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British Library, Egerton MS 609 is a Breton Gospel Book from the late or third quarter of the ninth century. It was created in France, though the exact location is unknown. The large decorative letters which form the beginning of each Gospel are similar to the letters found in Carolingian manuscripts, but the decoration of these letters is closer to that found in insular manuscripts, such as the
Book of Kells The Book of Kells ( la, Codex Cenannensis; ga, Leabhar Cheanannais; Dublin, Trinity College Library, MS A. I. 8 sometimes known as the Book of Columba) is an illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New ...
and the
Lindisfarne Gospels The Lindisfarne Gospels (London, British Library Cotton MS Nero D.IV) is an illuminated manuscript gospel book probably produced around the years 715–720 in the monastery at Lindisfarne, off the coast of Northumberland, which is now in the ...
. However, the decoration in the Breton Gospel Book is simpler and more geometric in form than that found in the Insular manuscripts. The manuscript contains the Latin text of St Jerome's letter to Pope Damasus, St. Jerome's commentary on Matthew, and the four Gospels, along with prefatory material (an introduction) and canon tables (an index for a medieval manuscript). This manuscript is part of the
Egerton Collection The Egerton Collection is a collection of historical manuscripts held in the British Library. The core of the collection comprises 67 manuscripts bequeathed to the British Museum in 1829 by Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Earl of Bridgewater, along with ...
in the
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
.


Provenance

The Breton Gospel Book was produced in France, most likely in
Brittany Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica during the period o ...
or
Tours Tours ( , ) is one of the largest cities in the region of Centre-Val de Loire, France. It is the prefecture of the department of Indre-et-Loire. The commune of Tours had 136,463 inhabitants as of 2018 while the population of the whole metrop ...
. In the fifteenth century, the Benedictine Abbey of St Martin at Tours owned the manuscript; it has the inscription "Iste Liber est de Ecclesia beatissimi Martini Turonensis" on
folio The term "folio" (), has three interconnected but distinct meanings in the world of books and printing: first, it is a term for a common method of arranging sheets of paper into book form, folding the sheet only once, and a term for a book ma ...
102v (the last page). The Breton Gospel Book was then acquired by the
Maurist The Congregation of St. Maur, often known as the Maurists, were a congregation of French Benedictines, established in 1621, and known for their high level of scholarship. The congregation and its members were named after Saint Maurus (died 565), ...
Abbey of Marmoutiers, also in Tours, during the eighteenth century, as evidenced by the inscription "Majoris monasterii Congregationis S Mauri" on folio 1r (the first page). It was bought in 1836 by the
British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It documen ...
, using money that was left to them from
Francis Henry Egerton Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Earl of Bridgewater, (11 November 1756 – 11 February 1829), known as Francis Egerton until 1823, was a noted British eccentric from the Egerton family and supporter of natural theology. Egerton was a Church of En ...
. Francis Henry Egerton was the 8th Earl of Bridgewater. When he died in 1829, he donated £12,000 and 67 manuscripts to the British Museum creating the
Egerton Collection The Egerton Collection is a collection of historical manuscripts held in the British Library. The core of the collection comprises 67 manuscripts bequeathed to the British Museum in 1829 by Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Earl of Bridgewater, along with ...
. The money created the Bridgewater Fund, which was used to buy more manuscripts. Before 1973 the
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
had been part of the British Museum, but the British Library Act 1972 separated the library from the museum. Since then, it currently resides at the British Library, and is now part of the Egerton Collection.


Description

The manuscript is believed to be part of the 'Irish-Northumbrian' group. Other manuscripts considered 'Irish-Northumbrian' are the
Book of Armagh The ''Book of Armagh'' or Codex Ardmachanus (ar or 61) ( ga, Leabhar Ard Mhacha), also known as the ''Canon of Patrick'' and the ''Liber Ar(d)machanus'', is a 9th-century Irish illuminated manuscript written mainly in Latin. It is held by the L ...
, the Lichfield Gospels, the
Book of Kells The Book of Kells ( la, Codex Cenannensis; ga, Leabhar Cheanannais; Dublin, Trinity College Library, MS A. I. 8 sometimes known as the Book of Columba) is an illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New ...
and the MacRegol Gospels. There have long been cross-cultural artistic connections between the British Isles and Brittany, which is especially evident in medieval manuscripts, due to their locations across the channel from each other. Breton manuscripts resemble British and Irish decoration with their animal ornamentation, interlace and other designs; while also using the script developed at Tours and earlier Continental decoration.


