Legenda aurea, etc., 1400 - 1450

Written in brown ink, punctuation added throughout articles 1 and 2 in black ink. Running heads in upper outside corner of margin in two different hands end at f. 210v. Inconsequential repairs to paper in lower margin. Red ink smears on f. 266v result in no loss of text.

Paper support (watermarks: quires I-XXIII: unidentified mountain; quires XXIV-XXXIX: similar to Briquet Tête humaine 15613; quires XL-XLI: large unidentified head of an ox with eyes surmounted by a shaft terminating in a flower).

Original pigskin over wooden boards; five brass bosses on front and back with two rectangular catches on the upper board, and two square clasps on the lower board, leather straps attached to lower board modern repair. Bottom board has considerable worm damage. On upper spine in ink: “Aurea Legenda”; on worn leather labels on front cover: “[L]ombartica historia”.

ff. i + 491, 294 x 210 (189 x 115) mm.

Written in ca. 32-39 unruled lines with single vertical and horizontal bounding lines full length in ink (horizontal lines very occasionally double, see quire XL).

Batarde scipt, written by a single scribe.

The prologue begins with a crudely drawn large 7-line red and blue initial with a brown penwork animal [dog? lion? dragon?] incorporated into the initial; initial infilled with red and blue circular designs; long red penwork extensions complete the initial. The text begins with a 5-line red and blue initial similar to the first, without the animal. Crude 2- to 4-line red or blue initials with contrasting penwork extensions begin each chapter. Alternating blue and red paragraph markers, sentence strokes and headings in red. The Moralitates includes finding aids in margin.

From ff. 1-260 nearly contemporary foliation, by the scribe who wrote article 4; modern foliation from ff. 261-491.