Walters Ms. W.494, Lace Book of Marie de' Medici Added Flemish image cycle Priers Crestiennes <note type="title" xml:id="n621.062379">This is the title inscribed on fol. 3r</note> Prayerbook Principal cataloger Randall, Lilian M.C. Principal cataloger Walters Art Museum curatorial staff and researchers since 1934 Cataloger Herbert, Lynley Editor Herbert, Lynley Copy editor Dibble, Charles Contributor Brown, Emily Contributor Emery, Doug Contributor Noel, William Contributor Schuele, Allyson Contributor Shartrand, Emily Contributor Tabritha, Ariel Contributor Toth, Michael B. Contributor Wiegand, Kimber Conservator Owen, Linda Conservator Quandt, Abigail The Walters Art Museum

Licensed for use under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported Access Rights, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode. It is requested that copies of any published articles based on the information in this data set be sent to the curator of manuscripts, The Walters Art Museum, 600 North Charles Street, Baltimore MD 21201.

 This Prayerbook was made for Marie de' Medici in the second quarter of the seventeenth century. Beyond its provenance as a personal book owned by the famous queen, it is exceptional for its intricately cut borders, which transform the parchment margins into lace. This effect was created using a technique known as "canivet," in which a small knife was used to cut ornate patterns into paper or parchment. An art form that flourished originally among nuns in France, Germany, and the Netherlands beginning in the sixteenth century, it was employed to exceptional effect in several manuscripts connected with Marie de' Medici. The Walters manuscript, made for her while she was regent of France, and wife of King Henry IV, contains twenty-eight miniatures, including original religious imagery as well as several later additions: a gouache portrait of the elderly queen, and nine small miniatures produced in Bruges ca. 1450 by an artist influenced by the Eyckian and Gold Scrolls styles prevalent at the time; the coat-of-arms of Marie de Medici, as well as her monogram. The Walters manuscript retains its original binding composed of mosaic inlays in green and black leather, as well as fine gilt pointillé foliate tooling, and a replica of the binding was created by Léon Gruel for Henry Walters on one of his seventeenth-century printed books (92.467) that also connects to Marie de' Medici. Baltimore The Walters Art Museum W.494 The primary language in this manuscript is French. 1r - 52v Prayerbook 1r - 2r 4r - 4r Added Flemish image cycle Nine miniatures excised from earlier Book of Hours and inserted at later date 3r - 50v Priers Crestiennes <note type="title" xml:id="n621.062452">This is the title inscribed on fol. 3r</note> Sus sus mortels venez m'entendre French prayers, mostly written in verse, focused especially on lamenting personal suffering

Medium-weight parchment, borders pierced with complex lace patterns; first flyleaf parchment; front flyleaves i-iv and back flyleaves i-iii are antique laid paper

 Foliation: v+52+iii13.3 9.2 8.0 5.0 Modern pencil foliation upper right corners rectos

Lace-cut folios and fragile pigments make determining collation an unnecessary risk for manuscript None None

Layout varies greatly by page; text panels outlined in purple Written in humanist script These miniatures date to ca. 1450, and were produced in Bruges by an artist influenced by the Eyckian and Gold Scrolls styles prevalent at the time; Randall has reconstructed the original textual sequence associated with these fifteenth-century Flemish miniatures, which have been inserted into the manuscript: fol. 1r, top: Funeral Service (Office of the Dead), and Annunciation (Hours of the Virgin: Matins); fol. 1r, bottom: Garden of Gethsemane (Hours of the Cross: Matins), and Betrayal and Arrest of Christ (Hours of the Cross: Lauds); fol. 2r, top: Christ before Pilate (Hours of the Cross: Prime), and Carrying the Cross (Hours of the Cross: Sext); fol. 2r, bottom: Man of Sorrows (Seven Prayers of St. Gregory), and Souls of the blessed before God the Father (Commendation of Souls); fol. 4r: St. Jerome in his study (Psalter of St. Jerome) Miniatures (not including added cutting on fol. 4r) found on fols. 3r, 6r, 8r, 13r, 18r, 24r, 27r, 30r, 33r, 34r, 34v, 36r, 39r, 42r, 44r, 46r, 48r, 50v, and 51r Nine miniatures, cuttings from a fifteenth-century Flemish Book of Hours, affixed to fols. 1r, 2r, and 4r; contemporary with the manuscript are also one full-page miniature, fifteen smaller miniatures, and illuminations or painted scenes or patterns in borders (passim); gouache portrait of elderly Marie de' Medici affixed to fol. 51r at uncertain point (painting dates to seventeenth or eighteenth century); borders of fols. 5-50 cut with intricate lace designs, often with painted imagery and designs including architectural elements, christological symbolism, ciphers, and anagrams, such as MA, MR, MH, CS, IHS, and MARIE DE MEDICIS (latter found on fols. 15r and 38r); initials in red, blue, gold, and silver; text in black ink Top: Funeral Service; Annunciation; Bottom: Garden of Gethsemane; Betrayal and Arrest of Christ Small miniatures

These miniatures were removed from their original context in a fifteenth-century Flemish Book of Hours and pasted into Marie de' Medici's book at an unknown time.

