Newnham College : William Langland, Piers Plowman

Newnham College

William Langland (c. 1325–c. 1390), Piers PlowmanThis manuscript, dating to the first half of the 15th century, contains the B-Text of William Langland's Piers Plowman, the allegorical dream-vision poem, accompanied by The Lay Folks' Mass and a short Old English Grace, all written in Middle English. Piers Plowman was likely copied c. 1420, while the following two texts are thought to have been added up to 30 years later.Piers Plowman is written in alliterative Middle English verse. The poem describes the journey of the poet-narrator, Will, who falls asleep while wandering the Malvern Hills in the West Midlands region of England, and enters a "merveillous swevene" (a dream) (f. <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(9);return false;'>1r</a>, l. 11). The text proceeds through a sequence of dream-visions, or 'passus', which engage allegorical tropes and figures to explore the nature of Christian devotion, the institution of the Church, and the social and religious issues of late fourteenth-century England. Throughout Will's dreams, he seeks the allegorical figure Piers the Plowman, a journey which represents the Christian way of life as a movement toward salvation. The complex satire, however, is also famously resistant to systematic interpretations, and the poem frequently plays with the boundaries between the concrete and the allegorical, the theological and the political, and community and the individual self. The result is a multi-layered and self-theorizing text, which has been the subject of many decades of academic work, and which continues to offer a rich, albeit famously challenging, source for literary, theological, philosophical, and historical scholars alike.Langland's poem exists in multiple versions and survives in over 50 manuscript copies, presenting a challenge for any modern reader attempting to identify a single 'text'. The versions are usually categorised into three groupings, known as the A, B, and C versions. The A-Text is thought to have been produced in the later 1360s (after 1362), the B-Text a decade later (c. 1377–before 1381), and the C-Text a decade later still (after 1388). The A-Text is the shortest version, running to around 2,500 lines, while the latter two versions run to around 7,700 lines. The B-Text, as found in the present manuscript, adds seven more dreams to the A version, including two dreams-within-dreams.This manuscript witness of Piers Plowman is a well organised and neatly copied text. The manuscript boasts an elaborately decorated border on the first page, decorated initials at the start of each passus, red and blue paraph markers, and red ink for proper names, marginal headings, and Latin phrases. The scribe has adhered to the page rulings, which locate 40 lines to each page. Blank lines have been left after each paragraph. With this professional presentation, the manuscript reproduces what Simon Horobin has called a 'professional metropolitan' layout (2014, p. 184), of a kind with <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://mss-cat.trin.cam.ac.uk/Manuscript/b.15.17'>Cambridge, Trinity College, MS B.15.17</a>, also containing the B-Text, which has been used as a base text for many modern editions. Other such copies include <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://medieval.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/manuscript_7379'>Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 581</a> and <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://medieval.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/manuscript_8773'>Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawlinson Poetry MS 38</a>. It is not known for whom this copy was produced: the lower margins of four pages (ff. <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(9);return false;'>1r</a>, <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(77);return false;'>35r</a>, <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(144);return false;'>68v</a>, <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(204);return false;'>98v</a>) contain an eagle drawn with a red 'L' on its chest, standing on a green mound with wings outstretched, but the name of this owner has not been identified.This witness (listed as no. 'xvi' and collated as 'Y') was used by W.W. Skeat in his editions of Piers Plowman for the Early English Text Society, first published in 1886. Skeat proposed a single author for the different versions of the poem, and though this gave rise to many years of authorship controversy, it is now generally agreed that the poem is the work of a single poet.The second and third texts in the manuscript are written in a different hand. The second, The Lay Folks' Mass (also known as The Lay Folks' Mass Book), is a Middle English guide to the mass originating from the late 14th century. It survives in various forms in nine manuscripts, including the present copy. The poem is written in rhyming couplets, offering descriptions of the actions of the priest and recommended responses for the congregation (e.g. "A large cros on the thyn make / Seyeng thus in this maner" [Make the sign of a large cross on yourself / Saying the following in this manner], f. <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(217);return false;'>105r</a>, ll. 34–35). The present version was edited together with five other variants by Frederick Simmons for his EETS edition, published in 1879 (the remaining three manuscripts were discovered later).The final text in the manuscript, the short Old English Grace, is a verse prayer in six lines, and can be found in four other manuscript witnesses. The prayer appears to have been a grace to be said before supper, and asks God to bless the bread and ale to be consumed, just as he blessed the bread at the Last Supper (Maundy Thursday: 'mawde', in this version). The text was also edited by Simmons in his EETS edition of The Lay Folks' Mass Book (1879, p. 60).The Lay Folks' Mass and the short Old English Grace are more plainly presented than Piers Plowman, with black and red ink used throughout in alternating sections. Plainly decorated elongated brackets are used to group the couplets of the former text, with alternating colours used for text and bracket respectively. Red ink is also used for initials on each line. All texts in the manuscript are written in a neat Anglicana Formata, though the scribe of Piers Plowman has a more uniform hand, while the hand of The Lay Folks' Mass and Old English Grace is less consistent in size and placement on the line. Neither scribe has been identified.The manuscript's paratextual materials include various notes of ownership and editorial work. On the verso of the front binding, an ex libris reads "EX MUSÆO HENRICI YATES THOMPSON, Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856". The plate indicates the manuscript's ownership by the collector Henry Yates Thompson, who inherited it from his grandfather, Joseph Brooks Yates, and later donated it to Newnham College (see Provenance). On the opposite page is pasted a clipping from "a Catalogue of an exhibition of illuminated MSS to which I [Henry Yates Thompson] lent this volume", with corrections to the printed description added in the same pen as this note. On the following folio, another pasted slip folds out to reveal a letter penned by W.W. Skeat to Thompson, including the clipping of his description of the manuscript in his EETS edition. In this letter, Skeat notes that the "MS. proved very useful", and that he has categorised it in "sub-class b of Class B" of his scheme for the Piers Plowman witnesses. In the description, Skeat thanks "Mr Thompson in an especial manner for his kindness in lending me this MS, and so enabling me to become thoroughly acquainted with its contents at my leisure".Dr Hannah Lucas Newby Trust Research Fellow Newnham CollegeHenry Yates Thompson (1838–1928)This manuscript was donated to Newnham College Library in 1906 by Henry Yates Thompson (for his ownership, see the Provenance section), who inherited it 50 years earlier from his maternal grandfather, Joseph Brooks Yates. The UCL database Legacies of British Slave Ownership records that, at the point of abolition in 1833, Joseph Brooks Yates was associated with claims relating to 18 estates and 2287 enslaved people in Jamaica. It is therefore likely that Joseph Brooks Yates acquired the manuscript from the financial proceeds of slave-ownership.Henry Yates Thompson was a renowned manuscript collector. In this pursuit, he was influenced by Joseph Brooks Yates, who bequeathed ten illuminated manuscripts to his grandson. Yates Thompson inherited an enthusiasm for collecting too, and claimed that his passion for antiquarian books 'came from his maternal grandfather Joseph Brooks Yates, of Liverpool [...] Yates Thompson published a portrait of him in 1912, acknowledging that his "example made me a collector of manuscripts"' [De Hamel (1991), p. 79]. Yates Thompson was famous for limiting his collection to one hundred and selling old manuscripts every time he bought another to add to his collection. This collecting policy meant that he sold or gave away almost all the manuscripts he inherited from his grandfather once he found better copies. He and his widow presented some 50 rare books and manuscripts to Newnham College. Other notable beneficiaries were the Fitzwilliam Museum and the British Museum. Henry Yates Thompson appears to have been meticulous about recording the provenance of his books and manuscripts. This has allowed Newnham College to identify two medieval manuscripts and four early printed books that were originally in the collection of Joseph Brooks Yates. This is one of the medieval manuscripts.Henry Yates Thompson engaged directly with the question of slavery during his lifetime. He travelled across America during the Civil War and recorded his journey in diary entries, newspaper articles, and letters arguing with family members. He was a supporter of the North and the Union, and an advocate for abolition. His compiled writings [An Englishman in the American Civil War: the diaries of Henry Yates Thompson, 1863, ed. Chancellor (1971)] provide source material of interviews and encounters with slave owners and occasionally with enslaved or formerly enslaved people.Eve Lacey Librarian Newnham College Library

