Medieval Hungary

Niclaus Gerhaert at the Liebieghaus

2012-03-04T21:10:00.001+01:00

Niclaus Gerhaert: Self portrait (?), c 1463
Musée de l'Oeuvre Notre-Dame, Strasbourg

The Liebieghaus in Frankfurt dedicated a monographic exhibition to the late Gothic sculptor Niclaus Gerhaert of Leiden. Alongside Hans Multscher, Gerhaert is regarded as the most important artistic character developing the naturalistic formal language of Late Gothic sculpture. His career corresponds to the spread of artistic ideas from west to east: although it is not known whether he was actually born in Leiden (given as his origin in later sources), but he was likely trained in the artistic milieu of the Southern Netherlands, then in the 1460s worked on the eastern part of the Holy Roman Empire - more precisely in Strassburg - and was finally invited by Emperor Frederick III to Vienna and Wiener Neustadt, where he died in 1473. Although the corpus of works firmly attributed to him is rather small, his influence was enormous, and members of his workshop as well as his followers determined the development of Late Gothic sculpture in Central Europe. The art of both Veit Stoss and Tilman Riemenschneider would be unthinkable without the influence of Gerhaert.

The exhibition currently on view in Frankfurt is accompanied by a comprehensive catalogue edited by Stefan Roller. There are essays in the catalogue by a number of authors, following an introductory study by Roland Recht. This part is followed by catalogue entries, the first part of which include all the surviving works attributed to Niclaus Gerhaert (including those not in the exhibition), while the second part analyses the sculptures featured at the Frankfurt exhibition - arranged in groups of works from the environment of the master, and works showing his influence.

In the following, I would like to focus on one aspect of the subject, the influence of Gerhaert in the Kingdom of Hungary. I stated above that the sculptor was invited to Vienna by Frederick III, the most formidable opponent of Hungary's king Matthias. Gerhaert was commissioned to work on the tomb of the Emperor (in the Stephansdom of Vienna) and also on that of Queen Eleonore of Portugal (in Wiener Neustadt). Work on the Vienna tomb was likely disrupted in 1473, at the death of the artist, and again in 1485, when the troops of Matthias moved in to occupy the town. By that time the tombstone was moved to Wiener Neustadt, only to be returned to Vienna in 1493, so three years after the death of King Matthias. The tomb was not completed until 1513. There are few other works firmly attributed to Gerhaert from his Viennese period: first among them is the tomb of Queen Eleonore at Wiener Neustadt, wife of Frederick III, who passed away in 1467 - at the time the master was invited by the Emperor. In Wiener Neustadt, there is also a painted limestone statue of the Man of Sorrows at the former Cathedral (the Diocese was established by Frederick in 1469). Apart from these stone monuments, there a few wooden statues from this period, as Niclaus Gerhaert was an equally versatile sculptor both in stone and wood. Two small statues of the Virgin in Child - one in the Metropolitan Museum, the other in private collection - round out this period of the artist.

Head of St. John from Tájó

In the territory of the Kingdom of Hungary, it was his works of wood which exerted a considerable influence. Stefan Roller dedicated a study to the influence of of Gerhaert in Central Europe, and two objects from Upper Hungary (the territory of modern Slovakia) are actually included in the exhibition. Altogether, four works are discussed: the Head of St. John the Baptist from Tájó (Tajov, Slovakia), the main altar of Kassa (Košice) and the Nativity group as well as a figure of the Virgin at the reading stand - both originally from the main altar of the parish church of Pozsony (Bratislava).

In the catalogue, the head of St. John from Tájó, preserved at the Stredoslovenské múzeum of Banská Bystrica (Besztercebánya / Neusohl) is attributed to Gerhaert himself (cat. no. 16, by Stefan Roller) - a very convincing attribution, based on comparisons with the Crucifixion group of the Nördlingen altarpiece, as well as the Man of Sorrows in Wiener Neustadt. The last time this sculpture was shown in the west - at the exhibition of Gothic art from Slovakia, at the Musée Cluny in 2010 - this attribution was not yet spelled out explicitly.

The other works are attributed in the catalogue to a follower of Gerhaert, whose career matches that of the master: it is Hans Kamensetzer, who also moved from Strassburg to Vienna. Both the main sculptures of the high altar of Kassa (Košice, dating from 1474-77) and sculptures from the former high altar of Pozsony (Bratislava / Pressburg; dating from 1481 and after, cat. no. 54) are attributed to him in the catalogue, but only with a question mark. This is something which - as far as I know - has not been raised before, although the close reliance of both ensembles on the art of Niclaus Gerhaert has of course been mentioned many times before. I would be interested to know what experts of the period believe of this new attribution. There is one more question, which is not discussed in much detail in the catalogue: the role of the court of King Matthias at Buda in commissioning these works. One theory - represented for example by Robert Suckale - attributes these chief works to the direct patronage of king Matthias, who sought to emulate Frederick III by inviting artists from the same circle as he did. In this sense, these works would reflect the lost late Gothic art of the Hungarian capital, Buda. Others, such as Ernő Marosi and Gábor Endrődi, see different reasons for the appearance of these works, and emphasize local connections - quite plausible in the case of Pozsony and Vienna. Anyway, these are questions to be worked out by further joint efforts of Hungarian and Slovak art historians, as it was the case with the 2003 exhibition at the National Gallery of Slovakia, dedicated to Gothic art.

Central part of the main altar of Kassa ( Košice), 1474-77

However, perhaps the question could have been explored a bit further by the inclusion of two more statues in the exhibition. Obviously, the main altar of Kassa - which still stands in the sanctuary of the Church of Saint Elizabeth - could not be moved for the sake of an exhibition, but the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest has two statues originating from Kassa: statues of two of the church fathers, namely St. Gregory the Great and St. Jerome. The statues, which were carved in the workshop of the main altar, likely were part of the structure of the main altar originally. Their realistic style is a good example of the new style initiated in the region by Niclaus Gerhaert and his followers - even if their quality does not reach that of the main figures of the altarpiece, or the extraordinary fineness of the Nativity group from Pozsony. All in all, it is a welcome development that this circle of works from the territory of medieval Hungary is discussed in such an important and high quality, monographic exhibition catalogue.

One final observation: this catalogue is one of the most beautiful books I have seen in recent times. The printing quality is impeccable, and the illustrations are of the highest quality. The large, full-page photos - and some double-page spreads - literally jump of the pages. Other aspects of the content not discussed here - such as the technical analysis of the carving methods and decoration - also benefit a lot from this high level of production.

Nativity from Galgóc, originally on the main altar of St. Martin's at Pozsony, 1480s
Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava

The exhibition closes in Frankfurt at the time of writing, on March 4, 2012. However, starting from March 30, 2012, the exhibition will also be shown in Strasbourg, at the Museum Œuvre Notre-Dame.

Bibliographic data:

Roller, Stefan (ed..): Niclaus Gerhaert. Der Bildhauer des späten Mittelalters; Liebieghaus Skulpturensammlung, Frankfurt am Main, 27. Oktober 2011 bis 4. März 2012. Petersberg: Michael Imhof Verlag, 2011.

I would like to thank the Liebieghaus Skulpturensammlung and the press department of the Städel Museum in Frankfurt am Main, for providing a review copy. Photos are provided by Liebieghaus Skulpturensammlung (except of the Tájó head of the Baptist, which is my own photo from the 2003 Bratislava exhibition).

Related links: The website for the exhibition in English, and in German (with somewhat more information).

Press release for the exhibition in Frakfurt (pdf download).

Information on the catalogue on the museum website, and on the publishers website.

The table of contents of the catalogue (pdf).

A review of the catalogue by Ralf Dorn, in H-ArtHist.

Finally, here is a film about the exhibition - some more are available on the exhibition website as well as on YoutTube.

Medieval manuscripts of Batthyáneum available online

2012-02-19T14:05:00.002+01:00

The Batthyáneum Library of Gyulafehérvár (Alba Iulia, Romania) is one of the most important historic libraries in Transylvania. It was founded in 1798 by Ignác Batthyány, the bishop of Transylvania. The library was housed in the former church of the Trinitarian order - first an observatory was created here, and later the library was established in the building (all this was modeled on the Archdiocesan Library of Eger). The library of Batthyány grew from many sources, but the most important among these was the library of Christoph Anton von Migazzi, the bishop of Vác and also the bishop of Vienna. Batthyány bought the 8000 volume library of Migazzi, which included a lot of medieval manuscripts. When established at Gyulafehérvár, the Batthyáneum held about 20.000 volumes - a number which continued to increase throughout the 19th century. In addition to simply being a library, the institution worked as a museum, holding Batthyány's collection of minerals and naturalia, as well as a collection of ecclesiastical art. Finds from the excavations of Gyulafehérvár cathedral carried out by Béla Pósta in the early 20th century are also kept here.

The 20th century history of the library was not free from controversy: some books were sold in the 1930s, but the institution continued too function as a public library even after the Trianon peace treaty awarded Transylvania to Romania. However, in 1949 the collection was nationalized, and later became part of the Romanian National Library. Access to the collections became very limited - a situation which continues to this day. Even though a government decree returned the building and collection of the library to the Roman Catholic Archbishopric of Gyulafehérvár, the Library still functions as part of the state library system, and the court cases going on have so far not clarified the situation.

The library holds today altoghether 927 manuscripts and 565 incunabula, making it the richest collection of this kind of material in all of Romania. The medieval manuscripts are of various origins: Migazzi's library included all kinds of western manuscripts, but Batthyány also bought complete medieval libraries from Hungary, including the holdings of the ecclesiastical libraries of Lőcse (Levoča / Leutschau, Slovakia, see this Hungarian language study with German summary: Eva Selecká Mârza: A középkori Lőcsei Könyvtár, Szeged, 1997.). Several Transylvanian collections were also incorporated into the library, and there are rich holdings of orthodox Romanian manuscripts in the collection. In the framework of a European digitization project, a large number of manuscript are now available in the Manuscriptorium platform. In fact, there is a special section dedicated to manuscripts from the Batthyáneum.

The library holds a large number of first class illuminated manuscripts - many of which can now be consulted online. The following is a selection of a few of the most important of these (providing direct links to pages of this dynamic website is quite complicated. I managed to make direct links to the digital facsimile pages below - but you may start to browse or search from the start page, to get to object descriptions, etc.)

Ms II 1, first part of the Lorsch Gospels (Codex Aureus of Lorsch), from the Palace workshop of Charlemagne, dating around 810 (on the history of the whole manuscript, see also this overview)

Ms III 87, a nicely illustrated early 15th century Franco-Flemish Book of Hours

Ms II 134, A Missal from Pozsony (Bratislava / Pressburg), dating from 1377, with explicit by Henrik of Csukárd

There is a lot more there - you can start browsing from the start page, Manoscriti qui in theca batthyanyana. Furthermore, you can find some more illuminated manuscripts from the Europeana database - not all of which have been made available in the current digitization effort.

'Apollonius pictus' facsimile published by National Széchényi Library

2012-02-05T14:51:00.000+01:00

The National Széchényi Library just announced that an exclusive facsimile edition of the so-called Apollonius manuscript has been released, accompanied by a collection of studies by international authors.

The oldest medieval manuscript of the National Széchényi Library is a fragment, which has recently been identified (COD. Lat. 4). It contains a late-antique "adventure novel" of the story of King Apollonius of Tyre. The novel enjoyed great popularity in the Middle Ages. The manuscript contains not just the text of the novel, but 38 uncolored pen drawings, making it the oldest illustrated copy of the story. Despite the importance of the manuscript, it has been almost completely unknown.

The parchment manuscript was written around the year 1000, in the Benedictine monastery of Werden an der Ruhr, situated in the archdiocese of Cologne. The manuscript remained there during the Middle Ages, but then entered a collection in Cologne. By the 18th century it was held at the Evangelical Convention in Sopron, from where in 1814 it entered the National Library.

The manuscript was identified and first analysed by two researchers, Anna Boreczky and András Németh, and by 2010, a number of foreign researchers - most notably Xavier Barral i Altet - were involved in first phases of research, the results of which were presented to the public on December 8, 2010. The present facsimile edition is the result of a international collaboration, and is accompanied by multi-language commentary. The commentary volume starts with an introduction by Ernő Marosi, and was written by Xavier Barral i Altet, Anna Boreczky, Herbert L. Kessler, András Németh, Andreas Nievergelt and Beatrice Radden Keefe. In addition to the basic data and a bilingual (English and Hungarian) description of the manuscript, a critical edition of the text is also included.

Data of the volume: Apollonius pictus. Egy illusztrált, késő antik regény 1000 körül. / An illustrated, late antique romance around 1000. Ed. Anna Boreczky and András Németh. Budapest, Széchényi National Library, 2011.

The above text is based on the information released by the National Széchényi Library. A review will follow, once I get hold of the publication. Below is one page of the fragmentary manuscript.

Italy and Hungary in the Renaissance (Book review)

2012-01-22T12:52:00.000+01:00

Back in 2007, a major conference was organized at Villa I Tatti (The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies in Florence), dedicated to Humanism and early Renaissance art in the Kingdom of Hungary. The conference aimed to give an overview of the field, focusing naturally on connections between Italy and Hungary. In August 2011, the long-awaited volume of the these studies has been published by Villa I Tatti, edited by Péter Farbaky and Louis A. Waldman. The conference, the research trip to Hungary which followed it, and the volume together represent the crowning achievement of the role of I Tatti as "a bridge between Hungary and Florence in the world of humanistic scholarship for three decades" - as emphasized by director Joseph Connors in the Foreword.

It also has to be pointed out that in 2008, an entire series of exhibitions and events were organized in Hungary in the framework of the so-called Renaissance Year. Three exhibitions, in particular, have to be mentioned here: the Budapest History Museum organized a large international exhibition dedicated to the rule of King Matthias in Hungary. Titled Matthias Corvinus, the King, the exhibition was accompanied by a large catalogue, also edited by Péter Farbaky with Enikő Spekner, Katalon Szende and András Végh (published in an English version as well). A large number of the participants of the 2007 Villa I Tatti conference also contributed to this catalogue - where naturally actual physical objects are in focus. The two publications thus nicely complement each other. Two smaller exhibitions focused on more special topics: the exhibition at the National Széchényi Library, titled A Star in the Raven's Shadow, was dedicated to János Vitéz, archbishop of Esztergom, and the beginnings of Hungarian Humanism in the middle of the 15th century. The exhibition of the Museum of Applied Arts - The Dowry of Beatrice - examined the origins of Italian majolica at the court of King Matthias, focusing on the magnificent Corvinus-plates made in Pesaro. (To get the English-language catalogues, search for item nos. 58713 and 113069 at www.artbooks.com).

Temperance,
15th c. fresco at the Palace of Esztergom

However, the conference organized at I Tatti was the event met with most extensive response. This was largely due to two of the the papers presented at the conference and a press conference held by the Hungarian Cultural Minister in Rome, announcing the findings of these two papers. At the conference, Zsuzsanna Wierdl and Mária Prokopp presented their theory concerning one of the 15th century frescoes at the castle of Esztergom, attributing it to the young Botticelli - a subject I have written about elsewhere on this blog.

Naturally, there is much more to the book than these sensational claims. The volume makes the lectures presented at the conference available in an edited format. The description of the book at the Harvard University Press website gives a good overview of its main topic:

"In the later fifteenth century, the Kingdom of Hungary became the first land outside Italy to embrace the Renaissance, thanks to its king, Matthias Corvinus, and his humanist advisors, János Vitéz and Janus Pannonius. Matthias created one of the most famous libraries in the Western World, the Bibliotheca Corviniana, rivaled in importance only by the Vatican. The court became home to many Italian humanists, and through his friendship with Lorenzo the Magnificent, Matthias obtained the services of such great Florentine artists as Andrea del Verrocchio, Benedetto da Maiano, and Filippino Lippi. After Matthias’s death in 1490, interest in Renaissance art was continued by his widowed Neapolitan queen, Beatrice of Aragon, and by his successors Vladislav I and Louis II Jagiello. The twenty-two essays collected in this volume provide a window onto recent research on the development of humanism and art in the Hungary of Matthias Corvinus and his successors. Richly illustrated with new photography, this book eloquently documents and explores the unique role played by the Hungarian court in the cultural history of Renaissance Europe."

Giovanni Dalmata: Beatrice of Aragon and King Matthias Corvinus

I would only like to mention a few of the studies from the book. The volume starts with a number of studies on historiography - by Ernő Marosi, László Szörényi, Gyöngyi Török, and Péter Farbaky. The next section is dedicated to tracing the contacts of Hungary with Italian Humanism. The third, and perhaps most substantial section is dedicated to Renaissance art at the court of King Matthias, in particular to questions concerning the library of Matthias. As I already outlined here before, a lot of new research has been dedicated to this famous library, and thanks to the results of digitization efforts, now over one-hundred manuscripts once in the property of King Matthias can be consulted online. In the Villa I Tatti volume, Angela Dillon Bussi compares the library of Matthias with that of Lorenzo the Magnificent, while Jonathan J.G. Alexander writes about an Italian illuminator working in Buda, Francesco da Castello. Then follow the studies by Prokopp and Wierdl on Botticelli at Esztergom - the skepticism receiving their claims is already voiced in the editorial introduction to the volume (p. xxxii).

One of the Corvinus dishes made in Pesaro
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art

The following studies deal with Renaissance architecture in Hungary - Péter Farbaky writes on the royal castle of Buda and the role of Chimenti Camicia, while Gergely Buzás provides a summary of his research concerning the royal palace of Visegrád. Árpád Mikó of the Hungarian National Gallery writes about the patronage of the Queen, Beatrice of Aragon. Perhaps the most important study is provided by one of the editors, Louis Waldman. Waldman provide completely new material on commissioning for King Matthias in Florence, based on a review of the primary sources. In this context, he also provides further proof for refuting the claims of Prokopp and Wierld concerning Botticelli. In the focus of the essay is Alexander Formoser, and agent of Matthias Corvinus in Florence.

