The Medieval Imagination Exhibition Audio Tour

Item 1: Gospels of St Luke and St John

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:44:13 +1000

Hear the history behind the decorative patterns and text of pages from the Gospels of St Luke and St John, one of the few surviving Gospel books made by missionary monks in England. They include a medieval spelling mistake!

Item 2: Glossed Gospels

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:42:13 +1000

Discover the meanings behind the evangelist symbols featured in the Glossed Gospels. The fine initials, executed in gold and costly pigments, in this Gospel book are characteristic of the high-quality work found in books made for St Albans Abbey.

Item 3: Antiphonal-hymnal

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:39:39 +1000

Listen to the legend behind the illustration of St Dominic and the ladder to heaven in the Antiphonal-hymnal. This choir book was made for the nuns of St Louis de Poissy, a Dominican monastery founded by King Philip IV in 1304.

Item 4: Antiphonal

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:37:27 +1000

Discover the meanings behind the artist's composition for this 13th-century Italian Antiphonal, which are based on legends popular in Byzantium and Italy. This splendid manuscript contains the music and chants of the Office from Christmas to Epiphany.

Item 5: Psalter

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:34:44 +1000

Learn about the symbolism of the half-page miniatures and historiated initials in this Psalter. It was probably made for Mary de Bohun, daughter of the Earl of Hereford and Essex, for her marriage to Henry Bolingbroke, Earl of Derby, in 1380.

Item 6: Book of Hours (Use of Paris)

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:33:30 +1000

Hear about the decorative richness, bright and colourful palette and complex and lively approach to narrative, which characterise the Bedford Breviary present in this miniature of the Flight into Egypt, from this 15th-century Book of Hours (Use of Paris).

Item 7: Ptolemy, Almagest

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:32:12 +1000

Discover the illustration and history behind the opening chapter of Ptolemy's 'Almagest', which argues that only mathematics yields certain knowledge; yet, study of astronomy, the highest part of mathematics, can lead to the understanding of God.

Item 8: Bestiary

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:30:18 +1000

Bestiaries (medieval book of beasts) describe, and provide theological and moral interpretations of, familiar, exotic and fabulous creatures. Discover the strange beliefs that were bestowed on the elephant in medieval times, as shown in this example.

Item 9: Livy, Histoire Romaine

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:27:15 +1000

Listen to how the young Master of the Cite des Dames' confident modelling of form, subtle use of colour and the tiled floors and angled objects of his interiors for Livy's 'Histoire Romaine' herald later Parisian illumination.

Item 10: Scriptores Historiae Augustae

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 05:25:49 +1000

Hear how recent scholarship on 'Scriptores Historiae Augustae' ('The Augustan History') provides intriguing insights into the Medici family. This high Renaissance manuscript was made for Lorenzo de’ Medici in 1479 and is still in its original binding.