La Bibbia a Montecassino / The Bible at Montecassino

For manuscript historians, the Bible in the form of a codex represents a handcrafted object of the utmost importance: it was the sacred text par excellence and served as a vital reference point in the lives of medieval monks. In addition, it functioned as an indispensable tool for daily liturgical celebration, and as a study text and individual reading book for the purpose of moral edification. The manuscript collection of the Montecassino Abbey presents an exemplary case study, both for the total number of biblical manuscripts it preserves (just under a hundred, comprising 116 production units) and for the diversity of types (complete monolithic Bibles, Old and/or New Testament sequences of varying size and physiognomy, and individual glossed books with commentary beside the text), as well as for the presence of a significant group of codices in Beneventan minuscule produced for internal use within the same Abbey or in its dependencies in a period centered around the eleventh century (with sporadic extensions into the twelfth and thirteenth) which have remained there till the present day.