11 October 2019
The Nine Worthy Women
In the late medieval and early modern eras, heraldic collections often contained, alongside contemporary examples, the imaginary coats of arms of men from medieval romance and legend or of kings who lived before the age of heraldry. Prominent among these attributed coats of arms were those of the so-called ‘Nine Worthies’ (Les Neuf Preux), a group of three pagan (Classical), three Jewish, and three Christian leaders first described in the early 14th-century French poem Les Voeux du Paon by Jacques du Languon (found, for example, in Harley MS 3992). The Nine Worthies personified the ideals of chivalry and military excellence. At the beginning of one late 15th-century book of heraldry (Harley MS 2169), they were introduced as ‘The IX Worthy Conqwerourys’, and were identified (from left to right) as Hector of Troy, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar; David, Joshua and Judas Maccabeus; and King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey of Bouillon (one of the leaders of the First Crusade).
The arms of the Nine Worthies (4th quarter of the 15th century): Harley MS 2169, f. 5v
In the late 14th century, a group of female worthies joined their male counterparts. The Nine Worthy Women (Les Neuf Preuses) consisted of queens and female leaders who were also associated with military prowess. This grouping was much less fixed than that of the male worthies. For instance, the majority of the Nine Worthy Women who were part of the pageant for the coronation of King Henry VI at Paris in 1431 were queens of the Amazons, a tribe of warrior women from Greek mythology who, according to medieval sources such as the legendary travel memoir of John Mandeville, governed the land of Amozoyne where ‘dwellyth no man’. Other versions included female British leaders such as Boudica, queen of the Iceni (a British Celtic tribe), who led an uprising against Roman occupying forces; Æthelflæd, daughter of King Alfred, who fought off various Viking attacks; and Margaret of York, wife of King Henry VI, who led the Lancastrians in battle against Edward IV.
The Amazons in Mandeville’s Travels (1st half of the 15th century): Harley MS 3954, f. 30r
Another version of the Nine Worthy Women features at the beginning of Harley MS 6090, a late 16th- or early 17th-century English heraldic collection. In that manuscript the three Classical queens and female leaders are: Minerva, the Roman goddess of war, whose arms feature the ‘Aegis’ (a shield with the head of the gorgon Medusa) of her Greek equivalent Athena; Semiramis, a mythical queen of Babylon; and Tomyris, a legendary ruler of the Massagetae, who defeated Cyrus the Great.
The arms of Minerva, Semiramis and Tomyris (late 16th or early 17th century): Harley 6090, f. 3v
The three Jewish queens and female leaders are Deborah, a prophetess and judge of the Israelites; Jael, who killed the commander of an enemy Canaanite army by hammering a tent peg (of which six are displayed on her arms) into his temple; and Judith, who decapitated Holofernes (his head is displayed on her arms), the leader of an Assyrian army that occupied Israel.
The arms of Deborah, Jael, and Judith (late 16th or early 17th century): Harley 6090, f. 4r
The three Christian queens and female leaders are Empress Matilda (1102–1167), daughter of King Henry I, who initiated a war against her cousin, Stephen of Blois, after he usurped the throne; Isabel I of Castile [also known as Elizabeth I of Spain] (1451–1504), under whose rule Spain was united and the Emirate of Granada conquered; and Joanna II (1371–1435), Queen of Naples, who managed to re-establish herself as Queen after she had been imprisoned by her husband, James of Bourbon.
The arms of Empress Matilda, Isabel I of Castile, and Joanna II of Naples (late 16th or early 17th century) (late 16th or early 17th century): Harley 6090, f. 4v
The arms of the Nine Worthy Women in Harley MS 6090 were most likely copied from John Ferne’s The Blazon of Gentrie, first printed in 1586. Their audience would have been familiar with these women through contemporary and medieval works that praised their achievements, such as De Mulieribus Claris (About Famous Women) by Giovanni Boccaccio (as in Harley MS 4923) and the works of Christine de Pizan (for example, Harley MS 4431).
