Category talk:Illuminated manuscripts

comments

some people seem to add MSS to this category simply because they include a drawing. We need a clearer definition of what counts as "illuminated" (or scrap the category altogether) dab (ᛏ) 09:09, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

• Since I am probally the some person you are thinking of, what manuscripts do you have in mind? My standard is any significant decoration in the manuscript should land it here. Examples would inlcude decorated initials, or illustrations. Marginal doodles should not. Dsmdgold 20:50, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)
  • "Illuminations" usually refer to elaborate embellishments of medieval mss. Things like Codex Wallerstein, hardly even medieval, have illustrations, i.e. drawings, but I don't think anyone would refer to them as 'illuminated'. dab (ᛏ) 07:39, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)
    • I'm afraid I disagree. The original definition of "illumination" was a decoration or illustration using gold or silver leaf. Of course that definition excludes the Book of Kells. Art historians have since greatly expanded what counts as illuminated. It is true that most art historians ignore the fechtbücher, but I suspect that has more to do with the subject matter of the text and the generally perceived low artistic merit of the drawings. As to the date, Codex Wallerstein is roughly contemporary with the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. As to the medium, pen and ink, there are many medieval manuscripts illustrated with only pen and ink that are routinely discussed in texts on illuminated manuscripts. Perhaps the most famous of these is the Utrecht Psalter (see picture here). What I think should be done is that there should be several subcategories to illuminated manuscript such as "Gospel Books", "Psalters", and "Books of Hours", one of those categories could be "Fechtbücher". One difficulty with this idea is that there are manuscripts which would belong to these categories that have no decoration or illustration at all, so should not belong to a subcategory of "Illuminated manuscripts". Dsmdgold 14:07, Feb 16, 2005 (UTC)

Codices

Since there are so many of them, should the codices perhaps be compiled into their own subcategory? I imagine a lot of people might look for them that way to begin with. Beginning 21:15, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

The problem with that is that almost all illuminated manuscripts are codices, the ones that aren't are the exceptions. A codex is any manuscript that is bound on one side with several pages. The only illuminated manuscripts that aren't codices are a small number of fragments of ancient scrolls, some scrolls that were created later in the middle ages for specific purposes, such as Exultet rolls, and items that were produced as single sheets. The vast majority were bound as codices. The confusion arises because only some of the codices have the word "Codex" in their modern names, however manuscripts like the Book of Kells the Tres Riches Heures are codices none the less. Dsmdgold 21:52, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. I've only taken two medieval art history courses, but I was under the impression that there was a greater distinction and more groupings than that. But I guess I was wrong! Thanks for correcting me. Beginning 22:58, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

See Talk:Illuminated manuscript for Feb. 2007 discussion about this category and it's sub-categories. [>>sparkit|TALK<<] 15:49, 24 February 2007 (UTC)