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Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
 Though extensive glass works are known to have existed at
Constantinople and at Thessalonica between the ninth and thirteenth
centuries, there are scarcely any remains of Byzantine glass in
existence that can with certainty be ascribed to the Eastern empire,
unless we except the five cups and two shallow basins of thick green
glass that are decorated with Byzantine ornament, and which form
part of the treasure of St. Mark’s at Venice. Glass was used in the
windows of Byzantine churches and, of course, in the making of the
mosaic tesseræ.
It is highly probable that glass objects were made in Syria, and at
Damascus especially, since the Roman period, yet examples of the
earlier work from these parts are very rare. The celebrated gold cup
of Chrosroes (A.D. 531-579) is a Persian work which has been set
with glass lozenges and rosettes. Other examples are small glass
weights, discs, or tokens, and a Saracenic glass basin in the Cluny
Museum at Paris, which has been made either in Egypt or Syria, and
is known to date between 1279 and 1294.
With the above exceptions there is no authentic work that can be
pointed to which dates earlier than the fourteenth century. The
finest examples of Saracenic glass, some of which may be seen in
our museums, are the beautiful enamelled glass mosque lamps (Fig.
299). They mostly date from the fourteenth century, and are usually
decorated richly with Arabic inscriptions—sometimes with the name
of the artist—in gold and coloured enamels.
In the city of Damascus glass cups and other vessels of great
beauty were made at this period, having enamelled Saracenic
decorations.
The “cups of Damascus” were much prized, and according to the
inventories of the kings of England, France, and Germany, we learn
that they were set in gold stands or mounts, and were usually
presents to Western monarchs, brought by their ambassadors from
the East.
The cup kept by the Musgrave family, and known as the “Luck of
Edenhall,” is made in enamelled Saracenic glass, and has a leather
covering of fifteenth-century workmanship.
 Fig. 299.—Enamelled Oriental Glass Bottle and Mosque Lamp.

Venetian blown glass has always been renowned for its beauty,
both in its elegance of form-as in the wine-glasses, goblets, and
cups—and in the beautiful opalescent hues of its delicate colouring.
The making of glass in Venice began to assume great importance
in the fourteenth century, but many small glass furnaces were in
operation for more than a hundred years prior to this date.
The Venetians apparently, in the early period of the Renaissance,
studied very closely the remains of the Roman glass, and eventually
imitated and produced nearly all the kinds of glass that in former
days were made in ancient Rome.
Another direct cause which led to the advancement of the glass
makers’ craft in Venice was the parricidal conquest of Constantinople
by the Christians of Rome, aided by the fleets of Venice, in 1204, for
after the sacking of the Byzantine capital, most of the portable
works of art of every kind-including the bronze horses that had been
brought from Rome to Constantinople by its founder, and which now
adorn the front of St. Mark’s-were carried off to Venice, and it is
more than likely that after this the glass mosaic workers, among
other Byzantine craftsmen, had come to Venice, where they found
employment in the rising republic.
The work in the mosaic decoration of St. Mark’s doubtless helped
to develop the making of glass in Venice, and the lagunes were rich
in marsh-loving plants that would yield alkali and furnish the fine
sand requisite for its manufacture.
Mention is made in one of the documents in the archives of
Venice, dated 1090, of one Petrus Flavianus, who was a “phiolarius,”
or glass maker, and the trade regulations of the glass makers’
societies or corporations are preserved at Venice and Murano, which
show that in the thirteenth century they had become important
bodies.
Glass furnaces were becoming so numerous in Venice that the
Great Council decreed, in 1291, they should be demolished, but
permitted them to be set up outside the city, in the suburban
districts. In the following year, however, the decrees were altered to
the effect that the small glass workers might remain in the Rialto
(the city proper), provided fifteen paces were left between each
atelier. These decrees were made to guard against a possible spread
of fire.
It is supposed that this had the effect of moving many of the
principal glass works to Murano, a district of Venice which had
become renowned for the production of Venetian glass, and where
to-day the eminent firm of Salviati & Co. have their extensive works.
The glass house at Murano, which was known as the “Sign of the
Angel” in the early half of the fifteenth century, was the most
renowned of the ateliers of that century. Angelo Beroviero was one
of its earliest directors, who was succeeded by his son Marino in that
position. The latter was a head or master of the Company of
“Phioleri” (Glass Makers’ Corporation) in 1468, which was a very
strong society at that time and enjoyed exceptional privileges from
the city council.
The intercourse of Venice with the East furnished the Venetian
glass makers with patterns of Damascus and Egyptian glass, and the
enamelled and gilded Oriental varieties were imitated and improved
on by the Murano artists. Some of the products of this period are
preserved in the museums. The illustration (Fig. 300) is from a
Venetian enamelled cup of green glass in the Kensington Museum.
In the sixteenth century the glass-making furnaces of Murano had
increased to a great extent, and were placed under the special
protection of the Council of Ten. Owing to the jealousy at this time
of other European States, Venetian glass-blowers were bribed by
offers of money and large salaries to set up furnaces abroad, and
laws were then made forbidding workmen to leave the country to
carry on glass making in other places under the penalty of death.
This, however, did not prevent Venetian glass-blowers from taking
service under the protection of foreign rulers in such countries as
Flanders, Spain, and England.
The natural consequences followed, that the exports in glass from
Venice to foreign countries became lessened, so much so that the
workmen of Murano complained of being thrown idle for several
months in the year.
 Fig. 300.—Venetian Enamelled Glass; Fifteenth
Century. (S.K.M.)

