ID 993318
Lot 52 | Circle of the Master of Gijsbrecht van Brederode
Estimate value
£ 18 000 – 25 000
Book of Hours, use of Utrecht, in Dutch with some Latin incipits, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Zwolle, c.1460]
An expressively illuminated Book of Hours probably produced by the community of the Brethren of the Common Life in Zwolle.
151 x 102mm. ii paper + 167 leaves + ii paper: 18, 27(vii inserted miniature), 3-68, 79(iv an inserted miniature), 8-98, 109(iv an inserted miniature), 11-128, 139(i an inserted miniature), 148, 159(i an inserted miniature), 167(of 8 + ix an inserted miniature, lacking i, viii cancelled blank), 178(i an inserted miniature), 18-208, 214, likely lacking a gathering between 15 and 16, 20 lines of text, ruled space: 87 x 57mm, rubrics in red, text initials touched red, one- and two-line initials alternately in red and blue, three-line initials in blue flourished with red and touched with green, six large initials with blue staves reserving patterns of unpainted parchment, extensively flourished with red and touched with green, 6 full-page miniatures in square frames surrounded by full borders (margins trimmed into upper flourishings and slightly worn, offsetting from miniature borders, slight crackling in gold backgrounds). 17th-century brown leather over pasteboard, spine gilt tooled in five compartments, ribbon bookmark, edges mottled red (split by upper sewing band, corners and edges worn).
Provenance:
(1) The Office of the Virgin and the Office of the Dead are for the use of Utrecht, the diocese covering the northern Netherlands. The Calendar indicates the east of the diocese since it includes in red Utrecht feasts for Sts Poncian (Jan 14), Servatius (May 13), Boniface (June 5), Odulf (June 12), Lebuin of Deventer (translation June 25 and November 12), Lambert (September 18), Willibrord (November 7), and the patrons of Cologne, Gereon and Victor (October 10). The mistake in writing Sarijs for Marijs in the calendar (Jan 19) places this hours in a group of manuscripts written from a faulty exemplar in Zwolle, perhaps by the community of the Brethren of the Common Life. They ran a large and successful scriptorium, supplying books to patrons in Utrecht and elsewhere.
(2) Balthazar Huydecoper (1695-1778): B. Huydecoper written in an 18th-century hand on f.1v. Huydecoper was an Amsterdam patrician and classical scholar who wrote verses in Latin and translations from Latin but was passionately interested in the Dutch language. As well as his own compositions in Dutch, he produced the first scholarly edition of a Middle-Dutch text, Rijmchronijk van Melis Stoke, 1772, and is recognised as the founder of Dutch philology. His historical and linguistic interests led him to amass a considerable library, mostly auctioned in Amsterdam in 1779. Many of his manuscripts went to the Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde, whose foundation in Leiden in 1766 he had helped to inspire (see C.J.J. van Schaik, Balthazar Huydecoper, Assen, 1962). He also owned three manuscripts now in the Utrecht University Library, Mss 1037, 1014 and 1335 an Utrecht Hours illuminated by the Master of Zweder van Culemborg, a patristic collection from Rhenen and a Boethius in Dutch illuminated by a follower of Loyset Liédet, (see K. van der Horst, Illuminated and Decorated Manuscripts in the University Library, Utrecht, Cambridge, 1989.)
(3) Js. Fs. Pyke: 19th-century bookplate inside front cover, where different hands have written in ink 5057 at the top and No A below; on final paper leaf Ms 11, partially erased.
(4) Note of contents in French pencilled on second paper leaf; 166 f pencilled inside lower cover.
(5) Christie’s, 9 July 2001, lot 20.
Content:
Calendar ff.2-13; Office of the Virgin, use of Utrecht, ff.16-51v: matins f.16, lauds f.24, prime f.31v, terce f.34v, sext f.37, none f.40, vespers f.42v, compline f.47v; Long Hours of the Cross ff.53-75: matins f.53, lauds f.59, prime f.62v, terce f.64v, sext f.66v, none f.68v, vespers f.70, compline f.72v; Hours of the Eternal Wisdom ff.77-97: matins f.77, lauds f.84v, prime f.86v, terce f.88, sext f.89v, none f.91, vespers f.92v, compline f.95; Hours of the Holy Spirit ff.99-114v: matins f.99, prime f.102, terce f.104, sext f.106, none f.108, vespers f.109v, compline f.112v; Penitential Psalms, lacking end of psalm 142 from middle of verse 5, ff.116-123v; prayers, lacking opening of first for family members; before receiving the sacrament O heilige jesu christ, konink; after receiving the sacrament Alle creaturen helpen mi; to the Virgin Hertelike lieve moeder; a good prayer to your guardian angel O mijn alre liefte enghel, ff.124-129v; Office of the Dead, use of Utrecht, ff.131-166.