Minerva giving arms to her followers in Christine de Pizan’s L'Épître Othéa (c. 1410–1414): Harley MS 4431, f. 102v
Why are the female worthies so prominent in Harley MS 6090, while the male worthies are absent? Perhaps they were particularly popular among English authors. In an article published in 1946, Celeste Turner Wright pointed out that, during and following the reigns of Queen Mary I (1553–1558), and Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603), English authors often cited the Nine Worthy Women to justify female governance, to prove women's ability in national affairs, and to attack the Salic Law of France that excluded women from succession to the throne ('The Elizabethan Female Worthies', Studies in Philology, 43 (1946), 628–43).
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20 September 2019
Mapping medieval Scotland: between politics and imagination
It is unfortunate, but not necessarily surprising, that the earliest surviving topographical map of Scotland should be one designed for invasion. Some of the most accurate maps of pre-modern Europe were made in the context of trade or war, profit or conflict, two operations that required considerable precision. In this particular case, the conflict was the Anglo-Scottish Wars of the 15th century, with the map sitting at the very centre of the long-standing tensions between the two kingdoms. Its maker was a soldier-spy named John Hardyng (1378–1465), who was sent by King Henry V to Scotland on a reconnaissance mission. His primary goal was to collect tactical information about the country in order to plan an attack.
The first version of Hardyng’s chronicle is preserved only in this manuscript, which contains a full-colour map of Scotland; West is at the top: Lansdowne MS 204, ff. 226v–227r.
The outcome of Hardyng’s mission was a chronicle in Middle English verse, completed in 1457. It extended from the mythical foundations of Britain to 1437, and included a detailed map of southern and northern Scotland. There had been other maps which included Scotland, but Hardyng’s were unique. What is remarkable about them is that they focus on Scotland. This might seem insignificant, but in the medieval period it was not at all common to zoom in on a given area. While most other maps show Scotland as the northern part of Britain, Hardyng’s map turned a macro lens on the territory of the Scottish kingdom.
A close-up of the first version of Hardyng's map reveals the amazing detail of his cartographic representation: Lansdowne MS 204, ff. 226v–227r.
Having incorporated the results of his espionage in the chronicle, he presented its first version in turn to Kings Henry VI and Edward IV. Hardyng wanted these maps to provide visual support for the strategic planning outlined in the chronicle. As Sarah Peverley has argued, they are more symbolic than tactical, since they offer information about the general state of the country.
Hardyng’s chronicle survives in two versions, an earlier and a later one, each with its own map of Scotland. The two versions of the chronicle are noticeably different. The later version is shorter, more political, but also more popular and more influential than its predecessor. It was this version that was consulted by Shakespeare and John Milton.
The second version of Hardyng's Chronicle is preserved in 12 manuscripts and traces the history of Britain back to an imagined past: Harley MS 661, f. 1r.
The Scottish map of the second version of the chronicle is more diagrammatic and more intriguing. Like the earlier version, it represents Scottish topography in remarkable detail, with towns, castles, churches and natural features like rivers and marshes. However, it also inter-weaves the text and diagrams in order to explain the significance of many Scottish localities.
This map shows a high variety of southern Scottish castles, churches, walled cities and other fortifications.
This three-page map includes both southern and northern Scotland. While the southern part is packed with towns and fortifications, the northern parts are represented differently. The region between the mormaerdoms (medieval Scottish counties) of Strathern and Ros, the larger part of the Scottish Highlands, is represented using text and diagrams. The Highlands are referred to as the lands inhabited by the ‘wilde Scottes’. The map depicts the various mormaerdoms as protected by river courses and flanked by two seas, the Mare Orientale (North Sea) and the Mare Occidentale (the Atlantic). For example, ‘the shires of Marre (Mar) and of Carriocth (Carioch) aff this cuntrey stondeth between two waters'.
This map of the Highlands of Scotland has South at the top. It provides an overview of the locations of all the major Scottish shires: Harley MS 661, f. 187v.
But there is something rotten in the North of Scotland. At the far end of Britain, beyond the Orkney Islands, Hardyng located Satan’s infernal abode, the palace of doom. According to the English spy-soldier, the more one moved away from England, the more savage and devilish the inhabitants became, culminating in the source of all evil, at the ends of the Earth, under Scotland’s (and Satan’s) dominion.
