Art of Tradition: The Armenian Gospel Books (Seventeenth Century) in the Gulbenkian Collection

Hermine Grigoryan; Maria Adelaide Miranda; Lusine Sargsyan; Jorge Rodrigues; Karen Matevosyan; Maria João Melo

doi:10.18778/2084-140X.15.15

Authors

Hermine Grigoryan NOVA University of Lisbon, NOVA School of Science and Technology https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6783-098X
Maria Adelaide Miranda NOVA University of Lisbon, Faculty of Social and Human Sciences, Institute for Medieval Studies https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7581-3888
Lusine Sargsyan Yerevan State University, “Matenadaran” Research Institute of Ancient Manuscripts, Department of Medieval Art Studies https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3743-6962
Jorge Rodrigues Calouste Gulbenkian Museum
Karen Matevosyan “Matenadaran” Research Institute of Ancient Manuscripts, Department for the Study of Armenian Scriptoria https://orcid.org/0009-0003-6345-0420
Maria João Melo NOVA University of Lisbon, NOVA School of Science and Technology https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7393-6801

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/2084-140X.15.15

Keywords:

Armenian diaspora, Gospel Books, Gulbenkian Museum, illuminations, manuscript art

Abstract

This paper presents preliminary notes on three seventeenth-century Armenian Gospel Books preserved in the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. For the first time, these manuscripts are examined through a comprehensive art-historical lens, with attention also given to their codicological and material features. These codices attest to an unbroken manuscript tradition flourishing within the Armenian diaspora communities of Constantinople, Isfahan/New Julfa, and Crimea during the seventeenth century. Their production history and the art of their illuminations reveal both the social demand for such works and the enduring artistic preferences rooted in the medieval legacy of Armenian manuscript culture.

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