Calendar leaf from the Sforza Hours
Giovan Pietro Birago
- Art Funded
- 2004
- Dimensions
- 11 x 9 cm
- Vendor
- Les Enluminures Ltd
The calendar leaf is one of only three surviving leaves stolen from Birago's workshop before the manuscript had been bound into the book in the 1490s.
The peasants in the background are occupied with wine-making while the nobles in the foreground are hunting, representing October. The rest of the Sforza Hours together with the other two stolen leaves are already in the British Library collection. This work was acquired with assistance from the Wolfson Foundation.
Provenance
Commissioned by Bona Sforza, the widow of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan; stolen from artist by Fra Gian Jacopo; Giovanni Maria Sforzino; probably passed from the Marchese Girolamo d'Adda of Milan to Charles Fairfax Murray by 1902; probably to