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The origin of the Exeter Book of Old English poetry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Richard Gameson
Affiliation:
University of Kent at Canterbury

Extract

Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3501, fols. 8–130, the celebrated Exeter Book of Old English Poetry, preserves approximately one-sixth of the surviving corpus of Old English verse, and its importance for the study of pre-Conquest vernacular literature can hardly be exaggerated. It is physically a handsome codex, and is of large dimensions for one written in the vernacular: c. 320 × 220 mm, with a written area of c. 240 × 160 mm (see pl. III). In contrast to many coeval English manuscripts, particularly those in the vernacular, there is documentary evidence for the Exeter Book's pre-Conquest provenance. Assuming it is identical with the ‘i mycel Englisc boc be gehwilcum þingum on leoðwisum geworht’ (‘one large English book about various things written in verse’) in the inventory of lands, ornaments and books that Leofric, bishop of Crediton then Exeter, had acquired for the latter foundation, then it has been at Exeter since the third quarter of the eleventh century. This, however, is at least three generations after the book was written, and it has generally been assumed that it originated else where. Identifying the scriptorium where the Exeter Book was made is clearly a matter of the greatest interest and importance. A recent, admirably thorough monograph has put forward a thought-provoking case for seeing Exeter itself as the centre responsible, and has proceeded to draw a range of literary and historical conclusions from this. The comprehensive new critical edition of the manuscript has favoured the thesis, and it has been echoed elsewhere. If correct, this is extremely valuable and exciting – but is it correct? The matter is of sufficient importance to merit further scrutiny.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

1 The facsimile edition is: The Exeter Book of Old English Poetry, ed. Chambers, R. W., Förster, M. and Flower, R. (London, 1933)Google Scholar. The most recent and detailed discussion of the material fabric of the volume is Conner, P. W., Anglo-Saxon Exeter: a Tenth-Century Cultural History (Woodbridge, 1993), pp. 95147Google Scholar; his observations are meticulous, but the conclusions he draws from them are, in the opinion of the present writer, questionable. There are numerous editions of the individual poems. The ‘standard’, widely used, old edition of the codex as a whole is The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp, G. P. and Dobbie, E. V. K., ASPR 3 (New York and London, 1936)Google Scholar. A new comprehensive edition has recendy been published: The Exeter Anthology of Old English Poetry: an Edition of Exeter Dean and Chapter MS 3501, ed. Muir, B. J., 2 vols. (text and commentary) (Exeter, 1994)Google Scholar; see II, 695–817 for an extensive bibliography. Not the least valuable aspect of Muir's edition is the colour plate that prefaces each volume. For discussion of the anthology as a whole, see Sisam, K., ‘The Exeter Book’, in his Studies in the History of Old English Literature (Oxford, 1953), pp. 97108Google Scholar; The Old English Elegies: a Critical Edition and Genre Study, ed. Klinck, A. L. (Montreal, 1992), pp. 2430Google Scholar; Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 148–64Google Scholar; and The Exeter Anthology, ed. Muir, I, 1827.Google Scholar

2 The inventory survives in two copies: Oxford, Bodleian Library, Auct. D. 2. 16, fols. 1–2; and Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3501, fols. 1–2 (originally part of Cambridge, University Library, Ii. 2. 11). For editions and discussion, see The ExeterBook, ed. Chambers, et al. , pp. 1032Google Scholar; Anglo-Saxon Charters, ed. Robertson, A. J., 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1956), pp. 227–31 with 473–80Google Scholar; Lapidge, M., ‘Surviving Booklists from Anglo-Saxon England’, Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Lapidge, M. and Gneuss, H. (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 3389, at 64–9Google Scholar; and Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 226–35Google Scholar. There is also a sixteenth-century transcript: Graham, T., ‘A Parkerian Transcript of the List of Bishop Leofric's Procurements for Exeter Cathedral: Matthew Parker, the Exeter Book, and Cambridge, University Library, MS Ii. 2. 11’, Trans. of the Cambridge Bibliographical Sac. 10 (19911994), 421–55.Google Scholar

3 Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter.

4 The Exeter Anthology, ed. Muir, I, 3Google Scholar (‘either Crediton or Exeter’, with reference to Conner in the notes). Cf. also his ‘Watching the Exeter Book Scribe Copy Old English and Latin Texts’, Manuscripts 35 (1991), 322, at 13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 See above, n. 2.

6 see Toller, T. N., Supplement to an Anglo-Saxon Dictionary by J. Bosworth and T. N. Toller (Oxford, 1921), pp. 313–14Google Scholar: there is nothing among the meanings and examples there given to justify Conner's translation of ‘Þæt is Þæt he hæfð Þiderinn gedon …’ as ‘that is that he has therein acquired…’ (Anglo-Saxon Exeter, p. 231).Google Scholar

7 ‘7 he ne funde on Þam minstre Þa he tofeng boca na ma buton. i. capitularie. 7. i. forealdod nihtsang. 7. i. pistelboc. 7. ii. forealdode rædingbec swiðe wake. 7. i. wac mæssereaf’.

8 Thus Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 227–8.Google Scholar

9 If this were indeed the case, they would surely not have left behind a comparatively handsome volume like the Exeter Book.

10 ‘7 se Þe ðas gyfu 7 Þisne unnan wille God 7 Sancte Petre ætbredan, si him heofena rice ætbroden, 7 si he ecelice geniðerod into hellewite’ (‘And whosoever should wish to deprive God and St Peter of this gift and this grant, may he be deprived of the kingdom of heaven and may he be eternally condemned to hell-torment’).

11 Cf. the will of Alfwold, bishop of Crediton (drawn up 997 × 1012), in which that bishop leaves three service books to Crediton: Councils and Synods, with other Documents relating to the English Church I.A.D. 871–1204, ed. Whitelock, D., Brett, M. and Brooke, C. N. L., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1981) I, 382–6, at 386Google Scholar; also Lapidge, , ‘Booklists’, no. V (pp. 55–6).Google Scholar

12 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41 has a Leofric donation inscription (see Page, R. I., Matthew Parker and his Books (Kahmzzoo, MI, 1993), pl. 27b), but does not appear on the inventory.Google Scholar

13 For a rosier interpretation of the scanty facts, see Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 2132.Google Scholar

14 Florentii Wigorniensis Monachi Chronicon ex Chronicis, ed. Thorpe, B., 2 vols. (London, 18481849) I, 141Google Scholar: ‘Rex Anglorum pacificus Eadgarus, monachis in Exanceastra congregatis, virum religiosum Sidemannum illis abbatis jure praefecit.’ Knowles, D., Brooke, C. N. L. and London, V., The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 48Google Scholar, reasonably conjecture that he is identical with the Sidemann who was bishop of Crediton between 973–7.

15 see Gameson, R. G., ‘Book Production and Decoration at Worcester in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries’, Saint Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence, ed. Brooks, N. and Cubitt, C. (Leicester, 1996), pp. 194243.Google Scholar

16 Lapidge, ‘Booklists’, no. IV (pp. 52–5).Google Scholar

17 Two Saxon Chronicles Parallel, ed. Earle, J. and Plummer, C., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1899) I, 134Google Scholar; English Historical Documents I, ed. Whitelock, D., 2nd ed. (London, 1979), p. 239Google Scholar. Cf. Florentii Wigorniensis Chronicon ex Chronicis, ed. Thorpe, I, 156Google Scholar: ‘Hoc anno rex Danorum Swein, per insilium, incuriam, et traditionem Nortmannici comitis Hugonis, quern regina Emma Domnaniae praefecit, civitatem Exanceastram infregit, spoliavit, murum ab orientali usque ad occidentalem portam destruxit, et cum ingenti praeda naves repetiit.’

