Psaltiki Journal 04

Psaltiki: the online journal
Volume 4 (2012)
www.psaltiki.org/journal/
INSIDE
Psalmody and the Desert Fathers
john wortley | Psalmody
The Princess and Her Book: the

iconography, history and linguistics
of Urics tetraevangheliar (ad
1429). Oxford, Bodleian Library Ms.
Canonici Graeca 122
elena draghici-vasilescu | Byzantine Liturgical
Manuscripts
Mystagogy: Ecclesiastical History &

Mystical Contemplation
germanus constantinopolitanus | Liturgy
It is well that we are here:

transfigurations and realizations
on the Holy Mountain
john e afendoulis | Pascha on Mount Athos
w w w . p s a l t i k i . o r g
Superb Digital & CD Releases from Psaltiki, Inc

Hagios: The Byzantine Liturgy
Inspiring Chants of the Divine Liturgy of St Basil
the Great from XIIIth- through XVth-century
Byzantine composers
Paraklesis: Hymns of Supplication

The Small and Great Canons of Supplication to
the Mother of God in Greek and English
Available at www.psaltiki.org
Psaltiki, Inc a nonprofit dedicated to Byzantine Chant
Listen to sample tracks!
www.soundcloud.com/psaltiki/
Tweet us!
twitter.com/psaltiki/
Like us!
facebook.com/psaltiki/
T H E P S A LT I K I J O U R N A L
V O LU M E 4 ( 2 0 1 2 )
Palia Chora, Aegina
Cover
Hagia Kyriake, Palaia
Chora,
,
Psaltiki, Inc.
psaltikiMission
Dedicated to the Byzantine
Chant heritage.
Contributors
John Wortley
Psalmody and the

Desert Fathers
Devout psalmody in the
monastic desert and the
Apophthegmata Patrum
Germanus
Constantinopolitanus Patriarcha
(VIIIth Century)
Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)
Mystagogy
Ecclesiastical History and
Mystical Contemplation
John E. Afendoulis
It is well that
we are here:
Transfigurations
and Realizations on
the Holy Mountain
A Psaltiki Pascha on Mount

Athos Award Recipient
Elena Ene D-Vasilescu
The Princess and

Her Book
The Iconography, History,
and Linguistics of Urics
Tetraevangel, ad 1429:
Bodleian Library Ms.
Canon. Gr. 122
Psaltiki: The Online Journal Editor: Rev. Dr. Konstantinos Terzopoulos, email: frc@psaltiki.org; Editorial Assistant:
Thomas Carrol. Mailing Address: P.O. Box 149161, Orlando, FL 32814. Psaltiki, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in
the State of Florida dedicated to the advancement of the Psaltic Art in America and its study around the world.
Copyright Statement: All content of this publication (including but not limited to all documents, programs, and images
on this page and related pages of the Psaltiki Web Site, www.psaltiki.org) is protected by U.S. and international copyright
law under one or more of the following copyrights, or other copyrights to content of particular pages of this site.
ISSN 1946-7532. Copyright 2008 Psaltiki, Inc. and the Authors. Email: psaltiki@psaltiki.org
All Rights Reserved. The copyright holders provide the content online as reference material for educational or cultural
purposes. The content is provided as is without any warranty whatsoever. Commercial use of the content is prohibited
except by express, written license.
For submission requests, contributors should supply three copies of their transcript. All transcripts should be double
spaced with generous margins. Footnotes and indented quotations should also be double spaced. Electronic submissions
should be in the .rtf format with an accompanying .pdf. The editors will consider all typescripts as quickly as possible.
All musical examples, tables, images and diagrams should be written on separate sheets and identified by captions. For
general matters of style and spelling contributors should consult the mla Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing,
3rd ed. by the Modern Language Association. Upon acceptance for publication, Psaltiki will request a short biography
of the author, as well as any contact information that the contributor wishes to be included with the article. The Journal
requires contributors to obtain clearance for any copyright materials reproduced in their articles. The fact that the Journal
appears primarily online, with a downloadable print version may further complicate the issue. When in doubt seek advice.
All accepted articles will be archived within the Psaltiki site in their .html and .pdf forms. Articles must be submitted in
English, although they can also be simultaneously posted in Greek, German or Russian versions supplied by the author.
PSALTIKIMISSION
Perpetuating the Psaltic Heritage
saltiki, Inc. is a non-profit organization promoting the advancement and perpetuation

of the Psaltic Art, better known as Byzantine and post-Byzantine chant and
Hymnology.
Psaltiki supports the chant heritage and tradition through the creative initiating
of educational projects, the development of various multimedia, online resources,
publications, recordings, as well as financial gifts in support of worthy projects, individual
scholars, researchers and musicians engaged in exemplary activities and endeavors related
to Psaltikis purpose.
, ,
,
, .
Just as we make known and signify the thoughts of the soul through the words we express, so too the
Lord wished the melody of the words to be a sign of the spiritual harmony of the soul, and ordained
that the canticles be sung with melody and the psalms be read with the canticles.
Saint Athanasius the Great (ad 296-373), Letter to Marcellunus.
New Superb Digital & CD releases from the Psaltiki Ministry of

Chant!
hagios: the byzantine liturgy
paraklesis: hymns of supplication
n August of 2012, with great pleasure the Psaltiki Ministry of Chant released two recordings of both
ancient and practical chants. Both recordings are available as digital downloads or Compact Disc from
a number of points, including Amazon and iTunes.
hagios: the byzantine liturgy presents hymns for the Liturgy of Saint Basil
the Great as preserved by Chourmouzios Chartophylax and his exegeses as found in
the Constantinople-Athens manuscripts of the Holy Sepulchre ( 704 and 705)
completed in the year 1829. Included are compositions attributed to Byzantine composers
and melodoi Xenos Korones, Joannes Koukouzeles, Joannes Damascenus, Joannes Glykys
and Joannes Kladas, many of which are recorded here for the first time!
The production of Hagios: The Byzantine Liturgy CD was sponsored in memory of Dr
Robert (Charalambos) H Terss (1926 - 2007) by his loving wife of 52 years, Eugenia.
Psaltiki, Inc. is grateful for her support; may his memory be eternal!
Playlist:
1. Trisagion Mode II, Melos archaion
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Dynamis Mode II, Xenos (Xenophon) Korones (floruit circa 1325-50)

Allelouiarion Mode I Plagal, Joannes Koukouzeles Papadopoulos (floruit circa 1300-50)
Cherubikon Mode II Plagal, Joannes Damascenus (circa 650-circa 750)
Hagios (Sanctus) Mode II, Joannes Glykys (floruit late 13th century)
Amen Mode II, Joannes Glykys
Amen Mode II, Joannes Glykys
Se hymnoumen (We praise thee) Mode II, Joannes Glykys
Aineite (Praise the Lord from the heavensPsalm 148) Mode I Tetraphonos, Joannes Kladas
(floruit circa 1400)
paraklesis: hymns of supplication presents interpretations of the Small and
Great Canons of Supplication to the Mother of God in both Greek and English. The
Greek versions were chanted from the Anastasimatarion of Konstantinos Byzantios
(Constantinople 1863). The text for the canons in English were taken from the translation
by the Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Boston MA. According to their melos the Great
Canon was musically adapted and arranged by P Elgohary and the Small Canon by K
Terzopoulos.
The production of the Paraklesis: Hymns of Supplication CD was living sponsored by
Anastasia Chehak of Oklahoma City (of Anastasia Pure Skin Therapy, amlab.com)
in memory of her great-grandfather, Nikolaos G Louizos (1851 - December 29, 1923),
mousikodidaskalos and Protopsaltis of Karlovassi on the Island of Samos.
Psaltiki, Inc. is grateful for her generousity and support!
www.psaltiki.org/cd/
2013 Psaltiki Holy Week on Mount Athos Award Announced
he Rev. Deacon John Efthymios Afendoulis was the recipient for the 2011
Psaltiki Holy Week on Mount Athos Award. You can read his reflections on that
Psaltic Pilgrimage in this issue of the Psaltiki Online Journal, It is well that we are
here: transfigurations and realizations on the Holy Mountain. We are now also
pleased to announce the commencement of the 2013 competition!
This round of competition is sponored by the Helen Petriti-Stratigos Memorial Fund.
The Right Reverend Abott Alexios and the fathers at Xenophontos will once again be hosting the winner!
www.psaltiki.org/athos/
www.psaltiki.org/stratigos/
Mission
saltiki is dedicated to education, empowering, and connecting the next generation

of chanters in America. We are dedicated to enriching and informing the present
environment of psaltic culture in America in order to enhance and cultivate a spirit of
excellence worthy of this great musical inheritance and the spiritual benefits it provides
via the Orthodox liturgical life, the arts and beyond.
All projects are geared toward the advancement of the Psaltic Art, its application,
appreciation, preservation and perpetuation by focusing on at least one of the following core areas:
1. Education,
2. Visibility, and
3. Psaltic Community.
Established in the year 2007 and receiving 501(c)(3) classification in 2008, Psaltiki, Inc. is presently in its
plenary first phase. In this phase the organization looks toward foundational development and strategic
planning. Psaltiki is studying the prospects of providing educational services by utilizing the electronic
mediums available today.
Today, Byzantine chant is a rapidly vanishing sacred art form in America. Unfortunately, past generations
of chanters have not left behind a new generation of pupils. For various reasons, the Church has not
developed a formal educational system to ensure the continuation of our Byzantine chant heritage. Partial,
inadequate, piece-meal solutions have not resulted in the needed creation of a sustainable educational
plan that could be fruitful in supplying the Church with a continuous, renewable source of personnel to
carry on this all-important ministry and great spiritual heritage.
It is not that the talent and desire do not exist. Whenever people of musical aptitude are exposed to
Byzantine chant, they are often fascinated and desire to explore. The aural tie with our ancient Christian
roots and this uniquely Orthodox art form is spiritually uplifting and inspirational. Unfortunately,
teachers are nowhere to be found. In our seminaries instruction is aimed toward the practical,
unspecialized needs of preparing the clergy, who are not necessarily musically inclined. Due to financial,
linguistic, and geographic obstacles, schools of chant do not exist in America and have not been integral
to the American Orthodox experience.
Self-help resources abounding on the Web usually assume a certain level of familiarity and knowledge
of the chant tradition and are not designed to produce chanters or provide a complete educational
experience. Past attempts to transpose the chant corpus into Western Notation have often either
over-simplified or distorted the melodies to the point where they are unrecognizable, awkward and
un-inspired, failing to bring about the desired results. In short, no viable means exists to successfully
introduce and train chanters and readers to serve the liturgical needs of the Church.
At Psaltiki we believe it is time to re-order and re-imagine how one can learn this rich Orthodox liturgical
heritage. In harmony with the Book of Psalms of the Prophet-King David, the hymnographic and chant
heritage of the Orthodox Church stands at the very center of its spiritual and liturgical life. The Church
has always lived in a mystic link between earth and heaven using the Divine Services to raise the faithful
to the eternal reality of the heavenly Church triumphant. Her divine poetry and chant are important
partners in this process of anagogyraising the hearts of the faithful to the Lord. Along with the beauty
of the Churchs architecture, the oil lamps burning before the holy Icons, the vestments, readings and the
scent of incense, the words of the divine hymnslogosand melodies of the sacred chantsmelos
point the faithful to the eternal reality which the earthly eye has not seen, nor ear heard (Isaiah 64.4; 1
Corinthians 2.9).
The story of our Orthodox hymnography is one at the heart of our liturgical life, one richer and more
surprising than we have been told. Beginning with the earliest known Christian hymn written with
ancient Greek Hypolydian musical notation in a late third century papyrus fragment (Oxyrhynchus
No. 1786), Orthodox chant notation continues to develop its unique forms. Soon after the Iconoclastic
period in the eighth century, new forms of Byzantine chant notation emerged with the compilation of
the Oktoechos hymnbook of Eight Modes by Saint John of Damascus. The musical tradition continued
to grow, providing the Church with master composers hundreds of years before the Classical musical
tradition even began in the West, including such notable figures as Romanos Melodus, Xenos Korones,
Joannes Glykys, Joannes Koukouzeles, and others. The chant tradition was passed down through the
centuries in the Church, both East and West (although it would take a different course in the West).
Through the work of the Three Teachers, Gregorios, Chourmouzios and Chrysanthos, in 1814 the
tradition finally reached its present notational form, commonly referred to as the New Method.
For many Orthodox Christians in America, basic questions concerning the venerable art of Byzantine
liturgical chant abound: What is Byzantine chant, and where does it come from? What purpose does it
serve, and how did it take on its present form, style, and unique sound? How can I learn when I have no
teacher? While interest is on the rise, resources to learn this ancient art form and assure its continuation
in America are inadequate. Psaltiki is dedicated to these needs.
Psaltiki relies on volunteers and donations of money, materials and services to create and conduct its
projects.
We look forward to your participation!
www.psaltiki.org
CONTRIBUTORS
JOHN WORTLEY (Psalmody and the Desert Fathers) was born and
educated in Britain where he studied under Joan Hussey and Cyril
Mango. Appointed Professor of Medieval History at the University
of Manitoba in 1969, he developed a program of Byzantine studies
there until his retirement in 2002, since when (as professor emeritus)
he continues to research and publish, latterly concentrating on the
Apophthegmata Patrum. His pioneering work on the role of relics in
Byzantine society can now be conveniently consulted in Studies on the
Cult of Relics in Byzantium up to 1204 (Ashgate-Variorum 2009). A
priest of the Anglican Church since 1960 he continues to practice in an
assistant capacity.
ELENA ENE D-VASILESCU (The Princess and her Book: the iconography, history and linguistics
of Urics tetraevangheliar (ad 1429). Oxford, Bodleian Library Ms. Canonici Greaci 122) is a Tutor
in Theology and Religion and a Post-Doctoral Researcher in Byzantine iconography, University of
Oxford. Her project at the History Faculty focuses on Aspects of art circulation along Via Egnatia
in the Middle Ages and is funded by the British Academy for the period 2011-2013. Her research,
teaching, and publications are centered on Byzantine texts (Patristics) and post-Byzantine icons.
They also focus on the connection between liturgical art and text and on Byzantine and Eastern
Christian monasticism and spirituality.
JOHN E AFENDOULIS (It is well that we are here: transfigurations and realizations on the Holy
Mountain) is the parish priest at St John the Baptist Church, Salinas, California and submits these
reflections on his Holy Week pilgrimage to Mount Athos as the 2011 recipient of the Psaltiki
Holy Week on Mount Athos Award.
PSALMODY AND THE

DESERT FATHERS
BY J O H N W O R T L E Y
10
hile the early

Christian monks
withdrew further and further
into the desert wastes of
what is now Egypt then
of Syria-Palestine, there
is no reason to imagine
that they withdrew into
profound silence. Apart
from the natural sounds
of the wind and the wild
animals that made the desert such a dangerous place
(to say nothing of the bandits and the tribesmen who
occasionally harassed the monks) there would often
be the sound of human voices. It is unlikely that these
would be singing the (apparently) ribald songs that
invaded the ears of a pious greengrocer living in a city:
Now, just as they were going to eat, the elder heard
some people singing songs on the road [
,] for the
greengrocers cell was in a notorious place. Brother,
the elder said to him, since you so wish to lead a
godly life, how do you stay in this place? Are you not
disturbed now when you hear them singing these
songs? [ ;]
I tell you, abba, said the man; I have never been
troubled or scandalized. On hearing this, the elder
said: Well, what are you thinking in your heart when
you hear these [songs]? and he said: [I am thinking]
that they are certainly going off to the Kingdom. N 67 1
But even in the desert there could be similar distractions:

Some brothers visiting a holy elder living in a desert
place found some children outside his monastery
minding [animals] and making inappropriate
remarks [ .] After they had
revealed their logismoi to him and benefited from
his knowledge, they said to him: Abba, how do you
tolerate these children and do not tell them not to
be boisterous? The elder said: There are indeed
some days when I would like to tell them [that] but
I rebuke myself, saying: If I do not stand this little
[disturbance], how am I to withstand severe temptation
if it is unleashed upon me? For that reason I say
nothing to them so I may be nourished in order to bear
1
References to the Apophthegmata are in the form of:
name + number and ref. to PG 65 for APalph; by the letter N+
number to APanon; of which Franois-Nicolas Nau published
items 1-400 in his Histoires des solitaires gyptiens (ms. Coislin
126, fols. 158 256) in ROC 12 (1907) 18 (1913) with a partial
French translation and there is a complete French translation of
the series without the Greek text by Dom Lucien Regnault, of
blessed memory, Les sentences des Pres du dsert: srie des anonymes (Solesmes-Bellefontaine 1985); by chapter and item [XX.YY]
to Guys edition of APsys.
the things that come upon me. N 338, 16.23
The monks themselves were by no means silent.

