Category Archives: 16th century

‘On the roll’: a brief history of matriculation

It’s that time of year again when a new cohort of undergraduates arrives in Oxford to matriculate at the University. Matriculation is the formal admission of a student to membership of the University. Students, who have already been admitted to their colleges (which are legally and administratively separate from the central University), are then presented by that college to the University for matriculation. In celebration, the University Archives’ blog for October looks at matriculation through some of the records we hold of this longstanding Oxford tradition.

The history of matriculation is somewhat obscure for the University’s early years. Before the existence of colleges, students lived in private lodgings and were under the supervision of individual teaching masters. It’s generally understood that the University required every scholar to be on the roll or in the register (in rotulo or in matricula) of one of these masters. It appears, however, that this requirement was not enforced and there are, sadly, no surviving rolls or registers in the Archives documenting these early students. For the first few centuries of its existence, the University repeatedly tried, and seemingly failed, to get its students systematically recorded.

In 1420 a royal ordinance was issued which enacted that all scholars should reside in a college or hall, under the guardianship of a principal and that they, and their servants (more about them later), should swear an oath to observe the University’s statutes. The fact that this ordinance had to be revived in 1552, and the continued absence of any records of this process, suggests that it, also, was ignored. The 1552 ordinance is in fact the reason behind the creation of the earliest surviving list of persons residing in colleges and halls of the University. This list appears in a Chancellor’s register of the period, a register used for a wide range of University business.

Christ Church members 1552

Entry listing members of Christ Church in the Chancellor’s register, 1552 (OUA/Hyp/A/5, fol 68v)

The list is divided into sections for each college and each starts with the senior members of that college: masters (magistri in Latin) being denoted by the prefix ‘Mr’, and doctors, by ‘D’. It then goes on to list the junior members, ie students. There is no information about when a particular person entered the University or how long they’d been at the college. It isn’t, strictly-speaking, a record of matriculation at all, merely a list of names providing a simple snapshot in time.

In 1564 the University appointed a committee to look again into matriculation and draw up new regulations governing it. Their work culminated in the University’s first matriculation statute introduced in 1565. This required all scholars and privileged persons (more about them later, too) who, if 16 or over, should swear to observe the University’s statutes. The 1565 statute required students to be registered within seven days of their admission to a college or hall (or if living in the town under the supervision of a master), and to give the University certain personal information such as their age and place of residence.

The statute also established a scale of fees at matriculation whereby different amounts were charged depending on the matriculant’s social status. At the top of this list were the sons of princes, dukes and marquises (who paid 13 s 4d to matriculate). There then followed (in descending order) the sons of counts or viscounts; barons, bishops or baronets; esquires, deacons or archdeacons; knights and gentlemen. Until finally, at the bottom, the sons of plebeians (who paid only 4d). The ranks were peculiarly arranged – higher status individuals were separated into very small categories whilst the remaining 90% of the population were lumped together, effectively, as ‘plebs’.

The statute also made provision for a register or book of matriculations to be kept by the University. The very first matriculation register of the University was created that year. It is divided into sections, one for each college or hall. At first the entries are very much like the 1552 list of names, simply a snapshot roll-call for certain years, and not proper matriculation records. There are also long gaps in the register in which hardly any entries are recorded. Clearly the colleges were still not co-operating with the new matriculation statute. But the University persisted and in 1568 it set up yet another committee to look at the issue. The first proper matriculation entries in this register begin in c1571, presumably as a result of their efforts. In Christ Church’s entry (the first college listed in the register), for example, the first dated matriculation is in 1572. But there are still gaps in the register after that which suggest that matriculations were not being systematically recorded.

From 1581, a new restriction on matriculation came into force. From that date all matriculating students over the age of 16 were required to declare their assent to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England, the Book of Common Prayer and the oath of Royal Supremacy. In order to demonstrate this assent, the matriculating student swore the oath of supremacy and signed his name on pages bound up in a register with a copy of the Thirty-Nine Articles. This effectively barred anyone who was not a member of the Church of England from entering the University; students who were Roman Catholic, Jewish, Muslim or non-conformist protestants, for example, were now excluded.

The University appears to have tightened up its recording of matriculations after this and the entries in the register become fuller and more comprehensive. Each student was now required to provide the following information to the University: his age, the rank or status of his father, and his county of origin. Age was required by the University as it determined whether or not the student was required to take the oath of supremacy (if under 16, he was not required to do so). The father’s rank or status was still required in order to determine the matriculation fee. The county of origin was useful to colleges, as certain college fellowships and scholarships were limited to those born in specified counties, but it is not clear why the central University needed that information. From 1616, the registers begin to note whether the person matriculating was the eldest or second son, etc. Eldest sons of certain ranks were granted privileges relating to their studies, such as dispensations from particular University requirements. From 1622, the matriculation registers also contain the name of the student’s father and (it is not clear exactly which), either the parish in which the student was born, or the parish in which the father resided.

Christ Church matriculations 1570s

The first Christ Church matriculations, 1570s (OUA/SP 1, fol 20v)

What is also clear from the earliest matriculation entries, such as those of Christ Church, is that the ages of students matriculating ranged more widely, and, by and large, students were much younger than today. In the list pictured, Robert Sydney matriculated aged only 12; Edward Montague, aged 13. Putting aside the possibility of less-than-truthful entries, it is certainly the case that students matriculated at a younger age in centuries past. In the late 16th century, their ages ranged between 7 and 30, with one record found of a five-year old, Audley Mervin, matriculating in June 1618 (but it is suspected this might be a clerical error for ‘15’). The general trend has been for students to get older over the centuries until they reach the, more usual, age of 18+ as today.

