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IRISH CENTER DISPLAYS RARE
COPY OF 'KELLS' A rare copy of a priceless book is on permanent display
at the Irish Cultural Center in central Phoenix. The original version is on display under glass in a dimly lit room at Trinity College in Dublin, and a page is turned once every two weeks at most, Lee said. "At that rate, it would take you 30 years to see the whole book," he said. The exquisitely illustrated book of the four Gospels is thought to have been copied by hand by monks around A.D. 800 on 680 pages of vellum, which is the leather of more than 100 calves, some of them unborn. Although the book was probably begun on the island of Iona, between Scotland and Ireland, its name is derived from the Abbey of Kells in the Irish Midlands, where it was kept from at least the ninth century to 1541. One theory has it that portions of the book were made at Kells, after Viking raids on Iona forced the monastery to retreat to the more isolated location. It is not simply a religious manuscript, but its age and design allow a glimpse into the art and style of ancient Ireland. It is written in Latin using ornate majuscule, an ancient script, and almost every page is intricately illustrated in color. The book's facsimile in Phoenix is one of 1,481 copies, apparently all but one scattered in universities around the world. "As far as I know, this is the only privately owned copy, and the only one in the Southwest not in a university," Lee said. Copies exist at Austin College and at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. The copies were produced by a Swiss publisher that specializes in reproduction of rare illuminated manuscripts. After the Irish government finally gave its approval, the Swiss spent four years taking photos of the original, page by page. The pages were flown back and forth between Dublin and Switzerland before they were deemed acceptable to the curator and the publisher. Lee, who was born in the Irish town of Kells, came to the United States in 1958 and to Phoenix in 1987. To see it WHERE: Irish Cultural Center, 1106 N. Central Ave., Phoenix. WHEN: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. WEB: www.irishclans.com/articles/bookofkells.html
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