History of mediæval art . d architects. The libra-ries of the Diadochi do not appear to have contained many works ofthis kind, and M. Varros Hebdomades vel De Imaginibus wascertainly an exception. The word miniature itself is of great an-tiquity, its derivation pointing to a time when a simple pen drawingor writing was touched up with red lead (minium). But a system-atic employment of illumination as a branch of art did not obtainuntil Christian times. We are acquainted with no miniatures older than the epoch ofConstantine. The illustrations of the Iliad in the Ambrosiana in 94 EARLY CHRISTIAN
History of mediæval art . d architects. The libra-ries of the Diadochi do not appear to have contained many works ofthis kind, and M. Varros Hebdomades vel De Imaginibus wascertainly an exception. The word miniature itself is of great an-tiquity, its derivation pointing to a time when a simple pen drawingor writing was touched up with red lead (minium). But a system-atic employment of illumination as a branch of art did not obtainuntil Christian times. We are acquainted with no miniatures older than the epoch ofConstantine. The illustrations of the Iliad in the Ambrosiana in 94 EARLY CHRISTIAN AND BYZANTINE PAINTING. Milan, and those of the Vatican Virgil, do not antedate the fifthcentury; while those in the manuscript of Terence in the Vatican,and in that of Nicander in the National Library of Paris, althoughimitated from classic, or at all events pre-Constantine models, arethemselves the work of a still later period. There are few examplesof the illumination of other than religious writings, the most perfect. Fig. 53.—Miniature from the Codex of Dioscorides, now in the Imperial Library of Vienna. and most classic of these being the Codex of Dioscorides, now inthe Imperial Library of Vienna, which was executed about the year500 for the Princess Juliana Anicia, daughter of Placidia and Olyb-rius. Throughout this work, and especially in the dedicatory illus-tration {Fig. 53), there is evident an almost antique composition anddrawing, combined with a careful and well-studied execution which ILLUMINATED CODICES. 95 contrasts most favorably with the hasty and incorrect character ofother representations of that age. Although these miniatures mustbe attributed to an artist of the Eastern Empire, they are but littledisfigured by the defects of the Byzantine style. The manuscriptcontains a series of scientific illustrations—drawings of plants, snakes,beetles, and birds,—resembling in treatment those of the didacticworks of the Greeks and Romans. The Christian codices
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