MS. Canon. Liturg. 37
Summary Catalogue no.: 19247
Premonstratensian prayerbook, in Latin (one prayer in German); Germany (Regensburg diocese?), 1507
Contents
The rubrics are often on the page before the start of the text.
With antiphons, versicles, hymn, psalms, collects, etc.
The canticle ‘Benedicite’ followed by psalms, collects, etc.
Pss. 6, 31, 37, 50, 101, 129, and 142, as usual. The rubric is on fol. 15r; fol. 15v is unwritten.
With Savine second (after Stephen) among the martyrs; Augustine twice among the confessors, and ending with the series: Conrade, Wolgange, Geharde, Galle, Othmare, Udalrice, and Ruperte; the virgins end with Serena, Elizabeth, and Affra.
The collects are the same series as MS. Liturg. 402 (Premonstratensian, of the diocese of Regensburg), except that after ‘Ineffabilem misericordiam tuam domine’ the present MS. includes ‘Exaudi quesumus domine supplicum preces …’.
Seven Last Words
A few words and a longer passage are erased at fols. 33v–34r.
The common devotion; cf. MS. Buchanan g. 1, fols. 255r–257v
Seven Joys of the Virgin
A rhyming verse hymn followed by a collect.
Prayer
Devotion to St Onuphrius
Antiphon, verse, and collect.
Devotion to St Erasmus
Prayer, antiphon, verse, and collect.
Prayer and petition.
Five Psalms
Not the usual Psalms of the Passion (i.e. Pss. 21–30): Pss. 21, 34, 54, 68, and 108, each followed by one or two responses, verses, and a collect, the last also with a hymn.
Fol. 70r–v is unwritten; the following texts occupy the final quire.
Prayer, in German
Devotion to St Anne
With antiphon, verse, and collect.
This and the following texts are by a different scribe.
Mass prayers
Fol. 78r–v is unwritten and was perhaps formerly a pastedown.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
Frame-ruled in ink, written with 14–16 lines per page; ruled space 65-70 × 60 mm.
Hand(s)
Angular gothic hybrida; more cursive from fol. 71r
Decoration
1- and 2-line initials alternately plain red or blue, sometimes with simple ornament.
Binding
16th century, early, German (as MS.), sewn on two double bands and strongly bound for partly processional use: wood boards; polished pigskin, blind-tooled with double or triple lines and stamps in an all-over pattern, differing on each cover; remains of central clasp with lost strap of light brown leather running from back fore-edge to a front catch-plate embossed with a pattern which roughly matches the adjacent stamp; four metal corner-pieces and a centrepiece on each cover, each with several boss-like protrusions; glue-marks on front paste-down from a lost item (? an image) formerly pasted there; cf. the traces of glue on fol. 70v. ( 115 × c. 93 × c. 35–36 mm. (book closed). A piece of waste MS. is used for the front pastedown, with a stub after fol. 8. The spine has a paper label printed ‘Canonici Liturg.’ and the head of the spine is numbered ‘37’ in white paint. (Description based on Barker-Benfield: see bibliography.)
History
Provenance and Acquisition
The final prayer ends with the date ‘1507’ (fol. 77v). Watson notes that the script is more cursive in fols. 71–77v (the final quire) than in the preceding section, ‘but the hand may be the same throughout and the decoration in the two parts is identical’ (Dated and datable, no. 256).
The first rubric and the double invocation of Augustine in the litany show that the manuscript was written for Premonstratensian use; the very high grading of Savinus/Sabinus in the litany suggests an affiliation with Windberg Abbey, a Premonstratensian house in the diocese of Regensburg, which had his relics. St Onuphrius, to whom the first in a series of devotions is directed (fols. 40r–41r), was specially venerated at Augsburg cathedral, also in Bavaria.
Matteo Luigi Canonici (1727–1806), Jesuit and bibliophile of (from 1773) Venice; from whom they passed to his brother, Giuseppe (d. 1807).
On the latter’s death to Giovanni Perisinotti, from whom over 2,000 were bought by the Bodleian Library in 1817. Former Bodleian shelfmarks: ‘Lit. Misc. xxxvij’ (fol. 1r)
Record Sources
Digital Images
Digital Bodleian (full digital facsimile)
Bibliography
Online resources:
Printed descriptions:
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
Last Substantive Revision
2021-04-16: Description fully revised for Polonsky German digitization project.