Catholic Church. Liturgy & Ritual. Office. Saint-Pierre-le-Vif.

[Incipit f. 13r:] Hic secundum vsum monasterii S. petri Viui prope senonas ordinis sancti benedicti incipiunt prime feriales.

[Sens], c. 1523-34.

Agenda 8vo (184 x 90 mm.). MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM. Modern pencil foliation: 283 [r. 284] leaves. In three contemporary Gothic hands (hybrida formata and semihybrida libraria with Humanistic influences) in brown and black ink, 25 lines per page, writing frame c. 123 x 53 mm., ruled in ink, illuminated escutcheon with initials CH. T F DE. in the text (f. 131v), three-line decorated initials and smaller Lombardic initials in red ink (one in blue at f. 55r), majuscules touched in yellow throughout, red rubrics.

Late-16th-century ?Lyonese gilt calf (corners, edges and spine restored), double-rule outer frame, azured arabesque corner tools, central medallion of azured interlacing strapwork with a crucifixion in the middle, the field covered in trefoils, initials F V O stamped at the top center of both panels, gilt spine with azured vines and foliage, all edges gilt, evidence of four ties. In a black Morocco-backed clamshell box (P. Loutrel).

            This Breviary’s agenda format and distinctive rounded script mirror contemporary experimentation in French printed Books of Hours. It was composed at the abbey of Saint-Pierre-le-Vif (just outside Sens), likely during the tenure of its last Benedictine abbot, Sébastien de Tenarre (r. 1523-34).
            The book includes the Office for the liturgical year, the Little Hours of the Virgin, the Penitential Psalms, a section of Suffrages of the Saints, the Office of the Dead and an elaborate Commune Sanctorum (80 leaves) honoring virgins and holy women, martyrs, Church doctors, popes, confessors, etc. In the calendar, each feast day has a rubric detailing the appropriate readings and vestments.
            A faint note on the front pastedown records a marriage in 1591, by which time our codex had left the abbey — perhaps during the Huguenot looting of 1567. The illuminated escutcheon and the present binding were likely executed for the new lay owners.
            In nice condition (last three leaves stained, natural vellum flaws in nine leaves — five repaired with stitches). From the library of A.-M.-L. de Migieu, marquis de Savigny (1723-88), who in 1752 signed the rear pastedown and recorded his paid price (3 livres). On the front flyleaf, he recorded two previous owners — Jehan Donin (17th-century) and bookseller C.A. Picard (who acquired the codex in 1740). The Breviary later entered the collection of comte Chandon de Briailles (Bibliothèque 1954) 12).
¶Omont, “Un bibliophile bourguignon au XVIIIe siècle. Collection de manuscrits du M.is de Migieu au Chateau de Savigny-les-Beaune” in Revue des bibliothèques 11 (1901) 171; Bouvier, Histoire de l’Abbaye de Saint-Pierre-le-Vif de Sens 153-8; Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts (online) SDBM_85180.

Item #12240

Price: $27,500.00

Status: On Hold