A Forgotten Original or an Original Copy? On MS. Douce 387 in the Bodleian Library: Collecting Early Modern Festival Books

Focusing on one manuscript, today in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, this chapter deals with the question how early modern objects became collectable items. The manuscript is categorized as MS. Douce 387 and its name indicates that it came from the collection of Francis Douce (1757–1834), who was keeper of manuscripts in the British Museum from 1799 until 1811. MS. Douce 387 is described in the catalogue of the Douce’ian collection as the “presentation copy with coloured designs by Marten de Vos and others” of the 1595 printed festival book Descriptio publicae gratulationis … in adventu … Ernesti archiducis Austriae. This festival book, printed in Antwerp’s Plantin-Moretus press, was commissioned by the magistrate of the city of Antwerp to commemorate the Joyous Entry of Archduke Ernest of Austria from June 1594; that an “archducal copy” bound in red velvet was commissioned as well and was owned by the Archduke is know as well. However, first research showed that Oxford copy cannot be this “archducal copy” or Marten de Vos’s artist’s copy even though it is the only know version with a handwritten text and hand-drawn illustrations. It rather should be examined as something totally different altogether. The main question remains why someone then commissioned a hand made version of this festival book, something unknown for other books of this genre? Why would someone between 1600 and 1800 sit down and copy texts and prints from a collectable book? Why was there such an on-going interest in early modern festival books? Could this manuscript be the only later made copy of the “archducal volume” or is it rather a forgery made for the European collectors’ market?

Some remarks upon the Church of Great Haseley, Oxfordshire. Read at a meeting of the Oxford Society for Promoting the Study of Gothic Architecture, November 19, 1839. Together with extracts form Delafield's ms. in the Bodleian Library, entitled "Notitia Hasleiana."

Mode of access: Internet.

An examination of the Shelley manuscripts in the Bodleian Library : being a collation therof with the printed texts, resulting in the publication of several long fragments hitherto unknown, and the introduction of many improved readings into Prometheus unbound, and other poems /

Mode of access: Internet.

Collectanea anglo-premonstratensia; documents drawn from the original register of the order, now in the Bodleian library, Oxford, and the transcript of another register in the British museum.

Mode of access: Internet.

An examination of the Shelley manuscripts in the Bodleian library. Being a collation thereof with the printed texts, resulting in the publication of several long fragments hitherto unknown, and the introduction of many improved readings into Prometheus unbound, and other poems,

Mode of access: Internet.

Three catalogues; describing the contents of the Red Book of the Exchequer, of the Dodsworth manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, and of the manuscripts in the library of the honourable society of Lincoln's Inn. /

Originally published in the appendix to the General report of the Board of commissioners on the public records, 1837.

Ireland in the seventeenth century; or, The Irish massacres of 1641-2, their causes and results. Illustrated by extracts from the unpublished state papers, the unpublished mss. in the Bodleian library, Lambeth library, and the library of the Royal Dublin society, relating to the plantations of 1610-39; a selection from the unpublished depositions relating to the massacres ... and the reports of the trials in the High court of justice in 1652-4, from the unpublished mss. in Trinity college, Dublin.

Mode of access: Internet.

Catalogue of the printed books and manuscripts bequeathed by Francis Douce, Esq., to the Bodleian Library /

Double set of plates at end, one hand-colored, the other not.

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám : being a facsimile of the manuscript in the Bodleian library at Oxford, with a trascript into modern Persian characters /

Mode of access: Internet.

The state letters of Henry earl of Clarendon, lord lieutenant of Ireland during the reign of K. James the Second; and His Lordship's diary for the years 1687, 1688, 1689 and 1690. From the originals in the possession of Richard Powney, esq. with an appendix from Archbishop Sancroft's manuscripts in the Bodleian Library.

Mode of access: Internet.