Full text of "Illuminated manuscripts in classical and mediaeval times, their art and their technique"

ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS

CLASSICAL AND MEDIAEVAL TIMES.

: C. J. CLAY & SONS,
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE,
AVE MARIA LANE.

flTam&ritige: DEIGHTON, BELL AND CO.

Heipjifl: F. A. BROCKHAUS.
JJkfa gorfe: MACMILLAN AND CO.

ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS

IN CLASSICAL
AND MEDIAEVAL TIMES,

THEIR ART AND THEIR TECHNIQUE

IIV

J." HENRY MIDDLETON,

SLADE PROFESSOR OF FINE ART, DIRECTOR OF THE FITZWILLIAM MUSEUM,
AND FELLOW OF KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE;

AUTHOR OF "ANCIENT ROME IN 1888",
"THE ENGRAVED GEMS OF CLASSICAL TIMES" &c.

CAMBRIDGE:
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS:

1892

.^7 o o
Mb

amfrrifcgg :

PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AND SONS,
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

PREFACE AND LIST OF AUTHORITIES. Page xiii to xix.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Page xxi to xxiv.

CHAPTER I. Page i to 10.
CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS WRITTEN WITH A STILUS.

Survival of classical methods in mediaeval times ; epigraphy and
palaeography ; manuscripts on metal plates ; lead rolls ; tin rolls ; gold
amulets ; Petelia tablet ; waxed tablets and diptychs ; tablets shown on
gems and coins ; tablets found in tombs ; tablets from Pompeii ; Consular
diptychs ; many-leaved tablets ; the form of the waxed tablets ; whitened
boards used by the Greeks ; late survival of tablets ; "bidding the beads ; "
lists of members of guilds ; wooden book in Norway ; ivory tablets and
diptychs; inscribed Anglo-Saxon lead tablet ; "horn-books."

y CHAPTER II. Page n to 30.

CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS WRITTEN WITH PEN AND INK.

Two forms of manuscripts, the roll and the codex ; Egyptian Books of
the Dead ; Book of Ani ; existing manuscripts on papyrus ; the library of
papyrus rolls found at Herculaneum ; Herodotus on manuscripts ; use of
parchment ; manuscripts on linen ; inscribed potsherds or ostrakaj
manuscripts on leaves of trees ; Greek libraries ; Roman libraries ; a
list of the public libraries in Rome ; Roman library fittings and decora-
tions ; recently discovered library in Rome ; authors' portraits ; closed
bookcases ; booksellers' quarter ; cost of Roman books ; slave scribes ;
librarii of Rome. The technique of ancient manuscripts ; parchment and

VI TABLE OF CONTENTS.

vellum ; palimpsests ; papyrus manuscripts ; process of making papyrus
paper ; use of papyrus in Greece and Rome ; ancient .papyrus manu-
scripts ; the qualities of papyrus paper ; the form of papyrus rolls ; the
wooden roller ; inscribed titles ; coloured inks ; use of cedar oil ; black
carbon ink, its manufacture and price ; red inks and rubrics ; purple ink;
double inkstands ; pens of reeds and of metal ; Egyptian scribes' palettes,
pen-cases, and pens.

CHAPTER III. Page 31 to 44.
CLASSICAL ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS.

Use of minium; Egyptian miniatures ; illuminations in Roman manu-
scripts ; Greek illuminations ; two sources of knowledge about classical
illuminations ; the Ambrosian Iliad ; the Vatican Virgil ; the style of its
miniatures ; later copies of lost originals ; picture of Orpheus in a twelfth
century Psalter; another Psalter with copies of classical paintings ; the
value of these copied miniatures.

CHAPTER IV. Page 45 to 61.
BYZANTINE MANUSCRIPTS.

The very compound character of Byzantine art ; love of splendour ;
Gospels in purple and gold ; monotony of the Byzantine style ; hieratic
rules ; fifth century manuscript of Genesis; the Uioscorides of the Princess
Juliana ; the style of its miniatures ; imitations of enamel designs ; early
picture of the Crucifixion in the Gospels of Rabula ; the splendour of
Byzantine manuscripts of the Gospels ; five chief pictures ; illuminated
"Canons"; Persian influence; the Altar-Textus used as a Pax; its
magnificent gold covers ; the Durham Textus ; Byzantine figure drawing,
unreal but decorative ; Byzantine mosaics ; the iconoclast schism, and the
consequent decadence of Byzantine art.

CHAPTER V. Page 62 to 79.
MANUSCRIPTS OF THE CAROLINGIAN PERIOD.

The age of Charles the Great ; the school of Alcuin of York ; the
Gospels of Alcuin ; the golden Gospels of Henry VIII. ; the Gospels of the
scribe Godesscalc ; Persian influence ; technical methods ; the later
Carolingian manuscripts ; continuance of the Northumbrian influence ;
beginning of life-study ; the Gospels of Otho II. ; period of decadence in
the eleventh century.

TABLE OF CONTENTS. vii

CHAPTER VI. Page 80 to 97.
THE CELTIC SCHOOL OF MANUSCRIPTS.

The Irish Church ; Celtic goldsmiths ; technical processes of the
metal-workers copied by illuminators of manuscripts ; the Book of Kelts,
its perfect workmanship and microscopic illuminations ; copies of metal
spiral patterns ; the " trumpet pattern : " Moslem influence ; absence of
gold in the Irish manuscripts ; the Book of Durrow; the monks of lona ;
the Celtic missionaries to Northumbria ; the Gospels of St Cuthbert ; the
Viking pirates ; the adventures of St Cuthbert's Gospels; the Anglo-Celtic
school ; improved drawing and use of gold ; Italian influence ; the early
Gospels in the Corpus library : the Gospels of MacDurnan ; the Book of
Deer; the Gospels of St Chad ; the Celtic school on the Continent ; the
Psalter of St Augustine ; Scandinavian art ; the golden Gospels of
Stockholm and its adventures ; the struggle between the Celtic and the
Roman Church ; the Synod of Whitby ; the Roman victory, and the
growth of Italian influence ; the school of Baeda at Durham.

CHAPTER VII. Page 98 to 105.
THE ANGLO-SAXON SCHOOL OF MANUSCRIPTS.

The Danish invasions ; revival of art under king Alfred ; the Bene-
dictional of Aethelwold ; signs of Carolingian influence ; the Winchester
school ; St Dunstan as an illuminator ; Anglo-Saxon drawings in coloured
ink ; Roll of St Guthlac ; the great beauty of its drawings ; Canute as a
patron of art; the Norman Conquest.

(CHAPTER VIII. Page 106 to 125.
J^ j\

THE ANGLO-NORMAN SCHOOL.

The Norman invasion ; development of architecture and other arts ;
creation of the Anglo-Norman school ; magnificent Psalters; the Angevin
kingdom ; the highest development of English art in the thirteenth
century ; Henry III. as an art patron ; the rebuilding and decorating of
the Church and Palace of Westminster ; paintings copied from manu-
scripts ; the Painted Chamber ; English sculpture ; the Fitz-Othos and
William Torell ; English needlework (ppiis Anglicamini) ; the Lateran and
Pienza copes ; Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the Vulgate; the style of

viii TABLE OF CONTENTS.

their illuminations ; manuscripts produced in Benedictine monasteries ;
unity of style ; various kinds of background in miniatures ; magnificent
manuscripts of the Psalter; the Tenison Psalter; manuscripts of the
Apocalypse; their extraordinary beauty ; their contrast to machine-made
art ; English manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteeoth_centuries ; the
results of the Black Death ; The Poyntz Horae ; the Lectionary of Lord
Lovel ; the characteristics of English ornament ; the introduction of
portrait figures ; the Shrewsbury manuscript ; " Queen Mary's Prayer-
book ; " the works of Dan Lydgate ; specially English subjects i manu-
scripts of Chronicles and Histories.

CHAPTER IX. Page 126 to 146.
FRENCH MANUSCRIPTS.

The age of Saint Louis ; archaism of costume in miniatures ; French
manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries ; historiated Bibles ;
the ivy-pattern ; the Horae of the Due de Berri ; the treasure-book of
Origny Abbey ; the Anjou Horae; costly and magnificent French Horae;
their beautiful decorations ; their numerous miniatures ; the Bedford
Breviary ; the Bedford Missal; various styles in the same manuscript ;
manuscripts in Grisaille; manuscripts of secular works ; Cristina of Pisa ;
Chronicles and Travels ; Romances and Poems ; Italian influence in the
south of France ; the growth of secular illuminators ; the inferiority of
their work ; cheap and coarsely illuminated Horae; manuscripts of the
finest style ; use of flowers and fruit in borders and initials ; influence of
the Italian Renaissance ; the Horae of Jehan Foucquet of Tours.

CHAPTER X. Page 147 to 153.

PRINTED BOOKS WITH PAINTED ILLUMINATIONS.

Horae printed on vellum in Paris ; their woodcut decorations ; the pro-
ductions of the earliest printers ; the Mazarine Bible ; the Mentz Psalter;
illuminators becoming printers ; Italian printed books with rich illumina-
tions ; the colophons of the early printers ; the books of Aldus Manutius ;
invention of Italic type ; manuscripts illustrated with woodcuts ; block-
books ; the long union of the illuminators' and the printers' art.

TABLE OF CONTENTS. IX

CHAPTER XI. Page 154 to 182.

ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS OF THE TEUTONIC SCHOOL AFTER
THE TENTH CENTURY.

Revival of art in Germany in the eleventh century ; the Missal of the
Emperor Henry II.; the designs used for stained glass; the advance of
manuscript art under Frederic Barbarossa ; grotesque monsters ; examples
of fine German illuminations of the twelfth century ; their resemblance
to mural paintings ; the school of the Van Eycks ; the Grimani Breviary;
Gerard David of Bruges ; examples of Flemish miniatures ; the use of
gold ; grotesque figures ; the influence of manuscript art on the painters
of altar-pieces; the school of Cologne; triptych by the elder Holbein ;
book illuminated by Albert Diirer ; Dutch fifteenth century manuscripts ;
their decorative beauty; their realistic details ; illumination in pen
outlines in blue and red.

CHAPTER XII. Page 183 to 205.
THE ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS OF ITALY AND SPAIN.

Italian art slow to advance ; its degraded state in the twelfth century ;
illuminators mentioned by Dante; Missal in the Chapter library of
Saint Peter's ; the monk Don Silvestro in the middle of the fourteenth
century ; his style of illumination ; the monk Don Lorenzo ; Fra
Angelico as an illuminator; Italian Pontifical in the Fitzwilliam library;
manuscripts of the works of Dante and Petrarch ; motives of decoration ;
Italian manuscripts after 1453; introduction of the "Roman" hand;
great perfection of writing, and finest quality of vellum ; the illuminators
Attavante, Girolamo dai Libri, and Liberale of Verona ; manuscripts of
northern Italy ; their influence on painting generally ; Italian manu-
scripts of the sixteenth century, a period of rapid decadence ; Giulio
Clovio a typical miniaturist of his time ; the library of the Vatican ; its
records of the cost of illuminating manuscripts. The manuscripts of
Spain and Portugal ; the manuscripts of Moslem countries, especially
Persia.

CHAPTER XIII. Page 206 to 223.
THE WRITERS OF ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS.

Monastic scribes ; the great beauty of their work, and the reasons for
it ; their quiet, monotonous life ; examples of monastic humour ; no
long spells of work in a monastery ; care in the preparation of pigments ^
variety of the schemes of decoration ; the scriptoria of Benedictine

M. C. M. b

X TABLE OF CONTENTS.

monasteries ; their arrangement in one alley of the cloister ; the row of
armaria ; the row of carrels j the carrels in the Durham cloister
described in the Rites of Durham; the scribes of other regular Orders.
Secular scribes ; the growth of the craft-guilds ; the guilds of Bruges ;
their rules, and advantages to both buyer and seller ; the production of
cheap Horaej wealthy patrons who paid for costly manuscripts ; women
illuminators, such as the wife of Gerard David ; the high estimation of
fine manuscripts. Extract from the fourteenth century accounts of
St George's at Windsor showing the cost of six manuscripts. Similar
extract from the Parish books of St Ewen's at Bristol in the fifteenth
century, giving the cost of a Lectionary.

CHAPTER XIV. Page 224 to 238.
THE MATERIALS AND TECHNICAL PROCESSES OF THE ILLUMINATOR.

The vellum used by scribes, its cost and various qualities ; paper
made of cotton, of wool and of linen ; the dates and places of its
manufacture ; its fine quality. /The metals and pigments used in
illuminated manuscripts ; fluid gold and silver ; leaf gold, silver and tin ;
the highly burnished gold ; leaf beaten out of gold coins ; the goldsmith's
art practised by many great artists ; the mordant on which the gold leaf
was laid ; how it was applied ; a slow, difficult process ; laborious use of
the burnisher ; old receipts for the mordant : the media or vehicles used
with it ; tooled and stamped patterns on the gold leaf ; the use of tin
instead of silver ; a cheap method of applying gold described by Cennino
Cennini.

CHAPTER XV. Page 239 to 256.

THE MATERIALS AND TECHNICAL PROCESSES OF THE ILLUMINATOR

(continued).

The coloured pigments. The vehicles used ; blue pigments, ultra-
marine ; its great value ; story told by Pliny and Vasari ; smalto blues ;
"German blue;" Indigo and other dye-colours; how they were made
into pigments ; green pigments ; terra verde, verdigris, smalt, leek-green ;
red pigments, minium red lead, vermilion, red ochre (rubrica) ; murex
and kermes crimson ; kermes extracted from scraps of red cloth by
illuminators ; madder-red ; lake-red ; purples ; yellow pigments, ochre,
arsenic and litharge ; white pigments, pure lime (Bianco di San
Giovanni], white lead, biacca or cerusa. Black inks, carbon ink and
iron ink (incaustum or encaustum and atramentuiri) ; red and purple

TABLE OF CONTENTS. xi

inks ; writing in gold ; the illuminator's pens and pencils ; the lead-point
and silver-point ; red chalk and amatista. Pens made of reeds, and, in
later times, of quills ; brushes of ermine, minever and other hair, mostly
made by each illuminator for himself; list of scribes' implements and
tools. Miniatures representing scribes ; the various stages in the
execution of an illuminated manuscript ; ruled lines ; writing of the
plain text ; outline of ornament sketched in ; application of the gold leaf;
the painting of the ornaments and miniatures ; preparation for the
binder.

CHAPTER XVI. Page 257 to 264.
THE BINDINGS OF MANUSCRIPTS.

Costly covers of gold, enamel and ivory ; the more usual forms of
binding ; oak boards covered with parchment and strengthened by
metal bosses and corners ; methods of placing the title on the cover ;
pictures on wood covers ; stamped patterns on leather ; English stamped
bindings ; bag-like bindings for portable manuscripts ; bindings of velvet
with metal mounts ; the costly covers of the Grimani Breviary and
other late manuscripts. \The present prices of mediaeval manuscripts ;
often sold for barely the value of their vellum ; modern want of appre-
ciation of the finest manuscripts.

APPENDIX. Page 265 to 270.

Directions to scribes, from a thirteenth century manuscript at Bury
St Edmund's.

Note on Service-books by the late Henry Bradshaw. Extract from
the Cistercian Consrietudines.

Painting on panel by a fifteenth century artist of the Prague school ; it represents
St Augustine as an Episcopal scribe. The background and the ornaments
of the dress are stamped in delicate relief on the gesso ground and then
gilt. This picture, which is now in the Vienna Gallery, was originally part
of the painted wall-panelling in the Chapel of the Castle of Karlstein.

PREFACE.

THE object of this book is to give a general
account of the various methods of writing, the
different forms of manuscripts and the styles and
systems of decoration that 'were used from the earliest
times down to the sixteenth century A.D., when the
invention of printing gradually put an end to the
ancient and beautiful art of manuscript illumination.

I have attempted to give a historical sketch of the
growth and development of the various styles of
manuscript illumination, and also of the chief technical
processes which were employed in the preparation of
pigments, the application of gold leaf, and other
details, to which the most unsparing amount of time
and labour was devoted by the scribes and illuminators
of many different countries and periods.

An important point with regard to this subject is
the remarkable way in which technical processes lasted,
in many cases, almost without alteration from classical
times down to the latest mediaeval period, partly
owing to the existence of an unbroken chain of

xiv PREFACE.

traditional practice, and partly on account of the
mediaeval custom of studying and obeying the pre-
cepts of such classical writers as Vitruvius and Pliny
the Elder.

To an English student the art-history of illumi-
nated manuscripts should be especially interesting, as
there were two distinct periods when the productions
of English illuminators were of unrivalled beauty and
importance throughout the world 1 .

In the latter part of this volume I have tried
to describe the conditions under which the illuminators
of manuscripts did their work, whether they were
monks who laboured in the scriptorium of a monastery,
or members of some secular guild, such as the great
painters' guilds of Bruges or Paris.

The extraordinary beauty and marvellous technical
perfection of certain classes of manuscripts make it a
matter of interest to learn who the illuminators were,
and under what daily conditions and for what reward
they laboured with such astonishing patience and skill.

The intense pleasure and refreshment that can be
gained by the study of a fine mediaeval illuminated
manuscript depend largely on the fact that the
exquisite miniatures, borders and initial letters were
the product of an age which in almost every respect
differed widely from the unhappy, machine-driven
nineteenth century in which we now live.

With regard to the illustrations, I have to thank

1 See pages 97 and 113.

PREFACE. XV

Mr John Murray for his kindness in lending me a
clich^ of the excellent woodcut of the scriptorium
walk in the cloisters of the Benedictine Abbey of
Gloucester, which was originally prepared to illustrate
one of Mr Murray's valuable Guides to the English
Cathedrals.

The rest of the illustrations I owe to the kindness
of Mr Kegan Paul. They have previously appeared
in the English edition of Woltmann and Woermann's
valuable History of Painting, 1880-7.

I have to thank my friend and colleague Mr M. R.
James for his kindness in looking through the proofs
of this book. He is not responsible for the opinions
expressed or for the errors that remain, but he has
corrected some of the grosser blunders.

J. HENRY MIDDLETON.

KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.

XV11

BOOKS ON ILLUMINATED MSS.

THE following are some of the most important works on
this subject, and the most useful for the purposes of a
student. Many others, which deal with smaller branches of
the subject, are referred to in the following text.

Bastard, Peintures et Ornemens des Manuscrits, classes dans
nn ordre Clironologique, Imper. folio, Paris, 1835, &c.; a
very magnificent book, with 163 plates, mostly coloured.

Birch and Jenner, Early drawings and illuminations, London,
1879; this is a useful index of subjects which occur in
manuscript miniatures.

Bradley, J. W,, Dictionary of Miniaturists and Illuminators,
3 vols. 8vo. London, 1887-1890.

Chassant, Paleographie des CJiartes et des Manuscrits du XI me
an XVI lime Siecle, I2mo. ; a useful little handbook,
together with the companion volume, Dictionnaire des
Abbreviations Latines et Franqaises, Paris, 1876.

Denis, F., Histoire de V Ornementation des manuscrits ; 8vo.
Paris, 1879.

Fleury, E., Les Manuscrits de la BibliotJieque de Laon etudies
au point de vue de leur illustration, 2 vols., Laon, 1863.
With 50 plates.

Humphreys, Noel, Illuminated Books of the Middle Ages, folio,
London, 1849; a handsome, well-illustrated book.

xviii BOOKS ON ILLUMINATED MSS.

Humphreys, Noel, The Origin and Progress of the Art of

Writing ; sm. 4to., with 28 plates ; London, 1853.
Kopp, PalaeograpJiia Critica, 4 vols. 4to., Manheim, 1817-
1819; a book of much historical value for the student of
Palaeography.
Lamprecht, K., Initial- Ornamentik des VIII.-XIII. Jahrh.,

Leipzig, 1882.

Langlois, Essai stir la CalligrapJde des Manuscrits du Moyen
Age et sur les Ornements des premiers livres imprime's,
8vo. Rouen, 1841.

Monte Cassino, Paleografia artistica di Monte Cassino, pub-
lished by the Benedictine Monks of Mte. Cassino, 1870,
and still in progress. This work contains a very valuable
series of facsimiles and coloured reproductions of selected
pages from many of the most important manuscripts in
this ancient and famous library, that of the Mother-
house of the whole Benedictine Order.
Reiss, H., Sammlung der schb'nsten Miniaturen des Mittel-

alters, Vienna, 1863-5.
Riegl, A., Die mittelalterl. Kalenderillustration, Innsbruck,

1889.
Seghers, L., Tresor calligraphiqne du Moyen Age, Paris, 1 884 ;

with 46 coloured plates of illuminated initials.
Shaw, Henry, Illuminated Ornaments of the Middle Ages from
the sixth to the seventeenth century ; with de-
scriptions by Sir Fred. Madden ; 4to. with 60
coloured plates, London, 1833. A very fine
and handsome work.
,, The Art of Illumination, 4to. London, 1870;

with well-executed coloured plates.
Hand-book of Mediaeval A Iphabets and Devices,
Imp. 8vo. London, 1877; with 37 coloured
plates.

Silvestre, Paleographie Universelle, 4 vols., Atlas folio, Paris,
1839-1841. This is the most magnificent and costly
work on the subject that has ever been produced.
The English Edition in 2 vols., Atlas folio, translated and
edited by Sir Fred. Madden, London, 1850, is very

BOOKS ON ILLUMINATED MSS. xix

superior in point of accuracy and judgment to the
original French work. A smaller edition with 72
selected plates has also been published, in 2 vols. 8vo.
and one fol., London, 1850.

Waagen, G. F., On the Importance of Manuscripts witli Mini-
atures in the history of Art, 8vo. London (1850).
Westwood, J. O., P alaeograpJiia Sacra Pictoria, royal 4to.
London, 1843-5. This is a very fine work,
with 5 coloured plates of manuscript
illuminations selected from manuscripts of
the Bible of various dates from the fourth
to the sixteenth century.

Illuminated Illustrations of the Bible, royal

4to. London, 1846. This is a companion
work to the last-mentioned book.

Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo-Saxon

and Irish Manuscripts, fol., London, 1868;
with 54 very finely executed coloured
plates of remarkable fidelity in drawing.
The reproductions of pages from the Book
of K ells and similar Celtic manuscripts are
specially remarkable.

Wyatt, M. Digby, The Art of Illuminating as practised in
Europe from the earliest times; 4to. London,
1860 ; with 100 plates in gold and colours.

The best work on the form of books in ancient times is
Th. Birt, Das antike Buchwesen in seinem Verhdltniss zitr
Literattir, 8vo., 1882.

The publications of the Palaeographical Society, from
the year 1873, and still in progress, are of great value for
their well-selected and well-executed photographic repro-
ductions of pages from the most important manuscripts of
all countries and periods.

XXI

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Fig. i, page 33. Part of the drawing engraved on the bronze cista of

Ficoroni, dating from the early part of the fourth

century B.C. A beautiful example of Greek drawing.
2 37. Miniature of classical design from a twelfth century

Psalter in the Vatican library.
,, 3 39. Painting in the " House of Livia" on the Palatine Hill

in Rome.
,,4 41. A Pompeian painting of Hellenic style, as an example

of Greek drawing and composition.
5 43. The Prophet Ezechiel from a Byzantine manuscript of

the ninth century A.D.

,, 6 49. Miniature from the Vienna manuscript of Genesis.
,,7 51. Miniature from the manuscript of the work on Botany

by Dioscorides, executed at Constantinople about

500 A.D. for the Princess Juliana.
8 58. Mosaic of the sixth century in the apse of the church of

SS. Cosmas and Damian in Rome.
9 60. Miniature from a Byzantine manuscript of the eleventh

century ; a remarkable example of artistic decadence.
10 63. An initial P of the Celtic-Carolingian type, of the

school of Alcuin of York.

1 1 64. An initial B of the Celtic-Carolingian type.
12 66. Miniature of Christ in Majesty from a manuscript of

the school of Alcuin, written for Charles the Great.
,,13 68. A cope made of silk from the loom of an Oriental

weaver.

14 71. King Lothair enthroned; a miniature from a manu-
script about the year 845 A.D.

xxii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Fig. 15 page 73. Illumination in pen outline, from a manuscript written
in the ninth century at St Gallen. It represents
David riding out against his enemies.

Figs. 16 and 17, pages 74 and 75. Subject countries doing homage to
the Emperor Otho II. ; from a manuscript of the
Gospels. y

Fig. 1 8, page 77. Miniature of the Evangelist Saint Mark; from a

manuscript of the Gospels.

19 78. Miniature of the Crucifixion from a German manu- S
script of the eleventh century ; showing extreme
artistic decadence.
20 91. Miniature from the Gospels of MacDurnan of the

ninth century.

21 100. Miniature from the Benedictional of Aethelwold ; ^
written and illuminated by a monastic scribe at
Winchester.
22 127. A page from the Psalter of Saint Louis, written about

the year 1260, by a French scribe.
,, 23 130. Miniature representing King Conrad of Bohemia,

with an attendant, hawking.
24 132. Scene of the martyrdom of Saint Benedicta from a

Martyrology of about 1312.

25 134. Miniature of the Birth of the Virgin painted by the

illuminator Jacquemart de Odin for the Due de

Berri. The border is of the characteristic French

or Franco-Flemish style.

26 142. Miniature executed for King Rend of Anjou about

1475-
27 145. Miniature of the Marriage of the B. V. Mary from a

French manuscript of about 1480, with details in

the style of the Italian Renaissance.

28 146. Border illumination from a Book of Hours by Jacque-
mart de Odin which belonged to the Due de Berri;

see fig. 25.

29 155. A page from the Missal of the Emperor Henry II.
30 156. Figure of King David from a stained glass window

in the Cathedral of Augsburg, dating from 1065.
,,31 ,. 157- Miniature from an eleventh century manuscript of

the Gospels, by a German illuminator.
32 1 59. An initial S, illuminated with foliage of the North- /

umbrian type, from a German manuscript of the

twelfth century.
33 160. Miniature of the Annunciation from a German

manuscript of the beginning of the thirteenth

century.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. xxiii

Fig. 34 page 161. Page of a Kalendar from a German Psalter of about

1 200 A.D.
35 ^3- Initial Y from a German manuscript of the beginning

of the thirteenth century, with a most graceful

and fanciful combination of figures and foliage.
36 164. Paintings on the vault of the church of St Michael at

Hildesheim, closely resembling in style an illumi-
nated page in a manuscript.

37 J 66. Miniatures of Italian style from a German manu-
script of 1312, showing the influence of Florentine

art on the illuminators of southern France.
38 1 68. Miniature symbolizing the month of April from the

Kalendar of the Grimani Breviary, executed about

1496.
39 1 7- A P a o e fr m tne Book of Hours of King Rend,

painted about 1480.
40 171. A page from a Book of Hours at Vienna, of the finest

Flemish style.
41 ., 173. Marginal illumination of very beautiful and refined

style from a manuscript executed for King Wenzel

of Bohemia about the year 1390.
42 174. Miniature of Duke Baldwin, painted about the year

1450 by an illuminator of the school of the Van

Eycks of Bruges.
43 176. Retable painted by Martin Schongauer, in the style

of a manuscript illumination.
44 177. An altar-piece of the Cologne school, showing the

influence of manuscript illumination on the painters

of panel-pictures, especially retables.
45 179. Wing of a triptych, with a figure of St Elizabeth

of Hungary, painted by the elder Hans Holbein ;

this illustrates the influence on painting of the

styles of manuscript illumination at the beginning

of the sixteenth century.

46 180. Illuminated border drawn by Albert Diirer in 1515.
47 185. Illumination from an Italian manuscript executed for

the Countess Matilda in the twelfth century ; this

illustrates the extreme decadence of art in Italy

before the thirteenth century.
48 187. Miniature of Saint George and the Dragon from a

Missal, illuminated about 1330 to 1340 by a painter

of the school of Giotto.
49 196. An illuminated border from a manuscript by Atta-

vante, of characteristic north-Italian style.

xxiv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Fig. 50 page 198. A miniature from the Bible of Duke Borso d'Este,
painted between 1455 and 1461 by illuminators of
the school of Ferrara.

,,51 201. A Venetian retable by Giovanni and Antonio di
Murano, in the style of an illuminated manuscript.

52 208. Grotesque figure from a French manuscript of the
fourteenth century.

53 209. Miniature of a comic subject from a German manu-
script of the twelfth century, representing a mo-
nastic scribe worried by a mouse.

54 213. View of the scriptorium alley of the cloisters at
Gloucester, showing the recesses to hold the wooden
carrels for the scribes or readers of manuscripts.

,,55 219. Picture by Quentin Matsys of Antwerp, showing a
lady selling or pawning an illuminated manuscript.

Frontispiece. Painting on panel by a fifteenth century artist
of the Prague school; it represents Saint Augustine
as an Episcopal scribe. The background and the
ornaments of the dress are stamped in delicate
relief on the gesso ground and then gilt. This
picture, which is now in the Vienna Gallery, was
originally part of the painted wall-panelling in the
Chapel of the Castle of Karlstein.

CHAPTER I.

CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS WRITTEN WITH A STILUS.

BEFORE entering upon any discussion of the styles and
methods of decoration which are to be found in mediaeval
manuscripts and of the various processes, pigments and other
materials which were employed by the mediaeval illuminators
it will be necessary to give some account of the shapes and
kinds of books which were produced among various races
during the classical period.

The reason of this is that classical styles of decoration
and technical methods, in the preparation of paper, parch-
ment, pigments and the like, both survived to greater extent
and to a very much later period than is usually supposed to
have been the case, and, indeed, continued to influence both
the artistic qualities and the mechanical processes of the
mediaeval illuminator almost down to the time when the
production of illuminated manuscripts was gradually put
an end to by the invention of printing.

The word manuscript is usually taken to imply writing
with a pen, brush or stilus to the exclusion of inscriptions
cut with the chisel or the graver in stone, marble, bronze
or other hard substance. The science of palaeography deals
with the former, while epigraphy is concerned with the latter.
The inscribed clay tablets of Assyria and Babylon might be
considered a sort of link between the two, on account of the
cuneiform writing on them having been executed with a stilus
in soft, plastic clay, which subsequently was hardened by
M. C. M. I

Survival
of methods.

The pen
and the
stilus.

2 WRITING ON METAL PLATES [CHAP. I.

baking in the potter's kiln, but it will be needless to describe
them here.

Writing Manuscripts on metal plates. Another form of writing

on metal, especially used by the ancient Greeks, which falls more
definitely under the head of manuscripts, consists of cha-
racters scratched with a sharp iron or bronze stilus on
plates of soft tin, lead or pewter, which, when not in use,
could be rolled up into a compact and conveniently portable
cylinder.

A considerable number of these inscribed lead rolls have
been found in the tombs of Cyprus ; but none of them
unfortunately have as yet been found to contain matter of
any great interest.

Lead rolls. For the most part they consist either of monetary
accounts, or else of formulae of imprecations, curses devoting
some enemy to punishment at the hands of the gods. We
know however from the evidence of classical writers that
famous poems and other important literary works were
occasionally preserved in the form of these inscribed tin
or lead rolls. Pausanias, for example, tells us that during
his visit to Helicon in Boeotia he was shown the original
manuscript of Hesiod's Works and Days written on plates
of lead ; see Paus. IX. 31. Again at IV. 26, Pausanias records
the discovery at Ithome in Messenia of a bronze urn (hydria)
which contained a manuscript of the " Mysteries of the Great
Tin rolls. Deities" written on "a thinly beaten plate of tin, which was
rolled up like a book," Kao-crirepov e\rj\aa-p,evov e<? TO XeTrro-
rarov, eVetXt/cro Se wcnrep ra /3t/3A,ta. This method of writing
would be quite different from the laborious method of cutting
inscriptions on bronze plates with a chisel and hammer, or
with a graver.

A scribe could write on the soft white metal with a sharp
stilus almost as easily and rapidly as if he were using pen
and ink on paper, and the manuscript thus produced would
have the advantage of extreme durability.

We may indeed hope that even now some priceless lost
work of early Greece may be recovered by the discovery
of similar lead rolls to those which Cesnola found in Cyprus.

CHAP. I.] AND WAXED TABLETS. 3

Some very beautiful little Greek manuscripts, written on Gold
thin plates of gold, have also been discovered at various a " ntlcts -
places. The most remarkable of these were intended for
amulets, and were rolled up in little gold or silver cylinders
and worn round the neck during life. After death they were
placed with the body in the tomb. Several of these, dis-
covered in tombs in the district of Sybaris in Magna Graecia,
are inscribed with fragments from the mystic Orphic hymns,
and give directions to the soul as to what he will find and
what he must do in the spirit-world.

The most complete of these little gold manuscripts, Petelia
usually known as the Petelia tablet, is preserved in the fa>et '
gem-room in the British Museum. The manuscript consists
of thirteen hexameter lines written on a thin plate of pure
gold measuring ij inches by 2 inches in width; it dates
from the third century B.C. 1

In classical times, manuscripts were of two different
forms ; first, the book form, Trlvaj;, irivdiciov or SeXrtW, in
Latin codex (older spelling caudex); and secondly the roll,
Kv\ivSpo<?, /3i/3Xo<? or /3i/3Xioi>, Latin volumeii*.

Manuscripts on tablets. Both the Greeks and the Romans Waxed
used very largely tablets (vriW/ce?, Lat. tabulae or cerae) of taiets
wood covered with a thin coating of coloured wax, on which
the writing was formed with a sharp-pointed stilus (ypa(f)l<;)
of wood, ivory or bronze. The wax was coloured either
black or red in order that the writing scratched upon it
might be clearly visible. The reverse end of the stilus
was made flat or in the shape of a small ball so that it
could be used to make corrections by smoothing out words
or letters which had been erroneously scratched in the soft
wax.

These tablets were commonly about ten to fourteen
inches in length by about half that in width. The main
surface of each tablet was sunk from i to -jL of an inch

1 See Jour. Hell. Stud. Vol. in. p. 112.

2 It was not till quite a late period that the word j3t/3Aoj was used to mean
another form of book than the roll. The word cram is also used for a tablet ; see
p. 30.

I 2

WAXED TABLETS

[CHAP. i.

Waxed
cfiptychs.

Tablets on

coins and

gents.

Tablets

from

tombs.

in depth to receive the wax layer, leaving a rim all round
about the size of that round a modern school-boy's slate.
The object of this was that two of these tablets might be
placed together face to face without danger of rubbing and
obliterating the writing on the wax, which was applied in
a very thin coat, not more than ^ of an inch in thickness.
As a rule these tablets were fastened together in pairs by
stout loops of leather or cord. These double tablets were
called by the Greeks TrtW/ee? Trrvxrol or 8t7rrf%a (from 8/5
and TTTvaa-co) and by the Romans pugillares or codicilli.
Homer (//. vi. 168) mentions a letter written on folding
tablets

8' o ye a-rjfiara \vypd

p-ra^ ev irvaKt TTTVKTO).

Representations of these folding tablets occur frequently
both in Greek and in Roman art, as, for example on various
Sicilian coins, where the artist's name is placed in minute
letters on a double tablet, which in some cases, as on a
tetradrachm of Himera, is held open by a flying figure of
Victory.

A gem of about 400 B.C., a large scarabaeoid in chalce-
dony, recently acquired by the British Museum, is engraved
with a seated figure of a lady holding a book consisting of
four leaves ; she is writing lengthwise on one leaf, while the
other three hang down from their hinge.

Some of the beautiful terra-cotta statuettes from the
tombs of the Boeotian Tanagra represent a girl reading
from a somewhat similar double folding tablet.

On Greek vases and in Roman mural paintings the
pugillares are frequently shown, though the roll form of
manuscript is on the whole more usual.

Some examples of these tablets have been found in a
good state of preservation in Graeco-Egyptian tombs and
during recent excavations in Pompeii.

Part of a poem in Greek written in large uncial characters
is still legible on the single leaf of a pair of tablets from
Memphis in Egypt, which is now in the British Museum.
Though the coating of wax has nearly all perished, the

CHAP. I.]

OR PUGILLARES.

sharp stilus has marked through on to the wood behind
the wax, so that the writing is still legible. Its date appears
to be shortly before the Christian era 1 .

Some well preserved pugillares found in Pompeii are now
in the Museum in Naples ; the writing on them is of less
interest, consisting merely of accounts of expenditure. Though
the wood is blackened and the wax destroyed, the writing is
still perfectly visible on the charred surface.

A more costly form of pugillares was made of bone or
ivory 2 ; in some cases the back of each ivory leaf was
decorated with carving in low relief.

A good many examples of these tablets, dating from the
third to the sixth century A.D., still exist. These late highly
decorated pugillares are usually known as Consular diptydis,
because, as a rule, they have on the carved back the name of
a Consul, and very frequently a representation of the Consul
in \\\> pulvinar or state box presiding over the Games in the
Circus. It is supposed that these ivory diptychs were in-
scribed with complimentary addresses and were sent as
presents to newly appointed officials in the time of the
later Empire.

In some cases the ancient writing-tablets consisted of
three or more leaves hinged together (rpi7rrv)(a, TrevraTTTV^a
&c.); this was the earliest form of the codex or book in the
modern sense of the word. The inner leaves of these codices
had sinkings to receive the wax on both sides ; only the
backs of the two outer leaves being left plain or carved in
relief to form the covers.

When the written matter on these tablets was no longer
wanted, a fresh surface for writing was prepared either by
smoothing down the wax with the handle of the stilus, or
else by scraping it off and pouring in a fresh supply. This
is mentioned by Ovid (Ar. Am. I. 437); "cera rasis infusa

1 A fine set of five tablets is preserved in the coin room in the Paris Biblio-
theque Nationale; see Revue Arched, vm. p. 461.

2 A well-preserved example of Roman pugillares formed of two leaves of ivory,
now in the Capitoline museum in Rome, is illustrated by Baumeister, Denkwaler,
I- P- 355-

Pompeian

tablets.

Consular
diptychs.

Many-
leaved
tablets.

GREEK METHODS OF WRITING [CHAP. I.

Waxed
tablets.

Whitened
boards.

tabellis 1 ." These tablets were sometimes called briefly cerae ;
the phrases prima cera, altera cera, meaning the first page,
the second page. The best sorts of wooden writing-tablets
were made of box-wood, and hence they are sometimes
called Trv^iov. In addition to the holes along one edge of
each tablet through which the cord or wire was passed to
hold the leaves together and to form the hinge, additional
holes were often made along the opposite edge in order
that the letter or other writing on the tabulae might be
kept private by tying a thread through these holes and
then impressing a seal on the knot. Plautus (Bacch. IV. iv.
64) alludes to this in mentioning the various things required
to write a letter,

Effer cito stilum, ceram, et tabellas et linum.

In some cases wooden tablets of this kind were used
without a coating of wax, but had simply a smooth surface
to receive writing with ink and a reed pen. Many ex-
amples of these have been found in Egypt The writing
could be obliterated and a new surface prepared by sponging
and rubbing with pumice-stone.

Among the Greeks wooden boards, whitened with chalk
or gypsum, were often used for writing that was intended to
be of temporary use only. Charcoal was used to write on
these boards, which were called \evKa>fjiara or ypa/jLfjiaTeia
\e\,evK(oiJiva 2 . Public advertisements and official announce-
ments were frequently written in this way and then hung up
in a conspicuous place in the agora or market-place of the
city.

Thus some of the inscriptions of the fourth century B.C.,
found at Delos mention that every month a \evKcofia was
suspended in the agora, on which was written a statement of
the financial management and all the expenses of the Temple

1 Lucian, who lived in the second century A.D., mentions (Vita Luc. II.)
that when he was a boy he was in the habit of scraping the wax off his writing-
tablets and using it to model little figures of men and animals. Probably he was
not the only Roman school-boy who amused himself in this way.

2 Charcoal or crayon-holders of bronze with a spring clip and sliding ring,
exactly like those now used, have been found in Pompeii. These and other
writing materials are illustrated by Baumeister, Denkmaler> Vol. in. p. 1585.

CHAP. I.]

AND MEDIAEVAL SURVIVALS.

of the Delian Apollo during the past month. Finally, at the
end of the year, an abstract of the accounts of the Temple
was engraved as a permanent record on a marble stele. This
was also the custom with regard to the financial records of
the Athenian Parthenon, and probably most of the important
Greek temples. In connection with the sacred records, the
Delian inscriptions mention, in addition to the \evKca^ara,
other forms of tablets, the SeA,ro<? and the 7riva%, and also
Xaprai or writings on papyrus ; manuscripts of this last kind
will be discussed in a subsequent section 1 .

Late survivals of writing on tablets. Before passing on to
describe other forms of classical manuscripts, it may be
interesting to note that the ancient waxed tablets or pugi 'Hares
continued to be used for certain purposes throughout the
whole mediaeval period, down to the sixteenth century or
even later. Many of the principal churches, especially in
Italy, but also in other countries, possessed one or more
diptychs on which were inscribed the names of all those who
had in any way been benefactors either to the ecclesiastical
foundation or to the building. In early times, during the
daily celebration of Mass, the list of names was read out from
the diptych by the Deacon standing in the gospel ambon ; and
the congregation was requested or " bid " to pray for the souls
of those whose names they had just heard.

The " bidding prayer" before University sermon at Oxford
and Cambridge is a survival of this custom, which in the
fifteenth century was termed " bidding the beads," that is
"praying for the prayers" of the congregation. In some
cases fine specimens of the old ivory Consular diptychs were
used for this purpose in Italian churches till comparatively
late times, but as a rule they fell into disuse before the eleventh
or twelfth century, as the list of names became too long for
the waxed leaves of a diptych, and so by degrees vellum rolls
or else codices, often beautifully written in gold and silver letters,
were substituted. One of the most splendid of these lists, the

Sacred
accounts.

Late

survivals.

" Bidding
the beads."

1 An Athenian inscription (C. I. A. I. 32) mentions accounts and other docu-
ments written on TTIVO-KIO. jcai

8 MEDIAEVAL WAXED TABLETS [CHAR I.

Liber vitae of Durham, is now preserved in the British
Museum; Cotton manuscripts, Domit. 7. 2.

For many other purposes, both ecclesiastical and secular,
the classical waxed tablets were used in England and on the
Continent, especially for lists of names, as for example in
great Cathedral or Abbey churches the list for the week of
the various priests who were appointed to celebrate each
mass at each of the numerous altars.

List of The British Museum possesses a very interesting late

guild- example of a waxed tablet which in shape, size and general

members. * r

appearance is exactly like the Roman pugillares. This is an
oak tablet, about 20 inches long by 10 inches wide, covered
with a thin layer of wax protected by the usual slightly
raised margin about half an inch wide. Along one edge are
three holes with leather loops to form the hinges ; the other
leaf is lost. On the wax is inscribed a list of the names of the
members of a Flemish guild ; each name is still as sharp and
legible as the day it was written. The form of the writing
shows that it belongs to the end of the fifteenth century.
Such tablets were used both by the trade guilds of the middle
ages and by the religious guilds formed for the cult of some
special Saint.

Wooden The most interesting mediaeval example of the classical

form of manuscript made up of several leaves of waxed tablets
was found a few years ago in a blocked-up recess in the old
wooden church at Hopperstad in Norway. It was enclosed
in a casket of wood covered with leather, and thus it still
remains in a very perfect state of preservation ; it is now in
the University Museum at Christiania. The book consists of
six tablets of box-wood, coated with wax within the usual
raised margin, and hinged with leather thongs. The outer
leaves are decorated on the back with carving mixed with
inlay of different coloured woods.

Bestiary. The manuscript itself which is written on the wax is a

Bestiary, dating, as its style shows, from the latter part of the
thirteenth century, though the book itself is probably older.
It contains lists of animals in Latin with a Norwegian
translation, and it is copiously illustrated with drawings of

CHAP. I.]

AND IVORY TABLETS.

scenes from agricultural and domestic life, executed in fine
outline on the wax with a sharply pointed stilus. In every
detail, except of course in the character of the writing and
drawings, this book exactly resembles an ancient Greek or
Roman many-leaved wooden book, 7ro\v7rTv%ov, a very
striking example of the unaltered survival of ancient methods
for an extraordinarily long period.

During the mediaeval period, sets of ivory tablets hinged
together were frequently made for devotional purposes.
This form of manuscript has no layer of wax, but the
writing is executed with a pen on the thin smooth leaf
of ivory. Each leaf has its margin raised, like the ancient
pugillares, to prevent the two adjacent surfaces from rubbing
together.

These ivory tablets usually contain a set of short prayers,
and they are frequently illustrated with painted miniatures of
sacred subjects exactly like those in the vellum manuscripts
of the same date.

The South Kensington Museum possesses a very beautiful
example of these ivory books ; it is of Northern French
workmanship dating from about the middle of the fourteenth
century. It consists of eight leaves of ivory, measuring 4^
inches by 2| inches in width. The six inner pages are
extremely thin, no thicker than stout paper, and have paintings
on both sides, the two covers are of thicker substance, about a
quarter of an inch, and are decorated on the outside with
beautiful carved reliefs.

This remarkable work of art has on the inner leaves
fourteen very delicately executed miniatures of sacred subjects,
single figures of Saints and scenes from Christ's Passion,
painted in gold and colours in the finest style of French
fourteenth century art, evidently executed by some very
skilful illuminator.

Tablets like this with as many as eight ivory leaves are
rare, but a very large number of beautiful ivory diptychs still
exist, with carved reliefs on the outside of very graceful style
and delicate execution. "Most of these diptychs date from
the fourteenth century, and are of French workmanship, but

Ivory
tablets.

Tablet

witli eight
leaves.

Ivory
diptychs.

10 LEAD PLATES AND HORN-BOOKS. [CHAP. I.

they were also produced in England at the same time and of
quite equal merit in design and execution.

Inscribed Manuscripts on lead plates, like those of the ancient Greeks,

lead tablet. were occasionally used in mediaeval times.

A single lead leaf of an Anglo-Saxon manuscript from
Lord Londesborough's collection is illustrated in Arc/iaeologia,
Vol. XXXIV, Plate 36, page 438. This leaf measures 6
inches by 5 inches in width. On it is incised with a stilus in
fine bold semi- uncial writing the beginning of Aelfric's preface
to his first collection of Homilies, which in modern English
runs thus : " I, Aelfric, monk and mass-priest, was sent in
King Aethelred's time from Aelfeage the Bishop, the
successor of Aethelwold, to a certain minster which is called
Cernel, &c." At the top of the page there is a heading in
large Runic characters. Aelfric was sent by Aelfeage Bishop
of Winchester to be Abbot of Cerne in 988 or 989, and this
interesting page appears to be of contemporary date. It was
found by a labourer while digging in the precincts of the
Abbey of Bury St Edmunds. Along one edge of the leaden
page there are three holes to receive the loops which hinged
the plates together, but the other leaves were not found.
Horn- Horn-books. One form of wooden tablet continued in use,

especially in boys' schools, till the sixteenth century. This was
a wooden board, rather smaller than an ordinary school-boy's
slate, with a long handle at the bottom ; on it was fixed a sheet
of vellum or paper on which was written or (in the latest
examples) printed the Alphabet, the Creed, the Lord's Prayer
or such like. Over this a thin sheet of transparent horn was
nailed, whence these tablets were often called <: horn-books."
A good example dating from the sixteenth century is now
preserved in the Bodleian library at Oxford.

1 1

CHAPTER II.

CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS WRITTEN WITH PEN AND INK.

To return now to classical forms of manuscripts, it appears
to have been a long time before the book or codex form of
manuscript was extended from the wood and ivory tablets to
writings on parchment or paper.

It seems probable that throughout the Greek period manu-
scripts on paper or vellum were usually, if not always, in the
shape of a long roll ; and that it was not till about the begin- L
ning of the Roman Empire that leaves of parchment or paper J^
were sometimes cut up into pages and bound together in the -
form of the older tablets. During the first two or three cen-
turies of the Empire, manuscripts were produced in both of
these forms the codex and the volumen; but the roll form was
by far the commoner, almost till the transference of the seat
of government to Byzantium.

The roll form of book is the one shown in many of
the wall paintings of Pompeii ; but on some sarcophagi reliefs
of the second century A.D. books both of the roll and the codex
shape are represented 1 .

Having given some account of the various classical forms
of manuscript in which the writing is incised with a sharp
stilus, we will now pass on to the other chief forms of manu-
script which were written with a pen and with ink or other
pigment.

1 See, for example, a relief on the sarcophagus of a scriba librarius or library
curator which is illustrated by Daremberg and Saglio, Diet. Ant. I. p. 708. The
scribe is represented seated by his book-case arinariuin, on the shelves of which
both voluinina and codices are shown.

The roll

form of

MS.

7 'he codex
form ,

Writing

with a

pen.

THE RITUAL OF THE DEAD.

[CHAP. II.

Books of
the dead.

Egyptian
psalter.

Use of
\J papyrus.

Manuscripts on papyrus ; the oldest existing examples of
this class are the so-called Rituals of the Dead found in the
tombs of Egypt, especially in those of the Theban dynasties ;
the oldest of these date as far back as the sixteenth or fifteenth
century B.C. 1

They are executed with a reed pen in hieroglyphic writing
on long rolls of papyrus, and are copiously illuminated with
painted miniatures illustrating the subject of the text, drawn
with much spirit and coloured in a very finely decorative way.
Immense numbers of these Egyptian illuminated manuscripts
still exist in a more or less fragmentary condition. One of
the most perfect of these is the Book of the Dead of Ant,
a royal scribe, dating from the fourteenth century B.C., now in
the British Museum. An excellent facsimile of the whole of
this fine illuminated manuscript has been edited by Dr Budge
and published by the Trustees of the British Museum in 1890.

Manuscripts of this important class are not very accurately
described as Rituals of the Dead ; as Dr Budge points out they
really consist of collections of psalms 6r sacred hymns which
vary considerably in different manuscripts.

They appear to have been written in large numbers and
kept in stock by the Egyptian undertakers ready for pur-
chasers. Blank spaces were left for the name and titles of
the dead person for whom they were bought.

Thus we find that the names are often filled in carelessly
by another hand than that of the writer of the manuscript,
and some examples exist in which the spaces for the name are
still left blank.

Another of the finest and most complete of the funereal
papyri is preserved in the Museum in Turin ; see Pierret, Le
livre des Morts des anciens Egyptiens, Paris, 1882.

Papyrus seems to have been used for manuscripts more
than any other substance both by the Greeks from the sixth
century B.C. and by the Romans down to the time of the later
Empire. Some very valuable Greek manuscripts on papyrus
are preserved in the British Museum ; among them the most

1 The ancient method of manufacturing papyrus paper is described below, see
page IT..

CHAP. II.] EARLY GREEK MANUSCRIPTS. 13

important for their early date are some fragments of Homer's Existing
Iliad of the third or second century B.C. Another papyrus
manuscript in the same collection dating from the first century
B.C. contains four Orations of the Athenian Orator Hyperides,
a contemporary and rival of Demosthenes. In the last few
years the important discovery has been made that in certain
late tombs in Egypt, dating from the Roman period, the mum-
mied bodies are packed in their coffins with large quantities
of what was considered waste paper. This packing in some
cases has been found to consist of papyrus manuscripts, some
of which are of great importance. In this way the newly
discovered treatise by Aristotle on the Political Constitution
of Athens, and the Mimes of Herondas were saved from de-
struction by being used as inner wrappings for a coffin of
about the year 100 A.D. *

Other important manuscripts may yet be found, now that
careful search is being made in this direction.

Unfortunately the large library of manuscripts, consisting
of nearly 1800 papyrus rolls, which was discovered about the
middle of the last century in the lava-buried town of Hercu-
laneum, has not as yet been found to contain any works of
much value or interest. These rolls are all charred by the
heat of the lava, which overwhelmed the town, and the work
of unrolling and deciphering the brittle carbonized paper
necessarily goes on very slowly. The owner of this library
appears to have been an enthusiastic student of the Epicurean
philosophy in its later development, and his books are mainly
dull, pedantic treatises on the various sciences such as mathe-
matics, music and the like, treated from the Epicurean point
of view, or rather from that of the Graeco-Roman followers of
Epicurus.

All these manuscripts appear to be of about the same date,
not many years older, that is, than the year 79 A.D., when the
eruption of Vesuvius overwhelmed Herculaneum and Pompeii
in the same catastrophe. They are written in fine bold uncial

1 Some very interesting fragments of the Antiope of Euripides have been
brought to England by Mr Flinders Petrie, and have been edited by Dr Mahaffy
in a collection entitled The Flinders Petrie Papyri, Dublin, 1892.

14 MANUSCRIPTS ON PAPYRUS AND PARCHMENT. [CHAP. II.

Papyrus
rolls.

Herodotus
on MSS.

Use of
parchment.

Perga-
men a.

characters without illumination or ornament of any kind on
rolls of papyrus nine or ten inches in breadth. In their present
burnt and shrunken condition the rolls average about two
inches in diameter, but they were probably larger than that
in their original state ; see Palaeo. Soc. PI. 151, 152 ; the other
published 'facsimiles' of the Herculaneum manuscripts are
not perfectly trustworthy.

In the time of Herodotus (c. 460 >?) papyrus paper (/3t,/3\ia
or xdprai) 1 appears to have been used by the Greeks almost
to the exclusion of parchment or other kinds of skin. In his
interesting section on the introduction of the art of writing
into Greece by the Phoenicians, Herodotus (V. 58) remarks that
the lonians in old times used to call papyrus rolls Si<f)6epai or
"parchment" because they had once been in the habit of using
skins of sheep or goats for manuscripts, at a time when
papyrus paper was not to be had ; and, Herodotus goes on
to say, " Barbarians even now are accustomed to write their
manuscripts on parchment."

Manuscripts on parchment ; this old use of parchment for
manuscripts was again introduced among the Greeks by
Eumenes II., king of Pergamus from 197 to 159 B.C. At
this time men had forgotten that parchment had ever been
used for books, and so Varro, quoted by Pliny (Hist. Nat. XIII.
70), tells us that Eumenes invented this use of parchment ; the
real fact being that he re-introduced an old custom, and
stimulated the careful preparation of parchment for the sake
of the great library which he was anxious to make the most
important collection of manuscripts in the world.

Varro tells us that he was driven to this use of parchment
by the jealousy of the Egyptian King Ptolemy Epiphanes,
whose enormous library at Alexandria was the only existing
rival to the Pergamene collection. One of the Greek names
for parchment, Pergamena, was derived from the fact of its
being so largely made for the Pergamene Kings Eumenes
and Attalus, both of whom were not only great patrons of

1 The book-market in Athens was called -rd /Si/JXta, i.e. oC rd /3j/3\t'a wvta ;
see Pollux ix. 47. Lucian, in his treatise Adversus Indoclum, gives an interesting
account of the Greek book-buyers and book-sellers in his time ; see i and 4.

CHAP. II.] MANUSCRIPTS ON LINEN AND POTSHERDS. 15

literature and collectors of ancient manuscripts, but were also
enthusiastic buyers of pictures, statues, rich textiles and
works of art of every class. The other word for parchment
used for manuscripts is membrana.

Manuscripts on linen; in ancient Egypt hieroglyphic
manuscripts with sacred hymns and portions of the so-called
Ritual of the Dead were frequently written with a reed pen on
fine linen. These manuscripts, which are often found among
the mummy wrappings of burials under the Theban Dynasties,
are usually illustrated with pen drawings in outline, not painted
miniatures like those on the papyrus rolls. These drawings
are executed with much spirit and with a beautiful, clean,
certain touch.

The early Italian races, Latins, Samnites and others,
appear to have used linen very frequently for their manu-
script records and sacred books. Among the public records
mentioned by Livy as having once been preserved with the
Archives in the Capitoline Temple of Juno Moneta were some
of these early linen manuscripts (libri lintei} ; see Liv. IV. 7,
13, 20. Livy also (x. 38) describes an ancient manuscript,
containing an account of the ritual customs of the Samnites,
as a liber vetus linteus. In historic times, however, papyrus
and parchment appear to have superseded linen in ancient
Rome.

