Hard-coded id of currently selected item: . JSON version of its record is available from Blacklight on e.g. ??
Metadata associated with selected item should appear here...
Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII
- Record Id:
- 040-001102977
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-001101582
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000001273.0x00022f
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100064369323.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII
- Title:
-
Chronicle of Chichester Cathedral; List of bishops; Osbert of Clare, Epistolae; anonymous poems about the Passion and the Virgin Mary; Latin proverbs
- Scope & Content:
-
This composite manuscript contains two parts that were produced at separate locations in England and at separate moments during the 12th century. The first part (ff. 1r-17v) contains the Annals of Chichester and was produced at the Cathedral church of Holy Trinity, Chichester. The second part (ff. 17r-166v), is the only extant witness to the letters of Osbert of Clare (d. after 1139), Prior of the Benedictine abbey of Westminster. The letters show his commitment to re-establishing the English feast of the Conception that had been removed from the liturgical Calendar after the Norman Conquest. The two parts were most likely joined together in the library of Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631).
Contents:
ff. 1r-16r: A chronicle of Chichester from the birth of St John the Baptist to 1164.
f. 16v: A list of bishops present at a great council.
ff. 17v-164v: Osbert of Clare (d. after 1139), Epistolae (Letters)
The manuscript contains a number of additions:
f. 17r: Excerpts of Latin poems and proverbs.
ff. 23v-24r (lower margin): an anonymous poem on the Passion, begining ‘Mens, affectus, ratio, sensus convenite’.
f. 26r (lower margin): an anonymous poem entitled ‘Iohannis lucicij contra legistas et decretistas indiscretos’.
ff. 164v-165v: The second part (‘secunda pars’) of the poem on the Passion on ff. 23v-24r (lower margin); with moral and satirical notes in the margins.
ff. 165v-166v: Three anonymous poems on the Virgin Mary, the first incomplete at the beginning; the first complete stanza begins: ‘Mater caput agita manibus levatis’.
f. 166v: An anonymous poem on the three men revived by Christ, here entitled De Tribus Mortuis (On the Three Dead Men), beginning ‘Intro, foris, sub humo, recubat, vehitur, veterascit’.
f. 166v: Maximianus (fl. 6th century), Elegiae (Elegies), excerpts [written vertically].
f. 166v: An anonymous saying about the three types of unhappiness, beginning: ‘Tres infelices in mundo novimus esse’.
f. 166v: Aesop, Fabulae (Fables), 26: De Agno et Lupo (On the Lamb and the Wolf), excerpt: ‘Nil melius sano monitu, nil peius iniquo. Consilium sequitur certa ruina malum’.
[ff. i recto, i verso, ii verso are empty].
Decoration:
See the separate descriptions of parts 1 and 2.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Cotton Collection
England and France 700-1200 Project - Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-001101582
040-001102977 - Is part of:
- Cotton MS : Cotton Manuscripts
Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII : Chronicle of Chichester Cathedral; List of bishops; Osbert of Clare, Epistolae; anonymous poems about the Passion and… - Contains:
- Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII, ff 1-16 : Chronicle of Chichester Cathedral, AD 1-1178; List of bishops
Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII, ff 17-166 : Osbert of Clare, Epistolae; anonymous poems about the Passion and the Virgin Mary; Latin proverbs
Click here to View / search full list of parts of Cotton MS Vitellius A XVII - Hierarchy:
- 032-001101582[0807]/040-001102977
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Cotton MS
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
A parchment codex
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100064369323.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1125
- End Date:
- 1149
- Date Range:
- 2nd quarter or 3rd quarter of the 12th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
Please request the physical items you need using the online collection item request form.
Digitised items can be viewed online by clicking the thumbnail image or digitised content link.
Readers who have registered or renewed their pass since 21 March 2024 can request physical items prior to visiting the Library by completing
this request form.
Please enter the Reference (shelfmark) above on the request form.If your Reader Pass was issued before this date, you will need to visit the Library in London or Yorkshire to renew it before you can request items online. All manuscripts and archives must be consulted at the Library in London.
