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The Illustration of a Lost Palaeologan Lectionary of the year 1298 (pl. 14-39)

Articles

• Παπαδάκη-Oekland, Στέλλα
• ΠΑΠΑΔΑΚΗ-OEKLAND, Στέλλα

The manuscript presented here, now lost, was kept till the early yearsof the present century in the church of St. John the Theologian in Smyrna,where it was seen and examined by R. Eisler and G. Lampakis. Boththese scholars published, in the years 1906 and 1909 respsctively, a shortdescription of the codex and its miniatures giving at the same time itscolophon and the later entries. Since then there has been no further mentionof this highly important kimelion. Hence one can assume that it was lostduring the disastrous Asia Minor campaign of the years 1921 -1922.Fortunately from the above mentioned descriptions and the old Lampakis' negatives preserved in the Archives of the Christian ArchaeologicalSociety, now kept in the Byzantine Museum of Athens, the essential features of this manuscript can be still reconstructed. According to this documentation the codex consisted of 298 vellum leaves, measuring 320 x235 mmapproximetely, and it was decorated with four full-page miniatures of theEvangelists, cited at the beginning of each section of lections (pericopes),and in addition elaborated headpieces and initials.From the colophon we learn, that the manuscript was written in theyear 1298 on the orders and at the expsnce of the Métropolite of Philippoupolis, Gerasimus, by a monk named David. According to the laterentries the manuscript was acquired in the year 1779 for the church of St.Basil the Great in Ephesus and only in the year 1831 was purchased fromsome «Arabs» for the church of St. John in the Epano Machala of Smyrna.The value of this manuscript lies mainly in its miniatures and theirdate. Iconographically the portraits of the Evangelists which were illustratingit belong to a closely interrelated group of miniatures isolated by Professor K. Weitzmann, which consists of the Evangelists portraits of the following manuscripts : Athens, National Library, cod. 118, Athos, Iviron 5 and Philotheou 5, Paris, Bibl. Nat. cod. gr. 54 and Princeton, Univ. Lib.cod. Garrett 2 (former Andreas Skiti 753).The date of this group of manuscripts has become the object of greatdispute ever since its publication as such. Located in Constantinopel byProfessor Weitzmann due to their high quality these manuscripts were datedalso by him in the period of the Latin Conquest, mainly on the basis ofthe presence of Latin inscriptions or a billingual text in some of them andthe strong iconographical similarities of certain of their miniatures tothose illustrating two German manuscripts dated in the decade 1230-1240(drawings of the Wolfenbüttel Sketchbook and the derivative miniatures ofthe Goslar Lectionary).Other scholars departing from the apparent, in their opinion, stylisticdifferences between the individual members ot the group and disregardingthe witness of the afore mentioned German derivatives, have proposed agreater time span between them and assigned the miniatures of Garrett 2and Philotheou 5 to the end of the 13th- beginning of the 14th century,to mention only the latest proposed date.To this controversy the miniatures of Smyrna codex contribute throughtheir fixed date, which comes as a definitive support to the attempt madetill now only on the basis of stylistic comparisons, to discern betweentypological dependence and chronological correspondence of the differentmembers of the group. A further evidence supporting that conlusion is furnished by two of the miniatures with the Evangelists portraits illustratingan other manuscript, the codex Sinai gr. 2123. These miniatures, dated inthe year 1242, belong iconographically to the group and are also for thefirst time presented here in this connection.With these two manuscripts we now have more reason to assume acurrent use of the types of the Evangelists portraits in question throughoutthe 13th century (in order to remain within the limits of the period concerned). The dates offered by the German (1230-1240), the Sinai (1242)and the Smyrna (1298) miniatures cover this period almost from its beginning to its very end. Consequently that group which was formed on thebasis of an iconographical identity does not need to be regarded as possessing a stylistic homogeneity and representing a chronological unityas well.In the light of this new evidence an attempt is made, in the secondpart of this study, to define the character of the Smyrna miniatures andtheir stylistic relation to the other members of the Weitzmann group. With regard to the first of these two questions the comparative analysis of the Smyrna miniatures has shown a conscious effort towards iconographical as well as aesthetical uniformity of all four compositions. Thusall Evangelists are depicted seating on heavy benches turned toward theright (except Mark) and holding an open codex. In addition, the figures ofMatthew and Luke appear to be composed of motives borrowed from thegenuine iconographical types of the group. Finally, an architectural background of common general form and function and with very similar decorative motives in all four miniatures contributes further to the aestheticaluniformity of the different pictures.These modifications of the model gain more importance since theyappear to be rooted in the intention to adapt the picture as a whole toclassical prototypes. This tendency is expressed in the role and the decorative details of the architectural background as well as in the treatment ofthe figures and their relation to space.The figure style in particular, besides its palaeologan traits, is distinguished by the articulation, of the garments in large surfaces which indicateby gradual shadowing the relief of the body and are juxtaposed with broad,sharply indented folds, grouped richly in the free parts of the drapery.This system which combines a strongly pronouncing relief with garmentsdraped in rich, zig-zag folds, as can be recognised especially in the figuresof John and Luke of the Smyrna manuscript, is identified as having itsroots in a well-known style of the 10th century, represented here by theminiatures of the manuscript nr. 56 of the National Library in Athens.With these major characteristics the Smyrna miniatures appear todiffer stylistically as much from the more or less painterly style of themanuscripts Athens 118 and Iviron 5, which have consequently to beregarded as belonging to an earlier date, as also from the miniaturesof Garrett 2 and Philotheou 5. In these latter ones a certain decrease ofthe volume of the body combined with a progressive linearisation of thedrapery and a different conception of space in the picture are alreadyapparent and justify a later date (around after 1300) already proposedfor these miniatures.Thus the Smyrna miniatures contribute through their fixed date to thechronological and stylistic classification of a distinctive group of manuscripts and further more they offer one more example of the retrospectivetrends in palaeologan art around the year 1300.

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• http://ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr/index.php/deltion/article/view/4528
• http://dx.doi.org/10.12681/dchae.847