The Production and Use of English Manuscripts 1060 to 1220

Orietta Da Rold

London, British Library, Cotton Tiberius B. iv

Chronicle

Date: s. ximed- xi2

Summary:

A manuscript now made up of 218 folios which contains miscellaneous texts from s. ximed-xi2 to s. xiv (see, British Library Catalogue).

Fols 1-86 contain a copy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle datable to 1079 (the D version, see Cubbin 1996). It begins 'Britene igland is ehta hund mila lang' and ends 'his fæder ge' on fol. 86r/11. Lines 12-24 on fol. 86 have been cut away, and fol. 86v is blank with a four-line annal for 1130 at the top of the page (Onions 1908-09, p. 506) . The annals for 1045-51 are misdated 1045-52. The year number CCLXI concludes fol. 9v. Between fol. 9r and 19r, Joscelyn, Secretary to Archbishop Parker (1529-1603), supplies the missing text. Fol. 19 begins 'to arcebiscop' in the annal for 693. Fol. 85v/16-21 have been left blank. Ker notes that at the year 1051 the record may be contemporary (Ker 1957, pp. 253-54).

Fol. 87 includes annals from 1123 to 1131, but this folio belongs with London, Lambeth Palace 1370.

Manuscript Items:

1. Item: fols 3-86

   Title (B.17.8.1.EM): The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle to 1079

   Incipit: (fol. 3v) Britene igland is ehta hund mila lang

   Explicit: (fol. 86r) his fæder ge

   Bibliography:

   Ker 1957, pp. 253-54

2. Item: fol. 87

   Title (B.15.1.61.1.EM): Charters: Royal Charters: Writ of King Cnut, Christ Church, Canterbury Sawyer 988

   Incipit: (fol. 87r) + Cnut cyncg gret eadsige bisceop ˥ ælfstan abbod. ˥ ægelric. ˥ ealle mine þegenas on cent freondlice ˥ ic cyðe eoƿ þæt ic hæbbe geunnan æþelnoðe arcebisceope

   Text Language: English

   Bibliography:

   Ker 1957, p. 346

3. Item: fol. 87

   Title (B.15.1.61.2.EM): Charters: Royal Charters: Writ of King Cnut, Christ Church, Canterbury Sawyer 988

   Incipit: (fol. 87v) + Cnut cyncg great eadsige bisceop

   Explicit: (fol. 87v) freondlice ˥ ic cyðe eoƿ þæt ic ƿylle þæt æþelnoð arcebisceop

   Text Language: English

   Bibliography:

   Ker 1957, p. 346

4. Item: fols 88v-90r

   Title (B.17.8.2): The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle to 1079

   Bibliography:

   Ker 1957, pp. 253-54

Physical Description:

Object Description:

Form: codex

Support: parchment. Supply leaves are parchment and paper.

Extent: Fols 1-86

c. 285 mm x 190 mm (dimensions of all - size of leaves)

c. 243 mm x 116 mm (dimensions of all - size of written space)

Foliation and/or Pagination:

Fols 7 + ix + 68 + iii. Fols 10-18 are parchment and 88-90 are paper, and they are s. xvi supply leaves.

Collation:

Quires: The collation is probably, 18 wants 8 after fol. 9, fols 3-9, 28 +1, fols 10-18, 3-78, fols 19-42, 6-88, fols 43-66, 91, fol. 67, 106, fols 66-73, 108, fols 74-81, 114, fols 82-85, 12 two halves mounted as one, fol. 86 half fols and fol. 87 the other half, 133, fols 88-90 (see also Ker 1957, p. 254 and Cubbin 1996, p. x).

Note:

Fols 54, 70 and 71 have wider margins because of Joscelyn's marginalia. Text is written on 24 to 25 long lines, frame ruled in dry point on the flesh side in double bounding lines, 9 mm apart. Writing above the line from fol. 74r onwards.

Hand description:

Number of hands: 14?

Summary: The manuscript is copied by several hands datable from s. ximed to xi2. They are often difficult to discern, especially between fols 75v/22 and 86. As Ker notes, 'From here to the end the writing maintains a general similarity, but varies in appearance and in ink and slope from year to year in a way which suggests discontinuous writing' (Ker 1957, p. 254). Cubbin identifies another possible twelve hands (Cubbin 1996, pp. xi-xiv). All these hands, especially from Hand 3 onwards, show characteristics which can be found in contemporary Worcester's hands, for instance, Otho C. i, vol. 2.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: Insular minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 192 Scribe 1
• Description: Fols 3-9. A round and large Insular script, probably s. ximed.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: Insular minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 192 Scribe 2
• Description: Fols 19-67. A round and well proportionate insular script, probably s. ximed, considered by Ker 'perhaps somewhat earlier than 1050' (Ker 1957, p. 254).

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: Insular minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 192 Scribe 3
• Description: Fols 68-73 and 83r-86. A round insular script, probably s. xi2.
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• ð: a long ascenders often ending in a short tag curving to the left.
• d: a short ascender occasionally upright.
• s: a short form.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: Insular minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 192 scribe 4
• Description: Fol 73v. A small irregular insular hand, s. xi2.
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• s: the high, long form has a pronounced, curved, hook-like top.
• ð: a long ascenders often ending in a short flat bar to the left and occasionally also protruding to the right.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: Insular minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 192 scribe 5
• Description: Fols 74r-75v/21. A small, round insular hand, s. xi2.
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• s: a long form.
• ð: a long upstroke.
• Abbreviations:
• Tironian nota, almost above the line of writing, with a square angled head.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 75v-76v.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 76v-77r.
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• s: upright Caroline.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 77r-77v.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 77v-78r. A thinner hand and uses lighter ink (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• descenders have a slight hook to the left at the bottom.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fol. 78r. 'The starting point of the tenth hand is not clear' (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 78r-78v/2. 'There may be an eleventh hand which writes only seven lines' (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 78v/3-78v. 'This possible twelfth hand is very similar to the previous hands' (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 78v-79r. 'The start of the [...] thirteenth hand is also difficult to establish' (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Description: Fols 79r-83r. Possibly a new hand starts in the first half of 1066 on fol. 79r or v (Cubbin 1996, p. xiv).
• Other manuscripts:
  • Otho C. I, vol 2, fols 62-139v/5 (Gameson 2005, p. 103)

Decoration Description:

Initials in blue and red up to 794 the initial A of 'Anno' probably in a later style than the text and probably of s. xiex or xii (Ker 1957, p. 254). Colours over black initials. From 693 the colours are written over a plain black initial, and blanks are left from 795- 997. Red initials start from 998 to 1016. Year numbers and initials in red and occasionally purple, from 1052 (Cubbin 1996, pp. xv-xvi).

Additions:

Cotton's table of contents. Joscelyn added Old English annotations. Auctarium Bedæ have been added from four chronicles: CCCC 173; British Library, Cotton Tiberius A. vi; Tiberius B. i; Laud Misc. 636 (See, Ker 1957, pp. 253-54).

History:

Origin:

Unknown.

Provenance:

The manuscript was in Worcester Cathedral in about 1565. It is possible that the manuscript was partially compiled in Worcester, in view of the characteristics of some of the hands. Watson (1979, vol 1, p. 106) notes that 'local references suggest that the manuscript was written in the West Midlands, perhaps at Worcester. Joscelyn notes 'Chronica Saxonica Wigorniens(is) ecclesiæ ab anno domini primo ad annum domini 1080. est adhuc in bibliotheca ecclesiæ' (British Library, Cotton Nero C. iii, fol. 208). Perhaps owned by Joscelyn, as in Cotton's note in British Library, Harley 6018, fol. 156, in which Cotton refers to a loan to Francis Tate of 'Old Saxon story manuscrip. it was Mr Gocelins' (Ker 1957, pp. 255).

Acquisition:

Acquired by the British Museum along with the rest of the Cotton collection .

Additional Information:

Administration Information:

Manuscript described by Orietta Da Rold with the assistance of Hollie Morgan and Sanne van der Schee (2010; 2012).

Surrogates:

EM Project facsimile

Scragg, Donald, Alexander Rumble, and Kathryn Powell, C11 Database Project (Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies, http://www.arts.manchester.ac.uk/mancass/c11database/; accessed in 2009), details.

Thorpe, B., ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Rolls Series (1861), vol. 1, pl.4, fol 26.

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), plate 47a-f.

Bibliography:

Classen, E., and F. E. Harmer, An Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1926)

Cubbin, G. P., ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS D, A Collaborative Edition, 6 (Woodbridge: Brewer, 1996)

Gameson, Richard, 'St Wulfstan, the Library of Worcester, and the Spirituality of the Medieval Book', in St. Wulfstan and his World, ed. by Julia Barrow and Nicholas Brooks (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005)

Gneuss, Helmut, Handlist of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A List of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100 (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2001), item 372

Keller, Wolfgang, Angelsaechsische Paleographie, Palaestra 43, 2 vols (Berlin: Mayer & Mueller, 1906)

Ker, N. R., Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957; repr. 1990), item 192

Laing, Margaret, Catalogue of Sources for a Linguistic Atlas of Early Medieval English (Woodbridge: Brewer, 1993), p. 81

Manuscripts Catalogue (British Library, http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/manuscripts/; accessed in 2010)

Planta, J., A Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Cottonian Library, Deposited in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1802)

Onions, C. Talbot, 'Some Early Middle-English Spellings', Modern Language Review, 4 (1908-09), 505-07

Plummer, Charles, ed., Two of the Saxon Chronicles Parallel, repr. with a bibliographical note by Dorothy Whitelock, 2 vols (1892-99; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1952)

Roberts, Jane, Guide to Scripts Used in English Writings up to 1500 (London: British Library, 2005)

Scragg, Donald, Alexander Rumble, and Kathryn Powell, C11 Database Project (Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies, http://www.arts.manchester.ac.uk/mancass/c11database/; accessed in 2009)

Thorpe, B., ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Rolls Series (1861), 23

Wanley, H., Librorum Veterum Septentrionalium Catalogus (1705)

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)

Whitelock, Dorothy, ed., The Peterborough Chronicle: The Bodleian Manuscript Laud Misc. 636, with an appendix by Cecil Clark, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 4 (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1954)