Abstract
This article proposes to examine Mellin de Saint-Gelais’ activity as librarian at the court of François 1st, king of France. On the basis of rather famous documents (such as the royal acts, or the inventory composed for the transportation of Blois’ Library to Fontainebleau in 1544, the inventory being annotated by Mellin himself) and less known ones (such as annotations written by Mellin in certain manuscripts of the Royal Library), we will investigate the relationship that Mellin establishes with Italian Humanism, particularly through his opinions on certain works by Laurent Valla. This article further proposes, for the very first time, a paleographic analysis of Mellin’s writing, which is entirely based on the graphic model of Italian humanist minuscule of the 15th century.
Veneziale, Marco