St John's College MS 176
Legal miscellany
Physical Description
Binding
Modern replacement. Sewn on four thongs. At the front, a marbled paper leaf and two modern paper flyleaves; at the rear, two modern paper flyleaves and another marbled leaf (iv–vi).
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Ker, MLGB 181, assigns the book to Southwick (OSA, Hants.) on the basis of localizable documents in MS 4. These certainly refer constantly to ‘Suth”, but this appears usually to mean the county Southamptonshire, not the house Southwick (although a convent ‘Suik’ does appear in one item on fol. 83v). If these documents and forms clearly point to a monastic provenance, it is the frequently repeated ‘conuentus de Hida’, i.e. Hyde (‘New Minster’, Winchester) (see Ker, MLGB 103–4).
Indications of contents, in the hand which customarily inscribed John White’s donations (fol. 1 upper margin, s. xvi).
‘Iohannes White de Sutwyke in Comitatu Sutht Armiger dedit hunc librum Thome Whit⟨e⟩ Mil⟨torn⟩ ad vsum colegii per ipsum de nouo erecti in Oxon Anno 1555’ (fols. 2v–3, upper margin).
Manuscript 1 = Fols. 1–11
Contents
Language(s): Latin
A register of writs, with model writs added at the end, fol. 11v lower margin.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
In long lines, 35 lines to the page. No prickings; bounded and ruled in black ink.
Hand(s)
Written in anglicana, s. xiv in. Punctuation by point and punctus elevatus.
Decoration
Headings in red, sections of the text broken with red paraphs.
History
Manuscript 2 = Fols. 12–33
Contents
Language(s): Latin
ed. A. Wunderlich, Anecdota quae processum ciuilem spectant (Göttingen, 1841), 121–345.
Fols. 32rb–33v were originally blank, now with additions in anglicana, s. xiii ex.:
notes of forms for various ecclesiastical documents
a distinctio ‘Est appellandum’.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
In double columns, each column 167 × 50 mm. , with 8 mm between columns, in 50 lines to the column. No prickings; bounded and ruled in lead.
Hand(s)
Written in gothic textura semiquadrata, s. xiii2/2. Punctuation by medial point.
Decoration
Headings in red.
Alternate 2-line red and green lombards at chapter heads.
History
Manuscript 3 = Fols. 34–80
Contents
Language(s): Latin
ed. in his Opera (Cologne, 1591), unavailable to us; another copy appears at Worcester Cathedral MS F.125. For Roffred and his book, see Johann Friedrich von Schulte, Die Geschichte der Quellen und Literatur des Canonischen Rechts, 3 vols. (Stuttgart, 1875–80), 2:76–8.
Fols. 78vb–80v were originally blank; now added:
form materials, in anglicana, s. xiii/xiv or xiv in.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
In double columns, each column 147 × 48–52 mm. , with 7 mm between columns, in 34–45 lines (individual scribes vary) to the column. Some prickings (e.g., fols. 43–51); bounded and ruled in lead.
Hand(s)
Several scribes in anglicana, s. xiii ex. or xiii/xiv: the stints run fols. 34ra–41vb, 42rab, 42va–57rb (with some portions perhaps other hands), 57v–end (the first hand returns). Punctuation by point only (fols. 34ra–41vb, 57v–end); and by point and punctus interrogativus (fols. 42va–57rb).
Decoration
Headings in red.
Alternate 2-line red and green lombards at divisions.
Many spaces for rubrics and capitals unfilled, especially late in the text (quite notably after fol. 75).
Text divided by red paraphs.
History
Manuscript 4 = Fols. 81–84
Contents
Language(s): Latin
Physical Description
Collation
Condition
Hand(s)
Written in anglicana, s. xiii/xiv.
