Post date: Dec. 4, 2021

Unto the scribal and interested populous does Mistress Robin of Thornwood, Guild Chronicler, send Greetings and Salutations!

Lapis

Lightly shaping her brush between her lips, leaving them slightly blue with ultramarine, the middle-aged nun bent over her work on a historiated initial in the sumptuous gospel before her. It would be her magnum opus. She was one of the few granted the costliest of materials and was called upon to put forth all her considerable skill in its creation. She gave thanks to God, Her Savior and the Blessed Virgin as she worked for bestowing upon her the abilities that has won her this most prestigious of commissions. There were other sisters here who were also highly able and there had been an intense, though friendly, rivalry in the choosing. She would forever treasure the moment when the visiting priest and Mother Superior had called her forth to name her as the chief illustrator and she reveled in the warm congratulations from the other sisters, even, especially, from those who had not been selected. She vowed she would do her very best, and better, while her eyesight prevailed, for there were indications that it might soon begin to fail, and to put forth all her love of the Holy Family, her temporal one here in the small convent she had called home since girlhood and her art in this sumptuous work.

She carefully laid down a sky-blue wash on the Virgin’s robe, then added deeper shadows, gently guiding the more brilliant hue through the still damp background to mold the graceful folds of the drapery to the perfection required. She shaped her brush once more, pigment was staining her teeth and gums now, but she was oblivious in her concentration, and added a last pivotal detail. She was happy, more than happy, as she proceeded to the next initial, her azure lips set in a smile of complete fulfillment.

Bright blue microscopic flecks are caught within the layers of tartar on the teeth of a 1000+/- year old skeleton of a nun, cataloged as B78 in Dalheim, northern Germany. The chance discovery in 2019 could have been easily overlooked if researcher Anita Radini had not chanced to notice the minute particles as she checked for something else. The observations set off an investigation which has led to a series of fascinating conclusions. The rich blue particles were ultramarine pigment, made by grinding high quality lapis lazuli from Afghanistan into a fine powder and suspending it in binder. This treasured and costly blue pigment held pride of place with gold, at times superseding it in value and expense. It can be extrapolated that such precious pigment would be trusted only to the most skilled of painters for the highest quality texts and the fact that ultramarine built up over time as she shaped her brush repeatedly, (do NOT do this at home, or studio!), indicates that this nameless middle-aged artist, she is judged to have been between 45-60 at the time of her death, must have been such a one.

Doubtless among many, the library of Admont Monastery in Salzburg contains many books calligraphed and illustrated by the nun’s section of the dual-sexed establishment. A female artist by the name of Ende worked on the illustrations of the 10th century Spanish Gerona Beatus, (incidentally the earliest known use of ultramarine by an identified woman). A deluxe Gospel, (among at least 40 other works), was produced in Wessobrunn, Bavaria in the 12th century by yet another anonymous woman and another, less self-effacing 12 centaur limner, Guda, signed her work alongside a female figure, (a self-portrait?).

A paper by archaeologists Alison I. Beach, Cynthia Cyrus, Anita Radini, Roland Kröger, Felice Lifshitz, Monica Tromp, and Christina Warner details the intriguing forensics and analysis that lead to fascinating social insights and possibilities concerning a time and place all too often misjudged. We extend our Thanks to the scholarly team for their important work and to fellow artist ‘B78’ for her gift to us from down the centuries.

And Now for Something Completely Different

Leonardo the humorist

When asked if he had, in truth, created a new primary color, Leonardo answered that indeed he had— a pigment of his imagination.

A Story by Leonardo

The Saturday before Easter, a priest was sprinkling holy water in the houses of his district. He happened to find himself in a painter's house, and as he had spilled the water on the paintings, the painter turned on him, filled with indignation, and asked him why had the priest ruined his work.

Then, the priest answered that it was his custom and obligation, that he was doing good, and people who do good should expect good and better, as God promised so, and every good deed on Earth would have been awarded a hundred times above.

So, the painter waited for the priest to get out, went to the upper floor, and from a window he showered a bucketful of water on the priest's head, saying "This is your deed a hundred times from above!"

A story about Leonardo, from Vasari’s Lives of the Artists

"Leonardo, therefore, having composed a kind of paste from wax, made of this, while it was still in a half liquid state, certain figures of animals, entirely hollow and exceedingly slight in texture, which he then filled with air. When he blew into these figures, he could make them fly through the air, but when the air within had escaped from them they fell to the earth. One day the vine dresser of the Belvedere found a very curious lizard, and for this creature Leonardo constructed wings, made from the skins of other lizards, flayed for the purpose; into these wings he put quicksilver, so that when the animal walked, the wings moved also, with a tremulous motion: he then made eyes, horns and a beard for the creature, which he tamed and kept in a case; he would then show it to the friends who came to visit him, and all who saw it ran away terrified. He more than once, likewise, caused the intestines of a sheep to be cleansed and scraped until they were brought into such a state of tenuity that they could be held within the hollow of the hand, having then placed in a neighboring chamber a pair of blacksmith's bellows, to which he made fast one end of the intestines, he would blow into them until he caused them to fill the whole room, which was a very large one, insomuch that whoever was within was forced to take refuge in a corner: he thus showed them transparent and full of wind, remarking that, whereas they had previously been contained within a small compass, they were now filling all space, and this, he would say, was a fit emblem of talent or genius."