18 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum, ed. Stubbs, W., 2 vols., RS (London, 18871889) I, 188Google Scholar: ‘Occidentalis provincia, quae Devenscire vocatur, pessundata, eversis monasteriis et Exonia urbe incensa.’

19 Codex Diplomaticus, ed. Kemble, J., 6 vols. (London, 18391848), no. 729Google Scholar; Sawyer, P., Anglo-Saxon Charters: an Annotated List and Bibliography (London, 1968), no. 954Google Scholar. see Chaplais, P., ‘The Authenticity of the Royal Anglo-Saxon Diplomas of Exeter’, Bull. of the Inst. of Hist. Research 39 (1966), 134CrossRefGoogle Scholar (repr. with addendum in his Essays in Medieval Diplomacy and Administration (London, 1981), no. XV (p. 45)).Google Scholar

20 Knowles, Brooke and London, Heads of Religious Houses, p. 48.Google Scholar

21 According to the charter purporting to date from 1019 (see above, n. 19).

22 According to Leofric's inventory (see above, n. 2).

23 ‘Et quia locus ille terris, libris, omni/bus/que ornamentis ecclesiasticis pene despoliatus eratnam ex. xxvi. terris quas rex religiosus Æthelstanus illuc dedit, uix una uilissima remansit, et tres codices feretrumque reliquarum …’ For an edition of the text as a whole, see Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 215–25 (this extract at p. 225).Google Scholar

24 This follows the version in Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3501 (originally part of Cambridge, University Library, Ii. 2. 11). Fundamental on the identity of the texts and correspondences with surviving manuscripts are Förster's discussion in Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , esp. pp. 2530Google Scholar, and Lapidge, ‘Booklists’, esp. pp. 66–9.Google Scholar

25 see Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , p. 29, n. 111.Google Scholar

26 Though, to put it in perspective, it is less than half the number reputedly acquired by Abbot Olbert of Gembloux, near Namur (d. 1048). According to the Gesta abbatum Gemblacensium, ed. Pertz, G. H., MGH, SS 8 (Leipzig, 1848), 540Google Scholar, he accumulated a hundred sacred and fifty secular texts in his bid to amass a comprehensive library.

27 The missal is Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 579. For the scribes, see Bishop, T. A. M., ‘Notes on Cambridge Manuscripts Part III: Manuscripts Connected with Exeter’, Trans. of the Cambridge Bibliographical Soc. 2 (19541958), 192–9Google Scholar; Chaplais, ‘Anglo-Saxon Diplomas of Exeter’; Rankin, S., ‘From Memory to Record: Musical Notations in Manuscripts from Exeter’, ASE 13 (1984), 97112Google Scholar; and, above all, Drage, E., ‘Bishop Leofric and the Exeter Cathedral Chapter 1050–1072: a Reassessment of the Manuscript Evidence’ (unpubl. DPhil dissertation, Oxford Univ., 1978), esp. ch. 3. It is a great pity that Drage's important work is not more easily accessible.Google Scholar

28 Bishop, , ‘Notes’, p. 194Google Scholar; Ker, N. R., Catalogue of Manuscripts containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford, 1957), no. 17Google Scholar; Robinson, P. R., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 757–1600 in Cambridge libraries, 2 vols. (Woodbridge, 1988) I, no. 48Google Scholar; II, pl. 20.

29 Ker, Catalogue, no. 19; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 54; II, pl. 21; see further Morgan, D., ‘The Old English Pastoral Care: the Scribal Contribution’, Studies in Earlier Old English Prose, ed. Szarmach, P. (New York, 1986), pp. 108–27, esp. 119–24Google Scholar. Though not readily apparent from the published plates, this is a strikingly handsome book.

30 Ker, Catalogue, no. 20; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 55; II, pl. 22.

31 Ker, Catalogue, no. 46; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 139; II, pl. 24; Page, Matthew Parker and his Books, pl. 52. For the edition, see The Old English Version with the Latin Original of the Enlarged Rule of Chrodegang, ed. Napier, A. S., EETS os 150 (London, 1914), with facsimiles as frontispiece and facing p. 70.Google Scholar

32 Ker, Catalogue, no. 47; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 141; II, pl. 25; with Kotzor, G., ‘St Patrick in the Old English “Martyrology”: on a Lost Leaf of MS C.C.C.C. 196’, N&Q 219 (1974), 86–7.Google Scholar

33 Ker, Catalogue, no. 50; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 144; II, pl. 26. CCCC 191, 196 and 201, pp. 179272Google Scholar are virtually identical in size (c. 280 × 170mm), in format (written area: c. 225 × 100mm; 27 lines per page; space between lines 8–9mm), and in articulation (the plain section initials are alternately red, green, red, blue).

34 Ker, Catalogue, no. 69; Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge I, no. 164; II, pl. 27. This is a supplement to a s. xi1 collection of Old English homilies, which comprised CCCC 419+421, pp. 12, 99208 and 227334.Google Scholar

35 Watson, A. G., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts c. 700–1600 in the Department of Manuscripts, The British Library, 2 vols. (London, 1979) I, no. 322Google Scholar; II, pl. 40; Prescott, A., ‘The Structure of English Pre-Conquest Benedictionals’, Brit. Lib.Jnl 13.2 (1987), 118–58, at 130 with fig. 4.Google Scholar

36 Sotheby's Western Manuscripts and Miniatures, December 1981, sale Catalogue (London, 1981), lot. 8 with plateGoogle Scholar; de Hamel, C. R.. A History of Illuminated Manuscripts (Oxford, 1986), pl. 210Google Scholar; Rankin, ‘Exeter’, pl. IXa.

37 Ker, Catalogue, no. 144; Watson, Dated and Datable British Library I, no. 524; II, pl. 41.

38 Ker, Catalogue, no. 213; Watson, Dated and Datable British Library I, no. 573; II, pl. 42.

39 Watson, Dated and Datable British Library I, no. 638; II, pls. 43 and 102; The Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art, ed.Backhouse, J., Turner, D. H. and Webster, L. (London, 1984), no. 160 with pl. on p. 156.Google Scholar

40 Watson, Dated and Datable British Library I, no. 718; II, pl. 44; Rankin, ‘Exeter’, pl. XI. For the text, see The Liofric Collector, ed. Dewick, E. S. and Frere, W. H., 2 vols., HBS 45–6 (London, 19141921), with plates in vol. I.Google Scholar

41 Ker, Catalogue, no. 283.

42 Lapidge, M., ‘Ealdred of York and MS Cotton Vitellius E. XII’, Yorkshire Archaeol.Jnl 55 (1983), 1125Google Scholar; repr. in his Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066 (London, 1993), pp. 453–67.Google Scholar

43 In fact, we cannot be certain that inscriptions were added to all his ‘second hand’ acquisitions. The assumption that this was the case is a circular argument, since it is only via the inscriptions that we can confidently identify Leofrician volumes. Moreover, the evidence of Lambeth Palace Library, 149 (below, n. 129) suggests that on at least one occasion Leofric had himself commemorated in an acquisition in an entirely different way.