Some students may have wanted to avoid having to assent to the beliefs of the Church of England and so deliberately came up to Oxford before they were 16 (at which age it became compulsory). Some may have been young boys sent to Oxford at the same time as an older brother. What other records held here show is that most of these very young matriculants rarely proceeded to a degree.

The information given by the matriculants was not checked or verified, as far as we know, and so was not necessarily entirely accurate. Like many records kept by archives, the information these registers contain has its limitations. It is what someone wanted the University to believe, not necessarily what was the case. Some students deliberately understated their social rank in order to pay smaller fees, for example; there’s evidence from college records that students sometimes assigned themselves a lower status to the University, and a much higher one to their college.

There’s also evidence that not every student at a college even matriculated. The University’s matriculation records contain errors and omissions when compared to college admission records. Students unwilling to subscribe, for example, might avoid matriculating entirely. It appears, however, that attendance at colleges without matriculation was rare by the end of the 17th century and had mostly ceased by the middle of the 18th.

A far greater range of people were admitted to membership of the University at this time than today. One large group of these were privileged persons. Privileged persons (personae privilegiatae) were, generally, of two types: servants or tradesmen. Servants (servientes) could be either personal servants or common servants. Any University member could bring his personal servant to Oxford with him and have him admitted to the status of privileged person. ‘Common servants’ included lower-ranked University officers such as bedels, or college servants such as manciples or cooks. The other type of privileged person were tradesmen and workmen of the town (privilegiati), people such as booksellers, brewers or carriers. Privileged status conferred on them the right to trade with the University and its members and gave them access to a large and wealthy customer base that the non-privileged tradesman did not have. Privileged persons appear in the matriculation registers until the late 18th century, often in a separate list at the back of the volumes.

In 1870 the University introduced a new system for recording student information at matriculation: the matriculation form. Completed by each matriculating student, in their own hand, this asked for personal information. For the first 20 or so years, the form was very small, requiring students to give much the same type of information as they had done for years past: ie name, age, whether the matriculant was the eldest or second child, place of birth, father’s name and ‘quality’, date of matriculation and college.

Oscar Wilde's matriculation form

Matriculation form of Oscar Wilde, 1874 (from OUA/UR 1/1/6)

Dates of birth, school and father’s present address were added to the form in 1894, a useful addition for both the University at the time and the genealogist of the future. But one has to wonder how practically useful some of the other information on the form now was. The University had asked for the same kind of information from its students for centuries, long after some of it was of any use at all. Would the fact that a student was a third son be of any relevance in 1890? One suspects not, as the privileges that status had once offered had long since disappeared.

The social ranks had also changed quite dramatically over time and the particular terms used had changed, or lost, their meaning so much that by the 19th century they’d become rather meaningless. Matriculating students were using, and misusing, outdated terminology established over 200 years earlier. In 1891 the confusion felt on all sides led the University to change the question from father’s rank or ‘quality’ to occupation.

A very significant change to matriculation took place in 1871. Subscription at matriculation remained obligatory until 1854 when it was abolished by the Oxford University Act. But religious tests for membership of the University were not finally abolished until 1871 when the Universities Tests Act enabled those of all faiths and none to matriculate. This began the opening up of matriculation to a greater number and range of people.

The University took a little longer to allow women to matriculate. Although women had been studying in Oxford, at the women’s colleges set up in the city from the 1870s onwards, they were still not allowed to matriculate. Women could sit and pass University examinations but until they could matriculate, under the University’s longstanding regulations, they were not allowed to graduate. This finally changed in 1920.

Isobel Matthew's matriculation form

Matriculation form of Isobel Millicent Matthew, 1920 (from OUA/UR 1/2/1)

The first woman to matriculate, Isobel Millicent Matthew, did so on 7 October 1920. As her matriculation form shows, the University had to change its standard male-centric matriculation form for its new women matriculants. But instead of taking the opportunity to review the forms and see whether the information they were asking for was relevant to the 20th century, the University decided to simply tweak them, change their colour, and replace all masculine vocabulary with feminised versions. As a result, the form now asked its female matriculants for some entirely irrelevant information: no-one in the University would ever need to know whether the matriculant was an eldest daughter. This had no bearing on any University procedure. The men’s forms were also restructured into this new, enlarged format, but the redundant information continued to be collected.

The matriculation registers continued to be maintained after the forms were introduced in 1870. These were completed, as they always had been, by University administrative staff and from the 1870s, they simply copied the information from the forms into the registers, effectively creating a second (often much more legible) copy of the information. By 1924, however, the time taken to maintain the parallel series of matriculation registers could no longer be justified and the University decided to stop keeping them. From then on, the forms themselves were to be the official record of matriculation. The last register entries were made in 1925.

The University continued using the matriculation forms all through the twentieth century. The occasional review added another piece of required information to the form (such as the type of school attended, nationality, or proposed subject of study) as demands grew on the University to report statistics of the nature of its student body. It therefore had to add to the forms the kind of information which it needed to answer the questions being asked of it by others (such as social origin, class, income and background). By and large, however, the content, and purpose, of the forms remained the same.

