MS. Buchanan f. 3
Book of Hours, in Middle Dutch, Netherlandish, 15th century, second quarter
Contents
mainly in the translation of Geert Grote
[fols. 1r-2v: see below, endleaves]
[Item 1 occupies quires I-II]
Calendar
With an entry for almost every day of the year; each month headed by a note in red, usually relating the seasonal occupation to the length of the calendar month ('Januarius Ioemaent'; 'Sporkelle heuet xxviij dage'; 'Hert maent heuet xxxi dage'; etc.); major feasts (in red) include several saints whose relics were at Cologne, including Pantaleon (28 July), Gereon, Victor (10 Oct.), 11,000 virgins (21 Oct.), and Severinus (23 Oct.). Compared to the major feasts in the Cologne calendar (i.e. those printed in bold type by Grotefend, Zeitrechnung des deutschen Mittelalters, II pt.1, 82–6), the present manuscript has the following differences: the following are in black: Fabian & Sebastian (20 Jan.), Gregory (12 Mar.), and Mark (25 Apr.); the following, whose relics were at Cologne, are in red: Albinus and 10,000 martyrs (22 Jun.), and Cunibert (12 Nov.); the following are omitted: translation of the Three Kings (relics in Cologne) (23 July), dedication of Cologne Cathedral (27 Sept.), Presentation of the Virgin (21 Nov.); fols. 3r-v and 16v originally blank, fol. 16r is ruled only with the left-hand vertical lines of the calendar.
[Item 2 occupies quires III-IX]
Hours of the Virgin
[Item 3 occupies quire X]
Hours of the Cross
[Items 4–5 occupy quires XI-XIII]
[fol. 81r blank, fol. 81v with a miniature]
The Seven Penitential Psalms
Litany, a prayer, and collects
The litany with Augustine (1), Lubin, and Odulf (18–19) among nineteen confessors; Mary Magdalen (1), Walburga, Gertrude (10–11), Ursula and Elizabeth (15–16) among sixteen virgins; followed (fols. 101v-102v) by a prayer:
and three collects, each headed 'Collecte.':
(pr. ibid., 153)
[fol. 104r blank, fol. 104v with a miniature]
[Item 6 occupies quires XIV-XIX]
Short offices for each day of the week
for Sunday, devoted to the Trinity
for Monday, devoted to All Souls
for Tuesday, devoted to the Baptism
for Wednesday, devoted to the Betrayal of Christ
for Thursday, devoted to the Holy Sacrament
for Friday, devoted to the Passion
for Saturday, devoted to the Virgin
[Item 7 occupies quires XX-XXIII]
Office of the Dead
with only three lessons at Matins (pr. ibid., 156–95, i.e. starting on the second page of the pr. text, at 'Mi hebben ombeuanghen die suchten des doots. ...'; and with only the first three lessons at Matins); fol. 186r-v ruled, otherwise blank.
[Items 8–14, by a different scribe, occupy quires XXIV-XXVII]
Devotion to the Seven Last Words, here attributed to Bede
Indulgenced prayer on the Passion, here attributed to Pope John XXII
A long indulgenced version of the Anima Christi, here attributed to Pope John [XXII?]
followed by the collect
Three Communion prayers, the first two here attributed to St. Thomas (Becket?) and St. Bernard, respectively
Prayers and suffrages
a prayer to one's Guardian Angel
suffrages to Sts. Philip & James, Antony Abbot, Catherine, and Barbara
a prayer to Our Lord:
a long prayer to Our Lord
Devotion to the Virgin
consisting of a prayer:
and seven invocations, the first:
each followed by a Latin cue for the Ave Maria.
Devotion to St. Erasmus
with a collect:
fol. 216r-v ruled, otherwise originally blank.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
16 lines ruled in pale purple ink (a brighter tone in the calendar), between single vertical bounding lines extending the full height of the page, the top two and bottom two horizontal lines ruled the full width of the page; the calendar with all five verticals ruled the full height of the page); prickings frequently survive in all margins, about 10 mm. from the lower edge in the lower margin, the penultimate horizontal ruled line with a double pricking at the fore-edge. 15 lines of text per page.
Ruled space 87–90 × 60–1 mm. , written space 86 × 61 mm.
Calendar: ruled space 94–5 × 81–2 mm.
Hand(s)
Written in gothic bookhand, by two main scribes, responsible for (i) 17r-185v, and (ii) 187r-215v; the calendar appears to be by the second of these, or a third scribe.
Decoration
Headings in red, capitals and some abbreviations touched in red.
