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Detailed record for Additional 21114
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| Part 1 |
ff. 1-122 |
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| Title |
Psalter (the 'Psalter of Lambert le Bègue') |
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| Origin |
France, N. (Liège) |
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| Date |
Between 1255 and 1265 |
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| Language |
Latin and French |
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| Script |
Gothic, written below the top line |
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| Decoration |
2 full-page miniatures (ff. 8v, 9v) and 1 full-page historiated initial (f. 10v) in colours with gold. 1 full page ink drawing (f. 7v). 11 historiated initials in colours and gold (ff. 11, 12, 27v, 37v, 46v, 47, 56v, 68v, 79v, 81, 114v). 12 unframed figures representing the labours of the months, 11 calendar roundels with zodiac symbols and 1 unframed zodiac symbol in colours with gold. Framed initials in colours with gold. Small initials in red with brown penwork decoration, or in blue with red penwork decoration. Marginal figures and hybrid creatures. |
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| Dimensions in mm |
185 x 120 (125 x 75) |
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| Part 2 |
ff. 123-163 |
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| Title |
Office of the Dead, Penitential Psalms and Litany |
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| Origin |
France, S |
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| Date |
2nd half of the 14th century |
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| Language |
Latin |
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| Script |
Gothic |
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| Decoration |
Framed initials in colours with gold (ff. 122-123v). 1 puzzle initial in red and blue with pen-flourishing (f. 124). Initials in red or blue, some with penwork decoration in the other colour. |
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| Dimensions in mm |
185 x 120 (125 x 75) |
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| Official foliation |
ff. 163 (+ 1 unfoliated paper flyleaf and 3 unfoliated parchment flyleaves at the beginning and 3 unfoliated parchment flyleaves at the end) |
| Form |
Parchment codex |
| Binding |
Post-1600. Leather with raised bands and blind tooling; the fore-edge is inscribed '33' and 'Beate Marie…(illeg.)' |
| Provenance |
The Béguine monastery of St Christopher in Liège: a portrait of Lambert le Bègue (d. c. 1177), its supposed founder (f. 7v) and entries in the calendar, for this area.
Additions in the 15th century (ff. 156-158).
Names of months in the calendar and titles of some prayers added in the Catalan language in a 15th-century hand.
Inscription on the fore-edges of the leaves, '33 Beate Marie..', perhaps added in Spain.
Prayers with a rubric in French (ff.162v-163v) and correspondences to the Psalms added in the late 15th or early 16th century.
Marie Berardier, her name and a date of 1584 or 1589 inscribed on f.162.
Bought by the British Museum from Messers Boone, Booksellers, 28 July 1855. |
| Notes |
Contents include:
ff. 1-6v: Calendar;
f. 7: A table for calculating the date of Easter for 1140-1672, containing a hidden Latin verse identifying Lambert de Bègue as the author (see Paul Meyer, 'le Psautier' (1900), pp. 536-40);
ff. 9-10: Two verses in Northern French: ff. 9, incipit 'Pius deus omnipotent ki haut sies et lonc voi'' ff. 10: incipit, 'Sire qui pour nos fustes traveilhies'.
The same artist or artists as Keble College MS 17, according to Morgan, 'Resistance to Paris' (2008), p. 69. |
| Select bibliography |
Walter de Gray Birch and Henry Jenner, Early Drawings and Illuminations: An Introduction to the Study of Ilustrated Manuscripts (London: Bagster and Sons, 1879), p. 6.
Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1854-1860 (London: British Museum, 1875), p. 324.
Paul Meyer. 'Le psautier de Lambert le Bègue', Romania: Revue Trimestrielle, 29 (1900), 528-48.
Günther Haseloff, Die Psalterillustration im 13. Jahrhundert : Studien zur Geschichte der Buchmalerei in England, Frankreich und den Niederlanden ([n.p.]:[n.pub.], 1938), p. 69 (Table 20).
Keith Sinclair, 'Les manuscrits du Psautier de Lambert le Bègue', Romania, Revue Trimestrielle, 86 (1965), 22-47 (pp. 25, 46).
Rhin-Meuse: Art et civilisation 800-1400 (Cologne: Rudolf Muller, 1972), p. 84.
