Together these four " foundation collections " included many of the most treasured books now in the British Library including the Lindisfarne Gospels and the sole surviving copy of Beowulf.

At some point in the early 700s the famous illuminated manuscript known as the Lindisfarne Gospels, an illustrated Latin copy of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, was made probably at Lindisfarne and the artist was possibly Eadfrith, who later became Bishop of Lindisfarne.

The Lindisfarne Gospels now reside in the British Library in London, somewhat to the annoyance of some Northumbrians.

The Lindisfarne Gospels have also featured on television among the top few Treasures of Britain.

* Eadfrith, Bishop of Lindisfarne ( 698 – 721 ) and presumed author of the Lindisfarne Gospels

Page from the Lindisfarne Gospels, c 700.

Northumbria played an important role in the formation of Insular art, a unique style combining Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, Pictish, Byzantine and other elements, producing works such as the Lindisfarne Gospels, St Cuthbert Gospel, the Ruthwell Cross and Bewcastle Cross, and later the Book of Kells, which was probably created at Iona.

After the Synod of Whitby in 664 Roman church practices officially replaced the Celtic ones but the influence of the Celtic style continued, the most famous examples of this being the Lindisfarne Gospels.

* Brown ( 2003 ), Brown, Michelle P., The Lindisfarne Gospels: Society, Spirituality and the Scribe, 2003, British Library, ISBN 978-0-7123-4807-2

The area has a strong religious past, as can be seen in works such as the Lindisfarne Gospels.

The Lindisfarne Gospels ( 715-720 AD ) are an early example ( Brown 2004 ).

Carpet page from Lindisfarne Gospels, showing knotwork detail.

These knots are most known for their adaptation for use in the ornamentation of Christian monuments and manuscripts, such as the 8th-century St. Teilo Gospels, the Book of Kells and the Lindisfarne Gospels.

Folio 27r from the Lindisfarne Gospels contains the incipit from the Gospel of Matthew.

The Lindisfarne Gospels ( London, British Library Cotton MS Nero D. IV ) is an Illuminated manuscript gospel book produced around the year 700 AD in a monastery off the coast of Northumberland at Lindisfarne, which is now on display in the British Library in London.

The Lindisfarne Gospels are presumed to be the work of a monk named Eadfrith, who became Bishop of Lindisfarne in 698 and died in 721.

The lime kilns on Lindisfarne are among the few being actively preserved in Northumberland.

Lindisfarne had a large lime burning industry, and the kilns are among the most complex in Northumberland.

Large parts of the island, and all of the adjacent intertidal area, are protected as Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve to help safeguard the internationally important wintering bird populations.

St Cuthbert, Lindisfarne, and the Viking raid, are also focal points of Westall's " The Wind Eye ".

* The monastery and monks of Lindisfarne are an important part of British author / broadcastor Melvyn Bragg's epic, historically based novel " Credo " published in 1996.

Oswald's head was interred in Durham Cathedral together with the remains of Cuthbert of Lindisfarne ( a saint with whom Oswald became posthumously associated, although the two were not associated in life ; Cuthbert became bishop of Lindisfarne more than forty years after Oswald's death ) and other valuables in a quickly made coffin, where it is generally believed to remain, although there are at least four other claimed heads of Oswald in continental Europe.

While there are few records, the Vikings are thought to have led their first raids in Scotland on the holy island of Iona in 794, the year following the raid on the other holy island of Lindisfarne, Northumbria.

The school's houses are named after important locations in the life of the Saint: Dunblane ( Yellow ), Elgin ( Green ), Iona ( Purple ), Kelso ( Blue ), Lindisfarne ( White ) and Melrose ( Red ).

As Alan Thacker notes, the Lindisfarne Gospels are " undoubtedly the work of a single hand ," and Eadfrith remains regarded as " the scribe and painter of the Lindisfarne Gospels ".

The pages of the Lindisfarne gospels are vellum, made from the skins of sheep or calves and evidence from the manuscript reveals that the vellum used for the Gospels was made from calfskin.

The Lindisfarne Gospels are impeccably designed, and as Backhouse points out vellum would have been too expensive for ‘ practice runs ’ for the pages, and so “ preliminary designs ” may have been done on a wax tablet ( a device that is hollowed out wood or bone with a layer of wax ).

The Lindisfarne Gospels are in remarkable condition and the text is complete and undamaged ( Backhouse 1981, 66 ).

