16 - [HORAE AD USUM ROMANUM. In Latin and French].

[HORAE AD USUM ROMANUM. In Latin and French]. (Title) These hours for Roman use were completed on the 8th day of August, in the year M.CCCC.iiiixx. seventeen. For Simon Vostre, bookseller residing on Rue Neuve Notre-Dame under the sign of Saint John the Evangelist. Paris, Philippe Pigouchet for Simon Vostre, August 8, 1497. In-8 (176 x 112 mm), an Italian binding from the first half of the 16th century in red morocco leather, with gilded decoration on the covers consisting, within a triple frame of gilded fillets and scrolls, of a central rectangle adorned with a motif composed of a single large fleur-de-lis repeated sixteen times, spine with five raised bands, each of which, as well as the two end caps, is accented with a gilt fillet; original silver-plated clasps preserved; gilt and chiseled edges. Collation: a-k8 l10, 90 ff. Almanac for the years 1488 to 1508. Latin text. Title, address, and headings for *Plusieurs devotes louenges* (l2v–l5v) and *Les sept oraysons sanict gregoire* (l5v), as well as *Oraison à Dieu le Père* (l6v–l7) in French. Initials and line ends carefully rubricated in red, yellow, blue, and gold. A very rare incunabulum edition of the Pigouchet-Vostre Hours, one of the most remarkable published by this famous duo. It was described by Renouvier (Woodcuts in the Hours of Simon Vostre) as an “edition with the date erased” because in the vast majority of known copies, the date M.CCCC.iiiixx.dix sept (1497) has been scraped off, sometimes replaced in pen with the erroneous date 14981. Of the ten copies we have been able to identify (four of which are incomplete), only three—including ours—have retained their date intact, among them the incomplete copy at Cambridge University’s Trinity College. Our copy is therefore, along with the VELIN-1494 at the BNF (formerly the Yemeniz copy²), the only complete copy with the date preserved intact and the sole surviving copy in private hands. The edition is also one of the first to include both the complete second suite of Pigouchet’s 14 metal-engraved plates based on the Master of the Très Petites Heures of Anne of Brittany³ and the complete set of 66 remarkable vignettes from the Dance of Death inspired by Guyot Marchant’s plates (30 for the Dance of the Men, 36 for that of the Women, plus twelve repetitions)—iconographic cycles that appeared progressively in the editions by Pigouchet-Vostre beginning in 1496. Illustration: Philippe Pigouchet’s mark (a1); Anatomical figure (a2); 14 full-page plates: 1. Martyrdom of Saint John (a8v). 2. Betrayal of Judas and Arrest of Jesus (b3v). 3. The Annunciation (b8). 4. The Visitation (c7). 5. The Crucifixion (d4). 6. Pentecost (d5). 7. The Nativity (d6). 8. The Announcement to the Shepherds (d8). 9. Adoration of the Magi (e2). 10. Presentation in the Temple (e4). 11. Flight into Egypt (e6). 12. Death of the Virgin (f1). 13. David and Bathsheba (f8). 14. Lazarus and the Rich Man (g8v); Dance of the Dead: 78 vignettes (66 different ones plus twelve repetitions) distributed in the margins across 24 pages (h1–i5v). 39 small figures in the text and several hundred vignettes and border ornaments on each page illustrating seasonal labors and occupations, the Passion, the life of Christ, and that of the Virgin, as well as a superb set of grotesques on a perforated background. As is the case in other Parisian Hours from the 1490s, the first leaf of each quire contains, in addition to its own letter (placed in the lower right corner), a printed letter opposite it indicating the intended use of these Hours, in this case “r” for Rome. The absence of this letter on quire b of this copy indicates that this quire comes from a different edition. This fairly common substitution was carried out by the publisher himself, who thus made use of quires remaining in stock from earlier editions intended for the same purpose. This practice did not result in any omissions, as the text and typography remained strictly the same (save for minute spelling variations), as did the vignettes; the borders varied only in their arrangement. The same variation is found in one of the two copies held by the BNF, VELINS-1494 (formerly the Yemeniz copy), and in the copy at the Dobrée Museum in Nantes. A superb copy on vellum covered with a very beautiful Italian-style decorated morocco binding executed in the 1530s. The curious die in the shape of a “posturing headless mannequin, with arms curved inward and unequal legs” (Hobson and Culot), which appears sixteen times in the center of the decoration, is believed to be of Paduan origin (see Hobson and Culot, *Bookbinding in Italy and France in the 16th Century*, no. 3, for a binding using this same die and attributed by the authors to Padua or Venice). The copy has been repaired. The volume is in perfect c