Byzantine Illumination of the Thirteenth Century

Staatliche Museen zu Berlin -- Preußischer Kulturbesitz

Studies in Byzantine Illumination of the Thirteenth Century Author(s): Hugo Buchthal Reviewed work(s): Source: Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen, 25. Bd. (1983), pp. 27-102 Published by: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin -- Preußischer Kulturbesitz Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4125786 . Accessed: 22/08/2012 21:56 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

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STUDIES IN BYZANTINE ILLUMINATION OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY* BY HUGOBUCHTHAL for Carl Nordenfalk I After a short-lived period of political successes and of deceptive internal prosperity, the Byzantine Empire during the last years of the Emperor Manuel Comnenus (1143-1180),and even more under his weak successors, experienced a near-disintegration which ominously foreshadowed the manner in which it would be carved up by the Latins afterthe Fourth Crus*The present article took shape gradually over the years, after I had been fortunate enough to study the Dionysiou manuscript on Mt. Athos in May, 1972, and had realized its overriding importance for the history of Byzantine provincialillumination in the first half of the thirteenth century.The work was constantlyinterruptedbecause I had to give priorityto two other major projects, but during all that time the frequent and fruitfulexchange of ideas with Mrs. Annemarie Weyl Carr,who had written her Ph. D. dissertation on the New Testament manuscriptin Chicago and now prepares a comprehensive monograph on the entire group provisionally dubbed the "decorative style", kept my interest alive. We finally decided that I should devote a separate articleto the Gospels in Dionysiou and Berlin and to the small group of manuscriptswhich form their immediate succession, but should exclude the discussion of the narrative Gospel cycle contained in the Berlin manuscript. Accordingly the present paper covers only those Gospels which stem more or less directlyfrom Dionysiou 4; they are without any doubtthe finest books of the entire "decorativestyle" group, which is not otherwise distinguished by the high quality of its illustrations. The more distant relatives, from the middle of the twelfth century onwards, which now amount to almost one hundred, will be treated by Mrs. Carr in a book, which will include a catalogue listing all those codicological details which were not relevant within the framework of my own more limited endeavour. Still, despite the limitations of this paper, I venture to think that my conclusions may mark the beginning of our understandingof provincialillumination duringthe period in question, and I hope that furtherdiscoveries may eventually clinch my arguments, and confirm my conjectures. My thanks go to all those authoritieswho have assisted me in the formidable task of assembling the pictorial documentation. Pride of Place goes to Dr. Alice Bank and to Professor Olga Popova, who took considerable time and trouble to arrange for access to the manuscripts, and to procure the unpublished photographs from Leningrad and Moscow; and to Mr. Sot. N. Kadas in Thessalonica who made several trips to Mt. Athos to take photographs of the Dionysiou and Iviron manuscripts. I am especially grateful to the British Academy for enabling me to visit Berlin, Moscow and Leningrad, and study the Gospels in Cracow; access to the Cracow manuscript was granted by Dr. Adam Homecki, and the photographs taken specially by the art-historicalInstitute of Cracow University, on the initiative of Dr. WandaAltendorf. The British Academy also made it possible for me to accept an invitationfrom the Matenadaranto visit Erevanand to studyArmenian manuscriptson the spot. The graciouswelcome I received from the Armenian authorities, especially from His Holiness Vasken I, Catholicos of all Armenians, and Director Kachikian and vice-director Chookaszian, will always be among my most precious memories. I also owe thanks to Dr. Tilo Brandis, director of the department of manuscripts at the Staatsbibliothek,Berlin, who made the Berlin manuscriptfreely availableto me on successive occasions, and to the keepers of the libraryof Gonville & Gaius College, Cambridge, the John Rylands Library,Manchester, and the Bodleian Library, Oxford, who made their treasures accessible to me and supplied me with photographs.A special word of thanks should go to the Jahrbuch and to its editor, Professor F. Anzelewski who readily agreed to accept this article for publication, in spite of its unusual length and the formidable number of illustrations which had to go with it. Finally, as on former occasions, Dr. John Lowden read through the entire manuscriptand rendered it into readable English; and the staff of the photographicdepartment and of the studio of the WarburgInstitute, University of London, were particularly helpful, and successful, in improving the quality of flawed photographs to make them suitable for publication.

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ade of 12041.During the last quarter of the twelfth centurythe central authoritylost more and more of its prestige and power, and was no longer able to keep control of various outlying territories, in which rebellious provincial governors adopted the role of more or less independent rulers rejectingthe authorityof the capital2.Some of them, like Isaac Comnenus the Lord of Cyprus, were even related to the imperial family. They established miniature courts and imitated the outward trappings of imperial power. In a way, they were the forerunners of the Greek Empire in exile, which Theodore Lascaris was to establish in Nicaea in 1204'. We know rather little about the activities - artistic or otherwise - which went on in the rival Latin Empire of Constantinople, or in Salonica, or in Nicaea itself; and though a number of manuscripts survivewhich must belong into the first half of the thirteenth century,their precise date and localisation still escapes us. It was not until 1261that Constantinople was reconquered, and the resources and prestige of the metropolis - albeit reduced - were once again at the disposal of a Greek dynasty. To some extent this untoward development is reflected in the history of the fine arts, especially of painting. The almost complete absence of religious painting in the capitalin the twelfth century may be due to accidents of survival;but the proliferation of fresco painting in Macedonia and Cyprus during the second half of the century certainly points to the growing importance of provincial centres. The history of miniature painting offers rather close parallels. Some of the turbulent events mentioned above are to be found reflected in the history of the production of the illuminated book. As a rule we take it for granted that manuscript illustration during the middle Byzantine period, and certainly after the turn of the millennium, was a highly centralized activity, and that it flourished mainly in the capital, Constantinople, whereas most provincial scriptoria were artisticallysterile and unproductive. This is especially true for the eleventh century, and also for the firstpart of the twelfth. In his survey of Byzantine illumination and icon painting in the eleventh century, K. Weitzmann hardly mentions the problem of provincial versus metropolitan art4. The manuscripts he adduces to characterize the development of style and the changes of emphasis which occurred during the eleventh century are overwhelmingly of Constantinopolitan origin - from the Menologium and Psalter of Basil II, to the "imperial" Lectionary in the Dionysiou Monastery, the Gospels Paris grec 74, the Lectionary Vat. gr. 1156,the Gospels in Parma, and the Climacus manuscript in the Vatican,to mention just a few of the more outstanding books of the period. Only in the case of the illustration of certain Saints's lives does he consider their origin, as it were, in situ, e.g., that of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste in eastern Anatolia5. But in the first half of the twelfth century, Constantinople still stands very much in the forefront, first of all through the oeuvre of the "Kokkinobaphosmas-

1Cf. G. Ostrogorsky, History of the Byzantine State, New Brunswick 1969, pp. 585ff. 2Cf. H. Ahrweiler, L'idbologie politique de l'Empire byzantin, Paris 1975, pp. 89ff. 3Ostrogorsky, History, pp. 426ff. 4 K. Weitzmann, Byzantine miniature and icon Painting in the eleventh century, in: Proceedings of the XIIIth international Congress of Byzantine Studies, Oxford 5-10 September 1966, London 1967,pp. 207-224, reprinted in the author's Studies in Classical and Byzantine Manuscript Illumination, ed. H.L. Kessler, Chicago 1971,pp. 271ff. 1979, 5K. Weitzmann, Illustrations of the lives of the five Martyrs of Sebaste, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 3355, pp. 97-112.

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ter", an outstanding artisticpersonality of great skill, and with an impeccable technique, who is responsible for the illustration of over a dozen manuscripts, most of them Gospels 6; one has an imperial dedication portraitwhich can be dated in the years just after 1122'.These manuscripts apart, an impressive number of equally or slightly less distinguished works may be attributedto Constantinople during the second quarter of the century. It is, therefore, all the more striking and significant that soon after the middle of the centurythe metropolitan tradition appears to come to an almost complete stop. Few illustrated manuscripts of that period can be assigned to the capital, and only one, the Gospels no. 3 in the Greek Patriarchate in Istanbul, has really outstanding merits8. The provinces, on the other hand, now enter the limelight, and completely dominate the production of illuminated manuscripts from about 1150onwards - a situation which continues to prevail well into the first half of the thirteenth century. The proliferation of provincialproduction in the second half of the twelfth centuryhas caused much confusion among art historians . A group of almost a hundred related manuscripts, and their numbers still growing, most of them still unpublished, has already been identified. The best-known work in the group, a lavishly illustrated New Testament in Chicago, which was at one time dated to the period after the Palaeologan restoration, is now thought to be one of its earliest members, a product from the third quarter of the twelfth century'o.As scribal colophons are almost completely lacking, and the few comparisons which can be made with the styles of provincial fresco ensembles are mostly not convincing, there are still no reliable conclusions about the precise dates, chronology, and place, or rather places, of origin of the members of the group. Their connection with the metropolitan tradition is slender; their manufacture in Constantinople, though it was at one time considered, is unlikely. However this may be, they are of unmistakable identity. The group is also characteristic in that it includes very few lectionaries, but a certain number ofpsalters, and of the popular combination of Psalter-and-New-Testament". But the majority are merely Gospel Books with evangelist portraits. The appearance of those big, centralized figures, endlessly repeated in a few conventional poses, is dominated by their emphatic outlines; the ornate architectureand furniture combine with them into a lively overall linear interplay of patterned surfaces; and their unreal, pastel-like colour scheme in which pink, mauve, and light green are prominent, create a new kind of reality, a distinctive style that is particularto this group". In addition to the por6J.C. Anderson, An Examinationof two twelfth-centurycenters of Byzantinemanuscriptproduction, Ph. D. dissertation, Princeton 1975;the same, The Seraglio Octateuchand the KokkinobaphosMaster, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, forthcoming. 7I. Spatharakis, The Portrait in Byzantine illuminated Manuscripts, Leiden 1976, pp. 79ff., pl. 46. 8R.S. Nelson, Text and Image in a Byzantine Gospel Book in Istanbul, Ph. D. dissertation, New York 1978. 9 Cf. the summary in A. Weyl Carr,A Group of provincialmanuscriptsfrom the twelfth century, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 56, 1982, pp. 39-81. 1oCf. the preceding note, and, provisionally,the same author's summary "Byzantinemanuscriptillumination in twelfth-centuryPalestine", in: Second Annual Byzantine Studies Conference, Madison, Wisconsin, 1976,pp. 15-16. A provisional list of manuscriptsis given in A. Cutler& A. Weyl Carr,The Psalter Benaki 24,3: An unpublished illuminated manuscript from the family 2400, in Revue des Etudes byzantines, 54, 1976, p. 507. 12Cf.the paper quoted in note 9, and, provisionally, the same author's Ph. D. dissertation "The Rockefeller McCormick New Testament, Studies toward the reattributionof Chicago, University Library,MS 965, Ph. D. dissertation, University of Michigan 1973, esp. pp. 268ff.

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traits, there are carpet headpieces decorating the top halves of the pages with the beginnings of the texts of the individual Gospels, and often leaving space for only a few lines of script. The headpieces are for the most part rectangular; in the finest manuscripts they form perfect squares, similar to those in the Gospels illuminated in the second quarterof the centuryby the Constantinopolitan "Kokkinobaphos master". Still, the overall picture remains extremely confusing. Few of these manuscripts are so close to each other that one would unhesitatingly ascribe them to the same masters, or to the same scriptorium.The entire group, illustrated in what has provisionally been called the "decorative style", will be the subject of a comprehensive monograph, complete with a catalogue of all known manuscripts, by Mrs. Annemarie Weyl Carr, and I do not propose to anticipate her results. My aim is more modest: I shall concentrate here on a single small sub-group, of comparatively late date and amazingly homogeneous, which not only stands somewhat apart from the rest, but also offers illustrations of superb qualitywith which most of the other manuscripts cannot compete. This sub-groupcan, at least from a purely art-historicalpoint of view, receive more detailed attention here than within the forthcoming fuller treatment of the entire group. The manuscripts to be discussed here are all tetraevangelia of the usual type; only one of them has, in addition to the standard equipment, a comprehensive cycle of narrative Gospel scenes, which, however, will have to remain outside the scope of the present enquiry'".If there are any liturgical indications at all, they are as a rule confined to a line at the bottom of the first page of the Gospel of John, indicating that this is the reading for Easter Sunday. Evidently these books were in demand for their biblical text, and perhaps also for their artistic decorations, but not, or at least not primarily, for their possible use in the liturgy. It has been noted above that lavishly decorated service books form a small minority within the group; they are indeed also a minority within the production of manuscripts in the twelfth century as a whole. It appears that the sumptuously decorated Lectionary had by that time largely disappeared, and been superseded, not only in provincial centres, by illustrated Gospel books. The switch in the emphasis of Byzantine illumination from the Lectionary to the Gospel, and even more so that from metropolitan to provincialproduction, must reflect a concomitant change in patronage. We saw that the capital's loss represented a gain for the provinces. Manuscripts like the Chicago New Testament and its numerous progeny were certainly not produced for members of the imperial family or the military aristocracy,but rather in and for provincial monasteries, or perhaps for provincial administrators and members of the laity, for their private devotions. The artistictastes of these patrons were not all too demanding. But it is interesting to observe a distinct rise in qualityduring the lasttwentyyears of the century,when the deaths of Manuel I and Andronicus I had weakened the impact of the capitaleven further, and more artistic activities seem to have been transferred elsewhere. One finds it difficultto associate the noble appearance of manuscripts like the Gospels no. 11,5in the Ludwig Collection4, or the Holkham Hall Gospels no. 515,with provincialmonasticism. One would prefer to 13The Gospel scenes will be discussed in a forthcoming study by Mrs. Weyl Carr. 14formerlyAthos, Dionysiou 8, cf. A. von Euw & J.M. Plotzek, Die Handschriften der Sammlung Ludwig, I., Koln 1979, MS II, 4; pp. 159, figs. 56-65. s'5W.O.Hassall, Byzantine Illumination at Holkham, in: The Connoisseur, no. 13355, March 1954, pp. 87ff.

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Fig. 1. fol. 4v Moses receiving the Law.

Fig. 2. fol. 5. Ammonius and Eusebius.

Fig. 3. fol. 6. Eusebius letter.

Fig. 4. fol. 6V.Eusebius letter, end. Athos, Dionysiou 4

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look for their patrons among members of the powerful governing class who ruled over their territories more or less independently of the central authority.The small group of Gospels to which the present study is devoted represents the continuation of this pattern of patronage into the thirteenth century, and in a way constitutes a link with early Palaeologan illumination.

II

Perhaps the most outstanding member of the small sub-groupmentioned at the end of the preceding paragraph, and probably also its earliest representative, is the Gospels no. 4 in the Dionysiou Monastery on Mt. Athos'6.Most of its illustrations are of stunning quality, and its set of Canon Tables, unfortunately no longer complete, is in its way unique. The manuscript starts with a full-page miniature of Moses receiving the Law (fig. 1), a theme alluding to Old and New Testament harmony" and characteristic of the "decorative style" from early examples such as the Chicago New Testament onwards. Moses is not the youthful figure usually found in Byzantine representations of the prophet, but has a shaggy beard, and his hair is neatly arranged in distinctive strands. A comparable depiction is found in an early thirteenth century Moses icon in the Sinai Monastery, a work which was probablyproduced under Constantinopolitan influence'8. The paint on the face of the Dionysiou Moses has almost completely flaked off, so that the underdrawing with its wavy hair over the forehead and pointed chin is clearly exposed. The prophet is shown in a half-kneeling position; i.e., he is represented kneeling but turned round by 45 degrees, so that his legs and knees do not touch the ground, but seem to hover in mid-air. Above and below is a quotation, written in large golden uncials, from the Gospel of John, 1.17: "forthe Law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ".The quotation suggests that the figure was originally intended to have as counterpart on the opposite recto page a miniature showing Christ in glory; and this is indeed the case in a few manuscripts of the "decorative style" group'9.But since, in this case, the complete text was set out at the top and bottom of the Moses leaf, it seems that there was never a plan to include a second miniature. The style of the Moses figure, with its creeping hems and undulating folds, is characteristicallylate Comenian; the treatment of the drapery invites comparison with that of the fresco of the Angel of the Annunciation at Lagoudera on Cyprus, dated 119220,but lacks the latter's exaggerated animation. The miniature is of an exceptionally high quality; no earlier manuscript of the "decorative style" can possible compete,

1626 x 18 cm. ruling system Leroy 44 D 1. S.M. Pelekanides, P.C. Christou, C. Tsoumis, S.N. Kadas, The Treasures of Mount Athos, Illuminated Manuscripts, I, Athens 1974, pp. 393-396, figs. 14-26, with earlier literature. '7A. Weyl Carr, Gospel Frontispieces from the Comnenian period, in: Gesta, 21, 1982, p. 11. '8K. Weitzmann, Loca Sancta and the representationalarts of Palestine, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 28, 1974,

fig. 48.

