Copy number: T-280(1)

Wanting the inserted leaf (26, between [b10] and [c1]) of the last gathering, bearing the woodcut of St Dominic; see note in BMC.

Binding: A sewn text -block on unsupported structure, within early, sixteeenth-century(?), German long-stitch limp parchment bearing a manuscript title at the head of the upper cover and the inscriptions below, within eighteenth-century half calf over paper boards. The lost upper corner of the parchment lower cover has a laced patch repair. Patch and lacing consist of a noted twelfth/thirteenth-century manuscript on parchment. Remains of early simple sewing(?) at tail-edge centre of each gathering suggest gathering tackets, possibly Italian(?). A crease along the fore-edge of the lower cover suggests that originally there was a fore-edge flap (perhaps a Roman feature, to hold the gatherings together when they were sent to Germany).

Size: 313 × 235 × 17 mm.

Size of leaf: 301 × 222 mm.

‘N. 13' later deleted, in brown ink on the parchment front cover. Some verses in a contemporary hand in light brown ink, inside the upper cover. A few marginal notes, mainly extracting key words, adding pointing hands and initials, in an early German hand in brown ink. In the same hand, the first five leaves of gatherings are numbered 1-5 in the lower right-hand corner of the rectos in brown ink; gatherings 2 and 3 are marked ‘2^us’ and 3^tius; catchwords, probably provided by a bookseller. On [c9v], below the colophon: ‘anno domini M.cccclxxiii'. A number of early quotations from classical authors inside the parchment rear cover.

Some of the woodcuts are coloured.

Provenance: Contemporary manuscript device on the parchment front cover and on [a1r]: a jar on a tripod, below: ‘X M X | Nulla calamitas sola | Jo. Hawssner de Winznech'. In a slightly later hand below: ‘1555 R O F | O Mellinger'; a ‘T' appears, slightly raised, between the first and second 5. Purchased for £8. 8. 0; see Books Purchased (1843), 49.

SHELFMARK: Auct. 6Q inf. 1.13.