From Stage to Page: In Celebration of Queen and Author
In November 1514 the city of Paris celebrated the coronation of Queen Mary Tudor by
organizing an entry in her honor. Sister of King Henry VIII, Mary Tudor had been offered to the
French king in marriage as a prize for his diplomatic achievements in negotiating a treaty with
England. His third bride, Mary represented Louis XII’s last hope of producing a male heir. On
November 6th, the day after her coronation, the new queen processed with her entourage down
the rue Saint-Denis to Notre Dame and then the Palais Royal, where a banquet was held on her
behalf. Along the entry route, Mary Tudor and her party halted at seven different sites to view
living theaters that had been produced under the direction of Pierre Gringore1 [SLIDE left].
These theaters were multi-media events par excellence, for they orchestrated visual, textual and
oral performances simultaneously. As stagings of allegorical figures and symbols whose interrelationships were designed to convey a political or moralistic message associated with the
queen or the royal couple, Gringore’s entry theaters were striking visual experiences. What
dominated their visual landscape, at a time of growing uncertainty over the king’s future and
anxiety about his foreign-born queen,2 was the representation of the peace treaty and the royal
union it had engendered. Many of the theaters, even those staged at the traditionally religious
sites, presented political allegories that celebrated the alliance of France and England through
the new European peace.3
Gringore’s tableaux vivants also transmitted information through texts, because Latin inscriptions that had inspired his entry theaters and French verses and translations that explained
The sites at which the entry theaters were staged for Mary Tudor’s entry were the following: Saint-Denis
Gate, Ponceau Fountain, Church of the Trinity, Painters’ Gate, Church of the Holy Innocents, Châtelet
and the Palais Royal.
2 See Louise Fradenburg, Women and Sovereignty (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1992), 61 fpr
a discussion about the tenuous position of foreign queens.
3 That one and the same person, Pierre Gringore, had coordinated the municipal stagings in 1514 explains their more uniform message in comparison with previous entries.
1
2
their meaning were displayed on many of the stages, or échafauds.4 In addition, at nearly every
site an actor, often called the expositeur, provided an oral elucidation of the meaning of the scene for his spectators.5 Gringore’s multi-media events thus offered the public three levels of discourse - oral (in French) and textual (in French and in Latin) –, suggesting that the author was
accommodating three different audiences simultaneously.
4
French texts were displayed on stage at four of the seven entry theaters (Trinity, Holy Innocents, Châtelet, and Palais Royal) and Latin inscriptions appeared at two of them (Holy Innocents and Châtelet).
Scholars have adopted a variety of terms to refer to the performances staged during a royal entry, including spectacles (Michael Sherman, “‘Pomp and Circumstances’ : Pageanty, Politics, and Propaganda in
France during the Reign of Louis XII, 1498-1515, », Sixteenth-Century Journal : IX, 4 [1978],15), pageants (Lawrence Bryant, “Configurations of the Community in Late Medieval Spectacles: Paris and London during the Dual Monarchy,” in City and Spectacle in Medieval Europe, eds. Barbara A. Hanawalt and
Kathryn L. Reyerson [Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994], 17) and entry theaters (Lawrence Bryant, The King and the City in the Parisian Royal Entry Ceremony: Politics, Ritual and Art in the
Renaissance [Genève: Droz, 1986], 66) in English and tableaux vivants (Robert W. Scheller, “Ensigns of
Authority: French Royal Symbolism in the Age of Louis XII,” Simiolus XIII [1983], 102), mystères (Bernard
Guenée et Françoise Lehoux, Les Entrées royales françaises de 1328 à 1515 [Paris: CNRS, 1968], 25ff.)
and « échafauds » (Joël Blanchard, “Le Spectacle du rite: les entrées royales,” Revue historique, CCCV,
3 (2003 ?), 476 et passim) in French. In his account of Anne of Brittany’s entry, André de la Vigne used
the words echaffaults (294) et misteres (for a copy of this text, see Appendix II of my forthcoming edition
with Éditions Droz: Pierre Gringore, Entrées royales à Paris de Marie d’Angleterre (1514) et Claude de
France (1517). This latter term referred at once to the ceremonies associated with the queen’s coronation (271, 272, 276, 278) and the allegorical mises-en-scènes staged in her honor by the Parisians.(288,
294, 295, 296). The term misteres also appears in the city hall records (see Bonnardot, Registres des
délibérations du bureau de la Ville de Paris [Paris : Imprimerie Nationale, 1883], t. 1, 96-97). Charles
Oulmont, “Pierre Gringore et l’entrée de la reine Anne en 1504,” in Mélanges offerts à Emile Picot par ses
amis et ses élèves (Paris, 1913; reprint Genève: Slatkine, 1969), t. II, 386, makes a distinction between
the “mystères mimés” of the royal entries and the longer “mystères” or mystery plays, which he labels
“mystères parlés.” For a general description of entry theaters, see Bryant, King and City, 169-72, and
Ralph E. Giesey, “Inaugural Aspects of French Royal Ceremonials,” in Coronations: Medieval and Early
Modern Monarchic Ritual, ed. Janos M. Bak (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), 98, 107-10.
See also Joël Blanchard, “La Conception des échafauds dans les entrées royales (1484-1517),“ Le
moyen français (La Langue, le texte, le jeu : Perspectives sur le Theâtre médiéval), Actes du colloque
international, Université de McGill, 2-4 octobre 1986, éds. Giuseppe Di Stefano et Rose M. Bidler, 19
(1986 ?), 62-64, for a discussion of the vocabulary most appropriate to use in referring to these
“misteres.” In “Spectacle,” 476-77, Blanchard offers the following description: “Sur une charpente de treteaux, appelés ‘échafauds’, ‘establies’, ‘estages’ ou ‘loges’, plus rarement ‘théâtre’, sont disposées des
estrades les unes à côté des autres, dans l’alignement et sur un côté de la rue, dans le sens du parcours
suivi par le roi pour son entrée. Sur les échafauds, des ‘tableaux vivants’ – le terme, impropre, est celui
de la critique moderne, alors que les textes parlent d’‘histoire’ ou ‘mystere’, plus rarement ‘spectacle’ –
regroupent des personnages en costumes, muets et immobiles, au milieu d’ensembles figurés architecturaux ou autres. Le dispositif représentatif s’anime ‘a la passee’ du roi quand il s’arrête devant chaque
échafaud.”
