A Little-Known Manuscript Dated 1471, made for Ercole d’Este, Duke of Ferrara

Rather than attempt a full blog-post this week, I will just link to one that I wrote for the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, that was posted online yesterday.

The Hours of Philip Ringstone

Looking through old photos taken on a visit to Bristol Reference Library I came across my pictures of their MS 11.

The Duprat Bible [Part I]

The so-called "du Prat atelier" of 13th-century Parisian illuminators was named by Robert Branner after a luxurious large (c.440×320mm) Bible that is now in Boston Public Library (MS. f. Med. 104):

Boston, Public Library, MS. f. Med. 104, vol.IV, fols.434v-435r

Parts of its recent provenance are well known, but thanks to images taken by Lisa Fagin Davis I have been able to fill in much of the gap between the 16th century and 1830.

More About the Bible of Louis de Harcourt, Vol.II

I recently visited Houghton Library at Harvard and was able to see MS Typ 239, discussed in a previous post. I am now able to show colour images of features which I could previously only show in black and white, or not at all. First, here is the ownership inscription of Louis de Harcourt:

Department of Printing and Graphic Arts, Houghton Library,
Harvard University, MS. Typ 239, fol. 335v

A 13th-Century Bible From Beauvais at Smith College

On a recent visit to Smith College, Massachusetts, I saw a 13th-century Bible (MS 241) with unusual clues to its provenance.

Stephen Ferguson's blogging at Princeton

I have recently found blog-posts by Stephen Ferguson at http://blogs.princeton.edu/notabilia/author/stephen-ferguson/

A sample post, similar to those I post myself, is this (from here: http://blogs.princeton.edu/notabilia/2013/05/17/shelf-marks-of-sunderland-books/):

Shelf-marks of Sunderland books

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Stephen Ferguson

	Horace. Ars poetica with commentary of Aldus Manutius (Venice, 1576) Call number: PTT 2865.311.076. [Shelf mark on verso of front free endpaper, which is marbled on recto. The front paste-down is marbled. These are the only marks of ownership.]
	Charles Spencer, third Earl of Sunderland (1674-1722), his “books are easily recognizable by the bold shelf-marks written in ink on the verso of the upper cover in the upper left hand corner.” S. DeRicci, English Collectors of Books & Manuscripts (1530-1930) and Their Marks of Ownership (Cambridge, 1930), p. 39.

For more about the history of the Sunderland Library, see the record for the 18th century manuscript catalogue of the Library held at John Rylands Library:
http://archiveshub.ac.uk/data/gb133-engms62.txt

Philip Bliss (1787-1857) and Rebekah Bliss (1749-1819)

Earlier this year a fine Flemish Book of Hours with an interesting  early 19th-century provenance was sold in London. A faint pencil inscription on a flyleaf:

Inscription, as it appears in normal light

at first appeared to read:

"Missal of considerable 

delicacy and beauty.

cost Mr. Bliss [£25 ??]"

This immediately suggested Philip Bliss, the well -known Oxford antiquarian, book-collector, and member of the Roxburghe Club. 

Bodleian, MS. Auct. D. 4. 6

Bodleian, MS. Auct. D. 4. 6 is a 12th-century English Glossed Psalter, well known for its initial apparently naming the scribe/artist and patron: "Ioh(ann)es me fecit Rogerio".

A Walsingham MS

While at the Chester Beatty Library I also had the opportunity to look at the so-called Walsingham Bible (Western MS. 22) (on which see Kauffmann, Romanesque Manuscripts, no. 59).

[Source]

Ker (MLGB, 2nd edn., p. 192) associates it with Augustinian Canons of Walsingham, but with a "?" as the only evidence is a leaf of a Walsingham rental bound in as the first medieval leaf of the volume (fol. 2).

On a back flyleaf, however, is inscribed in a late medieval hand "Domine dominus [noster] qua(m) admirabile est nomen tuum in universa terra [i.e. Psalm 8:2] Henric(us) Burnham" (fol. 135v).