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 4374

Record Id:

040-002050211

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002050211

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000807.0x0003be

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 4374

Title:

Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicolas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 1-4

Scope & Content:

Contents:

Simon de Hesdin and Nicolas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, a translation of Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta memorabilia, in 9 books. This copy of the work is now bound in 6 volumes: Harley 4374/1, Harley 4374/2, Harley 4374/3 and Harley 4375/1, Harley 4375/2, Harley 4375/3.

Harley 4374, contains books 1 to 4, arranged as follows:

Harley 4374/1: prologues and book 1;

Harley 4374/2: book 1 (continuation), book 2 and book 3;

Harley 4373/3: book 3 (continuation) and book 4.

Simon de Hesdin, Knight Hospitaller of Jerusalem and Master of Theology (d. 1383), began the translation/commentary for Charles V in 1375, but completed only as far as book 7, chapter 4. Nicolas de Gonesse, Master of Arts and Theology, completed the work for presentation to Jean, Duc de Berry (b. 1340, d. 1416) in 1400-1401.

Decoration:

Attributed to Maître François (see Avril and Reynaud, Les manuscrits à peintures (1993), pp. 50-51).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002050211", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4374: Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicolas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 1-4" },{ "id" : "041-003314470", "parent" : "040-002050211", "text" : "Harley MS 4374/2: Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 1, 2 and 3" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-003314471", "parent" : "040-002050211", "text" : "Harley MS 4374/3: Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 3 and 4" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} },{ "id" : "041-003314474", "parent" : "040-002050211", "text" : "Harley MS 4374/1: Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, book 1" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002050211

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 4374 : Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicolas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 1-4

Contains:

Harley MS 4374/2 : Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 1, 2 and 3
Harley MS 4374/3 : Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, books 3 and 4
Harley MS 4374/1 : Valerius Maximus, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, book 1

Click here to View / search full list of parts of Harley MS 4374

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[4367]/040-002050211

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

French, Middle

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1468

End Date:

1485

Date Range:

c 1473-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:

Letter of introduction required to use this manuscript.

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment.

Dimensions: 475 x 350mm (written space: 280 x 185mm), written in two columns.

Foliation:

Harley 4374/1: ff. 80 (+ 1 unfoliated paper and 1 unfoliated medieval parchment flyleaf at the beginning and 2 paper flyleaves at the end + paper interleaves);

Harley 4374/2: ff. 88 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and 2 at the end + paper interleaves);

Harley 4374/3: ff. 85 (f. 253 is a medieval parchment flyleaf + 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and 1 unfoliated medieval parchment and 1 paper flyleaf at the end + paper interleaves).

Script: Gothic cursive.

Binding: BM/BL in-house. Rebound and divided into 3 volumes in 1933. Tooled fore edge, with quartered arms of Philippe de Comines and 'PH' monogram, no longer visible due to interleaving. Part of the former Harley binding, with Harley arms including the motto 'Virtute et fide' in gold is attached to the inside upper binding of Harley 4374/1. The remains of the former binding are kept separately, together with the those of Harley MS 4375, as Harley 4375/4.

Custodial History:

Origin: France, Central (Paris).

Provenance:

Philippe de Commynes (b. 1447, d. 1511), after his marriage, 27 January 1473: his arms (quartered with that of his mother, Marguerite d'Arnemude), and the monogram of Philippe and his wife, Hélène de Chambes-Montsoreau (d. 1531) on full-page miniatures (ff. 1r, 88r, 161r, 211r).

Inscribed in a 15th/16th century hand: 'iv grandes / xxiii [sic!] petites' (f. 253v).

The Benedictine abbey of Ste. Geneviève, Paris: erased inscription (Harley 4375, f. 1r); inventories of the library, between 1681 and 1687, and between 1710 and 1719 (see Kohler, Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève (1893)).

Charles Davis (bap. 1693, d. 1755), bookseller, an apprentice to the London bookseller Nathaniel Noel: sold to the Harleys on 24 January 1722/3 (see: Wright, Diary (1966) and Fontes Harlieani 1972).

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: part of the Harley binding with Harley arms including the motto 'Virtute et fide' attached to the inside upper binding of Harley 4374/1.

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 Originals:

Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digitised Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts.

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

Publications:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: [n. pub.], 1808-12), III, nos. 4374 and 4375.

Walter de Gray Birch and Henry Jenner, Early Drawings and Illuminations: An Introduction to the Study of Illustrated Manuscripts (London: Bagster and Sons, 1879), p. 18.

Charles Kohler, Catalogue des manuscrits de la bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève, 2 vols (Paris, 1893-96), I, pp. XCI, XCIV.

G. F. Warner, Illuminated Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: [n. pub.], 1903), pl. 50.

Alexandre de Laborde, Les Manuscrits à peintures de la Cité de Dieu de Saint Augustin, 3 vols (Paris: Société des Bibliophiles Français, 1909), II, p. 405, III, pls. LVII-LVIII.

G. F. Warner, Reproductions from Illuminated Manuscripts (London: [n. pub.], 1907), II, pl. XXXIII.

G. F. Warner, Valerius Maximus. Miniatures of the School of Jean Fouquet, illustrating the French version by Simon de Hesdin and Nicholas de Gonesse, contained in a MS. written about A.D.1475 for Philippe de Comines (London: Quaritch, 1907), passim.

Schools of Illumination: Reproductions from Manuscripts in the British Museum, 6 vols (London: British Museum, 1914-30), VI: French: Mid 14th to 16th Centuries, pp. 12-13, pl. 13.

Loren MacKinney and Thomas Herndon, Medical Illustrations in Medieval Manuscripts, Wellcome Historical Medical Library, New Series, 5 (London: Wellcome Historical Medical Library, 1965), no. 86.47.

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. 186 n. 1.

Robert Lucas, 'Medieval French Translations of the Latin Classics to 1500', Speculum, 45 (1970) , 225-53 (p. 247).

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. 110, 125, 266.

Dorothy M. Schullian, ‘A Revised List of Manuscripts of Valerius Maximus’, Miscellanea Augusto Campana: Medioevo e Umanesimo, 45 (1981), 695-728 (p. 708).

Janet Backhouse, 'French Manuscript Illumination, 1450-1530', in Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts: Treasures from the British Library, ed. by Thomas Kren (New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1983), 143-92 (p. 147, fig. III.15).

François Avril and Nicole Reynaud, Les manuscrits à peintures en France 1440-1520 (Paris: Flammarion, 1993), pp. 50, 528 [exhibition catalogue].

Janet Backhouse, The Illuminated Page: Ten Centuries of Manuscript Painting in the British Library (London: British Library, 1997), no. 172.

Nicolas Bell, Music in Medieval Manuscripts (London: British Library, 2001), p. 54.

Patricia Gathercole, The Depiction of Clothing in French Medieval Texts (New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 2008 ), p. 55.

'M. Valerius Maximus. Factorum et dictorum memorabilium libri novem: Traduction de Simon de Hesdin et Nicolas de Gonesse (1375-1401): Manuscrits', in Frédéric Duval and Jeanne Viellard, Miroir des classiques, 17 (Éditions en ligne de l'École des chartes) [http://elec.enc.sorbonne.fr/miroir/valeremaxime/traduction/?para=Hesdin_Gonesse#mspartie1] [accessed 1 June 2016].

Irit Ruth Kleiman, Philppe de Commynes: Memory, Betrayal, Text (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2013), p. 257.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Related Archive Descriptions:

Harley MS 4375