The Assumption of the Virgin, large historiated initial cut from an illuminated manuscript antiphoner on vellum

Estimate

2,000 - 3,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

a cutting, 117mm. by 156mm., a large initial 'U' in divided red and blue (doubtless from the invitatory "Venite adoremus …" at the opening of Matins, feast of the Assumption, 15 August) enclosing a scene of the Virgin in prayer being carried upwards by six angels, all with burnished gold haloes edged with a ring of punchmarks, elaborate penwork surround in red and black, marginal figure of a Franciscan friar kneeling in prayer while gazing at the Virgin, with a banderole "O mater dei memento mei", verso with remnant of 3 lines of text in a gothic liturgical hand and music on a 4-line red stave, slight rubbing and some minor loss of paint, cut roughly to shape, in a card presentation folder

Catalogue Note

This cutting contains a remarkable mix of styles. The script and much of the decoration is French, but the use of punchmarks to highlight the edge of the burnished gold points towards German practices, and it is perhaps worth noting that E. König, in his recent book on the Bedford Master (The Bedford Hours: the making of a medieval masterpiece, 2007), has postulated an origin for that artist in the region of Alsace, partially on the basis of that criterion. The presence of the kneeling Franciscan friar indicates that this miniature originated in a monastic house of that order, probably in one of the numerous houses of Franciscans which flourished around the principal centres of Strasbourg and Metz from the second quarter of the thirteenth century onwards.

As a monastic product, the quality of the composition of this miniature is worth note. While the Virgin stands at the centre of the composition in a rather wooden and heavy pose, the artist has extended the tips of the wings of the angels a few millimetres out of the enclosed body of the initial, giving the illusion of space and movement; this is complemented by the use of green on the underside of the angel’s wings to echo the grass below, and orange on the upper to echo the sun, towards which the entire group is moving.