Leaf from the St Albans Bible, France (Paris), 1320s-1330s.

Leaf from Bible written on two columns.
Recto: the column on the left has two decorated initials, one is blue and gold with flourishes that extends the length of text and the other is blue, red and gold at the end of line of text. The column on right has two decorated initials at the tope of the page, one is gold with black flourishes and the other is blue with red flourishes.
Verso: with decorated initial P.

From a Bible in the library of the abbey at St Albans from at least the 15th century. May have been one of two Bibles obtained by abbot Michael of Mentmore (abbot from 1335 to 1349) for the abbey. He could have got it from Richard de Bury, Bishop of Durham, who visited Paris in the 1320s and 1330s. This Bible could have been one of the books Richard de Bury bought there (see de Hamel 1981 and Kidd 2021).
Bound volume (though already incomplete): Sotheby's sale, London, 'The Property of a Lady', 6 July 1964, lot 239 (then 526 leaves in a 16th-century vellum binding; described as 'wanting the first two leaves of the prologue and the first leaf of each of the four gospels', with 'initials or decorations cut from about thirty leaves'); bought at this sale by Philip Duschnes (£1,500) who broke the manuscript and was selling it as single leaves by the following year.

This leaf:
Bought from R.F. Martin Esq, 9 Portman St, W, received on 19 August 1924, together with six other cuttings (CIRC.719 to 727-1924). Total price paid: £10.10.0. (Information from the Departmental Circulation Register).

Cuttings from the same manuscript in the V&A collection: Museum nos Circ. 153-1919, Circ.207-1923 and Circ.721-1924.
Cuttings from the same manuscript in other collections: Tregaskis, Catalogue 777 (1916), no. 37 (two leaves); Harvard, Houghton Library, MS Lat 471 (one leaf); Vancouver, UBC Library, Z114 M424; etc. (for more see Kidd 2021).

CIRC.721-1924