Antonio Urquízar-Herrera (2015) ‘Making invisible things visible and palpable’: visual marks of nobility in Early Modern French social theory and the embodiment of social estates in collections, 1550–1650, Word & Image, 31:3, 386-397

DOI: 10.1080/02666286.2015.1057433

This is an Accepted Manuscript (AM) of an article published by Taylor & Francis Group in Word & Image on 16/09/2015, available online:

(free print) http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/YU2KEg5XexVf8rJhyQAV/full

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Abstract

In recent years, the literature about collections has converged on the study of the

ideological content of cabinets and the analysis of the forms of relationship that existed between the collected object, the owner and the audience. Collections have been defined and explained through the existence of narratives that transfigure the nature of the objects and images, establishing new uses and meanings in the context of collecting. In this vein, collections of artifacts are commonly seen by historiography as social devices. However, ideological support for this function has not been studied beyond the ‘theory of magnificence’. This article foregrounds the corpus of treatises on nobility composed in France between 1550 and 1650 in order to analyze the role of social thinking in the establishment of specific forms of collected objects as signs of nobility. The article clarifies the sources and content of these social narratives in the context of their usefulness for defining the visual signs of nobility that could be embodied in collected objects. The particular strength of the debate about nobilities of the robe and sword in the early modern re-ordering of French society increases the value of the sources of this case study.

Keywords Nobility, Magnificence, France, Social Theory, Social Estates, Collecting

*****

In recent years, the literature about collections has converged on the study of the ideological content of cabinets and the analysis of the forms of relationship that existed between the collected object, the owner and the audience. Collections have been defined and explained through the existence of narratives that transfigure the nature of the objects and images, establishing new uses and meanings in the context of collecting.1 In this vein, the common early modern implementation of the narratives of social theory to art, antiquities and cabinets of curiosity framed the interpretation of the pieces and defined a type of social collecting. Among other narratives, there were objects that had been collected, as Krzysztof Pomian has pointed out, as visible proof of invisible social hierarchies.2

How and why did social theory support this interpretation of collected objects as visible signs of nobility? The existence of a correlation between public image and noble status was a shared belief in early modern Europe. Some 40 years ago, the so-called ‘theory of magnificence’ and the notion of ‘splendour’ offered a historical interpretation for the emergence of the sumptuous artistic decorations of 15th- and 16th-century Italy.3 Capacity for major expenditure and the exhibition of sumptuousness in buildings, the decoration of households, clothing, spectacle and gifts was a convenient virtue for the prince. These ideas have been widely used to explain the spread of courtly collecting across Europe. However, magnificence and splendour alone do not give the full picture of the social understanding of early modern collecting by the nobility. The particular contexts of different countries and periods offered interesting additions and variations to the model, as has been studied in relation to Spain.4 The aristocracy’s search for social legitimacy emphasized other means that would facilitate the transmission of ideological content beyond the mere exhibition of opulence. Objects and images in collections had a serious narrative potential and were commonly taken as such.

1 See Krzysztof Pomian, Collectionneurs, amateurs et curieux. Paris, Venise: XVIe-XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Gallimard, 1987),

pp. 42-47; Krzysztof Pomian, Des saintes reliques à l’art moderne. Venise-Chicago XIIIe-XXe siècle (Paris: Gallimard, 2003), pp. 333-353; and Arthur MacGregor, Curiosity and Enlightenment. Collectors and Collections from the 16th Century to the Nineteenth Century (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007), pp. 11-18 and 54-59. See also, for instance, Adalgisa Lugli, Naturalia et mirabilia: les cabinets de curiosites en Europe (Paris: Adam Biro, 1998); Philip Blom, To Have and to Hold. An intimate History of Collectors and Collecting (New York: Overlook, 2003); Jean Baudrillard, ‘The System of Collecting’, in The Cultures of Collecting, eds. Jan Elsner and Roger Cardinal (Cambridge, Mass.: Reaktion Books, 1994), pp. 7-8; and Mieke Bal, ‘Telling Objects: A Narrative Perspective on Collecting’, in Elsner and Cardinal, The Cultures, pp. 97-115. 2 Pomian, Collectioneurs, pp. 42-47.

3 For the original formulation of the ‘theory of magnificence’ see Anthony D. Fraser Jenkins, ‘Cosimo de’ Medici’s

Patronage of Architecture and the Theory of Magnificence’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 33 (1970), pp. 162-70 and Ernst H. Gombrich, ‘The Early Medici as Patrons of Art: A Survey of Primary Sources’, in Italian Renaissance Studies, ed. Ernest Fraser Jacobs (London: Faber, 1960). See also Louis Green, ‘Galvanno Fiamma, Azzone Visconti and the Revival of the classical Theory of Magnificence’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 53 (1990), pp. 98-113; Kornelia Imesch, Magnificenza als architektonische Kategorie. Individuelle Selbstdarstellung versus ästhetische Verwirklichung von Gemeinschaft in den venezianischen Villen Palladios und Scamozzis (Oberhausen: Athena, 2003), Francis W. Kent, Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Art of Magnificence (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); James R. Lindow, The Renaissance Palace in Florence Magnificence and Splendour in Fifteenth-Century Italy (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007) and Peter Howard, Creating Magnificence in Renaissance Florence (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2012). 4 For a similar survey taking Spain as a case study see Antonio Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Teoría de la magnificencia y teoría de

las señales en el pensamiento nobiliario español del siglo XVI’, Ars Longa, 23 (2014), pp. 93-112 and Antonio Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Políticas artísticas y distinción social en los tratados españoles de nobleza’ in Las élites en la Edad Moderna. La monarquía hispánica, vol. 1, ed. Enrique Soria (Córdoba: Universidad de Córdoba, 2009), pp. 225-239.

17th-century French nobles had to deal with a contemporary reordering of society which provoked a lively theoretical discussion about the nature of nobility. In this context, I will examine the cultural practice of collecting and explore its possible connections to this social debate. In particular, I am interested in verifying whether the references to the visual signs of nobility might be considered an ideological supply for the interpretation of noble collections at the time. For this reason I have chosen the corpus of treatises about nobility composed in France between 1550 and 1650, with a view to identifying the topics of debate that can be related to collecting. Secondly, I have used other social literature and documentary references to ascertain the reception of the ideas contained in the treatises. Admittedly, prescriptive texts cannot always be considered a reliable source of actual behaviours, but these treatises can offer evidence about the debates and ideas that participated in shaping noble identity. They are particularly valuable sources since they directly targeted the owners of the objects. Aristocrats were given dedications in these books; they bought them, possessed them and sometimes even read them. Noble treatises did not expound on contemporary collections, but their references to Roman habits of collecting and their significance in terms of the display of social signs of distinction provide a framework for a specific noble understanding of collections.5

Adapting Paula Findlen’s concerns about early modern Italian scientific collectors, I believe that to understand what compelled 16th- and 17th-century nobles to collect, we must first appreciate the philosophical aspirations that shaped their comprehension of the world. What did they hope to gain by concentrating the objects into one place?6 Polysemy was in the very nature of collections. Obviously, in this period objects were collected in response to different concerns and a fondness for antiques, curiosities and art was not uncommon. Also, alternative interpretations, even for a single collection, were appropriate. However, social issues surfaced recurrently in all kinds of collecting narratives and were in many instances the leading discourse.

The analysis of the reception of the renowned collection of Boniface Borrilly can be usefully invoked as a good introduction to this involvement of social narratives in the shaping of collections in early modern France. It will also be useful in showing the different focuses that modern historiography has maintained. In 1884, the Dictionnaire des amateurs français au XVIIe siècle by Edmond Bonnaffé gave an account of the 17th-century collection of the notary Borrilly.7 Although the description briefly mentioned Louis XIII’s visit to the collection and his presentation of a ‘baudrier’ (baldric) to Borrilly, it focused on the paintings and curiosities. A century later, Antoine Schnapper gave a more complete picture of the collection. He went through Borrilly’s paintings and also considered the cultural nature of the curiosities.8 Schnapper’s emphasis on the wonders documented many of the 17th-century interpretations of the collection. In 1625, the Mercure François published a long report on the collection.9 The text included the attributions of some paintings and contained references to the antiques, curiosities and wonders of the collection. Remarkably, the article began with the presentation of ‘un Cyclope embaumé’ (an embalmed Cyclops) that Borrilly possessed. The article had previously been discussing the topic of monsters

5 See Freyja Cox Jenkins, Reading the Roman Republic in Early Modern England (Leyden: Brill, 2012).

6 Paula Findlen, Possesing Nature. Museums, Collecting and Scientific Culture in Early Modern Italy (Berkeley:

University of California Press, 1994), p. 51. 7 Edmond Bonnaffé, Dictionnaire des amateurs français au XVIIe siècle (Paris: A. Quantin, 1884), p. 32.

8 Antoine Schnapper, Curieux du Grand Siècle. Collections et collectionneurs dans la France du XVIIe siècle (Paris:

Flammarion, 2005 -first edition in 1994-), p. 117 and Antoine Schnapper, Le géant, la licorne, la tulipe. Collections françaises au XVIIe siècle (Paris: Flammarion, 1988), pp. 34, 64, 65, 69, 96, 96, 116, 117, 157, 174, 177, 236, 241-243 and 254. 9 Le dixiesme tome du Mercure François… (Paris, publisher unknown, 1625), pp. 392-402. Also see Pierre-Joseph de

Haitze, Les Curiositez les plus remarquables de la ville d’Aix (Aix: C. David, 1679).

in Aix and the writer had just commented on the birth in the same town of a girl with four legs. The Mercure, like a large proportion of present-day historiography on 17th-century collections, correctly acknowledged the interest in marvels that lay behind many collectors’ interests.10

[Figure 1]

However, contemporary descriptions of Borrilly’s pieces were also strongly attracted by the baudrier, which was only briefly commented on or even omitted in 20th-century accounts. Another report on Borrilly’s collection by the collector of wonders, Pierre Borel, divided its attention equally between the cyclope and the baudrier.11 More than half of the Mercure report was devoted to this object. Borrilly himself had also promoted a printed description of the baudrier two years before. The book contained an engraved reproduction of the piece and a compilation of poems about it. In this volume, the baudrier was described as a well-earned reward for Borrilly’s collecting efforts that ‘croisse en ton Cabinet la Palme & le Laurier’. 12 Since the baudrier evoked memories of the king’s military exploits, the piece might represent Borrilly’s ‘eternelle memoire’13 and his consideration as a gentleman. The sword nobility of this robe officer ought to be accomplished for the sake of his descendants: ‘car puis que le Baudrier à l’Espee convient, il faut qu’un jour quelqu’un des tiens soit Connestable, pour joindre à ce Baudrier l’Espee redoutable’.14 It is likely that Borrilly did not intend to establish a global interpretation of his collection, but these readings contributed to giving the character of social device to the pieces in this varied collection of curiosities, antiques and works of art.

Making Invisible Things Visible and Palpable

It was commonly held in the 16th and 17th centuries that public image was a relevant issue in the identification of social estate. As I have explained, magnificence linked the exhibition of opulence with virtue, as can be seen in the widely known Il Cortegiano by Baldassare Castiglione (1528). Its translation into French in 1537 presented the model of the wealth of the court of Urbino with its ceremonies, its silver dinner service, its silk and gold tapestries, its ancient statues, rare paintings, musical instruments and library of books bound in gold and silver.15 Signs and ceremonies, as the political author Jean d’Arrérac affirmed, almost preempting Pomian’s modern statements about collecting, ‘rendent la chose invisible comme visible et palpable’.16

More precisely, treatises on nobility established a discourse about the ‘marks of nobility’ that related matters of identity to the perception of collections. Latin authors offered social thinkers a narrative for the interpretation of collected objects as social devices. Latin quotations provided a reference for both the typologies of objects (antiques, portrait galleries, jewel) and

10

For instance, an interpretation of Boniface Borrilly as a collector of wonders in Lorraine Daston and Katharine Park, Wonders and the order of nature, 1150-1750 (New York: Zone Books, 1998), p. 267. 11

Pierre Borel, Les Antiquitez de Castres (Castres: Ch. Pradel, 1649), p. 138. 12

‘Make the Palm & the Laurel in your cabinet grow’. All quotations have been translated by the author. 13

‘Eternal memory’. 14

‘Because since the Baldric deserves the Sword, / one of yours must one day become constable, / to join to this Baldric the formidable Sword ‘. Boniface Borrilly (ed.), Le baudrier du Sacre de Louys le Iuste XIII… (Aix: J. Thólosan, 1623), pp. 5, 37 and 53. 15

Baldassare Castiglione (Jacques Colin, trans.), Les quatre livres du courtisan du conte Baltazar de Castillon (Paris: D. de Harsy, 1537), p. 7. For the Spanish situation see Antonio Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Teoría de la magnificencia’. 16

‘Makes invisible things visible and palpable ‘. Jean d’Arrérac, La Philosophie civile et d’estat, divisée en l'Irénarchie et la Polémarchie (Bourdeaux: S. Milanges, 1598), pp. 516-517. See also Jean d’Arrérac, ‘Des dignitez et grandeurs et des offices’, in Jean d’Arrérac, Trois divers traictez (Bourdeaux: P. de La Court, 1625).

their interpretations (social concerns). These arguments appeared all over Europe.17 André de Tiraqueau’s erudite Commentarii de Nobilitate (1549) should be considered a leading archetype of this corpus.18 Many pages of this essay were devoted to the classical traditions of public image and the exhibition of nobility. The authority of Suetonius, Persius, Martial, Propertius, Ovid, Pliny the Elder or Cicero was frequently recalled. The key idea was that authority and inequality were to be shown by signs. Similar statements were to be found in many texts. As a long tradition of social history has established, the rise of collecting in early modern Europe coincided with a need for new means of legitimacy.19 In 16th-century France, Guillaume d’Oncieu established that the most excellent honour always had a public mark. As in Rome, magistrates should never forget these signs in order to avoid a lack of due respect.20 François de l’Alouëte asserted that descriptions and genealogies of the family and visual marks of nobility were to be used in order to avoid the decline of nobility.21 By this means contemporary social thinking provided conceptual support for a specific noble understanding of collected objects.

Although the debate about the legitimacy of the signs of nobility partly reflected transnational discussions, it also addressed the particular situation of France. The texts suggest a view of cultural habits in relation to the re-ordering of society at the time. Social historians have identified a frequent form of social advancement for 16th-century traders, financiers and wealthy bourgeois. Their fortune and luxurious lifestyle provided them with some recognition as nobility that was not easily accepted by everyone. For instance, in barely one generation, the families of Sébastien Zamet and Albert de Gondi made the transition from banking to sword nobility.22 The unusual speed of this ‘annoblissement taisible’ (silent ennoblement) provoked a reaction. The sumptuousness of the Gondi’s chateaux was attacked in pamphlets denouncing the family’s ignoble origins. The family responded to these publications by commissioning the writing of

17

See Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Teoría de la magnificencia’. 18

André Tiraqueau, Commentarii de Nobilitate et Jure Primigeniorum (Venice: G. Rovillium, 1549). 19

See David Bitton, The French Nobility in Crisis, 1540-1640 (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1969); Arlette Jouanna: L’idée de race en France au XVIe siècle et au début du XVIIe siécle (1498-1614) (Lille: PUF, 1976), p. 516; Ellery Schalk, L'épée et le sang: une histoire du concept de noblesse, vers 1500 - vers 1650 (Paris: Éditions Champ Vallon, 1996), p. 121; George Huppert, Bourgeois et gentilshommes. La réussite sociale en France au XVIe siécle (Paris: Flammarion, 1983), p. 10; Jean-Pierre Labatut, Les Ducs et pairs de France au XVIIe siècle: étude sociale (Paris: PUF, 1972), p. 401; André Devyver, Le sang épuré. Les préjugés de race chez les gentilshommes français de l’Ancien Régime (1560-1720) (Brussels: Université libre de Bruxelles, 1973), p. 56. See also Rudolf Braun ‘Rester au sommet’: modes de reproduction socioculturelle des élites du pouvoir européennes’, in Les élites du pouvoir et la construction de l’État en Europe, ed. Wolfgang Reinhard (Paris: PUF, 1996), pp. 323-354; Kristin Neuschel, Word of Honour: Interpreting Noble Culture in 16th Century France (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1989), p. 160; and Robert Descimon, ‘La haute noblesse parlementaire parisienne: la production d’une aristocratie d’Etat aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles’, in L’Etat et les aristocraties: XIIe-XVIIe siècles, France, Angleterre, Écosse, ed. Philippe Contamine (Paris: Presses de l'École normale superieure, 1989), pp. 357-386. For a general view of the historical debate on the early modern Crisis of Aristocracy, see Hamish Scott, ‘The Early Modern Nobility and its Contested Historiographies, c. 1950-1980’, in Contested Spaces of Nobility in Early Modern Europe, eds. Matthew Romaniello and Charles Lipp (Farnham, Ashgate, 2011), pp. 11-39. 20

Guillaume d’Oncieu, La Précédence de la Noblesse.... (Lyon: J.-B. Buisson, 1593), pp. 44-45 and 124. 21

François de L’Alouëte, Des affaires d’estat, des finances, du prince et de sa noblesse (Metz: J. d’Arras, 1597), p. 197. 22

For the social advancement of the bourgeois, see Huppert, Bourgeois et gentilshommes, p. 10. See also, Jean-Marie Constant, ‘Noblesse et élite au XVIe siècle: les problèmes de l’identité noble’, in L’identité nobiliaire. Dix siècles de métamorphoses (IXe-XIXe siècles), ed. Jean-Marie Constant (Mans: Laboratoire d'histoire anthropologique du Mans, 1997), pp. 45-61. For Sébastien Zamet, see Louis Prunel, Sébastien Zamet. Evéque-duc de Sangres, pair de France (1588-1655) (Paris: A. Picard, 1912), p. 5; Catherine Grodecki, ‘Sébastien Zamet, amateur d’art’, in Actes du colloque Les Arts au temps d’Henri IV (Paris: Association Henry IV, 1992), pp. 185-254; Schnapper, Curieux du Grand Siècle, pp. 46 and 119-120. For the Gondis, see Huppert, Bourgeois et gentilshommes, 64; Schnapper, Curieux du Grand Siècle, p. 118.

invented genealogies. The luxurious editions of these genealogies were illustrated with coats of arms, portraits of ancestors and images of the domestic and religious foundations of the family. These visual representations were intended to make up for the fabrication of the Gondi noble genealogy.

