Flood, fire and war: fragmentary manuscripts in The Medieval Imagination exhibition.[FIGURE 1 OMITTED] Introduction Fragmentary manuscripts make up the majority of the surviving illuminated medieval material in existence today. The circumstances of how and why manuscripts are broken are as variable as their contents. However, their stories are linked by common themes of disaster and restoration, or perhaps more aptly, transformation. The manuscript fragment exists neither as a true representation of the original object nor as a facsimile. It is a relic requiring greater interpretation than a complete manuscript, and carrying with it complex records of its journey. This essay examines three fragmentary manuscripts included in the State Library of Victoria's The Medieval Imagination exhibition, in particular the events surrounding their ruination and the way in which the meaning of these manuscripts has changed through both their perceived and physical states. I Flood: Four bi-folios from a book of hours book of hours, form of prayer book developed in the 14th cent. from the prayers of clerics appended to the main service. The subjects of the miniature illustrations (see miniature painting) were frequently derived from the appendix of the Psalter. by the workshop of the Boucicaut Master Boucicaut Master (b sēkō`), active c.1375–1400, Franco-Flemish manuscript illuminator.
The Baillieu Library, University of Melbourne
In 2006, Times Higher Education Supplement ranked the University of Melbourne 22nd in the world. Because of the drop in ranking, University of Melbourne is currently behind four Asian universities - Beijing University, , owns four illuminated bi-folios from a book of hours produced in the early fifteenth-century century at the workshop of the Parisian illuminator illuminator (light box), n a source of light with uniform intensity for viewing radiographs. illuminator the source of light for viewing an object. known as the Boucicaut Master. The bi-folios have been badly damaged by water and the illuminations subsequently over-painted as part of a nineteenth-century restoration. Nevertheless, these fragments remain significant as examples from the workshop of an influential master illuminator and as part of an early fifteenth-century Parisian book of hours that can be securely dated to 1408. Furthermore, alongside their changes in fortune these bi-folios have filled a series of distinct roles, from being perceived as items of affluence and piety, to decorative and artistic objects acquired as part of the Victorian infatuation with collecting, to their current status as items preserved for their informative and interpretive value. The original manuscript was a small book of hours of high quality but without a clear indication of a patron or region, suggesting that the manuscript may have been produced without a commission. The manuscript originally consisted of 187 folios with 28 miniatures, and Christopher de Hamel Ham´el v. t. 1. Same as Hamble. has located 56 extant folios from it, including the Baillieu bi-folios and leaves at the Dunedin Public Library and the Princeton University Princeton University, at Princeton, N.J.; coeducational; chartered 1746, opened 1747, rechartered 1748, called the College of New Jersey until 1896. Schools and Research Facilities Museum. (1) The Baillieu Library bi-folios are from the Gospels of Mark, Luke and John and matins mat·ins n. (used with a sing. or pl. verb) 1. a. Ecclesiastical The office that formerly constituted together with lauds the first of the seven canonical hours. b. for the Hours of the Virgin. (Figs. 1-5) The manuscript can be securely dated due to the presence of an inscription noted by Manion et al on folio 158v, Factum est anno mo cccco viiio quo ceciderunt pontes pon·tes n. Plural of pons. parisiis, (2) stating that this manuscript was completed shortly after the flood of Paris in January 1407-08 which destroyed the Petit Pont, the Grand Pont and the Pont Neuf The Pont Neuf, oddly enough, is the oldest standing bridge across the river Seine in Paris. Its name— the "new bridge"— which distinguished it from the old bridges that were lined on both sides with houses, simply stuck. . Christopher de Hamel notes the similarity between this inscription and one found on the Bodleian manuscript Douce a. 1. Sweet; pleasant. 2. Sober; prudent; sedate; modest. And this is a douce, honest man. - Sir W. Scott. 144, also credited to the workshop of the Boucicaut Master. (3) The inscription may have had particular significance to the scribe as the Petit Pont joined the two areas where the Parisian manuscript community primarily lived and worked. As it was, this early association with disaster was to foreshadow fore·shad·ow tr.v. fore·shad·owed, fore·shad·ow·ing, fore·shad·ows To present an indication or a suggestion of beforehand; presage. fore·shad future events affecting the manuscript. The complete manuscript from which the Baillieu leaves were taken was first recorded in the collection of John Boykett Jarman. Jarman was a goldsmith and jeweller in London in the early nineteenth century who acquired an impressive collection of illuminated manuscripts This is a list of illuminated manuscripts; that is, illustrated or decorated manuscripts. see also List of manuscripts 2nd Century
After the flood, Jarman engaged the services of Caleb Wing, a skilled painter primarily employed to make accurate copies of artwork for publication. Wing commenced a campaign of restoring the miniatures that were most damaged by water. His work in this instance has been credited with a high degree of accuracy with respect to the original style and palette. Jarman's employment of Wing was not limited to the restoration of damaged works. Under Jarman's direction he continued to create new miniatures for those volumes that lacked embellishment, and also provided and extended decorated borders. Jarman's embellishment of his collection also included rebinding, often in a highly luxuriant luxuriant /lux·u·ri·ant/ (lug-zhoor´e-ant) growing freely or excessively. fashion but sometimes with inaccurate incorporation of coats of arms Here is a list of articles that discuss and/or depict coats of arms. Articles in bold face are specifically about a particular coat of arms. Arms for corporations, etc.
