Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index



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  • Title: Isabel de Byron and Robert I de Neville before St. Christopher
  • Creator:
  • Description: The Neville of Hornby Hours was a family manuscript intended for personal use. In this illustration, Isabel de Byron and Robert I de Neville clasp their hands in prayer and kneel before an image of St. Christopher walking through a river filled with fish. He holds a staff in his hand, and the Christ Child is perched on St. Christopher’s shoulders. Both the Christ Child and St. Christopher direct their bodies towards the figure of Isabel de Byron, thus establishing her as the more important of the two laypeople depicted. Christ stretches out his hand in benediction towards her, and she looks up at him in reverence.
  • Source: British Library
  • Rights: Public domain
  • Subject (See Also): Books of Hours Christopher, Saint Donor Portraits Hagiography Isabel de Byron, Wife of Robert I de Neville of Hornby Manor Jesus Christ-Infancy Neville of Hornby Hours Robert I de Neville of Hornby Manor
  • Geographic Area: British Isles
  • Century: 14
  • Date: Second quarter of 14th C., possibly 4th decade
  • Related Work: Neville of Hornby Hours: http://molcat1.bl.uk/illcat/record.asp?MSID=8838&CollID=28&NStart=2781
  • Current Location: London, British Library, Egerton MS 2781, fol. 36v
  • Original Location: England, S.E., possibly London
  • Artistic Type (Category): Digital Images; Manuscript illuminations
  • Artistic Type (Material/Technique): Vellum (parchment); Paint
  • Donor: Laywoman; Isabel de Byron, Wife of Robert I de Neville of Hornby Manor
  • Height/Width/Length(cm): 17 cm/11 cm/
  • Inscription:
  • Related Resources: Kathryn A. Smith, Art, Identity, and Devotion In Fourteenth-Century England: Three Women and their Books of Hours, The British Library and University of Tornoto Press, London, 2003, pgs. 35, 156-7