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Cambridge. Corpus Christi College, Parker Library MS 175

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Source
Parker Library On the Web (Cambridge)
Library
UK, Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, Parker Library
Shelfmark
  • MS 175
Biblissima authority file
Date
  • 1275 - 1299
Language
  • Latin
  • Middle French
Title
    • Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 175: Walter of Coventry (attrib.), Memoriale
    • Tituli cardinalium cum brevi descriptione eorum officii || Tituli cardinalium cum brevi descriptione eorum officii
    • Historia Britonum per compendium || Historia Britonum per compendium
    • Nomina regum Angliae et chronica Saxonum || Nomina regum Angliae et chronica Saxonum
    • Privilegium ecclesiae Sancti Petri Eboraci || Privilegium ecclesiae Sancti Petri Eboraci sive epistola Gregorii papae ad Augustinum de ordinatione episcopi Eboracensis qui habeat pallium et jus metropolitanum || Privilege of York
    • Chronica regum Northumbriae et archiepiscoporum Eboracensium || Chronica regum Northumbriae et archiepiscoporum Eboracensium
    • Quaedam de conquestu Hiberniae et jure regis Angliae in Scotos || Quaedam de conquestu Hyberniae et jure regis Angliae in Scotos
    • Prophetiae Sybillae et Merlini || Prophetiae Sybillae et Merlini
    • Walter of Coventry (attrib.), Memoriale || Annales Angliae per Walterum Coventrensem
    • see more
Agent
Description

  • Summary: CCCC MS 175 contains a copy of an historical compilation called the Memoriale commonly attributed to Walter of Coventry who was writing in the second half of the thirteenth century, the period in which this manuscript of his text was written. In addition, the first few leaves of the manuscript are taken up with a range of historical notes, extracts and genealogical tables, some relating to the archdiocese of York. The manuscript was almost certainly in the hands of the Tudor poet and antiquary John Leland (1506-1552), who thought it was in poor condition - 'Codex erat aliquot locis mancus'. The historian John Bale (1495-1563) saw the manuscript in Leland's collection, but Parker must have acquired it some time before 1572 (possibly from the Cheapside resident William Carye), since the text was used as the basis for the archbishop's Antiquitates published in that year. The manuscript was copied many time in the course of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the details it supplied about church government in Angevin England being keenly studied by church historians.


    Contents :


    vir-vir - Tituli cardinalium cum brevi descriptione eorum officii || Tituli cardinalium cum brevi descriptione eorum officii

    Note: f. vr-vv is blank

    Note: In a hand of xiii-xiv

    incipit: (vir) Quia primo summo pontifici i. Christo in triumphali ecclesia tres Ierarchie Angelorum obsequntur

    Note: List of Cardinals, ending

    explicit: (vir) Sancte AgatheSancte Lucie in capite suburre S. Kirici Et sic sunt li cardinales

    Note: (not in Stubbs)

    Note: (viv) An extract from Bale (p. 264) on Walter of Coventry


    1r-1r - Historia Britonum per compendium || Historia Britonum per compendium

    Note: Huic historiae prefixae sunt Anglice emensuratio et recensio septem regnorum Heptarchiae, illa Gallice, haec Latine. Ipsa historia incipit Britannia insularum optima inter Galliam, et ex Galfredo Monumetensi satis inscite et jejuniter compilata videtur: mores enim sui seculi ad pristinum hoc tempus transtulit autor imperitus, et loquitur de parliamento, baronibus, comitibus, et homagio feudali apud Britonas

    Note: The main hand of the book begins here

    rubric: (1r) Anglia

    incipit: (1r) La lungure de engleterre cuntent viiic lues ceo est a sauer' de escosce deskes a toteneys en cornwalle. E. en leur ccc lues ceo est a sauer de meneueye la uyle seynt dauid deskes a doure etc.

    Note: Length of Ireland

    Note: Kingdoms of the Heptarchy in Latin

    Note: (Stubbs, Appendix to Preface vol. I).


