| LOCATION | Edinburgh, NL Scotland |
| MANUSCRIPT | Edinburgh, NL Scotland, Adv.MS.31.2.2(i) |
Edinburgh, NL Scotland, Adv.MS.31.2.2(i)
Century: XVI medies (a.1550 and decades onwards)
Number of folios: 202
Material: chart.
Height: 300
Width: 225
Region and Place of Production: Britannia
Scribe(s) / Possessor(s):
Cover: saec. XVIII, rough leather with embossed decorations, glued onto cardboard. Leather spine renewed in 1906. On spine: GRANT MANUSCRIPT I.</p> <p> The manuscript was not mentioned in the supplement 1776 to the catalogue of the library of the Faculty of Advocates, but mentioned in the supplement 1807 on p. 269.</p> <p> [{i}Note on inside of front cover:{/i}] Castlegrant, March 30th 1740. This book is gifted to Lord Elches by Lud. Grant.</p> <p> Quires of paper:</p> <p> Quires 1-5 contain accounts and Maitland's Practicks.</p> <p> The first quire has twelve bifolia: fol. iv-v (accounts) plus fol. 1-22 (Maitland's Practicks), ending in the middle of Maitland's item 103. The leaves also bear a modern foliation in pencil, in the lower left corner: 1-23. Bookbinder's thread (middle of quire) can be seen between fol. 10v and 11r. The centre folds of the outermost two bifolia and of fol. 4-5 and 18-20 have been glued in modern time - obviously because they were no longer properly connected.</p> <p> The second quire has twelve bifolia: fol. 23-47. Bookbinder's thread fol. 34v/35r. Fol. 47v is blank.</p> <p> The third quire has ten bifolia and one half: fol. 48-68. Bookbinder's thread fol. 57v/58r. After fol. 58 one leaf was cut away. Fol. 57 is glued. The quire ends in the middle of item nr. [268], dated 1568/12/6.</p> <p> The fourth quire has twelve bifolia: fol. 69-92. Bookbinder's thread fol. 80v/81r.</p> <p> The fifth quire has eleven bifolia: fol. 93-114. Bookbinder's thread fol. 103v/104r.</p> <p> Watermarks in quires 1-5: gothic letters 'dp', welded together = 'lettres soudées' (clearly traceable in the blank leaves 111 and 112. Many variants of this mark are reported in Briquet, nr. 9744-9767. The mark was applied by several producers whose paper was used 1433-1595 in the eastern and south-eastern parts of France, seldom farther away. Single occurrences also in the Netherlands, Normandy, Orléans, Hamburg. The marks in the five quires resemble in principle the type Briquet 9749, applied in a paper already used in 1469 at Caumont, Abbaye de Beaubec - but the shape in the present MS varies a trifle. I assume that the wires constituting the mark were not properly sewn to the paper sieve and could thus change their position. Occurrences: fol. 2 faint, 3 faint, 5, 11, 13, 15, 17, 25, 26, 27, 33, 38, 49, 51, 55, 73, 75, 81, 85, 94, 101, 104 faint, 109 faint, 111 - see details below -, 112 - see details below. The marks in fol. 5, 11, 17, 25, 101 can clearly be seen to be identical to fol. 111, and this is almost as clearly the case for fol. 33).</p> <p> Details, fol. 112: distance between vertical wires in the paper: 38-40 mm. The watermark shows letters 'dp', closely drawn together as if they were a bundle of sticks (= so-called 'lettres soudées'). The upper stroke of the letter 'd' sticks out at an angle of 45 degrees. Next to it, a thin rod rises vertically from the upper rim of the 'p', 35 mm long - and 8 mm below its upper end there is the middle-point of a six-pronged asterisk, the prongs are 5 mm long. The letters are altogether 30 mm high and 20 mm wide. The lower part of the letter 'p' sticks out 10 mm. It widens, and then splits - so as to form two feet, similar to a tree's roots. The width of both 'feet' together is 15 mm, at their bottom.</p> <p> Details, fol. 111: almost identical to fol. 112, yet the wires which had delineated the two 'feet' in fol. 112 are here clamped together, so that they just become single thick lines, curving to the left and to the right, respectively.</p> <p> Quire 6, twelve bifolia (fol. 115-137, one leaf missing). Bookbinder's thread fol. 126v/127r. The quire contains blank leaves, then 'Statutis to be reid' (fol. 120r-126r) and again blank leaves (fol. 127-137).</p> <p> Watermark in quire 6: gothic letters 'dp', welded together = 'lettres soudées' (clearly traceable in fol. 117 and 119, also present e.g. in fol. 121, 123, 125, 126, 130, 132, 134 - closely related to the mark of the first five quires, but the upper stroke of letter 'd' is vertical, and the lower stroke of letter 'p' sticks out at an angle of 45 degrees below. Next to it a thin vertical rod also sticks out below, 25 mm long, and it ends in a cross).