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De coloribus: The Meanings of Color in Beatus ManuscriptsAuthor(s): Elizabeth S. BolmanReviewed work(s):Source: Gesta, Vol. 38, No. 1 (1999), pp. 22-34Published by: International Center of Medieval ArtStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/767110 .Accessed: 17/05/2012 03:44

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De coloribus: The Meanings of Color in Beatus Manuscripts*

ELIZABETH S. BOLMAN

Temple University

Abstract

This study is premised on the idea that human responses to color are historically and culturally specific. Illuminations of the Apocalypse in mid-tenth- through early twelfth-century Beatus manuscripts are analyzed for patterns of color use. These patterns suggest that color functioned differently than twentieth-century viewers might expect. Links between the text of Revelation and the colors chosen by the illuminators may be evidence that the illuminations were used mnemonically. Although they appear to us as the antithesis of illusionism, some of the colors in these manuscripts were chosen with reference to the natural world. Colors could carry symbolic meanings which varied according to context, and they could be tied to ideas about light and darkness, not only to hue. An aesthetic system which prized complex and systematized chromatic variety informed the painting of these illuminations. These and other patterns show that color provides a significant point of access for historical readings of Beatus illuminations.

When asked by Fernand L6ger what single work of art he should see in New York, Meyer Schapiro chose a tenth- century illuminated copy of Beatus of Li6bana's Commentar- ius in Apocalypsin, housed in the Pierpont Morgan Library (Color Pls. 1-2).' Schapiro has described mozarabic painting, of which Beatus manuscripts are a large part, as "an art of color."2 Mireille Mentr6 has pointed out that most twentieth- century viewers enthusiastically describe the colors in the illuminations of these manuscripts as beautiful, passionate and powerful, but that nineteenth-century viewers usually said they were ugly.3 As this dichotomy illustrates, responses to color can change over time. Recent scholarship has also shown that people in different parts of the world, and at different times in history, have had varying ideas about the nature and meanings of color.4

Despite the salience of color as one of the determining characteristics of Beatus manuscripts, it has not been the subject of rigorous historical analysis.5 The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that a series of historically-specific ideas about color affected the choices made by the illuminators of Beatus manuscripts. My principal method is to examine repeating patterns of color use in these densely illustrated codices. Some of these patterns will help to test proposals by John Gage and Liz James concerning medieval ideas about color. In some ways Beatus manuscripts provide a more fruit- ful ground for analysis of color patterns than the geographi- cally disparate, and principally monumental examples used by Gage and James. The density of illustration in each manu-

script, and the comparatively large number of codices from the same region and time period, provide ample material for study. The data derived from them permit me to propose additional motivations for the selection and reception of color, thereby broadening our understanding of medieval ideas about color.

Beatus manuscripts are named after the eighth-century Spanish monk Beatus of Li6bana, who assembled a commentary on the book of Revelation which became very popular. The text came to include a remarkably elaborate group of images.6 A complete set of paintings numbers one hundred and eight, of which sixty-eight illustrate the Apocalypse.' It is from the latter group that I draw my examples. Beatus arranged his Commentary in sections, each beginning with several verses from the book of Revelation followed by the relevant exegesis. In the mid-tenth- through early twelfth- century manuscripts considered in this study, the illuminations illustrate the biblical text and are placed adjacent or very close to it, before the bulk of the exegesis. Most of these images are full-page, and depict the same basic subjects in what is often a startling array of colors.

Illustrated copies of this work survive from the early tenth century on, and follow two main stemmata, or branches (Fig. 1). The second stemma has two major sub-branches (IIa and IIb). The divisions into these groupings were made on the basis of textual and iconographical differences. While their basic assignment into three divisions has not been changed, the relationship of elements within these recensions continues to be revised.8 Analysis of these issues is outside the scope of this project. I will therefore use as a working model Peter Klein's stemma I, onto which I have grafted John Williams's recently published revision of stemma II.9

I studied eight manuscripts for patterns of color use."' All were copied and illuminated in a small, relatively isolated area of northern Spain, between ca. 940 and 1109 C.E. Two are ascribed to stemma I, five to stemma IIa, and one is from stemma IIb. Their selection was informed by several factors, the most important of which are their close temporal and geographical relationships. An attempt to build an understanding of historically specific ideas about color can most profitably be undertaken within restricted parameters. Because textual and iconographic elements tend to be transmitted through copying, a study of patterns of color use must consider this factor as well. Finally, the pragmatic reality of access to manuscripts and to color reproductions of them has also informed my selection."

22 GESTA XXXVIII/1 ? The International Center of Medieval Art 1999

Commentary Key: Stemma I, 784 edition Stemma IIa

Stemma I, 784

A2 San Millin Stemma I, earlier 8th c.A San Milln

edition E Escorial N Navarre Fc Silos Fragment L Lorvdo O Osma C Corsini

Stemma I, earlier 8th c.

A' Madrid 14-1 Stemma IIb S San Sever

Fc A' M Stemma IIa T

M Morgan U Urgell

A2 G | | V Valladolid

U V J Facundus D Silos

1TuStemma IIb

L R T Tabara G Girona

Pc Tu Turin H Las Huelgas R Rylands

Fr Pc Cardefia Ar Arroyo Ar Fr Riosecco

FIGURE 1. Stemmata for Beatus manuscripts, after Klein, Der diltere Beatus-Kodex, II, 36 and Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 23, 26 (drawing: author).

Historical Perceptions and Definitions of Color

Asking questions about color systems and selecting ter- minology presuppose an awareness of color as a category. An- thropologists and color theorists assert that humans perceive millions of variations in hue, but that not all cultures are in- terested in color or vision in the same way.12 Isaac Newton's discovery of the color spectrum, apparent in rainbows and in a ray of white light refracted through a prism onto a white surface, forms the basis of modern color systems. Twentieth- century efforts to systematize color understanding and nam- ing have resulted in the development of a three-dimensional model based on three concepts. These are hue, value and saturation, which are considered to be the constituent elements of any color. Hue refers to a color name, for example red. Value indicates the degree of white or black added to the hue, and is sometimes called tone or brightness. Saturation means the intensity or purity of a hue. The most common three- dimensional color models position hue around the circum- ference of a globe, value along its central vertical axis, and

saturation radiating out horizontally from its center.'3 Inter- estingly, no consensus exists even today on which hues are primary. Newton, acknowledging that the color spectrum was continuous, still identified seven color segments in it: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.14 The Munsell theory, which was the first three-dimensional model for color, organizes hues in a circle divided by one hundred evenly spaced points, but selects from them five principal and five intermediate hues. The principal hues are red, yellow, green, blue, and purple."5 Note that even though both systems are based on the constant phenomenon of the colors of visible light on a white background, the identification of the more important or primary hues differs.16 Harold Conklin, in a critique of color systems, observes that other qualities affect our perception of color, including luminosity, transparency, texture, and lustrousness.'7 Color theories, therefore, even those based on scientific data, are historically constructed.

Recent scholarship on medieval ideas about color by Gage and James helps to make sense of some of the patterns of color use identified in this study. Using texts and images,

23

Gage and James have shown that value, and not hue, was the principal organizing element of color systems in the middle ages.'8 The two primary poles of this linear model were white and black, with red and possibly also purple understood to be bright colors.19 The place of hues in this system was subordinate to value; thus a hue was understood to be inherently light or dark. Gage also observed that ideas about the relationship of hues to each other and to value were often contradic- tory, and loosely conceptualized. Generally speaking, instead of thinking, as we do, of a circle of hues to which value and saturation are added, people in the middle ages imagined a somewhat flexible scale of light to dark, along which hues were arranged.20

Definitions of color words are historically no more stable than other ideas about color. Words such as red, which a twentieth-century reader of English understands in relation to a specific hue range, in other contexts might have entailed reference to additional hues and to other qualities, such as brightness. It has been shown that in antiquity and the middle ages, the word purpureus referred to hues which we identify as red and blue in addition to purple, and also connoted saturation and lustrousness.2• This lack of fixity with respect to hue boundaries can be unsettling to a modern audience, and should be kept in mind as one of the basic differences between medieval and modern ideas about color. For the sake of clarity, the English color words used in this article corre-

spond to twentieth-century, western definitions. Hyphenated color words should be read with an emphasis on the second word; for example, orange-red means red which tends towards

orange.

