The Stockholm Codex Aureus (

Stockholm Stockholm () is the capital and largest city of Sweden as well as the largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people live in the municipality, with 1.6 million in the urban area, and 2.4 million in the metropo ...

National Library of Sweden The National Library of Sweden ( sv, Kungliga biblioteket, ''KB'', meaning "the Royal Library") is Sweden's national library. It collects and preserves all domestic printed and audio-visual materials in Swedish, as well as content with Swedis ...

, MS A. 135, also known as the Codex Aureus of Canterbury and Codex Aureus Holmiensis) is a

Gospel book A Gospel Book, Evangelion, or Book of the Gospels (Greek: , ''Evangélion'') is a codex or bound volume containing one or more of the four Gospels of the Christian New Testament – normally all four – centering on the life of Jesus of Nazareth ...

written in the mid-eighth century in

Southumbria The Southumbrians or 'Suðanhymbre' were the Anglo-Saxon people occupying northern Mercia. The term might not have been used by the Mercians and was instead possibly coined by the Deiran or Bernician people as a territorial response to their own ...

, probably in

Canterbury Canterbury (, ) is a cathedral city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, situated in the heart of the City of Canterbury local government district of Kent, England. It lies on the River Stour. The Archbishop of Canterbury is the primate of t ...

, whose decoration combines Insular and Italian elements. Southumbria produced a number of important illuminated manuscripts during the eighth and early ninth centuries, including the

Vespasian Psalter The Vespasian Psalter (London, British Library, Cotton Vespasian A I) is an Anglo-Saxon illuminated psalter decorated in a partly Insular style produced in the second or third quarter of the 8th century. It contains an interlinear gloss in Old E ...

, the Stockholm Codex Aureus, three Mercian prayer books (the Royal Prayer book, the

Book of Nunnaminster The Book of Nunnaminster (London, British Library, Harley MS 2965) is a 9th-century Anglo-Saxon prayerbook. It was written in the kingdom of Mercia, using an " insular" hand (as used in the British Isles), related to Carolingian minuscule. It was ...

and the

Book of Cerne The Book of Cerne (Cambridge, Cambridge University Library, MS Ll. 1. 10) is an early ninth-century Insular or Anglo-Saxon Latin personal prayer book with Old English components. It belongs to a group of four such early prayer books, the other ...

), the Tiberius Bede and 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 Briti ...

's Royal Bible.

Description

The manuscript has 193 surviving folios which measure . It contains the text of the four

Gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...

s in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

written in an

uncial script Uncial is a majuscule Glaister, Geoffrey Ashall. (1996) ''Encyclopedia of the Book''. 2nd edn. New Castle, DE, and London: Oak Knoll Press & The British Library, p. 494. script (written entirely in capital letters) commonly used from the 4th t ...

vellum Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. Parchment is another term for this material, from which vellum is sometimes distinguished, when it is made from calfskin, as opposed to that made from other anim ...

leaves that alternately are dyed purple and undyed. The purple-dyed leaves are written with gold, silver, and white pigment, the undyed ones with black ink and red pigment. On some folios, the differing colours of ink are arranged to form geometric patterns. Purple parchment was, in the Roman and Byzantine Empires, reserved for Imperial manuscripts, and in the West reserved for the grandest commissions, and often only seen on a few pages. The illustration programme includes two surviving

evangelist portraits Evangelist portraits are a specific type of miniature included in ancient and mediaeval illuminated manuscript Gospel Books, and later in Bibles and other books, as well as other media. Each Gospel of the Four Evangelists, the books of Matthew, ...

, six

canon table Eusebian canons, Eusebian sections or Eusebian apparatus, also known as Ammonian sections, are the system of dividing the four Gospels used between late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. The divisions into chapters and verses used in modern texts d ...

s and seven large decorated initials. The manuscript is the oldest surviving example of initials decorated with

gold leaf Gold leaf is gold that has been hammered into thin sheets (usually around 0.1 µm thick) by goldbeating and is often used for gilding. Gold leaf is available in a wide variety of karats and shades. The most commonly used gold is 22-kara ...

. The style is a blend of

Insular art Insular art, also known as Hiberno-Saxon art, was produced in the post-Roman era of Great Britain and Ireland. The term derives from ''insula'', the Latin term for "island"; in this period Britain and Ireland shared a largely common style dif ...

, as in the

Chi-Rho The Chi Rho (☧, English pronunciation ; also known as ''chrismon'') is one of the earliest forms of Christogram, formed by superimposing the first two (capital) letters— chi and rho (ΧΡ)—of the Greek word ( Christos) in such a way tha ...

initial shown, and Mediterranean traditions, possibly including some from early

Carolingian art Carolingian art comes from the Frankish Empire in the period of roughly 120 years from about 780 to 900—during the reign of Charlemagne and his immediate heirs—popularly known as the Carolingian Renaissance. The art was produced by and for th ...

