Page 317 - The Secret Museum

able to find out about the mysterious manuscript.

When Anne Marie was hired to research the vast collection of rare books in the

museum and archive left by Isabella Stewart Gardner, all that was known about the
old book sitting on the chest in the Gothic Room was that it was probably eighteenth
century and Spanish, a present from Isabella’s brother-in-law, George. There was a
story about it having been rescued from a shipwreck in Naples – there is a lot of
water damage on the pages – but no one knew much more than that. Anne
Marie/Marple began her detective work by looking at an inscription inside: ‘I
brother Girolamo da Nola from the Province of St Catherine wrote this book in the

year …’ He hadn’t finished the sentence. Still, Nola is near Naples, and so Anne
Marie trawled through publications on Neapolitan illuminated manuscripts until, by
luck, she found an identical book that had been scribbled in by the same Girolamo da
Nola. Only, this time, he had finished: ‘… for the convent of Santa Maria dell’Arco
in the year 1614’.

Santa Maria dell’Arco is an important pilgrimage site near Naples and has been
since Easter Day in 1450. On that day, some men were playing handball in the street.
On the wall where they played there was a fresco of the Virgin Mary. One man threw

the ball at a tree in anger. It bounced off a branch and hit the left cheek of the Virgin
Mary. She began to bleed. The little shrine quickly became a sensation. Pilgrims
arrived from far and wide to see the miracle. A church was built to accommodate the
pilgrims and, in 1593, a medal was struck to commemorate the laying of the first
stone of the sanctuary of the Madonna dell’Arco. The image on the medal is of Mary
and Jesus – and in his hand is the fateful ball. This same metalwork image is on the

upper cover of the binding of the book in the Gardner Museum.
Once Anne Marie had discovered the provenance of the book, she uncovered ten

companion volumes – that makes 11 in all – each bearing the same image of the
Madonna dell’Arco with the Christ child holding the ball. Two books had always
been kept in the convent in Naples. Eight had somehow ended up just up the coast
from Boston, at the Hispanic Society of America in New York. They, perhaps
realizing the books in their collection weren’t Spanish, sent them to be auctioned at
Christie’s in 2009. The sale never happened, because the convent heard about it and

asked for the books to be given back to them. The books were brought home to
Naples for a triumphant exhibition held in April 2010. Local Italian newspaper
clippings show that the exhibition was a hit.

Each of the 11 manuscripts is a choir-book containing Gregorian chants for the
feast days of the church’s calendar. This particular volume runs from 30 November
to 26 June, celebrating saints from St Andrew to the Holy Martyrs, John and Paul.
The other books cover the rest of the liturgical year.

The books were created between 1601 and 1615 in Naples for the choir of Santa
Maria dell’Arco monastery. They are enormous – the volume at the Gardner
measures 70 by 44 by 17.5 centimetres – because, like the Gutenberg Bible in the