23 January 2014
Sex and Death in the Roman de la Rose
Where can one go to witness the pursuit of the opposite sex, music and dancing, violence and beatings, and gratuitous nudity? No, not a British town centre on a Friday night, but in the Roman de la Rose, obviously!
An exquisite copy of this important medieval verse romance – Harley MS 4425 – has now been digitised and is available for you to browse in its entirety on the BL’s Digitised Manuscripts website. The Roman de la Rose was written in Old French by Guillaume de Lorris from the late 1220s up until his death in 1278, and completed some forty years later by Jean de Meun. This manuscript was made for Count Engelbert of Nassau (1451-1504), a wealthy courtier and leader of the Duke of Burgundy’s Privy Council. The artist to whom the decoration is attributed is known as the Master of the Prayer Books, and he and his studio were active around 1500. He portrayed the author in one of the column miniatures: he is shown sat at a writing desk with his book before him, in the act of composition (see below for an image which will be familiar to those of you who follow us on Twitter @BLMedieval). Note how the artist has set out the text in the author’s book in two columns, with spaces left for illustrations, exactly resembling this manuscript in a conceit that emphasises the figure’s status as author.
Detail of a miniature of Jean de Meun writing his book, from the Roman de la Rose, Netherlands (Bruges), c. 1490 – c. 1500, Harley MS 4425, f. 133r
The Roman de la Rose is an allegorical poem about courtship, love and a gentleman’s pursuit of ideal love (represented by the rose), experienced in a dream by the narrator. However, just in case you thought it was all ‘paddling palms and pinching fingers’, the miniatures that accompany the text reveal some darker elements to the story.
Running alongside all the displays of sophisticated, wealthy, aristocratic life, are rather more violent images, relating to stories and events in the text. For example, there is quite a lot of fighting in the Roman de la Rose – a virtual panoply of brawls and murders (and it isn’t just the men slugging it out!):
Detail of a miniature of Franchise fighting Danger, Harley MS 4425, f. 134v
Detail of a miniature of a jealous husband beating his wife, while neighbours look on, Harley MS 4425, f. 85r
Detail of a miniature of Beaute (‘Beauty’) and Laideur (‘Ugliness’) beating Chastete (‘Chastity’), now sadly damaged, Harley MS 4425, f. 81v
Detail of a miniature of the Lover being beaten by Honte (‘Shame’), Peur (‘Fear’) and Dangier (‘Danger’), Harley MS 4425, f. 131v
Below we can see two characters, Abstinence Contrainte (‘Forced Abstinence’) and Faux Semblant (‘False Seeming’) travelling in disguise: one as a Beguine nun (medieval cross-dressing!) and the other as a Franciscan friar.
Detail of a miniature of Abstinence Contrainte (‘Forced Abstinence’) and Faux Semblant (‘False Seeming’) travelling in disguise, Harley MS 4425, f. 108r
Detail of a miniature of Abstinence Contrainte (‘Forced Abstinence’) and Faux Semblant (‘False Seeming’) killing Malebouche (Evil Tongue), and cutting out his tongue, Harley MS 4425, f. 111r
These two are on a mission to kill off Malebouche (‘Evil Tongue’, literally ‘Bad Mouth’) and, appropriately, cutting out his tongue before slitting his throat (above).
Detail of a miniature of Virginius beheading his daughter Virginia, Harley MS 4425, f. 54v
In another scene (above), we see a story relating to Appius Claudius Crassus, a member of the decemviri (a council of ten men established to institute new laws) of the Roman Republic around 451 BC. In a tale originally related by Livy, Appius lusted after Virginia. However, since the girl was thoroughly repulsed by his lechery, Appius had one of his men claim that she was his slave, in the very court over which Appius himself presided. Predictably, Appius upheld the claims (which would allow him to then buy the girl and have his wicked way with her) – but her father, to defend her liberty and protect her from this sorry fate, decided it would be better to kill her, and so chopped off her head without further ado…which all seems a bit rough for poor, young Virginia!
