Manchester. The John Rylands Library, English MS 98
- Source
- Manchester Digital Collections
- Library
- The John Rylands Library
- Shelfmark
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- English MS 98
- Biblissima authority file
- Date
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- Mid 15th century
- Language
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- Middle English
- Title
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- Mirror of the Life of Christ
- Agent
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- Preferred form
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- Nicholas Love (13..?-1423?)
- Role
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- Translator
- Original form
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- Love, Nicholas, active 1410
- Nicholas Love, active 1410
- Other form
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- Nicholas Love
- Nicholas Love OCarth
- Nicholas Love, active
- Love, Nicholas, active
- see more
- Biblissima portal
- Biblissima authority file
-
- Description
-
- Extent:
140 folios (ii+140+ii) Leaf height: 300 mm, width: 200 mm.
Binding:
Full brown calf, rebacked in brown morocco, ?17th century
Decoration:
There are good 5-line initials in blue and pink with white penwork on a burnished gold ground with elaborate floral infill and elaborate foliate border extensions terminating in acanthus, ivy and holly leaves and bezants, at the beginning of the sections for Tuesday (folio 26r), Wednesday (folio 37v) and Thursday (folio 56r)
Numerous 3-line gilded initials on blue and pink grounds with foliate extensions.
Acquisition:
Purchased by the John Rylands Library in 1905 from the London booksellers Bull & Auvache for £25; invoice dated 12 July 1905
Layout:
Written height: 188 mm, width: 130 mm.
Collation:
Quire 18 lacking 1 and 2,
Quire 2-118,
Quire 128 lacking 5 after folio 90,
Quire 13-168,
Quire 178 lacking 2 after folio 126,
Quire 188 (leaf 8 was a pastedown). Two leaves are missing after, folio 90 and after folio 126.
Quires are signed in the usual late medieval way.
Secundo folio: n/a (the first quire is lacking the first and second leaves).
Script:
Gothic cursive anglicana formata
Subject(s):
Religion; Theology--History--Middle Ages, 600-1500; Christianity
Abstract:
A fine illuminated manuscript of the Myrrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ, a translation by Nicholas Love of Pseudo-Bonaventura's Meditationes vitae Christi.Myrrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ, a translation by Nicholas Love of the Meditationes vitae Christi. Edition of Lawrence F. Powell, (1908): see Bibliography below. The text begins imperfectly 'and euery age an euery dignite' (Powell, p. 8 line 5) and ends on folio 136v, 'with outen endinge amen' (as Powell), after which it continues on folio 137r with two paragraphs, 'And for als moche as þat blessid and worthy feste of þe precious sacrament... of alle false lollardes.
Thus endith the contemplacion... nowe and euere wt outen ende Amen', and on folio 137r and 137v in red ink, 'Memorandum quod circa annum... (as in MS. 94, folio 2) Explicit speculum vite cristi conplete'. In the second of the two paragraphs on folio 137r-137v the reader is advised to pick and choose as suits him rather than keep to the Monday-Sunday divisions of the text.
A leaf is missing after folio 90v, which ends 'grace inwardly' (Powell, p. 214 line 7); folio 91r begins 'the fairest the wisest' (p. 216 line 28). A further leaf is missing after folio 126v, which ends 'of þe holy' (p. 299 line 5); folio 127r begins 'haue mynde of' (p. 302 line 13). folios 138v-140v were left blank.
Foliation:
Foliated 1-140 (modern foliation)
Format:
Codex
Material:
Parchment
Provenance:
Roberts family of Willesden, Middlesex, and Hordefamily of Ewell, Surrey
Annotated 'Brindley' in a 16th-century hand of folio 61r, with the forename 'John' added in a 17th-century hand.
Robert Knyvett. Inscription 'Robert Knyuett oweth this booke' on folio 138v, 17th century. A Robert Knyvett of Westminster gent. is recorded in 1611 (Norfolk Record Office, KNY 473 372 x 1). Sir Robert Knyvett bart of Buckenham, Norfolk, died in 1699 (Burke's extinct and dormant baronetcies (1841)
Thomas William Evans. Armorial bookplate inside the back cover, 19th century
- Extent:
- Place
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-
- Preferred form
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- England (United Kingdom)
- Original form
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- England
- Other form
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- Angleterre
- Angleterre (?)
- Angleterre.
- Angleterre ?
- Anglaterra
- Inglaterra
- Engeland
- Angleterre (Salisbury ?)
- Anglaterra (Salisbury?)
- Inglaterra (Salisbury?)
- England (Salisbury?)
- [Oxford?]
- [England]
- England, Norwich?
- England, Canterbury, St. Augustine's Abbey?
- England, Cornwall?
- England, St. Albans?
- England, North?
- England, York?
- England, Witham?
- England, Winchester or St. Albans
- England, Reading or Leominster
- England, Cirencester?
- England, Sherborne?
- England, Worcester?
- England, Bury St. Edmunds?
- England, Tewkesbury?
- England, East Anglia?
- England, Peterborough?
- England, Mercia?
- England, Canterbury, Christ Church?
- England, Canterbury, St. Augustine's?
- England, Winchester?
- England, Oxford?
- Flanders (possibly executed in England)
- England and Netherlands
- England, Canterbury?
- England, West Midlands?
- England, London?
- England, Crowland?
- England, Wessex?
- England, Reading?
- England, Northeast?
- England, Southeast?
- England, Ely?
- England, Winchester or Hereford?
- England, Salisbury?
- England, Oxford or Salisbury
- German (but made in England)
- England, South East (?)
- England. Peterborough (?) or Lincoln (?)
- Hereford?, England
- England, Durham ?
- England, Durham?
- England, probably Durham
- England, Oxford (?)
- England, possibly Oxford
- England (?Oxford)
- England, Durham (?)
- England, London/Westminster
- Unknown, possibly London and Cambridge
- Royal Chancery, London; Cambridge
- Engeland (?)
- England (II)
- I. England
- [Engeland]
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- Biblissima portal
- Biblissima authority file
-
- Rights
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- 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).
