Durham University Library Archives & Special Collections Catalogue
Manuscript codex containing Decretales of Gregory IX, with Gloss of Bernard of Parma, written in Northern France in the second half of the 13th century.
Parchment: modest quality; many leaves thin and transparent; some papery with a propensity to curl, others stiffer; H sides yellow, some with pronounced follicle marks; edgecuts and flaws. Arranged: FH, HF. Generally grubby, with some liquid damage and cockling throughout; the lower third of f.1 reinforced with newer parchment; blobs of wax on f.17v.
Modern pencil foliation.
f.1-3 (flyleaves), structure uncertain. I12, II8, III-XI12, XII10, XIII-XIV12, XV10, XVI2, XVII10, XVIII-XIX12, XX10, XXI10 (=12 with leaves 11-12 [probably blank] cancelled or lost). Quire XIX (f.200-211) is misplaced and should properly precede quire XVIII (f.188-199).
Written area: variable. Designed for all-round apparatus. Main-text block normally: 210 x 130 mm. Two columns (65 mm). With apparatus: up to 400 x 250 mm. Lines: main text: 40 (space, 5 mm; height of minims, 3 mm). Gloss: up to 102 (space, 4 mm; height of minims, 2 mm). Pricking: awl. Prickings preserved in upper and lower margins only. Ruling: lead and ink. Up to eight verticals: one for the outer and inner edge of both main-text columns, and for the outer and the inner edges of the gloss. The top and bottom horizontals of the main-text block were sometimes extended.
Written in Textualis semi-quadrata for the main text, Textualis libraria for the apparatus. The number of scribes uncertain, perhaps four:Dashes and dots (or circles) are used to fill short lines at the ends of subsections within the gloss, and to occupy empty column lines in order to make the two columns of gloss on a page visually more even (e.g. 33v, 34r, 34v, 189r-190v).
The diagrams of Consanguinity (f.176v) and Affinity (f.177r) in (c) are presented within fully painted miniatures that exactly fill the main-text space. The former features a king, frontal, with branches in either hand, a pair of dogs below his feet. The latter has an Amorous couple, the man (on the left) holding a glove in his left hand and reaching out with his right to the woman (on the right) who reciprocally extends her right hand while holding her cloak with her left hand. There is a tree (with blue leaves) between them; below them are a stag and a rabbit being chased by two dogs, all between two further trees. The palette of both miniatures is dominated by blues and dusky reds and pinks, plus gold at the corners of the frames, dotted across the background, and used for the king’s crown and the woman’s hair-net. The diagrams within them take the form of black inscriptions within pink circles against plain parchment. The Prefatory letter (f.4r) and each book (4r, 61v, 109v, 160v, 178r) of (c) is headed by a decorated initial, 8+ lines high. Adorned with beast-elements and foliate sprigs (that on 178r has a hybrid with a human head), these are predominantly coloured blue and pink with touches of green, orange and gold, plus detailing in white. They are accompanied by 2 to 4 lines of display script in white lettering on panels of blue or red/pink or both. The Preface and incipit of (d), tituli and chapters in (c), and tituli in (d) are all headed by 2+-line high initials, alternately red then blue flourished in the other colour. Slightly smaller initials of the same type mark subdivisions within the apparatus.
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). Rust stained holes at the fore-edge of f.1 from a pair of clasps on an earlier binding; a single rust stained hole at the top centre of f.1 possibly from a chain staple on an earlier binding.
Written in Northern France, later 13th century.
Pressmark: “2a.8i P [altered to] O”, 15th century, f.4r, top right.
Inscription:
“Noue decretales glosata. cum constitucionibus nouis [gregorij - deleted] innocencij pape iiiiti in consilio lugduniens′ edite”, 15th/16th century by Thomas Swalwell, monk of Durham c.1483-1539, f.4r, top.
Flyleaves. Exact duplicate of the end of (c) as found on f.222-223, with rubrics and flourished initials, but with neither apparatus nor the start of item (d).
First version (f.2v) was abandoned after 19 entries for Book I only; 2 is complete. Much of 2v and all of 3r, blank.
Book I, f.4r-61v; Book II, f.61v-109v; Book III, f.109v-160v; Book IV, f.160v-175v; Diagrams of consanguinity and affinity, f.176v-177r (f.176r and 177v, blank); Book V, f.178r-223r (owing to the inversion of what are now quires XVIII and XIX, the text currently runs: 178r-187v, 200r-211v, 188r-199v, 212r-223r). The prefatory letter is addressed to members of the University of Paris. The gloss starts: “In huius libri principio v sunt precipue prenotanda videlicet que sit intencio que materia que utilitas cui parti philosophie supponantur”; see also Kuttner 1981. Contemporary corrections, short notes and nota marks (including faces and pointing hands) throughout, seemingly the work of the main scribe(s). Tituli rubrics were added to the upper margin of rectos from f.4r-160r, 14th/15th century.
No annotation. Another copy of Durham provenance now Cambridge, Jesus College, Q.A.6 (6).
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]).
Corpus iuris canonici (Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1879-81)
Kuttner, S., The history of ideas and doctrines of canon law in the middle ages (London : Variorum reprints, 1980)
Kuttner, S., "Notes on the Glossa ordinaria of Bernard of Parma", Bulletin of Medieval Canon Law 11 (1981), 86-93
Mansi, G. D., ed., Sanctorum conciliorum et decretorum collectio nova, seu Collectionis conciliorum ... (Lucae: Ex typographia Josephi Salani, & Vincentii Junctinii., 1748-1752)