The impact of this shift echoed throughout Europe. In Insular manuscripts, powerful words are visually elaborated and become talismans. According to Ong, people from typographic cultures tend to think of words as things which are not easily associated with magic, since they are dead, unlike the spoken word. In Insular manuscripts, the Chi Rho symbol for the name of Christ, and the Incipits to the Gospels, which serve to identify the section they begin, were among the first letters to become ornamental. This approach to narrative is perfect for manuscript artists, who are literally copying a known story, but for a new context and purpose, whatever that may be as determined by the patron of the manuscript.
Appropriate embellishments are acceptable, but the text stays basically the same.
In a similar vein, Insular manuscripts adopt the decorative traditions of Celtic culture. In addition, memory in oral culture is aided by methods whose descriptions seem analogous to decorative techniques. It is easy to see the analogies between this patterned system of mnemonic devices and the repetitive ornamental patterns, familiar to Celtic culture, that flourish in Insular manuscripts. Celtic mythology abounds in animal imagery, and zoomorphic and anthropomorphic images are interchangeable in Celtic mythology and in art. This fluidity between human and animal, seen also in the concept of the shamanistic shape-shifter, seems to be echoed in the early manuscripts.