Hard-coded id of currently selected item: . JSON version of its record is available from Blacklight on e.g. ??
Metadata associated with selected item should appear here...
Harley MS 978
- Record Id:
- 040-002046807
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002046807
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000652.0x0001e4
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 978
- Title:
-
Collection of poems including fables and musical, calendrical, and medical texts
- Scope & Content:
-
A miscellany or 'manual' including poems, fables, musical, and medical texts, several of which are unique to this collection, such as the song 'Sumer is icumen in', the Song of Lewes, several poems by Marie de France and Goliardic verses. The collection was possibly compiled between 1261 and 1265.
The contents are as follows:
1. Musical miscellany (ff. 2r-15r):
- Four monophonic Latin songs 'Samson dux fortissime’, ‘Regina clemencie Maria vocata’, ‘Dum Maria credidit’, ‘Ave gloriosa virginum regina’ (ff. 2r-8v);
- Three untexted estampies in two parts labelled cantus superior and cantus inferior (ff. 8v-9r).
- Three-part polyphonic conductus, ‘Ave gloriosa mater salvatoris’, with ‘Duce creature, virgine Marie’ (ff. 9v-10r);
- Monophonic song, ‘Felix sanctorum chorus eximius apostolorum’ (ff. 10v-11r);
- Four-part rota canon ‘Sumer is icumen in, Lhude sing cuccu’, with an alternative Latin text, ‘Perspice christicola’ (f. 11v);
- Three monophonic sequences: ‘Eterni numinis’, ‘[A]nte thronum regentis omnia’,‘[G]aude salutata virgo fecundata’ (ff. 12r-13v);
- Solmisation table explaining the Gamut (f. 14r);
- Solfeggio exercise setting the words ‘Est tonus sic: ut re ut ...’ (ff. 14v-15r).
2. Calendar with prognostication; proverbs (ff. 15v-21v);
3. Medical miscellany (ff. 22r-37r):
- Pseudo-Aristoteles, Epistula ad Alexandrum Magnum de corpore humano sanando (from the Secretum Secretorum), translated by John of Seville (ff. 22r-23r);
- Medical treatise (ff. 23r-25v);
- Glossary of herbs (ff. 26r-27v);
- Pseudo-Hippocrates, Letter to Caesar (Regimen sanitatis), with an addition (ff. 27v-35v); including an ophthalmological recipe 'Ad clarificandum visum' (f. 30r);
- Mediecal recipes (ff. 35r-35v);
- Pseudo-Aristoteles, Epistula ad Alexandrum Magnum de corpore humano sanando (from the Secretum Secretorum), translated by John of Seville, excerpts (ff. 35v-36v);
- Verses on the plant scabiosa (f. 37r);
4. Two letters (f. 38r);
5. Short texts in prose and verse by various hands (ff. 38r-39v);
6. Marie de France, Fables (ff. 40r-67v);
7. Walter Map, Poems (ff. 68v-74v);
8. Litterary miscellany in verse and prose (ff. 75r-117v):
- Goliardic verses including poems by Walter Map (ff. 75r-107r);
- Song of Lewes or Song of the Barons (ff. 107r-114r);
- A legend of Becket's parents (ff. 114v-116r);
- Dialogue on falconry in verse, excerpt (ff. 116v-117r);
