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Notes
Research for this article was begun during a National Endowment for the Humanities seminar. I am very grateful to the NEH for its support, and to Robert Calkins, the seminar director, for his insights and encouragement.
On the far less familiar London manuscript, British Library Additional MS 31042, see John J. Thompson, Robert Thornton and the London Thornton Manuscript (Wood-bridge, 1987); Thompson discusses decoration in the London Thornton MS on 56-63, and also briefly discusses the Lincoln Thornton MS there. In addition see the early description by Karl Brunner, "MS British Museum Additional 31042," Archiv, 132 (1914): 316-327; more recently see Karen Stern, "The London 'Thornton Miscellany,'" Scriptorium, 30 (1976): 26-37, 201-218; Sara M. Horall, "The London Thornton Manuscript: A New Collation," Manuscripta, 23 (1979): 99-103; Ralph Hanna III, "The London Thornton Manuscript: A Corrected Collation," Studies in Bibliography, 37 (1984): 122-130.
See Derek Brewer's introduction to The Thornton Manuscript (rev. ed., London, 1977; hereafter cited as TM), p. viii. On the nature of booklets in miscellanies see the work of Pamela R. Robinson, particularly "The 'Booklet,' A Self-Contained Unit in Composite Manuscripts," Codicologica, 3 (1980): 46-69; Manuscript Tanner 346 A Facsimile (Norman, OK, 1980), xix-xx, xxv; and (with Frances McSparran) Cambridge University Library MS Ff. 2. 38 (London, 1979), xii-xvii, xxi-xxv. For some modifications of Robinson's arguments, particularly the notion that booklets were necessarily based upon single texts, see Ralph Hanna III, "Booklets in Medieval Manuscripts: Further Considerations," Studies in Bibliography, 39 (1986): 100-111; on the Lincoln Thornton MS see particularly 104 and 109.
Fundamental articles on the medieval book as a testimony to contemporary reception include particularly M. B. Parkes, "The Influence of the Concepts of Ordinatio and Compilatio on the Development of the Book," pp. 115-138 in Medieval Learning and Literature, ed. J. J. G. Alexander and M. T. Gibson (Oxford, 1976); Parkes's application of these ideas to Chaucer MSS in The Poetical Works of Geoffrey Chaucer: A Facsimile of Cambridge University Library MS Gg. 4. 27, 3 (Norman, OK, 1980), pp. 60 and 64; and A. I. Doyle and M. B. Parkes, "The Production of Copies of the Canterbury Tales and the Confessio Amantis in the Early Fifteenth Century," pp. 163-203 in Medieval Scribes, Manuscripts and Libraries, ed. M. B. Parkes and A. G. Watson (London, 1978). On decorative hierarchies see Sandra Hindman and James D. Farquahar, Pen to Press: Illustrated Manuscripts and Printed Books in the First Century of Printing (Baltimore, 1977), pp. 63-87.
See in particular A. E. B. Owen's introduction to TM, pp. xiii-xvi; also his "The Collation and Descent of the Thornton MS," Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 6 (1975): 221; John J. Thompson, "The Compiler in Action: Robert Thornton and the 'Thornton Romances' in Lincoln Cathedral Library MS 91," 113-124 in Manuscripts and Readers in Fifteenth Century England, ed. Derek Pearsall (Cambridge MA, 1983); George R. Keiser, "Lincoln Cathedral Library MS 91: Life and Milieu of the Scribe," Studies in Bibliography, 32 (1979): 158-179; and his "More Light on the Life and Milieu of Robert Thornton," Studies in Bibliography, 36 (1983): 111-119.
TM, p. vii. Brewer is quoting Mary Sinclair Ogden from her introduction to an edition of the Liber de Diversis Medicinis (another TM text), EETS o.s. 207 (London, 1938), p. xv, n. 3; Ogden seems simply to be relying on the original judgment in New Paleographical Society, Facsimiles of Ancient Manuscripts, series II, plate 45; and similar remarks by Karl Brunner. Also see Owen, TM, p. xv. E. G. Stanley, in his review of TM in Notes and Queries, 223 (1978): 167, argues that the drawings on f. 33r of the London Thornton MS. are in the same ink as Thornton's signature, apparently misunderstanding a reference to the manuscript made by Frances Foster in The Northern Passion, EETS o.s. 147 (London, 1916), 11-13. This observation seems to come down to the point that both are in black ink. See Thompson's more cautious discussion in London Thornton, p. 58, and on p. 62 his discussion of whether one "Willa Frostt" may have had a hand in the decoration of the London MS.
Kathleen Scott in MS Bodley 283: the physical composition, decoration, and illustration (Oxford, 1980) provides valuable information for the period; other observations and classification can be found in Marc Drogin, Medieval Calligraphy: Its History and Technique (New York, 1989); and L. N. Valentine, Ornament in Medieval Manuscripts, A Glossary (New York, 1965), 35-40.
The only substantial attempt to classify types I have found, concerned exclusively with grouping Chaucer MSS and of little help with less decorated provincial MSS generally, is Margaret Rickert's "The English Tradition in Border Decoration, 1400-1450," 565-583 in The Text of the Canterbury Tales, vol. 1, ed. John M. Manly and Edith Rickert (Chicago, 1940).
The TM facsimile adequately reproduces the initials for the basic stylistic comparisons of these very different styles. All observations given here can be confirmed easily by reference to this widely available facsimile.
See ff. 53r-102r; full citations given below. On these East Anglian characteristics see Eric G. Millar, English Illuminated Manuscripts of the XIVth and XVth Centuries (Paris, 1928).
