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a c k n o w l e d g m e n t s I am grateful to a number of individuals and organizations that have made important contributions to the development of my ideas during my research on this project and have helped usher the book to its completion. This work would not have come to fruition without the numerous research grants I received from the UCSB Faculty Senate over the course of the project. I am particularly appreciative of a Senate award to cover the purchase of illustrations and permissions to reproduce the many images in this volume. A Summer Stipend from the National Endowment for the Humanities in 2006, for which I am very thankful, supported research in Europe at a critical stage of this process. The University of California President’s Fellowship for the Humanities I received in 2006–7 was absolutely invaluable, for I was able to complete a first draft of my book during this leave. Many thanks to Lori Walters for her comments on an early draft of the entire manuscript and to Mary Beth Winn for her insightful reading of the material in Chapters 3 and 4. I greatly appreciate the incisive queries of Diane Booton concerning the inventory of books associated with Anne of Brittany in the Appendix. Rogert Wieck, Curator of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the Pierpont Morgan Library, deserves special thanks for his advice and intercession on my behalf concerning several privately owned manuscripts . I am also indebted to Thierry Delcourt, directeur du département des manuscrits at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, who graciously facilitated my examination of numerous luxury Boccaccio manuscripts, and to Jacques Santrot, Conservateur at the Musée Dobrée in Nantes, who authorized a special viewing of the original manuscript of Antoine Dufour’s Vies des femmes célèbres. I am particularly grateful to E. Jane Burns, who played an instrumental role in bringing my project to the attention of Jerry Singerman at the University of Pennsylvania Press. The close readings of my manuscript for the 402 acknowledgments Press by François Rigolot and a second anonymous reader yielded thoughtful suggestions that have enhanced the final outcome. A Borchard Foundation Symposium Grant generously supported a colloquium I organized at the Château de la Bretesche on the political and cultural legacy of Anne of Brittany in 2008. Besides the extraordinary opportunity to interact and debate with specialists from multiple disciplines carrying out research on the French queen and issues associated with her two reigns, this meeting provided inspiring feedback on my own project. I am also indebted to the following colleagues who extended invitations that permitted me to present my work publicly in the U.S. and Europe and contribute to edited volumes: Adrian Armstrong, Renée-Claude Breitenstein, Jennifer Britnell, Margaret Burland, E. Jane Burns, Annie Charon, Martha Driver, Laurence Harf-Lancner, Roberta Krueger, David Laguardia, Anne-Marie Legaré, Seth Lerer, Frank Lestringant, Deborah McGrady, Jean-Claude Mühlethaler, Nancy Regalado, Michelle Szkilnik, Andrea Tarnowski, Tania Van Hemelryck , Lori Walters, and Kathleen Wilson-Chevalier. These opportunities provided me with considerable stimulus as I reformulated the ideas that found their way into the final version’s pages. A special thanks to Maura Jess, photographer in Instructional Development at UCSB, for her unusual dedication in formatting many of this book’s illustrations for publication. I am also grateful to Zelda Bronstein for her assistance in formulating the title for this volume. The continuous support of my husband Art Ludwig over the years has been immeasurable. I dedicate this book to my mother, the most influential woman in my life, with gratitude for her abiding sustenance and encouragement. ...

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