Les cycles iconographiques des calendriers des livres d’heures à l’usage de Metz

Abstract

From the end of the twelfth century onwards, the city of Metz, a French-speaking city but politically dependent on the Empire, flourished through international trade and financial operations. Until the end of the fifteenth century, members of the patrician families ordered illuminated books of hours, mainly in local workshops. Forty-one of these manuscripts, with the liturgical use of the diocese of Metz have been identified. Some contain illuminated calendars: while the zodiac cycles are very close to the traditional composition, labours iconography in books of hours from Metz is sometimes quite different. The survey of the themes of each medallion in our corpus has enabled us to develop a typology which was compared to conventional reference calendars, especially from illuminated manuscripts made in Paris and the north of France. This comparative study highlights three main features in Metz’s calendars and shows the existence of a regional peculiarity: a sitting man holding two keys in February. These various features provide a specific profile of the calendar cycles in books of hours, which can be used as a template to check if a devotional manuscript is linked with the Metz area.