired by examination of Northern reliquaries and the early nineteenth-century historical paintings by Pierre François de Noter (Fig. 6.108) which capture the interior of St. Baafskerk and show a stone canopy above the Ghent Altarpiece. According to Philip, Van Eyck’s panels originally were set within a Gothic wooden superstructure reminiscent of tall, twostorey French reliquaries which displayed an enthroned Christ within a “Golden Shrine.” Set back in space, the lower storey with the Adoration of the Lamb, had paired columns on either side which supported the Deësis, the triadic grouping of Christ in Majesty and the intercessors for mankind, the Virgin Mary and John the Baptist. Philip suggests that the two panels of the 32 Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 22ff; idem, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen VI, 89–93. Also consult: Baron Kervyn de Volkaersbeke (Philippe Augustin Chrétien), Les églises de Gand, 2 vols. (Ghent: L. Hebbelynck, 1857–58); Édouard de Moreau, Histoire de l’église en Belgique des origines aux débuts du XIIe siècle, 5 vols. (Brussels: l’Édition universelle, 1940–1952). 33 Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck, 3–35. For recent technical studies, see J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “A Scientific Re-examination of the Ghent Altarpiece,” Oud Holland IXCIII (1979): 141–214; Pim W. F. Brinkman, L. Kockaert, L. Maes, L. Masschelein-Kleiner, F Robaszynski, and E. Thielen, “Het Lam Godsretabel van Van Eyck. Een heronderzoek naar de materialen en schildermethoden, 1. De plamuur, de isolatielaag, de tekening en de grondtonen,” Institut Royal du Patrimonie Artistique, Koninklijk Instituut voor het Kunstpatrimonium Bulletin XX (1984–1985 (1986): 137–66; Pim W. F. Brinkman, L. Kockaert, L. Maes, E.M.M. Thielen and J. Wouters, “Het Lam Gosretabel van Van Eyck. Een heronderzoek naar de materialen en schildermethoden, 2. De hoofdkleuren. Blauw, groen, geel en rood,” Institut Royal du Patrimonie Artistique, Koninklijk Instituut voor het Kunstpatrimonium Bulletin XXII (1988–1989) (1990): 26–49; G. Corinth, “Eine spielfähige Rekonstruktion des gotischen Positives von Genter Altar,” ISO Yearbook (1991): 6–35; Liliane Masschelein-Kleiner, “De verplaatsing van het Lam Gods,” Monumenten en Landschappen V, No. 4 (1986): 29–30. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute, “Les cadres de l’Agneau mystique de Van Eyck,” Revue de l’art LXXVII (1987): 73–76; idem., Cadres et supports dans la peinture flamande aux 15e et 16e siècles (Heurele-Romain: 1989): 275–84.

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Angelic Choir initially were beneath flying buttresses which connected the shrine to panels of Adam and Eve on the side piers.34 The argument that Van Eyck’s framework was designed from the beginning to provide different spatial environments and levels of reality has been debated. Still, the scheme of a tabernacle adorned with paintings has substantial merit despite the fact that the present simple frame of the Ghent Altarpiece accords with a prevailing Flemish trend of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.35 Brand’s reconstructions explain the incongruous sizes of figures existing in the present arrangement of Van Eyck’s panels, as well as the blue sky behind the angelic choir. The initial appearance of the Ghent Altarpiece is an issue that may never be resolved.36 However, setting aside this contested matter of framing, there is the thorny problem of Jan’s contribution to a project which was begun by his brother Hubrechte van Eyck, an artist who was successful in his day, but to whom not a single work has been definitely assigned.37 Due to the iconoclasms of 1566, and the destruction of Ghent’s old monuments, including the Stadshuis, the 34 According to Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 24, the Vijd Chapel in SintJanskerk “came to be known as the Chapel of Adam and Eve owing to the fame of these figures in the altarpiece.” The surname Vijd is very close to “Vijg,” which means “fig” in Dutch. See also Thomas Martone, “Van Eyck’s Technique of the “Trompe-l’intelligence’ Applied to the Deësis of the Ghent Altarpiece,” Versus: quaderni di studi semiotici XXXVII (1984): 71–82. 35 John L. Ward, “Hidden Symbolism in Jan van Eyck’s Annunciations,” Art Bulletin LVII, No. 2 (June, 1975): 196–220, at 208 note 79, discusses Philip’s reconstruction. He mentions a late sixteenth-century painting of the interior of St. Pieter at Louvain which illustrates eight large altarpieces with simple frames in sitú. Canopies were installed above two altarpieces. See Gert von der Osten and Horst Vey, Painting and Sculpture in Germany and the Netherlands: 1500–1600, translated from German by Mary Hottinger (HarmondsworthBaltimore: Penguin Press, 1969), Fig. 300. For additional comments by Ward about the Ghent Altarpiece, see his article, “Disguised Symbolism as Enactive Symbolism in Van Eyck’s Paintings,” Artibus et Historiae. An Art Anthology XXIX (1994): 9–53. 36 Regarding the original setting of the Ghent Altarpiece and subsequent changes, see Elisabeth Dhanens, “De wijze waarop het Lam-Godsaltar was opgesteld,” Gentse Bijdragen tot de Kunstgeschiedenis en de Oudheidkunde XXII (1969–1972): 109–50; Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 49–50. Until 1772 the chapel contained stained glass windows bearing the Vijd arms (which still appear in the stone vault). Iron railings were installed to enclose the chapel. See Van der Haeghen, “Autour des Van Eyck, Cartulaire,” 64–66 and Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van OsstvlaanderenVI, 93–95 (Ghent City Archives, MS. Jaerregistre, 1438–1439, f. 129 and 1439–1440, f. 109v.). 37 Hubert maintained an active workshop having assistants. The documentation of a gratuity given to his disciples by Ghent aldermen in 1425–26 follows Hubert’s completion of two designs for an altarpiece by the officials in 1424–25. See Joseph de Smet, “L’Adoration

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Abbey Sint-Baafs, the Hof ten Walle, and the interiors of several churches, Hubrechte’s art may never be known. The Ghent Altarpiece lacks the original framework which once unified the spatial compositions of its panels, but even with present scientific knowledge, scholars still cannot technically separate hands of two distinct masters in the polyptych, so uniform is the painting style, and so minor the changes. Master Hubrecht’s contribution to the commission might have been limited to preliminary designs and carving of the structural components. Beneath the donor portraits and the panels of St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist, the lower section of the frame is painted with a dedicatory quatrain in hexameter which give the date of completion (1432) in a chronogram formed by the red letters in the last line of verse. This quatrain (Fig. 6.109) has been translated as: Pictor [Fictor] Hubertus e Eyck . Maior que nemo repertus Incepit . pondus . q[ue] Johannes arte secundus [Frater perfunctus] . Judoci Vijd prece fretus . Versu sexta mai . vos collocat acta tueri. The painter [frame maker] Hubert van Eyck, greater than whom no one was found, began [this work], and Jan, his brother, second in art, having carried through the task at the expense of Judocus Vijd, invites you by this verse on the sixth of May, to look at what has been done.38 After his death Hubrecht van Eyck was buried in the Vijd Chapel of Sint-Jans before the altar, an interment which accords with the high praise given by Jan to his brother in the quatrain (Fig. 6.110). Hubrecht’s white marble tombstone initially would have been set within in the floor, where it was seen by Hieronymus Münzer, a humanist from Nuremberg, on March de l’Agneau par les frères Van Eyck,” Inventaire archéologique de Gand (Ghent: 1902): Nos. 241–50 (Ghent Archives, MS. Jaerregistre, City Accounts for 1425 (f. 188) and 1425–25 (f. 288v). 38 The translation is taken from James Snyder, Northern Renaissance Art. Painting, Sculpture, The Graphic Arts. From 1350 to 1575 (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1985), 89–90, with the exception that I retained the spelling of Vijd’s full name and inserted “Fictor.” Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck , 44ff., reads fictor Hubertus rather than pictor Hubertus. By this reading of the quatrain, she attributes the original frame of the retable to Hubert van Eyck’s hand, and gives the execution of the panels solely to Jan van

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26–27, 1495.39 The carved effigy of the tombstone originally had a brass placard strapped from his shoulders, but this metal plaque was removed about 1578, when the Dutch Calvinists transferred the Ghent Altarpiece to the Town Hall with the intent of giving the polyptych to William I of OrangeNassau (1533–1584). About 1759, Hubrecht’s tombstone was taken from the Vijd Chapel and installed in the portico of the north transept. When Sint-Janskathedraal was restored in 1890–92, it was transferred again, to the Abdij Sint-Baaf. Despite the loss of the epitaph, Marcus van Vaernewyck in 1532 recorded the inscription, which has been transcribed and translated by Elisabeth Dhanens.40 A pertinent passage of the plaque substantiates Hubrecht died of an illness which caused pain, perhaps cancer, and that he had achieved some renown: Art, honour, wisdom, power, great riches — None of these are spared when death comes. I was called Hubert van Eyck But now I am food for the worms; I was once known and highly honoured Eyck. Hubert’s tombstone in the Lapidary Museum of St. Bavo’s Abbey gives no birthdate although he hailed from Maeseyck near Mons. His death is recorded as September 18, 1426. See also C. S. Engel, “Sator ara te. The Ghent Altarpiece Cryptogram,” Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Oudheidkunde en Kunstgeschiedenis,” Revue belge d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art LXII (1993): 47–65; Reinhard Liess, “Der Quatrain des Genter Altares – Ein Selbstbildnis Jan van Eycks,” Musis et Litteris, Festschrift für Bernhard Rupprecht zum 65. Geburtstag (Munich: 1993): 35–67; George Hulin de Loo, “La fameuse inscription du rétable de l’Agneau,” Revue Archéologique CXI (1934): 62–87; Jozef Duverger, Het grafschrift van Hubrecht van Eyck en het quatrain van het Gentsche Lam Gods-retabel (Brussels-Antwerp: Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse Schone Kunsten, Verhandeling IV-Standaard-Boekhandel, 1945) with a technological study by Ed. Bontinck, Natuurwetenschappelijk onderzoek van de opschriften en de lijst van het Lam Godsretabel, 74–82; Victor Tourneau, “Un Second Quatrain sur l’Agneau Mystique,” Académie Royale de Belgique, Bulletin de la Classe des Lettres et des Sciences Morales et Politiques XXIX, séries 5 (1943): 57–65 [Maximilian de Vriendt]; Paul Post, “Pictor Hubertus Deyck major que nemo repertus. Eine Untersuchung zur Genter Altar-Frage auf Grund des Tatsächlichen,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte XV (1952): 46–68. 39 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 23. 40 Marcus van Vaernewyck, Den Spieghel der Nederlanscher Audtheyt (Ghent: 1568), f. CXIX. See Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedraal te Gent. Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oostvlaanderen VI, 110–15, Documenten, 16–21. Also consult Marcus van Vaernewyck, Van de beroerlicke Tijden in die Nederlanden en voornamelijk in Ghendt, 1566–1568, Ghent University Library, HS. G 2469; See Dhanens, Inventaris VI, 108–10, Documenten, 22.

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for my painting; yet shortly afterwards I became nothing…. I gave up my soul to God with pain. Pray to God for me, all you who love art, That I may see His face..41 Nineteen of the Ghent Altarpiece’s original paintings survive. Had Hubrecht left a body of panels unfinished in 1426, it would have taken a very patient patron to wait four years before resuming the decoration of a family chapel. More likely, Hubrecht left studies, sections of a carved framework, and perhaps some preliminary work stored in his studio. Jan van Eyck was away from Flanders substantially on diplomatic missions between 1426 and 1430, but he must have visited Ghent to settle his brother’s affairs before he left for Portugal in autumn of 1428. When he returned to Ghent as a member of the ducal entourage in spring of 1430, Vijd probably approached Jan to complete the commission for his chapel. A wealthy burgher, Vijd would have expended some monies to Hubrecht van Eyck in the initial phase of his altarpiece project. This expenditure alone would have precluded a thrifty businessman from procuring the services of another artist outside the Van Eyck family circle. Lambert van Eyck is described in documents as a brother of Jan, yet even less is known about his life than Hubrechte’s. Lambert may not have been as versatile an artist, as Vijd reasonably would have contacted him in Bruges to complete the Sint-Jans chapel when Jan was absent from Flanders. Lambert’s training may have been as an illuminator and designer of heralds. His role in the Eyck atelier might have been confined to that of a useful associate who supervised the day-to-day operations of a workshop, the purchase of pigments, wood, tools, etc, and the directing of assistants. Lambert did have contact with the Burgundian court as proven by a document in the Lille Archives dated March, 1431. However, a monetary recompense of 7l. 9s. to “Lambert de Hech, brother of Iohannes de Hech” for rendering a service to Duke Philip the Good on several occasions concerning certain affairs” only substantiates employment. The record provides no information regarding the nature of Lambert’s activity.42 41 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck , 29. She provides the entire text and the original Flemish quotation. 42 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), xxxiv. Document 15 (Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, B 1942).

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A clue to solving the mystery of the Van Eyck family’s homeland is given in a silverpoint drawing of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati in Dresden (Figs. 6.111–6.112) which Jan completed in October of 1431, when the Cardinal of Santa Croce in Rome and legate of Pope Eugenius IV (1431–1447) arrived in Flanders to initiate peace negotiations between Duchy of Burgundy and the monarchies of France, Burgundy and England.43 According to the account of Antoine de la Taverne, Albergati met with Philip the Good at Brussels on October 18, and subsequently visited Ghent (November 3–5), Lille, and Bruges (December 8–11).44 Jan’s drawing is unique among his works because it contains marginal notations transcribed by Alfonso Lieven Dierick. 45 The abbreviated remarks in two lines above Albergati’s head and 43 Regarding the Albergati drawing in Dresden, see Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries, 170, 174–75; Lorne Campbell et al., “The Methods and Materials of Northern European Painting 1400–1500,” in National Gallery Technical Bulletin XVIII (1997): 6–55, at 26. 44 As a consequence of his diplomacy among three European courts, Cardinal Albergati assumed a significant role when the Council of Arras finally was convened between July and September of 1435. Antoine de la Taverne [† 1448], Journal de la paix d’Arras faite en l’abbaye de Saint Vaast entre Charles VII et Philippe le Bon [1435], ed. André Bossuat (Arras: Impr. de la Société anonyme l’Avenir, 1936); Paolo de Toeth, Il Beato Cardinale Niccolò Albergati e i suoi tempi, 2 vols. (Viterbo: 1934); Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 282–91 (Portrait of Cardinal Niccoló Albergati); John Hunter, “Who is Jan van Eyck’s ‘Cardinal Nicolo Albergati’”, Art Bulletin LXXV (1993): 207–18; Lorne Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1990), 170–71, 174–75; Elisabeth Dhanens, Het Portret van Kardinaal Nicolò Albergati door Jan van Eyck (1438),” Academiae Analecta. Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België. Klasse der Schone Kunsten L, No. 2 (1989): 19–41; Millard Meiss, “’Nicolas Albergati’ and the Chronology of Jan van Eyck’s Portraits,” Burlington Magazine XCIV (1952): 132–44; Angelica Dülberg, Privatporträts: Geschichte und Ikonologie einer Gattung im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Mann, 1990), 218–19; Dieter Jansen, “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis – der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 44, 47 and note 8); Jochen Sander, “Individualität im Rollenbild. Die Entwicklung des Portraits,” Die Entdeckung der Kunst: Niederländische Kunst des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts in Frankfurt, ed. Jochen Sander (Mainz: exhibition catalogue, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main-P. von Zabern, 1995), 43–45; Karl Schütz, “Jean van Eyck. Cardinal Nicolo Albergati,” La peinture flamande au Kunsthistorisches Museum de Vienne, ed. Arnout Balis et al. (Antwerp-Zurich: Fonds Mercator, 1987), 12–13; J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Technical Aspects of Some Eyckian Portrait Paintings,” Werk: opstellen voor Hans Locher (Groningen: 1990), 8–12. 45 The notations read: “The hair in the front/Ochreous [ash] gray/The lower part of the forehead/Between the eyes sanguineous/Close to the hair palish/The wart purplish/The

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in sixteen lines in front of his face concern color and tonality, and they are a window unto Jan’s artistic approach in capturing a realistic likeness. More significantly, the technical comments were written in a dialect not tracked to Bruges, Ghent, The Hague or even the Maasland. According to Dierick, Jan relied on his mother tongue in writing notes, and his dialect corresponds with that of Gederland. Though the Gothic dukes of the province maintained an ancestral castle in the town of Geldern (present-day Germany), they presided over the region which was divided by the Rhine and Maas rivers and traversed by their subsidiary arms, such as the Ljssel, Waal and the Linge. Along these waterways, several cities became important commercial centers and members of the Hanseatic League. Kampen and Nijmegen were two towns which enjoyed prosperity from their trade with the Baltic countries, Belgium, Germany and England.46 Jan van Eyck’s native dialect in the Albergati drawing insinuate his brothers Hubrechte and Lambert also originated in Gelderland, where the artistic contacts with the Westphalian center of Cologne were considerable.47 apple of the eye/Around the pupil/Dark yellowish And in its circumference/Close to the white bluish/That … …ish/The white of the eye yellowish/The nose sanguinish/Like the cheekbone down the cheeks/The lips very whitish/Purple/The stubby beard/rather greyish/ The chin reddish.” See Alfons Lieven Dierick, “Jan van Eyck’s Handwriting,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 79–82, at 79. The original text is provided in addition to a very fine photograph of the marginal notations, which are analyzed with regard to Jan’s technique. See also Alfons Lieven Dierick, “La lecture des textes,” Le dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture: Colloque VIII, 8–10 Septembre 1989, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1991): 181–84. 46 Nijmegen was the place of origin of Jean Malouel, who, before his permanent relocation to France, created arms and banners for the court at Guelders. Employed as a designer of heralds for King Charles VI and Queen Isabeau de Bavière, Malouel in 1397 entered the service of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, for whom he created some of the most beautiful treasures of Dijon. Concurrent with his ducal appointment, Malouel contacted his sister Mechteld and arranged to have three of her six children apprentice with a goldsmith in Paris. Pol, Jean and Herman, sons of the wood carver Arnold de Limbourg, traveled to France, but they were sent home in 1399 to avoid a plague. The youths returned to Paris with funds Malouel procured from local goldsmiths and a matching stipend from the Duke of Burgundy. Jean and Pol in 1402 were employed as illuminators by Philip the Bold. By 1408 they were retained by Jean, Duke of Berry, whose appreciation for their manuscript miniatures is revealed by his lavish gifts at New Year festivities. Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, with a preface by Milliard Meiss, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. Musée Condé, Chantilly (London: Thames and Hudson-George Braziller, 1993), 19–22. 47 Nicole Reynaud, Les primitifs, de l’école de Cologne (Paris: Éditions des Musées Nationaux, 1974).

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Elisabeth Dhanens documents a “Magister Hubrecht pictor” in 1409 at the collegial church of Our Lady in Tongeren, where he received eleven crowns and wine for a pictura tabule.48 A Roman settlement on the road between Bavai and Cologne, Tongeren’s bishopric was the first to be established in Flanders, but its see was moved to Liège by St. Hubert in 720 and it subsequently became a dependency of the prince-bishop. Founded in the early fourth century, the Onze Lieve Vrouwbasiliek was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, the oldest church to have that distinction north of the Alps. Tongeren was occupied by the French in 1677, and while the basilica begun in the eleventh century survived the sack of the town, numerous monuments were destroyed, among them Hubrecht’s altarpiece. Dhanens has proposed that Jan’s brother in Tongeren would have been introduced to the reforming ideas of Rudolphus de Rive († 1403/4), a former rector from the Cathedral of Cologne. Despite the reference in a tombstone epitaph to Hubrechte’s fame as a “painter,” the inscription does not clarify the genre of painting in which he excelled. Like Jan, he might have been an illuminator and specialist in panel painting, whose skills encompassed polychroming statues, as well as a muralist and cloth painter. Dhanens documents another lost work mentioned in a testament of 1413 pertaining to the estate of Jan de Visch van der Capelle. A painting of an unidentified subject by “Master Hubrechte” was bequeathed by the Lord of Axel to his daughter Marie, a Benedictine nun at a convent in Bourbourg near Grevelingen.49 Otto Pächt has recognized the Eyckian character of a drawing in Nuremberg which he attributed to Hubrechte50 (Fig. 6.113). The study illustrates an appropriate theme for a cloistered nun, 48 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 20–22. See Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen VI, 86–88. Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 44, relates Hubert was known by several names in documents: Luberecht (1424–25); “Master Ubrecht” (1425–1426); “Hubrecht” [Hubertus eeyck] on the quatrain of the Ghent Altarpiece; and “Lubrecht van Heyke” on the recording of estate taxes in 1426–27 (see Ghent Town Archives, MS. Jaerregistre, City Accounts for 1426–1427, f. 319v; published by Charles Louis Carton (Abbé), Les trois frères van Eyck (Bruges: 1848), 370. 49 Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 23. 50 Otto Pächt, Van Eyck. Die Begründer al altniederländischen Malerei, ed. Maria SchmidtDengler (Munich: Prestel-Verlag. 1989), 198; idem., Van Eyck: and the Founders of Early Netherlandish Painting, with a foreword by Arthur Rosenauer, ed Maria Schmidt-Dengler, translated by David Britt (London: Harvey Miller, 1994). Pächt comments the Nuremberg

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the mystical engagement of St. Catherine of Alexandria. If the Nuremberg sketch concerns a commission by Hubrechte van Eyck completed prior to 1413, then its composition commands a prescient position in the history of the sacra conversazione. The central seated Madonna is flanked by saints revered in Ghent. Because of their respective association with the sword and the arrow, medieval warrior-knights and archers implored the aid of the two female saints in battle, Catherine and Barbara. On the left St. Catherine of Alexandria receives her ring from the infant Christ seated on the Virgin Mary’s lap and St. Barbara is identified by her traditional tower. St. Margaret of Antioch likely stands behind them. She was the name saint of two important Countesses of Flanders: Margaret of Flanders, wife of Baldwin V; and her granddaughter, Margaret of Constantinople. Opposite the holy women are three male saints venerated at the important churches in Ghent where citizens returning from pilgrimages had customarily congregated for meetings. Sint-Jans, where pilgrims to Jerusalem met, was named for John the Baptist, patron and protector of Ghent, whose lamb like St. Margaret’s flock of sheep, was associated with the woven wool which contributed to the city’s prosperity. St. James the Elder holds a staff capped by a shell, and he was the patron of Ghent’s Sint-Jakobskerk (Figs. 6.114–6.118), a thirteenthcentury church built upon an earlier Romanesque chapel (destroyed by fire in 1120), where pilgrims from Santiago de Compostela convened.51 The remaining St. Nicholas of Bari was venerated at Sint-Niklaaskerk. Pilgrims from Rome foregathered at this church, the place of worship for the town guildsmen and merchants. Because the three virgin-martyrs are Mosan types, the Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine recently has been discussed with respect to a Rhenish-Mosan regional sculpture tradition.52 drawing has the imprint of “Jan van Eyck’s invention” in his article, “A New Book on the van Eycks,” The Burlington Magazine XCV (1953): 252–53. 51 At least since 1282 a Confraternity of Santiago met in Ghent which numbered four hundred members. The majority had traveled to Santiago de Compostela. A Confraternity of Santiago also was established at Tournai with administrators who were required to have made the pilgrimage to Galicia. Though Philip and Sofia, Count and Countess of Flanders, made the pilgrimage to northwest Spain in the twelfth century, and John of Gaunt also passed through Compostela’s Porta de la Gloria, Jan van Eyck in early 1429 traveled with a diplomatic entourage to the famous shrine of St. James on behalf of Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy. 52 John Seyaert, “Sculpture and the van Eycks: Some Mosan Parallels,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 119–30, at 126–27 and note 18 at 130. See also Paul

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Relating the Nuremberg drawing with Hubrechte van Eyck would support Charles Sterling’s contention that Jan’s brother, like Robert Campin (ca. 1378–1441) in Tournai, was even more exposed to a Northern FlemishGermanic tradition of monumental sculpture.53 Robert Campin is first cited in a legal testament of 1406 as a beneficiary of two works from a private estate: “To maistre Robert Campin, painter living at La Lormerie, for a small panel and crucifix he has made and delivered.”54 This document suggests Campin was both a painter and sculptor, or at least a specialist in applying polychrome to carvings. Many artists who trained in the Northern Netherlands possessed skill in the two media. The Dutch variation of the name Campin suggests his lineage may be tracked to Kempen, a town north of Maaseyck, the presumed point of origin in Belgium for the Eyck family. Campin’s wife was Ysabiel de Stoquain, evidently a French spelling after either the town of Stokkum in the Dutch province of Gelders or the village of Stokkem to the south of Williamson, “Ghent. Late Gothic Sculpture,” The Burlington Magazine (1994): 861–62; idem, Northern Gothic Sculpture 1200–1450 (London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1988); Robert Didier, Hubert Frère, Luc F. Genicot (eds.), Rhin-Meuse. Art et Civilisation 800–1400 (Cologne-Brussels: exhibition catalogue, Schnütgen-Museum de Cologne-Kunsthalle de Cologne-Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Brussels, Ministères de l’Éducation Nationale de la Culture Française et de la Culture Néerlandaise, with scientific editors Jacques Stiennon and Rita Lejeune, et al., Bruxelles, 1972); Robert Didier and Hartmut Krohm (eds.), Les Sculptures médiévales allemandes dans les collections belges (Brussels: Exposition Europalia 77, Société Générale de Banque, 1977); Robert Didier and Roland Recht, “Paris, Prague, Cologne et la sculpture de la second moitié du XIVe siècle. A propos de l’exposition des Parler à Cologne,” Bulletin Monumental CXXXVIII, No. 2 (1980): 173–219; Hartmut Krohm, Meisterwerke mittelalterlicher Skulptur (Berlin: D. Reimer, 1996); Marguerite Devigne, La sculpture mosane du XIIe et XVIe siècle (Paris-Brussels: G. van Oest, 1932; Rhein und Maas – Kunst und Kultur 800–1400, 2 vols. (Cologne: exhibition catalogue, Kunsthalle, 1972– 1973). Also consult Napoléon de Pauw, “Les premiers peintres et sculpteurs gantois,” Bulletijn der Maatschappij van Geschieden Oudheidkunde te Gent VII (1899): 239–77. 53 Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art 33 (1976), 7–82, “Appendice I: Pour Hubrecht van Eyck,” at 60–63. Sterling, who identified the drawing as a copy after Hubrecht van Eyck, circa 1415, refers to Friedrich Winkler, “Die Vermählung des Hl. Katharina im Germanischen Nationalmuseum,” Anzieger des Germanischen Nationalmuseums (Nürnberg: 1964): 24–31. 54 Account of Jehanne Esquierqueline: “À maistre Robert Campin, pointre, demorant en le Lormerie, pour un tabliel et une croix que il avoit fait et livré du vivant de ladite défuncte, 45 s.” For this document that concerns a panel and probably the polychrome work for a cross, see Albert Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle. La fascination du quotidien (Antwerp: Fons Mercator Paribas, 1996), 345–57 (Documents: Robert Campin), at 345 (1406) panel and sculpture. Châtelet, 345, relates Jehanne Esquierqueline was the widow of the sculptor Jacques Braibant who made his testament on September 3, 1400. He refers to

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Maaseyck.55 Documented as a master painter of Tournai from 1406 until his death in 1441, Robert Campin’s primary patrons were the wealthy bourgeois and he maintained a workshop in the Lormerie district on the Rue des Chapeliers near the Cathedral of Notre Dame until 1419, when he moved to the Puits-l’eau. Serving as subdeacon of the goldsmith guild and dean of the painter’s guild, he also was active in municipal affairs. Campin was a steward of Tournai in 1425 and 1427 and subsequently officiated on the Tournai Council, a committee of six guild deans that governed the town. He was a warden and bursar of the parish church of St. Margaret, where in 1422 he and a priest co-founded a chantry at the altar of St. Luke, for which he painted a lost altarpiece of the Evangelist.56 Campin might have been an acquaintance of Hubrechte because his contact with Jan van Eyck is documented. Armaury Louys de La Grange (Baron) and Louis Cloquet, Études sur l’art à Tournai et sur les anciens artistes de cette ville [Mémoires de la Société historique et littéraire de Tournai XX and XXI], 2 vols. (Tournai: Typ. Vve H. Casterman, 1887–1889), I (1888), 221–22. Nothing is known about Robert Campin prior to 1406, when he is named in Tourani as the recipient of objects recently made and delivered. Also consult Joseph de Smet , “Le registre de Saint-Luc de Tournai, “ in Émile Renders, La solution du problème van der Weyden-Flémalle-Campin, 2 vols. with the collaboration of Joseph Jean de Smet and Louis Beyaert-Carlier (Bruges: C. Beyaert, 1931), II, 127–72, at 157; Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden: The Complete Works (Antwerp-New York, Mercantorfonds-Harry N. Abrams, 1999), 44. Felix Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, translated from the German by Ishbel Flett (Munich-Berlin-London-New York, Prestel Verlag, 2002), 9–28, expounds upon Campin’s origins as a tapestry designer with specific reference to the St. Eleutherius and St. Piatus tapestries in Tournai’s Cathedral of Notre-Dame, both of which are dated to 1402. For Campin’s patronage also consult Peter Schabacker, “Notes on the Biography of Robert Campin,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLI (1980): 3–14. See also Peter Schabacker, “Notes on the Biography of Robert Campin,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLI (1980): 3–14; Martin Davies, Rogier van der Weyden. An Essay with a Critical Catalogue of Paintings assigned to him and to Robert Campin (London: Phaidon Press, 1972). 55 Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 47. He cites Maurice Houtart, “Quel est l’état de nos connaissances relativement à Robert Campin, Jacques Daret et Roger van der la Pasture – van der Weyden?” Annales de la Fédération Archéologique et Historique de Belgique, XXIIIe Congrès (Ghent: 1913, III): 88–108, at 89, De Smet, , “Le registre de Saint-Luc de Tournai,“ in Renders, La solution du problème Van der Weyden – Flémalle – Campin, II, 157; Albert Chatelet, Robert Campin, de Meester van Flémalle (Antwerp: Fons Mercator Paribus, 1996), 17. 56 Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle, 348–50; Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 47, and Georges Hulin de Loo, “Sur la date de quelques oeuvres du Maître de Flémalle,” Bulletin de l’Académie Royale d’Archéologie de Belgique II (1911): 109–12, at 111.

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On October 20, 1427 the magistrates of Tournai received the Burgundian ambassadors who had just returned from their voyage to Valencia and the Court of King Alfonso V of Aragon. That Jan van Eyck was a member of the delegation sent to negotiate a marriage between Duke Philip the Good and Alfonso’s niece, Isabel de Urguell, is proven by the municipal accounts. According to the city records of Tournai, he was given a gift of wine, usually four large jars, from the magistrates on October 18, 1427.57 Because the ceremony occurred on the feast day of St. Luke, the patron of artists, the celebration is thought to have taken place at an annual banquet in the painters’ guild. Robert Campin would have attended the event, and he probably would have invited Jan to his workshop.58 Jan van Eyck visited Tournai a second time on March 28, 1428. Though the reason is not known, in that same year guildsmen, among them Campin, were tried for a popular uprising by patricians who had gained control of the Tournai Council. Jan van Eyck perhaps traveled to testify on Campin’s behalf, a course of action that would substantiate a sustained friendship. As a repercussion of Campin’s refusal to speak against a colleague, Henri le Quien, he was given the penitential task of making a pilgrimage to Saint-Gilles-duGard in Provence, banned from holding civic positions, and undoubtedly given a hefty fine.59 A far more serious affair occurred on July 30, 1432, which basically put an end to Campin’s artistic activity and signaled the beginning of independent careers for the masters of his workshop. Campin, then about the age of fifty-four, was accused of conducting a lengthy adulterous relationship with a woman, Leurence Polette. A harsh verdict was delivered on July 30 and Campin’s workshop was closed. He escaped the ignominy of incarceration only due to the intervention of Margaret of Burgundy, Duchess of Hainaut, who on October 25 dispatched her squire Colart Galeriau to Tournai with a plea for clemency.60 Tournai until 1432 was under the jurisdiction of the Duchy of Bavaria, and Jacoba of Bavaria also is thought to have interceded with the Council on Campin’s behalf. 57 Jacques Paviot, “La Vie de Jan van Eyck selon les documents écrits,” Revue des Archéologes et Historiens d’Art de Louvain XXIII (1990): 83–93, at 86 and note 24 for documentation concerning the visit of 18 October 1427 and 23 March 1428. 58 Houtart, “Quel est l’état de nos connaissances relativement à Robert Campin, Jacques Daret et Roger van der la Pasture – van der Weyden?,” 97. Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 50–51. 59 Châtelet, Robert Campin, de Meester van Flémalle, 29, 355; Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 51; Renders, La solution du problème Van der Weyden – Flémalle – Campin, 168. 60 Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 52.

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When Philip the Good acquired Holland, Zeeland and Hainaut, he limited his niece’s authority. Titled “Lady Forester of Teylingen,” a hunting lodge near Haarlem, Jacoba’s sphere of influence was restricted to this very small center in the Northern Netherlands. Jan van Eyck moved in courtly circles, and he would have been a logical intermediate to galvanize Margaret of Burgundy to act on behalf of Campin. The master of Tournai was able to restore his workshop, despite the loss of his best disciples, but the decline of his productivity lasted until his death in 1441. In 1427 Campin had four apprentices, three of whom attained the status of “Maistre” in 1432, the year assigned the Ghent Altarpiece.61 The best known of the disciples, Rogelet de la Pasture († 1464), registered with Campin on March 5 of 1427 as a “native of Tournai.” 62 That same year Rogier married Lysebette Goffaert, whose mother, Cathelyne van Stockem, is thought to have been related to Campin’s wife Ysabiel de Stoquain. On August 1 of 1432, Rogier became a master, and while he and his wife settled by 1435 in Brussels, Rogier’s pictorial paraphrasing of Jan van Eyck’s compositions indicates he must have visited Bruges between 1432 and the year of his transfer to Brabant.63 As varlet de chambre of Philip the Good, Jan van Eyck might have recommended Campin’s talented disciple to the Duke of Burgundy’s patrician circle, who patronized him as Rogier van der Weyden. The least known of Campin’s apprentices, Haquin de Blandain is registered in the atelier on April 30 of 1426, but he did not complete his tenure. 61 Houtart, “Quel est l’état de nos connaissances relativement à Robert Campin, Jacques Daret et Roger van der la Pasture – van der Weyden?,” 97. Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 50–51. 62 De Smet, “Le registre de Saint-Luc de Tournai, “ in Émile Renders, La solution du problème Van der Weyden-Flémalle-Campin, II, 136–37, for the registry of the Campin’s pupils: Rogelet de la Pasture and Jacquelotte Daret on folio 81; and Willemet and Haquin de Blandain on folio 81v. 63 Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 50. Rogier purchased a house in Brussels at the corner of Cantersteen and Rue de la Madeleine in the same district where Lysebette Goffaert’s family owned houses. For information about the St. Luke drawing the Virgin, consult Vos, 200–206; Till-Holger Borchert, “Rogier’s St. Luke: The Case for Corporate Identification,” Rogier van der Weyden: Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin and Child. Selected Essays in Context, edited by Carol Purtle (Turnhout: Brepols, 1998): 61–86; Chiyo L. Ishikawa, “Rogier van der Weyden’s St. Luke Drawing the Virgin Reexamined,” Journal of the Museum of Fine Arts II (Boston): 49–64; Heinrich Theodor Musper, Untersuchungen zu Rogier van der Weyden und Jan van Eyck (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1948); Hermann Theodor Beenken, “Roger van der Weyden und Jan van Eyck,” Pantheon XXV (1940): 129–37.

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According to a document of April 21, 1418, Jacquelotte Daret, who descended from a Tournai family of cabinetmakers and sculptors, began his training early with Campin, although he was not officially registered until April 12 of 1427. In 1423 he professed religious vows, and under the authority of the Bishop of Cambrai, he was attached to the diocese of St. Brice.64 Daret became a master on October 18 of 1432, and in that same year was elevated to the position of prévôt of the Guild of St. Luke, perhaps an office of chaplain.65 Less than a year later, on January 8, 1433, his halfbrother Danelet Daret became an apprentice in his atelier, and in 1436 they were joined by the manuscript illuminator Eleuthère Dupret. Documents confirm Daniel Daret inherited Jan van Eyck’s position as varlet de chambre to Duke Philip the Good on November 5, 1449.66 Registered in the workshop of Robert Campin on May 13, 1427, “Willemet” appears to have been known by his place of origin rather than a surname. Willem van Tongeren († 1456) is mentioned in the city records of Tournai in 1433–1434. In 1435 he is documented in Bruges among the artisans called upon to polychrome and gild statues of the Counts and Countesses of Flanders gracing the exterior of the Stadshuis. Willemet van Tongeren remained in Bruges, where in 1441 he became dean of the Guild of St. Luke.67

64 For documents see Albert Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle. La fascination du quotidien (Antwerp: Fons Mercator Paribas, 1996), 362–67 (Jacques Daret) and 367 (Daniel Daret). Maurice Houtart, Jacques Daret (Tournai: 1907); idem., “Quel est l’état de nos connaissances relativement à Robert Campin, Jacques Daret, et Rogier van der Weyden?”, Annales de la Fédération archéologique et historique de Belgique, XXIIIe Congrès, Gand, 1913, III (Liège: 1914): 88–108. 65 Peter H. Schabacker, “Observations on the Tournai Painter’s Guild, with Special Reference to Rogier van der Weyden and Jacques Daret,” Medelingen von de Koniklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten von België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLIII (Brussels: No. 1, 1982): 9–28, at 26. 66 Bruxelles, Archives Générales du Royaume, Inv. 052/01, No. 412. Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 51 and Houtart, “Quel est l’état de nos connaissances relativement à Robert Campin, Jacques Daret et Roger van der la Pasture – van der Weyden?,” 97. See also Theodore H. Feder, “A Re-examination through Documents of the first fifty Years of Rogier van der Weyden’s Life,” Art Bulletin XLVIII (1966): 416–31.. 67 Charles Vanden Haute, La Corporation des Peintres de Bruges (Bruges: Kortrijk, 1913; William Henry James Weale, Hubert and John van Eyck: Their Life and Work (London-New York: J. Lane, 1908), 21; Jozef Duberger, “Brugse Schilders ten tijde van Jan van Eyck,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique IV (1955: Miscellanea Erwin Panofsky): 83–120 at 107–109.

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To summarize, Jan van Eyck definitely was familiar with Robert Campin and the artists who worked with him in Tournai, it reasonably might be argued that Hubrechte, an honored master of Ghent, also had contact with the Campin atelier prior to 1426. According to a document of August 25, 1419 the Ghent painter Gheeraert van Stoevere arranged an apprenticeship for his son with Campin. Hannequin (Jan) van Stoevere likely began his training in 1415, before returning to Ghent where he received additional training under the goldsmith Pieter van der Pale from December 7, 1419 until 1422. As will be addressed, Hannequin van Stoevere appears to have collaborated with Hubrecht van Eyck until 1425, the year he is recorded in Bruges as engaged in painting a “History of the Virgin” for the Chapel of Notre Dame in Saint-Sauveur.68 A Crucifixion in the Museum Narodowne in Poznan (Fig. 6.119) has been identified as a replica of a lost original by Robert Campin dated 1410– 1415, but this assignment might be reconsidered in light of the apparent acquaintance between the Van Eyck brothers and Robert Campin, who shared a common heritage in Gelderland. The panel has a provenance in Spain, having been acquired in 1850 by Count Athanase Raczynski, one of the early specialists in Portuguese art.69 Mary Magdalene is veiled, but like her counterpart in Jan van Eyck’s Calvary of the Metropolitan Diptych, she is shown from the back kneeling before the cross with her arms upraised and hands clasped. The Poznan mourning females (Fig. 6.120), with their rotund faces, broad cheeks, high foreheads and delicate features, are not far removed in physical type from the virgin martyrs of the Nuremberg drawing. Concerning the spectators at Golgotha, the Poznan and Metropolitan Museum “Calvaries” display richly dressed equestrians, some of whom gaze solemnly towards the crucified Christ. The Madrid and Oberlin Fountain of Life paintings have been discussed as replicas of a work Jan van Eyck painted for King João I of Portugal that was lost in the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755. The Metropolitan Museum Calvary and the Last Judgment, universally dated to 1429, 68 Ghent, Archives de l’État, Staten 1419/20, folio 13v. See Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle. La fascination du quotidien, 348; Victor van der Haeghen, “Un élèvede Robert Campin à Gand,” Bulletin de la Société d’Histoire et d’Archéologie de Gand XXI (1913): 126–30. Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, 48. 69 Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle. La fascination du quotidien, 307, Catalogue C2, provides information on the provenance of the Poznan painting and past bibliographies.

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additionally have been proposed as comprising the wing panels to an original Fons Vitae centerpiece (Fig. 6.121). As any artist traveling to a foreign court, Jan van Eyck would have packed a portfolio of drawings and sketchbooks when he sailed to Portugal in 1428. Hubrechte van Eyck died three years before Jan’s diplomatic trip to Lisbon, yet some of his portfolio studies may have been preliminary designs for the Ghent Altarpiece. Following Hubrechte’s death, modest inheritance duties were paid by his unnamed heirs outside Ghent, as he was not married and had no children.70 Jan van Eyck must have acquired his brother’s collection of drawings, which would have been ignored in an evaluation of his household effects, like Hubrechte’s work for the Vijd Chapel still in his atelier when he died in 1426. The frame of the Poznan painting significantly carries a lengthy quotation in Latin from Isaiah 53, which must have been faithfully copied from the original.71 A frame inscription amplifying the devotional meaning of the subject is not characteristic of Robert Campin’s oeuvre, but it is an Eyckian trait of some magnitude. In raised letters on the frame of the Metropolitan Last Judgment panel is the significant passage ECCE TABERNACULUM DEI CUM HOMINIBUS. Taken from Apocalypse 21:3, the words are even more pertinent to the display of secular, ecclesiastical and Hebrew portraits in the centerpiece Fons Vitae: “Behold the Tabernacle of God is with Man.” Without further evidence, therefore, it would be just as valid to state the Poznan Crucifixion is an invention by Hubrechte van Eyck as to state it is a work which replicates a “lost” picture by Robert Campin. The representation of sumptuously clad onlookers may be observed in art of the Rhenish-Mosan Crescent, the centers extending along the Rhine and Meuse (Maas) rivers and in the bordering valleys. The Master of St. Veronica’s Calvary in Cologne (Fig. 6.122–6.123) may be a small work, but it is a volkreiche kalvarienberg animated with narrative figures, among them, several riders in fashionable dress. Recently identified as Gerhard von Soyst (Soest: ca. 1360–after

70 71

Otto Pächt, Van Eyck. Die Begründer al altniederländischen Malerei, 24.

IPSE PECCATA MUTORUM TULIT/ET PRO TRANSGRESSORIB[US] ORAVIT UT NP?/TRADIDIT I MORTEM ANIMAM SUAM/ET CUM SCELERATIS REPUDATUS EST/ VULNERAT E IPTER NOVITATES NRAS/[ET] SICUT OVIS AD OCCISIONEM DUCETUS/ DEDERUNT IN ESCAM MEAM FEI/ ET IN SITI MEA POTAVERUNT ME ADETO. For this

passage, see Châtelet, Robert Campin, 307. 72 Brigitte Corley, Painting and Patronage in Cologne. 1300–1500 (Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers-Brepol Publishers, 2000), 75–97, at 77–78.

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1422),72 an affluent member of the painter’s guild in Cologne, the Veronica Master who also worked at Dortmund in North Germany, appears to have had first-hand acquaintance with the international courtly style of Paris.73 The Poznan Crucifixion and Jan van Eyck’s New York Calvary exhibit the same horizontal bars for the crosses of the two thieves, which has been branded a “hallmark of Westphalian art.”74 Departing from the northwest Rhenish tradition, however, the Poznan and New York paintings display the suspended thieves as blindfolded with white cloths. Robert Campin depicted Calvary in two monumental works, both of which present the dead Christ as the centerpiece subject. The Seilern Triptych (ca. 1410–1415) (Fig. 6.124) is thought to have been painted for the Brotherhood of the Holy Cross in the Tournai Church of St. Brice.75 The right wing provides the Resurrection, while the opposite panel shows the barren hill of Golgotha with a kneeling donor and three crosses. The golden sky detracts from the realism of the scene, but it also throws into relief the “Rhenish” angels bearing instruments of the Passion. Though Christ’s body is being lowered into a stone sepulchre, the thieves still seem to writhe in agony. Neither thief is portrayed with a blindfold. Campin’s second triptych is lost but its appearance is known by a fragment of the Impenitent Thief in Frankfurt (Städelches Kunstinstitut), and a circa 1450 replica of the entire triptych in Liverpool (Fig. 6.125).76 This later version dates about 1415– 1420 and shows a more naturalistic setting and sky. The theme of the Descent encompasses the wings. The left panel contains portraits of the donor and his wife. The “Penitent Thief ” above them, with his tied arms drawn rigidly behind his back, most closely approximates the Poznan “Impenitent Thief ” to the left of Christ and he wears a blindfold. By contrast with the Campin triptychs, the compositional orientation of the Poznan panel is vertical like the New York Crucifixion, which also shares the distinctive atmosphere of a cloudy but deep azure sky.

73 Brigitte Corley, Conrad von Soest: Painter among Merchant Princes (London: Harvey Miller Publishers, 1996), 131–80 (connections with the Parement Master in Paris). 74 Corley, Painting and Patronage in Cologne. 1300–1500, 84. 75 Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, 284–85. See Barbara G. Lane, Depositio et Elevatio: The Symbolism of the Seilern Triptych,” Art Bulletin LVII (1975): 21–30; NYS Ludovic, “Le triptych Seilern: une nouvelle hypothèse,” Revue de l’Art CXXXIX (2003): 5–20. 76 Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, 288–90.

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Hubrecht van Eyck apparently completed work in 1424–1425 for Magistrates Court or Aldermen Hall of the Ghent Schepenhuis. “Master Luberecht” presented the Ghent city council with two project designs, but the subject of these studies is not given in documents. Archival accounts of 1425–1426 may pertain to the same initiative because they record a gratuity from municipal funds given to the pupils of “Master Ubrecht.” There is no trace of Hubrechte’s taeffeles (pictures), but Elisabeth Dhanens has suggested his work may have resembled Lluis Dalmáu’s Virgin of the Councilors with Sts. Eulalia and Andrew (Figs. 6.126–6.128), ca. 1443–45, painted on Baltic oak panel.77 Sent by Alfonso V of Aragon to Portugal in 1428, Dalmáu was a member of the delegation of ambassadors assigned the task of escorting the ruler’s niece to Lisbon. The marriage of Doña Isabel de Urguell to Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra, occurred just prior to the arrival of the Burgundian diplomats to the Avis court, and therefore, the Valencian artist did not have an opportunity to meet Jan van Eyck. However, Alfonso V in 1431 provided a stipend of 100 gold florins to cover Dalmáu’s travel expenses to Flanders, where he ostensibly was to acquire technical expertise in Northern painting. Because he was accompanied on his trip by the tapestry-maker Guillem d’Uxcelles, Lluis likely visited Arras and Tournai, as well as Bruges and Ghent. Dalmáu returned to Valencia in 1436, spending two years with the court before moving to Barcelona, where his brother Manuel Dau had rented a residence for him. His whereabouts in Flanders for five years, as well as his activity between 1438 and 1443 remain elusive. Dalmáu’s Virgin of the Councilors is one of a few works assigned to his hand. Five magistrates are introduced to the enthroned Madonna and Child by the virgin-martyr Eulalia and the Apostle Andrew, the patron saints of Barcelona. The governors kneel in front of four arched windows ornamented with tracery, and in this space angels sing who are reminiscent of the choir in the Ghent Altarpiece. Following the commission for the Virgin of the Councilors, the only other secure record of Lluis Dalmáu’s work is the 1448– 77 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 26–27. She cites the document in city accounts of 1424–25 for his work in the town hall, a payment to “Luberecht” for “twee bewerpen van eenre taeffele” (two designs for a picture) and the 1425/26 records in the city accounts for the gratuity to the “Kinderen te meester Ubrechts” (apprentices of Master Hubrecht). For information about Dalmáu, consult Judith Berg-Sobré, Behind the Altar Table. The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain, 1350–1500 (Colombia: University of Missouri Press, 1989), 213–16, who suggests Dalmáu spent time in Jan van Eyck’s studio about 1432– 34. Dalmáu remained in Barcelona the remainder of his life.

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50 center effigy from the Retable of St. Baudelius (Fig. 6.129) contracted for the parish church of Sant Baldiri at Sant Boi de Llobregat. For an artist who spent five years in Flanders, this painting of the second-century deaconmartyr of Orléans-Nîmes reveals how little he was affected by Northern style. While the face and hands of St. Baudelius are finely modeled and he stands gracefully on a foreshortened tiled floor, the gold-tooled background, combined with the relative flatness of the saint’s dalmatic, accords with the prevailing Catalan taste.78 The Virgin of the Councilors has been described as “large votive scene” of uncommon format and background, and proposed to be a “special case” illustrating Dalmáu’s desire to impress his patrons with his knowledge of foreign art.79 For example, he departed from the stipulations in his contract to provide a gold background and his angels are silhouetted against a blue sky like those featured in the Ghent Altarpiece. Additionally, he represents a panoramic landscape with a few churches behind them. However, not one of the angels exactly copies an Eyckian model, a replication which might be anticipated by an artist unfamiliar with Northern figure types. If the Virgin of the Councilors was based on Hubrechte’s painting for the Ghent Town Hall, then it could be an accurate duplicate of the lost painting. Like Dalmáu’s single votive scene, Hubrechte’s arrangement for the Ghent Schepenhuis would have consisted of two portrait groups flanking the Virgin and Child. Ghent had twenty-six magistrates: the thirteen Law aldermen of the Keure; and the thirteen Estate aldermen of Gedele.80 Hubrechte could have depicted three magistrates on each side of the Madonna and ten aldermen in each wing. 78 Berg-Sobré, Behind the Altar Table. The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain. 1300–1500, 213–14 and 216. The closest comparable to St. Baudelius in the North is the Eyckian folio of Christ Blessing from Hand K of the Turin-Milan Hours (Malibu: JP Getty Museum, assigned to a date circa 1440–1450. Holding a book inscribed Ego sum via veritus vita (John 14:6), the frontal figure of Christ stands on a tiled floor that is comparable in pattern to the receding floor upon which St. Baudelius stands. Perhaps the folio in the Getty dates earlier, ca. 1435, or Dalmáu had access to a lost modello by Jan van Eyck. 79 Berg-Sobré, Behind the Altar Table. The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain. 1300–1500, 213–14, 216. Also see Till-Holger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Jan van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, Catalogue No. 113, 265. The panel of St. Baudelius measures 255 x 161 cm. 80 David Nicholas, The van Arteveldes of Ghent. The Varieties of Vendetta and the Hero in History (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988), 3–5, provides a precise and clear explanation of the governance of Ghent with a diagram of the Great Council comprising: 1) Law

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The groups of men in Hubrechte’s centerpiece panel could have been introduced by Sts. Andrew and Catherine of Alexandria, Eulalia being an easy replacement by Dalmáu for a Catalan audience. With regard to magistrates in the wings, they might have been shown in the company of popular Ghenter saints, such as Stephen Martyr (a model for Dalmáu’s St.Baudilio) and Livinius, both of whom appear in the Ghent Adoration of Lamb in the context of benefactors of the city’s churches. The reverse side of the wing panels also would have been painted, conceivably with subjects appropriate to the theme of justice. Hubrechte submitted two designs for the consideration by the Ghent Council, so he must have provided plans for a rather large project. A drawing of Jael and Sisera (Fig. 6.130) in the Brunswick Kupferstichkabinett of the Herzog Anton-Ulrich Museum has been discussed as figural study by Hubrechte for the commission, and justifiably viewed as a pendant subject to a complimentary theme of Queen Tomyris.81 Attributed to Hannekin van Stoevere, Campin’s disciple whose father practiced in Ghent, a pen and ink sketch of the Vengeance Queen Tomyris (Fig. 6.131) displays a view of the town on its reverse side. An early sixteenth-century painting by a Ghenter master (176 cm square) replicates the finished painting (Fig. 6.132), and the work reveals a penchant for filigree decoration and ornamentation that might be expected by Hannekin van Stoevere, who trained as a goldsmith after leaving Campin’s workshop in 1419.82 The painting of the Queen of the Massagetes dipping the head of the aldermen (Keure) who also governed the parishes, Captains and Militia; 2) the “Members” (Poorters or landowners; small guilds; weavers; fullers) who were over the Deans and councils of individual guilds; 3) the Estate aldermen (Gedele). 81 For information and bibliography about the drawings, consult Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 191–95, 317–20; Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, 311–12; Stephan Kemperdick, Der Meister von Flémalle: Die Werkstatt Robert Campins und Rogier van der Weyden (Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 1997), 112–18. Julius Held, “Review of Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character,” Art Bulletin XXXVII (1955), 205–34; Elizabeth Dhanens, “Tussen de van Eyck’s en Hugo van der Goes,” Medelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België: Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLV (No. 1, 1984): 1–98, at 40 (View of Ghent). 82 A panel of Queen Tomyris was hung in the Episcopal Palace of Liège according to later inventories of 1587, 1621 and 1662 and another painting of the same theme was created in 1610 by Pieter Pieters for the city court of the municipality of Bruges, which departs from the Berlin work, most obviously in the figure of the queen, who more closely resembles the Virgin of the Ghent Altarpiece Deësis. The Berlin replica was taken to Spain by Archduchess Mary of Hungary. In 1564 the work was installed by King Philip II in the Pardo Palace. A painting of

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Persian King Cyrus into an urn of blood contains diverse lettering: Greek on the robes of the heroine and blade of the executioner; and Kuftic on the urn’s neck. Regarding the instrument of execution, the sword shows IYCTIXLA (Latin: Justice). Aside from evident compositional paragones, both Jael and Tomyris wear similar turbans and their hair is identically braided to fall over the ear. Also portrayed in exotic attire, the warriors are not far removed from the Calvary figures of the Poznan Crucifixion or Budapest Way to Calvary (Fig. 6.133) which has been placed in the Eyckian circle. The lost paintings which have their source in the accounts of Herodotus (I: 204– 215) and the Speculum Humanae Salvationis present a typological parallel to the Apocalyptic Virgin of the Last Judgment.83 The subjects of Jael and Tomyris, therefore, would have been appropriate selections for the exterior wing panels of a centerpiece replicated in Dalmáu’s Virgin of the Councilors. The Schepenhuis project as mirrored in the drawings and replicas is useful because the commission, in addition to the Nuremberg Sacra Conversazione and the Poznan Crucifixion, provides at least a foundation from which to consider what might have been the artistic input by Jan’s brother Hubrechte in the Ghent Altarpiece. Dated May 28, 1432, a document pertaining to the decoration of the Chapel of Notre Dame installed in 1428 at the abbey of Sint-Vaast (Arras) identifies the artist responsible for the devotional pictures as a “Maistre Jacques Daret” (Fig. 6.134–6.135). On July 16, 1435, Cardinal Niccolò Albergati visited the Chapel of Notre Dame to attend Mass and view Daret’s new altarpiece. He was accompanied by Thomas Parentucelli, the future Nicholas V (1447–1445), and Luis de Amaral, bishop of Viseu.84 Dom “Queen Tomyris with the Head of Cyrus” is recorded in the 1636 inventory of the Alcázar of Madrid in the audience room called the Hall of Mirrors. See Steven N. Orso, Philip IV and the Decoration of the Alcázar of Madrid (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 108 and Robert W. Berger, “Rubens’s ‘Queen Tomyris with the Head of Cyrus,’ ” Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston LXXVII (1979): 4–35; Kemperdick, Der Meister von Flémalle: Die Werkstatt Robert Campins und Rogier van der Weyden, 189, No. 112; Dhanens, “Tussen de van Eyck’s en Hugo van der Goes,” 31–52. 83 George Hulin de Loo, “Le tableau de “Tomyris et Cyrus” au musée de Berlin et dans l’ancien palais épiscopal de Gand,” Bulletin van des Geschied-en Oud-heidkundige Kring van Gent IX (1901): 222–34. 84 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 286 (Albergati’s itinerary) . Regarding the visit to Saint-Vaast, see Antoine de la Taverne [† 1448], Journal de la paix d’Arras faite en l’abbaye de Saint Vaast entre Charles VII et Philippe le Bon [1435], 14–16. The Visitation measures 22 ½ x 20 ½". The remaining panels of the altarpiece comprise: the Nativity (Madrid: Thyssen-

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Amaral was sent to Flanders by King Duarte, who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1433, and had been urged by his sister Isabel to support the proceedings. The four paintings of the “Infancy of Christ” at Sint-Vaast which were painted about 1433–35 are a benchmark to securely separate Daret’s style from both his mentor Campin and the young Rogier van der Weyden.85 The physiognomies in the Virgin and Child with Saints in a Closed Garden (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art: Fig. 6.136) are quite different from those in the Sint-Vaast panels, as exemplified by the Visitation, the subject of the set which provides the most landscape. The artist of the Hortus Conclusus is a mature master, with an independent style recognizable from both Campin and Daret. His hand also may be discerned in the Brussels Annunciation (Fig. 6.137), a variation upon Campin’s Merode Altarpiece (New York: Metropolitan Museum, Cloisters), begun about 1425, which replicates elegant physical traits, distinctive drapery folds with deep furrows, and a gallery with a checkered floor on the left side of the composition. Félix Thürlemann has identified the mature master as Willem van Tongeren, who trained with Campin but was active in Bruges after 1435.86 The National Gallery sacra conversazione shows four saints surrounding the Virgin Mary who is seated with the infant Christ on a bench before a patterned cloth of estate: the erudite Catherine of Alexandria with her sword, John the Baptist holding a lamb, Barbara with her tower, who offers a fruit to the infant Christ and is based upon one of the Marys in Campin’s Descent from the Cross (Liverpool Replica); and Anthony Abbot, who brings his attribute pig into the garden. St. Catherine of Alexandria, a martyr of royal lineage, similarly is seated on the threshold of the House of Nazareth, and her pink robes billow over her wheel emblem and onto the grass of the garden.87 Although some of the flowers replicate botanical studies by Campin, the setting is reminiscent of the meadowed terrace of the Eyckian Fons Vitae replicas (Fig. 6.138), and the company of music-playing angels Bornemisza Museum); the Presentation (Paris: Petit Palais); and the Adoration of the Magi (Berlin: Staatliche Museen). 85 Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, 321–22, Catalogue entry D8–11 (Visitation, Nativity, Adoration of the Kings, Circumcision). 86 Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 188–90, 305–7. 87 The composition with saints enjoying the ambiance of the Virgin Mary’s private garden has something in common with the anonymous panel of the “Frankfurt Paradise Garden.” See Lilli Fischel, “Über die künstlerische Herkunft des Frankfurter Paradiesgärtleins,” Beiträge für Georg Swarzenski zum 11. Januar 1951 (Berlin-Chicago: 1951): 85–95.

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who are cushioned comfortably on soft bedding of clover and wildflowers with their woolen robes spread out in angular folds with expansive troughs. The earliest provenance for the Washington painting is the 1831 private collection of Imbert de Mottelettes in Bruges88 and it seems relevant that Bruges was the same destination for Campin’s original Descent from the Cross. Despite questions of authorship, the Virgin and Child with Saints in a Closed Garden betrays an artist familiar with Eyckian sources in Ghent. Both the Madrid and Oberlin versions of the Fountain of Life present a deësis with the flanking figures of the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist enthroned on stone benches. This imagery is paralleled in the Douai Virgin and Child, also a replica of a lost painting purported by a master of the “Flémalle Group” (Fig. 6.139). Dated by its wood to about 1502–1508, the panel until the French Revolution hung in the Chapelle de Notre-Dame belonging to the Carthusian Abbey of Saint-Bertin in Saint-Omer. The work includes irises, flowers that prognosticate the sorrow of the Mater Dolorosa at Calvary and her Pietà at the Holy Sepulchre. For this reason, a viable antecedent for the Douai Virgin and Child can be found in a tomb mural of Bruges (Fig. 6.140) which depicts the Ara Coeli that legend relates was revealed by the Tiburtine Sibyl to Augustus. 89 The Madonna in the fresco 88 Mojmir S. Frinta, The Genius of Robert Campin (The Hague-Paris: Mouton, 1966), 120–21. See also Albert Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, D3, 318. Also consult Charles Sterling, “Observations on Petrus Christus,” Art Bulletin LIII (1971), at 5 note 24; Colin Eisler, Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation – European Schools excluding Italian (Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), 46–50, John Oliver Hand, and Martha Wolf, Early Netherlandish Painting [The Collection of the National Gallery Systematic Catalogue](Cambridge-Washington, DC: Cambridge University Press-National Gallery of Art, 1986), 35–40. 89 Jean Genoix’s Tomb Relief for Jehan du Bois and his Wife Catherine Bernard in the Tournai Church of Notre-Dame, dated circa 1400, also shows a stone bench. Campin incorporates an Ara Coeli vision in his Virgin in Glory with St. Peter, St. Augustine and the Augustinian Pierre Ameil (Aix-en-Provence: Musée Granet), ca. 1435. However, Mary in this case is shown seated on a draped bench with a backboard, so the effect of an actual altarsarcaphagus is not as apparent. Campin’s Virgin and Child in Glory was created about 1435 for Pierre Asalbit († 1441) to honor his deceased Augustinian uncle, Pierre Ameil († 1401). Then work has a provenance from the Augustinian monastery of Limoux (Aude). See Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, Catalogue No. 17, 304–5. Thürlmann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 196–201, attributes the “Memorial of Pierre Amiel,” to the Pseudo Vrancke van der Stockt. In Augustinian habit Pierre Ameil kneels between his eponymous patron, Peter the Apostle, and St. Augustine as he experiences a vision of the Virgin and Child seated on a bench, the ara coeli. Similar imagery is recalled by Rogier van der Weyden in his Tiburtine Sibyl revealing to Emperor Augustus a Vision of

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is seated upon an altar with a pair of candlesticks; she holds a fleur-de-lys while her son extends his arm with a rose and a pomegranate. Nothing precludes regarding the Marian “altar-bench-sepulchre” as an invention emanating from the Van Eyck circle. Sitting solidly on a chair with curved sides that resembles a low bench, the Madonna of the Nuremberg drawing equally serves as a metaphorical “altar” for Christ who rests on her lap, and she presides as priest over the mystical marriage between St. Catherine and her son, the Apocalyptic Bridegroom and Lamb of God.90 Two additional replicas of the Douai Madonna are in Spain, one in the private collection of Manuel La Rosa in Madrid, and the other a triptych with wing panels of Saints Catherine and Barbara in Huesca (Figs. 6.141–6.142).91 A rational explanation for the Spanish compositions is that they were made in Aragon after a lost composition by Lluis Dalmáu, who certainly admired the art of Ghent, as proven by his Virgin of the Councilors. The Huesca Madonna includes four angels, two bearing a crown of heavenly coronation and two playing the bas instruments of the lute and viol as they chant hymns of a divine liturgy. Paired musicians of the celestial choir appear with some frequency in devotional paintings by Hans Memling of Bruges. They embellish the Virgin and Child in the Apse, a galactotrophousa or suckling Child composition of Byzantium that was circulated early in Eastern Europe. Of the multiple versions of the theme, the earliest in Zagreb is inscribed with the date 1420, probably the year of the original work generally regarded as an invention of Robert Campin. The best replica in the Metropolitan Museum has been assigned to circa 1480, and has a

the Virgin and Child (which has a ceremonial bedchamber as its setting). For information about the left wing panel of the Bladelin Altarpiece of 1445–48 (Berlin: Staatliche Museen de Berlin, Preussischer Kulturbesitz), see Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden, Catalogue No. 15, 242–48. De Vos also discusses the centerpiece Nativity with Pierre Bladelin and right wing of The Christ Child appearing to the Wise Men as the “Oriens Sol” of Bethlehem. Campin alludes to the legendary apparition of the Tiburtine Sibyl in his “Memorial” painting which includes a “Holy Augustus” and “wise” man (Latin Doctor). See Philippe Verdier, “A Medallion of the ‘Ara Coeli; and the Netherlandish Enamels of the Fifteenth Century,” The Journal of the Walters Art Gallery XXIV (1961): 8–37). 90 Barbara G. Lane, The Altar and the Altarpiece: Sacramental Themes in Early Netherlandish Painting (New York: Harper and Row, 1984). 91 Châtelet, Robert Campin, Le Maître de Flémalle, 310, Catalogue Entries: No. C6a (Donai Panel, Musée de la Chartreuse: 83 x 90 cm); No. C6c (Huesca Triptych) and No. C6b (Immaculate Virgin and Child in the Manuel La Rose Collection, Madrid, 16th Century).

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provenance in Salamanca, Spain.92 (Fig. 6.143). Possibly the composition with its overly large figures in an architectural setting might be given to the Hannekin van Stoevere. The Ghenter copy of the Revenge of Queen Tomyris , if exact to the original in dimensions, is characterized by the same dichotomy of proportion as the heroic matriarch and her companions practically obscure the palace chamber that is defined by a row of columns with capitals carved to show battle subjects and by windows decorated with warriors. Though the decoration is not as intricate as the Revenge of Queen Tomyris, the angel with a harp wears a priestly cope of green that is piped in gold and edged in seed pearls. A gold morse that fastens the vestment shows small identifiable figures of the Virgin and Child with an angel, betraying the hand of a master familiar with works crafted in precious metals. The popular Virgin and Child in the Apse presents an intriguing pictorial interpretation of the Eucharistic consecration, because the white robed Madonna and her two angelic attendants respectively substitute for the monstrance and candlesticks of the sacrificial altar. The same physical type of Virgin with golden hair cascading in parallel waves to the sides of her oval face is found in yet another compositional variant of the proposed “Eyckian stone bench.” The Madonna of Humility before a Grassy Bench in Berlin, circa 1420–142593 (Figs. 6.144–6.145), and a more detailed replica of the same theme in the J.P. Getty Museum, circa 1470–1480,94 are unusual in that the Virgin is given a golden halo in lieu of a crown. The archaic nimbus was still immensely popular in fifteenth-century Spain and Portugal, so possibly the haloes were painted at the request of foreign clients by an artist whose training was that of a goldsmith like Hannekin van Stoevere. The town of Bruges, the trading center of the Netherlands until supplanted by Antwerp, seems to be depicted in the distant background of the J.P. Getty, an oak panel having a provenance in Brussels. Seated on the ground between closed and open books that signify the alpha of the Old Law and the omega of the New, the Maryan W. Ainsworth and Keith Christiansen (eds.), From Van Eyck to Brueghel. Early Netherlandish Painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1998), 220. 93 Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 313, and citations. The under drawing differs from the final painting, which Kempedick, Der Meister von Flémalle: Die Werkstatt Robert Campins und Rogier van der Weyden, 74–76, believes formed a diptych and was by the same master who created the Seilern Triptych. 94 Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 333 and bibliography. 92

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Virgin is portrayed before an expansive picturesque landscape redolent of the meadow surrounding the Lamb of God in the Ghent Altarpiece. Her scarlet cloak additionally is clasped in a manner similar to that of the blue velvet mantle worn by the deësis Virgin of the Ghent Altarpiece. Jan van Eyck’s brother Hubrechte created several paintings for Ghent’s Sint-Baafsabdij and the nearby parish church of Helig-Kerstkerk, both of which were destroyed in 1540–1545 by Emperor Charles V (1500: r. 1519–1555). The Hapsburg monarch was not an iconoclast, but a staunch defender of Roman Catholicism, and though the two Ghenter institutions were razed to build an imposing fortress, the art within their chapels would have been transferred to other locations. Hubrechte’s altarpieces, however, did not survive the later sixteenth-century devastation of key monuments in Ghent by the Dutch reformers. According to the March 9, 1426 will of Robrecht Poortier and Avezoete, Hubrecht was completing work for their “Chapel of Our Lady” within the parish church of Helig-Kerstkerk near the Ghent Sint-Baafs Abdij. Poortier’s will stipulates that an altar was to be erected, upon which would be placed “an image of St. Anthony, which is now in the hands of Master Hubrechte the painter, together with several other works intended for the same altar.”95 Though the term beelde (image) may refer to a painting as well as a statue, this project does insinuate that Hubrecht was a multi-faceted artist, capable of creating small devotional pictures, but equally adept in assembling and painting a polyptych of large dimensions. What work Master Hubrechte van Eyck completed in the VijdBorluut Chapel of Sint-Jans before his death on September 18, 1426 will continue to be an unresolved issue. Scientific analysis of the Ghent Altarpiece reveals some sections were reworked, but even infra-red photographs do not provide information to prove Hubrecht might have done more than complete preliminary sketches and possibly the frame for the altarpiece. Jodocus Vijd was away from Ghent as a member of Philip the Good’s diplomatic delegation to Holland and Zeeland from September 1425 until March of 1426. Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 28 and Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de SintBaafskathedral te Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Osstvlaanderen VI, 87–88, provides the translation and original wording: Thelde van sente Anthonise welc beelde nu ter tijt rust onder meester Hubrechte den schildere met meer ander weercx dienende ten selven altare.The document referring to the commission is in the Ghent City Archives, MS. Register van Staten, 1425–1426, f. 63, published by Van der Haeghen, “Autour des van Eyck, Cartulaire,” 31. See also Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 44–45, regarding Hubert’s entombment in Sint-Baafskerk. 95

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Elisabeth Dhanens has remarked about that the “learned character” of the Ghent Altarpiece, especially the interior painting of the Adoration of the Lamb (Fig. 6.146), and she has pondered if Hubrecht’s title of magister might have stood for “Master of Arts” and signified his position as a member of a clerical order rather than a guild.96 Jan van Eyck’s corpus of paintings assures that the Ghent Altarpiece was not an aberration in investigating arcane mysteries of the faith. All pictures given to his hand manifest a “learned” approach to sacred subjects, revealing an artist strongly familiar with devotional literature and ecclesiastical doctrine. Had Hubrecht been an elite member of the clergy, his ecclesiastical position would explain why he was not documented as belonging to the guild of Ghent, his unmarried status at the time of his death, and his lack of wealth despite his reputation as an “honored” painter. A complex iconographical scheme bonds the individual panels of the Ghent Altarpiece like super glue, and if Jan van Eyck was the “second” master to complete the work, Hubrecht at least planned the basic components of the polyptych. Moreover, had Hubrecht professed religious vows, it stands to reason that Jan sprang from a family familiar with hagiographic sources. He probably only needed to consult infrequently with a theological advisor. Among the three parish priests of Sint-Jans, Master Johannes van Impe (Fig. 6.147), documented at the church as early as 1421, was an attending scholar at the University of Louvain in 1432. Under his aegis a foundation of a Hieronymite Chapter was established at Sint-Jans in 1429 with a scriptorium and school.97 Buried in a crypt of Sint-Jans beneath the high altar in 1440, the learned priest is stated to have established a House modeled upon foundations of the “Brethren of the Common Life” at Deventer and Zwolle. Located near Sint-Janskerk, this institution was designed for priests to live in imitation of the Apostles. Van Impe is believed to have served as a theological advisor in the painting of the Ghent Altarpiece, the composition of which in its most basic iconographic interpretation, centers upon the celebration of Mass in the setting of a New Jerusalem. A second priest, Master Arnoldus Roebosch was enrolled at the University of Louvain about 1427. He served Sint-Jans from 1421 until his death in 1431.98

Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 24–25. Elisabeth Dhanens, “Le Scriptorium des Hiéronymites a Gand,” Scriptorium XXIII (1969): 361–79; Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 20–21. Goodgal, The Iconography of the Ghent Altarpiece, 103–21 suggests Oliver de Langhe served as a theological advisor. 98 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 21. 96 97

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Jan van Eyck depicts two identifiable patron saints of Ghent in his central panel of the “Adoration of the Lamb” (Fig. 6.148). The Early Christian deacon Stephen holds rocks of his martyrdom in the folds of his robes. Behind him is Livinius (Lebuinus), a mid-seventh-century Irish preacher ordained by St. Augustine of Canterbury, who was martyred near Alost in Brabant. The bishop is depicted holding a crosier and his tongue in the pincers which symbolize his torture. Several generic figures stand behind the row of holy popes, deacons and bishops, and their attire suggests they might be important secular patrons of the Church. Behind St. Livinius and his mentor, St. Augustine of Canterbury, are two men wearing widebrimmed fur hats whose physiognomies are sufficiently individualized to suggest they might provide portraits. Though their identify must remain enigmatic, perhaps they are Vijd-Borluut relations. Though members of Elisabeth Borluut’s family were abbots at Sint-Baafs Abbey, her greatgrandfather, Gerelmus Borluut had founded Ghent’s church of St. Stephen and the monastery of the Augustinian Eremites after returning from the University of Paris.99 Besides the chantry of Sint-Jans, Jodocus Vijd in 1414 founded a Trinitarian hospice at Beveran Waas, where his father Nikolaas Vijd had been appointed castellan in 1355. Nikolaas’ second son, Christoffel, entered the military and became a knight and captain of the Land of van Waas. With his wife Amelberga van der Elst, Nikolass also had two daughters: Mabelie, who married the Chancellor of Brabant, Godfried Raes; and Elisabeth, whose husband was the Lord of Ten Walle in Beveren Waas, Antoon Triest. Before his death in 1412, two years before Jan’s founding of the Trinitarian hospice, Jodocus’ father had lent his financial support to the Carthusians of Rooigem.100 Johannes van Impe and Arnoldus Roebosch also might be considered plausible candidates for the two portraits behind Saints Stephen, Augustine of Canterbury and Livinius. Their lengthy tenure at Sint-Jans coincided with the installation and decoration of the Vijd-Borluut chapel. Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 40. Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 37–38 and 140 note 19. Also consult Elisabeth Dhanens, “Bijdrage betreffende het Lam-Godsretabel te Gent,” Festschrift für Wolfgang Krönig, Aachener Kunstblätter XLI (1971): 100–101; P. de Maesschalck, “Josse Vydt, le donateur de l’Agneau Mystique et quelques membres de sa famille,” Annalen van den Oudheidkundigen Kring van het Land van Waas (1919–1920): 13–36; Jan van. Rompaey, Het grafelijk baljuwsambt in Vlaanderen tijdens de Boergondische periode (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1967), 425–26. 99

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However, as priest-scholars in residence, they would not have been stationed behind the ecclesiastics grouped beside the Twelve Apostles. Such a place of honor more justifiably would have been reserved for prominent benefactors of religious institutions, like the Ghenters Gerelmus Borluut and Nikolaas Vijd. The Exterior Panels of the Ghent Altarpiece A “Tabernacle of God” with Man If Hubrecht van Eyck only completed designs for the Ghent Altarpiece project and a framework for the panels, that initial work certainly was acknowledged by his brother in the laudatory quatrain inscription. As for the contribution of Jan van Eyck, he managed to stamp his artistic persona on the completed result. His singular brand of pictorial realism is the reason the polyptych astounded later artists who studied the Ghent Altarpiece and continues to fascinate visitors to Ghent. Turning to the exterior panels of the altarpiece for Sint-Janskerk (Fig. 6.149), Jodocus Vijd and his wife Elizabeth Borluut kneel before two statues in grisaille and within stone niches articulated by Gothic trefoils. Above the level of the couple, radiographs of the four panels comprising the “Annunciation” subject bear traces of a similar trefoil framework101 (Fig. 6.150). By his decision to eliminate the upper trellis in the Annunciation and replacing it with a wooden plank ceiling, Jan presented a viable domestic interior rather than a shrine-like stone setting in the tradition of Late Gothic reliefs, for example, the “Annunciation” carved for a tomb monument in Évora (Fig. 6.151). The niche statues of Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist (Figs. 6.152–6.155) are reminiscent of Lenten cloths and panels that typically displayed sacred figures in grisaille. Scientific analysis of the Evangelist, however, indicates he originally had an older visage. Whether the alteration of the apostle’s features indicates the under drawing was completed by Hubrecht van Eyck is impossible to determine, but a young St. John was selected for the deësis of the Fons Vitae replicas. The Ghent’s exterior “Statues” might have their source in devotional icons created for the court of Burgundy by Claus Sluter or his nephew Claus de Werve. The images have a certain affinity with the late fifteenth-century carvings of Antoine le J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “A Scientific Re-examination of the Ghent Altarpiece,” Oud Holland IXCIII (1979): 141–214. 101

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Moiturier, a master who sprang from the Dijon circle of sculptors employed at the Chartreuse de Champmol. Gary Radke has addressed John the Baptist’s singular status as Baptismatis initium and herald of justice (praeco judicis), as well as pseudo-Bernard’s declaration that he was a “revealer and mediator” of the Holy Trinity.102 Amplifying upon John the Baptist’s role as subdeacon of an “eternal Mass,” Radke refers to the Legenda Aurea. According to Jacobus da Voragine, Christ’s cousin “is called an angel because he exercised the office of all the angels.” Among his nine privileges was the announcement of Christ’s descent to Limbo. If John the Baptist is the “messenger” who proclaims the Messianic first coming, John the Evangelist’s Apocalyptic Book of Revelations foretells the second coming, the Last Judgment and the wonders of an Eternal Jerusalem. The Ghent Annunciation accents the “house” of the Virgin Mother as the model for all households, patrician and plebian alike. Jan designates it as the place of ceremonial pronouncement and the fulfillment of Messianic prophecy.103 Above the expansive chamber of the Gabriel’s visitation Jan van Eyck paid especial tribute to Lusitania in his Sibyls (Fig.6.156). The Erythraean Sibyl has been identified as a metaphorical portrait of Princess Isabel of Portugal.104 The Duchess of Burgundy alone with the prophet Micah (Fig. 6.157) is privileged to witness the Virgin’s response to Gabriel inscribed upside down so as to be visible from heaven: ECCE ANCILLA DNI (BEHOLD THE HANDMAIDEN OF THE LORD, Luke 1:38). The verse taken from Micah (5:2): FROM YOU SHALL ISSUE HE WHO SHALL BE Gary M. Radke, “A Note on the Iconographical Significance of St. John the Baptist in the Ghent Altarpiece,” Marsyas XVIII (1975/1976): 1–6. 103 Carla Gottlieb, “En ipse stat post parietem nostrum: The Symbolism of the Ghent Annunciation,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique XIX (1970): 75–100. The book on the Virgin Mary’s prie dieu is open to a passage from II Chronicles 2:6, which refers to Solomon’s building a Temple: “But who is able to build him a house, since heaven, even highest heaven, cannot contain him? Who am I to build a house for him, except as a place to make offerings before him?” See The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), The Old Testament, 389. 104 César Pemán y Pemartin, Juan van Eyck y España (Cadiz: Museo Provincial de Bellas Artes de Cadiz, 1969), 52–56, was first to publish the resemblance between the Cumaean Sibyl and Isabel of Portugal. However, Charles Sterling in a seminar on Renaissance Spain at New York University in 1970 juxtaposed the two images so presumably he had presented his comparison on earlier occasions. See Sterling, “Observations on Petrus Christus,” Art Bulletin 53 (1971), 1–26, at 18; and “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” La Revue des Arts 33 (1976): 7–82, at 33. 102

370 RULER IN ISRAEL) accents the site of the Nativity, Bethlehem, the natal town of King David. The Cumaean Sibyl, who is most associated with Christ’s Nativity, has been proposed in an earlier chapter to be a portrait of Philippa of Lancaster. She is paired with the prophet Zacharias, whose Latin scroll has been read as: EXULTA ... REJOICE GREATLY, DAUGHTER OF SION … BEHOLD THY KING COMETH UNTO THEE.105 The passage from Zachariah (9:9) also centers upon Christ’s royal lineage as it foretells his triumphant adventus into Jerusalem, the seat of Israel established by David. The oldest sibyl, the Erythraean, is mentioned in the Dies Irae compiled in the thirteenth century with reference to David as forecaster of the Last Judgment and Armageddon: Teste David cum Sibylla.106 Because of her Davidic association, the Erythraean Sibyl is probably the crowned female seer among the Hebrew prophets bearing scrolls in the “Tree of Jesse” miniature of the Parisian Ingeburghe Psalter of circa 1195–1210 (Chantilly: Musée Condé, MS. 1695 ).107 By the fifteenth century the Erythraean Sibyl

105 G. van den Gheyn [Canon], “Les inscriptions sur le polyptique des van Eyck,” Société d’histoire et d’archéologie de Gant Bulletin 32 (1924): 65–7, who also addresses the theme of the Messiah’s royal lineage in Le Retable de l’Agneau Mystique des Frères Van Eyck (Ghent: 1921). Also see G. van den Gheyn, ”L’Interprétation du Retable de Saint-Bavon à Gand,” Handelingen der Maatschappij van Geschiedenis Oudheidkunde te Gent XVI (1920): 1–30; idem., “Les tribulations de l’Agneau Mystique,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art XV (1945): 25–46. On the sibyls and prophets see Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” 237–42, who cites the research of Canon van den Gheyn (249 notes 5 and 6) and several Sibylline sources. She concurs with J. de Baets in the identification of the right sibyl as the Erythraean and the left counterpart as the Cumaean. Baets has discussed the texts held by the sibyls and remarked that they do not relate to the names of the seers appearing on the frame. See J. de Baets, O.P., “De gewijde teksten van ‘Het Lam Gods’: Kritisch onderzocht,” Koninklijke Vlaamsche Academie voor Taal en Letterkunde, Verslagen en Mededelingen (1961): 531–614), especially 543–58; and Dana Goodgal, “The Central Inscription in the ‘Ghent Altarpiece,’” Le Dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque IV, 1981, ed. Roger van Schoute and D. Hollanders-Favart (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1982): 74–86. Setting aside arguments concerning the frame, I have simply maintained St. Augustine’s view that the Erythraean Sibyl was the oldest of all the ancient sibyls. As such, when identifying Van Eyck’s two sibyls as veristic portraits of Isabel of Portugal and her mother Philippa, the latter logically would have been depicted as the Erythraean. 106 Gaston Duchet-Suchaux and Michel Pastoureau, The Bible and the Saints (Paris-New York: Flammarion, 1994), 310. 107 Gertrud Schiller, Ikonographie der christlichen Kunst, 3 vols. (Gűtersloh: 1968). Consult the edition of Iconography of Christian Art, translated by Janet Seligman, 5 vols. (Greenwich, CN: 1971), I, 19 and Fig. 33.

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was associated with the Annunciation and the Virgin Mary’s infusion by the Holy Spirit. The inscription of the banderole held by Van Eyck’s Erythraean Sibyl (Duchess Isabel) derives from the Greek Oracula Sibyllina and appears in Augustine’s Civitate Dei (Book 18: 23). It reads: REX A[LTISSIMUS] ADVE[N]IET P[ER] SEC[U]LA FUTUR[US SCI[LICET] I[N] CARN[E] (The most high king will come, certainly in the flesh, for future generations). The scroll held by the Cumaean Sibyl (Queen Philippa of Lancaster), derives from Virgil’s Aeneid (Book 6), which recounts Apollo breathing upon her: NIL MORTALE SONA [N]S + AFFLATA ES NUMINE CELSO (Nothing speaking as a human, you are inspired from on high).108 With respect to Queen Philippa’s allegorical depiction, the mother of Duchess Isabel had a familial association with the town governed by Philip the Good since 1419 as she was the daughter of John of Gaunt and Blanche of Lancaster. John of Gaunt played a pivotal role in the Hundred Years War, and born in Ghent’s Abbey of St. Baaf, he probably was baptized in the parish church of Sint-Jans. John the Baptist likely was his patron saint. The Essene prophet was appropriately placed below the Cumaean Sibyl, as the Greek word for baptism means illumination. John the Baptist may have been the last of the desert dwellers to prognosticate the advent of a Messiah but he also was portrayed in the deësis of the Ghent Altarpiece as an Apocalyptic mediator to the left of the resurrected Christ, the “dayspring on high ” (Luke 1:78). John the Evangelist stands beneath Duchess Isabel. The Oracula Sibyllina begins with a description of the birth of the Logos and appearance of a star shining in the midst of day.109 These passages repeat the Evangelist’s Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue of The Aeneid was interpreted by Emperor Constantine in his Oratio ad Sanctorum Coetum as a Messianic prophecy. See Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus , Series Graeca, Lutetiae Parisiorum, 161 vols. (Paris: 1857–1866), VIII: 456; Joseph Bickersteth Mayor, William Warde Fowler, R.S. Conway, Virgil’s Messianic Eclogue. Its meaning, occasion, & sources, three studies with a text of the Eclogue and a verse translation by R. S. Conway (London: J. Murray, 1907); Harold Mattingly, “Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue,”Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes X (1947): 14–19. 109 The inscriptions are transcribed by J. de Baets, “De gewijde teksten van ‘Het Lam Gods’: Kritisch onderzocht,” and translated by Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” who discusses the concept of “adventus” in the Ghent Altarpiece. Also consult Edgar Hennecke, New Testament Apocrypha, 2 vols. , ed. Wilhelm Schneemelcher, translated by Angus John Brockhurst Higgins and others and edited by Robert McLachlan Wilson (Philadelphia: The Westminister Press, 1964), II, 703–9 (Christian Sibyllines) and 709–45 (Oracula Sibyllina); Ernst Kantorowicz, “The ‘King’s Advent’ – and the enigmatic panels on the doors of Santa Sabina,” Art Bulletin XXVI (1944): 207–31; idem., “Deus per naturam, Deus per gratiam – a Note on Medieval 108

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metaphorical imagery describing final revelations on the Island of Patmos. Witness to the gesta Dei, the apostle who was the name saint of Isabel’s father, significantly substitutes for the Baptist in the deësis of Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life, a lost work inspired by St. Augustine’s City of God. In the context of Augustinian ideology concerning the Incarnation of the Logos, the “light onto the Gentiles,” Van Eyck’s Sibyls are iconographically relevant to the birth of Isabel’s second son, Josse, who likely was baptized on May 6, 1432 in the Ghent church of Sint-Jans.110 According to the red chronogram of the quatrain on the outside of the Ghent Altarpiece’s lower frame, Jan van Eyck’s masterwork was dedicated on the same day. Officiating at the baptism of Infanta Isabel’s son was Cardinal Henry Beaufort († 1449) (Fig. 6.158). He was the second-born son of John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford, († 1403), the brother of John Beaufort, Earl of Somerset, and the half-brother of King Henry VI. Between 1404 and 1447 Henry was the Archbishop of Winchester, the former headquarters of Anglo-Saxon kings until the battle of Hastings.111 At this historical site in Wessex, William the Conqueror had built a castle. Erected in 1235, the present “Great Hall” replaced a former gallery, and housed within its walls is one of England’s greatest treasures, the legendary Round Table of King Arthur (Fig. 6.159). Carved in the thirteenth-century, it perhaps was modeled after a deteriorated original. The earliest church dates to 648, and the Benedictine monastic center (1079) with its Norman priory of St. Swithun’s and Wolvesey Castle (1110), the bishop’s residence, was famous for its library and important relics. St. Josse (Fig. 6.160) was a favorite saint of medieval England as well as Flanders, and some of his relics were enshrined at Winchester. St. Josse († 668, fd December 13) had served as an interim king of Brittany after the abdication of his brother Judicäel. Thereafter, he made a pilgrimage to Rome and returned to become a hermit near Saint-JossePolitical Theology,” Harvard Theological Review XLV (1952): 253–77; idem., The King’s Two Bodies – A Study in Mediaeval Political Theology (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957). 110 For the coincidence of Josse’s baptism and the dedication of the Ghent Altarpiece, see Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 162–63 and notes 3–5, and Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 48 (baptism of Josse) and 26–31 (quatrain); idem, “La Visite Organisée du Retable de Gand, XVe–XVIIIe siècles,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 89 (1977): 153–54. Also consult: Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, duc de Bourgogne (1419–1467) et de Charles, conte de Charolais (1433–1467), 100; Amaury de la Grange, “Itinéraire d’Isabelle de Portugal,” Annales du comité flamand de France, LXII (1938), 13ff. 111 He was elevated to the office of cardinal by Pope Martin V (1417–1431). See Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 48 and 141 note 26.

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sur-Mer (Montreuil-sur-Mer). The saint’s tomb chapel is near Étaples, and it was visited and patronized by both Philip the Good and Isabel following the death of their son.112 The site of Josse’s birth appears to have been determined by Philip the Good to secure the loyalty of the Ghenters. When his son was born and baptized, the Duke of Burgundy was in Dijon, and he did not arrive to Ghent until May 28.113 Isabel, however, had resided at Hof ten Walle in 1432 between late January and July 8, the date of her return to the ducal residence in Brussels. During that time she would have stamped documents with her seal as regent of the Northern territories and met frequently with Ghent’s mayor. Vijd must have delighted in the naming of the newborn son of the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy, as Josse is a variation of Jodocus. Though it is doubtful that the child actually was named after the burgomaster, he would have planned the public unveiling of Van Eyck’s altarpiece in his chapel as a concurrent event with the infant’s baptism. As the primary court artist of Duke Philip, Van Eyck assuredly would have consulted with Duchess Isabel about aspects of the retable before and after her arrival to Ghent. Therefore, she, with the approbation of the municipal administrator Vijd, must have requested that her child’s Burgundian, English and Portuguese heritage be magnified in the altarpiece. On May 1 of 1432, the same week of Josse’s baptism, the Burgundian court had commemorated the feast of the Apostle Philip, name saint of the Duke of Burgundy and Isabel’s mother, Philippa of Lancaster. King João of Portugal’s name saint was the Apostle John, whose secondary feast, “John the Evangelist before the Porta Latina in Rome,” coincided with the May 6 baptismal day selected for Josse. Pious legend relates that John was brought to Rome by Emperor Domitian, who condemned him to be plunged into a cauldron of boiling oil at the Latin Portal. By a striking miracle, the apostle escaped this torment, emerging from the water more vigorous than before, and a sanctuary later was erected on the site. Van Eyck’s John the Evangelist is not shown before the Porta Latina, as might be expected. Instead he stands in a niche holding a chalice with a snake, an image which conjures another 112 Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” 252 note 28, cites Georges Doutrepont, La littérature française à la cour des Ducs de Bourgogne – Philippe le Hardi – Jean sans Peur – Philippe le Bon – Charles le Témaire (Paris, H. Champion, 1909), 223, who mentions a gold statuette of the deceased Josse sent to the shrine near Etaples. 113 Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, 100.

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“martyrdom,” which the apostle survived. As a test of faith, the apostle drank poison given to him by a priest in Diana’s Temple at Ephesus. Unaffected by the brew, John restored two victims to life. The story which ironically relates to a pagan goddess of fertility, fulfills a prognostication in the Gospel of St. Matthew (20:20–23). After forecasting his death and resurrection, Christ had promised James and John that they would drink the chalice of his passion in order to participate in his triumph. As recounted by Matthew: ... the mother of the two sons of Zebedee came to him with her sons, and kneeling before him, she asked a favor of him...“Declare that these two sons of mine will sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.” But Jesus answered, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.” He said to them, “You will indeed drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left, this is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” 114 Like John the Evangelist, Josse had an elder brother. As mentioned, Antoine was born on December 30, 1430 at the ducal residence in Brussels, where Isabel had resided since October. This beloved child lived a mere thirteen months, dying in the major city of Brabant on February 5, 1432. Despite the proximity of Antoine’s birth to the traditional feast day of St. John the Evangelist (December 27), Duchess Isabel had named her firstborn after Anthony of Padua (1195–1231: fd June 13), a Portuguese Augustinian canon who had trained in Coimbra at the Monastery of Santa Cruz prior to professing the vows of a Franciscan monk.115 Isabel also may have selected the name of her second son. “Josse” has a homophonic resonance with both the Portuguese “José” and the biblical “Jesse.” From St. Joseph, whose attribute like Anthony’s was the Annunciate Virgin’s lily of chastity, Christ traced his paternal ancestry to the tree of Jesse, father of King David. From his matriarchal line, however, he descended from the House of Levi, and a lineage of high priests. The panel closest to the Archangel Gabriel (Fig. 6.161) shows a bipartite window ledge which is open to a vista of the outside world. The dividing

The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), The New Testament, 22. 114

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column, even in miniature, provides a speaking reference to Roman flagellation and mocking of Christ as “King of the Jews.” By contrast, the second panel closest to Mary has been identified as an “ecclesiastical piscina or niche” which contains the basin and towel used by priests for the ritual washing of hands in the Mass. In view of Gabriel’s salutation within the Levi House of priestly service, the sacerdotal objects indeed function as emblems of ritual purification.116 During the Mass, a commemorative re-enactment of the Last Supper and Calvary, a washing ceremony occurs before the Eucharistic consecration of the bread and wine, so that in the words of St. Augustine, “The water that flows over the tips of our fingers washes away the last traces of our impurities.” 117 The Virgin Mary wears white linen robes in Van Eyck’s Ghent “Annunciation,” and though the pristine garments signify her purity, they also have a priestly association. According to Josephus, the vestments of the high priest of Jerusalem had cosmic significance, his tunic representing heaven and earth, and his upper garments the four elements. Only once annually, however, did the high priest deviate from his colorful raiment to enter the House of Yahweh on Mount Zion. On the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), he would change into white linen garments, the attire of angels, the mediators between mankind and the godhead. Following rites of water purification, he would pass through the heikhal (central hall) adorned with Edenic flora and fauna to enter the devir, the Holy of Holies, where the invisible deity dwelt, “enthroned upon the cherubim” with the Ark of the Covenant as his “footstool.” (Psalm 99: 1–5). Jan van Eyck’s Annunciation of 1434–36 (Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art) has a provenance Vander Linden, Itinéraires de Philippe le Bon, 87. Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” 253 note 42, states Antoine presumably was baptized on January 17, the feast day of the Portuguese St. Anthony of Padua. 116 Snyder, Northern Renaissance Art, 93. J. Rivière, “La nature morte des Pays-Bas. Du mythe à la réalité,” Bulletin de la Société des Amis du Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes (Special Issue: La nature morte), V (1987): 26–41, at 27–29 (Ghent Altarpiece). Also see Penny Howell Jolly, “Jan van Eyck’s Italian Pilgrimage. A Miraculous Florentine ‘Annunciation’ and the Ghent Altarpiece,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte III (1998): 369–94. 117 Josef Andreas Jungmann, The Mass of the Roman Rite: Its Origins and Development, translated by Francis A. Brunner, abridged version with revisions by Charles K. Riepe (New York: Benziger Bros 1959); idem., Missarum sollemnia; eine genetische Erklärung der römischen Messe, 2 vols. (Vienna: Herder, 1952); John Bossy, “The Mass as a Social Institution, 1200– 1700,” Past and Present C (1983): 29–61. 115

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from Dijon (Figs. 6.162), the capital of Burgundy, and possibly the ducal church of Notre Dame linked with Philip the Good’s Order of the Golden Fleece.118 As a domestic appointment, the footstool in the setting of a Christian temple insinuates the notion of the church as God’s dwelling place. Mary’s expansis manibus gesture is sacerdotal. Adopting a similar pose, a priest officiating at the ritual of the Mass recites the penitential Psalm 26: 6–12 after the sacramental of hands-cleansing and in anticipation of the Eucharistic consecration: I wash my hands in innocence, and go around your altar, O Lord, singing aloud a song of thanksgiving, and telling all your wondrous deeds, O Lord, I love the house in which you dwell, and the place where your glory abides.119 See Ward, “Hidden Symbolism in Jan van Eyck’s Annunciations,” op. cit; Thomas W. Lyman, “Architectural Portraiture and Jan van Eyck’s Washington Annunciation,” Gesta XX (1981): 263–76; Carol J. Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 40–59; Geneviève van Bever, “Van Eyck et le drame de la fin du Moyen-Âge,” Apollo: Chronique des Beaux-Arts V (Brussels: 1941): 18–20 (Missa Aurea celebrated on Ember Wednesday in Advent as a source for Van Eyck). Max J. Friedländer, Die Altniederländische Malerai Malerei [1924–1937, 14 vols., Berlin: Paul Cassirer, I–XI–Leiden: A.W. Sijthoff, XII–XIV], I (Leiden: 1934), 104, first suggested Philip the Good was the patron who acquired the Washington Annunciation. Carra Ferguson O’Meara, “Isabelle of Portugal as the Virgin in Jan van Eyck’s Washington Annunciation,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts, vol. 6, XCVII (1981): 99–103, suggests the work was commissioned to commemorate the birth of Charles the Bold in Dijon. This notion of marking the birth and baptism of the Count of Charolais is very feasible. While queens and princesses of the Iberian Peninsula were portrayed as female saints and virgin martyrs, there is no precedent for their representation as the Virgin Mary. However, courtly literature of the Spanish “Catholic Monarchs” confirms Queen Isabel of Castile’s devotion to the Virgin Mary and even her identification with the Mater Dolorosa after the deaths of her son Juan (October 4, 1497), her daughter Isabel (August 24, 1498) and her grandson Miguel (July 20, 1500). See Peggy K. Liss, Isabel the Queen, Life and Times (New York-Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992). An Annunciation dated 1605 (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum) by Juan Pantoja de la Cruz, court painter of Philip III of Spain (1578: r. 1598–1621), shows Queen Margarita as the Virgin Mary and her daughter Ana, future wife of Louis XIII (1615), as Archangel Gabriel. The work which alludes to the birth of the Hapsburg Philip IV, derives from a sustained Renaissance perception of the dynastic house as a cadet branch of the Holy Family and Tree of Jesse. 119 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition, Old Testament, 588. See Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 52–53 and Yves Marie Joseph Congar, 118

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The chamber of Gabriel’s salutation significantly replicates the traditional Kaiserloge, or solarium of the king over the western entrance to a church. Upper chambers of Northern Westwerk churches were situated between two towers, as indicated in the tower projections behind Van Eyck’s white-robed figures of the Archangel and the Virgin Mary. That Van Eyck intended such an association of the “Annunciation” setting with the Kaiserloge seems proven by the Friesdam Annunciation (Fig. 6.163) in the Metropolitan Museum, attributed to Petrus Christus and dated to about 1450.120 The painting shows the Virgin at the entrance of a church and she undeniably is presented as the mystical portal uniting the exterior sensory world with the interior spiritual realm of the godhead. Though not visible in the Christus’ composition, the type of solarium represented by Van Eyck in his Ghent “Annunciation” would have been situated directly over the place where Mary stands. Because Christus’s work is believed to have been cut down on all sides save the right, the original painting might have illustrated the private chamber for royalty. Beneath her deep blue mantle, the Virgin wears a crimson gown edged at the collar and hemline with ermine. Moreover, the threshold step is engraved with the words: QUEEN OF HEAVEN REJOICE (Regina C[o]eli L[a]et[are), which has been identified as the opening line of the Eastertide Antiphon to the Virgin Mary.121 The Kaiserloge was a imported feature of Portuguese palatine churches due in large measure to the presence of Burgundian architects, sculptors and masons employed by the Crown. The royal gallery of the Church of St. Michael at Alcaçova Palace in Lisbon would have served as a suitable O.P., The Mystery of the Temple, or, The Manner of God’s Presence to his Creatures from Genesis to the Apocalypse, translated by Reginald F. Frevett (Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1962), 26–28, for a discussion of God’s “House of Israel” and the Pauline interpretation of mystical unity in the body, or “Temple of Christ.” Also consult Jeanne Villette, La maison de la Vierge dans la scène de l’annonciation. Étude d’iconographie dans la peinture italienne du XVème siècle (Paris: H. Laurens, 1940). 120 John L. Ward, “A New Look at the Friedsam Annunciation,” Art Bulletin L, No. 2 (June, 1968): 184–87. 121 Maryan W. Ainsworth, with contributions by Maximilian P.J. Martens, Petrus Christus. Renaissance Master of Bruges (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1994), 117– 25. Also consult: Otto Pächt, “”The Friedsam Annunciation and the Problem of the Ghent Altarpiece,” Art Bulletin XVII (1935): 433–73; Erwin Panofky, “Once More ‘The Friedsam Annunciation and the Problem of the Ghent Altarpiece,’” Art Bulletin XX (1938): 419–42; Hermann Beenken, “The Annunciation of Petrus Christus in the Metropolitan Museum and the Problem of Hubert van Eyck, Art Bulletin XIX (1937): 220–41; John Malcolm Russell,

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place for Maundy Thursday ceremonies in which the queen and her noble attendants would wash, clothe and feed the poor. Occurring the day before Good Friday, Holy Thursday marked the solemn beginning of the Easter Triduum. Originally known as the “new command” (Mandatum novum: John 13:34), the ritual of washing feet were first performed in Rome during the thirteenth century and they included three distinct liturgies. A public reconciliation of penitents was followed by a bishop’s blessing of chrism. The fragrance of the perfumed olive oil used in post baptismal anointing was related to the presence of the Holy Spirit and this chrism also was used in the anointing ceremonies of coronations. Renowned for her charity, St. Elizabeth of Hungary (1207–1231: cd 1235), has been bonded with the tradition of courtly women caring for the poor on Holy Thursday (Figs. 6.164–6.165). Like her great-aunt for whom she was named, St. Isabel of Portugal (1271–1336), also had founded homes and orphanages for destitute women and children. Inspired by the example of these charitable queens, Philippa of Lancaster and her daughter Isabel had presided over the ceremonial washing of feet on Maundy Thursday.122 Princess Isabel was portrayed with Elizabeth of Hungary in an engraved bronze plaque in Basel dated about 1446 (Figs. 6.166–6.167) and created to document Isabel’s donation to La Chartreuse du Petit-Bâle. The Carthusian relief with armorials and personal mottos of the Duke and Duchess, has a Pietà centerpiece. Kneeling before a prie-dieu on the right, Isabel is accompanied by St. Elizabeth holding her attribute of a triple crown. To her side are her deceased sons Antoine and Josse († both 1432), who wear white robes and hold crosses of the Portuguese Order of Christ. Opposite and also depicted at a prayer stand, is Philip the Good with St. Andrew, whose saltire was a device of Burgundy. Like his father in front of him, Charles the Bold wears the collar of the Golden Fleece and the spurs “The Iconography of the Friedsam Annunciation,” Art Bulletin LVIII (1978): 23–27; Susan Urbach, “Domus Dei Est et Porta Coeli: Megjegyzések Petrus Christus Madonna-Képének Ikonográfiájához,” Epítésépítészettudomány 3–4 (1974): 341–53. 122 Claudine Lemaire and Michèle Henry, Isabella van Portugal. Hertogin van Bourgondië, 1397–1471 (Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliothek Albert I, 1991), 151–52 and Pl. 35; Pierre Quarré, “Plaques de fondations d’Isabelle de Portugal, duchesse de Bourgogne, aux chartreuses de Bâle et de Champmol-de-Dijon,” Jahresbericht 1959 des Historisches Museums (Basel: 1960): 29–38. An anonymous sixteenth-century pen and ink drawing in the Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliothek Albert I (400 x 315 mm) replicates the composition. See Lemaire and Henry, 152 and Pl. 36.

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of a knight. A pen and ink drawing in Brussels replicates the composition of the plaque from Basel. Doubt still shrouds the identity of the female donor with St. Elizabeth of Hungary in a panel by a disciple of Petrus Christus dated 1457–60 in Bruges (Fig. 6.168); however, she does have an undeniable resemblance to accepted portraits of Duchess Isabel. The painting has been related to a triptych described in the 1526 inventory of Archduchess Margaret of Austria taken at Mechelen Castle. The lost centerpiece illustrated a Mater Dolorosa, probably a “Pietà” like the Basel plaque. Both the Brussels wing and its opposite shutter of “St. Catherine of Alexandria” bear traces of grisaille on their reverse sides, which accords with the sixteenth-century description of the triptych as having the theme of the “Annunciation” on the shutters.123 The royal cleansing of beggars by royalty constituted an act of humility, and following the blessing of chrism, the third liturgy of Holy Thursday was an evening Mass commemorating the Last Supper. The Gospel of Matthew (10:24–28) recited on the May 6 feast of “St. John the Evangelist before the Porta Latina” describes Christ’s promise that James and John would share in the cup of his Passion. Christ’s comments to his apostles following this pledge are even more relevant to the symbolic association of Holy Thursday liturgy with the basin and towel in Van Eyck’s solarium. He defined the goals of a priest of his kingdom, and the means by which the devout could enter his heavenly household: ... whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be the first among you must be your slave, just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”124 Christ spoke these words just prior to his entry into Jerusalem. Within a few days of this triumphal procession, the Roman governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate, would cleanse his hands before a multitude and sentence the “King of his Jews” to death by crucifixion on Mount Golgotha outside the Till-Holger Borchert, ed. The Age of Van Eyck: The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, with contributions by Andreas Beyer et al. (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), Catalogue No. 15, 232. Dirk De Vos, Groeningenmuseum Brugge (Ghent: 1989), 96–98. The Bruges panel measures 79 x 33 cm. 124 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition, New Testament, 22. 3 123

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walls of Jerusalem. In recent years scholars have pointed to the influence of the Benedictine theologian Robert von Deutz (1075–1129) of Cologne, whose ideas circulated in the fifteenth-century Europe, particularly in the monastic houses of the order and in the brotherhoods of Devotio Moderna.125 The German monk’s commentaries on prophets and his Commentaria in Canticum canticorum are relevant texts for the iconography of the Ghent Altarpiece when closed.126 Especially significant is Robert von Deutz’s persistent description of a Redeemer-Christ as “God and Man, King and Priest.” 127 When open, however, the Vijd polyptych encapsulated even more the Pauline spirituality espoused by the Medieval scholar, whose Eucharistic ideology surfaces in several of his more important treatises, such as the Regarding Rupert von Deutz, consult Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 88–100 and 141–42 notes 39 and 62. She points to Ludolf Nicholas of Zwolle’s Dye declaratie vander missen [The Explanation of the Mass, Antwerp, 1529], as evidence of Rupert’s influence, and quotes, 99, relevant passages from the treatise. Nicholas compares the Mass to a fountain from which “streams of living waters,” denoting the “manifold benefits of Christ” flow without ceasing. The altar, “composed of many stones, signifies the Holy Church, which consists of many peoples of different nations, both Jews and heathens, gathered together.” The “Agnus Dei” celebrated at Mass represents “the Atonement, and the Pax,” serving as the means by which mankind is united with God. Dhanens cites (142 note 62; 141 note 39): Ludolf Nicholas, Dye declaratie vander missen na dye meyninghe vanden heylighen kercken te weten Dionisius, Origines, Johannes Chrysostomus, Augustinus, Gregorius, Gelasius, Rupertus ende meer andere [etc.] (Antwerp: 1551; 2nd ed.) ; E. Beitz, Rupert von Deutz, seine Werke und die Bildende Kunst (Cologne: 1933); Hubert Silvestre, “La tradition manuscrite des oeuvres de Rupert de Deutz. A propos d’une étude récente de Rhaban Haacke,” Scriptorium XXVI (1962): 336–48. Additionally consult: John H. Van Engen, Rupert of Deutz (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983); idem, Devotio Moderna: Basic Writings, translated and introduced by Heiko A. Oberman (New York: Paulist Press, 1988); idem., Rupert of Deutz (ca. 1075–1129): Monk, Theologian and Controversionalist at the End of the Gregorian Reform (Los Angeles: Ph.D. Dissertation, University California, 1976); Guntram Gerhard Bischoff, The Eucharistic Controversy Between Rupert of Deutz and his Anonymous Adversary. Studies in the Theology and Chronology of Rupert of Deutz (c. 1075–1129) and his Earlier Literary Works (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965; Rhaban Haacke, Programme zur bildenden Kunst in den Schriften Ruperts von Deutz (Siegburg: Respublica-Verlag, 1974). 126 See Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), CLXVIII [Commentaries on the prophets]: 700–814 (Zechariah); 441–526 (Micah); 838–962 (Song of Songs). Also consult Rupert von Deutz, Commentaria in Canticum canticorum, ed. Hrabanus Haacke (Turnholt: Brepols, 1974). 127 Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 91, refers to Jan van Eyck’s seated Christ as “Magnus Pontifex, the High Priest,” and hence, the papal tiara is appropriate. At his feet is the crown of the “Rex,” or earthly king. 125

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Liber de divinis officiis (1111), Liber de Sancta Trinitate, Commentaria in Evangelium Santi Johannis and Commentaria on the Apocalypse (1114).128 As pictured by Jan van Eyck, and described by Rupert von Deutz in Liber de victoria verbi Dei (1125–1127), the “kingdom of the Word” truly is a sacra monte of Christ’s Sermon on the Eight Beatitudes.129 Jan van Eyck’s “Adoration of the Lamb” provides a classical empyrean. The “Son of Man” sits triumphantly between the “Planet Woman” and the Baptist John as a heavenly choir rejoices that the forces of darkness have been vanquished by the Archangel St. Michael. Beneath such an iconic scheme, the glorious meadow recedes to reveal the sacrificial Apocalyptic Lamb on an altar before the Fountain of Grace.130 All in God’s peaceable kingdom belong 128 Rupert von Deutz [Ruperti Tuitiensis: 1075–1129], De Sancta Trinitate et operibus eius, ed. Hrabanus Haacke, 4 vols. (Turnholt: Brepols, 1971–1972); idem., Commentaria in Evangelium Sancti Johannis (Turnholt, Brepols, 1969); A. A. Young, The “Commentaria in Iohannis Euangelium” of Rupert of Deutz: A Methodological Analysis in the Field of twelfth Century Exegesis (Toronto, Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Toronto, 1984); Rupert von Deutz, Les Oeuvres du Saint-Esprit, ed. Jean Gribomont, O.S.B, and translation by Élisabeth de Solms, O.S.B. (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1967); Rupert von Deutz, Liber de divinis officiis. Der Gottesdienst der Kirche. Hrabanus Haacke, Helmut and Ilse Deutz, 4 vols. (Freiburg-New York: Herder, 1999); Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXX (De divinis officiis), which contains commentaries on the liturgy of the Mass. During the 1458 entry of Philip the Good into Ghent, a tableau vivant of the “Adoration of the Lamb” was staged in the Poel, an open area of the town. The programme concerned the subject of the “Beatitudes.” See Elisabeth Dhanens, “De Blijde Inkomst van Filips de Goede in 1458 en de plastische kunsten te Gent,” Academie Analecta. Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België. Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLVIII, No. 2 (1989): 3–17. 129 Rupert von Deutz, De victoria verbi Dei, ed. Rhaban Haacke (Weimar: Böhlau, 1970). See Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXIX. Regarding the imagery selected for the Ghent Altarpiece, this treatise [On the Victory of the Word of God] appears to have been very influential, and Dhanens has chosen pertinent passages from it and other commentaries. She also observes (Van Eyck, The Ghent Altarpiece, 91–92): “Rupert’s comment on the Octave of Easter, seen in the perspective of universal resurrection, is based on the Eight Beatitudes, which accords with a permanent tradition linking the Adoration panel with the Beatitudes, and on the Epistle of Low Sunday, the Sunday after Easter (I John V, 5–10) concerning the Witness of the Spirit, the Water and the Blood, represented on the panel by the Dove, the fountain and the Lamb.” See Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXVIII [Commentaries]: 1389 (Commentary on the Semon on the Mount: “Blessed of the Beatitudes”); Migne, CLXX, 218–40 (De divinis officiis: Commentary on the Octave of Easter ). 130 Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 65, compares the locus amoenus to the concept of a classical “ideal landscape” in the tradition of Theocritus and Homer. She cites, 141 note 36, Ernst Robert Curtius, Europäische Literatur und lateinisches Mittelalter (Bern: A. Francke, 1948); idem., European literature and the Latin Middle Ages, translated from the German by Willard R. Trask (New York: Pantheon Books, 1953).

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to a universal temple, and the architecture of this Apocalyptic “church” has no walls. Under the rays of a sun that will never set, righteous Jews and ancient philosophers mingle and process with Christians towards a symbolic banquet.131 Beneath the Pentecostal dove, they will partake in the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit and the purifying waters of eternal life. Within the highly theological scheme of the Ghent Altarpiece’s interior panels, the figures of Adam and Eve occupy a special place. Though they stand in curving niches their physical appearance belies a perception of their images as stone statues. Jan’s skillful illusionism causes the viewer to accept his brand of realism. His portraits of Jodocus Vijd and Elisabeth Borluut create the same impression of congruity, as similar to the progenitors of mankind, they penitentially kneel in stone niches beneath the subject of Christ’s Incarnation. The commentaries of Robert von Deutz undeniably form the theological framework of the Ghent Altarpiece, yet there are additional elements which merit consideration, not the least of which is Jan’s tribute to the “house” of a new Burgundian heir. Windows unto Ghent The Ghent church of Sint-Janskerk stood in the commercial center of the city (Figs. 6.169–6.170), amidst the main streets used by wealthy merchants and guildsmen and foreign traders. Like the Merode Altarpiece, Jan van Eyck’s polyptych for Sint-Janskerk presents window views of urban landscape within his grouped panels comprising the subject of the “Annunciation.” Jan’s depiction of civic architecture magnifies the history of a town granted privileges by the Counts of Flanders and presided over by Jodocus Vijd in his municipal appointment as mayor. He provided views which would have been recognized by visitors to their new chapel in Sint-Jans. Jodocus and his wife Elisabeth Borluut had established a foundation which gave annual stipends to a sacristan for the care of their chapel and to two monks who

131 D. E. Timmer, The Religious Significance of Judaism for Twelfth-Century Monastic Exegesis: A Study in the Thought of Rupert of Deutz, c. 1070–1129 (Notre Dame, IN: Ph.D. Dissertation, 1983); Michael A. Signer and John H. Van Engen (eds)., Jews and Christians in Twelfth-Century Europe (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001). Also consult F. Peeters, “Les Noces Eucharistiques de l’Agneau,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art II (1932): 144–53.

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were mandated to offer masses in perpetuity.132 Analyzing the view from the bipartite window beside the “priestly” niche near the Annunciate Virgin (Figs. 6.171–6.173), a tower on the right appears to resemble Ghent’s Belfort, which even then had a spire capped by the “Bruges” dragon weather vane.133 Picturesque houses still line the present-day Limburgstraat and Hoogpoort, the roughly parallel avenues that enclose Sint-Baafsplein (St. Bavo Square). To the left of the window column in his “Annunciation,” Jan van Eyck shows a row of houses with high-pitched slate roofs, but beyond them is a circular white tower. The northern view from the bell tower of Sint-Baafs is to the Biezekapelstraat, a narrow crooked alley situated to the left of the cathedral that is linked with the Hoogpoort (High Gate). A cluster of three dwellings in this sector of Ghent once belonged to the Van der Sikkelen family, and two flank the Biezekapelstraat (Figs. 6.174–6.175). The stone house known as Kleine Sikkel at Nederpoder 2, dates to the thirteenth century. In 1418 the Van der Sikkelens moved to the Grote Sikkel, a large step-gabled mansion on the opposite site of the street at Hoogpoort No. 64. As suggested by its popular name, the third private residence of the family, the Achter Sikkel (“Back Sikkel”), was a rear addition to Grote Sikkel property situated on Bizekapelstraat near the crossing at Nederpoder. The Gothic components of the Achter Sikkel include tall double-step gables, an arcaded courtyard, a little turret of the fourteenth century and a round white 132 Elisabeth Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, edited by John Fleming and Hugh Honour (London-New York: Allen Lane-The Viking Press, 1973), 24, states: “The chapel was founded for the celebration of a daily mass whose institution was registered by the city authorities in a deed dated 13 May 1435. This deed records that Joos Vijd, Lord of Pamele and Ledeberg and Elisabeth Borluut his wife, ‘do to the glory of God, his Blessed Mother and all His saints, establish in perpetuity the office of a daily mass for the salvation of their souls and those of their forebears, in the chapel and at the altar that they have caused to be erected at their own cost on the south side of the church. The deed specifies in detail the measures that are to be taken in connection with the endowment and establishment of the chaplaincy, the conduct of services at the altar, and the perpetuity of the foundations…”. Dhanens cites the Ghent City Archives, MS. Jaerregistre 1434–35, f. 149v, published by V. van der Haeghen, “Autour des Van Eyck, Cartulaire,” Handelingen der Maatschappij van Geschied-en Oudheidkunde te Gent XV (1914): 51–55. See also Elisabeth Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lamb Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedraal te Genet (Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oost-Vlaanderen, VI) (Ghent: Bestendige Deputatie van de Provinciale Raad van Oostvlaanderen, 1965), 89–93. 133 Henry Peterson [Karl Nikolaj Henry], Gents Beffroi (Copenhagen: B. Lunos bogtrykkeri, 1889); Henri Ernest Adolphe Nowé, Het Belfort van Gent (Ghent: 1949).

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tower dating to the early fifteenth century. Comprising multiple stories with small windows punched into the walls, the Sikkelen white tower is similar to Ghenter architecture which has been related to Crusader strongholds of Syria.134 The multi-leveled stone white tower superficially resembles the oldest hall on the Graslei quay, the corn granary of 1200 (Fig. 6.176).135 Ghent’s first Stadhuis would have been similar in design to Graslei’s Koornstapelhuis, but it was razed to create space for the belfry and its surrounding plaza. The base of the Belfort was laid in 1314 and the first four stories were constructed by 1323, about the time that a second Stadhuis was begun (1321) on the corner of the Botermarkt and Hoogpoort (Figs. 6. 177–6. 180). Within the present Baroque Stadhuis only two subterranean vaulted chambers exist from the fourteenth century, and these cellars which once serviced the merchants of butter.136 Looking south from the Sikkel property to Sint-Baafs yields a fairly good view of the cathedral (Fig. 6.181). Jan’s white tower seems larger than that of the Achter Sikkel, and the structure has far more windows. In their marked uniform arrangement, the windows are not unlike the fenestrations 134 The Grote Sikkel and the Kleine Sikkel presently serve as Ghent’s Academy of Music. See Julien van Remoortere and Frans van den Bremt, Gent-Gand/Ghent/Gent-Gante (Brussels: Les Ateliers d’Art Graphique Meddens, 1978); Andrea De Kegel, et al., Beschermde monumenten, stads- en dorpsgezichten en landschappen in Oost-Vlaanderen: Arrondissement Gent (Ghent: Provinciebestuur Oost-Vlaanderen, 1992); Leen Charles et al., Erf, huis en mens: huizenonderzoek in Gent (Ghent: Stadsarchief Gent: Stichting Mens en Cultuur, 2001). 135 Besides the twelfth-century Koornstapelhuis (corn granery, No.11), the Graslei is noted for several important commercial buildings: the sixteenth-century Korenmetershuis (Grain Measurers House) at No. 10; the small Tolhuisje van tolbaas at No. 12 (Toll Collector House) created in 1682, and originally employed as a customs house and used for grain storage; the Gildehuis der Graanmeters (Grain Measurers House, No. 13) built in 1698 to replace the Korenmetershuis, and the Huis de Vrije Shippers (Guild Hall of the Free Boatmen, No. 14) built between 1500 and 1532 by Christoffel van den Berghe and adorned with a portal bas-relief of a triple-mast caravel and carvings of boatmen unloading goods. Besides the Lakenhall (Cloth Hall: 1425–1445) adjoining the Belfort, in the vicinity of the Vrijdagmarkt is the Toreken, the fifteenth-century Tanners Guild Hall, and the Cloth Measurers House. Among the notable commercial districts of Ghent, the Klein Turkije Stradt (Little Turk Street) contains several Medieval stone houses, which face the north side of Sint-Niklasskerk. Among them is the thirteenth-century Spice Merchants Guildhouse (No. 2), part of which functioned as an inn, Den Rooden Hoed (Red Hat). In April of 1521 Albrecht Dürer visited the hostel, which now is a café. See Juliaan H.A. de Ridder, Gerechtigheidstaferelen voor schepenhuizen in de zuidelijke Nederlanden in de 14de, 15de en 16de eeuw (Brussels: AWLSK, 1989). 136 Ghent’s Town Hall was totally rebuilt with two wings between 1518 and 1595: one section completed by Rombout Keldermans in a flamboyant Gothic style (1518–1560); and

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aligned in rows along the exterior of the Castle of Gerard the Devil (Geraard de Duivelsteen) (Figs. 6.182–6.183) at the end of Limburgstraat. Built in 1245 by Geraard Vilain, a descendant of the Viscounts of Ghent, the fortified Romanesque mansion on the Muinschelde, an arm of the Scheldt, is one of Ghent’s oldest monuments. Jan’s western view from the kaisersalle of the “Annunciation” would have encompassed the Belfort, the old Stadhuis, a row of houses fronting Limburgstraat and the corner of Bizekapelstraat. This sector of Ghent during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance significantly held some prominent guild houses, especially in Hoogpoorte which passes north of the Stadhuis. For example, Ghent’s Gildehuis van de Meselaars (House for the Guild of Masons: Figs. 6.184–6.186) at the corner of Cataloniëstrraat and Limburgstraat was erected in 1527 by Christoffel van den Berghe. Situated opposite the entrance to Sint-Niklaaskerk, where the diverse guilds maintained the chapels, the golden sandstone building retains the aspect of a thirteenth-century structure. The Brabantine Gothic façade of the Masons’ Guild House was replicated in 1913 for a new building on the Graslei (No. 8), which displays four seated saints, including St. Andrew, the patron saint of Flanders, and also St. Thomas, who holds a small building to signify his traditional role as a protector of Medieval masons. The practice of adorning the door of a guild house with the image of a holy patron is demonstrated by one of the old houses near the Stadhuis. A blackened stone building opposite the Botermarkt façade of the Stadhuis, at Hoogpoort, No. 58, rests on the foundations of a former militia house, the Sint-Jorishof (1228), which was rebuilt in 1469 and dedicated on April 20, 1477 as the Guild House of Crossbowmen (Kruisboogschutters) (Fig. 6.187). The structure has a stepgable decorated with an equestrian statue of St. George slaying the Dragon, and its upper floor constituted a chapel honoring the heroic warrior.137 the other on the Botermarkt side built by Domien de Waghemakere in a more austere manner about 1581. The structure was even further modified during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. See Frieda van Tyghem, Het stadhuis van Gent: voorgeschiedenis, bouwgeschiedenis, veranderingswerken, restauraties, beschrijving, stijlanalyse, 2 vols. (Brussels: AWLSK, 1978); idem, Gent: het Stadhuis: voorgeschiedenis, bouwgeschiedenis, beschrijving-l’Hôtel de ville: préhistoire, architecture, description /Gent: the City Hall: prehistory, architecture, description (Ghent: Snoeck-Ducaju & Zoon, 1995). 137 Derek Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored. Bruges, Ghent, Antwerp, Mechelen, Leuven & Ostend (London: Pallas Athene, 1998 3rd Ed.), 108 (Gildehuis van de Meselaars on the Graslei) and 119 (St. Jorishof, now a hotel).

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Besides the Guild House of the Crossbowmen, two additional houses in Ghent were martial confraternities: the Guild of the Swordsmen, dedicated to Archangel St. Michael; and the Guild of the Handbowmen, whose patron was St. Sebastian. Later Ghent saw the rise of the gunmen, whose Guild was devoted to St. Anthony Abbot. Hoogpoort still has step-gable structures erected in the early Brabant Renaissance style (Fig. 6.188). Among the best known is the Goldsmiths Hall (Hoogpoort, No. 33: Fig. 6.189), and this structure called “Het Samson” undoubtedly contained an icon of St. Eligius, patron saint of metal-workers. Considering Van Eyck’s acquaintance with goldsmiths-alchemists, he would have been familiar with the earlier Gildenhuis van de Goussmeden during his stay in Ghent. The Kleine Sikkel (“Small Sickle”), situated on the corner of the Biezekapelstraat and Nederpolder streets (Nederpolder, No. 2), was built in the thirteenth century and its façade displays the Van der Sikkelen crest of three sickles (Fig. 6.190). The architectural style of the structure closely approximates the three-storey house with a crenellated screen wall and eight bipartite windows depicted to the right of the column in the Jan’s “Annunciation” (Fig. 6.191). Seen frontally, Jan’s prominent Romanesque house is distinguished by an arched portal from which a gentleman departs. The space above the door is difficult to discern but there seems to be a low relief and a barely visible carved image of a seated figure. If the structure is identified as the Gildehuis belonging to the confraternity of Ghenter painters, which certainly would have been proximate to the houses of goldsmiths and masons, the relief would represent the artist-Evangelist St. Luke. More easily discerned are two individuals engaged in conversation behind a double window on the first floor. Perhaps the one on the left with a chaperon is Jan van Eyck, and if so, then his companion might be his deceased brother, Hubrechte, who was buried in the crypt beneath the chapel of Jodocus Vijd in Sint-Jans. The notion of a “hidden” self-portrait in the Ghent Altarpiece is not far-fetched as demonstrated by Jan’s imaginative self-portraits in Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife and the Madonna of Canon van der Paele. The narrow windows closest to the Archangel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary do not provide expansive views of landscape. Rather, each illustrates a single house (Fig. 6.192). The one behind Gabriel is constructed of primarily of hewed wooden planks and is a rather modest building. The house visible through the window behind the crystal vase signifying Mary’s chastity is made of stone and brick. With two chimneys, multiple fenestrations, and ample garden, it undeniably must have been the dwelling of a wealthy family.

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Jan van Eyck perhaps modeled this residence after the home of Jodocus Vijd and Elisabeth Borluut. The architecture resembles the thirteenth-fifteenthcentury Borluutsteen in Ghent (Korenmarkt Nos. 6–7), which has a stepped roofline and bipartite windows distinguished by columnar dividers. The combination of domestic as well as civic architecture in the “Annunciation” panels insinuates that the mayor was appointed to serve all social levels in Ghent, from the prosperous merchants to townspeople whose households were as humble as that of the Holy Family in Nazareth.

7 The Grail Quest and Chivalric Ideals: Counts of Flanders and Paladins of Lusitania Throne for the “Dayspring on High”: The Adoration of the Lamb

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he interior of Van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece reveals a majestic deësis (Figs. 7.1–7.2). Christ is enthroned as a transcendent priest-king in front of a “Cloth of Gold.”1 The black curtain contains repeated gold images of the pelican piercing its breast to feed its young and above each emblem of “charity” are two clusters of grapes on vines which signify the mystical winepress, and an arched scroll with the name of “Jesus the King.”2 Portrayed in the act of blessing with a crystal, gold and bejeweled scepter in his left hand, the Dominus Coeli wears a fine wool robe and mantle of royal scarlet edged in gold and precious stones. His gem-studded white and gold papal tiara, a triple crown designating the Trinity, also comprises a green stole edged in pearls and decorated with pearl and ruby cross-crosslets. The liturgical color of the season of Advent, this stole represents the “yoke” of Christ (Matthew 11:29–30) as well as the power and office of the priest. A second stole is Jean Leclercq, L’idée de la royauté du Christ au Moyen Age (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1959). Also consult Thomas Martone, “Van Eyck’s Technique of the “Trompe-l’intelligence’ Applied to the Deësis of the Ghent Altarpiece,” Versus: quaderni di studi semiotici XXXVII (1984): 71–82; L. A. Blacksberg, “The Paintings of the Godhead by Jan van Eyck and Gerard David. A Study of Influence and Effect,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VIII, 8–10 Septembre, 1989, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-laNeuve: Collège Érasme, 1991): 1989 (1991): 57–66, especially 57–61. 2 Anne Marie Mariën-Dugardin, “Les draps d’honneur du retable de l’Agneau Mystique,” Bulletin de la Société Royale d’Archéologie de Bruxelles (1947–1948): 18–21. 1

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visible beneath the red mantle, which crosses Christ’s chest. The golden fabric, bordered with round crystal tassels, is embroidered with pearls which form the word SABOATH. The compound name “Yahweh Saboath” means “Lord of Hosts,” a title given by Zechariah (14: 5–10) to foretell the arrival of the “Lord Almighty,” commander of the heavenly armies, at the end of time: Then the Lord my God will come, and all the holy ones with him…. And there shall be continuous … living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem … it shall continue in summer as in winter.… The whole land shall be turned into a plain.… But Jerusalem shall remain aloft on its site … Jerusalem shall abide in security.3 The embroidered words on border of Christ’s mantle, REX REGUM ET DOMINUS DOMINANTIUM (“King of Kings and Lord of Lords”) derive from Apocalypse 19:16, and they assure the context of the eschaton, or “end of days,” as the wedding banquet of the Lamb.4 The arched moulding behind the “Lord of Hosts” reads: “This is God all-powerful in his divine majesty. The supreme, the best because of his loving kindness. The most open-handed

3 The Holy Bible. Douay Version, Rheims (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1960; rpt. of 1st ed. 1956), New Testament, Part I, 1070. See Luc Dequeker, “Jewish Symbolism in the Ghent Altarpiece of Jan van Eyck (1432),” Dutch Jewish History. Proceedings of the Symposium on the History of the Jews in the Netherlands (November 28–December 3, 1982, Tel AvivJerusalem), ed. Jozeph Michman and co-ed. Tirtsah Levie (Jerusalem: Tel-Aviv University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Institute for Research on Dutch Jewry, 1984), Seventh Session, Chairman: M. Eliav), 347–62, at 358. Also see Luc Dequeker, “Het Lam Gosretabel van Van Eyck en het jodensvraagstuk,” Tijdschrift voor Christenen en Joden XIV, No. 2 (1986): 98–110. The future worship of all nations was to keep the pilgrimage feast of Tabernacles, the Sukkot. Celebrated for eight days from the fifteenth of Tishri (late September, early October), the festival of “Booths” marked a period of thanksgiving for the autumnal harvest (Exodus 23:16). For this reason, the grape clusters depicted in the “Cloth of Gold” behind Van Eyck’s “Lord of Hosts” alludes to the winepress of divine judgment (Isaiah 63:1–3; Apocalypse 14:18–20). The triumphal song before the consecration of the Eucharist in the Mass proclaims the holiness of God by a threefold repetition of the word Holy: “Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus, Dominus Deus Sabaoth. Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua. Hosanna in excelsis. Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini. Hosanna in excelsis.” (Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth. Heaven and Earth are full of Thy glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest). 4 Rupert von Deutz, De victoria Verbi Dei ; see Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), CLXIX , 1478–1479.

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provider, because of his measureless generosity.”5 A hammered and foliated gold crown lies at Christ’s feet, evoking metaphorical imagery of Isaiah 66: 1: “Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool.” The riser of the stone step above this crown is tinctured gold and it bears an inscription translated as: “Eternal life shines from his head. Eternal youth lights his face. Undisturbed joy at his right. Freedom from care at his left.”6 Cloaked in a robe and mantle of deep ultramarine velvet bordered in a band of gold with precious stones, the “Bride-Queen of Heaven” wears a gold crown embedded with pearls and cabochon sapphires and rubies. Stemming from the upper rim are alternating lilies and crimson roses. Behind her head the moulded arches are inscribed in Latin with the words: “She is more beautiful than the sun and all the army of the stars; compared to the light she is superior. She is truly the reflection of eternal light and a spotless mirror of God.”7 According to the Protoevangelium of St. James the Less, the Holy Kinship constituting Christ’s immediate family included not only cousins who were the offspring of Mary Salome and Mary Cleophas, but also John the Baptist, the son of Zachariah. Infused with the Holy Spirit from his conception, John leapt in ecstasy within the womb of his mother Elizabeth when she welcomed an enceinte Virgin Mary to her home. As an adult John became a prophetic witness by the Jordan River to the arrival of the Messiah , “Ecce Agnus Dei.” In the deësis of the Ghent Altarpiece, the patron of St. Bavo’s Church is portrayed as he described himself, the amicus sponsi (bridegroom’s friend), who listens with joy to the voice of the bridegroom (John 3: 19). The Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 106, 377. The framing arches are inscribed: +HIC 5

EST DEUS POTENTISSIMUS PROPTER DIVINAM MAIESTATEM. + SUMMUS OMNIUM OPTIMUS PROPTER DULCEDINIS BONITATEM. + REMUNERATOR LIBERALISSIMUS PROPTER INMENSAM LARGITATEM/VITA. She also notes, 111, that the verses of the arches

originally were painted in the wrong order. For orginal study of the inscriptions in the Ghent Altarpiece consult J. de Baets, O.P., “De Gewijde teksten van ‘het Lam Gods’,” Koninklijke Vlammse Academie voor Taal-en-Letterkunde, Verslagen en Mededelingen (1961): 532–614. 6 The steps of the throne are inscribed: SINE MORTE IN CAPITE. IUVENTUS SINE

SENECTUTE IN FRONTE./GAUDIUM SINE MERORE A DEXTRIS. SECURITAS SINE TIMORE A SINISTRIS. See Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 106 and 377. The brocade of Christ’s robe carrys the letters: IHESUS XPS [CHRISTUS]. 7 HEC EST SPECIOSIOR SOLE ET SUPER OMNEM STELLARUM DISPOSICIONEM LUCI COMPARATA INVENITUR PRIOR. CANDOR EST ENIM LUCIS ETERNE ET SPECULUM SINE MACULA DEI. See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 107–8 and 377.

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moulded arch behind the Baptist is inscribed: “This is John the Baptist, greater than man, equal to the angels, summarizer of the law, spreader of the scriptures, voice of the Apostles, silence of the Prophets, lamp of the world, witness of the Lord.” 8 Over his camel skin, token of his asceticism in the wilderness, John attests to the second coming of the Messiah wearing a supple mantle of fine wool with jeweled tassels which is fastened by a gold and large cabochon ruby pin. The Avis heraldic green color of his raiment matches precisely the sacred cloth held by the Virgo Sapientissima beneath her codex of prophecies. John’s book is open to Isaiah 40: 3, and the words Consolamini, consolamini, popule meus. These words begin the Liber Consolatonis which describes the voice of God as a comfort to Jerusalem. A choir of angels flanks the mediating figures of the Virgin Mary and John the Baptist and they accentuate the celebratory nature of a wedding banquet. A closed hymnal on the lectern in one panel bears the title Eterna Sapientia, which identifies their music as poetic verses from the Solomonic bridal book, the Canticum Canticorum. The singers and musicians are vibrantly depicted in a plethora of damask and brocaded dalmatics with embroidered bands adorned with gemstones.9 The oak lectern of the angels grouped near Mary pertinently is carved with a relief of St. Michael the Archangel spearing the Apocalyptic beast, represented as a seven-headed Hydra. 8 HIC EST BAPTISTA IOHANNES, MAIOR HOMINE, PAR ANGELIS, LEGIS SUMMA, EWANGELII SACIO, APOSTOLORUM VOX, SILENCIUM PROPHETARUM, LUCERNA MUNDI, DOMINI TESTIS. See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 108 and 379. The book held by St. John is open to Isaiah 40:1 CONSOLAMINI (“Comfort. O comfort my people”).

The same biblical passage actually continues with words that are repeated in the Gospel of St. John with reference to the Baptist: “A voice cries out: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord.’” Also consult Gary M. Radke, “A Note on the Iconographical Significance of St. John the Baptist in the Ghent Altarpiece,” Marsyas XVIII (1975–76), 1–6. 9 Robert Wangermée, La symbolique musicale dans la peinture de la renaissance,” La musique source d’inspiration dans l’art belge. XIIIe–XXe siècle (Brussels: exhibition catalogue, 1985): 35–51, at 42–43 (Ghent Altarpiece); Alexandra Goulaki Voutira, “Die musizierenden Engel des Genter Altars,” Imago Musicae V (1988): 65–74; Maurice B. McNamee, S.J., Vested Angels: Eucharistic Allusions in Early Netherlandish Paintings (Louvain: Peeters, 1998); idem., “The Origin of the Vested Angel as a Eucharistic Symbol in Flemish Painting,” Art Bulletin LIX (1972): 263–78. Beneath the panel of the celestial musicians is the inscription LAUDATE EUM CORDIS ET ORGANO (Psalm 101: “Praise him with stringed instruments and organs”). Viewed in infra-red, the closed book bears the words: ETERNA SAPIENTIA (Eterbnal Wisdom). Opposite, the frame of the angelic singers bears the words LAUS PERHENNIS GRATIARUM ACTIO (“Songs of Supplication, songs of praise, songs of thanksgiving”), which relate to prayers recited in the liturgical offering of the Mass, specifically the Offertory, Consecration and Communion. For the inscriptions, see Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck,

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Van Eyck painted the standing figures Adam and Eve (Fig. 7.3) in stone niches beside the paradisiacal angels. Their disobedience provided the raison d’être for the sacrifice of Calvary. However, medieval exegetes argued that a compassionate Redeemer after the Resurrection had released from Limbo his primordial ancestors and the righteous who lived before him. Adam seems to step forward as if freed from the confines of his dark space. The more stationary Eve, however, holds a greenish-yellow citrus fruit in her right hand, which clearly alludes to the Tree of Knowledge in the story of Genesis. Identified as the Pomo d’Adamo (Adam’s Apple), it is indigenous to Portugal and the Canary Islands.10 Above Adam and Eve are half-lunette carvings in grisaille which respectively illustrate the “Sacrifice of Cain and Abel” and the “Murder of Abel.” These themes signify mankind’s inheritance after the Fall, that is, a proclivity to sin.11 The “Adoration of the Lamb” beneath the deësis is the central panel of five lower registers constituting the interior of Van Eyck’s polyptych. Illuminated by the mystical light of the Holy Spirit represented as a dove within an aureole, the panel concentrates on the Apocalyptic celebration of the Mass embodied in the sacrificial Lamb.12 This symbolism is suggested by the chalice which catches the spilt blood pouring from wound in the Lamb’s side, and the cluster of angels bearing attributes of the Passion and wafting incense burners.13 This outside “Chapel” of the 377. Elisabeth Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, edited by John Fleming and Hugh Honour (London-New York: Allen Lane-The Viking Press, 1973), 84–85, described the decorative blue-grey and reddish brown tiles of the floor. They contain alternating emblems of the Lamb of God, the name of Jesus (IECVC), monograms for Mary (M), Alpha and Omega (Α and ω), Principium (P), F (Finis) and AGLA (Atha Gibbor Leolam Adonay). To these motifs would also be added the repeated saltire of St. Andrew, represented as a x-shaped foliated cross. 10 James Snyder, Northern Renaissance Art, Painting, Sculpture and Graphic Arts from 1350 to 1575 (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1985), 96; idem, “”Jan van Eyck and Adam’s Apples,” Art Bulletin LVIII (1976): 511–15. 11 Claude Schmitt with the participation of Jean-Pierre Vernant et al., Eve et Pandora: la création de la femme (Paris: Gaillimard, 2001). Also see Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, “Jan van Eyck, Autonomisierung des Aktbildes und Geschlechterdifferenz,” Kritische Berichte XVII, No. 3 (1989): 78–99. The inscription below Adam and Eve read respectively: ADAM NOS IN MORTEM PRAECIPITAT (“Adam thrusts us into death”) and EVA OCCIDENDO OBFUIT (“Eve has afficted us with death”). See Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 86. 12 The antependium of the altar bears the words ECCE AGNUS DEI QUI TOLLIT PECCATA MUNDI (Gospel of John 1:29) IHESUS VIA VERITATS VITA (Gospel of John 14:6). See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 377. 13 Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 19, points out that the Medieval seal of Ghent displayed St. John the Baptist flanked by angels swinging incense burners. An angel

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Agnus Dei replaces the impressive variety of churches shown in the distant landscape.14 Considering that these monuments erected by the world’s nations held main altars and lateral chapels housing the relics of saints, the two uppermost groups of figures converging towards the “Lamb of God” summon the Apocalyptic imagery of the rising of the dead. In a meadow of eternal springtime and perpetual light, the two bands of saints carry palms which traditionally are associated with martyrdom. According to the witness of the Apocalypse (9:1–17) “ there was a great multitude … from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. Robed in white with “palm branches in their hands, “ they joined “all the angels” who “stood around the throne” singing hymns of “blessing, glory and wisdom and thanksgiving.” One of the elders asks the witness to identify those “robed in white,” and the witness responds: These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb … the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them … for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life. Approaching the altar on the left are the holy confessors — popes, bishops, cardinals, deacons and abbots — their rank denoted by vestments swinging a censer also surfaces at Santiago de Compostela among the reliefs of the “Epiphany” carved for the Puerta de la Azabachería. Late Gothic tombs beneath the choir of the Church of Our Lady (Onze-Lieve-Vrouw) in Bruges display frescoes of incense bearing angels. 14 Attempts have been made to identify the architectural components of the landscape, which include the recognizable towers of Utrecht and Ghent (Sint-Niklaaskerk). See Rolf Lauer, “Köln in Flanderen. Eine Domansicht auf dem Genter Altar,” Kölner Domblatt. Jahrbuch des Zentral-Dombau-Vereins LVII (1992): 309–14; R. van Elslande, “De SintSalvatorskathedraal als inspiratiebron voor van Eyck,” Het Brugs Ommeland XXVII (1987): 173–76, at 174, 176; R.-M. Hagen and R. Hagen, “Am Horizont leuchtet das himmlische Jerusalem,” Art. Das Kunst-magazin III (1989): 98–105; Aart J.J. Mekking, “Pro Turri Trajectensi: de positieve symboliek van de Domtoren in de stad Utrecht en op de aanbidding van het Lam Gods van de gebroeders Van Eyck,” Annus Quadriga mundi: opstellen over middeleeuwse kunst opgedragenaaan Prof. Dr. Anna C. Esmeijer (Utrecht: 1989): 129–51; Regnerus Richardus Post, Geert Grootes tractaat Contra Turrim Traiectensem teruggevonden (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1967), which concerns a treatise by Gerard Groote [1340– 1384] concerning the expense of the Utrecht monument at the cost of caring for the poor. Jan van Eyck likely visited the important center of Utrecht when he worked at The Hague for Jan of Bavaria, Count of Holland.

