The blasom poétique and allied poetry of the French renaissance

Abstract

This thesis is a study of the development of the blasom poétique in the sixteenth century. We have focussed our attention on the blason anatomique - a subsection of this main genre - and have tried to demonstrate that the blason anatomique does fit in with the blasom poétique, which itself forms part of a French literary tradition with roots stretching back to the fourteenth century, and which continues into the seventeenth century and beyond. The key tithe genre lies in its descriptive, interpretative character, inherited from its heraldic ancestry. The first section of the thesis examines the early blasom poétique. Chapter I investigates its heraldic origins, and the importance of its etymological meaning, denoting the description and interpretation of a painted shield. Chapters II indie examine the twin influences of medieval French poetry, and Italian petrarchism upon the blazons anatomiques. The central section (Chapters IT - VI) discusses the anatomical blasons and contreblasons, reassessing in particular the chronology of individual poems on the evidence afforded by recently rediscovered editions which have upset the previous opinion that these poems were produced only slowly, over a period of years Chapter VI underlines the argument that the blason is not an isolated genre, discussing the importance of the iconography of the blason anatomique, and its kinship with similar illustrated poetry of the mid-century - emblems, bestiaries or calendriers. The third section (Chapters VII - IX) traces the later development of the genre, after the anatomical blasonso In the later half of the sixteenth century two distinct branches of the blason emerge – the sonnet-blason perpetuates the characteristics of the anatomical blason, while the longer hymne-blason reverts to the universality of subject of the pre- anatomical blason.In conclusion we have emphasised that far from dying out, the genre continues to flourish - in such modified guises - throughout the early seventeenth century.