This edition reproduces the most important of the fully decorated pages plus a series of enlargements showing the almost unbelievable minuteness of the detail; spiral and interlaced patterns, human and animal ornament - a combination of high seriousness and humour. Accompanying the illustrations is a new text by Bernard Meehan, the Keeper of Manuscripts at Trinity College, Dublin. He provides an authoritative analysis of these exuberant inventions, the artists, the text and the writing, and a full account of the historical background to the miraculous world of the Book of Kells.