Armorial de la Paix d'Arras

This armorial (APA) gives the arms of 401 participants and members of their retinues, who were present at the conference held in Arras (Artois) in June-September 1435. The purpose of the conference was to end the 'Hundred Years' war between the King of France and the King of England and his ally, the Duke of Burgundy, a relative and formal subject of the King of France. The conference was called and mediated by the Concilium of the Church held at Basel. The result was that France and Burgundy made peace, but the war between England and France continued for two decades.

The reconstruction is based on two manuscripts:

• (A) London, British Library, Ms.Add.11542, ff.94r-106r; 203 items; loose pages bound into a volume of miscellaneous material; a contemporary painted fragment in the same hand and brush as the scribe-artisan responsible for the Armorial Equestre de la Toison d'or et de l'Europe (TOE), and include a copy of the English segment of TOE.
• (B) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, ms.fr.8199, ff.12r5-15v6, 17v-46v; 398 items; a painted notebook of Philippe d'Aumale dit marquis d'Haucourt, fl.1650; besides the APA, this notebook contain the Armorial Hozier-Cenalis (HCH), and the Austrian segment of ETO and the Bohemian segment of Armorial Lyncenich al. Gymnich (LYN).

The two manuscripts have overlapping contents, but in different order. The younger manuscript (B, ms.fr.8199) was copied in Bruxelles, probably by long lines over a double spread of pages either from an earlier copy or possibly from ms.A with some now lost pages.

The reconstruction is based on ms.A (Add.11542) with the addtional material presented as in ms.B. Regrettably, the analysis of the structures did not allow a full reconstruction of the original layout.

It consits of four segments: (1) the Mediators, 12 items; (2) the French delegation, 18 items; (3) the English delegation, 15 items, only in ms.B; and (4) the Burgundian hosts, 356 items.

How to get it

• download APA, pdf, 700 KB; Steen Clemmensen: Armorial de la Paix d'Arras, Heraldiske Studier 4, Societas Heraldica Scandinavica, Copenhagen, 2006, 104 pp., ISBN 87-88313-05-0