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Harley MS 4904
- Record Id:
- 040-002050748
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 040-002050748
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000859.0x0001a7
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100059465400.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Harley MS 4904
- Title:
- St Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains the Enarrationes in Psalmos (Commentary on the Psalms) by the Church Father St Augustine of Hippo (b. 354, d. 430). It was produced in the 2nd half of the 12th century, perhaps at the Cistercian abbey of Sancta Maria de Rupe (St Mary of the Rock) at Maltby in South Yorkshire.
Contents:
ff. 1r-193v: St Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos.
Decoration:
1 large decorated initial 'B'(eatus) in red and blue with foliate pen-work in green decoration on f. 1r. 4 puzzle initials in red and blue with blue or red pen-work decoration for treatises on Psalms 26 (2nd treatise), 36, 37 and 39 (ff. 44r, 105v, 122r, 136r). Decorated initials in blue or red with pen-work decoration including foliate motifs in the other colour and occasionally with geometric motifs (ff. 148v, 156, 173, 176, 180v, 185v, 189v). Large initials in blue or red with red or blue pen-work decoration, one with green fillers (f. 2r). Simple initials alternately red or blue. Large initials are followed by display script in red and blue, rubrics in red or capitals highlighted in red. Small initials in red or blue. Letters with pen-flourishing in brown ink throughout the manuscript. Paragraph marks and descenders occasionally decorated with foliate motifs in brown ink. The initial to Psalm 40 has been removed (f. 144r).
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- England and France 700-1200 Project
Harley Collection - Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "040-002050748", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 4904: St Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002045828
040-002050748 - Is part of:
- Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts
Harley MS 4904 : St Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos - Hierarchy:
- 032-002045828[4904]/040-002050748
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Harley MS 1-7661
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- A parchment codex
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100059465400.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1150
- End Date:
- 1199
- Date Range:
- 2nd half of the 12th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment.
Dimensions: 380-390 x 255-265 mm (text space: 260-280 x 170-180 mm, in 2 columns).
Foliation: ff. 193 ( + 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 1 unfoliated parchment flyleaf and 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end); the quires have been mounted on paper guards; one quire missing between ff. 8-9 and leaves lost after f. 192 (including initial to Psalm 50) and f. 193 (ends imperfectly with 'cuius faciem timet, ipsius faciem invocat. Ne'); Catchwords, quire marks, running headers.
Script: Protogothic.
Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house. Brown half leather binding with Harley’s bookplate gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers, the spine inscribed in gold at the British Museum: ‘S. AUGUSTINE. COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS’.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: ? Maltby, Northern England.
Provenance:
The Cistercian abbey of Sancta Maria de Rupe, also known as Roche Abbey, Maltby (South Yorkshire), founded in 1147, owned in the 12th century (?): The manuscript has the recurring numbers I, II and III in the margins; three manuscripts with a Roche provenance have similar marks in their margins: Cambridge, University Library, MS Gg. 3.33 and Oxford, Bodleian Library, MSS. Laud. misc. 308 and 309. Similarities between these three manuscripts were observed by Neil Ker in the officially annotated James catalogue (Montague Rhodes James, The Western Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge: A Descriptive Catalogue, 3 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1900-1904)) at Trinity College Cambridge with respect to MS B.3.23 which has these marks as well. Letters (?) ‘AH’ (class-mark?) in upper margin of f. 1r.
John Batteley (b. c.1646, d. 1708), Church of England clergyman and antiquary, in 1723: bought from him in 1723 through his nephew, John Batteley, by Edward Harley, along with other manuscripts (see Diary, ed. by Wright (1966), II, p. 263 n. 1).
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 ‘5 die novembris, A.D. 1723’ (f. 1r).
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:
-
Full digital coverage available for this manuscript: see Digital Manuscripts, https://bl.uk/manuscripts/.
Select digital coverage available for this manuscript; see the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, https://bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/.
- Publications:
-
A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-1812), III (1808), p. 218.
The Diary of Humfrey Wanley 1715-1726, ed. by Cyril E. Wright and Ruth C. Wright, 2 vols (London: Bibliographical Society, 1966), II: 1723-1726, p. 263, n 1.
Cyril E. Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), p. 67.
Franz Römer, Die handschriftliche Überlieferung der Werke des heiligen Augustinus, II/2: Grossbritannien und Irland: Verzeichnis nach Bibliotheken, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse: Sitzungsberichte, 276; Veröffentlichungen der Kommission zur Herausgabe des Corpus der Lateinischen Kirchenväter, IV (Vienna: Böhlau, 1972), p. 183.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Notes:
- This manuscript is part of The Polonsky Foundation England and France Project: Manuscripts from the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France, 700-1200.