10 < THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME viii: 1933-34 THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME VIII: 1933-34 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1934 Sold at THE BRITISH MUSEUM and by BERNARD QUARITCH ri Grafton Street London fV.i. HUMPHREY MILFORD Oxford University Press London E.C.\. KEGAN PAUL, TRUBNER & Co. Ltd. 38 Great Russell Street London W.C.i. PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, OXFORD BY JOHN JOHNSON, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY CONTENTS DEPARTMENT OF BRITISH AND MEDIEVAL ANTIQUITIES The Garraway Rice Bequest of Prehistoric Objects The Cesena Treasure . Ornaments of Keszthely Type A Pendant with Byzantine Coin An Early British Spoon Examples of Mesolithic Art . DEPARTMENT OF COINS AND MEDALS Roman Gold Coins ...... Coins of Thessaly ...... Medieval Muhammadan Coins .... The Fletcher Collection of Irish Tokens A New Kushan Coin ...... Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection Two Rare Greek Coins ..... Greek and Roman Coins . . A Rare Italian Medal DEPARTMENT OF EGYPTIAN AND ASSYRIAN ANTIQUITIES An Early Painted Vase from Khafaji Sumerian and Babylonian Antiquities Granite Ram from the Sudan A Hieratic Papyrus ..... Two Head-rests and other Egyptian Antiquities Three Antiquities from Syria DEPARTMENT OF GREEK AND ROMAN ANTIQUITIES Two Italic Girdles ........ A Cycladic Idol ......... Geometric Bronzes from Potidaea ...... A New Corinthian Aryballos ...... PAGE 44 45 46 47 74 144 48 49 50 51 73 ^55 156 38 41 43 73 105 141 72 108 108 109 An Archaic Greek Gem The Elgin Athena . ' . Mycenaean and Greek Gems Early Greek Bronzes . A Cameo Portrait of a Roman General DEPARTMENT OF MANUSCRIPTS Three Manuscripts from the Chester Beatty Collection A Register of Deeds from Shaftesbury Abbey Two New Liturgical Manuscripts . Simpson Documents On an Answer to the Articles of the Rebels Devonshire .... The Garraway Rice Genealogical Collections A Dering Manuscript . The Skinner Manuscripts The Keene Papers Papers of the late F. G. Edwards . An Autograph of Borodin The Lithuanian New Testament . The Muchelney Breviary Townshend Papers A 'Private View' of the Museum in 1756 Nelson's Log-Book The George Smith Memorial Bequest The Codex Sinaiticus An Early MS. of Greek Canon Law Seals of Evesham Abbey The Whalley Chartulary A Religious Tract of Charles II Letters of Talleyrand . The Coventry Mysteries The Papers of Richard Cobden Two Leaves from the Book of 'the Monk of Hyeres' Laurence Nowell and a recovered Anglo-Saxon Poem A Collection of Autographs and Charters A Letter in Slavonic .... vi of Cornwall and 109 no 142 143 143 17 18 22 23 24 26 27 28 30 31 32 54 76 77 78 79 89 92 93 94 95 97 98 100 128 130 132 A Katharine Adams Binding ...... New Letters of John Wesley ...... Charles Dickens's Letters to his Wife ..... DEPARTMENT OF ORIENTAL ART AND ANTIQUITIES AND OF ETHNOGRAPHY ORIENTAL ANTIQUITIES, ETC. A Chinese Painting Two Indian Paintings . A Sculpture from Indo-China Hangchow Potsherds . Ceramic Documents from Honan A Nepalese Painting of the early Sixteenth Century A Woodcut by Okumura Masanobu A Han Pottery Group ..... A T'ang Bronze Mirror .... A Persian Pottery Box .... A Seventh-Century Chinese Painting English Glass ...... A Persian Pottery Jug ..... Inlaid Bronzes of the Han Dynasty A Glass Pall from Chin-ts'un An Early Mughal Illuminated Page SUB-DEPARTMENT OF ETHNOGRAPHY English Ewer and Punch-Bowl from Ashanti . Bequest of the late Dame Clarissa Reid, D.B.E. A Wooden Figurine from Easter Island The 'Charles Beving' Collection of Textiles An Ethnographical Series from the Sudan Carved Shields and Spears from Dutch New Guinea 134 137 7 8 9 10 70 71 72 III 113 113 113 145 146 146 148 149 52 75 114 152 ^53 DEPARTMENT OF ORIENTAL PRINTED BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS Two illustrated Assamese Manuscripts . . . . . 10 A Tibetan Collection of Books and Manuscripts . . . 12 An illustrated Divan of 'Khata'i* 13 vii A Collection of Chinese Printed Books . A Unique Manuscript of the Amali of Ibn al-Shajari A Manuscript of Works of Kasim ul-Anvar . Some Hindustani Poems ..... Two Persian Manuscripts ..... Some Oriental Manuscripts ..... DEPARTMENT OF PRINTED BOOKS An Early Printed Book of Hours for Sarum Use An Early Latin Comedy written in London Three Early Printed Spanish Books Two Tracts in Verse by William Samuel A News-Sheet of 162 1 . Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress . Early English and Welsh Schoolbooks . A Cobden-Sanderson Binding A Tract by St Augustine A Spanish Writing-Book Three Sixteenth-Century English Pamphlets Three Cologne Aristotle Incunabula Three Early Printed English Books An Irish Library .... English Bookbindings .... DEPARTMENT OF PRINTS AND DRAWINGS A Drawing by Rubens ...... An Etching and a Drawing by Antoine Watteau An Undescribed Florentine Engraving of the Fifteenth Century Prints acquired at the Boerner Sale, Leipzig, May 1933 Etchings by Seymour Haden Drawings by Walter Crane . Theatrical Designs by Charles Ricketts, The Turner Bequest Blake's Songs of Innocence A Dutch Drawing of the first half of the A Drawing by Gentile Bellini A Sheet of Studies by Jacopo Pontormo viii R.A. Sixteenth Century Drawings from the Selwyn Image Collection A Drawing by Philippe Mercier . Sporting Prints and Drawings Prints acquired at the Boerner Sale, Nov. 1933 Drawing by Jacopo Ripanda . Drawing by John Crome The Elgin Marbles in an Idealized Setting Engraving after Andrea Mantegna Contemporary Prints and Drawings 67 68 69 103 104 139 140 140 141 OTHER GIFTS IN ALL DEPARTMENTS 53, 83, 88 (erratum), 119, 155 EXHIBITIONS English Art . . . . . . . . .125 Arpachiyah Expedition . . . . . . .167 Drawings by George du Maurier . . . . . .168 Prehistoric Antiquities . . . . . . . .168 MISCELLANEA Infra-red Photographs of Illegible Leather Manuscripts . . 52 The Department of Oriental Antiquities and of Ethnography . 60 A Catalogue of Bronze Age Metal Objects . . . .123 Supply of Casts . . . . . . . . .162 Loan Series of Drawings and Water-Colours from the Turner Bequest . . . . . . . . . .162 RECENT PUBLICATIONS Facsimile of Lexicon of al-Kali . . . . . . 58 General Catalogue of Printed Books, New edition. Vol. V . . 59 » » ,, » » Vol. VI. . *87 „ „ „ „ „ „ Vol. VII . .165 Catalogue of Greek, Etruscan, and Roman Paintings and Mosaics 59 Guide to Processes and Schools of Engraving . . . . 87 Subject Index of Modern Books, 1925—30 .... 