Research trends in studies of Polish baroque illuminated manuscripts

Abstract

The author studied and discusses interesting, however often marginally treated, the topic of baroque illuminated manuscripts. He notices that the makers of these manuscripts subjected the artistic content to specific ideological messages in their works, or limited them in favour of utility values. Dissemination of printed books and displacement of the miniature art by reproduction techniques of illustration (xylography and copperplate) found its symbolic expression in the fact, that figures often pasted into a book being illustrated started to play an important role in illumination. They were coloured quite often and supplied with additional, hand-made ornaments, making them in that way an inherent part of the miniature decoration. The author underlines that figures were used by the codices' illuminators as iconographic patterns. The habit of illuminating of printed books had been practiced in Poland for a long time, as confirmed by the literature discussed in the article.