44 Ælfric's Catholic Homilies: the Second Series, ed. Godden, M., EETS ss 5 (London, 1979), xliii.Google Scholar

45 Exeter, Cathedral Library, 2072 and 2526: Ordnance Survey Facsimiles of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, ed. Sanders, W. B., 3 vols. (Southampton, 18781884) II, Exeter xii and xiii; Chaplais, ‘Diplomas of Exeter’, nos. 26 and 27, pp. 2630.Google Scholar

46 see most recently Babcock, G., Reconstructing a Medieval Library: Fragments from Lambach (New Haven, CT, 1993), esp. pp. 3549 (drawing on the work of Kurt Holter).Google Scholar

47 Bede, HistoriaAbbatum, chs. 4, 6, 9 and 15: Vinerabilis Baedae Opera Historica, ed. Plummer, C., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1896) 1, 367, 368–9, 373 and 380.Google Scholar

48 For instance, in the correspondence of Fulbertof Chartres and Anselm: The Letters and Poems of Fulbert of Chartres, ed. Behrends, F. (Oxford, 1976), epp. 82, 88 and 105Google Scholar; Sancti Anselmi Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi Opera Omnia, ed. Schmitt, F. S., 6 vols. (Seckau, Rome and Edinburgh, 19381961) III, epp. 12, 23, 25–6, 42–3, 60, 72, 74 and 146–7.Google Scholar

49 Cross, J. E. and Hall, T. N., ‘The Fragments of Homiliaries in Canterbury, Cathedral Library, MS Addit. 127/1 and in Kent County Archives Office, Maidstone, MS PRC 49/2’, Scriptorium 47 (1993), 186–92, at 186–7, identify Saint Orfier, Bibliotheque Municipale, 202, with Leofric's ‘i full spelboc wintres 7 sumeres’ [inventory 21]. No details are provided (a future discussion is promised) and it is not a manuscript I know. Accordingly it seems prudent to note the suggestion, but not to include the book here at this stage.Google Scholar

50 Ker, Catalogue, no. 32; Temple, E., Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900–1066 (London, 1976), cat. 81Google Scholar; with Grant, R. J. S., Cambridge Corpus Christi College 41: the Loricas and the Missal (Amsterdam, 1979)Google Scholar; and Three Homilies from Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41, ed. Grant, R. J. S. (Ottawa, 1982).Google Scholar

51 Ker, Catalogue, no. 45A. see also Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , p. 27, nn. 92–3.Google Scholar

52 Ker, Catalogue, no. 45B.

53 Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 21; Keynes, S., Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts and otherItems of related Interest in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge, OEN Subsidia 18 (New York, 1992), no. 6.Google Scholar

54 See above, n. 42.

55 van Dijk, S. J. P., Latin Liturgical Manuscripts and Printed Books (Oxford, 1952), no. 7Google Scholar; Pacht, O. and Alexander, J. J. G., Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, 3 vols. (Oxford, 19661973) 1, nos. 427 and 433, with pl. xxxvGoogle Scholar; Zarnecki, G. et al. , English Romanesque Art 1066–1200 [Arts Council exhibition Catalogue] (London, 1984), no. 8.Google Scholar

56 SC 2455. Ker, Catalogue, no. 294; Bishop, T. A. M., English Caroline Minuscule (Oxford, 1971), no. 9Google Scholar; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 37; also Parkes, M. B., Pause and Effect. Punctuation in the West (Aldershot, 1992), pl. 72.Google Scholar

57 SC 2455.

58 SC 2666. Wieland, G., ‘The Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts of Prudentius' Psychomachia’, ASE 16 (1987), 213–31, esp. 218–21 and 225–9Google Scholar. Leofric's inscription is illustrated in Barlow, F., Dexter, K. M., Erskine, A. M. and Lloyd, L. J., Leofric of Exeter (Exeter, 1972), pl. VIGoogle Scholar. Written in a moderately neat, quite rectilinear Caroline minuscule, and bearing extensive, planned marginal annotation, the volume is unlikely to have been much more than a generation old when Leofric acquired it.

59 SC 2225. It is written in an intriguing, difficult to locate (and hence difficult to date) Caroline minuscule. The corrections (s. xiex) include work by a Norman or Anglo-Norman hand (see, e.g. 17r); and there are no additions in a diagnostically Exeter hand. The book is now bound with an Exeter copy (s. xii2/4) of Jerome, Contra Iouinianum (= fols. 85–127). See further below, n. 161.

60 SC 2675. Edition: The Leofric Missal, ed. Warren, F. E. (Oxford, 1883)Google Scholar. Ker, Catalogue, no. 315; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 17; Rankin, ‘Exeter’, pls. IXb and c and X; Dumville, , ‘The Liturgical Calendar of Anglo-Saxon Glastonbury: a Chimaera?’, in his Liturgy and the EcclesiasticalHistory of Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 3965.Google Scholar

61 SC 2609. Ker, Catalogue, no. 316; Bishop, English Caroline Minuscule, no. 10; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 19 (xi).

62 SC 2602. Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 413; Watson, A. G., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts in Oxford Libraries c. 434–1600, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1984) I, no. 116Google Scholar; II, pl. 4.

63 Mention should also be made of Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 229 (SC 2120; Augustine, Sermoner, s. ximed; origin: continental, probably northern France) which is old enough to have been acquired in Leofric's time and which contains notes on the correct order of the text in a hand that Drage identified as belonging to an Exeter scribe (53v, 54r, 86r and 92v). However, the text is not on Leofric's inventory, suggesting that the book was either acquired by the canons themselves or by Leofric's successor, FitzOsbern.

64 King Alfred's West Saxon Version of Gregory's Pastoral Care, ed. Sweet, H., 2 vols., EETS os 45 and 50 (Oxford, 1871) I, 67Google Scholar. For a convenient summary of his literary programme, see Alfred the Great, trans. Keynes, S. and Lapidge, M. (Harmondsworth, 1983), pp. 2537Google Scholar. For further comment on the individual texts, see Frantzen, A. J., King Alfred (Boston, 1986), pp. 22105.Google Scholar

65 ‘Persius’ (work unspecified) appears four times among the thirteen booklists printed in Lapidge, ‘Booklists’, one of these being Leofric's, the others being nos. III and XI (twice).

66 Ker, N. R. [and Piper, A.], Medieval Manuscripts in British Libraries, 4 vols. (Oxford, 19691992) [henceforth: MMBL] II, 839–40Google Scholar; also Dumville, , Liturgy, p. 76.Google Scholar

67 Ker, , MMBL II, 840Google Scholar; Dumville, , Liturgy, p. 77.Google Scholar

68 Ker, , MMBL II, 845.Google Scholar

70 Lowe, E. A., Codices Latini Antiquiores, 11 vols. plus Supplement, with 2nd ed. of vol. II (Oxford, 19341972) II, no. 190Google Scholar; Ker, Catalogue, no. 194; Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 165–9Google Scholar; Dumville, D. N., ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Mid-Century Phases’, ASE 23 (1994), 138–64, at 134–5.Google Scholar

71 SC 2129. The English hand was responsible for fol. 26. See further below, n. 100.

72 SC 2122. There is a partly erased inscription of s. x/xion 1r (‘–sea marian for – / – hys gemæccan’) which may imply it was connected with a house dedicated to Mary at that time. See further Ker, Catalogue, no. 307; Bishop, , English Caroline Minuscule, p. xxvGoogle Scholar; and Dumville, D. N., English Caroline Script and Monastic History: Studies in Benedictinism, A.D. 950–1030 (Woodbridge, 1993), pp. 54–6.Google Scholar

73 Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3512; Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 94, 147, 148, 707, 717, 739, 808, 810 and 813. The same hand also added a tide to the slightly earlier Bodley 229. Different hands added tides to Bodley 193, 237 and 274, and added to the contents lists in Bodley 94 and 147.