9. Marie de France, Lais (ff. 118r-160r);
10. List of contents and notes (ff. 160v-162r).
Decoration:
Initials in blue or red (ff. 2r-15r). 'KL' letters in red or blue, some with penwork decoration. Small initials and numbers in red, green, or blue in the calendar, unfinished (ff. 15v-21r). Initials in alternating blue and red with contrasting pen-flourishing (ff. 22r-25r, 40r-67r, 118r-160r). Small initials in blue, red or black, some with marginal extensions (ff. 27v-33v, 75r-100v, 104v-106r). Sentence or verse initials touched in red (ff. 22r-33v, 40r-100v, 103r, 104v-106r, 118r-160r). Rubrics in red throughout.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
Harley Science Project - Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002046807", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 978: Collection of poems including fables and musical, calendrical, and medical texts" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-002207876", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 2r-15r: Musical miscellany" },{ "id" : "041-002207877", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 15v-21v: Calendar with prognostications" },{ "id" : "041-002207878", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 22r-37r: Medical miscellany" },{ "id" : "041-002207879", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, f 38r: Two letters" },{ "id" : "041-002207880", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 38r-39v: Short texts in prose and verse" },{ "id" : "041-002207881", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 40r-67v: Marie de France, Fables" },{ "id" : "041-002207882", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 68v-74v: Walter Map, Poems" },{ "id" : "041-002207883", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 75r-117v: Literary miscellany" },{ "id" : "041-002207884", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 118r-160r: Marie de France, Lais" },{ "id" : "041-002207885", "parent" : "040-002046807", "text" : "Harley MS 978, ff 160v-162r: A list of contents of a collection of polyphonic music and notes" }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002046807 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 978 : Collection of poems including fables and musical, calendrical, and medical texts - Contains:
- Harley MS 978, ff 2r-15r : Musical miscellany
Harley MS 978, ff 15v-21v : Calendar with prognostications
Harley MS 978, ff 22r-37r : Medical miscellany
Harley MS 978, f 38r : Two letters
Harley MS 978, ff 38r-39v : Short texts in prose and verse
Harley MS 978, ff 40r-67v : Marie de France, Fables
Harley MS 978, ff 68v-74v : Walter Map, Poems
Harley MS 978, ff 75r-117v : Literary miscellany
Harley MS 978, ff 118r-160r : Marie de France, Lais
Harley MS 978, ff 160v-162r : A list of contents of a collection of polyphonic music and notes
Click here to View / search full list of parts of Harley MS 978 - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0978]/040-002046807
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Harley_MS_978 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Anglo-Norman
English, Middle
French
French, Old
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1250
- End Date:
- 1274
- Date Range:
- 3rd quarter of the 13th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
- Restrictions to access apply please consult British Library staff
Please request the physical items you need using the online collection item request form.
Digitised items can be viewed online by clicking the thumbnail image or digitised content link.
Readers who have registered or renewed their pass since 21 March 2024 can request physical items prior to visiting the Library by completing
this request form.
Please enter the Reference (shelfmark) above on the request form.If your Reader Pass was issued before this date, you will need to visit the Library in London or Yorkshire to renew it before you can request items online. All manuscripts and archives must be consulted at the Library in London.
This catalogue record may describe a collection of items which cannot all be requested together. Please use the hierarchy viewer to navigate to individual items. Some items may be in use or restricted for other reasons. If you would like to check the availability, contact our Reference Services team, quoting the Reference (shelfmark) above.
- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment codex, except f. 1: paper.
Dimensions: 190 x 130 mm (text space: 145-160 x 101-113 mm).
Foliation: ff. iv + 162 + 74* + iv (f. 74* is blank, f. 1 is an added early modern paper leaf; f. 162 is the original back flyleaf; all unfoliated flyleaves are modern paper or parchment leaves). Old foliation by Edward Lapworth in pen '1-35, 58-182' (ff. 2-161, including blank after f. 74 as f. 95) dated 5 March 1595 (f. 162r) signalling the loss of 22 leaves after f. 37. Modern foliation in pencil and pen ff. '1-162' (including front and back flyleaves; ff. 68r, 117v are blank).
Collation: Gatherings were possibly rearranged by a later binder:
i12 (ff. 2-13), ii8 (ff. 14-21), iii12 (ff. 22-33), iv6 (ff. 34-39), v-vi12 (ff. 40-63), vii12 (ff. 64-74*), viii-x12 (ff. 75-110), xi8-1 (ff. 111-117; 1st leaf cancelled), xii-xiv12 (ff. 118-153), xv12-4 (ff. 154-161; 9th-12th leaves cancelled).
Layout: Traces of pricking. Ruled in metal point (single vertical bounding lines) and red ink (staves) for single (ff. 2-13v) columns of 9 staves each followed by a line, and single (calendar on ff. 15v-21) or double columns of 32-35 lines. Texts written below the top line.
Quire vii displays two different pricking patterns. The quire was originally pricked and ruled in plummet in full, with a narrow ruling pattern used for Ysopet. These prickings continue throughout the quire, along the very outer edge of the leaves. However, the plummet ruling was erased from f. 68v onwards, and new prickings for a broader ruling pattern were made further into the leaf. These are particularly visible on f. 70r. The pricking and ruling, then re-pricking and re-ruling, is also especially noticeable on f. 74*v, where the first ruling remains alongside the new pricking.
Script: Gothic with 15th-century (ff. 16v-19r) and 14th-century (ff. 68v-74v) additions in Gothic cursive bookhands.
Binding: British Museum/British Library binding with the Harley arms and motto gilt-tooled at centre of covers.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England.
