large size and the quantity of decoration with which they were produced. In
Germany, the method of ornament still repeats the Anglo-Saxon type derived
from Carolingian work, and the handwriting is still Carolingian, but the
letters lean forward instead of being upright, their forms are narrowed and
chiselled off by short sharp terminal strokes that give an appearance of
angularity. (An example of the art is given on plate 21.) In Spain, the
beautiful round "Visigothic" letters are still retained, with large
initials of interlaced Celtic pattern, and the illustrative pictures (if
there are any) have the same style as had been developed some centuries
earlier in Aquitaine. The German and the Spanish have a sort of resemblance
by reason of their common origin, but more especially because of the
striking combination of green and yellow in the paintings, the note of
yellow apparently being strongest in the latter, and of green in the
former. The use of green tints predominates likewise in English work of the
eighth-twelfth centuries, but became much more sparing under the influence
of the French school which, after the eleventh century, began to avoid
indulgence in that colour. It never lost its favourite place in German art,
and the MSS. of Holland and Flanders only dropped it when they began to
assimilate French methods in the fourteenth century. England in the twelfth
century {62}produced much finer work than the French. In fact the English
school of that century was the parent of nearly all the art of the
following century. Both in calligraphy and in pictorial designs, it
forestalled the work done in the whole of Western Europe between 1200 and
1300, which has rendered the thirteenth century the most noteworthy in the
history of illustrated MSS. The mode and style of drawing, unfinished by
illumination, which were practised in England towards the close of the
thirteenth century, may be examined in plate 10. Italian work of the same
time is shown in plate 11 to have been much more barbaric and unskilful.
The difference between English twelfth-century work and that of Europe in
the thirteenth century consisted in the large and ample freedom of hand
which marks the former and the delicate minuteness which characterises
alike the writing and the miniatures of the latter. As for style and
quality of work, there is scarcely any difference between them. This new
English school, so admirable in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, had
grown up over the decline of the Anglo-Saxon phase, which, fine as it was,
had still somewhat of a barbaric air about it. The conquest of the Saxon
monarchy by a Duke of Normandy in the eleventh century, and the succession
in the twelfth of a Count of Anjou who united under his sceptre England,
Normandy, and Aquitaine, made this country the centre of French art and
literature for a considerable period. Hence the almost complete identity of
the modes of writing and ornamentation between English and French work in
the thirteenth century. In Central and South-eastern France the style
varied somewhat as will be seen by comparing the examples given on plates 8
and 9. There is no school of art more interesting than the Anglo-Norman, as
it is called, of that time. The illuminated border had not yet established
itself, but the initials, drawn upon a ground of burnished gold or of
diapered tints, enclose painted miniatures looking like very fine
pen-and-ink designs carefully coloured. Bibles thus decorated are very
{63}numerous. As they approach the end of the century, they exhibit now and
then long straight lines, ending in curves or fleurons, which spread from
the pictured initial upwards and downwards, and form a simple border to
more than half the page. This incipient practice increased gradually from
the beginning of the following century onwards. The fleurons became gold
ivy-leaves, and similar leaves were figured as sprouting out from the long
straight border-lines, these lines being extended so as to enclose the page
on all sides. Still the effect was stiff and imperfect, but by the close of
the fourteenth century, a very splendid kind of foliated border was used by
French illuminators. The gold leaves called ivy-leaves were now introduced
in greater number and made to sprout, no longer from the straight border
frame itself, but more naturally out of branches which festooned from the
frame. The ivy-leaf border in this state was very much favoured in French
illumination, but was little used elsewhere. It generally accompanies
pictorial illustration of superior merit, and gives an air of distinction
and elegance to any MS. in which it is found. The French schools of Central
France and of Paris had by the middle of the fourteenth century regained
their lost pre-eminence in art.
The thirteenth century was the first and the finest period of mediæval
"gothic," so far as handwriting is concerned. (The name is a misnomer, but
has a clear recognised sense, and is useful.) The letters are angulated at
their extremities, but the bodies are still rounded and perfectly clear.
