848 ILL 
To ILLUhVIE, v. a. [ illumincr , Fr.] To enlighten ; to 
illuminate : 
When yon dime ftar, that’s weftwavd from the pole, 
Had made his courfe, t’ illume that part of heav’n, 
Where now it burns. Skakejpeare. 
To brighten ; to adorn : 
The mountain’s brow. 
Illum'd with fluid gold, his near approach 
Betokens. Thomfon. 
ILLU'MINAELE, adj. [from illume.'] Capable of be¬ 
ing illuminated. 
ILLU'MINARY, adj. [from illume .] Pertaining to il¬ 
lumination. Scott. 
To ILLUMINATE, v. a. To enlighten ; to fupply 
with light.—No painting can be feen in full perfection, 
but as all nature is illuminated by a iingle light. Wotton. 
Reafon our guide, what can fhe more reply 
Than that the fun illuminates the fky; 
Than that night rifes from his abfent ray, 
And his returning lultre kindles day ? Trior. 
To adorn with feftal lamps or bonfires.—To enlighten 
intellectually with knowledge or grace.-—When he illumi¬ 
nates the mind with fupernatural light, he does not ex- 
tinguifh that which is natural. Locke— To adorn with 
pictures or initial letters of various colours.—To illuflrate. 
—My health is infufficient to amplify thefe remarks, and 
to illuminate the feveral pages with variety of examples. 
JVatts. 
ILLU'MINATING,/ The aft of enlightening. Alfo 
a kind of miniature-painting, anciently much praCtifed 
for illuftrating and adorning books. Befides the writers 
of books, there were artifts whofe profellion was to orna¬ 
ment and paint manufcripts, wdro were called illuminators ; 
the writers of books firft finifhed their part, and the illu¬ 
minators embelliflred them with ornamented letters and 
paintings. We frequently find blanks left in manufcripts 
for the illuminators, which were never filled up. Some 
of the ancient manufcripts are gilt and burnifhed in a 
ftyle fuperior to later times. Their colours were excel¬ 
lent, and their fkill in preparing them mull have been 
very great. 
The praftice of introducing ornaments, drawings, em¬ 
blematical figures, and even portraits, into manufcripts, 
is of great antiquity^ Varro wrote the lives of feven hun¬ 
dred illultrious Romans, which he enriched with their 
portraits, as Pliny attefts in his Natural Hiftory (lib. xxxv. 
chap. a). Pomponius Atticus, the friend of Cicero, was 
the author of a work, on the aCtions of the great men 
amongft the Romans, which he ornamented with their por¬ 
traits, as appears in his life by Cornelius Nepos (chap. 18). 
But thefe works have not been tranfmitted to pofterity. 
There are, however, many precious documents remain¬ 
ing, which exhibit the advancement and decline of the 
arts in different ages and countries. Thefe ineftimable 
paintings and illuminations dii'play the manners, cuftoms, 
habits ecclefiaftical, civil, and military, weapons and in- 
ftruments of war, utenfils, and architecture, of the ancients; 
they are of the greateft ufe in illultrating many important 
faCts relative to the hiftory of the times in which they 
were executed. In thefe treafures of antiquity are pre- 
ferved a great number of fpecimens of Grecian and Ro¬ 
man art, w hich were executed before the arts and fciences 
fell into negleCF and contempt. The manufcripts con¬ 
taining thefe fpecimens form a valuable part of the riches 
preferved in the principal libraries of Europe. The Royal, 
Cottonian, and Harleiah, libraries, as alfo thofe in the two 
univerlities in England, the Vatican at Rome, the Impe¬ 
rial at Vienna, the Royal at Paris, St. Mark’s at Venice, 
and many others. 