Concurrently, while during the 16th century the nobility of the robe could not expect to be mistaken for the nobility of the sword, by the beginning of the 17th century the robe gradually asserted its noble position and strengthened its links to the sword.23 The letters of nobility clearly stated equality of rights. For example the document of Claude Fauchet first argued that he was receiving the degrees of honour that his virtues deserved; later stating that these honours should be inherited by his descendants; and finally, confirming that his privileges were those of the nobility of ‘ancienne race’.24 This rapid achievement of legal nobility by officers aroused mistrust in many and also provoked lively debate about the preeminence of the sword.25 Most authors stated that high officers belonged to the nobility, although some writers considered that it was a different kind of nobility. Florentin Thierriat, for instance, distinguished in the title of his treatise between ‘la noblesse de race’ (nobility of the bloodline), ‘la noblesse civille’ (civil nobility) and ‘des ignobles’ (commoners). In any case, marriages between sword and robe descendants were frequent and many 17th-century French nobles shared both cultural traditions.26 Dual identities were very common and this situation had consequences for the building of a public image through collections. The particular strength of nobility of the robe shaped French noble theory and played a role in the social perception of collected objects, such as weapons collections, swords depicted in the portraits that hung in galleries, or books in libraries. Authors of robe origin stressed the idea of signs. Their texts contained continuous references to the collecting habits of Romans which could be interpreted as a search for legitimacy. These strategies were needed in order for them to differentiate themselves from the magnificent decorative settings of the commoners of finance and to acquire particular signs of nobility in parallel with nobles of the sword.

In this context of social competition, the simple relationship between luxury and estate did not fulfil the complex interests of the noble ideological perspective. It required more accurate narratives for objects and images.27 Noble treatises were clear on the issue. In the words of Louis Ernaud, magnificence was not enough: ‘ie blasme le iugement à rebours de ceux qui se pensent par ce seul moyen pouvoir acquerir un honneur stable. Car s’ils perdent leur habit & magnificence, (comme il n’est pas impossible) voila par consequent leur reputation en grand danger’.28 The exhibition of wealth could help admission, but most authors thought that it should not in itself be enough for the recognition of noble status. Nicolas Pasquier criticized the possible social confusion that luxury might produce and Claude de Marois was reluctant to accept the construction of public image through clothes.29 Other social and political literature followed suit. Nicolas Barnaud (alias

23

Descimon, ‘La haute…’, p. 365. 24

Janet Girvan Espiner-Scott, Documents concernant la vie et les oeuvres de Claude Fauchet (Paris: Paillart, 1938), p. 21. 25

See Huppert, Bourgeois et gentilshommes, p. 47. 26

See Jonathan Dewald, The Formation of a Provincial Nobility. The Magistrates of the Parlement of Rouen, 1499-1610 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980) and Mark Motley, Becoming a French Aristocrat. The Education of a Court Nobility, 1580-1715 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), pp. 15, 101 and 306. 27

For the ‘mythification du signe extérieur’ see Jouanna, L’idée de race, p. 386. 28

‘I disapprove of the wrong judgment of those who think that they can acquire a stable honour by these means. If they lose their clothes and magnificence (as is not impossible) they will consequently put their reputations in great danger’. Louis Ernaud, Discours de la noblesse et des justes moyens d’y parvenir (Caen: B. Macé, 1584), p. 15. 29

Nicolas Pasquier, Le Gentilhomme (Paris: J. Petis-Pas, 1611), pp. 319-320 and Claude de Marois, Le gentil-homme parfaict, ou tableau des excellences de la vraye Noblesse (Paris: C. Besongne, 1631), p. 631. Also see Fanny Cosandey

de Montand) accused those ‘demi messiers’ (half gentlemen) of achieving unauthorized social advancement through the construction of ‘palais & logis si somptueux & magnifiques, qu’à grand peine en pourroit on construire de plus beaux & exquis pour loger les grands rois, que ceux la’.30 Harsh criticism was made of the ornamentation of palaces. Antoine de Montchrestien explained this very clearly, railing against breaches of the sumptuary laws that restricted the clothing of the lower estates and complaining simultaneously about ‘ces bombances publiques, ces ornemens domestiques, ces beaux meubles, ces riches tapisseries, ceste vie splendide’ of the bourgeois.31 Both the old sword and the new robe nobles were interested in the definition of more precise signs of nobility, which went beyond mere magnificence.

As Thierriat made plain, the confusion generated by the inappropriate use of magnificence by the third estate was strong enough that ‘si le Gentil-homme a quitté son espée il n’a souvent rien en l’habit qui le differe d’avec un vallet de boutique’.32 Social authors demanded specific marks to distinguish the noble from the commoner. On this point the strong juridical background of French social literature (in connection with nobility of the robe) seems to have been decisive. There was a previous tradition: medieval literature on heraldry (Bartolo da Sassoferrato) had expounded on signs and Italian Renaissance courtly literature (Baldassare Castiglione) and noble treatises (Giambattista Nenna) had rehabilitated classical theory on the marks of nobility. But the early statements on the topic by André Tiraqueau (1549) changed European literature about nobility. Tiraqueau based himself firmly on the systematization of classical sources regarding the demonstration of honours that Barthélemy de Chasseneux’s Catalogus Gloriae Mundi (1529) had set forth.33 But the Catalogus was not a treatise on nobility and Tiraqueau brought a fundamental change in approach by emphasizing the relationship between the possession of nobility and the possession of portraits and other signs. None of the preceding texts had developed a comparable discourse on the importance of marks. As Élie Haddad has recently pointed out, Tiraqueau answered the need of French elites for a juridical clarification of nobility after François I’s imposition of the requirement of proof of nobility for exemption from taxes.34 Tiraqueau intended to offer precise signs of recognition and his sixth chapter included references to the ‘Insignia gentilicia & familiaria’, the ‘Stemma nobilium’ or the ‘Imagines & statuenobilius’, which were conveniently remarked on in the marginal notes. Tiraqueau’s Latin treatise brought together dispersed references to Roman traditions and legal principles about signs of nobility and offered a thorough and systematic account that was widely followed and disseminated in Romance texts. Italian and Spanish noble treatises from the second half of the 16th century reflected its

(ed.), Dire et vivre l’ordre social en France sous l’Ancien Régime (Paris: École des hautes études en sciences sociales, 2005); Maurice Magendie, La Politesse mondaine et les théories de l'honnêteté en France, au XVIIe siècle, de 1600 à 1660 (Paris: Alcan, 1926), vol. 1, p. 32; John Shovlin, ‘The Cultural Politics of Luxury in 18th-Century France’, French Historical Studies, 23-4 (2000), pp. 576-606 and Madeleine Lazard, ‘Le corps vêtu: signification du costume à la Renaissance’, in Le Corps à la Renaissance: actes (Paris: Aux amateurs de livres, 1990), p. 78. 30

‘Palaces and rooms so sumptuous and magnificent that it would be hard to build more beautiful and exquisite buildings to house great kings’. Nicolas de Montand, Le miroir des françois (place and publisher unknown, 1581), p. 31. 31

‘This public feasting, these domestic ornaments, this fine furniture, these rich tapestries, these splendid lives’. Antoine de Montchrestien, Traicté de l’oeconomie politique…. (Rouen: J. Osmont, 1615), p. 309 (cited from Geneve, 1999). 32

‘If the gentleman takes off his sword, he often has nothing in his clothes that distinguish him from an employee of a store’. François Thierriat, Trois traitez; de la noblesse de race, de la noblesse civille & des immunitez des ignobles (Paris: L. Bruneau, 1606), p. 70. 33

Barthélemy de Chasseneux, Catalogus Gloriae Mundi (Venice, 1569), p. 5r. (First Edition of 1529). 34

Élie Haddad, ‘The Question of the Imprescriptibility of Nobility in Early Modern France’, in Romaniello and Lipp, Contested Spaces of Nobility, p. 151.

statements about signs.35 To varying extents, Jean Le Masle (1578), Pierre d’Origny (1578), Louis Ernaud (1584), Jean de Caumont (1585), Guillaume d’Oncieu (1593), David du Rivault de Flurance (1596), François de L’Alouëte (1597), Florentin Thierriat (1606), Nicolas Pasquier (1611), Charles Loyseau (1613), Antoine de Montchrestien (1615), Jean d’Arrérac (1625), Claude de Marois (1631) and other authors show the reception of Tiraqueau in French noble treatises and other social literature.36 The potential interest of this for buyers and readers of the treatises can be evaluated through the recurring appearance of references to marks and signs in the titles of the chapters, marginal notes and indexes of the books.37 For instance, it was no coincidence that the second French translation (1633) of Torquato Tasso’s dialogue Della nobiltà (1583) adopted the following subheading: ‘où il est exactement traitté de toutes les prééminences, et des principales marques d'honneur des souverains et des gentilshommes’.38 The addition pointed up the concerns of noble readers in early modern France.

