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 3396

Record Id:

040-002049227

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002049227

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000761.0x000348

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 3396

Title:

Aristotle, Ethica

Scope & Content:

ff. 1r-118r: Aristotle, Ethica, in the Latin translation by Robert Grosseteste (Parisian recension?), rubric: 'Libri primi de quibusdam preambulis ad virtutem et de felicitate politica sunt capitula xxi. Capitulum primum ostendit quod sit bonum quod in huius sciencia principaliter intenditur', incipit: 'Omnis ars et omnis doctrina similiter autem et actus'; with marginal glosses, incipit: 'Incipit ethica nicomathia.'

ff. 118v-123v: Martin of Braga, Formula vitae honestae, here attributed to Seneca as De quatuor virtutibus, rubric: 'Senece Moralius phylosophy de quatuor virtutibus libellum feliciter incipit', incipit: 'Quatuor virtutum species'; explicit: 'Prudentissimum Senece opusculum de quatuor virtutibus finit feliciter.'

Decoration:

Table of Virtues in colours and gold, in the form of a tree, with 4 coats of arms, a partial rinceaux border, and two wild men wielding clubs, preceding the Formula vitae honestae (f. 118v). 1 large initial in colours and gold with foliate motifs and a partial border with rinceaux decoration in the outer margin, at the beginning of Aristotle's Ethica (f. 1r). Another large initial in colours and gold and foliate motifs at the beginning of Formulae (f. 119r). Initials in red and blue with red and black pen-flourishing and penwork decoration (ff. 12r, 21v, 33v, 46r, 58v, 67r, 80v, 92v, 104v). Smaller initials and paraphs in blue or red. Running headers in blue and red. Rubrics in red. Capitals marked in red. Diagrams in red or black ink in the margins (ff. 50v, 51r).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002049227", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 3396: Aristotle, Ethica" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002049227

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 3396 : Aristotle, Ethica

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[3397]/040-002049227

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

Parchment codex.

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1465

End Date:

1485

Date Range:

c 1470-c 1480

Era:

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: 240 x 165 mm (text space: 150 x 85 mm).

Foliation: ff. 123 (+ 6 unfoliated flyleaves: 1 paper, 1 paper pasted on parchment and 1 parchment at the beginning and at the end). Catchwords and bifolium signatures.

Script: Gothic, with Humanistic influence.

Binding: Post-1600. Mottled brown calf with gold tooling; gilt edges.

Custodial History:

Origin: France (Paris).

Provenance:

Louis XI (b. 1423, d. 1483), King of France: the royal arms of France surmounted by a gold gem-studded crown paired with the arms of the Dauphin of France probably refer to him and his son, the future Charles VIII (b. 1470, d. 1498)

Unidentified coats of arms of a man dressed in red rending a lion; and of a cross (white?) now obscured by the arms of Pierre Séguier which have been painted over it (f. 118v).

Pierre Séguier (b. 1588, d. 1672), chancellor of France, 1635: his arms of a blue shield with two stars and a sheep, surmounted by a gem-studded crown, encircled by a collar of the Order of the Holy Spirit (?) (f. 118v).

Andrew Hay (d. 1754?), dealer: sold to Edward Harley on 5 September 1720.

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 ‘ 5 Septembris 1720’ (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.

Administrative Context:

France (Paris).

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), III (1808), no. 3396.

George Lacombe, Aristoteles Latinus (Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1939), no. 301.

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, p. 50 n.13, 68 n.1.

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. 183, 300.

Aristoteles Latinus, vol. 26: Ethica Nicomachea, ed. by L. Minio-Paluello (Leiden: Brill, 1974), p. clviii.

Paul Oskar Kristeller, Iter Italicum: Accedunt Alia Itinera: A Finding List of Uncatalogued or Incompletely Catalogued Humanistic Manuscripts of the Renaissance in Italian and other Libraries, 7 vols (London: Warburg Institute; Leiden: Brill, 1963-1997), IV (1989), p. 169.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names: