The Production and Use of English Manuscripts 1060 to 1220

Orietta Da Rold

Lawrence, Kansas, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, Pryce C2:1

Fragment of the Legend of the Holy Cross before Christ

Date: s. ximed

Summary:

A trimmed folio from a copy of the Anonymous Homilies, Homilies for Specified Occasions, Sanctorale: Invention of the Cross, with glosses by the Tremulous Hand. Two fragments from the same manuscript and text are CCCC 557. Another copy of the text survives in Bodley 343 (Colgrave and Hyde 1962, p. 62).

Manuscript Items:

1. Item: fol. 103

   Title (B.3.3.5): Anonymous Homilies, Homilies for Specified Occasions, Sanctorale: Invention of the Cross

   Incipit: (fol. 103r) Ðridde æt his wynstran sidan. On morgen þe he aras.

   Explicit: (fol. 103v) to þam tune þe genemned is .robathi.

   Bibliography:

   Colgrave and Hyde 1962, pp. 60-78

Physical Description:

Object Description:

Form: fragment

Support: parchment

Extent:

219 mm x 163 mm (dimensions of all - size of leaf)

185 mm x 150 mm (dimensions of all - size of written space)

Note:

23 long lines, ruling in dry point, possibly single bounding lines. According to Colgrave and Hyde, the uncropped leaf originally had 27 lines, judging from the amount of text missing in comparison to Napier's edition (1962, p. 65).

Hand description:

Number of hands: 2

Summary: One hand writes the main text. The Tremulous Hand provides glosses in Latin in the early thirteenth century.

Hand: main text
• Scope: major
• Script: English Vernacular Minuscule
• Ker reference: Ker 73 SC1
• Description: a small and round hand, using insular letter forms. Ker describes it as 'a rather poor hand' (1957, p. 122).
• Summary of the characteristics of the hand:
• e: high in the combination æ.
• s: only long s is used.
• ð: Round bowl with a long tapered ascender towards the left, a cross bar often starting midway from the ascender to the right.
• descenders: elongated tapered to the left on the lower margin of the verso, as if they were used as page filler.
• Date: s. ximed

Hand: additions
• Scope: minor
• Scribe: Tremulous Scribe
• Script: English Vernacular Minuscule
• Description: Some punctuation, accents and diacritics by the Tremulous Hand (Colgrave and Hyde 1962, pp. 74-5).
• Date: s. xiii1

Decoration Description:

Tinted initials in red (Doane 1998, p. 29).

Binding Description:

The leaf is unmounted.

History:

Origin:

Probably written in Worcester, as it contains glosses by the Tremulous Hand.

Provenance:

Probably remained in Worcester, and removed from the rest of the manuscript by Parker or Joscelyn.

Acquisition:

The book containing the sheet was acquired by the Spencer library in 1957 from Pearson's Book Rooms, Cambridge. It was found in the same book as Pryc.C2:2 (Collins 1976, pp. 48-9).

Additional Information:

Administration Information:

Manuscript described by Orietta Da Rold with the assistance of Hollie Morgan and Johanna Green (2010; 2012) and with reference to facsimiles and published scholarship.

Surrogates:

Doane, Alger Nicolaus, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile, Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 1998), vol. 7: Anglo-Saxon Bibles and "The Book of Cerne"

Colgrave, Bertram and Hyde, Anne, 'Two Recently Discovered Leaves from Old English Manuscripts', Speculum 37 (1962), pp. 60-78

Bibliography:

Colgrave, Bertram and Hyde, Anne, 'Two Recently Discovered Leaves from Old English Manuscripts', Speculum 37 (1962), pp. 60-78

Collins, Rowland, Anglo-Saxon Vernacular Manuscripts in America, Exhibited at the Pierpoint Morgan Library, 1 April-9 May 1976 (New York: The Scheide Library; The Pierpont Morgan Library, 1976), vol. 7

Doane, Alger Nicolaus, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile, Medieval & Studies (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2002), vol. 7: Anglo-Saxon Bibles and 'The Book of Cerne'

Franzen, Christine, The Tremulous Hand of Worcester: A Study of Old English in the Thirteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991)

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 117

Ker, N. R., 'An Eleventh-century Old English Legend of the Cross before Christ', Medium Ævum, 9, (1940), 84-5

---, 'A Supplementary Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon', Anglo-Saxon England, 5 (1976), 121-31, item 79

Napier, Arthur Sampson, ed., History of the Holy Rood-Tree: a twelfth-century version of the Cross-legend with notes on the orthography of the Orumulum (with a facsimile) and a Middle English Compassio Mariae, EETS, OS 103 (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, 1894)

Page, R. I., Mildred Budny, and Nicolas Hadgraft, 'Two Fragments of an Old English Manuscript in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge', Speculum, 70 (1995), 502-29