Leaf from an Antiphonary, North Italy, possibly Bologna, late fourteenth century.
Large historiated initial "C" (of Contumelias [Defamation]), for the first Matins response for the Divine Office for feria tercia (Tuesday of Holy Week).
Musical notation: 4 and 5 4-line staves in red ink, square notation.
Another leaf from the same Antiphonary and by the same artist was lot 7 in the same sale (Christie's, London, 29 June 1994). The historiated initial "L" (of Locuti) shows a man carrying a log. The text begins the first Matins response for Wednesday in Holy Week. The leaf is numbered 48 in an 18th-century hand. The image alludes to Christ bearing the cross.
The Gospel reading for the day is the Passion. Could the capture of Christ be alluded to by the fisherman catching a fish, which could be a symbol of Christ? "Let us trap him, and prevail against him," are the words in the response. The highly unusual subject may have been inspired by calendar illustrations for pisces, such as that used by Niccolò da Bologna in his 1374 Missale Romanum in Munich (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, lat 10072, fol. 2v), reproduced in Millard Meiss, French Painting in the time of Jean de Berry, The late fourteenth century and the patronage of the Duke, London. II, 1967, p. 311, fig. 716.