Guillaume Fillastre (died 1473)

Guillaume Fillastre or Fillâtre (died 1473) was a Burgundian statesman, prelate and patron of arts.

[1] In 1431, he served Duke René I of Anjou as an envoy to Pope Eugene IV at the Council of Basel.

The monks yielded only to the implied threat of violence when Philip showed up in person in 1447–1448.

[1] In 1456, Philip designated him as the successor to the diocese of Tournai, where Bishop Jean Chevrot's health was failing.

[7] Fillastre lost influence in the Burgundian court after Charles the Bold seized power in March 1465, although he retained his posts of chancellor and chef du conseil until his death.

He died in 1473 and was buried, in accordance with his will, in the nave of Saint-Bertin in front of the altarpiece he had commissioned.

[1][9] He composed a liturgical office for the order and his greatest work, never finished, is the Histoire de Toison d'Or ('history of the golden fleece').

[2] Malte Prietzel calls it "a vast treatise on the moral and theological bases of politics" misleadingly titled.

[11] Edith Warren Hoffman describes the lost work as Fillastre's greatest commission: "The format of the altarpiece is noteworthy in that it consisted of a combination of gilded silver sculpture and paintings in an architectural framework; it was a type of Gesamtkunstwerk.

As such, it belongs to a category quite distinct from altarpieces made exclusively of painted panels.

In his will, he left behind five personal tapestries depicting falconry, ladies under canopies, Amis et Amiles, and the stories of Lucretia and David.

The Saint Petersburg Grandes Chroniques de France was commissioned as a gift for Philip the Good and contains a presentation miniature showing Fillastre handing the manuscript to the duke.

[13] Towards the end of his life, Fillastre commissioned the Della Robbia of Florence to sculpt his tomb.