The Production and Use of English Manuscripts 1060 to 1220

Hollie Morgan

London, British Library, Harley 3667

Names of the Winds

Date: s. xii1

Summary:

A quire that was once part of a larger scientific manuscript, along with Tiberius C. i, fols 2-17. Old English Names of the Winds are written in the four margins of fol. 7v, surrounding a typological diagram of Christ and the Apostles with Old Testament kings and prophets.

Manuscript Items:

Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-lower margin
Item: fol. 7v-left margin
Item: fol. 7v-left margin
Item: fol. 7v-top margin
Item: fol. 7v-top margin
Item: fol. 7v-top margin
Item: fol. 7v-right margin
Item: fol. 7v-right margin
Item: fol. 7v-right margin

Physical Description:

Object Description:

Form: Codex

Support: Parchment, leaves are arranged HFHF. Flyleaves are paper.

Extent:

315 mm x 210 mm (dimensions of all - size of leaves)

232 mm x 143 mm (dimensions of all - size of written space)

Foliation and/or Pagination: iv + 10 + ix leaves, foliated in pencil 1-10, perhaps in May 1882, when the manuscript was inspected (as noted on the first endleaf in pencil).

Collation:

Quires:

Signatures:

Tiberius C. i

Condition: Fols 1r and 10v are soiled. Parchment is of good quality, but with some holes (fols 3, 5, 10) and mends (fol. 5). Fol. 7 has holes where pair of compasses were used to draw the circles and arcs of the diagram on fol. 7v.

Layout description:

Ruled in drypoint with 43 lines per page. Double bounding lines, which extend across the length of the page. The top and bottom horizontal lines extend across the width of the page. Prick marks are visible on the outer margins of all leaves.

Hand description:

Number of hands:

Hand:

Scope: Minor
Script: Vernacular Insular Minuscule
Ker reference: Ker 196 SC1
Description: Fol. 7v. Nearly contemporary to the hand of the main text of the diagram. The hand could be that of the diagram on fol. 8r, which also involves the names of the winds.
Summary of the characteristics of the hand: Special letter-forms are retained, but th is used twice instead of ð or þ in 'noth' and 'rith' in the right margin.
a sometimes has a cedilla.
ę is occasionally used.
Both long and short s are used.
ð is retained.
þ is retained.
ƿ is retained.
Other manuscripts: The same hand is found in Tiberius C. i, fol. 11r

Decoration Description:

Rubrics are in red.
The diagrams on fols 1r, 2v, 4r, 4v, 5r, 6r, 9v, 10r, 10v have red lines.
The diagrams on fols 1v-r have red and green lines.
On fol. 4v are pen-and-ink drawings of Life and Death carrying banners with numbers written on them.
The diagram on fol. 5v is in red, purple and green, with the winds represented as winged faces.
The diagram on fol. 6v is in red, yellow and green.
The diagram on fol. 7r is in red and yellow.
The diagrams on fols 7v and 8r are in red, yellow, green and purple.
The diagram on fol. 8v contains a mappa mundi in red, yellow and green.
Initials are in red, green and purple on fols 3r, 8v, 9v.
Smaller initials are in red on fols 5v, 10v.
The smaller initial on fol. 10r is in green.

Binding Description:

Binding is black leather with Harley's crest in gold, bearing the motto 'virtute et fide'. Written along the length of the spine in gold, from left to right, are '3667' 'MUS. BRIT | BIBL. HARL' 'TABULAE CHRONOLOGICAE, | ETC. | SEC. XII'. The pastedowns are green and black marbled shiny paper.

Accompanying Material:

A bibliographical slip is pasted to fol. [i]r.
On fol. [i]v in the bottom left-hand corner in pencil is 'ɛ692e' written above '655f' (cancelled), which in turn is written above '49e' (cancelled). This '49e' corresponds with the sticker '49. E' on the spine of the book.
On fol. [iv] at the top is '118B2' written in brown ink, '3667' in black ink and '2/IV E' written in pencil.
On the first endleaf is the note '10 fols 4' [?] May 1882' in pencil.
British Museum stamps are visible on fols 1v, 5v, 6v and 10v.

History:

Origin:

Written at Peterborough between 1122 and 1135, probably soon after 1122, as indicated by the annals concerned with Peterborough Abbey, which has records up to 1122 in one hand, then a record of the death of King Henry I in 1135 in a different hand. The script and decoration suggests that the manuscript was produced in the same scriptorium as the Peterborough Chronicle (Laud Misc 363).

Provenance:

Probably remained with the rest of the manuscript in Peterborough until the late fourteenth century, as it is probably item A. ii in a late fourteenth-century book-list (James 1926, p. 34).

Acquisition:

After the manuscript was broken up, it found its way into the Harley collection. Acquired by the British Museum in 1753 on the death of Robert Harley's son.

Additional Information:

Administration Information:

Described by Hollie Morgan with the assistance of Sanne van der Schee; ed. by Takako Kato (2010; 2013).

Surrogates:

EM Project facsimile

Wilcox, Jonathan, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2000), vol. 8

Bibliography:

Baker, Peter S., and Michael Lapidge, eds, Byrhtferth's Enchiridion, EETS, SS 15 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995)

Clark, Cecily, 'Notes on MS. Laud Misc. 636', Medium Aevum, 23 (1954), 71-75

Gameson, Richard, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England (c. 1066-1130) (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 1999)

James, M. R., Lists of Manuscripts Formerly in Peterborough Abbey Library, Transactions of the Bibliographical Society, suppl. 5 (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the Bibliographical Society, 1926)

Ker, N. R., Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957; repr. 1990), item 196

---, 'Membra Disiecta ', in British Museum Quarterly 12 (1937-1938), pp. 130-35

Liebemann, F., ed., Ungedruckte anglo-normannische Geschichtsquellen (Strassburg: Trübner, 1879)

Logeman, H., 'Anglo-Saxonica Minora', Anglia, 11 (1889), 97-120

Pulsiano, Phillip, 'Old English Nomina Ventorum', Studia Neophilologica, 66 (1994)

van de Vyver, A., 'Les œuvres inédites d'Abbon de Fleury', Revue Bénédictine, 47 (1935), 125-69

Watson, Andrew George, Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts, c. 700-1600 in the Department of Manuscripts, the British Library, 2 vols (London: British Museum, 1979)

Wilcox, Jonathan, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2000), vol. 8