The Hachette Hours served as a spiritual companion to the future Queen Claude of France, who was known for her love for books and her religious devotion. With 17 full-page arched miniatures, 32 small miniatures and 24 miniatures on the calendar pages depicting signs of the zodiac and occupations of the months, this prayer book represents the very best that royal manuscript production had to offer. Every single page of this tome is embellished with borders of liquid gold.

1. Made in Tours for Claude de France before she was crowned queen, c. 1508-
1512.
2. In the centre of the book, written on a gold ground in a 18th(?) century writing,
are the following lines: “Mon coeur une fois attaché / Ignore le changement /
Mon coeur ayant une fois aimé / Aime toujours tendrement. / Que ton coeur
semblable au mien / Ne connoisse pas linconstance / Quil naime helas jamais
rien / Que la douce perseverance. S****** ”.
3. Scotland, Lanarkshire, Hamilton Palace Library, Duke of Hamilton Collection.
An important portion of the renowned Hamilton Library was sold to the Prussian government by private contract and never appeared on public sale. Sotheby’s published a catalogue of this sale, in 1882, where our manuscript was
no. 462.
4. Berlin, Royal Museum, 1882-1887. The manuscript was resold in 1887 by private contract.
5. Paris, André Hachette. Hôtel Drouot, Librairie Giraud-Badin, 16 December
1953, lot 26.
6. Paris, Librairie Denis. Exhibited in the Salomon de Rothschild Foundation in
April 1954. La Civilisation du livre - Les richesses de la Librairie Française des
origines à nos jours - Exposition de livres anciens et modernes du 2 avril au 3
mai 1954 , p. 47.
7. New Haven, Laurence de Witten, Early Books and Manuscripts , catalogue 4, lot
4, 1975. Sold as “The Montmorency Hours”, as the paired wings were mistakenly interpreted in the catalogue as a reference to the coat of arms of the Montmorency Family.
8. USA, private collection built up in the 1950-1960s. By descent to Switzerland, private collection.