This diagram of Northern Scotland explains that 'the wilde Scotrie have their propre mancion' in Pluto (or Satan's) palace: Harley MS 661, f. 188r.
Surrounded by the four infernal rivers (Styx, Phlegethon, Cocytus and Acheron), Satan’s diagrammatic seat of power was a metaphor for Hardyng’s view that the 'wickedness' of the Scots was attributable to Satanic influence.
If you would like to read more about Hardyng’s Chronicle, we would highly recommend these by Sarah Peverley:
https://sarahpeverley.com/2014/09/18/medieval-maps-of-scotland/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03f8c54
https://www.medievalists.net/2015/11/john-hardyng-and-his-chronicle/
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13 September 2019
Gardeners' Question Time
Today's episode of BBC Radio 4' popular Gardeners' Question Time (repeated on Sunday at 14:00) was recorded here at the British Library.
If you listen carefully, as well as hearing Bob Flowerdew, Anne Swithinbank and James Wong discussing the size of someone's melons, you may catch our curators Julian Harrison and Maddie Smith introducing some of the nation's favourite herbals. Julian showed presenter Matt Biggs pages from the Old English illustrated herbal (Cotton MS Vitellius C III). Sadly, this manuscript was badly damaged by fire in 1731, but Matt and Julian discussed how it contains an important record of early plant lore. Some of the plants it illustrates were not native to early medieval England, indicating that this book was based on earlier texts compiled around the Mediterranean. Matt was fascinated in particular with the accuracy of the drawings: he recognized this depiction of brassica without being able to read the original Old English text.
A plant of the brassica family in the Old English illustrated herbal: Cotton MS Vitellius C III, f. 56v
Julian also showed Matt this early 16th-century German herbal (Harley MS 3736), which has a series of idiosyncratic illustrations. You may have come across the manuscript before as it was open (on the mandrake page) in our exhibition Harry Potter: A History of Magic. The page shown here depicts what was once thought to be the Emperor Charlemagne (died 814) kneeling in front of a plant pierced by an arrow. The plant is named 'Carlina' and the caption explains that an angel advised him to eat it in order to be purged of poison. Since the recording, we have realised that the genus 'Carlina' was actually named in honour of Emperor Charles V (reigned 1519–1556), and this helps us to date the manuscript with more accuracy.
The Emperor Charles and 'Carlina' in Giovanni Cadamasto's herbal: Harley MS 3736, f. 20r
Maddie presented the story of Elizabeth Blackwell's A Curious Herbal, made in the 1730s in order to fund her husband's release from a debtors' prison. You can read more about the story of Elizabeth Blackwell on our Treasures pages.
Gardener's Question Time is broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Friday, 13 September (15:00), repeated on Sunday, 15 September.
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07 September 2019
Wine-making, medieval-style
Pluck. Crush. Cork. Medieval calendars remind us that September is the month for making wine. If planting and pruning vines fall to the month of March, September is the time for cashing in on all the effort.
The depiction of the parable of the Labourers in the Vineyard in the Stavelot Bible takes us closer to the toil involved in tending the vines: Add MS 28106, f. 6r
To turn grapes into wine has never been an easy task. During the summer months, the vines grow heavy with fruit. September is the time to start picking the grapes and prepare them for the arduous journey towards vinification.
The two figures on the right are carrying a large cluster of grapes, freshly picked, illustrating the Old Testament story of the spies of Canaan (Numbers 13:1-33): Harley MS 4996, f. 24v
After picking the grapes, the next stage is to crush them. The evidence in medieval manuscripts is interesting. The majority of representations of wine-making involve some form of crushing the grapes. This was usually done by treading them in a large tub. It provided the model for the most enduring image of medieval vinification, that of winemakers stomping on grapes, allowing the juice to drain into a waiting basin.
