Byzantine influences on Western aristocratic illuminated manuscripts

Byzantine influences on Western aristocratic illuminated manuscripts

By Jesús Rodríguez Viejo

Estudios Bizantinos:Revista de la Sociedad Española de Bizantinística, No. 1 (2003)

Abstract: The main subject of this study is an outstanding twelfth-century psalter produced in Normandy which has clear Eastern influences, both in terms of technical conception and iconography. This manuscript, kept in the Royal Library in the Hague with the signature 76 F 13, is certainly related to other preserved examples, produced at the same time in Norman England, such as the Gough Psalter from the Bodleian Library in Oxford. The historical records of these artworks will permit us to shed light on the arrival of these iconographies and techniques of Byzantine origin in the medieval West, where the Abbey of Cluny played a major role, after which they spread throughout the Norman kingdom. Finally, we will devote a part of the research to how these sacred images with Byzantine influences have been appreciated by contemporary Western viewers.

The main subject of my research is an illuminated manuscript preserved at the Royal Library of The Hague with the signature 76 F 23, produced in the Abbey of Fécamp in Normandy at the end of the twelfth century. The artistic period which we will deal with is roughly that of the Romanesque, and the geographic context is that of the Norman Kingdom in the territories of present-day France and England. This study is intended to shed light on the phenomena of transmission of iconographies and art appreciation. In this way, this analysis will permit us to better understand the way that Byzantine art followed to influence the contemporary medieval Western production, and eventually that this output, modified in some degree by Byzantium, could have had on the minds of contemporary Latin viewers. Naturally, the main aim of analyzing the state of the art of the one topic will require a brief introduction to what has been done in this area, in order to consider our case study and our approach as truly innovative. For the art historian devoted to the study of the relationship between the Byzantine East and artistic production of the medieval West, the duality of research fields has been the main problem to face.

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