ELEMENTS OF HYPERTEXTUALITY IN THE PAGE DESIGN

THE MANUSCRIPT MATRIX

Theodore designed the pages of his Psalter to incorporate illustrations, leaving wide margins at the leading edge and the foot of the page. The illustrations linked portions of text to external textual sources and to historical events, much as do the hypertextual links of today's World Wide Web.

Titles and Initials
The sober design of the textual block contains no visual surprises such as sudden changes of colors or scripts. Theodore established a hierarchy of size and colors, gold, red, and blue, to designate the relative importance of elements such as titles, initial letters, and connecting marks.

Titles and initials occupied the summit of Theodore's hierarchy. The short "title" headings of each Psalm appeared as horizontally centered, uncial capitalized script, in gold ink. The letters of the titles stood twice as tall as the miniscule script of the text, marked by four preceding and three succeeding dots.

Initial letters of pages followed titles in the hierarchy, as tall as two lines of miniscule script. In addition to this initial, each Psalm verse (consisting of two lines) started with a capital uncial initial in gold ink. In some cases, the scribe decorated initials. All initials align vertically at the left margin, with hanging indent for the rest of the verse. The scribe announced the beginnings of Psalms and verses with these initials, differentiated from the rest of the text written in a brownish miniscule script. Theodore's hierarchy resembles the hierarchy of styles in HTML script, styles that designate the importance of text by font size, boldness, and color.

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LINKS AND INSCRIPTIONS

Theodore established an elaborate system of connections between the marginal illustrations and the Psalm text. These connections resemble contemporary electronic hypertextual "links," varying in length, shape, form and color. Theodore's links matched the color of the labels appearing above the appropriate illustrations (red or blue), the labels sometimes being inscriptions that identify the figures portrayed or provide brief summaries of the textual source that the illustration was based on. For example, a red line in the textual block linked the text of Psalm 8:3 to a second, shorter red line adjacent to an illustration of the Entry to Jerusalem, which had a red inscription reading "the palm branch bearing."

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Folio 100 recto: Psalm 77:1-2: Headpiece

folio 3v: Psalm 4:4-5:2: Example of blue color links and inscriptions

folio 35r: Psalm 31:11-32:8: Example of liturgical marks (doxa and kathisma)

LITURGICAL APARATUS

The versatile use of the Psalter required an elaborate system of internal subdivision and reference, involving marginal illustrations that served as finding aids for locating certain texts used during the liturgy. Those illustrations by no means merely decorated or illustrated the text, but rather re-created the most holy moments of religious worship (De Hammel, 210). The Theodore Psalter provided visual directions such as these marginal illustrations, liturgical rubrics, and decorated initials.

Liturgical marks such as "doxa" and "kathisma" appeared at locations to signal the beginnings and ends of each of the twenty kathysmata. They also linked the disconnected texts that comprised special rites. This system of internal subdivision and reference resembles the footer and header of some Web pages and the navigational links connecting one Web page to another.

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The images presented here come from the electronic facsimile of the Theodore PsalterTheodore Psalter produced by Professor Charles Barber of Notre Dame University, as published by the University of Illinois Press.

GENERAL INFORMATION: Home:: ::Medieval hypertexts:: ::Theodore Psalter:: ::Gallery 1:: ::Gallery 2

ADVANCED RESEARCH: Elements of hypertextuality in the page design:: ::Hypertextual Analysis: Psalm 7:: ::Psalm 25:: ::Psalm 32:: ::Function and categories of illustrations:: Conclusion