Today, according to The Voyage of Saint Brendan, the saint and his brothers would have landed on the back of Jasconius the giant fish en route to finding the promised land of the saints. Some manuscripts of this work incorporated planned illustrations, others had enthusiastic readers...

This is Sprout. He just turned 21, so his doggy retirement home threw him the party of the year. After getting his new ID, Sprout got his first legal pup cup, then he and his friends celebrated with cake, presents, and even a Sprout-themed calendar. 13/10 happy birthday buddy #SeniorPupSaturday

I learn via Ainoa Castro of this useful online guide to Latin palaeography, put together by the Vatican library spotlight.vatlib.it/latin-paleog.... Any other suggestions for student-friendly palaeography welcome...

The Easter bunny baking hot cross buns BL Lansdowne 451; 15th century; England; f.6r @blmedieval.bsky.social

It’s the textures for me. #bookhistory #rarebooks 💙📚📜

Reminds me of a post I saw some years ago from a tourist in a Welsh pub. A drunk patron there kept going on about "Ed" being the source of all of his problems. Tourist asked the bartender if there was any danger for Ed, given how upset he was. Reply was, "He's talking about Edward 1 of England."

Nailed It!: Medieval Marginalia Edition #medievalsky

Nailed It!: Medieval Marginalia Edition #medievalsky

Siân Echard's talk from a couple of weeks ago, "Facsimiles of Illuminated Manuscripts and the Problem of Color," is now online! #medievalsky #bookhistory #iwishsianwasonbluesky youtu.be/UOAut7G3eus?...

Hi, Historian here. Just a heads up that the shape of the future is actually not inevitable or fixed. *You help make it happen. So try to make it the one you want*

Here's what I write about the Castell Dwyran stone in my AELAW book about Ogam (puz.unizar.es/2703-ogam-la...).

"The number of people on Dysgu Cymraeg courses has risen every year since the programme began in 2016, and is up 61% since data was first published for the academic year 2017-18." www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

🗽 #NoKings

New at the Dye Garden: a Tetrapanax papyrifer, known as a 'pith paper plant' 🌿 Once the stems are mature enough, the inner pith can be used to make paper! Thank you to Harry Metcalf, Paper Conservator at the @fitzmuseum.bsky.social, for the donation.

Thinking about Lancelot being menaced by a corgi in his dreams, a change in the Welsh adaptation of Perlesvaus from the French "petit mastin" (little mastiff). "And then Lancelot saw in his sleep that a corgi was barking at him, and five cur-dogs with him were falling on him from all sides, ..."

Thinking about Lancelot being menaced by a corgi in his dreams, a change in the Welsh adaptation of Perlesvaus from the French "petit mastin" (little mastiff). "And then Lancelot saw in his sleep that a corgi was barking at him, and five cur-dogs with him were falling on him from all sides, ..."

OH MY HEART...the Oberlin Luddites Reject "The Year of AI Exploration"! 💚

caveman’s best friend www.bbc.com/news/article...

"integrate AI into your workflow..." buddy, given half a chance I'd be scratching on vellum with oak gall ink in a nice dark clochán on Skellig Michael. I have no interest in generative AI at all, I wish they would stop trying to crowbar it into *everything*. Sometimes the effort is the point.

Someone drew a little bird in a hat in this 16th century Welsh manuscript of regulations for bards. British Library, Add MS 19711.

A poem composed early in the 16th century in a margin of the Black Book of Carmarthen begs God for protection from a series of enemies, including the English and the Irish, but the worst of all is saved for last: kerdd Wiliam Sion ‘the poetry of Wiliam Siôn’ #WorldPoetryDay

🧵 1/5: I'm THRILLED to see Jiří Vnouček's paper on the Hamburg Bible's parchment finally published with such stunning illustrations (73 in all)! This research shows how a careful reading of parchment tells a rich story of its creation. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

One of the SCE’s goals is the support of young academics. For this reason, we offer two annual prizes: for the best PhD thesis in Celtic Studies; and for the best scholarly article by a pre-doc in Celtic Studies. 🔗 The deadline for the 2026 prizes is 31 March: celtologica.eu/gb/prizes/

🔖I’r Dyddiadur! 📢 Seminar Cyfraith Hywel 🗓️ 11 Ebrill 2026 🗣️Siaradwyr: Gerald Morgan, Sara Elin Roberts & Sebastian Rider-Bezerra 📍Ystafell Seminar @yganolfangeltaidd.bsky.social ac ar lein 📧E-bostiwch [email protected] i gofrestru. Croeso i bawb! #CyfraithHywel

"All I can do is what is written: 'Weep with those who weep'" The mayor of NYC quoting St. Patrick's own words in his Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus. The full letter can be read (in translation or the original Latin) on confessio.ie

My favorite maniculae are in the Black Book of Carmarthen (NLW Peniarth MS 1). Both are drawn to "catch" run-ons split over the end of a line, but only one actually serves that purpose. The other acts as a nota bene signalling a verse line that should be added to the main text. This raises a ? 👇

And now in honor of #StPatricksDay ☘️

Then Patrick came to Vallis Rosina, and thought to lead his life there. And an angel came to Patrick, and told him: "Leave," he said, "this place to a boy not yet born." (2/9)

Heno! adran-y-gymraeg.eventcube.io/events/94383...

