Manuscript on parchment (thick, furry) of the Wycliffite New Testament. Begins imperfectly in Matthew 3.4 and breaks off at 1 Timothy 1.15; also missing Romans 9.22 to 1 Corinthians 1.23 (2 bifolios lost after f. 73). Contains the Gospels without prologues, and the Epistles with prologues. The text has been altered in places by a near contemporary hand that has written over erasures. Since the alterations correspond to those adopted in the later edition of John Purvey, MS 125 may reflect an intermediate stage between the Wycliffite Bible and Purvey's version
Description:
In Middle English., Script: Written in a neat gothic bookhand by a single scribe who carefully corrected his errors; changes by at least one nearly contemporary and one later writer., Blue initials, 10- to 4-line, with extensive penwork designs in red, introduce each chapter. Headings, running titles, and underlining in red; paragraph marks in red or blue., Bookblock chewed by rodent in upper right corner; margins of many leaves trimmed resulting in some loss of text, marginalia, and catchwords., and Binding: Eighteenth century. Red spattered edges. Brown leather, flesh side out, blind-tooled. A black calf spine, gold-tooled, added.