Note 48 — Chapter I · INTRODUCTORY—THE USE OF BOOKS IN EARLY IRISH MONASTERIES

Mr. Allen, in his admirable volume on Celtic Art, p. 208, in this series, says cumdachs were peculiar to Ireland. But they were made and used elsewhere, and were variously known as capsae, librorum coopertoria (e.g. ... librorumque coopertoria; quædam horum nuda, quædam vero alia auro atque argento gemmisque pretiosis circumtecta.—Acta SS., Aug. iii. 659c), and thecae. Some of these cases were no doubt as beautifully decorated as the Irish cumdachs. William of Malmesbury asserts that twenty pounds and sixty marks of gold were used to make the coopertoria librorum Evangelii for King Ina’s chapel. At the Abbey of St. Riquier was an “Evangelium auro Scriptum unum, cum capsa argentea gemmis et lapidibus fabricata. Aliae capsae evangeliorum duae ex auro et argento paratae.”—Maitland, 212. In 1295 St. Paul’s Cathedral possessed a copy of the Gospels in a case (capsa) adorned with gilding and relics.—Putnam, i. 105-6.