Table Of ContentUNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
Santa Barbara
Transmission of Knowledge to and between Women in 15th-Century France:
Agnès de Bourgogne’s Education and Library
A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of
Philosophy in French
by
S. C. Kaplan
Committee in charge:
Professor Cynthia J. Brown, Chair
Professor Jody Enders
Professor Sharon Farmer
Professor Anne-Marie Legaré, Université Lille-III
June 2016
ProQuest Number: 10159779
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The dissertation of S. C. Kaplan is approved.
Anne-Marie Legaré
Sharon Farmer
Jody Enders
Cynthia J. Brown, Committee Chair
June 2016
Transmission of Knowledge to and between Women in 15th-Century France:
Agnès de Bourgogne’s Education and Library
Copyright © 2016
by
S. C. Kaplan
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Words cannot express my gratitude to Cynthia Brown for her encouragement, support,
suggestions, and mind-bogglingly quick turn-around time on drafts over the past seven years,
culminating in this dissertation. My gratitude as well to Jody Enders for her incisive
comments and observations, which were crucial in coming to a coherent and cohesive
argument. Thanks to Sharon Farmer and Anne-Marie Legaré for their feedback and support
on both the personal and professional levels. Thank as well to Noel Greer, Rachel Levinson-
Emley, and Aria Dal Molin, for the emotional support, brain-storming sessions, discussions,
camaraderie, and tolerating my books all over the house. Thanks to my family, especially my
father, Adam Kaplan, and my grandmother, Arlene Winkler, for their help during the tough
times. I also wish to acknowledge the support received in the form of the University of
California, Santa Barbara, Central Humanities Fellowship (2014-2015, 2009-2010); the
Grace Frank Dissertation Grant from the Medieval Academy of America (2014); and the
Albert and Elaine Borchard European Studies Fellowship for Dissertation Research (2013-
2014).
iv
Curriculum Vitae
S.C. Kaplan
Department of French and Italian, 5216 Phelps Hall
University of California, Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, CA 93106
(805) 568-8770 [email protected] [email protected]
Education
Ph.D., French literature, University of California, Santa Barbara, June 2016
Doctoral Emphasis in Medieval Studies
M.A., French literature, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2011
B.A., French literature, with Distinction, minor in Medieval Studies, University of Virginia,
2008
Teaching Experience
University of California, Santa Barbara
Lead TA, French Language Program, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2015-2016
Responsible for supervision of other TAs teaching Beginning and Intermediate French
Language Instructor, responsible for all classroom instruction, grading
Intermediate French
French 6, Fall 2015
French 5, Winter 2016, Spring 2015, Spring 2012
French 4, Winter 2012
Beginning French
French 3, Fall 2011, Spring 2011
French 2, Summer 2011, Winter 2011
French 1, Summer 2012, Summer 2011, Fall 2010
Literature Instructor, responsible for syllabus design, all classroom instruction, grading
Tales of Love in the Middle Ages and Renaissance: What’s Sex Got to Do with It? (French
50AX), Summer 2015
Medieval and Renaissance Tales of Love (French 50AX), Summer 2014
Modern Images of the Middle Ages (French 156C), Summer 2014
Université Paris-VIII
Lecturer, responsible for syllabus organization, all classroom instruction, grading
General English A1, Fall 2012-Spring 2014
v
Publications
“La Légende dorée, BnF 244-245 (1480 – 1485): Un manuscrit conçu pour Catherine de
Coëtivy?” In Les femmes, la culture et les arts en Europe entre Moyen Âge et Renaissance, ed.
Cynthia J. Brown and Anne-Marie Legaré, 197-220. Turnhout: Brepols, 2016.
Contributor to “Archives de littérature du Moyen Âge”:
<http://www.arlima.net/uz/vision_de_lame_de_gui_de_turno.html> (2016);
<http://www.arlima.net/mp/miroir_des_dames1.html> (2015);
<http://www.arlima.net/ad/christine_de_pizan.html> (2013);
<http://www.arlima.net/mp/passion_isabeau.html> (2013).
“Middle French Transcriptions”: Guillaume de Vaurouillon, Declaracion de la differance entre
pechié mortel et veniel selon l’oppinion de maistre Guillaume Vorrillon
<https://mftranscriptions.wordpress.com> (Nov. 29-Dec. 6, 2015).
Review: Jamie K. Taylor, Fictions of Evidence: Witnessing, Literature, and Community in the Late
Middle Ages (Columbus: The Ohio State University Press, 2013), in Comitatus: A Journal of
Medieval and Renaissance Studies 45 (2014): 337-39.
Works in Progress
Paperbound: An Online Archive of Medieval Western-European Watermarks. Database under
construction at <http://www.paperbound-watermarks.com>.
“Middle French Transcriptions”: Guillaume de Digulleville, Le Pelerinage de l’ame en prose,
trans. Jean Galopes <https://mftranscriptions.wordpress.com> (Dec. 7, 2015 to present).
“Couleuvre or Mélusine?: The Illuminated Transformation of the Women of the Sibylle’s
Court in Antoine de La Sale’s Paradis de la reine Sibylle.”
