Manuscript on parchment (sturdy) of Calendar; Psalter; Six canticles; and Litany
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written by a single scribe in bold, early gothic bookhand. Notes by several later scribes, some of which have been erased., Full page initial B (f. 2v) in blue with pink and blue interior vine-stem patterns, on gold ground surrounded by red rectangular frame outlined in black. Smaller gold initials, 10- to 8-line, for Psalms 26, 38, 51, 52, 80, 97, 101, 109 (ff. 21r, 33v, 43r, 43v, 53v, 68r, 70r, 83r), of similar design, on blue ground with vine-stem patterns of olive green, white, and red, and rectangular frame of red and white. Other psalms introduced by gold initials, 9- to 3-line, outlined in red, infilled and surrounded by blue penwork designs; headings and first letter of each verse in red. Most decorative initials are severely rubbed., Trimming of outer margins on ff. 8 and 122 affects text., and Binding: 16th-17th centuries. Resewn with three strands of thread on four round, twisted, vegetable fiber cords laid in forked grooves and laced in and out of flush oak boards. The cords are pegged twice: from outside to inside and vice versa with almost square pegs. The vegetable fiber endband cores are laced into the boards, the endbands themselves wanting. The spine is rounded, with traces of adhesive. Covered in tawed skin, once white, now tan and white. The turn-ins are sometimes turned in over small fragments of a parchment manuscript, in other cases, under, and the corners cut square. There is some inscribed parchment on the outside of the upper board, probably part of a spine lining. The discoloration on the endleaves does not match the present turn-ins. There are traces of four round bosses on each board and of a pin in the center of the upper one. The white, tawed strap, most of which is now wanting, is attached to the lower board through a metal plate. One corner of the upper board is cut away and the covering of the spine and part of the boards wanting. A messy, somewhat primitive binding.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Psalters
Manuscript on parchment (ff. 56v-57r palimpsest?) of a Psalter; with Hours of the Virgin, use unidentified
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written by a single scribe in well formed late caroline minuscule, above the top line. Marginal notes, some with neumes above them (e.g. ff. 63v, 65r), in several later hands have been partially lost due to trimming., Initials for text divisions, 11-line (f. 115r: Ps. 101) and 7-line (f. 22r: Ps. 26, f. 40r: Ps. 38, f. 93r: Ps. 80, f. 112v: Ps. 97, f. 133r: Ps. 109), gold, with symmetrical gold tendril ornament, occasionally with dragon-head terminals, against green and mauve panelled grounds covered with dense red cross-hatching set in red and mauve frames. 7- to 2-line initials for other Psalms, red or green with red and/or green flourishes. 1-line initials for verses, alternating red and green. Headings in red and/or green throughout., and Binding: Sixteenth century. Resewn on four tawed, slit straps. Wooden boards chamfered and indented. Edges gilt. The spine is square and now lined with cloth. Covered in dark brown calf, blind-stamped with portraits of saints (one of whom may be Rochus) and fleurons in concentric panels (?); very little of the earlier cover remaining. Clasp-and-catch fastening, the catch on the upper board, the brown leather straps attached through metal plates to the lower. Rebacked with one half of the leather on the boards replaced with old leather from another book. Catches and clasps wanting. Upper sewing supports broken.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Psalters
Manuscript on paper in a neat bookhand of 57 devotional poems written in celebration of the feasts of the Roman Catholic Church from Trinity Sunday to the close of the Time after Pentecost. The volume opens with a 13 stanza poem, "For Trinitie Sunday," followed by a 12 stanza poem, "Of the Blessed Sacrament." Thereafter the poems cover feasts and saints' days from St. Barnaby's Day (June 11) to St. Catherine's Day (November 25); there are several feasts represented by two poems and The verses are in a variety of stanza forms. Stanzas are numbered, and each poem is headed by a title within rules and closes with "Amen."
Description:
In English. and Volume may be the surviving second volume of a set covering the complete church year.
