Un contributo alla storia della miniatura a Montecassino nel XII secolo. La Bibbia di Ferro

• Autores: Gaia Elisabetta Unfer Verre
• Localización: Rivista di storia della miniatura, ISSN 1126-4772, Nº. 14, 2010, págs. 32-43
• Idioma: italiano
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • The first complete Bible written certainly in southern Italy is the Casin. 557, a manuscript now in Montecassino Archive and produced in the Abbey shortly after the first half of the 12th century. In the survey of southern Italian book production, especially of Montecassino, this Bible is peculiar in many ways: it includes the complete Old and New Testament followed by an exegetic collection and it is written in a small and regular praegothic script, not in Beneventan, by several hands, with a main contribution by the scribe Ferro. Furthermore, the deco- ration that marks the textual partitions is varied: characteristic Cassinese initials, direct prosecution of the local tradition, are placed next to foreign others. The pen-flourished initials are newly introduced in the scriptorium, perhaps in this manuscript for the first time, and they are not so common in Beneventan manuscripts before the end of the century. Moreover, it is possible to point out the evolution of the decorated initials from the middle of the 11th century up to the style attested in the Ferro’s Bible. The connections with contemporary Beneventan manuscripts, not yet studied in detail, are many and often very closed.

    Compared to the Desiderian models, the Casin. 557 initials continue on the way of miniaturization and extreme elegance started in Oderisian manuscripts. The separation between letters and decoration, always clear in 11th century initials, is now uncertain, with the ribbons that continue in multicolor racemes and take possession of the letter inner space.

    Every aspect of the manuscript, especially its decoration, reflects the historic and cultural situation of Montecassino shortly after the middle of the 12th century, when the Abbey is definitively included in the Norman kingdom and the scriptorium receives new spurs and influences.