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Harley MS 988
- Record Id:
- 040-002046817
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002046817
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000652.0x0001ee
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 988
- Title:
- Commentaries on the Song of Songs
- Scope & Content:
-
This composite manuscript consists of two parts that were written separately in the first half of the 12th century: Part 1 (ff. 1r-26v), and Part 2 (ff. 27r-71r). Both parts contain a commentary on the Song of Songs.
Contents:
ff. 1r-26v: Commentary on the Song of Songs, entitled: 'Incipiunt glosulae super canticum canticorum'; beginning: ' Trinomius Salomon fuit. Edida, id est dilectus'.
ff. 27r-71r: Commentary on the Song of Songs, untitled, beginning: 'Tribus modis vel nominibus vocatum fuisse Salomonem'.
The manuscript contains a later addition:
f. 27*v: 'Jhesus'; written in a (?) 15th-century hand.
Decoration:
1 initial in red (f. 1r). Rubric in red (f. 1r). 1 initial in red with penwork decoration (f. 27r).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002046817", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 988: Commentaries on the Song of Songs" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002046817 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 988 : Commentaries on the Song of Songs - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[0988]/040-002046817
- 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:
- 1100
- End Date:
- 1149
- Date Range:
- 1st half of the 12th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 170 x 110 mm (text space: 120/125 x 75/90 mm).
Foliation: ff. 1* + 15* + 27* + 71 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 3 at the end); 1 unfoliated folded modern paper leaf with bibliographical notes mounted on a paper guard between f. [ii] and f. 1*; 3 unfoliated parchment leaves between f. 1* and f. 1; 2 unfoliated parchment leaves between f. 26 and f. 27*; f. 1* is a parchment leaf that is conjoined with a paper leaf; f. 15 is a parchment leaf; f. 27* is a parchment leaf that is inserted before f. 27;
Script: Protogothic. Written by several scribes.
Binding: British Museum in-house. Trace of one metal fitting and of turn-ins of a previous binding on f. 1*v, centre of outer margin.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England.
Provenance:
An unidentified monastery, ? 13th/14th century: its ownership inscription on f. [1*a]verso: 'H[...] d[...] anathema [...]'; perhaps 'Hunc librum dedit'; and another erased inscription on f. [1*b]recto.
Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (b. 1571, d. 1631), 1st baronet, antiquary and politician; given by him to the Bodleian Library, Oxford, 1602: ex dono inscription in the form of a votiva ara in the lower margin of f. 1r (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 113; Tite, 'Lost or Stolen or Strayed' (1992), pp. 108-09, and Howarth, 'Sir Robert Cotton' (1992), p. 2).
? The Bodleian Library, Oxford: the ex dono inscription suggests that Cotton intended to donate the manuscript to the Bodleian Library in 1602, but there is no evidence that it actually arrived there (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 263).
An unknown English owner: their inscription of c. 1700 on f. 1*v: 'Mr Cobs saith that this tractatus erat ad Bodleum Colledge et est in Cantica Canticorum incerti autem authoris est pretium I1.5s.o' and their number '236' (subsequently crossed out).
Edward Stillingfleet (b. 1635, d. 1699), bishop of Worcester and theologian (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 316).
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), p. 316).
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. 499 (no. 988).
Friedrich Stegmüller, Repertorium Biblicum Medii Aevi, 6 vols (Madrid: Graficas Marina, 1940-1958), VI, nos. 9627 and 9628.
Cyril Ernest Wright, 'The Elizabethan Society of Antiquaries and the Formation of the Cottonian Library', in The English Library before 1700, ed. by Francis Wormald and Cyril Ernest Wright (London: Athlone Press, 1958), pp. 176-212 (p. 212 n. 65, pl. 15).
David Howarth, 'Sir Robert Cotton and the Commemoration of Famous Men', British Library Journal, 18 (1992), 1-28 (p. 2 fig. 2).
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. 113, 263, 316.
Colin G. C. Tite, ''Lost or Stolen or Strayed': A Survey of Manuscripts formerly in the Cotton Library', British Library Journal, 18 (1992), 107-47 (pp. 108-09).
Richard Gameson, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England (c. 1066-1130) (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999) p. 158 no. 933.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Places:
- England