Psalter ('The Ormesby Psalter'), Calendar, Easter table, Psalter, Weekly canticles, each followed by a collect; no rubrics, Confitebor tibi domine, Ego dixi, Exultauit cor meum, Cantemus domino, Domine audiui, Audite celi, Daily canticles, prayers and creeds, each except the Te Deum followed by a collect; no rubrics, Te deum, Benedicite omnia opera, Benedictus dominus deus, Magnificat, Nunc dimittis, Quicumque vult, Litany, Litany of Norwich cathedral — 13th century, late; additions, c. 1310–20 and c. 1325; English, East Anglia; additions, Norwich

Title

Psalter ('The Ormesby Psalter'), Calendar, Easter table, Psalter, Weekly canticles, each followed by a collect; no rubrics, Confitebor tibi domine, Ego dixi, Exultauit cor meum, Cantemus domino, Domine audiui, Audite celi, Daily canticles, prayers and creeds, each except the Te Deum followed by a collect; no rubrics, Te deum, Benedicite omnia opera, Benedictus dominus deus, Magnificat, Nunc dimittis, Quicumque vult, Litany, Litany of Norwich cathedral — 13th century, late; additions, c. 1310–20 and c. 1325; English, East Anglia; additions, Norwich

Shelfmark

MS. Douce 366

Place of origin

English, East Anglia; additions, Norwich

Date

13th century, late; additions, c. 1310–20 and c. 1325

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

parchment

Physical extent

2 + 213 + 2 fol.

Decoration

(fol. 9v), full page Beatus initial, with Tree of Jesse, Annunciation, and praying couple (with arms of Foliot and Bardolf); praying bishop and Benedictine monk painted over the original block of text.

Five- or ten-line initials at the text divisions: (fol. 10r), Ps. 1, David playing harp (fol. 38r), Ps. 26, Anointing of David (fol. 55v), Ps. 38, Christ before Pilate (fol. 71v), Ps. 51, Doeg and the Priests (fol. 72r), Ps. 52, Temptation of Christ (fol. 89r), Ps. 68, Jonah and the Whale (fol. 109r), Ps. 80, David playing bells (fol. 128r), Ps. 97, Clerics singing (fol. 131r), Ps. 101, David praying (fol. 147v), Ps. 109, Christ and God the Father

All historiated initials except Ps. 1 with full borders.

2-line decorated and inhabited initials extending into partial borders; 1-line versals.

Binding

Contemporary binding of white leather on boards with leather chemise. Fore-edge painting with the arms of Norwich cathedral priory, the see of Norwich, and the Uffords of Suffolk.

Acquisition

Bequeathed by him to the Bodleian.

Provenance

Three stages of production: (1) late 13th century, the main part of the MS. was written, and most of the minor decoration on fols. 10–45, 58–69 decorated; (2) c. 1310–20, most of the main historiated borders and initials were added; (3) 1320s, finishing of the decoration, the insertion of fol. 9v, execution of the second Beatus initial on fol. 10, addition of calendar and new litany, binding.

Arms of Foliot and Bardolf (fol. 9v), possibly associated with an intended marriage between these families (not known to have taken place).

Presented to Norwich cathedral by Robert of Ormesby, probably c. 1325.

Pressmarks 'A.I', 'xlij', 14th cent.

'A. Gray', 1654, fol. i.

Francis Douce, acquired November 1831.

Title

The Psalter, in Latin

Shelfmark

MS. Douce 366

Summary

Preceded by a (rather later) calendar and paschal table, and followed at fol. 189v by the usual canticles, creeds and (fol. 206) litany: a second more local litany has been added in about A.D. 1400 at fol. 209v.

There are fine miniatures and borders on fols. 10, 38, 55v, 71v, 72, 89, 109, 128, 131, 147, and smaller ones elsewhere in profusion, many with grotesques. The latter part of the volume is instructive for the art of illumination, as in some margins the drawing only is finished, other leaves have only the clay ready for gold, others the gold leaf burnished, and so on. Fol. 9 is later and bears on the recto part of the first psalm (from secus decursus) and on the verso a very fine illuminated 'Jesse tree' exhibiting kings, prophets, etc., springing from Jesse, and portraits of an abbot and a monk (Robert de Ormesby?), the centre bearing the words 'Beatus uir qui non.' This leaf is quite separate but perhaps of the same date as the calendar, and both of these and the second litany may be of Robert of Ormesby's time (about A.D. 1400?). See Waagen's Art Treasures (1854) iii. 92, and H. Shaw's Illuminated Ornaments (1833), no. ix, where there are facsimiles of parts of fols. 55v, 72, with description by sir F. Madden, mentioning the coats of arms in the volume.

'[P]salterium Roberti de Ormesby monachi Norwyci per eundem assignatum choro ecclesie sancte Trinitatis Norwici ad iacendum coram Suppriore qui pro tempore fuerit in perpetuum' (abt. A.D. 1400?), see above. Marked 'A. j' and 'xlij' probably in some list in the Benedictine abbey of the Holy Trinity (now the Cathedral) at Norwich. 'A. Gray 1654.'.

Date

written chiefly in about the middle of the 14th cent., perhaps at Norwich

Language

Latin

Physical facet

On parchment, with fine miniatures, and illuminated borders, capitals, etc., binding: red leather on boards covered with a large piece of white sheep-skin, contemporary

Physical extent

214 Leaves