Lessons in Leadership and Liturgy in the Winchcombe Psalter
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8864901 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Laura Slater (0000-0003-3627-3417, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2016 |
| Volume | 98 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 49-62 |
| Publication date | 2016-11-16 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | English Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0013-838X • E-ISSN: 1744-4217 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0013838x.2016.1230323 |
| OpenAlex | W2556727385 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 9 |
Visual illustration of the Psalms in devotional manuscripts could play a key role in guiding English responses to the Psalms. This paper examines the unusual illustrations added to a combined New Testament and Psalter made for the Benedictine abbey of Winchcombe c.1130–40, now Dublin, Trinity College MS 53. I first consider its depiction of the royal ancestry of Christ and then explore its illustrations to Psalm 1. I argue that these images, displaying the exemplary morals and conduct of ancient Biblical kings, encouraged pictorial meditation on the subject of good Christian rulership. I link an unusual image of David dancing to the cult of St Kenelm at Winchcombe, and suggest it may have emphasised the importance of liturgical performance as a means of spiritual renewal and purification. Finally, I consider the manuscript’s possible ownership, speculating that the manuscript may have been produced to mark the 1138 arrival at Winchcombe of Abbot Robert, a kinsman of King Stephen, but abandoned unfinished during the twelfth-century civil wars between Stephen and the Empress Matilda
Art · Cult · Depiction · Key (lock · Literature · Liturgy · Meditation · New Testament · Subject (documents · Theology · Historical Studies of British Isles · Medieval Literature and History · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity · Classics · History · Philosophy
| Highly cited | No |
|---|