Detail of a miniature of Nero watching while his mother Agrippina is dissected, Harley MS 4425, f. 59r
Elsewhere, we see the grisly fate of Agrippina the Younger. Having failed to murder his mother by means of a ship deliberately designed to sink, Nero pursued his matricidal ambitions by ordering Anicetus (Nero’s boyhood tutor and commander of the fleet at Misenum) and his men to murder her in person. According to Tacitus, before she was stabbed to death, and realising her son was responsible, Agrippina cried, ‘Smite my womb!’. The image here shows Anicetus or one of the others rummaging around in Agrippina’s viscera, while Nero looks on. Tacitus noted that some accounts related that Nero wished to see the place where he had been conceived, and also looked upon his mother after her death and praised her beauty. Those Roman emperors didn’t really go in for filial devotion.
Detail of a miniature of Seneca committing suicide as Nero watches, Harley MS 4425, f. 59v
The verso of this folio depicts Seneca’s suicide (above). Having charged Seneca with involvement in the Pisonian plot to assassinate him, Nero ordered Seneca to kill himself, which he did by opening his veins whilst in a bath. The inclusion of Nero in the image may be derived from the account of his presence at Seneca’s death in the Golden Legend.
Other suicides – people literally falling on their swords – are shown as well:
Detail of a miniature of Nero committing suicide, Harley MS 4425, f. 61r
Detail of a miniature of Lucretia committing suicide in front of her family (and an attentive dog), Harley MS 4425, f. 79r
Detail of a miniature of Dido committing suicide as Aeneas sails away, Harley MS 4425, f. 117v
There’s also some nudity thrown in for good measure:
Detail of a miniature the painter Zeuxis painting nude models, Harley MS 4425, f. 142r
Detail of a miniature of Pygmalion and the statue, Harley MS 4425, f. 177v
Perhaps after the reading the Roman de la Rose – what with all the courting and wooing, birds and bees, flowers and fruit trees, and the like – you find yourself with a few questions about the procreative act. Well, the Medieval Manuscripts Blog brings you Sex Education, Medieval-Style.
Q. How are babies made?
A. By Nature, with a hammer, on an anvil.
Detail of a miniature of Nature forging a baby, Harley MS 4425, f. 140r [see our post Royal Babies and Celebrated Infants for more on this miniature]
And there’s another depiction of people being created elsewhere in the manuscript…can you find it?
This manuscript also contains a number of extraordinary images of medieval dress and clothing styles, as well as a variety of depictions of the social classes. Check out the blog next Tuesday for a post on these subjects, and still more from the magnificent Roman de la Rose.
- James Freeman
16 January 2014
The Three Living and the Three Dead
Inspired by the massive success of our recent Knight v Snail post, we thought it might be interesting to have a look at some other tropes of medieval art which feature in many of our manuscripts. One such is that of the Three Living and the Three Dead.
Miniature of the Three Living and the Three Dead, with the Anglo-Norman poem 'Le dit des trios morts et trios vifs' below, from the De Lisle Psalter, England (East Anglia), c. 1308 – c. 1340, Arundel MS 83, f. 127v
The precise origins of the Three Living and the Three Dead are still somewhat mysterious, but there are many versions of the tale dating back to the 13th century, with the best-known coming from England and France. The basic version of the story goes like this: three young noblemen are out hunting when they suddenly come across three corpses, which are in varying states of decay, but nonetheless still animated. Unsurprisingly, the young men express shock and dismay at the sight, while the three corpses admonish them to consider the transience of life and to improve their behaviour before it is too late.
Detail of a miniature of the Three Living and the Three Dead, from the De Lisle Psalter, England (East Anglia), c. 1308 – c. 1340, Arundel MS 83, f. 127v
The dialogue between the two groups is sometimes explicit, as in the relatively early example above from the early 14th century De Lisle Psalter (Arundel MS 83). Beneath a miniature of three kings encountering three corpses is an abridged version of the Anglo-Norman poem Le dit des trios morts et trios vifs which describes the ensuing conversation. Interestingly, above this double-register miniature is a series of inscriptions in the English vernacular, giving additional voice to the characters. The Three Living cry out: ‘I am afraid’ (Ich am afert), ‘Lo, what I see!’ (Lo whet ich se), and ‘Methinks these be devils three’ (Me þinkes hit bey develes þre). And the Three Dead reply: ‘I was well fair’ (Ich wes wel fair), ‘Such shall you be’ (Such schel tou be), and ‘For God’s love, beware by me’ (For godes love bewer by me).
