Westminster Psalter
The Westminster Psalter,
Description
The manuscript has 224 medieval folios with a page size of 230 x 155 mm and a typical text area of 160 x 95. The binding is modern, from 1932. The contents begin with a calendar, illustrated with the
In about 1250 five tinted full-page drawings were added on previously blank pages (ff 219v-221v). These show: a king and a kneeling knight on facing pages, Saint Christopher carrying the Christ-Child, an archbishop, and finally the head of Christ in a format associated with images of the Veil of Veronica, with a prayer below referring to that relic. There were later additions of prayers and antiphons up to the 15th century, including a late 14th or 15th century drawing of a naked man.[2]
History
The manuscript is presumed to have been commissioned for Westminster Abbey by the monk who is shown at folio 116 (see above), who was perhaps William Postard, abbot from 1191 to 1200, or Ralph de Arundel, abbot from 1200 until "he was deposed for high-handedness" in 1214. According to one scholar, the calendar reflects changes "upgrading" some feasts that were introduced by Ralph as abbot, in terms of the markings reflecting the number of lessons to be read and copes to be worn, though stylistically a date as early as the 1180s would be possible.[3] The pattern of additions suggest it remained in use for services from its creation until the monastery was dissolved in 1540, and it appears in an inventory made in 1388 of the contents of the vestry, including 17 books used in services, as opposed to those in the library of the monastery,[4] as well as another inventory of 1540.[5] Like many monastic books, its history then becomes unclear for a period, before it reappears in the collection of the antiquarian bibliophile John Theyer (1597–1673), who made some notes in the book. After his death his collection was bought via the London bookseller Robert Scott for the Old Royal Library, which itself was given by George II to the newly founded British Museum in 1757.[6]
Recent writers such as Nigel Morgan are confident that all the 13th century illustration was produced in London, although the earlier full-page miniatures are by an itinerant master, which is reflected in Deirdre Jackson's catalogue entry for the British Library's 2011–12 Royal Manuscripts exhibition. However
The clear and detailed depiction of the costumes of the figures in the tinted drawings has been discussed and copied in works on the history of costume since the late 18th century; in particular the sleeveless open-seam surcoat worn over chain mail of the kneeling knight is often used as an example of this innovation from the Islamic world.[8]
Style of the miniatures
Nigel Morgan was the first to distinguish a total of five hands in the decoration, three in the original campaign around 1200, one around 1250 and the last (naked man) later. The first artist did the roundels in the calendar, the Beatus initial, and the other figured initials, except for that with the monk on f 116, which was done by another artist. Between them these two were presumably responsible for the other decorated initials and text embellishments. These may well have been monks at Westminster, whereas the full-page prefatory miniatures were done by an artist of higher quality, who may well have been an "itinerant lay professional", as his work is also found in the initials in a bible made at
The five tinted drawings added around 1250 are in a style especially associated with England, and best known through the contemporary work of Matthew Paris at St Albans, although it had been an English speciality since Anglo-Saxon times. A pen drawing with a strong outline is coloured with light brushed washes (the archbishop is in fact purely in ink, perhaps unfinished). They may be connected with a now lost psalter, also at Westminster and recorded in the inventory of 1388, which was said to have been given by Henry III (r. 1216–1272), who was rebuilding Edward the Confessor's abbey and also his Palace of Westminster at just this time. There are a number of documentary references to paintings in connection with the works on both buildings, now almost all lost.[11]
Like most English tinted drawings around this time, these were once attributed to Matthew Paris or his "St Albans school", but recent scholars see them as characteristic of a distinct London style: "The Westminster work has more detailed, refined faces, and contours and internal folds show more jagged effects of line. There is a sophisticated professionalism about the drawing which contrasts with Matthew's accomplished but somewhat naïve style".[12]