 Top: Christ before Pilate; Carrying the Cross; Bottom: Man of Sorrows supported by angel; Souls of the blessed brought before God the Father Small miniatures

These miniatures were removed from their original context in a fifteenth-century Flemish Book of Hours and pasted into Marie de' Medici's book at an unknown time.

 David harping Title page Full-page miniature St. Jerome in his study Small miniature

This miniature was removed from its original context in a fifteenth-century Flemish Book of Hours and pasted into Marie de' Medici's book at an unknown time.

 Flight into Egypt Small miniature John the Baptist baptizing Christ Small miniature Transfiguration Small miniature Betrayal and Arrest of Christ Small miniature Last Supper Small miniature Garden of Gethsemane Small miniature Christ before Pilate Small miniature Flagellation of Christ Small miniature Ecce Homo Marginal miniature Christ Carrying the Cross Marginal miniature Crucifixion Small miniature Deposition Small miniature Resurrection Small miniature Noli me tangere Small miniature Christ announcing Virgin's death to her; Assumption of Virgin in margin Small miniature, and marginalia Nimbed man on deathbed Small miniature Painted emblem with snakes, cross, oil lamp, and thistles on top of tomb Small miniature Portrait of Marie de' Medici Small portrait painting

Painted in gouache on paper and affixed at later date.

Bound in France, likely in Paris, by Ruette at time of manuscript's creation ca. 1640; red leather with olive-brown inlaid leather geometric panel designs; fine gilt pointillé foliate tooling; two extant gilt inlaid diamonds on spine; gilt edges; León Gruel created facsimile of binding for one of Henry Walters' related printed books, L'Entree de la Reyne Mere du Roy Tres-Chrestien dans les Villes des Pays Bas, 1632, by Jean Puget de La Serre (accession number 92.467)

