Detail View: Medieval Collection: Fortune and Glad Poverty

Image Number: 
JRL0927384dc
Reference Number: 
English MS 2
Previous Accession Number: 
Crawford MS 2
Link to Catalogue: 
Image Title: 
Fortune and Glad Poverty
Parent Work Title: 
Fall of Princes
Alternative Parent Work Title: 
Falle of Pryncys
Creator: 
Lydgate, John, 1370?-1451?
Creator Role: 
Author
Display Creator: 
Lydgate, John, 1370?-1451?
Date Created: 
15th-16th century
Page: 
61v
Image Sequence Number: 
061v
Description: 
Fall of Princes. Book three: Poverty asserts that she is no longer the servant of Fortune as Princes and rich men are and desiring nothing, she is not afraid of Fortune. Poverty goes on to say that emperors and princes only fall when they worship Fortune but in Glad Poverty there is security. Fortune is furious and is amazed that Poverty thinks she can overcome her. Small illuminated and coloured initials introduce the verses. The written space is 285 x 200 mm in two columns and the script is rather an ugly and unstable anglicana formata.
Language Code: 
enm-GB
Subject: 
English literature
Subject: 
Literature, Medieval
Subject: 
Poetry, Medieval
Subject: 
Literature, Medieval--Manuscripts
Subject: 
English literature--Manuscripts
Category of Material: 
Manuscripts
Sub-Category: 
Codex
Technique Used: 
Handwriting
Technique Used: 
Illumination (image-making process)
Medium: 
Ink
Support: 
Vellum
People Covered: 
Fortuna (Roman deity)
People Covered: 
Lydgate, John, 1370?-1451?
Item Height: 
417 mm
Item Width: 
292 mm
Current Repository: 
John Rylands University Library, The University of Manchester, U.K.
Provenance: 
Child, Francis, Sir, 1735-1763, of Osterley Park, Middlesex.
Provenance: 
Fairfax, Brian, 1676-1749, the commissioner of customs and a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.
Provenance: 
Lindsay family Earls of Crawford and Balcarres, former owner
Rights Holder - Image: 
The University of Manchester Library
Rights holder - Work: 
The University of Manchester Library
Access Rights: 
Creative Commons License
References: 
Tyson, Moses, 'Hand-List of the Collection of English Manuscripts in the John Rylands Library' (1928), p.7.
References: 
Bergen, Henry, 'Lydgate's Fall of princes.' (London: Pub. for the Early English Text Society by H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1924-27.)
References: 
Parts of this catalogue have been reproduced from Ker, N.R., 'Medieval manuscripts in British libraries, vol. III, Lampeter-Oxford' (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983), p. 400. By kind permission of Oxford University Press
Bibliographic Citation: 
Morgan, Margery M., 'A specimen of early printer's copy: Ryland English MS 2', Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, vol. 33 (1950), pp. 194-6.
Notes: 
Ostensibly the work is an adaptation of Laurent de Premierfait's 1409 translation of Giovanni Boccaccio's 'De casibus vivorum illustrium', a collection of moralized tragedies, extending from Adam to King John of France, that were designed to illustrate Fortune's fickle nature and the downfalls brought on by sinful living and unjust government.
Date Captured (yyyy-mm-dd): 
2009-08-11
Multi Page Number: 
640
Image Creation Technique: 
Digital capture by Heritage Imaging, The University of Manchester Library
Date Image Added (yyyy-mm): 
2009-10
Metadata Language: 
eng-GB