5 The entry theater at the Palais Royal was the only one, according to Gringore’s account, that did not
involve an oral explanation of the tableau vivant staged there. At the Holy Innocents, a pucelle rising out
of a rose, rather than an expositeur, declaimed verses of welcome and of explanation to the queen and
other spectators about the allegorical scene staged there.
3
To commemorate the event, Gringore had produced an illuminated manuscript book of
Mary Tudor’s entry, which he dedicated to the queen herself. It is housed today in the British
Library under the call number Cottonian ms. Vespasian B. II.6 Gringore’s account of Mary Tudor’s entry presented the urban ceremonial from an entirely different angle than previous entry
books. Unlike earlier narratives that had depicted the ceremonies and rituals that figured the
queen as protagonist, Gringore’s entry book reconstructed the perspective Mary Tudor would
have shared with the Parisian populace as spectator of his entry tableaux. Thanks to his role as
entry director, Gringore was able to reconstitute the visual, textual and oral dimensions of his
theaters, albeit in slightly different configurations than the original performances. For the first
time, the entry theaters themselves defined the raison d’être of a French entry book.
Other important differences distinguish Gringore’s rendition from conventional chronicles. From the outset of his account of Mary Tudor’s entry – as well as that of Claude de
France three years later -, the author, who did not hold an official court position, took center
stage on behalf of his own artistic creations. In a dedication to the queen, he explained that he
had been commissioned by city officials to organize all of the entry theaters. This action alone
set a new precedent in Paris, whose officials had never commissioned one person to orchestrate these events.7 Moreover, what compelled Gringore to write his accounts was the publication of untruthful and unreliable versions of the 1514 entry. Placed in the unique position of redacting an account of a royal entry whose theaters he had organized, Gringore thus addressed
the queen to set the record straight. In order to appreciate fully this self-promotional intervention, allow me to reconstruct briefly Gringore’s profile up to this point in time.
Pierre Gringore was one of the most self-consciously active French authors of the early
sixteenth century. As the first vernacular writer to have his very first works printed, Gringore en-
6
See my forthcoming edition with Éditions Droz: Pierre Gringore, Entrées royales à Paris de Marie
d’Angleterre (1514) et Claude de France (1517). All subsequent references are taken from this edition.
7 Michael Sherman, 24, argues that either court officials or royal officials in Paris were responsible for
granting Gringore this large commission, because of his earlier writings supporting royal policy.
4
sured recognition of nearly all of his writings with an acrostic signature at the end of his texts,
beginning with his Chasteau de Labour in 1499 [SLIDES left and right]. The same publication
team that had produced his first book, the printer Philippe Pigouchet and bookseller Simon Vostre, brought out his second work as well, the Chasteau d’Amours, in 1500 [SLIDE left, BLANK
right]. Gringore again punctuated the publication with his acrostic signature [SLIDE right]. In
addition, he included acrostics identifying the last name of his printer and first and last names of
his bookseller. However, in two later editions of this same work, the printer Michel Le Noir appropriated Gringore’s acrostic signature, replacing it with his own [SLIDES left and right]. This
unauthorized behavior likely explains Gringore’s subsequent defensive actions. The author’s
name appeared paratextually for the first time in the October 1505 publication of his Complainte
de Trop Tard Marié [SLIDES left and right]. Information provided in the colophon indicates not
only that Gringore authored the work, but that it was printed for him as well. Gringore had thus
taken up the role of publisher. A few months later, in December 1505, Gringore became the
first known vernacular writer in France to obtain a privilege for the publication of his Folles Entreprises [SLIDE left, BLANK right]. As yet another sign of his increasing involvement in the reproduction of his own writings, the “ordonnance de justice” that the author had obtained granted
him control over the printing and distribution of the Folles Entreprises for one year. The incorporation of this early version of a privilege into the colophon of his edition of the work publicly authenticated Gringore’s title to his own words and implicitly announced to book producers and
purchasers alike his consciousness concerning issues of literary property and propriety. The
use of a personalized woodcut on the title page of the Folles Entreprises [SLIDE right] and of
other first editions of many of his other works [SLIDE left] likewise confirmed Gringore’s intent to
ensure recognition of his authorship. This image depicts Gringore in his well-known dramatic
role of Mère Sotte, or Mother Folly, a conventional character of the theatrical troupe called the
Enfants sans souci. The appearance of the author’s address below the woodcut indicates that
he also sold copies of the Folles Entreprises. Gringore’s alter ego reappeared time and again
5
on the title page of many of his subsequent works, even those whose publication he did not control [SLIDES left and right].
As I have demonstrated elsewhere, Gringore’s association with the publishing industry,
evidenced through these textual and paratextual signs and documents, firmly established his
position at the forefront of an informal French movement that sought to preserve authorial rights
over literary texts some thirty years after the advent of the printing press to France.8 And yet,
unlike his contemporaries André de la Vigne, who initiated a lawsuit against the printer Michel
Le Noir,9 and Jean Bouchet, who not only sued the publisher Antoine Vérard but also attacked
printers in his published work,10 Gringore’s critical challenge to printers and publishers during
the first decade of the 16th century remained essentially implicit, embedded as it was in the paratext of his publications. The paratextual material he introduced into his printed books announced his “ownership” and control over his works without directly attacking the publishers of
them.
Gringore’s campaign on behalf of his works finds explicit expression, however, in the offensive posture he adopts in his royal entry account of 1514. In his dedication to Mary Tudor,
he openly attacks distorted printed accounts of the queen’s entry that had already appeared.
Gringore claims to provide the accurate version of events, because as the official director of the
entry theaters, he was not writing based on hearsay, like those he criticized [SLIDE left, BLANK
right]:
Treshaulte, magnanime, vertueuse, illustrissime dame et princesse Marie d’Angleterre, royne de
France. Pierre Gringore, vostre subgiect obedient, simple aprentiz des rethoriciens, eloquens
orateurs, facteurs et compositeurs modernes en françoys, a consideré que aucuns expositeurs se
sont ingerez publier en impression la reception que vous firent messeigneurs les prevost des
marchans et eschevins de la ville de Paris, acompaignez des bourgoys, marchans, cytoiens et
habitans d’icelle ville. Et ce voyant qu’ilz n’ont descript vostre triumphante et magnificque entree
8
See my Poets, Patrons, and Printers (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995).
