General illustration: | The manuscript opens with a large frontispiece with a quadripartite miniature which covers the width of two columns (height: 49 lines). The two upper miniatures represent dancing at a courtly feast. The limage in the lower left shows four noblemen and two nuns. The image at the right depicts a knighting ceremony (of Galahad?). The miniature is framed in a window of blue, red and goldleaf. The justification of the page is bordered with a frame of blue and scarlet bars, decorated with goldleaf and white flourishings. The outer frame is vine (red and goldleaf) with blue and red flowers, gold balls and acanthus (blue, red, yellow). The text is introduced with a decorated initial (height: 6 lines).
Large single-column miniatures (height: 18 lines) further illustrate the text. Eye-catching features are the bright pastel colouring, the depiction of buildings suggesting perspective and cityscapes in the backgrounds. The miniatures are framed in fine, goldleaf borders.
|
General decoration: | Main divisions of the text (genre: 'Or dist li contes') are marked with wide, decorated initials (height: 6 lines), painted on a field of goldleaf , coloured blue and pink with white flourishings, the eye decorated with tendrils and floral patterns. Borders of ivy and thistle in blue, red and goldleaf and decorated with flowers and gold balls usually spring from these initials.
The text is further subdivided by champ initials (height: 3 lines), goldleaf on a field of blue alternating with red.The eye of the letters is painted in the contrasting colour. Both the coloured field and the eye are decorated with white flourishings.
Other decorative features include line-filling devices, consisting of blue and red bars, decorated with white flourishings and goldleaf.
No rubricated tituli, nor further highlighting of letters with dashes of red ink in the text.
|
Evidence of readership: | f. 12v: addition in the lower margin of a portion of text which was not originally copied (19th. c?); also 20r; 42r; f. 45r ( a piece of parchment has been pasted over the back of a miniature replacing the original text. Miniature cut and replaced); also f. 52. F. 105; f. 106; 112; 117; 120; 123 (x2); 138; In some cases, broad messy border of goldleaf applied to hide the edges of the cutting.; 58r, added text; 70r.; 109r; 146; 150; 154; 156; 157: when the miniature on 158 was cut, it also cut the preceding folio. The original text has been repasted. The miniature on f. 158 has been replaced by a modern (19th c?) imitation.; 164;
f. 163r: Ex-libris of Nicolas Moreau. 'Des liures de Nicolas Moreau / Sn Dauteuil General de france / a Paris Morreau //'
|
Foliations description: | Modern foliation in arabic numerals in the upper right corner of the recto. |
|