Abstract
This paper explores the interest of Charles IV of Luxembourg (1316–1378), King of Bohemia and Holy Roman Emperor, in collecting gemstones, which has hitherto been little studied. It analyses this interest in connection with the fourteenth-century French royal court, and especially with the collecting activities of Charles V of Valois (1338–1380), King of France. Both of these sovereigns had an interest in ancient gems and they used them in the same manner; their practices prove to have been inspired by the reinvented traditions of the saintly Capetian monarch Louis IX, King of France, and of the ancient Roman Empire. This study shows how Charles of Luxembourg and Charles of Valois sought out and used precious and semi-precious stones as instruments of their royal self-images and claims to power.
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CHARLES IV of Luxembourg, King of Bohemia (r. 1346–78) and Holy Roman Emperor (r. 1355–78), was undoubtedly one of the most avid imperial collectors of sacred relics. A man of international education, he proved himself a very capable and effective ruler; he also accumulated many of the most sacred relics of Christendom, and it was during his reign that Prague gained its reputation as a repository of the most holy relics. Less widely known is that, in addition to relics, Charles IV also amassed various precious objects of both ‘Western’ and ‘Eastern’ provenances. Among them were many antique, Byzantine and medieval carved gems – delicate, durable and rare objects, with considerable dynamic potential to bridge the gulf between profane and sacred, and with the capacity to forge multiple kinds of connections and relationships over space and time. Charles’s interest in assembling gemstones was inspired by various stimuli, one of the most important of which was the fourteenth-century French royal court, to which attention is given here.
At the outset it should be said that relationships between Paris and Prague in the Middle Ages have long been the subject of historical study; there exists a considerable body of literature on this topic,1 and special attention has been paid to the relationship of Charles IV with the King of France, Charles V of Valois. It has been observed that the social practices of both rulers not only overlapped but also displayed certain similarities, including comparable forms of self-image and self-presentation, which both men consciously constructed and assiduously promoted. Another shared interest of the two monarchs was their passion for gemstones, especially ancient cameos and intaglios. However, the literature includes only a few studies to date that have engaged with this topic in any detail – namely, those of Krzysztof Pomian, Danielle Gaborit-Chopin, Daniel Alcouffe and Emanuel Poche.2 Two principal reasons may be suggested to explain this scant level of attention.
The first concerns the historiography of art, and in particular the authority of Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574) and his Vite de’ piu eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architettori (1550). It was Vasari who, in the second edition of his book, published in 1568, promoted the separation of crafts from architecture, sculpture and painting, uniting these under the heading of ‘arti del disegno’, a term that is still in use today. This idea – a construct of the Italian Renaissance and entirely foreign to medieval thought – contributed to the subsequent undervaluation of decorative arts in general.3
The second reason for the limited interest in this subject relates to the formation in the nineteenth century of European national myths. This era encouraged art historians to focus their attention on highly visible and static monuments – works that could be identified as embodying a supposed essence of national identity, objects with secure provenance and authorship, chiefly monumental architecture, sculpture and painting. Portable decorative, applied or ornamental objects, often lacking a firm origin or authorship – items such as engraved precious and semi-precious stones – were generally disregarded. In addition, research on these objects usually took an approach that considered them independently from their historical context and from the narrow perspective of the specialized fields of art history and archaeology.4 Furthermore, such investigations were all too often confined to formal analysis.
In the present essay, the gemstones in question will be examined from a different perspective, tracing the ways in which Charles V of Valois and Charles IV of Bohemia ‘collected’ gemstones and how they used them. This examination will be carried out in relation to object studies and in the light of a wider historical and cultural context, using a comparative approach. It takes the form of a dialogue with the past in time and space, which allows the two sovereigns to be placed side by side, without privileging either of them. Charles of France is considered first and then Charles of Bohemia, in order to establish their shared characteristics and their relationship.
