Add MS 49622

Text from The British Library Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts 1956-1965, I: Descriptions (London: British Library, 2000), pp. 134-40:

Psalter in Latin, written and illuminated for the church at Gorleston, co. Norf. (formerly co. Suff.); early 14th cent., with later additions circa 1320-1325. For black and white photographs of ff. 1-225b, see MS. Facs. 559 (1).

See also, in addition to the works listed by Sandler, L. M. C. Randall, 'The Snail in Gothic Marginal Warfare', Speculum, xxxvii, 1962, p. 358; D. H. Turner, Illuminated Manuscripts Exhibited in the Grenville Library, London, 1967, no. 23, pl. 7; A. Martindale, Gothic Art, London, 1967, pp. 141-2, pl. 142; G. Evelyn Hutchinson, 'Aposemetic Insects and the Master of the Brussels Initial', American Scientist, lxi, 1974, p. 170 n. 3; L. F. Sandler, The Peterborough Psalter in Brussels and Other Fenland Manuscripts, 1974, pp. 12-13, 88, 96, 98-9, 130-1, 134-5, 161, figs. 298, 342-343; L. F. Sandler, 'An Early Fourteenth Century English Psalter in the Escorial', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, xlii, 1979, pp. 65 n. 4, 75-8.

The MS. passed circa 1320-1325 from Gorleston church to Norwich Cathedral Priory where it probably stayed until the Reformation. An ownership inscription of Sir Thomas Cornwallis, M.P., Treasurer of Calais and Comptroller of the Household, b. 1519, d. 1604, is on f. 1. An armorial bookplate of the Cornwallis family is on the front pastedown. The MS. remained in the possession of the Cornwallis family until the death of Charles, 2nd Marquis Cornwallis, without male issue, 9 Aug. 1823, when it was presented by his five daughters to the Hon. Richard Neville, 3rd Baron Braybrooke (1825), who had married Jane, eldest daughter of 2nd Marquis Cornwallis. An inscription recording the presentation of the MS., signed by Jane and her four sisters Louisa, Jemima, Mary and Elizabeth, is on the first flyleaf, and reads: 'This Missal originally the property of Sir Thomas Cornwalleys from whom it descended to the Daughters and Coheiresses of Charles 2nd Marquis Cornwallis was by them presented to the Honble Richard Neville as a token of their regard & affection 1823'. Sold by Henry Neville, 7th Baron Braybrooke, in 1904 to C. W. Dyson Perrins. Dyson Perrins bookplate and label with Dyson Perrins number '13' on front pastedown. Label with old Dyson Perrins number '92' on rear pastedown. Label with old 19th cent.(?) pressmark, 'TI', on front flyleaf. Bequeathed, with Or. MS. 12208, by Charles William Dyson Perrins. See also Additional MS. 49999-50005 and Egerton MS. 3763.

Vellum; ff. 228. 374 x 235mm.; text-space 240 x 140mm. 16 lines in single column, except in the added litany, which is in double columns. Gatherings of

8 except i6 + added leaf, v (wants 1), xxix6. Catchwords except on the first gathering.

The original text is in a single gothic book hand. M. R. James considered that the Gorleston Psalter and Douai Psalter were written by the same scribe (see New Pal. Soc., 1st ser., ii, pl. 14). Although the hands of these two MSS. are indeed very similar, they are not identical (e.g. the feet of the letters in the Douai Psalter are formed in a slightly different way to those in the Gorleston Psalter and the writing in the Douai Psalter is more compressed. In the Gorleston Psalter, letters at the beginning of words, such as 'p' and 'o' or 'd' and 'e' are frequently run together, which does not occur in the Douai Psalter). It should be noted, however, that the scribe of the Douai Psalter apparently wrote the Stowe Breviary. The catchwords of the Gorleston Psalter are in a small cursive documentary script. The catchwords of the Douai Psalter and Stowe Breviary are also in a cursive documentary script, but a different hand to that in the Gorleston Psalter. The added material in the Gorleston Psalter is in two different text hands. The first occurs in the prayer before the psalter (f. 7b) and is identical with the text hand in the Stowe Breviary and the Douai Psalter. The second is in the added litany (ff. 226b-228) and is smaller and much more irregular and unsteady than the other text hands in the MS.

