Gospel Book

Unknown

about 1480–1520

Tempera

J. Paul Getty Museum

This illuminated manuscript page depicts eight figures arranged in two rows of four. Each figure has a halo and is shown frontally, holding objects or gesturing. The background is divided into colored geometric sections. The Gospel book, which contains the New Testaments texts of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, is the main liturgical book used in the Ethiopian liturgy, as it was in the early Middle Ages in Europe. This example belongs to a group of manuscripts executed in the so-called Gunda Gundé style. Named after a Stephanite monastery in the Christian highlands of Ethiopia, Gunda Gundé illumination is characterized by a bright palette of primary colors, and monumental figures with rounded outlines and prominent, almond-shaped eyes. Intricate interlace patterns frame miniatures and decorate canon tables. Particularly extraordinary in this Gospel b