The Hundred Years’ War

16 Saturday Jan 2016

Posted by michelinewalker in France, History, Illuminated Manuscripts, Middle Ages

Tags

Battle of Crécy, Battle of Poitiers, Charles VI of France, Edward III, Edward the Black Prince, Henry V of England, Hundred Years' War, Jeanne d'Arc, Siege of Orleans, War of Succession

The Battle of Agincourt by Enguerrant de Monstrelet[1] (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Jeanne d’Arc

Painting, c. 1485. An artist’s interpretation, since the only known direct portrait has not survived. (Centre Historique des Archives Nationales, Paris, AE II 2490)

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Although it seems difficult to believe, there was a Jeanne d’Arc (6 January c. 1412 – 30 May 1431). She was born to a peasant family in Domrémy in north-east France, and was directed by the Archangel Michael, Saint Margaret, and Saint Catherine to fight the English who claimed France as their realm and lead Charles VII the Dauphin,[2] to Reims cathedral where he would be crowned King of France. Kings of France were crowned at Reims cathedral.

Jeanne, or Jehanne, was nicknamed “The Maid of Orléans,” La Pucelle d’Orléans.

The Hundred Years’ War

I have been trying to tell the story of the Hundred Years’ War waged between 1337 and 1453 and must report that it is difficult to fit such a topic in a post.

The Hundred Years’ War opposed the French House of Valois and the English House of Plantagenet, but it was an interrupted war. Basically, it was a war of succession. Eleanor of Aquitaine had married English King Edward II, after her marriage to Louis VII of France was annulled. She had failed to produce a heir to the throne of France. Only males could inherit the crown. She did not lose Aquitaine, so her descendants felt they could claim the throne of France.

That’s how the military conflicts began.

[I have read that during the Hundred Years’ War, it was also proposed that William I, Duke of Normandy having conquered Britain at the Battle of Hastings (1066), Britain could claim the French crown.]

Historians divide the Hundred Years’ War into three phases: the Edwardian Era War (1337–1360); the Caroline War (1369–1389), and the Lancastrian War (1415–1453). (See Hundred Years’ War, Wikipedia.)

Edward III was the son of Isabella of France and he was married to Philippa of Hainaut.

Phase 1: the Edwardian Wars, 1340 – 1360

claims to the throne of France by the English House of Plantagenet
Edward III of England
Edward, the Black Prince of England

In 1337, English monarch Edward III claimed he was heir to the French crown as the grandson of Philip IV of France. His mother, Isabella of France, was the daughter of King Philip IV. His son, Edward the Black Prince, was the great-grandson of Philip IV of France.

Three battles were fought regarding this claim. Edward III fought the Battle of Sluys, a sea battle, on 24 June 1340. It was an English victory. Six years later, on 26 August 1346, he fought the Battle of Crécy, which was also an English victory. On 19 September 1356, Edward, the Black Prince, Edward III’s son, fought the Battle of Poitiers. It was also an English victory, but the war was not over. It had just begun.

The Black Death

The Battle of Crécy was followed by the Black Death. The Black Death, the plague, was a pandemics that took the life of an estimated 75 to 200 million Europeans. Poland was spared. The Black Death peaked in the years 1346-1353. (See Black Death, Wikipedia.)

There were other battles, which I must leave aside.

Battle of Sluys, 1340

Battle of Crécy, 1346

Edward, the Black Prince

Battle of Sluys, Chroniques de Jean Froissart
Battle of Crécy, Chroniques de Jean Froissart
Edward, the Black Prince
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Phase 2: the Caroline War, c. 1369 – 1389

Charles VI, of France (crowned in 1380)
regents: the Burgundians
Charles VI dismisses the Burgundians (1388)
truce declared in 1389

During the Caroline War, French King Charles VI (3 December 1368 – 21 October 1422) opposed the Burgundian Dukes. Charles VI of France was 11 years old when his father died (1380). The Dukes of Burgundy therefore ruled France. They were extremely powerful and wanted to reign. In 1388, Charles VI dismissed them all, which was humiliating.

1392

However, in 1392, Charles VI went mad. He nearly killed his brother: Louis I, Duke of Orleans. As of that event, Charles VI the Beloved, le Bien-Aimé, was transformed into King Charles le Fol or le Fou, the Mad. He had long periods of sanity and therefore reigned until his death in 1422, two years after he signed the Treaty of Troyes, discussed below.