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and priestly regalia. Virgin martyrs, holy women and abbesses advance on the right (Figs. 7.4–7.5), and they compositionally are kindred to the maidens who walk towards the Lamb of God in the bas-de-page of the Virgo inter Virgines folio of the Turin Très Belles Heures.15 Five among the Ghent assembly can be securely identified by their attributes, and they are at the forefront of the group: St. Agnes with a lamb; St. Barbara with a tower; St. Catherine of Alexandria with her wheel; and St. Dorothea with a basket of flowers. Philip the Good had four sisters, and possibly they either were named after or born near the feast day of these vierzehn nothelfer, the auxiliary saints known as the fourteen “holy helpers” of the Virgin Mary. The fourth-century St. Agnes (fd January 21) was the patron saint of Philip’s youngest sister, Agnes of Burgundy (1407–m. 1425–1476), the wife of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon (1401–1456). When the Treaty of Amiens was signed on April 17, 1423, an alliance was established between the Duke of Burgundy and John of Lancaster, (1389–1435) Duke of Bedford, and regent of the young Henry VI. The third signatory to the Treaty was John V, the Duke of Brittany. As per the wishes of her brother, Anne of Burgundy (1404–1432) on May 13, 1423 married John of Lancaster.16 A folio (257b) of the famous Bedford Book of Hours (Fig. 7.6), created just prior to Christmas of 1430, shows the Duchess of Bedford kneeling in prayer before St. Anne with side vignettes of the Holy Kinship, members of Christ’s extended family. On the other hand, another miniature in the same prayer book opens the “Hours of All Saints” (f. 126). The main panel includes Saints Clare, Agnes, Margaret of Antioch, Anne and Gertrude of Nivelles. Of the five marginal quatrefoils, one depicts St. George and three show martyrdoms of male saints: the beheading of Denis, the roasting of Lawrence, and the stoning of Stephen. The remaining quatrefoil presents the martyrdom of the fourth-century St. Catherine of Alexandria (fd November 25). Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Character and Origins, 2 vols. (New York: Harper and Row, 1971 rpt. of Harvard University Press, 1953 edition), II, 239 and I, Plate 159 (photograph of the folio prior to the 1904 fire of the Turin Royal Library). Consult Ludwig von Baldass, Jan van Eyck (London: Phaidon Publishers Inc., 1952), 92 note 4 (“Adoration of the Lamb”) and notes 1–3, who believes the miniatures of the Turin Hours were not illuminated before 1432. The holy virgins wear flower-chaplets. See Alice Planche, “La Parure du Chef: Les Chapeaux de Fleurs,” Razo VII (Nice: 1987): 133–44. 16 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 9–10. He cites( 9 note 1): Dom Urbain Plancher [1667–1750], Histoire générale et particulière de Bourgogne, 4 vols. (Dijon: A. de Fay-L. N. Frantin, 1739–1781), IV, 66–71; IV, No. 23 (Treaty of Amiens); Barthélemy A. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, “Anne de Bourgogne 15

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Philip the Good’s sister Marie (c. 1399/1400–1473) in 1406 married Duke Adolph (1373–1448) of Cleves, a northwest Germany region which, with Guelders, Philip the Good sought to transform into Burgundian client states.17 St. Barbara of Nicodema (fd December 4), however, not only was the patroness of architects, masons and sailors, she was invoked as a protector against sudden death, fire and lightening. The dexter flank of the Duke of Cleves’ herald consisted of eight rays emanating from a center core with fleur-de-lis points, a pattern somewhat reminiscent of thunderbolts. Philip the Good’s eldest sister was Marguerite (1393–1441) and in 1412 she had married Louis, the Dauphin of France (1396–1415), who died at Agincourt. As a repercussion of the “Triple Alliance” formed by the Treaty of Amiens, Marguerite was persuaded to wed Arthur of Brittany (1393–1453), Count of Richemont and the brother of John V. Their marriage occurred on October 10, 1423.18 In his “Adoration of the Lamb” Jan van Eyck did not include St. Margaret of Antioch with her attribute dragon among the virgin martyrs. The French name Marguerite translates as “daisy.” St. Dorothea (fd February 6), whose name means “gift of God,” typically was portrayed with a pannier of three roses and three apples. Pious legend relates an angel gave her the basket with flowers and fruit from the Garden of Paradise. However, the fourth-century virgin martyr also was a native of Cappadocia, Asia Minor’s “land of beautiful horses” and birthplace of St. George the dragon slayer. Late Gothic artists often conflated St. Margaret of Antioch with the Princess rescued by George who bridled the dragon. Possibly Dorothea, a popular saint in Germany, also was identified as the maiden saved by the Roman warrior, who had similarly refused to worship idols.

et le testament de Bedford,” Bibliothèue de l’École des Chartres XCV (1934): 284–326; Ethel Carleton Williams, My Lord of Bedford, 1389–1435; being a life of John of Lancaster, first Duke of Bedford, brother of Henry V and Regent of France (London: Longmans, 1963), 97–105; Charles Arthur John Armstrong, “Le double monarchie France-Angleterre et la Maison de Bourgogne, 1420–1435. Le décline d’une alliance,” Annales de Bourgogne XXXVII (1965): 81–112, at 83–85: Richard Vaughan and Charles Arthur John Armstrong, England, France and Burgundy in the Fifteenth Century (London: Phaidon Press, 1983). 17 Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy, 289–96. Also consult: Heinz Will, Maria von Burgund, Herzogin von Kleve (Kleve: Boss, 1967). 18 Plancher, Histoire généralet particulaire de Bourgogne, IV, No. 311 (Marriage Contract of Arthur and Margaret); Barthélemy A. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, “Le connétable de Richemont, seigneur bourguignon,” Annales de Bourgogne VII (1935): 309–36 and VIII (1936): 7–30; 106–38.

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Two additional female saints favored by the House of Burgundy group of nuns are crowned with floral wreaths to signify the fragrance of their virtues. The most visible abbess with a pastoral staff probably is the Benedictine St. Gertrude of Nivelles (626–659; fd March 17), whose sister Begga also was a saint. Raised in the pious household of Pepin of Landen and Itta, Gertrude had refused an offer of marriage by the Merovingian king Dagobert I, electing instead to become the superior of the double monastery at Nivelles. She ruled her community with extraordinary wisdom acquired from constant reading of the Scriptures, and achieved renown for her hospitality to monks and wayfarers. Gertrude was venerated as a guardian of travelers in the Low Countries. In front of the Benedictine abbess is another patroness of pilgrims, St. Ursula (fd. October 21), who undoubtedly was invoked for safe travel by the Ghenter Guild of Boatmen, whose meeting house on the Graslei was rebuilt in the early sixteenth century (Figs. 7.7–7.8). Recognized by her attribute of a golden arrow, this daughter of a British Christian king was martyred by the Huns in Cologne after making a pilgrimage to Rome in the late fourth or early fifth century. All members of her retinue were slaughtered, including her betrothed, a prince of Brittany, and undecim millia virgines (more likely eleven attendants).19 Though more will soon be said about the symbolism of Ursula’s golden arrow in a chivalric age, the virgin martyr was an exalted saint in Portugal due to influence of Queen Philippa of Lancaster. If Jan van Eyck intended to provide portraits of Philip IV’s four sisters as Saints Agnes, Barbara, Catherine of Alexandria and Dorothea, then perhaps the Duchess of Burgundy’s half-sister Brites (Beatrice) was depicted as Ursula. On November 26, 1405 the Archbishop of Canterbury had presided over the marriage of Brites to Thomas Fitzalan, the Earl of Arundel at Lambeth, and in 1413 she was elected to the English Order of the Garter (Fig. 7.9). Isabel of Portugal encountered rough seas on her voyage to Sluis in October of 1429, storms which cost over half her fleet and necessitated a layover in Plymouth.20 Assuredly during that life-threatening ordeal, she and her pious attendants invoked the saints associated with travel, particularly Ursula and the virgin-martyrs of Cologne. Jan van Eyck was a witness to the

Guy de Tervarent, La légende de Sainte Ursule: dans la littérature et l’art du moyen âge, 2 vols. (Paris: Les Éditions G van Oest, 1931). 20 Eric George Millar, “Les principaux manuscrits à peintures du Lambeth Palace à Londres,” Bulletin de la Société Française de reproduction de manuscrits à peintures VIII (1924) and IX (1925). 19

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turbulence of the storms on that voyage and the Infanta’s devotion to the princess of Brittany would not have escaped his notice. Jan van Eyck was an artist of incredible observation as proven by the verdant meadow around the Lamb of God (Figs. 7.10–7.11). Peppered with delicate flowers, it is a botanist’s delight. Among the forty-one species of plants, vegetation is included from Portugal and Spain, inter alia, palms, date trees, cypresses and umbrella pines, all a testament to his visual acuity during the period of his diplomatic travels.21 The centerpiece altar of Mount Zion is the destination of the righteous. With its Pascal Lamb and the chalice of spilt blood, the open-air chapel elicits the memory of sacrifices from the Hebrew Bible which were pleasing to God: the redolent thanksgiving of Noah; the offering of a beloved son by an obedient Abraham; the feast of the Tabernacles originating with Moses’ Exodus. In the Pauline sense of the universal Church open to the world, an unequivocal supplementary meaning can be imparted to the splendid outside altar — unity in the Lamb’s body and blood through the sacrament of the Eucharist. Complimenting the mystical imagery of the “sacrificial stone” sheathed in Pentecostal red and covered with a pristine cloth, is the octagonal fons vitae (Figs. 7.12–7.13). This basin symbolizes another sacrament, baptism, and specifically, Josse’s initiation into the “Kingdom of God.” 22 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, 226, mentions the change in vegetation and comments that X-ray examination indicates the scenery in the pentaptych was intended to be continuous. See Alfons Lieven Dierick, “Van Eyck – Botanicus,” Monumenten en Landschappen V, No. 4 (1986): 38–39; S. Segal, “Die Pflanzen im Genter Altar,” De art et libris. Festschrift Erasmus 1934–1984 (Amsterdam: 1984): 403–20; K. van Assche, “Planten bij Van Eyck,” Monumenten en landschappen XV, No. 1 (1996): 8–25; I.E. Doetsch, “Die Metamorphose des Löwenzahns im Lichte der Auferstehung. Seine Symbolik in der mittelalterlichen Kunst, insbesondere der westfälischen Tafelmalerei des 15. Jahrhunderts,” Westfalen LXXIII (1995): 1–70 at 54 (Ghent Altarpiece); Esther Gallwitz, Ein underbarer Garten: die Pfanzen des Genter Altars (Frankfurt-am-Main, 1996); Moritz Willkomm, Die strand- und steppengebiete der Iberischen halbinsel und deren vegetation (Leipzig: F. Fleischer, 1852); idem., Spanien und die Balearen; Reiseerlebnisse und Naturschilderungen nebst wissenschaftlichen Zusätzen und Erläuterungen (Berlin: T. Grieben, 1876); idem., Grundzüge der pflanzenverbreitung auf der Iberischen halbinsel (Leipzig, W. Engelmann, 1896). 22 Barbara G. Lane, The Altar and the Altarpiece. Sacramental Themes in Early Netherlandish Painting (New York: 1984), 43, 50, 137–143; Elisabeth Dhanens, “De Fontein op het Lamb Gosretabel door de gebroeder Hubert en Jan van Eyck,” Academiae Analecta. Mededelingen van Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten L, No. 2 (1989): 3–17. Craig Harbison, “Visions and Meditations in Early Flemish Painting,” Simiolus XV (1985): 87–118, at 106–7 and 112 note 48 (Ghent Altarpiece). 21

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Water jets from two groups of dragonish gargoyles attached to a slender central column which culminates in a gilded statuette of an angel pouring water from vases held in his hands. The objects recall the judgment scales held by the Apocalyptic weigher of souls, St. Michael, whose name means “He who is like God.” Late Gothic artists typically represented the Cardinal Virtue of Temperance as a woman transferring liquid from one vessel to another, diluting wine with water in a priestly act. Water gushes from a gargoyle’s head at the base of the font and surrounds the basin in a shallow stream so transparent that the bed sparkles with gold, bdellium and polished red carnelian. Crystal-clear water also flows to a single channel which runs apparently beyond the foreground grass. Inscribed on the rim of the basin is the primal source for the wellspring, the Sedes (seat) of Christ.23 The Tree of Knowledge The carved centerpiece of the militant St. Michael, in addition to the archangel’s depiction on a lectern of the “Singing Angels” relate to the eschatological theme of the Ghent Altarpiece. As mentioned earlier, Van Eyck’s original retable of the “Fountain of Life” does not present an altercation or diatribe in the Medieval sense between Ecclesia and the Synagogue. The Hebrew banners with their inscriptions from the Song of Songs underscore marriage as a metaphor to describe the relationship between God and Israel (Hosea:3) and the Avis court’s belief that the First Chosen, Jerusalem the “Bride,” would be redeemed at the end of days. The central ritual of the Jewish marriage ceremony was the symbolic escorting of the veiled bride into the groom’s house (Genesis 29:23–25; Song of Songs 4:1). The removal The rim of the well is inscribed: HIC EST FONS AQUE VITE PROCEDENS DE SEDE DEI + AGNI. (Apocalypse 7:17 and 21.6). See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 377. 23

As noted by Dhanens, Van Eyck, The Ghent Altarpiece, 98, Rupert von Deutz “repeatedly refers to the Fountain of Life, citing the words of Revelation which are summed up in the inscription on the fountain in the Altarpiece…(Apocalypse 22: 1). Rupert links this text with the twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit, which may perhaps explain the twelve jets of water which sprout from the bronze column of the fountain in the Altarpiece.” Dhanens, 142 note 60, refers to the writings of Rupert von Deutz in Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), CLXVIII (Commentaria: Sermon on the Mount) 253–5, 797; CLXIX (De victoria Verbi Dei), 36–9, 520–22, 1206; CLXX (De divinis officiis), 274–76.

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of the bridal veil signaled the commencement of singing and feasting. Therefore, the cloths covering the eyes of the Jews in the Eyckian replicas of the “Fountain of Life” do not signify “blindness.” Rather they portend the bringing of the righteous “Bride Israel” to the joyful banquet Bridegroom’s House. Ascribed to the hand of St. Augustine (354–c.440), the Sermo contra Judeos, Paganos et Arianos de Symbolo (Patrologia Latina XLII, 1117–30), a tractate supposedly written in Spain about the sixth century, has been proposed as the source for the Ghent Altarpiece’s arrangement of foreground figures in the “Adoration of the Lamb.” Though the Sermo patently was influential in Jan van Eyck’s representation of the Hebrew prophets on the left side of his composition (Fig. 7.14), the artist drew from his knowledge of the literary tastes of the Avis court in depicting righteous pagans among the group. Pseudo-Augustine does mention three classes of witnesses for Christ. The first testimonial is provided by the prophets ex lege, who are named as Isaiah, Baruch (Jeremiah’s secretary), Daniel, Moses, David and Habakkuk. The second ensemble, ex gente vestra, includes witnesses for Christ: Simeon (Luke 2: 29–31); Zachariah, the priestly father of John the Baptist; and John the Baptist. The final testimonial is given by the pagans, ex gentibus, and the Sermo quotes from Virgil, Nebuchadnezzar and the Sibyl. In the right foreground of the “Adoration of the Lamb” are the original twelve apostles who served to witness that the Christ they followed was indeed the Messiah: Simon Peter, Andrew, James the Great, John the Evangelist, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the Less, Jude or Thaddeus, Simon the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot. One additional figure included among the brown-robed disciples probably represents Matthias, who replaced Judas. The second figure in the same type of mantle with a long beard and bald head must be St. Paul, who referred to himself as an apostle in his Letters to the Galicians (1:1, 11–12). The dextra group also consists of richly adorned popes, bishops and other ecclesiastics of the Church, impossible to securely identify, but whose biblical commentaries shaped “Christian Theology.” Directly opposite the “apostolic” Church, and also infused with the rays of divine knowledge, are the twelve Hebrew prophets. Between Isaiah, who is hit directly by a ray of light, and a blue-turbaned Daniel, they are probably the most often quoted: Habakkuk, Jeremiah, Baruch, Ezechiel, Hosea, Jonah, Amos, Obadiah, Joel and Nahum. His back turned from the cluster of prophets, one stately bearded figure in a red robe and matching headdress might be identified as the priest Zacharias (Fig.

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7.15), whose features are strikingly similar to those of his son in the deësis. In front of Zachariah is a white-bearded sage attired in a green wool robe and speckled fur hat. Hit by a ray of light, he perhaps is Simeon, the prophet of the Presentation, who forecast Christ would be a lumen ad revelationem gentium et gloriam plebis tuae Israel (light of revelation unto the Gentiles and a glory to thy people Israel (Luke 2:32). Behind Zachariah is a figure wearing an ermine crown, conceivably King David, author of the Psalms and founder of Jerusalem. Certainly the remaining patriarchs in the upper row are impossible to securely identify, but one individual wears a golden domed crown, the rim of which is studded with gemstones. Because of his exotic headdress, not unlike Daniel’s blue turban, he plausibly could be King Nebuchadnezzar. To the left of the Assyrian King is another grey-bearded figure who displays an elaborate red headdress with a protruding front rim. The Hebrew letters have been read as keywords from Isaiah 46: 13: “I will grant deliverance in Zion and give my glory to Israel,” a passage which has been related to Simeon’s Judeo-Christian hymn Nunc dimittis. Possibly this imposing man represents Moses. The Church drew analogies between this deliverer of the Israelites and Christ the Redeemer. Next to Moses is a red-bearded figure with a monk’s tonsure. Could this oddly placed ecclesiastic be the author of the Sermo? Prior to his conversion to Christianity, St. Augustine entered the orbit of a circle of Christian Neo-Platonists headed by Ambrose, bishop of Milan. Introduced to the writings of Plotinus and Porphyry, he retired from teaching rhetoric at the university and withdrew to a villa at Cassiciacum to engage in philosophical discussion. Due in part to the prayers of St. Monica, his Christian mother, Augustine returned to Milan in 387 and was baptized at Easter by Bishop Ambrose.24 Two figures standing near the redRobert Austin Markus, Saeculum: History and Society in the Theology of St. Augustine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 78, comments: “Both the vision of a cosmic orderand the idea of human society as a means of man’s teliosis within the order are commonplaces of classical thought.” Markus goes on to remark, 80, that St. Augustine regarded the disciplina of the liberal arts as a reflection of the disciplina of divine providence. This ideology appears to explain the inclusion of classical authors within the setting of Jan van Eyck’s Adoration of the Lamb. For further reading, see: Arthur Hilary Armstrong and Robert Austin Markus, Christian Faith and Greek Philosophy (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1964); Arthur Hilary Armstrong, St. Augustine and Christian Platonism (Villanova, PA: Villanova University Press, 1967); H.J. Blumenthal and Robert Austin Markus (eds), Neoplatonism and Early Christian Thought: Essays in Honour of A.H. Armstrong (London: Variorum Publications, 24

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bearded monk flank Nebuchadnezzar. The anomaly of their bare heads has led to their identification as St. John the Baptist and his mother Elizabeth. Though the dark-haired bearded man resembles Zacharias, and the Baptist is mentioned as a testis fidelis et amicus sponsi in the Pseudo-Augustine’s Sermo, the woman more likely is the Erythraean Sibyl to whom the tractate ascribes the prophecy of Christ’s birth, passion and resurrection, as well as the second adventus.25 Behind the twelve Hebrew prophets and in front of Simeon, Nebuchadnezzar and St. John the Baptist, are several prominent philosophers, three of whom can be identified based upon the twigs which they hold. All are pagan authors. The first is crowned with a poet’s wreath of laurel. A botanical investigation of his twig’s leaves has resulted in the certain identification of it as Citrus medica or Malus Assyria, which is the same fruit appearing in Jan van Eyck’s panel of “Eve” (Fig. 7.16). Also known as the Malus Adami or Pomus Adami native to the Portuguese Canary Islands, the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge has a pagan counterpart, the golden apple of Eris (Strife) tossed at the wedding banquet of Peleus and Thetis. At the behest of Jupiter, Mercury gave the Trojan prince Paris the apple inscribed with the message “To the Fairest.” He chose Venus (Pulchritude) over Hera (Power) and Pallas Athena (Wisdom), subsequently fell in love with Helen of Sparta, and thus sparked off the Trojan War. Though the wedding of Peleus and Thetis was described by Lucan (39 A.D. in Córdoba–65), author of Pharsalia (De Bello Civili), the fame of the Iliad and Odyssey would make the Greek poet Homer the most logical candidate for the laurel-crowned poet in white. An engaging moralistic miniature of the late fifteenth century by the French illuminator Robinet Testard falls within the tradition of the late Gothic Romance of the Rose, but it borrows its imagery directly from Homer (Fig. 7.17). A poet is depicted beside “Desire,” shown as a flamboyant Paris whose sexual arousal is insinuated by his sword. Greeted by Dame Nature, the poet must decide among three ladies within the castle garden, the parterres of which resemble a chessboard: an Eve-like Venus beneath a Tree of Knowledge laden with 1981); Robert Austin Markus, Sacred and Secular: Studies on Augustine and Latin Christianity (Aldershot, Hampshire, GB-Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1994). 25 “Haec de Christi nativitate, passione et resurrectione, atque de secundo ejus adventu dicta sunt.” See Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), XLII: 1126. Consult Dequeker, “Jewish Symbolism in the Ghent Altarpiece of Jan van Eyck (1432),” 354 and note 16.

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forbidden fruit, vita voluptas; Juno, a noblewoman signifying worldly power, vita activa; and Pallas Athena, the maid sitting humbly on the ground, vita contemplativa. Having already succumbed to sensual beauty, as suggested by the background vignette, the poet gazes in the direction of the farthest maiden, “Wisdom.” The Counts of Brabant, who included Philip the Good by 1432, traced their remote ancestry to the ancient Trojans. This belief may explain the inclusion of Homer in the composition of the “Adoration of the Lamb.” However, the Avis princes of Portugal and their sister Princess Isabel were weaned on the exploits of heroes described in the Iliad and Odyssey. In the latter epic (XXII, 230), Pallas Athena reminds Odysseus that Troy was taken by his device. Strabo (63 B.C.–21 A.D.), Greek geographer and historian, studied the etymology of the town Olissipo and concluded that Odysseus was Lisbon’s founder. He additionally gleaned from his reading of Homer that Tartarus, the place where Odysseus consulted with the Shades, was the region of Cádiz, the Phoenician kingdom of Tartessos. Strabo further identified the Elysian Fields as the land adjacent to Tartarus, the fertile valleys of Portugal’s Douro and Guadiana Rivers.26 In front of Homer is a man in black robes with a red hat (Fig. 7.18) who holds a twig which has been botanically identified as myrtle. He must be Cicero (106–44 BCE), whose Hortensius had inspired Augustine at nineteen to study philosophy. Cicero’s essays and orations were greatly admired by the Portuguese court. Prince Duarte’s Leal Conselheiro (The Loyal Counselor), which elevated the just conduct of João I in the temporal sphere, was greatly influenced by ancient perceptions of the virtú extolled in the works of Cicero.27 Among the volumes Duarte cites in his treatise is a Memorial das Virtudes, which was based in part upon Cicero’s “Rhetoric” and Aristotle’s “Ethic” and authored by a Spanish ecclesiastical advisor.28 Myrtle is featured in Cicero’s Somnium Scipionis, which recounts 26 Strabo, III, ii, 12–13. See Leonard Bacon, The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões (New York: The Hispanic Society of America, 1950), 306 Notes. 27 Prince Duarte’s Leal Conselheiro is in the Archives of the Torre do Tombo (MS 1928). See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, o qual fez Dom Duarte. Rey de Portugal e do Algarve e Senhor de Cepta, ed. Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand, 1942), 208 note 2. Duarte elaborates about Cicero’s De Officiis in Ch. LVIII and his brother’s translation, O livro de Tullyo De Oficiis. According to Piel (Preface Commentary, XII), Marco Tullio, o qual tirou em linguajem o Ifante Dom Pedro, listed in the inventory of Duarte’s library (MS 3390 Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon, #51), survives as a codex in Madrid. 28 The Memorial de Virtudes is mentioned in Ch. L of the Leal Conselheiro. A Castilian translation of the treatise is housed in the library of the Palace-Monastery of the Escorial.

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the dream of the Scipio, grandson and namesake of the Roman general who defeated the Carthaginian Hannibal in the Punic Wars. Scipio Africanus the Major, to whom the Holy Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira was compared, appears to the younger Scipio in a vision and tells him about the heavenly abode of noble and honorable men.”29 The great warrior describes the stars as an aura of light guiding virtuous souls to their eternal home and the harmony of Elysium. Myrtle additionally was a plant sacred to the alluring Venus. According to Scipio Africanus, the sun was the “regulator of the other lights,” the stars and the planets, and the moderator of a firmament which resonated with seven different tones.”30 Crowns of laurel, the plant sacred to the sun god Apollo and emblem of poetic achievement are worn by the foreground warriors in Van Eyck’s panel of the “Holy Knights.” The Avis princes had fought victoriously in North Africa. Their documented literary interests not only reveal a thorough familiarity with the great authors of classical antiquity, but also an admiration of Arthurian chivalry. The greatest knights of Camelot, like Homer’s Odysseus and Cicero’s Scipio Africanus, were chaste warriors who rejected the sensual temptations of Venus’s “myrtle.” The tower of Mértola at the confluence of the Rivers Guadiana and Oeiras The author has been suggested to be Don Alfonso de Cartagena, counselor to King Duarte, Bishop of Burgos and “Doctor” of Santiago. In his commentary notes to the Leal Conselheiro, Piel (207 note 1) provides the prologue to the codice: Commigo pensando determiné traslader en nuestra comun lengua castellana un gracioso e noble tratado que de virtudes fallé, el qual de los dichos de los Morales filosofos compuso el de loable memoria D. Alfonso de Santa Maria, obispo de Burgos, al muy ilustre e muy inclyto Sr. D. Duarte, rey de Portugal, seyendo primero principe, al qual ‘Memorial de virtudes’ intituló. Piel states Cartegena had access to a Portuguese translation of the original Latin manuscript. Consult Joaquim de Carvalho, “A erudição de Eannes de Zurara,” Boletim da Biblioteca da Universidade de Coimbra VII (n.d., ca. 1953): 127–32. The works of Aristotle enjoyed wide popularity in Late Gothic and Early Renaissance Europe. See C. Richter-Sherman, Imaging Aristotle. Verbal and Visual Representation in Fourteenth-Century France (Berkeley-Los Angeles-London: University of California Press, 1995); Ezio Ornato, “Les humanistes français et la redécouverte des classiques,” Préludes à la Renaissance: Aspects de la vie intellectuelle en France au XVe siècle, eds. Carla Bozzolo and Ezio Ornato (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1992): 1–45. 29 Bacon, The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões, 31. 30 Cicero, Dream of Scipio, 4.2. Consult Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio [Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis], translated by William Harris Stahl. Commentary on the Dream of Scipio, edited and translated by William Harris Stahl (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990); idem, Martianus Capella and the Seven Liberal Arts (New York, Columbia University Press, 1971); Kathi Meyer-Baer, The Music of the Spheres and the Dance of Death (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970).

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is situated twenty-five miles south of Beja, the ducal estate of Prince João (1400–1442), and about the same distance north of Castro Marim. Van Eyck perhaps visited Beja and Mértola during his lengthy stay in Lisbon, as the estates of Prince João were about ninety-five miles from Lisbon and close to the historical town of Évora.31 Silhouetted high above the Moorish town walls, King Dinis’ castle of Mértola (ca. 1290–1325) looks down on the eleventh-century mosque he converted into a five-aisled igreja matriz (parish church) with flanking towers topped by mudéjar pineapple-top merlons. Dante in his Paradiso questions Jupiter’s Eagle to learn why virtuous heathens who had never heard about Christ were excluded from heaven. Responding that the human intellect was unable to explore the depths of divine justice, the Eagle states: “ … full many shall cry aloud: Christ! Christ!/ Who in the Last Day shall be sent to lodge/Farther from Him than they who know not Christ.”32 The Eagle who symbolically speaks for the collective “Just Judges” proceeds to denounce several “unjust rulers of Europe,” including Lusitania’s King Dinis (1279–1325): “And Portugal shall be held up to blame/With Norway, and the Rascian who laid eyes/On Venice coin and forged his own ill-fame.” Dante groups King Dinis with Hakkon, king of Norway (1299–1319) and Stephen Ouros, King of Dalmatia, who, minted coins which counterfeited the Venetian ducat. The first Cantos of the Paradiso opens with Dante’s vision of the heavenly spheres and a vast sea of light, and he pertinently cites a pagan mystery to insinuate that a poet had to experience the agony of Marsyas’s flaying before obtaining the laurel of Apollo. The story of Marsyas’s punishment defined the dichotomy of “Dionysian passion” and “Apollonian reason.” Knowing this, and the Maria Angela V. da Rocha Beirante, Évora na idade média (Coimbra: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian : Junta Nacional de Investigação Científica e Tecnológica, 1995); Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Évora (Lisbon: Emprêsa Nacional de Publicidade, 1932); Mário Tavares Chicó, A Catedral de Évora na Idade Média (Évora: Edicões Nazareth, 1946); idem., Catedral de Évora, esculturas, sec. XV e XVI (Lisbon: Éditora Litoral, 1946); idem., A arquitectura gótica em Portugal (Lisbon-London: Livros Horizonte-Capa de Moura George and Partners, 1968, 2nd ed.); Gabriel Pereira, Documentos historicos da cidade de Évora, 2 vols. (Évora: Typographia de Casa pia, 1885–87) and rpt. (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1998); idem., Loios. antigo mosteiro ou casa de S. Joâo Evangelista (Évora: Minerva Eborense de J. J. Baptista, 1886; idem., Estudos eborenses (Évora: Ediçoes Nazareth, 1947, 2nd ed. amplified). 32 Dante Alighieri [1265–1321], The Divine Comedy: The Inferno, The Purgatorio, and The Paradiso, translated by John Ciardi (New York: New American Library, 2003), Paradiso: Canto XIX (139–40). John Freccero, Dante’s cosmos (Binghamton, NY: Center for Medieval & Renaissance Studies, State University of New York at Binghamton, 1998). 31

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historic role of St. Elizabeth of Portugal as peacemaker between her husband Dinis and his rebellious son Afonso IV (1291: r. 1325–1357), Dante placed Lusitania’s “Dionysius” with the Eagle’s unjust rulers. Van Eyck presents an entirely contradictory image of King Dinis in his panel of the “Holy Knights” who ride in the company of the “Just Judges.” Like the arcane mysteries of the ancient Romans, which involved rites of purification, sacrifices, and priestly revelations, the science of alchemy which greatly interested the Avis Prince Duarte, was practiced close to his Lisbon residence, on the street of goldsmiths near royal house of St. Eloi. Alchemical processes were associated with spiritual refinement, with lead representing the preliminary base metal, copper an interim product, and gold the ultimate goal. Revisiting Mértola, commercial center first settled by the Phoenicians of Carthage and then the Romans, the eponymic source for the town seems to be Myrtea, the Venus-like goddess described by Pliny to whom myrtus was sacred. Horace in his Epistles (1,15), however, refers to warm, sulphuric vapors rising from the earth where myrtle grew. The soil around Mértola impedes agriculture, but it is rich in lead, manganese and copper. Ancient copper miles have been discovered six miles east of the town and coins minted in the second century B.C. Myrteolus was the adjective Romans used to describe the chestnut brown of the myrtle’s blossoms perhaps because the plant recalled the luster of the metal used to make coins. When King Sancho II scaled the walls surrounding the Moorish citadel of Mirtolah in 1238, he gave the fortress to the Order of Santiago, the institution of which Prince João was “Grão Mestre.” Mertola probably continued to produce coins for the royal treasury established at Leiria Castle in 1375 by Fernand I, King Dinis’s grandson and King João I’s half-brother. The figure behind Cicero holds a twig with leaves which have been identified tentatively as willow. However, this branch most likely is mistletoe considering that Pseudo-Augustine in the Sermo mentions one important pagan author, Vergilius. Virgil (70–19 BCE), wrote his last famous book of The Aeneid during the reign of Augustus, the Caesar under whose system of justice, Christ was executed in Jerusalem. Similar to the younger Scipio in Cicero’s Somnium Scipionis, the Trojan Prince Aeneas has an experience relating to the afterlife. Like Odysseus, the heroic son of Venus descends to the underworld. Seeking to consult his father Anchises, he is accompanied by the Cumaean Sibyl and protected by a sprig of mistletoe. Prince Pedro, elder brother of Duchess Isabel, was so fond of classical literature that when he passed through Florence in 1428, he quickly visited the famed library

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assembled by the Portuguese Abbot Gomes Eanes at the Benedictine La Badia. Among the treasures he saw was an original text of Cicero’s De Officiis. In haste to sail home in time for Prince Duarte’s September wedding, he evidently was interested in translating the work personally or having an expert provide a copy after his return to Portugal. The Duke of Coimbra’s Livro dos Ofícios was dedicated to King Duarte (r. 1433–1438).33 Identifying other writers of antiquity beyond those holding leafy branches is difficult, but because Homer, Cicero and Virgil were revered classical authors at the Avis court, two additional writers can be suggested. Portrayed in green wool robes and a casual tan hat perhaps is Horace (65–8 BCE), a colleague of Virgil in his early years, and a friend of Cicero’s son. His Odes and Epistles were enjoyed by King João I and the Avis princes, who admired his ideals of moderation. The Portuguese royals additionally were fond of Horace’s Satires which described the benefits associated with a rural life of otium. Standing beside Horace on the far left side of Van Eyck’s “Adoration of the Lamb” in a prominent hatless figure dressed in a broad red mantle. Though the man with a long grey double-pointed beard has been identified as St. Jerome (341–420), Doctor of the Early Christian Church, he lacks the hat worn by other cardinals in the “Adoration of the Lamb” and appears in the Detroit Eyckian St. Jerome in his Study. Jan either intended the figure in red robes to be Seneca (4 BCE–65 ACE), the famed Roman Stoic who hailed from Córdoba, or he preferred to have the identity of this stately philosopher remain ambiguous. About 382, Pope Damasus in Rome directed Jerome to produce a Latin translation of the Bible (Vulgate) from the Greek version of the Septuagint and extant Hebrew manuscripts. Like Jerome who evidenced a life-long passion for the classics, Prince Pedro aspired to translate ancient texts. His most famous work, Da Virtuosa Bemfeitoria, reiterated ideas presented in Seneca’s De Beneficiis and theories Francis Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal (Cambridge, Mass: Cambridge University Press, 1961), 51, mentions this point and also Vasco Fernandes de Lucena as a possible translator. He additionally conjectures (328 note 41) Prince Pedro’s interest in Cicero was stimulated before his European sojourn by Alfonso García de Santa María (Alonso de Cartagena), the Spanish ambassador in Portugal of King Juan II of Castile in 1421, 1423–1424. He cites Guido Battelli, “O Infante Dom Pedro, Duque de Coimbra, em Florença, Portucale XIII (1940): 153–54; Prince Pedro, Livro dos Ofícios de Marco Tullio Ciceram, ed. Joseph Maria Piel (Coimbra: Por Ordem da Universidade 1948), xiii–xiv; Francisco Cantera Burgos, Alvar Garcia de Santa Maria y su familia de conversos; historia de la Judería de Burgos y de sus conversos más egregios (Madrid: Instituto Arias Montano, 1952), 419, 459. 33

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of the Christian moralists. It was written between 1415 and 1425, prior to Jan van Eyck’s visit to Portugal.34 Behind Seneca are a few additional ancient Romans. Though they cannot be securely identified, the Renaissance interest in the writings of Ovid, Martial, Statius and Lucan compels their presence among the authors representing “pagan philosophy.” The twigs of myrtle, Pomus Adami, mistletoe, provide imagery related to the Edenic Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life. The foreground figures disposed to the left and right of the Fons Vitae — classical poets and philosophers, Hebrew prophets and patriarchs, apostolic messengers and Christian theologians — combine to reveal the sum total of human wisdom. The rays of light which fall upon both foreground groups intimate all human achievement is the result of divine inspiration. The Cavalcade of Just Judges Philip the Good was in Dijon when his son Josse was baptized, a documented absence which supports his wife’s active role in orchestrating the event at Sint-Janskerk. The inclusion of Avis portraits in the attic area above the “Annunciation,” and subtle references to Portugal throughout the polyptych, suggest Jan van Eyck must have consulted with the Duchess when he was engaged by Vijd to complete the commission. The “Adoration of the Lamb of God” elicits the “Golden Fleece” of Duke Phillip the Good’s newly founded chivalric order (January 10, 1430). In equal measure, the “Ship of Faith” is a Christian equivalent to Jason’s Argo, a Trojan “Ship of State” which sailed in quest of the legendary ram skin. Moreover, the Argo has a pertinent association with the Sibylline imagery of Van Eyck’s exterior panels. 34 Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra, O livro da virtuosa bemfeitoria, ed. Joaquim Costa (Porto: Empresa Industrial Gráfica do Porto, 1940; 3rd ed. 1946 ). The text is listed in the 1521 Inventory of King Manuel’s Wardrobe: an “illuminated manuscript on vellum composed by the Infante Pedro with a brocade cover and two silver clasps.” See Annemarie Jordan [Schwend], Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580): A Bibliographic and Documentary Survey, M.A. Thesis (Washington, DC: The George Washington University, 1985), 172, who confirms that a copy of the book is in the Biblioteca Nacional of Madrid. Also consult J.M. Castro, “A Biblia no Leal Conselheiro,” Didaskalia I (Coimbra, 1971): 251–61. A copy of Prince Pedro’s manuscript is listed in the inventory of Duarte (MS. 3390, #47). Duarte was fond of the writings of Seneca. Recorded in his library were: Epistolas de Seneca com outros Trattados (#12) and Declaração sobre as Epistolas de Seneca (#15). He also possessed a volume entitled Dialectica de Aristotles, #9.

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According to Valerius Flaccus’s Argonauticon, timber from the oracular oak of Dodona was embedded into the bow of the ship and gave advice to the navigators when it was needed. The stars guided seamen on long journeys, and in the Argonauticon,, the Jason’s vessel is transposed to a constellation.35 Together the side panels of the Just Judges and Holy Knights form a bold cavalcade of contemporary and past travelers, all chivalric defenders of Christ, the Sol justitiae. The Just Judges (Fig. 7.19) were studied intently by Erwin Panofsky, and he could not account for their inclusion in an Allerheiligenbild.36 Stating the secular group had no hagiological status and did not include a single saint, he concluded that they did not constitute a chorus beatorum but rather, were “ideal representatives” of “living dignitaries” aspiring to be included in the cour céleste.37 The Justi Judices of the foreground display superb control of their spirited horses. The bridles held in most cases by one hand perhaps were intended to recall the chivalric Golden Mean, “nothing to excess.” The noble code of moderation assuredly can be linked with the “Temperance” statuette of Michael on the Fons Vitae of the “Adoration of the Lamb.” Philip the Good is the only “Just Judge” 35 Valerius Flaccus, Argonauticon, I, 2 (oracle) and I, 4 (The Argo Contellation seen as far north as the Andalusian port of Cádiz). See Bacon, The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões, 170 Notes 5 and 8 to Book IV and Raoul Lefèvre {flourished 1460), Jason et Medée, translated as The History of Jason [Westminster: 1477] by William Caxton [1422–1491], ed. John Munro (London: Early English Text Society-K. Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd. and H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1913). 36 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, 217. The Ghent panel of the Just Judges is a replica of the original stolen in 1934 and never recovered. The frame of the Just Judges is inscribed + IUSTI IUDICES +, while that of the “Warriors of Christ” contains the words:

+CHRISTI MILITES+/DOMINUS FORTIS ADONAY T SABAωT V/ EMNUEL IHESUS T XPC [CHRISTUS] A G L A [ATHA GIBBOR LEOLAM ADONAY]. See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van

Eyck, 377. 37 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, 210. See Paul Eeckhout, “Séance ordinaire du 17 novembre 1990. Quand reviendront les Juges intègres,” Belgisch tijdschrift voor Oudheidkunde en Kunstgeschiedenis. Revue belge d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’art LX (1991): 182–83; Paul Post, “Wen stellen die vier ersten Reiter auf dem Flügel der gerechten Richter am Genter Altar dar?,” Jahrbuch der Preussischen Kunstsammlungen XLII (Berline: 1921): 67–81; Karl Mortier and Noël Kerckhaert, Dossier Lam Gods. Zoektocht naar De Rechtvaardige Rechters (Ghent: 1994); Chris Noppe, Het geheim van de Rechtvaardige Rechters: een koningsgeschenk (Antwerp: Houtekiet, 2001). See Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 141 note 37. She remarks Jan Karl Steppe has proposed a source for the “Just Judges,” a didactic treatise by Jacques de Cessolis (1288–1322) entitled Liber de Moribus hominum et officiis nobilium sive super ludum scacchorum. See his Tractatus de scachis mistice interpretatus de moribus per singulos hominu status (Vienna: Joannem Winterburg, 1505; copy Washington, DC, Library of Congress).

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who wears the emblematic collar of the Toison d’Or. His portrait also can be singled out because of his ebony dress. He embraced black attire almost exclusively after the brutal assassination of his father in 1419 by agents of the French Dauphin Charles d’Orléans. Philip’s wool surcoat is elegantly trimmed in marten fur, and while his neckline reveals a red robe beneath, even his chaperon is a matching sable. Mounted on a white steed, Philip’s body is inclined slightly towards his right, as Jan van Eyck wished to show the Duke engaged in conversation with his companion rider. The pensive equestrian on a red stallion who has riveted Philip’s attention is his father, Jean Sans Peur (1371–1419) (Figs. 7.20–7.21). Jean wears a costume reflecting his royal French bloodline, a velvet purple tunic and ermine cape. His scarlet chaperon is adorned with a solitary gold pin. Formed in the shape of a cross with a central ruby and four stems of pearls, the piece serves as an insignia of the Duchy of Burgundy. In front of Jean the Fearless are two riders. The most visible of the “Just Judges” is mounted on a splendid white palfrey and he wears a deep perse (blue-green) haincelin, a shorter version of the houppelande, which is slit at the sides. Over a red cotta, this garment with its wide sleeves is lined and bordered in grey fur with pale highlights, which either is genette (civet cat) or sheared silver fox. This dramatic equestrian who wears a light brunette marten hat with its brim turned upwards, must be Philip the Bold (1342–1404), the first Duke of Burgundy, and grandfather and namesake of Duke Philip the Good. The second equestrian who is sandwiched between Philip the Bold and Jean the Fearless is likely Louis III de Mâle (Fig. 7.22), Count of Flanders (1330–1384), whose daughter Marguerite was the wife of Philip the Bold. As a consequence of the marriage, when Louis died, his holdings and his hereditary title passed to Philip the Good. The tomb of Louis was installed in an edifice which had witnessed the site of the first chapter meeting of the Order of the Golden Fleece, the Church of St. Pierre at Lille. The funeral monument sculpted by Jacques de Gérines of Brussels in the early 1450s for the pilgrimage chapel of Nôtre Dame de la Treille was destroyed during the French Revolution. Drawings and engravings of the bronze effigy do not contradict recognizing Louis III de Mâle as the brown-bearded rider shown in profile between two dukes of Burgundy. Wearing a scarlet surcoat over a black robe, his fine wool blue hat is edged with brown mink and he exhibits a golden chain studded with rubies. “Just Judges” riding behind Philip the Good are more difficult to identify, but because Jan’s altarpiece was a Ghent commission, the equestrians probably

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illustrate the second dynasty of the “Counts of Flanders,” specifically those judges who bore the hereditary title before their house merged with that of Burgundy (Fig. 7.23). Eliminating those “Counts of Flanders” whose marriages were without issue, results in a lineage of six important Counts — Thierry of Alsace, Baldwin V, Baldwin IX, Guy de Dampierre, Robert III of Bethune, Louis II of Nevers. Jan depicts the Dukes of Burgundy in order of their succession from the foreground rider, Philip the Bold, to Philip the Good, the third to hold the ducal title. Louis de Mâle was not a Duke of Burgundy, but Jan broke the dynastic chain of his foreground group to underscore the passing of Louis’ hereditary title to the House of Burgundy. He logically would have attempted to provide a chronological order in his representation of the earlier Counts of Flanders. By showing Philip the Good turning slightly towards John the Fearless and with his back to the rider in profile, he provides a compositional separation of the two clusters of “Just Judges.” The rider depicted in profile behind the left shoulder of Philip the Good wears an identical flapped hat similar to that of Philip the Bold but it is articulated by gray genette rather than brown marten fur. He probably is Louis I de Nevers, Count of Flanders between 1322 and 1346, and the father of Louis II de Mâle. As the last “Counts of Flanders,” they compositionally would mark the end of a group of the “Second Dynasty of the Counts of Flanders.” The first figure belonging to the row of riders behind the Dukes of Burgundy wears scarlet robes with an ermine collar which falls over his shoulders. His hat with a wide upraised brim also is trimmed with ermine. He would be the patriarch of the second dynastic house of the Counts of Flanders, Thierry (Dietrich) of Alsace. Born about 1099, he ruled between 1128 and 1157 and journeyed four times to Jerusalem as a crusader against the Saracens. Thierry’ son by Countess Sibyl d’Anjou (m. 1134), Philip of Alsace was the Count of Flanders between 1157 and 1191. He fought bravely in 1177 at the battle of Montgisard, where he challenged a Saracen commander to single-handed combat. The trophy of his encounter was an enemy shield displaying a black lion on a gold field. Belgian heraldry originated in the Orient as the design became both the crest and seal of Flanders. Philip married Elisabeth of Hainaut, heiress of Vermandois (eastern Picardy), but when he left no heirs when he died during the Third Crusade siege of St. Jean d’Acre. Philip’s sister, Margaret of Alsace (ca. 1135–1194) wed Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut (1171–1195). As a “Count of Flanders” (1191–1195), he is also recorded as Baldwin VIII. He might be the rider

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to the side of Thierry of Alsace, who wears a tall orange hat, rimmed in either beaver of marten fur. His gold brocaded tunic over a black robe evokes the colors of the arms of Flanders. After their marriage in April of 1169, Margaret of Alsace and Baldwin VIII (V) had six children. When he died on December 17, 1195 at Mons in Hainaut, Baldwin IX (b. 1171) became the “Count of Flanders” and the sixth count to rule over Hainaut. He left Bruges for Palestine to participate in the Fourth Crusade and in 1204 became the Emperor of Constantinople. However, after the battle of Adrianople in 1205, Baldwin IX was taken captive by Bulgars and Slavs of Thrace and he died on June 11, 1205. Baldwin IX is shown in profile. Dressed in a rich azure velvet silk tunic edged with a gray fur collar, he is pictured as a golden-haired young man. His bust recalls portraits of Alexander the Great on ancient coins. Baldwin IX rides near Philip the Good, whose aspiration to engage in a holy crusade and admiration for Alexander the Great are documented. Married to Marie de Champagne in 1186, Baldwin IX sired two daughters, Johanna and Margaret, both of whom were important “Countesses of Flanders” between 1206 to 1279. With respect to their bloodlines, the twice-married Johanna left no offspring. Margaret, however, took Guillaume de Dampierre, a vassal of Philip of Alsace, as her second husband in 1214. They gave Flanders the next Count, Gui de Dampierre (1280–1304). Riding next to Baldwin IX, the bearded Gui wears a scarlet robe and matching chaperon. By his side rides his successor, Robert III of Bethune (1304–1322). The father of Louis II of Nevers has a brocaded surcoat and tall hat which are nearly identical to the attire of Baldwin V. The Ghent panel of the “Just Judges” is both a visual acknowledgment of Philip the Good’s heritage and a political statement regarding the sovereign right of his heirs to rule over one of the most important commercial towns of Flanders. Between 1448 and 1453 the Ghenters rebelled against the authority of their Burgundian duke (Figs. 7.24–7.25). They suffered a humiliating defeat at Gavere and their privileges were severely limited. Nearly a century later the Ghenters challenged Charles V (1500–1558), who was “Count of Flanders” by age seven. Though the Holy Roman Emperor was born in Ghent’s Hof ten Walle, he rapidly subdued the rebellion of 1540 and exacted an even harsher punishment, almost total destruction of the town’s most important abbey of Sint-Baafs. By the reign of Charles V, Ghent’s cloth industry had been devastated by English trade. Despite this loss to Ghent’s economy, grain merchants and boatmen eclipsed drapers and cloth merchants in wealth by their shipments of agricultural products

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along the Scheldt and Leie. Though Charles commissioned the digging of the Terneuzen canal in 1547, the reign of his son Philip II (1555–1598) witnessed continued destruction of Ghent’s monuments by the Calvinist iconoclasts and the occupation by the Dutch, who closed the Scheldt to traffic. This cessation of shipping activity, combined with the decline of Bruges and Ypres, effectively caused the commercial denouement of Ghent even after the restoration of Hapsburg power in 1585. The Cavalcade of Holy Knights: The Princes of Ceuta The phalanx of horsemen known as the “Counts of Flanders” punctuates a Burgundian lineage of potentates. By contrast, the panel of the Holy Knights stresses a “Portuguese” and English genealogy (Figs. 7.26–7.27).38 Among the equestrian warriors arrayed en échelon are St. Martin, St. George and St. Sebastian. The triad may be portraits of the “Princes” of Portugal whose valorous combat at Ceuta had been imbued with a legendary cast: Duarte, age twenty-four, Pedro, age twenty-three, and Henrique, age twenty-one.39 In the wake of the 1415 victory at Ceuta, a new continent was opened to Europe. Even by 1432 the medieval world picture was altered. Van Eyck would have returned to Bruges from Lisbon with a portfolio of preparatory drawings for the royal figures in the Fountain of Life. The same sketches would have been used anew when van Eyck painted his polyptych for the Church of St. Bavo. The three princes of the Avis dynasty — Duarte, Pedro and Henrique — who lead the procession of “warriors” in the Ghent Altarpiece demonstrate Van Eyck’s acuity for realism, his remarkable ability to render a sitter younger than in actuality, and even his penchant for subtle allusion. Although not in full harness, all three princes wear complete suits of body armour that display the epitome of Gothic chivalric fashion. Ownership of a fine suit of armour not only indicated the commanding officer by its magnificence, but also was a privilege reserved for descendants of the knightly nobility belonging to the

Juliaan H.A. de Ridder, “Kijkend naar ‘Het Lam Gods’ Agla en Akelei,” Gentse bijdragen tot de Kunstgeschiedenis en Oudheidkunde XXIX (1990–1991): 57–68. 39 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, 210, identifies the warrior saints as Martin, George and Sebastian. He additionally reads the cabalistic inscription on Sebastian’s silver shield as: D[OMINV]S FORTIS ADONAY SABAOT V..EM[ANV]EL I.H.S.XR.AGLA. 38

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ruling class, and on rare occasions, an heroic professional warrior who had distinguished himself in an extraordinary manner and won royal favor.40 By virtue of the design and function, Gothic armour of the fifteenth century was most aesthetically pleasing to the eye. While the fashioning of various components of armour dates back in history even before the Roman times, full-plate steel body armour gradually had evolved throughout the fourteenth century and had a direct correlation with the invention of gun powder. In the adaptation of form after the Renaissance, when body plate was gradually abandoned, the Gothic armour continued to be regarded as the simplest, most practical and beautifully designed protective covering. Carefully fitted to the anatomical structure and proportions of the wearer’s body, it stressed a lean-waisted, and athletically elegant body. The two most renowned centers for the production of full-plate armour were southern Germany, namely Augsburg and Nuremburg, and northern Italy (Milan). The making of a suit of armour was costly and fabrication was carried out by families of artist-craftsmen. Each commissioned suit was custom made for the owner. While all suits of armour displayed a combination of basic components that covered the head, neck, torso and limbs, no two suits were identical in kind, as exemplified by the stylistic details seen in the Ghent Altarpiece. Variations in the design of individual body components provide identifying characteristics associated with the geographical location of manufacture. German suits reveal a partiality for rippled surfaces, points and cusps by comparison with the Italian preference for smoother and more rounded surfaces. The type of armour pictured by Van Eyck, documentary citations found in the archives of the Torre do Tombo, and surviving examples of plate, attest to the fact that the Portuguese princes maintained a long-standing tradition of commissioning the making of their body armour from German craftsmen.41 The Ghent’s saintly warrior Martin closely resembles the portraits of Prince Duarte in replicas of the Fountain of Life and it corresponds with a

Claude Blair, European Armour circa 1066 to circa 1700 (London: Batsford Publishers, 1958); François Buttin, Du costume militaire au Moyen Âge et pendant la Renaissance (Barcelona: Real Academia de Buenas Letras, 1971); Zorosalava Drobna and Jan Durdik, with Eduard Wagner illustrator, Medieval Costume, Armour and Weapons, 1360–1450, translated by Jean Layton (London: Paul Hamblyn, 1962). 41 The parade suit of King Sebastian of Portugal (1554–1578) in the New York Metropolitan Museum was made by Anton Peffenhauser of Augsburg. 40

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likeness recently identified as “King Duarte” in Gomes Eanes de Azúrara’s Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné (1453; Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris), a manuscript completed by “João Gonçalves” in February of 1453. Pictured in the near foreground astride a handsome dapple gray steed is Prince Duarte, whose raiment displays the customary manner in which armour was worn by the Portuguese nobility on ceremonial occasions. His costume consists of multi-layered garments, worn one on top of the other and only select sections of the gleaming metal body covering are visible. Sheathed in plate, however, the prince is wearing “prolonged lamed sabatons” on his feet that have fashionably pointed toes, and a long-necked spur attached to the back of the footwear. Metal “greaves”, extending from the ankle to the base of the knee, dovetail under the large knob of the protective poleyn that covers the knee cap, and are undoubtedly complimented by metal cuisse around the thighs. The gauntlets on his hands are fashioned in the style of the Gothic miton and feature a wide cuff that overlaps the vambraces on his forearms. In an effort to “proof ” the protective function of body armour during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries a number of devices were introduced to further shield the torso and vulnerable parts of the upper body, such as the shoulders and elbows. Duarte’s armour readily displays the adaptation of several of these articles. Covering the torso he wears a brigantine in which large, convoluted metal plates have been sewn between the layers of fabric and a waffenrock skirt is attached to the waist.42 The entire garment then has been recovered with a rich brown velvet cloth and belted at the waist. On top of the fabric of the garment pauldrons, or shoulder guards, composed of overlapping metal plates, have been added. On the right side of the center body a metal plate also has been attached, called a basague or lance shield. The purpose of the basague was to provide a second layer of metal reinforcement to deflect blows from a lance, javelin or spear, especially in hand-to-hand combat or jousting. Of particular note is the defensive shield secured by a diagonal shoulder strap and positioned next to the bridle arm. Known as a targe or buckler, and often identified by the French term as an armet or rondelle, this form of small, curved, rimmed and convoluted shield is of Frankish origin. The targe was used in Italy from about 1440 onwards, The custom of covering armour was a fifteenth-century characteristic. It was an improvement over the surcoat that shielded the metal from intense sunlight and a surfeit of padding underneath prevented chaffing and provided warmth. See John Hewitt, Ancient Armour and Weapons in Europe, 2 vols. (Chicago: Argonaut Publishers, 1967). 42

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and on the Iberian peninsula more than half a century before it was adopted in the rest of Europe.43 The belt was an indispensable element in the battle regalia of every knight. Although almost impossible to see in Duarte’s costume, minute sections that are indicated suggest a rather wide and ornate version. The belt not only aided in securing the heavy plate fast and in place on the body, but it also functioned as the main support from which the sword and dagger were hung. A very large sword hangs on the left side of Duarte’s body. Encased in a sheath embossed with a cross, his quillon (sword) is suspended from a chain attached to his belt on the right side of his body. Van Eyck depicted Prince Duarte in opulent attire. Beneath his brigantine the prince wears a magnificent bronze-green silk jerkin with cape-like, or corset sleeves, that display a close affinity with the prevailing Italian mode of early Renaissance fashions. The sleeves of his garment have been extended to an exaggerated length by flowing panels composed of successive layers of dagged and scalloped leaf-shaped appliquéd extensions. This decorative border treatment has been repeated to form the lower section of the bases or skirt of his jerkin. Above the padded neckline of his brigantine, Duarte wears two additional body garments. The wide band of soft brown fur which encircles his neck is attached to a pelicón or doublet, also lined in fur, and worn over a chemise (camica). This shirt of fine linen is edged with a narrow ruffle at the base of the neck. Consistent with the ceremonial theme of the “Adoration of the Lamb,” the bridle and trappings on Duarte’s mount also have been embellished in a distinctive manner to compliment the rider’s attire. The bridle, harness and reins and made of converging leather strips set with domed rivets and edged with a continuous metal band of hinged ornamental plaques worked in raised relief. The medallions of the harness are evocative of the blue shield designs which form the escutcheon of the Avis dynasty. Van Eyck’s identification of Duarte as St. Martin acknowledged his status as heir of the Portuguese realm. While the Moorish Castle of São Martinho was the primary residence in Lisbon of Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique, the fortress was under the authority of the eldest son of King João. The Paço dos Infantes, illustrated by Georg Braun and Georg Hogenberg This form of shield (targe) not only protected the arm but also was used to protect the back and spinal cord. An early prototype may have been the Roman scutum, a larger style of rectangular and convex shield. See Hannsjoachim Wolfgang Koch, Medieval Warfare (London: Bison Books, 1978). 43

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(Urbis Olisiponensis, 1572), once stood in front of a church dedicated to the saint of Tours.44 Martin of Tours (315–397), the alter-ego for the heir-apparent Duarte (Fig. 7.28), is one of the most important saints of the Iberian peninsula.45 The account of Martin’s life in the Aurea Legenda of Jacobus Voragine (c.1228–1298) repeats the biography of Sulpicius Severus.46 Martin of Tours, a tribune’s son, was born in Sabaria (Pannonia or Hungary) and raised at Pavia (Italy). He had served as a warrior under Emperors Constantine and Julian. As a Roman soldier in Gaul, the young Martin was passing through Amiens in winter when he came upon an almost naked beggar by the city gate. Dividing his cloak with his sword, he gave half to the poor man. The following night, Christ appeared to him in a vision wearing the mantle of the beggar, and Martin converted to Christianity. After his baptism, Martin continued his profession but refused to fight with weapons. Responding to a charge of cowardice by Emperor Julian, he declared he was a “soldier of Christ.” Offering to venture unarmed into battle, he professed that he needed neither helmet nor shield, only the sign of the cross. When the barbarians surrendered without a fight, Martin abandoned the military life to found the first monastery in Gaul. He became bishop of Tours in 370/371. Miracles attributed to the evangelical Martin by St. Gregory of Tours (538–594) led to a perception of “Christ’s Warrior” as a wonderworker.47

See Augusto Vieira, Augusto Vieria da Silva, A Cêrca Moura de Lisboa: Estudo historicodescriptivo (Lisbon: Amigos de Lisboa, 1939, 2nd Ed.), A cerca moura de Lisboa: Éstudo histórico-descriptivo (Lisbon: 1939), 168–70 and Plate VII. 45 For information about the cult of S. Martinho in Portugal, consult Manuel Justino Maciel, “Arquitectura Paleocristã em Contexto Suévico. Algumas reflexões,” Câmera Municipal de Viana do Castelo (1991): 1–11 (Comunicação. VI Colóquio de Arqueologia, October 1987); idem., Antiguidade tardia e paleocristianismo em Portugal (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 1996). 46 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, translated and adapted from the Latin by Granger Ryan and Helmut Ripperger (New York: Arno Press, 1969), 663–74. 47 For French devotion to St. Martin of Tours (316–397), consult Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus [540–600], Vie de Saint Martin (Vita Sancti Martini ), translated by Solange Quesnel (Paris: Belles Lettres, 1996); Raymond van Dam, Saints and their Miracles in Late Antique Gaul (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Anne Bernet, Saint Martin: l’apôtre des Gaules (Etampes, France: Clovis, 1997); Christopher Donaldson, Martin of Tours: The Shaping of Celtic Spirituality (Norwich, Norfolk: Canterbury Press, 1997); Ivan Gobry, Saint Martin (Paris: Perrin, 1996); Saint Martin de Tours: XVIe Centenaire, eds. Jean Honoré, Michel Laurencin, Guy-Marie Oury (Chambray-Les-Tours: C.L.D., 1996); Charles Lelong, Martin de Tours: Vie et gloire posthume (Chambray-lès-Tours: C.L.D., 1996); idem., Vie et 44

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Present-day Braga, in antiquity called Bracara Augusta (Fig. 7.29), served as the major coventus of northwestern Tarraconensis (Callaecia). When the Rome converted to Christianity under Constantine, the new faith was readily accepted throughout the Empire. In the wake of Rome’s fall to the Visigoths, however, German Swabians assailed Lusitania about 468 A.D. The conversion of Portugal to Christianity in the sixth century was achieved due to the intercession of St. Martin of Tours.48 From the seat of the Swabian court at Braga, King Chararic sent emissaries to Tours for the purpose of seeking assistance for his ill son. The ambassadors returned with the cappa of Martin which affected a cure. The Basilica of St. Martin of Tours at Dume, which assuredly was visited by Jan van Eyck in 1429, was built and consecrated in 558 as an ex-voto. The proselytism of the Swabians in Portugal was achieved by a monk named Martin, a native of Pannonia, and missionary “from the East” who had accompanied King Chararic’s emissaries from Tours. Author of De Correctione Rusticorum, a sermon about folkloric superstitions, the learned ecclesiastic is better known as St. Martin of Braga (ca. 1515–580). Under the aegis of King Chararic, he supervised the construction of the basilica at Dume and following the accession of Theodomir (559), this edifice became an archetype for at least fifty churches erected between the Minho and the Mondego Rivers and placed under the protection of “São Martim de Tours.” With the introduction of communal monasticism in Portugal, the cult of St. Martin was diffused to throughout the Iberian peninsula. Vernacular admiration of the saint is revealed in Van Eyck’s portrait of Prince Duarte in the Ghent Altarpiece, a work in which spiritual pilgrimage and militant defense of the faith are key ideological components. The landscape architecture of the Ghent Altarpiece, like the Fountain of Life, effectively insinuates the concept of Eden restored. In 1432, when the Ghent Altarpiece was completed, and following an outbreak of plague in Lisbon, the Brotherhood of Bom Jesus do Monte was established at Braga, although since 1373 the Monte Espinho near Falperra had consisted of a steep path leading to a shrine of the cross. As it initially culte de Saint Martin: état des questions (Chambray-lès-Tours: C.L.D., 1990); Guy-Marie Oury, Saint Martin de Tours: l’homme au manteau partagé (Chambray-Les-Tours: C.L.D., 1987); Régine Pernoud, Martin de Tours (Paris: Bayard Éditions/Centurion, 1996); Albert Lecoy de La Marche, Saint Martin (Tours, A. Mame, 1881). 48 Jean-Pierre Leguay, António Henriques de Oliveira Marques, Maria Angela V. da Roche Beirante, Portugal das invasões germânicas à “reconquista” (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1993).

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was planned, Braga’s Monte Espinho underscored Portugal’s dedication to St. Paul’s cause of evangelical mission, a cause which was embraced by Martin of Tours and Francis of Assisi.49 To accentuate the concept of journeying towards Jerusalem, an elliptical Holy Sepulchre was built by the Brotherhood at the summit so a pilgrim could meditate at chapels and duplicate the route of the via crucis. Braga’s garden landscape functioned as a highly symbolical metaphor of man’s ascent to the citadel of the sacrificial “Lamb of God.”50 The early pilgrimage site of Braga honored the memory of another saint, who like Martin, rejected the life of a warrior to embrace the Church, Francis of Assisi.51 St. Francis’s life so perfectly conformed with that of Christ that he was marked with the Stigmata on Mount Alverna in 1224. The Fourth Lateran Council (1215) convened by Pope Honorius III had advocated a strong Christian opposition to Saracens and responding to the Pauline fervor of an age which asked men don the “armour of God,” and with a deep desire to suffer martyrdom in imitation of Christ, the perfect “knight of heaven.” St. Francis attempted to travel to Syria in 1212 but was shipwrecked in Dalmatia. Illness in Spain prevented the conclusion of a second voyage to Morocco (1213–1214). During the fifth Crusade (1219), however, St. Francis journeyed to Damietta by the Nile Delta, and although his attempt to convert Sultan Malik-al-Kamil was unsuccessful, the “Pentecostal Spirit” he inspired universalized his brotherhood. St. Francis sent five of his Friars Minor to the Portuguese King Afonso II (r. 1211–1223). All were martyred in Morocco (Figs. 7.30–7.31).

49 See Hans Baron, “Franciscan Poverty and Civic Wealth as Factors in the Rise of Humanist Thought,” Speculum XIII (1938): 1–37; Francis Rapp, “Les Pèlerinages dans la vie religieuse de l’Occident médiéval aux XIVe XVe siècles,” Les Pèlerinages de l’antiquité biblique et classique à l’occident médiéval, ed. Freddy Raphaël et al. (Paris: P. Geuthner 1973): 117–60; Jonathan Sumption, Pilgrimage: An Idea of Medieval Religion (London: Faber & Faber, 1975); Reindert L. Falkenbourg, Joachim Patinir: Landscape as an Image of the Pilgrimage of Life, translated from the Dutch by Michael Hoyle (Amsterdam-Philadelphia: J. Benjamins Pub. Co., 1988). 50 Mónica F. Massara, Santuário do Bom Jesus do Monte: Fenómeno Tardo Barroco em Portugal (Braga: Confraria do Bom Jesus do Monte, 1988); João de Azavedo Coutinho, Bom Jesus do Monte (Braga, Livraria Central, Editora de Laurindo Costa, 1899); George Kubler, “Sacred Mountains in Europe and America,” Christianity and the Renaissance, ed. Timothy Verdon and John Henderson (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1990): 423–41. 51 Adrian S. Hoch, “St. Martin of Tours: His Transformation into a Chivalric Hero and Franciscan Ideal,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte IV (Deutscher Kunstverlag München, 1987: 471–82.

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To stress Prince Duarte’s royal lineage from the kings of England, Queen Philippa had named her son in honor of his grandfather Edward III. Jan van Eyck’s portrait of Duarte as St. Martin might have a locus amoenus in a thirteenth-century literary work adapted to prose by Jean Wauquelin. Written for Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, Wauquelin’s Histoire de Sainte Helene (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale, MS. 9967) contains twentysix miniatures which were illuminated by Loyset Liédet in 1460–65. The manuscript’s prologue strangely establishes a link between England and St. Martin of Tours, because it identifies the warrior knight’s parents as St. Helene of Constantinople and King Henry of England.52 Riding a spirited white steed in van Eyck’s panel of the “Warriors of Christ,” Pedro surges forward between his two brothers. In his right hand he carries the banner of St. George; and in his left hand he holds an écu-shaped shield which also is emblazoned with the red cross of St. George. Because the upper part of his steel plate suite is exposed, a number of details marking the German style of Gothic armour can be observed. His body and limbs are well protected. Sheltering his torso is a fine globose breastplate that has been extended at the waist by long tassets which cover the hips and upper part of the thighs. The breastplate has been raised in a pattern of convex convolutions that radiate upward from the waist. Flanged pauldrons extend over the shoulders, cupping around the shoulder and upper arm, and terminate in long ridged points. Coordinating with the pattern on the breastplate, the pauldrons have been raised into deeply ridged convolutions of relief over the crest of the shoulder. Although his arms are covered in metal plate, between the joint of rerebraces on the upper arm and the vambraces on the forearm a large, 52 Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 137–38. He cites Joseph van den Gheyn, L’ystoire de Helayne; reproduction des 26 miniatures du manuscrit no 9967 de la Bibliothèque royale de Belgique (Brussels: Vromant & Co., 1913); Chrétien César Auguste. Dehaisnes, Documents inédits concernant Jean le Tavernier et Loyset Liédet, Miniaturistes des ducs de Bourgogne (Brussels: 1882); Friedrich Winkler, “Loyset Liédet, der Meister des Goldenen Vliesses und der Breslauer Froissart,” Repertorium für Kunstweissenschaft XXXIV (1911): 224–31; 376; L.M.J. Delaissé, De gouden eeuw der Vlaamse miniatuur, het mecenaat van Filips de Goede, 1445–1475 (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, 1959). Apparently Helen was the widow of the Byzantine Emperor Anthony, who journeyed to Rome where she secured permission to remarry and aided the Christians attacked by Saracens. Helene eventually settled in England, wed King Henry and had children, including Martin of Tours. According to Smith, 351, Loyset Liédet, illuminator of La Histoire de Sainte Hélène (Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale, MS. 9967), was active at Hesdin until the mid-1460s when he transferred to Bruges.

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flanged, protective elbow-cap or coutière is mounted on top of the outer garment he wears beneath the armour. Very little can be seen of the garments Pedro wears beneath his armour, but the small section of the left sleeve that is visible provides sufficient detail to reveal the Prince is attired in an elegant red velvet garde-corps with moderate sleeves of three-quarter length, a tight body and a high round neckline. The garde-corps is similar in style to the super côte-hardi of the Middle Ages and the doublet of the Renaissance. All of these outer garments had been worn for extra warmth and eventually became visible male costumes. Beginning from the end of the thirteenth century they were made of a variety of fine and luxury fabrics. Generally they were made of duplicate layers of material and they customarily were quilted, tufted or fur-lined, especially when fashioned for members of the upper class. Pedro’s garde-corps is lined in fur and edged with wide bands of brown marten fur around the neckline and base of the sleeves. He also wears a camica very similar to the one worn by his brother Duarte. Because of his marriage to Philippa of Lancaster in 1387, King João I had been afforded a place among the very select number of thirteen knights that constituted the Order of the Garter in 1400. He was one of the first foreigners to have received this distinction.53 Van Eyck depicted Pedro as the order’s protector St. George, because the Prince had been admitted to the Garter in 1427, when the number of knights had expanded to twentysix. Prince Duarte, however, was not afforded identical honors due to diplomatic protocol. English courtly etiquette dictated that the heir to the Portuguese throne would assume the place left vacant by his father’s death. João I, founder of the “Order of Avis,” died in 1433, a year before the Ghent Altarpiece was completed. Prince Henrique is pictured in direct alignment beside Pedro on a black mount and very few details of his clothing can be seen, although he too is dressed in ceremonial armour. The small section of a velvet sleeve on the right arm and double bands of fur encircling the neckline imply that he either is wearing a garde-corps or jerkin lined and edged in fur with a doublet beneath that also is trimmed with fur around the neckline. In his left hand Henrique carries a large shield which is nearly identical to 53 Consult George Frederick Beltz, Memorials of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, from its Foundation to the Present Time (London: William Pickering, 1841), xiv and xv (preface) and 399 (23rd April, 1401 list of the thirteen knights, including “John I, king of Portugal, elevated 1400”). My thanks are given to Dr. Georgiana Ziegler, Reference Librarian of The Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, DC, for her assistance in research.

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Duarte’s. In his right hand he bears a very distinctive rectangular standard displaying a cross pattée, the emblem of the Hospitaller Knights. The banner comprises a scarlet red field divided into quatrains by a large cross in cloth of gold. Each of the four quarters has been emblazoned with gold crosses. Henrique, who substitutes for St. Sebastian, served as the “Grand Master” of the military Order of Jesus Christ, which replaced the Hospitallers. When Henrique fought at Ceuta his life had been considerably endangered. Like the Christian officer of the Praetorian guard under Diocletian, he was the target of arrows and yet miraculously was not mortally wounded.54 The cult of St. Sebastian was popular in Burgundy especially after 1430, when Philip the Good selected him as the patron saint for his new Order of the Golden Fleece.55 Prince Henrique’s appearance is substantiated by similar portraits of the prince in the Eyckian Fountain of Life and in Nuno Gonçalves’s St. Vincent Altarpiece (Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon).56 Van Eyck has provided a superb portrait of a young Prince Henrique the Navigator. With head held high and looking beyond the horizon, the soft fleshy contours of the face fail to obscure the sense of maturity and focus that characterize the features of his purposeful countenance. In the Company of Royal Warriors An identification of other figures belonging to the legion of the three knights is tenuous (Figs. 7.32–7.33). The idealized portraits, however, must pertain to chivalry and to the origin of knightly orders in the lands associated with Josse’s matriarchal lineage, namely England and Portugal. Edward III 54 The 1521 Inventory of books belonging to the Wardrobe of Manuel I lists several important texts: “one Manuscript on vellum of the Order of the Garter with a crimson velvet cover,” “one Manuscript on vellum of the Order of the Golden Fleece with a crimson satin cover with Florentine gold borders with the sheep in the middle of the chain,” a book of The Rules and Definitions of the Military Order of Christ (perhaps a text that incorporated the Orders of Santiago and Avis). A large manuscript on vellum entitled Crónica de El Rei D. Afonso Henriques with a “gilt copper coat-of-arms” by Duarte Galvão [1446–1517] was created for King Manuel. The historical work exemplifies the Manueline importance placed upon the achievements of his reign. See Jordan, Portuguese Royal Collections (1505–1580), 173, 178–79. 55 Abbé Voillery, “A quel Titre saint Sébastien est patron du chancelier Rolin et saint Antoine de Guigone de Salins,” Société d’archéologie de Beune, Mémoires (1906–07). 56 In Gonçalves’s altarpiece for the Capela-Mór of the Cathedral of Lisbon, the widowed Duchess Isabel of Burgundy in the tertiary habit of the Franciscan Poor Clares stands opposite

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(1312–1377) had founded the Order of the Blue Garter between 1344 and 1351 after the English victory at Crécy (August 26, 1346) over the French troops of King Philippe VI (1293–r. 1328–1350). Extant panels in the National Portrait Gallery and his effigy in Westminster Abbey confirm his identity among the Ghent Knights (Figs. 7.34–7.35). The London portraits establish that Edward had a grayish-white beard, shoulder-length hair, and a moustache with the ends pointed downwards. The elderly rider behind St. George (Prince Pedro) is dressed in a cape of velvet. Its purple color was associated with royalty and with the Garter. Falling within the scope of jewelry, the Garter insignia which was worn on the left leg below the knee, bore the gold-embroidered motto Honi soit qui mal y pense (Shamed be he who thinks ill of it). The insignia was made either of velvet or silk, and though usually it was blue, in rare instances the color purple was selected for the commemoration of St. George’s feast day. Luxurious fur comprises the collar of Edward’s mantle, and it seems to be genette. The same civet cat fur borders the wide arm slits and broad cuffs of his robe protruding from beneath the cape. Edward’s domed silver hat lined in gold silk is further embellished by the superimposed gold crown, which is decorated with cabochon rubies and sapphires along the base and arching bands. Extending vertically from the base are foliated flanges articulated with pearls which gracefully alternate with smaller foliates studded with a figure with a black silk chaperon. Identified traditionally as Henrique the Navigator, this royal probably is King Duarte. In another painting of the polyptych, called “The Panel of the Monks”, the robed figure in the foreground likely is Prince Henrique, whose visage corresponds best with his tomb effigy at Batalha. The period of Gonçalves’s activity as an artist postdates Van Eyck’s visit to Portugal. Yet he appears to have traveled to the court of Philip the Good and Duchess Isabel. In Brussels he would have met, and perhaps studied under, Rogier van der Weyden. The sixty individualized portraits in Gonçalves’s famous polyptych betray a familiarity with Rogier’s brand of verism. At the Lisbon court of Afonso V (1438–1481), Gonçalves also designed a cycle of tapestries illustrating the Portuguese taking of Tangier in 1471. The Arzila Tapestries have been the focus of extensive research by Jeanne Schnitzer, Professor Emeritus of California State University. Her analysis of the panels, which she has photographed on site, will be the subject of a forthcoming book. Consult: Nuno Gonçalves. Novos documentos. Estudo da pintura portuguesa do Séc. XV (Lisbon: Instituto Português de Museus, 1994); Reynaldo dos Santos, As tapeçarias da tomada de Arzila (Lisbon: Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, 1925); Circa 1492. Art in the Age of Exploration, ed. Jay A. Levenson (New Haven-London: Exhibition Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art, Yale University Press, 1991, 136–38, catalogue entries by José Teixeira, (Gonçalves’ Panel of the Infante, Museu da Arte Antiga) and 138–41 (Taking of Tangier, tapestry, ca. 1471–75, attributed to the Tournai workshop of Pasquier Grenier, Museo Parroquial de Pastrana).

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rubies. The distinctive Garter collar known as the “Great George” consists of twenty-six links of alternating red and white enamel roses set within a blue enamel garter, each of which is separated by a gold double knot. The collar’s white and gold enamel pendant shows St. George on horseback in the act of spearing the dragon. The Ghent equestrian Edward does not wear the “Great George” because the insignia collar was instituted during the reign of Henry VII (1485–1509). However, his delicate gold link necklace terminates in a spectacular cabochon ruby medallion set in gold with six huge pearls. Unlike the roses of the “Great George,” which symbolized the Houses of Lancaster and York, Edward’s pendant stones provided the colors of the banner St. George supposedly brandished on the ramparts of Jerusalem during the First Crusade. Beside King Edward, and garbed in a dark green houppelande trimmed in brown marten, a younger man pertinently holds delicate cords belonging to St. George’s leather and silver helmet. Plausibly he can be identified as the Lancastrian grandfather of the Duchess of Burgundy (Figs. 7.36–7.37), John of Gaunt (1340–1399). Native of Ghent, the fourth son of Edward III wears a red hat with upturned marten brim and side flaps, over which a rests a gold foliated crown inset with pearls. Around his neck is a chain-link

For an analysis of the textiles in the Wilton Diptych, see Lisa Monnas, “Fit for a King: Figured Silks shown in the Wilton Diptych,” in The Regal Image of Richard II and the Wilton Diptych, ed. Dillian Gordon, Lisa Monnas and Caroline Elam, with an introduction by Caroline M. Barron (London: Coventry, 1997): 165–77; Ulrike Ilg, Das Wiltondiptychon: Stil und Ikonographie (Berlin: Akademie, 1996); Dillian Gordon, The Wilton Diptych , with an essay by Caroline M. Barron and contributions by Ashok Roy and Martin Wyld (London: National Gallery, 1993); Caroline Elam, The Regal Image of Richard II and the Wilton Diptych (London: 1997); M.V. Clarke, “The Wilton Diptych,” The Burlington Magazine LVIII (1931): 283–94; Ulrike Ilg, Das Wiltondiptychon: Stil und Ikonographie (Berlin: Akademie, 1996); idem., “Ein Wiederentdecktes Inventar der Goldschmiedearbeiten Richard II. von England und seine Bedeutung fü die ikonographie des Wiltondiptychons,” Pantheon LII (1994): 10–15.Francis Wormald, “The Wilton Diptych,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XVII (1954): 191–203. Consult also Stella Mary Newton, Fashion in the Age of the Black Prince. A Study of the Years 1340–1365 (Woodbridge-Totowa, NJ: Boydell PressRowman & Littlefield, 1980) and rpt. (Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK-Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1999); Gervas Mathew, The Court of Richard II (London: John Murray Publishers, 1968); Age of Chivalry, Art in Plantagenet England, 1200–1400 (London: exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts, 1987); E. Scheifele, Anthony Goodman and James Gillespie (eds.), Richard II: The Art of Kingship (Oxford-New York: Clarendon Press-Oxford University Press, 1999), especially E. Scheifele, “Richard II and the Visual Arts”; James L. Gillespie (ed.), The Age of Richard II (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997). 57

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collar of alternating cabochon rubies and crystals. Like his father, he displays an immense ruby pendant surrounded by six pearls. The design of the ruby and pearl pendants worn by both Edward III and John of Gaunt may be found in the anonymous Wilton Diptych (Fig. 7.38) which contains the portrait of King Richard II (1367: r. 1377–1400) identified by his badge of the crouching hart 57 (Figs. 7.39–7.40). Because in 1396 he married Isabelle (1389–1409), daughter of the King Charles VI of France and Isabeau of Bavaria, the diptych could have been created about that time by a French master of the International Gothic style. The diptych pays tribute to the Order of the Garter founded by Richard’s grandfather. The right panel exalts the Virgin Mary as the Regina Coeli. Eleven heavenly attendants wearing wreaths of red and white roses also exhibit collars of broom-cods and badges of harts. The blue of their flowing gowns as well as the tips of their wings replicate the traditional blue of the Garter insignia. An indirect reference to St. George the “dragon slayer” is provided by the gesture of the Virgin Mary, who holds the infant Christ’s foot with the thumb and forefinger of her left hand. This imagery derives from Genesis 3:15, which forecasts that Eve’s offspring would crush the head of the serpent with his heel. The halo of Christ is embellished with instruments of his future death, the crown of thorns and three nails of the crucifixion, but he reaches jubilantly for the standard held by an angel. This banner, which signifies the Resurrection, and the adult Christ’s triumph over death, pertinently can be recognized as the herald of St. George. Against the diapered gold background of the left oak panel of the Wilton Diptych, King Richard II kneels, knight of the Garter, attired in a vermillion mantle embroidered in gold with his insignia hart. His gold crown shimmers and around his neck is his broomcod collar adorned with pearls and a white-enameled hart. He is depicted in the company of three standing saints (Fig. 7.41): St. Edmund (849– r. 855–869), the last king of the East Angles; St. Edward the Confessor (1003– 1066), King of England; and John the Baptist, the Apocalyptic intercessor and Messianic witness. The crown of coronation from the time of Edward I (1272–1307) was known as “St. Edward’s Crown.” Pious legend relates it, the sovereign’s coat, and other “royal ornaments” such as the long scepter, were removed from the original tomb of the Confessor at Westminster Abbey (Figs. 7.42–7.43) before King Henry III solemnly re-enshrined his relics on October 13, 1162. In the wake of Charles I’s execution in 1649, Parliament ordered the regalia broken up and the coronations objects, sacred symbols of monarchy, were

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taken from Westminster Abbey to the Tower of London, evaluated, and broken up. Only two items survived, the solid gold Ampulla in the form of an eagle, the head of which was filled with holy oil for anointing; and the silver “Anointing Spoon” used to pour oil into the eagle’s beak. According to the inventory of items taken by the Parliamentary Commissioners from Westminster Abbey which is housed in the British Library, “King Elfreds Crowne of Gold … Sett with Slight Stones and two little Bells” was valued highly, £248.10 by comparison with the silver gilt crown of Queen Edith (wife of Edward the Confessor in 1044), ca. with its “Garnetts, foule Pearls, Saphyrs & Some odd Stones,” which was valued at £12. Gold and gemstones from the crown of Alfred the Great (849–899, believed to be the same as “St. Edward’s Crown,” were reworked into a new State Crown and used in the 1661 coronation ceremonies of the restored Stuart monarch Charles II. The crown of Edward III in Jan van Eyck’s panel of the Holy Knights more closely approximates the Wilton Diptych crown worn by St. Edward the Confessor than the reworked State Crown of Charles II. Equally intriguing is the similar physiognomy of Van Eyck’s Edward III and his patron saint. Could Van Eyck have intended to show the founder of the Garter Order in the guise of Edward the Confessor, the saint who rebuilt Westminster Abbey? The regalia of Alfred the Great, Saxon King of Wessex, would have held great interest for Henry Beaufort, the Cardinal presiding over Josse’s baptism in Ghent. The site of Winchester in Wessex had been the former center of Anglo-Saxon kings. St. Edmund, the King of the East Angles is depicted in the Wilton Diptych wearing an ultramarine blue surcoat of figured velvet with pairs of gold peacocks, their necks encased within crowns. His long-sleeved undergarment is of a lighter “Garter Blue” and his bright green mantle is lined with ermine. The cape’s clasp consists of a large ruby set within a gold medallion. Surrounded by pearls, this clasp is kindred to the pendants worn by the Ghent Knights Edward III and John of Gaunt. Additionally, the face of St. Edmund in the Wilton Diptych bears an uncanny resemblance to the grandfather of Archduchess Isabel of Burgundy. Among the “royal ornaments” taken from Winchester Abbey was a large spinal known as the “Black Prince’s Ruby.” Set into the center of Charles II’s State Crown with vestiges of “St. Edward’s Crown,” this gem conceivably bedecks the clasp of St. Edmund’s ermine mantle in the Wilton Diptych. King Edward III’s campaign to bring French provinces under English control in 1345 had begun with designating his son John of Gaunt a “king’s lieutenant” with virtual viceregal powers in

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Aquitaine and Languedoc.58 A year later, following the English subjugation of the French at Crécy (Fig. 7.44) and the subsequent fall of the port of Calais, lack of funds, papal diplomacy and plague caused a temporary lull in fighting, which did not actively resume until the summer of 1355. Spearheading this second phase of military campaigns, the “Black Prince” Edward of Woodstock (1330–1376), crossed the English Channel to bolster the army of his brother John. While John of Lancaster remained in Normandy, Edward, Prince of Wales, supervised operations in Aquitaine. Planning a two-pronged attack on the French at Poitiers in 1356 (Fig. 7.45), John of Gaunt’s troops were prevented from crossing the Loire south of Angers at Les Points-de-Cé. However, against overwhelming odds for success, and in full retreat to Bordeaux, the Black Prince managed to lead his contingent forces to victory on September 19. During the period of 1358 and 1359, the French King Jean II “Le Bon” (1319–r. 1330–1364) was imprisoned in London, the Valois Kingdom was divided by discord, and Edward III virtually had control of Normandy, most of Brittany and Aquitaine, with English forces settling in Anjou, Maine, Tourraine and Burgundy. The Black Prince’s triumph at Poitiers was England’s most important military engagement between Crécy and Agincourt (1415). Directly descended from the lineage of Edward III, the Portuguese Princes sought to emulate the Black Prince and their grandfather John of Gaunt in planning their own campaign to North Africa. The “Black Prince’s Ruby” would have been an appropriate centerpiece stone of the clasp worn by St. Edmund in the Wilton Diptych. The September 1356 Poitiers victory was achieved by nearly identical tactical measures as that of Crécy a decade earlier. Retreating north from Paris, Edward III’s army had been trapped at Abbeville by the troops of Philippe VI. Forced to engage in an open field and outnumbered three to one, Edward was forced to a defensive position. Therefore, he ordered his horse-arches to dismount and join his men-of-arms, encasing the advancing French cavalry within a horseshoe and barrage of arrows. In a fray fought at 58 Malcolm Vale, War and Chivalry: Warfare and Aristocratic Cultures in England, France and Burgundy at the End of the Middle Ages (London: Ducksworth, 1981); Philippe Contamine, La Vie quotidienne pendant la guerre de Cent Ans: France et Angleterre, XIVe siècle (Paris: Hachette, 1976); Jonathan Sumption , Hundred Years War, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991); idem., Hundred Years War (London-Boston: Faber and Faber, 1999); Kenneth Fowler, The Age of Plantagenet and Valois. The Stuggle for Supremacy 1328–1498 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1967); Jean Favier, La guerre de Cent ans (Paris: Fayard, 1980).

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close quarters, the French crossbow because of its short range was no match to the English longbow. Similarly at Poitiers, the Black Prince assigned archers to his wings and placed his men-of-arms at the rear, so the attacking French were devastated. St. Edmund in the Wilton Diptych holds an arrow, symbol perhaps of his brutal martyrdom after the Viking Ingwar of Denmark invaded the East Anglian center of Thetford in Norfolk. Edmund was captured at Hoxne in Suffolk and he refused to renounce Christianity. According to his Vita in the Bury St. Edmunds Manuscript (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, ca. 1130), in which the majority of the thirty-two miniatures illustrate his torture and death, he was shot with arrows and then beheaded. The incorrupt body of St. Edmund was discovered about 915 in a small chapel at Hellesdon in Norfolk. The relics were transported to Bedricsworth, where King Cnut in 1020 founded the Abbey of Bury St. Edmund’s. Like Henry Beaufort’s Winchester, the abbey at Bury was under the aegis of the Benedicines. Besides serving as an attribute for England’s revered St. Edmund, the arrow is an irrefutable emblem of Edward III’s decisive victories at Crécy and Poitiers. The Ghent “Holy Knight” in green robes, who is proposed to be John of Gaunt, rides significantly behind St. Sebastian, the soldiermartyr who was shot with arrows by Diocletian’s archers. If the Wilton Diptych provides portraits of John of Gaunt as St. Edmund and Edward III as St. Edward the Confessor, then conceivably the ascetic St. John the Baptist presents an accurate likeness of the Black Prince, whose slender giltcopper effigy survives in Canterbury Cathedral (Fig. 7.46). Since the twelfth century, one of the favorite legends of Edward the Confessor concerns his ring and a test of charity. Disguised as a hermit like John the Baptist, St. John the Evangelist supposedly approached Edward and begged for alms (Fig. 7.47). Declaring he had no money about him, the charitable king gave him his gold ring. Seven years passed and the apostle appeared to an English pilgrim in Jerusalem, gave him the ring and charged him with informing Edward that he soon would be called to the heavenly elect. After years of fighting in France, the Black Prince returned home in 1371. His health broken, he died in 1376 at the age of only forty-six. Edward III expired a year later (Fig. 7.48). Flemish recognition of Edward III as the legitimate king of France on December 3, 1339 was a prelude event to the taking of Crécy. Two years earlier a revolt was led in Flanders by Jacques van Artvelde, a patrician of Bruges due an English embargo on the transport of wool to the Flemish cloth-manufacturing centers. As a consequence, the

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pro-French Count of Nevers was removed, and Flanders was placed under the hegemony of Ghent, Ypres and Bruges. Though these Burgundian towns attempted initially to remain neutral in England’s conflict with France, they soon proclaimed Edward III the rightful ruler of not only Aquitaine, Brittany and Normandy, but also Flanders. Their support shaped Edward III’s strategy, as his employed princes of the Low Countries in exchange for pensions and promises of fiefs, and began his martial campaign in Flanders. The taking in 1340 of Sluis, port town of Bruges, prevented France from invading England and wrested control of the Channel. At the time Jan van Eyck painted the Ghent Altarpiece, Philip the Good was seeking to distance himself from France, particularly Charles VII, whom he held responsible for the assassination of his father, Jean Sans Peur.59 The Ghent Altarpiece celebrates a Burgundian-Anglo-Portuguese alliance. For this reason, the ubiquitous arrow depicted in Flemish portraits, particularly of Golden Fleece knights associated with Bruges’ Guild of St. Sebastian, an elite confraternity of archers, may have its genesis in the martial stratagems of Edward III, John of Gaunt and the Black Prince.60 (Fig. 7.49) The Crécy-Poitiers battlefields of the slain would have evoked an ancient paradigm recounted by Statius, the arrows of King Adrastus hitting their mark and returning miraculously to the mouth of his quiver.61 The first English campaign occurred about the time the Black Death swept through Europe, targeting inhabitants with the swiftness of arrows. For this reason, Saints Edmund and Sebastian were invoked then, and continued to be supplicated as protectors against the plague. The laurel-wreaths displayed by the Avis princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique are symbols of poetic achievement, and items evocative of 59 The Treaty of Arras in 1435 established peace between Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, and King Charles VII of France. See Antoine de la Taverne [† 1448], Journal de la paix d’Arras faite en l’abbaye de Saint Vaast entre Charles VII et Philippe le Bon [1435], ed. André Bossuat (Arras: Impr. de la Société anonyme l’Avenir, 1936); R. Brill, The English preparations before the Treaty of Arras,” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History VII (1970): 211–47. 60 Anthony of Burgundy, illegitimate son of Philip the Good and Jeanne de Presle, was knighted in 1452 and was elevated as a member of the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1456. He was appointed King of Arms of the Guild of St. Sebastian in 1463. See Dirk De Vos, Rogier van der Weyden. The Complete Works (New York-Antwerp: The Harry N. Abrams, Inc.Mercatorfonds, 1999), 311–13; . 61 Statius (45–96 A.D.), Thebaid (Deeds of the Seven Against Thebes), VI, 938–41 (also VIII, 412–20). Consult Bacon, The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões, 392 Notes. The gold-tipped arrows of Cupid also were unpredictable; Ovid, Metamorphoses, I, 468–71.

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Apollo’s Parnassus. As such, the garlands also conjure the ancient Roman contrasting of Apollo’s arrows of destruction with the curative powers of the sun’s rays.62 Perhaps no ancient myth so demonstrated the power of the light as that of Phaëthon, the son of Helios, who drove a spectacular quadriga of steeds — Phlegon (Burning One), Pyroïs (Fiery), Eoüs (Eastern) and Aethon (Blazing). Because the youth lacked prudence and moderation, he blackened Africa.63 Holding the bridles of their horses and crowned in laurel, the Avis Princes of Ceuta are the antithesis of the impetuous youth destroyed by Jupiter’s thunderbolts. In the Ghent Altarpiece they ride uniformly beneath the Sol-Invictus Christ as the rays of the Holy Spirit extend in all directions to heal the earth. Riding behind St. Sebastian in the Ghent panel of “Holy Knights,” Charlemagne (Figs. 7.50–7.51) may be recognized, because of his golden crown of crossed bridges, which has its counterpart in Eyckian replicas of the Fountain of Life. When in England in 1416, Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg (1368: r. 1411–1437) was elected to the English Order of the Garter and at his palace in Buda (Hungary) he established his own equivalent Order of the Dragon64 (Fig. 7.52). Presumably the Ghent Charlemagne presents a portrait of Sigismund, who not only fought Ovid, Metamorphoses, II, 150–327. See Bacon, 206–7 Notes (horses of Helios). Bacon, The Lusiads of Luíz de Camões, 164 Notes. He credits the observation of Aljubarrota occurring as the Sun entered Virgo to Jeremiah Denis Matthias. Consult Luís de Camões, Os Lusíadas, edited by J.D.M. Ford, with introduction and notes (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1946); idem., The Lusiads [Os Lusíadas], translated by Richard Fanshawe with an introdiction by J. D. M. Ford (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1940). 64 Antal Ádásy, Zsigmond király és Spanyolorzág (Budapest: 1927); Engel Pál, Királyi hatalom és arisztokrácia viszonya a Zsigmond-korban: 1387–1437 (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1977); Joseph Ritter von Aschbach, Geschichte Kaiser Sigmunds, 4 vols. (Aalen: Scientia Verlag, 1964); Wilhelm Baum, Kaiser Sigismund: Hus, Konstanz und Türkenkriege (Graz: Styria, 1993); Max Lenz, König Sigismund und Heinrich der Fünfte von England. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Zeit des Constanzer Concils (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1874); Sabine Wefers, Das politische System Kaiser Sigmunds (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989); Josef Macek, Ernö Marosi and Ferdinand Seibt (eds.). Sigismund von Luxemburg: Kaiser und König in Mitteleuropa 1387–1437: Beiträge zur Herrschaft Kaiser Sigismunds und der europäischen Geschichte um 1400 [nternational Congress in Budapest, 8–11 July 1987] Anlässlich der 600. Wiederkehr seiner Thronbesteigung in Ungarn und seines 550. Todestages (Warendorf: Fahlbusch, 1994); László Beke, Ernö Marosi and Tünde Wehli et al., Müvészet Zsigmond király korában, 1387– 1437, 2 vols. (Budapest : MTA Müvészettörténeti Kutató Csoport, 1987); Kéry Bertalan, Kaiser Sigismund. Ikonographie (Vienna: A. Schroll, 1972. Béláné Baranyai, “Zsigmond Király úgynevezett Sárkány rendje, Századok LIX (1925): 561–62; LX (`926): 1–69. 62 63

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at Nicopolis (1396) with Jean Sans Peur and John of Gaunt, but also commanded an army in the Balkans which was joined in 1426 by Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra. To the right of Charlemagne-Sigismund is a rider whose mount would be situated directly behind Prince Henrique, Duke of Viseu and Master of the Portuguese Order of Jesus Christ. Probably this equestrian is King Dinis (1279–1325), who founded the institution in 1319 (Figs. 7.53–7.54). Besides a resemblance to the gisant of Dinis’s sepulchre in the Franciscan Church of Odivelas (Lisbon), Van Eyck’s beaver-capped knight wears a brocaded houppelande trimmed in light genette. The red and gold colors of his robe are the liturgical colors of Pentecost, a feast day commemorated with great ceremony by Dinis’s queen, St. Isabel of Portugal. Two remaining “Holy Knights” ride behind Edward III-St. Edward the Confessor and John of Gaunt-St. Edmund. One is attired in red wool trimmed with white fur, and his elevated status is affirmed by a golden crown with raised foliated flanges which is inset across the base with precious rubies and sapphires. An undeniable family resemblance exists between this distinguished equestrian and the foreground Christian knights of Van Eyck’s panel. This reason, and the documented testament of 1391 sumptuary edict limiting the wearing of scarlet to the royals, he might be identified as King João I (1357–r. 1385–1433), the Grand Master of Avis. In 1147 Afonso Henriques I (1128–1185), Burgundian founder of the kingdom of Portugal and first Master of the Order of Santiago, instituted the Freires de Évora (Brothers of Évora), the first knightly order of Europe to fight the Moors. In 1211 their headquarters were transferred from Évora to the town of Aviz by Afonso II and the brotherhood subsequently was called the “Order of São Bento” in honor of St. Benedict. When João I ascended the throne in 1385, he became the “Grand Master of the Order of Avis.” The outcome of the battle of Aljubarrota was decided by new weapons. About 800 English archers and Genoese crossbowmen turned the odds, about four to one, against the Portuguese. Fought on August 14, 1385, a week before the sun entered the zodiacal sign of Virgo, the victory against the Spanish on the eve of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary would have been interpreted in astrological terms. Astraea’s return to earth would signal the end of an “iron age” of discord and the beginning of a new “golden age” of peace.65 King João I’s successful campaign to Ceuta was achieved 65 See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 362, who informs Philip the Good held the official title “Marquis of the Holy-Empire,” which referred to his “Lordship of Antwerp.”

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when he was fifty-eight and in the aftermath of this fray he knighted Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique. The King’s eldest son, Afonso (1370–1461), already was a knight but he also fought valorously beside his half-brothers at Ceuta. Without doubt, he would be the rider engaged in conversation with King João, who is richly dressed in a black velvet houppelande trimmed in ermine. Though his face is partially obscured beneath his sky blue chaperon, he appears in Jan van Eyck’s Fountain of Life also in black with an immense chaperon. Even in this earlier composition, the elegant Duke of Barcelos was portrayed at a slight distance from the same three Avis Princes who won their spurs at Ceuta. Van Eyck thus indicated the Portuguese line would be perpetuated with the accession of Prince Duarte to the throne. Above all, in his panels of the Just Judges and Holy Knights the dynastic genealogy of the “Tree of Josse” was unveiled on the occasion of his baptism, specifically his patrilineal lineage from the illustrious Dukes of Burgundy and the Counts of Flanders, and his matrilineal heritage from England and Lusitania. From both parents he could claim descent from Charlemagne.66 The January 7, 1430 ducal marriage between Philip the Good of Burgundy and Princess Isabel was an inauguration of economic relations between Portugal and Flanders (primarily Ypres, Bruges, Ghent and Liège).67 Yet the union also marked culmination of Burgundian chivalric ideals with the founding of the Order of the Golden Fleece on January 10, 1430. Josse of Burgundy was born at Ghent on April 24, 1432, the feast day of St. George, a warrior Portuguese archers and militia associated with Saints Sebastian and Barbara. Although Josse died fifteen days after his birth, May 9, and was buried in the Ghent church of St. Pharailde, nowhere in the history of Northern art is a more outstanding tribute paid to the valorous dragon slayer than in Van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece with its cavalcade of “Just Judges” and chivalric “Holy Knights.”

66 Jacques Paviot, “As relações de Portugal e da Flandres no Século XV,” Oceanos 4 (Julho, 1990): 28–35. 67 Ibid.

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Holy Hermits and Pilgrims Jan van Eyck designed his tall panels of the Holy Hermits and Holy Pilgrims (Fig. 7.55) as an iconographical compliment to his vertical paintings of the Just Judges and Holy Knights.68 The topography of these works is deliberately akin, as the rocky terrain alludes to the arduous path followed by those seeking to imitate Christ’s ascent of Calvary. The “Holy Hermits” are difficult to identify. The central figure of St. Anthony Abbot of Egypt (c. 251–356 fd January 17), the father of monasticism, leans against his traditional T-shaped crutch. His Vita compiled by Sts. Athanasius and Jerome recount his isolation for one hundred years as a hermit in the desert near the Red Sea. By the middle of the eleventh century, Anthony’s relics were in Dauphiné at the monastery of Sainte Antoine en Viennois.69 The Order of Hospitallers of St. Anthony attributed healing powers to their protector hermit, who typically was depicted in their black homespun habit with a cowl. He also was venerated as the patron of an eponymous chivalric order favored by the Counts of Holland. St. Paul the Hermit, whose biography was compiled by St. Jerome, lived as a hermit in the desert of Thebes until his death in 342. Visited by Anthony, who is reputed to have buried him, Paul reasonably stands near his friend in the Ghent Altarpiece panel. Opposite him is a hermit with a scourge, who probably is Julian the Hospitaller. The Golden Legend records that after he slayed his parents in error, Julian led a life of penitence, and with his wife’s assistance, he built a hospice and served as a ferryman for travelers. Devotion to Julian was strong in Flanders, where Ghent maintained a guild of shippers and wealthy merchants lent their support to almshouses and hospices for the infirm. While meditating in the desert, St. Anthony Abbot was the target of several attacks by demons but he was not distracted from his prayers, even when he was lifted into the sky. Besides these physical attacks, he also experienced carnal temptations in the form of nude women. Therefore, it may seem strange that within the same composition showing numerous male saints who withdrew from society to lead a life of self-mortification, 68 The frame inscriptions carry simple inscriptions which identify the figures: +HEREMITE SANCTI+ and +PEREGRINI SANCTI+. See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 377.

69 P. Louis Bouyer, La Vie de S. Antoine: essai sur la spiritualité du monachisme primitif (Bégrolles-en-Mauges (49720): Abbaye de Bellefontaine, 1978, 2nd ed., revised).

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Van Eyck included two beautiful women. Both have been identified as former prostitutes who abandoned their profession to embrace a life of penitence in isolation, Mary of Egypt and Mary Magdalene. The legend of the fifth-century St. Mary of Alexandria (fd April 2) relates that she traveled in curiosity to Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre. An invisible hand stopped her at the portal, and seeing an icon of the Virgin Mary, she asked forgiveness and was able to enter. She subsequently lived in the wilderness near the Jordan River, imitating the ascetic existence of John the Baptist, until her burial by an old hermit, Zosimus. The story of Marie l‘Egyptienne was depicted in some of France’s most important cathedrals, Chartres, Bourges and Auxerre, and the lion who assisted Zosimus in burying her body may have been associated with the heraldic lion of Burgundy. However, even more popular in France was the cult veneration of the members of the Bethany family who were close friends of Christ. St. Augustine commented upon Christ’s visit to the Bethany household (Luke 10:38–42). Referring to the contemplative Magdalene and the active Martha, who was rebuked for not taking time from her tasks to listen, Augustine cited a parallel precedent in the sisters Rachel and Leah, the wives of Jacob (Israel). He states in his Contra Faustium, XXII: “Therefore the action of human and mortal life in which we live by faith, doing many laborious works, is Leah … delightful understanding of truth is Rachel.”70 Jan van Eyck’s Just Judges and Holy Knights exemplify the active life of chivalric crusading warriors. Opposite them are the hermits and pilgrims who signify contemplative life. The women in the panel of the Holy Hermits, accordingly, should be identified as the sisters who together embodied balance, and in a classical sense, Aristotle’s “Ethic of the Mean.” Van Eyck chose not to include the cross and the asperge, which are Martha’s traditional attributes. The Magdalene, however, is depicted with a vanitas emblem, an ointment jar which signifies her charity when she disposed of her worldly goods to purchase costly myrrh for the anointing of Jesus’ body. She was the first follower to whom the Resurrected Christ appeared, though she mistook him for a gardener near the tomb (John 20:14–18). The story of Mary Magdalene (fd July 22) after the Ascension 70 Contra Faustium, XXII, 52. See Frederick Cummings, “The meaning of Caravaggio’s ‘Conversion of the Magdalen,’” The Burlington Magazine 116, No. 879 (October 1974): 572– 78, at 575 note 8. He also cites, 576–77 note 16, another similar discussion about the active and contemplative “virtues” and the example of Jacob’s wives in Augustine’s De Consensu Evangelistarum, V, 8; Patrologia Latina (Paris: 1847), XXXIV, cols. 1045–46.

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is told in Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea (ca. 1275). The Dominican’s account probably derived from the Vita eremitica beatae Mariae Magdalenae, a tractate then attributed to the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (37–100). During the Middle Ages, other histories embellished the trip of the Bethany family from Palestine to Aix-en-Provence, branching out to encompass Joseph of Arimathaea as a shipmate who settled in England. Though Martha of Bethany (fd. July 29) appears to have established a monastic community at Tarascon, where her bones were discovered in 1187, and Lazarus became the first bishop of Marseille, Mary Magdalene withdrew to a grotto and cave of Sainte-Baume, fifteen miles from Marseille, where she dwelled for thirty years. Angels then apparently transported her to Aix-en-Provence where she received the sacrament of extreme unction. The Magdalene’s purported early life as a harlot, similar first name, death as a hermit and burial by a priest, resulted in a conflation of her identity with that of the Egyptian Mary in an Anglo-Saxon martyrology dating as early as the mid-to late ninth-century. Regarding Van Eyck’s intentions in the Ghent Altarpiece, the issue of identity still remains a matter of scholarly polemic. Though the remains of Lazarus were transported north to the Cathedral of Autun, the Burgundian church of Vézelay claimed possession of the Magdalene’s relics in the eleventh century. The Second Crusade departed from the Vézelay sanctuary (ca. 1146), and several knights from this campaign had joined Afonso Henrique I in the 1147 siege against the Moors in Lisbon and Santarém. From that period onwards, cult devotion accelerated as pilgrims flocked to the center which served as a meeting point for the route to Santiago de Compostela. Jan van Eyck’s panel of Holy Pilgrims includes the stately St. Christopher in a flowing red mantle holding a sturdy staff (Figs. 7.56–7.57). Despite the fact that Judocus Vijd had a brother named Christoffel, the third-century Canaanite who purportedly was martyred in Lycia by Decius was a popular patron of voyagers throughout Europe. According to the Legenda Aurea, Christopher was converted by a holy hermit who led him to a river. While seeking the most powerful king in the world, he carried travelers across the dangerous water, until the day a child asked for his assistance. Fording the river, the child became increasingly heavier, but guided by the hermit’s lantern, Christopher reached the opposite shore. There the child revealed his identity as Christ and as proof, he ordered the giant to place his palm staff in the soil where it would blossom and fruit overnight. This prediction was realized, as the staff was a sign of divine favor analogous to Aaron’s rod and St. Joseph’s stalk of lilies. St. Christopher was the patron saint of Portugal’s

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chivalric Order of Jesus Christ. His feast day, July 25, coincided with that of St. James the Major, the patron of the Order of Santiago, also known as the Order of the Sword (Espada). Behind Christopher in the panel of the “Holy Pilgrims” is St. James the Major, whose hat bears the distinctive seashell signifying a visit to the shrine of Santiago in northwest Galicia. Jan van Eyck had traveled to the pilgrimage site at Compostela in 1429. Standing beside James are two saints who logically should be identified as the seventh-century Amandus of Aquitaine and his disciple Bavo, who were associated with the founding of Ghent’s important monastic institutions, Sint-Baafsabdij and Sint-Pietersabdij.71 John of Gaunt (1340–1399), Edward’s fourth son and Duchess Isabel’s grandfather, was born at the Benedictine Sint-Baafsabdij in Ghent (Fig. 7.58). The famed abbey founded by St. Amandus of Aquitaine about 630 also witnessed the 1369 marriage of Philip the Good’s grandfather, Philip the Bold, who wed Margaret (1350–1405), daughter of Louis de Mâle. This alliance brought Burgundian lands to France. Rebuilt by the Counts of Flanders, Sint-Baafsabdij was named for St. Bavo (ca. 589–654), one of Amandus’ converts. Born in Brabant, Bavo and his wife had owned land in the district of Liège, and he led a libertine life until left a widower. After hearing Amandus preach, Bavo underwent a spiritual metamorphosis becoming a penitential canon. He then founded the abbey of St. Peter on his estate above the Scheldt river in the southern sector of Ghent. Towards the end of his life, Bavo became a hermit in the Malmédum forest around SintPietersabdij, dwelling in a hollow tree or a monk’s cell (Figs. 7.59–7.60). The Sint-Baafsabdij was given by Charlemagne to his biographer Eginhard in 811, when he visited Ghent to review a fleet he assembled to fight the Vikings. By 851, however, the Norsemen sailed into Ghent. Though they sacked the abbey, Benedictine monks restored the buildings by 950. Despite the flourishing of the Romanesque abbey under the patronage of the later Counts of Flanders, little remains of the complex where Infanta Isabel’s grandfather was born (Figs. 7.61–7.62). In 1540 Emperor Charles V, Count of Flanders by age seven, razed most of Sint-Baafsabdij as a punitive measure against Ghent for their refusal to pay taxes levied between 1537 Édouard de Moreau, Les abbayes de Belgique (Brussels: La Renaissance du livre, 1952; idem., Histoire de l’église en Belgique des origines aux débuts du XIIe siècle, 2 vols. (Brussels: l’Édition Universelle, 1940); idem., Saint Amand, principal évangélisateur de la Belgique (Brussels: Off. de publicité, 1942). 71

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and 1539 to garnish support for the Hapsburg army fighting the Protestant Reformers in Germany. He stripped Ghent of its privileges, insisted on a public punishment of the rebellious leaders, and tore down the city’s most famous abbey. Donato Boni di Pellizuoli, an architect from Bergamo designed the Het Spanjaardenkasteel as it came to be called. Built between 1540 and 1545, the new Spanish castle reflected the influence of Northern Italian defense architecture. Square-shaped and surrounded by curtain walls and a moat, it had projecting corner bastions.72 Most of Sint-Baafsabdij’s buildings (Figs. 7.63–7.65) were demolished but the choir of the abbey church located to the south of the cloister was spared to serve as a chapel for the Hapsburg troops. Also left intact were the abbey’s thirteenth-century chapterhouse, dormitory, sections of the cloister and three adjacent rooms, including a chamber called the Mercatelzaal. Remodeled in 1495, these were the former quarters of Abbot Raphael de Mercatel, a bastard son of Philip the Good who retained the name of his mother’s husband, a Venetian merchant. A staircase ascends near the Mercatelzaal to a late twelfth-century refectory which runs the length of the cloister’s northern walk. This Romanesque gallery with arched windows on its south wall probably served a Great Hall. The guest quarters where John of Gaunt was born once stood in the garden west of the cloister along with the abbey’s kitchens.73 Of the remnants of the Sint-Baafsabdij (Figs. 7.66–7.68), the most intriguing is the octagonal lavatorium (1171) off the eastern walk of the cloister. Its second floor sanctuary held the relics of St. Macharius of Antioch. A native and bishop of Pisidia, Macharius made a pilgrimage to Ghent where he purportedly saved victims of the plague at a

See Johan Decavele (ed.), Keizer tussen stropdragers: Karel V 1500–1558, with participation by Johan Dambruyne et al., (Louvain: Davidsfonds, 1990), 66–67; Ivo Schöffer, Herman van der Wee, and Johannes Antonius Bornewasser ( eds.), De Lage Landen van 1500 tot 1780, with participation by Michel Baelde, Gerrit Jan Schutte and Helma Houtman-de Smedt (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1978), 53–57; Bob van Boogert and Jacqueline Kerkhoff, Maria van Hongarije. Koningin tussen keizers en kunstenaars, 1500–1558 (Zwolle: Waanders Uitgevers: Exhibition Catalogue for the Rijksmuseum Het Catharijneconvent, Utrecht and the Noordbrabants Museum, ‘s-Hertogenbosch, 1993), Catalogue entry 119, by Wil Fries on the engraving of “Castrum Novum Gandavense.” 73 For information about Sint-Baafsabdij see Derek Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored. Bruges, Ghent, Antwerp, Mechelen, Leuven & Ostend (London: Pallas Athene, 1998 3rd Ed.), 141–44; Elisabeth Dhanens, Sint-Baafskathedraal, Gent (Ghent: Provinciebestuur van Oostvlaanderen, Kunstpatrimonium, Bisdomplein, 3, 1965). 72

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miraculous well at St. Bavo’s before succumbing to an outbreak at the abbey in 1012.74 Around the island of Sint-Baafsabdij were several houses which were destroyed by Emperor Charles V to provide space for barracks and a garrison’s armoury. The parish church of the community, the Helig-Kerstkerk, also was torn down, but its twelfth-century baptismal font survived with four reliefs of Adam and Eve in Eden, The Expulsion, the rare subject of King Herod with the Magi, and The Epiphany.75 During the Wars of Religion, the Ghenters sided with the Protestant Northern Netherlands against Catholic Spain. Philip II had convened the twenty-third Chapter meeting of the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1559 at Sint-Baafskerk and then elevated Ghent to a bishopric in 1561 (Fig. 7.69). Even so, the memory of Charles V’s harsh measures remained strong. His Spanjaardenkasteel was occupied by the Dutch between 1576 and 1584, and after Ghent was recaptured by Alexander Farnese, the Hapsburg commander destroyed the citadel. The obliteration of Sint-Baafsabdij was the culmination of nearly three centuries of conflict in Ghent. A bareheaded and beardless youth with a golden staff appears to project from the ensemble of pilgrims behind St. James. He stands out among his austerely garbed companions because he is costumed in bold scarlet, the color worn by members of the Order of the Golden Fleece and Portuguese royalty. This unusual figure, possibly St. Josse, alludes the rigorous training of a perfect knight. Perhaps Jan van Eyck was contemplating a specific legendary hero. There were many chivalric warriors admired by the courts of Burgundy, England and Portugal. Though one dynamic figure may be impossible to single out, the mystique of the Grail quest is the common taproot of an age when knighthood was in flower. Imitating the Heroes of Camelot The Avis Dynasty originated when King João I had achieved his victory at Aljubarrota (August 14, 1385) with the English aid of 200 lances and 200 archers who arrived on April 2 at Lisbon despite a Castilian fleet of ten galleons Benedictine Monks of St. Augustine’s Abbey, Ramsgate, The Book of Saints. A Dictionary of the Servants of God (Harrisburg, PA, Morehouse Publishing, 6th ed. 1994), 357. The feast day of St. Macharius is April 10. 75 Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored, 143. 74

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blocking the Tagus. These men-of-arms had been sent from Plymouth by John of Gaunt (Fig. 7.70), who had been relentless in pleading Lusitania’s cause before Richard II. Portuguese nobility sent to the English court also championed João I.76 The delegation included the king’s ambassador, Lourenco Martins, his chancellor-elect, Lourenco Annes Fongaca, and the Grand Master of the chivalric Order of Santiago, Fernando Afonso de Albuquerque.77 After arriving at Plymouth on April 10, 1384, they rode to London. There the embassy resided at the Falcon Inn on Gracechurch Street while awaiting an audience with John of Gaunt.78 Following the Garter ceremony at Windsor (April 24), they visited the Duke at the Palace of Sheen. Conversing in French, John not only arranged a meeting with Richard II in the Star Chamber at Westminster, but also entertained them

76 Violet Mary Shillington, “The Beginning of the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 20 (1906): 109–32; idem., The Commercial Relations of England and Portugal (London: Routledge & sons, Ltd., 1907); Violet Mary Shillington and Annie Beatrice Wallis Chapman, The Commercial Relations of England and Portugal (New York: B. Franklin, 1970); Edgar Prestage, Chapters in Anglo-Portuguese Relations (Watford: Voss & Michael, 1935); Eduardo Brasão, Anglo-Portuguese Alliance (London: Sylvan Press, 1957); Peter Edward Russell, English Intervention in Spain and Portugal in the time of Edward III and Richard II (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955); idem., (ed.), Portugal, Spain, and the African Atlantic, 1343–1490: Chivalry and Crusade from John of Gaunt to Henry the Navigator (Aldershot, Hampshire-Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1995). Also consult: Sydney ArmitageSmith, John of Gaunt, King of Castile and Leon, Duke of Aquitaine and Lancaster, Earl of Derby, Lincoln and Leicester, Seneschal of England (Westminster: A. Constable & Co., Ltd., 1904) reprinted (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1964); Anthony Goodman, John of Gaunt: The Exercise of Princely Power in Fourteenth-century Europe (Burnt Mill, Harlow, Essex-New York: Longman-St. Martin’s Press, 1992); idem., A History of England from Edward II to James I (London-New York: Longman, 1977); Roger Collins and Anthony Goodman, Medieval Spain: Culture, Conflict, and Coexistence: Studies in Honour of Angus MacKay (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire-New York: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2002). 77 Pedro da Costa de Sousa de Macedo (Conde de Villa Franca), D. João I e a alliança ingleza, investigações historico-sociaes (Lisbon, Livraria Ferreira, 1884; rpt. Lisbon: 1950), CLXXVI. 78 Fernão Lopes [b. 1380], Chronica del Rey Dom João I (Lisbon: 1644), Part V, Ch. 80. See Fernão Lopes, Crónica de D. João I, 2 vols. ed. Manuel Lopes de Almeida, with introduction by António Sérgio (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1945–49); idem., Crónica de D. João I, ed. Teresa Amado (Lisbon: Seara Nova: Editorial Comunicação, 1980); idem., Crónica del rei dom Joham I de boa memoria e dos reis de Portugal o decimo, 2 vols., facsimile edition (Lisbon: Arquivo Histórico Português, 1915) prepared by Anselmo Braamcamp Freire with a preface by Luís Filipe Lindley Cintra, reprinted and edited by William James Entwistle (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1977).

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with a banquet at the Savoy Palace 79 (Fig. 7.71). Due to the assiduous efforts of Lourenco Annes Fongaca and Fernando Afonso de Albuquerque, Portugal received the support it needed. On the field of Aljubarrota the Castilians vastly outnumbered the Portuguese, but the English bowmen helped turn the tide of battle to Lusitania’s advantage the same way they had at Crécy and Poitiers. Their union of arms was reflected in the persistent war cries of “St. George for Portugal.” Securing the independence of Portugal with this victory, the Master of Avis became the strongest ally of the House of Lancaster according to the Anglo-Portuguese treaty signed on May 17, 1386 at Westminster.80 He even called his Lisbon Palace, the “Castle of St. George.” João I met John of Gaunt for the first time on Portuguese soil (Fig. 7.72). Obtaining a grant from Parliament, the Duke left Plymouth on July 6, 1386 with 114 English galleons to press his claim for the crown of Castile. Serving as his escort, were ten Portuguese ships and six smaller galleys commanded by Admiral Afonso Furtado.81 The Portuguese ships which arrived on June 30 were met by Lourenco Annes Fongaca. He and Afonso de Albuquerque returned to their homeland five days after John of Gaunt departed from Plymouth. Anchoring at La Coruña in Galicia on July 20 in Galicia with 5000 men, John established a provisional vanguard at Santiago de Compostela. Quarters were secured at the church’s abbey for his two unmarried daughters, Philippa and Catherine.82 Receiving news of the Duke of Lancaster’s arrival in Lamego, João dispatched a welcoming courier. In October, Lourenço Annes Fongaca departed for Compostela to arrange a meeting by the Minho River. On Thursday, November 1, All Saints Day, the two powerful lords approached a bridge, the Ponte de Thomas William Edgar Roche, Philippa. Dona Filipa of Portugal (London and Chichester: Phillimore, 1971), 38–39. He cites Jean Froissart [1338–1410], The Chronicle, 6 vols., translated from French by Sir John Bourchier, Lord Berners [years 1523–1525], with an introduction by William Paton Ker (London: D. Nutt, 1901–03), III, 29 (Frossart’s Chroniques is in the British Museum, Harleian MS 1479/80); Villa Franca, D. João I e a Alianca Inglesa, 56–57. 80 Fernão Lopes, Chronica de D. João I, Part II, Ch. 42. Also see Harold Victor Livermore, A New History of Portugal (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966), 103. 81 Roche, Philippa, 45; Henry Knighton [fl. 1363] Chronicon [Chronicon Henrici Knighton], Roll Series, 2 vols., ed. Joseph Rawson Lumby, (London: Printed for H.M. Stationery Office, Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1889–1895), II, 207; Fernão Lopes, Chronica del Rey Dom João I, Part II, Ch. 83. 82 Livermore, A New History of Portugal, 104; Froissart, The Chronicle, III, 33 (Santiago de Compostela and its Abbey). 79

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Mouro, where in the presence of their knights, they greeted each other in French.83 Subsequently, John of Gaunt was invited to the first of two lavish banquets in the Portuguese tent. Fernão Lopes in his Chronica del Rei Dom João I states that three bishops and the Archbishop of Braga, Lourenço Vicente, attended the first dinner, along with Sir John Holland, the English Constable. Eight days of informal discussion resulted in João I’s pledge to assist with 5000 men, whose expenses would be borne by the English. If the Duke of Lancaster became king of Castile, Lusitania was to receive the recompense in the form of frontier towns, roughly located along the edge of Extremadura. The negotiations were cemented by the announcement of a betrothal between the sovereign of Portugal and Philippa of Lancaster.84 John of Gaunt never was able to secure Castile as a kingdom, and when he died on February 13, 1399 at Leicester Castle, Dona Philippa sailed to London to attend his funeral obsequies at St. Paul’s. She remained in England until April 24, when, at the invitation of Richard II she wore Garter robes in the ceremonial procession through the Ward of Windsor Castle (Fig. 7.73– 7.74). Henry of Bolingbroke had appreciated Lusitania’s support when he ascended the throne as Henry IV (Fig. 7.75–7.76). When a Garter stall was vacant due to the death of Lord William Arundel in August of 1400, João I was the first foreigner to be honored by election to the Garter Order of St. George. The Portuguese monarch and his queen were delighted to attend the Garter ceremonies at Windsor Castle on April 24, 1401.85 From that Roche, Philippa, 47–49, states Philippa and Catherine were taken to the Benedictine Abbey of Celanova northeast of Melgaco on the Minho River when Duke John rode southeast towards Moncão, the town where João I set out with about 240 knights. The Portuguese paladins wore white surcoats embroidered with the red pattée cross of the Order of Christ, while their English counterparts were dressed in serge. 84 Fernão Lopes, Chronica del Rey Dom João I, Part II, Ch. 91. Regarding the negotiations, see Livermore, A New History of Portugal, 104 and Roche, Philippa, 49–50. 85 Roche, Philippa, 73–74. For the St. George ceremonies at Windsor Castle in 1401 (April 23–May 1), Henry IV gave robes to João I, according to the Wardrobe account for that year (Comp. Custod. M. garderob. de emtionibus & liberaco’ibs, 2–3 Hen. 4 – Queen’s Remembrancer’s Office). For St. George’s feast in 1408 he was given Garter robes, as indicated by the Wardrobe account between September 29, 1407 and May 1408. Still another gift is documented by the 1409 account among the records of the Queen’s Remembrancer’s Office. Richard Clifford, keeper, recorded deliveries of cloth, furs, etc. for robes made for both the king and queen of Portugal (May 1, 9 Hen. 4, 1408–September 29, 10 Hen. 4, 1409). On the same roll for the feast of May in 1409, Peter Swann the embroiderer, cites his charges for embroidering 1492 round garters of “tartarin and card worked with silk and cyprus gold, with the motto hony soit qi male y pense for the monarch, as well as “the king of Portugal.” 83

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point onwards, England and Portugal forged strong political, commercial and cultural bonds. The reign of João I and his Lancastrian consort Philippa marked an accelerated interest in English customs. Many English knights who had sailed with John of Gaunt to the Iberian Peninsula in July of 1386 settled permanently in Portugal after the marriage of Philippa. Accordingly, Arthurian legends were very popular at the Avis court, not just because the tales were exciting, but also they were deemed appropriate literature to shape the minds of royal princes.86 Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira (1438– 1431) (Figs. 7.77–7.78), who began his martial career in 1371 at the age of thirteen, was João I’s constant supporter. Recognizing the importance of foot soldiers over horsemen, he commanded the Portuguese army in several decisive battles against the Castilians, Aljubarrota, Atoleiros, Valverde and Torres Vedras (1384–1385). The sieges were not always successful in outcome. Following a conflict at Coria, João I stated: “We had great need today of the good knights of the Round Table, for surely if they had been Queen Philippa also received the livery of the “Garter fraternity of St. George.” Consult: Beltz [1777–1841], Memorials of the most noble Order of the Garter; Edmund Horace Fellowes, The Knights of the Garter, 1348–1939 (London: Society for promoting Christian Knowledge, 1939); Joseph Haydn [1786/7–1856], The Book of Dignities; containing rolls of the official personages of the British Empire ... from the earliest periods to the present time ... together with the sovereigns of Europe, from the foundation of their respective states; the peerage of England and Great Britain (London: Longmans, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1851; rpt. 1894 and Baltimore, 3rd. ed., 1970). 86 Arthurian literature is too vast to cite, but some useful manuscripts are: Richard Cavendish, King Arthur & the Grail: The Arthurian Legends and their Meaning (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1978); Gareth Knight, The Secret Tradition in Arthurian Legend (Wellingborough, Northamptonshire: Aquarian Press, 1983); idem., The Secret Tradition in Arthurian Legend: The Archetypal Themes, Images, and Characters of the Arthurian Cycle and their Place in the Western Magical Traditions (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1996); Roger Sherman Loomis, Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance (New York: Columbia University Press, 1927, rpt. New York, Haskell House, 1967); The Development of Arthurian Romance (London: Hutchinson, 1963) and rpt. (Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 2000); idem, Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages: A Collaborative History (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959); idem., Arthurian Tradition & Chrétien de Troyes (New York: Columbia University Press, 1949) and rpt. (New York: Octagon Books, 1982. Additionally, consult: Almir dos Campos Bruneti, A Lenda do Graal no Contexto Heterodoxo do Pensamento Português (Lisbon: Sociedade de Expansão Cultural, 1974); Daniel Poirion, Résurgences : mythe et littérature à l’âge du symbole, XIIe siècle (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1986); Werner Verbeke, Jozef Janssens, Maurits Smeyers (eds.), Arturus Rex: Koning Artur en de Nederlanden: la matière de Bretagne et les anciens Pays-Bas, 2 vols. (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1987–1991); Jozef Janssens, De Graal en de ridders van de Ronde Tafel (Louvain: Davidsfonds-Clauwaert, 1995).

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here, we should have taken the place.” As related by the chronicler Fernão Lopes, the nobleman Mem Rodrigues de Vasconcellas retorted testily to his king’s rebuke by naming knights who were as brave as Galahad, Tristan, and Lancelot, and declaring what the army needed was King Arthur, who knew good servants and bestowed many favors on them, so that they might seek to serve him well.87 Rewarded for his service to the Crown with great wealth and land, Nuno Álvares Pereira was a devout knight who believed in the concordance of chivalry and priesthood. Prior to professing the vows of a Carmelite monk in Lisbon, he had attended two or three masses daily, awakened at midnight to recite the Canonical Hours, fasted rigorously thrice weekly, and gave a tithe of incomes from his vast properties to the poor. This extraordinary model to the young princes of the “Illustrious Generation” had identified with Galahad. According to the biographical Chronicle of the Constable: He had great relish for and was often wont to hear and read story books, especially that of Galahad, and because he found that by virtue of virginity this man had accomplished great deeds which others could not achieve, he wished to imitate him and remain a virgin if it pleased God.88 In early 1416 Prince Henrique was entrusted by his father with defending and supplying the port of Ceuta. The Duke of Viseu returned to the town during a siege of 1418 and remained there for three months in 1419. Under his initiative, Portuguese galleons were sent to the Canary Islands between 1415 and 1416. As master of the Order of Christ, he devoted the institution’s 87 Fernão Lopes, Chronica de D. João I, Part II, Ch. 86, cited by Edgar Prestage, “The Chivalry of Portugal,” ed. Edgar Prestage, Chivalry. A Series of Studies to Illustrate Its Historical Significance and Civilizing Influence (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928): 141–66, at 154–55. 88 See Prestage, “The Chivalry of Portugal,” at 153–54. He cites the Coronica do condestabre de purtugall Nuno aluarez Pereyra (Lisbon: 1526), Ch.IV, and William James Entwistle, The Arthurian Legend in the Literatures of the Spanish Peninsula (London-Toronto-New York: J.M. Dent & Sons, Ltd.- E.P. Dutton & Co., 1925). Consult reprint (New York and Millwood, NY: Phaeton Press and Kraus Reprint Co., 1975), 239. Prestage states the biography of Nuno Álvares Pereira might be considered the finest effort of Arthurian prose. Also see William James Entwistle, A lenda arturiana nas literaturas da Península Ibérica, translated, amplified and edited by António Alvaro Dória (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, 1942). Also consult A Demanda do Santo Graal, ed. Joseph Maria Piel, completed by Irene Freire Nunes with an introduction by Ivo de Castro (Lisbon: Impressão Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1989).

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revenues to maritime exploration, and he died a virgin at Sagres. One of the newly discovered Canary Islands was named Lanzarote after Lancelot of the Lake.89 Among the chivalric tomes listed in the inventory of Duarte’s library were a Livro de Tristam, Merlim, and O Livro de Galaaz (“The Book of Galahad”).90 This love of Arthurian lore at the Avis court extended through the fifteenth century. Prior to meeting with Louis XI at Tours in November of 1476, Afonso V (1432: r. 1481–1495), the son of King Duarte, stayed a few days in Bourges, where a lord and bishop sent by the Crown gave him a tour of the “new fortress” built by Jean, Duke of Berry (1340–1416). The structure described as “the fairest in all France” likely was the Duke’s town mansion, but it also might have been Mehun-sur-Yèvre (Figs. 7.79–7.80). Subsequently, Afonso V was escorted to a “great and devout” Benedictine abbey, where the abbot showed him a “richly illuminated and ancient History of Sir Lancelot and Sir Tristam.” For the ecclesiastic to have brought forth a secular book, the royal bibliophile must have communicated his love of rare manuscripts and especially his fondness for Arthurian lore.91 Artur Teodoro de Matos, Henrique o Navegador, translated by George Dykes (Lisbon: CTT Correios, 1993), 31–32. 90 Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Piel, 415–16 (Appendix 9: Estes São os Livros que tinha el Rey Dom Duarte (Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, MS 3390, folio 163), 414–16 entire inventory). Concerning Duarte’s library, also see: Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. José Ignacio Roquete (Paris: Livraria Portugueza de J.-P. Aillaud Guillard, 1842), xx– xxii; Inocêncio Francisco da Silva, “Memoria ácerca da Bibliotheca de el-rei D. Duarte,” O Panorama: Jornal litterario e instructivo (Lisbon: 1854), XI, 315–17; Teófilo Braga, Historia da universidade de Coimbra nas suas relações com a instucçâo publica portugueza Lisboa, 4 vols. (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1892–1902), I, 209–28; António Caetano de Sousa [1674–1759], Provas da Historia genealógica da casa real portugueza, desde a sua origem ate’o presente, com as familias illustres, que procedem dos reys, e dos serenissimos duques de Bragança, 12 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, Na officina de J.A. da Silva, 1735–48); see rpt. (Lisbon: 1933), I, 544–46. Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, l 307, remarks a “final codification of the rules of chivalry” later was accomplished by Prince Pedro, and contained as Title LXIII in the Ordenações afonsinas, “Dos Cavalleiros, como, e per quem devem seer feitos, e desfeitos.” He cites Ordenaçoens do Senhor Rey D. Affonso V, 5 vols. (Coimbra: 1792), 360–76. 91 Rui de Pina, of Guarda [1440–1521], Chronica do Senhor rey D. Affonso V in Crónicas de Rui de Pina, ed. Manuel Lopes de Almeida (Porto: Lello & Irmão, 1977), Ch. CXCIV. See Elaine Sanceau, The Perfect Prince. A Biography of the King Dom João II (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1959), 100–10. As a condition for signing a treaty with Portugal, Louis XI (1423: r. 1461–1483) requested Afonso V persuade his cousin, Charles the Bold (1433–1477), not to invade France. In December Afonso and Charles warmly embraced halfway across a frozen river outside Nancy, and the Duke of Burgundy expressed his willingness to make peace. On January 6, 1477, Afonso V, then residing ten leagues from Nancy, received news that Charles 89

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The anonymous Franco-Burgundian Perlesvaus (ca. 1200), or High History of the Holy Grail, upheld that the Grail was not a physical object but a mystical aura. The text also contended the Sangréal to be a receptacle of royal lineage.92 The twelfth-century Le Conte del Graael. Roman de Perceval was written by Chrétian de Troyes (ac. 1160–1175), a poet attached to the court of Champagne, whose literary ambiance was stimulated by the patronage of Countess Marie, daughter of Eleanor of Aquitaine, and Count Philippe of Flanders.93 Chrétian’s unfinished work, which was concentrated upon the physical and spiritual qualities of knighthood, combined Arthurian lore with Celtic enchantment. the Bold had been killed the day before by the Swiss and German mercenaries of René, Duke of Lorrain. His plans for a treaty with France swiftly unraveled. After spending the spring in Paris and the summer in Normandy, Afonso V traveled to Honfleur, where, on September 24 in a despairing mood he abdicated. In October, he sailed from La Hogue for Portugal in a ship chartered from Southampton. The galleon arrived at Oeiras on November 15, five days after João II was proclaimed king at Santarém. Afonso V was greeted in the town by his son, who refused to accept his abdication. 92 Nigel Bryant (tr.), The High Book of the Grail: A Translation of the Thirteenth Century Romance of Perlesvaus (Ipswich-Totowa, NJ: D.S. Brewer-Rowman and Littlefield, 1978) rpt. (Woodbridge, Suffolk-Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 1996). Also consult: Nigel Bryant (tr.), Merlin and the Grail: Joseph of Arimathea, Merlin, Perceval: The Trilogy of Prose Romances attributed to Robert de Boron (Woodbridge, UK-Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2001); Robert de Boron [13th Century], Le roman de l’Estoire dou Graal, ed. William Albert Nitze (Paris: H. Champion, 1927); Norma Lorre Goodrich, Merlin (New York: F. Watts, 1987); idem., The Holy Grail (New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers, 1992). For alchemical associations of the nigrescent Merlin and the Grail, see Walter Johannes Stein, Der Tod Merlins: das Bild des Menschen in Mythos und Alchemie, with contributions by Thomas Meyer (Dornach: Switzerland: Philosophisch-Anthroposophischer Verlag, 1984); idem., The Death of Merlin: Arthurian Myth and Alchemy (Edinburgh: Floris, 1989). 93 Chrétian de Troyes, Oeuvres complètes, ed. Daniel Poirion with the collaboration of Anne Berthelot et al., (Paris: Gallimard, 1994). Chrétian de Troyes traveled about 1180 with Philip of Alsace, Count of Flanders, to Ghent. In the Count’s Castle the poet was given a manuscript that inspired his Le Chevalier de la Charrette (Story of Lancelot). See Laurens De Keyzer, The Count’s Castle, Ghent. Tales behind the Stones (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion Publishers, 2002), 62–63; and Deborah Webster Rogers, Lancelot. The Knight of the Green Cart (New York: 1984).; rpt. Geneva, 1977). Chrétien prefaced his Lancelot, or Le Chevalier de la Charrette, with an acknowledgment that Marie, Countess of Champagne, was responsible for the matière (content) and the sens (interpretation). The story concerns Queen Guinevere’s rescue from Meleagant, son of King Baudemagus, but appears to reveal Marie’s understanding of the weibermacht theme (power of women) as it related to her mother. See Marion Meade, Eleanor of Aquitaine (New York: Hawthorn Books, 1977); Douglas David Roy Owen, Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen and Legend (Oxford, UK-Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell, 1993); Norma Lorre Goodrich, Guinevere (New York: HarperCollins, 1991); idem., King Arthur (New

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A young Perceval is shielded by his mother Gornemans from the chivalric world, but he is unable to escape his destiny. From the enclosed boundaries of the castle, he moves to the hidden confines of a hidden glade, where his uncle, a hermit, provides him with the moral and social knowledge of a skilled warrior. When Perceval leaves the security of his family’s home to seeks the chivalric world of perilous adventure, his education continues, and he matures to greater spirituality at Grail Castle.94 This story not only has great relevance for the guiding role Queen Philippa assumed in her York: F. Watts, 1986); Sandra Hindman, Sealed in Parchment: Rereadings of Knighthood in the Illuminated Manuscripts of Chrétien de Troyes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994). 94 Consult: Chrétian de Troyes, Le livre du Graal, ed. by Daniel Poirion under the direction of Philip Chrétian de Troyes, Oeuvres complètes, ed. Daniel Poirion with the collaboration of Anne Berthelot et al., (Paris: Gallimard, 1994). Chrétian de Troyes traveled about 1180 with Philip of Alsace, Count of Flanders, to Ghent. In the Count’s Castle the poet was given a manuscript that inspired his Le Chevalier de la Charrette (Story of Lancelot). See Laurens De Keyzer, The Count’s Castle, Ghent. Tales behind the Stones (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion Publishers, 2002), 62–63; and Deborah Webster Rogers, Lancelot. The Knight of the Green Cart (New York: 1984).; rpt. Geneva, 1977). Chrétien prefaced his Lancelot, or Le Chevalier de la Charrette, with an acknowledgment that Marie, Countess of Champagne, was responsible for the matière (content) and the sens (interpretation). The story concerns Queen Guinevere’s rescue from Meleagant, son of King Baudemagus, but appears to reveal Marie’s understanding of the weibermacht theme (power of women) as it related to her mother. See Marion Meade, Eleanor of Aquitaine (New York: Hawthorn Books, 1977); Douglas David Roy Owen, Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen and Legend (Oxford, UK-Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell, 1993); Norma Lorre Goodrich, Guinevere (New York: HarperCollins, 1991); idem., King Arthur (New York: F. Watts, 1986); Sandra Hindman, Sealed in Parchment: Rereadings of Knighthood in the Illuminated Manuscripts of Chrétien de Troyes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994); Philippe Walter, with the collaboration of Anne Berthelot et al. (Paris: Gallimard, 2001); Chrétian de Troyes, The Story of the Grail [Le Conte del Graal], translated by Robert White Linker (Chapel Hill: North Carolina Press, 1952); Chrétian de Troyes, The Story of the Grail, translated by Ruth Harwood Cline (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1985); Jean Frappier, Chrétien de Troyes. The Man and his Work, translated by Raymond J. Cormier (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1982); idem, Chrétien de Troyes et le mythe du Graal; étude sur “Perceval ou le Conte du Graal” (Paris: Société d’édition d’enseignement supérieur, 1972); Leslie Thomas Topsfield, A Study of the Arthurian Romances of Chrétian de Troyes (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981); Alexandre Micha, La tradition manuscrite des romans de Chrétien de Troyes (Geneva: Droz, 1939 and 2nd ed. 1966); William Albert Nitze and Thomas Atkinson Jenkins (eds.), Le haut livre du graal; Perlesvaus, 2 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1932–37; rpt. (New York: Phaeton Press, 1972); 1st ed. Chicago, 1932); William Albert Nitze and Harry F. Williams, Arthurian Names in the Perceval of Chrétien de Troyes (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1955). Dell Skeels, The Romance of Perceval (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1966); Charles Potvin, Perceval le Gallois, 6 vols. (Mons: Dequesne-Masquillier, 1866–71).

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sons’ early training before the campaign at Ceuta, but it also illustrates why Jan van Eyck in his Ghent Altarpiece balanced his panels of Hermits and Pilgrims with Just Judges and Knights associated with chivalric orders.95 The literature of the court of Champagne seems to have been nurtured in a Templar environment. The Perceval tale, with its accent upon courtly grace and arcane mystery, strongly influenced the Cistercian Vulgate Cycle (1215–1235), a compilation of manuscripts attributed to the monk Robert de Boron (ac. 1190–1212): the Estoire del Graal, the Estoire de Merlin, the prose Livres de Lancelot, the Quête del Saint Graal (La Queste) and Mort (le Roi) Artu.96 After the Templar observances were analyzed and formulated into a rule at the Council of Troyes in 1129, the new institution had adopted St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) in Champagne as their official patron and protector. The Cistercian’s defense of the Templars in his De laude novae militae had garnished considerable support for the military order.97 When 95 Madeleine Pelner Cosman, The Education of the Hero in Arthurian Romance (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966). 96 Robert de Boron’s Joseph (1191–1202) centers on the chalice of the Last Supper brought by Joseph of Arimathaea to the Vale of Avalon (Glastonbury), and the Grail “banquet table” which can only be attended by the “pure of heart.” See the trilogy of prose romances by Robert de Boron, Merlin and the Grail: Joseph of Arimathea, Merlin, Perceval, translated by Nigel Bryant (Woodbridge, UK-Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2001. For further reading, consult: Robert de Boron [fl. 13th Century], Seynt Graal, or The Sank Ryal. The History of the Holy Graal , translated by Henry Lovelich Skynner [fl. Reign of Henry VI: 1422–1461], ed. by Frederick James Furnivall, 2 vols., partly in English verse and wholly in French prose from the original Latin manuscript by “Sires Robiers de Borron” (Cambridge: Library of Corpus Christi College and The British Museum (London: Roxburghe Club-J.B. Nichols and Sons, 1861–63); Ulrich, von Zatzikhoven [fl. ca. 1200], Lanzelet. A Romance of Lancelot, translated from the Middle High German by Kenneth Grant Tremayne Webster, with an introduction by Roger Sherman Loomis (New York: Columbia University Press, 1951); Pauline Maud Matarasso, The Redemption of Chivalry: A Study of the Queste del Saint Graal (Geneva: Droz, 1979); Ceridwen Lloyd-Morgan, “The Relationship between the Perlesvaus and the Prose Lancelot,” Medium Aevum LIII (1984): 239–52. Alexandre Micha, Lancelot: roman en prose du XIIIe siècle (Geneva: Droz, 1978–1983); idem., Essais sur le cycle du Lancelot-Graal (Geneva: Droz, 1987); idem., Merlin : roman du XIIIe siècle [Robert de Boron] (Geneva: Droz, 1979); idem., Étude sur le “Merlin” de Robert de Boron : roman du XIIIe siècle (Geneva: Droz, 1980); N. Rollet, L’Iconographie du Lancelot en prose à la fin du Moyen Âge (Thesis: l’École National de Chartes, 1998 97 Gabrielle Carmi, Des templiers aux Massenies du Saint-Graal (Paris: Nouvelles Éditions Debresse, 1977); Jean Carpentier, L’Ordre des Templiers (Paris: La Colombe, 1945; Alain Desgris, Organisation et vie des Templiers: sociologie féodale d’Orient et d’Occident (Paris: G. Trédaniel Éditeur, 1997); E. Durman, The Templars, Knights of God (Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1988); Jacquette Luquet-Juillet, Le Graal et le Temple (Grenoble: Éditions

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Pope Eugene III and King Louis VII of France advanced the Second Crusade in 1146, Bernard became their official spokesman, enlisting the support of the Knights Templar.98 In Portugal, the Knights Templar were superseded by the Order of Christ. The Cistercian Ideal of the Grail Knight in Portugal St. Bernard of Clairvaux and the Cistercian Order had been staunchly supported by Afonso Henriques I (1094–1185), founder of the kingdom of Portugal who shared a deep devotion to the Virgin Mary (Fig. 7.81). Perhaps relevant to Van Eyck’s portrayal of the minor prophet Zacharias in the Ghent Altarpiece is a sermon Bernard composed for the feast of the Annunciation. The same passage of Zacharias 9:9 was used by the Cistercian for Gabriel’s salutation to the Virgin Mary.99 Bernard’s Sermones in Cantica Le Mercure Dauphinois, 2000);. Helen Nicholson, Templars, Hospitallers, and Teutonic Knights: Images of the Military Orders, 1128–1291 (Leicester-New York: Leicester University Press-St. Martin’s Press, 1993; Karen Ralls, The Templars and the Grail: Knights of the Quest (Wheaton, IL: Quest Books, Theosophical Publishing House, 2003; James Wasserman, The Templars and the Assassins: The Militia of Heaven, including In Praise of the New Knighthood by Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, translated by Lisa Coffin (Rochester, VT: Destiny Books, 2001. Stephen Howarth, The Knights Templar (London-New York : Collins-Atheneum, 1982); B.S. James, St. Bernard of Clairvaux (New York: Harper & Row, 1957); Desmond Seward, The Monks of War. The Military Religious Orders (Harmondsworth-Baltimore: Penguin Publishers, 1995), 31–32; Bernard of Clairvaux, “Liber ad Milites Templi de Laude Novae Militiae,” ed. Dom Jean Leclercq and Dom Henri M. Rochais, in S. Bernardi Opera, vol. III (Rome: Editiones Cistercienses, 1963); The Rule of the Templars [Règle du Temple]: The French Text of the Rule of the Order of the Knights Templar, translated and introduced by Judith Mary UptonWard (Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK-Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1992). 98 Consult Elphège Vacandard, Vie de Saint Bernard, 2 vols. (Paris: V. Lecoffre, 1902, 3rd ed.); Jean Leclercq, Études sur Saint Bernard et le texte de ses écrits (Rome: Apud Curiam Generalem Sacri Ordinis Cisterciensis, 1955); idem., St. Bernard et l’esprit Cistercien (Paris: Édition du Seuil, 1966); idem., St. Bernard Mystique (Paris: 1948); Étienne Henri Gilson, La théologie mystique de saint Bernard (Paris: J. Vrin, 1934; rpt. The Mystical Theology of Saint Bernard, translated by Alfred Howard Campbell Downes (New York: Sheed & Ward-Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1936); Jacques Berlioz, Saint Bernard en Bourgogne: lieux et mémoire, with the participation of Patrick Arabeyre et al., (Dijon: Éditions du Bien Public, 1990). 99 Gertrud Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 3 vols., translated by Janet Seligman (Greenwich, CN: New York Graphic Society, 1971), I, 11 (1st ed. Ikonographie der Christlichen Kunst, 3 vols., Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus G. Mohn, 1966). See Penny Howell Jolly, “More on the Van Eyck Question: Philip the Good of Burgundy, Isabelle of Portugal, and the Ghent Altarpiece,” Oud Holland 101, No. 4 (1987): 237–53, at 249 note 4.

