Meticulously researched and annotated, The Second Carolingian Modelbook is a pattern collection for stitchers fascinated by the counted embroidery styles of the 1500s and 1600s.Its 75 plates of over 250 individual band, border, strapwork, and field designs are clearly depicted for ease of working, and are accompanied by observations on pattern "families", full source documentation, and descriptions of some of the many techniques that were used to stitch them. It contains linear designs appropriate for double-running or back stitch embroidery; and block unit designs can be used for long armed cross stitch and darned whitework. Block unit designs can also be used in modern context for cross stitch, filet crochet, and knitting. Designs appropriate for reserva or voided work (the ancestor of modern Assisi stitching) are also included. Please note that this is a reference work for stitchers creating their own works for private use, and not a book of fully composed projects and the step by step directions for creating them.

The court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II produced nothing more amazing than the Mira colligrophioe monumenta, a flamboyant demonstration of two arts-calligraphy and miniature painting. The project began when Rudolf's predecessor commissioned the master calligrapher Georg Bocskay to create a model book of calligraphy. A preeminent scribe, Bocskay assembled a vast selection of contemporary and historic scripts. Many were intended not for practical use but for virtuosic display. Years later, at Rudolf's behest, court artist Joris Hoefnagel filled the spaces on each manuscript page with images of fruit, flowers, insects, and other natural minutiae. The combination of word and images is rare and, on its tiny scale, constitutes one of the marvels of the Central European Renaissance. The manuscript is now in the collections of the Getty Museum. Forty-eight of its pages are reproduced in this book, containing samples of classic italic hands; historical, invented, and exhibition hands; Rotunda, a classicizing humanist script based on Carolingian miniscule; classically based scripts; and Gothic blackletter and chancery.

Now back in print, “the ultimate book-lover’s gift book” (Los Angeles Times) In 1561–62 the master calligrapher Georg Bocskay (died 1575), imperial secretary to the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I, created Mira calligraphiae monumenta (Model Book of Calligraphy) as a demonstration of his own preeminence among scribes. Some thirty years later, Ferdinand’s grandson, the Emperor Rudolf II, commissioned Europe’s last great manuscript illuminator, Joris Hoefnagel (1542–1600), to embellish the work. The resulting book is at once a treasury of extraordinary beauty and a landmark in the cultural debate between word and image. Bocskay assembled a vast selection of contemporary and historical scripts for a work that summarized all that had been learned about writing to date—a testament to the universal power of the written word. Hoefnagel, desiring to prove the superiority of his art over Bocskay’s words, employed every resource of illusionism, color, and form to devise all manner of brilliant grotesques, from flowers, fruit, insects, and animals to monsters and masks. Unavailable for nearly a decade, this gorgeous volume features over 180 color illustrations, as well as scholarly commentary and biographies of both artists to inspire scholars, bibliophiles, graphic designers, typographers, and calligraphers.

Focuses on one of the most attractive features of late medieval manuscript illumination: the portrait of the book owner at prayer within the pages of her prayer-book.

In this book, Liz James offers a comprehensive history of wall mosaics produced in the European and Islamic middle ages. Taking into account a wide range of issues, including style and iconography, technique and material, and function and patronage, she examines mosaics within their historical context. She asks why the mosaic was such a popular medium and considers how mosaics work as historical 'documents' that tell us about attitudes and beliefs in the medieval world. The book is divided into two part. Part I explores the technical aspects of mosaics, including glass production, labour and materials, and costs. In Part II, James provides a chronological history of mosaics, charting the low and high points of mosaic art up until its abrupt end in the late middle ages. Written in a clear and engaging style, her book will serve as an essential resource for scholars and students of medieval mosaics.