Ressources numériques en sciences humaines et sociales OpenEdition Nos plateformes OpenEdition Books OpenEdition Journals Hypothèses Calenda Bibliothèques OpenEdition Freemium Suivez-nous

Étiquette : histoire de l’art

Publié le

Gem: What it takes to represent a current event

Article by Marije Osnabrugge

Every second week of September, a horse fair is held in Valkenburg, a small town just south of Leiden. Coincidentally, this week marks its 1079th edition, according to the website. First documented in 840, this yearly event is characterized by popular entertainment, social gathering, and trade, drawing visitors from nearby villages and cities, but also from far and abroad. We find numerous traces of the fair in the archives, as well as in the visual arts.

Fig. 1. Pieter Bruegel the Elder,The Kermis at Hoboken, 1559, drawing (36.6 x 39.4 cm), London, The Courtauld Institute, inv. D.1947.LF.45,  https://gallerycollections.courtauld.ac.uk/object-d-1947-lf-45.

Village fairs had long been a popular topic for artists, perhaps most successfully in the oeuvre of Pieter Bruegel the Elder (fig. 1), who masterfully captured the merriment of such events.1 Seventeenth-century landscape painters, including Salomon van Ruysdael and Jan Van Goyen, made drawings and paintings depicting the Valkenburg horse fair (e.g. figs. 2 & 3). Phillips Wouwerman, renowned for his skills in painting horses in battle scenes and landscapes, also captured the scene (fig. 4). Adriaen van de Venne painted the fair in 1618 on an oblong oak panel (fig. 5).2 All these painters approached the subject from their own specialty, shifting the focus of the composition accordingly.

Fig. 2. Salomon van Ruysdael, The Horse Fair at Valkenburg, 1644, oil on canvas (105.3 x 131.4 cm), current location unknown, https://rkd.nl/images/72211.

Fig. 3. Jan van Goyen, The Horse Fair at Valkenburg, 1652, oil on panel (40 x 57 cm), private collection, https://rkd.nl/images/72231.

Fig. 4. Philips Wouwerman (attr.)The Horse Fair at Valkenburg, no date, oil on canvas (66 x 74 cm), location unknown, https://rkd.nl/images/72214.

With the exception of Van de Venne, these artists represented a generic recurrent happening in an easily recognizable location. Van de Venne’s version is the only one which instead depicted a specific historical event: the visit of Frederick Henry and Maurice of Nassau to the fair.3 In this gem, I will briefly consider the formal elements that set Van de Venne’s painting apart from the other representations of the Valkenburg horse fair, on the basis of early modern Dutch art theory.

Occasional depictions of historical events, including special celebrations and disasters, can be found throughout the history of art.4 It nevertheless seems that artists started to capture current events more frequently during the early modern period, arguably in parallel with the increased number of (illustrated) pamphlets and newsletters addressing the present.5 To depict such events, visual artists would naturally conceive of them as history paintings. In early modern Dutch art literature, theorists generally distinguish three types of history painting (i.e. a painting representing a story): mythological, biblical or religious, and worldly (waereldze) histories. In his Groot Schilderboek (1707/1712), Gerard de Lairesse moreover separates mythological and legendary stories from so-called ‘true histories’ (waare geschiedenissen) based on the Bible, the lives of saints, and history.6 No apparent difference is made between historical events from a distant (often ancient) or recent past in these art theoretical texts.

According to early modern Dutch art literature, the main aspects of a convincing history painting can be summarized as follows:

  1. The setting must be appropriate and recognizable in terms of location, time and circumstances.7
  2. An artist needs to understand the role and character of the people involved in a (hi)story, in order to capture their likeness and make them identifiable for the audience.
  3. The actions and emotions have to be represented appropriately for each character according to their role in the story.
  4. The history painter has to select the most appropriate moment in a story (the momentary action or occasion: oogenblikkelijke daad of zaak) that best captures its significance and turn it into a clear composition. Several theorists remind us that this makes the visual representation more challenging than a written history. Franciscus Junius cites Polystrates, who stated that a painting has to capture the past, the present, and the future in one image, whereas writers can describe all stages of a story.8
  5. All the elements of the painting must be plausible, on their own and together: ‘To start, one should hold onto the truth, or plausibility, and do not depict anything other than what is, or at least what can be.’9 Waerschijnelijkheyt is a complex concept referring to the appropriateness of all elements of the story, in terms of what was thought to be historically accurate and according to the status and role of the characters. If one of the elements does not comply to this criterium, the whole representation risks being deemed unnatural, failing its purpose of representing a ‘true history’. This plausibility is distinct from truth, as it involves the imagination of the artist and relies on their knowledge and understanding of the story rather than on direct observation of the event itself.

For pictures of the Valkenberg horse fair to be recognized as such, artists needed to observe the first point (1.). Indeed, in all the images evoked above, the weather seems appropriate for September; and they include the recognizable church tower of the town, tents and festivities of the fair, and of course horses. However, to capture the specific historical event of Frederick Henry and Maurice’s visit, Van de Venne made sure that the two men, seated in an ornate carriage, as well as the lord of the town and his wife (Johan de Hertoghe van Orsmael and his wife Josyna de Beye) to whom they pay their respect, would be identifiable to a contemporary audience (2.).10 Remarkably, the two eminent visitors are placed a bit in the background. Some other figures, like the horserider saluting the couple with a levade in the foreground, have not yet been identified by modern scholars, but contemporaries would likely have been able to recognize them by their distinct features.11 The painter has selected the exact moment in which the company greets the couple (4.), according to appropriate etiquette (3.). Lastly, the painter makes the scene plausible by adding all sorts of characters and objects that would be present at a horse fair (5.).

Fig. 5. Adriaen van de Venne, Princes Maurice and Frederick Henry at the Valkenburg Horse Fair, 1618, oil on panel (54.2 cm x width 133.5 cm), Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, inv. SK-A-676, https://id.rijksmuseum.nl/200108368.

This depiction of a minor historical event thus followed the basic rules of history painting. The occasion appears to have been primarily – arguably even exclusively – of interest to De Hertoghe van Orsmael, for whom the visit of Frederick Henry and Maurice signified an acknowledgment of his status. For this reason, it has been suggested convincingly that he was the commissioner of the painting. We could argue that by following conventions that were traditionally applied to the most well-known and significant histories, the artist provided an air of importance to this episode of personal history.