Venetian glass has been made in many colours, such as blue,

green, purple, amber, and ruby, and in variegated mixtures of clear
or transparent and opaque glass. The clear variety is remarkable for
elegance of shape and fantastic designs of handles or wings,
consisting of twisted and knotted interlacings, which were generally
executed in blue or red colours and attached to the sides of wine-
glasses and other vessels (Fig. 301). One beautiful variety of glass is
clouded with a milky-like opalescent tint, which is supposed to be
produced from arsenic. The opaque white glass is made by the
addition of oxide of tin to the usual ingredients.
 Fig. 301.—Venetian Glass of the Sixteenth Century. (J.)

Glass was made by the Venetians to imitate precious stones, were

streaked, splashed, or spotted with various colours, gold, and
copper; the aventurine spotted glass was obtained from a silicate of
copper.
The latticinio variety was formed of rods of transparent glass
enclosing lines of opaque white glass forming patterns. The vitro di
trina is the so-called lace-glass (Fig. 302); the latter and the mosaic-
like or mille-fiori glass were made by the Venetians in imitation of
the Roman varieties. Another variety was that known as a reticelli, in
which ornament of opaque network sometimes enclosed air bubbles.
That known under the German name of Schmelz is the variegated or
marble opaque glass made in the Murano furnaces, which imitated
chalcedony, lapis lazuli, tortoiseshell, and jasper. Crackled glass was
made by the sudden cooling of the half-blown material; this was
again heated and drawn out in order to increase the spaces between
the crackled lines.
In the sixteenth century the forms of the Venetian glass vessels
were of the Renaissance type; the long shanks and the wide bowls
gave them an appearance of elegance and grace. The light and thin
character of the material had also a great deal to do with the fragile
look of elegance in Venetian glass of this
period; the glass of the former
(fifteenth) century was of a much
thicker kind.
The lightness and superior strength of
Venetian glass was due to the absence
of lead in its composition, which is so
much used in the modern flint glass.
The materials of the composition of
the clear Murano glass are supposed to
be—one part of alkali, obtained from
ferns, moss, lichen, or seaweed, and
two parts of pebbles of white quartz or
fine clean white sand, and a small
quantity of manganese, all well mixed
together and melted in the furnace.
The colouring matter is produced from
the oxides of various metals, as in the
vitreous coloured glazes used in the
enamels for glazed pottery.
Vessels and objects in endless variety
have been made by the Venetians, such
as ewers, basins, drinking-glasses, Fig. 302.—Venetian “Vitro di trina.”
(S.K.M.)
bottles, standing cups, bowls, goblets,
large and small candlesticks, beads, and
mirrors, and were exported in great quantities to all parts by the
Venetian galleys.
Bead making at Venice was a separate trade, and was one of
great importance in the sixteenth and two following centuries. The
makers of the small beads were called the “Margariteri,” and those
who made the large beads were known as the “Perlai.” The beads
were made from small sections broken or cut off from rods or tubes
of glass and placed in an iron pot that was made to rotate, so that
the motion prevented the beads from adhering to each other, and at
the same time formulated their spherical shape.
 Mirrors were made by the ancients of polished metal and from
slabs of black obsidian—a kind of natural glass. In mediæval times
they were made of clear glass behind which was placed a sheet of
lead foil. Glass mirrors were made in Venice from the year 1507,
when methods had been discovered of polishing the glass and of
applying the “foglia,” or layer of metal leaf, to the back. After this
date the making of mirrors soon developed into great importance,
and the “Specchiai,” or mirror makers, had their own corporation.
Like the other glass wares of Venetian manufacture, the mirrors
were exported to all parts of Europe.
Some good examples of sixteenth-century mirrors and mirror-
frames in glass cut into ornamental shapes, with bevelled edges and
engraved, are preserved in our museums and in old houses.
Glass painting for windows was known and practised in Venice as
early as the fourteenth century. The very early Italian stained glass
used in windows is said to have been executed for Leo III. in 795.
Besides the painted or stained glass used in church windows
during the Middle Ages throughout Italy, there were glass
manufactories in Rome, Verona, Milan, and Florence for the
production of similar wares as those of Venice.
In France and Spain glass making was carried on at various places
from the days of the Romans; antique fragments of glass have been
dug up in Normandy and in Poitou. In the latter province glass
making flourished from a very early date up to the fifteenth century.
It was revived in 1572 by the Venetian Fabriano Salviati, who came
to Poitou and set up a glass workshop. At Paris, Rouen, Normandy,
and in Lorraine glass was made prior to the sixteenth century. The
Normandy glass was of a coarse kind, made chiefly for windows and
common utensils, but many of the Venetian varieties were made at
the other places named.
Some Venetian glass makers came to Paris in 1665, when an
establishment was formed for the making of mirrors, and about the
same time another factory was set up at Four-la-Ville; these two
factories were united by the French Minister Colbert, and were under
the patronage of the king. We find that soon afterwards, and
especially in the Louis-Quinze period, large panels and wall spaces
were filled with glass mirrors as interior decorations.

