Hours of Anne de Neufville (MS M.1250).

Accession number:

MS M.1250

Title:

Created:

France, Paris, ca. 1430

Binding:

16th-century brown morocco gilt tooled à la fanfare, framed with triple fillet, a central oval compartment linked to four oval and four rectangular compartments, with roundels or part-roundels at the frame, all filled with varying combinations of flower and fruit motifs and angel heads, surrounded by spirals and branches of meticulously veined leaves, in the central oval on upper cover ANN'/EN VEV/FIDEL/LE, in central oval on lower cover VNE/NÉ' A/VN FI/DELLE, spine smooth and similarly tooled (lacking two tie fasteners).

Credit:

Gift from Collection of Marguerite Steed Hoffman on the occasion of the Morgan's Centennial, 2024.

Description:

ii + 215 (last as pastedown) leaves, bound : vellum, illuminated ; 165 x 124 (89 x 63) mm

Provenance:

Presumably commissioned by or for the lady kneeling before St. Anthony on folio 202; Anne de Neufville (mottoes on the binding are anagrams of her name), possibly of the leading Parisian family of that name, the de Neufville-Villeroy (possible candidates are the illegitimate daughter of Nicolas II's son, Nicolas III de Neufville [d.1598], or her cousin, the daughter of Nicolas III de Neufville's brother, Jean, and his wife Genevieve Allard); L. Baudry, J. Levain and J.L. Levain (written on first flyleaf); Paris Hôtel Drouot, 20 February 1974, MS A; London, Sotheby's, 13 July 1977, lot 74; Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 11 December 1981, lot 44; Alexandre P Rosenberg (his MS 10 with Picasso bookplate incorporating initials "APR"); inherited by his wife, Elaine Rosenberg; her sale, New York, Christie's, 23 April 2021, lot 2 (unsold); bought by Marguerite Steed Hoffman from the estate of Elaine Rosenberg via private treaty through Christie's.

Notes:

Ms. book of hours for the use of Rome, written and illuminated in Burgundy, France, ca. 1480s.
As John Plummer wrote, the miniatures in the Hours of Anne de Neufville are "exceedingly fine paintings by the Bedford Master." Eleanor Spencer noted that they relate closely to those he painted in the so-called Salisbury Breviary commissioned by Duke John of Bedford but never completed before his death in 1435 (Paris, BnF, MS lat. 17294).
Collation: 1 (12), 2-26 (8), 27 (3: of 4?, iv a cancelled blank).
Contents: Calendar (fols.1-12); Gospel Lessons (13-21-); Obsecro te (21-25v); O intemerata (25v-28v); Hours of the Virgin (29-100v); Penitential Psalms (101-117v); Litany (117v-127v); Hours of the Cross (128-138); Hours of the Holy Spirit (138v-147); short Office of the Dead (147v-186); Quinze joies (186v-193v); Cinq plaies (194-198); Suffrages to Sts. Michael, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul, Christopher, Nicholas, Anthony, Claude, Eutropius, Catherine, Margaret, Genevieve, Ave verum corpus, Joachim and Anna, Mary Magdalene, Cinq festes de nostre dame, Cross, Gervase and Protase, Leonard, and Fiacre (198-213).
Illuminations: 15 large miniatures.
Artist: Bedford Master (Haincelin Hagenau?)
List of illustrations: Annunciation (fol. 29), Visitation (43), Nativity (58), Annunciation to the Shepherds (66), Adoration of the Magi (72v), Presentation in the Temple (78v), Flight into Egypt (84), Coronation of the Virgin (93v), David in Penance (101), Crucifixion (128), Pentecost (138v), Burial with St. Michael saving the soul from the devil (147v), Virgin Weaving (186v), Last Judgment (194), St. Anthony with the female patron (202).

Script:

textura quadrata

Language:

Latin and French

Catalog Link:

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Classification:

Manuscript

Department:

Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts