This article represents the first attempt to reassess Pacino di Bonaguida’s place within the history and scholarly literature of Trecento Florence, and offers new considerations about choir book production in Italy at the time. The largest body of material attributed to Pacino consists of illuminated manuscripts, specifically forty-seven choir books, which were studied in person by the present author (many for the first time in decades and several represent new discoveries). Based on recent technical analysis, aspects of workshop production (including painterly effects, materials, and conventions for framing illuminations), and by comparison with dated or dateable manuscripts, the choir books have for the first time been organized into two groups: manuscripts produced between 1300-1320s and 1330-1347. This new understanding of workshop production calls into question Pacino’s role in the development of painting in Florence at the dawn of the Renaissance.
Introduction
Pacino di Bonaguida, from the neighbourhood of San Lorenzo in Florence, was a publicus artifex in arte pictorum. The term refers to an artist, in this case a painter, who sold their wares out of a bottega (workshop), usually on the street level of a building.[1] A notarial document of 20 February 1303 records that Pacino ended an artistic partnership with a certain Tambo di Serraglio from the nearby neighbourhood of Santa Maria Maggiore.[2] As such, both lived in the quarter of San Giovanni, where the Duomo is located. Between 1327 and 1330, this same Pacino registered with the Guild of Medici e Speziali (Doctors and Apothecaries), to which painters belonged. A single painting bears his name in an inscription which also includes a partial and highly debated date: the polyptych for the High Altar of the Church of San Firenze, now in the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence (inv. 1890 no. 8568), variously dated between 1305-1310, 1310-1315, or ca 1340 (Fig. 1).[3] This work of art and the two archival documents are all that remains with certainty of Pacino’s career during the Trecento.
Today, art historians consider Pacino to have been a painter-illuminator and ascribe to him a vast oeuvre that includes paintings on panel in all formats (polyptychs, diptychs, triptychs, dossals, folding reliquary caskets, and monumental and portable crucifixes), illuminations on parchment, and stained glass windows.[4] Within this corpus of material are nearly fifty choir books made for every major religious order in Florence, including the Augustinians, Benedictines, Carmelites, Cistercians, Dominicans, Franciscans, and Vallombrosans. Also attributed to Pacino are at least forty leaves and cuttings from various additional choral manuscripts,[5] thirty-three fragments from the famous Laudario of Sant’Agnese (produced for a confraternity of laymen and women that met at the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence),[6] the largest number of illuminated copies of Dante’s Divina commedia (totalling twenty-seven),[7] and at least thirty-seven additional codices (liturgical manuscripts and miscellaneous religious and secular texts).[8] This vast collection of manuscripts was commissioned by private individuals, confraternities, guilds, churches affiliated with a religious order, and collegiate sanctuaries not only in Florence, but also in Castelfiorentino, Empoli, Fiesole, Impruneta, Pistoia, Prato, and elsewhere in Tuscany. Illuminated manuscripts, specifically choir books, far outnumber the works in other media attributed to Pacino and have in large part given rise to at least fourteen distinct Pacinesque personalities in scholarly literature. Each of the choir books attributed to Pacino, as well as the leaves and cuttings assigned to him or to his shop, were studied, catalogued, and photographed in person by the present author and have for the first time been organized into two groups—manuscripts produced between 1300-1320s and 1330-1347—based on recent technical analysis, aspects of workshop production (including painterly effects, materials, and conventions for framing illuminations), and by comparison with dated or dateable manuscripts. This article presents the first attempt to reassess Pacino’s place within the history and scholarship of Trecento Florence by taking a fresh look at choir book production and workshop practices in central Italy at the time.
A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting and Alternative Approaches to Trecento Art
Pacino’s position within the history of early Italian Renaissance art is owed to Richard Offner (1898-1965), the first scholar to refer to Pacino as a painter-illuminator and to compile the artist’s oeuvre in his magisterial A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. Offner’s earliest assessment (1922) was that Pacino represented a so-called ‘Miniaturist Tendency’ in Florentine art, that is, a strand of painting understood in parallel to the monumentality of works by Giotto di Bondone (1266/67-1337) but best suited to a smaller scale.[9] Offner set out to describe the contours of Pacino’s workshop (1927) by assembling a ‘specimen page’ of characteristic facial types, selected primarily from the San Firenze/Accademia Polyptych mentioned above, as well as from a panel of The Tree of Life (Florence, Galleria dell’Accademia, inv. 1890 no. 8568) and from a manuscript with The Life of Christ and the Life of the Blessed Gerard of Villamagna (New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M. 643) (Fig. 2, recreated here in colour).[10] Offner noted that a page from the Laudario of Sant’Agnese (now in Los Angeles, The J. Paul Getty Museum, Ms. 80a) was undertaken by a skilled illuminator autonomous of Pacino but part of his artistic legacy. In the earliest Corpus volumes (1930/1931), Offner began to outline the artistic milieu in which Pacino must have trained, with references to anonymous painters such as the Master of Saint Cecilia, the Master of the Fogg Pietà, the Master of the Horne Triptych, and so forth. Offner also began to categorize works that he felt were created by Pacino’s assistants, the broader workshop, and a following of related personalities, which included the Biadaiolo Illuminator or the Master of the Dominican Effigies (now considered to be the same painter-illuminator at different phases of a career) and Jacopo del Casentino (who is occasionally assigned works on parchment otherwise assigned to the Master of the Dominican Effigies).[11] Miklós Boskovits (1935-2011) expanded the Corpus (1984, 1987) and attempted to establish a chronology for Pacino’s career and to consolidate his oeuvre.[12] Boskovits presented an expansionist view of Pacino and his shop, which can be best summarised by the following passage: ‘Although some of Offner’s distinctions (master with assistance, shop of the master, close follower, etc.) may now appear too subtle and meticulous, they generally find their justification.’[13]
In the shadow of The Corpus of Florentine Painting, art historians have primarily developed two competing views of Pacino: either that he was the most highly sought after illuminator in early Trecento Florence and that he trained a well-organized workshop, which produced a uniquely Florentine style of manuscript illumination based closely on the master’s style; or that a distinct set of so-called Pacinesque illuminators were responsible for this material (this position distances the person of Pacino from the material and in some instances removes him completely from the equation).[14] The Offnerian association between Pacino and manuscript illumination has been scrutinized by numerous scholars. Mario Salmi called for a more rigorous look at miniatures assigned to Pacino by Offner.[15] Mirella Levi D’Ancona cautioned against characterizing Pacino as primarily an illuminator until further archival evidence emerges.[16] Marco Ciatti observed that the name of a single individual (Pacino) cannot suffice to explain the enormous output of manuscripts that continue to come to light and further comprise a heterogeneous oeuvre.[17] Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré dal Poggetto saw the term ‘Pacinesque’ as indicating diverse hands across chronologically distant periods.[18] Angelo Tartuferi considered the term ‘Pacinesque’ to be too all-encompassing.[19] Giovanna Lazzi suggested that the notion that Pacino was the head of a large workshop that dominated manuscript production in the first half of the Trecento casts a shadow on the intricacies of manuscript illumination at the time.[20] Following Mario Salmi’s dictum, ‘di giotteschi nel Trecento non vi fu che Giotto stesso’ (Of the Giottesque painters in the Trecento, there was only Giotto),[21] I accept only the signed Accademia Polyptych as an autograph work by Pacino and acknowledge that assistants likely aided in the painting process.
Since the publication of The Corpus volumes on Pacino and his shop, the various attempts to identify individuals within Pacino’s orbit have resulted in the emergence of fourteen so-called Pacinesque personalities, who appear to have been active at various moments throughout the five-decade career assigned to Pacino. The following scholars have christened Pacinesque illuminators (the monikers of each are indicated parenthetically): Alessandro Conti (Maestro di Piteglio), Carlo Bertelli (Maestro della Natività, Maestro di Santo Stefano, Maestro di San Guglielmo), Alessandro Guidotti (Maestro Pacinesco A and Maestro Pacinesco C), Magnolia Scudieri and Maria Sframeli (Primo and Secondo Miniatore Pacinesco), Alvaro Spagnesi (Master of the Trivulziana Bible), Giovanna Lazzi (Maestro del Messale and assistant), Ada Labriola (Master of the Panegyric of Robert of Anjou), and Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré dal Poggetto with later refinement by Laura Alidori Battaglia (Pacinesque Hands 1 and 2). Appendix 1 provides a brief historiography of each and Figure 3 includes details of these artists’ hands on the model of Offner’s ‘specimen page.’ It is important to remember that there is no consensus on the oeuvres of these individuals nor is there a consistent approach to applying these attributions across the large body of work contained within the Pacinesque oeuvre. One need only consider the stylistic diversity in a group of six leaves or cuttings—each from separate choir books or liturgical manuscripts—today housed in the Fondazione Cini in Venice (Fig. 4). In the 2016 catalogue of the Cini collection, manuscripts scholars Francesca Pasut, Cristina de Benedictis, and Sonia Chiodo each briefly addressed the questions of authorship that have arisen in scholarship related to Pacino and yet each concluded that all but one of the miniatures are autograph works of or closely supervised by the master (a single cutting was assigned to Pacino and workshop while the rest were identified as works by Pacino).[22] The range in colour palettes and approaches for rendering fleshtones vary greatly, as do the framing devices on the six leaves (from simple colour bands on two cuttings to those featuring a string of diamonds, scrolling vines and acanthus leaves, gold and blue tridents, or none at all). Stella Panayotova has suggested that scholars working on Pacino’s vast and ever-growing oeuvre need to better characterise the differences apparent among the many hands within this shop on a material, iconographic, and working or organisational level rather than coin new anonymous Pacinesque hands.[23] I support this approach and outline below a new pathway forward for working with this vast corpus of illuminations.