The Colors of the Text and Mnemonics

Examination of Beatus manuscript illuminations for color use yields numerous patterns. One which we might expect to find, given standard medieval artistic practice, is missing, and that is a close chromatic relationship among manuscripts in the same stemma. Four other factors played a much greater role in color selection than copying: words in the text of Rev- elation, ideas about color and the natural world, symbolism, and an aesthetic appreciation of variety. The absence of evidence for habitual copying of color along with text and ico-

nography can best be demonstrated by considering subjects which likely have no specific symbolic, natural, aesthetic, or textual reference point. Analysis of the background bands in stemma IIa illuminations of the River of Life shows no similarity in hue between the Morgan (M, fol. 223: peach, yellow, purple-red, peach) and the Urgell manuscripts (U, fols. 198v- 199: pale yellow, orange, pale purple, yellow, orange).22 The Urgell and Facundus (J) manuscripts have differently colored bands in the upper two-thirds of the folios, but are the same in the lower thirds (U, fols. 198v-199: pale yellow, orange, pale purple, yellow, orange; J, fol. 254: blue, yellow, pale purple, yellow, orange). These three manuscripts have a rel-

atively close relationship to one another, textually and icon-

ographically (see Fig. 1), but color does not bear out the connection. There is no similarity in the colors of the background bands between any of these stemma IIa manuscripts and the Silos Beatus, the last manuscript belonging to this stemma (D, fol. 209: gray-teal, gray-brown, orange-red, light brown). The absence of color repetition between the Urgell and Silos manuscripts is particularly noteworthy in light of the fact that Klein has observed a close iconographic rela-

tionship between them.23 These examples suggest that color was only rarely transmitted from the model, if at all, in stark contrast to features such as text and iconography. If routine

copying did not account for color choice, what did? A close relationship between the text of the Apocalypse

and the iconography in Beatus illuminations has been demonstrated.24 A survey focused on the two words alba and roseus revealed a correspondence in colors in about seventy-five percent of the examples studied, or eighty-five percent if we remove the Silos Beatus, the latest manuscript considered.25 The book of Revelation includes both color words and words for substances and qualities which suggest color. An example of the latter is the word "bronze," which could have been read for both hue and brightness (Revelation 1:15): "his feet were like burnished bronze." In many cases, the illuminators of these manuscripts followed the color word in the text, al-

though this fact is not always immediately apparent to the modern eye. Two methods were used to render color words. One, filling in the area of the subject in a single, mostly solid block of color, is familiar to twentieth-century viewers. In the second, outlines were the site of the object's most important color. The convention of using a border area or stripe to carry the color designation of the whole may derive ultimately from ancient clothing, for example the clavus of the Roman toga praetexta.26 The way a toga was worn displayed these borders as fluid, colored lines moving across the center of the wearer's

body, as well as around its periphery. The color of the border was the significant element, and not the overall color of the fabric. The practice of decorating clothing with colored strips of fabric, whether on the border or elsewhere, continued in medieval liturgical dress.

A consideration of depictions of clouds in five Beatus manuscripts demonstrates the importance of color words in the text for the illuminators. Revelation mentions four clouds, in 1:7, 10:1, 11:12, and 14:14. Uniquely, Revelation 14:14 specifies the color of the cloud, alba, meaning white or bright. In the Facundus, Escorial (E) and Girona (G) manuscripts, the clouds referred to in the first three passages are depicted, but only the clouds in the images to 14:14, the nubes alba, are white.27 The Morgan illustration of the nubes alba is yellow with white outlines. These clouds can be read as white because of the outlines. Yet two of the three other clouds in this manuscript also have white outlines, so the "white cloud" is not set apart from the other clouds by white pigment, as it is in J, E, and G.28 The nubes alba in the Valladolid Beatus

24

(V) is white (fol. 148v). The clouds in the Silos Beatus are completely inconsistent with the text; only one is white, and it corresponds to Revelation 10:1, not 14:14.29

As this example shows, color choices can reiterate the link between text and illumination which is established by iconography. The connections among color, iconography and text play a surprising role in the pictorial narrative. In some instances color choices rupture narrative progression. Con- sider the Morgan illuminations of the Seven Angels with the Seven Last Plagues, Revelation 15:1-16:1. These angels are mentioned four times as a group. All four references are pic- tured, in three illuminations (fols. 18 lv, 183v, 185). Describ- ing their first appearance, John says only that he sees the seven angels with seven plagues in the sky (Revelation 15:1). In the illumination accompanying this text the angels are shown dressed in mantles and tunics in a range of colors (fol. 181 lv; Color P1. 1, a). When John next mentions them, he describes their dress, saying that they wear clean, shining linen and have golden girdles upon their breasts (Revelation 15:6; fol. 183v; Color P1l. 1, b).30 Two features in the depiction of this line are unique in the sequence of illuminations of plague-bearing angels: white outlines around all of the angels' clothes, and golden bands across their mantles. This is the only instance of completely white outlining of any figure in the Morgan Beatus.31 Within the outlines, none of the color combinations used in their dress in the angels' first appearance is duplicated. Folio 183v represents the second and third textual references to the angels as a group (Revelation 15:6- 7). In the final appearance of all seven, the text indicates noth- ing about their apparel, and once again, as in their first appearance, the illuminator has shown the angels without golden girdles or white outlines (Revelation 16:1; fol. 185). This time, two of the seven color combinations in their mantles and tunics repeat those in their second appearance.

Color choices for the dress of the main protagonists of these scenes in the densely illustrated Morgan manuscript are not consistent from image to image. They do not assist the viewer in identifying sequential moments in time, in the manner of modern cartoon strips, but disrupt the narrative flow and call attention to specific words in the text. None of the words signaled by the gold and white-colored pigments is an abstract color word. One is a substance word, gold, and the other two-mundum splendidum, meaning clean and bright, spotless, or shining-are qualities which are rendered in the Morgan manuscript with white pigment. Brightness is depicted with white, and this choice corresponds with the color most often used for sources of light, as will be demonstrated below.

If, in some instances, a clear link exists between specific words in the text (whether abstract color words or words for substances and qualities) and the colors of the illuminations, there is also a substantial number of instances in which the link is unclear, or absent. Revelation 7:9 describes a multi- tude of people in white (alba) robes, holding palm branches.

In the Morgan manuscript (fols. 117v-118), at the beginning of stemma IIa, the palm-bearing figures are dressed in multi- colored robes which include only a few white lines, and no completely white outlines. In the Facundus Beatus, another use of alba in the text is visually highlighted in the Opening of the Fifth Seal (Revelation 6:11), in which the figures are all outlined in white or gold, implying a reference to the brightness aspect of alba (fol. 106). In the Silos Beatus, which is at the very end of stemma IIa, no white appears in this scene (fols. 112v-113).

