Maternity and Faith in the Copenhagen Bohun Women Saints’ Lives (Royal Library, Ms Thott 517 4º)

Resumé

Ms Thott 517 4° is a small illuminated fourteenth century English manuscript that
principally contains three Anglo-Norman French texts composed by different authors,
each narrating episodes from the life and afterlife of one of the three most popular
female saints in England at that time - Mary, Christ’s mother, Margaret, the virgin martyr,
and Mary Magdalene, the repentant harlot. One of the lives, that of Saint Margaret,
is followed by an antiphon, a versicle, and a prayer. The manuscript was illuminated
in a very distinctive style associated with two artists working for the Bohun family, probably
some time after the death of Humphrey de Bohun (1342-1373), the seventh Earl
of Hereford, sixth Earl of Essex and second Earl of Northampton. This article discusses
the reasons why this manuscript may have been intended for a female audience,
perhaps for one or more of the close female relatives of Humphrey de Bohun - his
wife, Joan (1347-1419), his daughter, Eleanor (1367-1399), who married Thomas of
Woodstock, Edward III’s youngest son, in 1376 or his daughter, Mary (1370-1394), who
in 1381 wed the king’s grandson, Henry of Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV.
I argue that Ms Thott 517 4° contains texts and images that would be appropriate for
the contemplation and instruction of a female audience. I show that the texts that were
selected for inclusion in the manuscript narrate the lives of two holy women who were
close to and important for Christ and who were present at many of the central events
of his life, as well as a virgin who was martyred because of her faith. I also show that
the major illuminations in the manuscript depict the heavenly favours bestowed on
each of the holy women as a consequence of the lives they led. Thus a female audience
could draw strength from the holy women’s examples. Additionally, in the article I
demonstrate that the three holy women whose lives were included in Ms Thott 517 4°
were all believed to come to the assistance of women in labour.
It is argued that the likely intended audience for Ms Thott 517 4° was a female who,
more specifically, was about to enter or already was in her childbearing years. However,
it is also suggested in this article that the Lives were not necessarily meant for the
exclusive contemplation of one person. The Transitus mariae and the legend of Mary
Magdalene deal with issues, such as faith, conduct and death, which might have had
relevance for a widow. Furthermore, the Transitus text, with its focus on the lamenting
mother of Christ, could have had a particular interest for the dowager countess, who
is known to have commissioned the devotional poem, the Complaint of the Virgin. It is,
therefore, suggested in this article that both Joan de Bohun and one of her daughters
could have been the intended audience of the Lives.