The square and lapidar Gothic was introduced in the fourteenth century, and
prevailed during that and the two succeeding centuries. It was a vicious
script, indistinct and difficult to read; and although some examples,
distinct, legible, and handsome, were brought out in the fifteenth century,
the system was generally bad, and there is no reason to regret its
extinction, which took place in France, Italy, and Spain about the middle
of the sixteenth {64}century, and in England somewhat later, although it is
lingering on even now in Germany and Denmark.
The square Gothic of the fourteenth century, however unclear and
objectionable as a script, was not ill adapted to ornamental purposes, as
the vast number of prayerbooks for the laity produced between 1350 and
1400, and throughout the succeeding century, make manifest. Of those
prayerbooks, which for a hundred and fifty years were the chief medium for
displaying the skill of the mediæval illuminator, the number of copies
which were made for individuals or families, as birth-day or wedding gifts,
or for whatever reason, was incredibly large. The existence of such
prayerbooks, well written and decorated with paintings, for private
persons, is enough in itself to show that the office of calligrapher and
miniaturist was a secular trade, and that the "old monks," to whom so many
persons ascribe the writing of the "missals," had long ceased to be the
sole producers of MSS.
Not many of the earlier Books of Hours have survived, that is, of those
which were written between 1300 and 1350; but from the latter date onwards
to 1400 they are not uncommon, and from 1400 onwards very numerous. This
statement refers to French and Franco-Flemish and Burgundian work. Of
English work, there are very few extant anterior to 1400, and the same may
be said of Dutch examples. As for those written in Italy and Germany, it is
only towards the close of the fifteenth century that they are met with. The
English and French Hours produced during 1350-1420 are very different in
their mode of ornamentation. The Gothic writing was pretty nearly the same
everywhere, and the larger illuminated initials had followed one model
since the thirteenth century. These initials (when not historiated with
little miniatures) were painted in colour upon a ground usually of gold.
The space within the letter-forms was filled up with a conventional
flower-pattern, having buds of red and blue tints. At the earlier
{65}period the letter-form has a small extension upwards and downwards, in
a simple style resembling wood-carving. In the fourteenth century this
extension is increased, and the long straight border, with ivy-leaves here
and there, was produced. While that kind of border was in France being
developed into its most elegant phase, a different type was preferred in
England. The gold ground of the initial is prolonged into a stem, around
which twines a corresponding prolongation of coloured foliage springing
from the curved extremities of the initial letter. Thus they form a border
which would be pretty enough in itself, but which is further decorated with
tufts of long feathery grass, tipped with buds, which grow out of the stem
and sweep in graceful curves outside the line of foliage. This feathery
ornament--which, except for the little fleurons in colour here and there,
seems drawn with a fine pen in brown ink--is distinctly English, and was
retained till late in the fifteenth century, side by side with newer
methods borrowed from France. The red and blue, with white lights, which
are used in the initials and capitals by the French illuminators, are in
the English MSS. pink and pale blue, and the white lights are broader.
As soon as the ivy-leaf pattern, with its brilliant gold points, began to
go out of fashion in France, a new kind of border came into vogue. The
conventional red and blue foliage still continued to spring out from the
initials and at intervals below and above; all the intervening space was
filled in with curling and twining tendrils, drawn with a pen or a very
fine brush, forming a kind of hedge, in the midst of which were scattered
here and there little natural flowers and fruits, growing out of the curled
tendrils. This was in use in French and Burgundian and Flemish MSS. from
about 1420-30 onwards, and became a favourite method of decoration in
England towards the middle of the century. At that time, and in that style,
prayerbooks done in the three countries are often much alike, and it is
{66}only the painting of the miniatures and the differences in the calendar
and litany which distinguish them.
_The chief Liturgical Books distinguished_
A word may be said here as to the means of distinguishing the liturgical
MSS., and obtaining an idea of their place of origin. It ought not to be
necessary, but, as a matter of fact, there are many persons of fair
education, and possessing no inconsiderable familiarity with manuscripts,
who call every Book of Hours a "Missal," and who cannot distinguish between
a Breviary and a Missal.
