Beschreibung:

BOOK OF HOURS, use of Sarum, in Latin, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM [England, probably London, 3rd quarter 15th century] 125 x 90mm. ii + 118 + ii leaves: 1 6, 2-11 8, 12 3(of 4, iv cancelled blank), 13 8, 14 5(of 6, vi cancelled blank), 15-16 8, COMPLETE, 19 lines written in black in a gothic bookhand between two verticals and twenty horizontals ruled in red until f.63v and thereafter in black, musical notation in the Office of the Dead in square neumes on a four-line stave of red, justification: 95 x 58mm, rubrics in red, one- and two-line initials alternately of burnished gold flourished blue and blue with flourishing of red, line-fillers in the Litany of blue and gold, major text divisions opening with ILLUMINATED FOLIATE BORDERS AND INITIALS from two to five lines high (all borders cropped, opening folios darkened affecting legibility of January and February). 19th-century panelled brown morocco (worn and upper cover detached). PROVENANCE: 1. The liturgical use and style of illumination show the origin of the manuscript in England, probably in London, around 1450-1460. Few of the major feasts in the Calendar are for saints particularly venerated in England (only St Edward king and martyr, 18 March, and Thomas à Becket, 29 December). This and the prayer for 'nostre congregationis fratres et sorores' may suggest that the manuscript was intended for a member of a religious confraternity or community. As is common in many manuscripts that remained in England after the Dissolution of the monasteries Thomas à Becket's name has been erased, leaving only his title 'archiepi'. 2. Thomas Appleby: note in a 16th-century hand on fol.117v 'Ex dono gratissimi viri M'ri Thome Appulby socii Cantuberuii Whittington London'. 3. Edmund Newman, Cistercian monk: notes in English recording the death of M.... of Westminster on 16 April 1673 and of Christopher, lord baron of Bel.... on 19 June 1672 are added to the Calendar in the same hand as the inscription, in Latin, recording the gift of the manuscript from Father Edmund Newman, 'monachi cist. de ?larha 1673' on fol.117v. 3. W. Maskell (?1814-1890), medievalist, ecclesiastical antiquary whose publications include Monumenta Ritualia Ecclesiae Anglicanae, or Occasional Offices of the Church of England according to the Ancient Use of Salisbury, the Prymer in English, and other Prayers and Forms with Dissertations and Notes , 3 vols, London 1846, 2nd ed. Oxford 1882: his signature and note on the front parchment endleaf describing the manuscript, 'Mss: according to the Use of Sarum are excessively rare. The present is quite perfect.', and going on to list the contents. Maskell had a library of patristic literature and was 'an enthusiastic collector of medieval service books, enamels and carvings in ivory, which from time to time he disposed of to the British and South Kensington Museums' (DNB). He printed a catalogue of some of the rare books from his library as Selected Centuries of Books from the Library of a Priest in the Diocese of Salisbury in Chiswick in 1848. CONTENT: Calendar ff.1-6v; Office of the Virgin, use of Sarum ff.7-38: matins f.7, lauds f.13v, suffrages f.20, prime f.23v, terce f.26v, sext f.28v, none f.30, vespers f.32, compline f.33v; Seven Penitential Psalms and incipits of the Gradual Psalms ff.38-47v; Litany ff.47v-52v; Office of the Dead, noted, use of Sarum ff.52v-89; Commendation of souls ff.90-102; Passion Prayers ff.103-109; Suffrages ff.109-113; sequence of prayers opening with Illuminata oculos meos ff.113-117v; elegiac couplets in Latin addressed to a political leader added in a 17th-century hand. The provision of music for the responses and antiphons in the Office of the Dead is a most unusual feature. It may indicate that rather than being intended for private devotional use the Office was designed for communal participation. Attending the funerals of fellow members and praying for their souls were major obligations for the members of medieval guilds and co