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Royal MS 2 A XVI
- Record Id:
- 040-002105805
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002105724
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000224.0x000392
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165176982.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Royal MS 2 A XVI
- Title:
- Psalter ('The Psalter of Henry VIII')
- Scope & Content:
-
The manuscript includes a Psalter with three Canticles, known as the Psalter of Henry VIII. The text is preceded by the dedicatory letter by Jean Mallard (ff. 1v-2v), who wrote and probably illuminated the manuscript, incipit: 'Regium istud Davidis'. Mallard's other works include Royal MS 7 D XIII and Royal MS 20 B XII. In the manuscript Henry VIII is depicted as king David and Jean Mallard compares him to David in the dedicatory letter preceding the Psalter. As indicated by the many marginal notes added in the King’s own hand, the volume became Henry VIII's personal copy of the Psalms.
Decoration:
8 miniatures in colours and gold: the royal coat of arms, at the beginning of Mallard's dedicatory letter (f. 1v), and at the beginning of Psalms: f. 3, Henry VIII as David reading in his bedchamber (Psalm 1); f. 30r, David and Goliath (Psalm 26); f. 48r, battle scene (Psalm 38); f. 63v, Henry VIII and his court jester William Sommers (Psalm 52); f. 79r, Henry as David kneeling in prayer among ruins (Psalm 68); f. 98v, Musicians (Psalm 80); f. 118r, Angels singing (Psalm 97) (Psalm 109 does not have a miniature). Large initials in colours and gold containing flowers, birds, fruits, and insects, at the beginning of other Psalms. Smaller initials in gold on red, blue, brown, or black grounds, or in black on gold grounds, at the beginning of verses. Line-fillers in gold and colours.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Royal Collection
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002105724
040-002105805 - Is part of:
- Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X : Royal Manuscripts
Royal MS 2 A XVI : Psalter ('The Psalter of Henry VIII') - Hierarchy:
- 032-002105724[0071]/040-002105805
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
-
176 folios.
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100165176982.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1535
- End Date:
- 1541
- Date Range:
- c 1540-1541
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
- Restrictions to access apply please consult British Library staff
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript.
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Materials: Parchment codex.
Dimensions: 205 x 140 mm (text space: 130 x 85 mm).
Foliation: ff. [ii] + i +176 + [ii] (all unfoliated flyleaves are modern paper leaves; f. i is a medieval parchment flyleaf).
Collation: i1+2, ii2, iii4, iv-v2, vi-xiii4, xiv4+1, xv-xvii4, xviii4+1, xxv6+1, xxvii-xxviii4, xxix2, xxx4+1, xxxi-xxxiv4, xxxv-xxxviii6, xxxix6+1, xl4.
Layout: Written in one column of 17 lines.
Script: Humanistic. Written by Jean Mallard.
Binding: Pre-1600. Red velvet binding with silver-gilt corner pieces and remains of clasps; gilt edges.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin: England (London).
Provenance:
Jean Maillart (or Mallard), a French poet at the court of Francis I and then at the court of Henry VIII, mentioned as the 'orator in the French tongue' in the king's household accounts 1539-41 (see Carley 2000, p. xlvii), written and illustrated by him for Henry VIII: inscribed 'Johannes Mallardus regius orator, et a calamo / Regi Angliae, et Francie Fidei deffensori invictis[simo]' (Jean Maillart, royal orator: from his pen to the most invincible king of England and France, and defender of the faith) (f. 2r).
Henry VIII (b. 1491, d. 1547), king of England and Ireland: addressed to him in the dedicatory letter (ff. 1r-2v); the royal arms of Henry VIII with the devise, 'Honny soet quy mal y pense' (f. 1v); his portraits (ff. 3r, 30r, 63v, 79r), and marginal Latin annotations in his hand.
The Old Royal Library (the English Royal Library): included in the Upper Library at Westminster, Westminster inventory number, no. 1283.Presented to the British Museum by George II in 1757 as part of the Old Royal Library.
- Publications:
-
George F. Warner and Julius P. Gilson, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King’s Collections, 4 vols (London: British Museum, 1921), I, p. 32.
