The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

212 THE BOOKS OF ENOCH En« 5 ii
E makes additions after TLKTOVOIV: first *of the children' at v. 14, then *of giants on the earth*
at V. 17, in order to make the author's thought more explicit; cf. En. 7: 2. Besides, the close
link between the destruction of the giants and the flood could already have been deduced from
chapter 6 of Genesis.
This motif was very popular in medieval, Greek, and Eastern art, in which miniatures often
represent Noah's ark and above it two drowning giants, either alone or mingling with the
corpses of men and beasts. (See, for example, W. Neuss, Die Apokalypse des hi Johannes in der
altspanischen und altchristlichen Bibel-Illustration {Das Problem der Beatus-Handschriften), 1931,
PP- 71-3 and phot. 90-8; J. M. Casanovas, C. E. Dubler, and W. Neuss, Sancti Beati a Liebana
in Apocalypsin codex Gerundensis, Prolegomena^ 1962, p. 58 and the photographs on pp. 57 and
59.) In the monastery church of Saint-Savin a fresco shows two giants climbing on to the ark
in order to escape from the waters of the flood. Another fresco in the same church shows the
figure of Enoch in the process of bodily translation into heaven (A. Grabar), deep in prayer,
perhaps that of En. 84 (P.-H. Michel), or else in the act of receiving the visions and inspiration
necessary to a holy writer, as in representations of the Evangelists (Y. Zaluska); see P.-H. Michel,
La fresque romane, 1961, pp. 84 and 120-2. Since the figure of Enoch is wholly exceptional in
Christian art, the two frescoes in Saint-Savin may testify to a knowledge, direct or indirect,
of the Book of Enoch in twelfth-century France.
The giants appear in other miniatures as well. In the illuminated Octateuch MSS. (references
above, p. 21), a row of armed men with a chief bears the legend: aay€Ls yiyavres rwv KaKwv
i€vp€Tal: Octateuch of Serail, fol. 54^; Octateuch of Smyrna, fol. 19^. This is a clear allusion
to En. 7-9. A preceding miniature represents the union of the sons of God with the daughters of
men (Serail, fol. 54^; Smyrna, fol. 18^) but, according to the later interpretation, they are
designed as Sethites (men) and Cainites (women): viovs Oeov vofxi^e rovs Sy]0 cKyovas . . .
pXeTTovras els Ovyarepas ^pcoriov exovaas rrjv yeveaiv €K KdVv,
Equally well known in iconography is the theme of Enoch's ascension to the heavenly paradise.
In Caedmon Poems (Oxford, Bodl. MS. Junius 11, p. 61) the scene is figured in two acts.
In the lower register, Enoch supported by two angels looks up with hands spread out in prayer;
two groups of onlookers watch as he is raised into the air; the upper register shows Enoch,
with two angels, half disappearing in the firmament of heaven. Also in two acts, but in a different
manner and with Latin legends, was painted the ascension of Enoch on the eleventhcentury
fresco of the Dionysius Chapel in Xanten; see V. H. Elbern, Kultur und Kunst im
werdenden Abendland am Rhein und Ruhr, ii (1964), 1017 and fig. 3. In Aelfric's Paraphrase of
the Heptateuch (London, Brit. Mus., Cotton MS. Claudius B. iv, fol. ii^) the bottom right compartment
of a full-page miniature represents the Lord helping Enoch to climb the ladder
leading to heaven.
Less popular was the motive of Enoch as writer or receiver of revelations. The Caedmon
MS., p. 60, represents Enoch, with halo, holding an open book, trampling on a dragon (Satan ?
Death ?), and listening to an angel addressing him from above. Enoch writing on the stone tablets
is figured in a Greek sacred history of the Old Testament (Sinai, MS. 1187, f. 26^). Enoch as a
bearer of celestial wisdom, especially of astronomy, is frequently mentioned in Greek chronicles;
above, pp. 19-22. Similar notices occur in Western chronicles as well, v. gr. in Historia Scholastica
of Patrus Comestor {PL 198, col. 1080): 'Henoch fuit optimus. Et transtulit ilium Deus in