Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T04:52:59.725Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

War Propaganda and Historiography in Fifteenth-Century France and England

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

P. S. Lewis
P. S. Lewis
Affiliation:
All Souls College, Oxford
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

At its lowest and most popular, verity concerning the war between England and France in the fifteenth century was slipped into the minds of its recipients by such itinerant chansonniers as the one who, according to Louis XI, ‘se soit mis a aller par nostre royaume pour chanter et recorder chancons, dictez et records touchant les bonnes novelles et advantures qui nous sont survenues et surviennent chacun jour au bien de nous et de nostre seigneurie’; it could be found obfuscated in the mysteries of semi-heraldic prophecy, to which even so respectable a figure as Christine de Pisan in her old age contributed; its sediment settled in commonplace note-taking on both sides of the Channel.

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society , Volume 15 , December 1965 , pp. 1 - 21
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1965

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 B[bliothèque] N[ationale], MS. fr. 5909. fo. 29r, printed by Samaran, C., ‘Chanteurs ambulants et propagande politique sous Louis XI’, Bibliotheque de VEcole des Charles, c (1939), p. 233.Google Scholar

2 Je, Christine, qui ay plouré, ed. Quicherat, J., Procès de condamnation et de rehabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc, v (S[ociété de 1'] Hfistoire de] F[rance], 1849), p. 8.Google Scholar A considerable elaboration of this theme may be found, with other prophecies, in the last of a group of treatises addressed to Charles VII about 1445 by his ‘povre, petit et ignorant subgiect, Jehan Dubois’ (B.N., MS. fr. 5734, fos 58r-59r).

3 For example see Delisle, L., ‘Notes de Nicole de Savigny, avocat parisien du xve siècle, sur les exploits de Jeanne d'Arc et sur divers événements de son temps’, Bull, de la Soc. de l'hist. de Paris, i (1874), pp. 42–44Google Scholar; B[odleian] L[ibrary], Rawlinson MS. B.214, fos 121 r–v, 150r-152r.

4 Delisle, , op. cit., p. 43Google Scholar; Political Poems and Songs, ed. Wright, T., ii (R[olls] Sferies], 1861), pp. 127, 130.Google Scholar

1 Le Mistère du siège d'Orléans, ed. Guessard, F. and de Certain, E. (Documents inedits sur l'histoire de France, 1862).Google Scholar For other examples see Wright, , op. cit., and Recueil de chants historiques français, ed. de Lincy, Leroux, i (Paris, 1841).Google Scholar

2 For an example of the latter see Chartier, A., Le Quadrilogue invectif, ed. Droz, E. (2nd edn, Paris, 1950), pp. 17–19.Google Scholar Verse could be used occasionally for sterner stuff: e.g. Wright, , op. cit., pp. 131–40Google Scholar; cf. below, p. 9, n. 3.

3 Full reference to these, and to the MSS. in which they are found, is given below, pp. 10–12, nn. 3–6, 1–5, 1–2, pp. 14–15, nn. 4–6, 1–2.

4 Some of the texts have been discussed by Potter, J. M., ‘The Development and Significance of the Salic Law of the French’, Eng. Hist. Rev., lii (1937), pp. 235–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bossuat, A., ‘Les Origines troyennes: leur rôle dans la littérature historique au xve siècle’, Annales de Normandie, viii (1958), pp. 187–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar A sensitive aperçu of the group as a whole (though one innocent of very much reference for its source material) is given by Bossuat, A., ‘La littérature de propagande au xve siècle: le mémoire de Jean de Rinel, secrétaire du roi d'Angleterre, contre le due de Bourgogne (1435)', Cahiers d'histoire, i (1956), pp. 131–46.Google Scholar

5 de Montreuil, Jean, A tome la chevalerie de France (B[ibliothéque] R[oyale de Belgique], MS. 10306–7), fo. 6V.Google Scholar

8 ‘Two Pieces of Fifteenth-Century Political Iconography: (b) The English Kill their Kings’, Journal of the Warburg and Counauld Institutes, xxvii (1964), pp. 319–20.Google Scholar

1 A toute la chevalerie de France, fo. 10r.

2 Cest chose profitable (Bfritish] M[useum], Add. MS. 13961), fo. 58v.

3 Ursins, Jean Juvenal des, Audite cell que loquor (B.N., MS. fr. 5022), fo. 28r.Google Scholar

4 Response d'un bon et loyal Francois au peuple de France de tous estats, ed. Barre, N. de La, Mémoires pour servir à I'histoire de France et de Bourgogne, i Paris, 1729), pp. 315, 321.Google Scholar

5 A toute la chevalerie de France, fo. 6 bisv.

6 La Geahologie des roys de France (B.N., MS. fr. 833), fo. 9iv. The sentiment was attributed by Jean de Montreuil, of whose larger treatise this ‘genealogy’ is in fact a variant abbreviation, to Richard II (‘Precursory text’ (B.N., MS. fr. 23281), fo. i2v).