After Jarman's death in 1864 the manuscript was sold through Sothebys to Edward Arnold Edward Arnold can refer to:
He was born in Atlanta and completed his studies with Ernesto Bitetti at Indiana University, as well as at the University of California at San Diego, where his teachers included from whom the Baillieu Library purchased the bi-folios in 1974. A further three leaves became part of the Reed collection in Dunedin. While the manuscript was in the possession of Alan Thomas, Christopher de Hamel was able to borrow it for examination before its final dispersal. (7) The ink of the text of the Baillieu Library bi-folios shows distinctive degradation, consistent with that of iron gall ink Iron gall ink (sometimes iron gall nut ink) is a purple-black ink made from iron salts and tannin from vegetable sources. It was the standard writing and drawing ink in Europe, from about the 12th century to the 19th century, and remained in use well into the 20th century. . Iron gall ink is naturally acidic, making it particularly suitable for use with parchment documents. Earlier inks relied largely on finely divided carbonaceous car·bo·na·ceous adj. Consisting of, containing, relating to, or yielding carbon. carbonaceous Adjective of, resembling, or containing carbon Adj. 1. substances dispersed in oil or water. Carbon-based inks are very stable, but bind poorly to the smooth closed surface of parchment. Carbon inks are thus prone to flaking and have in some instances been removed almost entirely from a parchment surface, allowing the parchment to be re-used--as in the case of palimpsests. The acidity of iron gall ink was a distinct advantage, causing it to 'bite' into the parchment surface making it more stable and impossible to remove entirely. When iron gall ink is used on paper, it is common to see the ink 'eat' away the paper support leaving a burn-like impression. Sometimes components of the ink migrate and form a halo around the writing. Occasionally the paper fails completely where the ink is applied, causing the phenomenon known as 'lacing'. The Baillieu Library bi-folios exhibit lacing, which is uncommon in parchment. [FIGURE 2 OMITTED] [FIGURE 3 OMITTED] [FIGURE 4 OMITTED] [FIGURE 5 OMITTED] It is unclear why lacing has occurred in this instance. It may be as a result of improperly prepared ink, which was too high in acid content. Or, the process of iron gall ink degradation may have been exacerbated by the water damage these leaves received in 1846. The latter scenario seems more likely, as an aqueous environment would have liberated chemically bound acidic material as well as swelling and opening the parchment network. The several days that the manuscripts remained wet would have allowed the acid to interact with the parchment causing the degradation. Other areas of the ink are blurred beyond legibility, confirming that the ink was not impervious to moisture. In 2005, the Baillieu bi-folios were mounted using a method developed by Christopher Clarkson (8) at the Bodleian Library Bodleian Library (bŏd`lēən, bŏdlē`ən), at Oxford Univ. The original library, destroyed in the reign of Edward VI, was replaced in 1602, chiefly through the efforts of Sir Thomas Bodley, who gave it valuable collections of , allowing them to be safely handled and displayed. (9) As parchment is raw animal skin it remains reactive to fluctuations in environmental conditions, especially humidity. The mounting technique developed by Clarkson buffers these changes by attaching a series of linen threads to the edges of the parchment. The threads act to counter the expansion and contraction of the parchment. The mounted bi-folios were then encased en·case tr.v. en·cased, en·cas·ing, en·cas·es To enclose in or as if in a case. en·case ment n. in
free-standing perspex envelopes.
