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Harley MS 273
- Record Id:
- 040-001945628
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-001945628
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000195.0x00016c
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 273
- Title:
-
Compilation of religious and secular texts
- Scope & Content:
-
A composite miscellany of religious and secular texts written in England (mostly in Anglo-Norman) and assembled for devotional and instructive purposes. It is made of six parts:
First unit (ff. 1r-69v) includes a French Psalter with a calendar, followed by other liturgical prayers, and Hours of the Virgin and of the Dead;
Second unit (ff. 70r-85v) includes Richard de Fournival, Bestiaire d'amour (ff. 70r-81r), Robert Grosseteste, Rules (ff. 81r-85r), and the Rules of Friendship (ff. 85r-85v);
Third unit (ff. 86r-112v) includes Pseudo-Turpin, Chronicle (ff. 86r-102v), and a Guide to nightly and daily meditations with diagrams (ff. 110v-112v);
Fourth unit (ff. 113r-198r) includes William of Waddington, Manuel des péchés (ff. 113r-190v) and Purgatoire de S. Patrice (ff. 191v-197v);
Fifth unit (ff. 199-203r) includes Nicholas Bozon, La Pleinte d'Amour;
Sixth unit (ff. 203-215v) includes prayers, poems and recipes for making colours and dying textiles (ff. 204r-212v).
The volume also includes charms (ff. 85v, 112v, ff. 213r-213v) relating to wounds, bloodletting, fever, cancer, gout, childbirth and toothache, some of which were added by the compiler of the collection.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
Harley Science Project - Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-001945628", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 273: Compilation of religious and secular texts" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-001945629", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 1r-69v: Psalter, Hours of the Virgin and Hours of the Dead" },{ "id" : "041-001945630", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v: Richard de Fournival, Bestiaire d'amour, Robert Grosseteste, Rules, and other text including charms." },{ "id" : "042-001945631", "parent" : "041-001945630", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v, ff 70r-81r: Richard de Fournival, Bestiaire d'amour" },{ "id" : "042-001945633", "parent" : "041-001945630", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v, ff 81r-85r: Robert Grosseteste, Rules" },{ "id" : "042-001945634", "parent" : "041-001945630", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v, ff 85-85v: Rules of Friendship (La Diffinission de Amurs)" },{ "id" : "042-001945635", "parent" : "041-001945630", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v, f 85v: Charms against wounds and for bloodletting" },{ "id" : "041-001945636", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v: Pseudo-Turpin, Chronicle; Guide to nightly and daily meditations" },{ "id" : "042-001945637", "parent" : "041-001945636", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v, ff 86r-102v: Pseudo-Turpin, Chronicle" },{ "id" : "042-001945641", "parent" : "041-001945636", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v, ff 103r-110r: Sermon on penance from the Church Fathers, followed by added prayers" },{ "id" : "042-001945642", "parent" : "041-001945636", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v, ff 110v-112v: Guide to nightly and daily meditations" },{ "id" : "042-001945643", "parent" : "041-001945636", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v, f 112v: Charms for bloodletting, against wounds and fever" },{ "id" : "041-001945644", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 113r-198r: William of Waddington, Manuel des péchés and Purgatoire de S. Patrice" },{ "id" : "042-001945645", "parent" : "041-001945644", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 113r-198r, ff 113r-190v: William of Waddington, Manuel des péchés" },{ "id" : "042-001945647", "parent" : "041-001945644", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 113r-198r, ff 191v-198v: Purgatoire de S. Patrice" },{ "id" : "041-001945648", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 199r-203r: Nicholas Bozon, La Pleinte d'Amour" },{ "id" : "041-001945649", "parent" : "040-001945628", "text" : "Harley MS 273, ff 204r-215v: Prayers, poems and recipes for making colours and dying textiles" }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-001945628 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 273 : Compilation of religious and secular texts - Contains:
- Harley MS 273, ff 1r-69v : Psalter, Hours of the Virgin and Hours of the Dead
Harley MS 273, ff 70r-85v : Richard de Fournival, Bestiaire d'amour, Robert Grosseteste, Rules, and other text including charms.
Harley MS 273, ff 86r-112v : Pseudo-Turpin, Chronicle; Guide to nightly and daily meditations
Harley MS 273, ff 113r-198r : William of Waddington, Manuel des péchés and Purgatoire de S. Patrice
Harley MS 273, ff 199r-203r : Nicholas Bozon, La Pleinte d'Amour
Harley MS 273, ff 204r-215v : Prayers, poems and recipes for making colours and dying textiles
Click here to View / search full list of parts of Harley MS 273 - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0272]/040-001945628
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Harley_MS_273 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Anglo-Norman
English, Middle
French, Old
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1300
- End Date:
- 1349
- Date Range:
- 1300-1349
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 223 x 142 mm (text space: ff. 1r-69v: 170-172 x 99-104 mm; ff. 70r-85v: 172 x 100 mm; ff. 86r-112v: 175 x 100 mm; ff. 113r-198r: 170 x 112 mm; ff. 199r-203r: 175 x 123 mm; ff. 203r-215v: 178 x 100 mm).
