Pliny the Younger, Letters (8 books)

Title

Pliny the Younger, Letters (8 books)

Shelfmark

MS. Duke Humfrey d. 1

Place of origin

Italy, Milan

Date

1441/2

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

Excepting flyleaves, crisp parchment, prepared like that in London, British Library, Harley MS 1705 and Oxford, Magdalen College, MS lat. 37 (B), with skin-side usually very smooth and hair-side slightly coarse; skin, hair-hair, skin-skin. All flyleaves and pastedowns are paper (17th c.) with a watermark (armoirie, not in Briquet: a variant on the arms of Burgundy, lacking a castle in the bottom section; cf. Briquet 1476 & 1477, Churchill 264).

Physical extent

iii + 104 + iii;

Hands

Written throughout in one small, humanist-influenced script identifiable as that of Pier Candido Decembrio. Many of the distinctive features seen in London, British Library, Harley MS 1705 are seen here, for example the ampersand floating above the line with its tongue descending to the line, and the g with its pronounced diagonal descender and horizontal top to its bottom bowl which extends to the right of the top bowl. One notable difference is the tendency in the present manuscript for the final s rarely to be tall but to be short, with a tail often descending below the line. In this codex, Decembrio writes in brownish black ink, with the opening protocol of each letter added in bright red; the opening majuscule of each letter, painted alternately in blue and red, is written in an eclectic or experimental style (see, for example, the various types of A: fols 8v, 14v, 16v, 19v, 24v, 33v, 35r, 36v, 38r etc). Greek phrases are included by the scribe (eg. fols 9v–10r), though there are sometimes absent with at one point Decembrio noting in the margin: deficit grecum nec in aliquibus exemplaribus potuit inveniri (fol. 97r). Throughout the manuscript, Decembrio provides copious marginalia, in the form of notes (both corrections and comments), a characteristic light manicula, and a tall nota monogram; these have occasionally been cropped (e.g. fol. 66).

Decoration

Each book opens with a simple four- or five-line initial, with the letter in gold and with Milanese-style bianchi girari decoration of which the palette is dominated by light green and blue with a small addition of darkish pink (fols 1r, 12v, 25a verso, 37r, 49v, 61v, 75v, 88r); these are in the same design as the initials in Oxford, Magdalen College, MS lat. 37 (B) and Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, ms. lat. 7805.

Each epistle opens with the initial majuscule alternating in colour between blue and red.

Binding

Leather binding (17th c.) with a simple double rectangle tooled both plainly and in gold on each board; also each board has a gilt centrepiece of the coat-of-arms of the University of Oxford, depicting an open book inscribed Sapientia fælicitas, a version of a motto used by the University between 1587 and 1623 \[Macray, Annals, p. 17n\]. At both boards there are also the remains of two pieces of green cloth, presumably used to tie the volume closed. The first recto and last verso of the manuscript are both moderately rubbed.

Acquisition

The 1620 donation was not considered worthy of inclusion in the Bodleian’s Register of Benefactors but there are signs that it was treated as a prized possession. The Benefactors’ Register is Oxford, Bodleian Library, Library Records b. 903, with pp. 229–231 covering the relevant year. Our manuscript is listed in Summ. Cat, i, p. 104 as no. 947. The inscription just quoted was added to the volume by a professional scribe, presumably paid for by the Library (Summ. Cat.). Similarly, the unusual binding was provided probably soon after the manuscript returned to Oxford. After its return to the University’s library, the manuscript did receive some attention. This is reflected not just in the set of pencil annotations visible in the margins, but also in the use made of it by Thomas Hearne. He employed this codex for his edition of Pliny’s Letters, and at fol. i recto, there is a note in his script commenting: Libri, qui in Impressis VIII & X in hoc codice desiderantur. Hearne cites this manuscript as Bod. 1 in his edition of C. Plinii Caecilii Secundi Epistolae (Oxford, 1703). Hearne did not note in his edition that this manuscript had belonged to Humfrey, but he does record the presence of his ex libris in his notebooks. (C. Doble ed., Remarks & Collections of Thomas Hearne, ii [Oxford Historical Society, vii] (Oxford, 1886), p. 339 & iii [Oxford Historical Society, xiii] (Oxford, 1889), p. 355. On this, see also my article in J. Raven ed., Lost Libraries.) That ownership note was later regarded as its most significant feature: at some point in the 1880s, the volume was added to the Bodleian’s permanent exhibition and placed alongside other examples of autographs of historical figures. The manuscript is absent from the listing of the glass-cases’ contents in [F. Madan], List of Books, Manuscripts, Portraits &c (Oxford, 1881) but noted by Macray, p. 458n. See also Vickers, p. 426. Emphasis on its original provenance was also enhanced by the decision, probably made in 1897, to give it its present shelfmark. However, when the glass-case exhibition was discontinued in 1921 and replaced with the select manuscript listing, our codex was effectively demoted; it only joined the ranks of the select in c. 1975. It was perhaps promoted because of its being displayed in the 1975 Survival of Ancient Literature exhibition. At the same time, MS Canon. Class. lat. 30 (Catullus; 14th c.) was also added to the list; see the hand-list held in Duke Humfrey’s. (I would like to thank William Hodges and Bruce Barker-Benfield for their assistance on this matter.) There are several former Bodleian shelfmarks in the manuscript. At the front pastedown written in pencil (in a twentieth century script) and crossed out: Auct. F. 2. 23. Also in pencil is: Arch. F. d. 41. Written in pen at the first flyleaf (fol. i recto): Bodl. Arch. A. 151 (2934). The bracketed number is the number by which it is recorded in Bernard, and in the Summary Catalogue.

Provenance

Humfrey, Duke of Gloucester: recorded his ownership by inscribing, just below the final colophon at fol. 101r, his short ex libris: Cest livre est A moy homfrey duc de glou/cestre.

The Duke presented the book to the University of Oxford in 1444. There is little evidence for this manuscript being consulted during its first stay in the University Library; there is little early marginalia and there do not appear to be any surviving codices transcribed from it. The one other extant manuscript of Pliny’s Epistulae which was in Oxford in the fifteenth century—that owned and partially written by Robert Flemyng, now Oxford, Lincoln College, MS lat. 77—was also of the Eight-Book tradition but it definitely was not derived from Humfrey’s copy. On Flemyng’s manuscript, see Alexander & Temple, no. 591; DH & EH, p. 37 [no. 6]. Flemyng’s text and that in Humfrey’s copy share idiosyncrasies of the γ family (the Eight-Book tradition), but there are also significant differences: see the appendix below.

At some point in the sixteenth century, the manuscript must have left the University’s library but it is not clear when this happened or what its fate was before 1620. There are only two pieces of internal evidence to assist us in reconstructing this missing period: first, the opening and last folio are rubbed, suggesting the manuscript was for some time left unbound. Second, at the top centre of fol. 1r, the words operibus credite are written in a sixteenth century hand; this Gospel phrase [John 10 v.38] is perhaps the motto of a presumably Catholic owner. Other inscriptions are unrevealing. The word opus is written at top right in a late fifteenth or early sixteenth century script; while at the final verso, there are several notes: one hand has written magister at the top left, while another has written just to the right, Suaua paies; written vertically at the outside edge of the page is the word benedictus.

Robert Master (1565–1625): inscribed, at the foot of fol. 1r: Anno Domini MDCXX 8bris 3º. / Robertus Master LL Doctor Cancellarius Episcopi / Coven: et Lichfeild Oxoniensi Bibliothecae Dono Dedit & restituit / hunc librum olim ad Humphredum Ducem Glocestriae / pertinentem ut videre est propria ipsius manu scriptum in / ultima pagina huius Libri. Robert was an Oxford man: a student of Trinity College (matriculated March 1578/9), he became a Fellow and Deputy Warden of All Souls, and, from 1599 to 1603, Principal of St Alban’s Hall. Outside the University, he was a M.P. in 1601, and, as his inscription states, the Chancellor of both Coventry and Lichfield dioceses. He made at least one gift of printed books to All Souls, but it is unclear how much of a bibliophile he was or how he came by this manuscript. See J. Foster, Alumni Oxonienses: the members of the University of Oxford, 1500–1714, iii (Oxford, 1891), p. 986; P. W. Hasler ed., The House of Commons 1558–1603, iii (London, 1981), p. 34. He gave, in 1598, to All Souls a four volume printed edition of the works of Zwingli [N. Ker, Records of All Souls College Library, 1437–1600 [Oxford Bibliographical Society, new series, vol. xvi] (Oxford, 1971), pp. 104, 158].