The Project Gutenberg EBook of Illuminated Manuscripts, by John W. Bradley

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Title: Illuminated Manuscripts

Author: John W. Bradley

Release Date: November 19, 2006 [EBook #19870]

Language: English

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                             Illuminated
                             Manuscripts

                            John Bradley


                            BRACKEN BOOKS
                               LONDON




CONTENTS

BOOK I

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

What is meant by art?--The art faculty--How artists may be compared--The
aim of illumination--Distinction between illumination and
miniature--Definition of illumination--The first miniature
painter--Origin of the term "miniature"--Ovid's allusion to his little
book.

CHAPTER II

VELLUM AND OTHER MATERIALS

Difference between vellum and parchment--Names of different
preparations--The kinds of vellum most prized for illuminated books--The
"parcheminerie" of the Abbey of Cluny--Origin of the term
"parchment"--Papyrus.

CHAPTER III

WRITING

Its different styles--Origin of Western alphabets--Various forms of
letters--Capitals, uncials, etc.--Texts used in Western Europe--Forms of
ancient writings--The roll, or volume--The codex--Tablets--Diptychs,
etc.--The square book--How different sizes of books were produced.

CHAPTER IV

GREEK AND ROMAN ILLUMINATION

The first miniature painter--The Vatican Vergils--Methods of
painting--Origin of Christian art--The Vienna Genesis--The
Dioscorides--The Byzantine Revival.

CHAPTER V

BYZANTINE ILLUMINATION

The rebuilding of the city of Byzantium the beginning of Byzantine
art--Justinian's fondness for building and splendour--Description of
Paul the Silentiary--Sumptuous garments--The Gospel-book of
Hormisdas--Characteristics of Byzantine work--Comparative scarcity of
examples--Rigidity of Byzantine rules of art--Periods of Byzantine
art--Examples--Monotony and lifelessness of the style.

CHAPTER VI

CELTIC ILLUMINATION

Early liturgical books reflect the ecclesiastical art of their
time--This feature a continuous characteristic of illumination down to
the latest times--Elements of Celtic ornament--Gospels of St.
Chad--Durham Gospels--Contrast of Celtic and Byzantine--St.
Columba--Book of Kells--Details of its decoration.

CHAPTER VII

CELTIC ILLUMINATION--_continued_

The Iona Gospels--Contrast with Roman and Byzantine--Details--Treatment
of animal forms--Colour schemes--The Gospel-book of St. Columbanus--That
of Mael Brith Mac Durnan--The Lindisfarne Gospels--Cumdachs--Other
book-shrines.

CHAPTER VIII

SEMI-BARBARIC ILLUMINATION

Visigothic--Merovingian--Lombardic--Extinction of classic art--Splendid
reign of Dagobert--St. Eloy of Noyon--The Library of Laon--Natural
History of Isidore of Seville--Elements of contemporary art--Details of
ornament--Symbolism--Luxeuil and Monte Cassino--Sacramentary of
Gellone--"Prudentius"--"Orosius"--Value of the Sacramentary of Gellone.

CHAPTER IX

DEVELOPMENT OF THE INITIAL

The initial and initial paragraph the main object of decoration in
Celtic illumination--Study of the letter L as an example--The I of "In
principio" and the B of "Beatus Vir".

CHAPTER X

FIRST ENGLISH STYLES

Transition from Iona to Lindisfarne--Influence of Frankish art--The
"Opus Anglicum"--The Winchester school and its characteristics--Whence
obtained--Method of painting--Examples--Where found and described.

CHAPTER XI

CAROLINGIAN ILLUMINATION

Why so-called--Works to be consulted--The Library of St. Gall--Rise and
progress of Carolingian art--Account of various MSS.--Feature of the
style--Gospels of St. Sernin--The Ada-Codex--Centres of
production--Other splendid examples--The Alcuin Bible--The Gospel of St.
Médard of Soissons.

CHAPTER XII

MONASTIC ILLUMINATION

Introductory--Monasteries and their work from the sixth to the ninth
century--The claustral schools--Alcuin--Warnefrid and Theodulf--Clerics
and monastics--The Golden Age of monasticism--The Order of St.
Benedict--Cistercian houses--Other Orders--Progress of writing in
Carolingian times--Division of labour.

CHAPTER XIII

MONASTIC ILLUMINATION--_continued_

The copyist--Gratuitous labour--Last words of copyists--Disputes between
Cluny and Citeaux--The Abbey of Cluny: its grandeur and influences--Use
of gold and purple vellum--The more influential abbeys and their work in
France, Germany, and the Netherlands.

CHAPTER XIV

OTHONIAN ILLUMINATION

Departure from Carolingian--Bird and serpent--Common use of dracontine
forms in letter-ornament--Influence of metal-work on the forms of
scroll-ornament--The vine-stem and its developments--Introduction of
Greek taste and fashion into Germany--Cistercian illumination--The
Othonian period--Influence of women as patronesses and
practitioners--German princesses--The Empress Adelheid of Burgundy--The
Empress Theophano--Henry II. and the Empress
Cunegunda--Bamberg--Examples of Othonian art.

CHAPTER XV

FRANCONIAN ILLUMINATION

The later Saxon schools--Bernward of Hildesheim--Tuotilo and Hartmut of
St. Gallen--Portrait of Henry II. in MS. 40 at Munich--Netherlandish and
other work compared--Alleged deterioration of work under the Franconian
Emperors not true--Bad character of the eleventh century as to
art--Example to the contrary.

CHAPTER XVI

ARTISTIC EDUCATION IN THE CLOISTER

The "Manual"--Its discovery--Its origin and contents--Didron's
translation--The "Compendium" of Theophilus--Its contents--English
version by Hendrie--Benedictine and Cistercian illumination--How they
differ--Character of monastic architects and artists.

CHAPTER XVII

THE RISE OF GOTHIC ILLUMINATION

Germany the chief power in Europe in the twelfth century--Rise of
Italian influence--The Emmeram MSS.--Coronation of Henry II.--The
Apocalypse--The "Hortus Deliciarum"--Romanesque--MS. of Henry the
Lion--The Niedermünster Gospels--Description of the MS.--Rise of
Gothic--Uncertainty of its origin--The spirit of the age.


BOOK II

CHAPTER I

THE GOLDEN AGE OF ILLUMINATION

The Gothic spirit--A "zeitgeist" not the invention of a single artist
nor of a single country--The thirteenth century the beginning of the new
style--Contrast between North and South, between East and West, marked
in the character of artistic leaf-work--Gradual development of Gothic
foliage--The bud of the thirteenth century, the leaf of the fourteenth,
and the flower of the fifteenth--The Freemasons--Illumination
transferred from the monastery to the lay workshop--The Psalter of St.
Louis--Characteristics of French Gothic illumination--Rise of the
miniature as a distinct feature--Guilds--Lay artists.

CHAPTER II

RISE OF NATIONAL STYLES

The fourteenth century the true Golden Age of Gothic
illumination--France the cradle of other national styles--Netherlandish,
Italian, German, etc.--Distinction of schools--Difficulty of assigning
the _provenance_ of MSS.--The reason for it--MS. in Fitzwilliam Museum,
Cambridge--The Padua Missal--Artists' names--Whence obtained.

CHAPTER III

FRENCH ILLUMINATION FROM THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY TO THE RENAISSANCE

Ivy-leaf and chequered backgrounds--Occasional introduction of plain
burnished gold--Reign of Charles VI. of France--The Dukes of Orleans,
Berry, and Burgundy; their prodigality and fine taste for
MSS.--Christine de Pisan and her works--Description of her "Mutation of
Fortune" in the Paris Library--The "Roman de la Rose" and "Cité des
Dames"--Details of the French style of illumination--Burgundian MSS.,
Harl. 4431--Roy. 15 E. 6--The Talbot Romances--Gradual approach to
Flemish on the one hand and Italian on the other.

CHAPTER IV

ENGLISH ILLUMINATION FROM THE TENTH TO THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY

Organisation of the monastic _scriptoria_--Professional outsiders: lay
artists--The whole sometimes the work of the same practitioner--The
Winchester Abbeys of St. Swithun's and Hyde--Their vicissitudes--St.
Alban's--Westminster--Royal MS. 2 A 22--Description of style--The
Tenison Psalter--Features of this period--The Arundel Psalter--Hunting
and shooting scenes, and games--Characteristic pictures, grotesques, and
caricatures--Queen Mary's Psalter--Rapid changes under Richard
II.--Royal MS. 2 E. 9--Their cause.

CHAPTER V

THE SOURCES OF ENGLISH FIFTEENTH-CENTURY ILLUMINATION

Attributed to the Netherlands--Not altogether French--The home of Anne
of Bohemia, Richard II.'s Queen--Court of Charles IV. at Prag--Bohemian
Art--John of Luxembourg, King of Bohemia--The Golden Bull of Charles
IV.--Marriage of Richard II.--The transformation of English work owing
to this marriage and the arrival of Bohemian artists in
England--Influence of Queen Anne on English Art and
Literature--Depression caused by her death--Examination of Roy. MS. 1 E.
9 and 2 A. 18--The Grandison Hours--Other MSS.--Introduction of Flemish
work by Edward IV.

CHAPTER VI

ITALIAN ILLUMINATION

Barbaric character of Italian illumination in the twelfth
century--Ravenna and Pavia the earliest centres of revival--The
"Exultet"--La Cava and Monte Cassino--The writers of early Italian MSS.
not Italians--In the early fourteenth century the art is
French--Peculiarities of Italian foliages--The Law Books--Poems of
Convenevole da Prato, the tutor of Petrarch--Celebrated patrons--The
Laon Boethius--The Decretals, Institutes, etc.--"Decretum Gratiani,"
other collections and MSS.--Statuts du Saint Esprit--Method of
painting--Don Silvestro--The Rationale of Durandus--Nicolas of Bologna,
etc.--Triumphs of Petrarch--Books at San Marco, Florence--The Brera
Graduals at Milan--Other Italian collections--Examples of different
localities in the British Museum--Places where the best work was
done--Fine Neapolitan MS. in the British Museum--The white-vine style
superseded by the classical renaissance.

CHAPTER VII

GERMAN ILLUMINATION FROM THE THIRTEENTH TO THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

Frederick II., _Stupor Mundi_, and his MS. on hunting--The Sicilian
school mainly Saracenic, but a mixture of Greek, Arabic, and Latin
tastes--The Franconian Emperors at Bamberg--Charles of Anjou--The House
of Luxembourg at Prag--MSS. in the University Library--The Collegium
Carolinum of the Emperor Charles IV.--MSS. at Vienna--The Wenzel
Bible--The Weltchronik of Rudolf v. Ems at Stuttgard--Wilhelm v. Oranse
at Vienna--The Golden Bull--Various schools--Hildesheimer Prayer-book at
Berlin--The Nuremberg school--The Glockendons--The Brethren of the Pen.

CHAPTER VIII

NETHERLANDISH ILLUMINATION

What is meant by the Netherlands--Early realism and study of
nature--Combination of symbolism with imitation--Anachronism in
design--The value of the pictorial methods of the old illuminators--The
oldest Netherlandish MS.--Harlinda and Renilda--The nunnery at
Maas-Eyck--Description of the MS.--Thomas à Kempis--The school of
Zwolle--Character of the work--The use of green landscape
backgrounds--The Dukes of Burgundy--Netherlandish artists--No miniatures
of the Van Eycks or Memling known to exist--Schools of Bruges, Ghent,
Liége, etc.--Brussels Library--Splendid Netherlandish MSS. at
Vienna--Gerard David and the Grimani Breviary--British Museum--"Romance
of the Rose"--"Isabella" Breviary--Grisailles.

CHAPTER IX

THE FRENCH RENAISSANCE

Communication with Italy--Renaissance not sudden--Origin of the schools
of France and Burgundy--Touraine and its art--Fouquet--Brentano
MSS.--"Versailles Livy"--Munich "Boccaccio," etc.--Perréal and
Bourdichon--"Hours of Anne of Brittany"--Poyet--The school of
Fontainebleau--Stained glass--Jean Cousin--Gouffier "Heures"--British
Museum Offices of Francis I.--Dinteville Offices--Paris "Heures de
Montmorency", "Heures de Dinteville," etc.

CHAPTER X

SPANISH AND PORTUGUESE ILLUMINATION

Late period of Spanish illumination--Isidore of Seville--Archives at
Madrid--Barcelona--Toledo--Madrid--Choir-books of the Escorial--Philip
II.--Illuminators of the choir-books--The size and beauty of the
volumes--Fray Andrés de Leon and other artists--Italian
influence--Giovanni Battista Scorza of Genoa--Antonio de Holanda,
well-known Portuguese miniaturist in sixteenth century--His son
Francesco--The choir-books at Belem--French invasion--Missal of
Gonçalvez--Sandoval Genealogies--Portuguese Genealogies in British
Museum--The Stowe Missal of John III.

CHAPTER XI

ILLUMINATION SINCE THE INVENTION OF PRINTING

The invention of printing--Its very slight affect on
illuminating--Preference by rich patrons for written books--Work
produced in various cities in the sixteenth century--Examples in German,
Italian, and other cities, and in various public libraries up to the
present time.

MANUSCRIPTS THAT MAY BE CONSULTED

BIBLIOGRAPHY




                     ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS

                             BOOK I




CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

What is meant by art?--The art faculty--How artists may be compared--The
aim of illumination--Distinction between illumination and
miniature--Definition of illumination--The first miniature
painter--Origin of the term "miniature"--Ovid's allusion to his little
book.


The desire for decoration is probably as old as the human race. Nature,
of course, is the source of beauty, and this natural beauty affects
something within us which has or is the faculty of reproducing the cause
of its emotion in a material form. Whether the reproduction be such as
to appeal to the eye or the ear depends on the cast of the faculty. In a
mild or elementary form, probably both casts of faculty exist in every
animated creature, and especially in the human being.

Art being the intelligent representation of that quality of beauty which
appeals to any particular observer, whoever exercises the faculty of
such representation is an artist.