Detail of bas-de-page miniatures of the Three Living and the Three Dead, from the Taymouth Hours, England, 2nd quarter of the 14th century, Yates Thompson MS 13, ff. 179v-180r
Similar rubrics can be found in the illustrations of this scene in the mid-14th century Taymouth Hours (Yates Thompson MS 13; see our previous post about this magnificent manuscript). The Three Living can be found in the bas-de-page of f. 179v, confronting the Three Dead on the following folio (f. 180r). One of the Living cries out that he is aghast at the spectacle (Ich am agast), while the others recoil in horror. The Dead respond in almost identical fashion to those in the De Lisle Psalter, exhorting the Living to take their message to heart and change their ways.
These bas-de-page scenes can be found in the Taymouth Hours towards the end of the Office of the Dead, a set of prayers for the dead and dying that were included in virtually every medieval Book of Hours. In some later medieval Hours, the visual motif of the Three Living and the Three Dead was ‘promoted’ to the leading role, prefacing the text of the Office proper. One interesting example comes from Add MS 35313, a manuscript variously called the ‘London Rothschild Hours’ or the ‘Hours of Joanna I of Castile’, which was produced, probably in Ghent, about the year 1500. It was almost certainly created for a female patron, possibly Joanna I of Castile, who was often called Joanna the Mad (for more information about Joanna and her manuscripts, see also The Mystery of the Hours of Joanna the Mad, A Medieval Menagerie, and our calendar series for 2012).
Detail of a miniature of the Three Living and the Three Dead at the beginning of the Office of the Dead, from the Hours of Joanna I of Castile, southern Netherlands (Ghent?), c. 1500, Add MS 35313, f. 158v
The Office of the Dead in Add MS 35313 opens with a scene of the Three Living encountering the Three Dead while out hawking, and is unusual in including a woman among the hunting party. This miniature may be a copy of a similar scene in a Book of Hours that belonged to Mary of Burgundy, who was the mother-in-law of Joanna I of Castile; these hours are now in Berlin (Staatliche Museen, Kupferstichkabinett MS 78 B 12, f. 220v). There are no rubrics or explanatory text associated with this miniature, which implies that these sorts of images were widespread enough to be instantly recognisable to a reader. The Three Dead, however, appear much more threatening here than in earlier versions, going so far as to chase after the escaping riders with arrows in hand.
Miniature of the Raising of Lazarus and a scene of the Three Living and the Three Dead, from the Stuart de Rothesay Hours, Italy (Padua? And Perugia), c. 1508 – c. 1538, Add MS 20927, f. 119v
Another group of ominous Dead appear in the Stuart de Rothesay Hours, produced in Italy c. 1508 – c. 1538. Beneath a miniature of the Raising of Lazarus is a small panel of the Three Dead, who appear to be attacking the Three Living; note the terrified horses and hunting dogs circling the scene (see detail below). Rather than exhorting the living to change their ways, the dead are here presented as a danger in themselves.
Detail of the Three Living and the Three Dead, from the Stuart de Rothesay Hours, Italy (Padua? And Perugia), c. 1508 – c. 1538, Add MS 20927, f. 119v
Several more images from our collections are below. As always, please let us know what you think; you can leave a comment below, or contact us on Twitter at @BLMedieval.
Bas-de-page scenes of the Three Living and the Three Dead on facing folios, from the Smithfield Decretals, southern France (probably Toulouse), c. 1300, with illuminations added in England (London), c. 1340, Royal MS 10 E IV, ff. 258v-259r [for more on this manuscript, see Finishing the Smithfield Decretals]
Detail of a miniature of the Three Living (a pope, an emperor, and a king) and the Three Dead (wearing matching crowns), at the beginning of thee Office of the Dead, from a Book of Hours, France (Paris), c. 1480 – c. 1490, Harley MS 2917, f. 119r
Miniature of the Three Living and the Three Dead on a tipped-in leaf, from a Psalter, Germany (Augsburg?), first half of the 16th century, Harley MS 2953, f. 19v
Sarah J Biggs
20 November 2013
The True History of Richard II
David Tennant (of Doctor Who and Hamlet fame) is currently wooing audiences in the new Royal Shakespeare Company production of Richard II. This is one of William's Shakespeare's most famous history plays, notable for the richness of its language (“This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle ... This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England”) and its depiction of the king's decline and overthrow. But Shakespeare was equally notorious for embellishing the facts -- to what extent does his play reflect the true history of Richard II?
