Miscellany
University Library, MS Add. 6860, f. 43r
England, early fourteenth century
Vellum, c. 215 x 160 mm (writing space variable), IV + 154 + II ff.
This manuscript contains a large number of scientific texts, including the Imago mundi of Honorius Augustodunensis (1080–1154), a main source for the medieval French encyclopedias, the Image du monde and La Petite Philosophie, both included in this manuscript. Most of the texts in this manuscript are in Latin, the only item in French being the one leaf at the end of the manuscript containing a fragment of Walter de Henley’s Le Dite de Hosebondrie (f. 155). The manuscript contains a large number of astronomical notes and tables and a treatise on the astrolabe attributed to Mashallah ibn Athari. The opening on display offers a diagram of the Universe.
Miscellany
University Library, MS Add. 6860, f. 43r
England, early fourteenth century
Vellum, c. 215 x 160 mm (writing space variable), IV + 154 + II ff.
This manuscript contains a large number of scientific texts, including the Imago mundi of Honorius Augustodunensis (1180-1154), a main source for the medieval French encyclopedias, the Image du monde and La Petite Philosophie, both included in this manuscript. Most of the texts in the manuscript are in Latin, the only item in French being the one leaf at the end containing a fragment of Walter de Henley’s Le Dite de Hosebondrie (f. 155).
The manuscript also includes a number of astronomical notes and tables, anonymous texts such as De mensuracione terre, Nova forma composicionis novi quadrantis, De natura planetarum et stellarum; extracts from Bartholomeus Anglicus, De proprietatibus rerum; a prologue to the lunar table and Compotus Correctorius both by Robert Grosseteste, bishop of Lincoln; three texts by Johannes de Sacrobosco (Algorismus, Computus ecclesiasticus, and Tractatus de Sphaera); Albumazar’s Flores Astrologiae, translated by Johannes Hispalensis (also responsible for the translation of Regimen Sanitatis). It also contains a treatise on the astrolabe attributed to Mashallah ibn Athari. The folio on display provides an astronomical table.
This manuscript, like Additional 4089 and Additional 4087 (also in this display case), is in a medieval binding. The binding, now discoloured, still bears traces of its original red colour. This manuscript belonged to the library of Bury St Edmunds, to which it had been given by Thomas of Scrouteby, possibly in an unbound state. The manuscript was bought at Sotheby’s for the University Library in 1936.