Many pages in most treatises were devoted to these ‘enseignes’ (signs) and ‘marques’ (marks). For his part, De l’Alouëte established six different ‘marques des nobles, par lesqueles on les doit & peut dicerner des roturiers’: the exercise of virtue, children as samples of the bloodline, the sword as the sign of military duty which nobility shared with the king, coats of arms, the possession of lordships and the appreciation of hunting.39 Depending on the author, the range of possible signs included physical appearance, clothing, ornaments, jewels, statues, coats of arms or portraits. When D’Oncieu wrote about Roman noble customs, he deliberately mentioned the robe dress as a mark of nobility, establishing that this costume was reserved for the highest nobility of the Roman Senate.40 The parallels between this Latin institution and the Parisian Parlement had been established at least since Tiraqueau and could even be perceived in Buonaccorso da Pistoia’s French translation.41 As noted below, portraits had a continuous presence in both texts and collections.

Some of these marks corresponded to objects that could be collected. Notably the sword mentioned by De l’Alouëte matched those displayed in ‘cabinets des armes’ (weapons) or even those represented in portraits in galleries. Although the role of swords as signs of noble virtue may not need further explanation, the potential of this narrative for the constitution of a social collection deserves commentary. Storing weapons in an arsenal was a different thing from

35

For the impact of Tiraqueau on Italian treatises see Claudio Donati, L’idea de nobiltà in Italia. Secoli XIV-XVIII (Bari: Laterza, 1998), p. 113. For Spain, see Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Políticas artísticas’ and Urquízar-Herrera, ‘Teoría de la magnificencia’. 36

Jean Talpin, La police chrestienne (Paris: N. Chesneau, 1568); Le Masle, Le breviaire; D’Origny, Le hérault; Ernaud, Discours; Jean de Caumont, De la Vertu de Noblesse (Paris: F. Morel, 1585); D’Oncieu, La Précédence; David du Rivault, Les états, esquels ils est discorou du prince, du noble, et du tiers estat (Lyon: B. Rigaud, 1596); De l’Alouëte, Des affaires and François de l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles et des vertus dont ils sont formez (Paris: R. le Manier, 1597); Thierriat, Trois traitez; Pasquier, Le Gentilhomme; Charles Loyseau, Traité des Ordres et Simples Dignitez (Paris: A. L’Angelier, 1613); Montchrestien, Traicté de l’oeconomie; D’Arrérac, La Philosophie; and De Marois, Le gentil-homme. For this literature, see Jouanna, L’idée de race, p. 205; Huppert, Bourgeois et gentilshommes, p. 16; and Devyver, Le sang, p. 339; Haddad, the Question of the Imprescriptibility. 37

Peter Burke, The Fortunes of the Courtier: The European Reception of Castiglione's Cortegiano (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996). 38

‘In which all the preeminences and leading marks of honour of sovereigns and gentlemen are considered’. 39

‘Marks of nobles, by which we should & can distinguish them from commoners ‘. De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, pp. 35-36. 40

D’Oncieu, La Précédence, p. 130. For an extensive discourse on the clothing of Roman magistrates, see D’Arrérac, La Philosophie, p. 82. 41

See Buonaccorso da Pistoia, Ici commence la Controversia de noblesse… (Bruges: Colard, 1475), unpaged. Also see Giovanni Battista Nenna, Traicté de la noblesse… (Paris: A. l'Angelier, 1583), p. 34.

displaying them in a cabinet. In France this transition took place during the 16th and 17th centuries and proves the importance of the ideological attribution of meaning in the process of collecting. Weapons could be collected and interpreted outside the interest in their original capacities to kill, maim and threaten. In peace time, Anne de Montmorency’s collection of weapons combined the exhibition of his own armaments with a varied collection of antiquities which included the armor of Jeanne d’Arc.42 This suit was regarded as a relic. Like Montmorency’s own swords, it was exhibited after a change of use from its original function to a symbolic means of expressing distinctive noble virtues. Following these patterns of high nobility, the ‘sale d’armes’ of the Duke of Lesdiguières at his chateau of Vizille was displayed and perceived in relation to these social narratives. Remarkably, the description of this castle by the traveller Abraham Gölnitz emphasized these contents. While he barely commented on most of the statues and paintings in the building, the portraits and military victories of Lesdiguières received considerable attention.43 In this selection, Gölnitz was following the discourse proposed by the family. The official biography of Lesdiguières was merely a continuous account of his ‘faits d’armes’ (feats of arms), in which all the battles of the gallery were narrated in detail. As has been pointed out, the book was an effort to hide his common origins through the assertion of his military prowess.44 It is likely that the symbolic exhibition of the accumulated weapons expanded this aim. Weapons assumed the nature of collector’s items as a result of these social narratives.

A similar process of attribution of meaning can be seen in other objects that were collected as a result of these narratives. As had happened with swords, rings and seals were claimed to have been given by kings as rewards for ‘beautiful feats of arms’.45 In addition, authors claimed recognition of rings for robe status.46 For instance, Tiraqueau, Thierriat, Loyseau and Ernaud placed them in the public recognition of all kinds of nobility: ‘mais les Chevaliers avoient une autre marque ou enseigne ,à-sçavoir l’Anneau ou cachet d’or’.47 These recurrent commentaries are relevant since they provide interpretations for the ‘bagues’ (rings) that frequently appeared in cabinets.

However, since other marks mentioned by De l’Alouëte, such as children, virtues, lordships and hunting, were not suitable for physical display in a room, there were always objects that could be turned into semiophores of these signs.48 Some items were explicitly described in this manner in De l’Alouëte’s text and in similar explanations. For instance, De l’Alouëte mentioned family portraits in his proposal of children as a second sign of nobility: ‘La deuxiéme marque des Nobles se rencontre en leurs enfans, ausqueles on void coutimierement reluire les graces & vertus des peres, comme s’ils estoient la vue image de leur representation, en laquelle elles fussent gravées &

42

See Léon Mirot, L’Hotel et les collections du connétable de Montmorency (Paris: Daupeley-Gouverneur, 1920), pp. 56 and 106; Brigitte Bedos Rezak, Anne de Montmorency. Seigneur de la Renaissance (Paris: Publisud, 1990), p. 226; Antoine Schnapper, Le géant, la licorne, la tulipe, p. 111; and Edmond Bonnaffé, Les Collectionneurs de l’ancienne France (Paris: A. Aubry, 1873), p. 45. 43

Antonin Macé, Dauphiné et la Maurienne au XVIIe siècle. Extraits du voyage d’Abraham Gölnitz (Grenoble: Merle, 1858), p. 68. 44

Louis Videl, Histoire de la vie du connestable de Lesdiguières... (Paris: J. Nicolas, 1638). For Videl’s writing, see Stéphane Gal, Lesdiguières. Prince des Alpes et connétable de France (Grenoble: Presses universitaires de Grenoble, 2007), p. 28. 45

Loyseau, Traité des Ordres, p. 49. Among many other references, see Thierriat, Trois traitez, p. 70; and De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, p. 51. See also Jouanna, L’idée de race, p. 524. 46

For bagues see D’Oncieu, La Précédence, p. 15. 47

‘But Knights had another mark or sign [apart from the sword], which was the gold ring or seal’. 48

For the concept of semiophore see Pomian, Collectioneurs, p. 42-47.

empreintes’.49 Remarkably these narratives provided meanings that turned simple objects into collections of signs. The coats of arms mentioned by De l’Alouëte, as I will argue below, aimed to embody virtues and lineage in every kind of object. The example of the Marquis de Rostaing, which has been recently studied, proves the actual reception of this notion in the behaviour of nobles.50 In a very explicit and literary manner, his forgery of the inventory of his ancestor Florimond de Robertet attempted to explain the meanings of many different kinds of collected object following the theory of signs offered by treatises on nobility. In this collection, a diamond or even a distaff could embody the virtues of his lineage.