Contents

The Breton Gospels Book contains St. Jerome's letter to Pope Damasus, The Prologue of St Jerome's commentary on St Matthew, and the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. It also includes prefatory material and canon tables, an index for a medieval manuscript. It consists of 102 folios, plus two unfoliated paper flyleaves. The book's dimensions are 310 by 210 mm, or about 12.2 by 8.3 inches. The text space for the script is 230 by 145 mm, or about 9.1 by 5.7 inches, with varying of lines of text per page. The Breton Gospels Book is written in Latin, with
Caroline minuscule Carolingian minuscule or Caroline minuscule is a script which developed as a calligraphic standard in the medieval European period so that the Latin alphabet of Jerome's Vulgate Bible could be easily recognized by the literate class from one reg ...
script. It is thought that the book was copied by an Insular scribe. It is a parchment
codex The codex (plural codices ) was the historical ancestor of the modern book. Instead of being composed of sheets of paper, it used sheets of vellum, papyrus, or other materials. The term ''codex'' is often used for ancient manuscript books, with ...
, with ink and pigments on vellum, and was bound after 1600 with red gilt leather, gold tooled paper, and marbled end papers. Carolingian minuscule began in the eighth century under Charlemagne, but became popular in the ninth century and was created from half-uncial script. Insular script developed in Ireland before spreading to the British Isles and other parts of Europe. Insular script, also known as Insular minuscule, was based on half-uncial. Majuscule in script is for when the letters are capitalized, not lower-cased. This manuscript has countless items in the margins. Most of it is script, but some of them are small designs.


Decoration

St. Jerome's letter to Pope Damasus was usually placed before the texts of the gospels in a manuscript, and is called 'Novum Opus' because of its first words. In the O of 'Beato' there is a face which was a common decoration in early medieval manuscripts. The face is this manuscript is simple; it has lines forming a basic outline of a human face. The canon tables are Eusebian Canon tables. Canon tables were used to divide up the gospels in a manuscript and are similar to a table of contents. The canon tables from folio 3v to 7r are in frames with brown and yellow. The canon tables' design changes between the open folio leaves. Some have animal heads at the ends, while others have organic designs. The canon tables on folio 3v to 4r have animal heads on both the top ends of each outer column. On folio 3v, both animal heads are the same and look like birds; whereas on folio 4r, they are different. The animal head on the left looks like a bird, where on the right it is another animal. Folio 4r on the second to the right column has a design at the top where it forms the arches, which the other side does not have. The canon tables are also inside a decorative micro-architecture frame. The canon tables on 4v and 5r only have a single animal head on each page. They are each on the column facing the index of the manuscript (on 4v it is the far-right column, and on 5r the far-left column). These frames also have less decoration, and are more simplistic. On folios 5v and 6r, they become simply lined frames. Folios 6v and 7r are almost the same except for small ornamentation at the cornered ends of the columns. Folio 6v has small curved ends at each of the bottom outer ends of the columns. The one on the right looks similar to an animal head. Where on folio 7r it has different swirling designs at the ends of the frames. There are four large initials that are decorated within the manuscript. They are mostly in brown, orange, yellow and some blue. They all show elements of interlace and
zoomorphism The word ''zoomorphism'' derives from the Greek ζωον (''zōon''), meaning "animal", and μορφη (''morphē''), meaning "shape" or "form". In the context of art, zoomorphism could describe art that imagines humans as non-human animals. It c ...
. These letters occur on folios 1r (Jerome's letter to Pope Damasus), 8r (the Gospel of Matthew), 46r (the Gospel of Mark) and 79r (the Gospel of John). Luke's was the only Gospel that did not have a large decorative initial. There are other initials on folio 1r, 2v (The Prologue of St Jerome's commentary on St Matthew), 7v (the preface to Matthew), 44v (the preface to Mark) and 77v (the preface to John) that are also decorated but not to the size and extent as the other ones. It was common in the Middle Ages to have a preface for each gospel. Luke is again the only saint not to have a preface or a decorated beginning. They also used the same colors, along with interlace and zoomorphism. Many of the beginning initials are highlighted or filled in with orange, brown and yellow, some of them having more than one color. It is thought that the monastery was not wealthy because the manuscript was modestly produced, along with a limited variety of colors. There are similarities from the colophon of Luke from the Bibliothèque Nationale MS nouv. acq. lat. 1587 to that in Egerton 609. The Bibliothèque Nationale MS nouv. acq. lat. 1587 was produced in the 8th to 9th century in Brittany.


Matthew

The beginning to the gospel of Matthew is similar to that of the beginning of the Gospel of Mark. The animal heads and interlace which appear on the 'LI' are related to styles that have been transformed and simplified from early medieval Northern and Western France. These designs are more geometric than that of extravagantly curving letters found in Anglo-Saxon and Irish manuscripts, they have more in common with the classicising letters found in Charlemagne's court.


