View sample images

MS. Laud Lat. 82

Summary Catalogue no.: 500

Portable Psalter and Hours; England, Diocese of Chichester (?), 14th century, second quarter

Psalter-Hours,

[item 1 occupies quires I and XXXII]

1. (fols. i recto–2v)

Fol. i recto–verso is blank.

Fols. 1–2 and 249–250 are made from a 16th-century legal document (see ‘Provenance’).

[item 2 occupies quires II–III]

2. (fols. 3r–7v)

Calendar, laid out one month per page, written in red and brown, not graded, approximately three-quarters full. July and August are missing. Includes two feasts of Richard of Chichester in red (3 April, 16 June). Partly erased additions concerning John Lovell on fol. 4v and elsewhere (see ‘Provenance’). The feasts of Thomas Becket and titles ‘pape’ are erased.

[items 3–9 occupy quires IV–XXXI]

3. (fols. 8r–42r)

Hours of the Virgin. Prayers after Lauds to the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, the Cross, Michael, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul, John the Evangelist, Thomas Becket (not erased), Lawrence, Nicholas, Mary Magdalene, Catherine, Margaret and All Saints (fols. 24r–26r).

4. (fols. 42v–219v)

Psalms 1–150 in the biblical order, without titles or numbers, laid out with each verse starting on a new line, punctuated throughout, with punctus used to mark the ends of verses, and punctus elevatus used to mark metrum. There are textual divisions at psalms 26, 38, 52, 68, 80, 97 and 109 (see ‘Decoration’). Subdivisions within psalms are not marked, apart from 17: 26 (fol. 58v). Psalm 118 is subdivided into twenty-two 8-verse units. Psalm 36 follows psalm 35 without a break or a larger initial (fol. 82v). Occasionally the original text is traced over in black ink (e.g. fols. 55v, 168v).

5. (fols. 219v–229r)

Weekly canticles, without titles:

(1) Confitebor tibi domine (Isaiah 12);
(2) Ego dixi (Isaiah 38: 10–21);
(3) Exultauit cor meum (1 Samuel 2: 1–11);
(4) Cantemus domino (Exodus 15: 1–20);
(5) Domine audiui (Habakkuk 3);
(6) Audite celi (Deuteronomy 32: 1–44).

6. (fols. 229v–236r)

Daily canticles, prayers and creeds, without titles:

(1) Benedicite omnia opera (fol. 229v);
(2) Te deum laudamus (fol. 230v);
(3) Benedictus dominus deus (fol. 231v);
(4) Magnificat (fol. 232v);
(5) Nunc dimittis (fol. 233r);
(6) Athanasian Creed (Quicumque uult . . .) (fol. 233r).

7. (fols. 236r–239v)

Litany, including Swithin and Hirinus (i.e. Birinus (?)), last among the confessors. Followed by collects (fols. 239v–241r):

(1) Deus cui proprium est misereri semper et parcere suscipe . . .
(2) Deus cui corda fidelium sancti spiritus illustracione docuisti . . .
(3) Deus a quo sancta desideria recta consilia et iusta sunt . . .
(4) Ure igne sancti spiritus renes nostros . . .
(5) Omnipotens sempiterne deus qui facis mirabilia magna solus . . .
(6) Pretende domine famulis et famulabus tuis dexteram celestis auxilii ut de toto corde . . .
(7) Actiones nostras quesumus domine aspirando preueni . . .
(8) Deus qui es sanctorum tuorum splendor mirabilis ac lapsorum subleuator . . .

8. (fols. 241r–247v)

Office of the Dead, responsories correspond to nos. 14, 72, 24, 32, 57, 28, 68, 82, 38 in Ottosen (1993).

9. (fols. 247v–248v)

Two added hymns: ‘[V]eni creator spiritus . . .’ (Chevalier, no. 21204) (fols. 247v–248v) written as prose in a 15th-century (?) hand; and ‘Ave maria prouida pia . . .’ (similar to Chevalier, no. 23605) (fol. 248v) written as verse in a different 15thcentury hand (?).

Language(s): Latin

Physical Description

Secundo Folio: Quadraginta annis (Hours of the Virgin, fol. 9r)

Form: codex

Support: parchment

Extent: 247 leaves

Dimensions (leaf): c. 100 × 60 mm.

Leaves were trimmed, occasionally causing the loss of decoration.

Foliation: modern, in pencil; i + 1–149 + 155–251.

Collation

Layout

Ruled in ink with single vertical and horizontal bounding lines extending the full height and width of the page; written below the top line; 19 lines per page; written space: c. 67 × 38 mm.

Hand(s)

Formal Gothic book hand; brown ink.

Decoration

KL monograms in the calendar, gold or on gold background, and borders, made of pink and blue bars, decorated with foliage.