Six (of an original thirteen?) full-page miniatures, in the general style of the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht (on which see James H. Marrow, et al., The golden age of Dutch manuscript painting (New York, 1990), 14 and cat. nos. 21–5), less fine than the historiated initial, smaller than the text-area, each on a gold ground, framed by coloured and gold lines and with sketchy black penwork and gold dots in the margins; on inserted single leaves, blank on the recto; several cut out, leaving stubs:
- [Hours of the Virgin, Matins and Lauds: miniatures missing, leaving stubs before fols. 17 & 28 respectively.]
- (fol. 40v) Prime. Betrayal of Christ; Malchus's Ear.
- (fol. 46v) Terce. Christ before Pilate.
- [Sext miniature missing, leaving a stub before fol. 51.]
- (fol. 55v) None. Christ Carrying the Cross.
- (fol. 60v) Vespers. Deposition; Joseph of Arimathaea supporting Christ's body.
- [Compline miniature missing, leaving a stub before fol. 69.]
- [Hours of the Cross miniature missing, leaving a stub before fol. 75.]
- (fol. 81v) Penitential Psalms. Last Judgement; a lily and a sword either side of Christ's head; figures rising from graves.
- (fol. 104v) Daily Hours. Pentecost.
- [Office of the Dead miniature missing, leaving a stub before fol. 153.]
- [Seven Last Words miniature missing, leaving a stub before fol. 187, and an offset on fol. 187r.]
There is no sign of the small ink stamps sometimes found on inserted leaves painted in this style (see James Douglas Farquhar, 'Identity in an anonymous age: Bruges manuscript illuminators and their signs', Viator 11 (1980), 371–83, figs. 1–12).
One seven-line historiated initial on a gold ground, the margins of the page with a foliate and floral border in colours and gold on all four sides, overlaid on three intersecting gold fillets, one in each of the outer margins: (fol. 17r) Hours of the Virgin, Matins. Virgin and Child, the Virgin crowned, half-length; damaged by abrasion.
Five-line initials in gold on a cusped square 'quartered' ground in pink and blue, with white tracery, with a painted and gilt bar-border in the outer margin, a gold fillet in the upper and lower margins, and gold and painted foliage and flowers in all four margins, at the start of the Hours of the Cross (fol. 75r), the Penitential Psalms (fol. 82r), the first of the Daily Offices (fol. 105r), and the Office of the Dead (fol. 153r); similar initials, but without the gold fillets, and with simpler foliage ornament, to the other Daily Offices (fols. 116v, 125v, etc.); similar four-line initials with a bar border the height of the text area, sprouting foliage into the upper and lower margins at the start of each canonical hour except Matins in the Hours of the Virgin (fols. 28r, 41r, etc.); similar three-line initials and borders at each canonical hour except Matins in the Hours of the Cross (fols. 76v, 77v, etc.); similar three-line initials without borders, but with a simple daisy-like design in the margin alongside at each hour of the Daily Offices except Matins (fols. 106v, 108v, etc.); one five-line penwork initial in blue with reserved designs containing and surrounded by penwork in red ink, partially filled-in with green wash (fol. 187r: the start of the section by the third scribe); plain two-line initials, alternately red or blue, to psalms, hymns, lessons, etc.; plain one-line initials, alternately red or blue, to verses and other minor textual divisions.
Comparable border decoration can be found in manuscripts with illumination in the style the Masters of Zweder van Culemborg, e.g. Utrecht, University Library, MS. 1037 (2.E.19), illustrated in van der Horst, University Library, Utrecht, cat., no. 37, col. pl. F, figs. 155–8.
Addendum, 12 April 2000. Dr. Anne Korteweg kindly informs me that the text pages have what is called 'multicoloured leaves' decoration (see Kriezels, no. 7 and fig. on p. 36), and that the inserted miniatures are by a Utrecht master known as the Bible Master of the First Generation, a coarse follower of the Gethsemane Master (the latter named after a miniature in a Bible, The Hague, Royal Library, 78 D 38, although he and his followers worked mostly in books of hours).
