Add MS 59495

JOHN GOWER. Vol. I. The Trentham Manuscript of poems by him; circa 1397-1400. Mostly Latin and French. Several of the pieces, which include love songs, moralising verses and some poems addressed to Henry IV, may be dated to the first year of the king's reign. All the texts were collated for G. C. Macaulay (ed.), The Complete Works of John Gower, 4 vols. (Oxford, 1899-1901). They comprise, in order of copying: (i) an English poem addressed to Henry IV, described in the colophon (f. 10v) as 'Carmen de pacis commendatione' and beg. 'O worthi noble kyng henry the ferthe', preceded by an introductory stanza in rhymed Latin verse, all composed circa 1399-1400. ff. 5-10v; (ii) a related poem in twenty-eight Latin elegiac couplets beg. 'Rex celi deus et dominus qui tempora solus', adapted from the original version of Gower's Vox Clamantis, Bk. VI, ch. 8. ff. 10v, 11. Texts of (i) and (ii) printed ed. cit., vol. III (1901), pp. 481-494; (iii) a series of fifty numbered love songs in French, entitled 'Cinkante balades', preceded by two dedicatory pieces, in French and in rhyming Latin verse, addressed to Henry IV. Imperfect, owing to mutilation of f. 12: lacking most of the second dedicatory poem and of the general title of the balades, along with the first stanza and a half of the opening one. Printed ed. cit., vol. I (1899), pp. 335-378. ff. 11v-33; (iv) a poem in Latin elegiacs beg. 'Ecce patet tensus ceci Cupidinis arcus'. Probably imperfect at the end owing to the loss of the leaf that originally followed. Printed ed. cit., vol. IV (1902), pp. 358, 359. f. 33v; (v) an untitled series of eighteen balades in French, forming 'un traitié selonc les auctours pour essempler les amantz marietz' composed in 1397, concluding with a related poem of seventeen Latin leonine hexameters beg. 'Quis sit vel qualis sacer ordo connubialis'. Imperfect, wanting all before l.2, st. 2, of the second balade. Printed ed. cit., vol. I (1899), pp. 379-392. ff. 34-39v; and (vi) a lament, in Latin elegiacs beg. 'Henrici quarti primus Regni fuit annus', on the author's blindness which it dates to circa 1399-1400. Printed ed. cit., vol. IV, pp. 365, 366. f. 39v. Owned, 12 Feb. 1651, according to his autograph chronograms, partly in Latin, at the foot of f. 39v, by the septuagenarian Charles Gedde of St. Andrews, whose triple chronogram in the right-hand margin of the first text page (f. 5) records its presentation 'Ipsis bis septenis Kalendis mensis Octobris' [i.e. 18 Sept.] 1656, to Thomas, 3rd Baron Fairfax. Fairfax's autograph statement of ownership, dated 25 June 1656, is interlined among the inscriptions at the foot of f. 39v, while his anagrams and verses, etc., on Gedde's name, in Latin, occupy f. 40: see also the signatures on ff. 1 and 5. Presented in the same year to his 'honorable frend & kinsman' Sir Thomas Gower, 2nd Bart., of Stittenham, as 'Sr John Gower's learned Poems the same book by himselfe presented to King [Edward del.] Henry ye fourth [att or del.] before his Coronation' (f. 1). Descended through the Barons and Earls Gower and Marquesses of Stafford to the 5th Duke of Sutherland, of Trentham Hall, co. Staff., whose heir in the Earldom of Sutherland offered it for sale at Christie's in July 1975. Pasted inside the front cover is an 18th-cent. armorial bookplate (f. i) of 'Gower Earl Gower', bearing old pressmarks in pencil 'N2.' and '3.', both deleted, and 'DC'. '3-4' in ink on first blank flyleaf (f. iii). For further descriptions of the manuscript see ed. cit., vol. I, pp. lxxix-lxxxiii, and Christie's sale-cat., 2 July 1975, lot 242 and pl. 8.

Vellum and paper: ff. vii+41. 232 x 155mm. Original manuscript formerly comprised forty-two vellum leaves, collating i4, ii1, iii6, iv-v8, vi8 (lacks 8), vii1, viii4, ix2, all unsigned. Leaves trimmed in re-binding, with consequent loss of text in marginal notes: final text-leaf (f. 39) larger than rest, owing to preservation of 17th-cent. inscriptions at foot. Twelfth leaf (ff. 12, 12v) mutilated by large excision at the centre. Text, copied in brown ink on pages (ff. 5-39v) ruled in ink with compartments comprising thirty-five lines, without signatures or catchwords. Mostly transcribed in a single pointed English, or bastard, hand, with Latin poems on ff. 33v and 39v copied in a different script and darker ink, and a few erasures and corrections added in the French and English pieces apparently in a third hand. Headings of poems, etc., in red: main initial letters in gold and secondary ones in blue on a pen-work background with marginal extensions. First four (ff. 1-4) and last two (ff. 40, 41) leaves originally blank. Name 'Rychemond' in 16th-cent. hand at top of f. 2v, with note in Fairfax's hand, 'Liber. Hen: Septimi tunc Comitis Richmond manu propria script', falsely identifying it as the signature of Henry VII when Earl of Richmond. 'Will Sanders un just (?)' jotted in a 16th-cent. legal hand in top right-hand corner of final blank leaf (f. 41) that also carries the crude outline of an armorial shield bearing a chevron (possibly part of coat of Sander of Charlwood, co. Surr.) and a large figure '29'. 18th-cent. binding of red morocco with, on covers, compartment formed of gilt treble rules, perhaps contemporary with that of Add. 59496 below. Five raised bands on spine interspersed with gilt ornaments. Two labels of green leather carry the legend 'GOWERS POEMS' and the crest of Earl Gower. Doublures gilt-tooled and endpapers decorated with large comb. Encased in modern dark red leather slip-case lettered on spine 'THE LEARNED POEMS OF JOHN GOWER M S CIRCA, 1400'.

Bookplates and Book-stamps: Granville Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl Gower; 1st Marquess of Stafford 1786: Armorial bookplates of `Gower Earl Gower': circa 1754-1786: Printed.

Bindings ENGLISH: Bagguley & Co; bookbinders; of Newcastle-under-Lyme: Binding by Bagguley & Co. of Newcastle-under-Lyme: 1818.

Henry IV of England: Poems of John Gower addressed to: circa 1399-1400: Partly Latin and French: Copies.

includes:

• f. 2v Henry VII of England: Spurious signature of, as `Rychemond': circa 1456-1485.
• f. 41 William Sanders: Name jotted in MS: circa 1500-1599.