Essen Cathedral Treasury Hs. 1

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v. 29v of the manuscript: Cross surrounded by the symbols of the four evangelists

The manuscript of Essen Cathedral Treasury Hs. 1 , often referred to as the Great Carolingian Gospel or Altfrid Gospel , is a parchment manuscript from the Essen Cathedral Treasury . It was created around the year 800 and has possibly been in Essen since the foundation of the Essen Women's Foundation around 850 . The Gospels contain over a thousand glosses in Latin , Old Saxon and Old High German .

description

The manuscript measures 32.5 cm in height and 23.0 cm in width and, since the last restoration in 1987, has been tied in between a wooden lid covered with gray suede and embossed with a stamp. It has been preserved in its entirety and comprises 188 veal parchment leaves in 28 layers , with a small-sized (17 × 23 cm) homiliar fragment bound. The layers are mostly quaternions , consisting of four folded parchment sheets, one inside the other, that make eight sheets (= 16 pages). The writing space of the Gospel measures 26.5 cm in height and 16 cm in width. The text has up to fol. 12v, the end of the list of pericopes , 38 lines, then 30 lines. In the 10th century it was provided with numerous glosses in Latin, Old Saxon and Old High German.

Some of the leaves were trimmed at the edges, which meant that parts of individual glosses were lost. Glosses have also been damaged by the use of chemicals intended to improve readability. During a restoration in 1958, individual sheets were incorrectly bound again: the double sheet 48v / 49r was folded in the wrong direction and the double sheet 143v / 144r was bound in the 21st instead of the 22nd position.

The manuscript contains a list of pericopes , in Latin the letter Novum opus of Hieronymus to Pope Damasus I , the preface plures fuisse of Hieronymus to the Gospels, the four prefaces to the individual Gospels and the text of the Gospels, as well as 14 canon tables , as well as from the same hand that entered most of the glosses, an incomplete Ordo lectorum . The attached homily contains extracts from various texts of the Beda Venerabilis . The text of the Gospel was created by three different scribes in brown ink, the script is an early version of the Carolingian minuscule . A capitalis quadrata was used as the font to mark , that is, to emphasize, the various sections . The uncial was only used in the Gospel of Matthew for the beginnings of chapters, the genealogy of Christ and the Our Father . The headings are colored in yellow, red and green. The book decoration is polychrome and includes decorative pages, canon tables, incipit and initial pages as well as initials of different designs and sizes. The colors used are red lead and copper green , the yellow color has not yet been investigated.

Book illumination

v. 68v: Front page of the preface to the Gospel of Mark. The initial I is made up of two worm-like mythical creatures that are symmetrically entwined with one another and are spun into a criss-cross braid. The word "Incipit" is formed by zoomorphic motifs, the capital letters of the following words are highlighted in color.

Georg Humann wrote in 1904 in his work on the treasures of the Essen Minster:

"Although most of these drawings are on a very low level from an aesthetic point of view, they are of art historical value, as they offer very characteristic examples of pre-Carolingian book illumination."

- Georg Humann : The works of art in the Münsterkirche in Essen , p. 37

Later, too, the illumination of the manuscript was certified as having a “barbaric taste” or “barbaric grandeur”.

The book decoration of the manuscript is extraordinarily diverse and interspersed with influences from several cultures. The decorative letters, in which parts have been replaced by dog- and bird-like figures, are striking. These ornamental letters can be traced back to fish-bird letters of the Merovingian book art of the 7th and 8th centuries. The initials, on the other hand, often have braided band ornaments that are derived from motifs from the Irish-Anglo-Saxon region. With these ornaments, the Essen manuscript shows identical forms to the so-called Psalter of Charlemagne (Bibliothèque Nationale ms. Lat. 13159), which can be dated between 795 and 800. Gerds assumes an origin in the same scriptorium. The use of different decorative forms in one manuscript was not uncommon in Carolingian book illumination. The ornamental character of the representation is unaffected by the Carolingian Renaissance , which included a recourse to ancient models and gave the representation of people more space. The illuminators designed the canon tables of the manuscript differently: Arcades are formed with round arches or gables made of ribbon strips or ribbon interlacing, which are provided with edging of leaf patterns. One of the canon tables has an identical ornament as a column filling as the Gundohinus Gospels (Autun, Bibliothèque Municipale. Ms 3), to which there are also similarities in the design of the round arches. Under the ornamental pages, the depiction of the cross with the bust of Christ at the intersection of the cross arms and the evangelist symbols between the cross arms is particularly striking. This miniature clearly shows Irish influences in the faces. The low foreheads, the eyebrows drawn in line with the nose, the wide open eyes as well as the mouths are similar to the ribbon crucifix from the 8th century on p. 266 of the Codex Cal. sang. 51 of the St. Gallen Abbey Library . The design of the cross in Hs. 1 by colored rectangles suggests precious stones, so the basic idea of ​​the representation is a " crux gemmata ". The representation therefore does not mean the crucifixion as an event, but Christ, who “entered into his glory” through the cross. The representation with the bust of Christ at the intersection of the cross beams is rare in the Western world, the Essen representation is one of the latest representations of this type. Through the book that Christ keeps, he is also characterized as a teacher of truth.

