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The Research Group on Manuscript Evidence exists to apply an integrated, holistic approach to manuscripts and texts in other forms through the ages. The work began on medieval Western European manuscripts and early modern printed books in specific collections, but the research work has expanded to embrace a wider body of written sources, from the Late-Antique Mediterra- nean world to the present.

The Group considers these and many related materials simultaneously as carriers of text, archaeological artefacts, works of art, layers of history, and monuments of culture. The Group seeks to examine, record, and analyze the evidence of these witnesses of history, life, thought, art, and culture, and to set their testimony in context. It also works to educate others in its methods and its results. It offers a concerted, informed response to the complex challenges of preserving, transmitting, and understanding the legacy of the past. By such means the Group seeks better to understand the present and to help prepare for the future, above all a future worth having.

Among the items of Menu on the Group’s website are history, origins, and aims; officers, organization, associates, and volunteers; and activities, which include meetings, photographic exhibitions, and publications. Meetings take the form of lectures, master classes, symposia, colloquia, seminars, workshops, and conference sessions. Conference sessions, both sponsored and co-sponsored, usually occur at the International Medieval Congress at Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Publications include catalogues, books, booklets, this website, and the illustrated Bulletin ShelfLife: A Meeting Place for Scholars, Collectors & Connoisseurs of Manuscripts, Books & the Written Word. The copyright high-quality digital font, called Bembino, is available for free use and suitable for multiple languages: so far English and most Western European languages based on the Latin alphabet, as well as Greek (both modern and polytonic), the Russian subset of the cyrillic languages, Hebrew, and Egyptian Arabic.

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The Graduate School of the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures (CSMC, Integriertes Graduiertenkolleg im Sonderforschungsbereich 950 Manuskriptkulturen in Asien, Afrika und Europa) at the University of Hamburg invites applications for Six PH. D. Scholarships (2012-2015).

Scholarships of € 1.365 per month (tax free) are granted for a period  of three years, starting 1 April 2012. Additional support according to individual need is available.

The CSMC is a unique research centre for the historical and comparative study of manuscript cultures in Asia, Africa, and Europe building on decades of manuscript studies at the University of Hamburg. It was recently established with a generous grant from the German Research Association (DFG) in order to develop a comprehensive approach to manuscript cultures including disciplines such as philology, palaeography, codicology, art history, and material analysis.

Communication in the international research community of the Centre is conducted in English, Ph. D. (Dr. phil.) dissertations should be written in English or German.

We are looking for highly qualified and highly motivated Ph.D. students with an M.A. or equivalent degree in all disciplines studying manuscript cultures regardless of region. Applications from candidates expecting to finish their degree before April 2012 are welcome.

Applications with a research proposal compatible with the programme of the Centre’s objectives, CV and copies of B.A., M.A. or other relevant certificates must be sent to the Director of the Graduate School:

Prof. Dr. Oliver Huck, Fakultät für Geisteswissenschaften, CSMC, Edmund-Siemers-Allee 1, 20146 Hamburg, Germany or via email.

Deadline: 31 December 2011.

Source: H-ArtHist

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EXHIBITION: Gothic Grandeur: Manuscript Illumination, 1200–1350, The Getty Center (1200 Getty Center Drive, Los Angeles, CA), 13 December 2011 – 26 February 2012 and 28 February – 13 May 2012.

The Gothic period, stretching from about 1200 to 1350 in Europe, saw the construction of soaring cathedrals and the first universities. Cities teemed with students, tradesmen, aristocrats, and churchmen, who all clamored for illuminated manuscripts. This exhibition showcases a range of books, from lavish prayer volumes and Bibles, to illustrated scientific texts and romances.

The increase of trade and the growth of cities throughout Europe during the Gothic period meant that both patrons and artists traveled more frequently, bringing with them artwork and styles that encouraged artistic discourse across regions. In the north, the style of manuscript illumination that emerged around 1200 was distinguished by naturalism tempered, by the end of the period, with courtly refinement. The art of ancient Greece and Rome as well as that of the Byzantine Empire influenced developments in southern Europe, resulting in the use of volumetric figures and stylized forms.

During the Gothic era, artists began to experiment with the design and format of the page in a variety of ways to increase its overall decorative effect. One of the most enchanting innovations was the extensive embellishment of the margins. These marginal elements sometimes relate thematically to the main image on the page, but often add a sense of humor. Other art forms also influenced the look of the painted page, such as stained glass, with its emphasis on geometric shapes and the predominant use of red and blue.