II Fire: Corpus 197B/Cotton Otho C.v. The remains of this fragmentary manuscript, a large Latin Vulgate Vulgate (vŭl`gāt) [Lat. Vulgata editio=common edition], most ancient extant version of the whole Christian Bible. Its name derives from a 13th-century reference to it as the "editio vulgata. Gospel book completed in the late seventh or early eighth century, (10) is divided between the collections of Corpus Christi College Corpus Christi College can refer to the following colleges:
Corpus Christi [Lat.,=body of Christ], feast of the Western Church, observed on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday (or on the following Sunday). (Corpus 197B) is 36 folios, comprising parts of the Gospels of John and Luke. (11) A single full-page illumination at the beginning of the Gospel of Saint John Saint John, city, Canada Saint John, city (1991 pop. 74,969), S N.B., Canada, at the mouth of the St. John River on the Bay of Fundy. A major year-round port, it has an excellent harbor, large dry docks, and terminal facilities and maintains extensive survives with a depiction of his symbol: the eagle. Part of a Canon Tables bound into the manuscript British Library Royal MS 7 C.xii., an eleventh-century copy of Aelfric's Homilies that belonged to Cardinal Wolsey (approx. 1471-1530), (12) perhaps a third fragment of Otho C.v., but this has not been established conclusively. (13) Why this manuscript was divided is unclear. It was most likely produced at a Northumbrian scriptorium scrip·to·ri·um n. pl. scrip·to·ri·ums or scrip·to·ri·a A room in a monastery set aside for the copying, writing, or illuminating of manuscripts and records. and has clear associations with other large Insular gospel books including the Lindisfarne and Durham Gospels. (14) Common inconsistencies in the Canon Tables suggest that this volume served as exemplar for or shared a model with the Book of Kells Book of Kells: see Ceanannus Mór. Book of Kells Illuminated manuscript version of the four Gospels, c. late 8th–early 9th century. (15). There are suggestions that this manuscript was in the collection of Saint Augustine's, Canterbury, (16) a belief apparently held by the earliest known owner of the Corpus fragment, Matthew Parker (1504-1575), Archbishop of Canterbury The Archbishop of Canterbury is the main leader of the Church of England and by convention is also recognised as head of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The current archbishop is Rowan Williams. under Elizabeth I Elizabeth I, queen of England Elizabeth I, 1533–1603, queen of England (1558–1603). Early Life The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she was declared illegitimate just before the execution of her mother in 1536, but in . The manuscript bears a Latin inscription applied by Parker's clerk stating that 'This book was sent by Pope Gregory Pope Gregory has been the name of sixteen Roman Catholic Popes and two Antipopes:
The largest portion of this manuscript and the most notable for its association with disaster are the 64 charred fragments of Cotton MS Otho C.v in the British Library. The Cotton Library is significant as the one of the founding collections of the British Museum British Museum, the national repository in London for treasures in science and art. Located in the Bloomsbury section of the city, it has departments of antiquities, prints and drawings, coins and medals, and ethnography. ; it was the most important private library of seventeenth-century England and the first lending library lend·ing library n. A library from which books may be borrowed or rented for a minimal fee. Also called circulating library. Noun 1. in Great Britain Great Britain, officially United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, constitutional monarchy (2005 est. pop. 60,441,000), 94,226 sq mi (244,044 sq km), on the British Isles, off W Europe. The country is often referred to simply as Britain. . (21) The collection contained a great many significant manuscripts and documents, not least of which were two copies of the Magna Carta Magna Carta or Magna Charta [Lat., = great charter], the most famous document of British constitutional history, issued by King John at Runnymede under compulsion from the barons and the church in June, 1215. , (22) a unique copy of Beowulf (23) and many state papers The term State papers is used in the British and Irish contexts to refer exclusively to government archives and records. Such papers used to be kept separate from non-governmental papers, with state papers kept in the State Paper Office and general public records kept in the Public . However, the collection is notorious for its decimation DECIMATION. The punishment of every tenth soldier by lot, was, among the Romans, called decimation. by fire in 1731, leaving a legacy of preservation needs. A Parliamentary Committee was formed to report on the condition of the collection after the fire. (24) Subsequently, work on the Cotton collection occupied the attention of generations of Keepers of the Manuscripts at the British Museum over the next 140 years. Work continues in some form to the present day. (25) Sir Robert Cotton Sir Robert Cotton may refer to:
