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Cotton MS Vitellius A XV, ff 94r–209v
- Record Id:
- 041-001102975
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-001101582
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000001630.0x0002a7
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165366968.0x000001
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Cotton MS Vitellius A XV, ff 94r–209v
- Title:
-
The 'Nowell Codex', containing a homily on St Christopher; The Marvels of the East; Letter of Alexander to Aristotle; Beowulf; Judith
- Scope & Content:
-
These folios, sometimes called the 'Nowell Codex', contain several works in Old English, copied as a discrete unit in England in the very late 10th century or the early decades of the 11th century. The hands of two scribes can be distinguished, responsible for writing ff. 94r–175v (line 3) and ff. 175v (line 4)–209v respectively.
Contents:
ff. 94r–98r: Homily on St Christopher (imperfect);
ff. 98v–106v: Marvels of the East, with a series of miniatures (listed below);
ff. 107r–131v: Letter of Alexander to Aristotle;
ff. 132r–201v: Beowulf;
ff. 202r–209v: Judith (imperfect).
Decoration:
Miniatures consisting of line drawings, with some parts coloured, illustrating The Marvels of the East, including:
f. 98v: a single horned sheep, facing right; two horned sheep, facing left.
f. 99r: a cock and a hen; a creature with two bodies, two heads and eight legs.
f. 99v: a double-headed serpent; a serpent on the left and a deadly two-horned donkey on the right.
f. 100r: a cynocephalus, a man with a dog-like head.
f. 101r: a half-page miniature of three gold-digging, dog-like ants attacking a tethered camel, with a man in a tunic on the left with a camel, and a young camel tied to a tree.
f. 101v: two elephants, resembling camels; a two-faced man.
f. 102r: a naked man holding a plant; two men talking, and between them a lertix, a sheep-like beast.
f. 102v: a blemmya, that is, a man with his eyes and mouth in his chest; two snakes; a centaur or homodubius.
f. 103r: two wheels side-by-side, representing lakes of the Sun and the Moon.
f. 103v: a tree from which balsam grows; a donestre, a beast-headed man, on the left holding a human leg and foot, and a person on the right.
f. 104r: a panotii, a man with ears projecting on stems, holding an object that looks like a bow.
f. 104v: a long-haired man in a cloak and tunic, whose eyes shine at night like lamps; the temple called Beliobiles.
f. 105r: a golden vine-tree; three people talking, representing a kindly nation who rule the Red Sea, where the best pearls are found.
f. 105v: a bearded woman facing right, and an upright beast; a long-haired woman holding a plant.
f. 106r: a man sitting on a cushion under an arch; two catini, open-mouthed beasts like dogs; a robed man with a staff, extending his hand to another man;
f. 106v: a man lifting a woman; a tree on which gems grow; two men representing the race of Ethiopians.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Cotton Collection
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-001101582
040-001102971
041-001102975 - Is part of:
- Cotton MS : Cotton Manuscripts
Cotton MS Vitellius A XV : (1) Old English adaptations of Augustine of Hippo's Soliloquia and other texts (known as the 'Southwick…
Cotton MS Vitellius A XV, ff 94r–209v : The 'Nowell Codex', containing a homily on St Christopher; The Marvels of the East; Letter of… - Hierarchy:
- 032-001101582[0805]/040-001102971[0004]/041-001102975
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: Cotton MS
- Record Type (Level):
- Item
- Extent:
-
Part of Cotton MS Vitellius A XV
- Digitised Content:
- http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Cotton_MS_Vitellius_A_XV (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- English, Old
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 0990
- End Date:
- 1024
- Date Range:
- 990s or 1st quarter of the 11th century
- 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
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
England.
Provenance:
Laurence Nowell (b. 1530, d. c.1570), antiquary: inscribed with his name and the year 1563 (f. 94r).
- Information About Copies:
-
Full digital coverage available at http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=cotton_ms_vitellius_a_xv .
James, Montague Rhodes (ed.), Marvels of the East, Roxburghe Club (Oxford, 1929).
Kiernan, Kevin, and others (eds), Electronic Beowulf, 2 CD-ROMs (London, 1999).
Malone, Kemp (ed.), The Nowell Codex: British Museum Cotton Vitellius A. XV Second MS, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 12 (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1963).
