Gospel book (MS M.860).
Previously in brown calf with two 18th-century Dutch silver clasps with the Agnus Dei; rebound in 20th-century full red velvet, clasps removed.
Purchased with the assistance of the Fellows, 1952.
206 leaves (1 column, 22 lines), bound : vellum, ill. ; 293 x 229 mm
Executed at the monastery of St. Martin at Tours between 857 and 862; Lucien Delamarre; his sale (Paris, Théophile Belin, 8 May 1909, lot 1) to Henry Yates Thompson through Sotheby's; purchased by A. Chester Beatty (his W ms. 8 [alternatively W ms. 3; 109]) in 1919 through Quaritch, £1,775; purchased through Maggs from Mrs. Edith Beatty with the assistance of the Fellows in 1952.
Ms. Gospel book; written and illuminated in Tours, France, in the monastery of St. Martin, between 857 and 862.
Written mainly in Carolingian minuscules, with Roman capitals, rustic capitals, uncial and half-uncial used as decorative and articulating devices.
Decoration: 6 decorated canon tables, 5 framed decorative title pages, 4 incipits with large illuminated initials, 7 smaller ornamental letters.