The Primer of Claude of France

Pentimenti

Artists' Techniques

The artist made several small changes to his compositions, as shown by elements which were sketched but never painted.

Notable examples include the serpent’s wing on fol. 4r, a carpet in the lower left scene on fol. 5v and the angel appearing in Joseph’s dream on fol. 7v.

A more significant change, which probably involved the entire scene, was made to the image of God and Gabriel on fol. 7v. The infrared image clearly shows the presence of an architectural interior, with arches at the top and a column on the right. The lower portion of a figure’s crossed legs is also visible, as well as his feet.

Select the ‘infrared’ layer and explore the hotspots in the folios on the right to see the pentimenti.

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Detail of the angel’s red face under magnification (10x). According to the biblical account, after God expelled Adam from Eden, he appointed two high-ranking angels, a pair of cherubim, to guard the gates of Paradise. In medieval art, cherubim, associated with divine knowledge, are generally blue, but this one, armed with a sword, is red, the colour customarily assigned to another type of angel, the seraphim whose name means ‘burning ones’.
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Detail of the serpent’s face under magnification (7.5x). In the book of Genesis, the serpent is not described as female, but in his highly influential biblical commentary, the Historia scholastica, Peter Comestor, chancellor of the cathedral school of Notre Dame, Paris (c. 1164), stated that the serpent had ‘the face of a virgin’, and that Eve was inclined to listen to it because ‘like attracts like’. By giving the serpent female characteristics, a male theologian transformed it into a creature that mirrors Eve, and by extension, all women. This misogynistic motif can be seen in images of the Temptation dating from the 12th to the 17th century.

Temptation of Eve; Eve offering fruit to Adam; Expulsion of Adam and Eve

The infrared image of this page reveals the careful way in which Adam and Eve’s bodies were drawn, especially clear in the body of Adam in the lower left scene. It also shows that the serpent tempting Eve was initially designed to have wings, one of which was sketched but never painted.

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