BOOKS AND LIBRARIES.

It is difficult to realise the external conditions under which the friars produced their works. At the end of the thirteenth and in the early part of the fourteenth century—the period of their greatest literary activity—privacy must have been almost unknown. Only ministers and lectors at the Universities were allowed to have a separate chamber or compartment shut off from the dormitory[371]. But there can be little doubt that, from Wiclif’s time onwards[372], each Doctor of Divinity had his chamber; and every student had some place allotted to him, in which stood a studium, or combined desk and book-case[373]. Every student friar had books set apart for his especial use[374]; these books were obtained by gift or bequest[375], by purchase[376] or by assignation by the Provincial[377] or Warden[378], or they had been copied out by the friar himself[379]. Alexander IV expressly declared that they were not the private property of the individual friars[380]; on the death of the friar who had had the use of them, they reverted to the convent, or were distributed to others ‘by the Warden with the consent of the convent and licence of the minister[381].’

There is no reason to suppose that the friars had a chamber specially set apart as a scriptorium; they were comparatively free from the legal routine or ‘office-work’ which the administration of their vast estates imposed on the monks and their clerks. But the transcription of manuscripts was part of the regular work of the Oxford Franciscans; and it is indeed the only kind of manual labour expressly mentioned in connexion with the convent. Roger Bacon’s statement[382] that he could only get a fair copy of his works made for the Pope by writers unconnected with his Order, means merely that there were no professional scribes among the Minorites of Paris. The vellum which Adam Marsh asked the Custodian of Cambridge to send at his earliest convenience[383], may have been intended for original compositions of the friars, but it was probably to be used for a careful fair copy of some work—perhaps a Missal or a book of the Bible. Several manuscripts, containing the works of Nicholas Gorham, are still extant, which Friar William of Nottingham copied at Oxford with ‘tedious solicitude’ and ‘laborious diligence,’ at the expense of his brother, Sir Hugh of Nottingham[384].

It was naturally in the libraries that most of the literary treasures were stored. In the fifteenth century there were two libraries in the Franciscan convent at Oxford, the library of the convent and the library of the student friars[385]. There is no evidence that either was founded by Grostete[386]. The convent probably received its first considerable collection of books from Adam Marsh, to whom his uncle, Richard Marsh, Bishop of Durham, bequeathed his library in 1226[387]. The next book we hear of at the Grey Friars is the volume of Decretals purchased by Agnellus[388]—doubtless the Decretum of Gratian with the additions codified by Raymund of Pennaforte and approved by Gregory IX in 1230. In 1253, Grostete,

From a rather obscure passage in one of Adam’s letters[390], this would appear to mean all Grostete’s writings ‘both original and translated,’ not all the books which he possessed: on the other hand, a copy of St. Augustine’s De Civitate Dei is extant which the friars received from Grostete[391]. These works of Lincolniensis were in the library in the middle of the fifteenth century, when Dr. Thomas Gascoigne was allowed to consult them[392]. He mentions particularly having seen a complete copy of Grostete’s letters[393], his autograph gloss or exposition on the Epistles of St. Paul[394], two copies (one of them autograph) of his commentary on the Psalter[395], a treatise against luxury[396], and another super textum[397], both written by his own hand. Boston of Bury notices his translation of the Testamenta XII Patriarcharum in the same place. Friar Thomas Netter of Walden refers to a book De Studio by Grostete, with autograph notes by the author, which he had seen in the Minorite convent[398]; and Wadding mentions two more treatises, or rather sermons, which Grostete gave to the friars—one De Laude Paupertatis, the other De Scala Paupertatis[399]. Probably all these were in the library of the convent[400]. Another relic of Grostete preserved there was his ‘episcopal sandals made of rushes[401].’

The statement that all Roger Bacon’s works were in these libraries rests on the authority of John Twyne[402], but it is not probable that his writings were ever collected in one place. No doubt the works of the scholastic philosophers, and chiefly of the Franciscan schoolmen[403], formed the bulk of the library; which also contained a bibliographical compilation of considerable value, namely the Catalogus illustrium Franciscanorum, of which Leland often makes use[404]. St. Jerome’s ‘Catalogue of Illustrious Men,’ was there bound up with ‘many other good books[405],’ his commentaries on Isaiah and Ezechiel[406], a book called Speculum Laicorum[407], and a few Hebrew and even Greek manuscripts[408].

Few only of the MSS. seem to have been preserved; very few at any rate can be identified[409]. Caius College possesses two of them, a copy of the Gospels in Greek and a Psalter in Greek[410]. The volume (already referred to) containing St. Augustine’s De Civitate Dei, with Grostete’s annotations, is now in the Bodleian[411]. A thirteenth-century MS. of some of Grostete’s lesser works, with St. Augustine’s De Concordia quatuor Evangeliorum, given to Lincoln College by Gascoigne, was perhaps obtained by him from the Franciscan library[412]. The copy of Jerome’s ‘Catalogue of Illustrious Men,’ which Gascoigne saw in this library, appears to be extant among the MSS. in Lambeth Palace[413]. It may be reasonably conjectured that the single copy of Adam Marsh’s letters[414], and some or all of the treatises bound up in Phillipps MS. 3119[415], were also kept, or at any rate written, in the Oxford convent. The following interesting notes occur in a Digby manuscript in the Bodleian[416]:—

Sometimes, if we may believe their accusers, the Friars obtained books by less creditable means than gift, bequest, or purchase. In 1330[417] the Sheriff of Oxfordshire received a writ from the King instructing him

failing this the said friars shall be summoned to appear before the King’s justices at Westminster. The Sheriff forwarded this writ to the Mayor, but the latter declared that the friars were not subject to his jurisdiction, ‘and therefore nothing was done in the matter[418].’

The friars had on all sides the reputation of being great collectors of books. Richard Fitzralph, the famous Archbishop of Armagh, was fond of exaggeration[419], and no one will accept without considerable modifications his statement, made before the Pope in 1257[420], that the friars have grown so numerous and wealthy,

Some rectors of churches, whom the Archbishop had sent to the Universities, had even been obliged to return home owing to the impossibility of getting Bibles and other theological books. Perhaps these rectors were not filled with a passionate desire to learn. In 1373 the University passed a statute against the excessive number of unauthorized booksellers in Oxford[421].

Richard of Bury mentions the great help he received from Dominicans and Franciscans in collecting his books[422], and bears testimony to the magnificence of the libraries of the Mendicants which he visited:

But Richard of Bury notices a tendency among the ‘religious’ to subordinate the love of books to

and the tendency became much stronger after his time. The almost[425] total absence of books in the bequests to the Oxford Franciscans in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries is the more striking because of the frequency of such bequests to colleges. It is said that the Minorites sold many of their books to Dr. Thomas Gascoigne[426]. Certain it is that in the latter days they parted with them, just as ‘forcyd by necessitie,’ they parted with their jewels and plate[427]. The exclusion of the Mendicant Friars from the use of the University Library by the statutes of 1412[428], cannot have been any real hardship to the Franciscans so long as their own library was intact. In the sixteenth century however this was no longer the case, and we accordingly find some instances of Franciscans supplicating for admission to the library of the University[429]. The earliest instance is in 1507; but, as the registers from 1463 to 1505 are lost, it would of course be ridiculous to attempt to draw from this fact any inference as to the date of the dispersion of the books of the Minorites. Leland visited the Friary shortly before the Dissolution, and we have from his pen the last description of the once famous library[430]:—