Crushing tubs varied in size. Some were small enough to accommodate only one person, others large enough for several: Royal MS 2 B II, f. 5r
In medieval calendars, each month had one or several types of agricultural activities (or labours) associated with it. The 'labours of the month' were illustrated on the calendar page, one (or several) for each month. You can find out more in our article on medieval calendars. The labour of the month of September was wine-making and the associated symbol was usually the wine-press, and later the wine barrel. There was significant variation in how the wine-press was depicted, but it usually involved one or several labourers treading on grapes in a tub.
Crushing freshly-picked grapes was an essential stage of making wine. This illustration is from a 14th-century calendar page for September: Royal MS 2 B VII, f. 79v
In an early 12th-century manuscript produced at Silos Abbey in Spain, picking the grapes and crushing them are represented as actions occurring simultaneously, a reading on a prophetic passage from the Book of Revelation:
"The angel swung his sickle on the earth, gathered its grapes and threw them into the great wine-press of God’s wrath. They were trampled in the wine-press outside the city, and blood flowed out of the press [...]". (Revelation 14:19-20).
Wine and wine-making are a prominent metaphor in the Book of Revelation. This manuscript of Beatus of Liébana's Commentary on the Apocalypse conveys the drama of the biblical text with vivid colours and imagery: Add MS 11695, f. 168r
On the other hand, once the grapes are picked, it is advisable to crush them immediately — unless one is producing wine made from dried grapes through techniques which, although popular today, did not exist in the Middle Ages. Trampling the grapes was not the only way to crush them. The Romans had invented technology using mechanical pressure to crush grapes into juice. Their successors went further, developing the 'basket press'. This typically medieval wine-press used a basket made of wood staves kept together by metal rings, while a heavy disc pressed down towards the bottom of the basket, forcing the juice of the grapes to ooze out between the staves into a container.
This image based on the words of the Book of Revelation shows Christ in a wine-press fitted with bars which allowed a mechanism to squash the grapes into the staves of the basket: Add MS 35166
The grape juice was then poured into casks and barrels and stored, but without any preservatives such as sulfites. Because of this, the wine could easily go bad, and aging was not possible.
While some are tread-crushing the grapes, others fill up the barrels with juice ready for fermentation, from a 15th-century calendar for September: Add MS 18851, f. 5v
Wine had been made in western Europe before the Middle Ages. The ancient Greeks and the Romans planted most of the vines that were producing wine in the Middle Ages. Just like today, wine was consumed for the pleasure of it. An important part of its production, however, was driven by the requirements of the Mass, with wine being an essential part of Communion. Wine was biblical, liturgical, communal, bridging the gap between the sacred and the profane. A common motif was that of Christ in the wine-press, which brought together several mystical and theological insights, based on imagery from the Book of Revelation: "He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty” (Revelation 19:15).
The image of Christ in the wine-press is common in manuscripts of the Apocalypse: Royal MS 2 D XIII, f. 45v
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31 August 2019
5 million page-views and counting
We once declared privately that we would never again begin a blogpost with the words, 'We are delighted to announce'. But today we have to break that rule: we are extremely delighted to announce that our Medieval Manuscripts Blog recently received its 5 MILLIONTH page-view. We have been blogging about the British Library's marvellous manuscripts since 2010, telling you all about our exhibitions, events and digitisation projects. We hope you have enjoyed reading this Blog as much as we have enjoyed writing it.
To celebrate, and for one day only, we are going to give the Blog over to you, our loyal readers. You keep us on our toes, and your kind and incisive comments help us to know what you're interested in. Earlier this summer, we asked you to tell us which British Library manuscripts inspire you? Here is some of the wonderful feedback we received: what 'delighted' us most was the range of people who responded, from art historians to nuns to calligraphers to fans of tattoos to historic sites, and from across the world. We received so many comments that we're listing them here in alphabetical order. Thank you all again.
PS this is one of the easiest blogposts we've ever had to write, as you've done it for us!
PPS we'd also like to thank the Blog's many contributors over the years (you know who you are); you'll be hearing from some of them over the coming days.
PPPS we'd finally like to thank the funders of our many digitisation initiatives, including The Polonsky Foundation and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, without whom it would not have been possible to make so many of our manuscripts available online.
