Portable Monastic Psalter, in Latin with English additions; England, York, St Mary’s (?), 15th century, beginning

Title

Portable Monastic Psalter, in Latin with English additions; England, York, St Mary’s (?), 15th century, beginning

Shelfmark

MS. Lat. liturg. g. 1

Place of origin

English, York (?), St Mary's Abbey (?)

Date

15th century, beginning

Language

Middle English (1100-1500)

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

parchment; paper fly-leaves

Physical extent

216 leaves Leaves were trimmed in rebinding, occasionally causing the loss of decoration.

Hands

Formal Gothic book hand, black ink (brown ink on fols. 177–183)

Decoration

Blue KL monograms with red penwork in the calendar.

8-line gold Beatus-initial, decorated with foliage, flowers and gold discs.

5- to 6-line gold initials, decorated with foliage, flowers and gold discs, at psalms 26 (fol. 38r), 38 (fol. 49r), 52 (fol. 59v), 68 (fol. 69r), 80 (fol. 82r), 97 (fol. 94r; the initial is filled in with a stylized red rose), 109 (fol. 107r) and the start of the canticles for the year (fol. 174r).

3-line gold initial, decorated with foliage at psalm 51 (fol. 59r).

2-line blue initials with red penwork at the beginnings of psalms, canticles, collects, etc.

Alternating plain 1-line red and blue initials at the beginnings of verses and periods.

Rubrics in red ink; unfinished in the hymnal and the Office of the Dead (e.g. fols. 163r, 190r, etc.)

Musical notation

Square notation on staves of four red lines.

Binding

English Grolieresque, 19th century, by Broadbere of Salisbury (signed on the turn-in, upper cover). Blue (faded to green) leather with red inlay and gilt floral decorations over pasteboard. Gilt lettering on the front cover, repeated on spine: ‘PSALTERIUM || ET || PRECES || SÆC: XIV.’. Four raised bands on spine. The panels between the bands are framed with gilt fillet lines and decorated with red inlay and gilt foliate designs. Fragment of a Bodleian (?) paper label on spine. Endbands of red, white and gold thread. Gilt fillet lines on the edges of covers and turn-ins. The edges of textblock are gilt and coloured red. Marbled paper pastedowns and fly-leaves; further fly-leaves of laid paper, contemporary with the binding. Fol. 10 has glue marks and was probably a pastedown of an earlier binding.

Acquisition

Bodleian Library: ‘Bt. by the Bodleian for £ 36.6 (including commission) at the E. H. Lawrence sale at Sotheby’s, 11 May 1892 (no. 535 in the catalogue)’ on fol. i verso.

Provenance

Made for private use of a monk of the Benedictine Abbey of St Mary, York (?). Frere (1894–1932) attributes the manuscript to St Bees Priory, Cumberland, whereas van Dijk (1958) points out the similarity of the calendar and litany to those of Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. Rawl. C. 553, from St Mary’s, York, and comments that ‘If this book had been written for St Bees one would expect either an octave for her feast or her name higher up in the litany’. The calendar of MS. Rawl. C. 553 also has the feast of St Bega (7 November). The scribe’s prayer is on fol. 106v.

15th-century corrections and additions, including corrections to the psalms, added memorials of the angels on fol. 200r, and added verses 15–16 of psalm 50 on fol. 6r.

Erased inscription in ink, two lines, perhaps medieval, on fol. 201v; one-line erased inscription on fol. 19r.

A note in the calendar recording the birth in 1465/6 of Princess Elizabeth of York (d. 1503), daughter of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, and Queen of England as wife of Henry VII: ‘Elisabeth primogenita Edwardi iiijti Regis & Elisabeth’ Regine Anglie . nata fuit inter horas terciam & quartam in Aurora diei Mercurij . viz xiji Februarii . Anno Domini MoCCCClxv et Anno regni dicti domini Regis vto. littera dominicali . E .’ (fol. 11v). The note was probably made some time after the birth of Elizabeth of York: the word ‘primogenita’ implies that she was no longer the only child. The text of the note, including the time and the day of the week, as well as the date of birth, suggests an interest in astrology.

Faint inscription ‘elyzabeth’ in plummet (?) on fol. 202r, probably in the same hand as the English poem on fol. 10v (note the shape of ‘e’, ‘y’ and ‘h’). This charm may have been particularly associated with women and childbirth (Gray, 1974).

Impressions from a heart-shaped object, possibly a pilgrim or secular badge, on fols. 7r and 10v (see ‘Physical description’ (‘Collation’)). Erased or faded inscriptions on both leaves.

A pattern, possibly early modern, of a hand holding a flowering branch, made of prickings and a plummet (?) drawing on fol. 206v, presumably copied from a pattern book. The pattern is partly cropped and therefore pre-dates the current binding.

Willett Lawrence Adye: armorial bookplate on the upper pastedown. Motto: ‘Nil desperandum’.

E. H. Lawrence, book-collector, 19th century.