The Compendium historiae in Genealogia Christi and its Iconographical Tradition: Legacy of Classical Antiquity in a Mediaeval Biblical Anthology

Abstract

This article aims to analyse a little known, yet extremely important, phenomenon of reception of Сlassical antiquity and its legacy in the Middle Ages. It deals with the Compendium historiae in genealogia Christi, a biblical anthology created at the end of the 12th century by Peter of Poitiers, theologian and teacher at the Cathedral school of Paris. In the prologues, Peter himself declared that the purpose of his work was to help his students to fix in memory the complex biblical material. For this reason the text was written in a simplified and resumptive way, and it was also accompanied by an 15 On this very interesting manuscript see [11, p. 165] and [16, pp. 180–183, no. 21]. unusual apparatus of images that immediately visualized the main concepts which the students should learn and remember. Peter seems to have derived the figurative system from Greek and Roman mnemonic treatises. Through selected case studies, I aim to demonstrate how Сlassical antiquity and its legacy made a contribution in the creation of that specific art system, tracing the connections between ancient theory and mediaeval practice.