123 The Book of the Dead . . . . . . . .124 The Mount Sinai Manuscript of the Bible . . . .163 ix The Royal Cemetery at Ur . Facsimile of MS. of Zu '1-Fakar ShirwanI Woodcuts of the Fifteenth Century The Assyrian Sculptures .... Guide to the Department of Coins and Medals Reproductions and Postcards 164 165 166 166 166 59, 87, 125, 163 APPOINTMENTS 61, 88, 169 PLATES I. Drawing by Rubens II. Drawing by Antoine Watteau III. Florentine Engraving . IV. Engraving by HW V. Indo-Chinese Sculpture VI. Scenes from the Life of King Sib Singh of Assam ..... VII. Scenes from the Life of King Sib Singh of Assam. .... VIII. Sumerian Vase from Khafaji . IX. Antiquities from 'Iraq . X. Babylonian Terracotta Plaques XI. Granite Ram from the Sudan . XII. Garraway Rice Bequest . XIII. Cesena Treasure .... XIV. Keszthely Ornaments . . XV a. Byzantine Coin-Pendant b. Roman Gold Coins XVI. Coins of Thessaly XVII. English Ewer and Punch-Bowl from Ashanti ..... XVIII. Infra-red photography of illegible Manu scripts ..... XIX. Drawing of the early Dutch School XX. Drawing by Gentile Bellini . XXI. Drawing by Jacopo Pontormo XXII. Drawing by Philippe Mercier XXIII. Coloured Etching by Thomas Rowlandson XXIV. Details from Nepalese Painting XXV ^,^. Italic Girdles . . . ' . c. Gold Coin of Wima Kadphises ( i^) . Frontispiece To J ace page 2 3 » 4 9 lO II 39 40 41 42 5J 43 44 45 46 46 » 47 » 52 Frontispiece to no, 2 To face page 64 65 68 69 72 73 73 xi XXVI. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. XXXIII. XXXIV. XXXV a-e, XXXVI. XXXVII a. h. XXXVIII. XXXIX. XL. XLI. XLII. XLIII. XLIV. XLV. XLVI. XLVII. XLVIII. XLIX. xii Early British Bronze Spoon . Peruvian Gold Beaker . Page from Nelson's Log-Book (reduced) The Codex Sinaiticus. Luke xix. 1 3-xx. 34 The Codex Sinaiticus. Luke xxii. 36-52 Engraving by Benedetto Montagna Drawing by Jacopo Ripanda . . Egyptian Limestone Head-rest Egyptian Limestone Head-rest Geometric Bronzes. /. Archaic Greek Gem. g. Corinthian Oil-bottle . The Elgin Athena T'ang Bronze Mirror . Han Pottery Group A Seventh-Century Chinese Painting Wooden Figure from Easter Island Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection Miniature from the Book of 'the Monk of To face page 74 IS 78 Frontispiece to no. 3 To face page 90 „ 104 „ 105 106 107 108 109 112 112 113 114 116 Hy^res' . Drawing by John Crome Frontispiece to no. 4 To face page 139 The Elgin Marbles in an Idealized Setting Mycenaean and Greek Gems. Syrian Seals. Roman Cameo. Greek Geometric Bronzes ...... Engraved Deer-antler from Romsey and Ox-bone Implement from the Thames . Inlaid Bronze Finials from Chin-ts'un Glass Tesserae from Chin-ts'un Page from the Ta*rikh-i Alfi . 140 142 144 147 148 150 L. Helmet worn in Funeral Dances, Latuka Tribe. Pottery Vase, Azande Tribe. Pottery Lion, Shilluk Tribe . . To face page i ^2 LI. Carved and Painted Wood shields from Dutch New Guinea .... „ 153 LIL Carved Wood 'Paddle-spears* from Dutch New Guinea ..... „ 154 YAW a. Medal of Francesco de' Girardenghi. h. Greek Coins ..... „ 155 xni CONTENTS An Irish Library ....... English Bookbindings ...... Two Leaves from the Book of 'the Monk of Hyeres Laurence Nowell and a recovered Anglo-Saxon Poem A Collection of Autographs and Charters A Letter in Slavonic .... A Katharine Adams Binding New Letters of John Wesley Charles Dickens's Letters to his Wife Some Oriental Manuscripts . Drawing by John Crome The Elgin Marbles in an Idealized Setting Engraving after Andrea Mantegna Contemporary Prints and Drawings Three Antiquities from Syria Mycenaean and Greek Gems Early Greek Bronzes .... A Cameo Portrait of a Roman General . Examples of Mesolithic Art . English Glass ..... A Persian Pottery Jug .... Inlaid Bronzes of the Han Dynasty A Glass Pall from Chin-ts'un An Early Mughal Illuminated Page The 'Charles Beving' Collection of Textiles An Ethnographical Series from the Sudan Carved Shields and Spears from Dutch New Guinea Two Rare Greek Coins Greek and Roman Coins xiv A Rare Italian Medal 156 Other Gifts . . . . . . . . .157 Supply of Casts . . . . . . . . .162 Loan Series of Drawings and Water-Colours from the Turner Bequest . . . . . . . . . .162 Recent Publications . . . . . . . .163 Exhibitions . . . . . . . . .167 Appointments . . . . . . . . .169 XV PRESENTED ■^ JUL 1934 SCUM l4 SffP 3;^ A/. ^ THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-.voL.viii.NO. i LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1933 THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY FOUR PARTS ARE PUBLISHED ANNUALLY, each dealing with the principal acquisitions of the previous quarter. The descriptions are intended to be not too technical for the layman, and to give the expert part at least of what he needs to know. Notice is also given of the temporary exhibitions periodically installed in the galleries, the results of excavations, and additions to the publications of the Museum. Crown /^tOy averaging 3 2 pages 4- 1 6 pages of plates. Price 2s, td,: 2s, ()d, postjree, I OS, impost jree) jor jour parts. It would help the Trustees if those intend- ing to subscribe would do so for five-year periods at a cost, post free, of ^2 i oj. Cases and title-pages for the annual volumes can be obtained from the Oxford University Press at a charge of 3s. 3d. for case and binding or is. 6d. for case alone (packing and postage in the British Isles included). The price of back parts has been raised to is. td. each as from the issue of Vol. VI, No. i. PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME VIIL NUMBER i. JULY, 1933 >V/ F3 R 1 1 1 S H j 14 SEP 3:, I NATUFvAL I I. DRAWING BY RUBENS THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-.voL.viii. NO. I LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1933 Sold at THE BRITISH MUSEUM and by BERNARD QUARITCH 1 1 Grafton Street London W,\ HUMPHREY MILFORD Oxford University Press London E.C.4. KEGAN PAUL, TRUBNER & Co. Ltd. 38 Great Russell Street London W.C.i PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, OXFORn BY JOHN JOHNSON, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY CONTENTS 1 . A Drawing by Rubens ...... 2. An Etching and a Drawing by Antoine Watteau . 3. An undescribed Florentine Engraving of the Fifteenth Century 4. Prints acquired at the Boerner Sale, Leipzig, May 1933 • 5. Etchings by Seymour Haden ..... 6. Drawings by Walter Crane ..... 7. Theatrical Designs by Charles Ricketts, R.A. 8. The Turner Bequest . . . 9. A Chinese Painting ...... 0. Two Indian Paintings ...... 1 . A Sculpture from Indo-China ..... 2. Hangchow Potsherds ...... 3. Two illustrated Assamese Manuscripts 4. A Tibetan Collection of Books and Manuscripts . 5. An illustrated Divan of 'Khata'i' .... 6. A Collection of Chinese Printed Books 7. A unique Manuscript of the Amali of Ibn al-Shajari 8 . A Manuscript of Works of Kasim ul-Anvar . 9. Three Manuscripts from the Chester Beatty Collection . 20. A Register of Deeds from Shaftesbury Abbey 2 1 . Two new Liturgical Manuscripts .... 22. Simpson Documents ...... 23. On an Answer to the Articles of the Rebels of Cornwall and Devonshire ....... 