Psalter (Premonstratensian Use); Illuminated Manuscript On Parchment In Latin, With (added) Musical Notation -

CHARMING MEDIEVAL ILLUMINATED PSALTER WITH MUSICAL NOTATION. In Latin, illuminated manuscript on parchment, with (added) musical notation, Northwestern Germany, (diocese of Cologne), c. 1270-1280. Dimensions 103 x 75 mm, 170 folios, complete, written by three different scribes in a gothic bookhand, prickings visible, 2-line initials, twenty one 3- to 6 -line decorated initials, ONE ILLUMINATED INITIAL, 7-lines, opening the psalms, chants added in the margins in the 14th century with hufnagelschrift notation. BINDING: sixteenth-century calfskin over wooden boards, blind-tooled with a roll with heads in profile. TEXT: charming example of an illuminated liturgical Psalter, certainly owned by women in the 17th century, and perhaps made for Premonstratensian nuns. This small volume, still in a fine early binding, includes an initial of David playing his harp painted in an elegant style close to that of the Cologne illuminator Johannes von Valkenburg. PROVENANCE: Details of the script and penwork initials date the manuscript to around 1270-1280, and several Cologne feasts in the calendar suggest this was made for use in Cologne or for its diocese for a Premonstratensian foundation, either for a double monastery of canons and nuns, which were usually predominantly female, or for Premonstratensian nuns; Margarita Geissin (17th-century ownership inscription in a German hand); Anna Elisabet von Hahfelt (multiple 17th-century German ownership inscriptions); Leander van Ess (1772-1847), theologian, former monk of Marienmünster in Paderborn; Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), his manuscript number 494; bought at his sale, Sotheby's, May 23, 1913, lot 1019 by Sidney Young F.S.A. (1843-1914); his sale, Sotheby's, July 20, 1921, lot 929 (bought by 'Tyler'); Robert N. Green-Armytage (d. 1966; English lawyer); Sotheby's sales: July 8, 1957, lot 70, and, December 1,1998, lot 74. CONDITION: small tear in the outer margin of f. 173, occasional flaking of the pigment and gold of initials, thumbing, binding lacking clasps and catches, worn at joints, otherwise in overall excellent condition. Full description and images available. (TM 1020)