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Egerton MS 1139
- Record Id:
- 032-001984226
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-001984226
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000057.0x0000d2
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165162080.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Egerton MS 1139
- Title:
-
Psalter (The 'Melisende Psalter')
- Scope & Content:
-
The Psalter conforms to the standards of the Holy Sepulchre, and the Office of the Dead is the use of Bayeux (according to Dondi, The Liturgy, 2004, p. 64).
The manuscript includes:
ff. 1r-12v: Prefatory cycle of illumination from the lives of the Virgin Mary and Christ;
ff. 13r-19r: Calendar, pre-Sarum use, for Winchester diocese, secular, including St Hedda, bishop of Winchester and the translation of St Edburga (see Morgan, 'Notes', 1981); with a table of ferial regulars, concurrents, and epacts (f. 13r);
ff. 19v-21r: Instructions on the computus, incipit: 'Terminus quarte decime lune sacro sancti pasce post passionem apostolorum abbati pachomio revelatus ab angelo domini hoc modo.';
ff. 21v-22r: Prayers to the Cross: 'Domine ihesu christe qui nos per passionem crucis', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe ascendentem in cruce', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe vulneratum in cruce', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe mortuum et sepultum', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe ad inferna descendentem', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe resurgentem a mortuis', 'Adoro te domine ihesu christe salvatorem venturum in iudicio', 'Domine ihesu christe fili dei vivi.';
f. 22v: Prayers before the Psalms: 'Suscipere digneris', 'Ad esto dominus unus omnipotens';
ff. 23v-177v: Psalms;
ff. 177v-189v: Canticles, including: the Prayer of Isaiah, the Prayer of Ezekiel, the Prayer of Hannah, the (First) Song of Moses, the Prayer of Habakkuk, the (Second) Song of Moses, the Te Deum, the Prayer of the Three Hebrew Boys, the Benedictus, the Magnificat, the Nunc Dimittis, the Gloria (Hymnus angelicus);
f. 189v: Pater noster;
ff. 189v-190r: The Apostles' Creed (Symbolum Apostolorum);
ff. 190r-192r: The Athanasian Creed, incipit: 'Quicunque vult';
f. 192r: A prayer after the Psalms, incipit: 'Liberator animarum';
ff. 192v-197r: Litany (printed in Buchtal, Miniature Painting (1957));
ff. 197v-211v: Prayers to the Virgin, the Trinity and saints (printed in Buchtal, Miniature Painting (1957));
ff. 212r-218r: The Office of the Dead.
Decoration:
24 full-page miniatures in colours on gold grounds in a prefatory cycle of the life of Christ with inscriptions in Greek (ff. 1r-12v). 9 half-page miniatures in colours and gold among the prayers dedicated to the Virgin and saints (ff. 202v, 205r, 206r, 206v, 207v, 208r, 209r, 210r, 211r). 12 calendar roundels in colours on gold grounds (ff. 13v-19r). 1 full-page historiated initial in ink on a gold ground at the beginning of Psalm 1 (f. 23v). 7 large initials in ink on gold grounds with animals, hybrids, men, and masks, with text in gold on brown strips in a decorated full-page border at the principal divisions of Psalms 26, 38, 52, 68, 80, 97, and 109 (ff. 46v, 60v, 74v, 89v, 106v, 123r, 139v). 1 full-page of text in gold on brown stripes in a decorated border at the beginning of Psalm 1 (f. 24r). Large and small initials in gold, with penwork decoration in blue and yellow from ff. 24v-32v. Text in red, blue, or gold (chrysography).
The subjects of miniatures and historiated initials are:
In the prefatory cycle:
f. 1r: The Annunciation.
f. 1v: The Visitation.
f. 2r: The Nativity.
f. 2v: The Adoration of the Magi.
f. 3r: The Presentation, with Anna holding a scroll inscribed, 'Τούτο το βρέφος ουρανόν και γήν εστερέωσε' (this child has established heaven and earth).
f. 3v: The Baptism of Christ.
f. 4r: The Temptations of Christ.
f. 4v: The Transfiguration.
f. 5r: The Raising of Lazarus.
f. 5v: The Entry in Jerusalem.
f. 6r: The Last Supper.
f. 6v: The Washing of the Apostles' feet.
f. 7r: Christ praying in the Garden of Gethsemane.
f. 7v: The Betrayal of Christ.