24. The Garraway Rice Genealogical Collections 25. A Dering Manuscript ...... 26. The Skinner Manuscripts ..... 27. The Keene Papers . ...... 28. Papers of the late F. G. Edwards .... PAGE I I 3 4 5 6 6 6 7 8 9 10 10 12 13 13 15 16 17 18 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 30 29. 30- 31- 32. 33- 34- 3S' 37. 38. 39- 40. 41. 42. 43- 44. 45- 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51- 52. 53. An Autograph of Borodin The Lithuanian New Testament An early Printed Book of Hours for Sarum Use An early Latin Comedy written in London . Three early Printed Spanish Books Two Tracts in verse by William Samuel A News-Sheet of 1 62 1 .... Bunyan's Pilgrints Progress . . . Early English and Welsh Schoolbooks A Cobden-Sanderson Binding . An early Painted Vase from Khafaji . Sumerian and Babylonian Antiquities . Granite Ram from the Sudan . The Garraway Rice Bequest of Prehistoric Objects The Cesena Treasure .... Ornaments of Keszthely type . A Pendant with Byzantine Coin Roman Gold Coins .... Coins of Thessaly . . . Medieval Muhammadan Coins. The Fletcher Collection of Irish Tokens English Ewer and Punch-Bowl from Ashanti Infra-red Photographs of Illegible Leather Manuscripts Corrections . Other Gifts Recent Publications .... The Department of Oriental Antiquities and of Ethnography Appointments ....... VI PLATES I. Drawing by Rubens II. Drawing by Antoine Watteau III. Florentine Engraving IV. Engraving by HW . V. Indo-Chinese Sculpture VI. Scenes from the Life of King Sib Singh of Assam VII VIII. Sumerian Vase from Khafaji IX. Antiquities from 'Iraq X. Babylonian Terracotta Plaques XI. Granite Ram from the Sudan XII. Garraway Rice Bequest XIII. Cesena Treasure XIV. Keszthely Ornaments XV a. Byzantine Coin-Pendant b. Roman Gold Coins . XVI. Coins of Thessaly XVII. English Ewer and Punch-Bowl from Ashanti XVIII. Infra-red photography of illegible Manuscripts Frontispiece To face page 2 35 3 )> 4 J' 9 3) lO 33 II 33 39 3) 40 33 41 33 42 33 43 33 44 33 45 35 46 33 46 53 47 33 52 35 SZ Vll BRITISH MUSEUM 14 SBP 3?. NATURAL HISTORY. I. A DRAWING BY RUBENS. A REMARKABLY fine study in black chalk by Rubens (Frontispiece) was recently acquired from an English private collection. It is a sheet of folio size showing, on one side, the study of a draped female figure, and on the other a series of sketches of an infant. A note on the reverse in Samuel Woodburn^s hand states that 'this drawing was lent by M'" Geddes to Sir T. Lawrence and was returned by him after being stamped', so that Lawrence's mark in the corner is an erroneous indication. The study of the seated figure might have been done in view of a penitent Magdalene, or a Magdalene in a Pieta, such as the picture of 1 6 14 at Vienna, while the sketches on the reverse might equally have served for a Virgin and Child ^ or for some figures in a Bacchanal, But as Rubens was in the habit of making drawings in the studio without definite thought of any particular subject, it is possible that no specific relation to any finished work will be found. A. M. H. 2. AN ETCHING AND A DRAWING BY ANTOINE WATTEAU. THE Department of Prints and Drawings has received a notable accession to its collection of the work of Antoine Watteau in one of his exceedingly rare original etchings, and in a drawing of a type hitherto unrepresented. Watteau is known to have etched in all ten plates, from which a total of only fifteen impressions had hitherto been recorded. The present example is of the plate known under the title Les Habits sont Italiens; it was sold in 1901 in the Defer-Dumesnil Sale (lot 478), and again at Sotheby's, as the property of Lady Harcourt, on 29 March of the present year (lot 38). Only one other impression is known before the plate was reworked by Simoneau I'Ain^, in which state the print is included in Jullienne's (Euvre grave de Watteau (D. & V. 130). This other impression, now in the Bibliotheque Nationale, belonged formerly to the brothers Goncourt, and is described by Edmond in La Maison d'un Artiste as la piece la plus precieuse de ma collection. It is annotated in Mariette's hand peint par Wattaux et gravS a leaujorte par luy mesme, which corroborates the underline appearing on the re-worked state of the print. The subject represented is a group of actors and actresses in the conventional costumes of the Italian comedy; it corresponds with a picture in the collection of Baron Edmond de Rothschild and with the engraving by Boucher entitled La Troupe Italtenne (D. & V. 85). Watteau's etchings are admittedly more in the nature of technical experiments than of works invested with the full measure of his genius. His preference as a draughtsman for soft crumbling chalks as opposed to the more linear vehicle of the pen is well known: tout lui etoit bon excepte la plume ^ writes d'Argenville in his interesting summary of Watteau's technical methods, and the etcher's needle is of course the instrument more nearly akin than any other to the draughtsman's pen. Thus in all Watteau's etchings there is something suggestive of a medium not altogether compatible to him, and this no doubt accounts at once for his reluctance to employ it, the comparative medi- ocrity of his work of this class and of the extreme rarity of impressions. It need hardly be pointed out, however, that in such passages as the hands Watteau's inimitable mastery becomes clearly discernible. The newly acquired drawing (PI. II) is a rapid but fully articu- late sketch in red chalk, representing, like the etching aforesaid, a group of comedians. This was, of course, one of Watteau's favourite subjects, to which he repeatedly turned his attention at different stages of his career; a marked resemblance, however, to the composi- tion of the picture painted for Dr Mead during the artist's sojourn in London and engraved by Baron under the title hes Comediens Italiens makes it possible that there is a direct connexion with this particular work. Two similar sketches, in the Jacquemart-Andr^ Museum at Paris and in the Laughlin (formerly Marius Paulme) Collection, show variants of the same theme and a close analogy in the style of execution. As already mentioned at the outset, the draw- ing is of a type hitherto lacking in the magnificent collection of Watteau's work in the Print Room: the type of composition study, comprising several figures, grouped as they would appear in one of the master's finished pictures. Very few such drawings are known to exist, indeed Count Caylus in his celebrated address on Watteau II. DRAWING BY ANTOINE WATTEAU I BRIT ! S H MoHVOXTRELEGlADRie HOMOKEap'l., M£2TAT0 HERICHE9A ME^APEPsT- ' MOMGIOVA CHOMTKO ALMIOASPIIO V^LERE 2\PV0 CHEV\W01 OGHI CtETTO KoHrE III. FLORENTINE ENGRAVING delivered to the Academy in 1 748 goes as far as to say that they were dispensed with by the artist entirely, haplupart du tems^ says