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Detailed record for Harley 4773
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| Title |
Bible (the 'Montpellier Bible') |
| Origin |
France, S. (Languedoc) |
| Date |
1st quarter of the 12th century |
| Language |
Latin |
| Script |
Protogothic |
| Decoration |
Large initials in colours and sometimes gold, some partly zoomorphic at the beginning of most books and other divisions (ff. 1v, 10, 13, 15, 21, 22v, 41, 42, 62, 65v, 71, 77, 91, 102v, 117, 126, 141, 157v, 158v, 164v, 170v, 174v, 176v, 178v, 180, 181, 183, 183v, 185, 186v, 187, 187v, 191v, 193, 194v, 195v, 197, 197v, 198, 198v, 212). Large initials in red and blue with penwork decoration. Large initials in red, some with simple penwork decoration. Rubrics in large letters of red and blue with penwork decoration. Numbers in red. |
| Dimensions in mm |
515 x 365 (410 x 255) in two columns |
| Official foliation |
ff. 218 ( + 3 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning and 3 at the end) |
| Form |
Parchment codex |
| Binding |
BM/BL in-house. |
| Provenance |
Given to the Capuchins at Montpellier in 1621 by François Ranchin (b.1564, d.1641), Chancellor of the University of Montpellier: inscription (f. 1).
The Harley Collection, formed by Robert Harley (b. 1661, d. 1724), 1st earl of Oxford and Mortimer, politician, and Edward Harley (b. 1689, d. 1741), 2nd earl of Oxford and Mortimer, book collector and patron of the arts.
Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta Cavendish, née Holles (b. 1694, d. 1755) during her lifetime and thereafter to their daughter, Margaret Cavendish Bentinck (b. 1715, d.1785), duchess of Portland; the manuscripts were sold by the Countess and the Duchess in 1753 to the nation for £10,000 (a fraction of their contemporary value) under the Act of Parliament that also established the British Museum; the Harley manuscripts form one of the foundation collections of the British Library. |
| Notes |
The second volume of this Bible, the continuation of Harley 4772.
Uncrossed tironian ets, and ampersands.
Quire signatures. |
| Select bibliography |
Bibliography for both Harley 4772 and 4773:
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts, in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: [n. pub.], 1808-12), IIII (1808), nos 4772-3.
Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener, A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, 4th edn, ed. by Edward Miller, 2 vols (London: George Bell & Sons, 1894), II, 67.
Meyer Schapiro, 'New Documents on Saint-Gilles', Art Bulletin 17 (1935), 414-31 (pp. 426-31, figs 1, 16).
Meyer Schapiro, 'From Mozarabic to Romanesque in Silo', Art Bulletin 21 (1939), 313-374 (p. 323 n. 14).
D. H. Turner, Romanesque Illuminated Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1966), p. 26, pl. 15.
C. M. Kauffmann, Romanesque Manuscripts 1066-1190 Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, 3 (London: Harvey Miller, 1975), p. 34.
Walter Cahn, Romanesque Bible Illumination (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1982), no. 74 [with additional bibliography].
François Avril, 'Les arts de la couleur', in François Avril, Xavier Barral I Altet, and Danielle Gaborit-Chopin, Le Monde Roman 1060-1200, 2 vols (Paris: Gallimard, 1983), I Les Royaumes d’Occident, pp. 159-259 (pp. 187-8, pl. 154).
Walter Cahn, Romanesque Manuscripts: The Twelfth Century (London: Harvey Miller, 1996), I, 23; II, 59, 66, no. 49 [with additional bibliography].
Janet Backhouse, The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), no. 27.
John Lowden, The Making of the Bibles Moralisées, 2 vols (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000), II: The Book of Ruth, p. 28, fig. 12.
Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle, Bible Manuscripts: 1400 Years of Scribes and Scripture (London: British Library, 2007), no. 67. |
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f. 21v
Zoomorphic initial |
f. 42
Dog |
f. 65v
Lion |
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f. 71
Bird |
f. 91
Decorated initial |
f. 157v
Decorated initial |
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f. 197v
Decorated initials |
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