21/07/2026
Take a moment to explore the beautiful details of Folios 309v – 310r from the Gospel of John. Now on display in the Old Library The Book of Kells.
The two lions on the left-hand folio, whose life-giving breath is shown in the form of grapes, are key elements in this opening (John 6.42-57), which deals with the eucharist (a Christian sacrament in which bread and wine are consecrated and consumed in remembrance of Jesus’s death). The lions frame the passage in which Jesus tells his doubtful listeners that whoever believes in him will have everlasting life: qui credit / in me habet uitam aeternam (lines 11-12).
The lions look across to the parallel passage on the facing folio, lines 10-13, to Jesus’s message: ‘He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day.’ A further celebration of the eucharist comes in line 17 on folio 309v, in the form of a calligraphic chalice and bunch of foliage, where the central stem may be wheat, a reference to the bread of life.