Dante: Divina Commedia

The decoration of this fine fifteenth century codex includes decorated initials and three full-page watercolour drawings.

The codex was once owned by Francesco Sassetti (1421-1490, a Florentine merchant who was the administrator of the Geneva branch of the Medici Bank. His famous family chapel in the Santa Trinità, Florence, was decorated by Domenico Ghirlandaio.

On folio 78v, shown here, at the beginning of Purgatory, the third watercolour shows the Mount of Purgatory guarded by an angel and the meeting of Virgil and Dante with Cato.