Louis de Laval
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale lat. 920
This striking Book of Hours, created c.1470-1475 and continued between 1485-1489, was presented by Louis de Laval Seigneur de Chatillon (one of the greatest bibliophiles of his day) to Anne of France, Duchess of Bourbon. It is described by François Avril “a MS of unusual richness and without doubt the most ambitious work to come out of the Jean de Colombe atelier... a gigantic iconographic achievement that overpasses any other contemporary attempt to assemble within a book of hours a compilation of biblical illustrations." In its 700 pages we find no less that 1,234 miniature, 150 of them are full pages. This is the richest corpus of illustrations that has ever existed in a book of hours. The largest part of this awesome iconographic ensemble is the work of the great Jean Colombe, also known for his work in the Très riches heures du Duc de Berry. But the book is too extensive to be the work of just one artist. In it the best miniaturists of the time come together and collaborate following the most complex modalities of this period which turns out to be much more extensive than what was previously believed.
