Book of Hours, Dominican Use ('The Hours of Engelbert of Nassau')

Title

Book of Hours, Dominican Use ('The Hours of Engelbert of Nassau')

Shelfmark

MSS. Douce 219-20

Place of origin

Flemish, Ghent(first phase of production perhaps mid-1470s, illusionistic borders added early 1480s; see Kren and McKendrick)

Date

c. 1475-85

Language

Middle French (ca. 1400-1600)

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

parchment

Physical extent

iii + 293 (i.e. iii + 159 + iii + iii + 125 + iii)

Hands

Lettre bâtarde attributable to Nicolaus Spierinc

Decoration

Important miniatures; see below for details.

Borders of acanthus, fruits and birds, in two styles, changing at fols. 76v-77r.

Later trompe-l'oeil 'scatter' borders on several pages and openings, painted over the earlier borders except on fols. 16v, 181v-182r (Alexander, pp. 13-14).

Bas-de-page scenes of hawking and a tournament intermittently on fols. 47-68v and 91v-159r

Initials.

Cadels, added after the writing of the main text (Alexander, pp. 9-10).

Binding

Dark green morocco with gold tooling by Nicolas-Denis Derome (Derome le Jeune) with the arms of Paris Le Meyzieu (about A.D. 1770-75)

Acquisition

Bequeathed to the Bodleian in 1834

Provenance

Owned at an early date by Engelbert of Nassau (1451-1504); his motto, 'Ce sera moy', fol. 214r. His arms (azure billety or overall a lion rampant or, quartering gules a fess argent), fols. 194r, 198v, 200r, later overpainted (Alexander, pp. 7-8). Scholars have disagreed about whether Engelbert was the original owner (see Kren and McKendrick, and Anne H. van Buren, 'The Master of Mary of Burgundy and His Colleagues: The State of Research and Questions of Method', Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 38. Bd., H. 3/4 (1975), 286-309 at 288). Evidence that may point to a different original owner includes small coats of arms on the collars of hounds on fols. 50r, 53r, 56r, and the letters 'GG' on fols. 151v, 158v.

Philip the Fair, 1478-1506, Duke of Burgundy: see above; arms, fols. 19v, 36r, 42v, 74r, 132r, 132v, 133r, 263r, etc.

'De la bibliotheque de Charles Adrien Picard, 1767'; his sale, 1780, lot. 37, described as 'de form quarré, relié en bois, couverte de velours verd'

Rebound in two volumes for a member of the Paris le Meyzieufamily (above, Binding); in the Paris sale (1791) no. 15.

Sold to the Henry Pelham-Clinton, second Duke of Newcastle, 1720-1794 for £110 5s.

Thomas Edwards of Halifax, bookseller: his sale, 15 May 1828, lot. 817; bought by Triphook for £70, probably on behalf of Douce.

Francis Douce, 1757–1834; acquired May 1828.