Beschreibung:

GREGORY I (ca. 540-604, Pope 590-604, Saint). Moralia in Job , in Latin. ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM AND PAPER. [Bohemia], 1397. Chancery 2 o (296 x 205 mm). i+554 leaves: 1-6 1 0(-6/9, blanks cancelled); 7-25 1 2, 26-35 1 2 36-37 1 4 38-46 1 2, COMPLETE. Modern pencilled foliation. Ff. 59-554 with horizontal catchwords in lower right margin and traces of two series of signatures in center lower margin on last versos. Ff. 1-58 with 56-57 lines written in black and red ink in a gothic cursive bookhand on 56-57 horizontal lines ruled in brown ink, ff. 1-36 in double columns between four vertical lines, justification: 240 x 165 mm, ff. 36-58 ruled as tables with 12 columns between 13 vertical lines, justification: 236 x 140 mm; ff. 59-554 in double columns of ca. 46 lines written in brown or black ink in gothic cursive bookhand between two horizontal and four vertical lines ruled in brown ink, justification: 215 x 135 mm. TWO ILLUMINATED HISTORIATED INITIALS, THIRTY-FOUR ILLUMINATED INITIALS in colors, liquid gold and silver, and burnished gold, with foliate arabesque extensions, the burnished gold sometimes patterned with circular and floral punches, 12 pen-flourished Lombard initials in index, simple red or blue two-line Lombards marking some chapter divisions in Moralia , running titles in red, chapter headings and index letters in red in margins, text initials slashed red, red paragraph marks and underlines. Citations and other notes in the hand of the scribe in the margins throughout, occasional marginalia in a 15th-century cursive hand, occasional early corrections to text. Ff. 1-58 written on vellum; ff. 59-554 with vellum bifolia as the outermost and innermost sheets of each quire, the other bifolia of paper. (Small natural flaws to vellum, lower blank margins trimmed from vellum ff. 543 and 549, small loss to blank margin of f. 280, light stain to f. 200r, some abrasion to burnished gold of first initial, the silver oxydized.) Binding : contemporary Bohemian tawed deerskin over wooden boards, with chemise of chamois-like leather, turned under the pastedown at the fore-edge of the front cover, attached under the back pastedown by a pocket sewn on, extending up to 200 mm. beyond the other edges of the book in an irregular shape which retains the silhouette of the animal's hide, ten center- and cornerpiece bosses, two clasps consisting of tawed leather straps with simple brass fittings catching on pins on the front cover (several tears to chemise, some with old repairs, one strap repaired, the other partially defective); contemporary vellum label on front cover, vellum index tabs, vellum pastedowns with passages in textura script on versos; modern drop-back box. Provenance : written by Leonhard of Schärding and completed in 1397: colophon on f. 551r ( Explicit secunda pars Moralium beati Gregorii pape super librum beati Iob. Sub anno domini Millesimo trecentesimo nonagesimo septimo feria secunda ante octavas vigiligie [sic] nativitatis Christi, per manus Leonhardi de Scherding ) -- illuminated in Prague, ca. 1398 -- binder's/rubricator's note on back pastedown: "sexterni 46 versualia 36" -- unidentified library label on spine -- [Sotheby Parke Bernet, 15 October 1974, lot 242, to Lathrop Harper] Contents : contemporary note on Gregory the Great (front pastedown); fragment of a notarized copy of a document from the consistorial court of the diocese of Meissen (f. i r, i v blank); alphabetical index to the Moralia (ff. 1r-36v); scriptural index to Gregory's Moralia, Homilies on the Gospels and on Ezechiel, and Pastoral Care (ff. 37r-58v); Moralia in Job: Books 1-17 (ff. 59r-286v), Books 18-35 (ff. 287r-551r, 551v-553r blank but ruled); Protestationes Magistri Johannis Wiclef et primo in tractatu suo de potestate pape capitulo ultimo ita scribit (ff. 553v-554r, 554v blank but ruled); contemporary note giving the mystical interpretation of the text 'Ve(Vere?) terre cimbalo alarum' (back pastedown). AN UNRECORDED EX