320 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



An inspection of this list is sufficient to convince us that the Book 

 of Durrow was copied from an cuangeli^Lvi which had the breues causae 

 of St. Luke and St. John only, and lacked all the argumenta. The scribe, 

 however, had access to another manuscript in which the argumentum of each 

 of the four Gospels followed its breues cntisne ; and from it he supplied the 

 deficiencies of his principal exemplar. It shows us also that the colophon 

 which runs in the name of St. Columba was at the place where we should 

 expect to find it, supposing it to have been transcribed from that exemplar — 

 at the end of the book.' It need only be added that the column at the head 

 of which the colophon stands is for the greater part of its length blank 

 except for the words half way down: 



Ora pro me fra 

 ter mi dns tecum 

 sit.. 



This supplies fresh evidence, if it is needed, that all that follows is of the 

 nature of an appendix.' This note may be the composition of the anonymous 

 scribe, or it may have been copied from his exemplar.^ 



It seems, then, that the proof of Dr. Abbott's theory of the origin of the 

 Book of Durrow comes as near to demonstration as in such a ease is possible. 

 If it is correct, the book, though probably written in the seventh century, 

 contains a sixth-century text. And yet it is a copy of the Hieronymian 

 Gospels. It is almost pure Vulgate ; and, indeed, it is one of the most 

 valuable manuscripts now in existence of that translation, as we have lately 

 been told.* This is the more remarkable, inasmuch as, though it is one of the 

 earliest of the Gospel-books of the Celtic Church in Ireland, it is the only one 

 which is free from serious Old Latin mixture. 



Let us pause to consider what that means. It shows us, in the first place, 

 that the rapid transcription of a biblical text was a task from the execution 



' Reeves (p. 327) is in error when he says that it was originally at the end of the 

 (jirescnt) volume. 



- It is well known that as late as the sixteenth century it was believed that by pouring 

 water on the Book of Durrow and " suffering it to rest there a while," cattle could be 

 cured of disease {Annals of Clonmacnoise, ed. D. Murphy, 1896, p. 95). This belief 

 was no doubt the Ciiuse of the stains which disfigure its pages. But we can now see that 

 care was taken to pour the water over the closing leaves, which were less richly ornamented 

 than those which contained the text of the Gospels. Thus the volume incurred less 

 injury from this strange usage than might have been e.\pected. 



^ I am glad to be able to refer to the excellent note on the Colophon of the Book of 

 Durrow which Professor Lindsay has been so kind as to contribute to this Essay (Appendix 

 U, p. 403), as supplying abundant confinuation of the conclusions reached in the foregoing 

 paragraphs. 



* J. Gwynn, op. cit., pp. cixxix f., clxxiii. 