1407 – 1435 (Louis d’Orléans is assassinated by a Burgundian = a civil war)

Finally, in 1407, Louis I, Duke of Orleans, a profligate ‘prince of the blood,’ or possible heir to the kingdom of France, was assassinated by John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, the event that triggered the Armagnac-Burgundian Civil War. The Armagnac-Burgundian Civil War erupted in 1407 and lasted until 1435: 28 years. The Armagnacs were loyal to the House of Valois (Charles VI). When Joan of Arc saved France (1429), the Burgundians fought for England, or the House of Plantagenet, but Scottish troops supported the Armagnacs, the French House of Valois.

Assassination of Louis I, Duke of Orleans (1409)
Assassination of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy (1419)
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Valentine of Milan weeping for the death of her husband, Louis of Orléans by Fleury-François Richard (c. 1802) Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Phase 3: The Lancastrian Wars, 1415 – 1453

the Battle of Agincourt (1415) English victory
Charles, Duke of Orleans captured 1415 (released in 1440)
the Treaty of Troyes (1420) Charles VII is disinherited
Charles VII, of France (crowned in 1429, because of Joan of Arc)

Joan of Arc was active in 1428 – 1429, during the Lancastrian Wars (1415 – 1453), named after John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford. The war continued to oppose members of the French House of Valois and English House of Plantagenet, but the Siege of Orleans, Jeanne d’Arc’s victory, destroyed the English Kings’ hope to reign over France, but claims did not end. The matter of succession was contentious.

1415

Emboldened by the death, by assassination, of Louis I, Duke of Orleans and by the illness of Charles VI (3 December 1368 – 21 October 1422), King Henry V of England attacked the French at Azincourt (Agincourt). Charles VI, pictured below, did not participate in the Battle of Agincourt, nor did his 12 year-old son, the future Charles VII (22 February 1403 – 22 July 1461). The Battle of Agincourt (25 October 1415), was a decisive English victory. Charles VI avoided capture. However, Charles Duke of Orleans (24 November 1394 – 5 January 1465), was taken into captivity. He was the son of Louis I, Duke of Orleans, an assassinated prince.

Charles VI by le Maître de Boucicault
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Treaty of Troyes

Our starting-point could be the Treaty of Troyes. In 1420, five years after the Battle of Agincourt (25 October 1415), an English victory, French Charles VI (3 December 1368 – 21 October 1422), disinherited his son, Charles VII, and consented to the marriage of his daughter, Catherine de Valois, to Henry V, King of England.

Catherine gave birth to a son, the future King Henry VI of England and France, on 6 December 1421. English King Henry VI never saw his son. He was on a campaign in France and died of dysentery, in 1422. Therefore, when Henry V died, in 1422, Henry VI (b.1421), still an infant, was heir to the throne of France.

Nothing so defies logic as the Treaty of Troyes (1420). French King Charles VI disinherited his son Charles VII, the rightful heir. Henry V, King of England would inherit the French throne and he had a son, Philip VI.

The King of France himself, King Charles VI, gave France to the English in what must have been a moment of delusion. Hence the great pity the Archangel Michael asked Joan of Arc to end. In the eyes of the French, Charles VII was King of France by right of primogeniture, the firstborn, but he had not been crowned and Henry VI of England had been made heir to the kingdom of France. John Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford, hence the Lancastrian wars, acted as regent of France for his nephew, King Henry VI.

Siege of Orleans

Jeanne d’Arc

Siege of Orleans
(Photo credit: Wikipedia & Royaume de France)

The Siege of Orleans, a French Victory

Siege of Orleans: 12 October 1428 – 8 May 1429
Joan of Arc: 22 March 1429 – 8 May 1429

Our story ends with the Siege of Orleans. Given their victory at the Battle of Agincourt and by virtue of the Treaty of Troyes, the British had the upper hand. The Siege began on 12 October 1428 at Orleans, territory belonging to imprisoned Charles, Duke of Orleans. It was a protracted siege, but it was lifted by 8 May 1429.

Jeanne d’Arc entered the Siege late in the conflict, on 22 March 1429, its sixth month, and there were further delays. At first, French officials would not hear her. She was telling a tale that was difficult to believe. She was divinely-ordained to defeat the English and to take Charles VII to Reims. When, at long last, she was allowed to meet the uncrowned King Charles VII, he put own garments that did not suggest he was the King. Yet, she identified him immediately.

