The decision by the Franciscans of St Paschal's College, Box Hill to deposit on long-term loan with the State Library of Victoria a rare thirteenth-century illuminated Missal will not only make this treasure more accessible to the public and ensure that it can be appropriately conserved for future generations; but it is in keeping with an agreement made over forty years ago between the Library and the Friars. It marks, moreover, another significant milestone in the journeyings of a venerable book whose origins go back to the place and times of the early followers of St Francis of Assisi.

The Missal, now called Codex Sancti Paschalis after the Franciscan College at Box Hill, was written and illuminated in the late thirteenth century for a Franciscan community in Perugia or a neighbouring Umbrian centre. Little research into the origins and the high quality illumination of this manuscript seems to have taken place before its arrival in Australia in 1949.1 Celsus Kelly O.F.M. has left us a vivid contemporary account of the book's reception in Melbourne and of the events that led to its acquisition by the Friars at Box Hill. His careful study of its text at that time firmly established the manuscript's date and origins.2

Kelly relates how early in 1949 it was announced in the Melbourne newspapers that eight medieval manuscripts had arrived at the Public Library, having been shipped from England by the London bookdealers, William H. Robinson, Ltd. The latter had recently purchased the remaining books of the famous library of Thomas Phillipps and were looking for potential buyers. The Public Library had already developed a policy of acquiring medieval manuscripts the first of which entered its collections in 1901.3 Several manuscripts had been purchased through Robinson, including three in 1947. It is testimony to the international reputation of the Library and the quality of its collections at this time that dealers deemed it worth their while to send such valuable consignments half way round the world for display and possible acquisition by the people of Victoria.4 When the eight manuscripts went on display, the Missal immediately attracted the interest of the Franciscans and in particular that of Reverend Celsus Kelly, a distinguished Franciscan scholar stationed in New Zealand, but who by a happy coincidence was visiting Melbourne at the time. When calling on the Chief Librarian at the Public Library to discuss the progress of his article on the manuscripts and incunabula of Franciscan origin in Australasia, Kelly saw the book and immediately recognised its importance not only for the Friars, but also for liturgical history, since it was an early example of the text which formed the basis of the standard Roman Missal up until the changes of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.

Kelly was permitted to study the manuscript and he wrote a late catalogue entry for his article on Franciscan manuscripts and incunabula which was already in press. At the same time he busied himself to try and secure the book for St Paschal's, the Franciscan College or House of Studies at Box Hill. The trustees of the Public Library were also keen to acquire the manuscript and for a time negotiations became further complicated by the fact that Reverend James Hackett S. J., a trustee who had undertaken to approach possible donors on the Library's behalf, found himself involved as Director of the Catholic Central Library with a counter bid for the work by that body. Matters were satisfactorily resolved, however, when Mr Pat Cody and his sister Johanna agreed to provide the funds for its purchase by the Franciscans, and the latter satisfied the Public Library Trustees' concerns by guaranteeing that the Missal would remain in Australia and that should the Franciscan library ever be dispersed the Public Library would have first option on the manuscript. The Franciscans further agreed that the book would be available, on request, to the Public Library for exhibition.

In appearance the Codex Sancti Paschalis is a sturdy book measuring 335 × 245 mm and comprising 395 folios. It is now bound in an unpretentious nineteenth-century half pigskin cover, which the label inside “Bretherton ligavit” identifies as the work of a binder employed by Thomas Phillipps.5 The easily legible, rounded Gothic script in black ink is now only slightly faded. It is interspersed with numerous red rubrics; and corrections in a later hand, together with marginal annotations, testify to the book's faithful service. Kelly's analysis of the Calendar and of the Mass texts not only confirms the Missal's Franciscan origins, but indicates that it was probably produced before 1297 and not in the fourteenth century as had been earlier suggested.