Making Lineage Visible

Visual marks of nobility not only offered content, but also provided a social interpretation of the very process of collecting that was closely related to lineage. The idea emphasized the perception of objects as familial property and thus favoured the maintenance of these objects in the lineage. Thanks to this trans-generational perpetuation, collected items furnished with genealogical legitimacy became an exemplary visual medium for the transmission of virtues. This interpretation was justified by the use of classical sources. All over Europe, nobles collected portraits and statues.51 Pliny the Elder had provided references about the Roman custom of collecting ancestors’ portraits and had also connected armour and portraiture. The ius imaginum was recovered in order to visualize social inequalities. In Tiraqueau’s words, old nobility was that ‘qui imagines in atrio exponunt’.52 After him most authors provided similar references. A relevant point in the argument was that portraits were related to coats of arms. Both shared the condition of being sources of genealogical memory and were commonly interpreted as being closely connected.53 De l’Alouëte did so when he placed the origin of his fourth mark, the coats of arms, in the ‘images & effigies que l’on appelloit Schemata & Stemmata’. He explained these images using the Roman idea of ‘rechercher toutes les Nobles & anciennes Races & familles’ and remarked upon the relationship between images and genealogy.54 He stated that Roman noble houses contained records, descriptions and representations of ancestors both in coats of arms and in cabinets and entrances. Cabinets being the archetypical setting for French collections, this mention of the

49

‘The second mark of nobles can be found in their children, who usually show the grace and virtues of their parents, as if they were their visual image, in which they had been engraved and printed’. De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, pp. 37-38. 50

Antonio Urquízar-Herrera, ‘La mémoire des choses passées: Florimond Robertet, Charles de Rostaing, Henri Chesneau and The Place of Social Narratives in French Early Modern Noble Collections’, Journal of the History of Collections, 23 (2011), pp. 29-47 51

Krzysztof Pomian has pointed out how collecting statues was an issue mainly reserved for the aristocracy in 17th-century Venice and Europe. Pomian, Collectioneurs, p. 97. See also Roberta Panzanelli, ‘Compelling Presence. Wax Effigies in Renaissance Florence.’, in Ephemeral bodies. Wax Sculpture and the Human Figure, ed. Roberta Panzanelli (Los Angeles: Getty Publications, 2008), p. 21; Jane Schuyler, Florentine Busts: Sculpted Portraiture in the Fifteenth Century (New York: Garland, 1976), p. 11 and Patricia Falguières, ‘La cité fictive. Les collections de cardinaux à Rome au XVIe siècle’, in Les Carrache et les décors profanes, ed. Angelantonio Spagnoletti (Rome: École française de Rome, 1988), p. 312. 52

‘Which exhibited family portraits in the entrances of their houses’. Tiraqueau, Commentarii, p. 93. 53

See Hans Belting, An Anthropology of Images: Picture, Medium, Body (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011). For the relation of arms and emblems see Mason Tung, ‘From heraldry to emblem: a study of Peacham's Use of Heraldic Arms in Minerva Britanna’, Word & Image, 3-1 (1987), pp. 86-93. 54

‘Images & portraits that we call Schemata & Stemmata’ and ‘seeking all nobles and ancient races and families’. De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, pp. 68-69.

placing in them of painted and carved ‘vrais effigies d’eus & de leurs ancestres’ does not seem to be accidental.55

In the context of the social interpretation of collections, this closeness between images and coats of arms seems to be significant. Coats of arms allowed any kind of item to be used to express the antiquity and virtues of the family ‘race’. They attributed a genealogical meaning to any object and could turn any collection of objects into a sort of familial portrait gallery or into a collection of sources of memory of lineage. Among hundreds of examples, the various 16th-century inventories of the robe Nicolay family are illustrative. None of the Nicolays was a collector of art or curiosities in the modern sense of the word. But they all collected and bequeathed blazoned dishes and tapestries. These objects were collected for reasons that went beyond their functional or aesthetic values to become records of the lineage’s nobility.56 Coats of arms captured the possession of objects within the family and distinguished the pieces (and their owners) from other similar collections belonging to commoners. In the same vein, the Parisian robe family Miron presented the coat of arms on a tapestry as judicial proof of their nobility. In 1634, they used this piece in the courts stating that the tapestry was of ‘façon antique’ and came from their paternal great grandparents.57 In 19th century the family still considered the piece a reference to their ancient nobility.58 Coats of arms gave collected objects the role of exemplifying genealogy. This sort of object-embodied family tree was more effective than domestic ornaments based merely on exhibiting magnificence. In contrast to this understanding supported by noble theory, coats of arms did not feature in the ideal bourgeois household of the contemporary Blasons domestiques pour la decoration d’une maison honneste by Gilles Corrozet, although it did include jewels, paintings, ‘belles images’, medals and other curious antiques. The absence of references to coats of arms in this literary catalogue can be associated with its lack of interest in the assertion of nobility and furthermore to its conceptual distance from the cabinets of the nobility.59

[Figure 2]

The extent of this trans-generational understanding of collected items put forward by noble literature can be verified by examining the treatment of libraries. Classical sources barely mentioned the presence of portraits in libraries and 16th and 17th-century social authors did not

55

‘Real portraits of themselves & their ancestors’. De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, p. 68. 56

In 1507, the president Jehan Nicolay ordered a tapestry with a crucifix, Mary Magdalene, his homonym Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Victor, homonym of his seigneurie de Saint-Victor-de-la-Côte. His chief interest in the contract was to show his coat of arms. His will of 1524 left some money for the building of a funeral chapel containing ‘les armes de la maison’ (the coat of arms of the house). However, in a moment of fashionable piety, he established that in the speeches at his burial no one should ‘exalter mon nom ne blasonner mes armez en façon que se sois […] car tout cela n’est que vanité’ (praise my name or use my arms in any way […] because this is but vanity). The most significant contribution to the household by his son Armand, who died in 1554, was some silver dishes. The inventory gave no explanation of them but their typology and the reference to being ‘armoyé aux armes dudict defunct’ (blazoned with the coats of arms of the deceased). Later inventories continued to record the arms on tapestries and silver. Only in 1597 ‘un portraiture d’homme dudict deffunct sieur de Goussainville’ (a portrait of the said deceased sieur de Goussainville) can be found. But it seems to be a personal souvenir rather than a social statement. For the references, see Arthur-Michel de Boislisle, Histoire de la maison de Nicolay… (Nogent-le-Rotrou: Impr. de Gouverneur, 1873), pp. 85, 96-97, 206, 218 and 290. For the Nicolay in the 18

th Century, see Olivier Bonfait, ‘Les collections des

parlementaires parisiens du XVIIIe siècle’, Revue de l’art, 73 (1986), p. 33. 57

Copies d’actes concernant les Miron de Paris, Archives Departementales du Loiret (Orleans), Fonds Miron d’Aussy, cote 14/J/130. 58

A photograph of the tapestry was then kept in the family archives under the section ‘objets de mémoire’, Archives Departementales du Loiret (Orleans), Fonds Miron d’Aussy, cote 14/J/94. 59

Gilles Corrozet, Blasons domestiques, pour la décoration d’une maison honneste (Paris: G. Corrozet, 1539), p. 31 (cited from Paris, 1865).

expound upon the collecting of books.60 Even pro-robe treatises did not go beyond general statements about the need for culture, such as Pasquier’s ‘le Gentilhomme sans lettres est semblance à l’arbre sans fruict’.61 Nevertheless, other contemporary narratives about the topic showed that the social perception of these devices was dependent upon the doctrine relating to signs in noble treatises and its emphasis on lineage.62 17th-century France produced a specific literature on libraries. These texts explained the collecting of books in terms similar to those used to describe other social collections. For instance, Louis Jacob’s Traicté des plus belles Bibliothèques was a catalogue of the wondrous libraries that had enlightened civilization since Julius Caesar.63 Gabriel Naudé dedicated his treatise on libraries to the robe noble De Mesmes and proposed their affirmation as robe signs.64 More than half of Parisian 17th-century noble inventories did not contain any books at all. On the contrary, any robe noble needed a library for his professional daily life and many of them built extraordinarily large ones.65 Several robe libraries were also a source of antiquarian and erudite studies.66 However, many sword nobles had libraries and some of them, from Montmorency to the maréchal de Bassompierre, the duc d’Angoulême and Gaston d’Orleans, could be considered book collectors. Additionally, possessing books was a virtue to be commented on in the praise of a sword noble, as De l’Alouëte did in his history of the Vervins.67

