Breviary, Use of monastery of San Sisto, Piacenza, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Lombardy (doubtless Piacenza), second half of fifteenth century (probably 1457)]

Estimate

4,000 - 6,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Vellum

482 leaves (including 3 endleaves at front with computistical material), 125mm. by 95mm., wanting a gathering at end, else complete, collation: i-xx¹⁰, xxi⁸, xxii⁴, xxiiixxx¹⁰, xxxi⁴, xxxiixlv¹⁰, xlvi³ (last a cancelled blank), xlvii-l¹⁰, double column, 32 lines in a tiny gothic bookhand, capitals touched in yellow, rubrics in red, 2- to 3-lines initials in alternate red and blue with contrasting penwork, catchwords within decorated frames (often elaborate and touched in colour), four illuminated initials in pink or blue enclosing scrolling acanthus leaves on brightly burnished gold grounds (fols.1r, 213r, 297r, 440r), the first with a decorated border panel of similar leaves with gold undersides and infill, large coloured circular diagram on verso of first endleaf, water damage at top (affecting a few lines of text on each page and top of leaves in centre of volume, also causing slight losses to last 2 illuminated initials), large smudge at base of fol.1r, else good and presentable condition, nineteenth-century brown leather over pasteboards, rebacked

Provenance

provenance

Written for use in the great monastery of San Sisto, Piacenza, by a member of the Benedictine congregation of Santa Giustina of Padua (founded by Empress Angilberga in 877, and the original home of Raphael’s Sistine Madonna, that sold to Dresden in 1754, community suppressed by Napoleonic decree in 1810): inscription opening text, “incipit breviarium monasticum secundum consuetudinem monachorum congregationis de observantia sancte iustine de padua” and in bright blue ink on fol.212v, “ Istud breviarium est monasterii sancti sixti placentie congregationis sancte iustine de padua, ordinis sancti benedicti”. A series of choirbooks made for them, and once used alongside this pocket volume, was sold by the Hispanic Society of America at Christie’s, 12 November 2008, lot 38.

Catalogue Note

text

The volume includes: the Temporal (fol.1r); a Ferial Psalter (fol.213r); the Sanctoral (297r); and the Common (fol.440r, wants ending). The Calendar Table on fol.1v is made out for the year 1457.