</p> <p> Quire 7is very thick. It consists of seventeen outer bifolia, and in their middle seven inner bifolia of smaller dimensions and thinner paper (fol. 138-184). Quire 7's seventeen outer bifolia contain in their first half a list of kings, ending in the year 1560 (fol. 138-154). The second half (fol. 168-184) starts with a genealogy of the houses of York and Lancaster, followed by blank leaves.</p> <p> Watermark in quire 7, outer bifolia:gauntlet or hand, big, holding a flower, the vertical wires are 24 mm apart (clearly traceable in fol. 182, also observed in fol. 144, 146, 149, 152, 153, 183 - mark to be grouped with Briquet nr. 10678-11467, very common in the 16th century).</p> <p> Quire 7's seven inner bifolia contain a second list of kings (fol. 155-167, one leaf missing). Bookbinder's thread fol. 161v/162r.</p> <p> Watermark in quire 7, inner bifolia:gauntlet, above the middle finger a flower (observed in fol. 155, 159, 163 - much smaller than the similar watermark mentioned above).</p> <p> Quire 8, eight bifolia (fol. 185-200). Bookbinder's thread fol. 192v/193r. The quire contains Maitland's history of the house of Seton.</p> <p> Watermark in quire 8: gothic letters 'dp', welded together = 'lettres soudées' (fol. 199 - as in quire 6).</p> <p> Quire 9, one bifolium (flyleaves 17th c. = fol. 201-202).</p> <p> Watermark in quire 9: shield, crowned, probably containing a monogram of two letters, but too weak to be discerned.</p> <p> Conclusions from the evidence of watermarks, bookbinding and handwriting:</p> <p> Already Lord Elchies (1690-1754) had suspected that the present MS is Sir Richard Maitland's original [{i}see below, MS Edinburgh, Signet L, 34, fol. 1{/i}]. This is indeed very likely to be the case. I base this assumption on the watermarks, bookbinding, handwriting, and also on many details of the contents [{i}see below{/i}]. Also Athol L. Murray (Keeper of the Records of Scotland 1985-1990) had independently come to the conclusion that the present MS is most probably Sir Richard Maitland's original. He had examined this MS in the ambit of his work towards editing {i}Sinclair's Practicks{/i}, and he communicated his results to me in winter 2008.</p> <p> All the handwriting in the volume shows characteristics which were frequent in the latter half of the sixteenth century.</p> <p> The watermarks of Maitland's Practicks show that the same type of paper was used for the entire text, in spite of the many changes in handwriting. It is highly probable that the paper was produced in the middle decades of the sixteenth century, at the latest. The volume is not just bound together at random, it does not assemble quires of paper of different origin. Its various parts were connected to each other from the outset or shortly thereafter.</p> <p> The 'Statutis to be reid' (quire 6, fol. 120r-126r, last date 1565) have the same watermark as the 'Historie of the hous of Seytoun' (quire 8, fol. 185r-199v, last date 1561). This suggests that both were penned in the same studio, although not necessarily by the same scribe (this latter point would require a very detailed investigation). The close relationship to the watermark in 'Maitland's Practicks' suggests that the paper came from the same dealer and paper mill - although not immediately from the same series of production. As the 'Statutis to be read' were obviously written in 1565 or not long thereafter, all the handwriting of quires 1-6 and 8 may be attributed to time spans not long before or after that year. At first sight it even appears possible that the 'Statutis to be reid' and the 'Historie of the hous of Seytoun' were penned by the same hand, and that the same scribe also wrote parts of the text of Maitlands Practicks. Yet this is difficult to tell because much of the handwriting in question fits standard characteristics of the time, and it lacks individual traits.</p> <p> The two types of paper for quire 7, in contrast, came from different sources, but the text must also have been written in the decade 1560.</p> <p> The fact that these eight quires of paper were bound together in one volume adds still more probability to the assumption that they all originated in the same time span, and were all penned in the same studio.</p> <p> Detailed analysis of contents.</p> <p> Fol. i-iii: flyleaves saec. XX
Literature quoting this MS: Dolezalek, Scotland under Jus Commune, vols. 1 and 2
Analyzed by: Dolezalek*