ILLUMINATING, a kind of miniature painting, anciently much practised for Illustrating and adorning books. Besides the writers of books, there were artists, whose profession was to ornament and paint manuscripts, who were called illu minators; the writers of books first finish ed their part, and the illuminators embel lished them with ornamented letters and paintings. We frequently find blanks left in manuscripts for the illuminators, which were never filled up. Some of the ancient manuscripts are gilt and burnish ed in a style superior to later times. Their colours were excellent, and their skill in preparing them must have been very great The practice of introduc ing ornaments, drawings, emblematical figures, and even portraits, into manu scripts, is of great antiquity. Varro wrote the lives of 700 illustrious Romans, which he enriched with their portraits, as Pliny attests in his "Natural History." Porn ponius Atticus, the friend of Cicero, was the author of a work on the actions of the great men amongst the Romans, which he ornamented with their portraits, as ap pears in his life by Cornelius Nepos. But these works have not been transmitted to posterity. There are, however, many precious documents remaining, which ex hibit the advancement and decline of the arts in different ages and countries. These inestimable paintings and illumina tions display the manners, customs, ha bits, ecclesiastical, civil and military, weapons, and instruments of war, uten sils and architecture of the ancients ; tbey are of the greatest use in illustrating many important facts relative to the his tory of the times in which they were exe cuted. In these treasures of antiquity are preserved a great number of specimens of Grecian and Roman art, which were executed before the arts and sciences fell into neglect and contempt. The manu scripts containing these specimens form a valuable part of the riches preserved in the principal libraries of Europe. The Royal, Cottonian, and the Harleian Libra ries, as also those in the two universities in England, the Vatican at Rome, the Im perial at Vienna, the Royal at Paris, St.
Mark's at Venice, and many others. A very ancient MS. of Genesis, which was in the Cottonian Library,and almost destroy ed by afire in 1731, contained 250 curious paintings in water colours. Twenty-one fragments, which escaped the fire, are engraven by the society of antiquarians of London. Without mentioning others, we may observe, that Mr. Strutt has given the public an opportunity of forming some judgment of the degree of delicacy and art with which these illuminations were executed, by publishing prints of a pro digious number of them, in his "Regal and Ecclesiastical Antiquities of Eng land," and " View of the Customs, &c. of England." In the first of these worxs we are presented with the genuine por traits, in miniature, of all the kings, and several of the queens of England, from Edward the Confessor to Henry VII. mostly in their crowns and royal robes, together with the portraits of many other eminent persons of both sexes. The illuminators and painters of this pe riod seem to have been in possession of a considerable number of colouring ma terials, and to have know n the arts of preparing and mixing them, so as to fbrm a great variety of colours: for in the specimens of their miniature paint ings that are still extant, we perceive not only the five primary colours, but al so various combinations of them. Though Mr. Strutt's prints do not exhibit the bright and vivid colours of the originals, they give us equally a view, not only of the persons and dresses of our ancestors, but also of their customs, manners, arts and employments, their arms, ships, .houses, furniture, &c. and enable us to judge of their skill in drawing. The figures in those paintings are often stiff and formal; but the ornaments are in ge eral fine and delicate, and the colours clear and bright, particularly the gold and azure. In some of these illuminations the passions are strongly painted. After the introduction of printing, this elegant art of illuminating gradually declined, and at length was quite neglected.