These examples demonstrate two points. First, the colors in the illuminations often relate specifically to words in the text, but do not always do so. Second, links between image and text vary by manuscript. In other words, in most cases the derivation seems to be illumination from text, and not illumination from illumination. Choices seem to have been made, perhaps by the illuminator or scribe, independently of the pictorial model used. This differs from our understanding of standard medieval practice, according to which text and imagery were copied with fidelity from models. The frequent correlation of text and painted colors continues to appear in Beatus manuscripts into the eleventh century, suggesting that there was an enduring motivation for these choices. The late eleventh- to early twelfth-century Silos Beatus, however, is singularly free of color links between text and illumination.32

What could have motivated illuminators to disable narrative continuity by using white for the clothing of plague- bearing angels (outlines in M, solid white in G), and adding golden girdles only once? A modern viewer might expect that the single textual reference to details of dress would have been applied by the artist consistently to every appearance of the figures. It has been suggested that monks and nuns in northern Spain memorized the Apocalypse text.33 Beatus wrote in his commentary that the Apocalypse was the key to all of the Bible's books, thus indicating its importance in early medieval Spain.34 Consider again the Morgan Beatus's plague- bearing angels. Describing their first appearance (Revelation 15:1; fol. 181v; Color P1. 1, a), John says that he sees seven angels with seven plagues in the sky. In verse 6, he states that they are wearing their clean, shining linen and gold girdles. In the next line, verse 7, the angels are mentioned again, being given the bowls of wrath. Verses 6 and 7 are combined on folio 183v (Color P1. 1, b). Two lines later (Revelation 16:1), John again refers to the angels, saying only that they are ad- dressed by God (fol. 185). We have here a surprisingly dense sequence of images for a short passage. Visually, the narrative is broken up by color changes. The descriptive details unique to one instance in the text are included only once in these illuminations, on folio 183v. It seems plausible that this sequence of images could have aided a reader intent on mem- orizing the corresponding text.

The various classical and medieval texts on mnemonic techniques known to us use visual images to assist memoriza- tion.35 While this feature of the treatises might seem to support

25

the hypothesis of a mnemonic function for color patterns in Beatus manuscripts, it also unsettles the hypothesis because these texts stress that each person must create a personal visual memory aid. Yet mnemonic practice may not always have conformed to these rules. A recent study of the schematic images accompanying several early versions of Cassiodorus's Institutiones suggests just such a mnemonic function for them.36 In this case the images are not at all as complete or literal in their illustration of the text as they are in Beatus manuscripts. It seems plausible that the Beatus illuminations may have been ready-made mnemonic images, sometimes incorporating parallels to verbal signs for color.

Representations of the Natural World

Mentr6 and Klein have remarked that the colors chosen by the illuminators of Beatus manuscripts have no relationship to the natural world.37 Given the brightly colored bands in their backgrounds, and the appearance of such details as blue horses and numerous multi-colored, fantastical beasts,38 this reaction is understandable. Furthermore, the painters of these illuminations made no effort to show any of their subjects as three-dimensional objects defined by light and shadow. There is no illusionistic space in these paintings. Nonethe- less, the natural world does seem to have played an important role in the color choices of Beatus manuscript illuminators, although it is ideas about nature which informed them, not unmediated nature itself. Just as the sense we make of color is constructed, so is the sense we make of nature. In the manuscripts it is possible to find regular patterns of color choices in depictions of light and of darkness, and also for certain physical substances such as blood and hail.

The illuminations of Beatus manuscripts are full of stars, fire, and lightning. Sources of light are consistently rendered with white and red, and less often with yellow and orange.39 Representations of darkness are less plentiful, but they do exist. When produced by smoke, darkness is commonly depicted with blue lines.40 The word niger, meaning both black and dark, appears twice in the Apocalypse text, and it is rendered with black or brown pigments in eight of the nine examples studied.41 These choices show that hues, even at their most pure and saturated, were understood as having a value aspect. On the basis of this evidence, we can readily hypo- thesize a value scale in which white, red, yellow, and orange made up the light end. Less securely, we can suggest that black, brown, and blue made up the dark end.

The colors used to depict darkness in the illustration of Revelation 8:12 show a more complicated pattern. "The fourth angel blew his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, and a third of the stars, and a third of the moon, so that a third of their light was darkened; a third of the day was kept from shining, and likewise a third of the night." In the Morgan and Escorial manuscripts, the purple-blue and black thirds of the sun and the moon read clearly as darkness, consistent with

the colors used to render the word niger (the remaining two- thirds is painted white: M fol. 138v, E fol. 94v). This color choice provides more evidence that blue and black were at the dark end of the value scale, and suggests that purple may have been at that end as well. The white two-thirds is understandable, as white was the color most commonly used to render light. The illuminator of the Silos manuscript, however, does not seem to have used colors representing extremes of light and darkness, but rather one color, white, which is most often used for light, and a color which is darker than white, in this case orange-red, according to a system which organizes colors on a value scale to convey the darkening of light. The Girona manuscript probably illustrates a similar tendency, following which pale purple was chosen for the dark third because it is darker than orange-red, the color of the light two-thirds. Pale purple may have been a median color, as it does not consistently appear in the rendering of sources of light and darkness.42 The stars in illuminations of Revelation 8:12 correspond irregularly with the text. In some cases a third of each star seems to have been darkened, in others a third of the group of stars,43 and in the Morgan and Silos manuscripts there is no suggestion of darkening at all. Light and darkness are not shown illusionistically, but through the mediation of medieval ideas about the relationship between hue and value. Colors that we read as hues were chosen to represent value, that is to say light and darkness. Hail, blood, skin, water, and precious metals are also regularly depicted with colors that relate to the natural world.

Colors used for skin are consistently white, tan, or peach (Color Pls. 1-2).44 Gold is rendered with actual gold, or with one or more of the colors used to depict light.45 Lambs are usually white (Color P1. 1, a). Blood is bright or dark red, or, exceptionally, only partly red.46 Hail is almost always white.47 Rivers and oceans are usually blue; less frequently they are designated by the off-white of unpainted parchment, with blue fish and blue outlines.48 The only dramatic deviation from this pattern is the red color of the Red Sea in paintings of the mappa mundi, which were often included in these codices.49

The key to the constant use of the same colors for fire and water may derive from the colors traditionally assigned to the four elements.50 Jerome and Isidore agree that ether, or fire, is red, and that water is purple.5' Fire is also a light source, and the use of red and orange-red to depict it is consistent with the colors for light discussed above. The hue which we identify as blue probably belonged within the range for purple. It is harder to explain the colors used for the elements of air and earth. Jerome described air as blue, and Isidore said it is white.52 Given the colored background bands in many Beatus manuscripts, it is hard to imagine where or how air could be represented. Trees and mountains present much less regularity. While many are blue or purple, multiple colors were used. The element earth, which would include mountains, was described as byssus (flax) by Jerome.53 Isidore described the element of earth as dark,54 but the colors

26

of mountains in Beatus manuscripts seem almost as varied as palette ranges would permit, and they are not limited to the hues used to render darkness. The motivation for choosing varying colors for mountains and trees, but only red for blood is not easily explicable in natural terms, unless it is because blood is a relatively constant color, while trees and the flora on mountains change color with seasons, geographical loca- tion, availability of water, and quality of light.

The patterns of colors used for sources of light and of darkness in these illuminations show that what we define as hues, for example red, included value-a quality of light or darkness-in early medieval Spain. Since red conveyed light, it was a bright color, second only to white, and brighter than yellow. These results correspond to Gage's characterization of the medieval color system as one which organized hues in terms of value. By virtue of the narrowness of its temporal and geographical scope, the present study permits a more precise demonstration of the relationship of hues to each other on a value scale than was possible in the broader studies of Gage and James. I have found connections between statements about at least two of the four elements (fire and water) and the colors used to represent them. In addition, red was constantly used for blood, and white for hail. These patterns indicate that ideas about the natural world and the observable colors of some things in it did play a role in determining the colors of Beatus manuscript illuminations, non-illusionistic though they may be.

