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Cotton MS Caligula A IX

Record Id:

040-001102334

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-001101582

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000001246.0x0002a0

LARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100165157081.0x000001

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Cotton MS Caligula A IX

Title:

Layamon’s Brut, The Owl and the Nightingale, religious and historical texts in Middle-English and Anglo-Norman French

Scope & Content:

Contents:

ff. 3r-194v: Layamon’s Brut (Boffey, no. 295), the most complete surviving copy of this work, composed in alliterative verse by Layamon, a priest at Areley Kings in Worcestershire, at the beginning of the 13th century. A second copy, much abbreviated, is found in Cotton MS Otho C XIII;

ff. 195r-216r: Chardri, La Vie de Seint Josaphaz (Dean, no. 532);

ff. 216r-229v: Chardri, Les Set Dormanz (Dean, no. 534);

ff. 229v-232v: Le Livere des reis de Brittanie (Dean, no. 13);

ff. 233r–246r: The Owl and the Nightingale, a satirical debate in verse, originally composed in southern England, probably Surrey or Dorset. This is one of two surviving copies of the text. The other is Oxford, Jesus College 29 (Boffey, no. 1384);

ff. 246r–v: Death’s wither-clench (Boffey, no. 2070);

f. 246v: An orison to Our Lady (Boffey, no. 2687); Will and Wit (Boffey, no. 4016);

ff. 246v–247r: Doomsday (Boffey, no. 3967);

ff. 247r–248v: The Last day (Boffey, no. 3517);

f. 248v: The Ten abuses (Boffey, no. 4051);

ff. 248v–249r: A Lutel soth sermun (Boffey, no. 1091);

ff. 249r-261v: Chardri, Le Petit Plet (Dean, no. 265).

The texts in Middle English (West Midlands dialect) are numbered according to Julia Boffey and A. S. G. Edwards, A New Index of Middle English Verse (London: British Library, 2005).

The texts in Anglo-Norman French are numbered according to Ruth J. Dean, & Maureen B. M. Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature: A Guide to Texts and Manuscripts (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 1999).

Decoration:

One historiated puzzle initial of a monastic scribe, perhaps Layamon, writing, with pen-flourishing in red and blue, a decorated initial in blue with pen-flourishing in red, and marginal decoration, including hybrid creatures, in red and green (f. 3r). Important names in the margin in red, some partially trimmed; extensions to letters in the lower and upper margins in red and brown (ff. 112v-194v), highlighting, paraphs and line-fillers in red (ff. 3r-194v). Initials, rubrics and highlighting of initials at the beginning of lines in red (ff. 195r-261v).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Cotton Collection

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-001101582
040-001102334

Is part of:

Cotton MS : Cotton Manuscripts

Cotton MS Caligula A IX : Layamon’s Brut, The Owl and the Nightingale, religious and historical texts in Middle-English and Anglo-Norman French

Hierarchy:

032-001101582[0497]/040-001102334

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Cotton MS

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

Parchment codex

Digitised Content:

https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100165157081.0x000001

Thumbnail:

Languages:

Anglo-Norman
English, Middle

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1250

End Date:

1299

Date Range:

2nd half of the 13th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

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Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment.

Dimensions: 215 x 150 mm (text space: 170 x 115 mm).

Layout: Written in two columns.

Foliation: ff. 261 (ff. 1 and 2 are early modern endleaves + 3 unfoliated parchment flyleaves and 1 unfoliated paper flyleaf at the beginning and at the end).

Script: Gothic, written below the top line.

Binding: Post-1600; British Museum, rebound in 1903.

Custodial History:

Origin: England (south-west Midlands).

Provenance:

Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631), 1st baronet, antiquary and politician: 'Robert Cotton Bruceus' inscribed on f. 3r and in the Cottonian catalogues of the first half of the seventeenth century: Additional MS 35213, f. 40, Harley MS 6018, no. 17 and Additional MS 36789 (f. 138v); see Colin G. C. Tite, The Early Records of Sir Robert Cotton’s Library: Formation, Cataloguing, Use (London: The British Library, 2003), p. 114.

