From: owner-scribes@castle.org (scribes digest) To: scribes-digest@castle.org Subject: scribes digest V4 #62 Reply-To: Sender: owner-scribes@castle.org Errors-To: owner-scribes@castle.org Precedence: bulk scribes digest Sunday, November 12 2000 Volume 04 : Number 062 ======================================================================== To unsubscribe from this list, send email to with unsubscribe scribes-digets in the body of the message. Leave the subject line blank. Do not include any additional text. Re: [scribes]: Visconti Hours [scribes]: I bought a medieval leaf... Re: [scribes]: Visconti Hours Re: [scribes]: I bought a medieval leaf... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2000 02:52:54 -0600 From: Robert Knaus Subject: Re: [scribes]: Visconti Hours I also have a copy of the Visconti Hours put out by the Florence Museum - as you said the colors are quite vivid and the gold leaf heavy. However, aside from the general quality of museum publications, I would trust these colors more because of the apparently accurate reproduction of the rest of the image - the manuscript itself. (By this I mean the material of the page, not the scribe's work.) Actually, from what I have been able to determine, many of the parchments were much more vibrant than we tend to believe - the colors tend to fade over time, and of course wear doesn't help. As far as the style (full page, etc.) it is a little unusual, probably due to the additional amount of work involved. Most of the works of this type we tend to imagine with a lot of illuminations simply because that is what is more interesting to view (and is what most places will show you because they are so impressive). The Visconti Hours do have more than their fair share, and they are quite large, which is nice for those of us who would like to use them as a model for a short text scroll. 8-) If anyone does get an opportunity to pick up this book, by all means do. I found mine in a used bookstore on my honeymoon (can't ever escape addictions). I had a choice between the Visconti Hours and the Duke of Berry - and I have never looked back at the descision. I have seen the Duke of Berry other times, but this is the only Visconti copy I have ever seen. (And personally, I think it is better looking, although I suppose I might feel differently if I had purchased the Berry instead.) The 18 X 30 reproductions of the de Berry might be different - sometime bigger is definately better. Al-yesari HRAFNASDOT@aol.com wrote: > I was so excited I sent this to the wrong address - I apologize if there is a > double sending- > > OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSH!!!!! I just picked up a slip cased 1972 edition of the > "Visconti Hours" published by the National Library, Florence. Its GORGEOUS! > Has anyone seen this edition? My question is, How close are the color > reproductions? There are very vivid pinks, greens and blues in this edition > as well as heavy gold leaf. As I understand it, museum editions are usually > right on target with color reproduction? The text lists this as an unusual > style of full page illumination for a book of hours. Has anyone used these > as a basis for scrolls or single sheet illuminations? > > The same shop also had full sized replicas of the the Jean De Berry Book of > Hours, with slip covers. They measured about 18" x 30". I will have to go > back and try to get one. > > Asa Hrafnasdottir > Loch Ruadh > =================================================================== > To unsubscribe from this list, send email to > with a blank Subject: line and > unsubscribe scribes > in the body of the message. Do not include any additional text in > the body. =================================================================== To unsubscribe from this list, send email to with a blank Subject: line and unsubscribe scribes in the body of the message. Do not include any additional text in the body. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2000 20:53:43 +1100 From: Christine Robertson Subject: [scribes]: I bought a medieval leaf... Thank you very much to the person who posted the address of C E Puckett. I went. I saw. I shopped. I bought a leaf from a printed, hand-decorated Book of Hours, French, c. 1509. Cost $250 US. I have scanned it and put it up on my web page for everyone to enjoy. I am now broke :-) http://goldgryph.virtualave.net/illumination/Printed_BoH.htm - --Yseult - ----------------------------------------------------------------- Chris Robertson http://goldgryph.virtualave.net Yseult de Lacy Wentworth Falls (Sydney) Barony of Rowany NSW Australia Lochac =================================================================== To unsubscribe from this list, send email to with a blank Subject: line and unsubscribe scribes in the body of the message. Do not include any additional text in the body. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2000 10:08:12 -0500 From: "Sally Burnell" Subject: Re: [scribes]: Visconti Hours > OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSH!!!!! I just picked up a slip cased 1972 edition of the > "Visconti Hours" published by the National Library, Florence. Its GORGEOUS! > Has anyone seen this edition? My question is, How close are the color > reproductions? There are very vivid pinks, greens and blues in this edition > as well as heavy gold leaf. As I understand it, museum editions are usually > right on target with color reproduction? The text lists this as an unusual > style of full page illumination for a book of hours. Has anyone used these > as a basis for scrolls or single sheet illuminations? This was the very first facsmile manuscript that I ever acquired. I joined the SCA in 1977 and began illuminating in early 1978, and that April for my birthday my mother gifted me with a copy of Visconti as a way to encourage my craft. That book never fails to just amaze me. I don't do Italian but I've seen plenty of scrolls done here in the Midrealm where the illuminator obviously was inspired by that book. There is a wonderful gentleman by the name of Master Wolfgang von Resslur here in the Midrealm who is Laureled in, um, I think illumination (Mistress Katarina, or Mistress Siobhan, am I correct? Or is it painting?). Anyway, I remember years ago now seeing a piece that Master Wolfgang did that was an absolutely faithful reproduction of a folio from Visconti. It was positively amazing! Wolfgang once told me that he wanted to reproduce every single folio from Visconti someday! He's done a lot of scrolls that I have seen that were heavily influenced by the Visconti Hours. He's an amazingly talented fellow and I've learned a great deal by "talking shop" with him! I've also got a copy of Duc de Berry that was gifted to me by an old college boyfriend back in the late '70's. I just this past winter acquired the Grands Heures de Jean Duc de Berry - now THERE'S a book you ought to see! That one just knocked my socks off when I saw it at Ęthelmearc Valentine's Day at a merchant's table last winter. I couldn't stop picking it up and drooling over it, and I finally just had to give in and buy it. The marginalia alone makes this book worth owning - it is so amazing! The little miniatures are so hilarious and bizarre that it leaves you wondering just what the illuminator was thinking! The book is HUGE and it sits on my floor in my ever increasing stack of BIG art books that don't fit anywhere else in this tiny apartment, but I still find myself spending considerable time looking at this book just marveling over its beauty and intricacy. Congratulations on your acquisition of Visconti! May it bring you many long hours of pleasure to study and to look at! This is quite the worthwhile book to own a copy of, even if you don't have any desire to work in those amazing loud bright pinks, purples and greens! Another good suggested Italian manuscript that you might want to seek out is "The Prayerbook of Michelino da Besozzo". The colours are more muted than those in Visconti, but still, it is really an exquisite little book. And if you go for the unusual, try a copy of "The Hours of Catherine of Cleves", a 15th c. Flemish Book of Hours. I love that one for its unusual borders - pretzels, bird cages, fish nets, rosaries, archery equipment, coins, mussels and other odd border motifs are what make this book so charming to me. And there are many, many more really beautiful facsimiles out there as well. Mistress Katarina (from the Midrealm) just acquired a lucious facsimile copy of "The Manasse Codex" (I am sooooooooooooooooo jealous!!!). Now THERE is one I want to own! Ah, too many books, too little space..........................guess I'll just need to hit the lottery and then maybe I could afford a house to put all my books into, and the many, many more I want to own!!! Saradwen Midrealm =================================================================== To unsubscribe from this list, send email to with a blank Subject: line and unsubscribe scribes in the body of the message. Do not include any additional text in the body. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2000 10:23:52 -0500 From: "Sally Burnell" Subject: Re: [scribes]: I bought a medieval leaf... > Thank you very much to the person who posted the address of C E Puckett. I > went. I saw. I shopped. That would be me, and you are most welcome!! Glad to be of service!! For those who missed it, the URL is: http://cepuckett.com/ > I bought a leaf from a printed, hand-decorated Book of Hours, French, c. > 1509. Cost $250 US. I have scanned it and put it up on my web page for > everyone to enjoy. I am now broke :-) Ooooh, thank you so much for posting that on your web page! That's one I'm going to have fun with studying! That's really not a bad price, either, when you consider it. The lady here in my local shire who sells leaves for Mr. Puckett, THLady Katarina Peregrine (Leaves of Our Times) has much higher priced stuff that I have seen and drooled over. It's so much fun to have someone here locally who has stuff that I can look at up close and study without some museum guard giving me suspicious looks. (Sometimes at the Cleveland Museum of Art, depending on who the guard is, they'll look at me funny when I have my nose pressed to the glass cases to get a good look at the manuscripts. When I pull out my pencil and sketchbook, they relax a little because they assume I am a student from the Cleveland Institute of Art working on a project.) If anyone is ever going to be in the Cleveland area for any particular reason, do yourselves a favour and stop in at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Their Mediaeval collection is really world class. You can get a small sampling of it on their web page at: http://clemusart.com Click on "Permanent Collections", then click on "Manuscript Illuminations" to get a small sample of the Museum's holdings. OK, enjoy, everyone! Saradwen Midrealm =================================================================== To unsubscribe from this list, send email to with a blank Subject: line and unsubscribe scribes in the body of the message. Do not include any additional text in the body. ------------------------------ End of scribes digest V4 #62 ****************************