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Exeter College MS. 7

William Woodford, De sacramento altaris;John of Wales, Summa justitiae (Tractatus de vitiis); etc.; England, s. xvin

Contents

Language(s): Latin

*1. (fol. iiir)

Added later.

Notes by a reader, perhaps an owner, s. xv, ‘de sacramento altaris’, on indulgences, etc., citing sources which include the Pupilla Oculi of Johannes de Burgo, the Fasciculus morum attributed to Robert Silk, OFM, ‘Franciscus de indulgenciis’, probably the work by Franciscus de Mayronis (Bloomfield, no. 4895). Fol. iiiv is blank.

*2. (fols. 1r-2r)

Added later.

Pope Martin V

Letter of pope Martin v, 26 May 1429, concerning the celebration of the feast of Corpus Christi established by Urban IV and an increase in indulgences for its observance.

Incipit: Martinus episcopus seruus seruorum dei ad perpetuam rei memoriam
Incipit: Sane dudum felicis recordations Vrbanus papa iiij
Explicit: litere forent exhibite vel ostense.
Final rubric: Data Rome apud sanctos apostolos .vij. Kal. Junij pontificatus nostri anno .12. et de curia duplicate.

Pr. by A. Tomassetti, Bullarum ... Romanorum pontificum ... editio, 24 vols. (Augsburg, 1857–88), iv (1859), 731–2.

Followed on fol. 2r by notes on indulgences granted by various popes.

Item 2 added at an unspecified time.

Fols. 2v–4v are blank.

3. (fols. 5r-162r)
William Woodford, Quaestiones LXXII de sacramento altaris
Incipit: Racione solempnitatis jam instantis de corpore christi ad rogatum aliquorum
Explicit: veritati autem increate sit honor et gloria per infinita secula seculorum. Amen.
Final rubric: [in blue] ‘Chyn:’.

unprinted. ‘Chyn:’ is presumably the scribe.

In the lower right-hand corner of fol. 162r is ‘Hic ffrater Wordefford de ordine minorum tr’ c⟨um⟩ transiret Londonie Oxo⟨n⟩. ad incipiendum in theolo⟨gia⟩ obuiauit latronibus qui sumps⟨er⟩unt ab eo xl libras in ….’

On Woodford and for a list of other manuscripts of this text see E. Doyle, ‘William Woodford, O. F. M., (c. 1330–c. 1400), his life and works’, Franciscan Studies, 43 (1983), 17–119.

4. (fol. 162v-164v)
An unidentified University quaestio
Incipit: ⟨Q⟩ueritur de comparacione vite actiuae et contemplatiue que scilicet illarum sit melior
Explicit: ne laboriosius aliud queritur nec fructuosus aliud inuenitur.
*5. (fol. 164v)

Added later.

Richard Rolle, Incendium amoris,

part of ch. 21

Incipit: Dicit enim Ricardus Hampolle in libro de incendio amoris ^capitulo 22 (?)^ quod quidam obicuit contemplacionem contemplative super activitatem dicentes quod activa ista fructuosior est
Explicit: tanto ad altius premium ascendit.

ed. M. Deanesley, The Incendium Amoris of Richard Rolle of Hampole (Manchester, 1915), 205. On Rolle see Sharpe, Latin Writers.

6. (fols. 165r-216v)
John of Wales (Ps.-Grosseteste), Summa justitiae (Tractatus de vitiis)
Incipit: Peccatum vitandum est
Explicit: est timendus hostis qui non potest vincere nisi voluntatem.
Final rubric: Explicit Wallensis de vicijs. Et iste tractatus est excerptus de parisiensi de vicijs.
(fol. 217r)
⟨Tabula⟩ Wallensis de vicijs.

unprinted, except prologue ed. S. Wenzel, ‘The continuing life of William Peraldus’s Summa uitiorum’, in Ad litteram: Authoritative Texts and their Medieval Readers, ed. M. D. Jordan and K. Emery (Notre Dame, IN, 1992), 135–63 (text 154–5). Our text is Recension 1, the long version, Bloomfield, no. 2881; Thomson, Grosseteste, 268; Glorieux, Arts, 409bo. On the author and his works see J. Swanson, John of Wales: A Study of the Works and Ideas of a Thirteenth-Century Friar (Cambridge, 1989), in the list of manuscripts in which, pp. 233–56, ours is no. 283; also Sharpe, Latin Writers (John Waleys). There are marginal quaestiones.

Fols. 217v–20v are blank.

Physical Description

Secundo Folio: (fol. 2r) in dominica
Secundo Folio: (fol. 6) 36. Si.
Form: codex
Support: parchment FHHF
Extent: 220 leaves, preceded by two 18th-century paper leaves and followed by another.
Dimensions (leaf): 215 × 140 mm.
Dimensions (column): 150 × 92 mm.
There is 15th-century numbering of chapters of item 2 and head-titles, and chapter numbers in item 6.
Foliation: numbered in modern pencil

Collation

16 2–712 812 (wants 5, 6) 9–1312 144 15–1912 208. During rebinding in the 18th century, quires 2–6 were replaced in the wrong order; the correct order is 2 (fols. 7–18), 4 (fols. 31–42), 6 (fols. 55–66), 5 (fols. 43–54), 3 (fols. 19–30). Catchwords in the scribe’s hand, in a cartouche, are on quires up to 14 (fols. 149–52); quire 15, being the last quire of items 2–5, does not need one. Quire signatures of s. xv in small letters or arabic figures are on first leaves of quires, running from a on quire 2 to s on quire 20, but the quire that should be marked b is marked f, d is marked e(?), e is marked d, f is marked D and h is marked j. Despite these peculiarities the text appears to be continuous when the misplaced quires are read in the proper order, thanks no doubt to the catchwords and to another system of quire-numbering, the remains of which can be seen on fols. 137r, 149r, 153r, and 213r, in which the 12th, 13th, presumably 14th, and 20th quires are numbered in the form ‘12us quaternus’ or very similarly.

Layout

One column, c. 31–37 lines. Frame-ruled in crayon.

Hand(s)

The original texts are in one good anglicana formata hand throughout, but using secretary a and occasional secretary r. Punctuation is by low point. The scribe is presumably the ‘Chyn:’ whose name is found on fol. 162r.

Decoration

On fol. 8 is a good illuminated border and initial, Alexander and Temple, no. 402.

Throughout there are 3/4-line blue lombards flourished red and blue and red paraphs. Lemmata are underlined in red.

Binding

Sewn on five bands. Standard Exeter binding: simple and quite elegant, calf over millboards, the calf bearing blind decoration of a floral type, early 19th century. Rust from a chain staple on a previous binding has made holes in the bottom centre of fols. 219–21, the stain being visible as far back as fol. 214v.

History

Origin: s. xvin ; England

Provenance and Acquisition

Unknown. Recorded at Exeter c. 1600 as Ecloga, no. 11, then in CMA, no. 25.

Exeter library identifications, on the front pastedown, are bookplate 2 and ‘D2—19’, ‘Kg—Gall’, ‘Q6–7 MS’ (all deleted), ‘174–K–7’ altered to ‘174–I–7’, and ‘Coxe VII’ in pencil.

Record Sources

Andrew G. Watson, A descriptive catalogue of the medieval manuscripts of Exeter College, Oxford (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2000.

Availability

For enquiries relating to this manuscript please contact Exeter College Library.

Funding of Cataloguing

Conversion of the printed catalogue to TEI funded by the Rector and Fellows of Exeter College.

Abbreviations

View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.

Last Substantive Revision

2020-04-29: First online publication

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