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You will make out intricacies, so delicate and subtle, so full of knots and links, with colours so fresh and vivid, that you might say that all this was the work of an angel, and not of man.
—Gerald of Wales

Manuscripts

Before the development of the codex, or book, by the Romans around the time of the second century, texts were inscribed onto clay tablets and scrolls of papyrus.

The word codex literally means a book composed of folded sheets sewn along one edge and bound between boards. Manuscript books were handwritten and generally made out of vellum or parchment, which is animal skin.

During the medieval era, the majority of manuscript books, such as the Antiphonarium, were created in the scriptoriums (or writing rooms) of monasteries.

The painstaking hand-copying of  texts helped save thousands of works that might otherwise have been lost. One such text was Boethius' De Musica which became the most copied musical treatise of the 9th century Carolingian Renaissance, and continued to be reproduced for the next 700 years.

With the rise of university towns, such as Paris and Bologna, there was an increased demand for books.  This led to most manuscripts being made in commercial workshops or ateliers, rather than monasteries.

The 14th and 15th centuries are considered a high point for the production of manuscript books. Books of Hours, in particular, were often lavishly illustrated with miniatures and gold illumination, and were prized as much for their beauty as for their content.