The glosses

One page of text (fol. 65r) with glossing (scan from Georg Humanns Tafelwerk from 1904), the text is matt 27.3–21

The 453 Old Saxon glosses of the Gospel come from the 10th century. They pass on a total of over 1050 individual vernacular words of the time, making the Gospels the second most extensive glossing of Old Saxon. Most of the glosses were written by a hand who wrote with a strongly changing style , sometimes marginally on the outer edge, sometimes also between the lines (interlinear). If there was not enough space, the clerk also used the inner margin. In terms of content, the glossing follows an unknown, lost template, to which the glossing of a Lindau Gospel originally from the Elten Abbey (Freiherr M. Lochner von Hüttenbach, Codex L, today's whereabouts unknown) can also be traced back to the Essen scriptorium . The glosses are distributed unevenly across all four Gospels: 109 interlinear and 78 marginal glosses explain the Gospel of Matthew , whereas the Gospel of Mark has only 15 interlinear and 12 marginal glosses. Of the 148 glosses on the Gospel according to Luke , 87 are inscribed interlinear and 61 marginal, the Gospel of John complements 34 interlinear and 57 marginal glosses. The literature provides different information on the language of the stylus glosses scratched into the parchment .

The Latin glosses are mostly scholias and consist of linguistically simplified excerpts from Carolingian and pre-Carolingian commentaries on the Gospels, especially from Beda's writings. The commented passages of the Gospel text were provided with uncial letters, which recur in the glosses and thus ensure the assignment of the commentary to the commented passage. As soon as the letters of the alphabet are used up, the next comment is again marked as "A". Simultaneously with the entry of the Latin glosses, individual German words were entered after rarely used words. In a second processing phase, the Latin glosses were corrected and partially supplemented, and further German additions to the scholia were made. In this editing section, the Latin glosses were also added at the end. These glossings refer to the end of the Latin gloss, in many cases they are complete German half-clauses that paraphrase and continue the end of the Latin gloss . Hellgardt comes to the impression of a preliminary form of a German-Latin mixed language, as it occurs as a clerical sociolect with Notker the German or Williram .

history

v. 16r: Page with a splendid initial P made from braided ribbon and two different fonts. The text is the beginning of Jerome's preface Plures fuisse .

According to the art-historical classification, the Gospels were created around 800, but where is uncertain. The scriptorium in which the manuscript was created has not yet been identified. Due to the typeface and the confluence of continental and insular influences in the book decorations, the place of origin is assumed to be in northwest Germany or northeast France. It is also unknown how and when the manuscript got to Essen. Due to the localization of the manuscript in areas where Saint Altfrid , who later founded the Essen Abbey, was trained, the high quality of the manuscript in both textual and artistic terms and the fact that a gospel was part of the liturgical basic equipment of a church, it is assumed that Altfrid's Carolingian Gospels were left to establish themselves. Katrinette Bodarwé pointed out, however, that the manuscript does not have an entry by the librarian's hand “A”, who was active in Essen at the beginning of the 10th century, so it may not have reached Essen as a founding gift.

A at the top of fol. 143r standing entry “Iuntram prb” (“Guntram presbiter”) could come from a previous owner. The table of contents “PLENARIVM” on fol. 2r the so-called librarian hand "B" was registered in Essen around 1200, perhaps not until the first half of the 13th century. Before that there was no direct proof of ownership of the manuscript.