The names of two individuals appear in manuscripts attributed to Pacino, and I would like to suggest that they were in fact illuminators responsible for a selection of these manuscripts. The first name appears in an inscription on the first folio of a gradual in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (41.100.191): a certain Domenicho di Casino (or Casentino) and compagni, or associates, appear to have fulfilled the commission (Fig. 5).[24] Six of the twelve historiated initials in this manuscript are framed with a row of lozenges alternating gold and green or blue, a pattern also found in a group of stylistically similar manuscripts or fragments: a newly discovered antiphonary for Dominican use (Venator & Hanstein, Cologne, 20 March 2015, lot 263), a Missal (Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Conv. Soppr. 233), a leaf from a gradual (London, Robert McCarthy Collection; ex-Breslauer), two of a three-volume antiphonary in Prato (Archivio storico diocesano, Cod. 1, Cod. 2), and a gradual from the Badia a Settimo (Rome, Church of San Bernardo alle Terme, Cod. D). These works may all be by the same hand or workshop. The second individual can be found tucked away in the inner margin on folio 4 of a Bible (Milan, Archivio Storico e Biblioteca Trivulziana, Cod. 2139): an abbreviated name appears inscribed in golden letters—XPOFORUS or Christoforus—above a half-length figure dressed in contemporary fourteenth-century clothing and grasping a mathematical compass (dividers) while gazing across the opening page of Genesis at God the Father, enthroned on the arc of heaven within an initial I containing The Creation of Eve (ca 1340, Fig. 6). Getty Museum manuscripts conservator Nancy Turner and I have argued that Christoforus was, in fact, one of the illuminators responsible for producing several of the manuscripts from the so-called late period in Pacino’s career (from about 1330-1347).[25] I will expand upon this point in the next section.
It appears impossible at present to completely divorce Pacino’s name from such a considerable and growing corpus of objects, but a closer look at this material does confirm Boskovits’s general assessment that the oeuvre attributed to Pacino or described as Pacinesque can be divided into two phases or generations based on stylistic—and indeed technical—comparison with dated and datable works of art: those objects dating from about 1300 to the 1320s and those from about 1330-1347. In the earlier period, Boskovits saw a range of styles and approaches to illumination, whereas he felt that the latter was more homogenous.[26] Through technical analysis and a re-evaluation of early and late objects in Pacino’s oeuvre, Getty conservators Yvonne Szafran and Nancy Turner noticed that Pacino layered the flesh tones on the San Firenze/Accademia Polyptych over a terraverde (or green earth) ground whereas in general no such green was used in manuscripts and panels attributed to Pacino that we can now assign to the period from about 1300-1320s.[27] Expanding upon this assessment of the artist’s working methods, Stella Panayotova and Nancy Turner have recently proposed a holistic and scientific approach to wading through the complexity of this material:
Early works ascribed to Pacino, such as the Scenes from the Life of Christ and the Life of the Blessed Gerard of Villamagna (c. 1315, New York, Morgan Library and Museum, MS M. 643) and the Tree of Life panel in the Accademia in Florence (c. 1305-1315), were painted with pink or ochre-tinged flesh colours with no green under layer present. Given such fundamental differences in flesh painting technique, perhaps late manuscripts like the Laudario [of Sant’Agnese]… can no longer be ascribed to the artist identified with these and other ‘Pacinesque’ works made decades earlier.[28]
By distancing the person of Pacino and the question of authorship from the central argument of this article, I hope to better characterise the working methods and moments of collaboration between an array of illuminators working on early Florentine illuminated manuscripts.
Following the approach in current scholarship on workshop organization for fourteenth-century painters (on panel, in fresco, and on parchment), I have characterized the two phases of choir book production mentioned above—from about 1300-1320s and about 1330-1347—as including work undertaken by a master and an apprentice or disciple (discepolo), or involving contracted day labourers (lavoranti), or featuring collaborations with other local workshops or with artists from different cities (forming partnerships of compagni or socii operating as a compagnia or consortium).[29] I look specifically to Hayden Maginnis’s scholarship on Trecento Siena, because he has demonstrated that the concept of a workshop is best understood as hierarchically and geographically fluid, with numerous possible intricacies and iterations for collaboration, such as those permutations just mentioned.[30] We can also turn to France and specifically to Mary and Richard Rouse’s work on Parisian illuminator Jean Pucelle (active ca. 1300-1355) and workshop and on the husband-and-wife team Richard and Jeanne de Montbaston (active 1338-1353) for a comparative look at manuscript production. The names of Pucelle’s collaborators—‘Mahiet’ and ‘Ancelet’—appear in the margins and in colophons in the Billyng Bible of 1327 (Bibliothèque national de France, Ms. Lat. 11935) and the Belleville Breviary of 1323-26 (BnF, Ms. Lat. 10483), and his widow ‘Perronelle la Pucelle’ may have continued running the family shop upon her husband’s death (which presents a challenge for distinguishing individual hands).[31] Similar framing conventions to those in Trecento Florentine manuscripts can be found in Paris from around the same time and even earlier, for example in the works of the Montbaston atelier and of the artists of the Morgan Picture Bible of about 1250 (also known as the Crusader Bible, the Maciejowski Bible, or the Shah ‘Abbas Bible). In these examples, stylistic analysis supports a division of hands based on the design or pattern within the frame.[32] It is becoming clearer to me that such designs can at times be useful in determining the illuminator’s place of origin within central Italy.
The 1320s and 1330s appear to signal a shift in workshop production in greater Tuscany, for panel painters and illuminators. Erling Skaug notes a definitive change in Siena between 1315-1320, when Simone Martini (ca. 1284-1344) began to incorporate elaborately shaped motif punches in haloes, garment details, and frame borders, a transition from incised decoration.[33] Punch technology then gradually began to emerge with greater frequency elsewhere in the region, including in Florence. Regarding punchwork on Florentine panel paintings, Skaug declared, ‘Whereas every workshop output in the period between c.1330-1340 normally can be identified by the use of its own, separate set of punches, this pattern is broken after the plague by a common use of tools by otherwise unrelated artists.’[34] Boskovits’s understanding of a fifteen-twenty-year artist generation, mentioned above, versus a sprawling fifty-year career (in the case of Pacino or Pacinesque illuminators) provides a manageable framework for assessing subtle shifts in workshop practice, especially when working with dated or dateable material together with technical analysis and archival material.
Building upon the discussion about shifts in practice in Florentine manuscript illumination, decorative frames around historiated initials appeared as early as a set of antiphonary volumes for Santa Maria Novella (about 1275-80) that were undertaken by five or six artists from Florence, Pistoia, Arezzo, and elsewhere in the environs of Tuscany and the Romagna (such as Imola). From 1300 onward, such frames continue to develop into recognisable repertoires for illuminator workshops in the city. In Siena, where such a phenomenon can be observed in the work of the Primo and Secondo Maestro dei corali di Siena, ca. 1270-90, it is not until the 1330s that more elaborate framing advanced there, by artists including the Maestro di Sant’Eugenio or Niccolò di Ser Sozzo.[35] Decorative frames emerge in Pisa around 1326 primarily in the work of the Maestro di Eufrasia dei Lanfranchi.[36] The distinguishing marks discussed briefly here—metal punches and decorative frames—may signal an early form of branding or they may have helped determine payment for work completed, as Bruno Zanardi suggests for large-scale fresco cycles.[37] These working hypotheses can continue to be tested as new evidence comes to light.
The Illuminated Choir Book in Trecento Florence
Illuminated choir books were essential to the careers of a substantial number of artists in the early Renaissance. In Florence, only a few churches—mendicant, monastic, and parish alike—housed decorated or illuminated song books by the last quarter of the Duecento, but by the mid-Trecento, dozens of ecclesiastical structures within the city and its environs had begun commissioning lavishly decorated volumes. In some instances, a single volume comprised the chants for the entire liturgical year whereas at other times multiple volumes were desired. The vast quantity of surviving choir book volumes, as well as evidence from leaves and cuttings for numerous others, reveals the demand for such objects. The illuminations contained within these manuscripts constitute a still-understudied aspect of the development of Italian painting at the time. The exigencies of cost, artists’ availability, and the practical and material conditions of painting dozens of miniatures in tempera on parchment likely contributed to the ongoing development of decorated choir books.
