Jean Bonfons, passeur de textes

Abstract

Jean Bonfons, Parisian publisher (inter 1547-1566), son-in-law of Pierre Sergent, and father of Nicolas, can be considered a true passeur de textes: in his career, which spanned 20 years, he focused on medieval past, even after the Renaissance had burst into full bloom. In this framework, the amount of romans medievaux he published deserves our attention: if for some titles Bonfons’s is the last known edition (and, as such, clear evidence of changing taste), he really “passed” many others texts on to the new century and the Bibliotheque bleue. This article deals with the history of literary works edited by Jean Bonfons (part 1) and then aims to highlight the challenges, and the possible results, of this kind of research (part 2).