The siege of Orleans was lifted by 8 May 1429 and Charles VII was crowned at Reims, on 17 July 1429. Henry VI of England, was crowned King of England on 6 November 1429 and King of France on 16 December 1431, at Notre-Dame de Paris.

Battle of Castillon (1453), a French Victory

The Hundred Years’ War did not end until the Battle of Castillon, fought on 17 July 1453, in Gascony. England lost its landholdings in France, except Calais and the Channel Islands. It would also lose Calais in 1558. (See Battle of Castillon, Wikipedia.)

However, the war was lost when French King Charles VII was crowned in Reims and France was again a kingdom. Between 1422 and 1429, it had been two kingdoms.

The House of Plantagenet was not able to claim France as its rightful inheritance. The Hundred Years’ War was, to a large extent, a war of succession, but an uncommon war of succession. As unbelievable as it may seem, King Charles VI of France bequeathed France to the King of England, Philip VI, disinheriting his own son, which was treason.

As for Joan of Arc, would that Charles VII, King of France, had saved her. He may have been a coward.

With my kindest regards. ♥
____________________
[1] Enguerrand de Monstrelet

[2] The heir to the throne of France was called the Dauphin (dolphin).

Medieval Warfare (Photo credit: Google Images)

L-M Boutet de Monvel in his Times

12 Tuesday Jan 2016

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Children's Literature, France

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

19th Century, Applied Arts, Arts and Crafts Movement, Etching, Illustrations validated, Japonisme, Jeanne d'Arc, Louis-Maurice B. de Monvel

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 6

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 7 (detail)

“God will help you.”

On a Summer day, when she was thirteen, she heard a voice calling to her. It was noon and she was in her father’s garden. She saw a flash of light and Michael the Archangel appeared to her.

He told her to be good and to go to church. He then spoke of the great misery that had befallen the kingdom of France and announced that she would rescue Charles VII, the heir to the throne of France, and lead him to Reims where he would be crowned.“Sir, I am but a humble girl. I would not know how to ride a horse and lead soldiers into battle.”

“God will help you,” replied the angel.

The child was overwhelmed and covered in tears.

Illustrations

the applied arts
Sir John Tenniel
Japonisme

Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel was a man of his times. His Vieilles chansons de France pour les petits enfants, published in 1883, and his Jeanne d’Arc, published in 1896, are products of an important turning-point in the history of European art: the acceptability of the applied arts. Successfully illustrated children’s literature could make it easier for artists to earn a living while remaining artists. Such had been and was the case in Britain. Sir John Tenniel was a cartoonist for Punch when he was asked to illustrate Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass (1872).[1]

If brilliantly illustrated, children’s literature could help ensure a better lifestyle for Sir John Tenniel, it could also benefit Boutet de Monvel without his having to choose a completely different profession. The required attributes were both the quality of the written text and that of its illustrations. Illustrated by John Tenniel, Lewis Carroll‘s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass were a perfect marriage of word and art. Therefore, although he lived across the English channel, Tenniel was a precursor.

Japonisme, again

However, Louis-Maurice’s art was influenced by Japonisme, as was Walter Crane‘s (15 August 1845 – 14 March 1915). Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel’s illustrations are characterized by his use of flat colours. This was a feature of the Japanese prints that flooded Europe in the second half of the 19th century.

For example, in the images shown above, Louis-Maurice’s black is a flat black. But Louis-Maurice also expressed dimensionality by juxtaposing a light and darker shade of the same colours. Joan’s hair is an example of this technique. However, simplicity is the chief characteristic of Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel’s art, including battle scenes where several human beings are depicted standing, riding a horse, or lying dead.

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 26

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 30 (le couronnement de Charles VII)

Word and Art

As for the combination of word and art, Boutet de Monvel’s text is mostly in boxes placed inside the page. Word and art are therefore integrated. Moreover, the text is told by Louis-Maurice himself. He may have had a source, but no author is named. In this regard, the art of Boutet de Monvel resembles the art of Beatrix Potter, except that Louis-Maurice did not invent the story of Joan of Arc. It had been told. Alexandre Dumas had written a Jeanne d’Arc (Internet Archives).

The Technique: Watercolours in Zincotype

In the case of Jeanne d’Arc, Louis-Maurice made a series of watercolours that were reproduced in zincotype, “a new photo engraving process using etching in conjunction with coloured inks.” (See Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel, Wikipedia.) Great progress had been made since the invention of the printing press. In fact, Europe had entered its industrial revolution for more than a century, which meant that duplicating images had become quite inexpensive.

