Peregrinations: Journal of Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture Medieval Art and Architecture

Volume 7 Issue 1 195-199

12-4-2019

BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and Mary Beth Winn. (Paris: Les Enluminures: 2018) Mary Beth Winn. (Paris: Les Enluminures: 2018)

Emily Savage University of St Andrews, Scotland

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Recommended Citation Recommended Citation Savage, Emily. "BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and Mary Beth Winn. (Paris: Les Enluminures: 2018)." Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture 7, 1 (2019): 195-199. https://digital.kenyon.edu/perejournal/vol7/iss1/12

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____________________PEREGRINATIONS_______________ JOURNAL OF MEDIEVAL ART AND ARCHITECTURE

VOLUME VII, NUMBER 1 (AUTUMN 2019)

BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the

Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an

introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis

Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and

Mary Beth Winn. (Paris: Les Enluminures: 2018).

EMILY SAVAGE

University of St Andrews, Scotland

This sales catalogue, produced by Les Enluminures, presents a rich and varied

collection of relatively unknown vernacular manuscripts from Western medieval Europe,

dating roughly from 1300 to 1550. Founded in 1991 by Sandra Hindman, Les Enluminures

now has gallery locations in Paris, New York and Chicago, and also regularly exhibits

medieval manuscripts, jewellery and other works of art at international arts and antiques

fairs. As this excellent little book demonstrates, however, their associated publications are

more than mere advertisements.

In his introduction, Christopher de Hamel observes that manuscripts are special

because, unlike other forms of art, “they can talk” (p. 8). De Hamel underlines the

continuing significance of orality to manuscript production, first in the early transitional

age famously described by Michael Clanchy in From Memory to Written Record (1979), and

later in the rise of the vernacular languages to which this volume is dedicated. We can

trace this development further as the taste for manuscripts in the vernacular trickles down

Savage

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from the aristocracy, and vernacular books for private devotion, edification, and pleasure

proliferate during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

This proliferation is reflected in the structure of the catalogue itself, with five

sections devoted to French, Italian, German, Dutch, and English manuscripts, respectively.

Each section is prefaced by a brief essay which weaves the catalogue’s featured

manuscripts into the larger history of their vernacular. Such a framework might

unintentionally produce isolated material and linguistic histories, but the authors are keen

to highlight connections between the thirty-six books highlighted here. (Two items, cat.

nos. 19 and 36, contain printed material.) The title, Shared Language, suggests one recurring

element: multilingualism. A case in point is the religious miscellany likely produced in the

Southeastern Netherlands or Western Germany (Cat. no. 23, Fig. 1). Dating to c. 1460-1480,

it contains texts in Latin, Low German, and Dutch, thus reproducing the “linguistic

realities” of its geographical origin (p. 76). In a time where white supremacists seek to

bolster their cause by citing an invented white, monolingual, nationalist history, it is

imperative that we teach this multilingual past.1

Are certain kinds of texts better suited to the vernacular? Reading Shared Language,

the overall impression is that vernacular languages fostered textual experimentation. For

the medieval Low Countries, John van Engen focuses on the “veritable explosion” of

religious texts associated with the Modern Devotion, a broad movement linked by

regimental meditation on the Passion of Christ (p. 90). Dennis Dutschke comments on

1 Rachel Moss, “Inventing (the) English: Racism, Multilingualism and Medieval Studies,” Creative

Multilingualism, August 9, 2017, accessed September 10, 2019.

https://www.creativeml.ox.ac.uk/blog/exploring-multilingualism/inventing-english-racism-multilingualism-

and-medieval-studies.

Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture, Vol. 7, Iss. 1 [2019]

https://digital.kenyon.edu/perejournal/vol7/iss1/12

https://www.creativeml.ox.ac.uk/blog/exploring-multilingualism/inventing-english-racism-multilingualism-and-medieval-studieshttps://www.creativeml.ox.ac.uk/blog/exploring-multilingualism/inventing-english-racism-multilingualism-and-medieval-studies

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the so-called Three Crowns, Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, whose literary

accomplishments ignited a passion for the vernacular in Italy, one which spread even

amongst the nascent middle classes (p. 47). Meanwhile, in England, manuscript collections

of legal statutes were perennially fashionable. One particular legal language used in these

texts, Law French, combines ingredients from Anglo Norman, Parisian French, and

Middle English (Cat. no. 33). In her accompanying essay, Emily Runde notes that even

with the advent of print “British books remained sites of multilingualism” (p. 107). Of

Figure 1 Miscellany including Thomas a Kempis, Imitatio Christi, book one; Marcus

of Regensburg, Visio Tnugdali; H[enricus] Salteriensis, Tractatus de Purgatorio de

Sancti Patricii; Johannes Gobi, Historia de spiritu Guidonis; Historia Udonis

Magdeburgensis episcopi; Ps-Bede, De meditatione passionis Christi; Bonaventure,

Lignum vitae; Ludolf von Sudheim, Reise ins heilige Land; Visio Philiberti; Ps-

Anselm, Dialogus beatae Mariae et Anselmi de passione domini (Latin and Dutch

versions); and other texts. In Latin, Low German, and Dutch, decorated manuscript on

paper. Netherlands (Southeastern?) or Western Germany, c. 1460-1480 [TM 625]

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course, this small collection should not be seen as wholly representative of the histories of

these vernaculars; the variety of texts, or lack thereof, presented here must be due in part

to commercial factors.

Figure 2 Prudentius of Troyes, Flores psalmorum (Flowers of the Psalms); Prayers in Latin

and Italian. In Italian and Latin, decorated manuscript on parchment. Northern Italy, c.

1400-1450 [TM 891]

Another matter echoed across the catalogue concerns the role of women, primarily

as agents of translation. In scholarship women are often identified as the intended

audience for early vernacular texts, due in part to low Latin literacy rates (p. 70). However,

in this collection we see them not just as readers or listeners, but also as patrons, authors,

and collectors (Cat. nos. 6, 16, 19, 21, 24, 28, 30). Indeed, a remarkable fifteenth-century

prayerbook in this collection (Cat. no. 16, Fig. 2) may even have been compiled and copied

Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture, Vol. 7, Iss. 1 [2019]

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by its female owner. Its contents, which include the early medieval Flores psalmorum by

Prudentius of Troyes and a charm to ensure safety in childbirth, suggest an individual

comfortable reading in Latin and Italian, and a woman as concerned about the condition

of her earthly body as her eternal soul.

Readers should note that fuller descriptions of most manuscripts in this catalogue

are freely available on www.textmanuscripts.com, which features a detailed inventory of

more than 1000 manuscripts that have passed through Les Enluminures over the years.

This information is unfortunately buried on the publication page.

As a sales catalogue, this book naturally boasts an appealing page design, and each

entry is illustrated with a single, high-definition color image. On an academic level, the

author and contributors have succeeded in producing a volume that functions as a

practical reference work for postgraduates and scholars. Their clear and concise

introductory essays are backed up by a useful, if brief, bibliography. As for the

manuscripts themselves, readers will find much to delight in.

Savage

Published by Digital Kenyon: Research, Scholarship, and Creative Exchange, 2019

http://www.textmanuscripts.com/

BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and Mary Beth Winn. (Paris: Les Enluminures: 2018)Recommended Citation

BOOK REVIEW: Shared Language: Vernacular Manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Text manuscripts 7. Text by Laura Light, with an introduction by Christopher de Hamel, and essays by Dennis Dutschke, Stephen Mossman, Emily Runde, John Van Engen, and Mary Beth Winn