19R.S. Nelson, The Iconography of Preface and Miniature in the Byzantine Gospel Book, New York 1980, pp. 66ff. The miniature of Christin glory survives, e.g., in the Gospels Florence, Bibl. LaurenzianaPlut. VI, 52, Nelson fig. 47. 20L. Hadermann-Misguich, Kurbinovo, Brussels 1975, fig. 38.

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Fig. 5. Tbilisi, Institute of Manuscripts of the Georgian Academy of Sciences A 1335. "VaniGospels", fol. 1v. Eusebius and Carpianus. Leningrad, State Public Library gr. 296

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Fig. 6. fol. 1. Canon Table 3. Leningrad, State Public Library gr. 296

or even be considered closely related. It belongs, without doubt, to an entirely different stylistic tradition. The illumination on the opposite rectopage, with the title and the beginning of the text of Eusebius's letter written in gold and arranged in cruciform shape (fig. 2), must have been a splendid work indeed before the two figures in the upper lateral rectangles were damaged almost beyond recognition. They represent two monks, Ammonius and Eusebius, seated writing in front of lecterns and identified by captions; the corresponding fields at the bottom contain ornamental patterns. Neither the cruciformlay-outof the page nor the inclusion of the two Fathers have any parallels in the illustrative program of "decorative style" manuscripts. In fact, these figures confronting each other are not frequently encountered in Byzantine art. Moreover, Eusebius is not faced by Carpianus to whom his letter is addressed, but by Ammonius who is only briefly mentioned in the opening words as an earlier author of a synopsis of the Gospels. Yet this anomaly continues a tradition which can be traced back to the pre-iconoclasticperiod, and is found in the late sixth century Syriac "Rabula"Gospels written in a monastery in the hinterland of Antioch21 21The Rabbula Gospels edd. Carlo Cecchelli (and others), Olten-Lausanne 1959, fol. 2a.

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Fig. 7. fol. 1'. Canon Table 4. Fig. 8. fol. 2. Canon Table 5. State Public Library gr. 296 Leningrad,

Fig. 9. fol. 2'. Canon Table 6. Leningrad, State Public Library gr. 296

Fig. 10. Athos, Dionysiou 4 fol. 8. Canon Table 7.

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Fig. 11.Athos, Dionysiou 4 fol. 8'. Canon Table 8.

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Fig. 12.Athos, Dionysiou 4 fol. 9. Canon Table 9.

Fig. 13.Athos, Dionysiou 4 fol. 9'. Canon Table 10.

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As far as I can see, these are the only two instances where Eusebius's interlocutoris explicitly called Ammonius. But the same pictorial group, with the two protagonists seated and facing each other, recurs in two Constantinopolitan manuscripts of the late eleventh century: in the splendid Gospels in Parma, Palat. gr. 5 22, where they confront each other just as in the Dionysiou manuscript, but are labelled Eusebius and Carpianus; and in MS Clarke 10 in the Bodleian Library23,again with the same arrangement of the figures but with no names attached to them. The Parma Gospels has moreover an additional miniature, inserted after the Canon Tables, which has in its upper part a second representation of Eusebius and Carpianus; in the lower register is Ammonius, in ordinary not clerical dress, instructing a group of people24. All three figures are identified by captions. Finally, the Codex Ebnerianus, a manuscript of the middle of the twelfth century also in the Bodleian Library25,has an arrangement of figures very much like that of the Rabula Gospels but again without identifying captions. The author of the CBM takes it for granted that in both Oxford manuscripts the two monks represent Eusebius and Carpianus,just as in the Parma Gospels. In support of her theory she might also have adduced the "VaniGospels", a Georgian manuscript illustrated at the end of the twelfth century in a Georgian monastery near Constantinople26.The two figures shown there in the first miniature, seated opposite each other, one writing, the other holding a scroll, have their names, Eusebius and Carpianus, added in Greek in the margins (Fig. 5). It is true that the captions could be later additions; but we may take it that they reflect the intentions of the illuminator. However this may be, the possibility that the two monks in the Ebnerianus miniature may, on the evidence of the Rabulaand Dionysiou Gospels, also be intended to represent Eusebius and Ammonius should not be altogether excluded. The ornament in the two lower lateral fields is identical with that in the lunette of the Canon Table fol. 8v (fig. 11), and will receive attention when the Tables as a whole are dis-

cussed. The text of the Eusebius letter continues, entirely written in gold, over the following three pages (figs. 3,4) 27. The text is inserted in eight-lobed fields within richlydecorated rectangular frames. The fettered monkey on fol. 6 deserves special attention: in this manuscript it occurs only once, but we shall meet similar figures populating the margins of illuminated pages in some of the later members of the group. Comparable playful simians, as well as some similar motifs to be mentioned later, are found in Canon Tables of Byzantine manuscripts from the late eleventh century onwards; one of the earliest instances is the above-mentioned Parma Gospels28. They also make a conspicuous appearance in the "Vani Gospels" to which reference has just been made. It would probably be a mistake to search for a deep underlying symbolism, as scholars have so successfully done in the case of"drbleries" in western Gothic and Renaissance art, especially of monkeys in marginal decorations of Latin Gothic manu22The miniatures of this manuscript have not yet been completely published. 23I. Hutter, Corpus der byzantinischen Miniaturenhandschriften(CBH), I, 1977, Oxford, Bodleian Library, I.

fig. 207.

24apparentlystill unpublished. Photograph at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. 25Hutter, CBM I, fig. 225. 26V. Lazarev, Storia della pittura bizantina, Turin 1967, p. 264 note 169, with earlier literature. 27Fol. 5Vis reproduced in Pelekanides (and others), Treasures, I, fig. 15. 28Lazarev,Storia della pittura bizantina, fig. 159.

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scripts, seen as "images of the blind and unhappy human soul"29; the significance here goes hardly beyond that of a harmless and spontaneous secular embellishment without any hidden meaning. The monkey should rather be classed together with similar grotesque and animal motifs derived by A. Grabar from the "cycle de l'hippodrome" and the related "corps d'acrobates et de gymnastes", which are frequent in Byzantine manuscripts from the eleventh century onwards 3".We shall encounter more of them in the decoration of the Canon Tables. It has been mentioned before that the set of Canon Tables is now incomplete: the first folio (fol. 7) has disappeared afterthe manuscriptwas foliated and can no longer be traced, and the following two leaves which have no folio numbers are now in the State Public Library in Leningrad as MS. gr. 296 (figs. 6-9)3". Fortunatelythese four pages are now also available for study, and will here be treated as if they were still in their original place, between the missing fol. 7 and fol. 8 of the Dionysiou manuscript. Together with the two remaining folios (figs. 10-13), eight pages in all, they are among the most impressive of their kind in the entire range of Byzantine illumination. The section numbers are copied very accurately, and the end of every Canon is clearly indicated. It is all the more surprising to find that the scribe, in spite of the great care which was lavished on the Tables, did not copy very carefully. Thus, the text column with the sections from John in Canon 4 and that with the sections from Matthew in Canon 5 (fig. 9) were interchanged - an error which is easily explained since the two columns in question follow each other directly on the same page. The construction of the Tables is traditional as far as Byzantine manuscripts generally are concerned; but it has no predecessors among earlier Gospels of the "decorative style" group. The master of the Dionysiou manuscript must have used a model introduced from outside just as he must have done for the Eusebius-Ammonius page. This applies in the first place to the architectural forms: the columns, either sturdy or slender, frequently interlaced in the centre, and the high rectangular superstructures,some of them framing semicircular arches which in their turn encompass the lunettes with the individual Canon titles. There are other features which perpetuate the Byzantine tradition of Canon Tables but have no parallels in earlier manuscripts of the "decorative style". Thus, some Tables facing each other on verso and rectopages are conceived in many essential details as mirror images, e.g., Tables 4 and 5 (fig. 7 and 8), and Tables 6 und 7 (figs. 9 and 10); and the tendency to limit marginal palmettes to the outer side of the architectural framework while the gutter sides remain undecorated, is only traceable in Constantinople from about the middle of the twelfth centuryonwards. By this device one can tell at a glance whether a single Table was intended to be used as a recto or a verso. The lateral palmettes are large and sprawling, and provide resting places for birds and, in one instance, for a peacock. They are surmounted by secondary palmettes springing from the level of the column capitals and rising to the full height of the superstructures; they, too, are inhabited by birds in lively postures and movements. Finally, a 29H.W. Janson, Apes und Ape Lore in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Studies of the WarburgInstitute 20), London 1952,p. 17;Lilian M.C. Randall, Images in the margins of Gothic manuscripts, Berkeley 1966,pp. 48ff. 30Une pyxide BDumbarton Oaks, in: Dumbarton OaksPapers, 14,1960,pp. 155ff,reprinted in the author's L'Art de la fin de l'Antiquiti et du Moyen Age, I, Paris 1968, p. 246. 31H. Buchthal, Disiecta membra, in: The Burlington Magazine, CXXIV, 1982, pp. 214-219 and Correction, p. 556.

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multiple fauna enlivens the tops of the superstructures:there are peacocks and other birds as well as foxes, rabbits, elephants, and griffins, most of them in violent movement, and some in rather aggressive positions. This realm of fantasy continues inside the rectangles themselves: there are animals's heads with tusks and elongated proboscis in the spandrels of Table 3 (fig. 6), the first of the surviving Tables, and lions's heads seen full face, with cornucopiae and vegetable scrolls sprawling from their mouths in Tables 6 and 7 (figs. 9, 10). This colourfuland unreal microcosm is rendered in a somewhat forceful and unrefined style, and in stark colours whose capriciousness provides the only and somewhat tenuous link with the ornament of the "decorativestyle" manuscripts. Though, as we shall see, every single motif can be paralleled in Byzantine manuscripts of the preceding century, the general impression is more reminiscent of the overblown character of Armenian Tables from late twelfth century Cilicia32:an exotic and exuberant world, infinitely involved but not so delicate as in Cilicia itself and at times rather gross, but always highly original and vigorous, and no doubt the result of a very special effort. The patron of the Dionysiou manuscript, whoever he was, appreciated the unique and the out-of-the-ordinary;and he was fortunate enough to secure the services of an unusually versatile artist who was familiar with the traditions of Constantinople as well as of Cilicia - either at first hand, or, more probably, through manuscript models. He did not reproduce the studied elegance of his models, but used them, as itwere, to create new forms and a new style. The single motifs of Constantinopolitan origin which our master introduced into his work fall easily into two separate groups: one from the middle and one from the end of the twelfth century. The first group is borrowed from the oeuvre of the "Kokkinobaphosmaster", the most outstanding artisticpersonality among Constantinopolitanilluminators from the second quarter of the century, who followed contemporary taste by lavishing generous ornamental decoration on his manuscripts. Outstanding among the motifs from the "Kokkinobaphos" workshop is the pipe-bowl-like receptacle rising on a stalk and mostly containing three pieces of fruit33.We noticed them first, in passing, in the two lower fields of the Eusebius-Ammonius page (fig. 2); they recur most prominently in the superstructureof Table 8 (fig. 11),where they constitute the prevalent ornamental decoration. But they are also found in other places, for example, in the superstructureof Table 10 (fig. 13). Next, the lions's masks in Tables 4 and 5 from whose mouths issue cornucopiae or scrolls (figs. 9, 10): they have a predecessor in the headpiece to the third homily in the Vatican Kokkinobaphos manuscript34.The elegantly shaped vessel supported by acanthus-like bases in the same manuscript35may also be compared with that in the superstructure of Table 5 (fig. 6). The ubiquitous leaves with their zigzag contours are found throughout both manuscripts; and the geometrical overall grid in the second headpiece of the Kokkinobaphos manuscript in Paris36, which also has parallels elsewhere in this group, recurs filling the entire superstructure of Table 9 (fig. 12). The Paris

32Cf.p. 40 and fig. 17. 33Cf. note 6 and, e.g., Hutter, CBM fig. 252 and in other manuscripts of the group discussed by J. Anderson. 34C. Stornajolo, Miniature delle Omilie di Giacomo Monaco e dell'Evangeliariourbinate (Codicies e Vaticanis selecti, series minor, I), Rome 1910.fig. 22. 35Ibid., fig. 59. 36unpublished.

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Fig. 14. Tbilisi, Vani Gospels, fol. 3. Canon Table.

Fig. 15. Tbilisi, Vani Gospels, fol. 5v. Canon Table.

Fig. 16. Tbilisi, Vani Gospels, fol. 4. Canon Table.

Fig. 17. Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery,M 538 fol. 7. Canon Tables 4 and 5.

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Kokkinobaphos manuscript also has a marginal ornament of a frontally displayed peacock37 which corresponds to that in Table 3 (fig. 6). All these motifs may well have been transmitted through a single manuscript; most of them occur several times within the oeuvre of the "Kokkinobaphosmaster". The second group of motifs borrowed from the Constantinopolitan tradition is found in the Georgian Gospels A 1335 in the Institute of Manuscripts of the Georgian Academy of Sciences in Tbilisi, generally called the "VaniGospels"38.It was illustrated for Queen Tamar of Georgia towards the end of the twelfth century in a Georgian Monastery near Constantinople, either by a Greek master, or, more probably, by a Georgian, or several Georgians, under the supervision of a Greek artist. Unfortunately a comprehensive publication of the manuscript, which has been promised for many years, is still awaited. Every observer will immediately be struck by the similarity in the general lay-out of the Canon Tables in the Dionysiou and the Georgian Gospels (figs. 14-16). The latter have the same broad superstructures,with a profusion of animal and genre scenes more or less symmetrically arranged along their upper frames; they are carried by columns of the sturdy or the slender type, with an interlace at the centre; and the outer margins have the same cabbagy palmettes on which hover birds, or, in one instance, a peacock (fig. 16). The comparison can be carried into greater detail. The fox on top of the first Georgian Table (fig. 14)recurs on fol. l1 of the Leningrad fragment (fig. 7), and the elephant of the second Table (fig. 15) on fol. 2v (fig. 9). Finally, and most significantly,the second Georgian Table has in the spandrels of its superstructure the same animals's heads with their long protruding proboscis as Canon Table 3 from Dionysiou 4 (fig. 6). To conclude the evidence, one may point to the playful monkeys with skullcapson the left of the same Georgian Table, which remind one of the monkey on one of the Eusebian pages of the Dionysiou Gospels (fig. 3). It is perhaps also worth mentioning that the pipe-bowl-like receptacles which played such an important part in the ornamental work of the Kokkinobaphosmaster39as well as in the Dionysiou Gospels 40, may also be traced in two of the Georgian Tables (figs. 14, 15), but much more schematically rendered: they should be taken as a pointer to the longevity of the motif in Constantinopolitanart rather than to any connection with the Dionysiou manuscript. Yetwhen all is said and done, some elements remain which just cannot be explained by reference to the Constantinopolitan tradition - whether represented by the "Kokkinobaphos master" or by the Georgian manuscript from the end of the century which reflects metropolitan book production. Still another sphere of influence has to be considered: that of Armenian Cilicia. The point has been mentioned before. First come to mind: three richly illuminated Gospel manuscripts, all dating from the last decade of the twelfth century, and produced in the region of the patriarchal seat of Hromkla: no. W. 558 in the Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore4' (fig. 17), dated 1195; the Gospels no. 1655, also dated 1195, in the Library of the 37H. Omont, Miniatures des Homblies sur la Vierge du moine Jacques, in: Bulletin de la Soci~ti frangaise de reproductions de manuscrits h peintures, 11,1927, pl. XXX e. 38Cf. note 26. 39Cf. note 6. 40 Cf. e.g., fig. 11.

