Customer Reviews

A History of Illuminated Manuscripts

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the first illumination book I encourage my students to purchase (with Drogin's history of calligraphy). This is an entirely reasonable price with abundant color and b&w pictures.

Unlike many tretises on the topic, this doesn't limit you to post-1200 Anglo-French. This gives you a true oversight of western european illumination of the entire span of the middle ages (spanish, moorish, greek, latin, etc...)

Added to the benefit of examples, de Hamel doesn't subject you to the same pictures you've seen in every other 2-bit book (yes, Victoria, other books existed before 1200 besides the Book of Kells).

The text is thoughtful without being dry and boring. This is written for an audience which is expected to appreciate the subject, without assuming you've devoted your life to it already.

Walk, do not run, to get this. A must for anyone who is learning how to illuminate.

Chris DeHamel works researching books for Sotheby's. That is all he does, and his numerous books on the subject show his mastery and command of the subject. Everyday he goes to work, he is getting time to research, free of teaching committments that fetter the ability of other scholars to pursue their writing. His research and ability shows in this beatiful and well-written book, which is an excellent introduction to the history of the book and to the processes and culture surrounding the book as an object. His book progresses, chapter-by-chapter, through the different groups that books were designed for, describing where and why they were made, and the special challenges of each. Chock-full of photographs of lavish manuscript writing and art, this volume is not only an extremely suitable textbook for art history and history classes dealing with the book or commodity-culture, but also is a great personal or coffeetable volume, and supremely reasonable at the price it is provided at, considering the cost of so many art texts.

This provides a lush, seemingly endless procession of early illumination. I rated it a 10 before I got to the text. An absolute must for anyone studying the art of illumination, especially if it is a hands-on study. This provides the best overview of pre-1000 MSS production. Normally I see a handfull of dry pages of text accompanied by just a "oh, here's two b&w pictures of the same stuff you've seen in every other book" - not here!!. I recommend it highly to my students.

I loved this book! I used it for a graduate course on Illuminated Manuscripts, and it was one of the main textbooks we used, but I used it often after the course as well. I really enjoyed reading it, and found that it was unlike most of the typical text books I had formerly used. For any art history student, it is an outstanding resource. For anyone who loves illuminated manuscripts, book arts, or the Medieval period in general, this is a wonderful resource. It is a book that I consider an indispensable resource in my personal library. It is very well written and easily accessible for anyone. Although some of the terminology may be unfamiliar, it isn't so esoteric that it is beyond the scope of general understanding. It is clearly one of the best resources on the subject that I have ever come across!

This book is an excellent overview of changing Illumination through the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance. The images are gorgeous and varied. My only real complaint is one of size and proportion. The book fails to give the original sizes of the pages so that the reader has an understanding of scale. Sometimes it can be difficult to determine the origin of the page, if you do want to follow up on size and additional pages.

Beautiful illustrations; simply page after page of color. While the text is wonderful as well, the medievalist will appreciate it for the large photographs that allow detail to be seen. A must for the manuscript junkie.

Christopher De Hamel's "A History of Illuminated Manuscripts" (now in its second edition) is certainly the definitive history for lay readers, but it is probably the best starting place for aspiring professionals as well. It is well-written, faultlessly researched, and copiously illustrated. I happily use it in my university course on illuminated manuscripts together with Ingo Walther's "Masterpieces of Illumination" (published by Taschen)--in my opinion, the perfect companion piece.

The second edition of De Hamel's book is structured as was the first: an informative introduction is followed by chapters which divide and discuss the manuscripts according to their intended users (missionaries, emperors, monks, students, aristocrats, everybody, priests, and collectors); an extended bibliography precedes several useful indexes. This Phaidon paperback edition is a beautiful book, with a white paper cover adorned with a full-color dust-jacket. Many new illustrations have been added, and there are many more color illustrations than there were in the first edition. More importantly, the text has been updated to reflect ongoing research in the field.

My only complaint about this edition is that many of the important full-color and full-page illustrations in the first edition (to which I often referred in my classes) have either been reduced in size or eliminated entirely in the new edition. There are also significant (and inexplicable) differences in the color reproduction of illuminations between the first (David R. Godine, Publisher) edition and this second (Phaidon Press) edition--sometimes the differences are so radical that only a close inspection (or a familiarity with the actual documents) reveals they are photographs of the same manuscript. And since many of these manuscripts are from private collections (to which Mr. De Hamel apparently gained access by reputation or through associations established during his tenure at Sotheby's), it would be impossible for most readers to know which of the differing reproductions are the more accurate. My own experience would suggest that not all the changes in the new Phaidon edition are indeed improvements.

Publishing faults aside, this is a fine book by a scholar with impeccable credentials and a gift for clarity and sensibility in his writing. I highly recommend it.

second only to my copy of "Masterpieces of Illumination" (Taschen; 25th edition [September 19, 2007]) I obtained this first, and it was my "Go To" book for reference material while being a scribe for several years. I highly recommend this book, as it has some material not covered in the Taschen reference, and in addition to all the wonderful reference of the artwork in this volume, I found the text to be of good use, and a decent read to boot. HIGHLY RECOMMEND!

A beautiful book, lavishly illustrated to explain and enhance the text. Many of the images are from private collections thanks to the author's work at Sotheby's.

The text is very accessible for the non-expert. The reader's understanding and appreciation of the art and craftsmanship which went into illuminated manuscripts will be greatly increased.

Worth every penny.

I am thoroughly impressed with this book. Its scholarship is impressive and helpful in my preparations to study medieval history at Oxford. And the thoughtfully written bibliography and through indexing of the manuscripts illustrated assist further studies. Even though it's not on my official reading list and is certainly not a light nor compact book, I'm packing it and taking it with me.

But, as scholarly as this work is, if one simply wants an attractive coffee table book on the subject, this can certainly be one. If one wants a very readable, engagingly written, well illustrated introduction to illuminated manuscripts, this is for you as well.

There is even some helpful guidance on collecting the more available manuscripts such as Books of Hours. And as the Fellow Librarian of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge and with his 25 years experience in evaluating manuscripts for Sotheby's, Dr. De Hamel's knowledge is not just theoretical.

Yet the price is extremely reasonable for a book of this quality.