" The few old Irish
satchels remaining are black with age, and the characteristic
decoration of diagonal lines and interlaced markings is
nearly worn away. Two of them are preserved in England
and Ireland: those of the Book of Armagh, in Trinity
College, Dublin, and of the Irish Missal in Corpus Christi
College, Oxford. The wallet at Oxford looks much like
a modern schoolboy's satchel; leather straps are fixed to
it, by which it was slung round the neck. The Armagh
wallet is made of one piece of leather, folded to form a case a
foot long, a little more than a foot broad, and two and a half
inches thick. The Book of Armagh does not fit it properly.
Interlaced work and zoomorphs decorate the leather. Remains
of rough straps are still attached to the sides.
[1] Stokes (W.), T. L., 75. The terms used for satchels are
sacculi (Lat.), and tiag, or tiag liubhair or teig liubair (Ir.).
There has been some confusion between polaire and tiag, the
former being regarded as a leather case for a single
book, the latter a satchel for several books. This distinction is
made in connection with the ancient Irish life of Columba, which
is therefore made to read that the saint used to make cases and
satchels for books (polaire ocus tiaga), v.
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