Les Visions du chevalier Tondal is an illuminated manuscript from 1475, now at the Getty Museum, of a French version of the "Visio Tnugdali", of which it is the only fully illuminated manuscript to survive. It has 20 miniatures by Simon Marmion and elaborate borders with "CM" for the initials of Margaret of York, duchess of Burgundy and her husband Charles the Bold. The text was scribed by David Aubert in Ghent, whilst the miniatures were done in Valenciennes, where Marmion was based.[1] Only the pages with the 15 two column miniatures and five single column miniatures have borders, but as there are only 45 folios, the illumination is very full. The manuscript is fully available online.[2]
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The Visions of the Knight Tondal or "Visio Tnugdali", was written in Latin in the 12th century by an Irish monk named Marcus in Regensburg, where there was an Irish monastery. It was "the most popular and elaborate text in the medieval genre of visionary infernal literature" and had been translated forty-three times into fifteen languages by the 15th century,[3] including Icelandic and Belorussian.[4] It may have been part of the inspiration for Dante's journey into hell, purgatory and heaven.
In the story, Tondal is a wealthy Irish knight who passes out at a feast and goes into a deep dream-journey through Hell, Heaven and Purgatory (never so named — the doctrine was still in development), guided by an angel. The experience turns Tondal into a pious man. The story is set in Cork, Ireland in 1148, and claims to be a translation of an original in the Irish language, which however has not survived.[4]
Titles by the Getty, 19/20 listed,[5]: