AUTHOR: JEROME OF STRIDON AND UNIDENTIFIED MONKS
DATE: C. 800
Described by the eleventh-century Annals of Ulster as ‘the most precious object of the Western world’, the Book of Kells is not merely a relic of extreme beauty but also shines a light upon the spiritual life of Christian Europe in the medieval period. An illuminated manuscript of the four Gospels (translated into Latin) along with accompanying texts and tables, it was created by monk scribes and artists around the beginning of the ninth century.
What stands out in the Book of Kells is its extraordinary illustration across 680 pages, a near flawless example of the so-called Insular style that dominated British and Irish monasteries between the sixth and ninth centuries. It combines ornate calligraphy, traditional Christian iconography and distinctive interweaving patterns (for instance, Celtic knots) along with depictions of humans, flora and fauna (including cats and goats but, more exotically, peacocks and lions too), as well as mythological beasts, all shimmering with colour (many of them derived from exotic pigments). The first page of St John’s Gospel, for example, consists of just four words (‘In principio erat verbum’ – ‘In the beginning was the Word’), along with an illustration of a contemplative John, and then the image of a drunkard slugging back a goblet of wine while a red-tongued monster looms over him.
Authorship of the text is uncertain, although it is likely that at least four monks worked on the text and three on the design features, and perhaps many more. Each page has sixteen to eighteen lines of text, picked out in inks of black, yellow, purple, blue, green and red. Most of the text derives from the Vulgate, a fourth-century Latin translation of the scriptures completed by Jerome of Stridon, although some is taken from the earlier Vetus Latina translation.
The Book of Kells remains uncompleted, a considerable number of illustrations only present in outline. What is clear is that this was a major undertaking, a volume intended for ceremonial use, destined to live on the high altar and to be read from at mass. The cost in terms of material (aside from the inks, the pages are of expensive vellum, or calf’s-skin parchment, and it is estimated that 185 calves were needed to provide sufficient material for all the folios) and man-hours would have been considerable. This was an object designed to inspire awe in all whose eyes fell upon it and to venerate the God whose truths the faithful believe it contains. From a time when we tend to think of Western Europe as being in darkness, the Book of Kells stands out as an immaculate jewel – a beacon of artistic expression fired by profound faith that tells us much of the mindset of the age. It also reflects the fact that, in the centuries following the collapse of the Roman Empire, monks were now responsible for keeping alive the Latin language that had spread the word of Christianity in Europe.
Exactly where the book was created is uncertain. It is named the Book of Kells because it was kept for many centuries at the Abbey of Kells in County Meath, Ireland. The abbey was built in the early ninth century on the site of a former hill fort and dedicated to St Columba, a sixth-century Irish abbot and missionary who founded the famous abbey at Iona, an island off Scotland’s west coast.
A THING OF BEAUTY
The years have not dimmed the book’s ability to stun an audience. Since 1953, it has been bound in three volumes, two of which are on public display in rotation. One volume is customarily open at an illustrated page, while the other displays a double page of script. Despite having been shorn of some thirty pages, most of them in the medieval period, the artefact remains one of Ireland’s biggest tourist attractions, receiving upwards of a million visitors a year.
There are numerous theories about how the book came to be at Kells. Some scholars have argued that it was produced in its entirety in situ, while others have suggested it was made partly or wholly at another monastery in England or Scotland (such as Lindisfarne – or Holy Island – in Northumberland) and later moved. The most commonly held thesis is that work was begun on Iona by Columban monks before the book was moved to Kells, perhaps to keep it safe from Viking raids – although Kells itself was the victim of a series of such raids in the period. With a little imagination, it is not difficult to picture those original Scottish monks bent over their painstaking work in their beehive-shaped stone huts on their weather-beaten island, carrying out their divinely inspired craft amid the elements.
The first documented reference to the book’s presence in Kells comes only in 1007, when it is referenced in the Annals of Ulster. It had seemingly been stolen and its bejewelled golden cover removed before it was rediscovered after several months beneath a sod of grass. This incident may have resulted in the loss of a few pages at the beginning and end of the text. It then remained at Kells until 1654, when the forces of Oliver Cromwell rolled into town and the local governor took the doubtless wise decision to have the book moved to Dublin, where it might be stored safely. Seven years later, it was gifted to Dublin’s Trinity College, which has been its permanent home ever since.
In 1188, the clergyman and historian Gerald of Wales wrote of the Book of Kells:
This book contains the harmony of the Four Evangelists according to Jerome, where for almost every page there are different designs, distinguished by varied colours. Here you may see the face of majesty, divinely drawn, here the mystic symbols of the Evangelists, each with wings, now six, now four, now two; here the eagle, there the calf, here the man and there the lion, and other forms almost infinite. Look at them superficially with the ordinary glance, and you would think it is an erasure, and not tracery. Fine craftsmanship is all about you, but you might not notice it. Look more keenly at it and you will penetrate to the very shrine of art. You will make out intricacies, so delicate and so subtle, so full of knots and links, with colours so fresh and vivid, that you might say that all this were the work of an angel, and not of a man.