Binding
Contemporary sewing and blind-stamped binding. Sewn on four split tawed straps, with cord endbands; bound in brown leather over bevelled wood boards: the four straps regularly spaced, and laced and pegged into staggered horizontal channels (the first and third longer than the second and fourth in both boards), the endbands secured in channels angled at about 45 degrees; each cover with a large central blind-stamped panel (that on the lower board very indistinct) representing the Man of Sorrows, standing in his tomb, surrounded by the Instruments of the Passion, enframed by the legend: 'O v[os om]nes qui transitis | per viam attendite | et : videt[e] si est [dolor similis] | sicut dolor m[eus]' (Lamentations 1:12) in gothic letters, starting at the lower left corner; framed by roll-tooled foliate scrollwork (using two different rolls) within blind fillets; the spine with four pronounced raised bands, the leather of the spine folded and stitched over the endbands; the top compartment inscribed in black ink '470' (cf. under Provenance) the fore-edges of both boards with marks from two pairs of metal clasp fittings, each with three nail-holes, parts of some of which are still visible on the inner face of the boards, which have been crudely gouged-out at these points; repaired, especially at the joints and corners, the leather of the upper joint weak, but the straps sound; with a bifolium of a breviary used as upper pastedown (now lifted) and endleaf (fols. 1–2); a similar pastedown (and endleaf?) are presumably missing at the end (see the note above). The panel stamps are similar to, but not the same as, those in Weale, Bookbindings in the National Art Library, II, 186–7 nos. 387–8, each of which he describes as a Netherlandish 'Image of Pity' stamp, and are rubbings taken from manuscript Books of Hours in Dutch.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Made for an unidentified Dutch-speaking patron, perhaps living in or near Cologne (possibly an exile during the Utrecht Schism of 1423–50): the decoration and the litany suggest that the main texts of the book were made in the diocese of Utrecht, while the calendar (on a separate quire, as usual, and by a different scribe; but also in Dutch, not German or Latin) indicates that it was tailored to the needs of a client in the city or diocese of Cologne, who presumably also requested the inclusion of the non-standard devotions from fol. 187r to the end (on separate quires, perhaps by the scribe of the calendar); since one of the inserted miniatures originally faced fol. 187r, the miniatures were presumably inserted after the writing of these textual additions. Patterns of holes and rust or other marks in fols. 39–40r, 45–46r, 186–187r suggest that pilgrim badge(s) or other votive image(s) may have been pinned/sewn in at these points, i.e. blank pages preceding miniatures.
Unidentified 17th(?)-century owners: the upper cover of the binding inscribed (apparently by the hand responsible for the foliation numbers on fols. 100r, 201r, and 216r): 'i5.' or 'is.' (possibly an abbreviation of 'ihesus', who is represented below?); inscribed by another hand in the upper margin of fol. 2r: 'fautis wal val slieri' (??).
Unidentified 18th/19th-century collection(s): inscribed in the top right corner of fol. 1r: '470' in a large bold hand (crossed through in ink), and in the top compartment of the spine (cf. under Binding); there is an erased inscription before this number on fol. 1r, apparently ending with a 'p'(?), but otherwise illegible even under UV light.
Unidentified 19th-century owner: inscribed in pencil (fol. 3v): 'Cöllnischer [?] Kalender'.
Thomas Arthur, or William Ridler, London booksellers, c.1875–85: the inner face of the upper board with a clipping from one of their catalogues, affixed sideways, in which the present manuscript was item 1, priced £8 8s.; inscribed in pencil on fol. 1r with the price-code 'd/s/-' (i.e. £5 10s) in the upper left margin, and on the wood of the inner face of the upper board, towards the centre of the fore-edge, sloping upwards; a pencil inscription is largely obscured by the catalogue clipping except for the word 'Pages', '[Cen]tury'(?), and a ',' sign.
Rt. Hon. T. R. Buchanan (1846–1911), after 1874
Given to the Bodleian by his widow, Mrs. E. O. Buchanan, in 1941.
MS. Buchanan f. 3 - flyleaves (fols. 1–2)
Contents
Use unidentified; an unfinished, presumably discarded, central bifolium of a quire, containing from the end of the versicle of lesson IV to the start of lesson IX (from '|| aurem tuam. Quia. ...' to '... viuere cum christo. Actualis ||'), perhaps part of Matins of the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin (15 Aug.).
Physical Description
Layout
ruled in brown ink with single vertical bounding lines extending the full height of the page, but horizontal lines are not visible (not ruled?), the 'pricked height' is 103 mm., the written height 100 mm., the ruled width 63 mm.; pricked with five regularly-spaced prickings in the fore-edge margin (alongside the notional bottom horizontal ruled line, and, counting from the bottom, the sixth, twelfth, eighteenth, and twenty-fourth lines), perhaps indicating the (intended?) use of a six-nibbed ruling implement; written with 23 lines of text per page
Hand(s)
gothic bookhand
Decoration
Headings in red, capitals touched in red, guide letters for one- and two-line painted initials which were never supplied, guides for rubrics in the outer margins; the letter 'a' in the lower margin of fol. 2r. Similar endleaves may have been used at the back of the volume, to judge by what appear to be offsets of rubrics on the inner face of the lower board.
History
Additional Information
Record Sources
Digital Images
Digital Bodleian (11 images from 35mm slides)
Bibliography
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
Last Substantive Revision
2019-10-15: Added binding description (omitted by mistake in previous version).