A large number of existing manuscripts are dated from the monasteries of the country immediately surrounding the metropolis of the eastern empire; and many also, from those of Asia Minor, from the islands of the Ægean Sea, and especially from Cyprus.
But no spot was more famed for the production of books than Mount Athos—the lofty promontory which stretches from the Macedonian coast far into the Ægean Sea. The heights and the sides of this mountain were almost covered with religious houses, rendered by art and nature, and by the universal opinion of the sanctity of the monks of the “holy mountain,” so secure that neither the meditations nor employments of the recluses were disturbed by the approach of violence. The chief occupation of the inmates of these establishments is affirmed to have been the transcription of books, of which each monastery boasted a large collection.
Many extant manuscripts prove that the copying of books was practised extensively during the middle ages in the monasteries of the Morea, in those of the islands of Eubœa and of Crete. This latter island seems indeed to have been a place of refuge for men of learning during the latter periods of the eastern empire, who found in its monasteries, both shelter, and the means of subsistence.
Fifty religious establishments in Calabria, and the kingdom of Naples, are mentioned, from which proceeded a large number of books afterwards collected in the libraries of Rome, Florence, Venice, and Milan.
In the monasteries of western Europe also, and especially in those of the British Islands, this system of copying was carried on. Though there were considerable diversities in the rules and practices of the monks of different orders, the elements of the monastic life were in all orders and in every country the same; and generally speaking, wherever there were monasteries, there was a manufacture of books. Yet, in some houses, these labours of the pen were much more worthily directed than in others. For while the monks of one monastery employed themselves in transcribing missals, legends, or romances, others enriched their libraries with splendid copies of the fathers of the church, and of the Holy Scriptures; and some, though a smaller number, took care to reproduce such of the classic authors as they might be acquainted with.
The monastic institution seemed as if it were framed for the special purpose of transmitting the remains of ancient literature—sacred and profane, through a period in which, except for so extraordinary a provision, they must inevitably have perished. In every country a large class of the community—freed from the necessity of labour, and excluded from active employments, was constrained to seek the means of allaying the pains of listlessness; and nothing could answer this purpose so well as the transcription of books. And to this employment, congruous as it was with the physical habits that are induced by an inert mode of life, and compatible, too, with the observance of a round of unvarying formalities, was attached an opinion of meritoriousness, which served to animate the diligence of the labourer. “This book, copied by M. N. for the benefit of his soul, was finished in the year ——, may the Lord think upon him.” Such are the subscriptions of many of the manuscripts of the middle ages.
Meanwhile along the cloister’s painted side,
The monks—each bending low upon his book
With head on hand reclined—their studies plied;
Forbid to parley, or in front to look,
Lengthways their regulated seats they took:
The strutting prior gazed with pompous mien,
And wakeful tongue, prepared with prompt rebuke,
If monk asleep in sheltering hood was seen;
He wary often peeped beneath that russet screen.
Hard by, against the window’s adverse light,
Where desks were wont in length of row to stand,
The gowned artificers inclined to write;
The pen of silver glistened in the hand;
Some on their fingers rhyming Latin scanned;
Some textile gold from balls unwinding drew,
And on strained velvet stately portraits planned;
Here arms, there faces shone in embryo view,
At last to glittering life the total figures grew.
Fosbrooke.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] De Re Diplomatica, Libri vi. in quibus quidquid ad veterum instrumentorum antiquitatem, materiam, scripturam et stilum; quidquid ad sigilla, monogrammata, subscriptiones ac notas chronologicas; quidquid inde ad antiquariam, historicam, forensemque disciplinam pertinet, explicatur et illustratur. Op. et Stud. Joh. Mabillon.—Fol. Paris, 1709.