J. Henry Middleton

“ In order to give richness of effect by the use of a thick body of colour the illuminator commonly applied his flat tints in two or even three distinct washes, a method which is recommended by Theophilus [4] and other early writers on the technique of illumination.
Gospels at Vienna. Another Book of the Gospels which belonged to Charles the Great, now preserved in the Imperial Treasury at Vienna, is decidedly inferior as a work of art to the Paris manuscript mentioned above. In it the influence of the enfeebled Roman style is much stronger ”

“ This inferiority is due mainly to the absence of that Northumbrian influence, to which the best Carolingian manuscripts owe so much of their beauty.
Successors of Charles. Manuscripts of the later Carolingian school. Under Charles the Great's successors the art of illuminating manuscripts continued to flourish, and, in the ninth century, under his grandsons Lothair and Charles the Bald, reached the climax of its development. During this century decorative splendour of a very high order was reached, in spite of there being very little advance in the power of rendering the human form. ”

“ And yet in spite of all this magnificence of shining metals and bright colours the effect is never harsh or gaudy, owing to the taste and judgment shown by the illuminators in the way they broke up their colours, avoiding large unrelieved masses, and in the arrangement of the colours so as to give a general effect of harmony in spite of the great chromatic force of the separate parts. ”

“ The somewhat realistic way of representing the Evangelists as aged white-haired men, which occurs in Byzantine manuscripts, in the Carolingian Gospels is replaced by a more conventional treatment, and thus they are as a rule represented as youthful, beardless men of an idealized type. ”

“ Fig. 15 shows a pen drawing from a St Gallen manuscript of the ninth century, the magnificent Psalterium aureum [7] ; it represents David going forth to battle.
Studies from life. With regard to studies from the life, either of men or animals, it should be remembered that an artist is always biased by tradition and association to a degree which is now very difficult to realise. Even when looking at the same object two painters of different race and education might receive very different impressions on their retina. ”

“ The figures of Christ and the Evangelists are sometimes hardly human in form, but are worked up into a kind of conventional scroll-pattern, just as they are in the older Celtic illuminations. The Paris library possesses two manuscripts of the Gospels, which are good examples of this revived Celtic style (Bibl. Nat. Lat. Nos. 257 and 8849) . The borders and initial letters in these manuscripts are remarkable for their intricate delicacy of design, and for their rich colour, tastefully arranged; while the figure drawing is of the purely ornamental scroll type.
Figure 14
Fig. ”

“ Thus in the very interesting sketch-book of Villard de Honecourt, a French sculptor and architect of the thirteenth century, there are studies of men, lions and other animals, which he has noted as being from the life ”

“ These rather weak drawings, which have but little decorative value, show the influence of the Roman school of illuminators, who still mainly adhered to the old debased form of classical art, modified by some observation and even careful study of the actual life and movement which the painters saw around them. ”

“ The Carolingian class of manuscripts in this way combined many different strains of influence—native Frankish, Classical, Oriental and English, all modified by the Byzantine love for gorgeous colours, shining gold and silver, and purple-dyed vellum. A considerable number of manuscripts were written in the reign of Charles the Great in letters of gold on purple vellum like those prepared in earlier times for the Byzantine Emperors. ”