Libri liturgici miniati della Custodia di Terra Santa (XIII - XVIII secolo)

The Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land owns a significant collection of ancient liturgical books that has never been investigated as a whole, and it needed to be reorganized in a new catalogue. The aim of this work is to offer a complete map of the collection and an in-depth research on the pieces that have higher impact from an historical and artistic point of view. In the last five years the Custody has carried out the renovation, reorganization and cataloguing of its library. The focus of this project is the creation of a new section of the General Library, in order to host all the ancient liturgical books transferred from the convents to the central seat of the Custody. I directly contributed making an inventory and a “map” of this new section (comprising 124 volumes, both manuscripts and printed books, dated up to the 19th century), cataloguing the manuscripts dated from the 13th to the 18th century, photographing and studying the illuminated choir books. The dissertation is organized in five chapters, each of them following the dating of the different groups of codices. The most ancient books, two missals and a breviary, date back to the first period of precarious Franciscan presence in the Holy Land – the 13th century. These books are small and conceived for traveling and personal use; their general look is simple and their decorations are modest. Starting from the third decade of the 14th century, the Friars minor had been permanently residing in Jerusalem and it’s at that time that Henry IV, probably in memory of his father, donated them a series of antiphonaries. This series of books was manufactured in Italy by Andrea di Bartolo and his workshop and it was carried to Jerusalem through Venetian vessels. Three books of the original gift are still preserved, the other two, perhaps three, were almost entirely lost. At present, the remaining pages belong to public and private collections. The fifteenth-century group of choir books, comprising seven manuscripts, has a peculiar story: these books were sent to Jerusalem around two centuries after their creation, because they weren’t originally meant for the Holy Land. In fact, before being sent to the friars, they were revised in order to be updated with the liturgy in use in Jerusalem at that time. Moreover the series had to be completed with some additions, made by Giacomo da Monza in late 17th century. Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, Francesco Castellario was manufacturing other four choir books for the Custody. In the last chapter of this thesis, a group of eight antiphonaries is introduced to the public for the first time. They were made in Barcelona, in 1740, and they represent a rather tardive experience of a monastic scriptorium. The books were commissioned by the General procurator of the order, father Antonio Ottaiza, during his visit in Spain for the Valladolid Chapter.