[Anglo-Saxon Art [continued]][21st February 1991]

[Redbook8:288][19910221:1142s][Anglo-Saxon Art [continued]][21st February 1991]

19910221.1142

[continued]

(See E[ncylopaedia of] V[isual] A[rt] 3:403 Illus[tration], a carpet page from the Lindisfarne Gospels)[‘The Lindisfarne Gospels, a carpet page; 698. British Museum, London’]

‘Thus by 700[ce] various traditions were available in Northumbria: Irish, Celtic, Anglo-Saxon represented by the books of Durrow and Ecternach; the purely Mediterranean tradition by the Codex Amiatinus. The various styles and ideas merged in hybrid manuscripts, such as the Lindisfarne Gospels.’

*

‘...The most remarkable monument to the interplay of different cultures is the Franks Casket (British Museum, London). A box about 9 in[ches] (23 cm) long, it appears, from the evidence of its inscriptions, to have come from northeastern England. It is made of whalebone plaques carved with such diverse subjects as Wayland the Smith murdering King Nithad’s son, Titus capturing Jerusalem, and the Adoration of the Magi. Such enthusiastic eclecticism is typical of the Northumbrian Renaissance and is its greatest contribution to the history of European culture, for it preserved for the future so much of the classical past and gave completely unexpected impetus to Christian art and literature in northern Europe.’

**

* – E[ncylopaedia of] V[isual] A[rt] 3:402

** – ibid [Encylopaedia of Visual Art 3:] 404

[continued]

[PostedBlogger22092023]