Catalog Archive
Auction 122, Lot 844

"[Manuscript Leaf]", Anon.

Subject: Medieval Manuscripts

Period: 1365 (circa)

Publication:

Color: Hand Color

Size:
3.5 x 5 inches
8.9 x 12.7 cm
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Book of Hours were prayer books designed for the laity, but modeled on the Divine Office, a cycle of daily devotions, prayers and readings, performed by members of religious orders and the clergy. Its central text is the Hours of the Virgin. There are eight hours (times for prayer ): Matins, Lauds. Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline. During the Middle Ages, the leaves making up a Book of Hours were written by hand on expensive parchment and beautifully illuminated with jewel-like pigments and gold leaf. These illuminated manuscripts combined the collaborative efforts of an array of highly skilled craftspeople; requiring the joint labors of the parchmenter, professional scribes to write the text in Gothic script, artists to illuminate the pages with decorations, and masterful binders to complete the process.

This small vellum leaf is from a Book of Hours translated into Dutch, probably by Geert Groote. Most Books of Hours were written in Latin at that time, but Groote thought that even lay men should be able to read religious books. Groote established a center for manuscript copiers that led to the formation of the Brethren of the Common Life, a teaching order that was a major influence in the development of German humanism. The text is in black with some initials painted in blue or red.

References:

Condition: A

Estimate: $70 - $90

Sold for: $50

Closed on 12/5/2007

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