Fig. 303.—Spanish Glass; Sixteenth

Century. (S.K.M.)

Glass was made in Spain in the Ibero-Roman period, as the

remains of glass vessels and necklaces have been found in tombs,
and the ruins of Roman furnaces have been found in the valleys of
the Pyrenees. It is supposed that the art was carried on under the
Gothic kings of Spain, and also by the Moors in the thirteenth
century, who brought with them glass workers as well as some of
the wares of the East. Much of the glass made in Spain subsequent
to this date is in imitation of the shapes of Arabian pottery, and this
is still the case in much of the modern Spanish glass. Spanish glass
of the Renaissance was similar in form and in material to the
Venetian work of the same period, and during the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries the work was in imitation more or less of the
contemporary Dutch and Flemish glass (Fig. 303).
 In Holland, glassware seems to have been made by Murano
artificers, who from time to time settled in that country and brought
the secrets of their trade with them. The objects made were
naturally imitations of the Venetian glass, and many of the Dutch
drinking-glasses were very graceful in design.
In Amsterdam, Antwerp, Brussels, and throughout the Low
Countries generally Venetian glass had been imported in great
quantities in the time of and prior to the seventeenth century, and it
is difficult to say how much of the old glass found at those places is
Dutch, Flemish, or Venetian.
Engraving on glass was much practised in Holland, and many
Dutch goblets have well executed portraits of kings, queens, and
other persons.
Glass making has been practised in Germany, like in most
European countries, from the days of the Romans downwards,
especially in the Rhenish Provinces, but German examples dating
from the Middle Ages are very rare.

Fig. 304.—German Glasses. (S.K.M.)

 There is documentary evidence which proves that glass was made
at Mainz as early as the beginning of the eighth century.
The earliest example of German glass in this country is a
wiederkom, or cylindrical drinking-vessel, which bears the date of
1571, but an older one, of the date of 1553, is preserved in the
Künstkammer at Berlin.
A favourite decoration on the German Wiederkoms is the arms of
the emperor or electors, those of the different states of the empire,
and of private owners (Fig. 304).
The colour of this kind of glass is usually green and the
decorations are enamelled or painted in grisaille; as a rule the
German cups and wine glasses of the seventeenth century are richly
decorated (Fig. 305). In the German wine-glasses known as
“flügelgläser” is seen an imitation of the Venetian “winged glasses”
(Fig. 301).
 Fig. 305.—Decorated German Vases; Seventeenth Century. (S.K.M.)