From 1300-1350, several illuminator workshops emerged in Florence—those native to the city and artists from Bologna, Pisa, Pistoia, and Siena—and through collaboration, they met the rising demand for decorated books. Yet nearly all of these individuals are now anonymous masters, despite the fact that art historical scholarship for nearly the last hundred years has championed Pacino di Bonaguida as the most prolific painter-illuminator of the early Trecento. Indeed, each master should be treated by the term ‘masters’ to acknowledge the presence of multiple hands within the same workshop, a phenomenon too often simplified in favour of individuality. Of the many additional illuminator hands encountered in a survey of the scholarly literature on the period, surely many more hands were involved in the making of these choir books than have been previously acknowledged, even if archival studies have not yet yielded the names of individuals who can be connected with surviving manuscripts.
Within Pacino’s historical and scholarly orbit are numerous anonymous Florentine illuminators, including the Master of the Dominican Effigies (whose early phase has been subsumed within that of the Biadaiolo Master), Maestro Daddesco, the Master of the Codex of Saint George, the Master of Saint Cecilia, and several illuminators from Pistoia or Pisa, such as the Master(s) of the Laudario (sometimes thought to be Lippo di Benivieni or the Master of 1310), the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas (and the often conflated pseudo-illuminator whose hand must be acknowledged as a separate personality, which I recently renamed the Master of Montepulciano Gradual I-H/2), and the Maestro del Dante di Petrarca (christened by Francesca Pasut as distinct from Maestro Daddesco and the Maestro della Carità).[38] It should be emphasised that each of the illuminators just mentioned remains completely anonymous—including the so-called Pacinesque artists—since none of the documented illuminators in Florence can be concretely connected with any of the eponymous commissions attributed to these masters.
It is helpful to keep in mind the genealogy of illuminators who worked in Florence during the long fourteenth century, as understood in current scholarship. The earliest emergence of a group of illuminators working in Florence can be seen in a four-volume gradual with decorated initials probably produced between 1263-1274 for the Dominican church of Santa Maria Novella. A four-volume antiphonary with decorated and historiated initials was illuminated by the Miniatore di Sant’Alessio in Bigiano and the Maestri dei Corali di Santa Maria Novella for the same church, and the commission was completed between 1275-80, and the 1290s.[39] The Servite church of Santissima Annunziata soon followed with a commission of eight antiphonaries with foliate decoration from 1287-90/91, all by an artist called Battagliuzzo of Bologna.[40] Pacino and the Pacinesque generations were active from about 1303-1347, a period that includes the activity of the Master of the Dominican Effigies, the Master of the Codex of Saint George, and Maestro Daddesco. From about 1350-70, the personality known as Ser Monte and the illuminators of the dispersed choir books possibly for San Pier Maggiore continued to decorate music manuscripts, some of which were begun by the previous generation.[41] The last great Florentine workshop from the final quarter of the century was the Santa Maria degli Angeli school, which included Don Silvestro dei Gherarducci, Don Simone Camaldolese of Siena, and others prior to the activity of Lorenzo Monaco and Fra Angelico. At various points during the Trecento, anonymous illuminators from Bologna, Pistoia, and Pisa were active in Florence—such as the Master of 1328 (Maestro Pietro?), the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas, and the Master of Montepulciano Gradual I-H/2, respectively—and by the mid-century Lippo Vanni and others from Siena also undertook choir book commissions there (Memmo di Filippuccio was active in Florence in 1302 but does not appear to have fulfilled other projects there). The landscape of potential illuminators in Florence, therefore, included a cross-section of central Italian traditions, and yet the native Florentine shops clearly dominated the market, based on the sheer quantity of surviving manuscripts in that style.
Of the forty-seven choir books attributed to Pacino, at least twenty-one can be stylistically assigned to the painter-illuminators of the Accademia Tree of Life and the Morgan Life of Christ (MS M 643), which do not use a terraverde layer for painting fleshtones, during the period of 1300-1320s when compared with datable manuscripts: the 1302 gradual from the church of Santo Stefano in Pane, the c. 1310 Laudario of Santo Spirito (Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, B.R. 18), the 1313 Fatti dei romani (Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, Hamilton 67; Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, Ms. 2418), the 1315 gradual from the Badia a Settimo (Rome, Church of San Bernardo alle Terme), and the 1317 Ordinamenti e Statuti della Compagnia di San Giovanni Battista (present location unknown; formerly Lyon). I argue that the choir books in Appendix 2 were produced during this period.
Also by this workshop are several of the leaves and cuttings that were likely once part of a Vallombrosan antiphonary and gradual, perhaps made for the Church of San Salvi in Florence (due to the presence of Saints Salvi and John Gualberto in two of the historiated initials) (ca 1330s, Fig. 7).[42] The other portions of this dispersed manuscript were illuminated by the Master of the Dominican Effigies, and I believe the original volumes may have been produced between 1325-30 if one compares the fragments with historiated initials by the two shops in the Santa Maria Novella choir books (datable after 1323) or with the early Dante manuscripts. The first phase of illuminations in the Badia a Settimo Gradual could in fact be removed from the grouping in Appendix 2 and assigned to a distinct illuminator or consortium of illuminators, which I have tentatively referred to as the Masters of the Badia a Settimo, to acknowledge both the lack of consensus in scholarship on Pacino’s supposed early career and his doubtful involvement in this choir book, as well as the inconsistency in attributions in current scholarship. Another key collaborator during the early decades of the 1300s is Maestro Daddesco, who participated in a few of the manuscripts listed above (this individual [or individuals] also appears to have worked alongside the later generation of illuminators in the 1330s, as demonstrated in Appendix 3 below).[43]
The 1330s and 1340s—the second phase generally considered part of Pacino’s lengthy career or legacy but more likely the moment when Christoforus and others were active—saw the emergence of the largest corpus of early illuminated copies of Dante’s Commedia, as well as such panel paintings as the Chiarito Tabernacle (Los Angeles, The J. Paul Getty Museum, 85.PB.311), and manuscripts including the Impruneta Antiphonary and the Laudario of Sant’Agnese (ca 1340, Fig. 8), both of which were produced together with the Master of the Dominican Effigies.[44] Dated and dateable manuscripts from this period assigned to Pacino and his associates include the 1342 Decretals (Vatican City, BAV, MS Vat. lat. 1388), the 1343 Ammaestramenti degli Antichi (Milan, Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense, Castiglioni 3), and the 1347 Gradual (Pistoia, Archivio Vescovile di Pistoia, s.s.). For the Master of the Dominican Effigies, comparable material includes the 1337 Divina commedia (Milan, Archivio Storico e Biblioteca Trivulziana, MS Triv. 1080), the 1338 Ordinamenti e matricola della Compagnia di Sant’Onofrio (Florence, Fondazione Horne, Inv. N. 2807 n. 6/29), the 1340-1347 Libro dei Lasciti alla Compagnia di Or San Michele (Florence, Archivio di Stato, Capitani di Orsanmichele, n. 470), and the 1342 Ammaestramenti degli Antichi (Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, MS II.II.319). My assessment is that the twenty-six choir books in Appendix 3 were produced by Pacinesque illuminators, Christoforus and compagni (or consortium), during this period.
Some of the manuscripts from these two moments in the early Trecento remain in their original locations but most have been moved to libraries, archives, or sold to private collectors or museums (as whole manuscripts or as dispersed leaves and cuttings). It is clear that the surviving volumes were written by numerous scribes likely at various scriptoria.[45] Only one choir book includes an inscription by a scribe: Matteo di Paulo signed an antiphonary possibly from the Convent of San Gallo and then San Jacopo tra i Fossi (today Florence, Church of San Remigio; see Appendix 2.11). Moreover, the stave heights and number of staves per page varied by project. In general, those manuscripts made for parish or monastic churches contain more staves per page (6-10) than those made for mendicant churches (4-6). With the exception of the Collegiata di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, perhaps parish and monastic churches desired to save on the expense of producing choir books by condensing more lines of music onto a single page. The dimensions of the choir books, however, varied in scale regardless of location or type of ecclesiastical institution. For example, the following manuscripts are larger than 50 x 36 cm: the Impruneta Antiphonary, an antiphonary from Santa Maria Novella (Cod. H), an antiphonary from Santa Croce (Cod. G), a gradual from Santo Spirito (Cod. 629 (G)), a gradual from San Lorenzo (Cod. E), a gradual from Santa Maria del Fiore (M.2, n.1), and a gradual from the Badia a Settimo (Cods. A-D), among others. By contrast, these manuscripts are smaller than the dimensions just given: an antiphonary from Castelfiorentino (Cod. C (inv. 32)), the Empoli Gradual (Cod. L), an antiphonary from Santa Maria del Fiore (L.2, n.2), an antiphonary from Santissima Annunziata (Cod. I), the choir books from the Collegiata di San Lorenzo in Montevarchi (Corali A-C), and others. At present, it has not been possible to determine a precise location (or locations) where the Pacinesque illuminators or other frequent collaborators may have operated.