And now in honor of #StPatricksDay ☘️

🍀Happy St Patrick’s Day! 🍀 📜 Here is St Patrick preaching, from a miscellany of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, containing a selection of historical texts, from Bury St Edmunds Abbey (CUL MS Ff.1.27 Part II). 🔗See this manuscript in the @camdiglib.bsky.social: https://loom.ly/joTgwvE

St Patrick described himself as a refugee ("profugus"). He was a Roman Briton, trafficked into slavery in Ireland as a teenager who chose to return in adulthood as a missionary. He was elevated to the role of Ireland's national saint in the 7th century by the church of Armagh. Happy #StPatricksDay ☘️

Beannachtaí na Féile Pádraig! The Irish Medical Manuscript of the Month for March 2026 is Dublin, @ria.ie MS 23 O 6, containing texts on uroscopy, poisons & their antidotes, the medicinal virtues of whiskey and these cool marginal drawings of fish: leigheas.maynoothuniversity.ie/leigheas-man...

Last year I didn't do a post for St. Patrick's Day because I was out of town and, iirc, Trinity College MSS were not loading well for me. So here's a rare Saints+MSS backfill post. This is the Book of Armagh, TCD 52, fol. 22r, the opening of the Confessio. 🧵 👇 for a detail of the script.

My favorite maniculae are in the Black Book of Carmarthen (NLW Peniarth MS 1). Both are drawn to "catch" run-ons split over the end of a line, but only one actually serves that purpose. The other acts as a nota bene signalling a verse line that should be added to the main text. This raises a ? 👇

The feast day of St Patrick is tomorrow. He shares his day with St Failtigern, a holy woman, now obscure, whose name is recorded in Félire Óenguso/Martyrology of Óengus, UCD-OFM MS A7, f 13r, C15th. H/T @elvabjohnston.bsky.social

☞ ☞ ☞ the index finger is a pointing gesture to be found in manuscript and print traditions. It was used to draw the reader's attention to a certain part of a text or image. This slow-moving thread highlight a few of them:

So, to conclude this🥧-day excursus & come full circle with the matter: 8th-century Old Irish gabulrind "pair of compasses" (a compound of gabul "fork" & rind "point, tipp") was borrowed into Old English and occurs in several c. 9th-century manuscripts with glosses on the Book of Isaiah. /1

This is Lance. He may have overreacted a little bit to a leaf, but when you are two inches from the ground, anything could be a potential threat. 12/10 (TT: katiemhartline)

Did you know that we offer 2 student prizes? This year's deadline is 31 March! 🔸 Johann-Kaspar-Zeuß Prize for the Best Scholarly Article in Celtic Studies (by a pre-doc) 🔹 Johann-Kaspar-Zeuß Prize for the Best PhD Thesis in Celtic Studies More information: celtologica.eu/gb/prizes/ #AcademicSky

Less than a month to submit an abstract! wp-research.aber.ac.uk/medievalgend...

Sgwrs am un o gerddi hynod y Myrddin Cymraeg canoloesol, sef yr 'Oianau'. Dewch yn llu yn y cnawd neu ar-lein! 📍 1.51, Adeilad Parry-Williams (Prifysgol Aberystwyth) 🛜 Ar-lein (linc yn y postiad nesaf) ⏰ 5:30pm 📅 Dydd Mawrth, 17.03.26 (Ni fydd cyfieithu ar y pryd.)

A few folios from the Bodmin Gospels (Add MS 9381), a 9th-century Breton Gospel-book that was brought to Bodmin in Cornwall by the end of the 10th century. It's notable for its added manumissions, documents recording the free of slaves. @ccurran.bsky.social searcharchives.bl.uk/catalog/032-...

Thurs 26 March, Prof. Fiona Edmonds will deliver the 2026 John Bannerman Memorial Lecture (in-person and online), on a topic close to Bannerman's own work: 'Dál Riata and Northumbria, c. 700‒1000: Connections and comparisons'. Tuilleadh fiosrachaidh | More info 👇 hca.ed.ac.uk/john-bannerm...

Babe, wake up, they're reinventing the commentary tradition from first principles

Perhaps most famous for her poem on the vagina, Welsh poet Gwerful Mechain (c. 1460-1502) also composed an ode to her maidservant as she shat: She bent where her water escaped - bubbling From the boiler of her breeches Her holes were babbling Muck came, and an arch of water #InternationalWomensDay

A Gaulish spindle-whorl from Saint-Martin-du-Tertre, Sens (Yonne) (L-120). It says: GENETTA IMI / DAGA VIMPI This probably means "I am a good and pretty girl" Source: Alex Mullen & Coline Ruiz Darasse, Gaulish. Language | Writing | Epigraphy (2018), p. 32.

Perhaps most famous for her poem on the vagina, Welsh poet Gwerful Mechain (c. 1460-1502) also composed an ode to her maidservant as she shat: She bent where her water escaped - bubbling From the boiler of her breeches Her holes were babbling Muck came, and an arch of water #InternationalWomensDay

#DiwrnodRhyngwladolYMerched #InternationalWomensDay