BOURDICHON, Jean (attributed to)

Offizium der Madonna. Vat. Lat. 3781 [cover title]

Zurich, Belser, 1984 (facsimile edition of a fifteenth-century manuscript).

Duodecimo, 113 leaves of facsimile illuminated manuscript (in Latin) plus [4] pages relating to the production of this edition at the rear.

Gilt-decorated full sheepskin, all edges gilt; leather very lightly mottled; an excellent copy in the original cloth-bound book-form box. The box also contains a companion introductory volume (in German) by Eberhard KONIG: Das Vatikanische Stundenbuch Jean Bourdichons (cloth, octavo, 136, [3] pages with 22 illustrations; in fine condition).

Volume 67 in the series 'Belser-Faksimile-Editionen aus der Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana'. The original of this beautiful illuminated manuscript is in the Vatican Library ('Codex Vaticanus latinus 3781'); it is attributed to Jean Bourdichon (c.1457-1521). 'Over the course of a career that lasted nearly forty years, Jean Bourdichon served as official court painter to four successive French kings: Louis XI, Charles VIII, Louis XII, and François I. As court painter, he designed stained glass windows, coins, and gold plate, illuminated manuscripts, and executed independent paintings. Charles VIII set up a workshop for him in his castle at Plessis-lès-Tours and gave large dowries to Bourdichon's daughters, and Bourdichon himself became a wealthy landowner. Although he is recorded as having received commissions for as many as forty paintings in one year, only one of his panel paintings is known to survive. Thus he is today known primarily from his work in manuscripts' (Getty Museum website). A trivial aside: Google translates 'Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana' as 'Library of Congress'.