With the advent of computerised student systems in the 1980s, the University revised the matriculation form yet again, with a view to standardising data collection and speeding up the production of statistics. The inevitable progress of technology meant that the decision to stop creating paper matriculation forms at all was finally taken in 2005.

Much has been written about the University’s early matriculation records. A good discussion of the period between 1571 and 1622 can be found in Andrew Clark’s Register of the University of Oxford Vol II, Part I, (published by the Oxford Historical Society in 1887).

For further information about how to access the information in the matriculation records, please see the guidance on the University Archives’ website at https://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/universityarchives/guides/past-members. The guidance includes links to published registers, available online, of those who matriculated before 1892. It also provides contact details for sources of information regarding students matriculating after 1892.

For a detailed look at the changing student body of the University over time, see Lawrence Stone’s chapter entitled ‘The Size and Composition of the Oxford student body 1580-1910’ in The University in Society, Vol I Oxford and Cambridge from the 14th to the Early 19th Centuries (Princeton, 1974).

The University recently commemorated the 150th anniversary of the 1871 Universities Tests Act with the creation of the ‘Opening Oxford 1871-2021’ website at  https://openingoxford1871.web.ox.ac.uk/

For information about matriculation today, see the University’s main website at https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/new/matriculation

Notes in the margin

This month’s University Archives blog looks at some of the stranger annotations which appear in the University’s records over the centuries. Administrative records of any organisation can be fairly dry affairs. They were created because a job needed doing and the University’s officers and administrators, in the main, dutifully carried our their tasks. Many of the records in the Archives here, however, show that the people who wrote them were not that different from us today. They got bored at meetings, they criticised their colleagues, and they couldn’t resist a joke at someone else’s expense.

As well as recording the important business of the day, some records can contain extra notes and annotations in the margins, or sometimes right in the middle of the text, which add unexpected details. Although mostly mere scribbles and doodles (‘marginalia’ seems too grandiose a term for these), some of the notes are making a very different point. The following is just a very small selection of what we’ve found.

One of the earliest registers of University business in the Archives is a register kept by the Chancellor. Known as the Chancellor’s Register (Registrum Cancellarii), it was maintained by successive Chancellors from 1435 to 1469 and contained a range of business with which they, or their specially-appointed commissaries (deputies) personally dealt. The Chancellor’s powers were wide and as well as being head of the University, he also had to act as judge, magistrate and keeper of the peace in Oxford.

Throughout the register there are little pointing hands drawn in the margins, directing the reader to something important. Known as manicules, these were commonly used for centuries as a way of highlighting key points or interesting parts of a text, much like the fifteenth-century equivalent of a post-it note.

Manicule from Chancellor's Register Hyp/A/1

Pointing finger, or ‘manicule’, in the Chancellor’s Register, 1435-59 (from OUA/Hyp/A/1)

In other places, there are more elaborate doodles which appear to serve no purpose whatsoever other than to quell the boredom of the writer. On one page, written by one of the Chancellor’s commissaries, John Beek, during his deputising for the Chancellor in September 1451, there is an elaborate circular drawing. This must have taken some time to do as it is carefully drawn. Perhaps the business that day was particularly dull?

Doodle from the Chancellor’s Register, 1451 (from OUA/Hyp/A/1)

Some records in the Archives also show evidence of officers’ recordkeeping skills being criticised by their colleagues. A Register of Congregation contains a terse exchange of 1580 written in the margin in which the Registrar (and writer of the register) Richard Cullen receives a complaint from an unhappy anonymous critic. The note is written next to a blank list of inceptors (those who were proceeding to higher degrees) in Theology, Civil Law and Medicine. The names haven’t been filled in yet. The anonymous critic starts things off, complaining about the emptiness of the list:

‘Mr Cullen, you must use to make your book more perfit and not leave their names owt so long til thei be quite forgoten’

Richard Cullen retaliates, firmly passing the blame onto someone else, namely one of the University’s Bedels:

‘not forgotten but the bedell not paynge of me for regestring this act hath dune me injurye and so you’

The matter seems not to have been resolved within the pages of the register. The entries remained empty. Let’s hope the people receiving their higher degrees were not forgotten as a result.

Exchange recorded in margin of Register of Congregation (NEP/supra/Reg KK, fol 311r).

Less commonly, the University’s records have been annotated to make a joke. Robert Veel, who matriculated from St Edmund Hall on 6 May 1664, was the victim of such a joke. Robert signed his name in the University’s subscription register, as every student was required to do at that time, confirming his assent to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England.

Someone, we don’t know who, then thought it hilarious to write in the word ‘py’ after Robert’s surname, so he is now listed for posterity as Robert Veel py (ie veal pie). It looks as if the comedy addition to the register was done at pretty much the same time as Robert wrote his name, but we don’t know whether it was a bored administrator who snuck the joke in, or perhaps one of the students signing their name further down the page after Robert who saw an opportunity. Either way, the joke made it into Joseph Foster’s Alumni Oxonienses, the multi-volume register of members of the University up to 1888, published in the late nineteenth century. There, Foster rather cheerlessly describes the insertion ‘doubtless as a jest’.

Subscription entry for Robert Veel (from OUA/SP/41)

It will be interesting to see how the transition from paper to digital records in the University affects the survival of doodles and other annotations like this in the future. Born-digital records offer many benefits, but they could, rather sadly, hail the demise of such notes in the margin.