Ostraka Manuscripts. For ephemeral purposes, such as
tradesmen's accounts and other business matters, writing
was often done with a pen and ink on broken fragments of
pottery (oarpaica). An enormous number of these inscribed
potsherds, mostly dating from the Ptolemaic period, have
been found in Egypt, and especially on the little island of
Elephantine in the Nile a short distance below the first
cataract.

Among the Greeks too, writing on potsherds was very
common ; especially when the Athenian tribes met in the
Agora to record their votes for the exile of some unpopular
citizen, whence is derived the term ostracism (oo-rpa/aoyAo?).

The word liber as meaning a book is supposed to be derived
from a primitive custom of writing on the smooth inner bark

Linen
MSS.

Early

MSS. in

Italy.

Inscribed
potsherds.

MANUSCRIPTS ON LEAVES AND BARK. [CHAP. II.

MSS. on
leaves.

Greek
libraries.

Roman
libraries.

of some tree, such as the birch, which supplies a fine silky
substance, not at all unsuited for manuscripts.

The large broad leaves of some varieties of the palm tree
have also been used for manuscript purposes, more especially
among the inhabitants of India and Ceylon. In early times
the questions asked of the Oracle of the Pythian Apollo
at Delphi were said to have been written on leaves of the
laurel plant. Pali manuscripts in Ceylon are even now
frequently written on palm-leaves ; and we have the evidence
of Pliny that this custom once existed among some of the
ancient classical races: see Hist. Nat. XIII. 69, "Ante non
fuisse chartarum usum, in palmarum foliis primo scriptitatum ;
deinde quarundam arborum libris. Postea publica monumenta
plumbeis voluminibus, mox et privata linteis confici coepta
aut ceris. Pugillarium enim usum fuisse etiam ante Trojana
tempora invenimus apud Homerum." In this passage Pliny
gives a list of all the chief materials that had been used for
manuscripts in ancient times, the leaves and bark of trees,
plates of lead, linen clotJi and ^vaxed tablets, he then goes on to
describe at considerable length the methods of making paper
from the pith of the papyrus plant ; see page 22.

Ancient libraries ; among the Greeks and Romans of the
historic period books do nat appear to have been either rare
or costly as they were during the greater part of the mediaeval
period.

In the time of Alexander, the latter part of the fourth
century B.C., large libraries had already been formed by
wealthy lovers of literature, and in the second century B.C.
the rival libraries of Ptolemy Epiphanes at Alexandria and
of King Eumenes II. at Pergamus were said to have contained
between them nearly a million volumes.

Among the Romans of the Empire books were no less
common. The owner of the above mentioned library at
Herculaneum, consisting of nearly 1800 rolls or volumes,
does not appear to have been a man of exceptional wealth ;
his house was small and his surroundings simple in character.

As early as the reign of Augustus, Rome possessed
several large public libraries (bibliothecae). The first of these

CHAP. II.]

ROMAN LIBRARIES.

was instituted in 37 B.C. by Asinius Pollio both for Greek and
Latin manuscripts. The second was the Bibliotheca Octaviae
founded by Augustus in the Campus Martius in honour of his
sister. The third was the magnificent double library of
Apollo Palatinus, which Augustus built on the Palatine Hill.
The fourth, also on the Palatine, the BibliotJieca Tiberiana
was founded by Tiberius. The fifth was built by Vespasian
as part of the group of buildings in his new Forum Pads.
The sixth and largest of all was the double library, for Greek
and Latin books built by Trajan in his Forum close to the
Basilica Ulpia. To some extent a classification of subjects
was adopted in these great public libraries, one being mainly
legal, another for ancient history, a third for state papers and
modern records, but this classification appears to have been
only partially adhered to.

In addition to these state libraries, Rome also possessed a
large number of smaller " parish libraries" in the separate
vtct, and the total number, given in the Regionary catalogues
as existing in the time of Constantine, is enormous ; see
Seraud, Les livres dans I'antiquite.

With regard to the arrangement and fittings of Roman
libraries, the usual method appears to have been this. Cup-
boards (armaria), fitted with shelves to receive the rolls or
codices and closed by doors, were placed against the walls all
round the room. These armaria were usually rather low, not
more than from four to five feet in height, and on them were
placed busts of famous authors ; while the wall-space above
the bookcases was decorated with similar portrait reliefs or
paintings designed to fill panels or circular medallions.

Pliny (Hist. Nat. XXXV. 9), speaks of it being a new
fashion in his time to adorn the walls of libraries with ideal
portraits of ancient writers, such as Homer, executed in gold,
silver or bronze relief.

The public library of Asinius Pollio was, Pliny says,
decorated with portraits, but whether the great libraries of
Pergamus and Alexandria were ornamented in this way,
Pliny is unable to say. Magnificent medallion portraits in
gold and silver were fixed round the walls of the two great
M. c. M. 2

The great
libraries
of Rome.

Parish
libraries.

Library
fittings.

Library
decora-
tions.

ROMAN LIBRARIES AND

[CHAP. ii.

Recent dis-
covery.

Authors'
busts.

Closed
bookcases.

libraries of Apollo on the Palatine Hill, and probably in the
other still larger public libraries which were founded by
subsequent Emperors.

The ordinary private libraries of Rome were decorated in
a similar way, but with reliefs of less costly materials. A
very interesting example of this has recently been discovered
and then destroyed on the Esquiline hill in Rome. The
house in which this library was discovered was one of no very
exceptional size or splendour. The bibliotJieca itself consisted
of a handsome room ; the lower part of its walls, against
which the armaria fitted, was left quite plain. Above that
the walls were divided into square panels by small fluted
pilasters, and in the centre of each space there was, or had
been, a medallion relief-portrait about two feet in diameter
enclosed in a moulded frame. All this was executed in fine,
hard marble-dust stucco (opus albarium or marmoreum).

The names of the authors whose portraits had filled the
medallions were written in red upon the frames. Only one
was legible APOLLONIVS THYAN...No doubt the works of
Apollonius of Thyana were kept in the armarium below the
bust.

The library at Herculaneum, which contained the famous
papyrus rolls, was a much smaller room. Besides the book-
cases all round the walls, it had also an isolated armarium in
the centre of the room ; and this, no doubt, was a usual
arrangement.

The room at Herculaneum was so small that there can
only have been just enough space to walk between the
central bookcase and the armaria ranged all round against
the wall.

As the Comm. Lanciani has pointed out {Ancient Rome,
p. 195), it is interesting to note that the ancient Roman
method of arranging books in low, closed cupboards is still
preserved in the great library of the Vatican in Rome ; which
is unlike most existing libraries in the fact that on first
entering no one would guess that it was a library, not a single
book being visible.

Of the ancient armaria themselves no example now

CHAP. II.]

ROMAN BOOKSELLERS.

exists. They were of wood, and therefore, of course, perish-
able. But we may, I think, argue from analogy, that the
doors of the cupboards were richly ornamented with painted
decorations, thus forming an elaborate dado or podium below
the row of portrait reliefs which occupied the upper part of
the walls.

The principal quarter in Rome for the shops of booksellers
(bibliopolae or librarii} appears to have been the Argiletum,
which (in Imperial times) was an important street running
into the Forum Romanum between the Curia and the Basilica
Aemilia; see Mart. I. 3, n/ 1 .

For ancient manuscripts or autograph works of famous
authors large prices were often paid. Aristotle is said to
have given three talents (about ^750) for an autograph
manuscript of Speusippus, and a manuscript of Virgil's second
book of the Aeneid, thought to be the author's own copy, sold
for twenty aurei, more than 20 in modern value ; see Aul.
Gell. ill. 17, and n. 3.

But ordinary copies of newly published works, even by
popular authors, appear to have been but little more expen-
sive than books of this class are at the present day. The
publisher and bookseller Tryphon could sell Martial's first
book of Epigrams at a profit for two denarii barely two
shillings in modern value; see Mart. xill. 3. It may seem
strange that written manuscripts should not have been much
more costly than printed books, but when one considers how
they were produced the reason is evident. Atticus, the Sosii
and other chief publishers of Rome owned a large number of
slaves who were trained to be neat and rapid scribes. Fifty
or a hundred of these slaves could write from the dictation of
one reader, and thus a small edition of a new volume of
Horace's Odes or Martial's Epigrams could be produced with
great rapidity and at very small cost 2 .

Little capital would be required for the education of the

1 The end of the Argiletum is shown in the plan of the Forum Romanum in
Middleton. Ancient Rome, 1892, Vol. I.

2 One reason of this was that even the most popular authors did not receive
large sums for the copyright of their works.

2 2

Book-
sellers'
quarter.

Cost of
neio books.

Slave
scribes.

20 ROMAN BOOKSELLERS. THE TECHNIQUE [CHAP. II.

slave-scribes, and when once they were taught, the cost of
their labour would be little more than the small amount of
food which was necessary to keep them alive and in working
order.

Cicero (Att. II. 4) speaks of the publisher Atticus selling
manuscripts produced in this way by slave labour on a large
scale.

Librarii. The name librarius was given not only to the booksellers,

but also to slave librarians, and to scribes, the latter being
sometimes distinguished by the name scriptores librarii.
Librarii antiquarii were writers who were specially skilled in
copying ancient manuscripts. The word scriba commonly
denotes a secretary rather than what we should now call a
scribe.

In Athens a class of booksellers, fii/3\ioypd<j>ot, appears to
have existed as early as the fifth century B.C. ; see Poll. VII.
211. The name /StySXtoTrcwXat was subsequently used, and
adopted by the Romans.

Parchment

and
vellum.

THE TECHNIQUE OF ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS 1 .

Parchment. With regard to the preparation of parchment
and other kinds of skin for writing on (Pergamena and Mem-
brana) there is little to be said. The skins of many different
animals have been used for this purpose both in classical and
mediaeval times, especially skins of calves, sheep, goats and
pigs. Unlike manuscripts on papyrus, parchment or vellum z
manuscripts were usually covered with writing on both sides,
since the ink does not show through from one side to the
other, as it is liable to do on the more absorbent and spongy

1 A good deal of what is said in this section with regard to the technique of
classical manuscripts will apply also to manuscripts of the mediaeval period.
Many of the processes had been inherited in an unbroken tradition from ancient
times, and others were revived in the Middle Ages through a study of various
classical writers on pigments and the like, especially Pliny and Vitruvius.

2 The words parchment and vellum are used vaguely to imply many different
kinds of skins. Strictly speaking vellum implies calf-skin, but the word is com-
monly used to denote the finer and smoother qualities of skin ; the name parchment
being given to the coarse varieties ; see Peignot, L'histoire du parchemin, Paris,
1812.

CHAP. II.] OF CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS.

Palimp-
sests.

papyrus paper. For this reason complete or partial erasures Erasures.

were much easier to execute on vellum than on papyrus.

The writing was first sponged so as to remove the surface ink,

and the traces that still remained were got rid of by rubbing

the surface of the vellum with pumice stone. In some cases

the manuscript was erased from the whole of a vellum codex

or roll, and the cleaned surface then used to receive fresh

writing.

Palimpsests ; manuscripts of this class, on twice-used
vellum, were called palimpsests (-TraTu'/x^crTcx?) ; see Cic. Fam.
vii. 1 8. Several important texts, such as the legal work of
Gaius, have been recovered by laboriously deciphering the not
wholly obliterated writing on these palimpsests. During the
early mediaeval period, when classical learning was little
valued, many a dull treatise of the schoolmen or other
theological work of small interest was written over the
obliterated text of some much earlier and more valuable
classical author.

In some cases it appears that papyrus manuscripts were
made into palimpsests, but probably not very often, as it
would be difficult to erase the ink on a roll of papyrus with-
out seriously injuring the surface of the paper.

Moreover as papyrus manuscripts were only written on
one side of the paper, the back was free to receive new
writing without any necessity to rub out the original text.
The recently discovered treatise by Aristotle on the Political
Constitution of Athens has some monetary accounts written
on the back of the papyrus by some unphilosophical man of
business not many years later than the date of the original
treatise.

Papyrus paper. The ancient methods employed in the
preparation of papyrus paper (chartd) can be clearly made
out by the evidence of existing examples aided by the minute
but not wholly accurate description given by Pliny, -Hist.
Nat. XIII. 71 to 83.

The papyrus plant, the Cyperus Papyrus of Linnaeus,
(Greek /3v/3Xo?) is a very tall, handsome variety of reed which
grows in marshes and shallows along the sides of streams of

Papyrus
MSS.

Papyrus
paper.

22 THE MANUFACTURE OF [CHAP. II.

Papyrus water. The plant has at the top a very graceful tufted bunch
of foliage ; its stem averages from three to four inches in
diameter, and the total height of the plant is from ten to
twelve feet.

It grows in many places in Syria, in the Euphrates valley
and in Nubia. In Egypt itself it is now extinct, but it was
abundant there in ancient times, especially in the Delta of
the Nile.

The only spot in Europe where the papyrus plant grows
in a wild state is near Syracuse in the little river Anapus,
where it was probably introduced by the Arab conquerors in
the eighth or ninth century A.D.

It grows here in great abundance and sometimes nearly
blocks up the stream so that a boat can scarcely get along.

The stem of the papyrus consists of a soft, white, spongy
or cellular pith surrounded by a thin, smooth, green rind.
Papyrus paper (fttfSXla or X"P rr )^ was wholly made from the
cellular pith. The method of manufacture was as follows.
Process The long stem of the plant was first cut up into convenient

facture pi eces f a ft or more in length ; the pith in each piece was
then very carefully and evenly cut with a sharp knife into
thin slices. These slices were then laid side by side, their
edges touching but not overlapping, on the smooth surface of
a wooden table which was slightly inclined to let the super-
fluous sap run off, as it was squeezed out of the slices of pith
by gentle blows from a smooth wooden mallet. When by
repeated beating the layer of pith had been hammered down
to a thinner substance, and a great deal of the sap had drained
off, some fine paste made of wheat-flour was carefully brushed
over the whole surface of the pith. A second layer of slices
of pith, previously prepared by beating, was then laid cross-
wise on the first layer made adhesive by the paste, so that
the slices in the second layer were at right angles to those of
the first. The beating process was then repeated, the work-
men being careful to get rid of all lumps or inequalities, and
the beating was continued till the various slices of pith in the
two layers were thoroughly united and amalgamated together.

For the best sort of papyrus these processes were repeated

CHAP. II.]

PAPYRUS PAPER.

Sizes of
papyrus.

a third and sometimes even a fourth time, the separate slices in
each layer being cut much thinner than in the coarser sorts of
paper which consisted of two layers only. The next process
was to dry and press the paper ; after which its surface was
carefully smoothed and polished with an ivory burnisher 1 ; its
rough edges were trimmed, and it was then ready to be made
up into sheets or rolls. There was nothing in the method of
manufacture to limit strictly the size of the papyrus sheets
(o-eAi'Ses, paginae) either in breadth or length ; the workmen
could lay side by side as many slices of the pith as he liked,
and slices of great length might have been cut out of the long
stem of the papyrus. Practically, however, it was found
convenient to make the paper in rather small sheets ; twelve
to sixteen inches are the usual widths of papyrus manuscripts.

The reason of this obviously was that it would have been
impossible to cut slices of great length to the requisite
thinness and evenness of substance, and so papyrus manu-
scripts are always made up of a large number of separate
sheets carefully pasted together. This was very skilfully done
by workmen who (in Pliny's time) were called glutinatores ;
cf. Cic. Att. IV. 4. The two adjacent edges of the sheets,
which were to be joined together by lapping, were thinned
down by careful rubbing to about half their original substance.
The two laps were then brushed over with paste, accurately
applied together, and the union was then completed by
beating with the wooden mallet. When the pasted joint was
dry it was rubbed and polished with the ivory burnisher till
scarcely any mark of the joining remained. In this way long Long rolls
rolls were formed, often fifty feet or more in length ; as a rule,
however, excessive length for a single roll was inconvenient.
Pliny mentions 20 sheets as being an ordinary limit. Thus,
for example, in such works as Homer's Iliad or Virgil's
Aeneid, each book would form a separate vo lumen or roll
(Greek tcv\ivSpo<; or ro/io<?).

The invention of papyrus paper dates from an early
period in the history of Egypt. Examples still exist which

1 In some cases the paper was sized, before the final smoothing ; but as a rule
sufficient size was supplied by the flour used to paste the layers together.

Union of
the sheets.

24 PAPYRUS IN GREECE AND ROME. [CHAP. II.

are as early as 2300 B.C., and its manufacture was probably
known long before that.

Papyrus In later times Egyptian papyrus was an important article

of ex P ort mto many countries. An Attic inscription of the
year 407 B.C. tells us what the cost of paper then was in
Athens ; two sheets (-^dprai Bvo) cost two drachmae and four
obols, equal in modern value to about four shillings ; see
C. I. A. I. 324. The xdpraL in this case probably mean, not a
single page, but several sheets pasted together to form a roll.
In Pliny's time paper was made not only in Egypt but

'"KOU" also in Rome and at other places in Italy 1 . The best kind
was formerly called Hieratica, because it was used in Egypt
for sacred hieroglyphic writing only. In later times this
finest quality, in Rome at least, was called Augusta, and the
second quality Liviana, from Li via the wife of Augustus. A
coarse variety used for wrapping up parcels and the like was
called "shop-paper," emporetica. Pliny also tells us that
paper was manufactured of many different breadths, varying
from about four to eighteen inches. The commonest width
was about twelve inches; see Pliny, Hist. Nat. XIII. 71 to 83.
Old In the last of these paragraphs Pliny mentions examples of

MSS. on , j . . . .. . , .

papyrus. '- papyrus manuscripts existing in his time, such as manu-
scripts in the handwriting of Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus,
which were nearly two centuries old. Manuscripts written by
Cicero, Augustus and Virgil are, he says, still frequently to
be seen.

With regard to the antiquity of paper Pliny's views are far
from correct. He thinks paper was first made in Egypt in
the time of Alexander the Great (Hist. Nat. XIII. 79), whereas,
as is mentioned above, papyrus paper of fine quality was
certainly made in Egypt nearly 2000 years before the time of
Alexander, and probably much earlier.

The best kinds of papyrus paper are close in texture, with

1 Some of the enormous ranges of store-houses for goods imported into Rome
and landed on the Tiber quay were specially devoted to the use of paper ware-
houses, horrea chartaria ; extensive remains of these have recently been discovered
near Monte Testaccio; see Middleton, Remains of Ancient Rome, 1892, Vol. II.
pp. 260 262.

CHAP. II.]

PAPER OF GOOD QUALITY.

a smooth surface, very pleasant to write upon with a reed
pen, and adapted to receive miniature paintings of great
refinement and delicacy of touch. To prevent the ink
spreading or soaking into the paper, it was as a final process
sometimes soaked in size made of fish-bones or gum and
water, exactly as modern linen paper is sized. The colour of
the papyrus is a pale brown, very pleasant to the eye, and
excellent as a background to the painted decorations.

When it was first made, papyrus paper must have been
extremely durable and tough owing to its compound structure
with two or more fibrous layers placed cross-wise. The
parallel fibrous lines of the pith are very visible on the
surface of papyrus paper ; and these regular lines served as a
guide to the scribe when writing, so that when papyrus was
used it was not necessary to cover the page with ruled lines
to keep the writing even, as had to be done when the
manuscript was on vellum.

In a papyrus manuscript the pages of writing are set side
by side, across the roll, with a small margin between each
page or column.

A small terra-cotta statuette 1 of about the fifth or fourth
century B.C. found at Salamis in Cyprus in 1890, shows a
Greek scribe writing on a long papyrus roll placed on a low
table before which he is sitting.

Among Greek vase paintings of the same date a not
uncommon subject is the poetess Sappho reading from a
papyrus roll. A fourth century vase with this subject in the
Central Museum in Athens shows Sappho holding a manu-
script on which the following words are inscribed (supplying
missing letters and correcting blunders)

EOI HEPIflN EHEON EPXOMAI
AITEAO2 NEHN TMNHN.

By the figure of Sappho is inscribed the beginning of her
name, SAP in letters of archaistic form.

A very similar design occurs on a beautiful gem in the
British Museum (B.M. Cat. of gems, No. 556), which appears
to date from the latter part of the fifth century B.C. A very

1 Now in the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Paper of

fine
quality.

Fibrous
texttire.

Greek

examples

of papyrus

rolls.

PAPYRUS MANUSCRIPTS AND [CHAP. II.

Sappho
reading.

Umbilicus
or roller.

Inscribed
titles.

graceful female figure, probably meant for Sappho, is repre-
sented seated on a chair with high curved back. She is
reading from a manuscript roll which she holds by the two
rolled up ends, holding one in each hand.

This method of holding a papyrus manuscript is shown
very clearly on a vase in the British Museum on which the
same motive is painted. The lady (Sappho) holds the two
rolled up portions of the manuscript, stretching tight the
intermediate portion on which is the column of writing which
she is reading.

As the reader progressed the paper was unrolled from the
roll held in the right hand, and the part just read was rolled
up in the left-hand roll. These Greek representations do not
usually show any stick or roller for the manuscript to be
rolled round ; but in Roman times a wooden or ivory roller
(o,u$aXo9, umbilicus) was used as the core of the roll ; and the
end of the long strip of papyrus by the last page or column
of text was pasted on to it. The ends of the umbilicus
were often fitted with a round knob or boss, which was
decorated with gilding or colour. The edges of the papyrus
roll were smoothed with pumice-stone (pumice mundus)> and
the whole manuscript was often provided with a vellum case,
which was stained a bright colour, red, purple or yellow.
Tibullus (El. in. i. 9) alludes to these ornamental methods,
Lutea sed niveum involvat membrana libellum.
Pumex et canas tondeat ante comas ;

Atque inter geminas pingantur cornua f routes.

The /rentes are the edges of the roll, and the cornua are
the projecting portions of the two wooden rollers.

The title of the manuscript was written on a ticket or slip
of vellum, which hung down from the closed roll like the
pendant seal of a mediaeval document. Thus when a number
of manuscripts were piled on the shelf of an armarium the
pendants hanging down from the ends of the rolls indicated
plainly what the books were, without the necessity of pulling
them from their place.

Small numbers of rolls, especially manuscripts which had

CHAP. II.]

METHODS OF ORNAMENT.

Coloured
inks.

Use of oil.

to be carried about, were often kept in round drum-like boxes
(capsae or scrinia), with loop handles to carry them by.

Much of the beauty of an ancient manuscript depended on
the use of red or purple ink for headings, indices and marginal
glosses. As Pliny says (Hist. Nat. xxxili. 122) minium in
voluminum quoque scriptura usurpatur.

The use of purple ink for the index is mentioned by
Martial in his epigram Ad librum snum (ill. 2) where he
sums up the various methods of decoration which in his time
were applied to manuscripts,

Cedro mine licet ambules perunctus,

Et frontis gemino decens honor e

Pictis luxurieris umbilicis ;

Et te purpura delicata velet,

Et cocco rubeat superbus index.

The oil of cedar wood, mentioned in the first of these
lines, was smeared over the back of papyrus manuscripts
to preserve them from book-worms.

The act of unrolling a manuscript to read it was called
explicare, and when the reader had come to the end it was
opus explicitnm. In mediaeval times from the false analogy
of the word (hie) incipit, a verb explicit was invented, and was
often written at the end of codices to show that the manuscript
was complete to the end, though, strictly speaking the word is
only applicable to a roll.

The use of papyrus paper for manuscripts to some extent
continued till mediaeval times. Papyrus manuscripts of the
sixth and seventh century A.D. are not uncommon, and, long
after vellum had superseded papyrus paper for the writing
of books, short documents, such as letters, Papal deeds and
the like, were still frequently written on papyrus. Papal
Briefs on papyrus still exist which were written as late as the
eleventh century.

The black ink which was used for classical manuscripts Black ink.
was of the kind now known as " Indian" or more correctly
" Chinese ink," which cannot be kept in a fluid state, but has
to be rubbed up with water from day to day as it is required.
One of the menial offices which Aeschines when a boy had to

Mediaeval

use of
papyrus.

BLACK AND RED INK

[CHAP. II.

Carbon
ink.

Black
pigment.

Red inks.

perform in his father's school was " rubbing the ink," TO
TpijBwv; see Demos. De Corona, p. 313. This kind of ink
(fi\av or fieXdviov, atramentum librarium) simply consists of
finely divided particles of carbon, mixed with gum or with
size made by boiling down shreds of parchment. It was
obtained by burning a resinous substance and collecting the
soot on a cold flat surface, from which it could afterwards
be scraped off. The soot had then to be very finely ground,
mixed with a gummy medium and then moulded into shape
and dried. The process is described by Pliny, Hist. Nat.
XXXV. 41 ; and better still by Vitruvius, VII. 10.

A variety of this carbon pigment used for pictures on
stucco by wall-painters was called atramentum tectorium,
modern " lamp-black " ; the only difference between this and
writing ink was in the kind of glutinous medium used with it.
Careful scribes probably prepared their own ink, as the
writers of mediaeval manuscripts usually did. The commo"h
commercial black ink of about 300 A.D. was sold at a very
cheap rate, as is recorded in an inscription containing part of
Diocletian's famous edict which was found at Megalopolis
and published by Mr Loring (Jour. Hell. Stud. Vol. XI., 1890,
p. 318, line 46). Under the heading "Pens and ink," Hepl
KaXdfjbwv KOI /ji\avlov, the price of ink, (j,\dviov, is fixed at 12
small copper coins the pound.

Very great skill is required to prepare carbon ink of the
finest quality. Though it is now largely manufactured in
Europe, none but the Chinese can make ink of the best sort.

In some places sepia ink from the cuttle-fish was used in
ancient times ; see Persius, Sat. III. 12; and cf. Pliny, Hist.
Nat. XI. 8, and XXXII. 141.

The red ink used for ancient manuscripts was of three
different kinds, namely red lead, vermilion or sulphuret of
mercury, and red ochre. The ancient names for these red
pigments were used very indiscriminately, /u'Xro?, minium,
cinnabaris and rubrica. In some cases /uXro? certainly means
the costly vermilion ; and again the word is also used both
for red lead and for the much cheaper red ochre. The latter
appears to be always meant by the name ytttXro? 'ZtvooTris ; see

CHAP. II.]

AND INKSTANDS.

2 9

Purple
ink.

Double
inkstands.

Choisy, Inscrip. Lebadeia, p. 197. The Latin words minium
and rubrica are used in the same vague way ; see Vitruv. VII.
9; and Pliny, Hist. Nat. XXXV. 31 to 35.

In mediaeval manuscripts red ink (rubrica) was largely
used not only for headings and glosses, but also in Service
books for the ritual directions, which have hence taken the
name of rubrics.

The purple ink (coccus), which Martial mentions in the
passage quoted above at page 27, was made from the kermes
beetle, which lives on the ilex trees of Greece and Asia Minor.
This was one of the most important of the ancient dyes for
woven stuffs and it was also used as a pigment by painters;
see below, page 246.

The inkstands of ancient scribes were commonly made
double, to hold both black and red ink. Many examples
of these from Egypt and elsewhere still exist, and they are
shown in many of the Pompeian wall-paintings. They
usually are in the form of two bronze cylinders linked
together, each with a lid which is attached by a little chain.
Other inkstands are single, little round boxes of bronze, in
shape like a large pill-box. Another method, specially com-
mon in ancient Egypt, was for the scribe to carry about his
ink, both black and red, in a solid form ; he then rubbed up
with water just as much as he needed at the time. The box
and palette mentioned below was made for this use of solid
inks, except that the whole thing, handle and all, is made out
of one piece of metal.

The pens used by ancient writers of manuscripts were Reed pens
mainly some variety of reed (aXa/io<?, calamus or cannd), cut
diagonally to a point like a modern quill pen. Great numbers
of reed pens have been found in Egyptian tombs and also in
Pompeii ; they exactly resemble those still used in Egypt
and in Oriental countries generally.

Metal pens were also used by Greek and Roman scribes.
Examples both in silver and bronze have been found in Greece
and in Italy, shaped very much like a modern steel pen 1 .

1 A silver pen was found by Dr Waldstein in 1891 in the tomb of the Aristotle
family at Chalcis.

Metal
pens.

PENS AND PEN-CASES.

[CHAP. ii.

Scribes'
palettes.

Pen-cases.

Reed pens.

In some cases manuscripts were written with a fine brush
instead of a pen, especially the hieroglyphic manuscripts of
ancient Egypt. Many combined scribes' palettes and brush
cases have been found in Egyptian tombs. These are long
slips of wood, partly hollowed to hold the brushes, and with
two cup-like sinkings at one end for the writer to rub up his
cakes of black and red ink.

In Egyptian manuscripts red ink is used much more
copiously than either in Greek or Latin manuscripts. Very
often the scribe writes his columns alternately in black and
red for the sake of the decorative appearance of the page.

Egyptian pen-cases in the form of a bronze tube about
f inch in diameter and 10 inches long with a tightly fitting cap
have frequently been found. The British Museum possesses
good examples of these, and of the other writing implements
here described.

The above-mentioned passage in the Edict of Diocletian
(see page 28) gives the prices of reed pens (/caXa/^ot) of
various qualities. The difference is very great between the
best and the inferior kinds of pens ; the best quality appears
to have been made from the long single joint of a reed.

There is no evidence that quill pens were used in classical
times, but it is difficult to believe that so natural an expedient
never occurred to any ancient scribe, especially when the use
of vellum for manuscripts came in ; for papyrus paper the
softer reed pen would be more convenient than a quill, and
indeed for all the earlier sort of Greek and Latin writing in
large uncial characters. It is only for the smaller cursive
writing that a quill would be as suitable as a reed pen.

The inscription mentioned at p. 24 as giving the cost of
paper in Athens in 407 B.C. is part of a record of the expenses
of building the Erechtheum. It also mentions the purchase
for 4 drachmae of 4 wooden writing-tablets, %dpTai, ecwijffrja-av

Bvo, e<? a? ra dvriypa(f)a eveypd-^ra^ev hHIII

hhhh

CHAPTER III.

CLASSICAL ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS.

THE mediaeval phrase illuminated manuscript means a Illumina-
manuscript which is " lighted up " with coloured decoration
in the form of ornamental initial-letters or painted miniatures.
Dante speaks of " The art which in Paris is called illumi-
nating,"

quell 1 arte

Che alluminare e chiamata in Parisi ; Purg. XI. 80.

The important use that was made of red paint (minium) Use of
in the decoration of manuscripts led to the painter being
called a miniator, whence the pictures that he executed in
manuscripts were called miniature or miniatures. Finally
the word miniature was extended in meaning to imply
any painting on a minute scale 1 . Originally, however, it
was only applied to the painted decorations of manuscripts.

The Egyptian manuscript " Books of the Dead " are Egyptian
very copiously illuminated with painted miniatures, both in '""res'
the form of ornamental borders along the edge of the
papyrus, and also with larger compositions which Occupy
the whole depth of the roll.

It is difficult to say to what extent illuminated manu-
scripts were known to the ancient Greeks, but they were
certainly not uncommon in Rome towards the close of the
Republic ; and it may fairly be assumed that it was from
the Greeks that the very inartistic Romans derived the
custom of decorating manuscripts with painted miniatures.

1 There is, of course, no etymological connection between the words miniature
and minute; the latter being derived from the Latin minutus, minus.

32 ILLUMINATIONS IN CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS. [CHAP. III.

Illustra-
tions in
Roman
MSS.

Writing
in gold.

Greek
minia-
tures.

Two

sources of
knowledge.

Pliny tells us (Hist. Nat. XXXV. 11) that a number of
manuscripts in the library of M. Varro in the first century
B.C. contained no less than 700 portraits of illustrious per-
sonages.

That the original manuscript of Vitruvius' work on
Architecture was illustrated with explanatory pictures is
shown by the frequent reference in the text to these lost
illustrations which are mentioned as being at the end of
the work; e.g. see III., Praef., 4.

A manuscript written in letters of gold is mentioned by
Suetonius (Nero, 10)'; this was a copy of Nero's own poem
which was publicly read aloud to an audience on the Capitol,
and was then deposited in the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.

Again, two centuries later the mother of Maximus, who
was titular Caesar from 235 to 238 A.D., is said to have given
him a manuscript of Homer's poems written in gold letters
on purple vellum ; see Jul. Capit, Max. Vita.

There is, in short, abundant evidence to show that illu-
minated manuscripts were common among the Romans of
the Imperial period ; and there is a very strong probability
that manuscripts decorated with miniatures were no less
frequent in the great libraries of the Ptolemies and of the
Attalid kings, in fact throughout the Greek world from the
time of Alexander the Great downwards, if not earlier still.

Some notion of the great beauty of the illustrations in
Greek manuscripts may perhaps be gathered from an exami-
nation of the masterly and delicately graceful drawings incised
in outline which decorate the finest of the Greek bronze cistae.
Nothing could surpass the perfect beauty of the outline en-
gravings on the so-called Ficoronian cista, which is now
preserved in the Museo del Collegio Romano in Rome. Part
of this series representing scenes from the adventures of the
Argonauts is shown on fig. I.

With regard to the general scheme of decoration in
classical manuscripts, we have the evidence of a few existing
examples dating from about the time of Constantine, and
also a large number of copies of Roman manuscript-pictures
of earlier date than the third century A.D., which are to be

CHAP. III.]

GREEK DRAWING.

seen in various Italian and Byzantine manuscripts of the
eleventh and twelfth centuries.

Fig. i. Part of the drawing engraved on the bronze cisla of Ficoroni, dating
from the early part of the fourth century B.C. A beautiful example of Greek
drawing.

The evidence derived from these two sources leads to
the conclusion that as a rule the illuminations in classical
manuscripts were treated as separate pictures, each sur-
rounded with a simple painted frame, and not closely linked
to the text in the characteristic mediaeval fashion. The
mediaeval method, by often introducing miniature paintings
within the boundary of large initial letters, and by surround-
ing the page with borders of foliage which grow out of the
M. c. M. 3

Isolated
pictures.

MINIATURES FROM THE ILIAD [CHAP. III.

Mediaeval
method.

Iliad of
the 4th
century.

Older
Greek
style.

chief initials of the text, makes the decoration an essential
part of the whole and creates a close union between the
literary and the ornamental parts of the book, which is
very unlike the usual ancient system of having a plainly
written text with isolated miniature paintings introduced
at intervals throughout the pages of the book.

Manuscript of the Iliad at Milan ; of all existing Greek
or Latin manuscripts none gives a better notion of the style
of illuminations used in manuscripts of the best Graeco-
Roman period than the fragments of Homer's Iliad which
are preserved in the Biblioteca Ambrogiana in Milan.

These fragments consist of fifty-eight miniature paintings,
which have been cut out of a folio manuscript on vellum of
Homer's Iliad, dating probably from the latter part of the
fourth century A.D. The mutilator of this codex seems only
to have cared to preserve the pictures, and the only portion
of the text which still exists is about eight hundred not
consecutive lines which happen to be written on the backs
of the paintings. Great additional interest is given to this
priceless fragment by the fact that the miniatures are much
older in style than the date of the manuscript itself, and have
evidently been copied from a much earlier Greek original.

And more than that ; these paintings take one back
further still ; their rhythmical composition, the dignity of
their motives, the simplicity of the planes, and the general
largeness of style which is specially noticeable in some of
the miniatures representing fighting armies of gods and
heroes, all suggest that we have here a record, weakened
and debased though it may be, of some grand series of
mural decorations on a large scale, dating possibly from
the best period of Greek art.

As is naturally the case with copies of noble designs
executed at a period of extreme decadence these paintings
are very unequal in style, combining feebleness of touch and
coarseness of detail with great spirit in the action of the
figures and great dignity in the compositions, which have
numerous figures crowded without confusion of line, thus
suggesting large scale though the paintings are actually

CHAP. III.] IN THE AMBROSIAN LIBRARY.

miniatures only five or six inches long. The treatment of
gods and heroes, especially Zeus, Apollo, Achilles and others,
has much that recalls fine Hellenic models. And some of
the personifications, such as Night and the river Scamander,
possess a gracefulness of pose and beauty of form which was
far beyond the conception of any fourth century artist.

It should, however, be observed that a fine Hellenic
origin is not suggested by all the fifty-eight pictures from
this Iliad. Some of them are obviously of later and inferior
style, with weak scattered compositions, very unlike the
nobility and decorative completeness of the best among the
miniatures.

With regard to the arrangement of these pictures, each
is surrounded by a simple frame formed of bands of blue
and red ; in most cases the miniatures reach across the
whole width of the page. The colouring is heavy, painted
in opaque tempera pigments with an undue preponderance
of minium or red lead. White lead, yellow, brown and red
ochres are largely used, together with a variety of vegetable
colours and the purple-red of the kermes beetle (coccus), but
no gold is used, a bright yellow ochre being employed as
a substitute 1 .

The costumes are partly ancient Greek and partly of
later Roman fashion. A nimbus encircles each deity's head,
and different colours are used to distinguish them. The
nimbus of Zeus is purple, that of Venus is green ; those of
the other gods are mostly blue. To a large extent the
backgrounds of the pictures are not painted, but the creamy
white of the vellum is left exposed 2 .

The Virgil of the Vatican; next in importance to the
Ambrosian Iliad, among the existing examples of classical
illuminated manuscripts, comes the manuscript of Virgil's
poems ( Vat. No. 3225) which is supposed to have been

1 Further details with regard to these pigments are given below, see pages 239
to 249.

2 Reproductions of these miniatures were published by Cardinal Mai, Picttirae
antiqtiissimae bellutn Iliacum repraesent antes, Milan, 1819. Far more accurate
copies of some of the miniatures, but without colour, are given by Palaeo. Soc.,
Plates 39, 40, 50 and 51.

Hellenic
models.

Scheme of
colour.

The

Vatican
Virgil.

THE COSTUMES AND STYLE [CHAP. III.

Miniatures
of the $th
century.

Period of
decadence.

written in the third or more probably the fourth century
A.D. The text is written in large handsome capitals, well
formed except that all the cross lines are too short, T, for
example being written thus \.

The whole manuscript, but especially the Aeneid, is deco-
rated with pictures, fifty in all, each framed by a simple
border of coloured bands. The style of these miniatures
is very different and artistically very inferior to that of
the Ambrosian Iliad.

The whole of the designs, in composition and drawing
and in the costumes of the figures, are those of the fourth
century. The details are coarse, the attitudes devoid of
spirit, and the figures clumsy. The backgrounds are painted
in and the colouring is dull in tone and heavy in texture, put
in with a considerable body of pigment (impasto}. Gold, not
in leaf but as a fluid pigment, is largely used for high lights
on trees, mountains, roofs of buildings, and for the folds of
drapery, especially where the stuff is red or purple. The
male figures have flesh of a reddish-brown tint like many
of the Pompeian wall paintings ; they wear short tunics
with cloaks thrown over the shoulders. Other figures wear
a long dalmatica or tunic, ornamented with two vertical
purple stripes, closely resembling the tunics which have
recently been found in such abundance in the late Roman
tombs of the Fayoum in Upper Egypt

'On the whole the miniatures are neither graceful nor
highly decorative ; they were executed at about the low
water mark of classical artistic decadence shortly before
the Byzantine revival under Justinian. Much that has been
written in their praise must be attributed to antiquarian
enthusiasm rather than to just criticism 1 .

Before passing on to another class of manuscripts it should
be noted that there is in existence one manuscript of the
fourth or fifth century A.D. which is of special interest on

1 Some fairly accurate reproductions of these miniatures were published by
Bartoli, Antiqtdssimi Virgiliani Codicis fragmenla Bibl. Vat., Roma, 1741 and
1782. Examples from this and two other ancient but un-illuminated codices of
Virgil in the Vatican library are given by the Palaeo. Soc., Plates 113 to 117.

CHAP. III.] OF THE VATICAN VIRGIL.

account of its being ornamented, not only with miniature
pictures, but also with some decorative designs of a stiff

Fig. 2. Miniature of classical design from a twelfth century Psalter in the
Vatican library.

CLASSICAL PAINTINGS.

[CHAP. in.

Copies of

lost
originals.

Classical
design.

Graeco-
Roman
design.

conventional character. This is a Roman Kalendar, which
forms part of a manuscript in the Imperial library in Vienna.
The ornaments have but little decorative merit, but they are
of interest as showing that the illuminations in classical manu-
scripts were not always confined to the subject pictures.

It has not as a rule been sufficiently noticed that the style
of miniature paintings in manuscripts of a considerably earlier
date than either the Ambrosian Iliad or the Vatican Virgil is
very fairly represented in various manuscripts of the tenth to
the twelfth century, the illuminators of which have evidently
copied, as accurately as they were able, miniatures in manu-
scripts of the first or second century A.D.

The originals of these early Roman manuscripts do not
now exist, and therefore the information as to their style and
composition, which is given in the mediaeval copies, is of great
interest.

A Greek twelfth century Psalter in the Vatican library
(No. 381) has one special picture which is obviously a careful
copy of a miniature painting of the first century A.D. or even
earlier : see fig. 2. The subject is Orpheus seated on a rock
playing to a circle of listening beasts together with two nymphs
and a youthful Faun or shepherd. These figures are arranged
so as to form a very graceful composition in a landscape with
hills and trees. The figures are extremely graceful both in
outline and in pose, showing a considerable trace of Greek
influence. The whole design closely resembles in style some
of the wall paintings in the so-called "House of Livia " on the
Palatine Hill in Rome, of which fig. 3 shows the scene of lo
watched by Argus, and those in the now destroyed villa which
was discovered by the Tiber bank in the Farnesina Gardens 1 ,
and many of the better class of paintings on the walls of the
houses of Pompeii. Of the latter a good example is shown in
fig. 4, a painting the design of which has much fine Hellenic
feeling in the grace of its form and the simplicity of the com-
position.

1 The chief of these paintings were cut off the walls of the villa, and are now
placed in the Museo delle Terme in Rome. The painting shown in fig. 3 is
still in situ; that given in fig. 4 is now in the Museum at Naples.

A /?.. ./.: L'ftLf, LI '/!// 'O//1
Fig. 3. Painting in the " House of Livia"" on the Palatine Hill in Rome.

CLASSICAL PAINTINGS.

[CHAP. in.

Orpheus

made into

David.

Graeco-
Roman
personifi-
cations.

Returning now to the above mentioned Psalter of the
Vatican, the scribe, probably a Greek monk, who in the
twelfth century painted this miniature 1 , converted it into quite
a different subject, that of David playing on the harp, by
the simple device of ticketing each figure with a newly de-
vised name. Orpheus is called " David," one of the Nymphs
who sits affectionately close to Orpheus, probably meant for
his wife Eurydice, is labelled "Sophia", "wisdom"; while the
other two figures are converted into local personifications to
indicate the locality of the scene.

It is not often that a mediaeval copyist has thus preserved
unaltered the composition of a whole subject of classical and
pre-Christian date, but it is not uncommon to find single
figures or parts of pictorial designs of equally early date
among the illuminations of the ninth to the twelfth cen-
turies.

As an example of this we may mention one painting in a
Greek Psalter of the tenth century in the Paris library (Bibl.
Nat. No. 139). This represents the Prophet Isaiah standing,
gazing up to heaven, in a very beautiful landscape with trees
growing from a richly flower-spangled sward. The somewhat
stiff figure of the Prophet is Byzantine* rather than Classical
in style, but the other two figures which are introduced are
purely Graeco-Roman in design. On one side is a personifi-
cation of Night (NTH), a very graceful standing female figure
with part of her drapery floating in the wind, forming a sort
of curved canopy over her head, such as is so often represented
above the heads of goddesses or nymphs on the reliefs of fine
Graeco-Roman sarcophagi.

On the other side of the Prophet is a winged boy, like
a youthful Eros, bearing a torch to symbolize the dawn.

The bold and very decorative, yet almost realistic treat-
ment of the foliage of the trees and of the flowers which are

1 See above, fig. 2.

2 The term Byzantine as applied to art is commonly used to denote the style
which was developed in the Eastern empire soon after Constantine had transferred
the seat of government from Old to " New Rome," or Constantinople as it was
also called instead of Byzantium, which .was the ancient name.

Fig. 4. A Pompeian painting of Hellenic style, as an example of Greek
drawing and composition.

4 2

CLASSICAL AND BYZANTINE STYLES [CHAP. III.

Classical
style.

Byzantine
style.

Graeco-
Roman
figures.

sprinkled among the grass is purely classical in style, and the
whole miniature shows that the tenth century illuminator had
before him some very fine manuscript of early Imperial date.
From this he has selected a picture which might by omissions
and modifications be adapted to his subject ; and for the
figure of the Prophet he has fallen back on another less
ancient original, but still one which must have been several
centuries older than his own time.

This is the explanation of what at first seems so strange a
union in the same painting of very graceful single figures by
the side of others which are rigid and awkward ; and again,
great skill shown in the drawing of the individual figures
combined with a feeble and clumsy arrangement of the whole
composition.

Fig. 5 shows a miniature of very similar style representing
the Prophet Ezechiel in the Valley of dry bones. It is taken
from a manuscript of the Sermons of Saint Gregory Nazian-
zen, which was written for the Byzantine Emperor Basil who
reigned from 867 to 886. This figure chiefly illustrates the
Byzantine, not the Classical element in the miniatures of
this mixed style of art, though there is also a clear trace of
Graeco-Roman influence in the finely designed drapery of the
Prophet.

The curious union of two utterly different styles is well
exemplified in another of the miniatures in the last mentioned
Psalter. Here David is represented like a Byzantine Emperor
crowned and wearing the richly embroidered toga picta, and
holding an open book. The figure might well pass for a
representation of the Emperor Justinian, and the original
painting was probably of that date, of the early part of the
sixth century.

On each side of the Byzantine David is a female figure
draped with most gracefully designed folds of pure Graeco-
Roman style, a most striking contrast to the central figure.
Who these ladies represented in the original manuscript it is
impossible to say, but the painter who in the tenth century
illuminated the Psalter called them Wisdom and Prophecy,
writing by them the names Sophia and PropJietia.

Fig. 5. The Prophet Ezechiel from a Byzantine manuscript of the ninth
century A.I>.

LATE CLASSICAL SURVIVAL. [CHAP. III.

Value of
late copies.

Classical
survival.

Many other examples might be given to show that a truer
notion of classical illuminated manuscripts of the best Graeco-
Roman style can be gained from a study of the works of
mediaeval copyists than from manuscripts which, though
older, are of late and debased style like the famous illuminated
Virgil of the Vatican 1 .

After Rome had ceased to be the seat of government,
Constantinople became the chief centre for the production
of illuminated manuscripts 2 , but nevertheless the older clas-
sical style of drawing to some extent did survive in Italy,
though in a very debased form, down to the thirteenth
century, when Cimabue and his pupil Giotto inaugurated
the brilliant Renaissance of Italian painting.

The Gospels, for example, which St Augustine is said to
have brought with him to Britain in 597 A.D., have paintings,
enthroned figures of the Evangelists, which in design and
colour are purely of late Roman style, unchanged by the
then wide-spread influence of Byzantine art.

1 Several manuscripts of this class are described by H. Bordier, Manuscrits
Grecs de la Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, 1883.

2 A great public library was founded by Constantine in New Rome and
partially stocked by manuscripts transferred from the old Capital. This library
was rapidly enlarged by his sons and successors, and it was rebuilt on a grander
scale by the Emperor Zeno after the building had been injured by fire about the
year 488 A.D.

CHAPTER IV.

BYZANTINE MANUSCRIPTS.

THE history of the origin, development and decay of the
Byzantine style in manuscripts, as in other branches of art, is
a long and strange one 1 . The origin of the Byzantine style
dates from the time when Christianity had become the State
religion, and when Constantine transferred the Capital of the
World from L _Rome to Byzantium.

Tn Russia ancT other eastern portions of Europe the
Byzantine style still exists, though in a sad state of decay,
not as an antiquarian revival, but as the latest link in a chain
of unbroken tradition, going back without interruption to the
age of Constantine, the early part of the fourth century after
Christ.

During the early years of the Eastern Empire, Constanti-
nople, or " New Rome" as it was commonly called, became
the chief world's centre for the practice of all kinds of arts
and handicrafts. Owing to its central position, midway
between the East and the West, the styles and technique of
both met and were fused into a new stylistic development of
the most remarkable kind. Western Europe, Asia Minor,
Persia and Egypt all contributed elements both of design and
of technical skill, which combined to create the new and for a
while vigorously flourishing school of Byzantine art. The
dull lifeless forms of Roman art in its extreme degradation

1 For a valuable account of Byzantine manuscripts, see Kondakoff, Histoire de
I' Art Byzantin, Paris, 1886 1891.

Byzantine

style.

Alany
strains of
influence.

46 THE CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS [CHAP. IV.

were again quickened into new life and beauty in the hands of
these Byzantine craftsmen, who became as it were the heirs
and inheritors of the art and the technique of all the chief
countries of antiquity.

Technical In architecture, in mosaic work, in metal work of all

kinds, in textile weaving, the craftsmen of New Rome
reached the highest level of technical skill and decorative
beauty. So also a new and brilliant school of manuscript
illumination was soon formed, and Constantinople became
for several centuries the chief centre for the production of
manuscripts of all kinds.

The Oriental element in Byzantine art shows itself in a
love of extreme splendour, the most copious use of gold and
silver and of the brightest colours.

Mm-cx Manuscripts written in burnished gold, on vellum stained

with the brilliant purple from the murex shell, were largely
produced, especially for the private use of the Byzantine
Emperors. This murex purple, produced with immense
expenditure of labour, came to be considered the special
mark of Imperial rank 1 . A golden inkstand containing
purple ink was kept by a special official in waiting, and no
one but the Emperor himself might, under heavy penalties,
use for any purpose the purple ink ; and the sumptuous gold
and purple manuscripts were for a long time written only for
Imperial use.

Gold and The principal class of manuscripts which were written

e i tner in part or wholly in this costly fashion were Books of
the Gospels ; and of these a good many magnificent examples
still exist, dating not only from the early Byzantine period,
but down to the ninth or tenth century. In these manu-
scripts the burnished gold and the brilliantly coloured
pigments which are used for the illuminations are still as
bright and fresh in appearance as ever, but the murex purple
with which the vellum leaves were, not painted, but dyed, has
usually lost much of its original splendour of colour.

1 The title Porphyro-genitus, " Born in the purple," referred to the fact that
Byzantine Empresses brought forth their children in a magnificent room lined with
slabs of polished porphyry.

CHAP. IV.] OF THE BYZANTINE STYLE. 47

Before describing the characteristics of Byzantine illumin- Monotony
ated manuscripts it may be well to note that the Byzantine -' s -
style is unique in the artistic history of the world from the
manner in which it rapidly was crystallized into rigidly fixed
forms, and then continued for century after century with
marvellously little modification or development either in
colour, drawing or composition.

This absence of any real living development was due to
the fact that paintings of all kinds in the Eastern Church,
from a colossal mural picture down to a manuscript miniature,
were produced by ecclesiastics and for the Church, under a
strictly applied series of hieratic rules.

The drawing, the pose, the colours of the drapery of ' Hieratic
every Saint, and the scheme of composition of all sacred
figure subjects came gradually to be defined by ecclesiastic
rules, which each painter was bound to obey. Thus it
happens that during the many centuries which are covered by
the Byzantine style of art, though there are periods of decay
and revival of artistic skill, yet in style there is the most
remarkable monotony. This makes it specially difficult to
judge from internal evidence of the date of a Byzantine
painting. In manuscripts the palaeographic, not the artistic
evidence, is the best guide, aided of course by various small
technical peculiarities, and also by the amount of skill and
power of drawing which is displayed in the paintings.

Long after the capture of Constantinople by the Ottoman Absence of
Turks in 1453, the Byzantine style of painting survived ; and
even at the present day the monks of Mt Athos execute large
wall paintings, which, as far as their style is concerned, might
appear to be the work of many centuries ago. M. Didron
found the monastic painters in one of the Mount Athos
monasteries using a treatise called the 'Ep/jUjveia TJ}? faypa-
<j>ucrjs, in which directions are given how every figure and
subject is to be treated, and which describes the old traditional
forms without any perceptible modification 1 . The proportions
of the human form are laid down after the characteristic

1 A translation of this curious treatise was published by Didron and Durand,
in their Manuel d'iconographie chrctienne; Paris, 1845.

4 8

THE VIENNA "GENESIS.

[CHAP. IV.

$tA cen-
tury MS.
of Genesis.

Weak
drawing.

The

Dioscorides

of
C. 500 A.D.

slender Byzantine models, the complete body, for example,
being nine heads in height.

The earliest Byzantine manuscript which is now known to
exist is a fragment of the Book of Genesis, now in the
Imperial library of Vienna, which dates from the latter part
of the fifth century. This fragment consists of twenty-four
leaves of purple-dyed vellum, illuminated with miniatures on
both sides. In the main the designs are feeble in composition
and weak in drawing, belonging rather to the latest decadence
of Roman classical art than to the yet undeveloped Byzantine
style, which was soon to grow into great artistic spirit and
strong decorative power, a completely new birth of aesthetic
conceptions, the brilliance of which is the more striking from
its following so closely on the degraded, lifeless, worn-out art
of the Western Empire. In this manuscript of Genesis there
is but little promise of the Renaissance that was so near
at hand. The drawing of each figure, though sometimes
graceful in pose, is rather weak, and the painter Has"
hardly aimed at anything like rear T^mpositforrprmfTigu res
merely stand in long rows, with little or nothing to group
them together. Fig. 6 shows examples of two of the best
miniatures, representing the story of the accusation of
Joseph by Potiphar's wife. In every way this Genesis
manuscript forms 'a striking contrast to the delicate beauty
and strongly decorative feeling which are to be seen in a
work of but a few years later, the famous Dioscorides of the
Princess Juliana.

Among all the existing Byzantine manuscripts perhaps
the most important for its remarkable beauty as well as its
early date is this Greek codex 1 of Dioscorides' work on
Botany, which is now in the Imperial library in Vienna 2 ,
No. 5 in the Catalogue. The date of this manuscript can be
fixed to about the year 5o A.D. by the record which it
contains of its having been written and illuminated for the

1 All manuscripts described in this book, from the Byzantine school onwards,
may be understood to be in the codex form and written on vellum, unless they are
otherwise described.

2 Published by Lambecius, Comment, sur la Bibl. de Vienne, 1776, Vol. in.

M. C. M.

THE DIOSCORIDES OF

[CHAP. iv.

Dioscorides

f
y nh ana.

Portrait
figure.

Inferior
paintings.

Princess Juliana Anicia, the daughter of Flavius Anicius
Olybrius who was Emperor for part of the year 472, and
his wife Galla Placidia : Juliana Anicia died in 527.

This beautiful manuscript, which was executed in Con-
stantinople, contains five large and elaborate miniatures, and
a great number of vignettes representing varieties of plants.
The fifth of the large miniatures consists of a central group
framed by two squares interlaced within a circle. The plait
pattern on the bands which form the framework, and the
whole design closely resemble a fine mosaic pavement of the
second century A.D. The resemblance is far too close to be
accidental ; and indeed this manuscript is not the only
example we have of miniature painters copying patterns and
motives from mosaic floors of earlier date.

The central group in this beautiful full page painting
represents Juliana Anicia, for whom the manuscript was
written, enthroned between standing allegorical female figures.
Minutely painted figures of Cupids, engaged in a variety of
handicrafts and arts, fill up the small spaces in the frame-
work.

In these paintings we have a curious combination of
different styles ; the enthroned figure of the Princess is of the
stiff Byzantine style, while the attendant figures and the little
Cupids are almost purely classical in drawing. This manu-
script forms a link between the classical or Graeco-Roman
and the Christian or Byzantine style. Other paintings in the
same manuscript are very inferior in design, partaking of the
late Roman decadence, rather than of the better and earlier
art of the above mentioned picture. Fig. 7 shows one of
these. It represents Dioscorides seated on a sort of throne ;
in front is a female figure Enresis (Discovery) presenting to
him the magic plant mandragora (mandrake). The dying
dog refers to the popular belief, given by Josephus, as to the
manner in which the mandrake was gathered. When plucked
from the ground the mandrake uttered a scream which caused
the death of any living creature that heard it ; it was therefore
usual to tie a dog to the plant and retire to a safe distance
before calling it, and so causing the dog to drag the plant out

CHAP. IV.] THE PRINCESS JULIANA. 51

of the ground. On hearing the scream the dog dropped down
dead. Cf. Shaks., Romeo and Juliet, IV. iii.

