Miniature

Origin

from Italian miniatura, via medieval Latin from Latin miniare rubricate, illuminate, from minium red lead, vermilion (used to mark particular words in manuscripts).

• early 18th Century

Definitions

• 1:(especially of a replica of something) of a much smaller size than normal; very small: children dressed as miniature adults.
• 2: a thing that is much smaller than normal, especially a small replica or model.
• 3: a plant or animal that is a smaller version of an existing variety or breed.
• 4: a very small and highly detailed portrait or other painting.
• 5: a picture or decorated letter in an illuminated manuscript.

Description

The word miniature, derived from the Latin minium, red lead, is a picture in an ancient or medieval illuminated manuscript; the simple decoration of the early codices having been miniated or delineated with that pigment. The generally small scale of the medieval pictures has led secondly to an etymological confusion of the term with minuteness and to its application to small paintings especially portrait miniatures, which did however grow from the same tradition and at least initially use similar techniques.

Apart from the Western and Byzantine traditions, there is another group of Asian traditions, which is generally more illustrative in nature, and from origins in manuscript book decoration also developed into single-sheet small paintings to be kept in albums, which are also called miniatures, as the Western equivalents in watercolor and other mediums are not. These include Persian miniatures, and their Mughal, Ottoman and other Indian offshoots.