74 On the latter, with brief comments on the former, see Blake, D. W., ‘Bishop William Warelwast’, Trans. of the Devonshire Assoc. 104 (1972), 1533.Google Scholar

75 The 1327 inventory is Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3671; printed in Oliver, G., Lives of the Bishops of Exeter (Exeter, 1861), pp. 301–10Google Scholar; matched with surviving manuscripts in Ker, N. R., Medieval Libraries of Great Britain, 2nd ed. (London, 1964), pp. 81–5Google Scholar, with Watson, A. G., Supplement (London, 1987), p. 36Google Scholar. For general comments on the Catalogue, see Erskine, A. M., ‘The Growth of Exeter Cathedral Library after Bishop Leofric's Time’, in Barlow, et al. , Leofric of Exeter, pp. 4355 with pl. VIIIGoogle Scholar. Another page is reproduced in Lloyd, L. J., The Library of Exeter Cathedral (Exeter, 1967), pl. 7.Google Scholar

The ‘Libri Wilhelmi Episcopi’ (Oliver, , Lives, pp. 304–5) are as follows. ‘Una biblia magna in duobus voluminibus, 10 marcas. Alia biblia consimilis in duobus voluminibus, 10 marcas. [Addition: Ostiensis in duobus voluminibus, 10 marcas. Receptus de Domino Johanne Episcopo in Escambio pro duabus Bibliis in duobus voluminibus ejusdem precii.] Liber omelarium “Passionem”, 1 marca. Alius liber omelarium, “Quum video”, 1 marca. Tercius liber omelarium, “Igiturquam”. Passionarius in tribus voluminibus, quorum primum “Quam Deo”, secundum “Sulpicius Severus”, tercium “Silvester igitur”. Una biblia in uno volumine, 4 marcas. Communis liber sanctorum de usu rotomagensi, “Architectus”. Unus liber sanctorum de eodem usu, in duobus voluminibus, quorum unum, “Erit in novissimis” et aliud, “Cum complerentur”. Legenda sanctorum, “Stabat Johannes”.’Google Scholar

76 See above, n. 63. The added tide is ‘Gregorori[us] xl/ta/ Omeliarum’.

77 Norman/Anglo-Norman type script; St Albans' style decoration. The scribe also wrote Durham, Cathedral Library B. III. 1 and B. III. 10, and Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 301. see further Bishop, , ‘Notes’, pp. 197–8Google Scholar; and Gullick, M., ‘The Scribe of the Carilef Bible: a New Look at some Late Eleventh-Century Durham Cathedral Manuscripts’, Medieval Book Production: Assessing the Evidence, ed. Brownrigg, L. L. (Los Altos, CA, 1990), pp. 6183, at 63 and 78, n. 18.Google Scholar

78 Comprises three distinct parts. Includes work by the scribe of Cambridge, Trinity College O. 10.23: Bishop, , ‘Notes III’, pp. 198–9.Google Scholar

79 The quire signatures show that, although prepared to the same format as fols. 1–57, this was originally a separate volume.

80 Written by one scribe who also contributed to TCC B. 14. 30.

81 Ker, , MMBL II, 708–11. I have not seen this manuscript.Google Scholar

82 Ibid. pp. 819–21. Not seen.

83 Ibid. pp. 830–2. Not seen.

84 Ibid. Not seen.

85 Warner, G. F. and Gilson, J. P., Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King's Collections, 4 vols. (London, 1921) I, 136Google Scholar; IV, pl. 46a.

86 SC 1901; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 462. Script type similar to that in Bodley 94 and 137.

87 SC 1904; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 460. Script type similar to that in Bodley 92 and 137.

88 SC 1899; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 456.

89 SC 1903. Script type similar to Bodley 92 and 94.

90 SC 1918; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 446; Boase, T. S. R., English Romanesque Illumination (Oxford, 1951), ill. 3Google Scholar. The script is similar to that of Bodley 707, 739 and 813. The artist is very similar to the second artist of Bodley 707 (91 v) and that of Bodley 739, 8v, 16r,24r,33v and 67v.

91 SC 1920; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 461; Gullick, , ‘Scribe of the Carilef Bible’, p. 83, n. 75 with fig. 20.Google Scholar

92 SC 2100; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 67, pl. VII.

93 SC 1939; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 83.

94 SC 2244; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 465.

95 SC 1940; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 79. A companion to Bodley 273 and 289 (different scribes were responsible for each volume).

96 SC 1941; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 79. A companion to Bodley 272 and 289 and hence included here although it looks to be of slightly later date.

97 SC 1942; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 466. Script similar to that of Bodley 301.

98 SC 2741; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 79. Companion to Bodley 272 and 273.

99 SC 2739; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 444 with pl. XXXVI. The artist is closely related to the decorator of the Carilef Bible (Durham, Cathedral Library, A. II. 4); compare also (for style) Rouen, Bibliotheque Municipale, A. 35 (?St Ouen, Rouen); and (for design) Bayeux, Bibliotheque du Chapitre, 58. The scribe also wrote Cambridge, Clare College 18 and Durham, Cathedral Library, B. III. 1 and B. III. 10 (see above, n. 77).

100 SC 2129. Ker, N. R., English Manuscripts in the Century after the Norman Conquest (Oxford, 1960), pls. 2–3Google Scholar; Thomson, R. M., ‘The Norman Conquest and English Libraries’, The Role of the Book in Medieval Culture, ed. Ganz, P., 2 vols., Bibliologia 3–4 (Turnhout, 1986) II, 2740, at 37Google Scholar. Mainly written in a variety of continental hands, it includes a single folio by an English scribe who worked in Bodley 815 and probably also in Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale, lat. 14782.

101 SC 2013. This bears the inscription Liber Clerobaldi, informally written at the bottom of 75v in a hand that probably dates from the first half of the twelfth century. Clerobald is possibly to be identified with a royal clerk who appears to have been a canon of Exeter in William Warelwast's time.

102 SC 2740; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 449 with pl. XXXVII. Shares a scribe with lat. bib. d. 10.

103 SC 2608; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 445. Shares placement and style of quire signatures with Bodley 739; and placement with Bodley 147. Shares a correcting hand with Bodley 739. There are two artists: one is similar to that of the Carilef book, Durham, Cathedral Library, B. III. 16; the other is very similar to the artist of Bodley 147 and the second artist of Bodley 739.

104 SC 2631; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 441 with pl. XXXVI. see also Pächt, O., ‘Hugo Pictor’, Bodleian Lib. Record 3 (1950), 96103Google Scholar; Rickert, M., Painting in Britain: the Middle Ages, 2nd ed. (Harmondsworth, 1965), pl. 56aGoogle Scholar; Trésors des abbayes normands [exhibition Catalogue] (Rouen and Caen, 1979), no. 145Google Scholar; English Romanesque Art, cat. 5.

105 SC 2736; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 448. Script type similar to that of Bodley 147, 707 and 813. Shares placement and style of signatures with Bodley 707; shares style with 147. The artist of the initials on 8v, 16r, 24r, 33v and 67v is very similar to, and probably identical with, the artist of Bodley 707, 91v and Bodley 147.

106 SC 2610; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 442, pl. XXXVI.

107 SC 2640; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 469. Ex-silentio the text of the Prognosticon is not that of the mainly German/Austrian family represented in the English copies British Library, Royal 12. C. XXIII (Christ Church, Canterbury) and Oxford, University College, 104 (Battle): Julian of Toledo, Prognosticon futuri saeculi, ed. Hillgarth, J. N., CCSL 115 (Turnhout, 1976), xlv.Google Scholar

108 SC 2663.

109 SC 2667; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 459.

110 SC 2677; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 467. Companion to Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3512. Partly written by the scribe of the Carilef Bible.