To Come

Together with my colleagues in WP1, we are studying the visual and textual representation of the present (e.g. by Cordélia Floc’hic and Tilleane Charavel). In WP2, it is the notion of the event that takes center stage. This short overview of art theoretical ideas about history painting and the particular case of Van de Venne’s representation of the Valkenburg horse fair are part of the preparation of a chapter on ‘Time and Temporalities’ in the Dutch Republic.

  1. In the case of this drawing, the artist identified the location of the fair (Hoboken) on the back: ‘Dit es / […] / hoboken / […] / […]’. ↩︎
  2. For a description of the painting, see the Rijksmuseum catalogue entry by Yvette Bruynen (2007): https://id.rijksmuseum.nl/200108368, including bibliography. Unfortunately, the format and word limit of these gems does not allow for an in-depth analysis. ↩︎
  3. It would have taken the company approximately a thirty minute carriage ride from The Hague to get to the fair. ↩︎
  4. To evoke an interesting example, Joris Oddens recently presented the depiction a particularly significant meeting of the States General, at which occasion the sovereignty of the Dutch Republic was first acknowledged: https://doi.org/10.51750/emlc19457. ↩︎
  5. This observation deserves further substantiation. Within our project Marie Verbiest and Alexander Goderniaux are conducting extensive research of such sources. The conference of Marion Pouspin was equally inspiring. ↩︎
  6. Lairesse, GS, vol. I, 86. ↩︎
  7. Point 1, 2, and 3: Hoogstraten, 96: ‘Datmen voornamentlijk op drie dingen te letten heeft, waer van het eerste is, de personaedjen, die ontrent de geschiedenis bezich zijn, te kennen; […] Ten tweeden moetmen de daed der Historie wel deurgronden, en aen wie het doen of lijden meest belangt:[…] Ten derden moetmen op tijd, plaets, en omstandicheyt acht geven;[…].’ Lairesse emphasizes that the inclusion of people from all walks of life appropriate to the history will make the painting more convincing Lairesse, GS, I, 53). ↩︎
  8. Junius 1641, 303; Lairesse, GS, I, 142. ↩︎
  9. Hoogstraten, 93: ‘Eerstelijk zoo moetmen zich vast aen de waerheyt, of waerschijnelijkheyt houden, en niets anders uitbeelden, als dat is, of ten minsten zijn kan.’ ↩︎
  10. In 1618, De Hertoghe served as Quartermaster-General of the States army; he had bought a manor near Valkenburg in 1615 (see catalogue entry cited in note 2). ↩︎
  11. Perhaps the other depicted dignitaries also held public functions in the government. A trip to the fair would have constituted a welcome moment of relaxation. We should be reminded this is the time of the Twelve Year Truce in the war with Spain. ↩︎

Publié le

Pépite : Neuss, ou les habits de l’empereur du contretemps

Billet rédigé par Élodie Lecuppre-Desjardin

À l’été 1474, le duc de Bourgogne Charles le Téméraire engageait son armée devant la ville de Neuss pour un long siège qui, sous la plume de son indiciaire, George Chastelain, devint l’une des Douze Magnificences dont ce prince pouvait s’enorgueillir. Après les noces de Bruges (juillet 1468), l’humiliation des rebelles Gantois à Bruxelles en janvier 1469, agenouillés dans la neige, rendus à la merci de la terrible sanction de leur redouté seigneur, le chapitre de la Toison d’Or à Valenciennes (1473), l’entrevue de Trèves (octobre 1473)…, Neuss devenait une nouvelle occasion pour enjoliver le caractère exceptionnel d’un principat dont la brièveté (1467-1477) et le caractère chaotique réclamaient toute la rhétorique des encomiastes de la cour pour en faire oublier l’échec piteux devant Nancy, le 5 janvier 1477.  

« La douzième et dernière magnificence fut au siège de Nusse, où toutes les choses, tant de marchandises comme de drogueries, se recouvroient comme à Bruges ou Gand ; et comment, le dit siège gardé, il envahit l’empereur, ensemble la puissance de Germanie ».

(Jean Molinet, Chronique, G. Douteront & O. Jodogne ed., Bruxelles, 1935-1937, Tome 1, chapitre 36, 170-172.)  

« Camp de Charles le Téméraire devant Nancy avec bombardes et armures italiennes », Pierre de Blarru, Le Nancéidos, (1518), BM Besançon, n°65310, p. 11. 

Bousculé par une révolte dans sa principauté ecclésiastique, Robert de Bavière (1427-1480), l’archevêque de Cologne, avait appelé en renfort son allié le duc de Bourgogne qui ne se fit pas prier pour saisir cette nouvelle occasion de faire la démonstration de sa puissance face à une Alsace remuante et des princes germaniques qu’il était bien décidé à convaincre de la légitimité de ses prétentions impériales, malgré le fiasco de l’entrevue de Trèves où, en octobre 1474, l’empereur Frédéric III avait préféré s’éclipser pendant la nuit plutôt que d’accéder aux demandes jugées extravagantes d’un duc de Bourgogne cherchant couronne. Élu grâce au soutien de Philippe le Bon, c’est naturellement que l’archevêque de Cologne s’était tourné vers l’héritier de celui-ci pour obtenir un arbitrage dans le conflit qui l’opposait à Herman de Hesse, désigné par les villes de sa principauté comme protecteur de leurs intérêts. Après l’échec des négociations, il revenait aux armes de se faire entendre. 