7 Audite celi que loquor, fo. 57r.

8 A toute la chevalerie de France, fo. 10r.

1 ‘Precursory text’, fo. 28v.

2 Cest chose profitable, fo. 2r.

3 de Montreuil, J., ‘French text’ (B.N., MS. fr. 4983), fo. 78v.Google Scholar

4 The authors of the treatises do not seem in general to have derived much help from the Songe. Jean de Montreuil made frequent reference to ‘un autre traictie a part assez plus grant que cest ycy’ (‘Precursory text’, fo. 22r), which may have been the Songe but which was possibly more likely to have been the Memore abrege grossement (see below, p. 17).Google Scholar The relevant chapters of the Songe were copied out for English diplomats (B.M., Cotton MS. Tiberius B.xii, fos 37r-42r; Harley MS. 861, fos 67r-72r; Harley MS. 4763, fos 35r-41r (Somnlum Viridarii, cap. 186Google Scholar); B[odleian] L[ibrary], Bodley MS. 885, fos. 4r-7v (Somnium, cc. 186–87); B.M., Harley MS. 4763, fos I99v-209r (Songe du Verger, cc. 145–46)).Google Scholar

1 ‘Precursory text’, fo. 26r. The ‘devote creature’ of Jean Juvenal's vision in Audite celi que loquor was conveniently unable to carry the more complex argument of the principal protagonists in her head (fo. 37r).

2 Quittance of 22 May 1453, B.M., Add. Ch. 8121.

3 Inventory taken in Nov. 1496, B.M., Add. MS. 11538, fo. 2V.

4 Le Songe du Vergier (Paris, 1492), B.L., Auct.2.Q-4.i., sig. [v vij]r.Google Scholar

5 Cest chose profitable, fo. 58v.

6 ‘Precursory text’, fo. 26r.

7 Pour vraye congnoissance avoir (B.N., MS. fr. 25159), p. 2.Google Scholar

1 Oeuvres de R. Blondel, ed. Héron, A., i (Soc. de Phist. de Normandie, 1891), p. 295. For the parallel French and Latin texts of Jean de Montreuil see below, p. 11, n. 5.Google Scholar

2 Reference to these is given below, as above, p. 2, n. 3.

3 Audite celi que loquor and Pourceque pluseurs, finished at Amboise on 7 Feb. 1470 (B.N., MS. fr. 5056).

4 Decorated copies of Pourceque pluseurs (B.N., MSS nouv. acq. fr. 20962 and fr. 5058).

5 Audite cell que loquor (described as ‘commentum et romancium’) written at Nîmes and dated 10 Mar. 1452 (B[ibliothéque] Mun[icipale de] Troyes, MS. 2380).

6 A poor copy of Audite cell que loquor (B. Mun. Bourges, MS. 242).

7 ‘Precursory text’, fo. 26r.

1 ‘Latin text’ (B.N., MS. lat. 18337), fo. 3r.

2 La Geanologie des roys de France, fos 91v-92r.

3 Traictie compendieux [de la querelle de France contre les Anglois] (B.N., MS. fr. 17512), fo. 2r.

4 Recueil de chants historiques français, op. cit, p. 326.Google Scholar

5 Dupont, A., ‘Pour ou contre le roi d'Angleterre (les titulaires de fiefs à la date du 2 avril 1426 dans les sergenteries de Saint-Lô, Le Hommet, Sainte-Marie du Mont, La Haye du Puits et Sainte-Mère-Eglise, dépendant de la vicomté de Carentan)’, Bull, de la Soc. des antiquaires de Normandie, liv (1957–1958), Pp. 164–66.Google Scholar

6 For picaresque examples see Cazelles, R., La Société politique et la crise de la royauté sous Philippe de Valois (Paris, 1958), p. 204Google Scholar; Thomas, A., ‘Le “Signe royal” et le secret de Jeanne d'Arc’, Revue kistorique, ciii (1910), p. 280, n. 2.Google Scholar

1 Chaplais, P., ‘Un Message de Jean de Fiennes à Edouard II et le projet de démembrement du royaume de France (Janvier 1317)’ Revue du Nord, xliii (1961), pp. 145–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Traictie compendieux, fos 4ir-43v.

