Book of Dimma
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The Book of Dimma (MS.A.IV.23) is an Irish illuminated manuscript from the end of the 8th century, which contains a gospel book written in minuscule and a collection of prayers . It is in the Trinity College Library in Dublin .
content
The four Gospels contained in the Book of Dimma are based on the translation of a Vetus Latina and not on the Vulgate translation, which was canonized a short time later . The prayers contained therein are intercession for the sick and come from a scribe from the 10th or early 11th century who also made changes to the main text, presumably to assign the manuscript to the scribe Dimma.
The first three gospels are preceded by pictures of the evangelists, stylistically based on the gospel book of St. Willibrord . The opening image of John's Gospel is the evangelist symbol of John, the eagle, and was designed by another artist. It is stylistically similar to the Stowe Missal and the Book of Mulling .
Because of the small size of the book, it is believed that it was created for either liturgical use or private study.
Markus
Matthew
John
Cum roof of the Book of Dimma
Lore
The manuscript was initially in the Roscrea Monastery , but according to a colophon it was written for a person named Dianchride. The name Dianchride comes from the Uí Chorcrain family, who in the 11th century appointed several abbots to important monasteries. After the Vita St. Cronan , which probably dates from the 12th century, Cronan commissioned the manuscript from Dimma, who then finished it under miraculous circumstances.
The place of origin of the manuscript and its whereabouts are unknown until the 19th century. Before 1836 it was in Nenagh , from where it was sold to Trinity College by the then Norroy and Ulster King of Arms William Betham .
literature
- Westley Follett: Céli Dé in Ireland: monastic writing and identity in the early Middle Ages . Boydell Press, 2006. ISBN 1-8438-3276-3 , pp. 160-161.
- Bernard Meehan: Book of Dimma . In: Hansgeorg Stiegeler, Hansgerd Hellenkemper (ed.): Irish art from three millennia - Thesaurus Hiberniae . Von Zabern, Mainz 1983. ISBN 3-8053-0736-5 . P. 132.