f. 8r: The Crucifixion.
f. 8v: The Deposition.
f. 9r: The Burial.
f. 9v: The Anastasis, or Harrowing of Hell
f. 10r: The three Marys at the tomb.
f. 10v: The doubting of Thomas.
f. 11r: The Ascension of Christ.
f. 11v: Pentecost.
f. 12r: The Dormition of Virgin.
f. 12v: The Deesis, with Christ flanked by the Virgin Mary and St John the Baptist, with hands raised in supplication
In the Calendar:
f. 13v: January: Aquarius.
f. 14r: February: Pisces.
f. 14v: March: Aries.
f. 15r: April: Taurus.
f. 15v: May: Gemini.
f. 16r: June: Cancer.
f. 16v: July: Leo.
f. 17r: August: Virgo.
f. 17v: September: Libra.
f. 18r: October: Scorpio.
f. 18v: November: Sagittarius.
f. 19r: December: Capricorn.
In the Psalter and prayers:
f. 23v: Historiated initial 'B'(eatus) of David harping (Psalm 1).
f. 202v: Virgin and Child.
f. 205r: Archangel Michael.
f. 206r: St John the Baptist.
f. 206v: St Peter.
f. 207v: St John.
f. 208r: St Stephen.
f. 209r: St Nicholas.
f. 210r: St Mary Magdalene.
f. 211r: St Agnes.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Egerton Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-001984226", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Egerton MS 1139: Psalter (The 'Melisende Psalter')" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-001984226
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-001984226
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
- A parchment codex, 218 folios
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100165162080.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1131
- End Date:
- 1143
- Date Range:
- 1131-1143
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
- Restrictions to access apply please consult British Library staff
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- User Conditions:
-
Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript.
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: parchment.
Dimensions: 215 x 145 mm (text space: 135 x 75 mm).
Foliation: ff. 218 (+ 9 unfoliated parchment flyleaves: 6 at the beginning and 3 at the end; + 4 leaves after f. 12; unfoliated paper leaves after ff. 1, 3, 5-8, 10-12, 46, 60, 74, 89, 106, 122, 139, 202, 204-210).
Script: Protogothic.
Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house. Gilt and tooled fore-edge. Parts of a former binding, including a silk spine and two carved ivory covers are now kept separately as Egerton MS 1139/1.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: Eastern Mediterranean (Jerusalem).
Provenance:
Probably made for Melisende (b. 1105, d. 1161), Queen of Jerusalem, wife of Fulk, Count of Anjou, between the death of her father Baldwin II in 1131 and that of her husband in 1143, by Basilius: inscription 'Basilius me fecit' (f. 12v), in the monastery of the Holy Sepulchre: her parents, King Baldwin II (reigned1118-1131), third King of Jerusalem, and Queen Morphia (d. 1126/1127), daughter of an Armenian prince, are mentioned in the calendar on 21 August and 1 October, respectively, but Fulk's obit is not included (see Watson, Catalogue (1979)); the inscription 'Herodius' on the lower ivory cover perhaps a reference to Fulk (the bird herodius used synonymously with 'fulica' (coot), and the French vernacular for coot 'foulque') (see discussion in Cahier, Nouveaux mélanges (1884) and Zeitler, 'Distorting mirror' (2000)); with a reference to the capture of Jerusalem (15 July); feminine forms and endings (e.g., ff. 21r, 198r); for her sister Yvette (b. 1119, d. c. 1178), Abbess of the convent of St Lazarus, Bethany, as the possible intended donee, see Boase, 'Ecclesiastical Art' (1977), p. 125.
Frère Ponz Daubon: late 12th or 13th-century inscription written upside-down (f. [v] verso).
?The monastery of the Grande Chartreuse, Grenoble (dissolved in 1793): said to be obtained from the Chartreuse by Amroise Comarmond (see Du Sommerard, Les arts (1846)): inscription 'La' in ink pasted onto f. [v] verso.
Ambroise Comarmond (b. 1786, d. 1857), director of the Palais-des-Arts, Lyons (c.1840): see Du Sommerard, Les arts (1846), a note by Frederick Madden, Keeper of Manuscripts at the British Museum, referring to Du Sommerard (f. [iv] recto).
Guiglielmo Libri Carucci (b. 1802, d. 1869), Italian aristocrat, mathematician and bibliophile: sold to Payne and Foss for £180 (see Ruju and Mostert, Guglielmo Libri (1995), p. 221).
