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Stemmatics and Image. Remarks on the Twelfth-Century Beatus Commentary on the Apocalypse of Lorvão

Jorge Silva Rocha
p. 63-85

Abstract

Most images produced in the Middle Ages are closely linked to written texts, as is quite evident in the field of illustrated manuscripts. In the same way that texts were copied and circulated in space and time, images also tended to accompany them with relative formal stability constituting, like the texts, cycles of works. For this reason and in some cases, textual criticism (and more specifically, stemmatics) has extended its domain to pictorial production, comparing images for a phylogenetic relationship and elements for the reconstruction of hypothetical originals. This has been the case for the illuminated manuscripts containing the Commentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus de Liébana, where stemmatics has had a significant influence in the approach to art history. Some notes on a twelfth-century Commentary on the Apocalypse, the codex of Lorvão, reflect on the functionalities and limits of the transposition of these textual analysis methodologies for the appreciation of pictorial creation.

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Introduction

  • 1 Beatus of LorvãoCommentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus de Liébana attributed to the scriptorium (...)

1Stemmatics belongs to the field of philology and appears to have nothing to do with the realm of the creation and transmission of images. In the history of art — especially in the history of medieval art — we find, however, the same methodological basis to develop pictorial stemmata of artistic cycles, in particular when the origin of the iconographic programmes are unknown. This is the case with the cycle of illuminated manuscripts containing the Commentary on the Apocalypse of John, attributed to the eighth-century Asturian monk Beatus of Liébana, which is here the subject of remarks based on one copy of the work, the manuscript of Lorvão.1

2The legitimacy of textual criticism and, by extension, “stemmatics” in the historical analysis of images adjacent to a text is questionable. Indeed, the production and reproduction of images are not submitted to the same procedures and constraints as those of texts. However two orders of reasons can justify a continuation, even a deepening, of image stemmata. The first reason, synthesized by M. Alison Stones, is based on an epoch when the copying and transmission of text and images followed specific rules and conventions. Stones notes that, in the analysis of medieval manuscript cycles, we verify that the position of the illustrations in the text and the content of these are not original creations in each work and “they tend to remain fairly standard, and it is possible to work out recensions for the iconographical cycles in much the same way as it may be done with texts” (Stones 1976, 96). The second order of reasons is broader and based on an understanding of the history of art that deepens and develops through the study of series and families of works: “No image is ever completely present in isolation. It often forms part of a series […]. The only meaningful work is perhaps that of the entire series: isolating one image will always be arbitrary and misguided” (Schmitt 2003, 31). If a series of works of art is built phylogenetically — that is, in an evolutionary relationship — we are, in fact, faced with a stemma codicum. It will then make sense to speak of a stemmatics of the image to designate this process. In this paper, we present considerations of the way in which the Lorvão codex was integrated within the series of illuminated manuscripts designated by Beatus and the genealogies proposed by historians such as Konrad Miller, Wilhelm Neuss, Peter K. Klein, or John Williams. It is not within the scope of this paper to discuss the general criticism that stemmatological research has received in the course of the last decades, but rather to consider the observations in relation to art-historical traditional discourses and to discuss some of the implications for the field’s methodology.

The Beatus family

  • 2 Viage de Ambrosio de Morales por Orden del Rey D. Phelipe II in Los Reynos de Leon y Galicia y Prin (...)

3In the report of his trip to the kingdoms of Leon and Galicia and to the principality of Asturias in 1572, under the orders of Filipe II, Ambrosio de Morales2 refers to an “excellent manuscript” that he has just discovered in the cathedral of San Isidoro de León, a work that he “hopes to give to the light, to be very worthy of it”. Morales suggested the monk Beatus of the monastery of Santo Toribio de Liébana, Asturias, as the likely author of the original exegetical text, which was written in the eighth century. The term “Beatus” is then the designation by which all Commentaries of this apocalyptic cycle are known. Twenty-nine illustrated Beatus have now been identified, including complete works, fragments, and facsimiles. For five centuries, this work of exegesis was copied and illustrated with rare frequency in the scriptoria of the north of the Iberian Peninsula, south of France, and in Italy. The text of the Revelation written in Patmos has always given rise to abundant exegesis, but the cycle that Beatus began in the eighth century is unique not only for its textual content but also, or above all, for the profusion of images with which the works are illustrated.

  • 3 Between the probable date of the first writing of the commentary (776) and those of the first fairl (...)

4The codices identified and collected since the discovery of Morales have been the object of reflection and analysis since the eighteenth century, but several questions raised by the images remain open. Among the interpellations made to the Beatus manuscripts, one continues particularly to occupy art historians: the origin and figurative evolution of the illustrations in the Beatus Commentary. Indeed, there are no witnesses for the first century and a half of its existence.3 The original and the evolution of subsequent copies remain unknown. The apparently isolated nature of this apocalyptic cycle also makes it difficult to understand the genesis of this artistic phenomenon.

Textual Criticism and Stemmatics of the pictorial tradition

5Stemmatics marked the textual and pictorial analysis of the Beatus cycle from the beginning, thus merging textual criticism with art history. Since the first attempts to identify the manuscripts made by Abbot Ambrosio de Morales in 1573, this exegetical work received renewed attention in the eighteenth century. In 1770, theologian and historian Henrique Flórez produced the first unifying text for the Commentaries. In 1895, Konrad Miller drew the first pictorial stemma of the Beatus. By considering only the first image of the Prologus libri secundi, a world map that illustrates the apostolic mission (Apostoli graece língua latine missi interpretantur) included in ten cited manuscripts, Miller was able to organize a genealogical tree with two main branches (see Fig. 1).

Figure 1: Stemma of Konrad Miller (1895).

Figure 1: Stemma of Konrad Miller (1895).