Janet Backhouse, 'Two Books of Hours of Francis I', The British Museum Quarterly, 31 (1967) 90-95 (pp. 93, 96 n. 17).
F. O. Büttner, 'Ad te, Domine, levavi animam meam: Bildnisse in der Wort Illustration zu Psalm 24:1', in Miscelanea Codicologica F. Masai Dedicata, ed. by P. Cockshaw and M. C. Garand, P. Jodogne (Gand: Story Sceientia, 1979), pp. 216-76 and 331-43 (p. 218).
Janet Backhouse, 'French Manuscript Illumination, 1450-1530', in Renaissance Painting in Manuscripts: Treasures from the British Library, ed. by Thomas Kren (New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1983), pp. 143-92 (p. 150.
T. A. Birrell, English Monarchs and Their Books: From Henry VII to Charles II (London: British Library, 1987), p. 7.
John N. King, Tudor Royal Iconography: Literature and Art in an Age of Religious Crisis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), pl. 17.
Pamela Tudor-Craig, 'Henry VIII and King David', in Early Tudor England: Proceedings of the 1987 Harlaxton Symposium, ed. by Daniel Williams (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1989), pp. 183-206 (esp. pp. 194-205).
Henry VIII: A European Court in England, ed. by David Starkey (London: Collins & Brown, 1991), no. XI.31 [exhibition catalogue].
Janet Backhouse, 'Sir Robert Cotton's Record of a Royal Bookshelf', British Library Journal, 18 (1992) 44-51 (p. 50 n. 8).
John N. King, 'Henry VIII as David: The King's Image and Reformation Poilitics', in Rethinking the Henrician Era: Essays on Early Tudor Texts and Contexts: Session, Convention, Papers, ed. by P. C. Herman (Urbana: Illinois University Press, 1994), pp. 78-92 (pp. 83-86, fig. 4).
Greg Walker, 'Henry VIII and the Politics of the Royal Image', in Pervasive Fictions: Fiction, Faith and Political Culture in the Reign of Henry VIII (Aldershot: Scolar, 1996), pp. 80-89.
The Libraries of King Henry VIII, ed. by J. P. Carley, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 7 (London: The British Library, 2000), H2. 1283, pp. xlvii.
R. A. Cooper, 'Jean Mallard, poete et peintre rouennais', in Premiere poesie francaise de la Renaissance: Autour des Puys poetiques normands, ed. by Jean-Claude Arnould and Thierry Mantovani (Paris: Honore Champion, 2003), pp. 193-213 (p. 204).
F. O. Büttner, ‘Der illuminierte Psalter im Westen’, in The Illuminated Psalter: Studies in the Content, Purpose and Placement of its Images, ed. by F. O. Büttner, (Belgium: Brepols, 2004), pp. 1-106 (p. 26 n. 121, pl. 68).
James P. Carley, The Books of King Henry VIII and His Wives, preface by David Starkey (London: British Library, 2004), p. 56, pl. 53.
Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle, Bible Manuscripts: 1400 Years of Scribes and Scripture (London: British Library, 2007), p. 156, fig. 142.
Sacred: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam and their Sacred Texts (London: British Library, 2007), p. 159 [exhibition catalogue].
Margaret Scott, Medieval Dress & Fashion (London: British Library, 2007), pl. 118.
Nicolas Bell, 'Commentary', in Music for King Henry: BL Royal MS II E XI (London: Folio Society, 2009), pll on p. 14.
Henry VIII: Man and Monarch, ed. by Susan Doran (London: British Library, 2009), no. 194, pl. on p. 184 [exhibition catalogue].
King Henry's Prayer Book, with a commentary by James P. Carley (London: Folio Society, 2009) [facsimile of the manuscript].
Scot McKendrick, John Lowden, Kathleen Doyle, Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination (London: British Library, 2011), no. 45 [exhibition catalogue].
Ian Christie-Miller, 'Henry VIII and British Library, Royal MS. 2 A. XVI: Marginalia in King Henry's Psalter', The Electronic British Library Journal (2015), no. 8.
- Exhibitions:
- British Library Treasures, (online), 27 February 2016-
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)