When they assembled and met together for worship,
they sang aloud (not sotto voce.) It was an imposition
when illness made it impossible for one to do so [ , Synkletika 8, 424CD, 7.24.] for they
believed their singing was the earthly representation of
the singing in heaven. An anchorite said:
Every day I behold the assembly of the spiritual forces
with the Lord of Glory in the midst of them, outshining
them all. When I become discouraged, I ascend to
heaven and contemplate the wondrous beauty of the
angels, the hymns that they unceasingly offer up to
God and their melodies. Then am I buoyed up by
the sounds, their voices and their tune, so that I have
a conception of that which is written: The heavens
declare the glory of God (Ps 18.2) and I count
everything on earth as ashes and rubbish. (cf. Phil 3.8)
[ 2

. ,

3
, ,

,

.] N 487
It was once revealed to Abba Antony in the desert:

There is somebody in the city like you, a physician
by profession, who provides those in need with his
superfluous income and is singing the trisagion with
the angels of God all day long. Antony 24, 84B, 18.1
A woman who has turned a monk away from sinning sends him back To hear the choir of those holy
ones singing [
] N 52 while another monk is urged to
glorify God and offer up hymns to him, in fulfilment
of the saying: Whether you eat or drink or whatsoever
you do, do all to the glory of God [1 Cor 10.31] N 85,
18.42. Another brother was instructed:
When you rise from your sleep your mouth will
immediately glorify God with its first words, breaking
out in hymn and psalms. For whatever the mind
encounters first thing, it grinds it like a mill all the day
long, whether it be wheat or tares. So always be the first
to throw in wheat before your enemy injects tares.
[

.
,
2 ] S Cod. Sina gr. 448
3
] om Cod. Paris Coislin 126
11

Byzantine composers

Tweet us!
Like us!
12
, .
, .]
N. 592/43
There was singing at funerals [

] N 618
and probably at many other times, for an unnamed
abba said:
If we do not pay attention also to God, we wander into
pathless [wastes] but if we constantly pay attention,
we sing to him unending hymns of thanksgiving
[
] and of the indescribable wonders of God
achieved on our behalf, so that we might also accede to
the benefits of eternity. 11.51
By hymns the writer means psalms, for the psalms

were so central to the life of monks that they coined
a word, , that is still in use: Psalmody:
the action, practice or art of singing psalms [OED].
There were psalms specified to be sung at the hours of
worship [ 18.48, lines 34-35]
twelve at night and the same number again at dawn
( , N 211 7.52). Macarius the Great said: The
soul ought to gather her own considerations together
in psalm-singing with sorrow for sin (,
compunction) 11.49 for psalm-singing is highly beneficial, e.g. against accidie (It is necessary to scare this
spirit [of accidie] away, especially by prayer and psalmAbbreviations used:
APalph Apophthegmata alphabetica Jean-Baptiste Cotelier (ed.), PG 65
APanon Apophthegmata anonyma, John Wortley (ed.,
trans.), Sayings of the Elders (Cambridge University
Press), forthcoming
APsys
Apophthegmata systematica Guy, Jean-
Claude (ed.), Les Apophtegmes des Pres, collection systmatique (Paris 1993, 2003, 2004), 3 Vols.;
Sources Chrtiennes 387, 474 and 498
GRBS Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies
OED
Oxford English Dictionary (begun 1879)
PG Migne, J.-P. (ed.), Patrologia Graeco-Latina, 161 vols.

(Paris 1857-66)
ROC
Revue de lorient chrtien
singing.10.102 Synkletike S 10, Guy p.35;) against

wrath (
Evagrius, Pract. 15, 10.25;) in repentance (a
penitent monk has many advantages: meditation,
psalm-singing and manual labor these are the foundations, APanon N 168 5.22) and for burning demons,
N 36 12.19. When a brother asked one of the fathers:
What is life? he got this answer: A truthful mouth,
a holy body, a pure heart, thoughts that do not wander
off to the world, psalm-singing with sorrow for sin,
living in hesychia and having nothing in mind other
than the expectation of the Lord.1.35
It is possible however that there were those who
were less than enthusiastic about psalm-singing, for
the great Evagrius also said: It is a great thing to pray
without distraction, but yet greater to sing without distraction too [ ]
Evagrius 3 173D 11.17 and Isaiah of Scete has this to say:
Do not look down on the Psalms for they expel the
unclean spirits from the soul and install the Holy
Spirit. Remember David when he sang to the harp, how
he pacified Saul from the unclean spirit. [1 Sam 16.23]
And Elisha too, who (when the people suffered severe
thirst while they were fighting with the sons of Moab)
said: Bring me somebody who knows how to sing
to [] the harp. While he was singing, Elisha
prayed: there came water and the people drank. [2 Kgs
15:13] 11. 33
It is clear from the above that it is not enough merely to sing with the voice. One should sing with sorrow
for sin and without distraction and, as the Psalmist
himself insists (cf. Ps 46.8 ) one must
sing with understanding ( 11.50
& 11.87). This however does not appear to have been a
universal conviction, for we read of a brother who
said to [an unnamed father]: Look, abba, I meditate
but there is no grief for sin in my heart for I do not
know what the phrase [I am repeating] means. [The
elder] said to him: Just meditate. I heard that Abba
Poemen and many of the fathers uttered this saying:
The snake-charmer does not know the force [dynamis]
of the words he speaks but the beast hears and knows:
it is rendered obedient and subservient. That is how it
is with us; even if we do not know the force [dynamis]
of the words we are saying, yet the demons hear and
retreat in fear. N. 184 / 5.37
little light is shed on how the psalms were sung

in a tale of Macarius the Great (the Egyptian) visiting two foreigners who came to live at Scete. When he
arose from sleep:
The older one merely said this to me: Do you want
us to offer the twelve psalms? Yes, I said and the
younger one sang five psalms, six verses at a time with
13
an allelujah [
]. With each verse [ ] a lamp
of fire came out of his mouth and went up into the
heavens. Likewise the older one too, when he opened
his mouth to sing, something like a rope of fire came
out, stretching up to heaven. Macarius 33 273D-277B,
20.3
It is difficult to be sure what exactly this means

about the way the psalms were sung, but it leaves one
in no doubt of the great value that was set on devout
psalm-singing.
We may not however greatly err in supposing that
the singing- (as opposed to the speaking-) voice was
used more widely than we have suggested so far. Following Dom Lucien Regnault, I have demonstrated
elsewhere that, for the Desert Fathers, to meditate
[] meant to recite and to recite audibly (unless secret meditation is specified)4 a text that had been
memorised. The text might be anything from a single
verse over and over again to one or more entire books
of the Bible,5 of which the most frequent would be the
Psalter. Constrain yourself to the melet of the psalms
for this protects you from being captured by the enemy says Isaiah of Scete.6 And melet, like psalmody,
may very well have meant recitation in a singing voice
(cantilena.) This is never expressly stated, but it seems
to be implied by a saying attributed to Abba Hyperechios: Let there be a spiritual song [Ep. 5.19] in your
mouth and let melet assuage the force of the temptations you encounter. A good example of this is a
heavy-laden traveller who dissipates the discomfort of
his journey with a song [asmati].7
So it may be safe to conclude that between the communal synaxis, his private worship and the monks
melet he would be using his singing voice a great deal
of the time. Now such is human nature that, wherever
there is singing, there will almost certainly be a tendency to elaborate and decorate the tunes in various
ways. A simple drone will be inflected, a monotonous chant be developed into a melody and a musical
tradition will evolve. But it is also human nature for
some to resist change. Evidence of such a resistance
among the early monastic community certainly exists,
4
H krypt melet, N 127, 5.29, cf 10.93, line 7 and N 567,
18.19 but especially Eulogius the Priest 169C-172A, 8.4.
5
How the Desert Fathers meditated, GRBS 46 (2006)
315-328.
6
Isaiah 9 / 5.53; cf Once I saw a brother doing melet in
his cell when a demon came and stood outside the cell. As long as
the brother continued his melet he was unable to enter but once
the brother desisted, in he went N 366, 18.38.
7
Hyperechios 7.27.
although how early it is difficult to say. The series of

apophthegms of the Desert Fathers known as Anonymous [APanon] was probably constituted (together
with the Alphabetic series, [APalph] to which it is an
appendix) shortly before AD500 but there is every
reason to suspect that subsequent scribes added other
material from time to time. The earliest complete
manuscripts we possess are no older than the end of
the tenth century. Their later pages contain some items
that clearly post-date the fall of Jerusalem in 614 and
not a few others that give rise to suspicion that they
may be even later.
Already among the earlier material of APanon there
is A passage from Gregory the Theologian on humility (it is in fact a piece by Basil of Caesarea) that
includes this:
Let your deportment, your clothing, your walking,
your down-sitting and your uprising, (cf. Ps 138.2)
your food, your way of life, the preparation of your
bed; your house and all the furnishings of your
house, be fashioned in a simple manner, likewise
your psalm, your hymn and your good behaviour
towards your neighbour [
]. Let these all be simple rather
than ostentatious. Let there be no boasting in clever
language, no excessively sweet sounds in the singing
[ ,] no highflown, no weighty conversations8
This plea for simplicity in singing is more than

echoed in a piece attributed to Abba Silvanus. Now
there was a very distinguished Abba Silvanus of whom
twelve sayings are included in APalph. A contempory
of Sisoes, he had at least as many disciples, some of
whose names are known. He was a Palestinian who
lived first at Scete then moved to Sinai ca 380 and
finally settled near Gaza. It is said that, in common
with Sisoes and Pambo, his face shone like Moses
[Silvanus 12, Pambo 12]. He was a fine counsellor of
the perplexed (N 217, 408, 557). But of the twelve narratives of his deeds and words given under his name in
APalph (408C-412C) and others in APanon (N 490/2,
N 557) none contains anything resembling what he
is made to say in the passage about to be considered.
The suspicion must therefore remain either that this is
some other Silvanus or that the author of this tale has
borrowed the name of Silvanus to confer on what he
has to say the authority of one of the original Desert
Fathers. This is an abbreviated version of what Silvanus is made to say:
34.
A brother questioned Abba Silvanus: What am I

8
N 486, cf Basil of Caesarea, De humilitate, PG 31:537,14-
14
to do, abba? How am I to acquire sorrow for sin

[]? I am severely afflicted by accidie, by sleep
and by lethargy. When I rise from sleeping I make very
heavy weather of the psalm singing. I cannot shake of
my languor, nor can I recite a psalm without a tune
[ ]. The elder replied:
My child, in the first place, to recite the psalms with
a tune [ ] smacks
of pride, for it puts you in mind that you are singing
while your brother is not. Secondly, it hardens your
heart, insulating it against sorrow for sin. So if you
want to acquire sorrow for sin, leave singing aside
[ ]. When you are standing in prayer, let
your mind study the meaning of the verse. Consider
that you are standing in the presence of the God who
searches the very heart and reins (Ps 7.10) [] Think
of the great fathers, how simple they were; they knew
neither tunes and tropes [
] except for a few psalms, and they were
brilliant luminaries in the world [] They even raised
the dead and performed mighty works, not with
singing and troping and tunes [
] but in prayer, with a broken and
contrite heart and with fasting. [] As for singing, it
has brought many down to the lowest most parts of
the earth; not only people in the world but priests
too; it entrenched them in porneia and many passions.
Singing is for worldlings, my son [

. , ,
]; that is why people congregate in churches. Just
think how many ranks [of angels] there are in heaven,
my boy, and it is not written of them that they sing with
the eight tones [
] but that one rank unceasingly
sings: Alleluia, another rank: Holy, holy, holy Lord
of Sabaoth, another rank: Blessed be the glory of the
Lord from this place and from his house. So do you,
my son, love the humility of Christ and watch over
yourself, keeping watch over your mind at the time of
prayer and, wherever you go, do not display yourself as
one of ready wit and a teacher but be humble and God
will grant you with sorrow for sin. N 7269
In spite of the considerations mentioned above,

Derwas Chitty10 accepted this passage as a genuine
memory of Silvanus and as an interesting piece of evidence of growing tensions between Egyptian and Syria-Palestinian monachism. There appears to have been
a gentle migration of monks from west to east, more
especially after the first devastation of Scete by the Mazices in 407-408. The Egyptian deserts appear to have
been infested with brigands who did not hesitate to
pillage monasteries when the occasion arose, whereas
9
Cod. Sina 448, 321vb-322ra PE 2.11.5.3 (olim 2.11.7); J726
in Lucien Regnault (trans.,) Les sentences des pres du dsert, srie
des anonymes, Solesmes-Bellefontaine 1985, p. 307.
10
Derwas J. Chitty, The Desert a City, Oxford 1966, 71-73.
Jerusalem had been constituted the Christian capital of the Empire by Constantine and had since been
found to possess the Holy Sepulchre and the most holy
of relics, the Wood of the True Cross. A remarkable
number of monasteries sprang up in the adjacent Judaean desert and, remarkable quickly, developed their
own way of life distinct from the traditions of Egypt.
Writing between 425 and 435 John Cassian compared
and contrasted the two.11
For among them (viz., the Egyptians) these offices
which we are taught to render to the Lord at separate
hours and at intervals of time, with a reminder from
the convener, are celebrated continuously throughout
the whole day, with the addition of work, and that of
their own free will. For manual labour is incessantly
practised by them in their cells in such a way that
meditation on the Psalms and the rest of the Scriptures
is never entirely omitted. And as with it at every
moment they mingle suffrages and prayers, they spend
the whole day in those offices which we celebrate at
fixed times. [] For that which is continuously offered
is more than what is rendered at intervals of time; and
11
One has to be cautious: what John says depends on his
memory of experiences at least thirty years earlier.
15
The reader may wish to consult the

following titles for further reading:
John goes on to say that in the East things have
Fryshov, Stig Simeon Ragnvald, La rtibecome much more formal and regulated, for instance
cence lhymnographie chex des anachothe services of Tierce, Sext, and None are ended with
rtes de lEgypte et du Sina du 6e au 8e
only three Psalms and prayers each Inst 3.3, tit., implysicles, in LHymnographie: Confrences
ing that prayer is concentrated at those hours rather
than continuous throughout the day. This was quite
Saint-Serge, XLVIe Semaine dtudes
different from the life of the earliest monks who may
Liturgiques (Roma 2000), 229-245; downwell have prayed without ceasing to the extent that
loadable as a PDF at http://mzh.mrezha.
they made no distinction between hours of prayer
ru/lib/froyshov/fhv2000a.pdf.
and other times. Thus Abba Isidore, a first-generation
Quasten, Johannes, Music and Worship in
monk and priest at Scete: For my part, when I was
Pagan and Christian Antiquity (Washingyounger and staying in my cell, I had no [time] limits for synaxis [ ] for both
ton D.C. 1983), Chapter 4, Unit 9.
more acceptable as a free gift than the duties which are
performed by the compulsion of a rule [] Inst. 3.2
night and day were synaxis.12 Abba Epiphanius (who

became Bishop of Salamina in Cyprus in 367) reproved the higoumen of a monastery he had founded
in Palestine saying: You are clearly deficient in prayer
at the other hours of the day, for the true monk most
unceasingly [] have prayer and psalmody
in his heart. Epiphanius 3 164BC 12.6 The higoumen
had reported the faithful observance of the third, sixth
and ninth hours of prayer by his monks. But Epiphanius had received his monastic formation from Abba
Hilarion and others of the Egyptian tradition, hence
his response: the monk must pray without ceasing
[, uninterruptedly], as Paul said to the
people of Thessaly.13
Thus the tendency in Palestine seems to have been
for prayer to be concentrated at certain times and
for this to be common prayer, in which case it is not
difficult to imagine how the psalmody of which that
common prayer chiefly consisted would become
increasingly sophisticated and possibly (for some) an
end in itself rather than a means to the greater glory
of God. But while Silvanus obviously disapproves of
this musical florescence, his main complaint is that the
young person he is addressing appears to think that
one cannot pray without music, sous-entendu cannot
pray other than at the times of common prayer (synaxis). One has to remember the young persons original
question: How can he acquire sorrow for sin? Silvanus
answer is formal: by learning to pray at other than the
times of common prayer with all its (musical) distractions which clearly, in his old-fashioned mind, do
considerably more harm than good.
12
13
Isidore 4 220 CD, 11.46.

1 Thess. 5.17.
Dr John Wortley was born and educated in Britain

where he studied under Joan Hussey and Cyril Mango.
Appointed Professor of Medieval History at the University
of Manitoba in 1969, he developed a program of Byzantine
studies there until his retirement in 2002, since when (as
professor emeritus) he continues to research and publish,
latterly concentrating on the Apophthegmata Patrum.
In retirement he has held visiting fellowships at the Universities of Belfast (Queens, twice) Princeton and Durham.
He has always maintained close ties with the Paris Byzantinists; it was at the instigation of R.P. Joseph Paramelle
that he began work on the Rpertoire of Byzantine
Beneficial Tales. His translation of John Skylitzes Synopsis Historiarum (Cambridge University Press 2010)
was made in close cooperation with Bernard Flusin and
Jean-Claude Cheynet. His pioneering work on the role of
relics in Byzantine society can now be conveniently consulted in Studies on the Cult of Relics in Byzantium
up to 1204 (Ashgate-Variorum 2009). He lives in Winnipeg with his wife, Sylvia Scott Wortley the harpsichordist.
A priest of the Anglican Church since 1960 he continues to
practice in an assistant capacity.
16
MYSTAGOGY
G E R M A N U S CO N S TA N T I N O P O L I TA N U S PAT R I A R C H A V IIIth cent ur y
Ecclesiastical History and Mystical Contemplation

The Trisagion Hymn is sung thus: there the angels say Glory to God in the highest; here, like
the Magi, we bring gifts to Christfaith, hope and love, like gold, frankincense and myrrh
and like the bodiless hosts we cry with faith: Holy God, that is the Father; Holy Mighty,
that is the Son and Word, for He has bound the might of the devil and made him who had
dominion over death powerless through the Cross and He had given us life by trampling on
him; Holy Immortal, that is the Holy Spirit, the give of life, through whom all creation is
made alive and cries out have mercy on us.
IT IS WELL THAT WE ARE HERE: TRANSFIGURATIONS AND

REALIZATIONS ON THE HOLY MOUNTAIN
BY JOHN E AFENDOULIS
NOTE: Photos used for the slideshow in the digital versions of Psaltiki: the online journal can be
viewed at the following URL http://flic.kr/s/aHsjCfArMs
18
We know not whether we were

in heaven or on earth. For on
earth there is no such splendor
or such beauty, and we are at
a loss how to describe it. We
know only that God dwells
there among men.
his is what the emissaries of

