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Royal MS 19 B IV

Record Id:

040-002107596

Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:

032-002105724

MDARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100000000338.0x000356

LARK:

ark:/81055/vdc_100165171608.0x000001

SLARK:

Format:

ISAD(G)

Reference (shelfmark):

Royal MS 19 B IV

Title:

Les Dits Moraulx des Philosophes, a French translation of Guillaume de Tignonville's Dicta moralia antiquorum philosophorum

Scope & Content:

This manuscript contains a copy of Les Dits Moraulx des Philosophes (The Moral Sayings of the Philosophers), a French translation of the Latin Dicta moralia antiquorum philosophorum by Guillaume de Tignonville, or Thignonville (d. 1414), Councillor to King Charles VI of France and Prevost of Paris. The text was completed before 1402. Further copies of the work are now Royal MS 16 F X and Royal MS 19 A VIII.

The manuscript also contains ‘La voie de Povreté et de Richesse’, a poem on the debate between poverty and riches, which was composed in c. 1342 by Jean Bruyant, king's notary at le Chatelet Paris, during the mid-14th century. Here the text appears with the title 'Le Livre de l'arguement que font ensemble povrete et richece'. Another copy of this poem can be found in Royal MS 19 C XI.

Contents:

ff. 3r-74v: Les Dits Moraulx des Philosophes, a French translation of the Latin Dicta moralia antiquorum philosophorum by Guillaume de Tignonville;

ff. 75r-96r: Jean Bruyant, ‘La voie de Povreté et de Richesse’;

f. 97v: A poem of 26 lines about the Fox and Geese, in Latin and English, beginning, ‘Pax nobis quod the Fox / For I am comyn to toowne’;

f. 98r: Notes in French, Latin and English, including a fragment in French on Renard the fox.

Decoration:

One miniature in colours of a figure reading at a lectern in front of a curtain, and a decorated initial in gold on a red and blue ground (f. 3r). Small initials in blue with pen-flourishing in red or in gold with pen-flourishing in purple, alternating at the beginning of each new philosopher’s name. Paraphs in red and blue.

Collection Area:

Western Manuscripts

Project / Collection:

Royal Collection

Hierarchy Record Ids:

032-002105724
040-002107596

Is part of:

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

Royal MS 19 B IV : Les Dits Moraulx des Philosophes, a French translation of Guillaume de Tignonville's Dicta moralia antiquorum philosophorum

Hierarchy:

032-002105724[1743]/040-002107596

Container:

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

Record Type (Level):

File

Extent:

1 volume

Digitised Content:

http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100165171608.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)

Thumbnail:

Languages:

English, Middle
French, Middle
Latin

Scripts:

Latin

Start Date:

1450

End Date:

1499

Date Range:

2nd half of the 15th century

Era:

Access:

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User Conditions:

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Physical Characteristics:

Material: Parchment.

Dimensions: 300 x 220mm (written area: 185 x 145mm) in two columns.

Foliation: ff. 98 (ff. 1 and 2 are parchment flyleaves + 3 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the beginning + 1 unfoliated parchment flyleaf following f. 1 and 4 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end).

Script: Gothic cursive.

Binding: British Museum/British Library in-house: Royal library binding of brown leather with gold tooling.

Custodial History:

Origin: France or England.

Provenance:

The Old Royal Library (the English Royal Library): an erased an inscription, ' Cest livre fu a Henry . . . . . ' and ‘Vive le Roy Henry’ among notes and pen-trials on f. 98r; perhaps included in the list of books at Richmond Palace of 1535, no. 92 (?) and in the catalogue of 1666, Royal Appendix 71, f.11(?).

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

Publications:

Robert Eder, ‘Tignonvillana inedita’, Romanische Forschungen, 33.3 (1915), 851-1022 (p. 876) [with an edition of the text].

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. 325.

R.H. Robbins, Secular lyrics of the XIV-XV centuries (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951), no. 1622 [text on f. 97v].

David J. A. Ross, Alexander Historiatus: A Guide to Medieval Illustrated Alexander Literature, 2nd edn., (Frankfurt am Main, Athenäum 1987), p. 8.