41S. Der Nersessian, Armenian Manuscripts in the Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore 1975, figs. 25-52. 42 S. Der Nersessian, Manuscrits arminiens illustris de Venise, Paris 1956, figs. 58-45.

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Mechitarist Fathers in Venice42; and the Skevra Gospels in the Armenian archbishop's palace in Lvov43, dated 1197. The ornamental work in all three Gospels is in many ways closely related; the manuscripts stand at the beginning of the finest period of book illustration in lesser Armenia, i.e., Cilicia. The Canon Tables of the three Armenian Gospels - especially those in Baltimore and Venice - invite comparison not so much with individual motifs in the Dionysiou manuscript, but rather with their general appearance as a whole. They are built up in much the same way, with heavy superstructureswhich are almost square in shape, and an overwhelming wealth of ornamental and animal decoration exhibiting an exuberance and eccentricitywhich are rare in Greek illumination but rather characteristicof Armenian art. It is true that the Armenian Tables have a studied elegance, both in their design and their colour scheme; the master of the Dionysiou manuscript cannot vie with their sophistication and finish. It cannot be denied that his work is in comparison crude and unrefined - though in its way just as impressive. In both sets, some of the birds and animals are engaged in deadly combat with each other; their appearance is mainly determined by their expressive outlines, with very little interior drawing, which makes them appear entirely flat, as if sketched in with a pen rather than painted with a brush. The violence of the animals's movements, and the slight asymmetry in the arrangement of most of them, give to the Armenian works both a somewhatpiquantnote and an unmistakable identity. It is predominantly in details such as these that the Athos manuscript depends on them. And this applies not only to the Canon Tables, but also to the other decorated pages. The exaggerated actions and the aggressive positions of the Dionysiou fauna have parallels, for instance, in the almost contorted animals poised on top of the headpiece at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark in the Lvov manuscript44.In one instance45there is an awkwardly shaped bird with a human head which belongs to the realm of fable46; there is little difficultyin recognizing its re-appearance in the two grotesque birds of Table 9 in Dionysiou (fig. 12), even though the human heads are here absent. Considered as a whole, the Canon Tables with their infinite and imaginative variety of patterns and motifs may perhaps be considered the most outstanding feature of the Dionysiou manuscript. The last Canon Table (fig. 13) deserves a separate discussion. It is different from all others: the superstructurecontains no lunette which would offer the scribe the space needed to insert the title of the Canon. It is only through the position of the Table at the end of the set that one may guess that the three columns of numbers refer to Canon 10,4. The origin of the omission is easily traced. In Armenian Tables the superstructures are as a rule solid, and not interrupted by lunettes; the title of the Canon is written underneath (fig. 17), between the capitals supporting the superstructure, similar to Canon 9 in our manuscript which follows Armenian usage fairly correctly (fig. 12). But in the last Table the Dionysiou master who copied a model of this kind, forgot to leave any space for the titles. Here, for once, the influence 43P. Nerses Akinian, Das Skevra-Evangeliarvom Jahre1197,aufbewahrtim Archivdes armenischen Erzbistums Lemberg, Wien 1950. 44Ibid., pl. 10.

45Der Nersessian, Manuscripts in the Waiters Art Gallery, pl. 16, fig. 26. 46Eva Baer, Sphinxes and Harpies in medieval Islamic Art (Oriental Notes and Studies. 9), Jerusalem 1965, pp. 29ff.

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Fig. 18. fol. 14'. St. Matthew.

Fig. 19. fol. 15. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel.

Fig. 20. fol. 112'. St. Mark.

Fig. 21. fol. 113.Beginning of Mark's Gospel. Athos, Dionysiou 4

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Fig. 22. fol. 177'. St. Luke.

Fig. 24. fol. 278'. St. John.

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Fig. 23. fol. 178. Beginning of Luke's Gospel.

Fig.25. fol. 279 Beginningof John'sGospel. Athos,Dionysiou4

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of Armenian Cilicia is not only the dominant feature of the architecturalsetting, but also the source of an awkward error. The whirling acanthus leaves in the central section of the superstructure,too, invite some comment. They are so similar to some sixth century sculpted architecturalornament at Qal'at Sim'an in Syria47that it is difficultto imagine thatthe two are entirely unconnected. Revivalsof early Byzantine ornament are not altogether unknown in middle Byzantine illumination. But here the similarity is especially striking; it is difficultto avoid the conclusion that a similar ornament served as the direct source of inspiration. Again, our master has regenerated his manuscript model with new forms of life. Among the four evangelist portraits,those of Matthew (fig. 18) and John (fig. 24) are clearly related to the frontispiece miniature of Moses (fig. 1). Mark (fig. 20) and Luke (fig. 22), however, are not so close, and may be the work of an assistant. The differences extend to the captions attached to the four pictures: only those of Matthew and John are consistent both with one another and with those of the Moses miniature. That of Mark is notable for being written in a different hand, with different abbreviations, and is the only one to start with a cross. Iconographically,the four portraits are entirely traditional, in the attitudes and activities of the evangelists as well as in the furniture and background architecture, e.g., Matthew's arched bench, Luke's stool, and the building cut in half in the Mark picture. Matthew and John are monumental, dignified and expressive figures, hardly remiscent of any oftheir counterparts in the true "decorative style"; and just as was the case in the Moses miniature, the colour scheme is darker, and more saturated. The light and dark browns and blues, and, especially, the deep purple shades have closer parallels among late twelfth centuryArmenian work from Cilicia, than in comparable Greek miniatures. Closest perhaps are the portraits inserted into the Sebaste Gospels of 1066 (Erevan, Matenadaran 311), which are now considered to be twelfth century Cilician work48.In the Dionysiou Gospels, Matthew's body is bent slightly forwards; and John dictating to Prochoros, easily the most impressive evangelist of the set, is a similar monumentally conceived figure in a dark blue and deep violet pallium, turning towards Prochoros in a telling and convincing gesture. Curiously enough, the feet of both figures protrude into the frame. These two evangelists may well be considered the most remarkable representations of their kind within the entire framework of the "decorative style". Mark and Luke are noticeably weaker in execution, and in many ways comply more with the run-of-the-mill tradition of the "decorative style". Though they are of the same size as the other two portraits, they cannot by any stretch of the imagination be called monumental. They are boldly but somewhat awkwardly contained within their sweeping and dominating outlines, which bestows on them a somewhat rubbery quality - a common feature in "decorative 47Cf. D. Krencker,Die Wallfahrtskirchedes Simeon Stylites in Kal'at Sim'an, Berlin 1959 (Abhandlungen der PreuBischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Berlin 1938, Phil. hist. Kl., 4), pl. 50 h.i. 48Cf. L.A. Durnovo, Armenian Miniatures, London 1961,p. 65, where the miniature is still dated in the eleventh century, and I.R. Drampjan & E.M. Korchmazjan,Chudolestvennye sokrovika Matanaderan, Moscow 1976,with the correctdate. I am most gratefulto Mrs. Korchmazjanto have the facts aboutthis manuscriptbroughtto my attention. It should be mentioned that the colour reproductionin Durnovo is not reliable: the evangelist's mantle is much darker, and closer to the purple shade of the Dionysiou evangelist's drapery.

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style"manuscripts -, and appear artificaland stilted. They share with their companion figures the bulging folds round their arms, and the circularfolds on the hips, but the treatment is less subtle. Compared with the other two they are at an obvious disadvantage. Their most distinctive features are the frames, which betray an astounding understanding of classical ornamental patterns. The pages with the beginnings of the Gospel texts (figs. 19, 21, 23, 25), which face the evangelist portraits, have sumptuous carpet headpieces of stunning originality, which have hardly any parallels outside the small sub-group to which this paper is devoted. Their constructionis strictlysymmetrical, and with one exception the fields are perfectlysquare. Square headpieces came into fashion in Constantinople in the second quarter of the twelfth century; the Codex Ebnerianus49and the Melbourne Gospelsso offer some of the earliest examples. They re-appear in some manuscripts of the "decorative style" which precede our group in date; the books Harley 1810in the British Library51,Holkham Hall 552 and Collection Peter and Irene Ludwig II,553 may be mentioned. But in Dionysiou 4 and its close relatives the scheme is elaborated: a very limited number of patterns are almost identically repeated in those four or five books, not all of them contemporaries. Their identity is so unmistakable, that it could by itself provide a justificationfor treating these manuscripts as a distinct sub-group. Yet, for once, the art historian on the look-out for possible models is at a loss. It is true that the headpiece for John (fig. 25) which consists entirely of conventional scrolls will not cause us much of a headache. But it is all the more difficultto adduce convincing sources of inspiration for the other three which introduce new forms into traditional schemes (figs. 19, 21, 23). That 49Hutter, CBM I, fig. 248. 50H. Buchthal, An illuminated Byzantine Gospel Book of about 1100A.D., in: Special Bulletin of the National Gallery of Victoria, CentenaryYear 1961,Melbourne 1961,figs. 6, 7. I am now inclined to date the manuscript in the second quarter of the twelfth century. The article was reprinted in the author's collected essays: Art of the mediterranean World, A.D. 100 to A.D. 1400, Washington 1983, pp. 140-149. 51unpublishedCf. provisionally, J.A. Herbert, Illuminated Manuscripts, London 1911,p. 51f. 52W.O. Hassall, Byzantine Illumination at Holkham, in: The Connoisseur 133, (March 1954), pp. 87ff. 53V. Euw & Plotzek, Sammlung Ludwig, figs. 66, 75.

Fig. 26. Paris, Bibl. Nat. grec 1208 fol. 54. Headpiece for third Homily.

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for Mark, basically a pattern of squares standing on edge, five of which - the only complete ones - forming a Greek cross with equal arms - might conceivably have been developed from elements like those which constitute the third headpiece in the Paris Kokkinobaphos manuscript (fig. 26). But for headpieces 1and 3 no suggestions can be made at this stage. In any case, the possibility of Islamic influence should be kept in mind. It should also be noted that in all four instances the gutter sides, too, are decorated with birds perching on palmettes, and that the floral and animal decorations on top of the squares are almost perfectly symmetrical. Below the headpieces are the Gospel titles written in large golden uncial script, with the mannered abbreviationsand contractionsusual at that period. On each page there is room for only four lines of text, and they, too, are written in golden ink. The figural initials introducing the text of each Gospel continue the metropolitan tradition, popular since the end of the eleventh century, of alluding to the main subject on the opposite page54:Matthew exhibits his Gospel (fig. 19), Luke is writing in a standing position (fig. 23), and John dictates to Prochoros (fig. 25). Only the beginning of Mark (fig. 21) has an animal initial (letter A) similar to those found in the Kokkinobaphos group. Finally, the script, a bold, blocky, and very regular black minuscule including a high proportion of unicals, has more or less close parallels in other "decorative style" manuscripts from about the end of the twelfth century, especially in manuscripts from Cyprus. But too many questions still remain open for us to be able to attributeour manuscript to any particular 54Cf. S. Der Nersessian, A Psalter and New Testament at Dumbarton Oaks, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers 19, 1965, p. 166 and passim; reprinted in the author's Byzantine and Armenian Studies, Louvain 1973, I, pp. 139ff.

Fig. 27. fols. 2v-53. Canon Table 1. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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Fig. 28. fol. 3V-4. Canon Tables 2 to 7.

Fig. 29. fols. 4V-5. Canon Tables 8-10. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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centre - the script is just as inconclusive as the illuminations and miniatures. One fact, however, seems to stand out: the manuscript was not produced in Constantinople itself. The numerous Constantinopolitan elements which have been found in its artistic decoration are outsiders, intruders into a style which must have developed elsewhere. Whether or not these dates fit the particular historical situation which existed just after the fall of the Byzantine capital to the Latins is a point to which I shall have to return after some other manuscripts, close relatives of the Dionysiou Gospels, have been studied.

III Most instimately connected with the Dionysiou manuscript is a Gospels in the Staatsbibliothek (Preussischer Kulturbesitz)in Berlin, MS graec. qu. 6655,which is only slightly smaller in size. Among the manuscripts in our sub-group, this is the only one which has been known for a long time; it has been shown at various exhibitions56,and, for once, photographs are easily available. The close relationship with the Dionysiou Gospels was first pointed out by R. Hamann-McLean57.The most significant feature of the Berlin manuscript is that its text is illustrated with over thirty narrative scenes, which are of outstanding interest and importance, and were indeed extensively drawn upon by G. Millet in his "Recherches sur l'iconographie de l'Evangile""8.More recently, Hamann-MacLean has discussed the special significance of the cycle as a whole59.These narrativeminiatures, however, fall outside the scope of the present study60. Unfortunatelythe Berlin manuscript is no longer a homogeneous entity. It includes a number of leaves which are replacements or additions. But as the binding was completely renewed after the last war61, and the first twelve folios mounted separately, it is now difficultto distinguish the various component parts of the book. In the first place, the Canon Tables (figs. 27-29) are separate. They are complete on six pages crammed with numbers, but decidedly inferior to the other illustrations in quality.They cannot originally have been produced for the Berlin Gospels, if only because they have been cut down round the edges in order to fit their present location; they must have been intended for a slightly larger volume. This observation has some bearing on the evaluation of a document in Arabic written on fol. 2, the recto of the first Canon Table, which was originally blank; the document is dated 1219,and points to a Christian ambiente in Egypt62.It thus supplies a date "before1219"for the Canon Tables; and 5522 x 16 cm, ruling system Leroy 44 D 1. Cf. R. Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex Graecus Quarto66 und seine niichstenVerwandten als Beispiele des Stilwandels im friihen 13.Jahrhundert,in: Studien z. Buchmalerei und Goldschmiedekunst des Mittelalters, Festschrift f. K.H. Usener zum 60. Geburtstag, Marburg/Lahn 1967,

pp. 225-250.

56Lately: The Year 1200,A centennial Exhibitionat the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NewYork 1970,I., no. 291; Zimelien, Abendlindische Handschriften aus den Sammlungen PreuBischerKulturbesitzBerlin, Ausstellung der Staatlichen Museen, Wiesbaden 1975, no. 5. 57Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex, p. 233. 58G. Millet, Recherches sur l'iconographie de l'Evangile, Paris 1916,p. 736f. and passim. 59Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex, pp. 226ff. 60They will receive detailed treatment in a forthcoming study by Mrs. Annemarie Weyl Carr. 61Thisis recorded in a note stuck onto the back cover of the manuscript. 62Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex, pp. 244ff.

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as Millet's iconographical study of the Gospel scenes makes it virtuallycertain that the manuscript was in Egyptby the middle of the century, we may take it that the terminusante applies not only to the Canon Tables but also to the rest of the manuscript: it must indeed have been produced some years before 1219. The manuscript itself, as has been mentioned before, is very closely related to the Dionysiou Gospels: the script is so similar that the two books must be considered products of the same workshop, if not of the same hand. The ruling system, too, is the same 63.So is the program of illustrations, with the portraits of the evangelists (figs. 30-32) and gorgeous square headpieces at the beginning of each Gospel (figs. 33-36). An exception is the first page of the Gospel of Matthew (fig. 33), where the headpiece is of a different type and probablyunfinished: it shows a bust of Christin the centre and busts of the four evangelists holding scrolls in the corners. The whole composition was inserted into a geometrical and floral setting but left unpainted and only sketched out in red against a background of a grid of white lines. In addition the page has suffered extensive damage from water; most of the headpiece is now blotted out, and the text of the beginning of Matthew has been carelessly rewritten by a later hand. Moreover, the original miniature of Mark is now missing, and the portrait of Moses (fig. 37) has been shifted from its correct place at the beginning of the manuscript to the beginning of the Gospel of John. The second group of insertions consists of five folios. The first of these is now a single leaf, fol. 5, while the second is a bifolio, fols. 262 and 267. On fol. 5v is a duplicate portrait of Matthew (fig. 38) which has been severely scorched by fire; its half-charred remnants are glued to an originally empty page 64. But fol. 6, which has the original portraitof Matthew on its verso, is still intact (fig. 30). The bifolio 262/267 has a duplicate portrait of John on fol. 262v (fig. 39), and part of the frame plus the imprint of the whole miniature of John on fol. 267 which is otherwise blank; these two folios must, therefore, at one time have faced each other. They have also severely cut down round their edges, a clear indication that the two portraits were originally intended for a larger manuscript. The other inserted folios contain the for Mark, the only such list in the manuscript, on a bifolio fols. 99/100, written in a icqpocata brown ink different from that of the rest of the book, and probablyby a slightly earlier hand. Fol. 99 also has the imprint of a miniature of Mark which must have faced it but which is now missing, and which had a double frame, just like the additional half-burntportraitof Matthew on fol. 5v, and that of John on fol. 262v (figs. 38, 539).These three portraitsmust have belonged together; but of the corresponding miniature of Luke there is no trace. These three separate parts - fols. 5, 99/100, and 262/267 - seem all to have belonged to the same manuscript which was split up, perhaps because of its partial destruction by fire. At what date the two bifolios with the original miniatures of John and Moses (fols. 2653v and 264v) were inserted in the middle of the bifolio 262/267 is unclear; the strong imprint made by the portrait of John on fol. 267 makes one think that it might have happened comparatively recently, though certainly before the manuscript was acquired for the Berlin Library in 1881. Finally, it should be noted

63Leroy D 44 1. 64The text written on the sheet of parchment on top of the miniature is from Psalm 41 (42), 1. I am grateful to Professor Robert Browning for his help in deciphering the inscription.

