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Add MS 62080

Record Id:

032-001962382

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-001962382

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000055.0x000117

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Add MS 62080

Title:

Medulla grammaticae

Scope & Content:

The manuscript contains an imperfect copy of the Medulla grammaticae, a fifteenth-century Latin-English dictionary.

Several other manuscript copies of the Medulla grammaticae survive: British Library, Add MS 24640, Add MS 33534, Add MS 37789 (bound with the Promptorium parvulorum), Harley MS 1000, Harley MS 1738, Harley MS 2181, Harley MS 2257, Harley MS 2270; Bristol, University Library, MS DM 1 (fragment), MS DM 14; Cambridge, Magdalene College, Pepys MS 2002; Cambridge, St John's College, MS C.22 (72); Canterbury, Cathedral Library, MS D.2; Downside Abbey, MS 26540; Gloucester, Diocesan Record Office, MS 31 (fragment); Lincoln, Cathedral Library, MS 88, MS 111; Oxford, Bodleian Library, Holkham Misc. MS 39, Rawlinson MS C.101, Rawlinson MS D.913 (fragment); Oxford, Brasenose College, MS UB S.2.87-88 (fragment); Shrewsbury School, MS 16; Stonyhurst College, MS 15 (A.1.10).

Six other lost or unlocated copies are noted by McCarren, 'Bristol University MS DM 1', Traditio, 48 (1993), p. 224.

The author of the Medulla grammaticae is not known. The text is often confused with the Promptorium parvulorum, not least because of the inclusion of 'Medulla grammaticae' as an alternative title in early printed editions of the Promptorium. As a result, authorship of the Medulla is often mistakenly attributed to Geoffrey the Grammarian: for example, annotations in Lincoln, Cathedral Library, MS 88, assign Geoffrey's name, plus the otherwise unattested surname of Starkey, to the contents.

No sources are explicitly mentioned in the Medulla, however comparative studies have indicated several likely candidates: glossae collectae from the Bible and classical texts, the vocabulary (class glossary) or nominale, and medieval Summae and encyclopaedia, such as Huguccio of Pisa's Liber deriuationem and Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae.

The contents of the manuscript are as follows:

f. 1r: leaf recycled from a 15th-century account-book, formerly the pastedown.

f. 1v: inscriptions and pen-trials.

ff. 2r-18r: Prologue to the Medulla grammaticae; 'A'.

ff. 18r-22v: 'B'.

ff. 23r-38v: 'C'.

ff. 38v-44v: 'D'.

ff. 45r-53r: 'E'.

ff. 53r-62r: 'F'.

ff. 62r-66r: 'G'.

ff. 66v-69v: 'H'.

ff. 69v-77r: 'I'.

f. 77v: 'K'.

ff. 77v-84r: 'L'.

ff. 84r-93r: 'M'.

ff. 93r-96v: 'N'.

ff. 96v-101r: 'O'.

ff. 101r-116v: 'P'.

ff. 116v-118r: 'Q'.

ff. 118r-122v: 'R'.

ff. 122v-136r: 'S'.

ff. 136r-142v: 'T'.

ff. 142v-144v: 'U/V'.

ff. 145-146: stubs from missing quire, containing fragmentary writing.

f. 147r: inscriptions and pen-trials.

f. 147v: leaf recycled from a 15th-century account book, formerly the pastedown.

Decoration:

Elaborate initials in pen, with interlace and cadels, in black/brown and red ink, sometimes inhabited by human or grotesque figures.

Plain initials in red.

Fancy ascenders, often incorporating grotesques.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Additional Manuscripts

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "032-001962382", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 62080: Medulla grammaticae" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-001962382

Is part of:

not applicable

Hierarchy:

032-001962382

Container:

not applicable

Record Type (Level):

Fonds

Extent:

Paper codex

Digitised Content:

Languages:

English, Middle
Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1460

End Date:

1499

Date Range:

Late 15th century

Era:

Access:

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Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Paper (with parchment endleaves and sewing guards).

Dimensions: 280 x 210 mm (text space: 210 x 125/160 mm).

Foliation: ff. i + 147. Folio i is a 19th/20th-century bookplate, pasted onto the inside front cover. Folios 1 and 147 are parchment endleaves.

