[WARD] ROMANCE OF THE ROSE 195 
Chancellor of the University of Paris, Guillaume de Tignonville,’ Prévot 
de Paris, and Marshal Boucicault. 
The last named, indeed, who had just returned from his successful 
campaign in the East, founded in 1399 an order of knighthood ex- 
pressly for the defence of women, called “ l’écu verd à la dame blanche.”’? 
A little later, February 14, 1400, St. Valentine’s day, a number of 
great lords and poets assembled in the hôtel of the duc de Bourgogne in 
Paris and founded an extensive organisation called the “Cour Amou- 
reuse,” * to honor ladies and cultivate poetry. All classes of society 
were represented in the six hundred members whose names have come 
down to us.‘ We are perhaps especially interested in noticing the 
names of Gontier Col, and his brother Pierre Col, probably the foremost 
disciples (with Jean de Montreuil) of Jean de Meung. 
One year to the day after the formation of the “ Cour Amoureuse, ” 
Christine de Pisan wrote her Dit de la Rose’ (document II) In this she 
seems to be conscious (probably from support given her by the “Cour 
Amoureuse” and by the queen) of having an established position as a 
defender of her sex. 
The controversy seems to have commenced,® as was very natural 
considering the circumstances, with oral discussions between Christine 
de Pisan, Jean de Montreuil,’ and a third person, probably Gerson.’ 

1 Counsellor and Chamberlain of Charles VI.—then prévôt of the City of Paris, 
1401—1408—afterwards président de la chambre des comptes until his death (1414)— 
widely known on account of his execution of two clerks of the Université, guilty of 
assassination, whom he had hanged at night by torchlight and left attached to the 
gibbet for four months, when they were cut down and buried by Pierre des Essars 
(a creature of the duc de Bourgogne), who thus was able to infringe the commission 
of full power given Guillaume de Tignonville, June 21, 1401—of noble lineage, wise, 
a fine orator, and highly esteemed by the king—the translator, before becoming 
prévot of Paris, of the Dicta Philosophorum under the title Livre des Philosophes. 
(Cf. P. Paris, Manuscrits français, IV. pp. 92-97, 173.) 
2 Cf. M. Roy, Oeuvres poétiques de Christine de Pisan (in the Sôc. des anc. textes 
rranc.) 6. IE, p: LV. 
3 Cf. A. Piaget in Romania, XX, pp. 417-454. 
4 Cf. Mss. 5233 and 10469, Bib. nat. fr. 
° Ed. by F. Heuckenkamp, Halle, 1891, and by M. Roy, op. cit. t. II. p. 29 sqq. 
5 Cf. for chronology of the letters A. Piaget in Etudes romanes dédiées à Gaston 
Paris, 1891, pp. 113-120. 
7 Jean de Montreuil (called maistre Jehan Johannes by Christine de Pisan), 
diplomat and secrétaire du roi, was one of the leading humanists of his time, and 
numbered among his friends manyfamous men. Cf. A. Thomas, De Joannisde Mons- 
terolio vita et operibus, Paris, 1883, p. 1: “ut Petro de Alliaco, Joanni Gersoni, Nicolao 
de Clamengiis, sed etiam italicis, ut Colutio Florentino Leonardoque Aretino amicitia 
conjunctus est.” He studied at the University of Paris, though he did not attend 
lectures there by Gontier Col, whom he elsewhere calls his “praeceptorem.’’ He 
8 Cf. document XI. 
