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Add MS 44986
- Record Id:
- 032-002017594
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002017594
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000037.0x0003d1
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100163532805.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 44986
- Title:
-
Collection of swan marks
- Scope & Content:
-
Collection of swan marks from Norfolk, Huntingdonshire, Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire in the late 16th century. Also containing a poem on a swan-herd. With the 1612 signatures of Thomas Harwood, Vice-Deputy and Master of Swans, and Thomas Glapthorne, a swan owner of Whittlesey. With alphabetical thumb index.
Contents:
ff. i-ii, v: original limp vellum covers. With pasted ownership label of William Cooper, d. 1856, Rector of West Rasen, Lincolnshire, and circular label of the Royal Archaeological Institute (see Provenance).
f. iii: Note concerning the bequeathal of the manuscript to the British Museum. Signed by Louis George Herbert Cooper, Rector of West Rasen, Lincolnshire. Dated 23 March 1936.
f. iv: Transcription of the memorial below (f. 42v).
ff. 1r-2r: Inscription of ‘Thomas Greye’, dated 1585. Possibly ‘Tho Gray’, the swan owner of f. 7r and f. 34r. Pen-trials and markings.
ff. 3r-30v: Illustrations of 600 swan marks, labelled by owner. With occasional descriptive notes and spaces for further additions.
ff. 3r-30v: 106 lines of verse in the voice of a swan-herd, written in the upper margins of each page. Beginning ‘Her I begine to mynde the thinge’, and ending ‘Ther shall we fynde it playne’.
ff. 31r-42r: Alphabetical thumb index of swan owners. In two columns, with space for further additions.
f. 42v: Memorial concerning a swan sighted on 16 July 1612. With signatures of Thomas Harwood, Vice-Deputy and Master of Swans, and Thomas Glapthorne, a swan owner of Whittlesey. For Glapthorne’s swan mark see ff. 34v, 26r.
f. 43v: Pen trials and markings, including the name ‘Thomas’ a short prayer, and a sketch of a bird, possibly a swan.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-002017594", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 44986: Collection of swan marks" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002017594
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-002017594
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100163532805.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1585
- End Date:
- 1612
- Date Range:
- 1585-1612
- Era:
- CE
- Place of Origin:
- England.
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 213 x 141 mm.
Foliation: ff. vi + 43.
Binding: Post-1600. British Museum 1964. Bound with original limp vellum covers.
Script: Secretary, italic.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England.
Provenance:
Thomas Grey: former owner, his signature, 1585 (f. 1r).
William Cooper, d. 1856, Rector of West Rasen, Lincolnshire: former owner, his ownership label (f. ii). Descended, according to family tradition, from the Cromwell family of Ramsey Abbey, Huntingdonshire, to whom the MS is supposed to have belonged (see Add MS 44987, ff. 24v, 27r).
William Waldo Cooper, d. 1907, Rector of West Rasen, Lincolnshire: former owner.
Louis George Herbert Cooper, Rector of West Rasen, Lincolnshire: former owner between 1907 and 1937, bequeathed to the British Museum.
Possibly exhibited at the Royal Archaeological Institute: see circular label of the Institute, numbered ‘28’, affixed to the back cover (f. iv). See Add MS 44987, papers of the Cooper family for a similar label and notes on the manuscript (f. 66r).
- Information About Copies:
-
Add MS 6302: contains a copy of the poem.
Add MS 44987, ff. 10v-12r: papers of the Cooper family, including a copy of the poem, transcribed by Albert Way in 1851.
Add MS 44987, ff. 45-63: papers of the Cooper family, including offprints of several publications on the MS (listed in the Publication Note).
Other collections of swan marks: Harley MS 3405, Egerton MSS 2412, 2413, and Add MSS 4977, 6301, 6302, 23732, 40072.
- Publications:
-
Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1946-1950: Part 1 Descriptions (London: British Library, 1979), pp. 64-65.
Bromehead, John May, ‘Memoir on the regulations anciently prescribed in regard to swans, on the rives of Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, and other parts of the realm; and on an original book of swan-marks’, in Memoirs Illustrative of the History and Antiquities of the County and City of Lincoln, communicated at the annual meeting of the Archaeological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, held at Lincoln, July 1848 (London: Bradbury and Evans, 1850), pp. 295-309. Offprint in Add MS 44987.
‘Proceedings at the Meetings of the Archaeological Institute’, Archaeological Journal, 7 (1850), p. 401.
Ticehurst, N.F., ‘The Early History of the Mute Swan in England’, British Birds, vol. 17, no. 8 (1924), pp. 174-82. Offprint in Add MS 44987.
Ticehurst, N.F., ‘On Swan Marks’, British Birds, vol. 19, nos. 11-12 (1926), pp. 262-73, 294-308. Offprint in Add MS 44987.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)