The libraries of the Irish monasteries of Würzburg and Reichau seem to have been large and important. Many existing Irish MSS. come from these two monasteries. Unfortunately, no old catalogue of the Würzburg collection seems to have come down to us. In the case of Reichau (Augia Major) on Lake Constance a catalogue was made while Erlebald was abbot between 822 and 838 A.D. The number of MSS. given in this catalogue is 415 of which 30 were written in Erlebald’s time.[317]

Important though the collections of Rébais, Würzburg and Reichau undoubtedly were they are overshadowed by the greater fame of Bobbio. Indeed there is only one library that could compare with Bobbio either for the extent or the value of its MSS., and that was the library of St. Gall or Sangallen in Switzerland. This great monastery was founded by St. Gall (in Irish Cellach), the pupil and companion of St. Columbanus, about the year of 612 A.D. In the ninth century the library of St. Gall possessed 533 volumes, nine of them being palimpsests.[318] This library was famous during the Middle Ages. The Fathers who attended the Council of Constance depended mainly for reference on the valuable MSS. in this library to which they had free access; and, sad to relate, when the Council broke up in 1418 A.D. many of these holy men neglected to return these valuable old theological works in Latin and Greek.[319] This same library came to another loss two years earlier, in 1416, when Poggio, the Florentine scholar, with two learned friends who had been engaged at the Council visited St. Gall. Having a season of leisure they made a search for some missing volumes of Cicero, Livy, and other classical writers. Nor were they disappointed. Among other precious tomes they discovered the well-known Argonauticon of Flaccus, copies of eight of Cicero’s orations with valuable commentaries by Asconius Pedianus, the works of the Roman architect Vitruvius, also the works of Priscian, of Quintilian, of Lucretius, and of other great scholars.[320]

In many libraries of Europe there are MSS. written, or copied, by Irish monks during the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries. These MSS. are bound together into Codices which are named either after the principal work included therein, or after the monastery where they were written, or sometimes from the library where they are at present deposited. These Codices contain copies of the classics, treatises on grammar, the Psalms, the Epistles of St Paul, and other portions of the Scriptures, Lives of the Saints, Hymns, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of England, &c. Scribes when studying these often added glosses and scholia either on the margin or between the lines to explain the Latin and Greek words of the text. Sometimes as in the case of the Psalms and of Priscian’s grammatical tract these glosses were copious and show that the scribe had availed himself freely of the work of earlier commentators. These glosses have been a rich mine to students of philology and have been extensively used for linguistic purposes containing as they do many of the most archaic forms of the Irish language. The meaning of these Old Irish words can now be obtained from the Greek and Latin words which were originally explained by the Irish words. Some of these MSS. were written by Irishmen on the Continent, while others were written in Ireland and carried to the Continent by other monks who deposited them in the libraries of their monasteries.

LIST[321] OF LIBRARIES CONTAINING MSS. WITH IRISH GLOSSES THEREON NOT LATER THAN END OF NINTH OR BEGINNING OF TENTH CENTURY:

  1. Trinity College Library, Dublin.
  2. Library of the Franciscan Monastery, Dublin.
  3. Royal Irish Academy, Dublin.
  4. British Museum, London.
  5. Lambert Library, South London.
  6. University Library, Cambridge, England.
  7. Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.
  8. St. John’s College, Cambridge.
  9. Bodleian Library, Oxford, England.
  10. Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.
  11. Library of Nancy.
  12. Library of Cambray.
  13. University Library, Leyden.
  14. University Library, Würzburg.
  15. Hof-und Landesbibliothek, Carlsruhe.
  16. Royal Library, Munich.
  17. Library of the Monastery of Engelberg.
  18. Library of St. Paul’s Kloster in Carinthia.
  19. Royal Library, Dresden.
  20. Stadtbibliothek, Schaffhausen.
  21. Royal Library, Vienna.
  22. Stifsbibliothek, St. Gall.
  23. Stadtbibliothek, Berne.
  24. Ambrosian Library, Milan.
  25. Vatican Library, Rome.
  26. University Library, Turin.
  27. Biblioteca Nazionale, Turin.
  28. Laurentian Library, Florence.

These numerous and valuable MSS. that have come down to us are in themselves the most convincing evidence of the zeal of the Irish monks for the promotion and transmission of classical learning. There can be little doubt that these Irish scholars under the most adverse circumstances fostered learning during the dark ages that preceded the Renaissance and, as we have seen, when the great awakening came one of the sources from which the treasures of classical antiquity emerged were the monastic libraries that contained the MSS. copied, or preserved, with loving care by Irish scribes and scholars.

In this chapter we have endeavoured to show how the zeal for learning which inspired the teacher in the class-room was carried into the scriptorium; how the scribes with patient industry copied, and so transmitted, the relics of classical antiquity; and how these relics were preserved to the afterworld in the great monastic libraries. The direct contribution made by the Irish monks of the Early Middle Ages to contemporary education will be studied in the next chapter. Here we would emphasise the fact that the full significance of the Irish monastic schools as an educational factor cannot be understood unless we realize the importance of the combined, as well as the separate, contribution of these three great centres of intellectual activity, the school, the scriptorium and the library.