The Missal gives the service of the Mass for the whole year. Its essence
lies in the Canon of the Mass, beginning with the words "Te igitur," which
is preceded by a number of præfationes (some of them general, some of them
appropriated to special occasions), and followed by the Communion and the
concluding thanksgivings. This was in more ancient times the first and the
larger part of the Mass-book, and was followed by a set of prayers, which
in the service itself preceded and led to the Preface, these preliminary
prayers being arranged under the festivals of the year from December to
December. In the Missal, as arranged and enlarged in the thirteenth
century, there are four divisions: 1. De Tempore (Sundays and festivals);
2. Prefaces, Canon, and Ordinary of the Mass; 3. Mass-prayers appropriated
to special Saints' days; 4. Mass-prayers common to all Saints' days. The
chronological order from Advent to Advent (30th November to 29th November)
was followed, except in the case of some of the most solemn and ancient
commemorations, and also of some special festivals that had been appointed
after the original compilement of the Mass-book. These were incorporated in
the part De Tempore, in succession to the text relating to the Advent. At
the end of the fourth part were also added some of the special offices in
regard to the laity, which had to be {67}performed by the priest, such as
matrimony, baptism, and burial.
The essence of the Breviary was the Psalter, which formed the groundwork of
all the forms of devotion used at the Canonical Hours. With the appointed
extracts from the Psalter a number of prayers were used, and these were
divided in exactly the same way as those of the Missal into Temporal (of
Sundays and festivals) in one sequence; and Sanctoral, in two sections,
Proper and Common. The perpetually recurring rubrics of Matins, Lauds,
Prime, Tierce, Sext, None, and Vespers (ad matutinas, in laudibus, ad
primam, ad tertiam, ad sextam, ad nonam, ad vesperas) mark the hours of
their use from midnight to midnight. These headings, repeated from day to
day all over the year, ought to be sufficient even to the least observant
eye to indicate the Breviary. It also contains at the end the offices of
Marriage, Baptism, Burial, &c.; and in some of the Breviaries the office of
the Mass itself (not the whole Missal) is included.
The Book of Hours (or Private Prayerbook) is a selection from the Breviary,
and is likewise marked with the rubrics of the hours (Matins, Lauds, Nones,
&c.), but they are applied only to the offices selected, and do not contain
the chronological divisions, Temporal and Sanctoral, for the year. The
offices are usually those of the Virgin, of the Cross, of the Holy Ghost,
of the Trinity, and these, with the Office for the Dead, and commemorations
of some special Saints, form the chief bulk of the Horæ.
The Calendar, which is found at the beginning, and the Litany (or Litanies)
of Saints, which is found in the body, of each of the three books, are
usually the most obvious sources of information with regard to the origin
of the manuscript. If the _use_, or diocesan form of the liturgy, is purely
Roman, as is sometimes the case even in books written in France, Flanders,
and England, then the search is frustrated. It happens, however, frequently
that even {68}the Roman Calendar and the Roman Litany are enlarged by the
addition of names to which a special local veneration was paid, and then
one is able to discover hints of origin which may indicate either a country
or a diocese. In the French books, the number of French Saints is usually
considerable, that is of French Saints who do not appear in the Roman
calendar, but they are generally gathered impartially from all the
dioceses. It is only when we find that a single diocese furnishes the names
of two or three canonised bishops, or when a name appears in gold in the
calendar which had no special importance for the whole of the country, but
must have had a particular interest in one city or diocese, that we can
begin to think of special attributions. Thus, if St. Ives (Yvo), Ste.
Genevieve, St. Germain, St. Leufroy, St. Louis, S. Faro, St. Ursin, St.
Saintin, St. Saturnin, Ste. Radegonde, St. Fiacre, St. Austrebert, and many
others, are found in the Calendar, and any of them in the Litany, it is a
sure proof of French origin. If St. Saturnin appears in gold in the
Calendar, it serves to indicate Toulouse; if St. Sainctin, Meaux; Martial,
Limoges; Firmin, Metz or Amiens; and if SS. Ursin, Guillaume, and
Austregisile occur together in the Litany, they point out Bourges--all
three having been Archbishops of that see. But in all cases collateral or
cumulative testimony is required.