Une entreprise titanesque hors du temps

Le 30 juillet 1474, l’imposante armée du Téméraire établissait donc son camp devant Neuss afin d’éradiquer la rébellion. Pendant près de onze mois, le duc multiplia les tentatives pour venir à bout d’une ville dont la situation topographique et les ravitaillements constants finirent par épuiser les 13 à 20.000 hommes engagés sous la bannière ducale. Élévation de ponts, assèchement de fossés, détournement du cours de l’Erft, introduction de nouvelles bombardes, structuration d’un camp aux allures de ville avec ses rues, ses places, ses églises, ses lois … Tout dit l’exubérance et l’agitation d’un prince, dont l’hyperactivité surprend, saisit les ambassadeurs italiens de passage comme les officiers de la cour, à l’instar de Philippe de Croy, comte de Chimay, dont le rapport est resté célèbre : 

« Nous avons un duc volant et plus mouvant qu’une aronde (hirondelle) : une heure, il est au quartier des Ytaliens, et en un moment, en celui des Anglois. Il va aux Hollandais, Hainuyers et Picards, il commande à ceux des ordonnances et ordonnes aux fieffés. Et vous asseure qu’il ne tient pas en oyseuses ceux de son hôtel ni de sa garde. Il est toujours sur bout et jamais ne se repose, et se treuve en tous lieux. » 

(Georges Chastelain, Oeuvres, J. Kervyn de Lettenhove (ed), Bruxelles, 1863-1868; t. VIII, p. 266-268)

 

Anonyme, Le siège de Neuss, (XVIe siècle), Malines, Museum Hof van Busleyden (Inv. n° S0609)

À Neuss, non seulement les entreprises innovantes se succèdent à un rythme effréné, mais également les délégations reçues en grande pompe, les messagers, les coursiers informant le prince des affaires de ses territoires, tandis que les mandements, requêtes, instructions prennent le chemin inverse qui garantit au sceau et au contre-sceau de ces allers et retours la bonne conduite de la machine gouvernementale. Et pourtant, tandis que les Anglais annoncent le débarquement prochain d’Édouard IV, accompagné de 10.0000 hommes pour en finir avec le royaume de France, relancent un duc qui toujours promet de se rallier mais jamais ne bouge, le temps à Neuss semble suspendu…       

Neuss, rêve d’Empire

Cet épisode de l’histoire bourguignonne a longtemps, pour ne pas dire toujours, été perçu comme le signe de l’archaïsme d’un prince englué dans ses chimères, un nouvel Alexandre conquérant et s’acharnant sur cette ville de Neuss, tel le Macédonien devant Tyr, prisonnier d’une image d’enluminure. Et pourtant, à bien y regarder, l’activité débordante du Téméraire n’a rien d’anarchique ou de romanesque. Elle ressortit d’un plan, d’une stratégie dont l’œuvre postérieure du peintre Adriaen Van den Houtte nous livre la clef. 

Adriaen Van den Houtte, Het Belegh van Nuysen, (début du XVIe siècle), Malines, Museum Hof van Busleyden. (Inv. n°S0608)

Dans ce tableau intitulé « Het Belegh van Nuysen » (Le siège de Neuss), Adriaen Van den Houtte (c. 1459-1521), connu pour avoir développé ses talents dans l’art du vitrail, des tapisseries et de la peinture à l’huile, exécute au début du XVIe siècle une représentation fidèle d’un camp militaire aux allures de ville tel qu’il nous est décrit par les chroniqueurs de l’époque et peut-être inspiré du plan que Le Téméraire avait lui-même établi. L’observation nous invite à deux régimes de contemplation : l’un qui consiste à tout embrasser d’un seul regard pour apprécier l’événement, l’autre qui nous invite à ralentir et à suivre ces différentes temporalités suggérées par tous ces détails parfois curieux. En effet, sur ces chemins sinueux, s’y croisent des hommes et des femmes, tous animés par leur propre temporalité. Le temps du commerce apparaît dans les échoppes, le temps des entraînements guerriers ou des jeux de hasard dit l’attente et le divertissement affiché dans la figuration des plaisirs licencieux, le temps de la justice n’est pas négligé si l’on veut bien estimer le nombre de cadavres pendus au pilori sous le regard du prévôt, le temps religieux scande la vie quotidienne de tous et domine la représentation par l’église figurée derrière la tente ducale, etc. 

Marché et soldats jouant aux dés. Adriaen Van den Houtte, Het Belegh van Nuysen, (début du XVIe siècle), Malines, Museum Hof van Busleyden. (Inv. n°S0608) (détail)

Justice du prévôt des maréchaux près du gibet. Adriaen Van den Houtte, Het Belegh van Nuysen, (début du XVIe siècle), Malines, Museum Hof van Busleyden. (Inv. n°S0608) (détail)

Enfin, légèrement excentré, le camp ducal fait apparaître une sorte de ville dans la ville, dans un espace restreint où, malgré les allers et venues des diplomates et des messagers, le duc de Bourgogne, absorbé par la nécessité du moment, semble s’exclure des réalités du temps. Alors que les costumes et les vêtements sont ceux des premières décennies du XVIe siècle (période de réalisation de l’œuvre), le duc au centre, accompagné de proches officiers, porte une armure dorée, et surtout la couronne fermée de l’Empire qu’il ne parvint jamais à obtenir autrement qu’en rêve. 

Charles le Téméraire en habit d’empereur. Adriaen Van den Houtte, Het Belegh van Nuysen, (début du XVIe siècle), Malines, Museum Hof van Busleyden. (Inv. n°S0608) (détail).

Charles le Téméraire, dans ce raccourci de l’histoire proposé par le peintre, est devenu son arrière-petit-fils, Charles Quint, sacré empereur à Aix-la-Chapelle en 1520 ! Cette image d’un avenir ambitionné, recomposée a posteriori, explique l’attitude d’un homme dont l’engagement excessif n’est pas pour autant déconnecté d’une stratégie établie depuis son arrivée au pouvoir : faire accéder la Grande Principauté de Bourgogne à l’Empire. En cela, tout démesuré et brutal qu’il pouvait être, il n’est pas un nouvel Alexandre aux allures surranées. Il est en avance sur son temps et donc en discordance avec lui. Aussi, à bien y regarder, l’activité débordante du Téméraire s’inscrit tout simplement dans une temporalité non partagée, ni par ses officiers, inquiets d’assister à la construction de ponts qui feront le succès du siège d’Anvers par Alexandre Farnèse près de cent ans plus tard en 1584, ni par des conseillers pour lesquels le rapport de force avec la France est le seul qui compte. Charles est un prince dont le présent ne le pousse pas à rejoindre les troupes anglaises, non par négligence, mais par un choix politique qui fait de lui le non-contemporain du roi d’Angleterre comme de ses propres conseillers ignorants des aspirations de leur maître et seigneur.  Sa Qualité des temps, pour reprendre l’expression machiavélienne, le pousse à agir dans une relation à ‘son’ présent. Cependant, privé de concordance des temps avec ses homologues, il n’en est pas le contemporain, et pire encore il n’en est pas non plus celui de ses sujets. Là réside, sans doute, la clef de son échec que met en lumière l’histoire différentielle et qui permet d’éviter l’écueil d’une sanction historienne confortée par le cumul omniscient des siècles de distance, encore formulée récemment, assimilant Charles à « un prince malhabile n’ayant pas su profiter du formidable patrimoine légué ».