Greatness or otherwise is simply the measure of the faculty, for in
Nature herself there is no restriction. There is always enough of beauty
in Nature to fill the mightiest capacity of human genius. Artists,
therefore, are measured by comparison with each other in reference to
the fraction of art which they attempt to reproduce.

The art of illumination does not aim at more than the gratification of
those who take pleasure in books. Its highest ambition is to make books
beautiful.

To some persons, perhaps, all ordinary books are ugly and distasteful.
Probably they are so to the average schoolboy. Hence the laudable
endeavour among publishers of school-books to make them attractive. The
desire that books should be made attractive is of great antiquity. How
far back in the world's history we should have to go to get in front of
it we cannot venture to reckon. The methods of making books attractive
are numerous and varied. That to which we shall confine our attention is
a rather special one. Both its processes and its results are peculiar.
Mere pictures or pretty ornamental letters in sweet colours and elegant
drawing do not constitute illumination, though they do form essential
contributions towards it; and, indeed, in the sixteenth century the
clever practitioners who wished, in bright colours, to awaken up the old
woodcuts used to call themselves illuminists, and the old German books
which taught how the work should be done were called _Illuminir bücher_.
Illuminists were not illuminators.

In the twelfth century when, as far as we know, the word illuminator was
first applied to one who practised the art of book decoration, it meant
one who "lighted up" the page of the book with bright colours and
burnished gold.

These processes suggest the definition of the art. _Perfect illumination
must contain both colours and metals_. To this extent it is in perfect
unison with the other mediæval art of heraldry; it might almost be
called a twin-sister.

As an art it is much older than its name. We find something very like it
even among the ancient Egyptians, for in the Louvre at Paris is a
papyrus containing paintings of funeral ceremonies, executed in bright
colours and touched in its high lights with pencilled gold. But after
this for many centuries there remains no record of the existence of any
such art until just before the Christian era. Then, indeed, we have
mention of a lady artist who painted a number of miniature portraits for
the great biographical work of the learned Varro. We must carefully
observe, however, that there is a distinction between illumination and
mere miniature painting. Sometimes it is true that miniatures--as _e.g._
those of the early Byzantine artists, and afterwards those of Western
Europe--were finished with touches of gold to represent the lights. This
brought them into the category of illuminations, for while miniatures
may be executed without the use of gold or silver, illuminations may
not. There are thousands of miniatures that are not illuminations.

At the period when illuminating was at its best the miniature, in its
modern sense of a little picture, was only just beginning to appear as a
noticeable feature, and the gold was as freely applied to it as to the
penmanship or the ornament. But such is not the case with miniature
painting generally.

Lala of Cyzicus, the lady artist just referred to, lived in the time of
Augustus Cæsar. She has the honour of being the first miniaturist on
record, and is said to have produced excellent portraits "in little,"
especially those of ladies, on both vellum and ivory. Her own portrait,
representing her engaged in painting a statuette, is still to be seen
among the precious frescoes preserved in the museum at Naples.

The term "miniature," now applied to this class of work, has been
frequently explained. It is derived from the Latin word _minium_, or red
paint, two pigments being anciently known by this name--one the sulphide
of mercury, now known also as "vermilion," the other a lead oxide, now
called "red lead." It is the latter which is generally understood as the
_minium_ of the illuminators, though both were used in manuscript work.
The red paint was employed to mark the initial letters or sections of
the MS. Its connection with portraiture and other pictorial subjects on
a small scale is entirely owing to its accidental confusion by French
writers with their own word _mignon_, and so with the Latin _minus_. In
classical times, among the Romans, the "miniator" was simply a person
who applied the _minium_, and had nothing to do with pictures or
portraits at all, but with the writing. That the rubrication of titles,
however, was somewhat of a luxury may be gathered from the complaint of
Ovid when issuing the humble edition of his verses from his lonely exile
of Tomi:--

         "Parve (nec invideo) sine me liber ibis in urbem:
          Hei mihi quo domino non licet ire tuo.
          ...........................
          Nec te purpureo velent vaccinia succo
          Non est conveniens luctibus ille color.
          _Nec titulus minio_, nec cedro carta notetur
          Candida nec nigra cornua fronte geras."[1]

                                   _Tristia_, Cl. 1, Eleg. 1.

[1] "Go, little book, nor do I forbid,--go without me into that city
where, alas! I may enter never more.... Nor shall whortleberries adorn
thee with their crimson juice; that colour is not suitable for
lamentations. Nor shall thy title be marked with minium, nor thy leaf
scented with cedar-oil. Nor shalt thou bear horns of ivory or ebony upon
thy front."

There are many allusions in these pathetic lines which would bear
annotation, but space forbids. The one point is the use of minium.




CHAPTER II

VELLUM AND OTHER MATERIALS

Difference between vellum and parchment--Names of different
preparations--The kinds of vellum most prized for illuminated books--The
"parcheminerie" of the Abbey of Cluny--Origin of the term
"parchment"--Papyrus.


As vellum is constantly spoken of in connection with illumination and
illuminated books, it becomes necessary to explain what it is, and why
it was used instead of paper.

We often find writers, when referring to ancient documents, making use
of the words parchment and vellum as if the terms were synonymous; but
this is not strictly correct. It is true that both are prepared from
skins, but the skins are different. They are similar, but not the same,
nor, indeed, are they interchangeable. In point of fact, the skins of
almost all the well-known domestic animals, and even of fishes, have
been used for the purpose of making a material for writing upon.
Specifically among the skins so prepared were the following: the
ordinary lambskin, called "aignellinus"[2]; that prepared from stillborn
lambs, called "virgin parchment."

[2] Strictly _agnellinus_.

From sheepskins was produced ordinary "parchment," and also a sort of
leather called "basane" or "cordovan." Vellum was produced from
calfskin; that of the stillborn calf being called "uterine vellum," and
considered the finest and thinnest. It is often spoken of in connection
with the exquisitely written Bibles of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries as of the highest value.

Besides these were the prepared skins of oxen, pigs, and asses; but
these were chiefly used for bindings, though occasionally for leaves of
account and other books liable to rough usage.

Before the tenth century the vellum used for MSS. is highly polished,
and very white and fine. Afterwards it becomes thick and rough,
especially on the hair side. In the examination of certain MSS. the
distinction of hair side and smooth side is of importance in counting
the gatherings so as to determine the completeness, or otherwise, of a
given volume. Towards the period of the Renaissance, however, the vellum
gradually regains its better qualities.

Thus it may be seen that the difference between vellum and parchment is
not a mere difference of thickness; for while, in general, vellum is
stouter than parchment, there is some vellum which is thinner than some
parchment. Not only are they made from different kinds of skin, but the
vellum used for illuminated books was, and still is, prepared with
greater care than the parchment used for ordinary school or college
treatises, or legal documents.

The fabrication of both parchment and vellum in the Middle Ages was
quite as important a matter as that of paper at the present time, and
certain monastic establishments had a special reputation for the
excellence of their manufacture. Thus the "parcheminerie," as it was
called, of the Abbey of Cluny, in France, was quite celebrated in the
twelfth century. One reason probably for this celebrity was the fact
that Cluny had more than three hundred churches, colleges, and
monasteries amongst its dependencies, and therefore had ample
opportunities for obtaining the best materials and learning the best
methods in use throughout literary Christendom. As to the name "vellum,"
it is directly referable to the familiar Latin term for the hide or pelt
of the sheep or other animal, but specially applied, as we have said, to
that of the calf, the writing material thus prepared being termed
_charta vitulina_--in French _vélin_, and in monastic Latin and English
_vellum_.

The name "parchment" had quite a different kind of origin. It is an old
story, found in Pliny's _Natural History_ (bk. xiii. ch. 70), that the
ancient use or revival of the use of parchment was due to the
determination of King Eumenes II. of Mysia or Pergamos to form a library
which should rival those of Alexandria, but that when he applied to
Egypt for papyrus, the writing materials then in use, Ptolemy Epiphanes
jealously refused to permit its exportation. In this difficulty Eumenes,
we are told, had recourse to the preparation of sheepskins, and that
from the place of its invention it was called _charta pergamena_.

Pliny and his authority, however, were both wrong in point of history.
Eumenes, who reigned from about 197 to 158 B.C., was not the inventor,
but the restorer of its use (see Herodotus, v. 58). It was called in
Greek μεμβράνα (2 Tim. iv. 13).

We may mention, by the way, that neither vellum nor parchment are by any
means the oldest materials known. Far older, and more generally used in
Italy, Greece, and Egypt, was the material which has given us the name
of our commonest writing material of to-day, viz. paper. The name of
this older material was _papyrus_ (Gr. πάπυρος and χάρτης). As a writing
material it was known in Egypt from remote antiquity. It was plentiful
in Rome in the time of the Cæsars, and it continued, both in Grecian and
Roman Egypt, to be the ordinary material employed down to the middle of
the tenth century of our era. In Europe, too, it continued in common use
long after vellum had been adopted for books, though more especially for
letters and accounts. St. Jerome mentions vellum as an alternative
material in case papyrus should fail (Ep. vii.), and St. Augustine (Ep.
xv.) apologises for using vellum instead of papyrus.[3] Papyrus was also
used in the early Middle Ages. Examples, _made up into
book-form_--_i.e._ in leaves, with sometimes a few vellum leaves among
them for stability--are still extant. Among such are some seven or eight
books in various European libraries, the best known being the Homilies
of St. Avitus at Paris, the Antiquities of Josephus at Milan, and the
Isidore at St. Gall.

[3] Thompson, _Greek and Latin Palæography_, p. 33.

And in the Papal Chancery papyrus appears to have been used down to a
late date in preference to vellum.[4]

[4] Thompson, _op. cit._, p. 34; Aug. Molinier, _Les Manuscrits_,
Prélim.; Lecoy de la Marche, _Les MSS. et la Miniature_, p. 24.

In France papyrus was in common use in the sixth and seventh centuries.
Merovingian documents dating from 625 to 692 are still preserved in
Paris.




CHAPTER III

WRITING

Its different styles--Origin of Western alphabets--Various forms of
letters--Capitals, uncials, etc.--Texts used in Western Europe--Forms of
ancient writings--The roll, or volume--The codex--Tablets--Diptychs,
etc.--The square book--How different sizes of books were produced.


Seeing that illumination grew originally out of the decoration of the
initial letters, our next point to notice is the penmanship. The
alphabet which we now use is that formerly used by the Romans, who
borrowed it from the Greeks, who in turn obtained it (or their
modification of it) from the Phœnicians, who, lastly it is said,
constructed it from that of the Egyptians. Of course, in these repeated
transfers the letters themselves, as well as the order of them,
underwent considerable alterations. With these we have here no concern.
Our alphabet, _i.e._ the Roman and its variations, is quite sufficient
for our story. In order to show as clearly as may be the varieties of
lettering and the progress of penmanship from classical times to the
revival of the old Roman, letters in the fifteenth century, we offer the
following synopsis, which classifies and indicates the development of
the different hands used by writers and illuminators of MSS. It is
constructed on the information given in Wailly's large work on
Palæography, and in Dr. de Grey Birch's book on the Utrecht Psalter. The
former work affords excellent facsimiles, which, together with those
given in the plates published by the Palæographical Society, will give
the student the clearest possible ideas respecting these ancient
handwritings.

Omitting the cursive or correspondence hand, the letters used by the
Romans were of four kinds--capitals (usually made angular to be cut in
stone), rustic, uncials, and minuscules.

The rounded capitals were intended to be used in penwork. Uncials differ
from capitals only in the letters A, D, E, G, M, Q, T, V, for the sake
of ease in writing. It is said that this class of letters was first
called uncials from being made an inch (_uncia_) high, but this is mere
tradition; the word is first used on Jerome's preface to the Book of
Job. No uncials have ever been found measuring more than five-eighths of
an inch in height.

For the assistance of such students as may wish for examples we must
refer to certain MSS. and reproductions in which the foregoing hands are
exemplified.

_CIRCA_ FOURTH CENTURY.

_Capitals_, yet not pure.
  The Vatican Vergil, No. 3225, throughout (Birch, p. 14; Silvestre's
    _Paléographie universelle_, pl. 74).

With regard to the relative antiquity of capitals and uncials, M. de
Wailly observes: "The titles in pure uncials, but less than the text
itself, give an excellent index to the highest antiquity. This is
verified in MSS. 152, 2630, 107 of the Bibl. du Roi, etc. MSS. of the
seventh or eighth century, whether on uncial or demi-uncial, or any
other letter, are never constant in noting the title at the top of the
page, or the kind of writing will vary, or if uncials be constantly
used, the titles will not be smaller than the text. These variations
become still greater in the following centuries. The ornaments which
relieve the titles of each page commence about the eighth century" (i.
p. 49 C).

_Capitals_ and _Uncials_.
  The Homilies of St. Augustine (Silvestre, pl. 74).
  Augustine Opera, Paris Lib., 11641 (Palæograph. Soc., pl. 42, 43).

_Rustic_.
  The Second Vatican Vergil, No. 3867 (Wailly, pl. 2), called the
    "Codex Romanus."

SIXTH CENTURY.

_Rustic_ and _Uncial_.
  The Montamiata Bible (Birch, 35; Wailly, pl. 2, 4).

_Rustic_ and _Minuscule_.
  The Cambridge Gospels (Westwood, _Palæograph. Sacra Pictoria_, pl. 45).

_Uncials_.
  Gospels in Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 5463.
  Paris Lib., Gregory of Tours (Silvestre, pl. 86).
  Vienna Imp. Lib., Livy (Silvestre, pl. 75).
  Brit. Mus., Harl. 1775 (Palæograph. Soc., pl. 16).

SEVENTH CENTURY.

_Uncials_ and _Minuscule_.
  The St. Chad's Gospels in library of Lichfield Cathedral (Palæograph.
    Soc., pl. 20, 21, 35).

NINTH CENTURY.

_Capitals_ and _Minuscules_.
  Paris Lib., Bible of Charles the Bald.