The Calendar contains early Franciscan feasts together with specific references to the diocese of Perugia. St Herculanus, for example, founding bishop of Perugia, is listed on 1 March. He came to be venerated on that day quite widely in Italy, but in the Codex Sancti Paschalis his “passio” or martyrdom is also commemorated on 7 November and this is a more local celebration. Characteristically Franciscan entries include: 4 October St Francis himself (canonised in 1228) with the description “qui fuit institutor et rector ordinis fratrum minorum” (“who was the founder and rector of the order of friars minor”); 24 March the translation of St Francis; 13 June St Anthony of Padua (canonised in 1232) described as “confessoris de ordine fratrum minorum”; 19 November St Elizabeth of Hungary (canonised in 1235); and 12 August St Clare of Assisi (canonised in 1255). The conventual character of the Calendar is further evident in its emphasis on monastic saints and those related to religious orders, for example St Benedict, St Scholastica, St Augustine, St Bernard, St Dominic, St Paul, the first hermit and confessor, St Anthony, abbot and St Maurus abbot. The “raptus” of the prophet Elijah which is singled out on 16 June is also consonant with Franciscan interests and the entry for the 21 July includes the note “hie debet fieri officium pro benefactoribus et defunctis fratribus” (“here the Office is to be said for benefactors and the deceased brothers”).

Calendars are not a secure guide by themselves to the provenance and origins of a book. Sometimes this section was copied as a separate document and does not reflect the contents of the rest of the manuscript. This is not, however, the case with the Codex Sancti Paschalis as Kelly demonstrated by cross-referencing the Calendar entries with the Mass texts and revealing a close correlation between the two. The incipit on f.7 also clearly states the book's Franciscan character: “Incipit ordo missalis fratrum minorum secundum consuetudine romane curie” (“Here begins the ‘ordo’ of the Missal of the Friars Minor according to the use of the Roman Curia”). There is a wealth of liturgical history contained in these words to which only brief reference can be made here.

Until the early years of the thirteenth century, prescriptions and rubrics for the performance of both the Mass and the Divine Office were contained within the one cumbrous and unwieldy document promulgated by the Roman Curia; but under Haymo of Faversham, fifth minister general of the order from 1240 to 1244, the Franciscans were responsible for reforming the Roman Ordo for both the Office and the Mass so that it became much more easy to follow. Not only did these reforms involve the separation of prescriptions or ordinances for the celebration of the Mass from those of the Office, but the rubrics, which had been confusing and difficult to interpret, were thoroughly re-written in more direct and lucid language.6 Thus the Codex Sancti Paschalis, while having particular regional and Franciscan features, is based on the official “ordo” promulgated by Rome, to the reform of which the Franciscans had made substantial contribution.

Several fourteenth-century additions to the Missal in a different hand help to establish the date of its original production.7 These additions comprise Mass texts for more recently instituted feasts namely those of the Visitation, St Louis of Toulouse and St Louis King of France. A Mass for Corpus Christi has also been inserted on folio 252 and St Clare's name has been added to the Litany of the Saints on folio 166v. As well as the new Mass Propers, the additions include a series of sequences or liturgical hymns for Easter, Pentecost, Corpus Christi and the Mass for the Dead.

The Visitation of the Virgin to St Elizabeth was adopted as a feast by the Franciscan Chapter of Pisa in 1263; but it was not regularly honoured with a Mass and Office until some years later. Perhaps the most important feast, however, for the dating of the original part of the Missal is that of St Louis, king and confessor. His canonization was proclaimed by Pope Boniface VIII at Orvieto in 1297 and the celebration of his feast, which was especially dear to the Franciscans, seems to have spread quite soon after this date, so it is reasonable to suppose that a Missal written even quite soon after 1297 would have included it. The absence of this feast from the original text of the Codex Sancti Paschalis together with the fact that the Missal contains no reference to liturgical developments that can be dated after 1297 suggests that it was probably completed before this time. We shall see that the artistic evidence also indicates a late thirteenth-century date.

Although Pope Urban IV ordered the annual celebration of the feast of Corpus Christi in 1264, he died soon after this date and the feast did not receive general recognition until the Council of Vienne in 1311. St Louis of Toulouse was canonized in 1317 and his feast was decreed for celebration by the Franciscans at the General Chapter of Marseilles in 1319. It would seem, therefore that the additions to the Missal were not made before the 1320s.

