Scuffed, scratched and even stained in places, the unpromising exterior of one of the Louvre Abu Dhabi’s latest acquisitions is proof positive that, when it comes to the quality of books, covers really are an unreliable guide.
Decorated with nothing more than an embossed pattern of lozenges and barely decipherable fleurs-de-lis, the volume’s brown leather binding offers no clue to the illuminated riches that lie inside.
The text is a late 15th century Book of Hours, a devotional text made specially for the use of a private and very wealthy individual and organised according to a religious calendar defined by saint’s days, religious holidays and time-appropriate prayers.
The Louvre Abu Dhabi’s example, written and painted in a Bruges workshop some time between 1450 and 1475, is composed of 138 parchment pages, or folios, and 47 miniatures, one of which features a mounted and haloed knight dispatching a wounded and writhing dragon in a manner commonly associated with Saint George.
The illumination is wonderfully detailed. As the knight delivers the coup de grace a maiden plays with a small white dog in the middle ground, seemingly oblivious to the drama unfolding before her, while two figures look on from the bridge and turret of a nearby town.

Source: The National