Les vitraux du bras nord du transept de la cathédrale du Mans et les relations franco-anglaises à la fin de la guerre de Cent Ans

Abstract

Only the north rose of the cathedral at Le Mans has preserved glass with figures. The three windows that accompany it originally had a row of portraits with heraldic bearings, described in a manuscript of 1798, which gives détails of an earlier state. The manuscript allows us to identify most of the people and reconstruct the entire programme. The rose was offered by Charles VII, king of France, whose portrait still exists, and his in-laws in Anjou. Other window were given by Jeanne de Laval, widow of du Guesclin, by the local clergy, and by the English, among whom figure Edmund Beaufort, régent of France after 1435. A study of this surprising series tends to nuance the perception we have of the two camps in the closing years of the Hundred Years' War. Not only was the work completed in a city occu- pied from 1425 to 1448, but works of art laced with political propaganda in favour of the Valois were not excluded.