1534

Dormer Window Frame (installed here as a doorway) with a Central Figure of Lucretia, from the Château of Montal

This monumental component was part of an ambitious scheme of architectural renovation that took place between 1519 and 1534 for a widowed French noblewoman named Jeanne de Balsac. It was executed as part of improvements to the interior courtyard of her château of Montal, and its carved motifs reveal the sculptor’s awareness of fashionable Renaissance ornamental designs. Some elements of the decoration carried personal meaning for Jeanne, including the initial “R” at the left center of the architrave, which referred to the widow's son Robert. At the center near the top is a figure of the tragic ancient heroine Lucretia plunging a knife into her breast. She may symbolize despair, a meaningful emotion for Jeanne, whose father, brothers, husband, and son died in the early 1500s in the French wars of the Italian peninsula.