The splendid
work they achieved may still occasionally be met with. In the British
Museum (Add. 21120) there is a beautiful copy of the Ethics of
Aristotle, with very peculiar initials and ornaments; and in the
National Library, at Paris, many other very fine examples of Neapolitan
work. Of the handwriting of Mennius we have a fine example in Add.
11912, which is a quarto copy of Lucretius, written on 160 leaves of
vellum. Fol. 1 has a grand border on a gold ground, with a miniature
containing a handsome initial E suspended over the author's head, who is
seated at a desk writing. The first three lines of the text are in Roman
capitals, alternately gold and blue. The illumination is of a
transitional character, inclining rather towards the candelabra style of
the Milanese and Neapolitan Renaissance--the Heures d'Aragon, executed
for Frederick III., show a similar taste for candelabra, etc. On the
other hand, the initials are of the older white stem type, with coloured
grounds. The writing is a small and very neat Roman minuscule, and dates
probably about 1485, or between 1480 and 1490. The penmanship of
Hippolito Lunensis appears in Ficino's Translation of Plato; also in the
British Museum, Harl. 3481, and in Add. 15270, 15271.
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