There is scarcely anything more difficult to judge than the true age of
square capital MSS. or of pure uncials. Even the rustic capitals, like
the first Vatican Vergil, No. 3225, are extremely rare. The letters in
this MS. are about three-sixteenths of an inch high.


TEXTS IN USE IN WESTERN EUROPE BEFORE THE AGE OF CHARLEMAGNE.

_Lombardic._ The national hand of Italy. Founded on the old Roman
cursive, it does not attain to any great beauty until the tenth or
eleventh century. Examples may be seen in Palæographical Society, pl.
95, and in the excellent lithographs published by the monks of Monte
Cassino (_Paleografia artistica di Monte Cassino_, Longobardo-Cassinese,
tav. xxxiv., etc.). A very fine example occurs in pl. xv., dated
1087-88. Its characteristic letters are _a_, _e_, _g_, _t_.

_Visigothic._ The national hand of Spain. Also founded on the old Roman
cursive. It becomes an established hand in the eighth century, and lasts
until the twelfth. Examples occur in Ewald and Lœwe, _Exempla Scripturæ
Visigoticæ_, Heidelberg, 1883. It was at first very rude and illegible,
but afterwards became even handsome. A fine example exists in the
British Museum (Palæograph. Soc., pl. 48). Its characteristic letters
are _g_, _s_, _t_.

_Merovingian._ The national hand of France. A hand made up chiefly of
loops and angles in a cramped, irregular way. Its derivation the same as
the preceding. In the seventh century it is all but illegible. In the
eighth it is much better, and almost easy to read.

_Celtic_. The national hand of Ireland. It is founded on the demi-uncial
Roman, borrowed as to type from MSS. taken to Ireland by missionaries.
It is bold, clear, and often beautiful, lending itself to some of the
most astonishing feats of penmanship ever produced.

Such are the chief varieties of writing found in the MSS. produced
before the great revival of the arts and learning which took place
during the reign of Charles the Great (Karl der Grosse), known
familiarly as Charlemagne.

Wattenbach (_Schriftwesen_, _etc._) says that uncials date from the
second century A.D. From examples still extant of the fifth and
following centuries, it seems that while the Roman capitals were not
uncommon, in Celtic MSS. the form generally adopted was the uncial. It
was the form also usually chosen for ornamentation or imitation in those
Visigothic, Merovingian, or Lombardic MSS., which made such remarkable
use of fishes, birds, beasts, and plants for the construction of initial
letters and principal words, of which we see so many examples in the
elaborately illustrated Catalogue of the library at Laon by Ed. Fleury,
and in that of Cambray, by M. Durieux. Most of these pre-Carolingian
designs are barbarous in the extreme, dreadfully clumsy in execution,
but they evince considerable ingenuity and a strong predilection for
symbolism.

Before concluding this chapter perhaps something should be said
concerning the shape of books, though this is a matter somewhat outside
the scope of our proper subject. Yet, as the brief digression will
afford an opportunity for the explanation of certain terms used in MSS.,
we will avail ourselves of it.

The ancient form of writing upon skins and papyrus was that of the roll.
The Hebrew, Arabic, or Greek terms for this do not concern us, but its
Latin name was _volumen_, "something rolled," and from this we obtain
our word volume. Such words as "explicit liber primus" etc., which we
often find in early MSS., refer to this roll-form; _explicare_ in Latin
meaning to unroll; hence, apropos of a chapter or book, to finish. When
transferred to the square form, or codex, it simply means, "here ends
book first," etc.

The modern book shape first came into use with the beginning of the
Christian era under the name of codex. Here it will be necessary to
explain that _caudex_, _codex_, in Latin, meant a block of wood, and had
its humorous by-senses among the Roman dramatists, as the word block has
among ourselves, such as blockhead.[5] So _caudicalis provincia_ was a
jocular expression for the occupation of wood-splitting.

[5] Terence, _Heautont._, 5. 1, 4.

Whether the word had originally any connection with _cauda_, "a tail,"
is not here worth considering, as if so, it had long lost the
connection; and when used to mean a book, had only the sense of a board,
or a number of boards from two upwards, fastened together by means of
rings passed through holes made in their edges.

Probably the first use was as plain smooth boards only; examples of such
are still in existence. Then of boards thinly covered with, usually,
black wax. A pair of such tablets, wax-covered, was a common form of a
Roman pocket-or memorandum-book. It was also used as a means of
conveying messages, the reply being returned on the same tablets. The
method was to write on the wax with a fine-pointed instrument called a
style, the reverse end of which was flattened. When the person to whom
the message was sent had read it, he (or she) simply flattened out the
writing, smoothed it level, and then wrote the reply on the same wax.
School-children did their exercises on these tablets, housewives and
stewards kept their accounts on them, and on them literary people jotted
down their ideas as they do now in their pocket-books. Extant examples
of these early books, or tablets, are fairly numerous, and may be seen
in most public museums. A codex of two leaves was called a diptych; of
three, a triptych, etc. The codex form was used for legal documents,
wills, conveyances, and general correspondence. Hence the Roman postman
was called a _tabellarius_, the tablets containing correspondence being
tied with a thread or ribbon and sealed. This custom of sending letters
on tablets survived for some centuries after Augustan times. Wattenbach
gives several interesting instances of their mediæval use.[6]

[6] _Schriftwesen_, 48.

Of course when the tablet gave place to the codex of skin or paper, the
papyrus was too brittle and fragile for practical utility, and examples,
as we have seen, were very rare; but vellum soon became popular. We may
mention, in passing, that the papyrus roll gave us a word still in use
in diplomatics, the word _protocol_. The first sheet of a papyrus roll
was called the πρωτόκολλον. It usually contained the name of place and
date of manufacture of the papyrus, and was stamped or marked with the
name of the government officer who had charge of the department.

In the vellum codex, though each leaf might have only one fold, and thus
technically be considered as a folio, the actual shape of it was nearly
square, hence its name of _codex quadratus_. When other forms of books,
such as octavo, duo-decimo, etc., came into use, it was in consequence
of the increased number of foldings. The gatherings, originally
quaternions or quires, became different, and those who undertake to
examine MSS. with respect to their completeness have to be familiar with
the various methods.[7] This kind of knowledge, however, though useful,
is by no means essential to the story of illumination.

[7] Wattenbach, _Schriftwesen_; Madan, _Books in Manuscript_, _etc_.




CHAPTER IV

GREEK AND ROMAN ILLUMINATION

The first miniature painter--The Vatican Vergils--Methods of
painting--Origin of Christian art--The Vienna Genesis--The
Dioscorides--The Byzantine Revival.


It has been already stated that the earliest recorded miniature painter
was a lady named Lala of Cyzicus in the days of Augustus Cæsar, days
when Cyzicus was to Rome what Brussels is to Paris, or Brighton to
London. All her work, as far as we know, has perished. It was
portraiture on ivory, probably much the same as we see in the miniature
portraiture of the present day.

But this was not illumination. The kind of painting employed in the two
Vatican Vergils was, however, something approaching it. These two
precious volumes contain relics of Pagan art, but it is the very art
which was the basis and prototype of so-called Christian art of those
earliest examples found in the catacombs and in the first liturgical
books of Christian times.

The more ancient of the two Vergils referred to, No. 3225, which Labarte
(2nd ed., ii. 158) thinks to be a century older than the other, Sir M.D.
Wyatt considered as containing "some of the best and most interesting
specimens of ancient painting which have come down to us. The design is
free and the colours applied with good effect, the whole presenting
classical art in the period of decline, but before its final
debasement." Whereas in the second MS., No. 3867, the style, though
still classical, is greatly debased, and probably, in addition to this,
by no means among the best work of its time. It is described as rough,
inaccurate, and harsh. The method is of the kind called _gouache_,
_i.e._ the colours are applied thickly in successive couches or layers,
probably by means of white of egg diluted with fig-tree sap, and
finished in the high lights with touches of gold (Palæograph. Soc., pl.
114, 117). This finishing with touches of gold brings the work within
the range of illumination. There is, indeed, wanting the additional
ornamentation of the initial letter which would bring it fully into the
class of mediæval work; but, such as it is, it may fairly claim to be
suggestive of the future art. Indeed, certain points in the MS.
3225--viz. that Zeus is always red and Venus fair, that certain costumes
and colours of drapery are specially appropriated--would lead to the
supposition that even then there existed a code of rules like those of
the Byzantine Guide, and that therefore the art owed its origin to the
Greeks.

Between this MS. and the first known Christian book work there may have
been many that have now perished, and which, had they remained, would
have marked the transition more gradually. But even as they stand there
is no appreciable difference between the earliest monuments of Christian
art and those of the period which preceded them. Nor shall we find any
break, any distinct start on new principles. It is one continuous series
of processes--the gradual change of methods growing out of experience
alone--not owing to any change of religion or the adoption of a new set
of theological opinions. Of course we shall find that for a very long
time the preponderance of illuminated MSS. will be towards liturgical
works; and we shall also find that where the contents of the MS. are the
same the subjects taken for illustration are also selected according to
some fixed and well-known set of rules. We shall see the explanation of
this by-and-by.

The first example of a Christian illuminated MS. is one containing
portions of the Book of Genesis in Greek preserved in the Imperial
Library at Vienna. It is a mere fragment, only twenty-six leaves of
purple vellum--that is, bearing the imperial stain--yet it contains
eighty-eight pictures. We call them miniatures, but we must remember
that by "miniator" a Roman bookseller would not understand what we call
a miniaturist; and, as we have said, the word "illuminator" was not then
known.

This Vienna Genesis is not introduced among illuminated books,
therefore, because of its miniatures--pictures we prefer to call
them--but because the text is nearly all written in _gold_ and _silver_
letters. The pictures, according to the Greek manner, are placed in
little square frames. They were executed, no doubt, by a professional
painter, not without technical skill and not hampered by monastic
restrictions. The symbolism which underlies all early art is here shown
in the allegorical figures (such as we shall meet with again in later
Byzantine work), which are introduced to interpret the scene. We see the
same thing in the catacombs. Being a relic of great importance, this
Genesis codex has been often described and examples given of its
pictures. Of course, in a little manual like the present we cannot
pretend to exhibit the literature of our subject. We can scarcely do
more than refer the reader to a single source. In this case perhaps we
cannot do better than send the inquirer to the Victoria and Albert
Museum at South Kensington.

If we select another MS. of this early period it is the one which may be
said to be the oldest existing MS. in which the ornamentation is worthy
of as much notice as the pictures. We refer to the Collection of
Treatises by Greek physicians on plants, fishing, the chase, and kindred
matters in the same library as the Genesis fragment. It goes under the
name of "Dioscorides," who was one of the authors, and dates from the
beginning of the sixth century. The Genesis is a century older.
Engravings from the Dioscorides are given in Labarte's _Arts
industriels, etc._, pl. 78, and in Louandre's _Arts somptuaires, etc._,
i., pl. 2, 3.

Enough has been said on these earlier centuries to show quite clearly
the character of the art known as Early Christian. It is simply a
continuation of such art as had existed from classical times, and had,
in fact, passed from the Greeks, who were artists, to the Romans, who
were rarely better than imitators. It is carried on to the period when
it again is nourished by Greek ideas in the Later Empire, and once more
attains distinction in the splendid revival of art under the Emperor
Justinian.

NOTE.--Julius Capitolinus, in his Life of the exquisite Emperor Maximin,
junior, mentions that the emperor's mother[8] made him a present of a
copy of the poems of Homer, written in golden letters on purple[9]
vellum. This is the earliest recorded instance of such a book in
Christian times. Its date would be about 235 A.D.

[8] Quædam parens sua.

[9] Purpureos libros.




CHAPTER V

BYZANTINE ILLUMINATION

The rebuilding of the city of Byzantium the beginning of Byzantine
art--Justinian's fondness for building and splendour--Description of
Paul the Silentiary--Sumptuous garments--The Gospel-book of
Hormisdas--Characteristics of Byzantine work--Comparative scarcity of
examples--Rigidity of Byzantine rules of art--Periods of Byzantine
art--Examples--Monotony and lifelessness of the style.


The signal event which gave birth to mediæval illumination, or rather to
the ideas which were thereby concentrated upon the production of
magnificent books, was the rebuilding of the Imperial Palace and the
Basilica of Constantine, henceforward to be known as the Church of
Sancta Sophia, or the Divine Wisdom, at Byzantium. The Emperor Justinian
had been reigning six years when a terrific fire, caused by the
conflicts between the various seditions, called Circus factions, of the
time, almost entirely destroyed not only his own palace and the great
Christian church adjoining it, but the city of Constantinople itself. So
important a scheme of reconstruction had probably never been forced upon
a government since the great fire in Rome under Nero. Justinian, whose
early training had been of the most economical kind, and whose
disposition seemed to be rather inclined to parsimony than extravagance,
now came out in his true character. For various reasons he had hitherto
studiously concealed his master-passion; but this catastrophe of the
fire, which seemed at first so disastrous, was really a stroke of
fortune. It afforded the hitherto frugal sovereign the chance he had
long waited for of spending without stint the hoarded savings of his two
miserly predecessors, and gratifying his own tastes for magnificent
architecture and splendour of apparel.

Not only Asia, with its wealth of gold and gems, but all the known world
capable of supplying material for the reconstructions, were called upon,
and ivory, marbles, mosaics, lamps, censers, candelabra, chalices,
ciboria, crosses, furniture, fittings, pictures--in short, everything
that his own taste and the experience of four or five of the ablest
architects of the time could suggest--administered to the gorgeous, the
unspeakable splendour of the new edifices and their furniture.

Paul the Silentiary, an eye-witness of the whole proceeding, has left a
description in verse, and the accurate Du Fresne in prose, which enable
us easily to trace how the Roman city of Constantine became transformed
into the semi-oriental Byzantium of Justinian. During the two centuries
which had elapsed since the days of the first Christian emperor many
foreign luxuries had found their way into the Eastern capital. Byzantine
jewellery and Byzantine silks were already famous. The patterns on the
latter were not merely floral or geometrical, but four-footed animals,
birds, and scenes from outdoor sports formed part of the embellishment,
which, therefore, must have taken the place occupied in later times by
the tapestries of Arras and Fontainebleau.