Mark

In the preface of the Gospel of Mark, the design in the first letter in 'Marcus' is a unique variation in Anglo-Saxon England and Ireland gospel books made from the eighth and ninth centuries. For this letter the shape and interlace have been modified into linked geometric patterns, where traditionally they use spirals and curves. The beginning of the Gospel of Mark is similar to the decorations in gospel books from Britain and Ireland in the eighth and ninth centuries. The title is written at the top of the folio (f. 8r) in capital letters with color added to the script. The beginning letters of the gospel are almost the size of the page and slowly shrink until it becomes standard script. The larger letters also have color added to them, while the regular script does not. The first two letters 'IN' at the start of the gospel are decorated with animal heads and interlace. These two letters are also unified, which first appears in the late 7th century in Irish manuscripts. The decoration with the animal heads and the interlace shows the Breton tradition of imitating Irish and similar art in manuscripts.


John

The beginning gospel of John is the same as the beginning gospels to that of Mark and Matthew. The first two letters are 'IN', just like Mark's, but both have varied artist style and are not exact replicas of each other. The simplified designs of interlace show the change from the intricate designs in manuscripts like in the Lichfield Gospels.The manuscript has two full-page miniature portraits of Mark (f. 45v) and John (f. 78v). Another way of portraying the evangelists were to use their symbols, which appeared in the vision
Ezekiel Ezekiel (; he, יְחֶזְקֵאל ''Yəḥezqēʾl'' ; in the Septuagint written in grc-koi, Ἰεζεκιήλ ) is the central protagonist of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible. In Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Ezekiel is ackno ...
had, and also in the
Book of Revelation The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament (and consequently the final book of the Christian Bible). Its title is derived from the first word of the Koine Greek text: , meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The Book of ...
, and early Christian writers interpreted the four creatures as signs of the gospels. By the ninth century, hybrid depictions of the evangelists' symbols were rarely being produced anymore. Areas that were remote, like Brittany, and not major centers were often resistant to the Carolingian standardization so the older traditions could flourish better. In the Symbol of John, there are serpents in the bottom panels of the frame which show the Breton-style of animal interlace. There were many different types of depictions of them developed early on with the combination of the animal head with a human body, just like the ones in this manuscript. According to Jerome, and the most common belief, is that
Matthew Matthew may refer to: * Matthew (given name) * Matthew (surname) * ''Matthew'' (ship), the replica of the ship sailed by John Cabot in 1497 * ''Matthew'' (album), a 2000 album by rapper Kool Keith * Matthew (elm cultivar), a cultivar of the Chi ...
is the man,
Mark Mark may refer to: Currency * Bosnia and Herzegovina convertible mark, the currency of Bosnia and Herzegovina * East German mark, the currency of the German Democratic Republic * Estonian mark, the currency of Estonia between 1918 and 1927 * Finn ...
is the lion,
Luke People * Luke (given name), a masculine given name (including a list of people and characters with the name) * Luke (surname) (including a list of people and characters with the name) *Luke the Evangelist, author of the Gospel of Luke. Also known ...
is the ox, and John the eagle, as depicted in the miniature portrait. Even though these interpretations were most accepted, some writers still made different pairings of animals with the saints. In the miniature portrait of Mark, the manuscript depicts him as the eagle (both Mark and John are shown as eagles), while others believed instead of him being the lion.


Gallery

File:MS Egerton 609 F. 1.jpg, Folio 1. The beginning of Jerome's letter to Pope Damasus, along with decorated initials 'B' and 'N' and interlace. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 2v.jpg, Folio 2v. Decorated initial 'P' with an animal head and a stylized tail. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 3v.jpg, Folio 3v. Cannon table with micro-architectural frame and beak heads. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 4.jpg, Folio 4r. Cannon table in a micro-architectural frame and beak heads. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 8.jpg, Folio 8r. Zoomorphic initial 'L' at the beginning of Matthew, which includes animal heads and interlace. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 44v.jpg, Folio 44v. At the beginning of the preface of Mark, the word 'Marcus' is decorated with geometric interlace. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 45v.jpg, Folio 45v. A miniature portrait at the beginning of Mark of a stylised man with an eagle head in an interlace border. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 46.jpg, Folio 46r. A decorated initial 'I' at the beginning of Mark with animal heads and interlace. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 77v.jpg, Folio 77v. The beginning of the preface to John, with a decorated initial 'H' and with colored letters. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 78v.jpg, Folio 78v. A miniature portrait before the beginning of John of a standing winged figure with a bird head in an interlace border. File:MS Egerton 609 F. 79.jpg, Folio 79r. The beginning of John has a zoomorphic word with the initials 'IN' with bird heads and interlace.


