“Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, MSS 23 and 223:
A Workshop” on
The Corpus Prudentius and the Saint-Bertin Prudentius

Invitation Letter for 2 June 1992

RSVP Form

5 June 1992
In the Series of Seminars on the Evidence of Manuscripts
The Parker Library, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge

Invitation in pdf.

The previous Seminar in the series considered
“Anglo-Saxon Writing Materials and Practices”
Parker Library, 11 January 1992

[First published on 8 September 2016]

Focused on the 2 early medieval manuscripts at the Parker Library with collections of the works of the Spanish poet Aurelius Prudentius Clemens (348 – after 405 CE), this workshop considered the evidence of Corpus MS 23 and MS 223 in the light of their relatives and their contexts, and in the company of gathered specialists, who had come from England and abroad.

The month of June in 1992 — during the 3rd year of the 5-year Research Project on “The Archaeology of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts” funded by the Leverhulme Trust, and during the 5th year of full-time research at the Library by its outside-funded Senior Research Associate, Mildred Budny, specifically directed toward an integrated approach toward the Anglo-Saxon and related manuscripts in the collection — was the first, and only, time during the full Series of Research Group Seminars (and Workshops) on the Evidence of Manuscripts (1989–1995) that 2 workshops or seminars were held in the same month.

The work of the Research Project is described in the detailed Annual Reports to the Leverhulme Trust. As listed among our Publications, the Reports were reprinted and circulated, together with the then-current Profile (updated as appropriate during those years) of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence.

*****

The Plan

© The British Library Board. Additional MS 24199, folio 18r. Reproduced by permission.

Issued in the name (and with the abbreviated signature) of R.I. Page, the 1-page Invitation Letter sets out the parameters.

We plan to hold a workshop on Friday, 5 June, concerning Corpus Christi College, MSS 23 and 223, which contain collections of works by Prudentius, with many glosses.  MS 223, a medium-format copy made in Northern France in the late ninth century, apparently belonged to the Abbey of St. Bertin.  It reached England by the late tenth century, to judge by entries by various Anglo-Saxon hands.  MS 23, Part I, a luxurious large-format copy made in Southern England in the late tenth or early eleventh century, apparently belonged to Malmesbury Abbey by the mid-eleventh century.  It contains a magnificant cycle of illustrations for the Psychomachia, rendered in coloured outline drawing and accompanied by some Latin and Old English titles.  Both its place of origin and function, whether as a ‘classbook’ or meodu-borde book, remain controversial.

Both manuscripts have been the subject of detailed study in the course of our research at the Parker Library.  We hope to produce a facsimile of MS 23, and we are preparing studies of particular aspects, to analyse its texts, layout, language, codicology, palaeography and art.  As part of this exploration, the workshop will discuss the problems of both manuscripts and related subjects.  We hope you might attend to give your advice and help.

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