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Harley MS 4430
- Record Id:
- 040-002050267
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002050267
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000807.0x00035e
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 4430
- Title:
- Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicholas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens volume 1: books 1-3.
- Scope & Content:
-
Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta memorabilia, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicholas de Gonesse as Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens, volume 1, containing Books I-IV.
ff. 1r-32v: A table of rubrics, beginning with the title, 'Cy commencent les rubrices du livre Valerius Maximus translaté de latin en françois par maistre Simon de Hesdin ouquel il traitte des Rommains et des Cartagemens et de pluiseurs autres nations et de leurs guerres.'
ff. 33r--35r: Translator's prologue.
ff. 35r-38v: Author's prologue.
ff. 38v-194v: Book 1.
ff. 195v-340r: Book 2.
ff. 341r-438r: Book 3, imperfect at the beginning (the first folio containing the miniature is lacking), begins '...car a la verité cellui Lepidus fut moult bon chevalier'.
ff. 438v-516v: Book 4. Ends: 'Icy fine le quatrieme livre et le premier volume de Valerius Maximus'.
This manuscript was intended as part of a two-volume set; the location of the second volume is unknown. The text is based on the edition princeps or first printed edition, produced in Flanders (?Bruges) before 1477 by the 'Printer of Flavius Josephus' (see Dubois, Valère Maxime, (2016), pp. 291, 387).
Decoration:
3 large miniatures in colours and gold with decorated initials and full scatter borders with flowers, acanthus leaves, human figures and hybrid creatures, at the beginning of books 1, 2 and 4 (ff. 33r, 195v, 438v). Puzzle initials in red or blue (ff. 35r, 55r, 155r). Coloured initials in red or blue. Cadels, occasionally including a face (f. 43r), or a leaf (e.g., ff. 74r, 108v). Paraphs in red or blue. Ruling in pink.
Full descriptions of the large miniatures:
f. 33r: Presentation scene of Simon de Hesdin presenting his book to the king of France Charles V; in the foreground, a dog pursues a monkey. The border includes a monkey mounted on a sheep (damaged); two figures facing each other, one with a lance and one playing a pipe; and a blank space for a coat of arms, at the beginning of book 1.
f. 195v: The banquets of the Temperate and Intemperate, with Valerius Maximus on the left, showing Tiberius two scenes in the interior of a castle: in the foreground on the right the diners, including a woman, are seated at a table and attendants are bringing food and drink; in the background the diners are fighting around the table, one with a knife, and a stool is overturned.. The border includes two knights fighting, a figure slaying a dragon, a fourth figure with axe and wood; and a blank space for a coat of arms, at the beginning of book 2.
f. 438v: Valerius Maximus and Tiberius watch as Valerius Publicola has his fortress destroyed and a smaller house built. The border contains three figures, and a blank space for a coat of arms, at the beginning of book 4.
The artist is identified with the circle of the Master of the Chattering Hands, active in Bruges in the 1470s and 80s and the miniatures can be dated to the early 1480s, based on the clothing fashions, according to Dubois, Valère Maxime (2016).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002050267", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4430: Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicholas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens volume 1:…" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002050267 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 4430 : Valerius Maximus, translated by Simon de Hesdin and Nicholas de Gonesse, Les Fais et les Dis des Romains et de autres gens volume… - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[4423]/040-002050267
- 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:
- 1475
- End Date:
- 1499
- Date Range:
- 4th quarter of the 15th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Paper.
Dimensions: 365 x 270 mm (text space 235 x 185 mm), written in 2 columns.
Foliation: ff. 516 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 2 unfoliated ruled leaves after f. 32 + 1 unfoliated ruled unwritten parchment leaf and 2 paper flyleaves at the end). Old foliation in red Roman numerals from the beginning of the translation.
Script: Gothic cursive (batarde).
Binding: BM/BL in-house. Edges speckled with blue and red ink.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: The Southern Netherlands.
Provenance:
Watermark of a bell with a cross (see ff. 33, 47) similar to C. M. Briquet, Les Filigranes: Dictionnaire historique des marques du papier dès leur apparition vers 1282 jusqu'en 1600:a facsimile of the 1907 edition with supplementary material, ed. by Allan Stevenson, 4 vols (Amsterdam: Paper Publications Society, 1968), no. 4086 (Sens, 1446), and shield with 3 fleurs de lys and the letters 'J' and 'P' (see f. 395), similar to Briquet no. 1760 (Calvados, 1474; Mayence, Bruges, 1477), but with different letters.
Nathaniel Noel (fl. 1681, d. c. 1753), bookseller, employed by Edward Harley for buying books and manuscripts chiefly on the Continent, where his agent was George Suttie; sold to Edward Harley on 18 January 1723/4 (Wright 1972; Diary 1966). 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 ‘Januarij die 18, A.D. 1723/4’ (f. [ii] recto).
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), III (1808), no. 4430.
The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, ed. by Cyril Ernest Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), II: 1723-1726, p. 269 n. 8.
Robert H. Lucas, 'Mediaeval French Translations of the Latin Classics to 1500', Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies, 45-2 (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. 253-54.
Dorothy M. Schullian, ‘A Revised List of Manuscripts of Valerius Maximus’, Miscellanea Augusto Campana: Medioevo e Umanesimo 45 (1981), 695-728 (p. 708).
'M. Valerius Maximus. Factorum et dictorum memorabilium libri novem: Traduction de Simon de Hesdin et Nicolas de Gonesse (1375-1401)', in Frédéric Duval and Jeanne Viellard, Miroir des classiques, 17 (Éditions en ligne de l'École des Chartes) at http://elec.enc.sorbonne.fr/miroir_des_classiques/xml/classiques_latins/factorum_dictorum_memorabilium_libri_ix_valerius_maximus.xml#bl_harley4430 [accessed 1.10.2021].
Anne Dubois, Valère Maxime en francais à la fin du Moyen Age: Images et tradition, Manuscripta Illuminata (Turnhout, Brepols, 2016), pp. 153, 291, 299, 304, 307, 317, 384, 415.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)