Creation by Variation:
The Uses of Models in Ghent- Bruges Marginal Decoration
Anne Margreet
W. As-Vijvers, Independent Scholar
In my paper I hope
to have demonstrated that the so-called Master
of the David Scenes in the Grimani Breviary, a Flemish illuminator active around 1500, played a
key role in the production of books of hours with
various and spectacular border decoration. My focus
was on the so-called 'Brukenthal Breviary,'
actually an abundantly illustrated book of hours,
which is kept in the collection of the Brukenthal
Museum in Sibiu (Romania). The miniatures can be ascribed
to the Master of the David Scenes and several other
illuminators. The rich marginal decoration includes
the typical Ghent-Bruges border, consisting of flowers
depicted in trompe-l'oeil (as if they are strewn
upon a gold background), as well as several other
types. The spacious architectural borders of the manuscript
at the text incipits are a well-known hallmark of
the David Master's workshop. My subject, however,
was the decoration of the text pages, each of which
is provided with a one-sided border in the outer
margin, and freestanding, single motifs in the upper
and lower margins.
The illuminators solved
the extraordinary task of decorating every page of
the 315 folios of the Brukenthal Breviary by
exploring several model sources. They derived motifs
from models for the usual Ghent-Bruges border decoration
which fills up the four sides around the text area,
from historiated borders (such as calendar illustrations),
from subsidiary elements in miniatures (e.g. the lion
of St. Mark), from models for earlier types of marginal
decoration consisting of acanthus leaves interspersed
with flowers and drolleries, from playing cards and
other engravings. The illuminators concentrated on
those motifs which were easy to isolate from the context
of larger border designs or illustrations. There is
evidence for the use of tracing and other methods
of reproduction, and for the existence of model drawings
as well as models in full colour. The illuminators
made a deliberate choice which motifs were appropriate
for each margin, using simple flowers or buds for
the narrow upper margin, more complicated flowers
and several other motifs in the side margins, and
mammals and drolleries in the spacious lower margins.
The marginal motifs display a preference for diversity.
The working method of the illuminators was to make
variations on existing marginal motifs, in the process
of which the models were adapted and changed, and
sometimes got obscured. At the same time, there was
the (opposite) tendency to a standardization of the
motifs and the processes by which the variations were
made.
The relationship between
the single motifs and the codicological structure
of the text block is particularly revealing. Motifs
taken from the same model source were usually applied
within one gathering, or even on the same bifolio.
The single motifs indicate that the bifolio was the
working unit. In some cases the distribution of the
motifs suggests a common source for apparently related
motifs. One of the most remarkable findings is that
the Huth Hours (London, British Library, Add.
Ms. 38126) must have been available as a direct source
for the single motifs of the Brukenthal Breviary. The single motifs in the Brukenthal Breviary were copied after the miniatures (executed by three
different artists: Simon Marmion, the Master of the
Dresden Prayer Book, and perhaps Jan Provost) as well
as the border decoration of the Huth Hours,
in the course of which the motifs taken from one page
of the Huth Hours ended up on one bifolio of
the Brukenthal Breviary. This suggests that
the Brukenthal Breviary was the first manuscript
made by the David Master and his co-illuminators using
single motifs as a decoration system.
Their second manuscript
with single motifs appears to have been the Hours
of Joanna of Castile (London, British Library, Add.
Ms. 18852). While here the repertory of single motifs
re-appears exactly, there is no relationship between
the structure of the gatherings of Joanna's Hours
and the Huth Hours, as in the Brukenthal
Breviary. Furthermore, the full border in the
outer margin was replaced by a single motif, thus
changing the decoration system into three single motifs
per page.
The David Master was
responsible for a number of other codices decorated
with single motifs, the majority of which is decorated
with three motifs per page. From the evidence it appears
that the David Master must have been the person who
owned the models for the single motifs. The idea spread
beyond his workshop, but the characteristic repertory
belonged to him. It was carefully kept over decades
and made available to his co-illuminators when necessary.
In conclusion, the workshop of the Master of the David
Scenes successfully specialized in manuscripts with
rich and special border decoration, and their efforts
were appreciated by a rich and wealthy clientele.
The subject of this
paper comes from my unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Randversiering in Gents-Brugse manuscripten.
De Meester van de DavidscA< University
of Amsterdam 2002.
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