Workshop of Willem Vrelant (d.1481)
10.12.2025 12:00UTC +00:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S| Auctioneer | CHRISTIE'S |
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| Veranstaltungsort | Vereinigtes Königreich, London |
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ID 1514543
Los 48 | Workshop of Willem Vrelant (d.1481)
Schätzwert
40000GBP £ 40 000 – 60 000
Book of Hours, use of Rome, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Southern Netherlands, Bruges, c.1470s]
A Book of Hours in delicate semi-grisaille from the workshop of Willem Vrelant, featuring an extensive programme of illumination including the illustrated meditation on the Passion and apparently further customised for the original owner.
141 x 100mm. i + 203 + i leaves, lacking single leaves after ff.82 and 190 and probably 6 leaves after f.169, collation: 1-26, 38, 410 (of 8, i and iv inserted miniature leaves), 59(of 8, v inserted miniature leaf), 69(of 8, ii inserted miniature leaf), 7-108, 117(of 8, lacking iv), 128, 136, 149(of 8, i inserted miniature leaf), 158, 169(of 8, iii inserted miniature leaf), 178, 186, 1910, 206, 2111(of 10, v inserted miniature leaf), 222(of ?8, lacking iii-viii), 236, 2412, 257(of 8, lacking iv), 266, 273(of 4, iv the lower pastedown), erroneous modern pencil foliation duplicating ff.40 and 101, skipping a leaf between ff.89-90 and ff.172-3, and omitting ff.132-133, followed here, prickings partially evident, 18 lines, ruled space: 49 x 77mm, one- and two-line initials of burnished gold on black grounds with white infill throughout, 12 three-line examples of the same in the Calendar, ten large foliate initials on grounds of burnished gold facing nine full-page inserted miniatures all within full foliate borders inhabited by birds, beasts, human figures, angels, and grotesques, further 32 historiated initials and small text miniatures with three-sided foliate borders, all executed in semi-grisaille (lacking probably 8 leaves, one of these a miniature leaf, faint surface soiling to certain miniatures, repaired tear to Last Judgement leaf reaching into miniature, tiny patches of pigment loss to Salvator Mundi, light smudging to some borders). Old red velvet binding, five raised spine bands, original flyleaf pasted down to lower cover as endleaf (worn at extremities and faded).
Provenance:
(1) The coat of arms in the borders of ff.41 and 101 – argent a chevron sable three birds arranged 2 and 1 – were presumably included for the original owner of these Hours: perhaps a member of the Audemeriel family of Tournai. The illumination shows the book to have been purchased from a workshop in Bruges and the sparsely filled Calendar is also for that city: Boniface (5 June), Donatian (14 October), Eligius (1 December) and Nicaise (14 December) all appear in red. William of Maleval, wearing a helmet and the penitent's mail coat hidden under a robe, and holding a lance and a book, is a very rare appearance in the Suffrages, perhaps indicating the name or personal devotion of the first owner; the relatively unusual inclusions of the Mass for the plague (f.94) and the Office of St Catherine (f.170) were presumably also at their request.
(2) Eude family, early 17th century: the text in French on the lower endleaf, apparently continuing from that erased on the preceding flyleaf, opens ‘Duquel mariage est sorty Jacques Eude Escuir [escuyer]’ and records his birth on 1 August 1607 and godparents Jacques de Montmorency and Charlotte Bechard, followed by a younger brother, Robert, born the same day in 1615, with godparents Roberte Legrolier and Jacques Varin.