111 SC 2681; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 446 with pl. XXXVII. Similar script type to Bodley 147, 707 and 739. Shares a correcting hand with Bodley 707 and 739.

112 SC 2759. Shares a scribe with Bodley 314, fol. 26. Probably collated as ‘D’ in S. Aurelii Augustini Confeisiones, ed. Pusey, E. B. (Oxford, 1838).Google Scholar

113 de la Mare, A. C., ‘A Probable Addition to the Bodleian's Holdings of Exeter Cathedral Manuscripts’, Bodleian Lib. Record 11 (19821985), 7983Google Scholar. Shares a scribe with Bodley 691.

114 Alexander, J. J. G., ‘A Litde-Known Gospel Book of the Later Eleventh Century from Exeter’, Burlington Mag. 108 (1966), 616Google Scholar; and Alexander, , Medieval Illuminators and their Methods of Work (New Haven and London, 1992), pp. 7782 with ill. 127Google Scholar; Kauffman, C. M., Romanesque Manuscripts 1066–1190 (London, 1975), no. 2Google Scholar; Zarnecki et al., English Romanesque Art. cat. 9; Avril, E. and Stirnemann, P., Manuscrits enluminés d'origine insulaire (Paris, 1987), no. 26 with pls. C and VIGoogle Scholar. The hand responsible for 3r/20 (last word) – 22, 4v/24 (last word) – 25 (word 4), 31v/16–19, 39v/23–6, 61v/14–15, 62r/25–6 (corrections) is probably identical with the scribe of Bodley 815.

115 Note should be made of Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3525 (Ker, , MMBL II, pp. 834–6Google Scholar), which Ker ascribed to s. xiiin but which does not appear in Medieval Libraries of Great Britain. Its only association with Exeter would thus seem to be the fact that it is there now. I have not seen the book so do not know whether or not it is linked to any other Exeter manuscripts of this period via its physical appearance. It must suffice for the moment, therefore, just to record its existence, pending future investigation.

116 For a convenient summary, see Thomson, ‘Norman Conquest and English Libraries’.

117 For which see Webber, T., Scribes and Scholars at Salisbury Cathedral c. 1075-c. 1125 (Oxford, 1992).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

118 Compare Ker, , English Manuscripts in the Century after the Norman Conquest, pp. 23–5Google Scholar; and Thomson, , ‘Norman Conquest and English Libraries’, pp. 35 and 37Google Scholar. see further Gameson, R. G., ‘Manuscrits normands à Exeter aux xie et xiie siécles’, in Manuscrits et enluminures dans le monde normand, xie–xve siècles, ed. Bouet, P. and Dosdat, M. (Caen, forthcoming).Google Scholar

119 see Gameson, R. G., ‘English Manuscript Art in the Late Eleventh Century: Canterbury and its Context’, Canterbury and the Norman Conquest, ed. Bales, R. and Sharpe, R. (London, 1995), pp. 95145, at 105–10.Google Scholar

120 I have not seen Eton 97 and Exeter 3520; and I know Exeter 3512 only from five photographs.

121 Durham, Cathedral Library, A. II. 4: Mynors, R. A. B., Durham Cathedral Manuscripts (Oxford, 1939), no. 30 with pls. 16–18Google Scholar; Gullick,‘Scribe of the Carilef Bible’.

122 See nn. 99 and 104.

123 see The Old English Version of the Englarged Rule of Chrodegang, ed. Napier, , cc. 13, 16, 32, 47 and 77 (pp. 23–4, 27–8, 42–3, 56–7 and 84).Google Scholar

124 For reflections on the sometimes paradoxical circumstances that engendered book production in the early medieval west, see Gameson, R. G., ‘Alfred the Great and the Destruction and Production of Christian Books’. Scriptorium 49 (1995), 180210.Google Scholar

125 Chaplais, , ‘Diplomas of Exeter’, esp. pp. 59 and 21–3.Google Scholar

126 ‘Deus cui omne cor patet, et omnis uoluntas loquitur et nullum latet secretum, purifica per infusionem sancti spiritus cogitationes cordis nostri, ut perfecte te diligere, et digne laudare mereamur’: the collect for the feast of the commemoration of the Holy Spirit (see, e.g. A Pre-Conquest English Prayer Book, ed. Muir, B. J., HBS 103 (London, 1988), 102Google Scholar). It appears in the Leofric Missal under ‘Missa de cordis emundatione per spiritum sanctum postulanda’: The Leofric Missal, ed. Warren, F. E. (Oxford, 1883), p. 177.Google Scholar

127 Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 3347.Google Scholar

128 Ker, , MMBL II, 813–14Google Scholar. For reproductions, see Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pl. XIII; Lloyd, Library of Exeter Cathedral, pl. 3; Barlow et at., Leofric of Exeter, pl. VII. Much the same collection of texts appears in British Library, Cotton Vitellius A. xii (Salisbury; s. xi/xii), and its De compute would seem to have been transcribed from the same exemplar. Also derived from the same exemplar is Avranches, Bibliotheque Municipale, 114. These three copies also have glosses in common: see Maurus, Hrabanus, De computo, ed. Stevens, W. M., CCCM 44 (Turnhout, 1979), 190, 191 and 194.Google Scholar

129 James, M. R., A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Lambeth Palace: the Medieval Manuscripts (Cambridge, 1932), pp. 237–9Google Scholar. For reproductions, see Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pls. VIII–IX; Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , p. 86Google Scholar; Muir, ‘Exeter Book Scribe’, pls. 3, 4 and 7.

130 SC 2226; Ker, Catalogue, no. 308. For reproductions, see Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pls. X-XI; Muir, ‘Exeter Book Scribe’, pls. 5–6. The first and last leaves (fols. ii–iv+1–18, and 72–5) have been badly damaged by damp. Much of the final leaf (75) has been neady cut away.

131 SC 2632; Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts III, no. 36 with pl. III; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 30(xiv), with III. 111. For further reproductions, see Alexander, J. J. G., Anglo-Saxon Illumination in Oxford Libraries (Oxford, 1970), Ill. 12(a)Google Scholar; Frantzen, A. J., The Literature of Penance in Anglo-Saxon England (New Brunswick, NJ, 1983), d.w.Google Scholar; Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pl. XIV; St Dunstan: his Life, Times and Cult, ed. Ramsay, N., Sparks, M. and Tatton-Brown, T. (Woodbridge, 1992), pl. 23.Google Scholar

132 Leroquais, V., Les pontificaux manuscrits des bibliothèques publiques de France, 4 vols. (Paris, 1937) II, 610, with pls. VII-XGoogle Scholar; Ker, Catalogue, no. 364; Catalogue des manuscrits en ecriture latineportant des indications de date, de lieu ou de copiste, ed. Samaran, C. and Marichal, R., 7 fascicules to date (Paris, 1959–) Il.i, 43Google Scholar; ii, pls. 134–8; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 35, pls. 134–8; Backhouse el at., Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art, no. 34; Avril and Stirnemann, Manuscrits enluminés, no. 16; Dumville, , Liturgy, pp. 82–4.Google Scholar

133 Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, p. 44.Google Scholar

154 Interestingly, on 77v the corrector quoted a variant, introducing it with the note, ‘Aha editio h[abe[t’.

135 ‘Explicit domino iuuante expositionis in apocalipsin sancti iohannis liber tertius bedan famuli Christi deo gratias.’

136 Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pl. XII.