Hitherto the Byzantines had imported their silks from Persia. After the
rebuilding of the Basilica, Justinian introduced silk-culture into
Greece. The garments ridiculed by Asterius, Bishop of Amasia, in the
fourth century, were repeated in the sixth century. "When men," says he,
"appear in the streets thus dressed, the passers-by look at them as at
painted walls. Their clothes are pictures which little children point
out to one another. The saintlier sort wear likenesses of Christ, the
Marriage of Galilee...and Lazarus raised from the dead."

On the robe of the Empress Theodora--the wife of Justinian, who is shown
in one of the mosaics of St. Vitale at Ravenna as presenting rich gifts
to that church--there is embroidered work along the border, showing the
Adoration of the Magi. _Theodora pia_ was one among the many rôles
played by that all-accomplished actress; but this seems to have been
after her death. Like Lucrezia Borgia, perhaps, she was better than her
reputation. With such surroundings liturgical books could not have
existed without sharing in the universal luxury of enrichment. And, in
point of fact, we still have records of such books. While Justinian
reigned in Byzantium it happened that Hormisdas, a native of Frosinone,
was Pope of Rome. He was a zealous eradicator of heresy (especially of
the Eutychian and Manichæan), and in recognition of his services in this
direction the Greek Emperor, with his thanks, sent him a great
Gospel-book richly decorated, no doubt, with those splendid Eusebian
canons and portraits of the Evangelists, the like of which we see in the
Byzantine examples still preserved at Paris, in London, and elsewhere.
Plates of beaten gold, studded with gems, formed the covers of the
Gospel-book of Hormisdas.

Nor was this sumptuous volume the only, or even a rare, example of its
kind. We read that the art of book decoration had become a fashionable
craze. No expense was spared in the search for costly materials. Colours
were imported from India, Persia, and Spain, including vermilion and
ultramarine, while the renowned Byzantine gold ink was manufactured from
imported Indian gold. Persian calligraphers had taught its use afresh to
the Byzantine scribes.

If, as we may believe, the first object of the Roman miniatores was
distinctness combined with beauty, we may now believe that the object of
the Byzantine scribes was splendour. The progress had been from mere
"cheirography" to calligraphy; now it was from calligraphy to
chrysography and arguriography.

This employment of gold and silver inks may be looked upon as the first
step in the art of illumination as practised in the Middle Ages. And the
preliminary to the use of metallic inks was attention to the tint of the
vellum. The pioneers in this career of luxury no doubt had observed that
very white vellum fatigued the eye. Hence, at first, they tinted or
stained it with saffron, on one side at least, sometimes on both. Once
begun, the tinting of the vellum extended to other colours. For works of
the highest rank the favourite was a fine purple, the imperial colour of
the Roman and Greek emperors. For chrysography, or gold-writing, the
tint was nearly what we call crimson. For arguriography, or
silver-writing, it became the bluish hue we call grape-purple. On the
cooled purples vermilion ink was used instead of, or together with, the
gold or silver. As the usage began with the Greeks, we may be sure that
it came originally from Asia.

The Emperor Nero, once having heard that an Olympic Ode of Pindar in
letters of gold was laid up in one of the temples at Athens, desired
that certain verses of his own should be similarly written and dedicated
on the Altar of Jupiter Capitolinus at Rome. This was an imperial luxury
several times repeated by other princes.

After the official establishment of Christianity it became a common
practice to have the greater liturgical books executed in the same
costly fashion. And between the time of Constantine and that of Basil
the Macedonian many a burning homily was directed against the custom,
denounced as a sinful extravagance, which no doubt it was, but in vain
until the fashion had worn itself out.

It might fairly be expected, this being the case, that many examples of
this kind of codex would still be in existence. But owing to war, fire,
robbery, and other misfortunes but very few remain. One of the oldest
and finest is the so-called _Codex Argenteus_, or Silver-book, now kept
at Upsala, in Sweden, containing portions of the Gospels of the
Mæsogothic Bishop Ulfilas. Originally the effect of the stamped or
burnished silver on the rich purple of the vellum must have been very
splendid, but now the action of the air has blackened it, as it has done
in many other instances where silver was used in illumination. Even gold
will gather tarnish, and in several such MSS. has turned of a rusty red.
Gold ink was not invariably confined to tinted vellum; it was often used
on the plain ground. The copy of the Old Testament in Greek, presented
by the high priest Eleazar to King Ptolemy Philadelphus, was a roll of
fine white vellum, upon which the text was written in letters of gold.

To enter upon the antiquities of Greek palæography would lead us too far
from our track in view of the brevity of our present survey. We
therefore with some reluctance turn from this interesting topic to our
more immediate subject. We may remark, however, that the great majority
of Greek MSS. are written on vellum. In the eleventh century are found
instances of what is called _charta bombycina_, or cotton-paper,
appearing more plentifully in the twelfth century, but on the whole
vellum is the chief material of Byzantine illuminated books. Much has
been said about the want of life and total lack of variety of treatment
in this school of art. To a very great extent the charge is just, yet it
could scarcely be otherwise. The one circumstance which compelled
Byzantine work to remain so long as if cast in one unalterable mould,
and thus to differ so strangely from that of Western artists, was due to
the fact that in very early Christian times the scribes and illuminators
were enrolled into a minutely organised corporation originating
primarily in monasticism, but by no means confined to the monastic
Orders. Lay guilds existed, the regulations and methods of which were
rigid beyond modern belief. So that, as a class, Byzantine art has
acquired the reputation of a soulless adherence to mechanical rules and
precedents, depriving it of originality and even of individuality, and
therefore excluding the remotest scintilla of artistic genius. Of the
great crowd of examples of ordinary work this may be true, but it
certainly is not true of the best, by which it has the right to be
judged, as we shall see from the examples referred to by-and-by.
Certainly there is one invaluable particular in which Greek MSS. are
superior to those of the West, Latin or otherwise. That is, they are
much more frequently signed with the names, localities, and dates of the
copyists and illuminators.

It will be some help towards our knowledge of this school if we divide
its existence into chronological sections or periods.

1. From præ-Christianity to the Age of Justinian, _i.e._ down to the
year 535. (Justinian reigned from 526 to 564.)

This period marks the decadence of ancient art, but carries with it the
characteristics and methods of the ancient Greek painters.

2. From the Age of Justinian to the Iconoclastic paralysis of art under
Leo III. the Isaurian, _i.e._ 564 to 726. (Leo reigned from 717 to 741.)

During this period vast numbers of illuminated liturgical books were
destroyed for religious or fanatical reasons, just as in our own
Cromwellian times numbers of _Horæ_, Missals, etc., were destroyed as
papistical and superstitious.

This Edict of 726 did not absolutely put an end to all art in MSS. It
only had the effect of excluding images of God, Christ, and the saints,
as in Arabian and Persian MSS., leaving the artist the free use of
flowers, plants, and line ornament, after the manner of the Mohammedan
arabesques.

3. From Leo III. to the Empress Irene, who restored the worship of
images in part, _i.e._ from 741 to 785. (Irene ruled from 780 to 801.)

This was a period of stagnation, though by no means of extinction of
art.

4. From Irene to Basil I. the Macedonian, _i.e._ from 801 to 867.

A half-century and more of rapid renaissance to the most brilliant epoch
of Byzantine art since the time of Justinian, if not the zenith of the
school.

Basil I. was a great builder--building, in fact, was his ruling
passion--so that it may be said that he took Justinian for his model
both as a ruler and as a patron of the arts. (He reigned from 867 to
886.)

5. From Basil the Macedonian to the Fall of Constantinople, _i.e._ from
886 to 1453.

Allowing for a few flashes of expiring skill in various reigns, this may
be considered as a period of gradual but certain decline to a state
worse than death, for though the monks of Greek and Russian convents
still kept up the execution of MSS., it was only with the driest and
most lifeless adhesion to the Manual. This so-called art still exists,
but more like a magnetised corpse than a living thing.

Examples of the first period are seldom met with. We have one signal
specimen in the British Museum Add. MS. 5111, being two leaves only of a
Gospel-book, and containing part of the Eusebian canons, or
contents-tables of the Four Gospels, etc. The work is attributed to the
time of Justinian himself. It is of the kind already referred to as
probably affording the model of work to the early illuminators of France
and Ireland, and as being like the Gospel-book of Hormisdas and those
brought to England by Augustine in 596. Another example of the same
Eusebian canons is found in Roy. MS. 1 E. vi.

Of the fourth period--_i.e._ the ninth century--perhaps the most typical
example is the Menologium (a sort of compound of a calendar and lives of
the saints), now in the Vatican Library (MS. Gr. 1613). This MS. shows
that the revival under Basil the Macedonian was a return not to Roman,
but to ancient Greek art, the facial types being of the purest classical
character.

[Illustration:
EVANG. GRÆCA
6TH CENT.
_Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 5111, fol. 13_]

[Illustration:
EVANG. GRÆCA
9TH CENT.
_Brit. Mus. Burney MS. 19 fol. 1 v._]

In some of them we see the horizontal frown of the Homeric heroes
(σύνοφρυς Οδυσσευς), and of the Georgian and Armenian races shown in the
features of the Emperor Johannes Ducas. We have, too, the large
Hera-like eye with its mystic gaze, which, in later Byzantine work,
becomes first a gaze of lofty indifference, as in the portraits of the
emperors and empresses, and lastly a stony and expressionless stare;
still, if possible, more stony and glaring when transferred to Celtic
and Carolingian Gospel-books. (See chapter on Carolingian Illumination.)

Of this fourth period we might indeed point to many examples. One must
suffice. It is the beautiful Greek Psalter, now at Paris (MS., p. 139),
containing lovely examples of antique design, including remarkable
personifications or allegorical figures. In this MS. is one of the most
graceful personifications ever painted, that of _Night_, with her veil
of gauze studded with stars floating overhead. The seven pictures from
the Life of David are among the best ever put into a MS. But
personification is carried to an extreme. Thus the Red Sea, the Jordan,
Rivers, Mountains, Night, Dawn, etc., are all represented as persons.
The drawings are really beautiful and the illuminated initials and
general ornament in good taste.

For other examples the reader may consult the British Museum Cat. of
Addit. MSS., 1841-5, p. 87; also Du Sommerard, _Les Arts au Moyen-âge_,
tom. v., 1846, pp. 107, 162-8, and album, 2e sér. pl. xxix., 8e sér.
pl. xii.-xvi.

It is noticeable in these Byzantine pictures that while the
figure-painting is often really excellent, the design skilful, and the
pose natural, the landscape, trees, etc., are quite symbolic and
fanciful. The painters seem to have been utterly ignorant of
perspective. Buildings, too, without any regard to relative proportion,
are coloured merely as parts of a colour scheme. They are pink, pale
green, yellow, violet, blue, just to please the eye. That the painter
had a system of colour-harmony is plain, but he paid no regard to the
facts of city life, unless, indeed, it was the practice of the mediæval
Byzantines to paint the outside of their houses in this truly brilliant
style. Possibly they did so; we have similar things in Italy even
nowadays.

No doubt the French illuminators of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries drew from these sources both their perspective and their
architectural colouring. As for ornamental illumination, the principal
method of decoration was a square heading,[10] perhaps including a
semicircular arch sweeping over several arcades, the corners and
wall-space being occupied either with arabesque patterns, showing them
to be after the time of Leo III., or with scrolls of line-ornament
enriched with acanthus foliages. Under this the scribe has placed his
title.

[10] It has been thought to represent the Greek π, and to mean πύλη, a
gate or door.

[Illustration:
CARVED IVORY COVER
LATIN PSALTER OF MELLISENDA
12TH CENT.
_Brit. Mus. Egert. MS. 1139_]

[Illustration:
CODEX AURENS
(GOLDEN GOSPELS OF ATHELSTAN)
C. 835
_Brit. Mus. Harl. MS. 2788, fol. 176_]

Other examples have a square frame filled with the latter kind of
scrolls and foliages, leaving a sort of open panel in the centre, in
which is placed a small scene of sacred history or perhaps of country
life. Sometimes the title, in golden letters, is surrounded with
medallions containing heads of Christ and the Virgin, apostles, and
saints. The peculiar interlacing bands of violet, yellow, rose, blue,
etc., which are still often seen in Russian ornament, are also features
of these Byzantine MSS.; but most of all is the lavish use of gold.
Perhaps the fact most to be remembered about these MSS. is that the
painters of them worked in a manner that was absolutely fixed and rigid,
the rules of which are laid down in a manual called the _Guide to
Painting_, a work which has been translated by M. Didron.

So fixed and unalterable, indeed, is the manner that there is absolutely
no difference to indicate relative antiquity between a MS. of the
eleventh century and one of the sixteenth or even later, we might almost
say, of the present day. In the matter of saint-images this is strictly
true.




CHAPTER VI

CELTIC ILLUMINATION

Early liturgical books reflect the ecclesiastical art of their
time--This feature a continuous characteristic of illumination down to
the latest times--Elements of Celtic ornament--Gospels of St.
Chad--Durham Gospels--Contrast of Celtic and Byzantine--St.
Columba--Book of Kells--Details of its decoration.


In the earlier centuries of Christianity, when liturgical books were the
chief occupation of the illuminator, it will need little pointing out to
demonstrate that the page of the illuminated manuscript, where it
contained more than the mere ornamental initial, was simply a mirror of
the architectural decoration of the church in which it was intended to
be used. Where the church enrichments consist, as on the Byzantine
basilicas, of panellings, arcades, and tympana of gilded sculpture in
wood or stone, with figures of saints, the pages of the Gospel-book bear
similar designs. Where, as in the Romanesque, they are rich in mosaics,
and fretted arcades interlacing each other, so are the illuminated Lives
of the Saints, the Menologia, Psalters, and Gospel-books. Where, as in
the Gothic cathedrals of the West--of France, Germany, or Italy--the
stained glass is the striking feature of the interior, so it is with the
illumination; it is a "vitrail"--a glass-painting on vellum. On this
latter point we shall have more to say when we reach the period of
Gothic illumination.

