Manchester. The John Rylands Library, Latin MS 16
- Source
- Manchester Digital Collections
- Library
- The John Rylands Library
- Shelfmark
-
- Latin MS 16
- Biblissima authority file
- Language
-
- Latin
- Title
-
- Genesis, beginning imperfectly in iii: 'disti uocem uxoris tue'. Ending xliii: 'nisi reduxero et tradidero.'
- Exodus, beginning in iii: 'ignis de media rubi'
- Leviticus
- Numeri
- Deuteronomium
- Prefacio S. Hieronimi presb. in libro Iosue Tandem finito.
- Iosue
- Iudicum
- Ruth, ending in i: 'morabantur ibi. Et mortuus est elimelech'
- see more
- Agent
-
-
- Preferred form
-
- James Ludovic Lindsay (comte de Crawford, 1847-1913)
- Role
-
- Former owner
- Original form
-
- James Ludovic Lindsay (b. 1847, d. 1913), 26th Earl of Crawford
- Lindsay, James Ludovic, 1847-1913
- Other form
-
- Lindsay, James Ludovic, Earl (1847-1913)
- James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford
- Lindsay, James Ludovic (1847-1913)
- James Ludovic Lindsay (b. 1847, d. 1913), peer and collector
- James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford, 1847-1913
- Crawford, James Ludovic Lindsay, Earl of, 1847-1913
- James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford 1847-1913
- James Ludovic Lindsay, 1847-1913, 26th Earl of Crawford
- James Ludovic Lindsay 1847-1913, 26th Earl of Crawford
- Lindsay, James Ludovic, 1847-1913, 26th Earl of Crawford
- James Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford of Haigh Hall
- see more
- Biblissima portal
- Biblissima authority file
-
- Description
-
- Extent:
ff. 240 Leaf height: 460 mm, width: 335 mm.
Decoration:
Each chapter has an initial, with a bar of ornament extending the whole length of the column, These initials usually contain animals or grotesques. A common practice with the bar of ornament is to decorate it with a shaft of blue on a red ground (or vice versa): round this shaft are entwined dragons or other beasts. Among the more interesting of these initials are:
Genesis: x. A cockatrice. xiii. Centaur. xxi. Sarah kneels with scroll, domine. God's head in sky. xxvi. Mermaid. xl. Fish, with human head.
Exodus: v. Fox, with cock in his mouth. xxxi. Merman in hat.
Leviticus: iii. Mermaid. xxi. Merman, hat and book. xxvii. Merman, with beak, club, and shield.
Numbers: gold is used for wings, etc. of birds. xxi. Mermaid, with fish.
Joshua: vii. A dog. ix. Owl.
In most cases the bar of ornament is surmounted by a bird.
The large initials to the book conform closely in subject and treatment to those which are found in the small Bibles of the thirteenth century; but, as might be expected in a book of this importance, they are of great splendour.
Leviticus: Gold ground. A building showing three trefoiled arches and roof with pinnacles. In centre kneel two Jews, facing right: the foremost places a sheep on a draped altar, above which is seen the face of Christ. Two more Jews stand on L., the foremost holding a small lamb. The initial (of pink, etc.) is set on a pattemed blue ground. Bar of ornament, mainly gold, spreads up and down the page.
Numbers: A similar setting. Trefoiled arches and gold ground. On left, Christ, slightly bearded, in blue over slate-coloured robe, holds up a small book and addresses Moses (horned, with the Tables) and three other Jews standing on right: one of these holds a red book.
Deuteronomy: A smaller picture. Moses, horned, with Tables, a Jew behind him, addresses three or four Jews on right, one of whom has a scroll. At top of the omament of the initial is a boy striking a bird: low down is a boy juggling with knives. He has thrown up three in the air and holds a fourth.
Prologue to Joshua: Decorative initial, with much fine gold. Joshua. A group of three men, one in a Jew's hat, kneel. The face of God in the sky. Brown-red ground.
Judges: A quite similar scene. All the men have Jews' hats: the ground is gold, and there is a fine gold border on two sides of the page.
Ruth: above, Elimelech, in hat, with cloak on stick over shoulder, walks to right. Below, Naomi leads her two young sons to right.
Acquisition:
Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay (b. 1847, d. 1913), 26th Earl of Crawford. Bequeathed by Rylands to the John Rylands Library in 1908.
Layout:
2 columns, 26 lines to a page.
Collation:
Quire a (gone)
Quires b-e10
Quire f (gone)
Quires g-z10
Quire &10
Quire ÷10
Quire π10
Data Source(s):
Description based on M.R. James, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Latin Manuscripts in the John Rylands Library at Manchester (Manchester, 1921), reprinted with an introduction and additional notes and corrections by F. Taylor (München, 1980), revised and expanded by Joanne Edge.
Subject(s):
Religion; Christianity; Bible. Old Testament
Abstract:
Biblical miscellany, produced in the Annevoie area in 1260-70. This manuscript is the most substantial surviving fragment of volume 1 of a large format 4-volume Bible. The first quire of our manuscript is missing, but 6 folios from it, containing prefatory material and the beginning of Genesis, are in the Pierpont Morgan Library as Glazier MS. 64 (see John Plummer, 'The Glazier Collection of Illuminated Manuscripts' (New York, 1968), p. 26 (no. 32). Other surviving fragments from this Bible have been identified as follows: (a) 3ff., containing 4 Kings, Canticles and 2 Maccabees, are now Brussels, Bibl. Royale MS. II 1339; (b) one column, containing the end of Luke and the beginning of the prologue to John, the whereabouts of which are now unknown, was Lot 2 in the Sotheby Sale of 29th November 1949 and then belonged to Major J. R. Abbey. This item was incorrectly described in the Sale Catalogue; (c) one column, containing part of the prologue to John and the first few words of his Gospel, is now Cleveland Museum of Art MS. 52. 565 (see Robert Branner, 'A Cutting from a Thirteenth-Century French Bible' in Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. lviii, no. 7 (Sept. 1971), pp. 219-27; Ellen J. Beer, 'Liller Bibelcodices, Tournai und die Scriptorien der Stadt Arras,' in Aachener Kunstbliitter, Bd. 43 (Aachen, 1972), pp. 190 sqq., particularly pp. 191, 211, 222; Willene B. Clark, 'A Re-United Bible and Thirteenth-Century Illumination in Northern France', in Speculum, 1 (1975), 33-47, particularly p. 46; and the references in all three). In the top left-hand corner of the front endleaf is: Annevoie 8bre 1836 SNA L[ ... lvye..VR Annevoie (Belgium) is in the area in which the manuscript was executed. This entry is written in the same continental hand as the inscription 'Dinant 8bre 1836 SVNA' [sic] on f. 1v of Rylands Latin MS ll above.
Format:
Codex
Material:
Parchment.
Provenance:
Lot 15 in the Vergauwen Sale of March 1884 in Brussels, where it was bought for James Ludovic Lindsay (b. 1847, d. 1913), 26th Earl of Crawford by the Brussels bookseller F. J. Olivier for 500fr. (CLL, Jan.-June 1884, nos. 23-27 passim, 33-34, 40-41; CLI, 1883-91, no. l08).
- Extent:
- Rights
-
- Provided by The University of Manchester. Zooming image © University of Manchester Library, All rights reserved. Images and Metadata made available for download are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). Images and Metadata made available for download are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).
