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About the Digital Collection

This digital collection site was created through a partnership with the McGill Library and the Groupe de recherche multidisciplinaire de Montréal sur les livres anciens (UQAM) in support of the creation of the Catalogue raisonné pour les Livres d’Heures des XVe et XVIe siècles conservés au Québec.

As material is added to the McGill Library catalogue there are plans to create a fully dynamic and searchable digital collection site. All accompanying website texts are used with permission from the MMFA Montreal Museum of Fine Arts 2018 exhibition: Resplendent Illuminations: Books of Hours from the 13th to the 16th Century in Quebec Collections (4 September 2018 – 6 January 2019).

The McGill CollectionThe McGill Collection: Codices McGill Library
  • Richard Virr, Retired Chief Curator, Rare Books and Special Collections
  • Ann Marie Holland, Assistant Librarian, Rare Books and Special Collections
  • Sarah Severson, Digital Library Services Coordinator
  • Gregory Houston, Digitization and New Media Administrator
  • Ella Myette, Digitization Project assistant
  • Kat Despain, Digitization Project assistant
  • Katelynn Siddall, Digitization Project assistant
  • Kim Geraldi, Digitization Project assistant



About the McGill Collection of Books of Hours

MS 161. Allemagne?, c. 1200.Macro Camera standThe McGill collection of Books of Hours was started in 1921 by the University Librarian, Dr. Gerhard R. Lomer. They were to be exhibits in the Library Museum that opened in 1922. The museum was dedicated to the History of the Book and a wide range of materials were exhibited: manuscript codices, single manuscript leaves, early printed books among others. These items were exemplars of the book across time and civilizations. The museum was closed in the late 1940s.

During its years of operation, five manuscript Books of Hours were acquired as were two printed Books of Hours. As well, many single leaves from Books of Hours and other works including Psalters and Breviaries were acquired; these were framed and hung in the museum.

In the 1978s and 1980s, four Books of Hours were received as gifts and few single leaves were acquired by purchase. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the collection of medieval and renaissance manuscripts was reorganized, and preliminary detailed descriptions were prepared by Dionysios Hatzopoulos. Preliminary descriptions for manuscripts that were either not in the collection then or were not available at that time have since been added.

Finally, in 2006 a Book of Hours printed by Gilles Hardouin in 1516 was acquired for the Library; it had been in Quebec collections since the early 1800s.



Digitization

This collection was carefully digitized using an overhead copystand system and a two person digitization team. The camera system includes a Nikon 3dx and 60mm macro lens mounted to a TTI reprographic motorized column with two buhlite soft cube lights. Each page was individually photographed and the books were delicately held open by the operator without the use of a book cradle. The second operator would control the software, check the focus and exposure settings. The pages were often held open using a smooth wooden palette.

All the raw images were colour balanced using a batch process in Photoshop. Gray-scale target values were normalized and saved as an adjustment curve. Once the raw master file was archived, a digital surrogate file was cropped and deskewed and converted to PDF. The PDF was compressed for online distribution.


Funding

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada four year research grant, (2014-2018), to fund the work of the research team led by Brenda Dunn-Lardeau, with the collaboration of Ariane Bergeron-Foote, Geneviève Samson and Richard Virr. The reasearch project is devoted to the Books of Hours held in Quebec public collections.


Catalogue raisonné

Resplendent Illuminations: Books of Hours from the 13th to the 16th Century in Quebec CollectionsResplendent Illuminations: Books of Hours from the 13th to the 16th Century in Quebec CollectionsCatalogue raisonné des livres d’Heures conservés au Québec, publié aux Presses de l’Université du Québec sous la direction de Brenda Dunn-Lardeau. En vente à la Boutique-Librairie du Musée. Éd. brochée, 48 $, ISBN : 978-2-7605-4975-3; reliée, 55 $. ISBN : 978-2-7605-4978-4).

Main Project collaborators :

Brenda Dunn-Lardeau (UQAM)
Ariane Bergeron-Foote (archivist paleographer)
Sarah Cameron-Pesant (Université de Montréal)
Helena Kogen (Université du Québec à Montréal)
Geneviève Samson (Bibliothèque et Archives Canada, Ottawa)
Richard Virr (McGill University)


Exhibition

Resplendent Illuminations: Books of Hours from the 13th to the 16th Century in Quebec Collections / Resplendissantes enluminures : Livres d’Heures du XIIIe au XVIe siècle dans les collections du Québec. 4 septembre 2018 – 6 janvier 2019 / 4 September 2018 – 6 January 2019. Montreal Museum of Fine Arts / Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal.

The curators are Hilliard Goldfarb (MMFA), Brenda Dunn-Lardeau (UQAM), Richard Virr (McGill).

References

Bergeron-Foote, Ariane, "Le livre de raison de Guillaume Tabouret et Jeanne Bernard, notables bourguignons (Heures à l'usage de Rome, Université McGill, MS 154)." Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016), 169-198.

Brendel, Maria L., "Deluxe Devotional Prayer Books: A McGill Book of Hours," Fontanus from the collections of McGill University, VIII (1995), 109-119 (illustrations on 82-90). MS 109.

Cameron-Pesant, Sarah, "Les Horae à l'usage d'Autun imprimées pour Simon Vostre (v. 1507) : examen du l'exemplaire conservé à McGill." Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016), 215-252.

Dunn-Lardeau, Brenda et Richard Virr, "La redécouverte d'un exemplaire des heures enluminées de 1516 imprimées par Gilles Hardouin." Gutenberg-Jahrbuch, 2014, pp. 144-170.

Dunn-Lardeau Brenda, spécial issue, « Enquêtes sur les livres d’Heures conservés au Québec. Introduction », Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016) published in 2017, p. 3-18

Kogen, Helena, "Les complexités hagiographiques, liturgiques et iconographiques d'un livre d'Heures régional." Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016), 107-167. MS 156.

Ricci, Seymour de. Census of medieval and Renaissance manuscripts in the United States and Canada / by Seymour de Ricci; with the assistance of W.J. Wilson. (New York: H. W. Wilson, 1935-1940), xxx-xxx.

Samson, Geneviève, "Les reliures des livres d'Heures manuscrits de l'Université McGill et la reliure gothique d'origine du McGill MS101." Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016), 199-214.

Virr, Richard. “Exemplars: Medieval Manuscripts in Montreal and the McGill University Library Collection of Books of Hours.” Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 39, no. 4 (2016), 73-105.


Credits

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts / Musée de beaux-arts de Montréal for permissions to use texts prepared by Brenda Dunn-Lardeau and Richard Virr for the 2018 exhibition: Resplendent Illuminations: Books of Hours from the 13th to the 16th Century in Quebec Collections / Resplendissantes enluminures : Livres d’Heures du XIIIe au XVIe siècle dans les collections du Québec.