Newly discovered relief fragment by
Gregorio di Lorenzo, from Vác

The last section of the book is dedicated to Italian renaissance sculpture at the Hungarian court. Francesco Cagliotti revisits the profile reliefs by Verrocchio sent to Matthias, while Dániel Pócs writes about the white marble fountain of Verrocchio, also sent to Buda. Alfrendo Bellandi gives an overview of the career of Gregorio di Lorenzo - identified not so long ago with the Master of the Marble Madonnas. Johannes Röll writes about perhaps the most important sculptor working for King Matthias: Giovanni Dalmata. The final essay, again by Waldman, focuses on the period after the death of Matthias, the Jagiellonian period.

Overall, this volume provides a great overview of new research about Humanism and Renaissance art at the court of Matthias Corvinus. When taken together with publications from Hungary's Renaissance Year of 2008, these books now provide a full overview of the state of the field for the English-speaking audience as well.

The double title page of the Philostratus-Corvina
Budapest, Széchényi National Library

Full citation of the book:

Italy and Hungary: Humanism and Art in the Early Renaissance. Acts of an International Conference, Florence, Villa I Tatti, June 6–8, 2007. Edited by Péter Farbaky and Louis A. Waldman. (Villa I Tatti 27). Florence, 2011. Hardback, 768 pp. The book was produced in partnership with Officina Libraria (Milan), and is distributed worldwide by Harvard University Press. € 76.50 / $ 85.00

I would like to thank Villa I Tatti and its previous and present Assistant Directors for Academic Programs, Louis A. Waldman and Jonathan K. Nelson, for providing a review copy of the book.
Related posts mentioned above:
New research on the Bibliotheca Corviniana

Corvinian Manuscripts at the Laurenziana
Botticelli in Esztergom?

New medieval art websites VI.

2012-01-18T21:59:00.000+01:00

A number of very useful online image databases have been launched recently, dedicated to late medieval / northern Renaissance painting. Also, access to digitized medieval manuscripts is getting more and more easy. Here is a selection - the following descriptions are based on texts given on the websites themselves.

Museum Mayer van den Berg

Antwerp

Flemish primitives - This website was created by the association of Flemish art museums, The Flemish Art Collection, and so is a collaborative project of Belgian museums in Antwerp, Ghent and Bruges. The goal is to present a website that is a reference point for the painted arts in the Burgundian Netherlands in the 15th century and early-16th century. Visitors can search paintings from Flemish museums or follow thematic collection presentations. It seems that over 400 paintings are available in the database now - I hope that image management and viewing options will improve later on.

Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

A lot more information and much more images are provided by the newly launched Cranach Digital Archive (cda). This is "an interdisciplinary collaborative research resource, providing access to art historical, technical and conservation information on paintings by Lucas Cranach (c.1472 - 1553) and his workshop. The repository presently provides information on more than 400 paintings including c.5000 images and documents from 19 partner institutions." The Cranach Digital Archive is a joint initiative of the Stiftung Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf and Cologne Institute of Conservation Sciences / Cologne University of Applied Sciences, with several partner institutions. It is highly recommended (via 1100sor).

University of Pennsylvania

More and more medieval manuscripts are also being made available online. Last Fall, the University of Pennsylvania finished the digitization of their manuscripts collections, making the books (including over a thousand medieval and renaissance manuscripts) available at the Penn in Hand website. The University of Chicago is providing online access to the Goodspeed manuscript collection, comprising 68 early Greek, Syriac, Ethiopic, Armenian, Arabic, and Latin manuscripts ranging in date from the 5th to the 19th centuries. Yale (Beinecke Library) and Harvard (Houghton Library) have been providing access to their early codices for quite some time now. Meanwhile, it has been announced that the union catalogue of medieval manuscripts in America is returning to the University of California, Berkeley. It is now at the url: http://www.digital-scriptorium.org

Hungarian Academy of Sciences

While we are on the subject of manuscripts, I would like to call attention to a special resource from Hungary (it is not new, but perhaps not too many people know about it). It is the Kaufmann-collection of medieval Hebrew manuscripts in the Oriental Collection of the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. The website provides an introductory study on the collector, Dávid Kaufmann and his collection, and the complete facsimile of five manuscripts. All of this is available in Hungarian, English and even Spanish. The manuscripts include the famous Kaufmann-Haggadah, originating from 14th century Catalonia, which has already been published in a print facsimile.

Pope Sylvester and the regalia of St. Stephen (Happy New Year!)

2011-12-31T16:10:00.000+01:00

December 31st is the feast day of St. Sylvester, that is Pope Sylvester I (314-335), well known as the recipient of the Donatio Constantini, in which Emperor Constantine transferred power over Rome to the pope. The document is actually an 8th century forgery, as already proved by Nicholas of Cusa and Lorenzo Valla in the 15th century. Pope Sylvester also carried out several miracles - for example resurrecting a bull which was killed by a sorcerer during their contest or defeating a dragon which terrorized the populace of Rome. You can read his legend (from the Legenda Aurea) here. The Hungarian Angevin Legendary illustrates his story in six scenes (all in the main body of the codex, which is at the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana); I am including the two scenes mentioned above.

Pope Sylvester revives a bull
BAV Ms. Vat.Lat. 8541, f. 72r

Pope Sylvester pulls a dragon out of the lake
BAV Ms. Vat.Lat. 8541, f. 73v

In this post, however, I would also like to commemorate another Sylvester, Pope Sylvester II (reigned 999-1003), that is, the scholar Gerbert d'Aurillac. Gerbert became pope with the support of Emperor Otto III, and played a crucial role in establishing the Kingdom of Hungary as the newest Christian monarchy of Europe. He established the first archbishopric of Hungary at Esztergom, which became the center of the Hungarian church. The pope also approved the coronation of Hungary's newly baptized ruling prince, István - who became Hungary's first king. According to early chronicles and legends, the pope sent a crown to Stephen for this event. The coronation of St. Stephen took place on January 1st, 1001 (by most accounts). For his role in establishing Hungary as a Christian Kingdom, Stephen was canonized in 1083.

At this point we briefly have to review the regalia associated with King Stephen I. It is known that the first symbol of his rule was a lance, which he received from the Emperor, and which was associated with the Holy Lance, one of the imperial relics. This insignia did not survive, but its former existence is proven by the first silver denarius of Stephen, which carries the inscription LANCEA REGIS. St. Stephen is also depicted with a lance in his right hand on the Coronation Mantle, while in his other hand he is holding a globe. This original globe did not survive, there is an early 14th century globe in its place among the Hungarian coronation insignia.

The Coronation Mantle itself, however, survives. It was originally a chasuble, which - according to its inscription - was ordered by Saint Stephen and his wife Giselle in 1031, and donated to the Church of the Virgin Mary in Székesfehérvár. The chasuble was probably prepared for the planned coronation of Stephen son, Prince St. Emeric - which did not take place due to the unexpected death of the young prince. It was transformed into a coronation mantle during the 13th century, and has been in continuous use during the coronation ceremonies until 1916, the coronation of the last Hungarian King, Charles IV. It is today in the Hungarian National Museum.

The oldest surviving element of the Hungarian coronation insignia is the specter. It consists of a rock crystal ball and a handle. The rock crystal was carved in Fatimid Egypt during the tenth century, so it could have been already in the treasury of King Stephen. It was most likely attached to the present-day handle during the twelfth century - although one of the esteemed researchers of the regalia, Endre Tóth believes that the entire specter dates from the time of King Stephen I.

Another symbol of royal power was the sword. The sword, which is presently part of the Hungarian royal insignia, dates from the 15th century. Two other swords, however, are likely connected with Saint Stephen:

The 10th century Hungarian saber in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna was the insignia of Hungary's ruling princes and was probably still in use at the time of St. Stephen. The saber got out of Hungary during the 11th century, and later became part of the imperial regalia, as the Saber of Charlemagne - and thus is kept at the Schatzkammer in Vienna to this day.

The other sword is today in Prague, and is known as the Sword of St. Stephen. It is a Carolingian sword, with a 10th century handle of Viking manufacture. It is likely the sword which Stephen received when he became ruling prince in 997. There are several theories concerning when and how the sword got into Prague - in an inventory of the treasury of Saint Vitus cathedral from 1355 it is already mentioned as Gladius beati Stephani regis Ungarorum cum manubrio eburneo.

Finally, what about the crown Pope Sylvester II sent to Stephen for his coronation on New Year's day of 1001? Of this nothing certain is known. Historical investigation has found no proof that the pope had actually sent a crown to Stephen - the story is only known from the early 12th century biography of St. Stephen, the so-called Hartvik-legend. The Holy Crown of Hungary had of course been regarded throughout history as the crown of St. Stephen - but in reality it is not. It is a crown which was combined of two parts some time in the late 12th century. The lower part of the the crown is a Byzantine female crown which was given by Emperor Michael Dukas VII to King Géza’s wife around 1075. The upper part of the crown - the so-called Corona Latina - also dates to the 11th century, and was originally part of an unknown object, an object possibly in the treasury of St. Stephen.

You can learn more about the Hungarian coronation insignia on my website or from an earlier brief post here.

My Hungarian-speaking readers may want to look at a recent article by Endre Tóth about King St. Stephen and his coronation insignia:

Tóth Endre: "Szent István és a koronázási jelvények." In: Magyar Szemle XX (2011), part I. and part II.

A Nativity Tapestry from Brussels (Merry Christmas!)

2011-12-23T11:49:00.000+01:00

I would like to wish Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all my readers with a detail from the most beautiful late medieval tapestry in the collection of the Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest. The central field of the tapestry depicts the Nativity, or more specifically, the Adoration of the baby Jesus - these beautiful angels hover over the scene. The Nativity image is of a type which became widespread upon the influence of late medieval mysticism: the newborn Saviour lying on the ground is adored by his mother the Virgin Mary and angels. On either side a sibyl is standing holding a scroll with the text of her prophecy in her hands. In the top left corner the Adoration of the Magi, in the right corner the Annunciation are seen. (see the full image below).

An exact analogy of the tapestry can be found in the Museo Diocesano in Trento, as the first piece of a seven-part cycle depicting Christ’s Passion. That cycle was purchased by Bernardo Cles, the prince-archbishop of Trento (1514–1539) from Joris van Lickau, a merchant of Antwerp in 1531. The tapestries were made earlier: the piece showing the Carrying of the Cross features the date 1507, and in another one the name of the leader of the Brussels weaving workshop, Pieter van Aelst (ca. 1450 – 1531/1533) can also be read.

The origins of the images on the tapestry can be traced to 15th century Flemish painting: the Annunciation follows the popular composition of Rogier van der Weyden (1399/1400 – 1464), while the central depiction was influenced, among others, by Robert Campin (ca. 1375 – 1444). The prototype for the Adoration is a print in Albrecht Dürer’s engraved cycle of the life of the Virgin (about 1500 – 1502). Based on the stylistic features of the tapestry, the composition can be attributed to Jan van Roome of Brussels, court painter of Margaret of Austria (demonstrable between 1498 and 1521), who is well-known from contemporary sources. The tapestry comes to the museum from the Cathedral of Győr - and probably originates from bishop Demeter Náprágyi’s (1559 – 1619) bequest in 1619. In 1914 Francis Joseph I, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, purchased it and donated it to the Society of the Friends of the Museum. (Money from the sale went for the renovation of the cathedral.)

Nativity Tapestry, Brussels, c. 1510. Pieter van Aelst’s workshop, Jan van Roome’s (?) design

Wool, silk and metal thread, woven with gobelin technique, H.: 275 cm W.: 260 cm

Budapest, Museum of Applied Arts, Inv.no.: 18328

(More details below!)

In memoriam Miklós Boskovits

2011-12-22T23:29:00.000+01:00

Miklós Boskovits in 2005

I learned with sadness of the passing of Miklós Boskovits, perhaps the most eminent art historian of Hungarian origin. The sad news was announced by Villa I Tatti in Florence, where Boskovits had been a fellow back in the 1960s, a short time after he had left Hungary. Miklós Boskovits, a university professor at the University of Florence and researcher at the Kunsthistorisches Institut was the leading expert of Florentine (and Italian) late medieval and early Renaissance painting. He was the author of a number of collection catalogues of early Italian paintings for major museums - including the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin (1988), the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection (2001), and most recently, the National Gallery of Art, Washington (2003). He wrote the most extensive monograph on Florentine painting of the late 14th century (1975), and took over the editing of the Corpus of Florentine Painting, started by Richard Offner in 1930 - authoring two recent volumes of the series: about the Origins of Florentine Painting and, more recently (in 2007) about the Mosaics of the Baptistery of Florence. He also worked on a number of major exhibition projects, and served as the editor of Arte Cristiana.
He was 76 years old.

Miklós Boskovits received his training as an art historian in Hungary, at Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest. Emigrating to Italy, he joined the ranks of a number of eminent Hungarian researchers working abroad. Listing only those working on Florentine art, we have to mention Frederick Antal, author of Florentine Painting and its Social Background (1948), and two great Michelangelo-scholars: Johannes Wilde and Charles de Tolnay. Throughout his career, Boskovits maintained close contacts with his home country, and was always willing to help his fellow Hungarians. He was instrumental in establishing a program at Villa I Tatti, providing a grant to art historians from East-Central Europe (a program benefiting a lot of Hungarian scholars). He was always very helpful to me, as well: consulting with me as I was writing my dissertation; helping a lot as a member of the advisory board of the 2006 Sigismundus-exhibition, and advising me in my research on Masolino, during my I Tatti fellowship last year. His death was unexpected, and he will be greatly missed.

You can browse the books written or edited by him at Kubikat - where you can also find his other publications numbering in the hundreds.

Update: I would like to call attention to a few more obituaries of Boskovits:

Notice in Il Giornale dell'Arte
Neville Rowley in The Art Tribune
Obituary in the Storia dell'Arte blog - with links to several newspaper articles
Finally, the brief news which appeared in the Hungarian press

Honoring Miklós Mojzer

2011-12-07T23:30:00.001+01:00

It is a long-standing tradition in Hungary's major art museums to celebrate on St. Nicholas's day: it is the name day of Miklós Mojzer, the doyen of Hungarian museologists, retired director of the Museum of Fine Arts. Yesterday a special celebration was held in his honor at the Hungarian National Gallery - the 80 year old Mojzer was honored by a special issue of Hungary's prestigious art history journal, Művészettörténeti Értesítő. Miklós Mojzer worked in all of Hungary's museum with major holdings of Old Masters: he started his career at the Christian Museum of Esztergom, and then worked at the Old Hungarian collection of the Museum of Fine Arts. When in 1974, this collection joined the rest of the Hungarian National Gallery in its new building - the former royal palace in Buda castle - Mojzer went with the collection, and became its head from 1977 to 1989. In this period this collection - encompassing works of Hungarian and Central European art from the 11th century to the Late Baroque - became one of the most significant such ensembles of the region. To get a glimpse of the relevant artwork, you can browse the website of the museum - the first four groups on this page of collection highlights belong to the Old Hungarian Collection. In this period, Mojzer was also the editor of Művészettörténeti Értesítő, the journal of the Association of Hungarian Archaeology and Art History.

From 1989 until 2004, Miklós Mojzer was the director of the Museum of Fine Arts, leading this institution into the 21st century by starting the reconstruction and underground expansion of the museum, and organizing a series of highly important exhibitions. The collections of the museum were also greatly expanded during his tenure. Miklós Mojzer remained active after his retirement, publishing a number of important articles - including ones dedicated to his lifelong research-interest, Master MS. His findings will be the topic of another blog post - it is enough to say now that Mojzer proposed a solution to this enigmatic master of late Gothic paintings, whose chief works are at the Christian Museum and at the Hungarian National Gallery (the latter providing the sole illustration to today's post). A selection of his publications is listed in the Kubikat catalogue.

The new issue of Művészettörténeti Értesítő contains studies from the general field of research of Mojzer: studies on late medieval altarpieces, on Hungarian medieval painting and sculpture, on Renaissance and Baroque painting and similar subjects. Edited by Anna Jávor and Árpád Mikó, the studies in this special issue were written by the best Hungarian researchers in these fields, many of whom had worked together with Miklós Mojzer for many years. I would like to wish him many more productive years and a long life!

More info here or here

Saint Nicholas Day

2011-12-06T00:00:00.000+01:00

St. Nicholas providing dowries at night to the three virgins.

Panel form the St. Nicholas altar of Jánosrét (Lúčky), c. 1480-90.

Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest

This is the central part of the altarpiece, with St. Nicholas in the shrine of the altar.

Happy Saint Nicholas Day!

More info here or here

Library of Medieval and Renaissance art in Transylvania

2011-12-03T23:05:00.000+01:00

Rather than being a proper post, this is more like a collection of links - links to full-length books on medieval and Renaissance art in Transylvania. New databases, especially the Transylvanian Hungarian database maintained by transindex.ro and the newly opened Transylvanian Digital Database of the Transylvanian Museum Society, have made a number of old and new publications available, which - together with other resources - provide a good overview of art historical research in Transylvania. As most of these publications are in Hungarian, the following links will be mainly of use to my Hungarian readers - but others may find something useful as well (as some publications are in English or German). The focus of these publications is architecture, but a few other things are also available online. I'd be glad to add more resources to these - let me know if you've spotted something relevant!

I. Historical overview

History of Transylvania, ed. by László Makkai and András Mócsy, General Editor: Béla Köpeczi

Volume I. - From the Beginnings to 1606. English edition from 2001.

István Lázár: Transylvania - A Short History. 1997

II. Period of Hungarian Conquest

Gyula László: A honfoglaló magyarok művészete Erdélyben. Kolozsvár, 1943.
Art of the Hungarians at the Conquest period in Transylvania

III. Romanesque architecture

Géza Entz: Erdély építészete a 11-13. században. Kolozsvár, 1994.
Monograph and database on architecture in Transylvania in the 11-13th centuries.

Géza Entz: A gyulafehérvári székesegyház. Budapest, 1958
Monograph on the cathedral of Gyulafehérvár (Alba Iulia).

Daniela Marcu Istrate: A gyulafehérvári római katolikus székesegyház és püspöki palota régészeti kutatása (2000-2002). Budapest, 2008.