Foliation: ff. iii + 1* +217. Modern foliation in pencil ff. 'i, 1-217' (including two back flyleaves originally blank as ff. 216-217; ff. 198r-198v blank but for a 2-line prayer; f. 203v blank; f. 1* is a parchment flyleaf).
Collation: single leaf, i6, single leaf, ii-iv12 (with horizontal catchwords), v14, vi12 (with horizontal catchword), vii-viii8, ix-x10 (with horizontal catchwords), xi8-1 (eighth cancelled), xii-xvii12 (with horizontal catchwords), xviii8 (with horizontal catchword), xix6, xx6-1 (sixth cancelled), xxi12, two single leaves.
Layout: ff. 1r-69v (gatherings i-vi): pricked and ruled in ink (red for the calendar; single vertical bounding lines) for single (calendar, ff. 1r-6v) and double columns of 33 (calendar) or 36 lines, text written below top line; ff. 70r-85v (gatherings vii-viii): pricked and ruled in metal point (single vertical bounding lines) for double columns of 37 lines, text written below top line; ff. 86r-112v (gatherings ix-ix): pricked and ruled in ink and/or metal point (single vertical bounding lines) for double columns of 36 lines, text written below top line; ff. 113r-198r (gatherings xii-xix): pricked and ruled in ink and/or metal point (vertical bounding lines, double at the left and single at the right) for double columns of 38 lines, text written below top line; ff. 199r-203r (gathering xx) pricked and ruled in metal point (single vertical bounding lines) for triple columns of 40 lines, text written below top line; ff. 203-215v (gathering xxi): pricked and ruled in metal point and ink (vertical bounding lines double at the left and single at the right) for single columns of 44 lines, text written below top line.
Script: ff. 1r-69v: Gothic; text on ff. 68r-69v added by two different hands; ff. 70r-85v: Gothic, written by two hands; ff. 86r-112v: Gothic; ff. 113r-198r: Gothic cursive (Anglicana); ff. 199r-203r: Gothic; ff. 203r-215v: Gothic.
Binding: British Museum binding.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England. Assembled by a cleric or scribe from Ludlow, southern Shropshire: the dedication date of the parish Church of St. Laurence at Ludlow written in red ink at 13 February, 'Dedicacion de la eglise seint Laurence de Lodelawe' ('lodelowe') (f. 1v).
Added table of contents, early 14th century (f. 217v).
Added texts of two indulgences by Popes Innocent Urbanus IV and John XXII (f. 7r), a correction to Grosseteste's Rules (f. 82r), a few charms (ff. 85v, 112v, 213r-213v), a marginal table (f. 116v), the last portion of the Manuel des péchés (ff. 181v-191v) with the addition of a table of sins (ff. 190v-191r), and most of the Purgatoire de S. Patrice (ff. 191v-197v) added by the Ludlow scribe between 1314-1329. The same scribe was also responsible for the copy of large portions of Harley MS 2253 (ff. 49r-141v) and Royal MS 12 C. xii (see Revard 2000).
Provenance:
Added title 'The salter in French', 15th century (f. 1*v).
Added notes by 14th- and 15th-century hands (ff. 7v, 198r, 216r (with notary sign), 216v).
John Clerk, warden of the London Company of Grocers in 1467 and 1475 and appointed grocer and apothecary to Edward IV, inscribed 'Iste liber constat John Clerk grocero apocethario regis Edwarde quarti post conquestum' (f. 1*r).
Sir Simonds D'Ewes, (b.1602, d. 1650), 1st baronet, diarist, antiquary, and friend of Sir Robert Cotton: his MS. 172: see Additional MS 22918, f. 16r; his note by the table of contents 'Contenta in isto Volumine omnia inedita' (f. 217v).
Sir Simonds D’Ewes (d. 1722), 3rd baronet and grandson of the former: inherited and later sold the D’Ewes library to Robert Harley on 4 October 1705 for £450 (see Watson 1966).
