Medieval Manuscripts in Cambridge Libraries

A catalogue of Western manuscripts and papyri at Cambridge University Library, the Fitzwilliam Museum and selected Cambridge colleges

Cambridge, Sidney Sussex College, MS 58

Book of Hours (Use of Sarum) [Unfinished]

Contents

Introduction: Made somewhere in England during the 15th century, this manuscript is one of a handful of examples of Books of Hours included in the Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries project on account of the addition of medical recipes to blank spaces. These additions - and the private, devotional manuscript context in which they are found - illustrate the penetration of medical knowledge and presumably practice into the late medieval household. Though it lacks full-page devotional miniatures of the sort seen in Cambridge, University Library, MS Ii.6.2 or Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, MS McClean 89 , or the extensive series of half-page miniatures, architectual frames and heraldic devices of Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, MS 38-1950 , and though it appears to have been left unfinished, nevertheless this manuscript's standard of production is notably high. The text is written in a large module, textura quadrata script: the letters are formed of a series of separate strokes of the pen, with the top and bottom of each minim finished with a diamond-shaped serif, and in addition they are often furnished with delicate, curling otiose strokes. Since the appearance of textura scripts and their variants in the 13th and 14th centuries, this had always been among the most technically challenging for scribes to execute. As the use of cursive or semi-cursive book hands spread in the late medieval period, in response to rising literacy and a growing demand for copies of books that were themselves often of increasing length, so this formal or 'set' style of handwriting became less commonly used. Furthermore, as Malcolm Parkes observed, by the end of the 14th century, 'there is evidence to suggest that good Textura was getting beyond the competence of some professional scribes', with its use being increasingly confined to 'display' purposes such as headings and colophons. In terms of decoration, large coloured initials on a gold background ornament the beginning of key sections of the text, accompanied by full or three-sided borders containing stylised foliage and flowers. The presence of aroid flowers, the enclosure of border decoration within ruled boundaries (to make a 'bar' border), and the inclusion therein of some naturalistic or semi-naturalistic flowers and leaves (but not in every instance), all point to production in the middle or probably third quarter of the 15th century. Whoever commissioned the book's production must therefore have been of some means. The reasons for the book's apparent incompleteness are unknown; perhaps its patron died prematurely. We would ordinarily expect to find a calendar at the beginning (it is possible that this was made but later lost), as well as other sections such as the Office of the Dead and the Commendationes animarum. Nothing is known of the medieval owners of the book beyond what is provided by an incomplete note about the birth of a 'Robert Mathew' on 3rd December in an unspecified year: presumably one of his parents or relatives was the book's owner at that time (for the use of a Book of Hours for similar familial record-keeping, see CUL, MS Ii.6.2 and Fitzwilliam, MS McClean 89). Subsequently, two owners or users of the book added recipes to blank spaces on the endleaves. The first added two cures 'for dissese in wommanis brestis' to f. iii recto; the second added a third to this, as well as a formula for rat poison, both of which they then copied onto f. 80r underneath the birth-date note. The first remedy instructs the reader to take half a pint of 'good stale ale', into which they mix a few powdered grains and (or amounting to?) a spoonful of clean wheat flour, and warm the concoction before drinking it in the evening and morning. The second, herbal recipe uses a handful of germander and sage, boiled in olive oil or May-butter, which are then lain 'warme to the sore brest upon a lynen cloth'. The third uses groundswell, mashed and wrung out in order to procure the juice for an unstated purpose; 'sche schall be esyd (i.e. eased) there of', it concludes. Recipes for rat poison, or charms to disperse vermin, are common occurrences - as, one presumes, were their intended targets. This one recommends placing on a tile-stone a mixture of arsenic, realgar (a sulphide of arsenic), diced bacon and a little oatmeal. That would certainly be effective. Dr James Freeman|Medieval Manuscripts Specialist|Cambridge University Library

Language(s): Latin Book of Hours with added Middle English recipes

1. ii recto
Psalm 8:2
Language(s): Latin
Incipit: || ii recto -mine dominus noster quam ad[mi]rabile est nomen tuum in uniuersa [Q]uoniam eleueta est mag-

The psalm is left unfinished.

