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Add MS 29250
- Record Id:
- 032-002020707
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002020707
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000034.0x00008b
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100193729051.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 29250
- Title:
-
Geoffrey Chaucer, 'Treatise on the Astrolabe', with incunables printed by Peter Liechenstein and Johann Trechsel
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains a copy of the 'Treatise on the Astrolabe', written by the poet Geoffrey Chaucer (b. c. 1340s, d. 1400).
The treatise has been bound together with some late 15th-century incunables: Ephemerides sive Almanack perpetuus by the Castilian astronomer and historian Abraham Zacuto (b. 1452, d. c. 1515) and printed by Peter Liechenstein (fl. 1490-1528) at Venice in 1498; and Jean Ganivet's Amicus medicorum et alia opuscula, printed by Johann Techsel at Lyons in 1496, this copy also featuring a printed Latin translation of a work by Abraham ben Meir Ibn Ezra (b. 1089/92, d. 1164/67).
Contents:
ff. 3r-26r: Geoffrey Chaucer, 'Treatise on the Astrolabe', written in Middle English, beginning, 'Litel Lowes my sone...'
ff. 27r-148v: Abraham Zacuto, Ephemerides sive Almanack perpetuus, printed by Peter Liechenstein at Venice, October 1498.
ff. 149r-194v: Jean Ganivet, Amicus medicorum et alia opuscula, together with Abraham ben Meir Ibn Ezra's Abbreviatio libri ejus de luminaribus et diebus criticis, printed by Johann Trechsel at Lyons, 14 October 1496.
The manuscript features a number of later additions:
f. 2v: An added note in a 17th-century hand, possibly Sir Christopher Heydon's: 'Certainly This manuscript was reported to be Chaucers ye Poets and because of ye antiquity I doubt not/ but it was a manuscript/ of his owne also/ It was related to me/ by Robert Hartwell.
f. 26v: An added cryptogram, possibly spelling the name 'C Heyton', i.e. Sir Christopher Heydon (b. 1561, d. 1623), and the words 'povder deuke' (which also appears in Harley MS 2421, f. 155r).
ff. 1v-2r are blank.
Decoration:
Plain initials in red. Spaces for initial left blank.
Paraph marks, underlining and line-fillers in red.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-002020707", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 29250: Geoffrey Chaucer, 'Treatise on the Astrolabe', with incunables printed by Peter Liechenstein and Johann Trechsel" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002020707
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-002020707
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100193729051.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English, Middle
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1450
- End Date:
- 1499
- Date Range:
- 2nd half of the 15th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Material: Paper.
Dimensions: 185 x 140 mm (written space: 150 x 110 mm).
Foliation: ff. i + 195 (+ 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 6 unfoliated paper leaves after f. 1 + 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end); f. i is a paper label affixed to a paper flyleaf.
Collation: Mounted on modern paper guards.
Catchwords.
Script: Gothic cursive (ff. 3r-26v).
Binding: British Library in-house. Brown half-leather binding. Rebound 1981.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England (ff. 1-26); Venice, Italy (ff. 27-148); Lyons, France (ff. 149-194).
Provenance:
Sir Christopher Heydon (b. 1561, d. 1623), English soldier, MP and astrologer: possibly his inscribed note, 'Certainely/ This manuscript was reported to/ be Chaucers ye Poets and because/ of ye antiquity I doubt not/ but it was a manuscript/ of his owne also/ It was related to me/ by Robert Hartwell' (f. 2v); an added cryptogram possibly spelling his name, 'C Heydon' (f. 26v).
Henry John Peachey (b. 1787, d. 1838), 3rd Baron Selsey: his book-plate, 'Westdean Library' (f. i recto); inscribed, 'Westdean Library' (f. 1r); his sale, Sotheby's 20-29 June, 1872, lot 492; purchased by the British Museum through Messrs Boone, booksellers for £3. 5s.
- Publications:
-
The British Museum Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts, 1854-1875 (London: British Museum, 1877), p. 607.
Ramona Bressie, 'MS Sloane 3548, Folio 158', Modern Language Notes, 54 (1939), 246-56 (p. 247 n. 5).
Chaucer's Treatise on the Astolabe. MS. 4862-4869 of the Royal Library in Brussels, ed. by P. Pintelon (Antwerp: De Sinkkell, 1940), pp. 34-35.
Michael C. Seymour, A Catalogue of Chaucer Manuscripts (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1995), I, Works before the Canterbury Tales, pp. 107-08.
Kari Anne Rand Schmidt, The Authorship of the Equatorie of the Planetis (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1993), pp. 58-59.
A Treatise on the Astrolabe, ed. by Sigmund Eisner (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002), pp. xx, 41-43, 46-47, 49, 53-54, 60, 90, 94, 96, 105, 132, 160, 171, 178, 180, 183, 189, 192, 195, 225, 253, 266-68, 272, 293, 300, 305, 309-10, 334-35.
Lisa H. Cooper, 'Figures for “Gretter Knowing”: Forms in the Treatise on the Astrolabe', in Chaucer and the Subversion of Form, ed. by Thomas A. Prendergast and Jessica Rosenfeld (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), pp. 99-124 (p. 117).
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)