Monograph on archaeological research at Gyulafehérvár.

Erdély ezeréves püspöksége. A gyulafehérvári Szent Mihály székesegyház és érseki palota régészeti kutatása 2000-2008. Budapest, 2010
Overview of recent research at Gyulafehérvár.

IV. Gothic architecture

Géza Entz: Erdély építészete a 14–16. században. Kolozsvár, 1996.
Monograph and database on architecture in Transylvania in the 14-16th centuries.

Ferenc Lestyán: Megszentelt kövek - A középkori erdélyi püspökség templomai. Budapest, 2000.

Database of medieval churches in Transylvania.

Victor Roth: Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte Siebenbürgens, 1914

Edit Grandpierre: A kolozsvári Szent Mihály templom története és építészete. Kolozsvár, 1936.
Study on St. Michael's church in Kolozsvár (Cluj).

Géza Entz: Dési református templom (link 2). Kolozsvár, 1942.
The church of Dés (Dej).

Géza Entz: Szolnok-Doboka középkori műemlékei (link 2). Kolozsvár, 1943.

Medieval monuments in Szolnok-Doboka county.

Géza Entz: A középkori székely művészet kérdései (link 2). Kolozsvár, 1943.

Study on medieval art in the Szekler territories.

József K. Sebestyén: A középkori nyugati műveltség legkeletibb határai (link 2). Kolozsvár, 1929.

Study on medieval art in the Szekler territories.

József Köpeczi Sebestyén: A brassai fekete templom Mátyás-kori címerei. Kolozsvár, 1927.

Coat of arms at the Black Church of Brassó (Brasov).

László Dávid: A középkori Udvarhelyszék művészeti emlékei. Bukarest, 1981.

Monograph on medieval monuments of Udvarhely county.

András Sófalvi: Székelyföld középkori várai. In: Castrum 3, 2006.

Study on medieval castles in the Szekler territories.

V. Renaissance

Jolán Balogh: Az erdélyi renaissance. Kolozsvár, 1943.
Classic monograph on early Renaissance art in Transylvania.

Jolán Balogh: Kolozsvári kőfaragó műhelyek. XVI. század. Budapest, 1985.
Continuation of the previous monographs - studies on Renaissance carving at Kolozsvár.

József Bíró: Erdélyi kastélyok. Budapest, 1943.
Book on mansions and country houses of Transylvania - a snapshot taken just before most of them were destroyed in and after WWII.

Margit B. Nagy: Reneszánsz és barokk Erdélyben. Művészettörténeti tanulmányok. Bukarest, 1970.

Studies on Renaissance and Baroque art in Transylvania.

Margit B. Nagy: Várak, kastélyok, udvarházak, ahogy a régiek látták: XVII–XVIII. századi erdélyi összeírások és leltárak. Bukarest, 1973.

Inventories of Renaissance and Baroque castles and mansions in Transylvania.

András Kovács: Késő reneszánsz építészet Erdélyben 1541-1720. Budapest-Kolozsvár, 2003.
Also available as a single pdf file.
New monograph on Late Renaissance architecture in Transylvania.

János Szőcs: A Mikó vár története. Csíkszereda, 2005.
The Mikó-castle of Csíkszereda.

VI. Decorative arts

János Érdi: Erdély érmei, képatlasszal. Pest, 1862.

Historic medals from Transylvania.

Victor Roth: Kunsdenkmäler aus den Sächsischen Kirchen Siebenbürgens. I. Goldschmiedearbaiten. I-II. Teil. Hermannstadt, 1922.

Elek Benkő: Erdély középkori harangjai és bronz keresztelő medencéi. Budapest-Kolozsvár, 2002.
Also available as a single pdf file.
Monograph and database of medieval bells and bronze baptismal fonts in Transylvania.

Emlékkönyv Kelemen Lajos hetvenedik születése napjára. Ed. Attila Szabó T. Kolozsvár, 1947.
Studies dedicated to Lajos Kelemen.

VII. Journals

Erdélyi Múzeum, Kolozsvár, vols. 1874-2007 (link 2)

Dolgozatok az Erdélyi Múzeum Érem- és Régiségtárából. Kolozsvár

Brukenthal Acta Musei, Sibiu

STUDIA PATZINAKA. Journal of Medieval and Modern Studies (online)

Exhibition of Medieval Art in Cologne

2011-11-22T20:40:00.001+01:00

Last week I had a chance to see the exhibition "Glanz und Grösse des Mittelalters" at the Schnütgen Museum in Cologne (Splendour and Glory of the Middle Ages). The new building of the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum provides a spacious and modern exhibition space right next door to the historic building of the Schnütgen (the former St. Cecilia church) for such exhibitions (this is in fact the first such show). The rich collection of the Schnütgen Museum provides a great overview of medieval art in Cologne and the Rhineland - the aim of the present exhibition was to gather other highlights stemming from Cologne but kept in various collections worldwide. The resulting exhibition and the accompanying catalogue does provide a great overview of medieval sculpture and decorative arts in Cologne, and includes a number of important paintings and illuminated manuscripts as well (although naturally it cannot match the complete overview of medieval painting in Cologne provided on the lower floor of the nearby Wallraf-Richartz Museum).

Over a decade ago, a select number of medieval objects from the Schnütgen toured the US at the exhibition Fragmented Devotion (at the McMullen Museum of Art of Boston College). Now objects from American collections in New York, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington, Cleveland, Chicago and Los Angeles are shown alongside of loans from various European museums. The Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest lent two spectacular late Gothic statues of the Virgin Mary and St John, which are now joined with the crucified Christ, once again forming the original group once standing at the abbey church of Grosskönigsdorf. As I was not able to take photos in the exhibition, I am illustrating this with a photo I found on Wikipedia:

Crucifixion group from Grosskönigsdorf by Master Tilman, 1480/90

The life-size figures were carved by master Tilman - who has a sizeable oeuvre in the area - around 1480/90. It was interesting to see the group united - the sculptures in Budapest preserved much of their polychromy, while the Christ figure still in Grosskönigsdorf has been stripped of its paint layer. The two saints appeared on the art market after the dissolution of the monastery, and were purchased from a Munich art dealer in 1916. Why and how the central figure remained in its original place, is not known. Here is a link to the object description on the Museum of Fine Arts website.

Other photos of the exhibition can be seen on the German language Wikipedia page on the Schnütgen Museum. This being a blog on medieval Hungary, I would like to introduce a few more medieval objects from Cologne in Hungarian collections - none of which made the journey back to Cologne this time. The first piece I would like to mention comes, in fact, from the collection of Alexander Schnütgen. This small ivory box from the 12th century (pictured to the left) is today in the Christian Museum of Esztergom - it was bought by archbishop János Simor in 1884.

The Schnütgen collection to a large degree provided the model when the Christian Museum of Esztergom was founded in 1875. Schnütgen by that time was a devoted collector of ecclesiastical art - although he only donated his collection (the basis of the later museum) to the town of Cologne in 1906.

Other objects, including a 12th century wooden sculpture of a female saint (Mary Magdalene?) were also purchased by archbishop Simor from Schnütgen, and are today in Esztergom. The statue, unfortunately, got damaged in the fired which broke out at the Christian Museum in 1905 - but is still a beautiful example of Romanesque wooden sculpture from Cologne, the subject of a section at the Splendour and Glory exhibition.

The Museum of Applied Arts also holds a late 12th century ivory-covered reliquary box made in Cologne. The piece comes from the 19th century collection of Miklós Jankovich, with the false provenance of the abbey church of St. Denis. The piece was last shown at the exhibition surveying the Jankovich-collection, held at the Hungarian National Gallery in 2002.

Finally, at least one late medieval painting should be mentioned from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts. Painted by the Master of the St. Bartholomew Altarpiece, who was active in Cologne at the end of the 15th century, the small panel depicts the Holy Family, and also comes from the Jankovich-collection. This concludes my brief survey of medieval objects in Hungarian collections originating from Cologne - you may want to read more about Hungarian museums with medieval holdings.

Hungarian National Gallery in Crisis

2011-11-08T21:25:00.000+01:00

Throne room in the former royal palace
- now the home of winged altarpieces in the National Gallery

Hungary (and its capital, Budapest) has a rich and multi-layered art museum system, the result of almost two centuries of organic development (I wrote about these museums in a previous post). One of the largest such institutions in Budapest is the Hungarian National Gallery, officialy created as a separate museum in 1957, and presently housed inside the former royal palace on top of Buda castle hill. The museums is home to art from all over the territory of historic Hungary, ranging in chronology from the 11th century to the present day. The museum is the largest repository of Hungarian medieval art, holding stone carvings, sculptures, painting and complete altarpieces. You can browse highlights of the collection starting from this page. It is also a very important research center of Hungarian art history - during the last few decades, most new knowledge about Hungarian art was published in the catalogues and journals of the National Gallery, many of which can be studied online in the database of Hungarian museum publications (go down to "Magyar Nemzeti Galéria").

Hans Siebenbürger: St. Eligius before King Clotaire
One of the more recent acquisitions of the Gallery

Several years ago, the director of the Museum of Fine Arts, László Baán raised the possibility of once again uniting the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts and the Hungarian National Museum, into one mega-museum (The Art Newspaper 177, 2007). The idea then was met with skepticism and rejection - but was already put partly in practice in the 2010 exhibition at the Royal Academy in London titled Treasures from Budapest (to mixed reviews, as the detailed overview of Gábor Endrődi at the 1100sor.hu blog proved - in Hungarian, but with links to English-language reviews). Things, however, sped up this year, after a major EU-funded expansion plan of the Museum of Fine Arts was scrapped (On this, see the brief report of The Art Newspaper, as well as the letter to the editor of TAN at the bottom of this page.) Baán then went ahead to realize his plan of merging the two museums under his leadership, and received government support for it. What was only a plan this summer (see once again The Art Newspaper's report) quickly became a reality when the backing of this plan was announced in a government decree, and Baán was appointed as state commissary to lead the project. There was talk of negotiations, examinations and planning - but less the nthree weeks later, another decree was published, announcing that the two museums will have to be officially merged by February 29, 2012.

In the following I will cite the official standpoint of the Hungarian section of AICA (Association Internationale des Critiques d'Art), who were the first to react:

"This means that on the basis of a government decision, in a little more than four months one of our most important public collection institutions will cease to exist, and at the same time the greatest museum investment of the last one hundred years will begin. These are decisions of enormous significance, in connection with which hardly any further information has been released and no impact studies or professional background studies have been made available whatsoever, neither for the professionals nor for the wider public. The 'preliminary guidelines' set in the statements made by government commissioner Baán László, appointed on 29 September, are neither based on consensus nor even on a single professional opinion. The government has provided neither a concept in support of this decision of great concern nor any reasoning for it." (read the full statement here)

Couldn't agree more. This is where the situation stands this week. Art historians are still just trying to grasp what had happened - more vehement criticism is sure to come in the next few days.

There are two updates to this blog post - both news arrived as I was writing the post.

Update1: The director of the National Gallery, Ferenc Csák announced his resignation yesterday. His opinion, already voiced last week, is the following: "the merger is hasty, professionally ill-considered and harmful for both institutions," - and he clearly does not want to assist to this process.

Update2: What the Hungarian government thinks of the Hungarian National Gallery, was indicated by more news yesterday. A government-appointed commissioner, Imre Kerényi, presented a series of paintings commissioned and paid for by the government, with the intention of "illustrating special editions of the Hungary's new constitution". The paintings were to illustrate specific moments of 20th-21st century Hungarian history, culminating in the act of accepting the new constitution. Kerényi announced that the paintings will be first put on public display early next year in the Hungarian National Gallery. You can browse the gallery of the first 14 paintings in this gallery. Some knowledge of Hungarian is required for the outrage pouring from all corners of the press (see here, here, less critical here, and see in English, too.) Because of the clear medieval (Byzantine) references, I just had to illustrate one of the paintings here, depicting the crushing of the 2006 riots (by János Korényi - interview with him here). Comments are welcome!

Inaugural Lecture of András Kovács at HAS

2011-10-19T19:53:00.000+02:00

András Kovács at Szászrégen (Reghin), 2009

65 year old art historian András Kovács will deliver his inaugural lecture to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences tomorrow, on October 20th (he is an external member of the Academy). The title of his lecture, to be delivered in Hungarian, is: The Gyulafehérvár palace of the Princes of Transylvania.

András Kovács's primary field of research is the architecture of 16th-17th century Transylvania. Based on a careful reading of the sources (many not even studied before) and a detailed analysis of existing building and their ruins, he fundamentally altered our knowledge of this period - the new overview of the field is now provided by his magisterial survey of the period (Késő reneszánsz építészet Erdélyben 1541-1720, which is available online, either chapter by chapter or as a full pdf-version). He also wrote on medieval architecture, in particular about the cathedral of Gyulafehérvár (Alba Iulia).

András Kovács is professor of Art History at the Babeș-Bolyai University at Cluj-Napoca (Kolozsvár), and during the last twenty years he has raised a new generation of Hungarian art historians in Transylvania. His pupils have just dedicated a volume of studies to him: the 23 studies represent that high level of scholarship and keen attention to detail that he always required of himself and of his students. (Liber discipulorum: Tanulmányok Kovács András 65. születésnapjára. Edited by Zsolt Kovács, Emese Sarkadi Nagy, Attila Weisz. Kolozsvár, 2011.) This in itself shows the success of his work, not to mention everything that he did in order to preserve historic monuments and to organize the field of Hungarian-language art historical research in Romania. An (incomplete) list of the publications of András Kovács can be consulted on the University's website as well as in the Transindex database (with some further works available online), and also on the website of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

With this brief post, I, too would like to congratulate András Kovács, and look forward to hearing his lecture tomorrow!

Royal manuscripts (New medieval art websites V.)

2011-10-12T21:55:00.000+02:00

The year 2011 has been particularly rich in medieval exhibitions of a very high standard: while the National Gallery in London showed Devotion by Design: Italian Altarpieces before 1500, the Treasures of Heaven exhibition also traveled to London and was shown at the British Museum. The latter is now also amply covered by a new website, a 'digital monograph' made at Columbia University's Media Center for Art History. In Germany after an exhibition on the Hohenstaufen dynasty and Italy, which closed in February, now the Naumburger Meister exhibition is on view at Naumburg. In Paris, the Museé de Cluny dedicated and exhibition to the medieval sword, titled L'Épée - Usage, mythes et symboles. There were also several exhibitions on medieval manuscripts, including two on medieval fashion. The Getty Museum had several other temporary displays of medieval manuscripts, such as Stories to Watch, while the Louvre in Paris also displayed its medieval manuscript pages.

However, the end of the year still has two major exhibitions for everyone enthusiastic about medieval manuscripts. The first one is already open at the Royal Library of Belgium, in Brussels, and is dedicated to Flemish miniatures. As the press release states, in making this project, the Royal Library of Belgium and the Bibliotheque nationale de France joined for the first time to display and celebrate the heyday of Flemish manuscript illumination by organizing an exhibition of international significance. The exhibition began in Brussels (September-December 2011), and will continue in Paris (March-July 2012). In total, more than 140 illuminated manuscripts of the highest rank will be presented to the public in an original staging, that will showcase these exceptional pieces while maintaining the context in which they were born. The project is of course accompanied by a scholarly catalogue. You can read about the exhibition here or here, as well as in the French-language press release (pdf).

From Nov. 11, the British Library (London) will show Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination, displaying "a unique treasure trove of medieval and Renaissance manuscripts assembled by English kings and queens over 700 years." The 150 manuscripts in the exhibition represent the most stunning pieces from the library's collection, the largest group of medieval manuscripts in Britain and one of the most important in the world. The Medieval and Earlier Manuscript Blog of the British Library regularly posts on outstanding items to be featured in the exhibition.

Those not fortunate enough to travel to one of these exhibitions, can now browse fully digitized versions of royal manuscripts on the website of the Europeana Regia project. The project aims to "digitise 874 rare and precious manuscripts from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, with the collaboration of five major libraries located in four countries and the support of the European Commission. The project will draw together three collections of royal manuscripts that are currently dispersed and which represent European cultural activity at three distinct periods in history: the Biblioteca Carolina (8th and 9th centuries), the Library of Charles V and family (14th century) and the Library of the Aragonese Kings of Naples (15th and 16th centuries)." Several dozen manuscripts are already online.

Reims, Naumburg - and Hungary?

2011-10-05T20:49:00.000+02:00

This week an international art history conference is commencing in Naumburg, in conjunction with a major exhibition dedicated to the Naumburg Master. The exhibition - which is still on view until the beginning of November - is accompanied by a monumental catalogue, published in two volumes, and in over 1500 pages. Titled “The Naumburg Master - Sculptor and Architect in the Europe of Cathedrals“, the Saxony-Anhalt State Exhibition focuses on "the sculptors and stonemasons associated with the name “Naumburg Master“ [who] had an outstanding reputation throughout medieval Europe." The main topic of the catalogue is the French origin of the so-called Naumburg Master, with special emphasis on the impact of the Reims cathedral workshop on Central Europe (there is an entire chapter dedicated to the effects of Reims, with 9 studies - see the contents here). This is not a review, and the following is only based on a cursory study of the book.

I think that a broader examination of direct connections of Central European artistic centers with the main sites of High Gothic art in France would have been necessary. In this context I definitely would have liked to see at least a few passages about medieval Hungary. Due to dynastic, personal and other, as yet untraced connections, a number of Hungarian monuments from the 1220s and 1230s are directly connected to the most fashionable monuments of French High Gothic. A few examples: in the early Gothic Cistercian Abbey church of Pilis, the tomb of Queen Gertrude (killed in 1213) was erected in the 1220s by a master hailing from Chartres or Reims. The tomb is one of the earliest examples anywhere of the combination of the Roman type sarcophagus and the medieval gisant. Another tombstone from Pilis, this time of a knight, gives the impression of being a two-dimensional, drawn version of the most fashionable High Gothic statues at Chartres. At about the same time, Villard de Honnecourt was also in Hungary (and likely at Pilis), coming directly from Reims - but it is not known what exactly he did here.

