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Harley MS 3865
- Record Id:
- 040-002049701
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002049701
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000807.0x000178
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 3865
- Title:
-
Robert Henryson, Fables
- Scope & Content:
-
A series of 13 verse fables with moralisations, and two prologues, containing altogether 2968 lines, arranged in 416 seven-line stanzas and 7 eight-line stanzas. The author, Robert Henryson, is thought to have composed this text during the 1470s (Ward, Catalogue of Romances (1893), II, 354), using a Middle Scots dialect that has much in common with the language of northern Middle English works.
This manuscript of Henryson's poems is a copy of Bassandyne's edition printed in Edinburgh in 1571 (see Bawcutt, 'Scottish Manuscript Miscellanies' (2005), p. 57; Fox, The Poems (1981), pp. liii-liv). The drawing of the cock (f. 3v) and the representation of the preacher, the birds in a tree, and the bird held by a hand (f. 43v) closely recall similar woodcuts in the edition (see below).
- f. 1v: The title-page is as follows: 'The Morall fabillis of Esope compylit be Maister Robert Henrisoun Scolmaister of Dunfermling', with the date 1571.
- ff. 2r-3r: The first prologue, in 9 seven-line stanzas. The second prologue is prefixed to 'The taill of the Lyoun and the Mous' on ff. 36r-37v below. In the following list, each stanza is of seven lines, unless otherwise stated.
- ff. 3v-6r: Cock and Jewel, in 9 stanzas, with a 'Moralitas' in 5 stanzas.
- ff. 6v-12r: Town Mouse and Country Mouse, 29 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 4 eight-line stanzas.
- ff. 12v-17v: Cock and Fox, 27 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 3 stanzas.
- ff. 18r-22v: Fox confessing to Friar Wolf, 23 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 3 stanzas.
- ff. 23r-31r: Parliament of Beasts, 43 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 7 stanzas.
- ff. 31v-35v: Dog versus Sheep, Wolf as Judge, 16 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 9 stanzas.
- ff. 36r-37v: The second prologue, in 12 stanzas.
- ff. 38r-43r: Lion and Mouse, 24 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 7 stanzas.
- ff. 43v-51r: Swallow and other Birds, 38 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 9 stanzas.
- ff. 51v-57v: Fox and Wolf and the creel of herrings, 36 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 4 stanzas.
- ff. 58r-63r: Fox and Wolf and the shadow of the moon, 28 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 4 stanzas.
- ff. 63v-67r: Wolf and Ram (Ram in the skin of dead Dog), 19 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 4 stanzas.
- ff. 67r-70v: Wolf and Lamb, 13 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 10 stanzas.
- ff. 71r-75r: Mouse and Frog, 19 stanzas; 'Moralitas' in 9 stanzas of which the first 3 are of eight lines.
Decoration:
Two marginal drawings in ink and colours, one representing a cock (f. 3v: 'The taill of the Cok and the Jasp'), and the other of a preacher in a pulpit, a tree full of birds, and a hand holding a bird (f. 43v: 'The preiching of the Swallow').
Historiated initial in colours of a man in profile (f. 51v).
Title page with title and full border in all'antica style with foliate decoration in colours (f. 1v).
Tail-piece with foliate decoration and a medallion of the profile of a man in helmet in ink and colours (f. 75r).
14 epigraphic initials with foliate decoration in colours, at the opening of the first prologue and fables (ff. 2r, 3v, 6v, 12v, 18r, 23r, 31v, 36r, 43r, 51v, 58r, 63v, 67r, 71r).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002049701", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 3865: Robert Henryson, Fables" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002049701 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 3865 : Robert Henryson, Fables - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[3857]/040-002049701
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Harley_MS_3865 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1571
- End Date:
- 1571
- Date Range:
- 1571
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript.
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Paper.
Dimensions: 285 x 190 mm (text space 200/215 x 110/115 mm).
Foliation: ff. 75 (plus 6 unfoliated flyleaves: one contemporary and two modern at both the beginning and the end).
Collation: Leaves are individually mounted on guards.
Script: Gothic cursive (Secretary).
Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
Scotland.
Provenance:
?Dr Archibald Pitcairne (d. 1713), Edinburgh physician, wit and Jacobite: possibly the manuscript listed in the posthumous catalogue of his library by Thomas Ruddiman, now Edinburgh, University of Edinburgh Library, M. La. III. 629, p. 11, no. 304 (see Fox, The Poems (1981), pp. lvi-lvii).
?The Emperor Peter I of Russia (b. 1672, d. 1725): bought for his library as part of Pitcairne's library sale negotiated by Thomas Ruddiman; sold to Edward Harley by the emperor librarian and director of the Russian Academy of Science, Schumacher, around 1729 (see Fox, The Poems (1981), p. lvi-lvii).
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), III (1808), p. 88.
Poems and Fables of Robert Henryson, ed. by David Laing (Edinburgh: William Paterson, 1865), pp. 228, 266.
Harry L. D. Ward and John A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), II: Harry L. D. Ward (1893), pp. 354-56.
Douglas Gray, Robert Henryson (Leiden: Brill, 1979), p. 62.
The poems of Robert Henryson, ed. by Denton Fox (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981), pp. liii-liv, lvi-lvii.
Chris Fletcher, Roger Evans and Sally Brown, 1000 Years of English Literature: A Treasury of Literary Manuscripts (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2003), pp. 42-43.
Priscilla Bawcutt, 'Scottish Manuscript Miscellanies from the Fifteenth to the Seventeenth Century', in English Manuscripts Studies 1100-1700, 12, Scribes and Transmission in English Manuscripts 1400-1700, ed. by Peter Beal and A.S.G. Edwards (London: The British Library, 2005), pp. 46-73 (pp. 57, 71 n. 43).
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)