St. Vladimir, Prince of Kiev,
reported after searching for an
acceptable religion for the rulers
people and returning from Hagia
Sophia in Constantinople in 988
AD. And likewise, these words
are the only words that I can use
to describe my pilgrimage to the
Holy Monastery of Xenophontos
on the Holy Mount Athos, funded
by Psaltiki, an organization with
a mission to educate, empower,
and connect the next generation
of chanters with tools for the
advancement of the liturgical
art of chanting in the Orthodox
Church. I will be indebted to them
for the rest of my life for providing
this scholarship to a Holy Cross
Seminarian, and that they chose
me, out of all my brothers, to go to
the Holy Mountain for Holy Week
and Pascha 2011.
In trying to decide whether
or not to apply for the scholarship, my wife and I concluded
that this would probably be the
only opportunity I might have
to go to the Holy Mountain for
Holy Week; after ordination my
priestly duties would prohibit
such an absence. My bishop was
already talking of ordaining me to
the Holy Priesthood which would
mean placement in a parish soon
thereafter. With Metropolitan
Gerasimoss blessing I applied
for the scholarship. I remember
that the announcement for the
award of the scholarship would be
on November 22, 2010, and. that
I must have checked my emails
at least100 times that day. I also
checked Psaltikis website for the

announcement. Nothing. By the
end of the day, I told my wife
Adina that I was so very disappointed that I didnt receive the
scholarship; I was sure the committee found a more worthy fellow seminarian. Two days later,
though, I received an email from
my beloved personal friend, Dr.
Grammenos Karanos, who was
the interim Byzantine Music
Professor at Holy Cross (filling in
for Photios Ketzetsis) congratulating me on being awarded the
Psaltiki scholarship. I told him that
I was not awarded the scholarship
and that I was so disappointed. He
assured me, that I was the recipient and he advised me to check
my spam box. Sure enough, the
notification e-mail was there. It
was official and I couldnt have
been more pleased. (Before I get
started in my memoirs with my
remembrance of Holy Week on
Mount Athos, allow me this time
to say some thank yous: to my
wife Adinait was our first (and I
pray our only) Pascha apart; to Fr.
Konstantinos Terzopoulos and the
entire Board of Psaltiki for making the scholarship available; and
to my Metropolitan Gerasimos of
San Francisco, for allowing me to

go. I would also like to thank the
two professors who wrote letters
of recommendation, Fr. Nicholas
Kastanas and Dr. Timothy Patitsas.
And lastly, thank you to all the fathers of Xenophontos Monastery
but particularly the Abbot Alexios
and Fathers Theonas, Joseph,
Bessarion, Paisios and Daniel.)
Fr. Konstantinos was the most
kind and gracious person who
guided me through the benefits
of the scholarship. I had been
to Mount Athos seven times before but never to Xenophontos
Monastery. Everything was paid
for but the real value of the scholarship is not monetary but that it
made a stay at one of the monasteries during their most busy time
of year possible. In 2003, I had
moved to Greece for two years and
in those two years I had tried to
get to the Holy Mountain for Holy
Week and Pascha. In order to give
equal opportunity to all guests,
each monastery limits the stay of
each pilgrim. If you want to go for
Holy Week, you must move from
monastery to monastery. Combine
that with the long services, and
it becomes almost impossible for
one to stay on The Garden of
19

Byzantine composers

Tweet us!
Like us!
20
the Panagia the entire week. The

Fathers of the monastery treated
me so well. Fr. Konstantinos, not
knowing the extent of my fluency in Modern Greek, told me
that two of the Fathers, Zosimas
and Jeremias, were English speaking. After they realized that my
Modern Greek was very good they
left me on my own, because they
were under obedience to help with
the non-Greek speaking pilgrims
in addition to their normal duties.
Both of Fathers had attended Holy
Cross Seminary and they had sent
back greetings to their fellow classmates, many who have become
professors at Holy Cross.
The Fathers at this monastery
balance the services so that they
are neither too long nor too short.
Their trapeza and hours of eating are neither too strict nor too
lax. They kept a strict fast, but
they always made sure that I had

enough to eat, and that included
snacks. My wonderful hosts were
Frs. Theonas and Joseph. They met
me at the archandorikion and were
most gracious. Fr. Joseph always
directed me during the services
and positioned me in a stasidi
(the chairs alone the walls) for the
services when I was not serving.
When not serving as a deacon, my
stasidi was on the left (north side)
of the church directly opposite
the icon of the Mother of God.
This icon was originally from the
Monastery of Vatopedi. How it
happened to come to Xenophontos
monastery was by an act and miracle of the Mother of God.
One day the Fathers of
Vatopedi saw that the monasterys
icon was missing from the church.
The icon is massive (maybe 4 or 5
feet tall) and they set out to find
out where it was. They discovered

it in the Church of Xenophontos
monastery. They thought that
someone stole it and so the fathers
brought others from Vatopedi and
returned the icon to its monastery.
But then again the icon was found
missing, and again the icon was
returned. When the miracle happened a third time, the Fathers
of Vatopedi realized that it was
the will of the Mother of God
that the icon should remain at
Xenophontos Monastery. On the
feast of the Icon, the Fathers of
Vatopedi come to Xenophontos to
celebrate jointly.
It was Holy Week. I knew the
services would be long and I would
be tired because I didnt expect
to get much sleep, but I was so
excited to be there the services
seemed to fly by. The first day was
a little tiring. The boat Axion Estin
21
left Ouranopolis at 9:45 a.m. and

I arrived at Xenophontos at 11:30
a.m. Upon arrival, Father Theonas
told me that Small Vespers would
begin at 4 p.m. for Palm Sunday,
then we would eat and at 8 p.m. we
would have an all night vigil for the
Feast of our Saviors Triumphant
Entry into Jerusalem (actually
the all night vigil ended at 2:30
a.m.) Divine Liturgy would begin
sometime around 7 a.m. Sunday
morning. The vigil was wonderful.
After apodeipnon and paraklesis, we
moved into vespers. They started
with the Phokaeus Anoixantaria.
The custom in the monastery is
that anyone who can chant is given
an opportunity and each takes a
different verse. Fr. David asked me
if I could chant and I, in my humble voice, chanted a verse. I was
delighted as I was positioned in my
stasidi to notice the small icons of
the Holy Five Martyrs: Eustratios,
Auxentios, Eugene, Mardarios, and
Orestes. These are the patron saints

of my maternal grandparents village of Semendre in Cappadocia
and there they werethere I was!!!
They looked down on me while I
was on the Holy Mountain for Holy
Week!!! And I, as unworthy as I
am, positioned myself on the stasidi
opposite the icon of the Mother of
God, and underneath the patrons
of my grandparents village
looking down and (hopefully)
blessing me! I could not have
been in a better place.
As the service progressed, I
noticed how different the monastic style of services is from
parish services. One of the most
beautiful sights during Holy
Week services at the monastery
was the swinging of the polyeleos (large candelabra). Since
the church was illuminated only
by a few kandilia (oil lamps),
when the polyeleos and the
kandilia were swung in a counterclockwise direction by the
ecclesiarch, the beauty of the
movement of the candle wicks
in that moment reminded me of
the universe being created, and
I gave glory to Almighty God.
The swinging of the polyeleos was
one of the most beautiful visual delights during the service, especially
during the chanting of the cherubic
hymn while the
Abbot Alexios censed and took his
censing around the
church, all those
present and the
icons of the saints
who are alive in
Christ, and my
only thought was
that this was one of
the most compassionate movements
in the service.
Additionally, what I noticed was the remarkable way the
services progressed and how nonmechanical the services were. In
reciting the petitions and common
prayers and hymns it appeared as
though the monks were having a
conversation with God. It seemed
just the most natural of conversations. The first time this dawned
on me was during the vigil service

when I saw the ephimerios (the
priestmonk whose obedience it
was to serve that week) read the
Akathistos Hymn to the Mother
of God. He had his epitrachilion
on and standing before the icon of
the Mother of God, removed his
kallimauchion. Without book or
papers, he gazed upon her icon and
started reciting the whole of the
Akathistos from memory, moving
only to cross himself when he said,
Rejoice, You Bride Unwedded or
the Alleluia. What a feeling!!! In
America, our prayers can appear
mechanical. We use our books and
read the words many times stumbling over them. The members of
our churches follow along in their
books, trying to find what page the
priest is on, not paying attention
to the prayers being recited. It just
does not sound or appear natural.
On the Holy Mountain, my impression of the services for all of Holy
Week and Pascha was that when
the monks prayed, it was a natural
conversation with Godsecond
22
nature.
At the beginning of Holy Week,
I stayed quietly in my stasidi, saying my prayer rope and enjoying the chanting of the Fathers.
Occasionally Fr. Daniel, one of
the chanters of the Left Choir,
invited me over to chant an occasional hymn. The Abbot of the
community, Alexios, has a wonderful voice. I have never heard the
troparion of the hymn of Cassiane
chanted so wonderfully. Likewise,
Fr. Seraphim, the protopsaltis of the
community also chanted the same
hymn in the Presanctified. (Abbot
Alexios gave allowed me to record
the church services. My wife lent
me her iPod, and thank God, I
have most of the services recorded.
My only challenge is editing them.
Once I figure out how to accomplish this task, I hope to revise this
paper with audio selections.)
Since I was a deacon, Fr.
Joseph, the typikaris, asked me on
Holy Thursday if I wanted to serve.
I felt so very grateful to God. I
never thought I would have made
it to the Holy Mountain for Holy
Week and now I was
being asked to serve!
Xenophontos has only
one hierodeacon, Fr.
Bessarion, who is an extremely patient and loving brother of the community. His instructions
were invaluable and I
stood in awe and compunction when I realized
where I was during this
most holy of weeks in
our ecclesiastical year.
Pascha day was
most amazing, and very
tiring. To the best of
my recollection, I think
we started reading the
Acts of the Apostles
around 10 p.m., then on to the

canon around 1 a.m., and into
the Resurrection Gospel and the
triumphant chanting of Christos
anesti. As I was serving, I heard the
glorious Paschal hymn chanted in
English and Fr. Joseph turned to
me and wondered if I recognized
it and if it was a good translation.
The Paschal Liturgy and trapeza
ended sometime around 5 a.m.
We had fish soup, fish, feta, and
a paschal egg, of course. What a
feast!!! I really was too excited to
lie down, but I forced myself and
after a few hours, upon rising, I saw
Fr. Efthymios walking down the
corridor. He asked me if I wanted
a cup of coffee. He was an elderly
monk who normally resides at the
Xenophontos Skete, but because
of health reasons, has been at the
monastery for some time. He is
a wonderful, jolly monk with a
beautiful smile and he radiates
with the love of our Savior. In his
cell he offered me Greek coffee and
kourambiedes (cookies) that some
of the pilgrims had brought him
for the Feast. He had asked me
about Fr. Ephraims monasteries in

America and if I had been to any of
them. He also recounted memories
of when he first arrived at the Holy
Mountain and how the brethren
struggled in those years.
Later that day toward evening, we celebrated the Agape vespers with the Resurrection Gospels
read in 15 different languages.
That evening I finally met with Fr.
Zosimas who had been a Master of
Divinity graduate of our beloved
Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School
of Theology. We spoke for quite
some time and he told me stories of
his coming to the Holy Mountain
and various obedience duties that
he had had while at Xenophontos
Monastery.
As St. Peter said to our
Savior on the feast of the Holy
Transfiguration, It is good for us
to be here. I felt the exactly that
while on the Holy Mountain. It
was so good to be there. It was my
last semester at Holy Cross and I
had an extremely hectic workload.
There was also talk about ordaining
me in the summer and being as-
23
signed to a parish. Spending Holy

Week at Xenophontos Monastery
was one of the most spiritually
rewarding events in my life and I
owe it all to Fr. Konstantinos and
the wonderful staff of Psaltiki.
May God bless them for offering
this scholarship to a Holy Cross
seminarian and may God bless all
those who donate their time and
monetary support for making this
once-in-a-lifetime scholarship
available for a seminarian of our
beloved school, Holy Cross Greek
Orthodox School of Theology. You
will always be in my prayers.
The Rev John E Afendoulis is parish

priest at St John the Baptist Church,
Salinas, California and submits
these reflections on his Holy Week
pilgrimage to Mount Athos as the
2011 recipient of the Psaltiki Holy
Week on Mount Athos Award.
24
THE PRINCESS AND HER BOOK

the iconography, history, and linguistics of urics tetraevangel, ad 1429:
bodleian library ms. canon. gr. 122*
E L E N A E N E D - VA S I L E S C U
Oxford: Bodleian Ms.

Canon. Graeci. 122, fol.7r
ad 1429; first page of the
Gospel of Matthew
25

Byzantine composers

Tweet us!
Like us!
26
ccording to Ralph Cleminson,

MS. Canon. Graeci. 122, or the
Gospel manuscript (Tetraevangheliar) written and illuminated in
1429 in Neam Monastery, Romania by the monk Gavril Uric1, was
bought by the University of Oxford
in 1817 from the heirs of Matteo
Luigi Canonici (1727- c. 1805/6).2
Canonici was a Jesuit who lived
in Venice. His collection consisting of 2047 manuscripts, which
Cleminson describes as being
mostly in Latin and Italian, but
with a substantial number of Greek
and Hebrew items, included also
five Slavonic manuscripts: two
Croatian glogolitic miscellanies, the
famous Moldavian Gospel written
by Gavrilo of Neamu, a Russian
Gospel codex and MS Canon. Lit.
1
Gavriil (Gabriel) Uric, the scribe
monk from Neam Monastery, was the
son of the uricar Paisie. This is Gavriils
father monastic name, and it seems that
he was a local boyar because the Prince of
the country chose him as a scribe in his
chancellery. Later he took monastic vow
in the same monastery where his son was
to follow him. Documente privind istoria
Romniei (sic), ed. by Petre Panaitescu,
Damian P. Bogdan, Francis Pall et. al.,
Bucharest, 1956, vol. 1, caption of Fig. 4
showing the first page of the Mark Gospel
from the Tetraevangheliar of Neam; there
is no number indicated on the page, but it
is no. [9]. Uricar is a scribe or caligraf . In
Old Romanian Uric is a type of a special
document, usually a donation decree (and
comes from Slavonic, since the Slavonic
was the language of the Orthodox Church
in Romania during the Middle Ages until
late seventeenth century).
2
Ralph Cleminson, A Union catalogue of Cyrillic manuscripts in British and
Irish collections, School of Slavonic and
East European Studies, University of London, 1988, pp. 242-244; No. 158. Cleminson
refers to the MS. Canon. Graeci. 122 as
Gospels. Moldavian. 1429.
413, a fifteenth-century Serbian

miscellany, and were all purchased
by the Bodleian Library at the same
time.3 Dr. Barker-Benfield from the
above mentioned Library says that
most of these manuscripts were
bought by the library, but not all.4
Cleminson5 and also J. D. A. Barnicot6 show that the original text of
this Tetraevangel was Old Slavonic
of the Bulgarian recension. The
Greek text was added only later.
the history of urics gospel
The date of Canonicis death was
a matter of controversy (especially
if it took place in 1805 or in 1806
1805 or 1806), but the latest conclusion on the matter points towards
September 1805.7.
3
Cleminson , Inaugural published
lecture The Serbian Manuscript Heritage
in the British Isles, University of Portsmouth, 15 November, 2002, p. 5.
4
E-mail correspondence of 18 November 2008 with Dr. Bruce Barker-Benfield.
5
R. Cleminson, A Union catalogue
of Cyrillic manuscripts in British and Irish
collections, London 1988, no. 158, pp, 242244. Cleminson refers to this document as
Gospels. Moldavian. 1429.
6
J. D. A. Barnicot, The Slavonic
MSS in the Bodleian, vol. 1, no. 2, 1938,
entry 40, S. C. 18575, p. 32 [S. C. means
Summary Catalogue]. This list of Slavonic manuscripts in Cyrillic and Glagolitic
characters reproduced, with some additional notes and references, a previous
one compiled by Dr. Craster [no precise
date offered, but only the note that it was
written some years ago during work on the
Summary Catalogue of Western MSS].
The date and Sirku notations refers to the
description of the manuscripts done by P.
A. Sirku in his Zametki o slavyannskikh i
russkikh rukopisyakh. All this information
is given by Barnicot in The Slavonic MSS,
p. 30.
7
Irma Merolle in Labate Matteo Luigi Canonici e la sua biblioteca: i
In the journal Magazin istoric [Historical Magazine] Lajos

Demny confirms that the Gospel
written by Uric arrived in Oxford
around the middle of the nineteenth century from Venice and
that it was obtained from the antiquarian Johan Pericinotti (sic).8
G. Popescu Vlcea agrees with this,
even though he cannot explain how
the manuscript reached Venice.
Here is how he mentions the codex:
Brought in the nineteenth century
from the antiquarian J. Pericinotti
(sic) from Venice for the Bodleian Library. The circumstances
in which the manuscript arrived
manoscritti Canonici e Canonici-Soranzo
delle biblioteche fiorentine, Institutum Historicum, Rome, and Soc. Iesu &Bibiloteca
Mediceo-Laurenziana, Florence 1958 develops that debate and speaks about other
aspects of Canonicis life and work. This is
a catalogue in Italian of Canonici manuscripts now held in Florentine libraries.
The main authors involved in the debate
regarding Matthaei Aloisii (Matteo Luigi)
Canonicis date of death are G. A. Moschini, Della letteratura veneziana dela sec.
XVlll fino a nostri giorni, vols. 1-4 (18061808), Venice, vol. 2, p. 72; C. Sommervogel, Bibliotque de la Compagnie de Jsus,
Brussels, Paris 1891, vol. 2, pp. 688-689; A.
& A. De Backer, Bibliothque des crivains
de la C. De J., lV, Lige, 1858, p. 93; C. Frati,
Dizzionario bio-bibliografico dei bibliotecari e bibliofili italiani dal sec. XlV al XlX,
Florence 1933, p. 134, and V. Rossi, La
biblioteca manoscritta del senatore Jacopo
Soranzo, in Il libro e la stampa, vol. 1, nos.
3-8, Florence 1907, p. 123. Moschinis arguments and information from the Museo
civico Correr, Venice, Ms. Cicogna, 532r
indicate the date of Matteo Luigis death
as some time in September 1805. Merolle
seems to agree with them, and I also find
their arguments convincing.
8
Lajos (Ludovic) Demny, nceputurile miniaturisticii romne, Magazin istoric [Historical Magazine], No 1 (46),
1971, p. 37.
* A shorter version of this paper was presented to the Center for the Study of the Book, University of Oxford, in December of
2008; yet another version was published in Romanoslavica (University of Bucharest 2010) under the title New Aspects Regarding the
Tetraevangelia Written by the Monk Gavril Uric in Neam Monastery in 1429. I am very grateful for the help provided by Dr. Burce
Barker-Benfield and the staff in the Department of Special Collections and Western Manuscripts at the Bodleian Library.
27
The 14th Century Church of Neam

