Noah's Ark on the two mountains of Ararat: The iconography of the cycle of Noah in the Ripoll and Roda Bibles*

Abstract

The two Catalan manuscripts known as the Ripoll and Roda Bibles are giant Latin Bibles written and illustrated at the beginning of the eleventh century in the monastery of Ripoll, during the long abbacy of Oliba (1008–46). During this time of spiritual and cultural renewal the monks of the Ripoll scriptorium probably worked on a new recension of the Bible designed for study rather than liturgy and produced these onevolume giant works, by collecting and unifying a vast amount of biblical, exegetical and pictorial material.