Copy number: B-389(1)

Impression of bearer type on b6v; explanatory pencil note: ‘This blank impression is from the type of the reverse of n3 | E. B. N[icholson] ex relatione E. G. Duff'.

Binding: Contemporary German/Polish(?) blind-tooled half calf over wooden boards, with metal clasps and catch. On both covers triple fillets form three compartments: on the upper cover the head and tail compartments are decorated with a repeated rosette stamp; on the lower cover the upper and lower compartments are decorated with the rosette stamp, a shield stamp, and another very badly worn stamp; in the central compartment of both covers a repeated haeded-outline-tool makes up merrythoughts. ‘Boethius De consulacione' on upper and lower edges in black in a contemporary hand. Two unidentified fragments of parchment manuscript leaves used to reinforce the binding.

Size: 215 × 150 × 56 mm.

Size of leaf: 202 × 140 mm.

Heavily annotated in an early hand. Bound with 58 leaves of manuscript in a fifteenth-century hand; fols 1-5: Latin verses, ‘Salutaris poeta', with incipit: ‘Aurea lux oritur, pratum pete, collige flores | Et puerile caput clarificare stude' (Walther, Initia, 1798); fols 6-8: [Johannes de Garlandia], ‘Penitencionis poeta', with incipit: ‘Peniteas cito, peccator, cum sit miserator | Iudex. Et sunt hec quinque notanda tibi'; see Walther, Initia, 13564; Bloomfield 3812; VL IV 619-20, with references given there; fols 9-58: a commentary on Boethius, with incipit: ‘Seneca octauo epistola ad Lucillium . . .', and with sketches in black ink of crowned figures.

Partial rubrication: initials, paragraph marks and occasional rubrics are supplied in red. Capital strokes in red. Chapter numbers supplied in black ink.

Provenance: Pelplin, Gdańsk, Poland, Cistercians, S. Maria; inscription on a1r. John Mozley Stark; Catalogue 4 (1854), p. 4. Purchased from Stark in Oct. 1854 for £1. 1. 0: see Library Bills (1851-55), 265; Books Purchased (1855), 9.

Former Bodleian shelfmark: 70 d.3.

SHELFMARK: Auct. 4Q 5.36.