拍品专文
The armorial shields on this extraordinary charger provide a terminus post quem and terminus ante quem for its decoration. Philip III, Duke of Burgundy, married Isabella of Portugal in 1429, and in the following year adopted the écu complet of Burgundy(1), which he used until his death in 1467. The border of the charger also includes fire-steels or briquets de bourgogne (b-shaped for Burgundy) and sparking flints, emblems which the duke incorporated into the Order of the Golden Fleece, which he created in 1430. These emblems form the jeweled collar of the order, which has fire-steels linked by flints.
The dating can be narrowed further because of the unusual combination of arms(2) and the events and intrigues surrounding Louis, Dauphin of France, at the time. Louis rebelled against his father, Charles VII, in 1440. The king forgave both him and his co-conspirators, and he was entrusted with the Dauphiné province in South-Eastern France. However, after further intrigues he was banished from Court, and he retreated to the Dauphiné. Against his father’s will, in 1451 he married the Duke of Savoy’s daughter, Charlotte, and in 1456 he left the Dauphiné and took refuge in the Duke of Burgundy’s Flemish territories. As the decoration of the present lot includes the Duke of Burgundy’s arms, this charger must date to Louis’s exile between 1456 and the death of his father in 1461, and his accession to the French throne as Louis XI.
In his 1904 article, Van de Put suggests that the present charger was probably given as a present by Philip ‘the Good’ to either the King, Charles VII, or his son Louis, the Dauphin. Although Philip was Charles’s enemy, when the Dauphin arrived in the duke’s Flemish territories Philip nonetheless wrote to the king directly. King Charles replied that the duke ‘should act as he would wish the king to act, if likewise he [the duke] had taken refuge with him’(3). The Dauphin was treated very generously and given a residence at Genappe. Van de Put noted that despite Philip's animosity towards the King, by ‘treating his guest with liberality, [Philip] was, in doing so, obeying the monarch’s behests’(4).
1. The écu complet of Burgundy, which followed Philip’s coronation as Duke of Brabant in 1430, is the impaling of the lions of Brabant and Limburg with the Duke’s second and third quarterings. Cf. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, pp. 64, citing O. De Wree’s publication on the Seals of Flanders, Les Sceaux des Comtes de Flandre, 1641, p. 61, pl. 33a.
2. The shield of Louis, the Dauphin, sits centrally on the border above the Royal arms.
3. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, p. 71, citing De Were, ibid., 1641, pp. 248-252.
4. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, p. 70.
The dating can be narrowed further because of the unusual combination of arms(2) and the events and intrigues surrounding Louis, Dauphin of France, at the time. Louis rebelled against his father, Charles VII, in 1440. The king forgave both him and his co-conspirators, and he was entrusted with the Dauphiné province in South-Eastern France. However, after further intrigues he was banished from Court, and he retreated to the Dauphiné. Against his father’s will, in 1451 he married the Duke of Savoy’s daughter, Charlotte, and in 1456 he left the Dauphiné and took refuge in the Duke of Burgundy’s Flemish territories. As the decoration of the present lot includes the Duke of Burgundy’s arms, this charger must date to Louis’s exile between 1456 and the death of his father in 1461, and his accession to the French throne as Louis XI.
In his 1904 article, Van de Put suggests that the present charger was probably given as a present by Philip ‘the Good’ to either the King, Charles VII, or his son Louis, the Dauphin. Although Philip was Charles’s enemy, when the Dauphin arrived in the duke’s Flemish territories Philip nonetheless wrote to the king directly. King Charles replied that the duke ‘should act as he would wish the king to act, if likewise he [the duke] had taken refuge with him’(3). The Dauphin was treated very generously and given a residence at Genappe. Van de Put noted that despite Philip's animosity towards the King, by ‘treating his guest with liberality, [Philip] was, in doing so, obeying the monarch’s behests’(4).
1. The écu complet of Burgundy, which followed Philip’s coronation as Duke of Brabant in 1430, is the impaling of the lions of Brabant and Limburg with the Duke’s second and third quarterings. Cf. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, pp. 64, citing O. De Wree’s publication on the Seals of Flanders, Les Sceaux des Comtes de Flandre, 1641, p. 61, pl. 33a.
2. The shield of Louis, the Dauphin, sits centrally on the border above the Royal arms.
3. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, p. 71, citing De Were, ibid., 1641, pp. 248-252.
4. Van de Put, ibid., 1904, p. 70.