Presentation miniature

Rogier van der Weyden, Jean Wauquelin presenting his 'Chroniques de Hainaut' to Philip the Good, c 1448
Charles the Bald receives the Vivian Bible from the monks of Tours in 845 (fol. 423)
Jean de Vaudetar, valet de chambre to King Charles V of France, presents the king with his gift of a Bible Historiale in 1372. Miniature by Jean Bondol, who was also a valet de chambre. Vaudetar was a nobleman, already in charge of the Louvre palace, who was to progress further at court.

A Presentation miniature (sometimes a dedication miniature) is a miniature painting often found in illuminated manuscripts, in which the patron or donor is shown being presented with a book, normally to be interpreted as the book containing the miniature itself.[1] The miniature is thus symbolic, and presumably represents an event in the future. Usually it is found at the start of the volume, before the main text, but may also be placed at the end, as in the Vivian Bible.[2]

In earlier manuscripts the figure of the "commissioner" may be a dead saint, the founder of a monastery or monastic order, for example, and the person handing over the book the abbot, or sometimes the scribe of the book. The genre is an extension of other forms of dedication portraits, for example wall-paintings or mosaics in churches showing the person who commissioned the church holding a model of it. The miniatures are usually found in books presented to the emperor or another major figure, which usually followed significant donations of land to the monastery concerned.

In the early period the manuscripts concerned are normally religious books, especially liturgical ones. The texts are old, and the "offering" represented is the creation of an expensive illuminated manuscript. In the late Middle Ages works,[3] often secular ones, are generally presented by their author or translator, though lavish copies of older texts may also still receive presentation miniatures. In these first cases the "offering" is usually the text itself, and the patron had presumably often paid for his own luxury copy himself, though some translators and even authors were also scribes. Now the text dedication to the patron, at this period often long and flowery, came to form part of the work itself, and at least the text was repeated in further copies. Such author's dedications, now far shorter, have remained part of the printed book. Sometimes presentation miniatures were also repeated in subsequent copies.[1]

Michelle Brown distinguishes between presentation miniatures, where the actual book containing the miniature passed between the parties shown, and dedication miniatures in subsequent copies made for other people.[1]

Early medieval

Royal presentation miniatures are especially a feature of Late Carolingian and Ottonian art, providing a series of portraits of the Ottonian emperors, mostly not actually shown with the book, and a precedent for later rulers. In a continuation and intensification of late Carolingian trends, many miniatures contain miniatures depicting the donors of the manuscripts to a church, including bishops, abbots and abbesses, and also the emperor.[4]

In some cases successive miniatures show a kind of relay: in the Hornbach Sacramentary the scribe presents the book to his abbot, who presents it to St Pirmin, founder of Hornbach Abbey, who presents it to St Peter, who presents it to Christ, altogether taking up eight pages (with the facing illuminated tablets) to stress the unity and importance of the "command structure" binding church and state, on earth and in heaven. The Egbert Psalter also has four pages of presentation scenes, with two each spread across a full opening, the left with a bowing offeror in near profile, the right with the enthroned receiver.[5]

The earliest surviving portrait of an English king (coins excepted) is a presentation miniature showing Æthelstan presenting St Cuthbert with the copy of Bede's Life of Saint Cuthbert containing it.[6] This was presented by Æthelstan to the saint's shrine in Chester-le-Street; southern-based medieval English kings were always careful to pay due respect to Cuthbert, the great saint of the North.[7]

Late medieval

As book culture increased in the Late Middle Ages, authors still relied on gifts from patrons to reward their efforts, and it is in this context that the dedication miniature revived. Very often the miniature was in the personal copy made by the patron for his library. The author or translator kneels, holding out his book, and the patron is often surrounded by a group of courtiers, advertising his generosity in encouraging literature.

The French royal family, including their Burgundian cousins, led the fashion, which spread to England and elsewhere. Extensively illuminated books were also presented to royalty as diplomatic gifts, or by ambitious courtiers to the monarch, and these might include presentation miniatures.

Notes

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  1. 1 2 3 Brown, 102
  2. ↑ Calkins, 116
  3. ↑ Brown, 102, places this revival in the 15th century, but 14th century examples are numerous, as Cynthia Stone points out. Two are illustrated here.
  4. ↑ Calkins, 116-118
  5. ↑ Solothurn Zentralbibliothek Codex U1 (ex-Cathedral Treasury), folios 7v to 10r; Alexander, 89–90; Legner, Vol 2, B2, all eight pages illustrated on pp. 140-141; Dodwell, 134
  6. ↑ "History by the Month: September and the Coronation of Æthelstan’". Parker Library, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. 8 September 2015. Retrieved 6 April 2016.
  7. ↑ Foot, Æthelstan: The First King of England, pp. 155–156

References

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