The glosses of the Gospel show characteristic features in the typeface that are typical of the scriptorium of the Essen women's monastery. The scribe was also involved in the Sacramentary Main State Archive Düsseldorf Essen D2, which was created in Essen in the last third of the 10th century , so that the manuscript MS. 1 is already in Essen in the late 10th century. Around this time the Gospels were newly bound for the first time. In 1904 Georg Humann found that the penultimate layer was incorrectly sorted and that it was listed as v. 60 a narrow strip of parchment with notes in the handwriting of the glosses had been bound. It is possible that the Gospels were no longer in use as a liturgical book as early as 946, when the Essen collegiate church burned down, but instead served as a school book for teaching the sanctimonials . While all current liturgical writings had to be recreated by the Essen scriptorium after the abbey fire, some books such as the Gospels (if it did not reach Essen after the fire) or the sacramentary manuscript of the Hauptstaatsarchiv Düsseldorf D1, which was no longer in liturgical use, were preserved , presumably because they were kept separate from the manuscripts in use. The use as a school book is also proven by the feather tests , which were carried out particularly numerous on the flyleaf, there, in addition to lines and hatching, verse beginnings such as "Scribere qui nescit, nullum putat esse laborem." it's work ”) and single words like“ Proba ”(“ test ”). It is discussed that the Gospels were also used for liturgical purposes in addition to this use. The Theophanu Gospels (Essen Cathedral Treasury Hs. 3), which Abbess Theophanu presumably gave around 1040 for the splendid staging of the Easter liturgy, has almost identical dimensions as the Carolingian Gospels, so Gass assumes that the Theophanu Gospels have the Carolingian Gospels as their splendid gospel replaced in the monastery liturgy.

Towards the end of the 11th century, the women's convention's interest in its codex stocks waned, from which the canons of the monastery put together their own library for educational purposes. In this context, the title of the librarian's hand "B" was made. The manuscript was preserved through its inclusion in the Canon Library, while other Essen books were turned into parchment waste. In the library, which was only accessible to a maximum of twenty canons, the Gospel was forgotten. None of the Essen treasure registers of the early modern period records the manuscript. When the Essen monastery was closed in 1802 and valuable manuscripts were brought to Düsseldorf by the new Prussian masters, the Carolingian Gospels remained in Essen for unknown reasons, and the manuscript may not have been found.

It was not until 1880 that the Gospels were discovered in the parish archives of the minster. In the following year, Georg Humann published his first essay with text excerpts, drawings and a colored photographic image of the cross with the evangelist symbols v. 29v. Particular attention was paid to the glosses, the artistic value of the drawings was measured against the taste of the times, even if they were recognized as characteristic examples of pre-Carolingian book illumination.

In August 1942 the gospel book, which had been kept in the Münster library, was evacuated to Marienstatt in the Westerwald to the local Cistercian monastery and thus escaped the bombing which destroyed the Münster library on March 5, 1943. In 1949 the manuscript was brought back to Essen. After the cathedral treasury was opened to the public in 1958, the gospels were housed in the manuscript room of the treasury. Since this is the former sectarium of the monastery, the manuscript is in its historical location. After the reopening of the Cathedral Treasury on May 15, 2009, the manuscript is no longer part of the permanent exhibition for conservation reasons.

Due to its importance and its good condition, the manuscript has been loaned out several times for exhibitions, most recently in 2014 for the special exhibition of Karl's art on the 1200th anniversary of Charlemagne's death in Aachen.

restoration

The manuscript has been restored several times. After suffering during their evacuation in World War II, the parish of St. Johann Baptist, who owned the manuscript after the abolition of the pen, commissioned the restorer Johannes Sievers at the main state archive in Düsseldorf with the restoration in 1956/57. He took the handwriting apart and stapled it again, sometimes incorrectly. Sievers covered the illuminated pages, which appeared to be particularly in need of protection, with Mipo PVC -based film in accordance with the state of the art at the time . 96 pages were affected by this measure.

The consequences of the restoration were devastating. The foil sealed the parchment airtight. Due to the lack of air humidity , the parchment began to keratinize. In addition, the high-gloss film falsified the rather dull colors of the book illumination. In the long term, the film turned brown and brittle. For a long time, it was considered impossible to remove the damaged film without destroying the handwriting. Tests on other manuscripts that had been stuck on in a comparable way showed that the pasty layers of paint in the painting stuck more to the foil than to the parchment and would have been peeled off like decals. In other cases it was possible to pull off the foils, but the residues of the adhesive layer caused the pages to stick together to form a massive book block.

