IDENTIFIERS ----------- id: 178883 accession number: MS Charles Fairfax Murray 16 DATE AUDIT ---------- created: Saturday 6 August 2011 updated: Thursday 20 May 2021 DESCRIPTIVE DATA ---------------- object type: PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Parchment, 124 fols., 250 x 180 mm (175 x 127 mm), 31-32 long lines, ruled in faint brown ink, catchwords, quire and leaf signatures. BINDING: Sixteenth century, limp vellum, sewn on three supports, two pairs of leather ties, the pastedowns are fragments from a fifteenth-century Italian liturgical manuscript, with part of its colophon showing in reverse inside the upper cover, [F]inito libro refferamus gratias Christo. Amen. CONTENTS: fols. 1r-3r Prologue, rubric Qui si comincia el libro (crossed out) prologho del libro di sidracho lo strolagho lo qual parla di tucte le cose che al uomo bisognano, inc. La providença di dio lo padre tucto possente; fols. 3r-114r Il libro di Sidrach, rubric Qui si comincia lo libro del savio sidracho per lo consiglio del quale el re botusso hedifico la sua torre, inc. Uno re era alleuante lo qual era signor; fols. 114r-122v Table of questions 1-551 (some questions omitted, others listed in table, but not found in main text); fol. 122v Colophon with puzzle suggesting that the scribe’s name was Pietro Pico: Explicit liber sidrach’ astrologi, una cum capitulis suis, Scriptor sum talis mea mostrat litera quails Nomen a primevo ecclexie clavigero sumpsi Cognomen vero a quadam bicolore ave E qua carmen istud magistrale datur Nigrior una pisce, pars altera candida pice fol. 123r-v Continuation of table with questions 447-476 and 512-538 written out of order, and questions 447-448 listed twice; fol. 124r-v Additional questions 179, 186, 194, unnumbered one, and 202, with rubric Questi sono alguni errori (they correspond to questions 178, 185, 195, 194 and 200 in the table, but are not found in the main text). DECORATION: Historiated initial in pink on gold and blue ground with spraywork and floral extensions: [L, 7 ll.] Half-length author portrait. Three unframed ink drawings coloured in green, blue, red, pink and mosaic gold, and inset within the text block: fol. 3v [17 ll.] Building the tower of King Boctus; fol. 4v [15 ll.] King Boctus and a counsellor observe as soldiers imprison an astrologer; fol. 8v [14 ll.] King Boctus and his courtiers observe as Sydrach destroys two idols on an altar. ORNAMENTATION: Alternate blue and red penwork initials [2-3 ll.] for questions; calligraphic extensions to the ascenders and descenders of letters in upper and lower margins. title: other NOTES ----- type: history note value: William Morris (1834-1896), his bookplate inside upper cover; purchased with the rest of Morris’s library by Richard Bennett of Pendleton, near Manchester; sold by him at Sotheby’s, London, 5-10 Dec. 1898, lot 1076; purchased by Charles Fairfax Murray (1849–1919); his gift, 1905. LICENSING --------- text license status: CC0 image license status: CC-BY-NC-SA OWNERSHIP --------- instutition: The Fitzwilliam Museum department: Manuscripts and Printed Books collection: Charles Fairfax Murray STABLE URL ---------- url: https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/178883 PEOPLE ------------------- Murray, Charles Fairfax Bennett, Richard Morris, William TECHNIQUES ---------- penwork TECHNIQUES ---------- illumination CATEGORIES ------ category: illuminated manuscript category: manuscript DATING ------ creation date: 1425 - 1450 creation date earliest: 1425 creation date latest: 1450 culture: 15th Century, second quarter# CREATORS -------- maker: Pico, Pietro EXHIBITIONS HISTORY ------------------- title: Splendours of Italian Illumination: Romanesque - Gothic - Renaissance CITATIONS -------- A Catalogue of Western Book Illumination in the Fitzwilliam Museum and the Cambridge Colleges. Part Two. Vols. 1-2: Italy and the Iberian Peninsula A descriptive catalogue of the additional illuminated manuscripts in the Fitzwilliam Museum ---