09 June 2018
Sir Robert Cotton's manuscripts added to Memory of the World register
We are delighted that Sir Robert Cotton's collection of manuscripts, held at the British Library, has been added to the UNESCO Memory of the World UK Register. Cotton's library contains many historical and literary treasures of national and international significance, such as Magna Carta, the Lindisfarne Gospels, the only surviving copies of Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the autograph papers of a number of British monarchs. Collectively they form a key part of the intellectual heritage of the nation.
A page from the Vespasian Psalter, known as Cotton MS Vespasian A I following Robert Cotton's system of arranging his manuscripts in presses named after Roman emperors and imperial ladies. This manuscript, made in Kent in the 8th century, contains an interlinear Old English gloss of the Psalter text: Cotton MS Vespasian A I, f. 31r
Sir Robert Cotton (1571–1631) was a politician and antiquarian scholar, who began to assemble his collection of manuscripts as early as 1588, aged just seventeen. Cotton's collecting interests focused on works central to the study of British history, such as chronicles, cartularies, maps and state papers.
A map of Britain by Matthew Paris, monk and chronicler of St Albans (d. 1259). Scotland is joined to the mainland by a bridge at Stirling, while Kent is located due South of London: Cotton MS Claudius D VI/1
The Cotton library contains a nationally significant collection of medieval chronicles. The manuscript of the Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, shown here recording (in red ink) the foundation of the monasteries of Rievaulx in 1132 and Melrose in 1136, is the oldest surviving annalistic chronicle from Scotland: Cotton MS Faustina B IX, f. 18r
The importance of these manuscripts for our knowledge of the past cannot be overstated. For example, Robert Cotton brought together the largest collection of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts in the world, including two early copies of Bede's Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum and five manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, as well as the earliest surviving Anglo-Saxon charter, dating from AD 679. Many of these manuscripts will be on display later this year in the Library's major Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition (19 October 2018–19 February 2019).
The earliest surviving Anglo-Saxon charter, a grant of land by King Hlothhere of Kent to Abbot Beorhtwald and his monastery, dated 679. This document is also sometimes known as the 'Reculver charter' after the place where it was issued: Cotton MS Augustus II 2
After Robert Cotton's death, the library passed in turn to his son, Sir Thomas Cotton (d. 1662), and grandson, Sir John Cotton (d. 1702). In 1702, the Cotton library was acquired by the British government, the first occasion that any library passed into national ownership in Britain – an important step in the creation of a national, public library.
Some of the greatest works of medieval English literature are preserved uniquely in the Cotton library, among them the only surviving copy of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: Cotton MS Nero A X/2, ff. 94v–95r
The Cotton library is integral to our knowledge of early modern British history. This document, written by King Edward VI of England in January 1551/2, is headed 'Certein pointes of weighty matters to be immediatly concluded on by my counsell': Cotton MS Vespasian F XIII, f. 273r. Edward's diary is also held in the Cotton collection: Cotton MS Nero C X, ff. 10–83
Most of the collection survived a major fire in 1731, which formed part of the impetus for the creation of the British Museum in 1753. Some of the manuscripts were damaged significantly in that fire, with a small number being completely destroyed. The volumes in question were restored in the 19th century and they continue to support scientific research into the preservation and digitisation of fire-damaged artefacts.
In October 1731, the Cotton library narrowly escaped near-total destruction when a fire broke out at Ashburnham House in London. In the 19th century, it was discovered that the fire-damaged parchment leaves could be inlaid in modern paper mounts, as shown here in a page from Bede's Ecclesiastical History: Cotton MS Tiberius A XIV, f. 39r
Ever since the library's formation, the Cotton manuscripts have been made available for consultation by scholars worldwide. Read more about the Cotton manuscripts in our collection guide.
The Cotton library is particularly rich in illuminated manuscripts from Britain and beyond. Here is the opening page of the Coronation Book of King Charles V of France, commissioned in 1365: Cotton MS Tiberius B VIII/2, f. 35r
Many of the manuscripts are written in Latin or in English (including Old English, Middle English and Scots English). Other European languages represented in the collection include Cornish, Danish, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Welsh. Non-European languages include Arabic, Chinese, Hebrew, Inuit, Persian and Turkish. Here is page from a Latin-Old Cornish glossary, copied in South-East Wales in the 12th century: Cotton MS Vespasian A XIV, f. 8v
You can view many of the Cotton manuscripts on the British Library's Digitised Manuscripts site. We recommend that, on the homepage, you type into the Manuscripts search box 'Cotton MS' or 'Cotton Ch' in order to see those currently available; more are being added all the time.
