Description
Alternative title
Ancrene Wisse
Type of resource
mixed material
Extent
ff. 4 + 118
Date created
[ca. 1200-1299]
Language
English, Middle (1100-1500), Latin
Material
Vellum
Layout
28 lines to a page
Height (mm)
210
Width (mm)
150
Collation
a(2) b(2) 1(10) 2(8) 3(10)-12(10).
Writing
in a very fine clear hand
Foliation
ff. a-b + i-iv + 1-118 + c-d
Provenance
From Wigmore (Herefordshire). At bottom of f. 1r (xiii): Liber ecclesie S. Jacobi de Wygemore. quem Johannes Purcel dedit eidem ecclesie ad instanciam fratris Walteri de Lodel(awe?) senioris tunc precentoris. Siquis dictum librum alienauerit a predicta ecclesia. uel titulum hunc maliciose deleuerit anathema. Amen. fiat (thrice). Amen.
Research
This copy is mentioned in the Camden Society edition of the Ancren Riwle (by J. Morton, 1853, p. vi) but is not used for the constitution of the text: an extract given by Wanley (p. 149) is reprinted at p. xxiii. The most original text, in a different dialect, seems to be the imperfect copy at Gonville and Caius (no. 234). The C. C. C. MS. has been transcribed for the Early English Text Society; specimens (from this transcript) are given in Anglia 1907, p. 103 etc. by Dr Heuser. In the Modern Language Review (July 1909) Professor A. S. Napier deals with Dr Heuser's article, and shows that certain prayers were copied from this MS. and archaic forms designedly introduced into them, by W. L'isle. His copy is in the Bodleian MS. Laud. Misc. 201.
Additions
f. ir pasted over has remains of writing. f. iiv. Title and notes on forms of English (xvi). ff. iiir-ivv. Part of the text transcribed into modern English (xvi). 1. Headed (xvi) Liber octauus, the book having been formerly reckoned by Parker as the eighth volume of his collection of Anglo-Saxon Homilies.
Abstract/Contents
- Summary
- Ancrene Wisse or Ancrene Riwle is a treatise on the religious life intended for anchoresses or nuns, written in the first half of the thirteenth century. There is much controversy as to when, where and by whom it was written, but possibly it was by a Dominican writing in the West Midlands in the 1230s. Others have argued for authorship by an Augustinian canon, also writing in the West Midlands in the first third of the century. CCCC MS 402, once considered to be one of the earliest versions of the text, is now thought to be of the late thirteenth century. The MS has recently been published in an authoritative new edition by Bella Millett, collated with variants from all other MSS of the text.
- Contents
- Ancrene Wisse
Access conditions
- Use and reproduction:
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- License:
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