adj. 1. Of, relating to, or having the nature of sedition. 2. Given to or guilty of engaging in or promoting sedition. See Synonyms at insubordinate. passage in his collection. Following his arrest the library was closed, and his papers searched and many confiscated con·fis·cate tr.v. con·fis·cat·ed, con·fis·cat·ing, con·fis·cates 1. To seize (private property) for the public treasury. 2. To seize by or as if by authority. See Synonyms at appropriate. adj. . (26) Despite its clear political value, Cotton ran his library as a lending institution, accepting almost all comers. The first disaster to affect the Cotton library is that an estimated ten percent was lost due to poor cataloguing and recording of loans within Sir Robert's lifetime. (27) Upon Sir Robert's death in 1631, the library passed first to his son Sir Thomas, and then to his grandson Sir John Cotton. During Sir John's lifetime the library was transferred to the public as per Sir Robert's original wishes (28) and in 1753 the Cotton Library became one of the founding collections of the new British Museum. (29) In 1722 the Library was moved from its traditional home at Cotton House, which had fallen into disrepair, to Essex House. In 1730 it was moved again to Ashburnham House, ironically because Essex House was considered too great a risk for fire. It was at Ashburnham House in 1731 that a fire started in a chimney below the room which housed the manuscript collection, (30) causing what has been described as 'perhaps the greatest bibliographical disaster of modern times in Britain.' (31) The report to the Parliamentary Committee set up to investigate the fire stated that of the 958 manuscripts in the collection before the fire, 114 were lost entirely, and a further 98 damaged. However, these figures both over- and underestimated the final loss. A great many of the manuscripts recorded as lost, in fact survived in some form, though they may have been either unidentifiable Adj. 1. unidentifiable - impossible to identify identifiable - capable of being identified or inaccessible at the time. In the final assessment only thirteen manuscripts were found to be entirely destroyed in the fire, though many of those surviving may only have existed as blackened black·en v. black·ened, black·en·ing, black·ens v.tr. 1. To make black. 2. To sully or defame: a scandal that blackened the mayor's name. 3. lumps or numerous loose and charred fragments. Conversely, the figures for damaged manuscripts were greatly underestimated. The parchment of the manuscripts, being raw skin product, suffered not only from the heat and smoke but from the water used to extinguish fire. Many of the surviving manuscripts were badly embrittled and much textual loss was suffered as a result of subsequent handling. (32) The salvage and conservation work began in earnest shortly after the fire. Paper manuscripts were disbound, the pages cleaned then washed with alum, and dried over a line. This was done rapidly by a large number of semi-skilled staff, to arrest the development of mould. However, when the pages were rebound the first of many errors in collation COLLATION, descents. A term used in the laws of Louisiana. Collation -of goods is the supposed or real return to the mass of the succession, which an heir makes of the property he received in advance of his share or otherwise, in order that such property may be divided, together with the , which continue to vex scholars and caretakers of the collection to the present, occurred. Initially few of the parchment manuscripts were disbound as they were mostly able to be dried by leaving the volumes open and routinely turning the pages. Little could be done at this stage to address the burnt parchment. Exuded fat deposits were removed from the edges but otherwise the manuscripts were left largely as they remained after drying. (33) After the initial salvage of the damaged material a great problem remained. Many loose fragments of paper and parchment existed, which were collated and assembled to a state as close to the appropriate order as could be determined. However, a lack of documentation at the time has further added to the continuing uncertainty regarding collation. The speed at which this work was undertaken (the bulk of the emergency conservation was completed in a three month period) no doubt contributed to the apparent lack of attention to detail. (34) After this initial flurry of attention the collection floundered for over twenty years TWENTY YEARS. The lapse of twenty years raises a presumption of certain facts, and after such a time, the party against whom the presumption has been raised, will be required to prove a negative to establish his rights. 