Caylus, la figure qu^il desstnott d^apres le nature I rCavoit aucune destination determinee, . , . Car jamais il n^ a j ait ni esquisse ni pensee pour aucun de ses tableaux^ quelque legeres et quelque peu arretees que f^a pu ^tre. That Caylus, while essentially correct in this assertion, overstated the case, and that the present drawing, and certain others resembling it, are the work of Watteau himself and not merely of one of his many imitators, is beyond all doubt. The fact remains nevertheless that composition studies are of altogether exceptional occurrence in his work, and it is fortunate that a representative example could be added to the Museum collection. K. T. P. 3. AN UNDESCRIBED FLORENTINE ENGRAVING OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. AN engraving of the greatest interest (PI. Ill) found in an JLjl album of miscellaneous prints in an English private collection, and recently submitted to the Museum. It was purchased and pre- sented to the British Museum by the National Art-Collections Fund. It is manifestly Florentine, engraved in the Fine Manner in the style of the so-called 'Otto Prints', of which the Museum possesses the largest number. One cannot regard the 'Otto Prints* as a series, except in so far as most of them came from the collection of an eighteenth-century collector of that name, but under that title have been grouped a variety of decorative pieces of various shapes, chiefly representing subjects of gallantry, engraved about 1465-70. The present example is certainly among the most important of its kind. It is an allegory on love and death, showing a gallant and his mistress with a musician and Death carrying a coffin. The word Sansobrien on the lady's sleeve also occurs on the sleeve of the mounted lady in the early Florentine engraving, 'Encounter oj a Hunting Party with a Family oj Wild Folk, which is only known in Paris. It may be some name from Italian or French Romance, but its source is unknown to me. The four lines of verse in the scroll are somewhat obscure, but their meaning is probably somewhat as follows: Neither graces, nor honours [nor pomp], nor state, nor riches, nor knowledge, [none of these your possessions] will avail against my fierce desire; perchance in you all delight will break. . . . The mutilated word in the first line is evidently pon[/>e]. Mr Arundell Esdaile offers the following version: Not all your favour, honour, pride. State, riches, learning, aught avail That my stern will be set aside; Haply all your delights shall fail. A. M. H. 4. PRINTS ACQUIRED AT THE BOERNER SALE, LEIPZIG, MAY, 1933. A CONSIDER ABLE number of rare and interesting prints were acquired at the recent sale at Leipzig, chiefly from the North- wick collection, and from that of Friedrich August II, Dresden. In the lack of official purchase grant acquisitions were made by ex- change of a Malcolm duplicate, from the H. L. Florence Fund, and by gifts from four friends of the Museum. An attractive and rare line-engraving of the Virgin and Child (dated 1 504) by the Upper German Monogrammist HW, was presented by Mr John Char- rington (PI. IV); a Dutch woodcut of the sixteenth century, the Wise Man and Wise Woman, an allegory, by Cornells Teunissen, was given by Mr Henry Van den Bergh; an interesting series of military prints, signed S. K. and probably illustrating operations of the Imperial Armies in Eastern Europe 159 1-3, was given by Viscount Bearsted; a sixteenth-century French line-engraving, Judith by Jacques Bellange, and an early seventeenth-century Dutch etching, the Gunner and the Peasant Woman by Willem Buytewech, were presented by an anonymous donor. The gifts of Viscount Bearsted and Mr. Van den Bergh were made through the National Art-Collections Fund. A series of 107 line-engravings by Hans Vredeman de Vries, hitherto poorly represented in the Department, largely architectural designs, was purchased out of the H. L. Florence Fund. The following prints were acquired by the Malcolm exchange, and will be considered as a supplement to the Malcolm collection: The Monogrammist FVB, St Peter, Lehrs, 26. A most brilliant impression of this rare fifteenth-century engraver. 4 IV. ENGRAVING BY HW \ BRITISH ' "v^ US FUN/ 14 SEP 37. NATURAL HISTORY. Jacob Binch St Jerome. B. 22. Line-engraving. Francis Deiaram, Portrait of Albrecht Diirer. Line-engraving. A brilliant impression with the address of Compton Holland. Rembrandt School, Seated beggar. Rovinski, Lievens, 77. A large etching, only known in this impression, from the collection of Friedrich August II. It gives the same subject as the Rem- brandt etching, H.ii, in reverse. Rovinski's attribution to Lievens is not accepted by Dr H. Schneider [Lievens, 1932, p. 232), and the name of Salomon Koninck has been suggested. Personally I am not convinced of either attribution, and would raise the question whether it might not be a youthful experiment by Rembrandt himself. It certainly falls into the group repre- sented by H. 4, 4 a, and 309. The Monogrammist B.G. Coat of Arms with the Signs of the Pas- sion. Undescribed German woodcut of the sixteenth century. Erhard Schon, Coloured Broadside *Der Narrenfresser' with verses by Hans Sachs. Rottinger 193. Woodcut, coloured by hand. Erhard Schon, Portrait of Ivan IV, the Terrible (1529-84). R. 272. In its second state, lettered as a portrait of Ivan's son Vassili Ivanovitch (regn. 1505-33). Woodcut, coloured by hand. Ludwig von Siegen, St Jerome. Andresen, and C.S. 8. Another print from the Boerner Sale, the Virgin and Child, a woodcut by Hans Leu, has been presented by a body of subscribers, completing the tribute which was noted in Vol. VII, No. 3 of the Quarterly, A. M. H. 5. ETCHINGS BY SEYMOUR HADEN. A NOTABLE series of etchings by Sir Francis Seymour Haden has been presented to the Museum by Mr W. M. Bocquet and his son Mervyn Seymour Bocquet in memory of the late Mrs W. M. Bocquet, grand-daughter of the artist. Eighteen examples form a supplement to the fine collection already in the Museum, which was acquired for the most part from Dr H. N. Harrington in 19 10. Twelve other duplicate impressions have been added to the Loan Collection of Prints. A. M. H. 6. DRAWINGS BY WALTER CRANE. TWO hundred and fifty-three drawings, and touched proofs, by Walter Crane, have been acquired from the artist's daughter-in- law, Mrs Lionel Crane. They are almost entirely studies for his book-illustration, and represent him at all periods of his life, in pre- liminary sketches and finished drawings and watercolours. A. M. H. 7. THEATRICAL DESIGNS BY CHARLES RICKETTS, R.A. A SERIES of eight designs for theatrical costume and scenery by the late Charles Ricketts, R.A., has been presented to the Print Room by the National Art-Collections Fund. Three of these are for stage-settings; one is for the Balcony