Skip to Main Content

The Lost Tapestries of the City of Ladies: Christine de Pizan's Renaissance Legacy

Online ISBN:
9780520928787
Print ISBN:
9780520234109
Publisher:
University of California Press
Book

The Lost Tapestries of the City of Ladies: Christine de Pizan's Renaissance Legacy

Published:
29 November 2004
Online ISBN:
9780520928787
Print ISBN:
9780520234109
Publisher:
University of California Press

Abstract

Like a particularly good detective story, this richly textured book follows tantalizing clues in its hunt for a group of missing artistic masterpieces. It opens a new window on the lives of noblewomen in the Renaissance, the brilliantly colored tapestries that were the ultimate artistic luxury of the day, and the popular and influential fourteenth-century writer Christine de Pizan. The tapestries around which this story revolves are linked to de Pizan's Book of the City of Ladies, originally published 600 years ago in 1405. The book is aT tribute to women that honors 200 female warriors, scientists, queens, philosophers, and builders of cities. Though twenty-five manuscripts of the City of Ladies still exist, references to tapestries based on the book are elusive. The book takes us along as it tracks down records of six sets of tapestries whose owners included Elizabeth I of England; Margaret of Austria; and Anne of Brittany, Queen of France. It examines the intriguing details of these women's lives—their arranged marriages, their power, their affairs of state—asking what interest they had in owning these particular tapestries. Could the tapestries have represented their thinking? As it reveals the historical, linguistic, and cultural aspects of this unique story, the book also gives a fascinating account of medieval and early-Renaissance tapestry production and of de Pizan's remarkable life and legacy.

Contents
Close
This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

Close

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

View Article Abstract & Purchase Options

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Close