Nicholas Trevet on the Psalms

Title

Nicholas Trevet on the Psalms

Shelfmark

MS. Bodl. 738

Place of origin

England

Date

1320s (probably before 1326)

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

Parchment of fine quality with only a slight difference between flesh and hair sides. Fols 1–15, of which the margins have been badly damaged, were repaired with transparent paper, which has sometimes made the text on those leaves difficult to read. Transparent paper was widely used for manuscript repairs at the Bodleian Library during Edward W. B. Nicholson’s time as Bodley’s Librarian between 1882 and 1912; see M. Stiglitz, J. Bearman, Of earth and sky: a pair of Ming hanging scrolls, from past repairs to present conservation, Restaurator, 37 (2016), pp. 309–27, at 309–16.

Physical extent

I–II + one non-numbered leaf + III–V (old parchment flyleaves) + 254 (fols 251–54 blank, between fols 251 and 252 stubs of two excised leaves).

Hands

Northern littera textualis by one hand. The use of straight d, alongside the round-backed form, decreases the probability that the copy was written later than the 1320s. Manuscripts described and reproduced in Sandler, Gothic Manuscripts, shows that the straight d, still found during the first three decades of the fourteenth century, becomes very rare afterwards (as an example of its late, and apparently already sporadic use, see London, British Library, Royal MS 10 E. iv (c. 1330–c. 1340), fol. 3r, l. 8, edificandis (vol. 1, il. 258, cf. vol. 2, catalogue, No. 101, pp. 111–12).

Decoration

All major divisions of the text (dedicatory letter, prologue, Jerome’s letter, and individual psalms) are marked by painted initials, in gold and colours, and provided with painted marginal extensions in the form of blue and rose bars, decorated with ivy and oak leaves, squiggles and drolleries. Two are historiated initials: Reuerendo, fol. 1ra, represents a Dominican friar, with an open book on a lectern, teaching a group of three students, apparently also Dominicans; Beatus, fol. 4vb, represents King David playing a harp. Other initials present human busts, en face, en trois quarts, or profiles, mostly male, bearded or beardless, sometimes distinguished by a halo (if cruciform then to be identified with Christ, see e.g. Dixit, fol. 24va), royal crown (e.g. Quare, fol. 6ra), papal tiara (e.g. Custodi, fol. 26rb), bishop’s mitre (e.g. Dixi, fol. 71va), or doctor’s cap (e.g. Domini, fol. 45ra: see M. Scott, Medieval Dress and Fashion, London, 2007, pp. 84–85, 116, and fig. 66); rarely female (Laudate, fol. 201ra, Cum, fol. 201va: Evans, Pattern, seems to be the only one to have noticed this gallery). Other painted initials include only floral or geometric motifs.

Minor divisions are marked by red initials with violet flourishing or blue with red. Psalm 150 (fol. 250ra–va) is illustrated with representations of musical instruments. Apart from the two forms of tuba, put into the mouths of fantastic creatures (fol. 250ra), the other six are presented as being played by human figures, in square vignettes within text-columns.

Otto Pächt and J. J. G. Alexander date this manuscript to c. 1320–1330 and attribute its decoration to one of the hands of Christ Church, Oxford, MS. 92. The latter is a presentation copy of Walter of Milemete’s Liber de nobilitatibus, sapientiis et prudentiis regum, prepared for Edward of Windsor, son and heir of Edward II. It is probable that the production of that manuscript had begun before the deposition of Edward II, but it was dedicated to his son as King Edward (III) at the beginning of his reign (crowned on 1 February 1327). MS. Bodl. 738 is therefore usually dated to the turn of 1326 and 1327. The illumination (unfinished) has been attributed to a group of artists working in London. Regrettably, Pächt and Alexander did not specify which of the artists was responsible for the decoration of the manuscript (the faces, at least, resemble those by Hand V in Milemete’s manuscript), or whether the entire decoration was done entirely by the same artist. Sandler, Gothic Manuscripts, vol. 2, No. 84 (pp. 91–93) identifies Hand V with the major artist responsible for the manuscripts Oxford, All Souls College, 7 (ibid., No. 90, pp. 89–90) and Dublin, Trinity College, 35 (ibid., No. 83, pp. 90–91). In a letter of 8 March 2020, Lucy Sandler defined the style of the manuscript as East Anglian, which does not necessarily mean that it was produced in East Anglia instead of a cosmopolitan London (cf. M. A. Michael, Oxford, Cambridge and London: towards a theory for grouping Gothic manuscripts, The Burlington Magazine, vol. 130, No. 1019, Special Issue on English Gothic Art (February 1988), pp. 107–15). It is worth adding also that the representations of the harp, the bagpipe, and the organs in the manuscript share some details with images of the respective instruments in Christ Church MS 92. Besides the companion volume of Milemete’s treatise (London, British Library, Add. MS 47680, the pseudo-Aristotelian Secretum secretorum, also destined for Edward III) and MS. Bodl. 738, the same artists, together or separately, have been recognized in a number of manuscripts datable to the third decade of the fourteenth century, some of which are associated with Oxford. (M. A. Michael, Urban production of manuscript books and the role of the university towns, in The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, 2: 1100–1400, ed. by N. J. Morgan, R. M. Thomson, Cambridge, 2008, pp. 168–94, at 180–83.) The use of violet ink in the penwork decoration does not contradict the localization based on the painted decoration. The manuscript awaits a detailed art-historical analysis.

Binding

Stamped white sheepskin (about 1602) on older sewing and boards, rebacked.

Acquisition

The manuscript was presented to Sir Thomas Bodley by the Dean and Chapter of Exeter in 1602. (Oliver, Lives of the Bishops of Exeter, p. 377; cf. Erskine, The growth of Exeter Cathedral library, p. 49.)

