BIBERMÜHLE COLLECTION.

Horae B.M.V. 158 Stundenbuchdrucke der Sammlung Bibermühle 1490-1550. Graphik, Illumination und Einbandkunst in Frankreich um 1500.

      Antiquariat Bibermühle AG, Ramsen. 2003. 3 Vols., oblong folio, 1348pp., over 1000 coloured illustrs., orig. decorated cloth, slip-case. The Bibermühle collection consists of 150 Books of Hours printed between 1490 and 1550 in France, forming, to the best of our knowledge, the most important collection of this type of book in private hands assembled within the last 300 years. It comprises 28 incunables, 112 vellum copies and 52 illuminated ones; many of them still being in their first or early bindings. Provenances are as wide-ranging as Anne de Beaujeu, Ruler of France on one side and the Duke of Bourbon-Parma on the other, with nearly every important collection of the 19th and 20th centuries fairly represented. The new catalogue Horae B.M.V. gives a comprehensive survey of this collection and the once so popular printed Books of ours in general, focusing on illumination, illumination and bindings. Introductory essays on printers, artists and publishers throw light upon the evolution of pictures, border-cycles and decorations. For the first time the numerous illustrations and border cycles have been classified and ascribed to different Parisian artists and workshops. Each entry with detailed bibliographical information, collation, full colophons etc. About 1000 coloured illustrations, most of them in original size, and full indices and references complete the thorough descriptions to form the most comprehensive study of these popular but as yet poorly documented books.