Fig. 7. Miniature from the manuscript of the work on Botany by Dioscorides,
executed in Constantinople about 500 A.D.

The colours used in the Dioscorides of Juliana are very Colours
brilliant, especially the gorgeous ultramarine blue, and are
glossy in surface owing to the copious use of a gum medium.
Gold is very largely and skilfully used, especially to light up
and emphasize the chief folds of the drapery, a method which

ENAMELS IMITATED IN MINIATURES. [CHAP. IV.

Cloisonne
enamel.

The pure

Byzantine

style.

is very widely used in Byzantine art, both in the colossal
pictures of the wall-mosaics, and also in most of the finest
class of illuminated manuscripts.

In this use of gold, in thin delicate lines which strengthen
the drawing, we have a very distinct copyism of another quite
different art, that of the worker in enamelled gold, an art
which was practised in Constantinople with wonderful taste
and skill. The kind of enamel which was so often imitated
by the manuscript illuminator is now called cloisonne enamel
from the thin slips of gold or cloisons which separate one
colour from another, and mark out the chief lines of the
design. So closely did many of the illuminators copy designs
in this cloisonne that very often one sees manuscript minia-
tures which look at first sight as if they were actual pieces of
enamel. In other ways too the art of the goldsmith had
considerable influence on Byzantine illuminations ; and the
designs of the mosaic-worker and the miniaturist acted and
reacted upon each other, so that we sometimes see an
elaborate painting in a book which looks like a design for a
wall-mosaic ; or again the gorgeous glass mosaics with gold
grounds on the vaults and walls of Byzantine churches
frequently look like magnified leaves cut out of some gorge-
ously illuminated manuscript.

It was only for a short period that manuscripts were
executed at Constantinople which, in their miniatures, were
links between the classical and the Byzantine style. Thus
we find that the famous Greek manuscript of Cosmas
Indopleustes in the Vatican library (No. 699) is of the pure
and fully developed Byzantine style, with its formal attitudes,
its rigid drapery, its lengthy proportions rfjiaw^-and stiff

monotonous schemes of composition, such as, grew to be
accepted as the one sacred___j>tyle, and as such has been
preserved by the Eastern Church down to the present
century.

This manuscript of Cosmas is certainly a work of Justinian's
time, the first half of the sixth century A.D., though it has
usually been attributed to the ninth century ; it really is but
little later than the Dioscorides of Juliana, and yet it has but

CHAP. IV.] EARLY PAINTING OF THE CRUCIFIXION.

little trace of the older classical style, either in drawing,
composition or colour 1 .

The Laurentian library in Florence possesses a manuscript
of the Gospels which, though poor as a work of art, has
several points of special interest A contemporary note in
the codex records that it was written in the year 586 by the
Priest Rabula in the Monastery of St John at Zagba in
Mesopotamia.

Its illuminations are weak in drawing, coarse in execution
and harsh in colouring, but one of them, representing the
Crucifixion of our Lord between the two thieves, is notice-
able as being the earliest known example of this subject.
The primitive Christian Church avoided scenes representing
Christ's Death and Passion, preferring to suggest them only
by means of types and symbols taken from Old Testament
History.

This and other subsequent paintings of the Crucifixion
treat the subject in a very conventional way, and it is not till
about the thirteenth century that we find the Death of Christ
represented with anything like realism.

In the Gospels of the Priest Rabula, Christ is represented
crowned with gold, not with thorns ; He wears a long tunic of
Imperial purple reaching to the feet The arms are stretched
out horizontally, an impossible attitude for a crucified person,
and four nails are represented piercing the hands and both
feet separately.

It appears to have been the gloomy Oriental influence
that gradually introduced scenes of martyrdom, with horrors
of every description into Christian art, which originally had
been imbued with a far healthier and more cheerful spirit,
a survival from the wholesome classical treatment of death
and the grave. Hell with its revolting horrors and hideous
demons was an invention of a still later and intellectually
more degraded period.

Evangeliaria or manuscripts of the Gospels. One of the
most important classes of Byzantine manuscripts, and the

1 Copies of some of the miniatures in the Vatican Cosmas are given by N.
Kondakoff, Histoire de T Art Byzantin, Paris, 1886, Vol. I. pp. 142 to 152.

Early
cruci-
fixion.

Oriental
influence.

MSS. of
the Gospels.

MAGNIFICENT EVANGELIARIA

[CHAP. IV.

MSS. of

the Gospels.

Thefom
Evan-
gelists.

The

Canons of
Eusebins.

one of which the most magnificent examples now exist are
the Books of the Gospels already mentioned at page 46 as
being occasionally, either wholly or in part, written in letters
of gold on leaves of purple-dyed vellum.

These Imperially magnificent manuscripts are usually
decorated with five full page paintings, placed at the be-
ginning of the codex. These five pictures represent the four
Evangelists, each enthroned like a Byzantine Emperor under
an arched canopy supported on Corinthian columns of marble
or porphyry. Each Evangelist sits holding in his hand the
manuscript of his Gospel ; or, in some cases, he is represented
writing it. In the earlier manuscripts, St John is correctly
represented as an aged white-bearded man, but in later times
St John was always depicted as a beardless youth, even in
illuminations which represent him writing his Gospel in the
Island of Patmos, as at the beginning of the fifteenth century
Books of Hours. Next comes the fifth miniature representing
" Christ in Majesty," usually enthroned within an oval or
vesica-shaped aureole ; He sits on a rainbow, and at His feet
is a globe to represent the earth, or in some cases a small
figure of Tellus or Atlas with the same symbolical meaning.

Other highly decorated pages in these Byzantine Gospels
are those which contain the " Canons" of Bishop Eusebius,
a set of ten tables giving lists of parallel passages in the
four Gospels. These tables are usually framed by columns
supporting a semicircular arch, richly decorated with archi-
tectural and floral ornaments in gold and colours. Frequently
birds, especially doves and peacocks, are introduced in the
spandrels over the arches ; they are often arranged in pairs
drinking out of a central vase or chalice a motive which
occurs very often among the reliefs on the sarcophagi and
marble screens of early Byzantine Churches both in Italy and
in the East 1 . These birds appear to be purely ornamental,
in spite of the many attempts that have been made to
discover symbolic meanings in them. Other birds, such as
cocks, quails and partridges, are commonly used in these

1 St Mark's in Venice and the churches of Ravenna and Constantinople are
full of examples of this design.

CHAP. IV.]

OR TEXTUS MANUSCRIPTS.

decorative illuminations, and this class of ornament was
probably derived from Persia, under the Sasanian Dynasty,
when decorative art and skilful handicrafts flourished to a
very remarkable extent 1 .

Among the most sumptuous and beautiful illuminations
which occur in these Byzantine Gospels are the headings and
beginnings of books written in very large golden capitals, so
that six or seven letters frequently occupy the whole page.
These letters are painted over a richly decorated background
covered with floreated ornament, and the whole is framed
in an elaborate border, all glowing with the most brilliant
colours, and lighted up by burnished gold of the highest
decorative beauty 2 .

These sumptuous Evangeliaria, or Textus as they were
often called, soon came to be something more than merely
a magnificent book. They developed into one of the most
important pieces of furniture belonging to the High Altar
in all important Cathedral and Abbey churches 3 . Throughout
the whole mediaeval period every rich church possessed one
of these magnificently written Textus or Books of the Gospels
bound in costly covers of gold or silver thickly studded with
jewels. This Textus was placed on the High Altar before
the celebration of Mass, during which it was used for the
reading of the Gospel.

The jewel-studded covers had on one side a representation

1 This Sasanian art was an inheritance from ancient Babylon and Assyria,
and was the progenitor of what in later times has been called Arab art, though
the quite inartistic Arabs appear to have derived it from the Persians whom they
conquered and forcibly converted to the Moslem Faith.

2 The mere gold of even the finest Byzantine manuscripts is never as sumptuous
or as highly burnished as that in manuscripts of the fourteenth century, owing to its
being usually applied as a fluid pigment, or at least not over the best kind of
highly raised ground or mordant, which is described below at p. 234.

3 In early times and indeed throughout the whole mediaeval period very few
objects of any kind were placed upon the High Altar even in the most magnifi-
cently furnished churches. In addition to the chalice and paten, and the Textus,
the only ornaments usually allowed were a small crucifix and two candlesticks.
The modern system of crowding the mensa of the altar with many candles and
flowers did not come in till after the Reformation.

In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the Pax was usually a separate thing,
of more convenient size and weight than the heavy, gold-covered Textus.

Sasanian
style.

Textus for

the High

Altar.

GOLD ENCASED TEXTUS.

[CHAP. iv.

Textus
used as
a Pax.

The

Textus at
Durham.

Weak
drawing

of the
figure.

of Christ's crucifixion, executed in enamel or else in gold
relief, and the book was used to serve the purpose of a Pax,
being handed round among the ministers of the Altar for the
ceremonial kiss of peace, which in primitive times had been
exchanged among the members of the congregation themselves.
One of the most magnificent examples of these Textus is the
one now in the possession of Lord Ashburnham, the covers of
which are among the most important and beautiful examples
of the early English goldsmith's and jeweller's art which now
exist 1 .

An interesting description of the Textus which, till the
Reformation, belonged to the High Altar of Durham Cathe-
dral, is given in the Rites and Monuments of Durham written
in 1593 by a survivor from the suppressed and plundered
Abbey 2 , who in his old age wrote down his recollections
of the former glories of the Church. He writes, " the Gos-
peller 3 did carrye a marvelous FAIRE BOOKE, which had the
Epistles and Gospels in it, and did lay it on the Altar, the
which booke had on the outside of the coveringe the picture
of our Saviour Christ, all of silver, of goldsmith's worke, all
parcell gilt, verye fine to behould ; which booke did serve for
the PAX in the Masse."

These Textus were not unfrequently written wholly in gold
on purple stained vellum, not only during the earliest and best
period of Byzantine art but also occasionally by the illumi-
nators of the age of Charles the Great.

Returning now to the general question of the style of
Byzantine art, it should be observed that, though little^
knowledge of the human form is shown by the miniaturists,
yet they were able to produce highly dignified compositions,
very strong in decorative effect. Study of the nude form was
strictly prohibited by the Church ; and the beauty of the
human figure was regarded as a snare and a danger to minds

1 Fine coloured plates of this wonderful Textus-cover were published in 1888
by the Society of Antiquaries in their Velusta Monumenta.

2 Published in 1844 by the Surtees Society of Durham.

3 The " Gospeller " was the officiating Deacon; the Sub-deacon being called
the " Epistoller."

CHAP. IV.]

UNREAL FIGURE PAINTING.

which should be fixed upon the imaginary glories of another
world. What grace and dignity there is iiTT^yzantine figure
paiQting depends chiefly^} the skilful treatment of the drapery
with simple tolds modellgd in^racefally-curving lines.

TfaemEnost splendour of gold and colour is lavished on
this drapery, and on the backgrounds, border-frames and other
accessories, while the colouring of the flesh, in faces, hands
and feet, is commonly unpleasant ; with, in many cases, an
excessive use of green in the shadows, which gives an unhealthy
look to the faces. This copious use of green in flesh tints is
especially apparent in the later Byzantine paintings, and again
in the Italian imitations of Byzantine art. Even paintings by
Cimabue and some of his followers, in the second half of the
thirteenth century, are disfigured by the flesh in shadow being
largely painted with terra verde^.

The monastic bigotry, which prohibited study either of the
living model or of the beauties of classical sculpture, tended
to foster a strongly conventional element in Art, which for
certain decorative purposes was of the highest possible value.
Anything like realism is quite unsuited both for colossal mural
frescoes or mosaics and for miniature paintings in an illumi-
nated manuscript.

Thus, for example, the existing mosaics on the west front
of St Mark's Basilica in Venice 2 , which were copied from
noble paintings by Titian and Tintoretto, are immeasurably
inferior to the earlier mosaics with stiff, hieratic forms designed
after Byzantine models, as for example the mosaics in the
Apse of SS. Cosmas and Damian in Rome, executed for
Pope Felix IV. 526 to 530; see fig. 8.

So, again, the skilfully drawn and modelled figures in
a manuscript executed by Giulio Clovio in the sixteenth

1 The remarkable artistic advance which was made by Giotto is to be seen
not only in his improved and more realistic drawing, but also in his freedom from
the long-established abuse of green in his flesh painting, for which he substituted
a warmer and healthier tint.

2 Of the original mosaics on the west facade of Saint Mark's only one remains
of the original highly decorative twelfth century mosaics. The rest, shown in
Gentile Bellini's picture of Saint Mark's, have all been replaced by later mosaics.
Inside the church, happily, the old mosaics still, in most places, exist ; see p. 61.

Livid
flesh
colour.

Monastic
bigotry.

Fine early
mosaics.

THE BYZANTINE STYLE.

[CHAP. IV.

century are not worthy to be compared, for true decorative
beauty and fitness, with the flat, rigid forms, full of dignity and

Limita-
tions of
Byzantine
Art.

Fig. 8. Mosaic of the sixth century in the apse of the church of SS. Cosmas
and Damian in Rome.

simple, rhythmical beauty which we find in any Byzantine
manuscript of a good period 1 .

It should, however, be remarked that in Byzantine art this
conventional treatment of the human form is carried too far,
and therefore, splendid as a fine Byzantine manuscript usually
is, it falls far short of the almost perfect beauty that may be
seen in Anglo-Norman and French illuminated manuscripts
of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, such marvels of
beauty, for example, as French manuscripts of the Apocalypse
executed in the first half of the fourteenth century in Northern
France ; see below, page 118.

Till the eighth century, Byzantine art, both in manuscripts

1 See ^>age 202 for an account of Giulio Clovio.

CHAP. IV.]

ICONOCLAST SCHISM.

and in other branches of art, continued to advance in technical
skill, though little change or development of style took place.
In the eighth century the iconoclast schism, fostered by the
Emperor Leo III. the Isaurian, an uncultured and ignorant
soldier who began by issuing an edict against image-worship
in the year 726 A.D., .gave a blow to Byzantine art which
brought about a very serious decadence during the ninth and
tenth centuries, more especially OIL Constantinople, which up
to that time_-liad_ben_one jof ihe chief literary and artistic
centres of the Christian world.

pictures" of all^kTnds, as well as statues, were destroyed
by the iconoclast fanatics, and the cause of learning suffered
almost as much as did the arts of painting and sculpture.

One result of this schismatic outbreak was that Constan-
tinople cease'd to be T>ne of the chief centres for the production
of beautiful illuminated manuscripts, and various Prankish
cities, such as Aix=la-Chapelle and Tours^ took its place under
the enlightened patronage of Charles the Great the Emperor
of the West, who, in the second half of the ninth century, by
the aid o_f the famous Northumbrian scholar and scribe Alcuin
of~York, brought about a wonderful revival of literature and
of the illuminator's art in various cities and monasteries within
the Western Empire.

At the end of the eleventh century Byzantine art, practised
in its original home, had reached the lowest possible level.
Thus, for example, a manuscript of some of the works of
St Chrysostom (Paris, Bibl. Nat. Coislin., 79) contains minia-
tures the figures in which are mere sack-like bundles with
little or no suggestion of the human form. The whole skill
of the artist has been expended on the painting of the
elaborate patterns on the dresses ; drawing and composition
he has not even attempted.

Fig. 9 shows a miniature from this manuscript, repre-
senting the Greek Emperor enthroned between four courtiers,
and two allegorical figures of Truth and Justice. The Emperor
is Nicephoros Botaniates, who reigned from 1078 to 1081.
An equally striking example of the degradation of Byzantine
art in Germany is illustrated on page 78.

Edict
against
statues.

Prankish
MSS.

Byzantine
decadence.

Fig. 9. Miniature from a Byzantine manuscript of the eleventh century ; a remarkable example

of artistic decadence.

CHAP. IV.] MONOTONY OF BYZANTINE ART.

Afterthis period ojie.cay dugpgjjie tenth and eleventh
Byzanfmil^aft-began^to re v7ve7~taTg^iy^u ndeTlhe
infTuoice~gfIIffie j JWest ; the original life and spirit had,
however, passed away, and the subsequent history of By-
zantine art is one of dull monotony and growing feebleness,
the inevitable result of a continuing copying and recopying of
older models.

It is rather as a modifying influence on the art of the
West that Byzantine painting continued to possess real im-
portance. As a distinct and isolated school, Constantinople
fell into the background at the time of the iconoclasts and
never again came to the front as an artistic centre of real
importance 1 .

1 Mr M. R. James has pointed out to me an interesting example of similar
designs being used by illuminators of manuscripts and by mosaic-workers. The
designs of the miniatures in a fifth or sixth century manuscript of Genesis in the
British Museum (Otho, B, vi) are in many cases identical with those of the twelfth
and thirteenth century mosaics in Saint Mark's at Venice ; see Tikkanen, Genesis-
bilder, Berlin.

Want of

life in

Byzantine

Art.

CHAPTER V.

MANUSCRIPTS OF THE CAROLINGIAN PERIOD.

The Age
of Charles
the Great.

Alcuin of
York.

THE age of Charles the Great and his successors. Charles
the Great, who was elected King of the Franks in 768, and in
the year 800 became Emperor of the West, did much to
foster all branches of art architecture, bronze-founding,
goldsmith's work, and more especially the art of writing and
illuminating manuscripts. The Imperial Capital. Aix-la-
Chapelle (Aachen), became a busy centre for arts and crafts
of all kinds, and various monasteries throughout the Prankish
kingdom became schools of manuscript illumination of a very
high order of excellence.

It was specially with the aid of a famous English scholar
and manuscript writer, Alcuin of York 1 , that Charles the
Great brought about so remarkabTe a revival both of letters
and of the illuminator's art, and created what may be called
the Anglo-Carolingian school of manuscripts. From 796 till
his death in 804 Alcuin was Abbot of the Benedictine
monastery of St Martin at Tours ; and there he carried out
various literary works for Charles the Great, and superintended
the production of a large number of richly illuminated
manuscripts. Alcuin's most important literary work was the
revision of the Latin text of the Bible, the Vulgate, which

1 Alcuin, when Dean of York, was sent by Offa, king of Mercia, about 782,
as an envoy to Charles the Great. A large number of manuscripts were written
under his guidance and influence, not only in Tours, but also at Soissons, Metz,
Fulda, and in other Benedictine monasteries.

CHAP. V.]

THE SCHOOL OF ALCUIN.

since Saint Jerome's time had become seriously corrupted.
The British Museum possesses (Add. Manuscripts, No. 10546) The
a magnificently illuminated copy of the Vulgate as revised by O f Ahuin.
Alcuin, which, there is every reason to believe, is the actual
manuscript which was prepared for Charles the Great either
by Alcuin himself or under his immediate supervision. This
splendid manuscript is a large folio in delicate and beautifully
formed minuscule characters, with the beginnings of chapters
in fine uncials ; it is written in two columns on the purest
vellum. The miniature paintings in this manuscript show
the united influence of various schools of manuscript art.
The figure subjects are mainly classical in style, with fine
architectural backgrounds of Roman style, drawn with
unusual elaboration and accuracy, and even with fairly
correct perspective. The initial letters and all the conven-
tional ornaments show the Northern artistic strain which

Fig. 10. An initial P. of the Cekic-Carolingian type, of the school of
Alcuin of York.

Northum-
brian
influence.

6 4

THE NORTHUMBRIAN SCHOOL. [CHAP. V.

Alcuin himself introduced from York. Delicate and compli-
cated interlaced patterns, such as were first used in the
wonderful sixth and seventh century manuscripts of the
Celtic monks, are freely introduced into the borders and large
capitals.

In Alcuin's time Northumbria and especially York was
one of the chief centres in the world, for the production of
manuscripts, and the Dean of York naturally introduced into
France the style and influence of his native school, which had

Fig. ii. An initial B. of the Celtic-Carolingian type.

CHAP. V.] CELTIC-CAROLINGIAN STYLE. 65

grown out of a combination of two very different styles, that Celtic
of Rome, as introduced by St Augustine, and the Celtic
style which the monks of Ireland and Lindisfarne had
brought to such marvellous perfection in the seventh
century.

Fig. 10 shows an initial of the Celtic-Carolingian type,
with a goldsmith's pattern on the shaft of the />, and a bird
of Oriental type forming the loop ; and fig. 1 1 gives a large
initial B in which the Oriental element is very strong, cf.
fig. 13, page 68.

The Carolingian class of manuscripts in this way combined
many different strains of influence native Prankish, Classical,
Oriental and English, all modified by the Byzantine, love for
gorgeous ccfotrrs~ shining gold arid silver, and purple-dyed
vellum. A considerable number of manuscripts were written
in the reign of Charles the Great in letters of gold on purple
vellum like those prepared in earlier times for the Byzantine
Emperors. A manuscript Book of the Gospels of this magni- Henry
ficent class was given by Pope Leo X. to Henry VIII. of Gospels.
England in return for the presentation copy of his work
against Luther, entitled Assertio Septem Sacrament or uin,
which the king had sent in 1521 to the Pope as a proof of his
allegiance to the Catholic Faith and the Holy See. This
magnificent Textus afterwards came into the Hamilton
collection through Mr Beckford of Fonthill, and was subse-
quently bought by Mr Quaritch 1 .

As was the case with the earlier Byzantine manuscripts, Car -

r lingian

the most magnificent books produced in the Carolingian Gospels.
period were this kind of Evangeliaria or Books of the Gospels.
Though differing in the details of their ornamentation, these
later Gospels are decorated with the same set of miniature
subjects that occur in the Byzantine Gospels. The library of
Paris possesses a fine typical example of this (Bibl. Nat. Nouv.
Acq. Lat. 1993), a richly decorated and signed Evangeliarium,

1 It is priced in Mr Quaritch's catalogue of 1890 at ^"2500. This manuscript
was probably written at Tours in the school of Alcuin of York ; see Wattenbach,
Die mil Gold auf Purpur geschriebenen Evangelienhandschriften der Hamilton' schen
Bibliothek, Berlin, 1889.

M. C. M. 5

Fig. 12. Miniature of Christ in Majesty from a manuscript of the school
of Alcuin, written for Charles the Great.

CHAP. V.] CELTIC AND ORIENTAL INFLUENCE.

which was written for Charles the Great in 781 by the scribe
and illuminator Godesscalc. Every page is sumptuously
ornamented with large initials and a border in brilliant
burnished gold, and silver, and bright colours ; and there are
also six full-page miniatures, the first four representing the
four Evangelists enthroned in the usual way. The fifth has a
painting of Christjn_Majesty with one hand holding a book,
the other raised in blessing; see fig. 12. The. sixth minia-
ture represents the Fountain of Life. In all these paintings
the backgrounds are very rich and decorative, with a greater
variety and more fancifully designed ornament than is to be
found in Byzantine manuscripts of a similar class, owing, of
course, to the introduction of the many different elements of
design which were combined with great taste and skill by the
Carolingian illuminators.

In this and many other manuscripts of the same class a
very distinct Semitic or Persian, strain of influence can be
traced in much of the rich conventional ornament. Very
beautiful and highly decorative forms and patterns were
derived from Oriental sources 1 , owing to the active Import
into France and Germany of fine Persian carpets and textile
stuffs from Moslem looms in Syria, Sicily (especially Palermo)
and from other parts of the Arab world ; all these textiles
were designed with consummate taste and skill both in colour
and drawing.

Fig. 13 shows a fine specimen of woven silk from the
Arab looms of Syria. It was used as an Imperial cope or
mantle by various German Emperors ; in the centre is a
palm-tree, and on each side a lion devouring a camel, treated
in a very decorative and masterly manner. The form of the
conventional foliage on the lions' bodies is imitated in many
manuscript illuminations, as, for example, in the ornaments of
the initial B shown in fig. 1 1, page 64.

One important characteristic of the Carolingian manu-
scripts is their extreme splendour. The freely used burnished
gold is often made more magnificent by the contrast of no

1 See for example the beautiful patterns of the woven hangings behind the
enthroned figure of Christ shown on fig. 12 ; cf. also page 84.

Gospels of
Godesscalc.

Oriental
influence.

Sicilian
silk cope.

3
*<

CHAP. V.]

CAROLINGIAN MINIATURES.

6 9

less brilliant silver. Purple-stained vellum was largely used,
and all the pigments are of the most gorgeous hues that great
technical skill could produce. And yet in spite of all this
magnificence of shining metals and bright colours the effect is
never harsh or gaudy, owing to the taste and judgment
shown by the illuminators in the way they broke up their
colours, avoiding large unrelieved masses, and in the arrange-
ment of the colours so as to give a general effect of harmony
in spite of the great chromatic force of the separate parts.

The somewhat realistic way of representing the Evange-
lists as aged white-haired men, which occurs in Byzantine
manuscripts, in the Carolingian Gospels is replaced by a more
conventional treatment, and thus they are as a rule represented
as youthful, beardless men of an idealized type. The general
treatment of the figure is flat, with little or no light and shade
or modelling of any kind. The drapery is represented by
strong, dark lines applied over a flatly laid wash of pigment.
The painter first drew in his outlines with a fine brush dipped
in red, and then filled in the intermediate spaces with a wash
of colour mixed with a large proportion of gummy medium,
so that a very glossy, lustrous surface was produced. The
folds of the drapery and the rest of the internal drawing of
the figures were put in after the application of the flat ground
colour. This method very much resembles the process of the
early Greek vase-painters. In order to give richness of effect
by the use of a thick body of colour the illuminator commonly
applied his flat tints in two or even three distinct washes,
a method which is recommended by Theophilus 1 and other
early writers on the technique of illumination.

Another Book of the Gospels which belonged to Charles
the Great, now preserved in the Imperial Treasury at Vienna,
is decidedly inferior as a work of art to the Paris manuscript
mentioned above. In it the influence of the enfeebled Roman
style is much stronger; the detail is far less refined and
decorative, in spite of a copious use of burnished gold. This
inferiority is due mainly to the absence of that Northumbrian

Splendour
ofMSS.

Technical
methods.

Gospels at
Vienna.

1 Theophilus, Schedula diversarum Artium, I. 34 ; this work is frequently
quoted in Chapter XV.

LATER CAROLINGIAN SCHOOL. [CHAP. V.

Successors
of Charles.

Portrait
figures.

Celtic
influence.

influence, to which the best Carolingian manuscripts owe so
much of their beauty.

Manuscripts of tJie later Carolingian school. Under Charles
the Great's successors the art of illuminating manuscripts
continued to flourish, and, in the ninth century, under his
grandsons Lothair and Charles the Bald, reached the climax
of its development. During this century decorative splendour
of a very high order was reached, in spite of there being very
little advance in the power of rendering the human form.
Gold, silver, ultramarine and brilliant pigments of all kinds
were skilfully used ; the subjects for miniatures became more
varied, and detail was more delicate and highly finished 1 .

Portraits of the kings are often introduced at the beginning
of books of this period, a fashion which in later times was
extended to other than royal patrons of art and learning. A
great number of places, chiefly Benedictine monasteries in
France, became active centres for the production of fine
illuminated manuscripts. Among them some of the principal
places were Paris, St Denis, Rheims, Verdun, Fontanelle,
and the two Abbeys of St Martin at Tours and Metz.

Fig. 14 shows a miniature from a manuscript of the
Gospels in the Paris library representing King Lothair en-
throned between two guards. This manuscript was written
about the year 845 in the monastery of St Martin at Metz.
In this picture a strong classical influence is apparent ; the
illuminator must have been familiar with manuscripts written
in Rome or elsewhere in Italy.

Some of the finest manuscripts of this period show a
strongly marked Northern influence, imitated from the old
Celtic illuminations of Ireland and Lindisfarne. Less gold is
used in this class of manuscripts ; and the intricate interlaced
patterns of the Celtic monks are used with much skill and
great beauty of effect. The figures of Christ and the Evan-
gelists are sometimes hardly human in form, but are worked
up into a kind of conventional scroll-pattern, just as they are in
the older Celtic illuminations. The Paris library possesses

1 See Janitschek, Die kiinstlerische Ansstatlung des Ada-Evangeliars und die
Karolingische Bitchmalerei ; fol. Leipzig, 1889.

Fig. 14. King Lothair enthroned ; a miniature from a manuscript of
about the year 845 A.u.

CELTIC SCHOOL AT ST GALL. [CHAP. V.

Classical

school

ofSt Gall.

Studies
from life.

two manuscripts of the Gospels, which are good examples of
this revived Celtic style (Bibl. Nat. Lat. Nos. 257 and 8849).
The borders and initial letters in these manuscripts are
remarkable for their intricate delicacy of design, and for their
rich colour, tastefully arranged ; while the figure drawing is
of the purely ornamental scroll type.

In the ninth century the Benedictine monastery of St
Gallen in Switzerland, which had formerly produced manu-
scripts of a purely Celtic type, now developed a very strange
school of miniature art 1 . The pictures in these St Gallen
manuscripts have figure subjects drawn in outline and then
faintly coloured with transparent washes, very like the Anglo-
Saxon (classical) style of illumination during the ninth and
tenth centuries. These rather weak drawings, which have
but little decorative value, show the influence of the Roman
school of illuminators, who still mainly adhered to the old
debased form of classical art, modified by some observation
and even careful study of the actual life and movement which
the painters saw around them. In this curious class of
manuscripts, though the figure subjects are devoid of much
vigour and artistic force, yet the decorative details of the
initials and borders are extremely fine, full of invention and
delicacy of detail. Fig. 15 shows a pen drawing from a
St Gallen manuscript of the ninth century, the magnificent
Psalterium aureum* ; it represents David going forth to battle.

With regard to studies from the life, either of men or
animals, it should be remembered that an artist is always
biased by tradition and association to a degree which is now
very difficult to realise. Even when looking at the same
object two painters of different race and education might
receive very different impressions on their retina. Thus in
the very interesting sketch-book of Villard de Honecourt, a
French sculptor and architect of the thirteenth century, there
are studies of men, lions and other animals, which he has
noted as being from the life ; and yet these drawings look to

1 See Weidmann, Geschichte der Bibliothek von St Gallen, 8vo, St Gall, 1841.
~ See J. R. Rahn, Das Psalterium Aureum von St Gallen, ein Beitrag zur
Geschichte der Karolingischen Miniatiirmalerei, folio, St Gall, 18/8.

CHAP. V.]

ATTEMPTS AT REALISM.

us like the purely imaginative conceptions of a heraldic
draughtsman, in spite of the fact that Villard certainly

Fig. 15. Illumination in pen outline, from a manuscript written in the ninth
century at St Gallen. It represents David riding out against his enemies.

represented them as faithfully as he was able, putting down
on his vellum the subjective visual and mental impression
that he had received 1 .

In the same way a modern Japanese artist evidently sees
the nobler animals, such as men and horses, in a very subjec-

1 An excellent edition with 72 facsimiles of Villard de Honecourt's Album or
sketch-book was produced by Professor Willis, London, 1859; it is superior to
the French edition issued by J. B. Lassus, Paris, 1858.

Figs. 16 and 17. Subject countries doing homage to the Emperor Otho II ;
from a manuscript of the Gospels,

BYZANTINE INFLUENCE.

[CHAP. V.

Personal
equation.

Byzantine
influence.

Classical
influence.

tive and distorted manner, whereas when he is dealing with
fishes, reptiles, plants and the like he is able to depict
them with the most wonderful grace, accuracy and realistic
spirit.

For this reason in examining an illuminated manuscript,
or other early work of art, to discover what use the artist has
made of actual study from nature, one should always take
into account the influences which made him see each natural
object in a special, personal way, and we must not argue that
because the drawing now looks very unreal that it may not
possibly have been as careful and accurate a study from life
as the painter's eye and hand could produce.

During the later Carolingian period there was a marked
revival of Byzantine influence, which did not tend to delay
the advancing decadence 1 . Figs. 16 and 17 show a very
striking example of this, a two-page miniature from a magni-
ficent purple and gold manuscript of tJie Gospels, which was
executed for the Emperor Otho II., and is now in the Munich
library. On the right-hand page is the Emperor enthroned
holding the long sceptre and the orb, with an archbishop
and some armed courtiers beside him. On the opposite page,
personifications of Rome, Gaul, Germany and Slavonia are
doing homage and offering gifts. The whole motive and
design is borrowed from a much earlier Byzantine work, such
as the mosaics of Justinian's time (c. 530 A.D.) in the churches
of Ravenna.

Fig. 1 8 from another fine manuscript of the Gospels is far
nobler in style ; here the influence is rather classical than
Byzantine. The figure illustrates one of the usual four
miniatures of the Evangelists, Saint Mark dipping his pen into
the ink. The Saint is robed in the alb, dalmatic with two
stripes, chasuble and pall as being Archbishop of Alexandria.
The figure is very dignified, and is evidently copied from a
much earlier Italian Textus, such as that which Saint Augus-
tine received from Pope Gregory or brought from Italy to
Canterbury.

1 See L. Delisle, L ' Evangeliaire d' 'Arras et la calligraphic Franco- Saxonne du
IX ine siecle, 8vo, Paris, 1888.

Fig. 1 8. Miniature of the Evangelist St Mark; from a manuscript of the Gospels.

78 THE LATER CAROLINGIAN SCHOOL. [CHAP. V.

Later Throughout the tenth century, and especially under the

patronage of the three Emperor Othos and Henry the Fowler,
fine and richly decorative manuscripts continued to be pro-
duced, with little change in the style of ornament employed.
After a long period of great artistic brilliance and wonderful
fertility of production the Carolingian style of illumination
came to an end when Charles the Great's Empire was (in
France) divided among various Feudal Lords. Then a serious
decadence of art set in, and lasted till the beginning of a most
magnificent artistic revival in the twelfth century.

To a large extent the illuminations of French manuscripts
during the latter part of the eleventh century consisted of

Fig. 19. Miniature of the Crucifixion from a German manuscript of the
eleventh century ; showing extreme artistic decadence.

CHAP. V.] PERIOD OF DECADENCE. 79

rude pen drawings with no washes of colour. The subsequent
history of the illuminator's art in France is discussed below,
see page 126.

Fig. 19 gives an example of the extreme artistic decadence Extreme
that in many places followed the brilliant Carolingian period.
This miniature of the Crucifixion is copied from a German
early eleventh century manuscript, now at Berlin. The
ludicrous ugliness of the drawing is not atoned for by any
decorative beauty of colour ; the whole miniature is dark and
heavy in tone, with yellow and green flesh-tints of the most
cadaverous hues.

CHAPTER VI.

THE CELTIC SCHOOL OF MANUSCRIPTS.

The Irish
Church.

Celtic
goldsmiths.

ONE of the most extraordinary artistic developments that
ever took place in the history of the world has been the
Celtic Monastic School of Art which in the seventh century
reached its highest aesthetic and technical climax, more
especially in the production of exquisitely minute gold jewel-
lery and no less minute and richly illuminated manuscripts.

The Christian Church in the east of Ireland dated from
an earlier period than the establishment of Christianity in
England 1 . It was founded about the year 430 A.D., and the
monks of Ireland, owing to their remote position, were able
for a long period to develope peacefully their artistic skill,
undisturbed by such successive foreign invasions as those
which for so many years kept Britain in a constant tumult of
war and massacre.

Thus it happened that by the middle or latter part of the
seventh century the Celtic monks of Ireland had learned to
produce goldsmiths' work and manuscript illuminations with
such marvellous taste and skill as has never been surpassed
by any age or country in the world 2 . Not even the finest
Greek or Etruscan jewellery, enriched with enamels and

1 Earlier that is than the conversion of the Saxon conquerors ; to some extent
a Romano-British Church had been established in Britain during the period of
Roman domination, but this native Church appears to have been almost wholly
eradicated by the Saxon Conquest.

2 Celtic manuscripts of all periods are well illustrated by Westwood, Miniatures
and Ornaments of Anglo-Saxon and Irish Manuscripts, London, 1868; see also
Westwood, Palaeographia Sacra Pictoria, 1843 5, and the companion volume,
Illuminated Illustrations of the Bible, 1846.

CHAP. VI.]

CELTIC GOLDSMITHS.

studded with gems, can be said to surpass the amazing
perfection shown in such a masterpiece of the goldsmith's art
as the so-called " Tara brooch" 1 in the Museum of the Royal
Irish Academy. As a rule the skill of these Irish goldsmiths
was devoted to the service of the Church in the manufacture
of such objects as croziers, morses (or cope-brooches), shrines,
chalices, textus-covers, receptacles for Bishops' bells, and
other pieces of ecclesiastical furniture.

These precious objects are decorated by a variety of
technical processes, such as applied filagree, repousse or
beaten reliefs, enamels, both chamfiTeve and cloisonne, and
inlay of precious Atones, especially the carbuncle in minute
slices, set in delicate gold cloisons and backed with shining
gold-leaf. All these and other decorative processes were
employed with unrivalled skill by the monastic goldsmiths of
eastern Ireland, a fact which it is important to notice, since /
nearly all the methods and styles of ornament which occur in
the Irish illuminated manuscripts of the same period are
clearly derived from prototypes in gold jewelled work. It is
in fact often possible to trace in a fine Irish manuscript of
the class we are now concerned with, ornamental patterns
of several quite distinct classes, one being derived from the
patterns of spiral or plaited form produced by soldering
delicate gold wire on to plain surfaces of gold, another being
copied from gold champleve enamels, and a third no less
clearly derived from the inlaid rectangular bits of carbuncle
framed in delicate gold strips or cloisons.

This strongly marked influence of the technique of one
art on the designs of another is due to the fact that the arts
both of the goldsmith and the manuscript illuminator were
carried on side by side in the same monastery or group of
monastic dwellings 2 , and in some cases we have written

1 Tara was the ancient inland capital of Ireland before Dublin was founded
by the Viking pirates.

2 The Irish monasteries of this date appear, frequently at least, to have con-
sisted of a group of a dozen or more separate wooden huts or stone "bee-hive"
cells, with one small central chapel of rectangular plan ; the whole being enclosed
within a wooden fence or a stone circuit wall, in which there was only one door
of approach ; see Arch. Jour. xv. p. i seq.

M. C. M. 6

Gold
jewellery.

Technical
processes.

Influence
on illumi-
nations.

THE WONDERFUL BEAUTY

[CHAP. VI.

The Book
ofKells.

Perfect

workman

ship.

Complex
inter-
lacings.

\ evidence that the scribe who wrote and illuminated an elabo-
; rate manuscript and the goldsmith who wrought and jewelled
\ its gold cover were one and the same person 1 .

It was in the second half of the seventh century that the
Celtic art of Eastern Ireland reached its highest point of
perfection. To this period belongs the famous Book of Kelts,
now in the library of Trinity College. Dublin, which was
probably written between 68ojand 700, and for many years
was, with its jewelled gold covers, the principal treasure of
the cathedral church at Kells 2 . This church had been
founded by Saint Columba, and so in old times this marvel-
lous manuscript was usually known as " the Great Gospels of
Saint Columba."

No words can describe the intricate delicacy of the
ornamentation of this book, lavishly decorated as it is with
all the different varieties of pattern mentioned above, the
most remarkable among them being the ingeniously intricate
patterns formed by interlaced and knotted lines of colour,
plaited in and out, with such amazingly complicated lines of
interlacement that one cannot look at the page without
astonishment at the combined taste, patience, unfaltering
certainty of touch and imaginative ingenuity of the artist.
The wonderful minuteness of the work, examined through a
microscope, fills one with wonder at the apparently super-
human eyesight of the scribe.

With regard to the intricate interlaced ornaments in which
(with the aid of a lens) each line can be followed out in its
windings and never found to break off or lead to an impossible
loop of knotting, it is evident that the artist must have
enjoyed, not only an aesthetic pleasure in the invention of
his pattern, but must also have had a distinct intellectual

1 For example, in an early Cashel Kalendar the monk Dagaeus, who died
in 586, is recorded to have been both a goldsmith (aurifex) and an illuminator
of manuscripts. Westwood, Miniatures in Irish Manuscripts, gives a number
of excellent coloured reproductions of illuminations of this school and also of the
Anglo-Celtic school of Northumbria.

2 It was formerly believed that this manuscript had once belonged to Saint
Cphjimba, who lived from 521 to 597, but it is shown by the internal evidence
of its style to be a century later than Saint Columba's time.

CHAP. VI.]

OF THE BOOK OF KELLS.

enjoyment in his work, such as a skilful mathematician feels
in the working out of a complicated geometrical problem.

The combined skill of eye and hand shown in the minute
plaits of the Book of Kells places it among the most wonder-
ful examples of human workmanship that the world has ever
produced. By the aid of a microscope Mr Westwood counted
in the space of one inch no less than 158 interlacements of
bands or ribands, each composed of a strip of white bordered
on both sides with a black line.

Giraldus Cambrensis, who visited Ireland in 1185 as
secretary to Prince John, writes in the most enthusiastic
language of the splendour of a similar manuscript of the
Gospels which he saw in Kildare Cathedral. It shows, he
says, superhuman skill, worthy of angels' hands, and he was
lost in wondering admiration at the sight.

One class of ornament in the Book of Kells and in other
manuscripts of this class consists of bands or diapers formed
with step-like lines enclosing small spaces of brilliant colour.
It is this class of pattern which is derived from the cloisonne
inlay with bits of transparent cajrbuncle used in gold jewellery.
Other ornaments consist of various spiral forms derived from
the application of gold wire to flat surfaces of gold, a class of
pattern which appears to have come, as it were, naturally to
the gold-workers of many different periods and countries.
Many of these spiral designs in the Irish manuscripts are
almost identical with forms which occur so frequently among
the gold ornaments of the Greek " Mycenean period," one
among many examples in the art history of the world, which
show the remarkable sameness of invention in the human
mind at a certain stage of development whatever the time or
the place may be 1 .

It should moreover be noticed that this close imitation of
metal-work is not limited to the separate details of the
manuscripts. The main lines and divisions of the decoration
on whole pages are accurately copied from the enamelled and
jewelled gold or silver covers in which these precious Gospels
were bound. Thus, the same design might appear in delicate

1 See Westwood, Irish Manuscripts, Plate 9'.

Microscopic
intricacy.

Copies of

jewellery.

Primitive

spiral
patterns.

8 4

ORIENTAL INFLUENCE.

[CHAP. vi.

Trumpet
pattern.

Arab
influence.

The
human
form.

goldsmiths' work on the covers of a Textus, and also might
be seen represented by the illuminator in brilliant colours on
a page within.

One form of ornament, which occurs very frequently in
the Irish manuscripts, is what is often called "the trumpet
pattern" from its supposed resemblance to a curved metal
trumpet. This kind of spiral ornament is used not only in
the Celtic manuscripts and goldsmiths' work, but also on
bronze shields and other pieces of metal-work on a large
scale. This special ornament is not peculiar to the Irish, but
was commonly used by the Celtic tribes of Britain from a
very early date.

United with these purely native types of ornament, we
find in these Celtic manuscripts one curious class of foreign
ornament derived from the patterns on imported pieces of
textile stuffs woven in Arab looms 1 . Among many strange
forms of serpents, dragons and other monsters of northern
origin, other animals, such as lions, eagles and swans, occur
which resemble closely those represented with such perfect
conventional skill on the rich silk stuffs and early Oriental
carpets woven in Syria, in the Arab towns of Sicily and in
other Moslem centres. These beautiful stuffs were imported
largely into Northern Europe for ecclesiastical purposes, such
as for the vestments of priests or to form wrappings round
some sacred reliquary 2 .

Though these Celtic manuscripts show such marvellous
dexterity of touch and unerring firmness of line in every
minute and complicated pattern, yet the monastic artist
appears to have been absolutely incapable of representing
the human form.

The figures of Christ and the Saints, which sometimes do
occur in these manuscripts, are treated in a purely ornamental
and (in its stricter sense) conventional way; the hair and
beard, for example, are worked up into scrolls or spiral

1 See fig. 13 on page 67.

2 When the grave of Saint Cuthbert in Durham Cathedral was opened in 1827,
it was found that the Saint's body had been wrapped in rich Siculo-Arab silk
of the eleventh century at the time when his body was moved, in 1 104 A.D. See
Raine, St Cuthbert, Durham, 1828, p. 183 seq.

CHAP. VI.]

TECHNICAL DETAILS.

ornaments, and the draperies are merely masses of varied
colour, with little or no resemblance to the folds of a dress.

The pigments used by the Celtic monks are very varied
and of the most brilliant tints, prepared with such skill that
after more than a thousand years they seem as fresh and
bright as ever.

Among these pigments is included the fine murex purple
which the Irish monks used occasionally to stain sheets of
vellum like those in the Golden Gospels of the Byzantines.
We are told by the Venerable Bede that the Irish monks had
learnt how to extract this beautiful dye from a variety of the
murex shell-fish which is not uncommon on both shores of
the Irish Channel. Splendid as they are in colour, there is
one curious feature in the early Irish manuscripts of the finest
class, such as the Book of Kells ; that is, that no gold or
silver either in the form of leaf or as a fluid pigment is used.
This seems specially strange when we remember the close
connection there was between the arts of the goldsmith and
of the illuminator of manuscripts among the Irish artists.

In later times, when the Celtic style of illumination was
transplanted to England, gold was to some extent introduced,
but in the finest Irish manuscripts of the best period, the
latter half of the seventh century, gold is completely absent.
Nevertheless, so great was the decorative genius of these
Irish monks that, even without burnished gold and silver,
their illuminated pages quite equal, not only in artistic
beauty, but even in mere splendour of effect, any illumina-
tions that have ever been produced.

In addition to the Book of Kells another manuscript of
similar style and date and of almost equal splendour should
be mentioned, the Book of Durroiv^, which, like the Book of
Kells, was also known as the " Gospels of Saint Columba," who
is said to have left behind him, at his death in 597, no less
than three hundred manuscripts written with his own hand.
It is not impossible that the Book of Durrow is one of these,
as it bears some signs of being earlier in date than the Book
of Kells.

1 Library of Trinity College, Dublin, manuscripts A, iv. 5.

Colours

without

gold.

Celtic art
in Britain.

The Book
of Durrow.

CELTIC ART IN SCOTLAND

[CHAP. vi.

Monks of
lona.

Celtic mis-
sionaries.

Gospels

ofSt

Cuthbert.

From Ireland the art of illuminating manuscripts was
carried by monkish colonists to the Western coasts of Scot-
land, and especially to the Island of lona, where a monastery
had been founded by Saint Columba in the latter part of the
sixth century 1 . Great numbers of manuscripts resembling in
style the Book of Kells were produced in lona ; and offshoots
from the monastery of lona, established at various places on
the mainland, became similar centres for the writing of
richly decorated manuscripts. No less than thirteen monas-
teries in Scotland and twelve in England were founded by
Irish monks from the mother settlement in lona. In fact the
whole of Britain seems to have owed its Christianity, during
the Anglo-Saxon period, to the Irish missionaries from lona,
with the important exception of the kingdom of Kent, which
was occupied by the Roman mission of Saint Augustine.

In the year 635, at the request of Oswald King of
Northumbria, the Scottish king sent an Irish monk from
lona, named Aidan, to preach Christianity to the North-
umbrian worshippers of Thor and Odin. Aidan selected the
little island of Lindisfarne as the head-quarters of his mis-
sionary church, which, at first consisting mainly of a few Irish
monks from lona, rapidly grew in size and importance. In a
few years, Saint Aidan, Bishop and Abbot of Lindisfarne, was
able to establish a number of monastic houses throughout the
Northumbrian Kingdom, and his own Abbey of Lindisfarne
became one of the chief centres of Northern Europe for the
production of fine illuminated manuscripts of the Celtic type.

After the death of Saint Aidan other Irish monks succeeded
him as Bishop of Lindisfarne, and the school of manuscript
illumination continued to flourish.

One of the most beautiful existing examples of the
Lindisfarne branch of the Irish school of miniature work is
the famous " Book of the Gospels of Saint Cuthbert 2 " as it is

1 See Jamieson, History of the Ancient Culdces of lona ; Edinburgh, 1811.

2 Saint Cuthbert was a monk of Irish descent, at first a member of the Celtic
monastery of Melrose, and afterwards sixth Bishop of Lindisfarne from 685 to
688. In later times his gold, gem-studded shrine in Durham Cathedral was one
of the most magnificent and costly in the world ; see Rites and Monuments of
Durham, Surtees Soc., 1842, pp. 3 and 4.

CHAP. VI.] AND AT LINDISFARNE. 87

called, now in the British Museum (Cotton manuscripts, Nero, Gospels
D. IV). The history of this manuscript is a very curious one ; CuMert
it was written some years after Saint Cuthbert's death in 688,
not during his lifetime as was formerly believed. Eadfrith, a
monk of Lindisfarne in Saint Cuthbert's time, and subse-
quently eighth Bishop of Lindisfarne (698 to 721), was the
writer of these Gospels, " in honour of God and of Saint
Cuthbert,'' as he records in a note. The illuminations were
added by the monk Aethelwold, afterwards ninth Bishop of
Lindisfarne, and the elaborate gold, gem-studded cover of
this magnificent textus was the work of a third monk of the
same Abbey named Bilfrith.

In the ninth century the Viking pirates were constantly Viking
harrying the shores of Northumbria ; more than once the ^"
Abbey of Lindisfarne was plundered and many of the monks
were slain, till at last, in the year 878, the small remnant who
had escaped the cruelty of the Northmen decided to leave
Lindisfarne and seek a new settlement in the original home
of the founders of Lindisfarne, the eastern coast of Ireland.
In 878 the survivors set off, carrying with them the body of Travels
Saint Cuthbert, and the magnificent manuscript of the Gospels,
which was the chief treasure of their Abbey, and which had
been successfully hidden in Saint Cuthbert's grave at the
time of the invasion of the Northmen. The monks crossed to
the western shore of Northumbria, and there took ship for
Ireland. A great storm, however, arose ; their boat shipped
a heavy sea which washed overboard the precious Gospels of
Saint Cuthbert, which had been carefully packed in a wooden
box. Eventually the little ship was driven back, and finally
was stranded on the Northumbrian shore. Soon after reach-
ing the land the fugitive monks, wandering sadly along the
beach, found, to their great joy, the lost box with its precious
manuscript thrown up by the waves and lying on dry land.
According to the chronicle of Symeon 1 (chapter xxvii.), the
brilliant illuminations were quite uninjured by the sea-water ;
this is not literally the case ; some of the pages are a good

1 The works of Symeon Dunelmensis were published by the Surtees Society
in 1868.

THE GOSPELS OF ST CUTHBERT [CHAP. VI.

Minster of
Durham.

Anglo-
Celtic
school.

deal stained, but wonderfully little injured considering what
the book has gone through.

When after many wanderings the successors of the exiles
from Lindisfarne found, in 995, a final resting-place for the
body of Saint Cuthbert in the. Minster which they founded
at Durham, the manuscript of the Gospels was laid on the
coffin of the Saint. There it remained till 1 104, when Saint
Cuthbert's body was exhumed, and soon after it was sent
back to Lindisfarne, where a Benedictine monastery had been
founded in 1093 by some monks from Durham on the site of
Saint Cuthbert's ruined Abbey.

There it was safely preserved till the dissolution of the
monasteries under Henry VIII. The gold covers were then
stripped off and melted, but the still more precious manu-
script escaped destruction ; it was subsequently acquired by
Sir Robert Cotton, and is now one of the chief manuscript
treasures of the British Museum.

In point of style the "Gospels of Saint Cuthbert" are a
characteristic example of the Irish school of illumination,
modified by transplantation to English soil. The inter-
mediate stage in lona and other monasteries of western
Scotland seems to have introduced no change of style into
the primitive Irish method of ornament. Whether produced
in eastern Ireland or in western Scotland the manuscripts
were the work of the same Celtic race, the Scots, who, at
first inhabiting the north-east of Ireland, passed over to the
not very distant shores of northern Britain to which these
Irish settlers gave the name Scotland.

When however the Irish monks passed from lona to
Northumbria the case was different ; they were surrounded
with a new set of artistic influences mainly owing to the
introduction into Northumbria of fine Byzantine and Italian
manuscripts. The result of this was that though the Lindis-
farne manuscripts continued to be decorated with exactly the
same class of patterns that had been used in the Book of K ells
and other Irish manuscripts for initials, borders and the like,
yet in the treatment of the human figure a very distinct
advance was made. Thus in Saint Cuthbert's Gospels the

CHAP. VI.] AND OTHER CELTIC MANUSCRIPTS.

8 9

seated figures of the Evangelists are drawn with much dignity
of form and with some attempt at truth in the pose, the
proportions and in the disposition of the folds of the drapery.
The monk Aethelwold who painted these miniatures must
have had before him some fine manuscripts of the Gospels
probably both of Byzantine and Italian style.

The whole result is a very splendid one, the Gospels of
Saint Cuthbert in richness of invention and minute intricacy
of pattern almost equal the Book of Kells ; while the figure
subjects, instead of being grotesque masses of ornament, are
paintings with much beauty of line as well as extreme
splendour of colour. Another modification is the introduction
of gold and silver leaf, which are wholly wanting in the Book
of Kells and the other finest purely Irish manuscripts.

Other typical examples of this combined Celtic and
English style are the magnificent Gospels in the Imperial
library in St Petersburg, and a manuscript of the Commentary
on the Psalms by Cassiodorus now in the Chapter library at
Durham. This latter manuscript, which dates from the
eighth century, is traditionally said to have been written by
Bede himself. The illuminations in this manuscript are
specially rich with interlaced patterns, dragon monsters and
diapers of the most minute scale, all purely Celtic in style,
and all showing with special clearness their derivation from
originals in goldsmiths' work. Not only the distinctly
metallic motives of ornament are faithfully copied, but even
the manner in which the gold-workers built up their elaborate
manuscript covers by the insertion of separate little plates of
gold filagree and enamel side by side on a large plate or
matrix is exactly reproduced by the illuminator. As in the
case of the Lindisfarne Gospels, the figures of the Psalmist
which are introduced are very superior to any figures which
occur in the purely Irish manuscripts, showing the distinct
influence of Italian manuscripts of debased classical style.

Another very interesting example of the Anglo-Celtic
school of illumination, with fine initials and a painting of an
eagle of the characteristic Northern type, is in the posses-
sion of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; No. cxcvn.

Improved
drawing.

Use of
metal leaf.

MS. of
Bede.

Italian
influence.

QO THE CORPUS AND LAMBETH GOSPELS. [CHAP. VI.

The This is an imperfect manuscript of the Gospels containing
Cartels, on ty ^ ie Gospels of Saint Luke and Saint John. The decora-
tive borders and initials have the interlaced Irish class of
ornament. This interesting manuscript was (in the sixteenth
century) in the library of Archbishop Parker, who inserted a
note stating that it was one of the manuscripts which were
sent by Pope Gregory to Saint Augustine. The actual date
of the manuscript is probably not earlier than the eighth
century, in spite of the ancient appearance of the figure
painting. An earlier copy of the Gospels in the same library
has full page miniatures of the two Evangelists of purely
classical style, surrounded with architectural framework of
debased Roman form, very little modified from similar
Roman miniatures of the fifth century A.D.

Returning for the moment to the Irish school of Celtic
art, it should be observed that richly illuminated manuscripts
continued to be produced in Ireland till the ninth, and tenth
centuries, but these later manuscripts, fine as they are, do not
equal in beauty the Book of Kells and other works of the
Gospels seventh and eighth century. The Book of the Gospels of
Din-nan MacDurnan 1 , who was Archbishop of Armagh from 885 to
927, is a good example of the later school of Irish art, in
which the figures of the Evangelists are no less grotesque
than those in the earlier manuscripts, while the interlaced and
diapered patterns of the borders and initials are inferior in
minute delicacy of execution to such masterpieces as the
Book of Kells ; see fig. 20.

