I’ve had no luck in getting away for a break. The prices for hotels are simply ridiculous, and somehow other things creep in.
But I’m making good progress with Botolph. After my last post, a very kind gentleman, who was visiting the Bodleian Library in Oxford on his own account, kindly offered to photograph the two manuscripts that they hold. And so he did.
These two are manuscripts of the epitome of the “Life of Botolph”, BHL 1429. The shelfmarks are Bodleian MS 240, and Bodleian MS Tanner 15, both manuscripts of the “Sanctilogium” of John of Tynemouth. The same text appears in the printed “Nova Legenda Angliae” of 1516, and was reprinted with amendments by Horstmann in 1901.
Since these appeared, I have been collating the text. Starting with Horstmann as a base – because I could OCR this – I compared it to the 1516 edition, to the two Bodleian manuscripts, and to British Library MS Cotton Tiberius E. 1, which I photographed myself. This latter was damaged by fire, but it doesn’t seem to have much in the way of original readings. All three manuscripts are 15th century, and much of a muchness. Horstmann’s edition – based on the 1516 and the BL manuscript – is perfectly sound. All I will contribute is a larger apparatus, I think.
All the same you really do learn a lot about a text and about the manuscripts by comparing them, word by word. You get a definite feeling that one of the scribes was in a hurry, copying a not-very-important text, happy to stick a word a bit later if his eye skipped it, and occasionally putting down the wrong word of identical meaning during the process of reading a sentence into his head and writing it out again. You get a feel for the scribe, and a feel for the language of the author.
Lots of fun!
The full “Life”, BHL 1428, was done, except that I have located the missing Cologne manuscript in Berlin, and need to collate that and establish its relationship to the other manuscripts, especially to the Rooklooster manuscript which is probably its twin. It may mean a change to the family tree (stemma) of the manuscripts. It will mean changes to the apparatus. I doubt that it will affect the text or translation.
As of today, I have a text of the epitome, BHL 1429, and a draft translation of it which I will now revise.
The very brief Life in the Breviarium Slesvicense (BHL 1430) was done a while back.
The “Translatio” of the relics of St Botolph (BHL 1431) has been transcribed and a translation made, but I need to do more on this.
So it’s coming along very nicely. But I still need some summer holiday!
