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Harley MS 863
- Record Id:
- 040-002046692
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002046692
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000652.0x000171
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100059910513.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 863
- Title:
-
Psalter ('The Leofric Psalter') with partial gloss in Old English
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains a Psalter (ff. 8r-123v) that was written by scribes who also produced manuscripts made for Leofric, bishop of Exeter (from 1046 to 1072 (see Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Litanies of the Saints (1991) no. 23). The manuscript also includes a 12th-century Kalendar with many later additions.
Contents:
ff. 1r-6v: Kalendar with numerous added obits in margins, written in the 12th century.
f. 7v: Anonymous, verses about a miracle performed at Exeter. The heading 'In festo reliquarum Exoniensis ecclesie ad processionem' is a slightly later addition. The verses are preceded by an extract of the Pictor in Carmine written by the scribe who wrote the previous heading.
ff. 8r-108v: The Gallican version of the Psalms with Canticles with a continuous interlinear Old English gloss to the Canticle 'Quicumque vult' (ff. 107r-v).
ff. 108v-111v: Litany, for the use of Exeter.
ff. 111v-123v: Prayers followed by offices with neumes response.
The manuscript contains a later addition:
f. 7r: Anonymous verses on the Calendar written in a 13th-century hand including a later note in margin dated to 1341.
Decoration:
Large 'KL' letters in red, blue, and green, with penwork decoration. Small initials in red, blue, green, or brown (ff. 1r-7v).
Initials in blue, red, green, and brown. Decorated line-fillers in brown. Unfinished, with spaces left for initials, for Psalm 1 filled in with a 12th-century added puzzle initial and rubrics in brown and red (ff. 8r-123v).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- England and France 700-1200 Project
Harley Collection - Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002046692", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 863: Psalter ('The Leofric Psalter') with partial gloss in Old English" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-003318533", "parent" : "040-002046692", "text" : "Harley MS 863 ff 1-7v: Calendar and verses" },{ "id" : "041-003318534", "parent" : "040-002046692", "text" : "Harley MS 863 ff 8-123v: Psalter, with canticles, litany for the use of Exeter, prayers, and offices (The 'Leofric Psalter')" }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002046692 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 863 : Psalter ('The Leofric Psalter') with partial gloss in Old English - Contains:
- Harley MS 863 ff 1-7v : Calendar and verses
Harley MS 863 ff 8-123v : Psalter, with canticles, litany for the use of Exeter, prayers, and offices (The 'Leofric Psalter')
Click here to View / search full list of parts of Harley MS 863 - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0863]/040-002046692
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- A parchment codex
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100059910513.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English, Old
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1050
- End Date:
- 1199
- Date Range:
- 2nd half of the 11th century-12th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 300 x 230 mm (text space 210/40 x 135/60 mm).
Foliation: ff. 125 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 3 at the end); f. 1* is a former medieval parchment pastedown.
Script: Caroline minuscule; Protogothic; and Gothic.
Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: Exeter, Southwestern England.
Provenance:
The Cathedral priory of St Peter, Exeter, founded in 1050: a 12th-century Kalendar with entries related to Exeter, and numerous obits added in the 13th and 14th centuries, including that of the lawyer and chancellor of Exeter cathedral, Henry de Bracton (d. 1268) (f. 5v); verses added by an early 14th-century hand refer to the Cathedral priory: 'In festo reliquiarum Exoniensis ecclesiae ad processionem' (f. 7v); a feast for the relics of St Peter of Exeter (23 May) 'Festum reliquiarum ecclesie beati Petri Exon[iensis]', added in the 14th century (f. 3r); the inclusion of the feast of St Thomas Becket provides a terminus post quem of 1173 (f. 6v); evidence from the script and litany; perhaps made for Leofric, Bishop of Exeter (r. 1046-1072) and given by him to the cathedral (see Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Litanies of the Saints (1991) no. 23). The Exeter litany features the earliest attestation of the cult of Pope Leo IX and St Bardo, bishop of Mainz (see Bishop, Liturgica Historica (1918) pp. 406-08); perhaps added numerous inscriptions and pen-trials of the 13th century and 14th century, particularly Latin verses such as 'O Maria maris stella' (f. 1*r) and a note on 'Feria VI' (ff. 1*r-v).
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:
-
Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digitised Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk.manuscripts/.
Select digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/welcome.htm.
- Publications:
-
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), I, no. 863.
E. S. Dewick and W. H. Frere, The Leofric Collectar, 2 vols, Henry Bradshaw Society, 45, 56 (London: Henry Bradshaw Society, 1914-21), II, p. ix n. 1, p. 435.
Edmund Bishop, Liturgica Historica: Papers on the Liturgy and Religious Life of the Western Church, ed. by R. H. Connolly and K. Sisam (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1918), pp. 406-08.
Neil R. Ker, Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957), no. 232.
Cecilia Sisam and Kenneth Sisam, The Salisbury Psalter, Edited from Salisbury Cathedral MS. 150, Early English Text Society, 242 (London: Oxford University Press, 1959), p. 7.
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. 83.
Nigel Morgan, 'Notes on the Post-Conquest Calendar, Litany and Martyrology of the Cathedral Priory of Winchester with a Consideration of Winchester Diocese Calendars of the Pre-Sarum Period', in The Vanishing Past: Medieval Studies Presented to Chrisopher Hohler, ed. by Alan Borg and Andrew Martindale (Oxford: B. A. R., 1981), pp. 133-74 (p. 168 n. 77).
Andrew G. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 700-1600 in The Department of Manuscripts: The British Library, 2 vols (London: British Library, 1979), no. 638.
Anglo-Saxon Litanies of the Saints, ed. by Michael Lapidge, Henry Bradshaw Society, 106 (London: Henry Bradshaw Society, 1991), no. 23.
Helmut Gneuss, Handlist of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A List of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 241 (Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2001), no. 425 (ff. 8-125).
The Leofric Missal, ed. by Nicholas Orchard, Henry Bradshaw Society, 113 (London: Henry Bradshaw Society, 2002), p. 216.
K. D. Hartzell, Catalogue of Manuscripts Written or Owned in England up to 1200 containing Music (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2006), no. 156.
Andrew Prescott, 'What's in a Number? The Physical Organization of the Manuscript Collecctions of the British Library', in Beatus Vir: Studies in Early English and Norse Manuscripts, ed. by A. N. Doane and Kirsten Wolf, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 319 (Tempe, Arizona: ACMRS, 2006), pp. 471-526 (pp. 471-75, 477).
László Sandór Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 900-1100. Study and Texts (Boston: Brill, 2007), pp. 348, 388, 528-29, 552.
Richard Sharpe and James Willoughby, Medieval Libraries of Great Britain (Oxford: The Bodleian Libraries, 2015) «http://mlgb3.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/mlgb/book/2711/?search_term=Harley%20863&page_size=500» [accessed 4 August 2016].
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Notes:
- This manuscript is part of The Polonsky Foundation England and France Project: Manuscripts from the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France, 700-1200.