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Details
GENEALOGICAL CHRONICLE OF THE KINGS OF ENGLAND TO EDWARD IV, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on vellum [England, 1466-67]
A rare winged roll-codex – perhaps the unique example of this format to survive in its original form – completed during the Wars of the Roses to support the Yorkist right to the throne, with additions of the Tudor Kings Henry VII and Henry VIII; with ownership inscriptions of Sir Edward Coke, the greatest of Elizabethan and Jacobean jurists.
8600 x 390mm overall, including the final added part-membrane, i+15+i membranes, folded to make i+38+i ‘pages’, each unfolded opening approx. 455 x 390mm, written on one side only with up to four columns of 43 lines of text per ‘page’ in black ink in an English bookhand, two large illuminated initials with foliage sprays into the margin at the head of the text, a round miniature of Adam and Eve, link to the Ascension of Christ with a band of blue and gold, numerous two-line initials of gold flourished blue or blue flourished red, biblical names framed with brown or green, the ancestors of the Kings of England in blue and gold circles and the Kings of England from Brutus to Edward IV in red or blue circles topped with crowns of burnished gold, six diagrams (a few folds reinforced with vellum or paper strips, some slight creasing, smudging, marking and offsetting but the written and painted side generally in excellent condition). Lacking binding, the pastedowns, now backed with paper serve as upper and lower covers (edges of pastedowns with small nicks and nibbles, slight worming, reinforcing strip of upper pastedown detaching, backing paper soiled and defective).
Provenance: Sir Edward Warner of Plumstead and Polsteadhall, Norfolk (1511-1565) his inscription recording the birth of his son Edward in 1547 inside front cover and an ownership inscription of 1558 inside rear cover. Warner was a household official and soldier under Henry VIII, and was restored to royal favour and office under Elizabeth I, including his appointment as Lieutenant of the Tower. His service to the crown continued after his retirement to his estates in Norfolk and he also acted as justice of the of the peace and MP. Predeceased by his sons he was succeeded by his brother Robert but one of the specific bequests in his will was ‘all my books of statutes and chronicles, and all my pedigrees of Kings or of any other person’, which he left to his nephew Henry — Henry Warner (c.1551-1616), lawyer and MP. In his will he appointed as supervisor his ‘good friend’ Sir Edward Coke — Sir Edward Coke (1553-1634): his signature beneath both Warner inscriptions. The leading lawyer and legal writer of his time, he was Attorney General to Elizabeth I and Chief Justice to James I. In disagreements with the Crown over the relative legal powers of the individual, Parliament and the King, Coke invoked Magna Carta as guaranteeing the Rights and Liberties of the individual through the supremacy of common law and the judiciary – ‘magna carta is such a fellow as he will have no sovereign’. His ideas on the Great Charter were crystallised in the second part of his most significant work, Institutes, which was published posthumously in 1642. Beyond their influence in England and the Civil War, Coke’s ideas lay behind the constitutional principles of the Founding Fathers of America — Pentrials of various dates include the name A M Robert — Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge, sale from 26 February 1900 for five days: cutting from the catalogue sellotaped to front cover and adhesive lot label 441, bought Leighton for £3 — Frederick Neville Sutherland Leveson-Gower (1874-1969), British Liberal Unionist Party politician, grandson of George Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, 2nd Duke of Sutherland. By descent to the present owner.
Content: This is one of an intriguing group of genealogical chronicles, named from the opening word of the prologue, which begins ‘Considerans histories acre prolixitatem’, that are thought likely to have been written by a single scribe working in London or Westminster. The Biblical history with which it starts derives from an interpolated version of Peter of Poitiers, Compendium Historiae in Genealogia Christi, which also included the section on the eight ages of the world, in the righthand column of the present manuscript above a T and O world map. The Biblical history continues as the central text ending on the eleventh opening with an abbreviated account of the life and death of Christ, but from the first opening the line of descent of the Kings of England runs in parallel on the right. This starts with Japheth, the son of Noah, and runs through Aeneas and Brutus, the latter, as the first King of Britain, is distinguished with a golden crown. After the end of Biblical history the Kings move centre stage and continue in a single line of golden crowns flanked by their biographies from Lucius to Cadwallader, then spreading across the page for the Anglo-Saxon heptarchy until into a single line from Edgar. In the present manuscript the line originally ended with Edward IV. Other manuscripts of the Considerans type end with Henry VI: variations in the textual content indicate that the chronicles had a political purpose arguing for the legitimacy of one or other of these conflicting monarchs during the Wars of the Roses. The present manuscript is particularly explicit in its Yorkist support: Richard II is described as the ‘true king’ who was deposed and usurped by the Lancastrian Henry IV. The later additions, in ink in different hands, continue to reflect the political situation of the day: Edward’s son and heir appears twice, once as Prince of Wales and again, as his successor as Edward V, Richard III was added but then erased, and is followed by Henry VII and from him the final crowned roundel contains the name of Henry VIII.
