Lambeth Bible
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The Lambeth Bible is a 12th-century illuminated manuscript (perhaps produced circa 1150–1170), among the finest surviving giant Bibles from Romanesque England. It exists in two volumes; the first is in Lambeth Palace Library (MS 3), where it has been housed since the library's establishment in 1610, as verified by Archbishop Bancroft's manuscript catalogue. This volume covers Genesis to Job on 328 leaves of vellum measuring circa 520 x 355 mm; the second incomplete volume (covering Psalms to Revelation) is in the Maidstone Museum & Art Gallery (MS P.5).
The style of the illumination is clearly influenced by the work of Master Hugo, the illuminator of the Bury Bible. The Lambeth Bible bears close stylistic resemblance to the Gospel book made for Abbot Wedric of Liessies Abbey (Hainault) in 1146, of which only two leaves survive (the rest having been destroyed at Metz in World War II), now in Avesnes-sur-Helpe.
For many years the first volume in the Lambeth Palace Library was paired with another volume (MS P.5) in the library, but in 1924 it was realized that the correct pairing was with the Maidstone volume.