Visual evidence from each set of choir books studied suggests that the manuscripts were essential objects of veneration for clerics and laity alike. Although very little documentation survives for these commissions, further visual clues allow us to associate certain families with the volumes, such as the Spini at the Badia a Settimo, the Buondelmonti in Impruneta, and the Mellini at the Carmine. In many of the sets of choir books, the presence of friars, priests, tertiaries, other clerics, and male and female lay supplicants demonstrates the importance of these decorated volumes for all members of society. The decorated song books from Santa Maria Novella, Santissima Annunziata, and Santo Stefano in Pane, among others, suggest that mendicant, monastic, and parish churches shared the desire to own lavishly decorated volumes at around the same time in the late Duecento or early Trecento, likely in relation to architectural projects in the ever-expanding city and region. By building upon discussions that began in The Corpus, and by adding to my own corpus of choir books, I will, in the future, endeavor to publish a study of Florentine manuscript illumination with a complete digital image repository so that others can have access to these important artworks and to advance scholarly understanding of the many voices and many hands that produced these manuscripts.
Appendix 1. Pacinesque Illuminators: A Brief Historiography
Maestro di Piteglio: In 1969, Alessandro Conti made the first attempt to describe distinct identities within the Pacinesque oeuvre. He argued that the Maestro di Piteglio was responsible for a gradual formerly housed at the Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta in Piteglio (now Popiglio, Museo Diocesano, Cod. 62a-b). According to Conti, this individual was also responsible for illuminating a Bible in the Trivulziana Library in Milan (discussed below).
Maestro della Natività, Maestro di Santo Stefano, Maestro di San Guglielmo: In 1970, Carlo Bertelli christened these Pacinesque personalities of eponymous illuminations in a gradual commissioned by the Cistercian monks at the Badia a Settimo (Rome, Church of San Bernardo alle Terme, transferred from the Biblioteca Sessoriana at the Church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, Cod. D). Elsewhere I have referred to these artists as the Masters of the Badia a Settimo.
Maestro Pacinesco A and Maestro Pacinesco C: In 1979, Alessandro Guidotti identified two Pacinesque hands in Cod. D of the Badia a Settimo gradual, mentioned above, but these attributions were later absorbed into the shop of the Master of Saint Cecilia or defined as vaguely Pacinesque hands (by Boskovits and others).
The Primo and Secondo Miniatore Pacinesco: These individuals represent the illuminators broadly characterized by Magnolia Scudieri and Maria Sframelli in 1990 as responsible for the majority of the decoration in the five-volume Impruneta Antiphonary (Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Codd. III-VII). They attributed a single full-page miniature in Cod. VII (fol. 19) to Pacino and the rest of the illuminations to the two Pacinesque hands just mentioned, as well as to the Master of the Dominican Effigies and to an Orcagnesque miniaturist.
The Master of the Trivulziana Bible (Maestro della Bibbia Trivulziana): A personality coined by Alvaro Spagnesi in 1994 after a Bible in the Archivio storico civico e Biblioteca Trivulziana in Milan (Cod. 2139). The illuminator is described as a highly productive artist, autonomous of Pacino, who led the campaign to illuminate the many surviving copies of Dante’s Divina commedia.
Maestro del Messale (and assistant): The individual master (perhaps Pacino himself) and assistant were distinguished from the Master of the Trivulziana Bible by Giovanna Lazzi in 1994 and named for a Missal in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze (Ms. N.A. 1168). Lazzi now uses the term bottega fiorentina (Florentine workshop) to refer to manuscripts that have traditionally been attributed to Pacino or called Pacinesque.
The Master of the Panegyric of Robert of Anjou (Maestro del Panegirico di Roberto d’Angiò): According to a 2008 catalogue entry by Ada Labriola, this personality is one of three artists (originally parsed out but unnamed by Marco Ciatti) responsible for illuminating a significant portion of the Carmina regia: The Appeal of Prato to Robert of Anjou (British Library, Ms. Royal 6 E IX), specifically the monumental figures. She described the other hands as Pacinesque.
Pacinesque Hand 1 and Hand 2: This broad denomination was first suggested by Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré dal Poggetto (1984) and later refined by Laura Alidori Battaglia (2009) to refer to Pacinesque personalities responsible for illuminating portions of service books today housed in Boston, Cestello, Empoli, Fiesole, and the Church of Santa Croce in Florence (see Appendices 2 and 3 below).
Appendix 2. Choir books produced in Florence and environs between 1300-1320s.
2.1 Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Gradual, Inv. Nr. 01.6454. Parchment, ff. i + 175 + i; 35.7 x 26.2 cm; stave height: 1.5 cm (8 or 9 staves per page). Seven historiated initials (fols. 2, 15v, 22, 113, 129, 133, 161).
2.2 Castelfiorentino, Museo della Collegiata di Santa Verdiana, Antiphonary, Cod. C (inv. 37), from the Church of San Francesco a Castelfiorentino. Parchment, ff. i + 237 + i (with several leaves missing); 48 x 34.9 cm; stave height: 2.5 cm (7 staves per page). Two historiated initials (fols. 143v, 153v) and one lost (fol. 171).
2.3 Castelfiorentino, Museo della Collegiata di Santa Verdiana, Antiphonary, Cod. C (inv. 38), from the Church of San’Ippolito e Biagio, Castelfiorentino. Parchment, ff. i + 118 + 20 + i; 47.1 x 35.5 cm; stave height: 2.5 cm (7 staves per page). Twelve historiated initials (fols. 4, 14v, 25, 37v, 53, 62v, 65v, 74, 78v, 84, 94v, 106).
2.4 Delaware, Ohio, The Library of the Ohio Wesleyan University, Antiphonary, s.s. 50 x 35 cm; stave height: 2.8-2.9 cm (9 staves per page). Six historiated initials by a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 2v, 60), Maestro Daddesco (fols. 116v, 219v, 241), and the Maestro del Laudario (fol. 267v). Unpublished.
2.5 Fiesole, Archivio Capitolare (Arcivescovile), Antiphonary, Ms. XXII, 2. Parchment, ff. iv + 206 + ii; 42.7 x 30 cm; stave height: 1.8 cm (8 staves per page). One historiated initial (fol. 40). Unpublished.
2.6 Florence, Archivio di Santa Croce, Antiphonary, Cod. G, from the church of Santa Croce, Florence (or another Florentine Franciscan church, possibly the Convent of Monticelli). Parchment, ff. iii (paper) + 190 (numbered 192) + iv + iii (paper); 53 x 37 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (5 staves per page). Four historiated initials (fols. 1, 63, 152v, 161v).
2.7 Florence, Archivio di Santa Croce, Antiphonary, Cod. Q, from the church of Santa Croce, Florence (or another Florentine Franciscan church, possibly the Convent of Monticelli). Parchment, ff. iii (paper) + 262 + iii + iii (paper); 52 x 35.4 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Ten historiated initials (fols. 1, 27v, 33v, 43, 102v, 110, 114, 121v, 136, 152).
2.8 Florence, Archivio di Santa Maria Novella, Antiphonary, H.Nr. 1357, from the church of Santa Maria Novella. Sanctorale. Parchment, ff. i + 251 + i; 56.3 x 37.8 cm; stave height: 3.3 cm (6 staves per page). Historiated or decorated initials: late thirteenth century (fols. 113-126), attributed to a Florentine illuminator (Maestro di San Paolo?) (fols. 113, 116v, 150); additions after 1323 (fols. 72-94, 127-142), attributed to the Master of the Dominican Effigies (fols. 72, 75v) and to Pacino di Bonaguida (fols. 127, 130); additional liturgical content after 1370 (fols. 95-112v) and second half of the fifteenth century (fols. 1-71, 143-147); sixteenth century additions (fols. 161-202); seventeenth and eighteenth century additions (fols. 203-251).
2.9 Florence, Archivio di Santa Maria Novella, Gradual, L. Nr. 1360, from the church of Santa Maria Novella. Parchment, ff. i (paper) + 180 + i (paper); 53.6 x 37.5 cm; stave height: 3.3 cm (6 staves per page). Folios 1-161 were written and decorated in the thirteenth century; folios 162-180 represent fourteenth century additions. One historiated initial (fol. 163).
2.10 Florence, Church of San Miniato al Monte, Antiphonary, Cod. A, from the Monastero di San Bartolomeo a Monte Oliveto, Florence. Parchment, ff. v + 303 (3-306) + iii; 50 x 33 cm; stave height: 2.5 cm (7 staves per page). One historiated initial (fol. 295).
2.11 Florence, Church of San Remigio, Canonica, Antiphonary, Cod. C, possibly from the Convent of San Gallo and then San Jacopo tra i Fossi. Parchment, ff. i + 250 + i; 57.5 x 39 cm; stave height: 2.6 cm (8 staves per page). Six historiated initials (fols. 23, 70, 119, 131v, 158, 171v). Scribe: Matteo di Paulo (signed Ego Matheus Pauli scripsi), fol. 158.
