Egerton MS 3880

Richard Symonds (1617-1660), royalist and antiquary: Commonplace-book, circa 1637-1677, with later additions partly by Sir Richard Gipps (d. 1708), circa 1685-1715. Mainly autograph. Partly Latin, Greek and Italian, and engraved. Several distinct stages are apparent in the compilation of this large and varied collection. It was begun, perhaps circa 1637 (cf. watermark), as a commonplace-book of moral and related topics the heads of which were listed in a prefatory ‘Index Capitum’ (ff. 2-3) and distributed, in alphabetical order from ‘Abstinentia’ to ‘Zoilus’, serially throughout the volume (ff. 5-221v). The earliest entries, copied in an educated script of mixed character that is quite unlike Symond’s later hand (cf. specimens of both on ff. 179v, 180; 187v, 188) were drawn principally from the Bible, Guillim’s Display of Heraldry (1610), Sandys’s Relation of a journey (1615), Heylyn’s Microcosmos (1621) and Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy (1621). To these were added in the same hand and duly indexed (f. 3) a section (ff. 222-236) on plants, living creatures and customs of different nations, etc. A further series of entries (ff. 239-274) copied largely in Symonds’s more familiar script and relating to religion and the Roman and Greek Churches (ff. 245v-274 passim) and are mostly transcribed from Italian sources. This is followed by extracts (ff. 275-277) on sculpture and, supplementing the earlier entry ‘Miraculum’ (ff. 137v-139v), on the seven wonders of the world (f. 276v). In addition, Symonds considerably expanded the scope of the main section by introducing throughout new, unindexed, topics on the blank portions of the pages. Material for various entries was communicated to him by named individuals (e.g. f. 141), partly between 1652 (ff. 1, 130v, 198v, 202v) and 1657 (f. 162v). A few diagrams (ff. 90, 131v) and sketches (ff. 194, 207, 267v) occur, along with an engraved portrait of Old Parr (f. 216). Later on he added a list (ff. 3v, 4), comprising 103 numbered items, of ‘The names of the Authors, Bookes, wrightings, M.S. Records &^c which I haue read ouer & out of which I haue written into this Common-Place booke’. The latest printed work mentioned here is ‘S^r Kenelme Digby of y^e Sy[m]patheticall Polder’, 1669 (no. 90); the earliest are editions of Higden’s Polychronicon and Caxton’s Chronicles of England, both first published in 1480. Several of over two dozen extracts (ff. 16-214 passim) from The Canterbury Tales of ‘S^r Geoffray Chaucer’ (no. 7) are copied in a hand imitating black letter. Classical poetry is represented partly by extracts from Horace in Latin or in Luigi Dolce’s verse-translation into Italian. Italian works on painting, architecture and gardening include the copy of ‘Georgio Vasari Vite de Pittori Scult. & Archit. 3 Vol:’ (no. 41) that is now preserved among the British Library’s collections (562.*c.12-14: Bologna, 1647) and incorporates Symonds’s autograph notes and additions. Manuscript sources recorded here mostly consist of his own collections. Of these ‘My Description of Essex in 3 Vol: folio. M.S.’ (no. 74), is now preserved in the College of Arms, while ‘Roma Moderna. In diuers little volumes M.S. My owne Observations’ (no. 93) may be identified with MSS Harley 942 and 943, Additional 17919 and Egerton 1635 and 1636, which date from 1649-1652. ‘My Epitomy of y^e \3/ large Volumes of the family of berkeley. M.S. fol.’ (no. 72), presumably abstracted from the original by John Smith (d. 1640) of Nibley, is now unknown. Also consulted are ‘Leland. M.S. in Bodleyes Library at Oxford’ (no. 96) and `a MSS. in S^r Robert Cottons Library’ (f. 202v). A list (f. 272) of printed works relating to maritime law, dated between 1613 and 1679, may not be his work. The manuscript subsequently passed to the Suffolk antiquary Sir Richard Gipps (1659-1708) who as ‘R: Gipps’ added a verse-translation from Seneca (f. 141v; and cf. initials on ff. 12, 16, 240v) and whose hand occurs sporadically throughout, three of the entries (ff. 214, 72, 135) being dated to 10 Sept. 1685, 12 May 1686 and 22 Apr. 1689. The reflections on ‘Vidua’ at the end (f. 279v) are his also. For his hand see his collections in Harley MS 7566. The manuscript has not been identified in the sale-cat. of his library, T. Green, 13 Dec. 1728 (but cf. lots 679, 680). It is uncertain who copied the inscriptions on Queen Anne’s coronation medal of Apr. 1702 (f. 241v), or the entry on f. 9, and various other hands added at the end of the volume (ff. 277v-279) satirical lapidary epitaphs, in Latin, for Bishop Burnet (d. 1715), Sir Fleetwood Shepherd (d. 1691) and Pope Alexander VIII, (d. 1692), along with a rhyming epitaph on Louis XIV (d. 1715), noted in the index (ff. 3), etc. For further manuscript remains of Symonds see his civil war diaries, 1644-1645, now MSS Additional 17062 and Harley 911, 939, 944, and the notebooks now MSS Harley 943, 964, 965, 986, 991, 1278. His ownership-inscription is found in Harley MS 872. Purchased at Christie’s, 12 July 2000, lot 328.

Paper: ff. v+277. 343 mm x 222 mm. 19^th cent. binding of half-morocco. Watermark of paper similar to Heawood no. 580 (from Camden’s Britannia, 1637). Each page of text from ff. 5-236v divided into two columns by double red ink rule. Tipped in at front is set of 19^th-cent. notes on Symonds (f. iv) and bookseller’s typewritten description of the manuscript (f. iii), with booksellers’ codes pencilled on verso of f. ii and on f. v. Owned, before 1882, by Evelyn Philip Shirley of Ettington Hall, co. Warwick (armorial bookplate pasted inside front cover, as f. i, with ‘N^r 135’ written in ink at foot), and before 1963, by William Alfred Westropp Foyle (red leather and gilt bookplate of Beeleigh Abbey pasted below preceeding): see the sale-cat. of his collection, part III, Christie, sale-cat., 12 July 2000, lot 328.