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

by J. H. Middleton

Beauty of fruit and flowers.The illuminated borders are also not unfrequently of very great merit and high decorative value; they are formed of rich and fanciful combinations of various plants and flowers, treated at first with just the due amount of conventionalism, but tending, towards the end of the fifteenth century, to an excessive and too pictorial realism. As late as the middle of the fifteenth century the "ivy pattern" of the previous century survived with little modification, and very beautiful borders occur with branches of the vine, the oak, the maple and other trees, together with a great variety of flowers, such as the rose, the daisy, the columbine, the clove-pink or carnation, the pansy, the lily, the iris or blue flag, the cornflower, the anemone, the violet, the thistle; and with many kinds of fruit, especially the grape, the strawberry, the pomegranate and the mulberry. Among this wealth of fruit and foliage, variety is given by the introduction of birds, insects, animals, and grotesque monsters half beast and half human, or else living figures growing out of flower blossoms, all designed with much graceful fancy and decorative beauty.

Later style. Imitation of relief.

Later style.Towards the close of the fifteenth century one skilfully treated but less meritorious style of illuminated border became very common in France and Flanders. This consisted of isolated objects, such as sprigs of various kinds of flowers and fruits, especially strawberries, together with butterflies and other insects, shells, reptiles and the like scattered over the margin of the page, very frequently on a background of dull fluid gold[^[143]]. Imitation of relief.A deceptive effect of relief is commonly attempted by the painting of strong shadows, as if each object were lying on the gold ground and casting its shadow on the flat surface. This attempt at relief of course marks a great decadence of taste, and yet it occurs in manuscripts which show much artistic feeling and great technical skill; as, for example, in the magnificent Grimani Breviary, mentioned below at p. [167], see fig. [38].

Use of fluid gold.

Use of fluid gold.In French and Flemish miniatures of this period, gold, applied with a brush, is often used to touch in the high lights, not only in the grisaille miniatures, but also in paintings with brilliant pigments, much in the same way as in the Umbrian and Florentine pictures of contemporary date.

Many manuscripts of the early part of the sixteenth century have elaborate architectural borders, consisting of tiers of canopied niches containing statuettes, all executed in fluid, mat gold.

Harsh colours.

Harsh colours.The use of a very harsh emerald green is characteristic of this period of decadence in France and in Flanders; and generally there is a want of harmony of colour in the miniatures of this time, in which gaudiness rather than real splendour gradually becomes the main characteristic.

Renaissance style.

Renaissance style.At the end of the fifteenth century the influence of the classical Renaissance of art in Italy began to affect the French manuscript illuminations, and especially those by Parisian miniaturists. The introduction of architectural forms of Italian classic style into the backgrounds of miniatures was the first sign of this, examples of which occur as early as the year 1475 or 1480. Fig. [27] shows a characteristic example of a French miniature executed under Italian influence. This is a scene of the marriage of the B. V. Mary to the elderly Joseph, who holds in his hand the dry rod which had blossomed. One of the unsuccessful suitors is breaking his rod across his knee, as in Raphael's early Sposalizio in the Brera gallery at Milan.