The Earls of Clarendon catalogue is now online

You can find the new catalogue of the family and working papers of seven Earls of Clarendon (2nd creation) online at Bodleian Archives and Manuscripts.

The archive adds considerably to the Bodleian’s existing collections of Clarendon family papers, which include the seventeenth-century state papers of the very first Earl of Clarendon (1st creation) who was chief advisor to Charles I and Lord Chancellor to Charles II. His heirs in the Hyde and Villiers families took up the mantle and continued to serve the British government and the royal family well into the twentieth century. Notable postings included the 4th Earl of Clarendon serving as Viceroy of Ireland during the Great Famine and later as Foreign Secretary, and the 6th Earl of Clarendon serving as Governor-General of South Africa in the 1930s.

The archive includes approximately 800 letters from Queen Victoria and correspondence with monarchs and statesmen including Frederick the Great of Prussia and Viscount Palmerston. It also includes intimate family and estate papers, including letters between mothers and sons and husbands and wives.

I have been blogging about interesting items I’ve found along the way, ranging from 19th-century condoms to letters from the front during the American War of Independence (plus one extremely cute dog) and you can find those posts all here at the Archives and Manuscripts blog.

The Langdon Hills map

This month’s University Archives blog looks at one of the most beautiful and colourful items in the University Archives: a 1585 plan of a farm and surrounding land at Langdon Hills in Essex. How did Oxford University Archives end up with a map of Essex? The reason is a bequest to the University which took place exactly 400 years ago.

In 1621 the University was given two plots of land in Essex by Thomas White, a clergyman and former Canon of Christ Church. The gift was intended to establish and provide ongoing financial support for a new professorship at the University: the White’s Professor of Moral Philosophy.

Portrait of Thomas White

Portrait of Thomas White (Bodleian Library LP 81)

Donations to the University like this were not unusual. Wealthy individuals wanting to perpetuate their name, or gain some kind of connection with the University, gave land and its associated income (eg from renting the land to tenants) to endow new academic posts or institutions. In the original deed of benefaction which conveyed the two plots of land (known as Langdon Hills and Blackmans Farm) to the University, White set out what he wanted the income from the estate to be used for. The principal one of these was to pay for the salary, or ‘stipend’, of the professor – the sum of £100 a year.

The trouble with estates is that it costs money to run them – sometimes more than the income that you get from them. White’s gift came with its own problems for the University. During the period 1621-1798 the income from the property was never enough for everything it was supposed to pay for. In 1832 the University discovered that the estate, having been neglected by its tenant, was in such ‘a grievous state of dilapidation’ that it was completely unlettable. The University had to spend nearly £2000 on repairs so it could be let again. Until the works were completed, nearly a decade later in 1841, the estate gave the University no income and not one of the post-holders was paid. The situation never really improved and so, by the 1920s, the University decided to part with the estate. By 1924, both plots of land had been sold.

When the University acquired the estate back in 1621, it also acquired a number of much older historical documents as part of the property transaction. These included two plans of the estate – one of Langdon Hills, and one of Blackmans Farm. They had been drawn up in 1585 for the then owner of the estate, Sir Thomas Mildmay. Like many wealthy landowners of the time, Mildmay commissioned surveyors to survey his estates and produce plans of them. Expensive to produce, they would have been a status symbol for him as well as having a practical purpose. Mildmay commissioned John Walker, a surveyor from Essex, and his son (also John), to survey this estate as as well as a number of others he owned in the county.

Plan of Langdon Hills estate

Plan of Langdon Hills estate, 1585 (OUA/SEP/2/1/2)

The larger of the two plans, concerning Langdon Hills, shows the size and use of the farm, including detail of trees and gates and, at the bottom of the plan marked ‘A’, an impressive Tudor house which appears to have been Langdon Hills Hall. The Hall is no longer there, but a farm, Langdon Hall Farm, with the same recognisable field boundaries, can be found just outside Basildon.

Detail of house at 'A'

Detail of house at ‘A’ (from OUA/SEP/2/1/2)

450th anniversary of the incorporation of Oxford University

This year marks the 450th anniversary of the 1571 Act of Parliament, of Elizabeth I, which formally incorporated the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Both had already existed for over three centuries but this confirmed their legal statuses as corporations.

In contrast to the colleges, the central University of Oxford has no charter of foundation. It is said to have emerged during the eleventh century when a  small group of teaching masters and their pupils set up home in hired lodgings in Oxford. Not yet the large corporate body we know now, the University was merely a group of individuals living and working in an already-established town. In 1214,  these individuals were placed under the jurisdiction of a Chancellor appointed by the Bishop of Lincoln and they quickly gained recognition as a corporate body.

Award of the Papal Legate, 1214

Award of the Papal Legate, 1214 (OUA/WPbeta/P/12/1)

First gaining in 1216 the title of ‘universitas’ (which meant, simply, any body of people have a distinct purpose and status), the University’s corporate status was further enhanced over the years by having its own statutes, officers and premises.

Until the reign of Elizabeth, the University had accrued its rights and privileges through the issue of royal charters. Each monarch keen to support the University would grant it a charter conferring yet greater powers and freedoms on it, as well as confirming those issued by their predecessors. Covering a range of areas, from law and order to street cleaning, these additional privileges were often obtained at the expense of the city authorities who saw their rights and privileges reduced as a direct result.

