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Harley MS 2431

Record Id:

040-002048262

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002048262

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000709.0x0003ab

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 2431

Title:

Breviary, with a York calendar and other liturgical texts

Scope & Content:

This breviary is a rare surviving example of a late medieval book that is known to have been used in (at least) two parish or local church settings: at the chapel of St Giles’s Hospital near Brompton-on-Swale, and slightly later in the chantry of St Giles, in the chapel of Ravensworth Castle, both in North Yorkshire. It also contains thorough directions for performing the marriage ceremony, with the words to be said by the bride and groom written in Middle English.

Contents:

ff. 4r-9v: Calendar, including the Feast of the Relics of York Cathedral (19 October).

ff. 10r-29r: Sanctorale.

ff. 29v-37r: The Seven Penitential Psalms.

ff. 37r-40v: Litany, including important English and Northumbrian saints, such as Alban (d. 3rd or 4th century), Oswald (d. 992), Wilfrid (d. c. 709-710), Cuthbert (d. 687), Swithun (d. 863), Edmund (d. 869, who is mentioned twice), Edward (d. 978), Hilda or Hild (d. 680), Æthelthryth or ‘Etheldreda’ (d. 679).

ff. 40v-44v: Various prayers.

ff. 45r-47v: Benedictions, including the blessing of salt and water (ff. 47r-47v).

ff. 48r-58r: Marriage sacrament, the original rubric of which has been erased and a new heading was added in 1550, reading ‘Sanc[t]o sacramento matrimoni Anno Domini 1550’. In Latin, except for the words to be said by bride and groom during the ceremony, which are written in English (ff. 50r, 51r).

ff. 58v-140v: Temporale, with square musical annotation on four-line staves for the antiphones on ff. 89r-136r. Folios probably lost between f. 64 and f. 65.

The manuscript contains various additions:

f. 1r: Responsories, beginning: 'Attendite popule meus legem'; added in the 15th century.

ff. 2r-3v: A prayer to Christ, beginning: 'Domine sacerdos et vere pontifex Jhesu Christe qui te obtulisti deo patri hostiam puram'; added in the 15th century.

f. 9v (margin): An inscription: 'Lawrence waffar'; added in the (?) 16th century.

ff. 141r-142r: Liturgical prayers, beginning imperfectly: 'peregrinorum in opiam debilium, disperaciones languencium. defectus senum. suspiria iuvenum. vota virginum. lamenta viduarum'; added in the 15th century.

Decoration:

11 large initials in blue with foliate decoration in colours on a gold ground, with a full bar border (ff. 10r, 26r, 29v, 45r, 48r, 54r, 65r, 72r, 86r, 89r, 95r). 2 large initials in blue with foliate decoration in colours and gold, with a three-sided bar border (ff. 117v, 126v). Small initials in gold and colours with foliate pen-flourishing in colours and gold (e.g., f. 14r). Small initials in blue with red pen-flourishing throughout. Small initials in brown ink with penwork decoration, including foliate motifs and faces, used only for the antiphons with musical notation (ff. 89r-136r). Capitals in red or blue, or in dark ink and marked in red. Headings in red.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002048262", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 2431: Breviary, with a York calendar and other liturgical texts" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002048262

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 2431 : Breviary, with a York calendar and other liturgical texts

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[2432]/040-002048262

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

English, Middle
Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1400

End Date:

1424

Date Range:

1st quarter of the 15th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

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Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment.

Dimensions: 170 x 120 mm (text space: 110 x 65 mm).

Foliation: ff. 142 (+ 4 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the beginning + 4 unfoliated modern paper flyleaves at the end); 1 unfoliated ruled parchment folio after f. 64; the top margin of f. 4 is damaged and was later repaired with a parchment strip. Folios contain several stains of ink and probably candle wax; the text at the bottom half of many folios is worn and faded.

Collation: Quires mainly regular quaternions; catchwords consistently written horizontally in bottom right margin; the quires are now mounted separately on paper guards.

Script: Gothic.

Binding: British Museum in-house; red half leather with the Harleian arms gold stamped on the outside covers; the previous covers of gilt-tooled dark brown leather are pasted on the inside of the current covers; rebound on 27 October 1965.

Custodial History:

Origin:

Yorkshire.

Provenance:

The chapel of St Giles’ Hospital, near Brompton-on-Swale, in Easby parish, Yorkshire, owned in the late 15th century: according to an inscription on f. 140v: ‘Iste liber fuit de capella sancti Egidii iuxta Brumton super Swale et iam pertinet as cantariam eiusdem sancti Egidii in capella sancti Johannis evangeliste infra castrum sive manerium de Ravenswathe' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), pp. 83-84).

The chantry of St Giles, in the chapel of St John the Evangelist at Ravensworth Castle in North Yorkshire, founded by Henry FitzHugh, 3rd Baron FitzHugh (b. c. 1363, d. 1425) in 1468, owned the manuscript in the late 15th century: according to an inscription on f. 140v [transcribed above]; the name 'Fitzhugh' inscribed in a 15th-century script on f. 142v (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 282).

Ardynton of Ardyn (possibly referring to Arden in Hawnby, near Helmsley, Yorkshire), 16th century: their name inscribed in on f. 142v: 'mayster Ardynton of Ardyn' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 53).

Anthony Pickering (most likely of the noble Yorkshire Pickering family), possibly a relative of Sir William Pickering (b. 1516/1517, d. 1575, courtier and diplomat, owned in the late 16th century or 17th century: according to an inscription on f. 110v: 'Anthony Pickeringe book' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 276).

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.

Information About Copies:

Select digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/welcome.htm.

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), II (1808), p. 691 (no. 2431).

Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by N. R. Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), pp. 219, 222.

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. 53, 83, 276, 282.

John B. Friedman, Northern English Books, Owners, and Makers in the Late Middle Ages (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1995), pp. 114, 245.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Places:

Yorkshire, England

Related Material:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, II (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808), p. 691:

‘Liturgia ecclesiae Romanae: cum Calendario, et notis Musicis. Codex membranaceus. XV.'