A document for teaching/practicing English Secretary Hand II

Last week I posted a paleography exercise using images from a seventeenth-century manuscript "particular" of lands in Gloucestershire. Today I am posting a set images depicting the rest of the document, and I again present them with hyperlinks to transcriptions. (By the way, a "particular" is a "statement giving details of a thing"—OED particular adj., n. B.1.c.)

As shown in the two images above, this document consists of a large piece of paper folded in half three times; the resulting small paper packet not only protects the writing inside (if at the expense of its exterior, as shown in the darkened section of paper in the second image), but makes the document portable and easily exchangeable.

The following image from the inside pages of the "particular" tallies the total acreage recorded in the main document.
  

transcription

Here is a detail of the sums shown on the right-hand side of the image above.

The document's watermark is easy to see and photograph, but since I haven't been able to consult Briquet's Les filigranes (only t.1 available on Google Books and local libraries with the book are closed today) I will only supply an image of the mark (crown and coat-of-arms).

Finally, there is also writing on the packet's weathered external "cover."

"A particular of Judgments"

transcription

 

 

A document for teaching/practicing English Secretary Hand

Today I am posting images of a seventeenth-century manuscript "particular" of land in Dymock, Gloucestershire. But rather than researching and discussing this text as a historical document, I present it as a tool for teaching English paleography. The manuscript's fairly easy secretary hand makes it suitable for beginners, and its illustration of scribal conventions (abbreviations, numbers, insertions) and material practices (folding, watermark) makes it ideal for discussing several aspects of early modern English paleography.

I have presented these images separately from their transcriptions so as to allow for viewers to "test themselves" on each line of the document. (Since Blogger's formatting capabilities leave much to be desired, I have used hyperlinks to replicate the interface of "checking" a user transcription against the "right answer".) 

But before I get to the images, here is a link to what is probably the web's best tutorial in English secretary hand (the "handwriting course" from Cambridge University's "Scriptorium" resource). The same site's "alphabets" guide is an excellent tool for checking letter-forms. 


SEGMENT ONE:

First two lines:

 

 

transcription

Third line:

transcription

Fourth line:

transcription

Fifth line:

transcription

Sixth line:

transcription

Seventh line:

 

 

 

transcription

Eighth line:

transcription

SEGMENT TWO:

Line 1:

transcription

Lines 2-3:

transcription

Lines 4-5:

transcription

Lines 6-7:

transcription

Lines 8-9:

transcription

Line 10:

transcription

 
SEGMENT THREE:

First line:

transcription

Second line: 

transcription

Third line:

transcription

Fourth line:

transcription

Fifth line:

transcription

Sixth line:

transcription

Seventh line:

transcription

SEGMENT FOUR:

transcription

 
I'll continue this post next week with images from the rest of the document, including its watermark.

A Manuscript-Enhanced Index in a Seventeenth-Century Book of Legal Reports

As I mentioned in my post two weeks ago (on the Center's annotated copy of the English-Latin language aid Janua linguarum), we own several books with manuscript enhanced indices and word lists. Today's post showcases a seventeenth-century English law book and an early owner's annotations to its index. Although largely instrumental in purpose (i.e. adding indexical entries for topics of interest to the reader), these annotations allow for the partial reconstruction of a reading experience, in this case revealing overlooked aspects of the book (at least in terms of the index) the reader considered important.

(NB: here is a link to the Picasa Web album versions of these pics. The link puts you at the first in the series (of all the pics ever posted on this site). Picasa has stronger zoom functionality than the browser, and so is a better tool for viewing the marginalia.)

note the ownership inscription of "W. Coryton" in the top right-hand corner

Sir Richard Lane, Reports in the Court of Exchequer: beginning in the third, and ending in the ninth year of the raign of the late King James. London: Printed for W. Lee, D. Pakeman, and G. Bedell, 1657
[4], 199, [5] p. ; 30 cm. (fol.); Wing L340; contemporary sheep binding

The Middle Temple barrister Sir Richard Lane (bap. 1584, d. 1651) devoted much of his legal career to the Court of Exchequer, and it is those experiences that formed the basis for this posthumously published book of legal reports. According to D.A. Orr's ODNB article on Lane, the book "contain[s] an important report of Chief Baron Sir Thomas Fleming's opinion in Bate's case (1606)," as well as other important cases from the early seventeenth-century.

The Center's copy of Lane's Reports bears evidence of early ownership and use. While a few minor manuscript notes appear in the book's margins, the lion's share of its annotations come at the end of the book, in the "exact Table of Principall Matters contained in this Booke." A former owner—perhaps the "W. Coryton" who signed his name on the title page (not the politician who lived from 1580-1651)—added dozens of new manuscript entries to the index, reflecting various legal actions and concepts he encountered while reading. 

These are personal annotations, meant for the private use and reference of the owner; as such, they were written quickly in a free italic hand without an eye to appearance or presentation. In fact most manuscript annotation of printed books in this period was executed in such a manner, a situation that poses certain challenges to modern readers and scholars. If these pages were closely cropped, as is the case with scores of early printed books surviving today, the annotations may have been cut in half and rendered illegible. While the margins survive intact in this case (probably because the book hasn't been rebound since the mid-seventeenth century, the date of the sheepskin binding), the difficult hand nonetheless makes it tough to decipher this annotator's notes. 

It would take me too much time to transcribe all the notes in this book's index, but one example will suffice to demonstrate their typical style and content. (I am also no expert on law or the history of law, so I am focusing entirely on what this annotation reveals about reading and indexing processes.)

