Layout: 2 columns, 58-59 lines Script: Cursive Gothic hybrida Decoration: 3-line initials in red or blue with contrasting penwork in purple or red, five large initials (two 13-line: ff. 54 and 141, three 16-line, ff. 94v, 122v, 224r) Decoration: initials are bright blue with decorative void spaces within the initial, infilled and on rectangular grounds filled with very fine red and blue penwork including foliate scrolls, edged in beads, with touches of gold-brown or green wash. Decoration: F. 1, large fourteen-line illuminated initial with border in the top and inner margins, initial in burgundy and blue, on a polished gold ground, edged in black, with penwork tracery, with leafy acanthus extension continuing in the upper margin in burgundy, dark yellow, green and blue, with large gold balls with black hairlines or spikes. Decoration: In the inner margin, an illustration of the spheres of the universe in overlaid colored and painted circles, crackling to gold and slight flaking from medge of miniature. Binding: Contemporary blind-stamped binding of brown leather over wooden boards. Areas of corners and edges replaced and restored, modern rebacking, spine with five raised bands, two clasps remain, two modern strapes and catches. Fore edge lettered "Tratta dei Vniverso dio." Watermarks: scissors, not in Piccard Online, scissors, 3684, Genoa, 1449, and Briquet 3664, Genoa, 1446, similar to Briquet 3685, Florence 1459-60, Naples, 1457, Rome 1470 and 1472, Lucca, 1465, and Venice, 1469 and 1472. Early foliation in Arabic numerals in ink in top outer corner recto, complete (collation, i-xx12 xxi12 [-12, cancelled with no loss of text]), horizontal catchwords lower inside margin, quire signatures, horizontal rules in ink, single vertical bounding lines in lead. No rubrics (a few headings in text ink before major sections of the text). Notable for the meticulous and numerous corrections found throughout, both within the body of the text (over erasures), and in the margins. There are numerous pages where the majority of lines include corrections within the text. On f. 244v, there is evidence of a major error; an extensive passage is copied in the margin by the corrector, who then added “vacat” alongside the text copied by the scribe (in the wrong place) on f. 245r. Evidence of the script and the penwork initials (both the three-line initials and the large initials at the beginning of sections of the text), overwhelmingly point to an origin in northern Italy, perhaps in Lombardy (Ferrara?), around the middle of the fifteenth century, c. 1440-60. The watermark, a scissors, was particularly common in Genoa (although a similar watermark is found more broadly in both northern Italy, in Venice, and in Florence and Rome, dating between 1457-1472. Provenance: Purchased from Les Enluminures, 2019. Provenance: Illuminated in Rome for Filippo Barbarigo of Venice, a papal protonotary; presented by him to the Franciscan Convent in Trastevere in Rome (“Transtyberim in urbe”), on the condition that the book not be sold and be reserved for the owner’s use during his lifetime: Provenance: inscription added at the end of the text in an italic script, f. 251, “Dominus phylippus Barbarycus nobilis Venetus protonotarius numerarius largitus est hunc librum de universo corporali et spirituali Gulielmi episcopi parisiensis conuentui sancti francisci Transtyberim de urbe. Non vendatur nec alienetur, usum tamen huius in vita sua sibi reseruauit.” Provenance: A damaged and very faded inscription at the top of fol.1r is partly readable as “liber ... s. francisci Transtyberim de urbe”; earlier description (Sam Fogg, 1991) records that the back cover includes evidence the text was once chained for use in the convent’s reference library (the binding has been restored since this time, and this is no longer extant). Provenance: Belonged to Robert B. Honeyman (1897-1987). H. P. Kraus, Cat. 155, 1980, no. 7; Sam Fogg, Cat. 14, 1991, no. 26. Belonged to Joost R. Ritman (b. 1941). Previous shelfmark: De Universe by William of Auvergne
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