The illumination or decoration of this manuscript is directly related to its use within the liturgy. Divisions or sub-sections of the text are marked by red or blue initials, usually two lines high, with penwork flourishes in alternate colours that often extend into the margins. This is more or less standard scribal decoration, but it has been noted by Avril and Gousset in their cataloguing of the Umbrian manuscripts in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, that while the elements of these flourishes are not original, their distinctive combinations help to identify a group of manuscripts produced by the same or related scribes in Perugia and related Umbrian centres in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries.8

More unambiguously decorative are thirty-seven painted initials ranging from two to six lines high whose function it is to highlight certain Mass Propers and parts of the Ordinary of the Mass. These initials are of uniformly high quality. Lucidly organized patterns on coloured grounds are precisely executed, and the consistent range of colours encompasses dark and light blue, pale pink, deep rose, maroon, orange-red, yellow and grey. Curling fronds of leaves outlined in black or white, fill the interstices of the letters and sometimes the corners of their rectangular frames. The latter are occasionally indented, especially when they extend to enclose the vertical descenders of initials such as P or F or the letter I. Both grounds and leafy patterns are filleted with fine white lines which form tiny circles and scrolls or clusters of sinewy tendrils. The ends of the frames or of the initials themselves often develop into elongated leafy projections with indented edges and extend into the margins as partial borders. Burnished gold circles and squares punctuate the outlines of some of the initials or alternate with the leaf and branch patterns of the interstices.

Many of the elements of these designs are broadly characteristic of thirteenth and fourteenth-century Italian illumination; but their orchestration and the range and blend of colours differ markedly from region to region. Recent work by English, French and Italian scholars on a large corpus of Umbrian manuscripts leaves no doubt of the Perugian characteristics of the initials in the Codex Sancti Paschalis.9 In particular, they compare closely with those in a late thirteenth-century Gradual-Sanctorale, now MS. 16 in the Biblioteca Capitolare in Perugia, but which was probably originally executed for a local Franciscan community, and with those in a Bible dating also to the same period, now MS. Lat 41 in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.10 These manuscripts are also linked by their figurative illumination and they were probably executed in the same atelier if not by the same artist.

As part of the whole functional design of the Missal, these decorative initials signal certain important texts or sections in the manuscript. On folio 7, for example, (Plate 1) which immediately follows the Calendar and is virtually the frontispiece of the book, three decorated initials of varying sizes are combined with the only historiated initial in the manuscript and the only full-length marginal borders. This page announces both the beginning of the Missal and the season of Advent, the official commencement of the Church's liturgical year. A modest two-line initial I marks the opening rubric which states that the text is that of the Friars Minor, according to the prescriptions of the Roman curia and that it begins with the Mass for the first Sunday of Advent. A larger initial A, some six lines high, marks the opening of the Introit verse for this Mass: “Ad te levavi …” (“to Thee O Lord have I lifted up my soul …”). The initial E introducing the Collect or prayer recited by the priest on behalf of the congregation before the Scripture readings, contains a 3/4 length representation of the Maiestas or Christ in Majesty. In accordance with a tradition that may be traced back to Early Christian times this image refers to Christ as the Lord of all creation whose kingdom is celebrated in every liturgy and who will return in glory at the end of time, an event which is foreshadowed each year by the season of Advent. Christ is depicted with his right hand raised in a gesture of blessing and imperial power, while the other clasps a book, an ancient symbol of philosopher-ruler status which by the Middle Ages was also a sign of the status of Christ as author of the New Dispensation (Plate 2). Both the rendering of the initial surrounds and the style of the figurative composition compare closely with those in the Franciscan Gradual, MS. 16 of the Biblioteca Capitolare, Perugia (Fig. 1). The composition of the Codex Sancti Paschalis is more developed naturalistically which may indicate a slightly later date for this manuscript; but there is no doubt about the close connection. Figurative compositions in the Paris Bible B. N. lat. 41 are also related, but appear to be somewhat earlier again than those of the Gradual.11 On this page the introduction to the Epistle is also marked by an illuminated initial, a three-line decorated F for “Frates” (“Brethren”). Leafy extensions from the initials form continuous vertical borders along both columns of text.

