Prayer Book in Latin and Netherlandic (Dutch/Flemish), written by at least nine scribes, intended for the use of nuns, perhaps Augustinian Regular Canonesses, at an unknown religious house in West Flanders, southern Netherlands (now Belgium).
Fols. 1r-12v, circa 1440-1460. Includes extracts from Latin Psalms. Responsory from the Office of the Dead in Latin, with musical notation (fols. 3r-4r) written with square notation on four-line staves ("Libera me domine de morte eterna in die illa tremenda"); and an introit ("Intret oratio mea in conspectu tuo domine..."). Prayers for special occasions, including among others, a prayer preceding the election of a prioress in Latin, with some rubrics in Netherlandic, and Six Psalms for the Dead, in Latin with Netherlandic headings.
Fols. 13r-99v, circa 1500-1525. Netherlandic and Latin prayers, many to God the Father, Christ, and the Virgin Mary. Some prayers offer papal indulgences. A prayer to Christ ("O lieve heere Jhesu Christe...") is written on a small piece of paper, bound into the manuscript between fols. 36 and 37. Illustrated with three hand-tinted woodcuts: fol. 14v, Christ as Man of Sorrows, with the Instruments of the Passion, a chalice with the host, and the xylographic caption "Salvator Mundi salva nos"; fol. 57r, Anna Selbdritt, with the Virgin, the Christ Child, St. Anne, the Holy Spirit as a dove and two bystanders, with the xylographic caption “tonser liever vrouwen ten troost” (i.e. "at Our Dear Lady of Consolation"), which refers to the convent of Carmelite Nuns at Vilvoorde, near Brussels, a religious house that from circa 1480 printed devotional woodcuts that could be inserted into manuscripts; and fol. 72r, Crucifixion with St. John and the Virgin Mary at the left, and St. Francis of Assisi, showing the Stigmata, kneeling at the right, image.
Notes
99 folios on unwatermarked paper, plus two folios on parchment (fols. 3-4). modern foliation in pencil on rectos in the upper right corner, traces of an older foliation in pencil on rectos in the lower right corner. Mostly in quires of 8, missing a leaf before fol. 5; written by at least nine scribal hands in 18-24 long lines per page: many three-, two and one-line red initials, several two- and one -line brown initials (fols. 1r-2v), capitals usually stroked with red, rubrics in red.
Binding note
19th-century, brown calf binding over pasteboard, blind-tooled (filets, roll stamps) in neogothic style, sewn on four raised bands, on the spine blind-tooled: “HEURES” and “CIRCA | 1500.” Blue edges, paper flyleaves and pastedowns, slightly worn.
Source acquisition
Purchase, 2016. AM 2016-47
OCLC
1340480534
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