Saints Vedastus and Amandus (Vaast and Amand), although belonging to
Flanders, may occur either in French or Flemish Calendars; but when they
are combined with Bavo and Bertin, and Quintin and Aldegund, they indicate
Ghent or its vicinity as the place of origin. St. Piat, St. Lehyre (or
Eleutherius), and St. Guillain point to Tournay. St. Valery or Walery
(Walaricus) is another Flemish Saint, as also are Audomar, Gaugericus,
Godeleve, Winnoc, and Amelberga. As for MSS. of Flemish origin, it must be
remembered that the word Flemish is loosely used to designate all portions
of the Low Countries except the {69}purely Dutch provinces, and that Artois
and Picardy and other portions of the French _Pays Reconquis_ of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were part of them. In the same way
Franche Comté and the Duchies of Burgundy and Lorraine were also outside of
France in the fifteenth century; and Languedoc and Provence and Dauphiné
were late additions to the French monarchy. The words Flemish (in its
fullest sense) and French have therefore to be used with caution. Even
Brittany was only incorporated at the end of the fifteenth century.
Manuscript liturgies of English origin of any date are unmistakable by
reason of the saints' names. St. Thomas a Becket is _not_ one of the
distinctive ones, for he was worshipped everywhere; but all the English
books, whether they be of Roman use, or of Salisbury or York use, contain
the names of SS. Alban, Cuthbert, Aldhelm, Guthlac, Botulph, Grimbald,
Edward, Richard, Edmund, Swithin, Dunstan, Etheldreda, Edith, Winifrid,
Chad, John of Beverley. The names of St. Wilfrid, St. William, St. Hilda,
St. Aidan, St. Bede, and St. Everilda, are proofs of York and northern use;
St. Milburga, St. Guthlac, and St. Thomas Cantilupe indicated Hereford, as
also does St. Osytha, although one name alone is not sufficient. St.
Wulfstan points to Worcester, St. Hugh to Lincoln, but not always. Aldatus,
Kinburga, Egwin, and Elwin, are only found in books of Gloucester or
western origin. St. Erkenwald always indicates London or the south.
Scottish liturgies of the kind are very rare, and contain the names of
saints not elsewhere met with. There can be no doubt as to the origin
beyond the border of a book which either in its calendar or its Litany
gives the names of Kentigern, Ninian, Aidan, Adamnan, Monan, Queen
Margaret, Duthac, and Modoc. Even any one of these names is sufficient,
although Adamnan, Aidan, and Ninian might possibly appear on this side of
the Tweed, as well as St. Adrian who was likewise Scottish.
{70}Special German saints are Gotthard, Lambert (not always), Adelbert,
Bernward, Sebald, Swibert, Cunegund, Hermenegild, Willibald, Kilian,
Hedwig, Wolfgang, Irmin.
Among the saints of the Spanish calendar are Isidore, Ildefonsus, Eulalia,
Raimund, Leocadia, Gumersind, Baldomer, Leander, Braulio, Turibius,
Quiteria, Froilan. There is sometimes a curious coincidence between the
Spanish and the German calendars. The Spanish coincidences with the
calendar of Southern France are more easily to be accounted for.
The Italian saints are always those of the Roman calendar, but St. Zenobio
is seldom found outside of Tuscany. SS. Bernardinus of Siena and Nicolas of
Tolentinum are Italian saints of the fifteenth century more frequently
found in Italian calendars (after 1450) than in calendars of other
countries. In the case of the latter two, their names are sometimes useful
in fixing a limit for the age of a book, because MSS. of the time of their
canonisation are numerous. The dates of beatification of some earlier
saints such as Thomas Becket, Francis, Dominic, and King Louis, are also
occasionally of service; but as a rule the names of the saints in the
calendars are far older than the thirteenth century.
