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Harley MS 2250

Record Id:

040-002048081

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002048081

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000709.0x0002f6

LARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100161514255.0x000001

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 2250

Title:

Middle English Life of Christ and other saints' Lives and theological texts

Scope & Content:

Contents:

ff. 1r-44r: Middle English stanzaic Life of Christ in verse (Circumcision, the first leaf of which has been misbound between ff. 44 and f. 45; Epiphay; Purification of the Virgin Mary; Innocents; Septuagesima; Sexagesima; Quinquagesima; Quadragesima; Lent; the Passion; Pilate; Judas; Resurrection; Minor Litany; Major Litany; Ascension; Pentecost).

ff. 45r-47v: Verse text on the descent of the Holy Spirit.

ff. 48r-49v: The life of St Martin of Tours in Middle English from the South English Legendary.

ff. 50r-64r: John Watton (?), Speculum Christiani, in Latin and Middle English.

ff. 64v-68r: Themata Dominicalia, excerpted from the Pseudo-Bonaventuran Dieta Salutis (Latin).

ff. 68r-72r: Tabula Diete Salutis, excerpted from the Pseudo-Bonaventuran Dieta Salutis (Latin).

f. 72r: Lists of the Articles of Faith, Seven Sacraments, Ten Commandments, Seven Deadly Sins; theological verses; Seven Works of Corporal and Spiritual Mercy (Latin).

ff. 72v-75v: The Life of St Erkenwald (Middle English).

ff. 75v-76v: The Life of St John the Baptist (Middle English) from the South English Legendary; followed by the opening lines of the Life of St Peter.

ff. 77r-77v: The Life of St Alban (Middle English) from the South English Legendary.

f. 77v: The Life of St Julian the Confessor (Middle English) from the South English Legendary.

ff. 77v-78v: The Life of St Julian the Hospitaller (Middle English) from the South English Legendary.

ff. 79r-80v: The Legend of the Rood (Middle English).

ff. 80v-81r: History of the Invention of the Cross (Middle English).

ff. 81r-81v: The Life of St Quiriac (Middle English).

ff. 81v-83r: The Life of St Helena (Middle English).

ff. 83r-83v: The ‘Exaltation’ of the Cross (Middle English).

ff. 84r-84v: John Mirk, Sermon for the feast of Corpus Christi (Festial).

ff. 85r-85v: John Mirk, Deus expediat me (sermon for Corpus Christi in the Festial).

ff. 85v-86v: John Mirk, Sermon for the feast of St Philip and St James.

ff. 86v-87r: Five exempla excerpted from John Mirk’s Festial.

f. 87v: Two Middle English tracts on the reckoning of time, also featuring in Harley MS 218, ff. 73v-74r, where one of its Latin quotations is attributed to Alfraganus; followed by two unidentified theological tracts in Latin and Middle English (ink faded).

ff. 88r-93v, 95r-108r: Anonymous theological tract on the Ten Commandments, vices and virtues (Middle English), featuring extracts from the Memoriale credencium.

f. 94r: Robert of Winchelsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, Constitutio de Juramento ac Obedientia Rectoribus sive Vicariis de illis Capellanis qui in eorum Ecclesiis sive Parochiis celebrant inpendendis.

The manuscript contains several later additions:

f. 49v: A Latin citation from the Elucidarium, added in the 15th century.

f. 49v: A Middle English note about tears in prayer, attributed to John Chrysostom, added in the 15th century.

f. 72r: A theological tract (lower margin), added in the 15th century.

f. 83v: A Middle English citation on calculating the distance between earth and heaven, attributed to Maimoinedes, added in the 15th century.

f. 83v: A Middle English medicinal recipe, added in the 15th century.

f. 87r: A Latin note, added in the 15th century.

Decoration:

Small red initials.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002048081", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 2250: Middle English Life of Christ and other saints' Lives and theological texts" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002048081

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 2250 : Middle English Life of Christ and other saints' Lives and theological texts

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[2252]/040-002048081

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100161514255.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)

Thumbnail:

Languages:

English, Middle
Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1450

End Date:

1499

Date Range:

2nd half of the 15th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Paper.

Dimensions: 285 x 205 mm.

Foliation: ff. 108 + 44a + 93* + 93** (+ 3 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning + at the end); f. 44a is a fragmentary leaf that originally was placed at the beginning of the manuscript but has been misbound between f. 44 and f. 45; f. 93* and f. 93** are two blank paper leaves between f. 93 and f. 94; 1 unfoliated paper pastedown with a note concerning the position of f. 1 between f. [iii] and f. 1; each leaf has been mounted onto a paper guard.

Script: Gothic cursive.

Binding: Post-1600. British Museum in-house.

Custodial History:

Origin:

Cheshire (ff. 1r-65v) and West Riding of Yorkshire (ff. 88vr-108r).

Provenance:

John Watton, copied ff. 50r-64r in 1477: a colophon on f. 64v: ‘Explicit Speculum Christiani anno domini M^oCCCC^molxxvij^o’; ff. 1-49 and ff. 65-83 probably are in the same hand; ff. 85-108 in other undated hands but the dialect suggests an origin in North-western England.

‘Thomas Masse’, owned in the late 15th or early 16th century: his name inscribed on f. 13r: ‘Thomas Masse’’ and f. 64v: ‘Thomas masse esquier’.

‘William Barton’, owned in the 16th century: his name (‘Willyam Barton’) on f. 75v, added in the late 15th or early 16th century.

? ‘Kesebit’: this (?) name in the opening of a bond on f. 75v: ‘Noverint universi per presentes nos [?] Kesebyt bothe of dunnam in the comytye of chester’, added in the late 15th or early 16th century.

Thomas Bowker [Boker], cantarist in the chantry of the Booths of Barton at Eccles, Lancashire, owned c. 1530: his name inscribed on f. 8r: ‘Sir Thomas Boker hos Thys boke’; and f. 71r: ‘Syr Thomas Bowker mine emys’.

Elizabeth Booth of Dunham Massey, Cheshire, owned between c. 1531-1541: her name in marginalia on f. 75v

(?) ‘Ravens’, owned in the 17th century: his name inscribed on f. 1r.

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), II (1808), pp. 577-78.

Julia Boffey and A. S. G. Edwards, A New Index of Middle English Verse (London: The British Library, 2005), nos 82/14, 428/1, 1286/20, 1755/1, 2167/22, 2233.5/8, 2842/13, 2893/1, 2945/15, 2949/16, 2950/17, 3005/13, 3046/18, 3051/13, 3388/14, 3687/8, 4150/18.

Veronica O'Mara and Suzanne Paul, A Repertorium of Middle English Prose Sermons, 4 vols, Sermo: Studies on Patristic, Medieval, and Reformation Sermons and Preaching, 1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), II, pp. 1208-1209.

Harry Leigh Douglas Ward and John Alexander Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), III (1910), pp. 705-707.

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: The Text, p. 121 (no. 645); II: The Plates, pl. 802.

Cyril Ernest Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), p. 405.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Places:

England