6Miller used two main criteria based on the following presumption: Beatus’ original Commentary was very detailed and would obviously iconographically describe the apostles’ missions. He thus divided the maps into two families, the first consisting of the more detailed maps, and the second of those that reveal many faults and absences. If the visual reference to the apostles’ missions is a plausible criterion for the branching of the stemma, the assumption of great detail in the original illustration is a simple personal conviction. Later, in 1954, Gonzálo Menéndez Pidal reformulated this stemma and introduced two new world maps (Fig. 2). But Miller and Menéndez Pidal did not include the map of the Lorvão codex in their trees because they were unfamiliar with it. Henry A. Sanders (in 1930) and Wilhelm Neuss (in 1931) developed the first stemmata which encompass all illuminated manuscripts known at that time.

Figure 2: Stemma of Gonzálo Menéndez Pidal (1954).

Figure 2: Stemma of Gonzálo Menéndez Pidal (1954).

Figure 3: Stemma of Wilhelm Neuss (1931).

Figure 3: Stemma of Wilhelm Neuss (1931).

7Neuss was the one to formulate, in the first place, the major questions on all of the manuscripts, the exegetical tradition, the lost archetype, and the first versions of the Commentary. The pictorial programme and iconographic tradition were also the privileged object of visual analysis by Neuss in close interaction with the textual analysis; that is, Neuss analysed the text and images together as a closely related whole in a single genetic development. He either justifies the nature of an image by the place it occupied in a codex during the transmission of the text or, inversely, he relied on the character of the illustration to consolidate the position of a manuscript in his Beatus stemma (Fig. 3). For Neuss, the text and image paths are parallel and identical. This methodology finds significant expression in two fundamental conclusions of the historian concerning the archetype: after determining that the text of the Saint-Sever manuscript was closest to the archetype, Neuss deduced that the illustration of this codex would therefore be the most faithful to the original pictorial model. In accordance with this deduction, he concluded that the style of the model would be classicist and Italianate like that of Saint-Sever. Henry A. Sanders proposed a new Beatus stemma based on the theory of the existence of three initial versions (Fig. 4). From the calculation of the praesens era included in Book IV in the calculation of the world ages of Saint Augustine (septem aetates mundi), Sanders concluded that the different dates observed in different codices for the current era would correspond to different editions (Actas Del Simposio Para El Estudio de Los Códices Del “Comentario Al Apocalipsis” de Beato de Liébana 1978, 1:165–167).

Figure 4: Stemma of Henry Sanders (1930).

Figure 4: Stemma of Henry Sanders (1930).

8This idea had direct repercussions on the organization of the pictorial development of the Beatus later elaborated by Peter K. Klein. However, Klein would be the first to demonstrate the possibility of a process of creating illustrations independent of the process of transmitting text. To seek a more precise and objective method than the conventional comparative method used by Neuss in the analysis of Beatus illustrations, Klein used a statistical method called the correlation test — already used in quantitative linguistics — because it is not limited to analysis of coincidences but allows for differences between the compared works. Applying this procedure to the works of the family I from the stemma of Neuss, the results obtained indicate a divergence of the pictorial tradition from the textual tradition of Neuss and Sanders. According to Klein, the results are conclusive: the text and images in these codices do not share a genealogy. Some doubts about the rigour of this method were immediately raised when these results were presented at the Madrid colloquium in 1976 (Actas Del Simposio Para El Estudio de Los Códices Del “Comentario Al Apocalipsis” de Beato de Liébana 1978, 2:107–115).

9Klein’s method had the merit, however, of emphasizing the need for an analysis of the transmission and creation of the images that is not captive to the textual tradition. Apart from this virtue, the statistical method used contributed very little to solving the problem of the archetype or to the development of pictorial creations for the Beatus during the first century and a half of the cycle of these codices. As Klein himself noted, while the correlation test makes it possible to establish differences and approximations between works, it does not make it possible to determine which of the compared works are the oldest. This is why Klein, in drawing the stemma of the Beatus pictorial tradition — despite the introduction of some changes to the existing strains — essentially preserved the structure inherited from Neuss and Sanders based on the Lachmannian method (Fig. 5). More recently, in an extensive compilation work John Williams proposed a correction of the Klein family tree (Williams 1994, 1:26). Williams saw a difference between what Klein thought of the IIb family and its representation in the stemma he proposed. In fact, Klein agreed with Sanders when he distinguished family IIb from family IIa, not as two branches from a hypothetical common archetype, but as one (IIb) being a new revision of the other (IIa) — an idea that the Klein diagram does not reflect. Williams thus proposed the corresponding rectification (Fig. 6), but essentially everything remains in his stemma for this cycle.

Figure 5: Stemma of Peter Klein (1976).

Figure 5: Stemma of Peter Klein (1976).

Figure 6: Stemma of John Williams (1994).

Figure 6: Stemma of John Williams (1994).

10Finally, Roger Gryson published a new stemma of the Commentary, which differed little from that of Klein and opted for ramifications not entirely binary (Fig. 7). For the purposes of our inquiries about the genealogy of the image, however, it is important to highlight Gryson’s critical edition of the Beatus text of 776, published in 2012. First, the enormous erudition and wisdom involved in textual criticism and in all subsequent stemmata by all the authors mentioned is not at issue here; rather, how illustrations were considered in these manuscripts is the issue. This is where Gryson’s critical edition is a good example of the ambiguity and casualness of his approach. The illustrations chosen to give an approximate idea of the Beatus autograph archetype dated to 776 are paintings that belong to manuscripts containing the text of a later edition (784). We must deduce that the images were chosen for decorative purposes, which is in contrast to the rigour required of the texts

Figure 7: Stemma of Roger Gryson (2012).

Figure 7: Stemma of Roger Gryson (2012).

11These genealogical constructions are not conclusive. The problem of the configuration of the original Beatus pictorial work remains open. The development of exclusively visual variants that each work in this cycle presents has not yet been organized in a phylogenetic scheme. The stemmata dedicated to the image persist, in general, dependent on the textual tradition. On what basis, then, can we build a stemmatics of the image? Let us look for possible answers in the analysis of some approaches to images — influenced by the methodology of textual criticism — from a specific Beatus, the manuscript of Lorvão.

