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Harley MS 308
- Record Id:
- 040-002046136
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002046136
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000596.0x000285
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 308
- Title:
- ‘Reeve’ or ‘Melford’ Register of Bury St Edmunds Abbey
- Scope & Content:
-
f. 1*: Inserted slip of parchment, perhaps from a former cover; on the verso in faint red 16th-century book-hand, ‘Dompnus Edmundus Bury vestiarius – 1529; dompnus Edmundus Bury pitanciarius. 1530’.
ff. 1r–139r: Indentures (1527–40), in chronological order. Later additions to 1546: leases, manumissions etc.
ff. 139r–139v: Partial index to the contents, with folio numbers.
Contents revised from Thomson (1980: 139).
Decoration:
Initials opening each indenture alternating between red and blue with penwork decoration; page headings in red with blue paraphs (ff. 1–38, 91–95). The style imitates the ‘Curteys’ registers, Add MS 14848 and Add MS 7096. From 39v, initials have not been executed; spaces are usually filled in with plain black initials from f. 74v. Some cadels (e.g., ff. 75r, 76r, 77r).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002046136", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 308: ‘Reeve’ or ‘Melford’ Register of Bury St Edmunds Abbey" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002046136 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 308 : ‘Reeve’ or ‘Melford’ Register of Bury St Edmunds Abbey - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0307]/040-002046136
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- Languages:
- English
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1517
- End Date:
- 1546
- Date Range:
- 1517-1546
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: parchment.
Dimensions: 375 × 280 mm (written area 270 × 200 mm).
Foliation: ff. 1* + 139 (+ 3 paper endleaves at the beginning and end). Medieval foliation 1 (modern 1)–140 (139), skipping 99.
Script: Gothic cursive.
Binding: British Museum.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
Benedictine abbey of St Edmund, King and Martyr, Bury St Edmunds.
Provenance:
(?)John Salysbury (d. 1573), monk of Bury St Edmunds and bishop of Sodor and Man (Watson, p. 224).
‘R.P. 57’ (fol. 1*), 16th century.
Added list of contents, 16th century (f. 139r–v).
Sir Simonds D’Ewes (b.1602, d. 1650), 1st baronet, diarist, antiquary, and friend of Sir Robert Cotton (see Wright 1972): the manuscript is recorded in his catalogue as no. A321 (see Watson 1966).
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 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, ed. by Robert Nares and others, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808–1812), i, 189.
M.R. James, On the Abbey of S. Edmund at Bury (Cambridge: Cambridge Antiquarian Society, 1895) https://archive.org/details/abbeyofsedmundat00jame, p. 96.
M.R. James, ‘Bury St. Edmunds Manuscripts’, The English Historical Review, 41.162 (1926), 251–60 https://doi.org/10.1093/ehr/XLI.CLXII.251, p. 259.
Andrew G. Watson, The Library of Sir Simonds D’Ewes (London: British Museum, 1966), no. A321.
The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715–1726, ed. by Cyril Ernest Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), I: 1715-1723, pp. xviii–xix.
Cyril Ernest Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts Preserved in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 131, 264, 295–96.
Rodney M. Thomson, The Archives of the Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk Records Society, 21 (Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press, 1980), no. 1291.
G.R.C. Davis, Medieval Cartularies of Great Britain and Ireland, ed. by Claire Breay, Julian Harrison, and David M. Smith, 2nd edn (London: British Library, 2010), no. 134.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Names:
- Benedictine abbey of St Edmund, King and Martyr, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, 1020-1539