3 Lambeth Palace Library, MS. 506, fo. 31v; Letters and Papers Illustra tive of the Wars of the English in France, ed. Stevenson, J., ii. 2 (R.S., 1864), p. [576].Google Scholar

4 For instance in Audite celi que loquor, fos 50v ff.

5 The boke of noblesse (B.M., Royal MS. 18 B.xxii,) fo. 28v ed. Nichols, J. G. (Roxburghe Club, 1860), p. 56.Google Scholar

1 Lambeth Palace Library, MS. 506, fo. 3iv; Letters and Papers Illustrative of the Wars of the English in France, op. cit., p. [576].Google Scholar

2 For instance by de Montreuil, Jean (in a letter printed in La Cronique martinienne (Paris, 1502?)Google Scholar, fos 267v-268v) and by Worcester, William (The boke of noblesse, fos 21r-22r; ed. Nichols, , pp. 41–42).Google Scholar

3 Rowe, B. J. H., ‘Henry VFs Claim to France in Picture and Poem’, The Library, 4th Ser., xiii (1932–1933), pp. 77–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For other propaganda produced on the English side see below, pp. 14–15.

4 B.L., Bodley MS. 968, fo. 187v. According to Noël de Fribois (fo. 70r) Oresme, ‘parle du droit du roy contre les Anglois’ in his translation of Aristotle's Economics, Ethics and PoliticsGoogle Scholar (cf. Bossuat, R., ‘Nicole Oresme et le “Songe du Verger”’, Le Moyen Age, liii (1947), pp. 114–16).Google Scholar

5 Coville, A., Gontier et Pierre Col et l'humanisme en France au temps de Charles VI (Paris, 1934), p. 251Google Scholar; Thomas, A., De Joannis de Monsterolio vita et operibus (Paris, 1883), pp. 6–13.Google Scholar

6 de Beaucourt, G. Du Fresne, Histoire de Charles VII, vi (Paris, 1891), p. 406.Google Scholar

1 Oeuvres de R. Blondel, op. cit., pp. xiv–xxxj, xiij.Google Scholar

2 Péchenard, P. L., Jean Juvénal des Ursins, historien de Charles VI, êvêque de Beauvais et de Laon, archevêque due de Reims (Paris, 1876).Google Scholar

3 (B.N., MS. fr. 5022), fos 27r-6ir (lightly corrected and signed in Jean Juvenal's hand; cf. B.N., M.S. Dupuy 673, fos 51r, 56r). Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MSS fr. 1128, 2701, 5038, 5056, 6160; Musée Condé, MS. 923; B. Mun. Bourges, MS. 242; B. Mun. Troyes, MS. 2380; B.R., MS. 14785–86. A résumé is given by Péchenard, , op. cit., pp. 167–77.Google Scholar The treatise was written in May 1435.

4 B.N., MS. fr. 5038, fos 49r-56r. The treatise was printed in Gersonii opera, ed. Pin, E. Du, iv (Antwerp, 1706)Google Scholar, cols 850–59 (from a St-Victor MS. now untraceable) and in Sibylla francica …; item dialogi duo de querelis Franciae et Angliae et iure successionis utrorumque regum in regno Franciae, ed. Goldast, M. (Oberursel, 1606), pp. 28–43Google Scholar (from a MS. in Goldast's library). Goldast identified the author as Pierre d'Ailly; if he was correct the text must have been refurbished at least two years after Ailly's death in 1420.

5 Cest chose profitable (B.M., Add. MS. 13961). Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MSS fr. 1233, 4943, 4949, 5026, 5701, 5705, 10141, 13569; B[ibliothèque de 1'] Arsenal, MS. 3430; B. Mun. Bordeaux, MS. 728; Bibliothèque publique et universitairede Genève, MS. fr. 83;Burgerbibliothek Bern, MS. 560; B[ibliotheca apostolica] V[aticana], MSS Reg. 725 (a fragment), Reg. 829; John Rylands Library, MS. fr. 57. The compendium sur vives in two versions, the first of which, written in 1459, is less well developed but contains more material than the second, which was put together soon after 1461. The versions do not vary in their treatment of the English claims in France.

