Beschreibung:

BOOK OF HOURS, use of Rome, in Latin and French, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM [?western France, c.1470] 179 x 127mm. ii + 143 + i leaves: 1 1 2, 2 7(of 8, lacking i), 3-6 8, 7 7(of 8, lacking iii), 8 7(of 8, lacking ii), 9 7(v cancelled), 10-18 8, 16 lines written in black/brown ink in a neat gothic bookhand between two verticals and 17 horizontals ruled in red, justification: 107 x 70mm, rubrics in red, text capitals touched yellow, one-line initials in liquid gold on blue or red grounds, similar line-endings, two- and three-line initials in blue with white tracery on gold grounds with orange/red and blue ivy-leaf infills, every page with a panel border with sprays of blue and gold acanthus and hairline tendrils with gold trefoil terminals and naturalistic flowers and fruit, one incorporating a peacock, eight similar full-page borders, four incorporating a coat of arms, TEN LARGE ARCH-TOPPED MINIATURES with full-page borders, six similar, and four with blue and red acanthus on gold grounds containing birds and sprays of flowers, f.62 with elaborate cadel with profile of a man, f.106 with flourishing in the form of leaves extending into lower margin (small loss from top of one miniature, occasional small pigment losses, surface abrasion or smudging affecting some borders and four miniatures). 17th-century French panelled red morocco gilt, marbled endpapers (extremities rubbed, a few small wormholes to upper cover). PROVENANCE: 1. Amongst the feast days in gold in the Calendar, are those of St Yvo (19 May) and Anne (July 26), saints particularly venerated in Brittany. However the Calendar as a whole does not appear to tie the manuscript to a particular area of France. 2. Hélène de Fonsèque, daughter of Rodrigo Fonseca, of the family of the counts of Monteiro who had settled in France, and Louise de Clermont, eventual heiress to the seigneurie of Surgères; she married Philippe de Barbézières in 1497: ownership inscription on the first preliminary leaf stating that the volume was a gift on 26 April 1502, from her brother, Claude de Fonsèque, seigneur d'Eguré; her elder brother Jacques inherited Surgères. The births of her seventeen children are recorded: from Katherine the eldest, on a date now illegible, followed by Louis in 1500, to the youngest Jacquette in 1520, including one set of twins, Nicolas and Guy in 1507. Three coats of arms were added for her: ff.13 and 15v Barbézière (fusilly argent and gules) impaling Fonseca (gules, five mullets or), and de Sylva (gules, a lion or, crowned, langued and armed azure), as used by the Fonsèque de Surgères; f.14 Fonsèques de Surgères impaling Clermont (gules, two keys in saltire with a crown or) and an unidentified coat; f.16 Barbézière quartering the coat on f.14. (H. Beauchet-Filleau, Dictionnaire historique et généalogique des familles de Poitou , 1891-, I, pp.269-70, II, pp.458-9, III pp.291-3. 3. The manuscript must have stayed with the family since the inscriptions were known to the compiler of vol.1084 of the Cabinet des titres . Hélène de Fonsèque was great-aunt to her namesake, Hélène de Fonsèque, mademoiselle de Surgères, to whom Ronsard addressed Quand vous serez bien vieille, au soir à la chandelle . 4. Edward Francis Searles of Methuen, Massachusetts, bequeathed to 5. B. Allen Rowland of Lawrence, Mass., who placed the manuscript on deposit at the Beinecke Library, Yale University, in 1957. 6. Sold in these rooms, June 24, 1992, lot 52. CONTENT: Calendar ff.1-12v; Gospel extracts, lacking opening ff.13-16; Obsecro te f.16-19v; Mass of the Virgin ff.20-25v; prayer to St Joseph with Indulgence added in a 16th-century hand f.26r+v; Office of the Virgin, use of Rome, ff.28-54v: matins f.28, lauds f.44; Hours of the Holy Cross f.54r+v, lacking opening; Hours of the Holy Spirit f.55r+v; prime f.56, terce, lacking opening (supplied in an 18th-century hand) f.60, sext f.63, none f.66v, vespers f.70, compline f.75v; Variants for Advent f.78v-80v; Seven Penitential Psa