Monastery, beautiful example of
Moldavian architecture
from Moldavia to Venice are not

known.9
On this issue mileTurdeanu
hypothesised, It is not impossible
that it was brought from Moldavia
to Venice by some Rumanian exile
or by numerous Greeks or Armenians who roamed through the
Danubian Pricipalities throughout the centuries.10 Nicolae Iorga
wrote about the Romanians living
in Venice11 and Sirarpie der Nersessian mentioned an Armenian
manuscript, copied and illuminated
in Moldavia, which reached the
library of the Mekhtarite monks in
Veniceshe did not know when.12
Turdeanue based his view on these
facts and sources, but I consider
that, in regard to Urics manuscript,
9
Achet au XlX-e sicle de chez
lantiquare J. Pericinotti de Venise, pour
la Biblioteque Bodleienne. On ignore les
circonstances qui ont fait parvenir le manuscript de Moldavie a Venise. Gheorghe
Popescu-Vlcea, La Miniature Roumaine,
Meridiane, Bucharest, 1982, p. 89; my
translation.
10
mile Turdeanu, The Oldest
Illuminated Moldavian Manuscript,
Slavonic and East European Review, London, XXlX, 1951, p. 464; I keep his spelling
of Romanians as Rumanians.
11
Nicolae Iorga, Ospiti romeni in
Venezia (1570-1610), Bucharest, 1932.
12
Sirarpie der Nersessian, Manuscrits armniens illustrs des Xlle, Xllle
et XlVe sicles de la Bibliothque des Pres
Mkhtaristes de Venise, Paris, 1937, no. 143.
The donation act from the 10th of February 1429

through which Alexandru cel Bun [the Kind] gives
Cpriana Monastery and some villages to his wife,
Marina
they are not substantial enough

to constitute a proof for its way to
Venice. Actually, as I will show further, today research has managed to
uncover a Romanian document of
1429, which can attest with a higher probability the circumstances
in which the manuscript reached
Venice.
With regard to its itinerary to
Oxford, Turdeanu affirms that in
the first half of the 19th century []
it was still in the ownership of the
Pericinotti (sic) family at Venice.13
Actually, the correct name of the
heirs of Canonici family is Perissinotti. Following the death of
Matteo Luigi Canonici his collections passed to his brother Giuseppe
Canonici, who in turn died in 1807.
Giuseppes property then passed to
their nephews Giovanni Perissinotti
and Girolamo Cardina, who divi13
Turdeanu, The Oldest, p. 456.
ded it up with Perissinotti taking

the manuscripts.14 As shown above,
most of these manuscripts were
bought from Perissinotti in 1817
by the Bodleian Library. The negotiation was carried out through
Mr. Scott, Vice Consul at Venice;
the price was 5500 Louis dor, which is about 6,000 ready money,
obtained mostly as a loan from the
Trustees of the Radcliffe Library in
Oxford. The Curators minutes of
the time mention only the name of
Mr. Scott, but not that of Perissinotti, who is only mentined as the
owner of the manuscript collection.15 However, the contemporary
14
Merolle, Labate Matteo Luigi
Canonici, p. 22.
15
Bodley Curators. Minutes 1793.
Library Records d. 12, fols. 39v-41v. On the
particular record of the amount, see the
minutes of 19 April, 1817 (39v) in which the
initial price is discussed (6000 Louis dors,
or 6150 Sterlings,) and of 16 June (41r-41v)
in which the final amount is stated to 5500
28
list of manuscripts in Italian, which preceded or accompanied the

collection, contains the following
heading: Collection of old manuscripts assembled by Senior Abate
Matteo Luigi Canonici, Venice, a
former Jesuit, left through his will
to Mr Giuseppe Canonici, his brother, and inherited by Mr Giovanni
Perissinotti.16
ms. canon graeci. 122 in
literature and bibliography
rics manuscript is important

for the historian of Romanian
culture because it is one of the
oldest monuments of minor art
executed in Moldavia; its origin
therefore requires to be explained
as precisely as possible.17 In Romania itself the iconography of the
manuscript was the aspect which
has received the most attention.
Studies on Urics Gospel have been
made as early as the nineteenth
century18, very intensely in the
twentieth, in both Romania and
abroad. Even when Urics Gospel
was in Venice it drew the attention of specialists, as for example P.
Solari.19 Generally speaking, in adLouis dors, after the negociations done
by? the Vice Consul at Venice, Mr. Scott.
The application for the money by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford
to the Trustees was discussed on 23 April
1817 (40 v).
16
Collezione di Codici antichi
fatta dal fu Sigr Abate Matteo Luigi Canonici, Veneto, Ex-gesuita, e lasciata con
Testamento del fu Sigr Giuseppe Canonici
di Lui Fratello ed erede al Sigr Giovanni
Perissinotti; Library Records e. 440, fol.
2r; my translation.
17
Turdeanu, The Oldest Manuscript, p. 456.
18
I. I. Sreznevskii, Sviedieniia i
zamietki o maloizviestnykh I neizvestnyh
pamjatnikah pisma, vol. 28, No. 1, St
Petersburg, 1875, reproduced in: Sbornik
ORJaS, X , 1876, pp. 559-660; I. Dobrowsk,
Institutiones linguae slavicae dialecti veteris,
Vienna, 1882, p. XV.
19
P. Solari, Pominak knieskij,
dition to Cleminson, Demny and

Turdeanu,20 among the researchers who have described and commented on this mediaeval manuscript are G. Bal,21 D. P. Bogdan,22 I.
Bogdan,23 I. Bianu,24 V. Drgu,25 N.
Iorga,26 E. Lzrescu,27 G. Mihil,28

J. Milin,29 G. U. Mircea,30 M.A.
Musicescu,31 S. der Nersessian,32
C. Nicolescu,33 G. Oprescu,34
P. P. Panaitescu,35 S. Petrescu,36
S. Pucariu,37 P. A. Syrcu,38 P. J.
Venice, 1810, pp. 33-34.

20 Turdeanu, in addition to The
Oldest Manuscript see also Les letters
slaves en Moldavie: le moine Gabriel du
monastre de Neamu, in Revues des
tudes Slaves, XXVll, 1951.
21
N. Iorga and G. Bal, Histoire de
lart roumaine ancient, Paris, 1922, p. 317;
in the book there is a colour reproduction
of a leaf from the Ms.. 122; plate facing p.
336. This information is mentioned also
in one Letter about Bodleian manuscripts,
XX, Canon. gr.(sic) 122. There are two more
such letters in the Bodleian containing
bibliography regarding the Manuscript
Canon. Gr. 122; I have mentioned the respective bibliography (Bianu and Nersensian) in the article [Actually these letters in
the Bodleian are three brief notes].
22
D. P. Bogdan, Paleografia
romno-slav (tratat i album)[Romanian-Slavic Palaeography](Treatise and
albume), Direcia General a Arhivelor Statului, Bucureti 1978; Quelques
tmoignages des liens roumano-grecs sous
la rgne dtienne le Grand, prince de
Moldavie, in: Bulletin V, nos. 1-2, Association internationale dtudes du Sud-Est
Europen, 1967.
23
I. Bogdan, Evangheliile dela Humor i Vorone din 1473 i 1550, in Analele
Academiei Romne. Memoriile Seciunii
istorice, s. ll, t. XXlX, Bucharest, 1907.
24 I. Bianu, Presentation to the first
Congress of Byzantinology, Bucharest, 1924;
at the respective congress Bianu presented
the reproductions in colour of the most
important ornaments in the manuscript
which we have included here (there is a
mention about it in Turdeanu, The Oldest
Illuminated MS, p. 257). Reproductions
of images from the manuscript were published in Evanghelia slavo-greac scris
n mnstirea Neamului din Moldova
de Gavriil Monahul la 1429 [The Slavonic-Greek Gospel written in Neam Monastery in Moldavia by Gavril the Monk in
1429], in Documente de art romneasc
din manuscripte vechi [Documents of Romanian Art in Ancient Manuscripts], vol.
1, Bucharest, 1922, pp. 2-10.
25
V. Drgu (illustrations P. Lupan),
Pictura mural din Moldova. Sec. XV-XVl,
Bucureti, 1982.
26 N. Iorga, La figuration des
vanglistes dans lart roumain et lcole
chypriote-valaque, in Buletinul comisiunii
monumentelor istorice, XXVL, fasc. 75, Bucharest, 1933, pp. 1-4 and the works further
mentioned.
27
E. Lzrescu, Trei manuscrise
moldoveneti de la Muzeul de Art al
Republicii Populare Romne, in: Cultura moldoveneasc n timpul lui tefan cel
Mare, Bucharest, 1958, pp. 541-547 (the
mention about the on p. 552).
28 G. Mihil, Manuscrisele lui
Gavriil Uric de la Neam i nsemntatea
lor filologic, in: Studii de lingvistic si
filologie, Timioara, 1981, pp. 48-58.
29 J. Milin, Din istoricul cercetrii
manuscriselor slavo-romne, in: Studii de
slavistic, Timioara, 1998, pp. 5-73, especially pages 6, 16, 25, 58.
30 G. U. Mircea, Contribution la
vie et louvre de Gavriil Uric, Revues des
tudes Sud-Est Europennes, vol. Vl, no. 4,
Bucharest, 1968.
31
M. A. Musicescu (illustration S.
Ulea), Vorone, Bucharest, 1971.
32
S. der Nersessian, Two Slavonic
Parallels of the Greek Tetraevangelia: Paris
in: The Art Bulletin, t. IX,

1927, nr 3.
74,
33
C. Nicolescu, Miniatura i
ornamentul crii manuscrise din rile
Romne. Sec. XlV-XVlll, Introd. by M.H.
Maxy, Catalogue of an Exhibition in the
National Museum of Arts, Bucharest,
July-September 1964.
34 Istoria artelor plastice n
Romnia, ed. by G. Oprescu (ed.), vol. 1,
Bucharest, 1964, pp. 189-194.
35
P. Panaitescu & D. Bogdan, F.
Pall et. al. (eds), Documente privind istoria
Romniei (sic), vol. 1, Bucharest, 1956.
36 S. Petrescu, Odoarele de la Neam
i Secu [The treasures from Neam and
Secu], Bucharest, 1911.
37
S. Pucariu, Istoria literaturii
romne. Epoca veche[The History of Romanian Literature. The Ancient Epoch], Sibiu
1930.
38
P. A. Syrku, Zametki o slavyannskikh i russkikh rukopisyakh v Bodleian
29
afaik,39 . Turdeanu,40 S. Ulea,41

and F. Uspenski.42 In literature there
are references to Mihai Berzas contribution on the manuscript, but so
far the research has not found out
in which publication his contribution were made.
As an example of the treatment
this manuscript has received we can
show that, in his book Paleografia
romno-slav [Romanian-Slavonic
Palaeography], D. P. Bogdan mentions either the Uric Gospel or its
author together with its work more
than 30 times in the 391 pages, comprising the treatise part of the book
(the other part of the book, which
Bogdan calls albume, has 101 pages).
Ion Bianu presented the Tetraevangelia to the first Congress of
Library v Oksforde, Iyvestija Otdelenija
russkogo jazyka I slovesnosti, vol. Vll, Book
4, St. Petersburg 1902, pp. 325-345.
39
P. J. afaik, Geschichte der serbishen Literatur, Prague 1865, pp. 185-186;
he quotes Solaris, but acknowledges that
since 1810, when the latests work was written in Venice, the 1429 Gospel was bought
by the Bodleian Library. Turdeanu mentions both these researchers in footnote 1
of his The Oldest Illuminated Manuscript
, p. 467.
40 Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminated Manuscript, pp. 456-469, and
also Les letters slaves en Moldavie: le
moine Gabriel du monastre de Neamu,
in: Revues des tudes Slaves , XXVll 1951;
Miniatura bulgar i nceputurile miniaturii romneti, Buletinul Institutului
romn din Sofia, no. l, Bucharest 1942, p.
414-419.
41
S. Ulea, Gavril Uric, primul artist romn cunoscut, in: Studii i cercetri
de istoria artei (SCIA), Arta plastic Series, vol. Xl, no. 2, Bucharest 1964, pp. 235263, and Gavril Uric. Studiu paleografic,
vol. XXVlll, idem, 1981; Gavril Ieromonahul, autorul frescelor de la Blneti, in:
Cultura moldoveneasc n vremea lui tefan
cel Mare, Bucharest 1964.
42 F. B. Uspenski, O nekotoryh
slavjanskich i poslavjanski psannych rukopisjach, chranjaichsju u Londone i Oxforde, in: urnal Ministerstva narodnogo
prosveenija, CC (LL ?) 1878), pp. 89-94.
Byzantinology which took place

in Bucharest in 1924. He showed
colour reproductions of the most
important ornaments in the manuscript, which I have also included
in this article (Bianus presentation
is mentioned in one of Turdeanus
articles).43 Additionally, the respective images were published in his
study Evanghelia slavo-greac
scris n mnstirea Neamului din
Moldova de Gavriil Monahul la
1429 [Slavonic-Greek Gospel written in Neam Monastery in Moldavia by Gavril the Monk in 1429].
MS. Canon. Gr. 122 in the Bodleian has also been mentioned briefly
in many books and catalogues. For
example J. D. A. Barnicot describes
it in the catalogue The Slavonic MSS
in the Bodleian as being written in
Slavonic of the Bulgarian recension
and Greek. 1429, Sirku I, no. 1.44
Gheorghe Popescu-Vlcea mentions it in his books,45 and Sextil
Pucariu, in his Istoria literaturii
romne has a reference to it and reproduces four plates from the man-
uscript.46 Also, Evangelina Smirnova mentions vangile moldave du

moine Gavriil Uric (1429), Oxford,
Bodleian Library, Cod. Canon. gr.
122.; she also refers to an article
by S. Ulea about the monk Gavril
Uric.47 In his catalogue of Gospel manuscripts Kurt Aland lists
Ms. Canon. Gr. 122 among other
documents from the Bodleian. He
describes it shortly in terms of languages, size, and number of pages.48 Studi Medievali, Serie Terza,
contains the following reference:
140 C Moldavian illumination.
Slavonic and Greek gospels written
in 1429 at the monastery of Neamtzyn [sic] (Cod. Canon. Gr. 122).49
Nicolescu refers to the manuscript
as follows: Written on parchment;
the Slavonic text on a full-page,
the Greek translation (sic!) on the
margins. Coloured rich decorative
headpieces formed by interlinked
and intertwined circles precede
the beginning of each Gospel. The
portraits of the four evangelists
on the full page, writing in front
of their desks, stand out from the
43
Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminatgolden background, surrounded by
ed MS, p. 457
vegetal frames.50 Popescu-Vlcea
44 J. D. A. Barnicot, The Slavonic
MSS in the Bodleian, vol. 1, no. 2, 1938,
entry 40, S. C. 18575, p. 32 [S. C. means
Summary Catalogue]. This list of Slavonic manuscripts in Cyrillic and Glagolitic
characters reproduced, with some additional notes and references, a previous
one compiled by Dr. Craster [no precise
date offered, but only the note that it was
written some years ago during work on the
Summary Catalogue of Western MSS].
The date and Sirku notations refers to the
description of the manuscripts done by P.
A. Sirku in his Zametki o slavyannskikh i
russkikh rukopisyakh. All this information
is given by Barnicot in The Slavonic MSS,
p. 30.
45
G. Popescu-Vlcea, Miniatura
romneasc, Bucharest 1981, plate 14, and
p. 88, and in its French translation, La
miniature roumaine, and also in Crile
populare miniate i ornate [Popular books
illuminated and decorated], Bucharest,
1989.
46 Pucariu, Istoria literaturii

romne. Epoca veche, p. 1? [the page facing
the title page], Plate of St. Evangelist Luke,
colour, p. 33? [the page facing p. 32] The
beginning of Matthews Gospel, colour; the
latest repeats itself in black and white.
47 E. Smirnova, Un manuscrit
illustr indit du premiere tiers du XV-e
sicle, in: Byzantine East, Latin West.
Art-Historical Studies in honor of Kurt
Weitzmann, ed. by C. Moss and K. Kiefer,
Princeton, 1995 , pp. 429, 431. In footnote 4
of her article S. Uleas works Gavril Uric,
primul artist roman cunoscut is mentioned.
48 K. Aland, Kurzgefasste Liste der
Griechischen der handschriften des Neven
Testaments, Berlin, New York, 1994, p. 60,
entry 525.
49 Studi Medievali, Serie Terza, vol.
V, no. 1, 1964, p. 392, entry 140 C.
50 C. Nicolescu, Miniatura i ornamentul crii manuscrise, Entry 11, p. 9,
30
mentions: Tetraevangelia of 1429.

