The Care of Books Part 23

[240] _Dictionnaire de l'Architecture_, I. 267.

[241] For the history of this library see Bouillart's work cited at the foot of Fig. 37; and Franklin, _Anciennes Bibliotheques de Paris_, Vol. I.

pp. 107-134.

[242] For the historical information contained in this narrative, which originally appeared as a paper in the _Camb. Ant. Soc. Proc. and Comm._ IX. 37 for 18 February, 1895, I am indebted to an article in _The Builder_, 2 April, 1892, pp. 259-263, by my friend the late Rev. E.

Venables, Canon and Precentor of Lincoln.

[243] This list has been printed in the Appendix to _Giraldus Cambrensis_ (Rolls Series), VII. 165-171.

[244] Memorandum quod in ista indentura continentur omnes libri existentes in libraria ecclesie beate Marie Lincoln de novo sub seruris cathenati, cuius quidem indenture una pars consuitur in fine nigri libri dicte ecclesie et altera pars remanet in.... The rest of the line is illegible.

I have to thank the Rev. A. R. Maddison for kindly lending me his transcript of this valuable MS.

[245] For this plan I have to thank my friend T. D. Atkinson, Esq., of Cambridge, architect.

[246] William of Malmesbury, _Gesta Pontific.u.m_, Rolls Ser. p. 183.

[247] Ex eo quod visum est eis vtile et necessarium diuersis causis eos moventibus habere quasdam scolas competentes pro lecturis suis vna c.u.m libraria ad conseruacionem librorum et vtilitatem inibi studere volencium qua hactenus caruerunt statuerunt ... quod super vna parte claustri eiusdem ecclesie huiusmodi scole edificentur ... c.u.m libraria [etc.].

Chapter Act Book. I have to thank A. R. Malden, Esq., Chapter Clerk, for his kind a.s.sistance.

[248] Dugdale, _History of S. Paul's Cathedral_, fol. 1658, p. 132.

[249] I have fully described this library and its fittings in _Camb. Ant.

Soc. Proc. and Comm._ 1891. Vol. viii., pp. 6-10.

[250] My account of the library at Lichfield is derived from the _History and Antiquities of the Church and City of Lichfield_, by Rev. Th. Harwood, 4to. Gloucester, 1806, p. 180; and the Chapter Act Book, which I was allowed to examine through the kindness of my friend the Very Rev. H. M.

Luck.o.c.k, D.D., Dean.

[251] Leva.s.seur, _Annales de L'Eglise Cathedrale de Noyon_, 4to. Paris, 1633, p. IIII. A marginal note tells us that the gift of the Bailly de Chapitre was accepted 14 June, 1507.

[252] _Voyage archeologique ... dans le Departement de l'Aube._ A. F.

Arnaud. 4to. Troyes 1837, pp. 161-163.

[253] For the library belonging to the monastery see p. 108.

[254] The deed is copied in _MSS. Prattinton_ (Soc. Ant. Lond.), Vol.

VIII. p. 379. For this reference I have to thank the Rev. J. K. Floyer, M.A., librarian of Worcester Cathedral. See his _Thousand Years of a Cathedral Library_ in the _Reliquary_ for Jan. 1901, p. 7.

[255] My princ.i.p.al authority for the history of the Chapter Library is the Minute-Book of the Dean and Chapter of Rouen Cathedral, now preserved in the Archives de la Ville at Rouen, where I had the pleasure of studying it in September, 1896. A summary of it is given in _Inventaire-Sommaire des Archives Departementales_ (Seine Inferieure), 4to. Paris, 1874, Vol. II. I have also consulted _Recherches sur les Bibliotheques ... de Rouen_, 8vo., 1853.

[256] The Canons held a long debate, 28 May, 1479, "de ambonibus seu lutrinis in nova libraria fiendis et collocandis"; but finally decided to use the furniture of the old library for the present.

[257] _Voyage Liturgique de la France_, par Le Sieur de Moleon, 1718, p.

268. I have to thank Dr James for this quotation.

CHAPTER IV.