The Beatus of Lorvão

  • 4 The set of codices identified to date consists of complete and partial works, fragments and a facsi (...)

12One of the twenty-nine known illustrated Beatus, this manuscript is attributed to the scriptorium of the monastery of São Mamede de Lorvão, near the city of Coimbra.4 Signed and dated 1189, this is a late copy of this cycle of Commentaries. Klein devoted a monograph to this codex (Klein 2004), but much of the iconographic differences identified by the author in this Commentary are attributed to “errors” of interpretation by the artist of Lorvão. However, Klein noted his impression that the Beatus of Lorvão is, in general, a faithful testimony of the original tradition of the first archetype and a useful resource in its reconstruction, although he did not fail to add that this “impression is obscured by curious misunderstandings” (Klein 2004, 42) by the illustrator. These supposed misunderstandings would be justified by the “style of a very old model, by the lack of theological knowledge and, perhaps, by the little education of the miniaturist who could hardly read the biblical text and that of the commentary” (Klein 2004, 42).

13We now present two complementary proposals which may help to overcome this divergence. The first is to pose the hypothesis, already formulated by Henri Quentin (1926), that an alleged variance can already be part of the archetype. The second, concerning visual creation, is that one should not consider the existence of “errors” in this field, but only options, because the idea of reproducing a work does not coincide exactly with the idea of copying. The following briefly reviews some illustrations from the more than seventy images in the Lorvão Commentary that may shed light on the differences between the copyist’s attitude and the illustrator’s method, even when both are identified as the same person.

Aspects of image creation in the manuscript of Lorvão

Iconography

14Elements added to the regular matrix of a cycle of illustrations disrupt the concept of transmission in stemmatics. The codex of Lorvão presents a very important number of iconographic elements which are not observed in other Beatus. These elements have often been attributed to misinterpretations by the artist, but are neither devoid of meaning nor intention, as a look at a few examples will reveal.

1. Super bestiam muliere (Fig. 8)

15Despite its inclusion in the Prologue of Book II, this painting illustrates the text of Apoc. 17.3–14. Compared to the fourteen other known illustrations, the image of Lorvão is the only one to present a set of six signs inserted in small rectangles in the centre of the composition; five heads at the back of the beast; the Christogram in the right hand of the woman, who holds a crown, which we have found parallels to only in the codex of San Andrés de Arroyos (Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris, Lat. 2290). All of these elements find textual support both in the biblical and in the exegetical text, which indicates that the author of Lorvão had a deep knowledge of the substance of the work. The exegetical text on the vision of Apoc. 17.3–14 can be found in two different places: in the prologue to Book II, where the image now discussed is inserted, and in Book IX, where the theme is repeated in the biblical text with a new illustration. We must resort to two extracts of the Commentary to understand the decisions of the artist of Lorvão.

Figure 8: Super bestiam muliere. Folio 43r. Lorvão codex.

Figure 8: Super bestiam muliere. Folio 43r. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

  • 5 The text of Beatus de Liébana followed in this article is the text unified by Henrique Flórez in 17 (...)

16The six signs are associated through the rectangles, where both the cup and the symbols are inserted. The golden cup that the woman holds and the abominations of John’s vision (Et habebat calicem aureum in manu sua, plenum abominationum; González Echegaray 1995, 566) are partially but perfectly identified in the exegetical text of the Prologue to Book II.5 It is said that the woman on the beast represents, among other evils, “those who practise augury and enchantments and carry signs, which the ignorant call Solomon’s, or other similar signs that they decide to make and wear around the neck, and collect herbs while praying, or the women who observe spider webs or footprints” (qui auguria et incantationes et caracteres, quod signum Salomonis rustici dicunt, vel alios huiusmodi caracteres, quos solent scribere, et collo suspendere, et herbas symbolo vel oratione dominica vel cum incantatione colligere, et mulierculas ad telas araneas vel pedes observare; González Echegaray 1995, 162). We can identify, in the small rectangles, esoteric double spirals, a plant, a possible spider’s web and two stars, which perhaps allude to Solomon despite having five and not six points (in one of the stars there appears to be a sketchy attempt to trace a sixth branch). The five heads on the back of the Beast are easily identifiable in the biblical and exegetical text. In John’s vision, the seven chiefs of the Beast are seven kings, of whom five have perished, one is alive and the other is yet to come. These seven kings are, in the Commentary, one body of vices and represent all of the kings of the earth. The five heads of those who have already died are expressively pasted to the back of the Beast and identified in the exegesis: Júlio César, Octávio, Tibério, Cláudio and Galba — Nero is still alive (574). The crown above the woman’s head is also explained by exegesis. In the exegetical text of the Prologue to Book II, the commentator sets out the different names by which the Church is called. These are paradoxical designations based on ambiguous explanations, which mark the entire text of the Beatus. Thus, the Church has the name of fornicator and prostitute, as well as virgin, sister, bride, wife, mother or queen (aliquando dicitur fornicaria, et meretrix; aliquando dicitur virgo; 164). Regarding the Christogram in the right hand of the figure, unique in the fourteen known representations, we find its textual support in the Beatus commentary of Apoc. 17.3–14 in Book IX. Here the woman is identified with the false Church (simulatae veritatis ornata ostenditur, quia de foris christianitas videtur. […] Id est, simulatio sanctitati; González Echegaray 566). The commentator’s explanations have complex developments, but these additional iconographic elements represent a deep link with the texts, especially exegesis, and represent an effort at a figurative translation and visual synthesis of the plurality of meanings existing in the Beatus text. Throughout the Lorvão Codex, we find this difficulty — which cannot be confused with the inability to illustrate or ignorance of the texts.

2. Unclean spirits issuing from the mouths of the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet (Fig. 9)

17The illustration corresponding to Apoc. 16.13–16 is an image without equivalent illustrations in the other Beatus codices, and it is apparently unjustified: first, because the illustration represents two dragons instead of one, and second, because the amphibians come out not only from the dragon’s mouth but also from the mouth of the three human figures represented, which is not in accordance with the apocalyptic vision.