Sir Robert Cotton was closely acquainted with many of the leading scholars and collectors of his day. In this letter, Sir Edward Dering (d. 1644) sent him the charter of King John dated at Runnymede, now known as Magna Carta, and preserved as Cotton Charter XIII 31A: Cotton MS Julius C III, f. 143r
Cotton was renowned for rearranging his manuscripts and for preserving pages from other books and documents. Prefacing a gospelbook is this cutting from the Breviary of Margaret of York, which in turn incorporates a mounted papyrus fragment of Gregory the Great, Homiliae XL in Evangelia, dating from the late 6th or 7th century: Cotton MS Titus C XV, f. 1r
The British Library's two manuscripts of Magna Carta, issued by King John in 1215 and both forming part of Sir Robert Cotton's library, were inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World International Register in 2009. We are thrilled that this whole manuscript collection of national and international importance has now been recognised by UNESCO. We hope that the Cotton library will continue to inspire research into the rich cultural and historical heritage of the British Isles. Access the full list of inscriptions on the UNESCO Memory of the World UK Register.
Tickets for the British Library's Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition, featuring a number of the Cotton manuscripts, can be purchased online.
08 June 2018
Registration now open for our ‘Manuscripts in the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms’ conference
On 13–14 December 2018, the British Library will be hosting an international conference to coincide with the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition which runs from 19 October 2018 to 19 February 2019. Registration for the conference is now open.
A calendar page for December, from a geographical and scientific collection made in England in the mid-11th century: Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, f. 8v
The programme comprises twenty-two of the leading experts in the study of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. They were invited on the basis of their long-established study of these manuscripts, their senior professional standing and the high calibre of their contributions to the field. The speakers were selected, with the advice of the exhibition’s advisory group, to ensure that the conference covers the full time-period, geographical range and themes reflected in the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition.
The conference will open and close with keynote lectures by Professor Lawrence Nees of the University of Delaware on 'The European context of manuscript illumination in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, 600–900' and Professor Julia Crick of King’s College London on 'English scribal culture in an age of conquest, 900–1100'.
Other confirmed speakers are Sue Brunning, Richard Gameson, Helen Gittos, Michael Gullick, David Johnson, Catherine Karkov, Simon Keynes, Rosalind Love, Rosamond McKitterick, Bernard Meehan, Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, Andy Orchard, Susan Rankin, Winfried Rudolf, Joanna Story, Francesca Tinti, Elaine Treharne, Immo Warntjes, Tessa Webber and Jonathan Wilcox. The conference will include an evening private view of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition.
Opening page of the Gospel of St Mark featuring a border and an initial in gold and colours with animal head decorations, from the Bury Gospels, England (Canterbury?), c. 1020–1030: Harley MS 76, f. 45r
The conference will be followed on 15 December 2018 by a symposium in which early career researchers will discuss their new work on manuscripts from Anglo-Saxon England. The speakers were selected following an open call for papers held last year.
Patientia talking to other virtues, from the Psychomachia, England, early 11th century, Cotton MS Cleopatra C VIII, f. 4r
As the Old English poem Maxims I urges, ‘Gleawe men sceolon gieddum wrixlan’ (‘Wise people ought to exchange learned speeches’). We hope you will be able to join us in December.
Register for the International Conference only (13 and 14 December)
Register for the International Conference and Early Career Symposium (13, 14 and 15 December)
We are very grateful to the donors who are generously supporting the conference and symposium:
The Polonsky Foundation
Patrick Donovan
The Association for Manuscripts and Archives in Research Collections
Past & Present Postgraduate Fund
07 June 2018
Two in one: a newly-identified bilingual papyrus
A newly-identified papyrus in Latin and Arabic has recently been discovered in the British Library’s papyrus collections. In the course of the Library’s collaboration with a Naples-based research project, Dario Internullo has identified an unique document: a private letter from 7th- to 9th-century Egypt written in two languages.
The first page of Sati’s letter in Papyrus 3124
The first language of this letter is Latin, a very lively Latin, in which the sender, whose name is 'Sati' (Sāṭi‘), greets the recipient, his friend 'Iohannes', and asks after his health.
The beginning of Sati’s greetings to Iohannes from Papyrus 3124r
'In the name of the Lord, I, Sati, write this letter to you, Iohannes. How are you? How is it going? I greet you, my dear friend, and your brothers with friendship, in the name of the Lord. How are you? How is it going? May God, our Lord, keep you safe and sound forever. A letter about your good health reached me: I thank God, because you are safe.'
