Beschreibung:

Two leaves from a copy of Peter Lombard, Libri Quattour Sententiarum, in Latin, manuscript on parchment [England, c. 1280] Two separate leaves, each with double column of 53 lines in a small and precise university hand, with elongated calligraphic cadels in uppermost and occasionally lowermost lines (some of these with penwork animal heads), capitals touched in red, pale red rubrics, initials in red or dark blue with elongated penwork in contrasting colours, medieval marginalia showing continuing use of volume throughout the Middle Ages, the leaf that was once last in volume mounted on parchment guard and so probably once loose and reattached to volume, modern pencil inscriptions at foot describing contents, spots, stains and small amount of cockling, else good condition, each 326 by 219mm. Provenance: 1. These leaves are from a codex originally containing books III-IV of this work (so perhaps one volume of two), which were written in England c. 1280. The work was the fundamental textbook of medieval theology, and so no cathedral- or monastic school or ecclesiastical library could be without a copy. At some point, perhaps at the close of the Middle Ages or in the Early Modern period seven lines of cipher using mostly Greek symbols were added to the second leaf here, in the margin. These remained undeciphered. 2. Edward Walmsley, whose library was sold in London in March 1795: the second leaf here with the crucial ex libris mark (his calligraphic signature) establishing his ownership of the volume. He also appears to have owned the Mirrour of the blessed lyf of Jesu Christi now in the Pierpont Morgan museum, MS. M.648. 3. Perhaps already imperfect in the early twentieth century, and leaves were given in 1910 by J.F. Lewis to the Free Library in Philadelphia (now Lewis fragment XIII:373), and another leaf was bequeathed by the Marquess of Cholmondley to the Society for Italic Handwriting. The remainder of the volume was owned by Nell and Charles Wheeler their sale, New York, 29 July 1919, lot 593. 4. C.L. Ricketts (1859-1941), the calligrapher, and described in his possession by de Ricci (see below). 5. Parke Bernet, New York, 24 February 1939, lot 280. 6. Sotheby's, 24 June 1980, lot 59, and soon after dispersed. Another leaf is now Tokyo, Keio University, MS. 17, and the historiated initial for the opening of book III, showing the Annunciation, was illustrated in A.M.W. As-Vijvers, Miniaturen en Monnikenwerk, 1999, p.57, no. 27. 7. This leaf acquired from North American trade in 2005. Published: S. de Ricci, Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States, 1935, I:646, no.185