Hiberno-Saxon

[ hahy-bur-noh-sak-suhn ]

adjective

1. having the characteristics of both the Irish and English; Anglo-Irish.
2. pertaining to or designating the style of art, especially of manuscript illumination, developed principally during the 7th and 8th centuries a.d. in the monastic scriptoria founded by Irish missionaries, characterized chiefly by the use of zoomorphic forms elaborated in interlaced patterns and often set within a symmetrically balanced framework of geometric shapes; Anglo-Irish.

Word History and Origins

Origin of Hiberno-Saxon¹

1935–40; Hiberno- combining form of Hibernian

Example Sentences

This notable volume is an excellent example of Celtic book art in the beginning of its transition stage, a stage which marks the approach to the two schools which were the result of the combination of Celtic and continental influences in the hands of intelligent and skilful Anglo-Saxon scribes—the Hiberno-Saxon and the English schools.

From Project Gutenberg

Mr. Owen Jones' illustrations commence with a page from the celebrated Durham book, or Gospels of St. Cuthbert, in the Hiberno-Saxon style of the seventh century, which was borrowed originally from the Romans, and afterward diffused throughout Europe by the itinerant-Saxon Benedictines.

From Project Gutenberg

He was also responsible in the main for the substitution of the continental Roman handwriting for the beautiful Hiberno-Saxon hand.

From Project Gutenberg

Religious fervour to make books was not wanting, as some of our most beautiful relics—works exhibiting much painstaking and skilful and even loving labour, calligraphy, and decoration aflame with high endeavour— belong to the Hiberno-Saxon period and the days of Ethelwold.

From Project Gutenberg

The two exceptions are, that Germany, both in writing and painting, has always stood apart, and lags behind the other nations of Western Europe in its development, and that England retains her Hiberno-Saxon hand till after the Conquest of 1066.

From Project Gutenberg