Nevertheless, etching remained a good starting-point. If colours were used, however, it was a time-consuming endeavour. Yet, colours were used. Later, Louis-Maurice’s son, Bernard Boutet de Monvel, perfected etching and “became the undisputed master of this technique.” (See Bernard Boutet de Monvel, Wikipedia.)

Artist and Illustrator

Louis-Maurice’s trajectory is somewhat unique. He was at first an artist who painted one-of-a-kind art works. After he married and his son Roger was born, he needed to supplement his income. He therefore turned to illustrating books for practical reasons only to realize he liked this kind of work. He had many customers. Nobel Prize laureate Anatole France was one of Louis-Maurice’s customers.

But Louis-Maurice also had projects of his own. The first was his Vieilles chansons de France pour les petits enfants (1883). French organist and composer Charles Marie Widor set the words to music. Louis-Maurice’s second project was Jeanne d’Arc (1896). His illustrations were so exquisite that the books he illustrated sold well, which enabled him to be both an illustrator and the creator of one-of-a-kind works of art.

A Lifestyle & a Social Life

Therefore, Boutet de Monvel is one of the artists who inaugurated a lifestyle for today’s artists. It is not uncommon for artists to produce both relatively inexpensive prints and rather expensive paintings. This is how several artists put bread on the table, so to speak. In the early 20th century, artists also hand coloured photographs or combined in some other way photography and painting.

Louis-Maurice’s illustrations also allowed him a rich social life. He befriended not only writers but also artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who made posters, and Edgard Degas, who was a printmaker and taught this technique to Mary Cassatt. Moreover, artist Édouard Detaille (1848 – 1912) introduced him to members of the newly-established Société des aquarellistes français (“the society of French watercolourists”). Louis-Maurice showed one work for approval and it was well received. Consequently, he was voted a member of the Société almost immediately. However, he had already been an ‘artist’ and had continued to produce original paintings.

(Please click on the images to enlarge them.)

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 11 (Joan identifies Charles VII)

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 32 (The people and Jeanne d’Arc)

p. 44

p. 45

Jeanne d’Arc identifies Charles VII
The people and Jeanne d’Arc
Jeanne d’Arc’s trial
Jeanne d’Arc sentenced to death

The Arts and Crafts Movement

Painters may become illustrators, but illustrators do not necessarily turn to painting. Nowadays, however, an illustrator is considered an artist, but someone had to lead the way. More than anyone else, William Morris was eclectic, and so were the artists associated with the Arts and Crafts movement. The comparison is unavoidable. The Arts and Crafts movement validated the applied arts thereby broadening the realm of things artistic and it spread abroad to countries where circumstances paralleled the British experience.

Moreover, not only did Louis-Maurice meet the writers whose work he illustrated, but he was also invited to participate in the Exhibition of Viennese Secession of 1899, the Jugendstil that supported the applied arts and avant-gardisme. (See Art Nouveau, Wikipedia.) Gustav Klimt is the best-known representative of the Vienna Jugendstil.

We associate Alphonse Mucha with Art Nouveau. His art was curvilinear, but Art Nouveau also incorporated innovative art and total art. It was a synthesis: Gesamtkunstwerk, a feature associated with the last years of the 19th century.

In short, Louis-Maurice was a man of his times, as would be his son, Bernard Boutet de Monvel, his nephews, George Barbier and Pierre Brissaud, and ‘artists’ everywhere.

With kind regards to all of you. ♥

RELATED ARTICLES

L-M Boutet de Monvel’s “Joan of Arc” (8 January 2016)
A Glimpse at the Boutet de Monvel Dynasty (3 January 2016)
The Art of Maurice Boutet de Monvel (1 September 2012)

Sources and Resources

Jeanne d’Arc, Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel (Internet Archives)
https://archive.org/stream/jeannedarc00boutuoft#page/n29/mode/2up
J oan of Arc
http://www.archive.joan-of-arc.org/
Photo credit: Jeanne d’Arc (Internet Archives)

____________________

[1] “Sir John Tenniel”. Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2016. Web. 11 janv.. 2016
<http://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Tenniel>.

