- 5
Collection of leaves from illuminated manuscripts, on vellum [twelfth to fifteenth centuries]
Estimate
3,000 - 5,000 GBP
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Description
- Vellum
4 leaves: (a) leaf from a Lectionary, 334mm. by 240mm., 22 lines in brown ink in a fine early gothic hand, one large initial touched in blue, another variegated in red and blue with penwork and a large extension into bas-de-page terminating in complex penwork foliage, Italy, mid-twelfth century; (b) opening leaf from Hebrew names section from a Bible, 210mm. by 150mm., double column, 50 lines, initials in red or blue, large initial 'A' in pink enclosing interweaving foliage terminating in a lacertine animal, all on blue ground edged with gold, northern France (doubtless Paris), second half of thirteenth century; (c) leaf from Gregory's Decretals, 215mm. by 145mm., "de Officio Archidiaconi", double column, 38 lines, one foliage-filled initial in red, blue, pink and gold on verso, another similar on recto enclosing a bust of a dog-faced man, Bologna, c.1350; (d) leaf from an antiphoner, 340mm. by 245mm., one large decorated initial in red, green, blue and faded pink, on blue ground with acanthus-leaf sprays and large bezants, 6 lines of text with music on a 4-line red stave, Italy (perhaps Florence), fifteenth century; all in excellent condition
Catalogue Note
Item (a) is from a book once owned by Otto Ege and now widely dispersed, and item (b) is from a Bible once in the library of the Carthusian abbey of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon, recorded by Ker, Medieval Manuscripts, I, p.xii, n.2, and Manion, Vines and de Hamel, Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in New Zealand Collections, 1989, no.68. The present leaf does not appear in that survey.