 Second quarter of the 17th century (with several added 15th-century miniatures) Paris (?) Created in Paris (?) for Marie de Medici in the second quarter of the seventeenth century Baron d'Heiss, Paris, second half of the eighteenth century; related inscriptions: "o Ep" on front flyleaf i, r; "40D168. 1776" on back flyleaf i, r; sold in his sale in Paris on March 7, 1785, lot no. 358, with front flyleaf iii, r inscribed "No. 358. B. d'Heiss" Duchesse de Berry, nineteenth century; inscribed "Duchesse de Berry No. 15" on front flyleaf i, r; her sale in Paris on March 22, 1864, lot no. 3, with "3" inscribed on front flyleaf i, r M. de Machy, purchased from Berry sale in 1864 for 1,260 francs León Gruel (?), late nineteenth or early twentieth century; his ownership of manuscript assumed given his careful replication of the binding on a printed book for Henry Walters ca. 1920, however there is no evidence in the manuscript to connect it with Gruel (he usually applied his bookplate inside), and as Walters owned the lace book by 1905, it is possible he obtained it elsewhere and only asked Gruel to replicate the binding; French book dealer Damascene Morgand published the lace book in 1886 while it was still in Machy's collection, and it is possible it could have gone through his hands later, as Walters purchased many books from him as well Henry Walters, Baltimore, possibly acquired from Gruel or Morgand before 1905 when it is published by Gruel as a book owned by Walters Walters Art Museum, 1931, by Henry Walters' bequest Relevant Works Meyer, Paul. Catalogue de manuscrits très précieux du XIIIe au XVIIIe siècle... composant la collection de Madame la duchesse de B*** [Berry] [Texte imprimé] : Paris, Hôtel Drouot, salle n ° 7, 22 mars 1864, Me Charles Pillet, MM. Mannheim, p. 16, no. 3. Quentin-Bauchart, Ernest. Les femmes bibliophiles de France. Vol. 1. Paris: Damascène Morgand Libraire, 1886; pp. 181-182. Gruel, Leon. Manuel historique et bibliographique de l'amateur de reliures. Vol. 2. Paris: Gruel and Engelmann, 1905; p. 116 (illus.). Quaritch, Bernard. A Catalogue of Illuminated and Other Manuscripts, Together with some Works on Paleography. London: Bernard Quatrich, Ltd, 1931; p. 38, ref. under lot 52. De Ricci, Seymour, and W. J. Wilson. Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada. Vol. 1. New York: H. W. Wilson Company, 1935; p. 816, cat. no. 362. Quaritch, Bernard. Catalogue 500. London, 1935; ref. under lot 246 [ex-Doheny Ms. 699, Camarillo, California, sold London, Christ's, December 2, 1987]. Baltimore Museum of Art. The Greek Tradition in Painting and the Minor Arts: an exhibition sponsored jointly by the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Walters Art Gallery from May 15 through June 25, 1939. Baltimore Museum of Art. 1939, p. 84, cat. no. 114. Miner, Dorothy. The History of Bookbinding, 525-1950 A.D.. Exhibition Catalogue for Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery. Baltimore: Trustees of the Walters Art Gallery, 1957; cat. no. 381, Pl. LXXVI. Christie's. London, December, 2, 1987; p. 117, ref. under lot 179. Randall, Lilian M. C. Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the Walters Art Gallery. Vol. 2. France , 1420-1540. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press in association with the Walters Art Gallery, 1989; pp. 648-649, app. 8. Randall, Lilian M. C. Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the Walters Art Gallery. Vol. 3. Belgium, 1250-1530. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press in association with the Walters Art Gallery, 1989; pp. 200-201, cat. no. 242; figs. 466. De Conihout, Isabelle. “Libri di propietà di Maria de’ Medici.” In Maria de' Medici. Una principessa fiorentina sul trono di Francia. Exhibition Catalogue for Florence, Museo degli argenti, 19 marzo-4 settembre 2005. Edited by Caterina Caneva and Francesco Solinas, pp. 366-368. Florence: Sillabe, 2005; p. 366. Christie's. New York, June 27-28, 2006; Sale 1769, ref. under lot 285. McFaddden, David. Slash: Paper Under the Knife. Exhibition Catalogue for New York, Museum of Art and Design, October 7, 2009-April 4, 2010. Milan: 5 Continents, 2009; pp. 14, 45. Christie's. Sale 7915- The Arcana Collection, Part 2: Important Rare Books and Manuscripts. October 27, 2010; ref. under lot 22 ["Philippe Desportes, prieres du roy au saint esprit, in French, and penitential psalms and litany, in LATIN, illuminated cut-work text"]. Art Medicine Museum Poetry Script Muhammad, the Prophet Kashmiri Horses Walters Art Museum Document Astrology Devotion History Legal Literature -- Poetry Literature -- Prose Liturgy Philosophy Science Science -- Medicine Scripture Sufism Theology Mineralogy Logic Geography Geomancy Cosmology Cartography Fortune-telling Koran Qur`an Firman Palimpsest Prayer Bible Gospels Psalter Missal Lectionary Book of Hours Antiphonary Homilary Processional Horologion Breviary Hymnal Chronicle Maghreb Sub-Saharan (West) Africa Turkey Afghanistan Central Asia Egypt England India Iran Iraq Pakistan Germany France Austria Netherlands Ethiopia Armenia Flanders Greece Mamluk Mughal Ottoman Ottonian Armenian Byzantine Abbasid Qajar Rajput Christian Arabic Austrian Dutch Egyptian Fatimid German Indian Islamic Persian Safavid Timurid Turkish Umayyad English French Flemish Ethiopian Carolingian Calligraphy Colophon Headpiece Illumination Illustration Medallion Miniature Ornament Painting Early Abbasid script Ragini Romanesque Gothic Watermark Grotesques Historiated initial Inhabited initial White-vine lettering Textura Batarda Humanistic Uncial Accordion book Album Book Codex Manuscript Heraldry Saint's Life Drawing Grisaille New Abbasid style Musical notation Russia Romania Charter Russian Genealogy Mass book Prayer book Gospel Lectionary Psalter-Hours Treatise Grammar Gloss Pontifical Private devotional text Gradual Protective scroll Scroll 10th century 11th century 12th century 13th century 14th century 15th century 16th century 17th century 18th century 19th century 20th century 8th century 9th century Block book Caroline minuscule Central Arab lands (Near East) Chart English secretary hand Kufic Gothic book hand Original binding Treasure binding Gospel Book Spanish Spain Italian Italy Coptic Scrapbook American United States Maryland Historical Society Friendship book Friendship Biography Judaism Talmud Collection of Sermons Notable Notable binding Liturgical Devotional Scriptural Theological Legal Historical Scientific Scientific -- Medical Literary -- Prose Literary -- Poetry Philosophical Astrological Sufi English Prayer book Flemish Book Manuscript Flanders France 17th century Devotion Christian French Heraldry Illumination Miniature Notable binding Original binding Ornament Painting Walters Art Museum 15th century