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Canticorum, which centers on the concept of Christ as the spouse of the soul, contains a polysemy of Solomonic metaphors involving the sense of taste.100 The wetting of Bernard’s lips by the milk of the nursing Magna Mater was interpreted as an infusion of wisdom by the Holy Spirit. This miraculous lactation was analogous to Isaiah’s vision of a universal Ecclesia on earth, which pictorially is expressed by Jan van Eyck in his Ghent Altarpiece and is symbolized by Rogier van der Weyden in his combination of such diverse subjects as St. George the Dragon Slayer and the Madonna nursing in a Niche (Fig. 7.82). The prophet states: Behold, I will bring upon her as it were a river of peace, and as an overflowing torrent the glory of the Gentiles, which you shall suck; you shall be carried at the breasts, and upon the knees they shall caress you. As one whom the mother caresseth, so will I comfort you.... And I will set a sign among them, and I will send of them that shall be saved, to the Gentiles into the sea, into Africa and Lydia, them that draw the bow; into Italy and Greece, to the islands far off, to them that have not heard of me and have not seen my glory (Isaiah 66: 12–13, 19).101 Bernardine mysticism was intrinsically the basis for the Portuguese veneration of “Our Lady of Nazareth,” whose legend originated in Porto de Mós, one of the estates St. Isabel of Aragon received from her husband King Dinis on June 23, 1287 (Figs. 7.83–7.84). In 1179 shepherds found a wooden statue which had been sequestered from the Moors. Townspeople identified the image of the nursing Virgin and Christ as a true carving by St. Joseph in Nazareth, and the rocky place of its discovery subsequently became a pilgrimage shrine. In 1182 the mayor of the Porto de Mós, Dom Fuas Roupinho, was hunting near the site where the statue was found, when a stag with long antlers leapt through the grass and disappeared. Pursuing 100 L. Dewez and Albert van Iterson, “La Lactation de Saint Bernard. Legende et Iconographie,” Cîteaux in de Nederlanden 7 (1956): 165–89; Maurice Dumontier, Saint Bernard et la Bible (Paris: 1953); Roch A. Kereszty, “Die Weisheit in der Mysticism Erfahrung beim Hl. Bernhard von Clairvaux, “ Cîteaux 15 (1963): 6–24, 105–34, 185–201; Ulrich Köpf, Religiöse Erfahrung in der Theologie Bernhards von Clairvaux (Tübingen: Mohr, 1980); idem., “Bernhard von Clairvaux in der Frauenmystik,” in Peter Dinzelbacher and Dieter R. Bauer (eds.), Frauenmystik im Mittelalter (Ostfildern bei Stuttgart: Schwabenverlag, 1985): 48–77. 101 The Holy Bible. Douay Version (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1960), The Old Testament, Part I, 961.

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the animal to a promontory shrouded by dense fog, Dom Fuas had difficulty restraining his horse when the stag suddenly jumped into the sea. Invoking the name of Nossa Senhora de Nazaré, the mayor was saved from certain death. With his front hoofs poised in the air, the horse halted and turned around, leaving the marks of his back hoofs on the rocks.102 A conflation of Arthurian myth and Christian legend surfaces in Portugal in the person of Lourenço Vicente. Archbishop of Braga and appointed guardian of Queen Philippa in Oporto at the time of her marriage, he was called “Lancarote Vicente” prior to his professing of vows. This native of Lourinha had fought courageously at Aljubarrota in 1385, wearing a rochet over his armour and a picture of Nossa Senhora de Nazaré in lieu of a plume on his helmet. The icon encouraged the Portuguese troops and dismayed the Spaniards.103 The Cistercian Vulgate’s Lancelot has a patent religious orientation (Fig. 7.85). The knight learns archery, instructed by his tutor and the Lady of the Lake. His tethered horse in a forest signifies a pause from chivalric adventure, and in equal measure, the anagogical White Hart he pursues and adopts as an emblem for his shield is a significant metaphor of Christ’s sacrifice and the knightly spiritual quest for the Grail. A mystical deer features in the legend of the Merovingian Clovis, king of the Franks (481–511), whose conversion to Christianity was due to his pious Burgundian queen Clothilda (Fig. 7.86). After visiting the Abbey of St. Martin of Tours before engaging in battle with Alaric the Visigoth, Clovis and his army were advancing towards

António José de Almeida, “Our Lady of Nazaré,” Crowning Glory. Images of the Virgin in the Arts of Portugal (Lisbon-Newark, NJ: Exhibition Catalogue, Gabinet das Relações Internacionais-The Newark Museum, 1997). Lusitanian representations of the Virgem do Leite depend stylistically upon Flemish models of the nursing Virgin and Child, especially archetypes from Bruges. However, the popularity of the theme merits further analysis with regard to the commanding role of the Cistercians in Portugal and their sustained patronage by the Portuguese Crown, beginning with King Afonso Henriques I. 103 Regarding Lourenço Vicente at Aljubarrota, see Roche, Philippa, 52, who cites: José Soares da Silva, Memorias para a historia de Portugal (Lisbon: 1731), II, CXII; Fernão Lopes, Chronica del Rey Dom João I (Lisbon: 1644), Part II, Ch. 94. The Archbishop of Braga served as the Queen’s mentor primarily when she stayed at the episcopal palace in Porto before her wedding. Roche relates, 54, the marriage could not take place at the Cathedral until a papal decree arrived from Urban VI (1378–1389) releasing João I from the vow of chastity he had taken as the Master of Avis. The shrine of Nossa Senhora de Nazaré was one of many pilgrimage centers in the Middle Ages. See Mário Martins, Peregrinações e livros de milagres na nossa Idade Média (Lisboa: Brotéria, 1957, 2nd ed.); idem., Nossa Senhora nos romances do Santo Graal e nas ladainhas medievais e quinhentistas (Braga: Edições “Magnificat,” 1988). 102

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Poitiers when a stag miraculously guided them across the flooded Vienne River. After Clovis fought in single combat with Alaric, an angel delivered the fleur-de-lys standard to a hermit at Joyenval (St. Germain-en-Laye), who then presented it to Clothilda.104 A splendid representation of the royal device of France appears in a frontispiece miniature belonging to the Chronicle of the Kings of France, a manuscript composed by Guillaume de Nagis (Fig. 7.87). The “Tabernacle of the Lily” revered by eight French monarchs is the centerpiece of a walled garden composed of formal parterres. The inventive mise-en-scène in which a pair of angels uphold the fleur-de-lys herald, magnified the nation as a “New Eden.” A wooden corral (Fig. 7.88) was adopted as an impresa by Isabel, Duchess of Burgundy perhaps in recollection of the “Virgin of NazarethLancelot” saga. The carving of a portrait of the Virgin Mary by St. Joseph the carpenter is quite unprecedented, and therefore, the icon which led Portugal to glory at Aljubarrota was a patent symbol for fidelity. Duchess Isabel’s fence impresa also served as an emblem of mutual devotion. The structure enclosed her coat-of-arms and scroll inscribed with the phrase “tant que je vive” (as long as I live), the ending response to Duke Philip the Good’s maxim, “autre naray” (I will have no other). Philip the Good’s infamous love affairs disproved his heraldic vow of loyalty. The birthplace of Dona Isabel was Évora, stronghold of Quintus Sertorius († 72 B.C). During a period when southern Portugal was incorporated into Hispania Ulterior, this Roman general and statesman revived the indigenous name of Lusitania and established a provincial form of senate at Ebora. He significantly adopted the white hart as his device.105 Isabel of Burgundy’s fence impresa recalled both the legendary Clovis and mythology that pertained to the capture of the ubiquitous unicorn, a beast having an analogous relationship with the white stag pursued by

Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 55–63 (“Clovis Tapestries”). Livermore, A New History of Portugal (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966), 16–17. He also informs the port of Olissipo (Lisbon) was the center of Roman rule in the Portuguese territory, and the only city with Roman rights before Julius Caesar conferred Latin rights on Ebora (Liberalitas Julia) and Myrtilis (Mértola). With regard to the “Lusitania” of Sertorius, Augustus Caesar gave it a new capital in 25 B.C., Emerita Augusta (Mérida). Founded to reward emerti (veterans), the commercial center of Emerita on the banks of the Guadiana continued to be prosperous under the Visigoths. Taken by the Moors in 713, Mérida was reconquered by Alfonso IX of León in 1229 and given to the Order of Santiago. Though the town is Spanish, its magnificent ancient monuments are Lusitanian. 104 105

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Lancelot (Fig. 7.89). Medieval versions of the Physiologus (second-fourth century, Alexandria) equated the capture of a unicorn by a virgin with Christ’s Incarnation. A late fifteenth-century altar frontal shows Archangel Gabriel holding a lance and blowing a horn. Accompanying hounds bearing the names of Virtue, Justice, Peace, and Mercy signify the four long notes of the mort, the song played on the hunting horn to signal the death of prey. Portrayed in the act of spearing the animal in an enclosed garden, Adam states, “He is wounded because of our sins.” Eve collects the sacred blood from the lance wound in a chalice, and comments, “And by his blood we are saved.” Approaching the unicorn that has been lured by the love of a maiden, the messenger Gabriel recalls Zachariah’s priestly words of thanksgiving following the birth of his son John the Baptist, “He hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David” (Luke 1:69). The shofar, a musical instrument made from a ram’s horn, has been blown traditionally at the Western Wall of Solomon’s Temple to call the devout to repent in anticipation of the Last Days. Angelic trumpeters feature in the Apocalypse of St. John the Evangelist. The Ghent Altarpiece reveals similar typological imagery of the altar frontal, with Van Eyck’s orchestration of specific subjects pertinent to the Unicorn-as-Christ theme: the Annunciation with the two Saint Johns denoting the Alpha-Omega of God’s revelations, the pendants of the primordial sinners, Adam and Eve; the speared sacrificial lamb on the altar; the fons vitae, and the Grail processional Judges, Knights, Hermits and Pilgrims. The Dame du Lac in the Livres de Lancelot, imparts to her foster son Lancelot lessons on chivalry, knighthood, the symbolism of arms and the horse, and the moral obligation to assist the poor and defend the Church. Tinged with an undeniable Cistercian spiritualism, the Queste of the Vulgate, centers upon Galaad. A hermit exhorts the son of Lancelot du Lac to cultivate specific virtues: chastity, humility, patience, justice and charity.106 The Queste specifically addresses the Grail lineage, for Galaad’s namesake was the Hebrew Gilead, son of Michael, the great-great-grandnephew of Abraham (I Chronicles 5:14). Galahad’s mother was Princess Elaine le Corbenic, daughter of Pelles and grandaughter of the “Fisher King” healed by Perceval. Le Corbenic, the name of the Grail Castle in both the Cistercian

106 Aldo Scaglione, Knights at Court. Courtliness, Chivalry, & Courtesy. From Ottonian Germany to The Italian Renaissance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 132–33.

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Estoire and Queste, means “the Body Blessed.”107 For this reason, the citadel symbolically had an association with the Davidic-Solomonic Temple housing the Ark of the Covenant on Mount Zion. Aside from Le Corbenic, the Grail mystically appears on Whitsunday, the liturgical feast of Pentecost, before the assembled knights of the Round Table, including Galahad, who occupies the “Perilous Seat” (Fig. 7.90). While Chrétian equated the Graal to the Eucharistic wafer, the Cistercian Vulgate explored even more fully the Pauline conviction that baptism is a transformation which establishes a People of God, united totally in the Corpus Christi.108 The priestly nature of the chivalric “Fisher King” Anfortas assuredly has its genesis in the Gospel era “baptizers” who were called “fishers of men.” By contrast with Erec, Yvain and Lancelot, all heroes of prowess in Chrétien de Troyes’s romances, Galahad alone is sexually chaste.109 The Cistercian 107 Laurence Gardner, Bloodline of the Holy Grail (Rockport, Mass; Element Books, 1996), 241. Also see Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, Henry Lincoln, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail (London-New York: Jonathan Cape-Delacorte Press, 1982). 108 Regarding St. Paul’s comments on baptism and a united Church, see: Romans 6:3–11 and 8:1–17; I Corinthians 12:12–13; Galatians 3:27–29 and 4:4–7. Other texts concerning the Grail might be consulted: Fanni Bogdanow, The Romance of the Grail: A Study of the Structure and Genesis of a Thirteenth-Century Arthurian Prose Romance (ManchesterNew York: Manchester U.P-Barnes & Noble, 1966); Noel Currer-Briggs, The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ: The Quest Renewed (Maulden, Beds.: ARA Publications, 1984), idem., The Shroud and the Grail (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1987); Roger Sherman Loomis, The Grail, from Celtic Myth to Christian Symbolism (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1963) and rpt. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991); John Matthews, The Grail, Quest for the Eternal (London-New York: Thames and Hudson-Crossroad, 1981); idem, The Grail Tradition (Shaftesbury, Dorset: Element Books, 1990); idem, Household of the Grail (Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1990); Douglas David Roy Owen, The Evolution of the Grail Legend (Edinburgh-London: University Court of the University of St. AndrewsOliver & Boyd, 1968); idem. Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances; translated with an introduction by Douglas David Roy Owen (London: Dent, 1987); R. Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1987). 109 See Muriel Whitaker, The Legend of King Arthur in Art (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1995, rpt. of 1st ed. 1990), 14–16. Chrétien’s Erec, which focuses upon the conflict between courtly love and knightly honor, was written about 1170 and adapted as early as 1191 by Hartmann von Aue. The Swabian was ein ritter, or a man of arms, well-trained in the Germanic virtues of mannesmuot (bravery), treue (fidelity) and diu mâze (measure; good form). Yvain, or Le Chevalier au Lyon [Lion], similarly was absorbed in von Aue’s Iwein (1201–1203), and it includes even more images of enchantment, inter alia, a mystical fountain with briars that impede the hero; fierce bulls; and a colossal monster-herdsman who bars the way to Mont St. Michael. See H.G. Atkins, “The Chivalry of Germany,” ed. Edgar Prestage, Chivalry. A Series of Studies to Illustrate Its Historical Significance and Civilizing Influence (New York: Alfred

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Estoire cast the valorous Galahad as a most devout monk-like imitator of Christ, the perfect athlete. His insignia, the red cross on a white ground, an attribute of the Risen Christ, significantly became the standard of St. George adopted by the Knights Templar to denote chivalric self-sacrifice, honor and purity. The same cross pattée (tatzenkreuz) was the insignia of Portugal’s Order of Jesus Christ. The most significant late Gothic texts to magnify the highest spiritual aspirations of chivalry and the “Order of the Knights of the Grail” were written in Germany. The closest heir to Chrétian was the early-thirteenth century Bavarian knight Wolfram van Eschenbach (ca. 1170–ca. 1220), who had migrated from the village of Wolframseschenbach to the court of Hermann of Thuringa. Von Eschenbach acknowledges the literary fons et origin of his Parsifal (ca. 1195–1210), 12,000 lines of rhymed couplets, as an account written by Flegetanis, a scholarly descendant from Solomon, preserved by Kyôt le Provenzale, a Templar aide. Wolfram’s epic has been perceived as the first great Bildungsromane in German literature, which traces the development of hero physically and philosophically, from his childhood in a secluded forest, through his phase of skepticism and rebellion, and finally, to his return to “grace” in the fellowship of the Grail.110 A. Knopf, 1928), 81–108, at 88–89 and 92; Ruth Harwood Cline, Yvrain or The Knight with the Lion (Athens: University Press of Georgia, 1975); Erich Auerbach, “The Knight Sets Forth,” Mimesis, the Representation of Reality in Western Literature, translated by Willard R. Trask (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953): 123–42 (Yvain); Jean Frappier, Étude sur Yvain, ou Le chevalier au lion, de Chrétien de Troyes (Paris: Société d’édition d’enseignement supérieur, 1969); Chrétian de Troyes, Ywain, the Knight of the Lion [Chevalier au Lion], translated by Robert W. Ackerman, Frederick W. Locke, and Carlton W. Carroll (New York: Ungar, 1977); Douglas David Roy Owen, Two Old French Gauvain Romances. Part I. Le Chevalier à l’Épée and La Mule sans Frein, ed. Ronald Carlyle Johnston and D. D. R. Owen. Part II. Parallel readings with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1972) and (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1973). 110 H.G. Atkins, “The Chivalry of Germany,” Chivalry, 94–95, who states that “five of Wolfram’s sixteen books, the first four and the last, are not to be found at all in Chrétian’s fragmentary work.” He additional remarks the Provençal Kyôt may be fictitious and that Wolfram in 1204 was a guest at the court of Hermann von Thüringen. Consult: Wolfram von Eschenbach, Parzival, ed. H.D. Sacher (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963); idem., Parzival, edited and translated by André Lefevere (New York: Continuum, 1991); idem., Parzival: The Quest of the Grail Knight, retold by Katherine Paterson (New York: Lodestar Books, 1998); Margaret Fitzgerald Richey, The Story of Parzival and the Graal, as related by Wolfram von Eschenbach (Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1935); idem., Studies of Wolfram von Eschenbach (London: Oliver & Boyd, 1957); Dieter Kühn, Der Parzival des Wolfram von Eschenbach (Frankfurt am Main: Insel, 1986); Rolf E. Sutter, Mit saelde ich gerbet han den gral. Genealogische Strukturanalyse zu Wolframs von Eschenbach Parzival (Göppingen:

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From his father Gahmuret, Parzival inherits a nature which predisposes him to the highest aspirations of knighthood. Unaware of his heritage, he is raised in a forest by his mother and taught the attributes of the ideal courteois.111 At Gurnemanz Castle, he marries Condwiramurs, the daughter of his noble mentor, and proves that knighthood is compatible with steadfast love. The mutual love of husband and wife is far stronger than that of the Chrétian’s Perceval and Blancheflor. By the time Parzival visits his uncle, the Fisher King Anfortas, at Grail Castle, he still had not progressed to an ultimate state of earthly perfection. Warned by Lord Gurnemanz to never display curiosity because it was a sign of rudeness, Parzival did not ask his ill uncle, “Lord, what ails thee?, and therefore, no magical cure resulted. Only later, after the hermit Trevrizant tutors the youth in matters of moral philosophy, does he return to end the spell of his uncle’s torment and understand the mystical nature of the Grail. In Chrétien’s Perceval, the Grail procession occurs in a castle hall, not a church, and it includes a boy holding a white lance which drips blood.112 This lance is used to effect the cure of King Anfortas. Like the procession dish, which manifests in von Eschenbach’s Parzival as a stone and in the Vulgate La Quête del Saint Graal as the chalice of the Last Supper, the lance has an anagogical meaning with the lance of the Passion. The object specifically recalls the moment at Calvary when Longinus speared the crucified Christ, cutting a passage to the Sacred Heart, and effecting a “cure” for mankind (Fig. 7.91). According to pious legend, Christ’s spilt blood from the lance wound was collected in a vial by Joseph of Arimathaea, a merchant of rare metals, and transported to Glastonbury Abbey. Saint Louis IX of France (1214–1270), the Crusader King who died in North Africa, had built the Sainte Chapelle in Paris as a shrine to house the most sacred relics of

Kümmerle, 2003); Emma Jung and Marie Luise von Franz, The Grail Legends [Graalslegende in psychologischer Sicht], translated by Andrea Dykes (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1971). 111 Similarly, the Dame du Lac educates her foster son Lancelot. She gives him lessons about: the meaning of chivalry and moral virtues to be practiced by a knight; the history and origins of knighthood; the significance of a warrior’s arms; the symbolism of a chevalier’s horse; the importance of charitable deeds; and the knightly obligation to defend the Church. See Aldo Scaglione, Knights at Court. Courtliness, Chivalry, & Courtesy. From Ottonian Germany to The Italian Renaissance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 132. 112 Queen Philippa’s education of her sons, recounted by Prince Duarte in his Leal Conselheiro, accords with a chivalric, notably Arthurian, tradition of instructing Grail heroes. She presided over the Pentecostal Grail processions at Sintra Castle.

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Christendom which he had acquired from the Byzantine Sancta Capella of Boukoleon Palace after the sack of Constantinople in 1204 113 (Figs. 7.92– 7.93). The crown of thorns was transported to Paris in August of 1439 and the remaining relics in September of 1241. They included a scarlet cloak, a reed scepter, an iron chain, sponge, a “Holy Face” (Edessa image), the purple tunic of Calvary, two nails, a crystal phial of blood, two large segments of true cross, and part of the shroud. When Sainte Chapelle was dedicated on April 26, 1248, these treasures were installed in the Upper Chapel of the Passion, with two additional relics which feature in the Parzival story; iron from the lance which pierced Christ’s side; and stone fragments of the sepulchre stone.114 113 Robert of Clari [12th–13th Century], The Conquest of Constantinople [Le Conquête de Constantinople], translated with an introduction by Edgar Holmes McNeal (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936, 102–3; Anthony of Novgorod, “Le Livre de pélerin [ca. 1200],” translated by Michel Erhard, Romania LVIII (1932): 44–65; Nicholas Mesarites, Die Palasrevolution des Joannes Komnenos in F. Grabler, Die Kruezfabrer Erobern Konstantinopel (Graz: 1958), 289–90; Daniel Weiss, Art and Crusade in the Age of Saint Louis (CambridgeNew York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 30–31 and 226 notes 87–88; Margaret Wade Labarge, Saint Louis: Louis IX, most Christian King of France (Boston: Little, Brown, 1968); idem., Saint Louis. The Life of Louis IX of France (Toronto-London: Macmillan of CanadaEyre & Spottiswoode, 1968). 114 Sophie de Sède, La Sainte-Chapelle et la politique de la fin des temps (Paris: Julliard, 1972); Louis Grodecki, Sainte-Chapelle (Paris: Caisse nationale des monuments historiques et des sites, 1960 and rpt. 1975; Robert Branner, St. Louis and the Court Style in Gothic Architecture (London: A. Zwemmer, 1965); Weiss, Art and Crusade, 14–15 and 220–221 notes 10–15. The Lower Chapel was dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Additional relics acquired by St. Louis IX comprised Christ’s swaddling clothes, the Virgin’s milk and veil, blood from an image of Christ, a smaller triumphal cross, a cloth for washing the disciples’ feet, the occipital of John the Baptist, the heads of Saints Blaise, Clement and Simeon, and the rod of Moses. See K. Gould, “The Sequences De Sanctis Reliquis as Sainte-Chapelle Inventories,” Medieval Studies 43 (1981): 315–41, especially 336–41. Twenty-two relics were sold by Baldwin II between 1237 and 1241. For the history of transportation of the Crown of Thorns, see the account of Gautier Cornut, the Archbishop of Sens, Historiae susceptionis Coronée spinée in Comte de Riant (Paul Édouard Didier), Exuviae Sacrae Constantinopolitanae 1 (Geneva: 1877), 1: 45–56. For a history of the transferral of the other relics, see the Comte de Riant (Paul Édouard Didier), “Dépouilles religieuses enlevées à Constantinople au XIIIe siècle,” Mémoires de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France XXXVI (1875): 1–214; Friar Gérard of Saint-Quentin-en-l’Isle, Translatio sancte corone, in Fernand de Mély, Exuviae Sacrae Constantinopolitanae 3 (Paris: 1904), 3: 102–12. Also consult Fernand de Mély, Les reliques de Constantinople au XIIIe siecle, 2 vols. (Lille: Desclée, De Brouwer, 1901); idem., “Reliques de Constantinople,” Revue de l’Art Chrétien (1899): 91–103, 207–12, 318–24, 478–90 and (1900): 102–15, 218–30, 393–409, 491–507; Louis Douët d’Arcqu, “Inventaire des reliques de la Sainte-Chapelle,” Revue Archéologique V (1848): 161–208; J. Vidier, “Le

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The crusading temperament of Louis IX, who died in Tunis still defending the cross from the crescent, was shaped in large measure by his mother Blanche of Castile (1188–1252). Philippa of Lancaster, who could trace a direct line of descent to Blanche, similarly intervened in the courtly education of her sons.115 Like Perceval’s mother Gornemans in Chrétian’s tale, she sought to enlist the Avis princes in service to the Grail. When Duarte, Pedro and Henry were respectively eleven, ten and eight, they were taught by Philippa, who under Katherine Swynford’s guidance, had studied astrolabes with Geoffrey Chaucer. As author of a Book on Hunting, King João I assumed a more instrumental role in the physical training of his sons, teaching them to ride, hunt and joust. However, it was Philippa who arranged for her sons to be tutored regularly by Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa of Arronches (1389–1435), mordomo-mór (chief steward) of her household, to perfect their understanding of cavalheirismo, the code of chivalry.116 After ascending the throne in 1433, King Duarte wrote a Book of Instruction on the Art of Riding Well, probably the most complete manual about jousting techniques for tournaments in the Renaissance.117 Although Trésor de la Sainte-Chapelle,” Mémoires de la Société de l’Histoire de Paris et de l’Île-de-France, XXXIV (1907): 199–324; XXXV (1908): 189–339; XXXVI (1909): 245–395; XXXVII (1910): 185–369; Le trésor de la Sainte-Chapelle (Paris: exhibition Catalogue, Musée du Louvre-Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 2001). 115 René Bertrand, La France de Blanche de Castille (Paris: R. Laffont, 1977); Philippe Delorme, Blanche de Castille: épouse de Louis VIII, mère de Saint Louis (Paris: Pygmalion, 2002); Régine Pernoud, Blanche of Castile, translated from French by Henry Noel (New YorkLondon: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan-Collins, 1975). E. Berger, Histoire de Blanche de Castile (Paris: 1895); R. Pernoud, Blanche of Castile, translated by H. Noel (London: 1975); Gérard Sivery, Blanche de Castile (Paris: 1990). Blanche’s parents were Alfonso VIII of Castile (r. 1158–1214) and Eleanor (1161: m. 1176–1214), the daughter of Henry II of England (r. 1154–1189) and Eleanor of Aquitaine (1122–1204). 116 Roche, Philippa, 75. See 76 for a quotation from Prince Duarte’s Leal Conselheiro: “In our presence Dom Lopo departed this life, leaving us in that true concord of hearts and honest conversation in which he had brought us up. Practice awoke in us reason and therewith we strove with the grace of God to do better.” According to his tomb inscription at Tomar, Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa died at the age of forty-six on February 9, 1435. See King João I, Livro da Montaria, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Coimbra: Impresa da Universidade, 1918) and King Duarte, Livro da Ensinança de bem Cavalgar toda sela que fez [el rey dom Eduarte de Portugal e do Algarve e senhor de Ceuta], edited by Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand, 1944). A copy of the hunting treatise by João I is documented in the library of King Duarte, according to the Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Piel, 415. 117 Livro de ensinança de bem cavalgar toda sela que fez el rey Eduarte de Portugal, ed. Joseph M. Piel (Lisbon: 1944), especially 74–101. Pertinent passages from the Piel editon

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Prince Pedro fought bravely with the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund in the Balkans, Prince Henrique succeeded Dom Dias de Sousa as Master of the Order of Christ. Eventually all three sons tutored by Queen Philippa, King João I and Dias de Sousa were elected to the English Order of the Garter. Of the vertical interior panels of the Ghent Altarpiece, the “Holy Pilgrims” is the only one which shows a distant town (Fig. 7.94). Tinged with saffron light, the river flowing alongside reflects the trees by its shadowy banks. To the right of this citadel is a dark forest, from which an undulating path leads into a large meadow with the palm tree attribute of St. Christopher, the saint linked in Portugal with the Order of Christ. Recalling that Parzival was tutored in a forest by his mother before leaving for the castle of the “Fisher King,” the secular youth in scarlet amidst the “Holy Pilgrims” previously suggested as St. Josse, also might provide a metaphorical portrait of a “Grail Knight.” An even more outstanding chivalric hero than Parzival was his son, Lohengrin, the grand-nephew of the Fisher King. If Galahad was championed by Templar “crusader monks,” who sought to match the purity of his ardor in their defense of Christendom, then the valor of the “Swan Knight” Lohengrin was the sine qua non of chivalry for the secular princes of Europe.118 Late Gothic chivalric manuscripts recount several variations upon the theme of the valorous “Swan Knight.” Beginning in the twelfth century with William of Tyre and continuing in the fourteenth-century chanson de geste entitled Le Chevalier au Cygne et Godefroid de Bouillon, the Swan Knight was identified as the grandfather of Godefrey de Bouillon (1060–1100). The last Duke of Lower Lorraine (Lower Lotharingia) and Merovingian descendant, Godfrey had lead the armies of the First Crusade against the Ottoman Turks in 1095 (Fig. 7.95). Designated the “King of Jerusalem” and “Guardian of the Holy Sepulchre,” he founded the Order of Zion in 1099. Godfrey’s realm was believed to have been later divided into have been translated by Amélia Hutchinson in Richard Barber and Juliet Barker, Tournaments (Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 1989). 118 As stated superbly by Aldo Scaglione, Knights at Court, 152, Wolfram’s Parzival “postulated an ideal of perfect knighthood which Parzival strove to reach but which only his son Loherangrîn, whose sublime chivalry was pure and uncontaminated inner humanity, was destined to achieve. This distinction between the courtly and the chivalric stresses the latter as God-oriented, the former as more thoroughly immanent.” Also consult Walter Fröhlich, Parzival and Lohengrin (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1936).

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the lands governed by the Counts of Flanders.119 Philip the Bold (1342– 1404), who inherited the territory of Louis III de Mâle in 1384, not only owned a tapestry of the “Conquest of Jerusalem,” but he also purchased the personal sword of Godefrey de Bouillon on March 13, 1393.120 This weapon was given to John the Fearless before the young Duke departed for the Nicopolis crusade in 1396. In a similar vein, Queen Philippa, stricken with the plague and dying at the convent of Odivelas north of Lisbon, gave swords to her three sons Duarte, Pedro and Henrique on the eve of their departure for Ceuta. According to Gomes Eanes de Zúrara, chronicler of King João I, she had ordered three swords to be fashioned for their knighting in North Africa. The scabbard and guards of each were garnished with gold, pearls and cut gemstones.121 Summoning her sons to her side, she gave the largest to Prince Duarte, calling it a “sword of justice.” After making him swear to temper his justice with mercy, she gave Pedro his sword, commending him to defend and protect the honor of ladies. Philippa then summoned Prince Henrique to her side, and with the bestowing of his sword, he pledged to protect the rights of the seigneurs, fidalgos, and squires of the realm.122 Pedro, apparently 119 The lands are identified by Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 126, as Brabant, Limbourg, Luxembourg, Hainaut, Namur, Looz, Holland, Guelders, Julich and Cleves. Also consult John C. Andressohn, The Ancestry and Life of Godfrey of Bouillon (Indianapolis: University of Indiana Press, 1947); Baron de Reiffenberg (Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand), ed., Le Chevalier au cygne et Godefroid de Bouillon, poëme historique, publié pour la première fois avec de nouvelles recherches sur les légendes qui ont rapport à la Belgique, un travail et des documents sur les croisades, 3 vols. (Brussels: M. Hayez, 1846–54); Célestin Hippeau, La chanson du Chevalier au Cygne et Godefroid de Bouillon, Poëm Historique [Brussels: 1846– 1848]), 2 vols. (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1969); William, of Tyre, Archbishop of Tyre [1130–1190], Godeffroy of Boloyne, or, The siege and conqueste of Jerusalem [Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum], translated by William Caxton, edited by Mary Noyes Colvin (Millwood, NY: Kraus Reprint, 1987); Georges Doutrepont, Inventaire de la “Librarie” de Philippe le Bon (1420) (Brussels: P. Weissenbruck, 1906); Jonathan Simon Christopher RileySmith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986); idem., The First Crusaders, 1095–1131 (Cambridge, UK-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Jacques Heers, Libérer Jérusalem: la première Croisade, 1095–1107 (Paris: Perrin, 1995). 120 Joseph Louis Antoine Calmette, Les Grands Ducs de Bourgogne (Paris: Albin Michel, 1949), 94. 121 Gomes Eanes de Zurara, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta, ed. Francisco Maria Esteves Pereira (Lisbon: 1915), Chapter xxxvi. 122 Roche, Philippa, 85–88, translates passages from Fernão Lopes, Chronica del Rey Dom João I (Lisbon: 1644), Ch. 40. In 1418 João I appointed Lopes his secretary and keeper of

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keeping in mind his mother’s request that he protect ladies and damozels, spoke with her about his nineteen-year-old sister Isabel. After seeing her daughter, Philippa asked her husband to grant the princess all her lands and jewels. Due to the plague, Princes João and Fernando had been sent away from Odivelas. Prior to receiving the last rites (July 18) Philippa urged the Princes by her bedside to catch the nortada, the best wind for sailing to Ceuta. She also prognosticated their fleet would leave on the feast day of St. James the Major (July 25). João I was present at his wife’s death on July 19 and the next day she was buried in the Franciscan convent of Odivelas. She later was interred in João I’s free-standing sepulchre placed at the center of Batalha’s royal pantheon directly opposite the wall tombs of her sons (Figs. 7.96–7.97). In advance of their campaign to North Africa, the three eldest Avis princes had adopted French mottoes.123 The aphorisms they selected closely correspond to the pledges they gave their mother when she conferred upon them their swords of knighthood (Fig. 7.98). Duarte determined to have léauté faray tam yaserey (loyal I shall ever be). The expression “l’eau te ferai” in nautical terms is an expression that means “I will take in water for you.” The motto, therefore, conjures the medieval representation of temperance by a woman pouring liquid from one vessel to another. Duarte was asked by his mother to balance his justice with mercy. Aristotle’s Ethic is cited by Duarte in his treatise Leal Conselheiro. To him the Aristotelian “Ethic of the Mean” applied not only to the mutability of the seasons and balance of nature and the elements, but also to the “right measure” or moderation and restraint that should be possessed by a noble warrior. Among the books in the Prince’s library was the Livro de Aristóteles do Regimento de Principes e Senhores, ou Segredo dos Segredos em Cartas ao grande rei Alexandre, a pseudo-Aristotelian book composed in the form of counsel given by Aristotle to Alexander the Great.124 Duarte also owned a manuscript by “Vallerio Maximo” who wrote his Factorum et dictorum memorabilium libri IX during the reign of Tiberius, a documents in the Lisbon Castle of São Jorge, a position he retained for thirty-eight years. The sword Queen Philippa gave to Prince Henrique is in the Naval Museum of Lisbon. 123 Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, 11. 124 MS. 3390 Biblioteca National de Lisboa, # 35: Segredos de Aristoteles. Prince Duarte mentioned the treatise in Ch. XXVIII of his Leal Conselheiro. A Catalan version exists in the Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid (MS. L 170) under the title Lo libre apellat secret dels secrets, ordenat per Aristotil al gran rey Alexandre. See Prince Duarte, Leal Conselheiro, ed. Joseph Piel, 115–116 and note 2.

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text containing historical accounts of the felicity, largesse and gratuitousness of Greek and Roman citizens.125 Prince Pedro’s maxim désir (desire) relates to his mother’s request that he serve as a knight-protector to ladies and damozels, yet it also could allude to chivalric zeal (Fig. 7.99). In anticipation of the Ceuta campaign, the Duke of Coimbra had assembled eight galleons at Sacavem, a short distance up the Tagus from Lisbon. Duarte had sailed with his fleet to join Pedro prior to their visiting Queen Philippa at Odivelas126 Prince Henrique’s apothegm talent de bien faire (talent to do things well) may have had something to do with his substantial operations at Oporto (Fig. 7.100). He equipped the Ceuta expedition with: seven trimarans, galleys with three hulls; six biremes, galleys having two tiers of oars; twenty-six “ships of burden,” supply ships called naus; and numerous pinnaces, lighter sailing vessels made of pine. To say the Portuguese Princes were well-organized is an understatement. They were chaffing at the bit to display their prowess after years of training. The first of the annual Garter celebrations had been orchestrated for Edward III at Windsor Castle on April 23, 1348, St. George’s day. On August 6 the monarch rededicated the old chapel of St. Edward to St. George. Although the Black Prince Edward, Prince of Wales (1330–1376), had distributed Garter insignia to twelve knights in December, the emblem of his father’s new order had first appeared in November of 1347 at the Christmas games at Guildford. The chivalric insignia until June of 1351 was connected with the “King’s Device,” a White Swan gorged Or, which bore a favored festival quote of Edward III: “Hay, Hay, the White Swan/ by God’s soul I am thy man.”127 After the institution of the Order of the Garter, heraldic badges became increasingly popular. Christopher Tyldesley, a London goldsmith, created a gold collar for Henry IV (1366–1413), son of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster (1340–1399). Enameled with the motto Soveignez (Remember Me), the collar terminated in a triangular ruby pendant with four large pearls. Perhaps the “Black Prince’s Ruby” passed to Duke of Lancaster in 1476 when his beloved brother died. Edward of The inventory of King Duarte’s library (MS. 3390, Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa) contains a volume titled Valerio Maximus, #11. 126 Roche, Philippa, 84–85. 127 Michael St. John Packe, King Edward III, ed. Lewis Charles Bernard Seaman (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983), 183. Ms. Elizabeth Weber, who obtained her Ph.D. at George Washington University where she completed her dissertation on Tudor ephemeral art, kindly provided this reference. 125

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Woodstock’s piece of jewelry, suggested to be the mantle clasp worn by St. Edmund in the Wilton Diptych probably was refashioned into a pendant soon after the death of Lancaster. Henry IV’s customary pendant was an enameled white swan, the herald of his wife, Mary Bohun (m. 1380–1394), daughter of Humphrey, Count of Hereford. The famous Dunstable Swan in opaque white enamel over gold is a version of Henry IV’s badge made by a London goldsmith around 1400128 (Fig. 7.101). Edward III had pledged to restore the Round Table of Arthur when he founded his new order. Prince Duarte had been named for his greatgrandfather, and he especially admired Edward III’s son, the Black Prince, who perhaps was idealized in the English metrical romance Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Composed by an anonymous contemporary of Geoffrey Chaucer, Queen Philippa’s tutor, the tale of the gallant chevalier sans peur concludes with the motto “Honi soit qui mal pense,” as if to associate the hero Gawain with the Order of the Garter (Fig. 7.102).129 A later version of the romance of “Sir Gawain” mentions the Order of Bath. An old knight turned hermit who tutors a squire in the virtues of chivalry is the story line of a treatise by the Catalán author Ramón Llull (1235–1315). Born in Palma de Majorca, he was the son of a soldier and seneschal at the court of Jaime See J. Cherry, “The Dunstable Swan Jewel,” The Journal of the British Archaeological Association XXXII (1969): 38–53; Elizabeth Hallam (ed.), The Wars of the Roses (New York: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988), 99. Matilde Sousa Franco, O Palácio Nacional de Sintra. Residência Querida de D. João I e D. Filipa de Lencastre, with English translation (Sintra: Palácio Nacional de Sintra, The British Historical Society of Portugal, Lloyds Bank, 1987), 34, also refers to a pertinent article by Roger F. Pye, “Uma Empresa Inglesa no Paço de Sintra,” Armas e Troféus-Revista de História, Heráldica, Genealogia e de Arte, II série, vol. VIII (Lisbon: 1967): 36–41. The Collar and Great George were not instituted until the reign of Henry VII (1485–1509) and it consisted of a pendant with an enameled equestrian figure of St. George slaying a dragon suspended from a collar composed of twenty-six pieces. Each link was in the form of alternating red and white enamel roses set inside a blue enameled garter, which were separated by gold double knots. The so-called Lesser George, a badge of the saint made at the knight’s personal expense, was worn usually on a blue ribbon at waist length. The motto of Honi soit qui mal y pense was embroidered on the garter. Of blue, and in rare instances of purple, the velvet or silk garter was worn below the left knee. See Col. Robert E. Wylie, Orders, Decorations and Insignia – Military and Civil (New York-London: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1921), 102, and John Lea. Nevinson, “The Robes of the Order of the Garter – I”, Connoisseur XCIX (May, 1937): 273–79, at 274. 129 Sir Israel Gollancz, “Chivalry in Medieval English Poetry,” ed. Edgar Prestage, Chivalry, 167–82, discusses the foundation of the Order of the Garter and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight as based upon a notable contemporary, the Black Prince, son of Edward III. 128

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II of Aragon. In 1266 Llull received a vision of the crucified Christ on five consecutive evenings, which changed the direction of his life.130 His book on knighthood, written about 1476, was printed with an epilogue by William Caxton in 1484 for Edward IV of England (1442: 1461–1483). The Ordre of Chyvalry or Knyghthood subsequently was translated into French and Scots.131 Two copies of William Caxton’s Ordre of Chyvalry have been discovered in the London British Museum. One is a fragment, executed in Tudor script (1A 55071), which recounts the ordination and robing of a squire and it is titled “Making of Knyghte of the Bathe.” The second, a more complete copy executed by the same hand (MS. Cotton Nero C ix), concerns the coronation of Henry VI on November 6, 1429, in which it is documented that thirtytwo knights of Bath were created on that occasion, and that the following day the “Prince of Portugal was knighted in Westminster Hall.132 The new foreign knight had to Pedro, who was installed to the Order of the Garter by

130 Seeking to convert Saracens, Ramón Llull became a Franciscan and in 1276 founded the College of the Holy Trinity at Miramar in Majorca, where he learned Arabic and perhaps composed his chivalric manuscript. With the fall of Acre in 1291, he made his first trip to Tunis and he returned to North Africa again towards the end of his life. For preaching Christian doctrine, he was stoned to death in Bugia. Consult Alfred Thomas Plestad Byles, “Medieval Courtesy Books and the Prose Romances of Chivalry,” ed. Edgar Prestage, Chivalry, 183–206, who remarks, at 192, that Llull’s primary theme is the perfect accord between knights and clergy, “who both endeavor, the one by doctrine and the other by force of arms, to incline the people to a godly life.” Consult: Ramón Llull, The Book of the Ordre of Chyualry, translated by William Caxton [1422–1491] and edited by A.T.P. Byles (London: Oxford University Press, 1926); The book of fayttes of armes and of Chyualrye [Livre des faits d’armes et de chevalerie], translated by William Caxton and edited by A. T. P. Byles (London: Early English Text Society-H. Milford, Oxford University Press,1932) and (Millwood, NY: Kraus Reprint, 1988). Richard Barber, The Knight and Chivalry (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1982 ed. ), 153, observes the knighting ceremony and symbolism of the arms described by Llull seems to derive from the Lady of the Lake’s speech to Lancelot. The philosophical treatise includes a discussion of the virtues to be practiced by an ideal knight. Such ideology is reflected in the literature of Christine de Pisan (1363–1421). 131 Ramón Llull, The Ordre of Chyvalry, translated by William Caxton (London: Early English Text Society, 1484). Edward IV also acquired an illuminated manuscript from Bruges, L’Ordre de Cheualrie (London, British Museum, Royal MS. 14Eii). 132 Byles, «Medieval Courtesy Books and the Prose Romances of Chivalry, ed. Edgar Prestage, Chivalry, 195, discovered the manuscripts. The more complete copy is part of a miscellaneous compilation of documents bound with statues of Henry VIII. As Byles informs, the article Coronatio regis Henrici VI is headed with the words: “Manner of making of a knight after the custom of England in times of peace, and at the coronation; that is, Knights of Bath.”

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proxy April 22, 1428.133 Prince Pedro, whose mother Philippa entrusted her ladies to his care, may have chosen his motto désir in imitation of Gawain, the paragon of chivalric courtoisie. Such a “romantic” perception of the famed Arthurian warrior accords with the late Gothic belief in a knight’s ability to ignore the sensual pleasures in pursuit of a higher cause. Consider St. Bavo’s traditional representation as a hunter bearing a falcon, a bird which medieval bestiaries associated with pride. The saint in Netherlandish art typically was portrayed with a peacock diadem, a clear emblem of the worldly materiality he eschewed to embrace monasticism (Fig. 7. 103). A dying Queen Philippa inspired her sons Duarte, Henrique and Pedro to the service of the Grail on the eve of their departure for Ceuta, a campaign which had been planned at Sintra Palace, where the ceiling of the “Great Hall of Princes,” as will be discussed, was painted with the repeated motif of Consult Walter Charles Metcalfe, A Book of Knights Banneret (London: Mitchell and Hughes, 1885) and James Charles Risk, The History of the Order of the Bath (London: Spink & Son, Ltd., 1972). Focusing upon the new order of knighthood created on May 11, 1725, Risk states, 4: “This order was based on “the medieval Knighthood of the Bath, a ceremonial custom not practiced since the Coronation of Charles II sixty-four years earlier.” Risk, 6, denies the existence of a separate Order of Bath prior to the reign of George I, pointing out that the tradition of conferring knighthood with “distinctive ceremonies” began with the Anglo-Saxons and slowly evolved becoming quasi-secular and quasi-religious. He states that by the time of Edward III, “the ceremonies included bathing as symbolic of spiritual purification” and “the sacramental of baptism.” Apparently after the bath, there was a vigil before an altar upon which was laid the candidate’s sword. The sovereign also bestowed gifts of robes and bathing containers, as well as a metaphorical “bed of paradise” and bed linens. Concerning the coronation of Henry IV with forty-six knights in attendance in 1399, Fisk comments that from this date, those individuals receiving the “full ceremonial” began to be called “Knights of the Bath.” In composing Statues for a new order, John Anstis (1669–1744), the Garter King of Arms (1718), adopted ritual elements of the old Knighthood of the Bath used in 1413 at the Coronation of Henry V. See John Anstis, Observations. Introductory to an Historical Essay Upon the Knighthood of the Bath (London: J. Woodman, 1725). The rites are summarized by Risk, 10, as follows: “The candidates had to appear in the Prince’s Chamber within the Palace of Westminster accompanied by two Esquires Governors, who had to be gentlemen, of blood and bearing coat Arms... There he was to take his bath, after which he was to be put to bed to prepare him for a long night’s vigil in the chapel of Henry VII. Before proceeding there, he was to be clothed with a robe of russet. Immediately after his arrival in the sacred precincts he was fortified with wine and spices. The vigils were followed by a short nap from which he was awakened by the sounds of music. He then was clothed in the crimson robes of the Order. Proceeding into the presence of the Sovereign, the gilt spurs were fixed on his heels, he received the accolade and was invested with the badge. He was then ready for the Installation, again held in the Chapel of Henry VII.” After pledging an oath, the candidate was seated in his stall and given the gold collar of the Order. 133

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white swans. Philippa was a Lady of the Garter and due to her influence, first King João I and then his three eldest sons became select “Swan Knights.”134 Duchess Isabel of Burgundy, Infanta of Portugal, and grandaughter of the Duke of Lancaster, assuredly wished for her son Josse to share in the crusading spirit of his illustrious forebears. She must have conversed with Jan van Eyck concerning the polyptych to be unveiled in the Ghent Church of Sint-Jans. Bearing in mind that Josse, born on the April 24 feast George the dragon slayer, was heir to Burgundy, the Duchess who never forgot her English heritage, should be perceived as the muse behind the masterpiece. The Ghent Altarpiece has been discussed as a commission begun by Jan van Eyck prior to his 1428–29 diplomatic visit to Portugal on behalf of Duke Philip the Good. As has been proposed, the original archetype of the Fountain of Life was executed in Lisbon and of a size corresponding to the suggested wings, the New York diptych of the Crucifixion and Last Judgment. The frame of the Ghent Altarpiece documents that Jan’s brother Hubrecht had some preliminary involvement in the polyptych, although it is impossible to know whether his work was that of a sculptor, painter or both. The September 18, 1426 receipt for estate taxes on the property of the deceased Lubrechte van Heyke suggests that Jan took over the Vijd commission after returning from a “pilgrimage” and “secret mission” on behalf of Duke Philip.135 Because Jan traveled with the Burgundian embassy to the court of King Alfonso V of Aragon in Valencia, the “pilgrimage” in question may have been to the famed Catalonian shrine of Montserrat. In

134 There were thirteen original “Knights of the Blue Garter” founded by Edward III following his triumph at Crècy in 1348. After Henry IV ascended the English throne, his brother-in-law, João I of Portugal, was elected to the Garter in 1400 to fill a vacant stall at Windsor Castle. Prince Pedro, Duke of Coimbra, was elected to the order on April 22, 1427. Ensigns were sent to him on May 22, 1427 and he was installed by proxy on April 22, 1428. King Duarte filled the stall left vacant by João I on May 8, 1435 and Prince Henrique, Duke of Viseu, became a Garter Knight on December 3, after 1442. King Afonso V, Duarte’s heir, was elected on April 22, 1447. His stall was taken by his son, João II, on September 15, 1482. The last Garter knight of Portugal was Manuel I, who was elected on April 23, 1510. Consult: William Arthur Shaw (1865–1943), The Knights of England (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1971), 10–20; Manuel H. Côrte-Real, The Portuguese Knights of the Order of the Garter (Lisbon: British Historical Society of Portugal, 1992). 135 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), xxxiii, “Receipt by the treasurers of the town of Ghent of 6s. gr. from the heirs of Hubert van Eyck… tax on the property of the deceased.” Weale cites the Town Archives of Ghent.

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any case, he would have little over a year to paint panels for the Ghent retable before returning to the Iberian Peninsula in October of 1428. The initial project for the mayor of Ghent may have been limited to a much smaller retable consisting of a centerpiece Annunciation flanked by wing panels with the realistic likenesses of Jodocus Vijd and his wife Elisabeth. This arrangement dovetails the Merode Altarpiece of Robert Campin, ca. 1425, in which the donors of the Englebrecht family of Mechelen look on the subject of Gabriel’s visitation in a domestic interior but are physically distanced by their setting. Seen in X-rays, traces of trefoil arches above the Archangel and the Annunciate Virgin seem to corroborate the initial disposition of the Vijd-Borluut portraits on the same level. The reverse of the portrait panels of the mayor and his wife would have displayed the grisaille images of the Two St. Johns. If the Ghent Altarpiece initially comprised the “Annunciation,” then Elizabeth Borluut would have been portrayed in the act of contemplating the Virgin Mary. But what about Jodocus Vijd, whose gaze is directed overhead? The Apocalyptic Lamb was the traditional attribute of John the Baptist, the patron of St. Bavo’s Church. Conservation studies also have divulged Van Eyck’s landscape was reworked to include flora of the Iberian Peninsula, which he would have seen in his travels. However, there is considerable discrepancy in scale between the figures of the “Adoration” and those which would have comprised an “Annunciation” grouping à la Merode. Therefore, perhaps Vijd’s gaze initially was intended to be directed towards a deësis — Christ in Majesty flanked by the Apocalyptic intercessors John the Baptist and the Virgin Mary. One is caught between Charybdis and Scylla in resolving the issue of Hubrecht’s work on the Ghent Altarpiece and the sequence of Jan’s panels. On one hand, there are no securely identified paintings by Hubrecht, and no panels survive by Jan’s hand of the 1420s. Still, an objective eye readily observes that the “Annunciate Virgin” heralded by Gabriel is the least comely of Jan’s Marian portraits. She truly pales in beauty beside the Apocalyptic “Planet Woman” of the deësis. While not wishing to be drawn into a whirlpool of polemic, it seems likely that Hubrecht began the “Annunciation” and had completed some preliminary sketches before he expired. It also seems probable that before departing Sluis in October of 1428, Jan completed his two donor portraits and grisailles of the “Two Johns.” And, if concurrently he altered the “Annunciation” vis à vis adding panels to expand the sacred chamber, then this adjustment would have been done to coordinate the lower section of the retable with the above panels of a deësis.

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Jan may have sailed for Lisbon having finished an altarpiece to satisfy his client Jodocus Vijd. After Jan returned to Flanders, the politically ambitious Vijd might well have called upon Jan to rework the Ghent Altarpiece with a twofold goal: to highlight the newly founded Order of the Golden Fleece (January 10, 1430) which would please Duke Philip; and to magnify the dynastic alliance between Flanders, Portugal and England, which would delight Infanta Isabel. The Portuguese sojourn had a profound effect on the artist, one which extended far beyond the mere addition of some southern Mediterranean plants to his retable in the Church of Sint-Jans. The inventive fountain of “living waters” is a primary iconographical element common to both the lost Portuguese Fons Vitae and the Ghent Adoration of the Lamb. Though replicas of the former work show a diminutive sacrificial lamb, they also display a tabernacle-like throne of the Apocalyptic bridegroom, fanciful stone turrets with singing angels, and tiered levels. This architecture of this heavenly Jerusalem may have been inspired by Burgundian houseshaped reliquaries which King João had in abundance. The composition, however, closely relates to the metaphorical imagery of the Portuguese Corte Imperial. So then, Jan’s Fons Vitae appropriately should be regarded as an iconographical prologue to the drama which unfolds in the Allerheiligenbilder of Ghent, a work with clear allusions to the mystical “hunt of the unicorn” (Fig. 7.104).136 Between 1430 and 1432, the year Jan moved from Lille to Bruges, he probably worked incessantly to: integrate his “portrait-Sibyls” and Prophets with his earlier panels; supplement his Deësis with Celestial Angels and the niche figures of Adam and Eve; and provide an Adoration of the Lamb as the processional focus of Just Judges, Holy Knights, Holy Hermits and Pilgrims. All this was done and more, as the collective body of works had to be installed within a carved wooden framework. Could Jan and his workshop have accomplished so much in such a relatively short period? By comparison, Created by an artist working in the orbit of Martin Schongauer (1448–1491), the Altarpiece of the Dominicans, Mystical Hunt of the Unicorn (Colmar: Musée d’Unterlinderr, ca. 1480–90) depends upon an earlier Northern pictorial lexicon. The work illustrates the capture of the unicorn by the Annunciate Virgin, who sits with a basket of apples beneath the “Tower of David.” Having entered the hortus conclusis from the opposite wooden portal, the Archangel Gabriel approaches, blowing a horn and holding a spear and four dogs identified as Mercy, Justice, Peace and Virtue. Beyond the walls of the garden is the “burning bush” (Book of Exodus). Within the verdant sanctuary is a lily, “sealed” fountain of grace, and an altar covered by a pristine white fringed cloth. The unicorn is depicted as an equivalent to the “sacrificial lamb” and fleece of Gideon. 136

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he designed and painted his Fons Vitae retable for King João I of Portugal in only a few months, late May to September of 1429. Pressed for time to provide a retable for the Avis court, Jan might have drawn upon preliminary designs for the Vijd deësis, but the rest was invented on location in Lisbon. As an ensemble attesting to the ideological impact of Lusitania, the panels of the Ghent Altarpiece do not merely acknowledge the union of European houses. Van Eyck in his greatest work sought to reveal the Arthurian concept of apostolic kingdoms. Antoine, the firstborn of Infanta Isabel expired in February of 1432, and his brother Josse passed away only a few months after his baptism in St. Bavo. The Burgundian male line ended with the death at the battle of Nancy of Isabel’s remaining son, Charles the Bold (1433–1477). However, in Portugal succeeding generations of royal princes continued to draw analogies between Christ’s messianic destiny and a nation’s objectives in opening the world. Jan van Eyck has provided the only known portraits from life of the “illustrious generation” whose world view so indelibly altered the Medieval world picture.

8 Circa 1437 — Portugal and Jan Van Eyck’s “Secret Mission The Templar Citadel of Tomar: Romanesque unto Renaissance

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n important monument which probably was visited by Jan van Eyck and the Burgundian embassy in 1429 was the stronghold of Tomar (Figs. 8.1–8.7). Granted the alcaidaria-mór of the town of Viseu in 1416, Prince Henrique had been entrusted with the administration of the Order of Christ in 1420. This appointment as “governor and administrator for life” was granted by Pope Martin V (1417–1431) at the king’s request.1 Peter Edward Russell, Prince Henry “the Navigator”. A Life (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 2000); Alberto Iria, Estudos Henriquinos (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da História, 1989); António Joaquim Dias Dinis, O.F.M., Estudos Henriquinos, I (Coimbra: Acta Universitatis Conimbrigensis, 1960); idem, ed., Monumenta Henricina, 15 vols. (LisbonCoimbra: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Aniversário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1960–1974); Francisco Fernandes Lopes, A figura e a obra do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Portugália Editora, 1960); Vitorino Nemésio, Vida e obra do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Centenário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1959); João Silva de Sousa, A Casa Senhorial do Infante D. Henrique (Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 1991). Regarding the Order of Christ, see: Possídónio M. Laranjo Coelho, As Ordens de Cavalaria no Alto Alentejo – I. Comendas da Ordem de Cristo (Lisbon: Impresa Nacional, 1926); Manuel da Silva Castelo-Branco, Inéditos da crónica da Ordem de Cristo de Fr. Bernardo da Costa (Santarém: Edição da Assembleia Distrital de Santarém, 1980); Frei Bernardo da Costa [1701/2–1779], História da Militar Ordem de Nosso Senhor Jesus Christo, 2 vols. (Coimbra: 1771) reprinted (Malveira: Atelier “Sol Invictus”, 1988); Manuel da Silva Castelo Branco (ed.), Inéditos da crónica da Ordem de Cristo de Fr. Bernardo da Costa (Santarém: Edição da Assembleia Distrital de Santarém, 1980); Alexandre Ferreira [1664–1739], Supplemento historico, ou Memorias, e noticias da celebre ordem dos Templarios, 1

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The office authorized the Prince to invest income from the Order in the crusade against the Saracens and to hold a yearly free fair (feira) in the town of Tomar.2 The Convent of Christ was remodeled extensively and enlarged under King Manuel I (r. 1495–1521) and King João III (r. 1521–1557). However, important sectors of the castle-monastery were built under Prince Henrique’s direction.3 para a historia da admiravel ordem de Nosso Senhor Jesu Christo, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, J. A. da Sylva, 1735; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress); José Vieira Guimarães, A Ordem de Cristo (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, 1901), rpt. 1936; idem., Marrocos e três maestres da Ordem de Cristo; memoria (Lisbon: Academia das Sciências de Lisboa, 1916); D. Tomás de Vilhena, História da Ordem da Santa Cavallaria em Portugal (Coimbra: 1920). 2 Highlighting the Festa dos Tabuleiros, held now every few years in July is the traditional display of girls in white who support tall containers of bread and flowers on their heads. Like the Whitsunday commemorations in the Azores, Tomar’s festa perhaps originated from Medieval Corpus Christi and Pentecostal pageantry. Under the Avis kings, such ephemeral ceremonies which honored the Eucharist and birth of an evangelical Church, were designed to evoke the memory of Holy Grail processions and the chivalric obligation to perform the Acts of Mercy. Bread would symbolize not only the “Body of Christ,” but also the charitable act of feeding the poor. Sweet cakes, on the other hand, allude to the transitory pleasures of the world. Penitential Christians were supposed to refrain from such delicacies during the liturgical seasons of Advent and Lent (respectively the four weeks before Christmas and Easter). Devout knights fasted as a form of discipline. Flowers were interpreted by Medieval and Renaissance theologians who commented upon the polysemy of taste and smell metaphors in the Solomonic Song of Songs. Fragrant blossoms were analogous to the virtues cultivated within the soul’s “inner garden.” Again, in chivalric terms, a knight’s moral strength was deemed to be as important as physical prowess. Regarding the town of Tomar, see: Alberto de Sousa Amorim Rosa, Anais do Município de Tomar, 9 vols. (Tomar: Câmara Municipal de Tomar, 1941–1972–1974); idem, História de Tomar, 2 vols. (Tomar: Ed. Biblioteca Tomar, 1965 and 1982); idem., De Tomar (Tomar: Comissão Central das Comemorações, 1960); Manuel Sílvio Alves Conde, Tomar Medieval (Lisbon: Tese de Mestrado, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, FCSH/DH, 1988); idem., Tomar Medieval: o espaço e os homens (Cascais : Patrimonia, 1996); idem., Horizontes do Portugal Medieval: estudos históricos (Cascais : Patrimonia, 1999). João Maria de Sousa, Notícaia descritiva e histórica da cidade de Tomar (1903, Tomar: rpt. facsimile edition, Tomar: Ed. Fabrícas Mendes Godinho, 1991). José Vieira Guimarães, Thomar. Noticia histórico-archeologica e artistica do monumento de Christo e das egrejas de Santa Maria dos Olivais, de Santa Iria e de S. João (Porto: Litografia Nacional, 1929); Manuel Sílvio Alves Conde, Tomar medieval: o espacio e os homens (Cascais : Patrimonia, 1996). 3 Mário Tavares Chico, “A Arquitectura em Portugal na época de D. Manuel e nos princípios do reinado de D. João III. O gótico final português, o estilo manuelino e a introdução da arte do Renascimento,” in História de arte em Portugal, ed. Aarão de Lacerda, 3 vols. (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1947–56), II (1952); idem, A Arquitectura Gótica em Portugal (Lisbon: 1968, 2nd ed.); Maria da Conceição Pires Coelho, A Igreja da Conceição e o Claustro de D. João III do Convento de Cristo, de Tomar (Santarém: Tesis Universitária, Assemblea Distrital de Santarém, 1987); Pedro Dias, Visitações da Ordem de Cristo de 1507 a

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The Order of the Knights Templar had risen to power in the wake of the Christian Reconquest by King Afonso Henriques I. Their commanders defended around thirty major fortress-castles taken from the Moors and reported to Tomar, the headquarters established by Grão-Mestre Gualdim Pais between 1157 and 1162.4 When Clement V (1305–1314) in Avignon suppressed the Templars in 1312, their extensive preserves and treasures were seized immediately in France. But King Dinis prolonged action on the papal decree until he could establish a new Portuguese Order of Christ. Instituted by 1319, this institution assumed direct control of the Templar holdings. Tomar, by the banks of the Nabão River, was established as the chief stronghold of the Order of Christ in 1336.5 The twelfth-century Rotunda 1510. Aspectos Artísticos (Coimbra: 1979); Pedro Dias et al., A Arquitectura Manuelina (Porto: Livraria Editora Civilização, 1988); José Vieira Guimarães, O Claustro de D. João III em Thomar (Gaia: 1931); Rafael F. Domingues Moreira, A Arquitectura do Renascimento no Sul Portugal (Lisbon: dac. Universidade Nova de Lisboa – FCSH/DHA, 1992); Reynaldo dos Santos, “Tomar,” Guia de Portugal, II, Etremadura, Alentejo, Algarve (Lisbon: 1927); idem, O Estilo Manuelino (Lisbon: 1952). 4 Consult: Frei Lucas de Santa Catharina [1660–1740], Catálogo dos Mestres da Ordem do Templo Portugueses, que tiveram ou exercitaram este título e cargo nesta Coroa Portuguesa e em outras de Espanha (Lisbon: 1772). According to a stone carving bordering a window of Tomar’s Torre de Menagem, the Templar castle was begun in “1160, primo die Marcii.” See Miguel de Mello e Castro, Pedras de armas de Tomar (Lisbon: 1955) and José-Augusto França, Tomar. Thomar Revisited (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1994), 50, who states the complex originally consisted of two nuclei: the Alcáçova (castle) and Torre de Menagem to the northeast; and the temple of the knights to the west, the Charola-orátoria. França also comments, 53, with acknowledgment to Fernando Eduardo Pais da Silva (1975) that Dom Gualdim Pais sustained a strong devotion to the martyr-statesman-soldier Thomas à Becket (1118–1170). The Archbishop of Canterbury was canonized by Pope Alexander III in 1173, about the time Thomar was designated the seat of the Knights Templar. Consult Fernando Eduardo Pais da Silva, As fôrças da segurança na defesa passiva das grandes cidades (Lisbon: Centro tip. Colonial, 1938). 5 After Gualdim Pais, there were seven Grand-Masters at Tomar before Prince Henrique. The first, Dom Gil Martins, previously had served as Master of the Order of St. Benedict of Avis. Therefore, he adopted statutes of the Ordem de S. Bento de Avis at Tomar. See Regra da cavallaria e ordem militar de S. Bento de Avis, ed. Yorge Roij (Lisbon: 1631; copy in Washington, DC, Library of Congress). In 1319, when the Templars were supplanted by the Order of Christ, statutes conforming to the chivalric Order of Calatrava were adopted. Beginning in 1426, Prince Henrique added new reforms to augment the power of his cavaleiros. Although he frequently visited Lagos in the Algarve between 1443 and 1447, during the 1450s he dedicated attention to building a residence at Sagres, the Vila do Infante. Despite his continued interest in the Algarve, he did stay at Tomar in 1451, and bequeathed to the citadel his income from the Azores Islands of São Miguel and Santa Maria. Madeira,

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at Tomar (Figs. 8.8–8.9) has the aspect of a military fortress, because the sixteen-sided polygon with a Charola, or central octagon, as a main altar, receives its support by wide buttresses which taper to a terrace. The oratory originally had a conical tower as proven by the frontispiece to the Manueline Leitura Nova (Livro IV da Estremadura, 1509) (Fig. 8.10). The folio was painted by an unknown master in Lisbon, who was familiar with GhentBruges illumination.6 It contains the heraldic insignia of King Manuel I (r. 1495–1521) and the bas-de-page is treated as an illusionistic window with a view of Tomar’s Charola.7 discovered in 1433, was given in autumn of 1484 by King João II (r. 1481–1495) to his nephew, the Duke of Beja and Viséu, Dom Manuel I. During his tenure as administrator of the Order of Christ, Manuel I continued the reforms instigated by Prince Henrique. See José-Augusto França, Tomar, 15–17, and Maria José Pimenta Ferro Tavares, As doações de D. Manuel, Duque de Beja. a algumas igrejas da Ordem de Cristo (Lisbon: 1971); idem., Estudos de história monetária portuguesa (1383–1438) (Lisbon: 1974). Also consult: Definições e estatutos dos Cavaleiros e Freires da Ordem de Nosso Senhor Jesus Christo com a história da origem e principio d’ella (Lisbon: 1628 and 1746); Frei Damião das Neves, Compêndio da regra e definição dos cavaleiros da Ordem de Nosso Senhor Jesus Cristo (Lisbon: 1607); António Duarte Brasio, “O Padroado da Ordem de Cristo na Madeira,” Arquivo Histórico da Madeira (Funchal: 1962); and José Manuel Garcia, Sagres (Vila do Bispo: Câmera Municipal de Vila do Bispo, 1990), which contains additional bibliographical sources on the Vila do Infante. 6 A pair of angels display the royal arms, and beside each is the king’s armillary sphere. Enframed by a variety of flora and fauna, the boxed text opens with the king’s name as its title. Within the initial D, the first letter of Dom Manuel, is a dragon. The beast is a pertinent symbol for his status as a knight of the English Order of the Garter. 7 In front of this landscape is a third angel. Marked by a red pattée cross, the escutcheon signifies Manuel I’s office as Master of the Order of Christ. José-Augusto França, Tomar, 53, credits Garcez Texeira, a collaborator in José Vieira Guimarães, Thomar. Santa Iria (Lisbon: Livraria Coelho, 1927), with identifying the building in the Leitura Nova as Tomar’s Charola. Also see Francisco Pato de Macedo, “Leitura Nova, Frontispício do Livro IV da Estremadura,” No Tempo das Feitorias. A Arte Portuguesa na Época dos Descobrimentos, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, 1992), II, 208–209. This manuscript (52.8 x 37.1 cm) is in the Lisbon Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Inv. LN20. Among the birds in the folio, the peacock particularly alludes to immortal vows. A drummer monkey is near the bas-de-page, but the top border shows a knight wearing chain maille and winged helmet as he plays a type of violin. Snails, bees and butterflies also are depicted near the bas-de-page. Snails are born from mud and eat what can be found at hand. St. John the Baptist, patron of the Knights Templar of Malta, subsisted in the wilderness on a basic fare of locusts and wild honey (Mark 1:6). Because of Templar devotion to the Resurrected Christ, the butterflies in the illumination would retain their traditional association with the cyclical process of life, death and regeneration. Some of the bas-de-page flowers allude to chivalric virtues: the violet, humility; the forget-me-knot, constancy; the rose, steadfast devotion. The purple irises, especially provide a reference to the seventh-century Saint Iria, whose legend is recounted by

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Similar to other Templar oratories, the Rotunda (Figs. 8.11–8.13) was modeled after Jerusalem’s Holy Sepulchre. The early character of the chamber is almost completely disguised, due to the Manueline remodeling of its interior between 1508 and 1525, but Jan van Eyck would have been intrigued by its design, as evidenced by the round towers he depicts in the Ghent Adoration of the Lamb. There are eight altars around the Charola. Sixteenth-century panels now decorate not only the walls above these altars, but also the walls over six doors of the Rotunda. During the period Prince Henrique was Master of the Order of Christ at Tomar, the same surfaces must have been painted with frescoes.8 Only one mural survives from the preManueline Rotunda, an over-altar landscape of St. Christopher (Fig. 8.14). Situated in the middle section of the wall on the north side of the Rotunda, the work is in a poor state of preservation so the Latin inscription to the right of the saint is difficult to decipher, but it substantially encapsulates the story recounted in the Dominican Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea (ca. 1275). Shown prominently at a tower window on the left portion of the fresco is the holy hermit who exhorted Christopher to fast and pray.9 The hermit extends a bell to sound the arrival of the Dominus Mundi. Sitting on Christopher’s shoulder, the Resurrected Christ, with his nimbus marked by the red cross França, Tomar, 18. A devout nun, she was violated by Britaldo, son of Castinaldo, the Lord of Nabância. Iria was beheaded by the ruler’s servant, Banão, who threw her remains from Tomar’s Ponte Velha bridge into the Nabão River. Iria’s body was carried to Santarém, where angels supposedly built her sepulchre in the middle of the Teja River. The town’s name derives from “Santa Iria.” 8 Luís Maria Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo (Lisbon-Mafra: Instituto Português do Patromónio Cultural, ELO – Publicidade, Artes Gráficas, 1991), 12–25, describes in detail the post-Manueline interior of the Charola and gives the exact placement of paintings on the walls. Panel pictures by Gregório Lopes (1536–1538) were installed over the eight altars on the lower part of the peripheral walls. Two works survive, and they are landscapes with St. Bernard of Clairvaux and St. Anthony of Padua. Above the altars, arched panel paintings were installed around 1592–1600. Attributed to Domingos Vieira Serrão or Simão Abreu, the extant subjects illustrate the following themes: the Baptism of Christ, Christ and the Centurion, the Resurrection of Lazarus, the Entry into Jerusalem, the Resurrection, and the Ascension. The upper walls either have windows or panel paintings by Simão Abreu (Christ with the Doctors, the Flight into Egypt, the Circumcision, the Agony in the Garden, the Road to Calvary, the Elevation of the Cross, the Descent from the Cross, and the Entombment. Twelve polychrome wooden statues of “Prophets” (ca. 1550–1600), each under a baldachin, were installed on wooden brackets around the Rotunda. These statues once flanked the middle arched paintings, but only five now exist. 9 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, translated from Latin by Granger Ryan and Helmut Ripperger (New York: Arno Press, 1969), 377–83.

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of Jerusalem, holds an orb with his left hand. From his right extends a phylactery, telling Christopher to plant his staff in the riverbank by his hut which as predicted grew “leaves and fruits” overnight, “like unto a palm tree.” The flowering palm appears behind the scroll in the fresco. Following this theophany, Christopher preached in Lycia (Asia Minor) during the persecutions of Decius. Before his martyrdom, he underwent many tortures, including being shot with arrows. Of the royal princes who fought at Ceuta in August of 1415, Henrique was the only one wounded, and he was shot by an arrow, the same ubiquitous shaft invested with chivalric meaning in the North. Jan van Eyck’s panel of the Holy Pilgrims highlights the same patron of travelers depicted in Tomar’s Oratory and venerated by knights of the Order of Christ.10 The Rotunda contains a single wall tomb (Figs. 8.15–8.16), that of Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa of Arronches, Sousa, the maternal cousin of Dona Leonor Teles (d. 1386), wife of King Fernando (1345: r. 1367–1383). Knight at the age of twelve, this mordomo-mór (chief steward) of Queen Philippa’s household also was head of the Order of Christ and tutor of Princes Duarte, Pedro and Henrique. Situated to the right of the St. Christopher mural, his tomb contains an epitaph which was carved when his remains initially were interred in Tomar’s Capela de Nossa Senhora dos Anjos. Enclosed by garlands of roses, the sepulchral inscription is bisected by a vertical arrangement, two crosses of the Order of Christ with the Sousa arms in the center. The legend recounts Dom Lopo Dias’s service as a knight of João I in five conflicts in Castile; his participation in the campaign at Ceuta; and his death at age forty-six on February 9, 1435. Most importantly, the inscription states that Prince Henrique, “governor of the said Order, Duke of Viseu and Lord of Covilhã,” ordered that the transfer of his remains to the Convent of Christ on March 8, 1435.11 The royal esteem for this venerable knight was long sustained, as proven by the placement of his sepulchre in Tomar’s Rotunda in 1502 by King Manuel I, who added no other tombs. Jan van Eyck obviously would not have seen this sepulchre in 1429, but he would have met the Restoration of the Charola dome has revealed it was painted by Manueline masters to simulate masonry. Fresco traces remain of heraldic devices and armillary spheres. Rafael Moreira of the Universidade Nova de Lisbon kindly discussed the discovery of the Tomar frescoes in Washington, DC during the summer of 1999 and mentioned the illusionistic stonework. Also see Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 24. 11 Pedrosa dos Santo Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 20–21, reproduces Lopo Dias de Sousa’s epitaph. 10

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honorable lord in Lisbon. Considering Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa was only forty when the Burgundian embassy was in Portugal, he logically would have been among the noblemen providing a tour of Lusitanian centers. The Sousa tomb originally was in the old Chapel of Nossa Senhora dos Anjos (Our Lady of the Angels) which was under the present sixteenthcentury bell tower that backs onto one of the eastern angles of the Rotunda (Fig. 8.17). A southeast door of the Rotunda once led to the Chapel as it now provides access to the bell tower.12 Raising the cineira necessitated the destruction of two staircases which led from the Rotunda to one of the two cloisters built under the aegis of Dom Henrique. To the left of the Rotunda portal for the bell tower, there are two passageways which lead to the “Cemetery Cloister.” The Convento de Cristo celebrated spiritual resurrection for the “Soldiers” united in the “Body of Christ.” As methodically as he planned the initial burial place of Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa in the Capela de Nossa Senhora dos Anjos, Prince Henrique built Tomar’s Claustro do Cemitério (Fig. 8.18) on the north wing of the Rotunda as a resting place for knights and monks of the Order of Christ. The floor is paved with tomb stones, and many carvings still retain their numerical inscriptions.13 The quadrangular cloister comprises a vaulted gallery of ogival arches and double columns. The

Judging by the appearance of the Templar Rotunda in the Leitura Nova frontispiece, the tower was constructed by 1509, and therefore, probably was raised under the direction of Diogo de Aruda. Its mammoth bell, the largest in Portugal, was not installed until 1559. The remains of Dom Lope Dias must have been transferred when Dom Manuel I initiated his constructions at the Convento de Cristo. 13 Consult J.I. da Costa Rosa, “Os oito claustros do Convento de Cristo,” Boletim Cultural e Informativo da Câmara Municipal de Tomar 1 (Tomar: 1981): 29–49. Important tombs in the “Cemetery Cloister” were installed during the fifteenth century. See Manuel da Silva Castelo-Branco, “O Obituário do Real Convento de Cristo em Tomar, Boletim Cultural e Informativo da Câmara Municipal de Tomar 1 (1981): 119–42; 2 (1981): 107–28; 5 (1983): 191–220; 6 (1983): 189–228. According to Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 28–29, the “Cemetery Cloister” was complementary to the pantheon of the Grand Masters of the Templars and Order of Christ in the Church of Santa Maria do Olival. He also states, 28, that “servants were buried either at the hermitage of Santa Catarina, situated on the left of the entrance to the castle, past the Porto do Sol [South Gate], or on the terrace of the Manueline Church.” For information concerning Santa Maria do Olival, the oldest church in the town of Tomar, see França, Tomar, 31–35. He also discusses, 36–40, Tomar’s Church of São João Baptista with its old bell tower. Santa Maria do Olival’s rectangular plan of three naves was replicated at São João Baptista, which began as a Templar shrine and was remodeled by King Manuel I (1510). Also consult Vieira Guimarães, Thomar (Porto: 1929) for information about the churches of Santa Maria do Olival, Santa Iria and São João Baptista (Porto: 1929). 12

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thirty-two pillars rest on beds tiled with glazed white and blue azulejos; their shafts are smooth and culminate in delicate, leafy capitals. On the northeast side of the gallery is a cistern, which provided water while simultaneously serving as a symbolic fons vitae. According to a chronicle by Dom Pedro Álvares Seco de Freitas, dated 1542, the “Cemetery Cloister” was used for processions.14 During the Gothic age, Corpus Christi was commemorated at the Monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra by Augustinian ecclesiastics who made a mnemonic circuit of their institution. The solemn march began at the church, which contained relics of the five Franciscan “Martyrs of Morocco,” then moved to the cloister and the churchyard, before returning to the church.15 The double passageways and staircases from the Rotunda to the “Cemetery Cloister” suggest that Prince Henrique intended from the beginning of his tenure as Master of the Order of Christ to accommodate Corpus Christi processions at Tomar. Though two Henriquine cloisters at the Convento de Cristo have been generally dated between 1437 and 1449, a pre-existing cemetery probably occupied the site of the later cloister.16 The square “Washing Cloister” (Claustro da Lavagem) consists of two floors which provide access to the Claustro do Cemitério, and it was built by Prince Henrique at the base of the Rotunda (Fig. 8.19). Though it was constructed with splendid ogival arches and double columns 14 França, Tomar, 56–57, discusses the Henriquine cloisters and gives this source. Dom Pedro Álvares Seco de Freitas was the chief magistrate of the House of Supplication (Casa de Suplicação), knight of the Order of Christ, and purser of the Masters (contador do Mestrado). Among his assigned tasks was the compilation of the writings of the Order. His tomb, on the west side of Tomar’s “Cemetery Cloister” between the Chapel of the Portocarreiros and the Philipine Sacristy, bears the date of 1599. See Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 38. 15 António Henrique de Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, translated by S.S. Wyatt (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1971), 219, states: “... the procession of Corpus Christi would come out of the church and cloister of Santa Cruz, circle around the churchyard and reenter. Only ecclesiastics took part in it.” He references Fortunato de Almeida, Historia da Igreja em Portugal, 4 vols. (Coimbra: Imprensa Académica, 1910–1912), II, 479. Also see reprint edition História da Igreja em Portugal, 4 vols., ed. Damião Peres (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1967–1971). 16 The Cloister has been attributed to Fernão Gonçalves because his signature in Gothic letters was inscribed on the base of a column that stands at the southern corner: FNAM:GLZ:FEZ. The eldest illegitimate son of Nuno Gonçalves, the sixth Hospitaller Prior of Crato (1419–1444), was named “Fernão de Goyos.” Whether Fernão de Goyos and Fernão Gonçalves was one and the same person is impossible to determine. Born about 1418, Fernão de Goyos is recorded in genealogical records of the Torre do Tombo as having been a

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decorated with vegetative motifs, the cloister originally contained water pools in the central space.17 Henrique’s cloister purportedly was designed for washing the habits of monks. But the garden initially might have served as a venue for rites of purification, akin to the “Bath” ceremonies initiating knight bachelors to the Order of the Garter. The upper storey of the cloister, subsequently decorated with tiles, constituted the quarters for the “Knights of Christ.” Near the Cemitério, the cloister closest to the Charola, a “Chapel of St.George” was constructed with a bell tower.18 This capela with a vaulted roof was donated in 1426 by Vasco Gonçalves de Almeida and his wife Méçia Lourenço, governors of the Prince.19 The cineira of São Jorge is depicted in the bas-de-page of the frontispiece to the Leitura Nova Livro IV da Estremadura (1509), but it no longer survives. Prince Henrique became a knight of the English Order of the Garter December 3, after 1442, but when the Tomar “Chapel of St. George” was created, King João I was a Garter Knight.20 About 1470 the chapel was converted to a sacristy for the Rotunda,

comendador of Barreiro, a military fortress of the Order of Christ. Fernão de Goyos and his brothers were sent by order of King Afonso V of Portugal to aid King Afonso V (1394–1458) in the conquest of Naples (1450s). This assistance could have consisted of sketching plans of Italian fortifications as Fernão surely had intimate knowledge about the Templar military bastion of Tomar, as well as the defense walls circumscribing Crato. 17 Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 40–41. 18 França, Tomar, 53. He also cites, 55, statements by the chronicler Gomes Eanes de Azúrara regarding acrescentamentos (additions) by Prince Henrique to specific projects that were mentioned in 1542 by the chronicler Pedro Álvares Seco de Freitas: duas mui fremosas crastas (two cloisters), the Capela S. Jorge, and a torre, which França believes probably was the bell tower. See Gomes Eanes de Zurara [1410–1473/4], Crónica do descobrimento e conquista da Guiné [1453: Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale), 2 vols. ed. José de Bragança (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1937), rpt. Lisbon, 1973); idem., The Chronicle of the Discovery and Conquest of Guinea [Crónica dos feitos de Guinee], 2 vols., translated by Charles Raymond Beazley and Edgar Prestage (New York: B. Franklin, 1963). 19 The roof with a circular stone at the top bears the herald of Vasco Gonçalves de Almeida and his wife. Beneath an arch of the western wall is a Gothic tomb which displays their arms and a carved inscription which reads: ESTA: CAPELA: MANDOU: FAZER/VAASCO: GONCALVES: DALMEY/DA: CAVALEIRO: E SUA: MOLHER/MECIA: LOURENCO: AMOS: DOIFA/NTE: DON: AMRYQ: EFOY: FEYTA/NA: ERA: DO SALVADOR: DE MILL: IIII: XXBI: A

(that is, 1426). See Pendrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 30. 20 Manuel I was the last Portuguese sovereign admitted to the Order of the Garter (April 23, 1510). See William Arthur Shaw (1865–1943), The Knights of England (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1971), 12 (Prince Henrique) and 20 (Manuel I).

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so its appearance at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit is unknown. However, its installation near the Charola was not coincidental. The hagiography of the “dragon slayer” relates that Christians of the First Crusade (1096–1099) led by Godfrey of Bouillon saw St. George with his red cross banner on the ramparts of Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.21 The building of the Capela de São Jorge and bell tower during the earliest phase of Henriquine construction underscores the underscores the immense importance of the warrior saint to the knights of the Order of Christ (Fig. 8.20). The Burgundian embassy would have boarded at the old quarters of the Convento de Cristo occupied by Prince Henrique which bordered the “Washing Cloister” to the east. Prior to leaving for Sagres in the Algarve, the Prince renovated these apartments and he also directed attention to the Torre de Menagem (Templar Keep).22 Among the building projects at Tomar which most engaged the Prince’s attention, however, was the planning of a new temple which symbolically would unite components of the complex. To that end, he devised the design which would transform the Charola of the fortress-like Rotunda into the main altar of a larger church (Fig. 8.21). Two western sides of the rotunda were demolished to create an arched entrance. According to the sixteenth-century Livro das Escrituras da Ordem de Cristo in the Arquivo Nacional de Torre do Tombo: ...for this church to be able to serve the convent of religious he [Dom Henrique] ordered made (...) a choir in the arch that still exists, for which he took two panels of the sixteen sides for the front of the arch of the chapel that faces west. [The entrance of the choir was made] “under the said arch, in smooth stone, on a level of the floor of the convent, of a braça (2.2 meters; 7½ feet) a little more or less, [and he added to it] a little balcony over an embankment and another above the church.” 23 Consult Georges Didi-Huberman, Riccardo Garbetta, Manuela Moragaine, Saint Georges et le Dragon. Versions d’une Légende (Paris: Société nouvelle Adam Biro, 1994). 22 Alberto Iria, O Infante D. Henrique no Algarve: estudos inéditos, ed. José Manuel Garcia and Pedro Moreira with a homenagem to Alberto Iria by Fernando Calapez Corrêa (Lagos: Centro de Estudos Gil Eanes, 1995); idem., Itinerário do Infante D. Henrique no Algarve (Faro: Delegação do Algarve para as Comemorações Henriquinas, 1960). 23 França, Tomar, 55, quotes from this document: “para esta igreja poder servir de convento de religiosos Ihe mandou fazer (...) coro no arco que agora está, com que tomou dois panos dos dezasseis aos de fronte do arco da capela que está contra poente.” Fez ele então o coro “debaixo do dito arco, no maciço da parede, altura do andar do convento, de uma braça, 21

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The Holy Sepulchre (325–335) was as an aeterna memoria and “Royal Church” for Christendom. Constantine modeled his palatine complex at Antioch after the Temple Mount, to parallel his earthly residence with the “spiritual dwelling place” of the “King of Kings.” The Emperor’s Domus Aurea, a domical tomb adjacent to a martyrium church of the Holy Apostles, was described by Eusebius of Caesarea, prior to its destruction by fire and reconstruction (526–588). Dedicated to Christ, the Corcordia poenitentiae, Constantine’s mausoleum, conjoining by an imperial house and church, became an architectural standard for later royal complexes, including those built by Theodoric at Ravenna, Charlemagne at Aachen and João I at Batalha.24 Religious military orders in Portugal had embraced the concept of Constantine’s martyrium at Antioch. According to Pedro Dias, one of the earliest funerary monuments with a central plan in Portugal was begun in 1333 in Alcáçer do Sal (“Castle of Salt”). Called Salacia by the Romans, the small town in the district of Setúbal is on the right bank of the Sado and its twelfth to thirteenth-century castle overlooks the river which widens to an estuary. Less than a mile to the west of Alcáçer do Sal is the RomanesqueGothic church of Nossa Senhora dos Mártires (Figs. 8.22–8.23) with its octagonal pantheon-chapel modeled after the Holy Sepulchre.25 Erected under Dom Garcia Perez, Master of Santiago, the chapel houses the remains of four mestres, and includes a stone sarcophagus of Diogo Pereira installed in 1427. Near the church is a burial ground for knights of the order. As pointed out by Paolo Pereira, Romanesque Portugal was absorbed by the Holy Grail mystique, and it was a cleric of the Order of Santiago who provided a translation of the celebrated manuscript O Livro de José de Arimateia.26

pouco mais ou menos” e acrescentou-lhe “uma pequena sacada sobre a mota e outra sobre a igreja.” Tinha o coro seis varas de longo e cinco de largo, e a sua serventia fez-se “no otro pano que está pegado na banda do norte,” sendo a respectiva escada lançada “pelo grosse da parede.” 24 See Earl Baldwin Smith, The Dome. A Study in the History of Ideas (1950; rpt., Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 29–30, who cites: Eusebius, Vita Constantini: III, 50; André Grabar, Martyrium: recherches sur le culte des reliques et l’art chrétien antique, 2 vols. (Paris: Collège de France, 1943–46), I (1946), 223–25, rpt. (London: Variorum Reprints, 1972); Richard Krautheimer, Studies in Early Christian, Medieval and Renaissance Art, translated by Alfred Frazer et al. (New York: New York University Press, 1969): 52‑54. 25 Pedro Dias, A Arquitectura Gótica Portuguêsa (Lisbon: Estampa, 1994), 108. Paulo Pereira, ed., História da Arte Portuguesa. Temas e Debates, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Printer Portuguesa, Ind. Gráfica, Lda., 1995), I, 391–92. 26 Paolo Pereira, ed., História da Arte Portuguesa, I, 392.

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Dom Frei Gonçalo de Sousa, companion in service to Prince Henrique, was an ideal knight of the Order of Christ. According to Artur Teodoro de Matos, his impressive sepulchre (Carmo Archaeological Museum, Lisbon) which originally rested at Tomar, describes the “virtues of his Lord” Henrique: ‘He gave nothing to the devil and when he caused displeasure he gave all to God, nor did he speak ill of anyone, nor was he envious, nor drank wine, never swore by God … fasted … was very obedient…”.27 Matos further quotes from the Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné, in which Gomes Eanes de Zurara (Chapters IV and VI) provides a character profile of Henrique, as a “fortress of strength,” who did not succumb to the “pleasure of the flesh or avarice” and spent his life in “pure chastity.”28 At Tomar, the extension of the Rotunda to the west significantly placed the Charola between the Cemetery Cloister and the Cloister of St. Barbara. This symbolical linking of the deceased warriors of the Order of Christ with the martyrs of the Early Christian Church appears to reflect Henrique’s vision of the valiant crusader as a Christ-imitator. The Avis Prince also consciously evoked the memory of Constantine in the planning of Tomar, where heraldic banners of the fortress recalled a famous incident of Reconquest history. The battle of Ourique in 1139 occurred near Chão de Santarém, a town then controlled by the Moor Ismar, a protagonist who has been identified as both a “king” and governor.29 On the eve of his portentous engagement with the armies of five Moorish kings, Afonso Henriques I (Figs. 8.24–8.25) had retired to his tent, where he read from the Book of Judges before falling asleep, a passage describing Gideon’s triumph over four Midianite kings. He then dreamed about an old man Artur Teodoro de Matos, Henrique o Navegador. Henry the Navigator (Lisbon: CTT Correios, de Portugal, S.A., 1994), 19: “Deu nenhuma cousa ao demo e quando Ihe faziam desprazer tudo dava a Deus, nem dizia mal de nenhum nem cobiçava a nenhum mal, nem bebia vinho, nunca jurou por Deus (…) jejunhava (…)foi muito obediente (…).” He states the transcription is given by Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, Trabalhos nauticos dos portuguezes nos seculos XVI e XVII ... Memoria apresentada á Academia real das sciencias por occasião da celebração do 4o. centenario do descobrimento do caminho maritimo da India, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1898–1900). See the reprint edition Trabalhos Náuticos dos Portugueses nos séculos XVI e XVII, ed. José Manuel Garcia (Lisbon: Impr. Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1988), 275. 28 Matos, Henrique o Navegador , 13–14. 29 Santarém was taken in 1147. For what follows, consult Edgar Prestage, “Chivalry of Portugal, Chivalry. A Series of Studies to Illustrate Its Historical Significance and Civilizing Influence (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928), 141–66, at 148–50. He gives the earliest account of the legend, an anonymous contemporary chronicle, Vita Santi Theotonii. 27

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who not only assured him of success against the Moors, but also forecast a meeting with the “Savior.” Awakened by a chamberlain, Afonso Henriques I was astounded as the messenger brought to him was the same prophet of his dreams. The old man repeated his prognostication and told King Afonso to leave his tent a midnight when he heard ringing from the bell of his hermitage. The ruler obeyed, and beheld a vision of the crucified Christ, who promised the founding of a kingdom. In order for the descendants of Afonso Henriques to know the source of their power, he was told to take for his arms the “price paid for man’s redemption.” The Arms of Portugal are blazoned with heraldic devices relating to the Passion. Five shields which symbolized the “Wounds of Christ” and the five Moorish kings defeated at Ourique are arranged in the form of a cross. On each are bezants (coins), also disposed as crosses. As an inversion of the “pieces of silver” given to the betrayer Judas, Afonso Henriques expended great sums to ransom Christians held in captivity. By contrast to the royal arms of Portugal, the origin of the shield adopted by the Order of Christ significantly was the labrarum of Constantine. Jan van Eyck displays the Constantinian shield in the Ghent Altarpiece (Fig. 8.26). Wearing laurel crowns, the Avis Princes ride in procession as latter-day descendants of the Grail Knights. The harnesses of their horses show the symbolic bezants of their nation’s herald. The choir built by Prince Henrique to the west of the Charola measured six varas in length and five in width (24 x 20 feet). By 1510, King Manuel I’s architect Diogo de Arruda had raised the height of the structure (Fig. 8.27). His successor, João de Castilho, completed the construction of the interior. In its final form, the exquisitely vaulted church has two levels: a balconied choir; and the sacristy below, which came to be used for chapter house meetings. In 1511 the carving of the choir chairs was ordered, in addition to a throne for the Grand Master, over which there would be a canopy with angels bearing instruments of the Passion. Begun by Olivier de Gand (Ghent), who had arrived to Portugal from Toledo in 1499, the stalls were completed in 1514 by his collaborator, Fernão Munoz, a Spaniard. Save for a few statues, all woodwork in the choir was destroyed during the French invasion of 1808– 1810.30 Despite its destruction, the choir’s iconography suggests that the 30 Pedrosa dos Santos Graça, O Convento de Cristo, 42–47 (Manueline church and choir) and 24 (diagram of the location of the statues in the Charola sanctuary. The Charola statues include two Heraldic Angels bearing the coat-of-arms of Portugal and the escutcheon of the

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church was decorated as new and grander chapel honoring “Our Lady of the Angels.” When the old chapel of Nossa Senhora dos Anjos was replaced by a Manueline bell tower, its liturgical contents and statuary would have been relocated to the remodeled church. Opening to the Charola, a symbolic substitute for Jerusalem’s Holy Sepulchre, a large chapel honoring the Virgen da Piedade (Virgin of Sorrows) would have been totally appropriate. The iconography adopted for the Manueline choir may have followed a thematic plan initiated by Prince Henrique. Images of angels bearing instruments of Christ’s Passion in Henrique’s old chapel pictorially resurface in Van Eyck’s altar of the Adoration of the Lamb (Fig. 8.28). The instruments of Calvary originated from the late legend pertaining to the “Mass of St. Gregory the Great,” the sixth-century Latin Doctor who revised the Eucharistic liturgy. Despite the fact that the centrally-placed Ghent angels stem from a surfeit of Northern sources, the fortress citadel of Tomar with its crusader atmosphere still must have been memorable to visitors circa 1429. The Burgundian embassy would have attended Mass in the Chapel of Our Lady of Angels. Sacred music comprises a variety of canticles for the divine offices, and Prince Duarte’s Regiment of the Royal Chapel gives evidence of the Avis interest in orchestral compositions. Measuring almost twelve meters, a parchment-lined device for amplifying the music of an organ still remains on the Gospel side of the arched entrance to the eightsided Charola. Prince Henrique’s future plans for constructing a choir may have been mentioned to the Burgundian guests. Connecting the Templar Rotunda with the choir proves his familiarity with philosophical arguments on cosmic harmony, which typically were reasoned in terms of geometry and music. Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) in his treatise De Re Aedificatoria Order of Christ, and a Pietà (Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist). Saints of diverse historical periods are represented: John the Baptist, Peter, Paul, Jerome, Augustine/Ambrose, Gregory the Great, Basil, Dominic de Guzmán, and Anthony of Padua. For the works of Olivier de Gand, consult Maria da Conceição Amaral, catalogue entries for Anjo Heráldico, Nossa Senhora e São João, and São Jerónimo in No Tempos da Feitorias. A Arte Portuguesa na Época dos Descobrimentos, II (Lisbon: Museu Nacional da Arte Antiga, 1992): 102–3 (Heraldic Angel: 180 cm), 104–5 (Pietà: 140 cm), 106–107 (St. Jerome: 170 cm). The throne of the Grand Master logically would have been decorated with the Pietà as the angels held instruments of the Passion. The right arm of the Heraldic Angel of the Order of Christ is upraised, the hand clinched in such a manner as to indicate a lance was once held. The instrument belonging to the Angel with the Portuguese Escutcheon is difficult to identify as his right arm rests by his side without a hand. If he originally carried a crown of thorns, the object would have been analogous to the regal coronet.

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(1452) drew upon Pythagoras’s proportional musical harmonies to compare the dimensions of space (line, plane and volume) with melody, interval and chord, defining “architectural beauty” as the “harmony and concord of all parts.” The Castilian theorist Bartolomé Ramis in his Musica practica (1482) replaced the traditional division of tones into hexachords (units of six tones) by the division into octaves. This monumental change assuredly sprang from a re-analysis of musical practice which began around 1400. Bartolomé Ramis de Pareia (b. 1440) regarded the octave as the most ideal consonance because it provided the most perfect duplication of an original tone. The octave, therefore, assumed an equivalent place among musical intervals as the circle in geometric principles. While Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), a leading voice in the Medicean circle of Neo-Platonist, compared the octave to the circle in his De rationibus musicae, Ramis additionally coordinated the octave with the eight planets (Earth, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn). Perceiving the “Spheres” to be musical notes of the cosmological scale, he compared silentium with the earth, and then paralleled the eight tones of the octave with the ascending order of the planets until the octave attained the caelum stellatum.31 The number eight in mystic cosmogony implied the soul’s ability to overcome the planetary influences of the materia mundi. The octagonal Charola is largely a Manueline overlay of an early Templar altar built in imitation of the twostoried domed Holy Sepuchre. Because of its implications of regeneration, the twelfth-century altar was analogous to a mystical Fons Vitae. Based upon medieval legends, the basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano in Rome was believed to have been the place where Pope Sylvester I baptized Constantine. The domed baptistery stands over the site of the baths of the Domus Faustae, which once adjoined the patrician palace of the Laterani confiscated by Nero. Following the Synod convoked by Pope Melchiades, the first rites of baptism were held in the baths. After Constantine transformed the baths into a circular double font, Pope Sixtus (432–440) enclosed the baptisterium within an octagonal building having four chapels. Under Pope Hilary (461– 467), bronze musical doors that once belonged to the Baths of Caracalla were

Edward L. Lowinsky, “The Concept of Physical Musical Space in the Renaissance,” Papers of the American Musicological Society (Richmond, VA: 1945): 57–84 (Alberti, 82; Ramis, 75, Ficino, 80). See Bartolomeo Ramis de Pareia, Musica practica [De musica tratacus, Bologna: Baltasaris de Hiriberia, 1483], translated with commentary by Clement A. Miller (Neuhausen-Stuttgart: American Institute of Musicology: Hänssler-Verlag, 1993). 31

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placed at the entrance to the fifth-century Chapel of St. John the Baptist. When opened they played like an organ. The transcendental belief of Christian theology, death to sin and rebirth to a spiritual plateau through the purification rite of Baptism, was suggested by the proportions, materials and domed vault of the Charola, which had all the metaphorical hallmarks of a Holy Grail even when Philip the Good’s embassy visited Portugal.32 West of the Charola is the Cloister of St. Barbara (Fig. 8.29), which hints that the Templars may have been the first to symbolically associate their twelfth-century tower with the virgin († 235: fd December 4) whose vita was included in the martyrology composed by the late tenth-century Byzantine Logothete Symeon Metaphrastes. According to his Menology based on earlier accounts, Barbara was guarded by her father Dioscorus in a tower, which she altered by installing three windows 32 The inner part of the Charola flaunts an opulent decorative style favored by Manuel I. The dome above the altar of the Charola shows a central medallion emblem of ΧΡЅ, the Greek initials of Christ. Eight ribs encase double rows of gilded fleur-de-lys mouldings, between which are alternating symbols of majesty, golden crosses of the Order of Christ and armillary spheres. Eight carved canopies, finished in gold, were suspended from the emblems. Only three now remain, and they have been attributed to Olivier de Gand, whose work on the baldachins predated his commission to carve the choir stalls of the church. See Albrecht Haupt, Die Baukunst der Renaissance in Portugal, 2 vols. (Frankfurt: 1890–1895), reprinted as A arquitectura do Renascimento em Portugal: do tempo de D. Manuel, o Venturoso, até ao fim do domínio espanhol, ed. Manuel Cardoso Mendes Atanázio and translated by Margarida Morgado (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1986); idem., Geschichte der Renaissance in Spanien und Portugal (Stuttgart: P. Neff, 1927); idem., A Arquitectura do Renascimento em Portugal (Lisbon: 1966). Fourteen statues are supported by brackets within the Charola, and some of them came from the choir after cataclysmic destruction by the French. As is the case with the adjoining Manueline church, angelic consolation — a subject intimately tied to the theophany of celestial messengers at the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem — was the poignant central theme dominating the exterior decoration of the Charola. Disposed about the drum of the upper walls are frescoes of paired angels, each flanking a narrow window above the arched piers of the ground level. The slender winged figures hold sixteen sacred relics of the Passion. The Charola’s murals display such technical proficiency in fresco painting by an indigenous artist, that clearly a foreign catalyst must have set the stage for such an evolutionary leap in quality. Their creator is polemical, as the murals have been attributed to two masters: Fernão Rodrigues, an artist of the Convent of Christ between 1533 and 1562; or more plausibly, to Fernão Eanes, a painter of Tomar, whose period of activity (1511–1521) coincided with the interior decoration of the Charola. A salient reason to assign the murals to Fernão Eanes is the similarity of Tomar’s paired angels to counterparts in Manueline editions of the Leitura Nova. In view of his surname and specialty, Eanes possibly descended from the dynastic line of court artists employed by the Avis House. See Pedrosa dos Santo Graça, O Convento de Christo, 24, who cites Vergílio Correia, Ciclo Manuelino (Porto: 1932).

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to denote the Holy Trinity. Denounced by Dioscorus for converting to Christianity, she attempted to escape his wrath by hiding in a cave. Taken before Martinianus, prefect of the Heliopolis (Egypt), she was tortured and then beheaded by Dioscorus. Returning home from his daughter’s execution, he was hit by lightening. The early eighth-century Martyrologium Romanum Parvum records Tuscany as the site of Barbara’s death, though other narrative accounts prefer Rome or Nicomedia. Venerated as a protector against sudden death by fire and storms, Barbara commonly was invoked by miners, archers and architects. Typically shown with a book to denote her wisdom, she is the only virgin-martyr portrayed with a chalice. Though the Eucharistic cup signifies her role as intercessor to assure the dying of the sacramental Last Rites, the chalice is a pertinent emblem of the mystical Holy Grail. Prince Henrique must have taken especial delight in this symbolism, as he was born in 1394 on December 4, the feast day of the virgin-martyr Barbara. King João I’s Batalha Abbey 1429–1450 In 1429 Jan van Eyck and members of the Burgundian delegation must have visited Batalha Monastery en route to Santiago de Compostela (Figs. 8.30–8.31). Located between Lisbon and Coimbra, Batalha Abbey was begun as an ex-voto by King João I to fulfill a vow he had made on the eve of his engagement with the Castilian troops of Juan II of Castile at Aljubarrota August 14, 1388).33 Archers sent by John of Gaunt helped turn the tide of the conflict on August 14, 1385, the “vigil” of the Virgin Mary’s Assumption. For this reason, the adjoining Real Mosteiro da Batalha was named after William the Conqueror’s “Battle Abbey” at Hastings. The church of Santa Maria da Vitória from its inception was planned to house a royal mausoleum. The edifice was substantially completed by the time of Van Eyck’s visit to Portugal. Batalha was situated within a short ride of the actual battlefield and town of Canoeira. After purchasing the former Quinta do Pinhal from one of his knights, João I deeded the property on April 4, 1388 to the Dominican 33 Antóio H. Araújo Stott Howorth, A Batalha de Aljubarrota: dúvidas, certezas e probabilidade militar inerente (Lisbon: Tip. da E.N.P. (Secção Anuário Comercial de Portugal), 1960).

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order.34 Limestone quarries and an abundance of pine, oak and elm trees in the Lena River valley provided the critical raw materials for the raising of such a large complex. The monarch’s Dominican confessor, Friar Lourenço Lampreia, probably had served as an initial advisor.35 Predating the royal cloister, Santa Maria da Vitória, was substantially raised by October 4, 1426, the date of King João I’s last testament. Franco-Flemish in appearance, the church is in the form of a Latin cross with three long naves, the lateral being shorter and narrower than the center. Two flying buttresses articulate the façade with its magnificently carved western entrance. The ogival arch of the western portal (Fig. 8.32) supports an impressive tympanum carved with the Apocalyptic Christ surrounded by the tetramorphs. Six archivolts contain seventy-eight stone figures. Standing beneath small canopies, they define the hierarchical order of paradise, beginning with the seraphim in the archivolt nearest the enthroned Christ, and continuing with rows of the angelic choir, Hebrew prophets, Kings of Israel, and lastly, the saints. Flanking the portal beneath the lancet arched archivolts are the twelve apostles, six to each side, who also stand on bases beneath baldachins of honor. Surmounting the portal is a crowned statue of Mary Immaculate, Mater Salvatoris.36 The images of Batalha’s tympanum seem to have been recalled by Jan van Eyck in his Fountain of Life, especially the masonry of the throne and hieratic Apocalyptic Christ. It would seem inconceivable that a master so observant of realistic details would not have completed a few on-site sketches of Batalha sculpted Christ in Majesty beneath a baldachin and surrounded by tetramorphs. 34 The fourteen hectares were acquired from Egas Coelho, a partisan, and his mother Maria Fernandez de Meira. Consult the following references for Batalha Monastery: Luís da Silva Mousinho de Albuquerque, Mémoria Inédita Acerca do Edificio Monumental da Batalha (Leiria, 1854: rpt. Batalha: Edição Museu do Mosteiro de Santa Maria da Vitória, 1983); Visconde de Condeixa, O Mosteiro da Batalha (Lisbon-Paris: 1892); Saul António Gomes, O Mosteiro de Santa Maria da Vitória no século XV (Coimbra: 1990); Pedro Vitórino, Mosteiro da Batalha (Porto: 1939). 35 Frei Luís de Sousa e Cacegas [1555–1632], Primera Parte da História de S. Domingos particular do reino, e conquistas de Portugal [1623], printed as História de S. Domingos Particular do Reino e Conquistas de Portugal, 2 vols. [1767, Lisbon], Vol. I reprinted (Porto: Lello e Irmãos, 1977); idem., Plans, Elevations, Sections, and Views of the Church of Batalha, in the Province of Estremadura in Portugal, with the history and description by Luis de Sousa, and an introductory discourse on the principles of Gothic architecture by James Murphy (London: Library of Fine Arts, 1836). 36 Vergílio Correia, Batalha; estudo historico-artistico-arqueologico do mosteiro da Batalha, 2 vols. (Porto: Litografia Nacional, 1929 and 1931).

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Two master architects have been documented in the early building history of Batalha. Master Afonso Domingues began the initial structures in February, 1394. Upon his death in June of 1406, a Master Huguet assumed control, though he is recorded in service to João I as early as 1401/2. As this Burgundian died at the beginning of 1438, he would have been present at Batalha at the time of Van Eyck’s tour to answer questions and show the diplomats around the site. Builders in service to the Crown enjoyed a high status and were accorded special privileges and favors, including a private residence on the site.37 Several teams of artisans were active at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit, their salaries paid by the royal treasury in Leiria. On the monastery grounds there were workshops for carpinteiros and masons (pedeiros). Stonecutters (aparelhadores) had quarters too, and they were divided according to their specialized talents: capitaladores, who made capitals for columns; and imaginadores, sculptors of wood or stone.38 Beside the river were the forges and lime kilns for the glaziers, blacksmiths and tile makers. Few stained-glass windows, however, survive from the reign of King João I.39 Martim Vasques of Évora was an aparelhador (construction foreman) between 1430 and 1433 and he served as mestre das obras do Mosteiro between February-April of 1438 until his death (between September 1442 and 1448). Vasques was succeeded by his nephew. First documented about 1437/38 as a pedreiro (stonemason), Fernáo de Évora held the office of “Master of Works” for almost forty years, from August 18, 1448 until 1477, the year of his death. See Mario Tavares Chico, Arquitectura da Idade Média em Portugal. Dois estudos acerca da Igreja do Mosteiro da Batalha (Lisbon: Instituto para a Alta Cultura, Centro de Estudos de Arte e Museologia, 1944); idem, O Mosteiro da Batalha e a arquitectura em Portugal no fim do século XIV e no século XV, História da Arte em Portugal, II (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1948). Afonso Dominges, who lived in Lisbon (Magdalena) rented houses from King João I in 1394. Huguet was given houses by King Duarte, one adjacent to the monastery and another on a farm close to Batalha. Martim Vasques owned a mill and lived on property near the monastery too. His nephew Fernão was honored by King Afonso V on two occasions, both of which involved the gift of real estate and precious objects. He increased his holdings by additional acquisitions in 1453 and 1467. See Sérgio Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória. Batalha (Lisbon-Mafra: Instituto Português do Patromónio Cultural, ELO – Publicidade, Artes Gráficas, 1992), 91–94: “Master-Builders of the Monastery.” 38 Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória. Batalha, 98–102, amplifies concerning the building activities and diverse professions represented at the monastery. 39 The complex has sixty-six large windows, many of stained-glass. The oldest examples were installed by order of King Manuel I (r. 1495–1521). According to a document of May 6, 1508, “Master João” was the head glazier who made the eighteen windows for the Founder’s Chapel. But there were other specialists, including Master Guilherme and João Rodrigues. Besides stained-glass scenes of the Passion in the chapterhouse, behind the choir 37

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In a tour of the site, the Burgundians would have seen the nave of Santa Maria da Vitória (Fig. 8.33), which measures eighty meters in length and twenty-two in width (260 x 72 feet). Eighteen massive piers soar to a height of thirty-two and a half meters (107 feet), and the sense of verticality is enhanced by tall stained-glass windows along the upper walls. Regarding the five chapels housed in the chancel (Fig. 8.34), they were created along Cistercian lines, rather than the Benedictine manner of disposing mendicant chapels according to increasing size.40 The largest chapel in the middle, the choir later illuminated by windows the “Fifteen Mysteries of the Rosary,” was reserved for King João I and Queen Philippa. When Napoleon’s troops used Batalha as military barracks between 1808 and 1810, there was considerable destruction to the altars of Santa Maria da Vitória. The chapel’s initial decoration, however, must have comprised statues and paintings illustrating the Virgin Mary’s life, specifically the joyful, sorrowful and glorious events recalled in the mnemonic recitation of prayers using St. Dominic’s chaplet of beads. The flanking four chapels were intended for the Avis princes, and installed at the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit. Protocol would have dictated that Prince Duarte’s chapel, with its altar of Nossa Senhora do Rosário (Our Lady of the Rosary) and four wooden statues of the “Holy Kinship” (Mary, Joseph, Anne and Joachim), would have been beside his father’s chapel on the Gospel side. Prince Henrique’s chapel, beside the chancel and to the far left, was dedicated originally to the virgin-martyr Barbara, his patron saint. On the Epistle side of the church to the far right was a chapel which João I consigned to Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa, Master of the Order of Christ.41 Because the “Sousa Chapel” originally was dedicated to St. Michael, it also may have been used by João I’s two younger sons, Prince João, Master of Santiago, and Prince Fernando, Master of Avis. Prince Fernando’s birthday, September 29, coincided with the feast day of the Archangel Michael.42 In were narrative vignettes of the “Fifteen Mysteries of the Rosary.” Bearing the date of 1514, they probably replaced earlier Joanine windows. See Boletim da Direcção-Geral dos Edificios e Monumentos Nacionais (DGEMN), Mosteiro da Batalha, Vitrais, 118 (Lisbon: 1964); Carlos Vitorino da Silva, O Vitral em Portugal, Séculos XV–XVI (Lisbon: 1983). 40 Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 28–36. He states construction began with the chapels and progressed towards the entrance. 41 The source for this assignment is the 1623 account of the Dominican Friar Luís de Sousa e Cacegas. Dom Lopo Dias de Sousa died February 9, 1435 and his remains were interred at Tomar’s Capela de Nossa Senhora dos Anjos rather than at Batalha Abbey. 42 Frei Luís de Sousa e Cacegas, História de S. Domingos Particular do Reino e Conquistas de Portugal [1623]. Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 37–38, states the chapel

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the initial planning of the quintet capelas, the altar of the remaining chapel on the Epistle side initially was dedicated to Nossa Senhora do Pranto (Our Lady of Weeping) and then to Nossa Senhora da Piedade (Virgin of Seven Sorrows). According to protocol, this chapel beside the king’s would have been given to Prince Pedro, who was next in line to the throne after her brother Duarte (r. 1433–1438).43 Presumably these chapels were used when requiem Masses for the Dead were offered at the main altar, similar to the type depicted by Jan van Eyck (Fig. 8.35). Folio 116 of the Turin-Milan Hours captures a Missa pro defunctis but without a polyphonic setting. While the purportedly earliest musical requiem attributed to the Burgundian composer Guillaume Dufay (1374–1474) is lost, chants, ceremonial motets, and secular chansons interested the Avis royals. The Church of Santa Maria da Vitória houses a royal pantheon at its western end (Fig. 8.36), the “Founder’s Chapel,” which was still being built when João I signed his last testament in 1426. Certainly at the time of the Burgundian tour the ceiling and main components were installed, as the pantheon was almost completed in August of 1434, the date of the king’s internment. Attributed to the engineering and architectural ingenuity of Master Huguet, who perhaps showed his designs to Jan van Eyck, the sixtyfive foot square mausoleum (19.8 meters) is entered by an immense portal leading from the south aisle of Santa Maria da Vitória. Set obliquely to the walls of the chapel, eight slender pillars support sectional arches to create the effect of a two-leveled octagonal space inscribed within the square (Fig. 8.37). To accentuate the immutable royal line founded by King João, Master Huguet reiterated the numeral eight in his architectural components. The octagonal lantern is pierced by eight bipartite windows, which symbolize resurrection and the passage of the soul through the spheres to the divine empyrean. The tracery designs of the fenestrations are complimented by the sumptuous vault, whose ribs define the shape of an eight-pointed star. Eight ceiling bosses, cut in a manner to resemble lace, also are in the form of stars of St. Michael Archangel, later dedicated to St. Sebastian, perhaps contained burial vaults of seventeenth-century nobility (Counts of Miranda do Corvo, Marquis of Arronches, and Dukes of Laföes). However, he also adds that no records survive to substantiate this. 43 In 1823 statues of St. Gonçalo of Amarante and St. Albert the Great were discovered in Prince Pedro’s chapel of the Virgin of the Seven Sorrows. This chapel housed the tomb and armour of King João II (r. 1481–1495) until it was ransacked by the French. The remains of João II and those of his son, Afonso V (1475–1491), were transferred to the Founder’s Chapel in 1901.

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with eight points. They ribs of the vault culminate in a central medallion with a pair of angels upholding João I’s arms.44 Dominating the “Founder’s Chapel” is the centrally placed sarcophagus conjugais of João I and Queen Philippa, which rests on eight lions (Figs. 8.38–8.39). The faces of their gisants are so naturalistic that they may have been carved from death masks. Both monarchs are sheltered by marble canopies, and with their feet resting on acanthus supports, they recall the saints standing beneath baldachins of honor on the exterior ogival entrance. The mutual devotion of Dom João and his queen is expressed by the clasping of their right hands. The sarcophagus with their respective coats-of arms is articulated by briar-wreaths which evoke the “Rose” of the House of Lancaster. Besides lengthy epitaphs in Latin on the sides, the tomb is carved with aphorisms particular to each sovereign, his por bem (pour bien: For good) and her yl me plêt (it pleases me). Traces of color and gilding still can be found on Philippa’s dress and João I’s armour, which includes the visor of the English Order of the Garter and the chivalric maxim “honny soit qui mal y pense” (Shamed be he who thinks evil of it).45 Queen Philippa had died at Odivelas on July 19, 1415, and dressed in the habit of the Poor Clares, her body was transported to Batalha a year later. On October 19, 1416 it was placed in a temporary tomb before the main altar of the Church of Santa Maria da Vitória. By the date that Jan van Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 40–50. The bodies of King João I and Queen Philippa rested in the main chapel of the chancel until the pantheon was constructed. 45 Queen Philippa has a prayer book in her left hand and King João I holds his sword, objects which respectively symbolize the arts of peace and the arts of war. Consult: Lucília da Glória Verdelho da Costa, “Morte e espaço funerário na arquitectura religiosa do século XV,” Jornadas sobre Portugal Medieval, Leiria/1983 (Leiria: Câmara Municipal de Leiria, 1986), 258; Emídio Maximiano Ferreira, A arte tumular medieval portuguesa. Séculos XII–XV (Lisbon: Dissertação de mestrado em História da Arte, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, 1986); Saul António Gomes, “Percursos em torno do Panteão dinástico de Avis,” Biblos LXX (Coimbra: 1994); Diogo de Macedo, Iconografia tumular portuguesa. Subsídios para a formação de um museu de arte comparada (Lisbon: Impresso na Sociedade industrial de tipografia limitada, 1934); Maria José Goulão, “Figuras do Além. A escultura e a tumulária,” Paulo Pereira, ed., História da Arte Portuguesa, II, 156–79, especially 170–73; Reynaldo dos Santos, A escultura em Portugal, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Academia Nacional de Belas Artes, 1948–1950). Philippa’s epitaph is reproduced in Thomas William Edgar Roche, Philippa. Dona Filipa of Portugal (London and Chichester: Phillimore, 1971), Appendix II, 115–16. Stating that some of the inscription is indistinct, Roche acknowledges his source as Joseph Soares da Sylva, Memorias para a historia de Portugal (Lisbon: 1731), who derived his reading from Friar Luis de Sousa. 44

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Eyck visited Batalha, the sarcophagus conjugais of the “Founder’s Chapel” probably was designed but not fully carved. He could have studied modelli of Philippa’s effigy, using his sketches for his portraits of the “Cumaean Sibyl” in the Metropolitan Museum Crucifixion and Ghent Altarpiece. When João I’s health began to fail in the spring of 1433, doctors advised him to rest in Alcochate in Ribateja, where the air was better than Lisbon. The monarch preferred, however, to end his days at Alcobaça Palace. He died on August 14, the eve of the feast of the Assumption and the anniversary of his greatest victory at Aljubarrota. According to the account of Ruy de Pina, Da Morte del Rey Dom Iohão e como seu corpo foi deposit ado na Sé de Lisboa, e do pranto, e exequias, que se lhe fizeram, João I’s body temporarily was interred before the reliquary Altar of St. Vincent in the Capela-Mór of the Cathedral of Lisbon. As dictated by the instructions in his 1426 will, his remains were transferred exactly a year after his death, August 14, 1434, to his limestone tomb in the newly completed Founder’s Chapel. The monarch’s testament additionally directed that his corpse would be garbed in the Cistercian habit to magnify his role as a “soldier of Christ.”46 With the exception of Dom Duarte, Batalha’s mausoleum contains the tombs of those Avis princes who have been praised as an “illustrious generation” 47 (Fig. 8.40). Royal standards abound in the “Founder’s Chapel” and particularly adorn the arcosolium tombs created for four princes of the realm on the south side. Each tomb is carved with Roche, Philippa, 95. For the royal obesquies consult Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Chronica do Senhor Rey D. Duarte, Inéditos de Historia Portugueza, 2 vols. (Lisbon: 1790), II, Ch. 1, 72. This manuscript has been published as Chronica d’el-rei D. Duarte (Lisbon: Escriptorio, 147 rua dos Retrozeiros, 1901) and Chronica d’el-rei d. Duarte (Porto: Edição da Renascença Prtuguesa, 1914). See also Damião Peres, D. João I (Porto: Vertente, 1983), 195–97. The solemn rituals in Portugal marking the death of royals paralleled those of the French kings at the Cathedral of St. Denis in Paris and the Dukes of Burgundy at the Chartreuse of Champmol in Dijon. See Ralph E. Giesey, The Royal Funeral Ceremony in Renaissance France (Geneva: Travaux d’Humanisme et de Renaissance, E. Droz, 1960; Alain Erlande-Brannenberg, Le roi est mort, Étude sur les funérailles les sépultures et les tombeaux des rois de France jusqu’à la fin du XIIIe siècle, Bibliothèque de la Société Française d’Archéologie, VII (Paris: Arts et Métiers Graphiques, 1975); Henri Chabeuf, Entrée de Charles le Téméraire et les Funérailles de Philippe le Bon (Dijon: 1903); Ernest-Léon Lory, Les Obsèques de Philippe-leBon Duc de Bourgogne Mort à Bruges en 1467 (Dijon: 1869). 47 Branca, Queen Philippa’s first child, was born in Lisbon’s Alcaçova Palace on July 13, 1388. She survived only eight months and is buried in the city’s Sé (Cathedral) beside the tomb of King Afonso IV. The second child, Afonso, was born at Santarém on July 30, 1390, but he died in 1400 and is buried in the Cathedral of Braga. Consult: Roche, Philippa, 66 46

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the personal emblems of the deceased. Because the sarcophagi are set flush to the wall, they do not fill entirely the spaces of their arcosoliums, which were installed by 1449. When King Duarte initiated the building of a second royal pantheon at Batalha behind the main altar of Santa Maria da Vitória, Martim Vasques perhaps modified Huguet’s original plan, which perhaps was shown to the Burgundian embassy in 1429. The tombs of Princes Pedro, Henrique, João, and Fernando face the door of the Capela do Fundador, and they disposed in the named order from left to right. The sarcophagus of Dom Pedro, Duke of Coimbra (9 December, 1392–1449) is carved with three arms (Figs. 8.41). The first herald belongs to his wife, Dona Isabel of Aragon-Urguell (1409–1443).48 The center shield of St. George is encircled by a buckled jarreteira (garter) inscribed with the famous maxim of the English Order of the Garter. Prince Pedro was installed to the institution by proxy on April 22, 1428. The third crest is his particular herald.49 The three arms are surrounded by oak branches which signify another chivalric order, that of “The Golden Tree,” which was founded by Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, following the ill-fated crusade to Nicopolis (1396). Prince Pedro became a member of the Burgundian order when he traveled to Flanders in the late summer of 1425. He then was en route to join Emperor Sigismund in fighting Ottoman Turks in the Balkans. At the Castle of Buda, the King of the Romans must have invited the Portuguese prince to join his chivalric Order of the Dragon (1408). While the dragon motif does not embellish the Batalha sarcophagus, the arms of Dom Pedro and Dona Isabel are enclosed by two sets of scales. The balance alludes to St. Michael, vanquisher of the Apocalyptic dragon-beast and dispenser of justice at the Last Judgment. The Archangel’s scales also adorn the frontispiece of O Libro da Virtuosa Benfeitoria (Fig. 8.42), a moralistic manuscript authored (Branca) and 70 (Afonso’s death given as the summer of 1392); Goulão, “”Figuras do Além. A escultura e a tumulária,” 170 (Afonso’ death at the age of ten years); Manuel Monteiro, “A iconografia funerária em Portugal – O túmulo do Infante D. Afonso,” Dispersos (Braga: ASPA, 1980). 48 Isabel of Aragon-Urguell’s monument is in the Convento de Santa Clara-a-Nova in Coimbra. Of limestone and carved by an artist from Coimbra, her effigy is attired in the robes of a Poor Clare and the tomb is decorated with a pair of angels. Some traces of polychrome are on the left side of the sarcophagus, which contains a simulated brocade frontal that exhibits the arms of Avis and Aragon. Consult Goulão, “”Figuras do Além. A escultura e a tumulária,” 168. 49 Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, “O Homem e a Hora São um Só,” A Dinastia de Avis (Lisbon: Presidência do Conselho de Ministros, 1983), 244, Plate 11.

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by Pedro to instill nobility with ideals of beneficence.50 Pedro’s motto désir (desire) is carved six times on the lid of his tomb in Batalha’s pantheon. The marble sarcophagus of Prince Henrique (Figs. 8.43–8.44), the Duke of Viséu and Lord of Covilhão (4 March, 1394–1460), the only one with a recumbent statue, also displays three arms.51 The first signifies his role as Master of the Portuguese Order of Christ. The center is nearly identical to that of his brother Pedro, as Henrique was elected to the Order of the Garter on December 3, after 1442. The third herald shows his princely escutcheon. Because oak branches with clusters of acorns also adorn his tomb, he presumably also belonged to the Order of the Golden Tree. Henrique’s motto is repeated three times on the lid which supports his realistic gisant, talent de bien faire (talent to do things well). Prince João, Duke of Beja (13 January, 1400–1442) is interred with his wife, Dona Isabel de Bragança († 1465) and their tomb is carved with only two heralds, their respective arms.52 (Fig. 8.45) Because Prince João was the Master of the Order of Santiago, carved shells attached to pilgrims’ sacks signify the Galician shrine of Santiago de Compostela. Branches of strawberries surround the escutcheons. A paradisiacal fruit, the strawberries also symbolize the good works achieved by a righteous man. Prince João’s maxim was j’ai bien resöa (I have good resolve). His wall tomb also displays a sculpted grouping within the lunette of the arch, a Passion ensemble comprising the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion and the Descent from the Cross. The corporeal remains of Prince Fernando (29 September, 1402–1443) were not placed at Batalha until June 17, 1472 (Fig. 8.46–8.47) when his bones were relinquished to King Afonso V after the Portuguese taking of Tangier. The prince’s tomb is decorated with two arms, the first of the Order of Avis, of which he was Master, and the second his personal herald.53 Between them are three interlocking rings formed by wild rose branches. If strawberries represented the fruit of good labor, fragrant flowers underscored the biblical concept of sacrifice. The offerings of Noah after the deluge emitted an aroma which pleased God (Genesis 8: 20–22). Carved thrice along the lid of Fernando’s tomb is his motto, le bien me plêt (good pleases me). Matos, Henrique o Navigador, 14. Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, “O Homem e a Hora São um Só,” A Dinastia de Avis, 242, Plate 9. 52 Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, “O Homem e a Hora São um Só,” 245, Plate 12. 50 51

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As described by Friar Luís de Sousa (1623), Batalha’s “Founder’s Chapel” contained wall arches with altars “all decorated with their small altarpieces, small because they had to be, and the painting was old, but perfect.”54 João I’s mausoleum was damaged extensively by Napoleon’s soldiers during the Peninsular War, and little remains of the splendid art which once filled the chapel. The king’s altar was between two pillars, and it was dedicated to the “Invocation of the Cross.” The testament of Frei Luís de Sousa also records that other altars were installed for the Avis princes.55 Pedro selected “St. Michael” for his altarpiece. Henrique ordered a painting of “Santo Prince Ferdinand,” who had died in captivity at Fez and was proclaimed a martyr by his devoted older brother.56 Prince João selected his name saint, “John the Baptist,” and the altar of his brother Fernando farthest from the entrance door, displayed a retable of “The Assumption of the Virgin” and other panels showing him as a “hostage in Tangier” and as a “saint.” To this mausoleum, Infanta Isabel, Duchess of Burgundy, sent a magnificent altarpiece about 1448 to honor her brother Fernando’s memory.57 Completed by Domingo António Sequeira about 1808 (Fig. 6.48), a drawing of The Virgin and Child

53 Os Descobrimentos Portugueses e a Europa do Renascimento, «O Homem e a Hora São um Só,» 243, Plate 10. 54 Frei Luís de Sousa e Cacegas, História de S. Domingos Particular do Reino e Conquistas de Portugal [1623], (Porto: Lello e Irmãos, 1977 edition), I, 637–38, quoted by Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 45–46. 55 For what follows, see Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 45–48, whose source is Frei Luís de Sousa’s 1623 account in his História de S. Domingos. 56 Titus Burckhardt, Fez, City of Islam [Fes, Stadt des Islam], translated from the German by William Stoddart (Cambridge, UK: Islamic Texts Society, 1992). Soon after his death Ferdinand was called “Santo Fernando” and regarded as comparable to Early Christian martyrs of the Iberian Peninsula. See Kenneth Baxter Wolf, Christian Martyrs in Muslim Spain (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988). 57 The drawing on paper measures 112 x 200 mm and is folio 46 in Sequeira’s Album, Lisbon inventory No. 3125. Several scholars have noted the resemblance between Infanta Isabel’s portrait and her likeness in a panel attributed to the workshop of Rogier van der Weyden in the J.P. Getty Museum. The issue of Nuno Gonçalves’s involvement with Rogier van der Weyden’s workshop is the subject of current research. For further information about the Sequeira Drawing, consult: José de Figueiredo, “Un Panneau inconnu de Roger Van der Weyden,” Boletim de arte e arqueologia (Lisbon: 1921): 91–94; Micheline Comblen-Sonkes, Dessins du XVe siècle: groupe Van der Weyden, Essai de catalogue (Brussels: Centre National de Recherches “Primitifs Flamands,” 1969, 109–112, C11, Pl. 23b (Les Primitifs Flamands 5); Luis Reis-Santos, “Un Portrait d’Isabelle de Portugal, Duchess de Bourgogne, date de 1470,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art 5 (1935): 135–37.

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with Duke Philip the Good, Charles the Bold and Duchess Isabel of Burgundy, is believed to replicate the general appearance of the lost Batalha panel. Along the top and left side are measurements, 4½ Palmas by 8 Palmas. Extrapolating the term Palma to mean a hand’s breadth, which averages about 3.31 inches (8.4 cm) for a male, the Flemish work would have measured about 26.48 x 14.90 inches (67.2 x 37.8 cm). The small dimensions of Duchess Isabel’s gift suggest the picture might have been placed on the back wall of Fernando’s tomb in a similar manner to the Passion sculptural groupings carved for Prince João’s sepulchre. However, more likely it was installed on the adjacent wall to adorn an altar used in funereal obsequies. Sequeira’s composition depicts the Virgin and Child flanked by Archduchess Isabel on the right with her double-horned bourrelet and starched veil, and Philip the Good kneeling on the left with his heir Charles the Bold. Based upon the figural types in the drawing, the original panel traditionally has been attributed to an artist practicing within the circle of Rogier van der Weyden, which, during the mid-fifteenth century could have included the Portuguese master Nuno Gonçalves. Besides its paintings and statues, Batalha’s “Founder’s Chapel” additionally served as a repository for historical treasures such as João I’s helmet and sword. A ceremonial cross and pair of gold candlesticks which were taken as booty after the battle of Aljubarrota, perhaps were placed on the wooden cupboards to the sides of the main entrance. These chests contained priestly vestments for solemn exequies. Like the stone sarcophagi, they were carved profusely with chivalric insignia.58 The cupboards and other paintings and polychrome statues which graced the fifteenth-century mausoleum plausibly were created by artists of the Eanes family and masters within their immediate courtly circle.59 58 Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 48–49. He mentions additional objects, including a gilded wooden oratory of the Teachings of the Apostles, and a painting of the Virgin and Child, attributed to Rogier van der Weyden, which was given to the monastery by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, and his wife, Princess Isabel. 59 In Santarém’s Museu Arqueológico de S. João de Alporão is the important sarcophagus of Dom Duarte de Meneses (1406–1464). Carved in limestone about 1465, it has a provenance from the Capela des Almas in the town’s Convento de São Francisco (founded 1242). Maria José Goulão, “”Figuras do Além. A escultura e a tumulária,” História da Arte Portuguesa. Temas e Debates, ed. Paulo Pereira, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Printer Portuguesa, Ind. Gráfica, Lda., 1995), 174–75, states the Santarém tomb is based upon Batalha models. The sarcophagus bears the monogram “GM” and recently a signature was discovered, “Gill eanyes,” carved on the left side. Goulão cites Vitór Serrão, “O património de Santarém,” Santarém, cidade candidata

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Separated from the “Founder’s Chapel,” and rest of the Avis family, the remains of King Duarte (1391–1438) and his wife Leonor († 1445) were transferred from a provisional resting place in João I’s chancel chapel and placed within in a second royal pantheon built to the east of the Capela-Mór (Figs. 8.49–8.51). Ordered by King Duarte perhaps as early as 1436, Master Huguet’s design for an octagon, or eight-pointed star within an exterior polygon, was retained by Martim Vasques who only completed arches for the radiating chapels (Figs. 8.52–8.53). Seven chapels, each about twentyeight feet deep, and six lower pentagonal chapels, are clustered around a large central space, sixty-five feet in diameter. They are called Capellas Imperfeitas because the eight massive buttresses around the inside of the pantheon were never crowned with a dome.60 Artisans of Manuel I (r. 1495–1521) later gave the structure sumptuous ornamentation, and raised second-storey terraces according to Huguet’s plan. However, sometime after 1517 Dom Manuel resolved to have his mausoleum in Lisbon’s famed São Jeronimos Church.61 junto da UNESCO a Património Mundial de Humanidade, ed. Jorge Custódio (Santarém: Câmara municipal de Santarém, 1995). Also see Vitór Serrão, Santarém (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1990), 32–35 (Convento de São Francisco founded in 1242 by Dom Sancho II) and 41–43 (Tomb of Dom Duarte de Meneses). Dom Duarte de Meneses died in Afonso V’s North African campaign at Alcácer-Seguer. Before his departure he gave his wife, Dona Isabel de Castro, a tooth, as a precaution. If he died in battle, and his remains were lost, she could place it within his tomb. The widowed Isabel followed his instructions. His arcosolium tomb resembles those of the Avis princes in the “Founder’s Chapel” at Batalha. The gisant is outfitted in armour, including a helmet and a sword. The side of the sarcophagus is carved like princely archetypes at Batalha. There are two coats-of-arms and the “Burning Bush of Moses” in the center. Relevant to the nobleman’s insignia is the relief of the “Crucified Christ” at the apex of the ogival arch. The “Calvary” theme continues with small statues of the Mater Dolorosa and St. John the Evangelist on the paired colunettes which flank the recumbent knight. 60 James Murphy [1760–1814], Plans, Elevations, Sections, and Views of the Church of Batalha (London: 1795), attempted an imaginary view of a finished mausoleum with a turreted dome. See also Joaquim de Vasconcelos, “O Mosteiro da Batalha e os projectos de Restauração das Capellas Imperfeitas,” A Revista 12 (Porto, 1905). 61 Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 88, notes the “different artistic treatment” of the second storey’s decoration and suggests the intervention of Diogo Boytac (ca. 1460–1528), French master builder at São Jeronimos Monastery in Lisbon. He states Boytac in 1509, 1512, 1514 and 1519 was at Batalha, where he maintained a residence. The broad western portal (1509), forty-five feet high, terminates in interlacing arches of the Flamboyant Gothic style. Mateus Fernandes, a master mason active at Batalha between 1490 and 1515, has been credited with the overall carving of fruits, foliage and repeated motto of King Duarte (l’eauté faray tam yaserey: loyal I shall ever be). See Robert C. Smith, The Art of Portugal, 1500–1800 (New York: Meredith Press, 1968), 52–54. A balcony was constructed in 1533

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Although a vestibule adjoins the choir of Santa Maria da Vitória, the only means of access to the second pantheon is from the monastery. The western side of the vestibule contains a magnificent Manueline doorway, fifteen meters in height (fifty feet), completed by Mateus Fernandes 1509. A repeated motif in the fanciful network of stone tracery is King Duarte’s herald, entwined trunks and bunches of leafy fruit (grapes), and his maxim Ta Yaserey /L’éauté Faray (Loyal I shall ever be). Directly opposite the doorway is the axial chapel which houses Duarte’s tomb and that of his queen, Dona Leonor (Figs. 8.54–8.56). Like the effigies of the monarch’s parents in the Royal Pantheon, the gisants are portrayed clasping hands, a gesture which Jan van Eyck repeats in his 1434 Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife, a work which indeed may present a memorial portrait of a beloved spouse.62 To the left of the Duarte-Leonor sarcophagus is the Chapel of Afonso V (1432: r. 1438–1481) and his wife, Queen Isabel (1432–1445). To the right of Duarte’s tomb, and decorated with emblems of a pelican and shrimp net, is the Chapel of João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), Queen Leonor (1458–1525) and their son Infante Afonso (1475–1491). While the capela destined for Manuel I was abandoned, spaces between the chapels were designed to serve as vestries for funeral obsequies. Archways were built into the walls of each, which were planned to house altars. Duarte’s impressive mausoleum of the Capelas Imperfeitas unfortunately remained unadorned. However, even in its incomplete state, the Capela Imperfeitas echo the design of Charlemagne’s above the door which provides the eighth side of the pantheon. Completed during the reign of João III (1521–1557), the balcony has been attributed either to the court architect Miguel de Arruda or to João de Castilho (ca. 1475–1552). Castilho was a Biscayan mason who came to Portugal in 1509. He worked on the chancel of Braga Cathedral before succeeding Boytac at São Jeronimos, where he provided one of Europe’s most beautiful cloisters. See Rafael Moreira, Jeronimos (Lisbon: Editorial Verbo, 1987), 9, and Cândido Augusto Dias dos Santos, Os Jerónimos em Portugal: das origens aos fins do século XVII (Porto: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica: Centro de História da Universidade do Porto, 1980); idem., Os monges de S. Jerónimo em Portugal na época do renascimento (Lisbon: Instituto de Cultura e Língua Portuguesa, Ministério da Educação; Amadora, Portugal, Livraria Bertrand, 1984). 62 Lorne Campbell, “The Arnolfini Double Portrait,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 17–24; idem., “Portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife,” National Gallery Catalogues. The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Schools (London: Yale University Press, 1998), 174–211. Pursuant to Lorne Campbell’s publication of the genealogy of the Arnolfini family, I have lectured about the possibility of the “Arnolfini Portrait” as a memorial, but will provide further discussion in a forthcoming completed manuscript that considers Jan van Eyck and Spain.

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Palace Chapel (Figs. 8.57–8.59) built by Odo of Metz at Aachen (792– 805 A.D). Such a deliberate architectural evocation suggests the pantheon was designed to symbolize the Portuguese line of descent from the Holy Roman Emperor.63 The Karlsschrein created about 1182–1215 (Fig. 8.60) is a sumptuous ossuary which was crafted not only to highlight the collective geneaology of sixteen rulers along the lateral sides, but to denote at one end, the majesty of Charlemagne as anointed head of the imperial house. Studded with gems and ancient cameos, the Emperor’s gilt “sarcophagus” – like the equally resplendent Shrine of the Virgin Mary at Aachen (Fig. 8.61) – is shaped in the symbolic form of a celestial domus aurea. Although King Duarte never traveled to Aachen, his younger brother Pedro did make a pilgrimage in the late 1420s to Cologne, where he would have made an offering on behalf of his father at the Cathedral at the Shrine of the Magi created by Nicolas of Verdun (Figs. 8.62–8.65). The Avis Prince also rode sixty-five kilometers west to visit the center that was the focus of Charlemagne’s court between 792 and his death in 814. Following two years of service with Emperor Sigismund against the Ottoman Turks, Pedro returned to Lisbon. Assuredly he described his entire experience to his family, including his impressions of the Shrine of the Magi in Cologne and the gilded reliquaries of the Palatine Chapel of Charlemagne. Batalha’s Capelas Imperfeitas resonate with King Duarte’s clear objective to replicate the ambiance of Aachen and to associate his radiating chapels with the exceptional ferreter shrines of the Holy Roman Empire. St. Barbara with her Tower: Batalha’s Capelas Imperfeitas and a View of Lisbon At the time of Jan van Eyck’s tour of Portugal in 1429, the surroundings of Batalha Abbey would have resembled the diverse vignettes of artisans which are illustrated in one of his most unusual works, a drawing on panel of St. Barbara with her Tower (Fig. 8.66). Brushed predominately in water-based black paint with ruled incisions made by a stylus, this work in grisaille reveals white heightening, as well as lapis lazuli and yellow-ochre enhancements in 63 Vérgílio Correia, Batalha (Porto: 1929); Mário Tavares Chico, “O Mosteiro da Batalha e a arquitectura em Portugal no fim do século XIV e no século XV,” História da Arte em Portugal (Porto, 1948), II, 17–59.

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the sky and landscape. A signature and date in Roman capitals on the sloping edge at the bottom of the frame have the appearance of being carved into marble: JOHES DE EYCK ME FECIT 1437.64 The massive tower building has been suggested by Elisabeth Dhanens to be the unfinished southwest tower of the Cathedral of Cologne. On behalf of his brother-in-law Adolph, Duke of Cleves (1373–1448), Philip the Good had intervened to diplomatically settle a dispute with the Archbishop of Cologne in 1426–27. In 1440 the Duke of Burgundy visited Cologne to secure his control over the princebishopric of Liège and he presented the Cathedral with a gift while negotiating with Archbishop Dietrich von Mörs. Despite these political connections with Cologne, and the pattern of eight rays on the Cleves herald which are reminiscent of the attribute thunderbolts of St. Barbara, the tower depicted by Van Eyck is not German but Portuguese.65 On behalf of Duke Philip the Good, Jan van Eyck made a secret trip in 1436, and his destination has been the subject of considerable speculation. Perhaps he returned to Portugal. The left side of Van Eyck’s drawing of St. Barbara provides a view of a walled city (Figs. 8.67–8.69) which readily compares with the famous Manueline View of Lisbon from the Crónica de Dom Afonso Henriques by Duarte Galvão (Cascais, Museu-Biblioteca Conde Castro Guimarães). The Palace of St. George and old Alcáçova Castle once loomed over the town which was disposed in tiers and encapsulated by landmark towers of the Fernardine Romanesque walls. The shoreline in Jan’s drawing corresponds with Lisbon’s waterfront sector known as the Ribeira Praça or “Riverbank Plaza.” Due to the narrowing of the Tagus estuary (Figs. 8.70–8.71), the 64 Rachel Billinge, Hélène Verougstraete and Roger Van Schoute, “The Saint Barbara,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 41–48; J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Over de techniek van Jan van Eyck’s De Helige Barbara,” Jaarboek van het Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerpen (1992): 9–18; Paul Vandenbroecke, Catalogus Schilerijen 14e en 15e eeuw. Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerpen (Antwerp: 1985), 168–73; Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute, Cadres et supports dans la peinture flamande aux 15e et 16e siècles (Heure-de-Romain/Oupeye: H. Verougstraete-Marcq, 1989), 126–27; Maurits Smeyers, “Jan van Eyck, Archaeologist? Reflections on Eyckian Epigraphy,” Acta Archaeologica Lovaniensia Mongraphiae VIII, Album Amicorum André Van Doorselaer (Louvain: 1996): 403–14; Bert Cardon, Jan van der Stock and Dominique Vanwijnsberghe (eds.), with the collaboration of Katherina Smeyers et al., Als Ich Can: liber amicorum in memory of Professor Dr. Maurits Smeyers, 2 vols. (Dudley, Mass: Peeters, 2002). 65 Rolf Lauer, “Köln in Flandern. Eine Domansicht auf dem Genter Altar,” Kölner Domblatt. Jahrbuch des Zentral-Dombau-Vereins LVII (1992): 309–14, at 312.

