Beasts on Parchment: Picturing Animals in Medieval Manuscripts

Baltimore, MD

Website: http://thewalters.org/eventscalendar/eventdetails.aspx?e=1770

Both real and fantastic, animals play an important role in medieval art and thought. In illuminated manuscripts, they appear in many places and many guises, from full-page miniatures of religious imagery to beautifully painted borders of fantasy tales.

This exhibition will explore the variety of beasts that swarm, creep, and scramble across the pages of medieval manuscripts and their allegorical significance. Offering to the visitors an insight into the values and concerns of medieval society and its imagination, the show will celebrate the beasts that charmed, delighted, and sometimes frightened medieval viewers.