{"product_id":"the-book-of-kells-michael-mcgilbourne-9798259015388","title":"The Book of Kells: An Island, a Gospel, a Hand IONA AD 797-807","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Book of Kells: The Prayer Hidden in the Page\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eYou are the end point of an unbroken chain of survival.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvery person who came before you - through plague, war, famine, and flood - lived long enough to pass forward what was necessary for you to exist. You did not begin when you were born. You began when humanity began.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEverything that happened between that beginning and this moment is not the past in any abstract sense. \u003ci\u003eIt is the story of the making of you.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis book takes you to one of the most extraordinary moments in that story.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe island of Iona. AD 797-807.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA monastery of timber and thatch on a small grey island in the Inner Hebrides. Forty brothers. One commissioned gospel-book. Two hundred calves. A single horizon, watched daily.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA book whose hidden ornaments are a tenth of a millimetre across - small enough that no human eye can see them. Painted anyway. Painted on purpose.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe arguments about why have never stopped.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Prayer Hidden in the Page\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e asks what it would have meant to be inside that moment.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNot as an abbot. Not as a saint. But as the \u003cb\u003eyoung illuminator\u003c\/b\u003e - the boy who ground pigment for two years before he was permitted to draw a line.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWhat does a man owe to a beauty no one will ever see?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWhy paint a spiral at the centre of a spiral at the centre of a spiral, when even the brother at the next desk cannot find it?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWhat is the difference between an \u003ci\u003eornament\u003c\/i\u003e and a \u003ci\u003eprayer\u003c\/i\u003e - when the people who made them saw no difference at all?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe facts are extraordinary enough.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Book of Kells contains \u003cb\u003e340 surviving folios\u003c\/b\u003e of calf vellum. An estimated \u003cb\u003e185 calves\u003c\/b\u003e died for it.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe blue was long believed to be Afghan lapis lazuli. \u003cb\u003eTwenty-first-century analysis\u003c\/b\u003e has revealed it to be \u003cb\u003ewoad\u003c\/b\u003e - grown in a monastery garden.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe purples were not Mediterranean murex. They were \u003cb\u003elichen scraped from Atlantic cliffs.\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEvery colour in the book is the colour of the island itself.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe book was made in the shadow of the \u003cb\u003efirst Viking raids\u003c\/b\u003e - Lindisfarne 793, Iona 795, 802, 806.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eOn a feast-day morning in 806, \u003cb\u003esixty-eight monks\u003c\/b\u003e were killed at Martyrs' Bay. The book survived.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ci\u003eIt has never been finished.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003eHistory is not a sequence of dates. It is the record of billions of lives lived forward through a present as urgent as your own.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe bell before first light. The smell of lime from the vellum yard. The white shell-sand of a small bay. \u003ci\u003eA boy of nineteen, bent over a page, painting a spiral he knows no eye will see.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThey were curious about the same things we are. They made something that is still asking us questions. This book is one ordinary witness's attempt to answer.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFor homeschooling families: \u003c\/b\u003e You are already doing the most important thing - putting the story of humanity directly into your children's hands. The \u003ci\u003eBeyond His Story We Stand\u003c\/i\u003e series was written for you. Each book takes one moment in human history and makes it lived rather than memorised, felt rather than filed away. Not a textbook. Not a syllabus. A story your child will not want to put down - and that will leave them asking the questions that no curriculum can generate for them. \u003ci\u003eThe questions that only wonder produces.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eVolume of the \u003ci\u003eBeyond His Story We Stand\u003c\/i\u003e series\u003c\/b\u003e - a chronological path through human history, told through the eyes of the people official history forgot to record.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe book lasted.\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe page lasted.\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe hand that painted the spiral is yours.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Michael McGilbourne\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9798259015388\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Independently Published\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 04\/26\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 224\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.58lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.50h x 5.50w x 0.51d","brand":"Michael McGilbourne","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":48623700607231,"sku":"9798259015388","price":14.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/the-book-of-kells-michael-mcgilbourne-9798259015388","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}