2.12 Florence, Museo dell’Ospedale degli Innocenti, Antiphonary, Cod. CXXXIX/2 (inv. 11109), from the Badia a Settimo. Parchment, ff. i + 336 + i; 56 x 39 cm; 6 staves per page. One historiated initial (fol. 70).
2.13 Florence (Rifredi), Pieve di Santo Stefano in Pane, Gradual, Cod. B, dated 1302 on the flyleaf, commissioned by Parish Priest Raynerius. Parchment, ff. i + 1 + 247 + 8 + i; 46.5 x 31.5 cm; stave height: 1.8 cm (8 staves per page). Five historiated initials (fols. 16, 21, 104v, 119, 242) and one missing historiated initial (fol. 14).
2.14 Montepulciano, Museo Civico, Antiphonary, Cor. A (formerly G), from the Church of Santo Stefano al Ponte, Florence. Parchment, ff. i + 324 + ii; 54.5 x 37 cm; stave height: 2.6 cm (7 staves per page). Four historiated initials (fols. 71v, 84v, 127v, 132).
2.15 Montepulciano, Museo Civico, Antiphonary, Cor. B (formerly A), from the Church of Santo Stefano al Ponte, Florence. Parchment, ff. i + 264 + ii; 52.1 x 38.1 cm; stave height: 2.6 cm (7 staves per page). Nine historiated initials (fols. 25v, 27v, 30, 35v, 166v, 191, 197, 206v, 210v).
2.16 Montepulciano, Museo Civico, Gradual, Cor. F, from the Church of Santo Stefano al Ponte, Florence. Parchment, ff. 3 + 168 + 3; 38 x 50.4 cm; stave height: 2.6 cm (7 staves per page). Twelve historiated initials (fols. 12, 15, 24v, 28v, 32, 33, 37, 38v, 41, 48, 51, 114v).
2.17 New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gradual, 41.100.191. Parchment, ff. i + 152; 34.1 x 25 cm; Stave heights: 2 cm (6 staves per page). Twelve historiated initials (fols. 24v, 35, 39v, 41v, 45, 49, 55v, 58, 61, 63, 65v).
2.18 New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, Gradual, Ms. 795, from a church dedicated to Saint Bartholomew. Parchment, ff. 292; 40.5 x 30 cm. Nine historiated initials (fols. 1, 17, 24, 125, 142, 146, 174, 200v, 202).
2.19 Prato, Archivio storico diocesano, Antiphonary, Cod. 3 (formerly E. 110. VI), possibly for the Badia di San Fabiano near Prato or for the Prato Cathedral. Parchment, ff. i + 258 + i; 52 x 37 cm; (8 staves per page). Two historiated initials (fols. 116v, 134v).
2.20 Rome, Church of San Bernardo alle Terme (formerly Biblioteca Sessoriana, Basilica di Santa Croce in Gerusalemme), Gradual, Cod. D, from the Badia a Settimo. Parchment, ff. 302; 59.5 x 42 cm; stave height: 3.7 cm (4 staves per page). Forty-four historiated initials total, attributed to Pacino or the Master of Saint Cecilia (unnumbered folio and fols. 2, 7, 38v, 39v, 47, 61, 63, 71, 83, 122v, 125, 184, 191, 265), the Master of the Codex of Saint George (fols. 39v, 108v, 133, 151v, 169v, 175v, 259, 265, 281v), and Maestro Daddesco (unnumbered folio and fols. 7, 89, 100v, 116, 135v, 141, 172, 177v, 200v, 218v, 222, 227, 234v, 239, 247v, 248v, 253, 272, 276, 283, 287, 289v).
2.21 Spazzavento, Church of Saints Maria Maddalena and Lazzaro, Gradual, s.s. Parchment, i + 266 + i; 51 x 34.5 cm; Stave height: 2-2.1 cm (8 staves per page). Three historiated initials (fols. 1, 109v, 177v).
Appendix 3. Choir books produced in Florence and environs between 1330-1347.
3.1 Bagno a Ripoli (San Giorgio a Ruballa), Gradual, s.s. Parchment, ff. i (paper, modern) + 286 + i; 45.3 x 29.2 cm; stave height: 2.1 cm (9 staves per page). Eleven historiated initials (fols. 3, 20, 27v, 119, 136, 140, 148, 185v, 191, 197v, 204).
3.2 Empoli, Museo della Collegiata, Antiphonary, Cod. L, from the Fraternita del Latte. Parchment, ff. iii + 264 + i (paper, modern); 39 x 28 cm; (8 staves per page). Four historiated initials (fols. 1, 148, 173, 178).
3.3 Fiesole, Archivio Capitolare (Arcivescovile), Antiphonary, Ms. XXII, 4. Parchment, i + 336 + i; 49 x 35.5 cm; stave height: 2.5 cm (7 staves per page). Two historiated initials (fols. 43, 76v) and two missing (fols. 53v, 67v).
3.4 Fiesole, Archivio Capitolare (Arcivescovile), Antiphonary, Ms. XXII, 3. Parchment, ff. i + 332 + i; 50.5 x 35.6 cm; stave height: 2.4-2.5 cm (7 staves per page). Two historiated initials (fols. 1v, 68). Unpublished.
3.5 Fiesole, Archivio Capitolare (Arcivescovile), Gradual, Ms. XXII, 9. Parchment, ff. i + 56 + i; 52.5 x 37 cm; stave height: 3.3 cm (6 staves per page). Decorated letters throughout. Unpublished.
3.6 Florence, Archivio di San Lorenzo, Gradual, Cod. E. Parchment, i + 295 + i; 54.5 x 37.5 cm; stave height: 3.4 cm (6 staves per page). Fifty-seven decorated letters by a Pacinesque illuminator and two historiated initials by Lippo Vanni (fols. 1, 39v).
3.7 Florence, Archivio di San Lorenzo, Gradual, Cod. F. Parchment, i + 225 (numbered 229) + i; 56 x 38 cm; stave height: 3.4 cm (6 staves per page). Fifty-five decorated letters throughout.
3.8 Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Hymnal, Conv. Soppr. 219, from the church of San Paolino, Florence. Parchment, ff. i + 74 + iv; 28.4 x 20.2 cm; stave height: 1.6-1.7 cm (variable number of staves per page). One historiated initial (fol. 65v).
3.9 Florence, Museo di San Marco, Gradual, Cod. 570 (D), from the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine, Florence. Parchment, ff. 192; 58.5 x 39.5 cm; stave height: 3.5 cm (6 staves per page). Six historiated initials attributed to Pacinesque illuminators (fols. 146, 168v, 171v, 174v, 177, 181v) and twenty-nine attributed to Pisan illuminators (fols. 1, 6v, 26, 28v, 31, 31v, 37v, 50v, 64, 78v, 81v, 86, 90, 93v, 97, 101, 105, 109v, 112v, 116v, 120, 124v, 129, 134v, 138v, 142, 146, 150, 185, 189).
3.10 Florence, Museo di San Marco, Gradual, Cod. 612 (A), from the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine. Parchment, i + 158 + i; 50.5 x 35.7 cm; stave height: 3.5 cm (8 staves per page). Eleven historiated initials (fols. 1, 8, 11, 14v, 18v, 19v, 23v, 26v, 30, 108, 116v).
3.11 Florence, Museo di San Marco, Gradual, Cod. 618 (B), from the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine, Florence. Parchment, ff. 200; 57 x 39 cm; stave height: 3.5 cm (6 staves per page). Two decorated initials by a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 176, 177) and twenty-six historiated initials by Pisan illuminators (fols. 1, 5, 8v, 11, 15v, 20, 35v, 41, 44, 46, 54v, 58, 62v, 65v, 70v, 76v, 82, 90v, 100v, 110v, 112, 124v, 131, 152v, 163v, 173v).
3.12 Florence, Museo di San Marco, Antiphonary, Cod. 629, from the Church of Santo Spirito, Florence. Parchment, i + 229 + ii; 60 x 42 cm; stave height: 3.5 cm (6 staves per page). Five historiated initials, attributed to a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 3v, 105v, 191v) and the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas (fols. 102v, 118v).
3.13 Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Antiphonary, Cod. III (formerly A 2), from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta. Parchment, ff. iii + 239 + i; 55 x 39 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Fifteen historiated initials (fols. 5, 18, 51, 66v, 79, 98v, 111v, 126v, 140, 155, 164, 178, 190, 205v, 223v).
3.14 Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Antiphonary, Cod. IV (formerly A 3), from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta. Parchment, ff. i + 271 + i; 52 x 37 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Fifteen historiated initials (fols. 1v, 20v, 36, 56, 75, 95, 120, 133, 172, 179, 192v, 205v, 217, 232, 247).
