Christine, de Pisan, approximately 1364-approximately 1431
Hennecart, Jean, active 1454-1475 (illuminator)
Louis, Duke of Guyenne, 1397-1415 (dedicatee)
Roudinesco, Alexandre (bookplate)
Bergé, Pierre, 1930-2017 (book label)
Christine de Pisan = Christine de Pizan.
Title from explicit.
Collation: ii + I-X⁸, XI⁴ (quire XI possibly two bifolia); bound with quire VI preceding quire V.
Foliated in a modern hand, beginning from first page of text (recto of leaf 3).
Text block: 188 x 124 mm; two columns of 36 lines.
Ruled in diluted red ink; preliminary leaves [1-2] and leaves 85 and 86 ruled but blank.
Written in black ink in a bâtarde script, possibly by more than one hand; numerous ornamental cadels at top of text block, some touched in yellow; numerous capitals touched in yellow.
Includes catchwords and signatures, with some pricking visible; some leaves with edges of axillary membrane filled out with fresh vellum, including one (leaf 20) filled out with vellum showing pricking.
Illuminated half-page miniature (141 x 123 mm) by Jean Hennecart on leaf 3 showing Christine de Pizan presenting a book to Louis de Guyenne.
Illuminated border (246 x 167 mm) on leaf 3 with flowers, acanthus leaves, ivy-leaf rinceaux, and a knight brandishing a sword.
Illuminated six-line initial on leaf 3 on a blue and pink ground with white penwork, incorporating the arms of Jean V de Créquy (or a crequer gules).
Numerous illuminated initials of two to five lines on blue and pink grounds with white penwork.
Numerous illuminated pilcrows on blue and pink grounds with white penwork.
Rubricated chapter headings; lemata underlined in red.
Nineteenth-century binding of marbled calfskin over pasteboards, with gilt-tooled border of alternating fleur-de-lis and ivy leaves on both boards, gilt-tooled pattern of alternating lines and spirals on edges of both boards, and gilt-tooled braided pattern on turn-ins of both boards; on five raised bands; marbled endpapers.
With the leather book label of Alexandre Roudinesco (?) on front pastedown.
With a manuscript note on paper in a 19th-century script pasted to front pastedown, possibly when the manuscript was put in its current binding, and describing the authorship, contents, date, illustration, and physical characteristics of the manuscript.
With the book label of Pierre Bergé on front flyleaf.
Purchase; King Alfred's Notebook; 2019; MS.19.017.
The manuscript appears in the Ader, Picard, and Tajan sale held on 19 May 1976 (lot 18) and the Gros & Delettrez sale held on 8 April 2011 (lot 550).
