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Simon Vostre - Glasses of Princes, 1499

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Simon Vostre (died 1521, Paris)

Glasses of Princes [Les lunettes des princes], 1499

Printed ink on paper , 17 x 11.2 x 1.5 cm (6 11/16 x 4 7/16 x 9/16 in.)

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Les lunettes des Princes (composed 1461-64) is a rare incunable--an early printed book--in the collection.  It is a moralizing didactic poem on conduct for rulers, composed by Jean Meschinot (1420-1492) a fifteenth-century poet in the court of the Dukes of Brittany, which was a bestseller of its century. The Gardner Lunettes was printed in Paris by the renowned Philippe Pigouchet for Simon Vostre, 1499 and is illustrated with metalcuts. It is one of just four known copies of this edition of the book worldwide, and the only one outside of Europe.Gardner bought the volume in 1890 believing it to be from the collection of a cardinal Yemeniz. The bibliophile Nicholas Yemeniz (1783-1871) was actually French silk manufacturer based in Lyon. His bookplate, two sides of coin resembling those issued by the famous Lyon mint and his last name with enlarged initial letter Y, appears to be the model for Gardner’s ex libris. Gardner commissioned her close friend, the painter Joseph Lindon Smith to design her bookplate featuring two sides of a coin or medal. On the obverse is the word ‘angelos’, meaning messenger in Greek, surrounding a winged foot of Hermes, the messenger of the Gods. The foot was drawn after a statue made for Gardner by Augustus Saint-Gaudens in 1892. On the medal’s reverse are the words ‘EX LIBRIS ISABELLA’- around the letter Y, surmounted by a crown. This pseudo-royal cipher reflects Gardner’s keen interest in heraldry, European monarchs, especially the Stuarts from whom she claimed descent, and her identification with the Renaissance art patrons and bibliophiles Isabella the Catholic, Queen of Castile and León (r. 1473-1509), and Isabella d’Este, Marchesa of Mantua (1474-1539). To this day, anyone called Isabella is entitled to free admission to the museum.