3.15 Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Antiphonary, Cod. V (formerly A 4), from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta. Parchment, ff. i + 227 + iv; 52 x 38 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Thirteen historiated initials (fols. 3, 8v, 12, 42, 59v, 71v, 87, 112, 130, 143v, 165, 179, 195).
3.16 Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Antiphonary, Cod. VI (formerly A 5), from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta. Parchment, ff. i + 262 + i; 52 x 37 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Sixteen historiated initials, attributed to a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 1v, 28v, 63v, 79v, 98, 112, 135, 142, 172, 179, 194, 207v, 226, 239, 246) and the Master of the Dominican Effigies (fol. 158).
3.17 Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta, Antiphonary, Cod. VII (formerly A I), from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta. Parchment, ff. i + 300 + i; 54 x 39 cm; stave height: 2.3 cm (6 staves per page). Full-page miniature attributed to a Pacinesque illuminator (fol. 19), and seventeen historiated initials, attributed to the Master of the Dominican Effigies (fols. 122v, 132v, 142), the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas (fols. 18v, 41, 91, 108, 221), the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas with a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 55, 154v, 168v, 200, 213, 237, 249v, 267, 285v).
3.18 Montepulciano, Museo Civico, Antiphonary, Cor. D, from the Church of Santo Stefano al Ponte, Florence. Parchment, ff. iii + 302 + iii; 54.2 x 37.7 cm; stave height 2.6 cm (7 staves per page). Five historiated initials, attributed to a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 27v, 87v, 144v, 159) and Maestro Daddesco (fol. 210).
3.19 Montepulciano, Museo Civico, Antiphonary, Cor. E (formerly B), from the Church of Santo Stefano al Ponte, Florence. Parchment, ff. iii + 249 + 3; 54.5 x 37 cm; stave height: 2.6 cm (7 staves per page). Six historiated initials removed prior to 1953 and attributed to Maestro Daddesco (fols. 2, 12v, 18v, 127v) and Pacino (fols. 206, 217v, 238v). Seventeen historiated initials attributed to Maestro Daddesco (fols. 31, 42v, 55v, 69, 79, 90v, 95, 106, 119, 141, 151v, 166, 177, 182, 199v).
3.20 New Haven, Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Gradual, MS. 549, from the Church of San Lorenzo, Florence. Parchment, ff. 246; 55 x 37.5 cm; stave height: 3.4 cm (6 staves per page). Twelve historiated initials, attributed to a Pacinesque illuminator (fols. 26v, 32, 48v, 52v, 56, 61, 144, 148), Lippo Vanni (fols. 36, 39, 42v), and a follower of Bernardo Daddi (fol. 17).
3.21 Pistoia, Archivio vescovile (formerly Capraia, Firenze, S. Martino in Campo), Gradual, s.s., possibly from the Church of Santa Stefano alle Brusche a Capraia. Parchment, ff. 143; 49.8 x 33.8 cm; 9 staves per page. Two historiated initials (fols. 9, 53).
3.22 Pistoia, Church of the Madonna dell’Umiltà, Gradual, Ms. A, possibly from the Church of Santa Maria Forisportam (inscription on fol. 240). Parchment, ff. xi + 258; 31 x 45 cm; stave height: 1.7 cm (9 staves per page). One historiated initial (fol. 1).
3.23 Popiglio, Museo Parrocchiale (formerly Piteglio, Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta e Pistoia), Gradual, Museo 62a, possibly originally for San Bartolomeo in Pantano a Pistoia. Temporale from the First Sunday in Advent to the First Sunday after the Ascension (fols. 3-128v). Parchment, 2 + 125 (3-128) + 1; 47.9 x 35 cm; 8 staves per page. Five historiated initials (fols. 3, 17v, 24, 109v, 125).
3.24 Popiglio, Museo Parrocchiale (formerly Piteglio, Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta e Pistoia), Gradual, Museo 62b, possibly originally for San Bartolomeo in Pantano a Pistoia. Parchment, 1 + 121 (131-253) + 1; 49.5 x 34.8 cm; 8 staves per page. Three historiated initials (fols. 139, 180, 181v).
3.25 Terranuova Bracciolini, Church of Santa Maria Bambina (now Arezzo, Archivio Storico Diocesano), Gradual, I.22 (formerly 29,1; listed by Offner as M.n.316). Parchment; ff. 331 (missing ff. 1-2); 36.2 x 24 cm; stave height 1.4-1.5 cm (9 staves per page). Six historiated initials (fols.107, 133, 141, 148v, 152, 153v) and eleven missing historiated initials (fols. 13v, 19v, 94v, 110, 111, 136v, 145, 147, 157v, 159v, 198)
3.26 United Kingdom, Denys Spittle Collection (labelled A.I.1 on the inner binding), Gradual, possibly from the Church of Santo Salvatore al Vescovo. Parchment, 1 + i + 184 + 1; 35 x 24 cm; stave height: 2.2 cm (8 staves per page). Fifteen historiated initials (fols. 1, 6, 15, 18v, 30, 31v, 39v, 59, 61v, 67, 69, 76, 77, 80, 132).
Bryan C. Keene completed his PhD at The Courtauld Institute of Art under the supervision of Joanna Cannon with a thesis entitled, Many Voices, Many Hands: Artist Collaboration and Workshop Practices in Fourteenth-Century Illuminated Choir Books from Florence. He is associate curator of manuscripts at The J. Paul Getty Museum where he specializes in Italian manuscript illumination, choir book production and art for the altar, and the global Middle Ages, with a particular focus on the nexus of Afro-Eurasian book culture, portable objects, and materials. He is also an adjunct professor of art history and humanities at Pepperdine University.
Citations
[1] Bryan C. Keene, Many Voices, Many Hands: Artist Collaboration and Workshop Practices in Early Fourteenth-Century Choir Books from Florence (PhD dissertation, The Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, 2018). I dedicate this article to Joanna Cannon, for her unwavering guidance, for always inspiring curiosity, for nurturing critical inquiry, and for patiently reading and commenting on each idea that I committed to paper or spoke aloud in pursuit of my PhD. The list of ideas to pursue post-thesis has grown considerably thanks to her input, and I look forward to being constant collaborators and colleagues. I am also inspired daily by my little family: Mark Mark, Alexander Jaxon, and Éowyn Arya Keene.
[2] The document can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Archivio de’Contratti di Firenze: Rogiti di Ser Lapo Gianni Ricevuti, protocollo dal 1298 al 1328.
[3] The inscription reads: Symon Presbiter sancti Florenti fecit pinghi hoc opus a Pacino Bonaguide anno domini MCCC[??]. The last two digits of the date are heavily repainted and much debated in scholarly literature. See Francesca Pasut, ‘Cat. no. 21: Pacino di Bonaguida, Polyptych with The Crucifixion and Saints Nicholas, Bartholomew, Florentius, and Luke’, in C. Sciacca (ed.), Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300-1350 (Los Angeles: Getty Publications, 2012), 104-107; Keene (2018), 55-59.
[4] For a consideration of Pacino’s work in various media, see Sciacca (2012).
[5] The following are choir book leaves and cuttings attributed to Pacino: Basel, Jörn Günther Antiquariat (Initial R: Saint Helena Adoring the Cross, Initial V: The Ascension (two leaves with the same iconography), Initial S: Pentecost, Initial G: A Pope-Saint Blessing a Crown of Saints, Initial E: The Baptism of Christ, Initial I: Apostles and Saint Stephen); Berlin, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, Min. 1230, Min. 1242; Cambridge, MA, Harvard, Houghton Library MS typ 1004; Compiègne, Musée Antoine Vivenel, inv. B 337; Florence, Carlo Bruscoli (formerly), Initial S: Saint Stephen, Initial M: The Annunciation; Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, No. 33 S, No. 34 S; Geneva, Bibliothèque Publique et Universitaire, Comites Latentes 74; La Spezia, Lia Collection, Initial S: Pentecost; London, The British Library, Add. 32058 f. 3 (a), Add. 32058 f. 3 (b), Add. MS. 35254/A, Add. 32058 f. 4; London, Christie’s (2009, lot 119); London, Collection of Robert McCarthy (Initial G: All Saints); London, Mags Bros LTD, 2001 (Initial D: A Cherub); London, Sotheby’s (3 December 2002, lot 55); London, Vitoria and Albert Museum, Ms. 894 inv. no. 9024.A, Ms. 895 inv. no. 9024.B; Milan, Private Collection, Initial S: Saint Stephen, Initial A: Christ Adored by Isaiah; Milan, Sotheby’s (27 June 2005, lot 94); Paris, Musée du Louvre, Cabinet des dessins, RF 54; Philadelphia, The Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E M 25:33, 48:14; San Francisco, Burke Family Collection, two leaves (see https://exhibits.stanford.edu/burke_mss); Venice, Cini Foundation, inv. 22078, inv. 22079, inv. 22081, inv. 22082, inv. 22083, inv. 22213; Zurich, Köller Auktion (18 September 2015, lot 123). See Keene (2018), 357-375.
