|
|
|
|
|
|
Detailed record for Royal 2 F VII
|
|
|
|
| Author |
Nicolaus de Hanapis [Latin patriarch of Jerusalem 1288-1291]; Robert Holcot; Thomas Ryngstede; William Kyngushome |
| Title |
Liber de exemplis sacre scripture; Commentary on Wisdom; Commentary on Proverbs; Commentary on Ecclesiasticus |
| Origin |
England, S. (St. Albans) |
| Date |
c. 1420- c. 1440 |
| Language |
Latin |
| Script |
Gothic cursive |
| Decoration |
4 decorated initials in colours and gold with full or partial foliate borders, at the beginning of the colophon and major text divisions (ff. 1v, 2, 79, 231). Initials in blue with red pen-flourishing. Paraphs in red or blue. |
| Dimensions in mm |
340 x 210 (220 x 130) |
| Official foliation |
ff. 326 (+ 2 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves and 1 unfoliated medieval parchment flyleaf attached to a modern paper flyleaf at the beginning and at the end; blank folio after f. 78) |
| Form |
Parchment codex |
| Binding |
Post-1600. Royal library parchment binding. |
| Provenance |
Lord John Beaver, a monk of St. Albans, commissioned by him and given to the Benedictine abbey of St. Albans with the permission of John Whethamstede, abbot of St. Albans (1420-1440): inscribed, 'Hunc librum fieri fecit Dompnus Joh[an]nes Beauer, / Monachus Monasterii Sancti Albani. Quem / librum ex licencia venerabilis mag[ist]ri Ioh[an]nis Whath[a]m/stede sacre theologie professoris eiusdemque Monasterii / Abbatis, contulit deo beate Marie et eccl[es]ie sancti Albani.', followed by an anathema and a list of contents (f. 1v); John's Beaver initials, 'IB', within initials (ff. 1v, 79, 231); arms of St. Albans (f. 2).
The Old Royal Library (the English Royal Library): Westminster inventory number 'no. 1102' (f. 2), acquired by the Upper Library at Westminster after the inventory of 1542; in the select list of works noted by John Bale of c. 1548; in the catalogue of 1666, Royal Appendix 71, f. 17v; and in the 1698 catalogue of the library of St James's Palace (see [Edward Bernard], Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliae et Hiberniae (Oxford: Sheldonian, '1697', but 1698?), no. 8230-8232).
Presented to the British Museum by George II in 1757 as part of the Old Royal Library. |
| Notes |
Catchwords, some in decorated frames with pointing hands, bifolium signatures.
Scott 1989 notes that this is one of the few examples of original owner inscriptions that were planned into the design of the book (f. 1v). |
| Select bibliography |
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), I, p. 66.
Beryl Smalley, 'Robert Holcot O.P.', Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, 26 (1956) 5-97 (p. 15).
Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by N. R. Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), pp. 161, 362.
Kathleen Scott, ‘Caveat Lector: Ownership and Standardization in the Illustration of Fifteenth-Century English Manuscripts’, in English Manuscript Studies, 1, ed. by Peter Beal and Jeremy Griffiths (London: British Library, 1989), 19-63 (p. 52 n. 4).
English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, ed. by R. Sharpe and others, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 4 (London: British Library, 1996), B.88.7.
The Libraries of King Henry VIII, ed. by J. P. Carley, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 7 (London: The British Library in association with The British Academy, 2000), H2.1102, H4.28. |
| Last revised: 17 September 2009 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
f. 1v
Colophon |
f. 2
Arms of St. Albans |
f. 79
Illuminated initial |
| |
f. 231
Illuminated initial |
|
|
|
|
