Collection ID: 0023 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

Bible

Other related names

• Lewis, John Frederick, 1860-1932, former owner (http://viaf.org/viaf/63874811/)
• Lewis, Anne Baker, former owner

Funders

• Council on Library and Information Resources

Call number

Lewis E 36
(Philadelphia, United States, Free Library of Philadelphia, John Frederick Lewis Collection of European Manuscripts)

Alternate identifiers

• https://know.freelibrary.org/Record/1466057
• deRicci: 8
• Leaves-of-gold: 4

Publisher

Free Library of Philadelphia

Language

Latin

Origin

Place

Padua or Venice, Italy

Summary

This Italian Bible was probably produced in either Padua or Venice in the second half of the thirteenth century. It features a classic Italian rotunda script, while the stylistic traits visible in the miniatures, such as the green flesh tones and highlighting of the drapery of the figures in the historiated initials, link this Bible to those produced by the renowned Italian scribe Giovanni da Gaibana of Padua at this time. The figure style in the Bible is clear evidence of the impact of Byzantine art on Paduan and Venetian manuscript painting from about 1260 through the end of the century. The initial fields are articulated with finely wrought vegetal designs and other motifs painted in white, and the running titles, penwork initials, and chapter numbers in red and blue are executed on fields of often extraordinarily intricate calligraphic pen flourishes that assume the form of stylized vegetation. The Vulgate Bible with prologues contains the Hebraic version of the Psalter and the Interpretation of Hebrew Names up to those beginning with the letter N (fols. 347-370v). The Gospels of Luke and John are bound after the Catholic Epistles.

Notes

• Several initials have been excised
   
• Edges of the book have been trimmed; right edge of fol. 1r trimmed approx. 18 mm from text block
   

Extent

I+370+i; 158 x 113 mm bound to 168 x 123 mm

Foliation

Modern foliation in pencil, upper right recto

Collation

1 (14), 2 (12), 3 (11, +1), 4 (9, +7), 5-8 (12), 9 (14, -4 -9 -12), 10-12 (12), 13 (12, -3), 14 (12), 15 (2), 16 (10), 17 (12), 18 (12, -12), 19-20 (14), 21 (8), 22 (12)

Support

Parchment

Binding

Nineteenth-century Italian goatskin binding with gold-stamped and lettered spine, inscribed: "BIBLIA SAEC. XIII"

Layout

Two columns of fifty-four lines, ruled in lead; written area: 120 x 78 mm

Decoration

Thirty-six historiated initials, seventeen decorated initials, flourished initials throughout, running titles in alternating red and blue ink throughout

Script

Gothic--rotunda

Libraria, littera bononiensis

Provenance

• William Morris of Kelmscott House, Hammersmith, England; sale, Sotheby's, London, December 5, 1898, lot 34; J. J. Leighton Co., London, 1920, cat. II (1921), no. 433; John Frederick Lewis, Philadelphia; given by his widow, Anne Baker Lewis, to the Free Library of Philadelphia in 1936
   

Related resources

• De Ricci, Seymour, with the assistance of W. J. Wilson, Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada, vol. 2 (New York,: H. W. Wilson, 1935-40), p. 2026, no. 8.
• Free Library of Philadelphia, A Descriptive Catalogue of the John Frederick Lewis Collection of European Manuscripts in the Free Library of Philadelphia, compiled by Edwin Wolf, 2nd, with an introduction by Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach (Philadelphia: The Library, 1937), p. 43, no. 36.
• Angela Daneu Lattanzi, "I Manoscritti e incunaboli miniati italiani della Biblioteca Bodleiana di Oxford nel catalogue di O. Pächt e J.J.G. Alexander" Bolletino d'Arte (1972), p. 47.
• Philadelphia Museum of Art, Leaves of Gold: Manuscript Illumination from Philadelphia Collections, edited by James R. Tanis (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2001), pp. 31-33, no. 4.
• New York, New York Public Library, The Splendor of the Word: Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts at the New York Public Library, edited by Jonathan J.G. Alexander, James H. Marrow, and Lucy Freeman Sandler (New York: New York Public Library and Harvey Miller Publishers, 2005), p. 71 n.12.

Keywords

• 13th century
• Italian
• Italy
• Bible
• Illustration
• Miniature
• Illumination
• Christian

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Free Library of Philadelphia Lewis E 36: Bible are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

  http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

• Text

  To the extent possible under law, Free Library of Philadelphia, Special Collections has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this metadata about Free Library of Philadelphia Lewis E 36: Bible. This work is published from: United States. For a summary of CC0, see https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/. Legal code: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode.

