The Bruges Garter Book is a 15th-century Anglo-Norman illuminated manuscript containing portraits of the founder knights of the Order of the Garter.[1] It was created sometime between about 1430 to 1440, probably in London,[2] to the order of William Bruges (c. 1375–1450), Garter King of Arms, and constitutes the first armorial covering members of the Order. It has been held since 1883 by the British Library (formerly the British Museum Library) in London under catalogue reference Stowe MS 594, indicating its former existence within the Library of the Dukes of Buckingham at Stowe House.
The cover probably dates to the years following 1600, of brown leather tooled in gold-leaf with a floriated pattern, measuring 385 × 285 mm. The text is in Anglo-Norman, written in a gothic and gothic cursive hand. It contains 27 full page miniatures in pen and watercolour, of which 26 depict standing knights displaying on a panel sitting on the ground to their right hand sides the heraldic escutcheons appertaining to their successors in the same Garter stall in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. The remaining page depicts William Bruges himself in the dress of Garter King of Arms kneeling before St George, the patron of the Order.[2]
The pages have been removed from their original positions and now exist mounted on modern paper leaves.
Folios 1–3 consist of subsequently made notes.
Folio 4 is a printed page imported from another book
Provenance
Файл:Arms of the Most Noble Order of the Garter.svgEmblem of the Order of the Garter, a cross of St George within a Garter inscribed: Honi soit qui mal y pense. It is shown embroidered onto the left shoulder of the Garter Robes of each of the knights depicted in the Bruges Garter Book, over a tunic or tabard bearing his own armorials
The manuscript is now held by the British Library in London. From William Bruges the manuscript passed successively to the ownerships of:
The illustrations depict the 25 Founder Knights and King Edward III the sovereign of the Order of the Garter as follows, shown in ascending order of Garter-Stall number in St. George's Chapel:
O'Conor, Charles, Bibliotheca Ms. Stowensis: A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Stowe Library, 2 vols (Buckingham: Seeley, 1818-1819), II, 552-53.
Catalogue of the Stowe Manuscripts in the British Museum, 2 vols, London, 1895-1896),vol. I, no. 594.
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