Manuscript on parchment (uneven quality, severely trimmed) of a Florilegium comprised of a series of meditations and prayers. The text, apparently a unicum, is a cento of biblical, liturgical, and patristic citations, with some additional material spuriously attributed to St. Bernard. The most important sources are the Song of Songs, the other Wisdom books, the Prophets, and, in the Trinitarian section, Augustine's De Trinitate
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written by three scribes. Art. 19 (ff. 189r-190r) written by Scribe 3 in an informal gothic bookhand, no later than ca. 1300. Scribes 1 and 2 collaborated on the rest of the manuscript: arts. 1, 3-5, 6 (ff. 124r-125r), 9-18 written by Scribe 1 in a neat, but somewhat irregular gothic bookhand, arts. 2, 6 (ff. 125v-132r), 7-8 written by Scribe 2 in an undisciplined gothic bookhand., The manuscript is outstanding for the quality and complexity of its program of illustration. In its original state it included at least fifty full-page miniatures, of which forty-six survive, one-hundred-and-sixty smaller miniatures, and forty-one historiated initials. Twenty-three tinted drawings were added on blank and added folios at a later date (between 1300 and 1350). The decoration is the work of at least three artists. The miniatures, initials, and marginal decoration are the work of two hands, one of whom contributed only two full-page miniatures (ff. 61r and 64r) that depend on the style usually associated with the name of Master Honore. The other, predominant hand works in a flatter, more linear style associated with Northeastern France. Full-page miniatures, in art. 1 only, some divided into two or three registers, in blue or orange frames, surrounded by a narrow gold band, with orange lozenges at the corners, each with an ivy spray, in black ink with five gold leaves; predominantly blue or vermilion tesselated or tooled gold grounds; two (ff. 25r and 55r) with fleurs-de-lis in lozenges. On each text page in art. 1 there is a smaller miniature, 9- to 5-line, with a witness who gesticulates towards the full-page miniature on the facing page; each miniature in a blue and/or pink frame with gold squares in the corners. Almost every folio in arts. 2-18 with at least one small miniature 10- to 5-line, framed as above. Arts. 11 and 14 illustrated almost exclusively with historiated initials, 6- to 4-line, blue, pink and/or orange against grounds of the same colors, with short ivy branches extending from the serifs, many with grotesque terminals., Illuminated initials, 2- to 1- line, in art. 1 only, gold against irregular blue or pink grounds, with white filigree, edged in black, some of the 2-line initials with ivy borders, as above. The borders, especially in arts. 2-18, are populated with grotesques and other marginal illustrations, the majority apparently non-narrative and without reference to the adjacent texts and miniatures, in the same style as the miniatures by the predominant hand. Names of Hebrew letters in art. 12 in red., Lower outer corners cut from ff. 167-192. Marginal decoration on many folios severely trimmed. Gold has flaked off considerably from the full-page miniatures on ff. 13r, 15r, 19r; some flaking of gold on ff. 6v, 18v, 25r, 34r, 44r, 51r., and Binding: ca. 1966. Bound in two volumes (I: ff. 1-96; II: ff. 97-192) in native tanned vermilion Nigerian goatskin, by J. Greenfield, without any adhesive touching the bookblock itself. Previously bound in brown leather in a single volume.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Devotional literature, Latin (Medieval and modern)., Exempla, Fathers of the church, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript on parchment (greatly trimmed) of a fragment of a Book of Hours. The twenty-six folios are the only fragment known to remain of the Book of Hours of Blanche of Burgundy (d. 1348), Countess of Savoy and granddaughter of Saint Louis of France, which was executed in Paris in the atelier of Jean Pucelle. The manuscript received additional texts and miniatures in the third quarter of the fourteenth century, when it was owned by Charles V, King of France, 1364-80.
