(Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 19352. 9¼ × 8 inches)
There are comparatively few of these extravagant relics now in existence. Their intrinsic value made them favorite objects of pillage, and hundreds were destroyed for their jewels and precious metals. In many of those that have endured, like the Codex Argenteus, at Upsala, in Sweden, the silver letters have turned black, the gold ink has become a rusty red, and the stained vellum now supplies a tawdry background.
After passing the early stages of the art, there are ten examples I particularly like to keep fresh in my mind as showing the evolution of that insatiable desire on the part of booklovers of all ages to enrich the book. Four of these are in the British Museum in London, four in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, one in the Library of San Marco in Venice, and one in the Laurenziana Library in Florence. In each of these storehouses of treasure there are many other manuscripts worthy of all the time a pilgrim can spare; but these ten represent different schools and different epochs, and in my own study have combined to make illumination a living art and a romantic history.
The Lindisfarne Gospels is where I start my illuminated pilgrimage. It takes me back to the seventh century, when the world was shrouded in darkest ignorance, and is a reminder that except for the development in the Irish monasteries, as typified by early illuminated volumes such as this, knowledge of books might have almost wholly disappeared. It recalls the asceticism of those early Irish monks carried even to a point of fanaticism; their toilsome pilgrimages to Rome, visiting the different monasteries and collecting, one by one, the manuscripts to bring back to form those early libraries that kept alive the light of learning.
The Irish school of writing and painting passed over to England through the monasteries established by the Irish monks in Scotland, and the earliest of the English settlements was Lindisfarne. It was here that the Gospels, one of the most characteristic examples of the Celtic School, as translated to northern England, was produced. Such knowledge of its date and origin as exists rests upon a colophon added at the end of the manuscript, probably in the tenth century, which would seem to place the date of the execution of the work at about the year 700. For nearly two centuries it remained as the chief treasure of Lindisfarne. In 875, so the tradition runs, in order to escape from the invasion of the Danes, it was decided to remove the body of Saint Cuthbert and the most valued relics to the mainland, and the Gospels was included. When the attempt was made to cross over to Ireland, according to the legend, the ship was driven back by storm, and the chest containing the precious volume was lost overboard. Here is the quaint chronicle:
In this storm, while the ship was lying over on her side, a copy of the Gospels, adorned with gold and precious stones, fell overboard and sank into the depths of the sea. Accordingly, after a little while, they bend their knees and prostrate themselves at full length before the feet of the sacred body, asking pardon for their foolish venture. Then they seize the helm and turn the ship back to the shore and to their fellows, and immediately they arrive there without any difficulty, the wind blowing astern.… Amidst their lamentations in this distress, at length the accustomed help of their pious patron came to their aid, whereby their minds were relieved from grief and their bodies from labor, seeing that the Lord is a refuge of the poor, a helper in time of trouble. For, appearing in a vision to one of them, Hunred by name, he bade them seek, when the tide was low, for the manuscript…; for, perchance, beyond the utmost they could hope, they would, by the mercy of God, find it.… Accordingly they go to the sea and find that it had retired much farther than it was accustomed; and after walking three miles or more they find the sacred manuscript of the Gospels itself, exhibiting all its outer splendor of jewels and gold and all the beauty of its pages and writing within, as though it had never been touched by water.… And this is believed to be due to the merits of Saint Cuthbert himself and of those who made the book, namely Bishop Eadfrith of holy memory, who wrote it with his own hand in honor of the blessed Cuthbert; and the venerable Æthelwald, his successor, who caused it to be adorned with gold and precious stones; and Saint Billfrith the anchorite, who, obeying with skilled hands the wishes of his superior, achieved an excellent work. For he excelled in the goldsmith’s art.
This quotation from Mr. Eric George Millar’s Introduction to the facsimile reproduction of this famous manuscript, published by the British Museum, is given at such length to emphasize at the very beginning of this pilgrimage the important place given to these manuscripts in the communities for which they were prepared. The fact that such a legend exists at all attests the personality the manuscript had assumed. It was my very great pleasure, the last time I studied the Gospels, to have Mr. Millar, who is an Assistant in the Department of Manuscripts at the British Museum, explain many things in connection with it which could not be gleaned without the exhaustive study which he has given to it.
The Gospels includes 258 leaves of heavy vellum, measuring about 13 by 10 inches. The Latin text is written in beautifully designed, semi-uncial characters. These differ from the capital letters only by their relatively greater roundness, inclination, and inequality in height. This style of lettering obtained until the eighth or ninth century, when the semi-uncial character became the transition to the minuscule. There are five full pages of decoration, in cruciform design of most extraordinary elaboration; six pages of ornamented text; four full-page miniatures of the Evangelists, in which the scribes are drawn in profile, seated, with cushion, desk, and footstool; sixteen pages of Canon tables, decorated in pure Celtic style; and numerous initials of various sizes.
The great interest in this manuscript lies in the cruciform pages. When I first saw them I thought the work a marvelous example of the amount of intricate design an artist could devise within a given area of space. Then, as I studied them, came the realization that, complicated as they were, there was a definite plan the artist had established and followed which preserved the balance of coloring and design.