Copy number: P-218(1)

Binding: Contemporary German (Kyriß workshop no. 56) blind-tooled pigskin over wooden boards; four corner-pieces and a central boss on each cover lost, two clasps and catches also lost. Formerly chained: staple-marks of a hasp at the head of the lower cover. On both covers a small acorn stamp is adjacent to the bands. Intersecting fillets form a frame, within which, on the upper cover is a floral and foliate stamp, and a foliate and bird stamp, and, on the lower, a scroll stamp bearing the name ‘Othamin', a small foliate stamp, a flower-petal stamp, and a repeated lattice-work stamp. On both covers triple fillets form the inner rectangle. On the upper cover this is divided by further triple fillets into triangular and lozenge-shaped compartments, on the lower cover triangular compartments only; on both covers these are decorated with a lozenge-shaped double-headed eagle stamp, two lozenge-shaped fleur-de-lis stamps, a lozenge-shaped lamb and flag stamp, the scroll stamp, the flower-petal stamp, the foliate stamp, a lozenge-shaped eagle stamp, and a small acorn stamp. The stamps are those of Johannes Othamin: see Kyriß pl. 115, nos 1-10. Remains of three paper labels on the upper cover; one paper label at the head of the spine bearing the number ‘226'; the name of the author and the title of the work are also written on the spine in black ink.

Size: 417 × 294 × 61 mm.

Size of leaf: 403 × 280 mm.

According to a note on the recto of the front endleaf (dated 1920), two leaves of a thirteenth-century Latin theological commonplace book and two leaves of a fourteenth-century volume of Latin sermons were removed from the binding at that time and are now MS. Lat. th. c.10 fols 9-12; in the handlist for the manuscript, fols 9-12 are described as being sermons and the leaves are dated to the fourteenth century, with fol. 12 described as ‘distinctiones', and dated to the thirteenth/fourteenth century.

Occasional early marginal annotations, including ‘nota' marks and pointing hands.

Principal eight- and nine-line initials are supplied in red with black pen-work decoration; other two- and three-line initials (some with extensions into the margins), paragraph marks, rubric titles, running headings, capital strokes, and underlining are supplied in red. Irregular early manuscript foliation in black ink: 1-206.

Provenance: Germany (fl. 1474); inscriptions on the recto of the front endleaf (over an erased inscription): ‘Gab ich ain bessers buch darvmb vnd gab dan noch ain halbn̄ guldin auff anno 1474 o Iesu Christi danne ich wolte es nun haben. das buch das ich darvmb gab was moralitates biblie que non placuerint mihi q[ ] aliunde heo[ ] moralitates que melius mihi placent'; and on [x8v], ‘Emi istam glosam et constat iii fl.' Georg Franz Burkhard Kloß (1787-1854); book-label; sale (1835), lot 2619 (paper label at the tail of the spine); purchased for £0. 13. 0; see Books Purchased (1835), 18.

SHELFMARK: Auct. 1Q inf. 2.18.