Manuscript on parchment. One of a number of Books of Hours almost certainly made in Flanders for the English market. During the 16th century, some references to Thomas of Canterbury were erased or altered, and the word "pape" in the Calendar was changed to "ape".
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in liturgical gothic bookhand., Decoration: Twenty-three fine miniatures (originally twenty-five) tipped in, in red, blue and gold frames, with gold quatrefoils in the corners; each with a 3/4 bar border, red and blue, with a full border of English-style acanthus, red, blue, pink and gold against cusped gold grounds, especially at corners and centers, surrounded by green, red, blue and pink flowers and berries, and ivy in black pen with gold and blue leaves, some with birds, in red bounding lines. Twenty-three historiated initials, 6-line, pink and blue with white highlights on gold grounds with black cusping. 6-line initials, pink and blue, with white highlights, filled with acanthus on gold, against pink and blue grounds, framed in gold and edged with black cusping. 3-line initials, gold, edged in black, on pink and blue grounds with white filigree. 1-line initials and line endings in the same manner. Calendar with 3-line KL monograms, as above, with hair-spray extensions and bar border, outer margin, and with hair-spray terminals. Kalends, Ides in blue and gold; important feasts in red., Shows signs of use (water stains, rubbing), but no serious damage to text or illumination., and Binding: 16th-17th centuries. Wound sewing on five large, tawed-skin supports, the backs of the gatherings cut in about 3 mm. on either side of the supports and at the kettle stitches. Dull gilt edges and traces of blue endband tie-downs. Covered in gold, striped velvet with two ribbon ties.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
In Latin., Script: Written in two sizes of liturgical gothic by two scribes. Scribe 1) ff. 1r-22v and 28r-130r; Scribe 2) ff. 22v-26v. Many later marginal notes throughout, including titles at the top of each page., One very crude full-page miniature on f. 71v (Office of the Dead): mourners at a bier. Set in a narrow arched frame of gold edged in black, in a border of pink, blue, and green acanthus leaves (concentrated at corners), flowers in same colors, infilled with black ink hair-spray with gold dots; the whole rather carelessly done. 6- and 5-line initials (ff. 57r and 72r): blue with white highlights, on gold ground, infilled with blue, green, and pink trilobe leaves, with segmented bar border (strapwork corners) in blue, white, pink, black, and gold; full border as for miniature. Other illuminated initials (5- to 2-line, as above) with segmented bar borders without strapwork, and full borders as for full-page miniature. 5-line initials (ff. 35r and 38r) gold, on pink and blue ground with white highlights; in inner margin, a simple bar border sprouting black hair-spray with gold leaves at top and bottom. 2-line initials: gold on pink and blue grounds with white highlights. 1-line initials within text sometimes marked with a red stroke. Line fillers: occasionally a red cable after a rubric or, in the litany, oblique red and blue strokes with dots attached (perhaps added later, as colors do not match those of 1-line initials). Rubrics in orange-tinted red., Mold at bottom of ff. 122-130; text not damaged., and Binding: Nineteenth century. Brown calf, blind- and gold-tooled.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript on parchment (coarse) of a Book of Hours containing only the Office of the Dead and Penitential Psalms and Litany
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in liturgical gothic script of two sizes, by one person. Prayer on f. 87v is added in a very similar script, but by a less firm hand., A pencilled note on f. 55r refers to a miniature cut out between ff. 54 and 55. 2-line initials in blue, with red penwork often extending along left border. 1-line initials in blue or red. Rubrication to mark headings within sections in crimson or orange ink., and Binding: Eighteenth century. Brown calf, blind-tooled. Rebacked; back cover detached.
Manuscript on parchment roll, unevenly trimmed at top and bottom, composed of three membranes segments glued together, the third an addition of the late 15th century. Includes Prayers to be said for a pardon of 32,055 years; and Prayer based on the measurement of the length of the body of Christ. The texts are written on one side of a roll (dorse is blank).
Description:
In Latin and English., Script: Written in gothic liturgical script in brown and red ink., Membrane I: Two miniatures of the Emblems of the Passion, the one above the written space in a gothic architectural setting, with a Saint on either side and instruments of the Passion included around the full-figure of Christ standing with the cross. The miniature below with three exceptionally large nails and a heart enclosed by a crown of thorns and supported by two angels; surrounded by instruments of the Passion. The patron in clerical costume of white gown and blue robe [Austin friar?] in prayer with a scroll. A curling acanthus and floral border, containing birds holding snakes in their beaks; red, blue, pink and orange, framed in blue, with a gentle ogee arch at the top., Membrane II: A large empty cross (17 mm.) drawn in black ink and colored brown, in the center of the written space. One 6-line initial, pink and blue acanthus on a gold ground infilled with an aroid. Three 2-line initials, one blue filled with a pink flower on gold, one pink with white filigree on gold, one gold, filled with blue with white filigree on a pink ground. Floral border, including columbines, roses, in red, blue, pink and green, with insects, against a tan ground with brown dots, framed in red and blue., Membrane III: A miniature of the Christ Child as Salvator Mundi: seated on a red cushion beside the cross, holding the orb and blessing. This iconography, rare and perhaps unknown in English manuscript illustration, is probably of foreign origin. One 3-line initial, pink and blue with white highlights, filled with a blue and pink flower on a gold ground. Border with large blue, pink, green and orange flowers joined by an undulating green stem, with brown hair-spray and gold dots. Framed in blue and pink., and Holes and tears in the margins of the upper two segments; considerably rubbed, with some loss of text.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Devotional literature, English (Middle), Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Indulgences, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript fragment on parchment bifolium (thick) of Passion of St. Bartholomew (25 August). Text is continuous
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in neat but somewhat uneven Beneventan script. Passages added in cramped text hands, (ca. 1250), in lower margins, f. 2r-v., Leaves trimmed with some loss of text along upper and outer margins; portions of f. 2v illegible due to paste and offset impressions of leather turn-ins and wooden boards., and Bifolium used as flyleaf and pastedown.