6 Apres la destruction de Troye la grant, B.N., MS. fr. 5059, fos. 41r-55v. Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MSS fr. 10139, 19561; B[ibliothèque] Ste-Geneviève, MS. 1994; B.M., Harley MS. 4473. A commentary is given by Bossuat, , ‘Les Origines Troyennes’, op. cit., pp. 195–96. The compilation was put together probably about 1419.Google Scholar

1 Pour vraye congnoissance avoir (B.N., MS. fr. 25159), pp. 1–38. Another fifteenth-century copy survives in B.N., MS. fr. 15490. The genealogy was compiled in 1471.Google Scholar

2 A toute la chevalerie de France (B.R., MS. 10306–7), fos ir-12r. Another fifteenth-century copy survives in B.N., MS. nouv. acq. fr. 12858 (fos 3r-14v, 50v-59v). A Latin version of the text exists with the incipit Regali ex progenie, B.N., MS. lat. 13062, fos 157r-164v; another fifteenth-century copy survives in Biblioteca Riccardiana, MS. 443. The Latin text was printed in Veterum scriptorum … amplissima collectio, ed. Martene, E. and Durand, U., ii (ParisGoogle Scholar, 1724), cols 1350–61, and in Deliciae eruditorum, ed. Lami, L., iii (Florence, 1737), pp. 17–36.Google Scholar In common with those of the French versions of Jean de Montreuil's larger treatise, the MSS of the French version of this text display considerable variation. The Latin and French versions exist as independent essays at the same text; both were written probably about 1411.

3 La Barre, Ed. N. de, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire de France et de Bourgogne, i (Paris, 1729), pp. 315–22.Google Scholar

4 Oeuvres de R. Blonde/, ed. Heron, A., i (Soc. de l'hist. de Normandie, 1891), pp. 155–294.Google Scholar This treatise was written in 1449; a French translation was made in 1460 (ibid., pp. 295–486).

5 Three versions of this treatise may with some difficulty be distinguished: (I) the ‘Precursory text’ (B.N., MS. fr. 23281). Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MS. nouv. acq. fr. 11198 (fos 32r-40r: fragments which correspond with fos 4V-5V, 16v-17v, 13v-14v, 25v-26v, 20v-21v, 11r-12r, 23v-24v, 24v-25v, 28r-v of MS. fr. 23281); MS. nouv. acq. fr. 12858 (garbled with the text of A toute le chevalerie de France and with fragments, some variant of material appearing in the text proper: the text reads through in the order fos 59v-62v, 28v-50v, 14v-28v, 62v, 68v-69r). (II) the ‘Latin text’ (B.N., MS. lat. 18337), fos 1v-21r. Another fifteenth-century copy survives in B.N., MS. lat. 10920. (III) the ‘French text’ (B.N., MS. fr. 4983), fos. 78r-94v. Another fifteenth-century copy survives in B.V., MS. Reg. 894. This text was printed in La Cronique martinienne (Paris, 1502?),Google Scholar fos 254v-267r. An abbreviation of the latter texts survives in Latin in B.L., Bodley MS. 885, and in French in B.M., Cotton MS. Tiberius B.xii; Harley MSS 861, 4763; with additional later material in B.M., Sloane MS. 960; and in a different and later version in B.N., MS. fr. 833 (printed as La Genealogie des roys de France depuis sainct Loys jusques à Charles VII et l'extinction du faux droit et musie querelle pretenduz sur le royaume de France par les Anglois, ed. Chesne, A. Du, Les Oeuvres de maistre Alain Chartier (Paris, 1617), pp. 253–59).Google Scholar Other fragments of material by Jean de Montreuil are to be found in B.N., MS. lat. 18337; B.R., MS. 10306–7; B.V., MS. Reg. 894. The problem of the composition of this treatise is far more complicated than it appeared to Thomas, , op. cit., pp. 16–29.Google Scholar Versions of the ‘Precursory text’ may have been written as early as the later 1390's, refurbished about 1402–3 and added to later. The ‘French text’ is a reworking, avowedly in the autumn of 1416, of this material; the surviving copies, though close to each other, vary in the degree to which they derive from it directly. The ‘Latin text’, an independent version close to the ‘French text’, was written avowedly in 1415.