Relations in Oxford between the University and the city were not particularly good at the time the 1571 Act was passed. The city was still smarting over the charter of Henry VIII issued in April 1523 which had given the University many new privileges and powers over it, including effectively putting much of the city’s business under the control of the Chancellor of the University. His powers had extended over control of certain trades (eg the regulation of essential goods such as bread and ale) as well as the right to claim legal cases for the University’s own court, the Chancellor’s Court, bypassing the city’s legal processes.

Exemplification of the Act of 1571

Exemplification of the Act of 1571 for incorporating the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, 7 June 1571 (OUA/WPbeta/A/10)

The Act of 1571 paid little attention to the bad feeling between the two and was instead intent on strengthening the two universities and confirming the rights and privileges they had already acquired over the preceding centuries. In it Elizabeth confirmed the validity of all the charters, deeds and documents previously issued by her predecessors, namechecking, somewhat pointedly, the contentious charter of 1523. The two universities’ possessions and freedoms were ratified and protected, now placed on a more secure statutory footing. The Act also established the University’s official title as ‘the Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of the University of Oxford’ and gave it a common seal.

In what seems to be a small placatory move towards the city, the last paragraph declared that the Act would not ‘extend to the prejudice or hurt of the Liberties and Privileges of Right’ of the city of Oxford and town of Cambridge.

The exemplification, or copy, of the Act in the University Archives bears the seal of Elizabeth I, showing her seated and holding her regalia. Annotated over the years by University officials and administrators, it has key clauses underlined, notes in the margins and a couple of doodles.

Detail of seal of Elizabeth I, 1571

Detail of seal of Elizabeth I, 1571 (from OUA/WPbeta/A/10)

Although this Act of Parliament did not create the University, it is the highest confirmation of its corporate status. More information about the legal status and constitution of the University can be found on the main University website at  https://governance.admin.ox.ac.uk/legislation/preface-constitution-and-statute-making-powers-of-the-university

Advancing and expanding access to our archives

Helping to navigate the Bodleian Libraries’ vast archives.

I am thrilled to be working on a major initiative by the Bodleian Libraries to prepare for the introduction of an online circulation system for the Bodleian’s vast collection of archive and manuscript materials. I grew up in a family avid about history and I went on to study history at university—so it’s an incredible privilege to be able to contribute to this work which will benefit readers, researchers and members of the public from all around the world.

My role at the Weston Library includes barcoding all the material stored there, uploading this information into our online systems, and contributing to the conservation and re-housing of collections. The work underway behind the scenes is a very significant project that will contribute to widening access to the Bodleian Libraries’ Special Collections. It’s energising to think that I am contributing to making all this material more accessible for as wide an audience of readers and scholars as possible. I am conscious that archival material is meaningful, powerful, and sometimes contested, and I am motivated by the idea I am contributing to a project which will allow a greater number of people to provide rigorous, progressive and exciting views of the past and its influence on the present.

One of the main privileges of my job is that I have the opportunity to work with all the collections in the Library. As I scamper around the Library’s many compartments to barcode the collections held there, I encounter material from all the Weston’s collections—medieval manuscripts, music archives, modern manuscripts, rare books, and maps from around the world. In the above photo, you can see me (please forgive the scruffy lockdown hair) preparing to put labels on each of the shelves in the Weston Library. I did this as the staff at the Weston came back to Library after the most recent lockdown, and the aim was to help my colleagues and I navigate the Library’s compartments to find materials—it can get quite labyrinthine! The coronavirus pandemic affected the Bodleian Libraries’ workings significantly, but through it all the Library always strived to “keep Oxford reading”. The project to which I am contributing was inevitably delayed by the pandemic because it involves a lot of work which can only be done onsite, but now a number of colleagues in the department are contributing to the project to catch up lost time and get it done!

Hopefully this has provided you with a glimpse of the daily inner-workings of the Bodleian and how we are working to make things accessible!

MS. e Mus. 78: Shields of arms, in colour, by the French royal herald Montjoie

Another day, another interesting item found whilst completing the retro-conversion of the Summary Catalogue. As a confessed lover of medieval history, this item took me right back to my knighthood and chivalry university studies. What caught my eye was the seemingly historical material included in this beautifully illuminated manuscript. It all looks relatively straightforward: shields of arms from various kingdoms in Europe by the French herald Montjoie, written in the 16th century. Any questions? I have one. Included in this manuscript we have “shields of the knights of the Round Table” such as those of “Galaad, Perseual, and Lancelot du Lac.” With a slight change in spelling, the figures Galahad, Perceval, and Lancelot are largely considered to be mythical. They are understood to be created by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his pseudo-historical Historia Regum Britaniae (History of the Kings of Britain c. 1136-1137) and later in the 12th century by Chrétien de Troyes in his Arthurian Romances.[1] So what are they doing here?

