The Fisher Antiphonarium and Breviarium

The Fisher Antiphonarium and Breviarium is a codex of chant music and some liturgical texts, likely made in Florence in the 15th century.² It came to the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto in 1964.³ Before this, it was part of the Royal Ontario Museum’s collections, bought in 1909 from book dealer Wilfred Michael Voynich (of cryptic manuscript fame).⁴

Antiphonal music was sung as part of the Catholic liturgy, often in a call-and-response manner, led by a cantor.⁵ The music and texts in this codex cover the first Sunday of Lent to the Feast of the Ascension⁶ (which for modern reference would be March 6 to May 26, 2022).

It is a large manuscript, measuring 55.5 by 41 centimetres,⁷ which would enable multiple users to read the music together. A book like this in use is shown in a detail from the Ghent Altarpiece, painted in the early 1400s by Jan and Hubert van Eyck.

The most remarkable thing about this book is the addition of these 21 works of art, which display musical and biblical scenes. They are drawn on top of the original music and text, making those sections difficult if not impossible to read, and have little or nothing to do with the pages they were added to.¹¹ 

In a research project published in Open Information Science, Sebastian Bosch and Andreas Janke of the University of Hamburg completed a scientific analysis of the added illuminations using X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, visible reflectance spectroscopy, and infrared reflectography, non-invasive techniques which analyze the materials used in the paints.¹² Based on this scientific analysis, which showed the presence of some materials which were not available until the mid-1800s (such as the white zinc that made the colours opaque enough to cover up the original text and music),¹³ as well as cultural clues (some musical notes in the illuminations are written in a much later style),¹⁴ they were able to conclude that the illuminations were added sometime between 1850 and 1908.¹⁵ Given the prevalence of Florentine source images (the Squarcialupi Codex, Lippi, and Fabriano art discussed elsewhere in this exhibit), it is safe to assume that the illuminations were done in or near Florence.