A NEWLY DISCOVERED LEAF OF 'THE SFORZA HOURS'

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Jocelyn Griffin
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1 A NEWLY DISCOVERED LEAF OF 'THE SFORZA HOURS' M. L. EVANS IN 1894, twenty-three years after the discovery of the Sforza Hours (BL, Add. MS ) and shortly after its presentation to the British Museum, Sir G. F. Warner, in his monograph on the manuscript, drew attention to a letter from the Milanese illuminator Giovan Pietro Birago. ^ Neither the date nor the addressee was stated in the letter, which sought that a certain Fra Gian Jacopo, then imprisoned in Milan, be detained until he had compensated the writer for the theft of an unfinished book of hours, upon which Birago had been engaged for Bona Sforza, dowager Duchess of Milan. It seems that part of this book was already in Bona's possession and that the stolen fragment had been taken by the thief to Rome, where it had been acquired by Giovanni Maria Sforza, a bastard half-brother of Bona's deceased husband and a future archbishop of Genoa. Although Warner realized both that the Sforza Hours had belonged to Bona and that it had been mutilated, he was too exact a scholar to conclude on this evidence alone that this manuscript was identical with that mentioned in the letter. Over sixty years were to pass before his intuition was proven correct by the discovery of Birago's signature on the illuminated frontispiece of a volume of Antonio Zarotto's Sforziada^ printed at Milan in 1490.^ This frontispiece, in Warsaw, and those in two further presentation copies of the same book, in Paris and London, are demonstrably by the Master of the Sforza Hours, as Birago was previously known.^ Birago's letter claimed that the stolen part of the manuscript was worth 500 ducats, which indicates that it must have been richly decorated. Despite his plea, the missing leaves were not returned and it seems likely that Bona had abandoned the project by In that year Ludovico il Moro assumed the title of Duke of Milan, brushing aside the claim of the young Francesco Sforza, his nephew's son and Bona's grandson. Utterly excluded from power by her brother-in-law, Bona returned to her native Savoy in 1495 as the guest of her nephew. Duke Phillibert II. She died at Fossano in 1503 and the unfinished manuscript was inherited by Phillibert, who died the following year. The book of hours then became the property of his widow, Margaret of Austria, who moved to the Netherlands in In 1517 she entrusted the scribe Etienne de Lale with the task of writing missing text pages and putting the book in order and in commissioned Gerard Horenbout to execute sixteen additional large miniatures, two 'vignettes' and a number of decorated letters, and to write some more text pages.''" The decorative 21

2 programme of the Sforza Hours thus assumed its present form. The book may then have been presented to Margaret's nephew, the Emperor Charles V.^ Such a provenance would account for its removal to Spain, where it was purchased by Sir J. C. Robinson in 1871.^ Owing to the separation of the leaves of the Sforza Hours, it is impossible to establish its original collation. However, the pages added on the instructions of Margaret of Austria are generally identifiable by the style of their script, capitals, and miniatures. This permits a partial identification of the stolen parts of the manuscript. The replacement folios include six in the Gospel extracts (which in all occupy fols of the manuscript), forty in the Hours of the Virgin (fols ^), twelve in the Passion according to St Luke (fols ^), thirteen in the Prayers to the Virgin (fols. 169^-185^), a single folio in the Memorials of the Saints (fols ^), eight in the Penitential Psalms (fols ^), twelve in the Litany (fols ), and twenty-five in the Oflice of the Dead (fols. 257^-342^)."^ The Hours of the Holy Spirit (fols ^) and the short Prayers to Our Lord on the Passion (fols ) apparently survived unscathed, both in text and decoration. At first sight, the splendid series of full-page miniatures in the Memorials of the Saints seems complete, only the favourite Burgundian saint Andrew having been added by Horenbout (fol. 189^). However, in the Memorials, the text and miniature pertaining to each saint invariably appears on the recto and verso of the same folio. It is consequently impossible to tell how much (if any) of this section is missing. Horenbout replaced single missing miniatures in the Gospel extracts (fol. 10^) and the Penitential Psalms (fol. 212^) and added one half-page miniature to open the Hours of the Cross (fol. 12^). The Passion according to St Luke has only one Horenbout miniature (fol. 136^). However, Birago's Passion cycle is incomplete and it seems likely that additional miniatures were intended to appear between fols. 154 and 159 and, possibly, on fol. 163 (all of which are undecorated replacement text pages). In the Hours of the Virgin, which one would expect to be extensively decorated, the whole of Birago's Marian cycle was abstracted, requiring nine replacement miniatures of Horenbout (fols. 41, 61, 82"^, 91,97, 104^, III, 124, and 133^). Both the Prayers to the Virgin and the Office of the Dead include large proportions of added folios, so it is possible that they too were originally intended to have extensive cycles of miniatures. In the present state of the manuscript, each of these sections has only two full-page miniatures: in each case one by Birago and one by Horenbout (in the Prayers to the Virgin the miniature on fol. 177^ is by Horenbout, as is the miniature on fol. 257^ of the Oflice of the Dead). As we shall see, it also appears that the calendar was removed, though not replaced by Margaret of Austria. There may indeed be further sections of the original book which are missing in their entirety. 1. In 1941 a miniature of the Adoration of the Magt by Birago was presented to the Museum (Add. MS ). It was recognized as an element of the decoration of the Hours of the Virgin from the Sforza Hours, its place having been filled with Horenbout's depiction of the same scene on fol. 97 of the manuscript. ^ The margin of the detached leaf is trimmed up to the edge of the painted frame of the miniature and an eighteenth-century engraving titled La B. Vergin(e) Del Rosario is pasted on the verso. The latter is inscribed 22

in a nineteenth-century hand 'Ancienne Coll. Davillier', presumably a reference to the collector Baron Jean Charles Davillier (1823-83).

