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Details
TWO CALENDAR LEAVES from a Book of Hours, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM
[Normandy, late 15th century]
160 x 95mm. Each leaf with a two-part arch-topped miniature in colours and liquid gold depicting the labour of the month and the sign of the zodiac, two-sided borders on rectos and three-sided borders on versos with liquid gold grounds on which sprays of flowers and scrolling coloured acanthus are interspersed with vignettes depicting saints of the month. The calendar in French with a saint for every day, the lines written alternately in red and blue with principal feasts in burnished gold (minor losses of pigment on versos). Mounted together in a double-sided frame.
The subjects of the miniatures are:
April: Picking flowers in an enclosed garden; Taurus (the bull grazing in a landscape with what appears to be a representation of Mont-Saint-Michel in the background). In the border: St Mary of Egypt (clothed in her hair), St Jerome, St Apollonia, and a bishop (perhaps St Boniface); on the verso: an abbess with book and crozier (probably St Opportuna, abbess of Séez), St Mark, and a bishop (perhaps St Germain).
December: Slaughtering the pig; Capricorn. In the border: St Nicholas and the three boys, the Virgin and Child accompanied by two putti with musical instruments; on the verso: St Thomas the Apostle (with lance and book), the Nativity, St Stephen, St John the Evangelist, and the Massacre of the Innocents.
St Opportuna, Abbess of Séez in the 8th century, was particularly venerated in Normandy and at Paris and Meaux. (2)
[Normandy, late 15th century]
160 x 95mm. Each leaf with a two-part arch-topped miniature in colours and liquid gold depicting the labour of the month and the sign of the zodiac, two-sided borders on rectos and three-sided borders on versos with liquid gold grounds on which sprays of flowers and scrolling coloured acanthus are interspersed with vignettes depicting saints of the month. The calendar in French with a saint for every day, the lines written alternately in red and blue with principal feasts in burnished gold (minor losses of pigment on versos). Mounted together in a double-sided frame.
The subjects of the miniatures are:
April: Picking flowers in an enclosed garden; Taurus (the bull grazing in a landscape with what appears to be a representation of Mont-Saint-Michel in the background). In the border: St Mary of Egypt (clothed in her hair), St Jerome, St Apollonia, and a bishop (perhaps St Boniface); on the verso: an abbess with book and crozier (probably St Opportuna, abbess of Séez), St Mark, and a bishop (perhaps St Germain).
December: Slaughtering the pig; Capricorn. In the border: St Nicholas and the three boys, the Virgin and Child accompanied by two putti with musical instruments; on the verso: St Thomas the Apostle (with lance and book), the Nativity, St Stephen, St John the Evangelist, and the Massacre of the Innocents.
St Opportuna, Abbess of Séez in the 8th century, was particularly venerated in Normandy and at Paris and Meaux. (2)
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