À venir

Ce billet s’appuie sur un exemple qui illustrera l’article « Saisir les multiples temporalités des sociétés de la fin du Moyen Âge : vers une histoire différentielle ? » et qui fera l’objet d’une analyse plus détaillée dans le cadre d’une communication qui sera donnée à Nancy pour le 550ème anniversaire de la bataille de Nancy (23-25 novembre 2027). 

Bibliographie

P. Ehm, Burgund und das Reich : spättmittelalterliche Aussenpolitik am Beispiel der Regierung Karls der Kühnen, 1465-1477, Munich, 2002.

É. Lecuppre-Desjardin, Le Royaume inachevé des ducs de Bourgogne, Paris, 2016.

W. Paravicini, “Die zwölf ‘Magnificences’ Karls des Kühnen”, in Vorträge und Forschungen: Formen und Funktionen öffentlicher Kommunikation im Mittelalter, (Band 51), Stuttgart, 2001, p. 319-395.

J.-B. Santamaria, 5 janvier 1477. La mort de Charles le Téméraire, Paris, 2023.

R. Vaughan, Charles the Bold. The last Valois Duke of Burgundy, London & New York, 1973 (reed. 2002).

H. Wayment, A rediscovered Master : Adrian van den Houtte of Malines (c. 1459-1521) and the Malines/Brussels School, Leiden, 1967.

   

Publié le

Participation in ‘Jenseits der Stärke’ Conference by Marije Osnabrugge (Hamburg, 4-6 June 2026)

Post by: Marije Osnabrugge

Between 4 and 6 June 2026 the conference “Jenseits der Stärke: Imaginarien schwacher Kräfte in Kunst, Literatur und Wissenschaft“  will be held at the Warburg-Haus in Hamburg, Germany. The conference is organized by Caroline Adler, Franca Buss, and Gerd Micheluzzi in the context of the DFG-Kolleg-Forschungsgruppe »Imaginarien der Kraft«.

Conference description (from website)

Concepts of weakness today are often associated with a pathological or degenerative condition: a state of exhaustion, powerlessness, vulnerability, or the drying up of creative energies. Conversely, references to weakness have always offered opportunities to reflect on subtle forces beyond dominance or control, about the small, the potential, the (re)emerging. Weakness should therefore not only be understood as the opposite of strength. It also constitutes its own forms of agency. The conference takes this observation as a starting point to examine the connections and productive ambivalences of weak forces and their aesthetic articulations.

On Friday 4 June, I will present my paper ‘Den bogh’ en mach altijt niet zijn ghespannen’ : Van Mander and Hoogstraten on Weakness and Rest in the Artistic Profession‘, in which I will discuss my ongoing research on the restful practices of early modern Netherlandish painters and show how they dealt with temporary moments of weakness and lack of professional stamina in the face of the intense competition and accelerated (artistic) innovation that characterizes the ‘Dutch Golden Age’. Amongst others, I will propose that the well-known drawing of the Bentvueghels by Pieter van Laer (fig.) does not only represent one of the group’s infamous parties, but also a playful activity to restore the creative mind.

Pieter van Laer, The Bentvueghels in a Roman Tavern, c. 1625, washed drawing, Berlin, Staatliche Museen, credit: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett / Jörg P. Anders.

For more information and the conference programme, see the website of the DFG Research Group.

Publié le

Call for Applications: A Place in Time: A Summer School for the Study of Women and Temporalities in Early Modern Europe (Lille, 6-8 July 2026)

FR

A Place in Time: A Summer School for the Study of Women and Temporalities in Early Modern Europe

Organised by Léon Rochard and Agathe Bonnin

Antoon van Dyck, Portrait of Maria de’ Medici, c. 1631. Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts.

DESCRIPTIF

The goal of this summer school, organised with the support of the Institut du Genre, the FNS/Sinergia project “Capturing the Present in Northwestern Europe (1348-1648)” and HARTIS (Université de Lille), partnered with the Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, is to help doctoral students develop an interdisciplinary reflection on the intersection between gender and time in the early modern period. With the help of invited keynote speakers, workshops around secondary literature, visits of the Palais des Beaux-Arts’s collections presented by its curators, and presentations by each participant, we aim to foster interest in this framework and complexify approaches to gender studies and key themes such as the question of agency or the inscription of women in history. This summer school will be structured around three main themes:

  1. Rhytmic lives: contextualising the rhythm of women’s lives historically, socially and culturally, beyond bioessentialist thinking.
  2. Thinking in the long term: explore women’s engagement with the distant past or future, and questions of heritage and legacy.
  3. Time and power: understanding the intersections between gender, power, and politics, to better define how women exercised agency over different temporalities.

This summer school is open to both doctoral students and master’s students who wish to pursue a PhD, specialising in the human sciences and the early modern period, with no requirements in terms of nationality or institution. Both English and French will be spoken. Candidates are invited to send a CV, a description of the current research project, thesis, or dissertation with an indication of the potential interest of this summer school to the project, and an abstract for a presentation connected to one or several of the three proposed themes.

Please refer to the call for applications below for additional information:

CfP_EcoleEte_PlaceInTimeTélécharger

 

Participants are invited to turn to their institutions to cover travel expenses and accommodations, as organisers can only cover collective meals.

DATES AND LOCATION

6-8 July 2026, Université de Lille (Campus Pont-de-Bois) and Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille

CONTACT

Applications, in English or French, should be sent before 30 April 2026 to both Agathe Bonnin (bonninagathe@gmail.com) and Léon Rochard (leon.rochard@univ-lille.fr).