scene in Romeo and yuliet, another is for a scene in Much Ado About Nothing (these two are drawings in black chalk, grey wash, heightened with white); the third represents the court of a temple and was designed for a play on Montezuma; this last is in colour. The other five drawings are all in colour and are designs for dresses. Two are figures, dressed with a splendid and savage magnificence, for Montezuma (a theme which greatly attracted the artist) ; one, of two figures, a woman and a page, was for a scene in Winter's Tale, The remaining two are for Parsijal; one is a single figure, the other represents a back view of Amfortas, wearing a great cloak of blue and gold and leaning on the shoulders of two pages. The eight designs are fine examples of Ricketts*s later style as a draughtsman, and illustrate a side of his work in which his genius for colour and imaginative design was shown with peculiar richness. L. B. 8. THE TURNER BEQUEST. THE drawings and watercolours of the Turner Bequest to the National Gallery have been deposited on indefinite loan in the Prints and Drawings Department of the British Museum since October 193 1. The transfer was made largely on account of the lack of Students' Rooms at the National Gallery or the Tate Gallery. In the British Museum any of the sketch-books and drawings can be seen at any time on application in the Print Room. Over six hundred drawings are already mounted, and by the end of the year this 6 number may be increased to nearly a thousand. This will form a basis for selected series for exhibition in the Tate Gallery, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Prints and Drawings Gallery in the British Museum, where four screens are now permanently devoted to this end. In addition, several series of framed drawings will be formed for short loans to Provincial Museums, and these will probably be avail- able by the beginning of 1934. Applications for these loans may be submitted after October ist. The immense number of sketches in the Turner Bequest, amounting to upwards of nineteen thousand, is chiefly made up of the leaves of sketch-books, which are still to a large extent intact. Much work remains to be done in the recondi- tioning and rebinding of these books. Many of them had been broken up, and separate leaves placed on exhibition. Except in the case of drawings whose character is more suited for mounting and exhibition, the sketch-books are being restored to their original condition. Any of these can be seen, as well as the mounted draw- ings, but particular care is needed in their handling, and students must accept greater restrictions in this section for the sake of the preservation of material that can easily be damaged. The damage caused by the flood at the Tate Gallery in January 1928 was con- siderable, and it will be some years before all that can be done in cleaning stained drawings will be achieved. In general it may be said that immersion in the Thames affected watercolours less than pastel and chalk drawings. But in relation to the mass of work in the collection, the irremediable damage is not so great as might have been expected. The drawings are arranged chronologically according to the official Inventory by Mr A. J. Finberg, two volumes published by the Trustees of the National Gallery in 1 909. This Inventory, originally published at 1 5J., can now be obtained from the British Museum at 6^. It contains a wealth of material of interest to all students of Turner's work, and its topographical and other indexes make it a most valuable book of reference. A. M. H. A A CHINESE PAINTING. SMALL Chinese painting bequeathed by Mrs Alfred Morri- son, who died in April of this year, enriches the Oriental 7 section of the Department of Prints and Drawings with a work which has unusual features and is rather difficult to place but is both beauti- ful and interesting. It measures 2i| x lof inches, and appears to be a fragment of a larger composition. Women, grouped on a verandah, hold long gilt staves, each tipped with a branch of blossom. The disposition of the groups seems to indicate that they are gathered to do honour to some one unseen who is at the right of the spectator. The head-dress and costume suggest that these are Apsaras, celestial rather than mortal beings; they are such as might appear in a Buddhist vision of Para- dise: but the staves and the blossom are quite unusual. Are they perhaps ladies playing, at some ceremony or festival, the part of heavenly nymphs? The date of the painting, which is on paper, not silk, is also matter for conjecture, and is the more difficult to determine in that it is not in its original state and has been retouched. The brush-line remains unobscured; it is fine and sensitive; but the colour seems in places to have disappeared. A deep red in the dress of the central figure seen in profile, and the blue in a robe hanging over her arm, are the strongest notes of colour. The faces, arms, and hands were white, but a good deal of the white has been rubbed o£F. L. B. lo. TWO INDIAN PAINTINGS. THE National Art-Collections Fund has presented to the Oriental section of the Department of Prints an Indian painting of the Mughal School. This represents the Emperor Jahanglr sitting in a small pavilion in a courtyard, and giving audience. He is embracing an envoy, an elderly man, who bends to kiss his hand. At the left is a group of people, among whom a man in European dress is noticeable. Miniatures of the time of Jahanglr are comparatively rare, and this, though unfortunately damaged in the lower right portion, is a welcome addition to the small series in the Department. Its interest is heightened by the introduction of the European, whom it is tempting to identify with Sir Thomas Roe, the ambassador from James I who was first received by Jahanglr in January 1 6 1 6 and who remained in India till February 1 6 1 9. The only known portrait of 8 I BRITISH 14 SEP 37, NATUKaL HISTORY. V. INDO-CHINESE SCULPTURE Roe, in the National Portrait Gallery, was painted many years later, some time after 1636 (he lived to 1644); and allowing for the difference in years and a different fashion of wearing the pointed beard, one can see a real resemblance in the shape of the face and a certain spirited carriage of the head. As in the other portraits in the miniature, the artist has set the eyes a little obliquely in the face. The blond colouring precludes the Portuguese; and though this might possibly be a portrait of William Hawkins, an earlier envoy, not from the king but the East India Company, it seems most likely that it represents Roe, who was so frequently and favourably received by Jahanglr. Another Indian painting has been acquired as a gift from the Keeper of the Department. The subject is a 'Prince visiting a holy man among his