In these collections, the very functional nature of books was combined with the interest in collecting ‘livres curieux’ (curious books) and furthermore with a cultural and social perception of all kind of books.68 The interaction between social discourses and scholarly customs was very common all over Europe.69 Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc's working library, which was extensively used for his erudite leisure and juridical occupation, was perceived as a social display.70 His contemporary intellectual biography by Pierre Gassendi supported this idea: the very title of the book mentioned his robe position of ‘senatoris Aquisextiensis’. Curiously, the English translation of 1657 emphasized the social assertion, lengthening the title to The Mirrour of True

60

The only reference by Pliny was to the location of portraits in libraries. Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, XXXV, 2. 61

‘An unlettered Gentleman is like a tree without fruit’. Pasquier, Le Gentilhomme, p. 15. 62

See Jean-Marc Chatelain, La bibliothèque de l’honnête homme, livres, lecture et collections en France à l’age classique (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2003), p. 87; and H.-J. Martin, ‘Livres et société’, in Histoire de l’Édition Française. 1 Le livre conquérant. Du Moyen Âge au milieu du XVIIe siècle, eds. Roger Chartier, Henry-Jean Martin and Jean-Pierre Vivet (Paris: Promodis, 1982), pp. 543-561. See also L. Viardot, ‘Livres rares et pratiques bibliographiques’, in Histoire de l’édition française. II Le livre triomphant, 1660-1830, eds. Roger Chartier, Henry-Jean Martin and Jean-Pierre Vivet (Paris: Promodis, 1984), p. 448; Bonfait, ‘Les collections des parlamentaires…’, p. 33; and Schnapper, Le géant, p. 195. 63

Louis Jacob, Traicté des plus belles Bibliothèques publiques et particulières qui ont esté, & qui sont a present dans le monde (Paris: R. le Duc, 1644). 64

See Chatelain, La bibliothèque, p. 68 about Ménestrier’s library of the honnête homme. 65

Martin, ‘Livres et société’, p. 550; R. Chartier and D. Roche, ‘Les pratiques urbaines de l’imprimé’. In Chartier, Martin, Vivet, (eds.), Histoire de l’Édition, vol II, p. 406. On the origin of robe libraries, see Roger Doucet, Les bibliothèques Parisiennes au XVIe siècle (Paris: A. et J. Picard, 1956). 66

The erudite nature of the notes taken by Peiresc on other libraries and the collections of other members of his circle of robe antiquarian fellows such as Savaron or De Mesmes show this customary use. See Recueil de dissertations et de notes… provenant du cabinet de Peiresc, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Ms. Dupuy 667; and Inventaires des cabinets de Peiresc, Bagarris, Sibou, Bourrily et Toussain-Lauthier, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Manuscrits fonds français 9534. 67

De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, p. 285. 68

Viardot, ‘Livres rares…’, p. 448. 69

For an introduction to the Italian case, see Findlen, Possessing Nature. For the Spanish case, see Jeremy Lawrance, Oliver Noble Wood and Jeremy Roe (dirs.), Poder y saber. Bibliotecas y bibliofilia en la época del conde-duque de Olivares (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica, 2011). 70

Peter N. Miller, Peiresc’s Europe: Learning and Virtue in the 17th Century (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2000), p. 31.

Nobility & Gentility.71 As can be seen, the juridical and professional images of French robe libraries were tinged with wider meanings by the display of descriptions and praise. In this regard, it is noteworthy that these texts connected libraries with the social narratives of collections. For instance, the cabinet and books of the officer Michel de Tiraqueau (son of the social author André de Tiraqueau) were related to ‘l’immortelle race’ of the ‘branche des Tiraqueaux’ in a poetic description by his nephew.72 This intellectual self-fashioning was nuanced by a higher interest in the signs of nobility and lineage.

For this reason, it is important to note that the social self-fashioning of robe libraries should not be interpreted as a bourgeois sign confronting nobility, as has sometimes been suggested.73 The fact that Président Savaron headed the confrontation of the robe against the sword in the États Géneraux of 1614 does not mean that he was championing a bourgeois status. Neither his library nor his antiquities aimed for a non-noble identity.74 At most, he may have tried to display certain non-sword nobility based on robe principles, but even this idea is debatable. Here, it is worth noting that books were associated with nobility through the key consideration of libraries as family property. As in the contemporary debate on the familial bequeathing of public offices, this interest in the traditional sword idea of lineage connects with the traditional ideological bases of nobility and is evidence of the mixed identity of the estate.75 In any case, robe and sword nobles frequently tried to assure the permanence of libraries in their lineage. Though commonly sold after a few generations, books stayed in the family for long enough to build a public image. The library of the De Thou family is a perfect example. Jacques-Auguste de Thou stated in his last will: ‘A l’égard de ma bibliothèque que j’ai amassée avec tant de soin et à si grande frais, depuis plus de quarante ans, et qu’il importe qu’elle soit conservée en entier, tant pour le bien de ma famille, que pour celui des bonnes Lettres, je défends qu’on la partage, ou qu’on la vende, ou qu’on la laisse se dissiper, de quelle manière que ce soit ; mais je veux que, conjoictement avec mes médailles d’or, d’argent et de cuivre, elle reste en commun entre ceux de mes fils qui s’attacheront aux Lettres, de telle sorte pourtant qu’elle soit ouverte à tous les étrangers et aux savants pour l’usage du public’.76 The link between conservation of the library and ‘the good of my family’ was a traditional noble custom. De Thou’s library was finally sold, but a printed catalogue remained, with the family coat of arms on the frontispiece. These arms, like those on the bindings of the books of both robe and sword nobles, offered a collective narrative of

71

Pierre Gassendi, W. Rand, trans., The Mirrour of True Nobility & Gentility. Being a Life of the Renowned Nicolaus Claude Frabricius Lord of Peiresk, Senator of the Parliament at Aix (London: publisher unknown, 1657). 72

‘The immortal race of the Tiraqueaus’. See André de Rivaudeau, Les oeuvres d'André de Rivaudeau Gentilhomme du bas-Poitou (Poitiers: N. Logeroys, 1566). 73

Viardot saw robe libraries as bourgeois devices in opposition to ancient nobility. Bonfait identified a preference for libraries in some eighteenth-century robe constructions of public image. Schnapper, although dismissing some sociological interpretations, admitted a general link between robe and book collecting. See Viardot, ‘Livres rares…’, pp. 446-448; Bonfait, ‘Les collections des parlementaires…’, p. 33 ; and Schnapper, Le géant, pp. 195 and 13-14. 74

See Antoine Vernière, Le Président Jean Savaron, érudit, curieux, collectionneur… (Clermont-Ferrand: M. Bellet et fils, 1884), pp. 15 and 60. 75

On the hereditary transmission of offices and rank, see Jonathan Powis, ‘Aristocratie et buréocratie dans la France du XVIe siècle: Etat, office et patrimoine’, in Contamine, L’Etat, p. 240. 76

‘Regarding my library, which I have gathered with much care and expense over forty years, it is important to keep it intact, both for the sake of my family and for the sake of the Humanities. Therefore I forbid it to be split up, sold or allowed to disappear in any way. Instead I want it to be transmitted, along with my gold, silver and copper medals, to those of my children engaged in studies, so it will be open to the public, foreigners and scholars’. See Henry Harrisse, Le président de Thou et ses descendants, leur célébre bibliothèque, leurs armoiries… (Paris: H. Leclerc, 1905). Also, Schnapper, Le géant, 196. Quotation in Harrise, Le président de Thou, p. 2.

nobility.77 Moreover, the desired public opening of the library should have linked the name of the family even more strongly with the image represented by the books.

[Figure 3]

Reliable Visual Signs of Virtue

Another significant point in the theoretical discussion of signs and lineage was their relationship with social mobility and social virtues. Apparently these signs of nobility were a barrier designed for social exclusion, but authors were aware of the fact that the signs frequently worked as support for inclusion. Thierriat claimed the sword to be the last visual difference between a noble and a commoner. But concurrently the sword was the most convenient alibi for the advancement of any banker’s son. Social treatises showed this contradiction. On the one hand there was a wish to limit the scope of signs, in order to point out differences of estate. On the other hand there was some interest in facilitating ways of acquiring these signs, in order to meet the need for legitimacy of newcomers. In terms of social mobility, signs should be related to the old debate between blood and virtue.78 In this context, their narrative potential made them very interesting for social authors. Since visual signs of nobility conveyed cultural content, they contributed to the assimilation of newcomers and the ideological reproduction of the estate. The narratives on collected items did so too.

