Sforza Hours

The Sforza Hours (British Library, London, Add. MS 34294), is a richly illuminated book of hours initiated by Bona Sforza, widow of Galeazzo Sforza, Duke of Milan, around 1490, who commissioned the illuminator Giovanni Pietro Birago (). The book remained in an unfinished state for 30 years until Margaret of Austria, Regent of the Netherlands, commissioned its completion in 1517–20 from the artist Gerard Horenbout. The book therefore contains decoration of the highest quality by two artists. It provides a unique example of an early fifteenth-century Northern Renaissance illuminator's response to Milanese art of the late Quattrocento. The history of the Sforza Hours also includes one of the earliest recorded examples of art theft.

Bona commissioned the Book of Hours around 1490, fourteen years after the assassination of her husband Galeazzo Sforza. Completion of the book was probably abandoned in 1494 when Bona found herself excluded from power by her brother-in-law, Ludovico Sforza, following the death of her son Gian Galeazzo. She returned to her native Savoy in 1495 as a guest of her nephew Philibert of Savoy. Bona died in 1503 and Philibert also died the following year, whereupon the book became the property of his widow, Margaret of Austria.

Bona of Savoy and Margaret of Austria were identified as the original owners of the book in 1894 from mottos and inscriptions on various folios. Also uncovered at this time was a letter from Birago that had been published in 1885. The letter, from about 1490, was addressed to an unnamed correspondent, 'your Excellency', who was in possession of a stolen portion of the manuscript. Birago's letter therefore makes the Sforza Hours one of the earliest recorded examples of art theft. In the letter, Birago claims that a friar, Fra Johanne Jacopo, had stolen the incomplete Book of Hours. Birago requests that Jacopo remains in prison until the thief has paid for the stolen items. According to Birago, the material stolen by Jacopo was worth more than 500 ducats. This was an enormous sum at the time and an indication of the contemporary value of the Sforza Hours.

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