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Cotton MS Vespasian B XXV
- Record Id:
- 040-001103264
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-001101582
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000001273.0x0002bb
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100062969167.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Cotton MS Vespasian B XXV
- Title:
-
Solinus, Collectanea Rerum Mirabilium; Priscian, De Situ Orbis; Pseudo-Dares, De Excidio Troiae Historia; Pseudo-Jerome, De Mobilitate Mentis Humanae; Prophetia Sybillae; Pseudo-Ausonius, Sententiae Septem Sapientum; (?) Segardus junior of St Omer, De Miseria Hominis; Roger of Caen, De Contemptu Mundi (excerpt); Hildebert of Lavardin, De Mysterio Missae (excerpts); De Tribus Mortibus; Pseudo-Nennius, Historia Brittonum; Pseudo-Bede, De Quindecim Signis ante Diem Iudicii; De Septem Miraculis Mundi; Latin verses (The Song of the Sybil).
- Scope & Content:
-
This 12th-century manuscript of historical, theological and prophetic texts was owned and possibly produced at the Benedictine cathedral priory of Holy Trinity or Christ Church, Canterbury (Ker, Medieval Libraries (1964), p. 36). The exemplar of this manuscript was a manuscript, extant in two parts as Royal MS 15 A XXII and Cotton MS Vespasian D XII, ff. 1-17, that was written at Rochester Cathedral Priory in the first quarter of the 12th century. The manuscript contains near-contemporary additions on ff. 117r [Pseudo-Jerome], 123r [Pseudo-Ausonius], 126r [Hildebert of Lavardin], 144r [Pseudo-Bede], and later 12th-century additions on ff. 144v-145r.
Contents:
f. 1*v: A table of contents.
ff. 1r-77v: Solinus (fl. 3th century), Collectanea Rerum Mirabilium (A Collection of Miraculous Things).
ff. 77v-98r: Priscian (fl. 500-530), De Situ Orbis (On the Description of the World); based on Dionysius’s Periegesis [Schaller 10028; Walther 11608].
ff. 98v-117r: Pseudo-Dares, De Excidio Troiae Historia (On the History of the Destruction of Troy).
f. 117r: Pseudo-Jerome [here attributed], De Mobilitate Mentis Humanae (On the Inconstancy of the Human Mind) [Schaller 10177; Walther 11749].
ff. 117v-123v: Anonymous, Prophetia Sybillae (The Prophecy of the Sybil) [Schaller 8495; Walther 9907].
f. 123r: Pseudo-Ausonius, Sententiae Septem Sapientum (Sayings of the Seven Sages) [Walther 15065].
ff. 123v-126r: ? Segardus Junior of St Omer (fl. early 12th century), De Miseria Hominis (Walther 4192); with additional verse from De Contemptu Mundi (On the Contempt of the World) by Roger of Caen (d. 1095).
f. 126r: Hildebert of Lavardin (b. 1056, d. 1133), verses from the De Mysterio Missae (On the Mystery of the Mass) [Walther 5831; Walther 19401].
f. 126r: Anonymous, De Tribus Mortibus (On the Three Deaths) [Walther 9516].
ff. 126v-143v: Pseudo-Nennius, Historia Brittonum (The History of the Britons) [‘Harleian recension’].
f. 144r: Pseudo-Bede [here attributed], De Quindecim Signis ante Diem Iudicii (On The Fifteen Signs before the Day of Judgement).
The manuscript contains a number of later additions:
ff. 144v-145r: Anonymous, De Septem Miraculis Mundi (On the Seven Wonders of the World), added in a hand from the middle of the 12th century.
f. 145v: Neumes in brown ink.
f. 146r: Latin verses, added in 12th-century hands (beginning ‘procul a nobis discordia causa doloris’), including: ‘Cum de latrina lapsum Salomona ruina / Extraherent laqueis non trahar inquit eis / Sabbata sunt plaudit populus plausum comes audit / Plaudit et ipse iubet cras ut ibi recubet]; The Song of the Sybil: ‘Judicii signum tellus sudore madescit / E celo rex adveniet per secla futurus / Scilicet in carne presens ut judicet orbem / unde deum cernent incredulus atque fidelis’.
f. 1*v: Additions to the 12th-century table of contents, made by Richard James (b. 1592, d. 1638), librarian for Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631).
[ff. 1r is empty].
Decoration:
2 large initials in purple, with arabesque penwork decoration in green, purple, red and yellow (ff. 1r, 117v); 3 medium initials in purple or green with arabesque motifs in the same colour and red (ff. 78r, 99r, 126v). Medium initials in green, purple, red or yellow, sometimes featuring arabesque motifs in the same colour. Small (one-line) capitals highlighted in red. Display script (Rustic Capitals) in green, purple and red. Rubrics in red. Line-fillers in red.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Cotton Collection
England and France 700-1200 Project - Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-001101582
040-001103264 - Is part of:
- Cotton MS : Cotton Manuscripts
Cotton MS Vespasian B XXV : Solinus, Collectanea Rerum Mirabilium; Priscian, De Situ Orbis; Pseudo-Dares, De Excidio Troiae Historia; Pseudo-Jerome,… - Hierarchy:
- 032-001101582[0947]/040-001103264
- 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_100062969167.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1100
- End Date:
- 1124
- Date Range:
- 1st quarter of the 12th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Condition: Intact.