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Nancy Ewart
One copy of the commentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus of Liébana can be found here: Add MS 11695
Göktug and Lilac Sunday
The Beowulf manuscript can be found online here: Cotton MS Vitellius A XV
Brandon Hawk
A miniature of monks presenting a copy of the Rule of St Benedict to St Benedict: Cotton MS Tiberius A III, f. 117v
My research is on the way memory systems work in non-literate and early literate cultures. I read Mary Curruthers "The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture" and started looking at medieval manuscripts for the way they were designed and annotated to aid memory during my PhD research. I already loved the artistry, but add in the incredible mnemonic aids - drolleries and glosses and the layout and lettering - and I fell even more deeply in love with them. I have written about medieval manuscripts and what they can teach us about the memory arts in my most recent book.
I have spent way too many hours browsing your glorious database and choosing a favourite is impossible. But if I have to, the Smithfield Decretals win my vote.
For example, I love this image:
A bas-de-page scene of a centaur fighting dragons, in the Smithfield Decretals: Royal MS 10 E IV, f. 173r
I discovered BL Egerton MS 1500 in 2005 because I was exploring the Occitan manuscripts. I was amazed by the rows of tiny heads, some of them topped by gold crowns, and by the maps. Nobody I asked at the time seemed to be sure what the text was. In 2011 I obtained funding from the Leverhulme Trust, which included digitising the manuscript. Our project's first three articles about Egerton 1500 came out in the eBLJ in late 2013. One of the exciting discoveries was that the columns of kings, popes, doges and emperors included borrowings from some illuminated rolls depicting kings of England, some of them also in the British Library. Since then, I have published several articles on this Occitan version of Paolino Veneto's illustrated history of the world until 1313, and more are to come.
Scenes from the First Crusade, in Abreviamen de las Estorias: Egerton MS 1500, f. 46r
I'm a newbie calligrapher, and was transfixed by the carpet pages I've seen in the gallery. So much so that I've actually just spent sixty or seventy hours creating my own, painstakingly painting knots and swirls and even attempting a bit of gold leaf! A brilliant experience for me, though I confess a certain amount of 'Anglo-Saxon' was muttered over the fiddly bits!
Fell into the manuscript rabbit hole whilst researching cats in art...and found a treasure trove. Since then have "spread the words" by posting the occasional video and giving introductory presentations on the story of Med MSS and its artwork at any institution interested... Do I have a favorite? Think the Rutland for its superb dragons and marginalia, Lindisfarne & St Cuthberts of course, the Talbot Shrewsbury, Lisbon Bible...too many favorites to list.
Historiated initial of a king and queen kneeling before an altar, with Christ above with a sword in his mouth, at the beginning of Psalm 101, in the Rutland Psalter: Add MS 62925, f. 99v
The Maastricht Hours can be found online here: Stowe MS 17
It is incredibly difficult to single out individual items in such an awe-inspiring and magisterial collection of ancient, medieval and early modern manuscripts as that held by the British Library.
On a personal level, the first manuscript I consulted for my thesis will always stand out. The humble Additional 10289 is a miscellaneous 13th-century book copied at the abbey of Mont Saint-Michel, containing a history of the abbey in Old French. I remember feeling privileged to be handling the book in the reading room, contemplating the production of its parts and the strange addition of the crude tale Jouglet on the final folios (in which the advice of a mischievous jongleur leads to an unfortunate toilet incident on a young couple’s wedding night…)
I’m currently consulting on a daily basis the Library’s digital images of three important illuminated manuscripts of the Histoire ancienne jusqu’à César, the earliest universal chronicle in French composed at the beginning of the 13th century. Thanks to the Digitised Manuscripts website, our team has been able to transcribe collaboratively the complete text of the significant Angevin manuscript, Royal MS 20 D I. In addition, we’ve recorded the contents of two substantial 13th-century manuscripts in our digital Alignment tool, which offer insights into the early dissemination of this text in the Holy Land (Additional MS 15268) and northern France (Additional MS 19669).
