Manuscript, on parchment, in a single hand, of Chaucer's Treatise on the astrolabe
Description:
In Middle English., Layout: single columns, mostly of 28 lines., Script: English bookhand., Decoration: initials in blue with red penwork., Presentation inscription on verso of front flyleaf: Augustus W. Franks, the gift of Sir David Dundas., Ownership inscription on verso of front flyleaf: C. H. Read., Tipped in: autograph letter signed from D. D. to A. W. Franks, 1877 February 11., and Binding: nineteenth-century full calf; in case.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400.
Subject (Topic):
Astrolabes, English literature, English prose literature, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript, on parchment, of the "extended version" of the Brut Chronicle
Alternative Title:
Chronicles of England
Description:
In Middle English., First leaf and end of text lacking., Layout: single columns with varying numbers of lines., Script: English bookhand., Decoration: blue initials with red penwork., and Binding: sixteenth-century blind-tooled calf over wooden boards. Later leather title tags on spine, gilt.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Topic):
English literature, English prose literature, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript fragment, on parchment, containing portions of chapters 214 and 221 of the Middle English prose Brut
Description:
In Middle English., Marginal note indicates that these two leaves served as a wrapper for a copy of Gabriel Harvey's The trimming of Thomas Nashe., Layout: single-column, 29-32 lines., Script: secretary., and Decoration: initials in blue with red penwork.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Topic):
Brutus the Trojan (Legendary character), English literature, English prose literature, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript on parchment (thick) of 1) Notes on the baronial Clare family of Gloucester, in chart format, from a manuscript contemporary with or slightly earlier than the main text (art. 3). Name of the appropriate King of England appears on the left in a red circle [concludes with King Edward IV, 1327-77], and a short history of certain members of the Clare family are added on the right. 2) Genealogical tree, added between 1450 and 1500, establishing the claims of King Edward IV (1461-83) to the kingdoms of England, France, Castile and Leon. 3) Brut Chronicle, up to 1419, but the final leaf of text has been torn out
Description:
In Middle English., Script: Written by a single scribe in neat Anglicana formata. Running titles and marginal notes added by later hands., Illuminated initial, 6-line, on f. 1r, pink on gold ground, with blue, green, and pink acanthus leaves, and white highlights; full bar-border with swirling acanthus leaves in same colors as for initial; black hair-spray in outer margins. Heading and chapter numbers in red. Small initials, 2-line, blue with red flourishes, for most chapters. Paragraph marks alternate red and blue., Parchment is well thumbed and worn, especially f. 1r; some loss of text., and Binding: 17th-18th centuries. Covered in brown calf, blind-tooled, with a brick-colored, gold-tooled label, probably a later addition.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut, New Haven., and Great Britain
Subject (Name):
Clare family. and Edward IV, King of England, 1442-1483.
Subject (Topic):
English literature, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, Manuscripts, Medieval, and History
Manuscript on parchment of Brut Chronicle to 1333, the earliest stage of the Middle English text
Description:
In English., Script: Written by at least two scribes in neat Anglicana formata., Plain initials, 9- to 2-line, in blue, throughout text. Headings and chapter numbers in red, with blue spiral line-fillers. Paragraph marks for headings in blue, for text in blue or red. Remains of guide-letters for rubricator., Parchment is stained and worn; some portions of text illegible., and Binding: Fifteenth century. Original wound, caught up sewing on four tawed, slit straps. Boards made of bifolios of vellum with a piece of leather wrapped around them, but not covering the spine. Sewing breaking.
Manuscript on parchment, in a single hand, of the "second version" of John Hardyng's Chronicle. While the manuscript has lost perhaps 36 leaves from the beginning of the work, it is textually complete from the reign of Vortigern on. There is a final entry referring to Elizabeth Woodville as the queen of Edward IV. The final leaves of the volume contain an anonymous sixteenth-century poem, A lamentable complaint of our saviour Christ; an eighteen-line carol in Middle English which begins "By resone of ii and power of one;" and a page of notes in a single sixteenth-century hand on executions at Smithfield in London between 1531 and 1534
Description:
In Middle English., Ownership inscription of "John Ravell" at the end of the Chronicles text, along with other notes., Layout: single columns of approximately 42 lines., Script: English bookhand., Binding: seventeenth-century full calf. Red leather spine tag, gilt: "M. S. Hist: of England / From Vortvmrk to Edw. 4.", and Previous shelfmark: MS. L. J. I. 10.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Hardyng, John, 1378-1465?
Subject (Topic):
English literature, English poetry, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Narrative poetry, English (Middle)
Manuscript, on parchment, in at least two scribal hands, of this narrative poem by John Lydgate. The text was almost certainly originally complete but now lacks the Prologue and the opening stanzas of Book I, opening at the line "For to be crowned in that regeous" and lacking the final few leaves of text as well. There is also a textual lacuna between f92v and f93r, Contemporary textual corrections and insertions marked by red crosses. Occasional pen trials and names in contemporary hands, and Autograph letter signed from Frederic Madden to Lord Braybrooke, 1840 March 9, tipped in at front of volume. The letter contains a description of the manuscript and advises that it be rebound while preserving the initials of Mary Sidney
Description:
In Middle English., Script: anglicana and secretary; in the hands of at least two scribes., Decoration: initials in red and blue, some with marginal scroll decoration., Layout: 56 lines in two columns, 15 stanzas per page. Catchwords., and Binding: 19th-century calf over wood, covers inlaid with fragment of 16th-century binding preseving the initials "M.S." (Mary Sidney).
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut and New Haven.
Subject (Name):
Lydgate, John, 1370?-1451?
Subject (Topic):
English literature, English poetry, Manuscripts, Medieval, and Narrative poetry, English (Middle)
Manuscript on parchment of Edward, the second Duke of York, Master of Game
Description:
In English., Script: Written by a single scribe in a careful English secretary script., Gold initials, 3-line, on blue and dark pink grounds with white highlights mark text divisions. Headings and marginal chapter references, in red, throughout., and Binding: Eighteenth century. Brown skin, flesh side out, blind-tooled, over paper boards. Front cover detached.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut, New Haven., and York (England)
Subject (Name):
Edward, of Norwich, 1373?-1415.
Subject (Topic):
English literature, Hunting, Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval, and Manuscripts, Medieval
Manuscript, on vellum, in a single hand, of the complete text of Love's translation of the Meditationes vitae Christi, a text often attributed to Pseudo-Bonaventure or Johannes de Caulibus. This version concludes with the "additional" chapter on the sacrament
Description:
In Middle English., Presentation inscription at end of text, in red ink: This booke is gyffyne to Allyse Belacyse. Be the gyfte of Johane Countesse of kente., Presentation inscription following the previous, in black ink: I Allyse Belacyse, gyfe this booke to Elysabeth my serua[n]t wt. my handys., Layout: single columns of 34 lines., Script: English bookhand., Decoration: illuminated initial and a full illuminated bar border on the first page of text; other illuminated initials., and Binding: eighteenth-century full paneled calf, gilt. Six-compartmented spine, decorated, gilt. Spine tag in red leather: Lyffe of Jesu Criste.
Subject (Geographic):
Connecticut, New Haven., and England.
Subject (Name):
Love, Nicholas, active 1410.
Subject (Topic):
Devotional literature, English (Middle), English literature, Manuscripts, Medieval, Women, and Books and reading