Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc. 601
| England |
| Oxford |
| Bodleian Library |
| Laud Misc. 601 |
| SC 1491 |
| s. xivex |
| English |
| Scribal Dialect: South East Gloucestershire. Linguistic Atlas Grid Reference: 393 198, LP 6980 (McIntosh, Samuels and Benskin 1986, p. 196). |
A late fourteenth-century, c. 1374-1400, decorated copy of the
Prick of Conscience with prayers added by a late fifteenth-century hand.
Item: 1| ff. 1r-115r |
| Prick of Conscience (Southern Recension, IMEV 3429) |
| 'The mi?t of že fader off hevene'. |
| 'žat for oure love made al žing. Amen'. |
| 'Heere endež že bok žat is ycleped že prikke of conncience'. |
|
Item: 2| f. 115v |
| Litany of the Cross and Blood (IMEV 3075) |
| 'Sauiour of že worlde saue ous žat by žy cros lorde god we prayet že helpe ows'. |
|
| 'ffor al maner yuel temptacion let a man say žys ywryt abowe žre tymes & at yeche tyme mak a cros i his brest and he ssal bue že lyuerd & holpe anon'. |
| Addition in a later hand. |
|
Item: 3| f. 115v |
| The Schoolboy's Lament (IMEV 1399) |
| Acephelous |
|
| A fragment only partially copied and now difficult to read. |
|
| Codex |
| Parchment |
| 310 x 210 mm |
| Fifteen quires. Eights. Catchwords throughout. |
| Pricking heavily cropped. Writing space of c. 220 x 140 mm. Single columns with 31 lines. Ruled in drypoint. |
|
Scribe 1 (ff. 1-115) writing in an Anglicana hand. Characteristics: 2-shaped r; double compartment a; dotted y; hooked ascender on b and l; flat topped t; ž; B-shaped w. Body height 3 mm.
Scribe 2 (f. 115v) writing in a Textura Semi-Quadrata hand. Characteristics: double compartment g, 2-shaped r in medial position; double compartment a. Body height: 5 mm.
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Rubrics and rectangle drawn around some lines in red.
Frequent three-line gold initials with attractive mauve/lilac pen-work flourishes.
One full bar-frame border on initial page (f. 1r). Motifs: alternating blue/rose vine with interlace corner roundels on a gold ground; pairs of alternating blue/gold/rose trefoils cross on short, thick stems over the bar. The trefoils are topped by a gold ball with a pen squiggle. On right-hand side gold balls with pen squiggles grow from vine into text space side. Pairs of leaves grow across the bar along the vine.
|
| Medieval. Size: 310 x 210 mm. Originally red leather although Pächt and Alexander describe it as 'white' (1973, p. 67). Mitred and pasted. Support of bevelled oak boards. Wormholes. Sewing unascertainable. Six raised bands across the spine. Remains of two straps on the fore edge and one on the bottom edge. |
| ff. i + 116 |
| F. 116r - scribbles, inscriptions, f. 116v - musical notation. |
| In good condition with its original binding. Texts still clear and decoration fresh. |
|
Sixteenth century: F. 116r - '' - late fifteenth/early sixteenth century. |
Catalogued and encoded by Rebecca Farnham, University of Birmingham, 2003.
Related Manuscripts
Lewis and McIntosh associate this manuscript with: Lichfield Cathedral, MS 16 (Scribe 1 - strong southwestern dialect, probably Somerset, south Gloucestershire, or Wiltshire; Scribe 2 - strong East Anglian); London, British Library, MS Harley 1731 (north east Wiltshire); and San Marino, California, Huntington Library, MS HM 125 (Gloucestershire/Worcestershire border) (1982, pp. 142-143).
- Allen, H. E. 1927. Writings Ascribed to Richard Rolle, Hermit of Hampole and Materials for his Biography, Modern Language Association of America Monograph series, 3, New York and London: Modern Language Association of America, p. 377.
- Coxe, H. O. 1858-85. Catalogi Codicum Manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae: Pars Secunda Codices Latinos et Miscellaneos Laudianos Complectens, 2 fascicles, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1, fasc. 1, col. 428.
- Dennison, L., Driver, M. W., Eljenholm Nichols, A., and Scott, K. L. ed, 2001. An Index of Images in English Manuscripts from the Time of Chaucer to Henry VIII c. 1380-c.1509: Fascicle 2, MSS Dodsworth-Marshall, London, Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers, p. 92, no. 692.
- D’Evelyn, C. 1930. ‘An East Midland recension of the Pricke of Conscience’, Proceedings of the Modern Language Association, 45, 180-200, p. 181.
- Lewis, R. E., and McIntosh, A. 1982. A Descriptive Guide to the Manuscripts of the Prick of Conscience, Medium Aevum Monographs 12, Oxford: Society for the Study of Medieval Languages and Literatures, pp. 142-143.
- McIntosh, A., Samuels, M. L. and Benskin, M. 1986. A Linguistic Atlas of Late Medieval English: County Dictionary, 4 vols, Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 4.
- Madan, F., and Craster, H. H. 1922. A Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, vol. 2, part 1, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 64.
- Pächt, O., and Alexander, J. J. G. 1973. Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, vol., 3, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 67.
- Tanner, T. 1748. Bibliotheca Britannico-Hibernica..., London: Societas ad Literas Promovendas, p. 375.
- Warton, T. 1824. The History of English Poetry from the Close of the Eleventh to the Commencement of the Eighteenth Century, new edition, 2 vols, London: Thomas Tegg.
- Waters, S. 1976. ‘The Pricke of Conscience: The Southern Recension, Book V’, University of Edinburgh, Ph.D thesis.
