Saint Agnes in a Historiated Initial "V" from an Antiphonary

Neri da Rimini · 1310/15

Medium

Manuscript cutting in tempera and gold leaf, with gothica textualis inscriptions in Latin in black and red ink, ruled in red ink, on parchment

Original size

Initial: 7 × 6.5 cm (2 13/16 × 2 9/16 in.); Sheet: 55 × 38.5 cm (21 11/16 × 15 3/16 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Medieval

This intimate manuscript cutting distills an entire world of medieval devotion into a few square inches of gilded parchment, with Saint Agnes rendered in luminous tempera inside an ornate initial letter that doubles as her sacred frame. Neri da Rimini was one of the most accomplished illuminators working in the Romagna region of northern Italy during the early fourteenth century, a period when manuscript painting and panel painting were in constant conversation. His work is distinguished by a refined sense of figural elegance inherited from the Byzantine tradition, combined with the emerging Gothic sensibility spreading down from France — delicate facial modelling, richly jewelled drapery, and architectural initials that feel almost architectural in their precision. The gold leaf background, burnished to a warm glow, was not decorative excess but a theological statement: Agnes stands outside earthly time. The cutting is one of several surviving leaves from the same antiphonary, a liturgical choral book, scattered across collections in Europe and the United States — evidence of how ruthlessly medieval manuscripts were dismembered and sold from the eighteenth century onward. The hand-painted oil reproduction translates the warmth of the original tempera and gold into a format made to last on a wall, preserving every detail of Neri's draughtsmanship at a scale you can actually live with.