The Book of Hours, Simon Vostre 1515. 

Size: 9 7/8 x 6 7/8 in. 

This book is titled The Book of Hours and was published by Simon Vostre circa 1515. The book was a Christian prayer book that was very popular in the Middle Ages, it grew out of the Church’s cycle of prayer that divided the day into eight segments, or “hours”, and it follows in the tradition of the medieval illuminated Book of Hours, but the text is in printed form, rather than done by hand, so it represents a transition from older medieval manuscripts to a newer printed text.      

The Gutenberg Bible, which preceded this book by about fifty years, was the first major book printed in Europe. First published around 1455 on a printing press with movable type, the Gutenberg Bible allowed writers to get away from the tedious task of doing manuscripts by hand, and for the first time, books could be produced on a mass scale.  It was also considered Incunabula, which referred to books printed in Europe between 1455 and 1500, and the Book of Hours here is one of the earliest printed editions, printed shortly after 1500, just at the end of the Incunabula period.          

Simon Vostre was one of the most important publishers in Paris at the time. He had a shop on the rue Neuve Notre Dame, the street leading to the Cathedral of Notre Dame, he was active from 1486 to 1518, and he produced a number of richly illustrated Book of Hours, which played an important role in the evolution of printing in France.  

The book is rebound in a 20th century commercial binding, probably from the 1950’s    or earlier, with a maroon label with gilt lettering and a gilt fleur-de-lis on the spine, the blank endpapers have the bookplate of Carl J. Ulmann on the front paste-down, the title page has the initials of Simon Vostre (“SV”) as well as the name “Simon Vostre” in full, which are often missing in other copies, and it is printed on paper in French and Latin.  

The important almanac page is present after the title page, followed by the text, with   26 full-page metalcuts, numerous smaller ones, and several hundred metalcuts in the borders which illustrate themes from the bible, the Dance of Death, the Triumphs of Caesar, and the Apocalypse, among other themes. The border vignettes also run parallel to the main text and provide a secondary narrative for the reader to follow.  

The text has initials in red and blue to begin words, which make the book seem illuminated, and some pages have vertically-ruled borders faintly outlined in red, and   all the edges are gilt.    

The book is not dated, but scholars believe the book was published in 1515, based     on its metalcuts, and the text is unpaginated by Vostre, but there are lightly penciled numbers at the bottom of the pages, for a total of 178 pages, including an index of saints on the last two pages of text.   

Vostre engaged Jean Pichore and the master of Anne de Bretagne (Anne of Brittany) to illustrate the book, and there are two full-page metalcuts done by an anonymous master who worked in the style of Albrecht Durer - the Martyrdom of John the Baptist and the Crucifixion. The Martyrdom image comes from Durer’s 1496 - 1497 Apocalypse series and the Crucifixion is an adaptation from a scene in his 1511 Life of the Virgin series, and these metalcuts introduced Durer to French audiences. There is also a beautiful full-page scene of the Nativity in the book. 

The skeletal figure after the almanac page is sometimes called the Anatomical Man and people think the image was done by Jean d’Ypres, a sworn master in the Parisian painter’s trade who was active from 1480 to 1508, the year of his death. He had been commissioned by Anne de Bretagne, or Anne of Brittany (1477 - 1514), to paint the Tres Petites Heures (the Very Small Hours). Anne became Duchess of Brittany in 1488 and Queen of France three years later, and d’Ypres did illuminated manuscripts and created designs for the printed Book of Hours, stained glass and a rose window for a chapel in Paris, and tapestries that now hang in the Met.  

Jean Pichore was a painter and illuminator who designed metalcuts and was the head of a large workshop in Paris. He was active from about 1490 to 1521 and his works have appeared in various printed Books of Hours.  

Of the two names mentioned on the front paste-down of the book, we don’t know who LaCombe was, but Hanns Bohatta published a German lexicon in 1926 with Michael Holzmann which covered the years 1501 - 1850 for authors of German books, and even though Simon Vostre’s book is in French and Latin, we believe Vostre’s work is included in the lexicon, and from what we can tell, the Bohatta citation probably refers to information about the almanac page which followed the title page in this book. (Bohatta was born in Vienna in 1864 and died in 1947. He studied classical philology and the lexicon he developed was called “the German Dictionary of Anonymous Names.”)  

Carl J. Ulmann (1863 - 1929) donated Incunabula and medieval books and prints to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and it makes sense for his bookplate to be on the front paste-down.    

The book measures 9 7/8 x 6 7/8 inches wide and is in very good condition. The binding is tight and the metalcuts are clean, with offset on the front flyleaf from the bookplate of Carl J. Ulmann, penciled notes on the blank endpaper after the front flyleaf (the notes mention Bohatta and Lacombe), there is light browning in the margins on a couple of pages, offset on a blank endpaper at the rear from the index of saints, a small chip on the edge of page 3 and a chip in the margin on page 8 - the chips do not affect or touch the metalcuts or text - there is wear on the edges of page 2, 12, and 42, and overall the pages and text are in very good condition.  

Frank Mowery, a world-renowned book binding expert in Venice, Florida, told us that the title page and D1 are probably taken from a later copy of the book, and the darker blank page at the rear has offset from the opposite page and the shadow lines are longer then the lines on the page opposite, so the blank endpaper at the rear probably came from another copy of the book, other than that, the book is a fine example of Vostre’s work.  

(Frank’s shop is called Mowery Book & Paper Conservation, you can find it when you cross the bridge on Venice Ave., it’s right on the corner after you get over the bridge. Frank’s credentials are impeccable: he trained for six years in Hamburg, Venice, and Florence and was awarded the title Master Binder and Conservator, he was head of Conservation at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC for over thirty years, he had a one-man show at the MET to highlight fine bindings, he has worked on 13th century manuscripts, and his name is among the royalty of the book binding world. People in the bookbinding field know who he is automatically. If you want a book rebound or papers and prints restored, he is the person to go to.) 

Frank trained in Europe for six years (Vienna, Hamburg, Florence) and was awarded the title of Master Binder and Conservator, he worked for over thirty years as Head of Conservation at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC. and he retired from the library in 2013. He has worked on 13th century manuscripts, his shop in Venice is Mowery Book and Paper Conservation on Venice Ave., and he is royalty in the book binding world - people know who he is automatically when his name is mentioned. If you want a book rebound or papers and prints restored, he is the person to go to.  

The book is exceptionally rare: we found only four copies listed in Special Collections around the world, according to WorldCat (UC Berkeley in Calif, The Morgan Pierpont Library in New York, Upshaw College in Durham in the UK, and the National Library of New Zealand in Wellington), we found only two copies for sale on the rare book website we use, one at $6600 and the other at $8400, and we are starting the bidding low to get the bidding going.  

All items are sold AS IS. Lot and condition details are for descriptive purposes only. Sarasota Estate Auction is not responsible for errors and/or omissions of condition. The absence of a condition report does not imply that the lot is perfect or free from wear, flaws, or characteristics of age. Please bid according to your own expertise, or request any additional information and/or photographs you deem necessary.