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Harley MS 2943

Record Id:

040-002048774

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002048774

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000761.0x0000da

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 2943

Title:

Middle Dutch Book of Hours

Scope & Content:

Contents:

ff. 1r-12v: Calendar.

ff. 13r-15v: Prayer for communion, with a rubric: ‘Dit gebet selmen lesen als men wil gaen totten heiligen sacrament te ontfanghen’, beginning: ‘O overste priester ende gewaer biscop here ihesu criste die di selven offerste gode dinen vader’.

ff. 15v-16r: Prayer after communion, with a rubric: ‘Dit gebet seltu lesen alstu dat heilighe sacrament ontfangen heves’, beginning: ‘O here ihesu criste hoe sel ic arme sundige mensche die en niet en bin dan een spise der wormen di ymmermeer te vollen danken mogen vander duerbare gaven die du mi huden gegeven hebste’.

ff. 18r-48r: The Hours of the Virgin Mary, entitled: ‘Hier begint onser liever vrouwen getide’.

ff. 50r-67v: The Hours of the Eternal Wisdom, entitled: ‘Dit is die getide vander ewiger wijsheit’.

ff. 69r-88r: The Long Hours of the Cross, entitled: ‘Dit is die lange cruus getide’.

ff. 90r-111v: The Hours of the Holy Spirit, entitled: ‘Hier begint die heilige geest getide’.

ff. 113r-120r: The Seven Penitential Psalms, entitled: ‘Hier begint die seven psalme in duutsch’.

ff. 120r-126r: The Litany of Saints, entitled: ‘Die letanien’; followed by prayers to God.

ff. 128r-156r: The Office of the Dead, entitled: ‘Hier begint die lange vigilie voir die sielen’.

The manuscript contains a later addition:

ff. 156r-157v: An excerpt from the Soliloquies of Augustine in German, beginning: ‘O mein erlöser, ich bin ein Son deiner magdt [etc.]’; written in the 17th century.

Decoration:

6 full-page miniatures with full foliate borders including human figures and/or animals, in colours and gold, for major divisions (ff. 17v, 49v, 68v, 89v, 112v, 127v). 3 large historiated initials with three-sided foliate borders, including human figures and/or animals, in colours and gold (ff. 18r, 50r, 69r). 1 smaller historiated initial with partial foliate borders, in colours and gold (f. 13r). Large decorated foliate initials with three-sided foliate borders, including human figures and/or animals, in colours and gold (ff. 90r, 113r, 128r [featuring death taking a man while he is drinking with others]). 29 large decorated foliate initials with partial foliate borders, many including human figures and/or animals, in colours and gold, for minor divisions (ff. 24v, 31r, 33v, 35v, 38r, 40v, 44v, 50v, 56v, 58v, 60r, 61v, 62v, 64r, 66r, 74v [initial in gold on a red and blue ground], 77r, 79r, 81r, 82v, 84r, 86v, 96v, 99r, 101r, 103r, 104v, 106v, 109r). Small initials in red with purple pen-flourishing or in blue with red pen-flourishing, with green wash. Red double-line ruling.

The subjects of the full-page miniatures are as follows:

f.17v: The Annunciation.

f. 50r: Christ in Majesty.

f. 68v: Christ on the Cross with a heraldic display of the Arma Christi in the margin.

f. 89v: A funeral; with Death holding a bow and arrow in the margin.

f. 112v: The Last Judgement

f. 127v: Christ outside the synagogue.

The subjects of the historiated initials are as follows:

f. 18r: The Virgin (as the Woman of the Apocalypse) with Christ Child; with Augustus and the Tiburtine Sybil in the margin.

f. 49v: The descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles.

f. 69r: The Man of Sorrows.

f. 69r: The Veil of Veronica.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002048774", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 2943: Middle Dutch Book of Hours" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002048774

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 2943 : Middle Dutch Book of Hours

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[2944]/040-002048774

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Dutch, Middle
German
Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1486

End Date:

1486

Date Range:

1486

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment.

Dimensions: 195 x 135 mm (text space: 100 x 65 mm).

