Stocky, richly textured blackletter was first seen around the thirteenth century and was particularly popular in the later Middle Ages. The sturdy Roman letters of the early Middle Ages gradually gave way to scripts such as Uncial and half-Uncial, especially in the British Isles, where distinctive scripts such as insular majuscule and insular minuscule developed. The script depended on local customs and tastes. After the general layout of the page was planned ( e.g., initial capital, borders), the page was lightly ruled with a pointed stick, and the scribe went to work with ink-pot and either sharpened quill feather or reed pen. Sheets of parchment or vellum, animal hides specially prepared for writing, were cut down to the appropriate size. In the making of an illuminated manuscript, the text was usually written first. By the end of the period, many of the painters were women, perhaps especially in Paris. However, commercial scriptoria grew up in large cities, especially Paris, and in Italy and the Netherlands, and by the late fourteenth century there was a significant industry producing manuscripts, including agents who would take long-distance commissions, with details of the heraldry of the buyer and the saints of personal interest to him (for the calendar of a Book of hours). In the early Middle Ages, most books were produced in monasteries, whether for their own use, for presentation, or for a commission. Wealthy people often had richly illuminated " books of hours" made, which set down prayers appropriate for various times in the liturgical day. It was usually reserved for special books: an altar Bible, for example. Illumination was a complex and frequently costly process. The decoration of this page from a French Book of Hours, ca.1400, includes a miniature, initials and borders. Indeed, for many areas and time periods, they are the only surviving examples of painting. Illuminated manuscripts are the best surviving specimens of medieval painting, and the best preserved. Illuminated manuscripts continued to be produced in the early sixteenth century, but in much smaller numbers, mostly for the very wealthy. Very early printed books were sometimes produced with spaces left for rubrics and miniatures, or were given illuminated initials, or decorations in the margin, but the introduction of printing rapidly led to the decline of illumination. Most medieval manuscripts, illuminated or not, were written on parchment (most commonly of calf, sheep, or goat skin), but most manuscripts important enough to illuminate were written on the best quality of parchment, called vellum, traditionally made of unsplit calf skin, though high quality parchment from other skins were also called parchment.īeginning in the late Middle Ages manuscripts began to be produced on paper. A very few illuminated manuscript fragments survive on papyrus. Most illuminated manuscripts were created as codices, which had superseded scrolls some isolated single sheets survive. However, especially from the thirteenth century onward, an increasing number of secular texts were illuminated. The majority of these manuscripts are of a religious nature. The majority of surviving manuscripts are from the Middle Ages, although many illuminated manuscripts survive from the fifteenth century Renaissance, along with a very limited number from Late Antiquity. The very existence of illuminated manuscripts as a way of giving stature and commemoration to ancient documents may have been largely responsible for their preservation in an era when barbarian hordes had overrun continental Europe and ruling classes were no longer literate. Had it not been for the monastic scribes of Late Antiquity, the entire literature of Greece and Rome would have perished as it was, the patterns of textual survivals were shaped by their usefulness to the severely constricted literate group of Christians. The significance of these works lies not only in their inherent art history value, but in the maintenance of a link of literacy offered by non-illuminated texts as well. (also in the gothic period), primarily produced in Ireland, Constantinople and Italy. The earliest surviving substantive illuminated manuscripts are from the period 400 to 600 C.E. ![]() As with other religious works, the creative process involved in making an illuminated manuscript was also a time of religious devotion and prayer monks used bright colors in order to illustrate the religious truth and the glory of God. Many illuminated manuscripts were made by monks at monasteries.
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