Getty Museum

Canon Table Page

Date

1256

Medium

Tempera and gold paint

Culture

Armenian

Department

Manuscripts

Institution

Getty Museum

All the pages of the canon tables from the Armenian Zeyt'un Gospels employ a similar architectural structure to house the concordance of the Gospels. The illuminator T'oros Roslin also consistently used small-scale jewelry-work motifs, here the four-part flowers, zigzags, and enamel-like shading that fills in the attic supported by the columns. To the sides of the architectural framework, scrollwork rises from horns of plenty. The upper ones in particular recall the balanced spiraling vines seen in western European Gothic illuminations. The appearance of a western motif such as scrollwork provides evidence of the complexity and richness of resources available to Roslin. The artist's treatment of the columns and capitals here is different from those on other pages. The mazelike patterning on the columns and the looseness of the handling of the leaves on the capitals denies the structural stability of the architectural supports.

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