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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
One of the apparent pillars of consistency in the medieval Latin liturgy is the divine, alias daily, office. Although scholars convincingly postulate forms of the office that both antedate the specific provisions for it which bulk large in the Rule of Benedict and reflect an urban secular (the so-called cathedral office) rather than a monastic context, in terms of actual books out of which the office was performed, not a great deal survives until roughly the eleventh century. By that time, if not before, thought is clearly being given as to how to present the contents of the office - given that much of it consists in the recitation of psalms - in a way that, while clear, minimizes repetition. This can most readily be done in the long stretch of the weeks after Pentecost and the shorter stretch (sometimes very short indeed, depending on when Easter falls) of the weeks between the octave of Epiphany and the beginning of Lent or pre-Lent (that is, from Septuagesima on). Although the structure of the office in this, to use the current phrase, ‘ordinary time’, remains the same as in the more exciting seasons of Advent, Christmastide, Lent, and Eastertide (plus, of course, the individual feasts of the Proper of Saints), the content of the various services is not driven by a particular time or saint, and so there is a somewhat abstract quality about it quite lacking from the great seasons and occasions of the liturgical year.
1 Laid out succinctly in Andrew Hughes, Medieval Manuscripts for Mass and Office: a Guide to their Organization and Terminology (Toronto, 1982), no. 835.
2 Procter, F. and Wordsworth, C., eds, Breviarium ad usum … Sarum, 3 vols (Cambridge, 1879-86)Google Scholar; Lawlcy, S. W., ed., Breviarium ad usum…. Eboracensis, 2 vols, SS, 71, 75 (1880-2)Google Scholar; Frere, W. H. and Brown, L. E. G., eds, The Hereford Breviary, 3 vols, HBS, 26, 40, 46 (1904-15)Google Scholar; Tolhurst, J. B. L., ed., The Monastic Breviary of Hyde Abbey, Winchester, 6 vols, HBS, 69–71, 76, 78, 80 (1932-42)Google Scholar.
3 Ansclm Hughes, ed., The Portiforium of Saint Wulstan, 2 vols, HBS, 89-90 (1958-60).
4 E. S. Dewick and W. H. Frere, eds, The Leofric Collectar (Harl. MS 2961), 2 vols, HBS, 45, 56 (1914-21); vol. 1 carries the subtitle, with an Appendix Containing a Litany and Prayers from Had. MS 863.
5 Andrew G. Watson, A Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts, c.700-1600, in the Department of Manuscripts, the British Library, 2 vols (London, 1979), no. 638.
6 Bede, Homiliae in Evangelia, II. 14, in Bedae venerabilis Opera: Pars III, Opera homiletica; Pars IV, Opera rhythmica, ed. D. Hurst, CChr. SL, 122 (Turnhout, 1955), pp. 95-6.
7 PL 80, col. 731; based on Gregory, Moralia in lob XII.33.
8 Robinson, Pamela R., Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts, c.737-1600, in Cambridge Libraries, 2 vols (Woodbridge, 1988), no. 157 Google Scholar.
9 Otic quire, almost certainly of eight leaves, is lost after p. 580, so the original book would have been even bulkier than it is now.
10 Bede, Homiliae in Evangelia, II.16; Hurst, Bedae Opera, pp. 290-3.
11 The modern editor, Ansclm Hughes (Portiforium, 2, II.48), suggests that an inset page might be missing before this office begins; it would presumably have contained further antiphons and the monastic canticles for ordinary Sundays. If it was an inset page it would not figure in the collations of M. R. James (A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 2 vols [Cambridge, 1909-12], 2, p. 242) or W. H. Frere [The Leofric Collector, 2, p. xviii). The present argument is not materially affected either way.
12 This seems to be a composite from Augustine, De trinitate DCi and Sermo 52: respectively, Sancti Aureli Augustini, De trinitate, libri XV (libri I-XII), ed. W. J. Mountain, CChr. SL, 50 (Turnhout, 1968), and P. Verbraken, ‘Le sermon III de saint Augustin sur la Trinité et l’analogie des facultés de l’âme’, Revue Bénédictine, 74 (1964), pp. 9-35 at 21.
13 Bede, Homiliae in Evangelia, 1.8; Hurst, Bedae Opera, pp. 52-9.
14 Ker, N. R., Medieval Manuscripts in British Libraries, I: London (Oxford, 1969), pp. 240–1 Google Scholar.
15 In my Liturgical Calendars, Saints, and Services in Medieval England (Aldcrshot, 1998).
16 The strongest influence discernible on the calendar is that of Worcester, as seen especially in the two feasts for Oswald; there is also the joint translation feast of Nicholas and Andrew on 9 May, which seems, for reasons I do not understand, to be characteristic of the diocese of Worcester. That Wulstan, canonized in 1203, is absent from the calendar, seems to yield that year as terminus ad quern; but Becket, canonized 1173, is present, in the original hand.
17 Wisd. 1.6-7, Ecclus. 5.1-2, and Ecclus. 7.31-3; the first is the same as the single lesson for Saturday in the Wulstan book.
18 I have not been able to identify this commentary, cither from the electronic resources of CETEDOC and the Patrologia Latina Database or from knowledgeable friends (the late Margaret Gibson, Philip Pulsiano, Joseph Wittig). I am especially grateful to Gill Cannell of the Parker Library, Corpus Christi College, and J. Joseph Wisdom of St Paul’s Cathedral Library for repeated access to the MSS in their care.
19 Thomson, R. M., Manuscripts from St Albans Abbey, 2 vols (Woodbridge, 1982), no. 25 Google Scholar and passim.
20 Warner, G. F. and Gilson, J. P., Calendar of Western Manuscripts in the Old Royal and King’s Collections, 4. vols (London, 1921), 1, pp. 29–30 Google Scholar.
