![SENECA, Epistolae morales, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Italy, perhaps Rome, c.1470]](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_18152_0457_001(seneca_epistolae_morales_in_latin_illuminated_manuscript_on_vellum_ita060019).jpg?w=1)
![SENECA, Epistolae morales, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Italy, perhaps Rome, c.1470]](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_18152_0457_000(seneca_epistolae_morales_in_latin_illuminated_manuscript_on_vellum_ita060010).jpg?w=1)
Details
SENECA, Epistolae morales, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [Italy, perhaps Rome, c.1470]
Very unusual and elegant Humanistic script and decoration on a pristine leaf of a Classical text by Seneca the Younger, Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist and satirist of the Silver Age of Roman literature.
A single leaf, c.290×205mm, ruled in plummet for 28 lines written above top line in a very fine Humanistic bookhand with calligraphic features such as the long tail of the letter ‘Q’, ruled space c.210×125mm, the number ‘113’ in the margin, and illuminated with an elegant three-line illuminated initial on a field of white-vine ornament with pale yellow wash on panels of red and green backgrounds with marginal extensions, the fore-edge of the recto with the offset of the initial to Epistola 112 in a different style (cf. the illustration in Quaritch cat. 1088 [1988], no 89). Bound in grey buckram by Bøthuns Bokverksted, Tønsberg, Norway, 2018.
Provenance:
(1) Bernard Quaritch, Bookhands V, cat. 1147 (1991), no 116 (‘in perfect condition’), citing another leaf from the same manuscript: Catalogue 1088 (1988), no 89; a third was in their Catalogue 1270 (2000), no 122.
(2) Schøyen Collection, MS 647.
Text:
Seneca (c.4 B.C. - 65 A.D.), wrote his 'Moral Epistles' as a series of 124 letters addressed to the otherwise undocumented Lucilius, the then procurator of Sicily. The present leaf is from Epistolae morales ad Lucilium, 112.3–113.9 (‘Non dico illum […] multa quia ex’), ending with vertical catchwords ‘Quia ex uno’, and the start of Epistola 113 with a rubric (its last word in Rustic Capitals), in which he deals with reforming hardened sinners and the vitality of the soul and its attributes.
Script:
In the early 15th century Italian Humanists looked back to 12th-century (Carolingian minuscule) manuscripts as models for a reform of handwriting. In addition to the overall aspect of the lettering (using well-spaced round forms instead of tightly-packed angular shapes), the present leaf displays several other features copied from their models such as the writing above top line, the absence of the tironian ‘et’, the use of the ampersand in place of ‘et’ within words (e.g. ‘deb&’, ‘opport&’), and the e-caudata (‘e’) to represent the ‘æ’ ligature. The main distinctive features of this particular – and peculiar, see below – script are the sharp sloping serifs at the tops of ascenders (‘b’, ‘d’, ‘l’, etc.) and bottoms of descenders (‘p’, ‘q’), the way the top of the tall ‘s’ reaches over to the right, and the elegant majuscule letters, especially the epigraphic ‘Q’ with a long tail. The vertical catchword is, however, a distinctively humanistic feature.
Two leaves from the collection of Neil F. Phillips were sold at Sotheby’s, 2 December 1997, lot 67, where the present leaf is cited, and it was suggested that they might be from southern Germany or even England, because the vellum appears to be northern, not Italian, and ‘the very careful slowly-written rather consciously classical script looks like those written by the early humanists in England and elsewhere far from Italy’. We might add that the ruling is in plummet, rather than the blind-ruling that we would expect of a humanistic book made in Italy; the shape of the gold ‘D’ does not have the proportions we would expect of an Italian manuscript; and the two types of initial are not typical of mainstream Italian illumination. We thank David Rundle for the suggestion that it may have been written by one of the many Germanic scribes active in Italy, particularly Rome.
Very unusual and elegant Humanistic script and decoration on a pristine leaf of a Classical text by Seneca the Younger, Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist and satirist of the Silver Age of Roman literature.
A single leaf, c.290×205mm, ruled in plummet for 28 lines written above top line in a very fine Humanistic bookhand with calligraphic features such as the long tail of the letter ‘Q’, ruled space c.210×125mm, the number ‘113’ in the margin, and illuminated with an elegant three-line illuminated initial on a field of white-vine ornament with pale yellow wash on panels of red and green backgrounds with marginal extensions, the fore-edge of the recto with the offset of the initial to Epistola 112 in a different style (cf. the illustration in Quaritch cat. 1088 [1988], no 89). Bound in grey buckram by Bøthuns Bokverksted, Tønsberg, Norway, 2018.
Provenance:
(1) Bernard Quaritch, Bookhands V, cat. 1147 (1991), no 116 (‘in perfect condition’), citing another leaf from the same manuscript: Catalogue 1088 (1988), no 89; a third was in their Catalogue 1270 (2000), no 122.
(2) Schøyen Collection, MS 647.
Text:
Seneca (c.4 B.C. - 65 A.D.), wrote his 'Moral Epistles' as a series of 124 letters addressed to the otherwise undocumented Lucilius, the then procurator of Sicily. The present leaf is from Epistolae morales ad Lucilium, 112.3–113.9 (‘Non dico illum […] multa quia ex’), ending with vertical catchwords ‘Quia ex uno’, and the start of Epistola 113 with a rubric (its last word in Rustic Capitals), in which he deals with reforming hardened sinners and the vitality of the soul and its attributes.
Script:
In the early 15th century Italian Humanists looked back to 12th-century (Carolingian minuscule) manuscripts as models for a reform of handwriting. In addition to the overall aspect of the lettering (using well-spaced round forms instead of tightly-packed angular shapes), the present leaf displays several other features copied from their models such as the writing above top line, the absence of the tironian ‘et’, the use of the ampersand in place of ‘et’ within words (e.g. ‘deb&’, ‘opport&’), and the e-caudata (‘e’) to represent the ‘æ’ ligature. The main distinctive features of this particular – and peculiar, see below – script are the sharp sloping serifs at the tops of ascenders (‘b’, ‘d’, ‘l’, etc.) and bottoms of descenders (‘p’, ‘q’), the way the top of the tall ‘s’ reaches over to the right, and the elegant majuscule letters, especially the epigraphic ‘Q’ with a long tail. The vertical catchword is, however, a distinctively humanistic feature.
Two leaves from the collection of Neil F. Phillips were sold at Sotheby’s, 2 December 1997, lot 67, where the present leaf is cited, and it was suggested that they might be from southern Germany or even England, because the vellum appears to be northern, not Italian, and ‘the very careful slowly-written rather consciously classical script looks like those written by the early humanists in England and elsewhere far from Italy’. We might add that the ruling is in plummet, rather than the blind-ruling that we would expect of a humanistic book made in Italy; the shape of the gold ‘D’ does not have the proportions we would expect of an Italian manuscript; and the two types of initial are not typical of mainstream Italian illumination. We thank David Rundle for the suggestion that it may have been written by one of the many Germanic scribes active in Italy, particularly Rome.
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