Fig. 30. fol. 6v. St. Matthew. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek,graeco quarto 66.

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Fig. 31.fol. 158'. St. Luke. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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that the quaternion fols. 290-97 is a later replacement. In conclusion, there are the three remaining evangelist portraits which belonged to the manuscript from the beginning; two additional miniatures, Matthew and John, were taken over from some other, larger, and slightly earlier book, and with them went a picture of Mark which has disappeared but left its imprint on fol. 99. The facts are complicated indeed. I shall now discuss the various constituent groups of illuminations in turn. First, the Canon Tables (figs. 27-29). They are strangely banal and prosaic, and carelessly executed; the titles of some Tables are wrongly copied, and the number of birds and animals poised outside the arcades is severely reduced. Still, some are realistically cought in violent movement: the monkey on fol. 4, and the rabbiton fol. 5 add a somewhat more animated note. But the whole conveys a rather lack-lustre impression. As for the single ornaments, they are outside the usual repertory of Byzantine decorations, and are but dull reflections of their presumptive models, Armenian works from Cilicia such as the Gospels from Drasark in the British Library Or. 8165,written in 1181,where similar feathery palmettes and rhomboid patterns are to be found (figs. 40, 41). The Tables, which seem to antedate the manuscript itself by some years, were perhaps a spare set in the possession of the scriptorium,which happened to come handy for the Berlin Gospels when it was decided not to repeat the outstanding endeavour to which we owe the Tables of the Dionysiou manuscript. The manuscript itself, with its three original headpieces and three portraits, might almost be called a twin sister of the Dionysiou Gospels. Yet it is true that the execution was not so carefully planned: the scriptis less regular, the number of lines of text on the first page of each Gospel vaccillatesbetween three and five; and, while the vast majorityof narrativescenes are normal column pictures, some are almost full page, while others are inappropriatelysqueezed in close to the margins 66.We should also note that in a number of instances the first few lines of a chapter are written in gold script; and all the text passages from the Gospel of Luke which go with illustrations from the Passion, such as the Crucifixion and the Ascension, are in red ink. I incline to attributethe use of red ink for prominent parts of the text to western, probably French, influence - just as the soldiers in chain mail in the miniature of the Betrayal67must have been taken over from a western model. Some of the illustrations in the Dionysiou and Berlin manuscripts appear at first sight practically identical: the headpiece for Matthew in Dionysiou (fig. 9) and that for Mark in Berlin (fig. 34); that for Mark in Dionysiou and that for Luke in Berlin (figs 21, 535);and the portraits of Moses (figs. 1, 537)and of John with Prochoros (figs. 24, 532).Only the Dionysiou headpieces for Luke and John have no counterparts in Berlin. The Berlin headpieces for Mark and Luke are, however, slightly simplified in design and ornamental detail (figs. 54, 55), and somehow

lack the perfect finish and the persuasive power of their Dionysiou forerunners; yet, it was presumably the Dionysiou manuscript itself which was the fountainhead on which the Berlin and other related headpieces depended. This dependence may also be traced in one historiated initial: the standing and writing evangelist who represents the letter Epsilon at the 65Cf. H. Buchthal & O. Kurz,A Handlist of illuminated oriental ChristianManuscripts (Studies of the Warburg Institute. 12), p. 87, no. 456, with earlier literature. 66Cf. Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex, figs. 1-7. 67Millet, Recherches, p. 269, fig. 547.

Fig. 32. fol. 2653. St. John. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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beginning of the Gospel of Luke (fig. 35). But the Dionysiou Matthew exhibiting his Gospel and John standing and dictating to Prochoros again have no counterpartsin Berlin. The same is true for the animal initial standing for the letter A at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark (fig. 21). The Berlin manuscript has instead the figure of the evangelist, holding his Gospel in his hand, striding vigorously forward (fig. 34). Other changes are the headpiece and the animal initial for the Gospel of John (fig. 36), which have no forerunners in the Dionysiou Gospels. Among the full-page miniatures those of Moses and of John with Prochoros (figs. 32, 37) stand out for their superb quality. The main difference from their Dionysiou counterparts (figs. 1, 24) is the ample use of gold honeycomb striation, especially in the second portrait- a technical feature found occasionally in slightly earlier or contemporaryminiatures belonging to the "decorative style"68, as well as in contemporary icons 69. In Dionysiou the rendering of Moses's drapery is more natural; the wavy hem about the waist is a genuine late Comnenian pattern. In Berlin the figure is more articulated and more outspoken, almost violent in its movements, with a prominent elongated neck and slightly cocked head. Its intense dramatic action makes it clearly the later of the two. In Berlin the drapery round the hip and the waist may be slightly retouched. Above and below is the quotation from John I, 18, but the figure itself lacks a proper caption - a fact which led the author of the Berlin Catalogue to a fanciful identification. This omission is shared with many evangelist portraitsin our group. The frame recalls that of the portraitof Mark in the well-known Gospels in Florence, Biblioteca Laurenziana Plut. VI, 23 70, in which the evangelist portraitsmay well be additions of the later twelfth century. The relation of the two miniatures of John and Prochoros to each other may be described in similar terms. The Berlin portrait is more forceful and majestic, but the abundance of gold highlights makes it appear restless and over-dramatic,almost visionary. The drawing is more angular, the outlines of the hems more capricious, the forehead more bulbous, the gesture of the right arm more expressive. Though all these features are not inappropriatefor the author of the Fourth Gospel, his Dionysiou counterpart in its simple humanity is more appealing. The plain straight vertical lines of drapery and the only slightly undulating hems compare favourablywith the deliberate excitement produced by the figure in Berlin; again the Dionysiou evangelist is plainly the earlier of the two. The evangelist's name which appears at the top of the Berlin page may be a somewhat later addition, as also the long cursive caption at the bottom: 6'EooytlK6cogto

• i03tvuri1 Kci ••,xQzoq T~v )ayyCXatczTu. The portraits of Matthew and Luke in the Berlin manuscript (figs. 30, 31) do not at first sight appear equally similar to their Dionysiou counterparts. Still, a more detailed comparison will show that they are based on the same figural types, and that they have much in common. Unfortunately the miniature of Matthew is much rubbed, and the details of the head

68 Cf., e.g., MS Dionysiou25: Pelekanides,Treasuresof Mt. AthosI, figs. 56-60. 69Cf.,e.g., K.Weitzmann,IkonenausdemKatharinenkloster aufdemBergeSinai,Berlin1980,pl. 11;K.Weitzmann (andothers),FriiheIkonen,Wien & Miinchen1965,pl. 3355, and manyothers. des Cahiersarch6ologiques. VI), 70T.Velmans,Le titradvangilede la Laurentienne,Paris1971(Bibliothbque figs. 4, 125, 180.

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Fig. 33. fol. 7. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel.

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Fig. 34. fol. 103. Beginning of Mark's Gospel.

Fig. 36. fol. 268 Beginning of John's Gospel. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

Fig. 35. fol. 162. Beginning of Luke's Gospel.

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are now almost unrecognizable. Moreover, the attitude of the figure has been altered: the evangelist bends forward almost violently in the act of writing. And, just as in the picture of John, the comparatively simple drapery system of the Dionysiou figure mainly rendered in straight lines is supplanted by fuzzy gold striation, and the various bulges of drapery are more complex and more angular. Again, it is clear that the Berlin miniature is the later version of the two. The relation of the two portraits of Luke (figs. 22, 31) may be described in similar terms: they both represent the same figural type, but in Berlin the evangelist bends forward over his book. Moreover, while Luke in Dionysiou is by far the weakest of the four, his counterpartin Berlin is a real masterpiece, a dynamic figure convincingly rendered in gold and glowing colours, almost perfectly preserved and a worthy companion to that of John in the same manuscript. The head has the same triangular shape as that of Moses, and the same slightly bulbous skull; there can be no doubt that both works are by the same master copying a model very much like that of the Dionysiou Gospels - if not the Dionysiou Gospels itself. The frames are again reminiscent of those in the late twelfth century portraits inserted into the Laurenziana Gospels, Plut. VI, 23. Compared with its sister manuscript in Dionysiou the Berlin Gospels thus leaves a contradictoryimpression. In spite of its multiplicity of sources and its inconsistencies the Dionysiou Gospels presented itself as a breakthrough, a new beginning, well on the way to creating a new style on the basis of very respectable if somewhat heterogenous models. The Berlin manuscript, on the other hand, though distinctly more advanced in style, leaves a less harmonious overall picture. It is not only that evangelist portraitsand headpieces do not face each other because of faulty re-binding; indeed, if they did the discrepancy would be even more obvious. In spite of the near-identity of figure types and similarity of style with their Dionysiou counterpartsthe portraitsstrike one as belonging to a different strand; and their combination with the headpieces, which was so successful in the Dionysiou manuscript, does not make for a unified whole. The obtrusive and rather crude honeycomb chrysography, their most outstanding stylisticfeature, especially in the pictures of Luke and John, alters their character;it does give them a true stylistic identity, but it is not really integrated into the fabric of the manuscript as a whole, and remains somehow extraneous. Attractiveand impressive as the Berlin Gospels certainly is, the Dionysiou manuscript remains more homogenous, more striking and more harmonious as a work of art - not least through the unity and perfect harmony forged out of its various constituent parts. The two additional portraits (figs. 58, 59) which, as we saw, did not originally belong to the manuscript, deserve very special attention. They, too, belong together and they cannot by any stretch of the imagination be called "provincial", or even be attributed to the "decorative style" at all. They are most impressive works of a stunning quality, even the Matthew in its present ruinous state: the miniature is considerably shrivelled by fire, and has lost about 2 to 5 cm. along its left and upper frames. The gold hatching is infinitely more elegant and delicate than in the original set; the meandering ends of drapery are executed with great bravura, and with a feeling both for rhythm and for a certain three-dimensional quality; they have numerous parallels among the mosaics of Monreale 7 and related works. Matthew's chair might 710. Demus, The Mosaics of Norman Sicily, London 1949, figs. 99, 105.

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Fig. 37. fol. 264v. Moses receiving the Law. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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Fig. 38. fol. 5v St. Matthew.

Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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Fig. 39. fol. 262v. St. John. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, graeco quarto 66.

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Fig. 40. London, British Library, Or. 81 fol. 112. Beginning of Gospel of Mark.

almost be called late Romanesque in its complex proliferation of arches; its horizontal band carries a pseudo-Kufic inscription. A second and third pseudo-Kufic inscription are on the cloth covering the table to the right. The portrait of John (fig. 39), on the other hand, is complete and undamaged - apartfrom the fact that part of the gutter side of its frame is hidden by the binding, and some of it even reappears on the conjoint leaf, fol. 267. There are the same bulging and meandering drapery hems as in the Matthew miniature, especially round and near the left hand. A close parallel to the figure of John may be found in that of Christ in the fresco of the Dormition in Kurbinovo (1191)72. The figure is not really standing on both feet as is John in the Dionysiou and first Berlin portraits, but is shown stepping forward and at the same time turning round in a contrappostomovement to look up to the hand of God in the sky (which is missing in the two other miniatures). There is also, and this is the most prominent feature of the two duplicate miniatures, the same strikingly virtuosohandling of the thread-thin chrysography,which has nothing in common with the crude honeycomb patterns of the other set of portraitsbut is in-

72L. Hadermann-Misguich, Kurbinovo, Brussels 1975, fig. 90.

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Fig. 41.London, British Library, Or. 81 fol. 290. Beginning of Gospel of John.

stead laid on in very delicate lines which emanate from a few focal points. This animated figure with its dynamic stance, slightly bent knees, softly flowing forms and conspicuous all-over patterns of infinitely subtle gold striation is a near relative of the Angel of the Annunciation with its gyratinggait in the famous Sinai icon of about 1180/9073.The mantle falling down from the left arm in a cascade-like pattern, too, may be compared with several late twelfth-century works, such as the Matthew miniature in the Gospels suppl. gr. 6 in the Biblioteca Nazionale in Napels (formerly in Vienna) 74. Finally, the general figure type echoes that of several figures among the mosaics of Monreale 75.It even survived well into the thirteenth century:the sculpture of a trumpet-blowing angel in the central square of St. Mark's in Venice 76which echoes a Constantinopolitan model offers an amazingly close parallel. It is no doubt hazardous to propose a definite date and place of origin for the duplicate portraits;but it may be affirmed that 73K. Weitzmann, The Icon, New York 1978, pl. 27. 74Reproduced in: W. Kallab, Die toskanische Landschaftsmalerei im XIV. und XV. Jahrhundert,in: Jahrbuch der kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des allerh6chsten Kaiserhauses, 21, 1900, Tafel IV. 750. Demus, Mosaics of Norman Sicily, figs. 72, 87a, 95b. 760. Demus, The Church of S. Marco in Venice: History, Architecture,Sculpture,Washington 1960 (Dumbarton Oaks Studies. 6), fig. 99.

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Fig. 42. fol. 1. Canon Table 1.

Fig. 44. fol. 2. Canon Table 3. 1870. Cracow, Biblioteka Czartoryskich

Fig. 43. fol. 1'. Canon Table 2.

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Fig. 45. fol. 2'. Canon Table 4.

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Fig. 46. fol. 3. Canon Table 5.

Fig. 48. fol. 4. Canon Table 7. Cracow, Biblioteka Czartoryskich1870.

Fig. 47. fol. 3'. Canon Table 6.

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they both pre-date those which go with the manuscript. We can only speculate about the lost book from which they were extracted, but it was definitely of a deluxe character:witness the double frames with which the portraits are provided to give them special distinction - a feature which has parallels only in Constantinopolitan miniature painting, and even there was limited to a few manuscripts of outstanding merit". Moreover, and this is a crucial argument, the two miniatures have little or nothing to do with the "decorativestyle"; as I have said before, there is nothing "provincial"about them. If they had come down to us as single leaves, one would no doubt classifythem as "late Comnenian, end of the twelfth century";and their origin in Constantinople would be considered a near-certainty.As it is, the only information on their context is provided by the KFcp&chatfor Mark, fol. 99/100 in the Berlin Gospels,

which include the imprint of the lost portraitof that evangelist on fol. 99. While this evidence cannot be considered conclusive, an origin for the two inserted miniatures in Constantinople is, to say the least, a distinct possibility.