Collation: (quire of 8 missing at the beginning of the volume), i^12-1 (ff. 2-13; 10th leaf after f. 11 missing), ii^12-2 (ff. 14-24; 1st and 12th leaves missing, before f. 14 and after f. 24), iii-iv¹⁰ (ff. 25-44), v^16-1 (ff. 45-59; 1st leaf missing before f. 45), vi^thirteen (ff. 60-72), vii-xi¹⁴ (ff. 73-141), xii^12-9 (ff. 141-144; 4th-12th leaves missing after f. 144).

Script: Gothic cursive (Anglicana).

Binding: Pre-1600, probably medieval. Oak boards backed with pink-dyed leather, with parchment endleaves and sewing guards; single clasp, now gone.

Custodial History:

Origin: England, ?Midlands (?Nottingham).

Provenance:

Note: several of the individuals whose names were inscribed in this manuscript during the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries were not necessarily its owners: some names are inscribed by a common hand, while others are mentioned within the context of extracts/fragments from contemporary documents that have been scribbled in the margins.

Thomas Guyner / Gayner of Nottingham (15th/16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 1v (three times)) and the following notes: 'Villa preceptis est thomam Gayner [] Nott''.

Edward Lyster / Lister (15th/16th century), gentleman ('generosus'): inscribed with his name (ff. 1v (twice), 147r and on one of the stubs before f. 2r) and the following verse: 'Who so wylle opyne and louke, thys ys Edward lystere boke' (f. 2r).

Gamaliell Drake (16th century), gentleman ('generosus'): inscribed with his name (f. 1v).

Sir Thomas Spencer of Wormleighton, Warwickshire (16th century), knight: inscribed with his name (f. 1v).

Thomas Hutchinson of Papplewick, Nottinghamshire (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 1v).

Robert Quarnby (16th century): inscribed with his name and the following verses: 'Who so on me dothe looke, I am Robart Quarnby his booke, A very good witnes I have, Your iudgment herin I crave'; 'Your Judgment is good, in a peace of wood, but not in a man, I sweare by the rood' (f. 2r).

- note: a single hand has inscribed Drake's, Spencer's, Hutchinson's and one of Lyster's names on f. 1v and Quarnby's name on f. 79r.

Roger Bacon (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 85v).

Henry Storeleay/Stearley (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 34v).

Thomas Stourleay/Stearley of Halam, Nottingham (16th century): inscribed with his name (ff. 128r, 143r).

Jacobus Carnadus (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 60r).

Thomas Stanour (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 108r).

John Stanoupe / Stanhope (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 108r).

Robert Stan[...] / ?Stanhope (16th century): inscribed with his name (f. 108r).

- note: a single hand wrote the above three names.

Humphrey Bonner (16th/17th century), Lord Mayor of Nottingham 1593/94, 1600/01, 1607/08: inscribed with his name (f. 76r).

Thomas Babington (16th/17th century), 16th/17th century: inscribed with his name (f. 76r).

Patricia Sacheverell (17th century), gentlewoman: inscribed with her name (f. 107v).

Medical Society of London: stamp of ownership (f. 2r).

Richard Heber (b. 1774, d. 1833), book-collector: his sale, 10th February 1836; purchased by Payne & Foss, booksellers, on behalf of Sir Thomas Phillipps, for £4 10s (annotated sale catalogue, P.R.4 A.42, p. 106).

Sir Thomas Phillipps (b. 1792, d. 1872), baronet, book-collector: inscribed with his number 'Phillipps MSS 8244'; his sale, 15th June 1896, lot 872.

Laurence W. Hodson (b. 1864, d. 1933), art collector and philanthropist: his booklabel pasted onto the inside front cover (f. i).

Purchased at Sotheby's, 8 December 1981, lot 90.

Publications:

Promptorium parvulorum sive clericorum: Lexicon Anglo-Latinum Princeps, auctore Galfrido Grammatico Dicto e predicatoribus Lenne episcopi, Northfolcensi..., ed. by Albert Way, Works of the Camden Society, 25, 54, 89, 3 vols (London: Camden Society, 1843-65), III, p. liv.

Peter Haworth, 'The First Latin-English Dictionary: A Bristol University Manuscript', Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, 45 (1923), 253-75, pls I-II [on the text].

