Mademoiselle Boquet

Mademoiselle Boquet
(fl late 14th century; d before 30 Nov 1406). French composer. He is probably identifiable with Johannes de Bosco (Boscho, Bosquo) or Jean du Bois, a cleric and singer from Tournai who can be traced from about 1364 to 1406.

In 1371, while rector of Ascq (near Lille), Johannes de Bosco received a canonicate at St Pierre, Lille. He served Cardinal Jean de Blauzac, Bishop of Nîmes (vicar-general in Avignon under Gregory XI), as cubicularius until 1379 (and probably for the previous 15 years), together with Richardus de Bozonvilla, who later became magister capellae in Avignon (1394–1405). From 1391 to 12 December 1404 Bosco was a singer in the chapel of the antipope Clement VII; in 1393 he received a papal grant as a musician to Duke Louis II of Anjou, a title he must have acquired before 1390. In 1394 Bosco and 13 other singers, including the composers Hasprois and Haucourt, swore allegiance to the new pope, Benedict XIII. Bosco renewed his oath after the pope’s flight from Avignon in 1403; the next year he followed Benedict to the abbey of St Victor at Marseilles, but he did not accompany the pope to Italy at the end of 1404. (A Catalan cleric with the very common name Johannes de Bosco, traceable during the siege of the papal palace in 1398, must have been a different person.) Johannes de Bosco, the papal singer, seems to have spent the last two years of his life at the Bourges palace of Jean, Duke of Berry (the uncle of Louis II of Anjou). The name Johannes de Bosco or Jehan du Bois appears as a vicar of the Ste Chapelle at Bourges from the time of its dedication in 1405 to 1406, next to those of three other composers: Pierre Fontaine, Guillaume le Grant and Paullet. He must have died shortly before 30 November 1406, since petitions for the reversion of his benefices in Le Mans and Reims are recorded from this date.