It is to supply this want that the ‘Primer of Illumination’ has been conceived. It contains just so much instruction on the history and principles of the art, as may serve to fix on certain definite bases, the wandering and somewhat hazy notions of people on the subject, and enable them, by reference to good examples, to erect their own superstructure on a certain foundation; and just so much instruction in the practical part of the art as may enable them, in a great measure, to teach themselves how to practise it. Advice is also given on the selection and purchase of colours, instruments, &c., and a progressive set of studies, printed both in outline and in the proper colours, and gold, is added to furnish models for copying.
Incidentally, an effort has been made to correct a few of the prevalent popular errors on the subject—such, for instance, as that every illuminated service book is a ‘missal,’ and so forth—and which errors stand sorely in the way of the beginner’s right comprehension of the subject.
All the examples selected have been taken from undoubted authorities, and will be recognized by persons acquainted with mediæval books.
Part I.
In a work of a merely practical character anything like a critical or historical dissertation on the art of illumination would of course be out of place. The growing or rather reviving taste in this and neighbouring countries which has during the last twenty or thirty years brought to light such vast treasures of mediæval art, which had lain for three centuries buried under a heap of pseudo-classical rubbish, has elicited amongst its most pleasing features a host of works on illumination which, without exhausting a subject which is inexhaustible, have at least contributed largely to place this beautiful art on its proper pedestal, and investigate and develope the rules by which it is governed. These works are of course of different pretensions and varying beauty, though of the majority it may fairly be alleged that they are magnificent and brilliant specimens of typography, and that the research and ability displayed in their contents are fully equal to the beauty of their illustrations. From such works the history of the rise and progress, the culmination and decadence of the art may be easily traced, and a catena of characteristics constructed. The principal defect exhibited by almost all these works is that their (necessarily) large price places them out of the reach of all but the wealthy, and it may be added that even when access can be obtained to them they are found to contain no practical directions for cultivating and practising the art of which they treat.