The presentation page of ‘The Capture and Death of King Richard’, showing the author, Jean Creton, and the Duke of Burgundy (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 2r).
Much of our knowledge of the downfall of King Richard II of England (1377–1399) is based on a contemporary account entitled La Prinse et Mort du Roy Richart (‘The Capture and Death of King Richard’). This work was composed by the French historian Jean Creton (c. 1386–1420), and presented to Philip the Bold, duke of Burgundy. Creton had been sent by King Charles VI of France to accompany Richard on a doomed expedition to Ireland in 1399, and was present when the English king was seized at Conwy in North Wales by the supporters of Henry Bolingbroke (the future Henry IV). La Prinse et Mort du Roy Richart records the official version of Richard II's death, namely that the king had died by starvation; but Creton believed that Richard remained alive and in prison. In 1402, when the French received reports that Richard II was in Scotland, Creton was despatched to ascertain the truth, at which point he finally concluded that King Richard was indeed dead.
A number of manuscripts of La Prinse et Mort du Roy Richart survive, one of which (Harley MS 1319) can be viewed in its entirety on the British Library's Digitised Manuscripts site. Made in Paris early in the 15th century, and painted by the Virgil Master, the manuscript in question contains a series of 16 miniatures which depict events in the final year of Richard II's reign.
A selection of images from Harley MS 1319 is reproduced here. We highly recommend that you look at the others on Digitised Manuscripts, so that you can see how people living in the 15th century would have viewed the life of Richard II, events which even at that time were subject to mystery and suspicion.
The relief ships (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 7v).
Archbishop Arundel preaching (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 12r).
Richard II at Conwy (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 19v).
Henry Bolingbroke and the dukes (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 30v).
Richard II and Henry Bolingbroke at Flint Castle (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 50r).
Richard II delivered to the citizens of London (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 53v).
Henry Bolingbroke recognized as king by the parliament (London, British Library, MS Harley 1319, f. 57r).
07 October 2013
Fancy Another Giant List of Digitised Manuscript Hyperlinks?
As promised back in July, we have an updated list of digitised manuscripts to offer you, our loyal readers. This master list contains details of everything that has so far been uploaded by the Medieval and Earlier Manuscripts department, complete with hyperlinks to each individual record on our Digitised Manuscripts site. You can download the Excel spreadsheet here: Download BL Medieval and Earlier Digitised Manuscripts Master List 07.10.13
Miniature of King Alfonso V praising our spreadsheet as Bishop Juan de Casanova looks on, from the Prayerbook of Alfonso V of Aragon - a new arrival to our list! produced in Spain (Valencia), 1436-1443, Add MS 28962, f. 14v
We should have another new list for you in 3 months - happy hyperlink clicking!
- Sarah J Biggs
03 October 2013
It's a Busy Life in Camelot
Those who are familiar with Royal MS 14 E iii, the gorgeous Arthurian manuscript which was in our Royal Exhibition last year and is now fully digitised on our Digitised Manuscripts site, will know that it contains The Estoire del Saint Graal, La Queste del Saint Graal, and Morte Artu, which tell the religious and mystical sections of the legends of King Arthur.
Detail of a miniature of Arthur and Merlin at dinner at Pentecost, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10292, f. 91r
In our collections we have another manuscript made at the same time by the same workshop in northern France, which contains the entire French prose ‘Vulgate Cycle’, as it is often called, and is now divided into 3 volumes: Additional MSS 10292, 10293 and 10294. Our virtual exhibition on Arthurian manuscripts on the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts puts these manuscripts into context.
In addition to the texts in the Royal manuscript, these three volumes also contain the Histoire de Merlin, about Merlin’s early involvement in the story, and the Lancelot du Lac, the original stories of Lancelot and the Knights of the Round Table and their chivalric exploits, including the love story of Lancelot and Guinevere.