. In the opening shown at the start of Matthew the evangelist portrait to the left is in a consistent adaptation of Italian style, probably closely following some lost model, though adding interlace to the chair frame, while the text page to the right is mainly in Insular style, especially in the first line, with its vigorous Celtic spirals and interlace. The following lines revert to a quieter style more typical of Frankish manuscripts of the period. Yet the same artist almost certainly produced both pages, and is very confident in both styles. The other surviving evangelist portrait of John includes roundels with Celtic spiral decoration probably drawn from the enamelled escutcheons of

hanging bowl Hanging bowls are a distinctive type of artefact of the period between the end of Roman rule in Britain in c. 410 AD and the emergence of the Christian Anglo-Saxon kingdoms during the 7th century. The surviving examples have mostly been found i ...

s. This is one of the so-called "Tiberius group" of manuscripts, which leant towards the Italian style, and appear to be associated with

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, or perhaps the kingdom of

Mercia la, Merciorum regnum , conventional_long_name=Kingdom of Mercia , common_name=Mercia , status=Kingdom , status_text=Independent kingdom (527–879)Client state of Wessex () , life_span=527–918 , era=Heptarchy , event_start= , date_start= , y ...

in the heyday of the

Mercian Supremacy The Mercian Supremacy was the period of Anglo-Saxon history between c. 716 and c. 825, when the kingdom of Mercia dominated the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy in England. Sir Frank Stenton apparently coined the phrase, arguing that Offa of Mercia, who ru ...

. It is, in the usual chronology, the last English manuscript in which "developed trumpet spiral patterns" are found.

History

An inscription asks for prayers for four individuals, one a goldsmith (Wulfhelm). The others are Ceolhard, Niclas and Ealhhun, who were presumably the monks responsible for creating the manuscript and the elaborate metalwork cover it no doubt originally possessed. In the late ninth century it was looted by a

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

army and

Ealdorman Ealdorman (, ) was a term in Anglo-Saxon England which originally applied to a man of high status, including some of royal birth, whose authority was independent of the king. It evolved in meaning and in the eighth century was sometimes applied ...

Aelfred (Alfred), ealdorman of

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant ur ...

, had to pay a

ransom Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner or item to extort money or property to secure their release, or the sum of money involved in such a practice. When ransom means "payment", the word comes via Old French ''rançon'' from Latin ''re ...

to get it back. Above and below the

text of the Gospel of St. Matthew is an added inscription in

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...

recording how the manuscript was ransomed from a Viking army who had stolen it on one of their raids in

by Alfred, and given to Christ Church, Canterbury. It reads: :"In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I, Ealdorman Alfred and Wærburh my wife obtained these books from the heathen army with our pure money, that was with pure gold, and this we did for the love of God and for the benefit of our souls and because we did not wish these holy books to remain longer in heathen possession. And now they wish to give them to Christ Church to the praise and glory and honour of God..."Nordenfalk, 106; Dodwell, 9 has the full text In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was in

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

, and in 1690 it was bought for the Swedish royal collection. It is now kept in the

Notes

References

* Complete facsimile fro
Wikimedia Commons
* Complete online facsimile on th
Internet Archive
* De Hamel, Christopher. ''A History of Illuminated Manuscripts''. Boston: David R. Godine, 1986. * Dodwell, C. R., ''Anglo-Saxon Art: A New Perspective'', 1982, Manchester UP, {{ISBN, 0-7190-0926-X * Nordenfalk, Carl. ''Celtic and Anglo-Saxon Painting: Book illumination in the British Isles 600-800''. Chatto & Windus, London (New York: George Braziller), 1977. * Walther, Ingo F. and Norbert Wolf. ''Codices Illustres: The world's most famous illuminated manuscripts, 400 to 1600''. Köln, TASCHEN, 2005. * Wilson, David M.; ''Anglo-Saxon: Art From The Seventh Century To The Norman Conquest'', Thames and Hudson (US edn. Overlook Press), 1984.

External links

Whole Manuscript Digitized at World Digital LibraryNational Library of Sweden: Codex AureusDescription
Notre Dame Hesburgh Libraries, Medieval Institute Library: Medieval Microfilms & Facsimiles Database, "Codex aureus: an eighth-century gospel book"
More information at Earlier Latin Manuscripts
History of Canterbury Gospel Books Hiberno-Saxon manuscripts Vetus Latina New Testament manuscripts 8th-century biblical manuscripts Purple parchment

Description

History

See also

Notes

References

External links