Visconti told to the lovers of letters

 You may have heard of the Book of Hours of the Duke of Visconti, a beautiful Italian manuscript from the late 14th century.

You may even have studied fragments of it, whether it be the magnificent rotunda gothic of the text or the countless elements of decoration and illumination.

But do you really know it?

What is this dragon that seems to be holding a child in its mouth?

What does the word dompne mean in the last line? And does a scribe make a lot of mistakes in copying?

Who is this "woman" with three faces?

Where are the beautiful capital letters (including the Y) in this manuscript?

Who are these fiery characters?

What do all these abbreviations mean?

to answer all these questions and many more, you can register for my zoom conference on February 13 at 6pm (replay available for a week) by clicking here

Happy birthday !

 Today is my wife's birthday.

As I didn't know what to give her, I started to create a new currency and I started with a big banknote, 1 million !

Cashable only with me and in nature :-)

The photo is printed (yes, I know, I should have done it by hand but that's one of the many things I don't know how to do).

Gold leaf for the control strip and the dot of the i, embossing for the number, everything else is done in watercolor, different dilutions of Payne's grey.

Best wishes

 I wish you all a very happy new year 2022, health, happiness and calligraphy :-)

And here is an A as in Appy New Year!