I have been going through and deleting the content I’ve uploaded to the other place, and in the process stumbled back on a thread created as a response to @arbookworm.bsky.social who was asking some very interesting questions about identifying and manuscripts, and if Cotton class marks were fluid - ThreadSky

biblioraphic.bsky.social • 108 days ago

I have been going through and deleting the content I’ve uploaded to the other place, and in the process stumbled back on a thread created as a response to
@arbookworm.bsky.social who was asking some very interesting questions about identifying and manuscripts, and if Cotton class marks were fluid

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biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

The original question was sort of « is it possible for the manuscripts to have ever changed reference number? » and the short answer is yes.

In the context of the Cotton collection specifically, we have six catalogues, of which at least one was compiled in his lifetime (Harley MS 6018)…

biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

… and one probably started but not finished when he was alive (BL Add MS 35213). In the first one the manuscripts are numbered, in the second they follow the famous emperor classes.
It’s important to note that Harley 6018 might not even have been all of the manuscripts Cotton owned when it was…

biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

… compiled. The original thread was born from questions surrounding the Nowell Codex (part of Vitellius A XV) which doesn’t appear in the early catalogue, but that doesn’t mean it was not present. It just wan not present in the form it is in right now.

biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

Since we’re on the Vitellius A shelf, it’s interesting to note that several of the manuscripts there are actually in Harley MS 6018, but they were not next to each other at that point in time; A II was n.27 and A III n.250.
Back in the old thread some other examples included Vitellius C XV…

biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

… which is now Faustina C V. The Early Records of Sir Robert Cotton’s Library by Colin Tite are absolutely full of examples of things moving about, and in one case receiving two classmarks because the book might have been shelved upside down and was mistakenly given a second emperor shelfmark.

biblioraphic.bsky.social•108 days ago

Almost six months after that thread, it’s really interesting to me how much my own research has confirmed this. Looking at Cotton’s descriptions of his books as they went out, it’s obvious that the library changed a lot throughout his life, and continued to do so under Thomas’ and John’s custody.

arbookworm.bsky.social•108 days ago

Thank you! 🙂

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