The Princess and the Prayer Scroll
Leslie Brubaker, Emerita Professor of Byzantine Art & Director of the Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies at the University of Birmingham
This event will be held in 308A Doe Library, UC Berkeley.
Byzantine private prayer scrolls are rare. Most date from the 13th or 14th centuries, and while several of them were written in gold ink only two of the preserved examples — neither of which has ever been published — contain any images. This paper presents one of the illustrated scrolls, now held in a private collection. It identifies the woman who owned it, considers the role of private prayer scrolls in the late Byzantine period, and examines the gender issues that this particular example raises.
Leslie Brubaker is Emerita Professor of Byzantine Art & Director of the Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies at the University of Birmingham. A comprehensive biography is available here.
Co-sponsored by the Program in Medieval Studies and the History of Art Department