Durham University Library Archives & Special Collections Catalogue
Manuscript composed of three separate parts: (A) f.1-38; (B) f.39-120; (C) f.121-187 (with its own signatures). (A) and (B) were evidently joined by mid 12th century when item (f) was added to the end of the former and the start of the latter; certain leaves within (A) and (B) (but none in C) have suffered localised liquid damage. All three parts had been brought together by the later 12th century when a list of contents itemising all parts was added to f.187r.
Foliation of main body: 1 (modern pencil), 2-171 (early modern ink), 171*, 172 (the two slips: modern pencil), 172-187 (early modern ink), 188 (modern pencil).
Symeon of Durham, wrote f.47 lines 1-15 in (A); in (B) he rubricated f.39v-54v and may have done the opening initial; in (C) he effected corrections throughout (including those on the added slips) and made notes in the margins (Gullick, 1998, no.11).
Standard Tuckett binding, mid 19th century full brown calf over thick wooden boards (Charles Tuckett, binder to the British Museum, rebound many Durham manuscripts in the 19th century)
Written in Durham, early 12th century.
Inscriptions: “Liber Sancti Cuthberti. De Dunelmo”, mid 12th century, f.1r, upper margin, centre.
Contents list, mid 12th century, f.187r, registering: (A) items a-d/e and f1-4, (B) items g, h+i, k, m1, m7, m8, m11, n-r; and(C) items s-v.
Contents-list, mid 14th century, f.187v, registering: (A), items a-d; (B) items e, h/i, k1, k2, m-o; and (C), items s-v.
Separate references to the content list(s) were added on f.1r, mid 12th, 14th, and 15th/16th century (this by Thomas Swalwell): “Require capitula in fine”.
Pressmarks: f.1r, top right, “.O.”, later 14th century. f.1r, top: “O Augustinus de fide ad petrum cum multis aliis De communi libraria monachorum dunelm”, early 15th century. “2. 2 [*]”, 15th century, f.1r, top right.
I-II8, III6, IV-V8
Written area: 184 x 118 mm; 33 lines
(a)-(e) written in Anglo-Norman Romanesque (f) written in Protogothic-documentary
(a)-(e) start with decorated initials.
Attributed to Augustine. A few late medieval annotations.
4 sermons
I-VII8, VIII10, IX-X8
Written area: 188 x 120 mm. f.39-112: 30 lines; f.113-120: 33 lines.
Written in Anglo-Norman ProtoGothic by 5 scribes.
Decorated initials.
By Augustine, Pseudo-Augustine, Origen etc.
Attributed to Gregory Illiberitanus.
Some annotations.
Section (i): I-IV8, V10 (leaves four and seven, fols. 156 and 159, singletons). Section (ii): VI8, VII8+2 (8 plus two slips inserted between leaves one (171) and two (172) which were subsequently foliated 171* and 172), VIII10
(C) is itself divided codicologically into two sections: (i) quires I-V, f.121-162; (ii) quires VI-VIII, f.163-188. Written area: (i) 198 x 116 mm - 33 lines; (ii) 186 x 126 mm - 30 lines.
Written in Anglo-Norman ProtoGothic by 3 scribes.
Decorated initials.
Contemporary corrections. A later copy of the same text DCL MS B.II.19 subdivides the text in exactly the same way and has the same initial rubric, though a slightly different explicit and concluding rubric.
Contemporary corrections and annotations. Regular later medieval annotation. A later copy of the text in DCL MS B.II.19 has a slightly different initial rubric, an identical concluding rubric, and the main texts share features.
Straddling codicological sections (i) and (ii), the text runs without interruption from f.162v to f.163r. Extensive contemporary interlinear and marginal corrections plus other marginalia throughout. Occasional later medieval annotation. The later copy of the same text in DCL B.II.19 has a different initial rubric.
Numerous later medieval annotations, especially in the first pages.
Catalogi veteres librorum Ecclesiae cathedralis
dunelm. Catalogues of the library of Durham cathedral, at
various periods, from the conquest to the dissolution, including
catalogues of the library of the abbey of Hulne, and of the mss.
,
Surtees Society 7, (London: J.B. Nichols and Son, [1838]).
Gullick, Michael, "The hand of Symeon of Durham: further observations on the Durham Martyrology scribe", in Rollason, David, ed., Symeon of Durham: historian of Durham and the North (Stamford: Shaun Tyas, 1998), 14-31
Mynors, R.A.B., Durham Cathedral
manuscripts to the end of the twelfth century. Ten plates in
colour and forty-seven in monochrome. With an introduction
[including a list of all known Durham manuscripts before
1200] ,
(Durham: 1939)