"Books of Hours receive their name from the core text known as the Hours of the Virgin, a series of prayers in honor of the Virgin Mary which are to be recited at each of the canonical hours of the day."
I was less impressed with the occasional illumination in this Copenhagen edition of the Hours of Sarum (ed. Anthoine Vérard, French printer. c. 1503) than I was with the large ornate woodcut border images on all 300-odd pages of this vellum manuscript. These are all border images displayed here.
- The Hours, completed for the English town of Sarum, is online at the Royal Library of Copenhagen.
- Mary Beth Winn's scholarly yet readable essay examines all aspects of the manuscript and her shorter review of Vérard's contributions to printing is also worth reading.
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