An extremely original text

The text of the manuscript, the Death Vigils of King Charles VII, is an extremely original poetic composition by Martial d’Auvergne. Born in Paris around 1420, he was notary to the Châtelet and public prosecutor to the Paris Parliament. Between 1477 and 1483, he wrote a long poem of some 18,000 verses, based on chronicles recounting the reign of Charles VII.

Structure of the poem

As the title of the work indicates, the poet chose for his poem the structure of the Office of the Dead, made popular by the Books of Hours. The Office is divided into three nocturnes and alternates nine psalms and nine lessons. Martial d’Auvergne did the same. His poem alternates nine epic sections recounting the reign of Charles VII and nine lyrical and sometimes satirical sections in which political allegories celebrate the memory of the king and lament the period of his reign. Behind this text, which celebrates the memory of Charles VII, we also hear criticism of his successor, King Louis XI, and the poet’s hope that the young King Charles VIII will draw more inspiration from the reign of his grandfather, whose first name he bears.

An abundant decoration

Made for the young King Charles VIII, the manuscript is lavishly illustrated. Like most of the manuscripts that belonged to Charles VIII, it opens with a frontispiece showing the royal coat of arms, created by the king’s painter, the brilliant Jean Bourdichon.

With miniatures from the workshop of Jacques de Besançon

The miniatures that follow page after page were produced in the workshop of the Master of Jacques de Besançon, now known as François Barbier. Barbier ran one of the largest illumination workshops in Paris at the end of the 15th century, where he succeeded Jean Rolin’s Master and Master François. In particular, he produced the Book of Hours of Charles VIII (Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid, Ms. Vit. 24-119,20). One by one, the miniatures allow the reader to follow all the ups and downs of one of the most important reigns in the history of the medieval West, that of Charles VII. It begins with the book of the civil war that tore France apart, followed by the English invasion, the disinheritance of Charles VII by his parents, the difficult struggle of the young king against his adversaries, the book devoted to the history and epic of Joan of Arc, the victorious reconquest and the general re-establishment of order in the kingdom.

An excellent pictorial chronicle

The events at the end of the Hundred Years’ War had repercussions throughout Europe. Scots, Castilians, Aragonese, Italians and Germans were involved in this great conflict between the French and the English, and they appear throughout the manuscript. It is thus a pictorial chronicle, interspersed with reflections on good government and political science. There is a succession of sieges, battles, massacres, burials, councils, campaigns, allegories, scenes of government and prayers, up to the unique representation of the miracle of Bayonne, which greatly impressed the people and strengthened Guiana’s attachment to France (f. 221). The whole of the Middle Ages, vivid and colourful, unfolds before our eyes in this manuscript as in no other.

The birth of the modern state

But beyond that, this manuscript is of great importance for understanding our world today. The modern state, which is the form of state in which we all live, was gradually built up in the 16th-18th centuries. But its roots are to be found in the great transformations that took place in France under the reign of Charles VII, which other European states gradually emulated. To retrace the deathwatches of King Charles VII is to witness the imposition of centralised justice and the rule of law throughout a kingdom, the establishment of permanent taxation and the creation of Europe’s first standing army, in other words, the birth of the modern state.

The Epic of Joan of Arc

The fine facsimile reproduction will include the book dedicated to the Epic of Joan of Arc, which consists of Bourdichon’s frontispiece and folios 1, 53-73v, which constitute the core of the reign of Charles VII. They narrate the epic of Joan of Arc. This is the only illuminated cycle devoted to her in such detail. The extraordinary epic of this peasant girl. She claimed to be led by heavenly voices. She went to the king, led his armies, galvanised his troops and completely reversed the course of the war, before she was burned at the stake. She left such an indelible impression that she was canonised by the Catholic Church in 1920 and remains a deeply moving figure to this day. This fine facsimile reproduction will give you access, for the first time, to the whole story of this extraordinary woman.