Hebrew Bible, with Kings Chronicles and Isaiah, manuscript on parchment [Germany, 12th/13th century]

Cuttings from a Hebrew Bible, with parts of Kings, Chronicles, and Isaiah, all with the commentary of Rashi and parts of the Haftaroth, manuscript in remarkably fine Azhkenazi script on parchment[Germany, twelfth or thirteenth century] Four leaves and two fragments (making up three bifolia) from a codex, with single column of 25 lines of a fine and pointed square Hebrew book hand, glossed in tiny Hebrew cursive hand in elegant designs and shapes in the margins, recovered from a binding and hence with some damage, but overall good condition, each leaf 200 by 170mm.; set in glass within folding case Provenance: 1. Quaritch cat. 1147, Bookhands of the Middle Ages V, 1991, no. 122.2. Schøyen Collection, Oslo and London, their MS 1631, acquired from Quaritch in November 1992. Text:It is often noted that the Hebrew Bible, prohibited from decoration, pushes its copyists' efforts towards the heights of refinement of its script, but even among its peers the parent codex of these leaves was a thing of great precision and delicate beauty. The tiny script set within charming shapes in the margins is small enough to qualify as micrographic script, and one wonders if the miniaturisation of university scripts and the distribution of mass-produced glossed university texts throughout thirteenth-century Europe influenced the scribe here.