Possibly commissioned from Oxford booksellers by the author of the note on f. 160v, 'Ord.li. W. de. Wint', variously identified as W[illiam?] of Wycombe (fl. c.1275), music copyist and Benedictine monk, or William of Winchester, monk of Reading (see Taylor 2002, Losseff 2004).
Provenance:
William of Winchester, Benedictine monk of the Reading abbey: probably assembled by him in c. 1265 (see Taylor 2002).
The Benedictine abbey, Reading, co. Berkshire, in the diocese of Salisbury: references to the death of some of its abbots, in particular Abbot Simon (d. 1226) on 13 Feb., and Abbot John de Fornsett (d. 1261) on 19 Jan. (ff. 15v-16r): the death of the latter probably sets a 'terminus post quem' for the manuscript, while the 'terminus ante quem' is the death of Simon de Montfort, eighth earl of Leicester (c. 1208-1265), magnate and political reformer, at Evesham on 4 Aug. 1265 (see Taylor and Coates 1998).
Clement Burdett (d. 1569) rector of Englefield, co. Berkshire, and official principal to the bishop of Salisbury: bought at the Dissolution.
Edward Lapworth (b. 1574, d. 1636), physician and poet, professor of medicine at Oxford: possibly acquired from Clement Burdett's son, Humphrey. Lapworth's foliation in pen '1-35, 58-182' (ff. 2-161, omitting f. 11), and note dated 5 March 1595, '5 martii 1595 sunt in hoc libro folia conscripta 182' (f. 162r) (see Taylor 2002).
Edward Stillingfleet (b. 1635, d. 1699), bishop of Worcester and theologian: MS 178 in his library inventory (Harley MS 7644) (see Wright 1972).
Edward Stillingfleet (b. 1661, d. 1708), physician and Church of England clergyman, son of the former: sold in 1707 to Robert Harley (see Wright 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. Valued '0.2.6.' by Harley's librarian Humfrey Wanley (1672-1726), Old English scholar, in Harley 7055, f. 77r, no. 178, and described by him in 1710-11 in the third volume of his 'Catalogus Brevior' (Additional MS 45703, ff. 188r-192r).
Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta, née Cavendish 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. Harley shelfmarks in dark brown ink '63.C.15 / 978' followed by '15/I B' inthe margin (f. 2r).
- Publications:
-
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), I (1808), no. 978.
The Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes, ed. by Thomas Wright (London: Camden Society, 1841), p. 21.
Léopold Hervieux, Les Fabulistes latins, depuis le siècle d'Auguste jusqu'à la fin du moyen âge, 5 vols (Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1884-96), I (1884), p. 635.
The Song of Lewes, ed. by Charles. L. Kingsford, Clarendon Press Series (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1890), pp. vii-xviii.
Harry L. D. Ward and John A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), I: Harry L. D. Ward (1883), p. 407; II (1893), p. 344 n.
Augustus Hughes-Hughes, Catalogue of Manuscript Music in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1906-1965), II (1908), pp. 25, 460.
F. Ludwig, Repertorium organorum recentioris, I/1 (Halle, 1910), pp. 267-78.
Neil Ker, Medieval Libraries of Great Britain, 2nd edn, (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 156.
Manuscripts of Polyphonic Music: 11th - Early 14th Century, ed. by Gilbert Reaney, Répertoire international des sources musicales, BIV 1 (Munich: Henle, 1966), pp. 505-08.
Cyril E. Wright and Ruth C. Wright, The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), I, pp. xix, xxviii.
Cyril E. Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 283, 316, 388.
D. C. Lindberg, A Catalogue of Medieval and Renaissance Optical Manuscripts (Toronto, 1975), p. 83, no. 116.
Betty Hill, 'British Library Ms. Egerton 613-I', Notes and Queries, New Series, 25 (1978), 394-409 (p. 408).
Christopher Hohler, 'Reflections on Some Manuscripts Containing 13th-century Polyphony', Journal of the Plainsong and Mediaeval Music Society, 1 (1978), 2-38 (pp. 2-19).
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), I, p. 120 no. 640, II, pl. 137.
Carter Revard, ‘Gilote et Johane: an Interlude in B. L. Harley 2253’, Studies in Philology, 79, 2 (1982), 122-46 (pp.127-28, n. 11).
P. Kibre, 'Hippocrates Latinus: Repertorium of Hippocratic Writings in the Latin Middle Ages' (VIII), Traditio. Studies in Ancient and Medieval History, Thought, and Religion, 38 (1982), 165-92 (p. 165).
