GRADUEL Gradual-Sacramentary-Lectionary of the Abbey of St-Victor of Paris. Illuminated manuscript on vellum.

Made in Paris in the second quarter of the 13^th century, during the reign of St. Louis IX, for the use of the Abbey of Saint-Victor – one of the era’s main centres of intellectual life. This large Parisian liturgical book contains a two-part miniature, three historiated initials, thousands of large, filagree initials, and 18 pages of musical notation.

The present codex is a compilation of liturgical texts, including a Gradual, a Sacramentary, and a Lectionary of the Mass – comprising a type of precursor to the Missal (Lebigue, Jean-Baptiste, Initiation aux manuscrits liturgiques, 2007, p. 145). The Gradual includes the chants for the Mass, here without musical notation. The Sacramentary gathers all the texts required for the clerical celebrant to perform the Mass (Lebigue 2007, p. 119). The Lectionary presents the Epistles and Gospels for the Mass (Lebigue 2007, p. 132. The book furthermore includes 18 pages of music in rhythmic modal notation, developed by the Notre Dame school and predominant until the mid-13^th century when mensural notation took over in popularity. 

The manuscript was written by a single scribe who must have been of Germanic origin based on particular spellings (Ewangelium, Chlodowaldi, Wilhelmi…) and his script dates the book to the first half of the 13^th century. The presence of St. Francis of Assisi (canonized in 1228) serves as a date post quem for the creation of the book and the later addition of St. Louis IX of France (canonized in 1297) in the calendar (f. 91v) serves as a date ante quem.

Text

ff. 1-7v                   Recommendation of the Soul and Office of the Dead

ff. 8-18v                 Gradual

ff. 8-16v                 Temporal

ff. 17-18v               Sanctoral, stopping abruptly at the holy Process and Martinian (2. VII) due to the loss of two leaves between folios 18 and 19

ff. 19-89v               Sacramentary

ff. 19-47v               Temporal

ff. 47v-49v             Votives

ff. 49v-75v            Sanctoral, beginning with 31 Dec. St. Sylvester, and including the feast of St. Genovefe (Genevieve; 3 Jan; f. 49v) as well as the translation of her relics in Paris on 28 Oct. (f. 71v), ending on 21 Dec. with the Feast of St. Thomas Apostle (f. 75v).

ff. 75v-89v             Common, beginning with prayers “In Vigilia Uni⁹ apostoli,” including the music for the (P)er Omnia (f. 86-86v); missing two folios between ff. 77v-78

ff. 90-92v               Calendar, including St. Genovefe (f. 90)

ff. 93-94v               Genealogies of Christ according to Saint Matthew and Saint Luke, set to music; 1 leaf removed between ff. 94v-95, possibly a blank

ff. 95-262v             Lectionary of the Mass comprising the Epistles and the Gospels

ff. 95-226v             Temporal, beginning with the First Sunday of Advent and ending with the Sunday before the Advent of Christ

ff. 227-244             Sanctoral, beginning with “In vigilia sancti Andree” (29 Nov.); including St. Genovefe (f. 228v; 3 Jan.), and ends with St. Edmund (20 Nov.)

ff. 244-262v           Common, beginning with “In Vigilia uni⁹ apl’i epl’a”and ending with “De Scō Fiacro ep”.

 Illumination

The artists of the illuminations and the filigree letters use the vocabulary of Parisian illuminators from around 1240, with gold grounds, alternating blue and red frames around the miniatures, and heavy outlines to the figures. The book’s main illumination is centred on the beginning of the canon of the Mass (f. 86 v) with a miniature in two registers: Christ in Majesty at top, and the Crucifixion at bottom. It is placed opposite the three major texts of the canon: the Per Omnium, the Vere Dignum, and the Te igitur –themselves decorated with three large historiated initials (f. 87). The iconography for the miniature and the initials is consistent with other books of this type from the period.

 Miniatures

f. 86v      Christ in majesty (top); Crucifixion (bottom) – 20 lines

f. 87        1. Elevation of the host in an historiated initial P – (P)er omnium – 7 lines – a priest elevating the host, behind whom a servant waves a flabellum (a liturgical fan intended to chase away flies).

2. Ecclesia and Synagogue in an historiated initial VD – (V)ere (D)ignum – 6 lines – on either side of the rising pole of the VD monogram, we find the triumphant Ecclesia crowned and holding a chalice, while Synagogue deposed of her crown, holds the tablets of the law of Moses and at the top centre of the composition, the Lamb of God is painted in a medallion.