This catalogue record may describe a collection of items which cannot all be requested together. Please use the hierarchy viewer to navigate to individual items. Some items may be in use or restricted for other reasons. If you would like to check the availability, contact our Reference Services team, quoting the Reference (shelfmark) above.
- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Condition: leaves damaged by fire in 1731.
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 210 x 145 mm (text space: 180 x 125 mm [ff. 1r-16v]; 165 x 85 mm [ff. 17v-164v]).
Foliation: ff. ii + 166 ( + 4 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning + 5 at the end); f. [iv] is a paper leaf with bibliographical notes on a paper stub; ff. i-ii are parchment endleaves; the quires have been mounted on paper guards; early modern foliation throughout the manuscript (modern foliation starts at f. 57).
Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house. Rebound in 1975; brown half leather binding with Cotton's bookplate gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers; the spine inscribed in gold at the British Museum: 'ANNALES WINTONIENSIS'; gilt fore-edge.
- Custodial History:
-
Provenance:
Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631), 1st baronet, antiquary and politician: his bookplates gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers; his shelfmark on f. i recto; the table of contents on f. ii recto was added by the so-called ‘stylized hand’: an unknown scribe who added tables of contents in Cotton’s most important manuscripts; Cotton’s name inscribed on f. 17r (‘Robertus Cotton’); the manuscript is listed in his catalogues (see Colin G.C. Tite, The Early Records (2003), p. 160).
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:
-
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: A Collaborative Edition, 9 vols [23 vols planned] (Cambridge: Brewer, 1983-ongoing), VIII (2000): MS F: A Semi-Diplomatic Edition with Introduction and Indices, ed. by Peter S. Baker, pp. xxxiii n. 16, xxxiv, xxxvii, xlvi, xlvii, xlviii, liii, liv, cvi (as ‘WC [Vitellius]’).
Briggs, Brian, The Life and Works of Osbert of Clare (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of St Andrews, 2004), pp. 2-3, 194-96.
A Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Cottonian Library Deposited in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1802), p. 381.
Eadmeri monachi Cantuariensis: Tractatus de conceptione Sanctae Mariae, ed. by Herbert Thurston and Thomas Slater (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1904), pp. 88-92 [edition of ff. 99v-101v].
Ihnat, Kati, 'Early Evidence for the Cult of Anne in Twelfth-Century England', Traditio, 69 (2014), pp. 1-44 (p. 11).
Jayne, Sears and Francis R. Johnson, The Lumley Library: The Catalogue of 1609 (London: The British Museum, 1956), p. 100 (no. 689).
Kennedy, Edward Donald, ‘Annales Cicestrenses (Annals of Chichester)’, in Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, ed. by Graeme Dunphy, 2 vols (Leiden: Brepols, 2010), I: A-I, p. 60.
Kwakkel, Erik, 'Biting, Kissing and the Treatment of Feet: The Transitional Script of the Long Twelfth Century', in Turning Over a New Leaf: Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Book Culture, ed. by Erik Kwakkel, Rosamond McKitterick and Rodney Thomson (Leiden: Leiden University Press, 2012), pp. 79-126 (p. 102 (no. 204)).
The Letters of Osbert of Clare, Prior of Westminster, ed. by Edward William Williamson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1929), pp. 33-36.
Liebermann, Felix, Ungedruckte Anglo-Normannische Geschichtsquellen (Strasbourg: Trübner, 1879), pp. 86-96 [edition of the Annals of Chichester].
Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by Neil Ripley Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 51.
Tite, Colin G. C., The Early Records of Sir Robert Cotton’s Library: Formation, Cataloguing, Use (London: The British Library, 2003), p. 160.
Watson, Andrew G., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c.700-1600 in the Department of Manuscripts, The British Library (London: The British Library, 1979), I: The Text, p. 110 (no. 574); II: The Plates, pl. 83.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Notes:
- This manuscript is part of The Polonsky Foundation England and France Project: Manuscripts from the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France, 700-1200.