In 1985, the Essen Cathedral Treasury found an expert in Otto Wächter, the head of the Institute for Restoration at the Austrian National Library , who believed that the foil could be removed. The manuscript was therefore brought to Vienna in January 1986, where Wächter dismantled it. Wächter then placed the individual sheets of parchment in a bath made up of four parts of ethanol and one part of amyl acetate , to which he added a part of butyl acetate if the dissolving effect was insufficient . After a bath lasting 20 to 30 minutes, Wächter was able to carefully peel off the foil. He then left the parchment to dry, revealing residues of the adhesive layer. The guards removed them by dabbing and carefully rotating a cotton cloth dipped in acetic acid amyl ester until no sticky residues were noticeable. This work step sometimes took several days for one page, as the adhesive residues were only visible when dry. The second restoration problem was verdigris , caused by the copper green used in illumination . Grünspanfraß occurs with book illumination when the individual color particles are only surrounded by a small amount of color binding agents. It was also known from the restoration of acidic papers that paper containing magnesium compounds was not affected by verdigris. Wächter therefore coated all parts of the manuscript where verdigris had been used as a dye on both sides of the parchment sheet with a magnesium bicarbonate solution , which he allowed to dry. Then he brushed a solution of 20 grams of methyl cellulose onto one liter of water. In doing so, he made use of the ability of celluloses in detergents to settle between dirt particles and fabric. In this way, Wächter stored the copper green particles in a buffer made of magnesium salts. Then he closed the places where the copper green had already eaten through the parchment with gold bat skin . The restoration was made more difficult by the fact that the parchment leaves of the manuscript could not be pressed or stretched, as this could have damaged the stylus glosses scratched into the parchment. After the restoration was completed, the manuscript, which had a wooden cover of unknown age, which was certainly not original, was rebound based on the model of preserved Carolingian book covers, with the cover of an originally Salzburg manuscript available in the Vienna National Library as a model for the stamping of the cover served.

