large miniature on a leaf from the Upholland Hours, illuminated manuscript in Latin on parchment [northern France (Amiens), c.1430-40] Single leaf, with half-page arch-topped miniature with the Virgin kneeling and reading within a detailed Gothic interior as the angel enters from the right pointing to the Holy Spirit as it descends in the form of a dove, a starry night’s sky above, all within thin gold frame, above 2-line initial in pink with white penwork and floral infill and on burnished gold ground, 5 lines of tall and angular text with 2 illuminated initials on coloured grounds and linefillers in same, full border of acanthus leaves and foliage, some forming scrolling interlacing patterns with gold infill, enclosing coat-of-arms in bas-de-page (lion gules rampant with bands vair all on or, charged with cross moleyn or on gules on sinister side), some slight water damage to top of leaf with slight cockling and discolouration, else good and presentable condition, 170mm. by 115mm., framed From an Book of Hours already missing a number of leaves, sold in Christie’s, 2 December 1987, lot 33, as the property of Upholland College, Wigan, and sold again in Sotheby’s, 5 December 1994, lot 94, and soon after dispersed with this leaf in Maggs cat.1283 (1999), no.7. This is the sole armorial leaf of the manuscript, which was part of a well defined group of Amiens manuscripts from the second quarter of the fifteenth century, closely centring on the Hours of Raoul d’Ailly (Sotheby’s, 11 July 1978, lot 48). Another member of this group, Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, McClean MS.77, has a near identical miniature to this one (M.R. James, Descriptive Catalogue of the McClean Collection of Manuscripts, 1912, pl.XLVIII). The style developed as a local offshoot of the Boucicaut Master’s work, standing immediately before the emergence of the young Simon Marmion (who was born in the city c.1425, where both his father and elder brother were painters). Exhibited in J.J.G. Alexander, Medieval and Renaissance Treasures in the North West, 1976, no.30, p.24, and briefly alluded to in Ker and Piper, Medieval Manuscripts in British Libraries IV, 1992, p.503
large miniature on a leaf from the Upholland Hours, illuminated manuscript in Latin on parchment [northern France (Amiens), c.1430-40] Single leaf, with half-page arch-topped miniature with the Virgin kneeling and reading within a detailed Gothic interior as the angel enters from the right pointing to the Holy Spirit as it descends in the form of a dove, a starry night’s sky above, all within thin gold frame, above 2-line initial in pink with white penwork and floral infill and on burnished gold ground, 5 lines of tall and angular text with 2 illuminated initials on coloured grounds and linefillers in same, full border of acanthus leaves and foliage, some forming scrolling interlacing patterns with gold infill, enclosing coat-of-arms in bas-de-page (lion gules rampant with bands vair all on or, charged with cross moleyn or on gules on sinister side), some slight water damage to top of leaf with slight cockling and discolouration, else good and presentable condition, 170mm. by 115mm., framed From an Book of Hours already missing a number of leaves, sold in Christie’s, 2 December 1987, lot 33, as the property of Upholland College, Wigan, and sold again in Sotheby’s, 5 December 1994, lot 94, and soon after dispersed with this leaf in Maggs cat.1283 (1999), no.7. This is the sole armorial leaf of the manuscript, which was part of a well defined group of Amiens manuscripts from the second quarter of the fifteenth century, closely centring on the Hours of Raoul d’Ailly (Sotheby’s, 11 July 1978, lot 48). Another member of this group, Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, McClean MS.77, has a near identical miniature to this one (M.R. James, Descriptive Catalogue of the McClean Collection of Manuscripts, 1912, pl.XLVIII). The style developed as a local offshoot of the Boucicaut Master’s work, standing immediately before the emergence of the young Simon Marmion (who was born in the city c.1425, where both his father and elder brother were painters). Exhibited in J.J.G. Alexander, Medieval and Renaissance Treasures in the North West, 1976, no.30, p.24, and briefly alluded to in Ker and Piper, Medieval Manuscripts in British Libraries IV, 1992, p.503
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