The debate was again fruitful on the level of social theory. Pliny had already anticipated the social misappropriation of statues.79 In the same vein, Tiraqueau commented on the use of ancestors’ portraits in illegitimate social advancement.80 Also D’Origny and Le Masle were worried about villains who usurped noble names, shields and houses.81 Authors realized that visual marks could be counterfeited, as used to happen with written genealogies. Oncieu denounced it sharply. After referring to the acknowledgement given by French civil law to portraits as proofs of nobility, he deplored its fallibility: ‘peu serviroit de nostre temps pour demonstration aucune de noblesse. Nous avons si bon marché de peintres, qu’à fort peu de frais un chascun pourroit avoir le pourtraict ou sien, ou de son pere, & precedesseurs, par imagination d’une figure & forme exterieure, à plaisir & discretion du peintre, s’accommodant à l’honneur de celuy qui le paye, pour & au lieu de quelque vieux penard de pere, luy rendre la gravité d’un Marius, d’un Pyrrus ou quelque autre tel capitaine’.82 Since a good portrait painter could turn ‘any old unfortunate father’ into a classical model of nobility, the fear was obviously reasonable.83 Portraits were indeed used in this way and

77

For the catalogues of collections as sources of their owner’s memory, see MacGregor, Curiosity and Enlightenment, p. 60. 78

Devyver, Le sang, p. 184. Haddad, The Question of Imprescriptibility, p. 155. 79

See Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, XXXV, p. 2. Also see, Georges Didi-Huberman, Devant le temps. Histoire de l’art et anachronisme des images (Paris: Éditions de Minuit, 2000), p. 73. 80

Tiraqueau, Commentarii, vol. I, p. 46. 81

Pierre d’Origny, Le hérault de la noblesse de France (Reims: J. de Foigny, 1578), p. 27 (cited from Paris, 1875); and J. Le Masle, Le breviaire des nobles (Paris: Bonfons, 1578), p. 5. 82

‘In our time portraits are of little use as proof of nobility. We have such good painters that everyone can have a portrait of himself, or his father and ancestors for a low price, accommodating their appearance to the idea of the painter and to the honour of the one who pays. In this way you can give to any old unfortunate father the gravity of Marius, Pyrrus or any other captain’. D’Oncieu, La Précédence, pp. 25-26. 83

For a discussion of the notion of truth in early modern French portraiture through two different examples, see Patrick T. Hajovsky, ‘André Thevet's ‘true’ portrait of Moctezuma and its European legacy’, Word & Image, 25-4 (2009), pp. 335-352 and Peter Parshall, ‘Portrait prints and codes of identity in the Renaissance: Hendrik Goltzius, Justus Lipsius and Michel de Montaigne’, Word & Image, 19-1-2 (2003), pp. 22-37.

these terms of description were also commonly applied: De Thou reported a portrait of his friend the baron des Adrets as having ‘l’air d’un veritable homme de guerre’ as ‘l’on nous depeint Sylla’.84

Thus for Oncieu, coats of arms were both the best portraits and the only reliable mark of nobility: ‘L’enseigne de la noblesse vraye, c’est le Prince: Les armoiries qu’il donne pour divise au lieu de ses images ne se changent iamais, elles sont telles au pere qu’au fils: Leur face est tousiours de mesme couleur immuable, pour monstrer que tel doibt estre celuy auquel elles sont conferees, & aussi les successeurs […] l’image des nobles assez s’y trouvera depaincte. Il n’est ia besoing autre protraict d’icelle: la face, & lineaments exterieurs sus lesquels l’image sera prise faillent bien souvent à nous representer tels que nous sommes. La vertu, la bonté, ou la malice ne sont logez en la face, c’est au coeur & à l’entendement, lesquels par nos oeuvres ne se trompent iamais à nous representer tels veritablement que nous sommes’.85 This derision of figurative portraits might be interpreted as a statement in favour of the robe. As has been suggested, robe nobles were newcomers and thus the first generations lacked ancient noble ancestors to be portrayed, while coats of arms affirmed their status on equal terms with the old nobility. However, other pro-robe authors such as Loyseau stated the contrary: portraits should be reserved only for robe nobles and coats of arms for sword.86 In any case, the common opinion did not distinguish between robe and sword in the use of portraits and coats of arms and both robe and sword nobles shared the use of both forms. The point is that military or parliamentary portraits and fake coats of arms implied the acceptance and reproduction of the estate’s ideology.

Many social authors felt that the unreliability of magnificence should cause a movement away from appearances and towards behaviour. Le Masle accused those who had ‘maisons dorees, et sumptueux palais, dont on voit peinturees’ of being as false as a gilded copper vessel.87 Always praising the ancient nobility, De Marois attacked the ‘annoblis’ (ennobled) who spent ‘leur vie & leur temps en affluence de richesses, en repos & delices, en exces d’habits, de festins, de balets’ rather than offering up their lives to the king.88 Other pro-sword authors wrote that hunting or duels were the most reliable marks.89 Theory stressed the need for a transmission of cultural values that could ensure the maintenance of the social order beyond individuals.

Theorists did not believe in the real possibility of the existence of full social immobility. Beyond their discourse, they recognized that advancement was unavoidable and sometimes even appropriate. Therefore the contribution of visual signs was considered valuable because mere decoration did not secure the required ideological assimilation. Authors thought that nobility was a matter of attitude. For this reason, images and other collected objects were justified as being

84

‘The air of a real warrior, as we used to paint Sylla’. Jacques-Auguste de Thou, Mémoires, in Collection universelle des mémoires particuliers relatives à l’histoire de France, LIII (Paris: Hôtel Serpente, 1789), pp. 51-52. 85

‘The Prince is the sign of real nobility. Coats of arms delivered by the Prince never change. They are equal for the parent and the child. The face of the coats of arms is always of the same unchangeable color. [...] There is no need for any portrait other than the coat of arms: often the face and appearance that supports a figurative portrait do not represent us as we are. Virtue, goodness or evil are not located in the face, but in the heart and understanding’. D’Oncieu, La Précédence, pp. 25-26. 86

In his opinion images ‘n’estoit permis qu’a ceux, qui avoyent eu ces grands Offices, la posterité desquels gardoit soigneusement leurs effigies, ornées des enseignes de leur Magistrat’ (were only given to those who had held high office, these images being adorned with the signs of his magistracy). Also, sword nobility should alternatively be shown by ‘les escus & boucliers q’elle mettoit aux temples & autres lieux publics’ (the shields placed in temples & in other public places). Loyseau, Traité des Ordres, p. 40 87

‘Golden houses and sumptuous palaces where we can see paintings’. 88

‘Their lives and their time in accumulating wealth, in rest and enjoyment, in an excess of clothes, feasting and balls’. 89

Le Masle, Le breviaire, pp. 51-52; Caumont, De la Vertu, pp. 9-10; De Marois, Le gentil-homme, pp. 307-308; and Pasquier, Le Gentilhomme, p. 15. Also, see Schalk, L’épée, p. 125; Bitton, The French Nobility, p. 100.

models of virtue.90 This Plinian idea, as Thêvet’s and Brantôme’s notion of portraits shows, had gone beyond juridical literature to become a general understanding.91 Noble houses stressed the exhibition of familial virtues for their descendants. As Nenna stated in his French translation, ‘les images, les statues, les peintures & plusieurs autres legeretez de ceste farine’ simply proved the nobility and virtues of the ancestors, but not automatically those of the current holders.92 These virtues of the descendants should be acquired, as the classical topos and many 16th- and 17th-century texts stated, through paying attention to the narratives conveyed in these images and other signs of the family. As du Rivault said, the descendants should have ‘leurs tendres aureilles tellement battues, par frequens exemples de leurs predecesseurs, par la reputation de leur nom, par le bruit du merite de leurs parens’.93 In this regard, the verification of behaviours and beliefs demanded proof other than mere catalogues of objects. In order to do so, building social and family iconographical narratives about collected items was again more advantageous for the lineage.