Payne and Foss, London booksellers: letter from Henry Foss to Frederick Madden dated 16 October 1845; sold to the British Museum.
Purchased for £350 by the British Museum from Payne and Foss in November 1845, using the Bridgewater fund (£12,000 bequeathed in 1829 by Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Earl of Bridgewater (b. 1756, d. 1829).
- Publications:
-
M. Didron, Iconograpahie chrétienne: histoire de Dieu (Paris: Imprimerie royale, 1843), p. 473, no. 2.
A. Du Sommerard, Les arts au moyen age, 5 vols (Paris: Vinchon, 1838-46), V, pp. 162-63.
Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1841-1845 (London: British Museum, 1850), pp. 87-88.
M. Didron, Christian Iconography: or, the History of Christian Art in the Middle Ages, trans. by E. J. Millington (London: Bohn, 1851), p. 462.
M. Digby Wyatt, The Art of Illuminating (London: Dan and Son Lithographers, 1860; repr. Studio Editions, 1987), p. 31.
P. Ch. Cahier, Nouveaux mélanges d’archéologie d’histoire et de littérature sur le moyen age, 4 vols (Paris: Firmin Didot, 1874-1877), II (1874): Ivoires, miniatures, émaux, pp. 1-14, pls 1-2.
Walter de Gray Birch and Henry Jenner, Early Drawings and Illuminations: An Introduction to the Study of Illustrated Manuscripts (London: Bagster and Sons, 1879), p. 1.
W. Y. Fletcher, Foreign Bookbindings in the British Museum (London: Kegan Paul, 1896), pl. 2.
O. M. Dalton, Byzantine Art and Archaeology (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1911), fig. 428.
J. A. Herbert, Illuminated Manuscripts (London: Methuen, 1911), pp. 57-60, pl. 6.
J. A. Herbert, Illuminated Manuscripts and Bindings of Manuscripts Exhibited in the Grenville Library, Guide to the Exhibited Manuscripts, 3 (Oxford: British Museum, 1923), p. 40, no. 5.
J. A. Herbert, British Museum: Reproductions from Illuminated Manuscripts, Series 3, 3rd edn (London: British Museum, 1925), pl. 6.
A Guide to the Exhibition of Some Part of the Egerton Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1929), no. 4.
Albert Boeckler, Das Goldene Evangelienbuch Heinrichs III (Berlin: Deutscher Verien für Kunstwissenschaft, 1933), p. 59 no. 1.
Die byzantinischen Elfenbeinskulpturen des X.-XIII.Jahrhunderts, ed. by Adolph Goldschmidt and Kurt Weitzmann, 2 vols (Berlin: Deutscher Verlag fur Kunstwissenschaft, 1934), II, no. 224a, b [with additional bibliography].
D. Talbot Rice, English Art 871-1100, Oxford History of English Art, 2 (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1952), p. 110.
T. S. R. Boase, English Art 1100-1216, Oxford History of English Art, 2 (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1957), p. 191.
Hugo Buchthal and Francis Wormald, Miniature Painting in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1957), esp. pp. 1-14, 139-40.
Francis Wormald, 'The Calendar of Queen Melisende's Psalter', 'Litanies of Saints', and 'Prayers following the Litany in Queen Melisende's Psalter', in Hugo Buchthal and Francis Wormald, Miniature Painting in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1957), pp. 122-34.
E. B. Garrison, Studies in the History of Mediaeval Italian Painting, 3 vols (Florence: L’impronta, 1953-58), III (1957-1958), pp. 302-04, 307-08.
André Grabar and Carl Nordenfalk, Romanesque Painting from the Eleventh to the Thirteenth Century, trans. by Stuart Gilbert (Lausanne: SKIRA, 1958), pp. 138, 172.
Otto Pächt, C. R. Dodwell, and Francis Wormald, The St. Albans Psalter (Albani Psalter) (London: Warburg Institute, 1960), pp. 52-53.
Frauke Steenbock, Die kirchliche Prachteinband im frühen Mittelalter (Berlin: Deutscher verlag fur Kunstwissenschaft, 1965), no. 90.
