Cambridge, Queens' College, MS 25
Contents
Produced in a commercial workshop
Physical Description
Late 19th/early 20th-century foliation:
1-64
Numbering in pencil in the upper right-hand corner of the first leaf of each quire, possibly by M.R. James. Full foliation added after digistisation.Collation
The manuscript comprises ten quires mostly composed of eight leaves. There are leaves missing from quires 1, 2, 4 and 7. Quire A is formed of a former pastedown (fol. i) and flyleaves (ff. ii-iii). The final leaf of quire 9 is used as a pastedown.
- Quire A4-1 (ff. i recto-iii verso: final leaf missing)
- Quire 18-1 (ff. 1-7: final leaf missing)
- Quire 28-1 (ff. 8-14: first leaf missing)
- Quire 38 (ff. 15-22)
- Quire 48-2 (ff. 23-28: leaves 4 and 5 missing)
- Quire 58 (ff. 29-36)
- Quire 68 (ff. 37-44)
- Quire 78-2 (ff. 45-50: leaves 4 and 5 missing)
- Quire 88 (ff. 51-58)
- Quire 98 (ff. 59-65 + rear pastedown)
The first half of each quire is signed in red or black in a contemporary hand (many trimmed). Quires numbered in pencil on the recto of the first leaf of each quire.
Catchword in the same script as the text on 14v; catchwords in a much smaller contemporary hand on 22v, 28v, 36v, 44v and 58v.
Layout
175 × 120 mm. Single columns, 21 lines, ruled in pink ink, written below top line.
Hand(s)
Gothic bookhand (textualis)
Decoration
Rectilinear border of gold, blue and pink, enclosing the text, with conventional foliage in blue, pink, white, green, orange and yellow, symmetrically arranged, and featherwork in black and green, terminating in conventional foliage, for the opening to the text (1r); for the other principal opening in the text (51r), a rectilinear border in the left margin of gold, pink and white, with conventional foliage in pink, blue, white, green, orange and yellow, and featherwork in green, black, gold and colours in the upper and lower margins.
Pink and white feather-patterned initial (C, 8 ll., 1r) on an outer and inner burnished gold ground, with infill of conventional foliage of blue and pink shaded in white and green and orange shaded in yellow, for the opening to the text.
Parti-coloured pink and blue white-patterned initial (D, 4 ll., 51r) on an outer and inner burnished gold ground, with infill of conventional foliage in pink and blue shaded in white and green and orange shaded in yellow, for the other principal opening in the text.
Gold initials (2 ll.) on an outer parti-coloured blue, or blue and pink ground, patterned in white, and an inner blue or black ground, with infill of conventional foliage in green, blue, orange or pink, highlighted in white or yellow, with featherwork in black and green, terminating in gold trefoils, for the chapter openings (e.g. 3v).
Red initials (1 ll.) on plain parchment inner grounds, with infill of stylized leaf and abstract forms in red, with flourishing around the initial and into the margin of abstract forms in red; alternating with gold initials on plain parchment inner grounds, with infill and flourishing of same in purple, for the verse openings throughout the book (e.g. 19r).
Chapter-headings in red in the same hand as the text with chapter-numbers up to xxxiiii (45v); unnumbered chapter-heading on 47r; the remaining chapters unrubricated.
Additions
On flyleaf iii verso: ‘felix quem faciunt aliena pericula cautum’ and another Latin note, entitled De dolore Christi et ingratitudine hominis, at foot. On 65r (erroneously noted as 64r in James): ‘JHC est amor meus’ and some proverbial sayings in verse ‘Eche mannys appetide like may recompense …’ (seven lines).
Marginal notes in a fifteenth-century hand (e.g. 27v); manicules; occasional marginal doodles (e.g. 14v, 33r).
Binding
15th-century blind-stamped leather over boards, possibly by so-called 'Scales Binder' who was working in London in the second half of the fifteenth century. On the front cover is a central panel of chequer-work; a small roll-stamp of quatrefoils in lozenges, used obliquely; and a larger square stamp of a crowned fleur-de-lys with a cusped ornament in the upper L. corner, which is here used lozenge-wise. On the back cover are the following stamps: (i) the largest, two curved feathers enclosing an ihc [iht?], surmounted by a crown of 3 fleur-de-lys; (2) the fleur-de-lys stamp on cover i, here set four square, not lozenge-wise; (3) a square stamp of a lion passant; (4) a smaller square stamp of a dolphin head and tail nearly meeting. Two clasps gone.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
On the first flyleaf over an erasure a near 1500 hand has inscribed: ‘Liber Johannis Bullur alias Spyllesby Emptus london[iensis]’, then in a bold hand: ‘unde myen sc. Johannis husey yeffen to me be the sed sr John’. Other notes in the same hand as the first inscription appear on 50v: ‘Deo gracias. Bullur.’ and on 65r:
‘Memorare nouissima et in eternum non peccabis Ecc' 4o | | When thy hede quakyth Memento| Then thy lyppys blakyth Confessio| Whien thy noose sharpyth Contricio| Then thy lymys starkyth Satisfaccio| When thy Brest pantyth Nosce te ipsum| Then thy wynde wantyth Miserere| When thy nyen hollyth Libera me domine| Then deth folowyth Veni ad Judicium.’
An inscription in script of the sixteenth century on the recto of the final flyleaf (65r), in the hand of John Hussey, 1st Baron Hussey of Sleaford (1465/1466–1537) (also spelt Huse) and chamberlain to Mary Tudor , indicates that this book was possibly owned by King Henry VIII’s elder daughter: ‘Thys bok ys my ladey Maryes [?] the Kyenges dautter. jhs keppe and send the kyenge a pryenche. John huse the kyenges treu seruantt’.
The second flyleaf bears the inscription of Edward Martin, President of Queens’ College (1631–44 and 1660–61) : ‘Fuit Viri admodum Reverendi D[omi]nis Martin Collegij hujus presidis dignissimi 1662’.
Additional Information
Record Sources
Bibliography
Digital Images
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
