[LIVRE D'HEURES - ENLUMINURES] Fragments recto verso des heures de la Vierge à l'usage de Rome/Dié(?)

Recto verso fragments of a manuscript Book of Hours on parchment with sumptuously illuminated full-page borders. This compartmentalized division of ornaments is representative of the production of Rouen and Parisian workshops at the turn of the 16th century.

Two illuminated pages on a recto verso leaf: the border is divided into bands decorated with floral motifs and leafy designs, gilt initials painted in alternating red and blue and rubriques.
The richness of the illumination characterizes these liturgical books intended for laypeople. Books of Hours were at the time jewels of piety, both an instrument of religious practice and a social claim affirmed by the richness of the artists' work. A veritable small painting, this leaf is probably extracted from a luxurious volume where each page was carefully painted.
Here we find a fragment of the Hours of the Virgin between the end of the office of none and the beginning of vespers. Despite the antiphon "Missus est", different from the classical usage of the Roman ritual, we find following it the usual psalm eight: "Dixit dominus...". This antiphon is found rather in the liturgy of the diocese of Die, but with the announcement of the rubric preceding vespers, we can suppose a minor Roman usage.
Writing called cursiva libraria on long lines. Witness to the formalization of cursive writing at the dawn of the French Renaissance, this writing is emblematic of the production of French copyists for laypeople during the period.