From Icons of Evil to Features of Princely Pleasure: Mongols in Fourteenth-Century Italian Illuminated Manuscripts

2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-214
Author(s):  
Francesca Manzari
Keyword(s):  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Manuscript Illumination ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Historical Writings ◽  
Trading Routes

AbstractThe representation of Mongols in Late-Medieval Italian illuminated manuscripts undergoes a transformation in the fourteenth century. In literature connected to the Crusades and in historical writings they are usually portrayed as symbols of Evil or of the Deadly Vices. In other instances, nonetheless, they seem to lose this significant iconic value and to turn into an exotic component for the amusement of princely patrons. It is certainly not by chance that illuminations comprising Mongols were produced in the cities most strongly tied to the East by trading routes and commercial interests, like Venice and Genoa. The appearance of Mongols within more widespread iconographies, both sacred and secular, and their metamorphosis as exotic decorations are connected to manuscript illumination at the Angevin court in Naples. This contribution re-evaluates both types of instances, with the purpose of achieving a survey of these types of representation in Italian gothic illuminated manuscripts.

scholarly journals An Arthurian Knight in Ivory and Ink

Eikon / Imago ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 423-439
Author(s):  
Katherine Anne Rush
Keyword(s):  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Stylistic Analysis ◽  
Dual Nature ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Production Methods ◽  
Medieval France ◽  
Conte Du Graal ◽  
Cultural Connections

Manuscript Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS fr. 12577 and ivory casket Musée du Louvre, OA 122, and are two of three extant fourteenth-century visualizations of Chrétien’s Le Conte du Graal, produced in Paris circa 1310-1330. Although the objects’ shared era of production suggests similarities of iconography, artistic influences, and production methods, little research has been conducted regarding visual and cultural connections between MS fr. 12577 and OA 122. Through iconographic and stylistic analysis of the scenes each artisan depicted within his respective medium, I elucidate how the casket and manuscript’s imagery personifies Perceval’s dual nature, a young knight symbolic of the secular and sacred. As visualizations of Chrétien’s most religiously-minded legend, MS fr. 12577 and OA 122 exemplify the intertwining of the sacred and secular within fourteenth-century French romantic art, specifically within illuminated manuscripts and carved ivory, materials that through their refinement, rarity, and expense, signified leisure, luxury, and nobility. By examining these two opulent objects, I provide insights into their purpose and significance in late medieval France, especially cultural crossover between the porous realms of sacred and secular medieval life.

Islamic Manuscripts of Late Medieval Rum, 1270s-1370s

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cailah Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Artistic Activity ◽  
Manuscript Production ◽  
Mirrors For Princes

This book is the first in-depth survey of illuminated manuscripts from late medieval Anatolia (Rum) before the rise of the Ottoman Empire. Between the Mongol invasions in the mid-thirteenth century and the emergence of Ottoman domination in the late fourteenth century, the Lands of Rum were marked by instability and conflict. Despite this, a rich body of illuminated manuscripts from the period survives, explored here and fully illustrated in colour with many unpublished or hard-to-find images. Meticulously analysing fifteen beautifully decorated Arabic and Persian manuscripts, including Qur’ans, mirrors for princes, historical chronicles and Sufi works, such as the Masnavi of Jalal al-Din Rumi, the author traces the development of calligraphy and illumination in late medieval Rum. She shows that the central Anatolian city of Konya, in particular, was a dynamic centre of artistic activity and that local Turcoman princes, Seljuk bureaucrats and Mevlevi dervishes all played important roles in manuscript production and patronage. The volume also includes a detailed catalogue that is comprised of codicological data and numerous translations of new and unpublished primary sources, including manuscript colophons, dedications and endowment notes.

At the Edge of Reformation

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Linehan
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Black Death ◽  
The West ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
History Of ◽  
Portuguese Society ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

This book springs from its author’s continuing interest in the history of Spain and Portugal—on this occasion in the first half of the fourteenth century between the recovery of each kingdom from widespread anarchy and civil war and the onset of the Black Death. Focussing on ecclesiastical aspects of the period in that region (Galicia in particular) and secular attitudes to the privatization of the Church, it raises inter alios the question why developments there did not lead to a permanent sundering of the relationship with Rome (or Avignon) two centuries ahead of that outcome elsewhere in the West. In addressing such issues, as well as of neglected material in Spanish and Portuguese archives, use is made of the also unpublished so-called ‘secret’ registers of the popes of the period. The issues it raises concern not only Spanish and Portuguese society in general but also the developing relationship further afield of the components of the eternal quadrilateral (pope, king, episcopate, and secular nobility) in late medieval Europe, as well as of the activity in that period of those caterpillars of the commonwealth, the secular-minded sapientes. In this context, attention is given to the hitherto neglected attempt of Afonso IV of Portugal to appropriate the privileges of the primatial church of his kingdom and to advance the glorification of his Castilian son-in-law, Alfonso XI, as God’s vicegerent in his.

scholarly journals Plague and the Fall of Baghdad (1258)