2. until the establishment of the British Museum in 1753. One of the first acts of the Trustees of the Museum was to inspect the collections. They found the Cotton Library dusty but otherwise unchanged, though once again poor record-keeping had caused some manuscripts initially recorded as undamaged to disappear into the general collection of fragments, from where they would not emerge for nearly a century. (35) The collection was finally transferred to the Museum in 1757, (36) where the trustees and caretakers found themselves at a loss for solutions to address the magnitude of the problem. The quantity of fragments alone was estimated as 'enough to fill a small cart.' (37) Attempts were made to soften and open the burnt parchment fragments, often using experimental techniques on significant material with disastrous results. Several fragments of one of the treasures of the collection, the Cotton Genesis, were sent for an experimental treatment and were returned with the consistency of 'burnt biscuits'. (38) The most successful and universally adopted technique for softening and opening the burnt parchment manuscripts was developed by the Keeper of Manuscripts, Josiah Forshall. Forshall developed a technique that involved immersing the manuscripts in water. Once softened, the fragments were cut open and air-dried. The opened fragments were inlaid in·laid v. Past tense and past participle of inlay. adj. 1. Set into a surface in a decorative pattern: a mahogany dresser with an inlaid teak design. 2. in paper to allow them to be handled without further losses to the edges, and were finally collated and rebound into volumes. (39) As conservation did not yet exist as a discrete profession, almost all of the opening and flattening of the parchment was carried out by the Keepers of Manuscripts--first Forshall, then the true champion of the collection, Sir Frederick Madden. (40) Madden's singular dedication to the recovery of the Cotton fragments spanned his forty year career as Keeper of Manuscripts to the collection and involved constant lobbying of the Board of the British Museum for funding for the project. Some fragments of Otho C.V were collected in the fire clean-up but the majority was rediscovered by Forshall after they were opened and flattened. Further fragments were added and the manuscript arranged by Madden before they were inlaid and bound. Initially some fragments from a different manuscript were included but these were removed in 1855. In 1963 the inlaid leaves were rebound with the inclusion of guards to allow for the bulk of the pages. (41) III War: Illuminated borders from a Missal of Pope Leo X Pope Leo X, born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici (11 December 1475 – 1 December 1521) was Pope from 1513 to his death. He is known primarily for his papal bull against Martin Luther and subsequent failure to stem the Protestant Reformation, which began during his reign The Cambridge University Library The Cambridge University Library is the centrally-administered library of the University of Cambridge in England. It comprises five separate libraries:
Medici (mĕ`dĭchē, Ital. mā`dēchē), Italian family that directed the destinies of Florence from the 15th cent. until 1737. device of a diamond ring with feathers and the motto 'Semper'. (42) The borders would originally have decorated the margins of a large illumination. The 1714 Vatican inventory records three such Papal Missals. These volumes were seized by France along with a large number of manuscripts, artwork and antiquities after the success of Napoleon's European campaigns. The fragments resurfaced in the first ever exclusive sale of manuscript cuttings in England in 1825--a sale which marked the beginning of the appreciation of manuscript illumination as an art form and set in motion the Victorian fascination for manuscript cuttings. France's young public cultural institutions had benefited from the nationalisation n. 1. same as nationalization. Noun 1. nationalisation - the action of forming or becoming a nation nationalization group action - action taken by a group of people 2. of the cultural collections during the French revolution. As the collections of religious orders and the nobility were confiscated, they were deposited in the public museums and libraries. Collections swelled under the system, allowing the Bibliotheque Nationale to increase its holding fivefold fivefold Adjective 1. having five times as many or as much 2. composed of five parts Adverb by five times as many or as much Adj. 1. . (43) Under the Commission of Monuments the seizure of cultural property was mandated in an attempt to prevent its wanton destruction. (44) The national collections were further enriched by the success of Napoleon's campaigns in Europe, which saw a vast number of treasures from wealthy families and religious collections in