A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges
Part Four: England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales. Volume One: Insular and Anglos-Saxon Manuscripts
Edited by Stella Panayotova Edited by Nigel Morgan
“This publication is the first volume to appear in the catalogue series devoted to the British Isles and covers Insular and Anglo-Saxon manuscripts produced between c. 700 and c. AD 1100. This was a period in which Britain witnessed a great blossoming of cultural awareness and artistic craftsmanship. Under the reign of King Alfred to
This publication is the first volume to appear in the catalogue series devoted to the British Isles and covers Insular and Anglo-Saxon manuscripts produced between c. 700 and c. 1100 AD. This was a period in which Britain witnessed a great blossoming of cultural awareness and artistic craftsmanship. Under the reign of King Alfred towards the end of the ninth century England experienced a renewed impetus for scholarly activity, and as a result the production of books intensified greatly. By the early tenth century, influenced and inspired by new trends and ideas from Continental Europe, English art began to flourish, and manuscript illumination especially made a great impact with the high quality of its figure style and decorated initials, and with its elegance of script and mise-en-page. Cambridge is fortunate in having a significant collection of manuscripts from this period, and the ninety-seven works catalogued and richly illustrated here are amongst the finest surviving examples of Anglo-Saxon decoration. Included here are the fragmentary yet striking remains of a once magnificent early eighth-century Northumbrian Gospels, while an early tenth-century copy of Bede’s Life of St Cuthbert contains a full-page image of King Aethelstan offering a book to St Cuthbert, that may be the earliest presentation scene surviving in England. In another tenth-century manuscript, Amalarius of Metz’s Liber officialis, one may see the fullest repertoire of ingenious interlace and zoomorphic initials-the high-point of Anglo-Saxon drawing skills. In yet another Gospel book, from the early eleventh century, a de luxe manuscript resplendent with gold, one can find all the characteristic features of Anglo-Saxon iconography and style, including exuberant frame ornamentation, as well as examples of drapery with agitated fluttering hemlines, the hall-mark of Carolingian-inspired draughtsmanship. In addition to the detailed catalogue of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts produced in England, Ireland and Wales, the volume also includes an Addenda to the previously published Part One of this series, listing thirteen Frankish manuscripts from the eighth to the tenth century that had not been catalogued before. Among these is the well-known copy of Hrabanus Maurus’ De laudibus sanctae crucis whose place of origin and circumstances of production still remain to be established. Every manuscript catalogued is illustrated in full colour, mostly with several illustrations, and frequently with special detail images. There is also an exhaustive bibliography and the catalogue is fully indexed including a comprehensive iconographic index.
- Edited by Stella Panayotova
- Edited by Nigel Morgan
Other Titles in this Series
A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges. Part Three
France: c. 1000-c. 1250
Volume 3.1
A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges
Part Two: Italy and the Iberian Peninsula
A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges
Part One: The Frankish Kingdoms, the Netherlands, Germany, Bohemia, Hungary and Austria
Volume 1
A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges. Part Five
Volume One: Books Printed in Italy before 1501
Volume 5.1
Similar Books
A Collaborative Tapestry in Honour of Shirley Ann Brown / Une fresque brodée en l’honneur de Shirley Ann Brown
The Bayeux Tapestry Seen by her Colleagues and Friends / La Tapisserie de Bayeux vue par ses collègues et amis
Balthasar Caymox of Nuremberg
Early Modern German Print Publishers: Popular Prints of the Seventeenth Century
Behind the Scenes of Medieval Roofs
An Overview of the Roofing Systems of Italian Churches
Volume 90
Innovation and Medieval Communities
The Circulation of Ideas and Practices in and out of the Town (1200-1500)
Volume 63
John Dunstaple Reading Boethius
John Dunstaple’s Annotations to Boethius’s “De institutione musica” in the Manuscript Oxford, Corpus Christi College Library, MS 118
Legal Visuality
Exegesis, Ambiguity, and Dissimulation of the Donation of Constantine in the Early Modern Period
Linguistic and Cultural Dynamics in a Frontier Society
New Perspectives on Northeastern Bavaria and Western Bohemia in the Early Middle Ages
Volume 9
Medieval Debates on Foreknowledge: Future Contingents, Prophecy, and Divination
Acts of the XXVII Annual Colloquium of the SIEPM, Trento 12-15 September 2023
Volume 31
Medieval Yeghegis, Armenia
History, Archaeology, Society. Local Multiplicities and Global Connections of a Rural Centre on the Silk Road(s)
Monastic Manuscripts from the Eastern Mediterranean (Sinai, Jerusalem, Antioch)
Production, Use, and Contexts
Naples as Laboratory / Laboratorium Neapel
Style Options, Artistic Rivalry and Self Fashioning in Neapolitan Baroque Painting / Plurale Stilbildung, Kunstlerkonkurrenz und Self Fashioning in der neapolitanischen Barockmalerei
Nurturing the Elite
Representations of Drinking, Eating, and Religious Vessels in Palmyrene Funerary Iconography
Volume 13