Page: front cover, outer

William Langland, Piers Plowman (Cambridge, Newnham College, MS 4)

William Langland (c. 1325–c. 1390), Piers Plowman

This manuscript, dating to the first half of the 15th century, contains the B-Text of William Langland's Piers Plowman, the allegorical dream-vision poem, accompanied by The Lay Folks' Mass and a short Old English Grace, all written in Middle English. Piers Plowman was likely copied c. 1420, while the following two texts are thought to have been added up to 30 years later.

Piers Plowman is written in alliterative Middle English verse. The poem describes the journey of the poet-narrator, Will, who falls asleep while wandering the Malvern Hills in the West Midlands region of England, and enters a "merveillous swevene" (a dream) (f. 1r, l. 11). The text proceeds through a sequence of dream-visions, or 'passus', which engage allegorical tropes and figures to explore the nature of Christian devotion, the institution of the Church, and the social and religious issues of late fourteenth-century England. Throughout Will's dreams, he seeks the allegorical figure Piers the Plowman, a journey which represents the Christian way of life as a movement toward salvation. The complex satire, however, is also famously resistant to systematic interpretations, and the poem frequently plays with the boundaries between the concrete and the allegorical, the theological and the political, and community and the individual self. The result is a multi-layered and self-theorizing text, which has been the subject of many decades of academic work, and which continues to offer a rich, albeit famously challenging, source for literary, theological, philosophical, and historical scholars alike.

Langland's poem exists in multiple versions and survives in over 50 manuscript copies, presenting a challenge for any modern reader attempting to identify a single 'text'. The versions are usually categorised into three groupings, known as the A, B, and C versions. The A-Text is thought to have been produced in the later 1360s (after 1362), the B-Text a decade later (c. 1377–before 1381), and the C-Text a decade later still (after 1388). The A-Text is the shortest version, running to around 2,500 lines, while the latter two versions run to around 7,700 lines. The B-Text, as found in the present manuscript, adds seven more dreams to the A version, including two dreams-within-dreams.

This manuscript witness of Piers Plowman is a well organised and neatly copied text. The manuscript boasts an elaborately decorated border on the first page, decorated initials at the start of each passus, red and blue paraph markers, and red ink for proper names, marginal headings, and Latin phrases. The scribe has adhered to the page rulings, which locate 40 lines to each page. Blank lines have been left after each paragraph. With this professional presentation, the manuscript reproduces what Simon Horobin has called a 'professional metropolitan' layout (2014, p. 184), of a kind with Cambridge, Trinity College, MS B.15.17, also containing the B-Text, which has been used as a base text for many modern editions. Other such copies include Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 581 and Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawlinson Poetry MS 38. It is not known for whom this copy was produced: the lower margins of four pages (ff. 1r, 35r, 68v, 98v) contain an eagle drawn with a red 'L' on its chest, standing on a green mound with wings outstretched, but the name of this owner has not been identified.

This witness (listed as no. 'xvi' and collated as 'Y') was used by W.W. Skeat in his editions of Piers Plowman for the Early English Text Society, first published in 1886. Skeat proposed a single author for the different versions of the poem, and though this gave rise to many years of authorship controversy, it is now generally agreed that the poem is the work of a single poet.

The second and third texts in the manuscript are written in a different hand. The second, The Lay Folks' Mass (also known as The Lay Folks' Mass Book), is a Middle English guide to the mass originating from the late 14th century. It survives in various forms in nine manuscripts, including the present copy. The poem is written in rhyming couplets, offering descriptions of the actions of the priest and recommended responses for the congregation (e.g. "A large cros on the thyn make / Seyeng thus in this maner" [Make the sign of a large cross on yourself / Saying the following in this manner], f. 105r, ll. 34–35). The present version was edited together with five other variants by Frederick Simmons for his EETS edition, published in 1879 (the remaining three manuscripts were discovered later).

The final text in the manuscript, the short Old English Grace, is a verse prayer in six lines, and can be found in four other manuscript witnesses. The prayer appears to have been a grace to be said before supper, and asks God to bless the bread and ale to be consumed, just as he blessed the bread at the Last Supper (Maundy Thursday: 'mawde', in this version). The text was also edited by Simmons in his EETS edition of The Lay Folks' Mass Book (1879, p. 60).

The Lay Folks' Mass and the short Old English Grace are more plainly presented than Piers Plowman, with black and red ink used throughout in alternating sections. Plainly decorated elongated brackets are used to group the couplets of the former text, with alternating colours used for text and bracket respectively. Red ink is also used for initials on each line. All texts in the manuscript are written in a neat Anglicana Formata, though the scribe of Piers Plowman has a more uniform hand, while the hand of The Lay Folks' Mass and Old English Grace is less consistent in size and placement on the line. Neither scribe has been identified.

The manuscript's paratextual materials include various notes of ownership and editorial work. On the verso of the front binding, an ex libris reads "EX MUSÆO HENRICI YATES THOMPSON, Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856". The plate indicates the manuscript's ownership by the collector Henry Yates Thompson, who inherited it from his grandfather, Joseph Brooks Yates, and later donated it to Newnham College (see Provenance). On the opposite page is pasted a clipping from "a Catalogue of an exhibition of illuminated MSS to which I [Henry Yates Thompson] lent this volume", with corrections to the printed description added in the same pen as this note. On the following folio, another pasted slip folds out to reveal a letter penned by W.W. Skeat to Thompson, including the clipping of his description of the manuscript in his EETS edition. In this letter, Skeat notes that the "MS. proved very useful", and that he has categorised it in "sub-class b of Class B" of his scheme for the Piers Plowman witnesses. In the description, Skeat thanks "Mr Thompson in an especial manner for his kindness in lending me this MS, and so enabling me to become thoroughly acquainted with its contents at my leisure".

Dr Hannah Lucas
Newby Trust Research Fellow
Newnham College

Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928)

This manuscript was donated to Newnham College Library in 1906 by Henry Yates Thompson (for his ownership, see the Provenance section), who inherited it 50 years earlier from his maternal grandfather, Joseph Brooks Yates. The UCL database Legacies of British Slave Ownership records that, at the point of abolition in 1833, Joseph Brooks Yates was associated with claims relating to 18 estates and 2287 enslaved people in Jamaica. It is therefore likely that Joseph Brooks Yates acquired the manuscript from the financial proceeds of slave-ownership.

