L'Hystoire des devx prevx tres nobles et tres-vaillans chevaliers Valentin et Orson : fils de l'Empereur de Grece, & nepueux du tres-vaillant & tres-Chrestien Roy de France, Pepin. Contenant plusieurs & diuerses matieres, comme vous pourrez veoir cy apres
A French chapbook of the Valentin and Orson romance, printed in Troyes in 1614 by Nicolas Oudot for popular readers of cheap tales of chivalry. Its four woodcuts show knights on horseback jousting and fighting in a landscape, a walled town with a tower, a crowd of armed men leading captives, and a courtly scene of a seated king receiving a kneeling figure. The crude, bold line work of the cuts suits designers wanting rustic medieval narrative imagery with strong black-and-white contrast.
