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"[Book of Hours Leaf]", Anon.

This leaf is from the brief transitional period when the new technology of printing with movable type was combined with the more labor intensive methods of hand painting. The earliest printers were trained in the manuscript tradition and incorporated the conventions of historiated initials and illustrations into their early work. At first they left those spaces blank for the illuminator to complete entirely by hand. Later they developed printing methods (using woodcuts or iron engravings) to decorate the leaves.

This vellum leaf has three large initials and a number of small symbols that were hand painted in red, blue and gold. The text includes part of Ecclesiasticus 24, and translates as:

And so was I established in Sion, and in the holy city likewise I rested, and my power was in Jerusalem.
And I took root in an honorable people, and in the portion of my God his inheritance, and my abode is in the full assembly of saints.

References:

Condition: A

Light staining along the fore-edge.