Color Symbolism

All three of the hues used in Beatus manuscript illuminations to represent darkness appear consistently in one other context: they depict the devil and Hades, who is the personification of hell. Devils in all but one of the Beatus manuscripts studied are rendered in blue, black, or brown.55 The personification of Hades appears as blue or brown, or a com- bination of both.56 This raises the interesting possibility that what we tend to read as hues-blue, brown, and black-functioned here as darkness, and that they occupied an area on the value scale that carried a negative symbolic meaning.57

Except for sources of light and darkness and natural objects, as discussed above, no other limited group of hues is consistently used for any other subject matter, and ascertain- ing the symbolic potential of colors is surprisingly difficult. The colors used to depict darkness and the devil also appear in representations of sacred subjects, such as angels and God, as one example from the Facundus Beatus demonstrates. The Woman Clothed with the Sun (fol. 187) shows God enthroned in the upper right, in a robe of the same black color with red outlines as the devil at the lower right in the same scene. Thus no color always had fixed symbolic significance, and only one, white, usually did.58

White appears almost exclusively in positive symbolic contexts in Beatus manuscripts, most commonly in the lamb

of God (Color P1. 1, a). Of twenty-six lambs depicted in the manuscripts studied, twenty-one are white, with brown and rarely also red outlines, and five are various shades of gray.59 All but one of these non-white examples are in the Silos Beatus. The symbolic consistency of white, and the symbolic inconsistency of other colors, is a characteristic of medieval texts as well. In texts, white is often linked to a symbolic cluster including brightness, purity, sanctity, cleanliness, chas- tity, and the lamb of God.60 Even if white was used in the illuminations for its value aspect-as brightness or light-it is unusual that only this one of the four hues used to render light was chosen for the lamb, and only rarely were lambs outlined in red. This is in contrast to the coloration of the devil, for whom all of the three hues used to render darkness were employed.

When colors function symbolically in Beatus manuscripts their meaning depends on context, and, excepting the case of white, symbolism does not entail a common associa- tion with a fixed meaning.61 The evidence from the illuminations corresponds to Beatus's discussion of this subject in his commentary.62 In the exegesis of the rosy-colored (roseus) horse of Revelation 6:4, Beatus explains that heretics, who "shed innocent blood," and the devil, with whom they are in league, sit upon this horse.63 The horse is roseus because of the blood they shed. The author goes on to explain that the rosy horse of Zachariah 1:8 has a very different meaning. It symbolizes the blood of martyrs who have sacrificed themselves. Both horses are red with blood, but one horse's color symbolizes evil killing, and the other sacred martyrdom.64 In this case colors are discussed simply as hues, without the suggestion of light or darkness. Color can work symbolically as a value (darkness) or as a hue (roseus), but its meaning depends on context. Because of this variability, more color symbolism may have been intended in these illuminations than can be retrieved by us.

Varietas

An appreciation for variety, with or without color, has been recognized as a characteristic of late antique poetry by Michael Roberts, and of late antique sculpture by Beat Brenk.65 James has described color variation as an intentional practice of Byzantine mosaicists when they were depicting a common scene.66 Two treatises on the technical manufacture of pigments also include opinions about color variety. Eraclius, the author of the ca. eleventh-century De coloribus et artibus Romanorum, states that mixing colors makes more beautiful varieties.67 Written in the early twelfth century,68 Theophi- lus's De diversis artibus gives us a richer understanding of the importance of varietas. The sanctuary of the temple of holy wisdom, for Theophilus, is a place "filled with a variety of all kinds of diverse colours with the usefulness and nature of each one set forth."69 In the case of varietas, it does not matter if these colors were principally thought of as hues or as areas

27

Type 1: linear mirrored repetition A A

or: ABC CBA

Type 2: mirrored repetition along A B a diagonal grid BX

Type 3: linear (horizontal or vertical) repetition of a pattern: ABABABABABAB

or: ABCBABCBABCBA

or: ACBAC BACBA CBACB

Type 4: regularly colored pairs in A B C D E F G two zones: H A B C D E F

Type 5: linear pattern reversed in AB CD lower zone: DC BA

Type 6: like elements framing a regular pattern: A BCDCBCDC A

Type 7: like elements framing an irregular pattern: A BCDEFGHI A

FIGURE 2. Principles of varietas in Beatus manuscripts.

on a value scale. The point is their difference and their profusion. This common appreciation for diversity manifested itself with color in a specific way in northern Spain.

Chromatic variety is an obvious characteristic of Beatus manuscript illuminations. Variety exists in the sheer number of colors used.70 The way in which these many colors are disposed also varies, so we are looking at a taste not simply for a single system of diversity, but for varieties of variety. Pattern and color work together. The borders of most of the illuminations studied are intricately patterned with colors, and each figure is painted with a dense build-up of colors, often between seven and nine hues on a single figure (Color Pls. 1, a; 2, a). In their density of polychromy, the figures and borders in these manuscripts contrast with the single-hued backgrounds in the manuscripts of stemma I, and the wide, solidly-colored bands that form the backgrounds in manuscripts of stemma II.

The structuring of varietas can range from simple to ex- tremely complex. At its most basic, varietas in Beatus manuscripts consists of the application of a profusion of colors in each illumination. This effect can be achieved in a manuscript which includes only about ten colors, like the Escorial Beatus of stemma I, by painting a multi-colored, patterned border; a single background color (usually a bright, saturated yellow); and three or four blocks or areas of color in each figure, over which a different color, and black or white, is added in the form of short lines or dots. The build-up of colors on a single figure and the use of patterned, colored

borders are apparent in several stemma I manuscripts, but they lack the feature which makes the stemma II manuscripts so unusual. In illuminations of both branches of stemma II, the colored and patterned border contrasts with solidly colored background bands, upon which are added numerous small figures with densely built-up colors.7" Banding can be seen in all of the stemma II manuscripts studied, and it increases chromatic variety considerably.

Carefully structured patterns of like colors add further varieties of variety to Beatus manuscript illuminations (Fig. 2).72 These patterns operate with identical subjects (e.g., angels) or groups of like units (e.g., wings, mantles, halos). A simple form of such organized variety consists of the linear mirrored repetition of a pair or paired groups of figures (Type 1 in Fig. 2). For example, in the upper left zone of the magnificent, double- folio rendering of the Last Judgment in the Morgan Beatus (Color P1. 2, b), the two angels flanking Christ are mirror images of each other in form and in color (fol. 219v).

A slightly more complicated version of organized varietas is mirrored repetition along a diagonal grid. Linear repetition of a pattern is also used; the pattern may be very simple or complex. In the scene of the Millennial Judges and the Souls of the Martyrs in the Morgan Beatus (fol. 214), the birds in the lower section of the illumination represent the martyrs' souls (Fig. 3; Color Pl. 2, a). They are colored in pairs, in a repeating ABC pattern which works vertically and also from left to right. The sequence of colors is the same throughout: white, corresponding to A in Figure 3, red (B), and ocher (C). The initial color of each set of three varies in a predictable manner. The first row, at the far left, from top to bottom, be- gins the pattern with A, B and C. The second row starts with C, and then immediately follows with A and B. The third again picks up the last color at the bottom of the preceding row, and continues in the same order.

A more complex variation, Type 4, regularly colors two different elements in adjacent figures. For example, in the Morgan's Plague-Bearing Angels (fol. 183v; Color Pl. 1, b), each angel's halo is the same color as the tunic of the angel to its right. Further, a sequential ordering of colors in an upper zone may be repeated in reverse, in a lower zone. Elements in one color or set of colors frame two types of sequences: regularly alternating colors, and completely irregularly colored patterns. Often, several types of color repetitions are combined in a single illumination, always in addition to the standard profusion of variety which is made up of border, background bands, and dense build-up of figural color. It is common for an otherwise completely regular pattern to have an irregular element, usually in the middle or at the end when the pattern is read from left to right.