C. R. Dodwell, Painting in Europe: 800 to 1200 (London: Penguin Books, 1971), 157, pls. 172-73.
T. S. R. Boase, ‘Ecclesiastical Art in the Crusader States in Palestine and Syria’, in A History of the Crusades, ed. by Kenneth M. Setton, 6 vols (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1969-1989), IV: The Art and Architecture of the Crusader States, ed. by Harry W. Hazard (1977), pp. 69-139 (pp. 125-29, 138-39, pls XXXIXa-d).
Andrew G. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 700-1600 in The Department of Manuscripts: The British Library, 2 vols (London: British Library, 1979), no. 598.
Nigel Morgan, 'Notes on the Post-Conquest Calendar, Litany and Martyrology of the Cathedral Priory of Winchester with a Consideration of Winchester Diocese Calendars of the Pre-Sarum Period', in The Vanishing Past: Medieval Studies Presented to Chrisopher Hohler, ed. by Alan Borg and Andrew Martindale (Oxford: B. A. R., 1981), pp. 133-74 (pp. 157, 162 no. 17).
Miriam Foot, Pictorial Bookbindings (London: British Library, 1986), pp. 46-48, pls. 44, opposite p. 5.
Francis Wormald, Collected Writings, ed. by J. J. G. Alexander, T. J. Brown, and Joan Gibbs, 2 vols (London: Harvey Miller, 1984-1988), II: Studies in English and Continental Art of the Later Middle Ages, p. 16.
Aliza Cohen-Mushlin, A Medieval Scriptorium: Sancta Maria Magdalena de Frankendal, Wolfenbütteler Mittelalter-Studien, 3, 2 vols (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1990), I, p. 135.
Bianca Kühnel, ‘The Kingly Statement of the Bookcovers of Queen Melisande’s Psalter’, in Tesserae: Festscrhift für Joseph Engemann, ed. by E. Dassmann and K. Thraede, Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, Ergänzungsband, 18 (1991), pp. 340-57.
John Lowden, ‘The Image and Self-Image of the Medieval Ruler’, in Kings and Kingship in Medieval Europe, ed. by Anne J. Duggan, King’s College London Medieval Studies, 10 (London: King’s College, 1993), pp. 213-40 (pp. 226-28, pl. 5).
Bianca Kühnel, Crusader Art of the Twelfth Century: A Geographical, an Historical, or an Art Historical Notion? (Berlin: Mann, 1994), pp. 51, 53, 61 n. 1, 63-125, 155, 160, 162-63, 166-67, figs. 47, 69, 87.
John Lowden, catalogue entry, in Byzantium: Treasures of Byzantine Art and Culture from British Collections, ed. by David Buckton (British Museum: London, 1994). nos. 180-81 [exhibition catalogue] [with additional bibliography].
Jaroslav Folda, The Art of the Crusaders in the Holy Land 1098-1187 (Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 137-63, pls. 6.8-6.12.
Andreas Petzold, Romanesque Art (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1995), p. 7, pl. 1.
P. Alessandra Maccioni-Ruju and Marco Mostert, The Life and Times of Guglielmo Libri (1802-1869): Scientist, Patriot, Scholar, Journalist and Thief (Hilversum: Verloren, 1995), pp. 221, 266-67, pl. 48.
Robert W. Scheller, Exemplum: Model-Book Drawings and the Practice of Artistic Transmission in the Middle Ages (ca. 900 - ca. 1450) (Amsterdam: University Press, 1995), p. 143.
Janet Backhouse, The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), no. 30.
The Glory of Byzantium: Art and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era A. D. 843-1261, ed. by Helen C. Evans and William D. Wixom (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997), no. 259 [with additional bibliography] [exhibition catalogue].
Holger Klein, 'The so-called Byzantine Diptych in the Winchester Psalter, British LIbrary, MS Cotton Nero C. IV', Gesta, 37 (1998), 26-43 (pp. 35-36, fig. 19).
The Apocalypse and the Shape of Things to Come, ed. by Frances Carey (London: British Museum, 1999), p. 67.
Jean Brodahl, 'The Melisende Psalter and Ivories (BL Egerton 1139): An Inquiry into the Status and Collecting of Medieval Art in Early Nineteenth-Century France' (unpublished PhD dissertation, Brown University, 1999).
Barbara Zeitler, 'The Distorting Mirror: Reflections on the Queen Melisende Psalter (London, B. L., Egerton 1139)', in Through the Looking Glass: Byzantium Through British Eyes, ed. by Robin Cormack and Elizabeth Jeffreys, Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies, 7 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000), pp. 69-81.
