MS. Laud Misc. 33

Summary Catalogue no.: 661

Language(s): Middle English with Latin

Fols. i recto–2r are originally blank parchment flyleaves (see Provenance).

1. (fols. 3r–96r)

Pauline (Romans–Hebrews) and Catholic (James–Jude) epistles in the Later Version of the Wycliffite Bible, with usual prologues

Running titles in red or black on most rectos and versos, typically consisting of an abbreviated title of a book and chapter number. Spaces left for rubrics but not filled in, apart from fols. 44r, 88r and 96v. Chapter numbers as Roman numerals, usually in the form ‘cᵐ viᵐ’, in black or red, often preceded by red paraphs. There are no indexing letters, but Latin incipits are written at the start of lections in the margins. Such incipits are usually surrounded by rectangular frames drawn in red or black ink. No marginal glosses, apart from fol. 29v; added material within the text is very occasionally underlined in red (e.g., fol. 68r). Corrections in a contemporary hand.

2. (fols. 96v–144r)

Apocalips of Jesu Crist

With commentary, Version A (Morey, J. H., Book and verse: a guide to Middle English biblical literature (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2000), pp. 351–3; ed. Fridner (1961)), with the Later Version of the Wycliffite Bible prologue to the Apocalypse. Passages of the translated text, underlined in red, are followed by passages of commentary. Found in two other manuscripts that contain parts of the Wycliffite New Testament, London, British Library Royal MS. 17 A. XXVI and Columbia University, Plimpton Add. MS. 3 (see Peikola (2006), p. 8).

Physical Description

Form: codex

Support: parchment

Extent: 148 leaves, c.

Dimensions (leaf): 182 × 112 mm.

; leaves were trimmed in rebinding, occasionally causing the loss of marginal text

Foliation: modern in pencil, i–ii + 1–146

Collation

(fols. i–2) I (4) | (fols. 3–90) II–XII (8) | (fols. 91–96) XIII (6) | (fols. 97–144) XIV–XIX (8). Catchwords survive; quire signatures run consecutively.

Secundo Folio: ‘go bitook’ (fol. 4r)

Layout

ruled in ink, with single vertical and horizontal bounding lines extending the full height and width of page; 28 lines per page; written space: c. 111–113 × 75–77 mm.

Hand(s)

textura, black and brown ink

Decoration

2- to 3-line plain red initials at the beginnings of books.

2-line similar initials (sometimes with penwork) at the beginnings of prologues and chapters.

Rubrics in red ink; the beginnings of verses highlighted in red ink.

Binding

Contemporary binding, originally red (?) leather over wood boards, fragments of a strap-and-pin fastening (two ties and two pins). Fragments of several paper labels on spine.

History

Origin: England ; 14th century, late or 15th century, early

Dialect survey:

ony(10)/eny(1), ech(7)/eche(2)/yche(1), fier(8)/fyer(1)/fiyr(1), ȝouen(10), lyif(4)/liyf(5)/liȝf(1), lik(1)/liyk(8)/lijk(1), myche(3)/meche(1)/moche(6), say(2) (sg.), seye(1) (pl.), silf(10), sich(3)/siche(1)/swyche(1)/swiche(5), þouȝ(10), þorouȝ(3)/þoruȝ(1)/þoru(1)/þorou(1)
-eþ(4)/-iþ(6) (pres.ind.3sg.), -en(6)/-yn(4) (pres.ind.pl.), -ynge(8)/-enge(1)/inge(1) (pres.part.), sche(10) (3sg.fem. pronoun, nom.), þei(8) (3pl.pronoun, nom.), hem(10) (3pl.pronoun, oblique), her(5)/here(5) (3pl.pronoun, possessive)

Provenance and Acquisition

The inclusion of the Apocalips of Jesu Crist may have been an afterthought: the quire containing the end of the epistles is shorter than normal.

‘ Iesus eterna dulcedo Dum cor non orat in uanum lingua laborat Omne quod est nimium vertitur in vitium ’ followed by ‘T. M.’, 15th century.

John Amerie, 16th century, late or 17th century, early: ‘ This is the booke that doth pertaine To him that doth it owe; And if you doubte vppon his name here shall you see below. John Amerie ’ (fol. 145r).

Andrew Cook, vicar of Mundon, Essex, from 1604 until his death in 1633; also owned Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. Laud misc. 513 and Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. Laud misc. 658 (Ogilvie-Thomson, S. J., Index of Middle English prose, 18 vols (Cambridge, 1984– ), Handlist XVI, pp. 14–15). A short description of contents on fol. 2v, including ‘Comment(arius) in Apocalypsin per Joh. Wickliff’ (fols. 2v); notes in English verse and in Latin explaining that John Amerie bequeathed the book to his wife Dorothy Amerie by whom it was given to Andrew Cooke by the hands of John Wilson, ‘magister’; date ‘1615’ (fol. 145r). Drawing of an acorn and oak leaves with initials ‘A C’.

William Laud (1573–1645); see Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: ‘Liber Guilielmi Laud Archiep(iscop)i Cantuar’: et Cancellarij Vniuersitatis Oxon. 1633’ (fol. 3r).

Bodleian Library: first donation from Laud, 22 May 1635. Former shelfmark ‘C. 9.’ (fols. i verso, 2v, 3r).

Record Sources

Elizabeth Solopova, Manuscripts of the Wycliffite Bible in the Bodleian and Oxford College Libraries , Exeter Medieval Texts and Studies (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2016), no. 30. Previously described:

Quarto Catalogue, col. 71

Quarto Catalogue, p. 543

Quarto Catalogue, p. 544

Summary Catalogue, vol. 2, part 1, p. 29

Bibliography

Forshall, J. and Madden, F. (eds), The Holy Bible … in the earliest English versions made from the Latin Vulgate by John Wycliffe and his followers, 4 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1850), vol. 1, pp. viii n. y, xlvi.

Deanesly, M., The Lollard Bible and other medieval biblical versions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1920), p. 381.

Fridner, E., An English fourteenth century apocalypse version with a prose commentary (Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1961), p. xiii and as ‘La’. Coxe, H. O., Catalogi codicum manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae pars secunda codices Latinos et Miscellaneos Laudianos complectens (Oxford, 1885), reprinted with corrections, additions and an introduction by R. W. Hunt (Oxford: Bodleian Library, 1973), no. 33.

Scott, K. L. (gen. ed.), An index of images in English manuscripts from the time of Chaucer to Henry VIII, c.1380–c.1509: the Bodleian Library, Oxford, 3 vols (Turnhout: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2000–02), vol. 2, p. 72, no. 637.

Hanna, R., London literature, 1300–1380 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 313 n. 1.

Peikola, M., ‘Lollard (?) production under the looking glass: the case of Columbia University, Plimpton Add. MS. 3’, Journal of the Early Book Society 9 (2006), pp. 1–23.

Dove, M., The first English Bible: the text and context of the Wycliffite versions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 72, 300.

Abbreviations

View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.

Last Substantive Revision

2023-03-24: Add Solopova description.

A catalogue of Western manuscripts at the Bodleian Libraries and selected Oxford colleges