An Ode to Epic Hair: Uncovering the Exegesis of a Green-Bearded Christ
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Lynley Anne Herbert
Abstract
The Sainte-Croix Gospels of Poitiers contains a remarkable and long-overlooked miniature of the Maiestas Domini. Many unusual choices by the artist, both in their unique approach to iconography and in their untraditional use of color, has led to scholarship disregarding them as a subpar copyist who misunderstood the model. However, by allowing the artist agency and accepting their unexpected choices as intentional, the sophistication and creativity of the artist comes into focus. This essay examines the unusual use of colors, focusing in particular on Christ’s striking green beard, and argues these hues were carefully chosen as a means to convey visualizations of exegetical writings by early Church fathers like St. Augustine and Gregory the Great. Dated to ca. 800, the manuscript and its cryptic image, which had once been left out of the canon of Carolingian art, can now be recontextualized within the intellectual milieu associated with the court of Charlemagne.
Abstract
The Sainte-Croix Gospels of Poitiers contains a remarkable and long-overlooked miniature of the Maiestas Domini. Many unusual choices by the artist, both in their unique approach to iconography and in their untraditional use of color, has led to scholarship disregarding them as a subpar copyist who misunderstood the model. However, by allowing the artist agency and accepting their unexpected choices as intentional, the sophistication and creativity of the artist comes into focus. This essay examines the unusual use of colors, focusing in particular on Christ’s striking green beard, and argues these hues were carefully chosen as a means to convey visualizations of exegetical writings by early Church fathers like St. Augustine and Gregory the Great. Dated to ca. 800, the manuscript and its cryptic image, which had once been left out of the canon of Carolingian art, can now be recontextualized within the intellectual milieu associated with the court of Charlemagne.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgments IX
- Contents XI
- Contributors XIII
- Abbreviations XV
- Foreword XVII
- Introduction 1
-
I Establishing Identity
- Of Colophons and Cryptographs 15
- The Ottonian Book Artist and the Case of the Uta Codex 37
- Idols in Ottonian Fulda? 61
- A Singular Combat: Anchises among the Kings of France 73
- A “Purely Jewish Style”: Celebrating Jewish Culture and Combating Antisemitism through Art and Architecture in Southeast Texas in the 1920s 89
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II Patronage and Politics
- Emperors, Empresses, and the Law in Carolingian Italy: The Illustrations of Vercelli, Biblioteca Capitolare, MS CLXV 117
- Boundaries Revisited: High Crosses as Liminal Markers and Protective Monuments 147
- The Cross of Dysert O’Dea Revisited 179
- Pope Calixtus and the Madonna della Clemenza 199
- Before 1297? St. Louis and Questions of Devotional Manuscript Dating 221
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III Beyond the Canon
- An Ode to Epic Hair: Uncovering the Exegesis of a Green-Bearded Christ 245
- The Emancipation of Early Medieval Artists 269
- The Salaberga Psalter 291
- Book Satchels and a Case for Relics: The House-Shaped Form in the Book of Deer 309
- Lawrence Nees Publications 333
- General Index 341
- Index of Manuscripts 351
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgments IX
- Contents XI
- Contributors XIII
- Abbreviations XV
- Foreword XVII
- Introduction 1
-
I Establishing Identity
- Of Colophons and Cryptographs 15
- The Ottonian Book Artist and the Case of the Uta Codex 37
- Idols in Ottonian Fulda? 61
- A Singular Combat: Anchises among the Kings of France 73
- A “Purely Jewish Style”: Celebrating Jewish Culture and Combating Antisemitism through Art and Architecture in Southeast Texas in the 1920s 89
-
II Patronage and Politics
- Emperors, Empresses, and the Law in Carolingian Italy: The Illustrations of Vercelli, Biblioteca Capitolare, MS CLXV 117
- Boundaries Revisited: High Crosses as Liminal Markers and Protective Monuments 147
- The Cross of Dysert O’Dea Revisited 179
- Pope Calixtus and the Madonna della Clemenza 199
- Before 1297? St. Louis and Questions of Devotional Manuscript Dating 221
-
III Beyond the Canon
- An Ode to Epic Hair: Uncovering the Exegesis of a Green-Bearded Christ 245
- The Emancipation of Early Medieval Artists 269
- The Salaberga Psalter 291
- Book Satchels and a Case for Relics: The House-Shaped Form in the Book of Deer 309
- Lawrence Nees Publications 333
- General Index 341
- Index of Manuscripts 351
