Oxford, Bodleian Libray, Bodley 109 (1962) Bede, "Vita S. Cuthberti" (prose and verse)

Abstract

350. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 109 (1962)

Bede, "Vita S. Cuthberti" (prose and verse)

[Ker 301, Gneuss/Lapidge 546]

HISTORY: A late 10c or early 11c copy ofBede's metrical "Vita S. Cuthberti" and partial text of the prose "Vita" (Ker, Cat.; Gneuss/Lapidge: no. 546) to which "substantial addition" to ff. 60v-78 was made between 1100 and 1130 (Gameson 1999: no. 632). The text of the metrical "Vita" represents a redaction, made in Canterbury in the 10c, of Bede's later 'vulgate' recension (Lapidge 2008: 113-14, 116-17; Lapidge 1995: 143-46; see also Wright 2005: 151-52 and Lapidge 1996: 346-47). The incomplete prose life is from the later but better B family of the text ( Col grave 1940: 45-48). Ker ( Cat.) dates the hands of quires I-III(= ff. 1-23), written in Anglo-Caroline minuscule, to "s. x/xi" and of quire IV (ff. 24-27) to "xi1 " (see also Laistner and King 1943: 88, 90). The script of the first three quires of the metrical "Vita" is in Style II, practiced at St. Augustine's, Canterbury around the year 1000 (Lapidge 1995: 143. On Style II see Dumville 1993: 2-4). The two OE glosses (ff. 2v and 6r) are dated to the first half of the l lc (Ker, Cat. and Scragg 2012: no 837). The prose on ff. 28-77 is in other, later hands. Gneuss/Lapidge( 546) gives the provenance as St. Augustine's, Canterbury, and dates it to 10c/11c and the first halfofthe llc (see also Barker-Benfield 2008: 3.1816). On f. 1r a caption in a post-medieval hand identifies the contents as 'vita s<anc>ti Cuthberti per Beda<m>: The manuscript was given to the Bodleian Library by Sir Henry Savile in 1620. The manuscript's previous shelfmark was NE.B.1.20.