Cambridge, University Library, MS Ff.1.25(4)
Compilation of crusade texts
Contents
- MS Ff.1.25(1): William of Malmesbury, Gesta pontificum Anglorum (Books 1-4)
- MS Ff.1.25(2): William of Malmesbury, Gesta pontificum Anglorum (Book 5)
- MS Ff.1.25(3): William of Malmesbury, Historia novella
- MS Ff.1.25(5): Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia regum Britanniae
Language(s): Latin
Book 2 starts on fol. 18v, book 3 on fol. 29v, book 4 on 33v, book 5 on fol. 43v and book 6 on fol. 53v.
The Itinerarium survives in twelve manuscripts, representing four different versions of the text. Scholars have established that the original version, consisting of only the first part of the first book, was written c. 1191-92 by an English crusader drawing on eyewitness accounts, particularly of the siege of Acre. The longer version of the text found in MS Ff.1.25(4) was written later, c. 1217-1220, and incorporates the original version and several other sources. The rubric in this manuscript attributes the Itinerarium to Geoffrey of Vinsauf, but this is a mistake probably caused by the copyist extracting details from the final rubric of Geoffrey's work which followed the chronicle in his exemplar. The actual author of the longer version has been identified as Ricardus de Templo, canon and prior of Holy Trinity Augustinian priory in London.
The text consists of two extracts from the Poetria nova, a verse treatise on the art of poetry, representing lines 625-664 (Faral's edition; 630-669 of Gallo's edition) and 326-430, with an occasional line added, adapted or omitted.
An almost identical copy of the same poem is found in Glasgow, University Library, MS Hunter 511 (V.8.14). Despite the reference here to 'eode rege' which would suggest that the poem concerned Richard I, the poem clearly alludes to the events of 1173-74 and celebrates Henry II (Faral (1936); Harbert (1975)).
The Historia Damiatina, based on letters written during the crusade itself and completed soon after, survives in more than twenty manuscripts in three recensions. According to its editor, MS Ff.1.25(4) is a copy of the first redaction (Hoogeweg (1894), pp. lxiv-lxv).
The text is incomplete, ending at chapter 40 of the edition (Hoogeweg (1894), p. 244), lacking chapters 41-89 and the Appendix.
Physical Description
19th-century foliation
[a-i] + 1-71 + [k-s]
Written in pencil in the upper right-hand corner of the recto side of each leaf, probably by Henry Bradshaw, University Librarian 1867-1886.16th-century pagination
237-375
Page numbers written in Parkerian red/orange crayon in the upper right-hand corner of the recto side of each leaf only (see Provenance for further details).Collation
- Quire 18 (ff. 1-8)
- Quire 28-1 (ff. 9-15: 1st leaf cancelled)
- Quire 3-98 (ff. 16-71)
No leaf signatures.
Quire signatures in Roman numerals, on the verso of the last leaf of the quire.
Catchwords (those on ff. 8v and 15v added by a later hand).Condition
Folios 7, 27 and 43 have tears, and many of the leaves have holes or are irregularly shaped. The verso of f. 27 has been left blank: as M. R. James comments, 'it was a bad piece of vellum', and the text shows through extensively from the recto. In the first quire, rubrics are often given in the side or lower margins and many have been trimmed.
Layout
190 × 150 mm. Ruled in leadpoint, frame and line. Two columns, 36-45 lines to the page, written above top line.
Hand(s)
Written in littera textualis script.
Decoration
Four-line initial in blue with infill and marginal flourishing in red at the opening of the text.
Two-line initials alternating in red and green, with infill and marginal flourishing in contrasting blue or green, at the beginning of each chapter. On ff. 69r-71r, the flourishing is executed in brown rather than red.
Additions
Quire numbers added to lower right-hand corner of the first recto of each quire, and '+' sign added to the lower right-hand corner of the first recto in the second half of each quire. Written in pencil by a modern hand.
Binding
Bound in brown calfskin over pasteboards with blind stamped and rolled decoration, by Wiseman, 1862.