Figure 4 is a schematic tracing of the Vision of the Lamb in the Silos Beatus (fol. 86v).73 In the four angels at the top of this miniature, simple mirrored repetition is varied by alternating the colors of the tunics and mantles of the larger pair, and of the halos and mantles of the middle, bust-length

28

(I'Lr / rAtC TC rB

B B A c c B

A. ir47Br eg

FIGURE 3. Varietas in M (Morgan Beatus), fol. 214, the Millennial Judges and the Souls of the Martyrs (drawing: author).

pair, and also by disrupting the otherwise precise schema by painting two halos yellow (top left and middle right) while

choosing two colors (orange-red and olive-green), not one, for the halos of the angels at the top right and middle left. The

larger circle includes repetitions within a regular schema. The

jagged semi-circle of angels at the bottom of the page shows three examples of linear repetition, the second of which shifts about halfway through the sequence. The colored elements are: wings, EABAEABA (olive-green, teal-green, yellow, teal-

green; there is a doubled A at the far right); halos, regularly BDADB (yellow, orange-red, teal-green, orange-red, yellow) and then EADBEAD (olive-green, teal-green, orange-red, yellow); and finally dress, in an ACEBACEB sequence. The illuminators of Beatus manuscripts did not copy these com-

plex systems of variety exactly from their models, and they may have consciously elaborated or changed them. An examination of the birds shown in the images of the Opening of the

Fifth Seal in three manuscripts of stemma IIa reveals the use of three different types of varietas (Fig. 5).74

The use of more organized systems of varietas seems to have increased dramatically over time. A study of the Mor-

gan manuscript, painted around 950 c.E., for carefully structured varietas yielded five reasonably clear examples.75 The examination of color reproductions of most of the Facundus Beatus (1047 c.E.) indicated seven clear instances.76 Twenty- one examples of the types of varietas described above can be seen in the Silos Beatus (1109 C.E.).77

In Beatus manuscript illuminations, varietas seems to have been principally an aesthetic system.78 In the Morgan Beatus, however, its absence also may have functioned symbolically. In the profusion of structured and contrasting variety in the Morgan Beatus, most angelic and evil beings are rendered in like fashion. For example, the Antichrist storming the faithful, in the middle zone of folio 215v, and the evil serpent

29

E E

A

c A c

B E

C~C E B

c c,

C

BBE

B

B `

EE / E C

E B C r

A' A C E B B A E A

FIGURE 4. Varietas in D (Silos Beatus), fol. 86v, the Vision of the Lamb (drawing. author).

and the angels of the Lord in the scene of the Woman Clothed with the Sun (fols. 152v-153), are all depicted in a similarly diverse range of colors in the standard dense build-up. In four cases, however, the usual density of figural color is strikingly absent: the devil, the lamb of God (Color P1. 1, a), the damned and the dead (Color P1. 2, b). Each of these subjects is rendered in a single, solid block of color, and outlined or detailed with one additional color. Compared to the usual appearance of figures with numerous and often carefully patterned colors, these figures stand out.

This rare, but regular absence of varietas must be meaningful, even though these unadorned subjects cannot share a unified or even a related symbolism. One theme of Beatus's commentary is heresy, and he is particularly concerned with the difficulty of distinguishing between true believers and heretics claiming to be Christians. In the Apocalypse, people are tricked into following false prophets and worshipping

M, fol. 109 AAAAAA BBBB BBBBB AAAAA CCCCC CCCCC BCBAB BABA

J, fol. 138v AA AA BBBB BB BB AAAA AA AA BBBB

D, fol. 105v AAAAA BBBB AAAA BBBB AAAAA BBBB

FIGURE 5. Varietas in stemma Ha manuscripts, birds in the Opening of the Fifth Seal.

beasts. As noted above, evil and angelic beings, true believers and those worshipping falsely are all rendered with varied colors. Yet when the devil appears unmasked, and is recognized for himself, this coloristic diversity vanishes.79 Simi- larly, when the heretics and worshippers of the beast are finally seen as damned on their day of judgment, they stand in monochromatic garb in the upper two zones at the far right of a double-folio illumination80 (fols. 219v-220; Color P1. 2, b). The absence of chromatic varietas in their clothing singles them out from the throngs of the saved, who are all dressed in multi-colored clothing on the left folio.8s

Inferences may be drawn from the absence of variety. The rupturing of a color system acts as a highlighting device. As with color symbolism in general, the absence of variety signals no single, uniform meaning. Like the color red, its meaning depends on context. Aesthetic preferences appear to add meaning to these illuminations. Chromatic varietas is cre- ated in all of the Beatus manuscripts I have studied. Thus far, I have noted its apparently meaningful absence only in the Morgan Beatus.82

Conclusion

John Gage's broadly conceived demonstration of the historically and culturally specific nature of color and Liz James's more focussed study of Byzantine ideas about color make it absolutely clear that art historians must reconstruct historical ideas about color, and not use post-Newtonian models in an attempt to understand original intention and meaning. This analysis of Beatus manuscripts provides further evidence that hue was generally subordinate to value. The occasional in- consistencies in the patterns observed also underline Gage's belief that ideas about hue boundaries, and about the relationship between hue and value, were flexible. This may partially explain why the illuminators' working practice did not entail fixed rules with regard to the copying of colors.

This study has identified four motivations for the uses of color observed in these manuscripts. Colors may have evoked

30

words or passages in the accompanying Apocalypse text, perhaps for a mnemonic purpose. A correlation between color words in the text and colors in the illuminations is apparent, although uneven, in most of the tenth- and eleventh-century manuscripts studied, but is singularly lacking in the Silos Beatus. This suggests that a functional shift took place some- time before the end of the eleventh century. While never at-

tempting the illusionistic recreation of the world around them, the painters did sometimes choose colors related to the natural world. Colors could have been read as manifestations of light or darkness and also as hues, within an organizational system which prioritized the former over the latter. Both val- ues and hues could have functioned symbolically, although symbolic meaning was never absolutely fixed to one color or

range of colors, but was dependent on context. An aesthetic

appreciation of polychromatic diversity, and varieties of va-

riety, is apparent in these illuminations, and may be related to a similar interest expressed in late antique literature and

sculpture, and in Byzantine painting and mosaic. Evidence from the Morgan, Facundus, and Silos manuscripts indicates that instances of elaborately structured varietas increased over time. In the Morgan manuscript, the occasional absence of varietas may also have worked as a highlighter, conveying meaning dependent, once again, on context. My hope is that this preliminary study may present a method for analyzing chromatic data from any group of like manuscripts datable to a limited time period.

NOTES

* This topic was the subject of my M.A. thesis, which was completed at

Bryn Mawr College in 1992 under the supervision of Dale Kinney. Preliminary presentations of the results were made at the 1993 Patristic Medieval and Renaissance Conference at Villanova University, and at the Twenty-Ninth International Congress on Medieval Studies at Kala- mazoo in 1994. I am greatly indebted to Kinney, Barbara Kellum, Irving Lavin, James O'Donnell, and John Williams for their invaluable assistance on this project. Special thanks are also due to Gregor Kalas for many stimulating conversations. Annemarie Weyl Carr and an anon-

ymous reader provided me with essential criticism of an earlier version of this article, for which I am very grateful. I have received friendly and

competent assistance from many librarians, especially Charles Burke, Eileen Markson, Marshall Johnston, and Carol Vassallo of Bryn Mawr

College, Alan Morisson of the University of Pennsylvania, Matt Roper of the University of Pittsburgh, Inge Dupont and Katherine Reagan of the Pierpont Morgan Library, and the staff of the British Library Students' Reading Room. My thanks to J. M. Backhouse, Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts at the British Library, for her permission to

study Add. MS 11695, and to William Voelkle and Roger Wieck, Cu- rator and Assistant Curator of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the Pierpont Morgan Library, for their permission to study M644. I have benefitted from Lynn Fotheringham's painstaking and excellent Latin translations.