IV A third manuscript, which Hamann-Mac Lean associated closely with the two preceding books, is now in Cracow, Biblioteka Czartoryskichno. 1870 (formerly1801)78.It is the smallest of all the manuscripts of the group discussed in this paper, and its decorations cannot in any way vie in qualitywith those of the Dionysiou or Berlin Gospels. Still, the evangelist portraits and headpieces clearly belong with those in the other two, and even the ruling system, including that of the Canon Tables, is the same. The Cracow manuscript,which still preserves traces of its former Baroque binding, was rebound in 1964 with the unfortunate result that most of the miniatures of the first gathering, which had probably come loose, were mounted separately. Even before the re-binding the manuscript had two different systems of foliation, one with Roman numerals for the Canon Tables in their left bottom corners, and with prominent Arabic numerals in the top right corners of the rest of the book, starting with the first page of the Gospel of Matthew; the other, more recent, in small and rather inconspicuous Arabic numerals in the bottom right-hand corners of the whole manuscript, startingwith the first Canon Table. These two systems have led to occasional confusion when the miniatures or headpieces have been cited in art-historical literature. I propose to follow Hamann-McLean, and to use the second system, which is more consistent. There are nine Canon Tables on fols. 1 to 5 (figs. 42-50); they are significantly different from the noble structures in the Dionysiou Gospels, following instead the typical patterns of the "decorative style" manuscripts, which had been fashionable in the group as far back as the 77Cf., e.g., the miniature of Isaiah in the Codex of the Prophets, Florence, Laurenziana Library.Plut. V, 9. See recently H. Belting & G. Cavallo, Die Bibel des Niketas, Wiesbaden 1979, pl. 5. 7819,5 X 14,5 cm. ruling system: Leroy 44 D 1. Cf. C. Osieczkowska, Notes sur la dbcorationdu manuscrit grec Czartoryski1801et sur l'ornement byzantin, in: Studi bizantini e neoellenici (Atti del V congresso internazionale di Studi bizantini, 1940, II, pp. 33554-33559, tav. XCI-XCIII.Hamann-MacLean, Der Berliner Codex, pp. 23355ff., figs. 25, 50. K. Aland, Die Handschriftenbest~indeder polnischen Bibliotheken (Deutsche Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, Schriften der Sektion fiir Altertumswissenschaft, Vol. 7), 1956, p. 51.

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Fig. 50. fol. 5. Canon Table 9. Cracow, Biblioteka Czartoryskich1870.

Fig. 49. fol. 4'. Canon Table 8.

days of the Chicago New Testament79.They are now arranged in the wrong order, and one folio, originally conjoint with fol. 5 and containing Canons 3 and 4, is missing. Only fols. 2 and 5, with Canons 5 to 10,5, still form a bifolio; all the others are now single leaves, probably as a result of the re-binding. The list of sections from Matthew in Canon 10erroneously occurs twice: in the last column of fol. 3, and again in the first column of fol. 3'. Most architectural columns carryrhomboid capitalswhich mark the transition to the arcades, while some of the arcades themselves are drawn overlapping one another, just as in some of their opposite numbers in the Dionysiou Gospels. The intricate foliate patterns of the superstructuresare in gold and white on a red ground. They vary from page to page; in one instance a cock roosts on the central pinnacle and is attackedby two dogs or foxes climbing up towards him (fig. 49) - a motif which might almost have come straight out of a Table in a tenth century manuscript now in Venice, which in its turn seems to reflect western ornamental patterns80.Just as remarkable are two apes standing upright and preparing to climb the two outermost columns of the last Table (fig. 50). Unfortunately they are in a bad state of preservation; only their outlines remain. Among the evangelist portraits that of Matthew is missing; and those of Mark and Luke (figs. 52, 54) have their closest parallels in the Matthew and Luke figures in Berlin (figs. 30, 79Fac-simile volume: The Rockefeller McCormickNew Testament, edd. E.J. Goodspeed (and others), Chicago

1932.

80Cf., e.g., K. Weitzmann, Die byzantinische Buchmalerei des 9. und 10. Jahrhunderts,Berlin 1935,figs. 39, 40.

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31), but they are clearly the work of an inexperienced master who was unable to live up to the tradition of the workshop. They are almost unbelievably crude, uncouth and prosaic; the colours are dull and lack lustre, and the honeycomb chrysography,in particular,which is the main feature of the portraits, is quite mechanically and insensitively applied. The drooping shoulders which distinguished the Berlin evangelists are here even more in evidence, so that the figures look somewhat distorted. Mark has the round head and round black beard of Comnenian portraits, comparable to his counterpartin the slightly earlier Gospels in the Ludwig Collection"'.The sparse furniture is almost identical in the Cracow and Berlin miniatures; only Luke has a desk resting on an arcade, similar to those of the two earlier manuscripts. The broad frames contain flatlypainted trefoil motifs within heart-shaped tendrils, or rhomboid patterns; they are unusually broad, so that the normal ratio between picture and frame is upset. The attempts at imitating the noble figures of the Berlin manuscript almost seems pathetic. John (fig. 56) is an outsider in this series: he is seated on a high golden throne with thick horizontal bars, of a type found frequently in miniatures of the "decorative style" and elsewhere, mostly for John but occasionally also used for other evangelists. Though the figure is badly proportioned, its execution is superior to that of the other two, especially in the handling of the gold striation, and the fold under the left knee which finds its way down to the ankle - a motif which we shall meet again in the Moscow and Iviron manuscripts"8.John holds a half-open book in his right hand, and grasps his tunic with his left. Most of the pigments of the face have unfortunately flaked off. As for the headpieces only that for Matthew (fig. 51)belongs strictlyspeaking to our group. It echoes those for Matthew in Dionysiou and for Mark in Berlin, but its effect is marred by the addition of an ugly grid of thin, spidery white lines forming interlacing squares, which distract from the main pattern of the ornament and make the whole design appear weak and fuzzy. The initial B at the beginning of the Gospel text (fig. 51) is formed by the evangelist exhibiting his Gospel, just as in the corresponding initial in the Dionysiou manuscript (fig. 19). But the headpiece for Mark (fig. 53), with commonplace rhomboid ornaments arranged in the form of a Greek cross, and that for Luke (fig. 55), with foliage and tendrils reminiscent of those in the Canon Tables, have no counterparts anywhere in the group; they appear banal and undistinguished. The initial A at the beginning of the text of Mark, with a dog trying to catch a snake winding round the main vertical shaft, recalls a similar motif in the same place in the Dionysiou manuscript. The headpiece for Luke (fig. 55) has nine symmetrically arranged conventional palmettes; that for John, together with the first page of the Gospel text as far as John I, 15, is now missing. On each of the surviving incipitpages to the Gospels there are only three lines oftext; and for once these are not distinguished by gold script. The text itself, written in a deep black ink, is palaeographically similar to those of the other two Gospels, but is somewhat less carefully written. Seen as a whole, the Cracow manuscript is an important member of the group, principally

81formerlyPhillipps 3887, now Collection Ludwig II., 5. fol. 77v, cf. A. von Euw & J.M. Plotzek, Die Handschriften der Sammlung Ludwig, fig. 74.

82Cf.figs. 80, 81.

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Fig. 51.fol. 6. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel.

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Fig. 52. fol. 73V.St. Mark.

Fig. 53. fol. 74. Beginning of Mark's Gospel. Cracow, Biblioteka Czartoryskich1870.

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because of its connection with the Gospels in Dionysiou and Berlin. Indeed, when the ruling system is taken into account, it might even be considered a product of the same scriptorium. But no doubt outside models also played an important part; and, considering the low artistic level of its decoration, its execution was evidently not in response to the request from a highplaced aristocratic patron.

V One more manuscript which may be of slightly later date than the three Gospels just discussed, has now to be considered, although it stands somewhat outside the mainstream of our group. It is a Gospels in the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore, W 52883,a large and specially carefully produced book which is written in a firm and fluent, widely spaced minuscule that has its closest parallels in the even later Gospels in Manchester, the last manuscriptto be dealt with in this paper. Only one figuralminiature remains, a picture of Luke 84painted on the verso of a single leaf with blank recto,glued in so as to face the beginning of the text of his Gospel. The last few lines ofLuke's Gospel are now missing and must once have been present on a recto page which had the portrait of John on its verso85.There may in fact have been the usual complete set of four evangelists. The Luke miniature is, however, so different from all other figural work in the group, both in its style and its colour scheme, that it was probably not originally part of the manuscript, but a later addition; and this must have been true of the other miniatures as well. For that reason it will not be discussed here. The pattern and colouring of the four exceedingly beautifulcarpet headpieces (figs. 57-60), all of them forming perfect squares, is unusually attractive,and constitutes a high point within the sub-group. The patterns, rendered in exquisite taste, are very complex, and may be considered the most original work in the whole group next to those of the Dionysiou Gospels. Three of them incorporate versions of the feathery fan-like structurewhich is the main feature of the Luke headpieces in Dionysiou and Iviron;they are embedded in vigorous overall scrollwork with leafy palmettes. To the right of the square ornament there rises in every case a stalk with a large palmette which carries a single bird, some of them in violent movement; and every square is surmounted by a group of two birds flanking a central ornament. These four exquisite pages are of an extremely lively and harmonious effect, and of an impeccability and vitalitywhich distinguishes them from their relatives in most of the other manuscripts. The cat forming the initial E at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke (fig. 59) may be singled out here for special mention; we shall meet it again in the same place in the Moscow Gospels 86.The other three initials are more traditional. The script, black and heavy, is upright and particularly regular; as usual in most manuscripts of this group, the first page of each Gospel, with four 8325,2 x 16,7 cm. Ruling system: Leroy 52 C 1. K.W. Clark, A descriptive catalogue of Greek New Testament manuscripts in America, Chicago 1957, pp. 558ff. 840. Demus, Studien zur byzantinischen Buchmalerei des 15. Jahrhunderts, in: Jahrbuchder osterreichischen byzantinischen Gesellschaft, 9, 1960, p. 80, fig. 2. 85Clark, A descriptive catalogue, p. 559. 86Cf. fig. 79.

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Fig. 54. fol. 116'. St. Luke.

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Fig. 55. fol. 118.Beginning of Luke's Gospel.

Fig. 56. fol. 1835. St. John. Cravow, Biblioteka Czartoryskich1870.

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lines of text, is written in gold. The ruling system recurs in other, related manuscripts of the "decorativestyle", but not in our sub-group.It would add considerably to our knowledge if we could discover by whom this outstanding book was commissioned, but we shall probably never know the circumstances of its production. It was certainly intended as a showpiece for a private collector; there are not even any liturgical indications.

VI Among the few other surviving works of our sub-group there is one which recalls in many ways the Dionysiou Gospels, the earliest manuscript dealt with in this paper: a Gospel in the Iviron Monastery on Mt. Athos, no. 5587. It is of slightly smaller size than its Dionysiou counterpart, and appears to be a somewhat later and less outstanding derivative, following its source of inspiration rather closely, at least in the greater part of its ornamental decoration. It is, for example, one of the few manuscripts illuminated in the "decorativestyle" to perpetuate the system of architecturallybuilt-up Canon Tables of the Dionysiou 4 type. The ten Canons, somewhat abbreviated, are accomodated on only six Tables (figs. 61-66), most of them filled with a bewildering profusion of numbers. They are conceived as solidly built structures carrying massive canopies, each supported by three sturdy columns thin as threads; the principal columns of the first Table (fig. 61) also have a broad interlace in the centre. Fols. 1v,2, and 2v of the Leningrad fragment (figs. 7-9), formerly part of the Dionysiou Gospels, offer good comparisons. The flora and fauna on top and at the sides of the main structures are also based on motifs borrowed from the earlier manuscript, though again somewhat simplified. In fact, the whole scheme is considerably toned down: the exuberant and somewhat eccentric accumulation of individual motives borrowed from Constantinopolitan manuscripts of the kind of the "Kokkinobaphos"group and the Vani Gospels have disappeared, and are replaced by palmettes of conventional type, and these are used much more sparingly. Still, the "drBleries" of the Dionysiou manuscript are echoed by some chained animals in the margins, e.g., the cat on the second (fig. 62), and the ape on the sixth Canon Table (fig. 66), and some of the birds roosting on the lateral palmettes, which are very delicately drawn. Only the last Table (fig. 66) is entirely different: its five slender columns carry four conspicuously overlapping arcades, and the arcades in their turn carry, not a solid canopy but a base-line from which rises a lunette offering ample space to enclose the title of the Canon. The slender columns do have forerunners in about half of the Dionysiou Tables, but the lunette has closer parallels in other, otherwise unconnected manuscripts of the "decorative style"88. The whole scheme of this Table constitutes a well-planned improvement over its Dionysiou predecessor. Closest to the Iviron manuscript and similar in size, though not of the same high quality, is a Gospels in Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 989. Thus, its first Canon Table (fig. 67), the only one of 8720 X 14,5 cm. Ruling system Leroy 21 C 1.Pelekanides (and others), Treasures of Mt. Athos, II, 1975,pp. 504ff., figs. 46-50; with earlier literature. 88cf., e.g., Buberl, Handschriften in Athen, figs. 74, 75. 8921,7 X 16 cm, ruling system Leroy 21 C 1. K. Treu, Die griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments in der U.S.S.R. (Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichenLiteratur. 91), Berlin 1966, pp. 511ff.

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Fig. 57. fol. 2. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel. Baltimore, Md., Walters Art Gallery W 528.

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which a photograph is available90, is clearly a poor relative of its Iviron counterpart (fig. 61). Its general proportions, as well as the shape of the capitals, the frames of the lunettes and the step ornaments of the superstructures, recur exactly. The relationship will appear even more marked when the Moscow Table is compared with the third Table in the Iviron manuscript (fig. 63) in which there are also two lunettes and in which the marginal decoration on the right, too, is closer. Unfortunately the photograph from Moscow is not distinct enough to show the heraldically arranged quadrupeds facing a central ornament on top of the superstructure, just as on the two Iviron Tables. One wonders what the precise relationship between the Canons in the Dionysiou Gospels on the one hand, and the Iviron and Moscow manuscripts on the other, might be. Itwill be noticed that the lists of the Iviron Tables are very carelessly copied. Thus, Canon 1 is not complete, and there are many other mistakes and omissions; Canon 4, for example, has the same title as Canon 3: Matthew-Luke-John, instead of Matthew-Mark-John. But the gravest and And for once this is not perhaps the most significant shortcoming is the absence of Canon 101_3. fol. 4 has on its recto folio: due to the loss of a leaf, for the omission occurs within a single Canons 7 to 9, while on the verso is only Canon 10,4.It is certainly significant that exactly the same omission occurs in the Tables of the Iviron Gospels's closest relative, the abovementioned volume in Moscow91.It is therefore tempting to trace both sets of Canons back directly to those of Dionysiou 4: in that manuscript fol. 9 (fig. 12) which Contains Canons 10-_3 has been damaged by humidity, and the chapter lists are now largely illegible. Perhaps they were already unsuitable for copying when the Iviron and Moscow manuscripts were written. However this may be, the Canon Tables in Iviron and Moscow certainly depend on the same model. The sets of evangelist pictures in Iviron (figs. 68, 72, 76, 80) and Moscow (figs. 70, 74,78,82) are also very close to each other, almost as close as those in Dionysiou and Berlin. Unfortunately the Iviron portraits, though far superior in quality,are in a very bad state of preservation. First, the two sets agree as to their colour scheme: they perpetuate the unpleasant combination of light, pastel-like colours dominated by that brick-red, mauve, and green which is almost a hall-mark of the "decorative style" from its earliest examples like the Chicago New Testament onwards, and which takes complete possession of the production of provincial miniatures during most of the second half of the twelfth century. There is no trace here of the darker, nobler and more saturated colouring which distinguishes the evangelists in Dionysiou, probably under Armenian influence. From the point of view of their palette the Iviron and Moscow miniatures merely qualify as run-of-the-mill specimens of the decorative style, and thus help to underline the very special place the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels hold within the school. The figures, some of outstandingly noble bearing, occupy more of the picture space than their Dionysiou counterparts: their haloes almost touch, and sometimes do touch, the upper frame. The buildings accompanying them on either side are nearly identical in all eight por-

90I am much indebted to Dr. Alice Bank and to Professor Olga Popova for her effortsto obtainthese photographs for me. 91Treu,Die griechischen Handschriften, p. 311.

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Fig. 58. fol. 70. Beginning of Mark's Gospel. Baltimore, Md., Walters Art Gallery W 528.