Bodleian Library Oxford (Cod.
Can. Graeci 122), Figs. 1-6. Parchment. Written in Slavonic, with a
Greek text on the margin. Frontispieces [worked] in interlaces: ff.
7r, 90r, 145r, 236r. The miniatures
the evangelists: Matthew, f. 6v;
Mark, f. 89v; Luke, f. 144v; John,
f. 235v.51 Then he describes each
image of the evangelists and reproduces them, as well as the Epilogue
of Urics Gospel. He acknowledges
as the source for his reproduction
of the images Bianus Evanghelia
slavo-greac. K. Sp. Staikos reproduces in colour and describes the
figures of St John the Evangelist
and of St Luke of Stiri [Figs. 290
in his book] from the Slavonic
manuscript Gospel, written by
the copyist Gavril in 1429 (Canon.
gr. 122, fols. 235v, 144v).52 Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 1952, refers
to the iconography of the Greek
manuscripts in Moldavia under
Metropolitan Makarios and in this
context Turdeanus article The
Oldest Illuminated Moldavian MSCanon Gr. 122 is mentioned. The
journal also refers to the style of
the characters of the Greek text on
the Urics manuscript.53
my trans.
51
Tetraevangile de 1429. Bibliotque Bodlienne, Oxford (Cod. Can.
Graeci 122) Fig. 1-6, Parchemin. Ecrit en
slavon, avec texte grec en marge. Frontispice en entrelacs: ff. 7r, 90r, 145r, 236r.
Miniatures: les vanglistes: <Matthieu>, f.
6v; <Marc>, f. 89v; <Luc>, f. 144v; <Jean>,
f. 235v. Popescu-Vlcea, La miniature
roumaine, p. 89. The figures of the Evangelists are reproduced in his book on pp. [89
- 94]; the pages have not been numbered
by the author. Some of them also contain
details from the figures, and on p. 84 there
are the captions of the images.
52
K. Sp. Staikos, The great librariei,
pp. 496 (Figs. 290), 498-499 (captions).
53
Byzantinische Zeitschrift, Stuttgart, 1952, vol. XLX, p. 135
description of ms. canon.

graeci. 122
urdeanu considers the Tetraevangel of Neam as one of the

most remarkable manuscripts in
the entire Slavic literature of the
Middle Ages,54 and today it is still
one of the Bodleian Librarys most
precious acquisitions. Der Nersessian, who mentions Urics manuscript in Oxford in the context of
a discussion about the collection
Parisinus Graecus 74, considers
it as one of the most important
[manuscripts] written during the
reign of Alexander the Kind.55
It initially had 312 leaves, and
this is noted in some of the bibliography, as for example in Henry
O. Coxs catalogue.56 However, if
one counts the blank page from the
beginning, the two pages with the
translations of the colophon, and
the last page which is blank, then
316 leaves can be counted; Christian Jensen and Martin Kauffmann
count 315.57 Their reckoning is true
if a hand-written note in Italian,
now glued on the inside front cover,
is not taken into consideration. The
54
Turdeanu, La broderie religieuse
en Roumanie. Les pitaphisi moldaves au
XV et XVl-e sicles, in: Cercetri literare,
vol. 4, Bucharest, 1940, p. 177, footnote 2;
my translation.
55
Der Nersessian , Two Slavonic
Parallels, pp. 222-274; my translation.
56
H. O. Cox, Bodleian Library
Quarto Catalogues. Greek Manuscripts
(reprinted with corrections from the
edition of 1853), Bodleian Library, Oxford
1969, cat. l, part ll, col. 105. (The original
title of the catalogue was: Catalogi codicum
manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae
pars prima recensionem codicum Graecorum continuens, Confecit Henricus O.
Coxe, A. M., Hypo-Bibliothecarus, Oxonii:
E Typographeo Academico, MDCCCLIV).
57
C. Jensen and M. Kauffmann, A
Continental Shelf. Books across Europe from
Ptolemy to Don Quixote. An exhibition to
mark the re-opening of the Bodleian Exhibition Room, Oxford 1994, catalogue entry
37, p. 96.
note mentions shortly some of the

characteristics of the manuscript
and of its language, stating that it
is written in a traditional idiom of
Russian language (as close to Russian as the Tuscan dialect is to that
spoken in Venice58).
The size of Ms. Canon. Graeci. 122 is 31x25 cm (Turdeanu) or
310x220 mm (Jensen & Kauffman). I have measured it myself
58
Levangelio in lingua Illirica
fu scritto in Moldovalachia per ordine
della principessa Moglie di Alessandro
lanno 6637, 13 Marzo, da un certo Gabriele Monaco, figlio di Urih (sic) in un
convento appartenente alla Germania
(sic). Eli carratteri sono di una eccelente
perfezione, pero nell espresione molto
differenti, quasi in ogni riga, cosicche non
pu, esser intlligible, che da pi pratici
della Lingua Russa, e della istoria dellevangelio; e la differenza consiste nell idioma
come differenze , Lidioma toscano dallo
Veneziano. Visono le stesse parole, ma
nonespress lingualmente. Lortografia in
mostioltissi luoghi differente, da questa
dipende la differente pronunzia. p.e use
une predana siot. Nell vangelio scritto
usio une predana sut. The text translates
The Evangel in the Illyrian language was
written in Moldovlahia on the orders of
Princess Marina, the wife of Alexander, in
6637 [1429], 13 March, be a certain Gabriel
the Monk, the son of Uric, in a convent
belonging to Germany (sic). Its characters
[letters] are well [clearly] drawn; however their expression is very different with
regard to their meaning in such a manner that they can be understood only by
someone who knows the Russian language
very well; the difference [between Russian
and the language of this Gospel Ilirica- ]
consists in the idiom. The difference is the
same as the difference between the Toscan
and Venetian idioms. In both there are the
same words, but they are not expressed
in the same way from the phonetic point
of view. In many situations, the orthography of some languages is different and it
depends on the pronunciation, i.e. on the
dialect. The dialect of this Evangel is traditional []?; page glued on the verso of
the first cover. Unknown author, probably
Canonici himself or a librarian (?). The
translation here was made by Dr. Marian
Ciuc, with essential corrections made by
Prof. Peter Mackridge.
31
and found that the covers are 31x23

cm, the width of the pages about
21.5 cm, with some little differences
from page to page depending on
the angle of opening and how much
of the page goes under the binding.
Cleminsons description of the
manuscript made in the A Union
catalogue of Cyrillic manuscripts refers to the documents pages, as follows: i+314+i leaves, foliated (i), (1),
2 312, (313-315). Earlier pagination
of ff. 8 85: 3-9 (rectos only), (1012), 13, (14-23), 24-25, (26-31), 32,
(33-34), 35-36 (37-39), 40, (41-43),
44-159; on ff. 90v-14 iv, 2-104; on ff.
145v-231, 2-173; and on ff. 236v-299,
2-127.59 In my correspondence with
Dr. Barker-Benfield it is stated that
Standard Bodleian practice in foliating does not distinguish between
original and later leaves; so under
our system there are 315 leaves [...]
of which fols. 2-312 are original
parchment leaves, fols. 1 and 315 are
(early?) blank parchment flyleaves,
and fols. 313-314 are later paper inserts.60 The present calf leather covers were added in the nineteenth
century.61 The marks of the previous
binding are still visible across the
pages. They indicated that probably
the book previously had what was
the usual silver Gospel covers in the
Middle Ages.
In the Bodleian Library Quarto
Catalogues: Greek Manuscripts,
compiled by Cox, Ms 122 is introduced as Codex Illyricus membranaceus, in folio, ff. 312, anno 54
59
Cleminson, A Union catalogue of
Cyrillic manuscripts, p. 242.
60 Barker-Benfield, correspondence
from December 2008.
61
Discussion with Dr. Barker-Benfield on 9 December 2008, when I gave a
lecture in the New Bodleian Library on
the Ms. Canon. Gr. for the Centre for the
Study of the Book, University of Oxford
and Romanian Cultural Institute, London
branch (which financially supported the
lecture).
[sic!], written by manu Gabrielis

cuiusdem monachi in Moldavia
exaratus.62 One of its descriptions
says, in the words of Jensen and
Kauffmann, that The Bulgarian
Church Slavonic text is written in
uncial script: each Gospel begins
with a decorated headpiece, gold
title, and decorated initial. The
pericopes, or liturgical readings,
are marked in the text, and their
appointed days are given in the
margins.63
The text of the colophon of Ms.
Canon. Gr. 122 on fol. 312r says the
following:
(a)
y ()
/ ( )
() ()
()() ()
/ () ()
()
/ ,
p
()
/ ()

, /
X(pcto)- cc
paa, oao
ae cca o, /
, cpc ( )c( )
a apa (), p ko
/ apa aa, c(i)a
Oypkoa, e cca
H eko / acp.
62 Cox, Bodleian Library Quarto
Catalogue, cat. l, part ll, col. 105. When I
last checked this catalogue, in Nov. 2008, I
noticed that the words Illyricus and cuiusdem have been crossed out by someones
handwriting (the librarians?)
63
Jensen and Kauffmann, A Continental Shelf, p. 96. They base their description on Cox, Bodleian Library Quarto
Catalogues, cat. l, part ll, col. 105; Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminated Moldavian
Manuscript, pp. 456-469, and Cleminson,
A Union catalogue of Cyrillic manuscripts
in British and Irish collections. In this exhibition of 1994 in the Bodleian Library Ms
Canon. Gr. 122 was entry 37.
This translates:
With the blessing of the
Father, the teaching of the
Son, and the fulfilment (perfection) of the Holy Spirit
this Four Gospel book was
written during [the reign] of
the devoted Orthodox ruling
Prince Alexandru Voievode,
the Master of all the land of
Moldo-Vlachia, and of his
wife Marina. Their love for
the word of Christ made
them ask for this writing to
be done. In the year 6937 (i.e.
1429); finished on the 13th of
March, by the hand of Gabriel, the son of Uric, in the
monastery of Neamu.64
Two translations of the colophon

with the Old Slavonic text above,
one in Italian and one in French,
were inserted at the back on the
manuscript; there are no indications as who made these translations and inserted them between
the covers of the Gospel.
Popescu-Vlcea also includes
a French translation of the colophon in his above-mentioned
work, and by comparing his text
with the other one at the back of
the Tetraevangeliar one can notice
some differences between these
two translations written at different
times, Popescu-Vlceas being the
most recent.
the iconography of ms. canon.
graeci. 122. byzantine elements
s mentioned above, Ion Bianu

reproduces ten images from
the manuscript and describes them
accurately saying, that on four folios there are reproductions of the
opening pages of the four Gospels,
each of them with two headings in
64 A translation of monk Gavrils
note in Slavonic was made by Turdeanu in
The Oldest Illuminated Moldavian Manuscript, p. 458. But the translation here is
my own.
32
colour, one for the Slav text, which

is the main one, and another one,
smaller, for the Greek text [Figs. 1a,
1b, 1c, 1d]. On other four folios the
faces of the Evangelists are reproduced [Figs. 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d]. A folio
has secondary ornamentation and
initials on it [Fig. 3], and the final
folio has the epilogue of the text
containing valuable data regarding its origins [Fig. 4]. Of a special
importance are the portraits of the
Evangelists, both for the variegated
and rich borders and for the architectural motifs [which surround
them], but especially for the manner in which the artist treats the
figures of the writers.65
Turdeanu is also one of the
specialists who describe in detail
the decorations of the Ms. Canon.
Gr. 122. His meticulous description
deserves reproduction here: The
miniatures represent the portraits
of the four evangelists, each on a
full page. The ornament consists of
large geometrical decorative headpieces which precede each gospel.
The analysis of these themes enables us to establish certain interesting facts about the origin of the
miniature painting and decorations
in Moldavian manuscripts. The
evangelists are represented sitting
at their work-table, in front of an
architectural scene. Their arrangement aims at a deliberate symmetry: Matthew, with head bent,
seems lost in thought, Mark and
Luke are writing, John looks attentively into distance. Matthew is old,
Mark and Luke are middle-aged,
John has white hair and beard.
Matthew is sitting in a large roundbacked chair beside a low table
with writing implements and with
65
Bianu (ed.), Evanghelia slavo-greac scris n mnstirea Neamului
din Moldova de Gavriil Monahul la 1429,
p. 2; my translation. The reproductions
also from Bianus work, pp. 2-10.
a higher desk, on which is unfolded

the parchment with the gospel
text: Mark and Luke are sitting on
slightly sloping backless benches
and holding on their knees the
parchment book or roll on which
they are writing; John is also sitting
in a broad round-backed chair, beside a marble pedestal which support a desk with a closed book. The
evangelists heads are circled with
haloes; beneath their feet they have
a little podium; their clothing consists of chiton and himation. Their
expressions are lively, their stature
is lofty, the draperies of their clothing are rich. An interesting detail:
the Apostle Luke wears a tonsure.
The architectural themes which
decorate the background of the
miniatures are fantastic. A portico
formed of 10 columns can be seen
in the portrait of Matthew, above
which rises a little church and four
towers. In the portrait of Mark one
observes a palace in front of which
there is a large baldachino supported on four thin porphyry columns.
Again a palace of a stranger type,
but one not unknown to Byzantine miniature, occupies the background of Lukes portrait, while the
palace which appears in Johns is of
a form not met with elsewhere.66
In the end of his thorough
description he concludes that the
decoration should be read, at least
partially, through a Byzantine key:
The model of the Oxford Gospels
was certainly borrowed direct from
Byzantium, the place from which
the Metropolitans of Moldavia at
this period came. The epitaphios
of the Metropolitan Macarius in
1428regarding which I shall refer
belowhas not only a Byzantine
model; its very inscription is in
Greek. Greek too is the inscription
66 Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminated Manuscript, pp. 464-465.
of the stole of Alexander the Good

but, as Iorga has shown, the name
of the Prince is quoted in its Rumanian form Alexandru, not in its
Greek form Alexandros.67
Turdeanu draws attention to the
fact that this type of representation of the evangelists is not found
either in Serbian or in Bulgarian
miniature, where, in the rare cases
where such portraits are depicted,
their representation is in the form
of small medallions enclosed in a
broad band of ornament.68 He has
problems in finding the source of
this type, as he has also in finding
the origin of the vignettes. They
consist in interlinked circles in various arrangements, loosely or closely
connected, with decorative details
some cut by diagonals. Turdeanu
concludes that the frontispieces belong to a broader tradition, already
noticeable in the manuscript copied
by Gavriil in 1424 Omiliile Sf.
Grigorie de Nazianz cu comentariile
Iui Nichita al Heracleii (1424) [The
Homilies of St Gregory the Nazianus, with commentaries by Nikitas
of Heraklea],69 and which was well
represented in Serbia. He points out
to an aspect of Ms. Canon. Gr. 122
which might surprise any researcher: even though written originally
in Old Slavonic of the Bulgarian
recension, in its iconography the
manuscript has more similarities
with Serbian rather than Bulgarian
incunabula: Vignettes, some identical, other similar, have been found
in Byzantine and Serbian manuscripts. On the other hand, it has
so far been impossible to establish
any interesting parallel with Bulgar67 Ibid., p. 465.
68 Ibid.
69 Omiliile Sf. Grigorie de Nazianz
cu comentariile Iui Nichita al Heracleii
(1424) [The Homilies of St Gregory the
Nazianus, with commentaries by Nikitas of
Heraklea],
33
even though he does this only once

and never repeats the idea.74 In a
work written shortly after the above
statement was made Iorga tempers
his affirmation and says that it
can only be suggested that monk
Gavriil could have learnt the skills
in miniature and ms illumination in
Byzantium: One should therefore
state Byzance as a source, without
been able to be more precise than
that.75
Vasile Drgu refers to the artistic works of that time in Moldova
(embroideries included, because
the painters made the cartoonspatterns for them), in the following
terms: Starting from iconographic
schemes of Byzantine tradition,
the Moldavian painters [] have
proven a real maturity in their
conception of the closed architecture forms, which are balanced
and calm, in which the internal
tensions allow themselves to be
controlled by a restrained solemnity. All these qualities are to be
found in the Tetraevangel of Princess Marina, the work of one of the
most important Romanian painters of the Middle Age, Gavril Uric,
monk and illuminator from Neam
Monastery. The son of a court
calligrapher, Gavril was himself
skilled in the technique, the proof
being the twelve manuscripts left
by him. Among them, the Tetraevangel accomplished in 1429 on the
order of the Princess is a veritable
70 Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminatmasterwork, pointing to an artistic
ed Manuscript, pp. 465. (Ibid Tur 465).
personality of undoubted original71
E. Ene D-Vasilescu, Inspiration
ity. It is interesting to notice that,
and innovation: orthodox art in Romaian art.70 This, in fact, should not
be a surprise since, in general, the
arts of the time especially the
architecture reflect the Serbian
influence in addition to that more
obvious Byzantine, and Turdeanu
emphasises that in his article. I have
mentioned elsewhere the influence
from the Serbian kingdom of the
fourteenth to fifteenth centuries
manifested in Romanian arts.71 Perhaps the correct statement would
be in this context to affirm a Byzantine influence manifested in Serbia,
and then spread to the Romanian
Principalities.
Jensen and Kauffmann also explain the manuscripts iconography
as being painted in the Byzantine
style. Furthermore, they affirm
that this is to be expected since the
principalities to the North of the
Danube were in the area of Byzantine influence: Moldavia (which
joined Walachia to form the state of
Romania in 1859) was an independent principality at this period; but
Byzantine influence continued in
all types of artistic production, and
is evident here in the Evangelist
portrait preceding each Gospel.72
Iorga and Bal also speak of Byzantine influence on the culture of
Romanian principalities in general.73 Iorga even mentions once Constantinople en passant and with no
proofs as the place where Gavriil
Uric would have been educated,
nian lands in the fourteenth and fifteenth

centuries, Proceedings of the 21st International Congress of Byzantine Studies, vol. 3,
Aldershote/London 2006, pp. 277-278.
72
Jensen and Kauffmann, A Continental Shelf, catalogue entry 37 (classified
as Slavonic Gospel, Neamtu, Moldavia,
1429), p. 96.
73
Iorga and Bal, Histoire de lart
roumaine ancient, p. 317.
74
Iorga, In jurul pomenirii lui
Alexandru cel Bun, Analele Academiei
Romane, Mem. Secia Istorie, Series lll, vol.
13, Bucharest, 1932-1933, p. 182.
75
It faut donc retenir comme source
Byzance, sans pouvoir prciser. Iorga, Les
artes mineurs en Roumanie, Bucharest
1934, pp. 47-48; my translation, his emphasis.
even though the objects under

