A large Beneventan fragment, Italy C14th

Leaf from a Missal, for the Sanctoral, with the Mass for the Feast of the Apparition of St. Michael (8 May) and for the Feasts of SS. Gordian and Epimachus, in notably late Beneventan minuscule, in Latin, from very large decorated manuscript on vellum; Southern Italy, fourteenth century

Large fragment of a leaf, with double column with 19 lines of a large late Beneventan script, one line trimmed away at base, rubrics and initials in red, some capitals touched in yellow wash, reused as an account book wrapper with the date ‘1563’ on what was the spine of that later volume, some folds, stains and spots, trimmed at foot, overall fair and presentable condition, each leaf 320 x 300mm.: in cloth covered card binding

Provenance:
1. Quaritch cat. 1128, Bookhands of the Middle Ages: Beneventan Script, 1990, no. 25, bought en bloc with the entire catalogue by Dr Schøyen.
2. Schøyen Collection, London and Oslo, their MS 70.

Script:
In this leaf we see Beneventan script in its final evolutionary phase. It is not quite the end of its use in Italy, but clear deviations from the earlier forms begin to make themselves known in some abbreviations (a horizontal line rising at its right-hand side for ‘-tur’ instead of the local form in the shape of a ‘2’ and the standard for ‘eius’ instead of the local ‘ei’ ligature with a tiny cross stroke, a feature Lowe noted as “a standing feature of Beneventan MSS from the end of the 9th to the beginning of the 14th century”, for example), as well as the more Continental gothic initials.

Published:
V. Brown, ‘A Second New List of Beneventan Manuscripts (II)’, Mediaeval Studies, 50 (1988), p. 602, no. vii. Répertoire des catalogues de manuscrits en ecriture latine anterieurs a 1600, List no.
10, 1990, p. 8 no 42. BMB. Bibliografia dei manuscritti in scrittura beneventana, 1994