Beschreibung:

Bifolium with four historiated initials from a lavishly illuminated Bible, in Latin, manuscript on parchment [England, mid-thirteenth century] Two conjoined leaves, with delicately painted historiated initials of Biblical figures holding scrolls and a book, and an angel looking down at a town and checking his own tally of the righteous on a scroll (opening 2-3 John, the Epistle of Jude and Revelation), three of these in pink or blue with white penwork set on burnished gold grounds with coloured frames heightened with dots, the largest with a pink-bodied dragon sitting atop the initial, his tail providing the gold and coloured extension into the border, that terminating in a spray of coloured acanthus leaves, the smaller two of these with similar border extensions, the last historiated initial with full-length figure of John standing in a burnished gold column between two drollery dragons, one further illuminated initial in blue enclosing mirrored sprays of acanthus leaf foliage, on tessellated red grounds with thin gold frame, alternate red and blue running titles and versal initials, red rubrics, double column of 56 lines, slight staining at head with some cockling there, natural split to edge of one leaf (only affecting blank border), marginalia showing trimming at edges, small spots and stains, else outstanding condition, each leaf 254 by 170mm. From a strikingly handsome English Bible, in impressively large format. The details of this leaf fit with a Bible from the collection of James P.R. Lyell (1871-1948) last sold by Quaritch, cat. 716 (1953), no. 300, and that may well be the parent manuscript of this leaf.