Effigies ad Regem Angliae and the Representation of Kingship in Thirteenth-Century English Royal Culture
Collard, Judith
eBLJ (2007), Article 9
Abstract
In the ‘Treasures of the British Library’ display, in the section devoted to various manuscripts of Magna Carta, are three large reproductions of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century English manuscripts. Two reproduce a single image of the Coronation of Henry III (London, British Library, Cotton MS. Vitellius A. XIII, f. 6), which comes from a late thirteenth-century manuscript representing the kings of England. Although familiar, as images from this work have been frequently reproduced, this manuscript has received little critical attention. The focus of this paper is this unusual sequence of images depicting each English king from Edward the Confessor to Edward I, known as the Effigies ad Regem Angliae. Produced during the reign of Edward I, Cotton MS. Vitellius A. XIII was made at a time when there was a sudden increase in the number of illustrated historical texts. These included the Flores Historiarum manuscripts and a group of illuminated genealogical rolls that also depicted English kings. Prior to the 1270s, with the notable exception of Matthew Paris’s extensive chronicles, very few histories were illustrated. The Effigies of the Kings of England, however, with its short Anglo-Norman texts and the attention given to narrative scenes, is unlike any other illustrated historical work produced in the second half of the thirteenth century. This deluxe manuscript draws its influences from a wide range of sources, both written and visual, including romances, chronicles and the decoration of royal apartments. I would suggest that it is by locating this work’s deft manipulation of the imagery of kingship within a broader royal visual culture, rather than the limited number of illuminated manuscripts produced at the time that focus on English history, that its context becomes clearer
Effigies ad Regem Angliae and the Representation of Kingship in Thirteenth-Century English Royal Culture
Collard, Judith
eBLJ (2007), Article 9
Abstract
In the ‘Treasures of the British Library’ display, in the section devoted to various manuscripts of Magna Carta, are three large reproductions of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century English manuscripts. Two reproduce a single image of the Coronation of Henry III (London, British Library, Cotton MS. Vitellius A. XIII, f. 6), which comes from a late thirteenth-century manuscript representing the kings of England. Although familiar, as images from this work have been frequently reproduced, this manuscript has received little critical attention. The focus of this paper is this unusual sequence of images depicting each English king from Edward the Confessor to Edward I, known as the Effigies ad Regem Angliae. Produced during the reign of Edward I, Cotton MS. Vitellius A. XIII was made at a time when there was a sudden increase in the number of illustrated historical texts. These included the Flores Historiarum manuscripts and a group of illuminated genealogical rolls that also depicted English kings. Prior to the 1270s, with the notable exception of Matthew Paris’s extensive chronicles, very few histories were illustrated. The Effigies of the Kings of England, however, with its short Anglo-Norman texts and the attention given to narrative scenes, is unlike any other illustrated historical work produced in the second half of the thirteenth century. This deluxe manuscript draws its influences from a wide range of sources, both written and visual, including romances, chronicles and the decoration of royal apartments. I would suggest that it is by locating this work’s deft manipulation of the imagery of kingship within a broader royal visual culture, rather than the limited number of illuminated manuscripts produced at the time that focus on English history, that its context becomes clearer
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