Oxford, Bodleian Library, Tanner 201
| England |
| Oxford |
| Bodleian Library |
| Tanner 201 |
| SC 10027 |
| s. xv2 |
| English |
| Scribe of ff. 7r-86v and Scribe of ff. 87r-end: Scribal Dialect: Herefordshire. Linguistic Atlas Grid Reference: 350 240, LP 7391 (McIntosh, Samuels, and Benskin 1986, p. 199).
|
A late fifteenth-century manuscript of the
Memoriale Credencium, a sophisticated manual of religious instruction, with shorter theological prose treatises.
Item: 1| ff. 2r-3v |
| Seven Deadly Sins |
| 'Pryde wroth and envy be synnes of the feynde'.
|
| 'that the wille of god be doon before thyne owne will so be hit amen deo gracias'. |
| 'Here begynnyth the knowledge of the vii dedly synnes'. |
| Prose treatise on the seven deadly sins incorporating the seven virtues contrary to the sins and the seven works of bodily and spiritual mercy.
Glossed by a later c. seventeenth-century owner? |
|
Item: 2| f. 4r |
| Ten Commandments |
| 'There by x commaundementis of the which'. |
| 'and on cristyn forth beleue thou stodfastly amen'. |
|
Item: 3| ff. 4v-6r |
| Prose prayer |
| 'O blyssed lord that madyst all thing of nought'. |
| 'and presyng be to this for all thy grace amen'. |
|
Item: 4| ff. 7r-106v |
| Memoriale Credencium (IPMEP 448) |
| 'žisse tyme žat moyses and aaron were ysend thurgh goddes owne mouthe to kyng pharao žat was kyng of egypt'. |
| 'Thys tretys ys ymade to ensample of že commune puple žat can nou?t vnderstonde latyn ne frensh and for cristenmen žat leuež in god shuld haue žynges žat here bež wrytt ofte yn mynde and hit is yclepyd memoriale credencium'. |
| 'Man and woman žit wilnež to fle synne and lede clene lyf taketh hede to žis litul tretys žat ys write in englisch tong for lewed men žat konne not vnderstonde latyne ne frenssche and žis ys ydrawe out of holy wrytt and že techyng of holy doctoures to fore žis tyme.' |
Kengen 1979.
|
Item: 5| f. 106v |
| prayer |
| 'Oure swete lorde ihesus cryste ?yue vs grace to worship god'. |
| 'žat graunte vs god žat sytt in trynyte. Amen'. |
| 'Explicit tractatus qui vocatur memoriale credencium'. |
| Prayer appended to the Memoriale in the same hand. |
|
| Codex |
| Parchment |
| 210 x 145 mm. |
|
16, ff. 1r-6v; 216, ff. 7r-22v, catchword; 316, ff. 23r-38v, catchword; 48, ff. 39r-46v, catchword; 58, ff. 47r-54v, catchword; 68, ff. 55r-62v, catchword; 78, ff. 63r-70v, catchword; 88, ff. 71r-78v, catchword; 98, ff. 79r-86v, catchword; 1010, ff. 87r-96v, catchword in large well-drawn scroll; 1110, ff. 97r-106v end of text; 128 (wants ii), ff. 107r-113v.
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| Pricking: Round holes visible on edge of fore edge, some cropped off. Writing space: Texts 1-3 - 160 x 100 mm. Text 4 - c. 150 x 100 mm. Columns: single. Lines: Texts 1-3 - c. 32 lines. Text 4 - c. 23/24. Ruling not visible. |
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Scribe 1 (ff. 2r-6r) writing in a small cursive hand. Characteristics: double compartment g; 2-shaped r; B-shaped w; double compartment a. Body height: 1 mm.
Scribe 2 (ff. 7r-86r) writing in a cursive hand. Characteristics: B-shaped w; double compartment a; B-shaped s in final position; long s in medial position; 2-shaped r; double compartment g; hooked l, h; frequent use of ž. Body height: 2-3mm.
Scribe 3 (ff. 87r-end) writing in a large Anglicana Formata hand with Textura influences. Characteristics: double compartment a; open B-shaped w with small feet at the top of the backstrokes; rounded s in initial and final position, in final position alternates with the B-shape variant; long s in medial and initial position; 2-shaped and short r used regularly with the short form also in final position; rounded open and closed 8-shaped g used regularly; rounded d with oblique upper stroke, with a variant terminating with a looped
ascender; frequent use of ? and ž; descenders extend in otiose hairlines but not much below the line of writing. Body height: 2mm.
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Memoriale text only: illuminated initial for Memoriale credencium f. 7r. Four-line capital M in gold on a quartered ground of rose and blue with white line decoration. Sprays of feathering grow from the three corners sporting green tinted oval lobes with pairs of gold balls and terminating in a gold elongated cone with spikes and a green tinted 'feather'. Two-line blue initials with red pen-work flourishing forming a border. Three-line blue initials with red pen-work flourishing forming a border.
Later drawings: Inside front cover on pastedown - crude drawing of a knight in armour and side view of leg of armour.
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Medieval binding, 1450-1500. Size: 210 x 145 mm. Undecorated white leather, mitred and pasted on 5 mm thick oak boards with 10 mm bevelled edge, cushion bevel. Boards cut flush with quires. Original sewing. Six double thongs across the spine. Remains of two leather straps on fore edge attached by round headed 'proud' nails. Pewter catches remain on the back cover. Inside back board is visible.
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| Modern pencil foliation replacing earlier erroneous foliation. Ff. 1-113. Really i + 105 + vii. i and i-vii are flyleaves. F. 113 (vii) is the back pastedown.
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| F. 1r - 6 lines of text c. fifteenth century. Very small hand c. 1mm. Short devotional tract regarding sin. F. 112r - 4 lines of Latin in ?two later hands.
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| Good. |
| Unknown |
| F. 2r: '' written on top fore edge.
F. 107r: wrote 'Iohannes Robinsonus me possidet' in a c. sixteenth/seventeenth-century hand.
F. 107r: various inscriptions by - 'Thys ys Rycharde ____ ys boke', 'Thys ys Rychard Horne/ Boke ____' in a sixteenth-century hand. |
| For information on Tanner see Madan 1895, p. 81. |
Catalogued and encoded: Rebecca Farnham, University of Birmingham, August 2003. Script described by Orietta DaRold, University of Birmingham, June 2004. Manuscript consulted.
Related Manuscripts and other documents
Textual
Other copies of the
Memoriale credencium copied in similar scribal dialect are London, British Library, Sloane 1009 (unmapped but South Herefordshire), London, British Library, Harley 535, and London, British Library, Harley 2398 (area of Mitcheldean) (see Hanna 1989, p. 903).
- Dennison, L., Orr, M. T., 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 3, MSS e Musaeo - Wood, London, Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers, p. 80, n. 1035.
- Hackman, A. 1860. Catalogi codicum manuscriptorum bibliothecae Bodleianae...Thomae Tanneri, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1860, rpt. 1966, p. 637, n. 201.
- Hanna, R. 1989. ‘Sir Thomas Berkeley and his Patronage’, Speculum, 64, 878-916, p. 903.
- Kengen, J. H. L. 1979. ‘Memoriale Credencium: A Late Middle English Manual of Theology for Lay People’, University of Nijmegen dissertation, privately printed.
- Madan, F. 1895. A Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 3, p. 87.
- 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.
- Pächt, O., and Alexander, J. J. G. 1973. Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, vol., 3, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 100, no. 1164.
