Illuminated manuscripts in classical and mediaeval times, their art and their technique

by J. H. Middleton

Fig. 42. Miniature of Duke Baldwin, painted about the year 1450 by an illuminator of the school of the Van Eycks of Bruges.

The finest Teutonic manuscripts of the fifteenth century show in their miniatures the influence of the Van Eycks; as is also the case with many of the manuscripts which fall rather under the head of the Franco-Flemish than the Teutonic school[^[168]].

School of the Van Eycks.

School of the Van Eycks.Fig. [42] gives a fine example of a miniature by an illuminator who must have been an actual pupil of the Van Eycks. It is taken from a fragment of a manuscript of the Croniques de Jherusalem, now in the Imperial library of Vienna (no. 2533). It represents Duke Baudouin (or Baldwin), who was crowned King of Jerusalem, in the guise of a fifteenth century German knight, under a graceful Gothic canopy of characteristically German style. The date of this sumptuous manuscript is about 1450.

Influence on painting generally.

Influence on painting generally.As is remarked below with regard to Italian art, it is interesting to observe the strong influence that miniature painting in manuscripts had upon the larger pictures of Teutonic artists. In many cases the German and Flemish painters of altar-pieces were also illuminators of manuscripts, like Liberale of Verona and Girolamo dai libri, who are mentioned below, see page [197][^[169]].

And even without this reason for similarity, it was not uncommon for the painter of a retable to borrow his composition and general decorative scheme from an illuminated manuscript by some skilful artist.

Fig. [43] shows a good example of this, the central panel of a retable dated 1473, in the church of St Martin at Colmar, which is almost certainly the work of Martin Schoen or Schöngauer.

The Cologne School.