I have decided to post once again this year, as I did five years ago and two years ago, the appropriate monthly calendar page from the Très Riches Heures of Jean, Duc de Berry. There is an article about this, probably the most famous Book of Hours here, which has links to articles on the artists involved.
The
manuscript was begun by the Limbourg brothers Herman (b. 1385), Paul
(b.1386 or 7) and Jean (b. 1388) in 1412, but left unfinished when they
all died, probably of plague, in February 1416. The Duke died that same
year and the Hours were completed by other artists, later in the
century, in a recognisably different style.
The majority of the calendar pages are by the Limbourgs themselves, and
include marvellous views of the ducal and of other royal residences in
France.
What
they do not indicate in their idyllic representations - and, given the
nature of the book, why should they I might add - is that they were
produced against the background of civil conflict between the Armagnacs
and the Burgundians, as detailed so graphically in the Journal of the
Bourgeois of Paris, and, in 1415, King Henry V's invasion and his spectacular defeat of the French at Agincourt, followed by his conquest of Normandy in 1417-19.
I
will post each Calendar page separately on the first day of the month
with revised notes about the scene and places depicted. This is the period of history in which I might claim to specialise - it is the one that brought me to Oxford - and I am always keen to share my enthusiasm for it.
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