Art Collections

The strength of these noble narratives about collections provided by social treatises can be finally verified through analysis of the growing appreciation of the artistic values of items that can be detected in France by the second half of the 17th century. Since several of the objects in cabinets were artworks, the interest in art had already intervened, helping to shape many collections from the 16th century. However, beside the natural coexistence of different readings, iconography had traditionally been the prevalent consideration for all genres of images, including works of art. This mode of interpretation perfectly suited the epistemological perspectives of social commentators and their public. By the 1620s, a new regard based on aesthetics was spreading across Europe, changing the nature of collections and the way of gaining social advantages.94 As seen above in the example of the reception of Borrilly’s collection, in 1625 the Mercure François divided its attention between the attribution of paintings to great masters, antiquities, curiosities and the baudrier. The explosion of interest in art theory in 17th-century France supported a new framework for art collecting that challenged the previous social narratives supported by noble theory . Around 1660, the descriptions of works of art moved from a narrative nature which stressed iconography, to an analytical nature which targeted the formal attributes of the pieces. Although this change was the result of an academic debate, it reached the emerging audience of noble ‘amateurs’ (connoisseurs). This shift had consequences for the common perceptions of collections.95 The descriptions of works of art served by André Félibien or Roger de

90

De l’Alouëte, Traité des nobles, p. 68. 91

Thêvet’s justification of his book contains an explanation of it. A. Thêvet, Pourtraits et vies des hommes illustres… (Paris: Vve J. Kervert et G. Chaudière, 1584), unpaged. For Brantôme’s use of portraiture, see Katherine Macdonald, ‘Colorer les faits: le statut du portrait graphique chez Brantôme’, Seizième siècle, 3 (2007), pp. 207-223. Also see, Edouard Pommier, Théories du portrait. De la Renaissance aux lumières (Paris: Gallimard, 1998), p. 192. and Hajovsky, ‘André Thevet's…’. 92

‘The images, the statues, the paintings & other lightness of this kind’. Nenna, Traicté, pp. 105-106. 93

‘Their tender ears so battered by frequent examples of their predecessors, by the reputation of their name and talk of the merit of their parents’. Du Rivault, Les états, pp. 274-275. 94

See. Jonathan Brown, Kings & Connoisseurs: Collecting Art in 17th Century Europe (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1995). For an example of the ambiguities of this turning point, see Maarten Delbeke, ‘A poem, a collection of antiquities and a Savior by Raphael: A case-study in the visualization of sacred history in early 17th-century Rome‘, Word & Image, 20-2 (2004), pp. 87-106. 95

For these changes, see in general, Jacques Thuillier (ed.), Histoire et théorie de l’art en France au XVIIe siècle, in XVIIe Siècle, 31-32 (1983). Also, Jacques Thuillier, ‘L'image au XVIIe siècle: de l'allégorie à la rhétorique des passions’, Word

Piles did not provide the ideological, historical and moral records that the old nobility had traditionally sought. As Claude Goldstein has pointed out in his study of Nicolas Fouquet and Louis XIV’s patronage, these descriptions again enabled the ambiguous and profitable field of magnificence.96 This new aesthetic recognition of works of art also considered the social advantages provided by the collection of art objects; but the process changed the compass of legitimacy.97 Artistic literature offered a new shaping of collections. Richelieu and Mazarin widely used a combination of iconography, aesthetics and luxury in their massive art collections.98 On a smaller scale, it has been said that the taste for painting was mainly a matter of exhibiting splendour for 17th- and eighteenth-century Parisian bankers.99 Connoisseurship then began to be an accepted social value in itself and a combination of different narratives was more frequent. Maréchal Charles I de Créquy, who was a descendent of the above-mentioned duc de Lesdiguières, combined military self-fashioning with a collection of modern Italian paintings whose novelty of style was admired, according to contemporaries, by ‘tout le monde’.100

From the art theorists’ perspective, the appreciation of style was a sign of noble virtue in itself. For instance, the description by De Piles of the duke of Richelieu’s Rubenses offered a clear artistic shaping, for the narrative that turned the paintings into collector’s items was based on discussions of stylistic issues by academics and collectors.101 Neither the subjects nor the stories told about the canvases were apparently related to the Richelieu family. Instead, we find the history, the nobility and the virtues of painting. Moreover, there is neither a genealogical consideration of the paintings as family relics, nor any personal memories projected onto them. From this narrative, the collection was strictly artistic. The gathering of different paintings with

& Image, 4-1 (1988), pp. 89-98; Jacqueline Lichtenstein, ‘Contre l' Ut pictura poesis: une conception rhétorique de la peinture’, Word & Image, 4-1 (1988), pp. 99-104; and Louis Marin, ‘Mimésis et description’, Word & Image, 4-1 (1988), pp. 25-36; Christian Michel, ‘De l’ekphrasis à la description analytique: Histoire et surface du tableau chez les théoriciens de la France de Louis XIV’, in Le texte de l’oeuvre d’art: la description, ed. Roland Recht (Strassbourg: PUF, 1998), pp. 45-55; Jacqueline Lichtenstein, ‘De l’idée de la peinture à l’analyse du tableau. Une mutation essentielle de la théorie de l’art’, in Thuillier, Histoire et théorie, pp. 17-36; Jean–Claude Boyer, ‘Le discours sur la peinture en France au XVIIe siécle: de la subordination à l’autonomie’, Quaderni del Seicento francese, VII (1986), pp. 253-266; and Olivier Bonfait, ‘Méthodes et enjeux de la description entre France et Italie au xviie siècle’, in La description de l’oeuvre d’art: du modèle classique aux variations contemporaines, ed. Olivier Bonfait (Paris and Rome: Académie de France à Rome, 2004), pp. 21-44. Finally, Paul Duro, ‘The surest measure of perfection’: approaches to imitation in 17th-century French art and theory’, Word & Image, 25-4 (2009), pp. 363-383. 96

See Claude Goldstein, Vaux and Versailles: the appropriations, erasures and accidents that made modern France (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008), p. 219. 97

Raphael Rosenberg, ‘André Félibien et la description de tableaux. Naissance d’un genre et professionnalisation d’un discours’, in Thuillier, Histoire et théorie, p. 153. See also Michel, ‘De l’ekphrasis…’, p. 48. 98

See Patrick Michel, Mazarin, prince des collectionneurs… (Paris: Bibliothèque Mazarine, 1999), pp. 511 and 542-543. 99

Françoise Bayard and Marie-Félicie Pérez, ‘Des hommes aux oeuvres: les collections des financiers français au XVIIe siècle’, Cahiers d’histoire, XXXV, 3-4 (1990), p. 233; Olivier Bonfait, ‘Les collections picturales des financiers à la fin du regne de Louis XIV’. XVIIe Siècle, 151 (1986), pp. 125-151; and the more recent Denise Amy Baxter, ‘Parvenu or honnête homme. The collecting practices of Germain-Louis de Chauvelin’, Journal of the History of Collections, 20, 2 (2008), pp. 273-289. See also Bernadette Py, Everhard Jabach collectionneur (1618-1695). Les dessins de l’inventaire de 1695 (Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2001). 100

See Jean-Claude Boyer and Isabelle Volf, ‘Rome à Paris: les tableaux du maréchal de Créquy (1638)’, Revue de l’art, 79 (1988), pp. 22-41; Moana Weil-Curiel, ‘The cabinet of François-Emmanuel Bonne e Créquy, Duc de Lesdiguières. A taste most refined’, Journal of the History of Collections, 19, 1 (2007), pp. 15-31; and Jean Adhémar, ‘Les critiques d’art français du XVIIème siècle et le public’, in Storiografia della critica francese nel Seicento, ed. Enea Balmas (Bari and Paris, Adriatica and Nizet, 1986), p. 242. He was described in his prayer for the dead commenting that ‘La guerre fut sa premiere passion’. Laurent de Bressac, Oraison funebre de tres haut et tres puissant seigneur messire François de Bonne de Crequi, duc de Lesdiguière (Grenoble: J. Petit, 1677), p. 14. 101

Roger de Piles, Dissertation sur les ouvrages des plus fameux peintres (Paris: N. Langlois, 1681), p. ii. Also published as Roger de Piles, Description du cabinet de monseigneur le duc de Richelieu (Paris: publisher unknown, 1676).

diverse original functions and subjects was justified by their common capacity to support a discourse on the artistic values of Rubens.102 Nevertheless, from this new point of view, taste implied social legitimacy. The writer of a pamphlet expressed surprise because ‘qu’un home [the duke of Richelieu] de son mérite et d’un si bon goust pour toutes choses en ait un si mechant pour la Peinture’ and Richelieu appeared explicitly cited as the ‘chef’ (leader) of a plot against the principles of painting. Thus De Piles stood up for the duke, describing him as ‘un grand Seigneur qui leur fait un accueil digne de sa connoissance’. 103 He was considered a patron comparable with the sovereigns who protected Peter Paul Rubens.104 The autonomy of the arts did not imply a forgetting of social legitimacy. In the academics’ mind, taste for art was something different from mere luxury and wealth. It also belonged to the field of moral beliefs and was indeed connected with nobility.

Although iconography was never ignored, these new narratives took on increasing importance during the 17th and 18th centuries and finally sustained the discourse on collecting of the contemporary world’s elites. Art theory came to replace social theory in the provision of narratives of distinction in collecting. However, for noble authors and noble collectors in the period 1550-1650, meanings and memory were essential. Both were needed to secure the reproduction of the ideological values of the noble estate in the face of social mobility. Although other narratives, such as interest in curiosities, antiquities and works of art, could equally enable the semiophoric nature of collected items, the social memory of virtues was then a key element in the shaping of collections.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This article was funded in part by the Research and Development Project HAR2012-36751 of the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain.

102

De Piles, Description, p. ii. 103

‘that a man of the merit and taste of the Duke of Richelieu for all things should have such bad taste in painting’ and ‘a great gentleman who gave [paintings] a reception worthy of his connoisseurship’. De Piles, Description, p. ii. 104

De Piles, Description, pp. 26-27.