This book is a comparative literary history of the two monasteries St. Gall (Eremus) and Reichenau (Insula). Many examples show that the spirit of competition was decisive for the intellectual and artistic development of these two great monasteries of the Lake Constance Region. The chapters cover the following topics: Libraries, Scribes and Painters, School and Church, Gardens and Guests, “Hausherren” and “Hausliteratur”, Poets of the Golden Age - Scholars of the Silver Age, Historians. A chronological table, a bibliography of the medieval literature of St. Gall and Reichenau and 16 illustrations are also included in an effort to provide a more comprehensive overview of one of the most fertile “literary landscapes” of the Latin Middle Ages.