There are catalogue entries and a selection of images already online in our Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, but these manuscripts contain over 600 of these colourful, imaginative images, which are soon to be available online, as we are currently preparing them for digitisation. Here is a selection of the delights in store:
Detail of a miniature of King Celidoine at sea in a small boat, with a lion, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10292, f. 41v Quiz question: who is King Celidoine and why is he having a 'Life of Pi' experience? (A tip: see H. Oskar Sommer, The Vulgate Version of the Arthurian Romances (Washington, 1909-1916), a 7 volume edition based on the Additional Manuscripts. It is available online here; happy searching!
Detail of a miniature of Lancelot, fully armed, joining knights and ladies in an enchanted dance in a forest, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10293, f. 292v
Detail of a miniature of Lancelot and Guinevere, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10293, f. 325v
Detail of a miniature of Hector and Gawain meeting in a forest, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10294, f. 29v
Miniatures of a lady being wounded by a sword while she mourns for Gawain, and of King Arthur ont the Wheel of Fortune with a blindfolded Lady Fortuna, northern France (Saint-Omer or Tournai), c. 1316, Add MS 10294, f. 89r
Watch this space and be the first to know when the full digitisation of these gorgeous manuscripts appear online! Or follow us on Twitter @BLMedieval.
- Chantry Westwell
26 September 2013
Knight v Snail
Recently a group of us went into our manuscripts store to have a look at some medieval genealogical rolls. We were examining Royal MS 14 B V, an English roll from the last part of the 13th century that contains quite a lot of marginalia, when one of our post-medieval colleagues noticed a painting of a knight engaging in combat with a snail.
Knight v Snail (from a genealogical roll of the kings of England, England, 4th quarter of the 13th century, Royal MS 14 B V, membrane 3)
This struck him as odd, which struck the medievalists in the group as odd; surely everyone has seen this sort of thing before, right? As anyone who is familiar with 13th and 14th century illuminated manuscripts can attest, images of armed knights fighting snails are common, especially in marginalia. But the ubiquity of these depictions doesn’t make them any less strange, and we had a long discussion about what such pictures might mean.
Knight v Snail II: Battle in the Margins (from the Gorleston Psalter, England (Suffolk), 1310-1324, Add MS 49622, f. 193v. Read more on the gorgeous Gorleston marginalia, in our previous posts.)
There has been much scholarly debate about the significance of these depictions of snail combat. As early as 1850, the magnificently-named bibliophile the Comte de Bastard theorised that a particular marginal image of a snail was intended to represent the Resurrection, since he discovered it in two manuscripts close to miniatures of the Raising of Lazarus. In her famous survey of the subject, Lilian Randall proposed that the snail was a symbol of the Lombards, a group vilified in the early middle ages for treasonous behaviour, the sin of usury, and ‘non-chivalrous comportment in general.’ This interpretation accounts for why the snail is so frequently seen antagonising a knight in armour, but does not explain why the knight is often depicted on the losing end of this battle, or why this particular image became so popular in the margins of non-historical texts such as Psalters or Books of Hours.
Knight v Snail III: Extreme Jousting (from Brunetto Latini's Li Livres dou Tresor, France (Picardy), c. 1315-1325, Yates Thompson MS 19, f. 65r)
Other scholars have variously described the ‘knight v snail’ motif as a representation of the struggles of the poor against an oppressive aristocracy, a straightforward statement of the snail’s troublesome reputation as a garden pest, a commentary on social climbers, or even as a saucy symbol of female sexuality. It is possible that these images could have meant all these things and more at one time or another; it is important to remember, as Michael Camille, who devoted a number of pages to this subject, once wrote: ‘marginal imagery lacks the iconographic stability of a religious narrative or icon’. This motif was part of a rich visual tradition that we can understand only imperfectly today – not that this will stop us from trying!
Knight v Snail IV: The Snails Attack (from the Queen Mary Psalter, England, 1310-1320, Royal MS 2 B VII, f. 148r)
Some more of our favourite British Library images are below, and please let us know what you think. You can leave a comment below, or we can always be reached on Twitter at @BLMedieval.