Figure 9: Unclean spirits. Folio 182r. Lorvão codex.

Figure 9: Unclean spirits. Folio 182r. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

18Now in the text of the Commentary there is an expansion, a doubling of the Devil who is one of the three prefigurations of evil, as well as the sum of these three entities (Unum spiritum vidit, sed pro numero partium unius corporis draconis, id est, diaboli. Nam et bestia corpus diaboli, et pseudopropheta, id est, praepositi, corporis diaboliunus spiritus est; González Echegaray 1995, 552). The presence of two dragons is legitimized by the meta-allegory, where the devil is himself and also a member of his own body. The three human figures represented are simultaneously the false prophet of John’s vision and what this false prophet represents in exegesis and in the plural: the false priests (Pseudo tamen propheta, ipsi pseudosacerdotes sunt; 552). The use of three elements, both for the figures of the Dragon and the Beast and for the false prophets, reinforces the recapitulated character of John’s vision, which the discourse of the exegesis does not escape, and which makes the illustrator’s work difficult. Umberto Eco talks about John’s text as an “allegory to the second power” — that is, an allegory which cites another allegory, which in turn recalls other allegories. But if an allegory is the key to interpretation, Eco notes, “Apocalypse, on the other hand, is rhetoric in action which ambiguously postulates and eludes a metalanguage capable of defining it” (Eco 1982, 26–27). The same idea is emphasized by Ives Christe with regard to the visions of Jean, who “in different forms and figures recapitulate, eadem aliter, the same reality” (Actas Del Simposio Para El Estudio de Los Códices Del “Comentario Al Apocalipsis” de Beato de Liébana 1978, 1:56). It is therefore natural that, in the Commentary, these characteristics are projected and, in turn, the illustrations devoted to the textual substance reflect the complex narrative structure. This illustration is one example, among many others from the Lorvão codex, of the visual translation of recapitulated allusions.

3. The last attack of Satan (Fig. 10)

19More questions are raised by iconography which is not exactly supplemental but rather divergent from the standard established by the regularity of corresponding illustrations known to date.

Figure 10: The last attack of Satan. Folio 203v. Lorvão codex.

Figure 10: The last attack of Satan. Folio 203v. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

20In the illustration of the biblical and exegetical text corresponding to the Last Attack of Satan (Apoc. 20.7–9), we see in the centre of the composition a reclining woman who points to a circle with nine inscribed busts; the circle is flanked by two nimbed figures. This iconography is unparalleled in any other Beatus. In almost all the codices, instead of this representation there are figures hidden in a schematic drawing which represent mountains. It is the visual expression of the exegetical text which says that, facing the attack of Antichrist qui in Iudaea sunt, fugiant montibus […] tempore Antichristi per loca inaccessibilia multi esse salvandi (González Echegaray 1995, 622). Only the codex of Osma does not contain this scene in its composition; that of Geneva does not represent the hills, but only a circle with the identification in the legend ubi absconduntur a facie anti / christus. Klein (2004, 126) alleges that the representation of the woman in the illustration of Lorvão “does not make sense in this context […] because Satan does not drive nations to lust but to war.” Yet it is precisely the context that seems to give all of its meaning to the iconographic choice of the Lorvão illustrator. We must emphasize that this illustration is exclusive to the Beatus, and we do not find it in any other apocalyptic cycle. It is therefore a creation that emerged in this cycle and probably has not had a definitive iconography from the first moment the image was imagined. The decision of the illustrator of Lorvão seems to precede the graphic representation of the hills where “those who are in Judea” take refuge (qui in Iudaea sunt, fugiant in montibus). This iconography becomes a stable standard in branch II of the Neuss stemma from the Morgan codex 664, attributed to the painter Magius. The model followed by the author of the Lorvão codex would therefore not contain this graphic solution. In the Commentary of Lorvão, the artist privileged the representation of this crucial weapon of Satan — seduction. As the exegesis explains, seduction means “losing oneself and leading to perdition” (seducere hic dixit, quod est dissipare et secum in perditionem adtrahere; 620); in the explanatory text, this often appears metaphorically associated with the figure of a woman. The Message to the Church of Thyatira (Apoc. 2.18–19) alludes to Jezebel, who seduces the innocent (Ipsa est Iezabel, quae seducit homines simplices: 224); this results in the exclusive illustration from the Lorvão Beatus with a female figure lying on a bed: the iconography is very similar to the illustration in Apoc. 20.7–9. This woman deceives the people and “gets drunk on the blood of the saints” (Et vidi mulierem ebriam de sanguine sanctorum, et sanguine martyrum Iesu; 568); she always receives expressive representation in Apoc. 17.3–14 and in the above referenced “Woman on the Beast” in the Prologue to Book II. It is true that the exegesis recalls Matthew 24.16 through the evocation of the call to those of Judea to flee towards the mountains, but the interpretive substance throughout the text focuses on the doctrinal falsification and false holiness that the figure of the woman has symbolized since the first representation of Jezebel. The illustration thus appears to fit perfectly into the exegetical context. Gog and Magog, who appear as giants participating in the attack on the Holy City in the illustrations of all known compositions — with the exception of the Beatus of Geneva which does not represent them — are, we believe, represented ambiguously beside the bed of the woman, simultaneously representing the nations seduced and the vanity which animates them (Gog enim interpretatur tectum: Dogmate sive de tecto Magog. Omnes quos extulit, in superbiae suae lapsum adduxit vel elationis tecto sublevavit; 620). In the illustration of Lorvão, Gog and Magog do not participate in the destructive action, because the fantastic and dynamic traces of the vision of Jean are clearly relegated to a secondary level in favour of a spiritual reading; this results in an iconography that is more emblematic than scenic. The circle represents the Holy City (castra sanctorum) and gives us some indications of the model used, as well as a possible origin for this illustration. The circle only appears in two other Beatus; as mentioned, this circle with busts inside of it appears in the Geneva codex with the legend ubi absconduntur a facie anti christus, while in the Beatus of Escorial (Biblioteca del Monasterio, II.5), the circle represents the Holy City, as in the Lorvão Beatus. It seems probable that this iconography belongs to the model used by the artist from Lorvão and probably to the original Beatus de Liébana, but it is not clear what original meaning was attributed to it.