1. H. Epstein, "Meyer Schapiro: 'A Passion to Know and to Make Known,'" Art News (May 1983), 61.

2. M. Schapiro, "From Mozarabic to Romanesque at Silos," in Roman-

esque Art: Selected Papers (New York, 1977), I, 35.

3. M. Mentre, "L'Utilisation des couleurs dans la miniature mozarabe," in

Espafia entre el Mediterraneo y el Atlantico (Actas del XXIII Congreso Internacional de Historia del Arte, Granada, 1973) (Granada, 1976), I, 417.

4. This work would not have been possible without the important contri- butions of John Gage: Color and Culture: Practice and Meaning from Antiquity to Abstraction (Boston, 1993); "Colour in Western Art: An Issue?" AB, LXXII (1990), 518-541; "Colour in History: Relative and Absolute," AH, I (1978) 104-130; "Locus Classicus of Colour Theory: The Fortunes of Apelles," JWCI, XLIV (1981), 1-26. See also L. James, Light and Colour in Byzantine Art (Oxford, 1996); V. Bruno, Form and Color in Greek Painting (New York, 1972); C. Rowe, "Conceptions of Colour and Colour Symbolism in the Ancient World," The Realms of Colour: Eranos Yearbook 1972 (Leiden, 1974), 327-364; and P. Dronke, "Tradition and Innovation in Medieval Western Colour-Imagery," ibid., 51-107.

5. Some scholars have questioned the sources of influence on the colors, and others have discussed their material aspects, identified palette ranges, or discussed their optical and psychological effects. For completely or

primarily formal analyses, see G. G. King, "Divagations on the Beatus," Art Studies: Medieval, Renaissance and Modern, VIII (1930), 3-58; Schapiro, "From Mozarabic to Romanesque," 28-101, esp. 33-35. For brief remarks on sources of influence see J. Williams, The Illustrated Beatus. A Corpus of Illustrations of the Commentary on the Apocalypse (London, 1994), I, 64, 73; King, "Divagations," 18; J. Pijoin, Arte bdr- baro y preromdnico desde el siglo IV hasta el aifo 1000 (Summa artis: Historia general del arte, VIII) (Madrid, 1942), 502; and J. Beckwith, "Islamic Influences on the Beatus Apocalypse Manuscripts," in Actas del Simposio para el Estudio de los C'dices del "Commentario al Apocalypsis" de Beato de Lie'bana (Madrid, 1980), II, 60. For material considerations, see: Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 64, 73; and P. Klein, Der iltere Beatus-Kodex Vitr. 14-1 der Biblioteca Nacional zu Madrid: Studien zur Beatus Illustration und der spanischen Buchmalerei des 10. Jahrhunderts (Studien zur Kunstgeschichte, VIII) (Hildesheim, 1976), 238-240. For descriptions of hues by manuscript and identification of links between manuscripts, see W. Neuss, Die Apokalypse des HI. Johannes in der altspanischen und altchristlichen Bibel-Illustration (Minster in Westfalen, 1931), 275; Klein, Altere Beatus-Kodex, 238- 240, 243-286; and Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 73, 95-96. Almost all of these studies consider color an incident of style, or view it through a system of color organization which was first developed in the seven- teenth century. Mentr6, O. K. Werckmeister and King are the only three, to my knowledge, to have considered some historical aspects of color, apart from the subject of the origins of pigments. Mentr6's analyses of color systems in Beatus manuscripts are interesting, as she treats color as a factor capable of producing meaning in Beatus manuscript illuminations. She also acknowledges that the observation and appreciation of colors are affected by many factors. Unfortunately, she still analyzes color combinations in modern terms (a hue-based system with com-

plementary, contrasting and close colors), and seems to assume that the illuminators of Beatus manuscripts were using the same system. Gage emphatically demonstrates the post-medieval genesis of this system: Color and Culture, 173. Mentr6, Illuminated Manuscripts of Medieval

Spain, trans. J. Wakelyn (London, 1996), 139-141, 145-148, 161-176, 195-208; "Espace et Couleurs dans les Beatus du Xbme sibcle," CSMC, XIV (1983), 179-196; "Originalit6 des couleurs et des perspectives dans les representations Mozarabes," Dossiers de I'Arche~ologie, XIV

(1976), 70; and "L'Utilisation des couleurs," 417-418. In "Das Bild zur Liste der Bistimer Spaniens im Codex Aemilianensis," O. K. Werck- meister has identified a symbolic, arithmetically-based rationale for the choice and frequency of colors in an illumination in a late tenth-century

31

Spanish manuscript (Madrider Mitteilungen, IX [1968], 418-423). My work neither contradicts nor depends on Werckmeister's conclusions, but could coexist readily with them. Unfortunately, difficulty in deciding which colors to count and how to identify them (e.g., outline colors, and value or hue) has prevented me from applying Werckmeister's method.

King tantalizingly alludes to the influence of Islamic numerological color theory in a few unspecified manuscripts, which she says were copied by "Sarracinus." She does not cite any sources or develop this point; "Divagations," 18. Modern systems of organizing color which priori- tize hue over value and saturation, and which arrange hues on a wheel have their origins in the 1600s; Gage, Color and Culture, 153-154. Formal analyses which do not take account of color's historical aspects assume that aesthetic reactions remain constant over time, and are in-

dependent of other factors, for example, symbolism and an awareness of cost.

6. Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 7.

7. Ibid., I, 31.

8. K. B. Steinhauser, The Apocalypse Commentary of Tyconius: A History of Its Reception and Influence (Frankfurt am Main, 1987), 158-161; Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 20-26.

9. Williams, Illustrated Beatus, I, 23, 26.

10. They are: New York City, The Pierpont Morgan Library, MS M644 (M in Fig. 1); Girona, Museu de la Catedral, MS 7 (G); Valladolid, Bib- lioteca de la Universidad, MS 433 (V); Seu d'Urgell, Museu Diocesa, MS 501 (U); El Escorial, Biblioteca del Monasterio, Cod. &.II.5 (E); Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, MS Vitrina 14-1 (olim B.31) (J); Burgo de Osma, Archivo de la Catedral, MS 1 (0); London, British Library, Add. MS 11695 (D).

11. Only M and D have been studied in person. Since I do not take into account small variations in color, some use of color facsimiles seemed

acceptable.

12. A. Kornerup and J. H. Wanscher, Methuen Handbook of Colour, 3rd ed. (New York, 1984), 12. Gage, "Colour in Western Art," 518. M. Pas- toureau, "Introduction," The Color Compendium, ed. A. Hope and M. Walch (New York, 1990), xvi.

13. Munsell Color Company, The Munsell Book of Color (Baltimore, 1929), 12-13. Kornerup and Wanscher, Handbook, 12.

14. H. C. Conklin, "Color Categorization," review of Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution, by B. Berlin and P. Kay, in American

Anthropologist, LXXV (1973), 939. "Colour," New Encyclopaedia Britannica: Macropaedia, 15th ed. (Chicago, 1990), II, 4, 595.

15. Munsell Book of Color, 13.

16. Some of this confusion and imprecision may stem from the fact that two very different, yet overlapping physical phenomena are involved. One depends on the interactions of colored light and the other on the

mixing of material colors. Different rules govern these two realms. Conklin, "Color Categorization," 934-935.

17. Ibid., 933.

18. Gage, Color and Culture, 70; James, Light and Colour, 90.

19. Gage, "Colour in History," 108-110.

20. Gage, Color and Culture, 70.

21. Gage, "Colour in History," 109-110, and M. Reinhold, History ofPur- ple as a Status Symbol in Antiquity (Collection Latomus, CXVI) (Brus- sels, 1970), 8 n. 1.

