I’m reading Gordon Corrigan’s history of the Hundred Years’ War, A Great and Glorious Adventure. I enjoyed his history of the battle of Waterloo and this book is more of the same–lots of historical details, plenty of witty footnotes, (this being the best) and a gleefully pro-English bias.
But that’s not what I’m here to talk about. I want to talk about the book’s cover:
From a design perspective, it’s perfectly fine. I might have gone for an older-looking font for the title and author’s name, but that’s not a big deal.
But let’s look closer at that painting on the cover:
According to Wikipedia, this is a painting by Charles de Steuben, entitled Bataille de Poitiers en octobre 732. (“The Battle of Poitiers in October 732.”) It depicts the victory of Charles Martel and the Franks over the Umayyad Caliphate.
This is a fascinating battle, but it doesn’t have anything to do with the Hundred Years’ War, which didn’t start until May of 1337. So what’s going on here?
Well, there was also a Battle of Poitiers during the Hundred Years’ War. In fact, this is the more famous Battle of Poitiers, and the Franks vs. Umayyads one is more commonly known as the Battle of Tours. I’ve written about this confusion before.
I’m thinking what happened here is that somebody searched for an image for “Battle of Poitiers,” found this, and was impressed by how sharp it looks. I can’t blame them; how were they to know there were two Battles of Poitiers?
Haha! What made you investigate the painting? I think most people would assume it was from the correct battle!
It so happened I was reading about the battle of Tours, and the Wikipedia page for it has that painting. I was puzzled for a minute and had to think to remember where I’d seen it before.
Hah! That’s pretty funny. I wonder if the author had the opportunity to see a proof first?
I’m guessing not–can’t imagine he wouldn’t have caught it.