Manuscript Description London, British Library MS Arundel 119 | |
Title: | Lydgate, Destruction of Thebes |
Author: | Lydgate |
Contents: | Destruction of Thebes |
Language: | English |
Scribal Hands: | Examples of the hand. Click on the link above for full details and images of individual letter forms. |
Dialect: | LP 9450; County: Essex |
Pagination: | Modernish pencil top right. |
Quiring: | 8 |
Signatures: | No a's visible. b, d, e, f, g, h, and upper case I, and k are all visible followed by roman numerals i-iiij. |
Catchwords: | Regularly present with elaborate boxing decorated in various ways with penwork. |
Page Size: | 273 x 190 |
Frame: | 4 x vertical - a single then a space then a double thus creating a margin for glosses and headings. 4 x horizontal with each pair enclosing top and bottom lines. Pricking still visible in places. Ruled throughout in grey plummet or sometimes in fine black ink. |
Writing Space: | 193 x 105 |
Incipits and Explicits: | In red ink to introduce or conclude each part. |
Marginal Headings: | Both explanatory and summary glosses appear in the specially ruled marginal box in red ink by the scribe. Most are preceded by pen-flourished paraphs. |
Running Titles: | In red ink by the scribe denoting 'Prima pars, secunda pars, tercia pars'. |
Title by Scribe: | The first folio begins with 'Incipit prologue' by the scribe in red ink above the four-sided border. |
Borders: | A 4-sided border for the opening folio. Two three-sided borders for the beginning of parts 2 and 3. Red, pink, blue, gold and green. |
Historiated Initials: | The opening folio has a 6-line historiated initial with a pilgrim on a horse dressed in black. |
Illuminated Initials: | A 6-line initial begins the second part, a 4-sided one begins the third part. Pink and blue on a gold ground and attached to the 3-sided border. |
Paragraph Marks: | Blue with red flourishing, gold with blue flourishing. They act as markers in the text and are also used in the margins to precede marginal headings or Explicits and Incipits. |