LONDON, ENGLAND.- The most spectacular Greek Renaissance manuscript currently in private hands will be offered at auction by Sotheby’s on Tuesday, June 18, 2002 for the first time in its history. The Bute Manuscript of the Oracles of Leo the Wise - estimated to fetch between £2-3 million - provides the highlight of one of the most important Illuminated Manuscripts sales at Sotheby’s in recent years.



The Oracles were the most well known of all the Greek predictions during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and relate to the Sibylline prophecies on the future of Greece and the expected fate of each of the Byzantine emperors in Constantinople. They were circulated under the name of Leo the Wise, Emperor from 886-912, and it was by way of the Oracles that the course of Greek politics was determined for many hundreds of years.



The manuscript was prepared by Francesco Barozzi (1537-1604) under the orders of the Venetian governor of Crete, Giacomo Foscarini (1523-1602) as part of the propaganda war against the Turks, probably in 1575. Noted for his patronage of the arts, Foscarini was responsible for the construction of many famous buildings in Venice, including the Rialto Bridge. Comprising 27 large paintings by Giorgios Klontzas (circa 1540-1608) - a painter considered to be second only to El Greco as the greatest artist of 16th century Crete - the manuscript embraces strange emblematic and apocalyptic scenes, half-religious, half-magical.



Barozzi, who was a celebrated astronomer and scholar, was best known as a sorcerer. He had edited the prophecies of Nostradamus in 1566 and in 1587 was arrested by the Inquisition in Venice for practising black magic and condemned to perpetual imprisonment. However, possibly through the intervention of Foscarini, he was permitted to return to Crete where he died. Foscarini left Crete in November 1577, and the manuscript was taken back to Venice where he had it bound in fine red morocco and elaborately tooled and painted with his coat of arms.



Of equal historical import is a Pontifical - a medieval service book containing the offices for the functions of a bishop - which has one of the richest cycles of miniatures in any known work of its kind. It was written for Ferry de Clugny (1410-83), Bishop of Tournai and advisor to the Dukes of Burgundy and later to Maximilian of Austria, and is estimated at £1,500,000-2,000,000. Cassiodorus Liber Humanarum Litterarum, a manuscript believed to be the single most important source for the survival of Classical secular arts and mathematics into the Middle Ages, is estimated to fetch £800,000-1,000,000. Cassiodorus (circa 485-circa 580) led a long life as a statesman and scholar, playing a crucial role in helping to preserve the Classical culture of Europe during the Dark Ages. He founded two monasteries in Calabria where he established a monastic tradition of scholarship. From 503 onwards, he held a succession of political offices and it was through these positions that he sought to build an Italian state based on the co-operation of both Gothic and Roman ideals.



Painted by one of the finest of all late Dutch miniaturists in the second quarter of the 15th century, the Wodhull-Harberton Hours marks the highpoint of the Delft school of illumination. The prayer book with its stunning portrayal of costume and landscape and awareness of spatial depth is estimated at £750,000-850,000



One of the great visionary texts of the Middle Ages and one of the few medieval books written by a woman is Angela of Foligno’s Mystical Visions, estimated at £6,000-8,000. Angela was a member of a wealthy Umbrian family who married young and had several sons, but according to her own account, her private life was dissolute and immoral. She was suddenly converted by a vision of the True Light to a life of extreme piety and mysticism in circa 1285. When her husband died she was free to join the Franciscan tertiaries becoming one of the great mystics of the 13th century. She dictated the entire Mystical Visions to her Franciscan confessor, Brother Arnoldo, who recorded, often despairingly, how she would ask him to read the text back to her over and over again correcting the slightest mistaken emphasis. Therefore, although presumably Angela herself was illiterate, the text can be regarded as her own work.