137 He also sometimes used an ‘oc’ form of ‘a’. For detailed discussion of the individual letter forms used in the Exeter Book, see Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , pp. 83–5Google Scholar; Muir, B. J., ‘A Preliminary Report on a New Edition of the Exeter Book’, Scriptorium 43 (1989), 273–88CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 5180.Google Scholar

138 Further on his work in general, see Muir, , ‘Exeter Book Scribe’, pp. 611Google Scholar; Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 80–6.Google Scholar

139 E.g. 53v–54v.

140 The ink has bled from time to time (e.g. 26r and v, 29v, 30r and 100v).

141 Capitals are washed in red (and occasionally green) throughout Bodley 319.

142 E.g. in the ET ligatures, and the occasional diminuendo after a capital (65r, 68v). The same features are intermittendy noticeable in Bodley 319.

143 see Muir, , ‘Exeter Book Scribe’, pp. 45Google Scholar; and Exeter Anthology I, 3743.Google Scholar

144 Fruitful comparison (and contrast) maybe made with Ordnance Survey Facsimiles, ed. Sanders, II, PROGoogle Scholar; Exeter v; Westminster iv, vi and viii; and III, xxix and xxxiv; British Museum Facsimiles of Ancient Charters, ed. Bond, E. A., 4 vols. (London, 18731878) III, 19, 25–7 and 33, and IV, 11Google Scholar; and Facsimiles of Anglo-Saxon Charters, ed. Keynes, S. D., British Academy Anglo-Saxon Charters Supplementary Volume I (Oxford, 1991), no. 9.Google Scholar

145 For recent discussion, see Dumville, , English Caroline Script, pp. 785.Google Scholar

146 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, lat. 10575: Leroquais, Pontificaux manuscrits II, 160–4; Ker, Catalogue, no. 370; Avril and Stirnemann, Manuscrits enluminis, no. 13, with pl. III. For an edition, see Two Anglo-Saxon Pontificals, ed. Banting, H. M. J., HBS 104 (London, 1989)Google Scholar, with plate on p. 2. For comment on the text, see Prescott, ‘Structure of English Pre-Conquest Benedictionals’, pp. 128–9Google Scholar. Prescott's analysis of the text suggests that it is unlikely to date from earlier than the 980s; the script (along with the consistent HF, HF arrangement of the parchment) indicates that it is unlikely to be much later.

147 Salisbury, Cathedral Library, 150: Ker, Catalogue, no. 379; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 18Google Scholar; see further Stroud, D., ‘The Provenance of the Salisbury Psalter’, The Library 6th ser. 1 (1979), 225–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an edition, see The Salisbury Psalter, ed. K. and Sisam, C., EETS os 242 (Oxford and London, 1959) with frontispiece facs.Google Scholar

148 London, British Library, Add. 37517: Ker, Catalogue, no. 120; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 22; Backhouse et al., Golden Age, no. 36, with pl. V. see further Gasquet, F. A. and Bishop, E., The Bosworth Psalter (London, 1908)Google Scholar; Korhammer, M., ‘The Origin of the Bosworth Psalter’, ASE 2 (1973), 173–87Google Scholar; and The Canterbury Hymnal, ed. Wieland, G. (Toronto, 1982).Google Scholar

149 James, M. R., A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1912) I, 114–18Google Scholar; Ker, Catalogue, no. 34; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, no. 30 (x). For an edition, see The Rule of St Benedict: the Abingdon Copy, ed. Chamberlain, J. (Toronto, 1982). For a reproduction of the script (also showing later restoration), see Dumville, English Caroline Script, pl. XVGoogle Scholar

150 More distant comparison may be made with Durham, Cathedral Library, B. IV. 9, 100r–148r/2, and 148r/3–171 v: Mynors, Durham Cathedral Manuscripts, no. 18.

151 Dumville, D. N., ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Background and Earliest Phases’, ASE 16 (1987), 147–79Google Scholar, now supplemented by ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Mid-Century Phases’, pp. 133–44Google Scholar; with Gameson, R. G., ‘The Decoration of the Tanner Bede’, ASE 21 (1992), 115–59, esp. 117–28.Google Scholar

152 Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 21; S. D. Keynes, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, no. 6, with pl. VI. The dating to the 930s that has recently been proposed on the grounds of the script alone (Dumville, D. N., ‘On the Dating of some Late Anglo-Saxon Liturgical Manuscripts’, Trans. of the Cambridge Bibliographical Sac. 10 (19911994), 4057, at 43)Google Scholar fits ill with the display script and decoration: an ascription to the mid-tenth century is more easily reconciled with all the features of the manuscript.

153 Keynes, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, no. 7, with pl. VII.

154 Ker, Catalogue, no. 217; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 19(ii); The Making of England: Anglo-Saxon Art and Culture A.D. 600–900, ed. Backhouse, J. and Webster, L. (London, 1991), no. 93, with ill. on p. 129Google Scholar; Two Lives of St Cuthbert, ed. Colgrave, B. (Cambridge, 1940), p. 27.Google Scholar

155 Collated as ‘Reg’ in Isidori Hispalensis Episcopi Etymologiarum siue Originum Libri XX, ed. Lindsay, W. M., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1911)Google Scholar. The beginning of bk I (7r) is headed by a fine Type IIb decorated initial D.

156 This important volume has yet to receive the attention it deserves. It measures 315 × 240mm, with a written area of 244 × 168mm. The parchment is mainly arranged HF, FH. The text is written thirty-four long lines to the page.

157 Dumville, , ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Mid-Century Phases’, pp. 136–43 argues for a date in the 930s for some of these St Augustine's books.Google Scholar

158 London, British Library, Royal 12. D. XVII. Ker, Catalogue, no. 264. For a facsimile, see Bald's Leechbook: British Museum Royal Manuscript 12 D. xvii, ed. Wright, C. E., EEMF 5 (Copenhagen, 1953).Google Scholar

159 The display script used in Bodley 319 is more difficult to parallel closely. However, this is just as true in relation to the five manuscripts with which it has recently been grouped as in relation to other broadly contemporary Anglo-Saxon books.

160 For discussions of this alphabet from different perspectives, see Heslop, T. A., ‘The Production of De Luxe Manuscripts and the Patronage of King Cnut and Queen Emma’, ASE 19 (1990), 151–95, esp. 162–72Google Scholar; and Gameson, R. G., ‘Manuscript Art at Christ Church, Canterbury, in the Generation after St Dunstan’, St Dunstan, ed. Ramsay, et al. , pp. 187220, csp. 188–99Google Scholar. The manuscripts known to me to contain such display script (or a relative of it (distinguished by *)) are as follows: Boulogne, Bibliothèque Municipale, 189; Cambridge, University Library, Ff. 4. 43; * Kk. 3. 21; Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 23; 57; 162; 389; * Cambridge, Pembroke College 41; Cambridge, Trinity College B. 1. 42; B. 14. 3; O. 1. 18; O. 2. 31; Durham, Cathedral Library, B. III. 32, pt I (fols. 1–55); Edinburgh, National Library of Scotland, Adv. 18. 7. 7; Exeter, Cathedral Library, 3507; London, British Library, Add. 37517; Add. 57337; Harley 1117, pt I; Harley 1117, pt II; Harley 5431; Royal 5. E. XI; Royal 6. A. VI; Royal 7. C. IV; Royal 12. C. XXIII; * London, Lambeth Palace Library, 149; Lambeth 200; New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, M 869; Oxford, Bodleian Library, Auct. E 1. 15, pt I; Auct. F. 1. 15, pt II; Bodley 97; Bodley 579 (additions); Bodley 708; Bodley 718; Digby 146; Rawl. C. 570; Oxford, Oriel College 3; Oxford, St John's College 28; Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, lat. 943; lat. 6401A; lat. 7585; lat. 17814; Paris, Ste Genevieve 2410 + Bibliothèque de 1'Arsenal 903; Rouen, Bibliotheque Municipale, A. 337; Sankt Gallen, Cantonsbibliothek (Vadiana), 337; Salisbury, Cathedral Library, 38; Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. lat. 204; Reg. lat. 489; and Worcester, Cathedral Library, Q. 5.

