Text and Image : Siege of Troy

Secundo folio:To bathe

Two columns, 44 lines at first, 43 from folio 89r (beginning of quire 11) and 45 from folio 113r (beginning of quire 14). Ruling is uniform throughout. Single vertical bounding lines extending to the top of the page and into the lower margin; first and second horizontal lines extending the full width of the page, and horizontal lines traversing the central margin; penultimate and last horizontal lines extending into the margin and occasionally the full width of the page. Pricking marks are evident on the external margins of numerous folios, for example on folio 157r.

Extensive illustrations throughout the Manuscript, 69 marginal and bas-de-page miniatures along with continuous borders. The illustrations have been identified as being painted by an artist stylistically close toWilliam Abell, an important mid-fifteenth century English illuminator.

Miniatures

Initials

6- to 8-line initials (7-8 line) occur at irregular intervals and not always at an obvious point:

3- to 5-line floriated, illuminated initials introduce the verses throughout:

On folio 174r, signatures of various owners, notably members of the Mundy family and Hugh Morgan of Monmouth (see provenance).

Library information written in pencil and ink on the inner upper cover (upper pastedown).

Purple velvet-covered boards, rebacked in the 19th century in purple morocco; single ornate gilt catchplate on the fore edge of upper board (clasp and hinge missing).

Carent family. The coat of arms on folio 173r has been identified as being that of a member of the Carent family, a 15th-century Somerset gentry family of Lancastrian political affiliation. The individual could possibly be William Carent, 1395?-1476, of Toomer in Somerset, who was a retainer of the Duke of Somerset, and served as an M.P. and occasionally sheriff for both Dorset and Somerset. Other possibilities are William's lesser-known brother, John Carent 'Senior', -1478, or in the next generation, William's son John Carent 'Junior', 1425?-1483, who also served as sheriff of Somerset and Dorset. See J.J.G. Alexander in the Bibliography below.

Sir Humphrey Talbot. Clark-Maxwell (see Bibliography below) argues that this is the copy of the 'Seege of Troy' mentioned in 1492 in the will of Sir Humphrey Talbot (died in 1494) and in 1503 in the will of his executor, Thomas Booth, who left it to his executor, Sir John Mundy (goldsmith and lord mayor of London in 1522), failing the daughter of Dr Roger Marschall, physician of London (Emden, A biographical register of the University of Oxford to A.D. 1500, page 392: he died in 1477), to whom Talbot had bequeathed it.

On folio 174r is written in a 16th-century hand 'Hugh Morgan of Monmouth in the marches of Walys'.

Mundy family of Markeaton Hall, Derbyshire.There is an inscription on folio 173v, which, according to Longman's Bibliotheca anglo-poetica of 1815 (see Bibliography below), page 186, reads: 'Mem. that I John Mundy Knight have yevyn to my Welbelovyd Son Vyncent Mundy this p[re]sent booke of the Seig of troy the xxvth Day of May Ao. xxv. nostri Regis Henr. viii. [1533] and delyvred it to him wt myne owne hands wt Godds blessyng & myne.' This inscription is now almost illegible even under ultra-violet light, perhaps due to the application of a chemical reagent to enhance the ink in the 19th century. Also inscribed on folio 174r: 'Francys Mundy of Markeyton, Esquire, September 18th, 1615' [Francis Mundy, great-grandson of Sir John, sheriff of Derbyshire in 1617]; 'Adryan Mundy'; and 'Adryan Mundy is my name and with my penn I writ the same and if My penne had bene anye' (incomplete) [presumed to be Adrian Mundy, 1608-1677, third son of the above Francis]. For the Mundy family see Burke's, Genealogical and heraldic history of the commoners of Great Britain and Ireland (1833-8), volume 1, pages 25-7.

John Baron Somers, 1651-1716. Seymour de Ricci and Ker suggest that this is likely to be the copy of the Siege of Troy entered as Poet. 7 in the catalogue of manuscripts of John, Baron Somers, 1651-1716 (British Library, Harley 7191) and sold for £8 15s in the Somers-Jekyll sale, 26 February 1739, lot 416: 'John Lydgate's Poem on the golden Fleece and Siege of Troy, finely written on Vellum, and illuminated, being the original Book presented by the Author to K. Henry V'.

Thomas Barrett of Lee, Kent. Clark-Maxwell argues that this is the copy of the Siege of Troy referred to in a letter to the owner of Markeaton Hall from Samuel Pegge in 1786, who saw the manuscript in the possession of Thomas Barrett of Lee, Kent.

Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, booksellers. Described in Bibliotheca anglo-poetica: or, a descriptive catalogue of a rare and rich collection of early English poetry: in the possession of Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown (1815), item 413, £350. According to Seymour de Ricci, nearly the whole of the collection had been obtained by Longman from Thomas Hill, 1760-1840, who had purchased the large poetical library of Thomas Park, 1759-1834. The manuscript may have remained unsold in 1818, for Clark-Maxwell cites a letter to the owner of Markeaton Hall from H. Smedley who saw it in 1818 when it was still with Longman. It appears for sale again in Bibliotheca selecta: a catalogue of the library of an eminent collector [i.e. James Midgeley], removed from the north of England; comprising a rare and rich assemblage of old English poetry, history, topography, illustrated books, as well as splendid, rare, and useful books in general, which will be sold by auction by Mr. Saunders... on Monday, February 16th, 1818, and five following days (London: T. Bensley and Sons, [1818]). This catalogue notes the associations with the 'Munday family' and cites the Longman catalogue above. As was common practice at the time, Robert Saunders doubtless brought together a number of properties for sale under the cloak of a single collection.

Henry Perkins. Perkins sale at Sotheby's, 3 June 1873, lot 634, sold to Bernard Quaritch, 1819-1899 for £1,320 on his own account.

Bernard Quaritch, 1819-1899. Catalogues 332 (1880), no. 47, and 343 (1882), no. 7375 (£1,720).

Lord Crawford. Bought from Quaritch by James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford, 1847-1913, in 1882. Barker, pages 256-257, 278. The inner upper cover (upper pastedown) bears the heraldic bookplate identifying the codex as having once been part of the Bibliotheca Lindesiana, the private library of James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford.

Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford, 1847-1913, and later transferred to The John Rylands Library.