Mughni Gospels
The Mughni Gospel Book , also Mugni Gospel Book , is a gospel book made in the 11th century in the form of an Armenian illuminated book , which is archived in the Matenadaran's collection in the Armenian capital Yerevan under the number MS 7736. The manuscript was copied and illustrated by a scribe named Yovhannes shortly after the middle of the 11th century in north-western Armenia and has been kept until the present in the church of St. George of Mughni in Tbilisi, which was founded in the 13th century .
The name of the gospel has nothing to do with the village of Mughni north of Yerevan, in whose George monastery another gospel, made in 1498, is venerated, which is also part of the holdings of the Matenadaran.
shape
Since the introduction of the Armenian script in the 4th century, manuscripts have enjoyed enormous esteem among the Armenians. In early Christian times the Bible, liturgical instructions and texts of the early church fathers were recorded in ancient Armenian script and handed down in book form. Anyone who copied one of the manuscripts considered to be miraculous or donated a new version earned religious merit. An essential part of Armenian manuscripts is the colophon added at the end ( Armenian hischatakaran , "memory"), in which the writer gives detailed information about his living conditions, working methods and client. A colophon has been present in most Armenian manuscripts since the oldest surviving Armenian manuscript, the Lazarian Gospel Book, dated 877. The colophon is missing in the Mughni Gospels, which is why nothing is known about the place and the exact time of its manufacture.
The Mughni Gospels have come down to us in excellent condition. It consists of 383 sheets in the format 42 × 32.5 centimeters, which were bound between two covers in 1679 to form the book block preserved today, thus forming a codex . The wooden lids are covered with red velvet and decorated with silver and gold-plated embossing plates. There are ten canon tables , eleven miniature paintings and four author pictures. The people in the miniatures, which fill the entire sheet format, appear in front of a realistic landscape in the background or in front of a building backdrop. The colors are predominantly yellow-brown, blue and green. Trees and birds, as they often appear in Armenian manuscripts, symbolize the garden in which Mary Magdalene meets the resurrected Jesus Christ, whom she takes to be a gardener. Between realistically depicted flowers and animals, there are also various mythical creatures that were supposed to make the earthly garden appear at the same time as a heavenly paradise garden. A total of 34 real and fantastic animal species were counted in the Mughni Gospels.
The panels begin on the left with an initial under a decorative strip running across the sheet. The initial is ornamented with the respective evangelist symbol in the form of a wing being. In the miniatures, the life of Christ is told chronologically in individual scenes according to the pictorial tradition in a representation form typical of the Armenian book art of the 11th century. A near forerunner is the Etchmiadzin Gospels produced in 989 in Bgheno-Noravank (Province of Sjunik ) . Later manuscripts referring to the Mughni Gospels are the Gospels of King Gagik of Kars , written between 1045 and 1054, and an only partially preserved manuscript from 1053 (Matenadaran 3593).
content
Significant numbers of Gospels were produced in Armenia during the 10th and 11th centuries. The Mughni Gospels contain a complete cycle from the life of Christ, as it is the basis of the twelve great celebrations of the Orthodox Churches . Among other things, this includes the Annunciation of the Lord (the angel Gabriel announces the birth of her son Jesus to Mary), the scene of the birth of Christ with the manger , the baptism of Jesus , the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on a donkey, the Lord's Supper and the Crucifixion of Christ . A special feature of this manuscript is that the resurrection and the descent into hell of Christ are missing.
The scenes shown in the illustrations are based on Byzantine iconography and also on Greek, Egyptian and Persian motifs. In the early Armenian manuscripts, for example, the Egyptian fishing scene on the Nile was popular during floods, with boats, crocodiles, fish and lotus flowers. While this scene is still vividly and comprehensively portrayed in Queen Mlke's gospel book of 862, it appears paler in the Mughni gospel book and further removed from the original direct view.
The birth of the baby Jesus is depicted on sheet 12 in an unusually strict and almost pitiless way. Instead of kneeling in front of her son's bed and embracing him in her arms, Maria lies next to it on a bed and looks in another direction. The child is not bedded in the usual crib, but rather, lying on a table, forms the center of the scene in the cave, into which a hard beam of light falls vertically from above. An ox and a donkey are still naturally part of the scene, although they do not appear in the Gospels. Their presence goes back to a prophecy of Isaiah and was cultivated by the early Christians as a symbol that Jesus welcomed the lowest of all creatures with him. The birth scene in the middle is connected on three levels one above the other on the outside with the visit of the three kings and the story of the Annunciation of the Lord. The figures appear flat and red in separate groups against a solid blue background; A certain plasticity is achieved through dark folds in the clothes. The areas in the foreground are filled with a dark green.
At the bottom right is an old woman with Jesus on her lap. The name Eva is written above her head. Obviously, the painter was referring to an apocryphal tale according to which Josef was looking for a midwife when he met the woman on the street. She introduced herself to him as Eva and explained that she was here to help Maria with her birth.
At the introduction of Jesus into the temple ( Presentation of the Lord ) on the opposite right on sheet 13, the figures are arranged symmetrically on both sides of the altar, over which a lamp hangs. Instead of the usual exedra , a ciborium has been built in the background , which is joined by buildings with masonry and windows on both sides. The Son of God and bearer of a new religion submits to the old law beforehand. Not only is the composition strict, the figures appear immobile and petrified.
literature
- Burchard Brentjes , Stepan Mnazakanjan, Nona Stepanjan: Art of the Middle Ages in Armenia. Union Verlag (VOB), Berlin 1981, ISBN 978-3703105487
- Sirarpie Der Nersessian : Armenian Art. Thames & Hudson, London 1977, pp. 115, 117
- Vrej Nersessian: Treasures from the Ark: 1700 Years of Armenian Christian Art . The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles 2001, pp. 161f, ISBN 978-0892366392
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ "Around the Middle of the 11th Century": John Beckwith: Early Christian and Byzantine Art . (Pelican History of Art) Yale University Press, 1993, p. 223; “In the third quarter of the 11th century”: Vrej Nersessian: Treasures from the Ark, p. 161; "Around 1060": Erevan, Matenadaran, MS 7736, Mugni Gospel. ( Memento of the original from January 16, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Armenian Studies Program (illustration)
- ↑ The roof of the previously vacant Church of St. George of Mughni in Tbilisi collapsed in November 2009: Georgia: Collapse of Armenian Church Provokes Row. Institute for War and Peace Reporting, December 4, 2009
- ^ Heide and Helmut Buschhausen: The illuminated book of Armenia . In: Armenia. Rediscovery of an old cultural landscape. (Exhibition catalog) Museum Bochum 1995, p. 192
- ^ Nona Stepanjan: Wall painting, book illumination and applied arts . In: Burchard Brentjes u. a., 1981, pp. 248, 297
- ↑ Andrew Esguerra: The Mugrdechian Gives Lenten Presentation on Armenian Art at St. Gregory Armenian Church. ( Memento of the original from January 16, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Armenian Action, Vol. 33, No. May 4, 2012
- ^ Burchard Brentjes: Three millennia of Armenia. Koehler & Amelang, Leipzig 1976, p. 120
- ↑ Wife of King Gagik Artsruni: Artsruni. In: Encyclopædia Iranica
- ^ Nona Stepanjan: Wall painting, book illumination and applied arts. In: Burchard Brentjes u. a., 1981, p. 236
- ↑ Sirarpie Der Nersessian, p. 117
- ↑ Vrej Nersessian, pp. 161f
