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Add MS 35254 V
- Record Id:
- 040-002088724
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002088702
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000001490.0x000115
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165148734.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 35254 V
- Title:
- Detached miniature from a Book of Hours ('The Hours of Louis XII')
- Scope & Content:
-
This single leaf originally belonged to a Book of Hours, known as 'The Hours of Louis XII', after Louis XII (r. 1498-1515), King of France, for whom it was made. The recto contains a framed miniature of the Virgin of the Annunciation, praying with an open book on her knees. The verso contains the opening of the text of Matins from the Hours of the Virgin Mary.
Two other detached miniatures from the 'Hours of Louis XII' housed at the British Library are now Add MS 35254 T (Job and his comforters) and Add MS 35254 U (Pentecost), while 52 of the manuscript's text pages are now Royal MS 2 D XL. A single leaf can also be found in the Bagford collection of fragments (Harley MS 5966, f. 54).
A further 9 detached full-page miniatures are housed in the following collections: St Luke the Evangelist (Edinburgh, National Library of Scotland, MS 8999); The Betrayal of Christ (Paris, Musée Marmottan, Wildenstein Collection), The Visitation (Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, No. K 2407), The Nativity (London Victoria and Albert Museum, No. E. 949-2003), The Adoration of the Magi (Musée du Louvre, No. RF 53030), The Flight into Egypt (London, Private Collection) Louis XII in Prayer, The Presentation in the Temple and Bathsheba Bathing (J. Paul Getty Museum, MSS 79a, 79b, 79).
Other fragments include: 1 leaf in the Samuel Pepys Collection at Magdalene College, Cambridge (Vol. I, p. 13); 4 leaves from the calendar with historiated borders (February, June, August, September), and 1 with a foliate border (September) in the Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E. M. II 19-22v.
For a discussion and reconstruction of the manuscript, see Janet Backhouse, 'Bourdichon's 'Hours of Henry VII' (1973), p. 96.
Contents:
f. 1r: A full-page framed miniature of the Virgin of the Annunciation.
f. 1v: The opening of the text of Matins, from the Hours of the Virgin Mary.
Decoration:
The manuscript's decoration was undertaken by the French court painter Jean Bourdichon (b. 1457/9, d. 1521).
1 full-page framed miniature in colours and gold (f. 1r).
Initials in colours and gold, containing fruits, flowers, birds or animals, with one-sided trompe l'oeil borders in colours and gold on the versos of folios. Line-fillers in gold and colours, some in the form of branches (f. 1v).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002088702
036-002088721
040-002088724 - Is part of:
- Add MS 35254 A-V : MINIATURES and borders, taken out of Italian illuminated MSS., on vellum; formerly in the collection of the late John Malcolm…
Add MS 35254 T-V : T, U, V. Three leaves from a Flemish Book of Hours.
Add MS 35254 V : Detached miniature from a Book of Hours ('The Hours of Louis XII') - Hierarchy:
- 032-002088702[0019]/036-002088721[0003]/040-002088724
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Add MS 35254 A-V
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
1 leaf
- Digitised Content:
- http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100165148734.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1493
- End Date:
- 1503
- Date Range:
- c 1498
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Material: Parchment.
Dimensions: 250 x 170 mm (130 x 85 mm).
Foliation: f. 1.
Script: Gothic cursive.
Binding: Housed together with Add MS 35254 P-U.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: Tours, France.
Provenance:
Louis XII (b. 1462, d. 1515), king of France, made for him c. 1498-99: his portrait with his patron saints Michael, Charlemagne, Louis, and Denis, and with two inscriptions, 'Loys XII de ce nom' and 'Il lest fait en l'eage de XXXVI ans', on a detached miniature associated with the manuscript, now J. Paul Getty Museum, MS 79a; and illuminated by Jean Bourdichon of Tours (b. 1457/59, d. 1521), court painter to four successive French kings: Louis XI, Charles VIII, Louis XII, and François I: this manuscript attributed to Bourdichon on stylistic grounds (see Kren et al, ed., A Masterpiece Reconstructed (2005), pp. 9-16, 81-82).
John Malcolm of Poltalloch (b. 1805, d. 1893), art collector and landowner: acquired between the first publication of the catalogue of his collection in 1869 and the second edition of 1876 (see Robinson, Descriptive Catalogue (1876), pp. 278-79).
Purchased by the Department of Prints and Drawings of the British Museum in 1895.
Transferred to the Department of Manuscripts of the British Museum in 1899.
- Information About Copies:
- Select digital coverage available for this manuscript; see the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, https://bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts.
- Publications:
-
J. C. Robinson, Descriptive Catalogue of Drawings by the Old Masters, forming the Collection of John Malcolm of Poltalloch, Esq, 2nd edn (London: Chiswick Press, 1876), pp. 278-79.
Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1894-1899 (London: Trustees of the British Museums, 1901), pp. 223-24.
W. R. Tymms and M. D. Wyatt, The Art of Illuminating as Practised in Europe from the Earliest Times (London: Day and Sons, 1860; repr. Studio Editions, 1987), pls XVI.3-4, 7.
Janet Backhouse, 'Bourdichon's 'Hours of Henry VII', British Library Quarterly, 38 (1973), 95-102.
Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts: Treasures from the British Library, ed. by Thomas Kren (New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1983), p. 163, fig. 21a.
Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography, ed. by Helene E. Roberts, 2 vols (Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1998), II, p. 769.
François Avril and Nicole Reynaud, Les Manuscrits à Peintures en France 1440-1520 (Paris: Flammarion, 1993), p. 295 [exhibition catalogue, with further bibliography].
A Masterpiece Reconstructed: The Hours of Louis XII, ed. by Thomas Kren and Mark Evans, with essays by Janet Backhouse and Nancy Turner (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2005), pp. 9, 16, 81-82.
- Exhibitions:
- Gold, British Library, London, 20 May 2022 - 2 October 2022
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)