Charles of Bohemia and his secular spaces
The Bohemian king and emperor Charles of Luxembourg was also a member of the Valois royal family. The eldest son of John of Luxembourg (1296–1346) and the grandson of Henry VII of Luxembourg, Holy Roman Emperor (1269/74–1313), he was christened Wenceslaus. His mother was Elisabeth (1292–1330), the last princess of the Czech royal house of Přemysl. He spent his boyhood at the court of Charles IV of France (r. 1322–28) and his wife, Marie of Luxembourg (1304–1324), who was his aunt. Here he accepted the name Charles from the French king, and used it for the rest of his life. The ties with French royalty were strengthened by his marriage to Blanche of Valois (c.1316–1348), a sister of Philip VI of France (1293–1350). In addition, Charles’s sister, Bonne of Luxembourg (1315–1349), married the future King John II of France (r. 1350–64), so that Charles became closely related by marriage to Charles V and to the royal princes.
From the outset of his reign in 1346, the young King of Bohemia made every effort to establish his position by linking it with an indisputably prestigious past. Charles placed particular emphasis on constructing links with the Roman Empire, especially with Constantine the Great and Charlemagne (747?–814), to whom he claimed a blood relationship through his grandmother, Margaret of Brabant (1276–1311). In addition, he also consciously maintained the local Bohemian traditions of the Přemyslid dynasty, and purposefully promoted the image of St Wenceslas, patron saint of Bohemia. Like Charles of Valois, he was associated with numerous artistic projects, mostly launched in Prague.
Charles completely regenerated Prague, turning a rather provincial city into a new political, economic and cultural capital of the Holy Roman Empire. He provided the city with all the features appropriate to its newly created centrality, notably an entirely rebuilt St Vitus Cathedral, befitting its status as coronation church and necropolis of the Bohemian kings, and he renovated Prague Castle as further tangible evidence of his majestic imperial presence.30 He is also documented as having built or renovated a number of other castles in Bohemia and elsewhere in his territories. In pursuit of his strategy of self-presentation, Charles arranged for several of these to be named after him – an unusual practice in the late Middle Ages – among them the Karlštejn, an imposing stronghold near Prague.31 It is often emphasized that Charles built the Karlštejn as a place for the safekeeping of the imperial regalia and the Bohemian crown jewels and holy relics, but it is less often mentioned that the castle was originally constructed as Charles’s occasional residence, a place of retreat, with an imperial palace and a free-standing great tower with a chapel at its heart. Unfortunately, whereas the artistic decoration of Prague Castle, and of the sacred spaces of the Karlštejn has been well studied, the historical records tell us almost nothing about the furnishing of the emperor’s private apartments. In addition, by contrast with the state of our knowledge of the possessions of Charles of Valois, as far as we know, no fourteenth-century inventories of the movable treasure of Charles IV’s residences have survived. Little is known about the precious objects once located in their interiors.
Gemstones and ornamenta
Despite this, it is known that Charles of Luxembourg favoured gemstones, largely because he dedicated a considerable part of his collection of precious objects to the service of the Church as ornamenta. In fact, the fourteenth-century inventories of the treasury of St Vitus Cathedral record many lavishly embellished objects donated by the emperor. For instance, Charles gave the cathedral a reliquary with a fragment of cloth that was understood to be the tablecloth from the Last Supper, which he had received as a gift from King Louis of Hungary (1326–1382) in 1348. The reliquary was a pear-shaped ewer made of rock crystal, likely to have served originally as a drinking vessel;32 however, shortly after 1348 the object was provided with a new openwork lid, which must have replaced a damaged crystal one, and the foot was encrusted with gemstones, including Bohemian amethyst and jasper. These interventions transformed the piece from its secular function into a container for the precious relic. Another magnificent ancient piece in Charles’s possession, which he bestowed upon St Vitus Cathedral, was a Byzantine bowl,33 carved from one piece of reddish sardonyx. Charles may have acquired this object in Italy, most probably in Venice, during his stay in the city in 1337. About 1350, the bowl was provided with a new mount, including a foot to which the imperial and Bohemian coats of arms were added, and was transformed into a chalice (Fig. 1). Thus both of these precious objects acquired by Charles – the crystal ewer and the sardonyx bowl – were culturally redefined and became part of the treasure of the new cathedral, where they promoted Charles as King of Bohemia and Holy Roman Emperor.