Foliation: ff. 157 (+ 3 paper flyleaves at the beginning + 3 at the end); 1 unfoliated medieval parchment leaf after f. 67.

Script: Gothic.

Binding: Post-1600. Harleian binding of gold-tooled red leather; marbled endpapers; gilt edges.

Custodial History:

Origin:

North-West Netherlands (Haarlem? or Beverwijk?).

Scribe:

Decorated and written by Nicolas Spierinc (fl. 2nd half of the 15th century), Flemish illuminator and scribe: signed his name 'Spierinck' with the date '1486' on f. 18r and f. 69r.

Provenance:

A member of the Lochorst family from Utrecht: their arms, partly effaced, on ff. 49v, 50r, 58v; they probably also commissioned Add MS 10043 and Add MS 38122.

The Harley Collection, formed by Robert Harley (b. 1661, d. 1724), 1st earl of Oxford and Mortimer, politician, and Edward Harley (b. 1689, d. 1741), 2nd earl of Oxford and Mortimer, book collector and patron of the arts, inscribed as usual by their librarian, Humfrey Wanley '12 die Septembris, 1722' (2nd flyleaf). Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta Cavendish, née Holles (b. 1694, d. 1755) during her lifetime and thereafter to their daughter, Margaret Cavendish Bentinck (b. 1715, d.1785), duchess of Portland; the manuscripts were sold by the Countess and the Duchess in 1753 to the nation for £10,000 (a fraction of their contemporary value) under the Act of Parliament that also established the British Museum; the Harley manuscripts form one of the foundation collections of the British Library.

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), II (1808), p. 721.

Karel de Flou and Edward Gailliard, Beschrijving van Middelnederlandse en andere handschriften die in Engeland bewaard worden, Verslagen en Mededelingen van de Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie voor Taal- en Letterkunde, 3 vols (Ghent: Koninklijke Vlaamsche Academie voor Taal- en Letterkunde, 1895–97), II (1896), pp. 152-59 (no. 17).

Walter de Gray Birch and Henry Jenner, Early Drawings and Illuminations: An Introduction to the Study of Illustrated Manuscripts (London: Bagster, 1879), p. 14.

Robert Priebsch, Deutsche Handschriften in England, 2 vols (Erlangen: Junge, 1896–1901), II: Das British Museum mit einem Anhang über die Guildhall-Bibliothek, pp. 11-12 (no. 21).

Paul Durrieu, La Miniature flamande au temps de la cour de Bourgogne (1415-1530) (Paris and Brussels: Van Oest, 1921), pl. LIV.

Klaas van der Hoek, 'De Noordhollandse verluchter Spierinck: Haarlem en/of Beverwijk, ca. 1485-1519', in Middeleeuwse handschriftenkunde in de Nederlanden 1988: Verslag van Groningse Codicologendagen 28-29 april 1988, ed. by Jos M. M. Hermans, Nijmeegse Codicologische Cahiers, 10-12 (Grave: Alfa, 1989), pp. 163-82.

The Golden Age of Dutch Manuscript Painting, ed. by Wilhelmina C M Wüstefeld, Anna Sophia Korteweg, and Henri L M Defoer (New York: Braziller, 1990), pp. 233, 242-43 [exhibition catalogue].

Klaas van der Hoek, 'The North Holland Illuminator Spierinck: Some Attributions Reconsidered', in Masters and Miniatures: Proceedings of the Congress on Medieval Manuscript Illumination in the Nothern Netherlands (Utrecht, 10-13 December 1989), ed. by Koert van der Horst and Johann-Christian Klamt (Doornspijk: Davaco, 1991), p. 281.

Antoine de Schryver, 'Nicolas Spierinc Calligraphe et enlumineur des Ordonnances des Etats de l'Hôtel de Charles le Téméraire', Scriptorium: Revue internationale des études relative aux manuscrits, 23 (1969), 434-58.

Andrew G. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c.700-1600 in the Department of Manuscripts, The British Library (London: British Library, 1979), I, no. 716.

Janet Backhouse, Illumination from Book of Hours (London: British Library, 2004), no. 28.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Places:

Northern Netherlands