Xne Library of Alice Chaucer, Jducness of Suffolk? a Fifteenfk-Century Owner of a Jdoke Ot Le ^L/Itee De Juames
Misericordia International Xne Library of Alice Chaucer, JDucness of Suffolk? A Fifteenfk-Century Owner of a JDoke ot le ^L/itee de JUames Karen K. Jambeck At the end of the Treasury of the City of Ladies, Christine de Pizan writes, I thought that I would multiply this work throughout the world in various copies, whatever the cost might be, and present it in various places to queens, princesses, and noble ladies. Through their efforts, it will be... circulated among other women.... Seen and heard by many valiant ladies and women of authority, both at the present time and in times to come, they will pray to God on behalf of their faithful servant Christine, ...wishing they might have known her.1 As Charity Canon Willard observes, Christine accurately predicted her own subsequent fame and her audience which would span centuries.2 Indeed, the rolls of this readership reveal generations of women of achievement and distinction, many of whom Willard has identified as patrons and owners of Christine's work: Isabeau of Bavaria, Anne of France, Isabel of Portugal, and Margaret of 1 A Medieval Woman's Mirror of Honor. The Treasury of the City of Ladies, trans. Charity Canon Willard (New York: Bard Hall Press/Persea Books, 1989) 224. 2 Charity Canon Willard, Christine de Pizan. Her Life and Works (New York: Persea Books, 1984) 211-212. 106 The Profane Arts / Les Arts Profanes Austria, among them.3 These and many other women who owned works by Christine de Pizan, Willard points out, played a significant role in the social and political life of their time.4 To this list of distinguished women can be added the name of Alice Chaucer, a fifteenth-century English book owner who possessed a copy of at least one of Christine's works.
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