Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts

Psalter-Hours of Guiluys de Boisleux
France, Arras, after 1246
MS M.730 fol. 11v

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1) Virgin Mary: Annunciation -- Archangel Gabriel, nimbed, with right hand raised, approaches Virgin Mary, nimbed, veiled, with right hand raised and book in left hand; both flank vase of three lilies.
2) Virgin Mary: Visitation -- Virgin Mary, with right hand raised, and Elizabeth, holding book, both nimbed, veiled, embrace.
3) Christ: Nativity -- Virgin Mary, nimbed, veiled, with her head resting on her raised right hand, reclines on draped bed before Joseph the Carpenter, nimbed, wearing hat, with his head resting on right hand. He looks toward swaddled Christ Child, cross-nimbed, lying in architectural manger with lamp hanging beneath its trefoil arch, before ass and ox (only foreparts visible).
4) Shepherds: Annunciation -- Nimbed angel emerges from clouds, with left hand indicating the Nativity (in preceding panel) and right hand raised toward two shepherds, one with pedum in left hand, and the other wearing hooded garment, both with right hands raised, beside dog and flock on hillock.
Scenes 1 and 4 with gold diapered and punched backgrounds, and scenes 2 and 3 with blue backgrounds, within decorated frames.