Book of Another still stronger proof of artistic decadence among

the Celtic illuminators of this period is afforded by the Book
of Deer' 1 ' in the Cambridge University library. This is a
small octavo copy of \hzLatin Gospels after the Itala version 3 .
In style it is a mere shadow of the glories of early Irish art,

1 Now in the Archbishop of Canterbury's library at Lambeth.

2 The Book of Deer was first brought to light by Mr Henry Bradshaw, and
has been published by the Spalding Club, Ed. John Stuart, Edinburgh, 1869.
The Monastery at Deer in Aberdeenshire was founded by Saint Columba as a
branch house from lona.

3 The so-called Itala version is the older Latin translation of the Bible, which
existed previous to the recension of Saint Jerome.

CHAP. VI.] THE BOOK OF DEER. 9!

with comparatively coarse and feebly coloured decorative

Fig. 20. Miniature from the Gospels of MacDurnan of the ninth century.

patterns. It appears to have been written in Scotland by an
Irish scribe during the ninth century 1 .

1 A very interesting Psalter of similar style and date is preserved in the library
of St John's College, Cambridge; its ornaments are of the unmixed Celtic style,
broad in treatment without any of the marvellous minuteness of the Book of Kells
and the Book of Durroiv.

9 2

COMBINATION OF THE CELTIC [CHAP. VI.

Gospels of
MacRegol.

Gospels of
St Chad.

Celtic

school

on the

Continent.

One of the finest of the manuscripts of the later Irish type
is the Book of the Gospels of MacRegol in the Bodleian library
(D. 24. No. 3946) executed in the ninth century. The orna-
ments and the very conventional figures of the Evangelists
are of the purely Irish type, unmodified by any imitation
of the superior figure drawing in Byzantine and Italian
miniatures 1 .

The manuscript Gospels of Saint Chad in the Chapter
library of Lichfield Cathedral is another example of the Irish
school and of the same date as the last-mentioned book. It
is named after Ceadda or Chad who, in the seventh century,
was the first Bishop of Lichfield, nearly two hundred years
before the date of this manuscript of the Gospels*.

During the most flourishing period of Celtic art in Ireland
its influence was by no means limited to the Northumbrian
school of illuminators. The Irish types of ornament were
adopted by the scribes of Canterbury and other places in the
South of England ; and on the Continent of Europe Celtic art
was widely spread by Irish missionaries such as Saint Colum-
banus, and by the founding of Irish monasteries during the
sixth century in various countries, as, for example, at Bobbio
in Northern Italy, at St Gallen in Switzerland, at Wurtzburg
in Germany, and at Luxeuil in France. In these and in other
places Irish monastic illuminators worked hard at the produc-
tion of manuscripts and spread the Celtic style of ornament
over a large area of Western Europe. The library of St
Gallen possesses a number of richly illuminated manuscripts
of the later Irish type, exactly similar in style to those which
during the eighth and ninth centuries were produced in the
monasteries of Ireland and Scotland 8 .

The result of this spread of Celtic influence was that
borders, initial letters and similar ornaments of pure Irish

1 See Westwood, Irish Manuscripts, PI. 16.

2 This is one of many examples of Books being called after some earlier Saint
who was connected with the monastery where the manuscript was written; for
example the Gospels of Saint Augustine in the Corpus library at Cambridge, the
Gospels of Saint Cuthbert, and the Gospels of Saint Columba, are all later than
the dates of the Saints they are called after.

3 See Weidmann, Geschichte der Bibliothek von St Gallen ; St Gall, 1841.

CHAP. VI.] AND THE CLASSICAL STYLES. 93

style were used in many manuscripts in which the figures
of Saints were designed after an equally pure Italian or
debased classic style. A good example of this is the so- Psalter
called Psalter of Saint Augustine 1 (Brit. Mus. Cotton -mann- f st .

. . . Augustine.

scripts Vesp. A. i) which for many centuries belonged to the

Cathedral of Canterbury. This is a manuscript of the eighth
century; one of its chief miniature paintings represents David
enthroned, playing on a harp with a group of attendant
musicians and two dancing figures round his throne. These
figures are purely Italian in style, of the debased Roman
School ; but the arched frame which borders the picture is
filled in with ornament of the Irish metal type, closely similar
in style, except that gold and silver are largely used, to those
in the Book of Kelts, though inferior in minute delicacy of
execution. It is of course very possible that the illuminations
in this Psalter are the work of two hands, the figures being
painted by an Italian illuminator and the borders by an
English or Irish monk.

In later times, especially during the ninth century, the Scandina-
Celtic art of Ireland appears to have been largely introduced
into Scandinavia by means of the Viking pirates who harried
the whole circuit of the shores of Britain and Ireland, and
finally in the ninth century established a Norse Kingdom
in eastern Ireland with the newly founded Dublin as its
capital'''. The Norsemen were far from being a literary
race and it was not in the form of manuscript illuminations
that Irish art was introduced into Norway and Denmark,
but rather in the rich gold and silver jewellery with which the
Viking chiefs adorned themselves, and also on a larger scale
in the magnificently decorative reliefs which were carved on
the wooden planks which formed the frames or architraves of
the doors of the Scandinavian wooden churches in the eleventh

1 This manuscript was formerly believed to have been once in the possession
of Saint Augustine, but it is clearly a good deal later in date than his time.

2 Eventually there were three Norse kingdoms in Ireland, the capitals of which
were Dublin, Waterford and Limerick ; and the three chief ports of Ireland,
Dublin, Cork and Belfast were all founded by the Viking invaders; see C. F.
Keary's valuable work, The Vikings in Western Christendom, London, 1891, pp.
165 to 185.

THE CODEX AUREUS OF STOCKHOLM. [CHAP. VI.

The Golden

Gospels of

Stockholm.

Viking
robbers.

and twelfth centuries, after the worship of the Thunderer had
been replaced by the Faith of the White Christ.

Lindisfarne, lona and the other chief Irish monasteries
suffered again and again from the inroads of the Vikings,
who found rich and easily won plunder in the form of gold
and silver chalices, reliquaries and book-covers in the treasuries
of the monastic churches undefended by any except unarmed
and peaceful monks.

One curious record of Viking plunder is preserved in the
Royal library of Stockholm. This is a very magnificent
manuscript Book of the Gospels of the eighth century, com-
monly known as the Codex aureus of Stockholm. It is mostly
written with alternate leaves of purple vellum, the text on
which is in golden letters. In general style and in the
splendour of its ornaments it closely resembles the Lindis-
farne " Gospels of Saint Cuthbert? described above at page 88,
and most probably, like the latter, was also written in the
monastery of Lindisfarne. The interlaced ornaments of
the Irish type are marvels of beauty, while the dignified
drawing of the enthroned figures of the four Evangelists
shows clearly the influence of Continental manuscript art.
In this case the Celtic or English illuminator must have
had before him a copy of the Gospels not of the Italian
but of the Byzantine style, since the Evangelists and other
figures in the book which are represented in the act of
benediction do so in the Oriental not in the Latin fashion 1 .

On the margin of the first page of Saint Matthew's
Gospel an interesting note has been written about the year
850 by the owner of the Gospels, an English Ealdorman
named Aelfred ; this note records that the manuscript had
been stolen by Norse robbers and that Aelfred had purchased
it from them for a sum in pure gold in order that the sacred
book might be rescued from heathen hands. Aelfred then
presented it to the Cathedral Church of Canterbury, and
new gold covers appear then to have been made for this
Textus, as there is another note in a ninth century hand

1 The blessing in the Greek Church is given by raising three fingers ; in the
Western Church two fingers and the thumb are used.

CHAP. VI.] CELTIC AND PAPAL PARTIES.

Long
st " l SS c -

requesting the prayers of the Church for three goldsmiths,
probably those who replaced the original gold covers which
the Viking pirates had torn off 1 .

Returning now to the manuscripts of the Celtic Church in The two
Northumbria, in order to understand the gradual introduction
into Northern England of the Italian or classical style of
painting it is necessary to remember the struggle which
took place during the seventh century between the adherents
of the older Celtic Church and those who supported the Papal
claims for supremacy throughout Britain.

On the one hand the See of Canterbury, founded by the
Roman Saint Augustine, claimed jurisdiction in the north as
well as in the south of Britain, in opposition to the Celtic Abbot
of lona, who was then the real Metropolitan of the Church in
the north of England.

Wilfrid of York and Benedict Biscop of Jarrow spent many
years in a series of embassies, between 670 and 690, backward
and forward between Northumbria and Rome striving to in-
troduce the Papal authority, by the aid of imported books,
relics and craftsmen skilled in building stone churches in place
of the simple wooden structures which at that time were
the only ecclesiastical buildings in Northumbria 2 . Very large
numbers of illuminated manuscripts were brought to England
during the many journeys of Wilfrid and Benedict Biscop; and
important libraries were created at York and at Jarrow which
led to these places becoming literary and artistic centres of
great and European importance.

In the end, after many failures, Wilfrid, Archbishop 3 of
York, was successful in bringing Northumbria under the supre-
macy of Canterbury and Rome. In 664 a great Council was
held at Whitby in the presence of the Northumbrian King
Oswiu. Bishop Colman, the successor of Saint Aidan at
Lindisfarne, represented the Celtic Church and the authority of
Saint Columba, while Wilfrid appeared to support the authority

1 See Westwood, Miniatures of Irish Manuscripts, London, 1868, PI. i. and n.

8 The points of difference between the Roman and Celtic Churches were very
trivial, the chief being the date for the celebration of Easter and the shape of the
monastic tonsure.

3 See note 2 on page 97.

Synod of

9 6

THE ROMAN VICTORY.

[CHAP. vi.

Defeat of

the Celtic

party.

Baeda of
Durham,

Northum-
brian
school.

of Saint Peter and the Bishop of Rome. After hearing that
Saint Peter possessed the keys of Heaven and Hell, while
Saint Columba could claim no such marvellous power, King
Oswiu decided in favour of the Roman Supremacy. This
decision, though based on such fanciful grounds, was a fortunate
one for the English Church, since, in the main, learning, culture
and established order generally were on the side of the Italian
Church.

The practical result of this Roman victory at the Synod of
Whitby in 664 was that a classical influence gradually extended
itself in all the English centres for the production of illuminated
manuscripts. It has already been noted that the splendid ma-
nuscripts of Lindisfarne and other Northumbrian monasteries,
though of Celtic origin, show a distinct Roman influence in
the improvement of the drawing of their figures of Saints.
By degrees the Irish element in the illuminations grew less
and less ; though the interlaced patterns and fantastic dragon
and serpent forms lasted for many centuries in all the chief
countries of western Europe and form an important decorative
element till the thirteenth century 1 .

One of the chief schools of English manuscript illumination,
that of the Benedictine Abbey at Durham, was raised to
a position of European importance by the Northumbrian
monk Baeda, afterwards called the Venerable Bede, who
was born in 673, a few years after the Synod of Whitby.

As the author of a great Ecclesiastical History of the
English Nation, Baeda ranks as the Father of English
History ; he did much to foster the study of ancient classical
authors, was himself a skilful writer of manuscripts, and made
the Abbey of Jarrow, where he lived till his death in 735, an
active centre for the production of richly illuminated manu-
scripts of many different literary classes.

In the eighth century the schools of illumination in the
Abbeys of Jarrow, Wearmouth and York in Northumbria,
and of Canterbury and Winchester in the south were among

1 This very decorative class of ornament not only survived till the thirteenth
century but was again revived in Italy at the close of the fifteenth century; see
below, page 193.

CHAP. VI.] ENGLISH SCHOOL OF ILLUMINATION. 97

the most active and artistically important in the world 1 . In Celtic and
these schools of miniature painting was gradually created a
special English style of illumination, partly formed out of a
combination of two very different styles, that of the Irish
Celtic illuminators and that of the Italian classical scribes.
This English School of illumination, which had been
partially developed before the close of the tenth century,
became, for real artistic merit, the first and most important in
the whole of Europe, and for a considerable period continued
to occupy this foremost position 2 .

1 It is mentioned above, see page 62, how Alcuin of York in the reign of
Charles the Great created the Anglo Carolingian style of illumination by intro-
ducing in the eighth century into the kingdom of the Franks manuscripts and
manuscript illuminators from the monasteries of Northumbria.

2 Canon G. F. Browne tells me that it is very doubtful whether Wilfrid ever
received the pall from Rome. It may therefore be more correct to speak of him
as Bishop rather than Archbishop of York.

M. C. M.

9 8

CHAPTER VII.

THE ANGLO-SAXON SCHOOL OF MANUSCRIPTS'.

Danish
invasions.

Time of

King

Alfred.

THE ninth century in England was one of great turmoil
and misery, on account of the fearful havoc wrought by the
Danish Northmen throughout the whole length and breadth
of the land. In Northumbria the thriving literary and
artistic school which had been raised to such preeminence by
Baeda was utterly blotted out from existence by the invading
Danes ; and when at last King Alfred, who reigned from
871 to 901, secured an interval of peace he was obliged to
seek instructors in the art of manuscript illumination from
the Prankish kings.

In this way the wave of influence flowed back again from

France to England. In Charles the Great's time the Caro-

jlingian school of manuscripts had been largely influenced by

,'the Celtic style, which Alcuin of York introduced from

j Northumbria, and now the later art of Anglo-Saxon England

\ received back from France the forms of ornament and the

technical skill which in Northumbria itself had become

extinct.

Alfred was an enthusiastic patron of literature and art,
especially the art of manuscript illumination, and before long
a new school of manuscript art was created in many of the

1 The word "Anglo-Saxon" is a convenient one to use, and is supported by
various ancient authorities; for example in a manuscript Benedictional (in the
library of Corpus College, Cambridge) England is called "Regnum Anglo-
Saxonum," and the English king is entitled "Rex Anglorum vel Saxonum."

CHAP. VII.] BENEDICTIONAL OF AETHELWOLD. 99

Benedictine monasteries of England and especially among
the monks of the royal city of Winchester, which in the
tenth century produced works of extraordinary beauty and
decorative force.

As an example of this we may mention the famous < B medic -
Benedictional of Aethelwold, who was_Bishop ofUW-inchester, \ ,^-/,J_
from_965 ^0^984'. The writer of this sumptuously decorated \ >K>old '
manuscript was Bishop Aethelwold's chaplain, a monk named
Godemann, who afterwards, about the year 970, became
Abbot of Thorney. Unlike the manuscripts of earlier date
in which the illuminated pictures are usually few in number,
this Benedictional contains no less than thirty full page
miniatures, mostly consisting of scenes from the life of
Christ. Each picture is franoed by an elaborate border,
richly decorated in gold and brilliant colours, with conven-
of classical, style. The drawing of the

figures is dignified, and the drapery is usually well conceived
and treated in a bold, decorative way, showing much artistic
skill on the part of the illuminator.

Fig. 21 shows one of the miniatures, representing the
Ascension ; the colouring is extremely beautiful and har-
monious, enhanced by a skilful use of burnished gold.

Though the figures and especially the delicately modelled Foreign
faces have a character of their own, peculiarly English in " l ^"'
feeling, yet in the general style of the miniatures, and in
their elaborate borders there are very distinct signs of a
strong Carolingian influence, owing, no doubt, to the
introduction of Prankish illuminators and the purchase of
Carolingian manuscripts during the reign of Alfred the
Great, more than half a century before the date of this
manuscript.

There is, for example, much similarity of style in the
miniatures of this Benedictional and those in a Carolingian

1 This splendid manuscript is in. the possession of the Duke of Devonshire;
a good description of it, with engravings of all its miniatures, is published in
Archaologia, Vol. xxiv. 1832, pp. i to 117, and a coloured copy of one of the
miniatures is given by Westwood, Irish Manuscripts, Plate 45.

The libiary of Trinity College, Cambridge, possesses a book of the Gospels
which in style is very similar to the Benedictional of Aethelwold.

TOO

Fig. 21. Miniature from the Benedictional of Aethelwold ; written and
illuminated by a monastic scribe at Winchester.

CHAP. VII.] THE WINCHESTER SCHOOL.

IOI

manuscript of tJie Gospels written for King Lothaire in the
monastery of St Martin at Metz soon after 843 *; see above
fig. 14, p. 71.

Another very fine example of the Winchester school
of illumination is the manuscript Charter which King Edgar
granted to the new minster at Winchester in 966. The
first page consists of a large miniature, painted in gold and
brilliant colours on a purple-stained leaf of vellum 2 , with
Christ in Majesty supported by four angels in the upper part
of the picture, and, below, standing figures of the B. V. Mary
and Saint Peter, with King Edgar in the middle offering his
charter to Christ. The whole picture is very skilfully
designed so as to fill the whole page in the most decorative
way, and it is framed in a border with richly devised conven-
tional leaf-forms.

In artistic power this tenth century Winchester school of
illuminators appears, for a while at least, to have been
foremost in the world. Both in delicacy of touch and in
richness of decorative effect the productions of this school
are superior to those of any contemporary Continental
country.

Saint Dunstan, the great ecclesiastical statesman of the
ninth century, created another school of illumination in the
Benedictine Abbey of Glastonbury. Dunstan himself was
no mean artist, as may be 'seen from a fine drawing of Christ,
which he executed 3 ; the Saint has represented himself as a
small monkish figure prostrate at the feet of Christ. At
the top of the page is inscribed in a twelfth century hand,
"Pictura et scriptura hujus pagine subtus visa est de propria
manu sancti Dunstani."

During the tenth century a large number of illuminated
manuscripts were executed in the southern parts of England,
the miniatures in which are very unlike and, as decoration,
very inferior to the manuscripts of the Anglo-Carolingian

1 The Gospels of Lothaire are in Paris, Bibl. Nat. Lat. 266.

2 This is one of the latest examples of the use of vellum dyed with the murex
purple; the purple grounds occasionally used in fifteenth century manuscripts are
usually produced by laying on a coat of opaque purple pigment.

3 Now preserved in the Bodleian library at Oxford.

Winchester
Charter.

St Dun-
stan as an
artist.

IO2

OUTLINE DRAWINGS.

[CHAP. vii.

Coloured

ink
drawings.

MSS. of

the XII th

century.

RollofSt
Guthlac.

style, as represented by the magnificent Benedictional of
Aethelwold. This class of illumination consists of drawings,
often with a large number of small figures, executed with a
pen in red, blue and brown outline. The drawing of these
figures is very mannered, the heads are small, the attitudes
awkward, and the draperies are represented in numerous
small, fluttering folds, drawn with an apparently shaky line,
as if the artist had lacked firmness of hand. This, however,
is a mere mannerism, as wherever he wished for a steady
line, as, for example, in the drawing of the faces, the artist has
drawn with the utmost decision and firmness of touch. The
costumes of these curious outline drawings, the architectural
accessories and other details, all show clearly the influence of
the very debased forms of classical Roman art, which still
survived among the manuscript illuminations of Italy 1 . This
degraded form of classical art was far from being a good
model for the Anglo-Saxon illuminator to imitate, and the
blue and red outline miniatures are very inferior to the
sumptuous Anglo-Carolingian manuscripts which were being
produced at Winchester by contemporary illuminators.

In the eleventh century Anglo-Saxon miniatures in
coloured outline improved greatly in beauty of form and
in gracefulness of pose ; till at the beginning of the twelfth
century extremely fine miniatures of this class were produced.
A very beautiful example of this is a long vellum roll
illuminated with eighteen circular miniatures, mostly drawn
with a pen in dark brown ink. These outline miniatures
represent scenes from the life of Saint Guthlac, the Hermit of
Crowland. The series begins with a drawing of the youthful
Guthlac receiving the tonsure from Hedda, Bishop of Win-
chester (676 to 705), in the presence of the Abbess Ebba and
two nuns. The whole composition is very skilfully arranged
to fill the circular medallion, and there is great dignity and
even delicate beauty in the separate figures. The precision of

1 The celebrated " Utrecht Psalter " is the best known example of a fine
manuscript of this date with outline drawings of the revived classical style.
Some northern influence is shown in the interlaced ornaments of the large initials.
Facsimiles of some pages have been published by W. G. Birch, London, 1876.

CHAP. VII.] LIFE OF SAINT GUTHLAC.

103

touch shown in the drawing is most admirable, recalling the
perfect purity of line seen in the finest vase-paintings of the
Greeks, in which, as in these miniatures, the greatest amount
of effect is produced with the fewest possible touches. A few
flat washes are introduced into the backgrounds, but all the
principal part of the miniatures is executed with this pure
outline.

There are no grounds for the suggestion that these
medallion drawings were intended as designs for stained
glass. There is much similarity of style in stained glass
paintings and manuscript illuminations during the twelfth to
the fourteenth century in England, just as in the early
Byzantine manuscripts the same design serves for a miniature
painting and a colossal wall-mosaic. The same simplicity of
drawing and flatness of composition were preserved in both
classes of art, and there is nothing exceptional in the fact that
these miniatures of Saint Guthlac might have served as
excellent motives for a glass-painter 1 .

The Pontifical of Saint Dunstan (Brit. Mus. Cott. Claud.
A. 3), executed in the early part of the eleventh century, is a
magnificent example of decorative art, both in its noble
designs and richness of colour. Though no gold is used, the
greatest splendour of effect is produced, especially in a large
miniature representing Saint Gregory enthroned under an
elaborate architectural canopy, with prostrate figures at his
feet of Archbishop Dunstan and the Benedictine scribe of
this beautiful manuscript ; see Westwood, Irish Manuscripts,

PI. 50.

The beauty of the best English manuscripts of the twelfth
century is a remarkable contrast to the once splendid
Byzantine school of illumination, which by this time had sadly
degenerated from its former vigorous splendour, and had
become weak in drawing, clumsy in pose and inharmonious
in colour. The English school on the other hand, all through
the twelfth century, was making rapid advances towards a

1 This beautiful roll is now in the British Museum, HarL, Roll Y, 6 ; two
of the miniatures are photographically illustrated by Birch and Jenner, Early
Drawings and Illuminations, London, 1879, p. 142.

Beauty of
line.

Pontifical

ofSt
Dunstan.

Byzantine
decadence.

104

REIGN OF KING CANUTE.

[CHAP. vii.

Canute a
patron
of art.

Feeble
colouring.

perfection both of design and technique which culminated in
the Anglo-Norman style of the latter part of the thirteenth
century, which for beauty of all kinds remained for a long
time quite without rival in any European country.

To return to the Anglo-Saxon school of manuscripts in
the eleventh century, it should be observed that the Danish
King Canute, unlike his destructive predecessors, did all that
he could to encourage literature and art in England. With a
view to fostering the production of fine illuminated manu-
scripts he introduced into this country, and especially into the
royal and monastic libraries of Winchester, a large number of
Roman manuscripts with the usual illuminations of the
debased classic type. This, no doubt, helped to encourage
the production of miniatures in outline such as those in the
Utrecht Psalter 1 . Another variety of Anglo-Saxon manuscript
illumination, executed during the first half of the eleventh
century, consists first of all of a pen drawing in brown outline;
to which subsequently the artist added with a brush narrow
bands of blue or red laid on in a thin wash as a sort of edging
to the brown outlines, apparently with the object of giving
roundness to the drawing 2 .

This class of illumination is, however, very inferior in
beauty and decorative splendour to the finest works of the
monks of Winchester and Glastonbury, in which solid colour
in great variety of tint is used, as, for example in the above-
mentioned Benedictional of Aethelwold and the Pontifical of
Saint Dunstan.

1 This Psalter, which is now in the public library at Utrecht, may possibly be
one of the very manuscripts which Canute brought from abroad. It was certainly
in England for many centuries before it passed into the possession of Sir Robert
Cotton, from whose library it must have been stolen, else it would have passed
into the library of the British Museum along with the rest of the great Cotton
collection of manuscripts.

The Utrecht Psalter has been thought to be the work of an Anglo-Saxon
artist, but, most probably, it is the work of a French scribe, though the miniatures
are mainly of the debased classical style of Rome, and the character of the writing
is even more distinctly classical, differing very little in fact from that of the fourth
century Virgil of the Vatican written several centuries earlier.

2 Good examples of this curious style of miniature are to be seen in a manuscript
in the British Museum, Cotton, Tib. C. vi.

CHAP. VII.] THE NORMAN INVASION. 1 05

The Norman conquest of England in 1066 soon put an
end to the Anglo-Saxon school of illumination, with its weak
imitations of the debased classical style of Italy. In place of The
this the magnificent Anglo-Norman schools of miniature Nona
painting were developed on both sides of the British Channel. school.
England and Normandy became one country, and as long as
this union lasted manuscripts of precisely similar character
were produced both in Normandy and in England, as is
described in the following Chapter.

io6

CHAPTER VIII.

THE ANGLO-NORMAN SCHOOL OF MANUSCRIPTS.

The

Norman
invasion.

Robert of
Gloucester.

THE twelfth century in England and Northern France
was a period of rapid artistic development in almost all
branches of the arts, from a miniature illumination to a great
Cathedral or Abbey church.

With regard, however, to the art of illuminated manu-
scripts and other branches of art in England it should be
observed that though the conquered English and the Norman
conquerors with remarkable rapidity were amalgamated with
great solidarity into one united people 1 , yet for a long period
after the Conquest it was distinctly the Norman element that
took the lead in all matters of art and literature. The
Bishops, Abbots and Priors of the great English ecclesiastical
foundations were for a long period wholly or in the main
men of the Norman race, and thus (intellectually) the native
English took a lower place, and did far less to advance the arts
of England than did the Normans who formed the upper and
more cultivated class. As Robert of Gloucester the Bene-
dictine monkish Chronicler of the thirteenth century says,

<f tf) JLormanms betf) tf)gs fceg nun, tfjat tttft of tfcgs lontr,
&nfc $ lofoe men of Sbaxons, as gel) unterstonte 2 .

1 Indeed it was not very long before the tables were turned and Normandy
was reconquered by an English army under a king, who, though of Norman
blood, was distinctly an English king. The victory of Henry I. over Robert,
Duke of Normandy, at Tenchebray in 1105, went far to wipe out any feeling on
the part of the English that they were a nation under the rule of a conqueror.

2 Chronicles of Robert of Gloucester, Hearne's edition, 1724 (reprinted in
1810), Vol. I. p. 363.

CHAP. VIII.] THE ANGLO-NORMAN SCHOOL. 107

In the eleventh century building in stone on a large scale Archi-
for military and ecclesiastical purposes had been introduced
into England by the Normans in place of the frail wooden
structures of the Anglo-Saxons. Towards the close of the
twelfth century the Gothic style of architecture, with its
pointed arches and quadripartite vaults, was brought to
England by the Cistercian monks of northern France, and
soon spread far and wide throughout the kingdom.

The artists of this century began to study the human form,
its pose and movement, and also in their drapery learnt to
depict gracefully designed folds with much truth and with a
keen sense of beauty 1 .

Manuscripts of various classes were now richly illuminated Anglo-
with many varied series of picture subjects, and the old school 1
hieratic canons of Byzantine conservatism were soon com-
pletely thrown aside. In the ornaments of the Anglo-
Norman manuscripts of the twelfth century rich foliage is used
made of conventionalized forms which recall the old acanthus
leaf, the half expanded fronds of various ferns and other
plants, all used with great taste in their arrangement, and
wonderful life and spirit in every line and curve of the design.
Older Celtic motives are also used ; ingeniously devised
interlaced work of straps and bands, plaited together in
complicated knots, and terminating frequently in strange
forms of serpents, dragons and other grotesque monsters 2 .
These ornaments are strongly decorative both in form and
colour, and, though delicately painted, are treated somewhat
broadly, very unlike the microscopic minuteness of the earlier
Irish and Anglo-Celtic school.

At this time a large number of very magnificently illumi- /////-
nated Psalters were produced ; and the use of gold leaf both
for the backgrounds of pictures and in combination with
brilliant pigments began to come into more frequent use. A
fine typical example of English manuscript art at the

1 An interesting example of this revived study from the life is afforded by the
Sketch-book of Villard de Honecourt, which is mentioned above at page 72.

2 See below, page 193, on the revival of this class of ornament in Italy in the
second half of the fifteenth century.

108 ANGLO-NORMAN MANUSCRIPTS. [CHAP. VIII.

close of the twelfth century is to be seen in the so-called
Huntingfield Psalter, which was executed, probably in some
monastic house in Yorkshire, a little before 1200 A.D. 1 It
contains 68 miniatures of very fine style, delicately painted
on backgrounds partially of gold ; the subjects are taken
from both the Old and the New Testament, beginning with
. the Creation of the World. The general style of the illumina-
tions in this Psalter is more exclusively English in character
and less Norman than is usual in manuscripts of this date.
Martyr- The book is interesting as containing one of the earliest
dom ofSt representations of the Martyrdom of Thomas a Becket, who
subsequently became so popular a Saint in England and
Normandy. In this case the painting is not quite of the
same date as the bulk of the manuscript, but it evidently was
added not many years after Becket's death, which occurred in
1 170 ; Saint Thomas was canonized only two years later 2 .

One of the earliest representations of this subject is a
miniature painted by Matthew Paris on the border of a
page of his Greater Chronicle in the library of Corpus Christi
College, Cambridge, No. xxvi.

Though I have used the phrase " Anglo-Norman " to
denote the school of manuscript illumination which, from the
twelfth to the fourteenth century, existed on both sides of the
Channel, it should be observed that manuscripts of a similar
type to those of Normandy were produced in many places
far to the south, and indeed almost throughout the whole
The dominions of the Angevin kings, including the whole western
half of France down to Gascony and the Pyrenees. The
fact is that to a great degree all forms of Norman art
extended throughout the whole Angevin dominions, so that,
for example, we find a Cathedral as far south as Bayonne
(not far from the Spanish frontier) resembling closely both in

1 This beautiful manuscript is now in the possession of Mr Quaritch, who
prices it at .800 in his catalogue of December, 1891. It appears once to have
belonged to Sir Roger Huntingfield, who died about 1337 A.D.

2 It is noticeable that even the earliest miniatures of Saint Thomas' death
represent him in Mass vestments, officiating at the High Altar, whereas he was
really killed late in the afternoon, and on the north side of the church.

CHAP. VIII.] THE PERFECTION OF ENGLISH ART.

109

general design and details of mouldings and carving the
ecclesiastical architecture of Canterbury and Caen.

English art at its highest period of development. The
thirteenth century was the culminating period of Anglo-
Norman art of all kinds ; and indeed for a brief period
England occupied the foremost position in the world with
regard to nearly all the principal branches of the fine arts.

The early years of the thirteenth century were a time of
war and tumult, little favourable to artistic advance, but
during the long reign of Henry III., which lasted from 1216
to 1272, progress of the most remarkable kind was made.
The King himself was an enthusiastic patron of allthe arts,
ranging from manuscript illumination to the construction of
such a fabric as Westminster Abbey ; and the lesser arts of
life, such as weaving, embroidery, metal work, together with
stained glass, mural painting and other forms of decoration,
were all brought in England to a wonderful pitch of perfec-
tion between 1250 and 1300.

Immense sums were spent by the King in improving and
decorating his Palaces and Manor Houses all over the king-
dom with an amount of refinement and splendour that had
hitherto been unknown. Many interesting contemporary
documents still exist giving the expenses of the many works
which Henry III. carried out. He spent large sums on
fitting the windows with glass casements, laying down floors
of " painted tiles," and in panelling the walls with wainscot
which was richly decorated with painting in gold and colours.
Large mural paintings were executed by a whole army of
painters on the walls of the chief rooms ; and decorative art
both for domestic and ecclesiastical purposes was in England
brought to a pitch of perfection far beyond that of any
continental country.

The chief works of Henry III. were the building of a
magnificent Palace at Westminster in place of the ruder
structure of the earlier Norman kings ; the reconstruction of
Westminster Abbey, and the providing for the body of
Edward the Confessor a great shrine of pure gold, richly
studded with jewels of enormous value. A long and interest-

English

art in

the XIII th

century.

Henry III.
as an art
patron.

Houses of
Henry III.

Chief

works of

Henry I II.

IIO

THE PAINTED DECORATIONS [CHAP. VIII.

Wall-
paintings
at West-
minster.

Paintings

copied
from MSS.

ing series of accounts of these and other lavish expenditures
of money still exist in the Record Office 1 .

A magnificent series of wall-paintings, with subjects from
sacred and profane history and from the Apocryphal books
of the Old Testament, were executed by various artists, both
monks and laymen, on the walls of the chief rooms in the
new Palace of Westminster. In style these paintings were
very like the miniatures in an illuminated manuscript of the
time; they were simply designed, flat in treatment, and
executed with the most minute and delicate detail. Great
richness of effect was produced by the use of wooden stamps
with which delicate diapers and other patterns were stamped
over the backgrounds of the pictures on the thin coat of gesso
which covered the stone wall. These minutely executed
reliefs were then thickly gilt, forming rich gold backgrounds,
such as are so commonly used in the manuscripts of the
Anglo-Norman school; see fig. 23, p. 130.

The close connection between these magnificent wall
paintings and the illuminated miniatures in manuscripts is
borne witness to by an interesting record that, in the year
1250, the King ordered Richard de Sanford, Master of the
Knights Templars, to lend an illuminated manuscript in
French of " The Gestes of Antioch and the History of tlte
Crusades " to the painter Edward of Westminster, so that he
might copy the miniatures, using the designs to paint the
walls of " the Queen's low room in the new Palace of West-
minster" with a series of historical pictures. From these
paintings of " the Gestes of Antioch " the Queen's room was
thenceforth known as " the Antioch chamber 2 ".

1 See Vetusta Monumenta, Vol. VI. pp. i to 37, and Plates 26 to 39; illus-
trations are given here of "the Painted Chamber" and its decorations before the
fire of 1834, and a number of interesting extracts are quoted from the accounts now
preserved in the Record Office.

- The Gestfs of Antioch probably means the capture of Antioch in 1098 under
the Crusader leaders Tancred and Godfrey of Bouillon. In the same way the
"Jerusalem " and "Jericho chambers" in the house of the Abbot of Westminster
were so called from the paintings on their walls. The curious "archaism" of
these paintings, with figures of knights in the armour of the eleventh century, is
explained below ; seepage 128.

CHAP. VIII.] OF WESTMINSTER PALACE.

Ill

The largest of the halls in the Westminster Palace, deco-
rated with a marvellous series of exquisitely finished paintings,
was known as " the Painted Chamber " par excellence from its
great size and the immense number of pictures which covered
its walls. The system of decoration adopted in the thirteenth
century was not to paint large pictures in a large hall, but
simply to multiply the number of small ones, keeping the
figures as delicate in execution and small in scale as if the
room had been of the most limited dimensions.

This had the effect of enormously adding to the apparent
scale of the room, a great contrast to the method of decoration
which was employed in later times of decadence, when large
halls were dwarfed and rendered insignificant by covering the
walls with figures of colossal size. The sixteenth century
tapestry in the great hall at Hampton Court is a striking
example of the way in which gigantic figures may destroy
the scale of an interior.

The great beauty and extreme minuteness of the work
can be seen in some few damaged fragments, now in the
British Museum, which were not completely destroyed when
the Royal Palace of Westminster, the seat of the two Houses
of Parliament, was burnt in 1834.

In the second half of the thirteenth century, during the
reigns of Henry III. and Edward I., the painting of England
was unrivalled by that of any other country 1 . Even in Italy,
Cimabue and his assistants were still labouring in the fetters
of Byzantine conventionalism, and produced no works which
for jewel-like beauty of colour and grace of form were quite
equal to the paintings of England under Edward I.

In sculpture too England was no less pre-eminent ; no
continental works of the time are equal in combined dignity
and beauty, both of the heads and of the drapery, to the
bronze effigies of .Henry III. and Queen Eleanor of Castile
on the north side of Edward the Confessor's Chapel at
Westminster. These noble examples of bronze sculpture

1 See, for example, that wonderful frontal, covered with miniature paintings,
from the High Altar of Westminster Abbey, which is now preserved in the south
ambulatory of the Sanctuary.

The

Painted
Chamber.

Existing
fragments.

English
sculpture.

112

THE ARTS OF ENGLAND. [CHAP. VIII.

William
Torell.

The
Fitz-Othos.

English
needle-
work.

were the work of the goldsmith citizen of London William
Torell, who executed them by the beautiful cire perdue pro-
cess with the utmost technical skill 1 ; see page 232 on their
gilding, which was executed by the old " mercury process."

One of the chief English families of the thirteenth century,
among whom the practice of various arts was hereditary,
was named Otho or Fitz-Otho. Various members of this
family were goldsmiths, manuscript illuminators, cutters of
dies for coins and makers of official seals, as well as painters
of mural decorations. The elaborate gold shrine of the
Confessor, one of the most costly works of the Middle Ages,
was made by the Otho family. The great royal seals of
more than one king were their handiwork, and it should be
observed that the seals of England, not only of the thirteenth
century but almost throughout the mediaeval period, were far
the most beautiful in the world, both for splendour and
elaboration of design, and for exquisite minuteness of detail.

Another minor branch of art, in which England during
the thirteenth century far surpassed the rest of the world,
was the art of embroidering delicate pictures in silk, especially
for ecclesiastical vestments. The most famous embroidered
vestments now preserved in various places in Italy are the
handiwork of English embroiderers between the years 1250
and 1 300, though their authorship is not as a rule recognized
by their present possessors 2 . The embroidered miniatures on
these marvellous pieces of needlework resemble closely in style
the illuminations in fine Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the
thirteenth century, and in many cases have obviously been
copied from manuscript miniatures.

1 Various attempts have been made to show that Torell was an Italian, and
that the painted retable at Westminster was the work of a foreign artist, but there
is not the slightest foundation for either of these theories.

s As examples of this I may mention the famous "Lateran Cope" in Rome,
the " Piccolomini Cope " at Pienza, and two others of similar date and style in
the Museums of Florence and Bologna. On many occasions we find that the
Popes of this period, on sending the Pall to a newly elected English Archbishop,
suggested that they would like in return embroidered vestments of English work,
opus Anglicanum. It should be observed that in almost all published works on
the subject the above mentioned copes are wrongly described as being of Italian
workmanship.

CHAP. VIII.] MANUSCRIPTS OF THE VULGATE. 113

There is, in short, ample evidence to show that the
Anglo-Norman art of the thirteenth century, in almost all
branches, and more especially on English soil, had reached a
higher pitch of perfection, aesthetic and technical, than had
been then attained by any other country in the world. In Decay of
the. fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, owing largely to the "f."
Black Death and the protracted Wars of the Roses, the arts
of England fell into the background, but it should not be
forgotten that there was one period, from about 1260 to 1300
or 1320, when England occupied the foremost place in the
artistic history of the world.

With regard to the Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the
thirteenth and early part of the fourteenth century, the most
remarkable class, both for beauty of execution and for the
extraordinary number that were produced, consists of copies
of the Vulgate, richly decorated with a large number of initial
letters containing minute miniatures of figure subjects 1 .

These Bibles vary in size from large quartos or folios MS.
down to the most minute codex with writing of microscopic
character. In the latter it appears to have been the special
aim of the scribe to get the whole of the Vulgate, including
the Apocrypha, the Prologue of St Jerome, and an explanatory
list of Hebrew names, into the smallest possible space. The
thinnest uterine vellum of the finest quality is used 2 , the text
is frequently much contracted, and the characters are of
almost microscopic size 3 . In these smallest Bibles the initials
are mostly ornamented with conventional leaves and grotesque
dragon monsters ; but in the larger manuscripts the initials at

1 Both before and after this period manuscripts of the Vulgate were compara-
tively rare, but between 1250 and about 1330 many thousands of manuscript
Bibles must have been produced, all closely similar in style, design, choice of
subject and character of writing. There is no other large class of manuscripts in
which such remarkable uniformity of style is to be seen.

- As an example of the wonderful thinness of this uterine vellum, I may
mention a Bible of about r 260 in my own possession which consists of 646 leaves,
and yet measures barely an inch and a half in thickness. In spite of its extreme
thinness this vellum is sufficiently opaque to prevent the writing on one side from
showing through to the other.

3 For example a Bible of this class in the Cambridge University library, dating
from about 1280, has from thirteen to seventeen lines to an inch !

M. C. M. 8

MINUTE PAINTINGS.

[CHAP. VIII.

Histo-
riated
Bibles.

Method of
execution.

Bible of
Maineriits.

the beginning of every book, about 82 in number, are illumi-
nated with a miniature picture of the most exquisite work-
manship, a perfect model of beauty and refined skill. The
drawing of the faces and hair is specially beautiful, being
executed with a fine, crisp line with the most precise and
delicate touch, worthy of -a Greek artist of the best period.
The drawing of the hair and beard of the male figures is
most masterly, with waving curls full of grace and spirit, in
spite of the extreme minuteness of the scale.

The miniatures of this school are executed in the following
manner : first of all a slight outline is lightly sketched with a
lead or silver point ; the main masses are then put in with
flat, solid colour ; the internal drawing of the folds of the
drapery, the hair and features and the like, are then added
with a delicate pointed brush, capable of drawing the finest
possible line ; and finally some shading is added to give
roundness to the forms, especially of the drapery, a broader
touch being used for this, unlike the first drawing of the
details, which is executed with a thin, though boldly applied
line. As a rule the portions which are in shadow are put in
with a pure pigment ; the high lights being represented with
white, and the half lights with a mixture of white and the
same pigment that is used for the dark shadows. By this
somewhat conventional system of colouring, the local colour
is never lost, and the whole effect is highly decorative, and
far more suitable for painting on such a minute scale than a
more realistic system of colour would have been 1 .

One of the larger and more magnificent manuscripts of
this class, in the library of S te Genevieve in Paris, is a
historiated Vulgate in three large volumes, which is of special
interest from the fact that it is signed by its scribe, a monk
named Mainerius of the Benedictine Abbey of Canterbury.

Most of these Bibles and other sacred manuscripts of this

1 This method of painting the shadows in pure colour, and using the same
pigment mixed with white for the rest, was employed on a large scale by many
of the Sienese painters in the fourteenth century, and by the Florentine Fra
Angelico in the fifteenth. Fra Angelico's earliest works were manuscript illumi-
nations, executed about the year 1407 in the Dominican Convent at Fiesole.

CHAP. VIII.]

UNITY OF STYLE.

period appear to have been written and illuminated in the
great Benedictine Abbeys of England and Normandy. On
this side of the Channel York, Norwich, Bury St Edmunds,
Winchester, St Albans, and Canterbury were specially famed
for their schools of illumination 1 . And probably some work
of the kind was done in every Benedictine House 2 .

The unity of a great monastic Order like that of St
Benedict, and the fact that monks were often transferred
from a monastery in one country to one of the same Order
in another country, had an important influence on the artistic
development of mediaeval Europe.

This unity of feeling was of course encouraged by the
existence of a common language (Latin) among all the
ecclesiastics of Western Europe; and to a great extent the
old traditions of a great Western Empire, uniting various
races under one system of government, survived in the
organization of the Catholic Church.

This unity of life, of custom and of thought, which was so
striking a feature of the monastic system, was, to a great
extent, the cause why we find a simultaneous change of
artistic style taking place at several far distant centres of
production 3 . Hence also it is usually impossible, from the
style of illumination in an Anglo-Norman manuscript of the
thirteenth century, to judge whether it was executed in Nor-
mandy or in England.

One extremely magnificent class of illumination of this
date and school, specially used for Psalters, Missals and
other Service-books, has the background behind the figures
formed of an unbroken sheet of burnished gold of the most
sumptuously decorative effect.

1 The Bodleian library (Douce, 366) possesses a specially beautiful manuscript
Psalter, which belonged to Robert of Ormsby, a monk of Norwich Abbey.

2 In all periods the Benedictines were the chief monastic scribes and minia-
turists ; the Mother House at Monte Cassino was one of the chief centres in Italy
for the production of manuscripts, and wherever the Benedictines settled they
brought with them the art of manuscript illumination; see page 211.

3 This is specially noticeable in the development of the architectural styles ;
not only general forms, but details of mouldings and the like seem to spring up all
over England almost simultaneously.

Benedictine
scribes.

Monastic
unity.

Back-
grounds
of sheet

Sold.

VARIETIES OF BACKGROUND. [CHAP. VIII

Chequer

back-
grounds.

Scroll
patterns.

Architect-
ural back-
grounds.

Realistic

back-
grounds.

In the fourteenth century the plain gold background was
mostly superseded by delicate diapers of lozenge and chess-
board form, with alternating squares of gold and blue or red,
very rich and beautiful in effect, and sometimes of extreme
minuteness of scale, so that each lozenge or square of the
diaper is not larger than an ordinary pin's head. In France
these diapered patterns were used with great frequency, and
their use survived in some cases till the early part of the
fifteenth century.

Another form of background, used in Anglo-Norman
miniatures, consists of delicate scroll patterns or outlined
diapers put in with a fine brush and with fluid gold over a
ground of flat opaque colour. Gold scroll-work of this kind
on a pink ground is specially characteristic of miniatures
painted in England during the fourteenth and first half of
the fifteenth century.

A fourth style of background, used in miniature pictures
of this date, consists of architectural forms, which frequently
enshrine the whole miniature, with background, frame, and
canopy in one rich architectural composition. This is often
painted in gold, with details in firm, dark lines, and, though
conventionally treated, gives not ^infrequently a representa-
tion of an exquisitely beautiful Gothic structure 1 .

Last of all come the realistic backgrounds, with pictorial
effects of distance and aerial perspective, often very skilful
and even beautiful in effect, but not so strongly decorative or
so perfectly suited to manuscript illumination as the more
conventional backgrounds of an earlier date.

These realistic surroundings began to be introduced in
the fourteenfrTcentury, but are more especially characteristic
of the fifteenth century. In the sixteenth century, when the
illumination of manuscripts had ceased to be a real living art,
though painfully and skilfully practised by such masters of
technique as Giulio Clovio and various Italian and French
painters, the pictorial character of the backgrounds was
carried to an excessive degree of elaboration and decadence.

See below, fig. i:,, page 133.

CHAP. VIII.] ILLUMINATED PSALTERS.

I!/

Among the most magnificent of the Anglo-Norman
manuscripts of the thirteenth century are copies of the
Psalter. One in the library of the Society of Antiquaries in
Burlington House is of extraordinary beauty for the delicate
and complicated patterns of interlaced scroll-work which fill its
large initials. The first letter B of the beginning of the Psalms
(Beatus mr etc.) is in this and some other illuminated Psalters
of the same class, of such size and elaboration that it occupies
most of the first page. Among its ingeniously devised
interlaced ornaments various little animals, rabbits, squirrels
and others are playing marvels of minute and delicate
painting. Round the border which frames the whole are ten
minute medallion pictures, some of them representing
musicians playing on various instruments, one of which is
a kind of barrel organ, called an organistrum, worked by two
players. This magnificent manuscript dates from about the
middle of the thirteenth century.

Another still more beautiful Psalter in the British Museum,
called from its former owner Archbishop Tenisoiis Psalter,
was illuminated for Queen Eleanor of Castile, the wife of
Edward I., about the year 1284. It was intended as a
marriage gift for their third son Alphonso, who, however, died
in August 1284, a few days after the signing of his marriage
contract. The manuscript was for this reason unfortunately
left unfinished, and was afterwards completed by a very
inferior illuminator. The letter B on the first page is filled
by an exquisite miniature of the Royal Psalmist ; and in the
lower part of the border is the slaying by an infantile David,
of Goliath, represented as a gigantic knight in chain armour.
At intervals round the border are minute but very accurately
painted birds of various kinds, including the gull, kingfisher,
woodpecker, linnet, crane and goldfinch. In places where
the text does not reach to the end of the line the space
is filled up by a narrow band of ornament in gold and colours,
occupying the same space that a complete line of words
would have done. This method of avoiding any blank
spaces in the page, and making the whole surface one
unbroken mass of beauty was employed in the finest manu-

Psalter at

Burlington

House.

The

Tenison
Psalter.

Il8 MANUSCRIPTS OF THE APOCALYPSE. [CHAP. VIII.

scripts of this and of other classes, especially the manuscripts
of France and Flanders.

Teaison The Tenison Psalter appears to have been written and

Psalter. iH um inated in the Monastic House of the Blackfriars in
London ; it is quite one of the noblest existing examples
of English art during the thirteenth century, and is unsur-
passed in beauty and skilful technique by the manuscripts of
any age or country 1 .

MSS. of Manuscripts of the Apocalypse. The Anglo-Norman and

French manuscripts of the Apocalypse, executed during the
fourteenth century, are on the whole the most beautiful class
of illuminated manuscripts that the world has ever produced' 2 .
For combined decorative splendour, exquisite grace of
drawing, and poetry of sentiment they are quite unrivalled.
During several years before and after 1300 a considerable
number of these copiously illustrated manuscripts of the
Apocalypse seem to have been produced with a certain
uniformity of style and design, which shows that, as in the
case of the historiated Bibles, one model must have been
copied and passed on from hand to hand through the
Scriptoria of many different Monastic Houses.

Perfect No words can adequately express the refined and poetical

iy ' beauty of these miniatures of Apocalyptic scenes, glowing
with the utmost splendour of burnished gold, ultramarine
and other brilliant pigments. The whole figures of the
angels, their beautiful serene faces, their exquisitely pencilled
wings with feathers of bright colours, the simple dignified
folds of their drapery, all are executed with the most wonder-
ful certainty of touch and the highest possible sense of
romantic beauty.

The accessories are hardly less beautiful ; the Gothic
arches and pinnacles of the New Jerusalem, the vine plants
and other trees and flowers, designed with a perfect balance
between decoratiye conventionalism and realistic truth, and

1 The first pages of the two last-mentioned Psalters are illustrated by Shaw,
The Art of Illumination^ London, 1870, pp. 17 to 23.

- An example of the most marvellous beauty and perfection was presented by
Lady Sadleir to Trinity College library in Cambridge.

CHAP. VIII.]

THE ENGLISH SCHOOL.

119

last of all the sumptuous backgrounds covered with delicate
diapers or scroll-work in gold and blue and crimson, all
unite the whole composition into one perfect harmony, like
a mosaic of gleaming gems, fixed in a matrix of pure, shining
gold.

Nothing perhaps could better exemplify the gulf that
separates the artistic productions of this feverish, steam-
driven nineteenth century from the serene glories of the art
of bygone days than a comparison of such a book as the
Trinity Apocalypse with that masterpiece of commercial art
called " the Victoria Psalter," which, printed in a steam-press
on machine-made paper, illuminated by chromolithography,
and bound in a machine-embossed leather cover, produces
a total effect which cannot adequately be described in polite
language 1 .

The later EnglisJi manuscripts. In the fourteenth century
a more distinctly English style of illumination began to
branch off from the Anglo-Norman style. Something like
separate schools of painting gradually grew up in the great
Benedictine Monasteries, such as those at St Albans, Norwich,
Glastonbury and Bury Saint Edmunds.

The type of face represented in English miniatures from
about the middle of the fourteenth century onwards is rather
different from the French type with its long oval face and
pointed nose 2 . In English manuscripts the faces are rounder
and plumper, and the backgrounds are very frequently formed

1 The Victoria Psalter is however frequently described in booksellers' cata-
logues, not only in polite, but in enthusiastic language. As an example I may
quote the following,

THE BEAUTIFUL VICTORIA PSALTER :
PSALMS of David illuminated by OWEN JONES, beautifully printed in large

type, on thin cardboards, on 104 pages, each of which is stirrounded by

SUMPTUOUS BORDERS ill GOLD and COLOURS, with the CAPITALS ILLU-
MINATED, and some of the pages consisting of large and most beautifully
illuminated texts, columbier 410. elegantly bound in morocco, the sides elabo-
rately carved, leathern joints, and gilt edges (A VERY HANDSOME VOLUME),
4. los. n. d.

- These same characteristics of face are very noticeable in the beautiful carved

ivory diptychs and statuettes of the Virgin and Child made during the fourteenth

century in France and England.

Machine-
made art.

English
Monas-
teries.

I2O

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF [CHAP. VIII.

The Black
Death.

Outline
drawings.

Lectionary

of Sifer

Was.

by gold scroll-work over a peculiar pink, made by a mixture
of red lead with a large proportion of white.

On the whole the style of figure painting in English
manuscripts deteriorated very distinctly after the ravages
caused by the Black Death in the middle of the fourteenth
century ; that is to say the average of excellence became
lower ; and, especially in the fifteenth century, a good deal
of very coarse and inferior manuscript illumination was
produced. On the other hand there were some illuminators
in England whose work is not surpassed by that of any
contemporary French or Flemish artist.

One very beautiful class of English illumination, executed
about the middle of the fourteenth century, has very small
and delicate figures, drawn in firm outline with a pen and
brown ink ; relief is then given to the figures by the
partial application of transparent washes of delicate colour,
producing an effect of great beauty and refinement. The
Poyntz Book of Hours in the Fitzwilliam Library has no less
than 292 miniature paintings of this very beautiful style.
The book was written for a friend and companion of the
Black Prince about the year 1350. Its delicate paintings
have unfortunately, in many places, been coarsely touched
up with gold and colours by a later hand.

A very fine characteristic example of English art towards
the close of the fourteenth century is preserved in the British
Museum (Harl. Manuscripts 7026). This is a noble folio manu-
script Lectionary 1 , unfortunately imperfect, which was written
and illuminated by a monk named Sifer Was for Lord Lovel of
Tichmersh, who died in 1408; it was presented by him to the
Cathedral church of Salisbury, as is recorded by a note which
asks for prayers for the donor's soul. The text is written in
a magnificent large Gothic hand, such as was imitated by the
printers of early Missals* and Psalters. On the first page is
a large, beautifully painted miniature representing the scribe

1 A lectionary contained the Gospels and Epistles arranged for use at the
celebration of Mass.

2 Especially for the Canon of the Mass. The famous Mentz Psalter of 1459
is printed in characters of this size and style; see below, page 149.

CHAP. VIII.] ENGLISH ILLUMINATIONS. 121

Sifer Was presenting the manuscript to Lord Lovel. The
figures are large in scale, and the heads are carefully executed
portraits, evidently painted with great eiconic skill. Each
page of the text has a richly decorative border with con-
ventional foliage of the characteristically bold English type.
Figures of angels are introduced at the sides, and an ex-
quisitely minute little painting is placed at the top, by the
initial letter of the page.

The English foliated borders and capitals in manuscripts of English
this type are very bold and decorative in effect, with a simple foliage.
form of leaf with few serrations, twining in most graceful curves
and broadly painted in blue and red with very good effect,
even in many manuscripts where the execution is not of the
most refined kind. A variety of what is commonly known as
"the pine- apple design" 1 is frequently introduced into these
very effective pieces of ornament.

It should be noticed that the first growth of portrait Portrait
painting in Western Europe seems to have arisen out of fis" res -
this custom of introducing portrait figures of patrons and
donors at the beginning of important manuscripts. In French
and Burgundian manuscripts especially we find many very
interesting portraits of Kings and Princes together with those
of the authors or the illuminators of richly decorated manu-
scripts.

Donors' portraits are also commonly introduced into
votive altar-pieces, usually in the form of small kneeling
figures. As time went on these figures of donors gradually
became more important in scale and position. Thus, for
example, the magnificent altar-piece in the Brera Gallery
in Milan, painted by Piero della Francesca about the year
I48o 2 , has, in the most conspicuous place in the foreground,
a kneeling figure of the donor, Duke Federigo da Montefeltro

1 The pine-apple was not known in Europe before the discovery of America,
and this very decorative form, which occurs so largely on the fine woven velvets
of Florence and Northern Italy, was probably suggested by the artichoke plant,
largely assisted by the decorative invention of the designer.

2 In the Brera Catalogue this very beautiful painting is wrongly ascribed to
Fra Carnovale, a pupil of Piero della Francesca.

122

FINE EXAMPLES OF

[CHAP. VIII.

Portrait

of Richard

II.

Portraits

Henry VI.
and his
Queen.

of Urbino, which is actually larger in scale than the chief
figures of the picture the Madonna and attendant angels.
During the fourteenth century, both in altar-pictures and in
manuscript illuminations, the portraits of living people are
treated in a more subordinate way.

