Season 2, Episode 8: Illuminating Illuminated Manuscripts


In this episode, we are taking a close look at some of the oldest items in the Society's collection. W. Dean Eastman Undergraduate Resident, Erin Olding, takes us along as she examines manuscripts from the Middle Ages that are illuminated with gold and silver.

Episode transcript

Click the images above to view the photos.

View more illuminated manuscripts and learn more:

Opening of the Long Hours of the Cross, page from Book of Hours

Calendar, beginning of January, page from Book of Hours

Episode Special Guests:

Erin Olding was one of the two interns for the MHS's innagural W. Dean Eastman Undergraduate Library Residency, working with the Library and Research departments. She is going on to study History at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

Dr. Agnieszka Rec is the Early Materials Cataloger at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. She is working on the collecting habits of Boston bibliophile Anna Cabot Lowell Quincy Waterston.

This episode uses materials from:

All the Ways by Podington Bear (Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported)
Psychic by Dominic Giam of Ketsa Music (licensed under a commercial non-exclusive license by the Massachusetts Historical Society through Ketsa.uk)
Curious Nature by Dominic Giam of Ketsa Music (licensed under a commercial non-exclusive license by the Massachusetts Historical Society through Ketsa.uk)

All Episodes

Season 4, Episode 4: Unlocking Winthrop's Tomb
Season 4, Episode 3: "Neither Shall There Be Any More Pain"
Season 4, Episode 2: "In the belfry arch Of the North Church tower"
Season 4, Episode 1: 1154 Boylston Street
Season 3, Bonus Episode: Inside Andersonville
Season 3, Bonus Episode: Eben Horsford's Nordic Nostalgia
Season 3, Episode 8: The Mortal & Everlasting Life of Frederic Augustus James: Enduring Life Behind the Deadline of a Civil War POW Camp
Season 3, Episode 7: Events That Did Not Happen
Season 3, Episode 6: Relics, Part 2: One of a Kind
Season 3, Episode 5: Relics, Part 1: Corporeal Remains
Season 3, Episode 4: Egyptomania and the Art of Egyptian Revival
Season 3, Episode 3: The Branded Hand
Season 3, Episode 2: Gouverneur Morris and the History of Disability
Season 3, Episode 1: “Holding the Atlantic World In His Mouth”: George Washington, an MHS Portrait, and the Culture of Teeth in the 18th Century
Season 2, Episode 9: The Roots of Liberty?: An MHS Mystery
Season 2, Episode 8: Illuminating Illuminated Manuscripts
Season 2, Episode 7: To Live Like John Quincy Adams
Season 2, Episode 6: Stories Told in Wax
Season 2, Episode 5: Small Objects
Season 2, Episode 4: Furnishing Foreign Relations: Benjamin Joy’s Sea Chest
Season 2, Episode 3: Thunderbolt: A World War II Bomber Pilot’s Canine Companion
Season 2, Episode 2: Who Were the Bucks of America?
Season 2, Episode 1: Daniel Webster's New England, Daniel Webster's Union
Season 1, Episode 11: Treasures Within: The Recovered Letters of Margaret Fuller
Season 1, Episode 10: The Letters of Phillis Wheatley
Season 1, Episode 9: The Many Lives of the Lusitania Medal
Season 1, Episode 8: The Ledger Art of Ft. Marion
Season 1, Episode 7: The Casket of Hair
Season 1, Episode 6: A Petition for Rebecca Nurse
Season 1, Episode 5: Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. and the "Lowly Hotdog"
Season 1, Episode 4: A Miniature Portrait of Elizabeth Freeman
Season 1, Episode 3: The Relics of Nora Saltonstall
Season 1, Episode 2: The Lost Sword of the MA 54th
Season 1, Episode 1: A Letter from Paul Revere

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