Add MS 62451

RANULPH HIGDEN: Polychronicon, etc.; mid 15th cent. Latin. Names written in margins in 16th and 17th centt. hands include Arthur Mawde (f. 50v), John Wyll[ia]m (ff. 136, 138v), Thomas Wright(?) (f. 140). Armorial bookplate of John Spencer, [of Attercliffe Hall and Badley?], 18th cent.(?) (f. ii). Owned by H. L. Bradfer-Lawrence, F.S.A. (d. 1965), and afterwards on deposit at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, as BL. MS. 12. Purchased through Quaritch, March 1982.

Vellum; ff. ix+288. 300 x 205 (text circa 200 x 125)mm. Gatherings (28) of 8, signed on first four leaves of each gathering in 3 alphabetical sequences, partially cropped (i wants all except the last leaf; v, 7, 8 cancelled; xxxvii, 8 cancelled; xxxviii wants all except the first leaf). Catchwords at the end of each gathering. Ruled in ink. Pricking, partly cropped. In single columns of 43 lines each. Written in two English secretary book hands, strongly influenced by Anglicana, of mid 15th cent. (hand 1, ff. 2-32, 97-288v; hand 2, ff. 33-96v). Marginal annotations in other hands. In Index, blue initials with red flourishing at beginning of each alphabetical section. In Polychronicon, blue initials with red flourishing at beginning of each book and to indicate new chapter, reign, year, etc. Diagram of Noah's ark on f. 71. Rubrications of capitals, marginalia, etc. Binding of brown leather, blind-stamped, 18th cent.(?).

1. ff. 2-26v. Index to Polychronicon. Imperfect: beginning with 'Cornelius Scipio'. Original system of reference erased and replaced with 2 column reference to folio and chapter by a later hand.

2. 26v-32. Verse genealogy of English kings from William I to Edward III, with diagrammatic representation of children and grandchildren of each king. A note on f. 26v states that this genealogy was compiled in 1339, but the diagram illustrating the children of Edward III is complete and notes the creation of Lionel of Antwerp as Duke of Clarence and John of Gaunt as Duke of Lancaster in 1362. Beg. 'Dux normannorum: Willelmus vi validorum'.

3. ff. 33-288. Polychronicon, comprising the short version (CD in the Rolls series edition), with additions in Book VII from John of Tynemouth's 'Historia Aurea' and a Latin Brut'. J. Taylor, The Universal Chronicle of Ranulf Higden (Oxford, 1966), pp. 101-102, and V. H. Galbraith, 'The Historia Aurea and a French Brut', English Historical Review, XLIII (1928), pp. 203-217, note manuscripts containing short versions of the Polychronicon which have been expanded by the inclusion of large sections of the Historia Aurea, but do not mention any examples where the Brut has been used as well. The present manuscript is not included in the list of Latin manuscripts of the Polychronicon in J. Taylor, op. cit., App. 1.