Object details
Object number
3.T.8
Creator(s)
English
Title
The Form and Manner of Keeping the Parliament and two treatises on the office of the marshal of England
Date
about 1558-1559 (binding about 1810)
Medium
Ink, colors and gold on parchment
Language
English
Publication Place
England
Binding Description
Red leather (English, about 1810)
Description
1 Vol. (35 leaves) ; parchment ; ill : 22 cm
Dimensions
22 x 16 cm (8 11/16 x 6 5/16 in.)
Signatures, inscriptions, and markings
Affixed (f. 2v, upper center): An exerpt from Robert Harding Evans. A letter on the expediency of a reform in Parliament: addressed to the Right Hon. Lord Erskine (London, 1817), p. 4.
Inscribed in brown ink (f. 3r, upper left): "Edw. Coke Attornat gen:**ex dono m[agist]ri Britten" [probably dated 1594-1606]
Inscribed in red pencil (f. 3r, upper left): No. 24. [Fountaine library no.]
Inscribed in pencil (f. 3r, upper right): "Arms of Earl Marshal (Duke of Norfolk)"
Inscribed in brown ink (lower f. 3r): "b[e] cap 10 cest treatise fint compose deb lestatut de 1403 cap 5 nome poetee collect hous de [o] le chapter cap 20 [?] compose [?] steward [?]"
Inscribed in pencil (f. 3v, upper left): arms of Edward VI
Inscribed in brown ink (f. 12v): "V[id]e libr[um] preced[entium] 535 temp[ore] Canuti regis"
Enclosed: dealer catalogue lot description titled "Parliament. The Forme and Maner of holdyne the Parliament of England with details"
Enclosed: description and price of edition [in Morris Carter's hand, dated 24 November 1902]
Provenance
Collection of Thomas Howard, fourth duke of Norfolk (1538–1572).
Possibly in the collection of Thomas Britten, burgess for St. Ives, about 1601.
Collection of the English lawyer, legal writer and politician Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634), no. 333.
Collection of the English art collector Sir Andrew Fountaine of Narford, (1676-1753), Norfolk, about 1700.
Purchased by "Perry" from the Fountaine sale at Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge, London on 11 June 1902, lot 647.
Purchased by Isabella Stewart Gardner from the booksellers J. Pearson & Co., London on 24 November 1902 for £675. (as a manuscript for Edward VI, 1547)
Commentary
Isabella Stewart Gardner believed that this book was made for King Edward VI (r. 1547-1553) of England, son of Henry VIII of England. He was briefly betrothed to Mary Queen of Scots. Isabella believed she was a direct descendant of the Scottish queen and hints of her pride in her presumed connection to the royal Scottish line are sprinkled throughout the Museum. She placed this book in the Mary Queen of Scots Case in the Long Gallery.
Bibliography
Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge. Catalogue of a selection of valuable books & manuscripts from the library of Sir Andrew Fountaine, of Narford Hall, Norfolk... (11 June 1902), lot 647.
Isabella Stewart Gardner. A Choice of Manuscripts and Bookbindings from the Library of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fenway Court (Boston, 1922), pp. 29-30, 63. (as written for Edward VI)
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 250.
Seymour de Ricci and W. J. Wilson. Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada, Vol I (New York, 1935), p. 932, no. 13.
W.O. Hassall (ed.). A Catalogue of the Library of Sir Edward Coke (New Haven, 1950), p. 26, no. 333.
Nicholas Pronay and John Taylor (eds.). Parliamentary Texts of the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1980), pp. 209-10, no. 9.
David Starkey. “Stewart Serendipity: a Missing Text of the Modus Tenendi Parliamentum”. Fenway Court (1986), pp. 38-51, ill. (as made for Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of Norfolk (1538-1575), as earl marshal of England, 1558-1559)
David Starkey. "Privy Secrets: Henry VIII and the Lords of the Council." History Today (August 1987), pp. 27, 30.
University of Pennsylvania Libraries. Schoenberg Database of University of Pennsylvania Libraries. Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts, no. 198052, accessed 4 November 2016.
Stephen D. White in Jeffrey F. Hamburger et al. Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections. Exh. cat. (Boston: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; Newton: McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College; Cambridge, Massachusetts: Houghton Library, Harvard University, 2016), p. 211, no. 176, ill.
Gallery
Long Gallery
Case
Mary Queen Of Scots Case
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