Manuscript on parchment (hairside yellow and speckled) of Cicero, Epistolae ad familiares. With Extract from Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae III.8.8: Epistula Fabricii et Aemilii consulum ad Pyrrhum regem. The text was copied ca. 1400 and the border decoration added between ca. 1415 and 1431.
Description:
14 elegant illuminated initials and partial borders at the beginning of each of the 16 books (the opening pages of Books XII and XV have been excised). Initials, 5- to 3-line, blue with white filigree or red with gold filigree on cusped grounds of gold. Most of the illuminated initials filled with bust-length portraits, presumably of Cicero's correspondents, on red, blue or diapered ground. Some initials filled with vine scrolls with trilobe leaves in red with white highlights against gold ground. Partial borders, scrolling vine with trilobe leaves or acanthus in blue, pink, red and gold with white highlights and green, red and blue with gold highlights. Small figures of angels, dressed in green with gold wings in borders or margins, some playing musical instruments, one holding an open book, one holding the cloth of Veronica. Other marginal figures include the "Agnus Dei" and a pelican piercing its breast. The figures are all characterized by white faces, small angled black eyes, and a preference for green and gold, the green with contour lines in gold. Plain initials alternate red and blue. Rubrics throughout., Binding: Nineteenth century, France (?). Red velvet case with a dark green gold-tooled label: "M. T. Ciceronis Epistolae Ad Familiares MS. in Membranis". Gilt edges., Imperfect: incomplete, some leaves wanting with loss of text., and Script: Written in a neat fere-humanistic hand by a single scribe, below top line.
Subject (Topic):
Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Manuscripts, Medieval--Connecticut--New Haven, and Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in Beinecke Library
Manuscript on parchment of Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae (abridged).
Description:
Binding: Fifteenth century, Italy. Sewn on three tawed skin, kermes pink slit straps nailed in channels on the outside of the wooden boards. Yellow edges. The plain wound endbands may have been resewn. The spine is lined with cloth. Covered in brown, originally tan, sheepskin with corner tongues. Blind-tooled with two rope interlace stars in a central panel bordered with concentric frames. Spine: bands outlined with double fillets; panels diapered with triple fillets. Two truncated diamond fastenings, the catches on the lower board (one wanting), the upper board cut in for straps attached with star-headed nails., Folio 1r with partial border in inner and lower margin (rubbed). Inner margin has scrolling vine, yellow, on parchment ground with red dots, with stylized foliage, flowers and fruit in green, red, purple and dove grey. Illuminated initial, 3-line, purple on dark green ground, is incorporated into border. In lower margin, wreathed medallion (unidentified mutilated arms: per pale, or and sable?) on pink ground, supported by two heraldic dragons, parchment colored (unfinished) against red ground. All of this decoration appears to be a later addition. Plain initials and headings in red., and Script: Written in fere-humanistic script by a single scribe, below top line.
Subject (Name):
Gellius, Aulus
Subject (Topic):
Commonplace-books, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Latin literature, Manuscripts, Medieval--Connecticut--New Haven, and Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in Beinecke Library