Notes and Queries, Number 01, November 3, 1849Various
History
Notes and Queries, Number 01, November 3, 1849
Various
Questions and answers -- Periodicals
Amongst the objects of the useful medium of literary communication
afforded by the publication of "NOTES AND QUERIES," one appears to be a
record of the casual notice of "some book or some edition, hitherto
unknown or imperfectly described." I am induced therefore to inquire,
whether the existence of an ancient MS. volume of Chronicles, which I
have recently noticed in the little library adjoining Reigate Church, is
already known to those who investigate out monastic annals? This volume
may probably not have escaped their research, especially since the
republication and extension of Wharton's Collection, have been recently
proposed. A chronological series of chronicles relativing to the see of
Canterbury was announced amongst the projected publications of the
"Anglia Christiana Society."
The Reigate library, of which brief mention is made in Manning's and
Bray's _History of Surrey_ (vol. i. p. 314.) without any notice of its
contents, is preserved in the upper chamber of a building on the north
side of the chancel, erected in 1513, and designated as a "vestibulum"
in a contemporary inscription. The collection is small, and amoungst the
most interesting volumes is a small folio, in the original oaken boards
covered with white leather, presented to the library, 7. June, 1701, by
William Jordan, of Gatwick, in the adjacent parish of Charlwood,
probably the same person who was member for the borough of Reigate in
1717. Of previous possessors of the book nothing is recorded. It
comprises several concise chronicles, which may be thus described:--
1. "Cathologus Romanorum Pontificum:"--imperfect, commencing with fol.
11; some leaves also lost at the end. It closes with the year 1359, in
the times of Innocent VI.
2. "De Imperatoribus Romanis:"--from Julius Caesar to the election and
coronation of Charles IV. after the death of the emperor Lewis of
Bavaria, and the battle of Cressy, in 1347.
3. "Compilacio Cronicorum de diversis Archiepiscopis ecclesie
Cantuariensis:"--the chronicle of Stephen Birchington, a monk of
Canterbury, printed by Wharton, from a MS. in the Lambeth collection.
The text varies in many particulars, which may be of minor moment, but
deserve collation. The writing varies towards the close, as if the
annals had been continued at intervals; and they close with the
succession of Archibishop William de Witleseye, in 1368, as in the text
printed by Wharton (_Anglia Sacra_, vol. i. pp. 1-48.).
4. "De principio mundi, et etatibus ejusdem.--De insulis et civitatibus
Anglie:"--forming a sort of brief preface to the following--"Hic incipit
Bruto de gestis Anglorum." The narrative begins with a tale of a certain
giant king of Greece, in the year 3009, who had thirty daughters: the
eldest, Albina, gave her name to Albion. The history is continued to the
accession of William Rufus.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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