Publié le

Appel à candidatures : Une place dans le temps – école d’été pour l’étude des femmes et des temporalités à la période moderne en Europe (Lille, 6-8 juillet 2026)

EN

Une place dans le temps : une école d’été pour l’étude des femmes et des temporalités à la période moderne en Europe

Organisation par Léon Rochard et Agathe Bonnin

Antoon van Dyck, Portrait de Marie de Médicis, v. 1631. Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts.

DESCRIPTIF

L’objectif de cette école d’été, organisée avec le soutien de l’Institut du genre, du projet FNS Sinergia « Capturing the Present in Northwestern Europe (1348-1648) » et du laboratoire HARTIS (Université de Lille), et en partenariat avec le Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, est d’aider les candidat·es à développer une réflexion interdisciplinaire sur l’intersection entre le genre et le temps à la période moderne. Avec l’aide des conférencières invitées, d’ateliers portant sur la littérature secondaire sur le sujet, des visites en présence des conservateur·rices des collections du Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, ainsi que des présentations des participant·es, il s’agira de mieux se saisir de ce cadre théorique et de le mobiliser pour traiter de questions clés des études de genre, comme l’agentivité ou l’inscription des femmes dans l’histoire. Cette école d’été sera structurée autour de trois thèmes principaux :

  1. Des vies rythmées : recontextualiser les rythmes de la vie des femmes dans un cadre historique, social et culturel, par-delà une pensée bio-essentialiste de ceux-ci.
  2. Réfléchir sur le long terme : explorer le rapport des femmes à un passé ou un futur lointain, à leur héritage et leur postérité.
  3. Temps et pouvoir : comprendre les intersections entre genre, pouvoir et politique, afin de définir les modalités d’exercice de l’agentivité des femmes sur différentes temporalités.

L’école d’été, assurée en anglais et en français, est à destination de doctorant·es ou de masterant·es souhaitant poursuivre une recherche doctorale, spécialisé·es en sciences humaines sur la période moderne, sans condition de nationalité ou d’université de rattachement. Les candidat·es sont invité·es à envoyer un CV, un résumé du projet de recherche en cours, thèse ou mémoire, avec une indication l’utilité potentielle de l’école d’été pour ce projet, et un projet de communication en lien avec un ou plusieurs des trois thèmes proposés.

Pour plus de précisions, veuillez vous référer à l’appel à candidatures ci-dessous:

CfP_EcoleEte_PlaceInTimeTélécharger

Les participant·es sont invité·es à se tourner vers leurs institutions de rattachement pour les frais de déplacement et de logement : seuls les repas en commun seront couverts par les organisateur·rices.

DATE & LIEU

6-8 juillet 2026, Université de Lille (Campus Pont-de-Bois) et Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille

CONTACT

Pour soumettre une candidature, veuillez contacter Agathe Bonnin (bonninagathe@gmail.com) et Léon Rochard (leon.rochard@univ-lille.fr) avant le 30 avril 2026.

Publié le

Publication : Innovation and Medieval Communities

Innovation and Medieval communities. The circulation of Ideas and practices in and out of the town (1200-1500).

This collective work edited by Élodie Lecuppre-Desjardin and Nils Bock, was published in January 2026 in the series Studies in European Urban History [SEUH 63] by Brepols.

Description

It has to be said that when it came to innovation medieval culture demonstrated its mastery of the art of the paradox. Medieval people were compelled to innovate, driven by the dissatisfaction that is part of their nature, leading to changes that could generate not only enthusiasm, but also mistrust and sometimes fear. In a world where innovation was ordinarily perceived in a negative light, societies developed discursive strategies to legitimize such developments, even going so far as to make the old out of the new. This book interrogates this gap between cultural assumptions and practical necessity. Drawing on numerous examples from the towns and cities of Western Europe between the thirteenth and the fifteenth centuries, it examines in context and in practice both sophisticated conceptions and unexamined habits of thought concerning innovation. These offered a range of possibilities for dealing with the new, often imposing novelty quietly, as the only means of maintaining the old state of affairs… at least in appearance.

Table of contents

Introduction – Élodie Lecuppre-Desjardin (Lille University, IRHiS) & Nils Bock (Münster University)

PART 1. Mastering Innovation: Communities and Individuals

Municipal law in the monastery. On becoming and being citizens in the later Middle Ages -Anne Diekjobst (Kiel University CAU)

Burghers’ reactions to new town books in Southwestern Germany in the Late Middle Ages – Olivier Richard (Fribourg University)

Innovation and ways of relating to time in memory writings by German townspeople at the dawn of the Early Modern Period – Aude-Marie Certin (Haute Alsace University)

Innovation in the Great Municipal Charter of Paris (1416) – Boris Bove (Rouen-Normandie University)

PART 2. Technological innovation at the heart of the circulation of knowledge and political intentions

Innovations catalysed by the papal court and the reconfiguration of local communities in and around early 14th-century Avignon – Valérie Theis (ENS Ulm, Paris)

The dukes of Burgundy’s Trésor de l’Épargne and reactions to it within princely administration – Rudi  Beaulant (Franche-Comté  University)

Technological innovation, social identities and the Dynastic State. Gunpowder Artillery in the Burgundian Polity (late 14th– early 16th c.) – Michael Depreter (University of Oxford)

Innovation and migration: The Economic impact of immigrant craftspeople in Late Medieval England  – Bart Lambert (Vrije University of Brussels)

Social incentives for innovation in Flemish artistic workshops: Social Network Analysis in late medieval art production – Joannes Van den Maagdenberg (UGent-ULB-Fondation Périer-d’Ieteren)

Plague Policies in the Fifteenth-Century Low Countries: Duplication, adaptation and Integration – Claire Weeda (Leiden University) 

PART 3. Think different: pioneering ideas from artists and scholars

Ecclesiological Innovations in the days of the Reform Councils of the Fifteenth-Century – Bénédicte Sère (Paris Nanterre University)

Mediaeval sacred song: creative impulses and innovation in repertoire, musical notation and transmission – Kristin Hoefener (University Nova of Lisbon, Centro de Estudos de Sociologia e Estética Musical)

“A desire to see more clearly”: theological device and sociological innovation of scholars in thirteenth-fifteenth centuries – Antoine Destemberg (Artois University)

Van Eyck’s Fictive Frames and Reinventions of Memorialisation – Andrew Murray (The Open University)

More Information

Élodie Lecuppre-Desjardin & Nils Bock (eds.), Innovation and Medieval communities. The circulation of Ideas and practices in and out of the town (1200-1500, Turnhout: Brepols, 2026.

