Hymnal

This Armenian hymnal was created in the late-seventeenth or early eighteenth century. Although no colophons are recorded in the manuscript, the name of the scribe, Awet, appears on fol. 11r. This may be the same Awet whose work is recorded elsewhere in manuscripts produced at the Monastery of Surb Amenap'rkic in New Julfa, Isfahan (Iran). The four miniatures depicting Joachim and Anna, Adam and Eve, the Resurrection of Christ, and Pentecost represent familiarity with European pictorial traditions. They appear to have been retouched after the original paint began to flake off. The head-pieces for canon divisions and the marginal decoration are based on earlier Armenian models. The small size of this hymnal suggests that it was used privately when participating in the Armenian liturgy.

Provenance

Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object.

Created by Awet (Avet), at the Monastery of Surb Amenap'rkic (St. Salvatore) in New Julfa [Isfahan], Iran, late 17th or 18th century [1]. Henry Walters, Baltimore [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [2]; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

[1] Location is based on the location of other known products of the scribe. The precise location of the manuscript is unknown between its creation and 1931, and it may have been removed from Armenian territory at some point during the 19th-century Armenian Massacres, World War I, or the Armenian Genocide.

[2] This could be the Armenian book purchased by Henry Walters in 1897; see also W.547.