Illuminated Manuscripts Part 4

CHAPTER VIII

SEMI-BARBARIC ILLUMINATION

Visigothic--Merovingian--Lombardic--Extinction of cla.s.sic 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 Ca.s.sino--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 cla.s.sic 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 cyclopaedia, 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 coa.r.s.e 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 const.i.tute the princ.i.p.al 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'etre_. A border-frame, pa.s.sing 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.

Lerins, founded by St. Honoratus of Aries; Luxeuil by Columba.n.u.s, Bobbio his last retreat; and, above all, Monte Ca.s.sino, 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 mediaeval 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. Columba.n.u.s 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 s.p.a.ce 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 pa.s.sa."

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 pa.s.sage 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 Treves, 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 ill.u.s.trated works to be found in those collections.

CHAPTER X

FIRST ENGLISH STYLES

Transition from Iona to Lindisfarne--Influence of Frankish art--The "Opus Anglic.u.m"--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-cla.s.s, 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, Glas...o...b..ry, 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 Anglic.u.m" was its distinctive t.i.tle. 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 _Palaeographia Sacra Pictoria_, the Palaeographical 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 _Archaeologia_ 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.