Songbird and Blossoms

Illumination from the manuscript "QUINTE CURSE RUFFE. Des Fais du grant Alexandre ", ms. Français 257, f. 114v, 15th century, Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des manuscrits, Paris.

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Illumination from the manuscript "Tresample description de toute la Terre Saincte", ms. Royal…

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Illumination from a Book of Hours (Paris), ms. Latin MS 164, f. 81r,…

About Me

Your virtual eye on illuminated manuscripts, rare books, and the stories behind them.
By Franco Cosimo Panini Editore.

FoliaFocus

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UFOs: Unveiling Fortuna’s Orb 2 July 2019
SAY CHEESE! Cheesemaking in the Middle Ages 4 June 2019
Between Leonardo and Hildegard: The Universal Man 2 May 2019
Timur the Great 9 April 2019

History is a war against time, for it brings back to life deeds and heroes of the past.

Alessandro Manzoni

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

Joseph Brodsky

You cannot open a book without learning something.

Confucio

The farther backward you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.

Winston S. Churchill

We are not makers of history. We are made by history.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

We're all stories, in the end. Just make it a good one.

Steven Moffat

Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you.

Carlos Ruiz Zafón

If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

If you don't know history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree.

Michael Crichton

A room without books is like a body without a soul.

Marcus Tullius Cicero