4. Christ between the clouds (Fig. 11)

21Going through all of the Lorvão illuminations, one always finds a deep commitment to the texts and an attempt to translate the emerging content into images. The artist’s attitude towards the model followed is dynamic and sometimes even audacious. In the Appearance of Christ Between the Clouds (Apoc. 1.7–8), we see the creative and unique way Alpha and Omega are drawn. The stems of the letter Α form a gable on the nimbus of Christ. Klein (2004, 56) has identified this motif as unique and “strange” without, however, associating it with the text of the vision. The ω is represented by the curved modelling of Christ’s arms, a posture we do not see in any other depiction throughout the manuscript and which supports our interpretation.

Figure 11: Christ between the clouds. Folio 14v. Lorvão codex.

Figure 11: Christ between the clouds. Folio 14v. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

Formal elements

22The transformative initiative of the monk of Lorvão is also expressed, beyond the additional iconography, in the realm of form by the introduction of original graphic elements. In the messages to Smyrna and Thyatira (Figs. 12 and 13), the chromatic alternation is not only ornamental, but also an element of the visual narrative. The orange colour establishes the spatial connection between the message delivered to John and its descriptive content. Also, not all of the formatted and irregular backgrounds are the result of hesitation or lack of talent in the preparation of the compositions. In the image of the fifth Angel who Throws the Cup on the Throne of the Beast (Apoc. 16.10–11), the excessive irregularity of the background seems to emphasize the disharmony induced by the Beast (Figs. 14 and 15). These irregularities in the frame and background often appear in compositions where the Beast is represented; we should not consider this fortuitous, but rather as an explicit or unconscious intention of the artist of Lorvão.

Figure 12: Message to Smyrna. Folio 54r. Lorvão codex.

Figure 12: Message to Smyrna. Folio 54r. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

Figure 13: Message to Thyatira. Folio 64r. Lorvão codex.

Figure 13: Message to Thyatira. Folio 64r. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

Figure 14:The fifth angel poured out his bowl. Folio 181v. Lorvão codex.

Figure 14:The fifth angel poured out his bowl. Folio 181v. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

Figure 15: Woman sitting on a scarlet beast. Folio 186v. Lorvão codex.

Figure 15: Woman sitting on a scarlet beast. Folio 186v. Lorvão codex.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

Composition

23The iconographic and formal elements mentioned have an experimental character; they appear to be vacillating and in a clear phase of spontaneous elaboration. Some compositions are clear attempts to organize spatially the separate graphic elements previously disconnected in the folio space, such as the Vision of the Son of Man (Apoc. 1.10–20). But there are also compositions which seem to result from a stable model where the painter does not feel the need to intervene and reproduces the model without major changes. The Vision of the Lamb and of the four living creatures (Apoc. 4.6–14) presents an organized and spatially balanced composition, as well as iconographic stability in all known codices. We here make special reference to the representation of the Celestial Jerusalem (Apoc. 21.1–17; Fig. 16), because until recently, it was apparently unique and contained the “usual simplifications and errors” (Klein 2004, 136). But another illustration emerged in the new Beatus of Geneva from the Italian province of Benevento, in which everything was identical to the image from Lorvão (Fig. 17). In two regions so different, the creation of two paintings so similar to each other can only indicate an archetype containing a stable composition that has been regularly transmitted.

Figure 16: Celestial Jerusalem. Lorvão. Folio 209v.

Figure 16: Celestial Jerusalem. Lorvão. Folio 209v.

Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.

  • 6 Genève, Bibliothèque de Genève, Ms. lat. 357: The Institutions of Priscian and the Commentary on th (...)

Figure 17: Celestial Jerusalem. Geneva. Folio 241r.6

Figure 17: Celestial Jerusalem. Geneva. Folio 241r.6

Image licensed under CC-BY-NC by the Bibliothèque de Genève.

24Finally, we have another order of compositions which consist of illustrations created entirely by the illustrator, perhaps impelled by an empty space between the biblical text and the text of the exegesis, as in the Opening of the Seventh Seal and the representation of the Silence in Heaven (Apoc. 8.1). Only eight codices visually mark this vision, and each has a different iconographic solution. Regarding the Beatus of Lorvão, we do not have uniformity in the genesis of the paintings. The type of connection between the copyist and the model seems to change for each illustration. Stemmatics cannot be applied without taking into account the specificity of the production involved in each image.

Integral archetypes and promorphic cycles

25We mentioned at the beginning that, for some philologists, the stability and standardization of the production of images in medieval manuscripts allows the creation of a recension of iconographic cycles in the same manner as for the texts. The modes of transmission reported by Stones are limited to only two or three procedures: the direct transfer of the model to the space intended for illustration in the work in preparation, and the schematic sketch of the composition in the margin of the manuscript, later erased, as well as indications written in the margins of the folios (Stones 1976, 96). Many scenes have also been taken from general models (battles, banquets, etc.) and applied to the context of the stories (Scheller 1995). But the production of the images in the Commentary of Lorvão, with a majority containing significant interventions by the artist’s initiative, does not appear to fit into these copying procedures. Lorvão iconographic diversity cannot be attributed solely to the difficulties and problems caused by a primitive model. In fact, in the approach to medieval illustration, copying processes were seen primarily as a means of pictorial reconstruction of the sources used — but they are more than that. There are many other elements involved in the process of copying illuminated manuscripts. Müller (2014) highlights some of these important factors in the introduction to her work on the use of models in the Middle Ages. The organization of the work and of the scriptorium, the transfer processes used, the technical-artistic constraints, the cultural background, the availability of models and motifs, the intention and objectives of the patrons, the messages that are sought in the selection of certain models — all of these are part of the intervening in the transmission process of a work.

