Three roundels from the margins of a Choirbook [Italy (Bologna), c.1365]

three circular miniatures, 80mm, 66mm, and 57mm in diameter, vellum, depicting three half-length figures, the reverses all blank (a) Christ blessing, holding an open book, and displaying the wound in his right hand, somewhat rubbed and creased; (b) a grieving female saint, probably the Virgin Mary or Mary Magdalene as depicted from the left side of a Crucifixion composition, minor rubbing and creasing; (c) a male figure, dressed in black/brown, holding a book, and identified as ‘Beatus Symon’; each framed against faded red velvet

From the collection of Dr. F.G. Zeileis (Più ridon le carte: Buchmalerei aus Mittelalter und Renaissance, 2004, no.36).

These cuttings were illuminated by NICCOLÒ DI GIACOMO DA BOLOGNA who was one of the most successful illuminators working in Bologna. He is mentioned periodically in the Bologna city archives from 1369, and by the late 1380s he had been appointed illuminator to the city. Some of his works are signed, dated or datable and his career can be established between 1349 and 1403.

The figure with rays of light around his head (not a solid gold halo), identified as Beatus Symon is, to judge by his tonsure and dark habit, an Augustinian monk. He has previously been identified as the Augustinian Simon of Cascia, who died of the Black Death in 1348 and who was the author of several works, which would explain the book he holds. He preached in Bologna, Siena, Florence, and Perugia, and was especially successful at converting prostitutes. This may explain the presence of Mary Magdalene (if that is the correct identification of the female figure), as she was thought in the Middle Ages to be a repentant prostitute. If this were correct, the manuscript from which these roundels are cut could have been commissioned for the church of Santa Maria Maddalena, Bologna. According to Gaudenz Freuler (cited in Zeileis’ 2004 catalogue), the fragments could also relate to the Augustinian church San Giacomo Maggiore in Bologna, for which the master produced several Choirbooks which survive only as fragments.