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Harley MS 56

Record Id:

040-002045884

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002045884

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000596.0x0000e1

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 56

Title:

Osbern, Life of Dunstan

Scope & Content:

f. 1r–v: Cassiodorus, Expositio in Psalterium 104.11–18, fragment: a flyleaf with 12th-century text in two columns, lemmata in red.

ff. 2r–24r: Osbern, Life of Dunstan, ending in chapter 16: ‘Epistula de vita sancti dunstani archiepiscopi et confessoris. Vniuersis catholicę matris ecclesię filiis. … absque iombrium infusione ab una domo in aliam possent introire.’

ff. 24v–25v: Pen trials, including lists of other saints’ lives and a rubric for a life of Germanus.

Decoration:

Large initial with penwork decoration in red, purple and green (f. 2v). Large initial in purple with penwork decoration (f. 2r). Small initials in red or brown. Small marginal diagram in brown ink (f. 14v). Rubrics in red. Highlighting of initials in green or purple.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002045884", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 56: Osbern, Life of Dunstan" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002045884

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 56 : Osbern, Life of Dunstan

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[0055]/040-002045884

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1100

End Date:

1124

Date Range:

1st quarter of the 12th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: parchment.

Dimensions: 265 × 175 mm (written area 205 × 125 mm)

Foliation: ff. 25 (+ 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and numerous at the end)

Collation: i^14–2+1 (ff. 1–13; 1st an added flyleaf, 5th/9th cancelled), ii^three (ff. 14–16; 3 singletons sewn together), iii⁸⁺¹ (ff. 17–25; 9th an added flyleaf).

Script: Protogothic

Binding: British Museum, rebound 1967; the former covers of brown leather pasted on the inside covers.

Custodial History:

Origin:

England.

Provenance:

? The Benedictine abbey of St Mary the Virgin, York: 14th-century inscription, ‘liber beate marie Ebora’ (f. 24v), but this occurs among the pen trials apparently made as preparation for another manuscript.

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 Cavendish, née 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.

Information About Copies:

Select digital coverage available for this manuscript; see the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, https://bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/.

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), I, no. 56.

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. 217.

Anne Lawrence, ‘English Cistercian manuscripts of the Twelfth Century’, Cistercian Art and Architecture in the British Isles, ed. by Christopher Norton and David Park (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), pp. 284-98 (p. 296, pl. 188).

Anne Lawrence, ‘The Artistic Influence of Durham Manuscripts’, in Anglo-Norman Durham 1093-1193, ed. by David Rollason, Margaret Harvey, and Michael Prestwich (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1994), pp. 451-69 (pp. 466-67).

Anne Lawrence-Mathers, Manuscripts in Northumbria in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries (Woodbridge: Brewer, 2003), pp. 68, 78, 121-23.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Osbern of Canterbury, c 1050-c 1090,
see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000000526679,
see also http://viaf.org/viaf/66569522