Between Flanders and Paris: Originality and Quotation in the Montebourg Psalter

A mid-thirteenth-century psalter once owned by the Norman abbey of Montebourg (Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS. 14 [85.MK.239]) possesses many features that might identify it as the product of a Flemish atelier, but at the same time many that point as strongly to an origin in French Flanders or even Paris. Comparable uncertainty characterizes the origins of the Old Testament Picture Bible (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, MS. 638), which is either Parisian or north French. What seems certain is that the Montebourg Psalter was created by an artist working in the Picture Bible’s immediate circle. The Psalter artist absorbed a fascination with the activities of everyday life and the expression of emotion; and he provides insight into contemporary social concerns: enthusiasm for King Louis IX’s crusading enterprise, growing animosity toward Jews, and anxiety over profit making in the new mercantile economy.