Manuscript fragment on parchment leaf (cut in halves in the middle of the height) of Passion of St. Terentianus, bishop of Todi (1 Sept.).
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in Beneventan script., Red headings. Heightening of the majuscules in red and yellow. 5-line initials in same colours., Stained with paste. The outer edge is heavily trimmed and 8 rectangular cuttings have caused important text losses in the outer column., and Used in a binding. On the top of the verso, in the middle and at the bottom of the leaf the offset of texts written on a flyleaf (?) of the binding from which the fragments were taken [to be read with a mirror]. In the inner margin of the same verso is an undeciphered 19th-century inscription.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Devotional literature, Latin (Medieval and modern) and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript fragment on parchment of a passionary containing two lives of St. Cassian
Description:
In Latin., Script: written in Beneventan script., and Decoration: the Prudentius life is written in poetic stanzas; six-line decorated initial is outlined in brown; 1-line initials are brown uncials; punctuated with the punctus, punctus elevatus, and punctus versus.
Manuscript on two fragments of a single parchment leaf, now crudely patched together in their original format. Contains lines of text from a Prayer "ad clericum faciendum"; Antiphon and Psalm; Part of an "ordinatio monachi"; and Prayer "ad barbas tonendas". The manuscript presumably originated in one of the episcopal seats of the period and perhaps in one of the monastic cathedrals
Description:
In Latin., Script: Written in a fine, large Anglo-Saxon square minuscule with headings, in red square capitals (mostly faded)., and Removed from a binding; numerous sections spotted and discolored.
Subject (Geographic):
England., Connecticut, and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Liturgy, Cathedrals, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Pontificals
Manuscript on paper (watermarks trimmed; unidentified) of various prayers
Description:
In German and Latin., Script: Text written in formal gothic by one scribe. Prayers added on the flyleaves, front and back, by several later hands in italic of the 17th century and later. 2- and 1-line initials in blue-grey or orange-tinted red. 1-line initials within the text, with red stroke. Extensive rubrication in orange-tinted red., and Binding: 16th-17th centuries. Sewn on three single, round, vegetable fiber cords laced into wooden boards. "Made" endbands glued on and extending onto the outer face of the boards. Red edges and numerous place marks of vellum or tawed skin on the fore-edge. The spine rounded and lined. Covered in dark brown calf with two brass catches on the upper board and brass clasps hinged to the lower. The lower board is detached and one clasp and some leather at head and tail of the spine are wanting.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Augustinians. and Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Manuscripts, Medieval, Monasticism and religious orders, and Prayers
Manuscript on parchment of 1) Psalter in English, in the 8-part liturgical division, beginning defectively. Text is the later version of the Wycliffite translation of the Psalms. 2-7) Book of Hours, use of Sarum. 8) St. Jerome's Psalter, with introductory prayer and text followed by a suffrage to the Virgin. With Notes on Historia, Alegoria, Anagogia, Tropologia
Description:
In Middle English and Latin., Script: Written in small, well formed gothic bookhand., Five 6- to 5-line initials at the liturgical divisions of the Psalter (Psalms 26, 52, 68, 80, 97; initials for Psalms 1, 38, and 109 missing, offset initials on ff. 35v, 109r, and 156r), pink and blue with white highlights against cusped gold grounds, filled with brown, blue, and pink foliage with curling foliate serifs; pink, blue and gold bar border in outer margin with foliate shoots, terminals and horizontal extensions full across in upper and lower margins. Eleven 5- to 4-line initials (ff. 139v, 158v, 161r, 162r, 163r, 163v, 164r, 165v, 168r, 169v, 176v), gold, edged in black against a cusped ground, quartered in blue and pink, with white highlights and floral hair-spray. 3-line initials, blue with red penwork throughout. Capitals alternating red and blue. Rubrics throughout. Red and blue line-fillers in litany., and Binding: 19th-20th centuries. Brown leather case, blind-tooled. Red edges. Smells like a Middleton binding.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Catholic Church
Subject (Topic):
Books of hours, Devotional literature, English (Middle), Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Psalters