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 two large initials and several small initials that were hand painted in red, blue and gold. The text includes part of "Ave Maria ... virgo serena" and translates as:

Hail, pious humility, fertility without a man, whose annunciation was our salvation.
Hail, true virginity, unspotted chastity, whose purification was our cleansing.
Hail, famous with all, angelic virtues, whose assumption was our glorification.
O Mother of God, remember me. Amen.

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Condition: A

Minor soiling.