Lindisfarne Gospels Essay

The Lindisfarne Gospels include the St. Matthew cross-carpet page, St. Luke portrait page, and the St. Luke incipit page. It was created in early medieval, or Hiberno Saxon, Europe, around 700 C.E. The Lindisfarne Gospels is an illuminated manuscript, created using ink, pigments, and gold on vellum. The work is known for its decorative patterning and its abstracted zoomorphic representations. “Carpet pages” depict decorative panels of abstract and zoomorphic motifs. The Lindisfarne Gospels exemplify traditional Hiberno-Saxon illuminated manuscripts created from the late seventh and early eighth centuries through the use of interlace, which formed abstract designs and animal patterns. Interlace is the creation of complex geometric patterns using bands that are braided, looped, or twisted around each other. The book’s abstract geometric designs and animal shapes were created using interlace, and also allows for the text to become more decorated. An example is the snakes which twist themselves into knots or birds. Lastly, the purpose of fibulae were to serve as brooches consisting of a body, a pin, and a catch.
The Lindisfarne Gospels was made at Lindisfarne Priory at a time of invasions and political upheaval. The book is an example of Hiberno-Saxon art, which includes works produced in the British Isles between 500-900 C.E., a time of intense invasions and political upheavals. Monks read from the book during rituals at their Lindisfarne Priory on Holy Island. This was a Christian community that protected the shrine of St Cuthbert, who was a bishop
According to a colophon, or an inscription typically on the last page which gives information about a book’s manufacture, Eadfrith, who was the bishop of Lindisfarne between 698 and his death in 721, wrote the Lindisfarne Gospels “for God and Saint Cuthbert”. Meanwhile, fibulae were created by those working on Roman military