Translations
Sharon Farmer, “Les Privilèges des métiers, l’intégration verticale et l’organisation de la
production des textiles de soie à Paris aux XIIIe et XIVe siècles,” trans. S. C. Kaplan,
Médiévales 69 (2016): 71-86.
Contributor to Anon., Petit traitise de nurture, The Medieval Texts Translations Project trial,
<https://medievaltexttranslations.wordpress.com/trial/> (2015).
Academic Presentations
“Paperbound, or Why We Need an Online Watermark Database.” Paper presented May 12,
2016 at the 51st International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Michigan.
“Not Just Books of Hours: Agnes of Burgundy’s Preferences for Religious Literature.” Paper
presented May 7, 2016 at the University of California, Santa Barbara Medieval Studies
vi
Program Annual Graduate Student conference, Gender and Religious Practice in the
Middle Ages at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
“Paperbound, or Creating an Online Watermark Database.” Paper presented Apr. 1, 2016 at
the College English Association’s Annual Conference, Denver, Colorado.
“Couleuvre or Mélusine?: The Imprecisely Illuminated Transformation of the Women of the
Sibylle’s Court in the Paradis de la reine Sibylle.” Paper presented May 15, 2015 at the 50th
International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Michigan.
“Clothes Don’t Make the Man: The Role of Cross-Dressing in the Development of Sexual
Identity.” Paper presented April 25, 2015 at the University of California, Santa Barbara
Medieval Studies Program Annual Graduate Student conference, Changes in Fashion in
the Middle Ages at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
“Puzzling Evidence: The Attribution of Brussels, Royal Library 1411 to Agnes of Burgundy.”
Paper presented October 17, 2014 at the Sixteenth Century Society Conference, New
Orleans, Louisiana.
“‘What’s in a Frame?’: The Function of the Maps in Chantilly, Musée Condé, ms. 653, Le
Paradis de la reine Sibylle.” Paper presented May 16, 2014 at the University of California,
Santa Barbara History of Books and Material Texts Research Focus Group conference,
Composition: Making Meaning through Design at the University of California, Santa
Barbara.
“Une Étude du destinataire possible du manuscrit BnF fr. 244–245 (1480–1490): La Légende
dorée.” Paper presented March 28, 2012 at the Partner University Fund/French American
Cultural Exchange conference, Les femmes, la culture et les arts en Europe, entre Moyen
Âge et Renaissance at the Maison européene des sciences de l’homme et de la société,
Lille, France.
“Sadness, Jealousy, Melancholy: Shifting Sensibilities in Medieval French Literature.” Paper
presented May 7, 2011 at the University of California, Santa Barbara Medieval Studies
Program Annual Graduate Student Conference, Senses and Sensibilities in the Middle
Ages at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
“Divine Providence?: A Study of Oracular Prediction vis-à-vis the Celtic and Christian
Supernatural.” Paper presented May 15, 2010 at the French Department Graduate
Student Conference, Chance and Destiny at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Grants and Honors
Central Humanities Fellowship, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2014-2015, 2009-
2010.
vii
University of California, Santa Barbara Doctoral Student Travel Grant, 2014-2015.
Grace Frank Dissertation Grant from the Medieval Academy of America, 2014.
Albert and Elaine Borchard European Studies Fellowship for Dissertation Research, 2013-
2014.
Mellon Summer Institute in French Paleography at the J. Paul Getty Research Institute in
Los Angeles, July-August 2013.
Participation in the student exchange with the Université de Lille-III as part of a Partner
University Fund/French American Cultural Exchange grant on “Women, Arts, and
Culture in the Middle Ages and Renaissance” awarded to Cynthia J. Brown (UCSB) and
Anne-Marie Legaré (Université de Lille-III), 2009-2012.
viii
ABSTRACT
Transmission of Knowledge to and between Women in 15th-Century France:
Agnès de Bourgogne’s Education and Library
by
S. C. Kaplan
In Late Medieval France, it is generally accepted that women learned from experience
and men from reading. Close examination of medieval tracts about and for female education
used in the teaching of Agnès de Bourgogne (1405/7-1476), duchess of Bourbon from 1434-
1456, and found in her collection of manuscripts reveals otherwise. I demonstrate that the
category of experience is differentiated into experience and imitation, and also that by the 15th
century, medieval authors were challenging these gendered stereotypes, particularly in works
aimed at a female readership. A critical synthesis of writings about women’s education from
St. Jerome, Vincent de Beauvais, Durand de Champagne, the Chevalier de la Tour Landry, and
Giovanni Boccaccio, brings to light the shift in emphasis from preparing women for a
cloistered life (Jerome) to readying them to participate in life at the French court (La Tour
Landry). I show that Christine de Pizan modifies her predecessors’ theories in her privileging
of feminine experiential knowledge over abstract male instruction in the Epistre Othea, the
Chemin de longue étude, the Livre de la cité des Dames, and the Livre des trois vertus, the
images adorning various manuscript copies of these works, and letters from the Querelle du
ix
Description:In Late Medieval France, it is generally accepted that women learned from experience and men from reading. Close examination of medieval tracts about and for female education used in the teaching of Agnès de Bourgogne (1405/7-1476), duchess of Bourbon from 1434-1456, and found in her collection of
