Christine de Pizan or Pisan (, ; born Cristina da Pizzano; September 1364 – ), was a Venetian-born French court writer for King Charles VI of France and several French royal dukes, in both prose and poetry. She wrote in French, having been raised in France to parents who came from Bologna. Her father was invited to the French court in 1368, when Christine was only four years old, to serve as a doctor and astrologer. He insisted that his daughter learn philosophy, Latin, Italian, French, history, literature, and science, which was very unusual for the time.
Christine became a court writer in medieval France after the death of her husband. Her patrons included dukes Louis I of Orleans, Philip the Bold of Burgundy, and his son John the Fearless. Considered to be some of the earliest feminist writings, her work includes novels, poetry, and biography, and she also penned literary, historical, philosophical, political, and religious reviews and analyses. Her best known works are The Book of the City of Ladies and The Treasure of the City of Ladies, both prose works written when she worked for John the Fearless of Burgundy. Her books of advice to princesses, princes, and knights remained in print until the sixteenth century.
Life
Early life and family (1364–1389) Christine de Pizan was born in 1364 in the Republic of Venice, Italy. She was the daughter of Tommaso di Benvenuto da Pizzano. Her father became known as Thomas de Pizan, named for the family's origins in the village of Pizzano (currently part of the municipality of Monterenzio), southeast of Bologna. Her father worked as a physician, court astrologer and Councillor of the Republic of Venice. Thomas de Pizan accepted an appointment to the court of Charles V of France as the king's astrologer and in 1368 Christine moved to Paris. In 1379 Christine de Pizan married the notary and royal secretary Etienne du Castel.
She had three children. Her daughter became a nun at the Dominican in 1397 as a companion to the King's daughter Marie. Christine's husband died of the plague in 1389, a year after her father had died. On 4 June 1389, in a judgment concerning a lawsuit filed against her by the archbishop of Sens and François Chanteprime, councillors of the King, Christine was called "damoiselle" and "widow of Estienne du Castel".
Writing career (1389–1405) After her husband Etienne died, Christine was left to support her mother and her children. When she tried to collect money from her husband's estate, she faced complicated lawsuits regarding the recovery of salaries still owed to her husband. Through this, Christine became a court writer. By 1393, she was writing love ballads, which caught the attention of wealthy patrons within the court. Christine became a prolific writer. Her involvement in the production of her books and her skillful use of patronage in turbulent political times has earned her the title of the first professional woman of letters in Europe.
Although Venetian by birth, Christine expressed a fervent nationalism for France. Affectively and financially she became attached to the French royal family, donating or dedicating her early ballads to its members, including Isabeau of Bavaria, Louis I, Duke of Orléans, and Marie of Berry. Patronage changed in the late Middle Ages. Texts were still produced and circulated as continuous roll manuscripts, but were increasingly replaced by the bound codex. Members of the royal family became patrons of writers by commissioning books. As materials became cheaper a book trade developed, so writers and bookmakers produced books for the French nobility, who could afford to establish their own libraries. Christine thus had no single patron who consistently supported her financially and became associated with the royal court and the different factions of the royal family – the Burgundy, Orleans and Berry – each having their own respective courts. Throughout her career Christine undertook concurrent paid projects for individual patrons and subsequently published these works for dissemination among the nobility of France.
France was ruled by Charles VI who since 1392 experienced a series of mental breakdowns, causing a crisis of leadership for the French monarchy. He was often absent from court and could eventually only make decisions with the approval of a royal council. Queen Isabeau was nominally in charge of governance when her husband was absent from court but could not extinguish the quarrel between members of the royal family. In the past, Blanche of Castile had played a central role in the stability of the royal court and had acted as regent of France. Christine published a series of works on the virtues of women, referencing Queen Blanche and dedicating them to Queen Isabeau. In 1402 she described Queen Isabeau as "High, excellent crowned Queen of France, very redoubtable princess, powerful lady, born at a lucky hour".
