Leaf from Psalter, likely Low Countries, early 15th century.
Single leaf on parchment (210 x 150 mm; text block 130 x 100mm) 16 lines in Latin of Gothic textualis in somewhat browned ink. Employs decorative hairlines, crossed tironian et, bifurcations on ascenders, Two 2-line initials in blue with red penwork decoration and gold with dark blue penwork decoration. Twenty single-line initials in alternating shell gold with blue penwork decoration and dark blue with red penwork decoration. Six line fillers in blue and shell gold. Rubricated psalm-section beginnings.Multiple corrections from a second, still- contemporary campaign in darker black ink, including signe-de-renvoi, palimsests/strikethrough, and interlinear insertion.
The scribe of this mansucript produced a very technically proficient product-- the letters have decorative hairlines, thorns, bifurcations, and feet. Each line begins with an illuminated initial, richly decorated by ornate penstrokes. Every indication that this manuscript was a high-end production.
However, another hand, in a darker ink with a less formal script has had to come through and make multiple significant corrections. On the third line of the recto, we see the use of a signe-de-renvoi (similar to our modern footnotes)-- a + symbol next to the line corresponds with a + in the top margin, adding in an entire line of text that the original scribe skipped. Throughout we see the use of 'carrot' symbols, inserting a word or two that our scribe omitted between the lines-- this correcting hand has gone into the margins on the verso to add possessive pronouns. We also see three examples of palimsets, the scraping off of words to create blank parchment, on the verso, two of which the corrector has emphatically struck through to ensure the correction is registered.
It's impossible to know if this single leaf happens to be where an otherwise competent scribe lost focus, or if it represents an illiterate scribe essentially blind-copying to the best of their ability without comprehension. Either way it's a remarkable moment of human error, demonstrating the difficulty of producing a handwritten work of several hundred pages and the indvidual labouring behind the scenes.