1 (B.N., MS. fr. 17512.) Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MS. fr. 2701; MS. Dupuy 310; B. Arsenal, MS. 3731; the copy in B. Mun. Arras, MS. 740, was destroyed in 1915. A resume is given by Péchenard, , op. cit., pp. 225–36.Google Scholar The treatise was compiled in 1444.

2 (B.N., MS. fr. 5056, fos 1r-30r.) Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.N., MSS fr. 5058, 12788; nouv. acq. fr. 6214, 20962; Bibliotheque Mazarine, MS. 2031; B. Arsenal, MS. 3434; B.R., MSS 9469–70, 12192–94; Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, MS. 3392; B.V., MS. Reg. 1933; Biblioteca reale di Torino, MS. L II 36; B.M., Add MS. 36541. For sixteenth-century printed editions see Potter, , op. cit., p. 249Google Scholar, n. 3. The treatise was also printed in Mantissa codicis juris gentium diplomatici, ed. Leibniz, G. W. (Hanover, 1700), pp. 63–97Google Scholar, and in Pretensions des Anglois a la couronne de France, ed. Anstruther, R. (Roxburghe Club, 1847). The treatise was written in 1464.Google Scholar

3 For the problem of the origin of the use of the Salic law in the debate between England and France see Viollet, P., ‘Comment les femmes ont ete exclues, en France, de la succession à la couronne’, Memoires de I'Acade'mie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, xxxiv. 2 (1895), pp. 125–78Google Scholar; Giesey, R. E., ‘The Juristic Basis of Dynastic Right to the French Throne’, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, New Ser., li (1961), part 5, pp. 17–20.Google Scholar

1 Two of the surviving MSS of his ‘Precursory text’ have the words ‘in regno’ inserted into a version of the Salic clause accompanied by a fully explanatory French gloss, ‘qui exclut et forclot femmes de tout en tout de povoir succeder a la couronne de France, comme icelle loy et decret die absolument que femme nait quelconque portion ou royaume’ (B.N., MS. fr. 23281, fo. 4v; MS. nouv. acq. fr. 11198, fo. 32r). The third surviving MS. has a different version of the clause in which the words ‘in regno’ are omitted but which is followed by an identical gloss, reinforced with the words ‘cest a entendre a la couronne de France’ (B.N., MS. nouv. acq. fr. 12858, fo. 29r). The ‘Latin’ and ‘French’ texts follow the second reading of the Salic law, the ‘French text’ with the gloss slightly abbreviated (fo. 80r; La Cronique martinienne, op. cit., fo. 257v), the ‘Latin text’ without a gloss.Google Scholar

2 Traictie compendieux, fo. IIr.

1 Audite celi que loquor, fo. 38r; Traictie compendieux, fos 12v-13r, 32v-33r; Joannes de Terra Rubea contra rebelles suorum regum, ed. Bonaud, J. (Lyons, 1526), fo. 15r.Google Scholar

2 Audite cell que loquor, fos 36r-37r; Traictie compendieux, fos 33v-41r.

3 Fos. 13r, 21v-22r; ed. Anstruther, , pp. 50, 84–86.Google Scholar

4 Ed. Riley, H. T. (R.S., 1876), pp. 3–5.Google Scholar For the dating of the text see The St Albans Chronicle, 1406–1420, ed. Galbraith, V. H. (Oxford, 1937), p. lx, n. 6.Google Scholar

5 Kingsford, C. L., English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century (Oxford, 1913), p. 53.Google Scholar

6 The commentary by de Rinel, Jean, secrétaire du roi to Henry VI, written in 1435 against the French view of the treaty of TroyesGoogle Scholar (B.M., Harley MS. 4763, fos 196v-199v another fifteenth-century copy survives in B.M., Cotton MS. Tiberius B.xii), has the air more of a private official memorandum than propaganda; of the same kind may have been the ‘learned treatise in confutation of the Salique law, to prove the right of the kings of England to the crown of France’, allegedly written by Thomas Beckington as dean of the Arches (Collinson, J., The History and Antiquities of the County of Somerset, iii (Bath, 1791), p. 384Google Scholar), which does not appear to survive. But see Bossuat, , ‘La littérature de propagande au xve siècle’, op. cit.Google Scholar