Italy, Germany, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands transplanted to Paris, primarily to the Museum Francais. These items arrived in convoys with much public fanfare. (45) The first convoy alone contained more than sixty pieces of sculpture from the Vatican, nine Raphaels, frescoes, sculpture, jewels, exotic animals and natural history collections. (46) In June 1796 the Pope signed a truce with France which included a promise of a further 500 manuscripts from the Vatican, as well as art and sculpture, with the Pope to pay the costs of transportation. The treaty of Tolentino The Treaty of Tolentino was signed after nine months of negotiations between France and the Papal States on February 19, 1797. It was part of the events following the invasion of Italy in the early stages of the French Revolutionary Wars. in 1797 included a promise of more treasures from the Vatican plus the sum of three hundred million scudi. The peace negotiated at Campio Formio in October 1797 ended Napoleon's Italian campaign and granted Venice to Austria, though this did not see the end of the transportation of cultural treasure to France. (47) The booty seized from Italy between 1796 and 1798 included sixteen hundred manuscripts, including the Papal Missals and all manuscripts from the Vatican dated before 900AD. (48) The personal library of Pope Pius VI Pope Pius VI (December 27, 1717 – August 29, 1799), born Giovanni Angelo Braschi, Pope from 1775 to 1799, was born at Cesena. After completing his studies in the Jesuit college of Cesena and receiving his doctorate of law (1734), Braschi continued his studies was confiscated in 1798; among its many great treasures were an illuminated copy of Dante's Divine Comedy (BnF MS ital 78) and Petrarch's Triumphs (BnF MS Ital 545), both of which remain in the Bibliotheque Nationale. (49) Not all of this material survived to become part of the public collection--much of the precious metal was melted down and two public auctions were held in 1804 and 1811 to raise money for the continuation of the military campaigns. By the Bourbon Restoration in 1814 more than four thousand books had been removed to France from other parts of Europe. (50) The justification for the wholesale looting of cultural material was convenient at best--from the stated need for exemplars for French artists to Napoleon's politic claim 'all men of genius ... are French no matter in what country they were born'. (51) After Napoleon's abdication abdication, in a political sense, renunciation of high public office, usually by a monarch. Some abdications have been purely voluntary and resulted in no loss of prestige. in 1815 many of the owners of the confiscated material undertook campaigns for restoration with some success, though much material remained and even now forms core collections in both the Louvre Louvre (l `vrə), foremost French museum of art, located in Paris. The building was a royal fortress and palace built by Philip II in the late 12th cent. and the Bibliotheque Nationale.
One of the most significant confiscations was the four bronze horses from St Mark's in Venice. These statues attributed to Lysippus were themselves looted from Constantinople in the 1204 during the fourth crusade. They were seized in 1797 and taken to Paris where Napoleon eventually had them installed at the top of the newly constructed Arc de Triomphe Arc de Triomphe Largest triumphal arch in the world. A masterpiece of Romantic Classicism, it is one of the best-known monuments of Paris. It stands at the centre of the Place Charles de Gaulle, at the western terminus of the Champs-Élysées. . (52) In 1815, the Austrian army removed them under an armed guard and returned them to Venice. (53) Of the location of the lost material, including the Papal Missals, little was known until a large number resurfaced in a series of sales of collections belonging to the enigmatic priest Abate Luigi Celotti in England. Celotti was the secretary and librarian to Count Giovanni Barbarigo from 1801. He purchased the libraries of many illustrious private and monastic collections in Italy and acted as a dealer in paintings, manuscripts and illuminations in the early nineteenth century. (54) In 1825, Celotti held three auctions of manuscripts in England. The first two were through Sothebys and included the State Library of Victoria's Scriptores Historiea Augustae which also bears the Medici arms. (55) The final auction which included the Cambridge borders was held through Christies and consisted entirely of manuscript cuttings. In this respect it was the first auction of its kind. (56) The auction was titled A Catalogue of a Highly Valuable and Extremely Curious Collection of Illuminated Miniature Paintings, of the Greatest Beauty, and of Exquisite Finishing, Taken from the Choral Books of the Papal Chapel in the Vatican, during the French Revolution; and subsequently collected and brought to this