The Bury Bible Up Close

Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury.
1504-1575
His outstanding collection of Anglo-Saxon 
manuscripts and other rare volumes
became the Parker Library housed in
Corpus Christi, Cambridge.

 On Saturday last I Zoomed in to St Edmund’s Cathedral, Bury, the Zoom hosts, AND Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, to join around 200 people to listen to illustrated talks on various aspects of the famous Bury Bible, now kept at Corpus Christi in the Parker Library. We heard wonderfully detailed commentary and insight into this large format Bible, created in Bury St Edmunds Abbey in 1130, although it is estimated that the considerable task took around two years to complete. It is in Latin Vulgate, the standard text in Europe at that time, and is an important example of Romanesque illumination from Norman England, bearing comparison with other famous monumental bibles such as the Dover Bible, [also kept in the Parker Library], Lambeth Bible, Rochester Bible and the Winchester Bible.

The Bury Bible.

The Bury Bible is a hand-written and lavishly illustrated bible of the type used in England before the Reformation. It was originally bound in two volumes of great size, each page measuring 52.5cms by 35cms which represented the ultimate double page size possible to create from one whole calfskin. The entire original Bible will have used about 350 skins in total.

Edward Cheese, Conservator of
Manuscripts.
who spoke on parchment.

Suzanne Reynolds who spoke on 500 years
of illustrated manuscripts in the Fitzwilliam
with reference to the Bury Bible.

Paola Ricciardi who spoke on the 
study of artists' materials
and techniques.

An illustration from the Bury Bible.

What remains today is just the first volume of the great bible ending at the Book of Job.

It has been rebound several times over the centuries, the last time in 1956 when it was sub-divided into three volumes. There are 357 pages remaining in all. The second volume is lost, almost certainly destroyed during the Protestant Reformation and the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry V111. Henry wished to divorce his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, at the same time as proclaiming his intention to rid the Church of widespread corruption. In reality he wished to marry Anne Boleyn and acquire the wealth of the Church for himself. The second volume of the Bury Bible was almost certainly destroyed during this period when it was already a venerable four hundred years old. Also in the Parker Library is the Hirsh fragment [50cms x 240cms] from Luke, Chapter 13 in the original second volume, discovered in 1984 by a book dealer! Apparently, small pieces or strips of discarded mediaeval pages were commonly used to repair damage in volumes of mediaeval texts in libraries.

Baldwin, a French monk was 
appointed Abbot in 1065 and became
physician to Edward the Confessor
and William 1.

1100 Bury St Edmunds Abbey at the height of its powers.

The Abbey had successfully survived the travails of the 1066 Norman Conquest chiefly due to its
leadership by Baldwin, the reforming Norman French abbot who had skilfully garnered the wealth engendered by the gift of Edward the Confessor conferring the right for the Abbey to rule West Suffolk on behalf of the Crown and retain the income such a privilege brought. By 1100 Bury Abbey was one of the largest and wealthiest of English religious houses. In 1046 there were no fewer than 51 books in the Scriptorium, impressive by early mediaeval standards, and book production with, increasingly, illustration in-house, was stronglyT
encouraged by the 1080s arrival of monks from Bec, in Normandy. Anselm became Abbott in 1121 when the Scriptorium was expanded bringing a major advance in book production. During his tenure, until 1148] it was considered essential for a well-run

A striking image from the Bury Bible.

 Benedictine monastery to house a wide repertory of volumes for study, and over 100 books were copied during his time. Among the great books of particular

The Bury Bible

splendour produced in Bury Abbey, as well as the Great Bible of Bury St Edmunds in 1130, there were, notably, the Libellus Vitae Sancti Edmundii, now in the Pierpoint Morgan Library, New York, around 1125 and the Pembroke College New Testament in 1150.

Illuminated initial from the Bury Bible.

The Great Bible [opere manifico; wondrous work] was created in the Abbey in Bury St Edmunds by Master Hugo, almost certainly a secular professional artist and not an employee of the Abbey although it is now estimated that he probably spent up to twenty years in the Abbey, working on various projects. It is unlikely that Hugo completed the whole work single-handedly though the entire main script is by one hand, almost certainly his and he, equally certainly, was the main artistic force behind the huge project. He was referred to as Magister rather than scriptor or illuminator, suggesting a contemporary reverence for his genius. Two other unknown scribes undertook the display script and were self-evidently gifted artists.

The idea for the Bible came from Hervey, the Sacrist brother of Prior Talbot of the Abbey and he, Hervey, funded this prestigious enterprise. The history of the Bury Abbey, the Gesta Sacristarum states: “This Hervey, brother of Prior Talbot, met all the expenses for his brother the Prior to have a great bible written, and he had it incomparably illuminated by Master Hugo. Because he could not find calf skins that suited him in our region, he procured parchments in Scotia.”

12th century painters/illuminators depicted in
the Bury Bible.

From the Zoom images the colours of the truly complex decorative images and lettering can be seen to be brilliant and jewel-like; clearly sophisticated decisions were made as to the range and quality of colours used by Hugo. The designs are extraordinary; Master Hugo demonstrated a huge talent for
originality, clearly under Byzantine and Greek influence. One of the Corpus Christi speakers, Paola Ricciardi, highlighted a doodle on one page showing a sketch of the head of St Edmund in the margin, uttering the words, “Hic! Hic! Hic! [Here! Here! Here!], the supposed cries from the severed head of St Edmund to the wolf who located him in legend. This would have been scribbled in during some repair subsequent to the Bible’s creation in 1130. She also identified tiny holes on one illustration which she said confirmed that certain special illuminations had been protected originally by a tiny silk curtain covering each.

Another tiny hole, identified by Paula Ricciardi.
Perhaps, wear and tear, showing page below.