Henry Yates Thompson was a renowned manuscript collector. In this pursuit, he was influenced by Joseph Brooks Yates, who bequeathed ten illuminated manuscripts to his grandson. Yates Thompson inherited an enthusiasm for collecting too, and claimed that his passion for antiquarian books 'came from his maternal grandfather Joseph Brooks Yates, of Liverpool [...] Yates Thompson published a portrait of him in 1912, acknowledging that his "example made me a collector of manuscripts"' [De Hamel (1991), p. 79]. Yates Thompson was famous for limiting his collection to one hundred and selling old manuscripts every time he bought another to add to his collection. This collecting policy meant that he sold or gave away almost all the manuscripts he inherited from his grandfather once he found better copies. He and his widow presented some 50 rare books and manuscripts to Newnham College. Other notable beneficiaries were the Fitzwilliam Museum and the British Museum. Henry Yates Thompson appears to have been meticulous about recording the provenance of his books and manuscripts. This has allowed Newnham College to identify two medieval manuscripts and four early printed books that were originally in the collection of Joseph Brooks Yates. This is one of the medieval manuscripts.

Henry Yates Thompson engaged directly with the question of slavery during his lifetime. He travelled across America during the Civil War and recorded his journey in diary entries, newspaper articles, and letters arguing with family members. He was a supporter of the North and the Union, and an advocate for abolition. His compiled writings [An Englishman in the American Civil War: the diaries of Henry Yates Thompson, 1863, ed. Chancellor (1971)] provide source material of interviews and encounters with slave owners and occasionally with enslaved or formerly enslaved people.

Eve Lacey
Librarian
Newnham College Library

Information about this document

Physical Location: Newnham College Library
Classmark: Cambridge, Newnham College, MS 4
Subject(s): Literature
Origin Place: England
Date of Creation: 1400-1450
Language(s): Middle English and Latin; the dialect has been described as North Oxfordshire but 'in a residual way' [Doyle (1986), p. 39], London with diluted Western forms [Samuels (1988), p. 206]; and 'London language with underlying North Oxfordshire forms' [Hanna (1993), p. 39]
Donor(s): Thompson, Henry Yates, 1838–1928
Former Owner(s): Tollemache, Lionel, 1708-1770; Yates, Joseph Brooks, 1780-1855; Thompson, Henry Yates, 1838–1928
Physical Description:
2r: lewed men
Extent: Codex: ii + 109 + ii leaves. Leaf height: 295 mm, width: 185 mm. ff. 1-106 measure 295 x 185mm and ff. 107-109 measure 285 x 180mm.
Collation:
- Quires 1-13⁸ (ff. 1-104)
- Quire 14² (ff. 105-106)
- Quire 15^{4-1 or 2+1} (ff. 107-109: 1st leaf cancelled or 3rd leaf added)
1-13⁸ 14² 15^{4-1 or 2+1} (1st cancelled or 3rd added)
Leaf signatures consisting of combinations of Roman numerals and letters in the lower right-hand corners of the rectos of the first halves of quires; written in brown ink (Quire 1: 'A'; Quire 2: 'B'; Quire 3: 'C'; Quire 4: 'D'; Quire 5: 'E'; Quire 6: 'F'; Quire 7: 'G'), except for the first leaf signature in Quire 10 ('K j'), which is written in red ink. The leaf signatures in Quires 8-9 ('[H]'-'[J]'), and Quire 11-13 ('L'-'N') are largely cropped off but the ascender of the quire letter 'L' remains visible on f. 81r. Quires 14 and 15 were perhaps added at a later stage and probably never contained leaf signatures.
Two quire numbers: "x quaterni[us]" [sic: quaternio] written in brown ink inside a frame of red ink, also featuring the catchwords for Quire 11, and "xij" written in red ink the lower right-hand corners of the last versos of Quire 10 (f. 80v) and Quire 12 (f. 96v).
Catchwords, sometimes underlined in or inside frames of brown ink, written in the lower right-hand corners of the last versos of quires.
Ker (1977) and Kane and Donaldson (1988) state that the manuscript contains only 14 quires since they consider the manuscript's final five leaves (ff. 105-109) as belonging to one and the same quire. While Ker leaves uncertainty about the uneven number ("14^five"), Kane and Donaldson identify the fifth leaf (f. 109) as a singleton. The collation in this record, however, follows Blanchfield (1997), and identifies Quire 14 as a bifolium (ff. 105-106 that is followed by another quire, Quire 15, of three leaves (ff. 107-109). Blanchfield's argument for the existence of Quire 15 is based on the fact that the last three leaves are 'distinctly smaller' (measuring 285 x 180 mm) than the preceding two leaves (measuring 295 x 185mm). But, additionally, the two sets of leaves also differ significantly in thickness, colour and brightness, and disposition: while ff. 105-106 are organised in a 'hair side - flesh side - flesh side - hair side' (HFFH) order, folios 107-109 are organised in a FHHF order, corresponding with the disposition in Quires 1-13. This means that there is a distinct break in the manuscript's usual pattern of openings with matching sides (i.e. hair sides facing hair sides and flesh sides facing a flesh sides) in the opening that shows f. 106v (a hair side) and f. 107r (a flesh side). Moreover, a piece of thread - almost certainly part of sewing thread - sticks out into the gutter between f. 107v and f. 108r, indicating that this is the centre of a separate quire. Finally, the differences in the layout on ff. 105-106 and ff. 107-109 (e.g. the first are ruled in ink and have 40 lines to the page whereas the latter are ruled in leadpoint and have 35-46 lines to the page) supports the idea that these leaves were added separately to the manuscript, and cannot be part of Quire 14. While Blanchfield (1997) suggests that Quire 15 is a bifolium with an added singleton, a parchment stub before f. 107 suggests that this quire instead may have consisted of four leaves and that its first leaf was cancelled.
Material: Parchment (Quires 1-13, and 15: FHHF; Quire 14: HFFH)
Format: Codex
Condition: Wormholes in the manuscript's final leaves. The lower margin of f. 2 was cut out (but no loss of text).
Binding:
18th-century reversed brown calf over boards, triple-filetted blind-tooled borders on the front and rear covers; the spine has five raised bands with blind-stamped motifs flanked by blind-tooled triple-filets, and a red leather label with a gold-stamped inscription: "MSS".
A paper card that is kept with the manuscript contains a printed formula for books that are rebound with funding from the Newnham Associates. This card has been filled in to state that the manuscript was 'rebound' - referring to the production of the dark blue storage box in which the manuscript currently lives - in 2004 in memory of "Lady Hamilton (Jenkins)" who matriculated from Newnham College in "1932". An entry for this year in the College Register, kindly provided by Eve Lacey, Librarian of Newnham College Library, identifies her as Winifred Mary Jenkins (1913-2000, NC 1932), daughter of Hammond Beaconsfield Jenkins and Edith Swinburne Dixon.
Binding height: 310mm; width: 190mm; depth: 35mm.
Script:
ff. 1r-104r have been copied by a single hand working in a neat Anglicana Formata.
ff. 1r-104v have been copied by a single hand working in a less fluent Anglicana Formata than that of ff. 1r-104r.
Foliation:
20th-century foliation:
[i], [ii], [iia]-[iib], 1-209, [iii], [iv]
Numbering in pencil in the upper right-hand corner of the rectos.ff. [iia] and [iib] is a booklet that is made from a single folded sheet that has been pasted onto f. [ii] recto at f. [iib] verso. The booklet contains an unfoliated paper pastedown on f. [iib] recto. Two more unfoliated paper pastedowns occur on f. [i] recto and f. [ii] verso.
Layout: 1r-8v and 17r-104v Written height: 215-220 mm, width: 130 mm. Ruled in ink, frame and line ruling. Single columns. 40 lines to the page, written below top line.9r-16v Written height: 220 mm, width: 130 mm. Ruled in leadpoint, frame only. Single columns. 43-47 lines to the page, written below top line.105r-109v Written height: 220-230 mm, width: 125-130 mm. Ruled in leadpoint, frame and line ruling. Single columns. 35-36 lines to the page, written below top line.
Decoration:
An eagle displayed drawn in dark ink with a Lombard letter 'L' in red ink on its chest, standing on a green mound, drawn in the lower margins of ff. 1r, 35r, 68v, and 98v (probably a heraldic badge or rebus: see the Provenance section for possible interpretations).