The Lindisfarne Gospels are not an example of “ isolated genius ... in an otherwise dark age ” ( Backhouse 1981, 62 ).

The Durham Gospels ( Durham Cathedral Library ) are suspected as being created slightly earlier than the Lindisfarne Gospels, and while they have the bird interlace, the birds lack the naturalness and realness of Eadfrith ’ s birds in the Lindisfarne Gospels ( Backhouse 1981, 67 ).

The Book of Kells ( Trinity College, Dublin, MS A. I. 6 ( 58 )) employs decorative patterns that are similar to other insular art pieces of the period, but is thought to be produced much later than the Lindisfarne Gospels ( Backhouse 1981, 41 ).

The Reserves are scattered through England, from Lindisfarne in Northumberland to The Lizard in Cornwall.

In the context of the cult of Cuthbert, the lavishly illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels were made at Lindisfarne, probably shortly after the St Cuthbert Gospel, with covers involving metalwork, perhaps entirely made in it, which are also now lost.

In 684, Cuthbert was elected Bishop of Hexham, at a synod at Twyford ( believed to be present-day Alnmouth ), but was reluctant to leave his retirement and take up his charge ; it was only after a visit from a large group, including king Ecgfrith, that he agreed to return and take up the duties of bishop, but instead as Bishop of Lindisfarne, swapping with Eata, who went to Hexham instead.

In the mediæval days when monks inhabited the island, it was thought that if the soul was in God's keeping, the body must be fortified with Lindisfarne Mead.

Some monasteries kept up the old traditions of mead-making as a by-product of beekeeping, especially in areas where grapes could not be grown, a well known example being at Lindisfarne, where mead continues to be made to this day, albeit not in the monastery itself.

Columba's founding Iona within the bounds of Dál Riata ensured that the kingdom would be of great importance in the spread of Christianity in northern Britain, not only to Pictland, but also to Northumbria, via Lindisfarne, to Mercia, and beyond.

It was probably a gift from Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey, where it was written, intended to be placed in St Cuthbert's coffin when his remains were placed behind the altar at Lindisfarne in 698.

Although it seems clear from the style of the script that the text was written at Monkwearmouth-Jarrow, it is possible that the binding was then added at Lindisfarne ; the form of the plant scrolls can be compared to those on the portable altar also found in Cuthbert's coffin, presumed to have been made there, though also to other works of the period, such as the shaft of an Anglo-Saxon cross from Penrith and the Vespasian Psalter.

Cuthbert's body is found to be incorrupt when translated at Lindisfarne in 698 ( Ch 42 )

Bede's Life recounts that Cuthbert was initially buried in a stone sarcophagus to the right of the altar in the church at Lindisfarne ; he had wanted to be buried at the hermitage on Inner Farne Island where he died, but before his death was persuaded to allow his burial at the main monastery.

Eardulf, the Bishop of Lindisfarne, decided the monastery must be abandoned, and orderly preparations were made for the whole community, including lay people and children, to evacuate.

It was probably created between 650 and 700, in either Durrow or Northumbria in Northern England, where Lindisfarne or Durham would be the likely candidates, or on the island of Iona in the Scottish Inner Hebrides.

It might be an abridged version of " Aidan's-croft "-the croft of St Aidan who was the first Bishop of Lindisfarne ( Holy Island ).

The bishopric of Lindisfarne was held by Cuthbert at Aldfrith's accession ; Cuthbert was succeeded by the Irish-educated Eadberht, who would later be Abbot of Iona and bring the Easter controversy to an end, and then by Eadfrith, creator of the Lindisfarne Gospels.

* Reverend Canon Kate Tristram, one of the first women to be ordained in the Church of England, former warden of Marygate House, an ecumenical retreat house on Lindisfarne ( 1978 – 2009 ), and author of ' The Story of Holy Island ' ( 1949 – 1952 )

Lindisfarne Castle, which served as the home in the film, is now a National Trust property and can be toured by the public ; despite the passage of forty years, the building and its surroundings are largely unchanged.

The suffragans continued to be limited to the bishops of Hexham, Lindisfarne, and Whithorn.

Æthelwold contributed to the production of the Lindisfarne Gospels: he took the raw manuscripts that his predecessor Eadfrith had prepared and had Billfrith bind them so that they could be read easily.