Preview
Location
Flanders, Belgium
Creation Date
1300
Description
Verso of leaf from a psalter, circa 1300. Written in single columns of 18 lines on each page, in gothic hand. Decoration: 22 one-line initials alternating in blue with red penwork embellishment or gold with blue penwork; two-line initial "C" in pink with white tracery on a burnished gold ground with marginal extenders the entire length of the page containing two eared serpents in pink, brown, and blue with white tracery, a pink bird perched on top of the marginal extender, and a blue bird with white tracery inside the initial. Large initial "L" in gold on a pink and blue ground with white tracery extends most of the length of the text.
A portion of the text is repeated by the scribe, an error which was rectified, presumably much later, by someone who has inked through the repeated passage, which is still legible. Some words are also inked through on verso.
Text is from Psalm 148 with the very end of Psalm 147 and the beginning of Psalm 149. This is an uncommon example of an early leaf where the illuminators' marginal embellishment (including snakes and birds) reflects the text, which, translated, reads in part: “Praise the Lord ... all ... beasts, and cattle, creeping things and flying fowl.”
Rose-Wright manuscript collection no. 17
Original Format
1 leaf; illuminated; manuscript on vellum
Original Size
16 cm
Link to Primo Catalog Entry
https://search.library.pdx.edu/permalink/f/1gfb8a9/CP71117015250001451
Link to Medieval Portland Entry
Persistent Identifier
https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/34723
Recommended Citation
Catholic Church, "25, Leaf from an Early Psalter" (1300). Manuscripts and Incunabula in PSU Special Collections. 18.
https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/34723