Elements of Art Historiography in Medieval Texts: an analytic study

156 Pages·1970·4.827 MB·English

by  E. F. van der Grinten (auth.)

Elements of Art Historiography
in Medieval Texts
Elements ofA rt Historiography
in Medieval Texts
an analytic study
by
E. F. VANDER GRINTEN
Translated from the Dutch by
MISS D. AALDERS
MARTINUS NIJHOFF / THE HAGUE / 1969
ISBN-13: 978-90-247-0387-6 e-ISBN-13: 978-94-011-6427-6
DOl: 10.1007/978-94-011-6427-6
CONTENTS
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . 1
Approaches of the concept of style 5
The hand of the artist . . . . . . 18
Personality and work of the artist . 23
Awareness of the history of art . 32
The idea of progress. . . . . . . 38
The concepts old and new . . . . 46
Seeing and describing works of art 56
Comparisons. . . . . 65
References to pictures . 73
Appendix ..... . 78
INTRODUCTION
The attitude of medieval men of letters towards plastic
arts, architecture and applied art has so far been studied
from a primarily aesthetic point of view. The cause of this
may be found, I offer no opinion on it, in the conceptions
of the authors who have been publishing on this during the
last seventy-five years or in the fact that most medieval
texts that until recently were available in editions, were
for the greater part works of a theological, mystical or
encyclopaedic-theoretical kind.1 Anyhow, it is an estab
lished fact that these studies were brought to bear on the
texts of a limited number of well-known medieval writers,
such as: Augustine, Isidore of Sevilla, Strabo, Scotus
Erigena, Alcuin, Hugh and Richard of S. Victor, Honore
of Autun, Bonaventure, Thomas Aquinas and Vincent of
Beauvais. The writings of these authors had been published
in large series such as Migne's Patr%gia Latina, the
1 L. Venturi, Storia della critica d'arte, Turin 19643 (1st ed. Brussels
1938); E. de Bruyne, Etudes d'Esthetique medievale, 3 vols, Bruges
1946; R. Assunto, La critica d'arte nel pensiero medioevale, Milan
1961; id., Die Theorie des SchOnen im Mittelalter, Cologne 1963;
E. F. van der Grinten, Enquiries into the History of Art Historical
Writing, Amsterdam 1952; L. Grassi, Costruzione della critica d'arte,
Rome 1955; C. Barret, "Medieval Art Criticism", The British Journal
of Aesthetics 5 (1965), 25-36; Encyclopedia of World Art, vol. VII
(1963) s.v. Historiography, col. 509-510 (L. Salerno); ibidem, vol. IV
(1961) s.v. Criticism, col. 122-128 (R. Assunto); ibidem, vol. XIV
s.v. Treatises, col. 281-286 (R. Assunto). Unfortunately I have not
been able thus far to trace the essay (1963) by E. Panofsky on medie
val english analytic description of works of art mentioned by H.
Kauffmann in his obituary notice on Panofsky in Kunstchronik
(XXI) August 1968 pp. 260-266.
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Monumenta Germaniae Historiae and in separate editions.
These writings contain relatively few actual evaluations of
monuments of art.
A great number of sources of a different kind have been
made accessible by Julius von Schlosser, Victor Mortet and
especially Otto Lehmann-Brockhaus; from chronicles,
annals and vitae they collected passages directly referring
to works of art and artists.1 The texts in these publications
have been arranged with a view to the study of the history
of a monument in a particular place, that is to say, they
are arranged alphabetically according to place names and
then chronologically for each place. I have thought it
useful to juxtapose these texts while tracing the words,
terms or turns of speech which were used by the chronicle
writers (as representatives of men of letters) in describing
or mentioning works of art in their immediate environ
ment, which they may be assumed to have seen them
selves or the data for which they have taken over from
eye-witnesses. By way of comparison I also included a
number of passages from Pliny and Vitruvius.
This paper consists of two parts: the first part ap
proaches and comments on characteristic terms and ways
of expression arranged in a number of paragraphs; the
second part is an appendix containing a number of frag
ments from texts in the original language, references to
which are made in the first part. For ease of survey the
first part is divided into nine chapters dealing successively
with: the approaches of the concept of style, the hand of
the artist, personality and work of the artist, awareness of
the history of art, the idea of progress, concepts old and
new, seeing and describing works of art, comparisons and
1 See list of abbreviations for works cited, pp. 78-79.
2
references to pictures. Where the commentary required it
I have provided the meaning of the passages I selected
and in doing so I have made use of the extensive vocabu
laries which have been added to the publications mention
ed (especially the 457 page list belonging to the English
sources from the hand of O. Lehmann-Brockhaus) and
also of Niermeyer's Lexicon the greater part of which has
