A Post-Byzantine Sketchbook in the British Museum Library (MS Add. 43868)
A Post-Byzantine Sketchbook in the British Museum Library (MS Add. 43868)

Summary/Abstract: The manuscript MS Add. 43868, an illuminated sketchbook of Post-Byzantine painting, was the object of my research during my postgraduate studies at the Courtauld Institute of Art of the University of London. The illuminated sketchbook MS Add. 43868 first became known by two publications of the British Museum in 1935 and 1936. It was first presented in 1935 by Eric G. Millar at the British Museum and from 1945 onwards it forms part of the manuscript department of its Library. It measures 19.5x14.5 cm and its cover is lined with dark brown later leather. It consists of 63 folios of white paper foliated in the top right corner of the recto pages. The manuscript contains text and drawings in black ink. The texts consist of technical instructions on rendering an icon, therapeutic recipes, religious writings and notes. Most of the drawings depict saints, scenes from their lives, Christological and Theometoric episodes, angels and decorative motifs. Hence, the drawings as well as the texts that occupy the pages of the illuminated sketchbook must have been produced after 1784 and 1785.

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