Editing Codex Amiatinus (section)

==Description==
[[File:Codex Amiatinus 03.jpg|left|thumb|The bulk of the Codex]]
[[File:Amiatinus Maiestas Domini.jpg|thumb|230px|''Maiestas Domini'' ([[Christ in Majesty]]) with the [[Four Evangelists]] and their symbols, at the start of the [[New Testament]] (fol. 796v)]]

The symbol for it is written am or A (Wordsworth). It is preserved in an immense tome, measuring {{convert|19+1/4|in|cm}} high, {{convert|13+3/8|in|cm}} in breadth, and {{convert|7|in|cm}} thick, and weighs over {{convert|75|lb|kg}} &ndash; so impressive, as biblical scholar [[F. J. A. Hort|Fenton J. A. Hort]] says, as to fill the beholder with a feeling akin to awe.<ref>[[Henry Julian White|H. J. White]], ''The Codex Amiatinus and its Birthplace'', in: Studia Biblica et Ecclesiasctica (Oxford 1890), Vol. II, p. 273.</ref><ref>{{Cite book | first1=Richard | last1=Marsden | editor-first1=Michael | editor-last1=Lapidge | editor-first2=John | editor-last2=Blair | editor-first3=Simon | editor-last3=Keynes | editor-first4=Donald | editor-last4=Scragg | chapter=Amiatinus, Codex | title=The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England | edition=1st | page=31 | year=2001 | publisher=John Wiley & Sons | location=West Sussex | isbn=978-0-47065632-7 | chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f65VUNvxQjkC&dq=Amiatinus+%22Old+Testament%22&pg=PA31}}</ref>{{r|CE}}

The ''[[Book of Psalms]]'' is provided in Jerome's third version, [[Latin Psalters#Versio juxta Hebraicum|translated from the Hebrew]], rather than in the pre-Jerome [[Latin Psalters#Versio Romana|Roman Psalter]] then standard in English bibles, or in Jerome's second, [[Latin Psalters#Versio Gallicana|Gallican version]], that was to supplant his Hebraic Psalms in most Vulgate bibles from the 9th century onwards. By contrast with most of the Old Testament, the Amiatinus psalms text is commonly considered an inferior [[Textual criticism|witness]] to Jerome's ''Versio iuxta Hebraicum'' (''Translation according to the Hebrew''); the presence of the 'Columba' series of psalm headings, also found in the [[Cathach of St. Columba]], demonstrates that an Irish [[psalter]] must have been its source; but the text differs in many places from the best Irish manuscripts. The New Testament is preceded by the [[Epistula Hieronymi ad Damasum|Letter of Jerome to Pope Damasus]], and the Prolegomena to the four Gospels.

The Codex Amiatinus qualifies as an [[illuminated manuscript]] as it has some decoration including two full-page [[Miniature (illuminated manuscript)|miniatures]], but these show little sign of the usual [[insular art|insular style]] of Northumbrian art and are clearly [[Copying#In literature|copied]] from [[Late antique literature|late antique originals]]. It contains 1,040 [[Recto and verso|leaves]] of strong, smooth [[vellum]], fresh-looking today despite their great antiquity, arranged in [[paper quire|quires]] of four sheets, or [[Section (bookbinding)|quaternions]]. As noted by scholar Christopher de Hamel, "[t]he 1030 leaves of the Codex Amitianus would have utilized the skins of 515 cattle."<ref name="MWRM">{{Cite book | first=Christopher | last=De Hamel | title=Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts | pages=68, 82, 61 | year=2017 | publisher=Penguin | isbn=978-1594206115}}</ref> 

The script is written in [[uncial]] characters, large, clear, and regular, two columns to a page, and 43 or 44 lines to a column. A little space is often left between words, but the writing is, in general, continuous. The text is divided into sections, which in the [[Gospels]] correspond closely to the [[Ammonian Sections]]. There are no marks of [[punctuation]], but the skilled reader was guided into the sense by [[Stichometry|stichometric]], or [[Verse (poetry)|verse]]-like, arrangement into [[colon (rhetoric)|cola]] and [[Comma (rhetoric)|commata]], which correspond roughly to the principal and [[dependent clause]]s of a sentence. From this manner of writing the script is believed to have been modeled upon the (''vetus latina'') [[Codex Grandior]] of [[Cassiodorus]],<ref>[[John Chapman (priest)|John Chapman]], [https://archive.org/stream/notesontheearlyh00chapuoft#page/2/mode/2up ''The Codex Amiatinus and the Codex grandior''] in: ''Notes on the early history of the Vulgate Gospels'', [[Clarendon Press]], Oxford 1908, pp. 2–8.</ref> which Jarrow monastery possessed and may have been a model for illustrations and arrangement as well,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Meyvaert |first1=Paul |title=Bede, Cassiodorus, and the Codex Amiatinus |journal=Speculum |date=1996 |volume=71 |issue=4 |pages=827–883 |doi=10.2307/2865722 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2865722? |issn=0038-7134|url-access=subscription }}</ref> but it may go back, perhaps, even to St. Jerome.{{r|CE}}