Overview

Join us for a talk "Beyond the Naked Eye: Scientific Analysis of Ireland's Medieval Manuscripts" with Anna Hoffmann, Research Support Officer for the McCarthy Multi-Spectral Imaging Project. This talk is part of the public programming for Recording the Past: The Annals of Inisfallen and the Making of Irish History, Glucksman 2 September - 1 November 2026.

About the speaker

Anna Hoffmann is the Research Support Officer for the McCarthy Multi-Spectral Imaging Project which began in October 2024. Concurrently to this she is completing her PhD entitled "Materiality and Scribal Practice in Late-Medieval Gaelic Manuscripts", with particular focus on the 14th century vernacular manuscript, the Book of Uí Mhaine. This follows on from her study as an Irish Research Council Laureate Scholar with the Inks & Skins Project (2020-2024). Anna graduated with her BA in European History from Columbia University in New York City in 2020. 

About the Talk

Ireland's manuscript tradition was a lengthy one, extending from c. 600 AD to 1900. Scholarly emphasis has always been philological: editing and analysing the texts transmitted by these handwritten books.

With advances in technology, and the advent of the new discipline of heritage science, long-standing questions as to the materiality of manuscripts - creation, writing and decorative materials - have begun to be pursued. In Ireland, UCC has played a leading role in the application of science to the understanding of the Irish manuscript.

The Irish Research Council-funded Inks and Skins Project, which began in 2019, was at the forefront in these developments, championing the collaboration between humanists, scientists (in particular the Library of Congress Preservation Department) and repositories such as the Royal Irish Academy.

This project focused on the use of various spectroscopic techniques, especially X-Ray Fluorescent Spectroscopy, to analyse the elemental components present in inks, pigments, and parchment.

This work then continued through the sponsorship by Brian McCarthy and Fexco of the McCarthy Multi-Spectral Imaging Project, which began in 2024 and incorporated the Inks & Skins project. McCarthy MSI currently employs multi-spectral imaging and processing techniques to uncover even more information about the Irish manuscript, revealing details that have been concealed from scholars for centuries.

Acknowledgements

With thanks to our partners: The Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford; National Museum of Ireland; National Parks and Wildlife Service; National Monuments Service; Fexco and Brian McCarthy; Kerry County Council; private philanthropy from Cork University Foundation and UCC's President's Strategic Fund.