Adjoining Leaves from a Book of Hours: Penitential Psalms and King David in Prayer (2 of 3 Excised Leaves) (c. 1530–35): Art, History and Details

Adjoining Leaves from a Book of Hours: Penitential Psalms and King David in Prayer (2 of 3 Excised Leaves) (c. 1530–35) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Noël Bellemare (French, d. 1546); The 1520s Hours Workshop (French).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

These two adjoining leaves begin the penitential psalms, or holy poems recited to ask for forgiveness. An elderly King David is depicted kneeling in prayer after having committed great sins. He has cast his harp and hat to the ground as an expression of humility and looks up to the sky to ask forgiveness. The text of Psalm 6 begins with the large decorated initial D and reads, “Domine ne in furore tuo arguas me: neque in ira tua corripias me,” or “O Lord rebuke me not in thy indignation, nor chastise me in thy wrath.”

Object facts

• Title: Adjoining Leaves from a Book of Hours: Penitential Psalms and King David in Prayer (2 of 3 Excised Leaves)
• Date: c. 1530–35
• Creator attribution: Noël Bellemare (French, d. 1546); The 1520s Hours Workshop (French)
• Culture: France
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: ink, tempera, and liquid gold on vellum
• Dimensions: Each leaf: 11.2 x 6.4 cm (4 7/16 x 2 1/2 in.)
• Collection: MED - Manuscript Illuminations
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 2003.174

A detail from the museum

The seven penitential psalms were recited to ask for forgiveness; they coincide with the seven deadly sins.

Collection credit

The Jeanne Miles Blackburn Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• Sutton, Kay, and Sam Fogg. Medieval Manuscripts. London: Sam Fogg Rare Books and Manuscripts, 1991.
• Fliegel, Stephen N. The Jeanne Miles Blackburn Collection of Manuscript Illuminations. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999.
• Orth, Myra D. Renaissance Manuscripts: the Sixteenth Century. London: Harvey Miller, 2015.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.