The Epistles of Saint Paul and Revelation

After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, this manuscript was one of the Greek works kept in the Topkapı Sarayi library in Istanbul. The ambassador of King Louis XIV, Pierre Girardin, sent it to the Bibliothèque royale de France in 1688. It then became part of the collection of the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

The first part of the manuscript is dedicated to the Epistles of Saint Paul; the text is surrounded by a string of commentaries. Placed at the beginning of this text, two magnificent illuminations on gold grounds relate to the saint’s Epistles: they depict Saint Paul writing the Epistles (fol. 6v) and Saint John Chrysostom interpreting – as indicated by the inscription – difficult passages of Saint Paul for his two pupils Ecumenius and Theodoret (fol. 7).

Triple frames surround these two miniatures. There are carmine and gold verses in small uncial hand on the middle band. They are iambuses[1] on the martyrdom of Saint Paul. The two other bands are identical: blue imbricated palmettes form a zigzag line in gold. In every corner is a small blue leaf.

Besides the Epistles of Saint Paul, the manuscript contains Revelation, also with commentaries. The third illumination separates the Epistles of Saint Paul and Revelation (fol. 222v). It is this page in particular that interests us here. The frontispiece of Revelation, also full page, is decorated with an elegant composition. A cross inscribed in a rectangular frame bears five circles, four at the end of each branch and the last at the intersection of the arms of the cross. Each circle contains a phrase from Revelation, written in gold. The decoration of the rectangular frame and the branches of the cross is very meticulous. On a gold ground, flowerets and palmettes in vivid colours are once again organised in circles. In each corner of the rectangular frame is once again a small blue leaf.

This illumination, consisting only of writing and decorative motifs, seems to be a long way from the classical tradition in which the Byzantine world claimed to have its roots. The vivid polychromy and geometry of the decoration are more reminiscent of the Islamic world. The entire page plays on the power of the text and the geometry more than on the representation enlivened by figures. In general the frontispieces of eleventh-century Byzantine manuscripts demonstrate a greater interest in figures than in adornment, which is not the case with the Revelation frontispiece discussed here. The ornamental quality of this manuscript may be compared to that of the mosaic of the Virgin between John II Comnenus and Irene-Piroska of Hungary, located in the south gallery of the church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (mosaic executed between 1122 and 1134). Even though human figuration continued to play a large role in Byzantine miniatures, the decorative aspect took on great importance, as shown, for example, by the manuscript of the homilies of Gregory of Nazianzus conserved in Saint Catherine’s monastery, Mount Sinai (Ms. gr. 339, fol. 9v). The writing also took on a decorative value, especially when it served as a frame to a miniature, as in the manuscript conserved in the Vatican Library (Vatican City, Ms. Barb. gr. 372, fol. 5v).