This is not a coffee-table book filled with dazzling color plates of what is arguably one of the most beautiful medieval manuscripts ever created. There's not even one full-page color plate of the actual Book of Kells here. Instead there are hundreds of details of the script and the script-embedded decoration reproduced in color. Donncha MacGabhann's book should be read with the digitized version of the manuscript in easy reach as the author readily acknowledges (https://digitalcollections.tcd.ie/concern/works/hm50tr726?locale=en) (21). The book's small-scale illustrations reflect the author's painstaking approach and support his bold thesis that only two masters were responsible for the entire Book of Kells, as opposed to the team of scribes and artists assumed by most scholars (26). MacGabhann dubs these individuals the Master-Artist and the Scribe-Artist. His Master-Artist largely overlaps with Françoise Henry's proposed “Goldsmith,” that is, the highly esteemed individual responsible for most of the manuscript's full-page color illustrations (57) (F. Henry, The Book of Kells. London: Thames and Hudson, 1974, p. 212).
MacGabhann's focus is the Scribe-Artist whom he believes created all of the text, the initials, most of the small-scale decoration of the text pages, and almost all of the display lettering, but who also played a role in many of the full-page illustrations as well, either under the mentorship of the Master-Artist, or later in the second campaign as he attempted to complete the manuscript. This Scribe-Artist is further characterized as a scribal-exegete whose sophisticated knowledge of the Gospels and incredibly fertile imagination imbue Kells’ letters and their ornament with endless variation. The author proposes that work on the manuscript extended over two campaigns separated by a significant hiatus. The first campaign comprised a rich period of collaboration with the Master-Artist serving as mentor to the talented Scribe-Artist. The second campaign was initiated after the presumed death of the Master-Artist and is divided by MacGabhann into an early and late phase. During the second campaign, the Scribe-Artist desperately attempted to complete the manuscript single-handedly in the face of his own mental and physical decline. This two-campaign proposal complements the long-held belief that the manuscript was begun on Iona and completed at Kells, but the author notes that it is not corroborated by any specific evidence from his study (245).
MacGabhann did not begin his career as a manuscript scholar, but rather as a practicing artist and a second-level art teacher (15–16). In 2007, he proposed to one of his art classes that together they recreate an enlarged version of the famous Chi-Rho page of the Book of Kells (fol. 34r). These high-school-aged students “shrewdly” declined. The author thought he would knock one out himself and this was the beginning of his “Kells’ adventure” (55). Eventually he pursued a doctoral thesis on the Book of Kells under the renowned manuscript scholar, Prof. Michelle Brown (16). While MacGabhann's trajectory as a medieval manuscript scholar is unusual, his research reflects an intimate knowledge of Insular manuscripts and their related scholarship. Moreover, the author exhibits the extraordinary patience necessary for the exhaustive comparative research required to tease out the complex personality of his Scribe-Artist.
This carefully edited text includes a highly useful introduction with chapter summaries, seven chapters on various aspects of the Book of Kells where the author finds support for his characterizations of the Master-Artist and Scribe-Artist (script, illumination, canon tables, initials and display-lettering, color, aspects of the second campaign and its later phase, excavating Kells’ text pages), an epilogue, 69 pages of appendices, a bibliography, an index of manuscripts cited, and a general index. MacGabhann is not concerned with the date (c. 800) or location of the creation of the Book of Kells. His focus is on “the makers and the making of the manuscript (15)” that is, the division of hands. Not surprising to this reviewer, the author gained his most striking insights through his careful study of unfinished aspects of the Book of Kells, especially its Canon Tables. They provided key insights regarding the creation of the manuscript including the author's ability to define the personalities and the respective roles of the Master-Artist and the Scribe-Artist, and to arrive at the concept of two campaigns (63). MacGabhann's chapter on the Canon Tables also showcases his ability to introduce confusing concepts in a manner that shouldn't alienate the motivated lay reader. His explanation of the Canon Table apparatus, found in most Gospel manuscripts, is exemplary (91–93). Like many deluxe manuscripts, Kells’ text was “[u]pstaged and largely obscured by the exuberance and colour” (183) of its decoration. Virtually every page of Kells’ text was ornamented in some fashion, yet canon numbers are found in the text only on fols. 292v and 293r (92). Also notable is the fact that “uncorrected errors occur throughout the manuscript” (186). The repetition of an entire page of text on fol. 218v was likely recognized by the Scribe-Artist late in the second campaign, according to MacGabhann, and “cancellation marks in red ink” were added to all four margins (51, 187).
At some point, the reader should consult Appendix 1C: Summary of the Proposed Sequence of Production of the Manuscript to appreciate the complexity of the creation of the Book of Kells (244–246). MacGabhann's research underscores the simultaneity of the execution of illumination and text, a concept that may surprise some readers. While the manuscript was “planned and laid out at the beginning” in a collaborative effort by both the Master-Scribe and the Scribe-Artist, the former initiated work on many of the full-page illustrations concurrently (58). Color was not added to these pages until much later with the possible exceptions of the Chi-Rho and the Eight-Circle Cross Carpet pages. A similar method is proposed for the Scribe-Artist whom the author believes began the text by writing the beginnings of the Gospels of John and Mark, as well as some of the Prefatory material for the manuscript.
I cannot determine if MacGabhann is correct in all the details of his argument, but scholars will clearly have to come to terms with his research in staking new ground.
