This is the oldest known copy of the Bestiary of Love (Bestiaire d’amour) by Richard de Fournival, one of the most popular and most famous French works of literature during the middle ages. This manuscript on vellum is written in the Parisian dialect of the time and was most likely edited by the author himself. Prof. X. Muratova proposes that the book was a wedding present from Thibault IV (Count of Champagne, later Thibault I, King of Navarre) to the future King of France, Philip the Bold. It is complete and includes 71 images in 65 miniatures and is bound in a 14th century vellum binding. It was produced in the workshop that was mainly active for King Louis IX of France. - [Heribert Tenschert bookseller]

This is the copy of the Bestiaire designated R.

The manuscript was sold in 2002 in a Sotheby's auction ("Fifty Magnificent Illuminated Manuscripts" / Lot 2) to an undisclosed buyer. The current location of the manuscript is unknown.

Note: The shelfmark "PL01" is used here for convenient identification; the manuscript has no known "official" shelfmark. It is also not foliated, so the images shown in the gallery use an arbitrary folio number (beginning with "X") that only serves to indicate the relative positioning of the images.

Additional Descriptions

None known

Editions and Facsimiles

None known