Knight v Snail V: Revenge of the Snail (from the Smithfield Decretals, southern France (probably Toulouse), with marginal scenes added in England (London), c. 1300-c. 1340, Royal MS 10 E IV, f. 107r)
Knight v Snail VI: The Gastropod Conqueror (from the Gorleston Psalter, England (Suffolk), 1310-1324, Add MS 49622, f. 162v)
Knight v Snail VII: A Pretty Comprehensive Defeat (from a fragmentary Book of Hours, England (London), c. 1320-c. 1330, Harley MS 6563, ff. 62v-63r)
Knight v Snail VIII: Switcheroo! It's a Monkey This Time (from the Gorleston Psalter, England (Suffolk), 1310-1324, Add MS 49622, f. 210v)
Knight v Snail IX: Just for Fun: A Rabbit, Monkeys, and a Snail Jousting (from the Harley Froissart, Netherlands (Bruges), c. 1470-1472, Harley MS 4379, f. 23v)
Further Reading
Lilian Randall, ‘The Snail in Gothic Marginal Warfare’ Speculum 37, no. 6 (June 1962), pp. 358-367.
Michael Camille, Image on the Edge (Reaktion Books: London, 1992), pp. 31-36.
Carl Prydum, What’s So Funny about Knights and Snails?, http://www.gotmedieval.com/2009/07/whats-so-funny-about-knights-and-snails.html
Visit our Medieval England and France website to discover how to make a medieval manuscript, to read beastly tales from the medieval bestiary, and to learn about medieval science, medicine and monastic libraries.
- Sarah J Biggs
09 September 2013
The Quimperlé Detective
In July we told the story of how the three parchment fragments of the Ely farming memorandum were re-united in the 1920s through a remarkable act of sleuthing by an Anglo-Saxon scholar, Professor Stenton of Reading. While updating our online catalogues in the British library, we regularly come across remarkable characters who have studied our manuscripts in the past, or who have owned them at some stage during their lifetime.
Here is another example of skilful detective work, this time by a French manuscript scholar, Monsieur Leon Maitre, in the late nineteenth century, who travelled from Brittany to Yorkshire to track down the Quimperlé Cartulary (Egerton MS 2802).
Former binding with label stating that the
cartulary was compiled in the 12th
century by the monk Gurheden, Egerton MS 2802, f. i recto
This unprepossessing manuscript with only rudimentary decoration is of great interest to historians of Brittany, as it contains unique historical records of the Abbey of St Croix and environs in the 11th and 12th centuries. For this reason it has recently been fully digitised, and can be viewed here.
Text from the Cartulary of Quimperlé abbey, compiled by Gurheden in the first half of
the 12th century with preface entitled 'Opusculum Gurhedeni monachi',
including a summary of the foundation charters and a Bull of Pope
Boniface IV. Additions by different scribes in the 2nd half of the 12th
century and the 13th century, Egerton MS 2802, f. 52r
Perhaps more interesting than its contents is the story of how it came to the British Library, a tale that could be straight out of the Scarlet Pimpernel! In his introduction to the edition of 1904, the French scholar Leon le Maitre writes in the rather quaint academic French of the period that he is obliged to re-tell the ‘historique des peregrinations’ (the tale of the wanderings or pilgrimages) of the manuscript. Apparently when the monastery was the object of ‘la rage destructive des révolutionnaires’ (the destructive rage of the revolutionaries) Brother Davau, one of the monks, escaped with this precious document and a few personal effects. With no means of support, he fell ill, and was tended by the kindly Dr Le Guillou of Nantes, to whom he bequeathed his only precious possession (‘la seule richesse qui lui restât’) as a sign of his gratitude. Le Guillou’s son sold it in 1836 to a Paris bookseller which was frequented by an English scholar, a Mr Stapleton. So our cartulary ended up in the collection of Lord Beaumont, nephew of Mr Stapleton, at Carlton Towers in Yorkshire, where it was kept (and mislaid among many old books and documents) during the remodelling and reconstruction of his magnificent new residence.
Text from the Cartulary of Quimperlé abbey, Egerton MS 2802, f. 162r
Fortunately, the pre-eminent French manuscript scholar, M Léopold Delisle of the Bibliotheque Nationale of France, kept his eye ('son oeil vigilant') on important French historical documents and so was aware of the situation. In 1881 he and the French Ministre d’Instruction Publique sent M le Maitre on an important mission: to find and make a transcript of this lost treasure of the patrimony of Brittany. The most difficult part of the mission was to get an entrée into English high society, which was finally provided by the Marquis de la Ferronays, who by a happy chance was in London at the time as military attaché to the French Embassy. He made the introduction and our French sleuth set off for Yorkshire, where he was once again fortunate to encounter a Monsignor Goldies, the local Catholic priest, whose brother had married a lady from Nantes, and who was therefore well-disposed towards him. He introduced Monsieur le Maitre to the Dowager Lady Beaumont, who was living alone at Carlton Towers at the time.