A (? bearded) human face in red ink in the upper margin of f. 42r (not part of a cadel).

1 large (7-line) blue initial 'I' in a gold frame with a full bar border in blue and gold with acanthus leaves in and knotwork in blue, madder, white, and gold on f. 1r. Gold ivy leaves and round gold bosses on spray-curl stems. One knotwork boss in blue, white, and gold in the bottom right-hand corner of the border.

Large (4 lines) gold initials in frameworks of blue and red penwork and pen-flourishing on ff. 35r, 68v, 98v, beginning the 'Do-well', 'Do-better', and 'Do-best' passus (8, 15, and 20).

Large (3-4 lines) blue initials in frameworks of red penwork and with red pen-flourishing extending into the margins at the beginning of each passus.

Cadels on ascenders of letters on the top lines, sometimes featuring human faces (e.g. ff. 2v, 4r, 5r).

Rubricated words in the text red ink, incipits and explicits for passuses rubricated in red ink.

Initials at the beginning of lines highlighted in red ink.

Paraphs alternately in blue and red.

The texts on ff. 104v-109v were added at a later stage and feature less decorative elements than the text on ff. 1r-104r. They include initials at the beginning of verse lines that are highlighted in red ink; rubrics in red ink; lines in red ink that connect pairs of verse lines (couplets); and line-fillers consisting of red horizontal wavy lines. There is also a small guide letter in red ink ('m') for an uncompleted decorated initial (3-line height) on f. 104v.
Additions:
On the upper half of f. [i] recto is a paper pastedown with a printed description of the manuscript that, according to an added handwritten note by Henry Yates Thompson, was taken "from a Catalogue of an exhibition of MSS to which I lent this volume". This exhibition catalogue lists the manuscript, here given the title "Pierce the Ploughman's Vision", as no. 84. The source of this description was previously unknown but is now identified as the catalogue of an exhibition of illuminated manuscripts at the clubhouse of the Liverpool Art Club in 1876 (see Liverpool Art Club: Exhibition of Illuminated Manuscripts (Liverpool: Liverpool Art Club, 1876), pp. 45-46 [no. 84]).
On the lower half of f. [i] recto is a note written in the hand of Henry Yates Thompson on observations on this manuscript's copy of Piers Plowman made by Walter William Skeat.
Folio [ii] recto features a paper bifolium containing a handwritten letter by William Walter Skeat in which he gives thanks to Henry Yates Thompson for borrowing the manuscript to him, dated 9 December 1869 (ff. [iia] recto-[iia] verso); and paper clippings with a printed description of the manuscrpt by Skeat from his EETS volume (f. [iib] recto.
Folio [ii] verso contains a paper pastedown with a printed description of the manuscript signed by Henry Yates Thompson, dated June 1909.
On the inside of the rear cover is a note written in pencil: "Rev. T.F. Simmon, Dalton Holme [...]".
Provenance:
Newnham College MS 4 was probably commissioned by an owner whose heraldic badge or rebus has been drawn no less than four times in the manuscript's lower margins (ff. 1r, 35r, 68v, and 98v). This badge/rebus consists of an eagle displayed with a Lombard letter 'L' in red ink on its chest and standing on a green mound. If it is a heraldic badge, then it is not recorded in Michael Powell SiddonsHeraldic badges in England and Wales (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2009). If it is a rebus, which seems more likely, then the eagle probably refers to the first name 'John' or surname 'St John'. Reading the rebus as 'L over St John', a possible solution is 'Oliver St John'. Considering the manuscript's dating, he could have been Sir Oliver St John of Bletsoe, Bedfordshire; Spelsbury, Oxfordshire; and Lydiard Tregoze, Wiltshire (d. 1437), the great-great-great grandfather of Oliver St John, 1st Baron St John of Bletso (d. 1582). His ownership of a Piers Plowman manuscript would fit with what else is known about book ownership by the St Johns of Bletsoe. The family owned a Middle English translation of the Legenda Aurea, known as the Gilte Legende, dating to the 2nd or 3rd quarter of the 15th century (London, British Library, Harley MS 4775) and perhaps also a printed copy of William Caxton's Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers (London, 1477) London, British Library, C. 10 b. 2 [STC 6828]). Another possible solution is 'John Elred' - reading the rebus as 'John red L' - in which case the commissioner may have been John Elvered, also spelled 'Elred', who occurs as rector of Oxburgh, Norfolk, in 1386. Elred held this position until 1416 when his will was drawn up on 1 October and proved on the 16th of that month. According to the Dictionary of British Arms, vol. 2 (London: Society of Antiquaries, 1996), p. 132, 'John Elred' used a seal with an image of St Michael slaying the dragon at its centre, a coat of arms with St Clare on his its right side, and a coat of arms with an eagle displayed on its left side (for a reproduction, see Sigilla Antiqua: Engravings from ancient seals attached to deeds and charters in the Muniment room of Sir Thomas Hare, baronet of Stowe-Bardolph, 2nd series (1862), no. 3.8.).
Perhaps owned by Lionel Tollemache (1708-1770), 4th Earl of Dysart, of Helmingham Hall, Suffolk: the manuscript is perhaps identifiable with a book in the handwritten Catalogue of MSS and Printed Books in the Library at Helmingham Hall Suffolk of 1762, described as follows: "Petri Plowman [on Vellum]. Bound in rough calf". The Tollemache's evidence of ownership may have been removed from the manuscript: glue stains on the centre of the inside of the upper cover indicate that a bookplate is missing. Traces of glue on the upper outer corner of the inside of the front cover suggest that a label is missing on the exact location where Helmingham manuscripts typically have a small label [Edwards (1999), p. 426]. If the identification is correct, then the manuscript was probably already owned by Lionel's ancestors and passed down the Tollemache family of Helmingham Hall after his death. Although the Helmingham manuscripts were largely sold off through auctions in the 1960s and 1970s, Newnham College MS 4 may have been among the many items that were stolen from the Tollemache family by the Suffolk antiquary William Stevenson Fitch (1792-1859) in the 1820s and 1830s. For the identification of Newnham College MS 4 with the Helmingham Hall manuscript, see Edwards (1999), and Edwards and Griffiths (2000), p. 64.
Joseph Brooks Yates (1780-1855), antiquary, merchant, slave trader, grandfather of Henry Yates Thompson: As indicated by a handwritten note "Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856" on the printed ex libris of the library of Henry Yates Thompson, the manuscipt once belonged to Joseph Brooks Yates and was passed down by him to his grandson, Henry Yates Thompson. For further details about their acquisition of medieval manuscripts, see Eve Lacey's introduction Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928) in this catalogue record.
Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928), collector of illuminated manuscripts, newspaper proprietor, and grandson of Joseph Brooks Yates: A printed ex libris from the library of Henry Yates Thompson (gold-stamped: "EX MUSAEO HENRICI YATES THOMPSON" bears the handwritten note: "Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856". His ownership inscription on f. [ii] recto: "H. Yates Thompson - Liverpool 1856"; but not listed in the four catalogues of his library, including lists of rejected manuscripts, published between 1898 and 1912. For further details about their acquisition of medieval manuscripts, see Eve Lacey's introduction Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928) in this catalogue record.
Origin: 1400-1450. According to William Walter Skeat, the copy of Piers Plowman in this manuscript was made in the early fifteenth century. Henry Yates Thompson, in a printed description of the manuscript dated "June 1909" pasted onto f. [ii] verso, dates it to c. 1420. In more recent scholarship, the copy is dated to the first half of the 15th century [Kane and Donaldson (1988), p. 14]; the middle of the 15th century [Ker (1977), p. 239]; and second quarter of the 15th century [Doyle (1986), p. 39; Hanna (1993), p. 39]. The copies of The Lay Folk's Mass Book and Old English Grace were added by a different hand and probably at a later stage. According to Simmons (1879), following information provided by William Walter Skeat, the latter texts were copied around the year 1450. EnglandDialectal features suggest that the scribe was educated in London and was copying from an exemplar copied in an Oxfordshire dialect (see further notes under Language(s)).
Acquisition:
Presented to Newnham College Library on 16 May 1906 by Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928): According to an inscription on the inside cover: "Presented to the Newnham College Library by H.J. Thompson - May 16.^th 1906". Newnham College Library's classmark "MS 4" inscribed in pencil on the inside of the upper cover.
Data Source(s): This catalogue entry draws on N.R. Ker and Alan J. Piper Medieval manuscripts in British libraries, 5 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969–2002), II (1977): Abbotsford-Keele, pp. 239-240; and C. David Benson and Lynne Sandra Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: The B-version (Cambridge: Brewer, 1997), pp. 51-54 (as 'Y').
Author(s) of the Record: Dr Hannah Lucas, Newby Trust Research Fellow, Newnham College, with supplements by Dr Clarck Drieshen, Medieval Manuscripts Specialist, Cambridge University Library
Bibliography:
Langland, William, The vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman, together with the Vita de Dowell, Dobet, et Dobest, Secundum Wit et Resoun, by William Langland (about 1362-1380 A.D.): The "Crowley" text; or text B, ed. Walter W. Skeat, Early English Text Society, Original Series 38, 4 (London: Published by Trübner for the Early English Text Society, 1869) 2.
Simmons, Thomas Frederick, The lay folks mass book, or, The manner of hearing mass: with rubrics and devotions for the people, in four texts ; and offices in English according to the use of York from manuscripts of the Xth to the XVth century, Early English Text Society, Original Series 71 (London: Published for the Early English Text Society by Trübner, 1879).
Langland, William, The vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman in three parallel texts, together with Richard the Redeless, ed. Walter W. Skeat, 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1886) 2.
Chancellor, Christopher (ed.), An Englishman in the American Civil War: the diaries of Henry Yates Thompson, 1863 contributor: M. W. Whitehill (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1971).
Ker, N.R., Medieval manuscripts in British libraries: Abbotsford-Keele, 5 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977) 2.
Uhart, Marie-Claire, The Early Reception of Piers Plowman (Doctoral dissertation thesis Leicester: 1986).
Doyle, A. I., "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman", in Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (eds), Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell (Cambridge: 1986) 35-48.
Samuels, M. L., "Dialect and Grammar", in John A. Alford (ed.), A Companion to Piers Plowman (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988) 201-221.
Kane, George and E. Talbot Donaldson (eds), Piers Plowman: the B version: Will's visions of Piers Plowman, Do-well, Do-better and Do-best Rev., Piers Plowman: the three versions (London: Athlone Press, 1988).
De Hamel, Christopher, "Was Henry Yates Thompson a Gentleman?", in Robin Myers and Michael Harris (eds), Property of a Gentleman: The Formation, Organisation and Dispersal of the Private Library 1620-1920 (Winchester: St Paul’s Bibliographies, 1991) 77-89.
Hanna, Ralph, William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages. English writers of the late Middle Ages 3 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1993).
Langland, William, Piers Plowman: a parallel-text edition of the A, B, C and Z versions, ed. A.V.C. Schmidt, 2 (London: Longman, 1995) 1.
Fisher, John H., The emergence of standard English (Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 1996).
Benson, C. David and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1997).
Edwards, A. S. G., "Two "Piers Plowman" Manuscripts from Helmingham Hall", Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 11 4 421-426 (1999) https://www.jstor.org/stable/41154880.
A. S. G. Edwards and J. Griffiths, "The Tollemache Collection of Medieval Manuscripts", The Book Collector 49 3 349-364 (2000).
Kerby-Fulton, Kathryn, "Professional Readers of Langland at Home and Abroad: New Directions in the Policital and Bureaucratic Codicology of Piers Plowman", in New Directions in Later Medieval Manuscript Studies: Essays from the 1998 Harvard Conference (Woodbridge: York Medieval Press in association with The Boydell Press, 2000) 103-130.
Hanna, Ralph, London literature, 1300-1380, Cambridge studies in medieval literature 57 (Cambridge: University Press, 2005).
Sargent, Michael G., "What do the numbers mean? A textual critic's observations on some patterns of Middle English manuscript transmission", in Margaret Connolly and Linne R. Mooney (eds), Design and distribution of late medieval manuscripts in England (York: York Medieval Press in association with the Boydell Press and with the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York, 2008) 205-244.
Mooney, Linne R., Estelle Stubbs and Simon Horobin, "Late Medieval English Scribes: Cambridge, Newnham College MS 4", in Late Medieval English Scribes (2011) https://www.medievalscribes.com/.
Horobin, Simon, "The Manuscripts and Readers of Piers Plowman", in Andrew Cole and Andrew Galloway (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Piers Plowman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014) 179-197.
Langland, William, The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive, vol. 9, The B-Version Archetype, ed. John Burrow and Thorlac Turville-Petre Turville-Petre contributor: Daniel V. Pitti contributor: Cindy Girard contributor: Paul A. Broyles, Piers Plowman Electronic Archive Series A.12 (Charlottesville: Society for Early English and Norse Electronic Texts, 2014) https://piers.chass.ncsu.edu/texts/Bx.
Jasper, David and Jeremy Smith, "'The Lay Folks’ Mass Book’ and Thomas Frederick Simmons: Medievalism and the Tractarians", Journal of Ecclesiastical History 70 4 785-804 (2019).
Wood, Sarah, Piers Plowman and its manuscript tradition, York manuscript and early print studies (Woodbridge: York Medieval Press, 2022) 5.

