An Apocalyptic Manuscript Monday
This week we present our facsimile of the 14th-century Cloisters Apocalypse, published in 1971 by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. As described in the introduction to the commentary about the manuscript, “[famine], pestilence, strife, and untimely death inspired apocalyptic fantasies and movements in Europe throughout the Middle Ages” (page 9), and this environmental influence led to the popularity of apocalyptic manuscripts like this French Apocalypse. Made in the 1330s for a Norman aristocratic couple, this manuscript has a few interesting details that set it apart from other Apocalypses, especially in relation to two other manuscripts in London (British Library, Add. Ms. 17333) and Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale, ms. Lat. 14410) that share similar formats, styles, and sequences with the Cloisters manuscript.
The first unique detail is the prefatory cycle of the life of Jesus in the introductory folios (1-2 verso). Since the Apocalypse of St. John the Divine (also known as the book of Revelation) was written by a titular St. John, prefatory cycles in Apocalypses usually consist of his life, rather than Christ’s. The other aspect of this manuscript that makes it distinct amongst its sister manuscripts is the addition of a dedication page on folio 38 verso. This page shows a man and woman kneeling in front of a tonsured saint and the Virgin and Child, respectively, representing the people for whom this manuscript was originally made for.
Interestingly, this manuscript also has multiple pages added to the original manuscript. Pasted on the inside front cover are handwritten provenance notes. The manuscript also did not originally include chapters and verses 16:14 through 20:3, and pages with this text were later added to the manuscript after the dedication page.
The materials used to create this manuscript include tempera, gold, silver, and ink on parchment with a later leather binding. If you are interested in seeing this unique Apocalypse manuscript, you can either use our facsimile, visit Gallery 13 of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Cloisters where the original is on display, or view their digital presentation of the manuscript.
View other posts on our facsimiles of illuminated manuscripts.
– Sarah S., Special Collections Graduate Intern
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One thing I don't think I've ever seen talked about is how post-apocalypse ideation is largely about homelessness.
Homelessness looms large in the American consciousness. Like, not that it's irrelevant elsewhere, but it's got a particular cultural place in the US that's reflected in Hollywood, and therefore relevant because what makes it into film and TV sets the terms of so many conversations.
We don't acknowledge it if we can help it, but I think most people know they're never more than a few very bad months from winding up there.
Even people who are sure it only happens to people who deserve it, who fuck up and put one foot in the morass of their own foolish volition. Even they know the quicksand is there, waiting to be walked into, and that the odds are stacked against ever climbing out on your own once you have. And that they, too, are capable of fucking up. Of trusting the wrong person. Of getting cancer incorrectly.
And those of us who know damn well we can't be sure we're safe even if we do everything right, we know it even better.
And in that sense it doesn't matter what the world would realistically look like after X kind of apocalypse, what people would do, how society would adapt. Because the anxiety that's being processed is about the reality that's in existence now.
About what if my world ends. And I lose access to the fruits of developed society, to clean clothes and new glasses and running water, to a safe place to sleep where I don't expect to be killed or robbed, or driven out by men with guns and dogs. To my home and work and family and everything I usually use to tell me who I am.
What if every man's hand is against me, and every meal is a small victory, and there's only my own dwindling strength between me and the long night?
Will I make it? Will I hold up under the strain? Will I retain my dignity? Will I be lucky? Will I be able to protect the people I love, in that world, the world where no one is protecting us anymore?
Is there a way to continue to live as a human person, when you're denied the prerogatives of one, and don't know if you'll ever get them back?
Putting this anxiety into the context of a massive apocalypse divorces this scenario from the burden of shame tied up in the idea of winding up in that sort of situation in the normal course of events, by having society vanish rather than expel you, personally, as a washout, and continue on around you.
It also allows you to rule out a priori the question of what resources might be offered but can't in an anticipatory context be counted on; shelters and programs and housed friends and family who may or may not help. And narrow the narrative to only the question of what you can survive, and often a fairy tale about surviving all of it and starting over.
Rehearsing for a loss in a mythologized format is a very normal anxiety processing behavior, and I think a lot of apocalypse scenario building is attached to the buried dread of that personal apocalypse. But I haven't seen that one make the list.
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i think batfam survival rates in zombie apocalypse would go something like
Bruce: he’s absolutely fine he’s literally bruce wayne he lives on an island??
Jason: has a 🤫🧏 pact with Dick
Dick: has a 🤫🧏 pact with Jason
Tim: he either gets got first or absolutely last
Damien: prolly with Bruce thru it all. Damian would survive 100%
Alfred: immune. survives (obviously, he’s Alfred, what do you expect?)
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