Lot 6

Collection of leaves including a leaf from the Hungerford Hours, manuscripts on vellum [fourteenth to eighteenth centuries]

Estimate

3,000 - 5,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Vellum and Paper

3 leaves and 3 documents: (a) leaf from the Hungerford Hours in Latin, 166mm. by 107mm., with a 3-line illuminated initial 'L' (opening "Lauda anima mea ...") in pink with white penwork, enclosing a drollery creature with a balding bearded human head, on burnished gold, coloured foliage extensions up and down inner margin, 11 small initials in blue and gold with line fillers to match, very minor flaking from initial and slight trimming at top, East Anglia (diocese of Ely), c.1330-40 (with a modern facsimile on vellum of the same leaf); (b) leaf from the St. Albans Bible with the end of Thessalonians and the opening of I Timothy, 293mm. by 200mm., an initial 'n' enclosing the tiny and detailed face of a Jewish prophet, one 5-line initial in blue enclosing foliage on gold grounds, three 2-line initials in same, all with extensions of coloured foliage edged with gold and terminating in ivy leaves forming a text frame, a 10-line initial cut out and space filled with modern blank vellum, Paris, c.1330; (c) upper half of a leaf from a Bible (Genesis 34:15 to 35:16 and 35:26 to 36:37), 260mm. by 210mm., double column, 34 lines, with remains of two bars of text frame in pink, blue and gold with foliage, a biting animal and a delicately painted grey stork, some folding else good condition, England or northern France, c.1300; (d) 3 Venetian documents, one a letter of Duke Marino Grimani of Venice (1595–1606), on vellum with attached lead bulla, dated 1603; two others on paper, from Lorenzo Priuli, a Venetian ambassador (and father of Duke Antonio Priuli), dated 13 November 1584, and Duke Marco Foscarini (1762–1763), dated 2 December 1759

Catalogue Note

Item (a) is from the Hungerford Hours, probably illuminated by the artist of the Psalter in Schloss Herdringen. The leaf includes the end of the Magnificat and the opening of Psalm 145, from Vespers in the Office of the Dead. It is an addition to the leaves recorded by M.A. Michael, English Manuscript Studies 1100-1700 II (1990), pp.33-108, with further additions in C. de Hamel, Gilding the Lilly. A Hundred Medieval and Illuminated Manuscripts in the Lilly Library, 2010, no.44.