Manuscript Description London, British Library, Additional 35287 | |
| Title: | Piers Plowman |
| Author: | Langland |
| Contents: | Piers Plowman, B Version |
| Language: | English and Latin |
| Date Range: | Late 14th c. or absolute beginning of 15th. |
| Scribal Hands: | Examples of the hand. Click on the link above for full details and images of individual letter forms.                 |
| Dialect: | County : Herefords |
| Material: | Parchment |
| No of Folios: | 2 paper flyleaves + folios 1-104 + 2 paper flyleaves |
| Pagination: | Modern pencil in upper outer corners recto first numbering 1-103, then crossing out errors and changing to 1-104 because originally skipped 88 and then went back to cross out numbers 88-103 and change to 89-104. |
| Quiring: | 8s |
| Signatures: | Signatures are l.c. letter plus romans i=iiii eg 'g j' to 'g iiij' on ff49-52; quires numbered below the catchwords on last folio verso, lower margin, numbered with roman numerals, eg 'iiij-us lower margin f32v even though no catchwords, and top of 'v' on f40v below catchword. |
| Catchwords: | By the scribe at the bottom edge of page and running into gutter, sometimes underlined in same brown ink as text. |
| Page Size: | 302 x 200 |
| Frame: | 6 x vertical forming pairs c. 5 mm apart, one in outer margin as ? outer edge of glosses column, second pair around initials at start of each line, third pair at right edge of text column; 4 x horizontal enclosing top and bottom lines, ruled within, all in very faint fine grey lines. Pricking survives top, outer and bottom edges of many leaves. |
| Writing Space: | 220 x 124 (ruled for, often less) |
| Incipits and Explicits: | On f104r at bottom, 'Explicit hic dialogus petri plowman' in enlarged script by scribe; then followed also by scribe in smaller script, 'Penna precor siste ; quoniam liber explicit iste; and below that by a different hand, less formal, 'Explicit iste liber qui obsecro transeat liber'. |
| Marginal Headings: | By the scribe in spaces of several blank lines left for them, written rubric. Passus titles in red, Latin enclosed in red boxes. |
| Running Titles: | Scribe(?) writes passus numbers as running titles on rectos only, eg in upper outer corner of f49 'passus xj-us'. |
| Flourished Initials: | 10-line red initial 'I' at beginning on f1, then each passus begins with 3-4 line red initial with brown foliage pattern inside letter but no further flourishing. |
| Other Names (not owners): | Front pastedown has bookplate 'From the Library of the Earl of Ashburnham, Appendix No. CXXIX, May 1897 first flyleaf recto handwritten, 'Purch at Sothebys (lot 77), 1 May 1899'. |