On the variations of the colour of the sun at the opening of the sixth seal (Rev. 6, 12-17) in Commentaria in Apocalypsin by Beato de Liébana

Abstract

The last text of the biblical corpus stands out for the intense chromaticism of the account, in keeping with the conditions imposed by the public reading envisaged by its author; this descriptive precision emphasised its veracity and its effectiveness among the listeners. Likewise, the copies preserved with the commentary by Lebaniego have stood out precisely because of the great development of their illustrative cycles. The main aim of this study is to analyse the allusion to the black colour of the sun, which was fully meaningful for the author of the text, perhaps also for Beatus and for those who visually translated the sequence in the first copies, but which, as time goes by, is displaced, distorted and updated. Thus, it reveals that texture of time that manifests the variations in the reception of the work.