Provenance

John Grandison, bishop of Exeter: bequeathed to the Exeter chapter in 1365. Two notes written in Grandisson’s hand witness the donation. The first reads: liber Johannis de Grandison. Exon’. Episcopi. quem damus ipsi ecclesie (fol. 1r, upper margin). The second appears on the old flyleaf (fol. IV verso): hunc librum. cum alio⹎ super psalterium. Scilicet. Nicholai Tryueth: et alium. Nicholai de Lyra⹎ damus capitulo nostro Exoniensi; manu mea .J. de .G. Exon’. Anno domi ni mºcccºlxºvº. et officij mei .xxxºixº et etatis lºxxiiijº [the number repeated below as] septuagesimo. iiijº [a capite, with another pen] Et atten de quod secundum interpretationem lxx. exponitur non iuxta textum nostrum. [a capite, in yet another pen] Ego Johannes de .G. Exon’. †noui† [nouim Steele, 34] vtrumque [a capite] Nota Nicholaum [the following part is displayed on two levels] de lyra Minorem | et Tryueth predica torem | fratres. The problematic reading noui has a diacritic sign above i and rising abbreviation sign above ui. Steele’s reading offers a non-existent form. The word could be expanded as nouerim, but then the use of the subjunctive would require explanation. Did Grandisson express a wish to know (or rather have known) both authors? As an alternative but not entirely satisfactory reading, Kujawiński proposes nomina ui, in the sense of render renowned. If, instead, the names of Lyre and Trevet referred to the bequeathed copies of their works rather than to the person of the authors, our word could be expanded as notaui, albeit a superscript cursive a as a contraction would have been more in line with Grandisson’s writing habits. Despite this apparent irregularity, the reading notaui, which has been ingeniously suggested to me by James Willoughby, offers the best meaning: the bishop claims responsibility for the annotations in both books. The bequest is also confirmed by Grandisson’s will (1368): Ita, tamen, quod Scripta Nicholai de Lira et Nicholai Tryvethe super Spalterium, una cum melioribus originalibus que non habentur in libraria Ecclesie Exoniensis, remaneant ibidem in Archivis. (The Register of John de Grandisson, Bishop of Exeter (A.D. 1327–1369), ed. by F. C. Hingeston-Randolph, 3 vols, London, 1894, vol. 3, p. 1553; cf. Oliver, Lives of the Bishops, pp. 448–49; in the forthcoming Willoughby, Ramsay, Libraries of the Secular Cathedrals, SC21.17.) The glosses added by Grandisson are written in the same display script and indicate the first psalms sung at Matins of each day of the week and at Vespers on Sunday, according to secular usage. The annotations provide the day, liturgical hour, often repeated in different positions, and are sometimes accompanied by the incipit of the psalm; the respective folios are tagged by strings sewn into the margins: Feria II, Nocturnum II (Ps. 26, fol. 49va); Feria III, Nocturnum III (Ps. 38, fol. 71va); Feria IIII, Nocturnum IIII (Ps. 52, fol. 96ra); Feria V, Nocturnum V (Ps. 68, fol. 118rb); Feria VI, Sextum Nocturnum (Ps. 80, fol. 145ra); Nocturnum VII Sabbato (Ps. 97, fol. 171ra); Ad vesperas in dominicis (Ps. 109, fol. 197va). Cf. Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Ott. lat. 599, where the decorated initials point to the same liturgical division. Margaret Steele (p. 34) also ascribed to Grandisson the pointing hands, monograms of Nota, and the glosses highlighting topics of interest. The attribution of the latter group is not entirely convincing, since the examples cited by Steele from fols 27r and 37v differ in size and some letter forms from the scripts used by Grandisson, as described and illustrated by the same scholar. (Compare the forms of the two-compartment a and long-tailed shoulderless r in the glosses in G with respective forms in Grandisson’s scripts as described and illustrated by Steele, pp. 15–21, and plates; cf. F. Rose-Troup, Bishop Grandisson: Student and Art­Lover, Plymouth, 1929, pl. 6.) Certainly attributable to Grandisson are the glosses written in his glossing script in the outer margins of fols 4r (Nota gula), 72r (Domine quid multuplicati, the incipit of Ps. 3 referred to in the commentary on Ps. 38), 94v (Tytulus sequentis), 103v (hic, followed by a square monogram of Nota, another monogram in the inner margin of the same page), 104r (Item alius psalmus), and 208r (Nota in toto .CLXXVI. versus, referred to Ps. 118; in the inner margin Grandisson picked up Hebrew letters Haleph, Beth and Gymel). This corpus of annotations, together with the liturgical division introduced by Grandisson, shows that he used the book (other glosses should probably be attributed to another medieval reader, for which see below). Grandisson, however, may have not been the first owner of G. A Psalter with Trevet’s commentary is registered among the books of his predecessor in Exeter, Walter de Stapeldon, in his post-mortem inventory of 1328: Item phalterium Jeronimi [J. sup. lin.] glosatum per fratrem N. Triuet precii .xl. s. (Exeter Cathedral Archives, Dean and Chapter 2847). If this were the same book, then G would have been completed before 1328 or, more probably, before Stapeldon’s death on 15 October 1326 (for further discussion of this question, see Kujawiński, Chapter 2, pp. 89–91).

Exeter, Devon, Cathedral church of St Peter. Registered in the library inventory of 1506 of Exeter cathedral among the books of Decimus descus, in parte orientali: Glosa super Psalterium in exposicione literali Nicholai Treneth, 2 fo., Quia ternarius. (Oliver, Lives of the Bishops of Exeter, p. 373; Willoughby and Ramsay, Libraries of the Secular Cathedrals, SC35.519.)