Illumination:
It was common practice for Netherlandish Books of Hours to be illustrated with full-page miniatures on single leaves. The scribe would start a text to be illustrated on a new recto so that the miniature leaf could be inserted with the picture on the facing verso. Sets of miniatures suitable for Books of Hours were widely traded in the Netherlands so that the purchaser or commissioner of a book could acquire miniatures in the desired quantity and price. Typically for the modest books produced by the Zwolle scriptorium, only six miniatures were envisaged for this Hours, one at the start of each Office, with the subsidiary Hours marked by flourished initials. The basic form of the flourishing is found in two Bibles written by the Brethren of the Common Life in Zwolle, one of 1451 (BL, Royal 1 C VI) and the Zwolle Bible of between 1464 and 1476 (Utrecth, Univ. Lib Ms 3). The cones of dashes, however, are more characteristic of the 'Thorn and Stitch' type, found in the county of Holland to the west (J. Gumbert, The Dutch and their Books in the Manuscript Age, 1990, pl.III, figs.23, 15).
The miniatures form a Passion cycle, frequently used for the Office of the Virgin in the northern Netherlands, as well as for the Hours of the Cross, but here distributed through the book with somewhat incongruous juxtapositions. Although closer integration of image and text would be expected in an expensively orchestrated Book of Hours, their different but congruent functions within devotional books made these apparently random insertions perfectly acceptable to the user. In a Haarlem Book of Hours of the 1470s, for instance, the Office of the Dead opens with an inserted miniature of the Flagellation (Utrecht, Rijksmuseum het Catharijneconvent, ABM h24, see H. Defoer and W. Wustefeld, L'art en Hollande au temps de David et Philippe de Bourgogne, exh. cat. Paris and Dijon, 1993-4, p.49). Whatever its subject, a picture guided the reader to the start of the office and could then be considered in isolation or in conjunction with the text, where the unity of the Christian message meant that relevance could be discovered in any Christian image.
The viewer is urged to empathise with Christ's sufferings by the inclusion of telling details like the spike blocks hung from His waist as He carries the Cross. The expressive figures set against delicately decorated gold grounds are reminiscent of the Utrecht Master of Gijsbrecht van Brederode, who takes his name from the Book of Hours painted for the elected Bishop of Utrecht (Liège, Bibl. Uni., Ms Wittert 13). The style here is closer to the miniatures sometimes considered his youthful works in an Hours in Cleveland, Gift of Milton B. Freudenheim in memory of his wife, Elizabeth Ege Freudenheim 1998.124, previously in the Collection of Otto F. Ege, dated to the earlier 1460s. The more forceful use of line and angular contours, most evident in the Flagellation, relate more to his collaborator in the Cleveland manuscript, the Master of the Boston City of God (Boston Public Library, Ms f.Med. 10), which was written by an Augustinian canon of St Mary and the Twelve Apostles in Utrecht in 1466, see exh.cat. The Golden Age of Dutch Manuscript Painting, Utrecht and New York, 1989, pp.198-224. The borders with their large acanthus sprays can be related to those in the Hours of Jan van Amerongen, Sheriff of Utrecht 1468-1470 (Brussels, KBR, MS II 7619), usually dated to c.1460. The miniature leaves were probably made in Utrecht and either supplied to the Zwolle scriptorium or to the purchaser or commissioner of the manuscript.
The subjects of the miniatures are as follows:
f.15v The Arrest of Christ, with the healing of Malchus's ear
f.52v Christ before Pilate
f.76v The Flagellation
f.98v The Carrying of the Cross
f.115v The Lamentation
f.131v The Entombment
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| Artist: | Master of Gijsbrecht van Brederode (XV century) |
|---|---|
| Place of origin: | Western Europe, Europe, The Netherlands |
| Artist: | Master of Gijsbrecht van Brederode (XV century) |
|---|---|
| Place of origin: | Western Europe, Europe, The Netherlands |
| Address of auction |
CHRISTIE'S 8 King Street, St. James's SW1Y 6QT London United Kingdom | |
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| Auction date | 12.07.2023 |
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| Auction date | 12.07.2023 |
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| Auction date | 12.07.2023 |
