Western Medieval Manuscripts : Gesta pontificum Anglorum (Book Five)

William of Malmesbury

Western Medieval Manuscripts

<p style='text-align: justify;'>This manuscript contains a 16th-century copy of the fifth Book of William of Malmesbury's <i>Gesta pontificum Anglorum</i>, which recounts the history of William's native abbey. The text of the fifth Book survives in full in only one medieval copy, William's own autograph, now <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/b18b9f25-baa4-4943-a641-5e184908a34d/'>Oxford, Magdalen College, MS lat. 172</a>; an abbreviated and probably not authorial version, is likewise found in one medieval copy, now London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius A.v, entitled therein as a Life of St Aldhelm. Aldhelm was the founder of Malmesbury Abbey. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>It is one of three copies of Book Five commissioned by Matthew Parker (1504-1575), archbishop of Canterbury, in this instance to augment a copy of the rest of the text that he owned, now MS Ff.1.25(1) (the other two copies are now <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://parker.stanford.edu/parker/catalog/jp667cv9012'>Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 43</a>, ff. 65r-112r, and <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://mss-cat.trin.cam.ac.uk/Manuscript/R.5.34'>Cambridge, Trinity College, MS R.5.34</a>, ff. 209r-256v). As this shows, Parker was not only a collector of manuscripts: he also used them, annotating and cross-referencing, rebinding and rearranging the books that he owned. Besides adding this copy of the fifth Book of the <i>Gesta pontificum Anglorum</i>, Parker augmented the manuscript with additional works by William and other chronicles, including a further copy produced at his direction.</p><p style='text-align: justify;'>The text of the <i>Gesta pontificum Anglorum</i> was first edited in 1596, using Parker's manuscript (<a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-FF-00001-00025-00001/1'>MS Ff.1.25(1)</a>), by the antiquarian and book collector Sir Henry Savile (1549-1622). Savile elected not to include the fifth Book in his edition, despite its immediate availability here. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>The description of the manuscript in the <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/departments/manuscripts-university-archives/subject-guides/medieval-manuscripts/early'>list of Parker's donations</a> confirms that this and the other additions were at that time bound together with the copy of the <i>Gesta pontificum Anglorum</i> in a single volume. They remained in this state until 1862, whereupon they were divided into five separate volumes, all of which are now available to view on the Cambridge Digital Library: <ul><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-FF-00001-00025-00001/1'>MS Ff.1.25(1)</a>: William of Malmesbury, <i>Gesta pontificum Anglorum (Books 1-4)</i></li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-FF-00001-00025-00003/1'>MS Ff.1.25(3)</a>: William of Malmesbury, <i>Historia novella</i></li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-FF-00001-00025-00004/1'>MS Ff.1.25(4)</a>: compilation of Crusade texts</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-FF-00001-00025-00005/1'>MS Ff.1.25(5)</a>: Geoffrey of Monmouth, <i>Historia regum Britanniae</i></li></ul></p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Dr Suzanne Paul<br />Keeper of Rare Books and Early Manuscripts<br />Cambridge University Library</p>