By contrast to the integration of the initials on folio 7 into a comprehensive page design, the rest of the decorated initials provide individual signposts to three types or series of texts. Firstly, they mark the Collects for feasts of particular significance for the community for which the Missal was made. Thus, in addition to the major feasts of the Temporal, which we might expect to find highlighted in most Missals — Christmas, Epiphany, Palm Sunday, Easter and Ascension day — there is an emphasis in the Sanctoral on the apostles, though not all warrant a decorated initial: the feasts of St John the Evangelist, St Andrew, St Thomas, the Conversion of St Paul, St Matthias, St Barnabas, SS Peter and Paul together with its octave, and St Matthew are so delineated. In addition to her role at Christmas and Epiphany, the importance of the Virgin is indicated by decorated initials for the feasts of her Nativity and Assumption. The Finding of the True Cross, the Nativity of St John the Baptist, the Dedication of the Church of St Michael Archangel, St Francis of Assisi, and All Saints complete the list of accentuated feasts. Taken as a whole, this group reveals the close relationship between longstanding traditions of the Roman Curia and devotional emphases radiating from Assisi.

Another series of decorated initials highlights the readings of the Passion during Holy Week and the prophecies for the Easter Vigil. One of the rare departures from the use of curving leafy branches for the infill of these initials occurs in relation to the Passion according to St Luke where the pink fish, which embellishes the introductory I (Plate 4), is no doubt an allusion to Christ, whose monogram had been associated from Early Christian times with the Greek word for fish.

A third set of decorated initials focuses attention on the musical texts for the various prefaces of the Mass. Here the combination of function and decoration is particularly striking. The celebrant needed to be able to locate promptly the appropriate chant for the day's feast since he had to intone the words which gave the cue for the choir's response. The lines of music and their decoration give a lighter and more elegant air to these pages (Plate 3), reminding us of the importance of sacred song for the solemn celebration of the liturgy, and that the Franciscans, despite their concern for poverty and simplicity, were enthusiastic and effective contributors to such music.12

The major figurative illumination in the Codex Sancti Paschalis occurs at the Canon, the most sacred part of the Mass. This solemn prayer commemorates the Last Supper, death and resurrection of Christ, and it climaxes in the words of consecration over the bread and wine which the priest pronounces in obedience to Christ's injunction to his apostles, “Do this in memory of me”. In keeping with long-established and widespread iconographical tradition the first words of the Canon, “Te Igitur” are illustrated in the Codex Sancti Paschalis by a miniature of the Crucifixion (Plate 5). The half-page depiction of the crucified Christ accompanied by a sorrowing Virgin and anguished St John, is framed by an elaborate border consisting of the same decorative elements as the initials. It is this miniature above all that has been the source of much recent interest on the part of art historians.

In 1962 Fernando Bologna had signalled the importance for the history of Umbrian painting of the Crucifixion miniatures in two thirteenth-century Franciscan Missals now in the libraries of Deruta and Salerno.13 The Missal at Deruta is the older of the two; it has been dated 1270–1280 and the Salerno Missal 1280–1285 (Fig. 2). Bologna attributed the illumination in these manuscripts to the same artist, an artist whom he argued demonstrated the interaction between local Umbrian tradition and the influence of the great Tuscan fresco and panel painter Cimabue. The identification of a new humanism in these miniatures coupled with a more Gothic treatment of both form and decorative details that owes its inspiration to Cimabue's work in Arezzo and Assisi has been strengthened by more recent studies of Umbrian manuscripts related to these Missals.14 When the Codex Sancti Paschalis was brought to the attention of specialists in the 1980s, they at once recognised that it formed part of the group.15 Comparison of its figure of the Crucified with that in the Salerno Missal for example reveals particularly close similarities in the rendering of the upper part of the torso and the head of Christ, while both compositions share a heightened emphasis on the dramatic interaction of the figures. There are also similarities in the decorative frames of the two miniatures although the geometric elements of the Salerno frame have been replaced in the Codex Sancti Paschalis by a more organic and free-flowing tendril design. The developments in the miniature of the latter manuscript, however, are not simply in the direction of certain refinements and subtleties, the whole composition is charged with an heightened emotionalism and human pathos which is all the more telling because it is expressed with a new sense of elegance and grace.

