The Creation of the Illustrated Octateuch

The illustrated Octateuch is among the most complex creations of the Middle Byzantine period. The Septuagint text of the first eight books of the Old Testament contains hundreds of miniatures in addition to a dense commentary, notes with variant readings, prologues and epilogues. The author shows that the text and images all derive from a single manuscript created in Constantinople around 1060. He accomplishes this by concentrating on one of the manuscripts in comparison with an example that is not illustrated but belongs to the same text family and shares a group of distinctive lacunae. This related Octateuch reveals how the designer of the model of the illustrated manuscripts worked to integrate the various form of content.