161 See above, n. 59.

162 The 1327 inventory (Oliver, , Lives, p. 303) includes under the heading ‘Libri Ysydori‘: ‘Ad Florentinam de Miraculis Christi “Quia Christus”’. As ‘Quia Christus’ are the opening words of the text as a whole (the beginning of the first capitulum) this is of no help in distinguishing between Bodley 319 and Bodley 394.Google Scholar The 1506 list includes ‘Liber de Miraculis Christi, 2 fo. “Quare mortuus”’ (Ibid. p. 367) and ‘Ysodorus ad Florenrium, 2 fo. “De latere”’ (Ibid. p. 372), the former presumably being Bodley 319 (secundo folio, ‘Quia mortuus’), the latter Bodley 394 (secundo folio, ‘Quia de latere’)

163 For the Salisbury copy of De miraculis Christi in British Library, Royal 5. E. XVI: Webber, , Scribes and Scholars, p. 68.Google Scholar

164 Discussed by Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 210–14Google Scholar. see further, Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , pp. 8590, esp. 87Google Scholar; Hill, J., ‘The Exeter Book and Lambeth Palace MS 149: a Reconsideration’, Amer. N&Q 24 (19851986), 112–16Google Scholar; and Hill, , ‘The Exeter Book and Lambeth Palace Library MS 149: the Monasterium of Sancta Maria’, Amer. N&Q ns 1 (1988), 49Google Scholar. In addition, note should be made of the lengthy erasure in the upper margin of 1 r where further evidence of provenance may have been obliterated.

165 ‘Hunc quoq[ue] uoluminem aethelu/v/ardus dux gratia dei admonaste / rium s[an]cte marie genetricis saluatoris /n[ost]ri/ condonauit; Quod est in loco qui dicitur [—] Hoc autem donum factum est anno / ab incarnatione redemptionis n[ost[re /m/xviii indi[cdone]. i. Et factum est ergo post obitum regis Eadmundi q[uo]d.’ At the end of the text on 138r a different s. xi1 hand has added, ‘AMEN / hec itaq[ue] huius sacramementi / + æþel + æþelwerd ealderma/n/ gret.’

166 Compare for general aspect Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 97.

167 Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , pp. 87–9Google Scholar. This Æthelweard was the son-in-law of Æthelmaer (founder of Cerne and Eynsham and patron of Ælfric), to whose earldom he succeeded.

168 The cases of Crediton and Exeter are discussed by Hill, ‘Monasterium of Sancta Maria’; Tavistock is treated by Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, p. 36.Google Scholar

169 The fact that the last line of the explicit is washed in a similar green to that of the Leofric inscription (the former is a slightly deeper and, in places, chalkier tone) is of no significance for the date of the latter. Such greens were widespread; moreover the washing of the explicit could have been done at any time – including the moment when the Leofric inscription was added. Nor is the circumstance that other Leofric inscriptions follow different formulae an argument against this one being his too: there is no reason to assume that Leofric was always commemorated in his books in the same way.

170 ‘Rabanus de compoto et Ysidorus de naturis rerum in uno volumine, “Dilecto fratri”’ (Oliver, , Lives, p. 303)Google Scholar. Its textual connections with BL, Cotton Vitellius A. xii and Avranches 114 (see n. 128) do not shed any clear light on its early provenance.

171 It is beautifully done. The letters are about the same size as those of the original script, the earlier types of d, g, r and s were employed, and some effort was made to form the other letters in accordance with a rectilinear matrix (some es have a straight back, for instance). Nevertheless, numerous details betray its origin in the second half of the eleventh century – though, because of the ‘cloned’ style, it is difficult tp establish the identity of the hand. It is clear that this leaf was prepared in situ since the transferred impression of its prickings can be seen on 102r. Comparison may be made with the semi-imitative script (the work of a different scribe) used for the supplementary quire in Cambridge, Trinity College B. 11. 2: see Robinson, Dated and Datable Cambridge II, pl. 28.

172 Drage identified the hand as that of the principal scribe of Harley 2961; Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pp. 216–25Google Scholar (which presents an edition of this and the other related texts), calls it hand A. Was 180v always part of the book? The structure of the last quire is difficult to make out and some of the leaves are now held together by glue. Fol. 180 (as also the blank 181) is 6–7mm shorter than the rest of the book, while 179v is blank except for a few probationes pennae. Yet the ruling pattern of 180 matches that of the remainder of the volume; while on the recto of the leaf an Exeter hand has added a brief extract from Gregory's Decreta complementing the similar additions made at the front of the volume. Accordingly it seems reasonable to believe that, though probably an addition, fol. 180 has been part of the manuscript since the second half of the eleventh century.

173 ‘… de istis quinque libris / unam portauit uuillelmus ad eilesbere’; ‘…libras debent dare laici homines de banabereie … / et de thama clericus elurich. v. marcos’ (lines 2b–3 of the first note on the left; lines 1 and 3b of the second note on the left). The non-Anglo-Saxon name William is worthy of note and would seem to favour a date later rather than earlier in the century.

174 The estate is mentioned on Leofric's inventory amongst those of his own with which he endowed the minster: Exeter Book, ed. Chambers, et al. , p. 20Google Scholar; Conner, , Anglo-Saxon Exeter, p. 230Google Scholar. William I's confirmation of the grant is Exeter, Dean and Chapter, ch. 2526: Ordnance Survey Facsimiles, ed. Sanders, II, Exeter xvi.Google Scholar

175 Councils and Synods, ed. Whitelock, et al. , I, 226–9Google Scholar. BN lat. 943 also contains two penitential letters issued by Wulfsige (Ibid. pp. 230–1).

176 Rosenthal, J., ‘The Pontifical of St Dunstan’, St Dunstan, ed. Ramsay, et al. , pp. 143–63Google Scholar; also Dumville, , Liturgy, pp. 82–4.Google Scholar

177 see Gameson, , ‘English Manuscript Art in the Late Eleventh Century’, p. 140, with pl. 6.Google Scholar

178 The crucifixion appears on the last leaf of the first quire, the rest of which contains texts that were clearly additions (made at Sherborne); see Rosenthal, , ‘Pontifical of St Dunstan’, pp. 159–62Google Scholar. For the Prudentius, see Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 49. The Arenberg Gospels is New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, M 869 (Ibid. cat. 56); its script is closely similar to that of British Library, Add. 57337 (the Anderson Pontifical) and Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. lat. 489.