In the early Middle Ages, manuscripts were largely produced by monks in monasteries for the use of the Catholic Church. During the Gothic era, however, the art of manuscript illumination became the province of professional artists living in rapidly expanding urban centers. Manuscripts designed to inspire devotion as well as to instruct and entertain were commissioned by a wide variety of individuals. Scenes reflecting aspects of daily life and society in the Middle Ages began to appear on the pages of a growing assortment of illuminated books— devotional works, law texts, scholarly literature, and romances—that might be written in either Latin or, for the first time, a local European language.

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EXHIBITION: Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination, London, The British Library (St Pancras, 96 Euston Road), 11 November 2011- 13 March 2012.

Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination is the British Library’s first major exhibition to bring together the Library’s Royal collection, a treasure trove of illuminated manuscripts collected by the kings and queens of England between the 9th and 16th centuries.

Curated by Dr Scot McKendrick (Head of History and Classical Studies, British Library), Professor John Lowden (Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London) and Dr Kathleen Doyle (Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts, British Library), the exhibition features stunning manuscripts that are among the most outstanding examples of royal decorative and figurative painting from this era surviving in Britain today, their colours often as vibrant as when they were first painted.

However, the manuscripts do much more than declare the artistry of their makers; the luxurious objects unlock the secrets of the private lives and public personae of the royals throughout the Middle Ages and provide the most vivid surviving source for understanding royal identity. As well as providing clear instruction on appropriate regal behaviour they also give a direct insight into royal moral codes and religious belief and shed light on the politics of the day.

Visitors to the exhibition will discover a series of spaces where they will be able to get up close to the objects, and will learn how the manuscripts were created. In addition, visitors will be introduced to the background of the collection, including how and why Edward IV turned the collection into a library after years of personal collecting by the monarchs and laid the foundations for the present British Library.

The catalogue features a full-page entry of around 750 words on each manuscript included, as well as three illustrated essays that explore the wider history and context of this unique collection. It is lavishly illustrated, with a beautiful reproduction of an image from each manuscript presented alongside the text for every entry.

Click here to learn about the Royal opening on the 10th of  November with Her Majesty the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh.

The exhibition has been reviewed by ROWAN WATSON, in The Burlington Magazine, volume CLIV, number 1309, April 2012, pp. 287-289.

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The Anjou Bible. A Royal Manuscript Revealed, Naples 1340, LIEVE WATTEEUW and JAN VAN DER STOCK, eds,  (Corpus of Illuminated Manuscripts, 18), Paris – Leuve – Walpole (Ma.) 2010 (Peeters), XII +335 pages, € 85,00.

The Anjou Bible, now kept in the Theology Faculty’s Maurits Sabbe Library of the University of Leuven (Belgium) is a superbly illuminated manuscript created at the Royal Court of Naples in the turbulent fourteenth century. At this time much of Central and Southern Europe was governed by the successful dynasty of Anjou, which continued to expand its territories and encouraged artists and writers like Giotto, Simone Martini, Boccaccio and Petrarch. In 1328, after the death of her father, Joanna of Anjou became the official heir to the prosperous Kingdom of Naples and Sicily. Several years later her grandfather, Robert I, gave Joanna and her young fiancé Andrew of Hungary a precious gift, which became known as the Anjou Bible, a manuscript that is priceless from a historical and art-historical point of view.

In addition to Bible texts and splendid miniatures, it contains a wealth of historical information about the house of Anjou and the book’s origins. One of the artists responsible for the magnificent painting was Cristophorus Orimina, the leading illuminator in Naples, who signed the work. The Anjou Bible has now been carefully conserved and studied: the research findings are brought together in this book. Essays by some of the most noted experts in the field describe how the arts were promoted at the court of Robert I of Anjou and also shed light on the Bible’s genesis and on all the research methods and results. This book is richly illustrated and contains all the illuminated folios of the Anjou Bible.

