Annals of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, A.D. 1598-A.D. 1867 Part 10

A.D. 1674.

In this year appeared the third _Catalogus impressorum Librorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae_, in one folio volume, divided into two parts of 478 and 272 pages respectively. It is dedicated to Archbishop Sheldon, by Hyde the Librarian, not without reason, as being printed in that Theatre which the Archbishop had so lately built. The Keeper, in this dedication, speaks very feelingly of the daily weariness of mind and body which the compilation of the Catalogue had cost him, and tells how his very hours for refreshment had been spent among books alone, and how (_mirabile dictu!_) he actually had not shrunk even from the inclemency of winter[131]. In his preface he says that, on his entrance into office, he reckoned that the work of a new catalogue would occupy him for two, or at most three, years; six, however, had been spent in compilation and transcription, one in revision and enlargement, and, lastly, two in the actual printing. Yet, says he, he never withdrew his neck from the yoke, and postponed all considerations of bodily health.

People little know, he proceeds, what it is to accomplish a work of this kind. What is easier, say they, than to look at the beginning of a book and to copy out its t.i.tle? They judge only from one or two weeks' work in some little library of their own. But, what with careful examining of volumes of pamphlets (which of itself was labour perfectly exhausting), what with distinguishing synonymous authors and works, and identifying metonymous ones, unravelling anagrammatical names and those derived from places, and the like, the poor man declares he endured the greatest torment of mind ('maximo animi cruciatu') as well as waste of precious time. It is clear, from these pathetic lamentations, that Hyde had no great love for Bibliography for its own sake. But, after all his complaints, it is actually a.s.serted by Hearne that he 'did not do much in the work besides writing the dedication and preface[132]!' Hearne attributes the real compilation of the Catalogue to Emmanuel Prichard, or Pritchard, of Hart Hall, the janitor, who examined every book in the whole library, and wrote out the Catalogue, in two volumes, with his own hand. Hearne repeats this a.s.sertion frequently; it is found, _e.g._, in his preface to the _Chronicon Dunstap._ p. xii., and in his _Autobiography_ (1772, p. 11), where he adds that he was well informed of this by Dr. Mill and others. If this be true, the inditing such a preface, while totally suppressing Prichard's name, does little credit to Hyde.

Frequent mention of this Emmanuel Prichard is found between 1686 and 1699 as being employed upon the MSS., and as engaged in taking an account of duplicates and arranging Bishop Barlow's books. In 1687, 20 were paid him for 'writing a Catalogue of MSS.' Probably this was the list upon which Hearne a.s.serts that the index to the Bodleian MSS., in Bernard's Catalogue, was founded[133]. Hearne describes him[134] as being 'a very industrious, usefull man.' Although a member of Hart Hall, he never took any degree; but wore a civilian's gown. He died in the Hall about 1704, aged upwards of 70, and was buried in St.

Peter's-in-the-East. He left 200 to the Vice-Princ.i.p.al of Hart Hall, which was partly spent in building a library-room[135].

[131] Of the 'hyemis inclementia' before the present system of warming the Library was introduced, several of the present staff of officers can speak as feelingly as Hyde. The writer remembers, in particular, one winter when, in consequence of the roof being under repair, the thermometer fell some eleven degrees below freezing point!

[132] _MS. Diary_, 1714, vol. ii. p. 193.

[133] _Reliquiae Hearn._ ii. 591. But see p. 116, _infra_.

[134] _MS. Diary_, li. 193.

[135] Hearne's _MS. Diary_, ciii. 38.

A.D. 1675.

In the Register of Benefactions, on a page faintly headed in pencil with this date, is entered a gift from Christopher, Lord Hatton, 'Homiliarum Saxonicarum 4 volumina antiqua.' The donor was consequently the second baron, and first viscount, Hatton, who succeeded his father Christopher (a firm royalist, and close friend of Clarendon, as well as antiquarian, and friend of Dodsworth) in 1670, and died in 1706. Possibly this gift may have been made through the influence of his uncle, Capt. Charles Hatton, who appears to have been much interested in Anglo-Saxon studies, who himself gave three MSS. to the Library, and several of whose letters to Dr. Charlett in 1694-1707 are preserved in vol. x.x.xiii. of Ballard's MSS. Strange to say, these volumes of Homilies (written shortly after the Norman Conquest) are now among the Junian MSS., Nos. 22, 23, 24, 99, and their appearance in that collection is accounted for by Wanley (_Cat._ p. 45, where they are fully described) by a story which, he says, was often told him by Hyde, viz. that, immediately upon the arrival of the MSS. at the Library, they were lent to Dr. Marshall, who most probably in turn lent them to Junius; that, Marshall dying soon after, Junius kept them until his own death, when they returned to the Library with his own books, by his bequest. Junius himself frequently refers to them under the description of _Codices Hattoniani_.

