{"id":1580,"date":"2013-03-13T14:53:35","date_gmt":"2013-03-13T14:53:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/labs.stefanschleifer.com\/codex\/?p=1580"},"modified":"2013-03-28T22:24:41","modified_gmt":"2013-03-28T22:24:41","slug":"decoration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/?p=1580","title":{"rendered":"Decoration"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Private<\/a>

Private Collection (by courtesy of the owner): Initial A in gold leaf (2 lines high)<\/p><\/div>\n

The medieval manuscripts that are admired the most are often those with lavish decorations<\/a>. Their detailed paintings with gold leaf are one of the highlights in western art. But we should keep in mind that not everybody could buy these manuscripts in the Middle Ages. Many less richly decorated <\/a>manuscripts must have circulated at the time.\u00a0The decoration often tells us something about the social status of the patron of the codex.<\/p>\n

Most manuscripts have at least some sort of decoration. These decorations range from simple rubrications (?<\/a>)\u00a0– such as highlighted capitals, underscored words, headings (?<\/a>) and paragraph marks – to miniatures (?<\/a>) with lush illustrations the size of a full page\u00a0with gold leaf additions.\u00a0These decorations are\u00a0often not mere illustrations to the text, but are an aid to understand its structure.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Private<\/a><\/dt>\n
Private Collection (by courtesy of the owner): Initial C in gold leaf (2 lines high)<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

Decorated initials, for instance, are nearly always used in hierarchical order. The most beautiful initial in the manuscript can usually be found at the beginning of the first text. Every new text may open with a similar beautiful initial, but the chapters of every text will have a more simple initial, while every new paragraph will have an initial that is more simple still.<\/p>\n

Whereas plain red initials are at the bottom of the hierarchy, the painted initials (with or without gold leaf) are at the top. They can be found\u00a0on the first page\u00a0of a manuscript or, when the patron\u00a0could afford to pay for it, at the beginning of every text <\/a>in the codex.\u00a0Often these initials contain animals and people <\/a>that may be connected to the text.<\/p>\n

For more pictures of beautiful manuscripts, you can visit the websites of\u00a0many important national and university libraries. Most of them will have an online exhibit of their treasures (e.g. the Royal Library <\/a>in The Hague). For a glimpse at some marvellous pictures of the\u00a0most well known type of decorated manuscript, the fifteenth century bestseller, the book of hours, click\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For information on manuscript pages and script, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Or you can return to the entrance <\/a>of this room.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The medieval manuscripts that are admired the most are often those with lavish decorations. Their detailed paintings with gold leaf are one of the highlights in western art. But we should keep in mind that not everybody could buy these … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1580"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2940,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions\/2940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everycodextellsastory.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}