26There is, however, also a transformative impulse in response to copying that is motivated by what we can call an ontological condition of visual representations. As “re-presentation”, an image being transmitted is always embedded in a hic et nunc: it is always updated. In view of this reality, the use of terms such as “copy” and “quote” should be made with caution. Müller (2014) has emphasized the fact that art history does not yet have specific terms to describe this phenomenon, and to cope with its “structural and semantic consequences” proposes the use of Julia Kristeva’s concept of intertextuality, where the hypotext would correspond to the new elements of the copied work of art, and the hypertext to the basic copied text. Hypotext is thus related to hypertext and “Perhaps using this terminology will allow us to describe in more detail the different levels of the copying process which translate into different levels of meaning” (Müller 2014, xxvi). Often, diversity prevails over unity in a series of works without, however, losing certain cohesive elements sufficient to give an identity to the cycle. Is a group of medieval works defined and structured by a single source (archetype), with which it maintains a commitment to continuity, or should we first consider the existence of cycles of mutant works?

27Regarding the cycle of Commentaries on the Apocalypse of Beatus of Liébana, Neuss was confronted with this problem early on in his attempts to link and merge the textual stemma with the pictorial stemma. Indeed, Neuss could not explain the pictorial divergences found in the oldest family of the tree, and thus divided his scheme into two main branches. While the second branch, in particular sub-branch IIa, exhibited relative consistency between textual genealogy and illustrations, the older branch — supposedly closer to the archetype and, therefore, supposedly more homogeneous — exhibited significant incongruities. Neuss justified this reality by a loss of artistic skill among the copyists of this period. Nevertheless, branch II has a formal and iconographic stability: the variations are mainly stylistic. Indeed, although a good number of these manuscripts are signed and include identification of the scriptoria, which are located in the same region near the models, the stemmatics with their traditional methodologies can still be relevant and useful in this case.

28We come back to the initial question of legitimacy and utility of a stemmatics of the image imported from textual criticism for the history of art. Regarding the intensive and extensive application of this method in the analysis of the Beatus cycle, we have found that it has been shown to have some usefulness and methodological adequacy in groups or branches of works with some peculiarities: works produced in a circumscribed region near scriptoria and accessible models, or works with substantial formal stability. Textual criticism and stemmatics used this hypothesis as a methodological basis, but these cycles and works of art were rarely born from original works. As Kubler recalls, using the biological metaphor, the mutant gene at the start of a series of works can be infinitely small, but this mutant fraction imposes consequences on the progeny of the art object. Kubler even wonders if the original objects have a real existence; in exchange, he designates the initial solutions for a series as “promorphic” and the final solutions as “neomorphic” (Kubler 1970, 40).

Retrograde analysis

29Without more documentary elements of the genesis of an image other than the image itself — and perhaps a date, a location and an identification of the authorship — and having only a few similar works to compare, how can one trace its stemma? How can one establish the connections with previous works? When we approached some aspects of image creation in the manuscript of Lorvão, we used a procedure very often used in art criticism, the analysis of the art-making process. We tried to understand the artist’s options and visual solutions and, in this way, tried to get closer to the meaning of the images. In doing so, we were able to reconstruct, almost naturally, the starting point of the illustrator — that is, we managed to take a reverse path along the artist’s creative process. We can call this process a retrograde analysis of the genesis of an image.

30This is why we are convinced that the first Commentary attributed to the monk Beatus of Liébana was not, in terms of the body of the illustrations, a complete work as we conceive it today. A few illustrations recovered from a previous tradition, interspersed between the apocalyptic message divided into extracts (historia) and respective exegesis (explanatio), perhaps generated a desire for successive completion. A stemmatics of the image should be considered more in the cartography of this genetic development rather than in the search for an archetype. But a stemma codicum structured in bipartite branches is not suited to a process where variants and transformations eliminate, replace or hide — often by erosion — the sources of transmission. New visual solutions can invert or deviate from a model; they can use different and anachronistic models, single patterns or other cycles, building a network that is not compatible with linear affiliation. Closer to the idea of a rhizome than a tree — evoking the concepts formulated by Deleuze and Guattari (1976) – the genealogical structure of a cycle of works can be expressed in a non-arborescent stemma, which develops in multiple, multidirectional branches. At the same time, these connections tend to a limit, as in an open function, a limit which may even be an integral archetype, but more likely just an original trait in a mutant fraction or a set of promorphic works.

  • 7 For an overview see (Williams 1994, vol. I, chap. 3, 31–102).

31Confronted with existing approaches to the pictorial work of Beatus’ Commentaries,7 the analysis of the creative process of the illustrator from Lorvão shows us succinct but revealing evidence that the evolutionary paths of textual transmission and pictorial transmission are not of the same nature. While the textual tradition has its main instrument in copying (with mutations), in the pictorial tradition, in most cases, the identity of a series is preserved through a significant and non-occasional sequence of deviations. The predominance of these deviations over the preserved elements partly dilutes their own filiation. In these cases, it is not appropriate to speak of “descent”, “witnesses”, “errors” or “contamination” in the observed variants. Does this compromise the relevancy or even the workability of a stemmatics of the image? Otto Pächt, writing about the genealogical tree of a work by Rembrandt, points out this difference while acknowledging the existence of genetic evolution:

Il est peut-être bon ici de bien prendre conscience de la différence d’essence entre la filiation biologique et la filiation artistique et spirituelle. […] L’artiste peut, jusqu’à un certain degré, dans une mesure qui varie selon la situation historique, choisir ses modèles ; autrement dit, il détermine en réalité les ancêtres qu’il veut avoir et, à la différence de ce qui se passe dans la relation parents-enfant, il peut choisir d’avoir plus de deux géniteurs. […] Il s’agit bien de liberté […] mais, en même temps, il n’est pas question de “non-dérivabilité” […] Cette liberté, il faut se la représenter comme une liberté de choix, un droit de cogestion, de participation, accordé au créateur, celui-ci ne pouvant toutefois choisir que ce qui, en quelque manière, a des affinités avec lui.