—ooo—

Music: Carmina Burana by Carl Orff (1935-36)
The Siege of Orleans (12 October 1428 – 8 May 1429)

Jeanne d’Arc arrested

L-M Boutet de Monvel’s “Joan of Arc”

08 Friday Jan 2016

Posted by michelinewalker in Children's Literature, France

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Aquarelles, Bernard Boutet de Monvel, Children's Literature, Jeanne d'Arc, Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel, Plon Nourrit & Cie

Jeanne d’Arc by Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel, 1896

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 3

Jeanne d’Arc, p. 7 (detail)

Above is Jeanne d’Arc (6 January c. 1412 – 30 May 1431) as depicted by Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel (18 October 1850 – 16 March 1913).

An angel has just appeared to tell Joan that she is to save France, whose king, Charles VII (22 February 1403 – 22 July 1461), has not been crowned. During the Hundred Years’ War, fought between 1337 and 1453, parts of northern France: Guyenne, Paris and Reims, were occupied by Duke Philip III of Burgundy. After the Battle of Agincourt (1415), English King Henry V, married Catherine de Valois, the daughter of French king Charles VI.

By virtue of the Treaty of Troyes, signed on 21 May 1420, King Henry V of England and his heirs would inherit the throne of France upon the death of King Charles VI of France. Philip V died in 1422, but Catherine had given birth to a son. Although Philip VI reigned as king of England, he was nevertheless the disputed king of France.

The Siege of Orléans: a turning-point

Joan of Arc did save France. After the Siege of Orléans (1428 – 1429), Philip V‘s dream of conquering France started to crumble. The uncrowned king of France, Charles VII, was crowned at Reims. However, Charles, Duke of Orleans (24 November 1394 – 5 January 1465), who had been captured at Agincourt, in 1415, was not released until 1440. He was a prince of the blood, or possible heir to the throne of France.

When he returned to France, Charles, Duke of Orleans, married a very young Maria of Cleves. Their son, one of three children born to the couple, would reign as king Louis XII.

Joan of Arc arrested and burned at the stake

On 23 May 1430, Joan of Arc was captured at Compiègne, by members of the Burgundian faction and handed over to the English. She was accused of various crimes and tried at Rouen by the Bishop of Beauvais, Pierre Cauchon. She was convicted and burned at the stake on 31 May 1431. She had had visions, which could lead to her being accused of witchcraft or to her being deemed heretical. She had been visited by the Archangel Michael, Saint Margaret, and Saint Catherine.

Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel

Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel, Bernard’s father, was born in Orléans to an accomplished family. He was raised in Paris and studied at the Julian Academy. He was an ‘academic’ painter, but he accepted to paint posters and became an illustrator. His Jeanne d’Arc (1896) is considered his finest book, followed by his 1883 Chansons de France pour les petits Français, both published by E. Plon, Nourrit et Cie. His Jeanne à la Cour de Chinon, shown at the Exposition universelle of 1990, earned him a gold medal.

Louis-Maurice was a successful artist. His artwork was often exhibited in the United States. In c. 1911, he in fact travelled to the United States and received several commissions, but he fell ill. Louis-Maurice had contracted a bronchial ailment during the Franco-Prussian War (1870), which made a winter visit to Chicago dangerous.

He died two years later, in 1913.

RELATED ARTICLES

A Glimpse at the Boutet de Monvel Dynasty (3 January 2016)
Charles d’Orléans: a Prince & a Poet (17 February 2015)←
Illustrating Fashion Magazines: Barbier & Colleagues (16 August 2014)
George Barbier’s Fêtes galantes (14 August 2014)
Charles d’Orléans: Portrait of an Unlikely Poet (17 September 2012)←
The Art of Maurice Boutet de Monvel (1 September 2012)
The Ballets Russes, Vaslav Nijinsky & George Barbier (27 July 2012)

Sources and Resources

Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel: Jeanne d’Arc
https://archive.org/details/jeannedarc00boutuoft
Photo credit: Internet Archives

The Art of Maurice Boutet de Monvel

01 Saturday Sep 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Music

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

Chansons, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Gustave Boulanger, illustrators, Jean-Batiste de Lully, Jeanne d'Arc, Joan of Arc, Jules Joseph Lefebvre, United States, Yvonne Printemps

Louis Boutet de Monvel (1851 – 1913) was a French painter and illustrator whose family had produced several artists. He attended the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, in Paris, where he was a student of Alexandre Cabanel, Gustave Boulanger, Jules Joseph Lefebvre and Carolus Duan. (Wikipedia) Moreover, he showed his work at the Salon de Paris, a juried exhibition, where he won a medal in 1878 for a painting called “The Good Samaritan,” which the internet would not allow me to copy. However, we have a link.

