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Harley MS 1729

Record Id:

040-002047560

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002047560

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000709.0x0000ed

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 1729

Title:

Polychronicon by Ranulf Higden with a continuation to the reign of Richard II (c. 1398), vol. 2

Scope & Content:

The manuscript is the second of two related volumes, Harley MS 1728 being the first. The text is a copy of Ranulf Higden's Polychronicon, with a continuation to the reign of Richard II (c. 1398). Incipit (f. 1r): 'lunares qui gravidatis feminis deputantur . ita quod . quilibet mensis sit 30 dierum'. An edition of the chronicle can be found in Polycrhonicon Ranulphi Higden, ed. by Churchill Babington and J. R. Lumby, Rolls Series, 9 vols (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1865-1886).

There are a large number of Latin notes in the margin, both by the manuscript's scribe and by subsequent readers or owners. those by the scribe are primarily source citations. The chapter numbers that are referred to by the index on Harley 1728, ff. 2r-6v are not part of the manuscript's original planned apparatus, but have been added in a later hand.

The text of the continuation regarding Richard II is that printed in Historia Vitae et Regni Ricardi II Angliae Regis, ed. by Thomas Hearne (Oxford: Sheldonian Theatre, 1729). Incipit (f. 145r): 'Ricardus de Burdeux puer nondum etatis plene xi annorum'. It ends imperfectly at the bottom of f. 180v. Explicit (f. 180v): 'seu fulminatum fuerit eciam censuris per prelatos ex nunc'. Chapter numbering does not extend into the Richard II continuation.

A note in the bottom margin of f. 150r is a series of English verses on the life and death of Wyclif. Incipit: 'Kyng Edward the iij dyd wicklyf defend'. Explicit: '& brent alle his bones suche charitie they have'.

Decoration:

4 initials, at the beginnings of books, in colours and gold with foliate decoration including acanthus and kidney-shaped leaves extending into the margins (ff. 1r, 32r, 70r, 93r). Numerous smaller initials in blue with red pen-flourishing.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002047560", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 1729: Polychronicon by Ranulf Higden with a continuation to the reign of Richard II (c. 1398), vol. 2" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002047560

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 1729 : Polychronicon by Ranulf Higden with a continuation to the reign of Richard II (c. 1398), vol. 2

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[1731]/040-002047560

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:

1400

End Date:

1449

Date Range:

1st half of the 15th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: parchment.

Dimensions: 295 x 205 mm (text space: 215 x 125 mm), in 2 columns.

Foliation: 180ff. (ff. [i] and [181] are unfoliated modern paper flyleaves).

Script: Gothic.

Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house binding of brown mottled calf with gold fillets.

Custodial History:

Origin:

England.

Added post-medieval pagination starting with p. 185.

Nicholas Shaxton (c. 1485-1556), fellow of Gonville Hall, Cambridge (1510-1534), bishop of Salisbury (1535-1539), owned these 2 volumes until c. 1535-1539: inscription (Harley 1728, f. 1r) mentioning the gift of this manuscript by him while bishop of Salisbury to Matthew Wotton ('in minoribus constitutus Cantabridgie').

Matthew Wotton (d. 1551), scholar and fellow of King's Hall, Cambridge (1523-1540), perhaps the treasurer of Salisbury in 1551: inscription (Harley 1728, f. 1r) by Godfridus Coben, dated 1551 recording the gift by Wotton of this manuscript in 1551.

Godfridus Coben: owned these 2 volumes from 1551: inscription (Harley 1728, f. 1r). A poem added in the margin of f. 150r is dated: '1550 script[a] sunt he[c]'. While the date is one year earlier than he records receiving the book in gift, the hand may be that of Coben. It is possible he had the use of the book before Matthew Wotton formally gave it to him in 1551, perhaps on his death.

Henry Worsley (1675-1747), scholar and manuscript collector, envoy at the Court of Portugal (1714-1721) and governor of Barbados (1721-1731): donated by him to Robert Harley together with other manuscripts from Worsley's collection (now Harley 1585-1747, 1811, 1812) before December 1712 (see Wright 1972).

The Harley Collection, formed by Robert Harley (1661-1724), 1st earl of Oxford and Mortimer, politician, and Edward Harley (1689-1741), 2nd earl of Oxford and Mortimer, book collector and patron of the arts.

Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta Cavendish Harley, née Holles (1694-1755) during her lifetime and thereafter to their daughter, Margaret Cavendish Bentinck (1715-1785), 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, 1808-1812), II (1808), p. 191, no. 1729.

John Taylor, The Universal Chronicle of Ranulf Higden (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1966), p. 154.

The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, ed. by Cyril Ernest Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), I: 1715-1723, pp. xix-xx.

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. 106, 303, 361, 362-63.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Related Material:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-1812), II (1808), p. 191, no. 1729:

'Codex membranaceus in fol. min. superioris scilicet Pars altera; in quo habentur;

Pars reliqua Policraticorum rogeri Cestrensis; cum amplissima continuatione usque ad annum 1398. ubi plura de Joanne Wycliffe & ejus Sequacibus liceat invenire. Desideratur autem, aliquo infortunio, folium ultimum.'

See also the description of the preceding, companion manuscript (Harley 1728), Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts, II, p. 191, no. 1728:

'Codex membranaceus in fol, min. quo continentur,

1. Adnotatio de Distinctione Policronicae, in Septem Libros. 1. b.

2. Nomina Regum Angliae a Conquestu; et in quibus Libris & Capitulis de eis tractatur in presenti Historia; et quam diu regnarunt, et quo tempore. ibid.

3. Tabula materiarum praecipuarum, cum in praesenti tum in insequenti codice contentarum, Alphabetico Ordine disposita.

4. Historia Policronicon inscripta, quam nuper Partem Priorem Polycraticorum rogeri Monachi Cestrensis, esse deprehendi; scil. ab initio primi Libri, usq; ad finem fere Libri tertij.'