Pannonhalma, Porta Speciosa
Detail from the archivolt

Furthermore, the final section of the Benedictine Abbey church of Pannonhalma, consecrated in 1224, would have been unimaginable without the cooperation of builders and stone carvers trained in Champagne (Reims). The Porta Speciosa there (also completed by 1224) was also carved by this group of masters coming from Reims. The masters who worked on the vaulting of the nave as well as the building of the southern wall and portal must have been in residence in Hungary at the same time as their compatriots were working on the Capella Speciosa in Klosterneuburg.

Other churches of that exact period, such as the Church of St Stephen protomartyr in Esztergom or the Cathedral of Kalocsa also followed French Gothic prototypes. Now, much of this is largely destroyed (except for Pannonhalma) - but stone carvings, statue fragments survive in large number. Much of this material has been published extensively in German, English and French, in international catalogues and journals, as well as in many Hungarian publications. Authors such as Ernő Marosi, Imre Takács and Tibor Rostás wrote extensively on the “French connection”.

Head of a king from the tomb of
Queen Gertrude, Pilis Abbey

When one looks at the "Naumburger Meister" catalogue, it seems that none of the above monuments or art historical connections are mentioned at all in those 1566 pages. No mention of Pilis, Esztergom or Pannonhalma. No Marosi, Takács or Rostás in the bibliography (there is no index in the book). No comparison of masked consoles or the Laubwerk of Reims with Pannonhalma (only with Naumburg). No mention of the relevance of the date of 1224 (consecration date of Pannonhalma) to the chronology of Reims. No mention of the connections of Reims, Pannonhalma and Bamberg (Fürstenportal), much discussed in the literature. Only a brief mention of Villard’s Hungarian trip, without any discussion of the context of this visit.

I think at least a brief overview of some of these Hungarian monuments - as well as some of the Bohemian or Polish monuments, which are similarly lacking from the catalogue - would have made for a much better understanding of the wider Central European context of the Naumburg Master. I also think this task still has to be done.

Pannonhalma, original capitals of the Porta Speciosa

I don't want to get into further details here - but to help start discussion, I am providing some bibliographic references - books and studies which could have been consulted in the making of the catalogue. To be fair, I am not citing obscure studies in Hungarian, only publications in world languages, available at the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte in Munich.

Marosi, Ernő: Die Anfänge der Gotik in Ungarn : Esztergom in der Kunst des 12.-13. Jahrhunderts.
Budapest, Akadémiai Kiadó: 1984.

Marosi, Ernő: "Zur Rezeption der Früh- und Hochgotik im Osten Mitteleuropas" In: Gothic architectures in Poland, Bohemia, Slovakia, and Hungary, Cracow, 1992, 21-26.

Marosi, Ernő: "Die Baukunst der Benediktiner im Ungarn der Árpádenzeit : zum Problem der "Ordensbauschulen"." In: Acta historiae artium Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 38.1996, 15-29.

Takács, Imre: "Die Erneuerung der Abteikirche von Pannonhalma im 13. Jahrhundert" In: Acta historiae artium Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 38.1996, 31-65.

Wiebenson, Dora - Sisa, József, ed.: The architecture of historic Hungary. Cambridge, Mass. [u.a.], MIT Press: 1998.

Takács, Imre: "Fragmente des Grabmals der Königin Gertrudis" In: Die Andechs-Meranier in Franken. Europäisches Fürstentum im Hochmittelalter, Exh. Cat. Mainz 1998, 103-109.

Takács, Imre: "The French connection : on the Courtenay family and Villard de Honnecourt apropos of a 13th century incised slab from Pilis abbey." In: Künstlerische Wechselwirkungen in Mitteleuropa, ed. Fajt, J. – Hörsch, M. Ostfildern, 2006. 11-26.

Takács, Imre: "Transregional artistic cooperation in the 13th century in accordance with some Hungarian court art examples" In: Acta historiae artium Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 49.2008, 63-76.

Takács, Imre: "’Opus duplex’ in der Goldschmiedekunst des 13. Jahrhunderts und die höfische Kultur."
In: Ars decorativa, 26.2008, 7-37.

Goss, Vladimir Peter: "Bishop Stjepan II and Herceg Koloman and the beginnings of the Gothic in Croatia."
In: Hortus artium medievalium, 13.2007, 1, 211-224.

Rostás, Tibor: "Zwei gotische Pfeilerformen in Mitteleuropa" In: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Kunst und Denkmalpflege, 62.2008, 4, 539-564, 734.

Conference in memoriam Szabolcs de Vajay

2011-10-04T19:09:00.000+02:00

Szabolcs de Vajay, an outstanding medieval historian of Hungarian origin, passed away last year in the 90th year of his life. Of Hungarian origin, professor Vajay lived in Vevey, Switzerland, and wrote extensively on heraldry, genealogy, dynastic history, the knightly orders and many other questions. An international workshop to commemorate him will be held on October 7-8 at Budapest and Fehérvárcsurgó.

Titled Knights, Nobles, Diplomats. Social Network and International Contacts in Historical Perspective, the workshop was organized by the following:

Medieval Studies Department, CEU
Foundation Joseph Károlyi, Fehérvárcsurgó
The Order of Malta, Budapest
CAPITULUM, University of Szeged

I could not find the program of the conference anywhere on the web, so I uploaded the invitation I received here. You are advised to contact the organizers listed there if you intend to participate.

Hungarian silver from Heller collection on view in MAK Frankfurt

2011-09-22T21:14:00.000+02:00

Lidded jug, 1605. Nagyszeben (Hermannstadt / Sibiu)

Since earlier this year, the gold and silver collection of István Heller has been on view at the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Frankfurt. István Heller has amassed an exquisite private collection of European goldsmith works, which had been shown at previous exhibitions and was published in several volumes by Hirmer Verlag. After a succesful career in medicine, Heller trained as an art historian late in his life, and at a mature age successfully submitted a thesis for a doctorate in the history of art - he is also the author of the books introducing his collection. István Heller has decided to make his collection accessible to the public through a permanent partnership with the Kunstgewerbeverein in Frankfurt am Main, thus the collection will have a place at the Museum für Angewandte Kunst Frankfurt in perpetuity. A total of 615 objects were placed in the Museum.

The Heller collection contains high-quality gold and silver objects, ranging in time from the mid-sixteenth century to the twentieth, largely from Central European centers of goldsmith art. All the important German centers of gold work are represented, as well as – for biographical reasons – those of Hungary and Transylvania. One of the four volumes mentioned above was dedicated to goldsmith objects from this territory in the collection. In the Museum für Angewandte Kunst Frankfurt, this magnificent collection will be permanently housed in a room of its own in the Historische Villa Metzler. The tasteful exhibition setting allows the visitor to trace the principles of ornamental design from the Renaissance to Art Nouveau.

Flask with lid, 1670. Neusohl

(Besztercebány / Banská Bystrica)

This text and the images are based on the press release issued by the MAK Frankfurt (and also available in German). You can find an image gallery at hr-online.de.

If you are interested in such collection of gold and silver, you may want to read my earlier posts about the recent sale of Hungarian and Transylvanian goldsmith objects from the Herzog collection, or about the goldsmith objects which entered the Metropolitan Museum last year from the Salgó collection (see also part II and part III).

Medieval wall paintings discovered at Magyarlóna

2011-09-21T19:47:00.000+02:00

Cover of the book on Magyarlóna

The village of Magyarlóna (formerly known as Szászlóna, now Luna de Sus, Romania) is a characteristic village of the Kalotaszeg region of Transylvania, near Kolozsvár (Cluj). The village was first mentioned in 1332 as Lona, and has a medieval church dating from roughly this period. This Calvinist church has always been noted for its rich set of painted wooden furniture, including an 18th century painted coffered ceiling by Lőrinc Umling (1752). However, its medieval origin was also plain to see: even if its vaults did not survive, the Gothic south portal and the medieval windows of the sanctuary survived. However, until 2009, no real research has been carried out in order to find more of the medieval features of the building. As soon as this work started, significant medieval frescoes have been found on the walls of the nave.

Last year, a book was published about the church and the cemetery around it. Edited by Gergely Nagy (President of the Hungarian National Committee of ICOMOS) and his wife, Klára Szatmári, the book summarizes the history of the village and its church (Klára Szatmári - Gergely Nagy: Magyarlóna református temploma és temetője. Veszprém-Budapest, 2010) . The book was written at the same time as research on the building started - and the first results of this are already reflected there. This research was carried out by art historian Attila Weisz, who first identified traces of the wall paintings. At this point a restorer, Loránd Kiss was brought in to uncover and conserve these paintings.

Magyarlóna, interior view towards East

Work continued this year, and so far the following has been revealed: There are frescoes in the nave of the church, on either side of the triumphal arch. The scenes on these walls have been arranged in three rows. On the northern side, the upper two rows, while on the southern side, the lower two rows have been uncovered so far. The top row contains scenes from the legend of a Virgin Martyr, perhaps St. Margaret of Antiochia. As only one scene has been uncovered so far from what must have been an extensive cycle, identification at this point is not yet possible. The second row appears to contain one large composition of the Annunciation, with the figures of archangel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary arranged on either side of the triumphal arch (similar to the arrangement found at Disznajó). The lower row holds images of saints, one of whom is definitely a bishop. Further images are being uncovered on the intrados of the triumphal arch, and it has also been established that likely the entire north wall is painted.

Wall paintings on the south side of the triumphal arch

Magyarlóna thus joins a number of other churches in the immediate region where significant fresco decoration has been uncovered. The neighboring village of Szászfenes (Floreşti) has a large set of badly-preserved frescoes, while better-preserved frescoes have been partially uncovered at Magyarvista (Viştea), and the frescoes of Magyarfenes (Vlaha) have been known since the 1930s. The date of these frescoes varies, although most were painted around 1400 (you can read my Hungarian-language study on this group of frescoes at academia.edu). The frescoes of Magyarlóna are definitely earlier, and were likely painted during the first half of the 14th century - thus at the same time as the earlier of two sets of frescoes at Magyarvista. All these villages belonged to the estate of the bishopric of Transylvania, the center of which was at the nearby castle of Gyalu (Gilău). This factor perhaps accounts for the rich painted decoration of these small village churches - although the role of nearby Kolozsvár cannot be underestimated, either. More research needs to be carried out partly in order to uncover more of the painted cycles, and partly to better understand their iconography and internal connections. For starters, a new edition of the book on the church is being prepared, which will include a preliminary report on these frescoes.

Wall paintings on the south side of the triumphal arch

This post could not have been written without the help of my friends, Attila Weisz and Loránd Kiss, as well as Gergely Nagy, who were kind enough to share information on these discoveries and to provide photographs. You can read more about the book (in Hungarian) here. To get to know other aspects of the the heritage of the village, chack out traditional Hungarian folk music recorded there by Zoltán Kallós in the 1960s - just search here for Magyarlóna.

Late Medieval Goldsmith Works in the Kingdom of Hungary

2011-09-16T20:34:00.001+02:00

A new book by Evelin Wetter has been dedicated to late medieval goldsmith works from the historical Kingdom of Hungary. The book was published in the series Studia Jagellonica Lipsiensia, published by the GWZO at the University of Leipzig. The series consists of art historical volumes about the time of the Jagiellonian dynasty (broadly interpreted as Central Europe during the 14-16th centuries). Of the eight books published so far in the series, this is the first one dedicated entirely to medieval Hungary.

Evelin Wetter currently works at the Abbeg Stiftung in Riggisberg, and is a noted expert on late medieval liturgical textiles and goldsmith works. She has published extensively on these subjects, and contributed to various major Central European projects, such as the 2003 exhibition on Gothic Art held in Bratislava, or the 2006 Sigismundus-exhibition in Budapest. The present book is based on her Habilitationsschrift at the University of Leipzig.

Reliquary bust of St. Ladislas from Várad cathedral
Győr, Cathedral Treasury

Titled Objekt, Überlieferung und Narrativ - Spätmittelalterliche Goldschmiedekunst im historischen Königreich Ungarn (Object, tradition, and narrative - Late medieval goldsmith's art in the historic Kingdom of Hungary), the book represents a major milestone in the research of Hungarian medieval goldsmith works. Unlike most other works published in this field, the book is not dedicated to details of technical questions, but rather focuses on the use and afterlife of the medieval objects. Significant chapters are dedicated to the survival and later use of liturgical objects and reliquaries, often in circumstances quite different from the time of their creation. Another focus of the book is the historiography, display and later interpretation of these objects. The chronological range of the book is thus from the early-15th century to the early 20th, while the territorial focus is largely determined by the survival of the objects, and is thus mainly Upper Hungary (roughly the present-day Slovakia) and Transylvania. The subject of the analysis includes such key works as the reliquary of St. Ladislas, as well as lesser-known objects, giving an overall view of the field. The often hard historical situations, the destruction of major medieval centers and the changing confessions of the population are equally treated, resulting in a complex analysis of Central European history. The chapters on 19th century historiography - especially in connection with such questions as filigree enamel - are similarly captivating. Another chapter is dedicated to profane goldsmith works, including those luxurious items which entered the Museum of Applied Arts from the Esterházy-treasury. The book is beautifully illustrated with 20 color plates and numerous black & white illustrations. All in all, the book represents a much-needed complex approach to the creation and afterlife of medieval Hungarian goldsmith works, and thus comes highly recommended.

Decorative flask from the Esterházy Treasury
Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest

Bibliographic data:

Evelin Wetter: Objekt, Überlieferung und Narrativ. Spätmittelalterliche Goldschmiedekunst im historischen Königreich Ungarn (Studia Jagellonica Lipsiensia, Bd. 8). Ostfildern: Thorbecke, 2011. Hardcover, 312 pp. ISBN: 978-3-7995-8408-1

P.s.: Notice the similarity of the cover image to my sidebar image? Yes, it is the same object, the chalice of Benedek Suki, today at the Cathedral Treasury of Esztergom - photos by Attila Mudrák.

Remains of Carolingian palace found at Zalavár

2011-08-26T12:24:00.000+02:00


The church of St. Hadrianus at Mosaburg/Zalavár (from Wikipedia)

The area of Zalavár in western Hungary has long been one of the most interesting archaeological sites of medieval Hungary, especially for the Carolingian period. The area has been idetified with Mosaburg, where the Slavic prince Pribina established himself around 840, after he was expelled from Nyitra (Nitra, Slovakia). Lands in the area were granted to him by Louis the German. The first church there was dedicated by Liutprand, archishop of Salzburg in 850. Several other churches have also been documented there. In the late 9th century, Arnulf of Carinthia had his seat there, before he became Holy Roman Emperor at the end of his life. This late Carolingian flourished until the time of the Hungarian (Magyar) conquest of the Carpathian basin, including the area of Pannonia. Later, in 1019, King St. Stephen established a Benedictine abbey at Zalavár, and by the 12th century, a new castle was established there. The settlement - including the castle and the churches - became largely abandoned during the Ottoman Turkish occupation of Hungary, and after the reconquest, in 1702, the remaining buildings were torn down.

Carolingian glass fragments from Zalavár

Archaeological excavations of the past decades, however, have brought many interesting remains to light. The sensation of the previous decade was the excavation of the third church of Mosaburg, the pilgrimage church dedicated to Saint Hadrianus, established in 855 (the conserved foundations walls of the church can be seen above). Several interesting finds, including fragments of stained glass windows were found here.

Reports from this summer's archaeological season indicate that the remains of a Carolingian stone palace have been found at the site of Mosaburg. As the online magazine műemlékem.hu reports, archaeologists have found the corner of a large, rectangular stone building. Béla Miklós Szőke and Ágnes Ritoók, archaeologist in charge of the excavations identified the remains with the foundations of the palace of Arnulf, and thus date it to the last quarter of the 9th century (Arnulf died in 899, after becoming Holy Roman Emperor in 896. These are also the years of the Hungarian Conquest). Research still has to continue - it is hoped that by next summer, the full area of the Carolingian palace can be excavated.

Remains of a Carolingian building at Zalavár

You can find more aerial photos of the area on the website of Civertan.
More information about the history of Zalavár and its churches is available on the website of the Zalavár Historical Memorial Park.

For more of the historical and ecclesiastical context, you may want to read the following studies:

Szőke Béla Miklós: Mosaburg / Zalavár a Karoling-korban. In: Paradisum Plantavit. Bencés monostorok a középkori Magyarországon. Ed. Imre Takács, Pannonhalma, 2001 (in Hungarian)

Szőke, B.M.: Christliche Denkmäler in Pannonien aus der Karolingerzeit. Zalai Múzeum 11 (2002) 247–266.

Szőke, B.M.: Karolingische Kirchenorganisation in Pannonien, in: U. von Freeden – H. Friesinger – E. Wamers (hrsg.): Glaube, Kult und Herrschaft. Phänomene des Religiösen im 1. Jahrtausend n. Chr. in Mittel- und Nordeuropa. Akten des 59. Internationalen Sachsensymposions und der Grudprobleme der frühgeschichtlichen Entwicklung im Mitteldonauraum. Römisch-Germanische Kommission, Frankfurt a.M. Eurasien-Abteilung, Berlin des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Kolloquien zur Vor- und Frühgeschichte Bd. 12. Bonn 2009. 395–416.

Leaf from Hungarian Angevin Legendary on view at the Louvre

2011-08-05T17:10:00.000+02:00

Leaf from the Hungarian Angevin Legendary
Louvre, Paris

This summer, from July 7, 2011 until October 10, 2011, the Louvre is showing its Medieval and Renaissance Illuminations in an exhibition featuring seventy Italian, French, Flemish, and Germanic manuscript pages from historical, literary, or liturgical manuscripts. As the homepage of the exhibition states, "the Louvre’s collection of illuminations remains little known, despite the famous masterpieces it comprises. The publication of the collection’s catalogue raisonné is an opportunity to discover these exquisite works."

You can read more about the exhibition at the narthex.fr website, as the Louvre itself does not provide a lot of information. I realized therefore from a recent article in the International Herald Tribune that a very important manuscript leaf with Hungarian connections, a leaf from the Hungarian Angevin Legendary is also on view (Département des Arts Graphiques, RF 29940). The page shows four scenes from the life of St. Francis, and can be seen here to the left (photo source: RMN).

