Art
Hildegard von Bingen’s Eternal Garden
The 12th-century mystic continues to attract devotees among both Catholic clergy and New Age gurus, Christian traditionalists and radical feminists.
illuminated manuscripts
Books
A Look at the Holy Roman Empire's Most Splendid Books
A new book joins meticulous historical analysis with more than 150 lush, full-color illustrations of these magnificent books and their elaborate bindings.
News
A Look at a Formerly Lost, Glimmering Manuscript by Persian Poet Hafez
The Divan’s whereabouts remained a mystery until last year, when Dutch art crime investigator Arthur Brand — sometimes referred to as “the Indiana Jones of the art world” — tracked it down.
Art
Illuminated Manuscripts Demonstrate that Medieval Borders Were Regularly Crossed
A new digitization project brings together 800 medieval manuscripts and offers a different image of the early middle ages: one of connection and exchange.
Test 2018 posts
The Somber Fate of a Manuscript Illuminator
In Written on Skin, currently playing at Opera Philadelphia, an illuminated manuscript artist gets involved with his patron's wife.
Art
Tracing the Lives of Women in Medieval Manuscript Illustrations
Illuminating Women in the Medieval World at the Getty Center in Los Angeles explores the lives of women in the Middle Ages through their representation in illuminated manuscripts.
News
Peruse 1,000-Year-Old Medical Remedies, from Ox Bile to Mandrake Root
The British Library owns the only extant illustrated Old English herbal, and it recently digitized the entire manuscript.
News
A Lavishly Illuminated Medieval Bestiary Goes Online
The Aberdeen Bestiary is filled with paintings of animals that illustrate tales of moral behavior. You can now page through it online.
Art
Beyond Gorgeous: Illuminated Manuscripts from Boston Collections
For viewers accustomed to looking at paintings on canvas and panel, manuscripts are a different beast.
Art
Revisiting an 18th-Century Illuminated Islamic Manuscript
One benefit of digitization is the return to the public, if only virtually, of religious and cultural artifacts often long hidden in the collections of institutions far from their regions of origin.