3. Moses and the Brazen Serpent in an historiated initial T (T)e igitur – 9 lines – The form of the T offers the iconographical column topped by the bronze serpent that God had charged Moses to make. The Te igitur, the most solemn moment of the Mass, is the prayer of the Eucharist, which transforms the bread and wine of the Mass into the body and blood of Christ. This typological image announces the salvation of Christ in the New Testament (Numbers 21:8-9).

Provenance

1.                   Paris, Made for the Abbey of the Augustinian canons of Saint-Victor

2.                   Paris, Trinitarians of Paris, also known as the Mathurins, 14^th century? (before 1514 at the latest)

3.                   Paris, Rieunier & Associés, 14 Dec. 2011

4.                   Paris, Camille Sourget, sold, March 2018

1.                   Europe, private collection.

The text shows indisputably that the manuscript was executed for the famous Parisian abbey of the Augustinian canons of Saint-Victor. 17 June marks the abbey’s essential feast: Susceptio reliquiarum sancti Victoris (ff. 91) and on 21 July the same Saint Victor enjoys a solemn octave where he is described as beatissimus. (The two other specific feasts of June 5 (dedication of the abbey) and 23 July (Susceptio pedis sancti Victoris) do not appear in the text, so we must conclude that it predates these two festivities). He is also celebrated in other areas of the text (ff. 50v, 59v, 91v).

The Abbey of Saint-Victor, in Paris, is one of the city’s most famous abbeys, whose location is today represented in large part by the quadrilateral occupied by the University of Jussieu between the Seine and the streets of Fossés-Saint-Bernard, Jussieu, and Cuvier.

Under the reign of St. Louis and when this manuscript was produced, the Saint-Victor abbey had become one of the most important centres of intellectual life in the medieval West, especially in the fields of theology and philosophy. Saint-Victor became a popular retreat for Benard of Clairvaux and Thomas Becket (1118-1170) and the bishops of Paris had an apartment there.

The abbey’s rich library was open to the public, with a reading room where the manuscripts were chained. The liturgical manuscripts, such as the book at hand, were kept in the choir. The teaching activity of the abbey encouraged the development of the library’s collection. Richly endowed, the abbey could purchase its manuscripts: the scriptorium does not seem to have been very developed. Legacies also greatly enriched the collection. In addition, documents found at the death of a Victorine (sermons for example) were bound and passed into the library. Throughout the Middle Ages, the abbey retained its fame, with its austere rule and its flourishing studies. It kept its scientific reputation until the Revolution, after which it was suppressed and destroyed (1790).

In the 14^th century, the manuscript came into use by the Trinitarians of Paris, a mendicant order better known as the Mathurins, as evidenced by the addition of the Mass of Saint Mathurin at the end of the sanctoral of the sacramentary and the addition to the calendar of a note thus conceived on July 14 (f. 91v): Obitus Egydii de Campis qui dedit fratibus sancti Maturini centum solidos annualis census. The Convent of the Mathurins of Paris was in the Latin Quarter from the beginning of the 13^th century to 1790.[3] The Mathurins were not geographically far from the Abbey of St. Victor and indeed came into possession of other manuscripts originally made for the Abbey (Franck Collard, “La bibliothèque de Saint-Victor au service des rénovateurs de l’histoire de France vers 1500 ? Nicole Gilles, Robert Gaguin et Paul Émile face aux ressources victorines.” Cahiers de recherches Médiévales: Journal of medieval studies 17 (2009), section 16-18, URL: https://journals.openedition.org/crm/11524).

 Literature

Unpublished.

Further reading:

Bermès, Emmanuelle, “Le couvent des Mathurins de Paris et l’estampe au XVIIe siècle.” Thesis, École des chartes, 2001. URL: http://theses.enc.sorbonne.fr/2001/bermes.

Collard, Franck. “La bibliothèque de Saint-Victor au service des rénovateurs de l’histoire de France vers 1500? Nicole Gilles, Robert Gaguin et Paul Émile face aux ressources victorines.” Cahiers de recherches Médiévales: Journal of medieval studies 17 (2009), pp. 227-40. URL: https://journals.openedition.org/crm/11524.

Lebigue, Jean-Baptiste. Initiation aux manuscrits liturgiques. École thématique. Ateliers du Cycle thématique de l’IRHT de l’année 2003-2004, directed by Oliver Legendre and Jean-Baptiste Lebigue. 2007. URL: http://aedilis.irht.cnrs.fr/liturgie/.