Sunny Day?

It's so ironic that a girl who loves the sun as much as I do has moved to Seattle and is spending one of Seattle's hotter months in London. Tomorrow's high? 60. So much for summer. But this weekend, I'll be visiting warmer climes, to be sure, because I'm going to Madrid! A friend from Riverside is from there and I will be visiting him and his beautiful city for a few days. I'm very excited to visit a new country, and even more excited to feel some sun on my brow!

I've had a great weekend in London getting out of my comfort zone.  Yesterday I took the tube down to Kew and went to the National Archive to look at a few 16th century documents.  I forget how beautiful the areas surrounding Kew are.  No wonder the medieval kings of England had their get-aways there.  As I walked to-and-from the archive there were a string of cats just waiting to be pet, and I (of course) obliged.  The cats have it good since it's the main road used by all the people to get from the tube stop to the Archives.  

Today I was invited to a friend's birthday luncheon, so I walked a 

mile or so to Marylebone High Street, one my favorite shopping districts in London.  It's a little too posh for its own good, but there's a wonderful farmer's market, an amazing cheese store, and some great food shops.  Today, I visited Rococo Chocolates, a wonderful local chocolate shop.  I picked out an assortment of truffles for my friend and they were wrapped up perfectly.  I love the images on the boxes!  She was generous to share a birthday chocolate with me, which happened to be a tea-flavored truffle.  It

 was lovely!

We met for lunch at a Sardinian restaurant aptly named Little Sardegna.  It doesn't seem to have a website, but a review can be

 found here.  I had a lovely pasta with clams with grated 

bottarga sprinkled on top.  The bottarga provided a nice, salty flavor, but wasn't overpowering in the least.  For dessert I had seadas, a Sardinian dessert that was delectable.  It's basically fried dough filled with cheese and lemon zest and drizzled with honey.  Yum.  Here's a recipe in case someone wants to make it for me in the future!

(image credits: jobrocken and freak_irish_sister)

 

A Few of My Favorite Things: Late-Carolingian Manuscripts

After I posted my last entry, I realized that I started at the very end of manuscript production, so I feel like I should go back and post about the beginnings of medieval manuscripts, mainly those from the Carolingian era. (Although now I realize this post is really about the late-Carolingian era and that I should probably go back even further!)

I am, by no means, an expert in this area, but what I do know is that this is the time-period when Gospel Books were very popular with the ruling elite. During this period, the bible, in its entirety was a rare thing to come across, much more common are codexes like Gospel Books, which only contain parts of the biblical narrative. And these manuscripts were sumptuous. The manuscript to the left comes from a monastery in Echternach (now Luxemborg). The backgrounds were often painted purple, and gold was used almost everywhere else. Usually they included lush illuminations of the 4 evangelists as well. (Here's a bigger version of the image.)

Over in England, the monks were making this type of book as well. Another popular type of manuscript from this period is a Psalter, which contains the Psalms and various prayers. The manuscript on the right was made by a monk named Eadui Basan, from Christ Church, Canterbury. The style of manuscripts in England is different, but this type of manuscript is a lavish affair no matter where it is made. On the right, David kills Goliath (a bigger image can be found here).

These aren't the only types of manuscripts that were being made, of course. Only the richest, most powerful people and monasteries had sumptous gospel books and psalters. Among the other manuscripts that survive, most aren't as breath-taking in terms of their art-historical value. A great many of these manuscripts hardly have any decoration at all. These manuscripts are still amazing records of medieval technology, however. The manuscript on the left uses trypical black ink, with red ink for the capitals and headings. The scriptorium must have been conserving their vellum, because in the center of the bottom red capital, there is a big hole on the page! The scribe, very ingeniously, worked around this problem, and made it a feature of his manuscript! It's little things like that, which make me smile when I'm looking through a manuscript. (Here's a bigger image.)

A Few of My Favorite Things

I like all manuscripts.  Even the crustiest hard-to-read ones are unique and special.  But sometimes a girl needs a little bling.  And as far as manuscripts go, you can't get much more showy than Italian manuscripts from the 15th century.  By the time the 1400s roll around, printing presses were all the rage, but printed books just didn't have the 'wow factor' that manuscripts did, especially for wealthy patrons. 