Bohemian glass of the seventeenth century is noted for its

clearness and good quality, and illustrates the advancement made in
the art of engraving on glass. The engraved work was done with a
diamond point as in etching, with the lapidary’s wheel, and by
means of biting the glass with fluoric acid; the latter method is said
to have been discovered by Henry Schwanhard of Nüremberg in
1670. John Schäper was a very clever glass engraver and decorator
of this period.
A beautiful kind of German glass is known as Kunckel’s ruby glass,
the originator of which was the director of the Potsdam glass works,
where he produced this variety about 1680.
Many relics of glass vessels and beads have been found in Roman
tombs, and in various parts of England, of a greenish or blue colour.
These may have been imported or may have been made in England,
but there is no certain evidence of this. Glass vessels for drinking
purposes have been found which are believed to have belonged to
the Anglo-Saxon period (Fig. 306).
The material of these is thin, the colour is generally of a pale
straw tint, and strips of thickened glass ornament the outside,
arranged in the nature of parallel lines, or wound spirally to produce
a kind of network decoration.
Venetian glass found its way to England in the sixteenth century;
in the inventories of Henry VIII. (1529) and of Robert, Earl of
Leicester (1588), large quantities of Venetian glasses are mentioned
as belonging to the above.
Some Muranese glass workers were engaged at this time (1550)
in the service of the King of England. The name of an Italian—Jacob
Vessaline—is mentioned as a glass maker who worked at Crutched
Friars in the beginning of Elizabeth’s reign (1557), and in the year
1589 there were supposed to be fifteen glass houses in England.
Sir Robert Mansel was a prominent glass maker of the
seventeenth century; he obtained patents in the year 1616 for the
making of window glass and all kinds of vessels, and from the
remains of glass objects that were found on the site of Princes Hall,
in Broad Street, London, it is believed that his
works were on that spot.
Mansel employed Italian workmen in the
first instance, and it appears that prior to
1623 he had set up works in Milford Haven, at
Newcastle-on-Tyne, in Scotland, and other
places. The Newcastle furnaces were the most
successful, the others being practically
failures. Mr. Nesbitt thinks that the success of
the Newcastle-on-Tyne works was due to the
new system of flint-glass making, which must
be credited as an English invention.
Flint or crystal glass is made of a mixture of
silicate of potash and lead. It was known but
imperfectly made by the Romans in their clear
glass variety, which contained a small portion
of lead. In the Middle Ages the glass which
contained lead was called “Jewish glass,” and
was generally used for painting on, as it was
more fusible than other varieties which did
not contain lead. But all authorities agree that
the English invented a new product in their
flint glass, which was made after many
experiments at Lambeth in 1673, as “clear,
ponderous, and thick as crystal.” Fig. 306.—Anglo-Saxon
Mr. Nesbitt infers that it was the use of coal Drinking Cup. (S.K.M.)
in the furnaces instead of wood that led to the
development of the process. When using coal the melting-pots had
to be covered in the furnace, which lessened the heating powers and
thus made the fusing more difficult. To put more alkali in the mixture
would have helped it to fuse at a much lower heat, but it would have
injured the colour and quality of the glass, so lead was added in
certain proportions, which gave the requisite clearness and strength.
All kinds of glass vessels and plate glass for carriage windows
were made at Lambeth, under the management or patronage of the
Duke of Buckingham.
 Fig. 307.—Stained Glass; Fifteenth Century.

Though there are no records of glass making in Ireland of a very

early date, the glass beads and glass bosses which decorate the
objects of Irish art, such as the crosses, croziers, brooches, book-
covers, and the celebrated Ardagh Chalice, prove that the art was
known in Ireland at least in the ninth century, if not earlier. Mention
has also been made in old writings of this period of glass vessels for
use in Irish churches.
 Fig. 308.—Window Glass; English, Fifteenth
Century.

Painted or stained window glass is the glory of our Mediæval

churches. The earliest coloured windows were doubtless made from
mosaic-like arrangements of different bits of coloured glass. The
mosaic window led to the representation of pictorial subjects in
stained glass, the latter being formed of pieces of self-coloured
glass, or that kind having each piece stained in one colour
throughout, cut in the requisite shapes, and fastened together by an
arrangement of lead lines which form the main lines of the design;
to help out the drawing and expression the stained glass is shaded
in hatchings, stippling, and bold lines, usually in a brown colour.
Painted glass, as distinguished from stained glass, is that which is
painted on clear or tinted grounds with various enamel colours made
from metallic oxides. After the painting is finished the piece of glass
is fired, and the enamel colours become fused with the glass
surface, and really become part of the glass itself. More finish, a
wider range of colouring, greater detail, and generally a more
pictorial effect is produced by the artist being able to use freely the
enamel colours; but a corresponding loss of depth and brilliancy of
colour and of bold decorative effect which belonged to older
examples of stained glass must be set against any advantages the
painted variety may possess from its pictorial point of view.
The earliest instance in the use of stained glass for church
window’s is supposed to have been in those that were given by
Count Arnold to the Abbey of Tegernsee in Bavaria in the year 999.
The thirteenth and fourteenth century were the finest periods for the
stained-glass windows of the Gothic cathedrals both in England and
on the Continent. About the middle of the sixteenth century enamel
colours began to be used, and, as before observed, the designs
showed a striving after pictorial effects.