The Hungarian Angevin Legendary is the most important 14th-century Bolognese manuscript made for Hungarian royal patrons.This lavishly illustrated picture-book of the lives of the saints contains four miniatures on each of its pages, accompanied by one-line text labels. The majority of the dismantled manuscript is preserved in the Vatican Library, but there are leaves from it in a number of other collections, most notably at the Morgan Library in New York. As of today, altogether 142 leaves from the Legendary (some of them fragmentary) are known in six different collections of the world. I am providing direct links to photos and descriptions of some of these page on my website about Medieval Hungary. It is possible that some other fragments will come to light, as the original number of folios is estimated at 176. The 549 surviving little pictures contain parts from the legends of altogether sixty-three saints, plus from the life of Christ and the Virgin Mary. The quality of its execution and its sheer size indicate that the manuscript must have been a royal commission, and its iconography – rich in Hungarian and Angevin saints – suggests it was created for the court of the Hungarian Angevin kings. According to earlier opinions, the codex could have been ordered by Charles I, king of Hungary (1307-1342), for his son, Andrew educated in Naples, or for his own library. This somewhat romantic notion, based on the naive theory that medieval picture-books were meant for children, has recently been called into question (see the study of Béla Zsolt Szakács: "The Holy Father and the Devils, or Could the Hungarian Angevin Legendary Have Been Ordered for a Pope?," In: ... The Man of Many Devices, Who Wandered Full Many Ways ... Festschrift in Honor of János M. Bak. Ed. by Balázs Nagy and Marcell Sebők. Budapest: CEU Press, 1999, 52-60.), but no new proposal has yet been generally accepted. With regards to its style, the research of Meta Harrsen, Robert Gibbs and others have clarified its connections with the Nekcsei-Bible (on which you can read my recent study, which I made available through Academia.edu), and thus with the circle of the Master of 1328. However, Tuscan, South-Italian and unidentified features are also present in the manuscript's style, and its iconography shows deep Hungarian influence; thus, the place of its creation might have been in Hungary. The dating of the codex, based on these hypotheses and stylistic examination, can be put between 1328 and 1345.

The leaf in the Louvre was first published in detail by Gyöngyi Török ("Problems of the Hungarian Angevin Legendary: a new folio in the Louvre," In: Arte cristiana vol. 89 (2001), 417-426), who also wrote on it in the new catalogue. A Hungarian version of her study is available here. Those with JSTOR access can read another study by Gyöngyi Török ("Neue Folii aus dem 'Ungarischen Anjou-Legendarium,'" In: Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte vol. 55. (1992), 565-577). Another study on a leaf at Berkeley is also available online (Julia Bader - George Starr: "A Saint in the Family: A Leaf of the "Hungarian Anjou Legendary" at Berkeley," In: Hungarian Studies vol. 2 (1986), 3-12). Pages from the manuscript were last on display at The Morgan Library and Museum, in 2009. Another leaf from the legend of St. Francis is at the Metropolitan Museum of New York.

Medieval seal matrix of Nagybánya stolen

2011-08-04T15:45:00.064+02:00

After some good news reported yesterday, today I have something sad to write on. As reported by Hungarian and Romanian press alike, the seal matrix of the town of Nagybánya has gone missing some time in late July. (Nagybánya was known as Asszonypataka or Neustadt in the Middle Ages, and was one of the most important mining towns in Szatmár county. The town is today called Baia Mare, and is the seat of Maramures county of Romania). The seal matrix was stolen from a glass showcase in the County Historical and Archaeological Museum of Maramures County. The theft was announced on August 2nd.

The octagonal silver seal matrix of Nagybánya is one of the celebrated miniature masterpieces of 14th century Hungarian goldsmith work. It can be dated to the 1360s, and was probably made in a royal workshop. King Louis the Great (1342-1382) has given several privileges to the emerging mining town, and supported construction of its great parish church, dedicated to St. Stephen. The seal shows a seated king atop a hill - likely St. Stephen, with two miners working below. The inscription on the perimeter reads: S[igilium] d[e] R[ivulo] D[ominarum], Mutuus amor civiu[m] optimu[m] e[st] civitatis firmamentu[m] (roughly: 'The mutual love of citizens is the best foundation of the city').

The original seal matrix and a modern cast on display at Baia Mare

After missing for centuries, the seal matrix was found in a vineyard in 1904. It was put on display in the history museum in 2004. Hopefully it will be recovered soon.

Read more: news report in Romanian and in Hungarian.

Most recent overview of the medieval architecture and sculpture of Nagybánya - in particular an overview of the church of St. Stephen - is available in a new volume about medieval Szatmár county, available in full text in Hungarian and Romanian. Look for the studies of Szilárd Papp and Veronika Csikós.

Medieval news in the Hungarian press

2011-08-03T04:13:00.002+02:00

I'm back from my vacation, and I am returning to blogging with a brief overview of news about medieval art and archaeology in the Hungarian press. Summer is naturally the chief season for archaeologists, so there are reports about various interesting finds. The links are all to Hungarian-language news sources - generally with images, so perhaps worth clicking, even if you don't know the language.


Remains of early Christian chapel found at Pécsphoto from pécsma.hu

The historical portal Múlt-kor reports on an early Christian chapel found at Pécs. More and more of the early Christian necropolis there is coming to light. This particular chapel was found in March - current reports are about the decision to re-bury the find, as there is no money to properly conserve and restore the architectural remains. Local newspapers reported first on the discovery - Múlt-kor now reports about the decision to protect the walls by covering them again.

In a post one year ago, I wrote briefly about the world heritage site of Pécs, linking to some 3D reconstructions of the early Christian building.

Photo of Siklós castle - by Népszabadság

South of Pécs, the castle of Siklós is in the news again - Hungary's largest daily, Népszabadság reports about the small late-medieval prayer niche found inside the castle wall there. I wrote about the research and reconstruction of Siklós castle in a previous post - and plan to report in more detail about this interesting painted niche as well.

As a further addition for now, I am providing this link to three 360 degree panorama photos of Siklós castle - one of them showing the interior of the famous chapel.

Reconstruction of Szeged in the second half of the 18th c.

Múlt-kor and other sources are also reporting on the excavations at the site of the former castle of Szeged. This year, remains of the southern gate tower were found, in the same area where remains of the southern wall of the castle were identified last year. Excavations in the area have been going on for several years. The castle of Szeged was originally built in the 13th century, and was significantly modified after the town was captured by the Ottoman Turks in 1543. During the 18th century, the fortress fell into disrepair, and was completely dismantled by local citizens after the flood of 1879.

Therefore, excavations are bringing to life only the remains of foundations, thereby helping to reconstruct exactly the former extent of the castle. The online magazine műemlékem.hu reported on finds from previous years, with a photo gallery.

Museums of Medieval Art

2011-07-09T21:34:00.001+02:00

My recent visit to the Schnütgen Museum in Cologne got me thinking about museums focusing mainly on medieval art. I decided to make a brief list of such museums, with direct links to their collection databases - thousands of medieval artworks can be discovered this way.

Reliquary ('Ursulabüste'),
Museum Schnütgen, Köln

Let's start with the Schnütgen Museum, then (Museum Schnütgen, Köln). Located in the Romanesque church of St. Cecilia, this 100 year old museum received a complete makeover, completed last year. The new entrance opens from a large hall, which is in the new building erected for the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, a museum of world cultures. The collection of the Schnütgen Museum consists largely of Christian religious objects, ranging from the Early Christian period to the Baroque, with a strong focus on sculpture, liturgical textiles and stained glass from Cologne and the Rheinland. There is no full collection database online, and the English version of the website only provides basic information. The website however does provide a good overview of chief works on display. An audioguide to the museum is available for download - although I don't know what its purpose is without the artworks.

Lady with the Unicorn,
Musée Cluny, Paris

Maybe the most famous of all medieval art museums is the Musée Cluny in Paris - officially the Musée national du Moyen Age. Located in the building of the Gallo-Roman thermes and the 15th century Hôtel de Cluny, and surrounded by a medieval garden, visiting this museum is a unique experience. The collection ranges from late Antiquity to the late Middle Ages, and includes exceptional goldsmith works, stone sculptures from Parisian churches - such as the Notre-Dame, as well as the famous Unicorn tapestries. There is a brief overview of the collection on the museum's website, but a lot more objects and images can be found through the photo agency of the Réunion des musées nationaux (where you can search for specific objects, but also by selecting the museum on the search form). The Museum's objects are also incorporated into the French national art database, Joconda. You can select the Musée Cluny directly, or search for thousands of other medieval objects in various French collection. In addition, a fascinating resource on the museum is also available online: the catalogue of 13th century sculptures (Les sculptures du XIIIe siècle du musée de Cluny).

The Unicorn in Captivity
The Cloisters, The Metropolitan Museum

The only similar museum to the Musée Cluny is on the other side of the Atlantic, in Manhattan: The Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Housed in a large pseudo-medieval structure, which contains actual chapels and cloisters shipped over from Europe, this is one of the finest collections of medieval art anywhere. The website of the Metropolitan Museum provides a lot of information on The Cloisters, and also on the medieval department, including a selection of works on view. The collection is rich in sculptures of all kind, goldsmith works, manuscripts and also includes another set of Unicorn tapestries. You can search these objects in the museum's Collection Database, which is continually growing. If you select The Cloisters from the list of collections, 2300 objects can be browsed at present (about half of which are on view). Selecting the Collection of Medieval Art from the list yields an incredible further 6700 medieval objects in the database.

You can also download the Metropolitan Museum's Resource for Educators on Medieval Art.

I would like to mention that many other American museums made their collections accessible online. For medieval art, I would particularly recommend the database of the The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore (see also the manuscripts there!) and that of The Cleveland Museum of Art, with 1214 works online.

To continue, I would like to mention a few more museums, which - while collecting many other things - are particularly famous for their medieval collections. Two museums in London - the Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Museum - have recently re-installed their medieval collections. The Medieval and Renaissance Galleries at the V&A reopened in late 2009, and now provide an unprecedented detailed overview of decorative arts and sculpture of medieval Europe. The new website of the museum provides detailed information on the galleries and on the collection, including articles, videos and a blog. The collection database of the museum provides photos and detailed information on thousands of objects. The galleries on Medieval Europe in the British Museum have also been refurbished. A search for the word "medieval" in the collection database yields thousands of results.

Sant Climent de Taüll

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya in Barcelone houses the world's most important collection of Catalan art, and is particularly famous for its medieval collection, especially for its collection of Romanesque mural paintings. The Museum created a new resource (available in English), its online collections, which provide hundreds of images of Romanesque and Gothic objects on view. Some of the objects - such as the apse frescoes of Sant Climent de Taüll - are also available on high-resolution photos.

The Romanesque galleries have just been reopened on June 30 with a new presentation (see also the press release, pdf). A series of photos are also available on flickr.

Italy's museums and church treasuries are full of medieval art - this is especially true of Florence, home of the Uffizi, the Bargello, the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, and many other museums. I would like to mention another institution, which is housed in a medieval/early Renaissance building, and houses a collection largely from the same period, even if the quality and quantity of the objects is not on par with the institutions mentioned above. The Palazzo Davanzati first opened as a museum in 1904, and contains a number of early Renaissance sculptures, paintings and tapestries, as well as an interesting cycle of wall-paintings preserved in various rooms of the house. The collection of everyday utilitarian objects is also of note. Browse some objects on the Italian-language version of the official website, and have a look at the Arttrav blog to read more on the museum.

Detail from the Resurrection
by Thomas de Coloswar
Christian Museum, Esztergom

Finally, as this is a blog on medieval Hungary, I would like to mention Hungary's most important museum dedicated to ecclesiastical art - and thus containing many medieval and Renaissance objects, especially paintings and altarpieces. This is the Christian Museum in Esztergom, created and opened by Archbishop János Simor in 1875 and located on the second floor of the Primate's Palace. The collection includes a significant ensemble of late medieval Hungarian altarpieces and panel paintings, including the Calvary altarpiece painted by Thomas de Coloswar in 1427. There are also several Austrian and German medieval panels, as well as a significant collection of early Italian panel paintings. The website of the museum provides a good overview of the collections in English (with rather small, but still useful images). I wrote on the medieval holdings of the museums of Budapest in a previous post.

Please let me know your favorite medieval art museum, especially if it is not listed above!

First publications on the murals of the parish church of Pest

2011-06-23T20:39:00.000+02:00

The 14th century fresco of the Virgin of Child, discovered last year in the sanctuary of the Inner City Parish Church of Pest (in downtown Budapest) created quite a stir. I suppose it always creates some stir when a a fresco appears older than the wall it is painted on. The sanctuary of the parish church of Pest has always been dated to around 1400, while the fresco clearly dates from some time in the 14th century. This then of course calls for a re-evaluation of the construction history of the church, something which is quite hard to do without more extensive on-site research. Already, debate is raging on concerning the date of the newly discovered frescoes (also, some questions have been raised about the restoration as well). A detailed examination of the building and all its fresco decoration, however, is yet to be carried out.

The Hungarian journal Műemlékvédelem published several articles on the building, summarizing the results of previous art historical and architectural research, also publishing restorer Éva Derdák's overview of the uncovering and restoration of the mural (Műemlékvédelem, vol. LIV, 2010/6). The journal is not available online, but you can see the contents of the issue here. Tünde Wehli wrote an article for the journal on the newly discovered frescoes. After briefly describing the frescoes, she proceeds to bring analogies to the image of the Madonna. Most of these come from the north of the Alps, from France and Central Europe (esp. Bohemia), although Wehli acknowledges the Italian origins of several motifs of the fresco (such as the shape of the throne). In the conclusion of her article, Tünde Wehli dates the fresco to the last quarter of the 14th century - a date which requires a relatively modest modification in the building's chronology.

More recently, Mária Prokopp also wrote on the frescoes. She is a noted expert of the Italian connections of Hungarian medieval painting (I wrote on her theory of Botticelli in Esztergom). Her article was published in Múzeumcafé, which is a flashy magazine about museums, and is not really known for serious studies on medieval art. Prokopp's article can be read in the online version of Múzeumcafé vol. 5, 23 (2011 június/július), and also here. A somewhat more detailed version of Prokopp's article is available in the journal Magyar Sion (2010/2, full text available here). Prokopp's study also appeared in the journal of the Budapest History Museum (Tanulmányok Budapest Múltjából 36, 2010), in what can be considered as its definitive version to this date. A pdf-version of the Hungarian-language article is available here; there is a brief German summary at the end. Prokopp cites mainly Italian analogies from the beginning of the Trecento, and thus dates the fresco of the Virgin and child to around 1320-1340 (the fresco of the bishop she considers even earlier, from the end of the 13th century). In explaining the significance of the frescoes, she analyses the historical importance of the church as well.

I've had no time to write anything more than some blog-length pieces on the fresco so far. My brief report on the find (essentially the same as my first two blog entries - see part I and part II) was summarized for the newsletter of the International Center of Medieval Art (April 2011 issue), while my report on Hungarian azurite was picked up by National Geographic Hungary (May 2011). Hopefully I'll get to write more about it soon!

Exhibitions on Medieval Fashion

2011-06-19T16:07:00.000+02:00

Two different exhibitions, both dedicated to medieval fashion are open at the same time: one at the West Coast of America, the other one at the East Coast. First to open was the exhibition at the Morgan Library and Museum in New York City. Titled Illuminating Fashion: Dress in the Art of Medieval France and the Netherlands, the exhibition is on view from May 20 through September 4, 2011. Its curator is Roger S. Wieck, Curator of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the Morgan Library. The exhibition coincides with the publication of Anne H. van Buren's long-awaited monograph on the subject. The book is "the first comprehensive history of fashion to be based exclusively on firmly dated or datable art. Drawing mainly upon illuminated manuscripts, this book also features panel painting, tapestry, sculpture, and early printed books produced in France and the duchy of Burgundy during the late medieval period – a time of rapid change in dress."

The website of the exhibition provides and online tour of the manuscripts on view. You can read about the exhibition in The Art Newspaper or on the Medievalists.net website.

From May 31–August 14, 2011, the exhibition Fashion in the Middles Ages is on view at the Getty Center in Los Angeles. The exhibition was co-curated by Kristen Collins, associate curator of manuscripts at the J. Paul Getty Museum, and Margaret Scott, scholar of medieval fashion and author of the accompanying exhibition publication. You can read more about the exhibition in the press release of the Getty Museum, and you can also download an exhibition checklist (pdf).

The Medievalist.net website also reported on the exhibition.

If you can't get to the US this summer, you can also see fashion in medieval manuscripts in Paris. The gallery Les Enluminures also opened an exhibition on fashion in its Paris space in the Louvre des Antiquaires. Approximately 35 works of art are featured in “Dressing Up and Dressing Down in the Middle Ages and Renaissance: Costume in Art,” from May 5 to August 25. Organized by gallery owner Sandra Hindman, the exhibition is accompanied by an online catalogue (pdf). You can get more information on this project from this video. This being a commercial gallery - you can even buy the artworks on display!

Exterior restoration of the Abbey Church of Lébény

2011-06-09T22:13:00.002+02:00

Scaffolding at Lébény

On my way to Vienna today (where my main goal was to see the exhibition on the medieval plans of the Stephansdom), I stopped at the Romanesque Abbey church of Lébény. Some alarming news emerged about the condition of the building in recent years, as photos on this Hungarian website also attest (click for 'more pictures'). Well, by now, work is well under way on the exterior restoration of the building, and almost the entire edifice is covered by a scaffolding. Heavy rain and wind prevented me to explore the building more closely, and there is also very little information available online on the ongoing restoration. Main tasks include a consolidation of the facades and the renovation of the roof of the edifice. They are also restoring the old parish building, with the intention of creating a new museum there. Work will go on throughout the summer.

