Beschreibung:

Workshop of the Mazarine Master The Calendar from the Chester Beatty Book of Hours, illuminated manuscript on vellum, Paris, 1408 The Calendar from one of the few securely dated Books of Hours: the Chester Beatty Book of Hours, illuminated by the Mazarine Master in the year the bridges were washed away in Paris. 174 x 130mm. 11 leaves from the Calendar of the Chester Beatty Book of Hours (February-December), all within a thin bar and full borders (water damage to all borders, especially affecting September-December). Provenance: (1) The present leaves were ff.169-178v (f.171 repeated) in the famous Chester Beatty Book of Hours, one of the few securely dated Books of Hours, written in 1408. The same Parisian scribe dated two Books of Hours in 1408, the year the bridges of Paris were brought down by floods at the end of January. That in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, Ms. Douce 144, was written earlier since the colophon reads: 'made and finished in the year 1407 when the bridges fell in Paris', dating it before the end of the year at Easter, which was on 15 April in 1408. The colophon of the Chester Beatty Hours reads 'made in the year 1408 when the bridges fell in Paris', and so was completed after Easter (f.158 with its colophon: Factum est anno mo ccco viijo quo ceciderunt pontes parisius, sold at Christie’s, The Arcana Collection, Part I, 7 July 2010, lot 22). Its litany includes two Breton bishops, Sts Tugdual and Corentinus, and the calendar offered here has Sts Arnoul (28 March) and Ronan (1 June), indicating a patron with Breton connections. The extent and quality of the decoration show that both were intended for patrons of great wealth and discernment. (2) John Boycott Jarman (d.1864): his sale, Sotheby's, 13 June 1864, lot 47. Evidently with his collection when it was damaged by flooding in August 1846; Jarman had Caleb William Wing (1801-1875) retouch some of the damaged manuscripts, see J. Backhouse, 'A Victorian Connoisseur and his manuscripts: the Tale of Mr Jarman and Mr Wing', The British Museum Quarterly, 32, 1968, pp.76-92. (3) Edward Arnold: his sale, Sotheby's, 6 May, 1929, lot 240. (4) Sir Alfred Chester Beatty (1875-1968): his W Ms. 103, purchased in September 1929. Sir Alfred had most of the miniatures separately mounted: six were sold in 1932 and three given away in 1939; some text leaves were also dispersed. The rest of the manuscript was lots 58 (which included the Calendar) and 58A-K in the Chester Beatty Sale, Sotheby's, 24 June 1969. For their history see M. Manion et al., Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in New Zealand Collections, 1989, pp.96-8. Miniatures in both Books of Hours were attributed to the Boucicaut Master but have now been reattributed to the Mazarine Master, his close associate. Active in Paris during the first two decades of the 15th century, he has been defined by Gabrielle Bartz as a distinct personality responsible for some of the most striking works previously attributed to the Boucicaut Master, among them the Book of Hours in the Bibliothèque Mazarine, ms 469, from which he takes his name (see E. Taburet-Delahaye and F. Avril, Paris 1400, 2004, pp.280-87). The two masters had a decisive influence on French illumination at one of its most resplendent periods, particularly through their interest in depicting three-dimensional space, and worked for the greatest collectors of the age, like the Duc de Berry.