22. Colors are listed from top to bottom, and within the same horizontal band, from left to right.

23. Klein, Ailtere Beatus-Kodex, 169.

24. Williams, Illustrated Beatus, 32-34; Mentr6, Illuminated Manuscripts, 142-143.

25. I have used the text of Revelation in Beatus's commentary, as edited by Romero (n. 62). While alba is used in Revelation fifteen times (1:14, 2:17, 3:4, 3:5, 3:18, 4:4, 6:11, 7:9, 7:13, 7:14, 14:14, 19:11, 19:14 [twice], 20:11), not all of these passages are illustrated. To complicate matters further, I have not found color reproductions of all of these illustrations. Two depictions of Revelation 1:14 illustrate white hair (J, fol. 46, E, fol. 3v), and two do not (M, fol. 27, G, fols. 36v-37). One

rendering of Revelation 4:4 refers to the color word (G, fol. 107), and two do not (M, fol. 83, J, fol. 116v). The white horse of Revelation 6:2 is shown white in G, fol. 126, J, fol. 135r, and O (no folio number available). The white robes of the souls under the altar are illustrated with white twice (U, fol. 106, with many but not all white lines; J, fol. 106), and twice without (M, fol. 109; D, fols. 112v-113). In illuminations of the white cloud of Revelation 14:14, four of the five studied have white outlines or are solidly white (white: M, fol. 178v, G, fols. 193v-194, J, fol. 209, E, fol. 120; not white: D, fol. 168). The white horses of Rev- elation 19:11-14 are painted white in the two examples I could find (O, no folio number available, J, fol. 240). The white throne in the Last Judgment (Revelation 20:11) is not white in M, fol. 219v. The rosy- colored horse of Revelation 6:1-8 is shown as orange, red, or white with red patterns on it in all four of the illuminations analyzed (V, fol. 93, G, fol. 126, J, fol. 135, O, no folio number available). In summary, nineteen of the twenty-seven examples studied here correspond to the color word in the text, and eight do not.

26. Barbara Kellum suggested this fascinating parallel. Cf. L. M. Wilson, The Roman Toga (Baltimore, 1924), 51-52.

27. J, fols. 43v, 138v-139, 182v, 209. E, fols. lv, 120. G, fols. 34, 161v, 167v, 193v-194.

28. M, fols. 26, 146, 154v, 178v.

29. Fols. 21, 138v-139, 144, 168.

30. "Induti linum mundum splendidum et cincti super pectora sua zonas aureas."

31. Occasionally the wings of an angel were completely outlined in white: fols. 152v-153, 181v, 185.

32. D, fol. 24, illustrating Revelation 1:14-16, shows a white face and white lines in God's hair, but the "eyes like a flame of fire" and "feet like burnished bronze" show little or no indication of light or brightness. Two very clearly colored examples of this text are seen in J, fol. 46 and E, fol. 3v. In D, the "white robes" of Revelation 4:4, 6:11, and 7:9 are multi-colored (fols. 83, 105v, 112v-113).

33. U. Eco and Werckmeister have already suggested a mnemonic function for the illuminations. Neither treats the subject at great length, nor do

they discuss the possible mnemonic role of color. Eco, Beato di Lied- bana. Miniature del Beato de Fernando I y Sancha (Parma, 1973), 37. Werckmeister, "The First Romanesque Beatus Manuscripts and the Lit-

urgy of Death," in Actas del Simposio . .. Beato de Liebana, II, 165- 192, esp. 167-170.

34. Werckmeister, "First Romanesque Beatus Manuscripts," 168.

35. E A. Yates, The Art of Memory (Chicago, 1966). M. J. Carruthers, The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture (Cambridge, 1990).

36. E Troncarelli, "Con la mano del cuore: l'arte della memoria nei codici di Cassiodoro," Quaderni medievali, XX (1986), 22-58. My thanks to James O'Donnell for directing me to this article.

37. Mentr6, "L'Utilisation des couleurs," 419; Klein, Altere Beatus-Kodex, 242.

38. G, fol. 15v, V, fol. 120, M, fols. 152v-153.

32

39. This pattern is so consistent and so plentifully illustrated that it needs no list of examples. One unusual deviation from it is in D, fol. 126, in which the stars are gray-brown with red and sepia lines.

40. J, fol. 169v; E, fol. 95v, the blue section in the upper right; M, fols. 137, 140v, 149, 202v; dark blue and orange-red, fol. 140v.

41. Revelation 6:5: black: J, fol. 135; green-black: 0, fol. 85v; brown- black: D, fol. 102v; brown: V, fol. 93, G, fol. 126. Revelation 6:12: black: with red edges, M, fol. 112; with red lines, J, fol. 141v; brown: with a small yellow circle and orange-red edges, D, fol. 108. Inconsis- tency: gold with a small red center: G, fol. 131v.

42. Pale purple was commonly used for lakes or pits of fire and brimstone, with the addition of red lines, but not otherwise in conjunction with any light source. M, fols. 212, 220, but not fol. 218; G, fols. 159v, 224v; J, fols. 187, 251.

43. G, fol. 153.

44. In one unusual example it is brown, in fol. 92 of a manuscript otherwise not considered in this study, the Beatus of San Millin, Madrid, Real Academia de la Historia, cod. 33.

45. Mentr6 points out that gold is rarely used in tenth-century manuscripts, with the exception of G, and that other metals are not used at all. Men-

tr6, La peinture "Mozarabe" (Paris, 1984), 62. Two medieval technical treatises, the Mappae clavicula and De diversis artibus, both link red to gold metal, and the latter text also mentions yellow. C. S. Smith and J. G. Hawthorne, "Mappae Clavicula: A Little Key to the World of Me- dieval Techniques," Transactions of the American Philosophical Soci- ety, n.s. LXIV (1975), 51. De Diversis Artibus, XXIII, XXIV, XXIX, in Theophilus: The Various Arts-De Diversis Artibus, ed. and trans. C. R. Dodwell (Oxford, 1986), 20-23, 28. Gold, often outlined in red, and in M sometimes also in blue: M, fols. 133v, 144, 178v, G, fols. 36v-37, 171v-172, J, fols. 46, 72v, 213. For yellow pigment with red lines or outlines, see M, fol. 27 (seven lamps), E, fol. 96v, D, fols. 83, 168.

46. E, fol. 120 shows dark green blood with black and red lines.

47. For fire see, among others, M, fols. 137, 149, 202v, J, fols. 166, 233v; for hail: M, fols. 134v (the background color has bled through the pigment of the hail, but it looks as if it were originally white), 193, J, fols. 163v, 223 (with both black and white hail), G, fol. 149, D, fol. 127.

48. M, fols. 33v-34 (parchment with dark red outlines and blue fish), 115v, 223, G, fols. 135, 152, 189, J, fols. 63v-64, 145, 166, 173, 216, 254, 0, fols. 34v-35, D, fols. 111, 138v-139, 147v-148, 175, 184v, 209.

49. J, fol. 64.

50. I am grateful to Kinney for this suggestion. My search for texts to explain these patterns has been limited.

51. Isidore, De rerum natura, XXXI, 2, 15-20, cited in Dronke, "Tradition and Innovation," 70. Jerome wrote that "purple designates the ocean since its dye comes from mollusks," and that the color coccus, which is probably a red, means fire and ether. Jerome, Ad Fabiolam, LXIV, 18; Saint J1rome: Lettres, Collections des Universitis de France, ed. and trans. J. Labourt (Paris, 1953), 132.

52. Jerome, Ad Fabiolam, LXIV, 18, trans. Labourt, 132; Isidore, De rerum natura, XXXI, 2, 15-20, trans. Dronke, "Tradition and Innovation," 70.

