The British Library is recruiting a Medieval Manuscripts Cataloguer and Researcher, to work at St Pancras in our Ancient, Medieval and Early Modern Manuscripts team.

A page from an early 13th-century manuscript of Gerald of Wales, Topographia Hiberniae, showing in the lower margin a bird perched on a building, a man with the tame falcon of Kildare, and a scribe writing the miraculous Gospels of Kildare: Royal MS 13 B VIII, f. 22r

This is a fixed term opportunity, for 6 months. The successful candidate will produce catalogue descriptions of pre-1600 western manuscripts, using the Library’s cataloguing system. They will support the completion of two major projects: (1) the cataloguing of manuscripts in the Library's Harley collection; and (2) Medieval and Renaissance Women. The post-holder will also promote the Library’s collections by writing blogposts aimed at a non-specialist audience, answering enquiries, and presenting manuscripts to specialist and non-specialist audiences.

To be successful in this role, you will have experience of cataloguing medieval manuscripts, specialist knowledge of medieval palaeography, and a strong reading knowledge of Latin. In addition, you will have experience of promoting collections, excellent attention to detail, and strong organisational skills.

For further information and to apply for this position, please visit www.bl.uk/careers quoting vacancy ref: 04090.

The closing date for applications is 15 May 2022. Interviews will be held on 30 May 2022.

Please note: we are unable to provide sponsorship under the UK Skilled Worker visa for this role, as it does not meet the eligibility criteria required for this immigration route.

Sending greetings to friends and family from places we visit has always been popular. Whether we text, call or just post something on social media, we love to let others know about where we travel and what we see there. Although we may associate tourism with modern or postmodern society, there are some fascinating documents surviving to prove that people were also interested in travel and sightseeing thousands of years ago.

Letter from Nearchus to Heliodorus, 1st/2nd century AD, Hermupolis (Egypt), Papyrus 854

The British Library has a fragment of a Greek letter that is the ancient equivalent of a postcard from a sightseeing trip, written on papyrus in the 1st or 2nd century AD in Middle Egypt. A man called Nearchus is writing to his friend Heliodorus to tell him about his trip on the River Nile. After the short greeting, Nearchus tells his friend why he started to travel:

‘As many people embark on ships today to travel and see the excellent works of human hands, I have also decided to follow their example and sailed downstream on the Nile towards Syene'.

The Island of Philae near Syene Aswan, after its relocation on the nearby island of Agilkia before the construction of the Aswan Dam in 1960 (Zakaria Rabea / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-SA-4.0)

From what Nearchus tells us, it seems like there was an extensive market for tourism to Upper Egypt. His first destination, Syene, is a town by the Nile near today’s Aswan. It is a picturesque place with an island in the river that has the great temple of Isis, famous for its architecture and miracles, which Nearchus probably visited.

View of the Siwa Oasis in Egypt (Youssef Alam / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-3.0)

His next stop, the Siwa Oasis, is quite a distance away: it is in the Western Desert near the Libyan border. Siwa had a famous sanctuary where the ram-headed god Amon gave oracles to his visitors, which Nearchus was keen to visit:

‘I went to Libya where Amon chants his oracles to everyone. I have received very promising words and I scratched the names of all my friends on the wall of the sanctuary for eternal memory…’

Just like Alexander the Great, who visited the same site some 500 years earlier and was proclaimed the son of Amon by the oracle there, Nearchus also received good news from the god. He also tells us that he scratched his friends’ names on the temple wall. Although this may sound very alarming today, putting names on the temple wall was considered pious at that time. It was to ensure that the absent friends would be present at the holy place forever – exactly as Nearchus assures his friend.

Graffiti on the wall of the Temple of Isis on Philae, an island in Lake Nasser, Egypt (Irene Soto / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-2.0)

Unfortunately, the last two lines of Nearchus’s postcard have been washed off the papyrus and are missing, so his story remains unfinished. But there is still hope his graffiti of his friends’ names may survive somewhere in the ruins of Amon’s Temple in Siwa. You can read more fascinating stories from our ancient papyri on our Greek Manuscripts webspace.

Peter Toth
Follow us on Twitter @BLMedieval

The Italian writer, poet and humanist, Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-75) is probably most familiar in the English-speaking world for his Decameron, a collection of one hundred short stories that were adapted by Chaucer and Shakespeare and inspired works by Swift, Tennyson and Keats. He was a key literary figure in late-medieval and Renaissance Europe whose considerable output included love poetry, courtly tales, a genealogy of the gods, and the first collection of biographies devoted solely to women in Western literature.