Incidentally, also, the book reflects the minor arts in vogue at the
period of its execution. Often in the illumination we may detect these
popular local industries. We see mosaic enamelling, wood-and
stone-carving, and lacquer-work, and as we approach the Renaissance,
even gem-cutting and the delicate craft of the medallist. In Venice and
the Netherlands we have the local taste for flower-culture; in Germany
we find sculpture in wood and stone; in France the productions of the
enameller and the goldsmith; until at length, in the full blaze of the
Renaissance itself, we have in almost every land the same varieties of
enrichment practised according to its own special style of work.

It has been said that the oldest Celtic illuminated MSS. show no signs
of classic, or even Byzantine, influence, yet the plan or framework of
the designs makes use both of the cross and the arch, as used in the
earliest Byzantine examples. The details, indeed, are quite different,
and manifestly derived from indigenous sources. It may be, therefore,
that the framework is merely a geometrical coincidence which could not
well be avoided. The fact that the basis of pure Irish ornament _is_
geometrical, and developed out of the prehistoric and barbarous art of
the savages who preceded the Celts in Ireland; such art as is used on
the carved shafts of spears, and oars, and staves of honour, and
afterwards on stone crosses and metal-work, may account for the
similarity of ideas in ornament developed by old Roman decorators in
their mosaic pavements, and may reconcile, in some measure, the varied
opinions of different writers who have approached the subject from
different points of view. Westwood adhered to the theory of its being
purely indigenous. Fleury, on the other hand, in his Catalogue of the
MSS. in the Library at Laon, asserts that we owe the knots and
interlacements to the influence of the painters, sculptors, and
mosaicists of Rome. "These interlacings, cables, etc., there is no
Gallo-Roman monument which does not exhibit them, and, only to cite
local instances, the cord of four or five strands is seen in the
beautiful mosaics discovered in profusion within the last five years
(1857-62) at Blanzy, at Bazoches, at Vailly, and at Reims. It was from
them that the Franks borrowed their knots and twists and ribbons for
their belts and buckles, their rings and bracelets" (pt. i., p. 8).

The elements, therefore, of book ornament, as used by the Celtic penmen,
are such as were employed by the prehistoric and sporadic nations in the
textile art in plaiting and handweaving, and afterwards transferred to
that of metal-work. Terminals of animal, bird, or serpent form
afterwards combine with the linear designs. The dog and dragon are
common, as may be seen in the archaic vases produced by the Greeks
before they came under the influence of ideas from Western Asia.

Among Celtic artists, as among those of later times, the practice of
working in various materials was common to the same individual, and
Dagæus (d. 586) may compare with Dunstan, Eloy, Tuotilo, and others.

To apply these observations to the style of illumination which now comes
under our notice it may be said that if we allow the cross and arch to
be copied from the Byzantine MSS. introduced from abroad, the details
are undoubtedly supplied by the wickerwork and textile netting familiar
to the everyday life of the artist. Assisted by the fertile imagination
of bardic lore in snakes, dragons, and other mythic monsters of heroic
verse, the illuminator produces a pencilled tapestry of textile fabric
or flexile metal-work as marvellous as it is unique. No amount of
description can give a true idea of what Celtic work is like; it must be
seen to be comprehended. One glance at a facsimile of such a MS. as the
Book of Kells or the Lindisfarne Gospels, or those of St. Chad at
Lichfield, or wherever, as at St. Gall, such work is to be met with,
will supersede the most laboured attempt at description. We must
therefore at once refer the reader to the facsimile. When that has been
inspected, we may proceed. In the first place it may be noted that with
these Occidental MSS. begins the importance and development of the
initial, which, indeed, as regards the illumination of Western Europe,
is the very root of the matter. It is the development of the initial
letter first into the bracket, then into the border, which forms the
great distinction of the "Art of Paris," as Dante calls it, from that of
Byzantium. The latter is almost always of a squared or tabular design,
traced and painted on a ground of burnished gold. The former exhausts
itself first in fantastic lacertine forms, twisted into the shapes of
the commencing letters or words of the writing, to which the suggestion
of some Byzantine MS, perhaps occasionally adds a frame. Next come
birds, dogs, dragons, vine-stems, and spirals embedded in couches of
colour; but, whatever its character, always it is the letter that
governs and originates the ornament. Only at the very end of its life,
when the border has completely eclipsed the initial, is the idea of
origin forgotten. Then, indeed, we find the border treillages of
flower-stem or leaf-work starting from meaningless points of the design,
or scattered shapelessly at random.

When we meet with work of this sort, we need no further proof that the
real art is dead. We have before us in such a performance--a trade
production--a mere object of commerce, valuable so far as it is the
result of labour, but not as a work of art.

According to the Abbé Geoghegan,[11] Christianity was known to the people
of Ireland in the fourth century. The Greek Menology asserts that it was
carried thither by Simon Zelotes, but this is contradicted by the Roman
Breviary and the Martyrologists. Simeon Metaphrastes attributes it to
St. Peter, Vincent of Beauvais to St. James. Unreliable as these
traditions may be taken singly, they nevertheless agree in placing the
conversion of Ireland at a very early date, probably, as Geoghegan says,
in the fourth century. It is certain that about the middle of the sixth
century an Irish prince of distinguished ancestry, and himself a saint,
led a band of missionaries from Donegal to Iona. It is curious to
observe that the event is almost contemporary with the renovations of
Justinian at Byzantium, and only a short time before the founding of the
famous Abbey of Monte Cassino by St. Benedict. Before the existence of
the Benedictine Order there was a monastery at Durrow, in Ireland, and
in this monastery the aforesaid prince was educated. His name was
Columba. At least, so he is called, but whether it be merely in allusion
to his mission--"the Dove"--or really a patronymic, it is hard to say.
He was the messenger of peace to the natives of Iona, and even the name
of the island seems to suggest an allusion to the Old Testament
missionary to the Ninevites, Jonah. The Irish missionaries called the
spot to which they went _I. columcille_, "the cell of the Dove's isle,"
or Columba's cell. It is usually spoken of as the Monastery of Iona.
Columba went on many other missions, but ultimately returned to his
beloved Iona, where he died in 597, the year after the arrival of
Augustine at Canterbury.

[11] _Hist. de l'Irlande._

His companions busied themselves with the transcription of the Gospels
for the use of new converts, after the model of those they had seen and
used at Durrow. It is even traditionally asserted that Columba himself
took part in the work, and transcribed both a Psalter and a Gospel-book,
moreover, that one of the Iona Gospel-books written by him is still in
existence. This MS., whether the work of St. Columba or not, and
probably it is not, is the earliest known monument of Irish calligraphic
art. It is known as the Book of Kells, and there is no doubt that it is
the most amazing specimen of penmanship ever seen. It is at once the
most ancient, the most perfect, and the most precious example of Celtic
art in existence. It exhibits the striking peculiarities and features of
the style--the band work knots and interlacings, such as may be seen on
the stone crosses which mark the burial-places of British and Irish
chieftains. Witness, for instance, the Carew, or the Nevern Cross,
described in the _Journal of the Archœlogical Institute_, iii. 71, which
might be taken to represent an initial "I" wrought in stone. There is no
foliage, no plant form at all. It is not, therefore, derivable from
Romanesque, Byzantine, or Oriental ornament. It is indigenous, if not to
Ireland, at least to those prehistoric Aryan tribes of which the Irish
were a branch. Its basis is the art of weaving, and in some respects
resembles the matting of Polynesia much more closely that the vine-stems
of Sicily or the arabesques of Byzantium. Spirals occur that bewilder
the eye, yet are so faultlessly perfect that only the magnifying-glass
brings out the incredible accuracy of the drawing. Among them are
mythological and allegorical beasts, snakes, and lizards--thought to
represent demons, like the gargoyles of Gothic architecture--in every
conceivable attitude of contortion and agony. There are also doves and
fishes, but the latter, being sacred emblems together with the lamb, are
seldom made grotesque. It was a monkish legend that the devil could take
the shape of any bird or beast, except those of the dove and the lamb.




CHAPTER VII

CELTIC ILLUMINATION--_continued_

The Iona Gospels--Contrast with Roman and Byzantine--Details--Treatment
of animal forms--Colour schemes--The Gospel-book of St. Columbanus--That
of Mael Brith Mac Durnan--The Lindisfarne Gospels--_Cumdachs_--Other
book-shrines.


We have seen that in both Roman and Byzantine MSS. the titles and
beginnings of books were merely distinguished by a lettering in red or
gold, rather smaller, in fact, than the ordinary text, but rendered
distinct by the means referred to. The handwriting, too, is clear and
legible, whether capital, uncial, or minuscule.

In absolute contrast to all this the Iona Gospels have the first page
completely covered with ornament. On the next the letters are of an
enormous size, followed by a few words, not merely in _uncials_, but in
characters varying from half an inch to two inches in height. The page
opposite to each Gospel is similarly filled with decoration, separated
into four compartments by an ornamented Greek cross. This may, of
course, be simply a geometrical device in no way connected with Greece,
but, taken in connection with other features, we see in it an indication
of contact with Byzantine work and the side of illumination which deals
rather with the tabular enrichment of the page than the development of
the initial. Further, the writing, though large, is not easily legible,
for it is involved, enclaved, and conjointed in a manner sufficiently
puzzling to those who see it for the first time.

The plaiting and inlaying are certainly borrowed from local usages, and
the survival of the same kind of interlaced plaiting in the Scottish
tartans is some evidence of the long familiarity of the Celtic race with
the art of weaving. When we remember that some of the early illuminators
were also workers in metals, we can understand that penmen like Dagæus,
Dunstan, and Eloy had designs at their command producible by either
method. So we see, both in the MS. and in the brooch and buckle, the
same kind of design. Among the earliest animals brought into this Celtic
work we find the dog and the dragon; the latter both wingless and
winged, according to convenience or requirement. The dog is so common in
some of the Celto-Lombardic MS., of which examples still exist at Monte
Cassino, as almost to create a style; while the dragon survives to the
latest period of Gothic art.

Whatever is introduced into a Celtic illumination is at once treated as
a matter of ornament. When the human figure appears it is remorselessly
subjected to the same rules as the rest of the work; the hair and beard
are spiral coils, the eyes, nostrils, and limbs are symmetrical
flourishes. Colour is quite regardless of natural possibility. The hair
and draperies are simply patterned as compartments of green or blue, or
red or black, as may be required for the _tout ensemble_; the face
remains white. Lightened tints are preferred to full colours, as pale
yellow, pink, lavender, and light green. A very ludicrous device is made
use of to denote the folds of the drapery; they are not darkened, there
is no light and shade in Celtic work, but are simply lines of a strongly
contrasting colour. The blue and red appear to be opaque, and therefore
mineral colours; the rest are thin and transparent. Nothing can be more
wayward than the colouring of the symbolic beasts of the Gospels. In the
Evangeliary of St. Columbanus (not Columba, but the founder of Luxeuil
and Bobbio, who died in 614) the Lion of St. Mark is an admirable beast
in a suit of green-and-red chain armour in the form of mascles or
lozenges. (See the illustration in Westwood's _Palæographia Sacra
Pictoria_ of a figure page from the Gospels of Mael Brith Mac Durnan for
a typical example.)[12]

[12] See also an article by Westwood in _Journal Archæol. Inst._, vii.
17, on "Irish Miniatures."

The only point that might argue the freedom in Celtic work from
Byzantine influence is the absence of gold, but perhaps this was only
because the earlier Irish illuminators could not obtain it; we find it
later on. In the Book of Kells and the Lambeth Gospels there is no gold.
The former dates somewhere in the seventh century, not the sixth, as
sometimes stated; the latter, shortly before 927. In the Lindisfarne
Gospels (698-721) gold is used. In the Psalter of Ricemarchus, now in
Trinity College, Dublin, are traces of silver. It is in connection with
these Irish MSS. that decorated and jewelled cases, called _cumdachs_,
make their appearance, such as the one attached to the Gospels of St.
Moling in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin. These book-shrines are
almost exclusively an Irish production. In other countries the idea was
to adorn the volume itself with a splendid and costly binding, perhaps
including gold, silver, and gems. In Ireland the idea of sacredness was
carried out in another way. Instead of decorating the covers of the book
itself, it was held, as in such a MS., for instance, as the Book of
Durrow, to be too venerable a relic to be meddled with, and a box or
case was made for it, on which they spent all their artistic skill.
Generally the case is known as a _cumdach_; but one kind, called the
_cathach_, was so closed that the book was completely concealed, and it
was superstitiously believed that if it were opened some terrible
calamity would overtake its possessors. Such was the _cathach_ of
Tyrconnell. We must remember, however, that in this instance the keepers
were not men of book-learning, but hardy warriors who carried the
_cathach_ into battle as a charm and an incitement to victory.

Of similar shrines, which were made for precious books by both the
Greeks and Lombards, the oldest and most famous is that made for
Theudelinde, wife of Agilulf, King of the Lombards, and given by her, in
616, together with the famous iron crown and other relics, to the
Cathedral of Monza, where they are still to be seen.

The enrichment of the covers of books themselves, as distinct from the
use of cases or shrines, has been usual in almost all ages and styles of
decoration. When we come to speak of Carolingian MSS. we shall find
several remarkable instances.

We must now pass on from this curiously attractive theme of Celtic
calligraphy to its contemporary styles of France, Germany, Spain, and
Italy, only remarking by the way that no other style of its time had so
marked an influence on the local _scriptoria_ into which it was
introduced as this same Celtic of Ireland. It is not only traceable, but
easily recognised all along the Rhine, in Burgundy, the Swiss Cantons,
and Lombardy, until at length overwhelmed by the general introduction of
Romanesque or Byzantine, which was restored and filtered through the
Exarchate and the Lombard schools during the early days of the new
Carolingian Empire.




