Customer Reviews

Time Sanctified: The Book of Hours in Medieval Art and Life

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It seems today that everyone is writing about Books of Hours. The lush painting and rich ornamentation make these small manuscripts veritable jewels for owners, collectors, historians, and viewers alike. Oddly though, up to the appearance of this book, the subject as a whole had never been treated in a comprehensive way. This book examines the subject using multiple examples from American museums and does not go for the big-name Berry, Bedford, or Royal French items. Therefore a whole group of fine but less well-known books gets introduced to us, and the scholarly text examines the theological, social, and stylistic aspects of these attractive medieval status-symbols. Abundant illustration takes us through the texts and Roger Wieck deftly handles variants and trends in the painting of subject matter. One of his pet interests is the medieval view of death, and he carefully elaborates the artistic themes associated with the rituals of last rites, funeral, and burial. As in other books produced before computer scans, much of the photography is in black & white and of relatively small size, and, through no fault of its own, the book suffers on this account, but is balanced by the plethora of material not otherwise accessible and the highly readable text combining erudition with humor. It is a great overview of what these precious picture books were about.

This book arrived in excellent condition and is invaluable as a scholarly text to any student, postgrad or full-time researcher working in this field, although anyone who is interested in the intricacies and wonders of medeival Books of Hours should obtain a copy of this seminal book.

This book was exactly as advertised, it was in wonderful shape and was hard to tell from a brand new book. It arrived in a very timely manner with no problems! I am very satisfied with this purchase! I would definitly buy from this seller again.