Zupitza, Julius (ed.), Beowulf, reproduced in facsimile from the unique manuscript British Museum MS. Cotton Vitellius A. XV, Early English Text Society, Original Series 245, 2nd edn (London: Oxford University Press, 1959).
- Publications:
-
Boyle, Leonard E., ‘The Nowell Codex and the poem of Beowulf’, in The Dating of Beowulf, ed. by Colin Chase (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), pp. 23–32.
Bjork, Robert E., and John D. Niles (eds.), A Beowulf Handbook (Exeter, 1997).
Chase, Colin (ed.), The Dating of Beowulf (Toronto, 1981).
Doane, A. N., ‘“Beowulf” and scribal performance’, in Unlocking the Wordhord: Anglo-Saxon Studies in Memory of Edward B. Irving, Jr, ed. by Mark C. Amodio and Katherine O'Brien O'Keeffe (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003), pp. 62–75.
Dumville, David N., ‘Beowulf come lately: some notes on the palaeography of the Nowell Codex’, Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen, 225 (1988), 49–63.
Dumville, David N., ‘The Beowulf-manuscript and how not to date it’, Medieval English Studies Newsletter, 39 (1998), 21–27.
Fleming, Damian, ‘Eþel-weard: the first scribe of the Beowulf MS’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen/Bulletin de la Société Néophilologique/Bulletin of the Modern Language Society, 105 (2004), 177–86.
Förster, Max, Die Beowulf-Handschrift, Berichte über die Verhandlungen der Sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Philologische-historische Klasse, 71, part 4 (Leipzig, 1919).
Fulk, R. D., ‘Some contested readings in the Beowulf manuscript’, Review of English Studies, n.s. 56 (2005), 192–223.
Gerritsen, Johan, ‘British Library MS Cotton Vitellius A.xv – a supplementary description’, English Studies: A Journal of English Language and Literature, 69 (1988), 293–302.
Gneuss, Helmut, and Michael Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014), no. 399.
James, Montague Rhodes (ed.), Marvels of the East, Roxburghe Club (Oxford, 1929).
Ker, N. R., Catalogue of Manuscripts containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957; repr. 1990), no. 216.
Kiernan, Kevin S., Beowulf and the Beowulf Manuscript, rev. edn (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1996).
Kiernan, Kevin (ed.), Electronic Beowulf 4.0 (2015), sponsored by The University of Kentucky College of Arts & Sciences and The British Library: [accessed 31 August 2021].
Kiernan, Kevin S., ‘A long footnote for J. Gerritsen’s “supplementary” description of BL Cotton MS Vitellius A.XV’, English Studies: A Journal of English Language and Literature, 72 (1991), 489–96.
Kiernan, Kevin S., ‘The state of the Beowulf manuscript 1882-1983’, Anglo-Saxon England, 13 (1984), 23–42.
Lucas, Peter J., ‘The place of Judith in the Beowulf-manuscript’, Review of English Studies, n.s. 41 (1990), 463–78.
McGowan, Joseph, ‘Readings from the Beowulf manuscript, ff. 94r-98r (the St. Christopher folios)’, Manuscripta, 39 (1995), 26–29.
Malone, Kemp (ed.), The Nowell Codex: British Museum Cotton Vitellius A. XV Second MS, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 12 (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1963).
Powell, Kathryn, ‘Meditating on men and monsters: a reconsideration of the thematic unity of the Beowulf manuscript’, Review of English Studies, 228, n.s. 57 (2006), 1–15.
Senra Silva, Inmaculada, ‘The rune ‘ēþel’ and scribal writing habits in the Beowulf MS’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen/Bulletin de la Société Néophilologique /Bulletin of the Modern Language Society, 99 (1998), 241–47.
Taylor, Paul Beekman, and Peter H. Salus, ‘The compilation of Cotton Vitellius A xv’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen/Bulletin de la Société Néophilologique de Helsinki/Bulletin of the Modern Language Society of Helsinki, 69 (1968), 199–204.
Temple, Elzbieta, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900-1066, Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, 2 (London: Harvey Miller, 1976), no. 52.
Ward, H. L. D. and J. A. Herbert, Catalogue of Romances in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum, 3 vols (London, 1883–1910), I, p. 134, II, pp. 1–15.
Zupitza, Julius (ed.), Beowulf, reproduced in facsimile from the unique manuscript British Museum MS. Cotton Vitellius A. XV, Early English Text Society, OS 245, 2nd edn (London: Oxford University Press, 1959).
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)