Becoming A Book Worm

Now I am more likely to squeak excitedly over a crumbling stone wall or grin inanely at some crudely executed tile decoration, but after having spent a day handling rare and expensive manuscripts it seemed only fair to include them amongst my weekly scribbles.

The Nativity, f. 135.
Sam Fogg, Master of the Beinecke Hours, undated, , (accessed 4^th March 2012).

This is a Book of Hours made in c.1500 in Bruges. It is a tiny book measuring in at less than 10cm height. Written in a beautifully clear Gothic hand on vellum it contains several texts in Latin and French, including a Calendar, the Hours of the Cross and the Office for the Dead. In total it contains 14 full page miniatures of biblical scenes, such as the Crucifixion, Annunciation and Coronation of the Virgin. The marginal decoration around these images includes architectural details and various images of nature, such as birds, plants and insects.

David and Bathsheba, f. 247.
Sam Fogg, Master of the Beinecke Hours, undated, , (accessed 4^th March 2012).

Originally Books of Hours were created to allow lay people to follow monastic practices in a more simplified form. Prayers and psalms were organised into the eight canonical hours: Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline. However particularly by the later Middle Ages expensively made and well illustrated Books of Hours became a sign of status.