Irish Bog Psalter

The Faddan More Psalter (Irish: Saltair an Fheadáin Mhóir) (also Irish Bog Psalter or "Faddan Mor Psalter") is an early medieval Christian psalter or text of the book of Psalms, discovered in a peat bog in July 2006, in the townland of Faddan More (Irish: Feadán Mór) in north County Tipperary, Ireland. The manuscript was probably written in about 800 in one of a number of monasteries in the area. A unique feature is that the inside of the leather cover is lined with papyrus, probably as a stiffening, an indication of the links between the Irish and Coptic churches at the time. After several years of conservation work, the psalter went on display at the National Museum of Ireland in Kildare St, Dublin in June 2011.

This discovery was hailed by the National Museum of Ireland as one of the most significant Irish archaeological finds in decades. Bernard Meehan of the Trinity College Library, who was called in to advise on the discovery, said that he believed the psalter was the first discovery of an Irish early medieval manuscript in two centuries. During the conservation process, in the period 2006–2010, the lining of the binding was found to have elements of papyrus, adding further evidence to the known links between Irish Celtic Christianity and the Egyptian Coptic Church.

The psalter joins the very small number of very early Western books that have survived fully intact with their original bookbindings. These mostly have their origins in the monastic Insular art of Britain and Ireland, and the Celtic and Anglo-Saxon missions to Europe. The earliest is the St Cuthbert Gospel of about 700 (British Library), and other examples probably of the mid-8th century are at Fulda on the continent. However the wallet-like style of the Faddan More binding, and the fact that it does not seem to have been physically attached to the sewn-together pages, make it unique among surviving covers.

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