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precise observation point for the panoramic view of Lisbon by Jan van Eyck and the Manueline illuminator would have from the left bank of the river at the Pontal de Cacilas near the fortress of Almada. When the Burgundian diplomats of Philip the Good arrived to Lisbon on December 16, 1428, King João I was residing at Estremoz Castle. The ambassadors would have crossed the Tagus River to the left bank in order to travel southeast. Damião de Góis (1502–1574) in his Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio (1554) describes the Tagus estuary and the “Other Side”: In early times the site of ancient Lisbon occupied only one high hill that extended down to the bank of the Tagus. Nowadays its scope encompasses several hills and valleys. The most important and famous area faces east. At this most important part the sea receives the waters of the Tagus, then opens up into an estuary six-thousand paces wide. The opposite shoreline forms two bays; one, pushing inland and onward the north, leads to a land known as Aldeia Galega, which is today rather well-settled; the other, turning slightly southward, allows for daily sailings to the village of Coina. A bit further downstream on this side lies the fortress of Almada, at the extreme tip of the sweeping curve of Coina’s bay. At this point, then the sea looks in upon a slight narrowing of the inlet. The distance from there to the city is a little less than four-thousand paces.66 The View of Lisbon from the Crónica de Dom Afonso Henriques by Duarte Galvão captures the appearance of early sixteenth-century Lisbon, a town whose Romanesque and Gothic edifices substantially were renovated in the grand-scale building campaigns of Manuel I. The Lusitanian Maecenas totally reworked the Lisbon waterfront, raising his own Paço da Ribeira, or “Riverbank Palace.” Jan van Eyck shows a broad landscape to the right of St. Barbara, and its terrain is peppered with trees redolent of olive groves (Figs. 8.72–8.73). The tower of St. Barbara is incomplete and its surrounding laborers at work on its masonry (Figs. 8.74–8.75) suggest Jan van Eyck was 66 See Jeffrey S. Ruth, Lisbon in the Renaissance . Damião de Góis. A New Translation of the Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio (New York: Italica Press, Inc., 1996), 17. He states, 46 notes 44–45, Aldeia Galega now is within the boundaries of the city of Montijo while Coina still thrives. The meaning of the Islamic “Almada” was “point” and on the coastline, the center is 1.7 miles from Lisbon. As pointed out by Ruth, this distance is half that given by Damião de Góis.

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drawing an architectural project in progress. A somewhat analogous focus upon workmen is provided in a Tower of Babel in The Hague, which has been identified as a copy after a “Master of the Turin-Milan Hours.67 Certainly the most important Crown-sponsored building project at the time of Jan’s 1429 visit to Portugal was Batalha Abbey. The master-architect stands on the right near stone-cutters beneath a shed (Figs. 8.76–8.77). Wearing a turban, he brandishes a measuring device and issues orders to his workmen above. His figure resembles the stone statue of “Master Huguet” at Batalha which still is situated high on the corbel of the southeast corner of the Chapter House. King João I’s architect is shown with a chaperon on his head and holding a plane, emblem of his profession. Teams of artisans mix mortar and haul stones. Skilled stone masons carve and chisel marble in the shade provided by a lean-to shed (Fig. 8.78). No one pauses for a respite. Van Eyck includes four aristocratic visitors, who have come to observe the works in progress. They include three ladies in crespin headdresses and a gentleman who has removed his hat in their presence and appears to be answering their questions. Their identity can only be speculated, but probably they are ladies-in-waiting of Queen Leonor. On the far right are four equestrians (Fig. 8.79), who plausibly are leading members of the Burgundian delegation. During his diplomatic journey in 1428–29 Jan van Eyck received a stipend of 160 livres, the same amount as the ambassadors Baudouin de Lannoy, Lord of Molenbaix, and Andrieu de Toulongeon, Lord of Mornay, and quadruple the sum allocated the squires. Only the leader, Jehan de Lannoy, Lord of Roubaix, received a higher allotment. Moreover, the travel orders specified that Jan van Eyck should march behind the Duke’s dignitaries in processions, but in front of the squires, secretaries and cup-bearers.68 If the four equestrians are portrayed

67 Otto Pächt, Van Eyck. Die Begründer al altniederländischen Malerei, ed. Maria SchmidtDengler (Munich: Prestel-Verlag. 1989), 206–7. 68 Joseph van der Elst (Baron), The Last Flowering of the Middle Ages (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1944; see reprint Port Washington, NY: Kennikat Press, 1969), 43, informs regarding the comparable salary of the Burgundian diplomats during Jan van Eyck’s journey to Portugal and stipulations regarding the place taken by the artist in processions. Also consult Catherine Reynolds, “The King of Painters,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 1–16, at 3, and Jacques Paviot, “La Vie de Jan van Eyck selon les documents écrits,” Revue des Archéologues et Historiens d’art de Louvain XXIII (1990), 83–93, at 87, regarding the salaries of the diplomats sent to the Iberian Peninsula.

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in order of their status as indicated by the traveling etiquette, then Jan van Eyck may provide a “self-portrait” as the last figure on horseback. A solitary cavalier enters a portal to Santa Maria da Vitória, but this doorway to which the four equestrians ride is not the western entrance. Rather, it appears to resemble the extant southern portal of the church, which traditionally in Portugal constituted the “pomp and ceremony” doorway. This lateral entrance was completed by Afonso Domingues between 1388 and 1402 and Mestre Huguet between 1402 and 1438.69 Van Eyck’s drawing of St. Barbara may be a composite to document the travels of the Burgundian embassy from their arrival in Lisbon — represented by its most famous view from the left bank of the Tagus — to their tour of Batalha Abbey. Besides Batalha’s southern ceremonial portal of Santa Maria (Figs. 8.80– 8.82), Van Eyck illustrates a tower with an octagonal foundation which rises two stories (Figs. 8.83–8.84). The Burgundian aesthetic at Batalha, especially the polygonal pantheon erected by King Duarte in imitation of Charlemagne’s chapel at Aachen, seems to be Van Eyck’s model. The apse end of Santa Maria was restructured when the monarch began his octagonal pantheon in 1436 known as the Capelas Imperfeitas. Duarte’s Chapel is so named because it lacks an upper level, but unquestionably there were designs for a completed project by the master architect. By the time Jan completed his drawing of St. Barbara with her Tower, a fair portion of the second royal tomb at Batalha had been raised. In completing his study, Jan probably might have filled in ornamental stonework which would have been indicated on architectural plans. The vast majority of the original stained glass windows installed by King João I and his son at Batalha did not survive the early fifteenth-century renovations of Manuel I. Even so, the lower windows of the Capelas Imperfeitas more closely approximate the fenestrations of St. Barbara’s tower than those of the Cathedral of Cologne, whose entrance also is markedly dissimilar. The lower bipartite windows of Barbara’s tower are surmounted by pointed arches. The uppermost lancet windows, three in number, signify the Holy Trinity and the construction St. Barbara ordered her servants to complete after her conversion to Christianity. Knights of the English Order of the Garter, whose ranks included King João I and the Avis Princes, venerated the Holy Trinity as their protector. A clandestine visit to Lisbon in 1436 by Jan van Eyck and select agents of Philip the Good may have been generated by the Portuguese royal family. 69

Paolo Pereira (ed.), História da Arte Portuguesa, I, 406.

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Prior to his death in April of 1433 King João I convened a family council at his estate in Santarém for the purpose of planning future policy regarding the Nasrids of Granada and the Merinides of Morocco. The monarch thought to attack Morocco, but was also contemplating forming an alliance with Juan II of Castile to conquer Andalusia. Afonso, Count of Barcelos and his son Afonso, Count of Ourém, joined Princes Duarte and João in supporting solely an alliance against Granada. Prince Henrique favored both an attack in Morocco and commitment with Castile, while Prince Pedro wished Portugal to avoid both ventures. King João I died on August 14, 1433, but it was his deathbed wish that Portugal continue its conquest of North Africa.70 Accordingly, Prince Henrique actively campaigned to mount an expedition to Morocco, but only in March of 1436 did he finally secure King Duarte’s approval for a crusade (Fig. 8.85). Henrique might have molified his brother by promising to lend his support for a Granadine alliance after the taking Tangier. Portugal needed to muster 4,000 mounted men-of-arms and bowmen and 10,000 footmen because the successful taking of Ceuta (Fig. 8.86) had required amassing an even greater number of army troops. According to dispatches sent in April of 1415 from the Castilian agent Ruy Díaz de Vega to Fernando I of Aragon, the expeditionary forces had consisted of 5,400 men-of-arms, 1,900 mounted bowmen and 9,000 footmen.71 The most extraordinary aspect of the attack on Ceuta in 1415 was the utter secrecy with which the royal family planned the attack. As documented by the chronicler Gomes Eanes de Zurara, the destination of the armada was not revealed until the vessels were at sea. João I had anticipated support from England, with a contingent to North Africa led by his son-in-law Thomas, Earl of Arundel, but Henry V diverted his forces to fight against the French at Agincourt. A few French and Flemish knights participated in the Ceuta 70 Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, Documentos sôbre a expansão portuguêsa, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Gleva, 1943–1956), II, 55–68, 126–37. Bailey W. Diffie and George D. Winius, Foundations of the Portuguese Empire 1415–1580 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Europe and the World in the Age of Expansion Series, Vol. I, 1977), 62–64 (Bailey W. Diffie). 71 Russell, Henry the Navigator, 31, cites the correspondence documents in António Joaquim Dias Dinis (ed.), Monumenta Henricina, II, No. 57, 132–46 and No. 71, 166–69. For a pertinent discussion about European conflicts, see: Jacques Heers, Les Barbaresques: la course et la guerre en Méditerranée, XIVe–XVIe siècle (Paris: Perrin, 2001); Peter Edward Russell, Portugal, Spain, and the African Atlantic, 1343–1490: Chivalry and Crusade from John of Gaunt to Henry the Navigator (Aldershot, Hampshire, Great Britain-Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1995).

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campaign, but the victory which astounded Europe was largely a Lusitanian affair. In the case of Tangier, numerous ships were required as transports and Duarte logically would have sought a Flemish alliance and dispatched a secret messenger to Duke Philip the Good and his sister Isabel. Jan van Eyck had traveled to Andalusia in 1429, and if he visited North African ports as well, his topographical sketches would have been critically important to Henrique’s campaign. With respect to the second crusade to North Africa, security must have been as taut as it was in 1415, with knowledge of the preparations restricted to the inner circle of the royal family and close advisors. Burgundian agents sent by the Duke and Duchess might have stayed several months in Portugal, dispatching squires to report on the activities. They also might have lingered in Lisbon to receive first-hand news of the outcome. Jan van Eyck’s Madonna of Canon van der Paele and Portrait of Jan de Leeuw are both dated 1436 according to their frame inscriptions. Accepting the St. Barbara with her Tower was created in Portugal, then certainly Jan van Eyck’s “secret mission” in 1436 extended to 1437. His Dresden Triptych and the lost Holy Face date respectively 1437 and January 30, 1438, and these commissions are not securely tied to Flanders. Only the Portrait of Margaret van Eyck establishes Jan’s certain presence in Bruges in 1439. Perhaps the Burgundian ambassadors informed Philip the Good about the divisiveness at the Avis family regarding the probability of success in Tangier. The Duke may have withdrawn a promise of support at the last minute giving as an excuse his own martial conflicts with Henry VI (r. 1422–1461) of England. Prior to the departure of the Portuguese expedition on August 22, 1437, every effort was made by the Crown to charter foreign ships but this assistance had failed to materialize at the final hour. Consequently about 3,500 men were left behind and the fleet which arrived at Ceuta on August 26 was woefully under equipped. In a dispatch of March 1438 addressed to Dom Gomes Eanes, abbot of the Benedictine Monastery of La Badia, King Duarte discussed the September–October attack on the garrison of Tangier and the Portuguese surrender of Ceuta. He commented: “The vessels we had chartered in England and Flanders did not come on account of the war between the king of England and the Duke of Burgundy, and at the same time, many ships chartered in Castile did not turn up because of other problems.”72 72

Russell, Henry the Navigator, 176.

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The tragic results of the Tangier expedition may clarify why the destination of Jan van Eyck’s clandestine mission in 1436 was never revealed. Once informed about the defeat and with a concern for his image among European courts, Philip would have distanced himself from any involvement in the ill-fated crusade. Duchess Isabel must have been dismayed by the capture of her youngest brother Fernando. Yet she was unable to do more than empathize from afar. Prince Henrique had adopted St. Barbara as a patron of the Order of Christ, and he urged his knights to prepare for a holy crusade in Morocco by practicing chastity. Besides her traditional tower, a monstrance containing the Eucharistic host is another attribute of the virginmartyr. Both emblems in Portugal were associated with the Pentecostal Holy Grail and the rites of Corpus Christi in Tomar’s stone Rotunda. Near the Charola was the small cloister dedicated to St. Barbara and Prince Henrique’s own chapel at Batalha had been dedicated to the same virgin-martyr, whose vita was recounted in the Menologion of Symeon Metaphrastes.73 No fifteenth-century portrait survives of Dona Leonor (1408?–† 1445) and though her birthdate is unknown, she probably was about eighteen when she married Duarte in 1428. Prince Henrique’s description of her vivacious nature suggests she was agile, and therefore probably of slender build. At the time of her September 1428 wedding the Duke of Viseu commented in a letter sent to João I: ...and in any other thing which she could adopt of enjoyment, she seized with goodwill; and she is quite gay and very wholesome, For basic information about the chapels, see Guimarães de Andrade, Santa Maria da Vitória, 35–38. Duarte’s chapel served as the tomb of Afonso V’s queen, Isabel (1432–1455), until November of 1901 when her remains were transferred to the “Founder’s Chapel.” Prince Henrique’s Chapel was the only one which had access to the monastery. Its northeast portal opened to the vestry of the Sala do Capitulo (chapterhouse) on the east side of Huguet’s Cloistro Real. A later altar in Henrique’s chapel was dedicated to the “Immaculate Virgin” and it was destroyed by Napoleon’s troops. Henrique had requested permission in 1436 and 1449 to bury his servants in his chapel. Although no documents exist to prove that occurred, the tomb of Dom Frei Gonçalo de Sousa, companion and servant of the prince, rests in the unfinished pantheon built behind the capela-mór. The sarcophagus is carved with the Sousa family arms on its sides and supports a reclining effigy of Dom Gonçalo. The lid also bears a laudatory inscription to Henrique: “He gave nothing to the devil and when he was caused displeasure he gave all to God, nor did he speak ill of anyone, nor was he envious, nor drank wine, never swore by God...fasted...and was very obedient.” This translation appears in Matos, Henrique o Navegador. Henry the Navigator, translated by George Dykes, 19, who refers to the transcription by Sousa Viterbo, Trabalhos Náuticos dos Portugueses (1898), 275. 73

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thanks be to God; and the singing of the Princess is praised a great deal and so is her playing of the virginal, and the dancing according to her personal style, and thus they say that she dances.74 On a return visit in 1436, Jan van Eyck, who had witnessed the entry of Dona Leonor into Lisbon in 1428, might very well have provided a metaphorical likeness of the young queen Leonor as St. Barbara (Fig. 8.87). After all, in his Ghent Altarpiece of 1432 he did represent the Avis Princes as saints. The heroes of Ceuta — Duarte, Pedro and Henrique — were portrayed respectively as the warriors Martin, George and Sebastian. St. Barbara with her Tower, which appears by its landscape components to document Van Eyck’s “secret mission” as an ambassador to Lisbon in 1436–1438, is a perplexing work because of its unusual medium. However, the master may have returned to Flanders with his drawing on panel with the intention of preparing a finished painting for King Duarte and Queen Leonor. By late 1438, the Portuguese monarch was dead and his nation was in turmoil. Van Eyck may have decided just to keep the grisaille as a personal memento of his trips to Portugal. When the “Prince of Painters” died, he left a scholarly polemic regarding the exquisite work which assuredly passed to his estate. On this second mission to Portugal, Jan was accompanied by Hendrick van Eyck, his first cousin or near-relation 75 (Fig. 8.88). The falconier of Philip the Good was sent with the foreknowledge of King Duarte’s equestrian and hunting interests. Therefore, Jan van Eyck had to revisit Sintra Palace, where the Avis family, like members of the Burgundian court, stalked game in the classical tradition of Alexander the Great.76 And conceivably both Jan and his cousin were given a tour by King Duarte, who, like his mother Philippa, 74 António Caetano de Sousa [1674–1759], Provas da Historia genealógica da casa real portugueza, desde a sua origem ate’o presente, com as familias illustres, que procedem dos reys, e dos serenissimos duques de Bragança, 12 vols. (Lisbon: Occidental, Na officina de J.A. da Silva, 1735–48); see rpt. (Coimbra: Atlântida, 1946–54), VI, Pt. II, 8–10. See Oliveira Marques, Daily Life in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 257–58. 75 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), 23–24. The varlet des faulcons of Philip the Good, and titled garde de l’esprivier and espriveteur in documents of 1433 and 1436, Hendrick van Eyck in 1436 was given a traveling stipend of 14l. 2s. “pour aller en aucuns lieux secretz ou icellui seigneur l’envoya don’t il ne veult aultre declaracion estre faicte.” Hendrick must have returned to Flanders with Jan van Eyck, as he married Elizabeth Sallard in 1444. 76 King Duarte, Livro da Ensinança de bem Cavalgar toda sela que fez [el rey dom Eduarte de Portugal e do Algarve e senhor de Ceuta], edited by Joseph Maria Piel (Lisbon: Livraria Bertrand,

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seems by all accounts to have truly cherished this countryside residence. The 1436 “secret mission” involved a second campaign to North Africa, not unlike that of Ceuta which was planned at the Templar Castle of Sintra and so indelibly linked with the “good memory” of King Joao I, the courage of his dying queen, and the valor exhibited by an “illustrious generation.” The payment of 360 livres to “Iohanes d’Eick for certain distant journeys to foreign parts on some secret business undertaken by order of the Duke” is far more than the 160 livres given to the artist for his diplomatic trip to the Iberian Peninsula in 1428–29.77 Traveling to Portugal on a second diplomatic voyage sometime after March of 1436 when King Duarte gave his stamp of approval for the Tangier expedition, Jan van Eyck would have had the opportunity to revisit Batalha Abbey and view the Capelas Imperfeitas which then were under construction. If his St. Barbara and her Tower was done on location, then the 1437 date on the marbleized frame proves a second lengthy stay in Portugal and establishes a time frame for the painting of additional commissions for the Avis court. Tangier and the Sword of St. Catherine: The Dresden Triptych The small dimensions of Jan van Eyck’s three-part work in Dresden (Fig. 8.89) affirm that unlike the Ghent Altarpiece, it was not created for public liturgical display but for private devotion. It is unique in that it is the only extant triptych by the master.78 With a central oak panel measuring 27 x 21.5 cm (10⅝ x 8 ½ inches) and wings 27 x 8 cm (10⅝ x 3 ⅛ inches), the 1944). Duarte wrote his treatise in imitation of his father, who authored a book on hunting: Dom João I, Livro da montaria [Lisbon: Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, MS. No. 4352], ed. Francisco Mara Esteves Pereira, Academia das Sciências de Lisboa (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1918). Regarding the hunt in Portugal, see: António de Sousa e Silva Costa Lobo, Historia da sociedade em Portugal no seculo XV (Lisbon: Imprenta Nacional, 1903), reprinted with a preface by José Mattoso (Lisbon: Edições Rolim, 1984); Gabriel Pereira, “As Caçadas,” Estudos Eborenses XXIX, Parts I–2 (Évora: 1892–93); Pero Menino [fl. 1382–1385], Livro de Falcoaria, ed. Manuel Rodrigues Lapa (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1931); idem., “Livros de falcoaria,” facsimile 3–4 of Boletim de Filologia I (1933): 199–234. 77 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxvii. Document 27 (Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, B 1957. 78 Anneliese Mayer-Meintschel, Niderläandische Malerei 15. und 16. Jahrhundert (Dresden: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, 1966),

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reliquary-like work was easily transportable, even allowing for its extension by a frame to about thirteen by twenty-one inches when open (33.1 x 27.5 cm: 33.1 x 13.6 cm).79 Such small votive works were common appointments in Burgundian and Portuguese oratories (Fig. 8.90). The golden brown marbled frame of the three interior panels is inscribed in Latin majuscule letters. On the moulding below the central subject of the enthroned Virgin and Child is written: Johannes de eyck me fecit et c[o]mplevit Anno Dm M-CCCC.XXX.VII. ALC IXH XAN.80 By contrast to its chromatically rich interior, the exterior wings in sober grisaille which illustrate the Annunciate Virgin and Archangel Gabriel, are encased in frames which were repainted. The red-black mottled patterning which gives the illusion of tortoiseshell reflects sixteenth-century taste for exotic materials.81 Open, the architecture functions to visually unite the panels of the triptych. The majestic Madonna is garbed in flowing red robes hemmed in gold (Fig. 8.91). She is uncrowned, though a jeweled diadem rests upon her head. Seated at the eastern end of the nave of a basilica-like church, 29–31, provides early bibliographical sources for the triptych. Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 242–51. 79 Uta Neidhardt and Christoph Schölzel (Gemäldegalerie, Dresden), “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 25–39; Carol J. Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 127–43; Craig Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism (London: Reaktion Books, Ltd., 1991), especially 129–57; Anja Maria Neuner, “Das geopferte Kind. Ikonographie und Programmatik des Dresdner Marienaltars von Jan van Eyck,” Jahrbuch der Staatlichen Kunstsammlungen Dresden XXV (1994–95): 31–43; Josef Gülden and Wolfgang Balzer, Marienleben, Mariendarstelllungen aus der Dresdener Gemäldegalerie (Wurzburg: 1964); Thomas Ketelsen and Uta Neidhardt, Das Geheimnis des Jan van Eyck: Die frühen niederländischen Zeichnungen und Gemälde in Dresden (München-Berlin: exhibition catalogue, Residenzschloss Dresden, Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2005). 80 Henner Menz, “Zur Freilegung einer Inschrift auf dem Eyck-altar der Dresdener Gemäldegalerie,” Jahrbuch der Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (1959): 28–29, mentions the discovery of the signature in 1959 by Heinz Weber and Hilde Krauth. 81 Regarding the marbelized frame, see Monika Cämmerer-George, “Eine Italienische Würzel in der Rahmen-Idee Jan van Eycks,” Kunstgeschichtliche Studien für Kurt Bauch zum 70, who points to the art of Pietro Lorenzetti as a source. Geburtstag von seinen Schülern, ed. Margrit Lisner and Rüdiger Becksmann (Munich-Berlin: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1967), 69–76. J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer analyzed pigments from the outer frame of the right wing in 1984 and determined the repainting. See Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” 27 and 38 note 4. Also consult J.R.J van Asperen de Boer and Jan Piet Filedt Kok (eds.), Scientific Examination of Early Netherlandish Painting:

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her elevated throne before the crossing occupies the traditional place of the altar. Despite the “miniature” appearance of the triptych, the mise-en-scène of a private audience manages to impart the ambiance of a formal palatine hall. Patterns are profuse in the nave: the dark geometric tiled floor and solitary oriental carpet beneath the throne; the tapestried canopy adorned with golden pomegranates, multiple vases of triple wildflowers, running lions, resting unicorns, and stylized verdure motifs; the marble columns in variegated tones of pink, red and porphyry with their intricately carved capitals; the sculptures of apostles they support, which stand beneath tall Gothic baldachins; the contrasting bottled glass of the lower level and triple stained glass windows high up at the apse. The nude Christ Child seated on his mother’s lap holds a phylactery in his right hand with Latin text from the Gospel of Matthew (11:29): DISCITE A ME QUIA MITIS ET HUMILIS CORDE (Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart).82 The words seem to belie such a sumptuous setting, and yet they would be totally appropriate for a princely commission. The left wing panel of St. Michael with the Donor and the right shutter of St. Catherine of Alexandria function to extend the dimensions of the church because they depict vaulted side aisles with windows. However, in spatial terms, the compressing of the figures in low vaulted side chambers causes them to appear larger in scale than their architecture. The gaze of the Virgin Mary and her child is directed towards the kneeling middle-aged donor. Dressed in a olive green velvet houppelande lined with white fur, he also has a red hood which falls over his right shoulder. His “Burgundian” bowl haircut has been remarked upon, but as proven by Van Eyck’s portraits in the Fountain of Life, the Avis court was influenced considerably by Northern fashion.83 Applications in Art History (Bussum: Fibula-van Dishoeck, 1976); Molly Faries, “The Underdrawing in Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” Le dessin sous-jacent et la technologie dans le peinture: perspectives, Colloque XII. La Peinture dans Les Pays-Bas au 16e siècle. Pratique d’atelier. Infrarouges et autres méthodes d’investigation, 11–13 Septembre 1997, ed. Roger van Schoute and Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq with the collaboration of Anne Dubois (Louvainla-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1997): 221–30. Regarding the “Annunciation” theme in grisaille, see: Paul Philippot, Les Grisailles et les ‘degrés de realité’ de l’image dans la peinture flamande des XVe et XVIe siècles,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique XV (1966): 225–42; Molly Teasdale Smith, “The Use of Grisaille as a Lenten Observance,” Marsyas VIII (1957–59): 43–54; E. Bosshard, “Revealing van Eyck. The Examination of the ThyssenBornemisza ‘Annunciation’,” Apollo CXXXVI, No. 365 (1992): 4–11, at 4, 6–7, 11. 82 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan Van Eyck, 385. 83 Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” 26, note the Burgundian hairstyle, “a round cut shaved around the ears.”

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Of the princes of the House of Avis, the one who most resembled King João I in appearance was Henrique (Figs. 8.92–8.93). Compelling evidence of the similarity of their physiognomies is suggested by a comparison of their effigies at Batalha Monastery. Royal portraits additionally appear to be provided in the “Panel of the Friars” created by Nuno Gonçalves in 1472–73 for the St. Vincent Altarpiece of the Lisbon Sé.84 Attired in the white habit of the Cistercian Order, Henrique may be identified as the figure that kneels in the foreground. Behind him, and recognizable by his portrait in the Eyckian Fons Vitae replicas, is João I. The monarch’s last testament of 1426 prescribed his burial in Cistercian robes. The third “monk” wearing a truncated cone hat may be Prince Ferdinand, “Santo Infante Fernando” (1402–1443) who died in the north Moroccan city of Fez. Though Henrique was depicted in profile in Van Eyck’s Fountain of Life and Ghent panel of the “Holy Knights,” his tomb gisant at Batalha Monastery which shows him at the age of sixty-six reveals a physical trait shared by the Dresden donor. The protuberance of flesh over the sculpted lips indicates a slight dental overbite. Gomes Eanes de Zurara in his Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné (Chapters IV and VI) provided a physical description and character analysis of Prince Henrique: “of good bodily stature” and “strongly constituted” with “broad, strong limbs” and “a head of hair somewhat raised.”85 The entire Tangier expedition was the ingenium of the Duke of Viseu, who then was forty-three. Henrique’s youngest brother Fernando (1402–1443), had joined him in the ill-fated venture. He then was thirtyfive, an age which corresponds with that of the Dresden donor. Additionally, 84 Literature on the St. Vincent Altarpiece (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga) has focused upon Prince Henrique as the figure with a distinctive black chaperon and liripipe who stands opposite Duchess Isabel of Burgundy in the so-called “Panel of the Prince.” However, this identification has been questioned with substantial evidence by Dagoberto L. Markl, O Retábulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os Documentos (Lisbon: Editorial Caminho, 1988), who suggests King Duarte is portrayed. Princess Isabel wears the tertiary habit of the Poor Clares which she adopted after 1457 after her withdrawal from court. Nuno’s selection of Cistercian robes as apparel for King João I and his sons was appropriate for an altarpiece which commemorates Afonso V’s successful expedition to Tangier in 1471. The Avis house had admired the crusading ideals of St. Bernard of Clairvaux. 85 Artur Teodoro de Matos, Henrique o Navegador/Henry the Navigator, tr. George Dykes (Lisbon: CTT Correios, 1993), 13, quotes from Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné by Gomes Eanes de Zurara [1410–1473] in Vida e obras de Gomes Eanes de Zurara, ed. António Joaquim Dias Dinis, O.F.M., 2 vols.(Lisbon: Divisão de Publicações a Biblioteca, Agência Geral das Colónias, 1949), Ch. IV and VI.

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Fernando’s patron saint was Archangel Michael, as the Prince was born on his feast day, September 29. There is no gisant of Fernando but a posthumous portrait survives in an anonymous retable which was placed in the royal pantheon of Batalha (Figs. 8.94–8.95). However, his standing effigy with a gaunt and heavily bearded face, has more the aspect of a suffering martyr than a royal prince. As postulated earlier, Van Eyck may have represented the prince as the redturbaned equestrian figure in the Metropolitan Calvary. The face of the rider in the diptych is difficult to discern, because his head is tilted upwards to contemplate Christ on the cross. By contrast, the Eyckian replica of the Versailles Festivity of Philip the Good and his Hunting Party shows a vigorous Prince Fernando with a Burgundian bowl haircut. He stands affectionately beside his sister Isabel, whom he escorted to Flanders in 1429. The apparel of the Dresden donor is significant as he wears a vibrant green houppelande trimmed in grey fur. Green was the color of the Order of Avis, of which Fernando was the Grand Master. The provenance of the Dresden Triptych is enigmatic despite the heralds depicted on the inner frames of the wings (Fig. 8.96). Scholarly consensus tends to regard the original coats-of-arms as unrecognizable due to their overprinting in grey-brown pigment. According to W.H. James Weale: At the upper dexter angle is an escutcheon bearing Gules a castle tripletowered argent, on a chief or an eagle issuant sable, Giustianiani…. At the upper sinister angle is an escutcheon bearing Argent 21 billets gules, on a canton or a fess gules. The shutters have suffered from over cleaning.86 Elisabeth Dhanens additionally remarks: The arms in the upper corners, which Weale had identified as those of a member of the Giustianiani family, merchants from Genoa, were certainly old — but not part of the original painting. Traces of another coat-of-arms, not identifiable, could be seen W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), 85–86. Based upon the shields, he identified the donor as Michele Giustianiani, fifty-years old in age. Gustav Künstler identified the figure as a “self-portrait” in his “Jan van Eycks Wahlwort ‘Als Ich Can’ und das Flügelaltarchen in Dresden,” Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte XXV (1972): 107–27. 86

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under the Giustianiani escutcheon. This invalidated the automatic identification of Michele Giustianiani as the donor on the left panel, who kneels before his protector St. Michael.87 A comprehensive laboratory examination of the Dresden Triptych by Uta Neidhardt and Christoph Schölzel remains inconclusive with regard to the identity of Van Eyck’s patron, as they candidly confirm that the corner heralds of the work are readable “with difficulty.”88 Even so, they have tracked the two escutcheons back to sixteenth-century Genoa, and provided the following description of the perplexing heralds under microscope: The coats of arms appear, just like the texts, to have been painted directly onto the bronze coloured ground, so that the shields recognizable today cannot be taken, as is often assumed, as over paintings of earlier versions.… The shield … in the left corner shows a light town wall with three towers with battlements of the same height on a Venetian red ground, above which a black eagle with outstretched wings was clearly painted directly unto the dark ochre coloured tone of the frame. The shield … opposite, which is more difficult to decipher, has a geometrical design made up of small red squares on a white ground which becomes darker on the right.89 A triple towered gold castle appears in arms of João I and his sons. The alignment of five azure shields (each charged with five bezants in saltire) is similar to the Dresden red shields. Prince Fernando’s herald comprises a pair of Lancaster lions passant guardant, that is, each lion walks with three paws on the ground, having the dexter paw raised with the tail displayed over the back. Although the Dresden escutcheons lack lions passant guardant, the image that has been identified as a black eagle actually resembles a dragon with outstretched bat-like wings. Therefore, the beast could be a crest variation to denote St. George, King Arthur of Pendragon, or Archangel St. Michael as Apocalyptic dragon slayer. Although each Avis Prince had his own herald resembling the arms of King João I, there is no reason to deny that secondary Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 242. Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” 27. They elucidate about the later provenance of the Dresden Triptych and provide important technical and stylistic information. They mention, 30 note 17, a more comprehensive publication is in progress. 89 Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” 27. 87 88

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iconic escutcheons and banner insigniae may have been adopted as personal impresa by the royals. This would have been a particularly prudent course of action in planning a multi-pronged siege on North African soil. Armed contingents fighting under the command of a specific Avis Prince had to quickly recognize the location of supporting troops, which would have been difficult if all the heralds were nearly identical. Another pervasive reason to identify Fernando as the donor of the Dresden Triptych is the fact that the prince never married. Scholars have been perplexed by the right wing of the altarpiece, which would be expected to house a portrait of a donor’s wife. Renaissance kings of the Avis dynasty sustained a remarkable devotion to St. Catherine of Alexandria (Fig. 8.97), seeking her miraculous intercession in successive campaigns to North Africa beginning with Ceuta and culminating with Tangier, which ultimately was conquered in 1471.90 The monarch who led that successful expedition was the son of King Duarte, Afonso V (1432: r. 1432–1481). In addition to his own herald, King Afonso had adopted Catherine’s wheel as his personal impresa and this device appears in the Arzila Tapestries designed by the court artist Nuno Gonçalves which probably were woven in Tournai. Holding a book and sword, and garbed in rich robes of blue and ermine, the virgin martyr Catherine is more “queen” than legendary princess. In lieu of a diadem, she wears a massive gold crown articulated at the rim by pearls and round her neck is a matching ruby and pearl lavalière. Her slender figure physically corresponds with Jan van Eyck’s St. Barbara, and St. Catherine was venerated as a favored saint at Batalha, where her attribute blade of execution was associated with the sword of King João I exhibited in the Founder’s Chapel. So then, it might be pondered in this case too, if Queen Leonor served as a model (Figs. 8.98–8.99).

Gustav Kunster, “Jan van Eycks Wahlwort ‘Als Ich Can’ und das Flügelaltarchen in Dresden,” 125, connects the Dresden Triptych with Philip the Good’s sustained interest in a holy crusade. He additionally identifies St. Catherine as the embodiement of the Kirche in the Holy Land and upholds St. Michael as the perfect Ritterschaft. This is related by Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 132, who, in note 17 mentions a precedent for selecting saints for reasons other than name patronage, Claus Sluter’s portal of the Burgundian mausoleum at Dijon’s Chartreuse de Champmol. Statues of Philip the Bold and Margaret of Flanders which flank the trumeau carving of the “Virgin and Child” are introduced by Sts. John the Baptist and Catherine of Alexandria. In the Gothic age, and even today, Catholic children at baptism customarily receive more than one name. The Sacrament of Confirmation also provides another occasion for selecting a patron saint. 90

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St. Catherine wears an ultramarine velvet surcoat with deep armholes that reveal her underdress. Her gown is trimmed in ermine, which also coils around her arms. Presupposing the maiden with her magnificent crown and jewelry provides a portrait of Queen Leonor, a relevant aspect about her dress is the fact that it is outmoded.91 This seems quite odd, in view of Van Eyck’s representation of the opposite patron in the prevailing Burgundian fashion. One explanation for the anomaly in attire may be that Queen Leonor is portrayed in the robes of a Dame de la Fraternité de St. George. On May 8, 1435, when King Duarte became a Garter Knight in place of his deceased father, his wife would have been conferred as a “Lady of the Garter.” St. Catherine’s costume has been dated circa 1375.92 Therefore, Van Eyck plausibly represented Queen Leonor in a Garter ceremonial dress treasured by the Avis family, namely the gown given to Philippa of Lancaster by Richard II (r. 1377–1399) when she was appointed a Dame de la Fraternité de St. George in 1378. Wardrobe accounts pertaining to the St. George feast of 1401 establish that Henry IV (r. 1399–1413) had gifted only the “King of Portugal” with cloth and fur for Garter robes, and not the queen. King João I had been elected to the Order to fill the vacancy created by the death of Sir William Arundel in August of 1400. Therefore, Queen Philippa must have worn the same robes of her 1378 appointment as “Lady of the Garter” in the knightly procession at Windsor Castle in April 23, 1401. Such chivalric apparel did not go out of style. Prince Henrique was not elevated to the Order of the Garter until December 3, 1442, succeeding to the stall left vacant by Sir Simon Felbridge. He was initiated by the Garter Knight of Arms, who brought Garter robes from England in 1443 and stayed ten months in Portugal to initiate the Duke of Viseu. After Henrique’s death on November 13, 1461, two inventories were taken of his estates in Lagos and the Algarve. Within one of his Algarvian wardrobes were his knightly robes. They comprised a mantle, undertunic, sash, cap, and a host of ceremonial items in the Garter colors of blue, crimson, scarlet and gold. As suggested by Peter Russell, Henrique may have worn the Garter robes on important occasions in the Algarve, such as

Harbison, “Bibliographic Commentary,” Jan van Eyck: The Play of Realism, 210, states that Anne Hagopian van Buren infomed him the costume worn by Van Eyck’s St. Catherine dates from about 1375. 92 Anne Hagopian van Buren, “The Canonical Office in Renaissance Painting, Part II: More About the Rolin Madonna,” Art Bulletin LX (December, 1978): 617–33. 91

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receiving foreign knights or dignitaries from the Canaries or Africa.93 Clearly Queen Leonor also would have worn her Garter robes for similar courtly ceremonies. The foliated capital of the pier supporting the vault behind St. Catherine is carved with a pair of dragons, which seem to relate her with the fair princess whose kingdom was threatened by a monster and rescued by the warrior knight George. The design of the green baldachin (Fig. 8.100) which is suspended by two ropes over the Virgin and Child is like the silk cloth of estate in the well-known bust portrait of King João I in Lisbon’s Museu Nacional de Arte. Animal-patterned lampas silks, also called “imperial” or baudequin silks, were conventional palatine accoutrements, and Jan’s pattern of pattern of horizontal bands is especially intricate.94 Three rows of five grayish white lions appear in the fabric above four rows of floral arrangements. The golden urns contain triple stems of wildflowers, red roses rising to the sides of a central white rose. Similar running lions adorn the herald of Prince Fernando (Fig. 8.101). The beasts and wild roses are Lancastrian emblems. As a compliment to the Lancastrian lions on the baldachin of the Dresden Triptych, there are three rows of unicorns in “equine contrapposto.”95 These mythical animals normally white in color are of a deep azure in the canopy, a hue which recalls the English blue Garter. The unicorn was paralleled with the Incarnate Christ of the Passion and Resurrection.96 Virgins in Northern Renaissance tapestries frequently were shown in the act of capturing the mythical beast (Figs. 8.102–8.103). They parallel the princess of the St. 93 Peter Edward Russell, Prince Henry “the Navigator”. A Life (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 2000), 356–57 and 355–56 notes 21–22. Consult: William Arthur Shaw, The Knights of England: a complete record from the earliest time to the present day of the knights of all the orders of chivalry in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and of knights bachelors. Incorporating a complete list of knights bachelors dubbed in Ireland, compiled by G.D. Burtchaell, 2 vols. (Baltimore: Genealogical Pub. Co., 1971), I, 12; John Anstis, The Register of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, 2 vols. (London: J. Barber, 1724 and 1784), I, 178–93, II, 180–81, 184. Regarding the inventories of Lagos and the Algarve, see António Joaquim Dinis, O.F.M., ed. Monumenta Henricina, 15 vols. (Coimbra: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Aniversãrio da Morte do D. Infante Henrique: 1960–1974), XIV, Nos. 127 and 129. 94 M. and D. King, “Silk Weaves of Lucca in 1376,” in Opera textilia variorum temporum: to honour Agnes Geijer on her ninetieth birthday (26th October 1988), ed. Inger Estham and Margareta Nockert (Stockholm : Statens historiska museum, 1988): 67–76. 95 Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 135 employs this descriptive term. 96 Adolfo Salvatore Cavallo, The Unicorn Tapestries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1998); Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, La dame à la licorne (Paris: Éditions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1978) and rpt. (Paris: M. Aveline,

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George legend, who used her chatelaine’s girdle, or “garter,” to tether the subdued dragon. Significantly for the traditional association of the unicorn with the resurrected Christ, a sacra cintola also is featured in the Dormition (Koimesis) of the Virgin Mary. In Portugal, the August 15 feast day of the Assumption commemorated two important military victories of King João I: Aljubarrota (1385), which ushered in the Avis dynasty; and Ceuta (1415), which marked Lusitania’s martial and commercial foothold in North Africa. The lettered passage which encircles the Dresden central panel is taken from the liturgical Office of the Assumption: She is more beautiful than the sun, and above all the order of the stars; being compared with the light, she is found before it. For she is the brightness of eternal life, and the unspotted mirror of God’s majesty. As the vine I have brought forth a pleasant odour: and my flowers are the fruit of honor and riches. I am the mother of fair love, and of feat, and of knowledge, and of holy hope.97 The royal heritage of Queen Leonor is alluded to in several motifs of the Dresden baldachin. The urns of roses above the lions are fashioned in the shape of pomegranates, and therefore, their bouquets seem to spring from the crowns of calyx lobes. Alternating rows of golden pomegranates on 1993); Margaret B. Freeman, The Unicorn Tapestries (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Cloisters, 1976); idem., La Chasse à la Licorne, adapted by Pierre Alexandre (Paris: Edita S.A. Lausanne-La Bibliothèque des Arts: 1983); James Cross Giblin, The Truth about Unicorns (New York: HarperCollins Publishers 1991); Odell Shepard, The Lore of the Unicorn (Boston: 1930; rpt. New York: Dover Publications, 1993); Geneviève Souchal, “Un grand peintre français de la fin du XVe siècle: Le maître de la Chasse à la Licorne,” Revue de l’art XXII (1973): 22–49; John Williamson, The Oak King, the Holly King, and the Unicorn. The Myths and Symbolism of the Unicorn Tapestries (New York: New York : Harper & Row, 1986); Edward Johnston Alexander and Carol H. Woodward, “The Flora of the Unicorn Tapestries, “Journal of the New York Botanical Garden (May-June, 1941; rpt. 1947 and 1965), 1–28; Pierre Verlet and Francis Salet, La dame à la licorne (Paris: Braun, 1960). 97 The translation is from Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 128–29, who points out the verse appears in the Chapter for Lauds on the Feast of the Assumption. For the Latin words, see Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 385, who provides biblical sources for fragments of the inscription: [Wisdom 7: 29, 26] HAEC EST SPECIOSIOR SOLE ET

SUPER OMNEM DISPOSITIONEM STELLARUM LUCI COMPARATA INVENITUR PRIOR. CANDOR EST ENIM LUCIS AETERNAE ET SPECULUM SINE MACULA DEI MAIESTATIS ECT. [Ecclesiastes 24: 23–24] EGO QUASI VITIS FRUCTIFICAVI SUAVITATEM ODORIS ET FLORES MEI FRUCTUS HONORIS ET HONESTATIS. EGO MATER PULCHRAE DILECTIONIS ET TIMORIS ET MAGNITUDINIS ET SANCTAE SPEL.

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stylized leaves are over the unicorns and they also adorn the band of fabric comprising the upper section of the canopy. Resembling a heart because of its multiple chambers, the fruit was a variation of the Edenic apple and therefore, denoted the charity of the Incarnate Redeemer, the second Adam. In a Pauline sense, the outer husk enclosing seeds alluded to the universal Church. Even more significant, the pomegranate thrived in the southern Mediterranean, where the Nasrid kingdom Granada was named for the succulent managra. As speculated by historians, a victory at Tangier was sought by Henrique to gain another base in North Africa from which to wrest Andalusia from Moslem control. The battle between the cross and the crescent was long fought in the Iberian Peninsula. One of the most decisive victories of the Reconquest was achieved by a union of Lusitanian, Castilian and Lancastrian arms. Between 1270 and 1340 the dynasty of the Banu Merin of Morocco was at the height of power, and the Merinids provided military assistance to the Nasrid rulers of Granada from their garrisons at Algeciras and Tarifa on the Castilian side of the Straits of Gibraltar. Though Tarifa was taken from the Merinids in 1292, Algeciras was the focus of a bloody siege in the years 1342–1344 by Alfonso XI (r. 1312–1350), king of Castile.98 As prelude to this campaign against Merinid and Nasrid troops, Alfonso XI had won a strategic battle in 1340 at the Salado River which prevented Moorish territorial advancement. He was supported by the French and an English contingent led by Henry of Grosmont, Earl of Derby, the father-in-law of John of Gaunt. In 1328 Alfonso XI had married Maria (1313–1377), the daughter of King Afonso IV of Portugal (1291: r. 1325–1357). Over 10,000 Portuguese men-ofarms had assembled to aid the Castilians. In gratitude for their support, the “Cross of Salado” (Fig. 8.104) was given to Lusitania, and this standard was placed among the sacristy treasures of the Cathedral of Évora. The Orden de la Banda, the Castilian equivalent of the English Order of the Garter, was founded on the battlefield of Salado. Dedicated to St. George the dragon slayer, the institution had adopted a jar of lilies as its official insignia. The multiple vases in Van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych contain wildflowers which resemble anemones. “Lilies of the valley” amidst brambles and “fruit sweet to the taste” are metaphors of love appearing in the bridegroom’s colloquy from the Song of Songs. Shushan was Hebrew word for “lilies of Richard Fletcher, Moorish Spain (Berkeley-Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1992), 159–60. 98

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the field” described by Christ in his “Sermon on the Mount.” The same wildflowers called susan by the Moors may have been anemones which grow abundantly throughout Palestine and in the southern Mediterranean region. Related to Christ’s Passion and the sorrow of the Mater Dolorosa, anemones appear in Ovid’s myth of the hunter Adonis, who died on a bed of blossoms tinctured by his spilt blood. Medieval Aragon, as well as Castile, had established a chivalric order dedicated to St. George (Fig. 8.105). Seven years after the victory of Salado, Afonso IV’s younger daughter Leonor (1328–1348) married Pedro IV of Aragon (1319–1387), “the Ceremonious” who began his own “Enterprise of the Knights of St. George” in 1330.” The heart and fingers of St. George were ensconced at Windsor Castle among the treasures of the Garter. In 1414 these relics had been given by Emperor Sigismund to his brother-in-law Richard I.99 Pedro IV of Aragon instituted his Order after July 27, 1377, the date he inherited the castle of Lavidia in the Greek duchy of Neopatria, a citadel famed for its relic of George’s head. Following in his wake, King Alfonso V of Aragon and Sicily (1394: r. 1416–1458) adopted an insignia white band and lily vase for his own Orden de la Stola y Jarra.100 Dona Leonor, wife in 1428 of the Avis Prince Duarte and “Lady of the Garter,” was the granddaughter of Pedro IV of Aragon and also the direct descendant of Alfonso XI who organized the crucial attack against the Moors at Salado. The Dresden baldachin appears to reflect Portugal’s sustained interest in mnemonic emblems associated with chivalry of the Christian Reconquest. The canopy’s colors of green, white and red have been equated with the 99 Christopher Hibbert, The Court at Windsor. A Domestic History (New York and Evanston: Harper and Row Publishers, 1964), 23. 100 In 1440 Alfonso V of Aragon was invited to become a knight of the Golden Fleece by Philip the Good. However, the king requested that he only be required to wear the collar on Sundays rather than daily. The Duke of Burgundy was offered membership in the Stola y Jarra, but declined gracefully by stating that the order’s white band would be displeasing to his subjects because it was too similar to the Armagnac band. To the best of my knowledge, membership to the Order of the Golden Fleece was not offered to the Avis kings, perhaps because they belonged to the English Garter. Philip the Good was offered membership to the Garter by John of Lancaster, Duke of Bedford, but he refused, stating he wished to found his own Burgundian chivalric order. See Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 161–62. He cites, 161 note 1: Constantin Marinesco, “Documents espagnols inédits concernant la fondation de l’Ordre de la Toison d’Or,” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres (1956): 401–17, especially 404–10. See also Charles Arthur John Armstrong, “Had the Burgundian government a policy

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theological virtues of hope, faith and charity Though the same colors respectively are displayed in churches during the liturgical seasons of Advent, Easter and Pentecost, they also have alchemical significance. Jan van Eyck’s Portrait of Jan de Leeuw (Fig. 8.106), the dean of the guild of goldsmiths in Bruges in 1441, is signed and dated 1436 on its frame. The frame’s inscription simulates engraved letters on metal, and its rhymed verse, which contains a rebus of a lion and two chronograms, can be related to the hidden language of symbols employed by European freemasons. Such symbols were employed by the English freemasons who settled in Portugal during the reign of King João I. The golden and silvered pomegranates displayed in the Dresden Triptych, the copper appearance of its inscribed frame, and the bejeweled armour of St. Michael, suggest the alchemical techniques for converting base ore into precious metals. Metallurgy was Merlin’s craft, as well as the profession of Joseph of Arimathaea, and accordingly, knights seeking to imitate St. George and the chivalric heroes of Arthurian-Grail lore, were supposed to experience a similar process of refinement. To earn one’s spurs involved more than acquiring knowledge in the art of wielding a sword. The active life was to be “balanced” by the contemplative life of chaste virtue. Temperance, or moderation, meant abstinence from worldly pleasures, that is, embracing the ascetic ideals of the inscription on the left side of the St. Catherine panel, Nudus nudum Christi sequi (Naked to follow the Naked Christ).101 As explained by St. Paul in his Letter to the Ephesians, worthy warriors of God’s army are given the breastplate of righteousness to defeat the forces of darkness. St. Michael, whose name in Hebrew means “He who is like God,” exemplifies the ideal knight of the celestial realm. It is noteworthy that the Archangel wears armour similar to that of St. George in The Virgin for the nobility,” Britain and the Netherlands, 2 vols., ed. John Selwyn Bromley and Ernst Heinrich Kossmann with an introduction by Pieter Geyl (Groningen-London: Chatto & Windus, 1960–1964), II, 9–32. 101 Jean Châtillon, “Nudum Christum Nudus Sequere. Notes sur les origines et la signification du thème de la nudité spirituelle dans les écrits de Saint Bonaventure,” S. Bonaventura 1274–1974 IV (Grottaferrata: 1974): 719–72; idem., “Nudus Nudum Christum Sequi and Parallel Formulas in the Twelfth Century: A Supplementary Dossier,” Continuity and Discontinuity in Church History, Essays presented to George Hunston Williams on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday, ed. T. Forrester Church and Timothy George (Leiden: Brill, 1979): 83–91; Reginald Grégoire, “L’Adage ascétique ‘nudus nudum christum sequi,’” Studi storici in onore di Ottorino Bertolini, 2 vols. (Pisa: Pacini, 1972): I, 395–409; Matthaus Bernards, “Nudus nudum Christus sequi,” Wissenschaft und Weisheit XIV (1951): 148–51.

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with Canon George van der Paele. Created between 1434 and 1436, as documented by the inscription on the lower section of the frame, this panel which bears heralds in its upper corners, is exceptional in its simulation of gold (Figs. 8.107–109).102 Crowned with a jeweled miter, St. Donatian stands in a blue velvet cope, distinguished by three heights of pile and gold-embroidered aurisfrisiae articulated by pearls.103 His raiment and shimmering processional crosier must have been from the vast repository of treasures in the Bruges church of Sint-Donaas, which included relics of the arm of St. George, the body of St. Donatian, the True Cross, and pieces Alfons Dewitte, “De Kapelanie-Stichtingen van Kanunnik van der Paele,” Biekorf: Westvlaams Archief voor Geschiedenis Oudheidkunde en Folklore LXXII (1971): 15–20. Also consult: Dennis Michael Hitchcock, The Iconography of the van der Paele Madonna by Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Ph.D. Dissertation Princeton University, 1976), who analyzes the work as an altarpiece and discusses comprehensively the iconography of the painting, including its sculpture and appointments; Rafael de Keyser, “De Kanunnik van der Paele,” Spiegel Historiael VI (1971): 336–43, who includes biographical information; idem., “Paele, Joris van der,” Nationaal Biografisch Woordenboek V (Brussels: 1972): cols. 673–77; idem., “Chanoines seculiers et universités: Le Cas de Saint-Donatien de Bruges (1350–1450),” The Universities in the Late Middle Ages, ed. Jozef Ijsewijn and Jacques Paquet (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1978), 584–87; Aquilin Janssens de Bisthoven, Musée Communal des BeauxArts (Musée Groeninge) Bruges, augmented 3rd ed., with the collaboration of Marguerite BaesDondeyne and Dirk de Vos (Brussels: Centre National de Recherches ‘Primitifs Flamands’ et A.C.L., Ministères de l’Éducation Nationale et de la Culture, 1983), 215–22, for documents pertaining to the painting; Lawrence Naftulin, “A Note on the Iconography of the van der Paele Madonna,” Oud Holland LXXXVI (1971): 3–8; Rudolf Terner, “Bemerkungen zur Madonna des kanonikus van der Paele,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte XLII (1979): 83–91; Henri Pauwels, “Van Eycks Madonna Van der Paele opnieuw bekeken,” Jaarboek 1983–1984 (Brugge Stedelijke Musea: 1985): 223–40. Regarding technical aspects of the painting, see J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Infrared Reflectograms of Two Paintings by Jan van Eyck in Bruges,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque X, 5–7 Septembre, 1993, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Erasme: 1995): 81–84, at 82–83; Verougstraete-Marcq and Van Schoute, Cadres et supports dans la peinture flamande aux 15e et 16e siècles, 54, 174–76; Rudolf Preimesberger, “Zu Jan van Eycks Diptychon der Sammlung Thyssen-Bornemisza,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte LIV (1991): 459–89, at 473–74, 483–84. 103 Lisa Monnas, “Silk Textiles in the Paintings of Jan van Eyck,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 147–62, at 150. Jean-Luc Meulemeester, Sint-Donaas en de voormalige Brugse katedraal (Bruges: Jong Kristen Onthaal voor Toerisme, 1988); idem., “Een kleine aanvulling betreffende de geschiedenis van het Schilderij O.-L-Vrouw met het Kind en kanunnik Joris van der Paele van Jan van Eyck,” Biekorf XCVI, No. 2 (1996): 114–16; Anton Legner, “Das Kölner Kristallkreuz,” Wallraf-Richartz Jarhbuch XLVI–XLVII (1985–1986): 135–45, at 143–44. 102

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of the Holy Sepulchre.104 Having the status in Bruges of Burgundian court functionary until his death about July 9, 1441, Jan belonged to the parish of the collegiate church of St. Donatian.105 Opposite St. Donatian is the Canon of Bruges (Fig. 8.110), realistically captured as he kneel devoutly beside his name patron St. George.106 In gilded and partially blue enameled armour, the holy warrior lifts his helmet before the enthroned Virgin and Child. This gesture, repeated by Gérard Loyet (Fig. 8.111) in his gold and enamel Reliquary of Charles the Bold with St. George, has been interpreted as an allusion to a passage in the Iliad (VI: 466–73) that describes Hector’s

104 Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 85–97, discusses the Van der Paele Altarpiece, and also discusses, 89–90, the similarity between the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the architecture depicted in Van Eyck’s panel. Regarding the possessions recorded in inventories of the Bruges church, consult Antoon Viaene, “Het Grafpaneel van Kanunnik van der Paele,” Biekorf LXVI ( 1965): 257–64. For additional information about the painting, consult: Craig Harbison, “Visions and Meditations in Early Flemish Painting,” Simiolus XV (1985): 87–118, at 99–100, 112; Dieter Jansen, “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis – der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 40–41, 47 note 21); idem., “Der Kölner Provinzial des Minoritenordens Heinrich von Werl, der Werl-Altar und Robert Campin,” Wallraf-Richartz Jarhbuch XLV (1984): 7–40, at 20–23. 105 At Midsummer in 1432 St. Donatian at Bruges received 30s., the annual change on Jan’s house. The identical entry appears on records until 1441, thereafter marked with Relicta Iohannis de Eyke. See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, Document 19, XXXV, Bruges, Episcopal Archives. Under the supervision of his brother Lambert van Eyck, Jan was buried at St. Donatian and then re-interred closer to the baptismal font on March 21 of 1442. In 1431 Lambert was recompensed for having rendered services to Duke Philip on several occasions. Whether he maintained a workshop after Jan’s death is unknown. See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 21–22 (biography of Lambert), Document 30, XXXVIII (burial of Jan, July 9, 1441, Bruges Episcopal Archives). On June 24, 1441, Jan van Eyck was paid 180 livres of 40 groats Flemish to the pound, his salary for two quarters to the Midsummer of 1441 (Document 29, XXXVIII, Lille, Archives of the Department of the North). Presumably he was ill at that time. 106 The health of the secular canon is discussed by: Jules Desneux, Rigeur de Jan van Eyck (Brussels: 1951); idem., “Under paintings and Pentimenti in the Pictures of Jan van Eyck,” Art Bulletin XL (1958): 13–21, at 15; Jan Dequeker, “Kan men uit Schilderijen iets leren over Ziekten in het Verleden,” Onze Alma Mater XXIV (1980): 46–57; “Polymyalgia rheumatica,” Spectrum International XXVI (1983): 9–10; “Rheumatism in the Art of the Late Middle Ages,” Organorum XVI (1979): 9–19; Barbara G. Lane, “The Case of Canon van der Paele,” Source IX (1990): 1–6. Also consult Yves Pauwels, “Les paradoxes du réalism dans l’oeuvre de Jan van Eyck,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXXXVII (No. 126 (1995): 201–10, at 204, 206; Richard H. Randall, “Jan van Eyck and the St. George Ivories,” Journal of the Walters Art Gallery XXXIX (1981): 39–48.

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leave-taking of his wife Andromache and his infant son.107 In the chivalric context of St. George Miles Christi, the parakeet in the Madonna of Canon van der Paele recalls Jacques de Longuyon’s Les Voeux de Paon (Vows of the Peacock), a courtly poem composed about 1310 which developed the theme of the “Nine Worthies,” three pagans, three Hebrews and three Christians. Though more later will be said about the legacy of the Neufs Preux in Portugal, the Pauline “helmet of salvation” raised by St. George is nearly identical to that of St. Michael in the Dresden Triptych. The snail shape of his headgear and epaulets has been interpreted as a metaphorical emblem of the Virgin Mary’s womb.108 The snail is a humble creature born from the earth. In alchemical terms, the insect which subsists on mud denotes the base elements and the preliminary stage of the refining process. To a learned individual of Van Eyck’s time, St. George’s helmet-lifting would have been perceived immediately as an analogous gesture to that of the youngest Magus, who removes his crown in the presence of a higher authority. Across George’s breastplate are letters fashioned from pearls which read ADONAI, the name commonly given by the prophets to Jehovah. The rewards of the just at the Final Judgment are enumerated in the Book of Wisdom (5: 15–20), and they are appropriate to martial imagery in the Dresden Triptych: … the righteous live forever, and their reward is with the Lord … they will receive a glorious crown and a beautiful diadem … with his right hand he will cover them, and with his arm he will shield them. The Lord will take his zeal as his whole armour … he will put on righteousness as a breastplate, and wear impartial justice as a helmet;

107 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 212–31. Hector Johannes Cornelis Opstelten, “De Miskende St. Joris van Jan van Eyck,” Oud Holland LXXX (1966) 107–10; David G. Carter, “Reflections in Armour in the Canon van der Paele Madonna,” Art Bulletin XXXVI (1954): 60–62. See also John L. Ward, “Disguised Symbolism as Enactive Symbolism in Van Eyck’s Paintings,” Artibus et Historiae. An Art Anthology XXIX (1994): 9–53, at 38–45; Pierre André Pidoux de Maduère [Baron], “Le Noble Ordre de Saint Georges au comté de Bourgogne,” Rivista del Collegio Araldico (August: 1905): 464–72. 108 H.S. Ettlinger, “The Virgin Snail,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XLI (1978): 316, refers to Francis Retz (1400): “If the dew of the clean air can make the sea snail pregnant, then God in virtue can make his mother pregnant.” See Lisa Monnas, “Silk Textiles in the Paintings of Jan van Eyck,” 161, note 45, who credits Dillian Gordan for the reference.

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he will take holiness as an invincible shield, and sharpen stern wrath for a sword…109 The Iliad describes Hector’s helmet as made from copper. This metal of the Trojan War which was used by Alexander and Julius Caesar, can be distinguished from the brass-iron armour donned by the Hebrew “Worthies” David, Joshua and Judas Maccabeus, and the silvered armour of the Christian “Worthies” Arthur, Godfrey de Bouillon and Charlemagne. To alchemically distinguish the knights of heaven as even more spiritually “refined” than the Neuf Preux of earthly epics, Van Eyck portrayed Sts. George and Michael with golden armour. A transmutation of metal into gold was the ultimate goal of alchemical operations. Gold materially meant wealth, but allegorically it denoted purity, that which could not tarnish or decay. In a spiritual sense, however, gold represented the attainment of wisdom, as revealed in arcane Hebrew literature, and prophetical verse.110 Isaiah, for example, described the crucible of divine enlightenment (48:10): “I have refined thee, but not with silver. I have chosen thee in the furnace of poverty.” Jan van Eyck’s “self-portrait” reflected in the armour of St. George indicates his awareness of metallurgical symbolism (Fig. 8.112). Recalling that the Trojan Hector was one of the “Nine Worthies” acclaimed by the Late Gothic knights, the ring-necked parakeet, a species indigenous to Africa and Asia, carries especial meaning in the composition for another “Worthy.” (Fig. 8.113) Alexander the Great is credited with the discovery of the small green parrot with a pink neckband renamed the popinjay in the late Gothic period.111 The Van der Paele parakeet probably was sent as a gift about 1435 from King Duarte to The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition (Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, Thomas Nelson Inc., 1993), 717. 110 Andrea Aromatico, Alchemy. The Great Secret, translated from French by Jack Hawkins (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. Discoveries Series, 2000), 66; Eugène Canseliet, L’alchimie expliquée sur ses textes classiques (Paris: J.-J. Pauvert, 1972); idem., Alchimie: études diverses de symbolisme hermétique et de pratique philosophale (Paris: J. J. Pauvert, 1964 and augmented rpt., 1978); Jacques van Lennep, Art et Alchimie (Brussels: Éditions Meddens, 1966). Besides mortar and pestles used for pulverization, glass flasks numbered among the practical tools used for chemical operations. See Brian Madigan, “Van Eyck’s Illuminated Carafe,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XLIX (1986): 227–30, discussion on the Lucca Madonna. 111 Alexander the Great dispatched peacocks home from his military campaigns in Persia and abolished the killing of the birds for their meat. The Alexandrine parakeet (Arabic: bab(ba) ghā) from India was prized so highly by the Greeks and Romans that the rare bird was evaluated at the price of a slave. See Claudia Masiulis, “Birdkeeping: Fad or Tradition,” 109

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the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy.112 Traditionally linked with the lost paradise of Eden, the parrot was associated with the Annunciate Virgin Mary because of its dense feathers which remained dry when drenched with rain. The bottled-glass windows of the Dresden Triptych shimmer with reflections of light (Fig. 8.114). The window beside St. Catherine is the only open one in the altarpiece. The town which is revealed through the fenestration conjures the memory of the princess whose kingdom was aided by the intrepid equestrian St. George. The structures are difficult to classify, though they could just as well be Lusitanian as Flemish, so strong was the influence of Burgundian architectural style in Late Gothic Portugal. The landscape beyond, however, contains snow-capped mountains that recall not only the Alps, but also the giant ridge of the Castilian Sierras that extend into the northern provinces of Portugal in especially high relief. Before the distant range are stretches of terrain with olive trees similar to the vegetation depicted in the background of St. Barbara with her Tower. According to her hagiography, St. Catherine of Alexandria was wed mystically to the Christ Child, who, in the Dresden Triptych sits solidly on the ample lap of his mother. The Virgin Mary displays two ring bands, one which signifies her title as the spouse of the Apocalyptic bridegroom, and the other which denotes Christ’s mystical union with the martyr Catherine. The green branch held in the infant Christ’s left hand has been identified as either a stem of grapes or laurel.113 Grapes were adopted by Prince Duarte Bird Talk X, 6 (June, 1992): 116–21, at 117–118; Ward, “Disguised Symbolism as Enactive Symbolism in Van Eyck’s Paintings,” 24–26 (parrot and bouquet similar to the Alpine Rockcress). 112 Christine E. Jackson, Great Bird Paintings of the World, 2 vols. (Woodbridge,Suffolk; Antique Collector’s Club, 1993), I, The Old Masters, 14–15. Jackson suggests, 15, the ringnecked parakeet was a gift from the Portuguese at the time of Duke Philip’s wedding, and Jan van Eyck may have brought it back from Lisbon in 1429. Had this been the case, it seems strange that he would not have depicted such a marvelous bird before the van der Paele commission. If, on the other hand, the parrot was sent by special envoy from Lisbon with news about Henrique the Navigator’s planned expedition to Tangier, such a gift would have been most appropriate. The feathers of the bird, realistically depicted in subtle tonal gradations, suggest the royal green of the house of Avis. Concerning Prince Henrique’s expeditions to the islands west of Africa and the coast of Guinea, consult Peter Russell, Prince Henry “the Navigator”. A Life (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 2000), 81–134. The sea-faring Portuguese introduced the canary to Europe. 113 Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 131, favors grapes, suggesting they are an Eucharistic compliment to the frame inscription which describes Mary as “the vine.” Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych,” 25, suggest laurel. Regarding

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as a personal device (Fig. 8.115), but an olive branch would be just as feasible in the Dresden Triptych, because clusters of green olives turn black as they ripen. The wood of the olive tree was used in the building of Solomon’s Temple (1 Kings 6:23) and branches formed the booths for the Feast of Tabernacles (Nehemiah 8:15) which fell at the end of the harvest season. In Portugal the olive tree which produces clusters of white flowers recalled the legend of the Visigoth ruler Wamba, whose wooden spear budded as a sign of divine favor at Guimarães (Figs. 8.116–8.117). In 1385 King João I had set out from the town’s Church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira to engage the Castilian troops at Aljubarrota on the feast day of the Assumption, August 15. Olive trees on the sacro monte of Guimarães still surround the castle keep which was begun in 930 on December 4, the feast of St. Barbara. Beside the tower is the Romanesque Chapel of São Miguel where Afonso Henriques I, the nation’s founder, was baptized in 1111. In spring of 1429 Jan van Eyck could have visited the site of Guimarães en route to Santiago de Compostela, the Galician pilgrimage center, whose name means “St. James of the Field of Stars.“ Painted along the frame of the Dresden Triptych, and visible only to the saints portrayed, are lengthy biblical quotations. St. Michael is proclaimed to be the Princeps of the militant angels: This is Michael the Archangel, leader of the angelic hosts, whose privilege it is to grant favors to the people, and whose prayer leads them to the kingdom of heaven. This Archangel Michael is God’s messenger for the souls of the just. By the grace of god, that great Victor has taken his place in heaven [on the side of peace].114

interpretation for grapes, see Eddy de Jongh, “Grape Symbolism in Paintings of the 16th and 17th Centuries,” Simiolus VII: 182–99. 114 See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 386, for the Latin inscription on the frame of the left wing: HIC EST ARCHANGELUS PRINCEPS MILITIAE ANGELORUM CUIUS HONOR PRAESTAT BENEFICIA POPULORUM ET ORATIO PERDUCIT AD REGNA COELORUM, HIC ARCHANGELUS MICHAEL DEI NUNTIUS DE ANIMABUS JUSTIS. GRATIA DEI ILLE VICTOR IN COELIS RESEDIT. A PACIBUS. The translation is from Purtle,

The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 129, who states, note 9, the passage is drawn from the Roman Breviary Office for the September 29 feast day of St. Michael: the Responsory at Matins (nocturne II) up to ad regna caelorum; and the first antiphon of Matins (nocturne III) from Hic Archangelus Michael. She also makes the relevant observation that the last part of the inscription, beginning with the words Gratia dei ille Victor, is not found in liturgy, and

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The inscription of the right panel of “St. Catherine of Alexandria” has been analyzed with regard not only to the undeniable Eucharistic imagery, but also to the analogy given between the “humble” infant, the adult Christ who ascends Calvary, and the Early Christian martyr who forsakes wealth to tread a similar path of suffering and death. The inscription reads: The prudent virgin has longed for the starry throne where she has made her place ready; leaving the world’s threshing floor, she saved the grain for herself by winnowing the chaff. The young girl has been steeped in heavenly learning. Stripped of everything, with sure footsteps, she followed Christ until she was delivered from earthly affairs.115 The inscriptions of the Dresden Triptych are based upon the Office of the Assumption according to the usage of the Church of St. Donatian in Bruges.116 Though Jan van Eyck belonged to the town parish of Sint-Gillis, he was a functionary of the Duke of Burgundy. Therefore, when the artist died about June 23, 1441, he was interred in Sint-Donaas, the traditional burial site of the Counts of Flanders.117 Van Eyck began his splendid therefore, it conceivably “refers more particularly to the donor or to the circumstances of the commission.” 115 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 386, provides the Latin inscription: VIRGO PRUDENS ANELAVIT AD SEDEM SIDEREAM, UBI LOCUM PRAEPARAVIT. LINQUENS ORBIS AREAM, GRANUM SIBI RESERVAVIT, VENTILANDO PALEAM, DISCIPLINUS EST IMBUTA PUELLA COELESTIBUS, NUDA NUDUM EST SECUTA CERTIS CHRISTUM PASSIBUS, DUM MUNDANIS EST EXUTA ECT. This passage also is translated by Purtle, The

Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 129, note 8, who states it derives from the consecutive antiphons at Vespers in the Office for the November 25 feast day of St. Catherine, as recorded according to practice at Sint-Donaaskerk in Bruges. 116 Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 129 with notes 6–8. See her Appendix B, “Office of the Assumption. Usage of the Church of St. Donatian, Bruges,” 187–92 (Bruges, Stadsbibliothek, no. 1528). 117 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 57. Concerning St. Donatian church and the ducal court, consult Édouard de Moreau, “Les Familiers des ducs de Bourgogne dans les canonicats des anciens Pay-bas, Miscellanea Historica in honorem Leonis van der Essen (Brussels: 1947): 429–37; idem., Histoire de l’Église en Belgique, 4 vols. (Brussels: L’Édition Universelle, 1949), IV, L’Église aux Pays-Bas sous les ducs de Bourgogne et Charles Quint, 1378–1559, 70; Rafael de Keyser, “De Kanunnik van der Paele,” 591–92. These references and others concerning Canon van der Paele are given in the useful “Bibliographic Commentary” of Jan van Eyck’s work compiled by Craig Harbison, Jan van Eyck: The Play of Realism (London: Reaktion Books, Ltd., 1991, at 206.

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Madonna of Canon van der Paele in 1434 and completed it in 1436, shortly before his diplomatic voyage on behalf of Duke Philip. Because he drew upon a Breviary of Sint Donaas as the source for inscriptions in two other commissions dated prior to 1436, the Ghent Altarpiece and the Madonna of Chancellor Rolin, he probably had his own personal copy of the prayer book. Such a costly tome might have been a courtly gift, and judging by the manuscript held by George van der Paele, it was sufficiently small in size to have been transported by the artist on his travels. The Dresden Madonna (Fig. 8.118) is a Sedes Sapientiae, and purposefully drawing upon the metaphors of celestial illumination in the Book of Wisdom, Van Eyck removes her from the realm of the civitas terrena to the civitate Dei. … she is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness…. She is more beautiful than the sun, and excels every constellation of the stars. Compared with the light she is found to be superior.” (Book of Wisdom 7:26 and 29).118 Unique to the Northern constellations and circumpolar stars studied by maritime Portugal was a royal house, notably one which centered on Perseus and Andromeda (Fig. 8.119). Apollodorus’s Bibliotheke describing Perseus’ feats in Ethiopia was a remote source for the legendary account of St. George. Renaissance humanists also had linked Catherine of Alexandria to the night sky (Fig. 8.120). Pious legend tells that milk issued from her decapitated head to form the cosmic stars. As suggested by the view of a mountain range in the Dresden Triptych, angels transported her body to Mount Sinai. Due to her wisdom, Catherine also was identified Canopus, the brightest star of Argo Navis located in the portion of the sky constituting “the Sea.” Van Eyck created his St. Barbara with her Tower in the same year as the Dresden Triptych. The seventh-century legend of the virgin-martyr killed by order of the Roman prefect Martinianus perhaps originates in Egypt. Like Catherine of Alexandria, and the knights of Arthurian lore, Barbara was instructed by a holy hermit as a prelude to her acquisition of extraordinary wisdom and passio. She understood the most arcane of divine

118 The Holy Bible. The New Revised Standard Edition. Catholic Edition, 720. See Millard Meiss, “Light as Form and Symbol in Some Fifteenth-Century Paintings,” Art Bulletin XXVII (1945): 175–81.

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mysteries, the concept of the Holy Trinity. Similar to her Alexandrian counterpart, St. Barbara, was extolled as one of the fourteen auxiliary helpers of the Virgin Mary. Due to an homophonic association of her father’s name, Dioscuros, with the Dioscuri adopted by the Roman equites as their patrons, Barbara came to be related to a winter constellation. Situated beside the charioteer Auriga in the night sky, the star cluster of Gemini was regarded by the Portuguese as propitious for navigation. The twins Castor and Pollux were born to Leda by her mystical union with Jupiter in the guise of a swan, a bird important to the English Order of the Garter, associated with the legend of Perceval’s son, and featured in an important heraldic hall of Sintra Palace. Leda’s sons had sailed with Jason’s Argonauts in quest of the Golden Fleece. The historiated capital above the head of Van Eyck’s donor is carved with a military scene of conquest which includes horsemen trampling a lion, emblem of worldly pride. About 4,000 mounted men-of-arms participated in Prince Henrique’s expedition to Tangier. A Setting for an Ex-Voto Triptych: The Chapel of St. Michael in the Lisbon Castle of St. George Van Eyck’s sober grey architecture in the Dresden Triptych has been the focus of study by numerous scholars More recently, Craig Harbison has made the pertinent observation: The adjectives ecclesiastical and palatial have both been applied to the edifice portrayed.… There is a central hall, not too large, only a little wider than the Virgin’s throne. This hall is squared off at the far end, and is surrounded by a subsidiary space, with a roundarched colonnade separating the two areas, and a balcony above. At the points where the donor kneels and St. Catherine stands, other smaller hallways lead off at right-angles from the Virgin’s hall.… The stained-glass windows in the second storey and the statues over the columns in the central space might at first suggest an ecclesiastical setting. But both are also to be found in palatial residences. Perhaps we are in a palace chapel.119

119

Harbison, Jan van Eyck: The Play of Realism, 151.

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The setting of Van Eyck’s triptych may be the palatine Chapel of São Miguel at Lisbon’s Alcáçova Palace (Figs. 8.121–8.122). Describing the architecture of the Dresden Triptych, Uta Neidhardt and Christoph Schölzel state: “The church itself is decorated with many sculptures, some with figures, on the capitals of columns and with a row of small statues of apostles over the abacus.… The columns, the spoils of an earlier edifice, worked from different coloured marbles, create a special accent, separating the aisles from one another.”120 The marble columns with their high cubiform bases are unusual, and they have been related to Constantinian era architecture in Jerusalem by Lotte Brand Philip.121 The concept of displaying statues of apostles on columns beneath individual canopies of honor may be observed at Batalha. The western portal of Santa Maria dates about the same time as the Capela Real of St. Michael which served King João I’s Lisbon Castle of St. George. The Paço had been named for the warrior of Cappadocia whose legend includes theophanies in notable battles: at Jerusalem’s ramparts laid siege by Godefroy de Bouillon and the knights of the First Crusade; and at Puig, where he joined the troops of King Jaime of Aragon against the Moors. With regard to the narrative capitals of the Dresden Triptych (Figs. 8.123– 8.124), probably the best example of such didactic carving can be observed in the Portuguese reliefs of Santa Maria de Celas. Created in the early fourteenth century, the capitals surmount double columns and they illustrate scenes of the life of Christ. Included among the vignettes, however, is the subject of St. James the Major fighting the Moors at Clavijo (834), which suggests the church received the patronage of King Dinis and knights of the Order of Christ. With regard to the column behind the Dresden donor with its ubiquitous imagery of riders on horseback trampling a lion, the relief appears to be an iconographical amalgam of Santiago Matamoros compositions and Romanesque carvings showing the subjugation of beasts. The portal of the Cathedral of Évora (Figs. 8.125–8.126) provides an example of the latter with its flanking statues of the twelve Apostles. Elevated on columns, the Apostles rest their feet upon twelve demons to signify the ultimate triumph of virtue over vice. The town of Évora (Fig. 8.127) in the Alentejo region lies about 130 kilometers south of Lisbon, and known under Roman rule as Liberalitas Julia, the town enclosed by ancient walls, was occupied by the Visigoths and Moors before its 1166 Reconquest. Under Avis rule, the late Gothic citadel became a Neidhardt and Schölzel, “Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych, 25. Lotte Brand Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 109–110. 120 121

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Renaissance center of humanist studies and manuscript illumination. While many of Évora’s historical monuments are extant, João I’s residence no longer stands, but it stood in the vicinity of the Temple of Diana. It may seem difficult to reconcile the supine portrayal of the lion in the Dresden relief above St. Michael because the lion was an intelligible heraldic emblem of both Flanders and Lancaster. However, the same Old Testament “Lion of Judah” resurfaces in an inverted form as the threatening lions of the Persian King Darius (Daniel 6:16–6). Equally, medieval exegetes came to associate the lion who breathed on its young three days after birth with the Resurrection of Christ, yet the same beasts devoured Early Christian martyrs in the arenas of Rome. Lions were embraced as a device by the Nasrids of Granada, as proven by the basin in the Alhambra ”Patio of the Lions,” which Jan van Eyck would have seen in 1429. After taking Tangier, Prince Henrique had intended to establish the citadel as a base of operations for assisting Castile in removing the last remnant of Islam in Andalusia.122 The majority of capitals in the Dresden Triptych are ornamented with acanthus leaves, which are typical of the organic designs of mudéjar architecture. The subjects of the narrative reliefs capping the piers behind the Dresden baldachin are difficult to recognize. Those on the epistle side of the Virgin Mary’s throne have been identified by Erwin Panofsky as two subjects from the Book of Genesis. Nearest the crossing is the “Expulsion from Paradise” and farther to the right is the “Sacrifice of Isaac.” The reliefs of the piers on the gospel side are less distinct. However, the farthest to the back has been identified as “Roman Soldiers.”123 Because the “Genesis” scenes iconographically are linked by their general theme of obedience, the group composition which includes an equestrian may be related to the carvings of the two standing figures belonging to the adjacent pier. The horse is not portrayed in the levade position, and consequently, the warrior is not George who typically was portrayed on a rearing steed. Rather, he might be identified as an equally popular saint in Portugal and a favorite patron of King Duarte, the Roman soldier Martin of Tours. The Dresden relief on the column behind St. Michael hints at the Reconquista which set the stage for the Portuguese expedition to Ceuta in 1415. As in the case of the Ghent “Holy Knights,” the equestrian Martin would be an alter-ego of King Duarte, who authorized a second military invasion at Tangier. Perhaps the adjacent standing “Roman Russell, Henry the Navigator, 144–51. Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966 rpt. of 1st ed. 1953), I, 140. 122 123

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Soldiers” could be identified as the two saints illustrated in the company of the Ghent Martin of Tours, George and Sebastian. Over seventy columns were taken from the Moorish stronghold of Ceuta after the 1415 victory of João I. Several pillars were taken by the monarch’s eldest son Afonso, Count of Barcelos and Duke of Bragança. When his palace was built at Guimarães in the late 1420s, some columns were installed to the sides of his chapel. Presumably, other marble and porphyry adornments from Morocco were dispersed to other residences of the Crown, including the Paço de São Jorge in Lisbon. The eclectic interior of João I’s castle overlooking the Tagus was described in 1571 by Cardinal Alexandrino, who greatly admired the Capela dedicated to St. Michael. If Van Eyck intended in his Dresden Triptych to depict the chapel of Lisbon’s Alcáçova Palace, then his representation of a nave decorated with columns from Ceuta and capped by foliate designs, certainly would enhance the meaning of the work as an ex-voto for a successful campaign to Tangier. The obtuseness of Van Eyck’s narrative reliefs in the Dresden Triptych perhaps stems from the courtly environment of Lisbon where the Avis princes delighted in the arcane, as proven by their exploration of Grail mysticism and fascination with Merlin’s mysteries, Kabbalism and alchemy. Jan’s odd juxtaposition of interiors—the wing compartments which are close to the picture plane and the center hall that shows a distant position for the Madonna throne — is spatially akin to the Ghent Altarpiece’s Apocalyptic “Lamb,” which is the hub of advancing spokes formed by legions of sacred and secular figures. The symbolic jeu de space of the Dresden Triptych has been discussed as a physical and spiritual progression of the donor seeking entry to the Sacred Heart.124 In this regard, the work which is more “private miniature” than “public memorial” contrasts with the Virgin of Autun (1434–1435) commissioned by Nicolas Rolin for Notre-Dame-du-Châstel (Figs. 8.128–8.129). 124 Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism, 143–44, specifically states: ‘The way van Eyck constructs the space of the Dresden Triptych might thus be related to the idea of a litany, or series of supplications, leading toward a goal. It might also suggest some analogy with the structure of Christ’s heart, the rounded side spaces or chambers leading to the main vessel itself…in this devotion [the artist and patron] did not literally follow visual models that included a representation of Christ’s heart. But just as George van der Paele can be said to be concerned with his ecclesiastical compact, and Nicolas Rolin with the crown he will receive as a result of his confession, the Dresden donor can be said to respond to Christ’s challenge, verbally presented in the painting, to learn from his heart.’ A primary devotional source for Van Eyck’s emphasis upon humility, obedience, and heightened spiritual identification with the subject is cited by Harbison, the Devotio Moderna.

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The setting of the Rolin Madonna is unambiguous in that Philip the Good’s important chancellor is revealed to have a privileged audience before the Regina Coeli. A triple arched portico, emblematic of the Holy Trinity, opens to the hortus conclusus of a high dwelling. Beyond the terrace of the sunken garden is an expansive landscape, which notably illustrates vineyards from the seigniorial estates of Rolin. The Romanesque and Gothic sectors of the town, like the bottled and stained glass windows of the inner sanctuary, reinforces the concept of Christ as the Messianic bridge bonding the Old and New Covenants. Rolin’s sumptuous portrait sets into relief the more modest image of the Dresden donor, who, if he indeed was Prince Fernando, preferred to imitate the humble mien of a child venerated by royals as the true “King of kings.” The depiction of the Dresden donor’s hands is critical for the evocation of a mystical “epiphany,” as they neither are held together in prayer nor shown clasping a prayer book. As observed by Craig Garbison, they are “parted in wonder and expectation, invocation and response, more like a litany…”.125 The orans gesture insinuates the notion that Van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych was designed as an ex-voto retable. Fernando’s brothers Pedro and João, but not Queen Dona Leonor, were opposed to Henrique’s plans for the Tangier expedition. Prince João especially addressed the pros and cons of the venture in his paracer, or written opinion

Consult: Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ [Imitatio Christi], translated by Richard Whitford [fl. 1495–1555: translated ca. 1530 as The pype or tonne of the lyfe of perfection], ed. with an introduction by Harold Charles Gardiner (Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1955). Also consult: Regnerus Richardus Post, The Modern Devotion. Confrontation with Reformation and Humanism (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968); Albert Hyma, The Brethren of the Common Life (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1950); idem., The Christian Renaissance. A History of the “Devotio Moderna” (1380–1520) (Grand Rapids, MI: The Reformed Press, 1924; rpt. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1965); Sixten Ringbom, “Devotional Images and Imaginative Devotions: Notes on the Place of Art in Late Medieval Private Piety,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 6, LXXIII (1969): 159–70. Aspects of Devotio Moderna are echoed in the Vita Christi of the Carthusian Ludolph of Saxony (1300–1377), a manuscript admired by the Franciscan spiritualists in Portugal and published by Valentim Fernandes in 1495 as an initiative of Dowager Queen Leonor (1458–1525), the wife of King João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), and a Poor Clare tertiary. See Ludolphus of Saxony, Vita Christi, translated and edited by Sister Mary Immaculate Bodenstedt (Washington, DC: The Catholic university of America Press, 1944); João José Alves Dias, No quinto centenário da Vita Christi: os primeiros impressores alemães em Portugal (Lisbon: Instituto da Biblioteca Nacional e do Livro, Presidência do Conselho de Ministros, Secretaria de Estado da Cultura, 1995). 125 Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism, 143.

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on foreign policy, submitted in 1432 to Duarte and members of the Royal Council. As explained by Peter Russell: Dom Joao began his paper by declaring that the dictates of chivalry and those of prudence were, by definition, opposed to each other.… He then proceeded first to examine Henry’s proposals from the point of view of prudence. His first observation was that such a project could only be financed by imposing the hated special war subsidy on a kingdom whose already hard-pressed commonality would thus have to bear the costs of the enterprise. This raised the question of the justness of a war against the Marinid kingdom.126 Prince João had expounded at length on the righteous cause of the campaign to North Africa and the pursuit of knightly honor. Still, at the end of his opinion he felt that only Duarte could determine a course of action about which the arguments were so evenly divided. Should defeat be the outcome of the venture, the Prince felt that the “sanctity of the intentions of the crusaders” would assure their salvation in death.”127 As Master of the Order of Santiago, João was the lay administrator of one of Portugal’s most important chivalric institutions, and his patron saint, John the Baptist, appears among the Apostles surmounting the Dresden columns. The rainbow-winged St. Michael, God’s warrior-archangel, also is an Apocalyptic weigher of souls and dispenser of divine justice. The cockleshellshaped protective plates of his armour are imposing emblems of St. James the Major, the protector of the knights of Santiago. Other sculptures depicted in the Dresden Triptych allude to chivalric ideals. The front arms of the Virgin’s throne are decorated with copper statues of: the pelican and the phoenix. These age-old symbols of self-mortification and resurrection recall the knightly practice of professing vows upon a bird. They also have an alchemical association with the “philosopher’s stone” and Grail quest. The back of the throne is decorated with the typological subjects of the “Sacrifice of Isaac,” and “David and Goliath.” The story of the young David elicits the chivalric legend of Arthur slaying the Giant of St. Michael’s Mount (Figs. 8.130–8.131), and therefore, the theme has especial relevance for the donor 126 127

Russell, Henry the Navigator, 137: see also 136–41. Russell, Henry the Navigator, 140.

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in the panel who was to win his spurs at Tangier.128 The biblical subject also can be related to the two narrative equestrian capitals of the Dresden Triptych. David had commented to Saul prior to his engagement with the Philistine colossus that he had killed lions while protecting his flock, and Goliath was “as one of them.” Donning armour given to him by Saul, a brass helmet and coat of mail, and girded with a sword, David rejected the equipment, and approaching his enemy stated: “Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield; but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel.” (I Kings 17: 34–45).129 According to the Vita of St. Martin written by Sulpicius Severus and recounted in the Aurea Legenda, the Roman soldier after his baptism fought unarmed in the army of Emperor Julian, professing to be protected “not by shield or helmet” but “with the sign of the cross.”130 Martin’s ideals were embraced by St. Francis of Assisi, who, dispatched the first missionaries of his order to Coimbra. In 1219, the same year the five monks suffered martyrdom in Marrakech, Francis accompanied the crusader Gautier de Brienne to Egypt, where his courage impressed the Sultan Malik al-Kamil. Within a few years the “Soldier of Christ” received the marks of stigmatization at Mount La Verna.131

Philippe Contamine, “L’Ordre de Saint Michel au temps de Louis XI et de Charles VIII,” Bulletin de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France (1976): 212–28. 129 The Holy Bible. Douay Version, Rheims (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1960; rpt. of 1st ed. 1956), Old Testament, Part I, 351–52. 130 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, translated and adapted from the Latin by Granger Ryan and Helmut Ripperger (New York: Arno Press, 1969), 663–64. 131 For general information about the impact of Franciscan spirituality in Medieval Europe see John V. Fleming, From Bonaventure to Bellini: An Essay in Franciscan Exegesis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982; idem., An Introduction to the Franciscan Literature of the Middle Ages (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1977). 128

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an van Eyck created two paintings of the subject of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata (Figs. 9.1–9.2).1 The two versions differ in their size and medium. The Philadelphia St. Francis measures 12.4 x 14.6 cm (4¾ x 5¾ inches) and was painted on vellum attached to a panel, which by dendrochronological examination originated from the same tree as Jan’s portraits of Baudouin de Lannoy and Giovanni Arnolfini, both in the Berlin Staatliches Museum. Executed on panel, the Turin St. Francis was also of a sufficiently small size, 29.2 x 33.4 cm (11¼ x 13⅜ inches) to be termed J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer et al., Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia, PA: exhibition catalogue, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997); K. Bé, Geological Aspects of Jan van Eyck’s ‘Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata,’“ Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 88–96; M.H. Butler, “An Investigation of Two Paintings of ‘The Stigmatization of St. Francis’ Thought to Have Been Painted by Jan van Eyck,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VIII, 8–10 Septembre, 1989, ed. Hélène VerougstraeteMarcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1991): 95–101; idem., “An Investigation of the Philadelphia ‘Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata’,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 28–46; Katherine Crawford Luber, “Annotated Bibliography,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 97–108; idem, “Patronage and Pilgrimage: Jan van Eyck, the Adornes Family, and Two Paintings of ‘Saint Francis in Portraiture,” Philadelphia Museum of Art Bulletin, XCI, No. 386/387 (Recognizing Van Eyck: Spring, 1998): 24–37; Joseph J. Rishel, “I dipinti di Filadelfia e di Torin. Letterat ura e problemi di attribuzione,” Jan van Eyck (1390–c. 1441). Opere a confronto, ed. Carlenrica Spantigati and Joseph J. Rishel (Turin: exhibition catalogue, 1997): 1

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a miniature. Easily transportable, both works have been dated generally circa 1438–40.2 The donor of the Dresden Triptych and Jan’s Francis share a common orans gesture and their physiognomies are so approximate, they could be brothers. At Batalha Monastery Henrique’s tomb (Figs. 9.3–9.4) is the only one of the Avis princes which has a gisant, and notably, his effigy is shown with an orans gesture. Nuno Gonçalves’ Panel of the Monks in the St. Vincent Altarpiece accents the Avis devotion to the crusading ideals of St. Bernard of Clairvaux as King João I and two of his sons are portrayed in the Cistercian habit (Figs. 9.5–9.6). Juxtaposing Nuno’s suggested portrait of Henrique with the Prince’s gisant at Batalha and Jan van Eyck’s St. Francis yields negligible differences. Though Henrique wears a black cap in Nuno’s 45–54; idem., “The Philadelphia and Turin Paintings: The Literature and Controversy over Attribution,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 3–12; Maurits Smeyers, “The Philadelphia-Turin Paintings and the Turin-Milan Hours,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 64–74; F. Ulrix, “Encore une vue de Liège peinte par Van Eyck?,” Bulletin de l’Institut Archéologique Liégeois (Mélanges Georges Hansotte), XCVIII (1986): 419–427, at 421–27; Carlenrica Spantigati, “The Turin Van Eyck ‘Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata’,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 13–27; idem., “’Le stigmate di san Francesco’ della Galeria Sabauda di Torino,“ Jan van Eyck (1390–c. 1441). Opere a confronto ed. Carlenrica Spantigati and Joseph J. Rishel (Turin: exhibition catalogue, 1997): 27–43; idem., “Turin. New Installations at the Galleria Sabauda,” The Burlington Magazine CXXXV (1993): 780–81; L. Meiffret, “L’ermite et la montagne dans l’art médieval XIIIe–XVIe siècles,” La Montagne et ses images de peintre d’Alrésilas à Thomas Cole. Actes de 116e Congrès National des Sociétés Savantes. Chambéry, 1991 (Paris: 1991): 107–51, at 123–24. 2 Charles Sterling,“Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art 33 (1976), 7–82, at 53–54, has argued that the Philadelphia version is a copy, a position which science now is addressing. See J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Some Technical Observations on the Turin and Philadelphia Versions of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia, PA: exhibition catalogue, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997), 51–63; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronological Analyses of the Two Panels of ‘Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata’,” Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997): 47–50. Consult Albert Châtelet, “Un collaborateur de van Eyck en Italie,” Relations Artistiques entre les Pays-Bas et l’Italie à la Renaissance, Études d’histoire de l’art dédiées à Suzanne Sulzberger IV (Brussels-Rome: L’Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 1980): 43–60; idem., “Les enluminures eyckiennes des manuscrits de Turin et de Milan-Turin,” Révue des Arts VII (July–August, 1957): 155–64, who maintains the Philadelphia St. Francis was created by Hand H of the Turin-Milan Hours. Hendrik van Eyck is documented in 1436 to have received payment from the Duke of Burgundy for expenses associated with a “secret mission.” See Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 23 (14l, 2s. “pour aller en aucuns lieux secretz ou

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Panel of the Monks, his hair is brown and sufficiently close in its blunt cut to that of St. Francis, whose mouth reveals a slight overbite. St. Francis of Assisi experienced his vision at forty-three, the approximate age of Henrique the Navigator during the Tangier expedition. Henrique’s effigy at Batalha shows his face at age sixty-six. A closer comparison of the faces of the stone Batalha effigy and Turin St. Francis is informative (Fig. 9.7), as lines formed at the age of forty over the space of twenty-three years would deepen as the skin becomes less supple. The parallel rows of lines on the foreheads are similar, as are the grooves flaring out on both sides of the nostrils and the web of lines radiating from the corners of eyes. Prince Henrique was Grand Master of the Order of Christ at Tomar, where the Templar Charola provided a model of the Holy Sepulchre. The symbol of his knights was the red cross pattée of Jerusalem, where the Sultan of Egypt in 1223 had granted the Franciscans the privilege of being guardians of the most sacred sites of Christendom. Accepting that Jan van Eyck revisited Portugal in late 1436, he probably lingered in Lisbon longer than planned once news was received about the disastrous outcome of the icellui seigneur l’envoya don’t il ne veult aultre declaracion estre faicte.” Hendrik, a falconer in the household of Philip the Good since December 24, 1426, appears to have traveled with Jan van Eyck in 1436. Perhaps the master known as Hand H accompanied the brothers to Portugal. Albert Châtelet has advanced the argument that Hand H was Jan Coene. If he indeed was the son of Jacques Coene – Francisco de Holanda’s “Master Jácome” who transferred to Lisbon from Florence in the company of Abbot Gomes of La Badia Fiorentina about 1425 – perhaps Jan Coene also traveled on the “secret mission” to see his father. The death of “Master Jácome” is recorded as 1439. The dwarf palm or palmetto represented in both versions of the “Stigmatization of St. Francis” is identified in Weale and Brockwell, 96, as the Chamoerops humilis which “grows in Portugal, among other places bordering on the Western Mediterranean.” They cite a study, Prodromus Florae Hispanicae, by the specialists Moritz Willkomm and Lange. See Moritz Willkomm, Die strand- und steppengebiete der Iberischen halbinsel und deren vegetation (Leipzig: F. Fleischer, 1852); idem., Spanien und die Balearen; Reiseerlebnisse und Naturschilderungen nebst wissenschaftlichen Zusätzen und Erläuterungen (Berlin: T. Grieben, 1876); idem., Grundzüge der pflanzenverbreitung auf der Iberischen halbinsel (Leipzig, W. Engelmann, 1896). The rocks of Hand G and Hand H of the Turin-Milan Hours have been studied by Georges Hulin de Loo, Heures de Milan; troisième partie des Très-belles heures de Notre-Dame, enluminées par les peintres de Jean de France, duc de Berry et par ceux du duc Guillaume de Bavière, comte du Hainaut et de Hollande; vingt-huit feuillets historiés reproduits d’après les originaux de la Biblioteca Trivulziana à Milan, avec une introduction historique (Brussels: G. van Oest & cie, 1911), 37. He observed the rocks of Hand G were rendered in gouache, while those of Hand H were more graphically captured with a pen, and colored by washes. The use of colored washes might indicate some training in the painting of linen, a technique supposedly perfected by Jacques Coene.

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Moroccan expedition. He had to have arrived back in Bruges by 1439, as ducal documents in Lille record a reimbursement of 6l. 6s. 6d. to Iohannes van Eicke for his payment to “an illuminator of Bruges who had illustrated a book for the Duke.”3 Following the October 17, 1437 capitulation by Henrique to Salah ben Salah, commander of the garrison of Tangier, the Portuguese were permitted to leave, but only in exchange for the surrender of Ceuta. Henrique also agreed to persuade King Duarte to sign a treaty of peace lasting a hundred years with all Moors of the Barbary coast. To assure the Moroccan commander of his intent to honor the terms, he offered his younger brother Fernando as hostage (Figs. 9.8–9.9). As related by Peter Russell, Salah ben Salah allowed his royal captive to retain his secretary and future biographer Frei João Alvares, his mayordomo, his chief cook, and advisor, João Rodrigues. Fernando and his attendants were transferred to Asilah, thirty miles from Tangier, and from this port the captive Prince was permitted to correspond with the Portuguese court. He also engaged in financial transactions with the Genoese and Spanish merchants. In May of 1438, after waiting several months for the Portuguese to hand over Ceuta, the Moroccan Yaya al-Wattasi Zakariya issued orders to move Fernando to a prison in the capital city of Fez.4 Following the death of King Duarte September 9, 1438, there was a heated dispute between Prince Pedro and Queen Leonor over the regency of the six-year-old heir, Afonso V. Though Pedro was declared regent by the Cortes, he did not surrender Ceuta to secure Fernando’s release. A letter sent by Fernando in the summer of 1441 urged such action and related his intense suffering. The dispatch also informs that Genoese and Majorcan merchants in the Sultanate were owed payment for the loans which had

Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxvii–xxxviii, Document 28 (Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, B1966). The breviary is described as having “272 large letters in gold and 1200 small.” 4 Russell, Henry the Navigator, 184 (retinue of Fernando), 190–1 (move to Fez), 192 (Genoese merchants). See Frei João Álvares, Trautado da vida e feitos do muito vertuoso S.or Infante D. Fernando, ed. Adelino de Almeida Calado in Obras, I, Acta Universitatis Conimbrigensis (Coimbra: Editorial Atlântida, 1960). Russell, 391 note 42, states evidence exists at the time which indicates envoys from Portugal were sent to England, Castile and Aragon to request their diplomatic intervention in securing the release of Fernando. He comments that despite ambassadors sent to Morocco by Juan II of Castile, who threatened commercial sanctions, nothing occurred. Trade was too critical for Aragon to do more than issue a token demand for the prince’s ransom, and Henry VI was distracted by political problems with France. 3

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kept him from starvation.5 Fernando languished in prison another two years before he expired in Fez the summer of 1443. Another aspect of Jan van Eyck’s “Stigmatizations” is the inclusion of Friar Leo as the contemplative and melancholic companion of St. Francis who sits beside a rocky protrusion of La Verna from which water flows. If Jan’s miniatures were executed in Lisbon, and Prince Henrique is cast as a visionary who emulates the example of Il Poverello, perhaps Leo presents a portrait of Prince João (1400–1442), who apparently was devoted to the Friars Minor. This commitment is alluded to in the testament of the Duke of Beja who also had accompanied the expedition to Tangier. His will stipulated that a commemorative retable be created for the chapel in Lisbon marking the birthplace of St. Anthony of Padua. The triptych with its centerpiece panel of the “Virgin and Child” was destroyed in the earthquake of November 1, 1755. Isabel, Duchess of Burgundy, contributed funds from the North to cover the costs. When the Portuguese court of King João VI transferred to Rio de Janeiro in 1807, documents were removed from the Real Biblioteca da Ajuda and taken to Brazil. Combined with materials of diverse periods collectively assembled as Vários pápeis de Portugal is an anonymous manuscript titled “Portraits of the Kings which are in Lisbon” (Retratos de Reis q. Estã e Lxa). Though it appears to be an incomplete listing, folio 127v. mentions Prince João’s altarpiece installed in the Chapel of St. Anthony of Padua which faced the Cathedral of Santa Maria: King Dom João the First of Good Memory is painted in the main altarpiece of St. Anthony at the right hand of the gospel side kneeling dressed in a brocaded houppelande, and kneeling at his feet and also dressed in black is the Prince Dom Fernando who died at Fez, and on the other epistle side the English queen mother of the king [Philippa], these portraits and the one of Dom Duarte were made by the grand painter of this genre who is called do. goose da roza [Nuno Gonçalves?].6 Joaquim António Dias Dinis, O.F.M., “Carta do Infante Santo ao Regente D. Pedro, datada da masmorra de Fez a 12 de Junho de 1441,” Anais da Academia Portuguesa da História, II Série, XIII (1965): 151–74, cited by Russell, 192 and 391 note 44. 6 See Maria Julieta Ruival, “Quem foi o pintor Nuno Gonçalves? I Nuno Gonçalves de Goes. Um Português do Século XV, II Nuno Gonçalves de Goes e seu Irmão Vasco Farinha de Goes. Serão os Pintores Nuno Gonçalves e Grão Vasco?,” Separata, Belle Artes, Nos. 21–22 (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga), 1966, 7–30, at 63–64, gives the transcription: 5

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As pointed out by Richard Vaughan, “There is some evidence that he [Philip the Good] was planning to attack the Turks as early as 1436, but it was not until 1438 that the formation of a Burgundian fleet was begun, and even then the purpose of the carvel, grand nave and other ships, which were constructed at Sluis, Brussels and Antwerp, is far from clear. It seems possible that they were originally laid down by Duchess Isabel for use in a projected Portuguese crusade against Tangier; they were certainly built under the supervision of Portuguese technicians.”7 If Van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych and the Turin painting of St. Francis traveled with Princes Henrique and Fernando to Tangier, could the works have been left with the unfortunate Infante? Could he have relinquished them as payment for his outstanding debts to the Genoese? As indicated by examination of the Dresden Triptych with a microscope, the corner arms of the shutter frames were painted onto the bronze-colored ground. Jan van Eyck may not have been able to complete the shutter frames in time for the Portuguese departure to Africa. Space may have been left to fill in heraldic decoration later, and North Italian masters were especially skilled in illusionistic simulation of metallic surfaces and highlighting. Even employing the latest technological equipment, arms painted circa 1441 would be very hard to distinguish from arms painted in 1437. Van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych can be traced to sixteenth-century Genoa, and it has been associated with the Giustianini family of merchants. Though the Santo Fernando theory is speculative, at least there are cogent reasons, ranging from familial resemblance to chivalric iconography fostered by the Avis court, which justify at least considering the Dresden Triptych as a commission that originated with Portugal. Elrrey Dom J.o o Primm.o de boa memoria esta retratado no altar mor de S. Ant.o a mã dirt.o do euangelho em joelhos vestido e hua oppa de brocado, e aos pes delle esta em joelhos tambe vestido de preto o Inf.e D. fr.ro que morro ‘ Fez, e da outra banda da Epistola a R.a Ingreza molher do d rey, estes retratos e o delrrey Don du.te seu f.o fez hé grã pitor daquelle tpo e se chamava do gooes da roza.” 7 Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 270 and note 2. He cites: R. Degryse, “De admiraals en de eigen marine van de Bourgondische hertogen 1384–1488,” Mededelingen der Akademie van Marine van België XVII (1965): 139–225, at 161–62; idem., “De Bourgondische expedities naar Rhodes, Constantinopel en Ceuta,” Mededelingen der Akademie van Marine van België XVII (1965): 227–52; Pierre-Marie Perret, Histoire des relations de la France avec Venise, 2 vols. (Paris: 1896), I, 324 and note 2; M. Leclercq, La politique navale méditerranéene de Philippe le Bon (Lille: Thesis, Université de Lille, 1958), 16–18; Lille: Archives Départementales du Nord B1966l, f. 253, Die Chroniken der deutchen städte, ed. Historische Kommission bei der bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 37 vols. (Leipzig: 1862–1931), XIII and II (Cologne), 183–4.

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Jan van Eyck’s two paintings of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata have been thought to have belonged to the Adornes family of Bruges. According to the February 10, 1470 will executed by Alselm Adornes (1424–1483) two panels of sinte Fransoys by meester Jans handt van Heyck were to be given to his daughters Margaret and Louise. The testament orders that each of the painting be given small wings (duerkens) with portraits of Anselm and his wife. Describing the works of van Heyck as tavereelkins (little paintings), the will makes certain that they were of a miniature scale.8 No documentation about Van Eyck’s “Stigmatization” paintings exists prior to 1470. However, the Adornes family history may be relevant for the Santo Fernando hypothesis. Though the Adornes line had been established in Bruges more than a century, Anselm appears to have been descended from the Adorno house of Genoa, which comprised bankers and merchants.9 Throughout the fifteenth century, the Genoese Adornos were wealthy, powerful landowners. Considering their commercial interests, it seems reasonable to conjecture that beyond Oppocino Adorno I, the ancestor of Anselm who settled in Bruges in the second half of the thirteenth century, other Genoese Adornos in the fifteenth century either moved to Flanders or kept in touch with familial relations in the North. Attempts have been made to link Jan van Eyck’s Dresden Triptych, a work which has all the hallmarks of a royal commission, with the Adorno family. Because the work has not been traced to the Duke of Burgundy, then why not consider its origin with the dynastic house of his Duchess? The St. Francis miniatures if they were painted in Bruges, should have been a ducal acquisition too, but they apparently were not, despite the documentation that both Philip the Good ardently supported the Friars Alphonse De Poorter, “Testament van Anselmus Adornes, 10 febr. 1470 (n. st.),” Biekorf XXXVII (1931: 225–39. See Noël Geirnaert, “Anselm Adornes and his Daughters: Owners of Two Paintings of Saint Francis by Jan van Eyck?,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 165–70; idem., Het archief van de familie Adornes en de Jeruzalemstichting te Brugge, I: Inventaris (Bruges: 1987), 166; idem., Het archief van de familie Adornes en de Jeruzalemstichting te Brugge II: Regesten van de oorkonden en brieven tot en met 1500 (Bruges: 1989), 96–97, nr. 266; Noël Geirnaert and Ludo Vandamme, Brugge, een verhaal van 2000 jaar (Bruges: Stichting Kunstboek, 1996). 9 [Jean Adorno] Itinéraire d’Anselme Adorno en Terre sainte: 1470–1471, translated by Jacques Heers and Georgette de Groër (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1978); Joseph de Smet, “De reis van Anselmus Adornes naar het H. Land in 1470,” Het Brugs Ommeland XIV (1974): 146–53. 8

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Minor in Burgundy and abroad. Jan’s first “secret mission” in 1425–26 even appears to have comprised pilgrimages on behalf of his lord to Jerusalem as well as famous Franciscan shrines in Italy, including Padua, Assisi and La Verna.10 Duchess Isabel donned a tertiary habit of the Poor Clares when she retired from the court to Mons, where she embraced a life of Franciscan spirituality. Following in the footsteps of the medieval queen, St. Elizabeth of Portugal, her magnanimity to the Poor Clares of Penha Longa at Sintra and the Church of St. Anthony is documented. Regarding the Adornos of Bruges, the argument has been advanced that Jan van Eyck would have known Anselm’s father Peter († 1464), an alderman of the City Council of Bruges in 1432–33, and that he probably also came into contact with Anselm’s uncle Jacob († 1465), a municipal councilor in 1433–1434. A portrait tentatively identified as Peter Adornes has been attributed to the hand of Van Eyck’s disciple Petrus Christus.11 (Fig. 9.10) This likeness, as well as a later Dutch engraving of the Genoese merchant, reveal a sitter with a distinctive cleft chin. Generous benefactors of Carthusian monasteries, the brothers Peter and Jacob co-founded the Franciscan “Jerusalem Chapel” in Bruges 12 (Fig. 9.11–9.13). While Peter and Jacob moved within the orbit of Philip the Good, Jan’s official appointment and status as court painter may have prohibited his being employed without ducal sanction. If he did work for Peter or Jacob Adorno, the most obvious date for such patronage would have been in 1432, when the burgomasters of Bruges and council members visited his workshop.13 Another opportunity might have been in 1435, the year municipal archives describe his activity at the Town Hall: 10 J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, et al., Jan van Eyck: Two Paintings of Saint Francis receiving the Stigmata (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1997). 11 Maryan W. Ainsworth, Petrus Christus, Renaissance Master of Bruges, with contributions by Maximilian P.J. Martens (New York-Ghent: exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Ludion Press, 1994), Catalogue No. 16, 154–57. 12 Marc Boone, Marianne Danneel and Noël Geirnaert, “Pieter IV Adornes (1460– ca. 1496): Ein Brugs patriciërin Gent,” Handelingen der Maatschappij voor Geschiedenis en Oudheidkunde te Gent, N.R. XXXIX (1985): 123–47; Noël Geirnaert, “De Adornes en de Jeruzalemkapel. International contacten in het laatmiddeleeuwse Brugge,” in Noël Geirnaert and André Vandewalle, Adornes en Jeruzalem. Internationaal leven in het 15de-en 16de-eeuwse Brugge (Bruges, 1983): 10–49. 13 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxv, Document 18 (Bruges: Town Archives): “gratuity of 3l. parisis given to the apprentices of Iohannes van Heyck when the burgomasters of Bruges and some members of the council went to see certain works.”

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Payment of 30l to meester Ianne van Eick for painting and gilding six statues and the tabernacles in which they stand, adorning the front of the Town-House, and of 3l. 2s. g for overwork on the same.” 14 However, the St. Francis miniatures technically have been dated closer to Jan’s 1436 “secret mission” than to the recorded period of service by the Adornos on the City Council of Bruges. Postulating that Jan’s two versions of St. Francis provides a metaphorical likeness of the same individual, both portraits of the holy poverello lack a cleft chin and both display many more facial lines, particularly in the area of the forehead. Neither the Petrus Christus Portrait of a Man nor the Jode engraving of Peter Adornes shows a man with an overbite. On the contrary, the lips are shaped full and also are evenly formed. In the equilibrium of weights used to determine the nature of the St. Francis commissions, the stylistically late date serves to tip the scale more heavily on the side of Portugal than Burgundy. Though it may be impossible to prove the Lisbon-Tangier-Genoa diaspora of Jan’s paintings, no records exist to support the position that the St. Francis miniatures or the Dresden Triptych were actual commissions by Italian patrons in Bruges. Additionally, recent investigations of Eyckian influence in Spain and Portugal have concerned several variations upon the “Stigmatization of St. Francis” theme15 (Fig. 9.14–9.15). They are sufficient in number in the kingdom of Aragon to substantiate that a replica of Jan van Eyck’s composition for a time was owned by Joan Reixach, court painter to Juan II, successor in 1458 to Alfonso V (1416–1458). According to Reixach’s testament of 1448 he possessed an oak panel of “St. Francis painted in oil” by the “hand of Johannes” which he purchased in Valencia for fifteen

Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxvii, Document 26 (Bruges: Town Archives). The payment was given sometime between January and September 29, when Jan received six silver cups from Philip the Good marking the baptism of his child. 15 José Gómez Frechina, “Algunas pautas flamencas en la pintura valenciana del siglo XV,” Fernando Benito Doménech and José Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos (Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo de Bellas Artes de Valencia, 2001, with an English translation), 63–103, especially 63–76 (“Claves Eyckianas en torno a la iconografía de la estigmatización de San Francisco”). Also consult in the same exhibition catalogue: Catalogue No. 1: “Jan van Eyck, San Francisco recibiendo los estigmas,” Philadelphia, Philadelphia Museum of Art, John G. Johnson Collection, 106–117 (Katherine Crawford Luber); Catalogue 2: “Maesro de la Porciúncula, San Francisco recibiendo los estigmas,” Castellón, Convento de Capuchinas, 118–123 (José Gómez Frechina). 14

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libras.16 Reixach painted his own variations of the theme, as did the artists of the Osuna family and the Master of the Porciuncula. The Prado Museum houses a Stigmatization of St. Francis (Fig. 9.16) by the Master of Hoogstraten, an anonymous artist from Holland who worked in Bruges before working with Quentin Massys in Antwerp about 1500. Dated about 1495, the painting which is thought to illustrate the town of Dinant in the distance, suggests that workshop replicas after Jan’s modelli circulated in Flanders. Two of these versions likely were acquired by the Adornes family, as the Jan’s Turin St. Francis was bequeathed by Joan Reixach to one of his best patrons, the Carthusian Andreu Garcia († 1452). The ecclesiastic never benefited from the gift as Reixach outlived his friend, dying in 1486. Thereafter, Reixach’s his family may have relinquished the picture to a clergyman as eventually the work was purchased from a cleric of Casale Monferrato by Feletto Canavese, who in 1866 sold it to the Sabauda of Turin. The Philadelphia miniature (Fig. 9.17) painted on parchment and attached to an oak panel has an even more critical association with the Iberian Peninsula. It was purchased in Lisbon between 1824 and 1828 by the English ambassador Lord William à Court, later Lord Heytesbury, whose family owned it until 1894 when it was purchased by John G. Johnson. If Francis provides an allegorical portrait of Prince Henrique as has been proposed, then plausibly the Master of the Order of Christ kept the 16 Luis Cerveró y Gomis, Pintores Valentinos. Su cronologia y documentación (Valencia: Anales del Centro de Cultura Valenciana, 1964), 106–7, provides the passage pertaining to the panel of St. Francis owned by Reixach and mentioned in the artist’s testamentaria of 1448: “Item com yo haja una taula de pintura de la historia com Sent Francesch reb les plagues, acabada ab oli de la ma de Johannes, la qual yo compri en Valencia per preu de XV litures de moneda de Valencia, vull que aquella romangua en poder del dit mossen Andreu Guarcia, de tota la sua vida. E aprés obte de aquell, sia venuda e torne a la mia herencia, aquella, e, o, lo que proechira daquella. Eleix, do e asigne en tudor e curador als dits fills meus e filla e bens daquells e daquella, lo dit mossen Andreu Garcia.” The above text is cited by Gómez Frechina, “Algunas pautas flamencas en la pintura valenciana del siglo XV,” 68, who conjectures Reixach’s panel was one of the two versions of St. Francis in Philadelphia and Turin. The document’s mention of the oil technique is significant. Regarding Jan van Eyck and his use of oil pigments, see: Ashok Roy, “Van Eyck’s Technique: The Myth and the Reality, I, “The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 97–100; Raymond White, “Van Eyck’s Technique: The Myth and the Reality, II,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 101–105.

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Philadelphia miniature in Lisbon but took the Turin St. Francis to Morocco. When Henrique was forced to leave Fernando in captivity, the Turin painting might have remained with the hapless Prince, who ultimately was forced to sell his belongings to survive. Genoese merchants could have taken the Turin work to Valencia, where Joan Reixach had the opportunity to purchase the painting for a considerable sum. Due to the fact that Reixach was a prosperous master of Aragon, it is probable that the work stayed in Spain until his death in 1486. The provenance of the Philadelphia St. Francis in Portugal is unknown before its sale to Lord Heytesbury. Because it escaped destruction by the earthquake of 1755, the picture must have been kept in an Avis residence outside of Lisbon. Another Portuguese Prince participated in the Tangier expedition, Prince João, Duke of Beja. Recent opinion speculates that the Eykian drawing of St. Christopher in the Louvre (Fig. 9.18) was created about the same time as the Philadelphia Stigmatization of St. Francis.17 Because the July 25 feast day was shared by St. Christopher and St. James the Major, perhaps Jan van Eyck intended to paint a devotional work for Prince João, who sailed to Tangier as Master of the Order of Santiago. St. Christopher was venerated by knights of the Order of Christ at Tomar, as demonstrated by the thirteenth-century fresco in the Romanesque Charola which Jan plausibly studied in 1429. Prior to his death in Bruges, Jan might have sketched the design for painting of St. Christopher, due to the fact that an artist in his workshop patently created the Philadelphia St. Christopher after an Eyckian modello (Fig. 9.19). Prince João died in 1442, and news of his death would have been communicated to the Portuguese Nation’s House in the Convent of Dominicans (Chapel of Santa Cruz) and to Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. Despite the zeal of Henrique and the enthusiasm of Princes João, Prince Pedro had thought his older brother’s expedition to be ill-conceived. In a rare Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” 53–55. Ann Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art LXVIII (1981): 86–119, at 106, states: “Whereas the Eyckian archetype for a St. John the Baptist is still missing, the one for St. Christopher is likely preserved in an Eyckian drawing in the Louvre. There are certain intriguing similarities between this drawing and the Cleveland Baptist, such as the physiognomy with high cheekbones, the mass of dark hair, and the beard. Note, also, the familiar treatment of St. Christopher’s intense grip on the walking stick and his long, upright thumb. Each figure reveals its author’s admiration for the severity and archaic stance of Eyckian figures, although the artist of St. Christopher exaggerated these aspects and the painter of the Baptist softened them.” 17

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instance of agreement — as within two years a widowed Leonor would clash with Pedro over the issue of regency — Duarte’s queen attempted to dissuade her husband from combat in Morocco. Divisiveness notwithstanding, all members of the royal family were agreed that such an engagement would provide an ideal opportunity for Fernando, the youngest son of João I and Philippa, to earn his knightly spurs. With this chivalric goal in mind and the expectations of a dynastic house to succeed in their crusade to Tangier, Jan van Eyck’s polemical Stigmatization of St. Francis and St. Christopher might be considered ex-voto themes which uniquely reflects the aspirations of Portugal circa 1436–37. Prince Pedro, the Kingdom of Aragon and St. George the Dragon Slayer Giorgio Vasari in his vita of the artist Antonello da Messina (1568) comments: Certain Florentines, who traded between Flanders and Naples, sent to Alfonso I of Naples a panel with many figures painted in oil by Johann, which became very dear to that King, both for the beauty of the figures and for the novel invention shown in the colouring, and all the painters in that kingdom flocked together to see it, and it was consummately extolled by all.18 The subject of this picture remains elusive, but on behalf of Alfonso V, the baile (judge) Pere Garro on June 25, 1444 acquired a painting on oak panel by “mestre Johannes lo pintor del illustre duch de Burgunya” of “Saint George riding a horse” in Valencia from Johan Gregori. The merchant had obtained the work on the Bruges market soon after Jan’s death in 1441.19 The municipal Book of Accounts indicate Garro’s intent to dispatch the painting to the Palace of Castel Nuovo in Naples.20 Once 18 Andres Beyer, “Princes, Patrons and Eclecticism, Naples and the North,” The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530, ed. TillHolger Borchert (London: Thames & Hudson, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges, 2002), 118–127, at 119. 19 José Sanchis y Sivera, Pintores Medievales en Valencia (Barcelona: Tip. l’Avenc: Massó, Casas & Ca, 1914); see reprint (Valencia: 1930), 114. 20 Sanchis y Sivera, Pintores Medievales en Valencia (1930 ed.), 114. The purchase price for 2000 soldi reyals is recorded in the accounts of the Bailia.

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installed in Alfonso V’s residence, Jan’s equestrian portrait of St. George was replicated by Colantonio before its destruction by fire in 1504. The picture’s measurements are recorded in the town ledgers of 1444 as 85 x 63 cm (2´ 9 7/16˝ x 2´ 13/16 ˝). In his correspondence of 1524 Pietro Summonte mentions a Flemish painting of St. George which Colantonio copied and he relates it was fifty-three centimeters square.21 His description apparently did not take into account the size of the frame, which must have been capped by a carved panel measuring 32 by 10 cm. Summonte additionally observed an Eyckian trait, the reflection of the dragon in the armour of the left leg of St. George.22 Among the artists of the Crown of Aragon who assimilated Eyckian style, Pere Nisart (Niçart) painted St. George slaying a Dragon (Fig. 9.20), and his painting has an incredibly detailed landscape with a multitude of figures populating the town and shore.23 The icon is Nisart’s only documented surviving work, but to have received the commission, he must have been an established master. His contract to paint an altarpiece for the Chapel of St. Anthony of Padua on Mallorca in 1468 was negotiated with a municipal cofradía. The brotherhood of St. George, composed of tradesmen who were wool-workers, tanners and shoemakers, specified that Nisart would paint the centerpiece and banco (predella), while another artist, Rafel Moger, was to complete the flanking narrative panels (Fig. 9.21). The subsidiary panels manifest a crowding of figures and compacting of architectural elements which accord with conventional Aragonese retables of the late fifteenth century. As his name implies, Nisart’s place of origin may have been the southern French port of Nice, and if so, his formulative years could have been in Provence within the orbit of Barthèlemy d’Eyck. The court painter and miniaturist of René d’Anjou (1409–1480) is best known for his Aix Annunciation Triptych of 1443–45, and his oeuvre 21 Summonte’s March 20, 1524 letter to Marcantonio Michiel. See Fausto Nicolini, L’Arte Napoletana del Rinascimento e La Lettera di Pietro Summonte a Marcantonio Michel (Naples: 1925), 162. 22 See Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 231 and Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 198, who cite Casellas, “La Novela den Sanpere,” IX, Veu de Catalunya (Barcelona: 1906). 23 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 rpt. of 1953 edition, Harvard University ), II, Plate 272. See also Roberto Weiss, “Jan van Eyck and the Italians,” Italian Studies XI (1956): 1–15 and XII (1957): 7–21, at 11–12.

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reveals undeniable familiarity with the art of both Jan van Eyck and Robert Campin.24 Generally dated 1468–79, Nisart’s centerpiece St. George slaying a Dragon rationally depends upon either Jan van Eyck’s original painting or the Colantonio copy. Naples was a magnet which drew foreign artists and the Provençal master might easily visited the Castel Nuovo (Fig. 9.22) if for no other reason than to see the works in progress by the architect Guillerm Sagrera (1380–1456) and other teams of artisans.25 When Alfonso V died in 1458, his brother Nicole Reynaud, “Barthélemy d’Eyck avant 1450,” Revue d’Art LXXXIV (1989): 22–43; Michel Laclotte, “Rencontres franco-italiennes du milieu du XVe siècle,” Acta Historiae Artium XIII (1967): 33–41; Charles Sterling, Enguerrand Quarton: le peintre de la Pietà d’Avignon, with documents verified by Nicole Reynaud and Michel Hayez (Paris: Ministère de la Culture, Editions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1983); Hans Devisscher, “Italiaanse en Frase primitieven in Vlaams openbaar bezit,” Openbaar Kunstbezit in Vlaanderen XXIII (1985): 43–78, at 66–70; B. Hochstetler Meyer, “Reexamination of the Aix Annunciation Triptych: Style and Iconography, Koninklijk Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Bulletin XXX–XXXIII, Nos. 1–3, 1981–1984 (1986): 9–32; J. Boyer, “Nouveaux documents sur le triptyque de l’Annonciation d’Aix,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXXVII , No. 106 (1985): 189–94. Albert Châtelet, Robert Campin. Le Maître de Flémalle. La fascination du quotidien (Antwerp: Fons Mercator Paribas, 1996), 256–69, 326–27, gives the history of scholarly opinion on the work, discusses the heraldic arms, and suggests a viable alternate author for the Aix Annunciation, the painter Arnoul de Cats. Also see Albert Châtelet, “Pour en finir avec Barthélemy d’Eyck,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXL, No. 131 (1998): 199–220, at 204–5 for Arnoul de Cats; idem., “A propos du panneau du Maître de l’Annonciation d’Aix, Koninklijk Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Bulletin (Miscellanea Philippe RobertsJones), XXXIV–XXXVII, Nos. 1–3, 1985–1988 (1989): 39–48; Albert Lecoy de la Marche, Le Roi René: Sa Vie, son administration, ses travaux artistiques et littéraires d’après les documents inédits des archives de France et d’Italie, 2 vols. (Paris: Firmin-Didot frères, fils et cie, 1875; and rpt. 1879); idem., Les relations politiques de la France avec le royaume de Majorque, 2 vols. (îles Baléares, Roussillon, Montpellier, etc.) (Paris: E. Leroux, 1892). 25 Ferdinando Bologna, Napoli e le rotte mediterranee della pittura: da Alfonso il Magnanimo a Ferdinando il Cattolico (Naples: Società napoletana di storia patria, 1977), 91–96. Consult Angerio Filangieri, “Le Castel Nuovo de Naples,” L’Europe des Anjou. Aventure des Princes Angevins du XIIe au XVu Siècle (Paris: Somogy Éditions d’Art, 2001), 66–71; Riccardo Filangieri di Candida, Castel Nuovo, reggia agioina ed aragonese di Napoli (Naples: 1934); idem., Rassegna critica delle fonti per la storia di Castel Nuovo (Naples: 1930– 39); idem., Relazione sull’isolamento e sui restauri di Castel Nuovo (Naples: 1940). Guillem Sagrera, master of works and an engineer from Mallorca, supervised the team of sculptors who carved the “Triumphal Arch” entrance of Istrian marble which was flanked by two towers on the northern façade (1447–1460s). See George L. Hersey, The Aragonese Arch at Naples, 1443–1475 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973). The palatine chapel of St. Barbara, decorated by Giotto’s workshop ca. 1307–11, is the only intact section of the Angevin castle. 24

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King Juan II of Navarre inherited Aragon and Sicily. Naples, however, went to Alfonso’s illegitimate son Ferrante (1431–1494). In 1465 Ferrante was installed as a knight of the English Order of the Garter, though insignia were sent to him as early as 1463. Ferrante’s reception into the chivalric institution would have been celebrated at the Castel Nuovo with festivities and tourneys that called upon the talent of skilled designers and craftsmen. Setting aside speculations about circumstances which may have induced Nisart to visit Naples, there is the visual evidence of the panel he painted about 1468–70 for the brotherhood in Mallorca. It presents an atypical landscape in lieu of a gold ground favored in Aragonese commissions. The broad panoramic vista has a surfeit of splendid genre vignettes and recedes in atmospheric perspective from the rocky foreground to the shoreline of a harbor and beyond to the distant sea. Nisart accurately depicted the Bay of Palma protected by the Puig Mayor range, the seafront buildings, as well as the routes around the town. However, other works by his hand are lacking to prove his technical expertise and creativity. Nisart’s fidelity to a lost Eyckian St. George will never be proven without further documentation or the discovery of a contemporary drawing. Even so, his dependency upon a source in Naples seems likely. The Balearic Islands were controlled by the Kingdom of Aragon (Figs. 9.23–9.24) and Mallorca’s port of Palma was well situated for Mediterranean commerce between Genoa, Naples, Sicily and Valencia.26 From Barcelona, 143 miles from the mainland, a modern steamer reaches Mallorca in about twelve hours. The trip is longer from Valencia (161 miles) and Alicante (149 miles), and ships departing from those centers traditionally would stop at Ibizia. Jan van Eyck would have had the opportunity to visit Palma in 1427. Philip the Good’s ambassadors traveled to Barcelona before meeting with Alfonso V in Valencia, and presumably when negotiations floundered, they

Charles Verlinden, et al., València, un mercat medieval , ed. Antoni Furió (Valencia: Diputació Provincial de València, 1985) Jacques Heers, The Balearic Islands, English version edited by Mrs. H.S.B. Harrison (Geneva-New York: Nagel Publishers, 1961); Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, The Problem of a Catalan Mediterranean Empire 1229–1327 (London: Longman, 1975); Spain and the Mediterranean in the Later Middle Ages: Studies in Political and Intellectual History (Aldershot-Hampshire, GB-Burlington, VT: Ashgate Variorum, 2003); idem., et al, Cultura i història a Mallorca, Menorca i Eivissa (Barcelona: Curial, 1976). Maria Barceló i Crespí and Gabriel Ensenyat i Pujol, with an introduction by Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, Els nous horitzons culturals a Mallorca al final de l’Edat Mitjana (Palma, Mallorca: Edicions Documenta Balear, 2000). 26

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returned along the same route. Knowing that their diplomatic mission was unsuccessful, the Burgundians may have sailed to Mallorca for the specific reason of making a pilgrimage on behalf of the Duke. Such an act of devotion would have at least justified the expense of the journey. The Catalan scholar and mystic Ramón Llull (1232–1316) was born on Mallorca (Fig. 9.25). He had served King Jaime I of Aragon and taught at Montpellier before leaving for North Africa as a Franciscan missionary.27 Voyaging to Tunis in 1293 and Bugía (Algeria) in 1307, he spent time in Sicily (1313–14) before returning to Tunis in 1314–15. Imprisoned in Bugía, he died a martyr’s death by stoning. Llull’s first contacts with Islam occurred on Mallorca between 1264–1269, where he expounded about Muslim culture and faith in The Book of the Noble and the Three Wise Men (El Libre del Gentil e los Tres Savis, 1270), only one of countless treatises he wrote reflecting the influence of Augustinian theology (Fig. 9.26). Franciscan Llullists in Aragon and Portugal circulated Ramón’s teachings, notably a cosmological manual on chivalry used for the education of young knights. The indented harbour of Palma on the southwest coast of Mallorca, lies at the base of a hill. As depicted in an engraving of the seventeenth century (Fig. 9.27), the coastal line seen from the south was dominated by a chain of towers belonging to several parish churches enclosed by high walls. The most important city gates were the Puerta de Santa Catalina and the Puerta de los Dragones, or St. George’s Gate. The old Moorish fortress of Palma was converted by the kings of Mallorca into a palace during the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries (Figs. 9.28–9.30). Called La Almudaina, it still stands with its sandstone masonry and picturesque double porticoes overlooking the harbour. Nisart provides an identifiable view of the Alcázar 27 Sebastián Garcias Palou, Ramón Llull y el Islam (Palma de Mallorca: Graficas Planisi, 1981); Edgar Allison Peers, A Life of Ramón Lull , translated from an anonymous Catalan manuscript of about 1311 (London: Burns, Oates & Wasbourne Ltd., 1927); idem., Fool of Love. The Life of Ramon Lull (London: S.C.M. Press Ltd., 1946); Ramon Lull. A Biography (New York: B. Franklin, 1969); Miquel Batllori and Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, Vida de Ramón Llull: les fonts escrites i la iconografia coetànies (Barcelona: Associació de Bibliòfils de Barcelona, 1982); Jesús García Pastor, Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth and Lorenzo Pérez Martínez, Manuscritos lulianos de la Biblioteca Pública de Palma (Barcelona: Biblioteca Balmes, 1965); Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, Ramon Llull i el naixement del lul·lisme, ed. Albert Soler, with the collaboration of Anna Alberni and Joan Santanach (Barcelona: Curial Edicions Catalanes, Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 1998); Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, Ramón Lull and Lullism in Fourteenthcentury France (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971); Miguel Cruz Hernández, El pensamiento de Ramón Llull (Madrid: Fundación Juan March-Editorial Castalia, 1977).

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of Palma and its seafront environs. He illustrates the fortified walls of the castle, with its crenellated towers, arcaded balconies, bipartite windows and courtly inhabitants. Absent in Nisart’s perspective is the primary entrance and inner patio of the Gothic residence, as well as its private Moorish gardens and baths (Figs. 9.31–9.32), which Jan van Eyck would have visited, in addition to the Capilla de Santa Ana (Figs. 9.33–9.35), a palatine chapel begun during the Romanesque period. The Burgundian diplomats would have resided at La Almudaina, where the appearance of several Late Gothic chambers has been preserved (Fig. 9.36). Nisart truly gives a precise topographical layout of the Palma harbour looking south with the fifteenth-century muelle (jetty) (Figs. 9.37–9.38). Sailors unload goods from diverse vessels near the Llotja. The commercial exchange on the west side of the bay now is landlocked. During the fifteenth century it had a quay which was surrounded by water and the old jetty then did not extend so far into the bay. Nisart illustrates a two-storied tower near Palma’s windmill which functions as a commercial exchange. However, it is not the famous Llotja erected by Guillem Sagrera (Fig. 9.39), the same architect responsible for Alfonso V’s “Great Hall” in the Castel Nuovo. The late fourteenth-century Llotja has the aspect of a Gothic keep with its four corner defense turrets though its militaristic aspect is softened by tall arched windows with stone traceries. Around the roof is a parapet with merlons and a pierced gallery for sentries and archers. A winding tower staircase connects the walkway with the cross-vaulted interior. Pointed arches supported by six spiral fluted piers divide the space into three sections. Patronized by the merchants, the Gothic Chapel of San Juan was dedicated to St. John the Baptist, the patron of wool-workers, and it adjoined the garden of La Llotja to the northeast. In the vicinity of the Llotja is the Church of the Holy Cross. This structure must be the Franciscan hermitage with a tiled roof that Nisart depicts (Figs. 9.40–9.41). The ermita de Santa Cruz patently alludes to Ramón Llull presence on the island of Mallorca, as the monk is portrayed welcoming disciples to an austere life of Franciscan spirituality. The Calle de la Marina that forms the northern projection of Palma’s jetty is the main avenue joining the Llotja and the castle of La Almudaina, with its entrance opposite the western portal of the Cathedral. Situated on the east side of the bay, the Cathedral (El Seo), the see of a bishop, was begun in 1230 by Jaime I of Aragon (Figs. 9.42–9.44). Slender columns separate the vaulted nave (328´ x 131´) and its side aisles (33´ wide) which date about 1380. Nisart shows the immense Seo with its buttressed walls but the massive bell tower

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on the northern side which resembles a castle keep was never capped. The southern portal of the Cathedral was a mirador unto the bay. Nisart appears to have included other important churches in Palma (Figs. 9.45–9.47) which are situated to northeast of the Alcázar on the Plaza de Cort, and which boasted fine bell towers which can be seen in the artist’s perspective. Santa Eulalia was raised concurrent with the Cathedral, and San Nicolau was a parish church of merchants. San Francisco, dating between 1281 and 1317, was substantially remodeled during the seventeenth century, though it retains its old cloister (Figs. 9.48–9.49). Llull’s tomb is situated in the Gothic church apse within the first ambulatory chapel on the left side. Created by Guillem Sagrera, the sepulchre is surmounted by a fifteenthcentury alabaster statue. Beyond the city walls in Nisart’s landscape are many winding roads and throughout the terrain called the Huerta de Palma are villas and country houses with several species of trees (Figs. 9.50–9.51). The orange, palm, olive and apricot trees signify Mallorca’s reputation as a major supplier of produce to Northern Europe. About one and a half miles to the west of Palma near the village of El Terreno is the Castillo de Bellver (Figs. 9.52–9.54), the summer residence of the old Kingdom of Mallorca (1276–1349). Rising 370 feet above sea level, the thirteenth-century castle on a hill above the Bay of Palma was erected by Jaime II. The estate has an unusual circular design for defense. Three crenellated towers were built into the main walls of a central arcaded courtyard, and united to a fourth by means of a high parapet. Nisart illustrates the Bellver Castle in his panoramic view of Parma. Had Jan van Eyck visited Mallorca in 1427 as proposed, Nisart’s expansive and informative vista is precisely the type of landscape he would have sketched. Nisart’s St. George in full armour is a commanding warrior, and the livery of his white steed would have been admired by a brotherhood whose members were tanners, shoemakers, and wool-workers. Medieval society interpreted the chaste virgin rescued by George as a human equivalent to the sheep sacrificed to appease the appetite of the dragon, and the Late Church conflated her identity with that of Margaret of Antioch (Figs. 9.55– 9.56), a saint frequently portrayed as a shepherdess. With her cascading long honey-blonde hair, Nisart’s Princess accords with the Eyckian type of female beauty emulated by artists in Aragon. Aragonese and southern Italian artists frequently depicted the dragon as a fanciful winged creature. Nisart’s beast resembles a plump lizard. Would Jan van Eyck have veered towards an imaginary beast? Might not his Flemish predisposition towards

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naturalism resulted in a more realistic antagonist? This small point might be overlooked, but only a master with Jan’s penchant for detail would depict an animal in the final death throes. The dragon is portrayed in the act of turning on its back with its legs in the air. This macabre touch is equiposed by the graphic representation of a skull, part of a spinal cord and ribs, and other bones scattered on the rocky ground, still life which hints at human as well as animal offerings. Looking beyond St. George to the main entrance gate of Palma’s walls (Figs. 9.57–9.58), are several warriors, one of whom is in full armour and he stands beside a companion wearing spurs and brandishing a shield decorated with the rampant lion of Flanders. In front of the defenders of the citadel is a bearded rider in Arabic turban and robes who gallops on a brown horse in the direction of St. George. Pere Nisart’s painting is proposed as the best replica after Jan van Eyck’s St. George and the Dragon, but unfortunately, it is just that, a copy. The original, with Jan’s subtle tonalities, atmospheric rendering of vistas, and light reflections on water, must have astounded all who beheld it after its arrival to the Castel Nuovo. So if the painting for the Brotherhood of St. Anthony is a fairly close approximation of a lost masterwork, why would Jan have painted a landscape with St. George silhouetted against a backdrop of Palma? Jan’s picture was obtained on the Bruges market after his death, so presumably it came from his home. He might have painted the work as a personal souvenir of his diplomatic mission and to record his pilgrimage to the tomb and dwelling places of Ramón Llull. Political circumstances also may have dictated the commissioning of the picture of St. George spearing the Dragon. Before addressing this issue, however, another work merits scrutiny to bolster the proposition that Jan van Eyck indeed visited the Balearic Island of Mallorca. Jan’s New York Last Judgment (Fig. 9.59) contains a Gloria with an Apocalyptic Christ displaying the wounds of his Passion before the heavenly elect and above a horrific scene of Hell. His diptych panel and even a few aspects of the Ghent Altarpiece appear to reflect the influence of frescoes by the Florentine artist Nardo di Cione († 1365/66) (Fig. 9.60). Commissioned as a memorial for Rosello Strozzi in the family chapel of Santa Maria Novella, Cione’s wall paintings of 1354–1359 concern the interrelated subjects of the Last Judgment, Paradise and the Inferno.28 Evelyn Welch, Art in Renaissance Italy. 1300–1500 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997; rpt. 2000), 11–13. She also states that the predella contains three narrative paintings: 28

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Rosello’s son Tommaso Strozzi, contracted with Andrea di Cione (Orcagna), Nardo’s brother, to complete the altarpiece of Christ in Majesty with Saints, which he painted in 1354–57. He also probably designed the stained glass of the “Madonna and Child” venerated by St. Thomas Aquinas, the patron saint of Tommaso and the Dominican church of Santa Maria Novella. Whether Jan traveled to Italy on behalf of Philip the Good in 1425–26 remains an unresolved issue. The Strozzi murals were a source for the Last Judgment of Miguel Alcañiz (Figs. 9.61–9.62), an Aragonese disciple of the Florentine Gherardo Starnia, who visited Toledo in 1393 and worked in Valencia between 1395 and 1401.29 Dated in the early 1400s, Alcañiz’s Last Judgment is thought to have been commissioned for a church in Miramar, a village on the northwest side of Mallorca. The early thirteenth-century Ramón Llull had dwelled in a small monastery on Mallorca’s Puig de Randa, a mountain in the hilly region east of Palma near Lluchmayor. His primary retreat, however, was a Franciscan monastery in Miramar, and this institution likely was the destination of Alcañiz’ retable.30 A Carthusian monastery was founded in Valldemosa three miles northwest of Miramar, and to the northeast Pollença, where a pilgrimage chapel with a Gothic image of Christ which was built at the summit of a steep hill called “El Calvari.” Alcañiz’ vertical altarpiece contains royal portraits, two of whom might be identified as Jaime II and Jaime III, the kings of Mallorca respectively in 1276 and 1324.31 Their alabaster tombs are in the Capella de la Trinitat of the Palma Cathedral built as a mausoleum in 1329. The crown of Mallorca was absorbed by Aragon about 1325. Jan’s New York Last Judgment is undeniably close to Alcañiz’ retable, though his spatial arrangement of the the Mass of St. Thomas Aquinas; St. Peter and Christ on the Sea of Tiberius; St. Lawrence saving the soul of the deceased Henry II of Germany (He tipped the scales of Lucifer with a goblet the king once donated to the Church). 29 Mauro Natale (ed.) et al., “El Mediterráneo que nos une,” in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e Itinerarios de Obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el Siglo XV (Madrid-Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza-Museu de Bellas Arts de València, 2001), 19–45, at 25–26. Starnia was a member of the Guild of St. Luke in Florence in 1387. He took two companions to Spain, Simone di Francesco and Niccolò d’Antonio. 30 Sebastián Garcias Palou, El Miramar de Ramón Llull (Palma de Mallorca: Diputación Provincial de Baleares, 1977); idem., Raíces mallorquinas de Ramón Llull (Inca-Mallorca: “Sa Nostra” Caixa de Balears, 1992). 31 Jesús Ernesto Martínez Ferrando, La tràgica història dels reis de Mallorca: Jaume I, Jaume II, Sanç, Jaume III, Jaume IV, Isabel, with a prologue by Joan Pons (Barcelona: Editorial Aedos, 1960); idem, Jaime II de Aragón, su vida familiar, 2 vols. (Barcelona: 1948).

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Elect is different and the figures sit further back in a heavenly space. He also substitutes a horrendous vision of hell for the resurrection of the dead. Dated to about 1425–30, Rogier van der Weyden’s St. George the Dragon Slayer and the Princess (Fig. 9.63) has identical measurements as the Thyssen Bornemisza Virgin and Child enthroned in a Niche, with which it shares a German provenance.32 In their original state the subjects were not viewed together as they were painted on the opposite sides of a single plank. As observed by Dirk de Vos, the ducal seal of Brabant designed in 1433 (Fig. 9.64) precisely duplicated the horse of Rogier’s St. George. Like landscape that illustrates a Flemish port city, Rogier’s holy tribune accords with the miniaturized courtly world of the International Style exemplified by the Limbourg Brothers, Jacquemart de Hesdin and Master Boucicaut. Jan van Eyck traveled throughout the Iberian Peninsula on horseback and as an experienced equestrian, he certainly would not have depicted a horse so gracefully stylized as the one ridden by Rogier’s St. George. Pere Nisart’s St. George sits solidly on his horse, which is closer to the muscular steeds ridden by the Ghent Just Judges and Holy Knights. Nisart’s landscape presents an identifiable venue, Palma de Mallorca, and such a panoramic view of a harbor, extraordinary in its detail, is an anomaly in the Kingdom of Aragon. However, it is precisely the type of realistic scenery which might have been done by a diplomat-artist who completed topological drawings as he traveled. Nisart’s vignette of a hermitage alluding to the Franciscan mystic Ramón Llull, martyr of Algiers, is a symbolic touch nearly as clever as the mirror reflections in Van Eyck’s oeuvre. St. George’s rescue of a princess was alleged to have occurred at Silene along the coast of Libya. If Jan provided allegorical portraits of members of the Avis family as admired saints during a stay in Portugal between 1436 and 1437, then his lost work acquired by King Alfonso V might have captured the realistic likeness of Prince Pedro, knight of the Order of the Garter, who was portrayed as St. George on horseback in the Ghent Altarpiece. Pedro’s wife Isabel (1409–1443) was the eldest daughter of Jaime II, Count of Urguell. Her image as a rescued princess would have been appropriate against a backdrop of Mallorca, an island under Aragonese control which Jan van Eyck could have visited earlier in his career. Postulating that St. George originated as a Portuguese commission, Jan van Eyck only may have 32 Dirk de Vos, Rogier van der Weyden. The Complete Works (New York-Antwerp: Mercatorfonds-Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1999), Catalogue No. 1, 172–74.