    1r-4v - Nomina regum Angliae et chronica Saxonum || Nomina regum Angliae et chronica Saxonum

    Note: In hoc chronico deducitur historia Angliae usque ad Edwardum I. sed ita raptim ut binis saltem constet foliis. Incipit, Adelstanus fuit primus rex de Saxonibus in Anglia qui regnavit post Chadwalladum ultimum regem Britonum; ipse vero Eymundernesse quam a paganis emerat in perpetuam elemosinam ecclesiae Sancti Petri Eboraci dedit.

    rubric: (1r) Incipit historia britonum per compendium

    incipit: (1r) Britannia insularum optima inter galliae (sic)

    Note: Ends in 1291 with verses on Edward I

    explicit: (4v) Eduuardus quartus modo regnat filius huius etc.

    Note: (Stubbs I 3-19)

    Note: Col. 1 on f. 5r is blank


    5r-5r - Privilegium ecclesiae Sancti Petri Eboraci || Privilegium ecclesiae Sancti Petri Eboraci sive epistola Gregorii papae ad Augustinum de ordinatione episcopi Eboracensis qui habeat pallium et jus metropolitanum || Privilege of York

    incipit: (5r) Reuerentissimi et sanctissimi Patri ffratri Augustino

    Note: (Bede Historia Ecclesiastica I 29)

    explicit: (5r) custodiat reuerentissime frater

    Note: (Stubbs I 19)


    5r-6r - Chronica regum Northumbriae et archiepiscoporum Eboracensium || Chronica regum Northumbriae et archiepiscoporum Eboracensium

    Note: Continet historiam ecclesiasticam istius provinciae a Paulino ad Thurstanum compendiose in uno folio scriptam

    incipit: (5r) Beatus siquidem Gregorius papa ubi gentem anglorum

    explicit: (6r) monachus factus obdormiuit in domino sub rege stephano

    Note: The greater part of a column blank (Stubbs I 20)


    6r-6v - Quaedam de conquestu Hiberniae et jure regis Angliae in Scotos || Quaedam de conquestu Hyberniae et jure regis Angliae in Scotos

    incipit: (6r) Nota quod ybernia habet octingenta miliaria in longitudine - alienoram uxorem leuwelini ultimi ex alienora sorore henrici quarti patris Eaduuardi illustris regis anglie

    Note: (Stubbs I 24)

    Note: Blank, part of column 6v

    Note: On English rights in Scotland

    incipit: (6v) (Sciendum ? Item ?) quia in carta Regis Edgari scocie Dunelmensi continetur quod idem rex cognoscit se possidere etc.

    Note: Papa Honorius 3us

    Note: Gregorius papa scribit regi Scocie

    Note: Clemens papa scribens regi anglie

    Note: (Stubbs I 24)


    6v-6v - Prophetiae Sybillae et Merlini || Prophetiae Sybillae et Merlini

    Note: Precedentia haec chronica non Gualtero Coventrensi (si ipse demum subsequentium autor sit habendus) sed potius anonymo cuidam monacho fani S. Petri apud Eboracenses adscribenda videntur, uti satis liquet ex donatione cujus fit mentio in initio chronici Anglo-Saxonum, chartaque et historiis quae illud excipiunt. Nec vero absimile videtur hosce quaterniones codici fuisse postea insertos, nam etsi caractere reliquis simili exarentur, magna tamen cernitur literarum initialium varietas, quae in illis simplici forma sine ornamento rubro atramento delineantur, in reliquo autem codice multo sunt ornatiores et diversis coloribus pictae

    rubric: (6v) Prophecia sibille et merlini uatis de Albania et Anglis et eorum euentibus

    incipit: (6v) Regnum scocorum fuit inter cetera regna

    explicit: (6v) Historie ueteris Gildas luculentus aratorHec retulit paruo carmine plura notans

    Note: (Stubbs I 25)

    rubric: (6v) Sibilla De euentibus regnorum et eorum regum ante finem mundi

    incipit: (6v) Gallorum leuitas germanos iustificabit

    Note: The last seven lines in a different hand, ending

    explicit: (6v) Papa cito moritur Cesar regnabit ubiqueSub quo tunc vana cessabit gloria cleri

    Note: (Stubbs I 26)


    7r-166r - Walter of Coventry (attrib.), Memoriale || Annales Angliae per Walterum Coventrensem