Christine believed that France had been founded by the descendants of the Trojans and that its governance by the royal family adhered to the Aristotelian ideal. In 1400 Christine published L'Épistre de Othéa a Hector (Letter of Othea to Hector). When first published, the book was dedicated to Louis of Orléans, the brother of Charles VI, who was at court seen as potential regent of France. In L'Épistre de Othéa a Hector Hector of Troy is tutored in statecraft and the political virtues by the goddess of wisdom Othéa. Christine produced richly illustrated luxury editions of L'Épistre de Othéa a Hector in 1400. Between 1408 and 1415 Christine produced further editions of the book. Throughout her career she produced rededicated editions of the book with customised prologues for patrons, including an edition for Philip the Bold in 1403, and editions for Jean of Berry and Henry IV of England in 1404. She employed several of the best manuscript illuminators of Paris; for the presentation copy of L'Épistre de Othéa a Hector made for Louis of Orléans, she employed (and may have discovered) the so-called Master of the Epître d'Othéa.
In 1402, Christine became involved in a renowned literary controversy, the "Querelle du Roman de la Rose". Christine questioned the literary merits of Jean de Meun's popular Romance of the Rose, which satirizes the conventions of courtly love while critically depicting women as nothing more than seducers. In the midst of the Hundred Years' War between French and English kings, Christine wrote the dream allegory Le Chemin de long estude in 1403. Writing in the first-person, she and the Cumaean Sibyl travel together and witness a debate on the state of the world between the four allegories – Wealth, Nobility, Chivalry and Wisdom. Christine suggests that justice could be brought to earth by a single monarch who had the necessary qualities.
In 1404, Christine chronicled the life of Charles V, portraying him as the ideal king and political leader, in Le Livre des fais et bonnes meurs du sage roy Charles V. The chronicle had been commissioned by Philip the Bold of Burgundy and in the chronicle, Christine passed judgment on the state of the royal court. When praising the efforts of Charles V in studying Latin, Christine lamented that her contemporaries had to resort to strangers to read the law to them. Before the book was completed, Philip the Bold died, and Christine offered the book to Jean, Duke of Berry in 1405 in an attempt to find a new patron. She was paid 100 livres for the book by Philip the Bold's successor John the Fearless in 1406 and would receive payments from his court for books until 1412.
In 1405, Christine published Le Livre de la cité des dames (The Book of the City of Ladies) and Le Livre des trois vertus (Book of Three Virtues, known as The Treasure of the City of Ladies). In Le Livre de la cité des dames Christine presented intellectual and royal female leaders, such as Queen Zenobia. Christine dedicated Le Livre des trois vertus to the dauphine Margaret of Nevers, advising the young princess on what she had to learn. As Queen Isabeau's oldest son Louis of Guyenne came of age Christine addressed three works to him with the intention of promoting wise and effective government. The earliest of the three works has been lost. In Livre du Corps de policie (The Book of the Body Politic), published in 1407 and dedicated to the dauphin, Christine set out a political treatise which analysed and described the customs and governments of late medieval European societies. Christine favoured hereditary monarchies, arguing in reference to Italian city-states that were governed by princes or trade guilds, that "such governance is not profitable at all for the common good". Christine also devoted several chapters to the duties of a king as a military leader and she described in detail the role of the military class in society.
Civil war (1405–1430) In the beginning of 1405, France was on the verge of a full-scale civil war. In 1407 John I of Burgundy, also known as John the Fearless, plunged France into a crisis when he ordered the assassination of Louis of Orléans. The Duke of Burgundy fled Paris when his complicity in the assassination became known, but was appointed regent of France on behalf of Charles VI in late 1408 after his military victory in the Battle of Othee. It is not certain who commissioned Christine to write a treatise on military warfare, but in 1410 Christine published the manual on chivalry, entitled Livre des fais d'armes et de chevalerie (The Book of Feats of Arms and of Chivalry). In early 1411, Christine was paid 200 livres from the royal treasury for the book. In the preface Christine explained that she published the manual in French so that it could be read by practitioners of war not well versed in Latin. The book opened with a discussion of the just war theory advanced by Honoré Bonet. Christine also referenced classical writers on military warfare, such as Vegetius, Frontinus and Valerius Maximus. Christine discussed contemporary matters relating to what she termed the Laws of War, such as capital punishment, the payment of troops, as well as the treatment of noncombatants and prisoners of war. Christine opposed trial by combat, but articulated the medieval belief that God is the lord and governor of battle and that wars are the proper execution of justice. Nevertheless, she acknowledged that in a war "many great wrongs, extortions, and grievous deeds are committed, as well as raping, killings, forced executions, and arsons". Christine limited the right to wage war to sovereign kings because as head of states they were responsible for the welfare of their subjects. In 1411 the royal court published an edict prohibiting nobles from raising an army.