The significant features of the Crucifixion miniature in the Codex Sancti Paschalis were publicly acknowledged on the occasion of an exhibition of illuminated manuscripts held at Foligno in 1982 in honour of the eight hundredth anniversary of the birth of St Francis of Assisi. Although it was not possible to exhibit the Missal itself, it was represented by large colour photographs and slides, and a catalogue entry was provided for the accompanying publication.16 Seen in the context of a large number of Umbrian manuscripts from the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, the Missal's secure place in that tradition as well as its innovative aspects emerged clearly. Professor Ciardi-Dupre dal Poggetto devoted considerable attention to the work, affirming not only its Perugian characteristics and the influences of Cimabue but also its relationship to older Assisi traditions.17 She noted, for example, that the same unusually impassioned gesture of St John, appeared in the Crucifixion miniature of a Missal in the Cathedral Library at Assisi dated c. 1270 (Fig. 3). The illuminator of the Codex Sancti Paschalis, however, combines this gesture with the raised head and curved body of the Evangelist, so that the whole anguished contour of the figure provides an expressive contrast to the restrained, erect depiction of the Virgin whose muted sorrow is communicated only by inclined head and clasped hands.

In its acute blend of anguish and compassion this composition has been compared with the dramatic rendering of the Crucifixion by Cimabue in the frescoes of the choir of the Upper Church of San Francesco, Assisi; but another striking feature of the miniature, namely the relatively diminutive proportions of the figures in relation to their setting, reveals additional influences. These small, finely modelled forms, whose soft grey and blue draperies contrast with an expanse of blue-starred background, reflect the growing importance of Gothic art in Italy towards the end of the thirteenth century. Professor Ciardi-Dupre has suggested that this particular blend of Gothic elegance and humane classicism, may have entered Umbria by way of Rome through the patronage of Nicholas IV (1288–1293) the first Franciscan pope. She cites an enamelled chalice by the Sienese Guccio di Mannara and a reliquary of Roman goldsmith work — both gifts of the pope to the tomb of St Francis at Assisi — as early expressions of the new taste and argues that the style of the Crucifixion miniature may have been affected by such works.

At the end of the original text of the Missal, that is before the later additions, there is a prayer written in minute Gothic script which is only just visible to the naked eye. Parts of this are now illegible, but it refers to the priest as God's unworthy minister and possibly also to the priest as scribe, though the damaged state of the text does not allow this to be stated with certainty. Be this as it may, there are other reasons to suggest that the Missal may have been written by a Franciscan cleric. Although St Francis did not provide for the establishment of libraries and scriptoria in his houses, nevertheless, as time progressed the need for books for both the celebration of the liturgy and for theological studies intensified and the Friars made provision for the production of manuscripts and for their safe-keeping. A scriptorium existed at San Francesco, Assisi in the thirteenth century and there were probably scribes in one or more of the friaries in Perugia which developed early into a centre for theological studies for the Franciscans.18 The illumination of the Missal, however, may have been carried out in a lay workshop in Perugia, which served the needs of various religious orders and the diocesan clergy as well as secular patrons.

The Codex Sancti Paschalis is thus an important book on several counts. Its clearly written text and accompanying rubrics are ancient documentation of the liturgical reforms carried out by the Roman Curia and the Franciscans in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, reforms which were to provide the basic shape for the celebration of the liturgy during the next seven hundred years. Its illumination testifies to one of the most creative periods in the history of western art. Through its small elegant miniature of the Crucifixion we enter into the emotional and artistic world of Cimabue and his even more famous successor Giotto, artists whose remarkable gifts found expression within the stimulating physical and cultural environment of centres such as Perugia and Assisi. At the turn of the thirteenth century these places were permeated with a fresh spirit of humanism as well as with the new fervour of the mendicant orders. Religious zeal and mysticism of a most intense kind were combined with a concern for humanity and for the natural world. In such a context empathy with the sufferings of Christ meant also compassion for the human individual and belief in the possible transformation of pain into subsequent peace and joy. The expression of this provided an increasing challenge to the artist.

The people of Victoria owe a double debt of gratitude to the Australian branch of the Franciscan order, for acquiring the Codex Sancti Paschalis for this country in the first place, and for making it accessible to present and future generations through the State Library of Victoria.