Late Gothic Portraiture: The Prioress and Philippa

Author / Editor
Fredell, Joel.

Title
Late Gothic Portraiture: The Prioress and Philippa

Published
Chaucer Review 23 (1989): 181-91.

Description
Chaucer's use of an identifiable late-Gothic portrait technique can be seen by comparing one of the most familiar portraits of GP--the Prioress--with a roughly contemporary sculptural portrait of Philippa of Hainault. These late-Gothic portraits represent a dialogue in which the creator of the portrait gives a (potentially ironic) respectful representation to the subject's attempts to fulfill high-Gothic abstract "types."

Chaucer Subjects
General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales.
Prioress and Her Tale.