The medieval scribes filled the volumes called beasts with illustrations and descriptions of fantastic creatures. The manuscripts containing representations of these animals also depended on a windows of beasts: the covers of these and other volumes were modeled by the skin of calves, goats, pecores, deer, pigs and, in some cases macabre, humans.
Most of these skins have been raked before they were transformed into book attacks. But a series of medieval manuscripts from northern France -oriental has a peculiar finish: its seasoned covers are covered by tufts of hair.
“These books are too rough and too hairy to be veal skin,” said Matthew Collins, bioarcheologist of the University of Copenhagen and Cambridge University and author of the new study. But identifying the source of Shaggy skin proved difficult.
While these hairy tomes seemed home in the Hogwarts library, originally they were made in the scriptorium of the Abbey of Clairvaux, an hub for an order of Catholic monks, the Cisterciani. The abbey, founded in 1115 in the Champagne-Arcene region in France, hosted one of the largest monastic libraries of medieval Europe.
About 1,450 volumes of the large corpus of the abbey survive. About half of these manuscripts remain in their fragile original ties. Many were linked during the XII and XIII century in Romanesque style, which put the parchment between the wooden axes fixed with wire and cord.
At the Abbey of Clairvaux, these Romanesque books were often housed within a secondary coverage that was hinged with fur. Traditionally, it was thought that this non -Shorn skin was made with wild boars or deer. However, the hair follicles on some manuscripts do not correspond to the fur of any of the mammals.
Dr. Collins and his colleagues examined the hairy covers of 16 manuscripts that were once hosted in Clairvaux’s abbey. The researchers rubbed the side of the meat of the skin with tires to carefully remove the crumbs of crumbs. They then used a series of techniques to analyze the protein and bit of ancient DNA from the skin.
Their discoveries, published on Wednesday in the magazine Royal Society Open Science, reveal that the books are not bound in the leather of local land mammals, but in Sealskin. Many of the books were linked to the skin of the port seal and at least one came from an ARPA seal. The comparison with contemporary DNA suggests an origin of the seals in Scandinavia and Scotland, or potentially far as Iceland or Greenland.
These disparate areas were once connected by a complex medieval trading network. In the Middle Ages, Norreni merchants collected Walrus ivory and films from Greenland and sent them to continental Europe. While Clairvaux and his monks were far away inland by these coastal outposts, the abbey was close to a well -treated commercial route.
According to Mary Wellesley, a member of the institute of Historical Research in London, specialized in medieval manuscripts and has not been involved in the new document, his discoveries shed light on medieval society.
“The small details of the manuscripts can tell you so much on the world that created them,” said dr. Wellesley. “It is a popular assumption that people do not move, but these monastic institutions are part of this extraordinary network of goods, books and ideas.”
The seals were a precious commodity due to their meat, blubber and waterproof skin, which could be modeled in boots and gloves. Some registers even claim that Sealskin has been used to pay the church taxes. The coastal communities in Scandinavia and Ireland used seal skin to tie books, but the practice was much rarer in continental Europe.
Cistercian monks, however, seem to have had a passion for seal books. Examples of these manuscripts covered with fur were found in other abbeys that descended from Clairvaux. These monks have even used the material to tie their most important documents, such as historical information on St. Bernard, a great Cistercian figure.
According to Dr. Collins, the color of the seal fur can explain the propensity of the monks to use animal skins. While the manuscripts covers are now yellow-tasty-grace or brown chatter, once they were enclosed in the white fur of the seal puppies. This shade corresponded to the non -monk -colored vestments.
“In medieval Europe, you really have nothing pure white,” said dr. Collins. “It must have been quite magical.”
The seals themselves probably seemed similar to the magical entities to the monks: in the medieval beasts, the seals were labeled with “marine calves” and resemble dogs with fish queues, rather than buffering pinnipedes.