The ‘Medieval manuscripts blog’ has been an amazing resource for discovering more about the incredible items in the collection, from the illuminations on calendar pages to medieval lolcats, knights vs snails, the mindboggling marginalia in the Maastricht Hours (Stowe MS 17, my personal favourite) and of course, who could forget the unicorn cookbook!
The minotaur, in the Histoire ancienne jusqu'à César: Royal MS 20 D I, f. 22r
Claudine Moulin
Claudine's 9th-century manuscript can be found online here: Harley MS 3034
Rachel
A good opportunity to tell you I don't have a single favorite. The joy of your blog is exactly that I am surprised by the variation and richness of our heritage. The comments and the wealth of background information is of help, but it is the images on my screen so rich in color and meaning that offer me great moments. Thanks for that.
Lucy Freeman Sandler
By a rough count I've written 3 books and about 30 articles either mentioning or solely focused on British Library manuscripts. Not one of these publications could have appeared without 1) access to the manuscripts; 2) the knowledge, assistance and interest of the BL staff; 3) the reference facilities of the BL; 4) the BL Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts; 5) most recently, and most wonderfully, the digitization of an increasing number of BL manuscripts; and 6) the BL Manuscripts Blog, which provides delight and discovery to specialists and amateurs alike. Bravo!
I have written about several manuscripts that have been featured in this blog, including the Neville of Hornby Hours (Egerton 2781), the subject of my dissertation and several articles as well as a key work in my first book; the Taymouth Hours (Yates Thompson 13), the subject of my second book; and the Queen Mary Psalter (Royal 2 B VII), about which I have written two articles. Multispectral imaging by The British Library's Christina Duffy enriched the research for my second article on the Psalter, published earlier this year. Most of my publications mention other BL manuscripts. My research as a whole has benefitted enormously from the BL's digitization initiatives as well as from access to the manuscripts, for which I am extremely grateful. I require students in my "Illuminated Book" course to subscribe to the blog and to use other of the BL's online resources: they and the blog are wonderful resources for teaching.
Miniature of Christ feeding the 5,000, in the Taymouth Hours: Yates Thompson MS 13, f. 102r
Sister Walburga
A mass for the feast of St Mildred: Harley MS 3908, f. 42r
18 August 2019
What is a bestiary?
As the Getty's wonderful Book of Beasts exhibition draws to close, it's an apt moment to reflect on the medieval manuscripts we know as 'bestiaries'. Elizabeth Morrison, one of the curators of Book of Beasts, has described the bestiary as 'one of the most appealing types of illuminated manuscripts, due to the liveliness and vibrancy of its imagery ... All of us can find something to relate to in the bestiary and its animals' ('Beastly tales from the medieval bestiary').
Function and origins
We might regard bestiaries as a kind of medieval encyclopedia relating to natural history, with one notable distinction: each creature was described in terms of its place within the Christian worldview, rather than as a purely scientific phenomenon. The animals were interpreted as evidence of God’s divine plan for the world. This is particularly true of the first animal typically described in the bestiary, namely the lion. One famous bestiary story is that of the birth of lions. Lion cubs were said to be born dead, until on the third day their father breathed upon them, bringing them to life, a reflection of the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ.
The origins of the bestiary can be traced to the Physiologus, a Greek text devoted to natural history from late Antiquity. Around the 11th century, material was added from Isidore of Seville's Etymologies, a popular early medieval encyclopedia. Bestiaries themselves became popular in England from the 12th century onwards, but they did not all contain the same descriptions or illustrations, leading to them being divided into different families by modern scholars. As Elizabeth Morrison has pointed out, 'the bestiary was not a single text, but a series of changeable texts that could be reconfigured in numerous ways. The number of animals could vary quite significantly, as well as their order.'
Real and imagined
Bestiaries offer an enticing insight into the medieval mind. Some of the creatures they describe would have been very familiar to their original audience, such as cats, donkeys and owls. Others were more exotic, such as crocodiles and elephants, and this is often a source of amusement for modern readers; normally, the artists were relying upon the text and their own imaginations when depicting such beasts, rather than working from first-hand experience.