disciples', and the painting presents some unusual features. While the landscape background shows conventions of the early Mughal School and reminiscences of Persian painting, the figures are in Rajput style. It seems to date from some time late in the seventeenth century. L. B. II. A SCULPTURE FROM INDO-CHINA. THE stone sculpture illustrated on PI. V has been presented to the Museum by the National Art-Collections Fund. It is part of a many-headed statue of the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, com- monly known in Indo-China as Lokesvara (Lord of the World); and it can be identified as such by the small image of Buddha in the tiara of the topmost head. There are five heads on this fragment, and it may be that the tale of them is complete as there is a five-headed Avalokitesvara in Buddhist iconography. On the other hand, the more usual number is eleven when the Bodhisattva is represented as many-headed. The sculpture is of sandstone. The facial features are character- istic of Khmer art in its mature period, about the twelfth century. Its provenance is not known, but persons familiar with Indo- Chinese sculpture regard it as a provincial piece, perhaps from Eastern Siam, and not as an example of the metropolitan art of Angkor. R. L. H. 12. HANGCHOW POTSHERDS. AN important though not spectacular addition to the Ceramic xjL Collections has been a series of fragments of porcelain and stoneware from the neighbourhood of Hangchow. Some of them come from kiln-sites and others from a neighbourhood where kilns probably existed, though they have not yet been precisely located, Chinese Ceramic histories tell us of three factories in this district which were active in the Southern Sung period. The most important is that situated below the Phoenix Hill, in the old Palace enclosure, which supplied the Sung Court with kuan (imperial) ware. Kiln refuse and a large variety of potsherds found below the Phoenix Hill can be definitely associated with this factory. The ware has a dark body-material which accords with the statements of the old Chinese writers, and the glaze-colours are varying shades of greenish and bluish grey. A second factory, which is reputed to have made wares of a similar nature, stood 'near the Suburban Altar*. This site has not been definitely located. The third recorded factory was at Yii-yao Hsien, about eighty miles east of Hangchow. The kiln-sites here were located by Dr Nakao, and he sent a few of the waste pieces and fragments found on them. These give us an insight into the nature of the Yiieh ware which was manufactured from the T'ang dynasty down to the Ming. Another group of fragments, found on a much disturbed site just outside the south wall of Hangchow, includes a variety of celadons and some ying ch'ing white porcelain. While it is probable that many of these objects are of local make, the site evidence is too vague to allow of any certainty. For these fragments, many of which are documents of great importance, we have to thank Sir Percival David, Dr Nakao, and Messrs O. Karlbeck and Peter Boode. R. L. H. 13. TWO ILLUSTRATED ASSAMESE MANUSCRIPTS. TWO Assamese manuscripts which have been lately acquired by the Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts are of very considerable interest. The older of the two is a copy of the 10 < C/2 CO < !-M o X o c ^ _o >-H *c^ CO U m o )— t k< CO o- f— 1 0 ■- ^ c •t—K u. rH 'c fe c o a; 3 w o? tin h— 1 en h:i IH "D w C DC rt H ^ ^ O OJ ^ p< ■4-> \^ CO W :z; w u CO 'MSH SFUM ;KP 3,-. TORY. < CO CO < o o I— I Q. CO a! "^ (U o -S , c X H O p^ CO W w o CO a, Pi Dhar ma-pur ana ^ a metrical manual of Hindu religious doctrine and practice according to one of the churches which worship Vishnu in his incarnation as Krishna. It is written on thin smooth sheets of wood 23 inches in width by 6| inches in height, the borders being coloured red, and was copied in the §aka year 1657, corresponding to A.D. 1735/36. The folios run to 179, but a few are missing. The book is profusely illustrated throughout with coloured drawings in a local style of art. Most of these are of somewhat mediocre quality; but a few of them, obviously by a different master, are of real merit, and are designed to illustrate not themes of Hindu religion but the life of the patron of the book, who was no less a personage than Sib Singh (Siva-sirnha), the contemporary Ahom King of Assam. The reign of this monarch lasted from 171 4 until his death in 1744. During the life of his first queen, Phulesvarl, he achieved a rather bad eminence by persecuting the worshippers of Vishnu-Krishna, both he and his consort being ardent devotees of Siva. Phulesvarl died about 173 i, and Sib Singh then married her sister Ambika. During the latter's reign, which ended with her death about 1738, more tolerance seems to have been shown to the church of Vishnu- Krishna. Our Dharma-purana bears evidence to this change of attitude. A manual of Vishnuite religion, it explicitly claims as its patrons Sib Singh and Ambika. On fol. 2 a we have a picture of Sib Singh on his throne graciously receiving a copy of the book; and on fol. 1 79b we see him on his throne ^examining the Dharma-purana', as the title below tells us, while behind him sits Ambika with the heir apparent on her knee. Fol. 179 a (Plate VI) presents the royal pair riding in procession. On fol. 2 b (Plate VII) is seen a dark handsome woman, with her hair dressed in the high chignon {jatd) affected by holy persons, who is seated on a couch, and holds in her lap the heir apparent; she is Rajapatesvari, 'Mistress of the King's Diadem*, the guardian genius of the throne. She reappears on fol. 3a, where she is seen sitting, again with the young prince in her lap, and convers- ing with Sib Singh. The other book is also an extremely rare religious poem, written on similar sheets of wood, which are 25 J inches wide and 8| inches in height; the date of copying is the Saka year 1758 (a.d. 1836). It II is the Brahma-khanda, the first section of the Brahma-vaivarta-purdna, in an Assamese metrical adaptation by one Durgacharya, who seems to be otherwise unknown to fame. It is Ukewise abundantly illus- trated with coloured drawings of a local Eastern school. These, despite their crudity, have some merit and more interest, as they show a slight but distinctly recognisable influence from Burma. A quaint anachronism in them is their frequent representation of the troops of soldiers attending upon kings, who are clad not in the garb of ancient Ind but in uniforms faithfully copied from those used by the British Army at the time, with shakos and muskets. L. D. B. 14. A TIBETAN COLLECTION OF BOOKS AND MANU- SCRIPTS. THE generosity of Sir Charles A. Bell, K.C.I.E., who has presented to the British Museum sixty-eight printed books and twelve manuscripts, has very