Format: The Considerans group, in spite of their broad textual similarity and common origin, vary in language, either Latin or Middle English, length, illustration and, above all, format. In her cataloguing of a manuscript in Oxford (Bodleian Library, Lyell Ms 33) Albinia de la Mare recognised that whereas the majority were rolls, the layout of the text showed that some of the group had originally been designed to be bound as a ‘roll-codex’: that is that although only written on one side of a length of parchment made up of multiple membranes, and with the lines of descent flowing continuously from top to bottom of the length in the manner of a roll, horizontal gaps at regular intervals in the texts allowed the ‘roll’ to be folded concertina-style, then sewn at alternate inner folds and bound as a book: A. de la Mare, Catalogue of Lyell Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library Oxford, 1971, pp. 82-3. This roll-codex form is still the structure of Lyell 33 and, indeed, another Bodleian ‘Considerans’ manuscript (MS e Musaeo 42): D. Wakelin, Designing English: Early Literature on the Page, 2018, pp.70-1 & ills 33a and 33b. Previously it had been thought that this arrangement -- as is the case with other types of roll (for example San Marino, Huntington Library HM 264) -- was a later modification for convenience, but the regular gaps left within the running texts demonstrate that these manuscripts had been designed from the start to be roll-codices. Kathleen Scott expanded the ‘Considerans’ group of genealogies to 21 of which ten were written for roll-codex structure: K. Scott, Later Gothic Manuscripts 1390-1490, 1996, ii pp.315-7.
The present manuscript represents a sophisticated variant of the roll-codex, one that results in the final ‘book’ being a more compact and conventional shape: the text has been organised into three regular vertical columns. The central wide block is flanked by two narrow columns, which are divided by horizontal cuts along the lower fold-line leaving the central sections still joined together as a continuous strip. This allows the two narrow texts to be folded in so that each page-opening becomes like a triptych. The openings were then sewn onto thongs along the middle folds of the central sections and put into a binding. Although binding and thongs no longer survive, the original sewing holes are clearly evident and the manuscript remains folded in the intended fashion. This winged roll-codex seems to be an adaptation combining two formats most commonly used for almanacs and medical manuscripts: the concertina-style folded strips likely originally kept in leather cases and ‘girdle-books’, or ‘bat books’, made up of single folded sheets joined on stubs and bound so that they could be suspended from a belt and each leaf unfolded for consultation: see J.P. Gumpert, Bat Books, a Catalogue of Folded Manuscripts Containing Almanacs or Other Texts, 2016. Two bat-books are particularly relevant, British Library Add. Ms 17358, datable to c.1431 and including, otherwise unknown in a bat-book, an abbreviated Peter of Poitiers and Cambridge, Magdalen Coll., Pepys Ms 1662, which includes historical notes and a list of kings to Henry IV: Gumpert, pp.160-3.
Only two of the known Considerans manuscripts have the text arranged into columns that would allow folding into the winged roll-codex format. Both are in the British Library one, Harley Rolls C.9, which seems never to have been folded, and Lansdowne 456, which is heavily restored and is now bound as a roll-codex. The present manuscript appears to be the single surviving example of this chronicle in its original unique format.
Illumination: Considerans chronicles are generally dated by the number of Edward IV’s children shown and Scott suggested that manuscripts of the same date were illustrated by the same illuminator. This appears to be borne out by the Coke manuscript which – like Beinecke Library, Marston 242 and Copenhagen Kongelige Bibliotek Ny. Kgl. 1858 fol. – finishes with Elizabeth, Edward’s eldest child born in 1466 while his second daughter born in 1467 is not included. All three manuscripts are painted by the same artist, considered by Scott to show strong Flemish influence. The three manuscripts otherwise perfectly exemplify the variety in the Considerans group: Marston 242 is in English, the Copenhagen manuscript is in Latin and both were written to be rolls.