_The Fourteenth Century in Italy and Germany_
To go back to the fourteenth century. In Italy the broken Lombard had given
way to the general adoption of the modern gothic. Some excellent decorative
work began to appear in the borders and miniatures of MSS. executed in
Northern and Central Italy. As a rule in the earlier times, Italian
miniatures were rude in drawing, and barbaric in colour like German and
Spanish work; but in the thirteenth century a distinct Italian type arose,
based at first on imitation of the semi-Byzantine art of Calabria and
Sicily; but soon growing more national under the influence of Giotto. There
is no resemblance in style or manner between the miniatures and borders of
Italian artists, and {71}those of Northern Europe. The figures and faces
are painted with opaque colour, and a broad brush; giving altogether a
stronger impression of representing real men and women, than the exquisite
drawing of the French artists, in which faces were washed with colour after
having had the features drawn in with a pen or a fine brush. (Plate 12
shows the style of illustration used at Venice in the first half of the
fourteenth century, in which there is a curious combination of French-like
calligraphy with the painty miniatures of the home school of art.) There
was in fact more of _modelling_ in the Italian illuminator's work in its
purely national stage from about 1350 to 1450. After the later date a more
subtle and minute delicacy in the drawing altered the character of the
pictorial work. The borders which prevailed during 1320 to 1420 are also
quite different from French work. Broad foliage of architectonic pattern
hangs in soft tints of red and blue from a long upright slender pole like
an ornamental curtain-rod, and little buds or drops of burnished gold fall
here and there within the line of sight, but there is no attempt to fill up
the spaces with any elaborate scheme of twining branches and real leaves
and flowers, as in the French parallels. The writing is usually square and
gothic, but with few of the oblique angles and little projecting points
that are seen in Western gothic. The Lombardic hand of Eastern and Southern
Italy, had left no trace in the script which succeeded it. The round and
beautiful Carolingian letter of North Italy had a distinct influence in
moulding the Italian gothic, and preserving its freedom from Teutonic
angularities. It had lasted longer here than in other countries, but
Spanish Visigothic was also a late lingerer, and did not succumb to French
influence till the thirteenth century.
In Germany, the fourteenth century proceeded as elsewhere to produce a
closely packed difficult Gothic letter, and also to introduce an ugly
cursive which came generally into use in the next century. In decoration,
the old {72}Germanic style had given way to the influence of French and
Italian work, and a sort of new school was created, which in the following
century became distinctively German. The cursive writing alluded to was an
ugly rapid script deformed from the minuscule, which was very largely used
in the fifteenth century, and developed in time the handwriting which still
prevails in Germany, although gradually giving way to the Roman.
_English Work in the Fourteenth Century_
The cursive hand in England, as used between 1250 and 1550 for all
purposes, and in legal documents for a long time afterwards, seems to have
grown up in the early part of the thirteenth century. It is quite unlike
the earlier charter hand, although it must have been derived from it. For
the first century or more of its use, it is remarkable by reason of the
long strokes which are broad and heavy above, but taper into thin lines
below, those heavy heads being bifurcated in the earlier times and looped
in the later. During the thirteenth and a great part of the fourteenth
century it looked handsome, and could be read without difficulty; from the
late part of the fourteenth century onwards it deteriorated both in aspect
and in clearness. Nothing resembling this English hand was used on the
continent, except (in a slight degree) in the notes written sometimes on
the margins of philosophical and legal books, by means of a hard leaden
stylus. Another cursive was also employed, which was merely the rapid
writing of the gothic minuscule, like that of Germany; but this appeared
rather on the continent.
It has been remarked that the Norman conquest introduced a new fashion in
writing; but the observation is too strong. That event led gradually to the
disuse of writing in the angular Anglo-Saxon letters, but had little
influence on the fashion of the script used for writing Latin, which had
become round and clear since the tenth century. The {73}Carolingian
reformation had failed to supersede the Anglo-Irish hand, but its influence
extended far enough to improve the shape even of the purely English
letters. In Ireland, the angular character had fixed its type which has not
since varied.
At the beginning of the fourteenth century, the English, as has been said
above, began to relinquish the lead in calligraphy and ornamentation, which
they had held since the twelfth. The Latin Bibles which had been produced
towards the end of the twelfth century were usually folios of good size,
written in a large and fine hand, and decorated with miniatures of the type
seen in the Huntingfield Psalter. The fashion of the thirteenth century
inclined to work of smaller dimensions, and the Bibles came out in small
octavo or duodecimo size until the end of the century approached, when
there was a tendency to revert to small folios. In the fourteenth century,
a favourite size was quarto or small quarto. The illustrations in MSS. of
both twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and of the beginning of the
fourteenth, were similar in style, but varying in appearance according to
the space allowed the artist.
_French Work in the Fourteenth Century_