Confessio Amantis, a fine MS, much maltreated, at least twenty leaves lost. London, s.xv, first quarter, early.

Contents

(fols 1ra–171vb) Confessio Amantis, Prol. 504–VIII.2791.

Prologue (fols 1ra–3vb) wants 1–503 (three leaves missing) and 984–I.343 (three leaves missing after fol. 3); Book I (fols 4ra–18vb) wants 1–343, 1531–1890 (two leaves missing after fol. 10), 2405–2558 (one leaf missing after fol. 13) and 3423–II.130 (one leaf missing after fol. 18); Book II (fols 19ra–36vb) wants 1–130 and 779–1117 (two leaves missing after fol. 22); Book III (fols 37ra–52vb) wants 2701–IV.86 (one leaf missing after fol. 52); Book IV (fols 53ra–69vb) wants 1–86, 1622–1806 (one leaf missing after fol. 61), 2492–2854 (two leaves missing after fol. 65), 3555–V.16 (one leaf missing after fol. 69); Book V (fols 70ra–111vb) wants 1–16, 3265–3450 (one leaf missing after fol. 87) and 7763–VI.91 (one leaf missing, but for a stub, after fol. 111); Book VI (fols 112ra–124vb) wants 1–91 (leaf missing after fol. 111); Book VII (fols 125ra–155vb) wants 1192–1359 (one leaf missing after fol. 131); Book VIII (fols 155vb–171vb: fol. 155vb has the Latin verses only; English begins at top of 156ra, with full bar-border) breaks of at 2791, on fol. 171vb, with probably at least two further leaves lost, containing 2792–end, and perhaps Latin concluding material. NB The foliation used in this description does not count missing leaves.

In addition to the twenty leaves missing, others are mutilated. The top halves of fols 2 and 3 are torn away, with loss of text, as also most of the outer side of fol. 6, with a tear down the recto of the first column; a stub (not numbered) follows fol. 111, which would have had V.7763–end and VI.1–91; the lower third of fol. 125 is cut out. In addition, fols 88–89 are misbound.

Text: not collated by Macaulay, but allocated to recension I by Eileen Gardiner (see Doyle and Parkes, ‘Production of Copies’, 195 and note 176).