The Faddan More Psalter – A study of the early medieval book-making techniques and codicology of a recently discovered eighth-century Irish Psalter and an examination of its features and materials which suggest influences both domestic and remote in its materiality and manufacture.

Abstract

When in 2006 an early medieval insular manuscript surfaced from the Faddan More Bog in North Co. Tipperary, the event afforded a unique opportunity to study in detail all aspects of what is now 'one of the National Museum of Ireland's top ten treasures' (Fig.1).1 Entombed in its own inhospitable time capsule, many features of the original book have survived. One particularly unexpected feature was the vegetable tanned leather cover, which seemed to draw stylistically on Near Eastern models for its form. The manuscript now popularly referred to as the Faddan More Psalter (from here on referred to as FMP) was discovered on 20th July when the operator of a peat-digger Edward Fogarty, during his daily working of the bog, un-earthed what he recognised as a book. The commercial bog owned by the Leonard brothers, Patrick and Kevin, is located in the townland of Faddan More (derived from the Irish name Feadán Mór) in the parish of Loughkeen, Co. Tipperary. Identification of the manuscript as a Psalter or Book of Psalms was quickly established on site by Raghnall Ó Floinn, then Head of Collections of the National Museum of Ireland, based on a small area of writing that was visible among the mass of peat surrounding the manuscript. This was Psalm 83:4-9, and the image was flashed around the world's media as news of the discovery spread. An aid to this identification were the key words in valle lacrimarum 'in the valley of tears'.