Monumental stenciled Choir book echoing the innovative technique of Jean-Denis Chandora at Notre-Dame.

172 paper leaves, with watermark initial ‘P’, paginated i–cccliv, [collation: i10, ii10, iii10, iv10, v10, vi10, vii10, viii10, ix10, x10, xi10, xii10, xiii10, xiv10, xv10, xvi10, xvii10+2], ruled in drypoint in single column of six staves (justification: 560 mm × 370 mm), stenciled in a Roman typeface with square notation on a five-line stave in red ink, capitals, running headers, and liturgical abbreviations in red, rubrics in red, enclosed by a variety of stenciled border types, primarily spindle, ring and dot, and rosettes, interior fields embellished by rosettes, and pinwheel fleurons in red and black. ORIGINAL CONTEMPORARY BINDING of brown leather over heavy wooden boards, blind-tooled with a rectangular frame of fillet and worn roll-stamped ornament, furnished with brass corner-pieces, a central boss, and protective studs, retaining traces of fore-edge clasps, spines with raised bands, the head and tail reinforced with later leather repairs, retaining a fragmentary paper spine label inscribed in red and black ink “MISSA / DOMINI/ SCE…”, partially detached textblock from spine at page xx, notable wear, molding, and staining to lower margins of leaves, some with guard repairs, ink smudged in a few areas, but decoration, notation, and text in good condition. Dimensions 635 mm × 465 mm.

Provenance
(1) Made almost certainly in the first quarter of the nineteenth century for a Parisian ecclesiastical institution, and executed in the style of Jean-Denis Chandora (1780–1844), cantor at Notre-Dame de Paris, who carried out numerous commissions for his own church as well as for other Parisian houses, including Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois, the Augustines of the Hôtel-Dieu, the Basilica of Saint-Denis, and the church of the Blancs-Manteaux.

(2) The Printing Museum, Houston, deaccessioned 2024.

(3) Private Collection, USA.

Text
pp. i–vi, First Sunday of Advent; pp. vii–xii, Second Sunday of Advent; pp. xii–xvii, Third Sunday of Advent; pp. xviii–xxii, Fourth Sunday of Advent; pp. xxiii–xxix, Second Sunday after Epiphany; pp. xxix–xxxiii, Third to Fifth Sundays after Epiphany; pp. xxxiv–xl, Septuagesima Sunday; pp. xl–xlvi, Sexagesima Sunday; pp. xlvi–liii, Quinquagesima Sunday; pp. liii–lx, Ash Wednesday; pp. lx–lxv, First Sunday of Lent; pp. lxv–lxxi, Second Sunday of Lent; pp. lxxi–lxxvii, Third Sunday of Lent; pp. lxxviii–lxxxiii, Fourth Sunday of Lent; pp. lxxxiv–xc, Passion Sunday; pp. xci–xcv, Low Sunday (Second Sunday of Easter); pp. xcvi–c, Second Sunday after Easter; pp. c–cvi, Third Sunday after Easter; pp. cvi–cxii, Fourth Sunday after Easter; pp. cxii–cxix, Fifth Sunday after Easter; pp. cxix–cxxv, Major Rogation Day; pp. cxxv–cxxx, Ascension Day; pp. cxxx–cxxxv, Sunday within the Octave of the Ascension; pp. cxxxvi–cxxxix, Vigil of Pentecost; pp. cxl–cli, Pentecost Sunday; pp. cli–cliv, Monday after Pentecost; pp. clv–clix, Tuesday after Pentecost; pp. clix–clxiii, Wednesday after Pentecost; pp. clxiii–clxv, Friday after Pentecost (Thursday as on the feast); pp. clxvi–clxx, Saturday after Pentecost; pp. clxx–clxxv, Trinity Sunday; pp. clxxvi–clxxxix, Feast of Corpus Christi; pp. clxxxix–cxciv, Sunday within the Octave of Corpus Christi; pp. cxciv–cc, Third Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cc–ccvi, Fourth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccvi–ccxi, Fifth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxii–ccxix, Sixth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxix–ccxxiv, Seventh Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxxiv–ccxxix, Eighth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxxix–ccxxxiv, Ninth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxxxv–ccxli, Tenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxli–ccxlvii, Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxlvii–ccliv, Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccliv–cclx, Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cclx–cclxiv, Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost (repeated); pp. cclxv–cclxx, Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cclxx–cclxxvii, Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cclxxvii–cclxxxiii, Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cclxxxiii–cclxxxix, Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cclxxxix–ccxcv, Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. ccxcvi–ccci, Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cccii–cccix, Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cccix–cccxiv, Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cccxiv–cccxix, Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost; pp. cccxix–cccxliv, Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost, with Sundays resumed after Epiphany using the chants of the Twenty-third Sunday.