CHAPTER VIII

SEMI-BARBARIC ILLUMINATION

Visigothic--Merovingian--Lombardic--Extinction of classic art--Splendid
reign of Dagobert--St. Eloy of Noyon--The Library of Laon--Natural
History of Isidore of Seville--Elements of contemporary art--Details of
ornament--Symbolism--Luxeuil and Monte Cassino--Sacramentary of
Gellone--"Prudentius"--"Orosius"--Value of the Sacramentary of Gellone.


To reach the beginning's of these various degenerate and illiterate
attempts at book-work we have only to watch the last expiring gleams of
classic art beneath the ruthless footsteps of the barbarian invaders of
the old Roman Empire.

In the sixth century the light of the old civilisation was fast fading
away. Perhaps we may look upon the so-called splendour of the reign of
Dagobert in France as the spasmodic scintillations of its latest moments
of existence. The kingdom of Dagobert, after 631, was almost an empire.
For the seven years preceding his death, in 638, he ruled from the Elbe
and the Saxon frontier to that of Spain, and from the Atlantic Ocean to
the confines of Hungary. It was during his reign that we read of the
skill in metal-work of the celebrated St. Eloy of Noyon, the rival of
our own St. Dunstan.

St. Eloy or Eligius (588-659) began his artistic career as the pupil of
Abbo, the goldsmith and mint-master to Chlothaire II., and rose from the
rank of a goldsmith to that of Bishop of Noyon. Among his handiwork were
crowns, chalices, and crosiers, and he is reputed to have made the chair
of bronze-gilt now in the National Library at Paris, called the
_fauteuil_ of Dagobert, and many other works, which disappeared either
during the wars of Louis XV. or those of the Revolution of 1789. He
founded the Abbey of Solignac, near Limoges, and it is not improbable
that the reputation of this city for metal-work and enamelling may be
dated from his foundation. With such works as those of Eloy before them,
it is difficult to believe that the wretched and puerile attempts at
ornamental penmanship and illumination which are shown at Laon and other
places as the work of this period can possibly represent the highest
efforts of the calligrapher. But we must remember that St. Eloy was an
extraordinary genius in his art, and that the bulk of the clergy, not to
mention ordinary workmen, were very ignorant and ill-taught. Very few,
indeed, were men who could be considered cultured. Gregory of Tours, the
historian, and Venantius Fortunatus, the hymn-writer, are among the few.

In the Library at Laon, M. Fleury describes a MS. of the Natural History
of Isidore of Seville, which is looked upon as a work of reference both
as regards art and learning. It was at one time a very popular book,
being a Latin cyclopædia, dealing with the sciences and general
knowledge of the time; yet the example referred to by M. Fleury shows us
only a crowd of initials learnedly styled by the Benedictine authors and
others "ichthio-morphiques" and "ornithoeides," _i.e._ made up of fishes
and birds, and about equal in quality and finish to the efforts of a
very ordinary schoolboy.

These initials betray an utter decadence from the beautiful uncials of
the fifth and sixth centuries, seen in the St. Germain's Psalter, for
example, now in the National Library at Paris. The colours are coarse
and badly applied, and even where brightest are utterly unrefined and
without taste.

Notwithstanding, however, the apparently total eclipse or extinction of
Roman art in Gaul, or, as it must henceforth be called, France, it is
claimed by M. Fleury[13] that the interlacements which constitute the
principal feature of these earlier Merovingian MSS. are derived from the
remains of Roman mosaics found profusely at Blanzy, Bazoches, and Reims.
This may be so, but those mosaics would not account for the same
features in the Irish work, for the Romans never reached Ireland as
occupants or colonists.

[13] See later.

Take another example from the Laon collection, the History of Orosius.
The first page is a type of the species to which it belongs, and,
moreover, a good sample of the earliest efforts of all pictorial art. An
ordinary rectangular cross occupies the centre of the page. The centre
shows us the Lamb of the Apocalypse and St. John. On the arms are the
beasts which typify the Evangelists--their emblems, as they are
sometimes called. We notice that they are all symbolic, and not intended
to be natural imitations of reality. The various animals scattered about
the page are all symbolic--all have a mystical interpretation and
_raison d'être_. A border-frame, passing behind each extremity of the
cross, contains a number of dog-like animals, some plain, others
spotted, while the body of the cross itself is occupied with attempts at
foliage ornaments. In the left upper corner are the letters "X P I," in
the right "I H V," thick foliage springing from the "I" and "V" and
falling back over the monogram. In the lower corners are two fishes and
two doves, each pair hanging to a penwork chain.

The emblem of John, on the upper extremity of the cross, is an
eagle-headed and winged man holding a book; its opposite one of Lucas at
foot is a singularly conceived anthropoid and winged ox, also with a
book. On the left Marcus, whose head is indescribable; and on the right
Matthew, with human head, the rest of the figures being as before. The
eye in all the figures is a most remarkable feature. Both in the
pictures and the initials of this MS. the outline has been drawn in
black ink, and the colours yellow, red, brown, and green applied
afterwards.

As the new masters of the West were not so much interested in the
artistic remains of the mangled civilisation they were endeavouring to
destroy as in mastery and military success, it was left for the
monasteries and the church to see to the welfare of books and monuments.

In the seventh century it was the monasteries that saved almost all we
know of the preceding centuries. During the turmoil of the period from
the fifth to the eighth century we find certain quiet corners where
learning and the arts still breathed, grew, and dwelt in security.
Lérins, founded by St. Honoratus of Aries; Luxeuil by Columbanus, Bobbio
his last retreat; and, above all, Monte Cassino, the great pattern of
monasticism, the Rule of whose founder was destined to become the basis
of all later Orders, were each of them steadily labouring to rescue the
civilisation daily threatened by the ravage of war, and to preserve it
for the benefit of the ignorant hordes who, because of their ignorance,
now only aimed at its entire destruction. We have seen how these monks
and clerics, with more goodwill than ability, did their best to adorn
the books which came into their hands. It is a poor show, but there is
no better. It is absolutely our only record of how civilisation managed
to struggle through the storm.

Let us, then, be thankful even for the Laon "Orosius," for the
Sacramentary of Gellone, and the Mozarabic Liturgies of Puy. They are
among the links between ancient and mediæval art.

As already stated, the handwriting of Merovingian MSS. is mainly an
adaptation of the Roman uncial, as it is in Irish and Lombardic, or, we
might say, everywhere else. Abbreviations we still uncommon. Where
minuscules are used, the writing is not quite so legible as in the
larger hands, but we are not met by the singular difficulties of some of
the Lombardic texts.

A few solitary texts of the earliest time are in capitals, such as the
really handsome "Prudentius" of the Paris National Library, where the
entire text of the great Christian poet is boldly inscribed in the
centre of a large white page of vellum, like a series of separate
inscriptions. The first few words are "rubrished" in the antique manner.
The MS. is supposed to date previous to the year 527. A little later
than this St. Columbanus founded the monastery of Luxeuil, and later
still, viz. in 616, that of Bobbio.

If we turn to the Visigothic area, including the South of France and the
entire peninsula of Spain, our first and typical example is the
celebrated Sacramentary of Gellone. This MS. dates, it is said, from the
eighth century. It is written throughout in Visigothic uncials, though
executed in the South of France. Its ornamentation is frankly barbaric.
The colours used are yellow, red, and green. The great initials are
double lined, and the interlinear space filled in with a flat tint of
colour and lines of red dots, as in the Book of Kells occasionally
follow the contours. Here, also, are the fish or bird-form letters as in
the Laon "Orosius." Now and then occurs a tiny scene--perhaps a fight
between two grotesque brutes, neither fish, nor fowl, nor beast known to
the naturalist, but a horrible compound of the worst qualities of each.
The human figure, when it occurs, is childishly shapeless. But the
design and treatment, nevertheless, bear witness to a lively imagination
and considerable knowledge of Christian symbolism. It is these mental
qualities which, in spite of the manifest absence of manual skill,
render the Gellone Evangeliary one of the most precious monuments of its
time. Of the rest of the MSS. of this wretched period we will say
nothing.

          "Non ragioniam di lor', ma guard' e passa."

We are glad to hurry on for another century or so, remembering that the
leading idea now is the development of the initial letter.




CHAPTER IX

DEVELOPMENT OF THE INITIAL

The initial and initial paragraph the main object of decoration in
Celtic illumination--Study of the letter L as an example--The I of "In
principio" and the B of "Beatus Vir."


From the moment when the initial was placed beneath the miniature the
object of the whole design was not to give prominence to the initial but
to the picture. Until then, that is, whilst the initial remains above or
beside or outside the picture, it is the initial we must watch for style
and development. And therefore we seize on one letter among those of the
latter part of the eighth century, because of the frequency of its
occurrence in the Gospel-book or Evangeliary, one of the commonest books
of the time. This the letter L of "Liber Generationis," etc., the
commencing words of St. Matthew. This passage is always made of
importance, and on the initial and arrangement of the words the artist
expends his best efforts.

Properly I should here display pictorially the series of which I speak.
It would certainly be the quickest way of explaining the matter. But as
this is out of the question for many reasons, and as the present little
guide aims rather at showing the way than marching through it, the
reader must be content to take its advice about where to look for
examples which it cannot reproduce.

Regarding the letter L as an index of time and style, first we may take
the Irish L of the Book of Kells on p. 17, pt. 1, of Miss Stokes' _Early
Christian Art in Ireland_. Note first the form of the letter, then the
way it is filled up with ornament. Compare this, which dates from the
seventh century, with a similar L in the Ada-Codex in the Town Library
at Trèves, No. 22. A black and white copy of this is given in taf. 6 of
Lamprecht Initial Ornamentik. This carries up the work to the second
half of the eighth century. Next, say the L in the Town Archives at
Cologne, No. 147. This belongs to the second half of the ninth century.
The chief departure here is towards the knotted band work which figures
so largely afterwards both in German and Italian book ornament, the form
is still unchanged. But with the tenth century comes change of form as
well as of mode of filling, as for example taf. 19 of Lamprecht, in
which there is a complete alteration of treatment. The student may take
for similar comparison also the I of "In principio" of St. John's
Gospel, and the B of the first psalm in the Psalter, and carry the
comparison on to the end of the fourteenth century, by referring to the
MSS. in the British Museum and other public libraries, or in the
numerous illustrated works to be found in those collections.




CHAPTER X

FIRST ENGLISH STYLES

Transition from Iona to Lindisfarne--Influence of Frankish art--The
"Opus Anglicum"--The Winchester school and its characteristics--Whence
obtained--Method of painting--Examples--Where found and described.


The succession of the school of Iona shows us in the first examples of
English illumination the type exemplified in the Book of Kells,
modified, but not very much, by its transference to Lindisfarne.

Whatever doubt may be felt as to the influence of Byzantine or
Romanesque models on pure Irish work, such as the Book of Kells, there
can be none as regards the Lindisfarne Gospels. In the first place we
have gold both in the lettering and ornament. This MS., known also as
the Durham Book (Brit. Mus., Nero D. iv.), was the work of Abbat
Eadfrith, of Lindisfarne. It has been often described, as it is really a
most precious example of eighth-century art in this country. No other
MS. of its time is to be found in any continental scriptorium to be
compared with it. It is not a collection of clumsy inartistic attempts
at ornamental writing, but high-class, effective work, which should be
seen and studied by every student of illumination.

From its style of execution, its details of portraiture, and other
features, it may be looked on as one of the earliest links between the
two extremes of Oriental and Occidental Art.

Another MS. in the British Museum (Vesp. A. 1), which combines the Roman
method of painting as in the Vergils with the penwork of these
Anglo-Celtic Gospel-books, may also repay careful examination.

It is very possible that the celebrated _scriptoria_ of York and Jarrow
may have been furnished with both MSS. and copyists from Rome, yet there
can be little doubt that the intercourse with Durham would be quite as
active. Nor is it less probable that similar intercourse would keep them
_en rapport_ with Oxford, St. Alban's, Westminster, Glastonbury, and
other _scriptoria_, so that in the eighth century England stood with
respect to art second to no other country in the Christian world.

During the ninth century active intercourse with the Frankish Empire
enriched English churches and religious houses, especially Winchester,
with examples of Byzantine and Roman models, which Charlemagne had
introduced into his own palatine schools. From such secondary models as
the Sacramentaries and Evangeliaries executed at Tours, Soissons, Metz,
and other busy centres of production, English illuminators succeeded in
forming a distinctive style of their own. In the French or, rather,
Frankish MSS., while the richness of the gold and the beauty and
delicacy of the colouring are in themselves most charming, and while
certain features may in general be recognised as no doubt suggestive
there is nothing which quite predicts the remarkable treatment which
characterises the English work. "Opus Anglicum" was its distinctive
title. The term, indeed, was applied to all English artistic productions
more or less--embroidery among the rest. The women of England, says
William of Poitiers, were famous for their needlework, the men excelled
in metal-work and jewellery. But it was the illuminated Service Books
that have perpetuated the term.

From the Lindisfarne Gospels to the Winchester Benedictionals is a far
cry--but Art is long and time is fleeting, hence many pages of
intervening description must be omitted. We may, however, refer the
reader to Westwood's _Palæographia Sacra Pictoria_, the Palæographical
Society's publications, and other works, for enlightenment on this
period. On the Rouen and Devonshire Benedictionals much interesting
information may be found in vol. 24 of the _Archæologia_ and in the
recent volume of the Bradshaw Society concerning them.

The work is peculiar; and if we consider the treatment of foliage apart
from the colour, we cannot but notice its similarity to the ivory
carving observable in the consular diptychs. Ivory carving was then a
popular artistic occupation. The foliage is graceful, the composition
well-balanced, and the colour mostly bright body colour applied in the
Greek manner. The fault of the heads is that they are too small for the
figure, and of the draperies that the folds are overdone too much
fluttering detail. The gilding differs from the Byzantine in not being
laid on the vellum in the form of burnished leaf, but painted on like
the colours, not only in the figures but in the framework and ornaments.

