Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 139: Simeon of Durham OSB, Historia regum. Richard of Hexham OSA, De gestis regis Stephani et de bello standardii. John of Hexham OSA, Nennius

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Title:
Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 139: Simeon of Durham OSB, Historia regum. Richard of Hexham OSA, De gestis regis Stephani et de bello standardii. John of Hexham OSA, Nennius
Alternate Title:
Simeon Dunelmensis. Ricardus et Johannes de Hexham. Nennius
Language:
Latin
Extent:
ff. 182 + 2
Dimensions:
302 Height (mm) and 217 Width (mm)
Approximate Date:
[ca. 1100 - 1199]
Provenance:
Most editors assign the book to Hexham, Mommsen to Salley on account of its relation to University Library Ff. 1. 27, part of which is from Salley (see MS 66). I consider Hexham the more likely. It is clear from many (eleven) references in Bale's Index Scriptorum (s.v. Nennius, Ailred, Ric. Hagustaldensis, Chronicon p. 488, etc.) that in his time a book very similar to this in contents was at Westminster Abbey. This fact is recognized by the editors of the Index. When Joscelin wrote his Catalogue of British historians, it seems to have been in the hands of a prebendary of Westminster named Pekyns. But from the same catalogue we learn that Dr Nicholas Wotton, Dean of Canterbury, gave Parker a volume containing much of the same matter as this. The items specified by Joscelin are Simeon of Durham, John and Richard of Hexham, and articles 11, 12, 14 in this MS. It seems most likely therefore that the Westminster volume was a sister book to this, and has perished, and that MS 139 is the book given by Dean Wotton to Parker. Wotton was Dean of York as well as of Canterbury and so may have procured the volume from his northern home.
Table of contents:
  • Chronicon
  • De gestis regis Stephani et de bello standardii
  • Epistola ad Hugonem decanum Eboracensem de archiepiscopis Eboracensium
  • De obsessione Dunelmi et de probitate Ucthredi comitis et de comitibus qui ei succeserunt
  • Historia regum
  • Continuation of Simeon of Durham OSB's Historia regum
  • Descriptio de bello inter regem Scotiae et barones Angliae
  • Carmen de morte Sumerledi
  • Relatio de standardo
  • Miraculum de quadam sanctimonali de Watton
  • Historia fundationis abbatiae Sanctae Mariae Eboracensis
  • Epistola de egressu monachorum Fontanensium
  • Gesta regum Anglorum (excerpt)
  • Gesta regum Anglorum (excerpt)
  • Gesta regum Anglorum (excerpt)
  • Gesta regum Anglorum (excerpt)
  • Estoire des Engleis (excerpt)
  • Visio cuiusdam clerici de gloria regis Malcolmi
  • Historia Brittonum
  • Vita Sancti Gildae
Description:
CCCC MS 139 is one of the most important post-Conquest chronicle manuscripts in the Parker Library. It contains a unique version of the Historia regum by Simeon of Durham OSB (fl. c. 1090-c. 1128) and its Continuation by John of Hexham OSA (d. before 1209), together with a number of other important texts relevant to the history of Durham, northern England and Scotland. Its production has variously been ascribed to the religious houses of Fountains, Hexham, Sawley and Durham, though by the sixteenth century it was almost certainly at Westminster Abbey, where it was seen by the historian John Bale (1495-1563).
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