Jonathan Sumption

The collectors’ obsession with rare medieval manuscripts

Most illuminated books are now in museums– but they were created to be enjoyed privately, and were fiercely fought over for centuries

Scene of hunting a wild boar, from the Hunting Book of Gaston Phoebus, Count of Foix, French school, 14th century. Credit (all pics): all from Bridgeman Images 
issue 17 December 2022
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  • The Posthumous Papers of the Manuscript Club

    Christopher de Hamel

    Allen Lane, pp. 624, £35

Why do people collect? Cicero said of the Roman governor of Sicily Gaius Verres that his appetite for Greek sculpture was called a passion by himself but a mental illness by his friends. Freud attributed the collector’s mania to bad toilet training. Others claim to have proved that it is due to abnormalities in the medial prefrontal cortex.

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