THE BOOK OF KELLS THE BOOK OF DURROW Comments on the Vellum, the Make-up, and Other Aspects

The privileged occasions of repairing and rebinding the Book of Kells during 1953 and the Book of Durrow during 1954 offered opportunities for examining both books such as had not occurred for nearly sixty years. In the case of the Book of Durrow the period may have been even longer. It was last completely rebound perhaps fifty years earlier than the last rebinding of the Book of Kells, but it was later " vamped," or rebacked. There are grounds for thinking that " vamping " included more than is covered by the term today.

When a book, particularly a vellum-leaved book, is taken completely to pieces things can be seen which are otherwise hidden, or can only be guessed at. And the very long hours spent in working on the leaves of these two particular books enabled us who had the honour to repair them to observe and record much that is of interest, and in some instances to correct earlier ideas about them.

The Book of Kells

The removal of the 1895 binding revealed the sewing holes of earlier bindings. The earliest which could be clearly distinguished was sewn on seven bands. It was not possible to distinguish the sewing holes of binding preceding those of 1895, 1830 (approx), and that on seven bands though there undoubtedly was earlier binding.

When the gatherings themselves were separated into their component sheets, the make-up was seen to be irregular. Not only did the number of leaves in a gathering vary from four (ff. 125-128) (or perhaps five) to twelve (fî. 312-323), but the number was by no means always made-up of a number of sheets folded in half. Of the 340 leaves, over fifty were single leaves. In other words, when the book was made, there were not more than about 145 conjoint bifolia in that part of the book which remains today.

In two places there are three of these single leaves adjacent in a single gathering. In another place nine of them occur between what was probably a once-conjoint bifolium. Next to this group follow five more adjacent single leaves. These sixteen form the last fifteen leaves of St. Luke's Gospel, and the first leaf of St. John.

At one time there was almost certainly enough vellum at the inner