been published.1
An attempt has been made to solve the problem of
translated texts,2 the problem of "Hineininterpretieren"
of non-contemporary concepts, by also giving the frag
ments selected in their original language so that one will
be able to judge terms and turns of speech in their context.
This comparative evaluation of terms and turns of
speech may contribute to a less absolutistic interpretation
of texts referring to single monuments. In offering their
judgements on works of art or artists chronicle writers
often u~ superlatives or call them unique because their
horizon, in contrast to that of classical authors like Pliny
and Vitruvius, do not reach beyond their own immediate
environment. This restricted outlook which does not allow
for a great deal of comparison, may be one of the causes of
the absence of any awareness of what we would call
style-periods.
One finds that works of art and artists are on the whole
judged in a business-like and materialistic way and one
is struck by the frequency with which the credit of a work
of art is given to artists (who more often than not appear to
1 J. F. Niermeyer, Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus (published
A-Vaccaricius), Leyden 1954-1968.
I E. G. Holt, A Documentary History ofA rt, vol. I, The Middle Ages
and The Renaissance, Princeton 1957; I have not paid sufficient atten
tion to this in my thesis cited on p. 1 note 1.
3
be known by name) and besides to principals or to secular
or church authorities during whose rule or with whose
support a work has been accomplished.
4
APPROACHES OF THE CONCEPT OF STYLE
In present day speech the style of a work of art is often
indicated by single adjectives to which can be added the
word style, manner or school. In this way one speaks of
gothic, impressionistic, classicistic, Venetian etc. During
the Middle Ages this way of indicating style, referring
to one particular work of art and adding a substantive,
was the only one known. The most common substantives
are: opus, scema, modus, mos, genus and stilus. The practice
of using substantives derived from adjectives such as
gothicism, impressionism, classicism, to indicate move
ments or periods, was completely unknown.
Compounds with opus. The word opus is used innumer
able times in medieval texts. According to the adjective
used with it I can distinguish three groups of meanings:
a. a style-denoting meaning by the addition of words like
romanum, italicum, theutonicum, jrancigenum, graecum,
saracenum, paganum, anglicum (often also by way of an
absolute ablative opere romano etc. or a genetive plural in
stead ofa n adjective opus romanorum or opere romanor um) ;
b. an aesthetic qualification by the addition of words
like speciosum, incomparibile, excellens, nobile, subtile,
splendidissimum, venustum, admirabile, artificiosum, delec
tabile, elegans, decens (this too by way of an absolute
ablative opere specioso etc.);
c. a technical qualification with the added adjective
indicating the technique in which the work has been car
ried out: arcatum (vault or arch construction), aurifabrile
(goldsmith work), caelatorium (chased work), caemen-
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tarium, carpentarium, fusorium (cast work), /apideum,
ligneum, musivum, quadratum (with square stone blocks)
and finally a number of qualifications referring to the main
outline of the plan of a building: opere rotundo, opere
sphaerico but usually the word scema is used in that case.
There is no doubt as to the origin of the technical
qualifications: they are directly derived from classical
Latin, in particular the expressions from building tech
niques like building walls: opus reticulatum, opus incertum
etc.; compounds with "work" also occur in the building
technique of germanic languages e.g. brick-work, forme
work, false-work and the german expression Westwerk.
ad. a. Compounds with opus which we might consider as
denoting style are those in which the added adjective is a
geographical word.
The earliest expression used is Graeco opere (Graeco
usually written with a capital); the 11 th century text of
the history of the church of Lindisfame mentions a donat
ion from King Ethelstan (925-939) to the church (in honour
of St. Cuthbert) consisting of a.o. two plates (patena), one
made of gold and the other one made Graeco opere. (Al)1
Bardo's biography (Bardo died in 1051 as archbishop of
Mainz), written towards the end of the 11 th century,
makes mention of a garment made of wool by Rohingus in
the Greek manner (Graeco facto opere). (A2) The Vita
Altmanni (bishop of Passau, died in 1091), written after
about 1150, mentions a painted portrait of the Virgin
Mary, with an admirable expression in the 9reek manner
(Graeco opere), presented by an ambassador from
1) Numbers combined with letter A refer to fragments of texts
numbered in the Appendix, pp. 80 seq.
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