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Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII

Record Id:

040-001103166

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-001101582

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000001273.0x000292

LARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100174220165.0x000001

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII

Title:

Refoundation charter of the New Minster, Winchester

Scope & Content:

f. 2v: Frontispiece depicting King Edgar of England offering his charter to Christ.

ff. 3v–33v: Charter of King Edgar refounding the New Minster, Winchester; dated 966 (Sawyer, no. 745).

ff. 34r–37r: Charter of King Edgar for the New Minster, 966 (Sawyer, no. 746).

ff. 37v–38v: Charter of King Henry I of England (1100–1135) for Hyde Abbey.

ff. 39r–43r: Charter of King Edgar for the New Minster, 966 (Sawyer, no. 746).

Composite volume, ff. 2–33 dating c. 966; ff. 34–43 dating to the last quarter of the 12th century or 1st quarter of the 13th century.

The main text of the document is 22 short chapters, addressing the creation and fall of the angels, the creation of man, the Fall, and of the coming of Christ. It notes that Edgar strives to be worthy of Christ and do God's bidding. It explains why Edgar expelled secular clerics and installed monks throughout his kingdom, and describes the interdependence of the abbey and the king, noting the efficacy of the abbot and his monks in protecting the king from demons by their prayers, and that the king in turn defends the abbey from worldly threats.

Decoration:

Full-page illustration in colours (f. 2v). Opening of the charter framed in colours, a blue wash applied to the background of the first page (f. 3v), and a large chi-rho in gold and green on the second (f. 4r). Two-line initials opening each section, and enlarged initials opening each sentence. Written in gold leaf.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Anglo-Saxon Charters
Cotton Collection

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-001101582
040-001103166

Is part of:

Cotton MS : Cotton Manuscripts

Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII : Refoundation charter of the New Minster, Winchester

Hierarchy:

032-001101582[0906]/040-001103166

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Cotton MS

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

Parchment codex

Digitised Content:

http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100174220165.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)

Thumbnail:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

0950

End Date:

1224

Date Range:

2nd half 10th century-1st quarter 13th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Dimensions: 235 × 170 mm.

Foliation: ff. 43 (ff. i–ii, 1 are early-modern paper endleaves).

Script: Anglo-Caroline minuscule. Written in gold ink throughout.

Binding: British Museum in-house, 1841.

Custodial History:

Origin: Benedictine abbey of New Minster, Winchester (later Hyde Abbey).

Provenance:

Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631), 1st baronet, antiquary and politician. 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, https://bl.uk/manuscripts/.

Publications:

J.J.G. Alexander, Norman Illumination at Mont St Michel 966-1100 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), p. 169n.

J.J.G. Alexander, 'The Benedictional of St Æthelwold and Anglo-Saxon Illumination of the Reform Period', in Tenth-Century Studies: Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and 'Regularis Concordia', ed. and with introduction by David Parsons (London: Phillimore, 1975), pp. 169-83 (pp. 179-80, 182 and frontispiece).

Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms: Art, Word, War, ed. by Claire Breay and Joanna Story (London: The British Library, 2018), no. 112 [exhibition catalogue].

Janet Backhouse, The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library (London: British Library, 1997), no. 8.

Walter De Gray Birch and Henry Jenner, Early Drawings and Illuminations: An Introduction to the Study of Illustrated Manuscripts (London: Bagster and Sons, 1879), p. 3.

Michelle Brown, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts (London: British Library, 1991), p. 17.

Cohen, Adam, ‘King Edgar Leaping and Dancing before the Lord’, in Imagining the Jew in Anglo-Saxon Literature and Culture, ed. by Samantha Zacher (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016), pp. 219–236.

Rosemary Cramp, 'Anglo-Saxon Sculpture of the Reform Period', in Tenth-Century Studies: Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and 'Regularis Concordia', ed. and with introduction by David Parsons (London: Phillimore, 1975), pp. 184-99 (p. 196).

G.R.C. Davis, Medieval Cartularies of Great Britain: A Short Catalogue (London: Longmans, 1958), no. 1049.

C.R. Dodwell, Anglo-Saxon Art: A New Perspective (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1982), pp. 34, 98, 107, 159, 179, 180, pl. E.