179 Wormald, F., ‘Decorated Initials in English Manuscripts from A.D. 900 to 1100’, Archaeologia 91 (1945), 107–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar (repr. in his Collected Writings, ed. Alexander, J. J. G., Brown, T. J. and Gibbs, J., 2 vols. (London, 19841988) IGoogle Scholar: Studies in Medieval Art from the Sixth to the Twelfth Centuries, 4775)Google Scholar; Gameson, , ‘Manuscript Art at Christ Church’, pp. 188–99Google Scholar. For good reproductions of the page in question, see St Dunstan, ed. Ramsay, et al. , ills. 1718.Google Scholar

180 St Dunstan, ed. Ramsay, et al. , ill. 22 and col. pl. VI.Google Scholar

181 See above, n. 160.

182 See above, n. 148. The main scribe wrote 4v–104r/4 and 105r–135r. His minims are c. 3mm high in a c. 12mm ruled space, the strokes being up to 0.75mm wide. A second hand supplied OE glosses to sections of the text (see Ker, Catalogue, no. 129). A third hand of s. x/xi or xiin (a Caroline-trained scribe writing an imitative Square minuscule) added a litany to 104r/5–104v; while a fourth rather continental-looking hand added prayers and hymns to 135v–137v/column 1, this work being continued by the third scribe in his ‘natural’ Caroline form of writing. For discussion of the origin of the book, see Korhammer, ‘Origin of the Bosworth Psalter’, who favours Christ Church. The alternative to Canterbury is Westminster, suggested by the fact that the main scribe also wrote Westminster Abbey WAM X: Ordnance Survey Facsimiles, ed. Sanders, II, Westminster 6. Westminster was refounded by Dunstan c. 959Google Scholar; and according to William of Malmesbury (De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum, ed. Hamilton, N. E. S. A., RS (London, 1870), p. 178Google Scholar), he made Wulsin (later Wulfsige of Sherborne) its abbot.

183 See above, n. 159.

184 In c. 7: see Rule of St Benedict, ed. Chamberlain, , p. 10Google Scholar. The manuscript in question is British Library, Cotton Tiberius A. iii (Ker, Catalogue, no. 186; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 100). This is of early Christ Church provenance, though whether it was made there or at St Augustine's is disputed (see Gameson, , ‘English Manuscript Art in the Late Eleventh Century’, pp. 111–12, n. 55).Google Scholar

185 see James, , Catalogue, pp. 115–18Google Scholar; with Keynes, S., The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ 978–1016 (Cambridge, 1980), p. 239, n. 22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

186 Antwerp, Plantin-Moretus Museum 16. 2 + London, British Library, Add. 32246 ? + Antwerp 16. 8 ? + Brussels, Bibliotheque Royale, 1650; Cambridge, University Library, Kk. 3. 21; British Library, Egerton 267, fol. 37; and Oxford, Bodleian Library, Digby 146.

187 Conner, Anglo-Saxon Exeter, pl. XTV (full page); Kendrick, T. D., Late Saxon and Viking Art (London, 1949), pl. XIX(2) (detail).Google Scholar

188 Utrecht, University Library, 32. For a facsimile, see Utrecht Psalter, ed. Van der Horst, K. and Engelbrecht, J. H. A., Codices Selecti 75 (Graz, 1982).Google Scholar

189 Wormald, F., English Drawings in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries (London, 1952)Google Scholar; Tselos, D., ‘English Manuscript Illustration and the Utrecht Psalter’, Art Bull. 41 (1959), 137–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gameson, , ‘Manuscript Art at Christ Church, Canterbury’, pp. 206–9.Google Scholar

190 Namely Artist F, on whom see Gameson, R. G., ‘The Anglo-Saxon Artists of the Harley 603 Psalter’, Jnl of the Brit. Arcbaeol. Assoc. 143 (1990), 2948, esp. 31–2CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and The Role of Art in the Late Anglo-Saxon Church (Oxford, 1995), pp. 39, 50–3, 67 and 112.Google Scholar

191 Ker, , Medieval Libraries of Great Britain, pp. 90–1Google Scholar; Watson, , Supplement, p. 38.Google Scholar

192 The earliest Catalogue dates from the mid-thirteenth century: Williams, T. W., Somerset Mediaeval Libraries (Bristol, 1897), pp. 5578.Google Scholar

193 Durham, Cathedral Library, A. II. 4, 1r: New Palaeographical Society Facsimiles of Ancient Manuscripts, 1st ser. (London, 1903), pl. 17Google Scholar. Discussed by Turner, C. H., ‘The Earliest List of Durham Manuscripts’, JTS 19 (1918), 121–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mynors, , Durham Cathedral Manuscripts, pp. 32–3Google Scholar; and Browne, A. C., ‘Bishop William of St-Carilef's Book Donations to Durham Cathedral Priory’, Scriptorium 42 (1988), pp. 140–53.Google Scholar

194 Cf. Lapidge, ‘Booklists’, nos. I–VI, IX and XII.

195 Ibid., nos XI and XIII. As no. VIII (thirty-three items) records books donated to Saint-Vaast, Arras, and it is not clear how many of them were of English origin, it is of no help here.

196 See further Lloyd, , Library of Exeter Cathedral, p. 14.Google Scholar

197 See further Barlow, ‘Leofric and his Times’, Leofric of Exeter, ed. Barlow, et al. , pp. 116Google Scholar; and Blake, D. W., ‘Bishop Leofric’, Trans. of the Devonshire Assoc. 106 (1974), 4757.Google Scholar

198 ‘Þæt ys Þæt he haefð geinnod Þær ær geutod wæs, Þurh Godes fultum, 7 Þurh his foresprxce, 7 Þurh his gærsuma.’

199 Abbot Geoffrey of Jumièges (1045–8), for example, is said to have established an annual service for the repose of the souls of those who had given books to, or transcribed them for, the abbey: Nortier, G., Les bibliothèques médiévales des abbayes bénédictines de Normandie (Caen, 1966), pp. 102–3.Google Scholar

200 Bede, , Historia Abbatum, ch. 4, ed. Plummer, , p. 367.Google Scholar

201 ‘… sacris codicibus conficiendis, comparandis, et quibus posset modis adquirendis, haul segnem operam impendebat’: Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis I. 13, ed. Douie, D. L. and Farmer, D. H., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1985) I, 85.Google Scholar

202 Crediton, like Glastonbury, is poorly represented by identifiable, surviving manuscripts: Ker, , Medieval Ubraries of Great Britain, p. 55Google Scholar. For books bequeathed to the foundation by Bishop Ælfwold (997–1012), see Councils and Synods, ed. Whitelock, et al. , I, 382–6Google Scholar; and Lapidge, , ‘Booklists’, no. V (pp. 55–6)Google Scholar. An inscription in the ‘Lanalet Pontifical’ (Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale, A. 27, fol. 196) indicates that it was at one point in the possession of Lyfing, bishop of Crediton (1027–46): Ker, Catalogue, no. 374; Temple, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, cat. 90. However this is not to say that the book belonged to Crediton, and it was later at Jumièges.

203 Cambridge, University Library, Ii. 2. 4: see Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 27–8Google Scholar; and The Pastoral Care edited from British Museum MS Cotton Otho B. ii, ed. Carlson, I., 2 vols. (Stockholm, 19751982) I, 1415.Google Scholar

204 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, 191: see Ker, , Catalogue, p. 174.Google Scholar

205 British Library, Add. 28188: Prescott, ‘English Pre-Conquest Benedictionals’, p. 130.Google Scholar

206 As implied by the Flemish-style miniatures that were added to fols. 72 and 146: Pächt and Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts I, no. 433 with pl. XXXV; Schilling, R., ‘Two Unknown Flemish Miniatures of the Eleventh Century’, Burlington Mag. 90 (1948), 312–17Google Scholar; Zarnecki et al., English Romanesque Art, no. 8; Alexander, , Medieval Illuminators, pp. 7782 with ill. 126Google Scholar. However, the possibility that the artist in question was working in England cannot be entirely discounted.

207 For reproductions of his inscriptions in other books, see Barlow et al., Leofric of Exeter, pl. VI (Bodleian Library, Auct. F. 3. 6); and Page, Matthew Parker and bis Books, pl. 27b (CCCC 41).

208 Bodleian Library, Auct. F. 1. 15 (part I) and Cambridge, University Library, Ii. 2. 4 are perhaps the finest surviving ‘second hand’ acquisition and Exeter work respectively.

209 Items land 12.