Macclesfield Psalter to Malibu?

Finally some news on the Macclesfield Psalter!

The most important medieval illuminated manuscript found in Britain in living memory is at the centre of a battle between leading museums.

The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge lost out to the John P Getty Museum of Los Angeles when the manuscript, now known as the Macclesfield Psalter, sold for £1.5m at auction this summer.

But the Fitzwilliam is pinning its hopes on the Government, which can put a temporary ban on export to give it a second chance to raise the money.

If anything should be preempted from sale abroad, this is it -- not merely some Italian artwork long resident in England, but a truly English object of the highest quality, rarity, and importance.

The Heritage Lottery Fund rejected an application for a £2.5m grant which would have been used to bid at Sotheby's. A private dealer bid for the museum using his own money, to be repaid when it raised the cash. But he could not go higher han £1.2m, and the Getty got the manuscript for what Ms Panayotova said was a very reasonable price.

Note that the Getty was itself represented by a well-known German dealer. From the Independent. No press release from the Getty as yet.

NOTE: I see that the Heritage Lottery Fund's list of applications includes that of the Fitzwilliam:

Project: The Macclesfield Psalter

Applicant: The Fitzwilliam Museum

Application Date: 7 May 2004

Grant Requested: £2,359,080

Posted by David on July 18, 2004 9:39 PM