Mendoza Binder (active 1518-1555), Upper cover of the commissione of Doge Francesco Donato to Girolamo Morosini as Captain of Brescia, 1547. Leather tooled in blind and gold, height 23.5 cm x width 16.5 cm. Accession Number: 2.c.2.2. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum © 2013 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Mendoza Binder (active 1518-1555), Lower cover of the commissione of Doge Francesco Donato to Girolamo Morosini as Captain of Brescia, 1547. Leather tooled in blind and gold, height 23.5 cm x width 16.5 cm. Accession Number: 2.c.2.2. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum © 2013 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Mendoza Binder (active 1518-1555), Spine of the commissione of Doge Francesco Donato to Girolamo Morosini as Captain of Brescia, 1547. Leather tooled in blind and gold, height 23.5 cm x width 4 cm. Accession Number: 2.c.2.2. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum © 2013 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Master T.° Ve. (active 1520s-1560s), Illuminated frontispiece of the commissione of Doge Francesco Donato to Girolamo Morosini as Captain of Brescia, 1547. Paint and gold paint on vellum, height 23.5 cm x width 16.5 cm. Accession Number: 2.c.2.2. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum © 2013 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Italian (Venice), Text page from the commissione of Doge Francesco Donato to Girolamo Morosini as Captain of Brescia, 1547. Ink on vellum, height 23.5 cm x width 16.5 cm. Accession Number: 2.c.2.2. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum © 2013 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Leather tooled in gold with the name Girolamo Morosini in Latin, double circle fringed with cross-shaped knots, frame of repeated lyre-shaped arabesques, fleurs-de-lys and ivy leaves.

The Mendoza Binder ran the leading Venetian bindery of the first half of the sixteenth century, producing both stock bindings for the book-trade and custom-made work for individuals. The decorative pattern and lettering of the name of the owner, Girolamo Morosini, and the date of his election as Captain of Brescia, on the book's upper and lower covers respectively, are typical of the elegant bindings the Mendoza Binder supplied for commissioni between 1530 and 1555. Named after his principal client, the Spanish bibliophile and ambassador to Venice, Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, the anonymous binder has been identified with a certain Andrea di Lorenzo of Verona.

Source: Anne-Marie Eze, Illuminating the Serenissima: Books of the Republic of Venice, special exhibition on view in the museum's Long Gallery, May 3 through June 19, 2011.

See the related artwork for another illumination by Master T.° Ve.