The arms of England and France are shown in association on the Beatus page, so the present MS. cannot have been executed before the marriage of Edward I to Margaret of France in 1299. A recurring feature in the decoration is an elderly bearded layman, who is shown alone (e.g. ff. 10, 145, 70) or with a monk (e.g. ff. 67, 73, 119b). This man is possibly the patron from whom the MS. was produced. On f. 70b, immediately beside an initial containing this figure, is a shield bearing the arms of Roger Bigod, 5th Earl of Norfolk and Marshal of England, d. 1306, and on this basis Cockerell, op. cit., p. 8, proposed that the elderly layman in the decoration was Bigod. If this identification is correct, then the monk shown in association with the layman may be Thomas Bigod, who became Prior of Thetford in 1304. The connection between Bigod and Gorleston church is unclear. Cockerell concluded that the psalter was executed towards the end of Bigod's life, giving a date of circ. 1306. He declared, however, that, if it was not for the occurrence of these arms, the style of the decoration would suggest a later date. N. J. Morgan (Medieval Art in East Anglia 1300-1520, catalogue of exhibition at the Castle Museum, Norwich, 1973, nos. 20 and 26) has emphasised the stylistic problems posed by an early date for the Gorleston Psalter.

Morgan stresses the similarities between the Gorleston Psalter, the Stowe Breviary, Douai Psalter, Castle Acre Psalter, Yale University Library, MS. 417, and Escorial Psalter, Escorial MS. Q II 6.

The Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter may be firmly dated circ. 1322-1325 because they include annals which have as their latest entry the execution of Thomas of Lancaster in 1322 and do not refer to the death of John Salmon, Bishop of Norwich, in 1325, although they record Norwich events. In Morgan's view, a discrepancy of date between these MSS. and the Gorleston Psalter could only be explained by an extreme conservatism of style in East Anglian illumination, which is unlikely. Sandler, Gothic Manuscripts 1285-1385, p. 57, has reassessed the heraldic evidence for the date of the manuscript and proposes a date of circa 1310-circa 1320 for it. She points out that Roger Bigod's arms were also borne by Thetford Priory, and that the context of the second appearance of these arms on f. 68v, is more appropriately interpreted as a reference to Thetford Priory rather than Roger Bigod. Other arms in the MS. (e.g. the arms of Gilbert Peche, d. 1322, f. 86, and Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, d. 1324, f. 107v) would support a terminus ante quem of 1322.

There are some indications that the Gorleston Psalter predates both the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter. The appearance of the hand of the scribe of the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter in the material added to the Gorleston Psalter and the close relationship between the added Crucifixion in the Gorleston Psalter and the Crucifixion in the Douai Psalter both suggest that the original decoration in the Gorlestion Psalter is somewhat earlier than the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter. Moreover, Thomas of Hereford (canonised 1320) is included in the calendars of the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter, but not that of the Gorleston Psalter. These considerations suggest that, assuming that Sandler's interpretation of the heraldic evidence is accepted, the Gorleston Psalter should be placed in the earlier years of the date range proposed by her. In view of the close links in handwriting and decoration between the added material in the Gorleston Psalter, the Stowe Breviary and the Douai Psalter, the added material in the Gorleston Psalter may confidently be dated circa 1322-1325.

