Grimani Breviary

Breviarium secundum consuetudinem Romanae curiae, belonging to the Grimani family

Venezia, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, cod. Lat. I, 99 (=2138)

The Grimani Breviary (approx. 280 × 195 mm) is one of the most complex and sumptuous manuscripts produced in Flanders in the second decade of the sixteenth century.

It contains an extraordinary cycle of illumination: fifty full-page miniatures and eighteen smaller figurative compositions, while all 832 pages are richly decorated. The imagery is marked by inventive richness and, at times, unexpected iconographic solutions.

The miniatures represent some of the highest achievements in the respective oeuvres of the artists involved.

The text—a Breviary according to Franciscan use, as commonly adopted at the time—is written in an exceptionally regular script, contributing to the manuscript’s overall character as a luxury object of the highest prestige.

Art-historical scholarship continues to analyse the specific contributions of the various illuminators, distinguishing individual hands within the refined flowering of Flemish manuscript production of the period.

This artistic context is characterised by a meticulous, almost lenticular attention to detail and belongs to a particularly significant phase in the history of illumination, when miniature painting and panel painting developed in close parallel, sharing design principles, techniques, subjects, scale, and ambition.

In the margin of fol. 81r—an apparently secondary position within the decorative sequence—the coat of arms of Antonio Siciliano, chamberlain to Massimiliano Sforza, was originally inserted.

In the absence of documentation concerning the original patron and destination of the codex, it has been hypothesised that the manuscript was brought to Italy by Siciliano and soon afterwards sold to Cardinal Domenico Grimani (1461–1523), who certainly possessed it by 1520.

The first record of Domenico Grimani’s ownership of the precious Ghent-Bruges illuminated Breviary dates to that year, that is, slightly later than the probable stylistic dating of the codex. It arrived in Venice at a moment of great appreciation for Flemish painting.

However, nothing certain is known about the manuscript’s early history; it must nonetheless have been conceived from the outset as a major work of art, intended to rival the celebrated Très riches heures, later known as those of the Duke of Berry, the masterpiece of the Limbourg brothers (now in Chantilly).

The best-known part of the Breviary is the opening calendar, entirely illustrated and, as noted, modelled on the exemplary Très riches heures, characterised by the naturalism of its scenes, in which we recognise the hand of Gerard Horenbout.

The full-page miniatures facing each month, framed by smaller scenes of contemporary life, depict courtly, bourgeois, and rural environments, reflecting the complex social stratification of the time.

It was especially these celebrated images—the magic of snow in January, the lordly banquet, the hunting scenes, the nocturnal effects of light—that astonished ambassadors and visiting dignitaries who were granted access to the Treasury of St Mark’s Basilica and, after the fall of the Venetian Republic, to the most precious holdings of the Biblioteca Marciana.

Although bequeathed to the Venetian State, the manuscript remained for various reasons in the possession of the Grimani heirs until 1592. It was then placed in the Sanctuary of the Venetian State, under the care of the Procurators of St Mark, and subsequently housed in the Treasury of the ducal chapel.

In the second half of the sixteenth century, the codex was further embellished with metal mounts applied to its red velvet binding, in keeping with the practice reserved for official and particularly prestigious volumes. These additions also served to mark its distinguished ownership.

At the centre of the front cover is a medal-shaped profile portrait of Cardinal Domenico Grimani (d. 1523). On the back cover appears a corresponding portrait of Antonio Grimani, Doge from 1521 until his death in 1523, and father of Domenico.

Susy Marcon