A fine example of portraiture in a manuscript is to be seen
in the Epistre au Roy Richard II. d'Angleterre (Brit. Mus.
Royal Manuscripts 20 B. vi) written by a Hermit of the
Celestin Order in Paris. The upper half of the first page is
occupied by an exquisite miniature of Richard II. on his
throne, surrounded by courtiers, accepting the bound copy
of the manuscript from the monastic author, who kneels on
one knee, presenting his book with one hand, while in the
other he holds a sacred banner embroidered with the Agnus
Dei. The background is of the sumptuous chess-board pattern
in gold, blue and red, and the whole page is surrounded with
the so-called ivy-leaf border.

The SJireivsbury manuscript, containing a collection of
chivalrous Romances (Brit. Mus. Royal Manuscripts 1 5 E vi),
has another beautiful example of miniature portraiture. The
first painting represents John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, for
whom this interesting manuscript was illuminated, kneeling to
present the book to Queen Margaret of Anjou on the occasion
of her marriage with Henry VI. The King and Queen are
represented side by side on a double throne, and around is a
group of courtier attendants. The kneeling figure of Earl
Talbot is interesting for its costume ; the mantle which the
Earl wears is powdered (semee) with small garters embroidered
in gold ; an early but now obsolete form of state robe worn by
Knights of the Order of the Garter. Both these manuscripts,
though executed for English patrons, are of French workman-
ship.

Some of the most magnificent manuscripts of the fifteenth
century and earlier were, like Lord Level's Lectionary, illumi-
nated at the cost of some wealthy layman for the purpose of
presentation to a Cathedral or Abbey Church. In return for
the gift the Church often agreed to keep a yearly obiit or
annual Mass for the donor's soul, which in England was called

CHAP. VIII.] ENGLISH MANUSCRIPTS. 123

" the year's mind "; and this kind of gift thus often served to
provide a "Chantry" of a limited kind.

One of the finest examples of English manuscript art in Queen
the fourteenth century is a Psalter commonly known as Prayer-
" Queen Mary's Prayer-book ". This exquisite manuscript, book -
which is in the British Museum, contains, before the Psalter,
a large number of miniatures of Biblical scenes executed in
outline, treated with delicate washes of transparent colour.
The Psalter is illuminated in quite a different style, with
brilliant gold and colours in all the miniatures and borders,
which are painted with wonderful delicacy of touch, unsur-
passed by the best French work. A Bestiary is introduced
into the margins of the Psalter ; and at the end there are
beautiful paintings of New Testament scenes. The date of
this book is c. 1330; in 1553 it was given to Queen Mary.

Another English manuscript of special interest both for MSS.

its text and its beautiful illuminations is a copy in the British of Dan

1 J Lydgate.

Museum of Dan Lydgate's Life of Saint Edmund, which was

written and illuminated in 1433 by a Monk in the Benedictine
Monastery at Bury Saint Edmunds ; it is an early and very
beautiful example of a manuscript in the Vulgar tongue. In
style the illuminated borders are not unlike those in " Queen
Mary's Prayer-book."

Another very similar manuscript both in date and style
was sold at the Perkins sale, in June, 1873, f r ^32O l . This
is a magnificently illuminated folio of "The Siege of Troye
compiled by Dann John Lydgate, Monke of Bury"; it contains
seventy miniature paintings, chiefly of battle scenes, in which
the combatants wear armour of the first half of the fifteenth
century. The illuminated borders are of the boldly decorative
English type mentioned above, and the miniatures are large
in scale, in many cases extending across the whole width of
the page with its double column of text.

In England the introduction of the art of printing in 1477

1 This very important English manuscript was bought by Mr Quaritch and
priced at ^1600 in his catalogue, No. 291, 1873. It was written in or soon after
1420 when Lydgate completed writing his work; it may possibly have been
written and illuminated by the author himself.

I2 4

ENGLISH SUBJECTS

[CHAP. VIII.

Woodcut
initials.

St George
and the
Dragon.

seems to have brought the illuminator's art to an end more
quickly than was the case in Continental countries. Caxton's
later books have printed initials 1 , instead of blank spaces left
for the illuminator, as in most of the early printed books of
Germany, France and Italy; and English book-buyers appear
to have been soon satisfied with simple illustrations in the form
of rather rudely executed woodcuts.

The subjects represented in English miniatures are for the
most part the same as those in contemporary French manu-
scripts ; but the martyrdom of Saint Thomas of Canterbury
occurs more frequently in English than in any continental
manuscripts 2 . Almost immediately after the event in 1170
this scene began to be represented ; see above, page 108.

Another specially English subject is Saint George, who
was at first the Crusaders' Patron and then the national Saint
of England. He is usually represented as a Knight on
horseback slaying the dragon with a lance. This subject did
not come into popular use till the fourteenth century 3 .

Both in England and in France, during the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries, manuscript Chronicles and Histories of both
ancient and modern times formed a large and important class
of manuscripts ; and these were usually copiously illustrated
with miniatures. The Chronicles of Sir John Froissart was
justly a very favourite book on both sides of the Channel 4 ,
and many richly illuminated manuscripts of it still exist ;
see below, page 139.

1 Caxton appears to have begun to use woodcut initials in the year 1484
or 1485, but most Continental printers continued to use hand-painted capitals
many years later than that.

2 This scene and the name of Saint Thomas, wherever it occurs, are frequently
obliterated in English manuscripts. This was done by the special order of
Henry VIII., who, after his quarrel with the Pope, appears to have regarded
Thomas a Becket as a sort of personal enemy.

3 See page 187 for a fine Italian example of this subject. It is interesting to
note that the popular legend of Saint George and the dragon is simply a mediaeval
version of the old classical myth of Perseus and Andromeda. In the more genuine
Oriental lives of Saint George this episode is not introduced.

4 It should be remembered that Norman-French continued to be the Court
language of England till late in the fifteenth century, and for certain legal purposes
even later. Its use still survives in the Law-Courts of Quebec and Montreal.

CHAP. VIII.] IN ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS. 125

The British Museum possesses a magnificent manuscript MS.
of the Chronicles of England in seven large folio volumes, Chronicles.
which were compiled and written at the command of Edward
IV. The miniatures which decorate th ; s sumptuous work are
partly Anglo-Norman and partly Flemish, in the style of the
school of the Van Eycks at Bruges.

One favourite form of Chronicle, giving an abstract of the
whole World's history, was in the shape of a long parchment
roll, illuminated with miniatures in the form of circular medal-
lions. Some of these great rolls were written and illuminated
by English miniaturists, but they appear not to have been as
common in England as they were in France ; see below, page
139. On these rolls the writing usually continues down the
strip, not at right angles to the long sides, as on classical
papyrus rolls.

126 THE TIME OF ST LOUIS.

CHAPTER IX.

FRENCH MANUSCRIPTS.

DURING the thirteenth century "the art of illumination as
it is called in Paris" 1 flourished under the Saintly King
Louis IX. (1215 1270) as much as it did in England under
Henry III. Manuscripts of most exquisite beauty and
refinement were produced in Paris, in style little different
Psalter of from those of the Anglo-Norman school. One of the most
t outs. k eau f-if u i anc j historically interesting is a Psalter (Paris, Bibl.
Nat.} which is said to have been written for St Louis
about 1260. This is a large folio, copiously illustrated with
sacred subjects minutely painted on a ground of burnished
gold enriched by tooling. Many of the miniatures are
framed in a beautiful architectural composition of cusped
arches, with delicate open tracery supported by slender
columns.

Fig. 22 gives the bare design of one of the historiated initials
in this lovely manuscript, the capital B at the beginning of
the Psalms. In the upper part is the scene of David watching
Bathsheba bathing; and below is a kneeling figure of the
Perfect king adoring Christ in Majesty. No reproduction can give
any notion of the exquisitely delicate painting, or of the
splendour of its burnished gold and colours. The historical
scenes from the Old Testament have, after the usual fashion
of the time, the Hebrew warriors and their enemies repre-
sented as mediaeval knights in armour.

It should, however, be observed that in this and many

1 Dante, Purg. xi. 80; see above, p. 31.

Fig. 12. A page from the Psalter of Saint Louis, written about the year
1260, by a French scribe.

128

ARCHAISM IN ILLUMINATIONS. [CHAP. IX.

Archaism
of detail.

MS. Bibles.

other French and English miniatures of the time the ancient
warriors are represented not in the armour of the actual date
of the execution of the manuscript, but with the dress and
arms of a couple of generations earlier. The monastic
artists were not skilled archaeologists, but they wished to
suggest that the scene they were painting was one that had
happened long ago, and therefore they introduced what was
probably the oldest armour they were acquainted with that
of their grandfathers' or great-grandfathers' time. This is an
important point, as in many cases a wrong judgment has been
formed as to the date of a manuscript from the mistaken
supposition that contemporary dress and armour were repre-
sented in it.

It is just the same with the thirteenth century art of
England. Paintings executed for Henry III. in his Palace at
Westminster had representations of knights in the armour of
William the Conqueror's time or a little later. In later times,
especially in the fifteenth century, this naive form of archaeo-
logy was given up, and the heroes of ancient and sacred
history are represented exactly like kings and warriors of the
artist's own time.

The historiated Bibles of Paris in the thirteenth-century
were equal in beauty and very similar in style to those of the
Anglo-Norman miniaturists, but they do not appear to have
been produced in such immense quantities as they were in
the more northern monasteries.

In the fifteenth century the influence of the Church
tended to check the study of the Bible on the part of the laity,
and very few manuscripts of the Bible were then written.
Their place was to some extent taken by the Books of Hours,
enormous numbers of which were produced in France and the
Netherlands, all through the fifteenth century ; see page 141.

French illuminated Manuscripts of the XI Vth and X Vth
centuries. To this class belong a great many of the magni-
ficent manuscripts of the Apocalypse which have been described
under the head of Anglo-Norman manuscripts. No hard and
fast line can be drawn between the manuscript styles of
Normandy and the northern provinces of France.

CHAP. IX.] BEAUTY OF FRENCH MANUSCRIPTS.

129

In the fourteenth century Paris and Saint Denis were
important centres for the production of manuscripts of the
most highly finished kind. Historiated Bibles, both in Latin
and in French, continued to be produced in great number till
past the middle of the fourteenth century. Some of these
French translations, executed as late as 1370, are what may
be called archaistic in style ; that is to say, the subjects
selected and the method of their treatment and execution
continued to be almost the same as that of the historiated
Vulgates of France and Normandy at the beginning of the
century. The miniatures are very minute in scale, and are
often painted on backgrounds of the brilliant chess-board and
other diapers in red, blue and gold. Though extremely
decorative and beautiful, the miniatures of this class are not
quite equal to those of the thirteenth century Bibles, either in
vigour of drawing or in delicacy of touch.

On the whole, in the fourteenth century, the French
schools of illumination were the finest in the world, and the
manuscripts of Northern France were the most sumptuously
decorated of all. One specially beautiful style of ornament
was introduced early in the century and lasted with little
modification for more than a hundred years. This was the
method of writing on a wide margined page, and then
covering the broad marginal space by delicate flowing scrolls
or curves of foliage, leaves and small blossoms of various
shapes being used, but more especially one form of triple-
pointed leaf which is known commonly as the " ivy " or
"thorn-leaf pattern." Brilliant effect is given to these rich
borders by forming some of the leaves in burnished gold ; and
variety is given to the foliage by the introduction of minutely
painted birds of many kinds, song-birds, game-birds and
others, treated with much graceful realism 1 .

Fig. 28 shows part of a border from a manuscript of this
class, a Book of Hours executed for the Duke de Berri ; the

1 In the magnificent English embroideries of the thirteenth century, such as
the Lateran and Pienza copes, mentioned at page 112, we see birds of exactly
similar style and kinds introduced among the scroll-work of the grounds and
borders.

Archaism
of style.

The ivy
pattern.

M. C. M.

1 3 o

Fig. 23. Miniature representing King Conrad of Bohemia, with an attendant,
hawking; from a manuscript of the fourteenth century, showing the influence
of French art.

CHAP. IX.] THE FINEST PERIOD. 131

typical pointed " ivy-leaves " grow from each of the quatrefoils
which are introduced to hold the arms and initials of the
owner. It comes from the same manuscript as the illumina-
tion shown in fig. 25.

These elaborate borders are usually made to grow out of Decorative
the ornaments of the illuminated initials in the text, and thus
a sense of unity is given to the whole page, the decorations of
which thus become, not an adjunct, but an essential part of
the text.

Fig. 24 shows a miniature from a French manuscript of
this magnificent class, the Treasure- Book of the Abbey of
Origny in Picardy, executed about 1312 for the Abbess
Heloise. It contains fifty-four large miniatures of scenes
from the life and martyrdom of Saint Benedicta. The shaded
part of the border is of the richest burnished gold, and the
whole effect is magnificently decorative.

The scene represented is the murder of the Saint, whose
soul is being borne up to Heaven by two Angels, held in the
usual conventional loop of drapery.

As an example of this class of illumination we may men- Horaeof
tion the famous Book of Hours of the Duke of Anjou (Paris, d^Anj'on.
Bibl. Nat'.) illuminated about the year 1380. Every page
has a rich and delicate border covered with the ivy foliage 1 ,
and enlivened by exquisitely painted birds, such as the gold-
finch, the thrush, the linnet, the jay, the quail, the sparrow-hawk
and many others ; and at the top of the page, at the beginning
of each division of the Horae, is a miniature picture of most
perfect grace and beauty, the decorative value of which is
enhanced by a background, either of gold diaper, or else of
delicate scroll-work in light blue painted over a ground of
deep ultramarine.

Enormous prices were frequently paid by wealthy patrons
for sumptuously illuminated manuscripts, especially in the
fifteenth century for Books of Hours.

1 The phrase ivy pattern is a convenient one to use, as it expresses a very
common and well-defined type of ornament, but the leaf is too conventionally
treated to he recognized as that of the ivy or any other plant : and the pattern
is varied with blossoms of different forms and colours.

1 32

t out 9mtme tame (tows

Fig. 24. Scene of the martyrdom of Saint Benedicta from a Martyrology of
about 1312.

CHAP. IX.] COSTLY MANUSCRIPT HORAE.

133

The Paris library possesses (Bibl. Nat. Lat. 919) a very
magnificent manuscript Home, which was painted for the Due
de Berri at the beginning of the century by a French
miniaturist named Jaquemart de Odin. At the Duke's death
this Book of Hours was valued at no less than four thousand
livres Tournois, equal in modern value to quite two thousand
pounds. It is mentioned thus in the inventory of the Duke's
personal property, item, unes tres belles Jieures tres ricJicment
enluminees et Jiystoriees de la main de Jaquemart de Odin...,
Like all books of this class, specially painted for a distinguished
person, the arms and badges of the owner are introduced
among the foliated ornaments of the borders of many pages ;
as the inventory states, par les quctrrefors dcs feuilles en
plusieurs lieux faictes des armes et devises^.

Fig. 25 shows part of a page from this lovely book, with
a miniature of the Birth of the Virgin, painted by Jacquemart
de Odin, within a beautiful architectural framing of the finest
style.

Space will not allow any attempt to describe even in
outline the many splendid classes of illuminated manuscripts
which were produced by the French artists of the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries. A few notable points only can be
briefly mentioned.

One special beauty of French illumination of this date is
due to the exquisite treatment of architectural frames and
backgrounds which are used to enshrine the whole picture.
The loveliest Gothic forms are introduced, with the most
delicate detail of tracery, pinnacles, canopy-work, shafts and
arches, all being frequently executed in gold with subtle
transparent shading to give an effect of relief. From the
technical point of view these manuscripts reach the highest
pitch of perfection ; the burnished gold is thick and solid
in appearance, and is convex in surface so as to catch high
lights, and look, not like gold leaf, but like actual plates of
the purest and most polished gold 2 . The pigments are of the

1 See Laborde, Les Dues de Bourgogne, Vol. n. p. i, and note to p. 121.

2 The manner in which this splendid effect is produced is described below, see
page 234.

Home of
the Due
de Berri.

Archi-
tectural
framing.

134

Fig. 25. Miniature of the birth of the Virgin painted by the illuminator Jacque-
mart de Odin for the Due de Berri. The border is of the characteristic French
and Franco-Flemish style ; see fig. 28 on page 146.

CHAP. IX.] COPIOUS ILLUSTRATION. 135

most brilliant colours, so skilfully prepared and applied that
they are able to defy the power of time to' change their hue or
even dim their splendour.

Another noticeable point about the French and Franco- Survival
Flemish illumination is the manner in which certain modes of style.
of decoration survived with very little alteration for more
than a century. Thus we find the blue, red and gold diapers
used for backgrounds, and the ivy-leaf pattern and its
varieties 1 , which had been fully developed before the middle
of the fourteenth century, still surviving in manuscripts of the
second half of the fifteenth century, and continuing in use till
the growing decadence of taste caused them to be superseded
by borders and backgrounds painted in a naturalistic rather
than a decorative manner 2 .

The Franco-Flemish manuscripts of the fifteenth century Costly
were in some cases remarkable for the amazing amount of Horae.
laborious illumination and the enormous number of miniatures
which they contain. Some of these, which were executed for
Royal or Princely patrons and liberal paymasters, engaged
the incessant labour of the illuminator for many years. In
these cases he was usually paid a regular salary, and so was
relieved from the incentive to hasty work which caused so
much inferior illumination to be produced in the fifteenth
century.

One of the most famous examples of this lavish expendi- The
ture of time on one book is the Breviary of the Duke of Bedford

J Breviary.

Bedford, who was Regent of France from 1422 to 1435 3 .
This wonderful manuscript, in addition to countless elaborate
initials, and borders round every page, contains more than
2500 miniature paintings, all delicately and richly executed
in burnished gold and brilliant colours, with backgrounds, in
many cases, of the fourteenth century type, with chess-board

1 Shown, for example, in fig. 25, page 134.

- The border from the Grimani Breviary shown on page 168, is an example,
though a very beautiful one, of this decadence of taste.

3 Now in Paris, Bibl. Nat. Lat. 17, 294. John, Duke of Bedford, was a son
of Henry IV.; he married in 1423 Anne, daughter of the Duke of Burgundy.
Very fine portraits of the Duke and Duchess of Bedford occur in the Bedford
Missal mentioned below.

136

THE BEDFORD MISSAL.

[CHAP. ix.

The

Bedford
Missal.

MSS. by
various
hands.

patterns and other diapers of the most elaborate and sumptuous
kind. The figures are of the finest Franco-Flemish style,
showing the influence of the Van Eycks, who were then
becoming the most skilful painters, technically at least, in
the world.

Another no less famous manuscript is the Bedford Missal
in the British Museum, which was painted for the Duke of
Bedford, and was presented by his wife to Henry VI. of
England, when he was crowned King of France in Paris in
the year 1430. The Bedford Missal contains no less than
fifty-nine large miniatures and about a thousand smaller ones,
not counting initials and borders. One point of special
interest about this gorgeous manuscript is that the illumina-
tions have evidently been executed by at least three different
miniaturists, who represent three different schools, the Parisian-
French, the Franco-Flemish and the English.

It is by no means uncommon to find the work of several
different illuminators in one manuscript. Naturally, when a
wealthy patron ordered a magnificent book, he was not
always willing to wait several years for its completion, as
must have been necessary when the whole of a sumptuous
manuscript was the work of one man.

Again, it was not an uncommon thing for unfinished
manuscripts to be sent to Bruges, Ghent and other centres of
the illuminator's art from various distant towns and countries,
especially from France, Italy and Spain, in order that they
might be decorated with borders and miniatures by one of
the Flemish miniaturists.

In some cases it was only the miniature subjects which
were left blank ; so that we have the text with the illuminated
borders and initials executed in the style of one country, while
the miniatures are of another quite different school.

Moreover, we find from the Guild records of Bruges that a
certain number of Italian and Spanish scribes had taken up
their residence in Bruges, and become members of the Guild
of Saint John and Saint Luke, so that some manuscripts
actually written in Flanders have a text which in style is
Italian or Spanish.

CHAP. IX.] ILLUMINATIONS IN GRISAILLE.

137

Various other combinations of style occur not unfrequently.
Many English .manuscripts, for example, have miniature
paintings which are French or Flemish in style, united with
bold decorative borders of the most thoroughly English type.

Manuscripts in Grisaille. In addition to the illuminations
glowing with gold and colour of jewel-like brilliance, a
peculiar class of miniature painting came into use in France
during the fourteenth century and to some extent lasted till
the close of the fifteenth. This was a system of almost
monochromatic painting in delicate bluish grey tints with
high lights touched in with white or fluid gold ; this is called
painting in grisaille or camaieu-gris 1 ; it frequently suggests
the appearance of an onyx cameo or other delicate relief.

The earliest examples of grisaille, dating from the first
half of the fourteenth century, sometimes have grounds of the
brilliant gold, red and blue diapers, the figures themselves
being painted in grisaille ; but in its fully developed form no
accessories of colour are used, and no burnished gold is
introduced, only the mat, glossless fluid gold being used in
some cases for the high lights.

Some of the miniatures of this class are extremely beautiful
for the delicacy of their modelling and the great refinement
of the design, and are evidently the work of artists of the
highest class. This system of illumination, being unaided by
the splendours of shining gold and bright colours, requires a
rather special delicacy of treatment, and was of course quite
unsuited for the cheap and gaudy manuscripts which were
mere commercial products. In some cases the grisaille
pictures are clearly the work of a different hand from the
rest of the book, and thus we sometimes see them combined
with richly illuminated initials and ivy-leaf borders of the
usual gorgeously coloured type.

In some late manuscripts the grisaille miniatures are
distinctly intended to imitate actual bas-reliefs, and are

1 The Italians call it chiaro-scuro or "light and shade" painting; its use in
manuscripts may have been suggested by the grisaille stained glass windows which
were introduced by the Cistercian monks, whose Rule prohibited the use of
brightly coloured figure subjects either in their windows, on their walls, or in
their books.

MSS. in
Grisaille.

Delicacy of
Grisaille.

138 ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS [CHAP. IX.

painted with deceptive effects of roundness. This led to the
introduction into manuscript ornaments of imitations of
classical reliefs of gilt bronze or veined marbles, such as occur
so often in the very sculpturesque paintings of the great
Paduan, Andrea Mantegna.

Secular Till the early part of the fourteenth century the art of the

illuminator had been mostly devoted to books on sacred
subjects, but at this time manuscripts of Chronicles, accounts of
travel, Romances and other secular works, often in the vulgar
tongue, were largely written and illuminated in the most
sumptuous way, especially for the royal personages of France
and Burgundy.

Philip the Bold of Burgundy, who died in 1404, was an
enthusiastic patron of literature and of the miniaturist's art ;
as was also Charles V. of France (1337-1380). A typical
example of this school of manuscripts is a magnificent folio,
formerly in the Perkins collection 1 , of Les cent Histoires de
Troye, a composition in prose and verse written by Christina
of Pisa 2 about 1390. This magnificent volume contains one
hundred and fifteen delicately executed miniatures, the first
of which represents Christina presenting her book to Philip
of Burgundy.

Interesting These miniatures and others of the same class are very
interesting for their accurate representations of contemporary
life and customs. The costumes, the internal fittings and
furniture of rooms, views in the streets and in the country,
feasts, tournaments, the king amidst his courtiers, scenes in
the Court of Justice, and countless other subjects are repre-
sented with much minuteness of detail and great realistic
truth. We have in fact in the miniatures of this class of
manuscripts the first beginning of an early school of genre
painting, which in its poetic feeling and sense of real beauty
ranks far higher than the ignoble realism of the later Dutch
painters.

1 It was sold for .650 at the Perkins sale in June, 1873.

2 Christina was one of the most famous authors of her time; she produced
thirteen different works ; one of which, The Fayts of Amies and Chivalry, was
translated and printed by Caxton about a century after it was written, in 1489.

CHAP. IX.]

OF SECULAR WORKS.

139

One rather abnormal class of manuscript, which belongs
both to this period and the following (the fifteenth) century,
consists of French or Latin Chronicles of the World beginning
with the Creation and reaching down to recent times, written
and illuminated with numerous miniature paintings on great
rolls of parchment, often measuring from fifty to sixty feet
in length. These are usually rather coarse in execution.

Sir John Froissart's Chronicles, and their continuation from
the year 1400 by Enguerrand de Monstrelet, were favourite
manuscripts for sumptuous illumination among the courtier
class both of France and England.

Among the many illuminated books of travel which were
produced during the latter part of the fourteenth and the
fifteenth centuries one noble example in the Paris library
may be selected as a typical example. This is a large folio
manuscript entitled Les Merveilles du Monde, containing
accounts in French of the travels of Sir John Mandeville,
Marco Polo and others. This manuscript was written about
the year 1412 for the Duke of Burgundy and was given by
him to his uncle the Due de Berri. Its numerous miniatures
are very delicate and graceful, of elaborate pictorial style,
with views of landscapes and carefully painted buildings,
street scenes and other realistic backgrounds to the figure
subjects, all executed with great patience and much artistic
feeling. The richly illuminated borders to the text are filled
with elaborate foliage, in which real and conventional forms
are mingled with fine decorative results.

In the fourteenth century the growing love for national
poetry and the more widely spread ability to read and write,
which in previous centuries had been mostly confined to
ecclesiastics, led to the production of a large number of
illuminated manuscripts of works such as the Quest of the
Holy Grail, including the whole series of the CJiansons de
Geste with the Lancelot and Arturian romances, the Roman
de la Rose, one of the most popular productions of the
fourteenth century, and a whole class of Fabliaux or short
stories in verse dealing with subjects of chivalrous and ro-
mantic character.

MS.
Chronicles.

MS.

travels.

MS.

poems.

140

SECULAR SCRIBES AND

[CHAP. ix.

Italian
influence.

Secular
miniatu-
rists.

Romances based on ancient history and mythology, such
as Les cent Histoires de Troye written by Christina of Pisa 1
about 1390 1395, became very popular among the knightly
courtiers of the Rulers of France and Burgundy 2 .

In manuscripts of this class the miniature illuminations
play a very important part, and give great scope to the fancy
and skill of the illuminator.

In southern France the style of manuscript illumination
differed a good deal from that of the northern provinces.
During the fourteenth century there was a considerable strain
of Italian influence, partly due to the establishment of the
Papal Court at Avignon, and the introduction there of
Simone Martini or Memmi, and other painters from Florence
and Siena, to decorate the walls of the Pope's Palace 8 .

On the whole, however, manuscripts were not produced in
such abundance or with such skill in southern France as they
were in the north. Paris, Burgundy and the French districts
of Flanders were the chief homes of the illuminator's art.

By this time the production of illuminated manuscripts
ceased to be almost wholly in the hands of monastic scribes,
as it had been in earlier days when manuscripts dealing with
profane subjects were scarcely known.

In Paris, Brussels, Antwerp, Bruges, Ghent, Arras and
other French and Flemish cities, large classes of secular
writers and illuminators of manuscripts grew up, and special
guilds of illuminators were formed, exactly like the guilds of
other arts and crafts 4 .

Before long this great extension of the art of illumination,
and the fact that it became a trade, a method of earning a

1 A fine manuscript of Christina's Romance is mentioned above, see page 138.

a These chivalrous romances were no less popular in England ; Dan Lydgate's
Boke of the siege of Troy, adapted and translated from Guido de' Colonna's
romance, was one of the most popular English books in the fifteenth century;
see page 123.

3 See Muntz, Les Peintres cT Avignon, 1342 1352, Tours, 1885; and Les
peintures de Simone Martini a Avignon, Paris, 1885. Many of these paintings
still exist in a good state of preservation, especially those on the vault of the small
private chapel of the Popes.

4 This subject is discussed at greater length in Chapter xm.

CHAP. IX.] THE DECADENCE OF ILLUMINATION. 141

livelihood, like any other craft, led to a serious decadence in
the art. Though wealthy patrons were able to pay large
prices for richly illuminated manuscripts, thus keeping up
the production of very elaborate and artistically valuable
works of miniature art, yet the practical result was a growing
decadence of style and workmanship.

No illuminator working mainly for a money reward could Decay of
possibly rival the marvellous productions of the earlier monas- art '

tic scribes, who, labouring for the glory of God, and the
credit to be won for themselves and for their monasteries,
could devote years of patient toil to the illumination of one
book, free from all sense of hurry, and finding in their work
the chief joy and relaxation of their lives 1 .

In most even of the best productions of the guild-scribes
of the fifteenth century one sees occasional signs of weariness
and haste ; and in the cheap manuscripts, which were turned
out by the thousand in France and Flanders during the
latter part of the fifteenth century, there is a coarseness of
touch and a mechanical monotony of style, which remind one
of the artistic results of the triumphant commercialism of the
nineteenth century.

It is more especially in the cheap Books of Hours of the Cheap

T^fC" C 1

second half of the fifteenth century that the lowest artistic
level is reached in France, Flanders and Holland. Education
had gradually been extended among various classes of laymen,
and by the middle of the fifteenth century it appears to have
been usual not only for all men above the rank of artisans to
be able to read, but even women of the wealthy bourgeois
class could make use of prayer-books. Hence arose a great
demand for pictured Books of Hours*, which appear to have
been produced in enormous quantities by the trade-scribes of
towns such as Bruges, Paris and many others. These common
manuscript Horae are monotonous in form and detail ; they
nearly always have the same set of miniatures, which are

1 See page 206 on the favourable conditions under which the monastic illumi-
nators did their work.

2 Books of Hours were the prayer-books of the laity, as the breviary, porti-
forium, or " portoos" was the prayer-book of the priest.

142

FRENCH ILLUMINATIONS

[CHAP. ix.

often coarse in detail and harsh in colour ; and the illumi-
nated borders, with which they are lavishly though cheaply
decorated, have the same forms of foliage and fruit -repeated
again and again in dozens of manuscripts, which all look as if
they had come out of the same workshop.

It must not however be supposed that all the later French
manuscripts, even of the latter half of the fifteenth century,
were of this inferior class. Though the best figure painting
was far inferior to the glorious miniatures in the Apocalypses

Fig. 26. Miniature executed for King Rene of Anjou about 1475.

of the fourteenth century, yet in their own way, as pictorial
rather than decorative illustrations, the French miniatures of

CHAP. IX.]

OF. THE PICTORIAL TYPE.

143

King
Rene's

Beauty of
fruit and
flffivers.

this date are often very remarkable for their beauty, their
refinement and their interesting and very elaborate details.

Some very fine manuscript illuminations of the highly
pictorial type were executed for King Rene of Anjou, who
died in 1480. Fig. 26 shows a good example of this, with a
carefully painted landscape background, one of sixteen fine
miniatures in a manuscript of the Roman de la tres donee
Mercy du Cneur damour fyris, one of the poetical and allegori-
cal romances which were then so popular in France. This
miniature represents the meeting of the Knight Humble
Requeste with the Squire Vif Desir. This manuscript is now
at Vienna, in the Imperial library, No. 2597.

The illuminated borders are also not unfrequently of very
great merit and high decorative value ; they are formed of
rich and fanciful combinations of various plants and flowers,
treated at first with just the due amount of conventionalism,
but tending, towards the end of the fifteenth century, to an
excessive and too pictorial realism. As late as the middle of
the fifteenth century the " ivy pattern " of the previous
century survived with little modification, and very beautiful
borders occur with branches of the vine, the oak, the maple
and other trees, together with a great variety of flowers, such
as the rose, the daisy, the columbine, the clove-pink or
carnation, the pansy, the lily, the iris or blue flag, the corn-
flower, the anemone, the violet, the thistle; and with many
kinds of fruit, especially the grape, the strawberry, the pome-
granate and the mulberry. Among this wealth of fruit and
foliage, variety is given by the introduction of birds, insects,
animals, and grotesque monsters half beast and half human,
or else living figures growing out of flower blossoms, all
designed with much graceful fancy and decorative beauty.

Towards the close of the fifteenth century one skilfully Later style,
treated but less meritorious style of illuminated border
became very common in France and Flanders. This con-
sisted of isolated objects, such as sprigs of various kinds of
flowers and fruits, especially strawberries, together with
butterflies and other insects, shells, reptiles and the like
scattered over the margin of the page, very frequently on

144

PERIOD OF DECADENCE.

[CHAP. ix.

Imitation
of relief.

Use of
fluid gold.

Harsh
colotirs.

Renais-
sance style.

a background of dull fluid gold 1 . A deceptive effect of relief
is commonly attempted by the painting of strong shadows, as
if each object were lying on the gold ground and casting its
shadow on the flat surface. This attempt at relief of course
marks a great decadence of taste, and yet it occurs in
manuscripts which show much artistic feeling and great
technical skill ; as, for example, in the magnificent Grimani
Breviary, mentioned below at p. 167, see fig. 38.

In French and Flemish miniatures of this period, gold,
applied with a brush, is often used to touch in the high lights,
not only in the grisaille miniatures, but also in paintings with
brilliant pigments, much in the same way as in the Umbrian
and Florentine pictures of contemporary date.

Many manuscripts of the early part of the sixteenth
century have elaborate architectural borders, consisting of
tiers of canopied niches containing statuettes, all executed in
fluid, mat gold.

The use of a very harsh emerald green is characteristic of
this period of decadence in France and in Flanders ; and
generally there is a want of harmony of colour in the minia-
tures of this time, in which gaudiness rather than real
splendour gradually becomes the main characteristic.

At the end of the fifteenth century the influence of the
classical Renaissance of art in Italy began to affect the
French manuscript illuminations, and especially those by
Parisian miniaturists. The introduction of architectural
forms of Italian classic style into the backgrounds of
miniatures was the first sign of this, examples of which occur
as early as the year 1475 or 1480. Fig. 27 shows a character-
istic example of a French miniature executed under Italian
influence. This is a scene of the marriage of the B. V. Mary
to the elderly Joseph, who holds in his hand the dry rod
which had blossomed. One of the unsuccessful suitors is
breaking his rod across his knee, as in Raphael's early
Sposalisio in the Brera gallery at Milan.

1 See below, page 230, for an explanation of the difference between "mat"
gold applied as a fluid pigment with a brush, and burnished gold leaf laid over a
raised "mordant" or enamel-like ground.

145

Fig. 27. Miniature of the marriage of the B. V. Mary from a French manuscript
of about 1480, with details in the style of the Italian Renaissance.

M. C. M.

146

MINIATURE BY JEHAN FOUCQUET. [CHAP. IX.

florae of

Jehan

Foucquet,

The painting represented in
Fig. 27 is from a manuscript
Book of Hours illuminated by
the famous miniaturist Jehan
Foucquet of Tours, whose ser-
vices were secured by Louis XI.
from 1470 to 1475. This manu-
script Horae, which has been
horribly mutilated, the minia-
tures being cut out of the
text, was originally executed
for Maitre Etienne Chevalier.
Foucquet and other French
illuminators of his time were
largely influenced not only by
Italian art, but also by the
Flemish school of miniaturists
who were followers of Memlinc
and Rogier van der Weyden ;
but by the end of the fifteenth
century the Italian influence
reigned supreme and soon de-
stroyed all remaining traces of
the older mediaeval or Gothic
style.

Fig. 28 shows part of a
border from the same MS. that
is illustrated in Fig. 25 on page
134-

Fig. 28. Border illumination from a Book of Hours
by Jacquemart cle Odin; see fig. 25.

CHAPTER X.

PRINTED BOOKS WITH PAINTED ILLUMINATIONS.

DURING the last few years of the fifteenth century and
the first twenty or thirty years of the sixteenth century
Paris was remarkable for the production of a beautiful class
of books which form a link between printed books and
illuminated manuscripts.

These are the numerous Books of Hours printed on vellum,
richly decorated with wood-cut 1 borders and pictures, and
frequently illuminated by painting in gold and opaque colours
over the engravings. One of the earliest of these vellum- Paris
printed Horae was produced by Pigouchet for the bookseller Hraeon
Simon Vostre in 1487* ; the pictures and borders are very
simply treated in broad outline, which the illuminator was
meant to fill in with colour, aided only in the general design
by the wood-cut 3 . In 1498 Pigouchet began to execute for
S. Vostre Books of Hours of quite a different and still finer
style, with engravings of the most exquisite beauty of design
and delicacy of detail, perfect masterpieces of the engraver's
art. The decorative borders in these lovely books have

1 In point of technique these beautiful miniatures are exactly like very delicate
wood-cuts, though in most cases they appear to have been cut (in relief) on blocks
of soft metal, treated just as if it had been wood.

2 Perhaps the earliest was one issued in 1486 by Antoine Verard.

3 In these earliest Parisian printed Horae the backgrounds of the borders are
left plain white ; unlike the later ones, in which the borders have dotted or criblce
backgrounds.

IO 2

148

PARIS HORAE ON VELLUM.

[CHAP. x.

Effect of
colouring.

Decadence
of style.

Latest
decadence.

dotted (criblte) backgrounds, and the whole effect, though
merely in black and white, is rich and decorative in the
highest degree. The comparatively coarse touch of the
illuminator ruins the beauty of these Horae ; but luckily a
good many copies have escaped this tasteless treatment,
which must have appealed only to a very ignorant love
of gold and gaudy colour on the part of the purchasers.

In the early part of the sixteenth century immense
numbers and varieties of these vellum-printed Horae 1 were
issued by Pigouchet and Vostre, Antoine Verard 2 , Thielman
Kerver and his widow, the brothers Hardouyn, and other
Paris printers and publishers. The cuts from the earlier,
fifteenth century editions 3 , were reproduced, and a great
number of new ones were cut; but after the year 1500 there
was a most rapid deterioration of style. Even between the
cuts of 1498 and those of 1503 a very marked change for the
worse is apparent, the fine mediaeval- French style being
replaced by somewhat feeble imitations of the works of the
Italian Renaissance.

These Parisian prayer-books gradually superseded the
coarse manuscript Horae which were still produced in the
early part of the sixteenth century ; and the latest examples
of these vellum- printed books, the work of Geoffroi Tory and
others as late as 1546, came to be sold without any assistance
from the hand, one can hardly say the art, of the illuminator
in his extreme decadence.

In a feeble way the art of writing and illuminating
manuscripts, as a sort of plaything for the wealthy, lingered
on in Paris till the seventeenth century. An illuminated
Book of Hours (Office de la Sainte Viergc), with four
miniatures and many floriated head-pieces of very minute

1 They include many different uses, especially that of Paris, Rome, Rouen and
Sarum.

2 Both Verard and Pigouchet produced Horae for the publisher Simon Vostre.

3 It is incorrect to speak of editions of these Books of Ifottrs ; hardly any two
copies appear to have been quite the same ; fresh arrangements and combinations
of a large stock of engraved blocks were made for the printing of almost every
copy, and thus the long list given by Brunei is very incomplete ; see the last
volume of Brunei's Manuel du libraire, Paris, 1865.

CHAP. X.] THE EARLIEST PRINTED BOOKS.

149

workmanship, which was in the Perkins collection 1 , is signed
N. Jarry Parisinus Scribebat, 1660. Other elaborate ex-
amples of Nicholas Jarry's work exist in the Paris library,
mostly painted in grisaille.

A few words on the connection between early printing
and the art of manuscript illumination may not here be out
of place. The inventors of printing, Gutenberg, Fust and
Schoeffer, appear to have had no idea of producing cheap
books by their new art, but that for a fixed sum they could
produce a more magnificent and beautiful book than a scribe
could for the same price. Such a finished masterpiece of
art as the Mazarine Bible, issued by Gutenberg in the year
1455, was not sold at a lower rate than the price of a manu-
script Bible ; but it was cheaper than a manuscript of equal
splendour. So also very few scribes of the fifteenth century
could with the utmost labour have produced such a marvel of
beauty as the Mentz Psalter of 1559, printed on the finest
vellum and illuminated with 280 large initials printed in blue
and red perfect marvels of technical skill in the perfect fit
of the two colours, or registration as it is now called 2 .

It is not known at what price this magnificent Psalter was
originally sold, but existing records show that copies of the
Vulgate produced in 1462 at Mentz by the same printers,
Fust and Schoeffer, were sold in Paris for no less than sixty
gold crowns, equal in modern value to double that number
of sovereigns.

For this reason, as beauty rather than cheapness was
aimed at by the inventors of printing, they left spaces for the
introduction of richly illuminated and historiated initials,
which were frequently inserted by the most skilful miniaturists
of the time. Thus the art of printing and illumination for
more than half a century walked hand in hand. Some of the
earliest printers had originally been illuminators of manuscripts,
as, for example, Peter Schoeffer de Gernsheim 3 , Mentelin of

1 Sold in June, 1873, f r l & l > with the rest of the Perkins library.
' 2 A copy of this glory of the printer's art in Mr Quaritch's possession is priced
in his catalogue of 1891 at ,5250; only eight copies are known to exist.

3 In 1449 Schoeffer was a young illuminator of manuscripts residing in Paris.

Early
printing.

The Mentz
Psalter.

Illumina-
tion and
printing.

THE GREAT BEAUTY OF

[CHAP. X.

The

various

Early

Italian

printing,

Strasburg, Bamler of Augsburg and many others 1 . The
ts of the workshop of an early printer included not only compositors
printer. and printers, but also cutters and founders of type, illuminators
of borders and initials, and skilful binders who could cover
books with various qualities and kinds of binding 2 . A
purchaser in Gutenberg's shop having bought, for example,
his magnificent Bible 3 in loose sheets would then have been
asked what style of illumination or rubrication he was
prepared to pay for, and then what kind of binding and
how many brass bosses and clasps he wished to have 4 .

In Central and Northern Italy especially, the printed
books of the fifteenth and first decade of the sixteenth
century were decorated with illuminations of the most
beautiful kind. Books printed in Venice about 1470-5 by
Nicolas Jenson of Paris and Vendelin of Spires, and Florentine
books, even of a few years later date, frequently contain
masterpieces of the illuminator's art. The Magnificent
Lorenzo de' Medici and others of his family were liberal
patrons of this class of work ; as were also many of the
Venetian Doges and prelates, especially various members of
the Grimani family.

There are no grounds whatever for the belief that the early

1 Mentelin was enrolled as an illuminator in the Painters' Guild at Strasburg
in 1447; and Colard Mansion, Caxton's master in the art of typography, belonged,
as a scribe and illuminator, to the Guild of St John and St Luke at Bruges. In
1471 he was elected Warden or Doyen of his Guild.

2 In some cases goldsmiths and engravers of coin-dies became printers owing
to their knowledge of the technical process necessary for cutting the punches for
type. The great French printer Nicolas Jenson, who produced the most magni-
ficent printed books in Venice, was, until the year 1462, Master of the Mint at
Tours. And Bernardo Neri, the printer of the Florentine Editlo Princeps of
Homer, was originally a goldsmith, and had assisted Ghiberti in his work on the
famous bronze doors of the Florentine Baptistery.

3 The glorious copy on vellum of the Mazarine Bible in the British Museum
has illuminated borders and initial miniatures of the finest style and execution.
This earliest of printed books is commonly called after the copy in the library
of Cardinal Mazarin which contains the illuminator's note that his work was
finished in 1456. Sir John Thorold's copy on paper was sold in 1884 for
3900.

4 Italian books frequently had clasps at the top and bottom as well as two
at the side.

CHAP. X.] THE EARLY PRINTED BOOKS. 151

printed books were passed off as manuscripts, or that Fust

was accused of having multiplied books by magical arts.

The early printers usually inserted a statement in their Early

colophon to the effect that the book was produced "without col P hons -

the aid of a pen (either of reed, quill or bronze), by a new

and complicated invention of printing characters." Many

different varieties of this statement occur.

In the Mentz Psalter printed by Fust and Schoeffer in
1459 the printer's statement at the end is, Presens Psalmorum
codex .venustate capitalium decoratus, rubricationibusque suffici-
enter distinctns, adinvencione artificiosa imprimendi ac cJiarac-
terizandi ; absque ulla calami exaracione sic effigiatus et ad
laudem Dei... In the Mentz CatJwlicon of 1460 the phrase is
used, Non calami, stilt aut penne suffragio

It was not till about half a century after the invention of
printing that the new art grew into an important means for
the increase of knowledge through the copious production of
cheap books.

No other typographer did so much for the advancement Aldine
of learning as Aldus Manutius, a Venetian scholar and printer,
who, in the year 1501, initiated a new and cheaper form of
book by the printing of his Virgil in small I2mo. size, with a
new and more compact form of character, now commonly
known as the Italic type 1 . As Aldus records in three verses
at the beginning of the Virgil, the new Italic fount of type
was designed and cut by Francesco Francia, the famous
Bolognese painter, goldsmith and die-cutter.

These small italic books of Aldus were not all intended
for sale at a low rate ; many copies exist which are magnifi-
cently illuminated, and some are even printed on vellum.

The issue of the cheaper Aldine classics gave the death-
blow to the illuminator's art, which the early large and costly
printed folios had done little or nothing to supersede.

It should also be noticed that half a century before the
invention of printing with moveable types, quite at the

1 The first or almost the first book printed by Aldus was the Hero and Leander
of Musaeus of 1494 in small 4to. The Virgil of 1501 was followed rapidly by a
Juvenal and a Martial, issued in the same year.

152

WOOD-CUTS USED TO

[CHAP. x.

Wood-cuts
in MSS.

Block-
books.

beginning of the fifteenth or towards the close of the four-
teenth century, some few manuscripts of a cheap and inferior
sort had their miniature illustrations not drawn by hand,
but printed from rudely cut wood-blocks. These prints
were afterwards coloured by hand. Manuscripts of this
class are very rare, and are now chiefly of value as sup-
plying the earliest known European examples of wood
engraving 1 .

One of the most notable examples of these manuscripts
illustrated with wood-cuts is described by Mr Quaritch in his
catalogue No. 291 of i873 2 .. This is a South-German manu-
script of about the year 1400, containing certain pious Weekly
Meditations written on 17 leaves of coarse vellum ; throughout
the manuscript text are scattered 69 wood-cuts of Saints
and Prophets, with Biblical and other sacred scenes, averaging
in size three inches by two inches and a quarter. These
miniature designs are all richly illuminated with gold and
colours; some of them have names and other inscriptions
forming part of the engraved block.

This method of combining printing and manuscript very
soon led to the next stage, that of Xylograpkic printing or
"block-books"; in which not only the illustrations but the
text itself was cut on blocks of wood and printed like the
wood-cut pictures ; each page occupying a separate plank of
wood 3 .

These block-book illustrations were coloured by hand in a
very decorative and effective way, very superior to the coarse
gaudy painting in opaque pigments with which the Parisian
illuminators so often spoilt the exquisite miniatures and the
borders in the vellum-printed Home. The block-books are
not painted over with opaque pigment, but delicately washed
in with transparent tints, without obliterating the outlines of
the printed pictures, which, though simple and even rude in

1 Chinese wood engravings of considerably earlier date do exist.

2 See page 1373; this remarkable manuscript was then (in 1873) priced at
^650.

3 Early wood-cuts were not cut on the cross ends of the grain, but on the
"plank side" of a wooden board.

CHAP. X.] ILLUSTRATE MANUSCRIPTS. 153

treatment, are often full of real beauty and great decorative
charm 1 .

Thus we see that as early as about the year 1400 the niumina-
printer's art had begun to supplement that of the manuscript >
illuminator 2 ; and the two arts continued to work, as it were,
hand in hand till after the close of the fifteenth century when
the illumination of manuscripts ceased to be a real living
art and gradually degenerated into a mere appendage to
individual pomp and luxury.

1 The Cantica Canticorum of about 1435 has most lovely designs, and the
Apocalypse, the Ars IHoriendi, the Speculum Humanae Salvationis, and the Biblia
Panperuvi all have wood-cut illustrations of great vigour and spirit, produced
between about 1420 and 1450.

2 Even before 1400 initial letters in manuscripts had been occasionally printed
from wooden stamps covered with red or blue pigment.

154

CHAPTER XI.

ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS OF THE TEUTONIC SCHOOL
AFTER THE TENTH CENTURY.

German
MSS. of
the XI th

century.

Missal of
Henry II.

THOUGH in the main the eleventh century was a period
of artistic decadence, mentioned above as having succeeded
the brilliant Carolingian period (see page 78), yet we
find that in certain places in Germany there was a very
distinct beginning of artistic revival, especially in the illumina-
tion of manuscripts, about the middle of the eleventh century
and even earlier. A school of magnificently decorative art
began then to be developed, and though the drawing of the
human figure was still weak, yet effects of the noblest
decorative character were produced by manuscript illumina-
tors, foreshadowing that marvellous climax of manuscript
art which was reached in the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries.

Fig. 29 shows a sumptuously decorative page from an
eleventh century manuscript Missal which was executed for
the Emperor Henry II. (now in the Munich library). On
a brilliant diapered background in gold, red and blue, a
standing figure of the Emperor is crowned by Christ, who
sits within a vesica aureole. The Emperor receives from two
angels the great Cross Standard of the Empire and a sword.
His arms are supported by a saint on each side, Saints Ulrich
and Emmeram. The whole page is a superb piece of decora-
tion, and is specially interesting because illuminations of this
type were evidently used by the earliest painters of stained
glass windows to supply them with designs.

Fig. 29. A page from the Missal ot the Emperor Henry II.

i 5 6

STAINED GLASS.

[CHAP. XI.

Fig. 30 illustrates a stained glass figure of King David,
one of five lancet-windows from the Cathedral of Augsburg,
executed about 1065, when the Church was consecrated, a'nd

Fig. 30.

Figure of King David from a stained glass window in the Cathedral
of Augsburg, dating from 1065.

probably about the oldest existing example of a figure in
stained glass. The manuscript-like type of the design is
very evident.

Fig. 31 is from a magnificently decorated book of the
Gospels, executed in the eleventh century for Uota, Abbess
of the convent of Niedermiinster, at Ratisbon, in the reign of
the Emperor Henry II. The whole page is a superbly

Fig. 31. Miniature from an eleventh century manuscript of the Gospels,
by a German illuminator.

158 GERMAN MSS. OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY. [CHAP. XI.

Gospels of
the XI th
century.

Revival
of art.

Grotesque
forms.

decorative composition ; in the centre is a Crucifixion with
figures of Life and Death at the foot of the cross. In the

lower angles are minute paintings of the Rent Veil of the
Temple, and the opened sepulchres ; above, at the sides, are
symbolical figures of the Church and the Synagogue, or Grace
and Law. At the upper angles are the Sun and Moon
veiling their faces before the Passion of Christ. Graceful
scroll foliage, of the Oriental textile type, fills in the span-
drels.

In the twelfth century the revival of manuscript art in
Germany progressed with great rapidity, and an immense
number of magnificently illuminated manuscripts were pro-
duced, especially in the chief Benedictine Monasteries, which
had always been the principal homes of learning and the
chief centres of the illuminator's art in Germany as in other
European countries 1 .

Frederic I. (Barbarossa), b. 1121 d. 1190, imitated the
example of Charles the Great in his patronage of art and
especially of the art of the illuminator. The manuscripts of
his time are remarkable for the richness and fancy of their
twining masses of conventional foliage, mingled with dragons,
monkeys, human forms and monsters of all kinds, designed
with extreme beauty in their strong sweeping curves and
coloured with brilliant and yet harmonious tints in a superbly
decorative way. Though the figure drawing of the illumina-
tors had not reached the perfection which was attained a
century later, yet in point of decorative ornament nothing
could surpass the best German manuscripts of the twelfth
century 2 . Figs. 32 and 33 give good examples of the
illuminations of this date.

Fig. 32 shows a fine initial S formed out of a winged
dragon, and ornamented with conventional foliage of the

1 Much of the German bronze-work of this period is extremely fine and skilful
in execution, such as the fonts and doors of churches at Hildesheim, Augsburg and
other places. The bronze font at Liege, cast about 1112 by a sculptor of the
German school, is a work of most wonderful grace and beauty.

2 Till the thirteenth century the art of the Netherlands and Flanders was
German in character; after that Flanders was, artistically, as well as politically,
partly Teutonic and partly French.

159

Fig. 32. An initial S, illuminated with foliage of the Northumbrian type,
from a German manuscript of the twelfth century.

33- Miniature of the Annunciation from a German manuscript of
the beginning of the thirteenth century.

Fig. 34. Page of a Kalendar from a German Psalter of about 1200 A.D.

M. C. M.

1 62

GERMAN ART OF THE TWELFTH [CHAP. XI.

Painting

of the
Annun-
ciation.

Page of a
Kalendar.

Mural
paintings.

noblest type. This initial shows the surviving Celtic or
rather Northumbrian influence, which in the time of Charles
the Great had been so important in the German Empire.

Fig. 33 illustrates a miniature of the Annunciation from a
fine manuscript Evangeliarium or Book of the Gospels, which
is now in the library at Carlsruhe. The drawing, though
stiff in pose, is noble in style ; and the whole miniature, with
its graceful scroll-work background, is of high decorative
value, a' prototype of the perfect style of the French and
Anglo-Norman illuminations of the second half of the thir-
teenth century. In this painting, as in many other manu-
scripts of early date, the B. V. Mary is represented as
occupied in spinning with a distaff while the angel Gabriel
approaches to announce the birth of the Messiah.

Fig. 34 shows a very beautifully designed page of the
Kalendar at the beginning of a Psalter executed about the
year 1200 for the Landgrave of Thiiringen. On the left is
the space in which the scribe inserted the days of the months,
and on the right is a noble and gracefully drawn figure of
Saint Matthew. The interlaced foliage of the initial K is of
characteristic German type.

Fig. 35 shows a very elaborate and graceful initial Y,
from another manuscript of the same date, decorated by a
vine-plant from which a youth is gathering grapes, while a
monkey, sitting in the branches, is eating some of the fruit.
The whole design is a masterpiece of decorative beauty,
elaborately worked out in gold and colours.

The fine mural paintings of this date are frequently
identical in style and design with pages from illuminated
manuscripts. This is most remarkably the case with the
late twelfth century paintings on the walls and vault of the
church of St Michael at Hildesheim ; in which the figures,
the conventional foliage and the general arrangement of
the whole have evidently been copied from manuscript
illuminations 1 .

Fig. 36 shows a striking example of this, painted about

1 See above, page 1 10, for an English example of wall paintings being copied
from manuscript miniatures.

CHAP. XL] AND THIRTEENTH CENTURIES.

163

1186 on the vault of Saint Michael's. The whole treatment VauitofSt
of this grandly decorative painting is precisely like that of the Muhaci: ' s -
page of an illuminated book.

Fig. 35. Initial Y from a German manuscript of the beginning of the thirteenth
century, with a most graceful and fanciful combination of figures and foliage.

In the centre is the Fall of Man in a medallion frame
with a conventionally treated tree on each side ; all round are
smaller paintings, including the great Rivers of Paradise and
the Jordan, two Evangelists and their Symbols, with a series
of medallion busts of Old Testament Saints linked together
by scroll-work of foliage exactly like that in illuminations of
contemporary date.

II 2

The Fall
of Alan.

CHAP. XI.] LATER GERMAN MANUSCRIPTS.

I6 5

The German manuscripts of the thirteenth and fourteenth
century are less purely national in style. The finest illumi-
nations of this date show in some cases a marked French
influence, and, especially during the fourteenth century, a
strong Italian influence was prevalent.

Fig. 37 gives a good example of this from a manuscript
Passionale, written in 1312 for the Abbess of the Convent of
St George at Prague. The figures in this manuscript resemble
those in some of the Florentine illuminated manuscripts of
Dante's Divina Commedia, executed about 1360 to 1390. The
subject of the miniatures shown in fig. 37 is a romantic story
of a bride who was carried off by brigands and flung into a
blazing furnace, from which, by the aid of the B. V. Mary,
she was rescued unhurt by the knight, her husband.

In the fifteenth century an important development of
Teutonic art took place under the Van Eycks and their
pupils. In Flanders, especially in Bruges, Antwerp and
Ghent, a very elaborate and beautiful class of illumination
was produced, in some respects different in style from the
Franco-Flemish school of art.