Poets, Patrons, and Printers, 1-3, 17-21.
10 For details about Vérard, see Brown, Poets, Patrons, and Printers, 25-27. For his general remarks
against printers see his 2 Epistre morale, xi, fol. 48r: “Vous Imprimeurs / Estes souvent des facteurs reprimeurs / Et…adjoustez a vostre fantasie / Chose maulvaise au propos mal choisie, / En corrompant la
rime bien souvent, / La prose aussi, la mettant trop au vent, / Et qui pis est corrompant la sentence / De
l’escripvant, c’est injure et offense.”
9
6
selon la verité, mais en ont parlé par ouyr dire, attendu que j’ay eu charge par messeigneurs les
tresoriers de France et de mesditz seigneurs de la ville inventer et composer les misteres faictz a
vostre dicte entree et reception, ay bien voulu descripre et rediger en hystoire ce qui a esté fait en
icelle ville tant a l’honneur du roy du royaume que de vous. Obmettant et delaissant les triumphes
des princes, ducz, contes, barons, chevaliers et escuyers tant de France que d’Angleterre et me taire de
la vostre excellente (fol. 3v) gravité, honnesteté, gratieuseté qui attroyoit le populaire a vostre amour en
desirant la prosperité du roy trescrestien, dont vous avez acquis le tiltre de trescrestienne, que de vous
ne aussi du triumphe des nobles dames, princesses et damoiselles tant de France que d’Angleterre.
Mais seullement des triumphes faictes en icelle ville le jour de vostre reception et entree, qui fut le sixiesme jour de novembre mil cinq cens quatorze.
Very noble, magnanimous, virtuous, very illustrious lady and princess Mary of England, Queen of
France. Pierre Gringore, your obediant subject, simple apprentice of rhetoricians, eloquent orators, modern writers and composers in French, has considered the fact that several have taken it
upon themselves to describe in print the reception given you by the eminent provost of merchants
and officials of the city of Paris, along with this city’s burghers, merchants, citizens and inhabitants. And seeing that they have not described your triumphant and magnificent entry according
to the truth, but have spoken of it through hearsay; [and] given the fact that I was charged by the
eminent Treasurers of France and by my aforementioned lords of the city 11 to create and write the
mystery plays performed at your entry and reception, I have decided to describe and write down
an account of what transpired in this city in honor of the king of the kingdom as much as in your
honor. Omitting and passing over the pomp and majesty associated with the princes, dukes, counts,
barons, knights and squires of both France and England and omitting mention of your excellent solemnity,
honesty, [and] graciousness, which draws the people to your love in desiring the prosperity of [our] Very
Christian King, from whom you have acquired the title of “Very Christian” Queen, as well as any mention
of the splendor associated with the noble ladies, princesses, and maidens of both France and England,
[mention shall be made] only of the celebration made in this city the day of your reception and entry,
which was November 6, 1514.
Stepping in to re-appropriate his work from the misrepresented versions of anonymous chroniclers, Gringore borrows strategies from his earlier challenge to printers and publishers but from
a more overtly defiant stance. Still staging his attack in the paratextual space of his work, the
author seeks this time to protect and control the reproduction of his performances, whose oral
and visual dimensions made them significantly more susceptible to misrepresentation and misinterpretation than the printed texts of his own words. Moreover, for the first time Gringore embraces the manuscript culture in order to control his creations. It offered him a more personalized means of addressing the queen, whose sponsorship he was very likely seeking. For even
though he had dedicated his printed works to prominent nobles, Gringore had been unsuccessful in obtaining patronage. In addition, the manuscript culture was more suited to Gringore’s
11
That is, the prévôt des marchands and échevins. As Charles Baskervill pointed out in his 1934 edition
of Mary Tudor’s royal enry (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), xvi, Gringore “was employed by both
city and realm.”
7
efforts to control performances, because it allowed for a more faithful visual reproduction of
them. [BLANK left]
Gringore’s careful reconstruction of his entry theaters in the queen’s dedication manuscript thus provides unique insight into his original performances and includes the first known
miniatures of French entry theaters.12 One striking aspect of these theaters that Gringore’s account exposes is the prominent role that texts played. The “textual performance” so integral to
Gringore’s theaters was, however, inextricably associated with other aspects of his dramas. For
in reconstructing the original “oral performance” associated with his allegorical tableaux, that
ephemeral dimension of live theater, Gringore resorted to “written expression.” The textual and
oral dimensions of his original stagings were further enhanced through the manuscript book’s
illuminations, recreations of the original “visual performances.” Venturing into the sphere of
manuscripts, as he so rarely did,13 while simultaneously imbued with the culture of printed
books, which he knew well by 1514, and the world of theater, with which the larger public most
readily identified him,14 Gringore inevitably brought a consciousness of texts and drama to the
original performances of his entry theaters and to his reconfiguration of them in manuscript
form.
12
The first known illustrations of entry theaters that have come down to us decorate an entry book account of Joanna of Castille’s entry into Brussels in December 1496. See Wim Blockmans and Esther
Donckers, “Self-Representation of Court and City in Flanders and Brabant in the Fifteenth and Early Sixteenth Centuries,” in Showing Status: Representation of Social Positions in the Late Middle Ages, eds.
Wim Blockmans and Antheun Janse (Turnhout: Brepols, 1999), 94-96, 99-107. The authors describe
Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, MS 78 D5, a manuscript containing 60 watercolours of the entry of Joanna of
Castille. Twenty-seven are reproductions of the tableaux vivants presented in her honor. I wish to thank
Susie Sutch for drawing my attention to this reference.
13 Surviving evidence indicates that only three of Gringore’s works were reproduced originally in manuscript form and never appeared in print. These include his entry book accounts in celebration of Mary
Tudor’s and Claude of France’s coronation and Parisian entries and his play entitled Vie de Monseigneur
saint Louis, thought to have been written around 1513-14. See the edition of this drama published by
Anatole de Montaiglon et James de Rothschild as volume II of the des Oeuvres complètes de Pierre
Gringore (Paris: Daffis, 1877).
