Note 11 — ACCOUNT OF THE SCRIPTORIA, OR WRITING ROOMS IN THE MONASTERIES OF ENGLAND.

Bede, commonly called the Venerable Bede, was the most learned man of the age in which he lived; he was born at Weremouth, in Northumberland, in the year 672. Both ancient and modern authors have bestowed the highest encomiums upon the learning of this extraordinary man. His works are many, making eight large volumes, in folio, the principal of which is his Ecclesiastical History of the Anglo-Saxons, consisting of five books, from whence the more perfect part of our early history is formed; his other works are the Lives of Saints, Treatises on the Holy Scriptures, and Philosophical Tracts. This great man died at his cell at Jarrow, in the year 735, aged 63.