Fig. 309.—Chinese Glass Bowl. (S.K.M.)

The revival of classic art in the Renaissance period has also a

great deal to do with this change in the style and method of
execution in painted glass, and we find that the greatest painters—
but not always the greatest decorators-of the period supplied
cartoons and designs for this class of work.
Glass making has been known in China and Japan from very early
times, but it appears to be difficult to obtain anything like authentic
information as to its history from our present imperfect knowledge
or acquaintance with the native records.
There are stories of ancient Chinese glass vessels that are said to
have been seen by the French missionaries of the last century, one
of which vessels was so large that “a mule could have been put into
it,” and that the Chinese made a kind of glass called “lieou-li” that
was sufficiently elastic as to bend easily.
The vitreous enamels of the Chinese were of course used as
glazes on their porcelain wares and pottery, but it seems that
formerly they only made glass objects in the imitation of precious
stones, gems, and in their enamels. Chinese glass is often made to
simulate rock crystal and jade carvings; their glass snuff-boxes and
other small objects are usually well coloured, and are decorated with
relief work of ornament, landscapes or figure subjects, the objects
generally being of a massive character (Fig. 309).
 CHAPTER IX.
THE DECORATION OF BOOKS.

Books may be illustrated in a more or less pictorial manner

without any particular regard to the decoration of the page, or with
due regard to its ornamentation. In the latter case the designer of
the decoration will be the illustrator and decorator in one.
The great majority of modern illustrated books are not decorated
in the true sense of the word, but have their illustrations inserted as
pictures, or scraps of pictures, without borders or frames, and with
little or no relation to the distribution of the printed matter or to the
boundary lines of the page. In this respect the modern practice is
different from that observed in the Mediæval and Renaissance book
illustration, for in the two periods named, when a purely literal or
pictorial scene was inserted, it had usually borders like mouldings, or
borders of rich decoration, or sometimes bands and lines only, which
separated the picture from the printed or written text, and
harmonized with any other decoration that might be on the page.
Thus an artistic unity was usually preserved in the book decoration
of earlier times, which, generally speaking, is the exception in the
present day, and not the rule.
The modern practice was brought about by the invention of
copper-plate engraving—about 1477—when the copper-plate
illustration became, in a great measure, the substitute for wood-
engraved blocks of a former period. The plates were usually
engraved with copies of pictures, and the book decorator was
superseded by the painter; the art and practice of the former
declined, while the work of the latter became fashionable, and has
remained so ever since.
 Photography has been a considerable aid to the pictorial side of
book illustration, and has, on the other hand, been a great help to
designers of decorative illustration, for by the use of photography
the designer is enabled to have the work of his hand reproduced in
facsimile, as in the process block method, which has been such a
powerful rival and competitor to all kinds of engraving that it has
now almost crushed them out of existence.
Before the invention of printing books were very scarce, as they
were written in manuscript, and were mostly of a devotional
character, made for the use of the clergy and others in monastic
establishments or religious houses.
The writers and decorators of these missals or illuminated books
were chiefly the brothers or monks of the several religious orders.
Some of the earliest and best decorated books are those
belonging to the Irish Celtic art of the seventh and eighth centuries.
The remarkable designs of illuminated initials and capitals, and the
intricate geometric patterns, spirals, and involved interlacings of
many varieties, all executed with astonishing skill, were not excelled
or equalled by the scribes and designers of similar work in England
or on the Continent.
Foremost in importance among the many remaining monuments
of Irish art in book decoration is the celebrated “Book of Kells,” now
preserved in Trinity College, Dublin. It was formerly supposed to
have been brought to the Columban Monastery of Kells, or Kenlis,
the ancient Cennanas, by St. Columba, the founder of that Christian
house, whose death is said to have taken place in the year 597; but
this is likely to be only tradition, for it would appear, according to
some later authorities, that the character of the lettering and the
style of the ornamentation fixes the date of its execution about the
end of the seventh century.
Although the native Irish phase of Celtic art possesses many
characteristics of its own, it is a development in some degree of the
more Eastern Romanesque ornament, and symbolic Byzantine, or
even the more primitive Greek. It is also mixed with a few geometric
forms and symbols that had existed in Ireland before the
introduction of Christianity in the fifth century.
 In the “Book of Kells,” for instance, there are several illustrations
which show in some parts a Greek influence, and in one page the
Greek monogram of Christ appears.
The initial letters in square or rectilineal capitals usually occupy
large portions of the illuminated page, and are often embedded in
rectangular panels with borders, the latter being filled with elaborate
interlacings and spirals, &c. (Fig. 310).
The smaller text used by the Irish scribes was founded on the
round or uncial Roman variety of lettering, but in the Irish variety
there is a distinct improvement on the Roman in its beautiful and
restrained quality of artistic simplicity, combined with its perfect
legibility. In some Irish manuscripts an angular cursive or running
hand was also used.
An illustration given at Fig. 311 of the frontispiece from the
“Epistle of Jerome,” in the Irish missal known as the “Book of
Durrow,” is a fine example of Celtic ornamentation. This and the
previous illustration are from Miss M. Stokes’ handbook on “Early
Christian Art in Ireland.”
 Fig 310.—Portion of Illuminated Monogram; Book of Kells.
(S.)