Iconography
The iconography of both campaigns of illustration has been related to the increasing assertion of royal power typical of the period. Meyer Schapiro pointed to very close similarities between some of the earlier miniatures and those in the slightly later Glazier Psalter, now Morgan Library & Museum, New York (MS G. 25), in particular in their miniatures of Christ in Majesty.[13] He analysed in the Glazier miniatures a programme related to the controversies over the balance between the power of monarchies and the Church that were very intense at this period, though finding the Glazier Psalter probably on the Church's side of the argument.[14] The Westminster miniatures lack some of the features that are distinctive in the Glazier Psalter, but the representation of the "sacred dynasty" of David, Mary and Jesus may still be significant, but "the idea is less clear-cut, less systematic, than in the later book".[15]
The grouping of the five tinted drawings is more unusual, since they combine the clearly devotional images of St Christopher and the Veronica face of Christ, with three figures from each of the
The unusual drawing of the knight, with his horse and squire behind him, wearing crosses on his banner and surcoat, and kneeling to his king has been described as "a crucial representation not only of the relationship of mutual responsibility imposed by the
Henry's proposed expedition was accompanied by an artistic "propaganda" campaign, "apparently confined to 1251-52", which included the recorded painted decorations in the Antioch Chamber in Westminster Palace, showing the
Exhibitions
The manuscript is now not normally on display (though it was for considerable periods when in the British Museum), but has been exhibited in the British Museum, English Art 1934 and English book illustration, 966-1846 1965;
Notes
- ^ Morgan, 49–50; BLC
- ^ BLC, Royal, 118
- ^ Pfaff, 231 (quoted), who analyses the calendar; Royal, 118; Morgan, 50
- ^ Pfaff, 229; Royal, 118
- ^ Morgan, 50
- ^ Morgan, 50; Royal, 81
- ^ Morgan, 50; Royal, 118 (quoted); Backhouse, 69; BLC; Thomson, 61
- ^ BLC bibliography; Snyder, 84
- ^ Royal, 118 (quoted); Morgan, 50, and no. 3, 51 for the Cambridge MS; Thomson, 61 on St Albans connections
- ^ Morgan, 50
- ^ Royal, 118; Alexander & Binski, 310-313 on Henry III's programme
- ^ Alexander & Binski, 200 (entry by Nigel Morgan)
- ^ Schapiro, 348–351; the Glazier Psalter is no. 50 in Morgan
- ^ Schapiro, 340-348
- ^ Schapiro, 331, 347, both quoted in turn
- ^ Alexander & Binski, 200, though at Royal, 118, the drawings are described as comprising "Christ, various saints and a king"
- ^ Wilson, 113
- ^ Alexander & Binski, 196 (quoted), 200
- ^ Coss, 136
- ^ Coss, 137–138, which cites Alexander & Binsky (giving the wrong catalogue number) who do not mention these ideas, other than in the quotation earlier in this paragraph.
- ^ Tyerman, 113-119
- ^ Tyerman, 117 (quoted); Alexander and Binski, 181-182 and 204 (by John Cherry); the British Museum displays The Chertsey combat tiles
- ^ Tyerman, 118
- ^ BLC, and References section below for the catalogues for 1984, 1987 and 2011
References
- Alexander, Jonathan & Binski, Paul (eds), Age of Chivalry, Art in Plantagenet England, 1200-1400, no. 9, 1987, Royal Academy/Weidenfeld & Nicolson
- ISBN 978-0-7123-4542-2
- "BLC": British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts (online), Detailed record for Royal 2 A XXII, accessed 14 December 2011, with a large bibliography
- Coss, Peter R., The Origins of the English Gentry, 2005 reprint, Cambridge University Press,
- "Royal": McKendrick, Scot, Lowden, John and Doyle, Kathleen, (eds), Royal Manuscripts, The Genius of Illumination, no. 12, 2011, British Library, 9780712358156
- Morgan, Nigel, A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, Volume 4: Early Gothic Manuscripts, Part I 1190-1250, no. 2, Harvey Miller Ltd, London, 1982, ISBN 0-19-921026-8(also no. 95 in Part II, for the tinted drawings)
- Pfaff, Richard W., The Liturgy in Medieval England: A History, 2009, Cambridge University Press, google books
- Thomson, Rodney M., Manuscripts from St Albans Abbey 1066-1235, 2 vols, 1982, Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer, google books
- Wilson, Christopher, Westminster Abbey, 1986, Bell & Hyman
- Zarnecki, George and others; English Romanesque Art, 1066-1200, no. 82, 1984, Arts Council of Great Britain, ISBN 0-7287-0386-6
External links
- British Library, Medieval and Earlier Manuscripts blog, 5 July 2011