The Plan of St. Gall :: :: University of Virginia Library

The number of monks who sat at work in the scriptorium
must have varied greatly. The layout of the Scriptorium on
the Plan of St. Gall would allow fourteen monks to write
simultaneously, if we assume that each writing desk was
manned by two scribes. Since there are ten feet of space
between each window, two scribes could have worked in
comfort at a single desk. But the total number of scribes at
work each day in the Scriptorium could have been considerably
increased if the scribes worked in shifts.

A. Bruckner, on the basis of an actual count of the hands
at work in individual manuscripts, has calculated that the
monastery of St. Gall, between 750 and 770, employed
some twenty-five scribes for copying manuscripts and
around fifteen more for writing documents—a total of
forty.[110] Under Abbot Waldo and shortly after him (770790)
the number of scribes rose to about eighty;[111] under
Abbot Gozbert (816-836) to about a hundred.[112] Some of
these may have worked in carrels, in one of the cloister
walks, as was customary in Tournai in the eleventh
century[113] and to be found later on in many other places.[114]

A codex was rarely written entirely by a single hand. At
the scriptorium of St. Martin's at Tours, in the first half of
the eighth century, more than twenty scribes collaborated
in a copy of Eugippius.[115] The texts of other manuscripts
copied at that same school were written, variously, by five,
seven, eight, or twelve different hands.[116] Fourteen scribes
listed by name in manuscripts of St. Martin appear in a
register drawn up in 820.[117]

152

[ILLUSTRATION]

ROMANESQUE CHURCH BENCH, MONASTERY OF ALPIRSBACH

100.

100.X

FORMERLY STUTTGART, SCHLOSSMUSEUM

(DESTROYED IN WW II.) After Falke, 1924, pl. 1

Although probably not antedating the thirteenth century, this medieval church bench with its simple carpentry embodies a type one
would expect to have been in use centuries earlier. The drafter of the Plan referred to this type of bench as FORMULA (see above
p. 137 and Glossary, III, s.v.). Four such benches, each with a seating capacity of not more than four people, would have been
set up in the crossing of the Church probably for use by a specially trained choir singing in antiphon.

153

[ILLUSTRATION]

HEXHAM, NORTHUMBERLAND, ENGLAND

NIGHT STAIRS, PRIORY CHURCH

Unquestionably one of the finest extant medieval night stairs, located in the southern transept arm, it leads directly from dormitory into church.
In general such stairs provided the only connection between dormitory and cloister. In the 12th and 13th centuries, they were invariably made of
stone; in earlier times perhaps of timber. Except for those in the Church, the author of the Plan of St. Gall omits stairs from it.

154

[ILLUSTRATION]

102.A GOD JANUS UNDER A CELESTIAL CANOPY

Roman medal of A.D. 187, more than twice original size
[after Gnecchi, II, 1912, pl. 84, fig. 5]

[ILLUSTRATION]

104. TYRE, PALESTINE (LEBANON)

Basilica built by Bishop Paulinus in A.D. 314. Reconstructed plan [after
Nussbaum, 1965, II, 24, fig. 1]. The reconstruction is based on a
description by Eusebius, History of the Church (X, 4, 44) where
the layout of Synthronon and Bema is referred to:

"after completing the great building he [Constantine] furnished it with
thrones high up, to accord with the dignity of the prelates, and also with
benches arranged conveniently throughout. In addition to all this, he placed
in the middle the Holy of Holies—the altar—excluding the general public
from this part too by surrounding it with wooden trellis-work wrought
by the craftsmen with exquisite artistry, a marvellous sight for all who
see it."

[ILLUSTRATION]

102.B EMPEROR DOMITIAN ENTHRONED
UNDER CELESTIAL CANOPY

Sestertius, nearly three times original size [after Mattingly, II, 1930, pl. 77,
fig. 9]

[ILLUSTRATION]

103. ROME. OLD ST. PETER'S

Presbytery, as rebuilt by Gregory the Great between 594-604. Drawing by
S. Rizzello [after Toynbee and Ward-Perkins, 1956, 215, fig. 22]

[110]

Bruckner, 1938, 17. Under Abbot Sturmi (744-779) the same
number, i.e., forty scribes, were constantly employed in the scriptorium
of Fulda. See Thompson, 1939, 51.

[111]

Bruckner, op. cit., 19.

[112]

Ibid., 22ff.

[113]

Of Tournai it is written "if you had gone into the cloister you
might in general have seen a dozen young monks sitting on chairs in
perfect silence, writing at tables, carefully and skillfully constructed (ita
ut si claustrum ingredereris, videres plerumque duo decim monachos juvenes
sedentes in cathedris et super tabulas diligenter et artificiose compositas cum
silentio scribentes)." See Wattenbach, 1896, 271-72. Whether claustrum
in the passage quoted above can be interpreted as "cloister walk" rather
than "claustral range of buildings" is subject to question: and this
matter as well as the evidence cited by Roover in support of the assumption
that in certain cloisters certain scribes performed their craft in the
open cloister walk (Note 104) requires careful re-examination.

[114]

Roover, 1939, 596ff.

[115]

Lesne, IV, 1938, 344.

[116]

Ibid., 344ff.

[117]

Ibid.

University of Virginia Library

NUMBER OF SCRIBES & COLLABORATION

ROMANESQUE CHURCH BENCH, MONASTERY OF ALPIRSBACH

HEXHAM, NORTHUMBERLAND, ENGLAND

102.A GOD JANUS UNDER A CELESTIAL CANOPY

104. TYRE, PALESTINE (LEBANON)

102.B EMPEROR DOMITIAN ENTHRONED UNDER CELESTIAL CANOPY

103. ROME. OLD ST. PETER'S

102.B EMPEROR DOMITIAN ENTHRONED
UNDER CELESTIAL CANOPY