Statutes of Cardinal College, Ipswich; England (Westminster), 1528

Title

Statutes of Cardinal College, Ipswich; England (Westminster), 1528

Shelfmark

Christ Church MS. 338

Place of origin

England (Westminster)

Date

1528

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

Parchment (HSOS).

Physical extent

Fols: ii + 36 + vii (numbered fols 37–41, -, -). All flyleaves and pastedowns paper, added at time of binding (front pastedown and fol. i: large coat-of-arms of single fleur-de-lys, from which descends a number ‘4’ and a ‘WR’ monogram: Churchill, no. 427?; fol. ii: ‘IV’; back pastedown: pot, with single handle, initials ‘NB’); the lower half of fol. 40 is torn away, and fol. 41 is followed by two stubs (conjoint with fol. 40 and 41).

Hands

Written in formal secretary, datable to the year of the college’s foundation, ie 1528 (but not in Watson, DMO).

Punctuation by point, modern comma, and virgula.

Decoration

Headings in the text ink, in bastard secretary. Decorated capitals at the heads of statutes in three styles, by the same hand: most often, five- or six-line examples constructed out of animal forms on leafy grounds in ink, with reddish wash, on two occasions (fol. 1, 7v) depicting Wolsey’s leopard’s head above a crown (cf. MS. 339); imitation of contemporary continental painted ‘classical’ initials (very close to the style of MS 101) in pen and ink (fol. 3, 6, 8v, 20), and several elaborate swag capitals.

Binding

Brown reversed calf over millboards, with a central rectangle formed of a floral roll and with fleurons at the corners, and a blind fillet at very edge of each board; attributable to Richard Sedgley and probably dating from the 1680s (see MS 340, binding). Sewn on six thongs. In the upper spine compartment, in gilt on a red leather tab ‘Ipswich College’, above which in pen ‘Statuta Collegij Ipsuicensis’ (s. xviiex / s. xviiiin; same hand on spine of MS 340 etc). Two holes through the gutter of all leaves (80mm and 175mm from foot); comparison with our MS 339 suggests that these once held the cords from which hung a box with the cardinal’s seal and this, in turn, suggests that the original binding was probably limp leather or possibly a wrapper. Present fol. 1 is rubbed, consonant with it having been left unbound after losing its early leaves.

Provenance

That this manuscript is an original set of the college’s statutes made for its founder is suggested by its illumination and confirmed by the presence of his signature, ‘T Carlis Ebor’ Fundator’, at fol. 35v, lower margin, below last line of text. It is not clear where the manuscript was at his fall or what happened to it immediately thereafter. Apart from rubbing and probationes pennae, the book’s only other addition is ‘Rob’ Clay’ (fol. 1, upper margin, s. xvii). The script of this note is the same as appears in, for instance, BodL, MS Bodley 728, fol. iiv, where he gives some information about himself: ‘Liber Roberti Clay De Clayhous in Comitatu Eborum. 1610’. This Robert Clay was the nephew of Sir Henry Savile, and himself a Mertonian, vicar of Halifax from 1624 until his death in 1628, where he founded a library in his parish church. Presumably, as well as being a donor to the new University Library known as the Bodleian (not only MS Bod. 728 but also MSS Auct D.2.18, e Musaeo 55, Bod. 59, Bod. 515 and Bod. 676), he thought this manuscript would be an appropriate gift to Oxford’s Cathedral (rather than to the Library; thus, it does not appear in the Donors’ Register, MS LR 1). Note that this Robert Clay is not to be confused with the vicar of Flore (Northants) who once owned our MS 145.

When this manuscript arrived at the House, it became part of the archive held in the Cathedral’s Chapter House, on which see the Headnote above. It was in situ by the time that the present binding was supplied; it was later recorded as number 15 in the 1771 catalogue of the Chapter House books: ChCh Archives, D&C iv.a.1, fol. 13.