Of particular interest to historians is a short treatise on the rules of jousting: Traité de la forme et devis d’un tournoi, of which only a few illuminated manuscript copies survive (Provence, c. 1460–1470); one of these is held in the MNK Czartoryski Museum (Manuscript 3090 III). The book, adorned with a series of large pen-and-ink drawings coloured with gouache and watercolour, contains a codification of the rules governing the organisation of a tournament, illustrating them with an imaginary duel between the princes of Brittany and Bourbon, featuring a large contingent of knights. One would search in vain in the manuscript for images of evening feasts combined with dancing and theatrical performances. Instead, over 10 drawings are realistic depictions of jousting and elements of armour: the choice of subjects points to the practical purpose of the codex, addressed to the male elite of fifteenth-century France, and makes it an indispensable source for the history of late medieval chivalric culture.
Dr Katarzyna Płonka-Bałus: a Doctor of Art History specialising in medieval miniature painting, art history methodology and the history of collecting. Curator of the MNK Czartoryski Museum and long-standing curator at this institution and at the Czartoryski Library, where she is responsible for the collection of medieval illuminated manuscripts. She is the author of a number of monographs, catalogue entries and articles devoted in particular to late medieval Northern art. She is a member of ICOM, CODART (Curators of Dutch Art) and the Historians of Netherlandish Art. From 2009 to 2025, she lectured at the Institute of Art History at the University of Gdańsk.
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