Le Mesnagier de Paris, ed. by Georgina M. Brereton and Janet M. Ferrier, trans. by Karin Ueltschi (Paris, Librairie générale française 1994), pp. 813-37 [an edition of the text on ff. 75r-96r].

Catherine Gaullier-Bougassas, 'Guillaume de Tignonville, Dits moraux des philosophes’, in La Fascination pour Alexandre le Grand dans les littératures européennes (Xe-XVIe siècle): Réinventions d’un mythe, 4 vols, (Turnhout: Brepols, 2014) IV, pp. 126-131.

La Voie de Povreté et de Richesse: Critical Edition, ed. by Glynnis M. Cropp (Cambridge: MHRA, 2016), pp. 4, 6, 9.

Material Type:

Archives and Manuscripts

Legal Status:

Not Public Record(s)

Names:

Bruyant, Jean, Notary, fl. 14th century,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/0000000079311784,
   see also http://viaf.org/viaf/121354359
Guillaume de Tignonville, French magistrate and administrator, d. 1414,
   see also http://isni.org/isni/000000004315668X,
   see also http://viaf.org/viaf/24145932

Places:

England
France

Related Material:

From 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. 325:

'LES DITS MORAULX des philosophes, and a poetical work in French, viz.:-

1. 'Sy senssuiuent les diz mouraulx des philosoffes deuant lincarnation nostre seigneur' (so later title, with a list of the philosophers, on f. 2b): Guillaume de Thignonville's translation of the Dicta Moralia as in 16 F. X, art. 3, and 19 A. VIII, art. 1. Beg. 'Sedechias fut philosophe le premier'; ends 'autreffaiz este deceu. Et ce souffise de la translacion des diz moraulx des philosophes. Explicit'. f. 3.

2. 'Le liure de larguement que font ensemble pourete et richece': poem by Jean Bruyant, notaire du roy au chastelet de Paris, of which there is another copy in 19 C. XI, art. 6 (see below), and copies are also in the Paris MSS. Bibl. Nat., anc. fonds fr. 808 and nouv. acqu. fr. 6222 and in the 14th cent. collection called Le Ménagier de Paris, from which it is printed, Soc. des Bibliophiles françois, Le Ménegier de Paris, 1846, ii, p. 4, as Le Chemin de Povreté et de Richesse. The MS. 6222 formerly contained an inscription (defaced when it came into the Barrois collection) which is said to have given the author's name as Jacques Briant and the date of composition as 1342. f. 75. Begins: 'En dit souuent en reprouchier Vn prouerbe que jay moult chier.' Ends: 'Appelle la voie et ladresce De pourete et de richesce.'

On the fly-leaf (f. 97 b) is a rhyme of the Fox and Geese in English (2 + 6 x 4 lines), beg. 'Pax nobis quod the Fox For I am comyn to toowne.' The rhymes in the rest of the poem are aaab, the b lines rhyming throughout with town. Another poem on the same motive is printed by Wright and Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae, 1840, i, p. 4, from Cambridge University MS. EE. i. 12, Which is dated 1492. On f. 98 among other scribbling are some French verses in a 15th cent. hand: 'Puisque je suis a mesnage, Je my tendray sagement. Je soulloye estre sauuage; Je suis priue maintenant. Aucunes gens vont disant Que Regnart est attrappe Puisque je suis marie.'

Vellum; ff. 98. 12 in. x 81/2 in. Second half of XVcent. Double columns. Gatherings (beg f. 3) of 8 1eaves, with catchwords. Sec. fol. 'semblable'. Illuminated initial and miniature (of coarse execution) of a philosopher reading on f. 3; other initials flourished in blue and red or gold and violet. On f. 98 is erased an inscription ' Cest liure fu a Henry . . . . . ' (&c.). Perhaps no. 92 of the cat. of MSS. at Richmond Palace in 1535 (cf. 15 D. I), 'Le dict des saiges'; cat. of 1666, f. 11?; not in CMA.'