A new section then starts. The script remains the same, using the Roman alphabet, but the language has switched: it is now in Arabic that Sati continues to address Iohannes. Here he mentions another friend 'Custantin', and some business relating to linen with which they are all involved.
The second part of Sati’s letter where he starts writing in Arabic using the Roman alphabet
Documents written in an alphabet different from the one that is commonly used for that language are not uncommon, but this particular combination — Arabic written in the Roman alphabet — is rather unusual. This document has an immense significance as it provides one of the earliest continuous texts to register Arabic consonants and vowels, enlarging the corpus of sources for early Arabic. The language of the papyrus is Middle Arabic transcribed on the basis of phonetic principles and free from the influence of Classical Arabic orthography.
As for the contents, the letter is linked to some kind of business — possibly the trading of linen — and it contains a general request for news. The onomastic data seems to point toward Egypt, where Latin imperial names were used in at least two regions (the Theban west bank and Aphrodito). The letter was probably dictated by the sender, Sāṭi‘, to a scribe with a graphic and linguistic education in Latin.
The back of Sati’s letter recording the sender’s name in Arabic written in the Roman alphabet as 'From Sāṭi‘, House of Ibn Manṣūr', Papyrus 3124v
The newly deciphered Papyrus 3124 compellingly combines two different cultures often considered as opposites, while elucidating a social network stretching from Egypt to Palestine. It also leads us to reflect in a more articulated way on the survival of Latin in the East long after the hegemony of Greek in the 6th and 7th centuries AD.
The text of this papyrus has been edited by Dario Internullo and Arianna D’Ottone Rambach, in One Script for Two Languages: Latin and Arabic in an Early Allographic Papyrus, in Palaeography Between East & West. Proceedings of the Seminars on Arabic Palaeography held at Sapienza University, edited by A. D’Ottone Rambach, Supplement no. 1 to the Rivista degli Studi Orientali, n.s. 90 (2017), pp. 53–72. For further information, see the article by Dario Internullo, 'Un unicum per la storia della cultura. Su un papiro latinoarabo della British Library (P.Lond. inv. 3124)', Mélanges de l’École Française de Rome. Moyen Âge, 128/2 (2016).
To learn more about the British Library's acquisitions of Greek and Latin papyri since 1956, please see this previous blogpost.
Dario Internullo (Università degli Studi Roma Tre/Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II)
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04 June 2018
The first voyage of Codex Amiatinus
One Thursday in June over 1300 years ago, a group of monks stood on the banks of the River Wear, weeping. In the distance, a boat was sailing away across the river. Over the water, the sound of the monks’ singing and sobs reached the elderly man in the boat, who was himself in tears. This was Ceolfrith, their abbot. He was leaving, never to return. Among the things he took with him was an enormous book, a gift he intended to deliver at his earthly destination. That book has never returned to the British Isles … until now.
Codex Amiatinus, written at Wearmouth-Jarrow before 716: Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, MS Amiatino 1 (© Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence)
The dramatic description of Abbot Ceolfrith’s departure is set out in The Life of Ceolfrith, written shortly after those events by an anonymous author. Ceolfrith's departure also features in another contemporaneous work, the History of the Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, which was written by another of Ceolfrith’s monks: the Venerable Bede. Wearmouth and Jarrow were two sites of the same monastery. Together, they formed one of the major intellectual centres in Europe in the 8th century, and these works are key sources for the monastery’s early history. They also provide useful information about the production of that giant book Ceolfrith took with him, now known as Codex Amiatinus. Today, Codex Amiatinus is the oldest surviving, complete Latin Bible in the world. The manuscript that contains the earliest surviving copies of both the Anonymous Life of Ceolfrith and Bede’s History of the Abbots has recently been digitised, thanks to The Polonsky Foundation England and France Project: Manuscripts from the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France, 700-1200.
Account of Ceolfrith's departure in the earliest copy of the Anonymous Vita Ceolfridi, made in England in the 10th century: Harley MS 3020, f. 29r
According to Bede, Ceolfrith was the sort of ‘man who worked hard at everything’ (‘industrius per omnia vir’). Ceolfrith was particularly energetic at expanding the libraries at Jarrow and Wearmouth that his predecessor, Benedict Biscop, had set up. According to Bede, he doubled the size of those libraries. He also ordered that three giant Bibles be made, using the new Latin translation of the Bible (Jerome’s Vulgate translation). One of the Bibles was to go to Wearmouth, the other Jarrow and the third Ceolfrith took as a gift for St Peter’s shrine in Rome.
