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The Cotton or Cottonian library was the library compiled by Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (1571–1631), an antiquarian and bibliophile. Cotton's library included his collection of books, manuscripts, coins and medallions in his personal estate. The materials comprised the books and artifacts stolen after the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII. Consequently, his collection is the single greatest known resource of literature in Old English and Middle English. Several well known works such as Beowulf, the poem Pearl, and the Lindisfarne Gospels exist today because of Cotton's library.
The leading scholars of the era, including Francis Bacon, Walter Raleigh, and James Ussher, came to use Cotton's works. Richard James acted as his librarian.1 Upon the foundation of the Bodleian Library, he made a substantial contribution.
The Cotton library is now part of the British Library.
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The Ashburnam House fire
Cotton's grandson, Sir John Cotton, gave the rest of the library to the nation of Great Britain. The library went first to Essex House, the Strand and then to Ashburnham House, Westminster. On 23 October 1731, there was a fire in Ashburnam House, and many manuscripts were lost, while others were badly singed (about a quarter of the collection was either destroyed or damaged). The librarian, Dr. Bentley, escaped the inferno clutching the Codex Alexandrinus under his arms, a scene witnessed and later described in a letter to Charlotte, Lady Sundon, by Robert Friend of Westminster School. Fortunately, copies had been made of some, but by no means all, of those works that were lost.
Classification
Robert Cotton had organized his library according to the corner and shelf of a book. He had busts of various Caesars in his library, and his scheme worked by Caesar-Shelf letter-Volume number from end. Thus, the two most famous of the manuscripts from the Cotton library are "Cotton Vitellius A.xv" and "Cotton Nero A.x." In Cotton's own day, that meant "Go to the bust of Vitellius, top shelf (A), and count fifteen over," for the Liber Monstrorum of the Beowulf manuscript, or "Go to the bust of Nero, top shelf, tenth book" for the manuscript containing all the works of the Pearl Poet. In the British Library, these two priceless books are still catalogued by these call numbers.
Selected Manuscripts
For a full list of manuscripts see List of manuscripts in the Cotton library.
Notable manuscripts:
- Augustus
- ii.106 Magna Carta: Exemplification of 1215
- Caligula
- A.ii "A Pistil of Susan" (frag.) (probably by Huchoun)
- A.xv Easter Table Chronicle
- Claudius
- B.vi Cotton Genesis (fragmentary)
- Cleopatra
- A.ii Life of St Modwenna
- Domitian
- A.viii: Bilingual Canterbury Epitome (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle F)
- A.ix fragment of the Bilingual Canterbury Epitome (ASC H), futhorc row
- Faustina
- A.x Additional Glosses to the Glossary in Ælfric's Grammar
- Galba
- A.xviii Athelstan Psalter
- Julius
- A.x Old English Martyrology
- E.vii Ælfric's Lives of Saints
- Nero
- Otho
- A.xii Battle of Maldon (destroyed in 1731)
- B.x Mary of Egypt (fragmentary)
- B.x.165 Anglo-Saxon rune poem (destroyed in 1731)
- B.xi.2 fragment of the Parker Chronicle (the Winchester Chronicle)
- C.i Ælfric's De creatore et creatura
- C.v Otho-Corpus Gospels (fragmentary)
- Tiberius
- A.vi Abingdon Chronicle I (ASC B)
- A.xiii Worcester cartularies
- B.i Abingdon Chronicle II (ASC C)
- B.iv Worcester Chronicle (ASC D)
- B.v Labour of the Months
- C.ii Bede, Ecclesiastical History
- Titus
- D.xxvi Ælfwine's Prayerbook
- Vespasian
- A.i Vespasian Psalter
- D.xiv Ælfric's De duodecim abusivis
- Vitellius
Literature
- Colin G. C. Tite, The Manuscript Library of Sir Robert Cotton, Panizzi Lectures 1993, London (1994).
- Christopher J. Wright (ed.), Sir Robert Cotton as Collector, London (1997).
References
- ^ John Aikin. The Lives of John Selden, Esq., and Archbishop Usher; With Notices of the Principal English Men of Letters with Whom They Were Connected. 1812. p. 375.
External links
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- This page was last modified on 23 December 2008, at 12:35.
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