LLANGATTOCK BREVIARY LEAF Illuminated vellum leaf with init

Sale 2175 - Lot 74

Price Realized: $ 6,000

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500

(LLANGATTOCK BREVIARY LEAF.) Illuminated vellum leaf from the Llangattock Breviary with initial in colors and gold depicting St. Helena holding the True Cross, also with one 3-line and 5 2-line initials in gold with penwork decoration, one vertical border of floral scrollwork, and 3 vertical bars in gold with floral extensions at top and bottom. Latin text (including the office of the Feast of the Discovery of the True Cross) written in Gothic script in brown and red ink, 30 lines, 2 columns, recto and verso. 271x202 mm; hinged to mat. Ferrara, 1440s

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Additional Details

Leaf from an illuminated manuscript made in the 1440s for Leonello d''Este, Duke of Ferrara, and known as the Llangattock Breviary for having belonged to the Rolls family, who were enobled as Barons Llangattock. Already fragmentary when auctioned on their behalf in London in 1958, the manuscript was subsequently broken up. The historiated initial on this leaf served as the model for a set of postage stamps issued in 1971 by the British overseas territory of St. Helena in the South Atlantic, a first day cover of which is taped to the back of the frame.