A rare winged roll-codex – perhaps the unique example of this format to survive in its original form – completed during the Wars of the Roses to support the Yorkist right to the throne, with additions of the Tudor Kings Henry VII and Henry VIII; with ownership inscriptions of Sir Edward Coke, the greatest of Elizabethan and Jacobean jurists.
8600 x 390mm overall, including the final added part-membrane, i+15+i membranes, folded to make i+38+i ‘pages’, each unfolded opening approx. 455 x 390mm, written on one side only with up to four columns of 43 lines of text per ‘page’ in black ink in an English bookhand, two large illuminated initials with foliage sprays into the margin at the head of the text, a round miniature of Adam and Eve, link to the Ascension of Christ with a band of blue and gold, numerous two-line initials of gold flourished blue or blue flourished red, biblical names framed with brown or green, the ancestors of the Kings of England in blue and gold circles and the Kings of England from Brutus to Edward IV in red or blue circles topped with crowns of burnished gold, six diagrams (a few folds reinforced with vellum or paper strips, some slight creasing, smudging, marking and offsetting but the written and painted side generally in excellent condition). Lacking binding, the pastedowns, now backed with paper serve as upper and lower covers (edges of pastedowns with small nicks and nibbles, slight worming, reinforcing strip of upper pastedown detaching, backing paper soiled and defective).
Provenance: Sir Edward Warner of Plumstead and Polsteadhall, Norfolk (1511-1565) his inscription recording the birth of his son Edward in 1547 inside front cover and an ownership inscription of 1558 inside rear cover. Warner was a household official and soldier under Henry VIII, and was restored to royal favour and office under Elizabeth I, including his appointment as Lieutenant of the Tower. His service to the crown continued after his retirement to his estates in Norfolk and he also acted as justice of the of the peace and MP. Predeceased by his sons he was succeeded by his brother Robert but one of the specific bequests in his will was ‘all my books of statutes and chronicles, and all my pedigrees of Kings or of any other person’, which he left to his nephew Henry — Henry Warner (c.1551-1616), lawyer and MP. In his will he appointed as supervisor his ‘good friend’ Sir Edward Coke — Sir Edward Coke (1553-1634): his signature beneath both Warner inscriptions. The leading lawyer and legal writer of his time, he was Attorney General to Elizabeth I and Chief Justice to James I. In disagreements with the Crown over the relative legal powers of the individual, Parliament and the King, Coke invoked Magna Carta as guaranteeing the Rights and Liberties of the individual through the supremacy of common law and the judiciary – ‘magna carta is such a fellow as he will have no sovereign’. His ideas on the Great Charter were crystallised in the second part of his most significant work, Institutes, which was published posthumously in 1642. Beyond their influence in England and the Civil War, Coke’s ideas lay behind the constitutional principles of the Founding Fathers of America — Pentrials of various dates include the name A M Robert — Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge, sale from 26 February 1900 for five days: cutting from the catalogue sellotaped to front cover and adhesive lot label 441, bought Leighton for £3 — Frederick Neville Sutherland Leveson-Gower (1874-1969), British Liberal Unionist Party politician, grandson of George Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, 2nd Duke of Sutherland. By descent to the present owner.
Content: This is one of an intriguing group of genealogical chronicles, named from the opening word of the prologue, which begins ‘Considerans histories acre prolixitatem’, that are thought likely to have been written by a single scribe working in London or Westminster. The Biblical history with which it starts derives from an interpolated version of Peter of Poitiers, Compendium Historiae in Genealogia Christi, which also included the section on the eight ages of the world, in the righthand column of the present manuscript above a T and O world map. The Biblical history continues as the central text ending on the eleventh opening with an abbreviated account of the life and death of Christ, but from the first opening the line of descent of the Kings of England runs in parallel on the right. This starts with Japheth, the son of Noah, and runs through Aeneas and Brutus, the latter, as the first King of Britain, is distinguished with a golden crown. After the end of Biblical history the Kings move centre stage and continue in a single line of golden crowns flanked by their biographies from Lucius to Cadwallader, then spreading across the page for the Anglo-Saxon heptarchy until into a single line from Edgar. In the present manuscript the line originally ended with Edward IV. Other manuscripts of the Considerans type end with Henry VI: variations in the textual content indicate that the chronicles had a political purpose arguing for the legitimacy of one or other of these conflicting monarchs during the Wars of the Roses. The present manuscript is particularly explicit in its Yorkist support: Richard II is described as the ‘true king’ who was deposed and usurped by the Lancastrian Henry IV. The later additions, in ink in different hands, continue to reflect the political situation of the day: Edward’s son and heir appears twice, once as Prince of Wales and again, as his successor as Edward V, Richard III was added but then erased, and is followed by Henry VII and from him the final crowned roundel contains the name of Henry VIII.