Late 12th-century image of a scribe that may depict Bede, from the Lives of St Cuthbert, Durham, 4th quarter of the 12th century: Yates Thompson MS 26, f. 2r
Both Bede and the anonymous author state that Ceolfrith decided to go on a final pilgrimage to Rome because he felt he was becoming too old to set a good example to his pupils. Both accounts claim this was something of a surprise to his monks: Bede claims they were only given two days’ notice. This seems dubious, given the elaborate preparations necessary for the journey, that included not only Ceolfrith but dozens of other travelling companions. Nevertheless, using both accounts, we can reconstruct some of his route.
Reconstruction of Ceolfrith's journey, based on the Anonymous Life, Bede's History of the Abbots, later pilgrim itineraries and the analysis of Grocock, Wood and Morris and comparisons with Archbishop Sigeric's later itinerary; with the Nodegoat visualisation environment
‘Now Ceolfrith set out from his monastery on 4 June, a Thursday …’ according to the Anonymous Life. Ceolfrith sailed across the River Wear in a boat, then rode south on horseback:
he got out of the boat ... and got on a horse, speeding away from the land of the Angles to the lands where, with a freer and purer spirit for contemplating angels, he might be delivered to Heaven.
Sometime between 4 June and 4 July, the Anonymous Life claims that Ceolfrith was in ‘Ælberht’s monastery, at a place called Horn Vale’. Scholars have suggested that this place was Kirkdale, in Yorkshire. Ceolfrith then boarded a boat for the Continent at the mouth of the River Humber on 4 July. It was not smooth sailing: the boat was apparently blown off course three times. Nevertheless, on 12 August Ceolfrith ‘reached the lands of Gaul’ (Galliae terras), where he was received with honour by King Chilperic himself. The party then travelled over land: Bede claims Ceolfrith went part of the way on horseback and part of the way being carried on a litter, as he was becoming ill. Ceolfrith reached Langres around 9am on 25 September. He died there on 29 September 716.
Codex Amiatinus’s journey did not stop there. According to the Anonymous Life, a group of monks continued on and delivered Ceolfrith’s gift to the Pope. The Anonymous Life also preserves the Pope’s thank you letter to the monks of Wearmouth-Jarrow, which mentions a fine gift he had received — probably Codex Amiatinus.
The dedication page of Codex Amiatinus as it now looks; the alterations use a brown ink, in contrast to the main text (© Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence)
In later centuries, Codex Amiatinus moved again, this time to the abbey of San Salvatore in Monte Amiata, Tuscany. An inscription in the front the book recording that it was a gift from Ceolfrith to St Peter’s was partially erased and altered to say that it was a gift from Peter of the Lombards (fl. late 9th century) to the abbey of Monte Amiata. However, later scholars have been able to prove this volume is the one that travelled with Ceolfrith, because a copy of its original dedicatory page is preserved in the Anonymous Life, and it matches the page in Codex Amiatinus, apart from the erasures.
Copy of the dedication page of Codex Amiatinus, from the Anonymous Life of Ceolfrith: Harley MS 3020, f. 33r
Codex Amiatinus is now preserved in the Biblioteca Laurenziana in Florence. It will be returning for the British Library’s Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition (19 October 2018–19 February 2019).
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06 May 2018
The spectacular Moutier-Grandval Bible
As part of his plan to reform the Church, Charlemagne gathered scholars and advisors to his court from all over Europe. One of these was Alcuin of York, who prepared a corrected version of the Bible for the Emperor in early 800. Alcuin was appointed abbot of the monastery of St Martin in Tours in 796, and under his direction and that of subsequent abbots, St Martin’s became a major centre for the production of Bibles — over forty copies from the first half of the 9th century survive (for more on this, see David Ganz, ‘Mass production of early medieval manuscripts’, cited in the Bibliography below). Together, these manuscripts constitute impressive evidence of the desire to produce a corrected text of the Bible for use throughout the Carolingian empire.
