Leaf from an Antiphonary with Historiated Initial (H) with The Nativity (recto) and Music (verso), early 1300s. Italy, Tuscany, 14th century. Ink, tempera, and gold on parchment; sheet: 53 x 38 cm (20 7/8 x 14 15/16 in.). This enormous initial h illustrates the beginning of the text of the first matins response for Christmas Day: Hodie nobis celorum rex (On this day the King of Heaven”). The initial is appropriately decorated with a scene of Christ’s nativity. Along with other painters and illuminators, Neri da Rimini established the school of Rimini, characterized by a painting style owing much to the work of Giotto, who he perhaps encountered in Padua.