DeWitt T. Starnes, Renaissance Dictionaries: English-Latin and Latin-English (Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1954), pp. 5-6, 9, 25-37, 39, 42, 129, 132, 135-36, 367n., 368n., 379n.

Gabriele Stein, 'The English Dictionary in the 15th Century', in Logos Semantikos: Studia Linguistica in Honorem Eugenio Coseriu, 1921-1981, ed. by Horst Geckeler and others, 5 vols (Madrid: Editorial Gredos, 1981), I: Historia de la Filosofía del Lenguaje y de la Lingüística, ed. by Jürgen Trabant, pp. 313-22 (pp. 315-18).

Gabriele Stein, The English Dictionary before Cawdrey, Lexicographia: Series Maior, 9 (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1985), pp. 74-90.

Vincent P. McCarren, 'Bristol University MS DM 1, A Fragment of the Medulla Grammatice: An Edition', Traditio: Studies in Ancient and Medieval History, Thought, and Religion, 48 (1993), 173-235 [on the text].

The British Library Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts: New Series, 1981-1985, vols (London: British Library, 1994), I: Descriptions, p. 37.

Vincent P. McCarren, 'The Gloucester Manuscript of the Medulla grammatice: An Edition', The Journal of Medieval Latin, 10 (2000), 338-401 [on the text].

Vincent P. McCarren, 'Linguistic Problems within the Tradition of the 15th Century Glossary Medulla Grammatice', Bulletin Du Cange, 60 (2002), 235-60 [on the text].

Reiko Takeda, 'Cambridge, Trinity College Library, MS O.5.4: A Fifteenth-Century Pedagogical Dictionary?', in Historical Dictionaries and Historical Dictionary Research: Papers from the International Conference on Historical Lexicography and Lexicology, at the University of Leicester, 2002, ed. by Julie Coleman and Anne McDermott, Lexicographia: Series Maior, 123 (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 2004), pp. 11-18 (pp. 11, 13-14, 17).

Vincent P. McCarren and others, 'A Prolegomenon to the Stonyhurst Medulla: An Edition of the Letter "A"', Bulletin du Cange, 65 (2007), 45-116 [on the text].

Florent Tremblay, A Medieval English-Latin Dictionary: Based on a Set of Unpublished 15th Century Manuscripts [of the] 'Medulla Grammaticae'/'Marrow of Grammar' kept in the British Museum (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 2009) [on the text].

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Related Material:

From the Catalogue of Additions (1994), p. 37:

'MEDULLA GRAMMATICE: Latin-English dictionary, attributed to Galfridus Grammaticus; late 15th cent. Imperfect, the last entry being 'Vespilio'. Other manuscripts, mostly imperfect also, of this work, are Harley 1000, 1783 (sic), 2181, 2257, 6514, and Add. 24640. See also A. Way, Promptorum Parvulorum sive Clericorum, Camden Society (1843-65), I, p. x, and III, p. liv. A dictionary based in part on the present text was printed by Wynkyn de Worde as Ortus Vocabulorum (1500). Ownership inscriptions of Thomas Sterleay, Edward Lyster, Sir Thomas Spencer of Wormleighton, Thomas Gayner, Thomas Hutchinson (ff. 1, 147); Jacobus Carnadus (f. 60), Robert Quarnby (f. 79), Roger Bacon (f. 85v), John and Thomas Stanope (ff. 108, 119); stamp of Medical Society of London; formerly in the collection of Richard Heber (1733-1833); Phillipps MS. 8244; bookplate of Laurence W. Hodson. Purchased at Sotheby's, 8 Dec. 1981, lot 90.

Paper; ff. i+147. 280 x 210mm. Gatherings: i12 (wants 9, torn out), ii12 (wants 1, 12), iii-iv10, v16 (wants 1), vi14 (wants 14), vii (wants 12), viii-xi14, xii1-3 (the remainder missing). Written in a single column in an English cursive book hand, with many pen-work intials, some pictorial, and some capitals and touching in red in the early part of the text. Contemporary binding of red leather over bevelled wooden boards, with pastedowns and sewing guards of 15th cent. vellum documents, including farming accounts (ff. 1, 147).'

Dictionaries: Galfridus Grammaticus: Latin-English dictionary, `Medulla Grammatice' by Galfridus Grammaticus: late 15th cent: Partly Lat.