Likewise, bestiaries contain accounts of animals that we would now identify as mythical, such as phoenixes and unicorns. These fantastic beasts inhabited a special place in the medieval imagination, and beyond. You may recognise the illustration of the phoenix, below, from an English bestiary, as one of the stars of the British Library exhibition Harry Potter: A History of Magic.
Bestiary folklore
Bestiaries abound with tales of fantastic and fabulous proportions. The story of the whale is a case in point. In bestiary tradition, the whale was so large that it could rest on the surface of the water until greenery grew on its back. Passing sailors, mistaking the animal for an island, would set camp on its back and unsuspectingly light a fire. The whale would then dive back into the ocean, dragging its victims with it.
We have reproduced the tale of the whale in this animation, created as part of The Polonsky Foundation England and France Project: Manuscripts from the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France, 700–1200. You could say, we 'had a whale of a time'.
Surviving manuscripts
Illuminated Latin bestiaries survive in significant numbers. The Getty's exhibition catalogue lists a total of 62 examples, now dispersed across collections in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Russia and the USA. No fewer than 8 are held at the British Library (and we loaned 6 manuscripts in total to Book of Beasts).
Here is a list of the illuminated Latin bestiaries in the British Library's collections:
Add MS 11283: England, 4th quarter of the 12th century
Cotton MS Vitellius D I: England, 2nd half of the 13th century
Harley MS 3244: England, after 1236
Harley MS 4751: England, early 13th century
Royal MS 12 C XIX: England, early 13th century
Royal MS 12 F XIII: Rochester, c. 1230
Sloane MS 3544: England, mid-13th century
Stowe MS 1067: England, 1st half of the 12th century
You can read more about bestiaries in Elizabeth Morrison's article, 'Beastly tales from the medieval bestiary'.
Julian Harrison
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30 July 2019
New Anglo-Saxon acquisition on display
Earlier this year, the British Library was delighted to acquire a leaf of an Anglo-Saxon benedictional (a service book used by a bishop). At the time we reported that, despite its fragmentary nature, this manuscript was of great significance for the study of 10th-century English political and religious culture. In particular, we observed that its script pointed to an early date of production, and that it was related textually to other benedictionals from Anglo-Saxon England, most notably the Benedictional of St Æthelwold.
We are pleased to announce that this manuscript (Add MS 89378) is now on display in our Treasures Gallery, in a display case devoted to new acquisitions. This gallery is free to visit and is open seven days a week. The benedictional leaf can be viewed in the same room as other iconic treasures, such as Magna Carta, the Shakespeare First Folio, the Beatles' lyrics, and a letter of the 19th-century computing pioneer, Ada Lovelace.
Given that this display coincides with the Library's major temporary exhibition, Writing: Making Your Mark, we thought it might be worth making a few remarks on the handwriting of the benedictional leaf. Most unusually, when compared with other surviving Anglo-Saxon benedictionals, it is written in English square minuscule. This script gained currency in 10th-century England during the reigns of King Athelstan (924–939) and his successors. It is characterised by its 'square' letter-forms, as shown, for instance, by the shape of a, c, d, e, g. We reproduce both pages here (the recto, above, is on show in Treasures) to give a flavour of this unusual script.
Our readers may also be interested to know that two leaves of the same benedictional (separated in the 1970s) are now in collections in the USA (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University, Houghton Library, Typ 612; New Haven, CT, Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Takamiya MS 89). In time we hope that they can be digitally re-united, and that researchers will be able to learn more about their production and usage.
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25 July 2019
Marvellous monsters
Medieval writers typically relied on Classical texts for their knowledge of the world beyond Europe. The Roman and Greek sources which they consulted informed them that legendary people inhabited distant regions. One of the most influential works was the Natural History of the Roman author Pliny the Elder (AD 23–79). Pliny described people with the heads of dogs (Cynamolgi) and four feet (Artabatiae) in Ethiopia, and with horses’ hooves as feet (Hippopodes) in the Baltic.
