Book of Kells produced the first facsimile of the Book of Kells. The majority of the pages were reproduced in black-and-white photographs, but the edition also featured forty-eight colour reproductions, including all the full-page decorations. Under licence from the Board of Trinity College Dublin, Thames and Hudson produced a second facsimile edition in 1974. This edition included all the full-page illustrations in the manuscript and a representative section of the ornamentation of the text pages, together with some enlarged details of the illustrations. The reproductions were all in full colour, with photography by John Kennedy, Green Studio, Dublin. In 1979, Swiss publisher Faksimile-Verlag
Book of Kells of the required power are not known to have been available until hundreds of years after the book's completion. The complicated knot work and interweaving found in Kells and related manuscripts have many parallels in the metalwork and stone carving of the period. Since their gradual rediscovery from the 19th century on, these designs have also had an enduring popularity. Many of these motifs are used today in popular art including jewellery and tattoos. The book had a sacramental rather than educational purpose. Such a large, lavish Gospel would have been left on the high altar of the church and