[6] For a re-assessment of the Laudario of Sant’Agnese, see Bryan C. Keene, ‘New Discoveries from the Laudario of Sant’Agnese’, Getty Research Institute Journal, 8 (2016), 199-208.
[7] For the illuminated Dante manuscripts, see Francesca Pasut, ‘Codici miniati della Commedia a Firenze attorno al 1330: Questioni attributive e di cronologia’, Rivista di studi Danteschi 6.2 (2006): 379-409; Keene (2018), 384-385.
[8] Keene (2018), 279-385.
[9] Richard Offner, ‘Pacino di Bonaguida, a Contemporary of Giotto’, Art in America, 11 (1922), 3-27.
[10] Richard Offner, ‘The Shop of Pacino di Bonaguida’, in R. Offner (ed.) Studies in Florentine Painting: The Fourteenth Century, (New York: Frederic Fairchild Sherman, 1927), 3-21.
[11] Richard Offner, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting: The Fourteenth Century, Section 3, vol. 2, part 1. Berlin, 1930; Richard Offner, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting: The Fourteenth Century, Section 3, vol. 1, The School of the S. Cecilia Master. New York: New York University, 1931; Richard Offner, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting: The Fourteenth Century, Section 3, vol. 6. New York, 1956.
[12] Miklós Boskovits, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Sect. 3, vol. 9, The Fourteenth Century: The Painters of the Miniaturist Tendency, Florence, 1984; Miklós Boskovits, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Sect. 3, vol. 1, new edition, The Saint Cecilia Master and His Circle, Florence, 1986; Richard Offner, A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Sect. 3, vol. 2, rev. ed. Miklós Boskovits. New York: New York University, 1987.
[13] Boskovits (1987), 10.
[14] Paolo D’Ancona, La miniatura fiorentina (secoli XI-XVI), 2 vols. Florence, 1914; Paolo D’Ancona, La Miniature Italienne du Xe au XVIe siècle. Paris-Brussels, 1925.
[15] Mario Salmi, La miniatura fiorentina gotica. Rome, 1954.
[16] Mirella Levi D’Ancona, Miniatura e miniatori (1962), 217.
[17] Marco Ciatti, ‘Primi ritrovamenti in seguito ad un’indagine sistematica nel distretto di Prato’, in G.V. Schoenburg Waldemburg (ed.), La miniatura in età Romanica e Gotica (Atti del I Congresso di Storia della Miniatura Italiana (Cortona 26-28 maggio 1978) (Florence: L. Olschki, 1979), 443-459.
[18] Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré dal Poggetto, ‘I francescani a Firenze: due antifonari della scuola di Pacino’, Studi Rotili, I (Naples, 1984), 243-249; Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré dal Poggetto, ‘I codici miniati di Santa Croce’, in M. Giuseppe Rosito (ed.), Santa Croce nel solco della storia (Florence, 1996), 77-96.
[19] Angelo Tartuferi, ‘I “Fatti dei Romani” e la miniatura fiorentina del primo trecento’, Paragone, XXXVII, no. 441 (1986): 3.
[20] Giovanna Lazzi, ‘Ancora sulla bottega di Pacino: Un “Messale” Miniato della Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze’, Antichità Viva, XXXIXVII, no. 4 (1994): 8.
[21] Roberto Longhi, ‘Frammenti di Giusto di Padova’, from Pinacotheca, 3 (1928), in Da Cimabue a Morandi: saggi di storia della pittura italiana scelti e ordinate da Gianfranco Contini (Milano: A. Mandadori, 1978), 142.
[22] Federica Toniolo et al., Mindful Hands: I capolavori miniati della Fondazione Giorgio Cini (Milan, 2016),158-159, cat. no. 26, entry by Francesca Pasut;159-160, cat. no. 27, entry by Cristina de Benedictis;160-162, cat. no. 28, entry by Francesca Pasut;162-164, cat. no. 29, entry by Sonia Chiodo;164-165, cat. no. 30, entry by Cristina De Benedictis;165-167, cat. no. 31, entry by Cristina De Benedictis.
[23] Stella Panayotova in personal correspondence with the author (5 February 2013).
[24] See Keene (2018), 88-90. The manuscript was attributed to Lippo di Benivieni by Laurence Kanter in L. Kanter et al., Painting and Illumination in Early Renaissance Florence, 1300-1450 (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1994), 6-7.
[25] Bryan C. Keene and Nancy Turner, ‘The Impruneta Antiphonary: Reframing the Collaborative Process in Works Attributed to Pacino di Bonaguida’ at Revealing the Early Renaissance: Symposium (Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, 23 March 2013).
[26] Boskovits (1984), 48-54; Miklós Boskovits, La pittura fiorentina alla vigilia del rinascimento (Florence: Edam, 1975), 9n14-15.
[27] Yvonne Szafran and Nancy Turner, ‘Techniques of Pacino di Bonaguida’, in C. Sciacca (ed.), Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300-1350 (Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012), 342-343, 350.
[28] Stella Panayotova and Nancy Turner, ‘Fitzwilliam Museum, MS McClean 201.4, The Last Communion of St. Mary Magdalene’, in S. Panayotova and P. Ricciardi (eds), Colour: The Art & Science of Illuminated Manuscripts (Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2016), 282, no. 78.
[29] See Sherwood A. Fehm, Jr., ‘The Collaboration of Niccolò Tegliacci and Luca di Tommè’, J. Paul Getty Museum, Publication No. 5. Malibu: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1973; Alessandro Bagnoli and Luciano Bellosi (eds), Simone Martini e ‘Chompagni’ [exhib. cat.] Florence: Centro Di, 1985; Bruno Zanardi et al., Il cantiere di Giotto: Le storie di San Francesco ad Assisi. Milan: Skira, 1995; Hayden Maginnis, Painting in the Age of Giotto. A Historical Reevaluation. University Park (PA): Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997; Roberto Cassanelli, ed. La bottega dell’artista tra medioevo e rinascimento. Milan: Jaca Book SpA, 1998; Maria Laura Testi Cristiani, ‘Francesco Traini, i “Chompagni” di Simone Martini a Pisa e la Madonna “Linksy,” con Bambino Santi e Storiette, del Metropolitan Museum’, Critica d’Arte: rivista timestrale dell’Università Internazionale dell’Arte di Firenze XXXI (2001): 21-45; Hayden Maginnis, The World of the Early Sienese Painter. University Park (PA): Pennsylvania State University Press, 2001; Bruno Zanardi, ‘Giotto and the St. Francis Cycle at Assisi’, in A. Derbes and M. Sandona (eds), Cambridge Companion to Giotto (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 32-62; Judith Steinhoff, Sienese Painting After the Black Death: Artistic Pluralism, Politics, and the New Art Market. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006; Dominique Thiébaut, ed. Giotto e compagni [exhib. cat.] Paris: Musée du Louvre, 2013; Jonathan J. G. Alexander, ‘Book Illuminators and their Patrons’, in J.J.G. Alexander, The Painted Book in Renaissance Italy, 1450-1600 (New Haven and London, 2016), 177-198.
[30] Hayden Maginnis, ‘The Craftsman’s Genius: Painters, Patrons, and Drawings in Trecento Siena’, in A. Ladis et al., The Craft of Art: Originality and Industry in the Italian Renaissance and Baroque Workshop (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1995), 29; Hayden Maginnis (2001).
[31] For Jean Pucelle and the Montbaston atelier, see Richard and Mary Rouse, Manuscripts and Their Makers (2000), I:264, 391, no. 105; II:108, 204; Kyunghee Pyun and Anna Russakoff (eds) Jean Pucelle: Innovation and Collaboration in Manuscript Painting. Turnhout: Brepols, 2013.
[32] For the division of labor in the Montbaston shop, see Elizabeth Morrison and Anne D. Hedeman (eds), Imagining the Past in France: History in Manuscript Painting, 1250-1500 (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2010), 153-55, no. 18, ill., entry by Elizabeth Morrison, 278, under no. 54, entry by Elizabeth Morrison; 284, under no. 56, entry by Élisabeth Antoine; Alison Stones, Gothic Manuscripts 1260-1320, part 1, vol. 2 (London: Harvey Miller, 2013), 515. For the Morgan Picture Bible, see William Voelkle, ‘Codicological Analysis’, in D. Weiss (edi.), Die Kreuzritterbibel = The Morgan Crusader Bible = La Bibles des Croisades (Luzern: Faksimile Verlag Luzern, 1998), 251-257.
[33] Erling Skaug, Punch Marks from Giotto to Fra Angelico: Attribution, Chronology and Workshop Relationship in Tuscan Panel Painting, with Particular Consideration to Florence 1330-1340, (Oslo: IIC, Nordic Group, 1994), vol. 1, 16-48; Erling Skaug, Giotto and the Flood of Florence in 1333: A Study in Catastrophism, Guild Organisation, and Art Technology (Florence: Giunti, 2013), 41.
[34] Skaug (2013), 20.