The British Museum contains several characteristic examples, but, as has
been said, the very finest are those at Rouen and in the library of the
Duke of Devonshire.

Perhaps no genuine example exists earlier than the Golden Charter of
King Edgar of true Winchester illumination, executed forty years after
the accession of Athelstan, whose Coronation Book (Brit. Mus., Tib. A.
2) is most probably not English at all, but Carolingian of the finest
type. Many other _scriptoria_ in England in the tenth century were
equally busy with Winchester, but none could vie with the royal city in
the production of illuminated books.




CHAPTER XI

CAROLINGIAN ILLUMINATION

Why so-called--Works to be consulted--The Library of St. Gall--Rise and
progress of Carolingian art--Account of various MSS.--Features of the
style--Gospels of St. Sernin--The Ada-Codex--Centres of
production--Other splendid examples--The Alcuin Bible--The Gospel of St.
Médard of Soissons.


Once more crossing the Channel let us now inquire what has been doing
among the Franks since the Gellone Sacramentary, especially in the
schools instituted by the Emperor Charles the Great. Materials for this
inquiry are most abundant. One of the more important works on the
subject is the lucid monograph of Dr. Rahn, of Zurich, on the Golden
Psalter of Folchard at St. Gall, which deals more or less with the whole
question of Carolingian art, while M. Léop. Delisle's brochure on the
Evangeliary of St. Vaast of Arras gives us a copious account of the
Franco-Saxon branch of it. Apart, however, from these sources of
information, we have not a few original MSS. still extant, which, of
course, more vividly speak for themselves, and only require pointing out
to the student.

The clearest method of study being to take things in the order of their
creation, so in order to understand the "character of savage grandeur
and naïve originality" which has been attributed to this style, it will
be best to take up these MSS. chronologically. At the same time, if
anyone merely wishes to know what the style is like at its best, Dr.
Rahn must be his guide, as the Golden Psalter which he has selected for
study is as splendid an example as perhaps may be found in the whole
career of the art. We have noticed how the Irish missionary-artists
carried their work to their continental settlements, how they planted
their schools in Burgundy, Switzerland, and Lombardy. Of all their
depositories, however, numerous as they are elsewhere, none is richer in
the relics of their work than the celebrated abbey which takes its name
of St. Gall from that disciple of St. Columbanus, who in 614 founded his
little cell beside the Steinach, about nine miles south of the Lake of
Constance. Under Charles Martel the cell had become a monastery, which
he endowed as a Benedictine abbey. In 830 was founded its magnificent
library of MSS. The library still exists, and at the present moment
gives shelf-room to 1,800 MSS. and more than 41,700 printed books.
Besides this, another, called the Town Library, founded in the sixteenth
century, and containing 500 MSS. and 60,400 printed books, gives this
upland, busy, modern manufacturing Swiss town no mean importance as a
centre of literary culture. Physically it is probably the highest town
in Europe, its street-level being very nearly 2,200 feet above that of
the sea. Its libraries and museums are rich storehouses of mediæval
treasures. The architect raves over its monastic buildings; the scholar
and palæographer gloat over its books and MSS. In the libraries of St.
Gall are some of the masterpieces of Irish Saxon, and Carolingian art,
and its great Benedictine abbey under Grimald from 841, _i.e._ during
the later Carolingian period, possessed one of the most active
_scriptoria_ in Europe. To begin with the beginning, however, we must
leave St. Gall, and, passing by some less important MSS., go back to the
year 781 and the city of Toulouse. In that year, and in the Abbey of St.
Sernin (Saturninus) in that city, was finished a wonderful and truly
splendid manuscript of the Gospels as a present to the Emperor and his
wife Hildegardis. This is our first example. It now is to be seen in the
National Library, Paris (Nouv. acqu. Lat. 1203).

Next comes the Evangeliary of Abbat Angilbert of Centula (now St.
Riquier), near Abbeville, Charlemagne's son-in-law. This MS., executed
about the year 793, is still preserved in the Town Library of Abbeville.
In the same rank, but somewhat finer in execution, comes a third
Evangeliary, that of St. Médard of Soissons, now in the National
Library, Paris (No. 8850, Lat.).

In these three MSS., reproductions from which are to be found in various
modern works on art, the writing and ornamentation are the parts into
which the artist puts his best work, not the figure drawing. Although in
the St. Sernin MS. there is, in the Christ-figure, a distinct attempt at
portraiture quite different from the coils and pen-flourishes which make
up the Gospel-figures in the Irish and Merovingian MSS. Here the
inspiration is clearly Greek, not Irish. The figure is draped in green
and violet--seated on an embroidered cushion before a low castellated
wall. The hair is light, and the chin beardless. The design shows a
decided likeness to the consular ivory diptychs, and the painting
follows the Eastern methods. In the details of ornament only are Irish
features. Thus we trace in this MS. the sources of Carolingian art. The
MS. being dated, is important as affording a means of comparison with
other undated work. It was presented to St. Sernin on the occasion of
the visit of the Emperor and Empress with their son, the amiable Louis
"le Debonaire,"[14] just after the latter had been made King of
Aquitaine. Godeschalk, the writer of it, on the last two leaves tells us
that it took him seven years to accomplish. It is written throughout in
gold and silver letters on purple vellum, and is, moreover, ornamented
with borders, pictures, portraits, and panellings. At first it was kept
in a _cumdach_ of silver, set with precious stones, but that has
disappeared.

[14] Mod. Fr. "Debonnaire."

The Golden Gospels of St. Médard, like the Centula MS., are similar, but
betoken an advance in both taste and execution. The figures are still
rude and deformed, but the artist shows a laudable desire, an ambition,
in fact, to imitate the work of better artists than himself.
Nevertheless, the calligraphy and borderwork are the best parts of his
performance. In this MS. the use of silver betrays a tendency to
prodigality. In design, the influence of the artists who built the new
church of San Vitale at Ravenna, a church which became the model for the
Abbey of St. Médard itself, is quite manifest, yet perhaps need not be
traced further than Soissons or Pavia. In certain of the illustrations,
as, for instance, the "Fountain of Life," there is at once a likeness
and a variation as compared with the same symbol in the Evangeliary of
St. Sernin. They are both too intricate to describe, but of both it may
be said that they show an intimate acquaintance with early Christian
symbolism. The ivory carving and architecture of Ravenna have evidently
been known to the director of these frames and backgrounds. In the year
which saw the completion of Godeschalk's Gospels, Alcuin was at Parma,
but when the St. Médard's Gospels were written he was Abbot of St.
Martin's at Tours. It was the presence of Alcuin at the Court of
Charlemagne that accounts for the prevalence of the Saxon character in
the new and beautiful handwriting we now call Carolingian. It was the
presence of Paul Warnefrid that accounts for much of the classic and
most of the Lombardic features, both of the writing and the
illumination. Many other scholars assisted these two in the various
centres in which Alcuin established branches of the palatine schools.
The intercourse with Italy and England was constant, and led to the
frequent interchange of books, and community of methods and models.
Another fine MS. of the same period (c. 780) is the Golden Ada-Codex of
St. Mesmin or Maximin, of Trèves. In 1794 this MS. was taken from Trèves
to Mainz; in 1815 it was transferred to Aix-la-Chapelle, and is now back
again at Trèves. The externals of the Ada-Codex are very costly, its
binding being a late Gothic pendant to the cover of the Echternach
Evangeliary at Gotha. In the centre of the fore-cover there is a
magnificent topaz,[15] with several imperial figures. Inside, the work is
a handsome example of the early Carolingian.[16] It contains the four
Gospels written by order of the "Mother and Lady Ada," sister of Charles
the Great, Abbess of St. Mesmin. Next we have in the British Museum
another grand example of the style as modified by English or Saxon
influence. Also the Zurich Bible, of the same date, executed at
Tours--and the Bamberg Bible, said to be a copy of the Alcuin Bible of
the same school. Then follow the Drogo Sacramentary, presented by the
Emperor to his natural son Drogo, Archbishop of Metz (826-855), perhaps
illuminated at Metz, but of the same school as those above mentioned.

[15] Or sardonyx (Lamprecht says topaz.)

[16] A photograph of the cover is sold by F. Linz of Trèves.

In our own National Library, again, we have the Athelstan Gospels (Harl.
2788), also in all probability executed at Metz. At Paris (Nat. Lib.,
Theol. Lat. 266) is the Evangeliary of Lothaire--a most beautiful
example of gold-writing and ornament. So we might enumerate a score of
splendid MSS., and classify them into their various minor schools. But
such is not our object. All we want here is a general but clear idea of
the style as a whole.

To characterise it broadly by the names of its most important elements
we should call it a Lombard-Saxon style--the interlacing bands and knots
and other minor features and the main character of the writing being of
Saxon origin, the classical foliages and manner of painting the figures
and certain ideas of design Lombardic, strengthened by direct contact
with the sources of the latter style. Whatever variations there may be,
they can generally be accounted for according to locality and centre of
production. We have instanced a few examples of the earlier time as
showing the principal features of the style. Under the Emperor Charles
the Great's grandson, Charles the Bald, Carolingian illumination reached
its highest point of excellence, and the MSS. executed for him or his
contemporaries accordingly give a correct idea of what Carolingian
illuminators considered as good work. The chief centres were still Tours
and Metz--the latter a branch of the former, but gradually developing
distinct features of its own; and among the productions of these schools
there still remain precious--we might say priceless--examples, such as
the Vivien Bible of the Paris Library, so-called because presented by
Count Vivien, Abbat of St. Martin's of Tours, to Charles the Bald in
850.[17] It contains a fine picture of the presentation with _beardless_
figures. It has also a number of exceedingly splendid initials showing
strong Byzantine influence--capitals of columns of classic origin and
traces of Merovingian in letter forms and ornamental details. It is like
the Evangeliary of Lothaire, already mentioned, a most sumptuous example
rich in silver and gold--the latter having a grand portrait of Lothaire
seated on his throne. Both MSS. are in the National Library at Paris,
the Vivien, No. 1 (Theol. Lat.), the Lothaire, No. 266. But the one
example to which we would call the reader's attention, though among the
earlier productions of the period, as not only most readily accessible,
but most precious to the English student, is the celebrated Alcuin Bible
in the British Museum (Add. MS. 10546). This venerable MS. is a copy of
the Vulgate revised by Alcuin himself, and said to be exactly similar to
the one at Bamberg. Biblical revision was perhaps the most important of
his many literary occupations, and this volume is reasonably believed to
be the actual copy prepared for presentation to Charlemagne under the
reviser's own superintendence, possibly, in part at least, the work of
his own hand. It is a large folio, finely written in a neat minuscule,
mainly Saxon hand, with uncial initials in two columns. The miniatures,
including their architectural details, are in the Roman manner, the
ornaments partly Byzantine, partly Celtic. The great similarity of
design between different manuscripts is strikingly exemplified by a
comparison of three borders from (_a_) the Evangeliary of St. Vaast of
Arras, fol. 28 _v._ (see Delisle); (_b_) the Evangel. in National
Library, Paris, anc. fds. Lat. 257 (see Louandre), and Evangeliary No.
309 Bibl. de Cambrai (see Durieux).

[17] Plate in t. 1 of Louandre.

Indeed, comparisons of this kind are very instructive frequently as
suggestive of _provenance_, as each working centre would have its own
set of models and designs. Of course, comparison of the MSS. themselves
is out of the question, but the comparisons can often be effected by the
student's having Louandre, Durieux, Fleury, Labarte, etc., by his side
during the examination of any given period. The limits of our little
book forbid our speaking of other examples of this splendid style, but
we cannot conclude without noticing that in the opinion of M. Ferdinand
Denis, the Golden Gospels of St. Médard of Soissons is the most
beautiful Carolingian MSS. extant.




CHAPTER XII

MONASTIC ILLUMINATION

Introductory--Monasteries and their work from the sixth to the ninth
century--The claustral schools--Alcuin--Warnefrid and Theodulf--Clerics
and monastics--The Golden Age of monasticism--The Order of St.
Benedict--Cistercian houses--Other Orders--Progress of writing in
Carolingian times--Division of labour.


In the sixth century the monasteries, such as they were, necessarily
kept themselves very quiet and unobtrusive. They were situated usually
in out-of-the-way corners, solitudes apart from civilisation, or, at
least, apart from the busy haunts of men. In the eighth century there is
a marked difference. The Capitular of Aix-la-Chapelle, of 789, required
that minor schools should be attached _to all monasteries and cathedral
churches_ without exception, and that children of all ranks, _both noble
and servile_, should be received into them. Also that the larger
monasteries should open major schools in which the seven sciences of
mathematics, astronomy, arithmetic, music, rhetoric, dialectics, and
geography, were to be taught--and this in two ways. There were to be two
sorts of schools--interior or _claustral_, intended for monastics only,
and exterior or _canonical_, intended for secular students. These
schools were under separate scholastics or masters, and lay students
were received in the exterior schools as freely and fully as in the
public schools of the present time. Mabillon[18] gives a list of some
twenty-seven monastic and cathedral schools, by no means confined to
great or wealthy cities, but well distributed throughout the Empire.

[18] Præfat. in iv. Sæcul. 184.

In the time of Charlemagne those most in repute were Tours, St. Gall,
Fulda, Reims, and Hirsfeld.

