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A major project to produce an innovative computerised edition of the medieval Durham Liber Vitae (London, BL MS Cotton Domitian VII), with full supporting scholarly material, is now underway in partnership with the British Library. The project is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board.
This Liber Vitae, or "book of life" was one among several put together in Europe during the Middle Ages. As the name suggests, these books were modelled on the one envisioned in the biblical book of Revelation, hence to be inscribed therein was, at least originally, a highly meaningful act. The Durham Liber Vitae originated in the mid-ninth-century as a list of several hundred names of persons associated with a Northumbrian church, probably Lindisfarne, but possibly Monkwearmouth/Jarrow. (These names, written in alternating gold and silver, are arranged according to the status and functions of the persons who bore them and have the potential to provide remarkable insights into a 'dark age' of English history.) A few more names were...