Content:
Calendar ff.1-12v; Hours of the Cross ff.14-20v; prayer to the Holy Face ff.22-23; Mass of the Virgin ff.25-34v; Hours of the Holy Spirit ff.36-39v; Hours of the Virgin, use of Rome, ff.41-92v; Missa pro pestilentia, the mass for protection against the plague ff.94-99; Seven Penitential Psalms and Litany ff.101-117; Office of the Dead, use of Rome ff.119-160; Prayers to the Virgin, Devota or[ati]o ad mariam virg[inem] and O intemerata ff.162-168; Suffrages to Sts James the Great, Sebastian and Chistopher, ff.168-169v (ending imperfectly); Office of St Catherine ff.170-174v (opening imperfectly); Suffrages to Sts William of Maleval and Apollonia ff.175-176v; sequence of prayers to the crucified Christ (Omnibus consideratis paradisus voluptatis), the instruments of the Passion, His wounds, and to Mary and John ff.177-184v; prayer on the Seven Last Words attributed to Bede, ff.183-184v; further prayers to the Trinity ff.185-191; Passion according to St John ff.192-201v.
Illumination:
The style is close to Willem Vrelant, first documented in Utrecht in 1449 and active in Bruges by 1454, where he came to dominate local production until his death in 1481. Many Vrelant compositions can be identified here, both from the smaller number of manuscripts securely attributed to Vrelant himself and in the numerous Books of Hours attributed to his workshop, whose size and nature remains the subject of debate (for Vrelant and his manuscripts, see B. Bousmanne, « Item a Guillaume Wyelant aussi enlumineur ». Willem Vrelant, 1997, and B. Bousmanne and T. Delcourt eds., Miniatures flamandes 1404-1482, 2012, pp.238-255). The miniature of the Holy Face (f.21v), popular in Bruges Books of Hours of the period, comes from a lost original by Jan van Eyck via Vrelant’s Arenberg Hours (J. Paul Getty Museum, MS Ludwig IX 8, f.32), while the Last Judgement and Funeral Mass miniatures differ in just a few details from those in another Vrelant-workshop production at the Morgan Library & Museum (MS H.7, ff.91v and 108v). Comparison of the borders of these two manuscripts reveals the same interpretation of Vrelant’s lively borders in works such as the Hours of Leonor de la Vega (Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, Vit. 24-2), with musical angels, Biblical vignettes, human-headed monsters, birds, mermaids, centaurs and hunting scenes emerging from the acanthus precisely halfway along the vertical and bottom borders.
Vrelant and his shop worked in various forms of grisaille and semi-grisaille: Vrelant himself produced the Ingoldisthorpe Psalter sold at Christie’s (Foyle collection, 11 July 2000, lot 34), while an Hours at the Walters Art Museum (Baltimore, Ms. W.180) is more typical of his workshop. Our Hours have in common with more sophisticated works a creative programme of illumination that deploys small text miniatures and historiated initials alongside full-page inserted miniatures, and the 32 examples in this book carry some of Vrelant's own characteristic delicacy of detail is still evident in the tiny highlights of gold and white, which define draperies, buildings and landscape forms at a small scale.
The subjects of the full-page miniatures are: Betrayal f.13v; Christ as Salvator Mundi f.21v; Virgin and Child with musical angels f.24v; Pentecost f.35v; Annunciation f.40v; David in Prayer f.93v; Last Judgement f.100v; Funeral Mass f.118v; Deposition f.161v.
The historiated initials and small text miniatures (from f.175 onwards) are on ff.15, 16, 17, 18v, 19v, 57v, 68, 72, 76, 80, 89, 165v, 168, 169, 169v, 175, 176, 177, 177v, 178, 178v, 179, 179v, 180, 180v, 181, 181v, 183, 185, 186, 187v, and 192.
| Herkunftsort: | Belgien, Westeuropa, Europa |
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| Kategorie des Auktionshauses: | Handschriften des Mittelalters und der Renaissance, Bücher und Handschriften |
| Herkunftsort: | Belgien, Westeuropa, Europa |
|---|---|
| Kategorie des Auktionshauses: | Handschriften des Mittelalters und der Renaissance, Bücher und Handschriften |
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| Auktionsdatum | 10.12.2025 |
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| Auktionsdatum | 10.12.2025 |
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| Auktionsdatum | 10.12.2025 |
