Add MS 6036

THE BLACK BOOK OF WINCHESTER: record book of the City of Winchester, temp. Henry IV - 1551. Partly Latin and French. Origin: England. The material chiefly consists of records of decisions at Common Council, together with copies of other documents concerning the customs and privileges of the City, the earliest being dated 1265. The contents are generally in chronological order, but copies of documents earlier than the main text are included where relevant, and later material is frequently inserted in spaces. Printed under the title The Black Book of Winchester, ed.

W. H. B. Bird (1925). Marginals, contemporary and 16th cent. A reference in a 17th cent. hand to the '2nd book of Ordinances fol. 93' occurs, f. 53v. Owned after 1797 by the Rev. John Price, Bodley's Librarian (d.1813), whose autograph appears on f. 1: Price gives his address as Trinity College, where he migrated in 1797. Purchased, 1814.

Vellum; ff. 86. ff. 4-85 bear mid-16th-cent. foliation 1-81 (36 and 77 lacking) on all folios except insets: old folio 36 may be accounted for by an error in numbering, old folio 77 is missing between ff. 81 and 82. A memorandum

(f. 85v, foot) notes that there were 81 leaves numbered in the book on 15 Oct. 1546. It is possible that the section from f. 66 was added after 1534: see memoranda on ff. 65v and 85v (top). 290 x 215mm. Gatherings: i-ii10, iii8, iv6, v10 (lacks 7, 9, 10), vi6, vii4, viii6, ix4, x8 (lacks 8), xi8, irregular from f. 81. Fly-leaves and end-papers: ff. 1, 2, 85, 86. Insets, ff. 3, 12, 26, 35. Numerous hands, chiefly documentary cursive and secretary. ff. 76 and 78 are cut at the foot and turned up to fit the present binding. The paste-downs, ff. 1 and 86, had apparently been detached from the original binding before the volume was acquired by Price.