Fruits

TM 466 — ELEGANT MANUSCRIPT CONTAINING TWO WORKS OF SPIRITUAL AND MORAL EDIFICATION IN FRENCH TRANSLATION. Illuminated manuscript on parchment in French France after 1482 c. 1490. Dimensions 274 x 175 mm. 70 folios written in a Gothic <i>bâtarde</i> bookhand 18 large initials parti-colored in red and/or blue inserted leaf in first quire with FULL-PAGE HERALDIC COMPOSITION IN GOLD SILVER RED BLUE AND BLACK. BINDING: Bound in modern nineteenth-century blue velvet over wooden boards pink paper pastedowns and endleaves edges gilt. TEXT: Manuscript contains two works that reflect the spirituality of fifteenth-century Carthusians and their quest for the contemplative life. The first text <i>Sept fruits de la tribulation</i> is known in only five extant manuscript and is still unedited. A free French version probably dating from the fifteenth century of either the longer <i>Latin Tractatus de tribulacione</i> or an abridged adaptation of the French <i>Livre de tribulacion</i>. The second text<i> Miroir d'or de l'ame pecheresse</i> is a work of spiritual edification which consists of seven sections: on human misery sin especially lechery penance rejection of the world the vanity of human wishes death and hell and heaven. There is neither a modern critical edition of the second text nor a complete census of the existing manuscripts; the copy here was apparently made from an incunable edition of c. 1490. This manuscript begins with a remarkable added full-page illuminated frontispiece with the coat of arms and motto of Louis de Grolée fl. late fifteenth-early sixteenth century the abbot of Bonnevaux and Saint-Pierre de Vienne. PROVENANCE: Copied in France perhaps northeastern based on script and linguistic characteristics as well as internal evidence. It belonged to Louis de Grolée fl. late fifteenth-early sixteenth century. It then belonged Charles Chardin bibliophile. It was later a part of the collection of Sir Thomas Phillipps 1792-1872 who has been described as the greatest private manuscript collector of all time. CONDITION: Gold slightly rubbed some off-setting from heraldic painted composition to opening text page slight staining in upper margin and into three lines of text ff. 68-69. Overall good condition. Full description and pictures available. TM 466 books