Copy number: A-081(1)

Bound with:
1. Augustinus, De agone christiano. [Cologne: Ulrich Zell, c.1470] (A‑512(1));
2. Visio Tnugdali. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), c.1473] (V‑145);
3. Lucius Annaeus Seneca, De remediis fortuitorum. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), 1470] (S‑140);
4. Lucius Annaeus Seneca [pseudo-] (Martin de Braga), De quattuor virtutibus cardinalibus. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), c.1472] (S‑161);
5. Petrus Blesensis, De amicitia christiana. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), c.1474] (P‑182);
6. Antoninus Florentinus, Confessionale. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), c.1472] (A‑317);
8. Hieronymus, Ordo, seu Regula vivendi Deo ad Eustochium. [Cologne: Printer of the ‘Historia S. Albani' (Johann Guldenschaff or Conrad Winters, de Homborch?), c.1474] (H‑099).

Binding: Nineteenth-century plain calf for the Bodleian Library; yellow-edged leaves, marbled pastedowns, and gold-tooled Bodleian stamp on both covers.

Size: 216 × 145 × 55 mm.

Size of leaf: 206 × 140 mm.

Fore- and upper edges severely damaged, possibly by a rodent: inscription dated 1542 damaged, whereas late sixteenth-century notes postdate the damage.

Early irregular foliation starting with 153 on the first page of item 1. Various notes, all by the same mid to late sixteenth-century English hand, at the end of item 3 and beginning of item 4, at the end of item 5 and in item 6 (leaf numbered 651 and 593):
1. ‘Bi the other members therfore saith seynt When willfull and unskilfull haue taken apon handes ar hyndred bi overmuche harboured ydlenes which cometh onelie of inordynate lust and desier of the flessche corrupte.
When phebus bright and clere from Taurus downe had sent his fyrye beames and golden leames . . .
When phebus bright and clere from Taurus downe had his golden leames . . . and fyrye
having all those en
And where men had that all shuld haue happened according to their owne desier then shuld thei haue
Yesterdaie in the mornyng when I beganne to examyne all causes in contraversie betwene the parties ye knowe well ynough then beganne
When phebus bright and clere from Taurus downe had ha h h had.'
2. ‘When phebus bright and clere from Taurus
The lief is long that lothsomlie doith last the dolefull daie drawe nigh vnto their da[ ] . . .
When phebus downe had sent yesterdaie at night
When phebus bright and clere from Taurus downe had sent his furiouse blastes and great y yerelie rates and
When phebus bright and clere from Taurus downe had sent his fy fyrie brennyng blastes.' ‘When phebus bright and clere' is probably intended to be in a metre which was prevalent in English metrics between 1550 and 1575, but which may have remained in use in some areas into the 1580s or 1590s. The writer of the verse seems to have had an uncertain grasp of the metre [ex informatione Katherine Duncan-Jones].
3. ‘To my mishap alas I find that her happie happes be danngerouse and betime worketh h h Twise h happie hath.' ‘To my mishap' is the opening of a poem in Tottel's Miscellany, entitled ‘When adversite is once fallen, it is to late to beware': see Tottel's Miscellany (1557-87), ed. H. E. Rollins, revised edn, 2 vols (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), I 175-6, II 290-1. In the lower margin of [b6v], the following note, in the same mid to late sixteenth-century English hand: ‘ . . . wight in this worlde that welthe can atteyne onlest he beleive that all is but vayne.’

One initial ‘F' is supplied in black ink on [a1r].

Provenance: John Fytheon (Phitheon/Fethyon/Fitton(?), late fifteenth/early sixteenth century); inscription on [d6v] of item 8: ‘When ye loke this boke on | Pray for the sowle of [ ] John ffytheon' | Off yo^r charite and for yowr' mede | Saye a pater noster and ave with y^e cred'. Acquired by 1835; see Catalogus (1843), I 32.

SHELFMARK: Auct. N 5.5(7).