THE FITTINGS OF MONASTIC LIBRARIES AND OF COLLEGIATE LIBRARIES PROBABLY IDENTICAL. a.n.a.lYSIS OF SOME LIBRARY-STATUTES. MONASTIC INFLUENCE AT THE UNIVERSITIES. NUMBER OF BOOKS OWNED BY COLLEGES. THE COLLEGIATE LIBRARY.

BISHOP COBHAM'S LIBRARY AT OXFORD. LIBRARY AT QUEENS' COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.

AT ZUTPHEN. THE LECTERN SYSTEM. CHAINING OF BOOKS. FURTHER EXAMPLES AND ILl.u.s.tRATIONS.

How were the libraries mentioned in the preceding chapter fitted up? For instance, what manner of bookcases did Archbishop Chichele put into his library at Canterbury in 1414, or the "bons ouvriers subtilz et plains de sens" supply to the Abbat of Clairvaux in 1496? The primitive book-presses have long ago been broken up; and the medieval devices that succeeded them have had no better fate. This dearth of material need not, however, discourage us. We have, I think, the means of discovering with tolerable certainty what monastic fittings must have been, by comparing the bookcases which still exist in a more or less perfect form in the libraries of Oxford and Cambridge with such monastic catalogues as give particulars of arrangement and not merely lists of books.

The collegiate system was in no sense monastic, indeed it was to a certain extent established to counteract monastic influence; but it is absurd to suppose that the younger communities would borrow nothing from the elder--especially when we reflect that the monastic system, as inaugurated by S. Benedict, had completed at least seven centuries of successful existence before Walter de Merton was moved to found a college, and that many of the subsequent founders of colleges were more or less closely connected with monasteries. Further, as we have seen that study was specially enjoined upon monks by S. Benedict, it is precisely in the direction of study that we might expect to find features common to the two sets of communities. And, in fact, an examination of the statutes affecting the library in the codes imposed upon some of the earlier colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, leads us irresistibly to the conclusion that they were derived from monastic Customs, using the word in its technical sense, and monastic practice. The resemblances are too striking to be accidental.

I shall therefore, in the next place, review, as briefly as I can, the statutes of some of the above colleges, taking them in chronological order[258]; and I shall translate some pa.s.sages from them.

But first let me mention that the principle of lending books to students under a pledge was accepted by the University of Oxford many years before colleges were founded. It is recorded that Roger L'Isle, Dean of York, in the early part of the thirteenth century, "bestowed several exemplars of the holy Bible to be used by the Scholars of Oxford under a pledge"; that the said books, with others, were "locked up in chests, or chained upon desks in S. Mary's Chancel and Church to be used by the Masters upon leave first obtained"; that certain officers were appointed to keep the keys of these chests, and to receive the pledges from those that borrowed the books; and that the books were so kept "till the library over the Congregation House was built, and then being taken out, were set up in pews or studies digested according to Faculties, chained, and had a keeper appointed over them[259]."

In the statutes of Merton College, Oxford, 1274, the teacher of grammar (_grammaticus_) is to be supplied with a sufficient number of books out of the funds of the House, but no other mention of books occurs therein[260].

The explanatory ordinances, however, given in 1276 by Robert Kilwardby (Archbishop of Canterbury 1273-79), direct that the books of the community are to be kept under three locks, and to be a.s.signed by the warden and sub-warden to the use of the Fellows under sufficient pledge[261]. In the second statutes of University College (1292), it is provided, "that no Fellow shall alienate, sell, p.a.w.n, hire, lett, or grant, any House, Rent, Money, Book, or other Thing, without the Consent of all the Fellows"; and further, with special reference to the Library:

Every Book of the House, now given, or hereafter to be given, shall have a high value set upon it when it is borrowed, in order that he that has it may be more fearful lest he lose it; and let it be lent by an Indenture, whereof one part is to be kept in the common Chest, and the other with him that has the Book: And let no Book, belonging to the House, be lent out of the College, without a p.a.w.n better (than the Book), and this with the Consent of all the Fellows.