Lébény, south portal

The Benedictine Abbey of Lébény was officially founded in 1208, and it is believed that the church was completed within a short time. Benedictine life went on with varied intensity during the Middle Ages, until the church was burned by Turkish troops in 1529, as they were marching towards the siege of Vienna. The vault of the nave was not even repaired until the Jesuits took over the church in 1631. Those knowing the history of the region will not be surprised to read that the Turkish army burned the church again in 1683, en route to another failed siege of Vienna. The building was again fixed up by the Jesuits, and finally underwent major renovation during the 1870s.

The church of Lébény before 1872

Despite all these events, the church of Lébény can be regarded as one of the most intact Romanesque churches of Hungary. The fact that the church is still standing after 800 years is also due to those Italian stonemasons, who were sent there to dismantle the church at the time when the Ottoman Turks were advancing towards Győr. The stones of the monastery would have been needed to to repair the fortifications of Győr - but the masons did not carry out the job, saying the Lébény was the most beautiful church they have ever seen.

You can judge for yourself by looking at photographs at the following links:

Photos of the art history department of Pázmány Péter Catholic University

Hungarian summary of the church's history from the catalogue of the Pannonhalma exhibition on Benedictines in medieval Hungary (click on "Fotó" at the bottom of the page)

You can read on the current restoration here (in Hungarian)

Finally, here are some details of the stone carvings of the western portal seen from the lower levels of the scaffolding.

The Route of Medieval Churches in Szatmár county

2011-06-04T15:57:00.000+02:00

Csengersima, parish church

A major research project, aimed at surveying and documenting the churches of medieval Szatmár country, was completed last week, and its results are now largely available on the web. As the territory of medieval Szatmár country is today divided between Romania and Hungary, the research project was a joint Hungarian-Romanian one, funded by the EU. The project documented a large number of medieval churches, including some only known from excavations. The area preserved some important medieval buildings, such as the Romanesque basilica of Ákos (Acâş), but most surviving buildings are small medieval parish churches.

The project consists of the following main elements: Mapping out a thematic route of medieval churches in the Hungarian-Romanian border area (in historic Szatmár county), which is the first common thematic route of Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg and Satu Mare counties. This route is supported by very useful and informative material: maps, brochures and on-site information. The route includes 30 medieval churches - 20 of them located in the Hungarian county of Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg, while another 10 in the Romanian country of Satu Mare.

A brand new website was also developed, which contains all the necessary information about the route and the churches. This website is available in Hungarian, Romanian and English versions. English readers should maybe start on this page. The website - even though the English-language texts are only summaries of the Hungarian versions - provides ample information in English on the medieval buildings of the region, and is thus highly recommended.

Csenger, parish church

In addition to this touristic project, significant art historical research was also carried out during the last few years. A series of conferences were held, dedicated to the project and to the monuments involved, and a major new book was also published. This book, titled Középkori egyházi építészet Szatmárban (Medieval ecclesiastical architecture in Szatmár County), was edited by Tibor Kollár and contains a number of analytic essay about medieval architecture in the region, as well as individual studies on about 40 monuments. Most are medieval churches, but the book - just as the touristic route - also includes a few later monuments, built for the Uniate Greek Catholic population of the region. Unfortunately, only two of the churches, Bere and Nagyar, preserve some of their medieval wall-paintings.

Nagyar, fragments of a Passion cycle

The full text of this book has also been made available online, in a Hungarian and a Romanian version. Even though the book is not available in English, it is worth taking a look at the PDF version, at least for the wealth of illustrations. These photos illustrate a large assortment of Romanesque and Gothic stone carvings, from churches which are no longer standing, and are thus not part of the touristic route. In addition to his work on the medieval heritage of the southern region of the former Hungarian Kingdom, editor Tibor Kollár has now put together another very important book on the north-eastern corner of medieval Hungary, a region which is still full of undiscovered treasures.

Agony in the Garden - relief from the former
church of Nagybánya (Baia Mare, RO)

The following links will make browsing the website easier:

Start browsing the website here for quick access to information on the churches. A PDF brochure on each church can also be downloaded from the website.

These are the links for the PDF versions of the new book: Hungarian version; Romanian version (approximately 15 MB each).

You can also watch a film (with English commentary) on the region and the churches, if you navigate to this introductory page.

Finally, I have already reported on the monuments of Szatmár county in an earlier post (although the links to the website zothmar.ro are not working at the time of writing).

The Tale of Two Lovers and an Unknown Image of Emperor Sigismund

2011-06-01T22:34:00.000+02:00

Pisanello: Portrait of Emperor Sigismund, 1431-33

Paris, Musée du Louvre

Emperor Sigismund was one of the most frequently depicted historical personalities of the 15th century. His real and disguised portraits can be found in countless panel paintings, frescoes and miniatures. Entire volumes - such as the Chronicle of the Council of Constance by Ulrich Richental or the Recollections of Eberhard Windecke - are filled with images of Sigismund. You can browse some of these portraits on the website of the 2006 exhibition on King and Emperor Sigismund. Despite this wealth of images from every part of the Holy Roman Empire from Siena to Görlitz, it seems that French and Netherlandish illuminators of the second half of the 15th century really had no clue as to what Sigismund looked like. He is often depicted in historical manuscripts, especially in images of the disastrous Battle of Nicopolis (1396). See, for example the lavishly illustrated copy of Sebastien Mamerot's Chronicle of the Crusades, Les Passages d'Outremer, completed by Jean Colombe around 1474, and held at the Bibliothe que nationale de France and recently issued in a facsimile.

A particularly amusing example in this respect is the so-called Pageants of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, which can be studied in this 1908 edition. Completed in 1485, this manuscript is the only illustrated biography of a late medieval secular figure, and features the Earl's various encounters with rulers, including Sigismund. Pageant 35 (on page 138 of the Roxburghe Club facsimile) for example shows the Earl and Sigismund exchanging gifts, and Sigismund is depicted as a fairly young, beardless figure, with a fancy three-tiered crown (see below). More information on this manuscript is available on the website of the British Library.

The visit of Sigismund to England
The Beauchamp Pageants, 1485
London, British Library

I went through a lot of effort to gather such images for the 2006 Sigismund exhibition and its catalogue, but no doubt several manuscripts escaped my attention. I would like to mention just one of these, which is currently on view at the Getty Center's exhibition on Fashion in the Middle Ages. The book is a French manuscript from around 1460-1470, containing the popular Tale of Two Lovers by Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (a story he wrote in 1444, obviously before he became Pope Pius II). The story of the two adulterous lovers is set in Siena, at the time of Emperor Sigismund's visit and lengthy stay there on his way to his imperial coronation in Rome (1432). The story is dedicated to Kaspar Schlick, imperial chancellor of Emperor Sigismund (and later of Emperor Frederick III), who is also the main character - Euryalus - of Aeneas’ tale.

You can read an English translation of the entire story on this website; I am quoting the beginning of the story from there, too:

"The city of Siena, your native town and mine, did great honour to the Emperor Sigismund on his arrival, as is now well known; and a palace was made ready for him by the church of Saint Martha, on the road that leads to the narrow gate of sandstone. As Sigismund came hither, after the ceremonies, he met four married ladies, for birth and beauty, age and ornament, almost equal. All thought them goddesses rather than mortal women, and had they been only three, they might have seemed those whom Paris, we are told, saw in a dream. Now Sigismund, though advanced in years, was quick to passion; he took great pleasure in the company of women, and loved feminine caresses. Indeed he liked nothing better than the presence of great ladies. So when he saw these, he leaped from his horse, and they received him with outstretched hands. Then, turning to his companions, he said: ‘Have you ever seen women like these: For my part, I cannot say whether their faces are human or angelic. Surely they are from heaven.’"

As I mentioned above, the Getty Museum preserves an illustrated copy of this manuscript, which also includes an illustration of the beginning of the story, the arrival of Sigismund to Siena.

Emperor Sigismund arriving to Siena
Illustration of The Tale of Two Lovers
Getty Museum, Ms. 68, fol. 25

Now, as it is plain to see, the Emperor looks nothing like the historical figure, and of course his attire and crown are imaginary - the image of course represents fashion of the time around 1460-70, and not the 1430s. I would very much like to see all other images in the manuscript - currently only five folios are reproduced on the Getty website. One of these images, which illustrates another text in the manuscript, depicts an emperor at court - the bearded ruler looks more like Sigismund, but is not identified as such.

These images are examples of a very interesting phenomenon, which we can observe in the second half of the 15th century. By this time an interesting separation of the historical figure of Sigismund and of his actual features took place. While Sigismund's familiar face lives on in countless works depicting other characters (mainly rulers), actual depictions of the emperor do not always present a faithful likeness. We can conclude that on the one hand, his features became the ideal vehicle for depicting imperial or royal majesty, might, and stature, without any reference to the actual person intended. On the other hand, despite the series of surviving true portraits of Sigismund, knowledge of his most characteristic features was apparently lacking when the above-mentioned late medieval chronicles were illustrated. The image in the Getty manuscript also reminds us that there must be still many images of Sigismund in various medieval manuscripts - meaning that one of the favorite pastimes of Hungarian medieval art historians, the search for Sigismund-portraits, is far from over.

Pinturicchio: Aeneas S. Piccolomini as ambassador to James I of Scotland
The image of the ruler is regarded as a disguised portrait of Sigismund
Siena, Duomo, Piccolomini Library

Siklós castle

2011-06-01T19:19:00.002+02:00

Siklós castle, a set on Flickr.

As an addition to my most recent post, here are some photos of Siklós castle. These photos were mainly taken in 2007, thus before and during the current restoration campaign. I hope I will be able to share new photographs soon, too.

Research and renovation at Siklós castle

2011-05-30T22:37:00.001+02:00

The medieval castle of Siklós reopened after years of research and renovation. The castle lies in southern Hungary (just south of Pécs). For much of the 15th century (until 1481), the castle and the large estate was in the property of the mighty Garai family - even king Sigismund was held captive here at the beginning of his Hungarian rule, in 1401. The general layout of the castle stems from this period, but it was enlarged and rebuilt in several later phases. Most significant of these campaigns was the addition of a large late Gothic sanctuary to the castle chapel, built in the second decade of the 16th century, at the time of the Perényi family. Although the castle was occupied by the Turks for almost 150 years, and was rebuilt after that in Baroque style, it still preserves a lot of significant medieval and Renaissance details (see these photos). A large new exhibition hall was created during this most recent reconstruction, which enable the display of these fragments.

The reconstruction was preceded by several years of archaeological and architectural research, which brought to light many interesting finds, including a previously unknown small and painted wall niche. I hope to report on these finds in more detail soon - I am planning a trip to Siklós some time soon, and maybe a guest post can be organized with one of the archaeologists. For now, here is a photo of one of the frescoes in the castle chapel, discovered during a previous restorations campaign in the 1950s.

St. Ladislas and St. Leonard - Fresco c. 1420, in the castle chapel of Siklós
Photo by Attila Mudrák

Siklós of course preserves many other treasures. I would only like to mention the former Augustinian church standing in the vicinity of the castle, which was decorated with an extensive fresco cycle at the beginning of the 15th century, commissioned by the Garai family. I have written extensively on these frescoes elsewhere - you may want to look at this Hungarian-language article with and English summary. For even more information, you can have a look at my dissertation (especially if you are based at any American institution with UMI/Proquest access...).

Hungarian silver on sale in NYC

2011-05-16T19:15:00.000+02:00

Nautilus cup
Nagyszeben, mid-17th century

About 30 precious silver and goldsmith works from Hungary and Transylvania will be auctioned off at Christie's New York tomorrow (17 May 2011). (Sale 2447: Important English, Continental and American Silver and Gold). The pieces in question are all Renaissance and Baroque works, mainly dating from the 17th century. Before WWII, the objects all belonged to the Herzog collection. The collection of Baron Mór Lipót Herzog, a wealthy Jewish magnate in Budapest was one of the largest of its time in Hungary, which got largely dispersed during the war. The silver objects in the collection were last fully documented in a 1930 inventory, and most of the pieces were on view for the last time at various exhibitions at Budapest's Museum of Applied Arts at around that time. The pieces have been recorded as wartime victims of looting, and their whereabouts were unknown until this sale.

The New York Times also wrote on the sale, and has this to say about the provenance of the objects, based on a telephone interview with the anonymous seller: "a Herzog family member had managed to bring the pieces to New York at some point. The family had long kept them in storage."

You can browse the objects on the website of Christie's, where a full e-catalogue and a slideshow of objects is also avaliable. When browsing the auction catalogue, the lots in question go from Lot 99 to 127 + lot 132.

17th century pendant with St. George

Many objects from the Herzog collection are of course embroiled in restitution cases. Record-setting pieces, like the recently restituted portrait of Sigismund Baldinger by Georg Pencz have come to the market from the collection (Christie's sale 7862 of last year). Currently there is a major lawsuit going on, as heirs of the Herzog family sued the Hungarian state for objects kept in various Hungarian public collections. The emergence of these Hungarian silver objects among these circumstance is definitely most interesting.

Nevertheless, after the best pieces of the Salgó collection entered the Metropolitan Museum, it would be nice to see these pieces stay together as well, and - preferably - enter a public collection.

New blog on Medieval Poland + Master Paul of Levoča

2011-05-15T19:55:00.001+02:00

I would like to report that a new art blog - quite similar in nature to my own venture - was started with a focus on medieval Poland. The blog provides brief news about new books, exhibitions and discoveries in the field of medieval art and medieval studies in Poland. You can find the bilingual (Polish/English) blog at this address: http://medievalpoland.blogspot.com/

I am immediately lifting one news item from the blog, concerning a new book which is of course quite relevant for the study of art in medieval Hungary as well. To quote the Medieval Poland blog (with one correction and):

"The Cracow publishing house DodoEditor has released Zoltán Gyalókay's monograph on the Master Paul of Levoča. The late medieval sculpture of Master Paul of Levoča certainly deserves more attention in international scholarly literature. His workshop has produced altars for churches Szepes (Spis) county and neighboring regions. The high craftsmanship of his works and the influence they had on contemporary artists has been studied by Czech, Hungarian, Polish and Slovak scholars. This monograph represents the author’s long-term study of the artist’s oeuvre."

I might add that the sculptor worked in Lőcse (germ: Leutschau, now Levoča, Slovakia) at the beginning of the 16th century, where he was responsible for carving statues and reliefs for the main altar, among other things. His workshop also supplied altarpieces for other towns in Upper Hungary. The website of St. James's church provides an overview of the medieval furnishings of the parish church of Lőcse - in addition to the main altar of St. James, also check out the altar of the Nativity.

You can read more on the book on the website of the publisher, while a brief summary is available on the AHICE website (click here for direct link to pdf summary). Of course it is hoped that the book will also be available in a German/English or even Hungarian version!

Art and Architecture around 1400 Conference

2011-05-08T20:36:00.002+02:00

As Medievalists around the US (the world?) are gearing up for this year's Medieval Congress at K'zoo, yours truly will drive over to neighboring Slovenia, to participate at the CIHA Colloquium at Maribor, titled Art and Archicture around 1400: Global and Regional Perspectives. I've gotten to like these more focused conferences, as discussions often tend to be livelier. The conference was organized by the University of Maribor, and by the Slovene Art History Society, under the auspices of a really distinguished Program Committee.

The six-day program of the conference is quite rich, with a number of interesting excursions aside from the talks, for example to see frescoes by the workshop of Johannes Aquila.

Naturally, there will be a sizable Hungarian delegation at the conference, and a lot of Hungarian medieval topics will be treated in lectures and posters. A conference report with pictures will likely appear on this blog some time later. For now, a number of pictures of Slovenia's rich Gothic heritage can be seen in this gallery (the statue of St. James to the left is from the pilgrimage church of Ptujska Gora).

Update:
Gothic frescoes in Slovenia, photos from earlier this week on Flickr http://t.co/FoOXlx2

Detail views of Salgó chalices at the Metropolitan

2011-04-28T22:12:00.001+02:00

The Metropolitan Museum has just made available a number of detail photographs of the two medieval chalices which had recently entered the museum from the Salgó collection. Both chalices date from the mid-15th century, and are decorated with a special technique very popular in late medieval Hungary: the so called filigree-enamel. In this special variation of the cloisonné enamel, the fields of enamel are applied inside loops and shapes of filigree wire attached to the surface of the objects. You can read about medieval enameling techniques in this article (pdf) by David Buckton of the British Museum.

The two chalices are now described on the Metropolitan website as of "Central European" origin. However, the technique and details of both chalices - which can be studies on these photographs - makes their Hungarian origin quite certain - there is plenty of comparative material available, such as this chalice. More information could be gleaned from the coat of arms on the foot of one chalice, and the inscription on the cup of the other.

These are the links to the object pages:

Chalice from 1462

Mid-15th c. chalice with coat of arms

I wrote about the Salgó collection before in two previous posts.

Medieval treasure discovered in Wiener Neustadt

2011-04-26T20:38:00.001+02:00

Belt buckle from the Wiener Neustadt treasure

An important cache of medieval goldsmith works was found a few years ago, it was announced last week. The treasure was found by a man digging in his backyard in Wiener Neustadt. He, however, only took an interest in the objects quite recently, finally bringing them to the Austrian Office of Monument Preservation. On Friday it was reported that about 200 pieces were found - rings, brooches, other jewels, most apparently dating from the 13th-14th century.

Currently no detailed information is available on the find, but several pictures are already circulating on the internet. The image on the left is from this report by Der Standard, but the same photos released by the Bundesdenkmalamt have been published in many other places. The Austrian weekly profil was the first to report on the find, and The Associated Press also reported on the treasure - finally the story was picked up by several news outlets worldwide. The Bundesdenkmalamt of Austria will provide more details at a press conference on May 2nd.

The author of this blog of course would like to know whether any of the objects can be identified as of Hungarian origin.

Update: here is the report on the press conference of the Bundesdenkmalamt, where some of the objects were put on display.

The secret of the casket

2011-04-21T19:21:00.001+02:00

Photos by Melange Galéria, Budapest

A small Italian Renaissance casket went on display earlier this month in a Budapest gallery. The display was opened by Mária Prokopp, university professor and a noted expert of Italian Renaissance painting. So far not much is known about the intriguing object, the website of the gallery only says this much about it:

"This is the first public appearance of this precious Renaissance casket, which had been serving as a medicine case in the household of an elderly lady for the last 30 years."