53. Jerome, Ad Fabiolam, LXIV, 18, trans. Labourt, 132.

54. Dronke, "Tradition and Innovation," 70.

55. Blue-black: M, fols. 152v-153. Black: J, fols. 186v-187, G, fol. 224v, U, fols. 140v-141, D, fols. 147v-148. Brown: M, fols. 212, 218, G, fols. 16v, 17, 171v-172, 224v, 228, J, fol. 249, O, fols. 23, 117; very dark brown: D, fol. 199v; brown with white outlines, G, fol. 17v. The exception is E, in which the devils are white: fols. 105, 115.

56. Blue: V, fol. 93, J, fol. 135. Brown: D, with a blue face, fol. 102v, G, with a blue shirt, fol. 126.

57. Examining devils in other Spanish images yields a similar, but not completely consistent picture. See, for example, the blue devil with brown hair or horns, shown twice in a Spanish Bible (Madrid, B. N. Vitrina 15-1, fol. 349), and the devil depicted three times, each time with a different range of colors, in the fresco originally in the Hermit- age of San Baudelio de Berlanga, and now in The Cloisters, New York. In the first image of the devil in the fresco he is ocher, white and red; in the second, blue; and in the third, ocher. Both illumination and fresco are reproduced in color in The Art of Medieval Spain, AD 500-1200 (New York, 1993), 298, 224.

58. The glaring exceptions to this pattern are the white devils in E, fols. 105 and 115. White outlines sometimes appear in G around brown devils, fol. 17v, and, also with red outlines, 224v.

59. M, white: fols. 87, 117v, 174v, 181v, 200, 222v. J, white: fols. 6v, 1 17v, 205, 230v, 253v. G, white: fols. 126, 189v-190, 196v, 213v, 138v-139 (white and exclusively red outlines); non-white: fol. Iv (gray-brown wash with red outlines). V, white: fol. 145v. D, white: fol. 170v; non- white: fols. 86v (pale blue-gray), 164, 188, 208v. U, white: fol. 198v. 0, white: fols. 92v, 165v.

60. Pastor Hermas, Vision, IV, 1, 10, trans. Dronke, "Tradition and Inno- vation," 63; Cives celestis patriae, Dronke, ibid., 77-79, esp. n. 81; Jerome, Ad Fabiolam, LXIV, 2 and 19, trans. Labourt, 121, 135-136; Isidore of Seville, Epistola, VII, 7-8, Redempto archidiacono; The Let- ters of Isidore of Seville, trans. G. B. Ford, Jr., 2nd ed. (Amsterdam, 1970), 42-43.

61. James has noted that color symbolism was more fluid in the east than in the west, although it was "unfixed" in both regions. James, Light and Colour, 105.

62. Despite the correspondence, the use of white is independent of the commentary. If the illuminators had followed the commentary, they would have been compelled to paint all holy subjects white, producing a very different kind of illumination! In book four, Beatus compares the trinity to pure white cloth, which is "darkened" with colors, in other words heresies. Beatus, Commentarius in Apocalypsin, IV, ed. E. Romero, Sancti Beati a Liebana: Commentarius in Apocalypsin (Rome, 1985), I, 622-623, cited in Gage, Color and Culture, 63-64.

63. Beatus, Commentarius in Apocalypsin, IV, ed. Romero, I, 555-556.

64. Discussing Revelation 6:4, Beatus uses rubeus, not roseus, ed. Romero, I, 556.

65. M. Roberts, The Jeweled Style. Poetry and Poetics in Late Antiquity (Ithaca, 1989); B. Brenk, "Spolia from Constantine to Charlemagne," DOP, XLI (1989), 103-109, esp. 105. Roberts's work had a very stimulating effect on this section. I decided to use varietas over his word variatio, because I found it frequently used in later texts, and because, at least according to Cicero, "varietas is a Latin word properly used of diversity of color." De finibus bonorum et malorum, II, 3, 10, cited by Roberts, Jeweled Style, 47. Varietas appears frequently in later western texts, albeit not always in the temporal and geographic orbit of early medieval Spain, to characterize an aesthetic preference. Some mentions of varietas without specific reference to color are: Rupertus Tuitiensis, De sancta trinitate et operibus eius, XIII; idem, in Exodum, IV, 706; and Petrus Damiani, Sermones, XXXII. Theophilus, in the twelfth century, does refer to color: Dodwell, Theophilus, xiv. Islamic art could also have played a role in the taste for variety seen in Beatus manuscript illuminations.

66. James, Light and Colour, 8-9.

67. Eraclius, De coloribus et artibus Romanorum, L, 57, trans. Merrifield, 244, 252-255. Dodwell notes that the common tenth-century dating of

33

this work is incorrect, and that the earliest surviving fragment of it is from the eleventh century. It probably did not reach its complete state until the twelfth century. Dodwell, Theophilus, xiv.

68. Dodwell, Theophilus, xix.

69. Theophilus, II, preface, trans. Dodwell, Theophilus, 37.

70. M has at least 110 variations of color, while D includes about 58. Klein matched the colors in J to color chips and found 180 variations of color. Klein, Altere Beatus-Kodex, 238-239.

71. Many of the pigments in G are thin washes, and do not lend themselves to layering colors on top of each other. Many different colors are still used to depict a single figure, but they are juxtaposed rather than placed on top of one another.

72. I give just one example of each type itemized in Fig. 2. Type 1: D, fol. 170v; type 2: D, fol. 7v; type 3: J, fol. 112v; type 4: M, fol. 183v; type 5: D, fol. 86v; type 6: J, fol. 205; type 7: J, fol. 176v; type 8: M, fol. 219v. On several of these folios more than one type appears.

73. In Fig. 4, A = teal-green, B = yellow, C = orange, D = orange-red, E = olive-green.

74. A = yellow, B = white, C = red.

75. Fols. 109, 183v, 117v-118, 214, 220.

76. Fols. 141v, 145v, 162v, 176v, 184v, 205, 250v-251.

77. Fols. 7v, 8 (colored text), 21, 83, 86v, 105v, 108, 111, 112v-113, 126, 133v, 138v-139, 141v, 147v-148, 151v-152, 164, 170v, 194v, 201, 209, 216.

78. Werckmeister identifies a similar color alternation in an illumination in the Codex Aemilianensis, but suggests a different motivation for its use. See n. 5, and "Das Bild ... im Codex Aemilianensis," 418-422.

79. Beatus interpreted the seven-headed dragon as the devil. J. J. Poesch, "Antichrist imagery in Anglo-French Apocalypse Manuscripts" (Disser- tation, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, 1966), 93-94, citing Romero, Sancti Beati Commentarius, II, 945.

80. Werckmeister describes these two zones as containing separate catego- ries: those waiting to be judged, and the damned. "First Romanesque Beatus Manuscripts," 180-183. Williams interprets them as a unified

group of the damned, in A Spanish Apocalypse: the Morgan Beatus Manuscript (New York, 1991), 17-18.

81. Interestingly, though, there is variety of a sort, for while the clothing of individuals is monochromatic, each zone forms a pattern of colored repetition. The top zone follows an ABCBA sequence, while the second row is aligned in a simple ABAB format. Nevertheless, the use of only three basic colors contrasts sharply with the numerous colors usually employed.

82. The nude dead, the devil and the lamb are usually rendered without a

build-up of colors in other manuscripts. Other groups of figures are not so rendered, and thus far I have not found compelling evidence for

expanding this interpretation from M to other manuscripts.

34

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PLATE 1, a and b. Beatus manuscript, New York, the Pierpont Morgan Library, MS M. 644, fol. 181v, The Seven Angels with the Seven Last Plagues, and fol. 183v, The Seven Angels (photos: Pierpont Morgan Library).

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