Country by the Abate Celotti. Included were many large illuminations framed and presented as paintings, often with illuminated borders pasted around the edges. The presentation of the illuminations as paintings instead of mere historic curiosities was no doubt Celotti's intention. The choice of Christies over Sothebys was presumably pre·sum·a·ble adj. That can be presumed or taken for granted; reasonable as a supposition: presumable causes of the disaster. based on Christies' greater popularity among art dealers. (57) The Cambridge cuttings are believed to be the borders surrounding Crucifixion miniatures which comprised lots 53 or 51. Celotti's sale of cuttings coincided with, and no doubt encouraged the popularity of manuscript cuttings in nineteenth century England. By presenting illuminations as monumental art, Celotti contributed to the appreciation of illumination as art. However, this shift in perception encouraged the isolation of the image from the text, which was the basis for the cutting up of many other manuscripts, a practice especially popular in Victorian times. Ironically many cuttings were eventually returned to a codex codex Manuscript book, especially of Scripture, early literature, or ancient mythological or historical annals. The earliest type of manuscript in the form of a modern book (i.e. format by being compiled into albums. IV Conclusions Fragmentary manuscripts, such as those included in The Medieval Imagination exhibition at the State Library of Victoria, are difficult to interpret and can never provide the same information as an intact manuscript. Besides the obvious physical losses and lacunae, there is a significant loss of context. Evidence of damage can be visually distracting, and in addition, restoration work further obscures the original nature of the manuscript as it inherently requires reinterpretation re·in·ter·pret tr.v. re·in·ter·pret·ed, re·in·ter·pret·ing, re·in·ter·prets To interpret again or anew. re by another individual. In the case of Cotton Otho C.v. most of the text and all of the illuminations are lost. The visual impact is highly disrupted by the charring and water staining from the fire as well as the inlaying inlaying, process of ornamenting a surface by setting into it material of different color or substance, usually in such a manner as to preserve a continuous plane. and binding. The collation has been disturbed and reconstructed. The illuminations of the Baillieu bi-folios are completely overpainted, the text largely illegible il·leg·i·ble adj. Not legible or decipherable. il·leg i·bil and the parchment discoloured adj. 1. same as discolored; as, discoloured paneling s>.discoloured U.S. discolored adjective stained and stained. The context is lost, as not only are the pages isolated from the complete volume, displayed flat and vertically, but also because they are bi-folios they are not sequential. The restoration of the illuminations, though credited with a high degree of accuracy, is largely a reconstruction. The Cambridge cuttings are so far removed from their original format as to bear no relationship to a volume. Though the presence of damage and restoration stand as a barrier between the viewer and the original object, they also add another layer of context to the history of the manuscript. Otho C.v. exists as an artifact of the collection and tragic decimation of the Library and ambitions of Sir Robert Cotton. The gathering of such a great collection was possible only due to the dissemination of monastic collections after the Reformation. The collection, though it provided substantial political power to its owner, was also highly accessible during his lifetime. The restoration of the Cotton Library was an epic event of in-depth conservation treatment and probably the largest and first of this type of project ever undertaken. The project extended over three centuries and spanned the careers of many individuals. The restoration also pioneered the development of new techniques for treating fire-damaged parchment. The Cambridge cuttings exist in their current format due to the perception of cultural property as the spoils of war. Napoleon's seizure of cultural property during his European campaign was not the first of such operations. The thefts were explicitly justified at the time by the example of Rome's looting from Greece and the idea that this had permitted Rome's subsequent intellectual and artistic development. (58) Parallels have also been made to the seizure and destruction of cultural artifacts by the Nazi regime. (59) The inclusion of the illuminated borders in the Celotti art sale places them at a definitive point in the history of illuminated manuscripts, marking the beginning of Victorian interest in manuscript cuttings. Though this interest encouraged the appreciation of illumination as art alongside monumental art, it also led to the devastation of many more manuscripts in an