14 For details about Gringore’s life and works, see Charles Oulmont, Pierre Gringore: la poésie morale,
politique et dramatique à la veille de la Renaissance (Paris: Champion, 1911; reprint Genève, Slatkine,
1976); Walter Dittmann, Pierre Gringore als Dramatiker (Berlin, 1923; reprint Nendeln, Liechenstein,
Kraus, 1967); and my edition of Pierre Gringore’s Oeuvres polémiques rédigées sous le règne de Louis
XII (Geneva: Droz, 2003), 9-28.
8
Recognizing the “page” as both dramatic tableau and manuscript folio, I wish to argue
that Gringore’s entry theaters, as defined through his account of them, were essentially decorated book folios which the queen “read” as she made her entry through Paris in 1514. By the
same token, the illuminated manuscript account that Gringore dedicated to Queen Mary Tudor
contained its own codicological dramas, including the painted reproductions of Gringore’s tableaux vivants and the artistic mises-en-scène of poetic texts that had originally been exhibited
on stage or orally transmitted. In this sense, both the entry theaters and their manuscript reconstructions can be defined as “books in performance.” By controlling the performance on both
stage and page, Gringore, as author and authority, threatened to upstage the original protagonist, Mary Tudor herself.
*****
Four descriptions of the 1514 entry theaters provide detailed evidence of Gringore’s use
of texts on stage. These include the tableaux vivants erected at the Trinity, the Church of the
Holy Innocents, the Châtelet and the Palais Royal. An examination of the display of French and
Latin texts at these sites, their relationship with the oral and visual performances on the same
stages and the interrelated reconstruction of these dramatic components into the queen’s entry
book uncovers the mise-en-page of Gringore’s stagings and his mise-en-scène of the entry theaters in the illuminated manuscript account.
Written on stage at the Trinity site the day of the entry, for example, was the following
rondeau, a description of the dramatic representation of the biblical story of the Queen of Sheba’s visit to Solomon created on stage in honor of Mary Tudor’s own journey from England to
France. [SLIDES left and right]
Rondeau.15
This poem, with slight variations, also figured in the anonymous account of Mary Tudor’s entry that has
come down to us in four contemporary printed versions. See the following copies : BnF Rés. Lb2951a,
BnF Rés. Lb2951, BnF Rés. Lb2951e and Bibliothèque Mazarine 35484 Rés. Théodore Godefroy offered a
15
9
Noble Sabba, dame de renommee,
Est venue veoir Salomon le tressaige,
Qui l’a receue d’ung amoureux couraige:
Par sur toutes l’a prisee et aymee.
4
C’est la royne de vertus enflamee,
Belle et bonne, vertueuse en langaige,
¶Noble Sabba.
Le trescrestien, sachant qu’elle est famee, 8
A prins plaisir veoir en son heritaige
Le beau present de paix; vray mariage
C’est ensuyvy, dont elle est estimee,
¶Noble Sab[b]a.
12
While Gringore does not reveal exactly how the verses were displayed on stage,16 they contributed significantly to the drama, not only because their very physical presence would have been
difficult to ignore, but also because they clarified the meaning of the figures in the scene before
spectators. Only the rondeau exhibited on stage clearly introduced the biblical scenario.17 In
addition, references in the poem to “la royne” (v. 5), “le trescrestien” (v. 8), a term associated
only with the French monarch, “paix” and “vray mariage” (v. 10) would have signalled to the alert
– and literate - spectator the implicit analogy being made between the queen of Sheba and
Mary Tudor.18
The reconfiguration of this rondeau in the queen’s manuscript book (fols. 6v-7r) stands
out visually in several ways [SLIDES left and right]. First, the distinction between the transcription of verse and prose on the manuscript folio immediately signals a change of discourse. This
particular generic transition represents just one scene of the extraordinary visual drama that repeats itself throughout Mary Tudor’s manuscript entry book, for verse insertions interrupt the
fifth version of the account in Le Cérémonial François, Paris : Cramoisy et Cramoisy, 1649, t. I, 731-36.
See Appendix III of my forthcoming edition of Gringore’s Entrées royales for a critical edition of these
anonymous versions.
16 Gringore’s account reads: “Sur lequel eschaffault estoit escript ung rondeau qui s’ensuit” (ll. 91-92).
17 In fact, viewers of the scene as it appeared in the manuscript miniature, which featured a queen on
bended knee before a king, would most likely have interpreted it at first glance as the French royal couple, especially since there are no inscriptions identifying characters on stage, like most of the other images (see the miniatures of the entry theaters at the Saint-Denis Gate, Ponceau Fountain, Painters’ Gate,
Holy Innocents, Châtelet and Palais Royal).
18 See 1 Kings 10, 1-13 and 2 Chronicles 9, 1-12 for the biblical account of Solomon and Sheba.
10
flow of Gringore’s prose narration fifteen times, an average of once per folio. 19 In every case,
the shift from prose narration to versified text marks the movement back in time from the postentry reconstruction of events – in prose -- to the real-time performances – in verse form. Gringore thereby enriched his historical account by adding a layer of prose discourse to his reconstituted performances to further explicate the meaning of his own entry theaters and to introduce
himself as post-entry narrator or acteur into the “action.”20
As for the rondeau displayed on the Trinity stage the day of the queen’s entry, the fixed
form of the reconstituted poem in the queen’s manuscript book is all the more discernible because of its artistically enhanced refrain. The initial letter of the first refrain – and of the entire
poem - invites attention because it is illuminated in gold: “Noble Sabba, dame de renommee.“
By the same token, the second and third repetitions of the refrain, in the form of rentrements, at
the end of stanzas 2 and 3 (“Noble Sabba”), are each indented and preceded by a paragraph
sign painted gold (vv. 7, 12). Like the first letter of the poem, the initial letters of the second and
third stanzas are also illuminated in gold (vv. 5, 8) as well. In addition, the rubric announcing
the entire poem - Rondeau - is transcribed in red ink, preceded by a decorated paraph. Perhaps in an imitation of the original display of the poem on the entry stage, artist and author have
collaborated in the entry book to reproduce a rondeau whose essential components (Abba abA
abbaA) are immediately recognizable to the reader. This reconfiguration constitutes a veritable
poetic guide. Thus, the text of the rondeau originally displayed on Gringore’s stage was transformed into a visual, codicological performance in the queen’s manuscript book.