C. B. Schmitt and D. Knox, Pseudo-Aristoteles latinus. A Guide to Latin work falsely attributed to Aristotle before 1500, Warburg Institute Surveys and Texts, 12 (London, 1985), p. 64.
Popular Medicine in thirteenth-century England, ed. by Tony Hunt (Cambridge: Brewer, 1990), pp. 101-04.
The Theory of Music, vol. IV: Manuscripts from the Carolingian Era up to c. 1500 in Great Britain and in the United States of America. Descriptive Catalogue, ed. by Christian Meyer, Michael Huglo and Nancy C. Phillips, Répertoire international des sources musicales, BIII 4 (Munich: Henle, 1992), p. 80 [with further bibliography].
Margaret Laing, Catalogue of Sources for a Linguistic Atlas of Early Medieval English (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 1993), p. 91.
Nicky Losseff, The Best Concords: Polyphonic Music in Thirteenth-Century Britain (New York and London: Garland, 1994), p. 84.
Charles Burnett, The Introduction of Arabic Learning into England, The Panizzi Lectures, 1996 (London: British Library, 1997), n. 4.
Andrew Taylor and Alan E. Coates, 'The dates of the Reading Calendar and the Summer Canon', Notes and Queries, 45.1 (1998), pp. 22-24.
Alan Coates, English Medieval Books: The Reading Abbey Collections from Foundation to Dispersal (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999), p. 75.
Ruth J. Dean and Maureen B. M. Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature: A Guide to Texts and Manuscripts (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 1999), nos. 176, 179, 209, 244, 312, 406, 435, 511, 810.
Nicolas Bell, Music in Medieval Manuscripts (London: British Library, 2001), pp. 27, 39-40, pl. on p. 27.
Richard Trachsler, 'Les fables de Marie de France', Cahiers de civilisation médiévale, 44 (2001), p. 63 (as 'A').
Andrew Taylor, Textual Situations: Three Medieval Manuscripts and their Readers (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002), esp. pp.76-136, figs. 8, 11-14.
Andrew Taylor, 'Manual to Miscellany: Stages in the Commercial Copying of Vernacular Literature in England', The Yearbook of English Studies, 33 (2003), 1-17 (pp. 11-12).
Steven J. Williams, The Secret of Secrets: The Scholarly Career of a Pseudo-Aristotelian Text in the Latin Middle Ages (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003), pp. 376-77. [ff. 22-23; 35v-36]
Nicky Losseff, ‘Wycombe, W. of (fl. c.1275)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/60119, accessed 11 Dec 2008].
Treasures of the British Library, ed. by Nicolas Barker and others (London: British Library, 2005), p. 978.
Helen Deeming, 'Observations on the Habits of Twelfth- and Thirteenth-century Music Scribes', Scriptorium, 60 (2006), 38-59 (p. 45), pl. 10.
Bryan Gillingham, Music in the Cluniac Ecclesia: A Pilot Project (Ottawa: Institute of Medieval Music, 2006), passim.
Rupert T. Pickens, 'Reading Harlye 978: Marie de France in Context', in Courtly Arts and the Art of Courtliness, ed. by Keith Busby and Christopher Kleinhenz (Cambridge: Brewer, 2006), pp. 527-42.
D. T. Tavormina, 'The Middle English Letter of Ipocras', English Studies, 88 (2007), 632-52 (pp. 636 n. 18 and 642).
Laurent Brun, 'London, British Library Harley ms. 978', Arlima: Archives de littérature du Moyen-Âge (2007) [http://www.arlima.net/index.html] and [ http://www.arlima.net/mss/united_kingdom/london/british_library/harley/00978.html] [accessed 05 November 2007].
Philip Howard, The British Library: A Treasure House of Knowledge (London: Scala Publishers, 2008), no. 84.
Sophie Marnette, ‘L’Énonciation féminine dans les lais médiévaux’, Le Discours et la langue, 8:1 (2016), 97-120.
Sophie Marnette, 'Énonciation et Locuteurs dans les Lais de Marie de France’, Op. cit.: Revue des littératures et des arts: Moyen Age 'Agrégation 2019', 19, (2018), online at https://revues.univ-pau.fr/opcit/427 [accessed 01.04.2019].
- Exhibitions:
- British Library Treasures, (online), 27 February 2016-
The Middle Ages, (online), 26 March 2015- - Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)