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Add MS 10302
- Record Id:
- 032-002108097
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002108097
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000042.0x000216
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165140827.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 10302
- Title:
-
Thomas Norton, Ordinal of Alchemy
- Scope & Content:
-
Contents:
Thomas Norton (c. 1433-1513/14) of Bristol, Ordinal of Alchemy, ''Of Alkimy the Ordinal, the Crede Mihi, the Standard Perpetuall'', chapters 1-5 (lines 1-2682, with lines 2503-2622 lacking). This is the earliest surviving manuscript of the text, composed in 1477, perhaps a copy of the original manuscript, presented to Edward IV (see Hughes, ''Politics and Occult'' (2000), p. 111).
Decoration:
5 full-page miniatures in colours with foliate borders in colours and gold (ff. 1r, 6v, 32v, 37v, 67v). Decorated initials with partial foliate borders in colours with gold at the beginning of chapters. A drawing of a figure kneeling on a cushion in the lower margin, beneath a scroll with a Latin prayer in gold (f. 19v); a manicula in colours pointing to a line written in gold (f. 31v). Line-fillers in combinations of green, red, blue or purple.
The subjects of the miniatures are:
f. 1r: Seven furnaces with stills, tended by two men, beneath a roof with a cupola and chimneys;
f. 6v: A kneeling pupil, perhaps representing the author, Norton, receiving a book from his master, with angels, written scrolls and a dove above;
f. 32v: Two men with pestle and mortars, a man holding a gold urn next to a fire, and a man stirring a pot; above are four heads labelled Gerberus, Arnuldus, Rasis and Hermes with their speech on scrolls;
f. 37v: Two men tending furnaces and a robed scholar, perhaps, Norton, with alembics, a pelican or vessel for repeated re-distillations of the same liquid and a scientific balance, enclosed by glass to prevent drafts disturbing the balance (the earliest known depiction of this instrument);
f. 67v: A horoscope with astrological figures suitable for the different stages of the preparation of the Philosopher''s Stone, with two figures that have been identified as Thomas Norton and Edward IV in the middle of the 12 houses of the Zodiac.
The style of clothing in the miniatures dates the manuscript to 1480-1490 (Reidy, Ordinal of alchemy (1975), p. xiii).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-002108097", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 10302: Thomas Norton, Ordinal of Alchemy" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002108097
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-002108097
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
-
A paper codex
- Digitised Content:
- http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100165140827.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1475
- End Date:
- 1499
- Date Range:
- 4th quarter of the 15th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Paper.
Dimensions: 145 x 110mm (text space 195 x 70mm).
Layout: Written in one column of 20 lines (Latin preface (f. 1v) written in 2 columns of 20 lines).
Foliation: ff. 67 (+2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and 1 at the end).
Collation: i9 (ff. 1-9), ii-viii8 (ff. 10-65), ix2 (ff. 66-67). Quire viii (ff. 58-65) has been mis-bound, and should follow quire v.
Script: Gothic.
Binding: The original binding in brown leather, extensively repaired, with blind tooling, including a large cross on the upper and lower covers and traces of a clasp.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: England.
Provenance:
(?) Elias Ashmole (b. 1617, d. 1692) antiquary, perhaps the manuscript lent to him ''by a gentleman'', from which he copied his engravings for his printed work, Theatricum Chemicum Britannicum (1652), see Reidy, Ordinal of alchemy (1975), p. xiv.
Richard Heber (b. 1773, d. 1833), landowner and book collector, in his sale, 20 February 1836, lot 1191; bought by the British Museum.
- Information About Copies:
-
Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digitised Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts.
- Publications:
-
List of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1836-1840 (London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1843), p. 28.
Thomas Norton''s Ordinal of alchemy, ed. by John Reidy, Early English Text Society, 272 (London: Oxford University Press, 1975).
John E. Murdoch, Album of Science: Antiquity and the Middle Ages (New York: Charles Scribner''s Sons, 1984), nos. 161, 182.
William R. Newman, ''Alchemy, Assaying and Experiment, in Instruments and experimentation in the history of chemistry, ed. by Frederic L. Holmes and Trevor H. Levere (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2000), pp. 35-54 (pp. 40-42).
William R. Newman and Anthony Grafton, ''Introduction: the Problematic Status of Alchemy and Astrology in Premodern Europe'', in Secrets of nature: astrology and alchemy in early modern Europe, ed. by William R. Newman and Anthony Grafton (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2001), pp. 1-38 (pp. 19, 36).
Alchemy Tried in the Fire: Starkey, Boyle, and the Fate of Helmontian Chymistry, by William R. Newman, Lawrence M. Principe (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), pp. 47-48.
Sophie Page, Astrology in Medieval Manuscripts (London: The British Library, 2002), pp. 4, 58.
Jonathan Hughes, ''Politics and Occult at the court of Edward IV'', in Princes and princely culture, 1450-1650, ed. by Martin Gosman, Alasdair Macdonald and Arjo Vanderjagt, 2 vols (Leiden: Brill, 2005), II, pp. 97-128 (p. 111).
Tributes to Kathleen L. Scott: English medieval manuscripts: readers, makers and illuminators ed. by Marlene Villalobos Hennessy (London: Harvey Miller, 2009), pp. 83, 89. - Exhibitions:
- Discovering literature: Shakespeare and Renaissance, (online), 30 April 2016-
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)