A large-format lectern Gradual (Temporale) on paper, comprising the cycle from the First Sunday of Advent through the Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost. The volume was almost certainly produced as part of a larger, multi-volume liturgical set, as it omits the principal festal cycles of the year, including Christmas, Epiphany, Palm Sunday, the Triduum (Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday), and Easter, which were likely transmitted in a companion volume. Close structural parallels may be drawn with the Graduale de tempore prepared in 1789 by Louis-Pierre Piorette for Saint-Lazare, Paris (Archives historiques de l’Archevêché de Paris, Saint-Louis d’Antin, no. 1), part of a homogeneous five-volume set of Graduals and Antiphonals, in which the Temporale likewise extends from Advent to the Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, with the major festal cycles distributed separately. The present manuscript, however, appears somewhat later in date on account of its stencil technique and typographic character.

The stenciled letters can be recognized by the small breaks in the body of the letter (stencil-templates must avoid contiguous shapes that would cause them to fall apart). Stenciled manuscripts are curious hybrids. They are unique items, like handwritten manuscripts, but were produced with a mechanical aid, and in that sense are more like printed books. Stenciled liturgical books, many of the Choir Books with musical notation, often made in monastic settings, are known from the mid seventeenth century until the latter decades of the nineteenth century, and in some cases later. This practice probably began in France, and then spread around Catholic western and southern Europe, including the Low Countries (presently francophone Belgium), Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, and Portugal, and possibly even Mexico. One example has been identified in England. Numerous stenciled books were also produced in France (François, 2010; O’Meara, 1933). Gilles Filleau des Billettes composed an extensive account of the process for the “Description des Arts et Métiers” of the French Royal Academy of Science c. 1700. In his description he suggests the practice was created by someone (name unknown) c. 1650, and specifically mentions that books for particular churches were written in this way, as opposed to printed books used more generally by the whole church (“C’est celui par lequel on écrit les plus beaux livres d’églises particulières qui n’ont pas besoin d’être autant répandus que ceux qu’on imprime pour l’usage général du clergé ...”).

The decoration and execution closely align with the Parisian stencil tradition associated with Jean-Denis Chandora (1780–1844), cantor of Notre-Dame de Paris, who was commissioned in 1819–1820 to complete and restore the Gradualis Ecclesiae Parisiensis following its restitution after the Revolution (now in the Bibliothèque nationale de France). Chandora’s work is distinguished by borders composed of small stenciled fleurons in red and black, and by composite headpieces densely built from repeating ornamental units. His use of a more modern Didone-influenced letterform, in place of earlier réale types, finds a close parallel in the present Gradual. The manuscript retains its original binding of brown leather over wooden boards, in a revivalist idiom, blind-tooled and fitted with brass, including corner pieces, a central boss, and protective studs (with traces of fore-edge clasps), evoking neo-Gothic forms characteristic of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century ecclesiastical bindings.

LITERATURE
Unpublished; Related literature: Eric Kindel, “A Reconstruction of Stencilling Based on the Description by Gilles Filleau des Billettes,” with two appendices by Fred Smeijers, Typography Papers 9 (December, 2013); Eric Kindel, ed. “The Description of Stencilling by Gilles Filleau des Billettes: Transcription and Translation,” Typography Papers 9 (December, 2013). Eric Kindel, “Stencil-Making in Paris in the Eighteenth Century,” Typography Papers 10 (2025), pp. 63–107; Laurent Guillo, “Liturgical Book Stencillers in Paris,” Typography Papers 10 (2025), pp. 11–61.

We thank Senior Consultant Sandra Hindman and Peter Bovenmyer for their assistance in preparing this sale.