notably enriched the Tibetan library in the Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts. A striking and welcome feature in this collection is its wealth in works of history, biography, legend, and antiquities. The manuscripts include a copy of Sum-pa's History of Buddhism in Tibet and Mongolia, two sections of the voluminous epic cycle of Kesar, and an account of the sacred places in Sikkim. Among the printed books we may make special mention of the biographies of the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Dalai Lamas and of dPal-ldan-ye-ses-dpal-bzaii, Chhos-kyi-rgyal- mthsan, and other Lamas of Tashilhunpo; the Mani-bka-'bum or Hundred Thousand Orders ascribed to King Sroii-btsan-sgam-po; a history of King Khri-sron-ldeu-btsan ; the history of Tibet styled dPal mii dbah pot rtags pa brjod pa *jtg rten kun tu dga bat gtam\ a biography of the popular humorist Kun-dga-legs-pa; another section of the Kesar Saga; and a treatise on the duties of officials written in the reign of the Fifth Dalai Lama by Sahs-rgyas-rgya-mthso. Arts and crafts are represented by two manuscripts styled respectively Bjn po chhe bzo-yi las kyt bsgrub pat rgyud dan ja dan dar gos chhen dan rta rgyud thsugs bzan nan gyi rtagpa, 2. guide to the various kinds and qualities of metal objects of art, tea, silks, and horses, and bZo ris kha sas kyi pa kra lag len ma yod pa, a practical manual of the 12 knowledge of certain arts and crafts, besides a printed inventory of the rare images in the great temple of Lhasa. Poetry, grammar, popular drama, and of course the Buddhist religion are also adequately represented in this remarkable collection. L. D. B. 15. AN ILLUSTRATED DiVAN OF ^KHATAT. A WELL-KNOWN friend of the British Museum, who desires to remain anonymous, has lately enriched the collections of the Department of Oriental Printed Books and MSS, by the gift of a fine copy of the Divan i Khatat or Navddir ul-muiuk, the Turkish poems of 'Khata'i', the literary name assumed by Shah Isma'Il Safavi, the famous ruler who founded the Safavl dynasty of Persia in 1 50 1-2. Though a Persian, Isma'Il wrote his Divan in the Azari dialect of Turkish, for he had passed his earlier years in Azarbaijan and Gilan among the Turkish tribes of Kachar and Afshar. The work is extremely rare: apart from the present copy and another manuscript in the British Museum, it would seem that no copies exist in Europe, though possibly some may be found in Con- stantinople. The manuscript, which is 6 inches in width and 10 inches in height, is beautifully written in a nasi a Ilk hand, apparently of the late sixteenth century, and is embellished with six coloured drawings of good style, some of which seem to belong to the seven- teenth century. A note in a later hand at the end, after stating truth- fully that there are 19 folios and 6 drawings, adds the date 906 [a.h.], which corresponds to a.d. i 500-2 and thus is approximately the year of Isma*Il Safavi*s accession, but certainly is not the date of copying. L. D. B. 16. A COLLECTION OF CHINESE PRINTED BOOKS. TWO outstanding features of this collection of 80 works, presented by Mrs Wakefield of Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, are the books relating to the Province of Hunan, and those on Chinese painters and painting. Among the former is the Ch'ang sha fu chih, one of the old-fashioned topographical works — sometimes for want of a better word called 'gazetteers' — ^which the Chinese have compiled with such industry for every part of their empire. 13 There is also a descriptive account of Hunan as a whole, and another work deals in considerable detail with the Miao tribes of that province and their subjugation by China. The Sacred Mountain of the South, which is situated to the north-west of Hengchowfu, has two separate treatises devoted to it, one of them running to i6pen (Chinese paper- covered volumes). The books on art include two catalogues of famous paintings, with descriptions, references, and historical notes. One of these is the Shu hua chien ytng in 1 2 volumes, compiled by Li Tso-hsien, which treats of calligraphy as well as painting, and starts as far back as the fourth century a.d. Three fine works are concerned exclusively with the biography of artists and calligraphists, and there is also an interesting collection of essays on art by various authors in eight volumes. Several other items call for mention. Of great historical value is a lithographed facsimile of the diary of the famous statesman and general Tseng Kuo-fan, who quelled the T'ai-p'ing rebellion, from 1841 to 1872, in no fewer than 40 volumes. The Tu shih ptng liieh is a useful military history of China down to the Sung dynasty (a.d. 960), and the Pal hat is a miscellaneous collection of reprints in 80 volumes. An even more extensive work is a collection of treatises on philosophical and other subjects, arranged under cate- gories, in 1 10 volumes. The Chin shih tse contains a great number of ink-rubbings of ancient inscriptions on bronze and stone, and in the Pao ching chat shih chi we have the collected poems of the Manchu statesman Pin-liang (i 784-1 847). The Keng ch'iang iu, printed in Korea, deserves notice if only on account of its quaint title, which means literally 'Soup and Wall Record'. This is a good instance of the freakish allusiveness often found in Chinese titles, which is so apt to confound the cataloguer. We are told in the Later Han History that after the death of the Emperor Yao, his successor Shun yielded himself up to the contemplation of his virtues for three years: ^sitting, he saw Yao on the wall opposite; eating, he beheld him in his soup.' Hence the phrase 'soup and wall' is used to express admiration for the rulers of old; and, in effect, our book turns out to be a chronicle of incidents redounding to the credit of the Kings of Korea. It would appear to be rather rare, as it is not given in Cordier*s Bibliographie Coreenne, With few exceptions the books in this collection are in excellent condition, and all will form a welcome addition to the Chinese Library. L. G. 17. A UNIQUE MANUSCRIPT OF THE AMALl OF IBN AL-SHAJARl. MOSLEM belief in the verbal inspiration of the Koran, which easily transcends the rigour of any western 'fundamentalism*, together with the Arabs' pride and delight in their wonderful language, fostered the production of a multitude of treatises devoted to Arabic lexicography and grammar. Of such works the Arabic collection in the Museum contains some fine examples, and it has now been further enriched by the purchase of a manuscript of Amdlt or 'Dictations* by one of the greatest philologists of his age, the Sharif Hibat Allah b. 