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drawn a few sketches before leaving Lisbon for Flanders. Conceivably his panel was left incomplete upon his death. Additionally, political instability in Portugal between Prince Pedro and Dowager Queen Leonor over the regency of Afonso V during the years 1438 to 1441 might have delayed shipment of the painting to the Avis court. The only certain fact is that Jan’s widow sold the St. George in Bruges, where it was purchased in 1444 for Alfonso V. Crucible of Wisdom: King Duarte and the Diptych of the Madonna in a Church Masters employed by the Crown of Aragon attempted to imitate the transparent glazes and color recipes which contributed to Jan van Eyck’s fame, and if Naples and Valencia became a bridge in the Mediterranean for art of the Paesi Bassi, it was due to Alfonso V’s utter infatuation with the Flemish manner and to the expatriates from the North who settled in his kingdom to secure his patronage. The provenance of Jan van Eyck’s Berlin Madonna in a Church (Fig. 9.65) is problematical, but accepting the merit of the above hypothetical arguments concerning the artist’s “secret mission” to Lisbon in 1436–37, the painting indeed may fall within the cluster of portable icons displaying allegorical portraits of Portugal’s “illustrious generation.” Created about 1438, the work originally was the left panel forming a diptych, and it displays a diminutive nude newborn Christ wrapped from the waist down within a white cloth which hangs over his legs.33 His small size is accentuated by the overly large golden crown worn by his mother, who is clad in a belted red gown and dark ultramarine mantle. Resting on the Virgin’s left arm, the infant grasps the neckband of her bodice.34 By this gesture, the Virgo Lactans of a domestic household, an image of Mary that evolved from the Byzantine Theotokos Galaktotrophousa (God-bearer and giver of milk), is subtly transformed into a symbol of Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 316–18, 390. Van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church (14 x 31 cm) has been discussed by Carol J. Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 144–56. Also consult: Craig Harbison, “Visions and Meditations in Early Flemish Painting,” Simiolus XV (1985): 87–118, at 110–12, 117; idem., “Miracles Happen: Image and Experience in Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church,” Iconography at the Crossroads: Papers from the Colloquium Sponsored by the Index of Christian Art, Princeton University, 23–24 March, 1990, ed. Brendan 33 34

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Ecclesia nurturing mankind in God’s “dwelling-place.”35 The Berlin panel has been aptly compared to Late Gothic shrine-like reliquaries, and even more specifically to the now destroyed reliquary of St. Gertrude of Nivelles.36 While this work presented a statuette of the Virgin and Child standing at the threshold of the heavenly gate, Van Eyck portrays his figures within the vaulted setting of a “soaring chevet” with “majestic verticals,” and therefore, he brings his audience beyond the western entrance portal to the sanctuary before the altar.37 According to Erin Panofsky, Jan’s cathedral: Is not a church but typifies the Church. He gives us … the whole doctrinal system in the guise of an individual building. In the jubé [rood screen separating the apse and nave], besides a statue of the Madonna herself, the prophets of the Old Testament, the Annunciation, the Coronation of the Virgin and, towering over Cassidy (Princeton: Index of Christian Art, Department of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University, 1993):157–69; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Erasme, 1987): 29–40, at 31–32; Herbert Lepper, “Kunsttransfer aus der Rheinprovinz in die Reichshauptstadt,” Aachener Kunstblätter LVI–LVII (1988–1989): 183–342, at 233, 238–39, 271); Jochen Sander, Niederländische Gemälde im Städel, 1400–1550, ed. Stephan Knobloch, with contributions by Peter Klein (dendrochronological studies) (Mainz-amRhein: Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main-P. von Zabern, 1993), 245–63, at 258–59; John L. Ward, “Disguised Symbolism as Enactive Symbolism in Van Eyck’s Paintings,” Artibus et Historiae. An Art Anthology XXIX (1994): 9–53. 35 For the motif of the Theotokos Galakotrophusa, see Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, “Picturing Devotion: Rogier’s Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Rogier van der Weyden St. Luke Drawing the Virgin. Selected Essays in Context, ed. Carol J. Purtle (Turnhout, 1997): 5–14. 36 Ernst Herzog, “Zur Kirchenmadonna van Eycks,” Berliner Museen VI, No. 1 (August: 1956): 2–16, drew an apt comparison of Van Eyck’s panel to the statue-tabernacle designs of the Late Gothic Age. Purtle, 146, has cited and illustrated the destroyed Marian shrine of St. Gertrude of Nivelles (1272–1298), which shows the Virgin on the threshold of an arched portal. Of course, Jan’s image of the Madonna depends upon Late Gothic statues. See L. François-Pilion, “Les Statues de la Vierge àl’Enfant dans la sculpture française au XIVe siècle,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts XIII, No. 2 (1935): 129–49; 204–27; William H. Forsyth, “The Virgin and Child in French Fourteenth-Century Sculpture – A Method of Classification, Art Bulletin XXIX (1957): 171–82. 37 Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966 rpt. of 1st ed. 1953), I, 144–45. Drawing attention to the Song of Songs, he states the representation of the Virgin is based upon illuminations which show the “loving union of the Sponsus with the Sponsa. Suggesting Van

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everything, the Crucifixion. The Missa Beatae Mariae Virginis with candles lighted on her altar, is celebrated not by human beings but by angels…38 The donor of the diptych’s right wing would have been portrayed kneeling in such proximity to the “Triumphant Church” that clearly Jan intended that this individual be included as a celebrant in the ritual of the Mass. Though more distanced from the sacrificial altar than the standing angels in liturgical robes, the patron would have been encouraged by Mary’s inviting glance and the example of the infant, to partake in the banquet of the consecrated Eucharist and be nourished. Nowhere does Van Eyck so fully affirm the Pauline viewpoint that the righteous share life with the soma pneumatikon, or spiritual body of Christ. The Hebrew meaning of Bethlehem is “House of Bread.” As observed by Milliard Meiss, the lost original frame of the Madonna in a Church along its upper arch was inscribed with lines from the second stanza of a Nativity hymn Dies Est Laetitiae: MATER HEC EST FILIA. PATER HIC EST NATUS. QUIS AUDIVIT TALIA. DEUS HOMO NATUS ETCET (This mother is the daughter. This father is born.

Who has heard of such a thing. God born a man). 39 The light of the Antwerp painting filters from the North, through the clerestory and the lower windows of a chapel on the gospel side. Though they appear realistic within the shadowy interior, the sunbeams are contrary to nature and symbolize divine illumination passing to earth from the Civitate Dei. Panofsky speaks about this phenomenon of light that comes from the Virgin’s right and contrasts with the natural rays descending from her left.40 The fifth stanza of the Dies Est Laetitiae pays tribute to the Virgin as the

Eyck devised an image of “the Virgin Mary in a Church and as The Church,” Panofsky, 146, comments Jan did not adopt the “traditional scheme of a Madonna ensconced in a small aedicula,” but “expanded it into a whole cathedral.” In so doing, he “found it necessary to stress its more natural significance by retaining the old proportion – or disproportion – between the figure and its architectural surroundings.” 38 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, 146–47. 39 See also: Milliard Meiss, “Light as Form and Symbol in some Fifteenth Century Paintings,” Art Bulletin XXVII (1945): 175–81. Also consult Paul Fierens, “Madones de Van Eyck,” Apollo, Chronique de Beaux–Arts V (Brussels: 1941): 9–13; Henri Barré, “Marie et l’Église; du Venerable Bede à Saint Albert le Grand,” Marie et l’Église. Bulletin de la Société Française d’Études Mariales (Paris: 1951): 59–143. 40 Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, I, 147–48.

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crystal vessel for the perfect flower, evoking the eternal vision of the dawn goddess “Aurora” as harbinger of the Oriens Sol : As the sunbeam through the glass. Passeth but not breaketh, So the Virgin, as she was, Virgin still remaineth.41 The Berlin Madonna in a Church is a miniature on oak (12½˝ x 5¾˝: 31 x 14 cm). Based upon the evidence of replicas, the composition of the Virgin and Child in a sanctuary remains substantially unaltered, but the appearance of the dexter panel remains elusive. The Master of 1499 in his Antwerp Diptych (Koninklijk Museum voor Schöne) replicated Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church in his left wing (37.1 x 20.4: 14⅝˝ x 8 1/16˝), and opposite he provided a donor portrait of Christiaan de Hondt (37.5 x 20.3: 14¾˝ x 8 1/16˝), the thirteenth abbot of the Cistercian Monastery of Ter Duinen (Our Lady of the Dunes) near Bruges (Figs. 9.66).42 Wearing his white habit, the ecclesiastic kneels at a prie-dieu within his bedchamber warmed by a fireplace. The domestic interior architecturally has little relationship to the imposing vaulted hall of the facing panel. Van Eyck’s painting recently has been compared by John Hand with the Antwerp version of the Madonna in a Church, “ … the Master of 1499 is generally 41 Meiss, “Light as Form and Symbol in some Fifteenth Century Paintings,” 179. In her analysis of the crowned image of the Virgin Mary, at 149–150, Purtle relates the words embroidered in gold on the hem of her red robe (SPECIOSIOR SOLE) to the Assumption Office inscription in three other works by Jan, the Ghent Altarpiece, the Madonna of Canon van der Paele, and the Dresden Triptych: HEC EST SPECIOSIOR SOLE SUPER OMNEM

STELLARUM DISPONSICIONEM LVCI COMPARATA INVENTUR PRIOR CANDOR EST ENIM LUCIS ETERNE SPECULUM SINE MACULA DEI MAIESTATIS (She is more beautiful

than the sun, and above all the order of the stars: being compared with the light, she is found before it. For she is the brightness of eternal light, and the unspotted mirror of God’s majesty). 42 Judith-Anne Testa, “A Note on the Relationship of Manuscript Illumination and Panel Painting. Simon Bening’s Beatty Rosarium and the Diptych of Chrétian de Hondt,” Jaarboek Antwerpen (1986): 19–29; Larry Silver, “The ‘Gothic’ Gossaert: Native and Traditional Elements in a Mabuse Madonna,” Pantheon XLV (1987): 58–69, at 61, 66. John Oliver Hand, Catherine A. Metzger and Ron Spronk, Prayer and Portraits. Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych (New Haven and London: National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC and Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, in association with Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 2007, Catalogue Entry 21 (Master of 1499: Virgin in the Church; reverse Salvator Mundi; Abbot Christiaan de Hondt; reverse Abbot Robrecht de Clercq), 140–49.

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more decorative and linear and favors detail over the effects of light … there are numerous other differences…”. He also states that because of a “distinction between a painterly versus a more decorative linear approach” and the “markedly linear quality of the underdrawing,” the Master of 1499 might not have worked from a painted model, but rather, from a “drawing that was virtually the same size as Van Eyck’s panel.”43 The reverse of the Master of 1499’s left wing presents the Salvator Mundi (Fig. 9.67) with the Apocalyptic Book of Revelations standing on a globe that is inscribed “Asia, Europe, Africa,” and a plinth bearing the date of 1499. The reverse of the right wing initially was marbled in imitation of red porphyry, but it was painted in the sixteenth century with a kneeling portrait of Robrecht de Clerq, thirty-second Abbot of Ter Duinen (1519–1557) (Figs. 9.67–9.68). This faux stone panel seems to intimate the group of drawings studied by the Master of 1499 was missing the subject for a second exterior panel. Painted for “Messer Antonio Siciliano,” chamberlain and secretary to Maximilian Sforza, Duke of Milan44, the left wing of Jan Gossaert’s diptych in the Galleria Doria Pamphilj (Fig. 9.69) also replicates Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church (45.9 x 27.5: 18⅛˝ x 10⅞˝). Painted between 1508 and 1513, the dexter panel has identical measurements but it provides an altogether different composition from that created by the Master of 1499. By contrast to the solitary Christiaan de Hondt, Gossaert’s patron genuflects in a landscape and he is accompanied by the standing figure of his name saint, Anthony Abbot. So then, in view of divergent mise-en-scénes for the donor panels, a basic question arises. Which one of the replicas is the most faithful to the Van Eyck original, which scholars have speculated was designed as a diptych? 43

140.

Hand, Metzger and Spronk, Prayer and Portraits. Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych,

Henri Pauwels, Hendrik R. Hoetink and Sadja Jacob Herzog, Jean Gossaert dit Mabuse: Catalogue (Rotterdam-Bruges: exhibition catalogue, Museum Boymans-van BeuningenGroeningemuseum, 1965), Catalogue 7, 76–79; Sadja Jacob Herzog, Jan Gossart, Called Mabuse: A Study of His Chronology with a Catalogue of His Works (Bryn Mawr: Ph.D. Dissertation, Bryn Mawr College, 1968); Lorne Campbell, “Notes on Netherlandish Pictures in the Veneto in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth centuries,” The Burlington Magazine CXXIII, No. 941 (1981): at 467–73, at 472. Bernard Aikema and Beverly Louise Brown, Renaissance Venice and the North. Crosscurrents in the Time of Dürer, Bellini and Titian (London-New York: Thames and Hudson, 1999), 88; Hand, Metzger and Spronk, Prayer and Portraits. Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych, Catalogue Entry 13 (Jan Gossaert, Virgin in the Church; Antonio Siciliano and Saint Anthony), 100–103. 44

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Looking at the setting of the church in Jan’s Berlin Madonna in the Church, the iconostasis screen (Figs. 9.70–9.71) should consist of three bays. Only two bays are visible and they show tympana of the “Annunciation” and “Coronation of the Virgin.” Suspended from the ceiling is a centrally placed cross, which falls between the screen’s sculpted images to suggest Calvary. However, Van Eyck shows only the standing Mater Dolorosa. John the Evangelist, traditionally placed opposite, is absent. By contrast with the Diptych of Christiaan de Hondt, which repeats these lacunae, Jan Gossaert’s replica reveals more of the epistle arcade than Jan van Eyck. He includes the third bay of the rood screen and a “Nativity” tympanum, and also correctly positions the Apostle John to complete the Calvary group. However, he added details not present in Eyck’s panel, specifically sepulchral slabs and ring brasses in the pavement. Weale states that the embellishments “must have been in the original painting.”45 Some authorities have placed the Berlin Madonna in a Church early in Jan’s career, circa 1425–1430. Their opinions are predicated not solely upon the unusual proportion of the Virgin to her surrounding space, but also upon the anomaly in Jan’s oeuvre of representing an interior obliquely rather than frontally. The more reasonable date of 1437–1438 has been proposed by James Snyder, who perceives a stylistic correlation with Jan’s paintings of St. Barbara with her Tower and the Dresden Triptych. His opinion has been shared by Elizabeth Dhanens. She pertinently observes that the Virgin’s glance goes beyond the compositional edges and suggests that the architecture could have been extended to the space of a donor panel to show a lateral aisle, portal or chapel. The earliest documentation of the Berlin Madonna in a Church was provided in 1855 by Leon Laborde four years after he visited a village near Nantes, where he saw the work in the collection of an architect named Nau.46 He describes Van Eyck’s Virgin Mary as standing in the nave of a church and holding the Christ Child on her right arm, and mentions the existence of a copy in the Antwerp museum. He additionally records Van Eyck’s panel retained its original frame and gave precise dimensions of the painting encased in its frame (43 cm x 25 cm). Laborde also elaborated about the provenance of the Madonna in a Church in Nantes, The picture was purchased by Nau for fifty francs from the housekeeper of a former W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), 168–69. 46 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 167–69. 45

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French diplomat named François Cacault. Cacault had obtained the panel in Italy, transporting it with other acquisitions upon the conclusion of his service. Between 1860 and 1869, the Madonna in a Church was sold by Nau and entered the Suermondt collection at Aachen. On May 12, 1874 it was acquired by the Berlin museum. On March 14, 1877, the work was stolen and while it was returned undamaged on March 26, the frame was lost. Museum archives fortunately preserved the inscription. The Italian provenance of Van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church and Laborde’s failure to mention a pendant, are intriguing tidbits of information. Renaissance Inventories of collections frequently record diptychs as a single item rather than paired paintings. Writing in 1530, Marcantonio Michiel describes the Galleria Doria Pamphilij paintings by Gossaert in the Palazzo of Gabriel Vendramini: the Virgin in the Church and Antonio Siciliano and St. Anthony. However, their format is not mentioned, so the two works may not have functioned as a diptych but rather, were placed beside each other on a wall. Moreover, the Anonimo Morelliano does not mention reverse sides, which typically bore the heralds of the donor.47 Jan Gossaert became a master in Antwerp in 1503 and his first princely patron was Philip of Burgundy (1465–1524). Born in Brussels, the illegitimate son of Philip the Good was appointed an admiral in 1502 before serving as governor of Gelderland and Zutphen. On October 26, 1508, Philip headed the embassy sent by Emperor Maximilian I to Pope Julius II in Rome. Gossaert accompanied the entourage which departed from Mechelen to travel by way of Verona and Florence. Fond of ancient art, Philip of Burgundy undoubtedly brought the artist to copy ancient monuments during a period of lengthy negotiations with the Pope. The mission did not return until spring of 1509, as documented by Philip’s report at The Hague on June 22, 1509 to Archduchess Margaret of Austria. Gossaert may have lingered in Rome until July, but he is recorded that same year among the members of a Middelburg confraternity under the name of Janin de Waele. Thereafter, Gossaert probably joined the select group of 47 Theodor von Frimmel, ed. Der Anonimo Morelliano. Marcantonio Michiel’s Notizia d’opere del disegno, 1 Abtheilung. Text und Übersetzung (Vienna: Carl Graeser, 1888), 107–8: “El quadretto in tauola a oglio del S. Antonio cun el retratto de M. Antonio Siciliano intiero, fo de mano de…maestro Ponentino, opera ex[cellent]te et max[im]e le teste” and “El quadretto in tauola della nostra donna sola cun el puttino in brazzo, in piedi, in un tempio Ponentino, cun la corona in testa, fo de mano de Rugerio da Brugies, et è opera a oglio perfettissima.” See Hand, Metzger and Spronk, “The Diptych Format in Netherlandish Painting,” Prayer and Portraits. Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych, 1–29, at 12.

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artists in the circle of the erudite Philip at Castle Suytburg on Walcheren, and he even accompanied his patron to Utrecht when Philip became bishop of the city in 1517. Max Friedländer conjectured several scenarios for the execution of Jan van Eyck’s work. First, he postulates Gossaert may have transported Jan’s Madonna of the Church to Italy and sold it to Antonio Siciliano, whereupon the merchant ordered Gossaert to copy the work and paint an adjoining panel. Friedländer suggests Jan’s little Madonna was a solitary picture. Why replicate Jan’s picture then, if only a donor portrait needed to be made to fashion a diptych? A second proposed alternative is that Gossaert met the chamberlain in the South and created the Doria Pamphilij Diptych upon returning to Flanders. A third possibility is that “Messer Antonio” spent time in Flanders. The arms of Antonio Siciliano appear in the Codex Grimani which was illumined in Bruges, and according to documents provided by Jozef Duverger, Siciliano visited Mechelen in 1513.48 Gossaert’s client may have commissioned the Doria Pamphilij Diptych retable in Italy or Flanders, and it passed from his estate by 1530. Neither case, however, adequately explains the presence of Jan’s masterwork in Italy. If Jan’s diptych remained in Flanders until 1513, then it seems strange that the Bruges Master of 1499 represented Christiaan de Hondt in such a divergent setting from that of Antonio Siciliano. Moreover, John Hand has observed Simon Bening’s illuminated folio of the Virgin and Child which faces a prayer to Mary as Regina Coeli in the Rosarium manuscript (Dublin: Chester Beatty Library: W.9, f. 44v–45r) depends upon the Virgin in a Church by the Master of 1499. Bening retains the same color scheme and also adopts the Master of 1499’s distinctive narrow crown.49 Why would Bening not have depended upon Van Eyck’s original work, if indeed the panel was accessible for replication in the Netherlands? Clearly in the North Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church was only known by the master’s silverpoint drawings in his atelier which eventually were in the possession of the Master of 1499. By contrast, Gossaert did travel to Italy, and his painterly Galleria Doria Pamphilij Madonna in a Church retains architectural minutiae which reveal his first-hand acquaintance with Jan’s original. 48 Jozef Duverger, “De Werken van ‘Johannes’ im de Verzamelingen van Margareta van Oostenrijk,” Oud-Holland XLV (1928): 210–220; idem, “Nieuwe gegevens betreffende het breviarium Grimani,” Annuaire des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique 1 (1938): 19–30. 49 Hand, Metzger and Spronk, “The Diptych Format in Netherlandish Painting,” Prayer and Portraits. Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych, 1–29, at 22–23.

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Gossaert enjoyed the patronage of members of the Burgundian dynasty, and the corpus of his works stylistically follow a more inventive line of development after his Italian sojourn, when his delight in architectural ornament and statuesque figures is most apparent. He was, nonetheless, skilled in the “art of imitation.” As attested by his work in 1523 for Archduchess Margaret of Austria in Mechelen, he was employed as a restorer of art. In his replication of Van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church, Gossaert recreates the Berlin vaulted interior but paraphrases Ecclesia and the Infant Christ, translating their features to a stylistic idiom more kindred to the masters of his age than to Jan’s dulcet vision. Judging from the adroit manner in which Gossaert captures the essence of the Berlin panel, can it be expected that he would do less in his donor portrait? Might not the representation of Antonio Siciliano also recreate the setting and form of the figures, but depart from the original only in the essential element of the portrait’s features? So then, what happened to the right interior panel of Jan’s diptych? Was it separated from the Madonna in a Church in the early sixteenth century and lost? The miniature nature of the Berlin panel suggests that it was conceived to be as portable as the Dresden Altarpiece. Considering the more reasonable date of 1437–1438, Jan’s diptych could have originated as a Portuguese commission. If so, the work may have followed the same proposed route as the Dresden Triptych: from Lisbon to Tangier, and from the possession of Prince Fernando at Fez, who bartered with Genoese merchants for critical supplies, to Northern Italy by 1441. St. Barbara and the St. Catherine panel of the Dresden Triptych have been postulated as portraits of the Avis Queen Leonor. The former contains not only a background landscape of Lisbon, but also a tower which echoes hauntingly of the octagonal pantheon of Batalha. The latter altarpiece appears to provide a view of the Avis “Chapel of St. Michael” in Lisbon’s St. George Castle. King Duarte died unexpectedly on September 9 of 1438 from a plague which swept Lisbon. If there was a Portuguese royal donor associated with the Berlin Madonna in a Church, then this monarch who had ordered the 1437 campaign to Tangier would be a feasible candidate. Was the small Eyckian diptych commissioned by Duarte and then given to his youngest brother following his capture? A “light” metaphor inscribed on the frame of Jan’s Madonna of the Church extols Maria Ecclesia as a virginal “sunbeam which passes through glass,” a clear reference to her immaculate nature, or chaste conception. On September 8, 1436, the feast of the “Nativity of the Blessed Virgin,” Eugenius IV had issued the crusading bull Rex Regum, a document which gave papal

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authority to Duarte’s expedition.50 Departing from the Tagus estuary on August 22, 1437, the Octave Day of the Assumption, the Lusitanian fleet docked at Ceuta four days later. At the bottom of Jan’s original frame, painted in imitation of stone, the inscription FLOS FLORVM APPELLARIS was drawn specifically from Lauds in the Assumption Office. The same SPECIOSIOR SOLE passage appears in three other works by Jan, the Ghent Altarpiece, the Madonna of Canon van der Paele, and the Dresden Triptych. If Van Eyck designed a donor panel with King Duarte, then the ruler probably would have been portrayed either in the guise of, or being introduced by a favorite saint, Martin of Tours. Gossaert’s panel of Antonio Siciliano has been described by Friedländer as a “figure of nobility,” and he additionally comments: The high-born donor, clad in shimmering damask, wearing spurs on his feet and swords at his side, has clearly dismounted during a ride in the hills, as if overcome with pious awe at the sight of the Virgin — although strictly speaking he cannot see her. His fine plumed hat has been tossed on the grass, as he sinks to his knee. The master may have thought of Dürer’s engraving of St. Eustache, with which he must have been familiar, for he borrowed from it one of the dogs.… The ecstatic face of the donor, softly modelled with faint shadows, is turned to the light. The face of Gossaert’s donor (Fig. 9.72) is turned to the light and his eyes lock precisely with the glance of Jan van Eyck’s Madonna. This aspect of mutual constancy is missing in Gossaert’s painting, as his Virgin gazes downward to the pavement of her church. Duarte before 1433 wrote the famous Book of Instruction on the Art of Riding Well, a complete tome directed to improving the equestrian skills of a young knight. The Prince scrutinized the diverse forms of the saddle, harness and spurs, observing that appropriate equipment was crucial for excellence in riding. Jousts and tournaments in the chivalric tradition were the “arts of peace.” Such pleasurable engagements which were staged to amuse the court often were designed to evoke the battles fought by the “Nine Worthies,” and undeniably they were viewed as a training ground for the “arts of war.” Looking beyond the “hunting” image of the kneeling donor in Gossaert’s landscape, and 50

Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 161.

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disregarding obvious adjustments of attire to accord with fashionable taste in 1508, it is not difficult to superimpose the image of St. Martin upon that of the genuflecting rider who has dismounted (Fig. 9.73). And recalling that Duarte appears as the same soldier-saint among the Ghent Altarpiece’s “Holy Knights” in cavalcade, a closer scrutiny of his attire yields two essential elements of the saint’s hagiography, a magnificent cape and sword, emblems of his charity at Amiens. Martini’s white steed (Fig. 9.74) is depicted in the background with a groom. Van Eyck may have included a dog in his preparatory study. Gossaert’s greyhound is a breed found in the Turin-Milan Hours, and it is positioned differently from any of the dogs illustrated by Albrecht Dürer in his engraving of the Vision of St. Eustache (1500). Several sepulchres are housed in the Cathedral of Lisbon, including the tomb of Lopo Fernandes Pacheco (Figs. 9.75–9.76), the seventh Lord of Ferreira de Aves, who in October of 1340 fought beside Afonso IV (1291: r. 1315–1357) at Rio Salado. The gisant of the noble knight is depicted with his sword, and the sepulchre in the ambulatory of the church is guarded by a greyhound. The dog is a traditional emblem of fidelity harking back to Odysseus’ faithful hunting hound Argos. St. Martin’s legend does not feature a steadfast dog, but a greyhound in the composition would have been appropriate for a commission given by King Duarte. The Portuguese sovereign took as his motto “Loyal shall I ever be” and he ruled in Lisbon, a city named Olysipponis for Odysseus. Turning to the landscape, a solitary tree is shown. This vegetation presents another relevant emblem of St. Martin’s vita. Among his most renowned miracles is that of the hewn pine tree. Seeking to convert Celtic pagans from their tree-cult, Martin requested the Gauls to cut down a venerated pine. They complied but insisted beforehand that the saint tie himself to the place where the tree would land when it was felled. When the tree was cut, Martin made the sign of the cross, and his life was spared as the pine fell to the opposite side. The tree illustrated in Gossaert’s work may not be coniferous, but in a painting of St. Martin it would have alluded to a miracle which resulted in conversions to the Christian faith. Oak leaves and acorns appear on Avis heraldry perhaps to recall the Burgundian heritage of the Crown of Portugal. Opposite the tiny infant held in his mother’s arms, the oak sapling contrasts with the cross of the adult Christ suspended over the jubé of the crossing, Eden’s “lignum vitae” (wood of life). The setting of Gossaert’s donor, with its diversity of flora, including cyclamen and

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irises, conjures the hortus conclusis, which in the wake of Christ’s sacrifice at Calvary was open to the world. Mystics of the Late Middle Ages related flowers to the cultivation of virtues, as the creator-God of Genesis was most pleased by the fragrance of Noah’s offering after the deluge. Beyond Gossaert’s donor is a river and to the right are steep rocky scarps. Possibly in this area of the composition Van Eyck had represented a view of Lisbon similar to the background vista of his St. Barbara. Gossaert would have had to alter this terrain for an Italian client, and it has been compared to panoramic vistas by Joachim Patiner (c. 1480–1524), one of the Ponentini (Northern masters who traveled to Italy). While Patiner voyaged to Genoa in 1511 with Adrien Ysenbrandt of Antwerp, Gossaert likely was acquainted with his work in Flanders. Antonio Siciliano genuflects as he is introduced by Anthony Abbot. King Duarte was born on October 31, 1391, the eve of All Saints Day. Astrology was an important science at the Avis court, and Duarte as his father before him, is known to have sustained an interest in astrological charting. Such records typically reckoned not only the date and time of birth, but also factored the date of conception. Duarte was conceived in January, a month which marked the feast day of St. Anthony Abbot (January 17), the commemoration of Christ’s Circumcision, and the Epiphany. The plumed hat discarded on the ground by Gossaert’s patron is a subtle symbolism worthy of Van Eyck. Like the crowns removed by kings in “Adoration” scenes, the headdress is a mnemonic device. It combines with the genuflection pose to recall the higher authority of the “King of kings.” Such allusions to humility were most apposite for the Roman soldier St. Martin, who recognized the superior power of the sign of the cross over the weapons of an Empire. Anthony Abbot, the founder of monasticism, lived an austere life in solitude, overcoming all temptations and trials, to establish the prototypical monastic community. The Order of the Hospitallers of St. Anthony had been established in 1100 to care for pilgrims. Martin of Tours also lived as a recluse on a small island off the coast of Liburia before he established a semi-hermetical community in Gaul. Even as bishop of Tours he dwelled in a cell near the cathedral, from which he founded several monasteries as replacements for pagan temples. Arthurian chivalry accented the importance of a knight’s training under the influence of holy hermits. As stated, the Master of 1499 apparently had access to silverpoint drawings by Jan van Eyck, which were completed as preliminary studies for the Madonna in a Church Diptych. If this was the case, perhaps he based

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his portrait of Abbot Christiaan de Hondt upon an exterior panel by Jan van Eyck. He was not adverse to using basically the same composition for double painting of the Virgin and Child and Archduchess Margaret of Austria in Prayer (Ghent: Museum voor Schöne Kunsten). Considering the sustained devotion of Lusitanin royals since the reign of Afonso Henrique I to St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), the right panel of Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church diptych might have held the image of the Cistercian Abbot. St. Bernard may not have supported introducing the feast of the Conception of Our Lady in France (Epistles, clxxiv) — which was instituted by the Franciscans in 1263 — but he still magnified the purity of Christ’s mother in his writings, especially his homilies collectively titled De Laudibus Mariae and his mystical sermons on the Song of Songs. who would not exchange his monachism for a bishopric in Milan or Reims. St. Bernard’s unequivocal glorification of Mary’s virginity is expressed in Renaissance icons which portray his singular vision of Maria Lactans at Speyer Cathedral in 1146, when he preached the Second Crusade to the German King Conrad. Flemings, Frisians and Englishmen were the first to leave for Jerusalem in April of 1147. En route to Gibraltar, they were delayed by storms and forced to land in Porto, where they were met by a contingent of knights in service to the Burgundian nobleman Alfonso Henriques I. The crusaders were persuaded by the new king of Portugal to lay siege against the Muslims in Lisbon. The capture of Lisbon on October 28, 1147, was crucial to the success of the kingdom’s Reconquest. to honor the dead, churches were constructed at the two main burial sites; the Igreja de Santa Maria dos Mártires (Our Lady of Martyrs: Cathedral of Lisbon) for the French and English soldiers who died in the conflict; and the Igreja de São Vicente da Fora (St. Vincent Outside the Wall), founded as an Augustinian institution on November 21, 1147,51 for the German and Lusitanian soldiers. In Portugal the nurturing Madonna Lactans depicted by Jan van Eyck was identified as the “Virgin of Nazareth” (Figs. 9.77–9.78). Legend relates the carpenter St. Joseph carved the dark wooden statue of the Virgin of Nazareth nursing the infant Christ. The fourth-century St. Jerome acquired the statue in Bethlehem and gave it to the care of St. Augustine, who sent it to the Cauliniana monastery near Mérida in Spain. Following the Islamic invasion of Tarik in 711, and the defeat of the Visigothic Rodrigo at Guadalete, the statue was hidden by Augustinian monks in Portugal. It Anne F. Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery: The Veneration of Saint Vincent (Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1979), 30. 51

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remained in a cave near the coastal town of Nazaré until its discovery in 1179 by two shepherds. One of King Afonso Henriques I’s bravest Templar Knights, and his illegitimate brother, purportedly was saved due to the intercession of Our Lady of Nazaré. As alcaide of the castle at Porto de Mós (Figs. 9.79–9.80) which defended the land between Leiria and Coimbra, Dom Fuas de Roupinho honed his martial skills for battle against the Almohads by riding and hunting. While chasing a deer on September 14, 1182, the feast day of the Exaltation of the Cross, a sudden fog prevented the warrior from seeing a cliff in the distance. The stag he pursued plummeted over the rocks and following in close proximity, the nobleman prayed for divine assistance to avoid certain death. The Virgin Mary allegedly appeared in a vision and intervened to stop the knight’s horse from moving forward into space. As an ex-voto, Dom Roupinho commissioned the construction of the Ermida de Memória, where he placed the wooden statue (Figs. 9.81). The crypt of the small chapel is believed to retain the hoof-prints left by the knight’s horse at the edge of the cliff. The larger Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora da Nazaré facing the Ermida de Memória rests on the site of a late Gothic church which was totally remodeled during the seventeenth century to accommodate numerous pilgrims (Figs. 9.82–9.84). Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church recalls the popular image of the Virgin of Nazareth, a favored advocational icon of the Knights Templar, who invoked her assistance during the Reconquest. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the venerable Abbot who preached the Second Crusade to Jerusalem, had defined the Rule of the Knights Templar (De Laudibus Novae Militiae), the ideal handbook of Christian warriors who valued loyauté to Crown and cause. Perhaps for this reason, the Cistercian Abbot frequently was portrayed in the company of a dog. He also traditionally was depicted with a crosier, as well as a triple miter at his feet,52 which alluded to his unwillingness to exchange his monachism for a bishopric in Milan or Reims. St. Bernard was canonized in 1184 on January 18, a day that nearly coincided with the commemorative feast of St. Anthony Abbot.53 If St. Bernard of Clairvaux Joseph M. von Radowitz, “The Saints and their Attributes,” The Saints in Art, a translation (Rome: Victoria Printing Press, 1898), 12. 53 Another possible ecclesiastical candidate would be St. Theotonius (b. 1088, active 1132–1166; fd February 18), Augustinian Canon and first prior of the Mosteiro de Santa Cruz in Coimbra, where St. Anthony of Padua was first instructed in the famed scriptorium. St. Theotonius made two pilgrimages to Jersusalem and was charged by King Afonso Henriques I with the re-evangilization of lands reconquered from the Moors. Despite his 52

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was depicted in the exterior panel opposite the Salvator Mundi, his open manuscript would have visually complimented Revelations’s eschatological “Book of the Seven Seals.” The “Son of Man” with his foot protruding over the globe recollects the incipient movement of Adam in the Ghent Altarpiece who seems to step forward from his stone niche, but even more, the glorified figure recalls Isaiah’s (66:1) description of heaven as God’s “throne” and the earth as his “footstool.” The hieratical face and raised blessing hand of the Maistas Domini are found in Eyckian variations of the Holy Face, all of which are based upon a late icon by the master which no longer exists (Fig. 9.85). If Jan van Eyck’s diptych of the Virgin in a Church was sold to Genoese merchants by Prince Fernando the suggested reverse exterior panels of the Salvator Mundi and St. Bernard of Clairvaux may have been in such deplorable condition after months of captivity the two paintings were discarded. One salient reason for iconographically pairing these subjects would be the “Opening of the Fifth Seal” (Apocalypse 6: 9–11) and the description of just martyrs given white robes of salvation “washed in the blood of the Lamb.” Based upon the dictates of João I’s last testament, in August of 1433 he was buried in the Cistercian habit. Presupposing the lost interior panel that once joined the Berlin Madonna and Child depicted King Duarte kneeling with St. Anthony Abbot, the setting of Van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church might have extended slightly into the composition of the dexter panel. Thus more of the nave, side aisle and third tympanum of the rood screen with its relief of the “Nativity” might have been visible, as indicated by Gossaert’s replica. Although it is speculative to comment further about the complexion of a lost donor panel or even preparatory drawings by Van Eyck known to the Master of 1499, many churches in Lisbon, like São Martinho opposite “Prince” Duarte’s palace, were three-aisled cruciform structures important position as monarchical advisor, he declined a bishopric. Nuno Goncalves’s St. Vincent Altarpiece of 1471 (Museu Nacional da Arte Antiga) commissioned for the Cathedral of Lisbon by Afonso V originally contained an icon of St. Theotonius. This extant painting of the reforming monk shows him sitting on a stone bench against a damask background of Avis green. He wears a white habit and miter, and holds a crosier. Nuno created his work as a pendant to paintings of St. Francis of Assisi, St. Peter and St. Paul. Unlike St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the hagiography of St. Theotonius does not include a dog, and despite his supervision of the intellectual monks of the Monastery of the Holy Cross in Coimbra, he neither was portrayed in the environment of a bedchamber of honor nor a study like the domestic cabinet room represented by the Master of 1499 in his paintings of Christiaan de Hondt and Archduchess Margaret of Austria.

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with bell towers. Only one structure in Portugal, however, had a radiating ambulatory conforming to churches of Northern Europe, the Lisbon Sé. The Lisbon Cathedral of Santa Maria and the Chapel of St. Vincent Among the ecclesiastical monuments of Lisbon that were built or renovated by Burgundian architects and sculptors, the most important structure was the Cathedral. The Medieval appearance of the Sé, however, is drastically altered from the time of Jan van Eyck’s visit.54 Matthew Seutter’s Map of Lisbon before and during the 1755 Earthquake summarily indicates the monuments of the city before the devastation that struck mid-morning on All Souls Day, November 1 (Fig. 9.86). The earthquake of 1755 was most destructive of several tremors which occurred in Lisbon in 1321, 1334, 1337, 1344, 1347, 1356 and 1404. The eighteenth-century cataclysm, however, was followed by three tsunamis and a week of violent fires which destroyed most buildings, inclusive of St. George Castle and the princely palaces once occupied by the sons of King João I (Fig. 9.87). Despite the Baroque and Neoclassical remodeling of the Cathedral at the end of 1777, and restorations in 1940, two fundamental phases of construction stylistically defined its architectural character, Romanesque and Gothic (Fig. 9.88–9.89). After retaking Lisbon from the Moors on October 28, 1147, Afonso Henriques I ordered the construction of the Cathedral and he dedicated it to the Virgin Mary and St. Vincent of Saragossa. By 1164 two architects are named, Masters Roberto and Bernado, both of whom planned a Norman construction in the form of a Latin cross with three naves. The central nave introduced a triforium of small arches which transversed the transept, the first of its kind in Portugal. The collateral walls of ashlar masonry were distinguished by lancet arches and cruciform piers, which were robbed of their sculpted decoration in the seventeenth century. The final phase of Romanesque construction by Afonso Henriques and Sancho I consisted of the western portal with its flanking towers and a huge bell tower situated in the southern transept. Gustavo de Matos Sequeira, Sé de Lisboa, estudo historicó-arqueológico e artistico (Porto, Litografia Nacional, 1930); idem., Depois do terremoto (Lisbon: Academia das Sciências de Lisboa, 1916); idem., Igrejas e mosteiros de Lisboa (Lisbon: Câmara Muncipal de Lisboa, 1963). 54

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The beginning of the fourteenth century witnessed the appointment of the first archbishop of the Lisbon Sé, Dom João Anes, by King Dinis (1279–1325). During this period, the cloister was raised in imitation of the Cistercian Monastery of Alcaçova (Figs. 9.90–9.92). There was no Episcopal palace per se ever built at the Cathedral. However, there was an established residence for bishops before the fourteenth century. These quarters were integrated into the cloister above a so-called Beco de Quebra-Costa (Hill of the Steep Street), although the exact location of the toponym remains unknown. The chapels of the cloister were decorated in the seventeenth century, but they retain their ogival arches. One Gothic chapel of the cathedral does survive from the reign of King Dinis (Figs. 9.93–9.94). Situated on the gospel side, near the northwest entrance tower is the Chapel of St. Bartholomew, named for Bartolomeu Joanes, a wealthy merchant who died in 1324. His sarcophagus with its gisant and heraldic carving stands within a lofty chapel with its ribbed vault intact. Afonso IV, the hero of the Reconquest battle of Salcedo (1344) and grandfather of King João I, ushered in an important building campaign at the Cathedral following the earthquake of 1344, the Gothic ambulatory and nine radiating chapels (Figs. 9.95–9.98). The polygonal apse was a model for the building of Batalha’s cabeceira in the basilica of Santa Maria. According to João Fagundes, the Lisbon Sé is the only cathedral in Portugal with an apse end congeneric to Gothic cathedrals in Northern Europe. Fagundes also states that the charola comprising the apsidal chapels and ambulatory received light directly from the outside because this area was lower than the main chapel. The 1755 earthquake left the charola substantially intact, as the vaulting and decorative elements of the chapels in the cabeceira retain their Gothic configuration. The nuclear Late Gothic Cathedral of Lisbon suffered major losses in 1755 (Fig 9.99). The capela-mór lost its rood screen and appointments, and its stucco vault constructed upon a wooden framework is a Neoclassical veneer obscuring any trace of a lofty ribbed vault. While the towers of the façade were only partly destroyed, the huge southern bell tower tumbled in ruins. The collapse of the torre sineira additionally destroyed the ribbed vaults of Santa Maria’s nave and the ancillary Chapel of the Holy Sacrament. This chapel on the gospel side of the capela-mór (main chapel) replaced an earlier sanctuary dedicated to the Spanish martyr St. Vincent of Saragossa. King Afonso Henriques I on November 21, 1147 founded the Lisbon Monastery of St. Vincent beyond the Walls, establishing it as a house of

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the Order of St. Augustine. Following a five-year truce with the Moors in 1173, the ruler sent a delegation to the Cabo de São Vicente for the purpose of retrieving relics of the martyr whose shrine named the Cape on the southernmost point of the Iberian Peninsula. These relics were transferred from the Algarve by ship to Lisbon, where temporarily they were safeguarded in the Church of St. Justa belonging to the St. Vincent Monastery. When canons of the Cathedral acted to remove the relics on September 15, 1173, Afonso Henriques dispatched another delegation to the Cape to acquire any additional relics to mollify the monks of St. Vincent. The emissaries returned with some coffin boards, a part of the saint’s cranium, and conceivably the arm which was later retained in the Cathedral of Porto.55 These relics were installed in the capela-mór of the newly built Romanesque Sé. Not until the reign of João I was a separate “Chapel of St. Vincent” installed in the Cathedral. Located on the gospel side of the Sé, this sanctuary in 1432 was struck by lightening and damaged by fire. On August 14, 1433, João I ordered the creation of a new chapel and altarpiece, but he died the day after issuing his decree.56 Considering the brevity of Duarte’s reign, a mere five years, the king may have had time only to restore the burned interior of the capela. Political upheavals following the death of Duarte delayed any further construction until the late 1450s. João Eanes, court painter of Afonso V in July of 1454 and mestre dos obras of Lisbon from 1461 until 1471, directed the installation of the “Chapel of St. Vincent” in the Romanesque bell tower situated on the epistle side of the Cathedral. This later project involved the construction of a magnificent framework to encase a new reliquary for the bones of the Saragossan martyr.

55 The relics are described in a manuscript in the Biblioteca Pública de Évora (codice CX, I–I–2, sobrescrito N.o 37), discovered by Mesquita de Figueiredo in 1926 and transcribed in 1791 by D. Frei Manuel do Cenáculo Vilas Boas, Bishop of Beja, in his Cuidados Literários do Prelado de Beja. António Belard da Fonseca, O Mistério dos Painéis – Os Príncipes – Últimas Páginas, 5 vols. (Lisbon: 1957–1967), V (1967), 137, records three arms at Santa Cruz of Coimbra, the Sé of Braga and the Sé of Porto; a reed in the Convent of S. Caetano at Lisbon; teeth at the Monastery of Santa Cruz of Coimbra, the Church of S. Vicente of Abrantes and the Monastery of Alcobaça; a piece of bone with five teeth in the Church of S. Roque at Lisbon; a bone and a “boat in which is seen the glorious body” in the Convent of Jesus at Setúbal; “relics” in the Jesuit Colégio da Companhia de Jesus at Évora; and part of a head in the Monastery of São Vicente de Fora at Lisbon. 56 Dagoberto Markl, O rétabulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os documentos (Lisbon: Caminho, 1988), 215.

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Examining the original layout and architectural elements of the Lisbon Sé yields information to suggest that Jan van Eyck depicted its interior (Figs. 9.100–9.104).57 His Madonna in a Church shows a wooden statue of a saint elevated mid-way on the northern wall of the transept. Standing beneath a stone baldachin, this figure appears to be holding a ship in his hands, the traditional emblem of Vincent of Saragossa. According to the twelfthcentury Relação de Chantre Estevan, a pair of ravens had escorted the body of St. Vincent en route to Lisbon. King Afonso Henrique selected a galleon with ravens at the stem and stern as the municipal empresa of Lisbon. The Berlin Madonna in a Church, as well as its replicas, include a bird perched behind the rood screen. Though its placement near the pinnacle of the “Annunciation” tympanum insinuate the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, the bird might just as easily be identified as a raven. Afonso Henriques entrusted the city’s cathedral to monks of the Augustinian Order. Regarding Gossaert’s representation of St. Anthony Abbot, the feast day of the father of monasticism nearly coincided with that of St. Vincent of Saragossa (January 22). Like Vincent, a raven appears in the story of Anthony Abbot, who, during his visit to St. Paul the Anchorite in the Theban desert, was subsisted on a loaf of bread brought daily to him by a tame blackbird. After spending some time in the company of Paul, Anthony departed for home. On the way, however, he saw a pair of angels carrying his friend’s soul to heaven. This incident in the vita of Anthony of Egypt may be relevant to the pair of vested angels in the sanctuary of the Berlin Madonna in a Church. The consecrated host in the liturgy of the Mass is referred to as the Panis Angelorum. Light in Jan’s painting is from the north, very near the spot in the Lisbon Sé where the “Chapel of the Holy Sacrament” later was located (Figs. 9.105–9.106). The Cathedral’s capela-mór and ambulatory had been completed in 1364 as an initiative of Alfonso IV. During the 1430s the reliquary of St. Vincent was reached by ascending steps at the choir’s crossing. Depicted in a mid-fourteenth-century municipal seal of the Archivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (Figs. 9.107–9.108), the alabaster 57 Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New York-Antwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 328, suggests the venue for the Madonna in a Church might be Tongeren, based upon her observation the gallery runs under clerestory windows. For the church in Tournai see Thomas W. Lyman, “Architectural Portraiture and Jan van Eyck’s Washington Annunciation,” Gesta, XX (1981): 263–76; [Canon] Jean Dumoulin and Jacques Pycke, La Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Tournai et son trésor (Tournai: Casterman, 3rd ed. 1980); Onze Lieve Vrouw Oorzaak Onzer Blijdschap, Causa Nostrae Laetitiae (Tongeren, 1979).

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structure containing the bones of the deacon-martyr was girded with metal bands and supported by four columns. It stood directly in front of the main altar.58 The altar is barely visible in Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church and there are variations in the replicas by Jan Gossaert and the Master of 1499 (Fig. 9.109–9.112). Jan’s altar is obscured by a rood screen that magnifies the Virgin Mary as intercessor for mankind. The Calvary and tympanums concern events of her life associated with the joyful, glorious and sorrowful mysteries of the rosary. Jan Gossaert’s altar has greater clarity, and his room screen shows two statuettes on slender colunettes. Standing under aediculae, and flanking a symbolical Marian Porta Coeli, they probably represent Sts. Peter and Paul (Fig. 9.113), the traditional “Pillars” of the Early Christian Church. In 1433 King Duarte donated six urns of oil for the burning of lamps at the reliquary of St. Vincent. This royal endowment to perpetuate the memory of his father is suggested by Jan’s depiction of tall lighted candles by the sides of the wooden statue of the Virgin Mary in a niche of the rood screen. The opposite niche in Gossaert’s painting suggests a votive arrangement. A candle flickers next to a statue of a bishop, whose ecclesiastical status is affirmed by his miter and crosier. In the context of a Portuguese commission, Gossaert’s bishop, could be St. Augustine (354–48). Particularly relevant to the imagery of the Berlin Madonna in a Church is a passage from Augustine’s Meditations: Positus in medio, quo vertam nescio, hic pastor a vulnere, hic lactor ab ubere (I stand between them, which way shall I turn? On the one side the blood of Christ, on the other, the milk of his mother). Two Augustinian canons had transported the relics of St. Vincent to Lisbon in 1173, and thereafter Afonso Henriques had decreed that their Order should be affiliated with the Cathedral of Santa Maria. On the other hand, a closer examination of Gossaert’s niche statue reveals the bishop does not wear black robes, and therefore, he might be identified as St. Theotonius (1086–1166), who typically was portrayed in 58 The alabaster casket appears to have the casing for a wooden box. By the late fifteenth century the relics of St. Vincent were housed in a silver container which was opened on November 10, 1690 in the presence of Archbishop Dom Luíz de Souza, Deão Antonio de Vasconcelos and the canons João de Azevedo, Lourenço Pires de Carvalho and Estêvão de Foyos. Miguel do Souto’s “testament of transferal” mentions an alabaster coffer girded with thirteen silver and five iron bands. The wooden box within, presumably of cedar, was similarly disposed. The body of Vincent was extolled by Souto as “entire and incorrupt and perfect” with the arms crossed, the right above the left, and with a face “mui bello.” Markl, O rétabulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os documentos, 235 and 232 note 16.

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white (Fig. 9.114). Prior to joining the Augustinian Canons Regular, he had been a “mitered archpriest” of Viséu, the ducal dominion of Prince Henrique the Navigator. The honorary pastoral position of “archpriest” entitled him to wear the crown or miter. Highly esteemed by King Afonso Henriques, Theotonius must have been instrumental in the monarch’s selection of the Augustinian Order to administrate the Lisbon diocese and titularies. Theotonius had resigned his position in Viséu to sail to the Holy Land, where he was impressed by the spirituality of the mendicant Franciscan monks who guided pilgrims to the most sacred sites of Christendom. According to an anonymous biography written shortly after the death of Theotonius in 1163, and probably before his canonization in 1167, the Canons Regular of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem were so impressed by his sanctity they invited him to join their community. They offered to give him custody of the Holy Sepulchre, which “they understood he desired above all.” Theotonius returned to Portugal about 1131 to set his affairs in order before transferring to the Holy Land. However, he was appointed grand prior of Coimbra’s Augustinian Monastery of the Holy Cross, and therefore, had to decline the position of custodian at the Holy Sepulchre. During the years he administrated the new order Theotonius maintained close ties with the Burgundian Cistercians. St. Bernard of Clairvaux sent him a beautiful crozier as token of his pastoral devotion and pivitol role as sage counsellor to King Afonso Henriques. Before the Lisbon earthquake of 1755, the Franciscan Church of St. Anthony of Padua faced the western entrance of the Sé (Fig. 9.115). Educated by Augustinian canons of the Cathedral, “António Martims” professed his vows in 1215 at Theotonius’ monastery in Coimbra. St. Anthony would have met the first Franciscan martyrs of Morocco when they departed from the city for North Africa. After witnessing the arrival of their remains at his monastery in 1220, he immediately joined St. Francis at Assisi. The Medieval age was an age obsessed with relics, and the Avis royals exemplified that devotional preoccupation with holy remnants. On his returning from his 1425–1429 sojourn abroad, Prince Pedro visited Padua where he obtained a fragment of St. Anthony’s cranium (Fig. 9.116). This relic likely was seen by Jan van Eyck in the Lisbon Church which honored the holy preacher. En route to Santiago de Compostela in 1429, he also would have toured the Monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra and seen the institution’s famed scriptorium, as well as the stone casket containing the relics of the holy quintet of Franciscan martyrs.

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Despite funding set aside by King João I for the construction of a “Chapel of St. Vincent” in the Romanesque bell tower of the Cathedral, the project was delayed over a period of several decades. Not until the reign of Alfonso V (c. 1448–1481) was the chapel decorated with a sumptuous polyptych by João Eanes and Nuno Gonçalves that encapsulated a new reliquary of St. Vincent. The altarpiece contained portraits of the Cathedral’s popular saints, Peter, Paul, Theotonius and Francis of Assisi, represented as seated canons. These four icons of the St. Vincent Altarpiece escaped the earthquake of 1755. Eight additional panels were discovered in 1882 in the new Church of St. Vincent behind the Walls, then a Patriarchal Palace, where they had been used by workmen as scaffolding. However, the altar of St. Vincent with its Eucharistic monstrance donated to the Cathedral by Afonso Henriques I, along with João Eanes’s reliquary were obliterated in 1755. The Lisbon Sé of Santa Maria as known by Van Eyck does not exist, but it still retains an awesome presence in large measure due to the reconstruction efforts of 1940. The earthquake not only toppled revetments, vaulting and statuary, but fires demolished almost all of the rare carvings, relics, and liturgical objects assembled within the church’s ambulatory and aisle chapels, as well as the treasures of the sacristy chambers.59 If Jan Gossaert’s Doria Diptych was more “imitation” than “invention,” and the Berlin Madonna in a Church can be considered a Lusitanian commission, Jan van Eyck’s panel with its dramatic illumination indeed may provide the only accurate interior view of the Renaissance Cathedral.

João Batista Castro, Mappa de Portugal antigo e moderno, 3 vols. (Lisboa: Na officina patriarcal de Francisco Luiz Ameno, 1762–1763, 2nd ed.), III, 348, describes the damage of the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and affirms the Cathedral was ravaged by a fire which destroyed the reliquary of St. Vincent, as well as statues and altarpieces. 59

10 Miscellanea: Reflections within a Dark Glass A Lost Triptych and the Lomellini of Lisbon and Madeira

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n 1444 the King of Aragon acquired a triptych by Jan van Eyck, the only description of which is found in the De Viris Illustribus (Book of Famous Men: 1455–1456) by Bartholomaeus Facius (Fazio), a humanist from Liguria at the Neapolitan court. In his manuscript dedicated to Alfonso V of Aragon, the scholar states: There is a remarkable painting by him [Jan van Eyck] in the private apartment of King Alfonso. One sees there the Virgin Mary, strikingly graceful and modest; the Angel Gabriel, who announces that the Son of God will be born of Her, is very handsome and his hair surpasses reality; John the Baptist expresses the marvelous sanctity and austerity of his life; Jerome, as a living being in a library, is done with extraordinary skill, for if you stand at a certain distance you have the impression that the room recedes within the painting and that the open books are real, but if you approach it is evident that it is merely a summary depiction. On the outside of the panels, the painter has represented Battista Lomelinus, who owned the painting, and you would think he lacked nothing but a voice; also his beloved and exceptionally beautiful wife, and she too is represented as she was. Between them,

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as if passing through a crack in the wall, falls a ray of sunshine, which you would take for a real one.1 The architectural background of a church interior must have been replicated, as demonstrated by Barthélemey d’Eyck’s Aix Annunciation (Fig. 10.1), as well as an Eyckian drawing in Wolfenbüttel (Fig. 10.2). The wing panels of the former altarpiece contain imposing figures of the prophets Jeremiah and Isaiah with still lifes of stacked books in each that are remarkable in their verisimilitude.2 Though it is not an upright panel, Colantonio’s St. Jerome in his Study, (Fig. 10.3) painted about 1445 for the Neapolitan Franciscan Church of San Lorenzo, also contains a shelves of tomes, and it visually corresponds with Fazio’s description of the Lomellini shutter of the Church Doctor.3 Determining what elements might have been taken, if any, from Jan van Eyck’s triptych might be too conjectural. The Detroit St. Jerome in a Study (Fig. 10.4), generally believed to be a work by Petrus Christus and linked with Cardinal Albergati’s intervention at Arras, also has been linked with the Lomellini Triptych.4 The library in the picture, which 1 Michael Baxandall, “Bartholomaeus Facius on Painting — A fifteenth-century manuscript of the De Viris Illustribus,” Journal of the Warburg Courtauld Institutes XXVII (1964), 90–107, at 102–3. Also see Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck (New YorkAntwerp: Alpine Fine Arts Collection, Ltd.-Mercatorfonds, 1980), 252. 2 J. Rivière, “La nature morte des Pays-Bas. Du mythe à la réalité,” Bulletin de la Société des amis des Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes (Special Edition: La Nature Morte), V (1987): 26–41. 3 Roberto Weiss, “Jan van Eyck and the Italians, I: The Merchants,” Italian Studies XI (Manchester: 1956): 1–15 and XII (1957): 7–21, at 10, suggests Jan van Eyck’s Lomellini Triptych panel of “St. Jerome” served as the model for Colantonio’s St. Jerome in his Study (Naples: Museo Nazonale) and Antonello da Messina’s St. Jerome (London: National Gallery). See Penny Howell Jolly, Jan van Eyck and St. Jerome: A Study of Eyckian Influence on Colantonio and Antonello da Messina in Quattrocento Naples (Philadelphia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1976); Bernhard Ridderbos, Saint and Symbol: Images of Saint Jerome in early Italian Art, translated by P. de Waard-Dekking (Groningen: Bouma’s Boekhuis, 1984); Milliard Meiss, “French and Italian Variations on an Early Fifteenth-Century Theme: St. Jerome and his Study,” Essais en l’honneur de Jean Porcher. Études sur les manuscrits à peintures, ed. Otto Pächt, Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXII (1963): 147–70. 4 Edwin Hall, ‘Cardinal Albergati, St. Jerome and the Detroit van Eyck,” Art Quarterly XXXI (1968): 3–34; idem., “More about the Detroit van Eyck: The Astrolable, the Congress of Arras and Cardinal Albergati,” Art Quarterly XXXVII (1971): 181–201; John Hunter, “Who is Jan van Eyck’s ‘Cardinal Nicolo Albergati’”, Art Bulletin LXXV (1993): 207–18, at 210–12, 215; Maryan W. Ainsworth (ed.), Petrus Christus in Renaissance Bruges: An Interdisciplinary Approach, ed. (New York-Turnhout: The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Brepols, 1995),

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is similar to an illumination by Hand H of the Turin-Milan Hours, (Fig. 10.5) lacks the open volumes that riveted Fazio’s attention. Antonello da Messina’s St. Jerome in his Study (Fig. 10.6), circa 1450–1455, is recorded in Naples as early as 1456, and it apparently also derives from the lost Lomellini panel.5 Similar to Colantonio’s St. Jerome, the saint is turned to the right.6 But even more obvious in Antonello’s panel is the spatial atmosphere, and this stunning play of lighted and shadowed areas is significant considering Fazio praise of Jan’s unusual illumination in the Lomellini Triptych. A lion emerges from the darkened right side of Antonello’s hall. As the antithesis to the domesticated cat perched naturalistically on the step of Jerome’s office, the beast more commonly is shown beside the Latin Doctor, as observed Catalogue No. 1, 68–71; Annarosa Garzelli, “Sulla fortuna del Gerolamo mediceo del van Eyck nell’arte fiorentina del quattrocento,” Scritti di Storia dell’Arte in onore di Roberto Salvini (Florence: Sansoni, 1984): 347–53. Recent scientific study of the Detroit St. Jerome has been undertaken by Barbara Heller, Conservator of the Detroit Institute of Arts in collaboration with L. Stodulski. Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Erasme, 1987), 29–40, at 31–32; Paula Nuttall, “Domenico Ghirlandaio and Northern Art,” Apollo CXLIII, No. 142 (1996): 16–22, at 18–19; Rolf Quednau, “Kunstgeschichte im Europäischen Kontext: Italienische Frührenaissance und Nordeuropäisches Spätmittelalter,” Kunstchronik XLV (1992): 186–211, at 193–94. 5 For Antonello da Messina, see Fiorella Sricchia Santoro, Antonello e l’Europa (Milan: 1986); idem., Antonello da Messina (Rome: exhibition catalogue, Messina-Museo regionale, De Luca Publishers, 1981); Giovanna Giacobello Bernard and Enrica Pagella, Van Eyck, Antonello, Leonardo: tre capolavori del Rinascimento (Turin-New York: U. Allemandi, 2003); Gabriele Mandel, L’opera completa di Antonello da Messina, ed. Leonardo Sciascia (Milan: Rizzoli, 1967). Stefano Bottari, Antonello da Messina, translated by Giustina Scaglia (Greenwich: CN: New York Graphic Society, 1955); idem., Antonello (Milan: G. Principato, 1953). 6 Following the traditional disposition of a fifteenth-century triptych, the central Annunciation subject when closed would have exhibited the kneeling portraits of Giovanni Battista Lomellini and his wife facing each other. The reverse side of Giovanni’s wing portrait would have shown St. John the Baptist. Therefore, St. Jerome as portrayed on the reverse side of the wife’s portrait panel would have been turned towards the Annunciate Virgin and Archangel Gabriel, and not positioned in his study like the Detroit St. Jerome, which is more dependent upon the St. Thomas Aquinas illumination ascribed to Hand H in the TurinMilan Hours (MS. K.IV.29, folio 73v, destroyed 1904). See Maryan W. Ainsworth, Petrus Christus, Renaissance Master of Bruges, with contributions by Maxmilian P.J. Martens (New York-Ghent: exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Ludion Press, 1994), 68–71: Catalogue No. 1 (Workshop of Jan van Eyck, St. Jerome in his Study, Detroit Institute of Arts), dated ca. 1442 and discussed with an illustration of the Turin-Milan St. Thomas Aquinas.

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in the Detroit panel. It might be pondered if Antonello took aspects of the interior setting of the Lomellini Annunciation and made it the backdrop of his “study chamber” of St. Jerome, which if taken separately resembles the office depicted by Colantonio. With its high vaulted ceiling, side aisles, upper clerestory windows and lower fenestrations opening to a continuous landscape, Antonio’s architecture seems to define the ambiance of a hall church rather than a saint’s study. Of the free renderings after Jan’s lost original, the interior by Antonello with its foreground still life and exquisite choir of birds, appears to be the most viable replication of an Eyckian composition. Fazio was unsparing in his praise for the donor portraits painted on the reverse sides of the wings. Remarking that they “lacked nothing but a voice,” he additionally was captivated by the simulation of a sunbeam which fell between them. This symbolic representation of divine illumination must have been extraordinary as Jan managed to suggest the rays of the Holy Spirit extended from the Annunciation to touch both the shutter frames and the figures of the kneeling donors. Unfortunately Fazio did not elaborate about the composition of “John the Baptist,” but likely the work was similar to the Landscape with St. John the Baptist – “Ecce Agnus Dei,” ca. 1445, attributed to Petrus Christus and/or the workshop of Jan van Eyck 7 (Fig. 10.7). John 7 Ainsworth, Petrus Christus, Renaissance Master of Bruges, 78–85: Catalogue No. 3 (Attributed to Petrus Christus, St. John the Baptist in a Landscape), dated 1445. Ann Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” 98–99, summarizes correspondence and conversations about the Cleveland panel with Charles Sterling (ca. 1979–1980), who: “favored an attribution of the work to a gifted satellite of Jan van Eyck. The voluminous Burgundian drapery, so full of lyrical dynamism, he maintains, is entirely absent in Christus’s documented works. He also points to the rocks which he finds reminiscent of the Eyckian Stigmatization of St. Francis in Turin. Sterling also notes the sudden leap into distance from one river bank to the other — a very odd compositional device found in the miniatures of the Boucicaut Master, those miniatures of Hand G and Hand H in the Turin-Milan Hours, the Eyckian Dyptych in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Calvary in Berlin, the Three Marys in the Museum Boymans-van-Beuningen in Rotterdam, the Frick Altarpiece, the Rolin Madonna, the St. Barbara grisaille and the right wing of the Dresden Triptych. Sterling also noted the ‘unity of aerial perspective and light-infused atmosphere,’ consistent with Jan’s pictures of 1435–1440.” As pointed out by Tzeutschler Lurie, Sterling discovered “tiny silhouettes of people in the background” that wore grand hats and over kneelength houppelandes. The apparel was consistent with costumes worn by the small figures depicted in the landscape views of the Ghent Altarpiece Annunciation, the Rolin Madonna and the St. Barbara grisaille. For this reason, he dated the Cleveland panel to circa 1435–1445. By pointing out these relationships, particularly a proclivity for minutiae and atmospheric

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the Baptist not only was Giovanni Battista di Giorgio’s name saint, but he was the patron saint of Genoa.8 Regarding the merchant’s wife, she may have been named either “Jeronima” in honor of the Doctor of the Church Jan portrayed, or “Paula,” after the wealthy Roman widow whose funds supported St. Jerome’s monastery in Bethlehem. Based upon Fazio’s comments, the Lomellini Triptych was installed in penetralibus Alfonsi regis, the most private apartments of the king of Aragon at the Castel Nuovo which were destroyed by fire in 1504.9 The work has landscape, Sterling bonds together a group of original works by Jan’s hand which must have been created about the time of his final “secret mission.” 8 The diptych of the Virgin and Child and St. John the Baptist in the Louvre is considered to be a workshop creation. The Baptist is more iconic and differs from Christus’s figure, which is portrayed standing in front of a realistic landscape. Both images likely derive from lost drawings by Jan van Eyck. See Micheline Comblen-Sonkes and Philippe Lorentz, Musée du Louvre, Paris II (Corpus de la peinture des anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux et de la Principauté de Liège au XVe siècle, 17) (Brussels: Centre national de recherches “Primitifs flamands”: A.C.L., Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale, 1995), 1–10; Marion Grams-Thieme, Lebendige Steine: Studien zur niederländischen Grisaillemalerei des 15. und frühen 16. Jahrhunderts (Dissertationen zur Kunstgeschichte, 27) (Cologne-Vienna: Böhlau, 1988): 303–7. 9 Paula Nuttall, “Jan van Eyck’s Paintings in Italy,” The National Gallery investigating Jan van Eyck, ed. Susan Foister, Sue Jones and Delphine Cool (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2000), 169–182, at 171; idem., From Flanders to Florence: The Impact of Netherlandish Painting, 1400–1500 (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 2004); See Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” 106–9, for a discussion about the lost Lomellini Triptych and the Cleveland Baptist. Fazio did not discuss the placement of the saints in the triptych. Neither did he indicate the work’s dimensions. In her discussion of the Cleveland panel, Ann Tzeutschler Lurie states: “The truncated windmill, so conspicuously perched on the top of the hill, strongly suggests that the landscape continued into a central panel.” Noting the Ghent Annunciation provides background window views across four panels, she additionally mentions Antonello da Messina’s Annunciation of 1474. While the work in Syracuse (Museo Nazionale) depicts an interior setting, the windows overlook a continued landscape. Elsewhere, 105, she scrutinizes the symbolism of the windmill, remarking that it appears in scenes of Christ’s Passion as a Eucharistic emblem of the “mystical mill,” denoting the transubstantiation of bread into the body of Christ. Pointing out the motif in some of the Eyckian miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours (Kiss of Judas, Hand G, destroyed; Baptism of Christ, bas-de-page, Hand G; Pietà, basede-page, Hand H) she also states there are no windmills in the Turin-Milan Road to Calvary (Hand H), but that three windmills are depicted in the Budapest Way to Calvary and one is shown in the landscape of the Berlin Crucifixion. A most pertinent source is given to support a link between the windmill and the “Annunciation theme,” a stained glass window in the Cathedral of Berne which shows the Annunciate Virgin and Archangel Gabriel observing Moses strike water from the rock to start the mill’s movement. Consult: Alois Thomas, “Die Mystische Mühle,” Die Christliche Kunst XXXI (1934–1935): 129–39; L. Lindet, “Les

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been presumed to have been acquired in Naples from an original owner, Battista di Giorgio Lomellini. From Vassallo Lomellini in 1177 through the sixteenth century, the Lomellini of Genoa were active merchants and traders.10 The notion has been advanced that Lomellini gave his triptych to Alfonso V in expiation for his family’s participation in the capture of the monarch’s brothers at the August 5, 1435 battle of Ponza.11 The ten hour battle fought in the waters off Ponza was won by the Genoese Biagio Assereto († April 25, 1456), whose sixteen galleys and 2400 soldiers defeated twenty-five ships and 6000 soldiers of Alfonso V of Aragon, a claimant to the kingdom of Naples after the death of Queen Joanna II (1414–1434). About 5000 prisoners were taken with the capture of the Aragonese fleet, and they included the monarch and his two brothers, Juan and Enrique, as well as the Prince of Taranto and Duke of Sessa. Imprisoned in Milan by Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan, who also ruled over Genoa, Alfonso V persuaded his former enemy to support his claim to Naples against those advanced by Pope Eugenius IV and René, the Duke of Anjou. By 1443 Alfonso V established Spanish rule in Naples, and an embassy from Genoa arrived to his castle in 1444 with petitions for his protection. The kingdom of Portugal in the Ponza conflict did not side with the Genoese, perhaps because King Duarte and Prince Henrique had hoped to secure Alfonso V’s support in an expedition to Tangier. Had Giovanni Battista di Giorgio Lomellini been stationed in Lisbon at the time of the Ponza conflict, he might have taken a neutral position. Following the Portuguese defeat at Tangier, the merchant plausibly gave his triptych to Alfonso V for a dual purpose: to expiate the Lomellini participation at Ponza; and to coax the monarch into negotiating the release of Prince Ferdinand from Moroccan

Représentations Allégoriques du Moulin et du Pressoir,” Revue Archéologique XXXVI, No. 3 (January–June, 1900): 405–411; Ikonographie der Christlichen Kunst I (Freiburg, Breisgau: 1928), 193, Fig. 55 (Window, Cathedral of Berne); Horst Appuhn, “Der Auferstandene und das Heilige Blut zu Weinhausen,” Niederdeutsche Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte I (Cologne: 1961): 73–138. 10 The genealogical records of the Lomellini family are among the archival papers of the collection of the Italian Count Antonio Cavagna Sangiuliani di Gualdana (1843–1913) in the Rare Books and Special Collections Library at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. My thanks are expressed to Bruce Swann of the Rare Book and Special Collections Library for his search through the thirteen-page unbound manuscript of the Lomellini family tree. 11 Carl Brandon Strehlke, “Jan van Eyck, un artista per il mediterraneo,” in Jan van Eyck. Opere a confronto (Turin: Galleria Sabauda exhibition catalogue, 1997), 69.

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captivity. Portuguese gratitude for Giovanni Battista di Giorgio’s support appears to be reflected in the documented preference the Lomellini family received in commercial activities in Lisbon during the fifteenth century.12 On June 22, 1357 the Genoese obtained the same trading privileges as the Florentine merchants were accorded by Afonso IV (1325–1357) on April 9, 1338.13 In 1424 Bartolomeo Lomellini is documented as transporting wheat from Sicily to the fortress of Ceuta.14 By September of 1433 the same merchant is recorded as a resident in Lisbon with kinsmen — Marco Lomellini, Daniel Lomellini and Filippo Lomellini, all brothers — and Leonardo Lomellini, Ambrosio Lomellini, Giovanni Antonio Lomellini, Juliano Lomellini and Battista Lomellini.15 Dated July 20, 1440, two cartas de real seguro (letters of royal security) for three years duration affirm the presence in Lisbon of Marco Lomellini, Daniel Lomellini, Leonardo Lomellini and Giovanni Antonio Lomellini.16 Ambrosio Lomellini, who negotiated in Nantes to send ships to Portugal circa September 25, 1433,

Virginia Rau, “Privilégios e Legislação Portuguesa Referente a Mercadores Estrangeiros (Séculos XV e XVI),” Estudios de História (Lisbon: 1968): 131–73; idem., “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV. Os Lomellini,” Revista da Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa XXII, 2 Ser. (Lisbon: Universidade de Lisboa, 1956), 56–69; translation “A Family of Italian Merchants in Portugal in the XVth Century: the Lomellini in Sep de Studi in Onore di Armando Sapori [História Económica – Portugal – Século 15 – Mercadores Italianos] (Milan: Istituto Editoriale Cisalpino, 1957): 717–26. Also Jacques Heers, Gênes au XVe siècle, activité économique et problèmes sociaux (Paris: S.E.V.P.E.N., 1961; idem., L’Occident aux XIVe et XVe siècles, aspects économiques et sociaux (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1966, 2nd ed. augmented); idem., Gênes au XVe siècle; civilisation méditerranéenne, grand capitalisme, et capitalisme populaire (Paris: Flammarion, 1971); Jules Finot, Étude historique sur les relations commerciales entre la Flandre et la république de Gênes au moyen âge (Paris: A. Picard, 1906). 13 João Martins da Silva Marques, Descobrimentos portugueses, documentos para a sua história, 5 vols. (Lisbon: Instituto para a alta cultura, 1944), I, 53 and 105–6; Henrique da Gama Barros, Historia da administração publica em Portugal nos seculos XII a XV, ed. Torquato de Sousa Soares, 11 vols. (Lisbon: Livraria Sá da Costa, 1945–1954, 2nd ed.), X, 199. 14 Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria D. João II, Livro 25, fl. 101. According to a carta de quitação dated October 1, 1398, King João I sent a “soma grande” of wheat to Genoa, the shipment having been sold to Saldom Lomellino. See Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 61, note 3, who provides another document of June 27, 1426 relating to the merchant Bartolommeo Lomellini. 15 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 62 and notes 2–4. See Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria D. João II, Livro 25, fl. 105v. 16 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 62 and notes 5–6. See Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria D. Afonso V, Livro 20, folios 70 and 73v. 12

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was a procurer of vessels and shipping supplies during the reign of Afonso V.17 Huge sums of money were given by Marco and Daniel Lomellini to the royal house.18 The Lomellini maintained a business and residence in Lisbon on the Rua do Vidro (Street of Glass) which belonged to the parish of São Julião (Fig. 10.8). Situated near the dockyard (Rua de Mercadores), the business comprised the first level of a two-storied building divided into four houses.19 Undeniably because of the predominance of the Genoese merchants in Lisbon society, on June 21, 1456 Afonso V of Portugal (r. 1450–1481) accorded a monopoly in the exporting of cork (quercus suber) to Marco Lomellini. A similar trading privilege was granted on June 7, 1456 to Maerten Lem, a merchant of Bruges, who in 1466 was a business associate of Marco Lomellini.20 According to a document dated January 10, 1480, Marco Lomellini had two sons by a Portuguese wife: Duarte, who presumably was born between 1432 and 1438 as he was named after King Duarte); and Francisco.21 In 1504 Duarte, then a merchant, rented another family house attached to Todos-os-Santos, a royal hospital initiated in 1492 by order of

17 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 62–63 and notes 1–2. See Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria D. Afonso V, Livro 25, f. 9v (25 September, 1433) and Livro 36, f. 12v (January 15, 1459: document pertaining to payment for work in collabortion with a Breton name Jaime Tanas). Ambrosio served the throne for the following ten years. 18 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 63. Though Rau specifically refers to the years 1452 and 1456, likely the Lomellini brothers even earlier courted royal favor with lavish gifts and donations of money. 19 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67. 20 Jacques Paviot, “Bruges et Portugal,” in André Vandewalle, Les marchands de la Hanse et la banque des Médicis. Bruges, marché d’échanges culturels en Europe (Bruges: Stichting Kunstboek, 2002), 45–49, at 46 for the Lomellini. Also consult his comprehensive study, “Les Portugais à Bruges au XV e Siècle,” Arquivos do Centro Cultural Calouste Gulbenkian, XXXVIII (Lisbon: 1999), 1–122. See also Francisco Marques de Sousa Viterbo, “O monopolio da cortiça no século XV,” Archivo Historico Portuguez II (Lisbon: 1904), 41–52; Anselmo Braamcamp Freire, Noticias da Feitoria de Flandres (Lisbon: Livraria Ferin, Baptista, Torres & C.ta, 1920), 38, 70–72; John G. Everaert, “Les Lem, alias Lem, une dynastie marchande d’origine flamande au service de l’expansion portuguaise,” in Actas III Colóquio Internacional de História da Madeira (Funchal: 1993): 817–38. 21 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 5. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 26, f. 40v. The name of Duarte is given as “Antonio,” which Rau attributes to a scribe’s error. However, “Antonio” might have been Duarte’s middle name.

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King João II.22 Marco and Daniel Lomellini’s trading privileges of cork were renewed on May 25, 1456 with reference to their “many services” to the Crown.23 The same adulation was according Filippo when his privileges were renewed on July 15, 1465.24 On October 11, 1468 Marco Lomellini and his brother Filippo were given a new carta de segurança e privilégios, which was to provide a monopoly until November 17, 1497. While the document referred to Filippo as being in London, it embraced Marco’s nephews residing in Lisbon, Battista Lomellini and Francisco Calvo.25 In July of 1469 Marco Lomellini returned to Genoa, perhaps not on his ship called the Santo Espirito, but by means of a royal vessel he was to sell in Genoa in order to purchase velvet panels and other goods in London.26 Marco Lomellini is documented as having returned to Lisbon on November 27, 1471 with his nephews Battista and Francisco.27 According to a license dated February 8, 1472, Battista Lomellini and Francisco Calvo were permitted to trade arms, wood and shipping supplies in “Moorish lands.”28 While Marco Lomellini’s name surfaces in a commercial receipt of 1474,29 other records of 1475 give the names of [Giovanni] Antonio Lomellini and Juliano Lomellini.30 Battista Lomellini and Urbano, another nephew of Marco Lomellini, maintained an economic presence in Madeira and Porto Santo (23 miles to Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 4. See Torre do Tombo, Livro 13 da Estremadura, f. 10. 23 Sousa Viterbo, “O monopolio da cortiça no século XV,” 52. 24 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 66 and note 3. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 14, f. 30v. 25 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 66 and note 4. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 28, f. 132v. and Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Manuel I, Livro 6, f. 111v. 26 Silva Marques, Descobrimentos portugueses. Documentos para a sua história, III, 63–64. Also consult Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 66, who mentions the amount of 399 ducados as the purchase price for the king’s ship according to a receipt dated July 4, 1469. 27 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 2. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 29, f. 53v. 28 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 6. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 37, f. 91. 29 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 3. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 30, f. 173. 30 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 67 and note 6. See Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria D. Afonso V, Livro 30, f. 158v. Juliano Lomellini and “Antonio” Lomellini are mentioned in a document of February 10, 1475 as engaged in trading activities with the “lands of the Moors.” 22

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the northeast) (Fig. 10.9). These islands located nearly 621 miles (1000 km) from Lisbon and 378 miles (608 km) from Morocco, initially were recorded on a Genoese map of 1351. However, they were claimed for Portugal in 1418–1420 by the explorers João Gonçalves Zarco, Tristão Vaz Texeira, and Bartolomeu Perestrelo. Within seven years the three mariners were granted hereditary fiefdoms in Madeira and Porto Santo. By the late 1430s the coastal towns, particularly Funchal, were supplying Genoese traders with “white gold.” Besides sugar cane, which was cultivated in the rich soil of terraced fields and irrigated by a system of levadas, other products were provided by the islanders, including chio, the filler sap of the pistacia tree, and alum, a product used in cloth dying. Sugar, wines and honey were exported from Madeira to Genoa, Venice and Bruges.31 Battista and Urbano Lomellini settled in Vila de Santa Cruz in the jurisdiction of Machico where they owned mills and ships. Battista is described as a citizen of Madeira on November 27, 1471.32 Urbano is listed as a native of Funchal on December 30, 1476, and he owned a house on Porto de Seixo and lands in Santa Cruz and in Santana. According to the July 9, 1518 testament of Urbano Lomellini, signed by his wife Joana Lopes and mother-in-law Isabel Correira, provision was made for the building and decoration of the Franciscan Convent of Nossa Senhora da Piedade (Our Lady of Mercy) on a site known as “La Granja” (the Grange) in Santa Cruz.33 Because the merchant had no direct heir, his nephew Jorge (Giorgio), son of Battista Lomellini, was named as administrator of his estate and trust. In 1515 Jorge Lomellini was knighted (fidalgo-cavaleiro) and he participated in the Portuguese taking of Azamor. Following his death on December 9, 1548, he was buried in the main chapel of Nossa Senhora da Piedade. He and his

31 M. Ferreira Pita, “Notas para a história da frequesia de Santa Cruz,” Das artes e da historia de Madeira IV, No. 1–2 (Funchal: 1955), 46–48. 32 J.L. Manso de Lima, “Urbino Lomelino” and “Baptista Lomelino” in Familias de Portugal (Lisbon: Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, Reservados, Fundo Geral), 16 vols. (1925– 1941), 1260. 33 Rau, “Uma Família de Mercadores Italianos em Portugal no Século XV,” 68 and note 6; 69 and notes 2. See António Cordeiro, Historia Insulana (Lisbon: 1866), II, 379–80; Domenico Giofré, “Le relazioni fra Genova e Madera nel 1.o decénnio del Secolo XVI,” Studi Colombiani III [n.d.]: 435–83. Urbano had established a trust with his wife, a native of Santana, who merged her own assets with those of her mother’s to the trust. Urbano, Joana Lopes and Isabel Correira were buried in the church they founded, Nossa Senhora da Piedade.

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wife Maria Adão left several children who propagated the family name and business in Madeira.34 So then, the “kinsman” of Marco Lomellini referred to merely as “Battista” in a Portuguese document of 1433 likely was Giovanni Battista di Giorgio Lomellini. He would have sired not only Francisco Calvo (illegitimate son) but also Urbano and Battista, the two Lomellini merchants who settled in Madeira. The vast tracts of land in Vila de Santa Cruz ultimately were acquired by Giovanni Battista di Giorgio’s grandson and namesake, Jorge Lomellini. The Lomellini presence in Lisbon and Madeira is quite significant. Scholars have assumed that Jan van Eyck painted his lost triptych in Bruges, but it is reasonable now to advance the idea that this altarpiece was painted in Portugal, perhaps even for a chapel belonging to the Gothic parish church of the Lomellini family in Lisbon which appropriately honored the patron of boatmen and travelers, St. Julian the Hospitaller. Philip the Good’s Mappamundi In his De Viris Illustribus, Bartholomaeus Facius (Fazio) comments that Jan van Eyck made a “map of the world” for Philip the Good, and he describes it as “ … a circular representation of the world … you may distinguish in it not only places and the lie of continents but also, by measurement, the distances between places…”35 Jan’s Ptolemaic mappamundi which so impressed Fazio with its realism has been related by Jacques Paviot to the first threedimensional globe created by Guillaume Hobit. The astronomer worked on some kind of latitudinal-longitudinal grid between 1436 and 1440 before giving his globe to Jan van Eyck, who filled in topographical details like rivers, 34 Grande enciclopédia portuguesa e brasileira (Lisboa: Editorial Enciclopédia Limitada (1935), XV: 402ff. Ms. Maria Angela Leal, Interim Curator of the Oliviera Lima Library at Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. kindly provided this source and information on the Lomellini in Madeira. 35 Michael Baxandall, “Bartholomaeus Facius on Painting — a fifteenth-century manuscript of the De Viris Illustribus,” Journal of the Warburg-Courtauld Institutes XXVII (1964): 90–107, at 102; Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 rpt. of 1953 edition, Harvard University ), I, 2–3, 361 note 7; Bartholomaeus Facius [d. 1457], De Viris illustribus [1454], ed. L. Mehus (Florence: 1745).

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valleys and mountains.36 The lost “World Map” has been dated generally to the late period of Jan’s career, and even related to the “secret mission” Jan undertook on behalf of Duke Philip the Good in 1436.37 Jan’s map must have accommodated the naturalistic details of the known continents, as well as the circumscribing oceans and usual cartographic paraphernalia. Jan also might have painted the twelve winds and even fantastic sea creatures. When tincturing the continents, he could have marked primary cities with vignettes containing a famous monument. With regard to the handling of landscape, it would have differed from traditional mappamundi like Barthélemy l’Anglais’s Planisphère (Fig. 10.10) which depicts an earth divided into three continents: Asia at the top with a silhouette of Jerusalem against a blue sky; and Europe and Africa below separated by wide bands of water containing several islands and surrounded by the oceans. Jan would not have presented such simplistic land formations and uniform clusters of architecture. Fazio remarked that in his knowledge of geometry and colour, he transcended nature. Based upon a Latin translation of Ptolemy’s Cosmographia begun for John the Fearless and completed in 1420,38 Jan’s unusual globe anticipated Hartmann Schedel’s World Map of 1493 (Fig. 10.11), that derived from the Ptolemaic Geografica, the first edition of which was written by Hogo Comminelli in 1472 and Jacques Paviot, “La Mappamundi attribuée à Jan van Eyck par Facio: une pièce à retirer de son oeuvre,” Revue des archéologues et historiens de l’art de Louvain XXIV (1991): 57–62. The Mappamundi was kept in the allée or upper corridor uniting the apartments of Philip the Good and Archduchess Isabel at the Prisenhof in Bruges, where “clocks and other things” were displayed. For this reference see Jan Karl Steppe, “De Mappemonde geschilderd door Jan van Eyck voor Filips de Goede,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Lettern en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLIV (1983), 2 :99–101. Also consult Krista De Jonge, “Bourgondische residenties in het graafschap Vlaanderen. Rijsel, Brugge en Gent ten tijde van Filips de Goede”, Handelingen der maatschappij voor geschiedenis en oudheidkunde te Gent, (Gent, nieuwe reeks), LIV(2000):. 93–134, at 101 and note 22. 37 Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art XXXIII (1976): 7–82, at 69–77, stressed Jan acquired his knowledge on his trip to the Iberian Peninsula. His opnion has been endorsed by Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 170–73, who mentions Prince Henrique the Navigator. Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467) (New York: Ph.D. Dissertation Columbia University, 1979), 225–28, has argued Bruges was a center for commercial trade which had its own map-makers. 38 George Doutrepont, Inventaire de la “librarie” de Philippe le Bon (1420), ed. P. Weissenbruck (Brussels: Commission Royale d’Histoire, Kiessling et Cie, 1906), No. 199. 36

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published by Petrus Massarius in Paris and Rome. The woodcuts of Michael Wohlgemut illustrating Schedel’s Liber Cronicarum printed in Nuremberg by Anton Koberger were created at the threshold of Europe’s age of exploration. Hobit’s sphere must have marked a considerable advancement over the three flat mappamundi acquired by Jean, Duke of Berry, who also possessed a map of Jerusalem. Listed in 1380 by Jean Blanchet in the library of Jean’s brother, Charles V, is the Catalan Atlas (Figs. 10.12–10.13). Attributed to a cartographer of Mallorca, Cresques Abraham, the map of 1375 encompasses Europe, North Africa and the Near East. The Catalan Atlas presents a cosmographical diagram of the Earth (Fig. 10.14) surrounded by concentric circles denoting the four elements, the seven planets, the twelve signs of the zodiac, the lunar phases of the moon and the four seasons. It also provides a diagram of the tides, a calendar and zodiacal man (Fig. 10.15). Accented with gold and silver, the small figures represented on the map are relevant emblems of temporal knowledge and worldly authority (Figs. 10.16–10.17). Among them are the three Magi whose knowledge of astronomy leads them to Bethlehem, and Alexander the Great, who purportedly harnessed the wind when he vanquished the Tartars. The Macedonian ordered his army to cast bronze statues of horn blowers, whose trumpets were pneumatically engineered to simulate the sound of fearsome winds. As depicted on Charles V’s vibrant atlas, the Tartars of the Steppes were equated with Gog and Magog, the eschatological nations of the four corners of the earth whose divine annihilation is confirmed in the prognostications of Ezekiel (39: 1–16) and the Apocalypse (20:7–9). Philip the Good owned eight manuscript mappamundi and an odd one which was apple-shaped.39 The Burgundian library in Bruges contained abundant cartographic information relating to Northern Europe. However, it paled by contrast with the resources of the Portuguese. In his initial design of Philip the Good’s globe Hobit would have consulted not only with the major Flemish cartographers of Bruges, but also Lusitanian specialists residing in the port city. The Portuguese were at the forefront of changing the Medieval “world picture” because of their superior knowledge of the stars, currents and winds. Honed by decades of trading, the accuracy of their navigational charts is proven by the commanding 39 For this information and amplification on the world map, see Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), 225–27. Also consult John Brian Harley and David Woodward, The History of Cartography, 2 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987).

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lead they took in the colonization of West Africa and their discovery of a route to the Indies. By the end of the fifteenth century, neither Flanders, Spain nor England could match Portugal’s navigational achievements. While Duke Philip the Good owned several manuscript world maps, King Duarte in 1436 probably had many more, in addition to astrolabes and other scientific equipment pertaining to maritime activities.40 King João I had used large mudéjar tents when he traveled, as proven by the two banquets John of Gaunt attended when he visited northern Portugal in early November of 1386.41 The practice of erecting such temporal quarters would have elicited the round cosmic tents of the Achaemenid kings of Persia, which inspired Alexander the Great. Plutarch comments (Alexander, III) the “Son of Heaven” had a magnificent tent made with fifty gilded posts which carried a “sky” of rich workmanship.42 In speaking of Jan’s Mappamundi, Jeffrey Chipps Smith mentions Alexander’s canopy and a painted map owned by Godfrey of Bouillon. He also cites the bedroom of Countess Adele, daughter of William the Conqueror, which contained a world map on the floor with the ceiling painted with stars, planets, and zodiac that placed her in the center of the cosmos.43 Of course, the Hebrews had tent sanctuaries, tribal ephods, the 40 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 226 and note 38. He cites Jean Baptiste Joseph Barrois, Bibliothèque protypographique, ou Librairies des fils du roi Jean, Charles V, Jean de Berri, Philippe de Bourgogne et les siens (Paris: Treuttel et Würtz, 1830): 784, 1344, 1521, 1522, 1523. Also consult: Armando Cortesão, História da Cartografia Portuguesa (Lisbon: Junta de Investigações de Ultramar, 1969); Armando Cortesão and Luís de Albuquerque, History of Portuguese cartography, 2 vols. (Lisbon: Junta de Investigações do Ultramar, 1969– 71); Armando Cortesão and Avelino Teixeira da Mota, Portugaliae Monumenta Cartographica, 6 vols. (Lisbon, 1960–62); Armando Cortesão, Cartografia e cartógrafos portugueses dos séculos XV e XVI (contribuição para um estudo completo) (Lisbon: Edição da Seara Nova, 1935); Jaime Cortesão, História dos Descobrimentos Portuguêses, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Circulo de Leitores, 1979); Duarte Leite, História dos Descobrimentos, [with notes and a study by Vitorino Magalhães Godinho], 2 vols. (Lisbon: Edições Cosmos, 1958–1961); Ronald Vere Tooley, Maps and Map-Makers (London: B.J. Batsford, Ltd., 1949); Joaquin Bensaúde, L’astronomie nautique au Portugal à l’époque des grands Découvertes (Bern: 1912); idem., Histoire de la science nautique portugaise à l’époque des grands Découvertes (Geneva: Société Sadag, 1913). 41 Roche, Philippa. Dona Filipa of Portugal, 47–49. 42 Earl Baldwin Smith, The Dome. A Study in the History of Ideas (1950; rpt., Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), 82. 43 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 226 note 37. He references Florens Deuchler, Die Burgunderbeute: Inventar der Beuteatücke aus den Schlachten von Grandson, Murten und Nancy 1476/1477 (Bern: Stämpfli, 1963), 24, who in turn cites M. Michelant (ed.) Le Roman de Alexandre (Stuttgart: 1846), 53–6.

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most sacred of which housed the Ark of the Covenant. Philo of Alexandria in his Life of Moses described the portable tabernacle of Exodus as symbolizing the “structure of the universe.” Josephus in his Jewish Antiquities similarly referred to the sanctuary as an “imitation of universal nature.”44 Princes of the Avis court were familiar with the history of Alexander the Great, the First Crusade legends of Godfrey de Bouillon, the biblical descriptions of Hebrew ephods. They may even have known about the chamber of William the Conqueror’s daughter, as Batalha Monastery was named for the Norman “Battle Abbey.” Due to contact with the oriental world, they were aware of the cosmic meaning of Islamic domed canopies. Jan van Eyck must have executed preliminary designs for Hobit’s globe, and logically the studies were done on linen which could be easily shaped around a curved surface in a manner similar to the Erdapfel (Earth Apple) of Martim Behaim (1459–1507), the German geographer and cartographer to João II of Portugal (Fig. 10.18). Because his Mappamundi depended upon the Ptolemaic astronomical system of Hellenistic Alexandria, it may have been replicated on a larger scale. In 1461 Philip the Good installed a grand tent in the gardens of the Hôtel d’Artois in Paris. Made of velvet silk, its exterior exhibited the embroidered arms of his dominions, as well as the flint and fire device of the Golden Fleece.45 As such, the pavilion of honor fell within the convention of historical cloth sanctuaries that magnified a ruler as valorous warrior, just judge, magnanimous leader, and vigilant shepherd. There can be no doubt that Philip the Good intended to draw a metaphorical analogy between his garden house, the classical shelter of Alexander the Great; and the Hebrew miškan and ‘ohel mo’ed, the “Tent of Meeting” where Yahweh sat enthroned on the Ark in the “holy of holies.”46 For the occasion of the entry of Louis XI (1423: r. 1461–1483) into Paris, the Duke of Burgundy also had ordered the façade of his Paris residence to be draped with tapestries of the Baldwin Smith, The Dome. A Study in the History of Ideas, 85 and notes 119: Philo, Life of Moses II, 88 (Loeb, VI) and 120: Josephus, Jewish Antiquities III, 123–187 (Loeb, IV). See also his discussion, 83–86 (Isaiah’s image of heaven (XL:22) as a vaulted chamber and God as tent-dweller). The prophet Isaiah also speaks of heaven as God’s “throne” and the earth as his “footstool.” (LXVI:1). Baldwin Smith cites several sources, some concerning the classical skene of Zeus, but especially relevant is Julian Morgenstern, “The Ark, the Ephod and the “Tent of Meeting,” Hebrew Union College Annual XVII (1942–43), n.p. and XVIII (1944): 1–17, reprinted in 1945. 45 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 97. He cites Théodore Godefroy [1580–1649], Le Ceremonial François, I (Paris: 1649), 181. 46 Baldwin Smith, The Dome, 85. 44

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“History of Gideon” and “Alexander the Great.”47 Perhaps additional panels from his collection of tapestries were placed within the garden pavilion of the Hôtel in imitation of the Macedonian titian’s domical tent. Alexander’s καμάρα (vaulted chamber) simulated the night sky with its constellation, but its side panels were painted by the famed Apelles with subjects of the Trojan War, the twelve labors of Hercules, and an astrological cycle of the twelve months.48 During his Rheinish wars, Charles the Bold had decorated his tent with tapestries from his father’s collection, including six “Millefleurs” panels (Fig. 10.19). His tapestries were captured as Swiss booty in 1476 at Grandson (March 4) and Morat (June 22).49 The “Millefleur Tapestries” were acquired Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 95–97, provides several sources for the entry of Louis XI into Paris, including Godefroy, Le Ceremonial François, I, 179–84 and Bernard Guenée and Françoise Lehoux, Les Entrées royales françaises de 1328 à 1515 (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1968), Ch. VIII, 86–95. Concerning the set of six Alexander Tapestries purchased in 1459 by Philip the Good from Pasquier Grenier in Tournai, see: Smith, 94–104; Marthe Crick-Kuntziger, “Note sur les tapisseries de l’Histoire d’Alexandre du Palais Doria,” Bulletin de l’Institut Historique Belge de Rome XIX (1938): 273–76; Jozef Duverger, “Aantekeningen betreffende laatmiddeleeuwse tapijten met de geschiedenis van Alexander de Grote,” Artes Textiles V (1960): 31–43. For information about the eight Gideon Tapestries (1449–1453), which were woven in Tournai by Robert Dary and Jean d’Ortie after designs by Baudouin de Bailleul of Arras, see: Smith, 149–59; Jean Lestocquoy, “L’Atelier de Baudouin de Bailleul et la tapisserie de Gedeon,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art VIII (1938): 119–37; idem., Deux siècles de l’histoire de la tapisserie, 1300–1500: Paris, Arras, Lille, Tournai, Bruxelles (Arras: Commission Départementale des Monuments Historiques du Pas-de-Calais, 1978). 48 Deuchler, Die Burgunderbeute: Inventar der Beuteatücke aus den Schlachten von Grandson, Murten und Nancy 1476– 1477, 24; Michelant (ed.), Le Roman de Alexandre, 53–6; Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 110 and note 174; George Cary, The Medieval Alexander (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956), 221 and note 129. 49 Deuchler, Die Burgunderbeute – Inventar der Beuteatücke aus den Schlachten von Grandson, Murten und Nancy 1476/1477, 171 (Swiss Booty Inventories); idem., Die Burgunderbeute: Grandson und Murten, 1476. Le butin de Bourgogne: Grandson et Morat, 1476 (Basel: Münzgässlein 16: Gesellschaft für Schweizerische Kunstgeschichte, 1975); idem., “Philipp der Gute und Karl der Kühne von Burgundim Spiegel zeitgenössischer Bildodokumente,” Kunstchronik XIX (1966): 282–83; idem., Der Tausendblumenteppich in Bern [Universal-Bibliothek CXVII] (Stuttgart: 1966); Robert L. Wyss et al., Die Burgunderboute und Werke Burgundischer Hofkunst (Bern: exhibition catalogue, Historisches Museum, 1969), No. 125, 205–10; Walter Rytz, “Der Tausardblumenteppich mit dem Wappen Philips des Guten in Bern – Seine Bedeutung für die Geschichte der Pflanzenabbildung und deren Auswertung,” Jahrbuch des Bernischen Historischen Museums in Bern XXXIX–XL (1959–60): 164–71; idem., “Weitere Blumenteppiche,” JBHM XXXIX–XL (1959–60): 171–84. Smith, 47

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in 1466 by Philip the Good from the Brussels weaver Jean de Haze.50 Charles the Bold displayed the set with the “Alexander Tapestries” at Trier in 1473 during negotiations with Emperor Frederick III (r. 1440–1493).51 Distinguished by a Golden Fleece armorial, the panels have been related to the paradisiacal setting of Van Eyck’s Adoration of the Lamb and discussed with respect to Philip the Good’s image as terrestrial ruler.52 However, they also accorded with a Burgundian tradition of decorating walls to suggest the eternal springtime of an arcadian “golden age.” In 1388, for Marguerite, Countess of Flanders, the chambre de brebis of the Château of Germolles was painted by Jehan de Beaumetz with an overall pattern of 180 sheep in a meadow while Claus Sluter’s sculpted bergerie showed Philip the Bold with the duchess seated beneath an elm tending a flock of sheep.53 (Figs. 10.20– 21) In 1419 Jean the Fearless received seven panels of green serge from the Provost of Noyon. Embroidered with sheep and his arms, the hangings were The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 198–202, discusses the set and comments (199) that the fragmentary Millefleur panel in Bern illustrates 400 plants, and shows six distinct shades of greens, browns, reds and blues. He also informs, 43, that the war tents of Charles the Bold comprised additional sets of the Life of Julius Caesar, Queen Esther and Ahasuerus, and the Justice of Trajan. See his documented analysis of the tapestries: 134–35 (six Esther panels, obtained from Pasquier Grenier of Tournai in 1462); 335 note 6 (Julius Caesar set acquired in late November of 1475 when Charles and Louis XI divided the collection of Luis of Luxembourg, Count of St. Pol); 335 (eleven “Destruction of Troy” panels from Pasquier Grenier in 1472). For the Millefleur tapestries, see Deuchler, Die Burgunderbeute (Bern: 1963), Catalogue 77, 172–77 and 109–110. 50 Jozef Duverger, “Jan de Haze en de Bourgondische wapentapijten te Bern,” Artes Textiles VI (1965): 10–25; Sophie Schneebalg-Perelman,”La Tenture armoriée de Philippe le Bon à Berne,” Jahrbuch des Bernischen Historischen Museums in Bern XXXIX–XL (1959–60): 136–63. 51 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 198, refers to the account of Diebold Schilling [fl. 1460–1485], the Chronik der Burgunder Kriege (Zurich: 1480) printed as Die grosse Burgunder Chronik “Zürcher Schilling” (Lucerne: Faksimile-Verlag, 1985). Isabel of Portugal probably stimulated the young Charles the Bold to see himself as a “new Alexander.” The Portuguese author Vasco Fernandes da Lucena (Vasque de Lucène) wrote his Faictz et Gestes d’Alezandre le Grand for the Duchess of Burgundy. In the Paris Bibliothèque National (MS. Fr. 22547), the manuscript was dedicated to Charles the Bold. See Vasco Fernandes da Lucena, The History of Alexander the Great, translated with comments by Scot McKendrick (Los Angeles: J.Paul Getty Museum, 1996). 52 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 200–201. 53 E. Picard, “”Le Château de Germolles et Marguerite de Flandre,” Mémoires de la Société Éduenne XL (1912), 147–218; idem., “La dévotion de Philippe le Hardi et de Marguerite de Flandre,” Mémoires de l’Académie des Sciences, Arts et Belles-lettres de Dijon IV No. XII (1910–13: 1–116; rpt. separately, Dijon: 1911).

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sufficiently large to cover an entire chamber.54 Such pastoral imagery in ducal houses underlined the ancient concept of the “shepherd tent” as both throne room and cosmic replica of the universe. Jan van Eyck’s Mappamundi must have been one of his final projects. The King of Aragon was inducted into the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1445, and conceivably Philip the Good planned a special offering to mark the ceremonial occasion. The Duke, however, typically did not present lavish gifts to dignitaries installed in his chivalric institution. Postulating the Duke sent Alfonso V the expensive world map to solidify an AragoneseBurgundian alliance for a holy crusade to the Levant truly does not make sense. A few costly tapestry sets would have sufficed to garnish the king’s military backing. About 1434 Alfonso V ordered tapestries for his palace and chapel in Valencia from Guillaume au Vaissel, a dealer in Arras. For the interior decoration of his Castel Nuovo in Naples, (Figs. 10.22–10.24) however, he appealed directly to Philip the Good for assistance procuring an agent in Flanders. Some aid from the Duke was forthcoming, because Alfonso V subsequently acquired three valuable tapestries of the Passion after cartoons by Rogier van der Weyden.55 As King of Naples, he also would have been the titular “King of Jerusalem.” An eighteenth-century plan of the Castel Nuovo shows the apartments of Alfonso V on the west side of an inner courtyard. To the south overlooking the water was the Torre Bruna, which functioned as a repository for his treasures. Beside his palatine chapel of St. Barbara, the Gran Sala must have contained the monarch’s prize weavings. During the 1440s Alfonso V would have been delighted had Philip the Good sent a few sets of fine Flemish tapestries. Something more compelling must have made the Duke of Burgundy send his magnificent terrestrial globe safeguarded in his treasure room as the Prisenhof in Bruges. Following an ill-fated Portuguese expedition to Tangier in August of 1437, and captivity of Infanta Isabel’s brother Fernando in Morocco, Alfonso V’s assistance 54 Alexandre Joseph Pinchart, Histoire générale de la tapisserie, 3 vols. (Paris: Société anonyme de publications périodiques, 1878–85), III. Pays-Bays, completed by Jules Guiffrey (1884–85), 28. Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 343–44, states Philip the Good’s tapestries until the late 1430s were divided between Dijon, Lille and Bruges. The Hôtel d’Ablainseveille acquired in 1365 by Marguerite, Countess of Flanders, then was refurbished as a place for storage. From 1419 until 1438 Jehan Prevost was guardian of the Duke’s tapestries. 55 Jacques Paviot, “Burgundy and the South,” The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert (London: Thames & Hudson, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges, 2002), 166–83, at 176.

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would have been sought in negotiating the release of the Avis Prince because of Aragon’s proximity to North Africa. Jan’s World Map may have been presented to Alfonso V soon after Jan completed his phase of the project, about 1440–41. Prince Fernando, who had traveled joyfully in 1430 with his sister Isabel to Flanders, died in captivity at Fez in 1443. He survived three years of imprisonment due to monetary loans by Genoese merchants and the sale of his possessions. It suffices to say that only such dire circumstances as the capture of his brother-in-law by Muslims justifies why Philip the Good would have parted with such a rare object as his Ptolemaic globe. Admired by Fazio in Naples, Guillaume Hobit’s globe passed to Alfonso V of Aragon most plausibly as a gift from Philip the Good. Decorated by Jan van Eyck, the sphere must have contained geographical references not only to North Africa, but also to the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada. After Jan’s death in 1441 Philip relinquished the Mappamundi, anticipating that Alfonso V would appreciate not only the work’s technical virtuosity but also the information it contained from Portuguese cartographic records. By 1445, the year Alfonso was elected to the Order of the Golden Fleece, Prince Fernando had died and Philip the Good was actively recruiting alliances for a holy crusade to Constantinople to dispel the memory of the unsuccessful expedition to Tangier. Fazio informs us that Jan van Eyck’s World Map was uncommon. Fifteenth-century “circular maps” placed Jerusalem at the center. Important sites were designated traditionally by a landmark. Rivers and surrounding bodies of water also were denoted, as well as the directional compass, wind gods, and zodiacal emblems.56 Perhaps what made Jan’s map unique was the geographical exactitude with which he depicted mountain ranges, hills and river valleys. A “world view” topography especially characterizes his St. Barbara and her Tower, but such a detailed approach to landscape also may be observed in Pere Nisart’s replica of St. George and the Dragon with its panoramic view of Mallorca. 56 Roberto Almagià and Marcel Destombe (ed.), Monumenta cartographica vetustioris aevi, A.D. 1200–1500. Catalogos paravit Commissio Cartarum Geographicarum Vetustiorum ab Unione Geographica Internationali mandata curantibus et Marcello Destombes. Monuments cartographiques anciens, A.D. 1200–1500, Monumenta Cartographica Vetustioris Aevi, II, Mappamundi – Imago Mundi, Supplement No. IV (Amsterdam: Catalogues prepared by the Commission des Cartes Anciennes de l’Union Géographique Internationale, N. Israel, 1964); Armando da Câmara Pereira, Teatro de Todo o Mundo. Mundivisão Artística e Iconográfica da Terra e do Universo. Sécs. XII – XVII (Lisbon: Publicaçõdx Ciência e Vida, Ld.a, 1989). R. Rubin, “Fantasy & Reality-Ancient Maps of Jerusalem,” Bible Review 9, 2 (1993), pp. 34–42.

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The Ghent “Hell” Altar Frontal and the Passion Panels of Lodewijk Allyncbrood In the 1429 Metropolitan Museum panels of Calvary and the Last Judgment (Figs. 10.25–10.27), Jan van Eyck inventively plays with the notion of dividing corporeal and spiritual realms. The high horizon line of Golgotha accentuates the “earth” and mankind redeemed by the sacrifice of the cross. A marvelous town is nestled in the distance, beyond which a river undulates to the foot of Alpine mountains. By contrast, the horizon rests in the middle of the Last Judgment, permitting only a shallow space for the earthly “resurrections” of the dead. Basically the majesty of the “Son of Man” is affirmed by dividing the composition into unambiguous zones of a sky paradise and cavernous underworld. In 1532 Marcus van Vaernewyck described the Ghent Altarpiece as originally containing a picture of “Hell” in watercolour.57 He additionally informs that it was ruined in an attempt to clean it. The scene of “Hell” is conjectured to have been a hanging on fabric used as an antependium in front of the mensa below the altarpiece panels. Such an altar frontal would have been displayed on Easter Sunday as the culmination of Holy Week observances. In a chapel of Sint-Jans, a church whose burial crypt was linked with Jerusalem’s Holy Sepulchre, the lost altar frontal should have provided narrative scenes which pertained to Christ’s Resurrection like the “Harrowing of Hell” and Three Maries at the Tomb.58 57 Marcus van Vaernewyck, Den Spieghel der Netherlandscher audthyt [Ghent: 1568]; see Elisabeth Dhanens, Sint-Baafskathedraal Gent, Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oostvlaanderen, V (Ghent: Provinciebestuur van Oostvlaanderen, Kunstpatrimonium, Bisdomplein, 3, 1965), VI, 110–15, Documenten 16–21, at 115 for “Hell.” Elisabeth Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, edited by John Fleming and Hugh Honour (LondonNew York: Allen Lane-The Viking Press, 1973), 86, mentions Marcus van Vaernewyck recorded 330 figures in the Vijd Chapel polyptych, by comparison with 300 counted by Lucas de Heere in 1559. Consult Marcus van Vaernewyck, Van de beroerlicke Tijden in die Nederlanden en voornamelijk in Ghendt [1566–1568], Ghent University Library, HS. G 2469 (Dhanens, Sint-Baafskathedraal Gent, Inventaris, VI 108–10, Documenten, 22). See Elisabeth Dhanens, Het retabel van het Lam Gods in de Sint-Baafskathedraal te Gent. Inventaris van het Kunstpatrimonium van Oostvlaanderen VI (Ghent: Bestendige Deputatie van de Provinciale Raad van Oostvlaanderen, 1965. 58 Henk van Os, “Opstanding of Helig Graf, enkele opmerkingen over de ikonografie van ‘De Drie Maria’s aan het graf ’ uit de groep van Eyck,” Oud Holland CV (1991): 39–40; Reiner Haussherr, “Spätgotische Ansichten der Stadt Jerusalem (oder: war der Hausbuchmeister in Jerusalem?),” Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen XXIX–XXX (1987–1988):

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The anastasis theme would justify the representation of Adam and Eve among the painted panels of the Vijd polyptych, which concern the Apocalypse and depends upon an “All Saints” composition. The allerheiligenbild prior to Jan van Eyck traditionally excluded Adam and Eve from the heavenly Elect.59 The Ghent Altarpiece also must have had a predella, the panels of which probably were too difficult to remove when the other panels were hidden and rescued from iconoclasts in 1566 and 1578. Presumably the predella perished with the original framework. Scenes of the Passion might have been comprised, inter alia, the Way to Calvary, the Raising of the Cross, the Crucifixion, the Descent from the Cross, and the Entombment.60 Late Gothic women identified with the stoical Holy Women who witnessed the execution, lamented when Christ was removed from the cross, and then returned to properly prepare his body for burial. Early scholars thought Hubrecht van Eyck was the painter of the Rotterdam Three Marys at the Tomb and even the Budapest replica of the Way to Calvary (Figs. 10. 28–10.29) has been discussed as a possible compositional invention by Jan’s brother. However, no evidence exists that Hubrecht ever made a voyage to the Holy Land by contrast to archival documents in Lille which permit Jan van Eyck that opportunity in 1426. Hubrecht was employed by Jodocus Vijd at the church of Sint-Jans, and the crypt of this noble institution from its inception was associated with the Holy Sepulchre. Hubrecht might have obtained 47–70, at 51–53, 59; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1987): 29–40, at 31–32; J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer and Jeroen Giltaij, “Een nader onderzoek van ‘Die drie Maria’s aan het H. Graf ’. Ein schilderj uit de ‘Groep van Eyck’ in Rotterdam,” Oud Holland CI (1987): 254–76; [Museum Boymans-Van Beuningen], Van Eyck to Bruegel, 1400–1550: Dutch and Flemish painting in the Collection of the Museum Boymans-Van Beuningen (Rotterdam: 1994), 34–39. 59 Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece, 97, states: “Rubert of Deutz discusses Christ’s descent into limbo for the redemption of the souls who waited there for His coming. Not only was the ‘hell’ painted on the lost predella probably a representation of limbo; the group of figures from the Old Testament and antiquity in the left-hand foreground of the Adoration panel is also related to this theme.” For the Benedictine Rupert von Deutz of Cologne (1075–1129), see Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. (Paris: 1844–64): CLXVIII, 256 (Commentaria: Christ’s Descent into Limbo). 60 James H. Marrow, Passion Iconography in Northern European Art of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance: A Study of the Transformation of Sacred Metaphor into Descriptive Narrative (Kortrijk: Van Ghemmert, 1979).

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information about Jerusalem’s setting and architecture from any number of pilgrims who congregated at Sint-Jans. The Rotterdam panel, however, has a terrain which introduces new topography from the foreground brown rocks around the tomb, to the middle ground rural meadow, and then beyond to the variegated architecture of the Jerusalem’s walls and towers, and ultimately the grey-blue of the horizon. The Eyckian Budapest Way to Calvary has an even more expansive vista and in this regard, it appears to parallel the panoramic Crucifixion mural by Altichiero da Zevio in the St. James Chapel of Padua’s Church of S. Antonio. By contrast with the Three Maries at the Tomb, the Budapest Way to Calvary seems more anecdotal with several onlookers even dressed in secular attire. The “genre” veneer and tendency to fill the narrative space in the Budapest panel are traits in common with Jan’s New York Crucifixion, which may build the landscape vertically, but it still gives the impression of horror vacui with its crowding of witnesses to the Roman execution. Attributed to the workshop of the Neapolitan Colantonio (ca. 1420–1460) is a upright version of the Rotterdam subject (Fig. 10.30). Familiar with the art of the Fiamminghi at the court of Alfonso V in Naples, Colantonio was the teacher of Antonello da Messina, according to Pietro Summonte writing in 1524. A study for the Rotterdam panel must have circulated in Valencia or Naples.61 Jan van Eyck might have brought a portfolio of drawings to Aragon in 1427. However, Philip the Good’s diplomats were not in Valencia very long because their marriage negotiations for the hand of Isabel de Urguell floundered. That an artist would casually relinquish an item of his creative invention to be replicated by another master seems improbable. More likely drawings after Eyckian compositions were transported to Spain by a Flemish master who settled in Valencia. The “Colantonio” panel conflates two incongruous events: the Resurrection and the visit of the Holy Women to Christ’s empty sepulchre.62 By contrast, the Rotterdam panel is more conservative because it adheres Till-Holger Borchert (ed.), et al., The Age of Jan van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, Catalogue No. 96, 259. Prior to 1912, the “Colantonio Workshop” Three Maries at the Tomb and the Resurrection panel are recorded in the collection of A.A. Komarovsky in St. Petersburg. Consult Penny Howell Jolly, Jan van Eyck and St. Jerome: A Study of Eyckian Influences in Colantonio and Antonello da Messina (Philadelphia: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1976), especially 80–100. 62 See Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, “On the Visual and the Vision: The Magdalene in Early Christian and Byzantine Art and Culture,” Mariam, the Magdalen, and the Mother, 61

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strictly to biblical text (Fig. 10.31). Despite its fidelity to a pictorial tradition, the Rotterdam landscape is more innovative. Three slumbering guards, sentinels of Roman justice, whose eyes are shut to the vision are balanced by a triadic grouping of women. Their cylindrical containers of myrrh symbolize their act of mercy, the burial of the dead. The Virgin Mary, a Mater Dolorosa, stands directly opposite the angel, and beside her is a green-robed Mary Magdalene carrying a ceramic blue and white vessel. The remaining female in crimson robes, Mary Salome, wears a white hood with a small bourrelet which was fashionable in the mid 1420s. She extends her hands in supplication to the splendid angel with gold and deep azure-tipped wings. Sitting placidly upon the cover of the stone sarcophagus, with his right arm raised in announcement, the celestial messenger delivers news to the mourning women that Christ has risen. According to the Archives of Bruges, Lodewijk Allyncbrood (Hallincbrood) is listed in the guild of imagiers et des selliers (image-makers or beeldmakers and saddlers) during the years 1432/33 and 1436/37. He is described as a vinder (arbiter, but also designer), a high guild status as it ranked just below that of dean (doyen).63 Allyncbrood left Bruges for the Iberian Peninsula about 1438, as proven by a document in Valencia concerning a sale of property on July 21, 1439 and confirmed by guild records of Bruges in 1456, which state he was living abroad. On March 4, 1441, a payment from the city is recorded to “mester Luis lo Flamench” at his residence-workshop on St. Vincent Street (carrer de sent Vincent) for painting a screen to protect the altarpiece of the Holy Trinity Portal. On March 10, 1448, the municipal Libre de Aveynaments describes Luis Alimbrot as a “native of Bruges.”64 From edited with an introduction by Deirdre Good (Bloomington-Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2005): 123–47. 63 For documents pertaining to Lodewijk Allyncbrood in Bruges, consult Josef Duverger, “Brugse Schilders ten tijde van Jan van Eyck,” Miscellanea Erwin Panofsky. Bulletin des Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts IV (1955: No. 3): 83–120, at 92–102. 64 Fernando Benito Doménech and José Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos (Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo de Bellas Artes de Valencia, 2001), 102–3 (José Gómez Frechina). For documents in Valencia concerning Lodewijk Allyncbrood, consult J. Sancis Sivera, Pintores medievales en Valencia. Archivo de Arte Valenciano XVI (Valencia: 1930), 3–4, 46–47, 127–28. Also consult Elisa Bermejo Martinez, La pintura de los primitivos flamencos en España, 2 vols. (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez (1980–1982), I, 75–77; idem., “Influencia de Van Eyck en la pintura española,” Archivo Español de Arte LXIII (1990): 555–69; Chandler Rathfon Post, A History of Spanish Painting, 9 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1930–47), VIII (1943), Part 2, 155–60.

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his marriage in Flanders to a woman named Margareta, Lodewijk had a son named Joris, whom he left behind when he sailed to Aragon.65 The youth was still a minor in 1439 as he was placed under the guardianship of a Jacob van den Rade and “Mathijs, son of Jan.” In 1456, Joris was entrusted to the care of Anton van Hyst and to Jan Hallincbrood, probably an uncle or cousin. In 1459 Joris reached his maturity and he joined the guild of imagiers et selliers in 1460–61. By December of 1463, however, he is documented in Valencia settling the estate of his recently deceased father. Lodewijk must have left substantial holdings to his son in his testament of October 8, 1460. “Jorge Alimbrot” did not return to Flanders, but stayed in Aragon where he painted/sculpted until his death in 1481. By a wife named Maria, he had two sons but neither took up the brush. Luis, born about 1521, became a spice merchant and Miguel made hats.66 Lodewijk Allyncbrood perhaps left Bruges in 1438 with the expectation of receiving commissions from Alfonso V of Aragon. During the period Lluis Dalmáu was in Flanders, 1431–1436, he must have communicated Alfonso’s intention to establish a tapestry industry in Valencia. Dalmáu may have been sent not only to acquire knowledge about Northern painting techniques, but also to seek out talented artists who might be enticed to work at the Aragonese court. Lodewick’s most famous work, the Triptych of Roiç de Corella (Fig. 10.32) was completed about 1440–1445 for King Alfonso V and purchased from the monarch by a loyal nobleman of his

Charles Sterling, “Tableaux espagnols et un chef d’oeuvre portugais méconnus du XVe siècle,” Actas del XXIII Congreso Internacional de Historia del Arte, Granada, 1973 (Granada: 1976), I, 497–524, at 503–12. 65 Luis Cerveró Gomis, “Pintores valentinos. Su cronologia y documentación. Apéndices,” Archivo de Arte Valenciano XXXVI (1965): 22–26, at 23. 66 Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos, 29. The catalogue is accompanied by an English translation, 385–476, and excellent bibliography. 67 Émile Bertaux, “Un triptique flamand à Valence,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts II (1906): 217–22. Additionally consul: El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e itinerarios de obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el siglo XV (Madrid-Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza-Museu de Belles Artes de Valencia, 2001: Pilar Silva Maroto, Catalogue No. 36, “Tríptico de la Crucifixión, ca. 1440–1450,” 288–90; Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos, 84–85 (Gómez Frechina).TillHolger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Jan van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, Catalogue No. 106, 262, perceives less influence by Jan van Eyck than by Robert Campin and his workshop, particularly Jacques Daret. Consult

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court.67 The triptych with its “Annunciation” shutters retains its original frame and the added herald of the patron. Eximen Pérez Roiç de Corella had served Alfonso V in Naples after the death of Queen Joanna between 1432 and 1442. The warrior-knight acquired Allyncbrood’s panels in 1445, three years after he was elevated to the title “Lord of Concentania.” The Prado triptych with its exterior wings of the Annunciation in grisaille, has a provenance in the Carmelite Monasterio de la Sanctissima Encarnación founded in Valencia during the late sixteenth-century. The Valencian triptych nominally acknowledges art of the “Flémalle Group,” but is primarily indebted to Eyckian designs, as is apparent from the main subject of the Way to Calvary (Fig. 10.33). The Roiç de Corella Triptych also contains relevant scenes drawn from the biblical accounts of Christ’s infancy which were associated with the sorrows of the Virgin Mary. The left wing shows the Circumcision (Fig. 10.34), an event marking the first shedding of Christ’s blood and his naming according to Hebraic law. But the prophet Simeon and Hannah also forecast the death of the Infant Jesus. In the center panel is another “sorrow of the Virgin,” the subject of the young Christ disputing with the Doctors. The debate forecasts his purpose as a mature adult to be about his “Father’s business” yet it additionally is prelude to the Lamentation in the right wing, as Mary with Joseph spends three days frantically looking for their son in Jerusalem before discovering him in Solomon’s Temple. The right wing Pietà and another Lamentation attributed to Allyncbrood in Milan especially recall Hand H of the TurinMilan Hours68 (Fig. 10.35–10.37). Allyncbrood’s placement of narrative vignettes in the unified pictorial space of a triptych is unusual as such sequential scenes in the works of Robert Campin and Rogier van der Weyden either were depicted as background staffage or as sculptural reliefs in grisaille in arched portals of architecture. Hans Memling (ca. 1440–1494), a native of Selignenstadt near Frankfurt, settled in Bruges by 1465, and he has been credited with the concept of providing religious vignettes in continuous narration within a unified Mauro Natale (ed.) et al., “El Mediterráneo que nos une,” in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e Itinerarios de Obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el Siglo XV (MadridValencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza-Museu de Bellas Arts de València, 2001), Catalogue No. 36 (Triptych of Roiç de Corella), 288–90 (Pilar Silva Maroto). 68 The comparison of these works has been made by Benito Doménech, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos, 29–30. See Charles Sterling, Observations on Petrus Christus,” Art Bulletin, LIII (March: 1971): 1–26.

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panorama of Jerusalem 69 (Fig. 10.38). By contemplating small scenes of the life of the Virgin Mary and Christ within an interconnected architectural perspective, the patron could make a “spiritual pilgrimage.” The devotional practice was analogous to praying the Stations of the Cross or reciting the rosary.70 Memling’s landscape andachtsbilder in Turin was painted about 1470 for Tommaso Portinari and his wife Maria, whose portraits appear at the bottom corners of the painting.71 A decade later, Memling created his Seven Joys of the Virgin (Fig. 10.39) for Pieter Bultinc (Bultynck) and his wife Katelyne van Ryebeke.72 A larger work, it was commissioned for the Church of Our Lady in Bruges, and installed in the Chapel of Tanners to the east behind the high altar. The present Chapel of the Shoemakers entered off the north transept retains its Gothic screen of 1430 and its emblematic guild motif, a boot surmounted by a crown which decorates the altar and doors. Memling’s panel with its subliminal accent upon “walking” through a landscape on holy pilgrimage was perfect for this guild. A confraternity of Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows patronized one of the five chapels off the ambulatory, so the Tanners of Bruges might have belonged to a similar brotherhood devoted to the Seven Joys of Our Lady. 69 See Vida Joyce Hull, “Devotional Aspects of Hans Memlinc’s paintings,” Southeastern College Art Conference Review XI (1988): 207–13, who relates Memling’s work with the devotio moderna and the prayer discipline by which the devout was to employ the imagination and “sense experience” in prayer to imitate the path taken by the suffering Christ in the via dolorosa. The spiritual pilgrimage, a reflection of a physical visitation to Jerusalem, relates to the traditional practice of the Stations of the Cross frequently depicted in Holy Week processions staged for the edification of the municipalities. 70 Anne Winston-Allen, Stories of the Rose: The Making of the Rosary in the Middle Ages (University Park: Pennsylvania State University, 1997). 71 Dirk de Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works (Ghent-Antwerp-New York: Ludion Press-Fons Mercator-Harry N. Abrams, 1994), Catalogue No. 11, 105–9. Also consult Dirk de Vos, Hans Memling, with contributions by Dominque Marechal and Willy Le Loup, translated by Ted Adkins and Marcus Cumberledge (Ghent-Antwerp: exhibition catalogue, Bruges, Groeningemuseum, Stedelijke Musea, Ludion-Fonds Mercator Paribas, 1994), Catalogue No. 4, 46–51; Kenneth Bruce McFarlane, Hans Memling, ed. Edgar Wind with the assistance of G. L. Harriss (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), 32–40 De Vos suggests Memling’s painting was installed in Sint-Jacobskerk, the parish church in Bruges of the Portinari family. He identifies the diverse sacred places of Jerusalem where indulgences could be obtained by pilgrims. 72 De Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works, Catalogue No. 38, 173–79, who comments the title of the painting is inadequate as it primarily concerns four great feasts of the Church: Christmas, the Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost (Whitsuntide). Regarding the combination of “mysteries” in a composition, the Bruges “Holy Blood” procession celebrates a relic associated

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Allyncbrood’s Roiç de Corella Triptych, however, dates twenty-five to thirty years before Memling’s Portinari commission, and therefore, the “inventiveness” of Memling’s compositions might be challenged. Could there have been a lost Jan van Eyck Passion Altarpiece in Bruges, or might not the predella paintings of the Ghent Altarpiece been disposed to suggest the Passion story? Bruges claimed the famous relic of the “Holy Blood” (Fig. 10.40–10.41), that inspired Memling. His Turin and Munich paintings have been tied to a tradition of late Gothic mystery plays. Performed in towns on liturgical feasts and sponsored by brotherhoods, the re-enactment of the Passion story was an integral feature of the omagame (procession) in Bruges since the inception of the Brotherhood of the Holy Blood in 1405. The phial preserved in the Basiliek van het Heilig Bloed by Dieric of Alsace after the Second Crusade was believed to have contained blood washed from the body of Christ by Joseph of Arimathaea. However, there were other relics throughout Burgundy and Flanders that were associated with the sacred blood of Christ. Since 1281 annual processions were held on Ascension Day in Bruges. The religious parade honoring both the relic and Dietrich of Alsace was a most important event in Flanders. On a smaller scale, inhabitants of other centers like Ghent held their own Holy Week processions with a roster of events that included a re-enactment of the Way to Calvary and other theatrical staging pertaining to the Passion. Similar to Memling’s “pilgrimage” paintings is a panel in the museum of Lisbon’s Poor Clare Convent of Madre de Deus (Fig. 10.42), which recollects a woodcut by Michael Wohlgemut for Hartmann Schedel’s Liber Cronicarum (1493), the oldest printed prospect of the incunabula of Jerusalem 73 (Fig. 10.43). According to a chronicle of the convent in Xabregas, with Christ’s Passion and the sorrowful mysteries. However, the pageantry coincides with the liturgical feast of a glorious mystery, the Ascension. The feast day of the Ascension, which falls between Easter and Pentecost, commemorates the lifting of the Resurrected Christ’s corporeal body to heaven. Also see Norbert Schneider, “Zur Ikonographie von Memlings Gemälde ‘Die sieben Freuden Mariens,” Münchener Jahrbuch der Bildenden Kunst XXIV (1973): 21–32; Mcfarlane, Hans Memling, 30 and 45 note 64; Carol M. Schuler, “The Seven Sorrows of the Virgin: Popular Culture and Cultic Imagery in Pre-Reformation Europe,” Simiolus XXI (1992): 5–28; James Marrow, Passion Iconography in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance (Kortrijk: 1979). 73 De Vos et al., Hans Memling (Bruges Broeningemuseum), 51, mentions the Lisbon Panorama of Jerusalem with the Passion, describing the painting as an anonymous work derivative of Memling’s “continuous narrative structure,” and closely related to the “Master of the Portraits of Princes.” He also states the “scenes are located in their actual topographical

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Frei Jeronimo de Belém in 1755 commented that the painting with “scenes from the Passion” had been given by Emperor Maxmilian I to his cousin, a benefactor and tertiary of the institution 74 (Fig. 10.44–10.45). Dona Leonor (1458–1525), dowager rainha of João II (r. 1485–1495) and beloved sister of Manuel I (1495–1521), is represented in the lower left corner of the panel. Her likeness was added when she presented the painting to the Colettine Clarissas.75 Attributed to an unknown fifteenth-century Flemish master and dated about 1500–10, the Madre de Deus “Passion” panel differs considerably from Memling’s Turin and Munich paintings, not the least of which is the more monumental perspective of Golgotha occupying the upper portion of the panel. This Crucifixion shows T-shaped Westphalian crosses and is flanked by subsidiary events of the Way to Calvary and the Descent from the Cross with the Entombment. The architecture which centers upon Jerusalem’s “Temple of Solomon,” is not as sophisticated as Memling’s and the dramatis personae accord with the multiple groupings favored by Lodewijk Allyncbrood, who additionally tends to paint figures with a range of emotive expressions. Besides the Panorama of Jerusalem, Emperor Maxmilian I sent Dona Leonor a reliquary of St. Auta, the companion of St. Ursula who died at Cologne (Fig. 10.46). The sacred treasure arrived in Lisbon before September of 1517, when the relics of the virgin-martyr were borne in a solemn procession to Madre de Deus, where its installation in and architectural framework.” On this aspect of the painting, De Vos cites M.-L. Lievens-de Waegh, Les Primitifs flamands. Le musée national d’art ancien et le musée national des carreaux de faience de Lisbonne (Brussels: 1991), 78. 74 Frei Jeronymo de Belem, Chronica Serafica de Santa Provincia dos Algarves da Regular Observançia do…Padre S. Francisco, 4 vols. (Lisbon: 1750–1758), III. An earlier anonymous chronicle of the convent dated 1639 does not mention the Panorama of Jerusalem. See TillHolger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Jan van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting, 1430–1530, Catalogue No. 3, 228; José Sarmento de Matos, “A Senhora do Povo,” Oceanos (Lisbon: 1991), 76–87. 75 Kate Lowe, “Rainha D. Leonor of Portugal’s Patronage in Renaissance Florence and Cultural Exchange,” Cultural Links between Portugal and Italy in the Renaissance, edited by Kate J.P. Lowe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000) 225–48, at 239–41 (Panorama of Jerusalem and “St. Auta Cycle”). See also I. Carneiro de Sousa, “A Rainha D. Leonor e a Experiência Espiritual das Clarissas Coletinas do Mosteiro da Madre de Deus de Lisboa (1509–1525),” Via Spiritus I (1994): 23–53; Vitor Serrão, “O mecenato da rainha D. Leonor e a pintura de Corte,” Oceanos (Lisbon: 1991): 104–9. The veneration of St. Colette of Corbie (Picardy 1381–1447 Ghent) began as a Carmelite intiative in the Netherlands in the late fifteenth century. Popular devotion to the Franciscan saint by the Poor Clares in Renaissance Portugal was due in large measure to her visions of St. Anne and the “Holy Kinship.” See

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the convent’s church was witnessed by the court chronicler Damião de Góis (1502–1574).76 The Flemish School panel in Madre de Deus with its multiple scenes of the Passion merits reassessment as a painting compositionally dependent upon a lost Eyckian model. This same lost archetype may have inspired Hans Memling’s Turin and Munich panels. Memling’s Altarpiece of the Crucifixion (Fig. 10.47) was acquired by the Lübeck merchant Heinrich Greverade in 1491, and it is a late commission completed three years before his death when the artistic star of Gerard David (ca. 1460–1523) was on the ascendant.77 A native of Bruges, David was heir to the artistic traditions of both Hans Memling and Jan van Eyck. Between 1484 and his death, he maintained an active workshop in the commercially declining center.78 David’s small triptych in Haarlem (Fig. 10.48) depends upon Memling’s Lübeck altarpiece, but it, and a workshop version in Budapest (Fig. 10.49), provide evidence that he borrowed elements from a lost masterwork.79 Against a background of Jerusalem, the Crucifixion scene shows a crowd with several equestrians. Grouped in the left corner of the composition are the holy women who stood at the foot of the cross in the company of the Virgin Mary. Christ’s mother faints backwards in the arms of St. John the Evangelist near Mary Salome.80 David’s Mary Magdalene, however, by contrast with Memling’s, is portrayed de dado and in the act of wringing her hands. David’s Magdalene might indicate that he had access to a study after Jan’s New York Calvary.81

Édmond Cécile, L’Iconographie Carmélitaine dans les anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux (Brussels: 1961); Kathleen Ashley and Pamela Sheinborn (eds.), “Introduction,” Interpreting Cultural Symbols. Saint Anne in Late Medieval Society (Athens and London: The University of Georgia Press, 1990), 1–68; Joseph-Th. Bizouard, Histoire de sainte Colette et des clarisses en FrancheComté d’après des documents inédits (Besançon-Paris: 1888). 76 Damião de Góis, Crónica do Felicíssimo Rei D. Manuel, ed. D. Lopes, 4 vols. (Coimbra: 1949–1955), IV, 68. See Lowe, “Rainha D. Leonor of Portugal’s Patronage in Renaissance Florence and Cultural Exchange,” 231 and 241 (St. Auta Relics). 77 De Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works, Catalogue No. 90, 320–29. 78 Gerard David: Flanders’ Last Medieval Master (New York: exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1972). 79 De Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works, 327–29, discusses David’s paintings. 80 The imagery of the fainting Virgin is addressed by Otto Georg von Simson, “’Compassio’ and ‘Co-redemptio’ in Rogier van der Weyden’s Descent from the Cross,” Art Bulletin, XXXV, No. 1 (March, 1953): 9–16. 81 Lotte Brand Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), Figs. 159 and 160, has observed the marked similarity

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He purportedly borrowed his good thief and bad thief from Memling. Berlin sketches of the “Two Thieves of Calvary” (Fig. 10.50) on both sides of a sheet of paper generally have been considered Memlingen. Commenting upon the fine modeling and pictorial quality, Dirk de Vos believes the sketches to have been copied direct from a lost original by Memling. Still another study in the British Museum (Fig. 10.51) shows the crowd at Golgotha, which contrasts from the assemblies represented by both Memling and David.82 The horses in the British Museum drawing are clustered quite differently than those in the Crucifixions by Memling and David, and they even depart from the steeds of Jan’s earlier New York Calvary. Despite the intrinsic beauty of his figures, Memling’s compositions remain quite formulaic. Setting aside their Memlingen cast, all the fragments on paper of a “Crucifixion” subject combine to suggest a highly inventive Passion subject. Might not the studies have been executed after a lost Jan van Eyck archetype? Could an Eyckian “Seven Sorrows of the Virgin Mary” or “Passion Altarpiece” have served as a model for Lodewijk Allyncbrood and late fifteenth-century masters in Bruges? Memling painted shutters of the “Annunciation” in grisaille for his Lübeck commission, and the Budapest Crucifixion Triptych has figures of the Archangel Gabriel and Virgin Mary set within stone niches (Figs. 10.52–10.53). Lodewijk Allyncbrood’s Roiç de Corella Triptych also contains shutters of the Annunciation in grisaille. Jan van Eyck’s Thyssen-Bornemisza Annunciation panels (Fig. 10.54) are believed to have been designed as a diptych because of their red marbled backs.83 The panels are unusual because the standard practice was to illustrate between Jan van Eyck’s Mary Magdalene and her counterpart in David’s Crucifixion housed in the Haarlem Frans Hals Museum. 82 Regarding the drawings consult De Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works, 328–29 and De Vos et al., Hans Memling (Bruges Broeningemuseum), Catalogue No. 47: Calvary Group and The Good and the Bad Thief, 168–69. 83 Rudolf Preimesberger, “Zu Jan van Eycks Diptychon der Sammlung ThyssenBornemisza,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte LIV (1991): 459–89; E. Bosshard, “Revealing van Eyck. The Examination of the Thyssen-Bornemisza ‘Annunciation’,” Apollo CXXXVI, No. 365 (1992): 4–11; Colin T. Eisler, Early Netherlandish Painting. The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, ed. Simon de Pury (London: Sotheby’s Publications, 1989), 50–61; Marion Grams-Thieme, Lebendige Steine: Studien zur niederländischen Grisaillemalerei des 15. und frühen 16. Jahrhunderts (Cologne-Vienna: Böhlau, 1988), 141; Yvonne Hackenbroch, “A Paternoster Pendant in the Robert Lehman Collection,” The Metropolitan Museum Journal (Essays in Honor of Helmut Nickel), XXIV (1989): 127–33, at 130–31 note 14); James H. Marrow, “Symbol and Meaning in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Age and the Early Renaissance,” Simiolus XVI (1986):150–69, at 161 note 21.

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such figures in grisaille on the exteriors of shutters. A precedent may have been the Louvre Diptych which may replicate an earlier lost work.84 (Fig. 10.55) Jan’s “statues” of Archangel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary even cast shadows on the imitation stone frames as they stand on extended octagonal plinths. The reflections of their silhouettes on the highly polished surface of the background black stone creates a level of reality unsurpassed in other “Annunciations,” enhanced by the illusionism of the dove, which flies as if just entering a window. Jan’s bold diptych might be dated about 1434–36, when he was experimenting with mirrors and trompe l’oeil reflections on metallic surfaces.85 In painting the Thyssen-Bornemisza Diptych Jan must have known he was providing a glorious exception to a pictorial tradition of painting the Annunciation theme in grisaille on triptych shutters. If, as proposed, he created a “Passion Altarpiece,” the lost work likely adhered to the usual practice, but determining the main subjects of the wings is a complex issue. Both Memling’s Lübeck Crucifixion Triptych and the David Workshop Budapest Triptych have left wings which depict the “Way to Calvary.” In the Haarlem triptych, however, David preferred the “Nativity” theme for his left shutter, a subject he frequently painted. The three altarpieces concurred with the choice of the “Resurrection” for the dexter wings. Only Memling, however, depicted the “Entombment” with his “Resurrection.” Lotte Brand Philip has discussed the possibility of a lost “Resurrection” painted by Jan van Eyck (Fig. 10.56), and scrutinized the renditions of the theme by Hans Memling, Gerard David and Pieter Brueghel the Elder (1525/30–1569), an Antwerp admirer of Eyck.86 Believing that Memling lacked the inventive outlook to have introduced a completely new iconographic type taken from an Italian tradition, she believes that David 84 Sterling, Jan van Eyck avant 1432, 49–50, related the Louvre Diptych to Jan van Eyck’s Annunciations in grisaille (Thyssen-Bornemisza and Dresden), concluding that the Louvre Diptych might replicate the appearance of what would have been Jan’s earliest grisaille figures. He additionally suggests the Louvre panels of St. John the Baptist and the Virgin and Child might once have formed a triptych. If true, the missing subject conceivably was St. John the Evangelist. 85 Paul Philippot, “Les Grisailles et le degrès de realités,” Bulletin des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Bruxelles XV (1966): 225–42. 86 Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck, 143–48. She cites: Friedrich Winkler, “Die Wiener Kreutragung,” Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek IX (1958): 83–108, who discusses several drawings attributed to Pieter Brueghel which were inspired by Jan van Eyck; and Fritz Grossmann, “The Drawings of Pieter Brueghel the Elder in the Museum Boymans and Some Problems of Attribution,” translated from Dutch in the Bulletin Museum

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would have more faithfully replicated a lost work by Jan. Philip points out the foreign origin for the concept of Christ rising from a cave tomb and elevated in the air. She gives a pertinent example from Florence in Santa Maria Novella, Andrea di Bonaiuti’s fresco of the Resurrection in the Spanish Chapel, circa 1365–68. The Spanish Chapel includes magnificent lunettes of “Calvary” and the “Triumph of the Church Militant” with a Christ in Majesty (Figs. 10.57–10.59) before the heavenly host and an agnus dei upon an altar surrounded by angels and emblematic tetramorphs. Jan likely would have seen these murals in the Dominican chapterhouse on a voyage to Italy, which scholarly opinion generally concurs, was undertaken about 1425– 1426. Memling’s Lübeck “Way to Calvary,” which includes a donor portrait, also differs from the Budapest version of the subject in that the background architecture contains subsidiary events relating to the Passion story, such as the Flagellation, Christ before Pilate and the Ecce Homo. Conjecturing that Jan completed a “Passion Altarpiece,” the composition might have contained auxiliary vignettes, and these mnemonic tableaux for devotional prayer would have been an ostensible source for Memling’s panoramas in Turin and Munich, both of which are quite original in design. Had Jan visited Siena in 1425–1426, he could have been inspired by Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s famous 1338–39 frescoes of the Allegory of Good Government in the City and Country extending the walls of the Stanza della Pace in the Palazzo Pubblico 87 (Fig. 10.60). Jan’s secular equestrians of

Boymans Rotterdam, Part V, 1 (July, 1954), 54–63; idem., Pieter Brueghel. The Paintings. Complete Edition (London: Phaidon Press, 1955), Figs. 30 and 31. 87 A. Luisa Haring, La pace è allegrezza: l’ordinamento di una città operosa sull’esempio dell’affresco Il buon governo di Ambrogio Lorenzetti da Siena [Frieden ist Freude : die Ordnung einer geschäftigen Handelsstadt am Beispiel des Freskos Die Gute Regierung des Ambrogio Lorenzetti zu Siena], ed. Erich Kaufer (Siena: Il Leccio, 2002); Anne-Marie Brenot, Sienne au XIVe siècle dans les fresques de Lorenzetti : la cité parfaite (Paris: Harmattan, 1999); Max Seidel, Dolce vita: Ambrogio Lorenzettis Porträt des Sieneser Staates (Basel: Schwabe & Co., 1999); Randolph Starn, Ambrogio Lorenzetti: The Palazzo Pubblico, Siena (New York: George Braziller, 1994); Enrico Castelnuovo with contributions by Maria Monica Donato and Furio Brugnolo, Ambrogio Lorenzetti: il Buon governo (Milan: Electa, 1995); George Rowley, Ambrogio Lorenzetti, 2 vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1958). Monika Cämmerer-George, “Eine Italienische Würzel in der Rahmen-Idee Jan van Eycks,” Kunstgeschichtliche Studien für Kurt Bauch zum 70, suggests in his mamoreal frames, Jan van Eyck drew inspiration from the art of Pietro Lorenzetti. Like Pol Limbourg before him, Jan also would have been intrigued by Italian spatial innovations. See Otto Pächt, “The Limbourgs and Pisanello,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXII (1963B): 109–22.

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“Just Judges” in the Ghent Altarpiece may seem oddly placed in a religious polyptych, but they may manifest a desire to equate civil with divine judgment. Riding in their company in a companion panel are the “Holy Knights,” the embodiment of Pauline ideals and the patrons of military orders. The Counts of Flanders and chivalric warriors are an antithesis of the Roman system of justice under which Christ was executed. Lorenzetti’s urban landscape, with its arched portals magnifying the successful administration of a city, provides a unified pictorial space as the viewer’s eye moves from the urban structures to the rural topography beyond the walls. With the exception that Memling provides a narrative sequence of events, the Sienese murals are not that distant from distant from his Turin and Munich devotional paintings of 1470–1480. The logical inventor of such a panoramic andachtsbild would be Jan van Eyck. Accepting Jan completed a lost Passion Altarpiece with “Annunciation” shutters in 1434–1436, the work and designs for it would have been seen by Allyncbrood before his departure to Valencia. His Roiç de Corella Altarpiece for Alfonso V presents the “Seven Sorrows of the Virgin Mary” — the Circumcision, the Flight into Egypt, Christ debating with the Doctors in the Temple, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, the Lamentation, and the Entombment. The original frame of the Valencian triptych bears a Latin inscription taken from the Stabat Mater. In lieu of the first lines of the hymn (STABAT MATER JUXTA CRUCEM LACRIMOSA) the words read: JUXTA CRUCEM STABAT DOLOROSA, MATER VIRGO MULTUM LACRIMOSA.

