• Brittany (probably)

Canterbury

• Gospel-book

• Decorated canon tables (4r-11v)
• Gospel of Matthew, preceded by preface (12r-66r)
• Gospel of Mark, preceded by preface and capitula (66r-99r)
• Gospel of Luke, preceded by preface, capitula, and an explanation of the Hebrew names occurring in this Gospel, headed Item incipit interpretatio nominum de Luca (99v-159v)
• Gospel of John (imperfect), preceded by preface and capitula (159v-192v)
• Jerome, Epistle to Pope Damasus (193r-194r)
• Jerome, Preface to the four Gospels (194r-196r)
• Eusebius, Epistle to Carpianus (imperfect) (196r-v)
• Preface and capitula to Matthew's Gospel (197r-199v).

• Probably written in Brittany

This MS is also known as 'Athelstan's Gospel': as shown by a notice on fol. 3r, it was part of the library of the English King, who subsequently donated it to the abbey of Saint Augustine at Canterbury c. AD 930 (cf. Marsden 2012: 422). In addition to the fact that both the script and the decoration point to a Breton origin (cf. EBGB 12), the text of the Gospels in this MS is also close to that of other Breton evangeliaries, such as the famous Paris, BnF, NAL 1587 (McGurk 1987: 176; Lemoine 2004: 156). Note also the occurrence of the Hellenizing phrase Item nunc incidit breuis aeuangelii degestio cata Lucae at fol. 99r, immediately after the explicit formula Explicit aeuangelium cata Marcum: similar formulas occur in other Breton Gospel-books (cf. Lemoine 1995: 11–13).

Scholars have pointed out some Irish affiliations in relation to this MS (cf. e.g. PMSB 302); in particular, it is worth quoting at length O'Reilly's important remarks on the links between the iconography of the Book of Kells and Royal 1.A.XIII (O'Rahilly 1994: 225): 'These are correspondences of a specific and idiosyncratic kind. They suggest not a common Early Christian inheritance shared by the Book of Kells and Royal I.A.XVIII in this respect but direct contact between the Breton manuscript or, more probably, one of its exemplars, and an ancient but apparently Irish tradition. [...] The style of the decoration of the Gospel and the chi-rho in the Breton book would indicate that the continental contact with these insular practices had occurred at some considerable time prior to the tenth century date of Royal I.A.XVIII and had been assimilated into a post-Carolingian decorative and stylistic tradition for a quite different kind of "working" Gospel book format.'

ASM 365 (§444); British Library Digitised Manuscripts; EBGB 11–12, 13 (n. 1); Fleuriot 1983: 104; ILLB In17; Keynes 1985: 165–70; Lemoine 1995: 11–13; Lemoine 2004: 156; Lemoine 2005: 16–17, 19; Lemoine 2008: 194; Lemoine 2010: 220; Marsden 2012: 422; McGurk 1987: 166 (n. 2), 176; OHLP 257; O'Reilly 1994: 222–5; PMSB 302 (§48).

• http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=royal_ms_1_a_xviii_fs001r