COMPLETE WORK IN EXCELLENT CONDITION, INCLUDING CASE AND COMMENTARY
The Palatine Medici Manuscript 143 and the Laurentian Library:
The Medici Palatine manuscript 143 is preserved in the Laurentian Library in Florence.
In 1571, the Library was opened to the public at the behest of Grand Duke Cosimo I, in its magnificent, yet unfinished, Michelangelo-esque layout. The two adjectives that have characterized it over the centuries—Medici and Laurentian—attest to its original noble origins and its location within the San Lorenzo complex. The codices, which constituted the Medici's private library, were arranged on plutei (desks) and stripped of their original covers, given a uniform reddish leather covering in the Medici coat of arms. The chains, which they still retain, testify to the practices of consultation and the librarians' concern for their preservation.
The prestige of the Laurentian Library, with its approximately 11,000 manuscripts, is based on the coincidence of two factors, both extraordinary: the unique nature of the collections and the nature of the building that houses them, designed and partly built by Michelangelo Buonarroti.