Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 11.djvu/422

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 8. XL MAY 22, 1915.

ILLUMINATED MSS. OF THE FIFTEENTH AND EARLIER CENTURIES.

"WE propose, in future, to frame our notices of Booksellers' Catalogues, not, as hitherto, upon each catalogue separately, but upon subjects grouping toother particulars of one kind from all the catalogues sent to us, and mentioning in detail some few of the principal items. \\ e hope that, classified in this way, our notes will prove of some- what greater use to our readers than they may hitherto have been. It will readily be understood that for lack of space, we can instance only a small proportion of the material under review, and that discussion of the examples cited cannot be attempted.

Under no heading is the lack of space likely to mnke itself more annoyingly felt than under the one we have chosen to be the first. We have had before us descriptions of some 1 rfO MSS. tailing within the period chosen. Out of somewhat more than thirty ' Howe,' thirteen are by French scribes, and the majority of these of the nlteenth centtiry Messrs. Parsons & Sons have a beautiful example, in Gothic letter, on 149 pages, illustrated bv fourteen large and very elaborate miniatures, with numerous borders and initial letters an octavo in a Grolier binding (140/.), as well as an almost equally good book, illustrated by nineteen large and sixteen small miniatures, and written in red and black on 222 11. (100 guineas).

V most interesting English ' Horse belonging to the early fifteenth century is described at length by Messrs. J. & J. Leighton. The minia- tures in this include a Martyrdom of St. Thomas of Canterbury, a St. George, and a Martyrdom of St. Edmund (300U. The same firm have also the finest of the Flemish ' Horae ' included in these MSS., the work of an artist of the school

of Bruges, which presents several unusual features in the depicting of saints, and contains a remark- ably beautiful calendar (050Z.).

Out of fourteen specimens of ' Bibha Sacra we may mention an English MS. of the early thirteenth century belonging to Mr. Barnard of Tunbridge Wells a book that was recently shown at the Ecclesiastical Art Exhibition, written m small minuscules, with initials and head-lines in
 * red and blue (42Z.) ; and a fourteenth - century

Anglo - Norman MS. in 2 vols., thick, small 4to,

described by Messrs. Maggs (08L).

There are a few delightful Missals, Breviaries, and Psalters. Thus Messrs. Young of Liverpool catalogue a Flemish Breviary of the fifteenth century having many fine illuminated initials aiid two remarkably good borders decorated with designs of birds, insects, and flowers (251.). Mr. Barnard has a late fourteenth-century English Psalter, containing entries of interesting genea- logical particulars (12L).

Among works of the Fathers, and books of similar interest, we noticed Messrs. Leighton's thirteenth- century MS. of Bede, English work which seems to have belonged in the fifteenth century to the Benedictine \bbey of St. Martin at Tournay (25Z.) ; and an Italian MS. of the ' Thesaurus adversus Hereticos ' of Cyril of Alexandria of the fifteenth century (95Z.).

Among MSS. of secular interest we have a fifteenth - century Italian transcript of Livy's 1 War in Macedonia,' on 116 leaves, a beau- tifully decorated and finely written work in a

contemporary oak binding, described by Messrs. Young (35Z.). The most considerable of these is, however, Messrs. Maggs's ' Histoire Univer- selle des Anciens Royaumes ' a MS. which, in the eighteenth century, belonged to the Due de la Valliere, and was brought to Eng- land at the time of the French Revolution. It consists of 7 2 -I pages in lettrcs bdtarde*, on stout ellum, with nearly 100 miniatures, of which six are unusually large, and over 500 ornamental nitials. All this work is of great vivacity, in particular the large miniatures above-mentioned, which introduce the six several sections of the ' Histoire.' The third section is devoted to English history, and begins with a picture show- ing the arrival in England of Brut, and his fight with the giants ; another large miniature depicts the story of (Edipus : yet others those of Romulus and Remu=, and of Alexander. Executed, to judge by a coat of arms on the opening page, for Adolphus of Burgundy, this is undoubtedly one of the most remarkable of secular illuminated MSS. extant (2,500/.).

in conclusion we may mention a collection of twenty-six pieces portions of leaves with decorated borders and initials upon them in the possession of Messrs. Young. Whether it is justifiable to cut examples out of complete works may, indeed, be a question ; but there can be no doubt that these specimens of French and Flemish work of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries form together a useful selection for purposes of study (36Z.).

Our next notes on Booksellers' Catalogues will deal with books and engravings relating to London in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

PROF. LANE COOPER (Cornell University, Ithaca, New York) writes to us as follows :

" Referring to your announcement of a Browning Concordance (ante, p. 180), may I call attention to the precise name of the society which takes an interest in such works? It is The Concordance Society, not ' the Concordance Society of America,' or the like. Several members are English ; one is a scholar in Japan, and so on. The officers of the society are eager to enlist new members."

ON all communications must be written the name and address of the sender, not necessarily for pub- lication, but as a guarantee of good faith.

To secure insertion of communications corre- spondents must observe the following rules. Let each note, query, or reply be written on a separate slip of paper, with the signature of the writer and such address as he wishes to appear. When answer- ing queries, or making notes with regard to previous entries in the paper, contributors are requested to put in parentheses, immediately after the exact heading, the series, volume, and page or pages to which they refer. Correspondents who repeat queries are requested to head the second com- munication " Duplicate."

MR. S. GASELEE. Forwarded.

CORRIGENDUM. P. 360, col. 1, sub 'Authors Wanted,' for " death's step " read death s stamp.