Guillaume de Machaut, Le remède de Fortune, Paris, BnF, ms. fr. 1586, fol. 30v.
Publié le

Colloque international “La ville au présent. Temporalités et rythmes urbains en Europe occidentale (XIVe-XVIIe siècles)”

EN

Du 1er au 3 octobre se tiendra à l’Université de Lille (France) un colloque international dédié aux temporalités urbaines.

DESCRIPTIF

« Les temporalités sont un code de lecture pour comprendre l’espace et rendre compte d’un monde complexe et contextualisé ». Cette citation que l’on doit à la géographe Françoise Lucchini (2015) ouvre une lecture originale de l’espace urbain, considéré au rythme de ses pulsations propres. La ville, comme espace construit, aménagé, vécu et pensé, a fait l’objet de nombreuses études, qui ont ponctuellement introduit une dimension temporelle à leurs réflexions, permettant de mieux saisir la dynamique de ses évolutions et des pratiques urbaines. Toutefois, il faut reconnaître que le « sens du temps », saisi au fil des rythmicités quotidiennes comme de l’organisation planifiée des lieux, a davantage retenu l’attention des géographes, urbanistes, sociologues ou des historiens des xixe et xxe siècles. L’accélération du temps induite par l’industrialisation, les grandes métamorphoses urbanistiques qui l’accompagnèrent et le développement des nouvelles technologies permet sans doute plus aisément de s’emparer de cette matière fuyante qu’est le temps et de forger, selon l’expression conçue par François Hartog (2003), un « régime d’historicité » présentiste, censément propre à la période contemporaine.  

Pourtant, les remarques de Peter Burke (2004), commentateur des observations pionnières de Jacques Le Goff sur le « temps du marchand », invitent depuis plusieurs décennies à explorer la matière vivante des villes du Moyen Âge et de la première modernité, pour mieux comprendre le sens de la multiplicité des temporalités qui se concentrent en un même lieu et forcent à interroger le rapport entre « le champ de l’expérience » et « les horizons d’attente » des communautés médiévales (Koselleck, 1979).

C’est tout du moins l’idée qu’aimerait défendre cette rencontre, inscrite dans le projet FNS-Sinergia « Capturing the Present in Northwestern Europe (1348-1648) ». Il s’agira de saisir non seulement la mesure du temps présent, mais aussi le ressenti de son écoulement, qui troublait tant l’esprit de saint Augustin et de tous ceux qui s’efforcèrent d’en donner une définition. La question du temps subjectivement vécu peut s’avérer d’une grande banalité. Mais la replacer dans un contexte particulier, déterminé par autant de paramètres que sont les lieux, les statuts sociaux, les âges, les activités, les ambitions individuelles ou collectives ou encore les impératifs politiques, économiques, etc. lui donne toute sa richesse et comble les vœux de Marc Bloch, pour qui l’histoire se doit d’approcher « le moment humain où ces courants se resserrent dans le nœud puissant des consciences » (Bloch,1949). Dans la comparaison offerte par une vaste Europe urbaine occidentale, qui viendra en appui aux études plus spécifiquement dédiées à sa partie septentrionale, afin d’en saisir les spécificités, le but de cette rencontre est d’observer les citadins pris dans le jeu des multiples temporalités qui les traversent et nourrissent leur sentiment d’appartenance ou d’exclusion à différents groupes sociaux.

Comment les habitants de villes (mais aussi celles et ceux qui les traversent) habitent-ils le temps présent ? Comment partagent-ils cette expérience individuelle au sein des communautés auxquelles ils se réfèrent ou sont assignés ? Peut-on parler de time communities (communautés temporelles), façonnées par les contours du groupe social, de l’adhésion politique ou du partage d’une même foi ? Sur quel socle culturel se fondent cette appréhension et cette représentation du temps présent, considéré autant pour lui-même que pour le passé qu’il synthétise et l’avenir qu’il annonce ? Autant de questions non limitatives qui nourriront la réflexion. Rythmes quotidiens, dynamiques de l’événement, temps de l’intime, maîtrise du risque et impacts de l’accident, suspension de l’action, sont autant de perspectives qui permettront aux historiens et historiennes des sources de la pratique, de la littérature et des images de s’interroger sur la ville vécue et pensée dans le(s) présent(s) de celles et ceux qui l’animent.

LANGUES

Français/anglais

ORGANISATEURS

Elodie Lecuppre Desjardin (elodie.lecuppre@univ-lille.fr) ; Sebastian Hackbarth (sebastian.hackbarth@univ-lille.fr) ; Anne-Frédérique Provou (annefrederique.provou@univ-lille.fr)

INFORMATIONS PRATIQUES

IRHiS-UMR 8529 (Univ. Lille, CNRS)

Salle de séminaire (A1.152)
Université de Lille
Site du Pont-de-Bois
59653 Villeneuve d’Ascq 

PROGRAMME

Télécharger

Publié le

Gem: Measuring and Sensing the Present – Our Project Logo

Article written by Marije Osnabrugge

Fig. 1. Anonymous, Hour and Calendar Dial, late 15th century, Leuven, Museum M, inv. S/4/O.

This ‘gem’ focuses on the object that is central to the logo that Guillaume Lecuppre (a.k.a. Nothos) designed so expertly for our project. After a description of this curious object, I will briefly reflect on the insights it might offer regarding the sensory and somatic experience of the present of fifteenth-century Netherlanders from different layers of society.

The Object

The Hour and Calendar Dial (fig.1), currently in the collection of the Museum M Leuven, was made by an anonymous artist around 1500, probably in the Southern Netherlands. It consists of a rather large oak panel (125.6 x 123.4 cm) featuring elaborate decoration in tempera and oil paint. To a twenty-first-century observer, the Roman numbers stamped on a thin band offer the clearest indication of its function. They consist of two series from I to XII, making for twenty-four markers in total, one for each hour of the day. As such, they indicate this contraption showed its late-fifteenth century users what time it was (approximately).

