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Harley MS 4066

Record Id:

040-002049903

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002049903

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000807.0x000242

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 4066

Title:

Petrus Riga, Aurora; Johannes de Alta Villa, Architrenius

Scope & Content:

This composite manuscript consists of two parts (ff. 2r-171v and ff. 173r-224v) that were produced separately in the 1st half of the 13th century.

Contents:

ff. 2r-171v: Petrus Riga, Aurora.

ff. 173r-224v: Johannes de Alta Villa [Hauteville], Architrenius; imperfect at the end.

The manuscript contains several additions:

Numerous marginal annotations in Gothic cursive added to Riga's text, 13th century.

f. 1r: A title-page for 'Aurora' and 'Architrenius' in English with references to other manuscripts ('Aug: Cant: Ben: Col: 1319', 'Corpus Christi College, Oxford': inscribed and 'ibid. Col: Corp: Chr: Oxf: numb: 1655'); added in the 17th or 18th century.

f. 172r: A title-page for Architrenius in Latin; 'Architrenius seu Liber de Potentia Laboris et Ingenu [...]'l; with references to other manuscripts in the Cotton library, Bodleian Library, and the collection of Kenelm Digby; added in the 17th century.

f. 225r: A list of contents for Architrenius; added in the 13th century.

f. 225v: Inscriptions relating to liturgical feasts (with instructions such as 'Ante natale' and 'Ante Pasche'); added in the 13th century.

Decoration:

Initials in red or blue with pen-flourishing in the other colour (ff. 2r-116v; and in a more skilled hand, ff. 173r-224v). Initials in red with green pen-flourishing and coloured initials in green or red (ff. 117r-171v; this corresponds to the beginning of the New Testament). Some initials with brown pen-flourishing or descenders decorated with brown ink (e. g., ff. 141r-142r). Running titles in red and blue throughout. Paraphs in red or blue with pen-flourishing in the other colour. Paraph in red with green pen-flourishing (f. 202r only). Added marginal drawings in brown ink: head of a man (ff. 4v, 11v), a bird by a pond with fish (f. 48v), a hare (f. 102v), and a table with several columns (f. 132v).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002049903", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4066: Petrus Riga, Aurora; Johannes de Alta Villa, Architrenius" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002049903

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 4066 : Petrus Riga, Aurora; Johannes de Alta Villa, Architrenius

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[4059]/040-002049903

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1200

End Date:

1249

Date Range:

1st half of the 13th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment (of poor quality).

Dimensions: 180 x 115 mm (text space: 140 x 45/50 mm).

Foliation: ff. 225 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 2 at the end); f. 1 forms a paper bifolio with f. [ii]; ff. 173r-224v have been foliated independently in a medieval hand and the decoration is in a different style.

Collation: Mainly in quires of 8. Indicated by quire marks (letters on the verso of the last leaf of each quire, or Roman numerals from quire starting f. 117); each quire has been mounted separately onto a paper guard.

Script: Gothic, written above top line (ff. 2-42v; 117-171v; 173-224v) and below top line; written by several hands.

Binding: British Museum in-house. Brown half leather binding with the Harleian armorial bookplate gold-stamped on the outsides of the upper and lower covers. Rebound on 17 February 1964.

Custodial History:

Origin:

England.

Provenance:

An unknown post-medieval owner: their added pressmark 'no 1' on f. [ii]recto.

'Thomas Hunter', 'Robert Johnson', 17th century: their names inscribed in the same hand on f. 172v: 'Tho: Hunter Robert Johnson' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), pp. 201, 206).

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: [n. pub.], 1808-12), III (1808), p. 113 [no. 4066].

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. 201, 206.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Johannes de Alta villa [Hauteville or Hauvilla], fl 1184,
see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000108875432
Riga, Petrus, canon of Rheims cathedral and poet, c 1140-1209

Places:

England