Antiphonary of Bangor

The Antiphonary of Bangor (Antiphonarium Monasterii Benchorensis) is an ancient Latin manuscript, supposed to have been originally written at Bangor Abbey in modern-day Northern Ireland.

History

A thin manuscript volume of 36 leaves, it is the oldest extant liturgical monument of the Celtic Church to which an approximate date can with certainty be assigned, and which on this and other grounds is of particular interest to liturgical scholars, particularly in Ireland and Great Britain.

The codex, found by Muratori in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, and named by him the "Antiphonary of Bangor" ("Antiphonarium Benchorense"), was brought to Milan from Bobbio Abbey with many other books by Dr Federigo Cardinal Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, when he founded the Ambrosian Library in 1609.

Bobbio, situated in a gorge of the Apennines thirty-seven miles north-east of Genoa, was founded by Saint Columbanus, a disciple of Saint Comgall, founder of the great monastery at Bangor, in County Down, Northern Ireland. Columbanus died at Bobbio and was buried there in 615. This establishes at once a connection between Bobbio and Bangor, and an examination of the contents of the codex placed it beyond all doubt that it was originally compiled in Bangor and brought thence to Bobbio, although not in the time of Saint Columbanus: there is in the codex a hymn entitled "ymnum sancti Congilli abbatis nostri", and he is referred to in it as "nostri patroni Comgilli sancti". Again there is a list of fifteen abbots, beginning with Comgall and ending with Cronan, the fifteenth abbot, who died in 691; the date of the compilation, therefore, may be referred to 680–691.

It is natural that a certain measure of occasional contact may have been kept up between Bobbio and Bangor. At what time or by whom the Antiphonary was carried from Bangor to St. Columban's Abbey of Bobbio, cannot with ceritainty be determined.