Fig. 2. Detail of fig. 1, The Months of October (left) and November (right).

Besides the hours, the panel includes several other temporal units. The most inner band represents the twelve signs of the zodiac and is directly related to the adjacent band with elaborate scenes from everyday life representing the months of the year. Presumably for reasons connected to the mechanical design of the dial, the central upper scene shows the month of July, rather than the first of the Julian calendar, January (which is instead seen on the lower right). The months are represented by fairly standardized scenes of typical seasonal activities (e.g. grape harvest for October, fig. 2), reminiscent of Books of Hours (see for example the month of June from the Très riches heures du Duc de Berry (fig.3).1 Like those precious manuscripts – destined for an even more elite audience than the device discussed here – the scenes on this dial show people from different societal classes, generally isolated from each other and sometimes coexisting in the same section.

Fig. 3. Unidentified Artist, The Month of June, from: Les très riches heures du Duc de Berry, 15th century, illumination on vellum, Chantilly, Musée Condé ©Photo. R.M.N. / R.-G. Ojda.

Following the thin golden band with the twenty-four Roman numbers, we see another band with scenes from everyday life. The twenty-four small sections initially seem to lack coherence or logical order. Previous research has shown that they represent the popular astrological system of the Planetenkinder or ‘Children of the Planets’, in which the Sun, Moon, and the planets Mercury, Saturn, Venus, Jupiter and Mars are connected to characteristics of individuals. Such aspects range from physical and character traits to professions and activities considered typical for people connected to that planet. In this case, professions and activities are represented.2 The scenes next to the Roman numerals III, XI (first series) and VI (second series), for example, show activities typical for the ‘Children of the Moon’, who were thought to thrive in water (fig. 4). But why are the Planetenkinder included on a time-measuring device? The moment of birth formed the main indication to which planet a person belonged, based on the ascendant associated with the day and/or the hour. Each ‘planet’ was in fact linked to a day of the week, as well as an hour of the day or night.3

Fig. 4. Detail of fig. 1, Two Figures Swimming, Another on a Ship (Children of the Moon).

To continue with the description of the object, the white band has 365 fields for the days of the year, with key liturgical dates (Christian feasts and saint days) indicated in French. The co-existence of astrological and Christian temporal systems was completely acceptable in the late-medieval and early modern period. The black band indicates the number of days for certain months (e.g. ‘maius habet dies xxxi’). In the four corners of the panel, we see a figure in a nimbus, accompanied by two zodiac signs. The figures are again identifiable as the planets Mars (right-top corner), Mercury, Venus and Jupiter, which were linked to specific zodiac signs. In its current state, only eight of the zodiac signs are represented in connection to the planets, possibly indicating missing parts of the panel.4

The dial’s use: determining, but also sensing the moment

The two sealed holes reveal that the panel originally featured a mechanism to indicate the time. The exact nature and functioning of this mechanism are unclear and must have been quite intricate. It would certainly have included hands to indicate the hour (the Roman numerals). Based on sixteenth- and seventeenth-century clocks and watches (fig. 5), we would furthermore expect some sort of frame (or several frames) that could be moved to highlight certain sections of the panel, for example to indicate the current month and zodiac sign, planet or day of the calendar.5 Matthew Champion has suggested the mechanism of this dial might have also included the phases of the moon, which was indeed a common feature of such devices.

Fig. 5. Jean Gaspard Girod (active in Geneva), Rock Crystal Verge Watch with Calendar, c.1645-55, diameter 61.3 mm, London, British Museum, inv. 1888,1201.213 © The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence.

In short, the object would have allowed its relatively wealthy owners to determine and measure time. Our project does not focus on the measurement of time per se. However, time-measuring devices such as this dial also played an essential role in the way people related to their present time. Several historians have already discussed the impact of the increasing availability of clocks, whether in the public context of a bell tower, or in one’s house or pocket.6 This is not the place to reiterate such observations. Instead, I would like to use this hour and calendar dial to explore the potential of such objects for studying sensory and somatic experiences of the present – as opposed to cognitive awareness. I will focus specifically on the representation of the months here. As discussed above, each month is represented by a depiction of typical activities. All these seasonal practices involve physical sensations, which in turn formed a part of the perception and experience of that month.

Many of the months are associated with agricultural activities (e.g. working the fields, harvesting). It is unlikely that the owners of the dial were themselves familiar with the strenuous physical toil such work entailed. Instead, these representations offer a rare opportunity to grasp the sensory experiences that farmers may have associated with specific moments in the year. For example, on this dial the month of June is represented by men sheering sheep (foreground), a woman milking a cow (center-right) and others picking apples (background left) (fig.6). These activities imply a range of bodily sensations, such as the physical effort of holding a wriggling sheep down, the touch and smell of soft greasy wool; the smell, sound and taste of fresh milk from juicy summer grass, pressed gently from dense utters, and splashing in a bucket; the smell, texture and taste of ripe apples, and fruit dropping with a muffled sound on the ground or in a hefty basket.

Fig. 6. Detail of fig. 1, The Month of June.

City-dwellers, on the other hand, might recall the eerie squeaking and intense smell of fresh blood of animals being slaughtered on a crisp November morning (fig. 2). On the dial, the violent but common scene is placed in an undefined urban setting, perhaps a market square. The freezing month of February (fig. 7), on the other hand, was perhaps associated with the comfortable warmth of a crackling hearth while chewing on a tasty waffle, the clinking of spears from jousting knights outside in the background.

As these examples suggest, each month carried its own specific sensory associations for a fifteenth-century person living in the Low Countries (or arguably anytime, anywhere). A particular time of year consequently evoked the memory or expectation of certain feelings, smells, textures, sounds, tastes and sights that they would experience each year at that moment (i.e. cyclically). A close examination of representations of the months, a very popular subject in medieval and early modern art (especially in the Low Countries), could therefore allow us to understand the bodily sensations involved in the experience and perception of the present.

