Imaging gender, poverty, and spirituality in the Trecento: The 'Meditationes Vitae Christi' (Italy)

This dissertation is an investigation of a single work of art illustrating the Life of Christ, a manuscript, Paris Bibliotheque Nationale ital. 115, likely made in or near Pisa circa 1350. With 193 images on its 206 surviving folios, ital. 115 is the most extensively illustrated copy of the famous Franciscan devotional text, the Meditationes Vitae Christi or the Meditations on the Life of Christ (henceforth MVC) known. Although references to a female audience and to saints Francis and Clare in the text make it clear that the MVC was originally intended for an audience of Poor Clares, neither this text nor its illustrated manuscripts has been studied in relation to female spirituality. The preponderance of images concerning women, in addition to the gendered Italian vernacular of the text, make it likely that ital. 115 was owned and used by a female Franciscan audience. This study thus presents this manuscript for the first time in terms of the broader cultural context of Franciscan female piety in late medieval Italy.