Magistra Nicolaa de Bracton
The project
In 1999, I completed my PhD thesis--a critical edition
of a 13th century Dominican basic theology text by Simon de Hinton known from
its incipit (first words) as Ad
instructionem iuniorem (For the Instruction of juniors) It is thought that this text was originally
used by Dominicans looking to obtain their license to preach. The contents focus on practical theology
regarding the Credo, the Lord's Prayer, the Sacraments, the Beatitudes, the
Virtues, the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, and the Vices. The manuscript had a remarkably long life,
circulating until into the 16th century and even being printed (in a somewhat
mutated version) in the early 18th century.
There are 56 extant manuscripts, and during its life the text seemed to
have evolved away from a text with a specific purpose to a more general one as
sort of a quick guide to practical theology. Later copies become increasingly
ideosyncratic. My PhD work focused on creating a critical edition--in this
case, an attempt to establish what the original most likely looked like--based
on four of the thirty manuscripts I viewed.
When one completes one's PhD work, a bound copy is
prepared for the archives of the university granting the degree. It was in ordering this copy that I first had
the idea: I had, essentially, produced
the 57th copy of this work. Wouldn't it
be wonderful to produce that copy in a truly medieval manner--copied by hand,
as a 13th century scholar or stationer might have done?
It took me sixteen years to realize this dream. I have been practicing calligraphy for about
20 years. Utilitarian works, such as
charters, have always been a favourite, and having studied Latin palaeography,
I had been always eager to use the abbreviations I learned to read as part of
my research. The Midrealm's Calf to
Codex project was my inspiration (I contributed a small piece to this work, and
in doing so saw the amazing things being done).
The proposal that was accepted was to copy the Ad instructionem iuniorem by hand. The bulk of the work would be done using
modern substitutes for period materials – vegetable parchment paper (Fabriano
Pergamon), Windsor and Newton India ink, and metal Brause nibs. However, the opening gathering would then be
recopied onto manuscript vellum using hand cut quills and oak gall ink (both
made by me). The final book would be
bound with a limp binding.
Layout and Script
I wanted this manuscript to replicate the look on the
page of a 13th century scholarly text. These books were meant for regular use by
students, rather than as luxury items.
Therefore, the illumination in these books is normally minimal, and the
text itself is often highly abbreviated to both save on costs and time needed
to produce such a manuscript. While I
did not have any images of the manuscripts I had originally viewed during my
initial research over 20 years ago, I did have access (thanks to the British
Library) to similar theological treatises.
The two-column layout I selected for the work is typical of these books
in the 13th century.
Harley MS 3244, f19r[1]
BL Harley MS 524 Theological tracts f 23v
These texts also often have memory aids that break down
topics in the text into a series of points (think of it as medieval PowerPoint
presentations). These were also used in
the original texts I viewed (and copied by me when originally transcribed the
manuscripts). Here is an example of how
one of these appeared in Harley MS524:
BL Harley MS 524 Theological tracts f 9 v
Layout guide lines, many of which can be still seen in
the extant examples, were done in pencil for this project as opposed to the
lead or silverpoint that would have been used in period.
As you can see, the script used is a Gothic book script
(textualis) of a lower grade, termed rotunda
by Michelle P. Brown: “The grade of the script is determined by the
treatment of the bottom of the minims, which lack formally applied feet and are
simply rounded off with a natural upwards curve of the pen.”[2] The script used during this project is my own
Gothic textualis rotunda hand.
Copying of text
The process of copying began in late December, 2015 and
concluded in early April, 2016. Here is
my first page, in progress, with a contemporary work (with the large M) for
comparison of the layout.
My first page!
Once I gained momentum and became more confortable with
copying large amounts of text (including not clamping down on the pen), it took
me 35-45 minutes to copy one page of text.
I took the copying project with me to a variety of venues, including
events and meetings.
As I progressed and became familiar with the
abbreviations, the number of abbreviations used definitely increased. (This would become clear when I came back to
recopy the first gathering--which ended up being significantly shorter than the
first iteration). I am including an article
I wrote on medieval sigla to show
some of the most important types of abbreviations used in the work.
I made two
major mistakes during the copying process.
The second, in which I copied an entire gathering out of order, was
redone (and the miscopied gathering eventually bound in the back of the book).
There were
seven figures in the work. Most of them were
in a sort of "flow chart" format.
These were done with a crow's quill pen.
Copying the figures
Once I had
completed the initial copy, I took a break from pen and ink to work on pen and
ink. I received a quill cutting tutorial
from Baroness Marioun Golightly, and produced three usable quill pens. I also experimented with oak gall ink made by
Ian the Green, Guild of Limners, and Dame Marguerite Gringraix before finally
making my own ink, using a kit and recipe obtained from Guild Mirandola. Oak
galls were hand ground by me for the project.
I found
using the quills and oak gall ink surprisingly straightforward. The pen had to be dipped more frequently, but
the ink was less susceptible to coming out in huge blots.
The project in progress.
The pile of completed gatherings.
Once
complete, the manuscript copy was 126 pages in length. I added in some simple decorated capitals in
red and blue (similar to the example from Harley MS 3244, f19r above)
I had also
retained the first gathering of 14 pages (one blank page front and back and 14
with text) that I had recopied on the vellum, as well as a second gathering of
16 pages where the pages were out of sequence and had to be recopied. Since
these were all aesthetically acceptable, I ended up binding them into the back
of the book.
Lessons
learned:
Ink
making: This was my first batch of oak
gall ink. For future batches, I would
like to work to get the ink slightly thicker.
I would
also like to experiment with a period ink recipe that would work on vegetable
parchment. Oak gall ink tends to stay greyish rather than developing to the
darker brown/black seen on real vellum.
Decorated
capitals: I need to practice the
flourishes on these capitals more, and use ink rather than paint.
[1]
All images are from the British Library Catalogue of Illuminated
Manuscripts, https://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/welcome.htm
[2]
Michelle Brown, A Guide to Western Historical Scripts from Antiquity to 1600,
p.88.
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