In the latter part of the century magnificent manuscripts
were produced by illuminators of the Memlinc and Van der
Weyden school, such as the famous Grimani Breviary in the
Venetian Ducal library, so-called from its having been bought
from a Sicilian dealer in 1521 for 500 gold ducats by Cardinal
Grimani, a member of the Venetian Grimani family, who were
liberal patrons of this class of art ; this sum was quite equal
to 2000 in modern value. The miniatures in this manuscript
were ascribed by the dealer to Hans Memlinc, Gerard of Bruges
and Lieven of Antwerp ; they were probably by the two latter
illuminators, not by Memlinc, who died in 1494 or 1495.

Gerard or Gheeraert of Bruges was a native of Oudewater
in Holland ; he was born about the middle of the fifteenth
century, and settled in Bruges in the year 1483, when he
became a member of the Guild of Saint John and Saint
Luke, to which all painters and manuscript illuminators were
obliged to belong. Gerard took the surname of David, and
became a famous painter of triptychs and altar-pieces, as well

MS. of

the XlVth

century.

School of
the Van
Eycks.

School of
Memlinc.

Gerard
David.

Fig- 37- Miniatures of Italian style from a German manuscript of 1312, showing
the influence of Florentine art on the illuminations of southern France.

CHAP. XL] THE BRANDENBURG AND GRIMANI MSS. l6/

as a skilful illuminator of manuscripts. Many fine panel-
paintings by him still exist in Bruges and elsewhere 1 . There
are also several fine manuscripts with miniatures by his hand
in addition to those in the Grimani Breviary. Among these
are two Books of Hours in the collection of the late Baron
Anselm Rothschild of Vienna, and another manuscript Home,
which was written and illuminated for the Cardinal Prince
Albert, Elector of Brandenburg, who was consecrated Arch-
bishop of Magdeburg in the year 1513 at the age of twenty-
three. An interesting monograph, with photographic repro-
ductions of the miniatures, was- written by Mr W. H. J. Weale
for Mr F. S. Ellis, the owner of the manuscript. This lovely
manuscript is almost equal in beauty to the Grimani Breviary ;
it is rather later in date, having been illuminated between
1514 and 1523.

The miniatures in the sumptuous Grimani Breviary, which
dates from the latter years of the fifteenth century, probably
about 1496, are very pictorial in style, with figures which are
larger than usual, proportionally to the size of the page.
In some of the miniatures the figures are shown only in half
length, so that the elaborately finished heads are painted to a
large scale. The borders which surround the pages, enclosing
both text and miniatures, are of the Franco-Flemish style,
with realistic flowers, fruit, insects and the like, scattered
over a flat gold ground, as is described above at page 143.
The butterflies, dragon-flies, strawberries, irises and lilies are
perfect marvels of naturalistic skill and beauty.

Fig. 38 illustrates one of the miniatures in the Grimani
Breviary ; it is one of the lovely series representing the charac-
teristic occupations of the twelve months in the Kalendar,
which commonly occur as small pictures at the tops of pages
in manuscript Kalendars of the fifteenth century, but in this
exceptionall)/- magnificent book are full page miniatures. The
one copied in fig. 38 represents the ftionth of April, a time for

1 The National Gallery in London possesses a magnificent panel by Gerard
David, a kneeling Canon with three standing figures of Saints, and an exquisitely
painted landscape background. This is one wing of an altar triptych which
was painted for St Donatian at Bruges. It is numbered 1045 in the Catalogue.
Paintings by Gerard David's wife are mentioned below, see page 218.

The Horac

of Prince

Albert.

The

Grimani
Breviary.

The month
of April.

i68

Fig. 38. Miniature symbolizing the month of April from the Kalendar
of the Grimani Breviary, executed about 1496.

CHAP. XL]

LATE FLEMISH SCHOOL.

169

love-making and out-door parties of pleasure ; here illustrated
by a most beautiful and dignified group of ladies and gentle-
men, enlivened by the humour of the scene in the left-hand
corner, with a little dog barking jealously at another pet dog
which is being petted on a lady's lap.

The background, with trees and Cathedral spires like
those of Antwerp or Malines, is specially beautiful and
highly finished.

Though marvels of minute and beautiful workmanship
these late Teutonic manuscripts belong to a period of deca-
dence. As has already been remarked, neither in poetic
feeling nor in decorative value do they approach the master-
pieces of French art during the fourteenth century.

Fig. 39 shows a page from a Book of Hours (Paris, Bibl.
Nat. Lat. 10, 532) which was illuminated for King Rene II.
of Lorraine (1473 to 1508). The figure of the Virgin shows
the influence of Italian art, which about this time, 1490, was
largely modifying and adding grace to the paintings of
Flanders.

The border, with lupines or vetch-plant realistically paint-
ed on a gold ground, is a good typical specimen of the style.

The famous Prayer-book of Anne of Brittany, painted
about 1500, after her second marriage to Louis XII., is a
work of the same magnificent style, with an immense variety
of the most exquisitely painted fruits and flowers treated with
the most minute realism. It is now in the Paris library 1 .

Fig. 40 gives a page from a magnificent Book of Hours
in the Imperial Library of Vienna (no. 1857); the miniatures
in which are of the finest Teutonic type, in some cases
suggesting the school of Van der Weyden, and in others
that of Hans Memlinc. The conventional scroll-work of
foliage with long serrated leaves in the border is very cha-
racteristic of the German and Dutch manuscripts of the
fifteenth century.

In some cases this foliage is painted with fluid gold ; the

1 The whole of this gorgeous manuscript was published in fairly good "fac-
simile " by Curmer, Le livre d^Heurcs de la Reine Anne de Bretagne, i Vols.
Imp. 4to., Paris, 1861; see also Laborde, Dtics de Bonrgogne, Vol. I. p. xxiv.

The

Grimani
Breviary.

Horae of
Kin? Rene.

Horae of
Anne of
Brittany.

Fig. 39. A page from the Book of Hours of King Rene, painted about 1480.

Fig. 40. A page from a Book of Hours at Vienna, of the finest Flemish style.

172

THE TEUTONIC SCHOOL.

[CHAP. XL

Technical
methods.

MS. of the
Emperor
Wcnzel.

Grotesque
figures.

high lights being touched in with white, and the shadows with
a grisaille blue. Another beautiful style of decoration in
manuscripts of this class has conventional flower forms
painted in transparent lake with white lights over a sheet of
burnished gold. The skilful use of gold both in the pigment
form, and in leaf on a raised enamel-like ground, is specially
characteristic of German and Dutch manuscripts of the fifteenth
century. In some manuscripts very beautiful borders are ex-
ecuted in delicate scroll-work with fine lines and dots, all of
burnished gold, the effect of which is very magnificent.

The borders and long marginal ornaments, which grow out
of the large illuminated initials, are often diversified with
figures of a naturalistic or grotesque type, devised with greater
fancy and variety than the similar figures of the same sort
which occur in so many French manuscripts.

Fig. 41 shows a beautiful example of this, which dates
from the last years of the fourteenth century, c. 1390. It
is an ornament at the foot of one of the pages in a manuscript
which was illuminated for the Emperor Wenzel of Bohemia.
Two scenes, a prisoner in the stocks, and a man being bathed
by two attendant girls, are placed in the centre of the grand
sweeping lines of foliage. The backgrounds with their delicate
scroll-work and diaper patterns are imitated from those in the
fine French and Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the earlier part
of the fourteenth century.

In some marginal illuminations, miniature figures of
knights jousting are introduced charging through the scrolls
of foliage ; and Angels gracefully drawn are very frequently
introduced into the elaborate borders, as is shown on fig. 40.

Grotesque figures were great favourites with the Teutonic
illuminators ; devils and monkeys, pigmies fighting cranes, or
strange monsters made up (like the Roman grylli) of several
animals and birds united, are of frequent occurrence in German
and Dutch illuminated manuscripts, more especially in Books
of Hours, where such fancies were probably a relief from the
gravity of the text both to the illuminator and to the owner
of the book : see below, page 208.

The finest Teutonic manuscripts of the fifteenth century

Fig. 42. Miniature of Duke Baldwin, painted about the year 1450 by an
illuminator of the school of the Van Eycks of Bruges.

CHAP. XI.] THE FLEMISH SCHOOL. 1/5

show in their miniatures the influence of the Van Eycks ; as
is also the case with many of the manuscripts which fall rather
under the head of the Franco-Flemish than the Teutonic
school 1 .

Fig. 42 gives a fine example of a miniature by an illumi- School of
nator who must have been an actual pupil of the Van Eycks.
It is taken from a fragment of a manuscript of the Croniques
de Jherusalem, now in the Imperial library of Vienna (no.
2 533)- It represents Duke Baudouin (or Baldwin), who was
crowned King of Jerusalem, in the guise of a fifteenth century
German knight, under a graceful Gothic canopy of charac-
teristically German style. The date of this sumptuous
manuscript is about 1450.

As is remarked below with regard to Italian art, it is
interesting to observe the strong influence that miniature
painting in manuscripts had upon the larger pictures of
Teutonic artists. In many cases the German and Flemish
painters of altar-pieces were also illuminators of manuscripts,
like Liberate of Verona and Girolamo dai libri, who are men-
tioned below, see page 197*.

And even without this reason for similarity, it was not
uncommon for the painter of a retable to borrow his com-
position and general decorative scheme from an illuminated
manuscript by some skilful artist.

Fig. 43 shows a good example of this, the central panel of
a retable dated 1473, in the church of St Martin at Colmar,
which is almost certainly the work of Martin Schoen or
Schongauer.

In the art of the Cologne School more especially, the The
relationship between the panel paintings and the miniature school*
illuminations of manuscripts is very close, both in the general

1 A very interesting account of the Flemish illuminators of the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries is given by Weale, Le Beffroi, Vol. iv. 1873, in which he
publishes the accounts of the Guild of St John and St Luke between the years
1454 and 1500.

2 Gerard David of Bruges was a notable example of skill in both branches of
art; see above, page 165. Gerard's wife also practised both these arts, and produced
manuscript illuminations and panel paintings of almost equal beauty to those of
her husband; see below, page 218.

Fig. 43 . Retable painted by Martin Schongauer, in the style of a manuscript

illumination.

Fig. 44. An altar-piece of the Cologne school, showing the influence of mr
script illumination on the painters of panel-pictures, especially retables.

M. C. M.

178

THE LATER TEUTONIC SCHOOL. [CHAP. XT.

Retable
at Cologne.

Triptych

by the

elder

Holltein.

Illumina-

tions by

A. Diirer.

decorative schemes and also in the extreme minuteness and
delicacy of the larger paintings.

Fig. 44 shows a beautiful example of this, a small panel,
now in the Archiepiscopal Museum at Cologne, representing
the Virgin and Child seated on a flowery sward with a trellis
covered with roses as a background, and lovely child-angels
playing on musical instruments all round. The whole panel
is a perfect gem of brilliantly decorative art of the purest and
most perfect kind, quite free from the too pictorial realism
which at this time, about 1460, was growing rapidly among
the miniaturists of France and the Netherlands.

Half a century later, in the early part of the sixteenth
century, the same tendency to paint pictures like a magnified
manuscript illumination is frequently to be observed.

Fig. 45 represents one wing of an altar triptych by Hans
Holbein the elder, painted about the year 1514. This beautiful
figure of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary is interesting as showing
the influence of Italian art, which at that time was widely
spread throughout Germany and France; it also, in its
minutely delicate touch and in the grotesque ornaments
at the top and bottom, shows a strong tendency to use
the forms and methods of the manuscript illuminator.

Manuscripts of the Teutonic school, which are known to
be by the hand of a famous painter, are of rare occurrence ;
there is therefore special interest in the book of which one
of the border-illuminations is illustrated in fig. 46. The text
itself (a book of prayers) is printed on vellum, but forty-five of
the pages are decorated with borders drawn by the masterly
hand of Albert Diirer in red, green and violet ink, a method
possibly suggested to Diirer by the sight of one of the tenth
or eleventh century manuscripts which were illuminated with
outline drawings in inks of these three colours. This beauti-
ful prayer-book was decorated by Albert Diirer in 1515 for
the Emperor Maximilian; it is now in the Munich Library 1 .
There is much that is grotesque and humorous introduced
among the finely designed scroll-work of these borders ; and

1 Maximilian's Prayer-book has been described (with copies of the borders) by
Stoeger, Vignettes d' 1 Albert Diirer, Munich, 1850.

Fig. 45. Wing of a triptych, with a figure of St Elizabeth of Hungary, painted
by the elder Hans Holbein ; this illustrates the influence on painting of the
styles of manuscript illumination at the beginning of the sixteenth century.

12 2

K
Q

their firm strong touch, united to muchfanci-
ful grace of form in the varied forms of
leafage, makes the whole well worthy of its
illuminator's artistic fame.

The border illustrated here has, at the
foot, a spirited group of musicians, and a
beautiful background, with a river and castle-
crowned hill, such as Diirer loved to introduce
'

into paintings and engravings of
all kinds. On one of the kettle- .
drums in the foreground are the
initials of the artist and the date 1515.

Dutch fifteenth century manuscripts. In
the main the manuscripts of Holland resem-
ble those either of the other contemporary
Teutonic or of the Franco-Flemish schools.

In the fifteenth century an enormous
number of Books of Hours and other works
for private devotion, such as "the Book of
Christian Belief," Den Boeck van den Kersten
G/ielove, and others of the same class, were
produced in Holland. Many of these are
written in the vulgar tongue.

The miniature illuminations are on the
whole inferior to the exquisite paintings in

nil

Fig. 46. Illuminated border drawn by Albert Diirer in 1515.

CHAP. XL] DUTCH MANUSCRIPTS. l8l

Flemish manuscripts ; but they are usually very decorative
in treatment, of a simple, homely style, which is not with-
out charm. The decorative initials are often very large and
beautiful, in some cases occupying a large proportion of the
page; and the borders, which grow gracefully out of these
large capitals, are magnificently rich both in design and
execution. Gold is used profusely and with remarkable taste
and skill in these Dutch illuminations, which frequently have
a combination of mat, fluid gold applied with the brush over
a ground of brilliantly burnished gold leaf. Very beautiful
initials are also formed by painting with a transparent lake
red over a ground of burnished gold, which shines through the
red pigment, thus producing a brilliantly decorative effect.

The miniatures of the fifteenth century Dutch manuscripts
are noticeable for their realistic architectural details, with
interiors of rooms full of elaborate furniture, bookshelves,
sideboards covered with silver plate, or the humbler jugs and
dishes of pewter, with countless other kinds of fittings and
furniture.

Dutch miniatures with ecclesiastical scenes frequently
have elaborately rendered interior views of churches, which
are usually very interesting from their illustration of the
choir and altar fittings, the retables, the " riddles " or altar-
curtains, the tabernacles for the Reserved Host, and many
other valuable records of mediaeval church furniture and
ritual 1 .

One very delicate and beautiful kind of illumination,
which occurs in many of the best Dutch manuscripts, is by
no means peculiar to Holland, but is also found in many
English, French, Flemish and Italian manuscripts.

This consists of capitals, often of large size, decorated
with rich ornamentation executed wholly with thin lines of
blue and red drawn with a very fine pen. The firmness of
touch and spirited quality of this pen illumination is often
very remarkable, showing the most perfect training of hand
and eye on the part of the illuminator. Though not as

Dutch
methods of
ornament.

Idealistic
details.

Skilful use
of the pen.

1 These minutely rendered ecclesiastical scenes occur frequently in other classes
of Teutonic illumination.

182

PEN ILLUMINATIONS.

[CHAP. XI.

Pen- work.

Illumina-
tions in
printed
books.

gorgeous as the usual initials painted with gold and colours,
this line ornament is sometimes of the richest and most
delicate quality that can be imagined. In some cases a
purple or violet ink is used, as well as the brighter blue and
red, especially in Italian manuscripts.

The form of the pen ornaments used in this class of
illumination is very much the same in all the chief European
classes of manuscripts; a somewhat exceptional circumstance,
since, as a rule, each country has its. own peculiar types of
decoration.

This beautiful pen-work reached its highest point of
perfection in the first half of the fifteenth century. It is
frequently used for the illuminated initials in the early
printed books of Germany. Books printed at Strasburg by
Mentelin, about 1460 to 1468, are often decorated with very
elaborate and skilfully drawn ornament of this type ; in
many cases probably by Mentelin's own hand, since he was
a skilful manuscript illuminator before he began to practise
the art of printing 1 .

The printed books of Koburger of Nuremberg are also
remarkable for the beauty of their illuminations, both in the
blue and red pen-work and also with painted ornaments in
gold and colour.

1 The Fitzwilliam Library possesses a beautiful example of this class of pen
illumination in a large folio volume of the Sumina of Aquinas printed by Mentelin
about 1465 or 1466.

Mentelin in his youth was an illuminator of manuscripts in Paris at the same
time that he was a student in the University ; see page 150.

183

CHAPTER XII.

THE ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS OF ITALY AND SPAIN.

As has been already mentioned, the old classical forms classic
survived in the manuscript miniatures of Italy for many survival -
centuries with but little alteration.

A slow, but steady degradation in the forms of classic art
began to take place about the fifth or sixth century ; the fact
being that no art can for long remain stationary ; there must
be either advance or decay, and when the habit of copying
older forms has once become the established rule an artistic
degradation soon becomes inevitable.

Just as the manuscript art of the Byzantine illuminators Italian
first lost its vitality and then rapidly deteriorated, so in Italy dccadcnce -
the late surviving classical style of miniature became weaker
and weaker in drawing, feebler in touch, and duller in com-
position, till in the eleventh and twelfth century a very low
stage of degradation was reached, at the very period when
the illuminator's art in more northern countries was growing
into the most vigorous development of power and decorative
beauty.

The great Renaissance of art in Italy, which led to such
magnificent results in the fourteenth to the sixteenth cen-
turies, in its first beginnings lagged behind the artistic
movement in the north, so that during the thirteenth century,
when England, France and Germany had almost reached

1 84

DECADENCE IN ITALY.

[CHAP. xii.

MS. of
Donizo.

Oderisi
of Giibbio.

Franco of
Bologna.

their climax of artistic growth, Italy had hardly begun to
advance 1 .

As an example of the degraded state of Italian art during
the twelfth century I may mention a manuscript in the
Vatican library ( Vat. 4.922)* of a poem in honour of the
Countess Matilda written by a monk of Canossa named
Donizo, which has a number of miniature illustrations. These
are of the lowest type, utterly feeble in the drawing of the
human form and quite without any feeling for the folds of
drapery ; the figures are mere shapeless masses without any
decorative beauty of colour to make up for the helpless
ignorance of the draughtsman ; see fig. 47.

Later on in the twelfth century, and during the first half
of the thirteenth century, art in Italy was mainly a feeble
reflection of the then degraded art of the Byzantines. This
was partly due to the introduction into Italy of mosaic-
workers from Constantinople, such as those who decorated
the vault of the old Cathedral of Florence (now the Baptis-
tery) with badly drawn but grandly decorative mosaics of the
Day of Doom 3 .

Little is known of the two illuminators of manuscripts
who are immortalized by Dante (Purg. xi. 79 83). Oderisi
of Gubbio, whom Dante calls the " Honour of the art that in
Paris is called allnminarc" is said to have been employed by
Pope Boniface VIII. to illuminate manuscripts in Rome
about the time of the great Jubilee of 1300, when Dante
visited Rome as an envoy from Florence.

Franco (Francesco) of Bologna is the other miniaturist
mentioned by Dante as an artist of great merit ; nothing is
known of him or of his works. During the thirteenth and

1 Such work as the Pisan Baptistery pulpit of Niccola Pisano, executed in
about 1260, was an almost isolated phenomenon, and it was not till about half a
century later that Giotto and his pupils produced paintings of equal merit to those
of France and England during the second half of the thirteenth century.

2 See Man. Germ. Hist. XII. p. 348 seq.; and Agincourt, Hist. d'Art,
PI. 66.

3 Partly owing to the necessarily decorative beauty of the glass tesserae,
Byzantine mosaics, even of a degraded period, are usually fine and rich in
effect.

Fig. 47. Illumination from an Italian manuscript executed for the Countess
Matilda in the twelfth century ; this illustrates the extreme decadence of art
in Italy before the thirteenth century.

1 86 ITALIAN MANUSCRIPTS OF [CHAP. XII.

fourteenth centuries Bologna was one of the chief Italian
centres for the production of manuscripts, partly on account
of its being the seat of one of the oldest and most important
Universities of Europe.

MS. of One of the finest manuscripts of the Florentine school,

school executed by an unknown miniatore of the school of Giotto, is
a Missal in the Chapter library of the Canons of Saint Peter's
in Rome. The arms of the donor, repeated several times
among the floreated borders, show that the manuscript was
illuminated for Giotto's patron Cardinal Gaetano Stefaneschi,
probably between 1330 and 1340. The same volume contains,
by the same illuminator's hand, a richly illuminated Life of
Saint George, with large historiated capitals of great beauty
and finely decorative colouring. Fig. 48 shows one of the
initials with Saint George slaying the dragon, and the Prin-
cess Saba kneeling at the side.

Italian In some cases, especially during the fourteenth century,

France skilful Italian illuminators appear to have worked in France.
Many French and even Flemish manuscripts, such as some of
those executed for Philip of Burgundy and the Due de Berri
towards the end of the century, show distinctly two styles of
painting, French and Italian, the book evidently being the
work of two different artists. Some of these Italian paintings
in French manuscripts suggest the hand of a disciple of
Simone Martini (Memmi), or some artist of the very decora-
tive Sienese school ; this was probably in many cases due to
the introduction of Italian painters into Avignon when the
Papal court was resident there; see page 140.

Late It was, however, not till nearly the middle of the fourteenth

revival century that Italy produced many illuminated manuscripts of
any remarkable beauty. Those executed under the immediate
influence of Giotto, between 1300 and about 1340, were not
as a rule to be compared to the illuminations of northern
Europe either for decorative value or for minute beauty of
detail.

By the middle of the fourteenth century, however, the
illuminator's art in Italy, and especially in Florence, had
reached a very high degree of excellence.

CHAP. XII.] THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY.

18;

Vasari, in his life of Don Lorenzo Monaco 1 , mentions a Monastic
Camaldolese monk of the Monastery of Santa Maria degli P aintrs -
Angeli near Florence, who, about the year 1350, wrote and

Fig. 48. Miniature of St George and the Dragon from a Missal, illuminated
about 1330 to 1340 by a painter of the school of Giotto.

illuminated a number of magnificent choir-books for his Don
monastery, which were very highly valued ; so much so that ' Ms '"'
after the death of the monk, whose name was Don Silvestro,
his hand was preserved in a shrine as a sacred relic of the

1 See Vasari, Vite dei pittori, Edition of 1568, Parte I. p. 229 seq. ; and ib.
Milanesi's edition, 1878, Vol. II. pp. 17 to 29.

1 88 THE ILLUMINATIONS OF DON SILVESTRO [CHAP. XII.

MSS.

of Don

Silvestro.

Methods of
decoration.

dead monk's piety and skill 1 . Some of Don Silvestro's
manuscripts are now preserved in the Laurentian library in
Florence, and a number of miniatures cut out of his choir-
books were acquired by W. Young Ottley 2 .

The existing works of Don Silvestro show that the
enthusiasm of his fellow monks was not exaggerated. The
miniatures are noble in style, finished with the most exquisitely
minute touch, splendidly brilliant in colour, and in every way
masterpieces of the illuminator's art. These choir-books are
of enormous size, being intended to be placed on the central
choir lectern so that the whole body of monks standing round
could chant the antipJionalia from the same book, and the
initials are proportionately large to the size of the page. Thus
some of the figures of Saints which fill the central spaces of the
large initials are as much as from six to seven inches in height,
and yet they are painted with the minute detail of an ordinary
sized miniature. The grounds of these splendid figures are
usually of burnished gold, decorated by incised tooling of
diapers or scroll-work; and the floreated borders, which
surround the letters and form marginal ornaments to the
pages, consist of nobly designed conventional foliage in
vermilion, ultramarine and other fine pigments, relieved and
lighted up by bosses of burnished gold thickly sprinkled
among the sumptuous coloured foliage. Tooled and burnished
gold is also used largely for the decoration of the dresses of
the figures, their crowns, jewelled ornaments and the apparels
and orphreys of their vestments. The whole effect is mag-
nificent in the extreme, and yet, in spite of the dazzling
brilliance of the gold and colours, the whole effect is perfectly
harmonious and free from the harsh gaudiness which dis-

1 This enshrined hand, and another, said to be that of a later miniatore of the
same Monastery, Don Lorenzo, still exist in the Sacristy of the church of Santa
Maria degli Angeli.

2 These magnificent miniatures were sold with the rest of the Hailstone
Collection in 1891; one of them, in the possession of the present writer, is a
magnificent initial O, measuring eight by nine inches, enclosing a very beautiful
seated figure of Saint Stephen in a violet dalmatic with richly decorated gold
apparels.

CHAP. XII.]

AND DON LORENZO.

189

figures so much of the late fifteenth century work of the
French and Flemish manuscript painters.

The special style of ornament used by Don Silvestro
survived in Italian illumination for nearly a century and a
half. In Italy realistic forms of fruit and flowers, such as
were painted with such taste and skill by the northern
miniaturists, were scarcely ever used. All through the
fifteenth century, alike in the manuscripts of the Florentine,
Sienese and Venetian schools, the same purely conventional
forms of foliage were used, with great curling leaves, alter-
nately blue and red, lighted up by the jewel-like studs and
bosses of burnished gold.

According to Vasari, the same Camaldolese Monastery
produced another manuscript illuminator whose skill was
hardly inferior to that of Don Silvestro. This was Don
Lorenzo, who appears to have been born about 1370, and to
have died about 1425 1 . Examples of his skill, also in the
form of large choir-books, are preserved in the Laurentian
library at Florence; they are rich with miniatures of great
beauty, and, like Don Silvestro's paintings, show a lavish
expenditure of time and patience in the exquisite minuteness
with which they are finished. Vasari tells us that his hand
also was preserved as a sacred relic in the treasury of Santa
Maria dcgli Angeli.

In later times Pope Leo X., who, like other members of
the Medici family, was an enthusiastic lover of illuminated
manuscripts, when on a visit to the Monastery, desired to
carry away to the Basilica of Saint Peter in Rome some of
these choir-books by the hand of Don Lorenzo 2 .

The Dominican Convent of San Marco in Florence, where
the famous Florentine painter Fra Beato Angelico 3 was a

Italian
ornament.

The monk

Don
Lorenzo.

Visit of
Leo X.

1 See Vasari, Milanesi Ed. Vol. II. p. 15. Vasari also mentions a monk of
the same monastery named Don Jacopo, a contemporary of Don Silvestro, who
illuminated twenty large choir-books of extraordinary beauty.

2 He appears to have abstained from purchasing these choir-books because
they were of the special Camaldolese Use, and could not therefore be used in
the Vatican Basilica.

3 Fra Angelico's works were executed throughout the first half of the fifteenth

FRA ANGELICO AS AN ILLUMINATOR. [CHAP. XII.

Domini-
can

painters.

Fra

Angelica's
style.

MSS. of

northern

Italy.

Friar, possesses, or till quite recently did possess, a magnificent
collection of choir-books richly illuminated with miniatures by
various members of the Convent Some of these are said to
have been painted by Fra Angelico himself, others by a
brother of his who was a Friar in the same Convent 1 .

The records of the Dominican Convent at Fiesole, where
Fra Angelico was born, show that he was working there as a
painter of illuminated manuscripts in the year 1407 and for
some time subsequently.

It is noticeable that Fra Angelico's style, even when
painting a colossal mural fresco, was essentially that of the
manuscript illuminator. He is utterly unrealistic in drawing
and still more so in colour; he deals with no possible effects
of light and shade, but paints all his figures glowing with the
most brilliant effects of gold and colour, in a style far earlier
than that of his own date, and with certain technical pecu-
liarities which, as a rule, are to be found only in the illu-
minations of manuscripts 2 .

In the fifteenth century the manuscript art of central and
northern Italy, especially Siena, Florence, Venice and Milan,
rose to a pitch of beauty and perfection which left it quite
without rival in any country in the world. As was the
case in writing of the glories of such manuscripts as the
French Apocalypses of the fourteenth century, words are
inadequate to describe the refined beauty of the best Italian
manuscripts of this period. As has been already pointed out
Italy was late in beginning her artistic Renaissance ; and now,
just when the rest of Europe was sinking into a more or less

century. Vasari mentions some magnificent manuscripts illuminated by him for
the Cathedral of Florence, but they are not now known to exist.

1 This is very doubtful. Fra Angelico's brother Fra Benedetto da Fiesole was
a scribe rather than a miniaturist, and probably only wrote the fine large text ; the
illuminations were probably added by a pupil of Fra Angelico, named Zanobi
Strozzi, who died in 1468.

2 As an example of this I may mention Fra Angelico's system of painting the
shadows of drapery in pure colour, using the same colour mixed with white for the
rest of the folds. To some extent this method was used by the Sienese school of
painting, which in other respects resembles in style the miniatures in illuminated
manuscripts; see above, p. 114.

CHAP. XII.] ITALIAN MSS. IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. IQI

rapid and complete state of decadence, Italy blossomed out
into one of the most magnificent artistic periods that the
world has ever seen 1 . The manuscripts of this period are
not unworthy of the general artistic glories of the time, and in
some cases their technical qualities bear witness to an almost
superhuman amount of dexterity and patience.

During the first half of the century, by far the greater
proportion of the manuscripts written in Italy were for
ecclesiastical purposes. Among the most magnificent, but
at the same time also the rarest, are folio manuscript
Pontificals*, executed for wealthy ecclesiastics of Episcopal
rank.

An Italian folio Pontifical, dating from early in the
fifteenth century, in the library of the Fitzwilliam Museum, is
of its kind, one of the most beautiful manuscripts in the world.
The delicacy of execution of the figures and especially the
faces is little short of miraculous, and the numerous historiated
initials, each representing some episcopal act of Consecration
or Benediction, scattered thickly all through the volume,
are a remarkable proof of the patient, unwearied skill which
through years of labour must have been devoted to this one
superb volume.

Among the illuminated manuscripts with secular texts the
most important are copies of Dante's Divine Comedy, the
works of Boccaccio and the Poems of Petrarch. The first
page of such works as these is usually richly decorated with a
wide border of scroll foliage, studded with the usual gold
bosses. Frequently small miniatures in medallion frames are
set at intervals among the conventional leafage ; and at the
bottom is a shield to receive the owner's coat of arms,
surrounded with a delicately painted leafy wreath, which is
supported on each side by a graceful figure of a flying angel

Renais-
sance in
Italy.

The Fitz-

ivilliam

Pontifical.

Italian
poems.

1 Taking it all round, in painting, sculpture, the medallist's art and other
branches of the fine arts, no country and no period except Athens in the time of
Pericles can ever have quite equalled the artistic glories of Florence under Cosimo
the Elder and Lorenzo de' Medici.

2 Pontificals contain such Services as only Bishops or Archbishops could
celebrate, and therefore comparatively few would be required.

ITALY IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. [CHAP. XII.

The

owner's
arms.

Classical
influence.

Capture of
Constanti-
nople.

or Cupid 1 . In many cases the shield is still left blank ; the
book not having been written for any special purchaser and
the owner having neglected to insert his arms 2 .

The painting of the wreath which surrounds the shield is
usually very beautiful, and the two flying angels or amorini
are models of grace. This motive of the wreath held by two
flying figures was largely used by the Florentine sculptors of
the fifteenth century, such as Ghiberti and Luca della Robbia;
it was suggested by the similar design, of very inferior
execution, which occurs on so many ancient Roman sarco-
phagi.

Some of the most elaborate Italian manuscripts of the
second half of the fifteenth century are decorated with very
minutely and cleverly painted copies of antique classical gems,
cameos, coins and medals, or reliefs in marble and bronze.
Wonderful skill is often shown by the way in which the
illuminator has given the appearance of relief and the actual
texture of the metal or stone 3 . Beautiful as the borders of
this class are, they belong to a period of decadence of taste,
though not of skill, and they paved the way for the elaborate
futilities of Giulio Clovio and other miniaturists of the
sixteenth century period of decadence.

The influx of Greek exiles into Florence, after the conquest
of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in 1453, led to the
famous revival of classical learning, and for a while made
Florence not only the artistic but the intellectual centre of the
world. Many of these fugitive Greeks brought with -them
both Greek and Latin manuscripts of ancient date, and a new
development of manuscript art took place in consequence of
this.

1 A beautiful manuscript of about 1460 in the Fitzwilliam Museum has its
first page surrounded with a border of this class of design, the interest of which is
much increased by the minutely written signature, "Jacopo da Fabriano," intro-
duced among the leavy ornaments of the margin.

2 This kind of design, with a blank space for the owner's arms, is used for
many of the beautiful wood-cut borders in the early printed books of Florence and
Venice.

3 Decorative accessories of this sculpturesque kind are largely used in the
paintings of Andrea Mantegna of Padua.

CHAP. XII.]

ARCHAISTIC STYLE.

193

Though manuscripts of Service books and other sacred
works continued to be written in the mediaeval "Gothic"
form of character, for secular manuscripts 1 a very beautiful
kind of " Roman" hand was largely used by the scribes of
Florence, Venice and other Italian centres of the illuminator's
art. This newly developed mode of writing was based on
the beautiful clear form of character which had been used by
the most skilful northern scribes of the ninth and tenth
century ; and at the same time a style of illumination for
borders and initials was imitated or rather adapted, with the
utmost taste and skill from the characteristic interlaced
patterns of England, France and Germany during the twelfth
century.

This beautiful kind of ornament consists of delicately
interlaced and plaited bands of white or gold, thrown into
relief by filling in the background, or spaces between the
laced bands, with alternating colours, blue, red and green.

This style of initial was also largely used for the early
printed books of Rome, Florence and Venice 2 , many copies
of which were illuminated in the most magnificent way,
quite equal to the ornaments of the finest vellum manuscripts.

Some of the Italian manuscripts of the second half of the
fifteenth century, for delicate beauty and for exquisite
refinement of detail, are unrivalled by the illuminated
manuscripts of any other country or age.

Among the greatest marvels of human skill that have
ever been produced are some of the very small Books of
Hours which were executed for the merchant princes of
Florence and Venice and for other wealthy Italian patrons.
The borders in these frequently have minute figures of
Cupid-like angels (amorini) playing among decorative foliage,
or birds and animals, such as fawns, cheetahs and the like,

1 And to some extent for manuscripts of religious works as well. This archaic
form of letter was also used by Sweynheim and Pannartz and other prototypo-
graphers at Subiaco and in Rome ; hence it got the name of Roman as opposed to
Gothic letter.

2 One of the finest examples of this style of illumination is in a volume of the
Italian translation of Pliny's Natural History, printed on vellum by Nicolas
Jenson in Venice in 1476; now in the Bodleian at Oxford.

M. C. M. 13

Copyism of

early
writing.

Celtic

style of

ornament.

Italian
florae.

194

ITALIAN MANUSCRIPTS OF [CHAP. XII.

Beauty
of the
text.

MSS. of
N. Italy.

Corvinus

a patron

of art.

designed with an amount of grace and modelled with a
microscopic refinement of touch that no words can adequately
describe.

And it is not only the unequalled beauty of the painted
decorations and miniatures for which these late Italian
manuscripts are so remarkable ; the mere writing of the text
in the most brilliant black and red ink is of striking beauty
in the form of the letters and the perfect regularity of the
whole. Last of all the vellum used by the Italian scribes
of this period is far more beautiful, from its ivory-like
perfection of tint and surface, than that of any other class of
manuscripts. Though not, of course, as exquisitely thin as
the uterine vellum of the Anglo-Norman thirteenth century
scribes, it is more beautiful in texture, and does much to
complete the artistic perfection of the manuscripts of fifteenth
century Italy, by its exquisitely polishecj surface and perfect
purity of tint.

The provinces of Florence, Pisa, Siena, Bologna and
Venice, including Verona, were all important centres for
the production of fine illuminated manuscripts. On the
whole Florence was the most famous in this as in other
branches of art, and it was especially to Florence that
wealthy foreign Princes sent their commissions when they
desired to possess exceptionally beautiful manuscripts.

One of the most enthusiastic art patrons of Europe,
Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary from 1458 to 1490,
had a large number of most magnificent manuscripts
written and illuminated for him by various miniatori of
Florence ; some of these are now in the Imperial library
of Vienna.

So also Federigo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino about
the same time, purchased from a Florentine that most
superbly illuminated Bible, in two large folio volumes, dated
1478, which is now in the Vatican library 1 .

Among the miniaturists who worked for King Corvinus,
the most famous was a Florentine named Attavante di

1 See Wattenbach, Schriftwesen, Ed. 2, pp. 411 and 469; and Romer, Les
Manuscrits de la Bill. Corvinienne, in VArt, Vol. X. 1877.

CHAP. XII.] THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

195

MSS. at
Venice.

Gabriello, who was born in 1452. Vasari mentions him as Attavante
a pupil and friend of Fra Angelico 1 , and describes at great '^ l */ 1 **-
length and with much enthusiasm a sumptuous manuscript of
Silius Italicus, belonging to the Dominican Monastery of San
Giovanni e Paolo in Venice, as being the work of Attavante.

This once magnificent manuscript still exists, but in a
much mutilated state, in the Venetian Biblioteca Marciana
(Cl. XII. Cod. LXVIII.) ; all the large miniatures have been
cut out, but the borders with winged Cupids, birds and
animals among decorative scroll-work are marvels of beauty
and minute delicacy of touch. Though quite worthy of
Attavante's fame, this manuscript cannot be his work, as it
was executed many years too early, in the time of Pope
Nicholas V., who reigned from 1447 to 1455.

The same library does, however, possess real examples of
Attavante's wonderful illuminations. The borders are specially
remarkable for the minute medallion heads which are
introduced among the conventional foliage. These minute
pictures occur in many of the finest manuscripts of this class ;
and other miniatori painted them with a microscopic refine-
ment of detail, quite equal to the best illuminations of
Attavante. Fig. 49 gives a good typical example of this
style of border, with two Cupid-like angels and busts of saints
in quatrefoil medallions.

Some of the borders of this class, especially in Venetian
and Florentine manuscripts, are decorated with very cleverly
painted representations of jewels, such as the emerald and
ruby, set at intervals along each margin. These are often
wonderful examples of skilful realism, the transparency of
the gem, and its bright reflected lights, being rendered with
an almost deceptive appearance of reality.

In the fifteenth century Verona was one of the chief
Italian centres for the production of magnificent manuscripts.
Various members of one family, known from their occupation
as " dai Libri," were specially famous as miniaturists. Stefano
the eldest was born about 1420 ; he and his younger brother

1 See Vasari's life of Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, Ed. Milanesi, Vol. n. p.
522 seq.

132

The mini-
aturists
called
dai Libri.

Fig. 49. An illuminated border from a manu-
script by Attavante of characteristic north
Italian style.

CHAP. XII.] DAI LIBRI AND LIBERALE OF VERONA. 197

Francesco were both skilled miniaturists, and Francesco's son
Girolamo dai Libri (1474 to 1556) was famous not only as a
miniatore, but also as a painter of altar-pieces and other sacred
pictures on a large scale 1 .

Another Veronese painter, Liberate di Giacomo, who was Liberate
born in 1451, was in his youth a very skilful miniaturist. of Verona.

He spent some years in illuminating large choir-books for
the Benedictine monastery of Monte Oliveto near Siena, and
then after 1469 he was for long occupied in the illumination
of similar choir-books for the Cathedral of Siena 3 .

The miniatures in these great AntipJionals are most
exquisitely finished, rich in fancy, brilliant in colour, but
wanting decorative breadth of style. With a far greater
expenditure of labour and eyesight, these wonderful illumi-
nations are far inferior to the works of the fourteenth century
French miniaturists, and show signs of that decadence of
taste, which, in the sixteenth century, led to the destruction
of the true illuminator's art 3 .

In addition to Venice, Padua and Ferrara were both MSS. of
important centres of manuscript illumination of a very high N ' Italy '
order during the fifteenth century. The Paduan miniatures
show strongly the influence of Andrea Mantegna and Gian
Bellini, whose styles also appear in the contemporary
manuscripts of Venice. The British Museum possesses a
magnificent example of the work of one of the ablest
miniatori of Padua, a Missal by Benedetto Bordone, who also
illuminated the great choir-books of the Convent of Santa
Justina in Padua.

1 The National Gallery in London possesses (No. 748 in the Catalogue) a
good example of Girolamo's work, a Madonna altar-piece, signed Hicronyiints a
libris f. No. 1134 in the same collection is an example of a panel picture by
Liberate da Verona. The Bodleian contains an exquisite Book of Hours illumi-
nated by Girolamo dai Libri for the Duke of Urbino.

2 The Antiphonals which Liberate illuminated at Monte Oliveto are now
preserved in the Chapter library at Chiusi. Those which he painted at Siena
are now in the Cathedral library. Records of money paid to Liberate for these
choir-books are published by Milanesi, Docnmenti per la Storia deW Arte Sanese,
Vol. II. pp. 384 386; and Milanesi's edition of Vasari, Vol. V. pp. 326 334.

3 Examples of Attavante's and Liberale's miniatures are illustrated by Eug.
Miintz, La Renaissance en Italic ct en France, Paris, 1885, p. 188 seq.

198

Fig. 50. A miniature from the Bible of Duke Borso d'Este, painted between
1455 and 1461 by illuminators of the school of Ferrara.

CHAP. XII.] MANUSCRIPTS OF NORTHERN ITALY. 199

Ferrara too produced many very beautiful manuscripts,
especially under the patronage of Duke Borso d'Este. It
was for this Duke of Ferrara that the magnificent choir-books,
now. in the Municipal library at Ferrara were executed.

Fig. 50 shows a miniature from a very splendid Bible,
which was illuminated for Duke Borso d'Este between 1455
and 1461 by Taddeo di Crivelli and Franco di Messer
Giovanni da Russi, two very talented miniaturists of the
Ferrarese school, though they were natives of the neighbour-
ing city of Mantua.

Parma, Modena and Cremona also were thriving centres
of the illuminator's art ; in fact wherever in Italy there was
a school of painting a subsidiary school of manuscript
miniaturists seems also, to have existed. The two classes of
painting acted and reacted upon one another ; and in some
cases, as is indicated below 1 , the more important art of
painting on a large scale owed more to the manuscript
illuminators than has commonly been acknowleged.

Milan, especially under Duke Ludovico and other mem-
bers of the Sforza family, was an active centre of manuscript
illumination. Some very beautiful late manuscripts exist
with miniatures which show the influence of Leonardo da
Vinci and his pupil Bernardino Luini ; a Book of Hours
in the Fitzwilliam Museum is a good example of this.

One rather exceptional class of richly illuminated manu-
scripts was largely produced in Italy during the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries ; these were State documents, University
diplomas and licences, patents of nobility and legal instruments
of various kinds, often very elaborately decorated with
illuminations and miniatures in gold and colours.

In Venice especially immense numbers of these were
produced ; the most elaborate are Appointments of Governors,
Commissions of officials of rank, Patriarchal Briefs, together
with State records and documents of the most varied kinds.
Bologna, Padua, Pisa and others of the chief Universities of
Italy issued diplomas for Doctor's degrees, and licences to

1 See page 200, and compare pages 163 and 175 for examples of similar
influence clue to the manuscript illuminators of Germany and Italy.

School of
Ferrara.

Parma
and

Modena.

School of
Milan.

Illumi-
nated docu-
ments.

2OO

VENETIAN ART.

[CHAP. xii.

Retables

like MSS.

Retable at
Venice.

give lectures, which were frequently very magnificently
decorated with letters of gold and richly illuminated capitals
and borders.

Before passing on to the Italian miniatori of the last
period, it is worth while to notice the strong influence that
the art of manuscript illumination had on the painters of
large retables and other sacred pictures in Italy and especially
in Venice; just as was the case with the contemporary painters
of Germany and Flanders 1 . Many of the Venetian altar-pieces,
from their minute detail, their use of burnished gold enriched
with tooled patterns, their, decorative treatment of flowers and
their architectural backgrounds and framework, look exactly
like a page from an illuminated manuscript.

Fig. 5 1 shows a characteristic example of this, a magni-
ficent retable glowing with brilliant colours and burnished
gold, now in the Accademia of Venice, which was painted in
1446 in the little island of Murano by two painters named
Johannes and Antonius de Murano 2 .

The same strongly marked influence of the decorative
style of illuminated manuscripts is to be seen in nearly all
the works of Carlo Crivelli, another Venetian painter of the
latter part of the fifteenth century, and in the gorgeous
retables of Gentile da Fabriano 3 , a follower of Fra Angelico's
richly decorative and brilliantly coloured method of painting.

Italian manuscripts of the sixteenth century. By about the
end of the first decade of the sixteenth century the art of
manuscript illumination had ceased in Italy to be a real
living art; and, though it continued to be practised with
great technical skill for more than half a century later, the
art, which once had been one of the most beautiful and
dignified of all branches of art, sank into the production of
costly toys to please a few Popes and luxurious Princes who
were willing to pay very large prices for manuscripts illumi-

1 For examples of this see above, page 175.

2 Each of these painters (in some pictures) also signs himself Alan/anus, meaning
not necessarily that they were Germans, but possibly natives of Lombardy, who
were often called Alamani by their Italian neighbours.

3 Especially in his magnificently decorative altar-piece of the Adoration of the
Magi in the Florentine Academy, dated 1423.

2OI

o .

'S o

s s

202 GIULIO CLOVIO AND EXTREME DECADENCE. [CHAP. XII.

nated by the skilful hands of Giulio Clovio and other
miniaturists, whose patience, eyesight and technical skill
were superior to their sense of what was fitting and beautiful
in an illuminated manuscript.

Giulio Of all the illuminators of this class the Dalmatian Giulio

Clovio 1 (1498-1578) was the most famous and technically the
most skilful. He found many wealthy patrons in Italy and
was employed by Charles V. of France.

The Soane Museum in London possesses a characteristic
example of his style, a Commentary on the Epistles of Saint
Paul, executed for Giulio's early patron, Cardinal Marino
Grimani of Venice, the brother of the owner of the Gri-
mani Breviary mentioned above. Clovio's miniatures are
marvels of minute execution, but not truly decorative in
style, and in design usually quite unsuited to their purpose.
In most cases they resemble large oil paintings reduced to
a microscopic scale ; the figures are commonly feeble imita-
tions either of large pieces of contemporary tapestry or else
of painting in Michel Angelo's grandiose style, both of which
of course were utterly unsuited for miniatures in a manu-
script 2 .
The The Manuscripts in the Vatican Library. The Archives

MSS. f the Vatican library contain a number of records of the
development of the library during the sixteenth century
and later 3 .

In mediaeval times manuscripts were rare and costly, so
that even Kings, Popes and Universities possessed libraries

1 Clovio is the Italianized form of a harsh Croatian name ; the artist adopted
the name Giulio as a compliment to his friend and teacher Giulio Romano,
Raphael's favourite pupil.

J. W. Bradley, Life of Gittlio Clovio, London, 1891, gives an interesting
account of him and of his fimes; see also Vasari, Ed. Milanesi, Vol. vu. p. 557.

2 The ex-king of Naples' library possesses a Book of Hours, on the illumina-
tions of which (Vasari tells us) Giulio Clovio spent nine years. It certainly is a
marvel of human patience and misdirected skill; the text was written by a
famous scribe named Monterchi, who was specially renowned for the beauty
of his writing.

3 An interesting little volume on this subject has been published by Eug.
Miintz, La Bibliotheque du Vatican, Paris, 1886; it deals chiefly with the growth
of the library during the sixteenth century.

CHAP. XII.]

THE VATICAN LIBRARY.

203

which in size were very insignificant compared to those of
ancient Alexandria, Rome and Byzantium.

Even in Leo X.'s time (1513-1522) the Vatican library,
which was probably the largest in the world, contained only
4,070 manuscripts and printed books. A century earlier,
before the invention of printing, two or three hundred volumes
would have constituted an enormous library.

As a rule even Royal and Public libraries were contained
in a few iron-bound chests or armaria ; and borrowers had to
deposit a pledge a gold ring, a silver cup or some other
valuable article, which was retained by the librarian till the
manuscript had been restored. In the Vatican this practice
survived till the sixteenth century, and books exist among
the Archives in which were recorded the date, the title of the
book, the borrower's name and a short description of the
deposited pledge. When the book was returned the word
"restituit" was written in the margin.

The same Archives contain a number of accounts giving
the sums paid to various illuminators of manuscripts, especi-
ally in the time of Pope Paul III. (Alex. Farnese, 1534 to
I 553)> wno was a great patron of Giulio Clovio and other
miniaturists. In 1540 a number of scriptores et miniatores
employed in the Vatican library received as pay 4 gold ducats
each monthly, of 10 Julii to the ducat, equal to about ,20 in
modern value.

In 1541 Messer Paolo received 30 gold ducats for writing
and illuminating four volumes.

It is interesting to note that the famous painter Sebastiano
del Piombo 1 (" Fra Bastiano piombator") received payment
"pro libris miniatis " in the year 1546 from Pope Paul III.

In 1549 Federigo Mario di Perugia received 4^ ducats
a month for his labour " in scribendis et ornandis seu pingen-
dis libris." This is the same miniaturist who illuminated some
choir-books for the Roman Monastery of Saint' Agostino 2 .

1 Fra Sebastiano was called " del Piombo " from his office as superintendant of
the pendant lead seals, pwmbi or bullae, which were attached to Papal Briefs and
other documents, one class of which were called Bulls from their lead bullae.

3 See Montault, Livres de chceur des eglises de Rome, Arras, 1874, p. y.

The
Vatican
library.

Payments
to scribes.

DelPiombo
as an illu-
minator.

2O4

SPANISH MANUSCRIPTS.

[CHAP. xii.

Spanish
MSS.

Moslem
influence.

It was especially for the great choir-books that the art of
the scribe and illuminator survived, the reason being that no
printers' fount of type had characters of sufficient size to be
read by a whole circle of singers. Thus we find Italian and
Spanish manuscript Antiphonals 1 and the like, which have the
grand Gothic writing of the fifteenth century executed as late
as the year 1620 or even later 2 .

The Manuscripts of Spain, Portugal and the East. Little
need be said about the manuscript illuminations of the
Spanish peninsula since they contain little that is native
or original.

In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries many magnificent
illuminations were produced in Spain and Portugal, but they
are mainly imitations either of Italian or of Flemish minia-
tures. In earlier times in Northern Spain the influence of
France was paramount, and in Southern Spain the beautiful
"Saracenic" art of the Moorish conquerors influenced all
branches of the fine arts, including that of manuscript illumi-
nation.

To some extent the same Moslem influence is apparent in
the decorative borders of Sicilian and Venetian manuscripts,
especially during the fifteenth century.

The illuminations of Oriental manuscripts do not fall
within the limits of this brief treatise, but it should be noted
that during the mediaeval period, and down to the present
century, Persian and Arabic manuscripts with decorative
illuminations of extraordinary beauty and skilful execution
have been largely produced in Syria, Persia and India under
the Moslem conquerors.

For delicacy of touch, for intricate beauty of ornament,

1 The Fitz william Museum possesses two noble vellum choir- books of this
class dated 1604 and 1605. Though the miniatures are poor, the writing of the
text and the music might well pass for the work of a fifteenth century scribe.

2 A valuable but by no means exhaustive list of manuscript illuminators is
given by J. W. Bradley, Dictionary of Atiniaturists, Illuminators and Caligraphers,
London, 1887. The names of Italian miniaturists are specially numerous, partly
because Italian manuscripts are more frequently signed by their illuminators than
the manuscripts of other countries. See also Bernasconi, Studj sopra la storia delta
pitlura Italiana del secoli xiv e xv, Verona, 1864.

CHAP. XII.] ORIENTAL MANUSCRIPTS. 2O5

and for decorative splendour in the use of gold and colour,
these Oriental manuscripts are, in their own way, unsurpassed.

In the orthodox Sunni manuscripts miniatures with figure Persian

MSS
subjects do not occur, but are lavishly used in the manuscripts

of the Persians and other members of the Sufi sect. The
drawing of the human form is without the dignity and grace
that is to be seen in Western manuscripts, but as pieces of
decoration the Oriental miniatures are of high merit. Copies
of the Koran, and the works of the favourite Persian poets
are among the most common kinds of Oriental manuscripts.
It is the latter that are so often sumptuously decorated with
figure subjects.

2O6

CHAPTER XIII.

THE WRITERS OF ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS.

The The Monastic Scribes. It may be interesting to consider

of^fs's what were the causes that made the illuminated manuscripts
of the mediaeval period among the most perfect and beautiful
works of art that the world has ever produced. No one can
examine the manuscripts of any of the chief European
countries down to the fourteenth century without a feeling of
amazement at their almost unvarying perfection of execution,
the immense fertility of fancy in their design, and the utterly
unsparing labour that was lavished on their production.
Moreover the manuscripts of this earlier period, before their
production became a commercial art in the hand of secular
scribes, are especially remarkable for their uniform excellence
of workmanship, and their "complete freedom from any signs
of haste or weariness on the part of their scribes and
illuminators.

Conditions Now the fact is that the countless illuminated manuscripts

which were produced in so many of the Benedictine and
other monastic Houses of Europe were executed under very
exceptionally favourable circumstances 1 . In the first place
the monastic scribe lived in a haven of safety and rest in the
middle of a tumultuous and war-harassed world. While at
work in the scriptorium he was troubled with no thoughts of

1 J. R. Green, in his Short History of the English People, chap. III., gives an
interesting sketch of the development of literature and the art of the scribe in the
great Monasteries of England, especially from the eleventh to the fourteenth
century.

CHAP. XIII.] MONASTIC ILLUMINATORS.

207

any necessity to complete his task within a limited time in
order to earn his daily bread. Food and clothing of a simple
though sufficient kind were secured to him, whether he
finished his manuscript in a year or in twenty years. He
worked for no payment, but for the glory of God and the
honour of his monastic foundation, and last, but not least, for
the intense pleasure which the varying processes of his work
gave him.

No one who examines a fine mediaeval manuscript can
help seeing in it the strongest marks of the delight which the
illuminator had in his work ; and this sort of retrospective
sympathy with the pleasure of the workman in his work is an
important element in the beauty of ancient works of art of
many different kinds and dates, from the simple but beautiful
wheel-turned vase of the Greek potter, down to the carved
foliage in a Gothic church, or the complicated ornamentation
of an illuminated initial.

Again, it should be remembered that the life of a medi-
aeval monk was a very uneventful and monotonous one, and
even the most pious soul must at times have felt a weariness
in the oft-repeated and lengthy Offices which made him spend
so large a proportion of each day within the Choir of his
monastic church. Thus it was that his work as an illumi-
nator of manuscripts provided the one great relief from his
otherwise grey and monotonous life, from which he turned to
revel in every variety of fanciful shape and of varied arrange-
ment of gleaming gold and brilliant pigments. Here at
least was no monotony, but the fullest scope for imaginative
fancy and the love of variety which is inborn in the human
mind.

In the illumination of his manuscript the monastic scribe,
even when decorating a sacred book, could lay aside for a
moment the solemn religious thoughts to which his vows had
bound him ; he could sport with every variety of grotesque
monster and of Pagan imagery, and could find vent for his
repressed sense of fun and humour by the introduction of
caricatures and pictorial jokes of all kinds among the foliage
of his borders and initials without any fear of reproof on the

Absence of
hurry.

Pleasant

work.

Relief from
monotony.

Scope for
humour.

208

HUMOROUS ILLUMINATIONS. [CHAP. XIII.

Grotesque
figures.

Humorous
scene.

A -wicked
mouse.

Fig. 52. Grotesque figure from
a French manuscript of the
fourteenth century.

part of his superiors 1 . Fig. 52 from a French fourteenth
century manuscript shows a charac-
teristic example of an illuminator's
humorous fancy, a grotesque Bishop,
with a mitre made out of a pair of
bellows.

