Psalter of Saint Louis


Two lavishly illustrated illuminated manuscript psalters are known as the Psalter of Saint Louis as they belonged to the canonized King Louis IX of France. They are now in Paris and Leiden, and are respectively good examples of French Gothic and English Romanesque illumination.

Paris

The Paris Psalter of St. Louis was made for Louis sometime between the death of his mother Blanche of Castile in 1253 and his death in 1270. Done in the elaborate Rayonnant style and richly gilded, the manuscript contains 78 miniatures of Old Testament scenes starting at the story of Cain and Abel and ending with the coronation of Saul, a calendar of feast days, prayers and the 150 psalms. The psalter is in excellent condition and considered a relic of Louis IX, who was canonized in 1297.

Leiden

The Leiden St Louis Psalter,, was originally produced for Geoffrey Plantagenet, Archbishop of York, probably in northern England in the 1190s. It is in Latin, with some inscriptions added in French, on parchment, with 185 folios, 24,5 x 17,7 cm. in size, 23 miniatures and historiated initials.
This manuscript passed into the hands of Blanche of Castile after Geoffrey's death, and, as religious manuscripts often were, was used to teach the future saint King Louis IX how to read as a child, as a 14th-century inscription below the Beatus initial records. After the king's death it passed through a number of royal owners, including the Valois Dukes of Burgundy, being regarded as a relic of the saint, before reaching the University Library at Leiden in 1741.