Hard-coded id of currently selected item: . JSON version of its record is available from Blacklight on e.g. ??

Metadata associated with selected item should appear here...

Harley MS 6579

Record Id:

040-002052428

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

040-002052428

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000935.0x000067

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Harley MS 6579

Title:

Walter Hilton, The Scale of Perfection

Scope & Content:

Contents:

ff. 1v-140r: Walter Hilton (d. 1396), an Austin monk at Thurgarton, Nottinghamshire, The Scale of Perfection.Beginning: 'Ghostly sister in ihesu crist I preie þe þat in þe calling whilke oure lord hath callid þe to his servise: þou halde þe paied and stond stedfastly þerinne'; opening with a colophon: 'Magister Walterus Hylton Canonicus de Thurgarton, qui fuit homo venerabilis sciencia et vite sanctitate, composuit hunc librum plenum catholica doctrina et edificacione'.

f. 140v: Theological note about sin, beginning: 'Item magna est dilectio inter sponsum et sponsa'.

ff. 141r-143v: 'Here is written þe Rubrike of þese .ij. bokis byfore writen the whiche is namyd the ladder of perfeccioun or in latyn Scala perfeccionis'.

The manuscript contains a few later additions:

f. 1*recto: Latin verses, beginning: 'Vicit Adam patrem, gula, Gloria, vana, cupido'; added in the 16th century.

f. 140r (lower margin) : A poem in English: 'If I reade and rereade what than [?] / the acte and the facte maketh the man / If readyng engenders faith and good lyvinge / let faith be expressed by the good doinge / who doth well, lyveth well, and he readeth beste / though I never reade yet do you well at þe leste'; added in the 16th century.

ff. 144r-145r: A poem in English: 'Nowght in this worlde þat welth can attayne / onles he believe that all ys but vayne'; added in the 16th century.

Decoration:

Large (2-line) plain red initials. Paraphs in red. Underlining in red.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Harley Collection

Hierarchy Tree:

[{ "id" : "040-002052428", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Harley MS 6579: Walter Hilton, The Scale of Perfection" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002045828
040-002052428

Is part of:

Harley MS 1-7661 : Harley Manuscripts

Harley MS 6579 : Walter Hilton, The Scale of Perfection

Hierarchy:

032-002045828[6584]/040-002052428

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

Languages:

English, Middle

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1460

End Date:

1499

Date Range:

Late 15th century

Era:

Access:

Please request the physical items you need using the online collection item request form.

Digitised items can be viewed online by clicking the thumbnail image or digitised content link.

Readers who have registered or renewed their pass since 21 March 2024 can request physical items prior to visiting the Library by completing
this request form.
Please enter the Reference (shelfmark) above on the request form.

If your Reader Pass was issued before this date, you will need to visit the Library in London or Yorkshire to renew it before you can request items online. All manuscripts and archives must be consulted at the Library in London.

This catalogue record may describe a collection of items which cannot all be requested together. Please use the hierarchy viewer to navigate to individual items. Some items may be in use or restricted for other reasons. If you would like to check the availability, contact our Reference Services team, quoting the Reference (shelfmark) above.

User Conditions:

Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript.

Physical Characteristics:

Materials: Parchment; paper (ff. 1*, 144, 145).

Dimensions: 205 x 135 mm (text space: 205 x 145 mm).

Foliation: ff. 1* + 145 (+ 2 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 3 at the end); f. 49 is a smaller parchment leaf (155 x 95 mm) that has been sewn onto f. 1 sewn parchment tab on f. 63; 1 unfoliated paper pastedown on f. [ii]recto (bibliographical notes).

Collation: Indicated by catchwords.

Script: Gothic cursive; written by two hands.

Binding: British Museum in-house; gold-tooled black half leather binding with the Harleian arms gold stamped on the outside covers; marbled endleaves.

Custodial History:

Origin:

England.

Provenance:

The Charterhouse of the Salutation of St Mary the Virgin (The London Charterhouse, founded in 1371 and dissolved in 1537, owned in the 15th century: their ownership inscription in the lower margin of f. 2r: 'Liber domus matris dei Ordinis Cartusiensis prope Londonensis' (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 226).

? John Murray (b. 1670, d. 1748), of Sacombe, Hertfordshire, collector of books and friend of Edward Harley: perhaps to be identified with a manuscript owned by him and referred to by Thomas Hearne [see Remarks and Collections of Thomas Hearne, ed. by C. E. Doble, O. W. Rannie and H. E. Salter, (Oxford: Oxford Historical Society, 1885-1921), p. 339]; his library sold on 8 May 1749 (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), pp. 247-248); the manuscript also features the initials 'J. M. S.' on f. 1*verso. Based on other Harley manuscripts, Cyril Ernest Wright speculates that these are the initials of John Murry of Sacombe (see Wright, Fontes Harleiani (1972), p. 291, where this manuscript is not listed).

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:

A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts in the British Museum, 4 vols (London: Eyre and Strahan, 1808-1812), III (1808), p. 377 [no. 6579].

The Scale of Perfection by Walter Hilton, Canon of Thurgarton , edited by Evelyn Underhill (London: Watkins, 1923), pp. xliv-xlv.

Minor Works of Walter Hilton, ed. by Dorothy Jones (London: Burns, Oates and Washbourne, 1929), p. xxv.

H. Gardner, 'The Text of The Scale of Perfection', Medium Aevum, 5 (1936), 103-27.

Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, ed. by Neil R. Ker, 2nd edn, Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, 3 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), p. 122.

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. 226, 247-48, 291.

Michael G. Sargent, 'Walter Hilton's Scale of Perfection: The London Manuscript Group Reconsidered', Medium Aevum, 52 (1983), 189-216.

Walter Hilton: The Scale of Perfection, ed. by Walter Hilton and John P. H. Clark (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1991), pp. ix, 14, 33, 34, 53, 54, 56, 162, 189 [edition of the text].

Stanley S. Hussey, ‘Editing the Scale of Perfection: Return to Recension’, in Crux and Controversy in Middle English Textual Criticism (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 1992), pp. 97-108 (pp. 102-05).

Barry Windeatt, English Mystics of the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 6, 150, 293.

Maidie Hilmo, Medieval Images, Icons, and Illustrated English Literary Texts: From Ruthwell Cross to the Ellesmere Chaucer (Farnham: Ashgate, 2004), p. 143.

Michael G. Sargent, ‘What do the Numbers Mean? Observation on Some Patterns of Middle English Manuscript Transmission’, in Design and Distribution of Late Medieval Manuscripts in England, ed. by Margaret Connolly and Linne R. Mooney (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2008), pp. 205-44 (pp. 229-32).

The Scale of Perfection, Book II: A Critical Edition based on British Library MSS Harley 6573 and 6579, edited by Stanley S. Hussey and Michael G. Sargent, Early English Text Society, Original Series, 348 (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017).

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

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
Hilton, Walter, c 1343-1396,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000118213408
Murray, John, library agent and book collector, 1670-1748

Places:

England