[It is perhaps good to become aware of the difference in essence between biological filiation and artistic and spiritual filiation. The artist can, up to a certain degree, to an extent which varies according to the historical situation, choose his models; in other words, he actually determines the ancestors he wants to have and, unlike what happens in the parent-child relationship, he can choose more than progenitors. It is indeed freedom but, at the same time, it is not a question of “non-derivability” This freedom is a freedom of choice, a right of co-management, of participation granted to the creator, a creator that cannot, however, choose what, in some way, has affinities with him.]

(Pächt, Demus, and Lacoste 1994, 135)

32Since Heinrich Wölfflin and particularly since Alois Riegel the work of art has been understood as a link in a historical chain. Despite this, there is no area of art history devoted specifically to the study of these genetic relationships. Hans Belting emphasizes in his “Thèses sur les tâches actuelles de la recherche en art” [Theses on the current tasks of art history] that history of art “envisage ainsi des series où une oeuvre est mise en rapport non seulement avec son publique mais aussi avec un art antérieur, ou avec des artistes ou des oeuvres à venir” [envisages series where a work is put in relation not only with its public but also with an earlier art, or with artists or works to come](Belting 1989, 44). Under the very broad and imprecise concept of “influence”, the history of art has developed its research without a clarification of what an influence consists of. An area of study more dedicated to the genesis of images could make a significant contribution to the making of art history. With a more accurate methodology it could rescue the history of art from the reductive simplicity of the iconographic and formal analogies on which the history of art has been based, try to free itself, as far as possible, from the “tyrannie du visible” [tyranny of the visible], to use a Didi-Huberman expression (Didi-Huberman 1990, 64).

  • 8 The concept of “mouvance” had already been formulated by Zumthor (1972).
  • 9 See also Canfora 2002.
  • 10 See Ferrer 2002. See also de Biasi and Herschberg-Pierrot 2017.

33The structuring role of variants (synchronous aspect of a single witness) in the transmission of images (diachronic aspect of the tradition) is not exclusive to the pictorial tradition. In philology, the awareness of the contrast between the verticality of diachrony and the horizontality of synchrony opened new paths in textual criticism that can be shared with an eventual stemmatics of the image. The so-called New Philology started with Cerquiglini’s “Éloge de la variante”(Cerquiglini 1989) where the new concept of “variance”, in contrast to that of variant, opens new paths for stemmatics,8 and where the original itself is understood as a potential variance in itself9 or the emergence of a “genetic criticism” that, in contrast to stemmatics, emphasizes the creative process in the textual transmission rather than the search for the purity of the original,10 providing some practical and theoretical foundations for a similar approach to pictorial traditions.

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Bibliography

Actas del Simposio para el estudio de Los códices del “Comentario Al Apocalipsis” de Beato de Liébana. 1978. 2 vols. Madrid: Joyas Bibliográficas.

Belting, Hans. 1989. L’Histoire de l’art est-elle finie? Nîmes: Jaqueline Chambon.

Canfora, Luigi. 2002. Il copista come autore. Palermo: Sellerio.

Cerquiglini, Bernard. 1989. Éloge de la variante. Histoire critique de la philologie. Paris: Seuil.

de Biasi, Pierre-Marc, and Anne Herschberg-Pierrot. 2017. L’Œuvre comme processus. Paris: CNRS Éditions.

Deleuze, Gilles, and Félix Guattari. 1976. Rhizome. Editions de Minuit.

Didi-Huberman, Georges. 1990. Devant l’image: Question posée aux fins d’une histoire de l’art. Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit.

Eco, Umberto. 1982. Beato de Liébana. Milan: Franco Maria Ricci.

Ferrer, Daniel. 2002. “Production, Invention, and Reproduction: Genetic vs. Textual Criticism.” In Reimagining Textuality: Textual Studies in the Late Age of Print, edited by Elizabeth Bergman Loizeaux and Neil Fraistat, 48–59. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

González Echegaray, Joaquín, ed. 1995. Obras Completas de Beato de Liébana. Vol. 47. Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos.

Gryson, Roger. 2012. Beati Liebanensis Tractatus de Apocalipsin. Vol. 107 B–C. Corpus Christianorum: Series Latina. Turnhout: Brepols.

Klein, Peter K. 1976. Der ältere Beatus-Kodex Vitr. 14-1 der Biblioteca Nacional Zu Madrid: Studien Zur Beatus-Illustration und der spanischen Buchmalerei Des 10. Jahrhunderts. Hildesheim and New York, NY.: G. Olms.

Klein, Peter K. 2004. Beato de Liébana: La Ilustración de Los Manuscritos de Beato y El Apocalipsis de Lorvão. Translated by Beatriz Mariño. Valencia: Patrimonio Ediciones.

Kubler, George. 1970. The Shape of Time: Remarks on the History of Things. 6th ed. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Menéndez Pidal, Gonzalo. 1954. Mozárabes y asturianos en la cultura de la Alta Edad Media. Madrid: Bolétin de la Real Academia de História.

Miller, Konrad. 1895. Mappaemundi: Die ältesten Weltkarten: Rekonstruierte Karten. Stuttgart: Roth.

Müller, Monika E. 2014. The Use of Models in Medieval Book Painting. Newcastle Upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Neuss, Wilhelm. 1931. Die Apokalypse des Hl. Johannes in der altspanischen und altchristlichen Bibel-Illustration: Das Problem der Beatus-Handschriften. Munich: Aschendorffschen Verlagsbuchhandlung.

Pächt, Otto, Otto Demus, and Jean Lacoste. 1994. Questions de méthode en histoire de l’art. Paris: Macula.

