The Bedford Hours is one of Britain's major treasures. An outstanding example of late medieval manuscript art, it was written and illuminated in the early 15th century for John, Duke of Bedford, younger brother of King Henry V, and his wife, Anne of Burgundy. The principal artist of the leading Parisian workshop in which it was produced takes his name, the "Bedford Master," from his English patron. Expertly planned and professionally executed, the Bedford Hours is celebrated for the enormous range of its pictorial scheme, with many superb large miniatures in brilliant colours, and almost 1250 exquisite marginal details. Here Janet Backhouse examines the overall design of the Hours, discussing the historical background to its production and ownership, with 60 colour and black-and-white plates showing full pages and details beautifully reproduced from the manuscript. Janet Backhouse is curator of illuminated manuscripts at The British Library.

The Bedford Hours (The British Library)

Arts & Photography

Janet Backhouse

History & Criticism

The British Library

This illuminated book of hours is one of the outstanding achievements of Renaissance Flemish illumination, admired and treasured for the quality of its miniatures and ornate floral border decorations. Named after its patron, William Lord Hastings, the book is considered one of the finest devotional works of the period to have survived, with crisply drawn miniatures and border motifs, and a remarkable harmony of colour throughout. This edition of the book reproduces all the major miniatures and many decorative borders near to actual size.

Hastings Hours

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

British Library Board

The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library

Illuminated manuscripts are among the richest and most revealing relics of the pre-print Western world, and are central to our understanding of medieval social and cultural history. The British Library boasts the world's finest collection of medieval manuscripts, and in this new and lavishly illustrated survey, Janet Backhouse draws on these collections to provide a comprehensive introduction to these exciting and colourful materials.The manuscripts featured include bestiaries, psalters, Bibles, books of hours, and medical and herbal collections that originated in workrooms as geographically diverse as the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria and the Crusader kingdom of Jerusalem. There is also a great chronological diversity among the selected manuscripts, with examples ranging from the seventh century AD and the Lindisfarne Gospels to early Renaissance offerings.Each of the almost 220 illluminations presented are accompanied by a caption and have been reproduced in colour. Many of the immages chosen have been reproduced here for the first time.

"The Luttrell Psalter" is one of the best-known English manuscripts. Written and illuminated in the early 14th century for Sir Geoffrey Luttrell, it is celebrated for its series of attractive marginal illustrations showing scenes of life in mediaeval England. The most celebrated sequence of pictures in the manuscript represents the annual cycle of growing crops, including ploughing, sowing, weeding, harvesting, threshing and the delivery of the grain. Animal illustrations include domestic boars, geese, pigs, cattle, ferrets, rabbits, birds, cats and mice. Many scenes depict women playing a full part in rural life. In this study of these illustrations, Janet Backhouse reminds us that although "The Luttrell Psalter" was designed to provide a reflection of the status of the Luttrell family, its preservation has given a supremely emotive pictorial source for the daily life of rural England.

Medieval Rural Life in the Luttrell Psalter

History

World

British Library

London: The British Library, 1997

The medieval Book of Hours was a richly decorated manual of private devotion comprised of a calendar of saints’ days and eight short services in honor of the Virgin Mary. The Hastings Hours is one of the finest of these to have survived. Intimate in scale and richly decorated with miniatures from the life of Christ and of the saints, it was made in the Netherlands by expert craftsmen during the last quarter of the fifteenth century. 
In this beautifully illustrated introduction to the manuscript, twenty-five of the surviving thirty-two large miniatures are reproduced--close to their actual size--along with many decorative borders and details. An essay by Janet Backhouse explores this outstanding achievement of Renaissance Flemish illumination.

The Hastings Hours

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Books by Janet Backhouse

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Janet Backhouse. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Bedford Hours (The British Library)

Hastings Hours

The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library

Medieval Rural Life in the Luttrell Psalter

The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library

The Hastings Hours