Ann Eljenholm Nichols – författare

Representations of the seven sacraments in medieval art examined in the context of theological, didactic and liturgical sources.Seven-sacrament art - the representation of all seven sacraments - first appeared in Europe as an occasional subject in the 14th century, but by the middle of the 15th it had become widely popular. In this interdisciplinary study,Ann Eljenholm Nichols provides an analysis of the iconography of the sacraments. The book begins with a comprehensive survey of all known continental work, some of it never before published, but it focuses on English work. Nichols argues that before 1450 there existed an international iconography of the sacraments, but that thereafter English work diverges so radically it is necessary to speak of a distinctive insular iconography. The explanation for thatdifference, she believes, is to be found in the peculiar religious climate created by the Lollard rejection of the sacramental system. The need to counter-attack, to make the sacred signs seeable, accounts for the theological character of the font iconography. Her book makes an important contribution to the cultural and social history of medieval England.ANN ELJENHOLM NICHOLS is Professor, Department of English, Winona State University.

The radical Protestantism that led to the suppression of religious drama in England also by the early years of Queen Elizabeth I destroyed perhaps the majority of ecclesiastical art in the country. The essays in this book provide analysis of the intellectual and religious motivation as well as new historical information concerning this phase of iconoclasm.

Richly illustrated venture into book production in Cambridge.William Dyngley (Peterhouse, 1393-1441), known for his personal library of at least 29 manuscripts, was primarily an editor. In the second decade of the fifteenth century, he began a major patristic project that ultimately comprised eight volumes of Augustine of Hippo, anthologies of Origin, Ambrose and Jerome, and a patristic miscellany. Dyngley also constructed thirty-five indexes for Augustine's works, which he copied in tandem with his primary text writer, the so called "Fish Scribe".This richly illustrated monograph considers the people who made the books, the network of Cambridge scribes who copied the texts, the limners who decorated them and the remarkable man behind the project. Dyngley, placed here in the context of contemporary life in a Cambridge college, is shown to be in charge at every stage of production, acquiring exemplars, correcting scribal errors, storing incomplete quires, reassigning texts from one volume, copying and revising tables of content and tallying expenses. The volume also examines the constituent features of the manuscripts themselves, non-verbal cues as well as content. Overall, it sheds considerable new light on manuscript production in the period more generally.

Fifteen years in the making, Ann Eljenholm Nichols's The Early Art of Norfolk: A Subject List of Extant and Lost Art Including Items Relevant to Early Drama is the most comprehensive listing of early art from Norfolk ever compiled. It is based on careful examination of the painted glass, wall paintings, woodcarvings, and other art in the 600 or so churches of this county and also on thorough searching of archival records and antiquarian accounts. The book (double columns, 357 pages, plus plates) will serve as a standard reference source for students of the ecclesiastical arts and also will provide an essential dimension for drama scholars. Appendices treating angels, Norwich Cathedral bosses, apostles and prophets, liturgical estates, painted panels, christocentric sequences, and Te Deum as well, and there are glossaries (including terms used in describing costume) and a contribution by Barbara Green on the antiquaries whose notes provided essential information about lost examples of Norfolk art.