An Introduction to British Library MS Lansdowne 380

The manuscript London, British Library, Lansdowne 380 has long been known to students of the poetry of Charles d’Orléans. It contains a version of the poetic collection that the Duke wrote during his twenty-five years as a captive in England following the Battle of Agincourt, the French poetry that Martin Le France referred to as “le livre qu’il fit en Inglant.” Assumed for nearly a century to have been produced in France for French consumption, Lansdowne 380 has never been studied in detail. Until this present study, there has never been but a cursory inventory of its contents, probably because it is a confusing mix of Latin and French liturgical, moralistic and didactic texts, medical recipes and treatises, courtesy texts, “historical” poems, astrological texts, and a variety of courtly poems, including sixty fifteenth-century French secular chanson texts. These chanson texts, most of which were set to music, reveal that the repertory of song that was known to the owner of the manuscript most likely reflects musical activity at the court of either Antoine or Jean de Croy, vassals of the duke of Burgundy, Philippe Le Bon.

The confusion is only superficial, however, as a close examination of its contents shows that the volume was compiled for the use of a young, unmarried woman who had recently learned how to read. The compilation was to serve as a primary tool of her education, with the religious and moralistic items included to insure that she was molded into a devout Christian, while a broad range of secular literature guaranteed a proper cultural upbringing for her, as well.

Further investigation has revealed that the manuscript was probably compiled in London, and was intended for Elizabeth Kingston, resident of Bristol or the surrounding area, who was the wife of William Kingston, courtier and body man to Henry VIII. Lansdowne 380 is thus a witness to continuing English interest during the fifteenth century in various types of French literature, notably the French secular chanson and the poetry of Charles d’Orléans, and it is a significant source of information regarding the education of women during the late Middle Ages.