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Zoomorphic initial, on a cutting from Gregory the Great, Registrum Epistolarum, in Latin [France, possibly Liessies, mid-12th century]
细节
Possibly from the Benedictine Abbey of St Lambert, Liessies
Zoomorphic initial, on a cutting from Gregory the Great, Registrum Epistolarum, in Latin [France, possibly Liessies, mid-12th century]
A handsome and rare Romanesque survival possibly from the Benedictine Abbey of St Lambert, Liessies.
Trimmed irregularly: c.120–140×170–175mm, preserving 17 lines from the bottom of one of two columns of text, written in a fine distinctive Romanesque bookhand, the text comprising the end of Book XIV, Epistle 7 and beginning of Epistle 8 (‘Quotiens eorum nos discordia tristes facit [...]’), continuing on the verso, the tail of the large initial ‘Q’ formed of a dog-like creature. Provenance: (1) Although catalogued in 2005 as Italian, this cutting is certainly French, and perhaps written at and for the Benedictine Abbey of St Lambert, Liessies, in the diocese of Cambrai, during the abbacy of Wedric (1124-47). (2) James Stevens Cox (1910–1997), whose substantial library was dispersed through Maggs Bros, London; this cutting was in their Catalogue 1376, Continental Books and Manuscript Leaves (2005), no 7 (with col. ill. inside front cover).
Script and Origin: The 2005 Maggs catalogue from which this cutting was acquired has five others, all described as being from a single manuscript, which would therefore have contained several additional texts by Church Fathers, including Ambrose, De Apologia David, De Josepho Patriarcha, and De Jacob & Vita Beda; and Cassiodorus, In Psalterio Expositio. This may be so, but Maggs nos. 4 and 5 are now catalogued in G. Freuler, The McCarthy Collection, I (2018), no 8, from whose reproductions it is evident that they are not written by the same scribe. A cutting in Philadelphia with part of Book VI, Epistles 60 and 64, written by the same scribe as the present cutting, is surely from the same manuscript (Free Library, Lewis EM 16:14).
The script has at least two very unusual features in common with another leaf owned by James Stevens Cox, which has the partial 12th-century ownership inscription ‘Lamberti Letiensis’ of Liessies Abbey. The script of the present cutting, the Philadelphia cutting, and at least one of the Liessies leaves in the Masson collection at the École des Beaux Arts, Paris, uses the ‘papal knot’ abbreviation mark, sometimes found in documents under papal influence, but very rarely found in book-hands. The present cutting and the Philadelphia one also all use a rare form of the punctus elevatus in which the upper stroke is convex instead of concave.
The library at Liessies certainly contained a copy of the text, recorded by A. Sanderus, Bibliotheca Belgica manuscripta, II (1644), p.24: under the heading for Gregory the Great is ‘Epistolae in magno volumine’. It is known that Liessies produced its own books in the 12th century, and that it borrowed exemplars from Clairvaux, and on at least one occasion sent scribes with parchment to Clairvaux to copy texts in situ; a close textual study might place this leaf within a stemma of manuscripts shared among early Cistercian houses. The abbey was suppressed in 1791, and the library scattered, with codices and leaves from at least 19 manuscripts now in at least eight institutions.
For the illumination of manuscripts from Liessies, see A. Boinet, ‘Manuscrit exécuté à l’abbaye de Liessies au XIIe siècle et conservé à la Bibliothèque de Metz’, Bulletin de la Société nationale des antiquaires de France (1919) and ‘L’atelier de miniaturistes de Liessies au XIIe siècle’, La Bibliofilia, 50 (1948), pp.149–61. For an updated list of manuscripts from the abbey, see J. Leclercq, “Les manuscrits de l’abbaye de Liessies”, Scriptorium, 6 (1952), pp.51–62, listing 19 whole or fragmentary manuscripts (plus six late-medieval cartularies), all in institutional collections.
Two of the finest of all Romanesque miniatures come from Liessies: the famous full-page Evangelist portraits of Mark and John, illuminated by the itinerant Master of the Lambeth Bible, that now belong to Musée de la Société archéologique, Avesnes, just a few miles from Liessies (on which see W. Cahn, Romanesque Manuscripts: The Twelfth Century (1996), no 106, ills. 255–56). They come from a manuscript dated 1146, written for Abbot Wedric by a scribe named John.
