Interesting Images of Liturgical Ceremonial and Art from a Medieval-Renaissance Era Codex

Recently I came across a rather interesting manuscript that shows various images of medieval/renaissance liturgical life, treasure and dress. In addition to these primary benefits, there is also something particularly evocative about the style of the drawings (at least in my estimation). The manuscript in question is fortunately fully digitized online (one of the definite benefits of the modern, digital age) and originally comes from the Benedictine Abbey of Ochsenhausen (and later Lambach), dated to circa 1475-1600.  Today it finds it home in the collection of the Austrian National Library (ÖNB) in Vienna, listed as Codex 3044. 

The codex in question is interesting insofar as it also contains various illustrations of the liturgical objects of the abbey, with the purpose of inventorying the contents of the treasury and the abbots under which it was obtained. Here are a just few examples of that.

As interesting as all that is in its own right, for me the real focal point are the ceremonial depictions found within. These illuminations document the Council of Constance (1414-1418) in which various papal claimants were deposed and Pope Martin V was elected.  It was the last papal election to happen outside of Italy.  The codex also seems to contain a chronicle of the abbey from which it originated, showing the life and death of its various abbots.

Here is just a small taste for your consideration. The most interesting aspect are the details of the liturgical ceremonial and how much of it is very recognizable liturgically speaking -- at least if you're familiar with the usus antiquior.  We're not going to comment too much on the illuminations here, we'll leave it to you to dig into these as you see fit. 

You can see these monks/clerics are wearing the "almuce" here -- a fur covered shoulder cape which was not merely decorative but also had a purpose of keeping monks and clerics warm in colder climates.

The election of Pope Martin V

The chanting of the Gospel

There are many other illustrations in this codex. I'd invite interested readers to use the link we provided above to see more.

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