Barberini Psalter Facsimile Edition

The Barberini Psalter is a deluxe illuminated Christian prayer book created at the behest of Alexius I Comnenus, Emperor of the East. A scribe known as Theodoros of Caesarea and a monk-illuminator created it at the monastery of Stoudios in the capital city of Constantinople around 1092-1095. It is a manuscript of the biblical psalms and odes copiously illustrated with more than 300 unframed painted vignettes that interpret the biblical text literally or in terms of Christian salvation history.

The Barberini manuscript is one of a group of Byzantine manuscripts termed “marginal psalters” because most of their illumination appears in the outer and lower margins of pages of text. The book’s pictorial program is informed by typology—the understanding of persons and events in the Christian Old Testament as types that prefigure New Testament events or Church history.

King David and His Poems

Although not direct copies, the paintings of the Barberini Psalter closely follow the program found in the ninth-century Chludov Psalter. The Israelite king David, the purported author of the psalms, appears enthroned, flanked by scribes, and in the company of music-makers in a full-page author portrait (fol. 5v). He also appears in the marginal vignettes, frequently in attitudes of prayer (e.g., on fols. 12r, 13v, 24r, 26v, 41r, etc.).

The Psalms in Christian Salvation History

Christians understand many phrases in the psalms to presage or suggest episodes in the life of Christ, and the Barberini Psalter's margins brim with New Testament scenes inspired by the proximate text. These include the Nativity (fol. 7v), Adoration of the Magi (fol. 120r), Massacre of the Innocents and Flight into Egypt (fol. 158r), Baptism (fols. 47v and 125r), Crucifixion (fols. 36r, 79v and 114v), Entombment (fol. 149v), and Ascension (fols. 27v and 81r).

A Tale of Two Emperors

The imperial portrait that opens the manuscript originally depicted Alexius I Comnenus (1048-1118), Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire; his young son John II Comnenus (d. 1143), future Emperor of the East; and the empress, Irene Doukaina (fol. 5r). At some point, probably in the thirteenth or fourteenth century, the manuscript’s illumination was refurbished.

The overpainting changed little of the pictorial content, but the imperial portrait was deliberately updated with new-fashioned crowns, transforming the painting into the image of a later—unidentified—ruling family in the Orthodox world. At that time, the dedicatory poem was added on the facing page (fol. 4v).

The Scribe Theodorus

The scribe of the Barberini Psalter identified himself in another manuscript as Theodoros of Caesarea. He wrote the text of the psalter in long lines (a single column), in Greek Minuscule, with ample outer and lower margins to accommodate the painted vignettes. Each poetic line occupies one or two physical lines, and the opening letter of each verse is set off in the left margin and written in gold.

From the Collection of a Catholic Cardinal

The psalter was in the collections of a Greek cleric named Scarlatos Matzas and Francesco Boncompagni (1592-1641), Archbishop of Naples, who either gave or sold it to Francesco Barberini (1597-1679), one of the great art patrons of the seventeenth century. It entered the Vatican library in 1902. Its current binding of brown leather over boards dates from the first half of the twentieth century.