The Harley Collection, formed by Robert Harley (b. 1661, d. 1724), 1st earl of Oxford and Mortimer, politician, and Edward Harley (b. 1689, d. 1741), 2nd earl of Oxford and Mortimer, book collector and patron of the arts,
Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta, née Cavendish Holles (b. 1694, d. 1755) during her lifetime and thereafter to their daughter, Margaret Cavendish Bentinck (b. 1715, d.1785), duchess of Portland; the manuscripts were sold by the Countess and the Duchess in 1753 to the nation for £10,000 (a fraction of their contemporary value) under the Act of Parliament that also established the British Museum; the Harley manuscripts form one of the foundation collections of the British Library.
- Publications:
-
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), I, no. 273.
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. 8.
H. L. D. Ward and J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), I, 587-89; II (1893), 471-74; III, J. A. Herbert, pp. 272-84.
J. Vising, Le Purgatoire de S. Patrice des manuscrits Harley 273 et fonds français 2198 (Göteborg, 1916).
C. H. Talbot, ‘A List of Cistercian Manuscripts in Great Britain’, Traditio: Studies in Ancient and Medieval History, Thought and Religion, 8 (1952), 402-18 (p. 410).
Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by N. R. Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 221.
Andrew G. Watson, The Library of Sir Simonds D'Ewes (London: British Museum, 1966), no. A249 and B172.
François Avril, La technique de l’enluminure d’apres les texts medievaux: Essai de bibliographie, Reunion du Comite de l’Icom pour les laboratories de musees et du sous-comite de l’Icom pour le traitement de peintures, Bruxelles 1967 (Paris: Bibliotheque nationale Cabinet des manuscrits, n. d.), p. 19 [with additional bibliography].
C. A. Robson, 'Vernacular Scriptures in France', in The Cambridge History of the Bible, 3 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963-1970), 2: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation, ed. by G. W. H. Lampe (1969), pp. 436-52 (pp. 440, 530).
Carter Revard, 'Richard Hurd and MS Harley 2253', Notes and Queries, 224 (1970), 199-202 (p. 200, n. 2).
C. E. Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 105, 131, 229.
R. N. Walpole, The Old French Johannes Translation of the 'Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle'. A Critical Edition (Berkeley, 1976), p. 2.
Carter Revard, ‘Three more holographs in the hand of the scribe of MS Harley 2253 in Shrewsbury’, Notes and Queries (1981), 199-200 (p. 200).
Pierre Rézeau, Répertoire d'incipit des prières françaises à la fin du Moyen Âge: addenda et corrigenda aux répertoires de Sonet et Sinclair; Nouveaux incipit, Publications romanes et françaises, 174 (Geneva: Droz, 1986), p. 465.
C. Paul Christianson, ‘Evidence for the Study of London’s Late Medieval Manuscript-Book Trade’, in Book Production and Publishing in Britain 1375-1475, ed by Jeremy Griffiths and Derek Pearsall (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 87-108 (p. 104 n. 12).
T. Hunt, Popular Medicine in Thirteenth-Century England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 88-89.
Adelaide Bennett, 'A Book Designed for a Noblewoman, in Medieval Book Production: Assessing the Evidence, ed. by Linda l. Brownrigg, Proceedings of the Second Conference of The Seminar in the History of the Book to 1500, Oxford, July 1988 (Los Altos Hills, California: Anderson-Lovelace, 1990), pp 1163-181 (p. 179 n. 2, 180 n. 21).
S. H. A. Shepherd, 'The Middle English Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle', Medium Aevum, 65 (1996), p. 32 n. 26.
Ruth J. Dean and Maureen B. M. Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature: A Guide to Texts and Manuscripts, Anglo-Norman Text Society, Occasional Publications Series, 3 (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 1999), p. 241.
Carter Revard, ‘ “Annote and Johon”, MS Harley 2253, and The Book of Secrets’, English Language Notes, March 1999, 5-19 (p. 12, n. 273).
Carter Revard, 'Scribe and Provenance', in Studies in the Harley Manuscript: The Scribes, Contents, and Social Contexts of British Library MS Harley 2253, ed. by Susanna Fein (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2000), chapter 1 (pp. 22, 26, 32, 58, 65, 67-71, 82-86).
Carter Revard, ‘Oppositional Thematics and Metanarrative in MS Harley 2253, Quires 1-6’, Essays in Manuscript Geography: Vernacular Manuscripts of the English West Midlands from the Conquest to the Sixteenth Century, ed. by Wendy Scase (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 95-112 (p. 95, n. 1, p. 102).
Rodney M. Thomson and others, 'Technology of production of the manuscript book', in The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain (Cambridge: University Press, 1999- ), II: 1100-1400, ed. by Nigel Morgan and Rodney M. Thomson (2008), pp. 75-109 (p. 273).
The Medieval Bestiary: Animals in the Middle Ages, ed. by David Badke, http://bestiary.ca/manuscripts/manulocshelf.htm [accessed 14 August 2009].
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)