[CRUCIFIXION, FROM A MISSAL]

[CRUCIFIXION, FROM A MISSAL]
Leaf with a miniature from the Canon of the Mass in a Missal, illuminated manuscript on vellum
[probably Flanders
early 16th century]
This image appears to have been taken by our artist from either a copy of Ludolph of Saxony's Vita Jesus Christi, printed in Paris by Berthold Rembolt at some point in the first decade of the sixteenth century (see British Museum, 1895,1031.894), a Missal printed by an unknown printer in the first three decades of the same century (the Crucifixion miniature surviving in British Museum, 1909,1020.5), or an untraced ancestor or descendent of those images. The figure of the Virgin Mary turns to the left, following prints by Schoengauer, but with downward pointing hands clasped together in prayer; while that of St. John has been adapted to give him a downward pointing head, again a feature of some of Schoengauer's work, and with the book he usually holds removed. Our artist kept the detailed cityscape in the background of the image, but removed much of the detail in the foreground. The large cross in the bas-de-page, surrounded by sprays of rosehips, was a common inclusion in Missals, allowing the officiating priest to kiss this during Mass, rather than the Crucifixion miniature, preventing damage to the devotional scene above
Single large leaf with a detailed scene of the Crucifixion on its verso, sketched in fine parallel lines first (and most probably copying this technique from an early print: see below), and then coloured, all within a thin gold frame and with sprays of foliage with rosehip buds in the outer (lefthand) and lower margins, with a large blank vellum Cross in lower margin on a yellow ground, the whole leaf laid down on modern card, slightly trimmed at edges, scuffs and abrasions in places, fair condition, 382 by 270mm