Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Saturday 10 June 2023

Identifying Thomas Cromwell’s Book of Hours


The Fine Books & Collections website has an interesting piece about the identification of a Book of Hours in the collection of Trinity College Cambridge as having been the property of Thomas Cromwell and as being the one shown in the Holbein portrait of him.

This came about as a result of an exhibition at Hever Castle of devotional books associated with Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn and how that prompted a further look at the Trinity volume. The article goes on to claim that the book is the only object depicted in a portrait of the period known to still survive.

Despite showing a seemingly vague understanding of Books of Hours as such the article is of interest and can be seen at Thomas Cromwell’s Holbein Portrait Book of Hours Discovered


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Unrelated to his Book of Hours, but as a bit of possibly interesting trivia I think Thomas Cromwell was the first recorded person to move house, literally!

One occasionally sees articles on houses being moved bodily on rails, often to reposition those near an eroding coastline further back from the sea . But Cromwell did the same with his London house, moving it twenty feet or more on greased wooden tracks, as I recall to increase the size of his back garden.

Regards

John R Ramsden

https://highranges.com