Chapter XX: Appendix: C

THE TWO-SCEPTERED FIGURE IN THE BOOK OF KELLS

(p. 78)

I am indebted to Miss Swann for the following extract from Professor Westwood’s _Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo-Saxon and Irish Art_ (p. 29):

The drawing representing (as I apprehend) the Temptation of the
Saviour occurs on fol. 202 v., and is copied in my Plate XI.

Here the bust of the Saviour is represented at the summit of an
elaborately ornamented conical design, which I suppose represents a
‘pinnacle of the temple’ rather than the ‘exceeding high mountain.’

The head of the Saviour is surrounded by a cruciferous nimbus, like
that of the Virgin in the above-described drawing, and He appears to
hold a roll in His left hand.

Two very rudely designed angels hover above His head, and two others
occupy the upper angles of the picture, the interstices of the latter
being filled in with foliage and branches springing from vases; that
on the right hand being in an unusual position.

The strangely emaciated black figure of the Tempter (destitute of
tail, but with hoof-like feet), and the crowd of heads at the side
and bottom of the design, as also the bust within a frame holding two
rosette-bearing rods, merit particular notice.

My interpretation of the Irish Figure was made solely from a study of the picture itself, without suggestion from any quarter. I had great difficulty in making up my mind whether the meaning were a personage at a window in the building, or whether it were simply a framed picture exhibited in front of the building. I was not then aware of Professor Westwood’s description, which takes the latter view. It is obvious that this view gives to the representation the nature of a reflection or comment more pointedly than the view which I have taken in the text.

I will here add another quotation from Professor Westwood, in which he describes and characterizes the _Book of Kells_: ‘It is the most astonishing book of the Four Gospels which exists in the world, and it is in Trinity College, Dublin, where it was placed along with the books of Archbishop Usher, after his death in 1656, where it has since remained, and where I trust it will ever remain, as the glory of Ireland’ (_The Book of Kells: a Lecture_, &c., p. 6).

For a partial illustration of the contents of this Appendix, see the illustration facing p. 77.