Historiated initial ‘B’ with David wrestling a lion, at the beginning of Psalms, in the Moutier-Grandval Bible, Add MS 10546, f. 234r
As noted following a recent discovery at Princeton, the copies of the Bible produced at Tours are large and their text is very legible, with a distinctive ‘export quality script’ (Rosamond McKitterick, ‘Carolingian Bible production: the Tours anomaly’). Of the fourteen surviving Tours pandect Bibles (books bound in a single volume), three are spectacularly illustrated, made during what has been called the ‘high point’ of Tours production, under abbots Adalhard (r. 834–843) and his successor Vivian (r. 844–851). The earliest of these is the Moutier-Grandval Bible (British Library Add MS 10546), an enormous volume of 449 leaves that is over half a metre (over one and a half feet) tall. To get a sense of its sheer size, see these images of the manuscript being filmed in the British Library’s photographic studio.
The Bible takes its name from the monastery of Moutier-Grandval in the diocese of Basel, for which it may have been made originally as an export of the Tours scriptorium. The book includes four miniatures that are celebrated as some of the earliest examples of full-page narrative art in manuscripts from the Middle Ages.
The Creation of Adam and of Eve, the Admonition, the Temptation and Fall, the Expulsion and Eve suckling and Adam toiling, at the beginning of Genesis, Add MS 10546, f. 5v
The first illustration appears at the beginning of Genesis, arranged in four friezes, in which the sequence of events moves from left to right. Individual scenes depict selected events described in the second and third chapters of Genesis: the Creation of Adam and Eve; God’s warning not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge; the Temptation and Fall; and the Expulsion. Within the borders is a poem in verse written in gold letters also summarizing these events; in fact, the poem may have been composed from the pictures.
Moses receiving the Law from the Hand of God, and extolling the Law to the people, at the beginning of Exodus, Add MS 10546, f. 25v
The book of Exodus also merits a full-page illustration recapitulating some of its most significant episodes, presented in two rather than four registers. In the upper one, Moses receives the law from the hand of God on a mountain erupting in flames, illustrating Exodus 24:17 (‘And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a burning fire upon the top of the mount’). Below this Moses imparts the commandments from the second set of tablets to the people of Israel (Exodus 34:29–32). Stylistically, the artist’s debt to classical art is clear, in the dress of the figures, the hanging curtains and in particular the architectural backdrop with its arcaded wall, coffered ceiling, and figures in the spandrels reminiscent of Roman wall painting, now known from excavations in Pompeii and Herculaneum.
You can view the Moutier-Grandval in all its splendour on our Digitised Manuscripts site.
Kathleen Doyle
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Further reading
Die Bibel von Moutier-Grandval, British Museum ADD.MS.10546, facsimile commentary by Johannes Duft and others (Berne, 1971).
Die Karolingischen Miniaturen, ed. by Wilhelm Koehler & Florentine Mütherich, 7 vols (Berlin, 1930–2009), II, Die Hofschule Karls des Grossen, ed. by Wilhelm Koehler (1958), pp. 56–69, pls 42–66; II, 2 parts, 3:1: Die Gruppe des Wiener Krönungs-Evangeliars, ed. by Wilhelm Koehler (1960), pp. 22–27, 30–31, 35–45.
Herbert Kessler, The Illustrated Bibles from Tours, Studies in Manuscript Illumination, 7 (Princeton, 1977), pp. 5, 14, pls 1, 44, 48, 87, 107.
David Ganz, ‘Mass production of early medieval manuscripts’ in The Early Medieval Bible: Its production, decoration and use, ed. by Richard Gameson (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 53–62
Rosamond McKitterick, ‘Carolingian Bible production: the Tours anomaly’ in The Early Medieval Bible: Its production, decoration and use, ed. by Richard Gameson (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 63–77 (p. 63)
David Ganz, ‘Carolingian Bibles’, in The New Cambridge History of the Bible, 4 vols (Cambridge, 2012–), II: From 600 to 1450, ed. by Richard Marsden & E. Ann Matter (2012), pp. 325–37.
Scot McKendrick & Kathleen Doyle, The Art of the Bible: Illuminated Manuscripts from the Medieval World (London, 2016), no. 6.
04 April 2018
Reynard the Fox and other curiosities
We sincerely hope that spring has sprung, and to mark that occasion we have recently uploaded a number of manuscripts to the British Library's Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts. Among them are translations of Boccaccio, a glorious missal and a collection of crusader's maps ...
Le Roman de Renart
If you need some light relief, who better to provide it than one of literature’s most endearing and enduring tricksters, Reynard the Fox? This 14th-century copy in French contains fourteen of the Renart or Reynard tales, in which the wily fox outwits his fellow creatures and humans; this vast collection of allegorical works circulated in medieval Europe, satirising courtly literature, the powerful and the Church.
