The Works and Days of John, Duke of Berry in his Très Riches Heures
Since its acquisition by Henri d'Orléans, Duke of Aumale in 1856 and its identification by Léopold Delisle in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts of 1884, hasn't everything already been said on the most famous illuminated manuscript ever: the ‘Très Riches Heures’ of John, Duke of Berry now preserved at the Château de Chantilly, north of Paris? Above all, the lively scenes of its calendar pages have been reproduced countless times through scholarly publications as well as school textbooks, tourist guides, postcards, posters, stamps, tableware, clothing... The mastery, complexity and subtlety of these paintings, however, always hold some surprises, as several discoveries have shown during the writing of the commentary intended to accompany the latest facsimile and since then, through the Maelwael Van Lymborch Studies and the Chantilly exhibition. We will focus here on the special relationship between the Duke of Berry and his latest Book of Hours. The manuscript intended for him was on the making from 1412 till his death on 1416 and, although left unfinished, it features an unprecedented degree of personalization, mainly through the development given to its calendar, and to full page miniatures without corresponding text added to the traditional program of the hours. [...]
I. Villela-Petit, « The Works and Days of John, Duke of Berry in his Très Riches Heures », dans A. Stufkens éd., Maelwael Van Lymborch Studies, t. 3, 2025, p. .