Beschreibung:

Details
Anonymous German or Bohemian workshop
Illuminated initial ‘M’ and inhabited border on a very large leaf from a Gradual, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Germany or Bohemia, c.1500]
An imposing leaf from a large-format German or Bohemian choirbook, the margins peopled by whimsical spindle-wielding nude figures precariously hanging from the looping foliate branches.
550 × 330mm, single leaf, 8 lines of text and music on four-line black staves, the text including the first Response of the first Sunday in Advent, ‘Missus est Gabriel angelus ad Mariam […]’ with a large initial in shades of dark blue on a field of gold with foliate ornament, extending into a partial border in the left and lower margins, incorporating a peacock, another bird, and a nude man and woman, she making thread with a distaff and spindle, he with a spindle and yarn-winder (a row of sewing-holes above the initial where a protective textile veil used to be). Mounted and framed.
Provenance:
Sold anonymously at Christie’s, 28 June 1973, lot 62A, bought for £220 by Scharf.
Illumination:
The punched gold grounds and intricate acanthus patterning of the initial stave, along with the thin, looping foliate borders inhabited by a pheasant, a fantastical green rooster and two naked figures precariously perched on the branches, are all features that recall the lively, humorous, ambitious illumination of the splendid 'Geese Book' at the Morgan Library (MS M.905), named for one of its bas-de-page vignettes and produced for the church of St Lawrence in Nuremberg by the illuminator Jakob Elsner
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