Byrhtferth of Ramsey — 11th century, middle, with additions; England, Canterbury, Christ Church (?)

Title

Byrhtferth of Ramsey — 11th century, middle, with additions; England, Canterbury, Christ Church (?)

Shelfmark

MS. Ashmole 328

Place of origin

England, Canterbury, Christ Church (?)

Date

11th century, middle, with additions

Language

Latin

Old English (ca. 450-1100)

Contents

Form

codex

Support

parchment

Physical extent

Fols i + 132 + i. Pages i, ii, 263-4 are parchment flyleaves of the date of binding conjoint with the pastedowns.

Hands

A neat, but in detail ill-formed, round hand: insular letter-forms are used for Latin as well as for OE down to p. 207, except that the insular form of h is not used either in Latin or in OE: descenders short, their ends curving to the left: eg and et ligatures, the e rising slightly above the line: long s initially and medially, low s finally: hyphens tend to slope upwards : i accented when doubled. Titles in Latin are in red rustic capitals: titles in OE are usually in the script and hand of the text.

Pp. 207-251, predominantly in Latin, style IV Anglo-Caroline by the same scribe (Baker and Lapidge, p. xvi)

Decoration

Good tables.

Borders.

Diagrams.

Marginal drawing (horse) added p. 66, 16th century (?).

Musical notation

Anglo-Saxon neums in the added Alleluia, p. 259 (see Hartzell 2006, no. 239).

Binding

Binding of s. xvii.

Acquisition

Transferred from the Ashmolean Museum to the Bodleian in 1860.

Provenance

Baker and Lapidge (pp. cxvii-cxx) tentatively suggest an origin at Christ Church, Canterbury, on the following grounds: (1) the added Alleluia to Dunstan suggests either Glastonbury or Christ Christ (2) Cambridge University Library MS. Kk.5.32 was 'very possibly' copied from the present manuscript, at St Augustine's Canterbury. They note that the manuscript is not visible in Henry of Eastry's catalogue of c. 1300.

Belonged to Elias Ashmolein 1654, according to Tanner, Bibliotheca (1748), p. 125: Ashmole's signature is on fol. 3r.