In one of the tales, Reynard tries to fool Tibert the cat, but of course he comes off second best.
Renard and Tibert the cat, seated with the moon above, from Le Roman de Renart: France or England, 14th century, Add MS 15229, f. 53r
In another tale, Reynard is stuck at the bottom of a well. He fools Isengrin (or Ysengrim), the greedy, dull-witted wolf, into lowering himself in the other bucket so that he will rise. Isengrin is often depicted as a cleric to make fun of the religious orders.
Reynard in a bucket being lowered into a well by a cleric in a white robe: Add MS 15229, f. 42r
The Missal of Augier de Cogeux
The Missal of Augier de Cogeux is a glorious missal from Grasse in Provence, whose pages contain an array of illuminated initials and borders, among them angels playing a variety of musical instruments, prophets, monks, lions, dogs and rabbits, and a menagerie of weird and wonderful creatures.
A historiated initial 'V'(ultum) at the beginning of an introit from Psalm 44, of a tonsured cleric in a black robe holding a crozier; a lion-rabbit hybrid creature in the upper margin and zoomorphic initials with hybrid creatures including one with a spotted body and two human heads and a lion-like creature wearing a mitre: France, S. (Provence, between Toulouse and Narbonne), 4th quarter of the 13th century or 1st quarter of the 14th century, Add MS 17006, f. 197v
This Missal, or book of liturgical texts for celebrating the Mass throughout the year, was made at the end of the 13th century for a chapel constructed in the abbot’s palace of the abbey of Sainte Marie de Lagrasse in Provence. It is sprinkled with the coats of arms of Augier of Cogeux, the abbot at this time.
Opening page of the Breviary, with the Offices for the first Sunday in Advent, with a historiated initial 'A'(d) of the two elders lifting a child representing 'anima' (the soul) to God above an altar, and a full border including a knight on horesback holding a shield and standard depicting the Virgin and Child (right). Angels with musical instruments: a trumpet, organ, lute, bagpipes and tabor, psaltery and rebec (below) and hunting scenes with animals, including a lion holding a shield with the arms of Augier de Cogeux, partially cropped (above): Add MS 17006, f. 8r
A Book of Hours from Paris
The cold weather in March may have been hard to endure, but there is always somebody who is worse off. A Book of Hours from Paris depicts some poor folks in Hell who are having a really bad time, but even for them there is a golden and floral lining. If they can only escape into the border, there is a beautiful meadow with an abundance of colourful birds, butterflies and flowers, though a few devils are lurking in the upper margins to catch unsuspecting souls who climb too high.
Miniature on two levels, of souls being brought in carts, pursued and thrown into holes in the earth by devils; below, in Hell they are subjected to various tortures, from a Book of Hours: France, Central (Paris), between 1406 and 1407, Add MS 29433, f. 89r
If the worst comes to the worst, one can always go fishing (in an orange hat, if necessary!). Here comes the Sun at last.
A calendar page for February with a miniature of a man in a hat fishing with a pole: Add MS 29433, f. 2r
The butterflies in this border are exquisite, and making a garland is fun, but the question is whose neck to put it on?
George and the Dragon: Add MS 29433, f. 207r
So, summer is on its way and it will soon be strawberry season! The borders of this manuscript are filled with more delights – flowers of every colour, fruits and birds, although it must be said that not everyone pictured is having much fun.
Giovanni Boccaccio’s The Deeds of Noble Men and Women
The latest upload also includes images of a copy of a French translation of Boccaccio’s The Deeds of Noble Men and Women. In the early 15th century, the original Latin work by Boccaccio was translated into French by the humanist scholar, Laurent de Premierfait, as Des cas des nobles hommes et femmes. It takes numerous examples from the lives of famous people throughout Biblical, classical and medieval history, describing their misfortunes with an ostensibly moral aim, but with a certain amount of undisguised relish and sanctimoniousness.
A framed miniature preceding Book 5 showing Boccaccio standing with a group of figures, pointing to a man in a barrel outside, two swans in a pool (lower right) and, in the background, a naked man is tied to a stake, having his eyes put out, from Des cas de nobles hommes et femmes, Add MS 11696, f. 136v
Les Trois Pelerinages (The Three Pilgrimages)
As Chaucer famously wrote, spring is a good time for going on a pilgrimage, and if you need to rest on the way, what better place than a garden with umbrella-shaped trees, as long as the birds don’t keep you awake. We have just uploaded images of a manuscript of Guillaume de Deguileville’s allegorical journey, containing over 140 images to illustrate the text. This work spawned a wide tradition of Christian allegorical literature and was extremely popular in the 14th century.
