I’m on Atlas Obscura!

Atlas Obscura is a publication that features stories about the wondrous in the world. Places, objects, events, customs and traditions. Anything out of the ordinary that is connected to a particular place.

I have wanted to publish something with them for a long time, and now I finally have. So please enjoy my first-ever article for Atlas Obscura. It has everything. Goths, Roman emperors, abdicated queens, disgraced noblemen, and a book that went missing for 1,000 years.

What’s Silver, Purple, and Very-Well Traveled?

Codex Argenteus, or Silver Bible at Carolina Rediviva, Uppsala, Sweden. Photo: Erika Harlitz-Kern.

Tucked into a far corner of the annex to the Carolina Rediviva, the main library at Sweden’s Uppsala University, a book sits alone behind bulletproof glass. You might think its remote placement indicates its minor significance. But look closer and you’ll see a work of visual splendor—a uniform script in silver and gold ink, written on purple parchment, as bright and vibrant as if it were brand new.

This is the Codex Argenteus, or Silver Bible. Created more than 1,500 years ago in northern Italy, it was commissioned by the ruler of a people long since vanished. But their lost language is preserved on the pages of the book before you.

Fittingly, the story of how this bible ended up on display at a Swedish university is as mysterious as the book is beautiful.

If you wish to read the entire article, please click here.

In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.