The transcription of the Queen of Sheba rondeau on stage the day of Mary Tudor’s entry
was not designed to “act” independently, however. As a hermeneutic device that elucidated the
literal significance of Gringore’s staging, it was complemented by the oral performance of the
expositeur, who, in a seven-lined decasyllabic stanza, made explicit the underlying analogy be19
See fols. 4v, 5r, 6r, 6v-7r, 7r, 8v-9r, 9r-9v, 10r-10v, 10v, 11r (3 different texts), 13r-13v, 13v-14r, 15r.
See Blanchard, “Le Spectacle du rite,” 493-497, 516-17, for a general discussion about the difficulty
spectators experienced in comprehending entry theater stagings and the related role of the expositeur.
20
11
tween the story of the Queen of Sheba’s bearing of gifts to Solomon and Mary Tudor’s gift of
peace to Louis XII: [SLIDE left, KEEP right]
L’expositeur.
Sabba royne, princesse de renom,
Apporta dons precieulx et richesse
Au vertueux noble roy Salomon,
Qui la receut en joye et en leesse.
4
Mais Marie, nostre royne et maistresse,
A apporté au roy doulx et courtoys
Present de paix pour Françoys et Angloys.
The narrator of these verses adopted a less complex poetic form (ababbcc) than that of the rondeau exhibited simultaneously on stage, perhaps to enable less literate spectators to comprehend more easily the meaning of the entry theater.21
Originally imparted through oral performance, these verses were conserved through
their transcription into the entry book in a mise-en-page that is visually enhanced through artistry. For a description and rubric written in red dramatically announces the expositeur’s words,22
Speaking in more straightforward terms, Gringore’s interpreter made a striking use of parallelism. Each
couple – Saba and Solomon, Mary and Louis - commands about half of the verses, with each female introducing the first hemistich of her section as grammatical subject: “Sabba royne” (v. 1), “Mais Marie” (v.
5). The next verse follows with her action of bearing gifts (dons precieulx et richesse [v. 2] in the case of
Sabba, Present de paix [v. 7] in the case of Mary), in which the verb apporter is first deployed in the passé simple for the biblical character of the more distant past, and then in the passé composé to convey the
same but more recent comportment of the new French queen. Each male counterpart completes the
second hemistich in a subsequent verse as indirect object - “noble roy Salomon (v. 3),” “roy doulx et
courtoys” (v. 6) – as he receives the gifts brought to him. Rhyme b in –esse in verses 4-5 literally links
the two sections of the poem, the two couples and the two stories in the analogy, while rhyme c in –oys,
exploited in the last two lines through the interior rhyme, announces the union of the Françoys and Angloys. We learn from François Bonnardot, I, 217, that Mary Tudor herself “ne savoit assez entendiblement parler françois.” Whether she understood spoken French is less clear, although marrying the French
king would make that a highly desirable ability. Since Gringore dedicated his entry account to her, the
queen presumably read French, although that fact is not confirmed either.
22 The text in Gringore’s account that is transcribed in red reads: ”Dessus lequel eschaffault estoit ung
expositeur qui disoit ce qui s’ensuit” (ll. 93-94). The rubric in red reads “¶L’expositeur.” The paraph,
painted in gold on red, emphasizes all the more this rubric. The verses declaimed by the expositeur at
the entry theater presented at the Saint-Denis Gate (ababbcbc) functioned in the same manner and are
similarly staged on the manuscript page.
21
12
while the first letter of the stanza is highlighted through illumination.23 Once again, we discover
a virtuoso collaboration of author and artist.
*****
Staged texts receive a slightly different codicological treatment in the queen’s manuscript account of the Palais Royal entry theater. [BLANK left; SLIDE right] At this site Gringore
had orchestrated a bi-level scenario, the upper stage of which dramatized the scene of the Annunciation. At the lower level, in the so-called Garden of France, sat an enthroned royal couple;
on each side of the king and queen stood Justice and Truth. Shepherds below, associated with
the biblical re-enactment on the upper stage, sang melodies.
As in his description of the tableau vivant at the Trinity, Gringore is rather vague about
the manner in which the text actually appeared on this entry stage. He states only the following:
“Aussy estoit escript sur ledit eschauffault le rondeau qui s’ensuit.” Although announced as a
rondeau, this poem, consisting of two five-lined stanzas that share one rhyme (abaab bcbbc),
does not possess the characteristics generally associated with this form:24 [SLIDE left; KEEP
right]
Comme la paix entre Dieu et les hommes
Par le moyen de la Vierge Marie
Ffut jadis faicte, ainsy a present sommes,
Bourgoys françoys, deschargez de noz sommes,
Car Marie avecq nous se marie.
4
Neither poem representing the original “textual” and “oral” performances at the Trinity theater is integrated into the miniature, distinguishing it from the illuminations depicting the tableaux vivants staged at
all the other entry theaters. The words that appear in the illumination of the Trinity theater contain the
prose narrative describing the queen’s movement to the next site, highlighted by a decorated paraph and
red rubric signalling the words of L’acteur, that is, the author (Gringore). This suggests that the placement of the miniatures in the entry book could not always be coordinated with the words, written or oral,
associated with them during the original performances. For a discussion of how Gringore’s role as acteur
rather than that of the expositeur was highlighted in this miniature, see Cynthia J. Brown, “Pierre Gringore: acteur, auteur, éditeur », Cahiers V. L. Saulnier (Les Grands Rhétoriqueurs), 14, 1997, 145-63.
24 Since the rhyme a (–ommes) is not repeated in the second stanza, there is no obvious refrain that can
be reconstituted. The meaning of the verses does not invite such a reconstitution either. This artificial
rondeau also appeared, with slight differences, in the anonymous entry account of Mary Tudor’s entry
that has come down to us. See note 15 above and Appendix III of my forthcoming edition of Gringore’s
Entrées royales.
23
13
Justice et Paix auprés d’elle apparie
Au parc de France et pays d’Angleterre,
Puis que le laz d’amours tient l’armarie.
Acquis avons, pour nous nul n’en varie,
Marie au Ciel et Marie en la terre.
