Beschreibung:

PSALTER, in Latin, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM [Bruges c.1445] 101 x 72mm. 104 leaves, presumably lacking gatherings at beginning as well as end, 21 lines written in a lettre bâtarde between two verticals and 22 horizontals ruled in violet, justification: 65 x 48mm, line endings in burnished gold and blue, occasionally in burnished gold and red, one-line initials alternately in burnished gold flourished with dark blue and in blue flourished with red, three-line initials with staves of burnished gold on grounds and infills of blue and red patterned with white, FIVE LARGE INITIALS with staves of red or blue patterned with white with foliate infills of red, blue and white on burnished gold grounds below FIVE ARCH-TOPPED MINIATURES in frames of burnished gold with full borders of painted acanthus and flower sprays and burnished gold leaves and disks on hairline tendrils with an animal, bird or grotesque in the centre of each lower and outer margin (border and miniature rubbed f.1, lower margins of first eight folios cut, upper miniature borders trimmed by binder, slight rubbing to other borders). French 18th-century red morocco gilt, sides with triple fillet border and small corner ornament, flat spine gilt-tooled with ornamental curl and black leather lettering-piece. PROVENANCE: 1. The style of the miniatures and borders shows the Psalter to have been made in Bruges. 2. Paper ticket pasted inside front cover: no. 6. de Bellenglise 3. Written on first paper leaf: Duras: 250fr. 4. Written on second paper leaf: M de la Péletière 5. Stamped below: C. Le. à Sully CONTENT: Psalter, Psalms 1-79, ff.1-104. It is likely that the book originally contained the whole Psalter, with further miniatures at Psalms 80, 97 and 110 to mark the remaining three divisions of the Psalter. Although by the 15th century Books of Hours had become the most common private devotional book, combined Psalter-Hours and Psalters, as separate volumes, were occasionally made, more probably on commission than for the open market. Whether an independent Psalter or originally combined with a Book of Hours, this small manuscript would have been an easily portable volume intended for personal prayer and contemplation. ILLUMINATION: A combined Psalter-Hours from Bruges, Glasgow University Library, MS General 288, has some miniatures so like those in this Psalter that the same hand may be responsible. The David type is repeated with the same delicate detailing in a variant of the composition with the Fool, who there wears a more conventional jester's outfit. The Glasgow manuscript can be dated c.1460 from the major part taken in its illumination by Willem Vrelant, active in Bruges from 1454 until his death in 1481 (see N. Thorp, The Glory of the Page , Glasgow, 1987, no.117 with ill.). The illuminator of this Psalter belongs to the group of Bruges illuminators associated with the completion of the Turin-Milan Hours in the 1440s, the artists who brought into miniature painting both Jan van Eyck's delight in detail and Eyckian compositions. The bearded figure of David, with broad face, and eyes emphasised by a black dot for the iris and dark eyelid and eyebrow lines, derives from the much re-used figure who watches the Invention of the True Cross in the Turin-Milan Hours, while on f.65 the table with its glass vessel and bowls descends from the still-life motif in the Birth of the Baptist (see E. König, Die Très Belles Heures von Jean de France Duc de Berry , Lucerne, 1998). The majolica vessel which adds to the luxury of David's place of prayer, f.1, shows the same attention to decorative and anecdotal detail. The bearded on-looker was more literally repeated in a Bruges Book of Hours in the Walters Art Gallery Baltimore, W.271, which relates to the Psalter in the figure style, the dominance of orange- and pink-reds, blues and greens, the detailed interiors and the landscapes with spindly trees leading to distant cities and hills; its very similar borders a