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.

A nice vellum manuscript from a French Book of Hours, in the style of a Rouen scriptorium. Written in brown ink, the leaf has a decorative panel in the margin on recto with ivy and flowers and a number of illuminated initials in red, blue and burnished gold leaf. Beginning with the large "D" on recto, the text translates in part as:

O God, reach out to help me. O Lord, hasten to assist me.
To you I have lifted up my eyes.
Had it not been that the Lord was with us.
Those who trust in the Lord.

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Condition: B+

Light soiling.