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.

Bede also travelled to the monastery of Lindisfarne, and at some point visited the otherwise unknown monastery of a monk named, a visit that is mentioned in a letter to that monk.

Lindisfarne is a tidal island off the north-east coast of England.

In 793, a Viking raid on Lindisfarne caused much consternation throughout the Christian west, and is now often taken as the beginning of the Viking Age.

The more popularly accepted date for the Viking raid on Lindisfarne is 8 June ; Michael Swanton, editor of Routledge's edition of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, writes " vi id Ianr, presumably an error for vi id Iun ( June 8 ) which is the date given by the Annals of Lindisfarne ( p. 505 ), when better sailing weather would favour coastal raids.

The Holy Island of Lindisfarne is well known for mead.

Lindisfarne mead is produced at St Aidan's Winery, and sold throughout the UK and elsewhere.

Tourism grew steadily throughout the twentieth century, and Lindisfarne is now a popular place with visitors.

Lindisfarne ( particularly the castle ) is the setting of the Roman Polanski film Cul-de-Sac ( 1966 ) with Donald Pleasence and Lionel Stander, shot entirely on location there.

The island is semi-fictionalised into " Lindisfarne Island " and the castle is " Rob Roy ".

* Lindisfarne is referred to as The Holy Isle in Nancy Farmer's book " The Sea of Trolls ," which also references the Norse invasion of Lindisfarne.

* Lindisfarne is where the main character of Harry goes to on pilgrimage in the book " Kingdom by the Sea " by Robert Westall.

* A thinly disguised version of Lindisfarne is the setting for the Lyndesfarne Bridge quartet of modern fantasy novels by Trevor Hopkins.

* Lindisfarne is known as Holy Island and The New Beginning in " Brother in the Land " by Robert Swindells, 1984.

* The sack of Lindisfarne monastery by a fleet of opportunistic Vikings is a pivotal event in Charles Barnitz ' historical fantasy / adventure, The Deepest Sea ( 1996 )

* Wells Tower's short story, " Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned ," is centred around a Viking raid on Lindisfarne.

* Freddie Frobisher, the flatulent hermit of Lindisfarne, is featured in Blackadder the second, episode Beer.

For instance, the carriage of the remains of St Cuthbert from Lindisfarne to Durham is the subject of " The Road from Lindisfarne ", the third movement of the Durham Concerto ( 2007 ) by Jon Lord.

is: Lindisfarne

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.

After the Synod of Whitby, Cuthbert seems to have accepted the Roman customs, and his old abbot, Eata, called on him to introduce them at Lindisfarne as prior there.

The latter was called to the bishopric of Lindisfarne but after two years he returned to the solitude of the Inner Farne and died there in 687, when Saint Aethelwold took up residence instead.

The text is a very good and careful copy of the single Gospel of John from what has been called the " Italo-Northumbrian " family of texts, other well-known examples of which are several manuscripts from Wearmouth-Jarrow, including the Codex Amiatinus, and in the British Library the Lindisfarne Gospels and the Gospel Book MS Royal 1.

Lindisfarne were a British folk / rock group from Newcastle upon Tyne established in 1970 ( originally called Brethren ) and fronted by singer / songwriter Alan Hull.

Colman resigned the Bishopric of Lindisfarne after the Synod of Whitby called by King Oswiu of Northumbria decided to calculate Easter using the method of the First Ecumenical Council instead of his preferred Celtic method.

The Lindisfarne Gospels is the best documented and most complete Insular manuscript of the period ( Backhouse 2004 ).

The interlace, like that of the Durham fragment, is mostly large compared to the Book of Lindisfarne, but the extreme level of detail found in later Insular books begins here in the Celtic spirals and other curvilinear decoration used in initials and in sections of carpet pages.

is a fragmentary seventh century Insular Gospel Book, produced in Lindisfarne c. 650.

Although this book is fragmentary, it is the earliest surviving example in the series of lavish Insular Gospel Books which includes the Book of Durrow, the Lindisfarne Gospels, the St. Teilo Gospels and the Book of Kells.

The period saw the flowering of Insular art in Northumbria and produced the Lindisfarne Gospels, perhaps begun in Aldfrith's time, the scholarship of Bede, and the beginnings of the Anglo-Saxon missions to the continent.

Especially in Northumbria, the Insular art style shared across the British Isles produced much of the finest work being produced in Europe until the Viking raids and invasions largely suppressed the movement ; the Book of Lindisfarne is one example certainly produced in Northumbria.

The mixing of Irish, Pictish and Anglo-Saxon styles created the Insular style of art, represented by the Lindisfarne Gospels and the Book of Kells.

and R. J. Clark, ‘ The Lindisfarne Gospels and two other 8th century Anglo-Saxon / Insular manuscripts: pigment identification by Raman microscopy .’ Journal of Raman Spectroscopy 35 ( 2004 ), pp. 4-12.

Insular scribes also started a tradition of giving the opening few words of each of the Gospels an elaborate decorative treatment ( see this example from the Lindisfarne Gospels ).

Equally, the forms used for the finest Insular art were all adopted from the Roman world: Gospel books like the Book of Kells and Book of Lindisfarne, chalices like the Ardagh Chalice and Derrynaflan Chalice, and penannular brooches like the Tara Brooch.

The Kingdom of Northumbria in the far north of England was the crucible of Insular style in Britain, at centres such as Lindisfarne, founded c. 635 as an offshoot of the Irish monastery on Iona, and Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey ( 674 ) which looked to the continent.

At about the same time as the Insular Lindisfarne Gospels was being made in the early 8th century, the Vespasian Psalter from Canterbury in the far south, which the missionaries from Rome had made their headquarters, shows a wholly different, classically based art.

Early Anglo-Saxon manuscript illumination forms part of Insular art, a combination of influences from Mediterranean, Celtic and Germanic styles that arose when the Anglo-Saxons encountered Irish missionary activity in Northumbria, at Lindisfarne and Iona in particular.

In the Lindisfarne Gospels, of around 700-715, there are carpet pages and Insular initials of unprecedented complexity and sophistication, but the evangelist portraits, clearly following Italian models, greatly simplify them, misunderstand some details of the setting, and give them a border with interlace corners.

File: LindisfarneFol27rIncipitMatt. jpg | The Incipit to Matthew from the Book of Lindisfarne, an Insular masterpiece

These initials are surrounded by small red dots, which is a common motif in many Insular manuscripts, including the Lindisfarne Gospels.