History
Manuscript 5 = Fols. 85–132
Contents
Language(s): Latin
Apparently an excerpted version of WILLIAM BRITO, Pratellum synonymorum (Walther no. 13730; Stegmüller, RB no. 2820 [2:402–3], cf. also no. 2824), the incipit corresponding with that at Oxford, Exeter College MS 16, fol. 170 (cf. also Balliol College MS 11, fol. 4). Definitions of proper names and rhetorical terms in alphabetical order, ending with ‘Yronia’.
Another alphabetical lexicon (the space for the rubric blank); Emil Seckel, Beiträge zur Geschichte beider Rechte im Mittelalter (Tübingen, 1898), 447–8, identifies the text as an alphabetical reworking of the legal ‘Epitome Exactis regibus’. A definition of ‘Ychonomus’ has been added after the original final entry, ‘Zenodochium’.
Fols. 131–2v, originally blank but pricked, bounded, and ruled, now have added texts, anglicana, s. xiii/xiv:
seven letters, probably forms, several dated 1277 x 1286 from a bishop John and from bishop Walter [Scamell, bishop of Salisbury 1284–6] to subdeans of Salisbury
Physical Description
Collation
Condition
Layout
In long lines, 32–5 lines to the page. Frequent prickings; bounded and ruled in brown crayon and lead.
Hand(s)
Written in gothic textura semiquadrata, s. xiii2/4 (below top line), one scribe to fol. 96v, another thereafter, with some patches (e.g. 111–15) perhaps in different hands. Punctuation by point and punctus elevatus.
Decoration
Alternate 1-line blue and red (to fol. 96v, the end of quire 10) or green and red arabesque capitals at the heads of the sections.
At the head, perhaps later supplies in blanks, 3-line blue lombards with red flourishing.
Text broken with red-slashed capitals and paraphs in text ink slashed in red or green.
History
Manuscript 6 = Fols. 133–201
Contents
Language(s): Latin
ed. Augusto Gaudenzi, Il propugnatore NS 3 (1890), i: 287–338, ii: 345–93 our copy more extensive than that printed. The remainder of the concluding verse has been added in a hand of s. xv; as has a brief letter dated 1280 at the foot of fol. 201vb, xiv in.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
In double columns, each column 137 × 50 mm. , with 10 mm between columns, in 33 lines. No prickings; bounded and ruled in brown crayon.
Hand(s)
Written in gothic textura semiquadrata, often approaching prescissa, with numerous anglicana forms, s. xiii2 or xiii ex.; quire 15 (fols. 141–7) is a nearly contemporary (s. xiii/xiv or xiv in.) replacement in anglicana. Punctuation by occasional medial point.
Decoration
Headings in red.
Two-line alternate red and green arabesque initials at heads of sections; in later portions alternate red and green paraphs, some extended.
The supply quire has frequent red paraphs and underlining in red.
History
Manuscript 7 = Fols. 202–15
Contents
Language(s): Anglo-Norman and Latin
Another Register of writs, this time in Anglo-Norman, ed. G. J. Turner and Theodore F T. Plucknett, Brevia Placilata, Selden Society 66 (1947), 153–82.
Followed by an added text on the originally blank foot of the leaf:
the fragmentary opening of a letter, in anglicana, s. xiii ex.. The scribe has used a bifolium from an older MS to complete his work, and fols. 214v–15v contain a further text.
a table for a sequence of 28-year cycles covering 1139–1643 with an explanatory text fol. 215rv.
Writing area 160 × 96 mm. . In long lines, 34 lines to the page. Written in protogothic bookhand, s. xii ex. Two-line red arabesque initials; red-slashed capitals to divide the text.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
In long lines, 32 lines to the page. Prickings; bounded and ruled in lead.
Hand(s)
Written in anglicana, s. xiii/xiv or xiv in. Punctuation by point and punctus elevatus.
Decoration
Headings in red.
Alternate red and green arabesque capitals.
The text broken with red and green paraphs.
History
Additional Information
Record Sources
Availability
For enquiries relating to this manuscript please contact St John's College Library.
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
2025-04-23: Sebastian Dows-Miller. Resolved typo in reference.