Towards the end of his life, disillusioned with love and suffering from a variety of ailments, he was only dissuaded from burning much of his own material by the intervention of Petrarch, a close colleague and mentor. Fortunately his works survived, and the many translations and extant manuscripts are testament to their popularity. In the 15th century numerous illustrated copies were produced for the courts of Europe.

Petrarch appears to Boccaccio who is ill in bed, in a building decorated with the coat of arms of the French royal family, from Des cas de nobles hommes et femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De mulieribus Claris (France, 3rd quarter of the 15th century), Add MS 35321, f. 247v

Twenty seven British Library manuscripts containing works of Boccaccio are either fully or partially digitised in our online catalogues. An advanced search in the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts using the field ‘Author’: ‘Boccaccio’ produces a list of all of these with a selection of images from each one. Six are also fully digitised on our Digitised Manuscripts website. Here are just some of these fascinating manuscripts.

Concerning Famous Women

Most impressive of all are two grand volumes of Boccaccio’s ground-breaking collection of biographies of famous women, De claris mulieribus (Concerning Famous Women) in a French translation by Laurent de Premierfait. Both contain magnificent illustrations of the characters and their deeds. Boccaccio’s purpose in this work is to encourage virtuous behaviour among women, but the examples he chooses from among biblical, classical, mythological and historical characters are both good and bad. All the well-known female figures are present, each one accompanied by a portrait, from Eve to Medusa, and from Sappho to Cleopatra, alongside less familiar examples such as Hypsicratea, Queen of Pontus, and Faustina Augusta, wife of Marcus Aurelius. Christine de Pizan based many of her biographies of women in the famous Cite des Dames on this work.

Cleopatra is bitten by two dragon-like ‘asps’ and blood pours from her arms, from Des cleres et nobles femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De mulieribus Claris (Rouen, c. 1440): Royal MS 16 G V, f. 101r

 

Hypsicratea cutting her hair and joining her husband King Mithridates VI in battle, from Des cleres et nobles femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De mulieribus Claris (Paris, 1st quarter of the 15th century): Royal MS 20 C V, f. 119r

The Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts also features copies of the original Latin text of Boccaccio’s De claris mulieribus. One of these, Harley MS 6348, is an early copy made in Italy in the 14th century, not long after Boccaccio’s death. The opening page of De claris mulieribus contains the dedication beginning with the words: ‘Pridie, mulierum egregia...’ The first sentence translates as:

‘Some time ago, illustrious lady, while away from the crude multitudes and almost free of other concerns, I wrote a little book in praise of women, more for the pleasure of my friends than as a service to humanity’ (trans. Guarino).

The opening page of Boccaccio's De claris mulieribus (Italy, last quarter of the 14th century): Harley MS 6348, f. 24r

Concerning Noble Men and Women

In addition to his biographies of women, Boccaccio produced a collection of biographies of both men and women, De casibus virorum illustrium, also translated into French by Premierfait. Some of these are very large volumes, each containing over fifty biographies with numerous miniatures. For example, Royal MS 14 E V, a Bruges manuscript owned by Edward IV, is almost half a metre tall and has 513 folios – the size of a small suitcase – so you need to be strong just to lift it off the shelf! the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts has images of all the pages with illustrations from this manuscript. For example, a historical event known as the Sicilian Vespers, the Easter rebellion by the Sicilians against French rule in 1282 when thousands of French civilians were murdered, is the subject of one illustration. 

The Sicilian Vespers, from Des Cas des nobles hommes et femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De casibus virorum illustrium (Bruges c. 1480): Royal MS 14 E V, f. 488r

The theme of the biographies is the changeability of fortune. Boccaccio focuses on the downfall of famous people, all of whom are subject to the will of Lady Fortune. In book 6 the two meet and speak about the fates of the unlucky nobles who are destined to fall from dizzy heights of power and wealth.

Boccaccio in his study, with his vision of Fortune as a crowned lady with many arms, from Des Cas des nobles hommes et femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De casibus virorum illustrium (Paris, 1st quarter of the 15th century): Royal MS 20 C IV, f. 198r

Another manuscript of his work, Harley MS 621, has a miniature at the beginning of each of the major sections or books into which the work is divided. In this one, Boccaccio watches Fortune turn her wheel. Note the cockerel in the border!

