In conjunction with their exhibition Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination, the British Library has created a Royal Manuscripts app for Apple iPad and iPhone users, which features over 500 images from 58 manuscripts in their collection.

The app is available for download at a cost of just £1.49 for the iPhone and £2.99 for the iPad, until November 2011.


The app includes:

• 58 manuscripts from the exhibition, each with interpretive text

• 500 high-resolution manuscript images of some of the best surviving examples of medieval painting in England, including many pages not on display in the exhibition

• 6 expert curator videos exploring the history and details of the manuscripts

• Functionality to star your favourite items and view them together in one place

Selected manuscripts include colourful histories and genealogies, Bibles and Psalters, scientific works and accounts of coronations. Highlights include:

• Book of Hours made for Margaret Beauchamp (great-grandmother of Henry VIII)

• Henry VIII’s Psalter, commissioned and annotated by the king himself

• Maps of an itinerary from London to Apulia and to the Holy Land

• Shrewsbury book, presented to Margaret of Anjou on her marriage to Henry VI in 1445


These manuscripts provide the most vivid surviving source for understanding royal identity, moral and religious beliefs, learning, faith artistic trends and international politics of the period. Each manuscript is a work of art in its own right. As a collection they give an outstanding indication of medieval and early modern royal taste and preferences.

Click here to go to the Apple iTunes Store

See also British Library hosts Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination

Source: British Library