[35] Ada Labriola, ‘La miniatura senese degli anni 1270-1330’, in A. Labriola et al., La miniatura senese, 1270-1420 (2002), 11-103, 256-319.
[36] Chiara Balbarini, Miniatura a Pisa nel Trecento: dal Maestro di Eufrasia dei Lanfranchi a Francesco Traini. Pisa, 2003.
[37] Zanardi et al. (1995).
[38] For a biography of each, see Milvia Bollati, ed. Dizionario biografico dei miniatori italiani: secoli IX-XVI. Milan: Edizioni Sylvestre Bonnard, 2004. For the Master of Montepulciano Gradual I-H/2, see Bryan C. Keene, ‘Anonymity and Choir Book Illumination: The Case of the Master of the Antiphonary of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas’, Rivista di storia della miniatura, no. 20 (2016): 76-87; Pia Palladino, ‘Cat. no. 156, Antiphonal cutting’, in J. Hamburger et al., Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections (Boston, 2016), 190-191; Bryan C. Keene, ‘Illuminators from Pistoia and Pisa in Trecento Florence: The Case of Two Antiphonary Commissions’, in H. Flora and S. Wilkins (eds), Art and Experience in Trecento Italy: Proceedings of the Andrew Ladis Trecento Conference (London and Turnhout: Brepols 2018), 279-293; Gaudenz Freuler, The McCarthy Collection: Italian and Byzantine Miniatures (London: Ad Ilissum, 2018), 199-202. Eleonora Mattia discovered a cutting by the artist that should be added to the list of fragments from a two-volume antiphonary: Initial V: Joseph and his Brothers. The Royal Library, kps. 3, 1965 / 186, Copenhagen. Eleonora Mattia, ‘Three Illuminated Cuttings in the Royal Library of Copenhagen: the Master B. F., Attavante and the Master of the Montepulciano Gradual I’, Digitalt saertryk af Fund of Forskning: I det Kongelige Biblioteks Samlinger, 56 (2017): 9-39.
[39] The Maestri dei Corali di Santa Maria Novella were illuminators from Florence, Pistoia, Arezzo, and elsewhere in Tuscany and the Romagna, possibly Imola. The four-volume gradual includes Corale I, n. 1358; Corale K, n. 1359; Corale L, n. 1360; and Corale M, n.1361. The four-volume antiphonary is comprised of Corale A, n. 1350; Corale B, n. 1351; Corale E, n. 1354; and Corale F, n. 1355. See Orlandi, ‘I libri di S. Maria Novella’, Memorie domenicane 83 (1965): 3-61, 73-96; Orlandi, ‘I libri di S. Maria Novella’, Memorie domenicane 82 (1965): 129-145, 193-224; Labriola, ‘L’eredità di Giotto nella miniatura fiorentina’, in L’eredità di Giotto, ed. Angelo Tartuferi (2008), 67-75, 200-207, cat. nos. 49-50, entries by Ada Labriola; Chiodo, ‘Oltre la decorazione’, in A. De Marchi (ed.), Santa Maria Novella (2015), 246-287.
[40] The eight-volume antiphonary is marked Cod. I, M, N, O, P, Q, R, and Y. The additional volumes from c. 1325-33 are labelled Cod. S and L. See Marco Assirelli, ‘Due corali bolognesi e gli antifonari trecenteschi della SS. Annunziata’, in L’ordine dei servi di Maria nel primo secolo di vita, Atti del convegno (Firenze, Palazzo Vecchio- SS. Annunziata, 23-24 maggio 1986) (Florence: Convento della SS. Annunziata, 1988), 294-299; Maria Grazia Ciardi Dupré Dal Poggetto, ‘I libri di coro’, in E. Casalini et al., Tesori d’arte dell’Annunziata di Firenze, exh. cat. (Florence, Basilica della Santissima Annunziata, 31 December 1986- 31 May 1987) (Florence: Fratelli Alinari, 1987), 183-199, 200-227, cat. nos. 18-27, entries by Emanuela Sesti and Marco Assirelli.
[41] Several surviving manuscripts were produced for San Pier Maggiore (or a Benedictine sister house) by the leading artists of the first half of the Trecento. These include a Breviary (Regello, Abbazia di Vallombrosa, Archivio Ms. V, 4) attributed to Pacino; the Regula di San Benedetto (Bergamo, Biblioteca Civica Angelo Mai, Ms. MA 374) attributed to Pacino; a Missal (Cestello, Biblioteca del Seminario Arcivescovile di Firenze, Inv. 325) illuminated by the Master of the Dominican Effigies; and a Missal (Toronto, Royal Ontario Museum, 997.158.147) illuminated by the Maestro del Laudario and Maestro Daddesco. For the group of leaves from the dispersed choir books possibly made for San Pier Maggiore, see Gaudenz Freuler, Italian Miniatures form the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Centuries, vol. II (Milan: Silvana editorial, 2013), 542-572. To the list of leaves, cuttings, and an antiphonary volume compiled by Freuler, I add an additional antiphonary (Princeton University Library, MS. 13), which has been hitherto overlooked from this group and was incorrectly catalogued as ‘Roman Antiphonary, s. XVI and XVII, Italy’. See Don C. Skemer, Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts in the Princeton University Library, vol. II (Princeton University Press, 2013), 172-173.
[42] For a list of these fragments, see Bryan C. Keene, ‘Dyers, Weavers and Illuminators: Evidence from the Florentine Ordinamenti e matricola della Compagnia di Sant’Onofrio (1338)’, in S. Panayotova and P. Riciardi (eds), Manuscripts in the Making: Art and Science I (London: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2017), 75-86.
[43] Maestro Daddesco illuminated at least fifteen choir book volumes, each studied in person by the present author. These include: Florence, Archivio storico dell’Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore (Antiphonary, L.2, n.2; Gradual, M.2, n.1); Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Gradual, Corale 41 (from Empoli); Florence, Museo dell’Ospedale degli Innocenti, Antiphonary, Cod. CXXXIX/1, from the Badia a Settimo; Florence, Museo di San Marco, Antiphonary, Cod. 563, from a Dominican monastery, later Santa Maria Novella; Montepulciano, Museo Civico (Antiphonary, Corale C (formerly H-1); Antiphonary, Corale D; Antiphonary, Corale E (formerly B), all from Santo Stefano al Ponte; Montevarchi, Museo della Collegiata di San Lorenzo (Antiphonary, Corale B; Gradual, Corale C); New Haven, Beinecke Rare Book Room and Manuscript Library, Antiphonary, MS 178; Rome, Church of San Bernardo alle Terme (Gradual, Cod. A; Gradual, Cod. B; Gradual, Cod. C; Gradual, Cod. D, all from the Badia a Settimo). Dozens of leaves and cuttings survive from additional dispersed choral manuscripts also survive. See Keene (2018), 357-375.
[44] The Master of the Dominican Effigies illuminated at least thirteen choir book volumes, each studied in person by the present author. These include Castelfiorentino, Museo della Collegiata di Santa Verdiana (Gradual, Cod. A, inv. 39; Antiphonary, Cod. D, inv. 40; Antiphonary, Cod. E, inv. 41); Antiphonary, Cod. B (lost); all from the Pieve of Sant’Ippolito e Biagio, Castelfiorentino); Florence, Archivio di Santa Maria Novella, Antiphonary, Cod. H Nr. 1357; Florence, Church of Santissima Annunziata, Antiphonary, Cod. I; Florence, Museo dell’Ospedale degli Innocenti, Antiphonary, Cod. CXXXIX/4, from the Badia a Settimo; Florence, Museo di San Marco, Gradual, no. 550, from the Badia Fiorentina; Florence, Museo di San Marco, Gradual, no. 564, from the Church of Santa Maria Novella, Florence; Impruneta, Museo del Tesoro di Santa Maria dell’Impruneta (Antiphonary, Cod. VII, formerly A I, and Antiphonary, Cod. VII, formerly A 5, from the Church of Santa Maria dell’Impruneta); Kraków, Wawel, National Collection, Gradual, No. 1230; Poppi, Biblioteca Rilli Vettori, Castello dei Conti-Guidi, Gradual, Cod. I, from San Fedele a Strumi. Dozens of leaves and cuttings survive from additional dispersed choral manuscripts also survive. See Keene (2018), 357-375.
[45] There has not been a systematic paleographic analysis of the choir books under consideration. The Dante manuscripts have received greater attention, but Francesco di Ser Nardo da Barberino (1264-1348) is the only documented scribe associated with Divina commedia manuscripts. See Marisa Boschi Rotiroti, Codicologia trecentesca della ‘Commedia’: Entro e oltre l’antica volgare. Rome: Viella, 2004; Gabriella Pomaro, ‘Ricerche d’archivio per il ‘copista di Parm’ e la mano principale del Cento (in margine ai ‘Frammenti di un discorso dantesco’)’, in P. Trovato (ed.), Nuove prospettive sulla tradizione della “Commedia”: Una guida filologico-linguistica al poema dantesco (Florence: F. Cesati, 2007), 243-278.