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Mar 12, 2008

Single Miniature Excised from Boccaccio's Des Cleres et nobles femmes: Queen Medusa and Her Court

c. 1470

circle of Maître François

(French)

France, 15th century

Tempera and gold on vellum

Sheet: 13 x 9.1 cm (5 1/8 x 3 9/16 in.)

Gift from J. H. Wade 1924.1015

Location

not on view

Did you know?

Medusa is shown here with her attendants before she was turned into the gorgon, a fierce frightening monster.

Description

This miniature comes from the French translation of a book by the Italian poet Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). A compilation of biographies of famous women, Boccaccio’s work remained popular in France throughout the 1400s, especially with aristocratic bibliophiles, and was usually beautifully illustrated in the form of a deluxe manuscript. Shown here is the miniature introducing the chapter dealing with the legend of Queen Medusa. Surrounded by her courtiers, Medusa instructs the reader on the disadvantages of possessing wealth, which brings fear and superstition as well as loss of sleep, security, and peace of mind.

Provenance

Jacques d'Armagnac, Duc de Nemours; Lord Mostyn, London (sale July 13, 1920, no. 9; entire MS); Mme. Th. Belin, Paris (remainder of MS., sale Paris, 1936); Durlacher Brothers, New York.

Citations

W. M. M. “Illuminated Miniatures in the Cleveland Museum of Art.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 12, no. 4 (April 1925): 61–71. Mentioned: P. 70; Reproduced: P. 67, fig. g www.jstor.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1925. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 21 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1928. Reproduced: p. 22 archive.org

Walters Art Gallery (Baltimore, Md.), and Dorothy Eugenia Miner. Illuminated Books of the Middle Ages and Renaissance: An Exhibition Held at the Baltimore Museum of Art, January 27-March 13. Baltimore: Trustees of the Walters Art Gallery, 1949.

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 74 archive.org

Wixom, William D. Treasures from Medieval France. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1967. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 302-303; cat.no. VII-5 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 74 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 85 archive.org

Martin Nagy, Rebecca. Textiles in Daily Life in the Middle Ages. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1985. p. 43, 59

Huizinga, Johan, Graeme Small, Anton van der Lem, and Diane Webb. Autumntide of the Middle Ages: a study of forms of life and thought of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in France and the Low Countries. [Leiden]: Leiden University Press, 2020. Reproduced: P. 481, fig. 22.2

Exhibition history

Detroit Institue of Art, "French Gothic Decorative Arts, 13th-15th Centuries" 11/9/1928-12/10/1928, no. 19.

Brooklyn Museum, "European Art, 1450-1500" 4/21/1936-6/3/1936, no. 94.

Baltimore Museum, "Illuminated Books of the Middle Ages and Renaissance" 12/29/1948-3/22/1949, no. 110.

Royal Ontario Museum of Archeology, Toronto, "Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts" 3/10/1950-6/13/1950.

Carnegie Institute, "French Painting, 1100-1900" 9/27/1951-12/10/1951, no. 18.

Los Angeles County Museum, "Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts" 11/12/1953-2/3/1954.

University of Kansas, 10/23/1975-01/22/1976

University of Michigan Museum of Art, "Images of Love and Death in Late Medieval and Renaissance Art" 10/23/1975-01/22/1976.

The Silver Jubilee Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 23-September 28, 1941).

The World of Miniature Painting. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 20-November 10, 1953).

Juxtapositions. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (September 11-October 10, 1965).

Treasures of Medieval France. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 16, 1966-January 29, 1967).

Textiles in Daily Life in the Middle Ages. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 22-March 17, 1985).

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=Single Miniature Excised from Boccaccio's Des Cleres et nobles femmes: Queen Medusa and Her Court|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1924.1015|author=Maître François|year=c. 1470|access-date=28 May 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Single Miniature Excised from Boccaccio's Des Cleres et nobles femmes: Queen Medusa and Her Court

Single Miniature Excised from Boccaccio's Des Cleres et nobles femmes: Queen Medusa and Her Court

circle of Maître François

Location

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