The Chalice of Charles IV of Luxembourg, c.1350, Byzantine sardonyx bowl from the mid-tenth century, mounted in a silver gilt and enamel setting (15.5 × 17.6 × 13.5 cm), Treasury of St Vitus Cathedral, Prague. Reproduced from A. Podlaha and E. Šittler, Chrámový poklad u Sv. Víta v Praze: jeho dějiny a popis (Prague, 1903), p. 21, pl. 64.
Charles IV undoubtedly had an opportunity to observe precious objects preserved in the treasuries of Saint-Denis and the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris and in other cities in France. During his numerous travels he also became acquainted with renowned church treasuries in Italian cities, including Rome, and he was certainly familiar with Aachen Cathedral and its treasury, to which he donated various pieces. The historical record proves that he saw some of the most splendid religious objects in the German lands, such as the Shrine of the Three Kings in Cologne Cathedral and the famous crown reliquary of St Elizabeth of Hungary in the church dedicated to her in Marburg (it is now in the Statens Historiska Museum, Stockholm), which are both fine examples of the re-use of ancient gems in the medieval period.34 Thus Charles’s visits to church treasuries to examine ancient and precious objects are certainly evidence of his devoted piety, but they also testify to his interest in a legendary heritage of myths and events of the past.35
Charles IV’s crowns
But to return to Charles and his own treasures: among the most impressive valuables he donated to the cathedral of St Vitus in Prague were the objects dedicated to St Wenceslas. Already in the 1330s, the future King of Bohemia commissioned a series of twelve free-standing statues of apostles made of silver for the cathedral, in memory of the royal saint; and later he is documented as having donated a golden reliquary and commissioned the saint’s tomb.36 Perhaps the most interesting piece, however, is a magnificent crown that Charles had made for his own coronation as King of Bohemia in 1347 and subsequently donated to the St Wenceslas treasury as a votive gift. The St Wenceslas or coronation crown (Fig. 2) still survives almost in its original fourteenth-century shape.
The crown of St Wenceslaus, fourteenth century, gold, gemstones and pearls, with a Byzantine sapphire cameo dating from c.1200, Treasury of St Vitus Cathedral, Prague. Reproduced from K. Schwarzenberg, Obrazy českého státu (Prague, 1939).
The Bohemian coronation crown37 is an object to which Charles paid special attention until his last days. It is also a good example of the personal passion of the King of Bohemia for precious stones. The crown takes the form of a golden diadem in four sections, from each of which rises a large fleur-de-lis, richly embellished with gemstones. The diadem itself supports two arches, crossing at right angles and encrusted with precious stones. A small golden cross with a sapphire cameo tops the point where the arches intersect; a Latin inscription on the cross explains that it functioned as a container for a relic of the Crown of Thorns. Thus, the crown was a reliquary too. A bull of Clement VI, dated 6 May 1346, states that the crown Charles of Luxembourg had had made to adorn the reliquary bust of St Wenceslas in the cathedral treasury was used for Bohemian coronations, so it is now assumed that the crown must have been created in 1346, or slightly earlier. Three elements of the crown are of different provenance: the precious royal diadem already existed and was remodelled for the crown; the golden arches also formed part of an earlier object, thought to have been created at the beginning of the fourteenth century; and the Byzantine sapphire cameo set into the cross dates to about 1200. The cameo itself might originally have served as a pectoral cross, since it is pierced with a hole, through which a cord or chain could be passed.