The Library also contains a collection of 112 miscellaneous and valuable MSS., 'ex Codicibus Hattonianis,' of the presentation of which no record has been found[136], but which doubtless came about the same time from the same donor. Some precious Anglo-Saxon volumes form the special feature of this collection. Amongst them are, King Alfred's translation of Gregory's _Pastoral Care_, of which the king designed to send a copy to each Cathedral Church in the kingdom, this being the copy sent to Worcester (No. 20); the translation by Werfrith, Bishop of Worcester, of Gregory's _Dialogues_, with King Alfred's preface (No. 76); and a version of the Four Gospels, written about the time of Henry II (No.

65).

Henry Justell, afterwards Librarian at St. James's, sent to the University from France, through Dr. Hickes, three very precious MSS. of the seventh century, written in uncial characters, containing the Acts of the Council of Ephesus, the Canons of Carthage, Nicaea, Chalcedon, &c., which had been used by his father Christopher Justell in his _Bibliotheca Juris Canonici veteris_, 1661. They are now numbered, _e Mus._ 100-102. Several other MSS. given at the same time are preserved in the same series. In return for this valuable gift Justell was created D.C.L. by diploma.

[136] The Register has evidently been kept very irregularly and imperfectly during the time that Barlow and Hyde held the headship.

A.D. 1677.

The wonderful collection of Early English poetry known as 'the Vernon MS.,' was presented 'soon after the Civil Wars' by Col. Edward Vernon, of Trinity College, who had been an officer in the royal army. One who bore the same name, doubtless the same person, of North Aston, Oxon, was created D.C.L. Aug. 6, 1677; it was probably therefore about that time that the MS. was presented. The volume is described in Bernard's Catalogue, 1697, p. 181, as being a 'vast ma.s.sy ma.n.u.script;' and very correctly. Its measurements are these: length of page, 22-1/2 inches; length of written text, 17-1/2 inches; breadth of page, 15 inches; breadth of written text, 12-1/2 inches. It is written in triple columns, on 412 leaves of stout vellum; and having been clad of late years in a proportionate russia binding, is altogether a Goliath among books. In date it is of the early part of the fourteenth century. Its first article bears the t.i.tles of 'Salus Animae' and 'Sowle-Hele,' and its chief contents are Lives of the Saints, Hampole's _p.r.i.c.k of Conscience_, Grosteste's _Castle of Love_, Hampole's _Perfect Living_, the treatise on _Contemplative Life_, the _Mirror of S. Edmund_, the _Abbey of the Holy Ghost_, and _Piers Plowman_; besides a mult.i.tude of smaller pieces, several of which have been recently copied with a view to publication by the Early English Text Society[137]. Fifty copies of a brief list of the contents (numbering altogether 161 articles) were printed by J. O.

Halliwell, Esq., in 1848. A MS., similar in size and contents, was presented to the British Museum a few years ago by Sir John Simeon; it is, apparently, the work of the same scribe as the Bodleian book.

[137] This Society has also just issued Part 1. of Piers Plowman from this MS., edited by W. W. Skeat, M.A. (Oct. 1867).

A.D. 1678.

Francis Junius, born at Heidelberg in 1589, who had pa.s.sed a large part of his life in England as librarian to that Howard Earl of Arundel who collected the marbles which go under his name at Oxford, as well as the MSS. similarly ent.i.tled, which are preserved in the British Museum and at Heralds' College, bequeathed to the Library, on his decease at Windsor in this year, all his Anglo-Saxon MSS. and his own life-long collections bearing on the philology of the Northern nations. Amongst these are some English relics of the greatest value and importance. The book of metrical Homilies on the Dominical Gospels, compiled by an Augustinian monk named Ormin, who thence called his book _Ormulum_ ([OE: 'iss boc iss nemmnedd Orrmulum, Forri att Orrm itt wrohte']) is one of the chief of these. Its date is conjectured to be the 13th century.