1 (B.M., Royal MS. 18 B.xxii.) The treatise was printed in The Boke of Noblesse, ed. Nichols, J. G. (Roxburghe Club, 1860).Google Scholar

2 Lambeth Palace Library, MS. 506. The collection was printed partially in Letters and Papers Illustrative of the Wars of the English in France, ed. Stevenson, J., ii. 2 (R.S., 1864), pp. [521]-[607].Google Scholar

3 McFarlane, K. B., ‘William Worcester: A Preliminary Survey’, Studies presented to Sir Hilary Jenkinson, ed. Davies, J. Conway (Oxford, 1957), pp. 210–14.Google Scholar

4 B.M., Add. MS. 10099, fos 205r-210v. Other fifteenth-century copies survive in B.M., Harley MSS 116 and 326.

5 The eagerness with which copies were made in the early-seventeenth century (B.M., Lansdowne MS. 223; B.L., Bodley MSS 710 and 875; Cam bridge University Library, MS. Ee.II.io; Lambeth Palace Library, MS. 713; Canterbury Cathedral Library, MS. C.19; Holkham Hall Library, MS. 683) of a translation of a collection of fifteenth-century diplomatic documents (B.L., Bodley MS. 885) then in the possession of Sir Peter Manwood em phasizes the shortage of material on the English side.

1 William Worcester, for instance, made effective use of the record of the homages taken in Aquitaine in 1363–64 (The boke of noblesse, fos 18v-19v; ed. Nichols, , pp. 37–38).Google Scholar

2 Traictie compendieux, fo. iv.

3 La Cronique martinienne, op. cit., fo. 255r.Google Scholar

4 Cuttino, G. P., English Diplomatic Administration, 1259–1339 (Oxford, 1940), pp. 19–83.Google Scholar

5 The Anglo-French Negotiations at Bruges, 1374–1377, ed. Perroy, E. (Camden Miscellany xix; Camden Third Series, lxxx, 1952), pp. vii–viii.Google Scholar

1 Such collections survive as B.N., MSS fr. 2699, 15490 (fos 27r-135v; fos 43–135 are misbound: they should be read in the order fos 43–66, 123–135, 109–22, 67–108; some leaves are missing);MSS nouv. acq. fr. 6215, 6224; MS. Dupuy 306; B.R., MS. 10306–7.

2 See below.

3 According to a contemporary annotator of B. Arsenal, MS. 3731, p. 77, after the taking of Fougerès ‘charga le roy ledit Je[han] Juvenel des Urssins, lequel a fait ce prese[n]t traictie, de fere aucuns advertissemens pour savoir se il pourroit licitement fere guerre, non obstant les treves; lequel vint a Paris et vit la teneur des treves et envoya au roy environ dix articles pour monstrer clerement que licitement il pourroit fere guerre, se quil a fait, et quil ne devoit actendre a paix’.

4 B.N., MS. fr. 4054, fos 241r-243r

1 B.N., MS. nouv. acq. 6215, fos 32r-43v. Other fifteenth-century copies of the mémoire survive in B.N., MS. fr. 15490; MS. Dupuy 306; B. Arsenal, MS. 2450; B.R., MS. 10306–7. It seems to have been fairly widely cir culated: it was known, for instance, at St-Victor (B.N., MS. lat. 14663, fo. 277r).

2 Readily available in the chroniques, Grandes (Chronique des règrtes de Jean II et de Charles V, ed. Delachenal, R., ii (S.H.F., 1916), pp. 76–116).Google Scholar

