The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of September 29, 2023

Leaf from an Antiphonary with Historiated Initial (H) with The Nativity (recto) and Music (verso)

early 1300s

Part of a set. See all set records

Italy, Tuscany, 14th century

Ink, tempera, and gold on parchment

Sheet: 53 x 38 cm (20 7/8 x 14 15/16 in.)

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1953.285

Location

not on view

Description

This enormous initial h illustrates the beginning of the text of the first matins response for Christmas Day: Hodie nobis celorum rex (“On this day the King of Heaven”). The initial is appropriately decorated with a scene of Christ’s nativity. Along with other painters and illuminators, Neri da Rimini established the school of Rimini, characterized by a painting style owing much to the work of Giotto, who he perhaps encountered in Padua.

Exhibition history

Main Gallery Rotation (gallery 115): December 7, 2015 -

The Decorated Letter and the Illuminator's Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 25-December 19, 1993).

The Glory of the Painted Page: Manuscript Illuminations from the Permanent Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 6, 2010-April 17, 2011).

Italian Choral Books of the Renaissance (Manuscript Rotation) - Gallery 115. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 10, 2015-December 12, 2016).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1953.285