Women’s work as scribes and illuminators of manuscripts has garnered considerable attention in the past decades, and it is clear that women were involved in the production of manuscripts. In most cases where women’s work as illuminators can be confirmed, the manuscripts are produced in monastic scriptoria, most commonly in German-speaking areas. Such is the case with German nuns considered in this essay. The implications of portraits depicting Guda and Claricia are considered in relation to their inscriptions within manuscripts made between 1250 and 1325. Hildegard of Bingen, Herrad of Landsberg, and Gisela von Kerssenbrock are each responsible for celebrated manuscripts, though debates have always surrounded their roles within the production of the illuminations. Fifteenth-century reform movements were followed by increased manuscript production in monastic workshops led by Barbara Gewichtmacherin, Sibylla von Bondorf, and Elsbeth Töpplin, though the reception and scholarly analysis of the style of these illuminations vary widely. Despite enormous efforts by art historians, female illuminators continue to go unrecognized. Colophons, self-representations, and other evidence of female artists within medieval manuscripts have frequently been interpreted as statements of patronage or some other indirect relationship to the illuminations.