Quentin, Henri. 1926. Essais de critique textuelle (Ecdotique). Paris: Picard.

Sanders, Henry A. 1930. Beati in Apocalipsin Libri Duodecim. Rome: American Academy (Papers / Monographs).

Scheller, Robert Walter Hans Peter. 1995. Exemplum: Model-Book Drawings and the Practice of Artistic Transmission in the Middle Ages (Ca. 900-Ca. 1470). Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

Schmitt, Jean-Claude. 2003. “Images and the Historian.” In History and Images: Towards a New Iconology, edited by Axel Bolving and Phillip Lindley, 19–44. Turnhout: Brepols.

Stones, M. Alison. 1976. “Secular Manuscript Illumination in France.” In Medieval Manuscripts and Textual Criticism, edited by Christopher Kleinhenz, 83–102. Chapel Hill, Nc.: University of North Carolina Press.

Williams, John. 1994. The Illustrated Beatus: A Corpus of the Illustrations of the Commentary on the Apocalypse. 5 vols. London: Harvey Miller Publishers.

Zumthor, Paul. 1972. Essai de Poétique médiévale. Paris: Seuil.

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Notes

1 Beatus of LorvãoCommentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus de Liébana attributed to the scriptorium of the Monastery of São Mamede de Lorvão, 1189. Arquivo Municipal da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa. Call number: Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Lorvão, códice 44.

2 Viage de Ambrosio de Morales por Orden del Rey D. Phelipe II in Los Reynos de Leon y Galicia y Principado de Asturias para Reconocer las Relíquias de Santos, Sepulcros Reales y Libros Manuscritos de las Catedrales y Monasterios. Republication of the report of Ambrosio de Morales’s expedition between June 1572 and 20 November 20 1573 by Henrique Flórez. 1765. Madrid: Antonio Marín, pp. 51–52.

3 Between the probable date of the first writing of the commentary (776) and those of the first fairly complete known Beatus (dated from the mid-tenth century), only the Fragment of Silos (Biblioteca del Monastero de Santo Domingos, frag. 4) remains — a single folio with an illumination dated to the last decades of the ninth century.

4 The set of codices identified to date consists of complete and partial works, fragments and a facsimile from the seventeenth century, as well as more than 1,500 illustrations.

5 The text of Beatus de Liébana followed in this article is the text unified by Henrique Flórez in 1770, and published in a bilingual edition prepared by González Echegaray (1995).

6 Genève, Bibliothèque de Genève, Ms. lat. 357: The Institutions of Priscian and the Commentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus of Liébana (https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/list/one/bge/lat0357). Image licensed under CC-BY-NC by the Bibliothèque de Genève.

7 For an overview see (Williams 1994, vol. I, chap. 3, 31–102).

8 The concept of “mouvance” had already been formulated by Zumthor (1972).

9 See also Canfora 2002.

10 See Ferrer 2002. See also de Biasi and Herschberg-Pierrot 2017.

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List of illustrations

Title Figure 1: Stemma of Konrad Miller (1895).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-1.png
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Title Figure 2: Stemma of Gonzálo Menéndez Pidal (1954).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-2.jpg
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Title Figure 3: Stemma of Wilhelm Neuss (1931).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-3.jpg
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Title Figure 4: Stemma of Henry Sanders (1930).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-4.jpg
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Title Figure 5: Stemma of Peter Klein (1976).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-5.jpg
File image/jpeg, 62k
Title Figure 6: Stemma of John Williams (1994).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-6.jpg
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Title Figure 7: Stemma of Roger Gryson (2012).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-7.jpg
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Title Figure 8: Super bestiam muliere. Folio 43r. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-8.jpg
File image/jpeg, 109k
Title Figure 9: Unclean spirits. Folio 182r. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-9.png
File image/png, 532k
Title Figure 10: The last attack of Satan. Folio 203v. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-10.png
File image/png, 504k
Title Figure 11: Christ between the clouds. Folio 14v. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-11.jpg
File image/jpeg, 123k
Title Figure 12: Message to Smyrna. Folio 54r. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-12.png
File image/png, 488k
Title Figure 13: Message to Thyatira. Folio 64r. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-13.png
File image/png, 505k
Title Figure 14:The fifth angel poured out his bowl. Folio 181v. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-14.png
File image/png, 617k
Title Figure 15: Woman sitting on a scarlet beast. Folio 186v. Lorvão codex.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-15.png
File image/png, 592k
Title Figure 16: Celestial Jerusalem. Lorvão. Folio 209v.
Credits Image reproduced with the permission of the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisboa.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-16.png
File image/png, 556k
Title Figure 17: Celestial Jerusalem. Geneva. Folio 241r.6
Credits Image licensed under CC-BY-NC by the Bibliothèque de Genève.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/variants/docannexe/image/1662/img-17.png
File image/png, 574k
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References

Bibliographical reference

Jorge Silva Rocha, “Stemmatics and Image. Remarks on the Twelfth-Century Beatus Commentary on the Apocalypse of Lorvão”Variants, 17-18 | 2024, 63-85.

Electronic reference

Jorge Silva Rocha, “Stemmatics and Image. Remarks on the Twelfth-Century Beatus Commentary on the Apocalypse of Lorvão”Variants [Online], 17-18 | 2024, Online since 01 December 2024, connection on 18 January 2026. URL: http://journals.openedition.org/variants/1662; DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/130sb

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About the author

Jorge Silva Rocha

Jorge Manuel Gomes da Silva Rocha (1952) graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts of Lisbon and PhD in History, Art and Archaeology from the Université Libre de Bruxelles where he was a member of the Groupe de Recherche en Histoire Médiévale (GRHM). He taught Art and Art History in Macau, Belgium and Lisbon for more than forty years. He is currently a cooperating professor at Universidade Lusófona.

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Copyright

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The text only may be used under licence CC BY 4.0. All other elements (illustrations, imported files) may be subject to specific use terms.

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