Mary reading

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One of the most lovely Christmas cards I received this year was this one, produced  by the Fitzwilliam Museum, which features an illumination from a fifteenth-century French Book of Hours (MS 69).

In this scene of the nativity, the infant Christ is not in the arms of his mother, but lovingly propped on the knees of Joseph. Meanwhile, the Virgin Mary rests in bed, holding an open book, perhaps her own Book of Hours. The juxtaposition of baby and book makes this tiny scene at once ordinary and extraordinary, a beautifully intimate depiction of the Word made Flesh.

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