attempt to isolate the images from the text. Notes (1) Margaret Manion, Vera Vines and Christopher de Hamel, Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in New Zealand New Zealand (zē`lənd), island country (2005 est. pop. 4,035,000), 104,454 sq mi (270,534 sq km), in the S Pacific Ocean, over 1,000 mi (1,600 km) SE of Australia. The capital is Wellington; the largest city and leading port is Auckland. Collections, Melbourne: Thames and Hudson, 1989, pp. 97-98. (2) Manion et al, p. 97. (3) Christopher de Hamel, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval Manuscripts in the Dunedin Public Library's Alfred and Isabel Reed Collection, Wellington: Reed, 1973, p. 54. (4) Janet Backhouse, 'A Victorian Connoisseur and his Manuscripts: the tale of Mr Jarman and Mr Wing', The British Museum Quarterly, 1968, p. 84. (5) de Hamel, p. 54. (6) Manion et al, p. 98. (7) de Hamel, p. 54. (8) Christopher Clarkson, 'Preservation and display of single parchment leaves and fragments', Conservation of library and archive materials and the graphic arts, London: Institute of Paper Conservation, Society of Archivists Overview and Aims The Society of Archivists is the principal professional body for archivists, archive conservators and records managers in the United Kingdom and Ireland. , 1987, pp. 201-209. (9) Jordi Casasayas, 'Housing and storage solutions for four book of hours bi-folios', Mounting and Housing Art on Paper for Storage and Display: History, science and present-day practice, London: British Museum, 2005, pp. 158-162. (10) Rosamond McKitterick, 'Gospels of St Luke and St John', The Cambridge illuminations: ten centuries of book production in the medieval West, London: Harvey Miller, 2005, p. 48. (11) George Henderson, From Durrow to Kells: the Insular Gospel-books, 650-800, New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of : Thames and Hudson, 1987, pp. 68-70. (12) Henderson, p. 92. (13) McKitterick, p. 48. (14) Henderson, p. 196. (15) Henderson, p. 71. (16) Henderson, p. 179. (17) Henderson, p. 92. (18) Henderson, p. 92. (19) Henderson, p. 179. (20) McKitterick, p. 48. (21) Colin Gerald Calder Tite, The manuscript library of Sir Robert Cotton, London: British Library, 1994, p. 6. (22) Tite, p. 24. (23) Tite, p. 14. (24) Andrew Prescott, '"Their present miserable state of cremation cremation, disposal of a corpse by fire. It is an ancient and widespread practice, second only to burial. It has been found among the chiefdoms of the Pacific Northwest, among Northern Athapascan bands in Alaska, and among Canadian cultural groups. ": the restoration of the Cotton Library', Sir Robert Cotton as Collector: Essays on an Early Stuart Courtier and his Legacy, London: British Library, 1997, p. 391. (25) Prescott, p. 435. (26) Tite, pp. 20-22. (27) Tite, p. 25. (28) Tite, pp. 24-26. (29) Tite, p. 39. (30) Tite, p. 38. (31) Prescott, p. 391. (32) Prescott, pp. 391-392. (33) Prescott, p. 394. (34) Prescott, pp. 394-395. (35) Prescott, pp. 396-397. (36) Prescott, p. 398. (37) Prescott, p. 418. (38) Prescott, p. 400. (39) Prescott, p. 406. (40) Prescott, p. 421. (41) Prescott, pp. 427-428. (42) Stella Panayotova, 'Illuminated borders' The Cambridge illuminations: ten centuries of book production in the medieval West, London: Harvey Miller, 2005, p. 48. (43) Stella Hindman, Michael Camill, Nina Rowe, and Rowan Watson, Art Illumination in the Modern Age, Evanston 111: Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art The Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art is an art museum located on the campus of the Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. The Block Museum was established in 1980 by Chicago art collectors Mary and Leigh B. , 2001, p. 50. (44) Hindman et al, p. 49. (45) Dorothy Mackay Quynn, 'The Art Confiscations of the Napoleonic Wars', The American Historical Review The American Historical Review (AHR) is the official publication of the American Historical Association (AHA), a body of academics, professors, teachers, students, historians, curators and others, founded in 1884 "for the promotion of historical studies, the , April 1945, p. 437. (46) Quynn, p. 438. (47) Quynn, pp. 440-441. (48) Quynn, pp. 440-441. (49) Hindman, p. 51. (50) Quynn, pp. 444-445. (51) Quynn, p. 439. (52) Quynn, p. 441. (53) Quynn, pp. 452-452. (54) Sandra Hindman and Micheal Heinlen, 'A Connoisseur's Montage: the "Four Evangelists Attributed to Guilio Clovio"', Art Institute of Chicago Art Institute of Chicago, museum and art school, in Grant Park, facing Michigan Ave. It was incorporated in 1879; George Armour was the first president. Since 1893 the Institute has been housed in its present building, designed in the Italian Renaissance style by Museum Studies, 1992, p. 157. (55) Panayotova, p. 48. (56) Hindman, p. 53. (57) Hindman, p. 54. (58) Quynn, pp. 438-439. (59) Quynn, p. 460. |
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