Add MS 45539

ORIGINAL COMMISSION, in Latin, from Andrea Gritti, Doge of Venice, to Giovanni Contarini as Captain of Cyprus; 30 July 1538. Subscribed (f. 24) by Hieronimo Muriano, Sec. to the Signory. Followed by instructions on the rendering of accounts (ff. 24b-25), in Italian, from the 'Provedadori sopra la Chamera di Imprestedi' (cf. Add. MS. 17347, ff. 101b-102) and a statement of Contarini's salary (f. 30). The commission is described and summarised by Sir G. F. Hill, A History of Cyprus, iii, 1948, pp. 864-874. Two paragraphs on ff. 8b, 9, are printed inaccurately by J. M. J. L. de Mas Latrie, Histoire de L'Ile de Chypre, iii, 1855, p. 471, n. 1. Vellum; ff. vi + 30. 233 mm. x 165 mm. A.D. 1538. Gatherings of 10 leaves. Illuminated border, with arms of the Contarini family and the Lion of Venice, f. 1. The later pagination (443-500) and de Mas Latrie's note (see above) show that the MS. originally formed part of the series of Ducal Commissions which belonged in the 19th cent. to Rawdon Brown of Venice and was bequeathed by him to the Public Record Office in 1883 (see The Forty- Sixth Annual Report of the Deputy Keeper of the Public Records, 1886, pp. 337, 368-370 (nos. 102-104)). The present commission was detached and presented to the Earl of Beaconsfield in 1878, presumably by Rawdon Brown, on the occasion of the Government's decision to defend Cyprus and the appointment of Sir Garnet Wolseley as Captain-General (see the inscribed binding and printed dedication, f. ii). Sotheby's sale, 23 Feb. 1937 (Hughenden Manor sale), lot 424. The MS. was subsequently acquired by Sir George Francis Hill (bookplate, f. i), whose note on it (ff. iii-ivb), together with a letter from Seymour de Ricci, 1938, relating to its history (f. v), is inserted at the front. Presented by Sir George Francis Hill, K.C.B.