This volume, L’iconographie du Bestiaire divin de Guillaume le clerc de Normandie, by Rémy Cordonnier provides an excellent introduction to the Divine Bestiary (Bestiaire divin, ca. 1210–11)) by Guillaume le clerc of Normandy, through the presentation of the complex textual tradition and an introduction of what is known of the author and the context. In his text, Guillaume explains that he translated Latin prose into French verse. Though originally from Normandy, Guillaume lived in England and was married with children. Working for patrons in the West Midlands, he wrote poetry, moral allegories, and exempla.

The Bestiaire divin results from a long tradition starting with the Greek Physiologos, which was written in Alexandria, Egypt in the 2nd century CE, using zoology and classical sources for Christian exegesis, from a moralizing and didactic perspective. The B version of the Latin Physiologus, translated between the 4th and 8th century, with more biblical references, commentaries, and interpolations for use in a school context, was the source of the Bestiarum latinum (Latin bestiary), compiled in England ca. 1100, which in turn added extracts from Isidore of Seville’s Etymologies (6th–7th century). The translation into the vernacular marked a transmission of knowledge from the schools to the world of the court. The Bestiaire by Philippe de Thaün, a more faithful translation, predates the Bestiaire divin by one century, but it is still unclear whether Guillaume le clerc of Normandy knew of it.

The Paris manuscript, BnF fr. 14969—the focus of this study, is the most heavily illustrated copy of the Bestiaire divin, with seventy-seven mainly one-column framed miniatures (for thirty-five chapters) unusually representing not only the animals but also their moralizations (called sarmuns). It is followed by an unillustrated Lapidaire (lapidary) by a different scribe. Manuscript BnF fr. 14969 was produced in London around ca. 1265–70. For Nigel Morgan, the author of the section “Style, datation et commanditaire,” (style, date, and patronage) the miniatures show the influence in England in the third quarter of the 13th century of the new “court style” of paintings and sculptures associated with royal patronage. The date and style of the manuscript are close to that of the Lambeth Apocalypse (made for Eleanor de Quincy, 1227–1296: the artists are different but may have collaborated) and the Gulbenkian Apocalypse. The female patron depicted on BnF fr. 14969 folio 49v, associated with the Franciscans (who are frequently represented in the miniatures), could be Eleanor of Provence (ca. 1223–1291), the wife of Henry III (1207–1272).

For Cordonnier, the main theme of the miniatures is social criticism, in the light of the Last Judgement, with many depictions of the Harrowing of Hell (Christ rescuing the prisoners of the Mouth of Hell). The illustrations present the Bestiaire divin as a treatise on vices and virtues, insisting on morals and acts of piety. As highlighted by Cordonnier, the recurrent stereotypical depiction of the Jews (criticized for their blindness to the gospel, but still bearing the hope of salvation) is rooted in the embedded antisemitism of the medieval church, which increased in the 13th century. The author considers that the function of the miniatures in the Bestiaire divin was to act as a bridge between the literal meaning of the animal and its allegorical meaning.

Cordonnier’s commentary takes up the challenge of explaining in a synthetic way how the text is composed of both description and allegory, as well as its relationship to the corresponding images. For each section, there is a summary of the poem, a description of the animal’s representation and moralization (this order can be inverted in the source text), and an interpretation. The analysis refers to the textual sources within a long multilingual tradition. This includes quotations in old French but also Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, to explain the names and identities of the animals. The study sometimes includes important visual precedents in different artistic media (monumental sculpture, ivory, and so forth). The example of the elephant (which exceptionally is accompanied by four miniatures) is a model of such an analysis.

A more careful revision might have avoided some typographical errors or redundancies (including the presentation of the author and the biblical sources used in the commentary; or the information about the historical context (date and patronage), which are repeated between the avant propos (foreword) and the avertissement au lecteur (notice to the reader); the same quotation appears on both pages 73 and 74).

The color reproductions of the miniatures in the appendix are invaluable; however, their size is not consistent (depending on whether or not the rubric is included) and some of them are too small to be clearly visible (for example the ants, Fig. 22). Figure 9 shows the moralization of the pelican (like figure 11) instead of the caladre, and the order of Figures 2–4 is muddled. It would have been useful to specify in which column the miniatures stand to clarify the respective position of the illustrations of the allegory and the animal featured on the same page. More could have been said about the short rubrics: they do not seem to have been part of the initial planning of the manuscript but are inserted between the end of the text and the miniature when there is space, or they feature in the margins. Their capitalization fluctuates and many are missing from BnF fr. 14969 folio 52v onwards.

Some miniatures are divided into two horizontal registers, but within the iconographic cycle, the moralization of the panther, (BnF fr. 14969 folio 38v) and that of the dove, dragon, and tree of Paradise (folio 54) feature more complex multipart architectural compositions. The commentary could have stressed how in some cases (see the panther, cetus (sea monster), asp, elephant . . .), the illuminator makes clever use of the margins, breaking down the boundary of the miniature frame in fun and inventive ways.

In the didactic spirit of the Corpus du Répertoire Iconographique de la Littérature du Moyen Age (Corpus of the iconographic repertoire of medieval literature) series, an index of animals (including their different denominations, in addition to the list provided on page 33) and of biblical and iconographic motifs would have been welcome, as well as a short glossary including specialized vocabulary such as parénétique or allégorèse. In any case, this important book will be very useful to students and scholars in medieval studies and potentially of interest to a wider public: either for one-off searches on specific animals or through a sequential reading. It introduces us to the intricate and sometimes unexpected associations used and developed by medieval allegory and manages to introduce concisely and clearly the Bestiaire divin within its complex textual and visual transmission.