Evidence preserved in MSS Ff.1.25(1) and MS Ff.1.25(5) (recycled endleaf bearing four friction-holes and rust stains, suggesting the presence formerly of four corner-bosses and a chain staple) indicates that all five volumes were previously bound together in similar style to that of the binding on other manuscripts donated to the University Library by Matthew Parker (for an example, see: MS Ii.2.4). See Provenance and Acquisition for further details.
Thomas James's catalogue, Ecloga Oxonio-Cantabrigiensis (1600) allocates two numbers to MS Ff.1.25:
- 244: 1. Gu. Malmesbury de pontificum gestis, lib. 59, vltimus liber scriptus est a neoterico ... 2. Nouella historia Anglorum ...
- 245: 1. Liber cum hac inscriptione. Itinerarium peregrinantium in terram sanctam ... 2. Galfridu Monumetensis ...
This implies that the manuscript was bound in two volumes at this time. However, in the list of manuscripts donated by Parker to the University Library in 1574, the manuscript is described as containing 460 pages. Such statements of extent were given for each of Parker's donations and were also written onto one of the opening leaves of the manuscripts themselves (see MS Ff.1.25(1), f. 3r). None of the other manuscripts within the Ff.1.25 classmark contain such an inscription, and the total number of pages amounts to 460, by the Parkerian pagination (see Foliation for further details).
Furthermore, as described above, Parker's donations were (with the odd exception) bound in a consistent format, and where the manuscripts have been rebound since that time this evidence is often preserved within the new binding. In MS Ff.1.25(1), only the recycled endleaves at the front of the volume have been preserved. Only Ff.1.25(5) contains similar endleaves, and only at the rear; they are found in none of the other volumes. The material evidence thus points to the manuscripts that are now Ff.1.25(1)-(5) having arrived bound as a single volume. Furthermore, each of these volumes bear evidence of having had the author(s) and title(s) of their contents inked onto the fore-edges of their leaves, presumably by Abraham Wheelocke , who treated other manuscripts in a similar manner (see, for example, MS Ff.1.28. This indicates moreover that the manuscript remained as a single volume in the mid-17th century.
In his History of the University Library, David McKitterick recounts that the part of this manuscript containing the Historia regum Britanniae (now MS Ff.1.25(5)) was discovered to be missing when the manuscripts in the Old Library were inspected in 1732 and again in 1748: the number '245' assigned by James in 1600 is in both lists, in the first with the partial title 'Galfrid: monumethensis etc' (see Cambridge, University Library, MS Add. 4451, ff. 18r and 19r). The implication is that by this stage Ff.1.25 had been rebound into two volumes. However, a more probable explanation is that James's assigning of two numbers to the manuscript misled the compilers of these lists of missing books, who were searching fruitlessly for Geoffrey of Monmouth and other texts bound into a discrete volume, when in fact they remained in place in the same volume as what James has designated '244'. Indeed, that no mention is made in the Catalogue of manuscripts preserved in the Library of the University of Cambridge, vol. 2 (1857) means that it is almost certain that it was not divided into separate volumes until 1862.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Erased inscription, perhaps the name of a former owner, on f. 1r.
Matthew Parker (1504-1575) , archbishop of Canterbury: partial pagination in characteristic red/orange crayon.
Presented to the University Library in 1574 by Matthew Parker (1504-1575) . No. 22 in the list of 25 'Libri Scripti in pergameno' published to commemorate Parker's gift (see Early catalogues of manuscripts, up to c. 1600).
Additional Information
Record Sources
Availability
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Bibliography
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langue, de littérature et d'histoire des sciences offerts
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linguistiques, Vieillard, P. (Paris, 807-818, Presses de l'Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2005)
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<hi rend="italics">Itinerarium peregrinorum et gesta regis Ricardi</hi> Encyclopaedia
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Geoffrey of Vinsauf's memorial verses Nottingham Medieval Studies, Camargo, Martin (56, 81-119, 2012)
Richard de Templo, <hi rend="italics">Itinerarium peregrinorum et gesta regis
Ricardi</hi> Richard Löwenherz: König - Ritter - Gefangener, Freeman, James (Regensburg, 138-139, Schnell + Steiner, 2017)
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Abbreviations
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