PRODUCTION METHODS OF ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS AT THE WORKSHOPS OF BYZANTINE MONASTERIES
BİZANS MANASTIR ATÖLYELERİNDE MİNYATÜRLÜ EL YAZMALARININ ÜRETİM TEKNİKLERİ

Author : İlkgül KAYA ZENBİLCİ
Number of pages : 238-271

Abstract

Byzantine monasteries were distinguished institutions impacting the Byzantines in social, cultural, economic and political frameworks. They served different classes at the Byzantine community in several ways. First, the place of manuscript production among the workmanship at the monasteries was considerable because of the fact that the work brought a monastery forward among other monasteries. Second, especially in the capital of the empire, in Constantinople, in addition to the palace workshop, some monasteries undertook the production of manuscipts. Third, considering the conditions of the Middle Ages, the production, acquisition and supply of materials for a work to be copied or scribed in the monastery; and the process of scribing and illustrating a book was quite demanding. Fourth, the materials were expensive probably. Therefore, the preparation work of a manuscript had a momentous and significant position among the other Byzantine crafts. This study explores methods used in the preparation of basic materials such as parchment, ink, pigment used on Byzantine manuscripts during Middle Ages and the properties of auxiliary instruments used in scribing are examined. Besides, working methods of Greek scribe-calligraphers, and miniature painters, the preparatory drawings, gilding in manuscripts, distribution of the color selection for the figures and objects on the miniature composition, full-page and margin miniatures, codex and Byzantine binding are described. It is known that manuscript production was a very crucial and coordinated work in the Byzantine monasteries, and that the production work was based on fixed rules and punishments. In this respect, the rules applied in the monastery writings are conveyed in the work of the Stoudios scriptorium.

Keywords

art history, Byzantine art, manuscript, illumination, monastic workshops

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