Carlton Towers, Yorkshire,
as it is today – many rooms to search! Photo by William Thomas, 2009, via Flickr Creative Commons
With ‘bonne grace’ she allowed him the free run of all the many rooms in her home, and he was free to ferret around among all the chests and cases of old books and documents, which were in some disarray. After eight days of searching, Lady Beaumont decided it was time to intervene, and finally emerged triumphant with a modest, yellowed booklet, untitled and unbound, which she had found in the middle of a pile of newspapers and brochures. It was the Quimperlé Cartulary! Mr le Maitre was able to make his edition and subsequently the manuscript was bought by the British Museum from Lord Beaumont’s successors. The funds used were from the bequeathed by Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Early of Bridgewater, and so it is part of the Egerton collection.
Full digitisation of the manuscript means that now French and other scholars will be able to study the contents in detail on our Digitised Manuscript here.
- Chantry Westwell
10 July 2013
Medieval Maps of the Holy Land
P. D. A. Harvey's most recent book, Medieval Maps of the Holy Land, is a richly-illustrated study of eight regional maps of Palestine, drawn between the 12th and the 14th centuries. Some of those maps survive as the work of the original mapmaker, most notably those of Matthew Paris; others are copies or derivatives of original maps that are now lost. Together, as Harvey argues, they are "of considerable interest for the light they throw on the way maps were thought of and constructed in medieval Europe. They contribute too to our understanding of the way Palestine [used purely as a geographical term] was viewed at a period when the crusades gave it particular interest."
The Acre map of Matthew Paris (London, British Library, MS Royal 14 C VII, f. 4v).
The maps featured are now dispersed worldwide, being held in Florence, London, Oxford, Cambridge, Paris, Brussels, Bruges, the Vatican and New York. For instance, the Ashburnham Libri Map is kept at the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Florence. Harvey describes how it was examined in Paris by Sir Frederic Madden in 1846, with a view to purchasing it for the British Museum. But the sale fell through when Madden was informed that Guglielmo Libri was not just a collector but also a dealer, and "was suspected to have stolen a portion of the MSS. he possessed."
Two of these medieval maps of Palestine are now cared for by the British Library. The two Tournai maps (Additional MS 10049, f. 64r and f. 64v) were made in the late-12th century, and belonged to the abbey of St Martin at Tournai. The recto supplies a map of Palestine, overlaid and replaced by a map of Asia; the verso has a second map of Palestine, again partly overlaid and replaced by yet another map of Palestine. One notable feature is a parchment patch, covering an original hole, used on one side to depict Crete and the other the Caucasus mountains.
The Acre map of Matthew Paris (London, British Library, MS Royal 14 C VII, f. 5r).
The second British Library map described by Harvey is the Acre map of Matthew Paris (Royal MS 14 C VII, ff. 4v-5r), with other versions surviving at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. The British Library example can be viewed on our Digitised Manuscripts site. That in Royal 14 C VII is said to be the most carefully executed of the three copies, and probably the first to be drawn, since its inscriptions are shorter and mostly in Latin rather than in French. Also found in the same book is an illustrated itinerary from London to south Italy, depicting the towns en route, mostly one day's journey apart, and with no contemporary or earlier medieval parallel.
The itinerary from London to Italy (London, British Library, MS Royal 14 C VII, f. 2r).
Medieval Maps of the Holy Land is published by the British Library (ISBN 9780712358248), and is available from the online shop.
Medieval manuscripts blog recent posts
- The Coronation Banquet of Henry VI
- Alexander, Porrus and the peacock
- Merlin the magician: from devil’s son to King Arthur’s trusted advisor
- ‘Frenssh’ as it was ‘spak’ in medieval England
- Charles d'Orléans, earliest known Valentine?
- The Polonsky project's two year anniversary
- The show must go on! Putting on a play in the 16th century
- Clever cats and other swashbuckling tales
- The Joyful Ballad of the Taverners
- What's the language?
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