8
At the Palais Royal theater, this text represented the only interpretive aid, offering the literate
spectator a symmetrically fashioned explanation of the analogy between the political and religious allegories at each level of the stage.25 Gringore provided here what amounted to a lesson
in the construction of analogy through biblical exemplum, allegory and symbol. The first stanza
translates the drama at the upper level, making explicit the association between the Virgin Mary
and Mary Tudor, both bearers of peace, through adoption of a “Comme...ainsy” grammatical
structure (vv. 1 & 3) that divides the strophe into two equal parts. The poet’s manipulation of
rhymes enhances this analogy as well. Mary’s name begins the fifth verse and, through exploitation of a rime équivoquée that at once echoes the Virgin’s name at the end of v. 2 and describes the French queen’s new marital status, the same word also ends the verse – and stanza. By ensuring the continuation of the rhyme in –arie in the second stanza of the poem (vv. 6,
8, 9), Gringore’s poetic ploy sustains the dominant role of the interrelated Maries throughout the
entire poem. The first stanza also recalls the analogy made between the Queen of Sheba and
Queen Mary Tudor at the Trinity entry theater, where each woman had been praised for bearing
gifts of peace to Solomon and Louis XII respectively.26 Extending this correlation further, Gringore makes an implicit comparison between Christ, the reincarnation of the peace brought by
The entry theater at the Palais Royal did not, according to Gringore’s account, provide an expositeur to
offer an oral version of the meaning of the tableau vivant for the public the day of the celebration. Did this
mean that Gringore expected most of the spectators at this site to be literate? Or rather that those contributing to the creation of the entry theater at the Palais Royal were literate, since they were probably
associated with the members of the Chambre des Comptes, traditionally responsible for the tableaux vivants at this site?
26 In this first strophe that analogy is dramatically expanded to encompass, on one hand, all of humanity,
and, on the other, the French people. The first-person plural voice of this poem, the last of the entire entry to be exhibited, is striking, as is the idea in v. 5 that in marrying Louis XII, Mary Tudor was also marrying the French people.
25
14
the Virgin Mary to mankind, and a future French heir whom the French king and people hoped
Mary would produce.
The second stanza transposes into words the staging on the lower level of the entry theater, where the personified figures of Justice and Peace27 provided allegorical support for the
queen. By the same token, the heraldic ties of love metaphorically joined her lineage with that
of the king, an acknowledgment that between the two stages the king’s emblem, a porcupine,
and a lion rampant, symbol of England, held the respective coats of arms of the king and
queen.28 In the final lines of the poem, the voice of the French citizenry29 reiterated the analogy
between the two Marys, between the celestial and earthly realms, between the religious and
political dramas, between the upper and lower stages.
This poetic text, originally displayed on stage, is artistically reconstituted in the entry
book in both written and artistic form. A large decorated initial sets off each stanza, thereby
drawing the reader’s attention to the verses. But in an even more innovative visual strategy, the
miniaturist incorporated the first stanza of the poem into his illumination of the entry theater in
the queen’s manuscript book. The stanza appears separately, below the visual re-enactment of
the tableau vivant, but at the same time is artistically integrated with it through its placement
within the same frame. While not an exact replication of Gringore’s entry theater, this reconstruction of word and image constitutes an ingenious strategy for rendering the original relationship between the visual performance and staging of texts. Space constraints related to the illuminated reproduction of the entry theater obviously made it impossible to incorporate the entire
poem within the miniature’s frame of the staging itself.30 Of all the French texts displayed at the
27
Logically, it seems as if this personified figure should in fact be Verité, since the latter is announced in
the preceding description as the companion of Justice (l. 217) and is identified by an inscription in the accompanying miniature. But practically speaking, the use of “Verité,” composed of three syllables rather
than one like “Paix” (or perhaps even “paix”), would have yielded a hypermetric line.
28 These symbolic arms are not reproduced in the miniature of the Palais Royal entry theater (fol. 15 r).
29 This first-person voice surfaces as well in the discourses associated with the entry theaters at the SaintDenis Gate and the Châtelet.
30 The words Gabriel delivered the day of the entry, Ave gratia plena (ll. 210-11), are absent from the miniature as well.
15
different sites the day of Mary Tudor’s entry, this poem is the only one that was incorporated
within the space of the miniature in the queen’s entry book.
*****
Gringore provides more specific details about the marriage of performance and text on
stage in the case of the entry theaters presented at the Châtelet in 1514. He offers, for example, the following description: [SLIDE left, BLANK right] “Au bort dudit eschauffault y avoit quatre grans tableaux escriptz en grosse lectre, ou estoit la balade qui s’ensuyt” (ll. 206-07). Logically, each of the four panels placed at the edge of the stage must have contained one of the
ballad’s four stanzas. Collectively these thirty-nine verses elucidated Gringore’s complicated
allegorical scenario in which Justice and Truth [SLIDE right], seated below a large crown and
surrounded on both sides by the twelve peers of France, witnessed the scenario on the platform
below. This allegorical performance conveyed the cooperation of classical gods and goddesses, and political personifications in negotiating the peace treaty between France and England
and the marriage of Mary Tudor and Louis XII. [Phebus, Diana and Minerva, two of whom doubled as contemporary political entities (Phebus = the French king, Diana = France); Stella Maris
(= Mary Tudor); and Bon Conseil (= a political personification)]. The alliterative refrain, Princes
en paix et peuple en asseurance, punctuated the political message four times and, together with
the envoi, made clear that this entry theater, which glorified the French king as much as, if not
more than, the queen, was created in Louis XII’s as well as Mary Tudor’s honor.31
Par le vouloir de Phebus qui reluyt,
De sa clarté Dyana enlumine,
Mynerve prent son plaisir et deduit
Donner lueur a l’estoille marine,
Et Bon Accord chasse guerre en ruyne.
Maintenant est la royalle couronne
Eslargie, l’Esglise bruyt lui donne,
Et noblesse se conduyt soubz icelle
En luy donnant vertu, force et puissance.
In fact, as we read earlier, Gringore, in his dedication to the queen, states: “ay bien voulu descripre et
rediger en hystoire ce qui a esté fait en icelle ville tant a l’honneur du roy du royaume que de vous. “
31
16
Ainsy voyons aprés guerre rebelle
Princes en paix et peuple en asseurance.
Considerons que Justice a le bruyt,
Du ciel descend et selon droit chemine,
Verité vient de terre qui l’ensuyt :
Ilz resident soubz la couronne digne.
Phebus a eu tousjours d’iceulx saisine,
Sans icelles jamais son cas n’ordonne,
Dont haultement Justice le guerdonne
Et Verité le nourrist soubz son aelle,
Qui est de bien advenir Esperance.