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in gothic bookhand; ff. 1r, 1v, 4r, and 4v added in the third quarter of the fourteenth century by Jean L'Avenant., Contains fifty of the original two hundred and fifty-five miniatures, the majority executed between Pucelle's death in 1334 and Blanche's death in 1348, the remainder between ca. 1370 and 1378, the terminus ante quem being the death of Charles's wife, Jeanne de Bourbon, represented on one of the destroyed leaves. All of the miniatures are in tricolor quatrefoils, the first, earlier set against pink or blue grounds with white filigree, gold frames and gold leaves on hair-line stems, the later miniatures with the grounds in pink or blue imitation relief., Each folio with a 3/4 bar border, detached from initial, pink, blue and gold with ivy terminals, or a single bar with ivy attached to initial, in inner margin; some with grotesque terminals, and birds and hunters in the margins and bas-de-page. 2-line initials, with heads, ivy, the arms of Savoy (ff. 2r, 14r, 18v, etc.) or the arms of Burgundy (f. 3v); blue or pink with white highlights on gold grounds. 1-line initials, blue or gold with red or black penwork. Line endings, red, blue and gold, on ff. 1 and 4 only. Rubrics throughout., and Binding: Eighteenth century. Red-brown sheepskin heavily gold-tooled with floral borders and corner fans, the center filled in with a circle made up of fan tools.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Pucelle, Jean, fl. 1320. and Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript on parchment containing 1) Nicolaus de Byard (ca. 1250), Tractatus de vitiis et virtutibus, often improperly titled Summa de abstinentia (themes treated in alphabetical order). 2) Readings for the liturgical year, referring to the chapters of Tractatus de vitiis et virtutibus, arranged as follows: the Vespers on Saturdays; Temporale and the feast of the Dedication of the church; Sanctorale ("De sanctis"), at the same time Common of the Saints
Description:
In Latin., Script: probably copied by one hand, writing a small, rapid Gothica Textualis/Semitextualis Libraria with numerous abbreviations., Headings and underlining in red. Alternately red and blue paragraph marks. Alternately red and blue 2-line half inset flourished initials, respectively with penwork at the opening of the chapters, with guide letters. 6-line littera duplex with penwork in the same colours on f. 1v., and Binding: spine with four raised bands. On the spine and partly on the covers, an 18th century paper title label with handwritten inscription "Ancien / Manuscrit / sur / Velin / Complet / et ********" (cfr. MSS 940 and 941).
Manuscript on parchment (trimmed) of Book of Hours with Full calendar, in French
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in batarde script., Miniatures and an extensive cycle of border vignettes by Jean and Jacquelin Montlucon who were active in Bourges between 1477 and 1492. The calendar pages are framed by gilt columns and entablatures in the antique manner with the occupations of the month and signs of the zodiac in the outer margin and a Creation cycle in the lower margin. Eleven half-page miniatures framed in magenta and gold with cusping at the top; fanciful architectural bases, surrounded by simulated grey-black marble with joined wings and foliage branches in gold. Twenty-three miniatures, 8-lines in height, in magenta and gold frames, each with a full border of flowers and acanthus, birds and grotesques on compartmented gold and white grounds. Text pages with full borders: columns in inner margin; panels with masks, shields, garlands, and wings in upper margin; flowers and acanthus, as above, in outer margin; and, in the lower margin, one of the fullest known cycles devoted to the wild man (sometimes extended to include outer margin as well). Other manuscripts from the same shop, the Monypenny Hours and Grenoble Bibliotheque Municipale MS 1011, also contain extensive cycles of wild-man imagery; the artists Jean and Jacquelin de Montlucon lived in Bourges in a house "at the sign of the Wild Man.", 5- and 4-line initials with leafy branches, gold with fruits, flowers, profile heads on pink or mauve grounds. 2- and 1-line initials, line-endings, and KL monograms in the same style. Rubrics in red. Calendar entries alternate red and blue. F. i verso added in 16th century: the arms of Gian Francesco di Montegnacco in a frame closely modelled on the decoration of the calendar pages., and Binding: Nineteenth century. Tan goatskin, gold-tooled with concentric frames, the central panel daubed with green and red. Red label.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