Joachim Ehlers, 'Sachsen und Angelsachsen im 10. Jahrhundert', in Otto der Grosse: Magdeburg und Europa, ed. by Matthias Puhle, 2 vols (Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 2001), I: Essays, pp. 489-502 (pp. 499-500, pl. 7).

Helmut Gneuss, Handlist of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A List of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100 (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2001), no. 382.

Mechthild Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 125n., 136n.

J.A. Herbert, Illuminated Manuscripts (London: Methuen, 1911), pp. 124-25.

Hartmut Hoffmann, Buchkunst und Königtum im ottonischen und frühsalischen Reich, 2 vols, Schriften der Monumenta Germaniae Historica, 30 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1986) I, pp. 23-24.

Illuminated Manuscripts Exhibited in the Grenville Library (London, British Museum, 1967), no. 1.

Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by N.R. Ker, 2nd edn (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 103.

The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester, ed. Simon Keynes, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 26 (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1996), pp. 26-28, col. pls I-IV.

Simon Keynes and others, The Electronic Sawyer http://esawyer.org.uk/manuscript/330.html [accessed 5 November 2016].

Charters of the New Minster, Winchester, ed. by Sean Miller, Anglo-Saxon Charters, 9 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. xxxviii, xlii, 95–116.

Lawrence Nees, Early Medieval Art (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 191-92, pl. 111.

Planta, Joseph, ed., A Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Cottonian Library Deposited in the British Museum (London: Hansard, 1802), p. 435.

D. Talbot Rice, English Art 871-1100, Oxford History of English Art, 2 (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1952), pp. 90, 184-85, pl. 46.

Margaret Rickert, Painting in Britain: the Middle Ages, 2nd edn (London: Penguin Books, 1965), pp. 27, 32, 36-37, 222 n. 40, pl. 25.

Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester: Documents relating to the topography of the Anglo-Saxon and Norman city and its minsters, ed. and trans. by Alexander R. Rumble, Winchester Studies, 4 (Oxford: Clarendon, 2002), pp. 10, 69–72 [includes edition and translation].

Mercedes Salvador, 'Architectural Metaphors and Christological Imagery in the Advent Lyrics: Benedictine Propaganda in the Exeter Book?', in Conversion and Colonization in Anglo-Saxon England, ed. by Catherine E. Karkov and Nicholas Howe, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 318, Essays in Ango-Saxon Studies, 2 (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medievl and Reanissance Studies, 2006), 169-212 (p. 198, fig 3.4).

P.H. Sawyer, Anglo-Saxon Charters: An Annotated List and Bibliography (London: Royal Historical Society, 1968), nos. 745, 746.

Schools of Illumination: Reproductions from Manuscripts in the British Museum, 6 vols (London: British Museum, 1914-1930), I: Hiberno-Saxon and Early English Schools A.D. 700-1100, pp. 9-10, pl. 8.

Margaret Scott, Medieval Dress & Fashion (London: British Library, 2007), pl. 7.

Elzbieta Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, 900-1066, Survey of Illuminated Manuscripts in the British Isles, 2 (London: Harvey Miller, c. 1976), no. 16.

E.C. Teviotdale, 'Latin Verse Inscriptions in Anglo-Saxon Art', Gesta, 35 (1996), 99-110 (pp. 102, figs. 4-5, 108 n. 13 and n. 22, 110).

[George F. Warner], Reproductions from Illuminated Manuscripts: Series One, Fifty Plates, 3rd edn [by J.A. Herbert] (London: British Museum, 1923), p. 7, pl. IV.

Andrew G. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 700-1600 in The Department of Manuscripts, The British Library, 2 vols (London: British Museum, 1979), no. 562.

D.W. Wilson, 'Tenth-Century Metalwork', in Tenth-Century Studies: Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and 'Regularis Concordia', ed. and with introduction by David Parsons (London: Phillimore, 1975), pp. 200-07 (p. 204).

Francis Wormald, 'Late Anglo-Saxon Art: Some Questions and Suggestions', in Studies in Western Art: Acts of the Twentieth International Congress of the History of Art, ed. by Millard Meiss, 4 vols (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), I, Romanesque and Gothic Art, 19-26 (p. 22).

Exhibitions:

Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms: Art, Word, War, British Library, London, 19 October 2018 - 19 February 2019

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)