The special session dedicated to manuscripts and manuscript fragments will feature several events spread across the first and second day of the conference.

DAY 1 (11.04) – University of Warsaw Library, Dobra 55, room 316, 3 floor)

  • Guest Lecture by M. Jane Toswell (University of Western Ontario, Canada) The layouts of vernacular psalters in early medieval England
  • Presentation of the N-Psalter research project: fragments from an Old English psalter in Bibliotheca Meienreisiana (Elbląg) – Monika Opalińska (University of Warsaw) – read more about the project
  • A display of exhibits related to the project, along with artefacts from the University of Warsaw Library (co-organized with the University of Warsaw Library)

DAY 2 (12.04) – Faculty of Modern Languages, Dobra 55, room 0.110 (Co-Working Zone), ground floor

  • Workshop: Barbara Wagner and Anna Wojtyś (University of Warsaw) Mediaeval scientific illustrations: Geoffrey Chaucer’s A Treatise on the Astrolabe

Day 1: Special Guest Lecture

M. JANE TOSWELL

University of Western Ontario, Canada

The layouts of vernacular psalters in early medieval England

A major feature of the N-Psalter as it continues to emerge from newly-disassembled books from about the year 1600 is the spaciousness of its layout. The Latin of the psalter is very large, and the gloss in Old English might be an opportunistic one (not lined for in the manuscript) but it is similarly expansive. This paper will compare this remarkably expansive layout with the layout of some other eleventh-century psalters from England with vernacular glosses, notably the Vitellius Psalter and the Stowe Psalter. Some consideration will be given to the content, but the principal concern is the mise-en-page and the choices the scribe and compiler made to highlight these texts critical to the Christianity of every individual using the manuscript. Some manuscript layouts are clearly intended for scholars who want to think through various options for translation and for nuances of meaning (notably the Lambeth Psalter), while others prioritize the Old English for reasons that still remain a bit opaque today (the Cambridge Psalter). The question of layout also connects to issues of style and elegance; several scholars have pointed to royal and secular connections for some psalters. T.A. Heslop famously suggested that Canute gave splendid gospel-books, and perhaps also psalters, as gifts to fellow monarchs (following the example of Charlemagne). E.G. Stanley believed firmly that the Paris Psalter, a bilingual psalter in two columns with both prose and poetic versions, was an homage to the commissioning noble’s ancestor King Alfred (who had perhaps translated the prose material: see Gameson for a wideranging analysis of these questions). Rebecca Rushforth points to entries in the Bury Psalter which commemorate the family of Edward the Exile, and Daphne Stroud suggests that the Salisbury Psalter was done for noblewomen as well. And, of course, to come full circle, various scholars have tied the N-Psalter to Gunnildis (Gunhild), the sister of Harold Godwin who fled to Flanders with her mother after the Norman Conquest of England.

Day 2: Workshop

Barbara Wagner and Anna Wojtyś

University of Warsaw

Mediaeval scientific illustrations: Geoffrey Chaucer’s A Treatise on the Astrolabe

Chaucer’s A Treatise on the Astrolabe was planned as a manual on the structure and uses of one of the most important mediaeval astronomic instruments. Of the surviving manuscripts, eight contain a number of illustrations of various completeness, which show the author’s idea of having each chapter illustrated with a diagram. Across the manuscripts, the diagrams differ both as regards their content and execution revealing a different degree of expertise of their creators.

The workshop will use the diagrams from A Treatise on the Astrolabe as a basis for a discussion on the design and rendition of mediaeval scientific illustrations. The participants will have an opportunity to discover the differences between the diagrams found in various manuscripts, the planning of a layout of the illustrated pages, as well as the tools needed at a different stages of the drawing process. The second part of the workshop will focus on practical exercises, such as copying diagrams from Chaucer’s texts as well as drawing them based on the treatise’s instructions. Participants will also prepare their won iron-gall ink for the illustrations.