A well-preserved leaf from the Choir books of San Domenico, Bologna, one of the most ambitious projects of early Trecento illumination.
 
535 × 375 mm, single parchment leaf from a Gradual, contemporary foliation “cxix” in red ink at upper margin, ruled in plummet for four staves with four-line musical notation, text below staves in a large Gothic rotunda script in dark brown ink, rubrics in red, ONE HISTORIATED INITIAL ‘D’ in white with ornamental modeling on a blue ground with white penwork decoration, enclosing a bust-length depiction of Saint John the Baptist with halo, long hair, and beard, holding a book and raising his hand in blessing, the initial extending into the margin with scrolling acanthus decoration in blue, red, and green. Some cockling and natural discoloration to parchment, horizontal and vertical folds from later storage, small marginal repairs and adhesive remnants, slight abrasion and losses to the illuminated initial, else in good condition with bright pigments and legible text and music.
 
The present leaf was once part of an important series of Choirbooks produced for the Dominican convent of San Domenico in Bologna, one of the most ambitious projects of Italian manuscript illumination of the early fourteenth century. First reconstructed by Venturino Alce (1961) and expanded through the discoveries of Giordana Mariani Canova (1979) and later scholarship, the dispersed leaves have been identified through their distinctive format, decorative program, textual sequence, and musical layout. Leaves from the Gradual volumes, including the present example, are characterized by four large staves per page (c. 48–50 mm high), monumental Gothic rotunda script, and a consistent system of historiated initials executed by a coordinated group of Bolognese illuminators.
 
This leaf, preserving the Introit De ventre matris meae for the Nativity of St John the Baptist (24 June), belongs to a group of five Gradual leaves attributed to the anonymous artist known as Decorator B of San Domenico, whose participation demonstrates the collaborative organization of the Dominican scriptorium. The large initial D introduces the chant with a bust-length image of Saint John the Baptist, set within a blue ground and framed by elegant acanthus ornament. Although working within the broader artistic environment dominated by the Seneca Master (First Master of San Domenico), Decorator B represents a distinct hand within the workshop, contributing to the later phases of the project alongside other illuminators who gradually introduced more naturalistic, Giottesque tendencies into Bolognese illumination.
 
The San Domenico Choirbooks were produced between c. 1307 and 1324–26, a chronology established through the inclusion of Dominican feasts such as Saint Alexius, Saint Thomas Aquinas, and Corpus Christi. Created within the highly organized Dominican book production system of Bologna, the series reflects close collaboration between scribes and painters, with marginal instructions surviving on related leaves. The present fragment is therefore an important relic of one of the great communal artistic enterprises of Trecento Bologna and of the evolving transition from Byzantine-influenced manuscript traditions toward the expressive naturalism of early Italian painting.
 
Provenance
(1) Parent manuscript created for the Dominican Convent of San Domenico, Bologna.
 
(2) Richard Offner (1889–1965), New York. One of the foremost scholars of early Italian painting, especially the Florentine Trecento and Quattrocento. His major work was the monumental A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, begun in the 1930s, which attempted to catalogue and attribute the entire field of early Florentine painting.
 
(3) Private Collection, Switzerland.
 
(4) Jörn Günther, Hamburg c. 2008.
 
(5) Robert McCarthy, London, MS BM 2312.
 
Parent manuscript and sister leaves
The present leaf belongs to the magnificent series of liturgical Choirbooks produced for the Dominican convent of San Domenico in Bologna in the early fourteenth century, one of the most important manuscript illumination projects of medieval Italy. The volumes are recorded in the inventories of the celebrated Dominican library as early as 1380 and again in 1477; many remain in situ at San Domenico, while others are preserved today in the Museo Civico Medievale, Bologna. The present leaf has been identified as originating from Corale 24-II (originally f. 149), a Gradual containing the Proper of Saints from the Feast of St Barnabas (11 June) through the Vigil of the Feast of St Dominic (7 August). Its text, the Introit De ventre matris meae for the Nativity of St John the Baptist (24 June), corresponds precisely to this section of the liturgical cycle.
 
LITERATURE
Published: Gaudenz Freuler, Italian Miniatures from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Centuries, Milan, 2013; Gaudenz Freuler with Georgi Parpulov, The McCarthy Collection, Vol I: Italian and Byzantine Miniatures, London, 2018, 99–105, no. 24; Related literature: Venturino Alce and Alfonso D’Amato, La Biblioteca di San Domenico in Bologna, Florence, 1961; Giordana Mariani Canova, Miniature della Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, 1978; Giordana Mariani Canova, “Nuovi contributi alla serie liturgica degli Antifonari di S. Domenico in Bologna,” in La miniatura italiana tra Gotico e Rinascimento: Atti del II Congresso di Storia della Miniatura Italiana, ed. Emanuela Sesti, Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1979; Massimo Medica, “Maestro del Seneca,” in Dizionario biografico dei miniatori italiani: Secoli IX–XVI, ed. Milvia Bollati, Milan, 2004, pp. 514–15; Elena D’Agostino and Laura Alunni, I corali di San Domenico a Bologna, Bologna, 2005.
 
We are grateful to Peter Kidd for permission to quote from his catalogue for this entry, and we thank Senior Consultant Sandra Hindman and Peter Bovenmyer for their assistance in preparing this sale.
 
The Robert McCarthy Collection.