Rossano Gospels
| New Testament manuscript | |
| Name | Purpureus Rossanensis |
|---|---|
| Sign | Σ |
| Text | Matthew, Mark |
| Date | 6th century |
| Script | Greek |
| Found | 1879, Rossano |
| Now at | Diocesan Museum, Rossano Cathedral |
| Size | 188 folios; 31 x 26 cm; 20 lines; 2 col. |
| Type | Byzantine text-type |
| Category | V |
| Note | close to N (022) |
The Rossano Gospels is an incomplete 6th-century illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Greek written following the reconquest of the Italian peninsula by the Byzantine Empire. It is also known as Codex purpureus Rossanensis due to the reddish-purple (purpureus in Latin) appearance of its pages. It is designated by the siglum 042 or Σ in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts, and as ε 18 in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts.
It is one of the oldest surviving illuminated manuscripts of the New Testament, possibly the oldest, and famous for its prefatory cycle of miniatures of subjects from the Life of Christ, arranged in two tiers on the page, sometimes with small Old Testament prophet portraits below, prefiguring and pointing up to events described in the New Testament scene above. It is now in Rossano Cathedral, Calabria, Italy, where it was discovered in the 19th century.