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Detailed record for Royal 15 E V
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| Author |
Revised by David Aubert |
| Title |
Perceforest (Anciennes croniques Dangleterre, faictz et gestes du roy Perceforest, et des chevaliers du Franc Palais) |
| Origin |
Netherlands, S. (Bruges) |
| Date |
Last decade of the 15th century |
| Language |
French |
| Script |
Gothic cursive (Bâtarde) |
| Artists |
Follower of the Master of the Prayer Books of c. 1500 |
| Decoration |
1 miniature in colours of a throned figure, perhaps Philip the Good, receiving the book, with a full tromp l'oeil border in colours and gold with a space left for a heraldic device, and an illuminated initial in colours and gold, at the beginning of the preface (f. 3). Initials in gold on blue and rose grounds with penwork decoration in white. |
| Dimensions in mm |
460 x 330 (285 x 200) |
| Official foliation |
ff. 333 (+ 3 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning and 4 at the end, and 2 unfoliated medieval parchment flyleaves at the beginning and 3 at the end; 1 blank leaf after f. 2) |
| Form |
Parchment codex |
| Binding |
BM/BL in-house. Gilded edges. |
| Provenance |
Henry VII (b. 1457, d. 1509), king of England and lord of Ireland perhaps belonged to him: inscription on a former 18th-century border mentioning, probably in error, Henry VI instead of Henry VII (see Warner and Gilson 1921).
The Old Royal Library (the English Royal Library): included in the catalogue of 1666, Royal Appendix, f. 13.
Presented to the British Museum by George II in 1757 as part of the Old Royal Library. |
| Notes |
Contains the first volume of the romance of Perceforest revised by David Aubert (b. before 1413, d. c. 1479), librarian to Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, with his preface (ff. 3-4). The following two volumes of the set are Royal 19 E III and 19 E II. According to Roussineau 1987, the set correspond with volumes I-III of the original produced by David Aubert for Philip the Good in 1459-1460 (Paris Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal 3483-3485). They are believed to be a printer's copy.
Foliation in red beginning on f. 3. |
| Select bibliography |
H. L. D. Ward and J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), I, pp. 377-81.
George F. Warner and Julius P. Gilson, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King’s Collections, 4 vols (London: British Museum, 1921), II, pp. 176-75.
I. M. P. Raeside, 'The Manuscripts of Les anciennes croniques de Pise', Scriptorium: Revue internationale des études relative aux manuscrits, 9 (1955) 85-104 (p. 90, n. 22).
Le Roman de Perceforest: Quatrieme partie, ed. by G. Roussineau (Geneve: Librairie Droz, 1987), pp. xxi-xxxiii.
Anne F. Sutton and Livia Visser-Fuchs, Richard III’s Books: Ideals and Reality in the Life and Library of a Medieval Prince (Stroud, Gloucestershire, Sutton, 1997), p. 238 n. 118.
Pascale Charron and Marc Gil, 'Les enluminures des manuscrits de David Aubert', in Les manuscrits de David Aubert escripvain bourguignon, ed. by Danielle Quéruel, Cultures et Civilisation Médiévales, 18 (Paris: Press de l'Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 1999), pp. 81-100 (pp. 86, 95-96).
Gilles Roussineau, 'David Aubert, copiste du Roman de Perceforest', in Les manuscrits de David Aubert escripvain bourguignon, ed. by Danielle Quéruel, Cultures et Civilisation Médiévales, 18 (Paris: Press de l'Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 1999) pp. 35-51 (p. 36, n. 8, 38).
Ursula Pieters, Das Ich im Bild: die Figur des Autors in volksprachigen Handschriften des 13. bis 16. Jahrhunderts (Cologne: Bohlau, 2008), p. 219.
Chantry Westwell, Dragons, Heroes, Myths and Magic (London: British Library, 2021), p. 142. |
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