Vrej Nersessian, Treasures from the Ark: 1700 Years of Armenian Christian Art (London: Briths Library, 2001), no. 131 [exhibition catalogue].
Adelaide Bennett, 'Commemoration of Saints in Suffrages: From Public Liturgy to Private Devotion' in Objects, Images, and the Word: Art in the Service of the Liturgy, ed. by Colum Hourihane, Index of Christian Art Occasional Paper, 6 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003), pp. 54-78 (pp. 55, 74 no. 14).
Kathleen S. Schowalter, ‘The Ingeborg Psalter: Queenship, Legitimacy, and the Appropriation of Byzantine Art in the West’, in Capetian Women, ed. by Kathleen Nolan (New York: Palgrave, 2003), pp. 99-135 (pp. 103-20, pls. 5.1, 5.3).
Christina Dondi, The Liturgy of the Canons Regular of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem: A Study and a Catalogue of the Manuscript Sources, Bibliotheca Victorina, 16 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 13, 63-64, 104, 121-23, 126, 131, 139, 162-66, 253-66, 331, pl. 3.
Frauke Steenbock, ‘Psalterien mit kostbaren Einbänden’ in The Illuminated Psalter: Studies in the Content, Purpose and Placement of its Images, ed. by F. O. Büttner (Belgium: Brepols, 2004), pp. 435-40 (p. 439, pls. 453-55) [part 2, binding].
Jaroslav Folda, Crusader Art in the Holy Land, from the Third Crusade to the Fall of Acre: 1187-1291 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 5-6, 10, 13, 18, 93-94, 210, 212, 215, 282, 285, 294, 324, 401, 423, 426, 508-09, 514, 518, 524.
Naomi Ruth Pitamber, 'Hybrid Devotion in Medieval Jerusalem: The Melisende Psalter's Identity Crisis' (unpublished master's thesis, University of Texas at San Antonio, 2005).
Saladin und die Kreuzfahrer, ed. by Alfried Wieczorek, Mamoun Fansa, and Harald Meller, Publikationen der Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, 17 (Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 2005), p. 179, pl. 101, no. C.39 [exhibition catalogue].
Janet Backhouse, 'The Case of Queen Melisende's Psalter: An Historical Investigation', in Tributes to Jonathan J. G. Alexander: The Making and Meaning of Illuminated Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts, Art and Architecture, ed. by Susan L'Engle and Gerald B. Guest (London: Harvey Miller, 2006), pp. 457-70.
Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle, Bible Manuscripts: 1400 Years of Scribes and Scripture (London: British Library, 2007), p. 84, fig. 71.
Sacred: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam and their Sacred Texts (London: British Library, 2007), p. 206 [exhibition catalogue].
Margaret Scott, Medieval Dress & Fashion (London: British Library, 2007), pp. 48-49, pls 23, 24.
Kathleen Doyle, catalogue entry, Byzantium 330-1453, ed. by Robin Cormack and Maria Vassilaki (London: Royal Academy, 2008), no. 260 [exhibition catalogue].
Jill N. Claster, Sacred violence: the European crusades to the Middle East, 1095-1396 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), pp. 177, 330, pl. 4.
Helen A. Gaudette, The Spending Power of a Crusader Queen: Melisende of Jerusalem', in Women and Wealth in Late Medieval Europe ed. by Theresa Earenfight (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), pp. 135-48 (pp. 136-37).
Jaroslav Folda, 'Melisende of Jerusalem, Queen and Patron of Art and Architecture in the Kingdom of Jerusalem', in Reassessing the roles of women as 'makers' of medieval art and architecture, ed. by Therese Martin, 2 vols (Boston: Brill, 2012), II, pp. 429-77 (pp. 450-59, pl. 8).
- Exhibitions:
- British Library Treasures, (online), 27 February 2016-
Faith Hope Charity: The Virtue of Caritas from the Early Christians to the Present, Diozesanmuseum, Paderborn , 23 July 2015 - 13 December 2015
Gold, British Library, London, 20 May 2022 - 2 October 2022
Jerusalem 1000-1400: Every People under Heaven, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 26 September 2016 - 8 January 2017 - Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Notes:
- Exhibited: Faith Hope Charity: The Virtue of Caritas from the Early Christians to the Present, Diozesanmuseum, Paderborn, 23 July 2015 - 13 December 2015