Manuscripts online at the Walters Art Museum

A bunch of gospel manuscripts and other items, mostly illuminated, are online at the Walters Art Museum here.  Blessedly, the Walters has made the images truly accessible:

This Web page links to complete sets of high-resolution archival images of    entire manuscripts from the collection of the Walters Art Museum, along    with detailed catalog descriptions. They are available for free under a Creative      Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license.  Manuscripts    images and descriptions were created and are provided through Preservation    and Access grants awarded to the Walters Art Museum by the National    Endowment for the Humanities, 2008-2014.

Images are offered in four sizes:

1. Master TIFF (600PPI for text pages/1200PPI [or highest resolution    attainable] for illuminated pages
2. 300PPI TIFF
3. JPEG (1800 pixels on the long side)
4. Thumbnail JPEG (190 pixels on the long side)

For an animated “turning the pages” presentation of the manuscripts and    downloadable PDFs, visit    the Walters Art

Well done the Walters!  This is what we want.  Serious users of the collection do not want to be trapped by some custom “viewer application”.

What of the mss?  Well, they aren’t that interesting to us.  There is a large collection of Korans, for instance.  Here are a few that might be of wider interest:

• 93.110,        Single leaf from a grammar, Donatus, Aelius, Latin (1400 – 1499 CE)
  Browse images |                   Cataloging in process                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.4,        Freising Gospels, Jerome, Saint, d. 419 or 20, Latin (860 – 880 CE, Freising, Germany)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.5,        Gospels of Abbot Duden, Latin (1000 – 1099 CE, Werden, Germany)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.7,        Reichenau Gospels, Latin (1030 – 1080 CE, Reichenau Abbey, Lake Constance, Germany)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.13,        Synonyms of Isidore of Seville, Isidore, of Seville, Saint, d. 636, Latin (1125 – 1175 CE, Germany)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.520,        Gospel Lectionary, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (950 – 1000 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.521,        “Imperial” Menologion, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1034 – 1041 CE, Constantinople (Istanbul))
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.522,        Gospel Book, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, approximately 260-approximately 340., Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1080 – 1100 CE, Constantinople (Istanbul))
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.523,        Gospel Book, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340., Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (900 – 999 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.524,        Gospel Book, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340., Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (900 – 950 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.525,        New Testament, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1290 – 1310 CE, Probably Constantinople (modern Istanbul))
• W.526,        Gospels, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1275 – 1300 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.527,        Gospel Book, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (975 – 1025 CE, Constantinople (Istanbul))
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.528,        Gospel Book, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1200 – 1230 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.529,        Gospel Book, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1040 – 1060 CE, Byzantine Empire)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.531,        Trebizond Gospels, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1140 – 1160 CE, Constantinople (Istanbul))
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.532,        Gospel Book, Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1070 – 1100 CE, Eastern Mediterranean)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.533,        Acts and Epistles, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1100 – 1500 CE, Eastern Mediterranean)
  Browse images |                    Manuscript Description |           TEI (XML format)                          | art.thewalters.org
• W.535,        Gospel lectionary, Greek, Ancient (to 1453) (1594 – 1596 CE, Buzǎu, Romania (text); Moscow, Russia (miniatures))

There are also a bunch of Armenian gospel manuscripts there, which makes me wonder whether we actually have a critical edition of the Armenian bible yet?  Metzger deplored the absence of one in his book on the versiones decades ago.

A useful resource, I think.