Lillian M. C. Randall, 'Flemish Psalters in the Apostolic Tradition', in Gatherings in Honour of Dorothy E. Miner, ed. by Ursula E. McCracken, Lilian M. C. Randall and Richard H. Randall, Jr (Baltimore, 1974), pp.171-91, (pp.180-81).
C. Lemaire, 'Le Comput de Lambert le Bègue: son interpretation et tradition', Scriptorium: Revue internationale des études relative aux manuscrits, 34 (1980), 78-85.
Judith H. Oliver, Gothic Manuscript Illumination in the Diocese of Liège (c. 1250 - c. 1330), Corpus of Illuminated Manuscripts from the Low Countries, 2-3, 2 vols (Leuven: Uitgverij Peeters, 1988), 1, no.18.
William Noel, 'Books in the Home: Psalters and Books of Hours', in Medieval Mastery: Book Illumination from Charlemagne to Charles the Bold 800-1475 (Leuven: Brepols, 2002), pp. 57-67 (p. 59, fig. 5) [exhibition catalogue].
Elisabeth von Thuringen: Eine Europaische Heilige, ed. by Dieter Blume and Matthias Werner, 2 vols (Petersburg: Michael Imhoff, 2007), I, Katalog, no. 245 [exhibition catalogue].
Andreas Bram, 'Fratrum Minorum Mater: Heiligenbilder als Angleichung and zum Patronat in Frankreich und Flandern und in der Anjou-Hofkunst Neapels' in Elisabeth von Thuringen: Eine Europaische Heilige, ed. by Dieter Blume and Matthias Werner, 2 vols (Petersburg: Michael Imhoff, 2007), II, Aufsatze, pp. 309-24 (p. 310, pl. 1).
Nigel Morgan, 'Resistance to Paris in the Iconography of 13th-century English, Netherlandish, North and East French Psalters in the Bodleian Library', The Bodleian Library Record, 21 (2008), 62-74 (pp. 69-70). |
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Part 1
ff. 1-122 |
| Psalter (the 'Psalter of Lambert le Bègue') |
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f. 1
January - drinking |
f. 1v
February |
f. 2
March - hoeing |
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f. 2v
April - a man with flowers |
f. 3
May - hawking |
f. 3v
June |
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f. 4
July - reaping |
f. 4v
August - harvesting |
f. 5
September - sowing |
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f. 5v
October - making wine |
f. 6
November - a pig farmer |
f. 6v
December - slaughtering a bull |
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f. 7
Table |
f. 7v
Lambert de Bègue |
f. 8v
The Annunciation |
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f. 8v
The Annunciation |
f. 9v
The childhood of Christ |
f. 10v
Death and Coronation of the Virgin |
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f. 10v
Death and Coronation of the Virgin |
f. 11
God holding Christ on the cross |
f. 11v
Framed initial with bird |
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f. 12
David playing the harp |
f. 20v
Illuminated initial |
f. 21
Marginal images |
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f. 27v
Christ healing a blind man |
f. 27v
Christ blessing a man |
f. 32v
Illuminated initial |
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f. 33
Marginal images |
f. 33v
Eagle |
f. 34
Marginal images |
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f. 34v
Illuminated initial |
f. 37
Text page with decoration |
f. 37v
The Flight into Egypt |
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f. 41v
Illuminated initial and marginal images |
f. 42
Marginal birds |
f. 46v
Herod and the massacre of the innocents |
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f. 47
Christ tempted by the Devil |
f. 56v
Jonah in the whale's mouth with Christ above |
f. 58v
Illuminated initial and eagle |
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f. 59
Marginal birds |
f. 66v
Marginal bird |
f. 67
A man with his hands and feet tied |
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f. 68v
Martin giving his cloak to a beggar |
f. 76v
Illuminated initial |
f. 77
A tonsured monk and a monkey |
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f. 79
Decorated initials and marginalia |
f. 79v
Francis with birds |
f. 81
Transfiguration |
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f. 82v
Illuminated initial |
f. 83
Marginal birds |
f. 93
Marginal images |
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f. 114v
Doubting Thomas touching Christ's wound |
f. 115
Marginal images |
f. 118v
Marginal images |
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f. 119
Tonsured head |
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