The small casket (about 50 cm wide) is decorated with a well-composed Renaissance painting on the front, and two coat of arms on the shorter sides. The main scene seems to be some kind of triumphal or marriage procession - and is in very bad condition. Some small areas have already been cleaned, to reveal the original bright colors. The details are very fine, like in a manuscript illumination. The coats of arms on the sides seem rather general - an eagle and a lion. On the back side, there is an inscription fitting for the object, which reads: "Quod ut custoditorum me nemo sciat" (No-one shall know what is guarded by me).

It is clear that the casket is in need of restoration and detailed examination. It is hard to say more about it, until that happens. A series of photographs can be seen on the website of the gallery, plus here is a detail of the painting from the front of the casket. Renaissance experts - feel free to comment!

Earliest Christian church of Transylvania found at Gyulafehérvár

2011-04-18T23:46:00.001+02:00

Traces of the oldest church of Transylvania
Photo from www.kronika.ro

New archaeological research near the Roman Catholic Cathedral of Gyulafehérvár (Alba Iulia, Romania, the seat of the bishopric of Transylvania) led to the discovery of the remains of the semicircular apse of a medieval church. Archaeologists believe this is Transylvania’s oldest church, built around the year 1000 - thus before the foundation of the diocese in 1009 (see my previous post on the history of the cathedral). The remains were found at a depth of only one meter, 24 meters away from the Catholic Cathedral of St. Michael. Daniela Marcu Istrate, well-known archaeologist announced in a press conference on April 18 that the newly discovered church might have been built either by prince Gyula or by Saint King Stephen. Around 952, Gyula was baptized in Constantinople, and upon his return was given a bishop named Hierotheos who accompanied him back to Hungary - so if the church dates to the period of prince Gyula, it was built for the Byzantine rite (of course we are before the Great Schism of 1054 at this time). Besides the apse, archaeologists have also discovered several tombs dating back to the 12th century. However, experts believe that the church was already destroyed at that time. For the moment, work at the archaeological site has been suspended for lack of funds. The remains of the apse will be preserved provisionally.

Most interesting about this find is that it is not connected to the present 13th century cathedral - or its 11th century predecessor - in any way. The archaeologist proposes that this feature means that the new Roman Catholic cathedral was deliberately distanced from the earlier structure built for the Greek rite.

You can read more about the discovery in Hungarian or in Romanian.

It is worth noting that the town - Roman Apulum - has an even older history: lately, more and more Roman remains have also come to light, see here.

Open access online journals of medieval art

2011-04-17T18:58:00.000+02:00

More and more journals are available in an open access format on the web - and more and more are only published in this format, without a printed version. The advantages of speedy publication at a lower cost are obvious, and the publications can potentially reach a much larger audience. Editorial work and peer-review can of course be maintained for online publications just as for traditional outlets.

When it comes to medieval art, there is a generous selection of such journals on the web, to supplement such print (+ restricted online access) journals as Gesta. What follows is a selection of such journals, with a brief description lifted from the introductory pages of the respective journals.

Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture

Peregrinations is published by the International Society for the Study of Pilgrimage Art, which was founded in 2000 to bring together scholars who explore the art and architecture of pilgrimage in the late Middle Ages. The journal "provides a forum for themes and topics related to that subject, and to share current research. [...] The artistic expressions which were created to give form to the cults are the objects of our investigation.

The journal is edited by Sarah Blick, and the latest issue is Volume 3, Issue 1 (2010). The journal also maintains a photo-bank.

Different Visions: A Journal of New Perspectives on Medieval Art

The journal is "a web-based, open-access, peer-reviewed annual, devoted to progressive scholarship on medieval art. Different Visions seeks to fill a significant gap in current publishing venues by featuring articles employing contemporary postmodern and poststructuralist theoretical frameworks to examine medieval visual culture. Authors are encouraged to explore the application of such approaches as feminist and gender analysis, historiography, semiotics, post colonialism and queer theory to works produced during the period from the fourth through the fifteenth century. The journal will also consider essays on medieval visual culture that emerge from multiple disciplinary perspectives." The editor-in-Chief of the Journal is Rachel Dressler, and Issue Two is the most latest on the site.

Vidimus: Online magazine devoted to stained glass

"Vidimus is the only on-line magazine devoted exclusively to stained glass. We hope to encourage interest in medieval and later stained glass, and to promote the work of the CVMA (GB), the national survey of medieval stained glass. A vidimus (‘we have seen’) was the approved design for a window in medieval times." The journal, which has just published its fiftieth (!) issue, has just received a new format. It is edited by Anna Eavis and Roger Rosewell (News and Features).

JHNA:

Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art

"JNHA is the electronic journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art. Every summer and winter, the journal publishes issues of peer-reviewed articles that focus on art produced in the Netherlands (north and south) during the early modern period (c. 1400-c.1750), and in other countries and later periods as they relate to Netherlandish art. Submissions are encouraged on painting, sculpture, graphic arts, tapestry, architecture, and decoration, from the perspectives of art history, art conservation, technical studies, museum studies, historiography, and collecting history." Latest issue available is Volume 3, Issue 1.

Concilium Medii Aevi online

One of the oldest medieval journals online, Consilium medii aevi has been avaible since 1998, and has developed into an interdisciplinary journal of Medieval Studies. It publishes studies and reviews in all fields of the Middle Ages, including naturally art history. Most studies are in German, but several are in English. The yearly publications can also be ordered in print format.

TMR: The Medieval Review

"Since 1993, The Medieval Review (TMR; formerly the Bryn Mawr Medieval Review) has been publishing reviews of current work in all areas of Medieval Studies, a field it interprets as broadly as possible. The electronic medium allows for very rapid publication of reviews, and provides a computer searchable archive of past reviews, both of which are of great utility to scholars and students around the world. TMR operates as a moderated distribution list. Subscribers receive reviews as e-mail; TMR posts each review as soon as the editors have received and edited it. There is no paper TMR. Once posted, reviews are archived and available for viewing, searching, printing, etc."

Marginalia: Journal of the Medieval Reading Group at the University of Cambridge

"Marginalia is an online, peer-reviewed journal for medievalists, which aims to fill a gap in the publishing world by creating a vehicle for graduate publication. It sprang out of, and continues to be closely associated with, the Cambridge-based Medieval Reading Group. The first issue of the journal came out in 2005, and since then two issues have been released each year: one yearbook issue, and a themed issue which invites submissions from graduate students working on the medieval period."

Hortulus:

The Online Graduate Journal of Medieval Studies

Hortulus: The Online Graduate Journal of Medieval Studies is a refereed journal devoted to the literature and cultures of the medieval world. Published electronically once a year, its mission is to present a forum in which graduate students from around the globe may share their work." Currently available: Volume 5, 2009.

STUDIA PATZINAKA: Journal of Medieval and Modern Studies

"This electronically edited journal is published on the web by the Romanian Group for an Alternative History and it consists of a series of articles, notes, and commentaries. Most of the articles have already been published in various other scientific journals or will be soon disseminated otherwise. Studia Patzinaka's purpose is not to compete with these journals, but to provide a wider and easier access to the information hardly accessible in print." Edited by Ana Maria Gruia, the journal includes several studies on art history in various languages. Unfortunately, Number 7 from 2008 is the most recent issue available.

Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU

Published by the Department of Medieval Studies at the Central European University (Budapest), this is a print journal which started in 1994, and contains several art historical studies. "The volumes of the Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU offer a series of articles on various aspects of the history of medieval Central and Eastern Europe and gives an overview of the articles of the department in the academic years." The journal has recently been made available online, although the last five volumes are password-protected. It is thus not fully open access - but it includes studies on medieval Hungary, so I had to include it here.

To keep track of open access art history journals and articles, I recommend the Art History TOCs blog of Gábor Endrődi. Do you know of any other online journals I should have listed here? Let me know in a comment!

Conference and exhibition about László Gerevich

2011-04-15T07:16:00.000+02:00

László Gerevich, one of the eminent Hungarian archaeologists of the Middle Ages, was born 100 years ago. To commemorate, the Budapest History Museum organized a conference and an exhibition about his career. The highlight of this career was the excavation of the medieval royal palace of Buda, which became possible after the destruction of World War II. Gerevich was able to uncover the lower lever of the entire medieval palace, bringing to light a number of highly important finds. In that period, he was the director of the Budapest History Museum, and later also the founder and first director of the Archaeological Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Gerevich also excavated several other medieval sites, including the Cistercian Abbey of Pilis (see my recent post on the abbey). His English-language books include The Art of Buda and Pest in the Middle Ages and Towns in Medieval Hungary. If you read Hungarian, you can find more information on him here.

You can read the program of today's conference by clicking on the image above. I will write another post on the exhibition once I get a chance to visit it.

Conquest-period sabretache plate found at Hungarian excavations

2011-04-14T21:50:00.000+02:00

Sabretache plate excavated in Pest county
Photo from Sírásók naplója blog

A Hungarian archaeological blog (Sírásók naplója) reported on a recent lucky find in Pest county of Hungary. Last week, remains from the period of the Hungarian Conquest (early 10th century) have been found on a field, and excavated by archaeologists from the Pest County Museums. Of the three tombs found, one belonged to a high-ranking male, and all his accessories were found intact, including his belt and his arrow. Most important is the his sabretache plate. To quote András Róna-Tas (Hungarian and Europe in the Early Middle Ages - An Introduction to Early Hungarian History), "the sabretaches are the most characteristic finds from graves of the Conquest period. They were strengthened with metal plates, generally of silver. At the side of each bag, a strap was threaded through, and both this strap and that which attached the bag to the belt were decorated with mountings. The sabretache, which fulfilled the function of a pocket, would have held fire-making tools."

Only about two dozen similar objects have been recovered from the Carpathian basin, and very few of them come from documented excavations, so the find is of great importance. As the archaeologists, Ágnes Füredi and Tibor Rácz report on their blog, the last similar find was made in the late 1980s, when tombs at Karos were excavated.

Sabretache from Galgóc
Hungarian National Museum

The photo above is from the Sírásók naplója blog - you can find more images of the excavations there. For more information on Magyar metalwork of the Conquest period, visit the website of the Archaeological Department of the Hungarian National Museum. Sabretaches enjoy some popularity in contemporary Hungary - I found the most complete list of such finds on one of the traditionalist websites, the Tarsolybearers' Homepage. Defitinely have a look at the sabretache plate from Galgóc, maybe the finest of such objects, and the first one to be found, back in 1868.

The Fejérváry collection of ivories

2011-03-27T19:17:00.001+02:00

Gábor Fejérváry (1780-1851) amassed a large collection of ancient and medieval objects in his house at Eperjes in northern Hungary (today Presov, Slovakia). After his death, his nephew Ferenc Pulszky inherited the collection. Pulszky at that time was living in England - he had to leave Hungary for his role in the 1848 revolution and war for independence. Pulszky managed to deliver parts of this collection to England, as he decided to sell much of it. In 1855 Liverpool goldsmith, jeweler and Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries Joseph Mayer (1803—86) purchased the Fejérváry ivory collection from Pulszky. The collection contained a large number of late antique, early medieval and later ivories, as you can see in the original catalogue published just after the sale, in 1856 (full text here). You can read more about the Fejérváry-Pulszky collection, and Fejérváry's Liber Antiquitatis, which contains images of objects in his collection, on the website of the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.

Venatio ivory, 5th c.
Liverpool, World Museum

Joseph Mayer gave his collection to the Liverpool Museum in 1867. Ancient ivories are in the World Museum today, while Gothic ivories from the Fejérváry-Mayer collection are in the Walker Art Gallery. The catalogue of the Liverpool ivories by Margaret Gibson was published in 1994 (see this link). The National Museums Liverpool Blog provides a bit more information on these ivories. When it comes to Gothic pieces, you can learn a lot more via the Gothic Ivories Project of the Courtauld Institute of Art. Search for the name of Fejérváry to get a list of the ivories from his collection (this link should work). One of the finest pieces, a 14th-century French mirror case, is illustrated below.

The Fejérváry collection held many other treasures, including such rare pieces as the Armento Rider (British Museum) or Codex Fejérváry-Mayer (also in Liverpool), one of the finest surviving Aztec manuscripts. You can read about that manuscript on the BibliOdyssey blog.

Upon returning to Hungary after his exile, Ferenc Pulszky became the director of the Hungarian National Museum. Items he could not sell from the Fejérváry collection, as well as a large number of other objects he collected later in his life, are in various museums of Hungary today. János György Szilágyi writes more on him in The Hungarian Quarterly.

Mirror case, French, first half of 14th century
Liverpool, Walker Art Museum

Botticelli in Esztergom?

2011-03-24T21:40:00.000+01:00

Temperantia
Esztergom, Studiolo of palace
Photo via artmagazin

I did not want to write this post. A great discovery has been announced a few years ago (frescoes painted by Botticelli have been identified in Esztergom!) but I still remain skeptical. Also, as I have been unable to study these frescoes personally during the last few years, and having never worked on Botticelli, I don't really have a very strong art historical argument to put forward here or in a more scholarly publication. In the end I decided to simply list a few facts here.

1. The medieval royal - later archiepiscopal - palace of Esztergom has been ruined and buried during the Turkish wars of the 16th-17th centuries (see this earlier post). The remains of the palace have been uncovered between 1934-38 in a large-scale archaeological campaign. Two large sets of frescoes were found on the walls of the building: a mid-14th century fresco-cycle in the chapel, painted by Riminese masters (in my opinion), and fragments of an early Renaissance cycle in one of the rooms of the palace. The room has been identified as the Studiolo of the archbishops of Esztergom, and the four surviving figures of the Renaissance fresco cycle as allegories of four virtues.

2. Starting in 2000, a new restoration campaign, led by Zsuzsanna Wierdl was started on the frescoes of Esztergom. Many later retouches, discolored repairs have to be removed, while structural problems of the entire building although had to be solved. This work is still not finished, in fact it largely stopped about two years ago, due to lack of funding. It is to be hoped that it will be continued this year, as the frescoes remain largely inaccessible (link to Hungarian article about funding).

The four Virtues at Esztergom, before restoration

3. At a conference (pdf) held at Villa i Tatti, Florence in 2007, restorer Zsuzsanna Wierdl and art historian Mária Prokopp presented their findings, announcing that the figure of Temperance at Esztergom was painted by Sandro Botticelli in the 1460s, commissioned by archbishop Johannes Vitéz. The Hungarian cultural minister, who happened to be in Rome at that time, announced that Botticelli frescoes have been found in Hungary, and the international and Hungarian press was enthusiastic (link to Reuters article, to serve as an example). Participants at the conference were less enthusiastic, and lively debate continued as the conference embarked on an excursion to Hungary. Pro and contra arguments were published in the Hungarian press - particularly lively was the rebuttal of the theory by Louis A. Waldman, assistant director of Villa I Tatti, and a noted expert of the period. Waldman's argument was published in an interview in a Hungarian weekly, Élet és irodalom. Other experts, most notably Miklós Boskovits expressed their doubts (summary in this Hungarian article). The acts of the Florentine conference - co-edited by Dr. Waldman - are to be published in the near future.

Fortitudo in Esztergom and a detail from Botticelli's Birth of Venus (Uffizi)
Comparison by Zsuzsanna Wierdl, Studiolo

Cover of the book of Prokopp-Vukov-Wierdl

4. Zsuzsanna Wierdl and Mária Prokopp have done a lot to publicize their theory. A film was made, several exhibitions were organized, and in 2009 they also published a book, co-authored with architectural historian Konstantin Vukov (the book is in Hungarian, with Italian abstracts). Most recently, their arguments have been summarized in an article by Mária Prokopp, which was also published in English (see the article in Magyar Szemle or in Hungarian Review), and further arguments were put forward in an interview published in Artmagazin (in Hungarian). Also, the original study will be published in the I Tatti conference volume.

5. Counter-arguments have not been published as often as the Botticelli-theory has. But there seems to be general consensus that the Esztergom frescoes date from a later period, most likely around 1490, and were painted by a Florentine master of lesser stature - probably by one of the masters, such as Albertus pictor fiorentinus, who were mentioned in documents at that time. Waldman's argument, mentioned above, was the most forceful, calling the Botticelli-attribution 'absurd'. I cannot link to many more publications, as doubts have often been very summarily argued. The debate has been summarized for example in this Hungarian-language article from HVG (2010). Problems with the whole story, and the presentation of the findings have been best summarized by Ernő Marosi (again, only in Hungarian).

Unfortunately, the frescoes still remain inaccessible, and the end of work is nowhere in sight. The art historical debate is also far from being over. Until it gets settled, you might want to read about a famous Florentine painter, who definitely spent some time in Hungary, although his works there did not survive: Masolino.

Fortified Saxon churches of Transylania

2011-03-20T21:05:00.000+01:00

Birthälm (Berethalom/Biertan)

The southern part of Transylvania has been populated by settlers from various (mainly the westernmost) parts of Germany, generally termed Saxons in medieval and more recent sources (you can read their history here). These Saxon settlers built some of the most urban settlements of Transylvania - cities such as Kronstadt (Brassó/Brasov), Hermannstadt (Nagyszeben/Sibiu) or Schässburg (Segesvár/Sighisoara). The villages of that region largely preserved their medieval structure to this day, and most are dominated by large medieval churches. Over the course of the 15-17th centuries, as the territory was under constant threat by the Ottoman Empire, these churches were all fortified - some built into veritable castles. Transylvanian Saxons became Lutheran during the 16th century, thus these churches preserved much of their medieval treasures - including altarpieces, goldsmith works, liturgical textiles, Turkish rugs - to this day. These days, more and more frescoes are also coming to light from under the whitewash in these churches. Owing to the mass exodus of Transylvanian Saxons to Germany during the 1980s-1990s, many of these churches are out of use today, some completely abandoned. However, more and more is done to preserve this rich heritage. The churches of the region of Hermannstadt have been put on the watch-list of the World Monument Fund, while seven churches and the historic center of Schässburg are on the Unesco World Heritage list. International conservation efforts have been quite successful in some cases, as with the Church on the Hill in Schässburg, and Prince Charles has taken an interest in the region, buying property there.

