Clément Marot’s Modernized Roman de la Rose in a Beautiful Derome le Jeune Binding

[Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meung]. Le Rommant de la Rose nouellement Reueu et corrige oultre les precedentes Impressions. Paris, Galliot du Pré, 1529.

The celebrated 1529 edition of the Roman de la Rose revised and modernized by Clément Marot, court poet to Francis I, and the first edition of the text ever printed in roman type (“lettres rondes”). Illustrated with 51 graceful woodcuts entirely newly designed for the edition and preserved in an elegant eighteenth-century red morocco binding by Derome le Jeune, this copy once belonged to the important French collector Charles Cousin.

Edition & Bibliographic Information

Π8 a–z8 &8 τ8 A–Z8 aa–bb8 cc4 = 8 leaves, 403 numbered leaves, 1 leaf. Title printed in red and black with faint pale-red ruling throughout.

Illustrated with 51 woodcuts (32 distinct compositions), including the printer’s device of Galliot du Pré on the final verso. Small octavo (137 × 89 mm).

This is the second edition of Clément Marot’s famous modernization of the Roman de la Rose, first published in 1526. The original medieval poem by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meung had already become linguistically antiquated by the early sixteenth century, despite its enormous prestige as France’s great allegorical love poem. Marot’s task was therefore not to rewrite the work completely, but to make it readable and attractive again for Renaissance audiences.

Marot was uniquely positioned for the undertaking. As court poet and entertainer to Francis I, and deeply immersed in the traditions of courtly love poetry, he was ideally suited to rejuvenate the great medieval romance. His modernization successfully gave the work “a new lease of life,” as Bourdillon later acknowledged, leading to four editions between 1526 and 1538.

Physical Description & Binding

Eighteenth-century red morocco binding by Derome le Jeune on smooth spine richly gilt with fillets and floral tools. Covers with multiple gilt border frames, gilt board edges, gilt dentelles, pale blue silk endleaves, and entirely gilt edges throughout.

Slight traces of dampstaining barely visible at the lower margins in places; first two leaves and leaves G7–8 slightly smaller. Otherwise an exceptionally broad and attractive copy, notably preserving the generous margins around the printed marginalia which are frequently cut close in other examples.

The copy was admired already in the nineteenth century for precisely these qualities. In the Charles Cousin sale catalogue of 1891, the auctioneer praised it as:

“Exemplaire superbe haut de 138 mm et très large”

and remarked with relief that even Derome — notorious for trimming books — had “religiously respected the margins of the volume.”

Galliot du Pré and the Renaissance Reinvention of the Roman de la Rose

Publisher Galliot du Pré approached the edition with remarkable sophistication. Rather than merely reissuing a medieval text, he consciously reshaped the Roman de la Rose for Renaissance readers through typography, format, illustration, and editorial modernization.

Most significantly, this became:

“the only edition of all the twenty-one in roman type”

according to Bourdillon.

The shift from gothic type toward elegant Antiqua letterforms visually aligned the medieval romance with contemporary Renaissance printing aesthetics. At the same time, the compact octavo format followed the newly emerging fashion for “small and dainty books.”

The 51 woodcuts likewise represented a major artistic departure. Though inspired partly by earlier Vérard illustrations, they introduced a much more modern visual language with increased attention to perspective, shading, movement, and graceful composition. Bourdillon considered them evidence that:

“the modern spirit has prevailed.”

Clément Marot and the End of Medieval France

The edition occupies a fascinating transitional moment between medieval and Renaissance France. Marot himself embodied many of the tensions of the age: admired court poet, literary innovator, suspected Protestant sympathizer, prisoner, exile, and one of the defining poetic voices of the French Renaissance.

His modernization of the Roman de la Rose therefore became more than a textual revision. It was an attempt to preserve a foundational medieval work by translating it into the language, visual culture, and reading habits of sixteenth-century France.

The success of this strategy was immediate. Through the combined effect of updated language, modern typography, elegant illustration, and portable format, the medieval romance once again became fully intelligible and desirable for Renaissance readers.

Provenance

Verso front flyleaf with monogram stamp “A. L.” and monogram ex-libris with the motto:

“C’est ma toquade”

belonging to the collector Charles Cousin (1822–1890); his sale, Paris, 6–11 April 1891, lot 238.

Literature

BM STC French 288; Bourdillon Q; Brun 241; Brunet III, 1174f.; Davies, Fairfax Murray French, no. 329; Ebert 19314; Graesse IV, 262; Lonchamp, Français II, 194; Panzer VIII, p. 126, no. 1834; Rahir 619; Tchemerzine VII, 245.

For a fuller scholarly description and illustrations, see Wunderkammer Catalogue 90, number 77a:
Wunderkammer Catalogue 90, Volume II