Prayerbook

Commencing with a calendar following the Use of Sarum, with marginal notes on English monarchs and each month concluding with a quatrain of medical advice ("In May rise earlie and walke in the fieldes..."), and with dates of Easter from 1584 to 1607 (25 pages), the remainder of the manuscript comprising prayers, some with titles including "A general Confession of our synnes to be said every morninge," "A praier to the Father, to the Sonne, and to the holy Ghjost, compiled & made by the Poet Skelton" (fol. 100v),  "A prayer for the preservation of the Queen from Traiterus practises compiled by Mr Thomas Barwick" (fol. 114), and many others, also with related notes on religious subjects (such as "The tenne Commaundementes with a brefe and shorte exposition of them," fols. 103v-110v), mostly in a calligraphic secretary hand with some prayers and other texts in a calligraphic italic hand, mostly in black ink with red, green, and brown inks used throughout, red ruled margins, Biblical citations and other marginal notes, altogether 259 pages, 8vo (165 x 120 mm), c.1584; fol. 110 torn, occasional light dust staining. Contemporary parchment over boards with yapp edges and the remains of green silk ties, "Robert Cooke" stamped on upper cover; scuffed and discolored.

"Robert Cooke" (name stamped on upper cover) — "Michael Blessett his Booke" (ownership inscription in an early hand) — "thomas slynn [?] his book god give him grace therein to Looke" (ownership inscription in a seventeenth-century hand) — John Meade Falkner, 1858–1932 — Sotheby's, 12 December 1932, lot 86. acquisition: Purchased at the foregoing sale through Bernard Quaritch

A highly attractive collection of prayers compiled by a Catholic in the reign of Elizabeth. The writer included a list detailing when Easter and other significant events would fall. The first year given is 1584, so the manuscript was presumably begun in or around that year.