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The Vision of Piers Plowman, B Version (image 9, page 1r) The Lay Folks' Mass Book (image 216, page 104v) Old English Grace [Grace before supper] (image 226, page 109v)

Information about this document

Physical Location: Newnham College Library
Classmark: Cambridge, Newnham College, MS 4
Subject(s): Literature
Origin Place: England
Date of Creation: 1400-1450
Language(s): Middle English and Latin; the dialect has been described as North Oxfordshire but 'in a residual way' [Doyle (1986), p. 39], London with diluted Western forms [Samuels (1988), p. 206]; and 'London language with underlying North Oxfordshire forms' [Hanna (1993), p. 39]
Donor(s): Thompson, Henry Yates, 1838–1928
Former Owner(s): Tollemache, Lionel, 1708-1770; Yates, Joseph Brooks, 1780-1855; Thompson, Henry Yates, 1838–1928
Physical Description:
2r: lewed men
Extent: Codex: ii + 109 + ii leaves. Leaf height: 295 mm, width: 185 mm. ff. 1-106 measure 295 x 185mm and ff. 107-109 measure 285 x 180mm.
Collation:
- Quires 1-13⁸ (ff. 1-104)
- Quire 14² (ff. 105-106)
- Quire 15^{4-1 or 2+1} (ff. 107-109: 1st leaf cancelled or 3rd leaf added)
1-13⁸ 14² 15^{4-1 or 2+1} (1st cancelled or 3rd added)
Leaf signatures consisting of combinations of Roman numerals and letters in the lower right-hand corners of the rectos of the first halves of quires; written in brown ink (Quire 1: 'A'; Quire 2: 'B'; Quire 3: 'C'; Quire 4: 'D'; Quire 5: 'E'; Quire 6: 'F'; Quire 7: 'G'), except for the first leaf signature in Quire 10 ('K j'), which is written in red ink. The leaf signatures in Quires 8-9 ('[H]'-'[J]'), and Quire 11-13 ('L'-'N') are largely cropped off but the ascender of the quire letter 'L' remains visible on f. 81r. Quires 14 and 15 were perhaps added at a later stage and probably never contained leaf signatures.
Two quire numbers: "x quaterni[us]" [sic: quaternio] written in brown ink inside a frame of red ink, also featuring the catchwords for Quire 11, and "xij" written in red ink the lower right-hand corners of the last versos of Quire 10 (f. 80v) and Quire 12 (f. 96v).
Catchwords, sometimes underlined in or inside frames of brown ink, written in the lower right-hand corners of the last versos of quires.
Ker (1977) and Kane and Donaldson (1988) state that the manuscript contains only 14 quires since they consider the manuscript's final five leaves (ff. 105-109) as belonging to one and the same quire. While Ker leaves uncertainty about the uneven number ("14^five"), Kane and Donaldson identify the fifth leaf (f. 109) as a singleton. The collation in this record, however, follows Blanchfield (1997), and identifies Quire 14 as a bifolium (ff. 105-106 that is followed by another quire, Quire 15, of three leaves (ff. 107-109). Blanchfield's argument for the existence of Quire 15 is based on the fact that the last three leaves are 'distinctly smaller' (measuring 285 x 180 mm) than the preceding two leaves (measuring 295 x 185mm). But, additionally, the two sets of leaves also differ significantly in thickness, colour and brightness, and disposition: while ff. 105-106 are organised in a 'hair side - flesh side - flesh side - hair side' (HFFH) order, folios 107-109 are organised in a FHHF order, corresponding with the disposition in Quires 1-13. This means that there is a distinct break in the manuscript's usual pattern of openings with matching sides (i.e. hair sides facing hair sides and flesh sides facing a flesh sides) in the opening that shows f. 106v (a hair side) and f. 107r (a flesh side). Moreover, a piece of thread - almost certainly part of sewing thread - sticks out into the gutter between f. 107v and f. 108r, indicating that this is the centre of a separate quire. Finally, the differences in the layout on ff. 105-106 and ff. 107-109 (e.g. the first are ruled in ink and have 40 lines to the page whereas the latter are ruled in leadpoint and have 35-46 lines to the page) supports the idea that these leaves were added separately to the manuscript, and cannot be part of Quire 14. While Blanchfield (1997) suggests that Quire 15 is a bifolium with an added singleton, a parchment stub before f. 107 suggests that this quire instead may have consisted of four leaves and that its first leaf was cancelled.
Material: Parchment (Quires 1-13, and 15: FHHF; Quire 14: HFFH)
Format: Codex
Condition: Wormholes in the manuscript's final leaves. The lower margin of f. 2 was cut out (but no loss of text).
Binding:
18th-century reversed brown calf over boards, triple-filetted blind-tooled borders on the front and rear covers; the spine has five raised bands with blind-stamped motifs flanked by blind-tooled triple-filets, and a red leather label with a gold-stamped inscription: "MSS".
A paper card that is kept with the manuscript contains a printed formula for books that are rebound with funding from the Newnham Associates. This card has been filled in to state that the manuscript was 'rebound' - referring to the production of the dark blue storage box in which the manuscript currently lives - in 2004 in memory of "Lady Hamilton (Jenkins)" who matriculated from Newnham College in "1932". An entry for this year in the College Register, kindly provided by Eve Lacey, Librarian of Newnham College Library, identifies her as Winifred Mary Jenkins (1913-2000, NC 1932), daughter of Hammond Beaconsfield Jenkins and Edith Swinburne Dixon.
Binding height: 310mm; width: 190mm; depth: 35mm.
Script:
ff. 1r-104r have been copied by a single hand working in a neat Anglicana Formata.
ff. 1r-104v have been copied by a single hand working in a less fluent Anglicana Formata than that of ff. 1r-104r.
Foliation:
20th-century foliation:
[i], [ii], [iia]-[iib], 1-209, [iii], [iv]
Numbering in pencil in the upper right-hand corner of the rectos.ff. [iia] and [iib] is a booklet that is made from a single folded sheet that has been pasted onto f. [ii] recto at f. [iib] verso. The booklet contains an unfoliated paper pastedown on f. [iib] recto. Two more unfoliated paper pastedowns occur on f. [i] recto and f. [ii] verso.
Layout: 1r-8v and 17r-104v Written height: 215-220 mm, width: 130 mm. Ruled in ink, frame and line ruling. Single columns. 40 lines to the page, written below top line.9r-16v Written height: 220 mm, width: 130 mm. Ruled in leadpoint, frame only. Single columns. 43-47 lines to the page, written below top line.105r-109v Written height: 220-230 mm, width: 125-130 mm. Ruled in leadpoint, frame and line ruling. Single columns. 35-36 lines to the page, written below top line.
Decoration:
An eagle displayed drawn in dark ink with a Lombard letter 'L' in red ink on its chest, standing on a green mound, drawn in the lower margins of ff. 1r, 35r, 68v, and 98v (probably a heraldic badge or rebus: see the Provenance section for possible interpretations).

