What Is the Book of Kells? How It Was Made? Illustrators and Scribes Colors and Inks
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What is The Book of Kells? How it was made? Illustrators and Scribes Colors and inks Book of Kells is an illuminated manuscript Gospel The Book of Kells was all made by hand. Monks Four major scribes copied the text. Each of them The basic pigments used to write and illustrate • Another color in the Book of Kells is blue, book written in Latin, containing the four Gospels produced their own materials an bounded book displayed characteristics and stylistic traits while Book of Kells are yellow, red, green, purple, blue, it has four separate shades used, light blue, of the New Testament. Date and place of origin of on their own. The manuscript was written on working within a scriptorium style. The spaces for brown, black, and white. There are also many azure, dark blue, and greenish blue. They are the Book are not certain. It was probably created vellum which is prepared calf skin. The pages decoration were left blank by the scribe. Several dif erent shades of those colors. made from lapis lazuli, indigo, and also chalk. close to the year 800 at the monastery in Iona and of a manuscript are called folios. Book of Kells illustrators, possibly at different periods, were • The brown color used was made from galls, may have had contributions from various Colum- contains 680 pages which is 340 folios measuring employed to fill them. Dr Françoise Henry iden- • One of the main pigments of yellow used in crushed oak, and sulfite of iron suspended in ban institutions from both Britain and Ireland. approximately 330 x 255 mm. Monks were using tified three main artists from the different styles the Book of Kells is orpiment, the other came a mix of gum and water. The name “Book of Kells” comes from the Abbey Quill pens made from bird tail feather and they that can be seen in The Book of Kells. They are from yellow ochre. • The black ink was created from lamp black or of Kells in County Meath in Ireland, where it was kept their inks in ink wells made from cow horns. known as the Goldsmith, Illustrator and Portrait • The red color comes from red lead, the other soot, and sometimes soot from burned bones. preserved during medieval times. Ink was also made by monks hands. Painter. The Goldsmith, whose work can be seen red comes from, like the yellow, red ochre. on the Chi Rho page, was capable of ornament • Some of the green shades used in the Book of such extraordinary fineness and delicacy. The comes from a copper pigment, to be exact Illustrator could painted the temptation page and the mineral malachite. Another, more dull the arrest of Christ page. Portrait painter probably green color that was used is veragut, which Manuscript made portraits of Christ, St Matthew and St John. is mixed from the yellow orpiment, and the Is any document written by hand blue indigo. or typewritten, as opposed to being • There are several shades of purple used in created any mechanical way. the Book of Kells. They were made from the purple shellfish, Crozophora, elderberries, blueberries, brazil wood, and lichens. References: Insular style Decoration and Caligraphy Symbols in Book of Kells • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Style produced in post Roman Ireland and The fully developed Insular style can bee seen on Many Christian symbols can be found in the Book_of_Kells Britain. Term insular became from latin word pages of Book of Kells. The manuscript is decorat- Book of Kells. Some most important of them are: • http://etc.ancient.eu/interviews/ irelands-exquisite-insular-art/ ‘Insula’ which means island. In this period those ed with paintings of animals, people and mythical • https://www.tcd.ie/visitors/com- islands presented style different from that of the beasts. There are also beautifully decorated capital • Lozenge- one of the most important symbols petition-inspiration/ rest of Europe. Insular art has its roots in La Tene letters, swirling motifs, patterns and intricate, very reprsenting Christ as the Word of God. • www.people.vcu.edu/~djbromle/ color-theory/color04/laura/ Culture is the name given to Celtic Continental detailed designs (sometimes so small that they can • The book- symbol of missions. bookofkells.htm Europe of the later Iron Age. When Christianity barely be seen with the naked eye.) • Designs grouped in three- The Trinity. • www.visual-arts-cork.com/cul- arrived, Irish art found influence in Mediterra- • Vines, chalices, circular elements- Eucharist. tural-history-of-ireland/book-of- nean and Germanic traditions. Most Insular art kells.htm#scribe Book of Kells is primarily written in insular ma- • The cross- symbol associated with Jesus. originates from the Irish monastic movement of juscule with some examples of minuscule letters. • The calf, man/ angel, lion and eagle- four Celtic Christianity, or metalwork for the secular Book of Kells: Insular script was a medieval script system created ewangelists, also used to represent different elite. The golden age of that style was between Masterpiece of Irish Art in Ireland and spread to England and continental stages within the life of Christ. the 7th- 9th centuries, before Viking raids across Author: Paulina Warzecha Europe. That script was inspired by Roman Half • Fish- clear symbol of Jesus and Christianity. Britain drastically set back cultural life and rav- Unical script and influenced wit Celtic artistic tra- • Angels- are intermediaries between the God aged many monasteries that were known for their dition. In manuscript text is usually written in one and man. production of illuminated manuscripts and other line across the page. artworks. Celtic Insular art focus on abstract and geometrical decoration. Important designs fea- tured are circular forms, spirals, triskeles, Celtic knots, plant forms and other curvilinear forms..