This dating is supported by the resemblance between the added decoration in the Gorleston Psalter and the decoration inserted in the Ormesby Psalter on its presentation to Norwich Cathedral Priory by Robert Ormesby, circa 1325 (see Cockerell and James, op. cit., pp. 1-37). The precise location and other products of the atelier responsible for the Gorleston Psalter are not known. It is probable that the Gorleston Psalter was an earlier product of the atelier which produced the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter, as well as the Escorial Psalter (cf. Sandler, 'An Early Fourteenth Century English Psalter in the Escorial', op. cit., passim). This would explain some of the superficial resemblances between these MSS., e.g. similarity in figure design, use of a cursive documentary script for catchwords. It would also account for the involvement of the atelier responsible for the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter in the insertion of new material into the Gorleston Psalter - in order to have these additions made to the Gorleston Psalter it was simply returned to the workshop which orginially produced it. This workshop may perhaps have been at Gorleston; apart from the present MS., the Douai Psalter has a connection with Gorleston, being presented to an Abbot named John by Thomas, Vicar of Gorleston. Brown russia leather binding, with blind tooling over leather boards, dated by Cockerell, op. cit., p. 10, between 1794 and 1823. On the spine is the (incorrect) title 'Missal', gold-stamped in gothic lettering.

Contents (for a more detailed analysis, see Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 10-17):–

1. ff. 1-6b. Calendar. Printed in Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 12-14, which gives a collation with calendars in the Stowe Breviary, Stowe MS. 12 (described by Sandler, Gothic Manuscripts 1285-1385, no. 79) and the Douai Psalter, Douai, Bibliothèque Municipale, MS. 171 (described by Sandler, op. cit., no. 105. This manuscript was severely damaged by damp whilst buried for safekeeping during the First World War. For photographs of the surviving fragments, see MS. Facs. 899). The calendar in the Gorleston Psalter agrees closely with those in the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter, but amongst the differences it should be noted that only the Gorleston Psalter includes the Dedication of Gorleston Church, March 8, which receives the highest grading. The calendars in the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter both contain Thomas of Hereford (canonised 1320), October 2, who does not appear in the calendar of Gorleston Psalter.

2. f. 7b. The prayer before the Psalter, 'Suscipere dignare domine deus omnipotens hos psalmos quos ego indignus peccator'. Printed in J. Wickham Legg, Missale ad usum ecclesie Westmonasteriensis, iii, Henry Bradshaw Society, xii, 1897, col. 1397. Added after the MS. passed to Norwich Cathedral Priory, circa 1320-1325.

3. ff. 8-190b. Psalter, with a ten-fold division marked by large historiated initials.

4. ff. 190b-206. Canticles. For a comparison of this set with those in other English psalters of the period, see Sandler, The Peterborough Psalter,

p. 161.

5. ff. 206-208b. Athanasian Creed.

6. ff. 208b-214. Litany. Differs considerably from those in the Stowe Breviary and Douai Psalter (see Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 15-16).

7. ff. 214-214b. Collects.

8. ff. 215-223. Office of the Dead.

9. ff. 223b-225b. Prayers, beg. as follows:- (a) 'Deus in cuius direccione';-

(b) 'Salvator mundi salvum me fac';- (c) 'Veniam peto coram te'.

10. ff. 225b-226. Hymn, beg. 'Deus homo fili dei / Fons et forma nostre spei'. Printed in full in Cockerell, op. cit., p. 16; it does not appear in either Analecta Hymnica or U. Chevalier, Repertorium Hymnologium.

11. ff. 226b-228. Litany, added after the MS. passed to Norwich Cathedral Priory, circa 1320-1325. The Norwich provenance of this litany is apparent from the double invocations of Benedict and William of Norwich. It is identical with a litany added to the Ormesby Psalter, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 366, after that MS. was presented to Norwich Cathedral Priory, circa 1325, except that the litany in the Gorleston Psalter places Anne second among the virgins with a double invocation, whereas she does not appear in the Ormesby Psalter, and also contains two extra collects ('Hostium nostrorum' and 'Deus qui misericordia'): see further S. C. Cockerell and M. R. James, Two East Anglian Psalters, Roxburghe Club, Oxford, 1926, p. 12; D. D. Egbert, The Tickhill Psalter and Related Manuscripts, New York, 1940, p. 211.

Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 23-6, distinguished the work of nine artists in the original decoration of the MS. These were divided into decorators, responsible for the decoration of the borders, half-borders, psalm initials, verse initials and line-endings; and figure draughtsmen, who drew all the figures apart from some minor grotesques and non-descripts, undertaking the historiation of initials and adding the marginal drawings, as well as inserting the heads and figures in the decorated borders. Sandler, Gothic Manuscripts 1285-1385, p. 57, suggests that some of the decorators and figure draughtsmen were not separate people, and that the total number of artists who worked on the manuscript was five. The decoration, which is described and analysed in detail by Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 17-48, may be divided into the following categories:–

1. 13 large historiated initials, viz:- (a) the Beatus page and initials of between 5 and 7 lines marking the standard ten-fold division of the psalter. Their subjects are:- (i) Ps. 1 (Beatus page). The Tree of Jesse. f. 1;- (ii) Ps. 26. The Anointing of David. f. 35;- (iii) Ps. 38. Christ standing at an altar. f. 52b;- (iv) Ps. 51. Doeg and the priests. f. 68b;- (v) Ps. 52. A King holding a drawn sword. f. 69;- (vi) Ps. 68. Above, Jonah thrown overboard; below, Jonah saved. f. 86;- (vii) Ps. 80. Above, Christ in glory; below, musicians. f. 107b;- (viii) Ps. 97. Above, the Annunciation to the Shepherds; below, clerks singing. f. 126;- (ix) Ps. 101. A female figure, symbolising the church. f. 128b;- (x) Ps. 109. The Trinity. f. 146b.

For a comparison between the subjects of these initials and corresponding initials in other English psalters of the first half of the 14th cent., see the table in Sandler, The Peterborough Psalter, pp. 98-9;- (b) 5 line initial for Ps. 119, the first of the gradual psalms, showing, above, Christ enthroned and, below, five robed figures, including a Franciscan, kneeling in prayer. f. 167;- (c) 5 line initial for the first canticle 'Confitebor', showing a prophet holding a scroll saying 'Zacarias'. This inscription is incorrect; it should read 'Isaiah' since the canticle is from the Book of Isaiah. f. 190b;- (d) 5 line initial for the Office of the Dead, showing the funeral of a bishop. f. 215. The borders of the pages bearing these initials are fully decorated. One of the most common decorative motifs used on these pages is heraldic devices; for full heraldic descriptions and attempted identifications, see Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 19-21.

2. 188 small decorated psalm initials, mostly historiated. These initials mark the opening of psalms, collects, prayers, etc. They are all of 2 lines, except for the I's, which extend into the margin, and the initials of Pss. 149 and 150, which are historiated but of only 1 line, presumably because Pss. 148-150 were sung together at Lauds without any break. The subjects of the 145 historiated initials are described in Cockerell, op. cit., pp. 33-48. The pages bearing these initials are decorated with elaborate half-borders.

3. Verse initials. These are of burnished gold on a blue and pink ground, which is decorated with white lines, often in a lace-work pattern. Where there are no longer initials on the page, the verse initials are connected by a thin bar of the same colours as the backgrounds to the initials; otherwise, the initials stand on their own, without any stem connecting them or linking them to the decorated borders.

4. Line endings, consisting of decorated rectangular panels. The decoration was divided by Cockerell (op. cit., pp. 26-7) into the following categories:- (a) Heraldic, e.g. ff. 35, 38, 163;- (b) Human heads, etc., most commonly heads of mailed knights, e.g. ff. 72, 121b, 122;- (c) Animals, most commonly a rabbit warren, e.g. ff. 19, 49, 210;- (d) A looped curtain, e.g.

ff. 18, 94, 195b;- (e) Sprays of oak leaves, often alternating with leopards' heads, e.g. ff. 50, 123b, 143b;- (f) An architectural pattern containing half-quatrefoils, e.g. ff. 134b, 156, 199;- (g) Geometrical patterns, most commonly a pink or blue fret on a burnished gold ground, e.g. ff. 79, 82, 101.