Religion & Devotion / Books of hours, Missals & Prayerbooks

[FLORIS VAN HAARLEM]. Den wech des levens. Een gheestelijc boecxken leerende hoe dat ee[n] goet kerste[n] mensch moet beginne[n] en[de] voortgaen in duechden, met veel devote ghebede[n] en[de] gheestelike corte vermaninghe[n] om tot een warachtich gheestelijc leven te comen.
[Antwerp, Heyndrick Peetersen van Middelburg, 1547?]. 8vo. With title printed in black and red, within woodcut borders. Contemporary slightly overlapping parchment, remnants of ties. [200] ll. Full description

GARCIA, Diego S.J. Sermon funebre en las exequias de la serenissima Señora D. Mariana de Austria Reyna Madre del Rey N. Señor Carlos II. Rey de las Españas. Que celebrò la nobilissima, y fidelissima ciudad de Mallorca en su Iglesia Catadral á 28. de Noviembre de 1696.
Palma de Mallorca, Miguel Capo, 1697. 4to. With the title in an ornamental frame built up from typographic ornaments (a fleur-de-lis and Vervliet vine leaf 207), three woodcut initials and a woodcut tailpiece. Modern marbled boards. [12], 26 pp. Full description

[ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT - ALTAR CANON]. Accipiendo in manibus hostiam dicat[!].... Initium Sancti Evangelii secundum Joannem. ... Cibavit illum dominus pane vitæ et intellectus.
[Belgium?], [ca. 1790?]. Three illuminated manuscript wall panels in matching style, forming a three-part altar canon lettered in blue and red ink on parchment (one 47.5 x 57 cm & two 31 x 22 cm; image sizes 46 x 54.5 cm & 29.5 x 21 cm), the larger stretched over a wooden frame and each of the smaller two over a wooden panel. All three panels meticulously and finely lettered in the style of roman printing types with 1 line in italic capitals, all 12 initials and some of their decoration in gold. All three panels richly illuminated around and between the text blocks with a gold background and extensive gold highlights, the illumination including decorated cartouches. The principal scenes at the head (miniatures in a wide variety of colours) show the Last Supper, Saint John the Evangelist and Christ washing his apostles feet; the central scenes at the foot (ink and ink wash drawings, probably emblematic, that on the large panel in grey and those on the small panels in red) show a lamb and cross on an altar, 4 standing figures with long staffs around a table with a platter (of bread?: some of the figures are eating something) and herald angels before a kneeling figure (it doesnt look like a shepherd or the Virgin Mary). Full description

[ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT - BOOK OF HOURS (DIOCESE OF UTRECHT)]. [Incipit, A2r:] Alst my gaet niet nae mij[n] syn / Soe wil ic my liden en[de] swyghe stil ...
[Diocese of Utrecht, the County of Holland], 1488. Large 8vo (19 x 13.5 x 4 cm). Written in Dutch on vellum by 2 gothic textura hands in 1 column (20 lines/page for the first hand for the main text and calendar; 22 lines/page for the additions written by the second hand). All leaves are numbered in pencil in the upper margin of the rectos by a 19th- or 20th-century hand. Richly iluminated by the Master of the Brussels Hours of the Bezborodko Group, being one of the stylistic groups of the Masters of the Dark Eyes, with 6 full-page miniatures, 2 historiated initials and 4 larger decorated initials, several smaller decorated initials, and many 1-line lombardic initials in blue and red. Also with a 6-line blue penwork initial on a red penwork ground, being a contemporary addition. Also with three- and four-marginal border decoration (an uncoloured background filled in with small dots or short tendrils in black, show acanthus leaves in different colours, various flowers and several brightly coloured birds and fabulous beings, with gold and black/white dots among them). Contemporary blind-tooled calf over rounded ("cushioned") wooden boards. With the original brass catch- and anchor-plates, the latter with remnants of the leather fastenings, and the later silk red ribbon markers loosely preserved. 144 ll. including 6 inserted leaves with miniatures and 2 blank endpapers used as paste-downs. Full description

[JEWELLED BINDING - FRENCH PRAYER BOOK]. L'abbé de la HOGUE.