Table of Contents

The Anjou Bible: A Masterpiece Revealed (pp. VIII-IX)

Eassays:
*John Lowden, The Anjou Bible in the Context of Illustrated Bibles (pp. 1-25)
* Frans Gistelinck, The Anjou Bible: A Treasure from the Maurits Sabbe Library in Leuven (pp. 27-35)
* Cathleen A. Fleck, Patronage, Art, and the Anjou Bible in Angevin Naples (1266-1352) (pp. 37-51)
* Alessandro Tomei and Stefania Paone, Paintings and Miniatures in Naples: Cavallini, Giotto and thge Portraits of King Robert (pp. 53-71)
* Michelle M. Duran, The Politics of Art: Imagining Sovereignty in the Anjou Bible (pp. 73-93)
* Nicolas Bock, A Kingdom in Stone: Angevin Sculpture in Naples (pp. 95-111)
* Alessandra Perriccioli Saggese, Cristophoro Orimina: An Illuminator at the Angevin Court of Naples (pp. 113-125)
* Luc Dequeker, The Anjou Bible and the Biblia Vulgata Lovaniensis, 1547/1574 (pp. 127-137)
* Pierre Delsaerdt, Arras College Library Leuven: The Academic Habitat of the Anjou Bible for Three Centuries (pp. 139-145)
* Lieve Watteeuw and Marina Van Bos, Illuminating with Pen and Brush: The Techniques of a Fourteenth-Century Neapolitan Illuminator Explored (pp. 147-169)
* Roberto Padoan, Marvin E. Klein, Gerrit de Bruin, Bernard J. Aalderink and Ted A.G. Steemers, Quantitative Hyperspectral Study of the Anjou Bible (pp. 171-185)
* Lieve Watteeuw, Codicology of the Anjou Bible (pp. 187-207)

Illuminated Folios of the Anjou Bible (pp. 209-299)
Captions to the Illuminated Folios of the Anjou Bible (pp. 301-307)
Biographies of Robert I and Joannna I of Anjou (pp. 309-310)
Bibliography (pp.311-328)
Partners (pp. 329-331)
About the Authors (p. 333)
Photo Credits (p. 333)
Colophon (p. 334).

Lern more about the International Conference: Miniatures and Music at the Court of Anjou Naples ca. 1340, M – Museum Leuven, 1-2 novembre 2010; and about the Exhibition: La Bible d’Anjou, Naples 1340: un manuscrit royal révélé, M – Museum Leuven, 17 septembre – 5 décembre 2010.

The book has been reviewed by C.M. Kauffmann, in Studies in Iconography, 33, 2012, pp. 298-300.

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Thirty-Eighth Annual Saint Louis Conference on Manuscript Studies, Lowrie J. Daly, S.J. Memorial Lecture on Manuscript Studies, Vatican Film Library at Saint Louis University, St. Louis (Missouri), 14–15 October 2011. Contact: Barbara Channell

The Vatican Film Library and its journal, Manuscripta, annually host the Saint Louis Conference on Manuscript Studies. The conference, known familiarly as the Manuscripta Conference, has no set theme and serves as a general forum for manuscript scholars to meet and discuss their work with colleagues. Each year a distinguished scholar is invited to deliver the Fr. Lowrie J. Daly, S.J. Memorial Lecture on Manuscript Studies. Topics addressed at the conference range from Antiquity through the early modern period and include many different subjects.:

This year the conference will be held by MICHELLE P. BROWN (University of London): Peopling Paternoster Row: Recovering the Artist of the Holkham Bible Picture-Book

The Holkham Bible offers a unique insight into the mind of a Londoner at a time when the great towns of Europe were in the ascendancy and people were relinquishing ancient feudal ties to the land in search of new opportunity—the Dick Whittington factor. Detailed ‘excavation’ of the way in which the manuscript was made reveals that it began life not as a book at all, but as a booklet of designs perhaps for an embroidered altarpiece or vestments, its style resembling opus anglicanum (‘English work’). The artist was not used to making books, but may have been inspired to do so by the scribes, illuminators and stationers alongside whom he worked in Paternoster Row beside St Paul’s Cathedral. He was evidently concerned to equate his own age and environment with ongoing biblical time—nor was he coy about depicting himself as the personal recipient of salvation, appearing on numerous occasions as a player in the drama that unfolds. The Holkham Bible offers us a window onto the beliefs and attitudes of the ordinary working men and women of London around the 1320s–40s, when urban living was already on the rise. This was the eve of the Black Death which, although it would decimate London’s population, also helped to attract further labour to it, as many folk left the decimated rural landscape, and to ensure its subsequent growth as an international mercantile centre and major publishing hub, founded on a firm ground of civic endeavour and belief that would have been fed by works such as the Holkham Bible.

Click here for further information on registration, accommodations and program

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