End 31.12.1941
Properties
| ID | 132959 |
|---|---|
| System Class | |
| Artifact | Manuscript |
| Case Study | Beyond East and West: Sacred Landscapes Duklja and Raška |
| Stylistic Classification | Latin-Byzantine Combination |
Description
The Prizren Gospel, written on parchment, in the Serbian recension of Old Church Slavonic, was most probably created in the last decades of the 13th century. It was purchased from Hadji Jordan from Skopje around 1880, in the village of Bitinja in the Sirinić area, in the then district of the town of Prizren, after which it was named. It was kept under the number 297 in the former National Library in Belgrade. Unfortunately, the manuscript was destroyed on April 6th 1941 during the German bombing of Belgrade. However, the manuscript can be studied based on black and white photographs and descriptions of previous researchers.
Within the codex were 36 miniatures, mostly located on the margins of the text. Their contours were made with black ink, with a thick pen or brush, and was partially painted with a reduced palette - light blue, red, ocher yellow and warm brown.
Figural representations were indirectly related to the text next to which they were painted. Among the miniatures were author's portraits of the evangelists (Matthew and Mark), various New Testament themes and figures, images of saints, etc. They were unskillfully executed and unusually iconographically resolved. The researchers recognized in them the influences of the Christian Orient, primarily works of Coptic art.