A hybrid figure in Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia (England, 2nd or 3rd quarter of the 12th century): Arundel MS 98, f. 85v
The Classical 'monstrous' people also feature in the Etymologies of the Spanish author Isidore of Seville (570–636). Isidore, who considered such strange beings to be signs of God, claimed that Libya was home to the Blemmyae, a headless people who had their mouths and eyes in their chest, and the Antipodes (‘opposite-footed’), a people whose feet pointed upward. In India, Isidore located the dog-headed people called Cynocephali (‘dog-headed’) and the Cyclopes (‘round-eyed’), a people with one eye in the middle of their foreheads. Ethiopia was supposedly inhabited by the Sciapodes ('shade-footed'), having a single leg with a large foot which they used to shade under during extreme heat.
Isidore of Seville depicted at the opening of the Etymologiae (France, 4th quarter of the 12th century): Add MS 15603, f. 1r
Tales of marvellous inhabitants were often included in descriptions of the regions outside Europe. For example, the early 8th-century Cosmography, a fictitious travelogue of a certain ‘Aethicus Ister’, reported that a dog-headed people lived on a northern island above Britain. In Scythia, female warriors known as Amazons reared the cubs of minotaurs (half-man, half-bull) and centaurs (half-man, half-horse) and trained them to fight in war.
‘In solitudinibus catulos minotauros invenisse’ (‘[The Amazons] discovered minotaur cubs in deserted places’, trans. by Michael W. Herren, Cosmography (2011), p. 157), in the Cosmographia (France or England, early 12th century): Harley MS 3859, f. 273r
Testament to the popularity of these tales is a 12th-century Bible from Arnstein Abbey in Germany (Harley MS 2799). On a page that was originally left blank have been drawn seventeen legendary people, including the Cynocephali, Cyclopes, Blemmyae (first row), and Sciapods (third row).
Legendary people added to the Arnstein Bible (Germany, c. 1172): Harley MS 2799, f. 243r
The existence of strange peoples became a popular theme in medieval accounts of Christian conversion. These works signalled that, if even 'monsters' could be taught Christianity, there should be no reason why the entire world could not be converted as well. The so-called Letter of Prester John is an example of this: it purports to be a letter from a priest named John addressed to Manuel of Constantinople and Frederick Barbarossa in 1163. The priest claims to govern a powerful kingdom in India, filled with gold and jewels, and inhabited by strange creatures that have converted to Christianity. The letter claims that the kingdom has:
‘sagitarii, homines agrestes, homines cornuti, fauni, satiri et mulieres eiusdem generis, pigmei, cenocephali, gygantes, quorum altitudo est quadraginta cubitorum, monoculi, cyclopes et a vis, quae vocactur fenix, et fere omne genus animailum, quae sub caelo sunt’.
(‘archers [i.e. centaurs], savage men, horned men, fauns, satyrs and women of the same race, pygmies, dog-headed men, giants whose height is 40 cubits, one-eyed men, cyclopses and a bird which is called ‘phoenix’, and almost every kind of animal which is under heaven’, trans. by Keagan Brewer, Prester John (2015), p. 69)
Unusual races listed in the Letter of Prester John (London, 1st quarter of the 13th century): Add MS 14252, f. 92v
The association between monstrous people and conversion to Christianity perhaps explains why the artist of an early 13th-century English Psalter (Arundel MS 157) chose to paint a figure that looks like a Sciapod at the opening line of Psalm 84:5: ‘Converte nos, Deus salutaris noster’ (‘Convert us, God our saviour’). However, the Sciapod — who appears to be lying upside down in order to find shade under his foot — could also be a pun on the Psalm verse, since the Latin word convertere can be translated both as ‘convert’ and ‘turn upside-down’.
A ‘converted’ Sciapod (England, 1st quarter of the 13th century): Arundel MS 157, f. 182v
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I started delving into medieval manuscripts and images because I was doing research that included herbals, alchemy, and early medicine. That got me hooked on many other types of medieval images. I can't possibly pick a favorite. So many are divine or informative.
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Miniature of Henry VII receiving the book from the translator, Claude de Seyssel: Royal MS 19 C VI, f. 17r
Marianne Lee Burdi