Zoomorphic initial, on a cutting from Gregory the Great, Registrum Epistolarum, in Latin [France, possibly Liessies, mid-12th century]
A handsome and rare Romanesque survival possibly from the Benedictine Abbey of St Lambert, Liessies.
Trimmed irregularly: c.120–140×170–175mm, preserving 17 lines from the bottom of one of two columns of text, written in a fine distinctive Romanesque bookhand, the text comprising the end of Book XIV, Epistle 7 and beginning of Epistle 8 (‘Quotiens eorum nos discordia tristes facit [...]’), continuing on the verso, the tail of the large initial ‘Q’ formed of a dog-like creature. Provenance: (1) Although catalogued in 2005 as Italian, this cutting is certainly French, and perhaps written at and for the Benedictine Abbey of St Lambert, Liessies, in the diocese of Cambrai, during the abbacy of Wedric (1124-47). (2) James Stevens Cox (1910–1997), whose substantial library was dispersed through Maggs Bros, London; this cutting was in their Catalogue 1376, Continental Books and Manuscript Leaves (2005), no 7 (with col. ill. inside front cover).
Script and Origin: The 2005 Maggs catalogue from which this cutting was acquired has five others, all described as being from a single manuscript, which would therefore have contained several additional texts by Church Fathers, including Ambrose, De Apologia David, De Josepho Patriarcha, and De Jacob & Vita Beda; and Cassiodorus, In Psalterio Expositio. This may be so, but Maggs nos. 4 and 5 are now catalogued in G. Freuler, The McCarthy Collection, I (2018), no 8, from whose reproductions it is evident that they are not written by the same scribe. A cutting in Philadelphia with part of Book VI, Epistles 60 and 64, written by the same scribe as the present cutting, is surely from the same manuscript (Free Library, Lewis EM 16:14).
The script has at least two very unusual features in common with another leaf owned by James Stevens Cox, which has the partial 12th-century ownership inscription ‘Lamberti Letiensis’ of Liessies Abbey. The script of the present cutting, the Philadelphia cutting, and at least one of the Liessies leaves in the Masson collection at the École des Beaux Arts, Paris, uses the ‘papal knot’ abbreviation mark, sometimes found in documents under papal influence, but very rarely found in book-hands. The present cutting and the Philadelphia one also all use a rare form of the punctus elevatus in which the upper stroke is convex instead of concave.
The library at Liessies certainly contained a copy of the text, recorded by A. Sanderus, Bibliotheca Belgica manuscripta, II (1644), p.24: under the heading for Gregory the Great is ‘Epistolae in magno volumine’. It is known that Liessies produced its own books in the 12th century, and that it borrowed exemplars from Clairvaux, and on at least one occasion sent scribes with parchment to Clairvaux to copy texts in situ; a close textual study might place this leaf within a stemma of manuscripts shared among early Cistercian houses. The abbey was suppressed in 1791, and the library scattered, with codices and leaves from at least 19 manuscripts now in at least eight institutions.
For the illumination of manuscripts from Liessies, see A. Boinet, ‘Manuscrit exécuté à l’abbaye de Liessies au XIIe siècle et conservé à la Bibliothèque de Metz’, Bulletin de la Société nationale des antiquaires de France (1919) and ‘L’atelier de miniaturistes de Liessies au XIIe siècle’, La Bibliofilia, 50 (1948), pp.149–61. For an updated list of manuscripts from the abbey, see J. Leclercq, “Les manuscrits de l’abbaye de Liessies”, Scriptorium, 6 (1952), pp.51–62, listing 19 whole or fragmentary manuscripts (plus six late-medieval cartularies), all in institutional collections.
Two of the finest of all Romanesque miniatures come from Liessies: the famous full-page Evangelist portraits of Mark and John, illuminated by the itinerant Master of the Lambeth Bible, that now belong to Musée de la Société archéologique, Avesnes, just a few miles from Liessies (on which see W. Cahn, Romanesque Manuscripts: The Twelfth Century (1996), no 106, ills. 255–56). They come from a manuscript dated 1146, written for Abbot Wedric by a scribe named John.
注意事项
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荣誉呈献
Julian Wilson
Senior Specialist, Books, Maps & Manuscripts