Rough translation of French

Line 1-6: “‘Book of the herald Montjoie,  containing shields of arms collected by him. In this book, which is made up of 72 leaves of parchment, there are various coats of arms of  some kingdoms in Europe, of the 150 knights of the Round Table, and those of  several dukes, counts, marquis, chatelains [someone who owns a castle], barons and other lords and gentlemen of  miscellaneous provinces of the kingdoms of France, England and Scotland…”
Line 9: “A treatise addressed to ‘my very dear … brother prince of Vienna'”
Line 11-12: “So, all good mores stem from virtue”
Line 13: “The means/way/method”

Whether this manuscript is fully fictional or not is a topic for discussion probably longer than a light-hearted blog post, and requiring a lot more knowledge of coats of arms than I possess. This interesting element does however warrant me to discuss the legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, as well as delve into heraldry and the beautiful illustrations by Montjoie.

Heralds

A French royal herald named Montjoie wrote and illuminated this book in the 16th century. We don’t know much about him, though another French herald of the same name was supposedly present during the Battle of Agincourt in 1415.[2] They could be the same person with the wrong date on this manuscript, Montjoie could be the name given to French royal heralds, or it could have been a popular choice. Other than this, we have no information about the herald apart from the obvious: being literate and adept at illustration. The level of detail given to each of these colour shields suggests someone with a lot of time and a lot of respect for the knights who displayed and fought with these coats of arms. Heralds were initially messengers used by kings, queens and the nobility, and they were also required to organise and oversee tournaments.[3] They would have spent a lot of time with knights and the heraldry that accompanied them, both at these tournaments, and also overseeing battles such as Agincourt. In this instance, the French and English heralds watched the battle from atop a hill and came to a decision about the victorious army – the decision was respected, showing just how much the heralds were also.

Heraldry

Clark described coats of arms as beginning in combat, with the need to distinguish chiefs and commanders as well as “point out those under their command” i.e. a bit like how different football teams usefully wear different colours, and captains wear armbands. According to Fearne, quoted in Clark, “the first soueraigne that ever gave coate of armes to his soldiers was King Alexander the Great, who, after the manner of his ancestors, desirous to exalt by some speicall meanes of honor his stoutest captaines and soldiers above the rest, to provoke them to incounter their enimies with manly courage, and by the advice of Aristotle, he gives unto the most valiant of his armies certain signes or emblemes, to be painted upon their armours, banners, and pennons, as tokens for their service in his wars”.[4] Coats of arms are heraldic visual designs on a shield and actually came into general use in European nobility around the 12th century. Who could bear and use arms changed from country to country, but they were personal and in England and Scotland were bestowed on individuals rather than families. They were legal property and were passed from father to son from the end of the 12th century on the order of King Richard I, strictly regulated by heralds.[5] The rules of coats of arms are very detailed, using figures such as lions for courage is only the beginning. For a fuller look into this distinct science, see H. Clark An introduction to heraldry.[6] Every line, figure, shape, and colour has meaning, and each worked to distinguish one knight from another.

Figures from H. Clark, An Introduction to Heraldry (London: Henry Washbourn, 1829).

King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table

In medieval Europe, knighthood went from a mounted warrior, to a class of lower nobility, to a rank associated with “the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfectly courtly Christian warrior.”[7] These shields of arms played a large role here, as the knights (largely on horseback) entered tournaments, justings, tiltings and other “honourable exercises” to “gain reputation in feats of arms”.[8] These arms identified the knights, as well as the nobility they may have been vassals for, and allowed them to show off and also gain skills they may need in actual battle. The knights would arrive and heralds would check their armorial bearings, proof of nobility and register them. These tournaments first began in Germany in the tenth century and became general practice in Europe shortly afterwards.[9] The tournaments are regarded largely in relation to the world of Arthurian romances, principally by French author Chrétien de Troyes in the 12th century, and bring visions of A Knight’s Tale to all who have seen the (brilliant) film adapted loosely from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.[10]

Getting back to the manuscript, Montjoie here has assigned some of the Knights of the Roundtable that we recognise from these romantic tales shields of arms. It’s fun to imagine Lancelot with the diagonally red striped shield and Galahad the starkly English red cross, but unfortunately these figures are largely accepted to be mythical legends rather than real life chivalric figures. The same is to be said for King Arthur, who became this romantic figure through Geoffrey of Monmouth’s centring of him in his pseudo-history mentioned above. It is largely accepted amongst historians that there is “no solid evidence for his historical existence” despite being credited with defeating the Saxons in the 5th and 6th centuries, though Arthur’s legend well and truly lives on.[11] It was Geoffrey who wrote about Merlin, Guinevere, Excalibur, and Arthur’s final resting place at Avalon, and Chrétian who added Lancelot and the Holy Grail, focusing on various Knights of the Round Table as well as the King.[12] Nicholas Higham discussed in his 2018 article how “Arthur has been pressed into service time and again to support any number of causes” and he even inspired a dish in the Great British Menu this year.[13] That such tales were so prevalent in society that Montjoie wanted to illustrate the shields of arms for these characters, and they are still prevalent today is very humbling. Perhaps all we want is a strong legend to believe in and an Arthurian romance. Whilst we will never truly know if King Arthur or any of the Knights of the Round Table existed (until time machines are invented), we can enjoy Montjoie’s book nonetheless.

References:

[1] Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia Regum Britaniae (History of the Kings of Britain c. 1136-1137), (originally published 1929); Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances, translated with an introduction and notes by William W. Kibler (London: Penguin Books, 1991).

[2] John Keegan, The Face of Battle (London: Penguin Books, 1983), p. 74.

[3] H. Clark, An introduction to heraldry (London: Henry Washbourn, 1829), p. 4.

[4] Ibid, p. 1-2.

