on the garment of the Maries is similar to its counterpart in the Bible ofAvila. The

drapery falls at the center with semicircular patterns. The garment of the angel is also

similar. There appears to be the same soft curving edges in the drapery of the angel. The

most similar example would be the ivory relief plaque from a reliquary in San Isidoro of

Leon. The drapery of the figures has a linear quality and it falls in semicircles at the

center, as in the Bible ofAvila. The way in which the veils cover the women is also

similar. And finally the Three Maries at the Tomb in the tympanum of San Isidoro has a

number of stylistic similarities with its counterpart in the Bible ofAvila. Among these

similarities are the way the artist seems to use the wings of the angel to fill the empty

space above him, just as the first angel in the Bible ofAvila, the mantle that covers the

shoulders of the angel and the fact that the arch is semicircular, like the three arches

found in the Bible ofAvila.


 The next scene on folio CCCXXIIII v depicts the Anastasis or Harrowing of Hell

(Fig. 67). According to Yarza Luaces, the Bible ofAvila represents the traditional

Castilian interpretation of the Harrowing of Hell, with the 12th century formula of Christ

opening the fauces of the leviathan and pulling the Just from Hell. 194 Yet the way of

representing this theme seems to vary. In manuscript illumination this theme had already

been represented in the Beatus of Gerona (975), and it was considered to be surprisingly

original and independent from Byzantine sources (Fig. 68).195 Nevertheless, the visions of

Hell in the Beatus of Gerona seem to be different in iconography and composition from




194 Yarza Luaces, J., Iconograjia de la 2iniatura Ca;stellano-Leonesa,~~11~11~~1 1973, p. 32.

195 Ibid.