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Psalter, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Naples, c.1475-85]
细节
Cola Rapicano (fl.1451-1488) and workshop.
Psalter, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Naples, c.1475-85]
A handsome Psalter with clean, wide borders, illuminated by the chief illuminator to the Aragonese court in Naples, Cola Rapicano, and signed by the scribe, Antonellus of Montefusco.
191 x 135mm. ii (paper) + 215 + iii (paper) leaves, complete, collation: 112, 2-1810, 199 (x a cancelled blank], 20-2110, 224, vertical catchwords survive, old foliation erratic, 19 lines, headings in red, capitals touched in yellow, small illuminated throughout, eight large illuminated initials with two-sided borders, one large historiated Beatus initial with King David within a full border incorporating a coat-of-arms originally apparently left blank and later infilled with the 3 crescents from the Wodhull arms (slight oxidisation to some of the figures on f.13, occasional marginal stains, else in excellent condition throughout with wide margins). 18th-century English red morocco, gilt, according to the Sotheby's 1994 description perhaps by Roger Payne, (edges a little scuffed, rebacked).
Provenance: (1) The manuscript is signed by the scribe, Antonellus, pastor of Montefusco (in the province of Avellino, Campania), in a colophon on f.213v, ‘Qui scripsit scribat. semper cum / Domino vivat: vivat in celis / Donnus Antonellus: pasto/ris de montefusculo: Valet’. (2) 18th-century English binding with a repeated armorial stamp on the spine, apparently with 3 fish. (3) Dr Anthony Askew (1722-1772), classicist, physician and traveller: his sale at Sotheby’s, 14 March 1785, lot 514, to Wodhull. (4) Michael Wodhull (1740-1816), of Thenford, Northamptonshire, with his note of purchase and collation on the flyleaf, £1.0.0 changed to £2.0.0; the date 27 September 1808 added at end; by descent to his sister-in-law Mary Ingram and from her in 1824 to Samuel Amy Severne, and thence to J.E. Severne; his sale at Sotheby’s, 19 January 1886, lot 2158, to the bookseller Ridler. (5) The manuscript was bought by Warren Howell, of San Francisco. (6) Sotheby’s 21 June 1994, lot 85.
Content: Calendar ff.1-12v, Psalter ff.13-190v; Canticles f.191-205v, Creeds ff.205v-208; Litany and other short prayers ff.208-213v.
Illumination: The illumination of the Beatus initial with King David in prayer is very close to the analogous scene in a Psalter for the use of the Franciscans now at the BnF, attributable to the great Neapolitan illuminator Cola Rapicano, the official illuminator to the Aragon court in Naples from 1451 to 1488. His earliest securely identified and documented work is the copy of Andrea Contario’s Obiurgatio in Platonis calumniatorum of 1471 (Paris, BnF, Ms lat.12947): we see the same flying little putti with splayed legs in the borders of the opening leaf of the present manuscript; these are lively and recurrent protagonists in several other manuscripts attributed to the artist (in addition to the BnF manuscript, see, for example a Breviary in Valencia, Biblioteca Universitaria Ms. 890-726 and a Quintus Curtius Rufus, Rerum gestarum magni Alexandri in Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, ms.vitr. 22.9). The Sotheby’s catalogue of 1994 also found similarities with the illuminator of a manuscript of Ausonius formerly in Major Abbey's library (Alexander and de la Mare, Italian Manuscripts, 1969, pp.77-8), described by Professor Alexander as ‘very close to that of Cola Rapicano’. From the mid-15th century, Cola led a thriving workshop that produced numerous manuscripts for the Aragonese court, and his engaging and modernising blend of Catalan, Franco-Flemish and Florentine styles was cemented by his sons and followers: he laid the foundations of a distinctive and coherent Neapolitan style that dominated book illustration in the city for the remainder of the century (see G. Toscano, La Biblioteca Reale di Napoli al tempo della dinastia Aragonese, Naples, 1998, pp.385-416).
The historiated initial with King David is on f.13. The large iluminated initials are on ff.40, 56, 72v, 89v, 110v, 130, 150v and 154v.
