Past Presents: New Year's Gifts at the Valois Courts, ca. 1400

• Autores: Brigitte Buettner
• Localización: Art bulletin, ISSN 0004-3079, Vol. 83, Nº 4, 2001, págs. 598-625
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Focusing on the ceremonial exchange of gifts on New Year’s Day (the étrenne) at the Valois courts, this essay examines gift giving in late medieval court society. Based on visual clues culled from a few surviving objects and book presentation scenes as well as on information from inventories and household accounts, the performative context of the étrennes and a typology of gifts are reconstructed. Central to the argument is the notion that objects and images brought a key ingredient to rituals of gift giving that I propose to name, after Jean Starobinski, a "surplus of visibility."