Regner voyons maulgré hayne mortelle,
Princes en paix et peuple en asseurance.
Qui est Phebus que Dyana conduyt,
Ffors que le roy qui en France domyne?
Dyana est France qui jour et nuyt
Prent d’icelluy le bien qui luy assigne,
Ayant vouloir par sa grace benigne
De mettre en bruyt France que hault guerdonne.
Et ce voyant, Mynerve saige et bonne
Luy presente ceste marine estoille,
C’est Marie, noble royne de France.
Bon Accord mect par le roy et par elle
Princes en paix et peuple en asseurance.
Prins ce, Phebus, qui mer, terre environne,
Se monstre humain, car sa clarté foisonne
Et a tant fait, maulgré trahyson cautelle
Des ennemys, qui luy ont fait nuysance,
Que Mynerve mett d’amour naturelle
Princes en paix et peuple en asseurance.
The first stanza explained the relationship among the personifications on the lower stage. The
second and third enlightened spectators as to the literal meaning behind the actions of Justice
and Truth on stage above as well as their association with the allegory on the lower level. Although the miniature reproducing the entry theater in the queen’s manuscript book does not display these verses within its frame, the stage, already congested with nineteen actors, 32 must
have been overcrowded with the addition of the “quatre grans tableaux” displaying the ballad.
32
Like all but one other miniature (the image of the Trinity staging), the illustration of this theater includes
inscriptions identifying the different characters. Presumably the individual actors held these inscriptions
or wore these identifications on their costumes. Charles Mazouer, “Spectacle et théâtre dans la chevau-
17
Just as the text of this ballad claimed considerable space on stage the day of Mary Tudor’s entry, so too it fills a significant portion of the manuscript book (fols. 13v-14r), [SLIDE left]
rivalling the narrator’s prose description. Recalling perhaps each stanza’s assignment to a separate panel on stage, the first letter of each strophe is illuminated. The visualization of these
verses on stage and in the queen’s entry book served to inform spectators and readers alike
about the very poetic structure of the ballad form (ababbccdedE x 3 + envoi [ccdedE]).
Further complementing this textual performance at the Châtelet, and following the pattern established at the Trinity, an expositeur offered a more condensed and simplified verse explanation (ababccddee) of Gringore’s tableau vivant at the Châtelet through his “oral performance.” This hermeneutic tool again may well have accommodated spectators unable to decipher the texts displayed on staged:33 [SLIDE left; KEEP right]
Par Marie, estoille illuminant
Et radiant, par Phebus humble et doulx,
Dyana est en terre reluysant
Tant que guerre ne luy est plus nuysant :
Accord triumphe et a le bruit sur tous.
Phebus est roy qui domine sur nous,
Et Dyana est France la fertille,
Et Mynerve Prudence tres utile,
Qui a conjoinct, comme on peult estimer,
Le cler Phebus a l’Estoille de Mer.
4
8
In the queen’s manuscript book, this oral performance was transformed into a textual and visual
performance. The first letter of the stanza attracts the reader’s eye because it is illuminated and
significantly larger than the other letters. Like the miniature of the Palais Royal entry theater,
the first five verses of the dizain are incorporated into the entry book illumination of the Châtelet
chée des Conards de Rouen au XVIe siècle,” Fifteenth-Century Studies, 13 (1988), 387-99, speaks of
characters on stage whose name was written on their back or shoulder or was attached to their sleeve.
33 Exploiting the symmetrical potential of yet another poetic form, Gringore had his speaker present the
personified characters on stage in the first five lines and then the allegorical meaning of the ensemble in
the second five lines. Appearing once again, the voice of the people, mediated this time through the expositeur, creates the dynamic link between the two sections of the poem with the adoption of the rhyme
tous-nous (vv. 5-6).
18
staging. Yet again, the manuscript bookmakers adopted an inventive strategy to preserve, this
time, the ephemeral nature of the expositeur’s declaimed words and to communicate the relationship between the original oral and visual performances.34
Yet another layer of textual performance and discourse surfaced in the Châtelet staging
and its reconstruction in the queen’s entry book. Without specifying its exact placement, Gringore makes note of a Latin inscription (from Psalm 84) displayed on stage the day of the
queen’s entry: [SLIDE left] “Veritas de terra orta est et justicia de celo prospexit.”35 Understood by only the most educated spectators, this verse, which offers evidence of Gringore’s own
erudition to the initiated and unitiated alike, describes the very actions of Justice and Truth as
they made their way to the upper level of the entry theater. The author’s prose account elucidates for his (less sophisticated) reader that Justice descended from the sky above as Truth
climbed from the foot of the eschauffault to a stage “environ cinq toises de hault” (l. 157), where
the two joined forces.
*****
34
While an expositeur appeared in six of the seven entry theaters, and his words, transcribed in Gringore’s account, were partially or entirely included in the miniature of the tableau three times (see the illuminations of the entry theaters mounted at the Ponceau Fountain, Painters’ Gate and Châtelet), the expositeur himself never appears in the images. The miniaturist of Gringore’s entry theater at the Ponceau
Fountain incorporated all of the expositeur’s verses of explanation (ababbcc) into the illustration of the
allegorical performance. The rubric announcing L’expositeur is highlighted in red ink and the first letter of
the text, larger than all others in the poem, is illuminated, thus enhancing the seven decasyllables. In the
miniature of Gringore’s entry theater at the Painters’ Gate, words again have been transformed from their
original oral rendition into a dramatic written and visual form. Below the image of the allegorical scenario
of Peace, Friendship, and Confederation surrounded by France and England, a red rubric designates
L’expositeur, whose versified explanation (ababbcbc) -- that is, three of its lines --, is incorporated into
the miniature. Once again the first letter of the stanza stands out by virtue of its decoration. The red rubric L’expositeur all but invades the illuminations of the entry theaters at the Ponceau Fountain and
Painters’ Gate, rivalling the inscriptions identifying the allegorical figures on stage. It is the four-verse
chanson of welcome (abab) sung by sailor-actors at the Saint-Denis Gate entry theater that is incorporated into the miniature associated with the tableau. The poem is announced in the queen’s entry book by
a red rubric (Chansson) and introduced by an illuminated letter.
