An undesirable royal present : the ex-voto of the victory of Rhodes in 1480 at Notre-Dame de Paris
Un présent royal indésirable : l'ex voto de la victoire de Rhodes en 1480 à Notre-Dame de Paris
Résumé
The victory at Rhodes in August 1480 offered Christian Europe a brief respite in its struggle against the Turks. Relaying propaganda from the Hospitaller Order, King Louis XI of France decided a few months before his death in 1483 to offer a monument commemorating the event to Notre-Dame de Paris. The hitherto known texts give a confusing echo of the affair. The deliberations of the chapter of Notre-Dame, published only in part, reveal the true nature of the exvoto : a statue, probably a king, accompanied by a painting representing the siege of the island.
The documents identify the actual patron of the painting as Antoine d’Aubusson, brother of the grand maître of the Hospitallers, Pierre d’Aubusson, and they make clear the reluctance of the canons to hang the picture in the church, despite the insistence of Charles VIII and his close advisors. The fate of the picture, sent back in 1487, remains mysterious, but a series of clues suggest that it is one of the most enigmatic French paintings from the last quarter of the fifteenth century that has come down to us, the panoramic view of the siege of Rhodes hanging in the town hall at Épernay.