Psalter, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Naples, c.1475-85]
A handsome Psalter with clean, wide borders, illuminated by the chief illuminator to the Aragonese court in Naples, Cola Rapicano, and signed by the scribe, Antonellus of Montefusco.
191 x 135mm. ii (paper) + 215 + iii (paper) leaves, complete, collation: 112, 2-1810, 199 (x a cancelled blank], 20-2110, 224, vertical catchwords survive, old foliation erratic, 19 lines, headings in red, capitals touched in yellow, small illuminated throughout, eight large illuminated initials with two-sided borders, one large historiated Beatus initial with King David within a full border incorporating a coat-of-arms originally apparently left blank and later infilled with the 3 crescents from the Wodhull arms (slight oxidisation to some of the figures on f.13, occasional marginal stains, else in excellent condition throughout with wide margins). 18th-century English red morocco, gilt, according to the Sotheby's 1994 description perhaps by Roger Payne, (edges a little scuffed, rebacked).
Provenance: (1) The manuscript is signed by the scribe, Antonellus, pastor of Montefusco (in the province of Avellino, Campania), in a colophon on f.213v, ‘Qui scripsit scribat. semper cum / Domino vivat: vivat in celis / Donnus Antonellus: pasto/ris de montefusculo: Valet’. (2) 18th-century English binding with a repeated armorial stamp on the spine, apparently with 3 fish. (3) Dr Anthony Askew (1722-1772), classicist, physician and traveller: his sale at Sotheby’s, 14 March 1785, lot 514, to Wodhull. (4) Michael Wodhull (1740-1816), of Thenford, Northamptonshire, with his note of purchase and collation on the flyleaf, £1.0.0 changed to £2.0.0; the date 27 September 1808 added at end; by descent to his sister-in-law Mary Ingram and from her in 1824 to Samuel Amy Severne, and thence to J.E. Severne; his sale at Sotheby’s, 19 January 1886, lot 2158, to the bookseller Ridler. (5) The manuscript was bought by Warren Howell, of San Francisco. (6) Sotheby’s 21 June 1994, lot 85.
Content: Calendar ff.1-12v, Psalter ff.13-190v; Canticles f.191-205v, Creeds ff.205v-208; Litany and other short prayers ff.208-213v.
Illumination: The illumination of the Beatus initial with King David in prayer is very close to the analogous scene in a Psalter for the use of the Franciscans now at the BnF, attributable to the great Neapolitan illuminator Cola Rapicano, the official illuminator to the Aragon court in Naples from 1451 to 1488. His earliest securely identified and documented work is the copy of Andrea Contario’s Obiurgatio in Platonis calumniatorum of 1471 (Paris, BnF, Ms lat.12947): we see the same flying little putti with splayed legs in the borders of the opening leaf of the present manuscript; these are lively and recurrent protagonists in several other manuscripts attributed to the artist (in addition to the BnF manuscript, see, for example a Breviary in Valencia, Biblioteca Universitaria Ms. 890-726 and a Quintus Curtius Rufus, Rerum gestarum magni Alexandri in Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, ms.vitr. 22.9). The Sotheby’s catalogue of 1994 also found similarities with the illuminator of a manuscript of Ausonius formerly in Major Abbey's library (Alexander and de la Mare, Italian Manuscripts, 1969, pp.77-8), described by Professor Alexander as ‘very close to that of Cola Rapicano’. From the mid-15th century, Cola led a thriving workshop that produced numerous manuscripts for the Aragonese court, and his engaging and modernising blend of Catalan, Franco-Flemish and Florentine styles was cemented by his sons and followers: he laid the foundations of a distinctive and coherent Neapolitan style that dominated book illustration in the city for the remainder of the century (see G. Toscano, La Biblioteca Reale di Napoli al tempo della dinastia Aragonese, Naples, 1998, pp.385-416).
The historiated initial with King David is on f.13. The large iluminated initials are on ff.40, 56, 72v, 89v, 110v, 130, 150v and 154v.
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