Format: The Considerans group, in spite of their broad textual similarity and common origin, vary in language, either Latin or Middle English, length, illustration and, above all, format. In her cataloguing of a manuscript in Oxford (Bodleian Library, Lyell Ms 33) Albinia de la Mare recognised that whereas the majority were rolls, the layout of the text showed that some of the group had originally been designed to be bound as a ‘roll-codex’: that is that although only written on one side of a length of parchment made up of multiple membranes, and with the lines of descent flowing continuously from top to bottom of the length in the manner of a roll, horizontal gaps at regular intervals in the texts allowed the ‘roll’ to be folded concertina-style, then sewn at alternate inner folds and bound as a book: A. de la Mare, Catalogue of Lyell Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library Oxford, 1971, pp. 82-3. This roll-codex form is still the structure of Lyell 33 and, indeed, another Bodleian ‘Considerans’ manuscript (MS e Musaeo 42): D. Wakelin, Designing English: Early Literature on the Page, 2018, pp.70-1 & ills 33a and 33b. Previously it had been thought that this arrangement -- as is the case with other types of roll (for example San Marino, Huntington Library HM 264) -- was a later modification for convenience, but the regular gaps left within the running texts demonstrate that these manuscripts had been designed from the start to be roll-codices. Kathleen Scott expanded the ‘Considerans’ group of genealogies to 21 of which ten were written for roll-codex structure: K. Scott, Later Gothic Manuscripts 1390-1490, 1996, ii pp.315-7.
The present manuscript represents a sophisticated variant of the roll-codex, one that results in the final ‘book’ being a more compact and conventional shape: the text has been organised into three regular vertical columns. The central wide block is flanked by two narrow columns, which are divided by horizontal cuts along the lower fold-line leaving the central sections still joined together as a continuous strip. This allows the two narrow texts to be folded in so that each page-opening becomes like a triptych. The openings were then sewn onto thongs along the middle folds of the central sections and put into a binding. Although binding and thongs no longer survive, the original sewing holes are clearly evident and the manuscript remains folded in the intended fashion. This winged roll-codex seems to be an adaptation combining two formats most commonly used for almanacs and medical manuscripts: the concertina-style folded strips likely originally kept in leather cases and ‘girdle-books’, or ‘bat books’, made up of single folded sheets joined on stubs and bound so that they could be suspended from a belt and each leaf unfolded for consultation: see J.P. Gumpert, Bat Books, a Catalogue of Folded Manuscripts Containing Almanacs or Other Texts, 2016. Two bat-books are particularly relevant, British Library Add. Ms 17358, datable to c.1431 and including, otherwise unknown in a bat-book, an abbreviated Peter of Poitiers and Cambridge, Magdalen Coll., Pepys Ms 1662, which includes historical notes and a list of kings to Henry IV: Gumpert, pp.160-3.
Only two of the known Considerans manuscripts have the text arranged into columns that would allow folding into the winged roll-codex format. Both are in the British Library one, Harley Rolls C.9, which seems never to have been folded, and Lansdowne 456, which is heavily restored and is now bound as a roll-codex. The present manuscript appears to be the single surviving example of this chronicle in its original unique format.
Illumination: Considerans chronicles are generally dated by the number of Edward IV’s children shown and Scott suggested that manuscripts of the same date were illustrated by the same illuminator. This appears to be borne out by the Coke manuscript which – like Beinecke Library, Marston 242 and Copenhagen Kongelige Bibliotek Ny. Kgl. 1858 fol. – finishes with Elizabeth, Edward’s eldest child born in 1466 while his second daughter born in 1467 is not included. All three manuscripts are painted by the same artist, considered by Scott to show strong Flemish influence. The three manuscripts otherwise perfectly exemplify the variety in the Considerans group: Marston 242 is in English, the Copenhagen manuscript is in Latin and both were written to be rolls.
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