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Harley MS 5004

Record Id:

040-002050848

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002050848

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000859.0x00020b

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 5004

Title:

Aristotle and Pseudo-Aristotle, Works

Scope & Content:

The manuscript includes a collection of works by or attributed to Aristotle in Latin translations:

1. Ethica (ff. 2r-64v);

2. Politica (ff. 64v-136v);

3. Rhetorica (ff. 137r-181r)

4. Pseudo-Aristotle, Economica (ff. 181v-184v)

5. Magna moralia (184v-208v).

f. 1 is a flyleaf including the list of contents and an ownership inscription of the Benedictine Abbey of Great Saint Martin, Cologne (now crossed out), written by a 15th-century hand (f. 1r).

According to Pannier (1991), the Magna moralia is copied from Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS lat. 16584, which includes the Ethics, Magnamoralia, and Metaphysics.

Decoration:

1 historiated initial of Aristotle teaching, with three-sided foliate border and bas-de-page scene, in colours and gold (f. 2r). 23 large and small foliate initials with partial foliate borders, in colours and gold (ff. 8r, 13r, 20r, 26v, 33v, 38r, 45r, 51v, 58r, 64v, 71r, 82r, 103r, 115v, 121r, 132r, 137r, 153v, 170r, 181v, 182v, 184v, 196r). Small initials in red with blue pen-flourishing or in blue with red pen-flourishing, with extensions in red and blue, some with guide-letters. Paraph marks in plain red or blue. Decorated catchwords. Cadels. Marginal contemporary sketches of dragons' heads (f. 45r).

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002050848", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 5004: Aristotle and Pseudo-Aristotle, Works" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002050848

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 5004 : Aristotle and Pseudo-Aristotle, Works

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[5004]/040-002050848

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1300

End Date:

1349

Date Range:

1st half of the 14th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment codex.

Dimensions: 300 x 195 mm (text space: 235 x 120 mm).

Foliation: ff. 208 (+ 5 unfoliated paper flyleaves: 3 at the beginning and 2 at the end; f. 1 is a medieval parchment flyleaf).

Collation: i-xvii¹² (ff. 2-205), xviii²⁺¹ (ff. 206-208; f. 207 is an added leaf). Catchwords and bifolium signatures. Pecia signes written in the edges of margins at the beginning of peciae (e.g. ff. 13r, 17r). Number of pieces: Ethics (17), Politics (16), Rhetoric (12), Economics [1], Magna moralia (7), numbered separately.

Script: Gothic.

Binding: Post-1600 binding of speckled brown calf; rebacked.

Custodial History:

Origin:

France (Paris).

Provenance:

The Benedictine Abbey of Great Saint Martin, Cologne: effaced inscription, 'Monasterium Sancti Martini maioris in Colonia', and table of contents both in the same 15th-century hand (f. 1r).

Nathaniel Noel (d. c. 1753), bookseller (see below).

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 'Bought by my Lord of / Mr Noel, A.D. 1716.' (f. 1r).

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.

Administrative Context:

France (Paris).

Information About Copies:

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, 1808-12), III, no. 5004.

George Lacombe, Aristoteles Latinus (Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1939), no. 304.

Palémon Glorieux, La Faculté des Arts et ses maitres au XIIIe siècle, Etudes de Philosophie Médiévale, 59 (Paris, 1971), pp. 170, 172.

C. E. Wright, Fontes Harleiani: A Study of the Sources of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1972), pp. 109, 253.

Christine Pannier, 'La traduction latine médiévale des Magna moralia: une étude critique de la tradition manuscrite', in La production du livre universitaire au Moyen Age: exemplar et pecia, ed. by Louis J. Bataillon, Bertrand G. Guyot, and Richard H. Rouse (Paris: C.N.R.S., 1991), pp. 166, 172-74, 177, 178, 193, 200, 203.

F. Alberto Gallo, ‘L’ottavo libro della Politica di Aristotele : il testo e le traduzioni. Indagine preliminare sulle fonti (XIII-XV secolo) in Medioevo umnanistico e umanesimo medievale. Testi della X Settimana residenziale di studi medievali Palermo-Carini, 22-26 ottobre 1990 (Palermo: Scrinium, 1993) 119-26 (p. 124).

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Aristotle, philosopher, 384 BC-322 BC
Bentinck, Margaret Cavendish, duchess of Portland, née Harley, collector of art and natural history specimens and patron of arts and sciences, 11 Feb 1715-17 Jul 1785,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000115857160,
   see also http://viaf.org/viaf/2356861
Harley, Edward, second earl of Oxford and Mortimer, book collector and patron of the arts, 2 Jun 1689-16 Jun 1741,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000108078249,
   see also http://viaf.org/viaf/160524259
Harley, Henrietta Cavendish, Countess of Oxford and Mortimer, née Holles, patron of architecture, 4 Feb 1694-9 Dec 1755,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000030125833,
   see also http://viaf.org/viaf/6045563
Harley, Robert, first Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, politician, 5 Dec 1661-21 May 1724,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000083423906
Noel, Nathaniel, bookseller, fl 1681, d c 1753