3 See above, p. 17, n. 1.

4 These occupied nearly a half (fos 44r-73v) of his text.

5 Traictie compendieux, fo. Iv.

6 ‘French text’, La Cronique martinienne, op. cit., fo. 261v.Google Scholar

1 Probably from a copy of the ‘Precursory text’: Audite celi que loquor, fos 41v-42r; Traictie compendieux, fos 24v-25r.

2 The author of Apres la destruction de Troye la grant drew upon his text extensively.

3 The author of Pourceque pluseurs (fos 7v-8r; ed. Anstruther, , p. 30Google Scholar) seems, for instance, to have derived his story of the bastardy of Philippa of Clarence from one of Sir John Fortescue's tracts on the Yorkist claim (The Works of Sir John Fortescue, ed. Clermont, Lord (London, 1869), pp. 499, 517Google Scholar; SirFortescue, J., The Governance of England, ed. Plummer, C. (Oxford, 1885), p. 354).Google Scholar In 1468 Fortescue delivered to Guillaume Juvenel des Ursins as chancellor of France ‘ung grant memoire declaratif des drois que le roy Edouart pretend a la couronne Dangleterre et apres a la couronne de France, et par lequel, en oultre, il monstre que ledit roy Edouart ne peult aucune chose reclamer es dictes couronnes de France et Dangleterre et quil ny a aucun droit par les moyens quil recite et declaire ou dit memoire; lequel est en forme de livre [et] est devers monsr le chancellier’ (B.N., MS. fr. 6964, fo. 27r; printed by Calmette, J. et Périnelle, G., Louis XI et I'Angleterre (1461–1483) (Paris, 1930), p. 303).Google Scholar

4 The boke of noblesse, fo. IIv; ed. Nichols, , p. 24.Google Scholar

5 B.M., Cotton MS. Julius F.vii; Royal MS. 13 C.i; College of Arms Library, Arundel MS. 48.

6 Viollet, , op. cit., p. 174.Google Scholar

7 This particular copy was ‘a Saint Savin, qui est une abbaye entre Le Blanc et Chauvigny’ (Traictie compendieux, fo. 3v). Geoffroy Vassal archbishop of Vienne, drew the attention of Regnaud de Chartres and Christophe d'Harcourt to a copy ‘ou monastere ou abbaye de Savigny en Poictou’ which they thought to translate for Charles VII; and Gerard Machet knew of a copy in St-Rémy de Reims (Mirouer historial abregie, B.L., Bodley MS. 968, fo. 41r-v). Jean de Montreuil (‘Precursory text’, variant in B.N., MS. nouv. acq. fr. 12858, fo. 64v) and the author of Pour vraye congnoissance avoir (p. 36)Google Scholar, perhaps following him, gave reference to a copy in ‘tresanciens livres de Saint Denis’. The annotator of a fragment by Jean de Montreuil had seen ‘ycelle loy en un ancien livre’ and had discussed it possibly with Jean Chartier at St-Denis (B.R., MS. 10306–7, fo. 12v; cf. Chronique de Richard Lescot, ed. Lemoine, J. (S.H.F., 1896), pp. xiv–xv).Google Scholar

1 One example from many will perhaps suffice: Charles, count of Valois, he recorded, married as his third wife Mahaut de St-Pol, by whom he had a first-born son, Louis, who died aged seven on 2 Nov. 1328, ‘comme il appert ou trente huitiesme feulliet du livre signe B estant en la … Chambre [des comptes] et pareillement ou commancement du … livre Noster. Neantmoins lepitaphe de sa sepulture estant aux Cordeliers a Paris, au pie de la sepulture de ladicte dame Mahault contesse de Valois sa mere, ou il gist, porte quil deceda ledit deuxieme jour de novembre Ian mil trois cens vingt neuf, qui est ung an subsequent' (pp. 12–13).

2 Potter, , op. cit., 249, n. 3.Google Scholar

3 In the sixteenth century, B.N., MSS lat. 10921, fr. 17182; in the seventeenth century, B.N. MSS fr. 7079, 7144, 17969, 19001, 23364, nouv. acq. fr. 7006, Dupuy 105; B. Ste-Genevieve, MS. 794; B. Mun. Charolles, MS. 5; B. Mun. Besancon, MS. Chiflet 74; B.M., Add. MS. 30664; in the eighteenth century, B.N., MS. nouv. acq. fr. 741; B.M., Add. MS. 12192, to give only a few examples.

1 Olivier Basselin et le Vau de Vire, ed. Gaste, A. (Paris, 1887), p. 105.Google Scholar

2 ‘Les … Angloiz norent onques se plainement la duchie de Guienne ne la conte de Pontieu’, wrote Jean de Montreuil, ‘quilz neussent suspecon que les gens et habitans des pays neussent le cuer au roy de France, comme tressouvent ilz leur reprouchoient, disans que tousjours avoient ilz la fleur de Hz ou ventre …’ (‘Precursory text’, fo. 11v).