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 2345
- Record Id:
- 040-002048176
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002048176
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000709.0x000355
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 2345
- Title:
-
A collection of sermons
- Scope & Content:
-
A collection of sermons written in England, as suggested by the presence of sermons for several English saints including Alphege, Frideswide, and Samson.
Contents:
ff. 1r-23r: sermons for different days of the year, mostly Sundays.
ff. 23r-79r: sermons for different saints’ days.
ff. 79v: vow for becoming an anchorite.
ff. 80r-86r: Thomas of Cobham, Summa de arte praedicandi (Compendium of the Art of Preaching), ending imperfectly.
ff. 86v: extract from St Augustine on the soul.
ff. 86v: short text on the Ten Commandments, Old English, partially erased.
ff. 87r: notes on pride, envy, anger, and gluttony, Old English.
ff. 87v: note on Christ’s passion.
1 parchment stub after f. 87.
According to Phyllis B. Roberts, ff. 57-58 of this manuscript may have served as the exemplar for Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 96, ff. 180v-181 (late 15th century); see Roberts 1992, 177.
Quire marks (in the centre of the lower margin of the verso of the last leaf of the quire); horizontal catchwords.
Crossed tironian ets.
Decoration:
Numerous initials in red with light blue penwork decoration, or in blue with red penwork decoration. Simple initials in red or blue. Highlighting of letters in red.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002048176", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 2345: A collection of sermons" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002048176 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 2345 : A collection of sermons - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[2346]/040-002048176
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- Languages:
- English, Old
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1250
- End Date:
- 1299
- Date Range:
- 2nd half of the 13th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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.
Dimensions: 190 x 140 mm (written space: 150 x 110 mm) in 2 columns.
Foliation: ff. 87 (+ 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and 4 at the end).
Script: Gothic, written below top line.
Binding: British Museum in-house. Rebound in 1968; trace of one metal fastening of a previous binding on f. 1.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: England, Central (Winchcombe?).
Provenance:
Perhaps written at the Benedictine Abbey of Winchcombe, Gloucester or copied from a Winchcombe manuscript: the manuscript includes sermons of a Winchcombe monk (see Catalogue 1808, pp. 660-662).
Added texts and notes in Latin including Thomas of Cobham's Summa de Arte Praedicatoria (ff. 80-86), and English, 13th-15th centuries (ff. 80r-87v).
Samuel Knott (d. 1687), rector of Combe Raleigh, Devon (1661-1668), antiquary and collector of manuscripts: added notes (see Wright 1972).
Johannes Batteson, 17th century: inscribed with his name (f. 87v).
Robert Burscough (b. 1650/51, d.1709), prebendary of Exeter in 1701, archdeacon of Barnstaple in 1703, rector of Cheriton Bishop in 1705; sold by his widow on 17 May 1715 to Robert Harley, along with other manuscripts (see Wright 1972, 87-88; Diary 1966).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, inscribed as usual by their librarian, Humfrey Wanley ‘17 May 1715’ (f. 1r).
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), no. 2345.
C. H. Talbot, ‘A List of Cistercian Manuscripts in Great Britain’, Traditio: Studies in Ancient and Medieval History, Thought and Religion, 8 (1952), 402-18 (p. 405).
The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, ed. by C. E. Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), I: 1715-1723, p. 11 n. 6.
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. 68, 88, 211, 355.
Phyllis B. Roberts, Thomas Becket in the Medieval Latin Preaching Tradition: An Inventory of Sermons about St Thomas Becket c.1170-1400 (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff International, 1992), pp. 175, 177.
Siegfried Wenzel, Latin Sermon Collections from Later Medieval England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 222.
Kathryn A. Smith, '"A Lanterne of Lyght to the People": English Narrative Alabaster Images of John the Baptist in their Visual, Religious and Social Contexts', Studies in Iconography, 42 (2021), 53-94 (88, n. 89).
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Places:
- Winchcombe, England