The descriptions of the Bohemian crown in fourteenth-century inventories reveal that in the course of time the shape of the crown was altered.38 The most significant changes seem to have been made in the period shortly before Charles’s death, in 1374–78. Technical examination of the crown has revealed traces of the secondary mounting of gemstones, and the fact that various stones came from other jewels. In addition, the manipulation of all sections of the diadem has been detected. Smaller gems were replaced by bigger ones, and some precious stones were reshaped or replaced. Finally, the colour composition of the crown was significantly altered in the remodelling: numerous white pearls that originally embellished the crown were almost all removed, and the emeralds became less prominent. Archival sources reveal that the last precious stone Charles acquired for his crown was a big ruby, redeployed on the prominent front face.39 After the final redesign, the object was dominated by gold and by the blue of sapphires and red of rubies, rubellites and spinels.
Scholars have argued that the Bohemian coronation crown’s last refurbishment might have been inspired by a French model that Charles had the opportunity to inspect during his final visit to France in 1378.40 In fact, the biography of Charles V written by Christine de Pisan, cited above, in which the emperor’s stay in France is thoroughly described, supports this idea. During his stay in France, Charles of Luxembourg particularly wished to see the crown of the king of France: ‘la belle couronne que le roi avoit fait faire’. The crown was brought to him at the château of Beauté-sur-Marne, where he was staying, and the king took it in his hands and looked at it attentively from all sides. Then he returned it, saying that he had not seen so many rich and beautiful stones together in all his life.41 In fact, this is a description of Charles’s keen examination of the work as an object, and of the attempt to read forms and colours as an experience in itself. ‘La très grande, très belle et la meilleure couronne du Roi la quelle il a fait faire’, which Charles IV admired at Beauté, has not survived, but it was described in detail in the inventory of Charles V’s treasury.42 From this description we know that the diadem of the French crown differed from the Bohemian one in having four additional fleurs-de-lis, but it is clear that the selection of the precious stones inserted into the Bohemian crown in the 1370s – principally rubies and sapphires – was, indeed, inspired by the crown of the King of France. The optical effect created by the gemstones set into the two objects was almost identical.43
It is well known that in the Middle Ages precious stones were understood to possess not only magical but also spiritual properties, which referred to the Bible and to God. The foundation stones of the heavenly Jerusalem were said in scriptural texts to be multiple gemstones, including sapphires, chalcedonies, emeralds and sardonyx. Other biblical texts refer to the sumptuous decoration with gems of the high priest’s breastplate.44 Charles and his learned advisers must have been aware of these examples and Charles himself surely regarded the precious stones in his crown as symbols of God’s beauty. Nevertheless, a distinction between the aesthetic merits and the utility of such objects was already recognized, and, as we have seen, the dazzling beauty of gems and the formal qualities of the workmanship were valued too.45
It is important to note that the Bohemian crown is not the only one with which Charles of Luxembourg concerned himself. The magnificent crown capping the reliquary bust of Charlemagne in Aachen Cathedral is another splendid object associated with him.46 The gem-encrusted crown of Charlemagne is regarded as a goldsmith’s masterpiece, but it is less often remarked that this object appears to be a unique assemblage of an impressive number of ancient gems. Apart from many other precious stones, no fewer than twenty-one cameos and intaglios are incorporated into this crown, some of which have Roman origins.47 Another nine cameos, Roman, Byzantine and medieval, are mounted on Charles’s cross, created after 1357 (Fig. 3).48
Reliquary cross, after 1357, gold, rock crystal plates, gemstones, pearls and cameos, set on a base dating from 1522, Treasury of St Vitus Cathedral, Prague. Reproduced from A. Podlaha and E. Šittler, Chrámový poklad u Sv. Víta v Praze: jeho dějiny a popis (Prague, 1903).
Acknowledgements
In writing this article, I have greatly benefited from the vast knowledge and the support of Martin Henig, whom I wish to thank. Also, I am deeply indebted to John Watts and Gervase Rosser, who patiently read the present text at various stages of development and responded with many valuable suggestions. In addition, my thanks go to Mathilde Avisseau-Broustet from the Cabinet des Médailles et Antiques of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France for allowing me to see the bâton cantoral of Sainte-Chapelle in situ and discussing it with me. This article was written thanks to funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 786156.