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Harley MS 2579

Record Id:

040-002032706

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002032706

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000153.0x000204

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 2579

Title:

Miscellany including Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum

Scope & Content:

The manuscript is a humanistic miscellany including:

Pseudo-Ovidius, Liber facetus (ff. 1r-12r);

Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum (ff. 13r-66r);

M. Porcius Cato, De re rustica or De agri cultura (ff. 67r-115r).

Decoration:

Large initials in colours and gold with foliate decoration (ff. 15r, 71r). Initials in red with purple pen-flourishing or in blue with red pen-flourishing. Smaller initials in red or blue with pen-flourishing in red.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection
Harley Science Project

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002032706", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 2579: Miscellany including Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-002054674", "parent" : "040-002032706", "text" : "Harley MS 2579, ff 1r-12r: Pseudo-Ovidius, Liber facetus" },{ "id" : "041-002054676", "parent" : "040-002032706", "text" : "Harley MS 2579, ff 13r-66r: Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum" },{ "id" : "041-002054677", "parent" : "040-002032706", "text" : "Harley MS 2579, ff 67r-115r: M. Porcius Cato, De re rustica or De agri cultura" }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002032706

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 2579 : Miscellany including Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum

Contains:

Harley MS 2579, ff 1r-12r : Pseudo-Ovidius, Liber facetus
Harley MS 2579, ff 13r-66r : Macer Floridus, De viribus herbarum
Harley MS 2579, ff 67r-115r : M. Porcius Cato, De re rustica or De agri cultura

Click here to View / search full list of parts of Harley MS 2579

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[2580]/040-002032706

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

116 folios.

Digitised Content:

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Harley_MS_2579 (digital images currently unavailable)

Thumbnail:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1430

End Date:

1470

Date Range:

Mid 15th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Paper codex.

Dimensions: 207 x 145 mm (text space: 150 x 83-90 mm, 137 x 88-93 mm (ff. 13-66 plus blank) and 144 x 85-94 mm (ff. 67-115 plus blank).

Foliation: v + 1* + 116 (ff. 1* and 116 are parchment flyleaves; two blank folios after f. 66 and nine after f. 115). Modern foliation in pencil '1-116' ( including original lower flyleaf as f. 116; ff. 12v, 66v, 115v blank).

Collation: Composite manuscript comprising two units: ff. 1-12 and ff. 13-115. The first unit comprises one gathering of twelve leaves; the second unit as follows: i-iv¹⁰, v-vi⁸, vii-x¹²,xi¹⁰, with horizontal catchwords and traces of leaf signatures (see 'b3' on f. 25).

Layout: Ruled (the first unit with double vertical bounding lines on the left and one on the right; the second unit with double vertical bounding lines) in metal point for single columns of 23 and 25-26 lines. The first unit with text written above ruled lines, the second unit below (leaving last line blank).

Script: Humanisctic. Marginalia (ff. 74v-115r) in light brown ink by a contemporary hand.

Binding: Harley binding of red morocco over thin wooden boards with gilt-tooled decoration; attributable to Christopher Chapman: three of the tools and the roll used for the gilt-tooled decoration of the covers correspond to tools nos. 1, 12, 15 and roll no. 5 reproduced in H. M. Nixon, 'Harleian Bindings', in Studies in the Book Trade in Honour of Graham Pollard, Oxford Bibliographical Society Publications, New Series, 18 (Oxford: Bibliographical Society, 1975), pl. 14.

Custodial History:

Origin: Italy.

Provenance:

Inscriptions in a 15th-century hand (ff. 1*v and 116; pre-dating the conversion of these leaves to flyleaves).

The Capilupi family of Mantua (?), 17th century: inscribed 'libro dei Capilupi' (f. 1*r).

Nathaniel Noel (fl. 1681, d. c. 1753), bookseller, employed by Edward Harley for buying books and manuscripts chiefly on the Continent, where his agent was George Suttie (see Wright 1972): sold to Edward Harley on 18 January 1723/4 (f. 1*r).

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, inscribed as usual by their librarian, Humfrey Wanley ‘18 die Januarij, A.D. 1723/4’ (f. 1*r).

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), II (1808), no. 2579.

The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, ed. by Cyril Ernest Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), II: 1723-1726, p. 240 n. 3.

Cyril Ernest Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 96, 253-54.

Cyril Ernest Wright, 'Manuscripts of Italian Provenance in the Harleian Collection in the British Museum: Their Sources, Associations and Channels of Acquisition', in Cultural Aspects of the Italian Renaissance. Essays in Honour of Paul Oskar Kristeller, ed. by C. H. Clough (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1976), pp. 462-84 (p. 473).

M. D. Reeve, 'Cato and Varro', in Texts and Transmission: A Survey of the Latin Classics, ed. by L. D. Reynolds (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983), pp. 40-42 (p. 41).

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)