Hours of the Virgin: 6- to 8-line initials, in gold frames and on gold backgrounds, and full borders, made of pink, blue and gold bars, decorated with foliage, flowers, birds and grotesques at the beginnings of the major sections of the Hours (fols. 8r, 15r, 27r, 30v, 33r, 35r, 37r).

2- to 3-line similar initials and three-quarter borders at the beginnings of texts.

Borders: see above.

1-line gold or blue initials, with contrasting red or blue penwork, at the beginnings of verses and periods.

Line-endings in gold, pink and blue with geometric designs.

Psalms: Miniatures on gold or patterned backgrounds, 4- to 5-line initials on gold backgrounds, and full borders made of pink, blue and gold bars, decorated with foliage, flowers and birds at liturgical divisions. Unusual style and some unusual iconography.

fol. 42v, Psalm 1 (miniature), King David, seated, playing harp.
fol. 69v, Psalm 26 (miniature), David, kneeling before an altar, pointing to his eyes; half-figure of God, blessing, in clouds above.
fol. 86v, Psalm 38 (miniature), David pointing to his mouth.
fol. 103r, Psalm 52 (miniature), Saul stabbing himself with a sword.
fol. 119v, Psalm 68 (miniature), David or possibly Jonah (?) nude, standing in water, hands joined in prayer; shore with an elaborate building (representing Nineveh (?)); a blessing hand of God in clouds above.
fol. 140v, Psalm 80 (miniature), Seated woman (?), playing four bells with hammers.
fol. 163v, Psalm 97 (miniature), Three clerics singing from a scroll draped over a lectern, containing musical notation and the word ‘alleluya’ twice.
fol. 182v, Psalm 109 (miniature), Crowned God-the-Father and Son, seated, holding an orb.

2- to 3-line initials, on gold backgrounds, and three-quarter borders decorated with foliage, flowers, birds and grotesques at the beginnings of psalms, canticles, litany, prayers and sections of the Office of the Dead.

Borders: see above.

1-line gold or blue initials, with contrasting red or blue penwork, at the beginnings of verses.

Line-endings in gold, pink and blue with geometric designs.

Rubrics in red ink.

Binding

Brown polished calf over pasteboard, 17th century. Double blind roll border round the outer edge of both covers. Gilt arms of Laud on both covers. Four raised bands on spine. Holes left by the fittings of two ties on both covers. Three paper labels on spine, containing respectively: ‘Psalmi || David(is) . &c . || M. S.’, ‘. . .19 . . .’ and printed ‘Laud. Lat. || 82’.

History

Origin: 14th century, second quarter ; English

Provenance and Acquisition

Made for the use of the diocese of Chichester (?): evidence of the calendar.

John, 5th Lord Lovell of Titchmarsh, Northamptonshire (d. 1408) (?): additions in the calendar.

Fly-leaves are made from a 16th-century legal document in English, which mentions Caddington (fol. 1r), John Sibley (fol. 1v), Robert Smythe, ‘[ ] Stopesley’, William Crawle[y?], Harpeden (fol. 2r) and Luton (fol. 2v).

William Laud (1573–1645), see ODNB: ‘Liber Guil: Laud Archiep(iscop)i Cant: & Cancellar: Vniuersit: Oxon. .1638.’ (fol. 3r).

Bodleian Library: third (?) donation from Laud, 28 June 1639 (see Summary catalogue, vol. 1, pp. 128–9). Earlier shelfmarks: ‘B. 19’ (paper label inside the upper cover).

Record Sources

Elizabeth Solopova, Latin Liturgical Psalters in the Bodleian Library: A Select Catalogue (Oxford, 2013), pp. 152–6. Previously described in the Quarto Catalogue (H. O. Coxe, Laudian Manuscripts, Quarto Catalogues II, repr. with corrections, 1969, from the original ed. of 1858–1885).

Quarto Catalogue, col. 36

Quarto Catalogue, p. 540 (addenda)

Summary Catalogue, Vol. 2, part 1, p. 25

Digital Images

Digital Bodleian (7 images from 35mm slides)

Bibliography

Select bibliography:

Frere, no. 456.

Summary catalogue, vol. 2, part 1, no. 500.

S. J. P. van Dijk, Latin Liturgical Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, vol. 2: Office Books (typescript, 1957), p. 53

Pächt and Alexander (1966–73), vol. 3, no. 598, pl. LXII.

Coxe (1973), col. 36.

Backhouse, J., The Madresfield Hours: a fourteenth-century manuscript in the library of Earl Beauchamp (Oxford: Roxburghe Club, 1975), pp. 30, 33.

Cavanaugh, S. H., A study of books privately owned in England, 1300–1450, Diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2 vols. (Ann Arbor, MI, 1985), vol. 2, p. 545.

Abbreviations

View list of abbreviations and editorial conventions.

Last Substantive Revision

2024-05: Encode full description from Solopova catalogue.

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