Single Leaf Excised from an Antiphonary: Inital A[spiciens a longe] with Christ in Majesty (c. 1330–1350): Art, History and Details

Single Leaf Excised from an Antiphonary: Inital A[spiciens a longe] with Christ in Majesty (c. 1330–1350) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This massive historiated initial A, among the largest painted by Renaissance illuminators, introduces the matins response for the first Sunday in Advent. For centuries this particular Sunday was known as Aspiciens a longe Sunday, since this is the very first chant of the Christian liturgical year to be sung with a special choir, or Schola Cantorum, on that day. The text as well as the image follow the prophecy of Isaiah who foresaw the birth of Christ: Aspiciens a longe, ecce, video potentiam (Long had I been watching. Behold, now do I see God coming in power as in a cloud of light). Within the letter A, Christ is enthroned in majesty surrounded by angels and saints meant to represent the redeemer who is yet to come. The two figures who occupy the bottom curves of the A are Old Testament prophets; on the left is Isaiah who holds a scroll revealing his prophecy: “Behold, a Virgin can conceive.”

Object facts

• Title: Single Leaf Excised from an Antiphonary: Inital A[spiciens a longe] with Christ in Majesty
• Date: c. 1330–1350
• Culture: Italy, Tuscany or Umbria, 14th century
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: ink, tempera, and gold on vellum
• Dimensions: Sheet: 57.8 x 40.7 cm (22 3/4 x 16 in.); Framed: 72.5 x 55 x 4 cm (28 9/16 x 21 5/8 x 1 9/16 in.); Folio: 72.5 x 55 x 4 cm (28 9/16 x 21 5/8 x 1 9/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Manuscript Illuminations
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1939.677

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Winternitz, Emanuel. "The Visual Arts as a Source for the Historian of Music." International Musicological Society: Report of the Eighth Congress, New York 1961, Vol. 1 - Papers (1961): 109–120.
• Keene, Bryan C. "Illuminators from Pistoia and Pisa in Trecento Florence: the Case of two Antiphonary Commissions," 279-293. In Art and Experience in Trecento Italy: Proceedings of the Andrew Ladis Trecento Conference, New Orleans, November 10-12, 2016. Edited by Holly Flora and Sarah S. Wilkins. Turnhout : Brepols, 2018.
• Freuler, Gaudenz and Georgi Radomirov Parpulov. The McCarthy Collection. Volume I: Italian and Byzantine Miniatures. London: Ad Ilissum, 2018.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.