[5] Coat of arms, Wikipedia, URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat_of_arms.

[6] H. Clark, An introduction to heraldry.

[7] Knights, Wikipedia, URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight.

[8] H. Clark, An introduction to heraldry, p. 3.

[9] Ibid, pp. 4-5.

[10] Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances.

[11] King Arthur, Wikipedia, URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Arthur.

[12] King Arthur, Wikipedia; Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia Regum Britaniae; Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances.

[13] Nicholas J. Higham, King Arthur: The making of a legend (Yale University Press: 2018), p. 2.

You can view the catalogue of this manuscript in the Bodleian Archives and Modern Manuscripts interface. Once the library reopens, it will be available to request and view in the Weston Library Reading Rooms.

 

Illuminated pedigree compiled by Thomas Gardiner, Monk of Westminster, showing the descent of Henry VIII from Cadwallader, Hugh Capet, Alfred and William the Conqueror, 1542/1564: MS. Eng. hist. e. 193

Notice the choice of a lion underneath Henry VIII, a symbol in heraldry symbolising courage, nobility, royalty, and strength. The Royal Arms of England contains 3 lions and was chosen by the Plantagenet kings who ruled England from 1154 until the House of Tudor.[1]

“Kynge Henry the VIJth in wysedome And ryches Equall to
Kynge Solomon he was sonne and Eyre to noble Edmunde
Erle of Rychemonde the ryght And trew Eyre to Holy
Kynge Cadwallyder / He maryed Quene Elizabethe the
Daughter and Eyre to Kynge Edwarde the IIIJth / After he
had openly in the ffelde obtayned Hys Ryghte he raigned
XXIIJth yere VIIJ monthes & XXIJ Dayes And he lyethe
Buryed in Westmynster where as he orderyd perpetuallye
to Endure the moste nobleste foundacyon that ever was
Harde of / He had by quene Elizabethe / Artur prince of
Wales / Edmunde Duke of Somersett / Elizabethe / & Kateryn /
All iiij Dyed wythe oute issu / Quene Margette of Scotlande
Quene mary of ffrance /”

“VIVAT REX HENRICUS”

Henry VIII (1491-1547) is without a doubt one of the best known English kings, mostly due to his penchant for wives, his break with Rome and the Catholic Church, and his role in the English reformation. The king reigned for 38 years, got through 6 wives, and “favoured then dispensed” of 3 chief ministers, all named Thomas.[2] But even this king, infamous now for his fickle attitude to marriage and his gluttony, had to prove his royal legitimacy in the 16th century. Henry VIII was, after all, only the second Tudor king. His father, Henry VII, had fought against the house of York for the crown, plotting their downfall from exile in Brittany for 14 years before his coronation in 1485.[3]

What is it?

This item, an illuminated pedigree, is a family tree/genealogy which served to provide evidence of Henry VIII’s legitimacy as king of England. It expresses the line of succession to Henry all the way back to the Welsh king Cadwallyder (633-682), also known as Cadwaladr ap Cadwallon. Cadwallyder ruled as king of Gwynedd from around 655 to 682 AD, when he is said to have died of a plague. There is not much information recorded on the Welsh king, aside from the fact he was the “laste kynge of that blode,” before the pedigree begins connecting him to Henry VI, Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. There is no doubt left as to who the pedigree was attempting to legitimise.

The pedigree traces Henry’s lineage through such other rulers as Hugh Capet (d. 996), King of the Franks between 987 and 996, as well as William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy. William ruled England between 1066 and 1087 after he had “slayne kynge harolde in the felde” and was succeeded by his son, William Rufus. The roll does not add much illuminating detail about each ruler, though tends to mention how they came to power, how they died, and any notable religious houses they founded.

The pedigree is dated internally as 1542, though on the outside is written “Pedigree of the Kings by Thomas Gardiner, Monke: 1564”. Alongside stitching and evidence of extra parchment being glued together, this may suggest that elements were added at different times, possibly by different people. The main author and artist of this piece does, however, seem to be Thomas Gardiner (or Gardyner), who was possibly the same monk of Westminster who wrote a chronicle of English history from Brutus to Henry VIII, called The Flowers of England.

Matthew Payne and Julia Boffey explored the life of Gardiner in their 2017 paper “The Gardyner’s Passetaunce, the Flowers of England, and Thomas Gardyner, Monk of Westminster.”[4] According to this research, Gardiner was born around 1479 in London. His father was a skinner and his mother may have been “the illegitimate daughter of Jasper Tudor, Duke of Bedford and the brother of Edmund Tudor, whose marriage to Margaret Beaufort produced the future Henry VII; Gardyner was thus, after 1485, the date of Henry’s accession, the king’s step-cousin once removed.”[5] This, if the same person, brings an interestingly personal element to this pedigree.

In around 1493, Gardyner was admitted a novice at Westminster Abbey. He studied at Oxford between 1497 and 1499 and even added a year at Cambridge. Displaying such intellectual prowess was probably part of the reason why he was chosen to create the pedigree. When he returned to Westminster in 1501, he was ordained a priest. Payne and Boffey point out that although the exact purposes of his book and the pedigree are unknown “their function as part of a programme of pious royal promotion seems unquestionable”. They were undoubtedly there to extol Henry VII and Henry VIII’s virtues as great kings, “proclaiming the justice of their claims to the crown.”[6]

Why did he need this?

