The special exhibition ‘Corvey and the Legacy of Antiquity. Emperors, Monasteries and Cultural Transfer in the Middle Ages’ at the Paderborn Diocesan Museum, which opened in September, has now been enriched by a valuable loan. The manuscript with the four Gospels, which has rarely been lent to date, was sent on its way to Paderborn from St Vitus Cathedral in Prague last Friday, 17 October 2024. Together with Father Monsignor Vladimír Kelnar and curator Michala Vraná from Prague and restorer Michaela Voss-Raker, Paderborn Cathedral provost Joachim Goebel and the director of the Diocesan Museum, Dr Holger Kempkens, were able to place the valuable manuscript from St Vitus Cathedral in Prague in its display case today. Until the end of the exhibition on 26 January 2025, the Gospels will now complete the section on the historical ‘Corvey Library’.
Image above: Cathedral provost Joachim Göbel is delighted about the arrival of the Prague Gospels. The Paderborn Metropolitan Chapter supported the Diocesan Museum in the loan request to the Prague Cathedral Chapter. (from left to right: curator Michala Vraná | restorer Monika Voss-Raker | Father Monsignor Vladimír Kelnar | cathedral provost Joachim Goebel | museum director Dr Holger Kempkens), photo: Isabella Maria Struck, Archdiocese of Paderborn.
From Corvey to Prague: gifts and their consequences
The Gospels were part of the library of Corvey Monastery in the 10th century. It is still unclear whether it was created there. In any case, the precious manuscript became a model for the school of book illumination that flourished in Corvey. The Gospels probably came as a gift to the newly founded bishopric in Prague in 973, when the monk Detmar, who came from the Westphalian region of the Saxons, became bishop there. The manuscript became part of the treasure in Prague Cathedral. In the 14th century, Charles IV designated it as the coronation gospel for the Bohemian kings.
Prague and Corvey are not only linked by the Gospels: Prague’s famous St Vitus Cathedral also received its patronage from a Corvey saint, St Vitus. His remains came to Corvey from St Denis, near Paris, in 836. In 1355, the head of St Vitus came to Prague and, as the most important reliquary, gave its name to the cathedral at Prague Castle. Today, Prague Cathedral is a UNESCO World Heritage Site as part of the Historical Centre of Prague, just like the Westwork in Corvey.
The Prague Gospels – cooperation with a European dimension
The binding of this gospel book alone – which can be presented separately from the book block in the exhibition – is extraordinary: it originally consisted of two oak boards covered with Byzantine silk. The ivory panel that adorns the centre of the cover was once part of an ancient consular diptych from the 5th century. The depiction of the consul was changed to one of the apostle Peter in the Middle Ages. It is still unclear whether the ivory was part of the original book decoration or was added in the ‘post-Corvey period’. The gilded copper plates engraved with figures of Czech (patron) saints on the front cover were created in Prague in the second half of the 16th century.

The codex itself contains the four Gospels. In addition to the Gospel text, the codex is decorated with 15 canon tables and magnificent double decorative pages. The latter each show an evangelist writing at the beginning of ‘his’ gospel as well as the calling of the respective evangelist by Jesus. The illuminators who created these decorative pages were trained in Reims, a cultural centre for book illumination that radiated far and wide in the Carolingian period. In addition to the figurative depictions, the manuscript is also richly ornamented. The corresponding decorative pages can be assigned to a group of manuscripts produced in the monastery of St Amand (today located on the French-Belgian border), which was famous for its Franco-Irish book illumination. So where does this manuscript come from? From Corvey (the scribes), from Reims (the figure painters) or from St Amand (the decorative pages)? The co-operation for such a work already had European dimensions in the Carolingian period. The now fragile decorative pages have to be turned regularly in the exhibition so as not to be exposed to light for too long.
About the special exhibition ‘Corvey and the heritage of antiquity’
The starting point of the exhibition in the Paderborn Diocesan Museum is an important think tank of the Middle Ages: the former Corvey Monastery, founded 1,200 years ago and a UNESCO World Heritage Site for ten years. The abbots of Corvey Abbey had extensive connections to Rome and Byzantium and were among the scholars of the Carolingian court. They made the abbey on the Weserbogen a centre for the transmission of ancient writing, architecture and wall painting. The exhibition shows how ancient knowledge and culture saved by monasteries, libraries and scriptoria – through the Middle Ages at the time of Charlemagne and his successors – reached the present day and still characterise our European society.
With unique exhibits – treasure art, fragments of architecture and wall paintings, valuable manuscripts and ivory art – the exhibition in Paderborn now makes it possible to experience how the Middle Ages made this cultural transfer possible and appropriated antiquity.

More than 120 fascinating loans from over 50 European and US museums, libraries and archives are on display in Paderborn until 25 January 2025, accompanied by insights into the work of the conservators and researchers who preserve the ancient heritage today. In poetic spatial interventions, calligrapher and artist Brody Neuenschwander (*1958, Houston, Texas) also devotes himself to the most astonishing antiquity preserved in Corvey: the tales of the wanderings of the Greek hero Odysseus.
A richly illustrated catalogue accompanying the exhibition offers the latest findings of European scholars on the reception of antiquity in the Carolingian period as well as an impressive panorama of fascinating exhibits from antiquity to the Middle Ages. The catalogue is published by Michael Imhof Verlag, 656 pages, numerous colour illustrations, 39.95 euros in the museum, 49.95 euros in bookshops.
WHEN?
Exhibition dates: Saturday, 21 September 2024 to Sunday, 26 January 2025
Opening hours: Tuesday to Sunday, 10 am – 6 pm, every first Wednesday of the month until 8 pm
WHERE?
Diözesanmuseum Paderborn
Markt 17
33098 Paderborn
COST?
12 EUR /ermäßigt 6 EUR, freier Eintritt für Kinder bis 12 Jahren