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Fig. 59. fol. 116.Beginning of Luke's Gospel. Baltimore, Md., Walters Art Gallery W 528.

traits (figs. 68, 70, 72, 74, 76, 78, 80, 82). In both sets Mark and Luke are given heads with prominently round backs. But Matthew is the only figural type to agree with his relative in Dionysiou; and in Iviron Luke echoes that of Matthew. Even so, Matthew does not lean forward: instead he is shown slightly hunched over his book. Mark recalls the corresponding figure in Dionysiou only in a very general way. And John presents an altogether different type: he is not shown standing and dictating to Prochoros, but seated and exaggeratedly hunched over his book (figs. 80, 82) - in this respect not even comparable with his seated relative in Cracow (fig. 56). It appears that the Iviron and Moscow sets reflect a particular figural tradition, for the most part independent of the Dionysiou manuscript. Stylistically, the two sets are more advanced than the Dionysiou evangelists, and show their later date in many ways. In all eight pictures the dominant stylisticfeatures are the undulating zig-zag folds following their right sleeves, and the rounded or barbed folds along their hips, with their many bulges and frills. They make for a concentrated tension which is enhanced by the effect of the violent all-over movement of the figures themselves with their prominently raised left knees. Their brick-red footstools are placed vertically; in seven of them they half cover the evangelists's left feet so thattheir toes and partof the soles of their feet are seen from below - a very popular motif in later miniatures of the "decorative style". The

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Fig. 60. fol. 188. Beginning of John's Gospel. Baltimore, Md., Walters Art Gallery W 528.

exception is the portrait of Mark in Iviron (fig. 72) 92,where the whole foot is seen from underneath, and its sole is framed by an accumulation of bulging and revolving drapery which seems to be quite independent of the evangelist's own garb - a mannerism bordering on the absurd, which has no parallel within our group, and few in middle Byzantine illumination generally. Equally conspicuous is the right arm, issuing from a circular "blackhole" at elbow height, with the "broken"hand forming a right angle at the wrist. The corresponding figure in Moscow (fig. 74) which is not the result of such an extravagant experiment, is much more homogenous, and more convincing in its movements; the whole human shape is contained within the bold sweep of its expressive outlines. Still, apart from the marked general difference in quality there are also differences of detail: in Moscow Matthew's hair is rendered in single strains (fig. 70); and Luke with his allongated neck (fig. 78) is stylistically the most progressive figure of them all, and foreshadows more than any of the others the "mannerism" of Palaeologan art. The movements of all figures are impressively contrasted with the rigid verticals of the framing architecture. 92Demus, Studien z. byz. Buchmalerei, in Jahrbuch der dsterr. byz. Gesellschaft, IX, 1960. pp. 80ff., fig. 1. Cf. also, more recently, W. Krause,Plantanuda. Metamorphosen eines antiken Motivs in der friih-und hochmittelalterlichen Kunst, in Wiener Jahrbuchf. Kunstgeschichte, XXXIII,1980, pp. 17ff.; esp. p. 18.

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Fig. 61.fol. 2. Canon Table 1.

Fig. 62. fol. 2v. Canon Table 2.

Fig. 64. fol. 5'. Canon Table 4.

Fig. 63. fol. 3. Canon Table 5. Athos, Iviron 55.

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Fig. 66. fol. 4'. Canon Table 6.

Fig. 65. fol. 4. Canon Table 5. Athos, Iviron 55.

The headpieces at the beginnings of the Gospel texts (figs. 71, 73, 75, 79, 81, 82) are rather different from the others in our group, with the one exception of those for Luke (figs. 77, 79) both of which take up the motif used for the same evangelists's headpieces in the Dionysiou manuscript (fig. 23). But the others, too, are masterpieces of ornamental design. In Iviron all four of them are square, like all their predecessors in the group, and of great originality. But three of the Moscow headpieces are rectangular, and filled with rather nondescript scrolls and tendrils, some of them growing out of cornucopiae and recalling the ornamental repertoire of the "Kokkinobaphos"group. Those for Matthew and Mark (figs. 71, 75), particularly, may well go back to a twelfth-century model direct. It will be noted that throughout both manuscripts the palmettes decorating the margins of the headpieces are only on the outer, not on the gutter side; and that in Iviron three of the headpieces lack all decoration on top of the squares. In other words, the ornamentation as a whole is simpler, not so exuberant as in Dionysiou and Berlin; and this must mean that there was no longer any direct contactwith the Armenian schools of Cilicia. The colours are again rather light, and make the patterns appear flat. Only the headpiece for John in Iviron (fig. 81)lives up to the splendour of its predecessors: its saturated colour scheme has the same stunning effect as the head - pieces in the earlier manuscripts. In both manuscripts the writing on the first page of each Gospel is in gold upon red, and again very similar to that in the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels. But it is less elegant and more idiosyncratic, and less carefullyplanned and executed; there are four, five, or even six lines to

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the page. There are more ligatures, and some flourishes; the script of the Moscow Gospels, especially, lacks all distinction, and cannot compare with its predecessors; and throughout its text there are numerous orthographical mistakes93.The overall impression the two manuscripts convey definitely suggests a date somewhat later than that of the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels. Moreover, while those two have the same ruling system, a system which recurs also in Cracow, the Iviron and Moscow Gospels have different and simpler rulings. These facts have to be taken into account when we shall draw our conclusions about the group as a whole. The later date of the Iviron and Moscow Gospels may also be deduced from the initials at the beginning of the text of the individual Gospels (figs. 69, 71, 73, 75, 77, 79, 81, 82). Gone are the little figures of evangelists writing, dictating, or striding forward, which echoed the fullpage evangelist portraits on the opposite pages, and which gave the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels such a charming and personal note (figs. 19, 23, 25, 534,535).Here they are replaced by animal initials. In both Iviron and Moscow that for Matthew which forms the letter B and shows a small quadruped fighting a serpent is an echo of numerous similar initials in manuscripts of the "decorativestyle"throughout its history. In Iviron that for Mark, standing for the letter A, has a fox rampant,like the corresponding initial in the Dionysiou Gospels (fig. 21), the only non-figural initial in the manuscript; but here the fox attacks a cockerel poised on top of the hasta. The initials for the Gospels of John in Iviron, and for Mark and John in Moscow, consist of groups of fighting animals, and leopards, hares and foxes (figs. 75, 81, 82); they are without forerunners in earlier manuscripts of the group, and have an elegance and a verve which reminds one of the finest animal initials in twelfth century manuscripts94.Finally, the cat at the beginning of Luke in Moscow (fig. 79) echoes the same feline in the same place in the Baltimore Gospels (fig. 59). Thus, even though some headpieces and initials are not in the direct succession of the Dionysiou manuscript, the tradition and continuity are convincing enough. Though neither the Iviron nor the Moscow manuscript is dated, a fairly reliable terminus ante quem can be established for them by reference to yet another Gospel book now in Cambridge, Gonville and Gaius College no. 4053/41295. Unfortunately the spaces intended for its headpieces have remained blank, and of its evangelist portraits only those of Mark and Luke are left (figs. 83, 84). Both of them are shown in roughly the same poses as their counterparts in the Moscow manuscript; they may well be based on a similar set of models. But they display strongly exaggerated movements, and idiosyncrasies which clearly point to a somewhat later date: they are in a true "storm style". Mark's left knee is strongly drawn up, to the height of his elbow, and his head is raised high so that he looks into the distance instead of straight ahead. Meanwhile his left hand grasps a piece of drapery in a more natural movement than the Moscow evangelist, who twists his whole arm to support his chin and exhibits the palm of his hand. Luke, too, moves vehemently forward. The figures are framed by buildings on both sides, but the arches and arched windows have disappeared and are replaced by ordinary rectangular slit windows resembling that seen on the right of the Mark miniature in Iviron. The draped curtains, too, have been retained. The modelling of both figures is entirely in white 93Treu, Die griechischen Handschriften, p. 515. 94J.C. Anderson, The Illustration of Cod. Sinai. Gr. 33559, in: The Art Bulletin, LXI, 1979, pp. 175ff. 95M.R. James, A descriptive catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Gonville & Gaius College, Cambridge, II, 1908, p. 469.

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Fig. 67. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 4. Canon Table 1.

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highlights, obviously a makeshift technique intended to imitate the gold striation of earlier manuscripts like the Berlin and Cracow Gospels. But it must be said that the honeycomb and radiating patterns of white lines are crude in the extreme. Generally speaking, the Cambridge figures, though still within the tradition of the Iviron and Moscow evangelists - just witness the decoration of the frames - have reached a degree of mannerism and sophistication which cannot leave any doubt about their later date. The Cambridge manuscript is here introduced mainly for one reason: it belonged to Robert Grosseteste, the protector and magisterregensof the Franciscans of Oxford, first chancellor of the University in the crucial years of its formation, and later bishop of Lincoln, then the most populous see in England. He died in 125396. Grosseteste was one of the most learned men of his time; he knew Greek well, and contributed more than any other person to introduce Greek learning into thirteenth-century England. He also collected Greek manuscripts himself; Roger Bacon attests that he had them brought from Greece and elsewhere, to be incorporated into his library97.Now our manuscript has headlines and chapter numbers in Latin, and a note which has been identified as being in Grosseteste's own hand. He left his libraryto the Franciscans of Oxford, whose ex-librisour manuscript still proudly exhibits. Few of Grosseteste's manuscripts are still extant, but our Gospels survived because it was lent to a Cambridge Franciscan, Richard Brinkley, at some time in the first quarter of the sixteenth century. Brinkley has earned our gratitude for not returning it; and it has remained in Cambridge ever since. The date of Grosseteste's death, 1253, thus constitutes a terminusante for the Cambridge Gospels, which must therefore have been brought to England in the second quarter of the century, probablyvery soon if not immediately after it was written and illuminated. Indeed, one could argue that the headpieces were never completed because the Latin prelate who had bought the manuscript, and who was not interested in the "decorativestyle" but only in the sacred text, was impatient and insisted on its instant dispatch, before the headpieces could even be executed. Be that as it may, it is important in the present context to point out that the terminusante applies all the more emphatically to the Iviron and Moscow Gospels, with their miniatures in a distinctly earlier and less extravagant style than Grosseteste's manuscript. Thus, if a date around 1210 is accepted for the Dionysiou and Berlin manuscripts, those in Moscow and Iviron should fall between that date and ca. 1230. It seems only logical then to attributethem to. the third decade of the century.

96D.A. Callus, The Oxford Career of Robert Grosseteste, in: Oxoniensia, X, 1945, pp. 42-72. 97R.W. Hunt, The Libraryof Robert Grosseteste, in: D.A. Callus (ed)., Robert Grosseteste, Scholar and Bishop, Oxford 1955, p. 155;N.R. Ker, Medieval Libraries of Great Britain, 2nd ed., Oxford 1964, pp. 141f.; RobertoWeiss, The private collector and the revival of Greek Learning, in: The English Librarybefore 1700, edd. Fr. Wormald & C.E. Wright, London 1958, p. 126.

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Fig. 68. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 5v. St. Matthew.

Fig. 70. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 7V. St. Matthew.

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Fig. 69. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 6. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel.

Fig. 71.Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 8. Beginning of Matthew's Gospel.

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VII Of all the manuscriptsdiscussedin this paperthe Gospelsin Manchester,JohnRylands Librarygr. 1798,is by farthe most advancedin style,and hence the latestin date.It is a large bookequalledin size in our sub-grouponlybythe BaltimoreGospels,and surpassedonlyby the Dionysioumanuscript.It now has no CanonTables,but they may originallyhave been present, since the first quire is signed B. Generallyspeaking,its selection of illustrations comescloserto the DionysiouGospelsthanto anyothermanuscriptin oursub-group.Still,its miniaturesare anythingbut faithfulcopies. The "Dionysioutradition"re-appears,first,in the frontispieceof Mosesreceivingthe Law (fig.85), based on the same iconographicalschemebutwith a slightlydifferentposture.The prophetis here representedwith his leftfootandrightknee firmlyplantedon the groundand his left knee bent, as if he were in the act of standingup. Moses is depictedas youthfuland beardless,in accordancewiththe establishedByzantinetradition.His name is writtenon top of the page, butthe Gospelquotationwhich normallygoes with it is omitted.Thereis onlya simpleborderprovidedby single verticaland horizontallines. The foliowiththe portraitof Matthew(fig.86) is on the versoof a leaf conjointwith thatof the Moses miniature,and is the work of the same master,justlike the otherevangelistportraits.The captionson top of the pages,too, arebythe same hand.The evangelistis here rendered differentlyfrom both his Dionysiou counterpart,and from the establishedtype of Matthew:he appearsolder, has a longerbeard,and is seatedon an elaborategoldenthrone with rows of arcadeddecorations- attributesmore frequentlyfound in portraitsof other evangelists,especiallyof John.Withinthe ambienteof related"decorativestyle"manuscripts a similarthroneis foundin the Lukeminiatureof the LudwigGospelsII,599.The exchangeabilityof evangelisttypesin ByzantineGospelillustrationis a commonplacefact,butthisis the firsttimewe haveencounteredit in ourgroup.The evangelistreadsin a half-openbookwhich he holds in his hands;justas in the portraitsof Markand Luke,the tablestandson arcaded feet,andis surmountedbya lecternwithinterlaceornament.In allthreeminiatures,justas in the Ivironand Moscowmanuscripts(figs. 68-81), the red footstoolstandson edge like the tabletop, and in the case of Matthewand Lukecoversabouthalf of the evangelist'sbare left foot,so thatthe toes and partof the sole are clearlyvisiblefrombelow - a mannerismwhich occurssporadically in Byzantineillumination fromthe middleofthe twelfthcenturyonwards"'0. The ornamentof the comparatively modestframe,whichrecursin the miniatureofJohn(fig. 92), also has forerunners in the Iviron and Moscow manuscripts. Mark (fig. 88) repeats the type of Luke in the Dionysiou Gospels (fig. 22), whereas Luke (fig. 90) is the conventional writing evangelist. Both figures have the projecting forehead which is such a prominent feature in the Prochoros figure of the Codex Ebnerianus'101' - about a 9824 X 17 cm. rulingsystem:Leroy11D 1. Catalogueof printedbooksand manuscriptsin the JohnRylands Library,III,1899,p. 1985. 99Cf.the Phillippsmanuscriptnowin theLudwigCollection:vonEuwandPlotzek,SammlungLudwig,fig.78. 100 the earliestexamplesof this mannerismare foundin the Vaticancopyof the Homiliesof the MonkJames: Stornajolo,Le miniaturedelle omilie,pl. 17.Cf. also Markin Iviron55, ourfig. 72. lol Hutter, CBM I, fig. 259.

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Fig. 72. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 69v. St. Mark.

Fig. 73. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 70. Beginning of Mark's Gospel.

Fig. 74. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 85'. St. Mark.

Fig. 75. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 84. Beginning of Mark's Gospel.

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Fig. 76. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 111v.St. Luke.

Fig. 77. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 112. Beginning of Luke's Gospel.

century earlier in date. The motif in the frame of the Mark picture is a slightly more elaborate imitation of that in the top section of the Luke portraitin the Dionysiou Gospels (fig. 22); that in the Luke miniature repeats the ubiquitous step motif. The figuraltype of Luke in Manchester may well be based on that of Matthew in the Dionysiou manuscript (fig. 18) - another exchange of types, this time one which anticipates Palaeologan practice. The miniature of John (fig. 92), too, returns to the Dionysiou type of the evangelist dictating to Prochoros. The evangelist is a gaunt, lanky figure, slightly stooped to fit into the picture space; even so, his halo touches the upper frame, and his feet protrude into the lower one. Prochoros, seated on the ground as usual, exhibits the whole of his bare left foot which is visible from below, just as Mark in the Iviron Gospels (fig. 72); curiously, his right foot is sandal-clad. The motif of his raised left hand, extended expectantly towards the evangelist, imparts an unusual animation and even excitement to the figure. In all four portraits the folds and meandering hems creep all over the draperies in snakelike movements, imparting to them a restlessness completely absent from the more "classical" Dionysiou evangelists. A close stylisticparallel is found, e.g., in the frescoes of the apse of the church of St. Nicholas in Prilepl02 The portraits as well as the headpieces are painted in sombre and subdued colours. The headpieces (figs. 87, 89, 91, 93) lack the cold precision seen in other manuscripts of the group. 102V.J. Duric, Byzantinische Fresken in Jugoslawien, Belgrad 1976, fig. 9. Djurii's date for the Prilep apse frescoes is about half a century too early.

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Fig. 78. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 132v. St. Luke.

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Fig. 79. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fol. 133. Beginning of Luke's Gospel.