The influence and art work of the Irish scribes and missal
decorators in England and on the Continent has been much greater
than was formerly believed. Missionaries were sent to England,
Scotland, and to the Continent, from the great monastic
establishments in Ireland during the period from the seventh to the
eleventh centuries, and carried with them “Gospels,” “Psalters,” and
other missals, besides making many other religious books for the
use of the monasteries they had founded in foreign countries. These
Irish scribes also taught their art of book illumination to the monks
who lived at such places where they set up their missions, or where
they had become recluses in the foreign monasteries already
established. This accounts for the number of Irish manuscripts that
have been found in such monastic houses as that of St. Gall in
Switzerland, Bobio in Piedmont, at Mentz (Mayence), at Ratisbon in
Bavaria, at Honau on the Rhine, and at many other places on the
Continent. The style of art in all the manuscripts found at these
places, though introduced at the inception of Christianity into Ireland
from Italy through Gaul, had died out in the latter countries during
the fourth and fifth centuries, and was re-introduced, as we have
seen, under a modified phase into the Continent by the Irish
missionary scribes.

Fig. 311.—From the Epistle of Jerome; “Book of

Durrow.” (S.)

The majority of the Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, if not written by

Irish scribes in England, were either decorated or copied closely from
the work of the latter. This is supported by some written testimony,
but the ornamentation of the pages themselves are distinctly of Irish
design.
A common feature in the illuminated pages of the books of the
Middle Ages was the dividing of the pages into four compartments
with ornamental borders, and each compartment holding the figure
of a saint or symbols of the Evangelists, or having a miniature on the
top half of the page and two small columns of text below.
Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, with classical treatment of the figure
designs, may be seen in the King’s Library at the British Museum.
The figures have the attenuated Byzantine character, with the linear
treatment of the draperies, and with the long lobe-like forms which
strongly mark the intended position of the limbs under the drapery;
while others show the influence of the early Christian paintings of
the catacombs at Rome and Naples.
The “Charter” of the foundation of Newminster at Winchester
(966) and several “Gospels” in Latin of the eleventh century in the
British Museum, are examples of the best kind of Anglo-Saxon
illuminated manuscripts.
“Psalteries,” “Gospels,” and botanical works known as “Herbals”
were among the principal kinds of illustrated books, which were
executed in considerable numbers during the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries. The text in these books was usually in solid
columns, neatly written in a kind of half-uncial letter in Latin, with
large initials and surrounded by broad borders, having little scrolls
and trefoil leaves or flowers in which four or six miniatures were
placed at intervals. Some pages had the upper half or more occupied
by a miniature and had less text, but nearly always there were the
accompanying delicate borders designed with great spirit and
freedom, and consisting of ornament made up of leaves, flowers,
fruit, stems, lines, and spirals, executed on the vellum ground in
bright colours and burnished gold.
A characteristic of some of the missals of the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries was the calendar pages at the beginning of the
book. The pages which contained the calendar had also, in some
cases, miniatures in the borders representing the seasons.
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