author
Geoffroy de La Tour Landry
d. 1402
A 14th-century French knight, remembered less for battle than for the lively advice book he wrote for his daughters. His work opens a rare window onto medieval family life, manners, and moral teaching.
1 Audiobook
Le livre du chevalier de La Tour Landry pour l'enseignement de ses filles
by Geoffroy de La Tour Landry
About the author
Born before 1330, Geoffroy de La Tour Landry was a French nobleman from Anjou who fought in the Hundred Years' War. He is best known today for Livre pour l'enseignement de ses filles—often called The Book of the Knight of the Tower—which he began in 1371 as a guide for his daughters.
The book mixes moral instruction with anecdotes, warnings, and practical examples, giving modern readers an unusually personal glimpse of aristocratic life in 14th-century France. Though written as conduct literature, it has lasted because it also preserves the voice of a father trying to shape the character and reputation of his children.
He is generally said to have died sometime between 1402 and 1406. Little about his life is known in detail, but his book remains his lasting legacy and one of the more vivid surviving works of medieval domestic advice.