Very frequently the jealousy
which existed between the Regular
and the Secular Clergy is expressed
in the pictorial sarcasms of the
monastic illuminators. This feeling,
on the Secular side, is vividly set
forth in the amusing Latin Poems
of Walter Map 2 , who, toward the
close of the twelfth century, was the Parish Priest of a little
church in the Forest of Dean 3 . Walter Map's satire is mainly
directed against the Cistercian order of monks, with whom
he was specially brought into contact owing to his parish
being situated near the Cistercian Abbey of Flaxley.

Fig. 53, from a German manuscript of the end of the
twelfth century, now in the Chapter library of Prague Cathe-
dral, gives an interesting example of the introduction of a
humorous scene into a grave work, Saint Augustine's De
civitate Dei. The illuminator, who was named Hildebert, has
been worried by a mouse, which stole his food ; and here on
the last leaf of the manuscript he represents himself inter-
rupted in his work and throwing something at the mouse
which is nibbling at his food. These explanatory words
are written on the open page of his book,

}3f sstmc mus, scptus me probocns afc tram, ttt tc tints pcrfcat.

" You wicked mouse, too often you provoke me to anger,
may God destroy you."

1 The carvings on the misericords (or turn-up seats) of choir-stalls were fre-
quently a vent for the pent-up humour and even spite of many a monastic carver.

2 The Poems of Walter Map were edited by Thos. Wright for the Camden
Society, 1841.

3 Walter Map subsequently obtained various degrees of preferment, and in
1197 became Archdeacon of Oxford.

2O9

Fig. 53. Miniature of a comic subject from a German manuscript of the twelfth
century, representing a monastic scribe worried by a mouse.

M. C. M.

210

REASONS WHY ILLUMINATED [CHAP. XIII.

Portrait
of the
scribe.

Short
hours of
labour.

No weari-
ness.

Variety of
labour.

At the feet of the scribe a lad named Evervvinus, possibly
a monastic novice, is seated on a low stool, drawing a piece
of ornamental scroll-work. The Monk Hildebert's desk is in
the form of a lectern supported by a carved lion ; in it are
holes to hold the black and red inkhorns, and two pens or
brushes. In his left hand the scribe holds the usual penknife,
and another pen is stuck behind his ear.

There is yet another of the conditions under which the
monastic scribe worked which was not without important
effect on the unvarying excellence of his work, and that was
that he could never remain long enough at work, at any one
time, for his hand or eye to get wearied. Owing to the
constantly recurring Choir services, the Seven Hours, which
he had to attend, the monastic scribe could probably never
continue labouring at his illumination for more than about
two hours at a time.

The importance of this fact is very clearly seen when we
compare one of the earlier monastic manuscripts with one of
the fifteenth century French or Flemish Books of Hours,
executed by a professional secular scribe. Thus in the
older manuscripts the firmness of line and delicate, crisp
touch never relaxes, and the artist's evident sense of power
and the joy in his manual dexterity lasts without diminution
from the first to the last page of his book.

Additional beauty is given to the mediaeval manuscripts
by the fact that each scribe commonly did much important
work in the preparation of his inks and pigments; in some
cases even to the beating out of the gold leaf he was about
to use in his miniatures and borders 1 . No colours bought
of a dealer in a commercial age could ever equal in beauty or
in durability the pigments that an illuminator made or at
least prepared for his own use. And his command over the
materials of his art would greatly enhance his pleasure in
using them, to say nothing of the relief given by the variety
of his labours.

All these influences, combined with others which it might

1 Theophilus, Schedula diversarum Artitim, I. 30 33, writes as if every
illuminator had to beat out or grind his own gold.

CHAP. XIII.] MANUSCRIPTS ARE SO BEAUTIFUL.

211

be wearisome to dwell upon, combined to make the manu-
scripts of the pre-commercial period works of the most
unvarying perfection of technique, unspeakably rich in the
varied wealth of fancy shown in their decorative schemes, as
well as in the minute detail of each part. The illuminated
ornament in one place is concentrated into a gem-like minia-
ture within the narrow limit of a small initial letter. At
another place it spreads out into the splendour of a full-page
picture, which swallows up most of the text, and covers the
whole page with one mass of burnished gold and brilliant
colour. Or again, springing from its roots in an illuminated
capital, it grows over the margin and frames the text with a
mass of richly designed and exquisitely graceful foliage.

Every possible scheme of decoration is to be found in
these manuscripts ; but in all cases the illuminator is careful
to make his painted ornament grow out of and form, as it
were, an integral part of the written text, which thus becomes
not merely a book ornamented with pictures, but is a close
combination of writing and illumination, forming one har-
monious whole in a united scheme of decorative beauty 1 .

The Scriptoria of Monasteries, As I have previously
mentioned, it was more especially the Benedictine monasteries 2
that were the centres for the production of mediaeval manu-
scripts 3 . I will therefore describe the usual arrangements of
the Scriptorium in a Benedictine House.

In early times, in the eighth and ninth centuries for
example, the Scriptorium and library appear usually to have
been a separate room, near or over the Sacristy, and adjoining
the Choir of the church 4 .

1 In this respect, as is noted above at page 33, the manuscripts of classical
date appear to have been inferior to those of the mediaeval period.

2 Monte Cassino the first and chief of the Benedictine monasteries, founded by
Saint Benedict himself, was for many centuries one of the chief centres in Italy for
the writing and illumination of manuscripts.

3 According to the severe Cistercian Rule richly illuminated manuscripts were
not allowed to be written or even used in Houses of that Order, which in England
from the end of the twelfth century came next in size and importance to the
monasteries of the parent Benedictine Order.

4 See the plan of the Abbey of St Gallen, published by Prof. Willis, Arch.
Jour., Vol. v. page 85 seq.

14 2

Varied
schemes of
ornament.

Monastic
Scriptoria.

212

SCRIPTORIA IN THE

[CHAP. XIII.

Scriptoria
in cloisters.

Monastic
library.

Scribes' 1
carrels.

During most of the mediaeval period, however, and in
England down to the suppression of the Abbeys by Henry
VIII., the system was to devote one whole walk or alley of
the cloister, that nearest to the church, to the double purpose
of a Scriptorium and library. This was naturally the
warmest and dryest portion of the cloister, at least in most
cases when the usual arrangement was followed of placing
the cloister on the south side of the nave of the Abbey
church 1 .

This north walk (as it commonly was) of the cloister faced
south and so received plenty of sun ; at each end of it a
screen was placed to shut it off from the rest of the cloister,
which formed a sort of common living-room for the monks".
Along one side of this alley of the cloister were fixed, against
the wall of the church, oak cupboards (armaria), with strong
locks and hinges, to receive the manuscripts which formed the
library of the monastery 3 . At Westminster and in other
Benedictine monasteries the marks showing where these
armaria were fixed are visible on the cloister wall or rather
along the wall of the church, which forms one side of this
walk of the cloister.

Down the middle of the alley a clear passage was left, and
the other side of the passage, that opposite the bookcases,
was occupied, at least in the fourteenth century, and probably
much earlier, by a row of little wooden box-like rooms called
carrels*, each of which was devoted to the use of one scribe.
As a rule there were either two or three of these carrels to
each bay or compartment of the cloister. They were
commonly made of wainscot oak, about six by eight feet in

1 The Abbey of Westminster is a well preserved example of the typical
Benedictine plan.

2 One walk of the Benedictine cloister, usually that on the west, was used as
the school-room where the novices repeated their "Donats" and other lessons.
Hence in many cloisters one sees the stone benches cut with marks for numerous
"go-bang" boards a favourite monastic game.

3 No monk could borrow a book to read without the express permission of his
superiors given in the Chapter House.

4 The word carrel is probably a corruption of the French carre, from the square
form of these little rooms.

CHAP. XIII.] BENEDICTINE CLOISTERS.

213

plan or even less ; just big enough to hold the seated scribe
and his large desk, on which rested the manuscript he was
copying, and the one he was writing, with some extra shelf

Carrels
in the
cloister.

Fig. 54. View of the scriptorium alley of the cloisters at Gloucester, showing the
recesses to hold the wooden carrels for the scribes or readers of manuscripts.

214 CARRELLS AT GLOUCESTER [CHAP. XIII.

space for his black and red inkhorns, his colours and other
implements ; see fig. 53 on p. 209.

These little rooms were provided with wooden floors and
ceilings, so as to be warm and dry; they were set close
against the traceried windows, which in most cloisters ran all
along the internal sides of the four alleys.

Cloister at The cloister of Gloucester Abbey 1 has a slightly different

Gloucester. arran g emen t. Here a series of stone recesses, each intended
to hold a carrel, extends all along the side of this walk 2 of
the cloister. There are two of these recesses to each bay, and
the lower part of the outer wall, instead of consisting of open
tracery, is of solid masonry, pierced only by a small glazed
window to give light to the scribe ; above the carrel recess
there is the usual large arch filled in with tracery; see
fig. 54 s .

When provided with these and other wooden fittings, the
cloister of a Benedictine Abbey would not have been either
in appearance or fact as cold and comfortless as such places
usually look now. With a small portable brazier the
monastic scribe in his little wooden cell was safe from damp
and probably fairly warm even in cold weather.

The Rites and Monuments of Durham* (Cap. XLI.) give
the following very interesting description of the carrels with
which the Durham cloister was fitted up ;

Cloister at "In the northe syde of the Cloister, from the corner

over againste the Church dour to the corner over
againste the Dorter (dormitory) dour, was all fynely
glased, from the hight to the sole (sill) within a little of
the ground into the Cloister garth. And in every
windowe iij PEWES or CARRELLS, where every one of
the old Monks had his carrell, severall by himselfe, that,

1 When the great Benedictine Abbey of Gloucester was suppressed, Henry
VIII. made the Church into a Cathedral by creating a new See; and so, happily,
the very beautiful cloister was saved from destruction.

2 Gloucester is exceptional in having the cloister on the north side of the
Church ; and also in having these stone recesses in the scriptorium alley.

3 The Gloucester cloister and the carrel recesses shown in this woodcut date
from the latter part of the fourteenth century.

4 Published by the Surtees Society, London, 1842; see p. 70.

CHAP. XIII.]

AND AT DURHAM.

215

when they had dyned, they did resorte to that place of
Cloister and there studyed upon there books, every one
in his carrell, all the afternonne, unto evensong tyme.
This was there exercise every daie. All there pevves or
carrells was all fynely wainscotted (with oak) and verie
close, all but the forepart which had carved wourkc that
gave light in at ther carrell doures of wainscott. And in
every carrell was a deske to lye there bookes on. And
the carrells was no greater then from one stanchell
(mullion) of the windowe to another.

And over againste the carrells against the church
wall did stande certaine great almeries (armaria or
cupboards) of wainscott all full of BOOKES, with great
store of ancient manuscripts to help them in their study,
wherein did lye as well the old auncyent written Doctors
of the Church as other prophane authors, with dyverse
other holie men's wourkes, so that every one dyd studye
what Doctor pleased them best, havinge the Librarie at
all tymes to goe studie in besydes there carrells."
In the sixteenth century, owing to the introduction of
printed works, the books in the Benedictine monastery of
Durham had become too numerous for the row of almeries
along the north walk of the cloister to hold them ; and so a
separate room was provided as a second library. The
present library at Durham is the old Dormitory or Dorter of
the Monks with all its "cubicles" or sleeping-carrels removed.
In the Houses of other religious foundations the arrange-
ments for the writing of manuscripts were different from
those of the Benedictines. In a Convent of Dominican
Friars, for example, each friar worked in his own cell where
he slept, and in a Carthusian monastery each monk had a
complete little house and garden with a small study and
oratory and a larger room, where his labours, literary or
mechanical, were carried on.

The Dominican House of San Marco in Florence, of
which Fra Beato Angelico was a member, throughout the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was famous for the mag-
nificent manuscripts that were illuminated there ; see above,

The

Durham
carrels.

The

Durham
armaria.

Other
monastic
Scriptoria.

2l6

THE LATER CLASS

[CHAP. xiii.

p. 190. And various other Convents of Dominican Friars
in Italy were important centres of manuscript illumination.
Some of the Regular Canons were also famous as illuminators,
especially the Austin Canons.

Growth
of Guilds.

Import-
ance of
the Trade-
Guilds.

THE SECULAR SCRIBES AND ILLUMINATORS.

Towards the latter part of the thirteenth and throughout
the fourteenth century, secular artisans in all varieties of arts
and crafts were gradually throwing off the bonds of the old
feudal serfdom under which they had for long been bound.
The growth in number and importance of the Trade-Guilds,
which in England developed so rapidly under Henry III.,
was one of the chief signs of the growing importance of the
artisans of the chief towns of this and other European
countries.

At the end of the thirteenth century, in London, in
Florence, and in many other cities no man could possess the
rights of a citizen and a share in the municipal government
without becoming a member of one of the established Trade-
Guilds. Edward I., Edward III. and others of the English
Kings set the example of enrolling themselves as members of
one of the London Guilds 1 ; and in Florence it was necessary
for Dante to become a member of a Guild 2 before he could
serve the Republic as one of the Priori.

At first the scribes and illuminators (librorum scriptores et
illuminatores*) were members of one general Guild including
craftsmen in all the decorative arts and their subsidiary
processes, such as leather-tanning, vellum-making, and even
saddlery 4 .

1 Frequently in the Linen-armourers' Guild, that of makers of defensive armour
of linen padded and quilted, a very important protection against assassination,
which was used till the seventeenth century.

2 Dante selected the Apothecaries' and Physicians' Guild.

3 This phrase was used in the twelfth century by Ordericus Vitalis, Hist. Eccles.
Lib. III. p. 77, Ed. Le Prevost.

4 Mediaeval saddlery, with its cut, gilt and stamped leather (ciiir houille), rich
and elaborate in design, was a decorative art of no mean character; and in
technique was akin to that of the bookbinder, which in most places was included
in the same Guild.

CHAP. XIII.] OF SECULAR ILLUMINATORS.

By degrees the Guilds became more numerous and more
specialized in character, till their fullest development was
reached in the first half or middle of the fifteenth century.
Much interesting information about the miniaturists' Guild
in Bruges during the second half of the century has been
published by Mr Weale 1 .

This was the Guild of Saint John and Saint Luke ; and
every painter, miniaturist, illuminator, rubricator, copyist,
maker of vellum, binder or seller of books who lived and
worked in Bruges was obliged to belong to this Guild. This
rule, which existed in Ghent, Antwerp and most artistic
centres, had a double use ; on the one hand it protected the
individual illuminator from wrong and oppression of any
kind ; and, on the other hand, it tended to keep up a good
standard of excellence in the work which was executed by
the Guild-members.

No miniaturist could be admitted till he had laid before
the Dean of the Guild a sufficiently good sample of his skill,
and all members were liable to be fined if they used inferior
materials of any kind, such as impure gold, adulterated
ultramarine or vermilion and the like. In this way the
officers of the Guild acted as moderators between the artisan
and his patrons, securing reasonable pay for the artist, and, in
return for that, reasonably good workmanship for his em-
ployer or customer. The Guilds also prevented anything like
commercial slave-driving by limiting very strictly the number
of apprentices or workmen that each master might employ.

Thus it happened that, though fine manuscripts were still
written and illuminated in many of the principal monasteries
of Europe, a large class of secular illuminators grew up,
especially in Paris and the chief towns of Flanders and
northern Germany. In this way the production of manu-
scripts, especially illuminated Books of Hours, became a
regular commercial process, with the inevitable result that a
great deal of work of a very inferior character was turned out
to meet the rapidly growing demand for cheap and showy
books.

1 See Le Beffroi, Bruges, Vol. IV. 1873.

Guilds in

the XVth

century.

Rules
of the
Guilds.

Decadence

of MS.

art.

2l8 COSTLY MANUSCRIPTS OF [CHAP. XIII.

An immense number of these cheap manuscript Horae
were produced after a few fixed patterns, with some mechani-
cal dulness of repetition in every border and miniature with
which they were decorated.

Costly At the same time manuscripts were still produced, mostly

Horae. a ^ j.j ie S p ec j a j order of some royal patron or wealthy
merchant, which, -in elaborate beauty and in unsparing labour
of execution, are hardly surpassed by the work of the earlier
monastic scribes 1 . Examples of this are mentioned above at
pages 135 and 169.

The Dukes of Burgundy and the Kings of France, towards
the close of the fourteenth and the first half of the fifteenth
century, numbered many illuminators among their regular
paid adherents. In some cases the artist was permanently
engaged, and passed his whole life in the service of one
Prince ; while in other cases famous illuminators were hired
for a few months or years, when the patron wanted a
specially magnificent manuscript either for his own use, or
as a royal gift on the occasion of a marriage, a coronation or
other great event.

Women In some cases, we find that women learnt to be manu-

ar " s ' script illuminators of great skill and artistic taste. For
example Cornelia, the wife of Gerard David of Bruges 2 , was,
like her husband, both an illuminator of manuscripts and a
painter of altar retables. A fine triptych painted by
Cornelia, in the possession of Mr H. Willett of Brighton, is a
work of great beauty and refinement, which it would be
difficult to distinguish from a painting by Gerard David
himself.

Costly In the fifteenth century the commercial value of sump-

tuously illuminated manuscripts rose to the highest point.
No object was thought more suited for a magnificent wedding
present to a royal personage than a costly manuscript 3 .

1 In poetic beauty, however, they cannot be compared to the glory of the
French Apocalypses such as that in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge.

2 Gerard David is mentioned above as one of the illuminators of the famous
Grimani Breviary; see page 165.

3 See pages 117 and 122 for examples of this.

CHAP. XIII.]

THE LATER TYPE.

219

And large sums were often advanced by money-lenders
or pawnbrokers on the security of a fine illuminated manu-
script.

Fig. 55. Picture by Quentin Matsys of Antwerp, showing a lady selling
or pawning an illuminated manuscript.

Fig. 55 shows a lady of the Bourgeois class negociating
for the sale or pawn of a Book of Hours or some such
manuscript, illuminated with a full-page miniature of the
Virgin and Child. The money-lender appears to be weighing
out to her the money. This beautiful painting which is
commonly called the " Money-changer and his wife" is signed
and dated 1514 by Quentin Massys or Matsys of Antwerp.
It is now in the Louvre.

In the sixteenth century, especially in Italy, during the
last decadence of the illuminator's art, very magnificent and
costly manuscripts were produced by professional miniaturists,
but these are merely monuments of wasted labour. Some

Painting
by Matsys.

220 EXPENSES OF ILLUMINATING MSS. [CHAP. XIII.

account is given at page 202 of Giulio Clovio, the most skilful
though tasteless miniaturist of his age.

Mr J. W. Clark, the Registrary of the University of

Cambridge, has procured and kindly allows me to print

the following very interesting record of the cost of writing

and illuminating certain manuscripts during the fourteenth

Accounts century. The extract is taken from the manuscript records

Georges, of the expenses of the Collegiate Church of St George at

Windsor. Windsor. The date is approximately given by the fact

that John Prust was a Canon of Windsor from 1379 to

1385-

"Compotus Johannis Prust de diuersis libris per eum factis

videlicet j Antiphonarium, j Textus Evangelij, j Martilogium,

iij Processionalia.

In primis onerat se de x li. vj s. viij d. receptis de Ricardo

Shawe per Indenturam.
Item onerat se de xx s. receptis de corpore prebende Edmun-

di Clouille.
Item onerat se de 1 s. receptis de dicto Edmundo pro officio

suo videlicet Precentoris.

Summa totalis receptorum xiij li. xvj s. viij d.
In xix quaternionibus pergamenti vituli emptis pro libro

Euangelij precio quaternionis viij d. xij s. viij d.

Item solutum pro uno botello ad imponendum Incaustum xd.
Item solutum pro incausto xiiij d.

Item pro vermulione ix d.

Item pro communibus scriptoris pro xviij . septimanis solutum

per septimanam x d. xvs.

Item pro stipendio dicti scriptoris per idem tempus xiij s. iiij d.
Item solutum Ade Acton ad notandum " Liber generacionis "

et " Passion[es]" in dicto libro 1 viij d.

Item pro examinacione et ad faciendum literas capitales

gloucas [for glaucas] iij s.

Item pro illuminacione dicti libri iij s. iiij d.

1 That is, for noting or writing the plain song of certain parts of the service
which were sung at Christmas and during Holy Week. This explanation I owe
to my friend Mr J. T. Micklethwaite.

CHAP. XIII.] IN THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. 221

Item pro ligacione dicti libri iij s. iiij d.

Item auri fabro pro operacione sua xx s.

Item in uno equo conducto pro Petro Jon per ij vices London
pro dicto libro portando et querendo viij d.

Item pro expensis dicti Petri per ij vices xj d.

Summa Ixxv s. viij d.

Item in vij quaternionibus pergamenti vituli emptis pro libro
Martilogij precio quaternionis viij d. iiij s. viij d.

et non plures quia staur[o].

Item pro scriptura xij quaternionum precio quaternionis
xv d. xv s.

Item pro illuminacione dicti libri vs. x d.

Item pro ligacione dicti libri ij s. ij d.

Item ad faciendum literas capitales gloucas viij d.

Summa xxviij s. iiij d.

Item in xxxiiij quaternionibus pergamenti vituli emptis pro
vno Anthiphonario precio quaternionis xv d. xlijs. vj d.

Item xij quaterniones de stauro

Item pro scriptura xl. quaternionum pro nota precio quater-
nionis xv d. 1 s.

Item pro scriptura vj quaternionum de phalterio 1 precio quater-
nionis ij s. ij d. xiij s-

Item ad notandum antiphonas in phalterio vj d.

Item ad notandum xl. quaterniones pro antiphonis precio
vj d. xx s.

Item ad faciendum literas capitales gloucas xij d.

Item pro illuminacione xv s. xj d.

Item pro ligacione v s.

Summa vij li. vij s. xj d.

Item in xlvj quaternionibus pergamenti multonis emptis pro
iij libris processionalium precio quaternionis ij d. ob.

ix s. vij d.

Item pro scriptura dictarum xlvj quaternionum xv s.

Item ad notandum dictas quaterniones vij s. vj d.

Item pro illuminacione ij s. ix d

Item pro ligacione ij s. vj d.

Summa xxxvij s. iiij d.
1 Evidently mis-spelt for psalterio ; and again in the next item.

222 COST OF MANUSCRIPTS [CHAP. XII.

Summa Totalis Expensarum xiiijli. ixs. iijd.
Et sic debentur computanter xij s. vij d.
probatur per auditores quos r[ecepit] de
Ricardo Shawe tune precentore. Et sic
equatur."

From these accounts we learn that six manuscripts were
written, illuminated and bound, one of them with gold or
silver clasps or bosses, at a total cost of 14. gs. ^d., more
than ,150 in modern value.

The books were a Textus or Evangeliarium, a Martyrolo-
gium, an Antiphonale and three Processionals.

*. d.
The Evangeliarium was written on 19 quater-

nions (quires) 1 of vellum, costing 8^/. each, total 12 8

Black ink I 2

A bottle to hold the ink 10

Vermilion 9

The scribe's ' ; commons " (food) for eighteen

weeks 15 o

Payment to the scribe ., 13 4

Corrections and adding coloured initials 3 o

Illumination 3 4

Binding 3 4

Goldsmith's work (on the binding) i o o

Two journeys to London and other smaller

items, making a total of 3. 1 5 j. 8</.
The Martyrologium was partly written on 7
quaternions of vellum 2 , costing &d. each quaternion 4 8

Payment to the scribe 15 o

Illumination 5 10

Binding 2 2

Coloured initials 8

Total i 8 4
The Antiphonale was written on 34 quater-

1 The quaternion was a gathering of four sheets of vellum, each folded once ;
thus forming sixteen pages.

2 This book was partly written on sheets of vellum which were in stauro (in
stock), and therefore do not come into the accounts.

CHAP. XIII.] AT WINDSOR AND BRISTOL. 223

nions of larger and more expensive sheets of

vellum, costing i$d. a quaternion 1 226

Payments to the scribe 3 3 o

Adding the musical notation ... i o 6

Coloured initials I o

Illumination 15 n

Binding 5 o

Total 7 7H

The three Processionals only cost i. ijs. ^d., being

written on 46 quaternions of cheap parchment made of

sheep-skin which cost only 2\d. the quaternion.

The following extracts from the Parish accounts of the
Church of St Ewen, in Bristol 2 , give some details as to the
cost of writing, illuminating and binding a manuscript Lee- Bristol,
tionary during the years 1469 and 1470. The total expense
is 3. 4-y. id., quite equal to 20 in modern value.

1468 9.
" Item, for j dossen and v quayers of vellom to perform

the legend [i.e. to write the lectionary on] x s vj d

Item, for wrytyng of the same xxv s

Item, for ix skynnys and j quayer of velom to the same

legend v s vj d

Item, for wrytyng of the forseyd legend iiij s ij d

14701471.

Item for a red Skynne to kever the legent v d

Also for the binding and correcting of the

seid Boke v s

Also for the lumining of the seid legent xiij s vj d

1 Twelve quires of vellum which were in stock were also used for this Anti-
phonale.

" See Trans. Bristol and Glouccs. Arch. Soc. Vol. xv. 1891, pp. 257 and 260.

224

CHAPTER XIV.

THE MATERIALS AND TECHNICAL PROCESSES OF THE
ILLUMINATOR.

Finest
vellum.

High price
of vellum.

Vellum for scribes^. The most remarkable skill is shown
by the perfection to which the art of preparing vellum 2 for
the scribe was brought. The exquisitely thin uterine vellum,
which was specially used for the minutely written Anglo-
Norman Vulgates of the thirteenth century, has been already
described; see page 113. For ivory-like beauty of colour
and texture nothing could surpass the best Italian vellum of
the fifteenth century.

One occasional use of the very thin uterine vellum should
be noted. For example in a German twelfth century copy of
the Vulgate, now in the Corpus library in Cambridge, some of
the miniature pictures have been painted on separate pieces
of uterine vellum, and then pasted into their place on the
thicker vellum pages of the manuscript. This, however, is an
exceptional thing.

The vellum used for illuminated manuscripts appears to
have been costly, partly on account of the skill and labour
that were required for its production, and, in the case of
uterine vellum on account of the great number of animals'
skins that were required to provide enough material for the
writing of a single manuscript such as a copy of the Vulgate.

1 See Peignot, Essai sur fhistoire du parchemin et du velin, Paris, 1812.

2 Strictly speaking the word vellum should denote parchment made from calf-
skin, but the word is commonly used for any of the finer qualities of parchment
which were used for manuscripts.

CHAP. XIV.] VELLUM FOR MANUSCRIPTS.

225

Even the commoner kind of parchment used for official
documents was rather a costly thing. The roll with the
Visitation expenses of Bishop Swinfield, Bishop of Hereford
from 1282 to 1317, shows that 150 sheets of parchment cost
3^. Afd., about 4 in modern value 1 .

The vellum used for manuscripts has a different texture
on its two sides. One side, that on which the hair grew, has
a mat, unglossy surface ; the other (interior) side of the skin
is perfectly smooth and, in the case of the finest vellum, has a
beautifully glossy texture like that of polished ivory.

In writing a manuscript the scribe was careful to arrange
his pages so that two glossy and two dull pages came oppo-
site each other 2 .

The art of preparing vellum of the finest kind is now
lost ; the vellum made in England is usually spoilt first by
rubbing down the surface to make it unnaturally even, and
then by loading it with a sort of priming of plaster and white
lead, very much like the paper of a cheap memorandum
book.

The best modern vellum is still made in Italy, especially
in Rome. Good, stout, undoctored vellum of a fine, pure
colour can be procured in Rome, though in limited quantities,
and at a high price 3 , but nothing is now made which resembles
either the finest ivory-textured vellum of fifteenth century
Italian manuscripts, or the exquisitely thin uterine vellum of
the Anglo-Norman Bibles.

Paper*. Though by far the majority of the illuminated
manuscripts of the Middle Ages are written on vellum, yet
paper was occasionally used, long before the fifteenth century,

1 Quoted by Hook, Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury, Vol. III. p. 353; the
Rev. Canon G. F. Browne kindly called my attention to this passage. Other
examples of the cost of vellum are given in the preceding chapter.

2 The same arrangement is to be seen in books printed on vellum.

3 For example, the mere vellum required to print a small thick folio, such as
Caxton's Golden Legend, would now cost about 40.

4 I owe many of the facts in the following account of early paper to the
excellent article on that subject in the Encyclopedia Britannica, ninth edition,
Vol. xvin. by Mr E. Maunde Thompson. See also E. Egger, Le papier dans
f an ti quite et dans les temps modernes, Paris, 1866.

M. C. M. 15

Cost of
vellum.

Bad
modern
vellum.

Use of
paper.

226 PAPER MANUFACTURE. [CHAP. XIV.

when its manufacture was largely developed to supply the
demand created by the invention of printing.

Paper made from the papyrus pith has been already
described, see Chap. II. page 22.

Mode of A very different process was used for the various kinds of

m paplr. paper which were made in mediaeval and modern times.
The essence of the process consists in making a fine pulp of
cotton or linen rags by long-continued pounding with water
sufficient to give the mixture the consistency of thick cream.
A handful of this fluid pulp is then spread evenly and thinly
over the bottom of a fine wire sieve, through which the super-
fluous water drains away, leaving a thin, soft mass which is
then turned out of the sieve, pressed, dried and finally soaked
with size to make the paper fit to write on. This process leaves
the wire-marks of the sieve indelibly printed on to the paper.
These marks are of two kinds, first, those of the stouter
wires which run longitudinally along the sieve at intervals of
about an inch or a little more, and secondly, very fine cross
wires, placed close together, and woven in at right angles to
the first-mentioned stouter wires.

Water- In the fourteenth century what are called water-marks

came into use, together with the invention of linen paper.
Some simple device indicating the city or province where the
paper was made was woven with fine wire into the bottom of
the sieve, and this mark was impressed upon the paper, like
that of the other (parallel) wires of the sieve. A double-
headed eagle, a vase, a letter or a bull's head are among the
earliest paper-marks which occur in manuscripts and books
of the fifteenth century 1 . In later times, during the sixteenth
century, each manufacturer adopted his own mark 2 ; and then
still more recently the year-date has been added 3 .

1 A good illustrated account of early water-marks is given by Sotheby,
Principia Typographia, London, 1858.

2 Some fifteenth century paper has a special maker's mark, but more usually
a general town or district mark was used, such as the cross-keys, a Cardinal's hat,
an Imperial crown or double-eagle.

3 What is now called " foolscap paper " originally took its name from a paper-
mark in the form of a fooFs cap and bells, a device which was frequently used in
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

CHAP. XIV.] THE DATES OF ITS USE.

227

These paper-marks in some cases afford useful evidence
as to the origin and date of a manuscript or printed book ;
but too much reliance should not be placed on such evidence,
since paper often remained for a long time in stock, and the
productions of one manufactory were frequently exported for
use by the scribes and printers of more than one distant
country 1 .

Paper of Oriental make has no water-mark, but the
earliest linen-paper of the fourteenth century made in Chris-
tian Europe always has a water-mark of some kind, very
clearly visible.

The dates of paper manufacture. The earliest paper appears
to have been made in China at a date even before the Chris-
tian Era. Its manufacture was next extended in Syria, and
especially to Damascus 2 . This early paper was made of the
cotton-plant, the "tree-wool" of Herodotus. Hence it was
called charta bombycina or Damascena, or, from its silky
texture, charta serica. Paper of this class, almost as beautiful
in texture as vellum, is still made in the East and used for
the fine illuminated manuscripts of India, Persia and other
Moslem countries.

Many Arab manuscripts written on cotton-paper of as
early a date as the ninth century still exist. The Moslem
conquerors of Spain and Sicily introduced the manufacture
of this charta bombycina into western Europe, and to some
small extent it was used for Greek and Latin manuscripts
during the tenth and eleventh centuries. It was, however,
rarely used in Christian Europe till the thirteenth century.

At first cotton only was used in the manufacture of paper,
but gradually a mixture first of wool and then of flax or
linen was introduced.

Peter, who was Abbot of Cluny from 1122 to 1150, in his
treatise Adversus Judaeos mentions manuscripts written on
wool-paper, made " ex rasuris veterum pannorum."

1 Some of Caxton's books, printed in Westminster, bear many different paper-
marks of Germany and Flanders, even in the same volume.

2 Paper was also made at an early date in Constantinople, through its intimate
relationship with the East. Hence the Monk Theophilus, writing in the eleventh
century, calls linen-paper "Greek vellum, " pergamena Graeca; see I. 24.

152

Evidence
of date.

Earliest
cotton
paper.

ArabMSS.
on paper.

Wool-
paper.

228

THE MANUFACTURE AND [CHAP. XIV.

Linen
paper.

Early
MS. on
paper.

Paper in
England.

In the fourteenth century linen-paper began to be made;
at first mixed with wool, and then of pure linen. This
fourteenth century paper is distinguishable by its stoutness,
its close texture, and its thick wire-marks; the water-mark
being especially clear and transparent. Paper was frequently
used for official documents, charters and the like before it
came into use for manuscript books 1 .

The British Museum possesses one of the oldest known
books on paper (A rundel Manuscripts, 268); this is a collec-
tion of Astronomical treatises written by an Italian scribe
early in the thirteenth century.

In the fourteenth century the Spanish manufactories of
cotton-paper were on the decline, and the first manufactory of
/Mien-paper was started at Fabriano in northern Italy. In
1340 another manufactory was set up in Padua, and before
the close of the fourteenth century paper was made in nearly
all the chief cities of northern Italy, especially in Milan and
Venice, and as far south as Florence and Siena.

In Germany paper-making began in Mentz in about 1320 ;
and in 1390 a manufactory was started at Nuremberg with
the aid of Italian workmen. South Germany, however, was
supplied with paper from northern Italy till the fifteenth
century.

In Paris and other places in France paper began to be
made soon after the first manufactories in Italy were started.

In England cotton-paper, especially for legal documents,
was largely used in the fourteenth century. In Oxford, in
the year 1355, a quire of paper, small folio size, cost five
pence, equal in modern value to eight or nine shillings. In
the fifteenth century its value had decreased to three pence
or four pence the quire.

Paper does not appear to have been made in England till
the reign of Henry VII. ; before that time it was mainly
imported from Germany and the Netherlands.

All Caxton's books are printed on foreign paper, and the
first book printed on paper which was made in England was

1 This old paper is almost as stout, tough and durable as parchment very
unlike modern machine-made paper.

CHAP. XIV.]

USE OF PAPER.

229

Wynkyn de Worde's Bartholomaeus, De proprictatibus rcrwn,
printed about the year 1495, four years after Caxton's death,
with the following interesting colophon, which alludes to the
first paper manufactory in England, set up by John Tate at
Hertford.

This colopJion, which does not do credit to Wynkyn de
Worde's literary style, runs thus :

also of gour cbargte call to remembraunce
soule of StHUUam <axton first prgnter O f tfjts bofee
En laten tongue at Colegn bgmself to auance
eberg fuel fctsgosgli man mag tberon lofce
3Tate tbe gonger joge mote be brofee
late bntbe in (Bnglonfc Uoo mafee tbts paper tbgnne
nofo m our englgssb tbts bofte is prnntei tnne.
During the fifteenth century the making of paper reached
its highest degree of perfection, and in the following century
its excellence began to decline.

The Venetian paper of about 1470, used, for example, in
the printed books of Nicolas Jenson and other printers in
Venice, is a substance of very great beauty and durability,
inferior only in appearance to the very best sort of vellum.
It is very strong, of a fine creamy tint, and sized 1 with great
skill, so as to have a beautiful glossy texture. For the
illuminator's purpose it appears to have been almost as good
as vellum. It even receives the raised mordant for burnished
gold of the highest beauty and brilliance.

The very small quantity of good paper that is now manu-
factured, mainly for artistic purposes, is made by hand in
exactly the same way that was employed in the fourteenth or
fifteenth century.

Most paper is now made by machinery, and as a rule
contains more esparto grass than pure linen fibre.

1 The size was made by boiling down shreds of vellum. Blotting-paper is
paper that has not been sized. A coarse grey variety was used as early as the
fifteenth century, though, as a rule, fine sand was used for this purpose till about
the middle of the present century, especially on the Continent.

Earliest

English

paper.

Beauty of
Venetian
paper.

230

FLUID GOLD

[CHAP. xiv.

Fluid and
leaf gold.

Method of
grinding.

Dull and

burnished

gold.

THE METALS AND PIGMENTS USED IN ILLUMINATED
MANUSCRIPTS 1 .

Gold and silver or tin. The splendour of illuminated
manuscripts of almost all classes, except manuscripts of the
Irish school such as the Book of Kells, is largely due to the
very skilful use of gold and silver. These metals were
applied by the illuminator in two ways, first, as a fluid
pigment, and secondly in the form of leaf.

The fluid method appears to have been the older. It is
easier to apply, but is not comparable in splendour of effect
to the highly burnished leaf gold, which was used with such
perfection of skill by the illuminators of the fourteenth
century.

Fluid gold was made by laboriously grinding the pure
metal on a porphyry slab into the finest possible powder.
This powdered gold, mixed with water and a little size, was
applied with a brush like any other pigment ; see Theophilus,
I. 30 to 33 2 . When dry, it could be to some extent polished
by burnishing, but as it was laid directly on to the compara-
tively uneven and yielding surface of the vellum it never
received a very high polish. As a rule therefore fluid gold
was left unburnished, and its surface remained dull or mat in
appearance.

For this reason it was not unfrequently used in conjunction
with burnished leaf gold, a fine decorative effect being pro-
duced by the contrast of the mat and polished surfaces.
Thus, for example, in fourteenth and fifteenth century manu-
scripts a delicate diaper of scroll pattern is sometimes painted
with a fine brush over a ground of burnished gold leaf.

1 Modern " shell gold " is practically the same thing as the fluid gold of the
mediaeval illuminators, except that it is not made with the pure, unalloyed metal.

- The following are the most useful and easily accessible books on the technical
processes of the illuminator; Theophilus, Schedula diversamm Artiunt, Hendrie's
edition with a translation, London, 1847; Cennino Cennini, Trattato della pittura,
1437, edited, with a translation, by Mrs Merrifield, London, 1844; and a large
and valuable collection of early manuscripts on the same subject, edited and
translated by Mrs Merrifield under the title of Original Treatises on the Arts of
Painting^ 2 Vols., London, 1849.

CHAP. XIV.]

USED AS A PIGMENT.

231

In the fifteenth century, during the decadence of the
illuminator's art, the use of fluid gold, which had previously
greatly diminished, was much revived, especially for the
background of the realistic borders in Flemish manuscripts 1 ,
for touching in the high lights of miniatures, and for many
other purposes. When used to cover large surfaces, it is
always unsatisfactory in effect and has little decorative
value.

The preparation of this gold pigment was a very slow and
laborious matter. The severe Cistercian rule regarded this
process as a waste of precious time ; and indeed the use of
gold in any form was prohibited in the manuscripts used in
Cistercian Abbeys. In the dialogue between a Cistercian
and a Cluniac monk, De diversis utriusque ordinis observantiis
(Thesaur. Nov. Anecdot. Vol. V. 1623), the Cistercian asks
"what use there can be in grinding gold and painting large
capitals with it"; aurum molere et aim illo molito magnas
capitales pingere litter as, quid est nisi inutile et otiosum opus ?
St Bernard himself had an even stronger objection, not only
to gold in manuscripts, but to any ornaments with grotesque
dragons and monsters, on the ground that they did not tend
to edification.

Fhdd silver was prepared and applied in the same way,
but it was much less used than gold pigment. A very
beautiful effect is produced in some of the gorgeous Caro-
lingian manuscripts by using in the same ornament both
gold and silver, which mutually enhance each other's effect
by contrast of colour.

Burnished Gold leaf. The extraordinary splendour of
effect produced by skilfully applied gold leaf depends mainly
on the fact that it was laid, not directly on to the vellum, but
on to a thick bed of a hard enamel-like substance, which
gradually set (as it got dry) and formed a ground nearly as
hard and smooth as glass ; this enabled the gold leaf laid
upon it to be burnished to the highest possible polish, till in
fact the gold gave a reflexion like that of a mirror. This

Cistercian
severity.

Fluid
silver.

Leaf gold.

1 See page 144.

232

THE USE OF GOLD LEAF

[CHAP. xiv.

Mordant
ground.

Convex
surface.

Piirity of
the gold.

enamel-like ground, or mordant as it was called, was com-
monly as thick as stout cardboard, and its edges were
rounded off, which has the double result of making the gold
leaf laid upon it look not like a thin leaf, but like a thick
plate of gold 1 , and at the same time the rounded edges catch
the light and so greatly increase the decorative splendour of
the metal.

Thus, for example, the little bosses and studs of gold,
which are strewn so thickly among the foliage in the illumi-
nated borders of Italian manuscripts of the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries, are convex in shape, like an old-fashioned
watch-glass, and each boss reflects a brilliant speck of light
whatever the direction may be in which the light falls upon
the page. Perhaps the most sumptuous use of gold leaf is to
be seen in some of the early fourteenth century French
manuscripts, in which large miniatures are painted with an
unbroken background of solid-looking burnished gold, with a
mirror-like power of reflexion.

It was only by slow degrees that the illuminators reached
the perfect technical skill of the fourteenth century in their
application of gold leaf.

In the first place the purest gold had to be beaten out,
not the alloy of gold, silver and copper which now is used for
making the gold leaf of what is called " the finest quality."
The English illuminators at the close of the thirteenth and in
the fourteenth century frequently got their gold in the form
of the beautiful florins of Florence, Lucca' 2 or Pisa, which
were struck of absolutely pure gold 3 . In England there was
no gold coinage till the series of nobles was begun by Edward

1 That is to say, it looks as if the whole substance, mordant and all, were one
solid mass of gold, nearly as thick as a modern half-sovereign ; see Theophilus, I.
24 and 25.

2 So when William Torell was about to gild the bronze effigy of Queen
Eleanor in Westminster Abbey he procured a large number of gold florins from
Lucca.

3 Not even the smallest admixture of alloy was permitted in the gold coinages
of the Middle Ages. Dante (Inf. xxx. 73) mentions the coiner Maestro Adamo
who had been burnt at Romena in 1280 for issuing florins which had scarcely
more alloy than a modern sovereign.

CHAP. XIV.] IN ILLUMINATIONS. 233

III. 1 , but these were of quite pure gold, like the Italian
florins, and so answered the purpose of the illuminator.

Another important point was that the gold leaf was not
beaten to one twentieth part of the extreme tenuity of the
modern leaf. The leaves were very small, about three by
four inches at the most, and not more than from fifty to a
hundred of these were made out of the gold ducat of Italy,
which weighed nearly as much as a modern sovereign 2 .

In many cases, we find, the illuminator prepared his own
gold leaf, and it was not uncommon for the crafts of the
goldsmith and the illuminator to be practised by the same
man. For example the Fitz-Othos, mentioned at page 112
as a distinguished Anglo-Norman family of artists in the
thirteenth century, were skilful both as makers of gold
shrines and as illuminators of manuscripts. Many inter-
esting notes about the Fitz-Othos and other artists em-
ployed at Westminster during the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries are to be found among the royal accounts now
preserved in the Record Office : see Vetusta Monumenta,
Vol. VI., p. i seq.

Among the accounts of the expenses of decorating with
painting the royal chapel of Saint Stephen at Westminster
in Edward III.'s reign, we find that John Lightgrave paid for
six hundred leaves of gold at the rate of five shillings the
hundred, equal to about ,$ or 6 in modern value. And
John " Tynbeter" received six shillings for six dozen leaves
of tin used instead of silver, not because it was cheap, but
because tin was not so liable to tarnish.

These accounts are in Latin, which is not always of

1 The gold penny of Henry III. and the florin and its parts of Edward III.
were only struck as patterns. The gold noble was first issued in 1341 ; its value
was 6s. 8</. or half a mark. So many nobles were destroyed to make gold leaf for
illuminating, and for other purposes, that an Act was passed prohibiting, under
severe penalties, the use of the gold coinage for any except monetary purposes.

2 In the same way the gold leaf used by the Greeks was comparatively thick.
The famous Erechtheum inscription of 404 B.C. gives one drachma as the cost
of each leaf (irfra\ov) used for gilding the marble enrichments ; see Cor. Ins. Aft.
I. 324, fragment C, col. ii. lines 35 and 42. Eighteen-pence will now buy 100
leaves of gold.

234

METHOD OF APPLYING

[CHAP. XIV.

Goldsmith
artists.

The gold
mordant.

Ciceronian purity ; a classical purist might perhaps carp at
such phrases as these,

Item. Pro reparatione brusJwrum, viij d , under the date
1307 ; and, in the following year,

Item. Unum scarletum blanketum, ij s vij d .

The scarlet blanket was not bought to keep the artist
warm, but to make a red pigment from, as is described below
at page 246.

This close connection between the arts of the goldsmith
and the illuminator had its parallel in other branches of the
arts, and with results of very considerable importance. Many
of the chief painters and sculptors of Italy, during the period
of highest artistic development, were also skilful goldsmiths,
as for example Ghiberti, Verrocchio, Ant. Pollaiuolo, Francesco
Francia and many others.

This habit of manipulating the precious metals gave
neatness and precision of touch to the painter, and in the art
of illuminating manuscripts taught the artist to use his
gold so as to produce the richest and most decorative effect.

Tfie mordant. We now come to the most difficult part of
the illuminator's art, that of producing a ground for his gold
leaf of the highest hardness and smoothness of surface. It is
a subject dealt with at much length by all the chief writers
on the technique of the illuminator, from Theophilus in the
eleventh century, down to Cennino Cennini at the beginning
of the fourteenth i.

Though differing in details, the general principle of the
process is much the same in all; the finest possible sort of
gesso, plaster, gypsum or whitening, was very finely ground to
an impalpable powder, and then worked up with albumen or
size to the consistency of cream, so that it could be applied
with a brush. After the first coat was dry, a second and a
third coat were added to bring up the mordant to the
requisite thickness of body, so that it stood out in visible
relief upon the surface of the vellum.

1 The best account of the way to make the mordant was given about 1398 by
a Lombard illuminator called Johannes Archerius ; see Mrs Merrifield's interesting
collection of Treatises on Painting, Vol. I. page 259 seq.

CHAP. XIV.]

THE GOLD LEAF.

235

In order that the illuminator might see clearly where his
brush was going, and keep his mordant accurately within the
required outline, it was usual to add some colouring matter,
such as bole Armeniac (red ochre), to the white gesso, which
otherwise would not have shown out very clearly on the
cream-white vellum. In many cases, however, this colouring
matter is omitted.

When the last coat of the gesso-mordant was dry and
hard, its surface was carefully polished with the burnisher
and it was then ready to receive the gold leaf; several days'
waiting would often be required before the whole body of the
mordant had set perfectly hard. White of egg was then
lightly brushed over the whole of the raised mordant, and
while the albumen was still moist and sticky, the illuminator
gently slid on to it the piece of gold leaf, which he had
previously cut approximately to the required shape. He
then softly dabbed the gold leaf with a pad or bunch of wool,
till it had completely adhered to the sticky mordant, working
it with special care so as completely to cover the rounded
edges. After the albumen was quite dry, and the gold leaf
firmly fixed in its place, the artist brushed away with a stiff
brush all the superfluous gold leaf; all the leaf, that is, under
which there was no mordant-ground to hold it fast.

The gold was then ready to be polished. For this
purpose various forms of burnisher were used, the best being
a hard highly polished rounded pencil of crystal or stone,
such as haematite, agate, chalcedony and the like ; or in lack
of those, the highly enamelled tooth of a dog, cat, rat or
other carnivorous animal was nearly as good 1 . In fact
patience and labour were the chief requisites ; one receipt,
in Jehan le Begue's manuscript, IQ2 2 , directs the illuminator
to burnish and to go on burnishing till the sweat runs down
his forehead. But caution, as well as labour, was required ;
it was very easy to scratch holes in the gold leaf, so that the
mordant showed through, unless great care was used in the
rubbing. In that case the illuminator had to apply another

Applica-
tion of leaf.

Burnish-
ingprocess.

1 See Theophilus, I. 25.

2 See Mrs Merrifiekl, op. cit. Vol. I. p. 154.

236 USE OF GOLD [CHAP. XIV.

piece of leaf to cover up the scratches, and do his burnishing
over again. To secure the highest polish, illuminators bur-
nished the hard mordant as described above before laying on
the gold leaf. In most cases two layers of gold leaf were
applied, and sometimes even more, in order to insure a perfect
and unbroken surface.

Applica- All writers speak of this burnishing as being a very

tl gold difficult and uncertain process even to a skilled hand, re-
quiring exactly the right temperature and amount of moisture
in the air, or else it was liable to go wrong. If the gold was
to be applied in minute or intricate patterns the illuminator
did not attempt to cut his leaf to fit the mordant-ground, but
laid it in little patches so as to cover a portion of the
ornament. The superfluous gold between the lines of the
pattern was then brushed away, as the leaf only remained
where it was held by the mordant. With all possible care
and skill, it was hardly possible always to ensure a sharp
clean outline to each patch of gold ; and so one commonly
finds that the illuminator has added a black outline round the
edge of each patch of gold, in order to conceal any little
raggedness of the edge.

As examples of mediaeval receipts for making the mordant
I may mention the following :

Receipts "Mix gypsum, white marble, and egg-shells finely pow-

nwrdant. dered and coloured with red ochre or terra verde ; to be
mixed with white of egg and applied in thin coats, and to be
burnished before the application of the gold." When dry, this
mixture slowly set into a beautiful, hard and yet not brittle
substance, capable of receiving a polish like that of marble,
and forming the best possible ground to receive the gold leaf.
Much of its excellence depended on the patience of the
illuminator in applying it in very thin coats ; each of which
was allowed to dry completely before the next was laid on.
When ready to receive the gold leaf, after the burnishing of
the mordant was finished, some purified white of egg was
brushed over to make the gold leaf adhere firmly so as not to
work loose or tear under the friction of the burnisher.

In some cases white lead (ceruse) was added to the gesso,

CHAP. XIV.] IN ILLUMINATIONS. 237

as, for example, in a receipt, given by Cennino Cennini (131

to 139, and 157,) for a mordant made of fine gypsum, ceruse

and sugar of Candia, that is ordinary pure white sugar 1 . Thjs Receipts

is to be ground up with white of egg, applied in thin coats mordant.

and burnished. To colour the mordant Cennino adds bole

Armeniac, or terra verde, or verdigris green.

Giovanni da Modena, a Bolognese illuminator, gives the
following receipt for a different gold-mordant to be used with
oil instead of albumen or size 2 . Instead of gesso it is to be
made of a mixture of white and red lead, red ochre, bole
Armeniac and verdigris ; the whole is to be ground first with
water, then thoroughly dried, and again ground up with a
mixture of linseed oil and amber or mastic varnish.

This variety of mordant appears to have been used in
a good many fifteenth century Italian manuscripts. It is not
such a good mixture as the gesso and white of egg, as the oil
used to mix with it is liable to stain the vellum through to
the other side of the page, and even to print off a mark on
the opposite page, especially when the book has been severely
pressed by the binder.

Tooled patterns on gold leaf . In many Italian and French Tooled

a J J , patterns.

manuscripts, especially of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,
a very rich and brilliant effect is produced with tooled lines
impressed into the surface of the flat gold. Diapered and
scroll-work backgrounds, the nimbi of Saints, the orphreys
and apparels on vestments, and many other kinds of decora-
tion were skilfully executed with a pointed bone or ivory
tool, impressed upon the gold leaf after it was burnished,
and through the gold into the slightly elastic body of the

1 In Cennino's time, the early part of the fourteenth century, in Europe, sugar
was sold by the ounce as a costly drug. Apothecaries, not grocers, dealt in it.
In Persia, Syria and some other Moslem countries cane sugar was made and used
in comparatively large quantities throughout the mediaeval period ; but in Europe
it did not come into use as an article of food till the i6th century, and even then it
was very expensive.

2 The date of this receipt is about 1410; it is quoted in Jehan de Begue's
manuscript published by Mrs Memfiel(l, Vol. I. pp. 9, 95, and 154; see also
Theophilus, i. 31, who speaks of burnishing fluid gold laid on a mordant of red
lead and cinnabar.

238

USE OF METALS.

[CHAP. xiv.

Stamped
patterns.

Silver leaf.

Cheap
methods.

gesso-mordant. Patterns were also produced by the help
of minute punches, which stamped dots or circles ; these,
when grouped together, formed little rosettes or powderings,
like those used in the panel paintings of the same time.
Gold treated in this way had to be of considerable thickness,
and in some cases, when a large flat surface of mordant was
to be gilt, as many as three layers of stout gold leaf were
employed to give the requisite body of metal.

Burnished silver leaf was occasionally used by the
mediaeval illuminators, though not very often, as it was
very liable to tarnish and blacken. For this reason leaf tin
was not unfrequently used instead of silver, as tin does not
oxydize in such a conspicuous way; see above, p. 233.

The use of all three metals, gold, silver and tin, is
described by Theophilus, Schedula diversarum Artium, I. 24,
25 and 26. Theophilus speaks of laying the gold leaf directly
on to the vellum with the help only of white of egg. This
method was not uncommon in early times, and it was not till
the end of the thirteenth century that the full splendour of
effect was reached by the help of the thick, hard mordant-
ground.

Inferior processes were sometimes used for the cheap
manuscripts of later times. Thus tin leaf burnished and then
covered with a transparent yellow lacquer or varnish made
from saffron was used instead of gold.

Cennino and other writers describe a curious method of
applying gold easily and cheaply. The illuminator was first
to paint his design with a mixture of size and pounded glass
or crystal ; this, when dry, left a surface like modern sand-
paper or glass-paper, the artist was then to rub a bit of pure
gold over the rough surface, which ground off and held a
sufficient amount of gold to produce the effect of gilding.
Only a very coarse effect, worthy of the nineteenth century,
could have been produced by this process.

239

CHAPTER XV.

THE MATERIALS AND TECHNICAL PROCESSES OF
THE ILLUMINATOR (continued}.

THE coloured pigments of the illuminators. Though me- Vehicles
dtaeval manuscripts are splendid and varied in colour to the
highest possible degree, yet all this wealth of decorative effect
was produced by a very few pigments, and with the simplest
of media, such as size made by boiling down shreds of vellum
or fish-bones 1 , or else gum-arabic, or occasionally white of egg
or a mixture both of the yoke and the white 2 . In the main the
technique of manuscript illumination is the same as that of
panel pictures executed in distemper (tempera). An oil
medium was unsuited to manuscript work because the oil
spoilt the beautiful opaque whiteness of the vellum and made
the painting show through to the other side 3 .

1 See Theophilus, I. 33 and 34 ; he recommends white of egg as a medium for
ceruse, minium and carmine, and for most other pigments, ordinary vellum she.

Jehan le Begue's manuscript gives the same advice as to the use of white
of egg, but advises the use of gum Arabic with other pigments; see 197.

- The British Museum possesses an interesting manuscript on pigments, entitled
De coloribus Illuminatorum (Sloane manuscripts, 1754); see also Eraclius, De
artibus Romanorum, published by Raspe, London, 1783 and 1801; and the
twelfth century Mappae Clavicula printed in Archicologia, Vol. XXXII. pp. 183 to
244. The first book of Theophilus, Diversarum artium schedula, written in the
eleventh century, contains much interesting matter on this subject; see also the
works mentioned above at page 230.

3 The Journal of the Society of Arts, Dec. 25, 1891, and Jan. 8 and 15, 1892,
has a valuable series of papers on "The pigments and vehicles of the Old Masters"
by Mr A. P. Laurie, who throws new light on the treatises edited by Mrs Merri-
field with the help of his own chemical investigations.

240

ULTRAMARINE BLUE.

[CHAP. xv.

Ultrama-
rine blue.

Its manu-
facture.

Its great
value.

Blue pigments. The most important blue pigment, both
during classical and mediaeval times, was the costly and very
beautiful ultramarine (azzurrum* transmarinuni), which was
made from lapis lazuli, a mineral chiefly imported from
Persia. This ultramarine blue was the cyanus or coeruleum of
Theophrastus and Pliny. It is not only the most magnificent
of all blue pigments, but is also the most durable, even when
exposed to light for a very long period.