See also

List of Hiberno-Saxon illuminated manuscripts Hiberno-Saxon manuscripts are those manuscripts made in Ireland and Great Britain from about 500 CE to about 900 CE in England, but later in Ireland and elsewhere, or those manuscripts made on the continent in scriptoria founded by Hib ...
List of illuminated later Anglo-Saxon manuscripts


Further reading

* ''List of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1836-1840'' (London: British Museum, 1843), 1836, p. 42. * . Maunde Thompson and G. F. Warner ''Catalogue of Ancient Manuscripts in the British Museum'', 2 vols (London: British Museum, 1881-84), Part II ''Latin'', p. 30. * Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener, ''A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament'', 4th edn, ed. by Edward Miller, 2 vols (London: George Bell & Sons, 1894), II, 76. * John Chapman, ''Notes on the Early History of the Vulgate Gospels'' (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1908), pp. 49, n. 1, 280 (as 'E'). * P. McGurk, 'The Gospel Book in Celtic Lands before AD 850: Contents and Arrangement', in ''Ireland and Christendom: The Bible and the Missions'', ed. By Proinseas Ni Chathain and Michael Richter, (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1987) pp.165-89. (pp. 176, 189) * ''A Guide to the Exhibition of Some Part of the Egerton Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum'' (London: British Museum, 1929), no. 50. * Edward Kennard Rand, ''A Survey of the Manuscripts of Tours'', Studies in the Script of Tours, 1, 2 vols (Cambridge, Massachusetts, Mediaeval Academy of America, 1929), I, no. 140, II, pl. 15 ith additional bibliography * C. R. Morey, ‘The Gospel-Book of Landevennec: The Illumination of the Landevennec Gospels’, ''Art Studies: Medieval Renaissance and Modern'' (1931), 258-62 (p. 260 n. 3). * H. H. Glunz, ''History of the Vulgate in England from Alcuin to Roger Bacon'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1933), no. 31. * Wilhelm Koehler, ‘The Fragments of an Eighth-Century Gospel Book in the Morgan Library (M. 564)', in ''Studies in Art and Literature for Belle da Costa Greene'', ed. by Dorothy Miner (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954), pp. 238-65 (p. 256, as ‘E’). * Francis Wormald, ''An Early Breton Gospel Book'', ed. by Jonathan Alexander (Cambridge: Roxburghe Club, 1977), pp. 14 n. 6, 19 n. 3. * Patrick McGurk, ‘The Disposition of Numbers in Latin Eusebian Canon Tables’, in ''Philologia Sacra: Biblische und patristische Studien für Hermann J. Frede und Walter Thele zu ihrem siebzigsten Geburtstag'', ed. by Roger Gryson (Freiburg: Herder, 1993), pp. 242-58 (p, 252 n. 26, 255 n. 37). * Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle, ''Bible Manuscripts'' (London: British Library, 2007), p. 39, fig. 26. * Martin McNamara, ''The Bible and the Apocrypha in the Early Irish Church (A.D. 600-1200)'', Instrumenta Patristica et Mediaevalia, Research on the Inheritance of the Early and Medieval Christianity, 66 (Turnhout, Brepols, 2015), pp. 279-80, 321-24, 530. * Kenney, James F., “Chapter VII: Religious literature and ecclesiastical culture”, in: Kenney, James F., ''The sources for the early history of Ireland: an introduction and guide. Volume 1: ecclesiastical'', Records of Civilization: Sources and Studies 11, Revised ed. (1929), New York: Octagon, 1966. 622–744. * Lindsay, W., & Bains, D. (1963). ''Notae latinae: An account of abbreviation in Latin MSS. of the early minuscule period (c. 700-850)''. Hildesheim: Georg Olms. * O'Reilly, Jennifer, Carol A. Farr, and Elizabeth Mullins. ''Early Medieval Text and Image II. The Codex Amiatinus, the Book of Kells and Anglo-Saxon art.'', 2019. Print. * Smith, Julia M. H. ''Province and Empire: Brittany and the Carolingians''. Cambridge [England: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Print. * Fernández, Cuesta J, and Sara M. Pons-Sanz. ''The Old English Gloss to the Lindisfarne Gospels: Language, Author and Context''. , 2016. Print.


Citations

{{Reflist Hiberno-Saxon manuscripts Gospel Books 9th-century biblical manuscripts Egerton collection 9th-century illuminated manuscripts