Breviary, Use of Autun, in Latin [France (perhaps Autun), c.1480]

c.190x135mm, vellum, v+463+v leaves, bound too tightly to allow confident collation, but lacking most of the leaves with historiated initials, 2 columns, 31 lines (c.117x83mm), 2 HISTORIATED INITIALS, AND HUNDREDS OF ILLUMINATED INITIALS WITH PARTIAL BORDERS THROUGHOUT, ff.175 and 380 torn, ORIGINAL BLIND-STAMPED BROWN LEATHER BINDING, with concentric rectangles made up of small square stamps (Paschal lamb, unicorn, lion, etc.), the joints renewed, the clasps missing

Provenance

(1) Written for the Use of Autun (‘Eduensis’ in Latin): the calendar includes numerous highly-graded entries for the city in red, including Nazarus & Celsus (28 July), Lazarus (1 Sept., 20 Oct.), Andochius, Thyrsus, and Felix (24 Sept.), and Leodegar ‘in eccles. Ed.’ (2 Oct.); other Autun feasts include Racho (29 Jan., 5 Dec.), Rheticus (17 July), Cassianus (5 Aug.), and the dedication of the cathedral of St-Lazare (30 Dec.); the litany and Sanctorale include Autun saints, the latter also has rubrics such as ‘Nota quod in aliis ecclesiis civitatis et dioc. Eduen. isto die fuerit vespere de sanctis Nazario et Celso …’ (f.370r). (2) The Carmelites of Semur-en-Auxois, about 40 miles north of Autun, with their 17th-century ownership inscriptions and shelfmark ‘Carmeli Semuriensis G.130’ (ff.v verso and 1r) and ‘ex bibliotheca Carmelitarum Semuriensium’ (f.8r). (3) From the library at Fettercairn House, Kincardineshire, the property of the descendants of Sir William Forbes, 6th Baronet of Pitsligo (1739–1806).

Text and Illumination

Calendar, graded up to quadruplex (f.1r); Ferial Psalter, beginning imperfectly in Ps.4 (f.8r) followed by litanies, benedictions, and suffrages; Temporale, beginning imperfectly in the first lesson at Matins in Advent (f.81r); Sanctorale (f.261r); Advent Office of the Virgin (f.431v); Common of saints (f.438r); Office of the Visitation, preceded by a rubric attributing it to Pope Sixtus IV (1471–84) (f.454r), and followed by an endorsement dated at St Peter’s, Rome, 1 January 1474, ‘L[eonardus] Grifus .ff. de montana. Registrata in camera apostolica. G[aspar] Blondis’ (f.463r).

The subjects of the historiated initials are: (1) a naked man, lying in water, looking up to heaven (Psalm 68; f.31r); (2) Pentecost (the vigil of Pentecost; f.201r); (3) part of a torn initial, The Visitation, survives at f.455r.