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Click here to subscribeSUITE OF MIKIMOTO PEARL JEWELLERY comprising of necklace, bracelet and earrings, the necklace 46cm long with pearls approximately 6.6mm diameter, the bracelet 18cm long with pearls approximately 6.6mm diameter, both with pearl set eighteen carat gold clasps, the earrings with pearls approximately 7mm diameter, in original box with dust bags, cleaning cloths and paperwork
100 Book of Hours, - Use of Rome, with numerous other devotional texts Use of Rome, with numerous other devotional texts, in Latin and French, illuminated manuscript on parchment [Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c .1460] 313 leaves (including 9 leaves added at end in sixteenth century, and plus two paper endleaves at front and back), too tightly bound too collate, but wanting approximately 7 text leaves (see below), single column, 18 lines in two sizes of a fine and regular Burgundian lettre bâtarde with ornamental penwork cadels, red rubrics, Calendar leaves (24 in total) in gold, blue and red, with every leaf in this part of text opening with a 3-line initial KL in blue or pink with foliate infill on bright gold grounds and a single decorated border panel of single-line foliage ending in coloured flowerheads and gold bezants, every line of Calendar beginning with a gold initial on burgundy and blue grounds, main text with same initials (often several per page) from one to 4-lines in height, the larger accompanied by single border panels (approximately 250 of these), eleven leaves with similar borders which extend down outer edge and halfway across top and bottom margins, thirteen leaves with 5-line illuminated initials with full-borders of acanthus leaves and other foliage (including realistic studies of sprigs of hazelnuts) enclosing drolleries, animals, birds and a bear and a monkey playing chess , thirty-eight historiated initials enclosing portraits of saints by a follower of William Vrelant , initial on fol.47v smudged, slight wear and thumbing to edges in places, occasional offsetting, sections of borders of fols.122 and 305 cut away, remnants of sale ticket once pasted to front endleaf, marks showing original leaves at each end once pastedowns in earlier binding, else in bright and sparkling condition on excellent parchment with wide and clean margins, 175mm. by 121mm., seventeenth-century French mottled calf with floral gilt spine in six compartments, spine restored, marbled endleaves, in fleece-lined brown morocco box with gilt title by the Lakeside Press, Chicago Provenance: (1) Almost certainly written and illuminated in Bruges for a married couple who were close to the family of the Burgundian dukes: with prayers in both masculine and feminine forms, and in some cases asking for blessings for famulos tuos and servos tuos ( your servants , fols.254r-255v). The Bruges saint, Basil (who had a chapel dedicated to him on the central square in the city, which abutted up against the ancestral comital residence) is highlighted in gold on 3 April in the Calendar, and there are other local saints, such as Omer, Bertin, and Bavo in the Litany. The presence of SS. Iodocus or Josse (after whom Philip the Good named his second son, the boy sadly dying only days after birth in 1432) and Louis (patron of the French royal family and their descendants) points towards the Burgundian court, and this impression is confirmed by the inclusion of Anselm s meditation on chastity on fols.268r-76r and a series of the saints commemorated in the last part of the book. Anselm s text also appears in the prayer book of Philip the Bold, the first Valois duke of Burgundy (Brussels, Bibl. Royale MS.10392), and among the saints here are Adrian, Gregory, Claud, Bernadino (canonised in 1450), Anne and Barbara, who were added to Philip the Bold s book when it was later enlarged for the personal use of his grandson, Philip the Good (see S. Panayotova and N. Morgan, A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and Cambridge Colleges , I, 2009, for Fitzwilliam, MS 3-1954). There are no arms or heraldic devices in the book, and it would appear that the original owners were trusted (but perhaps not noble) servants of the Burgundian court. It may even have been a commission by a member of the ducal household for these recipients. (2) Within a few decades, the volume would appear to have been in the hands of an owner from the house of Luxembourg (whose title passed to the Burgundian dukes in 1467), and it was then that the last gathering was added with a suffrage to St. Peter of Luxembourg (fol.306r), and a prayer in French for one to whom God has entrusted rule of a kingdom but who has children (fol.308r). This owner presumably added the prayer to St Edmund of England in a fifteenth-century hand before the calendar, most probably in response to either the marriage in 1464 of Edward IV of England to Elizabeth Woodville, daughter from the second marriage of Jacquetta of Luxembourg, or the marriage of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York in 1468. Edward IV was briefly exiled in 1470 and took refuge in Flanders with the celebrated bibliophile Louis de Gruuthuse ( c .1422-92) whose house in Bruges stills stands and is the site of a museum. It is more than likely that the owners of this book met the English king during his sojourn there. (3) H.R.H. Frederick Augustus, Duke of Sussex (1773-1843), the rebellious sixth son of George III who secretly married Lady Augusta Murray in Rome in 1793, clandestinely renewing these vows in St. George's, Hanover Square (a few metres from our rooms) later that year, and continuing to live together despite the king s disapproval and parliamentary annulment of the union: his printed bookplate inside front cover. The book was catalogued by T.J. Pettigrew ( Bibliotheca Sussexiana , I:1, 1827, no.136, pp.cxci-cxcii, beautifully written … on thin vellum … there are various beautiful little miniatures of saints dispersed throughout the volume ), when in the library of Kensington Palace. (4) Edward Hailstone (1818-90) of Walton Hall, near Wakefield, Yorkshire antiquarian and book collector; his sale, Sotheby's, 23 April 1891, lot 1394. A late thirteenth-century Bible from the Bibliotheca Sussexiana also passed to him, re-appearing in Sotheby s, 2 December 1986, lot 38. (5) Alfred Higgins F.S.A. (d.1902), antiquarian and collector; his sale, Sotheby's, 2 May 1904, lot 91, thence Quaritch, cat.237 (1905), no.337, and then Hiersemann, cat.330 (1906), no.31. (6) Isabelle Corwith Cramer (1861-1954), the second wife of Ambrose Cramer of Chicago: her inscription on label on book box and loose paper note recording gift of book in 1920 to her daughter, Isabelle Ryerson. (7) Christies, 2 June 2010, lot 207, for £32,450. Text: The Burgundian court in the fifteenth century was the scene of opulence, art patronage and conspicuous consumption of wealth on a scale never seen before or perhaps after. Breathtakingly large sums were regularly spent on single illuminated volumes, and Phillip the Good added 600 such books to the ducal library during his reign, as well as commissioning tapestries, jewellery and other artworks. He funded lavish tournaments, banquets and other forms of entertainment, founded the Burgundian school of music and sent no less than Jan van Eyk to Portugal in 1428 to paint an accurate portrait of Princess Isabella in advance of his betrothal to her. Any artwork produced in this environment is a testament to this abundance of wealth and power, and this book would appear to have belonged to a couple at the very centre of this world. It is a highly individual volume, with many more texts than are usually found in a Book of Hours. It comprises a Calendar (fol.2v); the Hours of the Passion (fol.15r, with matins wanting end and compline wanting opening); the Hours of the Cross (fol.32r); the Hours of the Holy Spirit (fol.39r, wanting terce, and prime wanting end); the Mass of the Virgin (fol.43r); Gospel Readings (fol.47v); the Hours of Virgin secundum usum romanum (fol.52r), with matins (fol.52r), lauds (fol.70r), prime fol.81r), terce (fol.85r), sext (fol.89r), none (fol.93r), vespers (fol.97r), and compline (fol.104r); the Hours of the Compassion of the Virgin (fol.108r), followed by prayers of compassion to the Virgin at the seven hours (A. Wilmart, Auteurs spirituels .........
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