Book of Dimma

The Book of Dimma (Dublin, Trinity College, MS.A.IV.23) is an 8th-century Irish pocket Gospel Book originally from the Abbey of Roscrea, founded by St. Crónán in County Tipperary, Ireland.^[1] In addition to the Gospels of Luke and John, it has an order for the Unction and Communion of the Sick. The surviving illumination of the manuscript contains a number of illuminated initials, three Evangelist portrait pages, and one page with an Evangelist's symbol (the eagle of St. John).^[2] The pocket gospel book is a distinctively Insular format, of which the Stowe Missal and Book of Mulling are other leading examples.^[3]

The gospels other than John are "written for the most part in a rapid cursive script", while John is "by a different scribe, in neat minuscule bookhand".^[4] It was signed by its scribe, Dimma MacNathi, at the end of each of the Gospels. This Dimma has been traditionally identified with a bishop who was later Bishop of Connor, mentioned by Pope John IV in a letter on Pelagianism in 640. This identification, however, cannot be sustained.