The general principle of the manufacture of ultramarine is
very simple ; consisting merely in grinding the lapis lazuli to
powder, and then separating, by repeated washing, the deep
blue particles from the rest of the stone 2 . The process of
extracting the blue was made easier if the lapis lazuli was
first calcined by heat. This is the modern method, and
was occasionally done in mediaeval times, but it injures the
depth and brilliance of the pigment, and in the finest
manuscripts ultramarine was used which had been prepared
by the better though more laborious process without the aid
of heat.

The proportion of pure blue in a lump of lapis lazuli is
much smaller than it looks ; the stone was and is rare and
costly, and thus the finest ultramarine of the mediaeval
painters was often worth considerably more than double
its weight in gold 3 .

Both in classical and mediaeval times it was usual for the
patron who had ordered a picture to supply the necessary
ultramarine to the artist, who was only expected to provide
the less costly pigments in return for the sum for which he
had contracted to execute the work.

Pliny (Hist. Nat. XXXIII. 120) tells a story of a trick
played by a painter on his employer, who suspiciously

1 This word is spelt in many different ways.

2 In mediaeval times this was done by first embedding the powdered stone in
a lump of wax and resin, from which the blue particles were laboriously extracted
by long-continued kneading and washing. The theory of this apparently was that
the wax held the colourless particles and allowed the blue to be washed out ; see
Mrs Merrifield, Treatises on Painting, Vol. I. pp. 49, and 97 to HI.

3 The modern value of ultramarine is about equal to its weight in gold. Sir
Peter Lely, in the time of Charles II., paid ^4. icw. an ounce for it.

CHAP. XV.]

THEFT OF ULTRAMARINE.

241

watched the artist to see that he did not abstract any of the
precious ultramarine which had been doled out to him. At
frequent intervals the painter washed his brush, dipped
in the ultramarine, in a vessel of water ; the heavy pigment
sank to the bottom, and at the end of the day the artist
poured off the water and secured the mass of powdered
ultramarine at the bottom.

It is interesting to note that Vasari, in his life of Perugino,
tells precisely this story about Pietro, who was annoyed at
the suspicions expressed by a certain Prior for whom he
was painting a fresco 1 . The Prior was in despair at the
enormous amount of pigment that the thirsty wall sucked
in, and he was agreeably surprised when, at the conclusion of
the work, Perugino returned to him a large quantity of
ultramarine, as a lesson that he should not suspect a
gentleman of being a thief.

The library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, possesses
a manuscript which affords a curious proof of the great value
of ultramarine to the mediaeval illuminator. This is a magni-
ficent copy of the Vulgate by a German scribe of the twelfth
century, copiously illustrated with miniature pictures, many
of which had backgrounds, either partially or wholly, covered
with ultramarine. All through the book the ultramarine
has in mediaeval times been very carefully and completely
scraped off, no doubt for use in another manuscript. This
theft has been accomplished with such skill that wonderfully
little injury has been done to the beautiful illuminations,
except, of course, the loss of splendour caused by the abstrac-
tion of the ultramarine.

In illuminated manuscripts ultramarine is very freely
used. It is specially noticeable for the thick body (impasto)
in which it is applied, so as very often to stand out in visible
relief. The reason of this is that this, and some other blue
pigments, lose much of their depth of colour if they are
ground into very fine powder. Hence both the ultramarine

Method of
theft.

Ultra-
marine
scraped off.

Impasto.

1 The Prior in question was the Superior of the Convent of the Frati Gesuati
in Florence.

M. C. M. 1 6

242 SMALTO BLUES. [CHAP. XV.

and smalto blues are always applied in comparatively coarse
grained powder ; and this of course necessitates the applica-
tion of a thick body of colour.

Ancient Smalto blues. Next in importance to the real ultramarine

''*"' come the artificial smalto or " enamel" blues, which were used
largely in Egypt at a very early date under the name of
artificial cyanus; see Pliny, Hist. Nat. XXXVII. 119. Among
the Greeks and Romans too this was a pigment of great
importance, and when skilfully made is but little inferior
in beauty to the natural ultramarine.

Vitreous Smalto blue is simply a powdered blue glass or vitreous

enamel, coloured with an oxide or carbonate of copper.
Vitruvius (vil. xi. i) describes the method of making it by
fusing in a crucible the materials for ordinary bottle-glass,
mixed with a quantity of copper filings. The alcaline silicate
of the glass frit acts upon the copper, which slowly combines
with the glass, giving it a deep blue colour. The addition of
a little oxide of tin turns it into an opaque blue enamel,
which when cold was broken up with a hammer, and then
powdered, but not too finely, in a mortar.

Smalto blue is largely used for the simple blue initials
which alternate with red ones in an immense number of
manuscripts. The glittering particles of the powdered glass
can easily be distinguished by a minute examination. Like
the ultramarine, the smalto blue is always applied in a thick
layer.

The monk Theophilus (ll. 12), who wrote during a period
of some artistic and technical decadence, the eleventh
century, advises the glass-painter who wants a good blue
to search among some ancient Roman ruins for the fine
coloured tesserae of glass mosaics, which were so largely
used by the Romans to decorate their walls and vaults, and
then to pound them for use.

German Azzurro Tedesco or Azzurro della Magna, German blue,

was much used by the illuminators as a cheap substitute for
ultramarine. This appears to have been a native compound
of carbonate of copper of a brilliant blue colour. It was
occasionally used to adulterate the costly ultramarine, but

CHAP. XV.]

DYES USED AS PIGMENTS.

243

this fraud was easily discovered by heating a small quantity
of the pigment on the blade of a knife ; it underwent no
change if it was pure ; but if adulterated with Azztirro delta
Magna it showed signs of blackening 1 .

Indigo blue. The above-mentioned blues are all of a
mineral character, and are durable under almost any circum-
stances. To some extent however the vegetable indigo blue
was also used for manuscript illuminations, both alone and
also to make a compound purple colour.

Colours of all kinds prepared from vegetable or animal
substances required a special treatment to fit them for use as
pigments in solid or tempera painting. Though indigo and
other colours of a similar class are the best and simplest of
dyes for woven stuffs, yet they are too thin in body to use
alone as pigments. Thus both in classical and mediaeval
times these dye-pigments were prepared by making a small
quantity of white earth, powdered chalk or the like absorb a
large quantity of the thin dye, which thus was brought into a
concentrated and solid, opaque form, not a mere stain as it
would otherwise have been.

These kinds of pigments are described by Pliny, Hist.
Nat. XXXV. 44 and 46 ; and by Vitruvius, VII. xiv. Eraclius
in his work on technique, De artibus Romanorum, calls them
colores infectivi, "dyed colours," an accurately expressive
phrase.

One method, occasionally used for the cheaper class of
manuscripts, was to paint on to the vellum with white lead,
and then to colour it by repeated application of a brush
dipped in the thin dye-pigment. 'Many of the colours
mentioned below belong to this class.

Green pigments. A fine soft green much used in early
manuscripts is a natural earthy pigment called terra verde or
green Verona earth. This needs little preparation, except

1 The German blue was also liable to turn to a bright emerald green if exposed
to damp air. This change has taken place in a great part of the painted ceilings
of the Villa Madama, which Raphael designed for Cardinal de' Medici (afterwards
Clement VII.) on the slopes of Monte Mario, a little distance outside the walls
of Rome.

1 6 2

Indigo.

Method of
using dyes.

Terra

verde.

244

GREEN PIGMENTS.

[CHAP. XV.

Verdigris
great.

Chryso-
colla.

Vermilion

and
minium.

washing, and is of the most durable kind ; it is a kind of
ochre, coloured, not with iron, but by the natural presence of
copper.

A much more brilliant green pigment was made of
verdigris (vcrderame) or carbonate of copper, produced very
easily by moistening metallic copper with vinegar or by
exposing it to the fumes of acetic acid in a closed earthen
vessel ; see Theophilus, I. 37.

Verdigris green was much used by manuscript illuminators,
especially during the fifteenth century, when a very unpleasant
harsh and gaudy green appears to have been popular. When
softened by an admixture of white pigment, verdigris gives a
pleasanter and softer colour.

A native carbonate of copper, which was called by the
Romans chrysocolla 1 , was also used for mediaeval manuscripts.
It is, however, harsh in tint if not tempered with white. Both
the last-named pigments were specially used with yoke of egg
as a medium.

Prasinum, a vegetable green made by staining powdered
chalk with the green of the leek, was sometimes used.

Cennino Cennini also recommends a grass green made by
mixing orpiment (sulphuret of arsenic) and indigo.

One of the best and most commonly used greens was
made by a mixture of smalto blue and yellow ochre; other
mixtures were also used.

Red pigments. Red and blue are by far the most im-
portant of the colours used in illuminated manuscripts, and
it is wonderful to see what variety of effect is often produced
by the use of these two colours only.

The chief red pigments used by illuminators are vermilion
(cinnabar or sulphuret of mercury) and red lead (minium),
from which the words miniator and miniature were derived, as
is explained above at page 31*.

Both these pigments are very brilliant and durable reds,

1 Because it was used by goldsmiths in soldering gold.

2 Minium was largely used in the manuscripts of classical times; this is
mentioned by Pliny (Hisl. Nat. xxxin. 122) who says minium in voluminum
quoquc scriptura usurfatur.

CHAP. XV.]

RED PIGMENTS.

245

the more costly vermilion is the more beautiful of the two ;
it has a slightly orange tint.

Illuminators commonly used the two colours mixed. One
receipt recommends one-third of red lead combined with two-
thirds of vermilion; Jehan le Begue's manuscript, 177
(Mrs Merrifield's edition, Vol. I. page 141). Vermilion was
prepared by slowly heating together metallic mercury with
sulphur. Red lead (a protoxide of lead) was made by
roasting white lead or else litharge (ordinary lead oxide) till
it absorbed a larger proportion of oxygen.

Rubrica or Indian red was a less brilliant pigment, which
also was largely used in illuminated manuscripts, especially
for headings, notes and the like, which were hence called
rubrics. Rubrica is a fine variety of red ochre, an earth
naturally coloured by oxide of iron 1 ; another variety was
called bole Armeniac. In classical times the rubrica of Sinope
was specially valued for its fine colour.

In addition to these mineral and very permanent reds
there were some more fugitive vegetable and animal scarlets
and reds which were used in illuminated manuscripts.

Murex. One of these, the murex shell-fish, has already
been mentioned for its use as a dye for the vellum of the
magnificent Byzantine and Carolingian gold-written manu-
scripts. The murex was also used as a color infectious by
concentrating it on powdered chalk 2 .

Kernies. Another very beautiful and important carmine-
red pigment was made from the little kermes* beetle (coccus}
which lives on the ilex oaks of Syria and the Peloponnese.
It is rather like the cochineal beetle of Mexico, but produces a
finer and more durable colour, especially when used as a dye.

1 All natural earthy pigments owe their colours to the various metals, which in
combinations with different substances give a great variety of tints. Thus, iron
gives red, brown, yellow and black ; copper gives many shades of brilliant blues
and greens ; and manganese gives a quiet purple, especially in combination with
an alcaline silicate.

2 Plutarch (De defec. Or. 41) mentions flour made from beans as being used
with murex purple and kermes crimson to give them sufficient body for the painter's
purpose.

3 Kermes is the Arabic name for this insect.

Mixed
reds.

Ochre
reds.

Murex.

Kermes.

246 KERMES AND LAKE. [CHAP. XV.

Kermes For the woven stuffs of classical and mediaeval times, and in
the East even at the present day, the kermes is one of the
most beautiful and important of all the colours used for
dyeing. The mediaeval name for the kermes red was rubeum
de grana ; when required for use as a pigment it appears to
have been usual, not to extract the colour directly from the
beetle, but to get it out of clippings of red cloth which had
been dyed with the kermes, by boiling the cloth in a weak
solution of alkali and precipitating the red pigment from the
water with the help of alum.

The reason for this method is not apparent. Possibly it
was first done as a means of utilizing waste clippings of the
costly red cloth, and then, when the habit was established, no
other method was known to the colour-makers, who in some
cases bought pieces of cloth on purpose to cut them up and
use in this way 1 . The scarletum blanketum mentioned at page
234 was bought for this purpose.

Madder, Madder-red was also used as a pigment by boiling the

root of the madder-plant (rubia-tinctoriinri), and then using
the concentrated extract to dye powdered chalk. Various
red and purple flowers, such as the violet, were used in the
same way as colores infectivi.

Lac. Lake-red (lacca or lac) was made and called after a natural

gum or resin, the lack of India ; see Cennino Cennini, 44.

This is a beautiful transparent colour, which, in some fine
manuscripts of the fifteenth century, is used as a transparent
glaze over burnished gold, the effect of which is very mag-
nificent, as the metallic gleam of the gold shines through the
deep transparent red of the over-painting. Lake was also
used as an opaque, solid pigment by mixing it with white,
which at once gave it "body," and destroyed its transparency.

Purple of a very magnificent tint was occasionally made
by a mixture of ultramarine with the carmine-red of the

1 It should be remembered that a large number of the mediaeval receipts and
processes were not based on any reasonable principle, and endless complications
were often introduced quite needlessly ; this is well shown in a very interesting
paper by Prof. John Ferguson of Glasgow on Some Early Treatises on Techno-
logical Chemistry, read before the Philos. Soc. Glasgow, Jan. 6, 1886.

CHAP. XV.] YELLOWS AND WHITES. 247

kermes beetle ; this was specially used by the illuminators of
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

Yellow ochre, a fine earth pigment coloured by iron, was Yellows.
the principal yellow of the illuminators.

In late manuscripts orpiment (sulphuret of arsenic), which
is a more brilliant lemon-yellow, was occasionally used ; see
Cennino Cennini, 47.

Litharge yellow, an oxide of lead, was another important
colour, but more especially for the painter in oil, who used
it very largely as a drier 1 .

Another fine ochreous earth of a rich brown colour was
the terra di Siena or " raw Siena" ; the colour of this was
made warmer in tint by roasting, thus producing "burnt
Siena."

White pigments were perhaps the most important of all to Use of
the illuminator, who usually only used pure colours for his
deepest shadows ; all lights and half tints, both in miniature
pictures and in decorative foliage, being painted with a large
admixture of white. The use of this system of colouring by
Fra Angelico and many painters of the Sienese school has
been already referred to ; see page 190.

For this reason it was very important to use a pure and
durable white pigment which would combine well with other
colours.

Bianco di San Giovanni was in all respects one of the Lime
best of the whites used by illuminators.

This was simply pure lime-white, made by burning the
finest white marble ; the lime was then washed in abundance
of pure water, then very fine ground and finally dried in
cakes of a convenient size ; see Cennino Cennini, 58 ; and

1 The use of litharge as a drier was one of the most important improvements
made in the technique of oil painting by the Van Eycks of Bruges in the first half
of the fifteenth century. Before then, oil paintings on walls had often been
laboriously dried by holding charcoal braziers close to the surface of the picture.
Among the accounts of the expenses of painting the Royal Palace of Westminster
in the thirteenth century (see above, page no) charcoal for this purpose is an
important item in the cost. Paintings on panel, being moveable, were usually
dried by being placed in the sun ; but, in every way, a good drier like litharge
answers better than heat, either of the fire or of sunshine.

248

WHITE PIGMENTS.

[CHAP. XV.

White

lead.

Process
of manu-
facture.

Carbon
ink.

Theophilus, I. 19. The medium used with it was the purest
size or gum Arabic of the most colourless kind.

Another white pigment was made of powdered chalk and
finely ground egg-shells ; this was a less cold white than the
bianco di San Giovanni.

White lead (cerusa or biacca) was also used 1 , especially by
the later illuminators, but with very unfortunate results, since
white lead is liable to turn to a metallic grey or even black if
exposed to any impure sulphurous atmosphere.

Many beautiful manuscripts have suffered much owing to
the blackening of their high lights which had been touched in
with white lead ; especially manuscripts exposed to the gas-
and smoke-poisoned air of London or other large cities.

The biacca of the mediaeval illuminator was made in
exactly the same way that Vitruvius and Pliny describe ; see
Vitr. vil. xii. ; and Pliny, Hist. Nat. XXXIV. 175.

A roll of lead was placed in a clay dolium or big vase,
which had a little vinegar at the bottom. The top was then
luted down, and the jar was left in a warm place for a week
or so, till the fumes of the acetic acid had converted the
surface of the lead into a crust of carbonate. This carbonate
of lead was then flaked off and purified by repeated grinding
and washing.

In order to keep the white pigments perfectly pure, some
illuminators used to keep them under water, so that no dust
could reach them.

Black inks. Two inks of quite different kinds were used
for the ordinary text of mediaeval manuscripts.

One of these was a pure carbon-black (modern Indian or
Chinese ink); this has been described under the classical
name atramentum librarium*\ see above, page 27. The great
advantage of this carbon ink is that it never fades ; it is not a
dye or stain, but it consists of very minute particles of carbon
which rest on the surface of the vellum.

The other variety was like modern black writing ink, only

1 See Theophilus, i. 39.

2 See Vitruvius, vu. 10; and Pliny, Hist. Nat. xxxv. 41; and Dioscorides,
V. 183.

CHAP. XV.] BLACK INKS. 249

of very superior quality. This acts as a dye, staining the iron ink.
vellum a little below the surface. Unfortunately it is liable to
fade, though when kept from the light (as in most manu-
scripts) it has stood the test of time very well.

Sometimes the mediaeval illuminators distinguished these
two kinds of black ink, calling the first atramentum and the
second encaustum ; but frequently the names are used indif-
ferently for either : see Theophilus, I. 40. The encaustum was
made by boiling oak-bark or gall-nuts, which are rich in
tannin, in acid wine with some iron filings or vitriol (sulphate
of iron). The combination of the iron and the tannin gives
the inky black 1 . Both these black inks were used with gum
Arabic.

A great part of the beauty of mediaeval manuscripts is Beauty of
quite unconnected with their illumination. The plain portion uxT"
of the text, from the exquisite forms of its letters and the
beautiful glossy black of the ink on the creamy ivory-like
vellum page, lighted up here and there by the crisp touch of
the rubricator's red, is a thing of extraordinary beauty and
charm. This perfection of technique in the writing and
beauty of the letters lasted considerably longer than did the
illuminator's art. Hence in some of the manuscripts of the
period of decadence, executed during the fifteenth century,
the plain black and red text is very superior in style to
the painted ornament; and one cannot, in some cases, help
regretting that the manuscript has not escaped the disfigure-
ment of a coarse or gaudy scheme of illumination.

Red inks were of three chief kinds, namely the 'vermilion,
red lead, and rubrica or red ochre, which have been already
mentioned.

Purple ink was used largely, not often for writing, but for Purple

ift/ j

the delicate pen ornaments of the initials in certain classes of
late Italian and German manuscripts. A vegetable pigment
seems to have been used for this ; the lines appear to be
stained, and do not consist of a body-colour resting on the
surface of the vellum.

1 Sometimes accidentally produced in domestic life by some overdrawn tea
remaining on a steel knife.

250 LEAD AND CHALK PENCILS. [CHAP. XV.

Gold writing is usually executed with the fluid gold
pigment, but in later manuscripts very gorgeous titles and
headings are sometimes done with burnished leaf gold applied
on the raised mordant, the writing being first done with a pen
dipped in the fluid mordant.

TJie pencils and pens of the Illuminator. Two quite dif-
ferent classes of pencils were used for lightly sketching in the
outline of the future floral design or miniature.

Lead One of these was the silver-point or lead-point 1 , very much

like the metallic pencil of a modern pocket-book. The use
of the silver-point was known in classical times ; Pliny (Hist.
Nat. XXXIII. 98) remarks as a strange thing that a white
metal like silver should make a black line when used to draw
with. It is, however, rather a faint grey than a black line
that a point of pure silver makes, especially on vellum, and so
it was more usual for illuminators to use a softer pencil of
mixed lead and tin ; Cennino recommends two parts of lead
to one of tin 2 for making the lead point, piombino.

Red. Another kind of pencil was made of a soft red stone, which

owed its colour to oxide of iron. From its fine blood-red tint
the illuminators called it haematite, lapis amatista or amatito,
hence an ordinary lead pencil is now called either lapis or
matita in Italy. This stone is quite different from the hard
haematite which was used in classical times for the early
cylinder-signets of Assyria.

Bur- The harder varieties of the amatista or haematite were

used to burnish the gold leaf in manuscripts, small pieces
being polished and fixed in a convenient handle. They were
also used as a red pigment, the stone being calcined, quenched
in water and finely ground ; see Cennino Cennini, 42.

1 The modern " lead-pencil " is wrongly named, being made of graphite, which
is pure carbon. This does not appear to have been used in mediaeval times.

2 The vellum was not prepared in any way to receive the silver-point drawing ;
but when an artist wanted to make a finished study in silver-point he covered his
vellum or paper with a priming of fine gesso, powdered marble, or wood-ashes ;
this gave a more biting surface to the paper, and made the silver rub off more
easily and mark much more strongly. In the case of manuscript illuminations
a strongly marked line was not needed, as the outline was only intended as a
guide to the painter.

CHAP. XV.] PENS AND BRUSHES. 25 1

Besides the hard red chalky stone (amatita rosso) used for
outlines by the illuminators, a somewhat similar black stone
(amatita nera) was also used, but not so commonly as the
red.

The pens of illuminators. In early times, throughout,
that is, the whole classical period and probably till about the
time of Justinian, the sixth century A.D., scribes' pens were Reed pens.
mostly made of reeds (calamus or cannd) ; and occasionally
silver or bronze pens were used ; see above, page 29.

But certainly as early as the eighth century A.D. and
probably before that, quill-pens came into use and superseded
the blunter and softer reed-pen.

Such exquisitely fine lines as those in many classes of
mediaeval manuscripts could only have been made with some
very fine and delicate instrument like a skilfully cut crow's Fine
quill or other moderately small feather.

The pen was a very important instrument for the illumi-
nator, not only when his pictures were mainly executed in
pen outline, like many of those in the later Anglo-Saxon
manuscripts, but also in such microscopically delicate minia-
ture work as that in the Anglo-Norman historiated Bibles of
the thirteenth century ; in these much of the most important
drawing, such as the features and the hair of the figures, was
executed, not with a brush, but with a quill-pen, which in the
illuminator's skilful hand could produce a quality of line
which for delicacy and crisp precision of touch has never been
surpassed by the artists of any other class or age.

Brushes were, as a rule, made by the illuminators them- Brushes.
selves, so as to suit their special needs and system of working.
Cennino ( 63 to 66) and other writers give directions for the
selection of the best hair and the mode of fixing it so as to
give a finely pointed brush. Ermine, minever and other
animals of that tribe supplied the best hair for the brushes
required for very minute work. But a great number of other
animals provided useful material to the craftsman who knew
the right places to select .the hair from, and, a still more
important thing, understood how to arrange and fix it in a
bundle of the best form.

252

SCRIBES' IMPLEMENTS.

[CHAP. xv.

List of
tools.

Paintings
of scribes.

The implements of scribes and illuminators. The following
is a list of the principal tools and materials required by the
illuminator of manuscripts, including those which have been
already described 1 .

Pens, pencils and chalk of various sorts, as described
above.

Brushes made of minever, badger and other kinds of hair.
Grinding-slabs and rubbers of porphyry or other hard

stone, and a bronze mortar.
Sharp penknife and palette knife.
Rulers, and a metal ruling-pen.
Dividers to prick out the guiding-lines of the text.
Scissors for shaping the gold leaf.

Burnishers, stamps, and stilt for ornamenting the gold.
Small horns to hold black and red ink ; see fig. 53 on

page 209.
Colour-box, palette, pigments, gold leaf and media of

various kinds.
Sponge and pumice-stone for erasures.

Miniatures representing a scribe writing a manuscript are
the commonest of all subjects in several classes of illuminated
manuscripts. For example the first capital of Saint Jerome's
Prologue in the historiated Anglo-Norman Vulgates almost
always has a very minute painting of a monastic scribe 2 ,
seated, writing on a sloping desk, with his pen in one hand
and his penknife in the other 3 .

In one respect such scenes are always treated in a con-
ventional way ; that is, the scribe is represented writing in a

1 See above, pages 29 and 30, on the pens and inkstands of the classical
scribes.

2 Usually meant for Saint Jerome translating or revising the Latin edition of
the Bible.

3 Again, the first miniature in the French and Flemish Horae usually represents
Saint John in Patmos writing his Gospel. The eagle stands by patiently holding
the Evangelist's inkhorn. In some manuscripts the Devil, evidently in much awe
of the eagle's beak, makes a feeble attempt to upset the ink. In the latest
manuscript Horae this scene is replaced by the one of Saint John at the Latin
Gate.

CHAP. XV.]

TECHNICAL METHODS.

253

complete and bound book, whereas both the writing of the
text and the illuminations were done on loose sheets of
vellum, which could be conveniently pinned down flat on the
desk or drawing-board.

The processes employed in the execution of an illuminated
manuscript of the fourteenth or fifteenth century were the
following ;

First, if the text were to be in one column, four lines were
ruled marking the boundaries of the patch of text and the
margin. These four lines usually cross at the angles and are
carried to the extreme edge of the vellum 1 .

Next, the scribe, with a pair of dividers or compasses,
pricked out at even distances the number of lines which were
to be ruled to serve as a guide in writing the text. These
pricked holes were, as a rule, set at the extreme edge of the
vellum, and were intended to be cut off by the binder, but in
many manuscripts they still remain. The scribe then filled
the space within the first four marginal lines with parallel
ruled lines at the intervals indicated by the pricks at the
edge.

In early manuscripts the guiding lines to keep the text
even are usually ruled, not with colour or ink, but simply
traced with a pointed stilus, which made a sufficiently clear
impressed line on the vellum, showing through from one side
to the other.

In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the practice began
of ruling the lines with a lead point ; and then, from the
fourteenth century onwards, they were usually ruled with
bright red pigment 2 ; this has a very decorative effect in
lighting up the mass of black text, and thus we find in many
early printed books 3 these red guiding lines have been ruled
in merely for the sake of their ornamental appearance.

The

scribes'
processes.

Ruled
lines.

Stilus
lines.

Lead
lines.

Red lines.

1 A two-columned page of text had, of course, two sets of framing lines, one for
each patch of writing.

2 In some manuscripts lines are ruled in blue or purple, but much less
frequently than in the more decorative vermilion.

3 In certain classes of books, such as large Bibles and Prayer-books, the custom
of ruling red lines lasted till the present century.

254

THE PROCESSES OF THE

[CHAP. xv.

The plain
text.

Guiding
letters.

Decora-
tion.

This ruling was nearly always done with special metal
ruling-pens, very like those now used for architectural draw-
ing ; and thus the lines are perfectly even in thickness
throughout

The next stage in the work was the writing of the plain
black text. In early times it appears to have been usual, or
at least not uncommon, for the same hand to write the text
and add the painted illuminations, but when the production
of illuminated manuscripts came mostly into secular hands,
the trades of the scribe and the illuminator were usually
practised by different people ; and in late times a further
division still took place, and the miniaturist frequently became
separated from the decorative illuminator.

Thus we find that in many manuscripts the scribe has
introduced in the blank spaces minute guiding letters 1 to tell
the illuminator what each initial was to be, and, especially in
fifteenth century Italian manuscripts, instructions are added for
the miniaturist, telling him what the subject of each picture
was to be. These instructions were commonly written on the
edge of the page so that they were cut off by the binder, but
in many cases they still exist, not obliterated by the sub-
sequent painting.

But to return to the progress of the page, when the scribe
had finished the plain text, leaving the necessary blank spaces
for the illuminated capitals and miniatures, the work of
decoration then began.

As a rule the decorative foliage and the like was finished
before the separate miniatures, if there were any, were begun.
First the illuminator lightly sketched in outline the design of
the ornament, using a lead point. Next, wherever burnished
gold was to be introduced, the thick mordant-ground was laid
on ; the gold leaf was then applied and finished with tooling
and burnishing.

The reason why the gold was applied before any of the
painting was begun was this ; the long rubbing with the

1 These guiding letters were used in all the early printed books which had
initials painted in by an illuminator.

CHAP. XV.] MEDIAEVAL SCRIBE. 255

burnisher acted not only on the gold leaf, but also naturally Gold leaf.
rubbed the vellum a little way all round it. This would have
smudged the painting round the gold if it had been applied
first. Moreover, the burnisher was liable to carry small
particles of gold on to the surrounding vellum, which would
have given a ragged look to the design, if the adjacent
surfaces had not been subsequently covered with pigment.
In cases where there is an isolated gold boss there is usually
a slight disfigurement from the burnisher rubbing the vellum
all round the gold. In these cases the outline of the gold was
made clean and definite by the addition of a strong black
outline, as is mentioned above.

When the whole of the burnished gold was finished, the The
painting was then executed. If any fluid gold pigment were ^ ai
used, that was usually added last of all.

In some cases, in the later and cheaper French and
Flemish manuscripts, the ornaments in the borders were not
specially designed and sketched in for the manuscripts but Trans-
previously used outline patterns were transferred on to the patterns
vellum by a bone stihis and ordinary transfer paper, made by
rubbing red chalk all over its surface.

In some of the better class of manuscripts with the " ivy-
leaf" border, the illuminator has made the general design of
one page serve for the next one in this way ; when he had
drawn in the main lines of the scroll-pattern on the borders
of one page, he held the vellum up to the light and so was
able to trace the pattern through from the other side of the
leaf. To prevent monotony he varied the design by intro-
ducing different little blossoms among the repeated scroll-work
which formed the main pattern.

When the scribe, the rubricator, the illuminator and the Prepara-
miniaturist (either as one or as several different people) had binding.
completed the manuscript it was ready for the binder. As an
indication of the order in which the leaves of the manuscript
were to be bound, the scribe usually placed on the lower
margin of the last page of each "gathering" of leaves a
letter or number.

256

SCRIBES' SIGNATURES.

[CHAP. xv.

Scribes'
signatures.

Owner's
name.

In the earliest printed books these guiding letters, or
signatures as they are called, were added by hand in the same
way 1 ; but in a few years the regular and more developed
system of printed signatures was introduced 2 .

Scribes' signatures at the end of manuscripts are com-
paratively rare, but they do occasionally occur in various
interesting forms. My friend Mr W. J. Loftie kindly sends
me the following :

In a Sarum Missal of the fifteenth century at Alnwick
Castle,

" Librum scribendo Jon Whas 3 monachus laborabat,

Et mane surgendo multum corpus macerabat."
More commonly manuscripts terminate with a vague
phrase invoking a blessing on the scribe, such as this, from a
Bible in the Bodleian (No. 50),
" Qui scripsit hunc librum

Fiat collectum in paradisum."
Or this, which occurs in several manuscripts,
" Qui scripsit scribat,

Semper cum Deo vivat."

In another manuscript Vulgate in the Bodleian (No. 75),
the owner of the book, who was named Gerardus, has re-
corded the fact in this fanciful way,
"Ge ponatur et rar simul associatur
Et dus reddatur cui pertinet ita vocatur."

1 As a rule these manuscript signatures in printed books were written close to
the edge of the page, and so have been cut off by the binder ; in some tall copies,
however, they still exist.

2 The next stage was the numbering of each folio or leaf, and the last system
was to number each page. Folios appear to have been first numbered in books
printed at Cologne about the year 1470. A further modification has recently been
introduced, namely, in two column pages, to number each column separately.

3 The Lectionary mentioned on p. 1 20 was written and signed by a monastic
scribe called Sifer Was.

257

CHAPTER XVI.

THE BINDINGS OF MANUSCRIPTS.

FOR the more magnificent classes of manuscripts, such as
the Textus (Gospels) used as altar ornaments, every costly
and elaborate artistic process was employed. In addition to Costly
the sumptuous gold and jewelled covers mentioned above at tndtn s -
page 55, manuscripts were bound in plates of carved ivory
set in gold frames, in plaques of Limoges enamel, especially
the chamlevt enamels with the heads of the figures attached
in relief, such as were produced with great skill at Limoges
during the eleventh to the thirteenth century. Some Evan-
geliaria were bound in covers made of the ancient Roman or
Byzantine ivory diptychs, a custom to which we owe the
preservation of the most important existing examples of
these 1 . Such costly methods of binding were of course
exceptional, and most manuscripts were covered in a much
simpler manner.

The commonest form of binding was to make the covers Common
of stout oak boards, which were covered with parchment,
calf-skin, pig-skin or some other leather. Five brass or
bronze bosses were fixed on each cover, arranged thus ::, and
two or four stout clasps made of leather straps with brass
catches were firmly nailed on to the oak. The angles of the
covers were often strengthened by brass or latten corner-
pieces, and in some cases metal edgings were nailed all along

1 Some fine examples of magnificently bound manuscripts are illustrated by
Libri, Monumens inedits ; Hist. Ornam. Paris, 1862 1864.

M. C. M. I/

258 VARIOUS METHODS OF [CHAP. XVI.

the edges of the oak, making a very strong, massive and
heavy volume. Large pieces of rock crystal, amethyst or
other common gem were frequently set in the five bosses of
the covers. These were always cut in rounded form en
cabochon, not faceted as is the modern custom.

The small amount of decoration, which was usually
employed on early bindings, was often limited to tooled lines
joining the five bosses on the covers 1 .

If the title of the manuscript was placed on the binding, a
not very common practice, it was usually written on the
upper part of one of the covers. In some cases the title was
written on a separate slip of vellum and was protected by a
transparent slice of horn, fixed with little brass nails.

This appears to have been the usual system as long as
books were kept in coffers or armaria ; but when open
bookshelves with chained books came into use, about the
time when printing was invented, the title of a book was
usually written on the front edges of the leaves.

At that time books were set on the shelves in the opposite
way to that now used, so that, not the back, but the edge of
the volume was visible.

Painted Towards the close of the fifteenth and throughout the

sixteenth century, the front edges of printed books and
manuscripts were sometimes decorated with painted illumi-
nation, usually a portrait figure of the author of the work or
some object illustrating its subject 2 .

The parchment which was used to cover the oak bindings
of manuscripts was often coloured by staining or painting ;
red and purple being the favourite colours. Chaucer, in the

1 In Geyler's Fatuorum Navicula, of which many editions, copiously illustrated
with woodcuts, were published shortly before and after the year 1500, the cut
showing the first fool of the series, the Bibliomaniac, represents him surrounded
with books, all of which are bound after this design.

2 A complete sixteenth century Venetian library, consisting of a hundred and
seventy volumes, all with painted illuminations on their edges, is now in the
library of Mr Thos. Brooke, at Armitage Bridge, near Huddersfield. The whole
collection forms a beautiful array of delicately painted miniatures, mostly the
work of Cesare Vecellio, a Venetian illuminator of the latter part of the sixteenth
century ; see Catalogue of Mr Brooke's library, London, 1891, Vol. II., pp. 663 to
681.

CHAP. XVI.] BINDING MANUSCRIPTS. 259

Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, describing the Clerke of
Oxenford says,

Jpor fjfm foas leber ijabe at fit's bctfoes

booties, dotfjetr in blafe antr rertr
gttfstottl anfc of f)ts pfnlosoplw
robes rtcfje or fitfwl or safotrte.

In some cases the oak covers of manuscripts were not Painted
hidden by leather, but were decorated by elaborate paintings. bindin s s -
A very interesting series of folio account-books of the Cathe-
dral of Siena, now preserved in the Opera del Duomo, are
specially remarkable for their pictured bindings. These
manuscripts date from about 1380 to 1410, one volume being
devoted to the expenses and records of each year. On one
of the covers of each is a large painting on the oak, frequently
of a view of some part of Siena or of the interior of the
Cathedral. Very interesting evidence with regard to the old
fittings of the high altar, with Duccio di Buoninsegna's
great retable, and the original position of the magnificent
pulpit are given by some of these pictured covers. One
volume of this Sienese series is now in the South Kensington
Museum.

In the fourteenth century bindings of books began to be Stamped
decorated by stamping patterns with dies or punches on the eat e '
vellum or pigskin covering of the oak board; a method of
decoration which was greatly elaborated and developed in
the sixteenth century, especially by the German and Dutch
bookbinders.

The earlier stamped designs were of a much simpler
character, usually consisting of powderings all over the surface
of the cover, with small flowers or animals, such as lions,
eagles, swans and dragons of heraldic character. In many
cases these punches, or at least their designs, continued in use
for a long time, and so one occasionally meets with a fifteenth
century book, the binding of which is decorated with stamps
of fourteenth or even thirteenth century style.

The later class of stamped bindings, belonging rather to
printed books than to manuscripts, is often very beautiful and

17 2

260

STAMPED BINDINGS.

[CHAP. XVI.

Stamped
bindings.

English
bindings.

Wallet
bindings.

decorative in character, the whole surface of the cover being
completely embossed in relief by the skilful application of a
great number of punches used in various combinations, so as
to form one large and perfectly united design. In these later
times, from about the middle of the sixteenth century the
tendency was to cut larger designs on one punch or die ; and
the leather or parchment was softened by boiling so that a
large surface could be embossed at one operation. This
process was much aided by the invention of the screw-press,
which enabled the workman to apply a steady and long-
continued pressure. But in the older stamped bindings, as a
rule, small punches were used, and the force was simply
applied by the blow of a hammer 1 .

In England very fine stamped bindings of this class were
made even in the first half of the fifteenth century. And,
just as in earlier times the operations of the binder and the
manuscript illuminator had been carried on by the same man,
or at least in the same workshop, so we find that some of the
earliest English printers, such as Julian Notary, were also
skilful binders of their own printed books. The very fine
stamped bindings of Julian Notary and other English crafts-
men are commonly decorated on one side with the Tudor
arms and badges supported by angels, and on the other side
with a pictorial scene of the Annunciation of the B. V. Mary
with I. N. or other maker's initials.

Returning now to the earlier bindings of manuscripts, we
should mention one system which was frequently applied to
Books of Hours, Breviaries (j>ortiforia\ and other portable
books. This system was to extend the leather covering far
beyond the edges of the wooden boards, which formed the
main covers of the manuscripts, so that the book, edges and
all were protected, very much as if it were kept in a bag. In
fact this sort of binding really was a leather bag to the inside
of which the book was attached.

The mouth of the bag was closed by a running thong,

1 An analogous change took place in the reign of Elizabeth in England when
coins, which up to that time had always been made by hammering, were first
struck by the " mill and screw."

CHAP. XVI.] COLOURED BINDINGS. 26 1

a loop or some other fastening, and the book was thus carried
about, hung from its owner's girdle 1 .

In bindings of this class the leather covering was fre-
quently dressed with the hair on. Corpus Christi College
at Oxford possesses a very well-preserved example of this, a
manuscript of the thirteenth century in a contemporary
bag-covering made of deer's skin, with its soft brown fur in
a perfect state of preservation.

Bindings of red or violet velvet were also frequently used Velvet.
for manuscripts. Plain red velvet, with elaborate clasps and
corner-pieces of chased gold or silver, was perhaps the most
usual form of binding for costly manuscripts of the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries. Fine gems, especially the carbuncle
and turquoise, were set in the gold mounts of some of these
princely books.

Vellum dyed with the murex was used to cover the oak Dyed
boards of manuscripts at a time when purple-stained vellum
was no longer used for the pages of manuscripts. A fine
green dye and other colours were also used for vellum
bindings. The Vatican records of books borrowed (and
returned) usually mention how each volume was bound.
Among the earliest of these records, dating from the Pontifi-
cate of Leo X. (1513 to 1522) the commonest descriptions
of bindings are in tabiilis, in rubio, in albo, in nigro, and in
gilbo, indicating the colour of the skin or velvet in which the
manuscript was bound.

In the sixteenth century, when private luxury and pomp Later
were taking the place of the earlier religious feelings and "" inss '
beliefs which had so greatly fostered the decorative arts,
bindings as costly as those of the Altar-textus of the great
Cathedral and Abbey churches were again made at the
command of wealthy patrons. Thus, for example, Cardinal
Grimani had his famous Breviary* bound in crimson velvet,
the greater part of which is concealed by the most elaborate

1 In the miniature pictures in manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries one often sees ladies represented with their Horae suspended in this way
from their girdle.

2 See page 167.

262

LATER BINDINGS.

[CHAP. XVI.

Gold
mounts.

Bindings
of needle-

. work.

Works on
bindings.

mounts, clasps, corner-pieces and borders of solid gold, of the
most exquisite workmanship, decorated with a medallion
portrait head of the Cardinal himself.

So also the very similar Horae of Albert of Brandenburg 1
is decorated with clasps and other mounts of pure gold ; and
an immense number of other sumptuous bindings, rich with
embossed and chased gold, studded with precious gems, were
made to enshrine the costly manuscripts of Giulio Clovio and
other famous miniaturists of the sixteenth century period
of decadence.

At the close of the fifteenth century or rather earlier,
the custom became popular of having Horae and other
manuscripts owned by wealthy secular personages bound in
velvet, richly decorated with embroidery in gold and silver
thread and silk mixed with a great number of seed pearls.
The arms, badges and initials of the owner are the commonest
designs for these embroideries.

Some of the German examples of this class of binding are
especially elaborate and magnificent ; but on the whole this
method of decoration is not at all suited for covering books.

With regard to books on the subject of early bindings ; it
is much to be regretted that existing works, of which there
are a great many, especially in French, all begin just about
the period when bindings of the greatest interest and the
truest artistic value were no longer made. Plenty has been
written about the costly bindings in which Grolier, Maioli, and
other wealthy book-buyers had their purchases encased, but
no work exists on the bindings of the mediaeval period,
when, frequently, the covers of a manuscript were as much a
labour of love as the illuminated pages within. The sixteenth
century binders, who worked for Grolier and other rich
patrons of art, lived at the verge of a commercial epoch, and
though their works are often very pretty and technically of
high merit, yet they cannot be compared, as true works
of art, with the bindings of the period before printing was
invented.

1 See page 167.

CHAP. XVI.] VALUE OF MANUSCRIPTS.

263

The present value of illuminated manuscripts. On the
whole a fine manuscript may be regarded as about the
cheapest work of art of bygone days that can now be
purchased by an appreciative collector. Many of the finest
and most perfectly preserved manuscripts which now come
into the market are actually sold for smaller sums than they
would have cost when they were new, in spite of the great
additional value and interest which they have gained from
their antiquity and comparative rarity.

For example, a beautiful and perfectly preserved histori-
ated Anglo-Norman Vulgate of the thirteenth century, with
its full number of eighty-two pictured initials, written on
between six and seven hundred leaves of the finest uterine
vellum, can now commonly be purchased for from .30 to
40. This hardly represents the original value of the vellum
on which the manuscript is written.

Manuscripts of a simpler character, however beautifully
written, if they are merely decorated with blue and red
initials, commonly sell for considerably less than the original
cost of their vellum 1 .

Again, the more costly manuscripts of fine style, which
now fetch several hundred pounds, usually contain a wealth of
pictorial decoration and laborious execution far in excess of
that which could be purchased for a similar sum in any other
branch of art.

Another noticeable point is that the modern pecuniary
values of manuscripts, even those which are bought only as
works of art, are by no means in proportion to their real
artistic merits. Manuscripts of the finest period of the
illuminator's art, the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, are
now sold for very much smaller sums than the immeasurably
inferior but more showy and over-elaborated manuscripts
of the period of decadence in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries.

1 The same want of appreciation extends to bindings. As a rule a book in a
fine mediaeval binding sells for no more than if it were in a modern binding by
Bedford. It is only the sixteenth century bindings of so-called " Grolier style "
and the like which add largely to the value of a book.

Small cost
o/MSS.

Want of

taste.

264 MODERN PRICES. [CHAP. XVI.

Modern A melancholy example of the existing want of taste and

l ac k of appreciation of what is beautiful in art is afforded by
the fact that such a thing as a manuscript signed and illumi-
nated by Giulio Clovio would fetch a far larger sum than so
perfect a masterpiece of poetic art as a fine example of a
fourteenth century Anglo-Norman Apocalypse.

So also the late and inferior Horae of about 1480 to 1510
often sell for much higher prices than simpler but far more
beautiful manuscripts of earlier date. Of course I am here
speaking of the values of manuscripts regarded simply as
works of art, not of those which are mainly of importance
from the interest of their text.

The result of this is that a collector with some real know-
ledge and appreciation of what is artistically fine can perhaps
lay out his money to greater advantage in the purchase of
manuscripts than by buying works of art of any other class,
either mediaeval or modern.

26 5

APPENDIX.

MR JENKINSON, the Librarian of the University of Cambridge,
has kindly supplied me with the following interesting extracts, from
a manuscript of the thirteenth century in the Parish Library of
St James' at Bury St Edmunds (M 27 + B 357) ', which gives in-
structions to scribes and illuminators of manuscripts as to the
various tools they are to use.

"Scriptor habeat rasorium siue nouaculam ad radendum
sordes pergameni vel membrane. Habeat etiam pumicem
mordacem et planulam ad pactandum (?) et equandum super-
ficiem pergameni. Plumbum habeat et linulam quibus liniet
pergamenum, margine circumquaque tarn ex parte tergi quam
ex parte carnis existente libera

Scriptor autem in cathedra resideat ansis utrimque eleuatis
pluteum siue ait'em (?) sustinentibus, scabello apte pedibus
posito.

.i.asserem

Scriptor habeat epicaustorium centone copertum. Arcanum
habeat quo pennam formet ut habilis sit et ydonea ad scriben-

dum Habeat dentem canis (?) sive apri ad polliandum

pergamenum Et spectaculum habeat ne ob errorem

moram disspendiosam (?). Habeat prunas in epicausterio ut

cicius in tempore nebuloso vel aquoso desicari possit Et

habeat etiam mineum ad formandas literas puniceas, vel rubeas,
vel feniceas et capitales. Habeat etiam fuscum pulverem ; et
azuram a Salamone repertam 2 ."

1 This library is now deposited in the Guildhall ; the press-mark is probably
that of an old monastic library.

2 Probably a blundered version of Pliny's statement (Hist. Nat. xxxvn. 119)
that azure blue (cyamis) was invented by a king of Egypt.

266 DIRECTIONS TO SCRIBES. [APP.

Translation.

"The scribe should have a sharp scraper or knife to rub
down the roughnesses of his parchment or vellum. He should
also have a piece of 'biting' pumice-stone and a flat tool to
smooth down and make even the surface of his parchment.

He should have a lead pencil and a ruler with which to rule
lines on the parchment, leaving a margin free (from lines) on
both sides of the parchment, on the back of the leaf as well as
on the flesh side

The scribe should sit in an arm chair, with arms raised on
each side to support a desk or ?; a footstool should be con-
veniently placed under his feet. The scribe should have an
epicaustorium ' covered with leather ; he should have an arcanum
(pen-knife ?) with which to shape his pen, so that it may be well
formed and suitable for writing

He should have the tooth of a dog (?) or of a wild boar for

the polishing of his parchment And he should have

spectacles lest troublesome delay be caused through blunders.
He should have hot coals in a brazier so that [his ink] may dry

quickly [even] in cloudy or rainy weather He should

also have mineum (ininiuni) for the painting of red, crimson or
purple letters and initials. He should also have a dark powder
(pigment), and the azure which was invented by Solomon."

The following excellent description of the chief kinds of Service-
books which were used during the later mediaeval period was
originally written in 1881 by Henry Bradshaw, the Cambridge
University Librarian, for The Chronicles of All Saints' Church, Derby,
by the Rev. J. C. Cox and Mr W. H. St John Hope. It is by the
kind permission of Mr Cox and Mr Hope that I am able to reprint
Mr Bradshaw's valuable note, which, with admirable clearness and
conciseness, explains the character of each of the principal classes of
Service-books used in English Churches and the manner in which
these books became differentiated and multiplied down to the time
of the Reformation.

1 This is evidently a different thing from the epicausterium or brazier for hot
coals mentioned below. My friend Mr J. T. Micklethwaite suggests that it was
a board covered with leather on which to stretch and dry vellum before writing
on it.

APP.]

SERVICE BOOKS.

267

Proces-
sions.

NOTE BY HENRY BRADSHAW.

In the old Church of England, the Services were either

1. For the different hours (Mattins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, The Hours.
None, Vespers, and Compline), said in the Choir,

2. For Processions, in the Church or Churchyard,

3. For the Mass, said at the Altar, or

4. For occasions, such as Marriage, Visitation of the Sick,
Burial, &c., said as occasion required.

Of these four all have their counterparts, more or less, in the
English Service of modern times, as follows:

1. The Hour-Services, of which the principal were Mattins and
Vespers, correspond to our Morning and Evening Prayer.

2. The Procession Services correspond to our Hymns or Anthems
sung before the Litany which precedes the Communion Service in the
morning, and after the third Collect in the evening, only no longer
sung in the course of procession to the Churchyard Cross or a sub-
ordinate Altar in the Church ; the only relic (in common use) of the
actual Procession being that used on such occasions as the Con-
secration of a Church, &c.

3. The Mass answers to our Communion Service.

4. The Occasional Services are either those used by a Priest,
such as Baptism, Marriage, Visitation and Communion of the Sick,
Burial of the Dead, &c., or those reserved for a Bishop, as Confirma-
tion, Ordination, Consecration of Churches, &c.

All these Services but the last mentioned are contained in our
"Prayer-book" with all their details, except the lessons at Mattins
and Evensong, which are read from the Bible, and the Hymns and
Anthems, which are, since the sixteenth century, at the discretion of
the authorities. This concentration or compression of the Services
into one book is the natural result of time, and the further we go back
the more numerous are the books which our old inventories show.
To take the four classes of Services and Service-books mentioned
above :

i. The Hour-Services were latterly contained, so far as the text
was concerned, in the Breviarium, or Portiforium, as it was called by
preference in England 1 . The musical portions of this book were

1 An explanation of the nature and constitution of the Breviary will be found
in the preface to the Psalter-volume of the Cambridge University Press edition of
the Sarum Breviary, lately published.

Occasional
Services.

The

Breviary.

268

VARIOUS KINDS OF

[APP.

The
Breviary.

Procession
Services.

contained in the Antiphonarium. But the Breviary itself was the
result of a gradual amalgamation of many different books:

(a) The Antiphonarium, properly so called, containing the
Anthems (Antiphonae) to the Psalms, the Responds (Responsoria)
to the Lessons (Lectiones), and the other odds and ends of Verses
and Responds ( Versiculi et Responsoria) throughout the Service;

(b) The Psalterium, containing the Psalms arranged as used
at the different Hours, together with the Litany as used on
occasions ;

(<r) The ffymnarium, or collection of Hymns used in the
different Hour-Services;

(d} The legenda, containing the long Lessons used at Mattins,
as well from the Bible, from the Sermologus, and from the Homi-
liarius, used respectively at the first, second, and third Nocturns
at Mattins on Sundays and some other days, as also from the
Passionalc, containing the acts of Saints read on their festivals;
and

(e) The Collectarium, containing the Capitula, or short Lessons
used at all the Hour-services except Mattins, and the Collects or
Orationes used at the same.

2. The Procession Services were contained in the Processionale
or Processionarium. It will be remembered that the Rubric in our
"Prayer-Book" concerning the Anthem ("In Quires and places where
they sing, here followeth the Anthem") is indicative rather than im-
perative, and that it was first added in 1662. It states a fact; and,
no doubt, when processions were abolished, with the altars to which
they were made, Cathedral Choirs would have found themselves in
considerable danger of being swept away also, had they not made a
stand, and been content to sing the Processional Anthem without
moving from their position in the Choir. This alone sufficed to
carry on the tradition; and looked upon in this way the modern
Anthem Book of our Cathedral and Collegiate Churches, and the
Hymn Book of our parish Churches, are the only legitimate suc-
cessors of the old Processionale. It must be borne in mind, also,
that the Morning and Evening Anthems in our "Prayer-Book"
do not correspond to one another so closely as might at first sight
appear to be the case. The Morning Anthem comes immediately
before the Litany which precedes the Communion Service, and
corresponds to the Processional Anthem or Respond sung at the

APP.] SERVICE BOOKS. 269

churchyard procession before Mass. The Evening Anthem, on
the other hand, follows the third Collect, and corresponds to the
Processional Anthem or Respond sung "eundo et redeundo" in
going to, and returning from, some subordinate altar in the church
at the close of Vespers.

3. The Mass, which we call the Communion Service, was con- The Mass.
tained in the Mtssale, so far as the text was concerned. The
Epistles and Gospels, being read at separate lecterns, would

often be written in separate books, called Epistolaria and Evan-
geliaria. The musical portions of the Altar Service were latterly all
contained in the Graduate or Grayle, so called from one of the
principal elements being the Responsorium Graduale or Respond
to the Lectio Epistolae. In earlier times, these musical portions of
the Missal Service were commonly contained in two separate books,
the Graduale and the Troparium. The Graduate, being in fact the
Antiphonarium of the Altar Service (as indeed it was called in the
earliest times), contained all the passages of Scripture, varying
according to the season and day, which served as Introits (Anti-
phonae et Psalmi ad Introitum} before the Collects, as Gradual
Responds or Graduals to the Epistle, as Alleluia versicles before
the Gospel, as Offertoria at the time of the first oblation, and as
Communiones at the time of the reception of the consecrated
elements. The Troparium contained the Tropi, or preliminary
tags to the Introits; the Kyries; the Gloria in excelsis; the
Sequences or Prosae ad Sequentiam before the Gospel; the Credo in
unum; the Sanctus and Benedictus; and the Agnus Dei; all, in
early times, liable to have insertions or farsura of their own,
according to the season or day, which, however, were almost
wholly swept away (except those of the Kyrie) by the beginning of
the thirteenth century. Even in Lyndewode's time (A.D. 1433),
the Troparium was explained to be a book containing merely the
Sequences before the Gospel at Mass, so completely had the other
elements then disappeared or become incorporated in the Graduale.
This definition of the Troparium is the more necessary, because so
many old church inventories yet remain, which contain books, even
at the time of writing the inventory long since disused, so that the
lists would be unintelligible without some such explanation.

4. The Occasional Services, so far as they concerned a priest, Occasional
were of course more numerous in old days than now, and included Services.
the ceremonies for Candkmas, Ash Wednesday. Palm Sunday, &c.,

2/0 SERVICE BOOKS. [APP.

besides what were formerly known as the Sacramental Services. The
book which contained these was in England called the Manuale,
while on the Continent the name Rituale is more common. No
church could well be without one of these. The purely episcopal
offices were contained in the Liber pontificalis or Pontifical, for which
an ordinary church would have no need.

The 5. Besides these books of actual Services there was another,

r ma e. aDSO lutely necessary for the right understanding and definite use
of those already mentioned. This was the Ordinale, or book con-
taining the general rules relating to the Ordo divini servitii. It is the
Ordinarius or Breviarius of many Continental churches. Its method
was to go through the year and show what was to be done; what
days were to take precedence of others ; and how, under such
circumstances, the details of the conflicting Services were to be
dealt with. The basis of such a book would be either the well-
known Sarum Consuetudinarium, called after St. Osmund, but really
drawn up in the first quarter of the thirteenth century, the Lincoln
Consueiudinarium belonging to the middle of the same century, or
other such book. By the end of the fifteenth century Clement
Maydeston's Directorium Sacerdotum, or Priests' Guide, had super-
seded all such books, and came itself to be called the Sarum
Ordinale, until, about 1508, the shorter Ordinal, under the name
of Pica Sarum, "the rules called the Pie," having been cut up and
re-distributed according to the seasons, came to be incorporated in
the text of all the editions of the Sarum Breviary.

H. B.

CAMBRIDGE,

March 17, 1881.

Mr Micklethwaite has kindly pointed out to me the following
passage from the Cistercian Consuetudines (Guignard, Documents
inedits, Dijon, 1878, p. 174), cap. LXXII, " Nullus ingrediatur co-
quinam excepto cantore et scriptoribus ad planandam tabulam, ad
liquefaciendum incaustum, ad exsiccandum pergamenum...." That
is, the kitchen fire might be used for melting the wax on the tablets,
so that a fresh list of names could be written (see above, p. 8), for
liquefying frozen ink, and for drying the vellum skins ready for
writing on.

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