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Harley MS 632

Record Id:

040-002046461

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002046461

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000652.0x00008a

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 632

Title:

John of Wales, Ordinarium sive Alphabetum vite religiose, Communiloquium, Summa Justiciae, and other works

Scope & Content:

This manuscript contains some of the most popular works of John of Wales [John Wallensis] (d. 1285), a Franciscan theologian who taught theology at the universities of Oxford and Paris. Among them is the Breviloquium de virtutibus antiquorum principum et philosophorum, a moral work with many exempla that relates to the genre of 'Mirrors for Princes', and the Communiloquium, a handbook for preachers.

Contents:

ff. 1r-24v: John of Wales, Ordinarium sive Alphabetum vite religiose.

ff. 25r-36r: John of Wales, Breviloquium de virtutibus antiquorum principum et philosophorum.

ff. 36r-131v: John of Wales, Communiloquium.

ff. 133r-167r: Alphabetical tables of chapters for the works by John of Wales, entitled: 'Tabula secundum ordinem alfabeti super Ordinario vite religiose / Breviloquio de virtutibus caridnalibus / Communiloquio / Summa Justicie / and Moniloquio'.

ff. 169r-247v: John of Wales, Summa Justiciae.

ff. 248r-307v: John of Wales, Moniloquium sive Collectiloquium.

ff. 307v-319v: John of Wales, Tractatus de decem preceptis; imperfect at the end.

The manuscript contains a few additions:

ff. 1*recto-1*verso: A fragment from another manuscript with Latin text featuring (?) biblical commentary and notes (perhaps previously used as binding material for this manuscript); written in the 15th century.

f. 2*recto: A title inscription: 'Opera Johannis Wallensis'; added by Sir Simonds D'Ewes in the 17th century.

f. 2*verso: Table of contents for the manuscript, beginning: 'In hoc libro continentur quedam opera doctoris Johannis Wallensis de ordinem fratrum minorum a de cathedra universitatis Oxoniensis'; added in the 15th century.

Decoration:

Puzzle initials in blue and red with pen-flourished decoration in blue and red. Initial in red with pen-work decoration in green (f. 168r). Initials in blue or red with pen-flourished decoration in red or ink. Paraphs in red, blue and green. Rubrics, underlining of words and marginal notabilia in red. Red initials to the left of the text marking paragraphs. Occasional cadels in green, red and ink (see f. 187r). Initials highlighted in red. Decorated frames for catchwords at the end of gatherings in red and ink, one decorated with a maiden's face (f. 72r).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002046461", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 632: John of Wales, Ordinarium sive Alphabetum vite religiose, Communiloquium, Summa Justiciae, and other works" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002046461

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 632 : John of Wales, Ordinarium sive Alphabetum vite religiose, Communiloquium, Summa Justiciae, and other works

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[0632]/040-002046461

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:

1438

End Date:

1438

Date Range:

1438

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Paper; parchment (f. 2* only).

Dimensions: 295 x 220 mm (text space: 220/225 x 150/160 mm, mostly written in one column, but in two columns on ff. 133r-167r, 168r-169r).

Foliation: ff. 1*-2* + 319 (+ 3 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning + 4 at the end); f. 1* is a paper slip; f. 2* is an original parchment flyleaf; 1 unfoliated blank paper leaf after f. 167; ff. 318-319 are fragments of excised leaves; old foliation in ink '1-335', omitting no. 188 and including a blank after f. 167 as '168', omitted by the modern pencil foliation that corrects the old one from f. 168 onwards; loss of 16 leaves (i.e. one gathering) after f. 247, corresponding to old foliation '250-265', with consequent loss of the rarely attested 'Pastoralia' described in Syon Abbey library's catalogue as beginning on f. 261 of the old foliation. The manuscript's edges are still equipped with medieval tabs, a typical feature of Syon Abbey's books (see Syon Abbey, ed. by Gillespie (2001), p. lxvi,).

Collation: Gatherings of 12 and 16 (ff. 168-247), with quire signatures in the lower right corner of the rectos in the first half of the gatherings and horizontal catchwords in decorated frames in the lower right corner of the last verso.

Script: Gothic cursive.

Binding: British Museum in-house: brown half leather binding with the Harleian arms gold stamped on the outside covers; re-bound 22 December 1965.