Those for Matthew and Luke (figs. 87, 91) are slight variations of those for Luke and John in Dionysiou (figs. 23, 25); they are more agitated and dynamic, and infinitely more complicated. They look as if the dynamic style, which dominated the Byzantine provinces at the end of the preceding century, had again asserted itself strongly. That for Matthew incorporates the cantharus base and the cornucopiae as well as those strange receptacles borrowed by the illuminator of the Dionysiou headpieces from the "Kokkinobaphos"master"13.The most interesting of the four headpieces is that for Mark (fig. 89), with its whirling leaf patterns. These lead us straightback to the last Canon Table ofthe Dionysiou Gospels (fig. 13).The grotesque pot-bellied little figure at the bottom of the central circle, on the other hand, is borrowed from the inexhaustible store of twelfth century Constantinopolitan initials. Moreover, the headpieces for both Mark and John (figs. 89, 93) incorporate the motif of the chained monkey, the first one reminiscent ofthose flanking a Canon Table in the Cracow Gospels (fig. 50), the other to be traced back to grotesques like that in the margin of the Dionysiou manuscript fol. 6 (letter to Carpianus) (fig. 3), where the skull-capped animal is seated in a similar pose, holding a receptacle in his outstretched arms. The headpiece for Luke (fig. 91) comes closer to its relative in Dionysiou (fig. 23) than any other headpiece in the entire group. Finally, we should consider the initials at the beginning of the four Gospel texts. That for Matthew (fig. 87) shows the apostle exhibiting an unfurled scroll, like the corresponding initial in the Dionysiou manuscript (fig. 19). Less traditional and more original is the Epsilon 103Cf. our figs. 9, 11.

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for John (fig. 93), with the hasta in human shape emerging from a row of fishes. But the glory of the manuscript are the two composite animal initials for Mark and Luke (figs. 89, 91), true masterpieces which are far superior to most of their forerunners, such as the stiff and lifeless initial for John in the Iviron Gospels (fig. 80). Their closest antecedent in our group is perhaps the initial for Mark in the Moscow manuscript (fig. 75); but it cannot vie with its delicacy and sophistication which are reminiscent of the perfection of their twelfth century ancestors. They are each made up of three or four animals; in one instance a human head is even used as base. The lively movements of the animals are rendered with an admirable sense of observation and even of humour. Smaller animal initials are also found throughout the text of the manuscript. The Gospel texts on the four incipit pages - three lines in the case of the synoptics, four lines for the Gospel of John - are written in gold. The script, as is only to be expexted, is in the tradition of the Dionysiou and Berlin manuscripts, but is less dense and compact, looser and more spread out, more cursive and incorporating fewer uncials and more ligatures. It lacks the regularityand strictorganisation seen in the scriptsof the earlier manuscripts, and betrays its later date in many ways. The illustrations of the Manchester Gospels are, therefore, remarkable from several points of view. The master must have had access to several earlier manuscripts of the group, and have combined single features which had special appeal to him. Above all, he must have known the Dionysiou Gospels or a closely related book, but at the same time he incorporated elements borrowed from the second stage in the history of our group, the Iviron and Moscow manuscripts. Perhaps even more important, he was himself a strong personality, who was not content to borrow, but introduced a number of original ideas of his own - ideas which single out the manuscript as one of the leading members of the group, in spite of its late date. In a way it represents the sum total of the group's achievements. Its animal initials are masterpieces in their own right; the interchange of evangelist types is, as far as the group is concerned, a new element, which lived on into the Palaeologan era'04;and the master's lively approach led him to personal solutions of his own. The Manchester manuscript certainly deserves more attention than than it has received so far, for it stands more than any of its relatives for the artisticcontinuityof the group throughout the first half of the thirteenth century.

VIII Broadly speaking, the seven manuscripts discussed on the preceding pages fall chronologically into three distinct groups. The Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels are the earliest; they are closely related to each other, and were probably produced in the same scriptorium at roughly the same time. They are dated to the period "before 1219" through a document in Arabic added on the recto of the first Canon Table of the Berlin manuscript. It appeared to us that the 104Cf. H. Buchthal & H. Belting, Patronage in thirteenth-centuryConstantinople, Book illumination and calligraphy (Dumbarton Oaks Studies. 16), Washington 1978, pp. 17ff.

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Fig. 80. Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 177'. St. John.

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Fig. 81.Athos, Iviron 55 fol. 178. Beginning of John's Gospel.

Fig. 82. Moscow, Lenin Library gr. 9 fols. 212v/213. St. John and the beginning of his Gospel.

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Fig. 83. Cambridge, Gonville & Caius College 403/412 p. 142. St. Mark.

period "before 1219" cannot have extended to more than a few years, perhaps at most to a decade. A study of the Gospel illustrations, for which we are looking forward to the book of Mrs. Carr, will suggest the same conclusion. The predominant feature of the evangelist portraits is their hectic chrysography,which has many parallels in icons dating from the turn of the century. Thus a date ca. 1210/15seems to be indicated for the Berlin Gospels, with the exception of the duplicate evangelist portraits, to which I shall return later. Codicologically speaking, the Dionysiou Gospels is an almost identical twin - apart from the absence of a cycle of narrative miniatures. But its illustrations appeared to us to be very slightly earlier in style; they should be dated ca. 1205/10.Thus the Dionysiou manuscriptis the earliest of the entire sub-group discussed here. We saw that in many ways it carries on the idisyncrasies of the "decorative style". But, even more important, it also incorporates a number of elements introduced from outside, most of which do not recur anywhere else in the sub-group, and which impart a special and unique distinction to its illustrations. Its outstanding quality,its glowing colours, and its almost exotic diffuseness single it out as one of the most

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Fig. 84. Cambridge, Gonville & Caius College 403/412 p. 238. St. Luke.

important witnesses surviving from the period immediately after the fall of Constantinople from the Latins. We shall see in due course how our art-historicalconjecture is supported by the historical situation. Related in a similar way, once more almost like twin sisters, are the somewhat later Gospels in Iviron and Moscow. In this case, there are no data that might help to fix them in time, and we have to rely entirely on circumstantial evidence; they must antedate the Cambridge Gospels which in its turn belongs to the period just before the middle of the century. Most telling are the Canon Tables. Basicallyboth their architecturalframework and their ornamental detail are in the metropolitan tradition, just as were those of the Dionysiou Gospels; but they are poor reflections, and lack the latter's originalitywhich, as we have seen, was due to a combination of various outside influences. Their prototype must have been a Gospels belonging to our sub-group, and very similar to the Dionysiou manuscript if it was not that manuscript itself. It should be noted that, in a way, the Iviron and Moscow manuscripts mark a retrograde step: the colour scheme of their illustrations, including their evangelist portraits,is

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one that had been current in the "decorative style" for several decades. The personal note which distinguished the Dionysiou evangelists is altogether lacking. Moreover they discard the type the of standing and dictating John, and re-instate the seated type of the Macedonian tradition and of the "decorative style". The two sets of portraits are very close to each other; they might almost be exchanged; only the Luke in Iviron does not share the noble bearing of the others but is an outstanding example of exaggerated mannerism. The evangelists of the Cracow manuscript, on the other hand, carry on the chrysographic style of their counterparts in Berlin. Yet here again, John reverts to the seated type; and the Canon Tables are typical of those of the bulk of the "decorativestyle" manuscripts, with their fantastic and unreal superstructuresconsisting of freely formed curves without any architectural framework, filled with linear palmettes and surmounted by beasts and birds in every kind of pose and activity,the whole scheme executed in one colour only - red. Only the horseshoe arches, and the false capitals which decorate the columns, lead us back to the Dionysiou Tables. The Cracow Gospels is not part of the mainstream of the development with which we are concerned here, but represents a sibling of the Berlin manuscript also adopting influences from various other sources. The Baltimore Gospels, which lacks Canon Tables and any original figural decoration, is not easy to place within this brief survey, but it is certainly not among the earlier products of our sub-group. Finally, the latest of them all, the manuscript in Manchester, is more closely dependent on the Dionysiou Gospels than on any of the intermediary works. Indeed, some of its most characteristicfeatures may well go back to that fountainhead direct. It may be dated towards the middle of the century, and forms a fitting conclusion to the development within the sub-group so far as it can still be traced. Thus both the absolute and the relative chronology of the principal Gospels of the subgroup present no real problems. It is therefore their place, or places, of origin that still need to be discussed. We argued that even the earliest manuscripts, the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels, post-date the Latin conquest of Constantinople by just a few years. We also saw that they do not in any way qualify as the offspring of a dying Constantinopolitan tradition. Such Constantinopolitan elements as we could trace proved to be strangers introduced from outside. The manuscriptsthemselves are more attached to what has been called the "decorativestyle", a widespread artistic movement which flourished in the Byzantine provinces, especially in those bordering on the eastern Mediterranean, from about the middle of the twelfth century onwards. With the help of scribal colophons its earliest products can be traced to Cyprus and Palestine, two provinces which had always maintained close contactwith each other'05.But in the second half of the century the style must have spread all over the mainland and also to other islands; during that later period it completely dominated Byzantine illumination. While the beginnings are not very impressive artistically,it appears that during the last quarterof the century there was a kind of regeneration which almost compensates us for the extreme paucity of illuminated manuscripts from the capitalitself. We saw that books like Holkham Hall 5, now in the Bodleian Library, and the original parts of Harley 1810in the British Librarymay in a way be considered the direct forerunners of the early members of our group. 105A.W.Carr, A Group of provincial Manuscripts, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers (as note 9).

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Fig. 85. fol. 2v. Moses receiving the Law. Manchester, John Rylands Library gr. 17.

The Dionysiou Gospels has been discussed in some detail before. It is a splendid book, which builds on the achievements of its predecessors in the "decorative style", but achieves something entirely new and highly original by combining the "decorative"material with motifs borrowed from two distinct stages of Constantinopolitan twelfth century illumination as well as from Armenian manuscripts from the Kingdom of Ciliciawhich was then approaching the apogee of its comparatively short independent existence'06.Perusing this extraordinary manuscript page by page one finds it difficult to avoid the conclusion that one is here in the presence of a book with high pretensions, i.e., probably with imperial associations, in the 106 Cf. S. Der Nersessian, The Kingdom of Cilician Armenia, in: A History of the Crusades, ed. K.M. Setton, II, 1969, 630-659, reprinted in the author's Byzantine and Armenian Studies-Etudes byzantines et arminiennes, I,

Louvain1973,pp. 333-352.

Fig. 87. fol. 6. Begi

Fig. 86. fol. 5'. St. Matthew. Manchester, John Rylands Library gr. 17.

Fig. 89. fol. 108. Be

Fig. 88. fol. 107'. St. Mark. Manchester, John Rylands Library gr. 17.

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glorious and awe-inspiring tradition of those comparatively few manuscripts which proudly exhibit imperial dedication portraits. And once this claim is accepted, the solution of the problem of its origin no longer presents an insurmountable difficulty. I should like to suggest that the Dionysiou manuscript was produced in Nicaea, the makeshift capital of the Byzantine Empire in exile during the occupation of Constantinople by the Franks and Venetians. In all probabilitythis attributionwill be received rather un-enthusiastically by most historians of Byzantine art. For some years past the role of Nicaea has, as it were, been under a cloud. For a time it was considered the home of the notorius New Testament in Chicago, a richly decorated book which had initially been attributedto an imperial Constantinopolitan workshop after 1261.When that speculation turned out to be incorrect, and the date too late, Nicaea seemed to be the ideal substitute. Later on, other manuscripts of the "decorative style" were also assigned to Nicaea'7?,for their twelfth century date was not recognized at the time. Today Nicaea no longer figures, as it were by default, as the place of origin of illuminated manuscripts, but it does not follow that it should be elimintated altogether. After all, it was the new centre of the truncated state, which considered itself the conscious and legitimate heir of the Byzantine tradition, and it was systematically organized on the pattern of old Byzantium in every detail'08.It continued the patrimony of the fallen Empire: it was the new Constantinople just as Constantinople in its day had been the new Jerusalem and the new Rome 109.It is true that the rulers of Thessalonica and Trebizond, too, claimed the imperial title. But it was Nicaea which assumed the role of the genuine substitute capital:the ecclesiastical hierarchy was headed by a Greek patriarchwho, though residing in Nicaea, took the title of ecumenical patriarchof Constantinople; and Theodore Lascaris, after his coronation and anointment by the patriarch,was widely recognized as the sole true emperor of the Romans. This new empire, which could count on the rich assets of western Asia Minor, soon became a force to be reckoned with. We know of the constant and heroic efforts of the Lascarid emperors to uphold all the trappings and appearances of legitimate succession, to revive the administration and civil service on old-established lines, and, especially, to encourage education and learning"0. It is true that the apogee of the cultural revival, when Nymphaion, the defacto capital after Theodore's death"',became a centre of literaryactivities and learning which contemporaries compared to ancient Athens, only occurs in the reign of Theodore II, after the middle of the centuryl". It is also unfortunatelytrue that we know next to nothing about monumental painting, which was certainlypractisedin the NicaeanEmpire1; 107S. Der Nersessian, preface to: H.R. Willoughby, The Four Gospels of Karahissar,II, The Cycle of Text Illustrations, Chicago 1956. 108Cf. Ahrweiler, L'histoire etla gbographiede la rigion de Smyrne, in: Traveaux et mmoires I,1965 pp.l1ff; H. M. Angold, A ByzantineGovernment in exile, Government and Society under the Lascarids of Nicaea, Oxford1975; H. Ahrweiler, L'Expirience nic6enne, in: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 29,1975, pp. 24ff. -. Still useful: Alice Gardner, The Lascarids of Nicaea, the story of an Empire in exile, London 1912. 109Ahrweiler, L'expbrience, p. 25. noGardner,Lascarids of Nicaea, pp. 267ff. On the activities of Theodore Lascaris, cf. Theodorus Skutariota,ed. Heisenberg, Leipzig 1905, pp. 297-8. " H. Ahrweiler, Byzance et la mer, Paris 1966, p. 528. A. Gardner, The Lascarids, pp. 197ff., 286ff. "12 n3Gardner, The Lascarids, p. 292; M. Restl6, Die byzantinische Wandmalerei in Kleinasien, Recklinghausen 1967, I, p. 85f., III, pl. 55, 1.

Fig. 91.fol. 171.Be

Fig. 90. fol. 170'. St. Luke. Manchester, John Rylands Library gr. 17.

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and in Nicaea itself; and that we are especially badly informed about Nicaean monasteries, and about scriptoria which may have worked in those monasteries"4. Yet it is most improbable that the city which had for a time taken over the leadership of the Greek world should not have produced any identifiable manuscripts at all. The evidence is scanty indeed, but one exception is a Vatican Rhetorica manuscript (Vat. gr. 105), which has a colophon mentioning the name of the Nicaean emperor John III"s. It was an intermittent though by no means universal - custom for scribes to include the ruling emperor's name when they added the date of completion of their work, and practically every emperor who occupied the throne of Byzantium was mentioned in such colophons 116.The fact that there is one instance, and one instance only, of a Lascarid joining the illustrious list may give us food for thought. It is certainly regrettable that no other such books have come down to us; but it does also show that manuscripts were written within the Nicaean realm. The Vatican Rhetorica dates from 1244/54, and may well have been produced in the imperial Monastery of Sosandra, which must have been located in the region of Nymphaion"7. It was founded by Theodore's successor John III, and enjoyed the special protection of the imperial family; both John and Theodore II were buried there. It also appears that Sosandra owned a library of sorts, a fact which encourages the speculation that it might also have had a scriptorium itself"8. But the few other manuscripts with illuminations which survive from the period of the Nicaean Empire hardly qualify for inclusion in the present survey'"9; and even the Vatican Rhetorica - and the foundation of Sosandra - belong to a later period than the one with which we are concerned here. Nevertheless one would expect that Theodore I, too, might have included the production of deluxe manuscripts in his ambitious revival programme. The technical difficulties would not have been insuperable as there were no restrictions on Greeks leaving Constantinople, and emigrants must, to a large extent, have been recruited from the intellectual elite which upheld Byzantine legitimacy'20. Thus, illuminated manuscripts, too, may have circulated freely from the old capital to the new, and could have been used to upgrade provincial production of the "decorative style" so as to conform more closely to metropolitan and aristocratic standards. The difficulty is that such manuscripts have not previously been identified. 114Cf. N.G. Wilson, Nicaean and Palaeologan Hands, in: Colloques internationaux du centre de la recherche scientifique, no. 559: La paleographie grecque et byzantine, Paris, octobre 1975; Paris 1977, pp. 263ff. Cf. also the recent publicationsby G. Prato: Scritturelibrarie arcaizzantidella prima etAdei Paleologi e i loro modelli, in Scrittura e civilth53,1979,pp. 151ff.,esp. p. 191;and: La produzione librariain area greco-orientalenel periodo del regno latino di Costantinopoli, in Scritturae civilta 5, 1981,pp. 105-147, esp. pp. 141ff. n"Al. Turyn, Codices graeci vaticani saec. XIII e XIV scripti annorumque notis instructi, Vatican City 1974 (Codices e vaticanis selecti. XXVIII)tav. 11,12. 116K.Treu, Byzantinische Kaiser in den Schreibernotizen griechischer Handschriften, in: Byzantinische Zeitschrift 65, 1972, pp 9ff.; p. 19: Johannes III Ducas Vatatzes, Vat. gr. 105. Cf. also p. 27ff. n7H. Ahrweiler, Rigion de Smyrne, pp. 89ff., 94ff. A Menaion for the month of November (Vat.Reg. gr. 65), dated 1259/60, written in the Galesius Monastery near Smyrna and mentioning Andronikos Palaiologos, the later emperor of Constantinople, may also be mentioned here. Cf. A. Turyn, Codices graeci vaticani, p. 44ff; E. Follieri, Codices graeci Bibliothecae Vaticanae selecti, 1969, no. 50. On the Galesius Monastery and its scriptorium, cf. R. Janin, Les 4glises et les monastPres des grands centres byzantins, Paris 1975, pp. 241ff. O. Volk, Die byzantinischen Klosterbibliothekenvon Konstantinopel, Thrakien u. Kleinasien, Munich 1958, 1180 p. 160. 119They have recently received a great deal of attention; cf., e.g., I. Spatharakis,An illuminated manuscriptfrom the Nicaean era, in: Cahiers archiologiques, 28, 1979, pp. 157ff, esp. p. 141,with footnotes. 120H. Ahrweiler, L'Expirience nic6enne, p. 29.