It is written on parchment, on folio leaves, very long and very narrow (averaging 20 inches by 8) in a very broad and rude hand, with many additions inserted on extra parchment sc.r.a.ps. Twenty-seven leaves appear to be wanting. The whole work was first published in 2 vols., at the University Press in 1852, under the editorship of R. M. White, D.D., formerly Professor of Anglo-Saxon. Caedmon's metrical paraphrase of Genesis and other parts of Holy Scripture, ill.u.s.trated with numerous curious drawings, is another of the gems of this collection. The MS. is of the end of the tenth century, but the work itself is now generally believed to be, in the main, the production of the earliest English poet, the Caedmon noticed by Bede (iii. 24), who died towards the close of the seventh century, and not, as Hickes conjectured, of some later writer of the same name. The MS. first came to light in the hands of Archbp. Usher, by whom it was given to Junius. The latter published it at Amsterdam in 1655, and it was re-edited by Mr. Benj. Thorpe in 1832; several English and German translations have also appeared. Many of the drawings were engraved and published in 1754, as ill.u.s.trations of the manners and buildings of the Anglo-Saxons; and the whole of them have been engraved in vol. xxiv. of the _Archaeologia_, with some remarks by Sir H. Ellis. MS. 121 is an extremely valuable collection of the Canons of the Anglo-Saxon Church, written in the tenth century, which belonged to Worcester Cathedral; and there are four valuable volumes of Homilies, which appear, however, to have been part of Lord Hatton's gift to the Library. (See under 1675[138].) Besides books, Junius left to the University six founts of Gothic, Saxon, and other types, together with the moulds and matrices.

Fifty-five MSS. and printed books, chiefly Oriental, were purchased in this year from the library of Dr. Thomas Greaves, Deputy-professor of Arabic, who died May 22, 1676. It appears from the list in Bernard's Catalogue that sixty-five volumes were purchased, but that ten of these were never sent. With Greaves' own books were obtained also the MSS. of Richard James, of Corpus Christi College, nephew of Thomas James, the first Librarian, which had come into the possession of his friend Greaves upon his death in Dec. 1638. These amount to forty-three volumes, entirely written by James himself, in a large bold hand; they consist chiefly of _Collectanea_ bearing on the history of England from various MSS. Chronicles, Registers, and early writers, particularly with reference to the corruption of the Church and clergy before the Reformation, and in opposition to Becket. A full list of their contents, drawn up by Tanner, is given at pp. 248-253 of Bernard's Catalogue. The price paid for the books bought out of Greaves' library was 55.

Fifteen shillings were paid, as appears from the accounts for the year, for the carriage of a whale from Lechlade, which, strange to say, had been caught in the Severn, and was presented by William Jordan, an apothecary at Gloucester[139]. Ten shillings were also paid for a 'sea elephant.'

[138] Parts of MSS. 4 and 5, which had been stolen from the Library, were recovered, in 1720, in the manner recorded in the following entry in the Benefaction Book: 'Vir doctissimus Joannes Georgius Eckardus, bibliothecae Brunsvicensis praefectus, pro singulari sua humanitate, folia quammulta MSS. Dictionarii Fr. Junii, continentia sc. litteras F. et S., a nequissimo quodam Dano jam olim surrepta, propriis sumptibus redemit et Bibl. Bodl. ultro rest.i.tuit.' Some further portions of Junius' papers (including some which had formerly been in the Library) are recorded to have been given in 1753 by the Provost and Fellows of Queen's College.

[139] In the Benefaction Book this gift is a.s.signed to the year 1672.

A.D. 1680. [See A.D. 1665.]

Sir W. Dugdale gave copies of his own works. Two hundred coins were given by Dr. George Hickes.

A.D. 1681.

In this year John Rushworth, of Lincoln's Inn, the historian of the Long Parliament, was a member of the Parliament held at Oxford. Probably it may have been at this time that he presented to the Library one of its most precious ?e????a, called, from its donor, 'Codex Rushworthia.n.u.s.' (Auct. D. 2. 19.) In 1665, Junius mentions it in the Preface to his _Glossarium Gothic.u.m_, as being then still in Rushworth's own hands[140]. It is a MS. of the Latin Gospels, written by an Irish scribe, Mac-Regol, (who records his name on the last leaf, 'Macregol dipincxit hoc evangelium,' &c.,) and glossed with an interlinear Anglo-Saxon version by Owun and by Faermen, a priest at Harewood. The volume is traditionally reported to have been in Bede's possession, but since the Irish annals record the death of Mac Riagoil, a scribe and abbot of Birr in 820, the volume must be about a century too late. It has been published in full, together with the Lindisfarne Gospels, by the Surtees Society in 3 vols., under the editorship of Rev. J.

