The contents are as follows:

(i) Hours of the Blessed Virgin Mary (folio 1). The Te Deum at Matins is replaced by the canticle ‘Te matrem laudamus’. The Hours are followed (folio 77 verso) by the same office for Advent.

(ii) Gradual and Penitential Psalms (folio 95 verso).

(iii) Litany and prayers (folio 128).

(iv) Office of the Dead (folio 141 verso).

(v) Hours of the Cross (folio 199 verso).

(vi) Office of the Cross (folio 204 verso).

(vii) Mass for a feast of the Virgin (folio 239).

(viii) Prayers, the Athanasian creed and ‘lntroibo ad altare Dei’ (folio 246).

(ix) Calendar in red and black (folio 270 verso). Entries in red include Saints Geminianus of Modena (30 January), Faustinus and Iovita (13 February), Zeno of Verona (10 April, 8 December) and Syrus of Pavia (16 and 21 May, 9 December). An entry in red for 25 June reads ‘con̲secratio altaris sa̲n̲c̲ti an̲dre’. There are a few additions in another hand.

Initials in gold on red, blue and green grounds throughout, with larger initials depicting saints and martyrs on folios 25, 40 verso, 46, 52, 57, 62 verso, 72, 96 and 239. There are five full-page miniatures, mostly in architectural settings: Virgin and Child (folio 1); David at prayer (folio 112); the women at the sepulchre (folio 143); the symbols of the Passion in a landscape (folio 200); the Crucifixion (folio 206). See ‘Italian illuminated manuscripts in British collections’, i, page 114 and figure 11.

There is an inscription, ‘Hoc opus scripsit Andreas pirus veronensis ad honorem dei et gloriosae et devotissimae Virginis matris Marie’ on

folio 204. It was originally in red but has been overwritten in brown ink, ‘Pirus’ substituted for the original name, and the date 1512 added. An erased shield on folio 1 contains a later pen sketch which was probably intended to represent the arms of the di Piri family.