Curiosities of Christian History Prior to the Reformation

by James Paterson

BEAUTIFUL MANUSCRIPTS OF MONKS.

The art of transcribing manuscripts flourished in the monasteries till about a century before the discovery of printing. Gerbert, in his “History of the Black Forest,” says that if there was nothing else, the beautiful writing of the tenth century, by means of which so many valuable monuments have been transmitted to us, ought to convince us that it was not a barbarous age. Books were then so beautifully painted and embellished with emblems and miniatures that the whole seemed to be the produce not of human but of angelic hands. The fervour of the abbots in that tenth century in employing writers to preserve valuable books by multiplying copies can never be sufficiently praised. Tangmar, in his Life of St. Berward of Hildesheim, says that he established scriptoriums, not only in the monasteries, but in divers places, by means of which he collected a copious library of books, both of divines and philosophers. In fact, the art of writing never attained to such perfection as in the ninth and tenth centuries; and all antiquarians will admit that the form—more or less elegant—of characters in the manuscripts of different ages places before our eyes the state of the sciences at that time, according as it was more or less flourishing. The same parchment was sometimes twice or thrice written upon. The monks only followed the practice of the Romans in thus rewriting on the same parchment.

THE PENMANSHIP OF THE MONKS.

One of the departments of every monastery was the scriptorium or writing-office, where, during the dark ages, many precious books were copied and circulated, and no member was admitted except the heads of the house or on business. There were two classes of monks in this department, called the antiquarii, who made copies of valuable old books, and the librarii, who copied new books and inferior ones. The books chiefly copied were the Scriptures, also missals or church services, works on theology, and the classics. St. David, the patron saint of Wales, is said to have begun shortly before his death to transcribe the Gospel of St. John in letters of gold with his own hand. In this constant practice sprang up the art of illumination, so vainly imitated by the artists of the present day, not from want of genius, but from want of something almost indescribable in the conception and execution—a tone and preservation of colour, and especially of gilding, which was essentially peculiar to the old monks, who must have possessed some secret both of combination and fixing of colours which has been lost with them. This elaborate illumination was devoted to religious books, psalms, missals, and prayer-books; in other works the first letters of chapters were beautifully illuminated, and other leading letters in a lesser degree. Such were the peculiar labours of the scriptorium; and to encourage those who dedicated their time to it, a special benediction was attached to the office. We got our Bible and our classics from them.

THE MONASTERIES AS MUSEUMS OF ART.

Kings and emperors often bequeathed their rarest treasures of gold and jewels to monasteries. The kings of France often left their crowns to the abbey of St. Denis. Monte Cassino had great store of presents from kings of chalices and patens, crowns and crosses, phials and vases, and precious ornaments of purest gold, and silks with gold and gems. When the Danes arrived at the abbey of Peterborough in 1070, they took away the golden crown in the church embellished with gems from the head of the crucifix, and the golden stool set with gems, and rare articles of gold and precious stones. In the monastery of Ripon were four gospels written on a purple ground in letters of gold, inclosed in a golden casket. The furniture for St. Ina’s famous chapel in Glastonbury was of silver and gold of great value, the covers of the gospels were of gold, and the priests’ vestments interwoven with gold and cunningly ornamented with precious stones. In the treasury of the abbey of the Isle Barbe, the horn of Roland was preserved; in the abbey of St. Denis the chessboard and men used by Charlemagne. In the abbey of Rheinau was a wooden cross nine inches high, cut out of a single piece, and showing in more than a hundred figures the chief passages of our Saviour’s life. In the abbey of St. Stephen, at Troyes, the Psalter of Count Henry, the founder, written in letters of gold, was still fresh after eight hundred years. In the treasury of Citeaux was the chair in which St. Bernard sat as a novice; and there were ancient breviaries of the monks, written in small letters, as pocket companions in their travels. At Treves the gospels, written in letters of gold covered with jewels, were the present of Princess Ada, sister of Charlemagne.

LEARNING AND EMBROIDERY OF THE NUNS.

The nuns who followed the Benedictine order often displayed learning as well as manual skill. Willibald says those of Britain and Germany excelled in the studies usual to men. They followed the example of the monks in transcribing books, and even in composing others. Those of the monastery of Eikers, in Belgium, were celebrated for their labours in reading and meditating, in writing and in painting. The abbesses Harlind and Renild, besides works of embroidery and weaving, were said to have written with their own hands the four gospels, the whole Psalter, and many other books of Scripture, which they ornamented with liquid gold, gems, and pearls. Cæsaria, abbess of Arles, and her nuns wrote out many Divine books during the time that was spent between psalmody and fasting, vigils and readings. Heloise and her nuns proposed difficult questions on the sacred Scriptures to Abelard, and showed an acuteness and discernment little inferior to his own. Peter the Venerable, in his letter to Heloise, said it was sweet to prolong discourse with her, for her erudition was not less celebrated than her sanctity. So that there was always a succession of noted women from age to age, like Marcella, whose acuteness and learning were constantly extolled by St. Jerome in his letters.

THE MONKS AT MISSAL PAINTING.

The art of illumination was one of the great triumphs of the monks in the Middle Ages, though the same, or at least a kindred, art was practised in Egypt long before the Christian era. So early as the fourth century St. Jerome complained of the ornamentation of enormous capital letters in books as an abuse. A copy of the New Testament was executed in the fourth century in letters of silver, with the initials in gold, and is still preserved in the royal library at Upsal under the title of the “Codex Argenteus.” In the seventh century enormous initial letters began to supersede the current practice of introducing miniatures in the ornamentation. The new style then consisted of interlaced fretwork or entwined branches of white and gold on a background of variegated colours. Irish monasteries excelled the British about that age in this kind of work, and the Anglo-Saxon youths went to Ireland to obtain a mastery of the favourite styles. St. Dunstan was himself an expert illuminator. A fine specimen, called St. Cuthbert’s Gospels, was executed by a bishop of Lindisfarne about 721, and is now in the Cottonian Library. The finest specimen of English illumination of the tenth century is the Duke of Devonshire’s “Benedictional,” executed by the Bishop of Winchester in 984, where pictures of glorified confessors are on the first page. The initial letters became longer and longer, until their tails reached nearly the whole length of the page, and next they were carried round the three sides. The foliage, flowers, birds, animals, and miniatures in the background were carefully drawn. The printing-press was the death-knell of this elaborate style of decorating books; yet the earliest printed books had also spaces for illumination. While it flourished, the great artists were vastly appreciated. It was a saintly work and a labour of love, and success in it was the highest ambition of the best men of the age.