La journée du chrétien, sanctifiée par la prière et la méditation.
Lyon and Paris, Librairie Catolique de Perisse frères, 1844. 16mo. Binding: ca. 11 x 7 x 2.5 cm. With a small printer's device on the title page. 17th-century elaborately jewelled and decorated gilt silver binding with a gilt silver imperial double-headed eagle and two hands holding a heart centre piece, below Jesus on the cross (with an added skull and bones at the foot of the cross) and ornamental gilt silver corner pieces connected to the gilt silver board edge fittings on both boards. The whole is set with numerous jewels (amethysts, garnets, turquoise, and (simulated) sapphires). With two jewelled clasps closing on pegs in the fore edge of the front board, gilt edges, red velvet paste-downs and blue silk flyleaves backed with paper. VIII, 524, [5], [3 blank] pp.

Full description

[LUYKEN, Jan]. Jezus en de ziel. Een geestelycke spiegel voor 't gemoed. Bestaande uyt veertig aangename en stichtelycke sinne-beelden.
Amsterdam, Pieter Arentsz., 1687. 8vo. With engraved frontispiece and 39 engraved emblems in text, all engraved by Jan Luyken. Contemporary vellum, sprinkled edges. 191, [5] pp. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - SERVICE BOOK - DIVINE OFFICES]. Ordine da osservarsi nell'oratorio di Santa Maria di Passione, circa gli Essercicii Spirituali delle feste cavato dalla Regola maggiore.
[Milan], [18th-century]. Folio (27,5 x 18,5 cm). With 5 full-page and 2 half-page, hand-painted religious illustrations and 9 hand-painted initials on a blue background, heightened with gold and silver. 18th-century gold- and blind-tooled parchment, each board with a blind ornamental centre-piece ornament in a blind-tooled frame, in a larger frame of gold fillets, with a gold flower in each of the 6 spine compartments. [1 blank], [1], 66 pp. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - PRAYER AND HYMN BOOK - LATIN]. [Devotionarium].[Incipit leaf 2r:] Or[ati]o deuota q[ue] debet dici[t] i[n] ficem diei ante dormitione[m].
[Northern Germany(?), 15th century]. 8vo. Written in Latin on relatively thin parchment (leaf 11.5 x 8.5 cm, text block 7.8 x 5.2 cm), in a gothic hand in one column of 17 lines per page using black/dark brown ink. The manuscript is rubricated throughout, with a 3-line red and blue initial at the start of each part, and 2- or 1-line lombards, alternating in red and blue, at the start of each smaller section, ruled in pencil. Early 19th-century(?) gold-tooled vellum showing a gold-tooled floral frame on both boards, with a leather closing tie on the front, gold-tooled board eges, gilt edges. [131] ll. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - PRAYERBOOK]. [1st rubric:] Form zu betten unser liebe[n] frawen mantel, Gebet. [incipit:] Cegrüest seiestu o süesse aller heiligste junckfraw maria ...
[Ravensburg?], [ca. 1670]. Small 16mo in 8s (10 x 8.5 x 4 cm; leaf: 9 x 7.5 cm). German manuscript in red and black ink on paper, written in an upright, semi-cursive gothic hand, with so-called lombardic initials in red, rubricated throughout. With 11 lines per page, text block 7 x 5.5 cm. Contemporary blind-tooled pigskin over bevelled wooden (beechwood?) boards, sewn on 3 double supports, In total more than 100 impressions of about 9 stamps. Further with 2 strap fastenings with brass clasps (each with an owners(?) stamp: 1.5 mm roman capital initials "LH" above a 3 mm head in profile, facing right), catchplates and anchor plates, plain headbands, blue edges. With 27 mm roman capital initials "BR" in brown ink on the foot edge. [423], [3 blank] pp. plus 3 endleaves at the front and 5 at the back. Full description

[MANUSCRIPT - PRAYER BOOK - GERMAN]. Geistlicher Seelen-Wecker. Allen in Gott Christlich glaubenden Seelen zu Nurz[!] und grösserem Eyfer zusam[m]en getragen. Darin[n]en Schöne auserlösene Morgen- Abend- Mess- Beicht und Communion Gebetter.
[Germany, Franconia, diocese Würzburg?, ca. 1780]. 8vo (17.5 x 11.3 cm). Written in a clear German cursive in brown ink with chapter titles and captions in Fraktur script in gold, blue, black, and red with red pen flourishes; the text is written within a manuscript double-lined frame in brown ink. With two mezzotint engravings of Christ carrying the cross and Christ's Vera effigies with a crown of thorns, mounted on p. [6] and p. 7; both engravings show Christ's wounds and blood painted red. The engravings are by Johann Martin Will (1727-1806), engraver and art dealer in Augsburg. Contemporary gold-tooled dark brown leather. [1], [3], 307, [9], [4 blank except for the text frames] pp. Full description