Merton College MS. 309
Former shelfmark: H. 3. 9
BOETHIUS, PRISCIAN, DONATUS &c.; S. XIII ex., XI
Contents
Language(s): Latin
Fols. i-iv blank. On f. ivv is a table of contents to the whole book in an anglicana hand of s. xv.
Physical Description
Collation
Binding
Standard Merton s. xvii; sewn on four bands; formerly chained from the usual position. The outermost leaves were pastedowns in an earlier binding. At the foot of f. i, and at the foredge near the foot, are the marks of iron chain-staples. Near the foot of the last few leaves are marks of the usual large iron chain-staple.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
At the College by the early 14th cent. (UO46. 54).
On f. 88Av, in faint pencil, is ‘Verba … de …sol Thome de …’.
At the head of f. 115v is ‘Liber domus scolarium de Merton’ in Oxon’ de legato M. Ioh’ Reynham sacre pagine professoris et quondam socii eiusdem domus’. Reynham occ. as fellow in 1321 and 1330–1.
On f. 204v ‘Hugo Herle habet librum particularem’ and ‘Iste liber emptus fuit [pro l ... florinis]’. Herley (BRUO 918) was fellow in 1409, probably still in 1414.
At the head of f. 201v is ‘Iohanni Cole’, perhaps John Cole or Cale (BRUO 339), bachelor 1495, fellow briefly in 1496.
Inside the front cover is a sheet of paper, s. xvii, with a table of contents of that date and ‘Q. 3. 11. Art:’, canc. and replaced with ‘H. 3. 9 (CCCIX)’ in red; the College bookplate.
Merton College MS. 309 – Part I (fols. 1–88v)
Contents
Language(s): Latin
CPL 1546; H. Keil, Grammatici Latini (7 vols, Leipzig, 1857–80), III, pp. 106–278.
Copious marginal glossing in ink and pencil, in several anglicana hands, little later than the main text, beg.
Apparently the only known copy. Also pointing hands, profile heads and other doodles. f. 88A is nearly filled with pencil notes. On the verso are pencilled scribbles.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
Ruled with pencil in 5 cols, the inner- and outermost two 25, 10, 20 and 35 mm. wide; the text, in 24 long lines, in the centre, 140 × 75 mm. The glossing not ruled for.
Hand(s)
The main text is in an English gothic rotunda bookhand of university type. One of the glossing hands looks like that of the Worcester monk John of St Germans.
Decoration
Opens with a red and blue flourished initial; otherwise red or blue initials plain or flourished in the other colour; red or blue paraphs.
History
Merton College MS. 309 – Part II (fols. 89–98v)
Contents
Language(s): Latin
III, glossed, fragm.
Ed. L. Holtz, Donat et la tradition de l’enseignement grammatical (Paris, 1981), pp. 653–74.
There is informal additional glossing in anglicana hands.
glossed, fragm.
Ed. Keil, III, pp. 519–28.
Glo. beg. ‘In hoc libro Prisciani qui est de accentibus primo declarat de eius subiecto s. de accentabili’.
Physical Description
Layout
Ruled with pencil for 19 widely-spaced lines of text, within a frame 165 mm. wide, the depth varying, ruled ad hoc for the glosses.
Hand(s)
The text in a gothic rotunda bookhand of Italian appearance; the gloss in a small hand of the same type but with anglicana letter forms.
Decoration
Unfilled spaces for painted initials and rubrics.
History
Merton College MS. 309 – Part III (fols. 99–113v
Contents
Language(s): Latin
Ed. C. H. Kneepkens, Het Iudicium constructionis. Het Leerstuk van de Constructio in de 2de Helfte de 12de Eeuw (4 vols, Nijmegen, 1987), IV, pp. 1–84, this copy at I, p. 520; R. W. Hunt, 'Absoluta: the Summa of Petrus Hispanus on Priscianus Minor', Historiographa Linguistica 2 (1975), 1–23. Informal glossing in anglicana hands.
f. 112v is covered with pencil notes, 113 with notes in a French cursive hand, c. 1300, apparently notes for a monastic sermon against superfluity of food and wine, ‘de operibus extra caritatem factis’, &c., including verses. More notes, in an anglicana hand of s. xiv ex., on f. 113v.
Physical Description
Layout
Ruled with pencil in 2 cols of c. 60 lines.
Hand(s)
A small gothic rotunda bookhand with some anglicana letter forms, probably the hand of the glosses in II.
Decoration
Blue initials flourished in red; red or blue paraphs.
History
Merton College MS. 309 – Part IV (fols. 114–204)
Contents
Language(s): Latin
A series of notes and sententiae on the four virtues and the liberal arts, s. xi, incl.: ‘Cum in hymno trium puerorum propter interminabilem infinitatem seculorum .in. prepositio ubique semper accusatiuo iungatur ...; Quis primus inuenit logicam id est rationem? Plato ...’.
xix. 73-xxvi. 100
Ed. W. Friedrich (Leipzig, 1891).
IV, excerpt (Communis speculatio de rhetorica cognatione)
PL 64. 1207A-12A, 1217C-22C.
IV, excerpt (Locorum rhetoricarum distinctio)
PL 64. 1212A-14C, 1221–4.
Ed. G. Schepss, ‘Pseudepigrapha Boethiana’, Philologus 55, N. F. 9 (1896), 727–31, at p. 730.
Ed. Schepss, p. 371.
Arts 6–9 are found together in Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibl., Clm 6371 (s. x) and 6372 (s. x-xi), St Gallen, Stiftsbibl. 830 (s. xi), BnF lat. 11127 (s. x-xi) and nouv. acq. 1611 (s. x-xi), Charleville-Mézieres, Bibl. mun. 187 (s. xii), Valenciennes, Bibl. mun. 406 (388) (s. x-xi), Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibl. 2269 (s. xiii), and Chartres, Bibl. mun. 100 (92) (s. x/xi). The group was studied by Schepss, not knowing of this copy.
PL 64. 1039–1169; CPL 888.
Marginal and interlinear glossing in hands of s. xi. On fols. 149v, 177 and 184v, in the text, ‘conditor operis emendaui’.
On f. 204 are two circular cosmological diagrams in ink, contemporary with the main text, and some pen-trials in a charter-hand, s. xii.
Physical Description
Layout
Blind-ruled in 32 long lines.
Hand(s)
In two Continental late Caroline minuscule hands, perhaps Norman.
Decoration
Initials ornamented in red and ink of text, red paraphs, highlighting and underlining.
History
Additional Information
Record Sources
Availability
For enquiries relating to this manuscript please contact Merton College Library.
Bibliography
Funding of Cataloguing
Conversion of the printed catalogue to TEI funded by the Warden and Fellows of Merton College .
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
Last Substantive Revision
2019-11-05: First online publication