  URL

  https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode

Table of contents

• fol. 1r — Bible, in usual order with Prologues; incipit: Frater ambrosius m[ichi] tua munuscula perferens detulit … [fol. 1r]; explicit: … gratia Domini nostri Iesu Christi cum omnibus. [fol. 346v]
• fol. 347r — Interpretations of Hebrew Names, beginning and ending incompletely with "Ahebreo" to "Nabuchadonosor"; incipit: Ahebreo i[n] latino d[icitu]r app[re]he[n]de[n]s [ve]l app[re]hensio... [fol. 347r]; explicit: Nabuchodonosor sede[n]s in augustia ag[ni]ta [ve]l cessio in agnitio[n]e augustie sive p[ro]ph[et]ans (?) istius ox …(ends imperfectly) [fol. 370v]

Decorations

• fol. 1r — Historiated initial P, Saint Jerome and an attendant
• fol. 1r — Marginal drawing, bird
• fol. 3r — Historiated initial I, Six Days of Creation
• fol. 3r — Marginal drawing, bird
• fol. 7r — Manicule
• fol. 16r — Manicule
• fol. 26r — Manicule
• fol. 28r — Historiated initial U , God speaks to Moses
• fol. 33r — Manicule
• fol. 33v — Manicule
• fol. 36r — Manicule
• fol. 49v — Manicule
• fol. 61r — Historiated initial P, Death of Joshua
• fol. 68r — Historiated initial I, Ruth, Boaz, and their son
• fol. 68r — Marginal drawing, dragon
• fol. 69v — Illuminated initial P, excised
• fol. 79v — Historiated initial F, Death of Saul
• fol. 106v — Historiated initial A, Seated Scribe
• fol. 115r — Historiated initial C, Solomon Communicating with God
• fol. 126r — Historiated initial I, Cyrus the Great and the Building of the Temple of Zerubbabel
• fol. 129r — Historiated initial V, Seated Scribe
• fol. 133r — Decorated initial E
• fol. 137v — Historiated initial T, Tobit with the Murdered Jew (?)
• fol. 140v — Historiated initial A; Judith slaying Holofernes
• fol. 147v — Historiated initial V, Job Mocked by his Friends
• fol. 155r — Historiated initial B, excised
• fol. 157v — Historiated initial D, King David (?)
• fol. 159r — Historiated initial D, King David (?)
• fol. 162v — Historiated initial S, Blessing Christ with David or Jonah in Water
• fol. 164v — Historiated initial E, excised
• fol. 168v — Historiated initial C, Three tonsured monks reading at lectern
• fol. 173v — Historiated initial P, Solomon speaking to Rehoboam (?)
• fol. 179v — Historiated initial V, Ecclesiastes Preaching
• fol. 182r — Historiated initial O, Nimbed Male Figure speaking to a Woman
• fol. 183r — Historiated initial D, Solomon enthroned
• fol. 184v — Manicule
• fol. 187v — Historiated initial O; Jesus, son of Sirach, or Solomon, with a Boy
• fol. 200r — Historiated initial E, Mattathias Slaying a Jew
• fol. 214r — Illuminated initial H
• fol. 222v — Manicule
• fol. 228r — Illuminated initial D
• fol. 228r — Illuminated initial D
• fol. 228r — Historiated initial A, excised
• fol. 234v — Historiated initial V, Hosea with Gomer and Three Children
• fol. 234v — Illuminated initial N
• fol. 234v — Illuminated initial D
• fol. 236v — Historiated initial V, Joel Preaching
• fol. 237v — Historiated initial V, Amos
• fol. 239r — Historiated initial V, Calling of Obadiah
• fol. 239v — Historiated initial E, Jonah and the Whale
• fol. 241v — Historiated initial O, Nahum Preaching (?)
• fol. 244r — Historiated initial O, excised
• fol. 245r — Historiated initial V, excised
• fol. 246v — Manicule
• fol. 255v — Manicule
• fol. 258r — Manicule
• fol. 258v — Historiated initial V, excised
• fol. 259v — Manicule
• fol. 266v — Manicule
• fol. 274v — Historiated initial Q, Jeremiah
• fol. 276r — Illuminated initial E
• fol. 281r — Historiated initial L, excised
• fol. 289r — Inhabited initial I, Anthropomorphic Lion
• fol. 289r — Drollery
• fol. 290v — Manicule
• fol. 294r — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 294r — Illuminated initial M
• fol. 297r — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 304v — Inhabited initial F, Anthropomorphic Bull
• fol. 313v — Historiated initial I, Saint John and the Eagle
• fol. 313v — Illuminated initial H
• fol. 320r — Historiated initial P, Saint Paul
• fol. 323v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 327r — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 329v — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 330v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 331v — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 332r — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 332v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 333v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 334r — Historiated initial P, Saint Paul
• fol. 335v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 336r — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 336v — Illuminated initial P
• fol. 339v — Historiated initial I, excised
• fol. 340r — Historiated initial P, excised
• fol. 341r — Illuminated initial S
• fol. 342r — Historiated initial Q, excised
• fol. 342v — Historiated initial S, Saint John