2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-177
Author(s):  
Nahyan Fancy ◽  
Monica H. Green
Keyword(s):  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Disease Outbreaks ◽  
Epidemic Disease ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Western Asia ◽  
Abbasid Caliphate ◽  
Historical Accounts ◽  
A Minor

AbstractThe recent suggestion that the late medieval Eurasian plague pandemic, the Black Death, had its origins in the thirteenth century rather than the fourteenth century has brought new scrutiny to texts reporting ‘epidemics’ in the earlier period. Evidence both from Song China and Iran suggests that plague was involved in major sieges laid by the Mongols between the 1210s and the 1250s, including the siege of Baghdad in 1258 which resulted in the fall of the Abbasid caliphate. In fact, re-examination of multiple historical accounts in the two centuries after the siege of Baghdad shows that the role of epidemic disease in the Mongol attacks was commonly known among chroniclers in Syria and Egypt, raising the question why these outbreaks have been overlooked in modern historiography of plague. The present study looks in detail at the evidence in Arabic sources for disease outbreaks after the siege of Baghdad in Iraq and its surrounding regions. We find subtle factors in the documentary record to explain why, even though plague received new scrutiny from physicians in the period, it remained a minor feature in stories about the Mongol invasion of western Asia. In contemporary understandings of the genesis of epidemics, the Mongols were not seen to have brought plague to Baghdad; they caused plague to arise by their rampant destruction. When an even bigger wave of plague struck the Islamic world in the fourteenth century, no association was made with the thirteenth-century episode. Rather, plague was now associated with the Mongol world as a whole.

Modern Literary Manuscripts in the Morgan Library

PMLA ◽  
1952 ◽  
Vol 67 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-36
Author(s):  
George K. Boyce ◽  
Pierpont Morgan Library
Keyword(s):  
Paradise Lost ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Scientific Interest ◽  
Historical Writings ◽  
Morgan Library ◽  
Modern Era

The Pierpont Morgan Library divides its manuscripts, somewhat arbitrarily, into two principal groups, the “Medieval and Renaissance” and the “Autograph.” Though neither term correctly describes all the materials classified in its group, the division serves well enough to distinguish the handwritten books of the period prior to the spread of printing from the more varied manuscripts of the modern era.The Morgan “Autographs” comprise the originals of literary and historical writings (with some others of primarily artistic, musical, philosophical, or scientific interest), all letters, and all documents save only those which are in effect illuminated manuscripts. Among these “Autographs” are many manuscripts which are not strictly autograph at all: some are original, though not in the author's hand (Book i of Paradise Lost being an illustrious example of this class, which includes many letters and most documents); others are copies which, for one reason or another, have a particular importance (manuscripts of Crashaw, Sterne, or Keats, for example).

A Blessed Union? Anglo-Scottish Relations before the Covenant

2005 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Brown
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
State System ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
The Government ◽  
British State ◽  
New Britain

This chapter provides a summary on the Anglo-Scottish relations before the Covenant. It specifically addresses the medieval inheritance of Anglo-Scottish relations. Undoubtedly, the fourteenth-century Wars of Independence hugely influenced the development of late medieval Scotland, leaving the Scots with a legacy of popular distrust of England. The new British state system with its composite monarchies was not unique, and multiple monarchies existed elsewhere in Europe. The structures put in place for the government of the new Britain had minimal or little impact on Anglo-Scottish relations, and what is surprising is how little governmental change took place. In terms of culture, the greatly improved Anglo-Scottish relations of the early seventeenth century had a modest impact. Religion was the single most damaging evidence of Scotland's distinctive traditions being compromised, and significantly it was on this issue that the Covenanters placed greatest emphasis in their subsequent negotiations with English parliamentarians in the 1640s.

Early Nineteenth-Century Liverpool Collectors of Late Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts

2007 ◽  
pp. 158-187
Author(s):  
Edward Morris
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts

‘Early Nineteenth-Century Liverpool Collectors of Late Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts’, written by Edward Morris, describes the pioneering phase of the collecting of illuminated manuscripts that began in the early nineteenth century and came to an end in the mid-nineteenth century.

Illuminated Manuscripts in Late Thirteenth-century Konya

2020 ◽  
pp. 23-81
Author(s):  
Cailah Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Illuminated Manuscripts ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Artistic Production ◽  
Visual Properties

This chapter initially focuses on two manuscripts – a small Qur’an and a monumental Masnavi of Jalal al-Din Rumi. Both were produced in 1278, soon after Rum was formally incorporated into the Ilkhanid empire. After discussing their visual properties in depth, the author uses the manuscripts’ production information to analyse the nature of production and patronage in late medieval Konya. This chapter introduces many key themes that are developed throughout the rest of the book, including the role of the Mevlevis in artistic production, the itinerancy of artists, and cosmopolitan nature of Rum’s towns. Based on the examination of these manuscripts, the chapter contends that several currently unidentified or misidentified manuscripts were also produced in Konya. Through an illuminated copy of Ibn Bibi’s Seljuk chronicle produced around 1282, the chapter also considers the part that Ilkhanid officials played in manuscript patronage in Rum.

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