Book: Did you mean...?

The Pillow Book (Makura no Soshi) is a personalised account of life at the Japanese court by Sei Shonagon which she completed c. 1002 CE during the Heian Period. The book is full of humorous observations (okashi) written in the style of a...

The Book of the Duchess is the first major work of the English poet Geoffrey Chaucer (l. c. 1343-1400 CE), best known for his masterpiece The Canterbury Tales, composed in the last twelve years of his life and left unfinished at his death...

Early medieval Irish book art is both beautiful and fascinating. It reflects a flourishing monastic culture which played a key role in the cultural development of Europe from the 6th to 9th centuries. Nowhere is this more clearly illustrated...

In Geoffrey Chaucer's first major work, The Book of the Duchess (c. 1370 CE), two genres of medieval literature are combined – the French poetic convention of courtly love and the high medieval dream vision – to create a poem of enduring...

A detail from the Book of the Dead of Aaneru from Thebes, Third Intermediate Period of Egypt, 21st Dynasty, 1070-946 BCE. Egyptian Museum, Turin.

Folio 27 of the Book of Kells with the four evangelists. Trinity College Library

The Book of Kells, (folio 292r), c. 800 CE, showing the lavishly decorated text that opens the Gospel of John. (Trinity College Library)

A detail from a Book of the Dead, on papyrus showing hieratic writing of Hornefer, Ptolemaic Period, provenance unknown. (Museo Castello Sforzesco, Milan)

The Book of the Dead of Henuttawy. The winged serpent god Nehebkau is depicted on the left. In the center of the papyrus is Osiris, who lies beneath the personification of the night sky. On the right side of the scene, the goddess Nut arches...

Folio 5 of the Book of Kells with the Eusebian Canons. Trinity College Library