THE ILLUMINATION OF MANUSCRIPTS

In a study such as the present no account will be expected of monastic architecture. The subject is wide, and falls within the provinces of the architect and the antiquary rather than of the historian; it has indeed been very minutely and copiously illustrated in monographs and in the publications of learned societies, though there is still wanting a full review of monastic architecture, making use of all the data amassed during the past hundred years, and composed by one who combines the qualities of an architect and antiquary with those of a critical historian capable of tracing developments and indicating relationships. Moreover, the monks, as monks, were not architects or masons, and though, like the governing bodies of colleges and universities at the present day, they were necessarily patrons of great architectural undertakings and not uninfluenced by the beauty and majesty of the buildings under whose shadow they lived, it was only by accident that an individual had a share in designing them, or exceptional gifts as a connoisseur of the art.

The case of illumination is very different. Throughout the period covered by these chapters it was the monastic art par excellence in England and its chief masterpieces before c. 1220 were products of the cloister. Moreover, surviving examples of the art and modern reproductions and studies are alike less accessible and less familiar than is the case with architecture, and though no detailed history of manuscript painting can be attempted here, to leave it without any mention would be to neglect one of the highest creative achievements of the epoch.