The majority of these manuscripts are of a religious nature. The majority of surviving manuscripts are from the Middle Ages, although many survive from the Renaissance, along with a very limited number from Late Antiquity. Illumination of manuscripts, as a way of aggrandizing ancient documents, aided their preservation and informative value in an era when new ruling classes were no longer literate, at least in the language used in the manuscripts. As it was, the patterns of textual survivals were shaped by their usefulness to the severely constricted literate group of Christians. Had it not been for the monastic scribes of Late Antiquity, most literature of Greece and Rome would have perished in Europe. The significance of these works lies not only in their inherent artistic and historical value, but also in the maintenance of a link of literacy offered by non-illuminated texts. The earliest surviving substantive illuminated manuscripts are from the period 400 to 600, produced in Italy and the Eastern Roman Empire. This article covers the technical, social and economic history of the subject for an art-historical account, see miniature. Islamic manuscripts may be referred to as illuminated, illustrated or painted, though using essentially the same techniques as Western works. Comparable Far Eastern and Mesoamerican works are described as painted. In the strictest definition of the term, an illuminated manuscript refers only to manuscripts decorated with gold or silver, but in both common usage and modern scholarship, the term refers to any decorated or illustrated manuscript from Western traditions. The decoration of this page from a French Book of Hours, ca.1400, includes a miniature, initials and bordersĪn illuminated manuscript is a manuscript in which the text is supplemented with such decoration as initials, borders ( marginalia) and miniature illustrations.
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