Custodial History:

Origin:

England.

Provenance:

The main scribe dated the manuscript 1438 and signed in cipher with the Roman numerals 'IX XII' [i.e. I.M.] combined with a Tau cross ['I.M.T.' or 'I.T.M.'] followed by an inscription in a different cypher, perhaps containing their full name, on ff. 24v, 36r, 131v, 167r [with the year '1438'], and 307v (Syon Abbey, ed. Gillespie (2001), p. 308).

Thomas Graunt (b. 1425?, d. 1474), fellow of Oriel College, Oxford: gave the manuscript to Syon Abbey, according to its catalogue (Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 170).

The Bridgettine abbey of St Saviour, St Mary and St Bridgit of Syon, Ilseworth, Middlesex, founded by King Henry V in 1415: its late 15th-century table of contents (f. 2*v); and listed as manuscript O.10 in the Brethren's library catalogue, now Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 141 (Bateson, Catalogue of the Library of Syon Monastery Isleworth (1898), pp. xviii-xix, 138-39; Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 323; Syon Abbey, ed. Gillespie (2001), pp. 307-308 [no. 952]).

Richard Grafton (b. c. 1511, d. 1573), printer and historian: described as 'ex domo Ricardi Grafton' in the index of books of British authors compiled by John Bale between 1548 and 1552 (Syon Abbey, ed. Gillespie (2001), pp. lxvi, lxix).

Sir Simonds d'Ewes (b. 1602, d. 1650), 1st baronet, diarist, antiquary: his number '45' inscribed in the upper margin of f. 1r; his title inscription on f. 2*recto; and his note ('Nihil ex his editum') below the table of contents on f. 2*verso; listed in his catalogues as A.322 and B.40 (Watson, The Library of Sir Simonds D’Ewes (1966), p. 142; Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 131).

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; according to a receipt in Add MS 70478 (Portland Papers) [formerly Loan MS 29/254 packet 2] (Watson, The Library of Sir Simonds D’Ewes (1966), pp. 60, 91 n. 308; Diary, ed. Wright and Wright (1966), p. xviii n. 3).

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.

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), I (1808), p. 392 (no. 632).

Edward Bernard, Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliæ et Hiberniæ in unum collecti, cum indice alphabetico, 3 vols (Oxford: Sheldonian, 1697), II, p. 386, no. 9900.

Mary Bateson, Catalogue of the Library of Syon Monastery Isleworth (Cambridge: University Press, 1898), pp. xviii-xix, 138-39.

John Bale, Index Britanniae scriptorum quos ex variis bibliothecis non parvo labore collegit Ioannes Bale?us, cum aliis: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, ed. by Reginald Lane Poole, Anecdota Oxoniensia, Mediaeval and Modern Series, 9 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1902; repr., with introd. by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley, Cambridge: Brewer, 1990), pp. 213-14.

Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by Neil R. Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 185.

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

Andrew G. Watson, The Library of Sir Simonds D'Ewes (London: British Museum, 1966), pp. 60, 91 n. 308, 142 [no. A322], 290 [no. B40].

Siegfried Wenzel, The Sin of Sloth: Acedia in Medieval Thought and Literature (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1967), pp. 215 n. 77; 219 n. 27; 237 n. 60; 247 n. 19.

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. 131, 170, 323, 384.

Jenny Swanson, John of Wales: A Study of the Works and Ideas of a Thirteenth-Century Friar, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, Fourth Series, 10 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 243-44 no. 196, 269, 270.

The Friars’ Libraries, ed. by Kenneth W. Humphreys, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 1 (London: The British Library, 1990), p. 219 no. 20.

Christopher de Hamel, Syon Abbey: The Library of the Bridgettine Nuns and their Peregrinations after the Reformation, with the manuscript at Arundel Castle (London: Roxburghe Club, 1991), pp. 60 and n. 23, 104, 114-15 no. 3, 125 and n. 16.

Syon Abbey, ed. Vincent Gillespie, with The Libraries of the Carthusians, ed. by A. Ian Doyle, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 9 (London: The British Library, 2001), pp. lxvi, lxix, 307-08 no. 952, 676.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

John of Wales, d 1285,
see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000453094063

Places:

England