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Royal MS 7 F I

Record Id:

040-002106277

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-002105724

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000277.0x00027e

LARK:

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Royal MS 7 F I

Title:

Alexander Neckam, Speculum speculationum

Scope & Content:

ff. 1r–94r: Alexander Neckam, Speculum speculationum: ‘Incipit speculum speculationum magistri Alexandri canonici cirecestrie. ¶ Prologus. Paradisum uoluptatis subdiuidit …’.

Decoration:

Full-page diagram in colours, tipped in (f. 72v); blank space left for a figure (f. 43v). Large initials opening the prologue (f. 1r) and text (f. 2v); new chapters open with a 2-line initial, alternating between red, blue, and green, sometimes with penwork decoration in an alternate colour; new sections open with an enlarged capital alternating between the same colours. Rubricated chapter headings; marginal notes indicating sources in red; running heads in red indicating the book.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Royal Collection

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002105724
040-002106277

Is part of:

Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X : Royal Manuscripts

Royal MS 7 F I : Alexander Neckam, Speculum speculationum

Hierarchy:

032-002105724[0510]/040-002106277

Container:

View / search within Archive / Collection: Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

Parchment codex

Digitised Content:

Languages:

Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1201

End Date:

1213

Date Range:

1201-1213

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

Physical Characteristics:

Dimensions: 345 × 240 mm (written area 250 × 155, in two columns).

Foliation: ff. i + 95 (+ 2 paper flyleaves at the beginning and end).

Collation: i, i¹⁰ (ff. 1–10), ii–viii⁸ (ff. 11–66), ix⁸⁺¹ (ff. 67–75; 6th added, i.e. the full-page illustration on f. 72), x–xi⁸ (ff. 76–91), xii^6–2 (ff. 92–95; 3rd, 5th cancelled). Catchwords. Quire signatures on the last leaf, i–v in red ink, vi–xi in plummet. Leaves of quires iv–v (ff. 27–43) are lettered.

Script: Protogothic.

Binding: British Library, 1985.

Custodial History:

Origin:

Augustinian abbey of St Mary the Virgin, Cirencester, Gloucestershire. Cambridge, University Library, Gg.6.42, from Cirencester, includes extracts from this manuscript (Dunning 2016). Presumably the copy of Speculum speculationum seen by Leland there (Webber and Watson 1998: A9.10). The title refers to Alexander Neckam as a canon of Cirencester; he became its abbot in 1213.

Provenance:

Presented to the British Museum by George II in 1757 as part of the Old Royal Library.

Publications:

Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King’s Collections, ed. by George F. Warner and J.P. Gilson, 4 vols (London: British Museum, 1921).

R.W. Hunt, ‘The Preface to the Speculum Ecclesiae of Giraldus Cambrensis’, Viator, 8 (1977), 189–214 .

R.W. Hunt, The Schools and the Cloister: The Life and Writings of Alexander Nequam (1157–1217), ed. by Margaret T. Gibson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984).

Alexander Nequam. Speculum speculationum, ed. by Rodney M. Thomson, Auctores Britannici Medii Aevi, 11 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988).

Teresa Webber and Andrew G. Watson, The Libraries of the Augustinian Canons, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 6 (London: British Library, 1998), no. A9.10.

Andrew N.J. Dunning, ‘Alexander Neckam’s Manuscripts and the Augustinian Canons of Oxford and Cirencester’ (unpublished PhD diss., University of Toronto, 2016) .

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Augustinian abbey of St Mary the Virgin, Cirencester, Gloucestershire, 1117-1539
Neckam, Alexander, scholar and abbot of Cirencester, 8 Sep 1157-31 Mar 1217

Related Material:

Description from Warner and Gilson, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King’s Collections:

'SPECULUM SPECULATIONUM magistri Alexandri canonici Cirecestrie': an unprinted theological work of Alexander Neckam, Abbot of Cirencester (1213-1217). In four books. A full-page coloured diagram is inserted at f. 72 b, but at f. 43 b a space for a figure is left blank. 'Prologus in lib. primum' beg. 'Paradisum uoluptatis subdiuidit sublimis intelligentia'; lib. i, 'Si duo essent prima rerum principia'. The prologue to lib. iv is in elegiac verse, beg. 'Respirare libet uiresque resumere fessis'.

Vellum; ff. 94. 133/4 in. x 91/4 in. First half of XIII cent. Gatherings of 8 leaves (i¹⁰, ix⁹, xii⁴), numbered at the end in ink as far as v, afterwards, if at all, with a plummet. Sec.fol.'confringat. Initials in colours. See pl. 56 a. There is nothing to show whether this is the copy seen by Leland at Cirencester (Coll. iii, p. 158), but no other MS. seems to be known. Cat. of 1666, f. 4; CMA. 8015.