[Item 1 occupies quires 1-22]
1. (fols. 1r-218r) Silius Italicus, Punica: 'Ordio[r arma qui] | bus celo se glor[ia tollit | aeneadum] partiturque ferox […] | … | Nec uero cumte memorat de stirpe deorum | Prolem tarpei mentitur roma tonantis || Finit decimus septimus liber punicorum silij italici' (ed. J. Delz, Sili Italici Punica, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart, 1987), pp. 1-471, the present manuscript described at pp. xxiv-xxv; cf. Hermann Blass, 'Die Textesquellen des Silius Italicus', Jahrbücher für classische Philologie, Supplementband 8, Heft 1 (1875), pp. 159-250, at pp. 168, 181, etc., siglum 'O'.); the fore-edge of fols. 1-14 are torn away with the loss of text (with modern repairs); fol. 218v is ruled, otherwise blank.
[Item 2 occupies quires 23-27]
2. (fols. 219r-264r) Valerius Flaccus, Argonauticon, the incomplete version ending in 4.317: 'Gagi valerij flacci balbi Extini Argonauticon liber primus incipit || Prima deum magnis cami|nus freta peruia nautis ... | Regis amor montem celeres siluamque capessunt | Hec sors hec amicum tandem manus arguit ausis || Finit quartus liber argonauticon' (ed. Widu-Wolfgang Ehlers, Gai Valeri Flacci Setini Balbi Argonauticon libros octo, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart, 1980), siglum 'Q').
The start of each book with large initials in blue or red, with simple reserved designs (fols. 1r, 54r, 66r, 216r, etc.), once with penwork of the other colour (fol. 26r), and once omitted (fol. 194r).
Paper, c. 295 x 205 mm., of good quality, the written areas polished; watermarks not easily visible: they appear to include a bull's head, a triple mount in a cross-topped circle, and a plain triple mount similar to Briquet no. 11656 (visible at e.g. fols. 218, 264).
ff. iii (paper) + 264 + iii (paper), foliated in 20th century pencil: i-iii, 1-264, using the Bodleian '(ult.)' convention, correcting a very sporadic 19th-century foliation on fols. 153 ('151'), 219 ('216'), and 264 ('261'); fols. 151-210 foliated correctly in medieval Arabic numerals, in the bottom fore-edge corner of rectos; fols. 265-267 foliated in modern pencil.
Quires mostly of ten leaves each: 1-2110 (fols. 1-210), 228 (fols. 211-218) | 2310 (fols. 219-228), 2410+1 or 12-1 (structure uncertain) (fols. 229-239), 258 (fols. 240-247), 2610 (fols. 248-257), 278-1 (last leaf cancelled) (fols. 258-264); catchwords present throughout except in the final quire of each text; leaf signatures present in most quires, in one consecutive series from [a] to z, followed by a tironian 'et', a 'con' abbreviation mark, and finally 'aa' and 'bb'; each letter usually followed by lower-case roman numerals i-v, but with occasional lapses into Arabic numerals (e.g. 'e3', fol. 43; 'I2', fol. 82).
Ruled in brown-grey leadpoint with 28 horizontal lines, between three vertical bounding lines to the left and two to the right of each column; the left-most pair used to guide the first initial of each line; the ruled space c. 180 x 100 mm.
Written with 28 lines per page above the top ruled line in a humanistic script, using the point for punctuation; occasional fine calligraphic cadels (e.g. fols. 11r, 39r) sometimes including a human face in profile (e.g. fols. 1r, 41r, 110v).
Secundo folio: 'Per clipeos'.
Sewn on five cords and bound in 18th-century brown calf over pasteboards; blind-tooled with a simple panel design on each cover; the spine with a paper label printed '10', and a blue-edged label inscribed '314'. The lower gutter corner of fol. ir inscribed in 20th-century pencil '26788', probably by a binder/restorer, cf. MS. 307.
1. Written almost certainly at Padua c. 1460, since the scribe made textual corrections to Bodleian Library, MS. Arch. Selden B. 50, which is securely localisable and datable to c. 1459-61. A copy of the incomplete Valerius Flaccus text was discovered by Poggio Bracciolini and his friends during the Council of Constance, in the summer of 1416; early in 1417 they found a copy of Silius Italicus. 'Only six copies are known of the incomplete Valerius Flaccus, for a complete text was found only a few years later, but this incomplete text is found with Silius in Cesena, Biblioteca Malatestiana, MS. S.XII.3, the closest manuscript textually to Queens 314, made for Malatesta Novello of Cesena, apparently in Ferrara between 1464-5, and also in Vatican, MS. Ottob. lat. 1258, the next closest, which belonged in Rome to Pietro da Montopoli before 1462.' (Bodleian Library, Duke Humfrey's Library & the Divinity School 1488-1988: an exhibition at the Bodleian Library, June-August 1988 (Oxford, 1988), no. 57; cf Albinia C. de la Mare, 'Lo scriptorium di Malatesta Novello', in Fabrizio Lollini and Piero Lucchi, eds., Libraria domini: i manoscritti della Biblioteca Malatestiana: testi e decorazioni (Bologna, 1995), pp. 35-93, at p. 46).
2. John Tiptoft (1427?-70) (on whom see DNB), earl of Worcester, with notes in his hand up to about fol. 37, and with a few notes by John Free (c.1430-1465), the English humanist (on whom see DNB under 'Phreas') who was with Tiptoft in Padua (see Bodleian Library, op. cit.; and Josef Delz, 'John Free und die Bibliothek John Tiptofts', Italia medioevale e umanistica, 11 (1968), pp. 311-6, at pp. 312, 315 n. 1, and Taf. XV.1, showing a detail of fol. 30v.).
3. John Lloyd, doubtless the classical scholar (1558-1603) (on whom see DNB) who was a fellow of New College from 1579-1596, and who gave MS. 202 to the College in 1595.
4. Queen's College, given by Lloyd: inscribed 'Joannes Luidus Collegio Reg[…]', the rest torn away (fol. 1r, upper margin; cf. MS. 202); included in James, Ecloga; in Langbaine's mid 17th century catalogue; and in the 1689 catalogue in MS. 555 (listed twice: under 'V' for Valerius Flaccus, and under 'S' for Silius Italicus; in the Library Benefactors book, MS. 556: 'Valerium Flaccum' is entered by the original hand, and 'Argonauticon' is added in darker ink below, apparently as a separate volume); inscribed with former College shelfmarks '5.6.B.5.1' and 'Arch:B:51' (fol. 1r): since all these shelfmarks are not on a flyleaf/pastedown, as is more common, it is likely that the book had no binding when presented to the College (cf. MS. 202), and that it was not bound until the 18th century - this would also help account for the damage to the first 14 leaves which must have occurred after the book arrived at the College; inscribed 'R. 10.', 'S. 10' (upper pastedown, both crossed through; cf. spine label); and in pencil '314' on the College bookplate (and fols. i verso, ii verso); the front pastedown also inscibed in pencil 'This M.S. was collated by Dr. Blas (sic) of Berlin during the summer of 1870 and returned December of the same year. | [signed:] H.D.B. | [and by:] A.H.S.'.
James, Ecloga, p. 52, no. 3
Bernard, CLM, p. 30 no. 944 (MS. 20)
Coxe, Catalogus, p. 75.
Paul Oskar Kristeller, et al., Catalogus translationum et commentariorum: mediaeval and renaissance Latin translations and commentaries: annotated lists and guides (Washington, D.C., 1960-92), III, pp. 359, 364.