3 in a nineteenth-century hand 'Ancienne Coll. Davillier', presumably a reference to the collector Baron Jean Charles Davillier ( ). As one might expect with a manuscript cutting which has apparently not been pasted into an album, this miniature is in a poorer state of preservation than the illuminations which were eventually augmented and bouna to constitute Add. MS It is rather faded overall, with some flaking. Birago's Adoration of the Magi is of considerable interest, both because it permits a direct comparison with Horenbout's representation of the same subject and because it provides incontrovertible evidence that the decorative programme of the Sforza Hours was mutilated, rather than merely left unfinished. The late Paul Wescher's interest in the Sforza Hours dates from several years before the discovery of the detached miniature of the Adoration of the Magi. In a letter published in 1936 he had drawn attention to Margaret of Austria's payments of 1517 to the scribe Etienne de Lale for the writing of the additional text pages in the manuscript.^ Many years later, in a footnote to an article on a different artist, Wescher noted that he had seen two calendar miniatures from the Sforza Hours in the collection of Tammaro de Marinis in Florence. ^ This dramatic revelation passed unnoticed until very recently, after it had been repeated in his entry on Birago in the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani.^^ Indeed, it is probable that the discovery would have remained unremarked upon, had it not been for the appearance in 1984 of the calendar page from the Sforza Hours which is the subject of this note. This leaf was brought to the attention of British Library staff during the run of the exhibition 'Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts' in the United States and after many centuries has entered the same collection as the other parts of the Sforza Hours. It now forms Add. MS In the present state of knowledge, it is impossible to state whether it is identical with one of the pair of calendar miniatures which Wescher saw in de Marinis's collection. However, given that de Marinis kept much of his valuable stock in Lausanne and that the newly discovered leaf was previously in the possession of a Swiss collector, this is by no means implausible. Measuring 115 x 85 mm.. Add. MS has been framed between two sheets of glass, one of which is now broken. The miniature is stained by damp, badly flaked in places, and has become partially attached to the glass. For the last reason, it was judged unwise to attempt to remove the frame of the leaf and it is illustrated here in its glazed state (fig. i). The miniature depicts an elegantly dressed young man with long blond hair seated by a rose bush and a stream. Before him are ranged a dwarf offering a dish (of fruit?), three young women proffering chaplets of roses, and five young men, some of whom are playing musical instruments and singing. In the background is a landscape with a small house and two peasants, one cutting grass with a scythe and the other carrying two baskets suspended from a pole over his shoulder. The obvious implication that this miniature depicts the month of May is confirmed by the text on the reverse, which comprises the section of a liturgical calendar for April. Many stylistic features, both general and specific, confirm the attribution of the May miniature to Birago. The even tonal range, emphasis on bright red and blue, appearance 23

4 Ftg. I. 'The Sforza Hours', miniature for May. Add. MS

5 2. Add. MS Verso of the miniature for May of the background landscape, range of facial types and costume details, and the characteristic method of delineating hair as a mass of wiry curls may all be compared with numerous scenes from the Sforza Hours. The seated young man is reminiscent of Birago's portraits of Maximilian Sforza in the latter's schoolbook in the Biblioteca Trivulziana.^^ The stout dwarf is a favourite Birago 'type', which appears both in the Maximilian schoolbook and on several folios of the Sforza Hours. ^^ Both the size of the leaf and the style of its script are consistent with the format and text of the Sforza Hours. The feasts of four saints appear in the fragment of the calendar on the reverse of the miniature (fig. 2). St Mark and St Peter Martyr are commemorated on their feast-days, respectively 25 and 29 April. St George, however, is celebrated on 24 April, presumably in error, for his feast-day is 23 April. 'Marcelli epi', who appears on the first day on the page, 20 April, is a less familiar figure. I am grateful to the late D. H. Turner for identifying him as the fourth-century martyr who was the first Bishop of Embrun, a city south-west of Turin and south-east of Grenoble.^"^ As the diocese of Embrun is not distant from that of Milan, it is possible that the commemoration of Marcellinus in the Sforza Hours calendar reflects Lombard practice. However, Marcellinus is a Savoyard saint and it seems more probable that his feast-day was included at the request of Bona, who was originally from 25

Savoy. The vigil on 30 April, which appears at the bottom of the leaf, is probably that for the apostles Philip and James the Less, whose feast-day is on i May.

