Thursday, October 7, 2010

Honors blog, book two

The second book I have chosen for honors is How the Irish saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill.

Cahill bases his book mainly off of the Ireland of St. Patrick and the Book of Kells. The book of Kells is written in very early latin and estimated to be as old as from 800 ca, and it contains the four gospels of the new testament. It is very extravagantly made and many have come to the conclusion that it was meant for its appearance to be appreciated rather then its contents read over and over. There are around ten pages in it that are coloured brilliantly with gold flecks and have pictures while the rest recite gospels and such. Today there are many copies that have been made of the Book of Kells, which are considered indistinguishable from the original.
There are approximately 340 pages left in the Book of Kells, which was originally 370. Over time and each time it was stolen pages would be removed and then lost, never to be returned.

It also talks about a few of the older rulers of Ireland, and how the political system was run. Many parts of this book are told in little excerpts of story where Cahill uses historical people to lay out skits of what was going on back then and how it could have played out.
Cahill also breaks out into poetry or songs throughout the book to better tell his story, as Ireland is known for it's oral and bardic history rather then it's written history.

When I have read more into this book I will update this section of my blog.

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