    Note: Titulus hic neotericus ex inscriptione ad imum hujus paginae desumptus videtur, quae ita se habet Memoriale fratris Walteri de Coventr et quae manu diversa et recentiori scripta ut placuit Cl. Tannero innuit hoc potius donum fuisse Gualteri quam scriptum. De hac controversia aliorum sit judicium, inscriptio ipsa reliquo codici haud multo recentior mihi videtur; et opus hoc Waltero olim fuisse adscriptum probat titulus deformi manu (seculo xv, si conjecturis uti liceat) in folio rejectitio ad finem codicis exaratus. In annalibus ad finem anni 1154 Explicit chronica Mariani, et similiter ad finem anni 1201 Expliciunt chronica Rogeri Hovedene. Incipiunt Romanorum nonagesimus tertius et continent historiam Angliae ab anno 1025/1003 ad annum 1225

    Note: The Annals begin. At the bottom of f. 7r in a very large black hand (xiv early) is: Memoriale fratris Walteri de Couentr.

    Note: From the position and script of this I should be inclined to call it a Library mark. See further below

    Note: Text

    incipit: (7r) Romanorum nonogesimus IIIus Henricus regnauit annis xxii

    Note: (Stubbs I 27)

    Note: Text ends

    explicit: (166r) literis domini pape acceptis repatriauit

    Note: (166v) Verso blank

    Note: (viir) On last leaf some references to the text (xvi)

    Note: (viiv) On verso scribbles

    Note: 1 (xv-xvi). ? Mongy

    Note: 2 (xiv). Cronica Walteri de Conuentren. Anno dni mo co lxxo vjo Rex filius matildis imperatricis fecit fund(itus) destrui Castellum Leycester et menia urbis et Castellum de groby similiter

    Note: This seems, to show an interest in Leicester on the part of the scribbler

    Note: Stubbs discusses the authorship at length and on pp. xx, xxi comes to the conclusion that Walter of Coventry is probably to be regarded as the author

    Note: On p. xxii he says that what little there is of local indication in the book, and it is very little, points to York rather than Coventry (as the home of the writer), possibly the city, but almost certainly to the diocese of York.

    Note: On p. xxv: Nasmith's inference that the writer was a monk of S. Peter's York, is of course erroneous: there were no monks at S. Peter's; but if he were a monk at all, there was no lack of monasteries in Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire. The great abbey of S. Mary's, York, was governed at the very time at which the MS. was written, by Simon of Warwick, who was Abbot from 1258 to 1296: and amongst the names of the monks then under vows there are those of William of Derby prior of S. Bees and afterwards of S. Mary's, and Walter of Leicester a great scholar and most excellent preacher (MS. Bodley 39). If the statement of Pits had any value that Walter was a native of Warwick, we might safely set him down as a follower of Abbot Simon: but anyhow the collocation of names is suggestive

    Note: Tanner thought that the inscription Memoriale fratris W. de C. meant that the book was potius donum Gualteri quam scriptum. Stubbs disagrees with him (p. xx) and cites the Memoriale presbyterorum and the Memoriale of Prior Henry of Eastry and of Henry Spenser Bishop of Norwich as instances of the use of the word to mean a collection of facts which the writer desires to be remembered

    Note: He does not cite instances which (coupled with the large script, and position of the words) incline me to believe that Tanner is in the right, and that the inscription means that Walter of Coventry presented the book to the library of his monastery and was not the author of it. Instances of such inscriptions are: University Library Ee. 5. 11. Astronomical Tables etc. Memoriale J. Wilton. University Library Ff. 4. 31. Hieronymus in Matthaeum. Memoriale fr. Walteri Hunt doctoris conuentus Carmelitarum oxonie. University Library Gg. 2. 18. Legenda Aurea. Memoriale fr. Joh. de Drayton monachi cuius anime propicietur deus. Lambeth MS. 160. Polychronica. Memoriale fr. Willelmi broscumbe magistri. K. ij. Lambeth MS. 215. Athanasius de trinitate. Memoriale de Lanthonia. The third of these examples, oddly enough, Tanner was inclined to interpret as an ascription of authorship. He had not seen that the work was the well-known Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine. The list might readily be enlarged, but I have thought the examples cited sufficient to show that the formula is an accustomed one for expressing a donation on the part of the person named

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  • Images courtesy of The Parker Library, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. For higher resolution images suitable for scholarly or commercial publication, either in print or in an electronic format, please contact the Parker Library directly at parker-library@corpus.cam.ac.uk
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