The Rochefoucauld Grail is a four-volume 14th-century

illuminated manuscript An illuminated manuscript is a formally prepared manuscript, document where the text is decorated with flourishes such as marginalia, borders and Miniature (illuminated manuscript), miniature illustrations. Often used in the Roman Catholic Churc ...

. Three volumes were formerly Amsterdam,

Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica (BPH) or The Ritman Library is a Dutch library founded by Joost Ritman located in the Huis met de Hoofden (House with the Heads) at Keizersgracht 123, in the center of Amsterdam. The Bibliotheca Philosophica He ...

, MS 1; the fourth volume is divided between the

Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1602 by Sir Thomas Bodley, it is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second-largest library in ...

in Oxford (MS. Douce 215) and the

John Rylands Library The John Rylands Research Institute and Library is a Victorian era, late-Victorian Gothic Revival architecture, neo-Gothic building on Deansgate in Manchester, England. It is part of the University of Manchester. The library, which opened to t ...

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

(Ms Fr. 1). It contains the

Lancelot-Grail The ''Lancelot-Grail Cycle'', also known as the Vulgate Cycle or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is an early 13th-century French Arthurian legend, Arthurian literary cycle consisting of interconnected prose episodes of chivalric romance originally writte ...

cycle in French prose, the oldest and most comprehensive surviving version of the legend of

King Arthur According to legends, King Arthur (; ; ; ) was a king of Great Britain, Britain. He is a folk hero and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain. In Wales, Welsh sources, Arthur is portrayed as a le ...

and the

Holy Grail The Holy Grail (, , , ) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miraculous healing powers, sometimes providing eternal youth or sustenanc ...

.Sotheby’s To Offer the Rochefoucauld Grail

Sotheby's Sotheby's ( ) is a British-founded multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine art, fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...

Press Release 11 November 2010'Legend of King Arthur on the table for £2m' ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' 12 November 2010 pg 27 The leaves are about 405 mm by 295 mm, and are written in two columns, by a number of scribes. Two other complete versions of the text are held by the

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...

, Add MSS 10292-10294 of c. 1315 and Royal MS 14 E III, both produced by the same team of artists and scribes. The hides of about two hundred cows would have been used in the manuscript's production. A few planks of wood and several yards of string would have been used for the original binding. The four volumes were created in

Flanders Flanders ( or ; ) is the Dutch language, Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, la ...

Artois Artois ( , ; ; Picard: ''Artoé;'' English adjective: ''Artesian'') is a region of northern France. Its territory covers an area of about 4,000 km2 and it has a population of about one million. Its principal cities include Arras (Dutch: ...

, possibly for the

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

nobleman Guy VII, Baron de Rochefoucauld, perhaps around the years 1315 to 1325 (based on the dating of similar manuscripts). There are "baronial arms and standard of Rouchfoucauld inserted later (perhaps in fifteenth or sixteenth century)" indicating ownership at that point, and the four volumes may (although there is no evidence for this) have belonged to the Rochefoucauld family until the 18th century, but were dispersed by the 1720s. The three volumes previously in Amsterdam were acquired in two separate purchases by the 19th-century English

antiquary An antiquarian or antiquary () is an aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artefacts, archaeological and historic sit ...

and

book collector Book collecting is the collecting of books, including seeking, locating, acquiring, organizing, cataloging, displaying, storing, and maintaining whatever books are of interest to a given collector. The love of books is '' bibliophilia'', and some ...

Sir

Thomas Phillipps Sir Thomas Phillipps, 1st Baronet (2 July 1792 – 6 February 1872), was an English antiquary and book collector who amassed the largest collection of manuscript material in the 19th century. He was an illegitimate son of a textile manufactu ...

and have subsequently been sold twice. Dr. Timothy Bolton of Sotheby's said of the ex-Amsterdam volumes, "It is a monumental format, with 107 miniatures, each a dazzling jewel of early

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, a Germanic people **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Gothic alphabet, an alphabet used to write the Gothic language ** Gothic ( ...

illumination. The scenes often have a riotous energy... lofty towers poking through the borders... and figures tumbling out on to the blank page as they fall or scramble to escape their enemies." The three volumes were sold by its previous owner, Mr Joost Ritman, for the benefit of the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

. It had been on loan to that library.Online images at the Lancelot-Grail Project website
/ref>

References

External links

The Rochefoucauld Grail
in artdaily.org
The Rochefoucauld Grail
in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' 11 November 2010 {{DEFAULTSORT:Rochefoucauld Grail 1310s books 14th-century illuminated manuscripts 14th-century books Literary illuminated manuscripts Holy Grail Arthurian literature in French

See also

References

External links