Boutet de Monvel as Academic Painter

Boutet was therefore, at first, an academic painter and had been exposed to the Neoclassicism of Jacques-Louis David, whose painting of Marat dead in his tub has become iconic. However, David’s Neoclassical style is better exemplified by his Oath of the Horatii (1784). We should also remember that as the Neoclassical style lost its popularity, there emerged schools such as the Barbizon School‘s plein-air painters (1830-1870) that favored realistic and representational painting but without the imprecision of Impressionism, a movement that flourished in the 1870s and 1880’s. Moreover, painters associated with Post-Impressionism often doubled up as illustrators and decorators. Art Nouveau (1890-1910) artists, some of whom are linked with Post-impressionism were interested in the decorative arts. They had to make a living and their clients were privileged.

Boutet de Monvel as Illustrator

Louis–Maurice Boutet de Monvel (a cover picture)

(please click of the pictures to enlarge them)

Photo credit: Wikipedia

Chansons de France pour les petits enfants

Several years ago, I purchased a copy of a hardcover edition of Boutet de Monvel’s Chansons de France pour les petits enfants (Songs of France for Children). It is a beautifully illustrated book published in what was the golden age of illustration and posters: the Post-Impressionism of the late nineteenth century and the age of fabulous posters (Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Théophile Steinlen) and illustrations often executed against a blank background, such as Léon Bakst‘s designs.

Characteristics of Boutet de Monvel’s Chansons

In Chansons de France pour les petits enfants, whenever the page includes the score and the lyrics, the illustrations are the background. But, as we can see below, in the Gallery, the background of the cover page of the Chansons is coloured but blank.

The combination of Three elements

A fine characteristic of Boutet’s Chansons de France pour les petits enfants is the successful combination of three elements: the illustration, the score, and the lyrics (sometimes abridged). In order to combine these three features, Boutet either knew music or hired an assistant. However, no mention is made of a collaborator.

La Vie de Jeanne d’Arc, by Anatole France

For that matter, no collaborator is named with respect to Boutet’s Jeanne d’Arc (Joan of Arc). Boutet’s Jeanne d’Arc seems altogether the work of an eclectic Boutet de Monvel. Yet Monvel collaborated with Nobel-laureate French writer Anatole France (16 April 1844 – 12 October 1924) in the creation of Nos enfants: Scènes de la Ville et des Champs (1887). Nos enfants is an online publication which, unfortunately, does not show illustrations. This would have been Boutet’s contribution.

Influence on Anatole France: Jeanne d’Arc

It may be, however, that Boutet influenced Anatole France, not as an artist but in the choice of Joan of Arc as a subject-matter. Zeitgeist played its role, but the more immediate example was Boutet de Monvel’s Joan of Arc. In 1908, thirteen years after the publication of Boutet’s Jeanne d’Arc, Anatole France published his Vie de Jeanne d’Arc.

Boutet’s Joan of Arc was translated into English and, during a trip to the United States, in 1899, the beauty of his illustrations brought Bouvet a commission “by a wealthy American.” He was asked to create “a series of large scale panels based upon his Joan of Arc illustrations” (Wikipedia). These panels are housed at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, in Washington, DC.

Back to Chansons de France pour les petits enfants

But, let us return to the Chansons de France pour les petits enfants. It would appear that Au Clair de la Lune was composed by Italian-born Jean-Baptiste de Lully, Giovanni Battista Lulli, (28 November 1632 – 22 March 1687), a dancer and a composer who worked at the court of Louis XIV. If such is the case, the song was composed in the seventeenth century and not in the eighteenth century.

However, it has just occurred to me that the song may have been written by Jean-Baptiste Lully fils, one of Lully’s sons. Au Clair de la Lune would then be an eighteenth-century composition. But knowing that the song is a composition is the more relevant information. Au Clair de la Lune did not go from generation to generation in an oral tradition, which is the case, for example, with Æsop’s fables. Au Clair de la Lune is not folklore, although it may have entered folklore for lack of an identified composer.

I have a great deal of admiration for illustrators. Their work is reproduced, but artistically it does not take a second place to the original. The difference is financial.

Sources and Resources