This note (taken from the bottom of the page shown above) reads:


"action personall dyes with the person. 93. 107." [italic letters expand scribal abbreviations]


By beginning his note with the word "action," our annotator imitates the type of index entries established in the printed "Table" (most of the entries in "A" are "actions"). He also uses several abbreviations in order to expedite the process of note-taking and fit his entries onto the small patch of available writing space. This note clearly references content on pages 93 and 107. Among other things, page 93 (end of a report on the case of "[Thomas] Wentworth and others against Stanley") reads "if the party die before the penalty inflicted, this shall not be inflicted at all," as well as "if any person shall dye, no seisure [of property] shall insue, or be continued." Page 107 (in a report of "Halseys case touching Recusancy") refers to a Jacobean statute that "giveth no penaltie without conviction, so that the death of the party before conviction dischargeth all." 

The owner's note, and indeed all of his notes, enhance the book and make it more useful, if not to a general reader than definitely for "W. Coryton," reflecting his specific tastes and legal interests. The index's remaining three pages  contain comparably extensive manuscript annotations, which I will not explicate further at this point.

 

I am not sure if any scholars have written much on annotated indices in early modern law books, but it seems these items could illuminate both the historical practice of law-book reading and the book history of early modern indexing.

Recovering obscured ownership inscriptions

As a book changes physical form over the course of its life (through factors such as environmental damage, the wear-and-tear of regular use, repairs, and rebinding), the evidential traces of its provenance often undergo a parallel transformation. When rebinding or repairing their books, many later owners set out to obliterate (or at least obscure) all signs of former ownership. Owners might simply cross out an earlier inscription with ink, or in more extreme cases "wash away" manuscript notes and marks chemically (as many French book collectors did in the nineteenth century). By routinely cropping pages and throwing away endpapers during rebinding/repair, book owners and binders may have improved the aesthetic qualities of their books (according to a historical sense of taste), but not without simultaneously eradicating the history of books' social lives. 

Sometimes these efforts to erase the past are reversible. Modern technology has demonstrated its ability to recover texts rendered unreadable by factors such as volcanic eruption (the Pompeii scrolls) and overlaid text (the Archimedes palimpsest). But most cases do not require academic grants, research teams, and expensive equipment to recover the writing that others have attempted to obscure. In today's post I demonstrate how a bit of ingenuity (and a good light source) can help reveal some of these hidden inscriptions and their concomitant histories of ownership. 

Michael Drayton, Poems. London: Printed by Willi[am] Stansby for John Smethwick [1630]
[12], 496 p., [1] leaf of plates ;  16 cm. (8vo). STC 7224. Later polished calf binding. 

It is evident that our copy of Michael Drayton's 1630 Poems was not only rebound and repaired at one point in its life, but that one of its former owners attempted to obscure its series of earlier, eighteenth-century ownership inscriptions. 

 

 

The most noticeable of these inscriptions comes at the very end of the volume: "Elizabeth Savage her book" (see images above). Elizabeth Savage inscribed her name many times throughout the book, but evidently a later owner was not fond of her markings.

This leaf from late in the volume bears three different eighteenth-century ownership inscriptions, all of which show signs of being partially erased. Fortunately the eraser did a poor job and we can easily read the names:

John Bywater 1733 [?]

Elizabeth Savage Her
Book Anne Downy [?] mdccxxx [1730]
Elizabeth Savage 1733


But at other points in the book Savage's inscription is faint and barely legible. 

The two inscriptions read "Elizabeth Savage," although the ink in both has significantly faded. While it is certainly true that ink inscriptions deteriorate over time (especially if exposed to too much light), considering the evidence we have of a former owner attempting to erase or obscure Elizabeth Savage's inscriptions, I think it is likely he or she also meddled with these two marks.

The most elaborate of Elizabeth Savage's inscriptions, however, are obscured to a degree that renders them illegible to the unaided eye. Two of the book's preliminary leaves (engraved title page and the table of contents) have been fortified by what appear to be new sheets of paper cut to size and glued onto the verso of each leaf.

In this image of the second repaired leaf one can make out traces of handwriting in the middle of the page as well as a complete ownership inscription at the top ("John Bywater"). While one might expect to turn the leaf over to get a better look at this faintly visible handwriting, the verso is actually blank (although handwriting is faintly legible). 

verso of contents leaf, rotated

The leaf's thickness (in addition to its handwriting traces) suggest that at some point in time (perhaps during rebinding) a later piece of paper was placed over the original as a strengthening measure. By placing a strong light source behind the leaf, we can actually read the ownership inscriptions now obscured by paper.

The now familiar inscription of "Elizabeth Savage" appears in the middle of the page, underneath "ELIZAB" written in large decorated capitals. 

An additional ownership inscription (John Lawson [?]; surname difficult to make out) is visible below Elizabeth Savage's signature (in this image, to the left of her signature).

The verso of the engraved title page leaf (also repaired with a sheet of blank paper) similarly obscures another set of eighteenth-century ownership inscriptions. 

While this leaf contains much more handwriting than the table of contents leaf, it is much more difficult to read against the background of an engraved title page. It is fairly easy to make out "Elizabeth Savage her book" in the middle of the leaf, as well as the ink "pinwheel" someone added to the reversed coat-of-arms. Unfortunately, modest camera and computer equipment makes it impossible for me to read the ms notes at the bottom of the leaf (although I am sure playing around with computer software could help reveal what these notes say). 


At first glance Elizabeth Savage seems to be just one of two or three owners who penned her name in this copy of Drayton's Poems. But upon closer inspection we know she was the most prolific inscriber of the book's documented owners, a fact that may have lead a later (male?) owner to begin systematically removing her manuscript marks. Since this removal was hardly systematic and only minimally effective, it is possible to recover this particular book's handwritten evidence of provenance, and thereby restore Elizabeth Savage's rightful place in the book's social history.