Detail View: Medieval Collection: Knights Templar

Image Number: 
JRL0927616dc
Reference Number: 
English MS 2
Link to Catalogue: 
Image Title: 
Knights Templar
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: 
177v
Image Sequence Number: 
177v
Description: 
Fall of Princes. Book nine: red rubrication and an illuminated initial 'A' introduces the story of Pope Boniface, who ate his own hands out of hunger after being imprisoned. Red rubrication and an illuminated initial 'E' introduces the story of the Knights Templar. The Order of the Templars was founded by knights who had won Jerusalam. Their guiding principles were poverty, humilty, chastity and they lived in a temple near Jerusalem. Pope Honorius gave them permisison to wear a white habit to which a red cross was added. The ink annotations in the margin '(g)iii' and '(g)iiii' correspond to pages in the Pyson printed edition of Fall of Princes. 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: 
Literature, Medieval--Manuscripts
Subject: 
Poetry, Medieval
Subject: 
English literature--Manuscripts
Category of Material: 
Manuscripts
Sub-Category: 
Codex
Technique Used: 
Handwriting
Technique Used: 
Illumination (image-making process)
Medium: 
Ink
Support: 
Vellum
Places Covered: 
Israel: Jerusalem
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: 
Lindsay family Earls of Crawford and Balcarres, former owner
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.
Rights Holder - Image: 
The University of Manchester Library
Rights holder - Work: 
The University of Manchester Library
Access Rights: 
Creative Commons License
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
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: 
Tyson, Moses, 'Hand-List of the Collection of English Manuscripts in the John Rylands Library' (1928), p.7.
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: 
1800
Image Creation Technique: 
Digital capture by Heritage Imaging, The University of Manchester Library
Date Image Added (yyyy-mm): 
2009-10
Metadata Language: 
eng-GB