Collection of Cistercian texts, including a Bestiary, sermons and extracts from the writings of Remigius of Auxerre, manuscript in Latin on vellum

Estimate

3,000 - 5,000 GBP

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Description

364 leaves (plus single medieval flyleaf), 145mm. by 110mm., complete, collation: i^{6, ii-iv^{12, v^{6, vi-xx^{12, xxi^{11 (i a singleton), xxii-xxiv^{12, xxv^{11 (i a singleton), xxvi-xxxi^{12, xxxii^{8, some horizontal catchwords and numeric quire signatures, foliated in modern ink 1-360 (omitting first 6 leaves and skipping the numbers 234 and 258; but followed here), written space 107mm. by 79mm., double column, 34 lines in black ink in a number of small and precise gothic bookhands, initials touched in red, rubrics in different sections of the text in red or underlined in red, paragraph marks either black and touched in red or in alternate red or blue touched in contrasting colour, with elaborate penwork tracery in red or green extending up and down margins from some paragraph marks (on occasion filling an entire border; see fols.50r, 61r and 89v for examples), numerous 2-line initials in alternate red or blue with contrasting tracery, 3- to 5-line initials in alternate red or blue with contrasting tracery on fols.231v-34v, Easter table on fol.119v decorated in alternate blocks of yellow, brown and orange with all four border-panels filled with foliage and tessellated designs on yellow and orange or blue grounds, similar border decoration on fol.1r, first leaf missing strip of parchment at bottom, now with modern repair, some wear to second leaf creating small holes in upper right-hand corner and removing single letters of text, minor wear to decoration on fol.1r, otherwise in excellent condition with few additions, bound in modern white vellum over pasteboards}}}}}}}}}

Provenance

provenance

(1) Written c.1269 for a Cistercian in an Italian community; and subsequently used for private devotion in the fifteenth or early-sixteenth century (perhaps by an inhabitant of the same community), who made additions to the calendar including those of the dates of his father's and mother's deaths.

(2) Library of Lord Cadogan, his family-bookplate (perhaps Admiral G. Cadogan, 1783-1864); bought for £120.

(4) Charles E. Roseman Jr of Cleveland Heights, Ohio, bought from Solomons and Berkeloew in 1929 (De Ricci, Census, ii, 1959-60, no. 4), and by descent to present owner.

Catalogue Note

text

The text includes a series of religious readings appropriate for private contemplation, specifically a short Expositiones super Bibliam (first 6 leaves); Sermones de festis et de tempore (fols.1r-92v) ; Flores sanctorum (fols.93r-107r) ; Remigius, Expositio Epistolarum S. Pauli (fols.107r-118r), Table for calculating Easter, with calculations for 1269-1302 (fols.118v-20v); Expositio difficilium vocabulorum Bibliae et aliorum secundum libros et alphabetum (fols.121r-61r); Expositio super Isaiam (fols.161v-85v); Expositio parabolarum Solomonis et Ecclesiae et Sapentiae (fols.185v-96v); Flores S. Bernardi et aliorum sanctorum (fols.196v-231v), with a bestiary (fols.222r-3r); Missa de sancta Trinitate (fols.231v-4v); an extended Expositiones super Bibliam (fols.235r-354v); and a Calendar (fols.355r-60v). The content and the size of the volume suggests that this was a personal book used for private reading. The fact that the Easter table calculations are laid out for 1269-1302 indicates that the work was written c.1269; and the Calendar is set out for a Cistercian (11 Jan, Commemoratio episcoporum et abbatum ordinis nostri; 28 March, Roberti abbatis, ie. Robert of Molesme; 21 August, in red; Bernardi abbatis, ie. Bernard of Clairvaux; and note the extracts from the writings of the latter on fols.196v-231v).

The presence of a Bestiary is worth note. It includes entries for the hoopoe bird, whose eyes become dim as she grows old and so her young return to her to care for her in her dotage, the weasel, who conceives at the mouth and gives birth via its ear, the unicorn, who can only be caught by a virgin, and other entries for the lion, the pelican, the serpent, the Siren and the Hedgehog. The inclusion of such a text in a private devotional collection might be thought incongruous, but links have been made between the Cistercian Order and the promulgation and survival of bestiaries (J. Morson, "The English Cistercians and the Bestiary", Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 39, 1956, pp.146-170), and the entries were probably used as the focus for moral or allegorical contemplation.