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 270 x 200 mm (text space: 195 x 130 mm).
Foliation: ff. 1* + 146 ( + 4 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning + 2 at the end); f. 1* is an original parchment end-leaf; a paper pastedown (with bibliographical notes) on f. [ii] recto; ff. 145-146 have been mounted on paper stubs; 17th-century foliation throughout the manuscript only.
Script: Protogothic.
Binding: Post-1600. Brown half leather binding; Cotton’s bookplate gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers, the spine inscribed in gold at the British Museum: ‘SOLINUS. DE MIRABILIBUS MUNDI, ETC.’; re-bound on 30 May 1962.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: ? Canterbury, Southeastern England.
Provenance:
The Benedictine cathedral priory of Holy Trinity or Christ Church, owned in the early sixteenth century: perhaps the abbey’s pressmarks on f. 1*r (‘Va Ga xiiii[?]’) and f. 51r (‘Liber 79’). Their ownership is confirmed by a note on f 1*v regarding the purchased of the manuscript by John Holyngborne (see below).
John Holyngborne, Benedictine monk of Christ Church, Canterbury, owned the manuscript 1503: acquired the manuscript in that year from Christ Church according to an ownership inscription (his name written on an erasure) on f. 1*v: ‘Liber dompni Johannis Holyngburne monachi ecclesie christi Cantuariensis emptus a quodam fratre Anno domini 1503 pretio xxd’.
? John Twyne (b. c. 1505, d. 1581), schoolmaster and antiquary: possibly his annotations on ff. 130-131 (see Watson, ‘Twyne’ (1986), pp. 138 [no. 1], 147 [no. 8]).
Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631), 1st baronet, antiquary and politician: his bookplates gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers; his press-mark on f. 1*r; additions to the 12th-century table of contents, made by Cotton’s librarian Richard James (b. 1592, d. 1638) on f. 1*v; his (?) inventory number (‘143’) on f. 1r; the manuscript is listed in his catalogues; his foliation throughout the manuscript; (see Tite, The Early Records (2003), p. 179).
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:
-
Carley, James P., 'The Royal Library as a Source for Sir Robert Cotton's Collection: A Preliminary List of Acquisitions', in Sir Robert Cotton as Collector: Essays on an Early Stuart Courtier and His Legacy, ed. by Christopher J. Wright (London: The British Library, 1997), pp. 193-93 (pp. 60, 72 n. 70).
Coote, Lesley Ann, Prophecy and Public Affairs in Later Medieval England (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2000), p. 261.
Dumville, David N., ‘The Liber Floridus of Lambert of Saint-Omer and the Historia Brittonum', Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies, 26, (1974), 103-22.
Dumville, David N., The Textual History of the Welsh-Latin Historia Brittonum, 2 vols (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Edinburgh, 1975), pp. 134-36.
Dumville, David N., Histories and Pseudo-histories of the Insular Middle Ages, Variorum Collected Studies Series, 316 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1990), Part XII (passim).
Dumville, David, N., ‘St Patrick in the Historia Brittonum: Three Texts’, in Saint Patrick, A.D. 493-1993, ed. by David N. Dumville, Studies in Celtic History, 13 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1993), pp. 221-32 (pp. 222-5).
Gameson, Richard, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England (c. 1066-1130) (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 104 (no. 415).
Holdenried, Anke, The Sibyl and Her Scribes: Manuscripts and Interpretation of the Latin Sibylla Tiburtina c. 1050-1500 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), pp. 26, 82 n. 35, 98, 99, 99 n. 20, 100, 101, 102, 103, 107, 159 n. 53, 162 n. 65, 174, 203, 205 table B.1
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. 36.
Paniagua, David, 'An Inventory of the Manuscripts of Julius Solinus', Scriptorium, 73 (2019), 101-25 (p. 108).
Tite, Colin G. C., The Early Records of Sir Robert Cotton’s Library: Formation, Cataloguing, Use (London: The British Library, 2003), p. 179.
Watson, Andrew G., 'John Twyne of Canterbury (d. 1581) as a Collector of Medieval Manuscripts: a Preliminary Investigation', The Library, 6th series, 8 (1986), 133-51 (pp. 138 [no. 1], 147 [no. 8]).
Webber, Teresa, 'Script and Manuscript Production at Christ Church, Canterbury, after the Norman Conquest', in Canterbury and the Norman Conquest: Churches, Saints and Scholars, 1066-1109, ed. by Richard Eales and Richard Sharpe (London: Hambledon, 1995), pp. 145-58 (p. 157).
Schaller, Dieter, and Ewald Könsgen, Initia carminum Latinorum saeculo undecimo antiquiorum: Bibliographisches Repertorium für die lateinische Dichtung der Antike und des früheren Mittelalters (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1977).
Waller, Katharine Mary, The Library, Scriptorium and Community of Rochester Cathedral Priory c. 1080-1150 (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Liverpool, 1980), pp. 170-71.
Walther, Hans, Initia carminum ac versuum Medii Aevi posterioris Latinorum: Alphabetisches Verzeichnis der Versanfänge mittellateinischer Dichtungen, Carmina Medii Aevi posterioris Latina, 1, 2nd edn (Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1969).
Ward, Harry Leigh Douglas and John Alexander Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), I (1893), pp. 12–13, 192.
- 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.