discussion are illuminated works,
the conception behind the images
is rather one of a monumental
painter. Covering in its entirety
the guard page (the page preceding each of the four gospels), the
miniatures represent the Evangelists in inspirational moments of
writing the Biblical texts, seated
in the middle of an architectonic
environment, at a desk. The iconographic models forming the basis
of Gavril Urics work are, obviously,
Byzantine from the Palaeologan
epoch. But the Romanian artist has
managed to escape the constraints
of canons, by ordering the decorative elements within a harmonious
composition lacking the traditional
Byzantine rigidity and lending
to the figures a noble serenity. In
spite of their small sizes, Urics
miniatures show some characteristics which are usually present in
monumental works, forshadowing
the impressive achievements of the
Moldavian mural painters from
the epoch of Stephen the Great, to
which they will serve as a valuable
and respected model.76
The website of the Romanian
Orthodox Church references thirteen manuscripts written by Uric
in Slavonic77 as having survived
76 V. Drgu (illustrations Petre
Lupan), Pictura mural din Moldova. Sec.
XV-XVl, Bucureti 1982, p. 8; my translation. The spelling in this text follows the
pre-1989 linguistic rules regarding the
usage of letters and a.
77 These 13 manuscripts are as follows: The Tetraevangel from1429, another
Tetraevangel without illuminations (1436),
three Mineia (probably the series was
complete); a Sbornic, containing sixteen
Sermons of St. Grigory of Nazianzum and
St John of Sinais Ladder (1413, today in
Moscow); The Homilies of St. Grigory of
Nazianzum with the commentaries of Nichitas of Heraclea (1424); another Sbornic,
containing The Sermons of St John Christostomous and other Patristic texts (no date),
34
and others being merely attributed

to him, their paternity being questionable. Most of them are in the
Library of the Romanian Academy
of Science; a Sbornic containing
Sixteen Sermons by St. Grigory of
Nazianzum and St. John from Sinais
Ladder, (1413) is now in Moscow,
and one of his Gospels (1436) is in
the Museum of Neam Monastery.
Together with other works,
Maria Ana Musicescu makes Urics
manuscript representative for the
Moldavian culture of the fifteenth
century: The embroideries which
illustrate scenes from the cycle of
the feasts, the pitaphisi from 1428
and 1437, or even more the Tetravangel written and illuminated by
Gavril Uric in the Monastery of
Neamt, are typical works, not only
as representing the area of art they
belong to, but also of the culture of
Moldavia in general. They demonstrate a high degree of technical
and artistic skill. The figurative and
decorative repertoire, the straight
lines and the chromatic combinations, the proportion between the
main composition and its background constitutes a true artistic
achievement. Its fundamentals
come both from the organic integration of various contributions
from the worlds of the East, Byzantium, and the West, and from
the cultural milieu, sensibility and
requirements of the Moldavian
society. This is the basis on which
the first phase of the classical style
of the Moldavian art in the Middle
Ages developed.78
two more Sbornic books containing the
lives of some saints and sermons (1439 and
1441); The Jewels [Mrgritarele] of St. John
Christostomous (1443), The ascetic writings
of St. Basil the Great (1444), and St Johns of
Sinais Ladder (1446); http://biserica.org
78 Ltoles brodes de scnes illustrant le cycle des ftes, les pitaphes de
1428 et de 1437, ou encore le ttravangile
crit et nlumine en 1429 par Gavril Uric
Other researchers share the view

that the illustrations in the Ms.
Canon. Gr. 122 are of Byzantine
influence. In his The Illuminated
Book: Its History and Production,
David Diringer describes fragments from Urics manuscript in
the following terms: Fig ll 30
represents the Evangelist Mark
(fol. 89v) and Luke (fol. 144v) and
the initial pages of their Gospels
[as they appear] in a beautiful
Slavonic-Greek Gospel-book of the
Bodleian Library (Ms. Canon. Gr.
122).79 He makes this affirmation

in the context in which he states
the Romanians connections with
Byzantium: Although most of her
art and culture came only indirectly from Byzantium, Romania
may nevertheless be considered to
be culturally within the Byzantine
orbit.80 (Actually in his The Handproduced book written earlier (1953)
Diringer had mistakenly taken as
and named St Mark a Late Byzantine scribe.81) Also Bianu puts
forward the hypothesis of a Byzantine common source for all the
au convnt de Neamt sous des oeuvres typiques non seulement de lart qui a prsid arts in the Romanian lands in his
study on the Slav-Greek Evangel
leur excution, mais aussi de la culture de
la Moldavie in gnral. Elles temoignent
(Evanghelia Slavo-Greac) writdun haut degr dhabilet technique et
ten in Neam.82 In spite of this fact
de maitrise artistique. Rpertoire figuratif
he thinks that one can recognise
et dcoratif, tracs lineaires et accords
a style similar to that of the Italchromatiques, rapport entre composition
et found constituaient tout autant des rali- ian primitives in the manner in
sation dont la russite sur le plan artistique which the Evangelists are depicted
impliquait lintegration organique des
in the 1429 manuscript. Then he
diffrentes apports du monde de lOriattempted to suggest that this is
ent, de Byzance, de lOccident, au fonds
culturel, la sensibilit et aux exigencies de the case based on the fact that
Romanian principalities received
la socit moldave. Cest ainsi que furent
consolides les assises sur lesquelles allait
direct and indirect cultural influslever et se parachever, dans la deuxieme
ence from Italy from time to time
moiti du XVe sicle, la prmiere tape du
throughout the countrys history
style classique de lart moldave au moyand, in his opinion, that this was
en ge. M. A. Musicescu (illustration S.
the case in the beginning of the 15th
Ulea), Vorone, Bucharest 1971, p. 6; my
translation from French. I have not found
century. Nevertheless, by the end
any documentation for an epitaphios of
of his article he doubts the prove1437. Musicescu might refer to a epitranience of the Italian influences and
chelion mentioned by Turdeanu in The
just mentions the fact that the arts
Oldest manuscript, p. 459. But what
in the Romanian lands, as in other
Turdeanu says even about this epitrachelion is that it dates from the same period
country from Balkans and even in
with the above-mentioned epitaphios; it
Italy itself, have the same common
might mean the year 1437, but not compulsory. See more in Iorga, Patriarhirul
lui Alexandru cel Bun. Cel dinti chip de
Domn romn, Analele Academiei Romne,
Memoriile sectiunii istorice, s. ll, vol. 35,
Bucharest 1913, pp. 343-346, with a plate
and Domnii romni, dup portrete i fresce
contemporane, Sibiu 1929, Pl. 10; G. Millet,
Broderies religieusse de style byzantin, album, fasc. l, Paris, 1939, Pl. Vlll; Turdeanu,
La broderie religieuse en Roumanie, ll
and Les toles des XV et XVle sicles, in
Buletinul Institutului Romn din Sofia, vol.
l, no. 1, Bucharest 1941, pp. 7-12.
79 D. Diringer, The Illuminated

Book: Its History and Production, Faber
and Faber, London, 1958, p. 120.
80 Ibid., p. 119.
81
Diringer, The Hand-produced
Book, London, New York, Toronto, Melbourne, Sydney, Cape Town 1953, Fig. Xl-6,
p. 558.
82
Bianu, Evanghelia Slavo-Greac
scris n Mnstirea Neamului din Moldova de Gavriil Monahul la 1429. Bibl.
Bodleian, Oxford: Cod. Can. Graeci 122,
Bucharest 1922, p. 2.
35
Byzantine source.
The culture in Moldavia flourished during the long reign (14001432) of Alexandru cel Bun [the
Kind] and the year 1429, when
Urics Gospel was written, was
one of the most fruitful. Princess
Marina, Alexandrus last wife, a
daughter of a local boyar (Marin)83
became the patroness of arts and
with a Greek Metropolitan, Macarius, a new wave of Byzantine influence manifested itself in the country. In addition to the manuscript
in Oxford today, as shown sabove,
more objects from that time have
survived. They not only reflect the
imperial artistic influence on them
that was still strong, but the fact
that, in their turn, they influenced
the evolution of miniature and
religious embroidery during the fifteenth through sixteenth centuries.
Drgu makes known the historical
context which made possible the
production of such objects: The
thirteenth century witnessed a
strong proliferation of the pre-state
formations having the necessary
means to live a luxury life obviously only for the upper strata of
the society a life in which the
showing off of clothes and jewellery was not a rarity. They were also
a proof of political connections
and commercial exchanges with
the Byzantine centres within the
83
M. Costchescu, Documentele
Moldoveneti nainte de tefan cel Mare,
Fundaiunea Regele Ferdinand l. Viaa
Romneasc, Iai, 1931, vol. 1. Documente
interne, 1374 1437 [Internal documents,
1374-1437], p. 296. Costchescu mentions
as sources for identifying this wife of
Alexandru the Kind: The list of names
(pomelnic) from Bistria Monastery where
the princess appears as Maria (Tocilescu,
Analele Academiei Romne, seria 2, vol. 18,
1896, p. 65) and the Chronicle (letopise)
from the same monastery, where she is
called Marina (I. Bogdan, Cronice inedite,
p. 35).
Danube-Pontic area, as well as the

artistic centres in the Ukraine, in
Russia or Hungary.84 He also refers
particularly to embroidery: Indeed, beyond the embroidery technique itself, one has to take into
consideration the clear and precise compositions, the supple and
elegant designs, and the chromatic
harmonies of a rare nobility.85
In this context it is worth mentioning that Gavril Uric made many
contributions to the cultural flowering of the time. He copied the book
of ascetic writings mentioned above
the collection from the Sermons
of Gregory the Theologian in 1424
and, as shown, other works
dating from before and after the
manuscript preserved today in the
Bodleian Library. The Gospel he
copied in 1436 (that which is now
in Neam) has decorations in the
style of the 1429 Ms., but with no
illuminations. He copied his third
Gospel in the year 1447, when the
first school of Slavonic scribes he
founded closed.86 This school was
to function again during Stephen
the Great time (1457-1504) through
direct and indirect disciples of
Gavril, as will be shown further.
My initial view on the issue of
iconography in the Moldavian
Tetraevangheliar of 1429 was that
this could be of Byzantine style
belonging to the Palaeologan
artistic phase. It looks similar to
the Serbian manuscript decoration.
This makes sense that the artistic
life from the neighbour country
would have influenced the Romanian principalities, because the
Serbian Kingdom [] adopted the
Palaeologan style as early as 1321
84 Drgu, Pictura mural, p. 6;
my translation.
85
Ibid., p. 8; my translation.
86 Turdeanu, The Oldest manuscript, p. 459.
(in Graanica Monastery.)87 This

would not be the only case when
the Serbian influence was present
north of the Danube.
However, Bianus argument for
the influence of the Italian primitives on Urics iconography in this
1429 book has some basis. In the
manuscript there are some common elements especially architectural with those in Giottos
paintings (ca. 1267-1337). Also, the
fact that St Luke the Apostle has a
tonsure in the Catholic fashion can
strengthen an impression along
these lines. On the other hand,
there are further similar examples
of such paradoxes later in history.
For example, in Anastasie Crimcas
Gospel, decorated in 1616/1617 by
the painter tefan from the town of
Suceava (and probably meant for
the monastery of Krehiv in Ruthenia, which it never reached), one
of the illustrations representing an
Apostle looks even more conservative than Urics Gospel in spite of
the fact that Crimcas manuscript
was written about two hundred
years later. So here the apparent
temporal discrepancy between the
illustration and the text goes in the
opposite direction.
Crimca was the Metropolitan of
Moldavia from 1608-1617 and 16191629; his Gospel manuscript existed
for long time in the Old University
Library in Lvov (I AZ) and is now
in the National Library in Warsaw
(Akc. 10778) with some of its
illuminated folios in Vienna (Cod.
Slav. 6). 88
87 Ene D-Vasilescu, Inspiration and
innovation, p. 278.
88 C. Costea, Une nouvelle replique
slavonne du Paris gr. 74: seven decades
after, in Series Byzantina, vol. 1, Wydawnictwo Neriton, Warsaw 2003, p. 114;
Turdeanu, Mtropolite Anastase Crimca
et son oeuvre littraire et artistique (16081629), in: tudes de littrature roumaine
et dcrits slaves et grecs des Principauts
36
Figure 1a. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci. 122, fol.7r

first page of the Gospel of Matthew
Figure 1b. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci. 122, fol.90r
first page of the Gospel of Mark
N.B. All color plates of the Oxford: Bodleian Ms.

Canon. Graeci. 122 are from I. Bianu 1922
37
Figure 1c. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci. 122,

fol.145r first page of the Gospel of Luke
Figure 2a. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci.

122, fol.6v illumination of the Evangelist
Matthew
Figure 1d. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci.

122, fol.236r first page of the Gospel of John
Figure 2b. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci.

122, fol.89v illumination of the Evangelist Mark
38
Figure 2c. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci.

122, fol.144v illumination of the Evangelist Luke
Figure 2d. Oxford: Bodleian Ms. Canon. Graeci.

122, fol.235v illumination of the Evangelist John

122 page showing secondary ornamentation
and initials

122 last page of the manuscript, with colophon
39
the question of languages in

ms. canon. graeci. 122
The Greek text
here has been an ongoing
debate in literature about the
dating of the Greek text in Urics
Gospel. Turdeanus opinion on
this issue is in agreement with his
position regarding the arrival of
the manuscript in Venice, being
brought there by travellers. He
thinks that the Greek text may
have been copied at Venice, where
there was a strong community and
where, starting from the end of the
15th century, countless books were
printed in Greek.89 Even today
a Greek Institute exists in Venice
(The Greek Institute of Hellenic
Culture), but it does not seem that
Roumaines, Leiden 1985, p. 232 (first published in 1952); apparently the first source
to mention the monastery of Krehiv as the
destination of the codex is M. Sokolowski,
Sztuka cerkiewna na Rusi i na Bukovinie
in: Kwartalnik historyczny, vol. 3, 1889, pp.
and Revue Roumaine

dhistoire de lart, vol. 38, Bucharest 2001, pp. 3-17.
See also Der Nersessian,
Two Slavonic Parallels of the
Greek Tetraevangelia; Paris
gr. 74, pp. 222-274; idem, Une
nouvelle rplique slavonne du
Paris gr. 74 et les manuscrits
dAnastase Crimcovici [in]
Mlanges offerts M. Nicolas
Iorga par ses amis de France et
des pays de langue franaise,
Paris 1933, pp. 695-725.
629-630,
Vienna source was indicated to me

by Waldemar Deluga, Professor in the
Department of History of Byzantine and
Post-Byzantine Art at the Cardinal Stefan
Wyszyski University in Warsaw who
sent me also the illustrations, for which I
am grateful; e-mail correspondence of 6
December 2008.
89 Turdeanu, The Oldest, p. 464.
the Greek community in Venice

would have had a special need for
a Gospel written in Old Slavonic
in Moldavia, especially one with a
margin too small for a second text.
Unless a very stringent need as
for example, a liturgical one
prompted this writing, the Greeks
would have not have hand-written
this text (and, moreover, this is not
a printed book).
In the context in which D. P.
Bogdan states the presence of other
Romanian-Slavonic palaeographical sources in various libraries in
Slavic and Western countries (he
mentions especially the libraries
in Paris, Vienna, Berlin, Dresden,
Leipzig, Munich, and Oxford),90
and brings a new element into
discussion regarding the history of
the Ms. Canon. Gr. 122. This element has a connection with the
Greek text in Urics Gospel. Bogdan
states that before being bought by
antiquarians from Venice the 1429
Tetraevangel was kept in Zographos
Monastery on Mount Athos. This
is what he affirms echoing also the
appreciation Turdeanu made with
regard to this manuscript: The
Tetraevangeliar from 1429, written on parchment, one of the most
remarkable art manuscripts in the
entire Slavic literature of the Middle
Ages, some time ago at Zographos,
today is in the Bodleian Library,
University of Oxford (Cod. Canonici Graeci, 122).91
Turdeanu explains how the
manuscript went to the monastery
on Mount Athos, and also dates
90 D. Bogdan, Compendiu al paleografiei romano-slave, [s. n], vol. 1, Bucharest 1969, p. 38. He also mentions Uric on
p. 67 as being the first to introduce the socalled literary minuscule [letter] in one
of his colophons (in Codice 164 written in
Moldavia, now in the Library of the Romanian Academy of Science in Bucharest).
91
D. Bogdan, Paleografia romnoslav p. 105.
the Greek text in accordance with

the following facts: On the 30
January 1698, when the Moldavian
ruler Antioh Cantemir dedicated
Cpriana to Zographos Monastery,
the Gospel of Uric dated 13 March
1429 was in Cpriana. This monastery was in Lpuna county, Orhei
district (in Moldavia beyond the
Prut River, not far from todays
Chiinu city). The Tetraevangel
was there together with the document through which Alexandru
cel Bun (the Kind) gives Cpriana
Monastery and some villages to
his wife, Marina. This document
was also issued in 1429, but on 10
February (see its reproduction at
the beginning of this text).92 Both
92 M. Costchescu, Document 91.
[Suceava. 1429 Fevruarie 10. Alexandru
Voevod druiete soiei sale, Cneaghina
Marena [Marina], mnstirea la Vinev,
unde este egumen Chiprian [], i satul
Calinoui, unde este Golovca, i prisaca
la Botne din vrful Cunilei, Brneti i
endreti i Prijolteani i Glvani. Se
arat hotarele. The transaltion of the text
is as follows: [Suceava. 1429 February 10.
Alexandru the Prince offers as a gift to his
wife, the Princess Marena [Marina], the
monastery at Vinev, where Ciprian is
the abbot, and the village Calinoui, where
Golovca is, and the apiary Botne from the
Cunila hill, [the villages] Brneti and endreti and Prijolteani and Glvani. The
borders are shown.], Documentele Moldoveneti nainte de tefan cel Mare, Viaa
Romneasc, Iai, 1931, vol. 1, pp. 248-253.
Costchescu shows, on pp. 251-252, that
mnstirea la Vinev [Monastery at
Vinev] was called Cpriana Monastery
in 1931, and he tries to identify all the other
places mentioned in the donation document (which is called uric in Old Romanian).
As regarding why and how the name of
Cpriana Monastery evolved, see also p.
140 in Documentele Moldoveneti from
being the monastery of the monk Ciprian
or Chiprian - who was already settled
there before 1420; the local popular language named the village and the monastery Chiprieni (and they shortened and
derived the name Cpriana for the monastery only). See also tefan Gr. Berechet,
40
the Gospel written by Uric and the

document to Marina were taken
to Zographos on the occasion of
Cpriana been dedicated to this
Athonite monastery. Costchescu
shows that in 1931, when he published his collection of documents,
the parchment with Alexandrus
donation act was in Zographos
Monastery [where it probably still
is].93 Syrku believes that the Greek
text that exists along with the Slavonic one within Ms. 122 was also
copied in Moldova. He thinks that
it happened during the Fanariot
regime installed by the Turks in the
Romanian principalities between
1711-1821, on the orders of one of
the rulers of the time.94
Bogdan assumes, very plausibly,
that the Greek in Urics manuscript
might have been written about the
end of the XVll century, after it
reached Mount Athos95 (the realisation that the Greek text was added
more recently than the Slavonic
explains why it has been categorised as a Greek manuscript by the
Bodleian Library we find it as
the Codex Cononici Graecus 122 and
not Slavicus 122). Coxe also thought
that the Greek text is more recent
than the Slavonic one and believed
Mnstirea Cpriana, Chiinu, 1928, p. 12.

