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Harley MS 4868
- Record Id:
- 040-002050711
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002050711
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000859.0x000182
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165169583.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 4868
- Title:
- Pliny the Younger, De Viris Illustribus and Epistolae
- Scope & Content:
-
Contents:
f. 1r: Suetonius, Vita Plinii.
ff. 1r-2v: Johannes Mansionarius ['de Matociis'], Brevis adnotatio de duobus Pliniis.
ff. 3r-4r: A table of contents.
ff. 5r-27v: Pliny the Younger (Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus), De Viris Illustribus; imperfect at the beginning.
ff. 28r-152r: Pliny the Younger, Epistolae.
f. 152v: Colophon.
f. 153r: Ownership notes.
Decoration:
9 large white vine initials in gold and colours (ff. 1r, 28r, 43v, 59v, 76v, 92r, 106r, 123r, 138v). Alternating initials in red or blue. Display script following white vine initials has capitals alternating in red and brown ink. Rubrics in red. Marginal notes in red.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Harley Collection
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002050711", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4868: Pliny the Younger, De Viris Illustribus and Epistolae" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002050711 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 4868 : Pliny the Younger, De Viris Illustribus and Epistolae - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[4867]/040-002050711
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- https://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100165169583.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1467
- End Date:
- 1467
- Date Range:
- 1467
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 265 x 170 mm (180 x 100 mm).
Foliation: ff. 153 (+ 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 3 at the end); 1 unfoliated parchment pastedown (with an ownership inscription) in the lower margin of f. 1r; f. 153 is a parchment former pastedown with inscriptions.
Script: Humanistic cursive.
Binding: British Museum in-house; re-bound on 27 July 1967. Gilt fore-edge.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
Italy, Central (Florence).
Provenance:
Written by Pietro Cennini in Florence in 1467: inscribed his name in a colophon on f. 152v: 'Scripsit florentie hoc opus petrus cenninus idibus maiis anno v[ero] salutis nostre MCCCCLXVIIo indictione XVa. Hoc opus o lector descripsit petrus: auorum cuius cennina est nomine dicta domus [...]'.
Matthias Corvinus I, King of Hungary (1443-1490): according to a 16h-century inscription in the lower margin of f. 1r: ‘Hunc librum scito fuisse in Bibliotheca Regis Hungariæ Bud[æ] nomine Mathiæ qui semper vicit, et numquam victus est) Cuius in testimonio in Corio expressa sunt Insignia Regni Hungariæ' (on a parchment strip pasted onto f. 1r). The binding that bore his arms is no longer extant (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 236; Watson, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts (1979), no. 817).
Joannes Feldwarius: according to a 16th-century inscription on f. 153r: 'Liber Ioannis fewelwarij Transylavani et Amicorum' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 158).
An unknown 16th- or 17th-century owner: notes receiving the manuscript from Feldwarius on f. 153r.
The Jesuit College in Agen (Lot-et-Garonne, France), maintained by the Jesuits from 1591 to 1762: their 17th-century ownership inscription on f. 1r: 'Collegii Agen. Societat. Jesu Catal. Ins.' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), pp. 47-48).
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:
-
L. F. Casson, 'A Manuscript of Landino's Xandra in South Africa', Studies in the Renaissance, 10 (1963), p. 54, n. 22.
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-12), II (1808), no. 4868.
Alfred John Fairbank, 'The script of Pietro Cennini', Journal of the Society for Italic Handwriting, 33 (1962), 19-21.
Paul Oskar Kristeller, Iter Italicum: Accedunt Alia Itinera: A Finding List of Uncatalogued or Incompletely Catalogued Humanistic Manuscripts of the Renaissance in Italian and Other Libraries, 7 vols (London: Warburg Institute; Leiden: Brill, 1963-1997), IV (1989), p. 181.
Edit Madas, 'La Bibliotheca Corviniana et les corvinas authentiques', in Colloque Matthias Corvin. Les bibliothèques princières et la genèse de l’État moderne. 15-17 novembre 2007, ed. by Donatella Nebbiai (Paris: IRHT, 2008) (Ædilis, Actes, 15); [online] [accessed 23 September 2008].
Albinia de la Mare, 'New Research on Humanistic Scribes in Florence', in Miniatura fiorentina del Rinascimento, 1440-1525: un primo censimento, ed. by Annarosa Garzelli, 2 vols, ([Florence]: Giunta regionale toscana, 1985), I, pp. 395-574 (p. 527).
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. 817.
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. 47, 158, 236, 449-450.
Pliny the Younger, Epistularum libri decem, ed. by R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. xii.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)