The pilgrim asleep in a garden with apple trees and birds; beside him is an old man, in Deguileville’s Les Trois Pelerinages France, c. 1400: Add MS 38120, f. 199r
The Book of Secrets of the Faithful of the Cross, with maps and portolan charts by Pietro Vesconte
This treatise was written by the Venetian, Marino Sanudo, for Pope John XXII, to promote a crusade to the Levant in 1321. The manuscript has images of the journey and the deeds of the crusaders in the lower margins. The text is accompanied by a set of maps consisting of a ‘mappa mundi’ or world map drawn in the style of a sea chart, five portolan sea charts of the coasts of Europe and North Africa, and a map of the Holy Land.
Knights on horseback jousting (f. 149v) and knights on foot fighting with lances and crossbows in a rocky landscape (f. 150r) and a historiated initial of a figure in a white headdress addressing robed figures seated on the ground, in the Liber secretorum fidelium cruces: Italy, N. (Venice); c. 1331 (after 1327), Add MS 27376, ff. 149v–150r
A portolan chart of the northern Red Sea (above) and the eastern Mediterranean (below), showing, Arabia, the coasts of Egypt and Syria, with Cyprus, the Nile (lower right), and the Tigris and Euphrates rivers (upper left): Add MS 27376, ff. 182v–183r
Here is a list of other manuscripts that have now been added to the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts:
Add MS 10015: La Disme de Penitanche and Gossuin de Metz, L’image du monde
Add MS 10341: Le Livre de Boece de Consolacion
Add MS 22660: Acts of investiture of the territories of Orciano and Torre
Add MS 18144: A 13th-century Psalter from Saxony or Thuringia
Add MS 19416: A Book of Hours of the Use of Thérouanne ('Hours of Charles Le Clerc')
Add MS 34890: The Grimbald Gospels. The whole manuscript can also be viewed on our Digitised Manuscripts site.
Chantry Westwell
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02 April 2018
A calendar page for April 2018
It's April, which means it's time to party. At least, in a calendar page for this month, made about 1,000 years ago, a party is in progress: men are drinking and chatting, seated on an ornate couch.
Detail of feasting, from a calendar page for April: Cotton MS Julius A VI, f. 4v
The artists of the two surviving, illustrated calendars from early 11th-century England both depicted scenes of feasting on the calendar page for April. They may have chosen to depict feasting in April because Easter often falls in that month. Indeed, in Old English, April was called Eáster-mónaþ (Easter month). Easter was a major holiday in early medieval western Europe, on a par with Christmas. Surviving sources mention it was also an occasion for political gatherings and grand ceremonies such as coronations and important royal meetings, where law codes were issued and other announcements made. For example, the prologue of the first law-code of King Edmund (reigned 939–946) states that Edmund called a meeting of a great number of nobles and churchmen in London, ‘during holy Easter-tide’ (‘halgan easterlicon tid’: Cotton MS Nero A I, f. 87v).
Closer examination of the image reveals a number of intriguing details, from spears and shields to a variety of drinking vessels. The left-most figure (see a detail below) pours liquid from a jug into a drinking horn. Archaeological examples of early medieval drinking horns have been found throughout northern Europe and beyond. In the centre, two men are holding drinking vessels with stems.
Detail of a jug and drinking horn: Cotton MS Julius A VI, f. 4v
The image may also hint at some types of objects which do not survive in the archaeological record. The seated figures are perched on cushions. Likewise, elaborate couches with sculptures of animals, if they were made of wood, would not have survived. However, it can not be proved if this scene, and the one in a related calendar, were imitating the way parties and furniture were depicted in classical art, or if these scenes were intended to represent contemporary furnishings.
Detail of a calendar page for April: Cotton MS Tiberius V B/1, f. 4v
Calendar page for April: Cotton MS Julius A VI, f. 4v
In addition to the illustration of the ‘labour’ of the month, the calendar page for April has the information and decoration found on other pages in this calendar. The zodiac symbol — Aries — appears in a roundel at the top. Information about the date, astronomical cycles and days of the week are highlighted in rows of red, green, blue and gold.