6 Savoy. The vigil on 30 April, which appears at the bottom of the leaf, is probably that for the apostles Philip and James the Less, whose feast-day is on i May. The Memorials of the Saints cycle in the Sforza Hours includes full-page miniatures of St Peter Martyr and St George by Birago (fols. 205^ and 195^, respectively). He also executed a miniature of St Mark as part of the cycle of Evangelists at the beginning of the book, but this was evidently removed as its place is now occupied by a replacement by Horenbout (fol. 10^). Add. MS demonstrates that the Sforza Hours originally had a calendar with a major cycle of full-page miniatures. On the evidence of this leaf, each month consisted of an illumination on the verso of a leaf followed by three text pages: a total of twenty-five folios, taking into account the first recto and the last verso, both of which would have been blank. To judge from the May scene, the miniatures depicted both aristocratic pastimes and seasonal peasant labours. The seated young man in the May miniature may have been intended as a portrait of a court notable, possibly Bona's son, the young Duke Giangaleazzo Sforza. However, this figure has longer hair than Giangaleazzo, as he appears in Birago's portrait in the Paris Sforziada}^ Portraits in fifteenth-century manuscripts are often inexact. For example, in the schoolbook of Maximilian Sforza, the likenesses of the young prince attributed to Ambrogio de Predis, a follower of Cristoforo de Predis, and Birago differ so considerably from one another that one would take them to be portraits of three different sitters. ^^ Under the circumstances, it seems unwise to postulate whether or not actual likenesses of members of the Milanese ruling house were included in the calendar miniatures of the Sforza Hours. One of the most intriguing features of the May miniature is its combination of aristocratic and peasant scenes: an idea first employed in several of the full-page calendar miniatures in the 'Tres Riches Heures' of Jean de Berry. This celebrated manuscript, left unfinished by the Limbourg Brothers, was completed by Jean Colombe between 1485 and 1490 for Duke Charles I of Savoy. ^^ As Bona Sforza was the daughter of the former Duke of Savoy and an aunt of Charles I, it is possible that the subject-matter of the May illumination was directly suggested by the calendar pages of the 'Tres Riches Heures'. One is left to wonder if the exceptionally rich decorative programme of the Sforza Hours was intended to equal that of the 'Tres Riches Heures' itself. 1 G. F. Warner, Miniatures and Borders from the Book of Hours of Bona Sforza., Duchess ofmilan^ in the British Museum (London, 1894), pp. viii-ix. 2 B. Horodyski, 'Birago, Miniaturiste des Sforza', Scriptorium^ x (1956), pp See Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts., ed. T. Kren (New York and London, 1983), pp for illustrations of the three frontispieces. 4 R. Flower, 'Margaret of Austria and the Sforza Book', British Museum Quarterly., x (1935-6), pp , and J. Duverger, 'Gerard Horenbault, 1465.'-1540, Hofschilder van Margareta van Oostenrijk', De Kunst. Maanblad voor Oude en Jonge Kunst, i (1930), p Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts^ p The dating of the completion of the Sforza Hours coincides with the years of Charles's nomination as King of Rome (1519), coronation as emperor (1520) and first Reichstag (1521). 6 For an account of its discovery, see J. C. Robinson, 'The Sforza Book of Hours', Bibliographica, i (1895), pp The following folios have been added. Gospel Extracts: 3, 6, 9-12; Hours of the Virgin: 41, 48, 60-1, 65, 68-9, 72, 82-3, 86-7, 91, 94, , '06, III, , 121, 124-5, ; Passion according to St Luke: , 154-9, 163, 166; Prayers to the Virgin: 171-4, 178-S5; 26

Memorials of the Saints: 189; Penitential Psalms: 217, 221, 225-6, 228-9, 234-5; Litany: 237-42, 244, 247, 250, 253-4, 257; Office of the Dead: 274, 276, 278-9, 281-2, 289, 291, 295-6, 298, 300, 303,

7 Memorials of the Saints: 189; Penitential Psalms: 217, 221, 225-6, 228-9, 234-5; Litany: , 244, 247, 250, 253-4, 257; Office of the Dead: 274, 276, 278-9, 281-2, 289, 291, 295-6, 298, 300, 303, 305, 307-8, , , 320, 330, British Museum, Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts igj6-ig4s {London, 1970), pp Printed in Flower, op. cit. 10 P. Wescher, T. Binasco, Miniaturmaler der Sforza', Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen^ NS, ii (196a), p I am grateful to Dr D. P. Waley for pointing this out. See Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, (1968), vol. X, p Milan, Biblioteca Trivulziana, cod. 2167, fols. 13V and 29. See J. J. G. Alexander, Italian Renaissance Illumination (London, 1977), pis. 31, See note 12 above and fols. 149^ and 190^ of the Sforza Hours. 14 See Bibliotheca Hagiographica Latina Antiguae et Mediae Aetatis (ed. Soc. Bollandiani, Brussels, ), p See Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts, fig. 14c. 16 See n. 12 above and Alexander, op. cit., pis. 29, J. P. Harthan, The Book of Hours (New York, 1977), P

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