Provenance: The fragment is from a from a compilation of Psalms and Gospel readings transcribed by Pietro Ursuleo, Bishop of Satriano from 1474 until his appointment as Archbishop of Santa Severina on 22 February 1483, shortly before his death in April of that year.

Acquired in 1966 from the estate of Colin B. Berckelman, a Sydney photographer and bibliophile.

A bookseller’s code, ‘M/15/I/124’, is inscribed in pencil in the lower right corner of the verso.

The parent manuscript is thought to have belonged to the library of Sir John Boykett Jarman (1782–1864), dispersed at auction by Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge on 13–14 June 1864 (lot 161). The manuscript later passed to the London bookseller James Tregaskis (1850–1926), who offered it for sale in 1912–13 (catalogues 717, 720, and 743). By 1916, the manuscript had been dismembered, and its leaves were offered for sale individually (catalogue 777), resulting in their subsequent dispersal to collections worldwide.

Contents: The fragment preserves portions of Isaiah 38:18–20, followed by the Canticle of Anna (1 Samuel 2:1–10) and the opening verse of the Canticle of Moses (Exodus 15:1).

Script and Decoration: Written in a formal humanistic minuscule. The canticles open with initials (2-line) in gold, embellished with interlaced branchwork in white on particoloured ground of blue, green, and red. Versals (1-line) alternate between red with violet pen flourishing and blue with rose pen flourishing.