Manuscript leaf from a Book of Hours, in Latin, produced in France (Picardy, possibly...

MS 5650/103

Manuscript leaf from a Book of Hours, in Latin, produced in France (Picardy, possibly Amiens)

c.1300

Text: From a Book of Hours, in Latin

Script: Textualis Formata (Textus Quadratus)

The text is partly from Psalm 68.

There is line ruling in brown with no line pricking.

One handsome two-line initial ‘S’ in gold and four colours, with marginal bar extenders, terminating in long, bold ivy leaf sprays. Eleven one-line initials in burnished gold on a blue or mauve background, with white filigree. Five rectilinear line fillers, and two line fillers with a flower. Rubrics are in red.

This leaf comes from a very early French Book of Hours, produced within the first generation of the use of this form of devotional book as a separate volume, apart from the Psalter. The manuscript was lot No.76 in a Sotheby's sale on 17 December 1991, described as ‘a remarkably rich and sophisticated manuscript with high quality illumination on every page.’ The codex belonged ‘in a small group of Picardy manuscripts clustered around the Hours of Yolande of Soissons in the Morgan Library, M. 729, ascribed to Amiens in the last decades of the thirteenth century (cf K. Gould, ‘The Psalter and Hours of Yolande of Soissons’, 1978).’

See also MS 5650/67, MS 5650/89, MS 5650/94 and MS 5650/95.

Recto side:

1 ritum mundumq(ue) solvens perditu(m)

2 L aus honor (christ)o . a(ntiphona) . Laboravi . p(salmu)s

3 [68:2] S alvu(m) me fac d(eu)s q(uonia)m int(ra)ver(un)t

4 atq(ue) : usq(ue) ad an(im)am meam .

5 [68:3] I nfixus sum in limo profundi :

6 et non est substantia . [line filler]

7 V eni in altitudinem maris : et

8 tempestas demersit me . [line filler]

9 [68:4] L aboravi clamans rauce facte

10 sunt fauces mee : defecerunt oculi

11 mei dum spero in deum meum [flower line filler]

12 [68:5] N ultiplicati sunt super capillos [It should be ‘Multiplicati’

13 capitis mei : qui oderunt me gratis .

14 C onfortati sunt qui p(er)secuti sunt

Verso side:

1 me inimici mei iniuste : que non ra-

2 pui tunc exsolvebam [line filler]

3 [68:6] D eus tu scis insipientiam meam :

4 (et) delicta mea ad te no(n) sunt abscondita .

5 [68:7] N on erubescant in me qui expecta(n)t

6 te d(omi)ne : domine virtutum . [line filler]

7 N on confundentur super me : qui

8 querunt te deus israhel . [line filler]

9 [68:8] Q (uonia)m propter te sustinui obp(ro)briu(m) :

10 operuit confusio faciem meam [flower line filler]

11 [68:9] E xtraneus factus sum fr(atr)ibus

12 meis : (et) peregrinus filiis matris mee .

13 [68:10] Q (uonia)m zelus domus tue comedit

14 me : et obp(ro)bria exprobrantium ti-

Notes:-

A Letters: a,b,c,d,e,f,g,h,i,l,m,n,o,p,q,r,s,t,u/v,x,z,L.

Versals: C,D,E,I,L,N,S,V.

B Alternative forms of the letters ‘i’(2), ‘r’(2) and ‘s’(2).

C Fusion between letters ‘an’, ‘da’, ‘de’, ‘do’, ‘he’, ‘ho’, ‘oc’, ‘od’ and ‘pe’.

D Elision between letters ‘fu’, ‘ri’ and ‘tu’.

E Ligature between letters ‘st’.

F Bifurcation of ascenders of letters ‘b’, ‘h’ and ‘l’.

G Hairline on letters ‘h’, round ‘r’, final ‘t’, ‘x’ and the abbreviation for ‘que’.

H Use of crossed Tironian ‘et’ symbol (e.g. verso, line 4).

I Abbreviation for ‘ue’ in ‘mundumque’ (recto, line 1).

J Abbreviation for ‘Quoniam’ (e.g. verso, line 9).

K Two line fillers have a flower.

MS 5650/67

MS 103

Latin

1 leaf

Material: Vellum leaf