Collecting Books of Hours
Written by Administrator Tuesday, 05 October 2010 09:28
As a group, Books of Hours are arguably the most beautiful of all books. They are also some of the most expensive, with modest examples starting in five figures. One of the finest Book of Hours-the richly illuminated Rothschild Prayerbook-sold for a record $13.5 million (£8.6 million) in 1999.
Books of Hours are private devotional books that were enormously popular with wealthy Catholics in the fifteenth century. They were typically structured around the hourly prayers observed in monasteries, and devout Catholics were expected stop eight times a day and recite the appropriate liturgy.
Despite their strongly religious origin, the books served more as status symbols and fashion accessories than paths to heaven, a fact testified to in the large number of copies that survive in exceptional condition. Most Books of Hours are illuminated manuscripts, beautifully written out by hand on vellum, with ornate initial letters in each section, decorative page borders, and-in the better examples-delicate paintings, which are called miniatures.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word miniature comes from the Italian term for medieval book illustration. Since these illustrations were small, the English word came to refer to diminutive size. Another common English phrase related to Books of Hours is red-letter day.
Books of Hours often included a calendar of holy days, and scribes typically indicated the most important days with red ink.
Tens of thousands of Books of Hours survive, making them by far the most common books of the Middle Ages. Today, as six hundred years ago, these manuscripts are sought for their beautiful illustrations and decoration, not their content, which is archaic and typically written in Latin. The price of a manuscript depends entirely on the number and quality of the miniatures.
The miniatures usually depict scenes from the Bible and the lives of the saints. The settings, however, are not historical. Instead, the painters placed the figures in contemporary settings showing, for example, medieval castle towers in the background of a painting of the Crucifixion. Often it is possible to find a portrait of the original owner of a Book of Hours in one of the paintings.
While complete Books of Hours can be expensive, individual leaves written out and decorated by a scribe six centuries ago, can be found for little more than the price of a new hardcover book about illuminated manuscripts.
Ten Choices - Books of Hours
AbeBooks' sellers offer everything from complete manuscript Books of Hours to children's books inspired by these devotional works. Other opportunities include facsimile editions-the best of which are hand-finished with gold highlights-and some exceptional coffee-table books on the subject.