Lot 15

Table of Affinity, miniature from an illuminated legal manuscript, in Latin, on vellum [Spain (perhaps Barcelona or Pamplona, late thirteenth century]

Estimate

4,000 - 6,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Vellum

a cutting, 202mm. by 117mm., with a standing couple holding an elaborately intertwined illuminated panel below an ornamental gothic architectural cornice terminating in a roof turret, to their sides a man and a woman, above 22 roundels (with the names of various degrees of kinship) in 3 columns and connected by two arches, all on a blue tessellated background with tiles picked out in white penwork with red dots, reverse with remains of 43 lines of text in 2 columns with red rubrics, trimmed to edge, slight thumbing to right hand side, else excellent condition, laid down on card mount

Provenance

provenance

From the collection of Charles Rattan (d.1984) of Paris; later Ferrini, Gothic Miniature Painting in Illuminated Manuscripts (Galleria Grafica, Tokyo, 1989), no.8, and then sold in our rooms, 17 December 1991, lot 18, to Alan Thomas, and again 22 June 1993, lot 27, to Maggs.

Catalogue Note

text

This is from a fine early gothic secular miniature. This is the table of the forbidden degrees of affinity, with a man proposing and a woman rejecting his advances. The style resembles that of Paris, but the work is Spanish in origin, and shows a close affinity with the former Dyson Perrins manuscript of Vidal Mayor (now J.Paul Getty Museum, MS.Ludwig XIV.6, commissioned by King James I of Aragon, 1208-76). The text is perhaps Johannes Andrea, Super Arbores Consanguinitatis et Affinitatis, and this was clearly a luxury copy.