A one-day international conference on the Skylitzes Matritensis will be held at the National Library of Spain, Madrid, on June 13th, 2024.
THE SKYLITZES MATRITENSIS,BYZANTIUM AND NORMAN SICILY: New and Old Issues on an Exceptional Greek Manuscript
The aim of this international symposium on the Sykilitzes Matritensis (BNE, Vitr. 26-2) is to delve into one of the most precious manuscripts of the National Library of Spain, which still poses many issues to scholars today. It is the oldest and most extensive surviving copy of an illustrated Byzantine chronicle, the Synopsis Historiarum by John Skylitzes, containing 574 miniatures. The manuscript was produced in the mid-12th century in Sicily, during the Norman period, and its creation involved two scribes and seven miniaturists with very different artistic backgrounds. This reveals the multicultural environment of the island, where Latin, Greek, and Muslim cultures coexisted. Scholars will approach various aspects of the manuscript from a multidisciplinary perspective -paleographic, codicological, philological, and historical-artistic -, and address some issues related to its commissioning, place of production and creative process, from the materials used by the miniaturists to their working methods. It will be an outstanding occasion to rediscover Byzantium, the fascination for Constantinople, as well as some aspects of the12th-century Sicilian culture.
Free entrance
For further information, please contact: info@mabilus.com
Live streaming on the BNE YouTube channel