Boccaccio watching Fortune turn her wheel, with an old king seated on top, a pile of fallen persons below, and a violent battle between two armies in the background, from Des Cas des nobles hommes et femmes, a French translation of Boccacio's De casibus virorum illustrium (France, 3rd quarter of the 15th century): Harley MS 621, f. 217r

The Fall of Princes

The English poet, John Lydgate, produced an abridged version of De Casibus in a Middle English translation, known as The Fall of Princes. Three copies are fully digitised on Digitised Manuscripts. One of these, which was probably made at Bury St Edmunds, contains a series of illustrations of key scenes in the margins. One gruesome example is of King Cyrus of the Persians who subdued all the nations from Syria to the Red Sea. According to the Boccaccio/Lydgate version of his life, Tomyrus, Queen of the Scythians defeated his army, severing his head from his body, and throwing it into a bowl of blood with these words, ‘Thou that hast all thy time thirsted for blood, now drink thy fill, and satiate thy self with it’.

The remains of King Cyrus floating in tub of blood, The Fall of Princes (England, perhaps Bury St Edmunds, 1450-1460): Harley MS 1766, f. 135r

The Decameron

There are also Boccaccio manuscripts on the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts containing a variety of his other works, including three of his most well-known work, the Decameron. This copy of the Decameron, translated into French by Laurent de Premierfait, is decorated with borders containing the royal arms of England. This is because it was part of the collection of manuscripts owned by King Edward IV of England. 

Jean, duke of Berry, receiving the book from the translator, Laurent de Premierfait, with the border containing the royal arms of England, from the beginning of Les cent Nouvelles, a French translation of Boccaccio’s Decameron (Bruges, 1473-83): Royal MS 19 E I, f. 1r

Other Boccaccio texts include Elegia di Madonna Fiammetta, a quasi autobiographical novel about a love affair set in Naples. 

Illuminated initials in Boccaccio's Elegia di Madonna Fiammetta (Italy, c. 1500), Harley MS 5427, ff. 19v-20r

This overview of Boccaccio manuscripts helps to demonstrate that our Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts, though not providing full digital coverage, remains a key source for images of our manuscript collections. We continue to maintain it and make updates and corrections to the records. We hope you enjoy exploring!

Chantry Westwell

Follow us on Twitter @BLMedieval

Our medieval manuscripts will soon feature on the major new documentary series, Art That Made Us, for BBC Two and BBC iPlayer. The series explores how pivotal works of art, literature, design and music have helped shape the history of Britain. Featuring very detailed, close-up filming of some of our manuscripts, it will be an opportunity to see them on screen in more detail than ever before.

The first episode, which will go out on 7 April, begins with the withdrawal of the Roman troops from Britain in the 4th century and the following period of migration, warfare, the rise of the English language and the spread of Christianity. In this episode, speakers will discuss the superb illuminated Gospel-book, the Lindisfarne Gospels, and the Old English epic poem Beowulf. It will also feature one of the earliest surviving maps of the world and the only example that originates from England before the 12th century.

Map of the World, from a scientific miscellany, England, 11th century, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, f. 56v

The second episode, airing on 14 April, explores the trauma of the Black Death in the 14th century and some of the creative works that came afterwards. There will be discussion of major Middle English poems including Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, William Langland’s The Vision of Piers Plowman and the anonymous meditation on grief, Pearl. The episode will feature the earliest manuscript of the Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich, an account of the spiritual visions witnessed by Julian, an anchoress in Norwich, when she was suffering from a near-fatal illness. It is also the first known work in English to be authored by a woman.

Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich, England mid 15th century: Add MS 37790, f. 97r

This episode will also include the only surviving manuscript of The Book of Margery Kempe. This is an account by Margery Kempe, a mystic from King’s Lynn, of her visions and experiences, and the earliest known autobiography in English.

The Book of Margery Kempe, England, c. 1440: Add MS 61823, f. 1r

The Old Hall Manuscript will also feature on this episode. This collection of sacred music is the most important source for our knowledge of early harmony music in England. It contains one of the oldest surviving collections of English part music (music written in parts for separate players or singers). Works by numerous English composers are included, such as the beautiful motet Veni Sancte Spiritus by John Dunstaple.

The motet Veni Sancte Spiritus by John Dunstaple in the Old Hall Manuscript, England, c. 1410-1420: Add MS 57950, f. 56r

Later episodes of the programme will feature other British Library collection items, including John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, poetry by John Donne, Paradise Lost by John Milton, Teares of Ireland by James Cranford and Micrographia by Robert Hooke.

Art that Made Us will be broadcast on Thursdays at 9pm from 7 April 2022 on BBC Two and it will also be available to view on iPlayer. We hope you enjoy seeing our amazing manuscripts on screen. You can also view all these manuscript in full on our Digitised Manuscripts site. 

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