Malmkrog (Almakerék/Malancrav)

In this post, I would like to call attention to a website aimed at documenting the Saxon churches of Transylvania. The website Fortified Churches provides information on the region in five languages, with photo galleries of many of the churches (browse them under Locations). It is well worth a visit - although the best of course is visit the region in person, something I can highly recommend.

(Pictures in this post are from the Fortified Churches website. See also my earlier post on Abandoned medieval churches in Transylvania).

New medieval art websites, IV.

2011-03-05T22:09:00.001+01:00

This is turning into a regular feature of my blog - once again I collected some wonderful new websites on medieval art. I learned about most of them on Twitter (you can find a number of excellent Tweeters just by clicking on my list of Medieval Art - or if you don't like Twitter, check out the Medieval Art Weekly, an automatic paper created from tweets on this list). Other websites I found on the Facebook page dedicated to Medieval Art. So, here are the recommendations for March, most related to medieval manuscripts:

Oxford, Bodleian Library.

Ms Douce, 134. fol 98

Medieval Imaginations: Literature and visual culture in the Middle Ages is a database coordinated by Faculty of English of Cambridge University. It has been online for some time, and it is an ongoing project. I am quoting from the main page: "Medieval Imaginations provides a database of images to enable you to explore the interface between the literature and visual culture of medieval England. It has been compiled to provide images corresponding to the main episodes dramatized in the English Mystery Plays, because these present the medieval view of human history from the Creation to the Last Judgement. The images are mostly of English origin and from the later Middle Ages, with an emphasis on material from East Anglia, one of medieval England's most dynamic regions."

Getty, Ms. Ludwig XV 3.

Fol. 89v

Stories to watch: Narratives in Medieval Manuscripts is a website of a new exhibition at the Getty Center, Los Angeles (February 22 - May 15, 2011). The exhibition focuses on narrative images and storytelling in medieval manuscripts. The website also has a nice interactive feature, where the gospel narrative from a prayer book can be studied.

München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek,

Cgm 1952

Treasures of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek 3D. More and more medieval manuscripts can be studied in digital format. The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek is now offering something more: 3D digital versions of some medieval manuscripts. You can virtually turn the pages, and even turn the book upside down or spin it. Its the kind of thing one often sees in new exhibitions, on touchscreen computers - where the real thing is in a showcase nearby. Browsing books like this at home, however, is really not all that useful - although fun, at first. The application is slow, pages often tend to turn the wrong way, zooming is quite limited, etc. I'll take an old-fashioned digital facsimile any day instead of this - luckily, the BSB has plenty of those!

It is more fun to look at virtual buildings in 3D - and that is precisely what you can do at the Catedral - Libro de Piedra website. It is a web application providing a virtual tour of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela and its museum, through new technologies. If you are interested in more details, this website describes the making of this web application.

The last site to be mentioned today is not only about medieval art - it is a general listing of art history websites, especially blogs. As stated in the overview, "the Art & History Database (AHDB) is an ongoing collation of information on art and history resources on the web". The database offers search capabilities, as well as a list of websites. You can read more about AHDB on the Three Pipe Problem blog of its creator, H Niyazi.

Hungarian azurite

2011-02-27T18:04:00.000+01:00

When the previously unknown fresco of the Virgin and Child was uncovered in the Inner City parish church of (Buda)Pest, the restorer and art historians alike were struck by the excellent preservation of large patches of azurite blue. The cloak of the Virgin and that of the Child is the same blue, and the background of the painting is painted with a darker shade of the same blue (azurite mixed with black). This find reminds us that during the Middle Ages, Hungary was one of the primary sources of azurite in Europe. The mineral (a copper-ore) came from the copper mines of northern Hungary, from places such as Rudabánya. It is well-known that ultramarine was the most expensive pigment in the Middle Ages - but it was very hard to get, and azurite was a good alternative. You can read about the pigment a lot, for example in Daniel V. Thompson's classic book on the Materials and Techniques of Medieval Painting.

Paint samples have been analysed from the Budapest fresco, and beautiful microscopic photos of the pigment were made by restorer Éva Galambos - such as this one to the right.

The Virgin Mary from
the Ghent Altarpiece

Hungarian azurite sources became generally unavailable to Europe after the Ottoman Turks occupied much of the country during the 16th century. There is a classic story, reported among others by Karel van Mander, that reminds us of these historical circumstances. Around 1558, Michiel Coxie was making a copy of the Ghent altarpiece of Jan and Hubert van Eyck (the panels of which are today in Berlin and Munich), for Philip II of Spain (also the Duke of Flanders). As Karel van Mander tells us, Coxie fulfilled this commission admirably. Coxie, however, was unable to obtain azurite of suitable quality - Coxie explains that this type of azure pigment, a natural coloring, comes from some mountains of Hungary, and was easier to obtain earlier, before the country came under Ottoman rule. Coxie in the end was able to get the needed azurite on the order of the king directly from Titian, who still had some. Van Mander goes on to emphasize that only the azurite needed for the cloak of the Virgin was worth 32 ducats. Did Jan van Eyck use Hungarian azurite, too? The sources do not reveal this - but maybe the new technical examination of the Ghent altarpiece will provide some answers.

You can read van Mander's original text in the Het Schilder-boek, in the online edition of the Dutch Digital Library. The story is told in the Life of Jan and Hubert van Eyck.

(See also my previous posts on the history of the Inner City parish church, and on various wall-paintings inside that church.)

Konzilstadt Konstanz

2011-02-23T21:43:00.001+01:00

Last week I traveled to Konstanz (Constance), Germany, to participate in a meeting to prepare a major exhibition dedicated to the Council of Constance. This event, which took place between 1414 and 1418 was the most important ever to take place in that town, and it was also the high point of the career of King Sigismund. He had been king of Hungary since 1387, but after his 1410 election as King of the Romans he became a major player on the European political scene. You can follow the route he took to get to the Council, and also through Western Europe to negotiate at the website of the 2006 Sigismundus-exhibition.

In order to commemorate the 600th anniversary of the Council, five years of events are planned for 2014-2018, each dedicated to a specific theme. A special event has been set up to coordinate these events, and you can find a lot of information on their website. The local paper also wrote about the preparation of the exhibition, as you can read here.

While there, I had a chance to see the newly restored frescoes of the Dreifaltigkeitskirche (former Augustinian church). Sigismund and his court stayed in this monastery during the Council, and he commissioned these frescoes in 1417. Of course he had his patron saint, St. Sigismund, depicted - resulting in a famed portrait of the king himself (see above). The German Wikipedia entry on the church is quite useful, and you can also see some of my photos of the frescoes below.

Medieval stone carvings stolen from the Hungarian National Gallery

2011-02-18T08:49:00.002+01:00

As it was revealead on Tuesday, two highly important Romanesque stone carvings had been stolen from the Hungarian National Gallery some time in early February. Both carvings were on view in the medieval lapidary of the Gallery, located on the ground floor of the building. There is no explanation as to how or when the theft took place.

The missing stones are the following:

A cornice fragment stemming from the church of Ják, dating from around 1230. The carving, decorated with the figure of a dragon (which originally joined another dragon), comes from the west portal of the abbey church of Ják, and was most recently published in the catalogue of the collection, written by Sándor Tóth (see my earlier post on this).

Hungarian National Gallery, Inv. no. 55.1037, sandstone, 24 x 26 x 15,5 cm

Left side fragment of a relief slab from the abbey church of Somogyvár, dating from around 1150. The stone carving belongs to the Rippl Rónai Museum of Kaposvár, it was on long-term loan in the National Gallery. The carving was published in the Pannonia Regia exhibition catalogue of the National Gallery in 1994.

Kaposvár, Rippl Rónai Museum, Inv. no. MCXC, white marble, 32 x 21 x 9 cm

It seems clear that objects such as these cannot be sold on the open market. It is hoped that the carvings will be recovered soon. The images here are from the official Hungarian database of stolen artwork, maintaned by the National Office of Cultural Heritage.

French review of Hungarian art history books

2011-02-17T22:53:00.000+01:00

As I wrote on this blog before, a number of books were published on Hungarian medieval wall-painting in recent years. A French researcher of medieval Hungarian painting, Marie Lionnet wrote a detailed and knowledgeable review of some of these publications, which was published in the journal of the French Institute of Art History, Perspective. Books reviewed include the Festschrift to Ernő Marosi, the book of Mihály Jánó on the research history of medieval wall painting in Transylvania - which was mention in this blog post before - as well as two books to which I contributed (and wrote about here).

Marie Lionnet wrote her doctoral dissertation on late medieval wall painting in the Kingdom of Hungary, you can read a pdf version of her conclusions here.

The full text of the journal Perspective is only available on a subscription basis. Thanks to the kindness of the author, and with permission of the publisher, I am able to provide the full text of the review, which you can access by clicking here. (This will open in Google docs - you might want to save a PDF copy for easier reading).

Full citation for the article is as follows:

Marie Lionnet: "Histoire de la peinture médiévale dans le royaume de Hongrie", dans Perspective, La revue de l'INHA, 2010/2011-2, décembre 2010, p. 384-389 (http://www.inha.fr/spip.php?rubrique259)

Blogging tools I use

2011-02-09T20:56:00.001+01:00

My Flavors.me page

I started this blog in August, so about 6 months ago. In this short time, Blogger stats recorded well over 10.000 page views here, which I consider very good for a blog with a somewhat obscure topic. I originally started this blog as an extension of my website on the art of medieval Hungary, essentially in order to replace the News section of the website (which I rarely updated). That website has been up and running for almost 15 years, and received many, many visitors. Today, the website and the blog are closely linked - all this works automatically thanks to a little tool called Feed Informer, which lists most recent content of this blog on the website. This is very neat, as now I never have to edit the news page - yet the content keeps refreshing.

In order to help readers find my blog - realizing that not everyone uses RSS feeds or Google Reader - I got a number of smart tools to work, which share all new content on social networks. First I registered at NetworkedBlogs - this service automatically posts updates to Facebook and Twitter. Oh yes, I also started a Twitter account, which proved to be one of the most important sources of traffic to my blog. As all these services were linking directly to individual posts, I also installed a LinkWithin widget, which helps readers get to other posts as well.

There are two more services I use, both of which required a few minutes to set up, and now work on their own. First is a very nice platform for creating personal websites, called Flavors.me. The website aggregates my blog and Twitter feeds, and also photos I uploaded to Picasa web albums and Flickr. Worth a try. The other service is a very interesting tool, called Paper.li. It automatically creates an online newspaper from Twitter posts I selected, so I set up a list following Twitter accounts focusing on medieval art - thus the Medieval Art Weekly was created.

Well, there was not much about medieval art in today's post - but if you follow some of the links above, you will get to a few interesting sites, and I hope that you keep following and reading the Medieval Hungary blog.

The Salerno Ivories

2011-02-03T20:53:00.000+01:00

I posted an image from the collection of the Museum of Applied Arts (Budapest) on Flickr today - a nice and small ivory panel showing the Creation of birds and fish. I detected from responses that there is some interest in the piece - hence this brief post on the Salerno ivories. Together with its companion piece at the Metropolitan Museum, the plaque comes from the cathedral of Salerno and dates from about 1080-1084. About fifty such plaques survive, all of which once decorated a large piece of church furnishing, such as an altar or reliquary. The panels depict biblical scenes from the Old and New Testament.

The plaque from Budapest traveled back to Salerno for an exhibition in 2007-2008. Titled "The Enigma of the Medieval Ivories from Salerno", the exhibition aimed to gather as many of these original pieces as possible (most of course are preserved to this day at the Museo Diocesano at Salerno). You can learn a lot more about the ivories by visiting the website of the exhibition. Photos of the individual ivory plaques are also available on the website of photographer Roberto Bigano. A two-day workshop at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florence, held in 2009, launched an ongoing research project dedicated to these ivories. So, expect to hear more about them in the near future!

(If, on the other hand, you would like to know more about the Museum of Applied Arts, you can follow the new Twitter account of the museum).

New medieval art websites, III.

2011-02-01T21:34:00.000+01:00

I will keep this post very short - there seems to be an ever richer selection of medieval art websites out there. I just want to point out a few I've recently discovered.

The Utrecht Psalter

Medieval manuscripts in Dutch collections

"This database contains descriptions of all medieval western manuscripts up to c. 1550 written in Latin script and preserved in public and semi-public collections in the Netherlands. These include the collections of libraries, museums, archives, collections of monastic orders and some private institutions open to researchers."

Arthur - La légende du roi Arthur

An online exhibition with copious illustrations from medieval manuscripts. Made by the Bibliothèque nationale de France, with direct links to Gallica, the 'Bibliothèque numerique' of the BnF, providing full digital versions of medieval manuscripts.

Reliquary with the Man of
Sorrows,
The Walters Art Museum

Treasures of Heaven: Saints, relics, and devotion in Medieval Europe

This exhibition, previously shown in Cleveland, is now going to the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. A brand new website has been created for this occasion, which contains really nice things, such as 3D photographs of several objects - photos where you can rotate and zoom in the objects. "The exhibition features over 130 sculptures, paintings and manuscripts, gathered from world-class collections, including the Louvre and the Vatican." For us in Europe, the exhibition will be available this summer at the British Museum in London.

Duccio: Rucellai Madonna
Florence, Uffizi

Finally, I would just like to mention a great new project, which created quite a buzz on Twitter: The Google Art Project, with virtual tours (streetview style) of several major museums worldwide. You can also browse (and zoom) works in the artwork viewer module.
Description from the website: "Explore museums from around the world, discover and view hundreds of artworks at incredible zoom levels, and even create and share your own collection of masterpieces."

Well, go ahead, and explore!

See previous installations of this feature: Medieval Art websites part I and part II.

New book on the frescoes of Johannes Aquila

2011-01-23T20:43:00.000+01:00

Johannes Aquila was a painter from the town of Radkersburg in Styria, working in the last quarter of the 14th century. Frescoes by him (or by his workshop) survive in altogether five churches in the area which used to be the border region of Styria and Hungary. Today two of those places: Mártonhely (Martjanci) and Bántornya (Turnisce) are in Slovenia. His earliest known work is in the small church of Velemér, dating from 1378. Latest works of Johannes Aquila's workshop are closer to his hometown in Austria: at the church of the Augustinian hermits in Fürstenfeld. One interesting secular fresco cycle at Radkesburg was also painted by the workshop (at the Pistorhaus). The style of his workshop is characterized by a mixture of Italian and Bohemian elements.

Johannes Aquila is most famous for not only signing his work, but also for painting his self-portrait. The self-portrait can be seen next to his signature, in a praying position (similarly to depictions of patrons) both at Velemér (1378) and at Mártonhely (1392). These are regarded as the oldest European self-portraits by a painter, and you can read more about in an article by Daniel Spanke (Spanke, Daniel, "Die ältesten Selbstbildnisse Europas? Zur Bedeutung der Malerdarstellungen Johannes Aquilas von Radkersburg in Velemér (1378) und Martjanci (1392) für eine Frühgeschichte des Porträts," Zbornik za umetnostno zgodonivo 34 (1998), 141-159, available in a pdf format).

A new book has just been published on this highly important painter, written by Terézia Kerny with photographs by Zoltán Móser (Kerny, Terézia - Móser, Zoltán: Képet öltött az Ige - Johannes Aquila freskói. Budapest, Kairosz, 2010). The book will be presented by Mária Prokopp on Tuesday, January 25 at Litea Literature & Tea Bookshop. The book is in Hungarian, but hopefully will be published in other languages as well.

I cannot post my own photos of the frescoes here, because the last time I visited these churches I still used slides - and those have not been scanned yet. To the left, you can see the self-portait of Johannes Aquila from Mártonhely (Martjanci), and you can find several other photos online, especially of Velemér:

Photos of the church, with Quicktime virtual reality views of the interior; more photos at the Fine Arts in Hungary website.

For more photos, visit the IMAREAL database of the Institut für Realienkunde des Mittelalters at Krems (search for Künstler: Johannes von Aquila [um 1400 tätig], or for Standorte: Turnisce and Martjanci. Does not seem to work in Chrome).

Medieval manuscripts at the National Library

2011-01-22T16:22:00.000+01:00

A page from the 14th century Bible
of 'Weceslaus dictus Ganoys'
National Széchényi Library

The National Széchényi Library preserves Hungary's largest repository of medieval manuscripts, and it is also an important research center in this field. On Monday, January 24th 2011, a series of lectures will be held about various medieval manuscripts and early printed books.The detailed program of these sessions can be studied on the blog of the National Library (in Hungarian). Lectures will be given by researchers working at the library, as well as by art historian Ernő Marosi.

If you would like to know more about the medieval holdings of the library, the 1940 catalogue of Latin medieval manuscripts is available online (Emma Bartoniek: Codices Latini Medii Aevi), to be found among the databases of the National Library (go to Kézirattár). Also, there is a lot of information available on the Bibliotheca Corviniana, as I wrote in a previous post and also on my website. Most important resource is the Bibliotheca Corviniana Digitalis. For other early Hungarian books, you might want to look at another website of the library, dedicated to the earliest Hungarian linguistic records (the full website is largely in Hungarian).

Armales Transylvanorum

2011-01-17T21:35:00.000+01:00

An international traveling exhibition, which presents photographs of about fifty armorial letters from Transylvania, will arrive to Budapest this week. It is the result of research conducted by specialists of the Institute of History, University of Debrecen and the Faculty of History and Philosophy, Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj Napoca. The project was coordinated by Tamás Szálkai, whose book on this subject was published in 2009. The armorials date from the period of the Principality Transylvania, and were donated by Princes of Transylvania to various noblemen.

The exhibition will open at the Budapest History Museum on January 19th, 2011. For that day, and entire conference has been organized on the subject of Coat of arms and society in medieval and early modern Hungary. You can read the conference program here, and you can read more about the exhibition here.

There is an entire website dedicated to the program, unfortunately only in Hungarian - visit Armales Transylvanorum for more information.