35 Gringore’s text reads : “Et y avoit escript en la place ou ilz s’arrestoient ce qui s’ensuit:” (ll. 157-58).
The Latin inscription does not appear in the miniature of the entry theater. But it is incorporated into the
anonymous account of Mary Tudor’s entry. See Appendix III of Gringore’s Entrées royales.
19
Gringore’s strategy of adding Latin discourse to his mise-en-scène at the Châtelet was
most dramatically exploited in the staging at the Church of the Holy Innocents.36 In the queen’s
entry book account, Gringore provides the texts of six different Latin inscriptions that had been
displayed on different parts of the stage the day of the entry, along with their French translations
in verse. Because no visual reproduction of the display of texts on stage is to be found, we can
only presume that the miniaturist, [BLANK left; SLIDE right] who went as far as providing names
of the many personifications composing the allegory staged at the Holy Innocents, was simply
unable to incorporate all the originally displayed written material into his artistic recreation of the
entry theater. While we can only imagine the organization of the textual and visual performances associated with this particular tableau vivant, it most certainly constituted an extraordinary
and memorable mise-en-page.
This incorporation of Latin quotes into Gringore’s entry theater recalls selected copies of
the editions of some of his works, such as the Folles Entreprises of 1505, in which Latin source
information was printed in the margins. [SLIDE right] Like the entry theaters, these versions
obviously targeted an educated, bilingual readership. Gringore thus consciously used paratextual space in his printed books and para-performative spaces on his stages to promote his own
erudition and reach out simultaneously to various publics. [BLANK right]
*****
In the end, the words that surfaced time and again in Gringore’s entry theaters -- in
French and in Latin, in the original oral and textual performances and in their reconstituted state
-- were words associated with “peace.” It was likewise the leitmotiv that ideologically and visual-
The upper stage of the entry theater at the Painters’ Gate was based on two displayed biblical texts.
One quote from Proverbs was, according to the author, written at the feet of God: Cor regis in manu
Domini est quocumque voluerit inclinabit illud. Proverbiorum. xxii o (ll. 103-05) The other citation, from the
Song of Songs, was written at the feet of the royal couple seated on the upper level: Veni amica mea
veni coronaberis. Canticorum 4o (l. 107). This second quote was preceded in the queen’s entry book by
an announcement in red ink that informs the reader of the placement of the quote (ll. 106-07). The anonymous versions of Mary Tudor’s entry also refer to this second Latin citation. See Appendix III of Gringore’s Entrées royales.
36
20
ly dominated Gringore’s stagings, providing literal, historic, symbolic, metaphoric and allegorical
configurations that synchronized all the tableaux vivants. While Mary Tudor saw herself portrayed as a bearer of peace in multiple forms, she was never staged as an independent actor in
this capacity, for she was depicted either on bended knee before the king (Trinity), at his side as
his partner (Palais Royal) or in an allegorical ensemble (Châtelet).37 Gringore’s entry theaters,
significantly bolstered by textual drama, thus staged conventional performances, in which the
queen, lacking political authority, was embodied as an agent of French royalty.38 Mary Tudor,
like many of her counterparts, thereby fulfilled a predetermined role similar to that played by actors representing the queen herself in the tableaux vivants she witnessed the day of her entry
into Paris. Whether “reading” the pages of the entry theaters at the time of their live production
or re-viewing them through their reconfigured performances in her manuscript entry book, Mary
Tudor was doubtless flattered by Gringore’s elaborate stagings in her honor. At the same time,
his visually enhanced books would have relayed to her the king’s and the kingdom’s expectations concerning her own performance as French queen.
As for Gringore, his manuscript entry books, defined against unreliable, anonymous
printed accounts that had featured the queen first and foremost as protagonist of the entry ceremonials, boldly promoted the city over the court, the chronicler over the queen, his role as author and entry director over anonymous hacks, and his rectified tableaux vivants over errorridden reconstructions of them. Just as he had upstaged the queen’s allegorical alter-egos in
37
The queen tended to be subsumed by a larger political entity, such as England, negotiating for peace
with France (Painters’ Gate) or the classical-Christian emblem, Stella Maris, who drew light from PhebusLouis XII and Diana-France, in the union of France and England (Châtelet). Even the sweet-smelling
rose conveyed political associations. As the symbol of England, it strived to reach up from below, thanks
to the help of other political male personifications, to join the fleur-de-lis in the Garden of France (Holy
Innocents). In the only tableau representing the queen alone, she was figured allegorically as a beauty of
triply divine grace (Ponceau Fountain). No representation of the queen figured in the entry theater presented at the Saint-Denis Gate.
38 In her study of the coronation of Jeanne de Bourbon in 1364, “The Queen in Charles V’s ‘Coronation
Book:’ Jeanne de Bourbon and the ‘Ordo ad Reginam Benedicendam,’” Viator, 8 (1977), 269, Claire
Sherman makes the following comment: “Although the political authority of the queen almost disappeared after 1200, she nevertheless continued to play an important role in the official and ceremonial life
of the reign and to function both as an agent and as a symbol of royalty.”
21
his own entry theaters by making her share center stage with her spouse and other political entities, Gringore also crowded the queen out of her own entry book by preceding her onstage and
by taking on the role of the expositeur or acteur, to whom all eyes and ears turned for an explanation of the drama.
Perhaps in part because of his bravado but also because of an unforeseen turn of
events, Gringore ultimately failed to obtain a royal appointment. Mary Tudor returned to England upon Louis XII’s death, less than two months after her Parisian entry. In addition, the preference of his successor, Francis I, for Italian over French theater and ban on staging of the sotties and farces Gringore performed with the Enfants sans souci seems to have doomed the author’s career in Paris as an actor and director as well. However, in 1518, just one year after he
had organized the theaters for Queen Claude de France’s entry into Paris, Gringore accepted a
post as herald at the court of the duke of Lorraine. This appointment was accompanied by a
return to the reproduction of his subsequent writings in print form. Gringore appears to have at
last found a favorable situation that addressed his needs for literary recognition, authorial control and long-term patronage within the context of the print culture [SLIDE left]. This title page of
his Heures de Nostre Dame of 1525 reflects the development of the title-page since the publication of his first work in 1499 with its use of multiple colors and geometric shapings, in a new
form of dramatization. It also suggests that Gringore had come to learn how to share center
stage – the title page in this case - with his patron as well as his publisher.
Cynthia J. Brown
University of California, Santa Barbara