Georgette de Montenay

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Georgette de Montenay (1567) by Pierre Woeiriot

Georgette de Montenay (1540–1581) was the French author of Emblemes ou devises chrestiennes,[1] published in Lyon between 1567 and 1571. Montenay has always been regarded as a lady-in-waiting to Jeanne d'Albret, the Protestant Queen of Navarre, partly because she dedicated her work to the Queen. An intriguing aspect of Montenay's Calvinist life is that she was married in 1562 to Guyon de Gout, a devout Catholic.

Montenay was born in

fille d'honneur and later as dame d'honneur. Her position enabled her to acquire a thorough grounding in the classics and exposed her to Evangelism.[2]
She died at Sainte-Germier, near Toulouse.

Emblemes ou Devises Chrestiennes

Montenay's book is an important milestone in the history of

Calvinist) faith. Montenay claims in her foreword that the book represents the first collection of Christian emblems. However, there are earlier emblematic works such as Claude Paradin's "Devises heroiques" (Lyons:, 1551; 1557). Montenay's Emblemes signals the beginning of a systematic exploitation of these emblems in religious propaganda. It was illustrated using allegorical engravings by Pierre Woeiriot rather than the more traditional woodcuts
. It is unusual in calling for participation by the reader in recognising biblical allusions, both verbal and visual, and serves to both educate and entertain.

Montenay's work was thought to have first appeared in 1571, but a copy in the

Zurich and Frankfurt. The motto or title included in each engraving is in Latin, and is invariably a quotation from the Vulgate version of the Bible, a book with which the common people shared an easy familiarity. The reader was expected to be able to place the quotations in context.[3]

The Scottish calligrapher Esther Inglis revised an emblem by Montenay to honour her patron, Marie Stewart, Countess of Mar.[4] The illustration of the "wise woman who builds her house" from Proverbs 14:1, originally identified the wise woman as Jeanne d'Albret.[5]

Bibliography

An illustration from a 1584 edition of Emblematum christianorum centuria
  • Alison Adams, Stephen Rawles, Alison Saunders, A Bibliography of French Emblem Books, 2 vols (Geneva: Droz, 1999-2002)
  • Montenay, Georgette de, Emblemes ou devises chrestiennes (1571), ed. Christopher N. Smith (Menston: Scolar Press, 1973). Facsimile reprint.
  • Adams, Alison, ‘Les emblemes ou devises chrestiennes de Georgette de Montenay: édition de 1567’ (2000)
  • Adams, Alison, ‘Georgette de Montenay’s Emblemes ou devises chrestiennes, 1567: New Dating, New Context’ (2001)
  • Adams, Alison, Webs of Allusion: French Protestant Emblem Books of the Sixteenth Century (Geneva: Droz, 2003)
  • Reynolds-Cornell, Regine, Witnessing an Era: Georgette de Montenay and the Emblemes ou Devises Chrestiennes (Birmingham, AL: Summa Publications, 1987).
  • Paulette Choné, Emblèmes et pensées symboliques en Lorraine (1525-1633) (Paris: Klincksieck, 1991)
  • Labrousse, Elisabeth & Jean-Philippe, ‘Georgette de Montenay et Guyon du Gout son époux’, Bulletin de la Société archéologique, historique, littéraire et scientifique du Gers (1990)

References

  1. ^ Emblemes ou devises chrestiennes
  2. ^ An Encyclopedia of Continental Women Writers - Katharina M. Wilson (editor)/Christopher Smith (1991)
  3. ^ French Emblems - Alison Adams
  4. ^ Thomas Lange, 'A Rediscovered Esther Inglis Calligraphic Manuscript in the Huntington Library', Papers of the Bibliographic Society of America, 89 (1995), pp. 339–42.
  5. ^ Michael Bath, Emblems in Scotland: Motifs and Meanings (Brill: Leiden, 2018), pp. 37-43.

External links

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