Intricate and large illuminated initial ‘D’ from a Breviary, C13th Germany

[Germanic / probably South-West Germany or Upper Rhine, first half of the 13th century]

Large illuminated initial ‘D’ on a cutting from an illuminated Breviary, in Latin, manuscript on vellum, the nearly square leaf fragment preserving a boldly painted initial in dark blue, enclosing dense interlace and scrolling foliage in blue, green and coral-red, all heightened with white, and set against a richly burnished gold ground. The initial is further animated by foliate extensions into the margins, including a right-angled green frame to the right, and incorporates a lively decorative programme of drollery ornament, including a small quadruped beast above and a bird-like hybrid creature to the left, together with other foliate and zoomorphic detail.

The reverse preserves traces of another smaller coloured initial, with red rubric and portions of approximately 12 lines of text, much obscured by remnants of an earlier mount. The cutting has been trimmed close to the painted borders, with some small losses, flaking, creasing, and surface wear, but remains highly decorative and visually strong.

Probably from a Psalm opening in the Breviary, perhaps beginning “Dixit …”, though the exact textual identification cannot now be confirmed from the surviving fragment alone.

Dimensions: approximately 90 × 100 mm.

*** Provenance: Professor Vladimir G. Simkhovitch (1874-1959) of New York, an economics and history professor at Columbia University: his sale in Sotheby’s, 11 July 1960, lot 91, to ‘Stevens Cox’ for £5 (the book-dealer James Stevens Cox of Beaminster, who lived 1910-1997, and was described in his obituary in The Thomas Hardy Journal, 13, Oct 1997, pp. 29-30, as “antiquary and archaeologist, bibliophile and publisher, bee-keeper and bird-keeper, gardener and keen draughts player” .and it noted that “[h]e frequently designed his own clothes and thought the medieval smock most sensible”).