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Harley MS 4487
- Record Id:
- 040-002050325
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002050325
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000807.0x0003d8
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100057738460.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 4487
- Title:
-
Aimon de Varennes, Roman de Florimont
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains the Roman de Florimont by Aimon de Varennes. Aimon wrote his work at Chatillon d'Azergues in the Forez region near Lyon in 1188. The poem, consisting of over 13000 lines, is in the Lyonnais dialect and relates the adventures of Florimont, the fictitious grandfather of Alexander the Great, a prequel to the Roman d'Alexandre.
Several folios, containing lines 1183-2370 and 8005-8152 are lacking (see Hilka, Florimont (1932), p. x). The text ends in the middle of a description of the King of Hungary on f. 10v and resumes on f. 11r with Florimont as a young man fighting a monster, so that the section on the birth and education of Florimont is missing. Hilka informs us that the manuscript has lacunae at ll. 1183-2370 and ll. 8005-8152.
Contents:
ff. 1r-2v: Guido Faba, Summa de modo dictaminis (partially erased fragment), beginning, 'Quasi modo genitis infantes' (f. 1r);
ff. 3r-86r: Aimon (or Aimé) de Varennes, Roman de Florimont, beginning, 'Cil qui at cuer de vaselage', and ending, 'Adonc fu retrais par aymon', with a colophon ending: 'sil deffende de pechiécil qui l'escrist, par sa pitié'.
ff. 87r-88v: Guido Faba, Summa de modo dictaminis (partially erased fragment), ending, 'dilecto amico suo abbati' (f. 88v).
Decoration:
Ink drawings on the endleaves (ff. 1v, 86v).
Initials in red. Rubrics in red in the Summa (ff. 1r-2v, 87r-88v).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002050325", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4487: Aimon de Varennes, Roman de Florimont" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002050325 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 4487 : Aimon de Varennes, Roman de Florimont - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[4481]/040-002050325
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100057738460.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- French
French, Old - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1295
- End Date:
- 1295
- Date Range:
- 1295
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript.
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 260 x 170 mm (text space: 215 x 130 mm).
Foliation: ff. 88 (+ 2 unfoliated parchment flyleaves and at the end + 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning and 3 at the end).
Collation: i2(ff. 1-2), ii-v8(ff. 3-42), vi7(ff. 43-49),vii-x8(ff. 50-81),xi5(ff. 82-86), xii2(ff. 87-88).
Layout: 2 columns of 37 lines.
Script: Gothic.
Binding: British Museum in-house. Rebound in 1964.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: Eastern France (possibly Lotharingia).
Provenance:
The date, 1295, in the colophon on f. 86r: 'Et quant cis romans fu escris / Corroit. M. CC. xxIIII / et quinze ens a mois aoust'.
One of four manuscripts from Eastern France (see Busby, 'Miniatures in BnF15101' (2005)).
Pierre Derloit, ? Procureur of the Collège de Dormans-Beauvais in Paris from 1412 to 1414, inscribed: 'Pierre Derloit prestre ?Corodathis' in the lower margin in a hand of the 14th or early 15th century (f. 3r) and P. Derloit (ff. 4r, 86r).
Nicolas Joseph Foucault (b. 1643, d. 1721), marquis de Magny, statesman and bibliophile, his book-plate with the legend 'EX BIBLIOTHECA | NICOLAI JOSEPH FOUCAULT | COMITIS CONSISTORIANI' and coat of arms ([sable] a lion rampant, dexter, crowned [argent], as supporters two lions [argent]; a couronne de marquis surmounting the shield) on the upper flyleaf (??f. iv) and his embossed coats of arms from the former binding pasted to the modern inside upper and lower bindings.
Thomas Ballard, bookseller and book auctioneer in London; his sale, 20 February 1720/21, lot 303, bought for Edward Harley through Nathaniel Noel (a note on f. 1r and see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (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. Edward Harley bequeathed the library to his widow, Henrietta, née Cavendish 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:
-
Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digitised Manuscripts at http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts.
- Publications:
-
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), III, p. 163.
Francisque Michel, 'Rapport de M. Francisque Michel, suivi de Descriptions et extraits de manuscrits, Collection de documents inédits sur l'histoire de France publiés par ordre du roi et par les soins du Ministre de l'instruction publique. Rapports au Ministre, Paris, Imprimerie royale, 1839, pp. 35-203 (pp. 122-23).
H. L. D. Ward and J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), I (1883), pp. 156-59.
Aimon de Varennes, Florimont, ed. by A. Hilka (Gottingen: Gesellschaft fur romanische Literatur, 1932), p. x.
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. 62, 445.
Andrew G. Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 700-1600 in The Department of Manuscripts: The British Library, 2 vols (London: British Library, 1979), no. 810, pl. 180.
Laurence Half-Lancner, 'Le Florimont d'Aimon de Varennes: un prologue du Roman d'Alexandre', Cahiers de civilisation medievale, 37 (1994), 241-53 [on the text].
Douglas Kelley, 'The composition of Aimon de Varennes' Florimont', Romance Philology, 23 (1969-1970), 277-92.
Keith Busby, Codex and Context: Reading Old French Verse Narrative in Manuscript (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2002), pp 171, 175, 180.
Keith Busby, 'Filling in the Blanks: The Missing Miniatures in BnF15101 of Florimont 'in "De Sens Rassis": Essays in honour of Rupert T. Pickens ed. by Keith Busby and others (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2005), pp. 85-96 (p. 85).
Joanne Marie Young, 'A Study of Aimon de Varennes' Florimont' (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Sheffield, 2010), pp. 6, 7, online at British Library Electronic Theses Online System (EThOS), no 527245 [accessed 4.1.2022].
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)