literature

  • Georg Humann : The works of art of the cathedral church to eat. Schwann, Düsseldorf 1904, pp. 37-81.
  • Gerhard Köbler : Collection of all glosses of Old Saxon (= work on law and linguistics. Vol. 32). Works on law and linguistics Verlags-GmbH, Giessen 1987, ISBN 3-88430-053-9 , pp. 95-109.
  • Alfred Pothmann : The Carolingian Gospel. Report on the restoration of the early medieval manuscript. In: Münster am Hellweg. Bulletin of the Association for the Preservation of the Essen Minster. Vol. 40, 1987, pp. 13-15.
  • The Essen Gospel Book. Ten facsimiles from the manuscript Hs 1 of the Cathedral Treasury to Essen. With an introduction by Alfred Pothmann. Verlag Müller and Schindler et al., Stuttgart et al. 1991.
  • Ernst Hellgardt : Philological finger exercises. Comments on the appearance and function of the Latin and Old Saxon glosses of the Essen Gospel (Matthew Gospel). In: Eva Schmitsdorf, Nina Hartl, Barbara Meurer (eds.): Lingua Germanica. Studies in German Philology. Jochen Splett on his 60th birthday. Waxmann, Münster et al. 1998, ISBN 3-89325-632-6 , pp. 32-69.
  • Isabel Gerds: The Carolingian Gospel Book Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. A study of ornamentation. Kiel 1999 (Kiel, Christian-Albrechts-Universität, unpublished master's thesis).
  • Gerhard Karpp: The beginnings of a book collection in the women's monastery in Essen. A look at the imported manuscripts of the ninth century. In: Günter Berghaus, Thomas Schilp, Michael Schlagheck (eds.): Dominion, education and prayer. Foundation and beginnings of the Essen women's monastery. Klartext-Verlag, Essen 2000, ISBN 3-88474-907-2 , pp. 119-133.
  • Katrinette Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. Written form and education in the Ottonian women's communities Gandersheim, Essen and Quedlinburg (= Institute for Research on Church History of the Diocese of Essen. Sources and Studies. Vol. 10). Aschendorff'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Münster 2004, ISBN 3-402-06249-6 .
  • Rolf Bergmann , Stefanie Stricker: Catalog of the Old High German and Old Saxon gloss manuscripts. Volume 1: Part A. List of Manuscripts, Part B. Introduction, Part C. Catalog No. 1–200. de Gruyter, Berlin et al. 2005, ISBN 3-11-018272-6 .
  • Babette Tewes: Essen Gospels. In: Peter van den Brink, Sarvenaz Ayooghi (ed.): Charlemagne - Charlemagne. Karl's art. Catalog of the special exhibition Karls Kunst from June 20 to September 21, 2014 in the Center Charlemagne , Aachen. Sandstein, Dresden 2014, ISBN 978-3-95498-093-2 , pp. 246-249 (with lit.).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The codicological description follows Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. 2004, p. 405f.
  2. ↑ The location scheme according to Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. 2004, is I (2) + IV (10) + (I + 1) (13) + (IV + 1) (22) + I (24) + II (28) + 3 IV (52) + (IV + 1) (61) + IV (69) + III (75) + 2 IV (91) + III (97) + (IV-1) (104) + IV (112) + (IV-1) (119) + 2 IV (135) + II (139) + 3 IV (163) + IV (170 + flyleaf) + 2 IV (186) + 2 (188). Gerds gives I + (III + 1) + I + (V + 1) + III + III + I + 2 IV + (IV + 1 + 1) + III + I + III + 2 IV + III + (III + 1 ) + IV + (III + 1) + 2 IV + 2 III + 2 IV + I + III + 2 IV + I an. (See here for an explanation of the formula ).
  3. ↑ Gerds: The Carolingian Gospels Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. 1999, p. 11.
  4. ↑ Bernhard Bischoff : In: Anzeiger für deutsches Altertum. Vol. 66, 1952/53, reproduced by Hellgardt: Philological finger exercises. 1998, p. 34.
  5. ↑ Introduction. In: Pothmann: The Carolingian Gospel. 1987.
  6. ↑ Gerds: The Carolingian Gospels Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. 1999, p. 69.
  7. ↑ Introduction. In: Pothmann: The Carolingian Gospel. 1987.
  8. ↑ Gerds: The Carolingian Gospels Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. 1999, p. 28.
  9. ^ Leonard Küppers, Paul Mikat : The Essen Minster Treasure. Fredebeul & Koenen, Essen 1966, p. 25; Gerds: The Carolingian Gospel Book Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. 1999, p. 22ff. points out clear differences and makes comparisons with mosaics in the churches of Sant'Apollinare in Classe and San Vitale in Ravenna .
  10. ^ Leonard Küppers, Paul Mikat: The Essen Minster Treasure. Fredebeul & Koenen, Essen 1966, p. 25.
  11. ^ Exhibition catalog Krone und Schleier. Art from medieval convents. Hirmer, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-7774-2565-6 , p. 233; Bergmann, Stricker: Catalog of the Old High German and Old Saxon gloss manuscripts. Vol. 1, 2005, p. 411.
  12. ↑ In all likelihood it was a writer, since Katrinette Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. 2004, was able to prove that around 70 people wrote in the style of the Essen scriptorium in the 10th century - too many for the few male priests who served as clerics in the women's monastery to be able to do so.
  13. ↑ All figures: Bergmann, Stricker: Catalog of Old High German and Old Saxon gloss manuscripts. Vol. 1, 2005, pp. 411f.
  14. ^ Hellgardt: Philological finger exercises. 1998, p. 34.
  15. ^ Hellgardt: Philological finger exercises. 1998, p. 43.
  16. ^ Karpp: The beginnings of a book collection in the women's monastery in Essen. 2000, p. 122; Hellgardt: Philological finger exercises. 1998, p. 82 indicates great similarity to the early phase of the Reims scriptorium.
  17. ↑ So already Humann: The works of art of the Münsterkirche in Essen. 1904, pp. 44f .; also introduction. In: Pothmann: The Carolingian Gospel. 1987; Karpp: The beginnings of a book collection in the women's monastery in Essen. 2000, p. 122; Bergmann, Stricker: Catalog of the Old High German and Old Saxon gloss manuscripts. Vol. 1, 2005, p. 410.
  18. ↑ Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. 2004, p. 404.
  19. ↑ Humann: The works of art of the Münsterkirche to Essen. 1904, p. 69.
  20. ↑ Berit H. Gass: The Theophanu Gospels in the Essen Cathedral Treasury (Hs. 3). In: Birgitta Falk (Ed.): "... how gold shines in the eyes". Treasures from the Essen women's foundation (= Essen research on the women's foundation. Vol. 5). Klartext-Verlag, Essen 2007, ISBN 978-3-89861-786-4 , pp. 169-189, here pp. 177f.
  21. ↑ Bodarwé: Sanctimoniales litteratae. 2004, p. 284.
  22. ↑ Otto Wächter: The de-lamination of the Carolingian gospel from the Essen cathedral treasure. In: Maltechnik, Restauro. International magazine for color + painting techniques, restoration and museum issues. Communications from IADA Vol. 93, No. 2, 1987, pp. 34-38.
  23. ↑ Gerds: The Carolingian Gospels Hs. 1 of the Essen Cathedral Treasury. 1999, p. 9.
This article was added to the list of excellent articles on May 19, 2008 in this version .