Addressing the subject of courtly gifts, the Neapolitan humanist Giovanni Pontano (1422–1503) commented: “There was nothing that Alfonso [V] kept with such pleasure as a picture by the painter Giovanni [Jan van Eyck].88 Had Jan completed a “Seven Sorrows” Passion triptych (which Allyncbrood imitated with variations to please the King of Naples), a possible patron for his devotional work might have been Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. Having experienced the traumatic loss of two sons, she certainly would have identified with the Mater Dolorosa. Could the original work have been shipped to Lisbon following her death in 1467, installed as a commemorative altarpiece in a royal chapel, and then been destroyed in 88 Giovanni Gioviano Pontano [1426–1503], I trattati delle virtù sociali: De liberalitate, De beneficentia. De magni Ficentia. De splendore. De conviventia, edited and translated by Francesco Tateo (Rome: Edizioni dell’Anteneo, 1965), 260. See Evelyn Welch, Art in Renaissance Italy. 1300–1500 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 79.

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the 1755 earthquake? Were drawings of the triptych made by a young Hans Memling before the work left Flanders? That Memling was moving in courtly circles is proven by his two wings of “members of the Rojas family” (Fig. 10.61), which bear heraldic arms, and have been dated by Dirk de Vos to 1465–1467.89 Francisco de Rojas was Spain’s appointed ambassador to the Burgundian court about 1492. He negotiated the 1496–1497 Hapsburg-Trastámara double-marriage uniting the houses of Emperor Maximilian I and the Catholic Monarchs Isabel of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon.90 Memling’s donor is an older relation, who must have served in a similar diplomatic capacity under Enrique IV, King of Castile (1425: r. 1454–1474). Enrique was Queen Isabel’s uncle, and his second wife Joana (1439–1475) was the daughter of King Duarte of Portugal and niece of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. Memling’s aristocratic Castilian likely bore the name of José de De Vos, Hans Memling. The Complete Works, Catalogue No. 2, 78–79, provides literature on these works. Also consult Till-Holger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting. 1430–1530, 242, Catalogue No. 47, who identifies the Rojas escutcheon in the Breviary of Isabel the Catholic (London: British Library, MS. Add. 18851, f. 437) — a shield with stars having seven points. Stating that Memling shows six-pointed stars, the same as depicted in Rietstap’s Armorial Général, he dates the panel to 1480 in essence because of the landscape. He also compares the work to portraits by Jorge Inglés in Spain. However, Inglés’s compositions which reflect inspiration from Rogier van der Weyden, range in date from ca. 1455 to 1475. Memling’s representation of a closed oratory space offset by columns in the Rojas panel more closely approximates the painting of St. Elizabeth of Hungary with Duchess Isabel of Burgundy in the Bruges Groeningemuseum. Attributed to Petrus Christus and/or his Workshop, the female donor who generally has been identified as Philip the Good’s third wife because of her veiled headdress, kneels in a viable interior, the architecture of which provides views of the outdoors. The Christus panel would date before 1457, the year Duchess withdrew from the Burgundian court to seek the quietude of a convent in Mons. Isabel set aside her fashionable apparel to wear the habit of the Poor Clares. 90 In 1496–1497 Maximilian I’s son, Archduke Philip the Fair, wed Infanta Juana, while her brother, Prince Juan, heir of the kingdoms of Spain, married Archduchess Margaret of Austria. Francisco de Rojas was in Bruges by 1492, but it is unlikely that he is the donor Memling portrays. Had the artist represented Francisco de Rojas, the artistocrat’s patron saint — Francis of Assisi — would have been depicted in the background landscape. The choice of the poverello would have been appropriate for a center subject dealing with the Passion of Christ, because the Friars Minor were charged with governing the sacred sites of Jerusalem. Of course, the young girl of the Paris fragment, conceivably Rojas’s daughter (or a very young wife) might have been named “Josefa.” However, the Castilian nobleman likely would have wished for a portrait that included his own patron saint. The accent upon St. Joseph of Arimathaea really suggests the donor’s first name was José. 89

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Rojas because his eponymous patron is depicted in the landscape behind the columned oratory. St. Joseph of Arimathea is portrayed standing before the open rock tomb of the Resurrected Christ. As conjectured by Dirk de Vos, the landscape subject indicates the lost central panel illustrated a “Crucifixion” or “Deposition.” On the other hand, Till-Hollger Borchert proposes the center theme was a “Resurrection.” The rock sepulchre of the Rojas wing was adopted by Pieter Brueghel (Figs. 10.62–10.63), and one of his awakening guards in an unusual bent knee pose has been related by Lotte Brand Philip to a Roman soldier in David’s Haarlem Resurrection, as well as the ancient sculpture of the Wounded Gaul now in the museum of Aix-en-Provence.91 The Roiç de Corella Triptych with its “Circumcision” and “Christ among the Doctors” is not the only Passion retable by the eclectic Allyncbrood which contains sequential narrative subjects. A Crucifixion formerly in the Madrid collection of Rodríguez Bauzá was attributed to Lodewijk by Charles Sterling 92 (Fig. 10.64). A truly remarkable aspect of the painting, is the representation of the four supernatural events which were purported to have occurred when Christ died on the cross. The blending of these subsidiary events in an expansive rural landscape might originate with a lost “Seven Sorrows of the Virgin-Passion Altarpiece.” Behind the Repentant Thief on the left is the resurrection of the dead (Fig. 10.65), represented as bodies and skeletons rising from the ground. Opposite the Impenitent Thief is the rending of the curtain belonging to the Temple of Jerusalem. Further back is the Harrowing of Hell (Fig. 10.66). The final event, the supernatural eclipse, is less easy to determine, but it was supposedly was witnessed as far away as Alexandria by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. This supposed disciple of St. Paul is shown high on the cliff overlooking the port city of Egypt. The harbor with its water reflections of boats and island architecture captures the phenomenon of the eclipse. Such a deft representation of light is evocative of some miniatures attributed to Hand G in the Turin-Milan Hours.93

Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck, Figures 164, 165, 166. Charles Sterling was the first to assign the Bauzá Crucifixion to Allyncbrood. See his “Tableaux espagnols et un chef d’oeuvre portugais méconnus du XVe siècle,” Actas del XXIII Congreso Internacional de Historia del Arte, Granada, 1973 (Granada: 1976), I, 497–524 . 93 Hans Memling provides a similar dramatic approach to lighting. A “rising sun” is depicted over water in his distant landscape of the Resurrection wing panel of the Lübeck Crucifixion Altarpiece. See Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck, Figure 157. 91 92

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There is an emotive quality to the Bauzá Crucifixion that is really quite extraordinary, and separates this master from the reserve that distinguishes the art of Jan van Eyck and his workshop. Stylistic aspects of Roiç de Corella Altarpiece importune some contact in the early 1430s with the Campin atelier, from which sprang the artist-extraordinaire who experimented in expressive figures, Rogier van der Weyden. Of the several Eyckian versions of the “Calvary” subject, the one which most captures the psychological state of grief experienced by Christ’s mother and the Apostle John is the Berlin Crucifixion (Fig. 10.67–10.68). This poignant panel was painted directly from a lost work or study by Jan van Eyck, conceivably an early composition which he took with him to Lisbon in 1428. The despair portrayed in the faces of the Virgin Mary and St. John is only equaled by Jan van Eyck in his New York Calvary of 1429. By contrast with the accentuated facial expressions and dramatic gestures of figures in these works, the Turin-Milan Crucifixion by Hand H and the Venice Cá d’Oro Galleria di Giorgio Calvary contain sacred personae which are reserved, icon-like and emotively distanced.94 The Berlin picture was known in Spain, and the composition circulated.95 This dispersal is proven by an anonymous Calvary from the Iturbe collection and Valencian variations upon the Passion subject by Rodrigo de Osuna (ca. 1440–1518) and the Xàtiva Master, both artists of harsh realism and theatrical spirit.96 94 Bernard Aikema and Beverly Louise Brown, Renaissance Venice and the North. Crosscurrents in the Time of Dürer, Bellini and Titian (London-New York: Thames and Hudson, 1999), Catalogue No. 10 (Collaborator or follower of Jan van Eyck, Crucifixion, Galleria Giorgio Franchetti alla Cà d’Oro, after 1430) and Catalogue 11 (Anonymous Paduan Artist, Crucifixion, Padua, Museo Arte Medievale e Moderna, mid-fifteenth century), both entries by Bernard Aikema. Also consult Haussherr, “Spätgotische Ansichten der Stadt Jerusalem (oder: war der Hausbuchmeister in Jerusalem?),” at 52 (Padua Crucifixion); Carlenrica Spantigati and Joseph J. Rishel, Jan van Eyck, 1390–c. 1441: Opere a confronto (Turin: exhibition catalogue, Galleria Sabauda, 1997), 91–92 (Cà d’Oro Crucifixion). 95 Bermejo, “Influencia de Van Eyck en la pintura Española,” Archivo Español de Arte, 566, 568–69. See Hugo von Tschudi, “Jan van Eycks Christus am Kreuz zwischen Maria und Johannes,” Jahrbuch der Königlichpreussischen Kunstsammlungen XIX (1898): 202–5, for a discussion about the landscape components which appear to reflect Jan’s inspiration from his travels on behalf of Philip the Good. Consult Albert Châtelet, “Un collaborateur de van Eyck en Italie,” Relations Artistiques entre les Pays-Bas et l’Italie à la Renaissance, Études d’histoire de l’art dédiées à Suzanne Sulzberger IV (Brussels-Rome: L’Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 1980): 43–60, at 55, for an attribution of the Berlin Calvary to Hand H of the Turin-Milan Hours. 96 Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos, entries by Gómez Frechina: Catalogue No. 50, 280–83 (Rodrigo de Osuna’s tempera Altarpiece of Calvary

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Like Rogier van der Weyden, Lodewijk Allyncbrood blended two stylistic approaches because he too was dually inspired by Robert Campin of Tournai and Jan van Eyck of Bruges. Both masters transferred to new locations, and while Rogier found fertile soil in Brussels for his artistic growth, Lodewijk was patronized only briefly by Alfonso V. Electing to remain in Aragon, he painted only a few “icons.” Therefore, he never attainted the high status attained by Rogier, whose body of work attests to his inventiveness once he removed himself from the shadow of the colossus Robert Campin, and sought to eclipse the fame of Johannes van Eyck. Allyncbrood has been proposed as the designer of two altar frontals that until 1936 adorned the High Altar of the Cathedral of Valencia 97 (Figs. 10.69–10.70). Because the master was so dependent upon Eyckian models, these frontals are significant because like the Bauzá Crucifixion, they amplify the repertoire of Passion subjects to include a scene of the anastasis. The Passion Frontal contains five scenes from left to right: Christ on the Road to Calvary; the Preparations for the Crucifixion; the Crucifixion with the Two Thieves; the Descent from the Cross; and the Entombment. The Resurrection Frontal has only two narrative scenes: the Harrowing of Hell and the Three Marys at the Tomb. Originating from the Apocryphal

in Valencia, Church of San Pedro Mártir and St. Nicolás; Iturbe Master); Catalogue No. 52, 292–95 (Xàtiva Master). Gómez Frechina cites Elías Tormo y Monzó, Catálogo de las tablas de primitivos españoles de la colección de la Excma. Señora Doña Trinidad Scholz-Hermensdorff, Viuda de Iturbe (Madrid: 1911), No. 26, 14–15. The Iturbe Calvary replicates the Berlin figures, and the titulus of the cross in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. However, the landscape is different in the representation of architectural components, as well as the elimination of leafy trees, distant windmill and even the path (via dolorosa) behind the Virgin Mary and St. John. The Iturbe Calvary has a frame with a Latin inscription, which unfortunately is difficult to read in photographs of the work, but may replicate the lost painted frame of the Berlin Calvary, which must be seen as a near replica of a Jan van Eyck original. José Gómez Frechina states with regard to Rodrigo de Osuna’s Altarpiece of Calvary: [Charles] Sterling noted the Eyckian echoes in the face of Christ, Saint John and one of the Marys, with a notably marked expression of pain, following van Eyck in the Crucifixions at the Metropolitan Museum of New York and at the Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz in Berlin. On the other hand, the Crucified Christ is covered with a perizonium or pure transparent cloth, tied around his waist similarly to the Crucifixion in Berlin. It is worth mentioning at this point, that the Cruxifixion in Berlin must in some way have been conceived in Spain, following another version of the same theme, probably Hispano-Flemish, which belonged to the Iturbe collection.” (282; see English translation, 453). 97 Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos, 90–103 (Gómez Frechina), “Los frontales de la catedral de Valencia.”

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Book of Nicodemus, Christ’s descent to hell was interpreted by the German Augustinian theologian and exegete Hugh of St. Victor (1096–1141), who was educated at Halverstadt before joining the abbey of St. Victor in Paris. He affirmed that Christ’s soul upon death descended to Limbo, where he crushed Satan’s portals of Hell to release the Just, among them, Adam and Eve and the Hebrew Patriarchs.98 Romanesque and Late Gothic artists often depicted the anastasis with the righteous set free from the open jaws of a monster from Hell. The Bauzá panel illustrates Adam and Eve rescued at the entrance to a fiery realm of caverns. By contrast to nature’s “architecture,” the Valencian Resurrection Frontal accords with the biblical commentary of Hugh of St. Victor in that the crumbling gates of Hell resemble the fortified towers of a castle. The ruins contrast with the finely constructed walls of a Jerusalem which rise to pennoned turrets beside the Holy Women approaching Christ’s empty tomb. Dated 1375, the Louvre Parement of Narbonne (Fig. 10.71) is a silk altar frontal (2´ 6¾˝ x 9´ ⅝˝) with multiple narrative events of the Passion painted in grisaille and set within arched niches.99 Charles V of France and Queen Jeanne de Bourbon (Fig. 10.72–10.73) kneel on opposite sides of the crucified Christ. Above the French monarchs are arched compartments. Each contains a standing prophet and female personification: “Ecclesia” holding a chalice; and the “Synagogue” with the tablets of divine law. Conrad von Soest (ca. 1360–after 1422) in Dortmund ushered in the international courtly style in Westphalia, fusing an indigenous tradition with elements that are believed to have originated from personal acquaintance with the Parement Master in Paris.100 His devotional art and that of the Veronica Master had a pronounced impact upon the Eastern Netherlands and those masters who migrated from Gelderland south to Bruges, Ghent and Tournai.

The Oeuvres de Hughes de Saint-Victor (Rouen: Canons of St. Victor, 1648) was reprinted in Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXXV–CLXXVII (1854): De Sacramentis Christianae Fidei (c. 1134). Also consult: Barthélemy Hauréau, Les oeuvres de Hugues de Saint-Victor [Paris: 1859 and 1886] (Frankfurt-am-Main: Minerva-Verlag, 1963). 99 Sara Mary Nash, “The Parement de Narbonne: Context and Technique,” in Caroline Villers, The Fabric of Images. European Paintings on Textile Supports, c. 1300–1500 (London: 2000): 77–87; Philippe Henwood, “Jean d’Orlèans peintre des rois Jean II, Charles V et Charles VI (1361–1407),” Gazette des Beaux-Arts (1980): 137–40. 100 For information concerning Conrad von Soest and the Parement workshop, consult Brigitte Corley, Conrad von Soest. Painter among Merchant Princes (London: Harvey Miller, 1996), 131–80. 98

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With respect to the provenance of the “Allyncbrood Altar Frontals” in Spain, the archival accounts dated 1607 in Libre de Antiguitats record their donation by a canon of Valencia’s Cathedral, mestre Vicent Climent.101 The two Holy Week hangings must have been given before Climent’s will was written as they are not mentioned in the document. Climent’s testament of August 16, 1472 informs he was a native of Valencia and had two married sisters with children. He died on December 18, 1474 at the age of thirtyfive. Additional biographical information about the canon is provided by Fray Josef Teixidor in his Antigüedades de Valencia (1896). Climent was a benefactor of the Zaidiá Monastery and he received a Master of Theology from the University of Oxford in England. At the time of his death he was canon (pabordía de junio) in Valencia, and main archdeacon (acedianato mayor) of Tortosa. In England, he held the similar status of archdeacon at Huntington and Winchester. The silk altar frontals of Valencia present embroidery work of the highest quality with yellow and red being the most dominant colors against a gold ground. The works provide a diversity of chiaroscuro and threaded surfaces. Eyckian models circa 1425, and more distantly the Parement of Narbonne, are the predominant sources for the narrative vignettes. If Lodewijk Allyncbrood designed the silk frontals, the one of the “Passion” may rely upon drawings for the lost predella of the Ghent Altarpiece. The Vijd painting on fabric described Marcus van Vaernewyck in 1532 as a “picture of Hell” by Jan van Eyck easily could have been an altar frontal displayed at the conclusion of Holy Week and on ceremonial occasions. The “Resurrection Frontal” in Valencia with its complimentary subjects of the Harrowing of Hell and Three Maries at the Tomb likely depends on studies Jan completed for his Ghent painting on cloth. Despite the claim that Flemish embroiderers worked in Aragon during the fifteenth century, there is no evidence that the two frontals in Valencia were made in that kingdom. Assigning them to 1460 is incongruous, because both the cast of figures and their fashions date the frontals closer to 1420. Even the “Preparations for the Crucifixion” that shows a cross in sharp perspective being braced for raising by rather energetic executioners, cannot justify assigning a late date. Gerard David’s 1480–85 version of the same subject in the London National Gallery is thought to have been modeled

Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos, 93 (Gómez Frechina). 101

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after a lost Eykian prototype.102 An anonymous Calvary in Cologne (Fig. 10.74) commissioned by Gerhard von dem Wasservass († 1445) and his wife Bela has been assigned to the year 1425.103 The deep landscape with its gold ground and hilly terrain contains a foreground scene with the nailing of Christ’s body to the cross. The anonymous artist who created the Wasservass Calvary for the church of St. Kolumba in Cologne may have studied in France or the Netherlands as suggested by his attempt to show the spatial recession of the cross on the ground and innovative panorama with diminishing color values. Concerning a link between the Valencian frontals and the Ghent Altarpiece predella, Vicente Climent’s biography establishes his close relationship with England, where he spent a few years at Oxford and he was archdeacon at Huntington and Winchester. So then, could the Ghent Altarpiece’s predella and altar frontal on fabric have been copied by the Bruges artist Lodewijk Allyncbrood circa 1432/33 for a specific purpose — a gift sent by Infanta Isabel to her brother Henry, Bishop of Winchester? The magnificent embroidered works would have been a fitting present to recall the memory of Henry’s officiating role at the baptism of Josse in Sint-Jans.104 If this ducal commission did occur, and the two Valencian frontals replicate the lost altar frontal and predella of the Ghent Altarpiece, Allyncbrood’s association with the Eycks might be reassessed. Had Hubrecht completed the framework with a predella prior to his death in 1426, assistants from his atelier must have participated in the early stages of the commission. The name “Allyncbrood” might refer to Lodewijk’s family origin in Westphalia. “A lijn Bruël” means See Hans J. van Miegroet, Gerard David, ed. Peter Ruyffelaere and Paul van Calster (Antwerp: Mercatorfonds, 1989), Catalogue No. 4, 277–78 for Gerard David’s Nailing of Christ and literature pertaining to the work. The wings of “Soldiers” and “Mourners” flanking the center panel bear the arms of Adolf of Burgundy († 1540), Lord of Vere and Beveren, a patron of Jan Gossaert. 103 Brigitte Corley, Painting and Patronage in Cologne. 1300–1500 (London-Turnout: Harvey Miller Publishers-Brepols, 2000), 110–112. She identifies Gerhard von dem Wasservas and his wife Bela [N.] in the left corner. Opposite them kneels their son Godert († 1464) and his first wife Stingen von Hosteden († 1440). Arms are depicted to the side of each couple. 104 Helen Rosenau, “Some English Influences on Jan van Eyck,” Apollo XXXVI (1942): 125–28. With the House of the English Nation in Bruges, logically artists traveled from London to the Flemish commercial center. One case in point was the master Jorge Inglés (George the Englishman), whose art reflects the tripartite influence of Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus and Rogier van der Weyden. Inglés was patronized by Don Iñigo López de Mendoza, an aristocrat who had fought in several battles on behalf of the Trastámara ruler Juan II of 102

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“On the route to Bruël,” a town just south of Cologne and about fifty miles southeast of Maaseik. Bearing in mind the close proximity of Ghent to Bruges, perhaps Allyncbrood trained with Hubrecht before his first recorded attachment with the guild in Bruges (1432–33).105 Allyncbrood’s exceptional interest in light and landscape has been noted in his Bauzá Crucifixion. His penchant to accent his religious works with genre elements, interest in architectural settings, and a miniaturist’s approach to detail, are revealed in the panels of the Roiç de Corella Triptych. Considering these traits, his documented activity in Bruges until 1438, his probable familiarity with masters of Cologne and Tournai, and his proposed involvement with the Vijd altarpiece at Sint-Jans in its early stages, it seems clear that he mingled with Jan van Eyck’s workshop. Lodewijk’s identified work in Valencia between 1439 and his death in 1463 are few in number by comparison with the many panels (Fig. 10.75) by Jacomart (1411–1461: Jaime Baço), who is thought to have trained with Lluis Dalmáu.106 The son of a foreign tailor who settled in Valencia in 1400, Jacomart was an established master by 1440 and the owner of two Castile (1405–1454). Given to his hand is the Retable of the Angels (Viñuelas: Palace of the Duque del Infantado). The altarpiece with its wing portraits of kneeling donors was destined for the high altar of the church built by the nobleman at his ancestral home of Buitrago (near Madrid). The commission is ordered in the testamentaria of Don Iñigo dated June 5, 1455 and the artist specifically designated in the document is Jorge Inglés. Following the death of Don Iñigo in 1458, his son Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, the Marquis of Santillana and first Duke of Infantado (1475), was obliged by his father’s testamentaria to donate 10,000 maravedís annually to the Benedictine Church at Sopetrán. The Sopetrán Altarpiece in the Prado Museum, attributed either to Jorge Inglés or to an anonymous Flemish master, evidences the first concrete use of oil glaze in Castile and the panels reflect substantial influence from Rogier van der Weyden. Consult José María Cabrera and María del Carmen Garrido, “El dibujo subyacente y otros aspectos ténicos de la tablas de Sopetrán,” Boletín del Museo del Prado III, No. 7 (January–April, 1982): 15–31; Judith Berg Sobré, Behind the Altar Table. The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain, 1350–1500 (Colombia: University of Missouri Press, 1989), 151; Enrique Lafuente Ferrari, “Las tablas de Sopetrán,” Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones XXXVII (1929): 89–111; César Pemán, “Sobre las tablas de Sopetrán,” Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones XXXVIII (1930): 128–130. 105 W.H. James Weale and Maurice W. Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art (LondonNew York: John Lane Company, 1912), xxxii, Document 4): Ghent Town Archives record a gratuity paid in 1425 to “apprentices” of Master Hubert. 106 Consult the introduction by Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos and citations, including those of Jacomart (Master of Bonastre) in Catalogue No. 22 (Transfiguration), 186–91, and No. 22 (Annunciation), 192–97, both entries by José Gómez Frechina.

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houses. Between 1442 and 1446 he served Alfonso V († 1558) in Naples. Upon his return in 1447, he lived in Valencia on the same San Vicente street as Allyncbrood, and they would have attended the same parish church of San Martín. Despite Jacomart’s employment in Italy and his contacts with Dalmáu and Allyncbrood, his paintings dip deep into the stylistic well of Aragon. The same may be said for the retables of his immediate successor, Juan Reixach (ac. 1431–1486), the Valencian court painter of Juan II.107 (Fig. 10.76) For a career in Valencia spanning nearly twenty-five years, the paucity of works by the hand of Allyncbrood may indicate that he received commissions which may not have involved panel painting. For example, the March 4, 1441 payment he received from the municipality of Valencia concerns his polychoming a protective screen for an altarpiece.108 Had he been patronized on his arrival by Alfonso V of Aragon, an admirer of Flemish art, Allyncbrood may have been called to Naples like Jacomart. And if he had multi-faceted experience as a painter-sculptor-illuminator, perhaps in this versatile capacity he produced a corpus of work in Valencia which remains unexplored.109 Prior to his departure for Aragon, Allyncbrood appears to have contact with the artist identified as Hand H of the Turin-Milan Hours. The Hand G and H miniatures of the Turin-Milan Hours have been viewed as marking a final phase in the completion of the prayer book once owned by Jean, Duke of Berry (Fig. 10.77). If Jan did not create the later illuminations of Hand H which have been dated inconsistently by scholars between 1435 and 1450, then just possibly the artist who served as overseer of this campaign in Bruges was Lambert. He could have directed 107 By contrast with Jacomart, a far greater number of retables survive by the hand of Reixach, who handled a variety of sacred themes, including such relatively rare subjects as the “Last Supper” and the “Death of Virgin.” For literature about Jacomart, see the introduction by Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos and citations, in addition to the entries by José Gómez Frechina for Catalogue Nos. 24–42 , 44–45, 48–49 (pages 198–279). For the Altarpiece of St. Catherine Martyr, see Catalogue No. 25, 202–7. 108 Benito Doménech and Gómez Frechina, La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos, 103 (José Gómez Frechina). The document mentions a payment to “mestre Luis lo flemench, que está en lo carrer de sent Vicent,” and refers to the painting of a “cortina” to protect the door of the Trinity. 109 Tammaro De Marinis, La biblioteca napoletana dei re d’Aragona, 4 vols. (Milan: Hoepli, 1947–1952); idem., La liberazione di Alfonso v d’Aragona (Naples: Società napoletana di storia patria, 1955); Eduardo Gonzalez Hurtebise, Inventario de los bienes muebles de Alfonso V de Aragón como infante y como rey (1412–1424) (Barcelona: Separate of Anuari de L’Institut d’Estudis Caalans: 1908).

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the workshop completion of miniatures for the Turin-Milan Hours when Jan was on diplomatic mission using a selection of the master’s drawings completed over a span of time. Lambert van Eyck’s artistic personality is difficult to assess due to the lack of documented works. He worked in The Hague with Jan van Eyck until the Duke of Burgundy inherited the holdings of John of Bavaria in 1425.110 When Jan van Eyck became Philip the Good’s varlet de chambre in Lille, Lambert did not settle in Ghent where Hubrecht by that date had an established reputation but instead remained with Jan. Though he probably handled the business aspects of the Van Eyck workshop, Lambert seems to have received training in Gelderland as a skilled artist.111 In March of 1431 he was remunerated by Duke Philip the Good for “having on several occasions waited on the Duke concerning certain affairs.”112 The Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxi, Document 1 (Hague: Royal Archives) reference payment of 2 lions a day to “apprentices” of Jan van Eyck at the Palace of The Hague between October 24, 1422 and September 11, 1424. Charles Sterling, “Jan van Eyck avant 1432,” Revue de l’Art 33 (1976), 7–82, at 12, interprets “plusieurs valets” as indicating the artist’s “companions” rather than his disciples. Why would individuals be paid by the Count of Holland, for being just friends and associates? Science eventually may solve the issue of workshop collaboration. See Peter Klein, “The Differentiation of Originals and Copies of Netherlandish Panel Paintings by Dendrochronology,” Le dessin sou-jacent dans la peinture: Colloque VIII, 1989, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Érasme, 1991): 29–42 (see Eyck Workshop, Berlin Crucifixion, pp. 31–32); idem., “Dendrochronological Findings of the Van Eyck-Christus-Bouts Group,” Petrus Christus in Renaissance Bruges: An Interdisciplinary Approach, ed. Maryan W. Ainsworth (New York-Turnhout: The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Brepols, 1995): 149–66. 111 A portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria containing the insciption: “Actum ao dñi. G 11J augusti a Lamberto de Eyck.” [Act done in the year of Our Lord 1432 August by Lambert de Eyck] was listed in an inventory taken for Charles de Croÿ († 1612) at the Castle of Heverlee near Louvain. See Jacques Paviot, “The Sitter for Jan van Eyck’s ‘Leal Souvenir’,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes LVIII (1995): 210–15, at 212, note 18; Jan Karl Steppe, “Lambert van Eyck en het portret van Jacoba van Beieren,” Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLIV, No. 2 (1983) Academiae Analecta: 53–86; Lorne Campbell, National Gallery Catalogues, The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Schools (London: National Gallery Publications and Yale University Press, 1998), 218–23 (Leal Souvenir, signed and dated 10 October 1432) and 222–223 note 30 (Lambert’s Portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria). For a Portrait of Jacqueline of Bavaria in Copenhagen (Statens Museum for Kunst) see L. Ninane, “Un portrait de famille des ducs de Bavière, comtes de Hollande, Zééland et Hainaut,” Koninklijk Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Bulletin (Miscellanea Philippe Roberts-Jones), XXXIV–XXXVII, Nos. 1–3 (1985–1989): 63–74, at 69. 112 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxiv, Document 15 (Lille, Archives of the Department of the North, B 1942). 110

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accounts of Lille pertain to harnesses and costumes, and this designing of liveries was a purveyance of Late Gothic artists. During the years Jan was abroad, between 1425 and 1430, Lambert had to earn money by some means in Lille, particularly if he had a family to support. The ducal payments of 1431, and absence of his name from guild records in Bruges, at least indicate Lambert received the patronage of Philip the Good, who then collected and commissioned fine manuscripts as assiduously as he sought to expand his territories. The medium of manuscript illumination is characterized by scores of unknown masters and scribes, and many specialists employed by Philip the Good remain anonymous, including masters who illustrated choir books. In 1432 a gratuity is given to the “apprentices of Iohannes van Heyck” following a visit to his studio by the “burgomasters of Bruges and some members of the council” who “went to see certain works.”113 Lambert must have been the host for this reception. That Lambert continued to oversee the atelier is proven by his arrangements for the burial of Jan van Eyck was buried on July 9, 1441 in Sint-Donaaskerk at Bruges.114 On March 21, 1442, Lambert received permission from the Chapter of Sint-Donaas in Bruges for the reburial of Jan’s body from the cloister which adjoined the cathedral to the north. As a officiarii duci, functionary of the Duke, Jan was entitled to a resting place in the church which served as the mausoleum of the Counts of Flanders. By 1442 his body found repose in a more prestigious location, near the baptismal font in the southwest sector of the Sint-Donaas.115 The fact that Lambert assists Jan’s widow Margaret in negotiating with officials of Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxv, Document 18). Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxviii, Document 30 (Bruges, Episcopal Archives), payment to Lambert of 13l. 4s. parisis by the treasurer of Sint-Donaas for burial fees: “Receptum pro sepultura magistri Iohannis Eyck, pictoris, xij lb par”; “Receptum ex campana magistri Iohannis Eyck, pictoris, xxiiij s. par.” Regarding Jan’s tomb, see Elisabeth Dhanens, De kwartierstaat en het graf van Jan van Eyck (Brussels: Paleis der Academiën, 1977). 115 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxix, Document 32 (Bruges, Episcopal Archives): “The Chapter of Saint Donatian, Bruges, at the request of Lambert van Eyck, grants permission for the body of his brother John, buried in the precincts, to be, with the bishop’s license, translated into the church and buried near the font, on condition of the foundation of an anniversary and of compliance with the rights of the fabric.” P. Kauch, “L’Apparition d’un nouveau groupe social aux Pays-bas bourgignons: celui des fonctionaires,” Revue de l’Institut de Sociologie Solvay XV (1935): 122–29; Jean Bartier, “L’Artiste et sa clientèle au temps des ducs Valois,” Bulletin de la Société des Amis du Musée de Dijon (1973–1975): 29–32. 113 114

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Sint-Donaas concerning the transfer of his brother’s remains indicate he was directly involved in settling his brother’s affairs, so it is reasonable to postulate he was active in the daily operations of the workshop until Margaret van Eyck left Bruges in 1450.116 Rogier van der Weyden has been credited with designing three ceremonial mantles for the Order of the Golden Fleece in the Schatzkammer in Vienna 117 (Fig. 10.78). Designed to be worn by high clergy officiating in the liturgy of the institution’s Chapter Meetings, the pluvials were meant to be seen together.118 As such, the combined parados of the mantles present a deësis of the Last Judgment similar to the Ghent Altarpiece: Christ, the “Oriens Sol” flanked by the two intercessors for mankind; the Virgin Mary on his right and St. John the Baptist on his left. The borders of each pluvial contain images of prophets and apostles, and within three rows comprising the body of the cape stand thirty figures within hexagonal frameworks that are reminiscent of inlaid stone. The mantles of Christ and John the Baptist respectively display the Archangels Michael and Raphael; populating the superimposed rows of hexagonal panels are male martyrs, holy royals, patriarchs, bishops, monks and hermits. The remaining cape of the Virgin Mary presents Archangel Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 22. Marc Fructuoso, “Broderies et Tissus precieux à la cour de Bourgogne,” Dossier d’Art XLIV (December,1997–January, 1998): 112–19. Also see Francis Salet, “La fête de la Toison d’Or de 1468,” Annales de la Société Royale d’Archéologie de Bruxelles LI (1966): 5–19; Julius von Schlosser, Der Bungundische Paramentenschatz des Ordens vom Goldenen Vlies, 2 vols. (Vienna: 1912). 118 Julius von Schlosser, Der Burgundische Paramentenschatz des Ordens von Goldenen Vlies, 2 vols. (Vienna: 1912); idem., Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien. Weltliche und Geisliche Schatzkammer, Bildführer (Vienna: 1987): 202–24. Von Schlosser identified the altar frontals with entries in the 1430–32 treasury records of Philip the Good. Two additional altar frontals for the Order of the Golden Fleece are in the Vienna Kunshistorisches Museum. Dated to about 1430–40, the altar antependium of the Virgin and Child with St. John the Baptist and the Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine of Alexandria shows the Madonna holding writing instruments in her hand, signifying her title “Seat of Wisdom.” The twelve lateral compartments of the altar cloth illustrate seated prophets. The frontal possibly was designed by Hue de Bologne, an artist attached to the Burgundian court, who trained in the Ypres workshop of Melchior Broederlam. A second altar antependium contains a rectangular central panel of the Throne of Grace, or the “Holy Trinity,” with twelve lateral compartments containing the seated figures of the apostles. See Félix Thürlemann Thürlemann, Robert Campin, A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, 154–72, “The Ecclesiastical Paraments of the Order of the Golden Fleece.” He has proposed the Throne of Grace was woven after a cartoon by Robert Campin, based upon extant paintings of same theme by Campin and his workshop. 116 117

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Gabriel with virgin martyrs, venerable holy women and turbaned sibyls. Embroidered with gold and silk threads on silk, the costly ceremonial capes date about 1440–50. Jeffrey Chipps Smith additionally postulates the weaver of the pluvials to have been Thierry de Chastel († 1458/59), who was active at the Burgundian court as early as 1424, serving first as a master embroider and subsequently as valet de chambre and court embroiderer to Philip the Good.119 At Lille Chastel maintained a workshop in a corner tower of the Hôtel de Salle, the ducal administrative center, and he did occasional work for Jean Aubry, the guardian of Philip’s tapestries in Arras. The principal figures seated in majesty betray an intrinsic awareness of a painter’s approach to chiaroscuro and drapery. The subsidiary effigies also are expertly rendered. A series of Eyckian drawings of “Apostles” in Vienna’s Albertina (Fig. 10.79) have been compared by Ann Tzeutschler Lurie with justification to the standing saints represented in the hexagonal panels of the Golden Fleece pluvials based upon type, cast of draperies, and poses.120 She comments: “It is known that at least one major set of ecclesiastical robes was commissioned by Philip the Good from his brodier (embroider) Thierry de Chastel, in 1424, and the project continued into the years when Jan van Eyck worked for Philip the Good.” 121 The Albertina “Apostles” are a suave cast of characters, not dissimilar from the figural types of Hand H. If Lambert was the artist-designer of the studies, his association with the masters of Tournai and courtly weavers is significant.

Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 164–70, “The Golden Fleece Capes.” 120 See Ann Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art LXVIII (1981): 86–119, at 106. 121 Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” 119 note 79. She additionally (119 note 78) identifies two drawings on parchment from another series: one of St. James the Less in New York (Pierpont Morgan Library); and the other of St. Paul in a dealers catalogue (Berlin: Börner & Graupe; Vienna: C. Czeczkowicka, 12 May 1930. Also consult Gustav Friedrich Waagen, Die vornehmsten Kunstdenkmäler in Wien, Part II (Vienna: 1867), 407–9; Max Dvořák, “Das Rätsel der Kunst der Brüder van Eyck,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses XXIV, No. 5 (Vienna: 1904): 162–317, at 290–93 (book edition: Munich, 1925) 165–66 (note 11: information on Thierry de Chastel) and a comparative analysis with the Ghent Altarpiece, inclusive of earlier scholarship. Also consult Albert Châtelet, “Un brodeur et un peintre à la cour de Bourgogne: Thierry du Chastel et Hue de Boulogne,” Aachener Kunstblätter LX, Festschrift für Hermann Fillitz (1994): 319–26 119

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Lluis Dalmáu traveled from Valencia to Flanders in 1431 in the company of Master Guillem de Uxcelles, a “tapestry-weaver,” who may have been known by his place of origin rather than his surname like Campin’s disciple Willemet de Tongeren. The capital of Brabant was first called Buocsella in 966, and then broek sole (edge of the morass), so a diminutive form of “Uxcelles” is viable. Master Guillem de Excelles may be the same “Guillaume” in Arras from whom Alfonso V of Aragon in 1434 ordered tapestries for his palace and chapel in Valencia.122 Therefore, the words “au Vaissel” after his first name also could designate his functionary role as a dealer-supplier of furniture and tableware (Vaisselles).” By the time Dalmáu returned to Valencia in 1436, he had visited Ghent and Bruges, and probably the weaving centers of Tournai and Arras. As previously discussed, he seems to have replicated Hubrecht’s altarpiece for the Schepenhuis of Ghent in his Virgin of the Councilors in Barcelona, a work which captures his undeniable admiration for Flemish textiles. A Last Judgment attributed to Lieven van den Clite and dated to 1413, the work is believed to replicate a lost painting which once was displayed in the main gallery of the Schepenhuis in Bruges (Fig. 10.80). According to a document of 1388–1389, the fresco in the Aldermen’s Hall was by “Jan Coene.”123 A Jan Coene, “painter and illuminator” is recorded in the guild registers of Bruges between 1424 and 1450, and Albert Châtelet has proposed he was Master H of the Turin-Milan Hours, and also suggests Jan Coene was the son of Jacques Coene, the illuminator-architect of Bruges who migrated to Paris about 1399.124 There may have been a familial connection between 122 Jacques Paviot, “Burgundy and the South,” The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting. 1430–1530, ed. Till-Holger Borchert, translated by Ted Alkins, Caroline Beamish, Alayne Pullen, Julie Martin (London-New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), 166–83, at 176. 123 Cyriel Stroo and Rita Van Dooren, “’Wat hemlieden toebehoort die vonnesse wijzen zullen,’ Bouts’ werk voor het Leuvense stadhuis in een ruimer perspectief,” Dirk Bouts (ca. 1410–1475) cen Vlaams primitief te Leuven (Louvain: Stad Leuven-Davidsfonds, 1998), 141– 42, mention the Last Judgment in Diest (on loan from the Brussels Museum of Fine Art), and cite an archival document ca. 1388–89 which pertains to a “Last Judgment” in the aldermen’s chamber by the Bruges stadsschilder (town painter) Jan Coene: Item gheghevene bi beveilne van borghmeesters Jan Coenen van eene barde daer ‘t jugement in staet bescreven, hanghende in scepenencamere…”. See Albert Schouteet, De Vlaamse Primitieven te Brugge. Bronnen voor de schilderkunst te Brugge tot de dood van Gerard David, 2 vols. (Brussels: 1989), I, A-K Fontes historiae artis Neerlandicae, 2, 125. 124 Albert Châtelet, Jan van Eyck Enlumineur. Les Heures de Turin et de Milan-Turin (Strasburg: 1993), 74–76. Paul Durrieu, Heures de Turin; quarante-cinq feuillets à peintures

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the two Coenes, but this relationship is impossible to securely determine without additional records. To receive the 1388 commission by officials of Bruges, however, Jan Coene must have attained the rank of master. Placing his birthdate circa 1360, he more logically would have been the parent of the Jan Coene registered in the Bruges guild in 1424 and a brother of Jacques Coene, the color specialist whose technical skills embraced the complimentary skills of peint-drap and fresco. Rogier van der Weyden’s Last Judgment polyptych (Figs. 10.81–10.83) completed for Chancellor Rolin’s Hôtel Dieu in Beaune between 1444 and 1448 shows Christ in Majesty seated on a rainbow as the triumphal centerpiece of a resplendent deësis, and the symmetrical composition is a clear accolade to the Ghent Altarpiece.125 The rewarding of the just and punishment of the damned, however, are foreign elements that may reflect glimpses of Jan van Eyck’s lost altar frontal of “Hell.” Jan must have studied the older paradigm of Coene’s fresco for the Aldermen’s Hall in Bruges, and Lieven van den Clite’s 1413 replica was destined for the Audience Hall (Salle du Conseil) of S’Gravensteen, the Castle of Counts in Ghent.. With its seated Apostles and imposing angels bearing instruments of the Passion, the Coene mural influenced not only Rogier van der Weyden, but also Hans Memling, whose Danzig Last Judgment was commissioned in Bruges by the Medici agent Jacopo Angelo Tani and his wife Caterina Tanagli, and shipped to Florence in 1473.126 Marcus van Vaernewyck in 1532 did not elaborate more about the altar frontal, framework, and predella of the Ghent Altarpiece,

provenant des Très belles heures de Jean de France (Paris: Typ. P. Renouard, 1902), reissued by Albert Châtelet with commentary, Heures de Turin. Quarante-cinq feuillets à peintures provenant des Très belles heures de Jean de France, duc de Berry (Turin: Bottega d’Erasmo; Off. graf. ing. G. Molfese, 1967): see xviii (Jan Coene). Also consult Tzeutschler Lurie, “A Newly Discovered Eyckian ‘St. John the Baptist in a Landscape’,” 86–119, at 118 note 62. There is a tendancy to forget children in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were given more than one saint’s name at a Catholic baptism. Conflation of names frequently occurred when artists traveled from one region to another. Jacques Coene likely was christened with more than one name, i.e. Jan-Jacques Antoine. If Jan Coene was age thirty when he joined the guild of painters in Bruges (1424), his birth would have taken place a few years after the painting of the “Last Judgment” fresco in the Bruges Schleppenhuis. 125 De Vos, Rogier van der Weyden. The Complete Works, Catalogue No. 17, 252–65. 126 De Vos et al., Hans Memling. The Complete Works, No. 4, 82–89; idem., Hans Memling (Bruges, Groeningemuseum, 1994), Catalogue No. 2, 34–41. See Barbara G. Lane, “The Patron and the Pirate: The Mystery of Memling’s Gdansk Last Judgment,” Art Bulletin LXXIII (1991): 623–39.

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which without additional documentation will continue to tantalize art historians. Though a final resolution regarding the original appearance of the entire polyptych in Sint-Janskerk may never be attained, at least an attempt has been made to demonstrate there were viable Passion subjects that Jan van Eyck and his workshop painted that were influential upon a subsequent generation of masters not only in Flanders but also in Spain and Portugal. A Portuguese Disciple of Jan van Eyck in Bruges Jan van Eyck in 1431–1432 moved from Lille to Bruges, where he had purchased from John van Melanen a stone-gabled house opposite the Schottinne Poorte in the Sint Gillis Nieu Straet, now the Gouden-handtstraet (Fig. 10.84).127 Jan’s residence, reached by walking down Gilliskerkstraat, was conveniently located. Nearby was the House of the English Merchant Adventurers on Spiegelrei (13).128 In 1493 the Portuguese merchants occupied a house on Riddersstraat opposite the later Jesuit church of SintWalburgkerk (Figs. 10.85–10.86). Until that date, the Portuguese used the Chapel of Santa Cruz in the Dominican Convent, the only institution of mendicant preachers which still stands in Bruges.129 Jan’s townhouse was situated in the artists’ quarter of Bruges around the thirteenth-century SintGilliskerk (Figs. 10.87–10.88), which remained a single-naved church until the addition of aisles in 1462–79.

127 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 15–22 (biography of the Van Eycks) and at 15 (House in Bruges). On November 28, 1428, a payment is recorded to Michael Ravary of 46 livres 4s. for the two-year rental of a house in Lille to Midsummer of 1428 by “Iohannes de Eyck, varlet de chambre et peintre de mon dit seigneur.” (Document 14, XXXIV, Lille, Archives of the Department of the North B 1938). In 1432 (between July 17 and August 16) a gratuity of 3 livres was given to apprentices of “Iohannes van Heyck” when burgomasters of Bruges, Jan van der Buerse and Maurice van Versanare, along with magistrates of the council viewed their works (Document 18, XXXV, Bruges, Town Archives, and also Weale, 15–17). By 1444 the widowed Margaret, recipient of a generous stipend by the Duke, sold the house on Sint Gillis Nieu Straet and moved to the Oost Meersch, where she lived at least until 1456. 128 Blyth, Flemish Cities Explored, 51. 129 Philip the Bold granted trading privileges in Bruges to Portugal on March 20, 1385. For more information about the Portuguese commercial activity in the town, consult Jacques Paviot, “Les Portugais à Bruges au XVe Siècle,” Arquivos do Centro Cultural Calouste Gulbenkian XXXVIII (Lisbon: 1999): 1–122.

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Infanta Isabel brought a household with her when she traveled to Flanders, including two Castilian musicians. Traveling apart from the Portuguese delegation, an artist apparently also was sent by King João I to Flanders. The Bruges Register for 1429 lists the name of ‘Ajuan,’ a painter of the Portuguese Nation (scildere van portugeezenation),130 who must have been dispatched by King João I to hone his skills with Jan van Eyck. If in Lisbon João Eanes had been assigned to serve as Van Eyck’s assistant, he could have been among the Portuguese who escorted the Burgundian delegation on a tour through Portugal to Spain which lasted from February until May of 1429. Although Jan transferred from Lille to Bruges after the January 7, 1430 marriage of Philip the Good, he would have informed the Avis court of his future plans when he was in Lisbon. An artist by the name of João Anes (Eanes) was appointed royal painter to Afonso V in July of 1454, and he was mestre dos obras of the municipality of Lisbon from 1461 until 1471.131 Because the legal retirement age was seventy, the date of his birth was circa 1400. That he was an accomplished portraitist before his death in 1493 is proven by the fact that he began the famous polyptych of the St. Vincent Altarpiece for the Lisbon Cathedral 132 (Figs. 10.89–10.90).This altarpiece, 130 Nicole Dacos, “Os artistas Flamengos e a sua influência em Portugal (sécs. XV–XVI),” Flandres e Portugal. Na confluência de duas culturas, ed. J. Everaert and E. Stols (Lisbon: Ediçôes Inapa and Antwerp: Fonds Mercator, 1991), 143–175, at 143. Dacos unfortunately does not provide the archival source. 131 Among the documented artists practicing their profession in Flanders, a master named “Johannes” was cited by Léon de Laborde (Marquis), Les ducs de Bourgogne, Études sur les lettres, les arts et l’industrie pendant le XVe siècle et plus particulièrement dans les Pays-Bas et le duché de Bourgogne, 3 vols. (Paris: Plon frères, 1849–1852), as “a painter attached from July 7, 1454 to the court of Portugal” (peintre attaché dès le 7 Juillet 1454 à la cour de Portugal). See António Belard da Fonseca, O Mistério dos Painéis – Os Príncipes –Últimas Páginas, 5 vols. (Lisbon: 1957–1967), IV (1963), 142. In a document dated July 18, 1454, “Johane anes” was designated as a royal painter in service to King Afonso V. The same source specified he only was to paint when required and he was exempt from taxes. Master Johane Anes also was not permitted to have a horse unless he owned one. Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chanceleria de Afonso V, vol. 10, f. 75. See Theresa Schedel de Castello Branco, Os Painéis de S. Vicente de Fora. As Chaves do Mistério (Lisbon: Quetzal Editores, 1994), 163–65. João Eanes (1400?–1493) was appointed the “Master of the Works” of the city of Lisbon in 1461. 132 When Johane Anes retired on April 12, 1471, his position as “Master of Works” was assumed by Nuno Gonçalves. Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Livro Vermelho de D. Affonso V (Book of Official Records, recopied 1531), Colecção de Livros Ineditos da História Portuguesa, III (Lisbon: Edicão da Academia das Ciências, 1793), 424. See Schedel de Castello Branco, Os Painéis de S. Vicente de Fora. As Chaves do Mistério, 164 and Joaquim de Sousa Viterbo, Noticia de alguns pintores portuguezes e de outros que, sendo estrangeiros, exerceram a sua

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a work with sixty portraits, was completed by Nuno Gonçalves after the Portuguese victory at Arzila (Morocco) in 1471. The Saint Vincent Altarpiece will be addressed in a final chapter, but present conservation analysis of the panels, particularly their under drawings which show alterations in costume, establishes João Eanes was the first master-designer.133 The Flemish veneer of the original painting suggests that he acquired technical experience in Flanders. If, as postulated, João Eanes was the artist “Ajuan” listed in the Bruges Register, due to political circumstances following the death of King Duarte in 1438, he probably stayed in Flanders until the ascendancy of Afonso V to the throne in 1450. Jeanne de Harcourt, Countess of Namur, was assigned to the new duchess as a means of indoctrinating Isabel to the social milieu of Flanders. The Infanta had arrived to Bruges with a wardrobe of fine houppelandes, robes and mantles, and though she was quick to adopt the Flemish henin she did retain some Portuguese headdresses which either were embellished with pearls or exotically tooled. Her dowry included costly pieces of jewelry such as the necklace depicted in her Louvre-Dijon portrait (Fig. 10.91). In fact, judging by the extant portraits of the 1430s, most of which are “Eyckian” in style and generally described as anonymous, Isabel of Portugal not only was attentive to Burgundian fashion she clearly commissioned more portraits than her predecessors. Considering the realistic ensemble of courtly portraits in the Lisbon St. Vincent Altarpiece, any discussion of João Eanes’ early artistic activity in Bruges must logically be grounded on the premise he was affiliated with Jan van Eyck and that he was employed by the duchess of Burgundy until his return to Lisbon circa 1450. Postulating João Eanes spent time with Jan van Eyck as a disciple in Bruges and lingered in Flanders until mid-century, he would have had the opportunity to hone his technical skills by studying the methods of another titan, Rogier van der Weyden. Had this been the case, and certainly the initial composition of the St. Vincent Altarpiece suggests this to be arte em Portugal; memoria apresentada á Academia real das sciencias de Lisboa [1899], 2 vols. rpt. 1903 (I) and 1906 (II) (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1903), I, 33. The 1471 carta of Afonso V states “Joane Anes” was a vassel of the king and not yet seventy-one, the legal retirement age. Anne F. Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery. The Veneration of Saint Vincent (Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1979), 156, gives the date of Johane Anes’s death as 1493. 133 Ana Paula Abrantes et al., Nuno Gonçalves, novos documentos. Estudo da pintura portuguesa do Séc. XV (Lisbon: Instituto Português de Museus/Reproscan, 1994), contains an excellent bibliography on the St. Vincent Altarpiece (pp. 93–95), and informs about the history (pp. 17–57) and conservation of the polyptych (pp. 61–89).

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possible, he could have produced the fine portrait of Isabel of Portugal in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Fig. 10.92). The likeness is of a mature woman dressed in a typical Burgundian court costume that dates closer to the mid-fifteenth century. Her face is still soft and fleshy, but the set of the features by comparison with the Dijon panel suggests a female who has aged fifteen years. Further, the semi-profile view captured by the artist tends to emphasize her pronounced chin and prominent nose. As was customary of the period, Isabel’s costume reveals the multiple layers of garments worn for a two-fold purpose. Layered fabrics provided an insulated barrier around the body which served as a protective shield against the cold and damp climatic conditions in northern Europe. Simultaneously the design of her garments acted as a showcase to display the quantities of luxurious materials amassed into a single costume and look. The elaborate headdress worn by Isabel in the New York portrait combines features of the Medieval caul, a cap-like netting, covering two coils of hair on either side of the head and projecting into exaggerated side extensions that flank a conical sugar-loaf. The caul is covered with an ornate patterned fabric embroidered in gold and edged with a band of gold braid encrusted with pearls. Mounted atop this distinctive headdress is a floating butterfly veil of starched silk. She is attired in a full-length velvet houppelande with radiating cartridge pleats broken by a girdle belted at the top of the rib cage, and padded inverted cone-shaped sleeves. The richness of her gown is further enhanced by the costly black velvet facings of the collar trimming the neckline which converges to a deep V at the top of her black velvet girdle. Under the elegant outer gown with a bag supported skirt, Isabel is wearing a chemise. Made of precious transparent silk, the chemise rises to the base of her neckline and has been trimmed with a soft narrow ruffle that remains unclasped to echo the V-shaped décolleté cut of the neckline on the outer gown. Isabel of Portugal’s portrait in the Chicago Art Institute (Fig. 10.93), with a left panel of Philip the Good, forms a most impressive diptych (each 21 x 16.2 cm/6˝ x 4 ¾˝). The Chicago pendants have gold arched frames with identifying inscriptions in black late Gothic script: phs.d.g. dux burg. co. fland ; and isabella portugalie coniunx. The panels have been attributed to the Flemish school, but possibly the pendants were painted by the Portuguese master who traveled with Jan van Eyck to Bruges. The Louvre-Dijon portrait of Infanta Isabel is believed to replicate a lost picture by Jan van Eyck, and João Eanes might have copied as precisely as possible the master’s archetype.

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Even so, the portrait shares with the Chicago panel a common softness in the rendering of flesh, and both works present a three-quarter view of the Infanta’s face. Duchess Isabel in the Chicago panel is portrayed half-length and sitting against a simple dark background, and she wears a high embroidered gold headdress inspired by Moroccan metalwork. Her veil cascades in graceful folds of the Avis green color. Eastern design also is suggested by the Infanta’s massive gold collier à entrelacs brandished around her neck, the undulating lines of which compliment the decoration of her gold embroidered bodice. Resting her left hand on the edge of the inscribed frame to show her ruby and gold wedding ring, the Princess wears a fancy, low-cut velvet gown of wine red trimmed in ermine, and a black and gold belt. She is a stunning contrast of color to her husband. Attired in formal black with his right hand shown, Duke Philip the Good wears a chaperon articulated by a ruby and pearl gold agrafe associated with the Burgundian Duchy. Besides his collar of the Golden Fleece, he also displays a gold cross of the Portuguese Order of Christ. Suspended from a double gold chain, this cross rests against a linen shirt dramatically accented by the mink fur edging of his black houppelande. A massive gold chain link necklace is worn by Isabelle of Bourbon (1435– 1457), wife of Charles the Bold (1433–1467) (Fig. 10.94), and it resembles the one brandished by Isabel of Portugal in the Chicago panel. This particular item of jewelry adorns the effigy of Isabelle of Bourbon in the Cathedral of Antwerp (Fig. 10.95). Though the Duchess in 1454 had argued for her son’s marriage alliance with the English House of York, for political reasons Duke Philip’s predilection for a French bride resulted in his son’s second marriage to his niece. Isabel of Portugal might have offered a treasured necklace to dispel any court gossip regarding her initial preference for a daughter-in-law. The pendants in the Ghent Musée de Beaux-Arts slightly differ in style, as the softly shaded portrait of the Countess of Charolais is more meticulous in its treatment of detail. Perhaps Isabel of Portugal commissioned João Eanes to paint the portrait of her daughter-in-law to mark her gift of a necklace. By contrast with the Chicago portrait of Philip the Good, the pendant of Charles the Bold seems less refined in its broader brushstrokes. João Eanes indeed could have remained in the North until 1454, the year of his appointment as court painter to Afonso V. He would have determined to leave Flanders about the time that Isabel and her husband quarreled over the betrothal of their son Charles. Following this marital clash, Isabel’s power at court diminished until she removed herself altogether from the political arena in 1457 after a major altercation. Following Jan van Eyck’s death in

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1441, João Eanes seems to have continued working for the House of Burgundy and it probably was this activity which secured for him the appointment as “Master of Works” in the city of Lisbon. He also appears to have been a multi-faceted artist like Jan van Eyck who not only painted panels, but also designed and polychromed sculpture. Notable familial sepulchres were donated by Philip the Good, whose commissioned memorials encompassed two distinctive brands of style. The earlier aesthetic was inaugurated by Claus Sluter (1360–1406) under Duke Philip the Bold.134 The mausoleum of the Holy Trinity adjoining the Carthusian Chapterhouse of Champmol at Dijon once contained the tomb of Jean “Sans Peur” (1371–1419) and Margaret of Bavaria (1363–1423) (Fig. 10.96). The sepulchre was begun by Sluter’s nephew Claus de Werve (1370–1439) and completed between 1443 and 1470 by Juan de la Huerta of Aragon († 1462) and Pierre Antoine Le Moiturier (1425–1495).135 Carved in Salins alabaster, the tomb shows a stately cortege of solemn monks. These gilded and carved pleurants seem to move gracefully through filigree arches, and as such they are reminiscent of figures which adorn Gothic reliquaries fashioned as chapels. Standing on a slab of black dinant marble, the dramatic monks are equally evocative of Gothic “Lamentations,” tableau vivants in stone wherein bereaved attendants around Christ’s sepulchre function as compassionate witnesses to 134 Kathleen Morand, Claus Sluter, Artist at the Court of Burgundy (Austin-London: University of Texas Press-Harvey Miller Publishers, 1991); [Boymans Museum], Claus Sluter ende Kunst te Dijon van de XIV tot de XVI Eeuw (Rotterdam: Exhibition Catalogue, 1950); Fernand de Mély, “Les Grands Tombiers du Moyen Âge,” La Renaissance de l’Art Français et des Industries du Luxe (1922): 654–65; Philippe Verdier, “La Trinité debout de Champmol,” Études d’Art Français offerts à Charles Sterling (Paris: 1975): 65–90. For additional information on the Burgundian tomb sculpture, also see John W. Steyart (ed.), Late Gothic Sculpture in the Burgundian Netherlands (Ghent: Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1994); Adelin de Valkeneer, “Inventaire des tombeaux et dalles à gisants en relief en Belgique,” Bulletin de la Commission Royale des Monuments et des Sites XIV (1963): 89–256. 135 Pierre Quarré, Claus de Wierve, Imagier des Ducs de Bourgogne (Dijon: Palais des Ducs de Bourgogne, 1976); idem., Jean de la Huerta et la sculpture bourguignonne au milieu du Xve siècle (Dijon: Palais des Ducs de Bourgogne, 1972); idem., Antoine Le Moiturier, le Dernier des Grands Imagiers des Ducs de Bourgogne (Dijon: Palais des Ducs de Bourgogne, 1973); Henri Chabeuf, “Jean de la Huerta, Antoine le Moiturier et le tombeau de Jean sans Peur,” Mémoires de l’Académie des sciences, arts et belles-lettres de Dijon, 4, ii (1890–91): 137– 271; idem., Dijon : monuments et souvenirs, with a prologue by Yves Beauvalot (Marseille: Laffitte, 1977); H. Drouet, “L’Atelier de Dijon et l’exécution du tombeau de Philippe le Hardi,” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art, II (1932): 11–39; [Anonymous] “Le Tombeau du Duc de Bourgogne Jeans sans Peur,” Archives Historiques, Artistiques et Littéraires II (1890–91): 54–63.

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the Redemption.136 In a similar vein, the anonymous ecclesiastics alluded to the Carthusian obligation to offer daily masses and prayers for the souls of deceased who reposed in the crypt of the Burgundian family chapel at the Chartreuse. A contrast to the Sluterian monument at Champmol was Jacques de Gérines’s later tomb for Louis de Mâle (1330–1384), Count of Flanders, and his wife, Marguerite (1323–1368) (Fig. 10.97). The names of the artists who worked with Gérines unfortunately are unknown.137 But this sepulchre which stood until 1793 in the pilgrimage church of Nôtre Dame de la Treille in St. Pierre at Lille, was commissioned by Philip the Good in 1453, a year before João Eanes’s documented arrival to Portugal. Unlike the mourners depicted in the tomb of Jean “Sans Peur,” the twenty-four pleurants adorning the base of Louis de Mâle’s tomb were near contemporary portraits disposed to magnify a dynastic union achieved by the houses of Burgundy and Flanders. The statues, each with a coats-of-arm, formed a genealogical tree stemming from the taproot of Philip the Bold and his wife Margaret de Mâle. Bridging the Gerinesque and Slutereque sculptural traditions is a critical sepulchre completed under the aegis of Philip the Good, that of his beloved sister Anne (1404–1432) 138 (Fig. 10.98). Anne of Burgundy’s tomb for the church of the Célestines in Paris was begun three years after she succumbed to an epidemic on November 13, 1432 and following the death of her husband, John of Lancaster, the Duke Bedford (1389–1435) 139 (Fig. 10.99). At a memorial service arranged by Philip the Good for his sister in 136

1971).

Pierre Quarré, Les Pleurants dans l’art du Moyen Âge en Europe (Dijon: Darantière,

For a dicussion of the monument and its relation to the Chartreuse tomb of Jean “Sans Peur,” see Smith, “The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467),” 64–78. Consult Alexandre Pichart, “Jacques de Gérines, batteur de cuivre du XVe siècle, et ses oeuvres,” Bulletin de la Commission Royale d’Art et d’Archeologie V (1866): 114–36; Marguerite Davigne, “Un nouveau document pour servir à l’histoire des statuettes de Jacques de Gérines au Musée d’Amsterdam,” La Revue d’Art XXIII (1922): 49–76; C.M.M.A. Lindeman, “De Dateering, Herkomst en Identificatie dar ‘Gravenbeeldjes’ van Jacques de Gérines,” Oud Holland LVIII (1941): 49–58, 97–105; 161–68; 193–219. 138 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, has made this observation and his analysis and documentation of the monument, 369–76, should be reviewed. 139 Upon the death of Henry V (1387–1422), his brother John, the Duke of Bedford and grandson of John of Gaunt, served as regent for Henry VI (1422–1471). As a Garter Knight he had commanded a victory at Verneuil in August of 1424 clad in blue velvet with the insignia of St. George, a white cross on which a red cross was superimposed. On May 13, 1423 in the Church of St. John at Troyes in Campaigne John of Lancaster formally married Anne 137

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the Church of the Célestines on April 19, 1435, he committed a “very rich offering of money.”140 Probably then, Anne’s sepulchre was entrusted to the Netherlandish sculptor Guillaume Vluten, who acquired marble from quarries located between Namur and Liège. According to Jeffrey Chipps Smith, the monument largely was completed before the death of Vluten around 1445, and he states the “Mason Jehan James finished the sepulchre’s foundation in the mid-1440s.”141 The odd surname of this associate in the project compels his identification as João Eanes (Anes/Ajuan of Bruges). Perhaps the same Portuguese master also painted the tomb figures before the monument was installed in the Célestins in 1456. That court painters were assigned such tasks is proven by documents pertaining to Jean Malouel’s work for Duke Philip the Bold, which included polychroming Sluter’s monumental sculptures for the Chartreuse de Champmol in Dijon.142 The white effigy of Anne of Burgundy in the Louvre (Fig. 10.100) is all that survives of what once constituted a remarkable sepulchre.143 The duchess’s status is proclaimed by her headdress, a pearl-studded henin surmounted by a crown, and the

of Burgundy. His second marriage In 1433 to Jacquette St. Pol (1416–1472) purportedly angered Philip the Good because he felt a longer mourning period was demanded. 140 Janet Shirley (ed.), A Parisian Journal 1405–1449, translated from the anonymous Journal d’Un Bourgeois de Paris (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), 294. See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 373; Louys Beurrier, Histoire du monastère et convent des Pères Célestins de Paris, contaenant ses antiquités et privilèges, ensemble les tombeaux et épitaphes des rois, des duc d’Orléans (Paris: 1634). 141 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 373, states records pertaining to the commission are in the archives of Lille. He cites Le Glay et al., Inventaire Sommaire des Archives Départementales du Nord Antérieures a 1790. Série B, Chambre des Comptes de Lille, IV (ed. Chrétien César Auguste Dehaisnes), 164 (B 1983: Vlutens) and 183 (B 2001: payments for the work’s completion). Consult Françoise Baron, “Le décor du soubassement du tombeau d’Anne de Bourgogne, duchesse de Bedford,” Bulletin de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France (1990): 262–74. 142 A cryptogram in the Nuno Goncalves’s Panel of the Prince has been identified on the right boot heel of Prince João of Viseu (1448–1473), a rubric signature showing a G, v within the G, and s, or Gvs for Gonçalves. See Adriano de Gusmão, Nuno Gonçalves (Lisbon: Publicações Europa-America, Colecção Saber, Série Especial, No. 5, 1957). The trim of another shoe in the same panel, that belonging to the young boy standing behind Prince João (Duarte, b. 1457), has been read as: NG [initials for Nuno Gonçalves] or Y [Imaginarius=Image Maker]/J Eanees [João Eanes]. See António Belard da Fonseca, O Mistério dos Painéis, IV (1963), 142; José de Bragança, “E Vasco Fernandes o Autor do Políptico do Infante Santo?” Diário Popular (Lisbon: December 28, 1961); Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery.

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gemstone girdle which articulates her buttoned surcoat, or houppelande. Her head rests on a soft pillow, while a pair of dogs serve as faithful sentinels at her feet. Set initially in the wall of the south side of the choir at the Célestines and very close to the Orléans family chapel, the monument’s appearance before the French Revolution is known through a drawing ordered by Roger de Gaignières.144 Dated to the late seventeenth century, this sketch shows an idiosyncratic placement of seven mourners behind Anne’s effigy (Fig. 10.101). These statues more plausibly would have conformed to earlier Burgundian prototypes, that is, they would have occupied niches of the tomb’s base as a funeral cortege. Flanking five clerics are two royal portraits: Philip the Good on the left, identified by his distinctive “Golden Fleece” collar; and Anne’s husband on the right, John of Lancaster, the Duke of Bedford and regent of France.145 During his stay in Paris, the English Duke of Bedford and Duchess Anne (Fig. 10.102) occupied the Hôtel de Tournelles, the former residence of Louis d’Orléans, younger brother of Charles VI (r. 1380–1422) whose

The Veneration of Saint Vincent, 45–46 and 101–102; Schedel de Castello Branco, Os Painéis de S. Vicente de Fora. As Chaves do Mistério, 172–73. Nuno Gonçalves’s initials combine with the name of Johane Eanes to suggest the retable was a joint project, and that Eanes was the sculptor responsible for the framework and reliquary centerpiece. 143 According to Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 369–70, the effigy (Louvre 442) measures 1.63 meters and rests on a black marble slab which bears the inscription: Cy gist madame anne de bourgogne espouse de tres noble prince jehan duc de bedfort et regent de france et fille de tres noble prince monseigneur jehan duc de bourgogne la quelle trespassa a Paris le XIIIe jour de nobembre 1an MCCCC et XXXII. 144 Bibliothèque Nationale, ms. fr. 20077, fol. 7. Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 370–71, note 4) provides this source and others, including: Henri Bouchot, Inventaire des dessins exécutés pour Roger de Gaignières et conservés aux départements des estampes et des manuscrits, 2 vols. (Paris: E. Plon, Nourrit & Cie, 1891), II, No. 7258; Jean Adhémar and Gertrude Dordor, “Les Tombeaux de la Collection Gaignières. Dessins d’archéologie du XVIIe siècle, II,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXXXVIII (July–September, 1976), No. 1089, 3 (1974–1976: full citation: 3–128). 145 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 371. A perception of the funerary exequies of the period is provided by Yann Grandeau, “La Mort et les obsèques de Charles VI,” Bulletin Philologique et Historique (jusqu’à 1610) du Comité des travaux historiques et scientifiques, 1970 (Paris: 1974): 133–186.

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death in 1407 was orchestrated by his arch rival Jean the Fearless.146 The Hôtel de Tournelles was but one of nine town houses owned by Louis d’ Orléans in Paris. His grand estate of Pierrefonds close to Cuise-la-Forêt and the Convent of the Célestines, an order he actively patronized, was renovated in 1396.147 This project soon was followed by the rebuilding of the castle of 146 Eugène Jarry, La vie politique de Louis de France, duc d’Orléans, 1372–1407 (Geneva: Slatkine-Megariotis Reprints, 1976); Éva Kovács, “L’Ordre du Camail des ducs d’Orléans,” Acta Historiae Artium XXVII (1981): 225–31; C. Ribéra-Pervillé, “Les hôtels parisiens de Louis Ie d’Orlèans (1372–1407),” Bulletin de la Société de l’histoire de Paris et de l’Ile-de-France (1980): 23–70. The Paris residence of Jean the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, was as stately as that belonging to his rival and contained a library of fine manuscripts. However, only a tower remains. See Philippe Plagnieux, “La tour Jean sans Peur, une épave de la résidence parisienne des ducs de Bourgogne,” in Histoire d’Art 1–2 (1988): 11–20; Ernest Petit, Ducs de Bourgogne de la Maison de Valois, I, Philippe le Hardi, 1363–1380 (Paris: 1909): 26–39 (ducal hôtels in Paris); Millard Meiss, The Master of the Breviary of Jean Sans Peur and the Limbourgs (London: Oxford University Press-The British Academy, 1971). For information about the royal monastery of St. Germain des Prés and other churches patronized by royalty, see Jacques Bouillart, Histoire de l’abbaye royale de Saint Germain des Prez. Contenant la vie des abbez qui l’ont gouvernée depuis sa fondation: les hommes illustres qu’elle a donnez à l’eglise & à l’Etat: les privilèges accordez par les souverains pontifes & par les évêques: les dons des rois, des princes & des autres bienfaicteurs. Avec la description de l’eglise, des tombeaux & de tout ce qu’elle contient de plus remarquable. Le tout justifié par des titres authentiques, & enrichi de plans & figures (Paris: G. Dupuis, 1724; copy in Washington, DC: Library of Congress); Louis Grodecki, Saint-Germain des Prés (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1945); Dany Sandron, “Le roi et les églises,” Paris et Charles V: arts et architecture, ed. Frédéric Pleybert, with the collaboration of Arnaud Alexandre et al. (Paris: Action artistique de la ville de Paris, 2001): 91–104. Also consult Bernard Prost, “Listes des artistes mentionnés dans les états de la maison du roi et des maisons des princes au XIIIe siècle à l’an 1500,” Archives historiques, artistiques et Littéraires I (1889/1990): 425–37; Jules Guiffrey, “Peintres, ymagiers, verriers, maçns, enlumineurs, écrivains et libraires du XIVe et du XVe siècle,” Nouvelles archives de l’art français VI, No. 1 (1878): 157–220. 147 Louis Grodecki, Pierrefonds (Paris: Caisse nationale des monuments historiques et des sites, 1979); Jacques Harmand, Pierrefonds, la forteresse d’Orléans: les réalités, with an introduction by Yvan Christ (Le Puy-en-Velay: Éditions Jeanne d’Arc, 1983); Jean Mesqui, “Les châteaux de Louis d’Orléans,” Dossier d’Art CVII (Dijon: Faton), 20–25. Jean Mesqui and C. Ribéra-Perville, “Les château de Louis d’Orléans et leur architectes,” Bulletin Monumental CXXXVIII (1980): 293–345; Frédéric Pleybert, “Les sculpteurs de Louis de France, duc d’Orléans,” L’Art gothique dans l’Oise et ses environs, XIIIe et XIVe siècles, Actes du colloque de Beauvais en 1998 (Beauvais: 2001): 207–21. Louis d’Orléans was one of the most important patrons of art in late Gothic France. Consult M. Gaude-Ferragu, “Le corps du prince. Le testament de Louis d’Orléans (1403), miroir de sa spiritualité,” Micrologus VII (1999): 319–44; Frances Marjorie Graves, Deux inventaires de la maison d’Orléans (1389 et 1408), 2 vols. (Paris: H. Champion, 1926); idem., Quelques pièces relatives à la vie de Louis I, duc d’Orléans, et de Valentine Visconti, sa femme (Paris: H. Champion, 1913); Louis d’Orléans

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Ferté-Milon in Champagne.148 The Hôtel de Tournelles was as spacious as other ducal estates in the city of Paris, such as the Hôtel de Bourbon. The domicile of Duke Louis II de Bourbon, the maternal uncle of Charles V (r. 1364–1380) was built near the Louvre Palace.149 The Hôtel de Nesle across et Valentine Visconti: mécénat et politique autour de 1400 (Blois: exhibition catalogue, Château de Blois, 2004); Léon de Laborde [Marquis], Glossaire français du moyen âge, à l’usage de l’archéologue et de l’amateur des arts, précédé de l’inventaire des bijoux de Louis, duc d’Anjou, dressé vers 1360 (Paris: A. Labitte, 1872); idem., Notice des émaux, bijoux et objets divers exposés dans les galeries du Musée du Louvre, I: Histoire et description; II: Documents, Inventaire de joyaux de Louis d’Anjou et glossaire (Paris:C. de Mourgues frères-successeurs de Vinchon, imprimeurs des Musées Impériaux, 1857); Eugène Gabriel Ledos, “Fragment de l’inventaire des joyaux de Louis Ier duc d’Anjou (1364–1365),” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartes L (1889): 168–79. Henri Moranvillé, Inventaire de l’orfèvrerie et des joyaux de Louis I, duc d’Anjou , 4 vols. (Paris: E. Leroux, 1903–1906); idem., “Inventaire de l’orfèvrerie et des joyaux de Louis I, duc d’Anjou,” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartes LXII (1901): 181–222. 148 Eugène Amédée Lefèvre-Pontalis, “Le château de La Ferté-Milon”; “Coucy le château,” 78e Congrès archéologique de France, 1911 (1911): 276–81 and 293–300; Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, “L’entrée de la Vierge au Paradis. Le relief de La Ferté-Milon,” 148e Congrès archéologique de France, 1990 (Paris: Société française d’archéologie, 1994): 327–39; Eugène Amédée Lefèvre-Pontalis, Le château de Coucy, with an historical introduction by Philippe Lauer (Paris: H. Laurens 1913); Jean Mesqui, “Les programmes résidentiels du château de Coucy du XIIIe au XVIe siècle,” 148e Congrès archéologique de France, 1990 (Paris: Société française d’archéologie, 1994): 207–47; Lucien Broche, “Notes sur d’anciens comptes de la chatellenie de Coucy,” Bulletin de la Société Académique de Laon (1908): 339–47. 149 Adrien Jean Victor Le Roux de Lincy [1806–1869], Le Paris de Charles V et de Charles VI: vu par des écrivains contemporains, ed. Le Roux de Lincy et Lazare Maurice Tisserand (Caen: Paradigme, 1992); Michel Fleury and V. Kruta, Le château du Louvre (Dijon: 2000); M. Whiteley, “Le Louvre de Charles V: disposition et fonctions d’une résidence royale,” Revue de l’Art XCVII (1992): 59–75; Jean Favier, Paris: deux mille ans d’histoire (Paris: Fayard, 1997); idem., Paris au XVe siècle, 1380–1500 (Paris: Association pour la publication d’une histoire de Paris-Hachette, 1974; Louis Douët-d’Arcq, Comptes de l’hôtel des rois de France aux XIVe et XVe siècles (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France-Mme Ve J. Renouard, 1865); Philippe Henwood, “Raymond Du Temple, maître d’oeuvre des rois Charles V et Charles VI,” Bulletin de la Société d’Histoire de Paris et de l’Ile-de-France CV (1978): 55–75; I Taveau-Launay, “Raymond Du Temple, maître d’oeuvre des rois de France et des princes,” Du projet au chantier : maîtres d’ouvrage e maîtres d’oeuvre aux XIVe–XVIe siècles, ed. Odette Chapelot (Paris: École des hautes études en sciences sociales, 2001): 323–38; M. Whiteley, “Lieux de pouvoir et résidences royales,” Paris et Charles V: arts et architecture, ed. Frédéric Pleybert, with the collaboration of Arnaud Alexandre et al. (Paris: Action artistique de la ville de Paris, 2001): 105–31; Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, Aspects du mécénat de Charles V. La sculpture décorative,” Bulletin Monumental CXXX (1972): 303–45; U. Bennert, “Les décors de résidences,” Paris et Charles V: arts et architecture, ed. Frédéric Pleybert (Paris: 2001): 138–50; Léon de Labord, “Inventaire du roi Charles V (21 Janvier 1380),” Revue Archéologique VII (1850): 496–509, 603–17, 731–45; Eberhard König, “Un grand miniaturist inconnu du XVe siècle français: le

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the Seine from the Louvre, and the Château de Bicêtre on the outskirts of Paris (Fig. 10.103–10.104) once were resplendent domiciles of Jean, Duke de Berry (1340–1416).150 However, Nesle was ransacked and Bicêtre was burned during a cabochien uprising of 1411 resulting from the ArmagnacBurgundian disputes. Almost all of the royal houses of Paris, including the Hôtel de Tournelles occupied by John of Bedford and Anne of Burgundy and Philip the Good’s Hôtel d’Artois no longer stand.151 João Eanes’s activity in Paris may have been limited to the Tomb of Anne of Burgundy. However, his work in the Church of the Célestines and involvement in other ducal projects undoubtedly qualified him for the position of “master of works for the city of Lisbon.“ The high office was bestowed upon the Eanes in 1454 by King Afonso V (r. 1450–1481), and he served in that capacity until 1471. The date of his court appointment suggests he returned to Portugal before Anne’s tomb was completed. João Eanes, therefore, is an important master of early Renaissance Portugal who seems to have acquired some training as an illuminator, painter and sculptor before he traveled to Bruges. Certainly he would have departed peintre de l’octobre des Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry,” Les Dossiers de l’Archéologie XVI (May-June: 1976): 96–123. Charles V generally preferred his royal house of St. Pol near the Bastille. See Fedor Hoffbauer, Paris à travers les âges; aspects successifs des monuments et quartiers historiques de Paris depuis le XIIIe siècle jusqu’à nos jours fidèlement restitués d’après les documents authentiques, with contributions by F. Hoffbauer, É. Fournier, P. Lacroix, A. de Montaiglon, A. Bonnardot, etc al., 14 parts in 2 vols. (Paris: Firmin-Didot et cie, 1875–1882), Part 8 (“La Bastille, l’ancien hôtel royal de Saint-Paul et le quartier de l’Arsenal”); Fernand Auguste Marie Bournon, “L’Hôtel royal de Saint-Pol,” Mémoires de la Société de l’Histoire de Paris et de l’Île-de-France VI (1879): 54–179; idem., La Bastille (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1893); Nicolas Faucherre (ed.), Sous les pavés, La Bastille, archéologie d’un myth révolutionnaire (Paris: exhibition catalogue, 1989). 150 Jean Mesqui, Île-de-France gothique, 2 vols. (Paris: Picard, 1988), especially II: Les demeures seigneuriales; idem., “Les ensembles palatiaux et princiers en France aux XIVe et XVe siècles,” ed. André Renoux, Palais royaux et princiers au Moyen Âge (Le Mans: Publications de l’université du Maine, 1996): 51–77; Florian Meunier, “Les résidences royales et princières à Paris,” Dossier d’Art CVII (Dijon: Faton), 16–19; Arnaud Alexandre, “Les hôtels princiers,” in Paris et Charles V: arts et architecture, ed. Frédéric Pleybert (Paris: Action artistique de la ville de Paris, 2001): 132–37; P. Bru, Histoire de Bicêtre (hospice, prison, asile) d’après les documents historiques (Paris: 1890). Simone Roux, Paris au Moyen Age (Paris: Hachette Littératures, 2003); Fedor Hoffbauer, Les rives de la Seine à travers les âges (Paris: C. Schmid, 1903); Émile, Comte de Toulgoët-Tréanna, “Les Comptes de l’hôtel du duc de Berry (1370–1413),” Mémoires de la Société des Antiquaires du Centre XVII (1889/1890): 65–175. 151 Jean-M. Richard, “Documents des XIIIe et XIVe siècles relatifs à l’hôtel de Bourgogne (ancien hôtel d’Artois) tirés dy trésor des chartes d’Artois,” Bulletin de la Société de l’histoire de Paris et de l’Île de France, XVII (1890): 137–59.

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Lisbon in 1429 with the promise of working with the great portraitist “Johannes”. While it is speculative to define the precise nature of his work with Van Eyck, or for that matter the duration of time spent in Bruges, Paris and Brussels, Eanes acquired sufficient polish in the North to have obtained a significant position as court artist of King Afonso V. Holy Kinship, Holy Face: Imaging an Icon for the Avis Court In August of 1415 King João I spearheaded the important expedition to Ceuta which assured his kingdom of a foothold in North Africa, and even a base of operations from which the conquest of Nasrid Granada could be accomplished. He was fifty-eight years old when he knighted his three eldest sons in the aftermath of battle, and their achievements of the Princes seem to be acknowledged in Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece panel of the Holy Knights (Fig. 10.105). However, it was a bittersweet victory as just prior to the sailing of his fleet, his beloved Queen Philippa died at the Franciscan Convent of Poor Clares in Odivelas. Attributed to João Eanes, a bust-length portrait of King João I (Fig. 10.106) in Lisbon, a tempera painting on panel, may imitate a lost Eyckian prototype.152 The inscription on the gold frame of the Lisbon portrait, which begins on the left side and runs along the top, relates that the “true” likeness of the king is posthumous. It reads: “Haec est vera dignae ac venerabilis memorie Domini Ioannis defuncti quond Portugalia nobilissimi et ilustrissimi regis ymago quippe qui dvviver est de juberot victoria potitus et potentissima.” The features of the monarch in the Lisbon portrait are remarkably strong, hinting at the intellectual, astute and perceptive character of a dynasty’s founder. A black silk hat tied with a golden cord hides his grey hair, and yet the realistic sagging jowls, slight wrinkles around his eyes, and the corpulence of a body past its jousting prime, are hallmarks which betray an individual older than fifty years, the age currently advanced by scholars. Beyond that, the style of the work, if indeed it captures the Pemán y Pemartin, Jan van Eyck y España , 83–84 and Pl. 62, suggests the king depicted in the Fountain of Life is Juan II of Castile (1405–1454), based upon his sepulchre by Gil de Siloe in the Cartuja de Miraflores, Burgos (commissioned by Queen Isabel the Catholic in 1486). The king depicted in the Fountain of Life is older than forty-nine. 152

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monarch’s likeness at fifty, cannot be reconciled with portraiture in Portugal circa 1407. King João I would have been about seventy-two in 1429, and he does appear younger in the Lisbon portrait. This discrepancy reasonably can be explained by a desire to flatter a prominent patron and possibly by an intent to represent that patron at a specific moment in time. King João I’s flesh sags below his chin, but still has the overall appearance of a vir leader. An expert portraitist like Van Eyck would represent a sitter naturalistically, but as demonstrated by the “Counts of Flanders” and “Holy Knights” in the Ghent Altarpiece, he also had the skill to subtract years from his sitter’s face to achieve gratifying commemorative portraits. The bust-length portrait of King João I readily may be juxtaposed with the crowned ruler previously identified as the founder of the Avis dynasty in the Ghent Altarpiece (Fig. 10.107). King João I’s likeness also might be compared stylistically with the Chicago panel of Duke Philip the Good, ca. 1432, tentatively attributed to João Eanes. Both reveal a similar heavy treatment of physiognomy, including deep-set eyes and folds of flesh. More unusual, however, are the Eastern influences common to both the Chicago portrait of Duchess Isabel and the Lisbon painting of her father. Behind João I is a cloth of estate, the folds realistically captured as they display an exotic gold foliated pattern. The large pattern repeat of leaf clusters not only indicates an expensive silk textile, but also green was the designated color of the House of Avis. In 1364 João I was the Grand Master of the Order of Avis. The monarch’s scarlet woolen heuque with brown fur collar covers a long-sleeved velvet garment, the collar of which suggests the luxurious imported fabric known as cloth of gold. If Eanes’ portrait is based upon a lost work by Jan van Eyck, the position of the monarch’s body with his hands clasped in prayer advocates the painting initially formed part of a retable, either a diptych or a triptych. In either case, the lost devotional image spatially would have had to conform to the body proportions of the monarch. Jan van Eyck’s icon of the adult Christ in half-length, the Holy Face, is known by copies (Fig. 10.108). However, a replica in Berlin is the only version with a provenance from the Iberian Peninsula.153 Its frame is inscribed Bernard Bousmanne, “Item a Guillaume Wyelant aussi enlumineur.” Willem Vrelant: Un aspect de l’enluminure dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux sous le mécénat des ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Bon et Charles le Téméraire (Brussels-Turnhout: Bibliothèque Royale de BelgiqueBrepols, 1997, 98–101; Elisabeth Dhanens, “Het Aanschijn van Christus door Jan van Eyck en het Concilie van Ferrara-Florence, 1438–1440,” Academiae voor Wetenschappen, Letteren 153

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with VIA VERITAS VITA at the top and on the bottom, Van Eyck’s motto AME (or ALS) IXH XAN followed by “Johes de Eyck me fecit et [com]plevit anno 1438 31 Ianuarij. Primus et Novissimus.” The Salvator Mundi is shown against a dark bluish-green background, and above his head are the Greek letters A and Ω, Alpha denoting the beginning of time and Omega, the end. Within the Omega is the “sword” cross which was associated with espada of St. James and the Order of Santiago (Figs. 10.109–10.110). The gold neckline of the garment worn by Christ has no gemstones but it provides significant words: REX REGVM. Each word which spells out “KING OF KINGS” is separated by a cross pattée, the emblem of Lusitania’s famed Order of Jesus Christ. Moreover, Christ’s halo with its four golden acanthus projections against the deep green ground, echoes hauntingly of the design of the Avis cross, the arms of which terminate in the fleur-de-lys, emblem of the Burgundian founder of the Order, Afonso Henriques I. Even more significant are the golden letters of “I” and “F” which are suspended from the gloria. The dangling pendants have been identified by W.H. James Weale as Latin equivalents to the A and Ω, Initium and Finis. However, they also are the initial letters of the royal names Ioão and Filippa.154 Another Holy Face replica in Bruges (Fig. 10.111) bears the date of 30 January 1440, and Christ’s gold collar lacks an inscription, but instead is set with gemstones. How faithful are the versions of Jan van Eyck’s Holy Face?155 Did the copyists en Schone Kunsten van België. Klasse der Schone Kunsten L, No. 2 (1989): 43–64; S. Duban, “Authorizing Identity in Fifteenth Century Bruges: the Case of Jan van Eyck’s ‘Man in a Red Turban,’” Chicago Art Journal IV, No. 1 (1994): 24–34, at 30–31; Maurits Smeyers, “An Eyckian Vera Icon in a Bruges Book of Hours, ca. 1450 (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, Ms. 421),” Serta Devota in memoriam Guillelmi Lourdaux. Pars Posterior: Cultura Mediaevalis, ed. Werner Verbeke et al., 2 vols. (Louvain: University Press, 1992–1995), II (1995): 195–224, at 210. 154 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 180. Also see 179–83. The Holy Face formerly in the J. Swinburne Collection (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) is known only by a black and white photograph taken in 1956. However, it closely resembles the Berlin panel. A Holy Face in the Town Gallery of Bruges measures 33.4 x 26.8 cm. The inscription on the frame read as: IHESVS VIA IHS VERITAS IHESVS VITA above and below, “Specios[vs] forma p[rae] filiis ho[m]i[nv]m AAE IXH XAN Johes de eyck Inventor anno 1440 30 January.” See Dhanens, Hubert and Jan Van Eyck, 389. The Bruges Salvator has a tunic with a golden collar edged in seed pearls and adorned with alternating square and diamond-shaped sapphires, each inset in gold and surrounded by four large pearls. 155 Bousmanne, “Item a Guillaume Wyelant aussi enlumineur.” Willem Vrelant: Un aspect de l’enluminure dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux sous le mécénat des ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Bon et Charles le Téméraire, 98–101; Dhanens, “Het Aanschijn van Christus door Jan

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work from an original single panel or from a drawing of Christ taken from a larger composition? Jan Gossaert in his Christ flanked by the Virgin Mary and St. John the Baptist (Fig. 10.112) provides a “Holy Face” as the center of a deësis. Walter Friedländer compared Gossaert’s panel with the “Golden Shrine” of the Ghent Altarpiece, an opinion endorsed by Lotte Brand Phillip.156 Perhaps Gossaert had an altogether different source than the Ghent Altarpiece.157 Setting aside the possibility that the Prado painting by Gossaert might be a fairly precise imitation of a late “Holy Face” design by Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden’s Braque Triptych, dated circa 1452 (Fig. 10.113) shows a similar bust-length arrangement of sacred figures, although a panoramic landscape substitutes for the distinctive tracery of arches depicted by Gossaert.158

van Eyck en het Concilie van Ferrara-Florence, 1438–1440,” 43–64. Smeyers, “An Eyckian Vera Icon in a Bruges Book of Hours, ca. 1450 (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, Ms. 421),” 210, mentions two versions of the Vera Icon in Great Britain: London (Buckingham Palace); Newcastle-upon-Tyne (J. Swinburne Collection); a Holy Face in Munich (Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Alte Pinakothek), and two works in Spain, one formerly in the Madrid Adanero Collection and the other auctioned on the art market. Consult Lorne Campbell, The Early Flemish Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen (CambridgeNew York: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 41–42. 156 Max J. Friedländer, Jan Gossart and Bernard van Orley, VIII, from Early Netherlandish Painting [Die Altniederländische Malerei, 1924–1937, 14 vols., Berlin: Paul Cassirer, I–XI– Leiden: A.W. Sijthoff, XII–XIV] with comments and notes by Henri Pauwels and S. Herzog, translated by Heinz Norden (New York: Praeger Publishers, Inc., 1972), 93 informs the painting of Christ with the Virgin and St. John the Baptist (122 x 133 cm) is a “free rendering after the figures in the top row of the Ghent Altarpiece” and the work in the Prado is painted on “parchment or vellum stretched over panel.” Also consult Philip, The Ghent Altarpiece and the Art of Jan van Eyck, 8 and note 13. Henri Pauwels, Hendrik Richard Hoetink and S. Herzog, Jan Gossaert genaamd Mabuse (Rotterdam: exhibition catalogue, Museum Boymans van Beuningen, 1965; Henri Pauwels, Jean Gossaert dit Mabuse (Bruges: 1965). Henri Boëz, Jean Gossart de Maubeuge (Maubeuge: Musée de Maubeuge, 1961); Ariane Mensger, Jan Gossaert: ie niederländische Kunst zu Beginn der Neuzeit (Berlin: Reimer, 2002). 157 A fragment of a lost work in Paris (Musée des Arts Décoratifs) suggests Jan attempted to represent intricate traceries in architecture towards the end of his career. The fragment appears to be a section of a magnificently carved niche superstructure. It has been related to a Eyckian Madonna and Child painted about 1500 in the New York Metropolitan Museum, which is based upon Jan’s Virgin of the Fountain. See Monique Blanc, Retables. La colecction du Musée des Arts décoratifs (Paris: Union Centrale des Arts Décoratifs: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1998), 106–8. 158 Larry Silver, “The ‘Gothic’ Gossaert: Native and Traditional Elements in a Mabuse Madonna,” Pantheon XLIV (1987): 58–69.

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From a convent in Burgos, and then in Segovia before passing to the Solly Collection, the Berlin oak panel of the Holy Face measuring 44 x 32 cm (16 ⅛˝ x 12 ⅝˝) might have been in the royal collection of Queen Isabel of Castile. An admirer of Flemish art, she was a patroness of both the Cistercian Convent of the Real Monasterio de Las Huelgas (1187) and the nearby Carthusian Monastery of Miraflores. Located east of Burgos, the fifteenthcentury Cartuja de Miraflores houses the tomb of Isabel’s parents sculpted by Gil de Siloé during the 1480s. Considering the close familial relationships between the royal houses of Spain and Portugal during the Renaissance, the Berlin Holy Face might have been completed in Jan’s workshop, shipped to Lisbon, and passed to Castile as part of a dowry belonging to a Lusitanian princess. In 1455 King Duarte’s daughter Joanna (1439–1475) married the Castilian King Henry IV (1425–1474). In 1447 Infanta Isabel (1428–1496), daughter of Prince João, Duke of Beja, wed Juan II of Castile (1405–1454) and she was the mother of Isabel the Catholic. Barely 1 3/16th of an inch in size separates the Berlin Holy Face from the panel of King João I (41 by 32 cm: 17 5/16˝ x 12⅝˝). The fact that the monarch’s portrait was in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna until 1952, suggests that it probably descended through the Hapsburg collections. Accepting that Jan van Eyck completed the original portrait of the Avis king, a logical patron for such a posthumous likeness would have been Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. And, would she not have also requested a pendant portrait of her mother Queen Philippa? Following the death of Prince João in 1442, the Princess contributed funds for the painting of the commemorative altarpiece in the Lisbon Church of St. Anthony to honor her deceased brother Fernando. That retable contained the kneeling effigies of her deceased parents.159 The January date of the Holy Face icons has been connected to the liturgy of the third or fourth Sunday after the Epiphany.160 Though the majesty of the Incarnate Christ is celebrated in the Berlin panel, his priestly heritage is recalled by the background, as green vestments traditionally are Isabel of Burgundy could have commissioned the devotional triptych of the “Holy Face” from Jan van Eyck upon his return to Bruges, at which time he would have given a report in person about her brother’s captivity in Morocco and Portugal’s efforts to secure his freedom. When the commemorative altarpiece for the Church of St. António was commissioned, Isabel might have dispatched Jan’s original triptych to Lisbon to serve as a modello for her parents’ portraits. Had Jan van Eyck’s work remained in St. António, or been placed in another institution in Lisbon, it likely was destroyed in the 1755 earthquake. 160 Dhanens, Hubert and Jan Van Eyck, 292–94. 159

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worn during the liturgical season following January 6. So then, if Jan van Eyck executed a devotional triptych of the Holy Face, and a replica of the wing portrait of King João I survives, the depiction of the monarch without the accoutrements of royalty is noteworthy. In the presence of the “King of Kings” it would have been inappropriate for the ruler to wear a crown, the most obvious symbol of earthly power. The monarch João I is portrayed in the Lisbon portrait wearing a simple black silk hat. Garbed in fine scarlet wool and set against an “AvisEpiphany” green background, his figure in a triptych of the Holy Face would be turned to the ideal “King.” While no copy exists to provide an idea of Queen Philippa’s pendant portrait, she might have been costumed similarly as the Cumaean Sibyl in the “Calvary” of the Metropolitan Diptych, that is, in a matching scarlet robe with a Moroccan-type headdress which would evoke her historical role in the planning of the Ceuta campaign. Though a reconstruction of a lost triptych truly is speculative (Fig. 10.114), assembling fragments can provide at least a concept of a lost altarpiece created by Jan van Eyck in January of 1438. As in the case of Rogier van der Weyden’s Braque Triptych, the reverse sides of the royal portraits may have carried the heraldic arms of João I and Queen Philippa of Lancaster. Moreover, though Gossart painted John the Baptist to the left of the blessing Christ, John the Evangelist occupies the same place in Rogier’s triptych. The Evangelist was selected by Jan van Eyck for the deësis level of the Fountain of Life because he was the patron saint of King João I, and if a Holy Face triptych once existed, likely the Apostle was portrayed and not the Baptist. Epiphany means “manifestation” in Greek. Following the feast of the Adoration of the Kings, the consecutive Sunday liturgies focus upon miracles of Christ’s ministry which reveal his divinity. The fourth Sunday centers upon Christ’s calming of the tempest (Matthew 8:23–27). In 1415 a dying Queen Philippa had implored King João I to depart for Ceuta so that his ships could catch the favorable Nortada winds. Royal devices and aristocratic arms are known to have been displaying on the masts of the galleons which had been outfitted for the campaign. Twenty-one years later, three years after the death of King João I, a similar expedition set sail for Ceuta under the command of Prince Henrique, Master of the Order of Christ. The goal of this campaign was the capture of Tangier. Marching from Ceuta on September 9, 1436, the Henrique’s army carried a relic of the True Cross sent by Pope Eugenius IV. Besides royal standards, the impedimenta displayed before the troops comprised banners painted with the images of: Christ as a “crusader,”

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João I, the Holy Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira, and the Virgin Mary.161 It is tempting to consider if these ephemeral icons had studies by Jan van Eyck as their source. From the relatively simple frontal views of Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife and the Madonnas of Chancellor Rolin (1435) and Canon van der Paele (1434–1436), Jan van Eyck subsequently produced small works showing intricate architectural views. The Antwerp St. Barbara sits placidly before a tower under construction. The engineering apparatus of a pulley in the painting hall all the convolutions of a fine Swiss watch. The Dresden Triptych with its multiple aisles exhibits such an arcane treatment of space that the work has been compared to chambers of the Sacred Heart. Jan’s Madonna in a Church also reveals a progression towards complexity of setting. While it recalls the Mass of the Dead miniature by “Hand G” of the Turin-Milan Hours, the oblique positioning of Virgin and Child is unique in Jan’s oeuvre. Moreover, the structural components of her shrine with its radiating chapels are far more complicated in design. There had to have been a catalyst for such intriguing tableaux. “Master Jácome Antonio,” identified by the sixteenth-century master Francisco de Holanda as an “eagle” among painters, was a primary court artist of King João I. He additionally appears to have been employed as an architect at Guimarães by Dom Afonso, the Duke of Barcelos. In 1436 “Master Jácome Antonio” completed the Hours of Prince Duarte (Lisbon: Torre do Tombo), a work stylistically linked by Erwin Panofsky to the Golden Scroll School of the Boucicaut Master. Jacques Coene, who achieved a reputation in Paris for his manuscript illumination and is recorded as a primary inzignerius or ingegnere (engineer) at the Cathedral of Milan in 1399, has been tentatively identified as the Boucicaut Master by Paul Durrieu, Milliard Meiss and Albert Châtelet. Jacques Coene returned to Paris circa 1402 and completed some miniatures for a Bible in Latin commissioned by Philip the Bold, but his whereabouts after 1404 are unknown. However, Jacques Coene’s connection with Italy is significant, because “Master Jácome Antonio” arrived to Portugal about 1425 in the Florentine retinue of Dom Gomes Eanes, Abbot of the Benedictine La Badia Monastery, which housed an important scriptorium. 161 Russell, Henry the Navigator, 177, cites Rui de Pina [1440–1521], Chrónica do Senhor Rey D. Duarte in Crónicas de Rui de Pina, ed. Manuel Lopes de Almeida, Tesouros da Literatura e da História (Porto: Lello & Irmão, 1977): 487–575, at 541.

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Despite the lack of court documents pertaining to “Master Jácome Antonio,” the year of his death is recorded as 1439. If this painter-architectilluminator of King João I was Jacques Coene of Bruges, then he would have met Jan van Eyck in 1428–1429, and also been domiciled in Lisbon during the period of the Tangier expedition. As court artist of King Duarte, “Master Jácome Antonio,” was an honored arbiter of taste who must have still commanded an important role in the realm’s palatine projects. With regard to the complex compositions created by Jan van Eyck circa 1437, Jacques Coene’s brand of architecture in manuscript illumination is exemplified by the innovative diaphragm arch and multiple views of the “Nativity” shed in the Boucicaut Hours. But it also encompassed actual construction, certainly the engineering designs for the Milan Cathedral, and probably the French aesthetic of Guimarães Palace, which, despite its “modern” approach to interior light, never achieved the popularity of the estilo Mudéjar which so characterizes the interior of Sintra. Once again in 1436–37, Jan would have had the opportunity to exchange ideas with “Jácome-Antonio,” whose attention had to be riveted to the newest building campaigns in Portugal: the raising of Batalha’s Capelas Imperfeitas, the planning of a new palace at Évora, the renovations of the Lisbon Cathedral, and continued refurbishing of Sintra, the Castle of St. George, and other princely estates overlooking the Tagus Estuary. Lisbon suffered a serious plague in 1438, and while Master “Jácome-Antonio” may have died of some ailment related to old age in 1439, King Duarte, an active patron of the arts, expired suddenly in early September. Jan probably had returned to Bruges by the time Dona Leonor mourned the loss of her husband. Considering the relatively small number of works the master completed between 1438 and his death in 1441, it might be pondered if he was affected by the plague or succumbed to a similar lingering illness as that experienced by his brother Hubrecht. Ecclesia-Eleousa and a Metaphorical “Cloth of Honor”: Magnifying Feminine Virtú An “Eyckian” Portrait of a Woman with a Child in Lisbon has a provenance from Cádiz, and it has a superficial resemblance to a portrait of Bonne d’Artois in Berlin (Fig. 10.115), acknowledged to be a replica after a lost work. Born to Philip of Artois, Count of Eu, Bonne’s mother was Marie, the daughter of Jean, the Duke of Berry. On November 30, 1424, she wed Philip the Good,

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but she died on September 17, 1425.162 Because Jan van Eyck entered the Duke’s service on May 19, 1425 and moved from Bruges to Lille on August 2,163 he would have had only a few months to complete the portrait of Philip’s second wife.164 In what might be considered a marriage portrait, Bonne is portrayed in bust length with folded hands resting gently upon a parapet, which is inscribed DAME BONE DARTOIS DUCHESS DE BORGOVGNE. Not only is the sitter’s identity confirmed by Jacques Debroucq’s sanguine drawing from the sixteenth-century Recueil d’Arras, but also the work is compositionally akin to the “Dimier Drawing” of Isabel of Portugal and Jan van Eyck’s Portrait of Gilles Binchois.165 Bonne wears a fur-trimmed robe and crespine headdress. Her huve actually was composed of several items. The base on the head was reticulated and composed of two cone-shaped cauls of moderate height that were covered on the outside with gold wire netting. The caul often was stuffed with the woman’s own hair, confined above the ears, or in some cases, the hair was drawn to the back of the head, but not usually for married ladies. The fine linen huve would rest on a truffeaux held inside the gilded hair net, the whole of which was secured by long pins. The cloth or huve was folded before it was placed over the truffeaux. Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, 188–89. Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and their Art, xxxi, Document 3, August 2, 1425, Payment of 20l. to “Iohannes de Heecq, varlet de chambre et paintre de mon dict seigneur” as recompense for the expense incurred in transferring from Bruges to Lille (Lille, Archives of the Department of the North, B 1931). 164 See Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419–1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 318–19, who also informs the portrait in the Recueil d’Arras (folio 62) is identified by the words: “Bonne d’Arthoys ducess de Bourgongne, fille du comte d’Eu, 2e femme de Philippe le Bon.” He comprehensively discusses crusading art and literature at the court of Philip the Good, 112– 59. 165 Jacques Debroucq, Recuil d’Arras (Arrras: Bibliothèque Communale, MS. 266, folio 62 (Bonne d’Artois?). Debroucq served as a herald and king of arms of Hainaut for Emperor Charles V (1500: r. 1517–1555) and Philip II (1527: r. 1555–1598), and briefly as the king of arms for the Order of the Golden Fleece between 1559 and 1560. He would have had the opportunity to study art in the Hapsburg Coudenberg Palace in Brussels, as well as the favorite residences of Archduchess Margaret of Austria (1480–1530) and her successor, Mary of Hungary (1505–1558): Malines, Brou, Mariemont and Binche. See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 274. A Portrait of an Unknown Woman in the Museo de Bellas Artes of Cádiz is a late sixteenth-century replica on canvas of the Lisbon Portrait of an Unknown Woman with a Child. See César Pemán y Pemartin, Juan van Eyck y España (Cadiz: Museo Provincial de Bellas Artes de Cadiz, 1969), Plate 45 for the Cádiz work and Plate 41 for the Arras drawing of Bonne d’Artois. 162 163

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The Northern layered cloth headdress evidently remained in fashion between 1425 and 1440 as attested by: the wife of Giovanni Arnolfini in Van Eyck’s famed double portrait of 1434; the bust portrait of Margaret van Eyck, the artist’s wife, which bears the date of 1439 (Bruges, Groeningemuseum); and even a Flemish Betrothal Brooch which was made between 1430 and 1440 (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum). The Duke of Burgundy’s second wife died childless. This significant fact would preclude linking Bonne d’Artois with the unknown woman in a stylistically kindred Lisbon painting (Fig. 10.116). A canopy of honor is suspended over the Lisbon Madonna and the child in her arms who gazes candidly towards the viewer. This infant caresses the chin of the woman, as if to display her beauty. Though the imagery of the work is evocative of the Cologne Madonna of the Sweet-Pea (Fig. 10.117), Jan perhaps was inspired by an Italo-Byzantine icon. An early fourteenthcentury Sienese panel of the eleousa type in the Cambrai Cathedral of Notre Dame de Grâces (Fig. 10.118) was transported from Rome by the canon Fursy de Bruille and it arrived in Flanders in 1440. The fact that Petrus Christus made three replicas of the subject insinuates the rarity of its theme. Following Jan’s disciple, several Northern masters provided their own variations, including Dieric Bouts, Rogier van der Weyden, Hugo van der Goes and Hans Memling. The Madonna and Child conventionally formed a diptych with a realistic donor portrait.166 Aragon once was part of the vast territory ruled by the sixth-century Emperor Justinian I, and accordingly, Byzantine style was embraced by eastern Spain and continued to be manifested in the frescoes and altarpieces of early Romanesque and Renaissance Aragon and Catalonia. A Virgen de la Guardia (Fig. 10.119) in the Convent Church of San Cristóbal in Valencia patently resembles the Cambrai Notre Dame de Grâces. Attributed to the Master of Perea, an artist active in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, the Aragonese panel is thought to have been based upon a prototype brought from Italy to Spain during the reign of Isabel and Ferdinand.167 Jan might have seen the icon imitated by the Master of Perea or a nearly identical Karl-August Wirth, “Eleousa,” Reallexikon zur Deutschen Kunstgechichte IV (1958): cols. 1297–1307; Marcell Restle, “Eleousa,” Lexicon der Marienkunde Regensburg: 1967), I, cols. 1550–54; Craig Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism (London: Reaktion Books, Ltd., 1991), 158–67, especially 159. 167 Fernando Benito Doménech and José Gómez Frechina (eds.), La Clave Flamenca en los Primitivos Valencianos (Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo de Bellas Artes de Valencia, Generalitat Valenciana, 2001), “Introduction,” at 76–77. 166

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subject when he toured the treasures of Alfonso V in the Alcázar of Valencia during his 1427 diplomatic visit. If he returned to Portugal in 1436, as appears to be documented by the landscape and architecture of his St. Barbara and her Tower, could he have brought to the Avis court a current portrait of Isabel, Duchess of Burgundy? Charles the Bold (1433–1477) was the third son of Philip the Good and Isabel of Portugal. He was born at Dijon on November 10, 1433, soon after Prince Duarte ascended the throne of Portugal. His birthday was the eve of the feast of St. Martin of Tours, the soldier-saint who especially was revered by Duarte. At the age of twenty days, Charles Martin of Burgundy, Count of Charolais, was baptized in Dijon’s Sainte-Chapelle. The same date, November 30, 1433, marked his induction to knighthood, far in advance of the customary ten to twelve years of age for receiving all the dignities and rank of the chevalier. Included among eight knights elevated to the Order of the Golden Fleece at the third chapter meeting in Dijon, little Charles Martin was sponsored by his namesake, Charles, Count of Nevers, and the Seigneur of Croÿ. Attending the ceremony which occurred in a bedchamber of honor at the ducal palace of Dijon, Philip the Good and Duchess Isabel took the oath on behalf of their son. As noted by Ruth Putnam: It is said that the baby cavalier was nourished by his own mother. Having lost her first two infants [Anthony and Josse], Isabella was solicitous for the welfare of this third child, who also proved her last. He was, moreover, Philip’s sole legal heir, as Michelle of France (m. 1420: d. July, 1422) and Bonne d’Artois, his first wives, had left no offspring. The care and devotion expended on the boy were repaid. Charles became a sturdy child.… In person, he strangely resembled his mother and her Portuguese ancestors, rather than the English Lancastrians, from whom she was equally descended. His dark hair and his features were very different from the fair type of his paternal ancestors, the vigorous branch of the Valois family. Possibly other characteristics suggesting his Portuguese origin were intensified by close association with his mother, who supervised the education directed by the Seigneur d’Auxy. They often lived at The Hague, where Isabella acted as chief and official advisor to the duke’s stadtholder in the administration.168 Ruth Putnam, Charles the Bold. Last Duke of Burgundy 1433–1477 (New YorkLondon: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, The Nickerbocker Press, 1908), 6–9, quote at 8–9. See also 168

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Jan van Eyck perhaps was called upon to provide a memento of the occasion of Charles’s baptism and knighthood in Dijon. The Lisbon mother and child therefore, plausibly is a replica by João Eanes which shows the little Count of Charolais held in the arms of his mother. The delicate face of the woman corresponds with that of the “Sibylline Isabel” in the Ghent Altarpiece, and frankly it is not difficult to picture the “sturdy” infant (Figs. 10.120–10.121) aging into the mature adult with “Portuguese” features portrayed by Rogier van der Weyden. The Lisbon Portrait of a Woman with a Child includes a small canopy of honor. The same museum houses an exquisite panel of St. Anne and the Virgin Mary (Fig. 10.122) attributed to the early Renaissance master Ramón Destorrents. The altarpiece, which is adorned with six carved and polychromed shields, was painted between 1349 and 1358 for the Chapel of St. Anne founded by Pedro IV of Aragon (1319–1387) at the Castle of La Amudayna in Palma de Mallorca.169 Jan van Eyck might have seen Destorrents’ work when he visited Valencia in 1427, or it might have traveled to Lisbon when Dona Leonor married Prince Duarte in 1428. The Aragonese princess was, after all, the granddaughter of Pedro “the Ceremonious.” In Aragon and Portugal, kingdoms which sustained close commercial contact with Florence due to a flourishing silk and wool trade, devotion to St. Anne was especially strong, as she was revered as the patroness of cloth merchants, wood carvers, and seamstresses. In 1239 a convent dedicated to St. Anne had been established in Valencia by King Jaime in 1239. The city’s cathedral contained a chapel in her honor by 1305. There was a Lisbon Monastery of St. Anne situated high above Rossio Square on a hill which was densely covered with olive trees near the Monastery. The Convent belonged to the Parish of St. Augustine, which also governed St. George’s Castle Chapel of St. Michael.

John Selden [1584–1654], Titles of Honor [London, W. Stansby for J. Helme, 1614] and particularly the 3rd edition with corrections by the author (London: Printed by E. Tyler and R. Holt for Thomas Dring, 1672), 147. See also Rudolf Friedrich Burckhardt, Über vier Kleinodien Karls de Kühnen,” Anzeiger für Schweizerische Altertumskunde XXXIII (1931): 247–59. 169 Beda Kleinschmidt, “Anna selbstdritt in der spanische Kunst,” Spanische Forschungen der Görresgesellschaft. Gesammelte Aufsatze zur Kulturgeschichite Spaniens, Erste Reihe (Munster in Westfalen: 1928), 149–65, at 151; idem., Die Hielige Anna; ihre Verehrung in Geschichte, Kunst und Volkstum (Düsseldorf: L. Schwann, 1926), 86. See also Judith Berg Sobré, Behind the Altar Table. The Development of the Painted Retable in Spain, 1350–1500 (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1989), 206–208.

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In Destorrents’ composition a metaphorical cloth of estate is upheld by three angels. Reminiscent of a Pentecostal liturgical altar cloth, this silk vermillion canopy with gold stripes containing leaf clusters and paired birds, evokes the angelic visitation to Abraham and the barren Sarah and by implication, the miraculous conception of the Virgin Mary to barren parents.170 The fabric additionally recalls the temple veil the Virgin Mary was weaving at the moment of Christ’s Incarnation. The top filoles which flank the central subject contain the standing figures of Archangel Gabriel and the Annunciation Virgin. The bottom filoles show two virgin saints, Catherine of Alexandria and Thekla. The story of the famed Alexandrian princess certainly concerns the infusion of divine wisdom. With regard to the only female disciple of St. Paul, Thekla is described in the Legenda Aurea as having appeared with St. Agnes in a vision to Martin of Tours, a favorite saint of King Duarte. The virgin martyrs compliment Destorrents’ nurturing image of the savant-educator Anne. The young Mary, guided by her mother, fingers a book of Messianic prophecies as she holds a red pomegranate. Destorrents portrayed Anne in a dowager headdress resembling the habit of an Augustinian nun. Christ’s priestly heritage was traced by his matrilineal heritage, and in the structure of the early Christian Church pious widows served as deaconesses who were empowered to baptize catechumens. Late Gothic mentality regarded Anne as a focal point of sacred lineage, but her sister Esmeria also was celebrated as a founder of a cadet familial branch. Esmeria’s daughter was St. Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist and patron saint of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. Batalha Abbey’s Church of Santa Maria housed a royal chapel dedicated to St. Anne and the “Holy Kinship.” Gisants of Portuguese noblewomen include the trope of a book to denote their desire to emulate the vita of Anne (Figs. 10.123–10.124). Polychromed stone statues of the Santa Ana Triplice, an ensemble of the Virgin Mary with her son and Anne, were very popular in Portugal (Fig. 10.125). This Mettertia type of carving which underscores the concept of a sacred Trinity evolved from iconic images that stressed the infusion of wisdom. Dated to the fifteenth-century, a Virgin Mary educating the Young Christ in Lisbon’s Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga (Fig. 10.126) thematically parallels a French devotional carving showing the young Jesus Jacqueline Lafontaine-Dosogne, Iconographie de l’enfance de la Vierge dans l’Empire byzantin et en Occident, 2 vols. (Brussels: Académie Royale de Belgique, 1964–65 and rpt. 1992). 170

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in the physical act of writing (Fig. 10.127). The Portuguese Madonna may have lost her metal crown, but she significantly displays in her right hand a golden pomegranate. The fruit of Eden’s Tree of Knowledge enhances the symbolism of the painted statue as Christ becomes a chronicler documenting his own “history” of the Redemption.171 Displayed in the same museum, an English polychromed alabaster statue of St. Anne and the Virgin Mary (Fig. 10.128) may have been an acquisition of Philippa of Lancaster. By contrast to João I, who supervised his sons in the knightly arts of war – hunting and equestrian skills — Philippa instructed the princes in the chivalric arts of peace — religion, philosophy, literature, poetry and music. A testament to the queen’s interest in her son’s humanist education are the books they either authored or translated and the libraries they amassed. Philippa equally was an outstanding role-model for her daughter Isabel, who was raised in as intellectual an ambiance as her brothers. The Lusitanian matriarch truly imitated St. Anne, a woman who taught the Virgin Mary her “letters.” The prevailing belief of the Moyen Age was that Christ’s mother understood the most esoteric mysteries of the Hebrew bible. Kabbalistic knowledge had been disseminated in Lisbon by Franciscan disciples of the Catalan mystic Ramón Llull (1232–1316). Prior to his death in North Africa he authored the Ars Magna which was based in part on Augustinian thought and developed the concept of contemplating divine perfection by the purification of memory. Llull also wrote an influential cosmological treatise, The Book of the Order of Chivalry, which expounded upon the Aristotelian “Ethic of the Mean”: Knights must be virtuous by “right measure.” Llull’s textbook reveals why the Chapel of the Lisbon Castle of St. George was dedicated to St. Michael, the traditional bearer of scales. It also explains the chivalric context of the Archangel in the Dresden Altarpiece. The Kabbalistic writings of Llull were studied in Portugal by Franciscan scholars, who also admired the Vita Christi by the Carthusian Ludolph of Saxony (ca. 1300–1378). The guidebook to contemplative prayer recommended employing the senses when meditating upon events of Christ’s life, particularly the Passion. Ludolph’s manual was circulated in Portugal during the reign The unusual depiction of the infant Christ taking up the pen may originate with Medieval sculpture. See William D. Wixom, “An Enthroned Madonna with the Writing Christ Child,” Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art LVII (December, 1970): 287–99; C.P. Parkhurst, Jr., “The Madonna of the Writing Christ Child, Art Bulletin XXIII (1941): 292–306; Philippe Verdier, “La Vierge à l’Encrier et l”Enfant qui écrit,” Gesta XX (1981: Essays in Honor of Harry Bober): 247–56. 171

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of João I.172 After the devastating loss of her two sons Antoine and Josse, the Duchess of Burgundy would have found solace in contemplating the Mater Dolorosa. But she would have remembered the childhood preparation of the Avis princes for future positions of responsibility when she held the infant Charles Martin at his knightly investiture in Dijon. The royal obligation to imitate the wisdom of the nuclear Holy Family is suggested in several of Jan van Eyck’s paintings.173 However, his Dresden Triptych unequivocally makes the point. The unfurled scroll held by the tiny child in the lap of his mother clearly advises the devout contemplator to “learn of me.” In 1434 a child was born in Bruges to Jan Van Eyck and his wife Margaret (Fig. 10.129). Although the sex of the infant is unknown, Sir Peter de Beaufremont, Lord of Charny, served as the proxy godfather for Philip the Good at the infant’s baptism. On June 30, 1434 the Duke had authorized payment to Jan Peutin, a goldsmith in Bruges, for a lavish gift, six silver cups weighing twelve marks.174 Jan’s Lucca Madonna (Fig. 10.130) has been dated to 1435, because of the resemblance of the Virgin Mary to Jan’s dated Portrait of Margaret van Eyck (Fig. 10.131–10.132). Depicted en buste, the artist’s wife wears a fine linen huve Her red wool robe has a wide green belt and it is edged in grey fur. The panel’s frame bears the master’s motto and the inscription: “My husband Johannes completed me in the year 1439, June 17. My age is thirty-three years.” (Coniux ms Johannes c.plevit Ao 1439 17 Junij, above; Etas mea Triginta trium annorum. Als Ixh Xan, below).175 In The treatise was first printed in Lisbon in 1495 by Valentim Fernandes. The publication was an initiative of Dona Leonor (1458–1525), dowager queen of Duarte’s grandson, João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), and the founder of several charitable institutions, including Lisbon’s Madre de Deus Franciscan Convent of the Poor Clares. 173 Cynthia Hahn, “Joseph Will Perfect, Mary Enlighten, and Christ Save Thee: The Holy Family as Marriage Model in the Mérode Triptych,” Art Bulletin LXVIII (1986): 54–66. 174 Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 17, states See document 22, xxxvi, payment to Jean Peutin of “96 l. 12s. of 40 groats Flemish to the pound, for six silver cups weighing 12 marks. (Lille: Archives of the Department of the North, B 1951). 175 Dieter Jansen, “Jan van Eycks Selbstbildnis – der ‘Mann mit dem roten Turban’ und der sogenannte ‘Tymotheos’ der Londoner National Gallery,” Pantheon XLVII (1989): 36–48, at 36, 38, 47 note 8; Lorne Campbell, Renaissance Portraits. European Portrait Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1990), 58, 61; Dirk de Vos, “Het Portret van Margareta van Eyck twee dagen te laat gedateerd,” Jaarboek 1983– 1984, Brugge Stedelijke Musea (Bruges: 1985): 266–68; Angelica Dülberg, Privatporträts: Geschichte und Ikonologie einer Gattung im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Mann, 1990), 219; Edwin James Mundy, “Porphyry and the ‘Posthumous’ Fifteenth Century Portrait,” Pantheon XLVI (1988): 37–43, at 37–38, 40; Jochen Sander, “Individualität im Rollenbild. 172

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all likelihood the Lucca Madonna was painted by Jan van Eyck for his own household because his wife is so recognizable as the model for the Virgin Mary.176 The rectangular room is so narrow, that anyone contemplating the work would have the sensation of being a member of the holy household. Robed in soft scarlet wool, the Virgin wears a ruby and pearl diadem. She sits on an elevated wooden throne, carved with lions, solar beasts that designate her majestic status. A lampas green silk canopy projects over the mother and child. It is decorated with golden pomegranates and vases of triple-stemmed red and white flowers which are similar to those of the Dresden Triptych. A richly patterned oriental carpet covers the tile floor, and appears to project beyond the foreground space. Only one arch of a triple arched window with oculus is visible on the left and it balances the niche wherein sacred vessels are displayed (Fig. 10.133): a crystal carafe, which has been scrutinized as an emblem of Mary’s chastity; and a laver of water and candlestick, objects associated with baptism and ritualistic purification. The ripening fruit on the window ledge and the apple held by the Die Entwicklung des Portraits,” Die Entdeckung der Kunst: Niederländische Kunst des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts in Frankfurt, ed. Jochen Sander (Mainz: exhibition catalogue, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main-P. von Zabern, 1995), 41–42; J.R.J. [Johan Rudolph Justus] van Asperen de Boer, “Infrared Reflectograms of Two Paintings by Jan van Eyck in Bruges,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque X, 5–7 Septembre, 1993, ed. Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Erasme,1995): 81–84, at 81–82; Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute, Cadres et supports dans la peinture flamande aux 15e et 16e siècles, 177–78. 176 Elisabeth Dhanens, Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 234. Concerning the Lucca Madonna (65.5 x 49.5 cm) which has lost its original frame see Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 98–126 and Brian Madigan, “Van Eyck’s Illuminated Carafe,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XLIX (1986): 227–30; James Elkins, “On the Arnolfini Portrait and the Lucca Madonna: Did Jan van Eyck Have a Perspectival System,” Art Bulletin LXXIII (1991): 53–62, especially 58–62; Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism, 78–85; Peter Klein, “Dendrochronologische Untersuchungen an Bildtafeln des 15.Jahrdunderts,” Les dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture, Colloque VI, 12–14 Septembre 1985, ed. Hélène VerougstraeteMarcq and Roger van Schoute (Louvain-la-Neuve: Collège Erasme, 1987): 29–40, at 31–32; Barbara G. Lane, The Altar and the Altarpiece. Sacramental Themes in Early Netherlandish Painting (New York: Harper & Row, 1984), 23–25; Jeffrey Ruda, “Flemish Painting and the Early Renaissance in Florence: Questions of Influence,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte XLVII (1984): 210–36, at 216–17, 227; Sander, Niederländische Gemälde im Städel, 1400–1550, 245–63; idem., “Bildgebrauch und Bilddialog,” Die Entdeckung der Kunst: Niederländische Kunst des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts in Frankfurt, ed. Jochen Sander (Mainz-am-Rhein: exhibition catalogue, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main-P. von Zabern, 1995), 36–39.

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infant Christ have been related to a passage from the Song of Songs (5:1): “Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat the fruit of his apple trees.”177 Jan’s small symmetrical interior, which imparts such a sense of compression, calls to mind the traditional castle oratory adjoining a “bedchamber of honor.” In the decoration of fifteenth-century domestic chapels, panel paintings were deemed inferior in status to costly reliquaries, which often were privately commissioned objects of gleaming gold or silver inlaid with gems.178 One such Southern German reliquary of the Anna Selbdritt theme (St. Anne with the Virgin Mary and Infant Christ) typifies the exquisite shrines which were made for the oratories of secular female patrons (Fig. 10.134). Fashioned of silver and partially gilded and polychromed, the ensemble by Hans Grieff was acquired by Anna Hofmann, the wife of a tax collector in Ingolstadt. The inscription on the reverse provides information concerning the cost of the reliquary’s gold and silver, precisely nine marks, as well as the 100 Rhine guilders paid to the artisan.179 Though this reliquary is dated 1472, it illustrates a Northern Renaissance goldsmith practice of including small lions as decorative motifs. Serving in this case as supports for the shrine, the beasts are very similar to their counterparts in the Lucca Madonna. Renaissance images of the Immaculate Virgin often accented the spiritual virtues of motherhood. If the Frankfurt painting was destined for the oratory of Jan’s stone house in Bruges on Sint Gillis Nieu Straet, the intended audience for the work would have been the women of his household. The infant born to Margaret in 1434 was followed by a second child, as documents of September 29, 1435 record another set of six silver cups presented by the identical goldsmith of the court, Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 104–5, who also draws the relevant connection with the Madonna as the “Second Eve” and Christ as the “New Adam.” For her complete analysis of the Lucca Madonna which she dates to 1436–37, see 98–126. 178 Lorne Campbell, “The Art Market in the Southern Netherlands in the Fifteenth Century,” Burlington Magazine CXVIII (1976): 188–98, at 189. 179 Henk van Os with contributions by Karen R. van Koij and Casper Staal, The Way to Heaven. Relic Veneration in the Middle Ages (Baarn: De Prom, exhibition catalogue Nieuwe Kerk, Amsterdam-Museum Catherijneconvent, Utrecht, 2000), 126–27. See also Dietmar Lüdke, Die Statetten der gotischen Goldschmiede; Studien zu der “autonomen” und vollrunden Bildwerken der Goldschmiedeplatik un den Statuettenreliquiaren in Europa zwischen 1250 und 1530 (Munich: Ph.D. Dissertation, University of München, 1983), No. 81, published as Die Statuetten der gotischen Goldschmiede: Studien zu den “autonomen” und vollrunden Bildwerken der Goldschmiedeplastik und den Statuettenreliquiaren in Europa zwischen 1230 und 1530, 2 vols. (Munich: Tuduv-Verlagsgesellschaft, 1983). The inscription of the reliquary reads: UND VIGET AL IX MARCK FIR GOLD SILBER, UND LON GESTET C. GULDEN REINIS. 177

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Jean Peutin.180 Though the sex of both children remains unknown, Jan did have a daughter named Livina. In 1450 a generous stipend of 24l. was given by Duke Philip to Lyevine van der Eecke when she entered the convent of St. Agnes at Maaseyck (Mazeck) near Liège. Had she been born in September of 1435, Lavinia, who was named for Aeneas’s wife, would have been about fifteen. The infant in the Lucca Madonna is not a newborn, but about a year old. Probably the model for the suckling child was a son born to Margaret. The fact that the Duke’s baptismal gift of 1434 was more expensive than the one of 1435, silver cups weighing 12 marks by contrast with a similar set of 9 marks and five ounces, indicates the higher distinction accorded a male offspring in Flanders. Even so, it seems that it was Lavinia’s birth which may have motivated Margaret to request the painting of a devotional panel for her home. Van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna (65.5 x 49.5 cm), one of his four largest works, has unusual imagery. In this regard, the work readily can be compared with another silver-gilt fifteenth-century statuette which once was housed in the church of Notre-Dame-en-Vaux in Châlons-sur-Marne 181 (Fig. 10.135). The reliquary of The Virgin and Child (H 33.4, W 18.9, D 17.2 cm) was created to hold a rare sacred object, part of the umbilical cord of the infant Christ. Inserted into the stomach of the Christ Child. a round crystal-plated box with the words DE UMBELICO DOMINI JESU CHRISTI dates to the eighteenth century. What is relevant about the silver reliquary is that even in its altered state, the position of the infant was unusual for Northern Renaissance art. He stands on the Virgin Mary’s knee and is turned frontally to best exhibit his stomach. Jan van Eyck similarly elected to position the nursing Christ in a non-traditional manner. The child sits on a white cloth with his back towards the viewer. Though a vial of Mary’s milk was among the relics recorded in St. Louis IX’s Sainte Chapelle in Paris, presumably containers of the sacra lactans were as numerous as splinters of the True Cross in Medieval Europe.182 If the Lucca Madonna might be viewed as a Weale and Brockwell, The Van Eycks and Their Art, 19, state cost of the cups was 67l. 15s. See document 26, xxxvii, which records payment to Jean Peutin for the cups that weighed 9 marks 5 ounces at 20s.g. the mark (Lille, Archives of the Department of the North, B 1957). 181 Henk van Os et al, The Way to Heaven. Relic Veneration in the Middle Ages, 39–42 and Fig. 33. 182 Daniel H. Weiss, Art and Crusade in the Age of Saint Louis (Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 14–15 and 220–221 notes 10–15. The relics included 180

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polychromed reliquary, that is, a sacred Solomonic shrine unto itself, the relic is not so much the milk of the Mater Admirablis, but the Corpus Christi. And, by extension, if the back of the infant is portrayed, the Renaissance mind would have drawn the obvious mnemonic association with the adult “flagellated” Christ, who freely chose mortification by Roman soldiers, bruising and bloody lashing of his body, and ultimately a gruesome nailing to a cross.183 In short, the infant’s nursing in the Frankfurt panel seems to presage his death, as according to the words of the Rheinish theologian Rupertus von Deutz (ca. 1075–1130): “My food is to do the will of the Father.”184 Eucharistic devotion was a prevalent feature of life in convents of the later Middle Ages, and this iconographical aspect of Jan’s Lucca Madonna underscores the appropriateness of his subject for the women of his immediate family. His wife was named for a saint whose identity in the Middle Ages frequently was conflated with that of St. Martha, the patroness of households and “active” counterpart to the “contemplative” Mary Magdalene, the first to see the resurrected Christ.185 The color scheme of the Lucca Madonna, replicating Christ’s swaddling cloths and the Virgin Mary’s milk and veil. Also see Daniel H. Weiss and Lisa Mahoney (eds.), France and the Holy land: Frankish Culture at the End of the Crusades (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). 183 Regarding the cloth upon which the Infant Christ rests, the fabric might allude to the shroud of the Holy Sepulchre. It also suggests the altar cloth upon which rests the monstrance that displays the “Eucharistic” body of Christ. See Barbara G. Lane, “’Ecce Panis Angelorum’: The Manger as Altar in Hugo’s Berlin Nativity,” Art Bulletin LVII (1975): 476–86. 184 The quote is provided by Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 109 and note 28. Rupertus of Deutz in the same passage describes Christ as “Lord of Israel” and “Prince…who is the form of God.” See his De Trinitate et Operibus Eius in Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, in qua prodeunt Patres, doctores scriptoresque Ecclesiae Latinae, a Tertulliano ad Innocentium III, 221 vols. Paris: 1844–64), CLXVII: 197– 1828, at col. 1494. As credited by Purtle, 110 note 29, Elisabeth Dhanens, Van Eyck. The Ghent Altarpiece (Art in Context) (London: Allen Lane, 1973), 88–102, has closely related Eyckian images with the writings of Rupertus de Deutz, who hailed from the Rhine-Meuse region. Purtle interpretes Van Eyck’s Madonna in Frankfurt as the Shulammalite bride of the Song of Songs, and concludes, 125, by stating: “We note that the room is at once the thalamos of a temple, the bridegroom’s chamber, where all the necessary purifications have taken place, and the enclosed garden where the bridegroom of the Canticle eats the fruit of his own tree offered by his bride.” She cites Rupertus of Deutz’s Commentaria in Cantica; see J.P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Latina, CLXVIII: 839–963. 185 Caroline Walker Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast; The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley: The University of California Press, 1987); idem., “Women Mystics and Eucharistic Devotion in the Thirteenth Century,” Women’s Studies XI (1984):

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that of the secular portrait of Margaret van Eyck, provides a symbolical contrast of three liturgical colors. The green baldachin may evoke the verdant meadows of Eden and the fragrant private garden of the Song of Songs. Even so, it was the color of Advent, the ecclesiastical period of Messianic expectation culminating in Christmas and the Epiphany. White is the color of the nursing cloth depicted by Jan in his panel. The fabric presages Christ’s tunica inconsutilis woven by Mary, whose virginity made her the “seamless tunic” of the Incarnation. Christ’s linen robe became a typological symbol, as its division at Calvary (Gospel of John: 19:23) fulfilled Davidic prophecy (Psalms 22:18). The pristine cloth upon which the infant Christ sits in the Lucca Madonna also anticipates the holy shroud of the Resurrection. Though white is the priestly color of Easter, red especially pertains to Pentecost, the liturgical season which coincides with the Hebrew Feast of Weeks, a gathering of the “first fruits” or wheat harvest. Edged in pearls, the massive robe of Van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna, gives her the same type of sculptural definition as the silvered reliquary of the Louvre. The fabric is tinctured the color of sacrificial blood and serves as a highly symbolical foil for the nude infant on her lap. Pentecost marks the birth of the Early Christian Church, which St. Paul defined as baptized catechumens united in the Eucharistic body and blood of Christ. For all the magnificent biblical, liturgical, and Pauline literary allusions, Jan’s panel still centers basically on the emotive image of a tender mother lovingly bonding with a well-fed child. The Jan’s Lucca Madonna was completed only a few years after the birth of Charles Martin to Isabel of Burgundy. Might not the unprecedented nurturing and maternal interest expressed by Duchess Isabel of Burgundy in the education of her son have motivated the artist to take this direction in “humanizing” the most ideal woman of biblical history? As pointed out by Rendert Falkenburg, vernacular manuals composed for popular devotion in Flanders drew a parallel between a household and its appointments and the dwelling place of the soul.186 Citing a fifteenth-century

179–214; Kathleen Corley, Private Women. Public Meals. Social Conflict in the Synoptic Tradition (Peabody, MASS: Hendrickson Publishers, 1960); Susan Haskins, Mary Magdalene. Myth and Metaphor (New York: Riverhead Books, The Berkeley Publishing Group, 1993). 186 Reindert Falkenburg, “The Household of the Soul: Conformity in the Merode Triptych,” Early Netherlandish Painting at the Crossroads. A Critical Look at Current Methodologies, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Symposia, ed. Maryan W. Ainsworth (New Haven-New York: Yale University Press-The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2001), 2–17.

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text by Hendrik Mande, Hier Beghint een Devoet Boecskijn van der Bereydinghe ende Vercieringhe onser Inwendiger Woeninghen (Here begins a Devout Book on the Preparation and Decoration of the Dwelling of Our Heart), Falkenburg proceeds to mention the diverse formal arrangements which were to be made ready for the spiritual habitation of the Heavenly Bridegroom, inter alia, a broom and wastebasket for “cleansing the soul,” a bundle of myrrh, to elicit contemplative thoughts of the Passion, and tapestries of the “Life of Christ.” The reference to tapestries as Christ’s “coats-of-arms” helps explain the traditional display of woven panels in church choirs and along processional routes leading to the portals of churches. According to Falkenburg, Mande’s guide to prayer provides precise instructions for preparing the house of the soul with aromatic herbs and a “bed of inner peace.” From a mattress denoting submission, the contents of the bed are precisely described, two pillows, white linens and a blanket, respective emblems of hope, faith and charity. Within this spiritual cubiculum, a candle resting upon a table signified burning desire. A more common metaphorical trope employed by theologians to define the soul’s meeting place with the mystical Bridegroom sprang from the Solomonic Song of Songs. The “garden,” a fragrant hortus conclusis of fruits and flowers, insinuated the cultivation of the virtues and the weeding out of vices. The transcription of Mande’s text is significant because it substantiates how devout donors in the fifteenth century would meditate upon pictorial images of the Madonna and Child seated within a realistic Flemish household. The canopy of the Lucca Madonna draws a pertinent symbolic parallel: between the Hebrew Ark of the Covenant, God’s “dwelling place” during the Exodus, which was protected by a nomadic tent; and the more permanent home of the infant Christ, whose body and blood were identified by St. Paul as the Eucharistic bread and wine of a new and everlasting Covenant. The north portal of the west façade of Notre Dame in Paris (Fig. 10.136), ca. 1210–20, shows the Tabernacle and Ark of the Covenant beneath reliefs of the Dormition of Mary and her Coronation at the apex of the tympanum. Reading the portal from the bottom upward, the trumeau statue of the Virgin and Child is surmounted by a baldachin. This canopy supporting the Ark may be just a small bit of architecture, but it functions to symbolically unite the “tent” of Exodus with the Holy House of Nazareth, the spiritual model for families entering the portal of the Cathedral. The Ince Hall Madonna (Fig. 10.137) occasionally assigned to the workshop of Jan van Eyck, bears a painted inscription to the left of the

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canopy, IOH[ANN]EM DE EYC BRUGIS and the date MCXXX. To the right of the canopy is the artist’s motto ALS ICH XEN.187 The green velvet baldachin is embroidered in gold, a vibrant undulating pattern of leaves that resemble the pomegranate bush. Indeed, on the windowsill are ripening pomegranates, and below them on the bench is a glass carafe. On the opposite sideboard is a candleholder with candles and a metal jug. Light enters through the windows to illuminate the Marian still life, especially the circular brass basin beneath the sideboard, but the most strongly lighted area of the composition is centered around the tranquil child.188 The baldachin, the equivalent of the Hebrew “tent,” is a lavish item for a poor household. Despite this appointment and expensive interior appointments, the Virgin Mary is portrayed in a posture of humility.189 She instructs the small child, who fingers the pages of the book with an interest which certainly belies his age. Depicted in the private chamber of her home, Mary with the small body of Christ is iconographically kindred to the image of an enlightened Ecclesia holding a monstrance. The same Eucharistic meaning of Christ’s corporeality may be discerned in the adult Jesus of Jan van Eyck’s New York Last Judgment. Clad in a red mantle, he exhibits the wounds of his Passion as a glorified “Man of Sorrows.” The Ince Hall Madonna presents an

187 The Ince Hall Madonna is based upon a lost prototype by Jan van Eyck. See Till-Holger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting. 1430–1530, translated by Ted Alkins, Caroline Beamish, Alayne Pullen, Julie Martin (London-New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002), Catalogue Entry 31, 237. First published as Jan van Eyck, de Vlaamse Primitieven en bet Zuiden, 1430–1530 (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges-Stedelijke Musea, Bruges, 2002). See Ursula Hoff and Martin Davies, The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (Brussels: Centre National de Recherches Primitifs Flamands, 1971, 29–50; Ursula Hoff, European Paintings before 1800 (Melbourne: National Gallery of Victoria, 1967, 2nd ed.), 103–6. 188 Ingvar Berström. “Disguised Symbolism in ‘Madonna’ Pictures and Still Life,” Burlington Magazine XCVII (1955): 303–8; 342–49. 189 Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism, 588–602, and 600 note 40; Elisabeth Dhanens, “Het raadselachtig schilderij van Ince Hall,” Academiae Analecta. Mededelingen van Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België. Klasse der Schone Kunsten XLVI, No. 1 (1985): 25–59; Jochen Sander, Niederländische Gemälde im Städel, 1400–1550, ed. Stephan Knobloch, with contributions by Peter Klein (dendrochronological studies) (Mainz-am-Rhein: Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main-P. von Zabern, 1993), 248–49; Millard Meiss, “The Madonna of Humility,” Art Bulletin XVIII (1936): 435–64.

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inviting domestic chamber, and spatially it is close to the Lucca Madonna.190 Identified as part of the original paint structure, the toponymical BRUGIS (“from Bruges”) has been proposed as indicating a work commissioned by a visitor to the town or by a foreign merchant. The painting’s provenance only has been tracked to the English collection of Henry Blundall at Ince Hall.191 Jan van Eyck could have brought the Ince Hall Madonna to Lisbon on his “secret mission” in 1436 with the expressed purpose of presenting the work to the new monarch Duarte. While it may be significant that the Ince Hall Madonna bears the date of 1433, the year Duchess Isabel’s brother became king, Duarte’s heir, Afonso V (1432–1481), was born at Sintra Palace on January 15, 1432. Assuming the Ince Hall Madonna was brought to Lisbon in 1436 as a gift, the work could have been installed in the Royal Chapel at Sintra, which escaped the destruction of the November 1, 1755 earthquake but was vulnerable during the Peninsular War. Numerous treasures were removed from Portugal and Spain by the troops of Wellington and Napoleon as spoils of conflict. The Covarrubias Madonna, ca. 1445–1450 (Fig. 10.138), provides a transparently close variation of the Ince Hall Madonna, and spatially it depends more upon the 1437 Dresden Altarpiece than the Lucca Madonna.192 The provenance of the picture is limited to the Colegiata de San Cosme y Damián at Covarrubias, and thus, the work might have transferred to Spain from Portugal with relative ease considering the close relationship of the royal houses during the Renaissance period and the fact that Philip II

190 Ursula Hoff and Martin Davies, The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 29–50; Ursula Hoff, European Paintings before 1800, 103–6; Harbison, Jan van Eyck. The Play of Realism, 588–602, and 600 note 40; Elisabeth Dhanens, “Het raadselachtig schilderij van Ince Hall,” 25–59; Jochen Sander, Niederländische Gemälde im Städel, 1400–1550, 248–49. 191 The Ince Hall Madonna is thought to have been painted almost concurrently with a lost prototype by Jan van Eyck. Till-Holger Borchert (ed.) et al., The Age of Van Eyck. The Mediterranean World and Early Netherlandish Painting. 1430–1530, Catalogue Entry 31, 237; Jan van Eyck, de Vlaamse Primitieven en bet Zuiden, 1430–1530 (Ghent-Amsterdam: Ludion, exhibition catalogue, Groeningemuseum, Bruges-Stedelijke Musea, Bruges, 2002). Mauro Natale (ed.) et al., El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e Itinerarios de Obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el Siglo XV, (Madrid-Valencia: exhibition catalogue, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza-Museu de Bellas Arts de València, 2001), Catalogue No. 30 (Ince Hall Madonna), 164–71. 192 Natale (ed.) et al., El Renacimiento Mediterráneo. Viajes de Artistas e Itinerarios de Obras entre Italia, Francia y España en el Siglo XV, Catalogue No. 31(Covarrubias Madonna), 272–74 (Elisa Bermejo).

