Miscellany and Tristan Romance (BL Add. MS 11619)

Tristan in the bath, f. 6v.

Colloquial name(s): Part 1: Miscellany; Part 2: drawings illustrating the Tristan romance
Official name(s): British Library Additional MS 11619

Date: Part 1: 2nd half of 13th C or 1st quarter of 14th C; Part 2: 2nd or 3rd quarter of 13th C
Origin: Part 1: England or France; Part 2: London (?), S.E. (?) England

Online facsimile available via: British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts


This manuscript consists of two distinct parts. The first part contains various miscellaneous items, namely:

• Miscellany of didactic and religious texts and Alan of Lille's Summa predicatoria (ff. 10r-73r).
• Twenty-one sermons (ff. 74r-106v).
• A digest of Isadore's Sententiarum liber (ff. 107r-134v).
• Various texts on the Seven Deadly Sins (ff. 159v-186v).
• Aesop's Fables in quatrains, based on the Romulus (ff. 189r-210r).

This part also contains several large puzzle initials, several large initials and several small initials in blue and/or red.

Part 2 consists of a series of full-page ink drawings illustrating the Tristan romance, some of which are washed in green, red and/or blue.

The binding is pre-1600, suggesting the two parts were brought together before this date.