MS. Lat. hist. d. 4
Summary Catalogue no.: Not in SC (late accession)
Historical collections, A: Italian, 14th cent.; B: English, 13th-14th cent
Physical Description
Decoration
Historiated initials. Added marginal drawings. (Pächt and Alexander iii. 588)
Initials, red flourished in brown or red, in the same style throughout.
Binding
Contemporary binding of wooden boards covered with white leather, with a chemise; traces of two clasps fastening to catches on outer edge of back board, and of chain fastening to bottom edge of upper board.
History
Provenance and Acquisition
Pressmark 'C. 59' and 'Liber monachorum sancti Edmundi de empcione fratris Willelmi de Colcestr' in quo continentur subscripta. Videlicet ...' followed by a list of contents (fol. vi verso).
'C. 59' and 'Liber monachorum sancti Edmundi' (fol. 1r) written by Henry of Kirkestede, the 14th-century librarian of Bury St. Edmunds.
Bought from his executors by Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792–1872) , MS. 11257.
Sotheby's 30 Nov. 1965, lot 16, with pl. of fol. 1. Bought.
MS. Lat. hist. d. 4 – Part 1
Contents
A copy of the latest version, C, ed. L. Wieland, MGH. Scriptores XXII, 1872, pp.397–474 (and see pp. 383, 386–90). The chronicle of popes is followed by the continuations for 1277–85 pr. ibid., pp.476–82.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
2 cols., 36–7 lines.
History
MS. Lat. hist. d. 4 – Part 2
Contents
Extracts, made ‘pro sola et una fraternitatis caritate’, see fol.58v.
Added by the original hand, with continuations to 1323 (St Paul's) and 1354 (bishops of London).
Prologue and cap.1–32, 36–39, in edition of W. Liebermann, Gesetze der Angelsachsen I, 1903, pp.627–55, 666–70.
Preceded by:
Passage on the reasons for the downfall of the Britons
The description of Britain is not taken from Gildas.
34 wonders ending (fol.67) with no.4 of the list in the edition cited below, and omitting no.27.
A slightly shorter version of these three items is in MS. Rawl.D.358, fol.97–101, 15th cent., with ex-libris of John Whetamstede, abbot of St. Albans. A version of the second and third items is printed in Ralph of Diceto's Abbreviationes Chronicorum, in his Opera HistoricaI, ed. Stubbs (R.S., 1876), pp.10–15. No.4 of the third item is in the longer version cited by Stubbs.
Pr. in Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica II, ed. Stubbs (R.S., 1876), pp.210–12.
The commonly found brief recension of the revelations of Ps.-Methodius.
Extracts, not all consecutive, from lib. XXXII, parts of caps. 105–6, 108–112, 115–24.
Closely related to MS. Lambeth 1106, probably from St. Paul's, London (see Luard's edition (R.S.1890), vol.i, pp.xxvii–viii and passim) but often even more abbreviated than Lambeth. After 1298, like most of the other MSS., both MSS. follow the E(‘Merton’) text rather than Ch(Chetham), from which they derive in the earlier part. Many of the longer insertions in Lambeth are included, and at 1291 (fol.186v) the ‘Ordinatio regni Scocie’ is in the form addressed to the dean and chapter of St. Paul's. The bull of Gregory X, 1273, on Peter Scot, found as a separate item in some MSS. of the Flores (e.g. MSS. Fairfax 20, fol.6v; B.M. Cotton Claud. E. VIII, fol.10), inserted in Lambeth at 936, is here inserted at 1185 (fol.152). Apparently peculiar to our MS. are: (fol.159v, 1213) John's charter of submission to the Pope in a fuller form than in the other MSS., with witnesses, etc.; (fol.162, 1216) copies of three further charters of John; and:
Perhaps the same as the separate piece in MS. BM. Cotton Claud. E.VIII, fol.260v. Cf. Robert of Avesbury, De gestis Edwardi tertii, ed. E. Maunde Thompson, (R.S. 1889), pp.286–90.
Beginning only (1307–8). Pr. from MS. Lambeth 1106 by Stubbs, Chron. Edw. I et II (R.S.1882), pp.255–66.
Extract: 1309 to mid 1334, ed. Maunde Thompson (R. S.1889), pp.14–74. Written in a different hand.
Rubric added by 'shaky' hand.
Continuing the preceding item, but not taken from Murimuth. Written by a hand of the mid-14th cent. which also added on fol.65 two missing chapters from the Flores for which spaces had been left on fol.80v, 81.
Leaves ruled up for further additions, two years to a page, for years 1341–63, by Henry of Kirkestede, who made entries only for 1341 (death and election of prior of Ely), 1342, 1360 (death of abbot of Bury), 1361 (death of prior and 18 monks of Bury in plague; destruction of tower in gale, etc.).
Items added on plank or inserted leaves by three 14th-cent. hands
Historical pieces
Extract: Bk. XII.iv–xix, pp.518–535 in ed. of Griscom. 1929.
The earliest is of Honorius III (1216–1227) and the latest of Boniface VIII (1294–1303).
The prophecy on the friars falsely attributed to Hildegard: see F. Vernet in Dict.Th.Cath. VI, col. 2470–1; preceded by a note on Hildegard's dates.
5 lines
4 lines.
Physical Description
Collation
Layout
c. 41–49 long lines (mostly 45–6).
Decoration
Initial Q with a face of a bearded man, and sprays with acorns and oak leaves extending into margins.
14th cent. annotations to fols. 76–217 include many crude marginal pen drawings apparently made by the shaky hand.
Accompanying Material
Fol.iv, flyleaf, is a reject leaf from the present MS. of the Flores. On fol.iv verso, continued on fol.71, the shaky 14th cent. annotator wrote brief annalistic notes up to the year 1326. Fol.iv and v (blank) are a bifolium. For the other flyleaves and end pastedown (fol.i–iii, vi, 225–227, fol.iii verso, vi–vi verso originally blank) see below.
History
MS. Lat. hist. d. 4 – Part 3
Contents
Physical Description
Layout
2 cols., 44–62 lines
History
Additional Information
Record Sources
Digital Images
Digital Bodleian (2 images from 35mm slides)
Bibliography
Online resources:
Printed descriptions:
Abbreviations
View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.
Last Substantive Revision
2017-07-01: First online publication.