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(1555–1598) ascended the throne of Portugal about 1580. Painted on the wall above the two niches of still life is a Germanic inscription that reads: “wer sich des sicher…”. The Covarrubias Madonna has been dated to about 1445–1450. If viewed as a Portuguese commission, the inscription might be explained by 1452 marriage (Fig. 10.139) of King Duarte’s youngest daughter Leonor (1434–1467) to the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III (1416–1493).193 Many Late Gothic and Renaissance artisans from the Rhineland were patronized by the Avis Crown. Only in July of 1454 was João Eanes (Anes) named court painter by Leonor’s brother, King Afonso V. Because the artist retired in 1471 at the legal retirement age of seventy, he would have been a seasoned master of fifty-three when he attained the appointment soon after his return from Flanders. Unfortunately, the Covarrubias Madonna survives in very poor condition. Despite the fact that the canopy displays the color of Avis green, it is oddly devoid of decoration. This discrepancy is all the more striking in view of the fact that the pomegranate-acanthus design of the Ince Hall Madonna canopy would have had relevance for a Avis-Hapsburg marriage. The pomegranate was a favored emblematic motif of the Northern ruler Frederick III and his son Maxmilian I (1459: r. 1493–1519). The extensive modifications to the Covarrubias Madonna preclude further comment. However, if the painting entered the Hapsburg collections as part of Leonor’s dowry, it easily could have passed to Burgos by the rule of her grandson, Charles V (1517–1555). Jan van Eyck’s Lucca Madonna and the Ince Hall Madonna, as well as the slightly later Dresden Madonna (1437) and Berlin Madonna in a Church Princess Leonor (born Torres Vedras, 18 September, 1434) was married in Lisbon on August 9, 1451 to Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III (b. 21 September, 1416), who was annointed King of the Romans at Aix-la-Chapelle on June 17, 1442. The Emperor’s proxy for the 1451 Lisbon marriage was Jacob Motz, a theologian and his chaplain. The documents of marriage are in the Archivo da Torre do Tombo, Lisbon, gaveta 17, maço 3, no. 12. A transcript is in vol. I of the Provas da História Genealogica da Casa Real Portugueza, 585. See António Caetano de Sousa, Historia genealogica da casa real portugueza, desde a sua origem ate o presente, com as familias illustres que procedem dos reys, e dos serenissimos duques de Brangaça, 12 vols. (Lisbon: 1735–1748; rpt. Coimbra, 1946–1954 and 2nd ed. 1968). A formal union was celebrated on March 16, 1452 in Rome. Concurrently Frederick was crowned Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Nicholas V. Hans Burkemair shows Emperor Frederick III with the collar-insignia of the Aragonese Order of La Banda (Jarra). The repeated motif of a jar of lilies appearing in the gold collar worn by the Holy Roman Emperor is complimented by the stalk of lilies borne by Leonor, who not only adopted the name of “Helen” after her marriage, but also preferred to wear her hair in the flowing Germanic manner. 193

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(1437–38), are joined thematically by their focus upon tender moments of intimacy shared by a mother and child whether those happy interludes occur in a private chamber of a home or in the more august ambiance of a parish church. To the group must be added a work in which splashing water is not just a sacred symbol but a playful source for amusement and toddler’s delight.194 Jan’s Madonna at a Fountain in Antwerp (Fig. 10.140) bears an inscription on its original frame: AAC (IXH) XAN over the words JOHES DE EYCK ME FECIT + OPLEVIT ANO 1439.195 The painting and a close replica from a private collection on loan to The Hague have been recently restored (Fig. 10.141). Formerly placed within the general orbit of Petrus Christus, the replica now is believed to have been created in Jan van Eyck’s workshop. Livia Depuydt-Elbaum presents a technical analysis of both versions of the Madonna at the Fountain which contributes to an understanding of the working methods of the master and copyist. In the same publication, Paul Vandenbroeck provides a pertinent iconographical analysis of the pictorial theme. He comments about the ambiguous nature of the low wall of the garden, noting that it is an aberration from the uninterrupted enclosure which traditionally signifies the hortus conclusis of Mary. About the rosa mystica he amplifies: She appeared in Western art as the “lady of the roses” from about 1325, and as the “lady in the rose hedge” from about 1400. “Rose garden” and “rose hedge” are not Biblical images, but come from 194 Paul Vandenbroeck and Livia Depuydt-Elbaum, Jan van Eyck. Madonna at the Fountain. Restoration (Antwerp: Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten: Vol. 2, No. l, 2002); Ottmar Kerber, “Jan van Eycks Madonna am Brunen,” Das Münster VI (1953): 137– 45; idem., “Fragen um Jan van Eyck,” Nachrichten der Giessener Hochschulgesellschaft XXXV (1966): 117–29; idem., “Jan van Eycks Madonna am Brunnen,” Pantheon XXVIII (1970): 21–31; Purtle, The Marian Paintings of Jan van Eyck, 157–67; Eugene Schiltz, De Madonna met Kind aan de levensbron van Jan van Eyck (Antwerp: 1972); Larry Silver, “Fountain and Source: A Rediscovered Eyckian Icon,” Pantheon XLI, No. 2 (April–May–June, 1983): 95–104; Paul Vandenbroeck, Catalogue of 14th and 15th-century Painting, Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp (Antwerp: Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, 1985), 174–78; R. van Eslande, “Jan van Eycks ‘Madonna bij de Fontein,’ uit Dikkelvenne,” Het Land van Aalst XLVIII, No. 2 (1996): 136–44; Leo Wuyts, De Madonna bij de fonteina,” Oude Meester in het Koninklijk Museum (Antwerp: 1980), No. 6; De Madonna in de kunst (Antwerp: Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, exhibition catalogue, 1954), 11–12. 195 Hélène Verougstraete-Marcq and Roger van Schoute, Cadres et supports dans la peinture flamande aux 15e et 16e siècles (Heure-de-Romain/Oupeye: H. Verougstraete-Marcq, 1989), 127–28.

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portrayals of profane love. The beloved lady is herself the rose who, in love (almost always described from the male point of view), will be picked, as in the renowned 14th-century Roman de la Rose by Guillaume de Lorris and Jehan de Meuny. In religious pictures this originally extreme image was purified into a suggestion of the highest, most self-less love.196 Vanderbroeck describes the setting ot the Madonna at the Fountain as a hoofkyn van devotien (garden of devotion) displaying a diversity of flowers, irises, lilies-of-the-valley, daisies, violets and forget-me-nots (Fig. 10.142). Besides their Edenic associations, the blossoms are a typological reference to Noah’s sacrifice, the “fragrance” of which was pleasing to God, and they additionally allude to the virtues to be cultivated during life by the penitential soul who seeks to enter the garden of paradise. As observed by Vandenbroeck, Rupertus van Deuz’s reference to Mary as a “garden” and “spring” made her 196 Paul Vandenbroeck, “Madonna at the Fountain: an icon of tenderness,” in Vandenbroeck and Depuydt-Elbaum, Jan van Eyck. Madonna at the Fountain. Restoration, 4–7, at 5. The image of the Virgin Mary may relate to popular devotion of Our Lady of the Fountain (or the Dunes). See Jacques Toussaert, Le Sentiment religieux en Flandre à la fin du Moyen Age with a preface by Michel Mollat (Paris: Plon, 1963), 272. Also consult: Ernest Langlois, Origines et sources du Roman de la Rose (Paris: E. Thorin, 1890); idem, Le Roman de la Rose par Guillaume de Lorris et Jean de Meun, 5 vols. (Paris: Firmin-Didot et cie, 1914–24); idem., Les manuscrits du Roman de la Rose: Description et classement [Paris: 1910] (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1974); Jean Dufournet, Études sur le Roman de la Rose de Guillaume de Lorris (Geneva-Paris: Slatkine-H. Champion, 1984); John V. Fleming, The Roman de la Rose. A Study in Allegory and Iconography (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969); idem., Reason and the Lover (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984); Kevin Brownlee and Sylvia Huot (eds.), Rethinking The Romance of the Rose: Text, Image, Reception (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992); Jillian M.L. Hill, The Medieval Debate on Jean de Meung’s Roman de la Rose: Morality versus Art (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 1991); Eric Hicks, Le Débat sur le Roman de la Rose [Christine de Pisan, et al.] Édition critique, introduction, traduction, notes (Paris: H. Champion, 1977). Joseph L. Baird and John R. Kane (eds.), La Querelle de la Rose: Letters and Documents (Chapel Hill: U.N.C. Department of Romance Languages-University of North Carolina Press, 1978). Of course, the rose is one of the most beautiful decorative images of the Late Gothic period. See Karl Otavsky, “La Rose d’or du musée de Cluny,” La Revue du Louvre et des Musées de France XXXVI (1986): 379–85; Jules Labarte, “Le Rössel d’or d’Altötting,” Annales Archéologiques XXVI (1869): 204–12; Lorenz Seelig and E. Roidl, and Friedrich Schott, Beschreibung und Technologie des Goldenen Rössels,” in Das Goldene Rössl (Munich: exhibition catalogue, 1995): 273–305; M. Campbell and C. Blair, “Das Goldene Rössl van Altötting,” Weltkunst LII (1982): 2902–2907.

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comparable to Christ, the “fruit of eternal life” the “well of living waters.” Medieval and Renaissance artists occasionally depicted the Resurrected Christ as a gardener. Such renditions ostensibly concern the theme of the Noli me tangere (John 20:17), in which Mary Magdalene mourning at the Holy Sepulchre is warned by Christ not to touch his “body.” The physical distance may appear to be odd behavior for a man described in the Gospels as embracing sinners, and the only explanation provided by Christ is that he had not yet ascended to his Father. Jan van Eyck’s infant Christ in the Madonna at the Fountain is nearly nude, save for the draping white cloth around his lower extremities.197 Clinging fragile arms underscore the strong bonds between the son and his spiritually perfect mother, but the deliberate turning of his back serves to physically distance the child. By showing the back of the infant, Jan van Eyck invites contemplation of the “sacred body” which will be marked bloody during the flagellation of the Passion. There is a pervasive aspect of the Noli me tangere in this small panel. The corporeality of an exquisite little boy accents the “sense” experience of devotional prayer, but in the same measure, the contemplating sinner is issued a directive. The Madonna’s child can only be “touched” in a similar affectionate manner if virtues are cultivated and watered with “grace.” Jan’s ambiguity of space in the Antwerp garden must be interpreted as the omega to the alpha landscape of the Ghent Altarpiece. Before the fragrant altar of the Adoration of the Lamb, the Father’s paradise is portrayed as a verdant flowering terrain, open to all souls, a church without walls in an eternally perfect Eden. Jan van Eyck was a diplomat, as well as an artist, and in his capacity as an ambassador to Philip the Good of Burgundy, when he traveled on the Duke’s behalf to the courts of the Iberian Peninsula on the two earlier missions of 1427 and 1428–1429, he would have taken with him a few paintings or drawings to present as gifts to the royal courts he visited. Due to overland travel by horseback, the items would have been small in size. With regard to For interpretations about the nudity and nourishment of the infant Christ, see Leo Steinberg, The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion (New York: Pantheon Books, 1983) and expanded 2nd edition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996); Caroline Walker Bynum, “The Body of Christ in the Later Middle Ages: A Reply to Leo Steinberg,” Renaissance Quarterly XXIX (1986): 399–439; idem., “Women Mystics and Eucharistic Devotion in the Thirteenth Century,” Women’s Studies XI (1984):179–214; idem., Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley-Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987). 197

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the Sultan of Granada, and cognizant of the silk industry in Andalusia, the Burgundian diplomats probably offered a variety of fine wools. Regarding a proposed second “secret mission” to Lisbon in 1436, it seems evident that Jan had a workshop in Bruges which was able to function during lengthy periods of his absence. Before he departed on his travels he likely left portfolios of drawings with his brother Lambert, and he certainly would have retained detailed sketches of commissioned works. Documented in Bruges in 1429, the Portuguese artist João Eanes probably was sent to Flanders by King João I to receive further training in the Northern style. Proposed to have been one and the same as the mason Jehan James, who, in the mid-1440s finished the sepulchre foundation for the tomb of Anne, Duchess of Bedford, he might be the ubiquitous skilled master in Van Eyck workshop besides Lambert who completed versions after original archetypes.198 Whether João Anes was still active in Bruges, or even continued to be affiliated with the Eyck workshop after Jan departed on his “secret mission” of 1436 is unknown. But in 1439 he would have been thirty-eight years of age, and an experienced artist. A clear and perfect picture of the contributions of Portugal during the Late Gothic and Renaissance periods will never be attained due to Lisbon’s November 1, 1755 earthquake. Countless monuments were left in ruins either by the three immense tsunamis that rose from the estuary of the Tagus or by the fires that ravaged the city for a week. Besides the Romanesque-Late Gothic Castle of St. George and sixteenth-century Manueline Riverfront Attributed to Jan van Eyck’s workshop, the Calvary in Venice (Galleria G. Franchetti alla Cá d’Oro) which has a provenance in Padua from the mid-fifteenth century, and the Berlin-Dahlem Calvary are compositionally similar to the same Passion subject in Turin Hours, f. 48v. The two scenes of “Calvary” generally are thought to have been based upon a lost prototype and they have been dated between 1435 and 1440. If it was a standard practice for Jan van Eyck’s workshop to have created duplicate compositions, then it seems odd that “double versions” do not predate 1435. However, it is plausible that in anticipation of his second voyage to the Lisbon court, Jan van Eyck wanted to have replicas of those works he intended to present as gifts. The subject of a “Calvary” was an immensely appropriate theme for the Portuguese Crown, whose chivalric orders (Avis, Santiago and the Order of Christ) had adopted the cross as an emblem. Both Eyckian panels show the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist standing at the foot of the cross, insinuating the moment when Christ entrusts them into each other’s care. The Apostle was the patron saint of King João I, whose most important battles were won on the feast day of the Assumption, and who also died on August 15 (1433). So then, if the “Calvary” replicas were made concurrently with an original given to King Duarte, then the two works remained in the North while the prototype, like the prototype Ince Hall Madonna, would have been installed in a royal residence in Lisbon, and subsequently destroyed in the 1755 earthquake. 198

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Palace and Xabregas Palace, the destruction encompassed several magnificent princely houses, aristocratic mansions, town domiciles, commercial districts, and innumerable churches. Unfortunately court inventories and ecclesiastical archives recording countless treasures also perished in the cataclysm and were lost to posterity. Northern Renaissance scholarship is grounded in documental evidence, but it has been enriched by art historical studies of a speculative nature. Despite the absence of critical historical sources regarding Jan’s patronage by the Avis court in Lisbon, it is incontrovertible that bonds between Flanders and Portugal were cemented in the wake of the 1430 marriage of a “Lusitanian Sibyl” to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy.

11 Conclusion: Ecclesia and an Age of Crusaders Shield, Spurs and Sword for La Sainte-Église: Revisiting the Theme of the Grail Banquet and Knightly Entrêmets

C

harles IV (1316: r. 1347–1378), Holy Roman Emperor, founded Prague in 1348 (Figs. 11.1–11.2).1 The son of John of Luxembourg and Eliška (Elisabeth) Přemyslid, he was tutored in Paris by Pierre Rogier de Fecampé, the future Pope Clement VI, and educated at the Sorbonne. Guided by his chancellor, Jan of Strěda and archbishops Arnošt of Pardubice and Jan Očko of Vlašim, Charles IV sought to make his new town one of the most spectacular centers of Late Gothic Europe. Simultaneously with the raising of the Cathedral of St. Vitus, he employed the French builders Matthieu of Arras and Pierre Parler to erect an imperial retreat sixteen miles southwest of Prague. Completed about 1355, Karlštejn Palace (Fig. 11.3) was designed as a repository for the crown jewels of the empire and as a fortress to protect Jan Royt, Medieval Painting in Bohemia (Prague: Charles University in Prague. The Karolinum Press, 2003) discusses the patronage of John of Luxembourg, 30–51, and Charles IV, 52–90. See also Jirí Spevácek, Karel IV, zivot a dílo, 1316–1378 (Prague: Svoboda, 1979); idem., Karl IV: sein Leben und seine staatsmännische Leistung (Prague: Academia Nakladatelstvi, Ceskoslovenské Akademie, 1978); idem., “Die Epoch Karls IV,” Die Parler und der Schöne Stil 1350–1400. Europäische Kunst unter den Luxemburgen, 2 vols. (Cologne: 1978), II: 585–605. Regarding cultural crosscurrents between European courts, see Mojmir Frinta, “Bohemian Painting vis-à-vis Southern Netherlands,” Flanders in a European Perspective. Manuscript Illumination around 1400 in Flanders and Abroad. Proceedings of the International Colloquium, Leuven, 7–10 September, 1993, ed. Maurits Smeyers and B. Cardon (Louvain: 1995): 75–92. 1

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the sacred relics acquired by the Holy Roman Emperor. The secular palace and burgrave’s quarters adjoin at the lowest level. Charles IV’s apartments on the third floor, below those of the empress, boasted an impressive audience chamber and “Luxembourg Hall” with a “Dynastic Tree,” constructed circa 1356–57 and purportedly painted by Nicholas Wurmser of Strasbourg, a master from Brussels. Besides Charles IV’s bedchamber, his quarters had two oratories, a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas of Bari and one to St. Wenceslas, whose actual lineage was Přemyslid. The intermediate level of Karlštejn Palace consists of a small tower, and its first floor contains the Chapter Chapel of the Virgin Mary used by five Benedictine canons charged with caring for the imperial treasures. A narrow passageway connects to a smaller capella regia (Fig. 11.4). Installed in 1357, St. Catherine’ Chapel may have served as Charles IV’s personal oratory because it contains two likenesses of the emperor. Over the altar is a mural of the enthroned Virgin and Child flanked by the monarch and his third wife, Anna of Svidnik. Above the entrance on the opposite wall is an Exaltatio Crucis showing Charles IV and Anne raising a crucifix as worthy successors to Constantine and St. Helen.2 The Chapel of the Virgin Mary was decorated in 1362–63 with frescoes of the “Apocalypse” (Fig. 11.5), including not only the famed Horsemen of the end of days, but also the “Planet Woman” of Revelations. On an opposite wall (Figs. 11.6–11.7) Wurmser painted the subject of Charles IV receiving relics from King Charles V of France and King Lajos of Hungary, as well as the Emperor placing relics into a finely crafted gold cross. The Marian oratory held sacred objects associated with Jerusalem and Christ’s Passion, but it was not the most celebrated shrine at Karlštejn. The uppermost level of the palace is formed by a five-storied tower that faces the northern road from Mořiny. From a large vaulted hall, a spiral staircase ascends to the imperial Chapel of the Holy Cross (Fig. 11.8). Occupying the entire second floor, the sanctuary has a gilded vault studded with stars of Venetian pâte de verre and wainscoting of semi-precious stones from northwest Bohemia set into plaster.3 A mural of the Adoration 2 Jiří Fajt and Jan Royt, Master Theodoricus. Court Painter of Emperor Charles IV. Decorations of the Sacred Spaces at Castle Karlštejn, translated by Dagmar Steinová (Prague: Exhibition Catalogue, Convent of St. Agnes of Bohemia, National Gallery of Prague, 1997), 17–18. Charles IV’s first wife was Blanche of Valois and his second was Ann Palatine. In 1363, a year after the death of Anne of Svidnik (Schweidnitz), he wed Elisabeth of Pommerania. 3 Fajt and Royt, Master Theodoricus. Court Painter of Emperor Charles IV. Decorations of the Sacred Spaces at Castle Karlštejn, 21, informs that Charles IV obtained Boč in in October

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of the Magi on the northeastern window recess presents a profile portrait of Charles IV as a Magus who recognizes a higher authority (Fig. 11.09). By contrast with this narrative subject that focuses upon a theophany of the infant Christ, the western window recess illustrates a theme from Revelations. The Apocalyptic Lamb of God worshipped by Twenty-four Elders shows the just patriarchs relinquishing their crowns as a sign of humility. Between 1360 and 1365, Master Theodoric painted 127 panels of favorite saints for the Holy Cross Chapel (Fig. 11.10) and these robust images that visually recollect realistic portraits en buste, denote the Church Triumphant. Charles IV and his son Wencenslas IV (1361–1419) undeniably wished to be numbered among these holy warriors of the heavenly Elect (Fig. 11.11). Karlštejn’s massive tower protected relics relating to Christ’s Passion: a thorn from the crown of Calvary; a piece of rope from the pillar of the flagellation; wood from the cross; a nail; the sponge of Sephaton; and the lance of Longinus. The chapels of Charles IV also contains relics of saints, including the skull of St. Wecenslas upon which rested the imperial crown, and the alleged standard of St. George as well as the petrified body of the dragon he fought. In imitation of Louis IX’s Easter display of sacred artifacts at Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, the relics of Karlštejn after 1354 were transferred annually in solemn procession to Prague for public veneration at Charles Square on the “Feast of the Holy Lance and Nails” (March 15: Feast of St. Longinus).4 When Charles IV and Prince Wecenslas visited France in 1378 as an honored guest of King Charles V (1337: r. 1364–1380), they would have been granted a private viewing of the important Sainte-Chapelle Passion relics (Figs. 11.12–11.15). Rising on three levels of a crag above the Berounka River, the imperial house of Karlštejn with its famed pilgrimage sanctuary of the Holy Rood has been compared with the Grail Castle of Arthurian lore. Connections with the “Fisher King” healed by Perceval may be unfounded, but the estate of of 1357, and the estate in northwest Bohemia was near rich mineral deposits west of Klášterec nad Ohří. According to documents of 1359–1364, a mason named Johann worked for the emperor. The 2451 stones of the chapel have been identified as agate, purple amethyst, jasper, cornelian, onyx, green chrysolite, and yellow, red and black topaz. See also Antonin Matějček and Jaroslav Pešina, Czech Gothic Painting, 1350–1450 (Prague: 1950) 4 Fajt and Royt, Master Theodoricus. Court Painter of Emperor Charles IV. Decorations of the Sacred Spaces at Castle Karlštejn, 37 (St. George), 18 and 39 (Passion). The crown jewels (36) were transferred from Munich to Prague in 1350 and deposited at Karlštejn when the Chapel of the Holy Cross was consecrated in 1365. The relics and imperial regalia were kept in caskets placed within niches behind the paintings.

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Bohemia certainly conjures the ambient beauty of Le Corbenic as described by Chrétian de Troyes. The concept of priest-king is underscored by the Gothic architecture of the complex in which the holy chambers of the house of God were planned to be perfectly integrated with the secular halls of the domus imperator. The laying out of a royal domicile to symbolize the unity and strength of the Church Militant was characteristic of the celebrated kingdoms of Medieval Christendom. Their audience halls, bedchambers of honor and reception rooms served a public function, but the galleries also embraced chapels that were sumptuous shelters for the most sacred of relics. Within palatine walls often several meters thick, grand processions, lavish ceremonies, and epical entertainments were tinged with the memory of the Grail mystique, especially the Pentecostal banquet attended by Perceval whose purity of spirit gained him entrance to the formidable citadel of King Anfortas. Due to their transient character, mechanical decorations which were designed for all’antica entries and courtly pageantry in Late Gothic European courts have not survived. Created with the twofold purpose of amusing guests and providing didactic imagery to enhance a ruler’s image before the nobility, the most spectacular automatons were reserved for commemorative banquets.5 Few pictorial mementos of these lavish affairs have been left to posterity but one rare example is a folio of the Reception of Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg from the Grandes Croniques of King Charles V of France.6 This magnificent festivity held in 1378 within the Grande Salle of the Palais de la Cité in Paris provides an idea of a late

5 Agnès Villadary, Fêtes et vie quotidienne (Paris: Éditorial Ouvrières 1968); Jean Verdon, “Fêtes et divertissements en Occident durant le Haut Moyen-âge,” Journal of Medieval History V, No. 4 (1979): 303–14; Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Fabulous Feasts: Medieval Cookery and Ceremony (New York: G. Braziller, 1976); idem., Medieval Holidays and Festivals: A Calendar of Celebrations (New York: Scribner, 1981); Patricia Denise Labahn, Feasting in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries: A Comparison of Manuscript Illuminations to Contemporary Written Sources (St. Louis: Ph.D. Dissertation, St. Louis University, 1975); Jacques Heers, “Les métiers et les fêtes médiévales en France du Nord et en Angleterre,” Revue du Nord LV, No. 218 (1974): 193–206; Margaret Wade Labarge, Cour, Église et Château (Ottawa: Galerie Nationale du Canada, 1972). 6 Marcel Thomas, “La Visite de l’Empereur Charles IV en France, d’après l’exemplaire des ‘Grandes Chroniques’ exécuté pour le Roi Charles V,” VIe Congrès International des Bibliophiles, Vienna, September 29–October 5, 1969 (Vienna: 1971): 85–89; Laura Hilbord Loomis, “Secular Dramatics in the Royal Palace, Paris 1378, 1389, and Chaucer’s ‘Tragetoures,’” Speculum XXXIII (1958): 242–55; Léopold Victor Delisle, Recherches sur la librairie de Charles V (1337–1380), 2 vols. (Paris: 1907), I, 312–14 (also see 2 vol. edition

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Gothic royal banquet planned to impress guests at the Valois court. Situated south of St. Louis IX’s Sainte-Chapelle, the Grande Salle (Figs. 11.16– 11.19) was an immense chamber built between 1292 and 1303 by King Philip IV “the Fair” (r. 1285–1314).7 Though the Grande Salle contained forty-two dynastic statues and magnificent tapestries, the manuscript illumination of the Reception of Charles V only divulges the monarch’s table of honor with three canopies (Fig. 11.20). The azure silk “estates of cloth” are embroidered with the repeated motif of golden fleur-de-lys, emblem of France since the twelfth century.8 King Charles V sits prominently between

rpt., Amsterdam: G. Th. van Heusden, 1967); Roland Delachenal, Chronique des règnes de Jean II et de Charles V (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, 1920). 7 Jean Gerout, “Le palais de la Cité à Paris des Origins à 1417,“ Mémoires de la Fédération des Sociétés Historiques et Archaeolgiques de Paris et de l’Île de France, 3 vols. (Paris: 1952); Jacques Hillairet, Connaissance du vieux Paris (Paris: Club français du livre, 1969); Ian Dunlop, Royal Palaces of France (New York-London: W.W. Norton Company, 1985), 1–17; Henri Stein, Le Palais de Justice et la Sainte-Chapelle de Paris; notice historique et archéologique (Paris: D. A. Longuet, 1912); (Paris: 1927); Jean Favier, Paris au XVe siècle, 1380–1500. Nouvelle histoire de Paris (Paris: Association pour la publication d’une histoire de Paris: Ville de Paris-Hachette, 1974); idem., Philippe le Bel (Paris: Fayard, 1978). Though Thomas de Cormont probably was the builder of the thirteenth-century Châtelet of Louis IX, the primary team of builders for Philip “the Fair” comprised: the master architect Enguerrand de Marigny; the master mason Jean de Cerenz (Jean d’Esserent); the master carpenter Jean de Gisors; and two painter-imagers, Evrard’Orléans and François d Orléans. Charles V shared with Emperor Charles IV a love of the arts, especially finely illuminated manuscripts, and literature is vast on the French monarch’s patronage. Among a few studies which can be cited are: Léopold Delisle, Recherches sur la librairie de Charles V, 2 vols. (Paris, H. Champion, 1907) and facsimile rpt. (Amsterdam: G. Th. van Heusden, 1967); Jean Bernard de Vaivre, “Monuments et objets d’art commandés par Gilles Malet, garde de la librarie de Charles V, Journal des Savants (October–December, 1978): 217–32; Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, “Aspects du mécénat de Charles V. La sculpture décorative,” Bulletin Monumental CXXX (1972): 303–45; idem., Jean de Thoiry, sculpteur de Charles V,” Journal des Savants (1972): 210–27; A. Hocquet, “Portraits de Charles V et de Jeanne de Bourbon sur une charte ornée (1371),” Revue Belge d’Archéologie et d’Histoire d’Art (January: 1933): 30–35. 8 The Salle Grande was renowned for the black marble table that measured twenty-three meters, and virtually spanned the width of the Great Hall. A suitable symbol of monarchical authority was a giant gilded stag, which alluded to the legendary hunt of King Clovis I. Guillaume de Diguelleville in his Roman de la Fleur de Lys (1338) recounts the legend of the three petals of an iris which an angel carried from heaven to the hermit of Joyenval (St. Germain-en-Laye) The monk presented the floral segments tied by a band to Queen Clothilda. She gave them in the form of a shield to her husband Clovis I, King of the Franks (r. 481–511). As a collateral branch of the Capetian dynasty (987–1328), the Valois kings also adopted the fleur-de-lys in their seals, heralds and regalia. See B.J.H. Rowe, “Notes on

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his guests.9 To the dexter side of the monarch is his maternal uncle from Prague, Emperor Charles IV. Directly opposite the King of Bohemia is his heir. Elected King of the Romans in 1376, Wenceslas IV converses with two of the three invited bishops. Gold plates and nefs resting upon the white tablecloth dramatically contrast with the bold checkered red and gold walls of the Grande Salle. The most important element of the French Reception is its two entrêmets, table decorations revealed between courses of the dinner. To the right, a few actors are shown scaling the walls of Jerusalem. This slice of the entertainment is sufficient to establish that the banquet’s entrêmet concerns the heroic deeds of Godfrey de Bouillon, who headed the contingent of Lorraine, Belgian and German knights of the First Crusade (1095–1099). The actors and the three foreground servants are reduced considerably in scale perhaps to indicate their lower status, but more likely to fit all of them into the space of the frame.10 The second entrêmet spills into the border of the the Clovis Miniature and the Bedford Portrait in the Bedford Book of Hours, Journal of the British Archaeological Association XXV, 3rd Series (London: 1962): 56–65; Colette Beaune, Naissance de la Nation France (Paris: Gallimard, Coll. Bibliothèque des histoires, 1985), Ch. VIII, “Les lys de France”, reprinted as The Birth of an Ideology: Myths and Symbols of Nation in Late-Medieval France, translated by Susan Ross Huston, ed. Fredric L. Cheyette (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991). Anne Lombard-Jourdan, Fleur de lis et oriflamme: signes célestes du royaume de France (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1991); idem., Paris, genèse de la ville : la rive droite de la Seine des origines à 1223 (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1976; and augmented rpt. 1985). 9 The portraits in the folio are generic and identifications are based upon courtly protocol. See Claire Richter Sherman, The Portraits of Charles V of France (1338–1380), Monographs on Archaeology and the Fine Arts, 9 (New York: 1969); Pierre Pradel, “Les tombeaux de Charles V,” Bulletin Monumental CIX (1951): 273–96. 10 François Avril, Manuscript Painting at the Court of France: The Fourteenth Century, 1310–1380, translated by Ursule Molinaro, with the assistance of Bruce Benderson (New York-London: George Braziller-Chatto & Windus, 1978), 106–7. Agathe Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454): Aspects politiques, sociaux et culturels (Montréal: Cahiers d’études mediévales, Université de Montréal, Les Éditions Bellarmin, 1984), 46–47, states Charles V’s counselor, Philippe de Mézières, had urged a crusade to the Holy Land. See Nicolae Iorga, Philippe de Mézières, 1327–1405, et la croisade au XIVe siècle (Paris: É. Bouillon, 1896). Lafortune-Martel mentions, 48, a dinner in 1389 offered by Charles VI (1368: r. 1380–1422) on the day after the grand entry into Paris of Queen Isabeau of Bavaria (1369–1435: m. 1385). The entrêmet for that occasion consisted of the assault of the Greeks against the walls of Troy. She cites, 48 notes 53–54: Jean Froissart [1338–1410], Chroniques, ed. Jean Alexandre Buchon, 15 vols. (Paris: Verdière, J. Carez 1824– 28), XII (1825), 20–21 and Philippe de Mézières, Le livre de la vertu du sacrement de mariage [1384–1389] in the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale, MS, Fr. 1175, fol. 109. Bernard Guenée and Françoise Lehoux, Les Entrées royales françaises de 1328 à 1515 (Paris: Éditions du Centre

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miniature. A ship displaying heraldic flags of England, Auverne and Flanders contains a single passenger. The monk does not appear to be an automaton, but rather, a live actor delivering an address which relates to the play. The figure can be identified as Peter the Hermit, (1050–1115) the Augustinian chaplain who led peasants to Jerusalem from northern France and the valleys of the Rhine and Danube. Meeting Godfrey de Bouillon in 1097, Peter entered Jerusalem in triumph with twelve knights of the First Crusade.11 The Grandes Chroniques de France contains another miniature (Fig. 11.21) illustrating a royal banquet with an entrêment and chivalric theme, The Institution of the Order of the Star and Banquet (MS. Fr. 2813, f. 394). Like the “Luxembourg Banquet,” this folio commemorates a specific event, only one which occurred during the reign of Charles V’s father. In 1350 King Jean II (1319: r. 1330–1364) had established the Order of the Star, partly in response to the English Garter of Edward III.12 The second miniature of the Grandes Chroniques is divided to suggest two palatial interiors: a royal audience chamber distinguished by interior walls patterned with multiple squares; and a banqueting hall decorated with a red and gold checkered design. The composition alludes to the alternate name of the Ordre de l’Étoile, the “Order of the Noble House.” In 1332 Jean II “le Bon” had married Judith of Luxembourg (1315–1349). Besides Charles V they sired three sons who also were illustrious patrons of the arts: Louis I, the Duke of Anjou (1339–1384); Jean I, the Duke of Berry (1340–1416); and Philip the National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1968) informs about the pageanty that characterized grand entries of the Valois dynasty. Also see Les Fastes du gothique – Le siècle de Charles V (Paris: exhibition catalogue, Grand Palais, 1981); Françoise Robin, “Le Luxe de la table dans les cours princières (1378–1380),” Gazette des Beaux-Arts LXXXVI, No. 2 (1975): 1–16. 11 By 1100 Peter the Hermit returned to Flanders where he became a prior. See Yves Le Febvre, Pierre l’Ermite et la croisade (Amiens: Malfère, 1946); Benjamin Ze´ev Kedar, Jonathan Riley-Smith and Rudolf Hiestand (eds.), Montjoie: Studies in Crusade History in Honour of Hans Eberhard Mayer (Aldershot, Hampshire-Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1997). 12 The brotherhood of knights known as the Order of the Star was assimilated by France’s national Order of Saint-Michel, founded in 1469 by Louis XI (1423: r. 1461–1483) as a counterpart to the Burgundian Order of the Golden Fleece.The first chapter meeting of St. Michel was held at Amboise in 1470, with fifteen knights garbed in crimson and displaying the shell of the pilgrimage site of Mount St-Michel in Normandy. Eventually this Order was absorbed by the Order of Saint-Ésprit founded by Henri III (1551: r. 1574–1589). Consult: Yves Renouard, “L’Ordre de la Jarretière et l’Ordre de l’Étoile,” Le Moyen Âge LV (1949): 281–300, reprinted in Renouard, Études d’histoire médiévale, 2 vols. (Paris: 1968), I, 93–106; André Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance. 1430–1620, translated by Deke Dusinberre (Paris-New York: Flammarion, 1995), 70–71.

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Bold (1342–1404), the Duke of Burgundy. The throne room depicted in the miniature probably is the Grande Chambre of the Palais de la Cité in Paris. This spacious audience hall adjoined the Grande Salle to the northwest. Seated upon a hound-headed chair beneath a canopy, the monarch is identified at the top of the folio with the script: “Du Roi Jehan.” Five knights of the Order of the Star stand in his presence along with three courtiers. Wearing the same white robes and vermilion mantles as their sovereign, they probably are the four Valois princes and their uncle, Philippe (1336–1375), Duke of Orlèans. With regard to the commemorative banquet, the setting appears to be the Grande Salle of the Palais de la Cité. Four chevaliers with star insignia are portrayed as guests of honor, and logically they are the sons of King Jean II. The princely quartet listens to fine music while dining. On the right a servant leaves an artificial châtelet to carry a tasty pie to a table already covered with gleaming golden vessels. Attesting even more to the high social status of these knights is a dressoir to the side of the entrêmet which exhibits the treasures of the palace. Mere nobles of the Order of the Star would not have been accorded such a prestigious banquet unless they were of royal blood. The entrêmets depicted in the banquets of the Grandes Chroniques de France prove that banquet decorations were quite large. As such, the majority of these table conceits must have been transported on wheeled platforms into Great Halls. As transitory decorations, automatons fashioned for gala events in France and in Burgundy must have been disassembled almost immediately after the feasts. Perhaps some artifices were reworked but most would have been discarded. Fourteenth-century European institutions of knighthood were begun as a replacement for the “traditional ordo militum.” Jean II’s Order of the Star was the model for the “Order of the Holy Spirit of Virtuous Desire” founded in 1352 in Naples by his son Louis I of Anjou (1339–1384).13 Jean

13 André Chastel, French Art. Prehistory to the Middle Ages, translated by Deke Dusinberre (Paris-New York: Flammarion, 1994), 322. He mentions a manuscript pertaining to the institution in the Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Fr. 4274. Dating this book to about 1355, Chastel suggests it was illuminated by Cristoforo Orimina, a southern Italian master acquainted with French art. He cites Émile Léonard, Les Angevins de Naples (Paris: Press Universitaires de France, 1954), 368. For information about the Angevin court in Naples, see: Ferdinando. Bologna, I Pittori della Corte Angioina di Napoli 1266–1414 (Rome: U. Bozzi, 1969); Pierluigi Leone de Castris, Arte di corte nella Napoli angioina (Florence: Cantini, 1986); Dominique Soulier, Chantal Colleu-Dumond (organizers), et al., L’Europe des Anjou: aventure des princes angevins du XIIIe au XVe siècle (Paris: Somogy Éditions d’Art, 2001).

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II’s great-grandson, René of Anjou (1409–1480), manifested an uncommon fascination for chivalric orders, heraldry and grand-scale pageantry perhaps because he possessed several titles.14 At age ten in 1419, he had married Isabel of Lorraine, and acquired her father’s ducal estates in 1431. When his elder brother Louis III (1403–1434) died prematurely, René became Duke of Anjou and Provence, as well as heir to the Italian dominions of Queen Joan of Naples and the Two Sicilies († 1435).15 René called his grandfather’s Neapolitan crusading institution the “Order of the Knot,” after the toupin, a tool used in Angers for making ropes. He also adopted the motto “In One,” which perhaps was a cryptic reference to his “weaving” of several lands into Louis I of Anjou was given the estate of Angers by Jean II in 1356 and conferred with the ducal title in 1360. Louis II of Anjou (1377–1417) resided at Samur Castle on the Loire, which he renovated between 1367 and 1410. His wife, Yolande of Aragon, also stayed at Mehun-sur-Yèvre, Bourges and Provence (after 1409). In 1422 Charles VII (1403– 1461), Yolande’s protegé as a dauphin, married René’s sister Marie of Anjou (1404–1463). René had sided with the Armagnacs against Burgundy after the 1419 assasination of Jean the Fearless. In 1431 in a dispute over Lorraine, René was captured by the army of Duke Philip the Good at Bulignéville. He then was imprisoned at the Hôtel de Dijon and ultimately ransomed in 1435. Despite political conflicts between ducal houses, two significant marriages followed the concord between Philip the Good and Charles VII. In 1440 Charles the Bold (1433–1477) married Catherine (1428–1446), daughter of Marie of Anjou and in 1445 Henry VI of England (1422–1471) wed René’s daughter, Marguerite d’Anjou (1430–1482). Ironically, the lady-in-waiting of Isabel of Lorraine was Agnes Sorrel, the mistress of Charles VII. Consult Richard Albert Lecoy de La Marche, Le roi René, sa vie, son administration, ses travaux artistiques et littéraires d’après les documents inédits des archives de France et d’Italie, 2 vols. (Firmin-Didot Frères, Fils et Cie, 1875); idem., Extraits des comptes et mémoriaux du roi René (Paris: Documents historiques, Société de l’École des Chartes, 1873); Françoise Robin, La cour d’Anjou-Provence: la vie artistique sous le règne de René (Paris: A. et J. Picard, 1985); Otto Pächt, “René of Anjou et les Van Eyck,” Cahiers de l’Association Internationale des Études Francaises VIII (1956): 41–67; idem., “René of Anjou – Studien I,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien LXIX (1973): 85–126; idem, “René of Anjou – Studien II,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien LXXXIII (1977): 7–106; Gustave Arnaud d’Agnel [Abbot], Les Comtes du roi René, 3 vols. (Paris: 1908–1910). 15 Isabel of Lorraine died in 1453 and in September of 1454 King René remarried a woman twenty-four years his junior, Jeanne de Laval, the daughter of a Breton nobleman. René’s favorite palace was Samur, though he renovated and expanded the Château d’Angers between 1450 and 1465. In 1471, he moved to Provence, residing at Tarascon Castle until his death at Aix-en-Chapelle on July 10, 1480. René’s son, Jean of Calabria, inherited his estate, which passed to the French Crown in 1481. His second daughter, Yolande, was given the duchy of Lorraine. See Noël Coulet, Alice Planche and Françoise Robin, Le roi René: le prince, le mécène, l’écrivain, le mythe (La Calade, Aix-en-Provence: Edisud, 1982); idem., Françoise Robin, La cour d’Anjou-Provence: la vie artistique sous le règne de René (Paris: Picard, 14

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a strong “cord.”16 Moreover, he established his own “Order of the Crescent” (Fig. 11.22) in 1448 to rival the prestige of Philip the Good’s “Golden Fleece.” The initial chapter of the Order of the Crescent convened in Angers at the church of St. Maurice, where members of the confraternity wore grey gowns, crimson mantles and black-rimmed hats. By contrast with Duke of Burgundy, whose knights had adopted the Apostle Andrew as their patron, King René selected the warrior Maurice as protector of his institution and their insignia was an enamel crescent with the motto in blue of loz en croissant (“praise that waxes”).17 Fanciful heraldry appearing in manuscripts like the Bellenville Armorial of 1364– 1386 (Fig. 11.23) provides only a glimpse of the spectacular array of animals and figures which were carved and polychromed by collaborative teams of imagiers and painters.18 Probably one of the loveliest texts of the Northern Renaissance is Le Livre de Tournois. Written by King René of Anjou around 1460, the manuscript was illustrated by Barthélemy d’Eyck. The manuscript includes a double-page tournament procession of knights and ladies, with an outstanding display of pennants, arms and other regalia assembled for a joust 19 (Fig. 11.24). A chivalric spirit pervaded the court of René, but even 1985); Christian de Mérindol, Le roi René et la seconde maison d’Anjou: emblématique art histoire, with an introduction by Michel Pastoureau (Paris: Léopard d’Or, 1987); idem., Le roi René: 1409–1480: Décoration de ses chapelles et demeures (Paris, exhibition catalogue: Musée des Monuments Français, Palais de Chaillot-Éditions de la Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1981); Nicole Reynaud, “Georges Trubert, enlumineur du roi René et de René II de Lorraine,” Revue de l’Art XXXV (1977): 41–63; Ottokar Smital and Emil Winkler, René I, d’Anjou, Roi de Naples et Jerusalem, 1409–1480, 2 vols. (Vienna: Bibliothèque Nationale de Vienne, Édition de l’Imprimerie de l’État Autrichien, 1927). 16 See François Avril, “Un ‘devise’ du Roi René: le toupin des cordiers,” Florilegium in Honorem Carl Nordenfalk (Stockholm: Nationalmuseum, 1987): 23–32; Paul Durrieu, “Les armoiries du bon Roi René,” Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, comptes rendus des séances de l’année I (1908): 102–14. Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance. 1430–1620, 68–71, discusses the diverse Orders of the House of Anjou and “princely devices.” He illustrates (69) the toupin in Barthémy d’Eyck’s Heures de René d’Anjou, ca. 1459–1460 (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Lat. 17332, f. 31). Consult also L. Germain, “La Souche et l’orange, emblèmes du roi René,” Bulletin Monumental LXI (1896): 5–28. 17 Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance, 70, elaborates René sought to imitate the insignia of an ancestor of his noble house, Charles of Anjou, who in 1268 had adopted a crescent and two stars as a herald when he instituted his “Order of the Moon.” 18 Chastel, French Art. Prehistory to the Middle Ages, 316–17, discusses seigniorial heraldry of France and the Bellenville Armorial. 19 Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance, 69. See also Françoise Piponnier, Costume et vie sociale. La cour d’Anjou XIVe – XVe siècle (Paris: École pratique des hautes études. Civilisations

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the grandest pageant “King of Naples and Jerusalem” and “Prince of the Fleur-de-Lys” paled in comparison with a splendid event orchestrated by Philip the Good to honor Burgundy’s knightly Order of the Golden Fleece. The concept of Sainte-Église protected by the Duchy of Burgundy and the knights of the Golden Fleece is at the heart of Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece, where the heavenly Elect include vigilant and virtuous crusaders for the Lamb of God. In 1454, thirteen years after the death of the court painter, Infanta Isabel of Portugal was hostess to a magnificent banquet which encapsulated chivalric images and ideas which had been geminating since the founding of Philip the Good’s knightly order in 1430. Held on February 17, 1454 at the Hôtel de la Salle in Lille (Fig. 11.25–11.27), Philip the Good’s Fête du Faisan perhaps marked the commencement of a week of courtly activities that were to culminate in the February 21 birthday celebration of Isabel of Portugal. This banquet would be the last major festivity attended at the court by an intellectual Duchess, who, like the erudite authoress Christine de Pisan (1363–1429), identified with the ancient sibyls (Fig. 11.28). The “Feast of the Pheasant” is the most studied of the Burgundian festivities 20 (Fig. 11.29). Decorations for the lavish event required the combined talent of forty painters, many of whom were skilled in the polychroming et sociétés, 21, Mouton, 1970); Paul Durrieu, “Les armoires du bon René,” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres I (1908): 102–14; Nicole Reynaud, “Barthélemy d’Eyck avant 1450,” Revue d’Art LXXXIV (1989): 22–43; idem., “La lettre de la veuve de Barthélemy d’Eyck au roi René,” Bulletin de la Societé de l’Histoire de l’Art Français 1984 (1986): 7–10; Eberhard König, Das Liebentbrannte Herz. Der Wiener Codex und der Maler Barthelemy d’Eyck (Graz: 1996); Albert Châtelet, “Pour en finir avec Barthélemy d’Eyck,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts CXL, No. 131 (1998): 199–220; [René d’Anjou, Traité de la forme et devis d’un tournoi, ed. Edmond Pognon (Paris: 1946); Edmond Pognon, Le Livre des tournois du roi René [Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Français 2695], with an introduction by François Avril (Paris: Herscher, 1986). 20 Georges Doutrepont, “Á la cour de Philippe le Bon, Le Banquet du Faisan et la littérature de Bourgogne,” Revue générale LXX, (December, 1899): 787–806 and LXXI (January, 1900): 99–118; idem., “Les historiens du ‘Banquet des Voeux du Faisan,’” Mélanges d’Histoire offerts à Charles Muëller, 2 vols. (Louvain-Paris: Picard, 1914): I, 654–70; Otto Cartellieri, “Das Fasanenfest. Am Hofe der Herzöge von Burgund, 1454,” Historisch-Politische Blätter für das Katolische Deutschland (Munich) CLXVII (1921): 65–80, 141–58. Marie-Thérèse Caron, La noblesse dans le duché de Bourgogne, 1315–1477, with a preface by Jean Richard (Lille: Presses Universitaires de Lille, 1987); idem., Les voeux du Faisan, noblesse en fête, esprit de croisade: le manuscrit français 11594 de la Bibliothèque Nationale de France (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003). For Colard and other artists see León de Laborde (Comte), Les ducs de Bourgogne, études sur les lettres, les arts et l’industrie pendant le XVe siècle et plus particulièrement dans les Pays-Bas et

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of sculpture. The Livre des Métiers includes Jehan de Hennecart and Pierre Coustain, but the most important of the named peintres et tailleurs d’ymages was Colart de Voleur, who was called from Hesdin Castle.21 The festivities were coordinated by the iconographer-director Olivier de la Marche. As maître d’hôtel, he worked in consultation with an official committee. Among the advisors were: Chancellor Nicolas Rolin (1380–1461); Antoine de Croÿ, the Count of Porcien, Philip the Good’s first chamberlain and governor of the duchies of Namur and Luxembourg; Jean d’Étampes, cousin of the Duke, and his squire, Jean Boudault; and Jean Lannoy, chevalier of the Order of the Golden Fleece.22 Attended by the great noblemen and ladies of the Burgundian court, the “Feast of the Pheasant” in fifteenth-century manuscript illumination seems a mild affair, but in actuality the banquet was a lavish and carefully choreographed allegorical spectacle. Burgundian knights were outfitted in damask robes and chaperons, and their squires were bedecked in satin, but all displayed the ducal colors of grey and black. For such a grand occasion in the winter season, Philip the Good (Figs. 11.30– 11.31) would have worn silk allucciolato velvet woven in two heights of pile. Around his neck was the golden collar of the Golden Fleece, and the silk hat he selected was adorned with so many diamonds, rubies and large pearls that

le duché de Bourgogne, 3 vols. (Paris: Plon frères, 1849–52), I, 422–29 and No. 1513–75. See Jeffrey Chipps Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (1419– 1467), Ph.D. Dissertation (New York: Columbia University, 1979), 142–49, who discusses the artists cited in Lille, Archives départamentales du Nord, B 2017, folios 250–255v. 21 Étienne Boileau [1200–1269], Le Livre des Métiers, ed. René de Lespinasse et François Bonnardot, Histoire générale de Paris (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1842), II, Ch. 10, rpt. Les métiers et corporations de la ville de Paris. XIIIe siècle (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1879); Laborde, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, 421, No. 1530. 22 Olivier de La Marche [1426–1502: maître d’hôtel and capitaine des gardes of Charles the Bold], Mémoires, 4 vols., ed. Henri Beaune and Jules d’Arbaumont (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, Librairie Renouard, H. Loones, successeur, 1883–1888), II, at 339 (account: 340–81); Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 86. Also consult: Olivier de La Marche, Les mémoires de messire Olivier de La Marche, augmentés d’un estat particular de la maison du duc Charles le Hardi, composé de mesmeauteur, [Paris: 1819–1820], ed. M. Petitot, Collection des mémoires relatifs a l’histoire de France, Ière série, X (Paris: 1825): 180–95; Malcolm Scott Hardy, Olivier de La Marche and Chivalry and Monarchy in the 15th Century (London: M.A. Thesis, University of London, 1970); Henri Stein, “Étude biographique, littéraire et bibliographique sur Olivier de La Marche,“ Mémoires couronnés de l’Académie Royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique XLIX, 4e série (Brussels: F. Hayez, 1888).

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an onlooker, Jean de Pleine, estimated the work of the jewels at 100, 000 nobles.23 One can merely speculate about the opulence of the silk and satin fabrics and ornaments worn by the ladies in the circle of Duchess Isabel. Gold and silver plates and vessels from the treasure rooms of the Hôtel de la Salle were displayed in tiered levels on a large dressoir beside the dais of Philip the Good (Figs. 11.32–11.33). Suspended above his table of honor was a baldachin of black silk “cloth of gold.” The canopy of estate was embroidered with the Duke’s heralds. White satin tablecloths adorned the three main tables of the chamber, each of which was elevated on a platform.24 (Fig. 11.34) Ten guests sat at Philip the Good’s table. To his right were: Isabelle of Bourbon (1435–1455): m. 1454), daughter of the Duke’s sister, Agnes of Burgundy, and betrothed of Charles the Bold, then Count of Charolais; Jean, the Duke of Cleves (1419–1481), son of Marie of Burgundy and nephew of Duke Philip; Lady Ravestein, Beatrice of Coimbra († 1462: m. 1453), daughter of Prince Pedro of Portugal (1392–1449), the niece of Duchess Isabel and wife of Adolphe II of Cleves, the younger brother of Jean; Isabel of Portugal (1397–1471), the Duchess of Burgundy; and Lady de Charneÿ, Marie de Valengin, wife of Pierre de Bauffremont, Lord of Charneÿ, the illegitimate daughter of Philip the Good.25 To the Duke’s immediate left was: Isabelle d’Étampes († 1483), daughter of Jean of Burgundy, Count Richard Vaughan, Philip the Good. The Apogee of Burgundy (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1970), 144–45, was the first to publish a letter of Jean de Pleine sent from Lille to an anonymous person in Burgundy. Bearing the date of Febuary 22, 1454, the document is in the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Fr. 5044, folios 30–31. At the end of his letter, f. 31, Pleine describes the robes of the knights and squires as well as the hat of Duke Philip. The colors of Jean the Fearless were white and green. As dauphin, between 1419 and 1422, Charles VII wore red, white and blue. After 1429 and for his entry into Paris in 1437 he wore red, green and white. See Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance. 1430–1620, 68. Philip the Good selected black and grey after the assassination of his father, a deed attributed to the henchmen of Dauphin Charles. 24 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 348–49; Mathieu d’Escouchy [Enguerrand de Mostrelet: 1420–1453], Chronique [Paris: L. Sonnius, 1595–96], 3 vols., ed. Gaston Louis Emmanuel du Fresne, Marquis de Beaucourt (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, Mme Ve J. Renouard, 1863–64, II (1863), 131. Strict etiquette dictated the seating arrangements. For information regarding the formal milieu of the Valois court in France and Burgundy, see Yvoin Lacaze, Moeurs, usages et coutumes au Moyen Âge et à l’époque de la Renaissance (Paris: F. Didot, 1872). Concerning courtly protocol, also consult Frederick Furnival, Manners and Meals in Olden Time (New York: Greenwood Press, 1969). 25 D’Escouchy, Chronique, II, 140–41 provides a more complete listing and order of the guests at the main tables. See Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le 23

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of Étampes-Nevers, and wife of Jean, Duke of Cleves, in 1455; Louis of Luxembourg, the Count of St. Pol; Lady de Beures, Marie de la Vieville, the wife of the Grand Bastard Anthony of Burgundy, the illegitimate son of Philip the Good and Jeanne de Prelle; Jacques, Lord of Pons in Poitou; and Madame la chancelière, Guigone de Salins, the wife of Nicolas Rolin.26 The second table of honor, called le grande, was dominated by Charles, Count of Charolais (1433–1477) and heir of Duke Philip: Jean of Burgundy, the Count of Étampes-Nevers; Adolphe II of Cleves (1425–1492), the Lord of Ravestein (1463); João of Coimbra (1433–1457), nephew of Duchess Isabel; the Lord of Fiesnes, brother of the Count of St. Pol; Antoine, the Grand Bastard of Burgundy (1430–1504);27 Wolfart de Borsele of Holland, the Count of Boucam; and the Count Jacques de Hornes.28 The third table, referred to as la petite, consisted of escuyers et demoiselles (lords and ladies).29

banquet du Faisan (1454), 104–5. Two additional anonymous accounts of the “Feast of the Pheasant are provided by Lafortune-Martel, 15 and note 1: Bibliothèque Nationale (Paris), MS. Fr. 5739 (fonds Baluze 10319) and Ms. Fr. 11594. 26 D’Escouchy, Chronique, II, 140–41; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 104–5. 27 Anthony, the “Grand Bastard,” was the son of Philip the Good and his mistress Jeanne de Presle. He was knighted in 1452 and admitted to the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1456. After Charles the Bold’s death in 1477, he served Louis XI of France (1423: r. 1461–1483) and his successor, Louis XII (1462: r. 1498–1515). Philip the Good’s mistress, Catherine Thieffries, was the mother of another bastard, Baudouin of Lille. Besides Anthony and Baudouin, the Duke fathered two additional sons: David, bishop of Therouanne and then Utrecht (1456–1494); and Philip, an admiral and bishop of Utrecht (1511). See Hubert Nelis, “Bâtards de Brabant et bâtards de Bourgogne, Revue Belge de Philologie et d’Histoire, I, 1 (1922): 337–42; Baron de Reiffenberg (Frédéric-Auguste Ferdinand Thomas), “Enfants naturels du duc Philippe le Bon,” Bulletin de l’Académie Royale de Belgique, XIII, 1 (1846): 172–87 and XIV, 1 (1847): 585–97; M. Bergé, “Les bâtards de la Maison de Bourgogne, leur descendance, L’Intermédiare des Généologistes LX (1955): 316–408; Amédée Charles Léon Boinet, “Un bibliophile du XVe siècle. Le Grand Bâtard de Bourgogne,” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartres LXVIII (1906): 255–69; Michael Harzgord, “L’essor des bâtards nobles au XVe siècle,” Revue Historique CCLIII, No. 514 (1975): 319–54; Lorne Campbell, “Rogier van der Weyden’s ‘Portrait of a Knight of the Golden Fleece’: The Identity of the Sitter, Bulletin Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique XXI (1972): 7–16; Siegfried Boudewijn Johan Zilverberg, David van Bourgondië. Bisschop van Terwaan en van Utrecht (Groningen: J. B. Wolters, 1951); Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 329–31. 28 D’Escouchy, Chronique, II, 141, La Marche, Mémoires, II, 355; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 106–7. 29 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 355; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 107.

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The immense gallery had five main doors and estrades grillagée des spectateurs, balconied galleries, which accommodated foreign ambassadors and municipal guests.30 Twenty gold and blue charettes were created to transport dishes to the tables. Embellished with four heraldic pennants of the Duke and his son, each held eighty-two plates. Evidently, a mechanical apparatus was installed which rotated an array of dishes from the ceiling like a ferris wheel.31 Recounting the banquet at Lille in a letter dated February 22, 1454, Jean de Pleine comments: “The dishes were such that they had to be served with trolleys, and seemed infinite in number. There were so many side-dishes, and they were so curious, that it’s difficult to describe them.”32 The movement of servants and entertainers to and from the Great Hall of Rihour (Fig. 11.35) was coordinated as perfunctorily as the apparatus invented for the festive occasion. Given the number of scenic entrêmets planned for the banquet, the seamless synchronization of multiple activities was itself a wonder.

La Marche, Mémoires, II, 354. Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 85. 31 Otto Cartellieri, The Court of Burgundy (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul), 1972, 264 note 145, refers to La Chronique de Floreffle, 170, regarding the twenty carts. See La Marche, Mémoires, II, 353, for their colors, and D’Escouchy, Chronique, II, 137 note 1, for the banners. This information is provided by Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 94 and notes 83–86. She also informs the only narrator to mention the engins was Jacques Du Clercq. Consult Jacques Du Clercq, Mémoires in Choix de Chroniques et Mémoires sur l’histoire de France, ed. Jean Alexandre Buchon (Paris: A. Desrez, 1836–1837), XVI, Livre II, Ch. XV, 88. 32 Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144, quotes from the letter of Jean de Pleine. For the traditional dishes served to the guests see Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan, 93–99. She cites: Monique Sommé, “L’alimentation quotidienne à la cour de Bourgogne au XVe siècle,” Bulletin Philologique I (1971): 103–17 and Henri David, “L’hôtel ducal sous Philippe le Bon. Moeurs et coutumes. Les Offices,” Annales de Bourgogne XXXVII (1965): 241–55. Besides the previously cited Pelner Cosman, Fabulous Feasts. Mediaeval Cookery and Ceremony (1976), additional sources are given in her study: Jacques Bourgeat, Les plaisirs de la table en Franc, des Gaulois à nos jours (Paris: Hatchette, 1963); Françoise Burgaud, La cuisine A à Z. Les entrêmets (Paris: Brodard et Taupin, 1975); Barbara Ketcham-Weaton, Savoring the Past. The French Kitchen and Table from 1300 to 1789 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982); Jérôme Frédéric Pichon [Baron] (ed.), Le Ménagier de Paris, traité de morale et d’économie domestique composé vers 1393 par un bourgeois parisien, 2 vols. (Paris: Techener, 1847; rpt. Geneva, 1967); Hardouin de Fontaines Guérin, Le trésor de vénerie [poem composed in 1394], ed. Jérôme Frédéric Pichon (Paris: Techener, 1855). idem., Guillaume Tirel [Taillevent: 1315–1395], Le Viandier, ed. Jérôme Frédéric Pichon (Paris: Pichon et Vicaire, 1892); rpt. Geneva, Slatkine Reprints, 1967). 30

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The 1454 “Feast of the Pheasant” marking the Birthday of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy For the occasion of the Feast of the Pheasant, the Grand Hall of Lille was decorated with a tapestry of the “Life of Hercules,” probably a panel from a set woven sometime after 1430 for Philip the Good (Fig. 11.36). The son of Jupiter who achieved immortality for his twelve labors, was regarded as a remote ancestor of the house of Burgundy Olivier de la Marche referred to Diodorus of Siculus’s Bibliotheca Historica (first century B.C) as a source for the prevailing belief that Hercules visited Burgundy after traveling to the Iberian Peninsula. His sons by a princess named Alisa purportedly became the first kings of Burgundy.33 Hercules founding the Olympic Games survives from a dismantled set of the “Labors of Hercules.” The panel concerns a classical subject but the compositions are “au courant” as the dramatis personae are portrayed in fifteenth-century Burgundian robes and headdresses. The solitary “Hercules” tapestry in the Great Hall at Lille provides a key for interpreting the iconographical programme of the table decorations created for the “Feast of the Pheasant.” At the center of Philip the Good’s Great Hall was the carved image of a nude girl with long hair who stood against a pillar. Rose-water sprayed from her right breast.34 Bearing in mind the impending marriage of Charles the Bold to Isabelle of Bourbon, the figure may have been identified as Psyche, the wife of Cupid. She drank ambrosia given to her by Zeus to become immortal, after completing tasks for the goddess Venus. In the context of entertainments which celebrated the Order of the Golden Fleece, it may be significant that one of Psyche’s labors concerned obtaining golden wool from a flock of grazing sheep. Undoubtedly few of the inebriated chevaliers

La Marche, Mémoires, I, 42–43. The “Hercules Tapestries” have been discussed by Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good , 43–46, who believes Hercules and Jason were linked to the Duke of Burgundy’s crusading and chivalric ideals. Also consult: Marc-René Jung, Hercule dans la littérature française du XVIe siècle. De l’Hercule courtois à l’Hercule baroque (Geneva: Droz, 1966), 30–37; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 126 and notes 71, 72. 34 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 354. Letter of Jean de Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144 (“Hippocras sprayed” from the “right breast” of the “figure of a girl, quite naked...against a pillar”; “live lion who sat near her on a round table in front of my lord the duke.” 33

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attending the ducal banquet would have ventured to drink the “nectar of the gods” from the fountain of Psyche. A live lion stood guard on a round table.35 The beast was an emblem of Flanders, but it also conjured Hercules’ vanquishing of the “Nemean Lion.” Olivier de la Marche recorded all the artifices of the “Feast of the Pheasant.” Four important entrêments were created for Philip the Good’s table of honor.36 The first was a church, which signified the Golden Fleece’s obligation to protect Ecclesia. The edifice contained an organist in its bell tower and opened to display chevaliers and a choir of four chaplains. As a compliment to the sacred architecture and the font of Venus, the second entrêmet consisted of a classical erote urinating rose water into a silver nef. This font of Cupid may have been intended to extol the Duke’s charitable largess. The third entrêmet, an anchored galleon with mariners unloading goods, symbolized a realm’s bounty due to commerce. The ship also recalled Jason’s Argo which sailed from Argos, the home of Hercules’ parents, to Colchis in quest of the Golden Fleece. The fourth entrêmet was an emblematic conceit, a crystal fons vitae with a forest of glass trees and meadow of flowers and precious stones. At the center of the fountain was a small figure of St. Andrew, the patron of the Order of the Toison d’Or. A jet of water issued from a branch of the Apostle’s x-shaped cross, the saltire of Burgundy.37 Behind the table hosted by Charles the Bold was a long window which nearly extended the length of the Great Hall. The glass assuredly reflected the torch lights which illumined the room.38 At the grande table of the Count of Charolais, La Marche, Mémoires, II, 354. Letter of Jean de Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144. 36 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 349–50. 37 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 364–65, “St. Andrew’s Cross.” La Marche, Mémoires, I, 49–50, informs Stephen, the second king of Burgundy, selected the brother of St. Peter as patron while praying during an illness to St. Mary Magdalene. Relics of St. Andrew housed in the monastery of Saint-Victoire at Marseilles may have effected the cure of the legendary ruler who adopted the saltire as his emblem in battle. Purported fragments of St. Andrew’s cross apparently were acquired by Philip the Bold and Philip the Good. These relics were housed in the ducal church of Sainte-Chapelle at Dijon. See Pierre Quarré, “La Toison d’Or,” L’Oeil XLIX (January, 1959): 14–23, 70, at 17. 38 Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 85, states the white glass measuring 46 pieds was the work of the verrier Gossuin de Vieuglise of Lille. She cites Guy Fourquin, Histoire de Lille (Lille: Faculté des Lettres et Sciences humaines de Lille, n.d. 1970s): 421–24. She also mentions, 88, Jehan Scalkin as a possible sculptor of the Naiad because his name is recorded with four companions in the general receipts. See Labord, Les Ducs de Bourgogne, I, 419–29 (No. 1513–1576). 35

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the first entrêmet was a huge pastry which contained twenty-eight musicians and vocalists.39 Throughout the evening they performed in concert with the choir and organ of the chapel on the Duke’s table. A second entrêmet of the grande table was the Château of Lusignan (Fig. 11.37) protected by Mélusine.40 The same castle and fairy appear in the March Calendar Page of the Limbourgs’ Très Riches Heures for Duke Jean de Berry.41 The subject underscored the Valois heritage of the Burgundian house, and also alluded to the upcoming marriage of Charles the Bold and Isabelle of Bourbon. The fairy Mélusine had promised to make Raimondin, prince of Breton, the most powerful nobleman of France if he married her but on the condition that he not see her on Saturday, the day she transformed into a flying dragon. Raimondin’s curiosity resulted in Mélusine’s departure from Lusignan, and his story parallels that of Cupid’s wife, whose inquisitiveness resulted in her husband’s flight. To be reunited, Psyche, like Hercules, performed labors. Only upon the conclusion of these tasks for Venus was she able to attain the high status of an immortal of Olympus. By comparison with the rose-water of the automated fonts of Venus and Cupid, the castle of Lusignan emitted orange-water from fountains in two towers, the Tour Poitevine and the Tour l’Horloge. These turrets were located beneath the Tour Mélusine. At the highest point of the castle, Lusignan’s ever-watchful guardian was a Burgundian counterpart to Jason’s dragon of Colchis and Hercules’s Ladon of the Hesperides. The Limbourg’s folio of March illustrates rural activities appropriate to the month. The remaining seven entremets of Charles the Bold’s table consisted of landscape vignettes, four of which suggest the seasons and several which thematically relate to Hercules. Springtime perhaps was denoted by a windmill with a magpie on one of its vanes which served as a target for archers of different classes (états). The moving wheel (Fig. 11.38) shown in La Marche, Mémoires, II, 351. La Marche, Mémoires, II, 351. 41 See Jean Longnon and Raymond Cazelles, with a preface by Millard Meiss, Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (London: Thames and Hudson Ltd., 1993 edition), 174. Interestingly, a month after the “Feast of the Pheasant,” Louis of Luxembourg, Count of St. Pol, hosted a banquet in Cambrai at the bishop’s Hôtel Épiscopal which was attended by noblilty and important bourgeois. The “Story of Mélusine” dominated the entrêmets. See Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454),50 and note 70, regarding the banquet described by D’Escouchy, Chronique, II, 240. Also consult Jacques Le Goff and Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, “Mélusine maternelle et défricheuse,” Annales, Économies, Sociétés et Civilisations XXVI (1971): 587–622. 39 40

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the context of people drawn from diverse stations might be compared to Renaissance depictions of the “wheel of fortune,” which raises individuals to the highest honors, only to drop them a moment later to the lowest nadir.42 Following the Moulin à Vent was an entrêmet of a rich man seated on a cask in the middle of a vineyard, which logically denoted the vintage season of autumn.43 Olivier de la Marche informs that the celebrator held two beverage glasses, one which contained good and the other bad. His placard reading, “Qui en veult, si en prenne,” elicits the classical subject of “Hercules at the Crossroads.” Two subsequent entrêmets described the harsh terrain of Virtue’s way: a vignette of a desert which illustrated a combat between a tiger and a serpent, beasts which respectively may have signified good and evil; and a savage walking with two camels towards the countryside.44 From these artifices, an La Marche, Mémoires, II, 351–52. La Marche, Mémoires, II, 352. 44 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 352. Wild savages frequently were part of courtly entertainments, as they signified bestial irrationality. In this regard, they were intended to contrast with the rational deportment of skilled knights. See Richard Bernheimer, Wild men in the Middle Ages. A Study in Art, Sentiment, and Demonology (New York: Octagon Books, 1970); idem., Wild men in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1952); Jacques Voisenet, Bêtes et hommes dans le monde médiéval: Le Bestiare des clercs du Ve au XIIe siècle (Paris-Turnout: Brepols, 2000). A dance of five savages covered with candles gave the name to the infamous “Le Bal des Ardents” on January 28, 1393 in the Paris Hôtel de SaintPol, a favored residence of Charles V near the Bastille. This ball ironically followed the August 5, 1392 punitive expedition against the Duke of Brittany, when Charles VI (1368: r. 1380– 1422) in the Mons forest experienced the first of several maniacal fits. The “Bal des Ardents” was held to celebrate the marriage of a lady-in-waiting of Queen Isabeau (1369–1435: m. 1385). In the festivities of the charivari, Charles VI participated in disguise as one of the savages. When approached by his curious brother, Duke Louis d’Orléans (1371–1407), the king’s costume accidentally ignited. He was rescued by Jeanne de Boulogne († 1424), second wife in 1389 of Jean (1340–1416), Duke de Berry. As members of the court looked on in horror, the quick-thinking Duchess wrapped Charles in the train of her dress. The “Bal des Ardents” appears in a miniature of the Chroniques de France, ca. 1450 (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, MS. Fr. 2646, f. 176r, which shows the Duchess of Berry wrapping Charles V in her train. The actual dance of savages is represented as the frontispiece of the Chroniques de Jean Froissart, ca. 1450 (London: MS. Harley 4380, f. 1). Albert Châtelet, L’Áge D’or du Manuscrit à Peintures en France au temps de Charles VI et Les Heures du Maréchal Boucicaut (Dijon: Institut de France, Editions Faton, 2000), 19–20 (“La Folie du Roi” ) and Fig. 7. Châtelet also illustrates (19, Fig. 6) a silverpoint drawing on panel prepared with gesso (New York:Pierpont Morgan Library, MS. M. 346, f. 3v). Attributed to the artist Jean d’Orléans, and dated about 1390, the work shows men costumed as savages and young girls. By the same hand another panel illustrates Charles VI and Queen Isabel in the presence of two men (MS. 42 43

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entrêmet then was displayed which showed the alternate “easy” path of Vice. This entrêmet pertained to the season of summer as it disclosed a laborer thrashing a bush full of birds in the presence of a picnicking chevalier and a dame (Fig. 11.39). Olivier de la Marche explicitly stated that the dame “signified to them the provider who worked ineffectively.” (La dame signifie à leur pourvoyeur qu’il travaille en vain). The lady’s escort might be interpreted, therefore, as a knight errant deflected from his quest.45 Because this vignette follows table decoration which focuses upon good and evil, it may recall in a contemporary context, the ancient subject of “Hercules in servitude to Omphale, Queen of the Lydians.” However, more likely, the woman portrayed diverting the hero from his athloi was intended to be the legendary Princess Alisa of Burgundy. Similar to Duke Philip’s entrêmet of “St. Andrew with his Saltire,” the remaining entrêmets for Charles the Bold’s table must have been composed of glass and mirrors. The season of winter was conjured by a fool mounted on a bear amidst icy, snow-capped mountains.46 The Lille “Feast of the Pheasant” occurred on February 17, ushering in Carnaval. The period of courtly revelries was prelude to Lent, four weeks of fasting and penance in preparation for Holy Week and Easter.47 Despite the glory of his twelve labors, which extended beyond the Peloponnesian world, Hercules performed his deeds as a means of atonement. As made clear by the Delphic oracle at the onset of his athloi (contests), his prize was immortality. The final entrêmet created for Charles the Bold was a nef which sailed on a lake. Reflecting the images of surrounding towns and castles, this vessel perhaps represented Hercules departing from Burgundy. Setting aside the “foolishness” of love

M 346, fol. 2v. See Michael Camille, The Medieval Art of Love. Objects and Subjects of Desire (New York-London: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. and Calmann & King, Ltd., 1998), 32, Fig. 22. He discusses the royal portraits and provides measurements, 13 x 17 cm (5 x 6¼”). Also consult Bernard Guenée, La folie de Charles VI: Roi bien-aimé (Paris: Perrin, 2004). 45 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 352, states: La dame signifie à leur pourvoyeur qui travaille en vain.” 46 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 352. See Douglas J. Gifford, “Iconographical notes towards a Definition of the Medieval Fool,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes XXXVII (1974): 336–42. 47 Julio Caro Baroja, Le Carnaval (Paris: Gallimard, 1979); Harvey Cox, The Feast of Fools. A Theological Essay on Festivity and Fantasy (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969); Claude Gaignebet, Le Carnaval (Paris: Payot, 1974); E. Oliver James, Seasonal Feasts and Festivals (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1963).

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to complete labors which would benefit mankind, he turned the wheel of fortune to his advantage.48 Like Duke Philip’s table of honor, the petite table of lords and ladies was provided with fewer entrêmets than the grande table. However, these decorations also accented Hercules as a paragon for knightly emulation. The first entrêmet was described by Olivier de la Marche as an “Indian forest” populated by strange “creatures” that moved.49 This exotic landscape may have been the Amazon forest of the warrior women ruled by the female “worthy” Queen Hippolyta, whose girdle was won by Hercules and displayed at Argos. The second table decoration included a mechanical lion attached to a tree in a meadow and a savage beating a dog.50 Hunting mastiffs and greyhounds were highly valued during the Renaissance, and sporting treatises contained several chapters devoted to their daily care. The sinister subject of a dogbeating is difficult to address, unless it depicted the capture of a wolf (Fig. 11.40). In Burgundian miniatures the animal symbolizes Louis I of Orléans, whose houppelandes were embroidered with the loup, a French word that provided a phonetic play on his name. A miniature by the Master of the Cité des Dames (Fig. 11.41) shows the Duke wearing such finery as he receives a manuscript written by Christine de Pisan which magnified his image as a second Hector. Louis wears the collar of the Order of the Porcupine. Also known as the Order of the Mail, this chivalric institution was founded in 1394, about the time Louis of Bourbon established the Order of the Golden Shield and Philip the Bold inaugurated the Order of the Golden Tree. Duke Louis was assassinated in 1407 by authorization of Jean the Fearless. Philip the Good’s father in turn was killed in 1419 by Armagnacs under the aegis of the French Dauphin Charles of Bourbon. Beyond their association with the opposing political factions of France and Burgundy, whose discord was indeed reminiscent of a Trojan War, the vignettes of the lion and the dog in the 1454 Feast of the Pheasant additionally might relate to a labor of Hercules. The hero slew a two-headed La Marche, Mémoires, II, 353. La Marche, Mémoires, II, 353. 50 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 353. As pointed out by Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 145, Jacques Du Clercq in his Mémoires, Livre 2, Ch. XV, 88, described the man beating the dog as a savage. Speculating the figure was intended to personify a Turk, she states the banquet at Lille was the first to illustrate proverbs in entrêmets. See Arnold van Gennep, Le Folklore de la Flandre et du Hainaut français (département du Nord), 2 vols. (Paris: Picard, 1935, rpt. Brionne: G. Monfort, 1981). 48 49

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dog which watched over King Geryon’s herd of oxen, but more importantly, his final task was the subduing of the triple-headed Cerberus, the hound of Hades’s portal. This twelfth labor followed Hercules’ taking of the “Golden Apples of the Hesperides” which were guarded by the daughters of the Night and the dragon Ladon. The entrêmet lion chained to a tree within a meadow is a potent emblem of the invulnerable “Lion of Flanders.”51 In combination with the entrêmet of the dog-beating, the setting designed for the beast insinuated the garden of Hesperides with its tree of golden apples. Atlas, the Titan for whom a mountain range in North Africa was named, assisted Hercules in plucking the apples. The third and last table decoration for Philip the Good presented a merchant crossing a village, his back laden with merchandise, a contemporary equivalent of Atlas with the world on his back.52 The theme, like the “Argo” entrêmet, underscored the commercial prosperity of a realm governed by a Burgundian Hercules. Additional entremets were designed for the primary theatrical entertainment of the “Feast of the Pheasant.” They provided the guests with a pertinent analogy of the labors of Hercules and the feats of Jason. Upon the curtained grand hourd, or elevated stage, at one end of the banqueting hall the hystoire de Jason was acted in pantomime. His capture of the Golden Fleece was a central episode in a three-part masque.53 The performance opened with the ringing of clock bells within Philip the Good’s table Church. A single vocalist from that edifice then sang, and he was joined by a flute-playing shepherd from Charles the Bold’s table pastry. Prior to the start of the first act, there were two entremets. Jean de Pleine in his letter of February 22, 1454 states: La Marche, Mémoires, II, 353. Eugenio Garin, Moyen âge et Renaissance, translated by Claude Carme (Paris: Gallimard, 1969), 67; idem., Medioevo e Rinascimento. studi e ricerche (Bari: G. Laterza, 1954). 52 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 354. 53 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 357–61. Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 197–98 provides an excellent synopsis of the entertainment. See William Rothwell, Étude sur les localisations spatiales et temporalles dans les Mémoires d’Olivier de La Marche (Paris: Thesis, Université de Paris, 1951); Paul Zumthor, Le masque et la lumière. La poétique des grand rhétoriqueurs (Paris: Éditorial du Seuil, 1978); Élie Konigson, L’espace théâtral médiéval (Paris: Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1975); Glyne Wickham, The Medieval Theatre (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1974); George Riley Kernodle, From Art to Theatre. Form and Convention in the Renaissance (Chicago: University of Chicago press, 1944); idem., The Theatre in History (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1989). 51

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My lord the duke was served at table by a two-headed horse ridden by two men sitting back to back, each holding a trumpet and sounding it as loud as he could, and then by a monster, consisting of a man riding on an elephant, with another man whose feet were hidden, on his shoulders.54 The conceit of the trumpeters may have signified dual episodes of Hercules which involved horses: the “Augean Stables” and the “Mares of Diomedes.” Olivier de la Marche’s account of the entremets describes the two-headed horse entering the Great Hall in the company of sixteen knights dressed in the black and grey colors of the Duke’s livery.55 After Hercules cleaned the stable of Augeas by diverting the Alpheus and Peneus Rivers, the King of Elis refused to relinquish a tenth of his herds as promised, and expelled the hero and his son Phyleus. Years later, Hercules returned to Elis with an army and instated Phyleus. Pindar in his Olympian Odes (3:16–18) relates that soon after this campaign, Hercules instituted the Greek festival of the Olympic Games. He marked out a stadium near Elis at Olympia and planted an olive tree to shade the precinct and provide victors with a coronet of glory. During the Renaissance age, jousting tournaments and sporting events in the “Herculean” tradition (Fig. 11.42) were held to hone the skills of courtly chevaliers. In their equestrian spectacles, the bridle became symbolic of Temperance and the Aristotelian balance possessed by an ideal warrior. Again, a precedent for Duke Philip’s knights of the Golden Fleece was set by Hercules. After taming and harnessing the wild mares of the Thracian King Diomedes, son of Ares, he transported them to Argos, Jason’s homeland. In the Lille entrêmet, the trumpeters seated Janus-like on a horse with two heads, obviously had to move sideways. Providing comic relief in the program of entertainments, their clumsy antics would have contrasted with the measured coordination of sixteen chevaliers of the Golden Fleece. When the group of knights reached the stage, the buffoon-equestrians sounded their trumpets. The organ of the table Church played in unison with a German horn blower from table pâté. Olivier de la Marche describes in his account the sudden appearance of a monster, luytin (golbin-like; lutin), bearded and disfigured, on the body of a man and on hairy griffin legs. Holding two 54 55

See Letter of Jean de Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144. La Marche, Mémoires, II, 356.

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arrow shafts and a target, his shoulders supported an acrobat with his feet in the air. They transversed the Great Hall on the back of a wild boar.56 La Marche’s identification of a sanglier rather than an elephant proves that the entrêmet which opened the first act of the “Story of Jason” differed from that observed by Jean le Peine. Because the monster “luytin“was part human and griffin, perhaps he was designed to represent the Minotaur of the famed labyrinth at Crete.57 The mad “Cretan Bull” King Minos refused to sacrifice to Poseidon was roped by Hercules and later killed at Marathon by Theseus the Minotaur-slayer. The fierce “Erymanthian Boar” also was taken alive by Hercules. Driven into a snow-drift and trapped with nets, both this beast and the “Cretan Bull,” were presented to Eurystheus of Tiryns, the ruler for whom Hercules performed his labors. Following the opening entremets, chanters sang in the table Church and two flutists played in the table pastry. The curtains of the stage then opened simultaneously with the sounding of four trumpets. The first of three Mistères pertaining to Jason was then performed in pantomime. Armed with a lance and a sword, the actor who played the hero had to perform a “labor” demanded by Aeëtes, ruler of Colchis: the yoking of two flame-breathing bulls to a plough (Fig. 11.43). Jason’s bulls were not subdued by weapons, but by a potion given to the hero by Medea. The first “mystery” concluded with motet and organ music. Three vocalists from the table pastry sang “La sauvegarde de ma vie.” Medea had acquired her arcane knowledge of sorcery from the enchanted grove of Hecate (Fig. 11.44). After the first act, another automaton entered the Great Hall, a white stag with golden horns. According to La Marche, the hind was covered with silver-gilt silk and ridden by a young boy who sang, “Je ne veiz oncques la pareille.” 58 The white stag would have related to another of Hercules’ labors, the “Cerynean Hind.” The miraculous animal of Arcadia, which was sacred to Artemis, was pursued by Hercules to the northern limits of the world. He finally caught the stag by wounding it with an arrow as it crossed the Ladon River. The story of the hind, which dealt with the conquest of death, had a quadrapartite association with: the popular legends of Sts. Julian, Eustache and Giles; the hunt of King Clovis;

La Marche, Mémoires, II, 356–57. Gilbert Lascault, Le monstre dans l’art occidental. un problème esthétique (Paris: Klincksieck: 1973). 58 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 359. 56 57

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the mystical unicorn of Franco-Flemish lore; and the fenced stag of Duchess Isabel of Burgundy’s empresa.59 La Marche, however, mentions only this single entrêmet, when paired entremets marked the opening and closing of the Jason theatrical. Jean le Pleine’s letter of February 22, 1454 supports including a second entrêmet following Act I of the Jason pantomime. After describing a “monster” who rode an elephant, Le Pleine used words which implied sequential action: “Next came a white stag ridden by a young boy who sang marvelously, while e the stag accompanied him with the tenor part.”60 The youth perhaps was intended to represent Hylas, the son of Theodmas, and beloved friend of Hercules. When the Argo docked at Cios in Asia Minor, Hylas was sent to obtain water for the Argonauts. Captivated by his beauty, the Naiads pulled him into their pond. Hercules searched in vain for the lost boy, spending so much time that his fellow Argonauts were forced to depart without him and he was forced to return on his own to Argos. Hercules’ voyage back to Greece had many parerga. These side adventures included not only the sublimation of irrational beasts but also the conquest The miraculous white stag which guided King Clovis in battle (and also Charlemagne) had been adopted as an emblem by King Charles VI of France. The same emblematic motif of the “winged stag” was retained by Charles VII. The famous miniature by Jean Fouquet of The Trial of the Duke of Vendôme from Boccaccio’s On the Fates of Famous Men, ca. 1458 (Munich: Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Codice. Gall. 6, frontispiece), shows a “Hall of Justice.” Hung from the ceiling on two sides of the room are tapestries distinguished by broad bands of green, white and red. Besides the colors of Charles VII, the panels display large rampant white stags. The paired winged beasts dramatically face each other. See Chastel, French Art. The Renaissance, 68, and Jean Bernard de Vaivre, “Les cerfs ailés de la tapisserie de Rouen,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts (October: 1982): 93–108; Michael Bath, The Image of the Stag: Iconographic Themes in Western Art (Baden-Baden: V. Koerner, 1992); P. Martin, “La Tapisserie royale des ‘cerfs volants’,” Bulletin Monumental CV (1947): 197–208; JeanBernard de Vaivre, “Les Cerfs aillés et la tapisserie de Rouen,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts C, No. 2 (1982): 93–108. For the life of Clovis, see St. Gregory, Bishop of Tours (538–594), History of the Franks [Historia Francorum], selections translated and edited by Ernest Brehaut (New York: Columbia University Press, 1916), Book II, No. 27–43, 36–50 (rpt. New York: Norton Publishers, 1969); Jules Marie Édouard Viard (ed.), Les Grandes Chroniques de France (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, 1920), Book I, Ch. XV–XXV, 54–92. Regarding the six “History of Clovis” tapestries woven in Tournai during the 1450s for Philip the Good, see Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 55–63; Louis Paris, Toiles peintes et tapisseries de la ville de Reims; ou, La mise en scène du théâtre des Confrères de la passion, 2 vols. (Paris: Le Vte H. de Bruslart, 1843), II, 1059–1085; Marguerite Sartor, Les tapisseries, toiles peintes & broderies de Reims, with a preface by Jules Guiffrey (Reims: L. Michaud, 1912). 60 See Letter of Jean de Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144. 59

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of colossal brutes.61 As recounted by Le Marche, the “monster luytin” in the “Feast of the Pheasant” rode a wild boar and supported an acrobat with his “feet in the air.” By contrast, the figure atop Le Pleine’s elephant-riding monster was accompanied by “another man, whose feet were hidden, on his shoulders.” This description, though brief, suggests the elephant-rider was contrived to be a giant The Lille banquet occurred during the pre-Lenten period of Carnaval. Giants and dwarfs frequently participated in such annual revelries at the Burgundian court.62 Virgil in his eighth book of the Aeneid narrates a story about Hercules which is relevant to the “monster” entrêmet described by Le Pleine. After visiting southern France, Hercules journeyed to Italy where he deflected the arrows of Ligurians before encountering a crafty giant. This son of Vulcan was a fire-breathing cave-dweller on the Aventine Hill beside the Tiber River, the future site of Rome. Living by his brigandage, Cacus made the mistake of stealing some of Geryon’s herd. When Hercules discovered the theft, he tracked the poacher to his lair, throttled him, and recovered his cattle. Like Hercules, Hannibal had passed through the Alps during the Punic Wars, only his men rode upon the backs of elephants. This historical crossing of the mountain range would explain the selection of a pachyderm as the mount of La Pleine’s monster . If the “elephant-rider” Cacus appeared before the white stag in the Lille entertainments, it would have followed Jason’s subjugation of fire-breathing oxen, and drawn an appropriate analogy to Hercules’ labor of the “Cattle of Geryon.” In the wake of this task on the island of Erythia, the hero sailed to Tartessus (Spain) and created the “Pillars” marking the western end of the Mediterranean world, the rocks of Calpe 61 For the diverse giants combatted by Hercules, see Mark P.O. Morford and Robert J. Lenardon, Classical Mythology (New York: McKay Publishers, 1971). Consult amplified 2nd ed., 1977, Ch. 10 (Heracles), 353–75. 62 René Meurant, “Étude des géants processionals,” Moeurs et traditions populaires XV, No. 2 (Paris: 1967): 119–60; idem., Contribution à l’étude des géants processionnels et de cortège dans le Nord de La France, la Belgique et les Pays-Bas (Paris, G-P. Maisonneuve et Larose, 1960); idem., Géants de Wallonie (Gembloux: J. Duculot, 1975); idem., Géants processionnels et de cortège en Europe, en Belgique, en Wallonie (Brussels: Ministère de la Culture Française, 1979). Also consult: Jacques Heers, Fêtes, jeux et joutes dans les sociétés d’Occident à la fin du Moyen Age (Montréal-Paris: Institut d’Études Médiévales-Librairie J. Vrin, 1971); idem., Fêtes des fous et carnavals (Paris: Fayard, 1983); Josette Britte-Ashford, Le Théatre populaire en Bourgogne au XVe siécle (Provo, UT: Ph.D. Dissertation, Brigham Young University, 1972); Douglas David Roy Owen, The Wandering Giant in Literature: From Polyphemus to Papageno (East Linton, Scotland: Tuckwell, 2003).

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(Gibraltar) and Abyla (Ceuta). The Lille entrêmets of the “Cacus ElephantRider” and the White Stag,” were followed by a motet performed by the chaplains of the table Church and a duet from a lute-player and singer in the table pastry. Trumpets then sounded on the stage to announce the second Mistère of Jason: the subduing of the dragon of Colchis, the eternally-alert guardian of the Golden Fleece. This automaton must have been magnificent, as flames and smoke issued from its mouth and nostrils. With the aid of Medea’s magical herbs, Jason drugged the beast into deep sleep. The second “mystery” concluded with the capture of the ram skin, and the dragon of Colchis would have been shown slumbering on the stage as the curtains closed. Olivier de la Marche then describes a second dragon, vermillion in color, which flew around the Great Hall. The beast of this entrêmet perhaps was the nine-headed Lernaean Hydra, which Hercules dispatched near Argos. The automaton is recorded to have disappeared suddenly from the banqueting chamber, probably by means of a trap door designed to simulate the marshy environment of the water serpent. Another entrêmet followed. From a high corner of the stage, a live heron was released as falconers emerged. Two peregrines were released. One flew over the spectators and another struck the heron. The quarry was presented to the Duke. This interlude might have been intended to recollect the “Stymphalian Birds of Arcadia,” which had feathers that they expelled like arrows. Hercules used brazen castanets given to him from Pallas Athena to frighten the creatures from the woods before he shot them.63 Pursuant to this symbolical bird hunt, chaplains of the table Church sang as three tambourines were shaken by the musicians in the table pastry. Trumpets sounded on the stage, and the third and final Mistère of Jason was enacted. Having pulled the dragon’s teeth, Jason was portrayed in pantomime laboring in a field, plowing with his tamed bulls and sowing the ground with teeth drawn from the dragon of Colchis. From trap doors of the elevated stage, armed men supposedly rose from the soil, to fight under the direction of their creator. This unusual subject of Jason’s legend must have been included to equate the armoured knights of the Order of the Golden Fleece with the sharp “teeth” of the ever-vigilant dragon. The “mystery” ended with organ music from the Chapel, sounds of the chase and poachers’ calls from the pastry, and a trumpet blast from the stage. The D’Arcy Wentworth Thompson, Glossary of Greek Birds (New York: Oxford University Press, 1936), 273 (2nd ed., Hildesheim, Olms: 1966). 63

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Lille banquet of 1454 continued with four significant entertainments: the entrêmet of “Holy Church”; the “Vow of the Pheasant”; the mystère of “God’s Grace”; and a Masque wherein the entire court danced to music until four in the morning.64 The entrance of Sainte-Église truly must have startled the audience as she was portrayed seated within a castle tower atop an elephant. This massive automation was led into the Great Hall by Hance, a giant employed by the Duke of Burgundy, who wore a turban to designate his status as the “Saracen of Granada.”65 Olivier de la Marche assumed the role of Ecclesia, providing over a hundred lines of verse. Addressing the noble compaignie, he stated that the “Holy Church” had traveled from afar to the banquet in hopes of ending the adversity in Constantinople.66 At this point, and concurrent with supplications by noble ladies, “Toison d’Or” signified by the King of Arms, Jean Lefèvre de Saint-Rémy, entered the Great Hall. He was accompanied by Yolande, the illegitimate daughter of Philip the Good, Isabella of Neufchastel, and two, Jean de Crequy and Simon de Lalaing.67 The Lord of Saint-Rémy carried a large pheasant in his hands and it was Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 198–99. 65 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 368. Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 155, points out Goliath was a biblical counterpart to the “Saracen” played by Hance. In a chivalric context, King Arthur also supposedly battled a giant on Mount St. Michel. Jean de Pleine did not confuse pachyderms in his dispatch of February 22, 1454, as he referred to two elephants. As discussed, the first supported a monster-giant. The second was “an elephant…carrying a castle in which sat Holy Church, who made piteous complaint on behalf of the Christians persecuted by the Turks, and begged for help.” See Letter of Jean de Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 144–45. 66 La March, Mémoires, II, 340 (Olivier de la Marche’s role as “Holy Church”), 361–63 (allegorical entrêmet) and 363–66 (verses). See Georges Doutrepont, “Épître à la Maison de Bourgogne sur la croisade turque projetée par Philippe le Bon, 1464,” Analectes pur servir à l’histoire ecclésiastique de la Belgique XXXII (Louvain: 3rd série, 1906): 144–95; Armand Grunzweig, “Le Grand Duke du Ponant,” Le Moyen Âge LXII (1956): 119–65. 67 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 366–67 (pheasant); 381–94 (oaths). See Jean Le Fèvre de Saint-Rémy [† 1468], Chronique de Jean Le Févre, seigneur de Saint-Remy, transcribed from a manuscript in the Bibliothèque de Boulogne-sur-Mer, 2 vols. ed. François Morand (Paris: Société de l’Histoire de France, Librairie Renouard, H. Loones, 1876–1881), II, 154–55, mentions Portuguese entrêmets planned by Henrique the Navigator for the wedding feast of his brother Duarte and Leonor of Aragon. Isabel, Duchess of Burgundy, attended these festivities at Coimbra in September of 1428. The Saint-Rémy reference is provided by Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en bourgogne au XV e siècle. Le banquet du Faisan (1454), 48 and note 57, who cites Luiz Francisco Rebello, Entremés, in Enciclopedia dello Spettacola (Rome: 64

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adorned with a “very rich collar of gold,” inset with rubies and pearls.”68 Speaking to the assembled guests, he remarked about the ancient tradition of professing a vow upon a noble bird at grans festes et nobles assemblées. And, with further pleas by Sainte-Église, Philip the Good wrote a statement to be read by the King-of-Arms. Jean de Pleine commented in his account of the banquet: It was understood that, if the King [of France] would go on crusade, the duke would follow him in person and with all his power. If the king did not go, but sent a royal prince instead, the duke would obey him; and if the king neither went, nor sent anyone, but other princes went, he would go with them provided the lands were at peace. If, when he was there, the Turk challenged him to single combat, my lord the duke would accept.69 The selection of a pheasant at a grand banquet celebrating the heroism of Jason and the capture of the Golden Fleece was apposite. According to the Etymologie of Isidore of Seville (560–636), the bird’s eponymous origin was the Phasis River which flows into the Black Sea. The watercourse was near ancient Colchis.70 Clearly Duke Philip the Good’s pronouncement upon a live pheasant concerned not only his plans for leading a new crusade against the Ottoman Turks, but also the recapture Constantinople.71 The titled lords 1957), IV, cols. 1512–13. Also consult Luiz Francisco Rebello, O primitivo teatro português (Lisbon: Ministério de Educação, Instituto de Cultura e Lingua Portuguesa; Amadora: Livraria Bertrand, 1984, 2nd ed.). Yolande of Burgundy married Jean d’Ailly, Lord of Picquigny in 1456. See Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 330–31. 68 Letter of Jean le Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 145. 69 Letter of Jean le Pleine, cited by Vaughan, Philip the Good of Burgundy, 145. 70 Smith, The Artistic Patronage of Philip the Good, 142–49, discusses the “Feast of the Pheasant,” and gives the pertinent source, 144, in Isidore of Seville’s Etymologiae, Bk XII, 7:49. He refers to Isidori Hispalensis Episcopi Etymologiarvm sive originvm libri XX, ed. W.M. Lindsay (Oxonii: E Typographeo Clarendoniano; New York: Oxford University Press, 1911) reprinted 1971 and 1985. Smith additionally mentions, 144 note 65, Edward III of England made a “Voeu du Heron,” at the beginning of the Hundred Years War. See Raoul Lefèvre [fl. 1460], L’histoire de Jason. Eine Roman aus dem Fünfzehnten Jahrdundert, ed. Gert Pinkernell (Frankfurt-am-Main: Athenäum-Verlag, 1971); Marie Tanner, The Last Descendant of Aeneas: The Hapsburgs and the Mythic Image of the Emperor (New Haven-London: Yale University Press, 1993), 11–19, 52–59. 71 Jules Finot, Projet d’Expedition contre les Turcs preparé par les Conseilleurs du Duc de Bourgogne, Philippe le Bon (Janvier 1457) (Lille: Impr. de L. Danel, 1890); Armand Grunzweig,

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of Burgundy responded to the bold challenge of a quest issued by their lord. They too swore oaths on the bird, demonstrating their loyalty as latter-day Argonauts of a “second Jason.” For their vows, they were thanked by SainteÉglise. Guided by Hance, the elephant left the chamber, as torchbearers entered followed by players of tambourines, lutists and harpists. The pledges made by noble knights assuredly had a genesis in the late fourteenthcentury tapestries illustrating the story of Porus and the “Nine Worthies” (Figs. 11.45–11.46). Commissioned by Philip the Bold and Charles VI, the panels were accompanied by a set of nine feminine counterparts. Written by Thomas Saluces for Duke Louis d’Orléans, Le Chevalier Errant illustrated by the Master Cité des Dames, an artist patronized by Christine de Pisan (1363–1429), the same “Nine Worthies” are represented in contemporary courtly attire. The neuf preuses (Fig. 11.47–11.48) are transformed into courtly ladies bearing heraldic arms associated with the traditional regalia of tournaments and battles. The procession of the nine female “Worthies” embodies a basic concept emphasized in the writings of Christine de Pisan, and understood well by Duchess Isabel, namely, that women have the power to intervene in altering the course of history. The collective oath-taking by Philip the Good’s knights underscores the same intercessory role of women in changing fortune. Following the proclamation of vows, the Mystère de Grâce-Dieu appeared in the Great Hall. Dressed in a white satin gown and a black mantle à guise de religieuse,” she was escorted by twelve knights, who walked with maidens personifying virtues. Identifying the brief held by each demoiselle, the “Grace of God” described Faith, Charity, Justice, Reason, Prudence, Temperance, Fortitude, Truth, Magnanimity, Diligence, Hope and Valour.72 Grâce-Dieu presented these virtues to Duke Philip as “necessary to the perfection of his ascendancy.” 73 Though the specific theme of the solitary tapestry of Hercules displayed in Philip the Good’s Great Hall of the Hôtel de la Salle in Lille may never be “Philippe le Bon et Constantinople,” Byzantion XXIV (1954): 47–61; Constantin Marinesco, “Philippe le Bon, Duc de Bourgogne et la croisade, deuxième partie (1453–1467),” Bulletin des Études Portugaises et de l’Institut Français au Portugal, XIII (1949): 3–28; Yvon Lacaze, “Philippe le Bon et les terres d’Empire, la diplomatie bourguignonne à l’oeuvre en 1454– 1455,” Annales de Bourgogne XXXVI (1964): 81–121; “Politique ‘méditerranéenne’ et projets de croisade chez Philippe le Bon: de la chute de Byzance à la victoire chrétienne de Belgrade (mai 1453–juillet 1456),” Annales de Bourgogne XLI (1969): 5–42, 81–132. 72 La Marche, Mémoires, II, 372–78. 73 Morford and Lenardon, Classical Mythology (1977 edition), 371.

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known, the panel probably illustrated the hero’s apotheosis rather than one of his twelve labors. Such an illustrious subject would have dovetailed GrâceDieu’s promise of divine rewards to the virtuous. As Pindar eloquently states in his Ishmian Ode (4: 61–67): To Olympus went Alcmena’s son when he had explored every land and the cliff-girt levels of the foaming sea, to tame the straits for seafarers. Now beside Zeus he enjoys a perfect happiness; he is loved and honored by the immortals; Hebe is his wife, and he is lord of a golden palace, the husband of Hera’s daughter.74 When Grâce-Dieu retired from the assembly in the Great Hall, the ladies personifying the “virtues” removed the banderoles attached to their shoulders and with their twelve knights proceeded to dance “en guise de mommeries” until the early hours of the morning. Somehow the merrymakers at this festivity were sufficiently sober by the next evening to partake in still another chivalric banquet. The Mémoires of Olivier de la Marche inform that the Fête du Faisan was preceded by a January 14, 1454 gala banquet at the Hôtel d’Adolph de Clèves in Lille, which was hosted by Jean, Duke of Cleves.75 Though on a substantially smaller scale than Philip the Good’s extravaganza, some of the court engineers and painters may have been called upon to provide entremets and scenic decorations. Though the table sets remain unknown, a dramatic tableau was presented to amuse the guests, and it was based upon the Rhenish story of the “Swan Knight.” However, instead of mime actors, the principal parts were given to significant figures at the Burgundian court. Adolph of Cleves played the part of Lohengrin, and stood in a large boat with billowing sails drawn by a swan automaton. Joining him in the vessels were Philip’s sons, Charles the Bold and Anthony the Grand Bastard. The same spectacle of the “Swan Knight” was re-enacted at the second banquet hosted by the Cleve family the day after Philip the Good’s celebrated “Feast of the Pheasant.”

74 75

Morford and Lenardon, Classical Mythology (1977 edition), 371. La Marche, II, Mémoires, 342.

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In the Company of St. Thekla: A Last Glimpse of the Portuguese Infanta Olivier de la Marche’s selection of two elephants for the “Feast of the Pheasant” provided a significant metaphor of the Burgundian Duke’s aspirations. One pachyderm displayed the castle of Sainte-Église, but the other was ridden by a “monster.” Though the elephant was a traditional symbol of Chaste Ecclesia, it also was associated with the Carthaginian army of Hannibal, which Scipio Africanus conquered. The 1454 “Feast of the Pheasant” has been linked specifically with Philip the Good’s goal of sending military forces to the Levant. Acting the part of a “Saracen of Granada,” the giant Hance in the context of the panoply of entertainments at Lille additionally alluded to the ongoing Portuguese conflict with North Africa. Spearheaded by Prince Henrique the Navigator, the first campaign to Ceuta in 1415 was undertaken with the pretext of defending Christianity against Islam, but the underlying goal of the engagement was to expand Lusitanian commercial foothold beyond the perimeters of the Mediterranean. The second Moroccan campaign of 1436, again advocated by Henrique, was an unsuccessful venture. Like the 1396 defeat of Jean the Fearless at Nicopolis, which kept Philip the Good’s “lamp of resolve” burning for a holy crusade in the tradition of Godefrey de Bouillon, the catastrophe at Tangier a century later was the oil which fueled the Portuguese determination to mount another expedition after Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. Prince Henrique died on November 13, 1460 at Sagres, where he had transferred about 1443, but his chivalric ideals were transmitted to his nephew Afonso V (1432: r. 1448–1481) who reinforced the citadel of Ceuta in 1457 with the intention of planning an attack against the Merinid king of Fez at Alcácer-Seguer (Al-Quasr as-saghir/Field of the Three Kings). Departing from the port of Setúbal at the end of September in 1458 to strategize with Henrique at Sagres, Afonso remained in Lagos to await the fleet of 220 galleons from Porto and the Mondego. The monarch and 25,000 cavalry men sailed for North Africa on October 17, arriving at Alcácer-Seguer on October 21. The city was captured after a two-day siege, but with great losses. Not until 1471 were the Portuguese able to muster the reinforcements to take the jewel cities of the Moroccan kingdom, Arzila and Tangier.76 Bailey W. Diffie and George D. Winius, Foundations of the Portuguese Empire 1415– 1580 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Europe and the World in the Age of 76

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Perhaps as an ex-voto for the 1458 victory at Alcácer-Seguer, and with hopes for eventual success in future campaigns, Afonso V ordered workmen to commence work on a delayed project of the Lisbon Cathedral, the new “Chapel of St. Vincent.” In the final phase of its decoration, this sanctuary commemorated Portugal’s epical conquest of North Africa (Fig. 11.49). About 1462 João Eanes began to direct artisans in the bell tower of the Romanesque Sé, and this initial construction of the chapel must have concerned the altar’s reliquary, a replacement to the free-standing alabaster casket of the capela mór.77 The best descriptions of the St. Vincent reliquary are provided in seventeenth-century documents. António Coelho Gasco in the first part of his 1625 treatise Das Antiguidades de Muy Nobre Cidade de Lisboa Imporio do Mundo, e Princeza do Mar Occeano comments: This glorious Deacon St. Vincent was placed in the main chapel in a large silver coffer which could have a price of three thousand cruzados, and it is adorned in bas-relief. On one side of the coffer is the figure of a Deacon adorned with an excellently tooled Dalmatic and covered with costly silver flower ornaments. [The casket] … is placed on four angels among clouds, who are supporting it with hands held in the air. They are on one side, while on the other corresponding side, there is an angel with large wings and the royal shield in the form of a heart, and with thirteen castles forming an aureole. Beneath this is the altar for Mass, located in the main chapel of the Epistle side, in front of the royal tomb of King Afonso IV, who defeated the King of Granada, with all the Moors in Spain, during the famous battle of Salado [1340], and who was to be buried in this main chapel, in the [illegible] bridge of the Evangelium [Gospel side], in front of this glorious martyr, accompanying him with

Expansion Series, Vol. I, 1977), 110 (Bailey W. Diffie); Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, Documentos sôbre a expansão portuguêsa, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Editorial Gleva, 1943–1956), III (1956), 240–45 (statistics of Alcácer-Seguer). 77 Vitor Serrão discovered a document in the Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa, códice 208, folios 6–56, which indicates the renewal of activity on the tomb: Manuel Pereira de Sottomayor, Cathalogo dos Priores da Igreja da S. Miguel de Contra em Que Se Conthem Algunas Antiguidades da Mesma Villa, 1666. The account states: “No ano de 1462 sedo Arçebispo dom Ao Nogueira mandou o Vor que tiras esmollas pa as obras da Capa do martyr S. Viçente da see e aos que as desem se lhe conçedi quorenta dias de perdo.”

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devotion and remembering him in life, taking him as advocate in death.78 An account in the História Ecclesiástica da Igreja de Lisboa (1642) by Dom Rodrigo da Cunha, Archbishop of Lisbon (1577–1643), is more informative. Paralleling Coeho Gasco’s testimony, he relates the reliquary was situated on the Epistle side of the main chapel in the Sé of Lisbon, and substantiates it was constructed in a vertical format as the center of a retable. Cunha additionally informs the tiers of the capela-mór displayed sixteen narrow pictures of “miracles” pertaining to Vincent’s hagiography. Inscribed with Latin verses, these subsidiary works that hung above the chairs of the canons should not be conflated with the panels attributed to Nuno Gonçalves in the Museu Nacional da Arte Antiga. Discovered by José Saraiva, Cunha’s narrative expounds: The place, that today holds the sacred artifact [bones of St. Vincent], is in the same capela mór [main chapel], in the side of the Epistle, slightly beneath the steps of the altar, in the area and setting of the chapel itself, between the first and second steps, corresponding to the glorious tombs of Kings Dom Afonso IV [1291–May 1357] and Dona Brites, his wife [1293–1359, daughter of Sancho IV of Castile]. The Saint’s altar rises in this area, and bears the Altarpiece with his image appearing in the middle, with the palm leaf of a martyr in his right hand, and the não [galleon] in which he was brought, on the left. The other Altarpiece panels show unique paintings of various of the Saint’s miracles, depicting the main events of his life and martyrdom. On the ledge or cymatium, there is a tomb of eight to nine palms [in length], along the length of the altar, sustained by four angels, two at the top and two at the foot of the tomb, so burdened by the weight.… On the other side, more than half of the tomb projects into the wall of the main chapel.… The part of the tomb facing the capela mór is covered with a gracious, antique wooden exterior, carved and gilded with great care. Within we find the image of the António Coelho Gasco, Das Antiguidades de Muy Nobre Cidade de Lisboa Imporio do Mundo, e Princeza do Mar Occeano [1625] (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, 1924): 207–208. 78

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Saint made of silver, resting on pillows, in the position of a dead person. On the days [feasts] of the Saint this can be viewed, when the frontal hiding it is lifted. Behind the Saint there is another silver exterior, corresponding to the wooden exterior, richly appointed and attached to a wooden coffin, protecting another of precious stones. All this is held together with a large number of heavy silver fascia, attached by the lower extremity, which guard and become the sanctuary of this most precious treasure that enriches and provides nobility to the City of Lisbon. That is, without any doubt, the reason why the glorious King Afonso Henriques I ordered it to be kept there, as seen by the antiquity of the artifact and the respect this City has always shown it, not daring to touch it or to perform any woodwork, so that it could be improved with costly metals, as the City has often wanted to do, always resisting its pious attempts with religious persuasion, with a sacred horror, persuaded that all other materials and instruments would be less appropriate than the antique and venerable ones, and therefore would be less sumptuous than when the work was first received by the religious and magnificent King Afonso Henriques. The Altarpiece continues forming a dome over the burial site. The inside is adorned with stars and the outside with silver work, showing various pyramids and castles as in the façade work, until it fades into the arched roof with an adornment of angels holding crowns and other insignias of the order of Saint…79 Eanes’s sculptural ensemble may have resembled a Reliquary of the Holy Trinity and Six Saints (Fig. 11.50) which was offered by King João III (1521–1557) and Queen Catherine of Austria to the Church of St. Andrew in Antwerp. The silver and gilt casket containing relics of six saints is supported by three angels and adorned with cherubim seated beneath the eye of God. Attributes of two virgin saints of royal blood are featured: the spiked wheel and sword of St. Catherine of Alexandria; and the tower of St. Barbara. Nestled amidst the palm fronds designating their martyrdom, are acorns and irises, traditional emblems of endurance and self-sacrifice, as well José de Saraiva, Os Painéis do Infante Santo (Lisbon: 1926). My thanks are given to Hilde Novais, Georgetown University, Department of Languages and Linguistics, for her assistance in the translation. 79

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as other insignia, inter alia, crowns and scepter of majesty, an ecclesiastical miter and the Burgundian saltire of St. Andrew. The Antwerp casket proves the extraordinary skill of silversmiths in Renaissance Portugal. Study of its design provides at least a perception of the lost prototype in the Lisbon Cathedral that so astounded visitors to the St. Vincent Chapel. In one basic aspect, however, the reliquary of Portugal’s Sé differed from that of the Flemish Church of St. Andrew. Upon the silver case containing the relics the sculpted image of Vincent recollected his tranquil death upon a bed after enduring numerous torments. Strewn with flowers, the blanket covering the martyr’s body clearly summoned the memory of biblical sacrifices having a fragrance pleasing to God, including that of the crucified Christ whose garden sepulchre was attended by angels. Unlike the Ghent Altarpiece begun by Hubrecht van Eyck and completed by his brother with such a mastery of touch that arguments continue to abound regarding their respective contributions, scientific analysis has proven panels of the St. Vincent Polyptych were reworked80 when João Eanes retired in 1471 and relinquished the project to Nuno Gonçalves, court painter on July 20, 1450.81 Probably the older master completed the framework, centerpiece reliquary and under drawings of the altarpiece. Dagoberto Markl has argued for a vertical arrangement of fifteen panels, with a lost painting 80 Ana Paula Abrantes et al., Nuno Gonçalves, novos documentos. Estudo da pintura portuguesa do Séc. XV (Lisbon: Instituto Português de Museus/Reproscan, 1994), 61–89. The literature about the altarpiece is extensive, but among the classic texts are: José de Figueiredo, Arte Portuguesa Primitiva: O pintor Nuno Gonçalves (Lisbon: 1910); Adriano de Gusmão, Nuno Gonçalves (Lisbon: Artis, 1958); Reynaldo dos Santos, Nuno Gonçalves: The Great Portuguese Painter of the 15th Century and his Altar-Piece for the Convent of St. Vincent, with a foreward by Anthony Blunt, translated by Lucy Norton (New York-London: Phaidon Press Publishers, 1955). 81 Document Antt. Chancelaria do Rei D. Afonso V, Bk. 11, f. 139, cited by Joaquim de Sousa Viterbo, Noticia de alguns pintores portuguezes e de outros que, sendo estrangeiros, exerceram a sua arte em Portugal; memoria apresentada á Academia real das sciencias de Lisboa (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1889), I, 88–89; idem., Dicionário histórico e documental dos arquitectos, engenheiros e construtores portugueses, ed. Pedro Dias, 3 vols. (Lisbon: Impresa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1988; 1st and 2nd ed., 3 vols, Lisbon, Impresa Nacional, 1899–1922); Virgilio Correia, Pintores Portuguêses dos siglos XV e XVI (Coimbra: Imprensdade, 1928), 40; Lita Scarletti, Nuno Gonçalves. Cavaleiro da Casa d’el rei e su pintor (Lisbon: 1970). 82 Dagoberto Markl, O rétabulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os documentos (Lisbon: Caminho, 1988), especially 55–81. Also consult Theresa Schedel de Castello Branco. Os Painéis de St. Vincente de Fora. As Chaves do Mistério (Lisbon: Quetzal Editores, 1994); Anne

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of the Transfer of St. Vincent’s Relics as a pinnacle subject.82 Even a speculative arrangement of the extant works suggests a formidable polyptych (Fig. 11.51). The centerpiece silver gisant of St. Vincent may have been flanked by two extant panels that pertained to the deacon’s suffering before death (Fig. 11.52): St. Vincent tortured on the Cross, which survives as a fragment; and St. Vincent bound to a Column.83 Four panels displayed saints seated against patterned silk fabric tinctured Avis green: the paired figures of Peter and Paul, as well as Francis of Assisi holding a processional cross with the crucified Christ, and Theotonis with a miter and crosier.84 The six paintings in the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga present a stunning array of royal, courtly and ecclesiastical figures from different epochs of history, beginning with the Reconquest of Afonso Henriques I and concluding with Afonso V and the taking of Tangier 85 (Figs. 11.53– 11.54). The entire assembly venerates the standing effigies of Saints Vincent of Saragossa and Thekla, both resplendently attired in scarlet and gold embroidered vestments. Identification of the secular portraits, and even the F. Francis, Voyage of Re-Discovery. The Veneration of Saint Vincent (Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1979). 83 The panels respectively measure 209 x 41 cm and 209 x 41 cm. The St. Vincent Altarpiece was dismantled after Philip II (1527–1589) ascended the throne of Portugal in 1582 under the supervision of Albert of Austria (1559–1621), who served as his uncle’s viceroy in Lisbon for a decade. Philip II’s matrilineal lineage vis-à-vis Empress Isabel of Portugal (1503– 1539), the daughter of King Manuel I r. 1495–1521), was the basis for his elevation by the Portuguese Cortes in Tomar. He would not have intended a permanent removal of ancestral portraits, but practically would have wished the polyptych cleaned, the framework regilded and the reliquary silverwork polished. The panels were reinstalled by 1614. The Memorial de Pero Roĩz Soares comprises records which date between 1565 and 1628. One relevant entry in 1620 by Padre Diogo Pires Cinza recounts one of the high panels belonging to the St. Vincent Altarpiece fell down in 1614. Described as a painting “nailed to the side” of the retable, the work plausibly was the only fragmented St. Vincent on the Cross. M. Lopes de Almeida (ed.), Memorial de Pero Roĩz Soares (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, 1953), 406; Adriano de Gusmão, Nuno Gonçalves, 14–15, No. 32 and Dagoberto Markl, O rétabulo de S. Vicente da Sé de Lisboa e os documentos, 221. 84 The measurements of the paintings are: St. Peter (1.36 x .80 cm); St. Paul (1.36 x .80 cm); St. Theotonis (1.16 x .89 cm); and St. Francis of Assisi (1.16 x .89 cm). 85 The following traditional titles have been given to the paintings: the Panel of the Friars (207. 2 x 64.2 cm); the Panel of the Mariners (207 x 60.5 cm); the Panel of the Prince (206 x 128 cm); the Panel of the Archbishop (206 x 128.3 cm); the Panel of the Knights (206 x 60.4 cm); the Panel of the Relic (206.5 x 63.1 cm). 86 X-Rays reveal the head of St. Vincent was once adorned with a diadem. Equally the figure I have identified as St. Thekla originally was portrayed with an oak-leaf crown. The

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sacred figures, has been a subject of intense contestation.86 Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece and the Fountain of Life supports the proposed identification of King Joao I’s sons who fought at Ceuta and Tangier, and their immediate successors who participated in later North African campaigns. The large Panel of the Archbishop pays especial homage to the heroes of Afonso V’s 1471 victory at Arzila. According to records in the Anais de Arzila (1560), the Chronicle of Rui de Pina (1504) and Damião de Góis’s Cronica do Principe Dom João (1556: Ch. XXIII), the king’s expedition was planned in Lisbon, where volunteers from Douro-Minho and the region of Porto met under the aegis of the king’s brother, Dom Fernando (1433–1470). Among the participating nobility were Dom João Coutinho, the twenty-two year old Count of Marialva, whose father had been killed at Alcácer-Seguer in 1458– 1459, and Alvaro de Castro, the Senhor de Cascais, conselho (counselor) and camareiro-mór of Afonso V since 1450. On August 15, the feast day of the Assumption, the Portuguese fleet left Restêlo, docking ten days later at Lagos on the coast of the Algarve to await the arrival of an armada of naus (great galleons). The cargo vessels and caravels were sent from the south by Henrique de Menezes, the Count of Valença and governor of AlcácerSeguer. Numbering about 30,000 men of arms, the troops set sail for North Africa, arriving at Arzila the afternoon of August 20. Despite the loss of several ships in a storm, the commanders, fidalgos (lesser nobility), cavalry and standard bearers marched to the walls of the city and a four-day siege followed. Concluding on August 24, the feast day of St. Bartholomew, the Portuguese attack against the Merinids of Morocco was successful but the losses were immense. In the fierce fighting of the battle, the Count of Marialva fell at the mesquita (mosque) and the Count of Monsanto was decapitated in the patio of the Arzila fortress. About 2000 Muslims were killed and 5,000 taken captive, among them the wife and two sons of the Sheikh of Arzila, Mulei Xeque. One son, Mafamedo was held prisoner for two years in Portugal, and in later years became the king of Fez. Critical to the Portuguese objective was obtaining the remains of the Infante Santo Fernando, who had died in captivity at Fez in 1443 and bequeathed his worldly possessions to the Lisbon Cathedral in honor of St. rope prominently placed at the feet of St. Vincent is symbolic of his torture, and there are no similar emblems for his counterpart. The pair of saints have been scrutinized as Cripin and Crispinanus and even as mirror images. Rather than discuss past speculations about the two saints and secular figures, I refer the reader to the major books about the St. Vincent Altarpiece, and have simply presented my best analysis.

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Vincent. The bones of João I’s youngest son were given to the triumphant army, as well as 80,000 dobras of gold taken as spoils of war. In the newly consecrated mosque, the soldiers of Afonso V offered thanks to Our Lady of the Assumption and mass was offered by Dom João Galvão, the Bishop of Coimbra. Given the title of the Count of Arganil, he became the first bishop-count of a prestigious dynasty of prelates. According to Rodrigo de Cunha’s História Eclesiástica da Igreja de Lisboa (1642), Dom Jorge da Costa, later Cardinal Alpedrinha, devised the iconographical programme of Nuno Gonçalves’s St. Vincent Altarpiece. Named for the ecclesiastic, the Panel of the Archbishop includes at the upper left a figure holding a book, which traditionally has been identified as the chronicler Gomes Eanes de Azúrara.87 The historian’s role in recording events of Portugal’s North African campaign would be analogous to that of the fourth-century Spanish writer Prudentius, author of a poem praising St. Vincent and his Bishop Valerius. The panel is dominated by the standing figure of St. Vincent in deacon’s robes, and on the ground beside his rope attribute is another instrument of his torture. The flagellation rod suggests the bastão de comando used to direct troops in battle. King Afonso V kneels in a place of honor to the right of the saint. Opposite him on the same level is Prince Fernando, who, prior to his death on August 18, 1470 had actively participated in planning his brother’s Arzila campaign. Goncalves’s panel contains two additional posthumous portraits of heroes who died in battle: Duarte de Menezes (1406–1464), Count of Viana de Caminha and Count of Vila Real, who was killed at Benacofú and is shown with the royal standard he carried as alferes-mór of the realm. His identify is based upon his realistic tomb effigy in Santarém (Museu Arqueológico de S. 87 Gomes Eanes de Azúrara was appointed court chronicler by Afonso V on July 6, 1545 and served in that position until April 2, 1474, shortly before his death. Also known by the name Eanes de Zúrara, the historian wrote four chronicles which are regarded as being among the most authoritative and often the only original sources of information on the Portuguese expansion in the first half of the fifteenth century. He held position as comendador of the Order of Christ and is considered by many historians to have been biased toward Prince Henrique the Navigator (1394–1460). Among his most famous works are the Crónica de Ceuta and the Crónica de Guiné which recounts the voyages along the western coast of Africa to about 1448. 88 The tomb created in 1465 and inscribed on the side with the name Gil Eanyes and bearning a monogram of “G.M.” was created for the Capela des Almas in Santarém’s Convento de São Francisco. Based upon the realistic likeness of the Santarém effigy, the portrait of Duarte de Meneses in Nuno Gonçalves’s St. Vincent Altarpiece has been identified

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João de Alporão).88 The other deceased warrior probably is Alvaro de Castro, the Count of Monsanto and Senhor de Cascais, who died at Arzila. In such august company stands Afonso V’s son, Prince João (1455–1495: r. 1481), who was sixteen when he accompanied the cavalry to North Africa, and received his sword of knighthood in the aftermath of the siege.89 Charles R. Boxer has observed that the chivalric ideal was embodied in a speech given by Afonso V upon the occasion of his son’s investiture in the mosque on August 24, 1471, following his hand-to-hand combat in the bloody battle: ... And before I, your king and your father, dub you a knight with my own hand, you should know that knighthood is a combination of virtue and honorable power, very fit of itself to impose peace on the land when covetousness or tyranny, with the desire of dominating, disturbs kingdoms, commonwealths, or ordinary persons. By its rule and institution it obliges knights to depose from their estates the kings and princes who do not administer justice and to put in their places others of the same rank who will do it well and truly. Knights are also obliged to serve loyally their kings, lords and captains, and to give them good service; for the knight who professes the true faith and does not conform thereto, is like a man who declines to use the reason which God gave him. Knights must be generous, and in time of war share their goods with each other, save only their weapons and chargers, which they must keep as a means to gain honour. Moreover, knights are obliged to sacrifice their lives for their

securely. See Vitór Serrão, “O património de Santarém,” Santarém, cidade candidata junto da UNESCO a Património Mundial de Humanidade, ed. Jorge Custódio (Santarém: Câmara municipal de Santarém, 1995); idem., Santarém (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1990), 41–43 (Tomb of Duarte de Meneses). Duarte de Meneses inherited an estate at Alcácerm before he departed for North Africa. His son, Dom Henriques de Menezes, the Count of Valença (Viana), fought at Arzila and he subsequently was appointed first captain and governor of the Moroccan citadel. 89 The face of the sensitive youth standing by the side of Dom Afonso V corresponds with a portrait of his mature years as King João II, which was recorded in Toledo (Duke of Lerma’s collection). Elaine Cerceau, Perfect Prince. A Biography of the King Dom João II (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1959. Edgar Prestage, “The Chivalry of Portugal,” Chivalry. A Series of Studies to Illustrate It’s Historical Significance and Civilizing Influence, ed. E. Prestage (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928), 141–66, at 142, notes the ages of knighthood, “The first king of Portugal, Afonso Henriques, assumed the honor at 14, John I was knighted at age 7, and John II at age 16.”

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religion, for their country, and for the protection of the helpless. For just as the sacerdotal estate was ordained by God for His one and only divine cult, so knighthood was instituted by Him in order to do justice, to defend His Faith, and to succour the widows, orphans, poor and forsaken. And those who do not do this cannot rightly be termed knights.90 The Panel of the Archbishop with its grouping of chivalric heroes and martyrs has a decidedly martial aspect which is shared by the Panel of the Knights. This narrow panel contains portraits of the Bragança family, beginning with Dom Fernando I (1403–1478), younger son of Afonso the Count of Barcelos and 1st Duke of Bragança, represented in the Panel of the Fishermen. Dom Fernando I traveled several times to North Africa with his two sons. Ferdinand II of Braganza (1430–1478) stands behind his father in the Panel of the Knights. Nearly the same age as King Afonso V, he served as the monarch’s valido (close companion) during the African campaigns, sailed to Ceuta in 1452 and 1463–1464, and distinguished himself at AlcácerSeguer in 1458 and 1461. As an indication of his high favor, Dom Fernando II became the Duke of Guimarães in 1469, and he was accorded the office of High Constable when he accompanied Afonso V to Arzila in 1471. He holds a sword and wears a golden chain with a small white enamel medallion, perhaps the insignia of the military order of Torre Espada, founded in 1459 by Dom Afonso V with 27 knights.91 Behind and to the right of Dom Fernando II is João of Bragança (1431–1484), who also holds a ceremonial sword with gloves, and was placed in charge of the initial occupation at Tangier. Holding the title Marquis of Montemór, he died in Seville, where he was buried in the Church of Sta. Paula. Grouped with the Braganças in the Panel of the Knights is a man with a black beard and gold-encrusted helmet placed over his long hair (Figs. 11.55–11.57). Because of his exotic appearance, he has been identified as Charles R. Boxer, The Portuguese Seaborne Empire 1415–1825 (London: Carcanet Publishers, 1991), 316. 91 Provas da História Genealógica da Casa Real Portuguesa, ed. António Caetano de Sousa, 2nd ed., 12 vols.(Coimbra: 1946–1954), III, 6, describes the emblem: “...it hung from a gold collar and consisted of a circular medallion, also of gold, on which a tower pierced by a sword stood out against a background of white enamel. Founded after the capture of Alcácer in 1459, the Torre Espada order became extinct under Dom João II, who beheaded Dom Fernando [II Bragança], and was revived only in 1808.” 90

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Mafamedo, the captured son of Sheikh Mulei Xeque of Arzila, but such an interpretation seems improbable. Many noblemen fought in the African campaigns of Afonso V, and it would have been somewhat insulting to have represented a conquered foe in lieu of a valorous knight who fought by the king’s side. The hirsute man also has been associated with the Santo Infante Fernando (1402–1443), based upon his Testament consigning worldly possessions to the Lisbon Cathedral. The ill-fated prince who died in Fez more plausibly is represented in the Panel of the Friars. Probably the most imaginative identification for the ubiquitous figure is the Christian priestking Prester John, the mythical potentate thought to rule a powerful realm located in an ambiguous region called the “Indies,” somewhere beyond the Islamic territory from Morocco to the Black Sea. The Portuguese believed, as did other Europeans, that once the court of this mysterious sovereign was found, he would support the Christian cause against the Muslims. The banded helmet is an archaic type, and the face of the sitter is turned deliberately towards the Panel of the Relics. Perhaps he is Afonso Henriques I, the Portuguese monarch responsible for the transportation of St. Vincent’s remains to Lisbon. The founder of the nation of Portugal, who fought valiantly to achieve a Christian Reconquest, was born at Guimarães Castle, the stronghold of the Bragança family. As an aside, a similar figure with an archaic banded helmet in golden armour is presented in Jan van Eyck’s New York Crucifixion, with his head tilted back as if he is experiencing an ecstatic moment. Of the House of Burgundy, Afonso Henriques I supposedly had a Constantinian vision (Fig. 11.58) before the Battle of Ourique in the region of Alentejo on July 26, 1139, and greatly outnumbered by Almoravids, he readily defeated the Emir Ali Iben Yusef.92 Gonçalves’s Panel of the Relic shows a pilgrim with a palm staff standing before a wooden coffin that probably is intended to be one of the sacred relics transported from the Cabo de São Vicente in 1147 to Lisbon. His image recalls the Burgundian knight Henricus, who, during Afonso Henrique’s Reconquest of the city supposedly appeared as a pilgrim at a castle gate to cure fellow crusaders. A heavy-set man with a chronicle written in a Pseudo92 St. Paul’s description of the “armour of God” in his Letter to the Ephesians (6:11– 20) seems apt in the Panel of the Knights: “…Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth and having on the breastplate of justice,/And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;/In all things taking the shield of faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one./And take unto you the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

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Arabic script near two canons has been suggested to be Stephen, the Mozarab chanter of the Cathedral of Lisbon. The most prominent foreground figure holds a cranium within a cloth, and his physiognomy corresponds with that of the individual identified earlier as Prince Pedro (1392–1449) in the Eyckian replicas of the Fountain of Life and the Ghent Altarpiece. The relic shown is deliberately ambiguous. It might be another bone fragment known to have been transported by Afonso Henriques I from the Cape of St. Vincent, but it additionally references a later gift by Prince Pedro, a section of the skull of St. Anthony of Padua which he acquired in Italy in 1428. St. Anthony had professed the vows of a novice at St. Vincent Beyond the Wall before becoming a regular canon of St. Augustine in 1210 at the Coimbra Monastery of Santa Cruz. Prince Pedro’s skull fragment was deposited in Santo António da Sé. Located directly opposite the Cathedral on the west side of the praça (square), the chapel marked the birthplace of the Franciscan saint.93 Santo António belonged to the Tertiary Franciscan Brotherhood established by papal bull, which operated independently from the cathedral. The Lisbon City Council, which appointed clerics of Santo António, met in a room located above the chapel housing Prince Pedro’s relic. The chapel’s lost altarpiece was commissioned with funds bequeathed by Prince João, Duke of Beja (1400–1442) and it contained portraits of King João I, Queen Philippa, and Santo Infante Ferdinand. Gonçalves’s selection of Pedro, Duke of Coimbra, as the bearer of the cranium of St. Anthony would have been appropriate as Afonso V’s flagship which sailed to Alcácer-Seguer in 1458 with about 200 galleons was named for St. Anthony. The choice of a red wool garment for the figure of Dom Pedro also is noteworthy. After he was killed on May 20, 1449 at Alfarrobeira, his body was heaped with the dead in the nearby church of Alverca. But it was wrapped in the red cape the Prince had worn in battle. Due to the intervention of his sister, Duchess Isabel of Burgundy, Pedro’s body was transferred to the Castle of Abrantes, and ultimately buried in late 1455 within the royal mausoleum at Batalha. The Panel of the Knights appears to have been joined originally with the Panel of the Relic, and therefore, the figure of Prince Pedro would have been placed on the same plane as Fernando II. Contrary to his father Afonso, the 1st Duke of Bragança, who supported Afonso V’s troops at Alfarrobeira, the 2nd Duke of Bragança was devoted to the “regent” Pedro. 93

Destroyed by the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, the chapel was rebuilt between 1757–1812.

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The primary figures portrayed in the Panel of Friars wear the white habit of the Cistercian order. The history of Alcobaça, a town located between the Alcoa and Baça Rivers, is tied with the Real Abadia de Santa Maria, a Cistercian Abbey begun by King Afonso Henriques I who granted land to St. Bernard of Clairvaux in the area reconquered after the defeat of Moors at Santarém on 15 March 1147. St. Bernard had lent his support to Afonso Henriques in negotiations for Papal recognition of the newly established “Kingdom of Portugal.” In 1148, Afonso Henriques laid the foundation stone of the church at Alcobaça, and the complex was erected between 1187 and 1222 by Burgundian monks.94 Influenced by the Clunic Alcobaça, the Dominican Monastery of Batalha (Leiria District) had been built by Joao I in gratitude for his victory against the Castilians at Aljubarrota on August 15, 1385 and it was designed to house the royal pantheon. Three royal portraits earlier in this study have been identified in Nuno Gonçalves’s Panel of the Friars. Among the Avis princes, Henrique the Navigator (1394–1460) physically most resembled his father, and his likeness is known by his gisant at Batalha.95 King João I (1357–1433), whose facial features and physique are known by his tomb effigy and extant portraits, is believed to have adopted the habit of the militant Cistercians for burial. The last monk, heavily bearded, is portrayed in the yellowed robes of the African monks belonging to the Order of St. Vincent. In view of his Testament, the representation of Santo Infante Ferdinand (1402–1443) in the robes of monks who guarded the relics of St. Vincent was suitable. Moreover, his likeness is comparable to an icon retained in the Monastery of Batalha believed to be a portrait of the Avis prince who suffered and died at Fez. The Panel of the Friars logically once was joined with the Panel of the Fishermen, previously discussed as containing realistic portraits of the Bragança family: the Holy Constable Nuno Álvares

Always numbering 999, according to the order’s rule (“one less than 1000”), the Cistercians cultivated orchards and vineyards in the river valleys. Modeled upon the mother house at Cluny, the dominion of the Portuguese Cistercians encompassed thirteen towns, three ports and two castles used as occasional royal retreats. Besides the Gothic church, dormitories, library and kitchen, Alcobaça contained five cloisters. The Claustro do Silêcio was erected by King Dinis between 1308 and 1311. The same king in 1290 founded a university in Lisbon, which was transferred in 1308 to Coimbra. Hieronymite monks were renowned educators at that august center of learning, attracting teachers from Oxford, Paris, Salamanca, and Florence. The Cistercians played a pivotol role in the early history of the institution. 95 Voyage of Re-discovery, 68. 94

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Pereira (1360–1431), who became a Carmelite in 1423; Afonso, Count of Barcelos and 1st Duke of Bragança (1377–1461); his elder son Afonso, Count of Ourém (1402–1460), and Prince João, Duke of Beja and Duke of Arriaolos (1400–1442). The Panel of the Archbishop is of a similar size as the Panel of the Prince, and while the composition also exhibits a group of figures around a holy deacon, the work has less of a martial aspect and seems more focused upon the administration of a peaceable kingdom. It is not coincidence that this painting is the one in which the Duchess of Burgundy (1397–1471) makes an appearance (Fig. 11.59). When Afonso V won his victory at Arzila she was seventy-four years in age, and Nuno Gonçalves depicts her garbed as a tertiary of the Franciscan Poor Clares. The Infanta stands to the right of the central figure of St. Thekla. This placement was apposite for a woman Jan van Eyck had compared with the Cumaean Sibyl. St. Jerome praised the Hellenistic Sibyls for their chastity in his Homilies and recommended women also imitate the purity of Christ’s mother. The Church Doctor additionally argued that the more virtuous a woman was, the more she became like a man. Thekla cut her hair to be a “female man of God,” so she could follow in the evangelical footsteps of her mentor St. Paul of Tarsus. In the company of St. Agnes, she purportedly appeared to St. Martin in a vision, a theophany which has relevance for the insertion of a portrait of King Duarte (1391–1438) on the opposite side, as the monarch embraced the soldier-bishop of Tours as his special patron.96 Thekla holds the unique honor of being the only woman in Byzantine art besides Ecclesia Maria to be shown with a “Book of Wisdom” as an attribute (Fig. 11.60). The tome she holds is open to Christ’s discourse at the Last Supper, and words repeated at his Ascension. The passage traditionally

96 The figure wearing a Burgundian chaperon who is identified here as King Duarte traditionally has been viewed as Prince Henrique the Navigator, based upon the resemblance of the portrait to a miniature from the Chronicle of Guinea (Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné) by Gomes Eanes de Azúrara (Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris). However, the identification of the sitter in the illumination recently has been challenged by Dagoberto Markl, who believes King Duarte is depicted. Markl has presented a fairly conclusive argument that the Bibliothèque Nationale manuscript is a combination of two lost texts, the “Chronicle of Events in Guinea,” and another historical chronicle which concerns the reign of King Duarte. Attributed to João Gonçalves, an illuminator who completed the manuscript on February 18, 1453, the portrait miniature closely approximates the figure I have identified as Prince Duarte in the Prado and Oberlin Eyckian replicas of the Fons Vitae and in the Ghent Altarpiece’s panel of the Holy Knights.

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is cited in the liturgy of Pentecost: “I will not now speak many things with you. For the prince of this world cometh; and in me he hath not any thing. But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father hath given me commandment, so do I.” (John 14:30–31).97 Kneeling in front of Duchess Isabel is Afonso V’s daughter, Princess Joana (1453–1490), whose likeness accords with her portrait from the Convent of Jesus at Aveiro 98 (Fig. 11.61). Joana served as her father’s regent during his campaign to Morocco. At a very young age she vehemently sought to enter a convent and she refused multiple offers of marriage. Against the wishes of her brother, João II, she cut her hair and entered the Dominican Convent of Jesus at Aveiro in 1475. Opposite Joana, are the grandsons of King Duarte and nephews of Afonso V: the kneeling Prince Joao, 3rd Duke of Viséu who succeeded to the titles of his father Fernando (1433–1470); and one of his younger brothers, either Diogo or more logically Duarte, who was born in 1457.99 Sixty portraits in the Altarpiece of St. Vincent commemorate a maritime realm’s continued defense of Christianity, and the deliberate genealogical alignment of the houses of Avis and Bragança magnifies Lusitania’s past, present and future. Despite an undeniable veneer of Flemish realism, the tableau vivant of society presents an extraordinary Pentecostal “Holy Grail procession” and provides the clearest visual testament of Jan van Eyck’s The Holy Bible, Douay Version [1609] (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1960, 4th ed.), New Testament, 144. 98 The anonymous painting measuring 60 x 40 cm perhaps is by João Eanes. Gonçalves shows Joana with a rosary, the mnemonic chaplet of beads whose invention was credited to St. Dominic de Guzman. Her dress, the green color of the Order of Avis, is complimented by a purple velvet toque. Her purple scarf lined with pale blue shows the colors of the Order of St. John the Evangelist which governed the convent of St. Eloi, an institution in Lisbon supported by Archbishop Jorge de Costa and her mother, Queen Isabel, the daughter of Prince Pedro (1392–1449). Queen Isabel (1432–1455) and her sister Filipa (1437–1497) were raised by Duchess Isabel of Burgundy. When his wife died in 1455, Afonso V secured for his sister-in-law Filipa her portion of Dom Pedro’s estate in Italy. Before Joana was appointed regent in 1471, she was tutored by her aunt Filipa, who assuredly passed on knowledge she gleaned from the Duchess of Burgundy. 99 Prince Henrique the Navigator, who had participated in the capture of Alcácer-Seguer in 1458–1459, never married. However, he had adopted as his heir Afonso V’s younger brother Fernando (b. Almeirim, 17 November 1433–September 18, 1470). Fernando inherited Henrique’s titles in 1461(Duke of Viséu, Senior Lord of Beja, Salvaterra, Serpa, Moura, Madeira and São Miguel). In addition he became the Master of the Orders of Christ and Santiago. In 1452 Fernando married Dona Beatriz († 1506), daughter of his uncle, 97

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enduring legacy in the kingdom of Portugal. In 1572 Luís Vaz de Camões (1524–1580) published his Os Lusiadas (The Lusiads), an epic poem in which he sought to rival Virgil’s Aeneid.100 Naming in his introduction several great kings of Portugal who challenged comparison with Charlemagne, he begins with Afonso Henrique I, the kingdom’s founder and exceptional crusader of the Reconquest and concludes with Joan II (r. 1481–1495), who envisioned a sea route to India. A decade before Vasco da Gama sailed for the Orient (1498), Bartolomeu Dias had rounded the “Cape of Hurricanes,” which was rechristened the “Cape of Good Hope” during the Manueline era. Among other great “Sons of Lusus” Camões eloquently paid tribute to João I, the king whose armies not only dispelled the Spanish threat, but also began the Portuguese age of expansion by the conquest of Ceuta. The poet aptly used the epithets “illustrious generation” (inclyta geração) and “noble” (altos) to describe the princes of the House of Avis. Sharing the same bloodline and heritage, Dona Isabel merits inclusion with her brothers as an Avis progeny of singular distinction. Within three years of her quiet marriage ceremony at Sluis, Jan van Eyck painted his Prince João (1400–1442), Duke of Beja. From their union was born Leonor (1458–1525), wife of King João II (1455: r. 1481–1495), and Manuel I (1469–1521), who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1495. Afonso V’s three sisters were raised at court under the tutelage of Cardinal Jorge da Costa. Princess Leonor (b. Torres Vedras, 18 September, 1434–September 3, 1467) married Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III on August 9, 1451. Catherina (b. 25 November 1436) was betrothed first to Carlos of Navarra, son of King Juan II of Aragon and then to Edward IV, King of England. Neither proposal came to fruition. Delicate and sensitive by nature, she shared a close relationship with Afonso V who became her champion and defender. Prone to an erratic and melancholy disposition, Catherina retired to a Lisbon convent and following her death on June 17, 1463, she was buried in the Lisbon Church of St. Eloi. With regard to Princess Joana (March 31, 1439–June 13, 1475), after her mother died in Toledo on February 19, 1445, she was returned to her sisters in Lisbon. Joana’s January 22, 1455 nuptial contract with King Henry IV of Castile (b. 1425; r. 1454–1474) was negotiated by Afonso V. After arranging a dowry of 20,000 florins of Aragonese gold, the contract was ratified in Segovia on February 25, 1455 and the marriage occurred in Córdoba on May 21, 1455. 100 By the time Camões’s Os Lusiadas was printed, Portugal had relinquished command of Alcácer-Seguer (1549) and Arzila (1550). In attempting to retake these strongholds lost by his father João III, and to preclude further Turkish expansion in North Africa, King Sebastian (January 20, 1554–August 4, 1578) sought to emulate the chivalric example of his forebears by a campaign to Morocco. Leading only an army of mercenaries, he was felled by the cavalry of Mohammed of Fez at Alcácer-Seguer. Sebastian’s body was never recovered, and his death had disastrous repercussions for Portugal. His uncle Henrique ruled only briefly before the kingdom passed to Philip II of Spain in 1580.

11 Conclusion

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renowned masterwork for Sint-Janskerk in Ghent. By this time she already had assumed a key and influential position at court, and her intervention in the commission has been overlooked, particularly if her painter João Eanes was attached to Van Eyck’s workshop between 1430 and 1435, the commencement date of Anne of Burgundy’s sepulchre. A close iconographic analysis of the Ghent Altarpiece supports a hypothesis that Van Eyck composed his altarpiece in consultation with the Portuguese Infanta, who, after all had been educated by the same chivalric code which had served to shape the destiny of her distinguished brothers. A powerful duchess until her retirement from the political and social arena in 1457, Isabel outlived her husband Philip the Good, who died on June 15, 1467. When she passed away at Dijon on December 11, 1471,101 the last of her “illustrious generation,” news of her nephew’s taking of Tangier already had reached been dispatched to Flanders. This study has sought to address some aspects of Jan van Eyck’s patronage by the Crown of Portugal, particularly João I, the “King of Good Memory,” and the daughter who left Lisbon to become Duchess of Burgundy. While points raised in this analysis of Jan’s interaction with Lusitania can be debated, an attempt has been made to address some aspects of his work as diplomat-artist, and certainly demonstrate his constant service to an Infanta who never forgot the chivalric lessons of her homeland.

101 Philip the Good’s body was not transferred to the Chartreuse de Champmol at Dijon until after the death of his wife Isabel (December 17, 1471). The solemn procession which began in Bruges, and passed through Ghent, reached Dijon February 10, 1474. See Elisabeth Dhanens, Hugo van der Goes, (Antwerp: Fonds Mercator, 1998), 25 and 369 note 2. Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting. Its Origins and Character, 2 vols., (1953, New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1971 ed.), I, 344 (1473 Pharahildis decorations).

