Pretty medieval manuscript of the day shows St Michael fighting the devil for the souls of two corpses.
According to the library:
“This Book of Hours was copied in Eastern France between 1425 and 1475. The miniature featured here is one of twelve large miniatures in gold frames, arched at the top and with three or four lines of text underneath. This leaf shows the beginning of the psalm for first vespers in the Office of the Dead. The miniature shows St Michael fighting a devil over two corpses; a third ‘corpse’ is ascending into heaven. The full border is a floral-acanthus design with twining ivy leaves. Immediately below the miniature is a 3-line initial in red, blue and orange with white tracery on a gold ground. The last line of text is completed with a line filler”
There is plenty here for the modern viewer to find peculiar, but the thing that strikes me as the oddest thing is the sight of a body ascending (or descending?) from heaven. The site of a torso and legs hanging from the celestial heavens, whilst St Michael and the devil fight like cat and dog is downright bizarre! These artists certainly had a tricky time, trying to find new ways to depict extraordinary stories!
Image source: Alexander Turnbull Library MSR-02, National Library of New Zealand. Image released into the public domain via the Flickr Commons.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is a very dapper looking cockerel, swinging a censer. Another lovely image from the Walters Museum, it’s a great image to start with after our Olympics holiday.
Image source: Walters Museum MS W.102. Creative Commons licensed via Flickr.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day shows St Michael fighting the devil for the souls of two corpses.
According to the library:
“This Book of Hours was copied in Eastern France between 1425 and 1475. The miniature featured here is one of twelve large miniatures in gold frames, arched at the top and with three or four lines of text underneath. This leaf shows the beginning of the psalm for first vespers in the Office of the Dead. The miniature shows St Michael fighting a devil over two corpses; a third ‘corpse’ is ascending into heaven. The full border is a floral-acanthus design with twining ivy leaves. Immediately below the miniature is a 3-line initial in red, blue and orange with white tracery on a gold ground. The last line of text is completed with a line filler”
There is plenty here for the modern viewer to find peculiar, but the thing that strikes me as the oddest thing is the sight of a body ascending (or descending?) from heaven. The site of a torso and legs hanging from the celestial heavens, whilst St Michael and the devil fight like cat and dog is downright bizarre! These artists certainly had a tricky time, trying to find new ways to depict extraordinary stories!
Image source: Alexander Turnbull Library MSR-02, National Library of New Zealand. Image released into the public domain via the Flickr Commons.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is the weirdest yet! Here’s St Peter of Verona, with a cleaver in his head, nonchalantly carrying an enormous church. You have to hand it to medieval artists, they really went for it didn’t they! They weren’t shy with the gold leaf on this one either - the patron must have had serious money. Martyred in 1252, he was canonised a year later - not bad going! He is the patron saint of midwives.
This image is from a lavishly decorated fifteenth century book of hours from Italy. We’ll look at some of the other illustrations over the coming weeks.
Image source: Walters Museum MS 322. Creative Commons licensed.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is St George slaying the dragon, from the same Italian book of hours we looked at yesterday. I still can’t believe how much gold leaf was used in this book. The patrons must have had a phenomenal amount of money to spend on something this lavish.
I think this image is hilarious. St George’s faithful charger looks far more like a wooden horse from a carousel than a battle hardened stallion. St George himself looks like a child, and don’t get me started on the dragon!
I love it, but to my twenty-first century eyes, it looks completely ridiculous!
Image source: Walters Museum MS W322. Creative Commons licensed via Wikimedia Commons.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is St Margaret of Antioch, and the dragon! A lovely historiated initial from a book of hours in the collection of the Walters Museum in Baltimore. I think it’s fabulous!
Image source: Walters Museum MS 168, f. 222r. Creative Commons licensed via Flickr.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is an early printed book of hours, which has been hand coloured. This rather cartoon-like image shows the resurrection.
Image source: Bibliotheek Kortrijk, Cod. 26, 43v. Creative Commons licensed via Flickr.
Pretty medieval manuscript of the day is rather sinister. The dead are accosting the princes, whose horses are rearing up in horror. Even in the margins, there is death. It is a weird and puzzling scene. A genuine gothic horror, if you will. From a fourteenth century book of hours in the collection of the New York Public library, it is a fascinating little book. It is theorised that the book is from France, though experts cannot seem to agree. Its provenance is unknown.
Image source: New York Public Library MS MA 156. Image believed to be in the public domain.