Cotton’s collection was augmented by his son, Sir Thomas Cotton (b. 1594, d. 1662), 2nd baronet, and his grandson, Sir John Cotton.

Sir John Cotton (b. 1621, d. 1702), 3rd baronet: bequeathed the entire Cotton collection of books and manuscripts to trustees ‘for Publick Use and Advantage’, 12 and 13 William III, c. 7. Formed one of the foundation collections of the British Museum in 1753.

Information About Copies:

Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digitised Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts.

Publications:

Barron, W.R.J and S.C. Weinberg, eds, Layamon's 'Arthur': the Arthurian section of Layamon's Brut (Lines 9229-14297) (Harlow: Longman, 1989), pp. x, xi;

Boffey, Julia, & A. S. G. Edwards, A New Index of Middle English Verse (London, 2005);

Brook, G. L., & R. F. Leslie, eds., Layamon: Brut, 2 vols, Early English Text Society, 250, 277 (London, 1963–78);

Bryan, Elizabeth J., ‘The two manuscripts of Layamon’s Brut: some readers in the margins’, in Françoise Le Saux (ed.), The Text and Tradition of Layamon’s Brut (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 89–102;

Cartlidge, Neil, ‘The composition and social context of Oxford, Jesus College, MS 29(II) and London, British Library, MS Cotton Caligula A.ix’, Medium Ævum, 66 (1997), 250–69;

Cartlidge, Neil, ‘Imagining X: a lost early vernacular miscellany’, in Stephen Kelly & John J. Thompson (eds.), Imagining the Book (Turnhout, 2005), pp. 31–44;

Cartlidge, Neil, ‘The linguistic evidence for the provenance of The Owl and the Nightingale’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, 99 (1998), 249–68;

Cartlidge, Neil, ‘Orthographical variation in the Middle English lyrics of BL Cotton Caligula A.IX’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, 253–59;

Dean, Ruth J., & Maureen B. M. Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature: A Guide to Texts and Manuscripts, Anglo-Norman Text Society, Occasional Publications Series, 3 (London, 1999), nos 13, 265, 532, 534;

Frankis, John, 'The Social Context of Vernacular Writing in Thirteenth-Century England: The Evidence of the Manuscripts', in P.R. Coss and S.D. Lloyd, eds, Thirteenth Century England: Proceedings of the Newcastle upon Tyne Conference, 1985 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1986), pp. 175-84 (p. 179-81);

Hilmo, Maidie, Medieval images, icons, and illustrated English literary texts: from the Ruthwell Cross to the Ellesmere Chaucer (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), pp. 1, 29, 97-99, 102-13, 197-98, figs 29-30; Ker, N. R., ed., The Owl and the Nightingale, Early English Text Society, 251 (London, 1963), [facsimile];

Merrilees, Brian S., ed., Le Petit Plet, Anglo-Norman Text Society, 20 (Oxford, 1970), pp. xi–xii, xxxi–xxxiii;

Merrilees, Brian S., ed., La Vie des Set Dormanz by Chardri, Anglo-Norman Text Society, 35 (London, 1977), pp. 8–9;

Roberts, Jane, ‘A preliminary note on British Library, Cotton MS Caligula A. ix’, in Françoise Le Saux (ed.), The Text and Tradition of Layamon’s Brut (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 1–14;

Salter, Elizabeth, English and International: Studies in the Literature, Art and Patronage of Medieval England (Cambridge: University Press, 1988), pp. 39-40, 48, 66, 68, 296, 299, 300;

Treharne, Elaine, ed., ' London, British Library, Cotton Caligula A. ix' in Old and Middle English c. 890-c.1450: An Anthology, 3rd edn (Oxford: Blackwell, 2010), pp. 456-505;

Ward, H. L. D., & J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London, 1883–1910), I, pp. 268–71; II, pp. 133–35;

Weinberg, Carole, ‘The Latin marginal glosses in the Caligula manuscript of Layamon’s Brut’, in Françoise Le Saux (ed.), The Text and Tradition of Layamon’s Brut (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 103–20.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)