Jean d'Arras

Jean d'Arras was a 15th-century North French poet-composer (trouvere) of whom little is known.

He collaborated with Antoine du Val and Fouquart de Cambrai in putting together a collection of stories entitled L'Évangile des quenouilles ("The spinners' gospel"). The frame story is that these are the narratives told a group of ladies at their spinning, who relate the current theories on a great variety of subjects. The work dates from the middle of the 15th century and is of considerable value for the light it throws on medieval manners, and for its echoes of folklore, sometimes deeply buried under layers of Christianity.

Jean d'Arras, perhaps the same, wrote, at the request of John, duke of Berry he says in his introduction, a long prose romanc

Jean d'Arras was a 15th-century North French poet-composer (trouvere) of whom little is known.

He collaborated with Antoine du Val and Fouquart de Cambrai in putting together a collection of stories entitled L'Évangile des quenouilles ("The spinners' gospel"). The frame story is that these are the narratives told a group of ladies at their spinning, who relate the current theories on a great variety of subjects. The work dates from the middle of the 15th century and is of considerable value for the light it throws on medieval manners, and for its echoes of folklore, sometimes deeply buried under layers of Christianity.

Jean d'Arras, perhaps the same, wrote, at the request of John, duke of Berry he says in his introduction, a long prose romance variously called the Roman de Mélusine or the Chronique de Melusine part of Le Noble Hystoire de Lusignan ("The Noble History of the Lusignans"), in 1392-94. He dedicated the work to Marie of Valois, Duchess of Bar and expressed the hope it would aid in the political education of her children.