alasdair
Site Admin
Joined: 28 Feb 2004
Posts: 53
Location: Cardiff
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 Posted: Mon May 29, 2006 3:04 pm Post subject: Renaissance manuscript |
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The following is a quote from an email sent to me by the Bodleian Library regarding the sketch showing Moses and the brazen serpent at the end of From Death Into Life and also referred to in The Threefold Gift of God.
| Quote: | I am happy to be able to identify the image (as illustrated in the derivative sketch on the website you mentioned) as deriving from MS. Douce 112 (fol. 3r). This manuscript is a Book of Hours, made in Flanders, in Bruges or Ghent, in the early 16th century. Its illuminations are of the highest quality and sophistication, and it would have been produced in workshop conditions by a team of professional artists and craftsmen. Its relatively late date makes it more a Renaissance than a medieval production, albeit one from Northern Europe rather than from Italy. The manuscript reached the Bodleian in 1834 in the bequest of Francis Douce (1757-1834).
A major feature of its sequence of illuminations (miniatures and figurative borders) is the emphasis on typological comparisons between the Old and New Testaments. Thus, the miniature which caught Haslam's attention at fol. 3r appears at the start of the Hours of the Cross, and its main miniature of Moses and the brazen serpent is evidently intended to prefigure the Elevation of the Cross, as at John 3. 14; the miniature is in turn surrounded by a full figurative border showing scenes from the Passion of Christ.
The easiest way for you to gain a good idea of the manuscript as a whole is to buy the 35 mm. colour filmstrip published by the Bodleian, which shows all the miniatures. The reference is Roll 163D, containing 53 frames (fol. 3r duly appears as frame 3). The cost for the filmstrip (unmounted, suitable for mounting as slides) is 30 pounds 55p. We also publish a second filmstrip from this manuscript, showing close-ups of flowers with birds and insects from the illuminated borders: this is Roll 159A, containing 29 frames, price 23 pounds 50p. Postage and packing costs and additional 6 pounds 50p (special delivery).
To order the filmstrips, please send an e-mail to our Slides Librarian, Mrs. Rigmor Batsvik, at rb[#AT#]bodley.ox.ac.uk .........
The original manuscript is classed as one of the Bodleian's major treasures. |
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