Reconstructing Cristoforo Cortese’s Dispersed Gradual: New Leaves in Prague
Detail of an historiated initial L with a Saint (Gervasius?) painted by Cristoforo Cortese. Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, inv. 04285, a.
One of the joys of working with medieval and Renaissance manuscripts is the thrill of discovery, the moment when a familiar hand suddenly reappears in an unexpected place. Recently, while browsing the Initiale: Catalogue des manuscrits enluminés (IRHT, CNRS), I came across three previously unrecorded leaves by Cristoforo Cortese, now in the collections of the Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague.
I know this corpus well, since I own one of the dispersed leaves from the Gradual. The Prague museum holds a number of leaves and cuttings, and two manuscripts that I had not encountered before, and it is exciting to see these now digitized and accessible to scholars.
These three Cortese leaves can be securely identified as part of the same vast dispersed Gradual illuminated by Cortese and his workshop in Venice around 1420. Their discovery not only expands the known corpus of fragments from this monumental commission, but also clarifies an important point that had gone unrecognized: the surviving leaves come from at least two separate volumes. While Graduals were typically produced in multiple volumes, scholars and collectors had previously treated the Cortese fragments as if they came from a single book. The distinction between the seven-line Sanctoral leaves and the eight-line Temporal leaves now shows definitively that this was a multi-volume set.
Initial: L, historiated with a saint (possibly one of the martyrs depicted generically).
Text: Loquetur Dominus pacem in plebem suam, et super sanctos suos…
Feast: Ss. Gervasius and Protasius (June 19).
Cycle: Sanctoral.
Ruling: Seven staves per page
Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, inv. 04285, b
Initial: S, historiated with a saint (possibly generic or an apostle).
Text: Suscepimus, Deus, misericordiam tuam in medio templi tui…
Feast: Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Candlemas, February 2).
Cycle: Sanctoral.
Ruling: Seven staves per page
Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, inv. 04285, c
Initial: S, historiated with a bearded saint.
Text: Suscepimus, Deus, misericordiam tuam in medio templi tui…
Feast: Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
Cycle: Temporal.
Ruling: Eight staves per page
Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, inv. 04285, a
At first glance, the Prague leaves are simply three more fragments from Cristoforo Cortese’s lost Gradual. But a closer look revealed a detail that changes everything: two of the leaves are ruled for seven lines of staves, while one is ruled for eight.
In medieval Graduals, the number of staves is normally consistent across a single volume. By researching the texts of each fragment and comparing them to other known leaves, I realized a clear pattern:
*Seven-stave leaves carry Sanctoral feasts (fixed saints’ days and Commons of Saints).
*Eight-stave leaves carry the Temporal cycle (movable feasts tied to the liturgical year).
This distinction, repeated across the whole dispersal, shows that the Cortese commission comprised at least two massive Gradual volumes. For example, even within the holdings of a single institution, the Victoria and Albert Museum preserves one Cortese leaf with seven staves (a Sanctoral Confessor Introit) and another with eight staves (a Temporal Lenten Introit), underscoring the division between volumes.
Seven-staves
London, Victoria and Albert Museum, Cognovi, Domine, quia aequitas iudicia tua…, Introit for the Common of a Confessor not a Bishop. D.637A-1894
Eight-staves
London, Victoria and Albert Museum – Ego clamavi quoniam exaudisti me…, Introit for Tuesday of the 3rd Week of Lent. D.637B-1894
Having established the distinction between the Sanctoral and Temporal volumes, it becomes possible for the first time to organize the surviving fragments accordingly. The following list gathers all known leaves and cuttings, grouped by stave count and liturgical function. This structure not only shows how widely the Gradual has been dispersed but also offers the first codicological framework for reconstructing Cortese’s original commission.
Sanctoral Volume (7 staves per page)
Prague, Museum of Decorative Arts – Loquetur Dominus pacem…, Introit for Ss. Gervasius & Protasius (June 19), inv. 04285, b & Suscepimus, Deus misericordiam tuam…, Introit for the Purification of the Virgin (Feb. 2), inv. 04285, c.
London, Victoria and Albert Museum, Cognovi, Domine, quia aequitas iudicia tua…, Introit for the Common of a Confessor not a Bishop, D.637A-1894.
Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E M 25:21 & Lewis E M 45:13 – Salus autem iustorum a Domino…, Introit for the Common of Martyrs & Fragment of a Gloria with an unidentified saint (Both cut vertically into narrow oblongs).
Keegan Goepfert, LLC – Plures martyres…, Introit for the Common of Many Martyrs, (my leaf, also cut oblong like the Philadelphia pair).
Les Enluminures, Paris, 50012 - Scio cui credidi…, Introit for the Feast of St. Paul (June 29).
Temporal Volume (8 staves per page)
Prague, Museum of Decorative Arts – Suscepimus, Deus misericordiam tuam…, Introit for the 8th Sunday after Pentecost (rubric: Dom. VIII Introitus), inv. 04285, a.
London, Victoria and Albert Museum – Ego clamavi quoniam exaudisti me…, Introit for Tuesday of the 3rd Week of Lent, D.637B-1894.
Maggs Bros., London (circulated in auctions over the last decade) Dominus illuminatio mea…, Introit for the 7th Sunday after Pentecost, stock # 247462.
Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, Marlay Cutting It. 20 , Entry into Jerusalem, Initial D (Palm Sunday).
Les Enluminures, Paris, A prophet, MIN 18-30, Dum medium silentium tenerent omnia…, Introit for the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas.
Other Attributions, but unable to locate:
Bologna, Museo Civico Medievale – Prophet in an initial C (possibly from this set; further confirmation needed).
Ex-F.G. Zeileis Collection, Sotheby’s 2006, lots 68–69 – Bearded Apostle, initial T, and Standing Saint, initial E. Attribution secure, but liturgical text not yet confirmed.
Special note:
One leaf formerly associated with this group, the Prophet (Isaiah?) once in the Robert Lehman Collection (Sotheby’s, London, 5 December 2012, lot 8; published in Palladino 2003, no. 39) can be excluded, since Palladino clearly identified it as part of an antiphonary rather than a gradual.
Cristoforo Cortese, A Saint, a fragment from a Gradual, likely the Introit for the Feast of the Common Martyrs, Justi epulentur, Northern Italy, Venice, circa 1420, Keegan Goepfert, LLC, MIN O1-23.
These Prague leaves now join the growing corpus of Cortese fragments, but they also raise questions about when and how the Graduals were broken apart. The evidence suggests the dispersal was not a single event, but a staggered process over more than a century.
One of the finest narrative initials may have been removed early, even before 1836, when William Young Ottley already owned the Entry into Jerusalem leaf now in the Fitzwilliam Museum. Later, in 1894, the Victoria and Albert Museum acquired two leaves from the dealer G. Hess in Strasbourg. By the 1920s, additional fragments had crossed the Atlantic, entering the collection of John Frederick Lewis in Philadelphia. Still others passed through the hands of major international dealers like Giuseppe Martini in the 1930s and 1940s.
This long, uneven history of dispersal helps explain why certain leaves, like my own and the pair in Philadelphia, survive in unusual formats. All three were cut vertically into narrow oblongs, reducing the broad proportions of a Gradual page to something more manageable for framing or handling. Their identical treatment suggests they were altered at the same time, probably by a dealer in the United States in the early 20th century. John Frederick Lewis acquired his two leaves in the 1920s, and it seems likely my leaf came from the same batch, carried across the Atlantic by the same trade networks.
Salus autem iustorum a Domino…, Introit for the Common of Martyrs & Fragment
Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E M 45:13
Fragment of a Gloria (?) with an unidentified saint
Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E M 25:21
The three Prague leaves sharpen our picture of Cristoforo Cortese’s monumental Venetian Gradual, painted around 1420. They show that the commission was conceived as multiple volumes, with the Sanctoral ruled for seven staves and the Temporal for eight, a distinction that provides the codicological key to reconstructing the set.
At the same time, their discovery highlights the Gradual’s long and uneven dispersal, from early extractions like the Entry into Jerusalem in the Fitzwilliam to later fragments in London, Paris, Philadelphia, New Jersey, and now Prague. Each new identification brings us closer to grasping the scale of the lost whole, and the Prague leaves mark a major step forward in that reconstruction.
