READINGS IN IRISH HISTORY

New Zealand Tablet, 5 July 1917, Page 14

READINGS IN IRISH HISTORY

By "Shanachie."

CONDITION OF IRISH ART BEFORE THE :J NORMAN INVASION. ■ We have already quoted the words of Giraldus Cambrensis wherein the fastidious court chaplain bears witness to the excellence in music attained by the Irish at the time of the Anglo-Norman invasion. Equally remarkable was the skill of the Irish in the art of illuminating manuscripts, working in metals, and sculpture. It was from the fifth to about the end of the twelfth century that the grandest specimens of these three kinds of. art were produced. They reached their highest degree of excellence during Ireland's Golden Age. Handmaids of religion, they flourished most when Ireland's piety was deepest indexes of culture and refinement, they reached their grandest perfection when our country was the brightest lamp of learning in Western Europe. No people was ever so profoundly influenced by the change from paganism to Christianity as the Irish. They were drenched with the spirit of Catholicism. It influenced their language, it breathed through their prayerful salutations, it formed the basis of their laws, it changed a nation of warriors into communities of studious monks. When this had come to pass, when the whole people looked like a great monastic tribe, the call for books became imperative. The priest must have his psalter, his ritual, his missal, his copy of the Scriptures. So willing hands were working in the monasteries copying, on parchment made of tanned sheepskin, manuscripts for students, monks, and missionaries. Naturally the first books to be transcribed and multiplied were those that had reference to religion, but especially the Scriptures. Nor were the scribes satisfied with merely copying the sacred text: their piety and zeal impelled them to adorn the pages of their manuscripts with beautifully colored and appropriate designs. The only mechanical instrument used in illuminating was a quill pen. With this alone the most elaborate and intricate designs were sketched in inks of five or six different colors—black, red, purple, violet, green, and yellow,—the permanency of the black and the brilliancy of the red being especially noticeable. The various colors were blended with artistic effect, and the page glowing with these colors is strikingly beautiful. It is, however, the lines and figures which most effectually challenge admiration. The Irish scribe had a firm hand and a well-trained eye, and in the lines and curves which are so numerous there is no trace of a swerve, nothing to denote but that these circles and lines had been drawn by the most accurate modern instruments of mathematics. Westwood, author ; of Anglo-Saxon and Irish MSS., examined the Book of Armagh for hours with a magnifying glass, and could discern not a single false line or irregular interlacement?, and in a space of threequarters of an inch by half an inch in width he counted 158 interlacements. "As we look at one of these illuminated pages, the variety of lines and curves, of spirals and interlacements, an animal in one place, the head of a fish in another, a human head in yet a third place, our curiosity is excited and baffled as to where the artist began and where he ended figures, lines, circles, spirals, and interlacements all are before us with such a completeness, an accuracy, a minuteness, lit up by a blaze of colors, blending so skilfully with those figures and with each other that even the trained artist is amazed at the skill displayed." The most celebrated and widely known of these existing manuscripts is the Book of Kells, now in Trinity College, Dublin, written on vellum, probably in the seventh century. It is a copy of the Four Gospels in Latin. "It is not," says an Irish historian, "the language of exaggeration to say that it is the most beautiful book in existence." "The Book of Armagh, containing, among many other pieces, a Life of St. Patrick and a complete copy of the New Testament in Latin, is almost as beautifully written as the Book of Kelts," says Joyce. He names four other books that are "scarcely inferior in ■ beauty o* execution'; to the uoo/c oj Kells.

It will be ; interesting .to, quote v the opinions of competent- judges regarding the beauty of the Book of Kelts. We will first quote' the statement of Giraldus Cambrensis, not because he was fan artist, but in as much as he found fault with almost everything Irish,* even the weather, he cannot be accused of partiality to the scribe who wrote and illuminated " that wonderful book." "Among all the miraculous things of Kildare, nothing surprised me so much as that wonderful book ». . . adorned with almost as many richly illuminated figures as it has pages. . . . The more ' I intently examined them the more was I filled with fresh wonder and amazement. Neither could Apelles do the like indeed, mortal hand seemed incapable of forming or painting them." .The same is repeated after the lapse of seven hundred years by many expert artists of the last century. Westwood writes thus: "Ireland may justly be proud of the Book of Kells. This copy of the Gospels, traditionally said to have belonged to St. Columba, is unquestionably the most elaborately executed manuscript of early art now in existence." He refers to the Irish illuminated manuscripts in general as follows:—"At a period when the Fine Arts may be said to have been almost extinct in Italy and other parts of the —namely, from the fifth to the eighth century, —the art of illuminating. manuscripts had attained a perfection almost miraculous in Ireland. . . . The invention and skill displayed, the neatness, precision, and delicacy far surpass all that is to be found in ancient manuscripts executed by Continental artists." Another critic, Mr. Digby Wyatt, who devoted a good deal of attention to the study of Irish art, declares:—" We freely confess that, in the practice of art at least, they (the Irish) appear in advance both in mechanical execution and originality of design, of all Europe, and the Anglo-Saxons in particular." He continues:. " When in Dublin some years ago, I had the opportunity there of studying carefully the most marvellous of all, the Book of Kells, some of the ornaments of which I attempted to copy, but broke down in despair. . No wonder that tradition should allege that these unerring lines had been traced by angels." The celebrated German critic on the Fine Arts, Dr. Waagen, comments on Irish illuminated manuscriptsin the following words :-r-"The ornamental pages, borders, and initial letters exhibit such a variety of beautiful and peculiar designs, so admirable a taste in the arrangement of colors, and such an unncommon perfection of finish, that one feels absolutely struck with amazement." The Irish artists in metal work were quite as skilled in their branch as the scribes were in penmanship. The ornamental patterns were generally similar to those used in manuscripts. The materials employed were gold, silver, bronze of a whitish color, gems, and enamel. A great number of the articles made by these accomplished artists have been found from time to time, of which the most remarkable and beautiful are the Cross of Cong, the Ardagh Chalice, and the Tara Brooch, all now to be seen in the National Museum in Dublin. A Swedish writer on Art, Adolf Bruun, says of the Irish workers in metal that, with poorer material they achieved greater success than the designers of many of gorgeous products of Oriental art. "The tenth century was a barren one for art in Europe, except in some of the monasteries of France, Italy, and in Ireland. In the last-mentioned country a good deal of good work was produced —in metal especially—in the ninth and tenth centuries. . . . The astonishing delicacy and intricacy of the Celtic ornamentation bear eloquent testimony to the great skill of the early Irish artists" (Ward's Historic Ornament). Miss M. Stokes says that the Ardaph Chalice "com-i bines classic beauty of form with the most exquisite examines of almost every variety of • Celtic ornamentation." These were the "Dark Ages" of faith; the present is the enlightened age of "Blood and Iron." Evidently ideals have not improved with the march of time- . ■ ■ -"