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Index A Aachen 124, 478, 497, 561 basilica 229 chapel of 228–9, 501 palace of 42 Aaron, rod of 434 Abbeville 38, 292, 298, 426 Abd al Rahman I 106 Aboim, João Peres de 196–7 Abraham 451 visitation to 649 Abrantes 66, 198 castle of 708 Abyla 106, 692 Achaemenid, kings 590 Achter Sikkel 383–4 Acre, St. Jean d’ 324 Ad Sanctum Coetum, (Eusebius) 139 Adam 171, 293, 341, 382, 392, 437, 451, 466, 569, 597, 614 Adam and Eve in Eden 437 Adão, Maria 587 Adonis 517 Adoration of the Kings 186 Adoration of the Magi 276, 667–8 Adornes (Bruges) Alselm 39, 540 family 39, 540 Peter 541 Adorno (Genova) family 540

Jacob 541 Oppocino 540 Adrastus, king 428 Adriatic 126 Advent 63, 169, 518, 656 Aeneas 182, 214, 259 Aeneas-Lavinia union 259 Aeneid, (Virgil) 141, 224, 405, 712 Afonso 83, 102, 119, 129–31, 133 count of Barcelos 66, 85, 141, 530 count of Ourém 67 Maria 196 Afonso Henriques I 56, 62, 67, 70, 72–3, 80, 84–5, 93, 101, 109, 174, 195–6, 209, 230, 333, 430, 434, 447, 479–80, 524, 567, 570, 572–4, 576, 639, 707–9, 712 Afonso II 74–5, 418, 430 Afonso III 108, 174, 190, 196, 233 Afonso IV 186, 190, 198, 405, 517, 565, 571, 583 Afonso V 121, 143, 201, 242, 443, 492, 512, 555, 572, 584, 626–7, 629, 636–7, 659, 698, 702–8, 710–11 chapel of 496 Africa 225, 448, 514, 522, 559, 588 Africanus, Scipio 105 Agincourt 89, 263, 287, 395, 426, 502

808 battle at 90, 209 Agnus Dei 97, 393 Ailes des Dames 17 Aix Annunciation, (d’Eyck, Barthémey) 578 Aix Annunciation Triptych 546 Aix-en-Provence 434, 611 Aix-la-Chapelle 161 Ajuda, Real Biblioteca da 538 Al-Andalus 104, 197 Al-Aziza, palace 169, 266–7 Al-Baçr 195, 197 Albergati, cardinal 345, 360, 578 Alberti, Leon Batista, De Re Aedificatoria 481 Albuquerque Fernando Afonso de 438–9 Leonor of 48 Alcáçer do Sal 478 Alcácer-Seguer (Kasr-El-Seghir) 697–8, 703, 706, 708 Alcaçova 72, 136, 175–6, 179–80, 191–2 Alcáçova palace (Lisbon) 111–12, 134, 136, 141, 159, 174–7, 179–80, 185, 190–3, 377, 498, 528 Pedro de 191 Alcalá del Río 105 Alcañiz, Miguel, Last Judgment 553 Alcázar of Palma 549, 551 of Segovia 103 of Valencia 647 Alcoa, river 709 Alcobaça 70–1, 77, 571, 709 Alcochate 490 Aldermen, hall 624 Alentejo 52, 62, 66, 108–9, 129, 133, 528, 707 Alexander Tapestries 593 Alexander the Great 94, 155–6,

182, 209–11, 224–5, 290–2, 309, 411, 459, 505, 522, 589–92 Alexandria 110, 224, 451, 611 Heron of 300 Philo of 591 St. Catherine of 132, 348, 359, 361, 379, 394, 396, 512, 523, 525–6, 649, 700 St. Mary of 433 Alexandrino, cardinal 177, 530 Alfama 193 Alfarrobeira 147, 708 Alfonso Henriques I 567 Alfonso I of Naples 545 Alfonso IV 573 Alfonso V king of Aragon and Sicily 45, 47–8, 61, 63, 104, 124–5, 146, 189, 351, 357, 464, 542, 546–8, 550, 555, 576–7, 582, 594–5, 598, 600–1, 609, 613, 618, 623, 647 Alfonso XI 516–17 Alfred the Great 425 Algarve 54, 108, 151, 174, 477, 513, 572, 703 Algeciras 516 Algeria 549 Algezira, palace of (Çala-ben-Çala) 91, 150 Algiers 554 Alhambra, Patio of the Lions 529 Alicante 548 Alimbrot, Luis 599 Aljubarrota 85, 130, 150, 226, 233, 437, 439, 441, 449–50, 484, 490, 494, 515, 524 battle of 62, 430, 494 All Saints Day 173, 175, 439 All Souls Day 570 Allyncbrood, Lodewijk 599–601,

INDEX

604, 606, 609, 613, 615–18 Roiç de Corella Triptych 603 Triptych of Roiç de Corella 600 Almada 499 Almeida bishop Jorge de 169 Vasco Gonçalves de 476 Almina 107 Almohads 105–6, 568 Almoravids 105, 707 Alost 367 Alpedrinha, cardinal 704 Alpha-Omega 451 Alpheus, river 688 Alps 40, 347, 523, 691 Alsace Dieric of, Basiliek van het Heilig Bloed 603 Margaret of 332, 334, 410–11 Philip of 323–4, 326, 333, 410–11 Thierry of 253–4, 332–3, 410– 11, 603 Altarpiece of the Crucifixion, (Memling, Hans) 605 Altarpiece of the Virgin of Pobla Llarga, (Anonymous) 45 Álvares Pereira, Nuno 66, 90–1, 102, 130, 133, 141, 145, 150, 188, 200, 403, 441–2, 643, 709 Alvim Beatrix Pereira de 141, 146 Brites Pereira 130 Leonor de 90, 130, 141 Amadis de Gaula 167 Amaral, Luis de 360–1 Ambrose, bishop of Milan 400 Amiens 416, 565 Amos 399 Anais de Arzila 703 Anchises 214

809 Andalusia 66, 104–5, 112, 193, 195, 503, 516, 529, 664 Andromache 521 Anes, João 571, 626, 632, 660, 664 Anfortas, “Fisher King” 214, 452, 454, 669 Angelic trumpeters 451 Angers 426, 674–5 Anglo-Portuguese, treaty 439 Anglo-Saxon 62, 372, 425 Anjou 41, 426, 672 Louis I of 210, 673 Louis II of 289 Marie of 58 René of 546, 674–5 Sibyl d’ 410 Annunciation 32 (Brussels) 361 (Lomellini) 580 (Thyssen-Bornemisza) 606–7 (Washington D.C.) 375 Annunciation 32, 368, 371, 379, 382–3, 385–6, 407, 447, 451, 556, 560, 580, 601, 606–7, 609 Anonimo Morelliano 561 Anthony the Grand Bastard 696 Marc 9 Antiga Praça 176 Antigüedades de Valencia, (Teixidor, Josef ) 615 Antioch 478 St. Macharius of 436 St. Margaret of 348, 394–5, 551 Antiquities of the Jews, (Flavius, Josephus) 155 Antonio Siciliano and St. Anthony, Gossaert, Jan 561 Antwerp 60, 238, 262, 321–2, 337–8, 364, 539, 543, 557–8, 560–1, 566, 607, 661, 700–1

810 Antwerp Diptych 558 Apelles 309 Apocalypse 381, 597, 667 book of the 159–60, 215, 355, 389, 393, 559, 569, 589 Apocalyptic bridegroom 363, 466, 523 Christ 240, 485, 552 lamb 171, 381, 465 Planet Woman 360, 381, 465, 667 Redeemer 215, 424 Apocalyptic Lamb of God worshipped by Twenty-four Elders 668 Apollo 139, 223–4, 240, 403–4 Parnassus 429 apostle 34, 80, 103, 133, 236, 366, 368, 372–4, 379, 391, 399, 427, 485, 508, 528, 532, 621–2, 642, 682 Aquilo, wind 150 Aquinas, St. Thomas of 553 Aquitaine 426, 428 Amandus of 435 Eleanor of 444 Ara Coeli, (Bruges) 362 Arabs 80 Aragon 25, 45, 47–9, 63–4, 79, 133, 363, 517, 542, 544, 546, 548, 551, 553–5, 577, 581, 594, 598, 600, 613, 615, 618, 646, 648 Alfonso V, king of 45, 61, 63, 124, 351, 357, 464, 517, 577, 582, 595, 600, 618, 623 Fernando I of 502, 610, 646 Jaime I of 46, 528, 549–50 Jaime II of 462 Juan de la Huerta of 630 Leonor of 51, 65, 77, 146, 242 Pedro IV of 517, 648 St. Isabel of 198, 448

Yolande of 289 Aragon-Urguell Isabel of 128, 491 Aragonese 46, 64, 105, 125, 255, 551, 554, 582 Aragonese-Burgundian alliance 594 Aranda de Duero 125 Arc Jeanne d’ 288, 323, 326 Arcadia 689 Stymphalian Birds of 692 Archangel 377, 465, 650 Gabriel 32, 88, 95, 374, 386, 451, 507, 606–7, 621, 649 Michael 144, 487, 510, 524, 621 Raphael 621 Archduchess Margaret of Austria in Prayer 567 Areopagite, Pseudo-Dionysius the 152, 611 Arezzo 38, 41 Argo 407, 682, 687, 690 Argo Navis 526 Argonauticon, (Flaccus, Valerius) 150, 408 Argonauts 527, 690, 695 Argos 565, 682, 686–8, 690, 692 Arimathaea, St. Joseph of 202, 434, 454, 518, 603, 611 Aristotle 163, 184, 459 Ethic of the Mean 402, 433, 459, 650 Arjona 66, 104 Ark of the Covenant 171, 227, 229, 237, 375, 452, 591, 657 Armageddon 138, 370 Armagnac-Burgundian, disputes 636 Armagnacs 13, 125, 686 Armas, Duarte de 207, 241, 245 Arnauf I 253 Arnolfini, Giovanni 646

INDEX

Arraiolos, castle 65 Arras 20, 94, 182, 192, 207, 267, 322, 357, 360, 578, 594, 622–3 Matthieu of 666 Recueil d’ 10, 286, 297, 645 Treaty of 40 Arrest of Christ 277 Arronches, Lopo Dias de Sousa 456 Arruda, Diogo de 480 Ars Magna, (Llull, Ramón) 650 Arthur of Brittany 287 king 203, 210, 215, 235, 511, 522 Round Table of king 461 Arthurian chivalry 403, 566 legends 441 lore 216, 443–4, 526, 668 myth 449 Perceval 182 Artois 261–2, 265, 267–8, 292, 297–8, 317, 322, 332 Bonne d’ 24–5, 263, 644, 646–7 Countess d’ 267 hôtel d’ 19, 591, 636 Mahaut d’ 266, 268, 272 Philip d’ 644 Robert d’ 317, 319 Robert II d’ 265, 267–8 Arundel, William 440, 513 Arundel and Warenne, Thomas Fitzalan, Earl of 91, 131, 396, 502 Arzila (Asilah) 107, 201, 627, 697, 703–7, 710 Arzila Tapestries, (Gonçalves, Nuno) 512 Ascension 100, 257, 433, 603, 710 Asia 522, 559, 588 Asia Minor 26, 63, 395, 473, 690 Assereto, Biagio 582

811 Assisi 38, 99, 193, 541 Friars Minor at 75 Porziuncola chapel 38 San Francesco basilica 38 San Paolo hermitage 99 St. Francis of 35–8, 73, 80, 82–3, 98–9, 418, 533, 536, 575–6, 702 Assumption 82, 430, 515, 525, 564 Assumption of the Virgin retable 493 Ataide, Isabel de 79 Atlas, mountains 107 Atoleiros 441 Atonement, day of 375 Aubert, David 305 Aucher, Jean (Johannes Alcherius) 87 De Coloribus Diversus 87 Augean Stables 688 Augeas 688 Augsburg 133, 413 Augustinian Canons Regular 575 Augustinian Eremites 367 Aurea Legenda, (Voragine, Jacobus) 416, 533 Auriga 527 Austria Albert II, duke of 24 Catherine of 700 Margaret of 60, 282, 379, 561, 563, 567 Autun 43, 434 Auvergne 133 Auverne 672 Auxerre 433 Auxonne 332 Avalon 203 Aveiro 80, 711 Aventine, hill 691 Aves, lord Ferreira de 565 Avesnes

812 Burchard of 334 Jan of 334 Avignon 165, 470 Avis 44, 48, 52–3, 55, 59, 63, 65, 109, 113, 119, 121, 134, 142, 146, 148, 151, 169, 182, 190, 192, 194, 199–200, 209, 226, 229–30, 235, 248, 402–3, 406, 412, 415, 429–31, 437, 439, 456, 459, 480, 487, 490, 492–3, 501, 505, 509–10, 512, 515, 530, 535, 563, 629, 638–9, 651, 660, 709, 711–12 castle 59, 61, 66, 259 court 49, 51, 61–2, 83, 146, 171, 205, 216, 232, 236, 278, 357, 399, 406, 441, 443, 467, 506, 508, 539, 555, 566, 591, 626, 647, 665 house of 63, 509, 638, 711–12 king João I of 48, 148 order of 121, 190, 230, 492, 510, 638 Avis-Hapsburg, marriage 660 Axel, lord of 347 Azambujato, Joáo Afonso de 149 Azamor 107, 586 Azores, archipelago 151 Azúrara, Gomes Eanes de 178, 458, 502, 704 Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné 414, 509 B Baça, river 709 Bachtenwalle 325 Badajoz 108 Baissy, Jehan de 51, 53 Baldwin I, “Iron Arm” 252, 333 Baldwin IX 254, 332–4, 410–11 Baldwin V 348, 410–11

Baldwin VIII 332, 410–11 Baldwin XI 333 Balkans 63, 126, 239, 430, 457, 491 Baltar Paços 131 Banda, orden de la 516 Banquet 310 baptism 58, 101, 168, 171, 277, 371–2, 397, 416, 431, 452, 467, 482–3, 533, 652 Baptismatis initium 369 Barbary, coast 537 Barbosa, Jorge Prior 74 Barcelona 30, 45, 47, 124, 154, 357, 548, 623 first bishop of 62 patron saints of 357 Barcelos 89, 91–2, 94, 102, 131–3, 145, 205 Afonso, count of 52, 83, 85, 90–1, 119, 133, 144, 149–50, 192, 502, 530, 706, 710 church of Santa Maria Maior de 102 Isabel of 134 Barlète, Renaud Coignet de 266 Baroque 12, 570 Barrameda, Sanlúcar de 108 Barroso, Leonor Alvim of 90, 130–1 Baruch 399 Basel 145, 378–9 Basevorn, Robert de 237–8 Basiliek van het Heilig Bloed 603 Bataille, Nicolas 210 Batalha 128, 232, 478, 484–6, 489–90, 492, 500–1, 504, 512, 528, 535–6, 709 abbey 62, 67, 140, 142, 229, 231–2, 484, 497, 500, 649 Dominican monastery of 70 Founder’s chapel 493–4 monastery of 65, 119, 484, 509,

INDEX

591, 709 royal mausoleum of 232, 331, 484, 491, 501, 510, 563, 708 Bath, order of 461 battle of Adrianople 411 at Agincourt 90, 209 of Bovine 333 of Crècy 310 of the Golden Spurs 319, 334, 339 of Hastings 372 of Montgisard 410 of Nancy 303, 467 of Ourique 479, 707 of Ponza 582 of Salado 516, 698 of Salcedo 571 of Sluis 320 Baudouin de Lannoy 49, 294, 534 Bauffremont, Pierre de 678 Bavai 347 Bavaria 2–4, 6–11, 14–16, 22, 57, 66, 140, 275, 277, 280, 286, 288, 295, 311, 351, 619, 630 Albert of 7, 11, 66 Isabel of 311 Jacoba of 351 Jacqueline of 9–10, 13, 286, 288, 295 John of 2–4, 6–8, 10–11, 14–16, 22, 275, 277, 295, 619 Margaret of 8, 10–11, 57, 140, 280, 630 Willem IV of 3 Bayonne 51 Beaufort Henry 328, 372, 425 John 28, 372 Beaufremont, Peter of 651 Beaumetz, Jehan de 593 Beaune 624

813 Beauneveu, André 3 Beauvais, Vincent de 6 Becerra, Gaspar, Legend of Perseus 283 Beco de Quebra-Costa 571 Bedford 27, 631, 636 Bedford Book of Hours 280, 394 Beguinhofs 333 Behaim, Martim, Erdapfel 591 Beira, Aguiar da 92 Beja 108, 133–4, 145, 230, 404 Isabel of 146 Belas, duke of 145 Belém, Jeronimo de 604 Belfort 252, 326–7, 384–5 Belgium 161, 321, 346, 349 Belgrade 124 Bellenville Armorial 675 Bellini, Giovanni, St. Francis in Ecstasy 39 Benacoú 704 Bening, Simon 140 Bensafrim, river 108 Berlin 7, 123, 273, 561, 563, 606, 612, 638, 644 Bermejo, Bartolomé 64–5 St. Engracia 64 Berounka, river 668 Berry, Jean, duke of 3–4, 89, 210, 213–14, 222, 289, 443, 589, 618, 636, 644, 672, 683 Besançon 250 Bethany 99 Martha and Mary of 99, 434 Bethlehem 32, 46, 370, 557, 567, 581, 589 St. Jerome’s monastery in 581 Bethune Robert III de 254, 410–11 Robert VIII de 330 Betrothal Brooch 646 Beursplein 255

814 Beveren Waas 338, 367 Bible Moralisée 315 Bibliotheca Historica, (Siculus, Diodorus of ) 681 Bibliothèque Nationale 4, 414 Biezekapelstraat 383 Bijlokemuseum 334 Bildungsromane 453 Binche 279, 282, 298–301 Binchois, Gilles 294, 306–7 Binnenhof, castle 3, 7, 9 Birth of St. John the Baptist 277 Biscay bay of 30, 51, 248 merchant house 255–6 Bishopric of Liège 7 Bizekapelstraat 383, 385 Black death 428 sea 694, 707 Blandain, Haquin de 352 Boa Memória 205 Boccaccio, Giovanni Coronation of the Virgin 89 Des Cleres et Nobles Femmes 89 Bohemia 24, 27, 309–10, 667, 669, 671 Emperor Charles IV of 8 Bohun, Mary 461 Bolingbroke 204 Henry of 440 Bologna 124 Eustache, count of 208 Bom Jesus 99–101 brotherhood of 100, 417 Bonaiuti, Andrea 33 Christian Wisdom in the Spirit of St. Thomas Aquinas 33 Resurrection 608 Bonne d’ Artois, (Berlin) 644 book of the Apocalypse 160, 667–8

of Chronicles 451 of Daniel 156 of Exodus 141, 229 of Genesis 171, 222, 398, 492, 529 of Job 157 of Psalms 158, 166, 170–1, 375–6, 400, 656 of the Seven Seals 569 of Wisdom 521, 526, 710 of Zachariah 370 Book of Famous Men, (Facius, Bartholomaeus) 577 Book of Hours, (Prince Duarte) 62 Book of Hours of Maréchal Boucicaut 125 Book of Instruction on the Art of Riding Well, (Libro da Ensinança Calvagar toda sela), (Duarte, king) 456, 564 Book of Judges 479 Book of Nicodemus 614 Book of the City of Ladies, (Pisan, Christine de) 311 Book of the Noble and the Three Wise Men 549 Book of the Order of Chivalry (Llibre del Orde de la Cavallería), (Llull, Ramón) 152, 650 Book on Hunting, (João I, king) 456 Boreas, wind 150 Borluut Elizabeth 338–9, 367, 382, 387, 465 Geerom 339 Gerelmus 367–8 Jan 319, 339 Borluutsteen 339, 387 Boron, Robert de 446 Borromini, Francesco 32 Borsele, Wolfart de 679 Borselen 16

INDEX

Bosch, Hieronymus 137 Botermarkt 384–5 Boucam, count of 679 Boucicaut Epiphany 125 Maréchal de 205, 277 master 88, 206, 554, 643 style 89, 232, 246 Boucicaut Hours 88–9, 127–8, 223, 644 Boudault, Jean 677 Boudewijn I 252 Bouillon 208–9, 457–8, 522, 528, 591, 671–2, 697 Godfrey of 209–10, 457–8, 522, 528, 590–1, 671–2, 697 Boukoleon, palace 455 Boulogne Hue de 303 St. Anthony of 331 Bourbon Charles I of 285, 294, 686 hôtel de 635 Isabelle of 57, 629, 678, 681, 683 Jeanne of 614 Louis II of 635, 686 Bourges 222, 433, 443 Bourgogne, hôtel de 19 Bourse, quarter 255 Bouts, Dieric 646 Boytoc, Diogo 242 Brabant 16, 208, 262–4, 288–9, 319, 321–2, 328, 352, 367, 374, 402, 435, 554, 623 Jean IV, duke of 10, 14, 16, 263 Brabantine Gothic 385 Brabants Wapenboek 57 Bracara Augusta (Braga) 98, 417 Braga 96–102, 197, 417 archbishop of 97, 102, 440 cathedral of 96, 101 pilgrimage site of 418

815 St. Martin of 417 Swabian court at 417 Bragança 145, 192, 706, 711 Afonso of 147 Brites of 138, 156 castle 110, 192, 205 Fernando I, duke of 146 Fernando II, duke of 706 Fernando of 146 house of 84, 92, 141, 145–6, 706–7, 709 Isabel of 145–6, 492 João of 706 Brain, Oudot 51 Brancacci, chapel 34 Braque Triptych, (van der Weyden, Rogier) 640, 642 Braun-Hogenberg 175–6, 415 Map of Lisbon 184, 190–1 Bravães 95 Brazil 538 Breton, prince of 683 Breviary of Sint Donaas 526 Brienne, Gautier de 533 Britain 202, 235 Brittany 27, 372, 396–7, 426, 428 Arthur of 287, 395 John V, duke of 394 Broederlam, Melchior 266, 268 Broquière, Bertrandon de la 28–30 brotherhood of Bom Jesus do Monte 417 of Franciscan tertiaries 98 of the Holy Blood 356, 603 of the Holy Cross 356 Seven Joys of Our Lady 602 of St. George 546 Brueghel the Elder, Pieter 607, 611 Bruges 18–20, 22, 24, 39, 44, 86, 90–1, 120, 124, 131, 133, 140, 161, 205, 248, 250–7, 260–1, 264–5, 278, 289, 292, 297–8,

816 303, 305–7, 318–19, 321–2, 326–7, 332–3, 337, 344–6, 352–4, 357, 361–4, 379, 412, 427–8, 431, 466, 503, 518–20, 525, 537, 540–4, 555, 558, 562, 584, 586–7, 589, 594, 599, 601–3, 605–6, 613–14, 617–18, 620–1, 623–8, 636–7, 639, 644–6, 651, 653, 659, 664 chapel of Santa Cruz 544, 625 chapel of the Holy Spirit 255 chapel of the Shoemakers 602 Franciscan Convent-Monastery of the Friars Minor 255 guild of Boatmen 396 guild of brewers 320 guild of Ghent 318, 366 guild of goldsmiths in 518 guild of House of Crossbowmen 385 guild of House of the Crossbowmen 386 guild of Masons 385 guild of Painters 48 guild of Shippers 432 guild of St. Sebastian 428 guild of the Handbowmen 386 guild of the painters 351 guild of the Swordsmen 386 house of the English Merchant Adventurers 625 Poortersloge 256 Prisenhof 18–19, 22, 249, 256, 258, 260, 323, 325, 594 Tanners chapel 602 Brugesl processions du Saint-Sang 257 Schottinne Poorte 625 Brugia, Gianes de, Otter Hunt 279 Bruille, cannon Fursy de 646 Brunelleschian principles 39

Brunswick 333 Brussels 11, 19–20, 57, 60, 122, 124, 128, 222, 263, 265, 282, 289, 297–8, 305, 307, 321–2, 328–9, 331, 345, 352, 364, 373–4, 539, 561, 613, 637, 667 Coudenberg Palace 12–13, 58 Jacques de Gérines of 409 Bução, Forest 80 Buccoleon, palace 254, 327 Bucharest 124 Buda 42, 124, 126, 128, 133, 239, 429, 491 Budapest 37, 597, 605–6, 608 Budapest Triptych, (David Workshop) 607 Bugía 549 Bugnicourt, lord of 326 Bulgars 411 Bultinc, Peter 602 Buonconsiglio, castello del 43, 281 Burg 252–3, 255 Burgos 103, 135, 137, 145, 641, 660 Real Monasterio de Las Huelgas (Burgos) 641 Burgundian 17, 28, 38, 56–7, 66, 75, 80, 101–2, 104, 107–10, 116, 134, 174, 183, 194, 232, 250, 261, 328, 330, 466, 486–7, 507, 523, 549, 589, 676, 683 ambassadors 70, 89, 156, 194, 351, 503 court 118, 257, 299, 306, 344, 373, 505, 610, 622, 677, 691, 696 diplomats 25, 37, 44, 47, 51–2, 61, 65–7, 69, 72, 77, 79–80, 83, 85, 96, 102–5, 107, 123, 133, 173, 178–9, 181, 183–4,

817

INDEX

193, 205, 357, 464, 468, 474, 477, 481, 484, 491, 499–501, 539, 550, 626, 664 dynasty 467, 563 fashion 513, 627 heritage 373, 565 mausoleum 43, 128 style 168, 501, 593, 633 Burgundian-Anglo-Portuguese, alliance 428 Burgundian-Brabantine, union of arms 15 Burgundian-English, alliance 48 Burgundian-Lusitanian, dynasty 119 Burgundy 10, 12–13, 15–16, 19–20, 22, 29, 48, 52, 66, 97, 251, 261–3, 328, 334, 345, 376, 378, 410, 421, 426, 431, 433, 523, 542, 603, 663, 673, 681, 685–6 Agnes of 285, 394, 678 Alisa of 685 Anne of 280, 286, 288, 394, 631–2, 636, 713 Antoine of 258, 328, 679 Charles, duke of 332 Charles Martin of 647 Friars Minor in 541 Grand Bastard Anthony of 679 Great Seal of the Duchy of 329 Guyot of 29–30, 36, 44 Henrique of 85, 97 house of 55, 58, 262, 396, 410, 630–1, 681, 695, 707 Isabel of 260, 327, 425, 464, 494, 544, 609–10, 641, 649, 656, 690, 708 Jean of 678–9 Margaret of 351–2 Marguerite of 293 Marie of 288, 328, 678

Mary of 58, 256 Philip of 23, 284, 561 saltire of 682 Byzantine 106, 118, 120, 162, 254, 306, 332, 363, 555 style 118, 646 C Caba Espichel 109 Cabo de São Vicente 108, 572, 707 Cacault, François 561 Cacilas, pontal de 499 Cacus 691 Cacus Elephant-Rider 692 Cadeia de Limoeiro 180 Caerleon 203, 235 Caesar Augustus 98, 223 Julius 9, 94, 210, 259, 522 Caesarea 253 Eusebius of 478 Cairo 26 Calais 15, 28, 292, 426 Calçada da Pendoa 197 Cale 80 Calendario, Filippo Expulsion from Eden 40 The Temptation of Adam and Eve 40 Calle de la Marina 550 Calvanists 255, 331 Calvary 56, 100–1, 138, 142, 146, 202, 238, 240, 375, 392, 432, 454–5, 481, 492, 525, 560, 566, 574, 597, 601, 603–4, 608–9, 613, 656, 668 Calvary (Anonymous) 612, 616 (Cologne) 355 (Hand H, Turin-Milan Hours) 35 (Masaccio) 34

818 (New York) 35, 37, 145, 157, 354, 356, 510, 596, 605, 612, 642 (Poznan) 360 (Venice Cá d’Oro Galleria di Giorgio) 612 (Venice) 34, 37 Calvinist 412 Calvo, Francisco 585, 587 Câmara, Luís Gonçalves da 99 Camber 51 Cambrai 306 bishop of 330, 353 Cambrensis, Giraldus, De Principis Instructione 202 Camelot 203, 403 Camere van den Rade 326 Camões 712 Campin, Robert 349–51, 353–6, 363, 547, 601, 613 Merode Altapiece 465 Canary Islands 392, 442–3 Canavese, Feletto 543 Canche, river 265 Canoeira 484 Canonical Hours 442 Canopus 526 Canterbury, archbishop of 396 Cantica Canticorum 158, 391, 448 Capela de São Jorge (Tomar) 477 de Sao Miguel (Lisbon) 134 do Fundador (Batalha) 491 Imperfeita (Batalha) 229, 232, 495–7, 501, 506, 644 Capella de la Trinitat (Palma Cathedral) 553 Cappadocia 240, 395, 528 Capture of St. Engracia 65 Caracalla, baths of 482 Carmine, church of the 34 Carolingian

court 118, 162 palatine chapels 253 Carrara, family 35 Carthage 98, 105, 301, 405 Carthusian monastery of Miraflores, (Simón de Colonia, German) 137, 641 Casa de Meca 242 de Moeda 180 do Infantado 92 Casal, Vasco Fernandes de (Vasco Manoel) 143 Casale Monferrato, (Feletto Canavese) 543 Cascais 51, 248, 498 Senhor de 703, 705 Cassiciacum 400 Castello, del Buonconsiglio (Trent) 43 Castelo de Leiria 67 São Jorge (Lisbon) 173, 179, 190 Velho 176, 178 Castile 66, 76, 97, 103–4, 112, 125, 129, 133, 145–7, 170, 193, 255, 283, 439–40, 473, 502–3, 517, 529, 641 Blanche of 456 Enrique IV of 112, 147, 610 Ferdinand I the Great of 72 Ferdinand III of 105 Ferdinand IV 76 Isabel of 610, 641 Juan I of 129, 199 Juan II of 112, 137–8, 145, 484, 502, 641 kingdom of 91, 129, 179 Sancho IV of 699 Castilho, João de 480 Castilian 60, 103, 105, 130, 226, 255, 437, 439, 441, 516, 523,

INDEX

709 castle 6, 52, 58, 67–8, 70, 84–5, 96, 103–4, 131, 134, 175, 179, 195, 198, 201, 205, 214, 239, 253, 258–9, 266–7, 269, 280, 298, 316–17, 323–5, 372, 385, 404, 445, 457, 510, 517, 524, 530, 550–1, 568, 582, 614, 624, 634, 683, 685, 697–8, 700, 707 of Ferté-Milon (Champagne) 634 of Gerard the Devil (Ghent) 385 of the Knights of São Bento (Avis) 52 Nuovo, Torre Bruna (Naples) 594 Stirling (England) 28 Suytburg (Walcheren) 562 Vieiros (Alentejo) 129 Windsor (England) 440, 460, 513, 517 Castor-Pollux 321, 527 Castro Alvaro de 703, 705 Fadrique de 104 Fernando de 78 Inês de 71, 180 Marim 108, 404 Catalan Atlas 589 Catalonia 45, 47, 61–2, 154, 646 Cataloniëstrraat 385 cathedral of Milan 643 of Notre Dame de Grâces (Cambrai) 646 of Saint Denis (Paris) 251 of St. Vitus (Paris) 666 of Valencia 613, 615 Catholic monarchs 178, 276, 610, 641 Cauliniana 567 Cávado, river 102 Caxton, William 273, 462

819 Ordre of Chyvalry 462 Celano, Tommaso de 98 Célestins 632–3 Cerberus 687 Cerca Fernardina 174, 176 Ceuta 30, 54, 83, 91–2, 106–7, 148, 156, 200, 209, 220, 236, 412, 421, 430–1, 446, 458–9, 463, 473, 502–3, 506, 512, 515, 530, 537, 564, 583, 642, 692, 697, 703, 706 Avis princes of 429, 505 campaign 149–50, 152, 230–1, 460, 637, 642 Châlons-sur-Marne 654 Champagne 262, 309, 444, 446, 635 Marie de 333, 411 Champmol 128, 631 Chartreuse de 128, 369, 630, 632 Chantilly 213 Chão de Vila 196, 199 Chapel of the Crib, (Giotto) 38 Chapel Reliquary of Charlemagne 168 Chararic, king 99, 417 Charlemagne 42, 118, 160–5, 210, 229, 231, 323, 429, 431, 435, 478, 496–7, 522, 712 Palatine Chapel 42, 228, 497, 501 Charles I king of England 424 Charles III, of Savoy 136–7 Charles IV of Luxembourg, Holy Roman Emperor 251, 666–8, 671 Charles the Bold 629 Charles the Bold 57, 256, 303, 467, 494, 520, 592–3, 629, 647, 678, 681–3, 685, 687, 696 Charles the Bold and Isabelle of Bourbon 57

820 Charles V Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain 137, 170, 269, 279, 282, 298, 411, 437, 660 king of France 3, 170, 210, 251, 269, 279, 282, 298–9, 310, 336, 365, 435, 437, 589, 614, 635, 667–70, 672 Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain 435 Charles VI 24, 126, 209, 214, 311, 321, 633, 695 Charles VII 14, 58, 322, 332, 428 Charny, lord of 651, 678 Charolais count of 13, 24, 280, 284, 332, 647–8, 678–9, 682 Chartres 433 Chartreuse de Champmol 128, 369, 631–2 Charybdis 465 Chastel, Thierry de 622 Château de Bicêtre 636 des Comtes 323 Chatillon-sur-Seine 331 Chaucer, Geoffrey 204, 456 Chaves 91, 131–2 Chisseret, Amiot le 332 Chrétian, de Troyes 215, 444, 452–3 Christ 38, 56, 82, 98–9, 101, 139, 146, 153–4, 159, 161, 169–71, 215, 227, 230, 238, 240, 277, 291–2, 354, 356, 362–3, 374–5, 379, 390, 394, 399, 404–5, 408, 416, 418, 433–4, 448, 454, 462, 469, 473, 476, 478, 480, 510, 517, 523, 531, 560, 566–7, 574, 597, 599, 601–2, 608–9, 611, 613–14, 621, 639–40, 642, 649–50,

654, 656, 658, 663, 701–2 life of 528, 657 in Majesty 44, 95, 143, 340, 465, 485, 553, 608, 624 mystical corpus of 171, 230, 557 order of 128–9, 148, 151, 187, 199–200, 225–6, 230, 235, 408, 442, 447, 457, 468, 470, 472–5, 477, 479, 487, 504, 528, 536, 543–4, 639, 642, 657 passion of 100, 145, 237–8, 254, 380, 388, 390, 400, 480–1, 517, 603, 613, 621, 655, 667–8 resurrected 34, 388, 398, 424, 557, 598, 614, 663 Christ, bas-de-page 277 Christ among the Doctors 611 Christ flanked by the Virgin Mary and St. John the Baptist, (Gossaert, Jan) 640 Christ in Majesty with Saints 553 Christ on the Way to Golgotha 37 Christendom 30, 41, 133, 165, 230, 382, 455, 457, 477–8, 521, 536, 575 Christian 118, 187, 407, 421, 449, 522, 707 church militant 669 church triumphant 230, 240, 668 knights 133, 159 Reconquest 40, 174, 200, 470, 517, 707 theology 399, 483 truth 153, 164 Christian Wisdom in the Spirit of St. Thomas Aquinas (Bonaiuti,Andrea) 33 Christmas 63, 124, 161, 169, 249, 394, 656 Christomimetes 55, 121

INDEX

Christus, Petrus 112, 293–5, 377, 379, 541, 578, 580, 646, 661 Landscape with St. John the Baptist 580 Madonna of the Dry Tree 293 Portrait of a Man 542 Chronica del Rei Dom João I, (Lopes, Fernão) 440 Chronicle of the Constable 442 Chronicle of the Kings of France 450 church of Alverca (Portugal) 708 of the Célestines (Paris) 631–2, 636 of the Dominicans (Bruges) 255 of Holy Cross (Llotja) 550 of Nôtre Dame de la Treille (Lille) 631 of Nôtre Dame en Vaux (Châlonssur-Marne) 654 of Our Lady (Bruges) 256, 602 of Our Lady of Mount Sion (Jerusalem) 37 of Saint Sauveur (Ghent) 25 of San Martín (Valencia) 618 of Santa Maria (Batalha) 649 of Santa Maria del Carmine (Florence) 34 of Santa Maria Maior (Barcelos) 102 of Santa Maria Novella (Florence) 33 of Santa Maria Vitória (Batalha) 67, 488–9 of Santa Marinha (Lisbon) 184 of Santa Trinità (Florence) 32 of São Bartholomeu (Lisbon) 191 of São Francisco (Porto) 81, 107, 140 of São Miguel de Alcaynça (Sintra) 197 of Sint-Jans (Ghent) 597

821 of St. Andrew (Antwerp) 700 of St. Paula (Seville) 706 Cicero 402, 405–6 De Officiis 406 Hortensius 402 Rhetoric 402 Somnium Scipionis 402, 405 Cione Andrea di 553 Nardo di 552 Cios 690 Circe 261 Cistercian Vulgate 452 Cité des Dames, master of the 686, 695 Citrus medica 401 Ciudad Real 125 Civitate Dei, (City of God), (St. Augustine) 159, 371–2, 526, 557 Civitates Orbis Terrarum, (Braun, George-Hogenberg, Frans) 175 Clairvaux, St. Bernard of 70, 83, 446–7, 535, 567–9, 575, 709 Clari, Robert of 254 Clarissa 208 Clavijo 41, 528 Clement V 470 Cleophas, Mary 142, 390 Cleves 208 Adolph I of 297, 395 Adolph II of 678–9, 696 Catherine of 330 Jean I of 288, 294, 323 Jean II of 679 Climent, Vicente 615–16 Cloth of God 64, 119, 178, 182, 251, 388, 421, 638, 678 Clothilda 449–50 Clovis I 213, 449–50, 689 Clunaic, order 96

822 Cluny 96–7 Clytie 224 Codex Grimani 562 Coene, Jacques 86–90, 205, 215, 218, 246, 278, 623–4, 643–4 Coenobium 123 Coimbra 48, 63, 65, 71–4, 76–7, 79–80, 96, 99, 102, 110, 120, 125, 142, 169, 174, 184, 198, 374, 475, 533, 568, 575, 678–9, 704, 708 Côrtes at 129 Patio das Escolas 80 Patio de Quintalinhos 184 Sé Velha, cathedral of 75–6 Colantonio 47, 546, 580, 598 St. Jerome in his Study 578–9 Colares, duke of 145 Colart Galeriau 351 Colchis 682–3, 689, 692, 694 Colegiata de San Cosme y Damián 659 Colettine Clarissas 604 Cologne 7, 124, 145, 175, 255, 325, 346–7, 355–6, 380, 396, 497–8, 604, 616–17 cathedral of 239, 347, 498, 501 Commentaria in Canticum Canticorum 380 Commentaria in Evangelium Santi Johannis and Commentaria 381 Comminelli, Hogo 588 Compiègne 323, 328 Compostela, Santiago de 40, 46, 101–4, 439 basilica of 102–3 pilgrimage to 101–2, 133, 435 Concentania, lord of 601 Conception of Our Lady, feast of the 567 Conflans, hôtel de 19

confraternity 100, 126, 215, 294, 297, 386, 602 of the Dry Tree 292, 294–5, 297 of Ghenter 386 of Middelburg 561 of Our Lady of the Dry Tree 294 of Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows 602 Coninck, Pieter de 319 Conqueror, William the 372, 484, 590 Conques 96 Consolamini, consolamini, popule meus 391 Constantine the Great 37, 139, 185, 416–17, 478–80, 482, 667 mausoleum 478 Constantinople 26, 118, 120, 165, 254, 595, 693–4, 697 fall of 332, 455 Johanna of 330 Margaret of 254, 334, 348 St. Helene of 419 Contra Faustium, (St. Augustine) 433 convent in Bourbourg 347 of Burgos 137, 641 of the Célestines (Paris) 634 of Jesus (Aveiro) 711 of Odivelas 83, 142, 458, 637 of Pena Longha (Sintra) 142 of St. Anne (Valencia) 648 in Xabregas 603 convento de Cristo (Tomar) 474–5, 477 de Fonte Colombo (Latium) 38 de Santo Elói dos Lóios (Lisbon) 191, 217 de São Domingos (Lisbon) 186–8 di Greccio (Italy) 38 di San Damiano (Assisi) 38

INDEX

do Carmo (Lisbon) 188 Cooster, Catherine de 321 Corbenic, Elaine le 451 Corcordia poenitentiae 478 Córdoba 64, 105–6, 406 Corella 600–1 Coria 441 Corinthians 171 coronation of Henry VI 462 of Sancho I 76 of the Virgin Mary 89, 363, 556, 657 Corpus Christi 233 Corpus Christi 232–3, 452, 475, 504, 655 Correira, Isabel 586 Corridor del Campo 283 Côrte Imperial 153 Cosmographia, (Ptolemy) 588 Costa, Jorge da 704 Costume Book, (Rubens, Peter Paul) 279, 281 Coudenberg, palace 12, 58, 263, 280, 288, 296, 302, 328–9 Council of Nicea 62 of Thirty-Nine 334 Counter-Reformation 303 Coupelle, Jean de la 266 Cour de Comptes 45 Court, lord William à 543 Courtrai 319, 321–2 Coustain, Pierre 677 Coutinho, João 703 Couto da Várzea 92 Covarrubias 659 Covarrubias Madonna 659–60 Covenant Ark of the 171, 227, 229, 237, 375, 591, 657 Covilhão, lord of 128, 473, 492

823 Cracow 207 Crato 66 Crècy 240, 310, 321, 422, 426–7, 439 Crécy-Poitiers, battlefields 428 Crequy, Jean de 693 Crete 26, 31, 689 Crimea 26 Cronica do Principe Dom João, (Góis, Damião) 703 Crónica dos Feitos da Guiné, (Azúrara, Gomes Eanes de) 121, 414, 479, 509 Croÿ Antoine de, duke of Porcien 677 Charles, Seigneur of 647 crucifixion 137, 140, 597, 609, 613, 615 Crucifixion 145–6, 276, 464, 492 (Bauzá) 612–13, 617 (Berlin) 612 (Budapest) 606 (da Zevio, Altichiero) 36–7 (New York) 140, 356, 464, 490, 598 (Poznan) 354–6, 360 (Turin-Milan, Hand H) 612 (Zevio, Altichiero da) 598 crusade 30, 74, 126–7, 150, 257, 469, 502–3, 545 fifth 418 first 209, 227, 240, 253, 423, 457, 477, 528, 591, 671–2 fourth 327, 332, 411 second 26, 253, 434, 447, 567, 603 third 324, 410 Cruz, Diego de la 138 Cuise-la-Forêt 634 Cunha, Rodrigo da 699 Cupid 259, 681–3 Custódia de Belém, (Vicente, Gil)

824 168 Cybele 133 Cygnus 219 Cynthia 194 Cyprus 31 Cyrus, king 360 D Da Virtuosa Bemfeitoria, (Pedro, Prince) 406 Dacianus 64 Dagobert I 396 Dalmatia 418 Stephen Ouros, king of 404 Dalmáu, Lluis 63, 125, 357, 363, 617, 623 Virgin of the Councilors 357 Damas, Duarte de 242, 245 Damascus 29, 155 Dame de la Fraternité de St. George 513 Damietta 36, 418 Dammartin, Renaud de 196 Dampierre Guillaume de 254, 319, 334, 410–11 Margaret of 266 Daniel 156, 399–400, 529 Dante 405 Paradiso 404 Danube 126–7, 672 Daret Danelet 353 Jacques 353, 360 Darius, king 155, 529 Daroca, rabbi Joseph Albo of 154 Dau, Manuel 357 Dauphinist 19, 24, 38, 40, 292 David king 159, 171, 210, 215, 230, 370, 374, 399–400, 522,

532–3, 605 house of 171 tower of 37 Gerard 605–7, 615 Haarlem Resurrection 611 Mary Magdalene 605 Davidic Psalms 158 Davidic-Solomonic Temple 452 De Bello Civili 9, 401 De Beneficiis, (Seneca) 406 De Civitate Dei, (St. Augustine) 138, 159 De Coloribus Diversus, (Aucher Jean) 87 De Correctione Rusticorum 417 De Croÿ, Anthony 329 De Hierarchia Celesti, (Pseudo-Dionysius) 152 De laude novae militae 446 De Laudibus Mariae 567 De Laudibus Novae Militiae 568 De Officiis, Cicero 406 De Ordine, (St. Augustine) 226 De Principis Instructione, (Cambrensis, Giraldus) 202 De rationibus musicae 482 De Re Aedificatoria, (Alberti, Leon Battista) 481 De regimine principium, (Romanus, Aegidius) 163 De Viris Illustribus, (Facius, Bartholomaeus) 577, 587 Debroucq, Jacques, Recueil d’Arras 645 Deguileville, Guillaume de, Pèlerinage de l’âme 293 Delft 15–16 Delphic, oracle 685 Demanda do Santo Graal 167 Denmark 427 Derby, Earl of 516 Descent from the Cross 492

INDEX

Descent from the Cross 100, 597, 604, 613 Descent from the Cross, (Campin, Robert) 361–2 Deschamps, Paul 323 Destorrents, Ramón 648–9 St. Anne and the Virgin Mary 648 Deventer 366 Devotio Moderna 380 Diálogos em Roma, (Holanda, Francisco de) 205 Dias Lopo 456 Mumadona 84 Didache 171 Dierick, Alfonso Lieven 345–6 Dies Est Laetitiae 557 Dies Irae 370 Dijon 20, 43, 55, 126–8, 140, 250, 282, 307, 328, 330, 332, 373, 376, 407, 630, 632, 647–8, 651, 713 Diksmuide 321 Dinis, king 67, 70–1, 76, 79, 102, 134–5, 142, 151–2, 174, 186–7, 190, 192, 198–9, 227, 404–5, 430, 470, 528, 571 Diocletian 109, 421 Dionysian passion 404 Dionysius 152, 405 Dioscorus 483–4, 527 diptych 135–6, 145, 424, 510, 555, 557, 559, 561–2, 606, 638, 646 Diptych of Christiaan de Hondt 560 Domingues Afonso 486, 501 Domingo 71 Dominicans 255, 330–1, 434, 484, 544 Dominus Coeli 388 Dominus Mundi 472

825 Domitian, emperor 373 Domus Faustae 482 Donkere Poorte 325 Doria Diptych, (Gossaert, Jan) 562, 576 Dormition 515, 657 Dortmund 356, 614 Douro 80, 84, 205, 402 Dover 123 Dresden 345, 506, 509, 511, 515 Dresden Triptych 503, 510–12, 514, 518, 521, 523–30, 532–3, 535, 539–40, 542, 560, 563–4, 643, 650–2, 659–60 Duarte, king 48, 63, 65, 77, 88–9, 120–1, 125, 129–30, 144, 147, 149–50, 160, 163–4, 180–3, 190–1, 201, 205–6, 216, 232, 238, 246, 413–14, 417, 420, 431, 458, 461, 487, 523, 569, 643–4, 647, 704 Book of Hours 88–90, 232, 643 Book of Instruction on the Art of Riding Well 456 Hours of 89, 643 Leal Conselheiro 164 palace of 190, 569 Dublin 562 Dubroeucq, Jacques 300 Duchess Isabel, (Chicago) 638 Dufay, Guillaume 306–7, 488 Duivelsteen, Geraard de 385 Duke Philip the Good, (Chicago) 638 Dume 417 Dumfries 28 Dunbar 28 Dunstable Swan 461 Duomo San Rufino 38 Dupret, Eleuthère 353 Dürer, Albrecht, Vision of St. Eustache 565

826 Dutch Calvinists 343 E Eanes, João 90, 144, 572, 576, 626–32, 636–8, 648, 660, 664, 698, 701, 713 King João I 637 Early Christian Church 63, 80, 99, 367, 406, 574, 649, 656 martyrs of the 479, 525, 529 Easter 10, 236, 400, 518, 656, 685 Triduum 378 Eastern Orthodox 118 Eastertide Antiphon 377 Ecce Agnus Dei 390, 580 Ecce Homo 608 Ecclesia 398, 448, 556, 563, 614, 658, 682, 693, 697, 710 Eden 40, 95, 417, 437, 523, 565, 656 Edward, the Black Prince 320, 426–8, 460–1 Edward III 266, 320–1, 419, 421, 424–8, 430, 460–1, 672 Edward IV 462 Ega, river 46 Egypt 9, 37, 157, 224, 484, 526, 533, 611 flight into 609 Mary of 433 St. Anthony Abbot of 432, 573 sultan of 536 Einaud 229 El Grao, port of 46 El Libre del Gentil e los Tres Savis 549 El Parral, monastery of 112, 147 El Seo 550 El Terreno 551 Elis, king of 688 Elysium 403

Emathia 223 Enchanted Garden 317 Engelsestraat 255 England 15, 26–8, 51, 91, 116, 122–3, 131, 174, 194, 202, 219, 232, 288, 306, 319–21, 345–6, 372–3, 419, 421, 426–9, 431, 434, 437, 440–1, 466, 502–3, 513, 590, 615–16, 672 John Lackland of 333 English-Burgundian alliance 28 Engracia, of Portugal 64 Enrique III 283 Enrique IV 112, 147, 283, 610 entombment 100, 597, 604, 607, 609, 613 Ephesians letter to the (St. Paul) 236, 518 Ephesus 312 Diana’s temple at 374 Thamaris of 312 Epiphany 437 Epiphany 7, 32, 45–6, 126, 168, 187, 213, 329, 437, 531, 566, 641–2, 656 feast of the 213, 329 Epistles, (Horace) 405, 567 Eques Virtute 223 Erdapfel, (Behaim, Martim) 591 Erec 452 Eris 401 Ermida de Memória 568 Erythia 691 Erythraean Sibyl 139, 141, 146 eschaton 158, 389 Escorial, palace-monastery 137 Esteves, Pedro 85 Estoire 446, 452–3 Estoire de Merlin, (Boron, Robert de) 446 Estoire del Graal, (Boron, Robert de)

827

INDEX

446 estrades grillagée des spectateurs 680 Estremoz 76, 499 Étampes Isabelle d› 678 Jean d› 677 Robinet d› 4 Étampes-Nevers,count of 679 Étaples 373 Eterius 62 Eterna Sapientia 391 Ethic of the Mean, (Aristotle) 433, 459, 650 Etymologie, (Seville, Isidore of ) 694 Eu, count of 644 Eucharist 164, 171, 376, 397, 481, 557, 655–6 Eulalia, virgin martyr 357 Europe 42, 91, 106, 115–16, 124, 179, 238, 309, 412, 415, 428, 434, 457, 559, 588–9 Eusebius Ad Sanctum Coetum 139 Oracula Sibyllina 139 Eustace 209 Eve 171, 451 Évora 52, 78, 108, 134, 179, 206, 233, 368, 404, 430, 450, 516, 528–9, 644 São Francisco Palace 179 Exaltatio Crucis 667 Exaltation of the Cross, feast day of 568 Exodus 157, 237, 397, 591, 657 Expulsion 437 Expulsion from Eden, (Calendario, Filippo) 40 Expulsion from Paradise 529 Extremadura 440 Eyck Barthélemy d’ 11, 546, 675 Barthémey d’

Aix Annunciation 578 Bathélemy d’ Le Livre du Cuer d’Ámours Épris 11 Ezechiel 293, 399 F Fabriano, Gentile da 32 Adoration of the Magi Altarpiece 32 Facius, Bartholomaeus 577, 580–1, 587–8, 595 Book of Famous Men 577 De Viris Illustribus 577 Falperra 417 Faria 131 Farnese, Alexander 437 Faro 108 feast of the Adoration of the Kings 642 of the Annunciation 447 of the Apostle Philip 373 of the Assumption 150, 294, 490, 515, 524, 703 of the Conception of Our Lady 567 of the Epiphany 213, 329 of the Holy Lance and Nails 668 of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin 563 of Passover 291 of the Pheasant 29, 260, 306, 676–7, 681–2, 685–7, 691, 696–7 of Santiago 91, 150 of St. Catherine of Alexandria 132 of St. John the Evangelist 379 of the Tabernacles 397 of the Virgin Mary 294 Fecampé, Pierre Rogier de 666 Felbridge, Sir Simon 513 Fernandes

828 João 197 Mateus 496 Fernando, Prince 78–9, 134, 146, 151, 190, 248, 260, 285, 323, 487, 492, 511, 514, 531, 563, 569, 595, 704 Ferrera 124, 133 Ferté-Milon, castle of 635 A Festivity at the Court of Philip the Good 280–1 Fez 493, 509, 537–8, 563, 595, 703, 707, 709 Ficino, Marsilio 482 Fiesnes, lord of 679 Filiberto, Emmanuele 137 Firenze, Andrea da, Seven Liberal Arts 185 Fitzalan, Thomas 91, 131, 396 Five Franciscan Martyrs of Morocco 73, 99 Flaccus, Valerius, Argonauticon 150, 408 Flanders 28–9, 31, 33, 37, 45, 47–9, 53–4, 57, 61, 103, 105, 111, 114–16, 118, 122, 124–5, 128–9, 168, 247–8, 251, 254, 260–2, 285, 288, 291, 318–23, 326, 332–3, 344–5, 347, 357–8, 361, 372, 411, 427–8, 431–2, 466, 491, 503, 505, 510, 523, 529, 540, 543, 545, 551, 555, 562, 566–7, 589–90, 594–5, 600, 603, 605, 615, 623, 625–9, 631, 641, 646, 654, 656, 660, 664–5, 672, 711, 713 Baldwin IX, count of 254 burial site of the Counts of 525, 620 count of 13, 214, 225, 252–4, 318, 321, 334, 338, 382, 458, 609

countess of 254, 332–4, 348, 411 crest and seal of 256, 410, 552, 682 Dietrich (Thierry) of Alsace, count of 253–4 Ferrand, count of 330 Gui de Dampierre, Count of 319 Johanna of 254 Louis de Mâle, count of 266, 631 Louis I de Nevers, count of 410 Louis II de Nevers, count of 319 Louis III de Mâle, count of 409 Margaret of 267, 348 Marguerite of 262, 333 Philip of Alsace, count of 333, 410 Robert II, count of 253 Flandria Illustrata, (Sanderus, Antonius) 255, 325 Flegetanis 453 Fleur des Histoires 89 Flor da Rosa 66 Florence 32, 34, 39, 73, 81, 86, 89–90, 122, 124, 133, 185, 246, 255, 278, 306, 405, 561, 608, 624, 648 Fongaca, Lourenco Annes 438–9 Fons Vitae 44, 119, 136, 145, 157, 215, 279, 298, 355, 361, 368, 407–8, 451, 466–7, 482 Fountain of Life 44, 112–13, 118– 19, 123, 125–6, 128–9, 131, 134–6, 138, 143–4, 147, 151, 154, 156, 158, 160, 164–5, 168–72, 187, 215, 233, 340, 398, 412–13, 417, 429, 464, 485, 508, 642, 703, 708 (Madrid) 112–13, 135, 147, 354, 362 (Oberlin) 112–13, 143, 354, 362 Fouquet, Jean 251 Fourth Lateran Council 418

INDEX

France 24, 40, 88, 99, 124–5, 205, 251, 262, 309–10, 319, 321–2, 325, 328, 332–3, 345, 427–8, 433, 450, 470, 567, 616, 633, 668, 670, 673, 683, 686, 694 Charles V of 3, 24, 209, 614, 667, 669 Charles VI of 24, 126, 209 Claude of 257 François I 257 Louis of Guyenne, dauphin of 287, 395 Louis VII 447 Michelle of 280, 647 Robert I of 97 St. Louis IX of 231, 454 Franche Comté 133, 262 Franciscan Order 36–9, 70, 74–5, 82–3, 100, 167, 255, 292, 418, 538 Franciscan Poor Clares 92, 710 Franco-Burgundian army 127 Franco-Flemish 140, 485, 690 tapestries 304 Frankfurt 208, 356, 601, 653, 655 Franks 213, 449 Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor 192, 593, 660 Freemasons 232 Freitas, Pedro Álvares Seco de 475 Friesdam Annunciation, (New York) 377 Frise. lord of 322, 567 Funchal 586 Furtado, Afonso 439 G Gaddi, Taddeo 34 Gahmuret 454 Gaignières, Roger de 633 Galaad 451

829 galactotrophousa 363 Galahad 236, 442, 452–3, 457 Galicia 66, 90, 96, 101–2, 104, 112, 133, 248, 435, 439 Gallic-Celtic 321 Galvão, Duarte, View of Lisbon from the Crónica de Dom Afonso Henriques 498–9 Gama, Vasco da 712 Gand, Olivier de 480 Garcia, Andreu 543 Garcia de Toledo, Juan 70 Garter, Lady of the 464, 517 Gates, Fadrique 190 Gaul 99, 102, 235, 325, 416, 565–6 Gaunt, John of 126, 144, 203, 320, 371–2, 423–8, 430, 435–6, 438–41, 460, 484, 516, 590 Gavere 411 Gawain 463 Gedele 358 Gelderland 346, 349, 354, 561, 614, 619 Gelmírez, Diego 101 Gemuleira 197 Genappe 265, 297–8 Genesis 392, 424, 566 Genoa 30, 47, 106, 122, 255, 510– 11, 537, 539, 548, 566, 569, 581–3, 585–6 Geografica, (Ptolemy) 588 Gerard, bishop 102 Gérines, Jacques de 631 Germany 27, 29, 54, 124, 133, 174, 259, 325, 346, 356, 395, 413, 436, 453, 567 Germolles, Château of 593 Geryon 687, 691 Ghent 13, 15, 20, 24–5, 57, 103, 120, 124, 225, 264–5, 307, 318–23, 326–33, 335, 337–41,

830 344–6, 348, 354–5, 357–9, 363, 365–8, 373, 384–7, 392, 411–13, 423, 425, 428, 431–2, 435–7, 465, 480, 567, 603, 614, 617, 619, 623–4, 713 church of Saint Sauveur 25 knights 318, 320, 326–7, 329, 338–9, 359, 422 Koornstapelhuis 384 Korenmarkt 327, 339 Kruisboogschutters 385 Ghent Altarpiece 7, 25, 32–4, 40, 43–4, 47, 54, 59, 61, 63, 65, 77, 80, 98–9, 101, 138, 140, 225, 227, 233, 277, 284, 298, 330, 335, 337, 340–1, 343–4, 352, 355, 357–8, 360, 365, 451, 457, 464–7, 480, 490, 505–6, 526, 530, 552, 554, 564–5, 569, 596–7, 603, 609, 615–16, 621, 624, 638, 640, 648, 663, 676, 701, 703, 708, 713 Adam and Eve 34, 40, 341, 382, 392, 466, 569 Adoration of the Lamb 32, 225, 340, 366–7, 381, 392, 399, 402, 406, 415, 466, 472, 481, 593, 663 Angelic Choir 341, 485 Annunciation 63, 375, 377, 465 Apocalyptic procession 187 Celestial Angels 466 Cumaean Sibyl 33, 140–1 deësis 365, 390, 466 Erythraean Sibyl 33, 54, 58, 61, 65, 138, 140, 260, 369, 401 Golden Shrine 640 Hell 7 Holy Hermits 101, 225, 432–3, 466 Holy Knights 99, 101, 123, 187,

225, 403, 405, 412, 425, 427, 429, 431–3, 446, 451, 466, 509, 529, 554, 565, 609, 637–8, 706 Holy Pilgrims 225, 432, 434–5, 457, 466, 473 Just Judges 123, 187, 225, 404–5, 408–11, 431–3, 466, 554, 609 Lamb of God 34, 80, 101, 233, 260, 317, 363, 365, 393–4, 397, 676 Pomus Adami 392, 401, 407 St. John the Baptist 342 St. John the Evangelist 342 Gibraltar 106–7, 149, 225, 516, 567, 692 Gideon 259, 592 Gihon Spring 171 Gijon, Count of 92 Gildehuis van de Meselaars 385–6 Giles 50, 239, 689 Gilles Binchois 645 Gilliskerkstraat 625 Giorgio, Giovanni Battista di 581, 583 Giotto 38 Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife 60, 277, 386, 496, 534, 643, 646 Giustianiani escutcheon 511 Glastonbury 28, 201–3, 454 Gloucester, Humphrey, duke of 14 Goerlitz, Élizabeth de 258 Goffaert, Lysebette 352 Gog and Magog 589 Góis, Damião de 217, 605 Cronica do Principe Dom João 703 Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio 184, 216, 499 Golden Fleece 260, 682, 687 insignia 54, 591, 593, 629, 677 order of the 20, 50, 58, 127, 148, 240, 250, 258–61, 273, 289,

INDEX

292, 326, 329, 376, 378, 407, 409, 421, 428, 431, 437, 466, 594–5, 621, 647, 676–7, 681, 688, 692 quest for the 230, 260, 527, 694 Golden Knights, order of the 32 Golden Scroll School 643 Golden Shrine 168, 340, 640 Golden Spurs, battle of the 319, 334, 339 Golden Tree 127–8, 257, 491 order of the 127–8, 148, 257, 492, 686 Golgotha 36, 354, 356, 604, 606 Goliath 532–3 Gomes Eanes 86 Gonçalo 242 Gomes Eanes, abbot 73, 86, 95, 121, 178, 204, 406, 414, 458, 479, 509 Gonçalves 198, 494, 707–8 João 197 Nuno 197, 538, 576, 627, 699, 701 Arzila, Pastrana Tapestries 512 St. Vincent Altarpiece 144–5, 421, 509, 535–6, 704, 706–10 Steuã 198 Gordian knot 291, 309 Görlitz Elisabeth of 8 John, Duke of 9 Gornemans 456 gospel of John 159, 291, 378, 390, 656, 663, 711 of Luke 369, 371, 399–400, 433, 451 of Matthew 374, 379, 388, 508, 642 Gossaert, Jan 559–63, 566, 574,

831 640 Christ flanked by the Virgin Mary and St. John the Baptist 640 Doria Diptych 576 Gothic 70, 83, 85–6, 95, 117, 187, 201, 243, 245, 254, 293, 327, 336–7, 368, 412, 499, 550, 570–1, 630 Gothic Brabantine style 331 Gothic Portuguese, calligraphy 90 Gouden-handtstraet 625 Grail 214–15, 218, 236, 437, 444–6, 449, 451–4, 456–7, 463, 480, 532, 668–9 Holy 109, 167, 202–3, 227, 231, 444, 478, 483, 711 Granada 29, 104–5, 109, 170, 502, 516, 595, 664, 693, 697–8 Grand Canary 151 Grandes Croniques of King Charles V of France 669, 672–3 Grandes Heures de Rohan 289–90 Graslei 331, 385, 396 Grassi, Giovannino de’ 87 Graven van Vlaanderen 323 Gravensteen 323–7, 333, 624 Greece 1, 141, 156, 161, 237, 360, 406, 448, 460, 642, 690 Irene of 312 Gregorium Sacramentary 164 Grenier, Pasquier 207 Grevelingen 347 Greverade, Heinrich 605 Grieff, Hans 653 Grigny 267 grisaille 8, 11–12, 32, 43, 368, 379, 392, 465, 497, 505, 601, 606–7, 614 Groeningelaan 319 Grosmont, Henry of 516 Grote Sikkel 383

832 Guadalete 567 Guadalquivir, river 108–9 Guadiana, river 108, 133, 402–3 Guedelha Ibn Yahya 156 Guelders 395 Guevara, Diego de 60 Guildford 460 Guimarães 72, 83–6, 89–94, 706 castle- palace 92, 94, 96, 145, 182, 205, 232, 278, 707 Guissin, master 266, 268 Gurnemanz 454 Guyenne 10, 287 H Haarlem 352, 605 Haarlem Resurrection, (David, Gerard) 611 Habakkuk 399 Hague, The 2–3, 7, 10–11, 21–2, 275, 295, 346, 500, 561, 619, 647, 661 Hainaut 3, 7, 14–16, 282, 306, 319, 322, 326, 334, 351–2, 410–11 Isabelle of 332–3, 410 Jacqueline of 7, 9, 308 Philippa of 320–1 Hakkon, king of Norway 404 Hallincbrood, Jan 600 Hammudids 106 Hance 29, 693, 695 Hannah, prophet 601 Hannibal 94, 403, 691, 697 Hanseatic League 116, 255, 258, 346 Hapsburg 60, 137, 276, 279, 281, 299, 303, 412, 436, 610, 641, 660 Harcourt, Jeanne de 285, 323, 328, 627

Harelbeke 50 Hastings 372, 484 Gilbert of 174 Haze, Jean de 593 Hebrew 44, 107, 111, 118, 153–8, 160, 164–5, 171–2, 193, 210, 215, 222, 237, 259, 341, 355, 374–5, 382, 389, 397–9, 406, 451, 479, 518, 521–2, 524, 526, 529, 532, 557, 590–1, 601, 614, 650, 656–8 prophet 32, 154, 236, 369–70, 380, 389–91, 399–401, 407, 447, 451, 466, 480, 485, 521, 556, 601, 614, 621 Hech, Lambert de 344 Hector 210, 520, 522, 686 Heinsberg, Jean of 328 Helig Bloedbasiliek 253 Helig-Kerstkerk, church of 365, 437 Heliopolis 484 Helios 219 hell 103, 137, 552, 554, 596, 611, 614, 624 gates of 614 harrowing of 596, 611, 613, 615 Helyas 219 Henegouwen, count of 332 Hennecart, Jehan de 677 Henrique the Navigator, Prince 77, 101, 121, 128–9, 131, 144, 149–50, 184, 193, 225, 412, 415, 420–1, 428, 430–1, 442, 457–8, 460, 463, 468, 473–7, 479–81, 484, 487, 491–3, 502, 504–5, 509, 513, 516, 529, 535–8, 543–4, 575, 582, 642, 697, 709 Henry III 424 Henry IV 440, 460–1, 513 Henry V 10, 209, 263, 292, 502 Henry VI 288, 372, 462, 503

INDEX

Hercules 94, 106, 150, 261, 391, 592, 681–3, 685–92, 695 Herodotus 360 Hertford, castles of 203 Herzeele, lord of 29, 49, 294 Hesdin 265–7, 269–70, 272–3, 275, 278–9, 297–300, 303, 317, 677 Jacquemart de 222, 554 Pavilion of Ponds 266, 298–9 Pavillon du Marés 266, 298 Hesperides 683, 687 Het Spanjaardenkasteel, ( Pellizuoli, Donato Boni di) 436 Heytesbury, lord of 543 Hierapolis 291 Hieronymite Monastery of El Parral 112 High History of the Holy Grail 444 Histoire d’Alexandre, (Wauquelin, Jean) 211 Histoire de Sainte Helene, (Wauquelin, Jean) 419 História Ecclesiástica da Igreja de Lisboa 699, 704 Historia Naturalis, (Pliny) 42 Historia Regum Britanniae, (Monmouth, Geoffrey de) 203, 235 History of Gideon 592 History of Jason 273, 687 History of Scipio Africanus 300 Hobit, Guillaume 587, 595 Hof ten Walle 322–3, 325, 329, 342, 373, 411 Hofmann, Anna 653 Hohenstaufen, Frederick II of 333 Holanda António de 161 Francisco de 81, 83, 137, 238, 278, 643 Book of Hours 205 Diálogos em Roma 205

833 Holland 3, 6–8, 10, 13–14, 16, 22, 25, 321–2, 326, 349, 352, 365, 412, 432, 543, 679 John 440 Holy Kinship 387, 390, 394, 487, 649 Women 142, 146, 348, 394, 597–8, 605, 614 Holy Blood 254, 257, 332, 603 Holy Cross Braga, sanctuary of the 98, 101 brotherhood of the 356 chapel of the 667–8 Coimbra’s Augustinian Monastery of the 135, 160, 176, 575 Mallorca, church of the 550 Holy Face 455, 569, 638–42 Holy Face (Berlin) 641 (Bruges) 639 Holy Lance feast of the 238–9, 668 Holy Land 29–30, 37, 62, 91, 123, 133, 149, 152, 575, 597 Holy Roman Empire 161, 165, 319, 411, 497, 666–7 Holy Sepulchre 36–7, 62, 100, 103, 231, 240, 338, 362, 418, 433, 457, 472, 478, 482, 520, 536, 575, 596–7, 663 Holy Spirit 33, 100, 141, 166, 170–1, 225, 236, 240, 255, 277, 371, 378, 382, 390, 392, 429, 448, 573, 580 Holy Trinity 7, 61, 170, 185, 277, 369, 484, 501, 527, 531, 630 Braga, church of the 98 Holy Trinity and the Passion, (Siloé, Gil de and Cruz, Diego de la) 138 Holy Week 596, 603, 615, 685 Homer 182, 401–2, 406

834 Iliad 401–2, 520, 522 Odyssey 401–3 Hondt, Christiaan de 558–60, 562, 567 Hoogpoort 383–6 Hoogstraten, Master of, Stigmatization of St. Francis 543 Horace 406 Epistles 405 Odes and Epistles 406 Satires 406 Hornes, Jacques de 679 Hortensius, (Cicero) 402 hortus conclusis 152, 159, 361, 531, 566, 657, 661 Hospitaller Julian the 6, 432, 587 Hospitallers 30, 235, 421 order of the 66, 294, 421, 566 hôtel d’Adolph de Clèves (Lille) 696 de Bourbon (Paris) 635 de Bourgogne (Paris) 19 de la Salle (Lille) 16, 622, 676, 678, 695 de Nesle (Paris) 635 de Tournelles (Paris) 633–6 de Ville (Bruges) 254 Dieu (Beaune) 624 Vert (Bruges) 18 Hours of Prince Duarte, (Jácome Antonio, Master) 643 House of Aragon 63 of Avis 63, 509, 638, 711–12 of Bragança 145, 711 of Burgundy 410, 630–1, 681, 707 of Flanders 631 of Lancaster 48 of Levi 374 of Nazareth 361, 657

of Portugal 63 of Valois 315 of York 629 Hoxne 427 Huelva 108, 195, 197 Huerta, Juan de la 630 Huesca 363 Huguet, Master 486, 488, 495, 501 Hundred Years War 266, 319, 371 Hungary 124, 133, 416, 429, 667 Lajos I, the Great of 41, 667 Mary of 281–2, 299 St. Elizabeth of 378–9 Hunting and Fishing Party at Binnenhof 7, 9 Huntington 615–16 Hus, John 27 Hylas 690 I Iberian Peninsula 24, 57, 91, 106, 110, 112, 277, 295, 415–17, 465, 506, 516, 543, 554, 572, 599, 638, 663, 681 iconoclasm 331, 340, 365, 412, 597 iconostasis 560 Il Trionfi, (Petrarch, Francesco) 41 imagiers et selliers 599–600 Immaculate Conception 62–3, 485 Impenitent Thief, (Frankfurt) 356 Incarnation 372, 514, 516, 641, 656 Ince Hall Madonna 657–60 inclyta geração 712 Ingeburghe Psalter 370 Ingolstadt 653 Institution of the Order of the Star and Banquet 672 Isabel, Infanta 16, 49, 53–5, 59, 61–3, 65, 134, 140, 142, 148, 184, 209, 247–9, 254, 256,

INDEX

259, 264, 307, 331, 334, 369, 372, 431, 435, 467, 493, 616, 626, 628, 641, 676 Isabel of Portugal 55, 645 (New York) 628 Isaiah 185, 399, 578 book of 148, 355, 390–1, 400, 448, 522, 569 Islam 54, 169–70, 245, 360, 549, 567, 697 Israel 141, 158, 238, 370, 398, 400, 433, 485, 533 Italo-Byzantine 646 Italy 30–2, 36–7, 39, 43–5, 59, 105, 122, 162, 205, 281, 414, 416, 448, 553, 561–2, 566, 608, 618, 643, 646, 691, 708 J Jacomart 617–18 Jácome Antonio, master 35, 81, 643–4 Jaddua 155–6 Jael 360 Jael and Sisera 359 j’ai bien resöa 492 Jaime I of Aragon 46, 549–50 of Scotland 28 Jaime II of Aragon 551, 553 count of Urguell 45, 63, 554 Jaime III of Aragon 553 Jan de Leeuw 503, 518 January, Les Très Riches Heures, (Limbourg Brothers) 214 Jason 182, 230, 259–60, 275, 407, 682, 687, 689–90, 692, 694 Jean II Le Bon, of France 310, 315, 426

835 Jean IV, duke of Brabant 263 Jean the Fearless 10–11, 13, 19, 26, 57–8, 116, 121, 126–7, 140, 254, 262, 280–1, 288, 322, 409–10, 428, 430, 458, 588, 593, 630–1, 634, 686, 697 Jean the Fearless and Margaret of Bavaria 57 Jerusalem 26, 29–30, 32–3, 37, 44, 99, 101, 103, 124, 134, 145, 152, 155–6, 159, 167, 169, 171, 202, 209, 227, 231, 237, 240, 253, 338, 348, 366, 369, 375, 379–80, 389, 391, 398, 400, 405, 410, 418, 423, 457, 466, 473, 528, 536, 541, 567, 588–9, 594, 598, 601–5, 611, 614, 667, 672, 676 Jewish Antiquities, Josephus 591 Joanes, Bartolomeu 571 Joanna II, of Naples 582 João, prince, lord of Reguengos 133–4, 145, 151, 189, 191, 404–5, 487, 492–4, 531–2, 538, 544, 641, 705, 708, 710 João I 49, 56–7, 59, 62, 66–7, 70–1, 77, 80–3, 85–6, 89–92, 95–6, 100, 102, 107, 109, 111–13, 119–20, 125, 128–9, 133–4, 144–6, 148–51, 156, 162, 192, 194, 200, 205, 220, 225, 243–5, 278, 340, 354, 373, 405–6, 415, 420, 430–1, 437, 457–8, 466–7, 476, 484–8, 499–502, 511–15, 518, 524, 535, 570–1, 576, 590, 626, 637–8, 641–4, 664, 708 king Book on Hunting 456 João II 179, 188, 191, 233, 469, 585, 591, 604 João III 161, 469, 700

836 João IV 92 João VI 538 Jode, Peter Adornes 542 John V, duke of Brittany 394–5 Jordan, river 101, 277, 390, 433 Josephus, Flavius 375, 434 Jewish Antiquities 155, 591 Joshua 141, 154, 210, 522 Jouffrey, Jean 207 Joyenval 450 Juan I, of Castile 199 Juan II of Castile 45, 103–4, 112, 137–8, 484, 502, 542, 618, 641 of Navarre 548 Julian, emperor 416 Juliers, William of 319 Justinian, emperor 105, 162 K Kabbalism 157, 530, 650 Kalandenberg 320 Kampen 346 Karlsschrein 497 Karlštejn 666–8 Kasteel van Laarne 326 Kenilworth 203 King Arthur 202–3, 372, 442, 511 King Herod with the Magi 437 King João I 641–2 (Eanes, João) 637–8 (Lisbon) 514 Kireath-Jearim 171 Kleine Sikkel 386 knight of Arthurian lore 526 of the First Crusade 528, 672 of the order of Avis 235 of the order of Christ 235, 473–4, 477, 528, 544 of the order of Santiago 235, 478,

532 of the order of the Blue Garter 128 of the order of the Espada 134 of the order of the Garter 8, 125, 177, 209, 424, 476, 501, 548, 554 of the order of the Golden Fleece 647, 676 of the order of the Hospitallers 235 of the order of the Templar 152, 167, 195–7, 230, 240, 447, 453, 470, 568 of the Round Table 441 Knoestigen Stok, order of the 125 Koberger, Anton 589 Kortrijk 319 Kuip 324 L La Almudaina 549–50, 648 La Badia Fiorentina 73, 81, 89, 95, 204, 278, 643 La Charité-sur-Loire 96 La Chartreuse du Petit-Bâle 378 La Coruña 439 La Granja 586 La Lormerie 349 La-Mote-au-Bois 58 La Mutation de Fortune, (Pisan, Christine de) 274 La Quête del Saint Graal, (Vulgate) 230, 454 La Verna 38–9, 538, 541 Lac 451 Lackland, John 333 Lady Forester of Teylingen 352 Lagos 91, 108, 513, 697, 703 Lalaing Guillaume de 326, 329

INDEX

Simon de 693 Lambeth 132, 396 Lamego 439 Lampreia, Lourenço 485 Lancaster 461, 516, 529 Blanche of 141, 371 house of 48, 82, 209, 222, 423, 439, 489 John of 27, 280, 286, 288, 394, 426, 631, 633 Philippa of 48, 62, 67, 82, 140–2, 161, 200, 203, 214, 222, 229, 370–1, 378, 396, 456, 513, 642 Lancelot 215, 329, 442–3, 451–2 Lancelot, (Vulgate) 449 Landscape with St. John the Baptist, (Christus, Petrus) 580 L’Anglais, Barthélemy, Planisphère 588 Languedoc 242, 426 Lannoy 26–9, 44–5, 49–50, 66, 102, 104–5, 111, 123, 248, 294, 297, 331–2, 500, 534 Baudouin de 45, 49–50, 66, 102, 104–5, 248, 294, 297, 332, 500, 534 Guillebert de 26–9 Jehan de 29, 44–5, 49, 111, 123, 294, 297, 331, 500, 677 Lascaris, Vataça 76 Last Judgment 276, 464 (Alcañiz, Miguel) 553 (Memling, Hans) 624 (New York) 354–5, 464, 552–3, 596, 658 (van den Clite, Lieven) 623 (van der Weyden, Rogier) 624 Last Judgment 72, 360, 369–70, 491, 552–3, 596, 621 Last Supper 202, 375, 379, 454, 710

837 Late Gothic 7, 38, 95, 142, 238, 256, 281, 304, 368, 395, 398, 522, 550, 556, 566, 614, 620, 649, 660 Latium 38 Lattre, Bocquet de 323 Lavinia 259, 654 Lazarus 434 le bien me plêt 492 Le Chevalier Errant, (Saluces, Thomas) 695 Le Conte del Graael. Roman de Perceval 444 Le Corbenic 451–2, 669 Le Dit du Lion, (Machaut, Guillaume de) 313, 315, 317 Le Fèvre 250, 258, 260, 693 Le Franc, Martin, Le Champion des Dames 259 Le Livre de Tournois 675 Le Meingre II, Jean 205 Le Moiturier, Pierre Antoine 369, 630 Le Remède de Fortune, (Machaut, Guillaume de) 310, 313, 315–16 Leal Conselheiro, (Duarte, Prince) 160, 226, 238, 241, 402, 459 Léal Souvenir 307, 309 Leda 527 Ledesma 125 Legend of King Clovis and the Fleursde-lys 280 Legend of Perseus, (Becerra, Gaspar) 283 Legenda Aurea, (Voragine, Jacobus de) 6, 89, 369, 434, 472, 649 Leicester, Castle 440 Leie 318, 323, 326, 331, 412 Leiria 67–70, 72, 129, 405, 477, 486, 568 Leitura Nova Livro IV da Estremadura

838 471, 476 Leland, John 203 Lem, Maerten 584 Lemos, Gomes Martins de 129 Lena, river 67, 485 Lent 302, 368, 685 León 96–7, 125, 179 Constance of 97 les chansons de geste 161 Les Points-de-Cé 426 Les Très Riches Heures, (Limbourg Brothers) 212, 222 Les Voeux de Paon, (Longuyon, Jacques de) 209, 521 Letter to the Entire Order, (St. Francis) 100 Letter to the Ephesians 518 Letters to the Galicians 399 Levant 267, 333, 594, 697 Liber Consolatonis 391 Liber Cronicarum, (Schedel, Hartmann) 589, 603 Liber de divinis officiis 381 Liber de Sancta Trinitate 381 Liber de victoria verbi Dei, (von Deutz, Rupert) 381 Liberalitas Julia 528 Libre de Antiguitats 615 Libre de Aveynaments 599 Libro da Virtuosa Benfeitoria 491 Libya 554 Liédet, Loyset 419 Liège 2, 8, 27, 124, 239, 328–9, 347, 431, 435, 498, 632, 654 Liève 318, 323–5 Life of Moses, (Philo of Alexandria) 591 Life of St. Martin of Tours, (Martini, Simone) 38 Liguria 577, 691 Lille 16, 18–20, 23–4, 29, 45, 47–9, 51, 140, 250, 260,

263–5, 278, 305–7, 322, 344–5, 409, 466, 597, 619–20, 625–6, 631, 645, 676, 680–1, 685, 695–7 Lima, estuary 83 Limbourg 16 Limbourg Brothers 3, 214, 223, 554 Les Très Riches Heures 212, 222 March 683 Très Riches Heures 683 Limbourgs Brothers March 683 Lindaraia 245 Linge 346 Linz 124 Lisbon cathedral of 109, 141, 144, 184, 191, 247, 490, 509, 530, 565, 567, 570–1, 573, 576, 626, 644, 698–9, 701, 703, 707–8 churches of 495, 571, 603, 648 earthquake 92, 137, 173, 175, 188, 192–3, 197, 354, 570, 575, 610 palace, Ogival House 175 palaces of 111, 141, 174, 180, 190, 377, 528, 530, 650 Rua Chão da Feira 192 Rua da Saudade 191 Rua das Escolas Gerais 184 Rua do Chão da Feira 190 Santa Luzia hermitage 190 São Brás hermitage 190 Sé 698 Liverpool 356 Livia, Empress 224 Livinus 367 Livorno 124 Livre des Métiers 677 Livres de Lancelot 446, 451 (Boron, Robert de) 446

INDEX

Livro das Escrituras da Ordem de Cristo 477 Livro das Horas 246 Livro das Meditações de S.to Agostinho, e das Confissões 226 Livro de Aristóteles do Regimento de Principes e Senhores, ou Segredo dos Segredos em Cartas ao grande rei Alexandre 459 Livro de Cartuxa de Évora 242, 244 Livro de Galaaz 443 Livro de José de Arimateia 478 Livro de Tristam, Merlim 443 Livro dos Ofícios, (Coimbra, Duke of ) 406 Livros de Linhagens 151 Liz, river 69 Ljssel 346 Llobregat, river 62 Llotja 550 Lluchmayor 553 Llull, Ramón 152–3, 461–2, 549– 50, 552–4, 650 Ars Magna 650 Llivre de fine 152 Order of Chivalry 168 Logos 371–2 Logothete Symeon Metaphrastes 483 Logroño 41 Lohengrin 207, 457, 696 Loire 86, 426 Lombardy 88 Lomellini 578, 582–7 Lomellini Triptych 578–9, 581 London 10, 26, 28, 51, 203, 425, 438, 585 Longuyon, Jacques de Les Voeux de Paon 209, 212 Romance of Alexander 209 Lopes Fernão 442 Chronica del Rei Dom João I 440

839 Joana 586 Lorca, Joshua de 154 Lorenzetti, Ambrogio, Allegory of Good Government in the City and Country 608 Lormerie 350 Lorraine 671 Isabel of 674 Lorvão, Cistercian monastery of 75 Lough Erne 28 Louis, the Great 43 Louis I 41 de Nevers 254, 410 duke of Anjou 672 Louis II 214 of Anjou 289 of Bourbon 635 de Mâle 254, 410 de Nevers 319, 410–11 d’Orléans 126 Louis III 674 de Mâle 325 Louis XI, of France 443, 591 Louis XIII, of France 257 Lourenço, Méçia 204, 439–40, 449, 476 Lourinha 449 Louvain 19, 124, 288–9, 297, 366 Lover contemplating his Lady, (Machaut, Guillaume de) 315 Lover Sings as his Lady Dances, (Mauchaut, Guillaume de) 316 Low Countries 4, 14, 16, 88, 396, 428 Lower Lorraine, duke of 457 Loyet, Gérard 520 Loyola, Ignatius of (Autobiography) 99 Lucan 407 De Bello Civili 9 Pharsalia (De Bello Civili) 401

840 Lucca Madonna 651–7, 659–60 Lupi, Bonifacio 41 Lusignan 683 Lusitania 28, 46, 66, 77, 91, 93, 95, 97, 99, 107, 118, 133, 140, 150, 174, 194, 215, 223, 225, 249, 255, 331, 333, 369, 431, 439–40, 450, 467, 474, 503, 516, 523, 555, 564, 567, 639, 697, 711, 713 Luxembourg 9, 667, 677 Bonne of 310, 315, 672 Charles IV of 124, 251, 669 John I of 309, 666 John II of 330 Louis of 679 Peter I of 330 Sigismund of 27, 42, 429 Lycia 473 Lyleforte 207 Lyons 30 M Maaseyck 2, 346, 349–50, 617, 654 Macedonia 155–6, 291 Macharius 436 Machaut, Guillaume de 309–10, 315, 317 Le Dit du Lion 317 Le Remède de Fortune 310 Macrobius, Saturnalia 223 Madeira 151, 585–7 Madonna, (Huesca) 363 Madonna and Child (Berlin) 555, 557–63, 567–9, 573–4, 576, 643 Madonna at the Fountain 661–3 Madonna in a Church (Berlin) 567, 569, 574, 576, 643, 660 (Galleria Doria Pamphilij) 562

Madonna Lactans, (Portugal) 567 Madonna nursing in a Niche, (van der Weyden, Rogier) 448 Madonna of Canon van der Paele 386, 503, 521, 526, 564 Madonna of Chancellor Rolin 40, 276, 526, 531 Madonna of Humility before a Grassy Bench, (Berlin) 364 Madonna of the Dry Tree, (Christus, Petrus) 293 Madonna of the Rose 140, 278 (Fiorentino, Antonio) 81 Madonna of the Sweet-Pea, (Cologne) 646 Madre de Deus 604–5 Madrid 135, 238, 283, 362–3 Maelwael, Herman and Willem 3 Mafalda 195, 197 Magdalene, Mary 100, 354, 433 Magna Carta 333 Maingre, Jean le 126, 128 Maison Dédalus 267 Maître aux Cygnes 206 Making of Knyghte of the Bathe 462 Málaga 105–7 Malatesta, Cleophe 306 Mâle 263, 265 Louis I de 266, 321, 338, 631 Louis II de 254 Louis III de 262, 325, 409, 458 Margaret de 631 Marguerite de 254 Malek al-Kamil 36 Malguarri 208 Malines 60–1, 282, 322 Mallorca 47, 105, 546, 548–51, 553–4, 589, 595, 648 Capilla de Santa Ana 550 Castillo de Bellve 551 Puig de Randa 553 Malouel, Jean 222

INDEX

Man holding Carnations 7 Man in a Red Turban 1, 297 Man with a Pink 6, 277 Manuel I 80, 136–7, 160, 168, 178, 180, 188, 191, 204, 207, 217, 242–3, 245, 469, 473, 495–6, 499, 604, 712 Map of Lisbon (Braun, George-Hogenberg, Frans) 184 (Seutter, Matthew) 570 Mappamundi 19, 228, 587–91, 594–5 Marche, Olivier de la 261, 677, 681–2, 684–6, 688, 692–3, 696–7 Margaret van Eyck 503, 646, 651, 656 Mariemont 279, 298 Marrakech 74, 107, 533 Marseilles 102, 106, 434 Marsyas 404 Martin Charles 656 Guillaume le 121 Martini, Simone, Life of St. Martin of Tours 38 Martinianus 484, 526 Martins Fernando 75 Fernando (St. Anthony of Padua) 75 Gonçalo 196 Lourenco 204, 438 Martius, Gaius 224 Martyrologium Romanum Parvum 484 Mary Magdalene 35, 100, 142, 354, 433–4, 599, 655, 663 Mary Magdalene, (David, Gerard) 605 Masaccio 34, 278

841 Calvary 34 Expulsion 34 Mater Dolorosa 35 Pisa Altarpiece 34 Masolino Temptation of Adam 34 Mass 81, 107, 150, 158, 169, 215, 249, 277, 310, 360, 366, 375–6, 392, 481, 488, 557, 573, 643, 698 Mass of the Dead 277, 643 Massarius, Petrus 589 Massys, Quentin 543 master of 1499 558–9, 562, 566, 569, 574 Antom 85–6, 205, 232 Arnoldus Roebosch 366 Bernado 570 Diogo 71 Gille 50 Jácome-Antonio 81, 83, 86, 89, 95, 185, 205, 278, 643–4 Jean Hibert 50 of Oliviera 129 of Parement 3, 614 Pelegrin 283 of Perea 646 Virgin de la Guardia 646 of the Porciuncula 543 Roberto 570 of Santiago 478, 487 of St. Veronica (von Soyst, Gerhard) 355 of the Swans 206 Theodoric 668 of Tournai 352, 622 of the Turin-Milan Hours 6, 500, 623 Veronica 614 Xàtiva 612 master G of Turin-Milan Hours

842 Prayer on the Shore 6 master Mateo, (Porta de Gloria) 103, 143 Matabrune 208 Mater Dolorosa 141, 362, 379, 517, 560, 599, 609, 651, 655 Mater Dolorosa (Calvary) 362 (Masaccio) 35 Mathilde, of Burgundy 196 Matthew 399 Maximian, Byzantine emperor 102 Maximo, Vallerio, Factorum et dictorum memorabilium libri IX 459 Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor 561, 604, 610, 660 Mazagão 107 Méaux, viscount of 330 Mechelen 60, 282, 337, 379, 465, 561–3 Medea 259–60, 273, 689 Medieval 152, 157, 159, 162, 165–6, 202, 218, 230, 238, 298, 327, 385, 392, 398, 420, 434, 451, 529, 589, 655, 669 Meditationes vitae Christi, (PseudoBonaventure) 101 Mehun-sur-Yèvre 292, 443 Mélusine 683 Memling, Hans 363, 601, 603–7, 609–10, 624, 646 Altarpiece of the Crucifixion 605 Annunciation 606 Lübeck Altarpiece 605, 607–8 Seven Joys of the Virgin 602 Mémoires, (Marche, Olivier de la) 696 Memorial das Virtudes 402 Memorias, aeterna 478 Menendiz, Egeas 95 Menezes

Duarte de 704 Henriques de 703 Tello de 192 Menologion, (Metaphrastes, Symeon) 504 Mercatel, abbot Raphael de 436 Mérida 567 Eulalia of 100 Merin, Banu 516 Merinides of Morocco 91, 502, 516 Merlin 216, 446, 518 Merode Altarpiece, (Campin, Robert) 361, 382, 465 Merovingian 213, 396, 449 Mértola 108, 403–5 Messiah 32, 154, 158, 369, 371, 390–1, 399, 424, 649 Messina, Antonello da 545, 598 St. Jerome in his Study 579 Metaphrastes, Symeon, Menologion 504 Metz, Odo of 497 Meuse, river 2, 208 Micah 32 Michaelmas 123 Michiel, Marcantonio 279, 561 Middelburg, confraternity 561 Miélot, Jehan 305 Mignot, Jean (Johannes Mignotus) 87 Milan 4, 30, 87, 122, 218, 400, 413, 559, 567–8, 582, 601, 643–4 Miletus, Tymotheos of 307 millefleurs 281, 592 Minho 80, 93, 95, 205, 417, 439 Minnewater 324 Minotaur 689 Miramar 553 Mithras 133 Moger, Rafel 546 Mohammed El Saikh (Mulei Xeque)

843

INDEX

707 Mohammed VIII 106 Moissac Gerald de 97 St. Pierre de 102 Molenbaix, lord of 45, 47, 49, 61, 294, 500 Molina, Argote de 283–4 monastery of the Augustinian Eremites (Ghent) 367 of Sainte Antoine (Viennois) 432 of Sainte-Marie de La Dourade (Toulouse) 97 of Santa Cruz (Coimbra) 74, 374, 475, 575 of Santo Elói dos Lóios (Lisbon) 191 of São Francisco (Lisbon) 145, 179 of St. Anne (Lisbon) 648 Mondego 72, 77, 417, 697 Monmouth, Geoffrey de, Historia Regum Britanniae 235 Mons 15, 19–20, 38, 292, 300, 306, 411, 541 Monsanto, Alvaro de Castro, count of 703, 705 Montbéliard 126 Monte Espinho 98–9, 417–18 Montemor 63, 72, 706 Montemor-o-Velho, castle of 72 Montenegro 131 Montereau 292 Montgisard, battle of 410 Months of the Year, (Trent) 281 Montmorency, Anne de 137 Montpellier 549 Montreuil 292, 331, 373 Montserrat 61–2, 464 Moors 40, 56, 62, 64, 67, 70, 72, 74, 80, 106, 108–9, 133, 150,

152–3, 190, 195, 200–1, 229, 266, 430, 434, 448, 470, 479– 80, 517, 528, 537, 567, 570, 572, 698, 703, 707, 709 Moriny 667 Mornay, lord of 28, 50, 297, 500 Morocco 74, 80, 82, 91, 106–7, 109, 149, 200, 418, 475, 502, 504, 516, 530, 544–5, 575, 586, 594, 627, 697, 707, 711 Mort (le Roi) Artu, (Boron, Robert de) 446 Moses 106, 141, 157, 229, 237, 399–400, 591 Mosque of Omar 37 mount Espinho (Braga) 100 mudéjar 57, 70, 83, 86, 178, 203, 209, 404, 529, 590 Muhammad ibh Sâ’id 46 Muinschelde 385 Munoz, Fernão 480 Munsalvaesche 214–15 Münzer, Hieronymus 179, 342 Musica practica, (Pareia, Bartolomé Ramis de) 482 Myrtea 405 Myrteolus 405 Mystère de Grâce-Dieu 695 Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine 348 N Nabão, river 470 Nagis, Guillaume de 450 Namur 285, 297, 322, 627, 632, 677 Jean of 319 Nancy, battle of 303, 467 Nantes 560 Naples 30, 34, 41, 47, 545, 547–8, 555, 577, 579, 582, 594–5, 598, 601, 609, 618, 673

844 Alfonso I of 545 Joan of 674 Nasrid 104, 106, 516, 637 Navarre 45–6, 133 Juan II of 548 Nazareth 361, 387, 448 Our Lady of 448, 568 Nebuchadnezzar 399–401 Nederpoder 383 Neiva 92, 131 Aguiar de 131 Nesle 635–6 Netherlands 6, 148, 156, 255, 320, 364, 463, 562, 616 Neuf Preuses 211, 213 Neuf Preux 209, 211, 213, 521–2, 695 Neufchastel, Isabella of 693 Nevers 126, 262–3, 647 Charles of 263 Louis I of 254, 410 Louis II of 319, 410–11 Philippe of 24 Nice 30, 546 Nicholas V 360 Nicodema, St. Barbara of 395 Nicomedia 484 Nicopolis 26, 48, 126–7, 257, 430, 458, 491, 697 Nieuwenbosse 334 Nijmegen 346 Nijmwegen 208 Nine Worthies 209–10, 212, 214, 225, 275, 521–2, 564, 695 Nisart, Pere 546, 548–51, 554 St. George slaying the Dragon 546–7, 595 Nivelles monastery at 396 St. Anne of 394 St. Gertrude of 394, 396, 556 Noah 40, 227–8, 237–8, 397, 492,

566, 662 Noir, Jean le 310, 315 Normandy 94, 209, 266, 333, 426, 428 Noronha, Constança de 92 Nortada, wind 149, 236, 459, 642 North Africa 82, 91, 105, 107, 152, 215, 226, 249, 403, 426, 454, 458–9, 502–3, 506, 512, 515–16, 532, 549, 575, 589, 595, 637, 650, 687, 697–8, 703, 705–6 Norway 296, 404 Nossa Senhora 85 da Oliveira 84–6, 226, 524 da Penha (Our Lady of Sorrow) 69 da Piedade (Virgin of Seven Sorrows) 488, 586 de Graça 234 de Nazaré 449, 568 do Pranto (Our Lady of Weeping) 488 do Rosário 487 dos Anjos (Our Lady of the Angels) 473–4, 481 dos Mártires 478 Nossa Senhora da Nazaré (Portugal) 568 Noter, Pierre François de 340 Notre Dame (Paris) 288 cathedral of (Tournai) 350 chapel of (Arras) 360 chapel of (Saint-Sauveur) 354 chapelle de (Saint-Omer) 362 de Grâces (Cambrai) 646 de la Treille (Lille) 631 du Châstel (Autun) 530 ducal church of (Dijon) 376 Noyon 323, 335, 593 Nuremberg 124, 239, 342, 347–9,

INDEX

354, 363, 413, 589 O Oberlin 112–13, 362 Fountain of Life 112, 135, 143, 145 Óbidos 198 Odivelas 430, 458–60, 489 Odysseus 402, 405, 565 Odysseus, (Homer) 403 Oeiras, river 403 Oignies, Bardouin d’ 50 Olesa 62 Olympian Odes, (Pindar) 688 Olysipponis 565 Onze Lieve Vrouwbasiliek (Tongeren) 347 Onze-Lieve Vrouwekerk (Bruges) 256 Oosterlingenhuis, (van de Poele, Jan) 255 Oporto 80–3, 449, 460 Oracula Sibyllina, (Eusebius) 139, 371 Orange-Nassau, William I of 343 Orden de la Banda 516 de la Stola y Jarra 517 Order Antoinine 7 of Avis 121, 151, 169, 190, 230, 430, 492, 510, 638 Grand Master of the 146, 430, 510, 638 master 83, 134, 146, 151, 226, 229, 430, 439, 487 of Bath 461 of Blue Garter 514 of Christ 93, 128–9, 151–2, 160, 187, 200, 215, 230, 240, 285, 378, 430, 435, 442, 447, 453,

845 457, 468, 470, 472–5, 477, 479–80, 487, 492, 504, 528, 536, 543–4, 629, 642 Grand Master of the 128–9, 421, 536 master 150, 198, 430, 442, 457, 472, 475, 487, 492, 543, 642 of the Crescent 675 of the Dragon 128, 239, 429, 491 of the Dry Tree 38 of the Flower and Leaf 144 of the Garter 8, 125, 148, 177, 396, 420, 422, 424, 429, 457, 460–2, 476, 489, 491–2, 501, 513–14, 516, 527, 554 of the Golden Fleece 50, 127, 148, 250, 259–60, 273, 289, 326, 329, 409, 431, 437, 466, 594–5, 621, 647, 676–7, 681–2, 692 of the Golden Knights 32 of the Golden Shield 686 of the Golden Tree 127–8, 148, 492, 686 of the Holy Spirit of Virtuous Desire 673 of Hospitallers 294, 566 of the Knights Templar 195–6, 230, 470 of the Knoestigen Stok 125 of the Knot 674 of the Mail 686 of the Noble House 672 of the Porcupine 686 of Santiago 41, 104, 145, 148, 151, 169, 235, 405, 430, 435, 438, 478, 492, 532, 544, 639 Grand Master 134, 145, 151, 478, 487 Grand Master of the 438 of Santiago de la Espada 41, 104, 145, 148, 151, 405, 430, 435,

846 478, 492, 532, 544, 639 master 145, 151, 492, 532, 544 of St. Anthony Abbot 7–8, 277 of St. Augustine 572 of St. James 188 of St. John (Lisbon) 191 of St. John the Baptist 66 of St. Maurice 137 Grand Master of the 137 of St. Vincent 709 of the Star 672–3 of the Sword 134, 435 of Torre Espada 706 of Zion 457 Order of Chivalry, (Llull, Ramón) 152, 168, 650 Ordre of Chyvalry, (Caxton, William) 462 Oriant 207, 209 Oriens Sol 558, 621 Orléans 633 Charles d’ 306, 409 Jean d’ 3 Louis d’ 126, 633–4, 695 Louis I d’ 686 Louis II d’ 125–6 Orléans-Nîmes 358 Orphic Mysteries 195 Os Lusiadas 712 Ostend 123 Ostia 31 Ostrevant, count of 10 Osuna 543 Rodrigo de 612 Otter and Bear Hunt 279, 281 Otto IV, count of Burgundy 333 Ottoman Turks 126, 215, 239, 457, 491, 497, 694, 697 Our Lady of the Angels 474, 481 of the Assumption 704 of the Dry Tree 294

of the Dunes 558 of the Hill 46 of Mercy 586 of Mount Sion 37 of Nazareth 448 of the Olive Tree 85 of the Seven Sorrows 602 of Victory 62 of Weeping 488 Ourém, Afonso, count of 129, 145 Ourique 56, 72, 197, 229, 479–80, 707 Outeiro dos Mós 194 Ovid 182, 259–60, 407 Oxford 123, 616 P Pacheco, Lopo Fernandes 565 Paço da Ribeira 137, 180, 217, 499 de Castello 175 de Estaus 186, 188 de Galé 191–2 de Ribeira 137 de Santo Elói 191 de Santos Velhos 188–9 de São Bartholomeu 190–1 de São Cristóvão 192 de São Jorge 173, 176–7, 179–80, 190, 530 de São Martinho 180, 217, 415 de Sintra 194, 199, 205 dos Infantes 180–1, 185, 415 Padrão do Salado (Oliveira) 85 Padua 35, 40–1, 43, 99, 124, 146, 279, 541, 575 chapel of St. Anthony of (Lisbon) 538 chapel of St. Anthony of (Mallorca) 546 Francesco I of 35, 41

INDEX

Palazzo Raggione 36 skull of St. Anthony of 708 St. Anthony of 36, 40, 75, 99, 193, 374, 538, 546, 708 Pais, Gualdim 195–7, 470 Palaeologus, emperor Manuel 306 Palais de la Cité 669, 673 Palazzo of Gabriel Vendramini 561 Palazzo Pubblico 608 Palencia, cathedral of 112, 145 Palermo 169, 266–7 Palestine 30, 36–7, 132, 197, 411, 434, 517 Palma 548–53 de Mallorca 461, 554 Pannonia 416–17 Panorama of Jerusalem 604 paradise 134, 170, 395, 485, 552, 662 Paradiso, (Dante) 404 Parallel Lives, (Plutarch) 9, 224 Pardo, palace 283, 298 Pardubice, Arnošt of 666 Parelhal 131 Parement of Narbonne 614–15 Parentucelli, Thomas 360 Paris 3–4, 19, 53, 87, 94, 127, 192, 197–8, 227, 266, 278, 288–9, 312, 318, 356, 414, 426, 455, 589, 591, 614, 623, 631, 633–7, 643, 657, 666, 668–9, 673 Park, Genoardo 169 Parler, Pierre 666 Parliament 320, 424, 439 Parque 131 Parzival 240, 453–4, 457 Parzival, (von Eschenbach, Wolfram) 208, 214, 454 Passion 37, 99, 101, 117, 138, 379, 455, 480, 514, 594, 597, 603, 605, 608, 611, 614–15, 650,

847 657, 663 instruments of the 143, 356, 392, 454, 480–1, 552, 624, 658 Passion Altarpiece 603, 606–9 Passion Frontal 613 Passover 291 Pasture, Rogelet de la 352 Pauline 99, 171, 230, 380, 397, 452, 516, 521, 609 Pavia 236, 416 Peculiar, João, bishop of Coimbra 72 Pedro Alvaro de 204 Prince, duke of Coimbra 63, 72, 78–9, 91, 104, 119, 122–6, 128–9, 144, 146–7, 149–50, 159, 163, 185–6, 225, 239, 357, 405–6, 412, 415, 420, 422, 428, 430–1, 456–8, 460, 462–3, 473, 488, 491–3, 497, 502, 505, 537, 544–5, 554–5, 575, 648, 678, 708 Da Virtuosa Bemfeitoria 406 Pedro I, of Portugal 48, 71 Pedro IV, of Aragon 517, 648 peint drap 86, 279, 281, 624 Pèlerinage de l’âme, (Deguileville, Guillaume de) 293 Pellizuoli, Donato Boni di, Het Spanjaardenkasteel 436 Penafiel 92 Penaventosa Hill 80–1 Peneus, river 688 Peñiscola 14 Pentecost 240 Pentecost 33, 100, 141, 169, 198, 226, 232, 235–6, 240, 255, 382, 397, 430, 452, 518, 649, 656, 669, 711 Perceval 167–8, 215, 230, 240, 444–6, 451, 668–9

848 Pereira Diogo 478 Isabel 92 Peres, João 196–7 Perestrelo, Bartolomeu 586 Peristephanon, (Prudentius, Aurelius) 64 Perlesvaus, (Anonymous) 168, 215, 444 Persian 155–6 Peter Adornes, (Jode) 542 Petrarch Francesco 41 Il Trionfi 41 Peutin, Jean 303, 654 Pharos 224–5 Pharsalia (De Bello Civili), (Lucan) 401 Phasis, river 694 Philip II, king of Spain 137, 238, 283, 337, 412, 437, 659 Philip IV “the Fair of France 163, 319, 670 Philip the Bold 19, 89, 116, 126–8, 211, 223, 254, 262, 266, 321, 409–10, 435, 458, 491, 630–1, 643, 672, 686, 695 Philip the Fair 60, 163 Philip “the Fair” of Castile of Léon 60 Philip the Good 9, 12–16, 18–20, 22, 24–30, 36–8, 40, 43–5, 47–50, 57–8, 65, 70, 103–4, 107, 111, 116, 126, 134, 140, 148, 156, 178, 193–4, 209, 211, 213, 248, 250, 257–61, 263, 265, 268–9, 275, 278, 280–2, 284–6, 288–9, 291–2, 294–5, 297, 299, 301, 303, 305–7, 309, 322–3, 326, 328– 32, 334, 345, 351–2, 365, 371, 373, 376, 378, 394–5, 402,

407–11, 419, 421, 428, 431, 435–6, 450, 483, 494, 498–9, 501, 505, 510, 531, 539–41, 548, 553, 561, 587, 589, 591, 593–5, 598, 619–20, 622, 626, 628–31, 633, 636, 644, 647, 651, 663, 665, 675–9, 681–2, 686–7, 693–7 Philip the Good, (Chicago) 629 Philippe-Augustus, king of France 332–4 Philippe St. Pol of Brabant 263 Philippe V Le Long of France 320 Philippe VI of France 422, 426 Philo of Alexandria, Life of Moses 591 Philosopher’s Stone 215, 218–19, 221, 236, 532 Phoenician 80, 105–7 Phrygia 291 Physiologus 451 Picardy 410 Pierrefonds 634 Pietà 378–9 pilgrimage 24, 26, 28–30, 36, 44, 98, 132, 281, 331, 348, 351, 464, 497, 541, 549, 552, 602 to Abbey of Ponthier 331 to Assisi 193 to Cologne 497 to Ghent 436 to Jerusalem 29, 91, 103, 123, 145, 338, 541 to Saint-Gilles-du-Gard, Provence 351 to Santiago de Compostela 101–2, 133, 435 to shrine of Montserrat, Catalonia 464 to St. Patrick’s Isle, Lough Erne 28 to St. Peter’s Basilica, Rome 327, 372, 396

INDEX

Pina, Rui de 163, 490, 703 Pinhal, Quinta do 484 Pires Inês 83, 129, 156 Marco 80 Pisa 106, 165 council of 149 John XXIII of 165 Pisa Altarpiece, (Masaccio) 34–5 Pisan, Christine de 306, 314–15, 676, 686, 695 Book of the City of Ladies 311 La Mutation de Fortune 274 Pisidia, bishop of 436 Planisphère, (L’Anglais, Barthélemy) 588 Plato 163 Republic 235 Plaza de Cort (Palma) 551 Pleine, Jean de 678, 680, 687, 694 Pliny 405 Historia Naturalis 42 Plotinus 400 Plutarch 9, 163, 182, 290, 292, 590 Parallel Lives 9, 224 Plymouth 51, 248, 396, 438–9 Poitiers 240, 426–7, 439, 450 Pol Philippe, count of St. 15–16, 263, 288–9, 679 Poland 26, 133 Polette, Leurence 351 Pollença 553 Pombal, Templar castle at 72 Pontano, Giovanni 609 Ponthier, abbey of 331 Poor Clares 100, 143, 489, 541 Franciscan Convent (Coimbra) 76, 83 Franciscan Convent (Odivelas) 83 Poortier and Avezoete, Robrecht 25, 365

849 Pope Alexander III 41 Benedict XIII 14, 154, 165 Clement VI 666 Damasus 406 Eugenius IV 306, 345, 582, 642 Gregory the Great 185 Gregory XII 165 Hilary 482 Honorius III 418 Julius II 561 Leo III 161 Martin V 16, 468 Melchiades 482 Paul IV 337 Pius V 177 Sixtus III 482 Sixtus IV 159 Sylvester I 482 por bem 225, 489 Porta Latina 373, 379 Portico of Glory, (Mateo, Master) 103, 143 Portinari, Tommaso 602 Porto 80–1, 83, 95, 140, 149, 161, 198, 248, 448, 567, 586, 697, 703 Porto de Mós, Elgarve 70, 198, 448, 568 Porto Santo 151, 585–6 Portrait of a Man, (Christus, Petrus) 542 Portrait of a Woman with a Child 644 (Lisbon) 648 Portugal 25, 28, 44, 48–9, 51, 54, 56–7, 60, 62–3, 66–7, 70, 73, 80–1, 83–4, 86, 88–90, 92, 94–6, 99, 101–2, 106, 108–10, 112, 116, 122, 129, 133–4, 145, 151, 154, 168–70, 174, 177, 181, 190, 193, 204–5,

850 209, 225, 229, 246, 260, 278, 297, 309, 331, 333–4, 344, 354–5, 357, 364, 392, 396–7, 402, 404, 406–7, 412, 417, 421, 430–1, 434, 437, 439–41, 447, 449–50, 457, 462, 464, 466–7, 474, 478, 480, 483–4, 497–8, 500–6, 513, 515, 518, 521, 523–4, 529, 532, 539, 542, 544–5, 554–5, 565, 567, 570–1, 575, 582–3, 586–7, 590, 625–6, 631, 643–4, 647– 50, 659, 664–5, 712–13 Afonso IV of 516 Afonso V of 584 Duarte of 48, 610 Ferdinand I of 80, 405 Fernando I of 174 Fernando of 161 Ferrand of 333 Isabel of 16, 18, 45, 55, 57, 76, 138, 140, 148, 256, 260, 284, 307, 322, 326, 334, 369, 396, 627–9, 645, 647, 676, 678 Matilde Teresa of 333 Pedro, Prince, duke of Coimbra 104, 678 Pedro I of 48 Sancho I of 330 St. Isabel of 76, 79, 141–2, 146, 378, 405, 430, 541 Swabians in 417 Portuguese 60, 68, 86, 91, 105, 124–5, 138, 146, 150, 161, 167, 249, 255, 374, 412, 415, 430–1, 439, 492, 497–8, 527, 537, 586, 589, 625–6, 697, 703, 707 court 77, 121, 136, 150, 156, 159, 164, 182, 330, 377, 402, 507, 537–8, 627 Portus 80

Praça da Vila 196, 198 Prague 27, 239, 309, 666–8, 671 Prayer on the Shore 6–7, 277 Prester John 167 Protestant 202, 327, 331, 436–7 Protoevangelium of St. James the Less 390 Provence 133, 351, 546 Provenzale, Kyôt le 453 Prudentius 109, 704 Aurelius, Peristephanon 64 Prussia 26 pseudepigrapha 237 Pseudo-Augustine 399, 405 Sermo 401 Pseudo-Bonaventure 142 Meditationes vitae Christi 101 Pseudo-Dionysius 611 De Hierarchia Celesti 152 Psyche 681–3 Ptolemy 9, 109 Cosmographia 588 Geografica 588 mappamundi 587 Punic, Wars 98, 105, 403, 691 Pythagoras 482 Q Quesnoy 10 Queste, (Vulgate) 236, 451–2 Quête del Saint Graal (La Queste), (Boron, Robert de) 236, 446 Qui en veult, si en prenne 684 Quien, Henri le 351 R Ramiro I, of Asturias 40–3 Ramis de Pareia, Bartolomé de 482 Musica practica 482 Raponde, Jacques 89–90

INDEX

Rates, Pedro de 96 Ravenna 478 Reception of Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg, Grandes Croniques of King Charles V of France 669–70 Reconquest 41, 56, 72, 134, 174, 333, 479, 516, 528–9, 568, 702, 707, 712 Recueil d’Arras, (Debroucq, Jacques) 645 Redemption 34, 148, 158, 631, 650 Regensburg 124, 126 Regula Pastoralis, (St. Gregory) 166 Regule Beati Augustini 74 Reie, river 249 Reims 567–8 Reixach, Joan 542–4, 618 Relação de Chantre Estevan 573 reliquaries 38, 74, 136–7, 188, 253, 556, 653–4, 699, 701 Reliquary of Charles the Bold with St. George 520 Reliquary of the Holy Trinity 700 Reliquary of the Holy Trinity and Six Saints 700 Reliquary of the Three Kings 239 Renaissance 57, 80, 117–18, 129, 131, 142, 161–2, 165, 167, 205, 213, 219, 278, 413, 415, 420, 456, 529, 561, 641, 648, 660, 686 Republic, (Plato) 235 resurrection 100, 356, 374, 392, 401, 424, 514, 554, 596, 598, 607–8, 611, 656 Resurrection 356 (Bonaiuti, Andrea di) 608 Resurrection Frontal 613–15 Retable of St. Baudelius 358 Retes 131 Rethel

851 Antoine, count of 262 Jean, count of 263 Retratos de Reis 538 Revenge of Queen Tomyris 359, 364 Rheims 253, 310 Rhenish-Mosan 348 Rhine 355, 660, 672 Rhodes 26, 30–1 Rhône 239 Ribadeo 248 Ribateja 490 Ribeira 80, 183, 498 Richard II 70, 126, 424, 438, 440, 513 Rieti 38 Rihour Place Rihour 17, 680 Tour //l’Horloge 683 //Poitevine 683 Rimini 306 Rive, Rudolphus de 347 Roa 125 robe décolleté 55 Robert I, of France 97 Robert II, of Artois 253, 266 Robrecht de Clerq 559 Rodrigues, João 537 Roeselare 321 Roiç de Corella Triptych, (Allyncbrood, Lodewijk) 600–1, 603, 606, 609, 611–12, 617 Rojas Francisco de 610 José de 611 Rolin, Nicolas 39, 43, 332, 530, 624, 677, 679 Romance of Alexander, (Longuyon, Jacques de) 209 Romance of the Rose 401 Romanesque 62, 68, 83–5, 95, 101, 184, 226, 253, 256, 265,

852 498–9, 550, 570, 572, 576, 614, 664, 698 Romanus, Aegidius, De regimine principium 163 Rome 31, 97–9, 102, 124, 133, 165, 312, 327, 348, 372–3, 378, 396, 417, 482, 484, 529, 561, 589, 646, 691 Romeu, Pedro 197 Roosebecke 214 Rosarium manuscript 562 rosary 293, 487, 574, 602 Rossio Square (Lisbon) 186, 188, 191, 648 Rotterdam 597, 599 Roubaix Jehan, lord of 29, 45, 47, 49, 61, 66, 111, 248, 251, 294, 329, 331, 500 Roupinho, Fuas de 448, 568 Rouvre, Philippe de 262 Rubens, Peter Paul, Costume Book 279 S Sabaria 416 Sabauda 543 Sacquepées, Héctor 51 sacra conversazione 348 (Nuremberg) 360 (Washington, D.C.) 361 Sado, river 109, 133 Safim 107 Sagrera, Guillerm 547, 550–1 Sagres 108, 443, 477, 697 Saint-Bertin, Carthusian abbey of (Saint-Omer) 362 Saint Denis, (Paris) 251–2 Saint-Gilles-du-Gard (Provence) 351 Saint-Josse-sur-Mer (Montreuil-sur-

Mer) 372 Saint-Omer 362 Saint-Rémy Jean Lefèvre de 250, 258, 260, 693 Sainte-Baume (Marseilles) 434 Sainte-Chapelle 21, 454–5, 654, 668, 670 Sainte-Chapelle (Dijon) 21 Sainte-Chapelle (Paris) 454–5, 654, 668, 670 Sainte-Foy, church of (Conques) 96–7 Salacia 478 Salado 85, 516–17, 565, 698 Salah ben Salah 537 Salamanca 103, 125, 364 Salcedo, battle of 571 Salins 322, 630, 679 Guigone de 679 Salisbury, Rites 62 Salome, Mary 142, 390, 599, 605 Saluces, Thomas, Le Chevalier Errant 695 Salvator Mundi 559, 569, 639 San Giovanni in Laterano (Rome) 32, 482 San Juan Gothic chapel of (Llotja) 550 San Lorenzo, church of (Naples) 578 San Miguel de Liño (Oviedo) 42 San Nicolau (Palma) 551 San Quentin (France) 137 Sanches, Pedro 74 Sanchez, Afonso 190 Sancho I of Portugal 76, 109, 570 Sancho II of Portugal 190 Sanctissima Encarnación, Carmelite Monasterio de la (Valencia) 601 Sanderus, Antonius, Flandria

INDEX

Illustrata 255, 325 Sant Baldiri (Sant Boi de Llobregat) 358 Sant Boi de Llobregat 358 Santa Ana Triplice 649 Santa Chiara (Assisi) 38 Santa Clara-a-Nova (Coimbra) 77 Santa Clara-a-Velha (Coimbra) 76–7, 142 Santa Croce (Florence) 34, 345 Santa Cruz (Coimbra) 72–4, 135, 176–7, 374, 475, 544, 550, 575, 586–7, 625, 708 Santa Fé, Jerónimo de (Hieronymus de Sancta Fide) 154 Santa Maria cathedral of (Lisbon) 538, 574 church of (Florence) 34, 484, 649 da Vitória (Batalha) 67, 128, 229, 484–5, 487–9, 491, 496, 501 de Celas (Coimbra) 528 degli Angeli (Assisi) 38 del Carmine (Florence) 34 Dominican church of (Batalha) 229 igreja de (Lisbon) 567 Maior (Barcelos) 102 real abadia de (Alcobaça) 70–1, 709 real abadia de (Batalha) 128, 709 Santa Maria (Assisi) 38 Santa Maria (Batalha) 571 Santa María Santa María, de Naranco (Oviedo) 42 Santa Maria Novella (Florence) 33, 185, 552–3, 608 Santa Marinha church of (Lisbon) 184 Santa Trinità, church (Florence) 32 Santana 586 Santarém 56, 71, 133–4, 141, 248,

853 434, 479, 502, 704, 709 Real Abadia de Santa Maria 709 Santi, Andriolo de› 35 Santiago church of (Lisbon) 190–1 convent of (Lisbon) 188 Paço de (Lisbon) 191 parish of (Lisbon) 190 Santiago de Compostela 46, 66, 76, 96, 101–4, 133–4, 143, 348, 434–5, 439, 484, 492, 524, 575 Santiago Matamoros 528 Santo António da Sé (Lisbon) 708 Santo Fernando 539–40 Santo Tomé (Lisbon) 184 Santos-o Novo 189 Santos Velhos, castle of 189 São Francisco church of 70, 81–2, 95, 107, 140, 150, 179, 192, 278 church of (Ceuta) 107, 150 church of (Coimbra) 278 church of (Évora) 179 church of (Lisbon) 70, 145, 192 church of (Porto) 81–2, 95, 140 São Jeronimo, monastery (Lisbon) 242 São Julião, church of (Lisbon) 584 São Martinho church of (Lisbon) 197, 569 church of (Sintra) 197 palace of (Lisbon) 189 São Miguel chapel of (Guimarães) 524 church of (Lisbon) 159 do Castelo (Lisbon) 84, 528 São Miguel de Odrinhas 194 São Pedro, church of (Leiria) 68 São Salvador church of 95 church of (Bravães) 95

854 Saracens 29, 36, 111, 160, 410, 418, 469 Satires, (Horace) 406 Saturnalia, (Macrobius) 223 Savoy 27, 203, 306, 439 Beatrice of 137–8 Charles III of 136–7 Emmanuele Filiberto, duke of 137 Thomas of 334 Saxony, Ludolph of 101, 142 Vita Christi 101, 650 Schedel, Hartmann, Liber Cronicarum 589, 603 Scheldt 318, 326–7, 385, 412 Schepenhuis 357–8, 360, 623 scildere van portugeezenation 626 Scipio Africanus 403, 697 Scotland 28, 133, 255 Sebastião, of Portugal 177 Sebourg, Baldwin de 209 Sebta (Ceuta) 106 Sêda, river 52 Segovia 103, 112, 641 Seilern Triptych 356 Selbdritt, Anna, reliquary 653 Selignenstadt 601 Sémur, Henri de 96 Seneca 406–7 De Beneficiis 406 Sens 292 Septum Fratres, (Seven Brothers) 106 Sequeira, Domingo António, The Virgin and Child with Duke Philip the Good, Charles the Bold and Duchess Isabel of Burgundy 493 Sermo, Pseudo-Augustine 399–400, 405 Sermo contra Judeos, Paganos et Arianos de Symbolo, Patrologia Latina XLII 399 Sertorius, Quintus 450

Seta, Lombardo della 41 Setúbal 109, 243 Seutter, Matthew, Map of Lisbon before and during the 1755 Earthquake 570 Seven Joys of Our Lady, brotherhood 602 Seven Joys of the Virgin, (Memling, Hans) 602 Seven Liberal Arts (Firenze, Andrea da) 184–5 Seven Sorrows of the Virgin Mary 606, 609, 611 Seville 74, 107–9, 154, 706 Isidore of, Etymologie 694 Sforza, Maximilian 559 Shrine of the Magi, (Verdun, Nicolas of ) (Cologne) 124, 497 Sibyls 34, 369 Siciliano, Antonio 559, 561–4, 566 Sicily 31, 169–70, 265–6, 517, 548–9, 583 Siculus, Diodorus of, Bibliotheca Historica 681 Sidon 155 Sigismund Holy Roman Emperor 24, 27, 42, 63, 124, 127, 165, 239, 429, 457, 491 Sikkel 384 Siloé, Gil de 138, 641 Sint-Baafs (Ghent) 24, 327, 337, 340, 342–3, 365, 383, 411–12, 435, 437, 463, 467 Sint-Baafsabdij (Ghent) 320, 337, 435–7 Sint-Baafskathedraal (Ghent) 327, 334, 337–8 Sint-Baafskerk (Ghent) 337, 437 Sint-Donaas (Bruges) 253, 255, 332–3, 519, 525, 620–1 Sint-Gillis (Bruges) 525, 625, 653

INDEX

Sint-Jacobskerk (Bruges) 256 Sint-Jacobskerk (Ghent) 348 Sint-Jans (Sint-Baafs) 25, 103, 264, 326–7, 330, 335, 337–9, 342–3, 348, 365–8, 371–2, 382, 386, 407, 464, 466, 596–8, 616–17, 625, 713 Sint-Michielkerk (Ghent) 330–1 Sint-Niklaaskerk (Ghent) 327, 331, 348, 385 Sint-Pietersabdij (Ghent) 327, 435 Sint-Salvatorskathedraal 256 Sint-Salvatorskathedraal (Bruges) 256 Sint-Vaast (Arras) 360–1 Sint-Veerleplein (Ghent) 324 Sint-Walburgakerk(Bruges) 255, 625 Sintra 86, 111, 142, 193–201, 204–7, 209, 223, 225, 232–3, 236, 241–6, 541, 644 Paço 86, 92, 141, 169, 193–4, 196–200, 203–7, 220, 223, 226, 231–3, 240–1, 246, 463, 659 Golden Hall 220 Golden Room 220 Great Hall of Princes 463 hall of the columns 242 heraldic hall of 527 Magpie Hall 220, 238 Patio de Tanquinhos 243 Sala de Brasões 243 Sala de Cisnes 207, 219, 221, 225 Sala de Corea 220 Sala de Pegas 220–1 Sala de Sereias 220 Sala dos Infantes 206 Sala Grande 207, 209 Swan Courtyard 209 palace

855 Sala de Arabes 220, 241, 246 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight 461 Sluis 19, 26, 30, 51, 58, 248–9, 260, 285, 320, 396, 428, 465, 539, 712 Sluter, Claus 368, 593, 630–1 Soares, Roy 197 Solomon 158, 215, 230, 451, 453, 524, 601, 604 Somerset, John Beaufort 28, 372 Somme, river 298 Somnium Scipionis, (Cicero) 402 Song of Songs 158, 239, 398, 516, 567, 653, 656–7 Soragna, Bonifacio Lupi di 35 Sousa António Caetano de 90, 136 of Arronches, Lopo Dias de 456, 473–4, 487 Dias de 457 Frei Gonçalo de 479 Friar Luís de 493 Soveignez 460 Spain 49, 60, 64–6, 83, 102–4, 106, 108, 116, 122, 135, 137, 147, 197, 265, 276, 282, 299, 309, 354, 363–4, 397, 399, 418, 542, 544, 567, 590, 598, 610, 612, 615, 625–6, 641, 646, 659, 691, 698 Spanjaardenkasteel (Ghent) 437 Speculum Humanae Salvationis 360 speculum principis 159 Speyepoorte (Bruges) 249, 251 Speyer 567 Spiegelrei-Spinolerei (Bruges) 255–6 Spieghel der Nederlanscher Audtheyt (Vaernewyck) 23 St. Agnes 285, 394, 649, 654, 710 St. Andrew 20, 73, 357, 359, 378, 385, 399, 682, 685, 700–1

856 St. Anne 293, 394, 487, 648–50, 653 St. Anne and the Virgin Mary 650 (Destorrents, Ramón) 648 St. Anselm 62 St. Anthony 7, 25, 35–6, 40, 81, 146, 277, 294, 331, 361, 365, 374, 386, 432, 538, 541, 552, 559, 561, 566, 568–9, 573, 575, 598, 641, 643–4, 708 St. Athanasius 432, 648 St. Augustine 41, 75, 109, 138, 159–60, 226, 228, 367, 375, 399–400, 433, 567, 572, 574, 648, 708 City of God 372 Contra Faustium 433 De Civitate Dei 138, 371 De Ordine 226 Meditations: Positus in medio, quo vertam nescio, hic pastor a vulnere, hic lactor ab ubere 574 St. Auta 604 St. Barbara 498, 512 St. Barbara with her Tower 348, 361, 363, 394–6, 431, 479, 483–4, 497–9, 501, 503–6, 523–4, 526–7, 560, 563, 566, 594–5, 643, 647, 700 St. Bartholomew 399, 571, 703 St. Basil, the Great 253 St. Baudelius 358 St. Benedict 430 St. Bernard 70, 446–7, 535, 567–9, 575, 709 St. Bernard of Clairvaux 569 St. Blaise 190 St. Bonaventura 38 St. Brice 353, 356 St. Catherine 110, 132, 192, 348, 359, 361, 363, 379, 394, 396, 508, 512–14, 518, 523, 525–7,

563, 649, 667, 700 St. Catherine of Alexandria 508 St. Christopher 6, 192, 434, 457, 472–3, 544–5 St. Christopher (Louvre) 544–5 (Manueline Rotunda) 472–3 St. Clare 38, 394 St. Denis 152, 394 St. Dominic 187–8, 487 St. Donatian 253, 519–20, 525 St. Dorothea 394–5 St. Edmund 424–8, 461 St. Edward 430, 460 St. Église 676, 693–5, 697 St. Elizabeth of Hungary 378, 649 St. Eloi 191, 217, 405 St. Encratis 63 St. Engracia 64 St. Eulalia 357, 551 St. Eustache 564–5, 689 St. Francis (Philadelphia) 534, 544 (Turin) 534, 539, 543–4 St. Francis St. Francis, Letter to the Entire Order 100 St. Francis in Ecstacy, (Bellini, Giovanni) 39 St. Francis of Assisi 36, 38, 73, 80, 82–3, 98–9, 101, 418, 533, 542, 576, 702 stigmata 38 St. Francis receiving the Stigmata 39, 534, 540 St. Fructuosus 102 St. George 546, 548 St. George 173, 177–80, 190, 192, 209, 239, 319, 385, 395, 412, 419, 422–4, 431, 439–40, 448, 453, 460, 476–7, 491,

INDEX

498, 511, 513–14, 516–23, 526, 528, 530, 546, 549, 552, 554–5, 563, 570–1, 595, 644, 648, 650, 664, 668 St. George and the Dragon 552 (Nisart, Pere) 595 St. George slaying a Dragon, (Nisart, Pere) 546–7, 551 St. George spearing the Dragon 552 St. George the Dragon Slayer, (van der Weyden, Rogier) 448 St. George the Dragon Slayer and the Princess, (van der Weyden, Rogier) 554 St. Giles 689 St. Gregory 164–6, 481 Regula Pastoralis 166 of Tours 416 St. Helen 72, 265, 667 St. Hugo 97 St. Isabel 76–7, 79 of Aragon 198 of Portugal 67, 76–7, 79, 141–2, 186, 378, 405, 430 St. James 35, 40, 43, 103, 133–4, 188, 230, 348, 399, 435, 437, 459, 528, 532, 544, 598, 639 the Less 390, 399 St. James the Major fighting the Moors at Clavijo 528 St. James the Moor slayer (Santiago Matamoros) 41 St. Jean d’ Acre 324, 410 St. Jerome 112, 406, 432, 580–1, 710 St. Jerome in his Study (Colantonio) 578–9 (Detroit) 406 (Messina, Antonello da) 579 St. Joachim 487 St. John the Baptist 43, 66, 82, 100, 134,

857 143, 277, 330, 335, 338, 340, 342, 348, 361, 368–9, 371, 390–1, 399, 401, 424, 427, 433, 465, 483, 532, 550, 577, 580, 621, 640, 649 the Evangelist 82, 134, 136–7, 145–6, 158, 170, 217, 342, 362, 368–9, 371, 373–4, 379, 399, 427, 451, 560, 605, 642 St. Joseph 187, 374, 434, 448, 450, 487, 567, 601 of Arimathaea 202, 434, 454, 518, 603, 611 St. Josse 331, 372, 437, 457 St. Julian 5–6, 277, 432, 587, 689 St. Justas 96 St. Kolumba 616 St. Lawrence 394 St. Livinius 359, 367 St. Longinus 101, 136–7, 238, 240, 454, 668 St. Louis IX 150, 231, 262, 265, 454, 456, 654, 668, 670 St. Lucy 190 St. Luke 47, 62, 350–1, 353 St. Macharius, of Antioch 436 St. Margaret 348, 350, 395 St. Martha 655 St. Martin of Tours 38, 98–9, 101, 110–11, 180–1, 185, 191, 197, 412, 415–19, 449, 529–30, 533, 564–6, 647, 649, 710 St. Martin of Tours, Vita of 416 St. Matthew 374 St. Matthias 124 St. Michael 80, 136, 159–60, 177, 331, 377, 381, 386, 391, 398, 487, 491, 493, 508, 511, 518, 521–2, 524, 528–30, 563, 648, 650 St. Michael vanquishing Lucifer 159

858 St. Michael with the Donor 508 St. Monica 226, 400 St. Nicholas 61–3, 327, 348, 667 St. Omer 20 St. Paul 80, 101, 171, 236, 399, 418, 440, 518, 574, 576, 611, 649, 656–7, 702, 710 the Hermit 432, 573 St. Paula 706 St. Peter 34, 62, 161, 435, 574, 576, 702 St. Pharailde 431 St. Philip 291, 399 St. Sebastian 386, 412, 421, 427–9, 505, 530 St. Stephen 359, 367, 394 St. Thekla 649, 702, 710 St. Theotonius 72, 74, 574, 576 St. Thomas 33, 164, 230, 385, 553 St. Ursula 396, 604 St. Victor 102, 227–8, 614 St. Vincent Ferrer 154 of Zaragoza 109, 184, 490, 571–4, 576, 599, 698–9, 702–4, 707–9, 711 St. Vincent Altarpiece, (Gonçalves, Nuno) 421, 627, 701–2, 704 St. Wencenslas 668 Stadhuis (Bruges) 254, 353 Stadhuis (Ghent) 341, 384–5 Stanier, Ymbert 90 Statius 407, 428 Steppes 589 Steuez, Johane 86, 90 Stigmatization of St. Francis (Hoogstraten, Master of ) 543 (Philadelphia) 544–5 Strabo 109, 402 Strasbourg 667 Streda, Jan of 666 Strozzi 32, 552–3

Suffolk 427 Suikerlade 324 Sultan Bayezid 127–8 of Egypt 36, 536 of Granada 664 Malik-al-Kamil 418, 533 Miramolim 74–5 Muhammad VIII 104 Summonte, Pietro 598 Swan Knight 182, 207–9, 219, 457, 464, 696 Swynford, Katherine 204, 372, 456 T Ta Yaserey /L’éauté Faray 496 Tabernacle of the Lily 450 Tagaste 226 Tagus 62, 91, 109, 149, 173, 175, 192–3, 247, 438, 460, 498–9, 501, 530, 564, 644, 664 Taillevent, Michault 304 talent de bien faire 460 Tanagli, Caterina 624 Tangier 107, 201, 492, 502–4, 506, 509, 512, 516, 527, 529–31, 533, 536–9, 544–5, 563, 582, 594–5, 642, 644, 697, 702–3, 706, 713 Tani, Jacopo Angelo 624 Taranto 582 Tareja, Teresa 85 Tarik 106, 567 Tartessos 107, 402 Taverne, Antoine de la 345 Teixidor, Josef, Antigüedades de Valencia 615 Teles de Menezes, Leonor 180, 473 Templars 195–7, 199–200, 203, 227, 236, 446, 457, 470, 483, 568

INDEX

Temptation of Adam, (Masolino) 34 Temptation of Adam and Eve, (Calendario, Filippo) 40 Tenda 76 Ter Duinen 558–9 Termonde 296 Terneuzen 412 Ternoise, river 265, 298 Terreiro da Meca (Sintra) 242 Terreiro do Paço (Lisbon) 217 Tervuren 265, 279, 297–8 Testard, Robinet 401 Texeira, Tristão Vaz 586 Thoisy 30 Geoffrey de 28, 30 Jean de 329 Tholen 10 Three Marys at the Tomb, (Rotterdam) 597–8 Thuringa, Hermann of 453 Tiryns, Eurystheus of 689 Toledo 65, 103, 147, 480, 553 Juan Garcia de 70, 86, 201 Tomar 66, 71, 129, 197, 468–72, 474–7, 479, 481, 483, 544 chapel of Our Lady of Angels 481 Manueline Rotunda 472–7, 479, 504 Torre, //de Menagem 477 Tomyris, queen 359–60, 364 Tongeren 347 Willemet de 623 Torres Vedras 441 Tortosa 154, 165, 615 Toulongeon, Andrieu de 28, 50, 66, 297, 500 Touraine, Jean de 10 Tournai 47, 207, 249, 327, 335, 349–54, 357, 512, 613–14, 617, 622–3 Tournelles, Hôtel de 633–6 Tourraine 426

859 Tours 416–17, 443 Tower of Babel 500 Transfer of St. Vincent’s Relics 702 Transylvania 124, 128 Trastagana 62 Trastámara 283 Treaty of Amiens 394–5 of Maartensdijk 10 of Tournai 322 of Troyes 209 Trent 43, 281 Très Belles Heures de Notre Dame 3, 222, 394 Très Riches Heures, (Limbourg Brothers) 289, 683 Treviso 133 Trier 593 Triest, Antoon 367 Trieste 124 Triptych of Roiç de Corella, (Allyncbrood, Lodewijk) 600 Triumph of the Church (Bonaiuti, Andrea) 33, 608 Troy 94, 138, 213, 259, 401–2, 522, 592, 686 Troyes 444, 446, 669 Chrétian of 444, 452, 669 Tunis 150, 456, 549 Turia, river 46 Turin 4–5, 39, 136, 394, 543–4, 602, 608–9 Turin-Milan Hours 3–4, 6–7, 35, 276–7, 488, 500, 565, 579, 601, 611–12, 618–19, 622–3, 643 Tutbury 203 Two St. Johns 465 Two Thieves of Calvary, (Berlin) 606 Tyldesley, Christopher 460 Tymotheos of Miletus 59, 294 Tyre 155

860 William of 457 U Ulrich, Jean of Heinsberg, count of 328 Urbis Olisiponensis, Braun-Hogenberg 416 Urbis Olisiponis Descriptio, (Góis, Damião de) 184, 216, 499 Urguell Isabel of 45, 63, 104, 124–5, 146, 351, 357, 598 Jaime II of 554 Urraca, queen 73 Usk, river 203 Utrecht 15, 25, 562 Uxcelles, master Guillem de 357, 623 V Vaissel, Guillaume au 594 Valença 145, 703 Valencia 45–8, 63, 104, 124–5, 351, 357, 464, 542, 544–5, 548, 553, 555, 594, 598–601, 609, 613, 615, 617–18, 623, 646–8 Valenciennes 329 Valengin, Marie de 678 Valladolid 103, 125, 145 Valldemosa 553 Vallée de la Ternoise 266, 268 Valois 290, 315, 670, 683 Valverde 441 van Artevelde Jacob 320–1, 427 Philip 214, 321 van Borselen, Frank 10, 16, 286, 308 van de Poele, Jan, Oosterlingenhuis

255 van den Berghe, Christoffel 385 van den Clite, Lieven, Last Judgment 623 van den Rade, Jacob 600 van der Capelle, Jan de Visch 347 van der Elst, Amelberga 367 van der Goes, Hugo 646 van der Paele, Canon George 39 van der Pale, Pieter 354 van der Sikkelen, family 383, 386 van der Weyden, Rogier 352, 361, 448, 494, 594, 601, 612–13, 621, 624, 627, 646, 648 Braque Triptych 640, 642 St. George the Dragon Slayer 554 van Eyck Hendrick 295 Hubrecht 25, 264, 341–4, 346, 348–9, 354–5, 357, 365–6, 368, 464–5, 597, 616–17, 619, 644, 701 Jan 3–4, 7, 11, 13, 22, 25, 29, 32, 39–40, 42–5, 47–50, 53–5, 59, 61, 63, 66, 68, 70–1, 73, 80–1, 84, 89, 94, 96, 99–100, 103–4, 107, 110–13, 117, 119–20, 131, 133, 135–8, 140–3, 147, 151, 155, 158, 160–2, 165, 187, 192–4, 204–5, 215, 243, 246, 253–4, 350–2, 354–7, 366, 368–9, 381, 383, 386–7, 395–7, 407, 417, 428, 432, 435, 437, 446, 448, 464, 467, 472–3, 477, 480, 484–8, 496, 498–501, 503, 505–6, 573, 575–7, 580, 587, 591, 595–8, 605–7, 609, 612–13, 615, 619–20, 624–8, 630, 637–46, 648, 652, 654, 657–9, 663, 703, 707, 710–13 Lambert 344, 346, 618–20, 622,

INDEX

664 Margaret 621, 646, 651, 656 van Hyst, Anton 600 van Impe, Johannes 366–7 van Melanen, John 625 van Ryebeke, Katelyne 602 van Stockem, Cathelyne 349, 352 van Stoevere Gheeraert 354 Hannequin (Jan) 354, 359, 364 van Tongeren, Willem 353, 361 van Vaernewyck, Marcus 23, 343, 596, 615, 624 Spieghel der Nederlanscher Audtheyt 23 van Vermandois, Elisabeth 333 Vários pápeis de Portugal 538 Vasari, Giorgio 215 Vasconcellas, Mem Rofrigues de 442 Vasques, Martim 491, 495 Vaudrey, Pierre de 51, 53 Vega Gaspar de 283 Luis de 283 Ruy Díaz de 502 Venice 26, 29–30, 35, 40, 43, 124, 133, 333, 586 Ventimiglia, Byzantine Greek count of 76 Venturino, Giovanni Battista 177 Verdun, Nicolas of, Shrine of the Magi 497 Vermandois 410 Vermoin 131 Verona 35, 561 Versailles 281 Versailles Festivity of Philip the Good and his Hunting Party 284–6, 288–9, 291–2, 294–5, 297–9, 304, 308–9, 510 Verversdijk 256

861 Vézelay 30, 43, 434 Viana de Caminha, Duarte de Meneze, count of 704 Viana do Castelo 83, 102 Vicente Gil, Custódia de Belém 168 Lourenço 440, 449 Victor Hugh of St. 614 Richard of St. 227 Viefville, Lancelot de la 329 Vienna 124, 126, 207, 621, 641, 646 Vienne, river 450 Vigo 102 Vijd 25, 338, 340, 344, 373, 407, 467, 617 Jodocus 25, 33, 330, 332, 338, 365, 367–8, 382, 386–7, 465–6, 597 Nikolaas 338, 367–8 Vila 92 Vila de Santa Cruz 586–7 Vila Real de Santo António 108, 704 Vila Viçosa 92 Vilain, Geraard 385 Vilhena, count of Seia, Henrique Manuel de 199 Villefranche 30 Villiers, Jacques de 323 Vimiero 97 Virgen de la Guardia, (Perea, Master) 646 Virgil 182, 399, 405–6 The Aeneid 141, 224, 371, 405, 691, 712 The Virgin and Child Virgin and Child (Bening, Simon) 562 (Douai) 362–3 The Virgin and Child, reliquary 654

862 Virgin and Child enthroned in a Niche, (Thyssen Bornemisza) 554 Virgin and Child in the Apse 363–4 The Virgin and Child with Duke Philip the Good, Charles the Bold and Duchess Isabel of Burgundy, (Sequeira, Domingo António) 493 Virgin and Child with Saints in a Closed Garden, (Washington, D.C.) 361–2 Virgin in a Church 569 (Master of 1499) 562 Virgin in the Church Gossaert, Jan 561 Virgin Mary 42, 62–3, 82, 137, 142, 146, 150, 159, 169, 188, 256, 291, 294, 340, 347–8, 361–2, 371, 377, 386, 391, 394, 424, 430, 433, 447, 450, 465, 484, 497, 515, 521, 523, 527, 529, 568, 570, 574, 577, 599, 601–2, 605–7, 609, 612, 621, 640, 643, 648–54, 658, 667 Virgin Mary educating the Young Christ, (Lisbon) 649 Virgin of Autun 530 Virgin of the Councilors, (Dalmáu, Lluis) 357–8, 360, 363, 623 The Virgin with Canon George van der Paele 519 Virgo inter Virgines 394 Virgo Lactans 555 Visconti Filippo Maria 582 Gian Galeazzo 87 Visegrád 41–2, 239 Viseu 128, 138, 360, 468, 473, 492, 504 Visigoth 80, 85, 99, 105, 133, 417,

449, 524, 528 Vision of St. Eustache, (Dürer, Albrecht) 565 Visitation 361 Vita Christi, (Saxony, Ludolph of ) 101, 650 Vita eremitica beatae Mariae Magdalenae, (Josephus, Flavius) 434 Vita Sancti Theotonii 74 Vlašim, Jan Ocko of 666 Vluten, Guillaume 632 Voleur, Colart le 268, 271–3, 278, 677 von dem Wasservass, Gerhard 616 von Deutz, Rupert 380, 382, 655 Liber de victoria verbi Dei 381 von Mörs, archbishop Dietrich 498 von Soest, Conrad 614 von Soyst, Gerhard, (St. Veronica, Master of ) 355 von Veldeke, Heinrich, Eneide 259 Voragine, Jacobus de 369 Legenda Aurea 6, 416, 472 Vows of the Peacock, (Languyon, Jacques de) 521 Voyage of St. Julian 5–6, 277 Vrijdagsmarkt (Ghent) 320 W Waal 346 Waalpoort 320 Waele Janin de 561 Ten 325–6 Wasservass Calvary 616 Wauquelin, Jean 305, 419 Histoire d’Alexandre 211 Histoire de Sainte Helene 419 Way to Calvary (Budapest) 360, 597–8 (David, Gerard) 601

863

INDEX

Wellington 659 Wenceslas IV 252, 668, 671 Werve, Claus de 368, 630 Wessex 372, 425 Westminster 203, 422, 424–5, 438–9, 462 Westphalia 604, 614, 616 Westrozebeke 321 Westwerk 377 White Stag 449–50, 689, 691–2 Whitsunday 198, 236–7, 452 Wilden, Godevaert 249 Willem VI 8, 10–11, 288 Wilton Diptych 424–7, 461 Winchester 132, 328, 372, 425, 615–16 Windecke, Eberhard 124 Wohlgemut, Michael 589, 603 Wolfenbüttel 578 Wurmser, Nicholas 667 X Xabregas 189, 603, 665 Xira, Joáo de 149–50 Y Yevele, Henry 70 yl me plêt 489 York 232

Ypres 268, 319, 321, 326, 337, 412, 428, 431 Ysenbrandt, Adrien 566 Yusef, Emir Ali Iben 707 Yusef I 106 Z Zachariah 32 Zaidiá 615 Zakariya, Yaya al-Wattasi (Lazeraque) 537 Zamora 125 Zaragoza (Saragossa) 64 Zaragoza, St. Vincent of 63, 109, 570–1, 573, 702 Zarco, João Gonçalves 586 Zedelaire, Guillaume le 329 Zeeland 7, 10, 14, 16, 322, 352, 365 Zevenbergen 15 Zevio, Altichiero da 35 The Crucifixion 35 Crucifixion 598 Zion 171, 400 Zosimus 433 Zutphen 561 Zwin, estuary 249 Zwolle 366