A (? bearded) human face in red ink in the upper margin of f. 42r (not part of a cadel).

1 large (7-line) blue initial 'I' in a gold frame with a full bar border in blue and gold with acanthus leaves in and knotwork in blue, madder, white, and gold on f. 1r. Gold ivy leaves and round gold bosses on spray-curl stems. One knotwork boss in blue, white, and gold in the bottom right-hand corner of the border.

Large (4 lines) gold initials in frameworks of blue and red penwork and pen-flourishing on ff. 35r, 68v, 98v, beginning the 'Do-well', 'Do-better', and 'Do-best' passus (8, 15, and 20).

Large (3-4 lines) blue initials in frameworks of red penwork and with red pen-flourishing extending into the margins at the beginning of each passus.

Cadels on ascenders of letters on the top lines, sometimes featuring human faces (e.g. ff. 2v, 4r, 5r).

Rubricated words in the text red ink, incipits and explicits for passuses rubricated in red ink.

Initials at the beginning of lines highlighted in red ink.

Paraphs alternately in blue and red.

The texts on ff. 104v-109v were added at a later stage and feature less decorative elements than the text on ff. 1r-104r. They include initials at the beginning of verse lines that are highlighted in red ink; rubrics in red ink; lines in red ink that connect pairs of verse lines (couplets); and line-fillers consisting of red horizontal wavy lines. There is also a small guide letter in red ink ('m') for an uncompleted decorated initial (3-line height) on f. 104v.
Additions:
On the upper half of f. [i] recto is a paper pastedown with a printed description of the manuscript that, according to an added handwritten note by Henry Yates Thompson, was taken "from a Catalogue of an exhibition of MSS to which I lent this volume". This exhibition catalogue lists the manuscript, here given the title "Pierce the Ploughman's Vision", as no. 84. The source of this description was previously unknown but is now identified as the catalogue of an exhibition of illuminated manuscripts at the clubhouse of the Liverpool Art Club in 1876 (see Liverpool Art Club: Exhibition of Illuminated Manuscripts (Liverpool: Liverpool Art Club, 1876), pp. 45-46 [no. 84]).
On the lower half of f. [i] recto is a note written in the hand of Henry Yates Thompson on observations on this manuscript's copy of Piers Plowman made by Walter William Skeat.
Folio [ii] recto features a paper bifolium containing a handwritten letter by William Walter Skeat in which he gives thanks to Henry Yates Thompson for borrowing the manuscript to him, dated 9 December 1869 (ff. [iia] recto-[iia] verso); and paper clippings with a printed description of the manuscrpt by Skeat from his EETS volume (f. [iib] recto.
Folio [ii] verso contains a paper pastedown with a printed description of the manuscript signed by Henry Yates Thompson, dated June 1909.
On the inside of the rear cover is a note written in pencil: "Rev. T.F. Simmon, Dalton Holme [...]".
Provenance:
Newnham College MS 4 was probably commissioned by an owner whose heraldic badge or rebus has been drawn no less than four times in the manuscript's lower margins (ff. 1r, 35r, 68v, and 98v). This badge/rebus consists of an eagle displayed with a Lombard letter 'L' in red ink on its chest and standing on a green mound. If it is a heraldic badge, then it is not recorded in Michael Powell SiddonsHeraldic badges in England and Wales (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2009). If it is a rebus, which seems more likely, then the eagle probably refers to the first name 'John' or surname 'St John'. Reading the rebus as 'L over St John', a possible solution is 'Oliver St John'. Considering the manuscript's dating, he could have been Sir Oliver St John of Bletsoe, Bedfordshire; Spelsbury, Oxfordshire; and Lydiard Tregoze, Wiltshire (d. 1437), the great-great-great grandfather of Oliver St John, 1st Baron St John of Bletso (d. 1582). His ownership of a Piers Plowman manuscript would fit with what else is known about book ownership by the St Johns of Bletsoe. The family owned a Middle English translation of the Legenda Aurea, known as the Gilte Legende, dating to the 2nd or 3rd quarter of the 15th century (London, British Library, Harley MS 4775) and perhaps also a printed copy of William Caxton's Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers (London, 1477) London, British Library, C. 10 b. 2 [STC 6828]). Another possible solution is 'John Elred' - reading the rebus as 'John red L' - in which case the commissioner may have been John Elvered, also spelled 'Elred', who occurs as rector of Oxburgh, Norfolk, in 1386. Elred held this position until 1416 when his will was drawn up on 1 October and proved on the 16th of that month. According to the Dictionary of British Arms, vol. 2 (London: Society of Antiquaries, 1996), p. 132, 'John Elred' used a seal with an image of St Michael slaying the dragon at its centre, a coat of arms with St Clare on his its right side, and a coat of arms with an eagle displayed on its left side (for a reproduction, see Sigilla Antiqua: Engravings from ancient seals attached to deeds and charters in the Muniment room of Sir Thomas Hare, baronet of Stowe-Bardolph, 2nd series (1862), no. 3.8.).
Perhaps owned by Lionel Tollemache (1708-1770), 4th Earl of Dysart, of Helmingham Hall, Suffolk: the manuscript is perhaps identifiable with a book in the handwritten Catalogue of MSS and Printed Books in the Library at Helmingham Hall Suffolk of 1762, described as follows: "Petri Plowman [on Vellum]. Bound in rough calf". The Tollemache's evidence of ownership may have been removed from the manuscript: glue stains on the centre of the inside of the upper cover indicate that a bookplate is missing. Traces of glue on the upper outer corner of the inside of the front cover suggest that a label is missing on the exact location where Helmingham manuscripts typically have a small label [Edwards (1999), p. 426]. If the identification is correct, then the manuscript was probably already owned by Lionel's ancestors and passed down the Tollemache family of Helmingham Hall after his death. Although the Helmingham manuscripts were largely sold off through auctions in the 1960s and 1970s, Newnham College MS 4 may have been among the many items that were stolen from the Tollemache family by the Suffolk antiquary William Stevenson Fitch (1792-1859) in the 1820s and 1830s. For the identification of Newnham College MS 4 with the Helmingham Hall manuscript, see Edwards (1999), and Edwards and Griffiths (2000), p. 64.
Joseph Brooks Yates (1780-1855), antiquary, merchant, slave trader, grandfather of Henry Yates Thompson: As indicated by a handwritten note "Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856" on the printed ex libris of the library of Henry Yates Thompson, the manuscipt once belonged to Joseph Brooks Yates and was passed down by him to his grandson, Henry Yates Thompson. For further details about their acquisition of medieval manuscripts, see Eve Lacey's introduction Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928) in this catalogue record.
Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928), collector of illuminated manuscripts, newspaper proprietor, and grandson of Joseph Brooks Yates: A printed ex libris from the library of Henry Yates Thompson (gold-stamped: "EX MUSAEO HENRICI YATES THOMPSON" bears the handwritten note: "Inherited from Jos B. Yates 1856". His ownership inscription on f. [ii] recto: "H. Yates Thompson - Liverpool 1856"; but not listed in the four catalogues of his library, including lists of rejected manuscripts, published between 1898 and 1912. For further details about their acquisition of medieval manuscripts, see Eve Lacey's introduction Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928) in this catalogue record.
Origin: 1400-1450. According to William Walter Skeat, the copy of Piers Plowman in this manuscript was made in the early fifteenth century. Henry Yates Thompson, in a printed description of the manuscript dated "June 1909" pasted onto f. [ii] verso, dates it to c. 1420. In more recent scholarship, the copy is dated to the first half of the 15th century [Kane and Donaldson (1988), p. 14]; the middle of the 15th century [Ker (1977), p. 239]; and second quarter of the 15th century [Doyle (1986), p. 39; Hanna (1993), p. 39]. The copies of The Lay Folk's Mass Book and Old English Grace were added by a different hand and probably at a later stage. According to Simmons (1879), following information provided by William Walter Skeat, the latter texts were copied around the year 1450. EnglandDialectal features suggest that the scribe was educated in London and was copying from an exemplar copied in an Oxfordshire dialect (see further notes under Language(s)).
Acquisition:
Presented to Newnham College Library on 16 May 1906 by Henry Yates Thompson (1838–1928): According to an inscription on the inside cover: "Presented to the Newnham College Library by H.J. Thompson - May 16.^th 1906". Newnham College Library's classmark "MS 4" inscribed in pencil on the inside of the upper cover.
Data Source(s): This catalogue entry draws on N.R. Ker and Alan J. Piper Medieval manuscripts in British libraries, 5 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969–2002), II (1977): Abbotsford-Keele, pp. 239-240; and C. David Benson and Lynne Sandra Blanchfield, The Manuscripts of Piers Plowman: The B-version (Cambridge: Brewer, 1997), pp. 51-54 (as 'Y').
Author(s) of the Record: Dr Hannah Lucas, Newby Trust Research Fellow, Newnham College, with supplements by Dr Clarck Drieshen, Medieval Manuscripts Specialist, Cambridge University Library
Bibliography:
Langland, William, The vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman, together with the Vita de Dowell, Dobet, et Dobest, Secundum Wit et Resoun, by William Langland (about 1362-1380 A.D.): The "Crowley" text; or text B, ed. Walter W. Skeat, Early English Text Society, Original Series 38, 4 (London: Published by Trübner for the Early English Text Society, 1869) 2.
Simmons, Thomas Frederick, The lay folks mass book, or, The manner of hearing mass: with rubrics and devotions for the people, in four texts ; and offices in English according to the use of York from manuscripts of the Xth to the XVth century, Early English Text Society, Original Series 71 (London: Published for the Early English Text Society by Trübner, 1879).
Langland, William, The vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman in three parallel texts, together with Richard the Redeless, ed. Walter W. Skeat, 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1886) 2.
Chancellor, Christopher (ed.), An Englishman in the American Civil War: the diaries of Henry Yates Thompson, 1863 contributor: M. W. Whitehill (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1971).
Ker, N.R., Medieval manuscripts in British libraries: Abbotsford-Keele, 5 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977) 2.
Uhart, Marie-Claire, The Early Reception of Piers Plowman (Doctoral dissertation thesis Leicester: 1986).
Doyle, A. I., "Remarks on Surviving Manuscripts of Piers Plowman", in Gregory Kratzmann and James Simpson (eds), Medieval English Religious and Ethical Literature: Essays in Honour of George H. Russell (Cambridge: 1986) 35-48.
Samuels, M. L., "Dialect and Grammar", in John A. Alford (ed.), A Companion to Piers Plowman (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988) 201-221.
Kane, George and E. Talbot Donaldson (eds), Piers Plowman: the B version: Will's visions of Piers Plowman, Do-well, Do-better and Do-best Rev., Piers Plowman: the three versions (London: Athlone Press, 1988).
De Hamel, Christopher, "Was Henry Yates Thompson a Gentleman?", in Robin Myers and Michael Harris (eds), Property of a Gentleman: The Formation, Organisation and Dispersal of the Private Library 1620-1920 (Winchester: St Paul’s Bibliographies, 1991) 77-89.
Hanna, Ralph, William Langland, Authors of the Middle Ages. English writers of the late Middle Ages 3 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1993).
Langland, William, Piers Plowman: a parallel-text edition of the A, B, C and Z versions, ed. A.V.C. Schmidt, 2 (London: Longman, 1995) 1.
Fisher, John H., The emergence of standard English (Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 1996).
Benson, C. David and Lynne S. Blanchfield, The manuscripts of Piers Plowman: the B-version (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1997).
Edwards, A. S. G., "Two "Piers Plowman" Manuscripts from Helmingham Hall", Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 11 4 421-426 (1999) https://www.jstor.org/stable/41154880.
A. S. G. Edwards and J. Griffiths, "The Tollemache Collection of Medieval Manuscripts", The Book Collector 49 3 349-364 (2000).
Kerby-Fulton, Kathryn, "Professional Readers of Langland at Home and Abroad: New Directions in the Policital and Bureaucratic Codicology of Piers Plowman", in New Directions in Later Medieval Manuscript Studies: Essays from the 1998 Harvard Conference (Woodbridge: York Medieval Press in association with The Boydell Press, 2000) 103-130.
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Section shown in images 9 to 216