93
Costchescu, idem, p. 251. A copy
of this document is in the library of the
Romanian Academy, Ms. 126, donated by I.
Bogdan who made this copy after a photograph taken by S. Nicolaescu. Costchescu
says that Uricaru made a wrong summary
of this document in (17, p. 102).
94 Syrku, Zametki o slavyannskikh
i russkikh rukopisyakh, p. 328.
95
D. P. Bogdan, Quelque
tmoignages des liens roumanogrecs sous la rgne dtienne le
Grand, prince de Moldavie, in:
Bulletin, vol. 5, nos 1-2, Association
internationale dtudes du Sud-Est
Europene 1967, p. 123; also in:
Paleografia romno-slav, p. 105,
footnote 36.
the Greek text to have been written

independently from the Slavonic.
Also Jensen and Kauffman affirm how The parallel Greek text
was added in the margins in the
late sixteenth or early seventeenth
century.96
In his continuation of the above
description of Urics manuscript
Cox shows that: The titles of the
chapters of this (Four-)Gospel, the
[Theophylactus] arguments and
the painted illustrations, as well
as the Greek version of the Gospel
hand-written on the margins of
the manuscript, are more recent
[than the Slav original]. The Table
of Contents, the Synaxarion, the
Menologion, and the other parts
are original.97 M. Vogel and V.
96 Jensen and Kauffman, A Continental Shelf, catalogue entry 37, p. 96.
97 The original translated by Cox
from Latin is as follows: Evangelia quatuor, titulis capitum, Theophylacti argumentis, et imaginibus Evangeliarum pictis
illustrata, necnon versione Graeca, quoad
evangelia, in margine manu recentiori
scripta. Subjiciuntur, Synaxarium, Menologium, et alia ejusdem generis. Cox,
Bodleian Library Quarto Catalogues, col.
105. Then the text continues, Cox has not
translated all of it, but we will include here
a translation of the entire text on p. 313 of
Ms. Canon. Graeci. 122: Praemissa est
notitia de codice, Italice scripta, quae incipit Levangelio in lingua Illirica fu scritto in
Moldovalachia per ordine della principessa
Moglie di Alessandro lanno 6637 [1429,
13 Marzo, da un certo Gabriele Monaco.
Adnectictur unicuique evangelio subscription, cujus initium subjungimus, manus in
linguam Italicam ita traduxit: Colla benedizione del Padre, dottrina dell Figliuolo,
e perfezione della Spirito Santo. Si e fatto
questo tetro-vangelio nel tempo dellortodosso e divoto padrone Gio Alessandro
Vajuodo (Pallatino) padrone di tutta la terra Moldavo-Valaca, e della fedele sua moglie Marina, la quale accesa damore delle
parole di Cristo, sollecitamente ha voluto
che sia scritto. Anno 929 (sic!) compito
nel mese di Marzo il giorno 13, colla mano
di Gabrielle Monaco, filio di Uricova, il
quale scrissa nella citta di Vanimesce. The
translation of the second part of the text is
Gardthausen, after mentioning

Gabriel, Monaco, figlio di Uricova as the author of the Slavonic
text, affirm that the Greek margin
translation is much later (seventeenth cent.).98
Bogdans explanation on a
seventeenth-century authorship of
Ms. 122 by the monks in Zographos
is consistent with that given by Turdeanu who tries at length to prove
that after a period in which scholars
like Syrku99 and himself believed that the Greek text was written by monk Gavriil at the same
time with the Slavonic original;100
now there is an agreement that it
was written later than the original.
Turdeanu changed his view after
as follows: The Preface is a hand written
note in the Italian language which begins
with: The Evangel in lingua Illirica was
written in Moldovlahia on the orders of
Princess Marina, the wife of Alexander, in
6637 [1429], 13 March, be a certain Gabriel
the Monk. To each Gospel an annotation
is attached, of which beginning we include
below; an unknown hand has translated
this text in Italian: With the blessing of
the Father, the teaching of the Son, and the
fulfilment (perfection) of the Holy Spirit
this Four Gospel book was written during
[the reign] of the devoted Orthodox ruling
Prince Alexandru Voievode, the Master
of all the land of Moldo-Vlachia, and of
his wife Marina. Their love for the word of
Christ made them ask for this writing to
be done. In the year 6937 (i.e. 1429); finished on the 13th of March, by the hand of
Gabriel, the son of Uric, in the monastery
of Neamu. The Tetraevangel Manuscript;
later adding [p. 313]. Dr Marian Ciucs
translation of this footnote. According to
Cleminson, Theophilactus was the Archbishop of Bulgaria at that time.
98 M. Vogel and V. Gardthausen,
Die griechischen Schreiber, p. 441.
99 P. A. Syrku (spelled also as Sirku
and Sircu in various sources), Zametki o
slavyannskikh i russkikh rukopisyakh v
Bodleian Library v Oksforde, in: Isvestia
otdelenia rucckogo iazika I clobecnosti, v.
7, no. 4, St Petersburg 1902, pp. 325-345,
especially p. 328.
100 Turdeanu, The Oldest Manuscript, pp. 460-464.
41
seeing Urics manuscript in the

library. A bibliographical note from
the Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 1952
draws attention to Turdeanus latest
position.101
To a possible objection that the
Liturgy in Zographos was (and still
is) held in Slavonic, being a Bulgarian monastery, one can answer that
on Mount Athos each monastery
has always had an ethnically mixed
community. This statement is especially true for the sixteenth through
eighteenth centuries, when it is
very likely that Greek monks lived
in Zographos alongside Bulgarians
and possibly others also. The Right
Rev Dr Kallistos Ware, Lecturer in
Orthodox Eastern Christianity at
the Faculty of Theology, University
of Oxford between 1966-2001, who
spent extensive periods of time on
Mount Athos, affirms that this was
the case in the respective places
during the period under discussion. He said that in the sixteenth
through eighteenth centuries the
ethnicity of the monks on Mount
Athos, as also on Patmos (the
monastery of his repentance) was
not very important.102 Even now,
in Zographos library there are 126
Greek manuscripts and 388 Slavonic and the monks who used to live
in that monastery until 1845 were
Bulgarians, Greeks and Serbians.103
Therefore, it is probable that, when
the Gospel written by Gavriil Uric
reached Zographos, the monks
there added the Greek text for their
spiritual needs, as most researchers
seem to agree.
Turdeanu appreciates that: For
the Byzantinologist, it [Ms. Conon101 Byzantinische Zeitschrift, Stuttgart 1952, v. XLX, p. 135.
102 Personal conversation, June
2009.
103 The 10th Ephorate of Byzantine
Antiquities website, Mount Athos, Prefecture of Halkidiki.
ici Graecus 122] poses the question

of the provenance of the Greek text,
just as for the historian of the art
of S.E. Europe it raises the problem
of the relations between Moldavian
miniature painting and the different Balkan sections of Byzantine
miniature painting.104 His arguments against the writing of the
both texts at the same time refer,
among others, to the linguistic
and also calligraphic aspects: The
Slavonic part is copied in semiuncials, large and precisely traced,
so that they appear printed, while
the Greek part is copied in a cursive
script, minute and with ligatures;105
and The Slavonic text, copied in
large semiuncials characteristic of
the Moldavian scribes fills twothird of the page, while the Greek
text, copied in a very small cursive
hand, forms a narrower and taller
column.106 The researcher has in
view that: While the Slavonic text
occupies a column 20 cm. high and
13 cm. wide, the Greek column is as
narrow as 5 1/2 cm and sometimes
even 5 cm.; on the other
hand it is 21 cm. high and has
in general 30 lines. Now if we add
to the width of the Greek text
the white space which separates
it from the Slavonic text on the
other hand and from the edge of
the parchment on the other, we
obtain precisely the width of the
white space on the lower edge of
the leaf. (The upper edge is usually
4 cm. and includes the line with
liturgical indications.) In other
words, the copyist of the Slavonic
text left a margin of 7 cm. both on
the outer edge of the book and also
at the bottom of each page. Then
another copyist used this free space
to transcribe the Greek text and
104 Turdeanu, The Oldest Illuminated Moldavian Manuscript, p. 456.
105 Ibid., p. 462.
106 Ibid.
in this way to adapt the beautiful

manuscript for believers of a different liturgical language rather than
for those for whom it was originally
intended. The Slavonic copyist did
not foresee the proximity of the
Greek text. Therefore, whenever
he had a correction to make to his
text, he did not hesitate to make it
on the margin of the page, making
free use of the empty space.107
Turdeanu concludes that the
very disproportion between the
Slavonic column and the Greek
shows that the copyist of the first
text did not think of reserving sufficient space for the second one.108
In the same place, Turdeanu even
tries to prove that Gavriil did not
know Greek, but his arguments
on this topic are not convincing
enough.109 Another argument is the
fact that it is known that no manuscript was copied in the Rumanian
lands during the period in question in both languages. And not
only in Moldova or Wallachia; not
even among Serbs and Bulgarians,
who were more closely linked with
the culture of the Byzantium, was
any religious manuscript copied
in Greek and at the same time in
Serbian or Bulgarian.110
Dr. Christos Simelidis, a British
Academy Fellow at the Ioannou
Centre for Classics and Byzantine
Studies in Oxford, and also Nigel
Wilson from Lincoln College (who
was consulted by Simelidis as his
mentor) appreciate, as did Bogdan
and Turdeanu earlier in the twentieth century, that the version of the
Greek text (i.e. the choice of variant
readings) used in this manuscript
conforms to the editorial conventions concerning the Bible that
prevailed in the Byzantine period.
107
108
109
110
Ibid., p. 461; my emphasis.

Ibid. p. 462.
Ibid. 456.
Ibid. p. 462.
42
The 14th Century Church of Neam

Monastery, beautiful example of
Moldavian architecture
It is also independent from the

Slavonic text and is not a translation of it.111 They also believe that
it could belong to the sixteenth or
seventeenth century, the later date
being in accordance with Bogdan,
Turdeanu, and also M. Vogel and
V. Gardthausens opinions.112 Simelidis conclusion on the Greek text
in Ms. Canon. Gr. 122 is summarized as follows: It is definitely the
Byzantine-type text, but I cant say
anything more. It also seems []
thatthe Greek text was copied from
a medieval manuscript and not
from a printed edition of the textus
receptus. The text was not copied
very carefully. There are omissions.
In some cases the text omitted has
been supplemented later (see e.g.
p. 34, l. 4). But elsewhere this is
not the case. E.g. in John 6.64
... has beenomitted
(by saut du mme au mme: - )
and not supplemented.The samein
John 6.69: is also missing.
I have nothing more to say about
the handwriting of the Greek text.
Itcould be dated to the 15th or 16th
centuries, but it could also be later
111 Christos Simelidis, e-mail correspondence in December 2008.
112 Marie Vogel and Victor Gardthausen, Die griechischen Schreiber des
Mittelalters und der Renaissance [The
Greek Scribes in Middle Ages and Renaissance], Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig, 1909.
(17th c.) [].113

The fact that Simelidis considers the Greek versions a copy
of another manuscript and not
of a printed text could mean
that the Greek text is actually a
translation of the Slavonic text,
but it was not enough space to
write the two texts in parallel
on the same page. So the scribe
wrote in Greek wherever he
found the necessary space. Therefore, they were two independent
texts in the sense that they were
written at different times by two
different authors.
The well-argued and logical
conclusions of all above-mentioned
specialists close the discussions
which took place in literature regarding whether or not the Greek
text was written at the same time
with the Slavonic original and
whether the Greek is an independent text from the Slavonic. The
texts were written independently
and the Greek in Ms. Canon. Gr.
122 is of the type which is still used
today in the Orthodox Church.114
until the moment when a sufficiently large number of gospel texts

pertaining to the last period of the
flowering of Bulgarian literature
has been published.116 In the 40
years which have passed since that
statement was made enough Gospel
manuscripts have been published
in order for the researchers to try to
find out more about Ms. 122 Canon.
Gr. by comparing it with Bulgarian
sources of the fourteenth century.
Turdeanus opinion that this
Tetraevangel is of interest for the
historian of Slavonic religious literature because it is typical of the
period of the first Middle Bulgarian texts copied in the Danubian
principalities.117 I have proposed
the project of mounting this manuscript on the University of Oxford
website via The Bodleian Library.
If this project succeeds the specialists working on similar documents
anywhere in the world will have the
chance to compare it with any of
the others.
In 1951 Turdeanu indicates the

fact that The orthography of the
manuscript is characterised by
the confusion of the nasals and
, a phenomenon which appears
particularly in the Slavo-Bulgarian
texts of the end of the fourteenth
century. The original of Ms. Canonici Gr. 122, or rather the archetype of the family of which it forms
part will therefore has to be sought
in the Bulgarian literature of the
preceding century.115 At that time
he considered that the investigation will not however be possible
113 Simelidis, the correspondence on

the 1 April, 2009.
114 Simelidis, the correspondence of
December 2008.
115 Turdeanu, The Oldest Manuscript, p. 460.
the role of ms. canon. gr. 122

as model for other mss. of the
same epoch
n Dragnevs opinion, expressed

when referring to manuscripts
from outside the Parisian group,
Uric models of tetraevangels
and, in general, the models of the
fifteenth century Neam school
display a relative homogeneity.118
Turdeanu concurs in Les letters
116 Ibid.
117 Turdeanu, The Oldest Manuscript, p. 456.
118 Emil Dragnev, O capodoper a
miniaturii din Moldova medieval: Tetraevanghelul de la Elizavetgrad i manuscrisele
grupului Parisinus Graecus 74, Civitas,
Chiinu, 2004, p. 169. The Parisian group
of manuscripts refers to a collection of
mediaeval Greek manuscripts of which the
archetype (sec. Vlll AD) is in the Bibliotheca Vaticanae.
43
slaves.119 Dragnev emphasises this

with regard to documents from the
second half of the fifteenth century,
but I believe that it can be also said
about some earlier manuscripts
written in the same geographical area. Dragnev states that those
model-manuscripts with entrlaces
on their frontispieces and the representation of the four evangelists
have become a business card for
the Moldavian illumination crafts
in the epoch of Stephen the Great.
The representation of the evangelists follows the famous model
in Oxford from the iconographic
point of view with the exception
of one of the three manuscripts
illuminated by Tudor Mriescu
(that from Munich from 1493),
where Prohorus is depicted besides
St John (after which similar replicas
followed).120
D. P. Bogdan compares Ms. Canon. Gr. 122 with some subsequent
ones, such as the illuminated FourGospel Book from 1493 mentioned
above and preserved today in the
National Library in Munich. The
latter was written on parchment
by the deacon Teodor Mriescu,
also in the scriptorium of Neam
Monastery on the order of Stephen
the Great for the Church of the
Dormition of the Mother of God
in Hotin. It has an autograph of the
Metropolitan Petru Movil (Peter
Mohyla), which makes it even more
precious.121 Iorga compares the
illuminations from this 1493 manuscript with those of another Gospel
written in 1473 for the Monastery
of Humor and with another one
finished in 1502 on the order of the
119 Turdeanu, Les letters slaves en
Moldavie.
120 Dragnev, O capodoper a miniaturii din Moldova medieval;my translation.
121 Bogdan, Paleografia romnoslav, p. 109.
same ruler (today in the National

Library in Vienna) and with the
manuscript in the Bodleian Library. His conclusion is that only
the Gospel from 1473 and 1502 belong to Gavriil Urics school.122 That
was also Bogdans conclusion.123
Popescu-Vlcea strongly supports
this view when he affirms that in
the Romanian lands the preoccupation with art and culture in general
through decorating and illuminating manuscripts arose in the
beginning of the fifteenth century
in the calligraphy and decorating of
cult manuscripts: the Tetraevangel
of 1429, by the artistic genius Gavril
Uric, followed by the works of his
famous fellow craftsmen: Paladie
and Spiridon from Putna, Nicodim
with his Tetraevangel of Stephen
the Great from Humor, Teodor
Mriescu from Neam, etc. Popescu-Vlceas statement strengthens
122
123
slav.
Iorga, AM, I, ll, p. 47.

