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Manuscript Description
England, Manchester, Chetham's Library MS 6696 (Mun. A.7.48)
 
Title:Confessio Amantis
Author:Gower
Contents:Confessio Amantis (A version) ff2-126
Language:English and Latin
Date Range:1625-1650; 16th century script; purchased for the library in 1666.
Scribal Hands:
Examples of the hand. Click on the link above for full details and images of individual letter forms.
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Dialect:Cf. LP 411; County: Lancs
Material:Paper
No of Folios:1 marbled matches pastedown + 2 newer paper flyleaves + text on folios 1-124 + 1 newer paper + 1 marbled matches pastedown
Pagination:Modern arabic but not every folio, rarely appears, in upper outer corner recto, grey ink.
Quiring:12s and 14s, some leaves missing
Signatures:Signatures are upper case letter only on first folio of each quire only, in lower margin c. centred under second column of recto first leaf of each quire, beginning 'C' on f22.
Catchwords:No
Page Size:384 x 262
Frame:2 x vertical at left edge of columns, 1 x horizontal at top, with top line of text written over it, all drypoint; not ruled.
Writing Space:313 x 188 including 2 columns, see frame
Incipits and Explicits:Shorter ending without the additional Latin texts, ends ME 'Oure Ioie may ben lenles' / Aman amen amen ' Explicit Iste liber qui transeat obsecio liber / Vt sine liuore vigeat lectoris in ore / Que sedet in stauis celi det vt ista Johannis / Perpetuis Annis stet pagina grata britanis // Quam cinxere freta Gower' (three more lines) / Amen'.
Marginal Headings:By scribe in black ink, in spaces left within column or sometimes in upper margin ('Incipit liber secundus) and Latin passages in text column but written in larger, bolder, slightly more formal script, by main scribe; also glosses in English in margins as finding aids as for example 'The worlde Of Brasse', 'Exposicione of the dreme'.
Miniatures:Space left top half of column 1 on f10, perhaps for the dream miniature but never filled.
Flourished Initials:2-3-line bold black initials for portions of text, drawn by scribe in same ink, throughout volume (with blue shadowing or in-fill ff1-11 only); some black-ink decoration around these initials and decoration inside the initials.
Other Names (not owners):'william yate oeth this book god' lower margin f21 in 16th century hand; 'Notehurste' in a scroll about equivalent of 3 lines below end of last Amen on f124v: Ker writes, 'It occurs also in the scribe's hand at the end of the Glasgow manuscript, which belonged in s. xvi med. To John, son and heir of Thomas Chetham 'late of Notehurst' (Nuthurst, Lancashire) Decessyd . . to be an heyrelome at Notehirst according to the tenour and effect of my fathers will'.
Further Information:Ker 3.345
Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York, King's Manor, York YO1 7EP