The Boundaries of Sainthood: Text, Image, and Iconographic Construction in Margaret of York’s Manuscript of the vie de Colette

This thesis examines a c.1470-1475 illuminated manuscript copy of Pierre de Vaux’s vie de Colette, created for Margaret of York (1446-1503) and later gifted to the Ghent Colettine Poor Clares. Previously known as Monasterium Bethlehem Gent MS 8, this manuscript is now held by the Bisschoppelijk Archief van het Bisdom, Gent, without a shelf mark. It contains the most extensive pictorial cycle of Colette of Corbie (1381-1447) and begins to develop an iconography where none had previously existed. By engaging with one manuscript copy and its text, this thesis enhances our understanding of how Colette was conceptualised posthumously. This thesis argues that the construction of Colette imagined in this manuscript is the product of c.1470-1475 Flanders, and that its text, image, and patron are inseparable exegetical components.

Chapter one provides a contextualisation of the manuscript, offering an overview of its physical composition, provenance, textual contents, and miniature cycle. Chapter two analyses the networks which construct, challenge, and breach the walls of the literal and represented cloister, nuancing our understanding of Margaret’s support of the Colettines. Chapter three explores the ‘natural’ world, proposing that the decorated margins work to create a contemporary, local, and hermetic saint, one that is constructed both in miniatures and margins. Chapter four examines the textual and visual emphasis placed on the demonic in the manuscript, arguing that such an emphasis fits well within Margaret’s library, and that demons played an important part of Colette’s early iconographic construction. A series of appendices and tables support this research. These include a full transcription of the text of Pierre de Vaux’s vie de Colette in this manuscript, accompanied by a table illustrating the distribution of text and image in the manuscript, a visualisation of the manuscript’s quire structure, and a catalogue of all known manuscript copies of the text.