Beschreibung:

HORAE, use of Paris (Latin and French). Ces presentes heures a lusaige de Paris... [ with :] Commendationes defunctorum. Paris: veuve de Thielman Kerver, 19 June 1525. 2 parts in one, 4to in 8s, 217 x 145 mm. (8 9/16 x 5 3/4 in.), brown morocco, covers blind-panelled with a floral roll-tool, spine in six compartments, two gilt-lettered, the remainder stamped in blind with large floral tool, crimson morocco liners richly gilt to a sixteenth-century interlocking strapwork and arabesque decor with sprays of leafy stems and gilt-hatched floral tools, edges marbled and gilt, bound by HARDY, finished by MARIUS-MICHEL- slight rubbing to extremities, two small scratches to upper cover, extensive marginal repairs, affecting a few edges of metalcut borders, supplied in skillful ink facsimile, fol. C6 possibly supplied from another copy, H8 and N2 with internal repairs similarly touched up in ink facsimile, small pinhole through most fore-margins, washed and pressed . Collation: A-R8 aa8. 144 leaves. Gothic type, title, initials, headings and text within borders printed in red, bâtarde type, Kerver's metalcut unicorn device (Renouard 501) on title and R8r, alamanach for 1525-38 on A1r, 59 large metalcuts, including Anatomical Man and 12 medallion cuts in the Calendar showing the twelve ages of man (the first of two sets used by Kerver veuve), 37 small cuts, the large cuts with French verse captions, printed within elaborate architectural borders, text printed within historiated and ornamental metalcut borders composed of multiple strips and blocks. Bohatta 324; Brunet V, 1624, no. 198; Lacombe 347; (cf. Mortimer 302 for a discussion of the illustrations). One of the innnovations of the sixteenth-century Horae printers was the use of new cuts for the Calendar, the Hours of the Cross, Hours of the Holy Ghost, Penitential Psalms, and Office of the Dead (cf. Harvard Mortimer French II, p. 365 for a list of subjects). This edition contains Kerver's last series of cuts, in which he redesigned his traditional illustrations to suit the style of the new series, characterized by thick outlines and heavy shading. Rare. Provenance : (Purchased by H. Burton in Paris, unnamed sale, Giraud-Badin expert , 3-4 May 1937, lot 31).