Stevenson and George Waring, Esq., M.A. A description is given in Prof.

Westwood's _Palaeographia Sacra Pictoria_.

Nine shillings were paid for the carriage of a mummy from London, probably one of those which are now in the Ashmolean Museum. It was given by Aaron Goodyear, a Turkey merchant, who gave also a model of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, and various little images, and in 1684 more than forty coins.

[140] It is strange that no entry of the gift of this priceless volume is found in the Register of Benefactions, any more than of that of the Vernon MS.

A.D. 1682.

Richard Davis, M.A., of Sandford, Oxon, gave the portrait of Margaret, Countess of Richmond, a book of Russian laws, and the Runic Calendar or Clog Almanack, now exhibited in the gla.s.s case at the entrance of the Library. The latter is thus described in the Register: 'Calendarium ligneum, tam materia quam usu perpetuum, unius ligni quadrati angulis incisum, more antiquo.'

Dr. John Morris, Regius Professor of Hebrew, who died in 1648, bequeathed five pounds annually to the University, to be paid to some Master of Arts of Ch. Ch., chosen by the Dean, for a speech 'in Schola Linguarum,' in honour of Sir Thomas Bodley, 'and as a panegyric and encouragement of the Hebrew studies,' on Nov. 8, in the presence of the Visitors of the Library after the conclusion of the annual visitation.

The bequest was to take effect after the death of his wife, which happened on Nov. 11, 1681; and on Oct. 6, 1682, Convocation fixed 3 p.m.

as the hour for delivery of the Speech on the Visitation-day.

The Speeches are continued annually, although, probably for want of public notice, only scantily attended, none but those actually interested in the Visitation of the Library, together with the speaker's friends, being generally aware of it. If provision were made for the deposit of the Speeches in the Library after delivery, they would no doubt form an interesting and accurate record of its growth, and of many pa.s.sing events which, for want of such a record, are soon forgotten.

Only one speech appears to be preserved in the Library: it is that delivered on Nov. 8, 1701, by Edmund Smith, M.A., of Ch. Ch., and is very beautifully written in imitation of typography. But in this case nothing is recorded of the history of the preceding year, the speech being simply a panegyric of the Founder. It has been printed among Smith's _Works_, a pamphlet of 103 pages dignified with that name, of which the third edition appeared at London in 1719[141]. Dr. Rawlinson appears to have endeavoured to compile a list of the Speakers; for Bishop Tanner, in a letter to him dated Oct. 11, 1735, from Ch. Ch., says he will enquire them out, if he can, but that they are not entered upon the Chapter books, since they are not appointed by the Chapter, but privately by the Dean or Hebrew Professor, and paid by the Vice-Chancellor, in whose accounts alone their names are probably entered[142].

The names of the Speakers up to the year 1690 are given in Wood's _Athenae_ (ii. 127) as follows. They were all M.A., and Students of Ch.

Ch.:--

1682 Thomas Sparke 1683 Zach. Isham 1684 Chas. Hickman 1685 Thos. Newey 1686 Thos. Burton 1687 Will. Bedford 1688 Rich. Blakeway 1689 Roger Altham, jun.

1690 Edward Wake * * * *

1701 Edm. Smith

The following list from 1706 to 1734 has been gathered out of Hearne's MS. Diary:--

1706 Rich. Newton 1707 Thos. Terry 1708 Will. Periam 1709 Rich. Sadlington 1710 Richard Frewin 1711 -- Aldred[143]

1712 Gilb. Lake 1713 Hen. Cremer 1714 Chas. Brent 1715 John White 1716 Edw. Ivie 1717 Hen. Gregory 1718 Thos. Fenton 1719 George Wiggan 1720 Thos. Foulkes 1721 Will. Le Hunt 1722 Hen. Shirman 1723 Matthew Lee 1724 Christopher Haslam 1725 Will. Davis 1726 Edw. Blakeway 1727 David Gregory 1728 [Rob.?] Manaton 1729 [Hen.?] Jones 1730 John Fanshaw 1731 Oliver Battely 1732 Dan. Burton 1733 Fifield Allen 1734 Pierce Manaton, M.D.

[141] A long account of Smith is given in Johnson's _Lives of the Poets_.

[142] _Letters of Eminent Persons, &c_, ii. 111.

[143] Doubtless an error for Chas. Aldrich