A very ancient mnnufcript of Genefis, which v 7 as in the 
Cottonian library, and almoff deftroyed by a fire in 1731, 
contained two hundred and fifty curious paintings in wa- 
I L L 
ter colours. Twenty-one fragments, which efcaped the 
fire, are engraven by the Society of Antiquaries of Lon¬ 
don. Several fpecimens of curious paintings alfo appear 
in Lambecius’s catalogue of the imperial library at Vienna, 
particularly in vol. iii. where forty-eight drawinos of 
nearly equal antiquity with thofe in the Cottonian library 
are engraven; and feveral others may be found in various 
catalogues of the Italian libraries. The drawings in the 
Vatican Virgil, made in the fourth century, before the 
arts were entirely neglected, illuftrate the different fub- 
jecls treated of by the Roman poet. A miniature draw¬ 
ing is prefixed to each of the gofpels brought over to Eng¬ 
land by St. Auguitin in the fixth century, which is pre¬ 
ferved in the library of Corpus Chrilti college, Cam¬ 
bridge ; in the compartments of thofe drawings are de¬ 
picted reprefentations of feveral tranfaCtions in each gof- 
pel. The curious drawings and- elaborate ornaments in 
St. Cuthbert’s gofpels made by St. Ethehvald, and now 
in the Cottonian library, exhibit a ftriking fpecimen of 
the ftate of the arts in England in the feventh century 
The fame may be obferved with refpeCt to the drawings 
in the ancient copy of the four gofpels preferved in the 
cathedral church of Lichfield, and thofe in the Codex 
Rulhworthianus in the Bodleian library at Oxford. The 
life of St. Paul the hermit, now remaining i n Corpus 
Chrifti college, Cambridge, affords an example of the 
ftyle of drawing and ornamenting letters in England in the 
eighth century; and the copy of Prudentius’s Pfycoma- 
cliia, in the Cottonian library, exhibits the ftyle’of draw¬ 
ing in Italy in the ninth century. Of the tenth century 
there are Roman drawings of a lingular kind in the Har- 
leian library, (No. 3820.) Nos. 5280, 1802, and 4.32, in 
the fame library, contain fpecimens of ornamented let¬ 
ters, which are to be found in Irilh manufcripts from the 
twelfth to the fourteenth century. Caedmon’s Poetical 
Paraphrafe of"the Book of Genefis, written in the eleventh 
century, which is preferved amongft F. Junius’s manu¬ 
fcripts in the Bodleian library, exhibits many fpecimens 
of utenfils, weapons, inftruments of mufic, and imple¬ 
ments of hufbandry, ufed by the Anglo-Saxons. The 
like may be feen in extrafts from the Pentateuch of the 
fame age, in the Cottonian library. The manufcript copy 
ot Terence in the Bodleian library, difplays the dreffes 
malks, &c. worn by comedians in the twelfth century* 
if not earlier. The very elegant Pfalter in the library of 
Trinity-college, Cambridge, exhibits fpecimens of the 
art of drawing in England in the lame century. The 
Virgil in the Lambeth library of the thirteenth century 
written in Italy, fhows, both by the drawings and writ¬ 
ing, that the Italians produced works much inferior to 
ours at that period. The copy of the Apocalypfe in the 
fame library, (No. 209,) contains a curious example of the 
manner of painting in the fourteenth century. The 
beautiful paintings in the hiftory of the latter part of 
the reign of king Richard II. in the Harleian library, 
No. 1319, afford curious fpecimens of manners and cuf¬ 
toms, both civil and military, at the dole of the four¬ 
teenth and in the beginning of the fifteenth century; as 
does No. 2278 in the fame library. Many other inftances 
might be produced ; but thole who defire farther infor¬ 
mation may confult Strutt’s Regal and Ecclefiaftical An¬ 
tiquities, 4-to. and his Horda-Angel-cynnan, lately pub- 
liflied in 3 vols. 
This art was-much prafrifed by the clergy, and even 
by fome in the higheft ftations in the church. “The fa¬ 
mous Ofmund, (fays Bromton,) who was conlecrated 
bifhop of Saliftmry A.D. 1076, did not difdain to fpend 
fome part of his time in writing, binding, an & illuminating 
books.” Mr. Strutt, as already noticed, has given the 
public an opportunity of forming fome judgment of the 
degree of delicacy and art with which thefe illumina¬ 
tions were executed, by publilhing prints of a prodigious 
number of them, in his Regal and Ecclefiaftical Antiqui¬ 
ties of England, and View of the Cuftoms, See. of Eng¬ 
land. Iu the firft of thefe vvorks we are prefented wit’ll 
the 