Henry VIII undoubtedly led in a very different fashion to his father, Henry VII, who was known to be reserved and did not involve himself in foreign affairs. Much more ostentatious, Henry VIII was known for his lavish banquets and greed, and his inability to reconcile his own opinions and actions with the Catholic Church. By breaking from tradition and waging war in France and Scotland, Henry VIII would have needed documents like this to ensure the people knew he was rightly in power, and there was nothing they could do about it.[7]

You can view and request this item through the new Bodleian Archives and Manuscripts webpage.

[1] Garai, J., The Book of Symbols (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1973); Jamieson, A. S., Coats of Arms (Pitkin Publishing, 1998)

[2] Cheshire, P., Kings, Queens, Chiefs and Rulers (London: Star Fire, 2003),  p. 132

[3] Ibid,  p. 129

[4] Payne, M., and J. Boffey, “The Gardyner’s Passetaunce, the Flowers of England, and Thomas Gardyner, Monk of Westminster,” The Library 18.2 (2017): 175-190

[5] Ibid, p. 177

[6] Ibid, pp. 178-182

[7] Brewer, J. S., and J. Gairdner. The Reign of Henry VIII from His Accession to the Death of Wolsey: Reviewed and Illustrated from Original Documents (London: John Murray, 1884)

A new project in Archives and Modern Manuscripts: the conversion of the Bodleian’s Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts

The summer of 2019 saw the beginning of an exciting and much anticipated new project in Archives and Modern Manuscripts: the conversion of the Bodleian’s Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts into machine-readable format, ready for greater online accessibility through the newly launched Bodleian Archives & Manuscripts website.

What is the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts?


The Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts edited by Richard W. Hunt, Falconer Madan and P. D. Record (1915)

The Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts is key to accessing our collections. The ten volumes were compiled to list all of the Western manuscripts held by the Library, as a summary of the collection (they are aptly named), and a finding aid for researchers and readers. The first seven volumes, edited by Richard W. Hunt, Falconer Madan and P. D. Record, provide an overview of manuscripts acquired before 1915. The last three volumes, edited by Mary Clapinson and T. D. Rogers, were published in 1991 and describe acquisitions made between 1916 and 1975.

Together, the volumes of the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts describes approximately 56,000 shelfmarks (physical places within our archival storage), and thus a substantial part of our vast and eclectic collection. The material ranges from manuscripts acquired singly such as an Album of genealogical tables of ruling families of Europe and the Middle East from classical times to the 20th century, to large archives such as the archive of John Locke (full catalogue coming soon).

If you want to learn more about the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts and the acquisition of material at the Bodleian Libraries, alongside our interesting history, we highly recommend William Dunn Macray’s Annals of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, A.D. 1598-A.D. 1867, which you can read online here. William Dunn Macray worked here at the Bodleian during the nineteenth century.

How can you discover what’s in the Summary Catalogue now?

The volumes of the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts are accessible in paper format in the Weston library and have also been digitised to be accessible remotely. Digitised scans, in PDF form, are available via SOLO: the first seven volumes are accessible here, and the last three volumes there.  The first few Summary Catalogue descriptions that we’ve converted since the project began in September have been published in Bodleian Archives & Manuscripts. You can find details of what’s been published so far on our New Additions page.

Meet the team:

We are two archivists working exclusively on the project: Alice Whichelow and Pauline Soum-Paris. Our colleague Kelly Burchmore also devotes some of her time to the project.

Alice Whichelow – Hi! I qualified as an archivist in September 2019, gaining my qualification in Archives and Records Management from University College London. As a history enthusiast, getting to explore some of the lesser known treasures of the Bodleian Libraries’ collection is great, and getting to share them is even better!

Pauline Soum-Paris – After completing my Master of Archives and Records Management at the University of Liverpool, I became a qualified archivist in September 2019. With interests in languages, history and religions, I can only see the collection held by the Bodleian Libraries as a goldmine and I am looking forward to sharing a few of the gems I come across every day!

Kelly Burchmore – As a project archivist who qualified in Digital Curation in March 2019, I work mostly on modern collections. Therefore, through the conversion process I enjoy learning about the physical characteristics of more traditional archive material; it’s interesting to read about the binding of the manuscripts, and see the meticulous methods by which they were catalogued. It’s great to work with Alice and Pauline to share the value of this project, and indeed, the collections and items themselves.

What you can expect from us:

The conversion of these Summary Catalogue descriptions into machine-readable form for online discovery is now well-underway, and new descriptions will be added regularly to Bodleian Archives & Manuscripts over the course of 2020 and 2021. We will be using this blog to keep you updated on what we find, sharing blog posts about items and collections from the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts which have sparked our interests. Likewise, if you have used the Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts and have suggestions regarding items that fascinated you, do let us know in the comments. So, keep an eye out and enjoy!

Oxford College Archives

A new website for Oxford College Archives has been launched at https://oac.web.ox.ac.uk/.

Painting of Oxford students entitled 'Conversation Piece, Worcester College' by Edward HallidayThe site includes a general introduction to the archives held by the Oxford colleges, individual pages on most of the colleges (with further links to catalogues etc.) and links to associated archives in the City and University.  There is also an FAQ page, a glossary of all those odd Oxford terms, and a bibliography.  The site will be enhanced and updated regularly.