St John's College MS 86
John Arderne, Works
Contents
Language(s): Latin with some Middle English
JOHN ARDERNE (Sharpe, no. 567 [202–4]),, 'Liber receptorum medicinalium’, like all the other texts here, unpublished. The contents correspond to BL MS Sloane 56, certainly from the same source as this MS, fols. 1v–38, 58–65, 74v–84. The texts contain sporadic English words to define Latin terms, unnoted in OT. See further Peter Murray Jones’s description of Arderne MSS, ‘Four Middle English Translations of John of Arderne’, in Minnis, 62–89 at 64–70.
This MS is lacking some material. Fol. 8v ends, ‘quantum calidum pati potent inter virgam et testiculos et anum bene cataplasmetur’, and fol. 13 begins, ‘et vitet dormire de die excepto quod si non dormiret de nocte’; absent are the contents of Sloane 56, fols. 13–26v. In addition, the second block of the text is acephalic, a gap corresponding to Sloane 6, fols. 56–8.
Corresponds to Sloane 56, fols. 38–56; the text here is atelous, part of the lost material included in the Sloane MS at fols. 56–8; cf. ‘Et de illo exibat aquositas nimia et aliquando sanguis […] ’, the continuation of the explicit here at Sloane, fol. 56.
corresponding to Sloane 56, fols. 65–74v.
corresponding to Sloane 56, fols. 84–95. There are only seven lines on fol. 54, the remainder blank, but the verso ruled. Fol. 53 has a paragraph in English, ed. in part OT 87.
Added texts
added in a blank, ed. in part OT 87, in secretary, s. xv ex.
the original blank final leaf is now filled with English recipes (the last four on the verso Latin), the English ones ed. in part OT 87; added in later s. xv hands.
Physical Description
Collation
18 [lost quire] 24 (?all single) 38 44 58 (–4, –5) 6–88: Catchwords, usually boxed, at the edge of the gutter. In quires 7 and 8, there are signs of signatures on all leaves in the first half of the quire, a letter plus roman numeral; these are quires g and h.
Fols. 9–12 are intruded in their present site; they belong, in the order 12, 11, 9, 10, before fol. 23. That is, they are the original central bifolia of quire 4, but now apparently single and disarranged, as well as misplaced. The signatures of quires 7 and 8 presumably indicate that originally the MS contained both an integral quire fols. 21–2, 12, 11, 9, 10, 23–4, the fourth, and another quire, the second, now lost, which followed fol. 8.
Layout
In long lines, 43 lines to the page. Prickings; bounded and ruled in pencil.
Hand(s)
Written in anglicana. Punctuation by sporadic double virgula and virgula.
Decoration
Marginal headings for recipes in text ink, with half-box in red.
Important recipes are introduced by a 2-line red lombard.
Some red underlining in recipes and red paraphs to break up longer items.
Frequent illustrations, mainly marginal (on this tendency in medical MSS, see Scott, 1:41 and 72 nn. 22–3): medical implements, plants, diseased bodies, modes of surgery; a full wind diagram on fol. 1; a table of moon signs on fol. 9v; a zodiac man on fol. 10; surgical instruments on fol. 12; several diagrams of operations for ‘fistula’ fol. 12v; cf. the illustration reproduced in Jones, 77 (from BL, MS Additional 29301).
A blazon in the margin as a signe de renvoi on fol. 39 (cf. the explicit to item 3), above a device which resembles a flaming rod and a blank scroll beneath it.
See AT, no. 370 (37).
Binding
A modern replacement. Sewn on five thongs. At the front, a marbled paper leaf and two modern paper flyleaves; at the rear, two modern paper flyleaves and another marbled paper leaf (iv–vi).
History
Provenance and Acquisition
‘Barnyx ?bequyxe’, ‘Mr Backter gave this Book vnto Willm [sic for William] Stowes Chirurgico Anno ⟨?domini⟩ 1571 (fol. 1, lower margin).
‘Liber Collegii Divi Johannis Baptistae Oxon’ ex dono Domini Gulielmi Paddei Militis et ejusdem Collegii olim Convictori⟨s⟩ 1634’ (fol. 1, upper margin).
Record Sources
Availability
For enquiries relating to this manuscript please contact St John's College Library.
Digital Images
Digital Bodleian (full digital facsimile)
Bibliography
Funding of Cataloguing
Conversion of the printed catalogue to TEI funded by the Thompson Family Charitable Trust
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
Last Substantive Revision
2023-01: First online publication