Bogdan, Paleografia romno-
that of Turdeanu in appreciating

that, with the afore-mentioned exception from Munich, Mriescus
works follow the 1429 Gospel-book
model. Ulea agrees with the idea
that manuscripts from the second
half of the fifteenth century constitute models for those from Stephan
the Greats reign.124
The fact that the Gospel written in 1429, now in the Bodleian,
was a model for other manuscripts
and that many researchers take the
document in Oxford as a reference
in assessing the value of other Mss.
with a similar content illustrates its
importance. However, until now
the comparisons had been made
only against other manuscripts
produced in the Romanian lands,
but not against those written in
other countries. Moreover, these
comparisons were not made from
the point of view of the redaction
of the texts, a fact which has been
rectified by this article.
Another contribution of this
study is that we now have opinions
regarding Ms. Canon. Gr. 122 from
the most qualified specialists in the
world. Nevertheless, the discussion
on it is not closed. On the contrary,
if the manuscript is mounted on
the Bodleian Librarys website it
will be available for ongoing comparisons and analyses against other
Gospel manuscripts.
124 Ulea, Gavril Uric. Studiu paleografic
44
bibliography
Aland, K., Kurzgefasste Liste der
Griechischen der handschriften
des Neven Testaments, Walter de
Gruyter, Berlin, New York, 1994
, . . et al. (eds.),

, Saint-Petersburg, 1998,
pp. 15-16
American Library Color Slide Company, Early Christian and Byzantine
art: 200 AD-1400 AD, American
Library Color Slide, Co. New York,
1970
Anderson, J. C., An examination of two
twelfth-century centers of Byzantine
manuscript production, dissertation, Princeton University Press,
Princeton, N.J., 2 vols., 1976
Barnicot, J. D. A., The Slavonic MSS in
the Bodleian, vol. 1, no. 2, 1938
Berza, M. et al. (eds.), Documenta
Romaniae historica: Moldova,
Bucharest, 1971-cont., vol. 1, no. 21,
pp. 13-156
Bianu, I., Evanghelia slavo-greac
scris n mnstirea Neamului din
Moldova de Gavril Monahul la 1429
[Slavonic-Greek Gospel written
in Neam Monastery in Moldavia
by Gavril the Monk in 1429], in
Documente de art romneasc din
manuscripte vechi [Documents of
Romanian Art in Ancient Manuscripts], Bucharest, 1922
Bianu, I., Presentation to the first Congress of Byzantinology, Bucharest,
1924
Bogdan, D. P., Paleografia romnoslav [Romanian-Slavic Palaeography](Treatise and albume), Direcia
General a Arhivelor Statului,
Bucureti, 1978
Bogdan, D. P., Quelques tmoignages
des liens roumano-grecs sous la
rgne dtienne le Grand, prince de
Moldavie, in Bulletin V, nos. 1-2,
Association internationale dtudes
du Sud-Est Europen, 1967
Bogdan, I., Evangheliile dela Humor
i Vorone din 1473 i 1550, in
Analele Academiei Romne. Memoriile Seciunii istorice, s. ll, t. XXlX,
Bucharest, 1907
Buchthal, H., and Belting, H., Patronage in thirteenth-century Constantinople: An atelier of late Byzantine
book illumination and calligraphy,
Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies Washington, D.C.,
Trustees for Harvard University,
1978
Corrigan, K. A., The ninth century
Byzantine marginal psalters: Moscow, Historical Museum cod. 129,
Mt. Athos, Pantokrator 61, Paris,
Bibliotheque Nationale gr. 20, 1985
Cleminson, R., The Anne Pennington
Catalogue: A Union catalogue of
Cyrillic manuscripts in British and
Irish collections, School of Slavonic
and East European Studies, University of London, London, 1988,
242-244: cat. 158, with bibliogr.
leminson, R., Inaugural published
lecture The Serbian Manuscript
Heritage in the British Isles, University of Portsmouth, 2002
, .,
1429 .

,
in:
: , ,
, 4 vols., Sofia, 2005, vol. 4,
240-25 2
Costea, C., Une nouvelle replique
slavonne du Paris gr. 74: seven decades after, in Series Byzantina, vol.
1, Warsaw, 2003
Cox, H. O., Bodleian Library Quarto
Catalogues. Greek Manuscripts (reprinted with corrections from the
edition of 1853), Bodleian Library,
Oxford, 1969, cat. l, part ll, col. (The
original title of the catalogue was:
Catalogi codicum manuscriptorum
Bibliothecae Bodleianae pars prima
recensionem codicum Graecorum
continuens, Confecit Henricus O.
Coxe, A. M., Hypo-Bibliothecarus,
Oxonii: E Typographeo Academico,
MDCCCLIV)
Demny, L., nceputurile miniaturisticii romne, Magazin istoric, No 1
(46), 1971
Der Nersessian, S., Two Slavonic Par-
allels of the Greek Tetraevangelia:
The Art Bulletin,

v. 9, nr 3, 1927
Paris 74,
Der Nersessian, S., Manuscrits armniens illustrs des Xlle, Xllle et XlVe
sicles de la Bibliothque des Pres
Mkhitharistes de Venise, Foreward
by Gabriel Millet, E. de Boccard,
Paris, 1936, no. 143
Deletant, D. J., Slavonic Letters in
Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania from the Tenth to the Seventeenth Centuries, Slavonic and East
European Review, vol. 58, 1980, pp.
1-21
Dioscorides, P., & Pierpont Morgan
Library, De materia medica, Davis
Art Slides, Worcester, Mass. 1981
Dobrowsk, I., Institutiones linguae
slavicae dialecti veteris, Vienna,
(publisher ?), 1822
Drgu, V., (illustrations P. Lupan),
Pictura mural din Moldova. Sec.
XV-XVl, Meridiane, Bucureti, 1982
Corrigan, K. A.The ninth century
Byzantine marginal psalters: Moscow, Historical Museum cod. 129,
Mt. Athos, Pantokrator 61, Paris,
Bibliotheque Nationale gr. 20, 1985
De Wald, E. T., A. M. Friend, and K.
Weitzmann, & Princeton University, The Illustrations in the manuscripts of the Septuagint, Princeton
University Press, Princeton, 1941
Elian, A., Elemente de paleografie
greco-romn, in Documente privind istoria Romniei: Introducere,
2 vols., Bucharest, vol. 1, 1956, pp.
357-386
Ene D-Vasilescu, E., New Aspects
Regarding the Tetraevangelia Written by the Monk Gavril Uric in
Neam Monastery in 1429, Bodleian
Library MS. Canon. Graeci. 122,
Romanoslavica 46 (2010), pp. 83-114
Garzaniti, M., Die altslavische Version
der Evangelien: Forschungsgeschichte und zeitgenssische Forschung
(Co-logne, 2001), pp. 386-387
Gerstinger, H., & Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek. Die Wiener Genesis: Fabenlichtdruckfaksimile der
griechistchen bilderbibel aus dem
6. jahrhundert n. chr., cod. vindob.
45
theol. graec. 31, herausgegeben und

erlautert von Hans Gerstinger, Dr.
B. Filser, Wien, 1931
, . .,
: ,

, Saint-Petersburg,
1904, pp. 306-430
Iorga N. and G. Bal, Histoire de lart
roumaine ancient, E. de Boccard,
Paris, [publ. ?], 1922
Iorga, N., La figuration des vanglistes dans lart roumain et lcole
chypriote-valaque, in Buletinul
comisiunii monumentelor istorice,
XXVL, fasc. 75, Bucharest, 1933
Iorga, N., Ospii romeni in Venezia
(1570-1610), [Monitorul oficial i
imprimeriile statului. Imprimeria
naional], Bucharest, 1932
Jensen C. and M. Kauffmann, A Continental Shelf. Books across Europe
from Ptolemy to Don Quixote. An
exhibition to mark the re-opening
of the Bodleian Exhibition Room,
Bosch & Bodleian Library, Oxford,
1994
Laurent, V., Aux origines de lglise
moldave: Le mtropolite Jrmie et
lvque Joseph, Revue des tudes
byzantines vol. 5, 1947, pp. 158-170
Lzrescu, E., Trei manuscrise
moldoveneti de la Muzeul de Art
al Republicii Populare Romne, in
Cultura moldoveneasc n timpul lui
tefan cel Mare, Bucharest, 1958, pp.
541-547 (the mention about Urics
Gospel is on p. 552).
Levit, S. M., A descriptive study of Byzantine book-art, 1924
Lowden, J., Illuminated prophet books:
A study of Byzantine manuscripts
of the major and minor prophets,
Pennsylvania State University Press,
University Park, 1988
Merolle, I., Labate Matteo Luigi Canonici e la sua biblioteca: i manoscritti
Canonici e Canonici-Soranzo delle
biblioteche fiorentine, Institutum
Historicum, Rome, and Soc. Iesu
&Bibiloteca Mediceo-Laurenziana,
Florence, 1958
Mihil, G., Manuscrisele lui Gavril
Uric de la Neam i nsemntatea
lor filologic, in Studii de lingvistic si filologie, Facla Publishing

House, Timioara, 1981
Milin, J.,Din istoricul cercetrii manuscriselor slavo-romne, in Studii
de slavistic, Mirton Publishing
House, Timioara, 1998
Milin, J., Din vechile relaii culturale srbo-romne, Eurostampa,
Timioara, 2000
Mircea, G. U.,Contribution la vie et
louvre de Gavril Uric, Revues des
tudes Sud-Est Europennes, Vl, 4,
Bucharest, 1968
Mullen R., S. Crisp and D. C. Parker,
The Gospel According to John in
the Byzantine Tradition, Deutsche
Bibelgesellschaft, 2009.
Musicescu, M. A., (illustration S.
Ulea), Vorone, ditions Meridiane,
Bucharest, 1971
Nelson, R. S., Theodore Hagiopetrites:
A late Byzantine scribe and illuminator, Verlag der Osterreichischen
Akademie der Wissenschaften,
Wien, 1991
Nestle, E., K. Aland (eds.), The Interlinear Greek-English New Testament,
27th edition, 1993
Nicolescu, C., Miniatura i ornamentul crii manuscrise din rile
Romne. Sec. XlV-XVlll, Introd.
by M. H. Maxy, Catalogue of an
Exhibition in the National Museum
of Arts, Bucharest, July-September,
1964
Oprescu, G. (ed.), Istoria artelor plastice n Romnia, Meridiane, Bucharest, vol. 1, 1964
, . .,
-
XV-XVI .,

, Ph. D. dissertation,
Moscow, 1990, pp. 50-107 (Ch. II);
on-line at www.bessarabia.ru/pascal.htm
Panaitescu, P., D. Bogdan, F. Pall et. al.
(eds), Documente privind istoria
Romniei (sic), Editura Academiei,
Bucharest, vol. 1, 1956
Parker, D. C., An Introduction to the
New Testament Manuscripts and
Their Texts, Cambridge University
Press, 2008
Patriarchikon Hidryma Paterikon
Meleton & S. M. Pelekanides, The
treasures of Mount Athos: Illuminated manuscripts, miniaturesheadpieces-initial letters, Ekdotike
Athenon, Athens, 1974
Pelin, V., Aspects inedits dans les
manuscrits de Gavril Uric, Bulletin
AIESEE 31 (2001), pp. 25-32
Petrescu, S., Odoarele de la Neam i
Secu, Bucharest, 1911
Popescu-Vlcea, G., Miniatura
romneasc, Meridiane Publishing
House, Bucharest, 1981
Popescu-Vlcea, G., Crile populare
miniate i ornate, Meridiane, Bucharest, 1989
Pucariu, S., Istoria literaturii romne.
Epoca veche, Krafft & Drotleff,
Sibiu, 1930
afaik, P. J., Geschichte der serbishen
Literatur, Prague, 1865
Smirnova, E., Un manuscrit illustr
indit du premiere tiers du XV-e
sicle, in C. Moss and K. Kiefer
(eds.), Byzantine East, Latin West.
Art-Historical Studies in honor of
Kurt Weitzmann, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1995
Solari, P., Pominak knieskij,Venice,
1810
Sreznevskii, I. I., Sviedieniia i zamietki
o maloizviestnykh I neizvestnyh
pamjatnikah pisma, St Petersburg,
The Academy of Science, vol. 28,
No. 1, 1875, St Petersburg, reproduced in Sbornik ORJaS, X , 1876
Syrku, P. A., Zametki o slavyannskikh
i russkikh rukopisyakh v Bodleian
Library v Oksforde, Iyvestija Otdelenija russkogo jazyka I slovesnosti, vol. Vll, Book 4, St. Petersburg,
1902
Studi Medievali, Serie Terza, vol. V, no.
1, 1964
Three letters about Bodleian manuscripts, XX, Canon. gr.(sic) 122,
Bodleian Library, Oxford
Tsamakda, V. The illustrated chronicle
of Ioannes Skylitzes in Madrid,
Alexandros, Leiden, 2002
, . .,
46
XV-XVI
., , vol. 2, 2005, pp.
144-167
, . ., , in
,
Moscow, 2000-cont., vol. X, pp.
207-209, with bibli-ogr.; on-line at
www.pravenc.ru/text/161279.html
Turdeanu, ., Mtropolite Anastase
Crimca et son oeuvre littraire et
artistique (1608-1629), in tudes de
littrature roumaine et dcrits slaves
et grecs des Principauts Roumaines,
Leiden, 1985
Turdeanu, ., The Oldest Illuminated
Moldavian MS-Canon Gr. 122, The
Slavonic and East European Review,
London, XXlX, 1951
Turdeanu, ., Les letters slaves en
Moldavie: le moine Gabriel du
monastre de Neamu, in Revues
des des tudes slaves, XXVll, no. l,
1951, pp. 270-276; repr. with addenda in, id., tudes de littrature,
86-97, pp. 434-436
Turdeanu, ., Miniatura bulgar i
nceputurile miniaturii romneti,
Buletinul Institutului romn din
Sofia, Bucharest, 1942
Ulea, S., Gavril Uric. Studiu paleografic, Studii i cercetri de istoria
artei, Bucharest, 1981, vol. XXVlll.
Ulea, S., Gavril Uric, primul artist
romn cunoscut, in SCIA, Arta
plastic Series, vol. Xl, no. 2, Bucharest, 1964
Ulea, S., Gavril Ieromonahul, autorul
frescelor de la Blneti, in Cultura
moldoveneasc n vremea lui tefan
cel Mare, Bucharest, 1964
Uspenski, F., O nekotoryh slavjanskich i poslavjanski psannych rukopisjach, chranjaichsju u Londone
i Oxforde, urnal Ministerstva
narodnogo prosveenija, CC, 1878.
Walter, C. Pictures as language: How
the Byzantines exploited them, Pindar, London, 2000
Weitzmann, K., Byzantine liturgical
psalters and Gospels, Variorum
Reprints, London,1980 Weitzmann,
K., Greek mythology in Byzantine
art. Princeton University Press
Princeton, 1984 Weitzmann, K.,
The ode pictures of the aristocratic

Psalter recension, Dumbarton
Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies,
Washington, D.C., 1976
Weitzmann, K., and G. Galavaris, The
Monastery of Saint Catherine at
Mount Sinai: The illuminated Greek
manuscripts, Princeton University
Press, Princeton, N.J., 1990
Weitzmann, K., M. Bernabo, and R.
Tarasconi, The Byzantine Octateuchs, Dept. of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University in association with Princeton University
Press, Princeton, N.J., 1999
Weitzmann, K. J., The miniatures of the
Sacra parallela, Parisinus Graecus
923, Princeton University Press,
Princeton, N.J., 1979
Willoughby, H. R., A bibliographical index to New Testament cycle in East
Christian art, 1932
ELENA ENE D-VASILESCU is a Tutor in Theology and Religion and a PostDoctoral Researcher in Byzantine iconography, University of Oxford. Her project at
the History Faculty focuses on Aspects of art circulation along Via Egnatia in the
Middle Ages and is funded by the British Academy for the period 2011-2013. Her
research, teaching, and publications are centered on Byzantine texts (Patristics)
and post-Byzantine icons. They also focus on the connection between liturgical art
and text and on Byzantine and Eastern Christian monasticism and spirituality.
47
Psaltiki: the online journal
Spons ors
A N A S TA S I A
DI A B ETI C PUR E SK I N THER A P Y
w w w.a ml a b .c o m
v o i c e o fd i a b e te s .o r g
Superb CDs of Byzantine Chant

PSALTIKI.ORG
PERPETUATING THE PSALTIC HERITAGE
www.psaltiki.org
ABOUT US
www.psaltiki.org/aboutUs.html
PROJECTS
www.psaltiki.org/projects.html
THE ONLINE JOURNAL
www.psaltiki.org/journal/
issuu.com/psaltikijournal
BOARD
www.psaltiki.org/board.html
WAYS TO SUPPORT
www.psaltiki.org/contribute.html
CONTACT US
www.psaltiki.org/contactUs.html

Psaltiki Journal 04

Transféré par

Informations du document

Copyright

Formats disponibles

Partager ce document

Partager ou intégrer le document

Options de partage

Avez-vous trouvé ce document utile ?

Ce contenu est-il inapproprié ?

Droits d'auteur :

Formats disponibles

Psaltiki Journal 04

Transféré par

Droits d'auteur :

Formats disponibles

Psaltiki: the online journal

The Princess and Her Book: the

Mystagogy: Ecclesiastical History &

It is well that we are here:

Superb Digital & CD Releases from Psaltiki, Inc

Paraklesis: Hymns of Supplication

Psalmody and the

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

A Psaltiki Pascha on Mount

Elena Ene D-Vasilescu

The Princess and

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

saltiki, Inc. is a non-profit organization promoting the advancement and perpetuation

New Superb Digital & CD releases from the Psaltiki Ministry of

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

Dynamis Mode II, Xenos (Xenophon) Korones (floruit circa 1325-50)

2013 Psaltiki Holy Week on Mount Athos Award Announced

saltiki is dedicated to education, empowering, and connecting the next generation

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

PSALMODY AND THE

hile the early

But even in the desert there could be similar distractions:

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

the things that come upon me. N 338, 16.23

The monks themselves were by no means silent.

It was once revealed to Abba Antony in the desert:

Superb Digital & CD Releases from Psaltiki, Inc

Paraklesis: Hymns of Supplication

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

There was singing at funerals [

By hymns the writer means psalms, for the psalms

Apophthegmata systematica Guy, Jean-

Oxford English Dictionary (begun 1879)

PG Migne, J.-P. (ed.), Patrologia Graeco-Latina, 161 vols.

Revue de lorient chrtien

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

singing.10.102 Synkletike S 10, Guy p.35;) against

little light is shed on how the psalms were sung

It is difficult to be sure what exactly this means

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

although how early it is difficult to say. The series of

This plea for simplicity in singing is more than

A brother questioned Abba Silvanus: What am I

to do, abba? How am I to acquire sorrow for sin

In spite of the considerations mentioned above,

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

The reader may wish to consult the

night and day were synaxis.12 Abba Epiphanius (who

Isidore 4 220 CD, 11.46.

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

Dr John Wortley was born and educated in Britain

Ecclesiastical History and Mystical Contemplation

IT IS WELL THAT WE ARE HERE: TRANSFIGURATIONS AND

We know not whether we were

his is what the emissaries of

checked Psaltikis website for the

San Francisco, for allowing me to

Superb Digital & CD Releases from Psaltiki, Inc

Paraklesis: Hymns of Supplication

Psaltiki: the online journal (4: 2012)

the Panagia the entire week. The

they always made sure that I had

out where it was. They discovered