Fig. 7. Detail of fig. 1, The Month of February.

TO COME

This ‘gem’ about our logo does not directly relate to my research project on the representation and experience of everyday life, for which I am currently studying the visual representation of rest; as well as the natural, biographical and societal rhythms that paced the artistic profession. Nevertheless, I see plenty of connections, which I intend to explore in the coming years. I am particularly fascinated by the impact of sensory, affective and somatic experiences – and their visual representation – with regard to the perception of the present. Such a query will benefit from the increased attention for the history of senses and emotions in our field. My interest was stimulated in particular by the book The Fullness of Time by Matthew S. Champion. Coincidentally, Dr Champion will be the keynote speaker at our conference ‘Present in the City‘ in Lille, 1-3 Oct. 2025.

Bibliography

Y. Bruijnen & P. Huys Janssen (eds.), De Vier Jaargetijden in de kunst van de Nederlanden 1500-1750, exh.cat. Den Bosch (Noordbrabants Museum) / Leuven (Stedelijk Museum Vander Kelen-Mertens), Zwolle: Waanders, 2002 [esp. cat.nr. 1].

M. S. Champion, The Fullness of Time: Temporalities of the Fifteenth-Century Low Countries, Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2017 [ref. to the Hour and Calendar Dial: pp. 34-36, figs. 1.2 and 1.3].

A. Klingner, Die Macht der Sterne: Planetenkinder: ein astrologisches Bildmotiv in Spätmittelalter und Renaissance, unpublished PhD Thesis (Humboldt University Berlin, 2017).

  1. This extraordinary manuscript is currently on display for the first time ever in an exhibition in Musée Condé at the Chateau de Chantilly ↩︎
  2. The Planetenkinder were often represented in the visual arts across Europe, for example in the so-called Salone dei mesi in Palazzo Schifanoia in Ferrara and on numerous paintings and prints. ↩︎
  3. The relation of the hour and planet shifted according to the weekday (the first daylight hour of each day was connected to the planet of the day). The order of the scenes on the dial follows the order of the weekdays associated to each planet. ↩︎
  4. I did not yet consult technical reports on the object to verify. ↩︎
  5. The Roman numerals on such watches and clocks are remarkably larger than on the object under discussion, perhaps indicating a decreased importance of astrological temporal markers. ↩︎
  6. Max Engammare, to name one example, insists on the role of clocks in the religious practices of Calvin and his followers in sixteenth-century Geneva (M. Engammare, L’ordre du temps: l’invention de la punctualité au XVIe siècle, 2004). ↩︎

Publié le

Call for papers: In search of Lost Time? Women’s experience of Time and Temporality (1400-1700)

Renaissance Society of America Annual Conference 2026 (February 19-21, 2026)

Peter Paul Rubens, Les Parques filant le destin de la reine Marie de Médicis sous la
protection de Jupiter et de Junon, 1622-1625, Huile sur toile, 155 x 394 cm,
Paris, Musée du Louvre.

DESCRIPTION

In her 1659 essay on the possibility for a woman to be a scholar, Dutch savante Anna Maria van Schurman lists the following limitations:

“that the condition of the times, and her quality be such, that she may have spare hours from her general and special calling, that is, from the exercises of piety and household affairs. To which end will conduce, partly her immunity from cares and employments in her younger years, partly in her elder age either celibate, or the ministry of handmaids, which are wont to free the richer sort of matrons also from domestic troubles.”

This passage, which shows the difficulty for a woman of finding leisure time, and calls to mind for modern readers the ideas expressed in Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, suggests an early modern awareness of women’s differentiated experience of time and its determination by their sex, age, and wealth.  As books of civility and household manuals rose in popularity over the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries especially, women’s time seemed to have been increasingly codified on a daily basis and over their lifetime, with different rules of conduct applying to women depending on their age, fertility, and marital status. These considerations, however, need to be nuanced in situations that fall outside of a gendered division of labour, especially as we move away from the bourgeoisie and consider both working women and women who held minor and major political positions. The numerous female rulers in France, England, or the Habsburg dynasty, among others, raise the question of their relationship not just to the present time (especially crucial to temporary rulers like regents) but to other temporalities. Their political role also implied a relationship to an individual and collective history and fate, such as the historical figures, ancestors and family members they could relate to in order to establish their legitimacy, as well as the future they sometimes had to ensure through childbearing and political manoeuvring. Important artistic commissions, such as Maria de Medici’s cycle for the Luxembourg Palace in Paris (1621–1625) or Amalia van Solms’s for the Huis ten Bosch in The Hague (1648–1651), immortalised and fictionalised their role as historical characters by emphasising their central position in the history of their country or even Europe, showing the cruciality of mastering time to assert their political agency.

CRITERIA FOR SUBMISSIONS

In this call, we seek participants for an on-location roundtable session. Participants are asked to present a brief case study exploring women’s experiences of time in early modern Europe and crucial methodological questions.

Is there indeed a gendered experience of temporality? By what factors is the experience of time structured? How did women’s experience of time generate visual or textual traces, or how were women’s temporal experiences shaped by visual and textual artifacts? How do we discuss women and time without lapsing into overly simplified biological determinism?

Case studies might include, but are not limited to:

  • discussions of women relating to or being depicted as historical or biblical figures; 
  • the legal, scientific, and social division of women’s lifetime and the rights and duties associated to each different stage; 
  • the structural role of religion in women’s everyday life; 
  • imitation and creation of precedent; 
  • questions of memory and immortality; 
  • relationship to technology
  • concepts of fame, dynasty, and legitimacy

Although the organizers both work on the Low Countries, we welcome submissions from across geographic boundaries and throughout the duration of the Renaissance and Early Modern periods. We welcome interdisciplinary, case-based contributions to be briefly presented before our collective discussion. 

SUBMISSION DEADLINE

Proposals should be 300 words long and centred on a case study. They should be sent on 31 July at the latest, along with a CV and a short biography, to both Dr. Saskia Beranek (srberan@ilstu.edu) and Dr. Léon Rochard (leon.rochard@outlook.fr). Accepted participants are required to be members of the Renaissance Society of America by the time of the conference and should be able to be present in person in San Francisco during the conference (19-21 february 2026).