2. iii recto
Medical and household recipes
Language(s): Middle English

Written by hands of the 15th century. They address the following: three for disease or sores in a woman's breasts ('for dissese in wommannis Brestis'), and for killing rats ('ffor to dystroy Rottis'). The third and fourth recipes are repeated on f. 80r.

Lucas (2016)
eVK2 (v0073630000)
3. iii recto
Date inscription
Language(s): Latin
Incipit: iii recto Anno domini [...]2

Full transcription attempted; added by a 15th-century hand.

4. 1r-53v
The Hours of the Virgin Mary
Language(s): Latin
Rubric: 1r Hic incipiunt matutine gloriose virginis marie
Incipit: 1r Domine labia mea aperies
Explicit: 53v et ad gaudia eterna feliciter peruenire valeamus. Qui vivis et regnat cum deo patre

On ff. 24r-24v a prayer to St Thomas Becket has been erased and crossed out.

5. 53v-66r
The Seven Penitential Psalms
Language(s): Latin
Rubric: 53v Hic incipiunt .vij. Psalmi penitentiales
Incipit: 53v Domine ne in furore tuo arguas me
Explicit: 65v-66r Et perdes omnes qui tribulant animam meam qui ego seruus tuus sum. Gloria patri.
6. 66r-68v
Psalms 119, 131, 132, 133
Language(s): Latin
Incipit: 66r Ad dominum cum triburarer
Explicit: 68v Benedicat te dominus ex syon qui fecit celum et et terram. Gloria patri. Amen
7. 68v
Antiphon
Language(s): Latin
Incipit: 68v Ne reminiscaris domine
Explicit: 68v in perdicionem propter nomen sanctum tuum domine deus noster.
8. 68v-77r
Litany with Collects
Language(s): Latin
Rubric: 68v Letania
Incipit: 68v Kyrieleyson Christeleyson Kyerieleyson
Explicit: 77r et requiem eternam condede. Per eundem Christum dominum nostrum. Amen
9. 80r
An unfinished birth date
Language(s): Latin
Incipit: 80r Robertus Mathew orundus ffuit vicesimo tercio die december Anno domini

Full transcription; the year is not given. This memorandum is added by the same fifteenth-century hand that has added the medical recipes on this page and those on f. iii recto.

10. 80r
Medical and household recipes
Language(s): Middle English

Two medical recipes, 'ffor a woman that hath a sore brest' and 'ffor to dystroy Rottes', repeating two of those written on f. iii recto.

Lucas (2016)

Physical Description

Secundo Folio: 2r: oremus
Form: codex
Support: Parchment (HFFH)
Extent: Codex: i + 4 + 80 + 2 + i leaves. ff. i-ii may be cancelled or unused leaves that were originally ruled for this unfinished Book of Hours. 210 × 145 mm.
Foliation:

20th-century foliation:

[a] + i-iv + 1-80 + v-vi + [b]

Numbering in pencil in the upper right-hand corner of the rectos.

ff. [a] and [b] are unfoliated parchment flyleaves that have been assigned letters to produce a functional electronic catalogue record for this item for the Curious Cures project.

Collation

  • Quires 1-108 (ff. 1-80)

1-108

Leaf signatures (mostly cropped) consisting of an apparently continuous sequence of letters with Roman numerals (Quire 1: 'a'; Quire 2: 'b'; Quire 3: 'C'; Quire 4: 'd'; Quire 6: 'f'; Quire 9: 'i'; Quire 10: 'k').

 Catchwords written at the centres of the lower margins of the last versos of quires.

Condition

A large horizontal cut in the middle of f. 56 and a horizontal tear in the middle of f. 74.

Layout

110-115 × 80-85 mm. Ruled in red ink, frame and line ruling. Single columns. 14 lines to the page, written below top line.

