Boecius de consolacione philosophie.

Accession number: 
PML 775
Author: 
Boethius, -524.
Published: 
[Westminster] : William Caxton, [about 1478]
Description: 
[94] leaves ; 28 cm (fol.)
Credit Line: 
Purchased with the Amherst collection, 1908.
Notes: 

Caxton is named on leaf [12]/5v; publication date from Needham.
An English translation by Geoffrey Chaucer, who is named on leaf [12]/5v. Includes a portion of the original Latin text.
Caption title, leaf [1]/2r.
"Epitaphiu[m] Galfridi Chaucer. per poetam laureatu[m] Stephauu[m] [sic] surigonu[m] Mediolanense[m] in decretis licenciatu[m]", in verse, leaf [12]/6.
Printed in Caxton's types 2:135B and 3:136B.
Collation: [1-11⁸ 12⁶]: 94 leaves, leaf [1]/1 blank.
Paper format: Chancery folio
PML copy leaf dimensions: 27.4 x 19.2 cm.
PML copy missing 1 leaf: [1]/1 (blank); leaves [6]/1.8 bound after [12]/6, and [6]/2-7 bound after [10]/8.
Previous Morgan copy (former PML 676, from Ashburnham collection, sold in June 1971) included leaf 80 now in Rosenwald copy at Library of Congress, removed from Morgan copy and given to complete Rosenwald's copy by Belle Greene, Jan. 1947 (see Sixth Annual Report to the Fellows of the Pierpont Morgan Library, 1955, p. 16).

Binding: 
18th-century English sprinkled calf over paper boards (28.4 x 20.3 cm); rebacked by Durpez Lahey. Board edges worn but formerly with gilt decoration. Decorative endbands; sprinkled edges.
Inscriptions/Markings: 

Hand decoration: Rubricated, red lombards, paragraph marks, and underlining in red (most likely in Caxton's workshop, see BMC XI 346). C-type paragraph marks. Annotations: Sixteenth-century notes by John Stow, leaves [6]/7v, [6]/8v, [7]/1r, and [12]/4v (inscriptions on leaves [6]/8v and [7]/1r visible under UV), including "Love [th]at is powre it is with pyne" (IMEV 2013), "Out of a sermon prechid at Powls Crosse" referring to John Lydgate, "[th]e ryver of twyd partythe england and scot[land ... ] scotland," as well as notes/quotations from English chronicles, including Livy's Life of Henry V (see notes in dept. file).

Provenance: 
John Stow (1525?-1605), inscriptions (leaves [6]/8v, [7]/1r, and [12]/4v), before 1570; Edward and Henry Cortney, signatures (or annotaton in Stow's hand), 16th century (leaf [7]/1r); John Corbett, signature, 16th century (leaf [6]/7v); Francis William Henry Fane, Earl of Westmorland (1825-1891), armorial bookplate (front pastedown), his sale, Sotheby's, 13 July 1887, lot 310, to: Bernard Quaritch, cat. 1886, no. 21840; William Amhurst Tyssen-Amherst, Baron Amherst (1835-1909), armorial bookplate (front pastedown), his sale, Sotheby's London, 3 Dec. 1908, lot 124, purchased prior to sale by: Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), purchased with the Amherst collection, 1908.
Classification: 
Department: