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Harley MS 865
- Record Id:
- 040-002046694
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002046694
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000652.0x000173
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100056059068.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 865
- Title:
- Ambrose, De Mysteriis and De Sacramentis;Jerome, Contra Jovinianum; and other theological works
- Scope & Content:
-
Contents:
f. [ii] verso: A table of contents.
ff. 1r-4v: Ambrose (b. c. 339, d. 397), De Mysteriis (On Mysteries), beginning imperfectly due to the lack of the opening folio.
ff. 4v-16v: Ambrose, De Sacramentis (On the Sacraments).
ff. 16v-18v: Pseudo-Eusebius of Emesa (Eusebius Gallicanus), De corpore et sanguine Christi (On Christ's body and blood), beginning: 'Liber sermo Isidori episcopi de corpore et sanguine Christi in Pascha. Magnitudo celestium beneficiorum angustias humane mentis excedit'; Homily from the Eusebius Gallicanus sermon collection.
ff. 18v-69v: St Jerome (b. c. 347, d. 420), Contra Jovinianum (Against Jovinian), beginning: 'Incipit liber beati Ieronimi presbiteri contra Iovinianum hereticum. Pauci ad modum dies sunt.'
ff. 70r-90r: Pseudo-Augustine, Hypomnesticon contra Pelagianos et Caelestiano (Hypomnesticon against the Pelagians and Celestians), beginning: 'Adversarii catholice fidei dum contra regulam veritatis diabolicis armis pugnare nituntur'.
The manuscript contains a later addition:
f. 90v: Excerpt of St Jerome, Contra Jovinianum (Against Jovinianus), beginning 'Certe in resurrectione eadem erit corporum substantia', added in the 15th or 16th century.
Decoration:
Four zoomorphic initials in dark brown ink, red and green and some blue, with knot-work and foliate motifs, in the shape of birds or hybrid creatures (ff. 6r, 16v, 19r, 69v).
Large and small initials in red, green or occasionally blue, some with penwork decoration including foliate motifs, occasionally in one or two alternate colour(s), with a reserved line, or rope and geometric motifs. Rubrics in red.
14th-century foliation in Arabic numerals (ff. 19r-50r).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- England and France 700-1200 Project
Harley Collection - Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002046694", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 865: Ambrose, De Mysteriis and De Sacramentis;Jerome, Contra Jovinianum; and other theological works" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002046694 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 865 : Ambrose, De Mysteriis and De Sacramentis;Jerome, Contra Jovinianum; and other theological works - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0865]/040-002046694
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100056059068.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1075
- End Date:
- 1099
- Date Range:
- 4th quarter of the 11th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 290 x 190 mm (text space 210 x 125/30 mm).
Foliation: ff. 1* + 91 (+ 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves and 1 unfoliated medieval parchment flyleaf at the beginning + 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end); f. 1* is a parchment flyleaf.
Script: Caroline minuscule.
Binding: Post-1600. Gold-tooled red leather over wooden boards; marbled endpapers.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
St Albans.
Provenance:
The Benedictine abbey of St Alban, St Albans, founded in 793; probably copied from a manuscript of the Benedictine Cathedral Priory of Holy Trinity or Christ Church, Canterbury, that was recorded in St Albans' library catalogue compiled between 1284-1331 (see Montague Rhodes James, The Ancient Libraries of Canterbury and Dover (1903), pp. 21-22 no. 53; and Chisholm, The Pseudo-Augustinian Hypomnesticon (1967)); the 12th-century table of contents (f. [ii] verso) and the running headers were added by a scribe who has been identified in other manuscripts from St Albans; fragments from a letter of monks of St Albans to Pope Boniface IX, relating to the election of the abbot of St Albans, after the death of the abbot John V (John de la Moote), 11 November 1401 (ff. 1*, 91r) (see Thomson, Manuscripts from St Albans Abbey (1982), I, p. 92); added, occasional corrections and notes in various 12th-century hands (ff. 19r-69v).
'John Berymore' (fl. 16th century), unidentified: ownership inscription 'John Berimor oueth this boke', written by a 16th-century hand (f. [ii] verso).
Edward Stillingfleet (b. 1635, d. 1699), bishop of Worcester and theologian (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972)).
Edward Stillingfleet (b. 1661, d. 1708), physician and Church of England clergyman, son of the former; in 1707 acquired by Robert Harley (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani, (1972)).
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. 865.
Montague Rhodes James, The Ancient Libraries of Canterbury and Dover (Cambridge: University Press, 1903), pp. 21-22, no. 53.
Otto Faller, 'Was sagen die Handschriften zur Echtheit der sechs Predigten "S. Ambrosii de Sacramentis"', in Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, 53 (1929), 41-65 (p. 55).
Francis Wormald, 'Decorated Initials in English MSS. from A.D. 900 to 1100' in Archaeologia or Miscellaneous Tracts relating to Antiquity, 91 (1945), 107-35 (p. 135).
Otto Pächt, C. R. Dodwell, and Francis Wormald, The St. Albans Psalter (Albani Psalter) (London: Warburg Institute, 1960), p. 277 n. 2.
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. 166.
John Edward Chisholm, The Pseudo-Augustinian Hypomnesticon against the Pelagians and Celestians, 2 vols (Fribourg: University Press, 1967), II, 26-27.
C. E. Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 71, 291-92, 316.
R. W. Hunt, 'The Library of the Abbey of St Albans', in Medieval Scribes, Manuscripts and Libraries: Essays Presented to N. R. Ker, ed. by Malcolm B. Parkes and Andrew G. Watson (London: Scolar Press, 1978), pp. 251-78 (p. 258 n. 35).
Rodney M. Thomson, Manuscripts from St Albans Abbey 1066-1235, 2 vols (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer, 1982), I, 14, 16-17, 29, no. 22; II: pls. 2-4.
Richard Gameson, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England (c. 1066-1130) (Oxford: University Press, 1999), p. 107.
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. 426.
The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain (Cambridge: University Press, 1999- ), II: 1100-1400, ed. by Nigel Morgan and Rodney M. Thomson (2008), pl. 4.11.
Richard Sharpe and James Willoughby, Medieval Libraries of Great Britain (Oxford: The Bodleian Libraries, 2015) [accessed 01 February 2017].
- 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.