The iconic Chi Rho page of the Book of Kells.

The Book of Kells is something that I’ve been wanting to see for a long time. I had looked at it in school back in 7th grade in my school’s “Arts Theory” class and I have wanted to see it in person ever since. When I found out that we were going to be staying in Dublin, I made it a point that my one, must see thing there was the Book of Kells. Jamie wasn’t too excited to go look at an old book and hear all about its history, but learning experiences are what this trip is all about!… and old books are very much my thing, so he didn’t have much say in the matter.

Trinity College put together a gorgeous exhibit to go along with the Book of Kells. It was full of information despite the small area that they used, which was about one room with various info walls. Along with the text, the walls hosted many photos of full pages and smaller details. Various stanzas of poetry also lined the walls, my favorite of these poems being Pangur Bàn, a poem written by a 9th century Irish monk about the similarities between himself and his cat. The title of the poem is the cat’s name, and is accompanied by a drawing of a charming cat found in the Book of Kells.

At the end of the exhibit was a small staircase. This led to the very monitored room where the Book of Kells itself is currently housed, kept at a specific lighting and temperature in order to preserve the delicate vellum (prepared calfskin) pages. I’ve been to many, many museum exhibits in my lifetime, and this one, while simplistic, was well put together.

Although I had studied the Book in school, it was for a short amount of time. I had stored vague information from the class, but the exhibit taught me so much more. The Book of Kells has been associated with St Colum Cille for a long time. He founded his principal monastery on the island of Iona in about 561, off the western coast of Scotland. The Book of Kells “may have been commissioned to celebrate the bicentenary of Colum Cille’s death,” but there is no confirmation if anniversaries like that were actually tracked. In any case, the Book of Kells was not intended to be a daily reading text. This is indicated by the “ornate nature” of the decorated pages. It was made as “altar furniture for special occasions.” (All of these quotes are from the exhibit information walls, which I dutifully took photos of.)

The Book of Kells, while it stands at a staggering 680 pages, is an unfinished document! There are blank pages and missing illustrations, though they could be lost, rather than unfinished. The true history of the Book of Kells is lost to time, as so many things are; we’re lucky that the Book is still with us at all! Even with the lack of reliable information, there is so much that we do know about the Book, such as the information about St Colum Cille’s relation to the Book. Along with that, we know that the Book was the work of three major artists (though, scholars have disagreements on the subject). These artists have been given nicknames, since we don’t know who they actually were. They’re classified by their art style.

The first artist is the “goldsmith,” who is characterized by the most detailed work within the book. The art style reflects metalwork, which is where he gets his name from. He was responsible for many gorgeous pages, most notable of which is the Chi Rho page. The second artist is the “illustrator,” and the third is the “portrait painter.” These two artists were not as discussed as the goldsmith in the exhibit, which is interesting, since they brought two thirds of the Book into being. Perhaps their lack of quite literal shininess made them less iconic than the goldsmith.

After seeing the Book of Kells (which was an amazing experience for my book loving self), the exhibit leads up to the Long Room. It’s the Old Library’s library, a gorgeous icon of Trinity College. Their books are currently going through a restorative process, so the shelves of the Long Room are sadly empty. It just gives me a reason to go back — how unfortunate, I definitely didn’t want to do that from the very start. (That’s sarcasm, by the way.)

The Long Room was gorgeous, even without all of its glorious books. It was a home for literature, for stories and logic and everything that one could explain in words — which is, actually, everything. There were various busts on either side of the walking area in the Long Room, and the first handful were male only; Plato, Socrates, etc. I had a doubt that I would see any female authors, but as we walked further, I was pleasantly surprised to see a bust of Mary Wollstonecraft.

Overall, our visit to Trinity College for the Book of Kells and the Long Room was a wonderful one. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and thanks to the children’s activity sheets that were provided, I’m pretty sure Jamie enjoyed himself, too. Dragging my family to see books wasn’t so bad, after all.