Fig. 92. fol. 271'. St. John and Prochoros.

Fig. 93. fol. 272. Be Manchester, John Rylands Library gr. 17.

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I want to suggest that the Dionysiou manuscript fits the case perfectly. It has been pointed out before that in a way it is still a manuscript in the tradition of the "decorativestyle", which reminds one of the slightly earlier books, Holkham Hall 3 and Sammlung Ludwig II, 5. Even its square carpet pieces, though of course ultimately of Constantinopolitan origin, had by the last quarter of the twelfth century become an integral part of the provincial tradition. But the Dionysiou Gospels differs from all its relatives through its determined and laborious attempt to modify and ennoble the "decorative style" by re-introducing values and practices derived from the art of the former capital. This applies first and foremost to the ornamental decoration. Features such as the solid architecturalframework of the Canon Tables, not found in any earlier "decorative style" manuscripts, must have been inspired by a prototype brought straightfrom Constantinople. Moreover, it has been possible to point to the precise models of a number of single ornamental motifs in the Canon Tables and the decorative frames of the pages with the Eusebius letter: they derive partly from a manuscript illuminated by the "Kokkinobaphosmaster", the leading illuminator in Constantinople in the second quarter of the century, and partlyfrom a late twelfth century book very similar to the Georgian Gospels now in Tbilisi, illustrated in a Georgian monastery near Constantinople. In a way the forceful and almost brutal colours still link our manuscript, and especially its ornament, to contemporary works of the "decorative style". But another additional source must be considered: the overblown exuberance and ponderous exaggeration of the Canon Tables, and the deep, rich colour scheme and noble bearing of the evangelist portraitsrecall the art of Armenian Cilicia. The connections between Nicaea and Cilicia, dynastic and otherwise, are documented and well known"'; the presence of Cilician manuscripts in Nicaea at that time would be in no way unexpected. Still, the resources available in Nicaea during the very first years after its proclamation as the capital city of a new Empire must have been rather limited. The effort which went into the production of this manuscript - the largest of all the books discussed in this paper - makes it an outstanding achievement. This fact suggests that, as I have mentioned before, the Dionysiou Gospels was probablycommissioned by, or intended for, a person of high standing in the secular hierarchy - perhaps even the emperor himself. The quality of its illuminations has indeed few or no rivals in this period. We also saw that the closest relative of the Dionysiou manuscript is the Gospels in Berlin, graec. 4 o 66. Its scriptis so similar thatthe common origin of both manuscriptsmay be taken as an established fact; perhaps one might even recognize the work of the same scribe, or scribes. Moreover, the ruling system and the placing of the quire signatures are identical. But there are also significant differences. Unfortunatelythe Berlin Gospels has no original set of Canon Tables which might be compared with that in Dionysiou; and of the four headpieces only two have an identical ornamental pattern. These two are somewhat simplified, which might be taken to point to a slightly later date; and the last headpiece only offers a conventional design without any individual character,which does not live up the high standards of execution of its various Dionysiou counterparts. The evangelist pictures are even more surprising. The fig121A.Garnder, the Lascarids, p. 87. Cf. also A. Heisenberg, Zu den armenisch-byzantinischenBeziehungen am Anfang des 15. Jahrhunderts,Sitzungsberichteder bayerischenAkademie der Wissenschaften, phil.-hist. Kl., 1929, Heft 6.

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ural types are the same as in Dionysiou, but the brilliant honeycomb-pattern gold highlights produce an impression of glowing though somewhat obtrusive beauty, especially in the wellpreserved portraits of Luke and John. The inner light emanating from the two figures is in fact more reminiscant of contemporary icons 12. Still, the probabilityis that they were copied from a manuscript model. However this may be, the Dionysiou and Berlin manuscripts are close enough to each other to be considered as practicallyof the same date, i.e., after 1204 but before 1219,probablycloser to the earlier than to the late date, and of the same provenance, i.e, Nicaea. To my mind the most interesting feature, because it is practicallyunique, in the Berlin Gospels is the two inserted miniatures - originally there were at least three of them - which seemed to us slightly earlier in date than the manuscript itself, and in all probability hailed straight from Constantinople where they were produced immediately before the impresa,i.e. during the last years of the twelfth or the very first years of the thirteenth century. The importance of that attribution can hardly be exaggereated: if our conjecture is accepted, these miniatures would fill a gap which has been all too painfully felt. Exactlywhen those portraits were inserted in the Berlin manuscript remains an open question. One would like to think that they found their way to Nicaea soon after the fall of Constantinople, that the original manuscript was perhaps damaged in transit, and that some of its parts were then incorporated in the Berlin Gospels soon afterwards. In any case, the inserted miniatures may now be added to the very few surviving works that date from the period just before the Fourth Crusade brought artictic activities in the capital to a more or less abrupt end. Our knowledge of Constantinopolitan miniature painting, and of Constantinopolitan art generally, during the last quarterof the twelfth centuryis scanty indeed. The famous Annunication icon"3, and the mosaic decoration of Monreale 24,provide the most reliable yardsticks. Among manuscripts, pride of place should go to the beautiful Gospel Book in the Ecumenical Patriarchatein Istanbul, no. 53,which was the subjectof Robert S. Nelson's Ph. D. dissertation at New York University in 1978 4a. Moreover, the book with the Gospels of Luke and John (Dumbarton Oaks, no. 4) "5may be mentioned, with its two portraits which are anything but uniform in style; and perhaps also the Gospels in Patmos, no. 80126,whose portraits show a strange combination of the style of Monreale with a more classical trend which we know best from fresco painting of the period around and just after the turn of the century127. It is true that our two duplicate miniatures have little in common stylistically with those in either of the manuscriptsjust mentioned; but similarly,those in the Dumbarton Oaks Gospels are so different from each other that one would never have attributedthem to the same manuscript if they had come down to us singly. Be that as it may, the attributionto Constantinople and to the 122e.g., K. Weitzmann (and others), Friihe Ikonen, Wien & Miinchen 1965, pl. 533. 123K. Weitzmann, The Icon, New York 1978, p. 92, pl. 27. 1240. Demus, The Mosaics of Norman Sicily, London 1949, pls. 61-110. note 8. 124Cf. 25G. Vikan (ed)., Illuminated Greek Manuscriptsfrom American Collections, Princeton 1973, no. 42; R,S. Nelson, A late twelfth-centuryilluminated Manuscript at Dumbarton Oaks, in: Fifth Annual Byzantine Studies Conference, Dumbarton Oaks 1979, Abstracts of Papers, p. 10. 126G. Jacopi, Le miniature dei codici di Patmo, in: Clara Rhodos, VI/VII, 1952-3355, pt. 5, tav. VIb-X. 127O. Demus, Byzantine Art and the West, New York 1970, p. 192f.

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period about 1200 of the two duplicate miniatures in Berlin is, as it were, an unexpected windfall for the history of late Comnenian book illustration. It is in the nature of things that the unusually high standard of the Dionysiou and Berlin manuscripts was not maintained in the later products of the group. The Cracow Gospels is only a "poor relative", an unimaginative imitation of its Berlin predecessor, probablynot even much later in date. It is the only other manuscriptwith identical rulings, and was in all probability produced in the same atelier, in other words, in Nicaea itself. It shows that less eminent patrons had to be satified with mediocre reproductions of the aristocraticmasterpieces which were the glory of the scriptorium. Moreover, the Canon Tables were copied from an ordinary "decorative style" manuscript; and John is represented seated and writing - again a return to the old Macedonian and the "decorative style" types. The multiplication of otherwise almost identical manuscripts on two different levels of quality,intended for different strata of society, has close parallels among the finest products of Byzantine illumination of the early Palaeologan period: the manuscripts in Baltimore, W 525, and Oxford, Barocci 31, present an almost identical case when they are compared with their high-class contemporaries, i.e., Vat.gr. 1158 and "X" 128. The Iviron and Moscow Gospels which I attributedto the third decade of the centurymark a further big step away from the artisticisolation of the group. They demonstrate assimilation to the average production of "decorative style" manuscripts; it is their headpieces, perhaps more than anything else, that ties them to their predecessors in Dionysiou and Berlin. But the colour scheme is that of the "decorativestyle"; and comparativelylittle else is left of the Dionysiou tradition. The individual effort with which the group had started now begins to be submerged by routine work. Most significantly, the ruling system is now different. Still, the Moscow Gospels has the distinction of being the only manuscript in our group which may offer positive visual evidence of its place of origin. A bifolio at the beginning, which has not so far been photographed or even noticed, has on its last page (fol. 2D)a rudimentary design of the upper half of a Canon Table drawn in red outline. The triangular pediment encloses a decoration consisting of two pairs of bars, crossing each other at right angles. The device is familiar to us. While its precise meaning has so far remained obscure, there can be no doubt that it represents a dynastic emblem of special significance to the family of the Palaeologil29. In a number of instances it is found combined with a Palaeologan monogram; the closest parallel is offered by the Canon Tables of the late thirteenth century Gospels in the Vatican Library, Vat. gr. 1158,a manuscript de grand luxe commissioned by a female member of the Palaeologan dynasty then ruling in Constantinople - the manuscript mentioned in the preceding paragraph'30.In addition, fols. 1and Ivof the Moscow Gospels also contain sketches of Canon Tables with decorative motifs identical with those in Vat. gr. 1158. In the present context this observation is of vital importance. The earliest known instance of the crossed bars is on coins of the Nicaean emperor John IIIVatatzes (1222-54),to whom the 28H. Buchthal & H. Belting, Patronage in thirteenth-centuryConstantinople, An Atelier of late Byzantine Book Illumination and Calligraphy (Dumbarton Oaks Studies, XVI.), Washington 1978, pp. 20ff. 129Cf. the recent summary by G. Vikan in The Art Bulletin, LXIII, 1981,p. 526. 1"30H. Belting, Das illuminierte Buch in der spitbyzantinischen Gesellschaft, Heidelberg 1970, pp. 62-66, plate XXIV; and the book quoted in note 128, pls. 18, 19.

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first Palaeologan emperor was related by marriage, and who could therefore be claimed by all later members of the dynasty as their ancestor13.The emblematic device was inherited by the Palaeologi from their imperial forbears in Nicaea. It is impossible to say precisely when the bifolio with its significant Canon Table was bound with the Moscow Gospels; but in all probabilityit co-existed with the manuscript from the beginning. Considering the most likely date of our manuscript, the third decade of the century,it is thus tempting to connect it directlywith the Nicaean court in the reign of John III, and to argue once again for an origin in the temporary capital itself, or in one of the nearby monasteries. If the Moscow Gospels was indeed an imperial manuscript, as the bifolio implies, the sad decline in quality vis-a-vis the masterpieces in Dionysiou and Berlin, works produced less than a generation earlier, is all too evident. But even so one is now encouraged to attributeall the manuscripts discussed in this article to the Empire of Nicaea: with the help of the bifolio a unique and direct link between the arts at the courts of Nicaea and Constantinople may be forged. The manuscript in Manchester, finally, the latest product of our sub-group, exhibits a conscious effort to return to the standards and also to the idiosyncrasies of the Dionysiou Gospels, and may in part even be based on it direcly, even though its ruling system is again different. It should be dated about the middle of the century; and with all due caution it might be argued that there is a possibility that it was also produced in the imperial Monastery of Sosandra under John III. There are, in fact, reminiscences of single motifs borrowed from practically every other manuscript of the group, which might be taken to suggest that all seven manuscripts originated in the same place, or at least geographically close to each other. But the ultimate solution of that thorny problem must be left to future research. In the last instance, the palaeographical evidence may well prove decisive32. To sum up: the seven Gospels discussed on the preceding pages have the unique distinction of containing a series of illuminations and figural miniatures very similar to each other, which constitute a real "school", an offshoot of the "decorativestyle", and which can be arranged in a continuous chronological sequence spreading over the entire first half of the thirteenth century. The "decorativestyle"itself did not continue farbeyond 1200;the earlier members of our group are in fact among its latest products. Their fountainhead seems to have been the Lascarid capital of Nicaea during the early years of its ascendency; and though this attribution may not applyto every single manuscript, there is no doubt that in the geographical sense they are all "provincial"works. Their comparative isolation within the realm of Byzantine art is also borne out by the fact that the earliest manuscripts are by far the finest in quality, that the later ones present only slight variations of the original themes, without introducing new fertile ideas, and also that many essential features of the latest of them all are again based directly on the fountainhead of the group. Their origin in Constantinople is certainlyout of the question, and it is significant both that they are completely free of Latin influence, and that 131Cf. C. Mango & J.W. Hawkins, Additional Finds at Fenar Isa Camii, Istanbul,in Dumbarton OaksPapers 22, 1968, p. 181; H. Buchthal,A Greek New Testament Manuscript in the Escorial Library:its miniatures and its binding (forthcoming). Cf. also V. Laurent. La gtnhalogie des premiers Palkologues, in Byzantion 8, 193355, pp. 150ff. 132Cf. the publicationsby G. Prato quoted in note 114. Unfortunatelythe splendid volume by Nigel G. Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium, London 1985, with a special chapter on Nicaea, was not yet availablewhen this article was written.

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they left hardly any impact on the artistic activities of the resurrected Greek Empire of Constantinople after 1261. That impact was the prerogative of those few manuscripts which were indeed produced in Constantinople and its dependencies during the period of Latin rule 13. In conclusion it may be said that the earliest manuscripts of the group, the Dionysiou and Berlin Gospels, are key products in the history of Byzantine illumination. It is true that we do not know how many related manuscripts have been lost or have not yet been traced. We can only hope that further discoveries will throw more light on this interesting and all too neglected interlude, which fills a significant gap in our knowledge and adds yet another dimension to the art of the thirteenth century - the most enigmatic century in the entire history of Byzantine art.

133Cf. in the first place, K.-Weitzmann, ConstantinopolitanBook Illumination in the period of the Latin Conquest, in Gazette des Beaux-Arts,86, 1944, p. 193-214, reprinted in the author's Studies in Classical and Byzantine Manuscript Illumination, ed. H. Kessler, Chicago 1971, pp. 314ff. Weitzmann's dates have not remained unchallenged, cf., most recently, H. Buchthal, The "Musterbuch"of Wolfenbiittel and its position in the Art of the 13th century (ByzantinaVindobonensia. XII), Vienna 1979, pp. 45ff.