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
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!
ReplyDeleteOne 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