Decorated Initial P

From the Getty Museum record

This leaf contains Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans (the title of which is clearly legible at the top of the page in capital letters: *Epistola ad Romanos*) that is a part of the New Testament. The large *P*, which begins the phrase *Paulus servus Jesu Christi* (“Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ”) spans several lines of text and features geometric and botanic designs reminiscent of those seen in metalwork and textiles of the same era. Based on the clear hierarchy of decoration, it is evident that legibility and organization were paramount in Carolingian graphic design: the capital letters that denote the beginning (*incipit*) and title of the text are followed by a decorated initial that leads into the text’s first few lines (also capitalized), which in turn lead to a smaller but no less readable text known as Carolingian miniscule. From there, different parts of the text are indicated by red letters and notes in the margins. This page is also notable for an addition made in the lower margin by a later reader in a markedly different hand. Written in Gothic script, the addition allows for a one-to-one comparison of scripts used at different points in the medieval period. This reader-turned-scribbler added the hymn *Surgamus ergo strenue* (“Let us therefore arise energetically”).