The Book of Kells: Ireland's Most Precious Medieval Artifact

Ireland’s greatest artistic treasure is full of fascinating mysteries. It is exhibited at the library of Trinity College in Dublin. It is the Book of Kells, an exquisite illuminated manuscript in Latin from the early ninth century. Compared to other ancient books of its time, it is obviously very special. As one thirteenth-century historian said, the Book of Kells looks like “the work, not of men, but of angels.”

VIKINGS AND THIEVES

Experts think the book was created by Irish monks at a monastery on the island of Iona near Scotland. Life there was not so peaceful. Vikings attacked in about the year 806 AD. The monks fled, taking the unfinished book to the monastery at Kells, north-west of Dublin. Still it was not completely safe. It was stolen in the year 1007. The golden shrine that used to cover it was never found again. The book was finally moved to Trinity College in 1661.

The four volumes of the Book of Kells include the Gospels and other supplementary texts. There are full-page illustrations and countless embellishments of words and letters. The main subject is the life of Christ.

The Trinity College exhibition tells how the book was made. The monks wrote and drew on vellum made of calf skin. The pigments were very precious. Many were imported from Mediterranean countries. If an artist or scribe made a mistake, he scraped it off with a knife. However, there are still many mistakes in the texts.

SEEING IS BELIEVING

The mistakes show that the monks and visitors to the monastery probably didn’t really read the book. Many people at that time couldn’t read at all. They could see the book lying open on an altar during religious processions. The monks made the book beautiful and complex in order to spiritually inspire anyone who saw it. Some details are too small to see.

MYSTERY

Many mysteries remain. Researchers who study the Book of Kells can often only speculate. It is sure that the images of lions, serpents, fish, and peacocks are all symbols of Christ. But why is a wolf walking across one page? Why are there images of men pulling each other’s beards? Why is one man with a horse stretching out his foot in such a strange way, as if to indicate something? Is there a special significance? Was the artist trying to be amusing? Or was he transported by his own marvelous imagination?

(play the audio)

Interview: THE SPARK OF GENIUS

Libraries are not usually considered tourist attractions, but perhaps Trinity College, Dublin is the exception that proves the rule. Large numbers of visitors come here every year in order to admire the Book of Kells, a splendid medieval manuscript that features illustrated versions of the four gospels. Anne-Marie Diffley, who is the Library’s Visitor Services Manager, explains the book’s background:

Anne-Marie Diffley (Irish accent): Christianity came to Ireland in 432, with the arrival of St. Patrick, and one of the sort of “products” of Christianity coming to Ireland was the art of writing, beautifully exemplified by books like the Book of Kells, the Book of Durrow, the Book of Armagh, and even the Lindisfarne Gospels in Britain. The Celtic Church was Ireland, Scotland and northern Britain, and in this area the monasteries had the power. If you have the power, you have the money. So they were able to buy the vellum that they wrote the gospels on, they were able to buy the inks and pigments, and there was a great creativity coming out of the monasteries at this time, and you can see them in these beautiful manuscripts. The scribes who created the Book of Kells… the Book of Kells was, we believe, written on the Island of Iona, which is a small Island between Ireland and Scotland. We know very little about the scribes who actually created the Book of Kells. However, a French expert, Françoise Henry, she believed four young scribes did the work of the script and at least three young artists did the illuminated pages. So we believe seven or eight young monks between the ages of 14 and 16 created the Book of Kells.

a personal favourite

And we asked Anne Marie Diffley whether she had a favourite page in the Book of Kells:

Anne-Marie Diffley: My favourite page comes from the Gospel of St. Matthew and it’s the Chi Ro, or “Chi Ro” (alternative pronunciation - ed) page, it’s really the Greek initials for Jesus Christ, basically “JC” in Greek, and it’s probably one of the most iconic pages in the Book of Kells because it shows the Celtic art, but also the artist’s own talent. It looks like a golden page, but it’s not, because the yellow colour is either ochre, or perhaps arsenic and sulphur, but it’s this beautifully exuberant, very beautiful page, in the Book of Kells, but there are also lovely little images in this page. Down at the end you’ll see a little otter, a little animal, a little water animal, the otter, with the fish, which was an early symbol of Christianity, you see cats and mice playing with the host, and, of course, this would have been a problem in medieval monasteries and churches, they were full of vermin. So maybe the monks were trying to work out how many cats they needed, to get rid of their problem. Who knows? There’s lovely other details of angels and butterflies, so a lot of natural detail in this page. You also get the sense of the talent that these monks had, or the spark of genius that one, maybe two of these monks had. We don’t know the names of these young monks, but one or two of them definitely had the spark of genius.