Studiose litteras in picturis attendere. Estudi i edició de les inscripcions de la pintura valenciana (1238-1579)

In this doctoral thesis, the inscriptions in Valencian painting executed between the years 1238 and 1579 have been studied, from an approach of the History of written culture. To this end, a catalogue has first been created with 368 sheets of paintings that contain epigraphs from the period under consideration. In them, apart from the technical and historical data of the work, a palaeographic transcription and a critical edition of each inscription has been carried out. To this is added an analysis of its characteristics, such as the type of writing, the language of writing, the support on which it is written and the sources of origin. The subsequent study has been built on this large corpus, divided into two parts. In the first, the intrinsic and extrinsic characteristics of the Valencian pictorial inscriptions are comprehensively analysed, which has made it possible to trace a diachronic vision of the different supports that contain them (phylacteries, placards, titulus crucis, books, halos, dresses, etc.), of the succession of scripts used in their execution (Gothic capitals and lowercases, pre-humanistic and humanistic capitals and lowercases), of the languages (Latin , Valencian, Spanish, Arabic, Hebrew and Greek) and sources (biblical-liturgical, patristic, hagiographic, literary) and of the different functions that these epigraphs perform within the work of art (identifying, discursive, informative) , allegorical, decorative, etc.). In the second part of the study, we sought to know the relationship of these epigraphs with the society that conceived them and made use of them. To this end, it has been necessary to reflect on the epigraphic nature of these inscriptions; those involved in its design and realization (clients, cultural intermediaries and painters), as well as its relationship with written culture; the documents from which information can be extracted (painting contracts, samples, samples of letters, sketchbooks, post-mortem inventories, etc.); the different phases of execution (delivery of the minutes with the texts to be represented, the design of the inscriptions and their transfer to the definitive support); and the function they fulfill both inside the painting and in the creative society. So, taking into account the particular nature of these texts, where the characteristics of visibility and readability are sufficiently compromised by their execution and location, the conclusion has been reached that it is necessary to overcome the more traditional epigraphic analyses, focused on the publicity of the message, the solemnity of the execution and the durability of the support, to adopt a more flexible model, which takes into account new concepts. In this way, different perspectives have been introduced to those applied in Spanish epigraphic studies, but already in full force in other schools such as the French, among which stand out: the iconicity of writing, that is, the image that projects any text, which causes it to be perceived in an iconic way, allowing the arrival of a message to the receivers beyond effective reading; agency, that is, the ability of writing to act on its environment, giving entity and "allowing the existence" of the images it accompanies, in a marked parallelism with the divine Logos and the Creation; and, in particular, the epigraphic intent of the inscriptions, which implies that the primary purpose of these texts is to present specific words in a specific place over time (regardless of their visibility and legibility) and not the mere dissemination of its verbal content.