We have given the names of Alcuin and Paul Warnefrid as the chief
promoters of the Carolingian Revival, but we should not omit that of
Theodulf, of Orleans, the indefatigable school inspector of the time. He
it was who assisted the artistic side of the movement by his ingenious
contrivances as a writer and illustrator of school books. Undoubtedly it
was from his suggestions that we so often find in mediæval scientific
treatises of the driest kind those graphic and wonderful tabulations and
edifices, labelled and turreted, which make Aristotle, Priscian, and
Marcianus Capella, not only comprehensible, but attractive. Theodulf
composed in simple and easy Latin verse--somewhat after the style of the
_Propria quæ maribus_ our own childhood--the description of a supposed
tree of science, which he had drawn and painted, on the trunk and
branches of which were the figures and names of the seven liberal arts.
At the foot sat Grammar--the basis of all learning--holding on her hand
a lengthy rod (ominous for the tender student). On the right Rhetoric
stretched forth her hand. On the left was Dialectic. Philosophy sat on
the summit; the rest being disposed according to their relative
importance. The whole was explained in the _Carmina de septem artibus_,
in which the bishop, who was one of the famous poets of the age, strove
in flowery language to render these dry-as-dust studies acceptable to
the youthful understanding. Theodulf was a great scholar, and assisted
Alcuin in the revision of the Bible, one copy of which he himself had
written whilst still Abbat of Fleury, about 790. At the beginning of
this Bible is a poem in golden letters on purple, and a preface in
prose, also in golden letters, giving a synopsis of the several books.
The text differs somewhat from the Alcuin Bible, as it is that of Jerome
before Alcuin's revision. This MS. is now at Paris. Another Bible
executed to the order of Theodulf is now in the Town Library at Puy.

It seems incredible, after the efforts made by Charlemagne and his
ministers for the maintenance of learning and the arts, that there
should ever be any risk of a return to barbarism, but it is a fact that
the dissolution of the Empire proved in certain localities the
suspension of prosperity. Fortunately the monastics--especially the
Benedictines--and the canons of the cathedrals still kept up the
practice of copying books; but almost all the South of France,
Languedoc, and Provence, always conservative, remained more or less
illiterate. They produced poets and jongleurs, but seldom artists or
scholars. And even in the North, where the capitular schools were most
flourishing--as Paris, Reims, and Chartres--the general tendency was
towards relapse. In High Germany it was even worse. In spite of all
efforts of the clergy by the extension of secular schools, the laity
preferred the excitement of chase and camp to the quiet humdrum of the
schoolroom. Religion seemed to be regarded rather as a profession than a
principle, quite right in its place, _i.e._ the Church and the
monastery, but unsuited for active life. The wealthy land-owners,
therefore, did not cease to endow religious houses or to build churches,
but they left book-learning to the clerics. Accordingly the clerics and
the monastics flourished exceedingly.

From the beginning of the tenth century to the beginning of the
thirteenth was the Golden Age of monasticism. The Order of St. Benedict
scattered its foundations thickly over France and Western Germany, while
its reformed colonies of Cluny, Citeaux, Clairvaux, and the Chartreuse
again spread their settlements in all directions. Thus we find Cluny
established in 910, Grammont in 1076, the Chartreuse in 1080, Citeaux in
1098, Savigny in 1105, Tiron in 1109, Austin Canons in 1038,
Premonstrants in 1120, Crutched Friars in 1169. In England, from 1100,
scarcely a year passed by without the establishment of some fresh
foundation. During the thirty-five years of the reign of Henry I. more
than 150 religious houses were founded. And even during the disastrous
reign of Stephen, in less than twenty years, no fewer than 100 houses of
various Orders were established. The twelfth century in England was
especially the age of monasteries.

It is true that not very much in the way of original literature, except
theological treatises, can be assigned to the three centuries referred
to, but the unwearied labours of the copyist and illuminator did much to
preserve the works which previous centuries had created. Of course, in
so long a period changes were many and great. So great, indeed, that
between a MS. of 850 and another of 1200 scarcely is there a common
feature.

From 850 to 1000 in France the Carolingian minuscule, from the first so
clear and beautiful, remained with scarce a stroke of alteration. But
immediately after the opening of the eleventh century a series of rapid
changes set in, and by the beginning of the twelfth a new hand,
perfectly clear and regular, but quite different from the Carolingian,
had been formed, which lasted until it was superseded by the Gothic,
while a system of contractions adopted because of the scarcity of
parchment creates a fresh need for study apart from the peculiarities of
personal habits. Side by side, too, with this there grows up a
non-professional hand--the so-called cursive or running hand of the
ordinary writer--in many cases, especially in deeds and other brief
compositions, all but utterly illegible, except to the professional
palæographer. Occasionally these autographs are of the highest
importance and intensely interesting, as, for instance, when in an
English MS. we come Across a note in the handwriting of Ordericus
(Vitalis) or Matthew Paris.

From 900 to 1200 the vast majority of MSS., illuminated and otherwise,
were the work of monastics. Every house of any note had its room set
apart for writing. The larger monasteries sometimes utilised the
cloisters of the churches themselves, in recesses of which they had
desks or tables placed for the copyist. Usually, however, they had a
large common room called the scriptorium, where either the copyist and
illuminator worked separately and each on his own account, or where a
number of copyists awaited with pen and parchment the dictation by one
of the fraternity of some work of which a number of copies had to be
made. "No admittance except on business" was the rule of this chamber.
There, under the direction of the _armarius_, the expert writers did
their work.

Sometimes a single monk executed the book from first to last by himself.
He prepared the vellum, ruled it with the fine metal point, copied the
text, painted the illuminations, put on the gilding, and even added the
binding. Generally, however, the labour was divided--one monk scraped
and polished the parchment; another ruled it; another wrote the text,
leaving spaces for initials and miniatures; another put in the initials
and did the gilding and flourishing with borders, etc.; and another
painted the miniatures. This in the monasteries was done in the case of
large and important MSS., and afterwards, when illuminating became a
lay-craft, subdivision of labour was the common practice. Binding was
done in a special apartment, and by one specially skilled therein.

The _scriptorium_ was looked upon as a sort of sacred place, and the
work of copying often considered as a labour of piety and love--entered
upon with devout prayer, and solemnly blessed by the superior,
especially in cases where the books to be written were Bibles, or
connected with the services of the house, the Lives of the Saints, or
Treatises on Theology.

Very frivolous or absurd indeed are sometimes the inducements to
copyists to do gratuitous work of this kind, such as that every letter
transcribed paid for one sin of the copyist, and it is said that a
certain monk--a heavy sinner--only owed his salvation to the fact that
the number of letters in a Bible which he copied exceeded by a single
unit the sum total of his sins.




CHAPTER XIII

MONASTIC ILLUMINATION--_continued_

The copyists--Gratuitous labour--Last words of copyists--Disputes
between Cluny and Citeaux--The Abbey of Cluny: its grandeur and
influences--Use of gold and purple vellum--The more influential abbeys
and their work in France, Germany, and the Netherlands.


Of course, only really expert calligraphers were employed on great and
important works. In the monastery all such labour was gratuitous, that
is, the copyist received no pecuniary remuneration, only his food and
lodging. Yet even this had to be provided for. Hence the frequent
requests for donations from the laity.

To give a volume to a monastery did not always mean actually to present
the book, but to stand the expense of its production in the monastery
itself. In the case of specially distinguished penmen, their
entertainment in a monastery was sometimes an expensive business. It was
only in later times, however, when lay-artists were invited to reside in
the monastery to do their work that money was paid for their services.
Very often we find notices at the end of volumes that "So-and-so" had
ordered the book to be written and illuminated at his expense, and an
invocation for the gratitude of the reader and remembrance in his
prayers is added, sometimes with the date to the very hour when the book
was finished.

The copyist's last words after his task was completed are often very
full of weariness--sometimes pious, sometimes hankering after fleshly
lusts, occasionally quite too dreadful to repeat. "May Christ recompense
for ever him who caused this book to be written." At the end of a Life
of St. Sebastian: "Illustrious martyr, remember the monk Gondacus who in
this slender volume has included the story of thy glorious miracles. May
thy merits assist me to penetrate the heavenly kingdom; and may thy holy
prayers aid me as they have aided so many others who have owed to them
the ineffable enjoyments both of body and soul." Wailly quotes the
following: "Dextram scriptoris benedicat mater honoris" ("May the mother
of honour bless the writer's right hand"). A very common ending is "Qui
scripsit scribat semper cum Domino vivat" ("He who wrote, let him write;
may he ever live with the Lord"). Another: "Explicit expliceat. Bibere
scriptor eat" ("It is finished. Let it be finished, and let the writer
go out for a drink"). Another ending is "Vinum scriptori reddatur de
meliori" ("Let wine of the best be given to the writer"). And again:
"Vinum reddatur scriptori, non teneatur" ("Let wine be given to the
writer; let it not be withheld"). Here is the recompense wished for by a
French monk: "Detur pro penâ scriptori pulcra puella" ("Let a pretty
girl be given to the writer for his pains," or "as a penance") The monks
enjoyed puns, as "bibere," a common pun on "vivere." One writer groans
thus: "Scribere qui nescit, nullum putat esse laborem" ("Whoso knows not
how to write, thinks it is no trouble").

As time goes on, after the tenth century, it is noticeable that the more
beautiful a manuscript becomes in its writing the less accurate becomes
its Latinity. And so the monks who once were noted for learning,
gradually lose their grip on Latin. The manuscripts executed in
Benedictine abbeys became inaccurate--almost illiterate. Faults of
ignorance of words; misrendering of proper names; blundering in the
inept introduction of marginal notes and confounding such notes with the
text, showing that the heart of the copyist was not in his work nor his
head capable of performing it. His hand is simply a machine, which when
it goes wrong does so without remorse and without shame. So in the
greater houses, men were appointed whose sole business was to supervise
the copyists--in fact, to supply the brains, while the scribe furnished
the manipulation of the pen. Even they, however, did not always succeed
to perfection, as very few of them were too well furnished with
scholarship. There were not many Alcuins or Theodulfs in the twelfth
century. What they did usually keep free from serious error were the
books used in their own services. It was the aim, particularly among the
Cistercian houses, to have their liturgical texts absolutely without
fault. In respect of illumination, there was a great quarrel between the
Abbey of Citeaux and that of Cluny. The great Abbey of Clugny (or Cluny)
in ancient Burgundy was founded in 910, and in the course of a century
or obtained a degree of splendour, influence, and prosperity unrivalled
by any other mediæval foundation. It possessed enormous wealth and
covered Western Europe with its affiliated settlements. Under Peter the
Venerable, when the controversy began, it was the chief monastic centre
of the Christian world. The words of Pope Urban II., when addressing the
community, were: "Ye are the light of the world."

The grand Basilica at Cluny was completed in 1131, and, until the
erection of St. Peter's at Rome, was the largest church in Christendom,
and even then was only ten feet shorter than the Roman edifice. The
building is a masterpiece of architectural beauty and massiveness, being
with its narthex added by Abbat Roland de Hainaut, no less in length
than 555 feet. The splendour of the church, its gorgeous tombs and
mausoleums, its huge coronals for lights of brass, silver, and gold--the
grand candelabrum before the altar, with its settings of crystal and
beryl--the mural painting of the cupola, and the general luxury and
magnificence of the whole constituted an unpardonable sin in the eyes of
the stern and self-denying Cistercians. Hence arose long disputes
between the abbats of the two houses about tithes and other matters.
Among the other matters were included questions of candlesticks and
bindings and gildings of books. The two houses were long at variance on
the right definition of luxury in living, and this variance may to this
day be observed in their separate and distinct styles, both of
architecture and the ornamentation of books. The use of gold was still
continued in the older Benedictine abbeys, but was long forbidden in the
Cistercian, almost all the ornament of the latter being confined to
pen-drawing and the use of coloured inks. The employment of gold for the
text of manuscripts so common in the ninth century became rare in the
eleventh. Only here and there do we hear of such volumes. Where the gold
lettering still lingers, it is confined to the first page or two, and
the same may be said of the purple vellum. A certain monk, Adémar, who
died at Jerusalem in 1034, wrote a Life of St. Martial of Limoges
entirely in letters of gold; but it was quite an exceptional volume.
Another example occurs in an Evangeliary, which was probably a copy of a
ninth-century model, as at first glance it might be assigned to that
age, but on closer examination it is found that in one of the borders is
a medallion bearing the name of the Emperor Otho, showing that it cannot
be later than the latter part of the tenth century. It is now in the
National Library at Paris.

Before speaking of Othonian illumination it may be well to refer to that
of the Netherlands in these earlier centuries.

The most ancient writings known in this district were charters and other
documents, and the pious effusion of the occupants of the monasteries,
such as St. Amand, Lobbes, Stavelot, etc.

It was the revival of art and literature under Charlemagne that was the
beginning of artistic calligraphy, then followed the production of books
outside the monasteries, classical authors, chronicles, and mirrors of
various sciences. In the eleventh century we find monastic books and
others of which the ornamentation is sometimes even splendid, such as
Psalters, Evangeliaries, Bibles, and Missals, glowing with gold and
colours. Already the Abbeys of Stavelot and Liége were high-class
centres of production. St. Martin's of Tournay had a famous scriptorium
also, noted for the beauty of its writing and its grand initial letters.
Immediately following St. Martin's, the Abbeys of Gembloux, St. Bavon at
Ghent, and others, produced or acquired MSS. of the most sumptuous kind,
and before the thirteenth century the Netherlands had established quite
a distinguished reputation.

In a later chapter we shall deal with the development of its remarkable
schools, whose work eventually took rank, not only among the most
artistic, but the most prolific in Europe.




CHAPTER XIV

OTHONIAN ILLUMINATION

Departure from Carolingian--Bird and serpent--Common use of dracontine
forms in letter-ornament--Influence of metal-work on the forms of
scroll-ornament--The vine-stem and its developments--Introduction of
Greek taste and fashion into Germany--Cistercian illumination--The
Othonian period--Influence of women as patronesses and
practitioners--German princesses--The Empress Adelheid of Burgundy--The
Empress Theophano--Henry II. and the Empress
Cunegunda--Bamberg--Examples of Othonian art.


Perhaps the first departure towards a new style arising out of the
elements of Carolingian illumination is in the combination of the bird
and serpent used for letter forms and continued into coils of vine-stem
and foliage in combination with golden panelled frames or pilasters. The
monsters thus produced seem to be a revival of the dracontine forms of
the semi-barbarous Celtic and early Frankish arts. But the difference in
elegance and refinement o