BOOK LOVE!

Today someone mentioned asking for a Lewis and Short* for Christmas. That made me think to check abebooks.com and alibris.com to see if any were available and what the asking price was. abe had nothing. Alibris had a copy for $40.

$40.

This book normally sells upwards of $250. Used, you're lucky to find it at $150.

Naturally, I bought it on the spot. This sort of book is an invaluable tool, a career investment.

I own a Lewis and Short!


* The ultimate Latin dictionary, for those not familiar.

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Today my palaeography class went to the Minster Library to look at some manuscripts. They were all circa 1500, on a variety of topics.

Outwardly the most interesting was the Wycliffite Bible with the signature of Queen Elizabeth I on a page of 1 Thessalonians.

Most amusing was the book of hours, and most entertaining, partly because I'm familiar with books of hours and had stuff to look for and compare, and party because it was a contender for "best illustration." The apostles and early saints each got illuminated miniatures and little bios, and there was one poor fellow whose head got chopped off. He's depicted with a bloody stump of a neck, holding his head in both hands. Oddly enough, the halo was still up where the head should have been.

The other rival for "best illustration" was a book of medieval healing recipes. Lotta weird stuff, and it was a heavily used book. A large number of distinct hands wrote in the margins, marking places for easy recall. Mostly they did this in words, but occasionally pictorally. In one case, there was a dead cow, flat on its back with its legs in the air, with a cloud above it raining on it. I'm not sure what exactly this was meant to mark, but it's a great picture.

And most useful was a copy of John Mirk's Instructions for Parish Priests. At least, it said John Mirk on the handout, but it was in Latin (not Middle English) and it was prose (not poetry), and the title stamped on the cover was not "John Mirk." This makes it even more interesting than Mirk, because I have a published copy of Mirk already and this is new. I'll be going back for this one.

Now, this class is a palaeography class, not a codicology class, so I know this was a first for a lot of my classmates. I, however, got my book (the Mirk) and instinctively started doing a manuscript description of it. I can tell you how many quires it has, the pricking pattern, the catchwords, etc. It was kind of nice to sit down with something and be able to look at it more deeply than just "Oooh pretty book." To know what the questions are. To know where to go for the answers. It was a good feeling.

My prof came over and asked if I'd found anything interesting, and I pointed out a couple things which she then explained to me. I kept a straight face and refrained from pointing out that I knew why they were interesting and that's why I pointed them out in the first place. It's nice to think I got some useful education at UofT, stuff that will stand me in good stead.

Thanks, Scary David.

In which I babble over a new book

Today I received in the mail Introduction to Manuscript Studies, by Raymond Clemens and Timothy Graham.

This is a MUST-HAVE book for anyone messing around with medieval manuscripts. I'm serious. If I had had this book this time last year, my Codicology class would have been significantly easier. This book is incredibly useful. It has chapters on the making of medieval manuscripts (four of them, including one on binding, on text, on glosses and corrections, and on tools). It has chapters (6) on reading manuscripts: general info, punctuation and abbreviation, damaged MSS, origins and provenance, description, and selected scripts. It has lists of common abbreviations, lists of unique features of scripts to help you date and place them. All in one book. It then has chapters on some manuscript genres. There's a glossary (very useful for the novice), and a section on tools for study of medieval Latin, with some books I have not heard of before but which may prove invaluable, since much of my own study will involve teasing out the delicate nuances of a single word here, a phrase there, etc.

Not only is it just dripping usefulness, it is absolutely gorgeous. Full-colour glossy with pictures almost every page.

It's a heavy volume, but I will just have to make room for it. Perhaps in my laptop bag, which they don't normally weigh.

If you have any interest at all in manuscript studies, you need this book.