Let there be put one Book of every Sort that the House has, in some common and secure Place; that the Fellows, and others with the Consent of a Fellow, may for the Future have the Benefit of it.

Every Opponent in Theology, or Reader of the Sentences, or a Regent that commonly reads (_regens et legens communiter_), when he wants it, shall have any necessary Book, that the House has, lent to him Gratis; and when he has done with it, let him restore it to that Fellow, who had formerly made choice of it[262].

The statutes of Oriel College, dated 1329, lay down the following rules for the management of books:

The common books (_communes libri_) of the House are to be brought out and inspected once a year, on the feast of the Commemoration of Souls [2 November], in presence of the Provost or his deputy, and of the Scholars [Fellows].

Every one of them in turn, in order of seniority, may select a single book which either treats of the science to which he is devoting himself, or which he requires for his use. This he may keep, if he please, until the same festival in the succeeding year, when a similar selection of books is to take place, and so on, from year to year.

If there should happen to be more books than persons, those that remain are to be selected in the same manner[263].

The last clause plainly shews how small the number of the books must have been when the statute was written. Their safety was subsequently secured by an ordinance of the Provost and Scholars, which, by decree of the Visitor, dated 13 May, 1441, received the authority of a statute. The high value set upon the books is shewn by the extreme stringency of the penalties imposed for wilful loss or failure of rest.i.tution. After describing the annual a.s.semblage of the Provost and Fellows, as directed in the former statute, the new enactment proceeds as follows:

Any person who absents himself on that day, so that the books selected by him are neither produced nor restored; or who, being present, refuses to produce or to restore them; or who refuses to pay the full value, if, without any fraud or deception on his part, it should happen that any one of them be missing; is to be deprived of all right of selecting books for that year; and any person who wittingly defers the aforesaid production or rest.i.tution till Christmas next ensuing, shall, _ipso facto_, cease to be a Fellow.

Further, any scholar who has p.a.w.ned or alienated, contrary to the common consent of the college, any book or object of value (_jocale_) belonging to the college; or who has even suggested, helped, or favoured, such p.a.w.ning or alienation, shall, _ipso facto_, cease to be a member of the Society[264].

The statutes of Peterhouse, Cambridge, dated 1344, cla.s.s the books of the Society with the charters and the muniments, and prescribe the following rules for their safe custody:

In order that the books which are the common property of the House (_communes libri_), the charters, and the muniments, may be kept in safe custody, we appoint and ordain that an indenture be drawn up of the whole of them in the presence of at least the major part of the scholars, expressing what the books are, and to what faculty they belong; of which indenture one part is to be deposited with the Master, the other with the Deans, as a record of the transaction.

The aforesaid books, charters, and muniments are to be placed in one or more common chests, each having two locks, one key of which shall for greater security be deposited with the Master, the other with the Senior Dean, who shall cause the books to be distributed to those scholars who have need of them, in the manner which has been more fully set forth in the section which treats of the office of the Deans[265].

The section referred to prescribes that the Deans

are to distribute them [the books] to the scholars in such manner as shall appear to them expedient; and further, they shall, if they think proper, make each scholar take an oath that he will not alienate any book so borrowed, but will take all possible care of it, and restore it to the Master and Dean, at the expiration of the appointed time[266].

In 1473 Dr John Warkworth became Master. He was evidently a lover of books, for he gave to the Library fifty-five volumes, which he protected, after the fashion of an earlier age, by invoking a curse upon him who should alienate them. Moreover, during his Mastership, in 1480, the College enacted or adopted a special statute headed, _De libris Collegii_, which may be thus translated:

In the name of G.o.d, Amen. As books are the most precious treasure of scholars, concerning which there ought to be the most diligent care and forethought, lest, as heretofore, they fall to decay or be lost, it is hereby appointed, settled, and ordained, by the Master and Fellows of the House or College of S. Peter in Cambridge, that no book which has been chained in the library there shall be taken away from, or removed out of, the library, except by special a.s.sent and consent of the Master and all the resident Fellows of the aforesaid College--it being understood that by resident Fellows a majority of the whole Society is meant.