For penwork initials of equivalent quality, grouped with others which might be the acme of provincial penwork initials during this period, see the facsimile of Cambridge University Library MS Gg. 4. 27, 1-3. These initials were judged "provincial" by Margaret Rickert in "Border Illustration," pp. 574-576, though this vague provenance might well be questioned. In any case the initials in Gg. 4. 27 are certainly professional and part of intended lavish production values overall; also see Parkes's comments in vol. 3, pp. 60 and 64.
Style one initials cited are, unless otherwise noted, one per page, 2-5 lines high, red ink, and decorated with penwork. Quire A: [PA, but 4 leaves missing at the beginning] 3v, 4v, 6r (12-line), 7r, 7v, 8r, 8v, 9r (3), 9v (3), 11v, 12r, 12v (no decoration), 13r (2), 13v (2), 14r, 14v (no decoration), 15r, 15v (no decoration), 16v (2), 17r (2), 17v (3, no decoration), 18r (2, no decoration). Quire B: 20r, 20v, 21r, 21v, 22v, 23r, 23v, 24r, 24v, 25r, 25v (2), 26r, 27v, 28r, 29r (2), 29v, 30r (2), 30v (2), 31r (3), 31v (2), 32r (2), 32v, 35v, 36r, 37r (2), 37v (2), 38r, 38v, 39r, 40r, 40v (3), 41r, 42r. Quire C (all undecorated): 43v (2), 44r (2), 44v (3), 45r (2), 45v (3), 46r (3), 46v (2), 47r, 47v, 48r, 49r. [PA ends; jump to middle of Octavyane in] Quire G: 105r, 108r (fragment), 114v [begins Dyocliciane], 118r. Quire H: 122v (fragment) [begins Sir Eglamour], 123v, 130v [begins Sir Degrevant], 134r, 137r, 138v (6-line) begins Sir Eglamour], 140v, 143r. Quire I: 145r, 147r [begins De miraculo Beate Maria], 148r [begins Lyarde], 149v (2) [1st begins Thomas of Ersseldoun], 151r, 152v (fragment, undecorated), 158r, 161r [begins Percyvale of Gales]. Quire K: 164r (undecorated). In the "devotional" quires there are far fewer decorated initials. Two (225r and 225v) are inhabited by figures but have no other penwork decoration. The rest are style one as above with no distinction between quires except relative frequency: 179r, 209v, 213r (6-line), 219v (6-line), 229v (6-line), 231r (7-line), 233v (7-line), 237r, 237v, 238r (2), 238v, 240r (6-line), 240v, 242r (2), 243v (2), 245v, 247v, 258r, 258v (3, 1 6-line), 262 (3), 267v (2), 268r, 268v (2). 269r, 269v (2), 270r, 270v (2), 276v.
Style three initials cited are, unless otherwise noted, one per page, 2-4 lines high, red ink, and decorated with penwork. Quire D: 53r (2), 53v, 54r, 55r, 55v, 56r, 56v, 57r, 57v (2), 58v, 59r (2), 59v (2), 60r, 60v (2), 61r, 66r. Quire E: 70v (3), 71r, 71v (2), 72v (2), 75v (2), 77v, 78r (2), 78v, 79r, 79v (2), 80r, 81v, 82v, 83r, 83v, 84r, 84v, 85r (2), 85v, 86r, 86v (2). Quire F: 87r (2), 88v, 89v, 90r (2), 91r, 93r (2), 94r, 94v (3), 95r (2), 95v, 96r, 96v, 97v, 98v, 102r.
Angus Macintosh, "The Textual Transmission of the Alliterative Morte Arthure," pp. 231-240 in English and Medieval Studies Presented to J. R. R. Tolkien, ed. Norman Davis and C. L. Wrenn (London, 1962).
Style two initials in Quire A: 19r, 19v. Quire B: 27r. Quire G: 109r [begins Ysambrace]. Quire I: 154r [begins The Awntyrs off Arthure]. Also see Owen's description in TM, p.xv.
See Ogden, p. ix n.; and Thompson, London Thornton, 59 n. 14. The "dragon" armorial reference mentioned in this note dates from a few centuries later—see Arthur Fox Davies, The Art of Heraldry (London, 1904), p. 190n., pl. 22. Also see The Victoria History of the Counties of England: A History of the County of Yorkshire North Riding, 1, 256 and 564-565 (hereafter cited as VHCE: YNR); The Autobiography of Mrs. Alice Thornton of East Newton, Surtees Society 62, (Durham, 1875), p. 342.
The text of the PA, along with brief descriptions of the initials, can be found in J. S. Westlake's diplomatic edition, The Prose Life of Alexander, EETS o.s. 153 (London, 1913).
Also, it might be noted that the first two style two initials in the PA (19r, 19v) mark Darius's attack and letter of surrender at the battle of Grancus.
Note that Thornton went uncharacteristically far over his margin on 24v to get the "Alexander" on the same line as this formula in his first use of it.
Thompson, London Thornton, 59n, notes Westlake's incorrect transcription of regalibus as talibus.
Helen M. Jewell, "The bringing up of children in good learning and manners: a survey of secular education provision in the North of England," Northern History, 18 (1982): 23; Nicholas Orme, English Schools in the Middle Ages (London, 1973), p. 310; JoAnn Hoepner Moran, "Literacy and Education in Northern England 1350-1550: A Methodological Inquiry," Northern History, 17 (1981): 15; and her The Growth of English Schooling 1340-1548: Learning, Literacy, and Laicization in Pre-Reformation York Diocese (Princeton, 1985).
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