Breviarum Romanum

In-folio of 12 pp., (1) blank leaf and 156 pp – the last 10 leaves of this second work are restored with loss of text.
Olive morocco, spine and covers decorated with straight and curved compartments with arabesques, scrolls and gilt fleurons, gilt edges, some restorations. Fanfare binding of the period.

397 x 265 mm.

Roman Breviary.
Paris, At Jacques Kerver, 1583.
Folio of 38 leaves and 1046 pages, complete.

Followed by: Offices of the Saints.
Paris,1592.

Rich "fanfare binding" made at the time, at the end of the 16^th century, by one of the best Parisian workshops to cover the Roman breviary printed in red and black by Jacques Kerver in Paris in 1583.

It is decorated with 4 full-page engravings.

The binding is similar to the one reproduced by Rahir in "Livres dans de riches reliures. Morgand/ Paris, 1910, n085."

"In the last quarter of the 16^th century, bindings with decorations only represent a limited field of activity for a few bookbinders. While in the middle of the 16th century they could form a strong core of a library, around which, as at Fontainebleau, the whole could be organized, they are now only isolated pieces, with no definable status, within the closed system of the collection. They are rather found there as traces of the owner's preferences for certain texts or cherished copies, or, in the case of presentation copies, as evidence of a relationship of feeling, or more often, of social subordination between the giver and the recipient.

The simplest, the 'semé' bindings, are made by the regular repetition over the whole cover of ornaments and tools, coats of arms, initials, monograms, emblematic signs such as the closed S.

On the other hand, bindings called "fanfare" offer their sinuous lines, dense gilding, complex compositions from which one can derive a determining structure formed by a network of "ribbons" which, starting from a central oval and intertwining, fragment the surface of the covers into compartments of varied shapes. A more detailed analysis has shown that seven elements must be involved to provide a complete definition of this style: seven elements that seem to have been usually felt by the binders as accepted obligations, even legitimized, almost articles of an unwritten rule. The "fanfares" were widespread from 1560-1570 until about 1620 and, thus, they can be considered, along with other foliage-based designs, as the manifestation, in bookbinding, of certain trends in Baroque art.

A question needs to be asked in this regard: how can we reconcile the sharp contrast between the austerity, stability of the semé bindings and the luxuriance, movement of the fanfares. How could the same binders and the same clients implement their practices and tastes in two such different styles? Semé bindings should be considered as a particularly elaborate form of collector’s binding for which belonging, whether shown or concealed, is paramount, while fanfare bindings were, for over half a century, the almost unique model of decorated binding" (Jean Toulet).

Superb fanfare binding in large-format contemporary olive morocco.