Writing As Spiritual Practice: Inside the World of Medieval Scribes

Because monastic life depended on books, it was natural that monks and nuns came to produce them. Many monasteries included a scriptorium, a dedicated writing room where books were meticulously copied by hand. In Northern Europe, the scriptorium was often located next to the calefactorium (warming room), where a fire was kept alive, allowing scribes to step in and warm themselves when needed. Most of these books were for the monastery’s own use, though some monasteries produced codices for sale.

Today, we are grateful that these monastics preserved the cultural heritage of antiquity, but preservation was merely a byproduct, not the primary motivation of their work. Nor were they engaged in “art for art’s sake.” In the monastery, every activity was oriented toward a single purpose: communion with God. This infused all aspects of monastic life—prayers, of course, but meals, work, sleep, and conversations as well. Books and education were no exception.

Monks and nuns copied texts to produce Bibles and prayer books for worship, but also because writing was seen as a spiritual exercise. The abbot Rabanus Maurus wrote in the ninth century: “The fingers rejoice in writing, the eyes in seeing, and the mind at examining the meaning of God’s mystical words.” Cassiodorus, a monk and scholar, likened scribal toil to a spiritual battle against the devil and praised those who engaged in this noble work: “A happy purpose, a praiseworthy zeal, to preach to men with the hand, to set free tongues with one’s fingers and in silence to give mankind salvation and to fight with pen and ink against the unlawful snares of the devil.”

Today, we are grateful that these monastics preserved the cultural heritage of antiquity, but preservation was merely a byproduct, not the primary motivation of their work.

Here, Cassiodorus emphasizes two points worth highlighting: first, that writing is arduous labor, and, second, that reading is salvific, rendering the scribe’s labor a blessed task. Beginning with the toil, we can note that writing was physically demanding; another monk lamented, “No one can know what efforts are demanded. Three fingers write, two eyes see. One tongue speaks, the entire body labors.” The scribe carefully inscribed each line with a quill made from a goose feather, while their other hand wielded an erasing knife used to sharpen the quill and scrape away any mistakes. At the same time, the scribe had to press the unruly parchment flat against the desk. All in all, it was a painstaking process. Productivity varied based on the scribe’s skill, attention to detail, page size, and writing style. A professional scribe could complete about three to four pages per day—yet few monastics wrote full-time, as they had to balance other duties in the monastery.

Before a single word could be penned, many preparations were necessary. First, the animals whose skins would become parchment—typically sheep or calves—had to be slaughtered; a complete bible required the skins of around five hundred sheep. These skins were then processed, cut, trimmed, and lined. Moreover, the scribes were not content with just writing; ideally, the text should be rendered in beautiful calligraphy and adorned with symbols or images, crafted by monks skilled in this art. While the earliest complete Bible, the Codex Sinaiticus, lacks illustrations, by the fifth century illustrations began accompanying biblical texts, enhancing their visual and spiritual impact.

The most well-known depiction of life in a scriptorium is likely Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose. In both the novel and its film adaptation, the scriptorium is portrayed as a solemn place where writing is a mechanical, joyless labor. Laughter and jokes are banned, and writing is presented as arduous and faintly depressing. Historical evidence supports this portrayal to some extent, with exhausted monks leaving wry marginal notes. “As the sick yearn for health, so the scribe yearns for the end of the volume,” reads one such marginalia. Another pleads, “St. Patrick of Armagh, deliver me from writing.” Asking Patrick for relief, however, seems ironic, given his well-known passion for books.

But there were other experiences as well. In contrast to these grave descriptions, an unknown Irish monk from the ninth century offers a more lighthearted view of scriptorium life. In a playful poem preserved within a manuscript where he practiced various writing exercises—including copying Virgil—this monk celebrates the joy of his work. His verse is a delightful mix of humor and wit, capturing the spirit of his daily routine. Here’s the full poem, a charming glimpse into the blend of effort and enjoyment he found in his calling:

I and Pangur Bán, my cat
’Tis a like task we are at:
Hunting mice is his delight
Hunting words I sit all night.

Better far than praise of men
’Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill-will
He, too, plies his simple skill.

’Tis a merry thing to see
At our tasks how glad are we,
When at home we sit and find
Entertainment to our mind.

Oftentimes a mouse will stray
In the hero Pangur’s way;
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.

’Gainst the wall he sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly;
’Gainst the wall of knowledge
I All my little wisdom try.

When a mouse darts from its den
O! how glad is Pangur then;
O! what gladness do I prove
When I solve the doubts I love!

So in peace our task we ply,
Pangur Bán, my cat and I;
In our arts we find our bliss
I have mine, and he has his.

Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade;
I get wisdom day and night,
Turning darkness into light.

The poem depicts writing as a joyful quest for enlightenment, of transforming darkness into light. Here, we find none of the gloominess that characterizes Eco’s scriptoria. Instead, we meet a monk who relishes his work, delighting in the wisdom he gains through it. Nearer to God through the pen. The work of the scribe was, as Cassiodorus had noted, hard work but also salvific.

This ideal is illustrated by certain manuscripts where the text is so minuscule that it’s barely legible. These books indicate that the act of writing held intrinsic value, even if it did not produce a readable book. By copying texts, the monk incorporated the words, absorbing them in a process akin to that described by the Greek rhetorician Quintilian, who emphasized internalizing classical texts as a foundation for oratory and writing. As discussed in the previous chapter, absorbing classical texts was the cornerstone of Greek education, where the literate were expected to carry these texts within them as a resource for life as well as work.

As we saw, the church adopted this pedagogy, and it lived on in the medieval monasteries, especially with regards to Scripture. The Bible’s message was seen as not only informative but salvific, and the monastic who memorized its words filled his or her soul with divine wisdom. Therefore, writing was more than book production; it was a spiritual discipline. Monks and nuns wrote not merely to produce books for others to read, but because the act of writing was believed to bring them closer to God. As the scribes’ pens scraped the parchment, the words became inscribed upon their soul. The text was intended to shape the heart and redeem the body so that, in a sense, they were writing themselves into heaven.

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From Reading Matters: A History for the Digital Age by Joel Halldorf. Copyright © 2026. Available from NYU Press.