Angelic Divine Comedy - Imago

Manuscript Ms 1102 in the Biblioteca Angelica is a 14th-century codex containing Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy and commentaries by Jacopo Alighieri and Bosone da Gubbio entitled Capitolo Sulla Commedia. It also contains a fragment of the poem on the history of Alexander the Great written by Gualterus de Castellione.

Relevant for the originality of the iconography representing Dante's Inferno, the codex is a notable example of fourteenth-century Bolognese miniature.

Each of the canticles of the Inferno is introduced by a miniature showing the contents of the canticle.

Thirty-four miniatures embellish the manuscript which shows scenes of Hell in bright colors on a gold background.

The first scene is organized in two columns, while the rest of the miniatures occupy only one column.

The manuscript was never completed. The blank spaces were left for the miniatures of the canticles of Paradise and Purgatory.

Delicate white plant motifs, typical of late medieval Italian manuscripts, adorn the entire book. A single scribe is likely responsible for writing the text in elegant littera textualis.

The Biblioteca Angelica manuscript 1102 has been little studied, and the style and meanings of its miniatures need further attention.

Generally attributed to a scriptorium in Bologna, the identity of the illuminator of the Divine Comedy is still a matter of debate. Mario Salmi attributes the work to Simone dei Crocefissi, which places the codex in the first quarter of the 15th century. The Mezzaratta workshop in Bologna has been suggested as the manuscript's production site, but more recently, scholars have proposed the names of Oderisi da Gubbio and Franco Bolognese for the illuminations in this precious manuscript.

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