There is something slightly different about this page. Unlike the pages for February and March, only one feast is marked out with a gold cross in the margin of the page for April, at the very end of the month. The day marked out is 30 April, which, according to this calendar, was ‘the first day [Noah’s] Ark was carried out of the waves onto solid [ground]’ (‘Pridie transfertur arca densissima abundis’). The lack of gold crosses earlier in the month might have something to do with the association of April and Easter, since Holy Week and Easter took precedence over other feasts. They could not be marked in this reusable calendar because their dates changed. However, the latest date Easter can fall is 25 April, so the feast of Noah’s Ark could safely be celebrated on 30 April.
Detail of a depiction of Noah's Ark, made around the same time as the calendar: from the Old English Hexateuch, Southern England, 11th century: Cotton MS Claudius B IV, f. 15v
For more on this calendar (and details about when you will be able to see it in person), please click here. For previous years’ calendar pages, and for explanations of medieval calendars, please click here.
Alison Hudson
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29 March 2018
Bathtime for monks
It’s almost Easter. Have you had your bath yet? If you were a reformed monk or nun and lived in England over 1,000 years ago, this was a pressing question. Everyone in their communities was supposed to wash before the elaborate church services and celebrations for Easter. Instructions for these baths were preserved in the Regularis Concordia (Unified Rule), a political manifesto and supplement to the Rule of St Benedict, probably written by Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester(d. 984).
Christ washing his disciples’ feet on Maundy Thursday, from a Psalter made in 11th-century England: Cotton MS Tiberius C VI, f. 11v
According to the Regularis Concordia, on the Saturday after Good Friday, ‘if they can, the helpers [ministri] or boys [pueri] shall shave and bathe themselves.’ If there wasn’t enough time for all the monks to wash on Saturday, some could bathe after Vespers on Good Friday.
Instructions for monks bathing and shaving before Easter, from the Regularis Concordia, made in Southern England (Canterbury?), mid-11th century: Cotton MS Tiberius A III, f. 20r
Washing was also a part of ceremonies before Easter. According to the Gospels, Jesus washed his disciples’ feet the night before he was killed. Monks re-enacted this on Maundy Thursday (the day before Good Friday), when the monks were supposed to wash the feet and hands of poor people from the community and to offer them food and money. This ceremony was known as the Mandatum, after one of the Biblical passages quoted in music for the ceremony: 'A new commandment (mandatum novum) I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you' (John 13:34). 'Mandatum' is the root of 'Maundy', which is why the Thursday before Easter is still known as ‘Maundy Thursday’ in Britain.
Detail of a monk washing three poor men’s feet while a crowned figure distributes alms, from the Harley Psalter, England (Canterbury), 11th century: Harley MS 603, f. 66v
Abbots also washed the monks' feet ahead of Easter. The Regularis Concordia stipulated that after Vespers on Maundy Thursday, ‘the brothers shall then have their meal … but they must carefully wash their feet first … [T]he abbot shall wash the feet of all [the monks] in his own basin, drying and kissing them …’ The monks then washed their hands. And, of course, Easter celebrations were also a time associated with the symbolic washing of baptism.
Instructions for the Mandatum on Maundy Thursday, from the Regularis Concordia: Cotton MS Tiberius A III, f. 17v
This is not to suggest that monks and nuns did not bathe at other times of year. The manuscript that contains the Regularis Concordia also includes a guide to monastic sign language with many signs related to bathing. Among these are the signs for nail-knife, comb and washing one’s head. Bathing was presumably a regular occurrence, since so many specific signs were developed for it.
'When you want soap, rub your hands together': a curator demonstrates a possible interpretation of the sign for soap from the Monasteriales Indicia
Bathing was also a topic discussed in monks' school texts, as part of a dialogue that was designed to help young monks learn Latin, known as the Colloquy of Ælfric Bata. In this text, the teacher upbraids the boys for not having washed and for being unshaven, while the boys complain there is no one to help them bathe and they don't have soap, shears and razors. The teacher then calls for a washer immediately to arrange baths for the whole monastery. This dialogue also suggests that Saturday is a good day for baths. Incidentally, Ælfric Bata may have used the manuscript that is now Cotton MS Tiberius A III: his name is inscribed on one of the pages.
The Regularis Concordia is preserved in two surviving manuscripts, now contained between Cotton MS Tiberius A III and Cotton MS Faustina B III. It is not clear that all its stipulations were always followed, even by the most fervent of Bishop Æthelwold’s students. Nevertheless, some of its details — such as the instructions for bathing before Easter — are striking. Even 1,000 years ago, it was important to look your best for a holiday.
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