Hand(s)

The unfinished psalm on f. ii recto is written by a single hand in a cursive Northern Textualis.

The Book of Hours has been copied by a single scribe in Northern Textualis.

The added Middle English recipes on f. iii recto and f. 80r have been added by fifteenth-century hands writing in a cursive script with both Anglicana and Secretary features.

Decoration

Large (4-line) initials in blue or purple in frames with gold grounds and acanthus leaves in colours and gold bar borders with fowers in colours and gold on ff. 1r [full borders], 11r [3-sided borders], 28r [3-sided borders], 36v [3-sided borders], 42v [3-sided borders] 45r [3-sided borders], 54r [full borders].

Large (2-line) 'Champ' initials in gold on blue and purple grounds with foliate motifs in white and, once, a human face (f. 76v) and sprays of dark ink.

Small (1-line) initials either in blue in penwork frames of red ink or gold in penwork frames of purple ink, occasionally with pen-flourishing extending into the margins.

A cadel decoration on a plain capital in dark ink, featuring the face of an animal (? lion) on f. 1r.

Incipits and liturgical instructions written in red ink.

Additions

A (?) 17th-century title inscription on f. iv verso: ‘Officium B. Mariae virginis’.

Binding

19th-century brown leather with a blind-tooled and blind-stamped frame consisting of rows of fleurs-de-lys under arches; blind-stamped interlace motifs on the spine with three raised bands and a piece of red leather gold-stamped with the title: ‘OFFICIUM B. MARIÆ VIRGINIS - M.S.’

History

Origin: 15th century. ; England.

Provenance and Acquisition

A member of the ‘Mathew’ family: the unfinished memorandum about the birth of Robert Mathew on f. 80r was probably added by a family member who had access to or owned this manuscript.

Manuscript owned / used in England after the Reformation: cancellation of the antiphon and prayers to Thomas Becket (f. 24r-24v) and removal of collect for the Pope (ff. 72v-73r).

Presented to the Sidney Sussex College in 1637 by Samuel Ward (1572–1643), Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity and Master of Sidney Sussex College (1610) : a paper pastedown on f. ii verso records his donation in a printed text: ‘Liber Collegii Dominae Franciscae Sidney Sussex, quem (una cum aliis MSS.) plurimum Reverendus Vir Samuel Ward, S.T.D. Professor pro Domina Margareta, dicti Collegi tertius Magister, ultima voluntate et testamento legatvit. Anno Domini. 1643.’; the College's classmarks ‘K.3.13’ [crossed out] and ‘Δ - 3 - 13’ are written on the paper pastedown. Recorded as no. 721 in Edward Bernard, Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliae et Hiberniae in unum collecti (1697). James (1895) number '58' written in pencil on f. [a] verso.

Additional Information

Record Sources

This catalogue entry draws on the description provided by Angela M. Lucas, Manuscripts in Christ's Church, Emmanuel, Jesus, Selwyn and Sidney Sussex Colleges. Peterhouse and Trinity Hall, Cambridge The Index of Middle English Prose, Handlist 22 (Cambridge: Brewer, 2016) and M.R. James, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1895).

Availability

Visitors to Sidney Sussex College who wish to consult Special Collections material are required to apply to the Library in advance of their visit. For information on eligibility and admission procedures see: Sidney Sussex College: Special Collections.

Bibliography

    A descriptive catalogue of the manuscripts in the library of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, James, M.R. (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1895) Medical Manuscripts in Middle English Speculum, Robbins, Rossell Hope (45, 3, 393-415, 1970, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2853500) Manuscripts in Christ's, Emmanuel, Jesus, Selwyn and Sidney Colleges, Trinity Hall, Cambridge Index of Middle English prose, Lucas, Angela M. (Cambridge, Handlist XXII, D.S. Brewer, 2016)

Funding of Cataloguing

Wellcome

Digital Images

Cambridge Digital Library

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