This manuscript (available in a bigger version here), is an example of a typical manuscript of later 15th c. written and illuminated in Northern Italy.  These manuscripts are known for having milky-white parchment, which really brings out the depth of color used by the painters.  You'll

 notice that the handwriting looks a lot like a printed book -- at this late date, scribes and printers were influencing each other as to what handwriting and font should look like.  Most manuscripts of this type have a border filled with acanthus leaves (the blue, green, and pink leaves) and life-like flora and fauna.  At the bottom, there is usually a laurel wreath that the illuminator could leave empty until he found a patron; then he would just paint in the patron's coat of arms, for a ready-made, personalized manuscript.  On either sides of the laurel wreath, many illuminators added little cherubs (usually called putti) and little gold dots (called bezants).  Here's an example of a manuscript that never found a patron, or perhaps the patron just ran out of cash before the painter got to his coat of arms!

 

Depending on how much a patron was willing to shell out, this type of manuscript could be incredibly flashy, like this copy of a work by Titus Livius, or somewhat understated, like this copy of a work by Virgil. 

 

My favorite image I came across today is this page from a copy of Cyriacus' works that Cyriacus himself annotated.  Look at that handwriting!  It's obvious that the scribe was having so much fun with his letters, especially the final 'g' and the ligatures between letters. (Click here to embiggen). And that stamp?  That's the old British Library stamp that you'll find on most manuscripts (and yes, it drives me a little crazy that someone actually stamped it right in the middle of the page).

Acclimation...

This is a fascinating wikipedia entry on the differences between British and American English.  It's strange, I read so many British books as a kid, that I use some British grammatical rules without realizing it.  Sadly, I think spell-checking programs are solidifying the differences between British and American spelling, especially when doubling consonants in front of a suffix with a vowel.  For example, I still write travelling, but most spellchecking programs tell me that traveling is the correct spelling, which looks totally wrong to me.  (Wikipedia also has an interesting article on the different spelling conventions of the two countries.)

Mostly, it gets difficult to remember which conventions to use where, especially when writing for a British audience, as I am when I work over here.  When I bring some of these conventions and colloquialisms back to the US, people think I'm being smarmy or hoity-toity, which is usually not the case at all.  Saying 'cheers' becomes second-nature here, as does asking where the 'loo' or 'toilet' is.  If you're looking for zucchini, you'd better look for a corgette instead, or you probably will go home empty-handed.  And if you want something 'to go,' you'd better ask for 'take away.'  I could go on and on about the subtle changes between American and British English.  It takes a me a few weeks to acclimate myself once I'm over here.  

Of Hats and Harrod's

After yesterday's trip to the British Museum, I went to the Victoria and Albert museum to see a few of their galleries. I ended up spending most of my time in the Fashion and Asian galleries, which were organized beautifully. 

Early in the evening, I met with K. and her husband M. to grab a cup of coffee. Coffee soon turned into a picnic at Hyde Park, which required food! On our way to Hyde Park, we stopped at Hotel Chocolat and grabbed a few types of chocolate to try (mainly salted-almond truffles and a mini fruit-and-nut bar.) Along with our sandwich from Paul's, we had the perfect early dinner. 

We watched people in their paddle boats and made snarky comments about a few people in row boats who couldn't figure out how to row them in a straight line. 

Then we made our way to Harrod's, which was a blast. I was amazed at the millinery section. One day, I will totally wear a head-piece like this to a wedding. Just watch me.  We had a blast looking at the housewares section, the food-halls, and the amazing clothes.

We ended our evening at Ladurée, which has a small cafe tucked away inside of Harrod's. I tried their bergamot macaron, as well as my favorite, the pistachio, along with some rose tea.  

It was a wonderful day -- I had such a good time with H. and M. They live in New Jersey, and their hospitality may be what gets me to finally visit New York!

Sunny Day...

It's positively balmy here in London today.  I walked down to the British Museum to see thier recently-renovated medieval gallery.  It was very nice, but there were far too many screaming children and hordes of Italian toursits for me to get more than a cursory glance at most of the exhibits.  

There was also a tiny exhibit on Javanese Gamelan, which was cool.  The British Museum is going to have an accompanying concert coming up, so I might attend if I have a spare moment.  

This afternoon I'm taking the tube down to the Victoria and Albert Museum, which inexplicably has an exhibit on hats.  There are also a couple fashion exhibits that look interesting.  After, I'm meeting a friend who lived in the dorms with me during my first go-round at the B.L.  She's recently gotten married, so I get to meet her husband as well.  If I can manage the tube on a hot London day (trust me, it's nasty), it should be fun!