February - Illuminated Calendar Page

 

Here's one last illuminated calendar page for February 

Compare it to the one I showed you previously for differences in script font layout and technique.

FEBRUARY - Da Costa Hours

 This is a page from a book created by Simon Bening's  studio showing February activities like pruning branches and vines and turning soil.

possibly the river in the background is the Rhine or a tributary ?

February - an Illuminated Manuscript page

 Before we had wall calendars those who could afford them had  brevaries 

A popular page layout was a list of major observances and saints for a month with a picture at the bottom 

You can see a monk perhaps the scribe or illuminator warming himself by a fire !

I suspect the blank lines were to allow the purchasers to add more saints in or other notes at a later time  as there are more saints and observances in February than those listed?

Or perhaps the patron asked to only have his favorites shown?