In the late eleventh century, Abbot Fortunio decided to enlist the scribes living in the
monastery of Silos, near Burgos, in the time-consuming and costly task of copying for
the monastery one of the most significant peninsular best sellers of the Middle Ages:
a Beatus, a commentary on the book of Revelation. In doing so, he was continuing a
long-lasting Iberian tradition originating in the late eighth century, already popular and
yet far from over. Fortunio was taking advantage of the fruitful efforts of his predecessor,
Abbot Domingo, to restore the Benedictine community of Silos, left in ruins after
theMuslim raids of the late tenth century. But what was the process of copying this
book? How did it all start, and what did this work mean for the monastery of Silos?
The colophons and historical data held in this Beatus, now known as the Silos
Apocalypse (London, British Library, Additional MS 11695), inform the reader about
the commissioners under whom the copy was produced, the scribes who engaged in
that task, the illuminators who created one of the most significant extant examples
of Mozarabic or northern Christian art, and when and where it all happened. But,
is all the contextual information the codex provides accurate? In this article, the Silos
Apocalypse is thoroughly analyzed to unveil the identity of its scribes, what can be
known about their professional careers, their cultural context, and how this codex
fits within thewritten production of the monastery of Silos in the late eleventh and early
twelfth century.

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