Photo: Front-Cover
Front-Cover
Front-Pastedown
Folio-1r-Inscriptions
Folio-1v-Psalm-1
Detail-of-initial-B
Beginning-of-Psalm-26-(27)
Collection ID
MS.000852
Type
Manuscript
Date
ca. 1150
Geography
Germany
Language
Latin
Medium
Ink on Parchment
Dimensions
168 folios; 11.4 × 7.7 × 3.1 in. (29 × 19.5 × 3.1 cm)
Exhibit Location
On View in The History of the Bible, Translating the Bible

This twelfth-century Psalter contains the Psalms, the biblical Canticles, and the Athanasian Creed. At least three scribes produced this manuscript in a Protogothic minuscule script that varies in size according to the scribe writing it. The margins and spaces between the lines of the text of each Psalm contain the glossa ordinaria, the medieval commentary on books of the Bible. The forty large pen-and-ink decorated initials, are the outstanding feature of the manuscript. A playful array of people, birds, animals, dragons, and leaves intertwine to create each initial, some of which have been colored in. At least two artists drew the initials, one of whom may have been a professional artist who created similar initials in manuscripts from different monasteries.

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