ILLUMINATED BOOK OF HOURS, use of Rome

Manuscript Book of Hours on vellum in Latin, with calendar in French, [Flanders, probably Bruges, mid fifteenth century]

Footnotes

AN ATTRACTIVE LOW COUNTRIES ILLLUMINATED BOOK OF HOURS IN AN ELABORATE EARLY BINDING.

TEXT: f. 1 blank; ff. 2-7 Calendar; 8-11 Hours of the Cross; 12-15v Hours of the Holy Spirit; 15v-20v Gospel readings; 21 blank; 22-86 Hours of the Blessed Virgin Mary (22-42v Matins; 43-54v Lauds; 55-59v Prime; 60-64 Terce; 64v-68v Sext; 69-73 Nones; 73v-81 Vespers; 81v-86 Compline); 86v blank; 87-100 Seven Penitential Psalms; 100v-108 Litany; 109-164v Office of the Dead; 165 Miserere Mei; 166 The Seven Joys of the Virgin; 168 Prayer in a later hand.

ILLUMINATIONS: 12 initials (KL) in liquid gold, red and blue colour at the beginning of each month of the calendar; 13 large illuminations, f.8 The Crucifixion; 12 Pentecost; 22 The Annunciation; 43 The Visitation; 55 The Nativity; 60 The Shepherds; 64v The Adoration of the Magi; 69 The Presentation in the Temple; 73v The Massacre of the Innocents; 81v The Flight into Egypt; 87 Christ in Majesty before the Last Judgement, 109 A Funeral; 156 Souls carried to Heaven by Angels.

The illuminations are in the characteristic style of Bruges of the mid fifteenth century. Several can be ascribed to a group of artists known as the 'Masters of the Gold Scrolls', as testified by many stylistic elements especially with regards to the backgrounds of the illuminations that are distinctive of this group of artists. For example, the golden scrolls over red backgrounds in the representation of the Nativity (f. 55) and in that of Christ in Majesty (f. 87) are strikingly similar to those found in other Books of Hours ascribed to the Masters of the Golden Scrolls, such as MS Laud Misc. 204 (f. 23v St Barbara) and MS Harley 2982 (f. 59v Christ in Majesty), today at the Bodleian Library and British Library respectively. In the representations of the Pentecost and Annunciation (ff. 12 and 21) we find instead chequered backgrounds of liquid gold and colours that are also typical of Flemish and French illuminations of this period (see for example MS Harley 2897, f. 340v St Anne teaching the Virgin to read, and MS Stowe 21, f. 57 Nativity).

The binding is signed by Ludovicus Bloc, a prolific and well known Bruges binder documented in the city between c.1484-1529. There are other surviving manuscripts with very similar bindings, such as Beinecke MS 663 (Book of Hours, use of Tournai), Walters Ms. W.428 (Book of Hours) and Cambridge University Library MS Nn.4.1 (Benedictional of Robert de Clercq).

Collation: A7 (of 8, A8 lacking ?cancelled, no loss of text), B8, C6, D-E8, F5 (of 6, F1 cancelled), G8, H4, I-N8, O6, P-R8, S6 (of 8, S4 and S6 cancelled), T-V8, W6 (of 8, W3 and W5 cancelled).

Provenance: An early Brugean provenance is denoted by the signed blind-tooled binding by Louis Bloc (d.1519). The Hours belonged to Jehan de Cerf (d.24 September 1554, aged 69), who served as echevin of the Liberty of Bruges. He gifted the manuscript to his eldest daughter Mary (by his first wife Judove van Schoore) on January 11th 1525. Mary then married John Spronehoff and left the book to their son, Philip. The flyleaves contain several notes about the family of De Cerf, which had settled in French Flanders as early as the fourteenth century, and about that of Spronehoff; Hugh Selbourne M.D., his sale, Bonhams, 25 March 2015, lot 23.