Single Leaf from an Antiphonary: Initial H[odie nobis] with The Nativity (1471): Art, History and Details

Single Leaf from an Antiphonary: Initial H[odie nobis] with The Nativity (1471) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Benvenuto di Giovanni (Italian, 1436–1509/17).

The work and its context

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

This initial h introduces the first matins response for Christmas Day: Hodie nobis celorum rex (“On this day the King of Heaven”). Illustrating this artist’s love of fantastic detail, an entwined dragon climbs the ascender of the h. Christ’s nativity is within the letter, complete with adoring shepherds. Above is the figure of Christ blessing, surrounded by singing angels intended to suggest the heavenly realm. Benvenuto is first recorded in 1453, when he is known to have been working on the frescoes in the Siena Baptistery. This leaf comes from a set of choir books commissioned for Siena’s Hospital of Santa Maria della Scala by Niccolò Ricoveri, the hospital’s rector, as indicated by the coat of arms at the bottom of the leaf.

Object facts

• Title: Single Leaf from an Antiphonary: Initial H[odie nobis] with The Nativity
• Date: 1471
• Creator attribution: Benvenuto di Giovanni (Italian, 1436–1509/17)
• Culture: Italy, Siena
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: ink, tempera, and gold on parchment
• Dimensions: Sheet: 56 x 40 cm (22 1/16 x 15 3/4 in.)
• Collection: MED - Manuscript Illuminations
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1952.282

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.

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.