Beschreibung:

GOSPEL LECTIONARY, in Latin, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM [Southern Germany, Regensburg or Augsburg, circa 1480] 260 x 185mm, 82 leaves, COMPLETE, including final 6 blank leaves, Collation: 1-9 8 (1/1 and 9/4-8 blank), 14/15 lines, justification 135 or 142x90mm, written in brown ink in a large gothic liturgical hand, rubrics in red, capitals touched in red, 47 LARGE ILLUMINATED INITIALS, from 5 to 8 lines high (up to 75x65mm), in gold on patterned blue, red or green ground, or in colours on highly burnished gold ground, each with a half or three-quarter page border of scrolling coloured and gold leafy tendrils, fruit and flowers, some with human faces, LARGE HISTORIATED INITIAL 'I' (80x75mm) on f.2, within a full border of coloured and gold scrolling leaves and flowers and golden fruit, peopled by two putti, birds, rabbits, a deer, a squirrel and a monkey (the outer border is cropped). Bound in late eighteenth-century German red straight-grained morocco gilt, the covers decorated with two floral gilt swags within a surround of intertwined wreaths, spine with raised bands in six compartments, each containing a floral vase (very small holes where two clasps have been removed), edges gilt. IN FINE CONDITION The text comprises 48 readings from the Gospels for feast days only, beginning with Christmas, containing the feasts of the Virgin and the principal saints, each pericope introduced by a splendid large initial The large historiated initial on folio 2 (the first text leaf) depicts the Nativity, the Virgin and Joseph outside the stable kneeling, the Child with two golden praying angels below, two peasants looking over a wall at back and a large town in the background. The sky in burnished gold with four angels and a falling star, in the distance a peasant in red standing on a mountain hears the annunciation from the angel above. The workmanship of the miniature is almost certainly South German and by a very accomplished artist, probably from an atelier in Augsburg or Regensburg