Christ on the Mount of Olives, a historiated initial on a leaf from an Antiphonary, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [southern Germany (Regensburg), c.1310]

single leaf, 478mm. by 369mm., historiated initial ‘C’ (opening ‘Calicem salutaris accipiam …’, the opening antiphon for Vespers of Holy Thursday) in blue with red and light pink foliage including a small human head on a silver ground framed in thin black and decorated with red and blue pen-flourishing extending into the border, enclosing Christ kneeling in prayer in a rocky landscape against a burnished gold ground, eight 4-line red staves with music and text in a gothic hand, rastrum 24mm., original prickings as ruling guides along inner margin, rubrics in red, initials in plain red, blue or brown with red and brown penwork decoration, partly cropped number ‘XV’ written in red ink at the bottom of verso, contemporary foliation ‘185’ in brownish-red ink in centre of recto at top, and modern pagination in brown ink in upper right corner ‘380’ and ‘381’, illumination with small pigment losses and a crease affecting Christ’s halo, gold and silver scuffed and chipped, remains of paper along edges on verso from previous mounting, in good condition

This leaf belongs to a well-known Antiphonary which was made by the nuns of the Dominican convent of the Holy Cross in Regensburg in the early fourteenth century (see R. Suckale in Harvard Library Bulletin 21.2, 2010, pp.45-52). The manuscript was still in the convent until 1876 when it was sold by the nuns. It had been broken up by the 1950s. Suckale identifies 13 other leaves with historiated initials: now in Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery, W.754a-b; Cambridge Mass., Houghton Library, MS. Typ 961; New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, M.870.1-3, see M. Harrsen, Central European Manuscripts, 1958, no.33, pl.51; Stockholm, National Museum, Erickson Foundation, Med. 1-4, see C. Nordenfalk, Bokmalningar, 1979, pp.54-5; two leaves offered by J. Günther, cat.5, 1997, no.33; and a leaf last recorded in a private collection. One of the Morgan leaves has the woman’s name "Gerwich" inscribed beneath its historiated initial, which may be that of the illuminatrix or the donor of the book.