Peter Lombard, Sentences

Title

Peter Lombard, Sentences

Shelfmark

St John's College MS 49

Place of origin

England

Date

s. xii3/4/1158 × 1169

with missing leaves supplied s. xvii/xviii

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

Vellum (HSOS/HFFH).

Physical extent

Fols. ii (numbered fols. i, 1) + 137(the medieval portion, numbered fols. 2–138) + 11 (modern supply, numbered fols. 139–49) + i (numbered fol. ii).

Hands

Written in transitional protogothic bookhand/gothic textura. Punctuation by point and punctus elevatus.

Decoration

Headings and marginal notations in red.

At the head of internal divisions, 2-line alternate slatey blue and red lombards with pen-work of the other colour.

Although the illumination at the head of book 1 has been excised, the illuminated letters at other major divisions survive: Fol. 2ra(the prologue): an 8-line red and blue lombard with green and gold (as well as red and blue) leafy infill;

Fol. 44rb: God creating Eve from Adam’s side, on gold leaf within a blue initial on diapered red ground;

Fol. 81va, the Nativity, on gold leaf inside a red initial on a diapered blue ground;

Fol. 107ra:a large green and blue S, its ends animal heads and filled with vine and leaf design and with animals, on gold leaf.

See AT, no. 89 (12) and plate 6 (fol. 44rb).

Binding

Reversed calf over millboards, s. xvii. Sewn on four thongs. Cloth ties on both boards to close the book. An old tab ‘62’ at mid lower board leading edge. Gold ‘49’ at the top of the spine; in ink on the leading edges. Pastedowns modern paper, a College bookplate on the front pastedown. At the front, a modern paper flyleaf and a medieval vellum flyleaf (half a bifolium, preceded by its stub); at the rear, a single modern paper flyleaf (ii).

Acquisition

‘Liber Collegij Sanctj Johannis Baptistae Oxon’ ex dono venerabilis virj Guilielmj Laud sacrae Theologiae Doctoris Archidiaconj Huntingtoniensis Ecclesiae Cathedralis Glocest Decanj et ejusdem Collegij Praesidis MDCXVII o’ (fol. 1vb). Our MS is described as Laud Exhib, no. 4 (7).

Provenance

‘liber sententiarum hillar’ [clear in ultraviolet light] Episcopi ij dofo dicatur F xxiiij’ (fol. 2, the lower margin; s. xv2), and an erased ex-libris (fol. 1, upper margin). Ker, MLGB 51, 247 associates the book with Chichester Cathedral.