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Royal MS 15 A VII
- Record Id:
- 040-002107014
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002105724
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000338.0x0000a4
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100174688006.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Royal MS 15 A VII
- Title:
-
Collection of Latin poetry and fables, including Statius, Achilleis, and Claudian, De raptu Proserpinae
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains a collection of Latin works, probably arranged as part of a school curriculum. They include the unfinished epic poem, the Achilleid, by the Greco-Roman author Publius Papinius Statius (b. c. 45, d. c. 96); a popular collection of proverbial wisdom, known as the Catonis Disticha; Avianus' collection of Latin Fabulae (Fables); the elegies of Maximianus (fl. 6th century); and Claudian's De Raptu Prosperpinae (On the Rape of Proserpina). An added quire at the end of the volume contains the Anglo-Latin Romulus, a fable collection closely connected with the Anglo-Norman French translations of Aesop's Fables made by Marie de France (fl. 1160-1215).
Collections of similar medieval school texts include Add MS 10090, Add MS 21213, and Royal MS 15 A XXXI.
Contents:
ff. 1v-7v: Catonis Disticha (Distichs of Cato), a collection of proverbial wisdom in Latin prose, with interlinear glosses and marginal notes; the preface beginning, 'Cum animaduerterem quam plurimos homines...'; the text, beginning, 'Si deus est animus, nobis ut carmina dicunt...'
ff. 8r-13v: Ecloga Theoduli (Eclogue of Theodulus), a dialogue written in Latin verse, with interlinear glosses and marginal notes, beginning, 'Ethyopum terras iam feruida torruit estas...'
ff. 14r-25r: Avianus, Fabulae (Fables), a collection of 42 Aesopic fables in Latin elegiac verse, with interlinear glosses and extensive marginal commentary, beginning, 'Rustica deflenti paruo iurauerat olim...'
ff. 25v-36v: Maximianus, Elegiae (Elegies), written in Latin verse, beginning, 'Emula quid cessas, finem properare laboras...'
ff. 37v-56r: Publius Papinius Statius, Achilleis (Achilleid), written in Latin verse, with interlinear glosses and marginal notes, beginning, 'Magnanimum Aeaciden formidatamque Tonanti...'
ff. 56v-76r: Claudian, De raptu Proserpinae (On the Rape of Proserpina), written in Latin verse, beginning, 'Inuenta secuit qui primus naue profundum...'
f. 76v: An added Latin couplet by Hugh of Orleans: 'Quos anguis dirus tristi mulcedine strauit, / Hos sanguis mirus Cristi dulcedine pauit'.
f. 76r-v: 'Paeniteas cito', a penitential poem in Latin verse, beginning, 'Peniteas cito, peccator, cum sit miserator...'
The manuscript features a number of later additions:
ff. 77r-83v: Romulus, a collection of 56 Aesopic fables in Latin prose, added in a hand of the 4th quarter of the 13th century or 1st half of the 14th century, the preface beginning, 'Grecia disciplinarum mater'; the main text beginning, 'Gallus dum eseas suas'.
f. 83v: A set of four Latin verses on the Ten Commandments, beginning, 'Idola sperne, dei non sit tibi nomen inane'.
f. 84r-v: A leaf from a 13th-century Psalter, with antiphons and neums, reused as an end flyleaf.
Decoration:
Large puzzle initials in red and blue ink, with pen-flourishing in either or both colours.
Numerous smaller initials in alternating red or blue ink, some with penwork decoration or pen-flourishing.
Initials at the beginning of each line highlighted in red.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Medieval and Renaissance Women
Royal Collection - Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002105724
040-002107014 - Is part of:
- Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X : Royal Manuscripts
Royal MS 15 A VII : Collection of Latin poetry and fables, including Statius, Achilleis, and Claudian, De raptu Proserpinae - Hierarchy:
- 032-002105724[1213]/040-002107014
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Royal MS 1 A I-20 E X
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- https://iiif.bl.uk/uv/#?manifest=https://bl.digirati.io/iiif/ark:/81055/vdc_100174688006.0x000001
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1250
- End Date:
- 1349
- Date Range:
- 2nd half of the 13th century-1st half of the 14th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Material: Parchment.
Dimensions: 185 x 130 mm (text space: 125 x 55 mm).
Foliation: ff. 84 (+ 5 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 1 unfoliated parchment stub after f. 37 + 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end ); ff. 1 and 84 are parchment flyleaves.
Collation: Mounted on paper guards.
Script: Gothic (ff. 1r-76v); Gothic cursive (ff. 77r-83v).
Binding: Post-1600. British Library in-house. Brown half-leather binding, with the Royal arms and the date 1757 gold-stamped on the upper and lower covers. The remains of the former spine affixed to the inside upper cover. Rebound July 1976.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England or France.
Provenance:
The Old Royal Library (the English Royal Library): the Royal seal of a ship, 17th century (f. 1r); listed in the 1698 catalogue of the library of St James’s Palace (see Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliae et Hiberniae (Oxford: Sheldonian, '1697'), nos. 8614, 8615).
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), II, p. 143.
H. L. D. Ward and J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1883-1910), II (1893), pp. 272-75, 286-91.
Marc Boas, 'De librorum Catonianorum historia atque compositione', Mnemosynes (1914), 2-30 (p. 4).
Nicholas Orme, English Schools in the Middle Ages (London: Mehtuen, 1973), pp. 102-04 [on the text].
Franzoi Alessandro, 'L'Appendix Maximiani, Edizione Critica, Probleme, Osservazoni', Romanobarbarica 8, (1984), 1-86, (p. 9 n. 15).
The Libraries of King Henry VIII, ed. by James P. Carley, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, 7 (London: The British Library, 2000), p. xxxvi, n. 48.
Harald Anderson, The Manuscripts of Statius, 3 vols (revised edition: Arlington, VA, 2009), I, p. 211, no. 318.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)