The Rebdorf Psalter
The Rebdorf Psalter
MS.000852
Manuscript
ca. 1150
Germany
Latin
Ink on Parchment
168 folios; 11.4 × 7.7 × 3.1 in. (29 × 19.5 × 3.1 cm)
On View in The History of the Bible, Translating the Bible
This twelfth-century Psalter contains the Psalms, the biblical Canticles, and the Athanasian Creed. At least three scribes produced this manuscript in a Protogothic minuscule script that varies in size according to the scribe writing it. The margins and spaces between the lines of the text of each Psalm contain the glossa ordinaria, the medieval commentary on books of the Bible. The forty large pen-and-ink decorated initials, are the outstanding feature of the manuscript. A playful array of people, birds, animals, dragons, and leaves intertwine to create each initial, some of which have been colored in. At least two artists drew the initials, one of whom may have been a professional artist who created similar initials in manuscripts from different monasteries.
Created around 1150 at a monastery in southern Germany.[1] Rebound in the fifteenth century at the Augustinian Abbey of St. John the Baptist at Rebdorf, near Eichstätt in Bavaria.[2] Acquired by 1928 by Edmund Hunt Dring (1863–1928), Surrey, England;[3] By descent in 1928 to Edmund Maxwell Dring (1906–1990), Surrey, England;[4] Acquired in 1990 by Martin Schøyen, private collector, Norway;[5] De-accessioned in 2008 to Sam Fogg. Acquired by 2014 by the Idda Collection, Switzerland; Acquired in 2014 by Les Enluminures; Acquired in 2015 by Green Collection, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Donated in 2016 to National Christian Foundation (later The Signatry), under the curatorial care of Museum of the Bible, Washington, DC.
Notes: [1] While the identity of the monastery is not certain, the manuscript could have been created in the same monastery where it was rebound about three hundred years later, the Augustinian Abbey of St. John the Baptist at Rebdorf, near Eichstätt in Bavaria. [2] Fifteenth-century inscriptions on the cover and front pastedown indicate the manuscript was in the monastery at that time, but there is no indication as to when it arrived there. The manuscript likely remained there until 1806, when the monastery was secularized and its library dispersed. [3] Edmund Hunt Dring worked for Bernard Quaritch Ltd., Antiquarian Booksellers, London, England, from 1877 to 1885 and from 1893 to 1928 (see (https://www.quaritch.com/about/our-history/)). In between, he worked for Thacker, Spink & Co. in Calcutta (Kolkata), India (see (https://becc.bristol.gov.uk/records/2002/220/1)). He likely acquired the manuscript through his connection with Quaritch. [4] Edmund Maxwell Dring also worked for Quaritch, beginning in 1925, and was a senior director from 1956 until his death in 1990. [5] The Schøyen Collection website states that he acquired it “via Quaritch from his (i.e., Dring’s) estate according to his wish” (see (https://www.schoyencollection.com/bible-collection-foreword/latin-bible-translation/rebdorf-psalter-ms-712)).
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