Title: The Vision of Piers Plowman, B Version
Author(s): William Langland
Language(s): Middle English verse with Latin incipits and explicits
Excerpts:
Incipit: 1r In a somer seson ; Whan softe was the sonne / I shope me in shroudes ; as I a shepe were
Explicit: 104v And send me happe ; and hele ; til I haue piers þe plowman / And sith he gradde after grace ; til I gan a wake
Final Rubric: 104v Explicit hic dialagus [sic] Petri Plowman
Bibliography:
IMEV 1459
NIMEV 1459 B Version
DIMEV 2459-14

Section shown in images 216 to 226

Title: The Lay Folks' Mass Book
Language(s): Middle English
Excerpts:
Incipit: 104v [M]an or woman þat wol lere / A masse deuouly [sic] for to here
Explicit: 109v And that hey holi god . he queyte the thi mede / Of whom we spek of . when we say oure crede
Bibliography:
Simmons (1879), pp. 1-60
IMEV 3507
NIMEV 3507
DIMEV 5537-4

Section shown in images 226 to 226

Title: Old English Grace [Grace before supper]
Language(s): Middle English with some Latin
Note(s): Full transcription; the word "gracias" has been written in red ink and inside a red frame in the outer margin.
Excerpts:
Incipit: 109v God that his brede brake / at his mawde whanne he sate / amonges his postyllis twelue / he bles oure brede and oure ayl / þat we haw and haw schal / and be with vs him selwe.
Final Rubric: 109v In nomine patris et filij et spiritus Sancti amen
Bibliography:
Simmons (1879), p. 60
IMEV 620
NIMEV 620
DIMEV 1011-1