Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts

Hours of Claude Molé
France, Paris, ca. 1500
MS M.356 fol. 30v

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1) David and Bathsheba: Bathsheba bathing -- Facing left, Bathsheba, wearing necklace, nude, stands in hexagonal fountain, lowering her right hand to water spouting from lion mask on column surmounted by Eros (?) shooting with bow and arrow. Beneath arch of portico in background, David, crowned, wearing ermine-trimmed robe, leaning on balcony, and male attendant, both gaze at her. Scene in garden with buildings, represented with statues, some full-length and some as half figures, in background. Miniature at upper left: 2) David and Bathsheba: in Bed -- Bathsheba, wearing snood (?), and David, crowned, with his right arm bared, both, partly nude, lie in draped bed beneath canopy. Scene in bedroom with blind tracery on walls and tiled floor. Miniature at lower left: 3) Uriah the Hittite: Death -- Joab, wearing helmet and armor, mounted on bridled brown horse, with lance in right hand pierces breast of Uriah the Hittite, wearing helmet and armor, bleeding through breastplate, with right arm raised, collapsing from bridled white horse, all before group of soldiers, wearing helmets and armor, some brandishing swords, some carrying bannered lances, and some mounted on horses. Scene in hilly landscape with city in background. Miniatures within architectural frame of three columns, two enclosing vignettes, the upper under elliptical arch and the lower under ogee arch. Miniature facing page of Psalm 6 at beginning of Seven Penitential Psalms on fol. 31r.