'All Ibn al-Shajari, who lived from a.h. 450 to 542 (a.d. 1058 to 1 148). Moslem scholars of the past are unanimous in their praise of this work, which they describe as the most extensive and important of all the author's compositions. This is the only copy now known to exist. The work was not written but dictated by the author in 84 Majdlis, or 'sessions'. Each Majlis consists of an exposition of some point of lexicography, syntax, poetic diction, or Koranic exegesis, the last three 'sessions' being specially concerned with passages in the poetry of al-Muta- nabbi. The book is divided into two parts [yuz) containing 49 and 35 'sessions' respectively. An interesting feature is that 23 of the 'sessions' are dated, showing that the master's disquisitions here collected covered a period of at least twelve years, when he was between 74 and 86 years of age, and thus represent the fruit of a life- long study. In the year 524 (1130), we are told, he dictated on Saturdays, in 526 (i 132) on Tuesdays, and in 536 (i 141-2) again on Saturdays. He was a native of Baghdad and a descendant of the Prophet, as his title Sharif indicates. In the Baghdad suburb of al- Karkh he held the office of Naklb al-Tdlibtytn^ i.e. examiner of the genealogies of those who claimed the honour of descent from the 15 Caliph 'All. The volume contains 320 folios, 9 inches by 7, with 25 lines 4 J inches long to each page. The writing, which is in clear naskht carefully executed, is the work of one Muhammad Shahin b. Fath Allah, a native of Damascus, domiciled in Egypt, and is dated the 8th of the month Sha'ban a.h. mo (9 February 1699). Fols. 133 to 137 are by a different but contemporary scribe. Two folios 138 and 139 were apparently lost and have been restored in a modern hand. A. S. F. 18. A MANUSCRIPT OF WORKS OF KASIM UL-ANVAR. THE Department of Oriental Printed Books and MSS. is again under a debt of gratitude to Mr R. S. Greenshields, who has presented to it a manuscript of Persian and Turkish poems and other compositions by Kasim ul-Anvar, finely written by the calligrapher *Abd Ullah al-Katib al-Isfahani, who completed it in a.h. 861 (a.d. 1457), and embellished by five miniature illustrations of good style. Kasim ul-Anvar, whose original name was Mu'In ul-Din 'All, was one of the most original and popular of the later Timurid poets of Persia. He was born in 1356, and died in a.d. 1433. Like many of his compatriots, he united poetry with mysticism. During his residence at Herat, under the reigns of Timur and Shahrukh, he acquired great influence, and attracted to himself a large number of disciples. His political and religious sentiments however were suspect, and many traces of Hurufi ideas have been detected in his writings. He showed equal facility in the composition of both Persian and Turkish verses, and several of his poems are in the dialect of Gilan. Manuscripts of his works are not rare, though no printed edition of them has yet appeared. The present copy is one of the earliest and finest that have been preserved. It was written only 24 years after the poet's death, in a small and elegant nastdltk hand, and comprises poems {ghazals or odes, ktfahs or fragments, and rubats or quatrains) and two tracts on Sufism, styled Anis ul-'arifin and Anis ul-'ashikin or Risalah-i-Amanah. In contents it is almost identical with the MS. Brit. Mus. Or. 3304, except that it contains 16 more odes and quatrains, but omits the tract entitled Nasihat-i-dar- vlshan contained in Or. 3304. The decoration of this manuscript originally was limited to the illuminated heading or 'unvdn on fol. i verso and the beautiful design on fol, i recto in which was inscribed probably the name of the patron or library for whom the copy was made, which has been erased. About a hundred years after the date of copying, in all probability, were added the five miniatures which now adorn the book, as well as another ^unvdn preceding one of the later sections. The margins of the folios containing the miniatures and the 'unvans^ together with the pages facing them, are decorated with designs of animals, birds, flowers, and foliage. The miniatures in style and exe- cution are good examples of the artistry of the beginning and middle of the Safavl period. Many of the faces display considerable character and liveliness, and the colour-scheme is graceful and pleasing. E. E. 19. THREE MANUSCRIPTS FROM THE CHESTER BEATTY COLLECTION. THE Department of Manuscripts has been fortunate in securing three volumes of unusual interest at the recent dispersal of the second portion of Mr A. Chester Beatty's once remarkable collection of Western MSS. The most important, as also the earliest in date, is an eighth-century MS. of the *De Vera Religione* and other works of St Augustine, followed by the unique text of the 'Carmen Apologeticum' of Commodianus. The volume, which was formerly Phillipps MS. 12200, is one of a group of books executed probably at Nonantola, near Modena, the greater number of which now form the Codices Sessoriani in the Biblioteca Vittorio Emmanuele, Rome, and is fully described as no. 3 in Mr Beatty's privately printed catalogue. The writing is of great palaeographical interest, afford- ing an example of the Italian pre-Caroline minuscule of 'Beneventan' type, with a curious admixture in places of uncials or half-uncials, while there are some rough initials in a debased Celtic style. In addition, the first 1 1 1 leaves are palimpsest, containing portions of the earliest known MS. of the Latin translation by Mutianus Scholasticus of the Homilies of St John Chrysostom on the Epistle D 17 to the Hebrews, written in uncials apparently of the seventh century. This splendid volume was included as lot 3 5 in the sale catalogue of 9 May 1933, but was withdrawn and sold privately to Mr Wilfred Merton, of Messrs Emery Walker Ltd, who immediately offered to transfer it to the Museum at cost price. It has been numbered Add. MS. 43460. The second MS. (lot 39 in the sale catalogue, and no. 16 in Mr Beatty's catalogue) is a copy of the Dialogues of St Gregory the Great, written probably in the south of France, perhaps at Clermont- Ferrand, in the tenth century. The writing is a Caroline minuscule with some marked peculiarities, such as might be expected in a MS. of southern origin, and the volume is decorated with two large and six smaller initials, some with figures, in a curious style showing some Spanish influence. It is now Egerton MS. 3089. Third and last (sale catalogue, lot 49, and no. 59 in Mr Beatty's Catalogue) is a fine English thirteenth-century MS., written prob- ably at Dore Abbey in Herefordshire, of Bede's 'De Temporum Ratione* and other works, followed by a chronicle of Dore Abbey, on account of which the MS. was especially desired by the Museum. The original hand stops at the year 1243, which may be regarded as the approximate date of the MS., and there are continuations down to 1362. The text of the chronicle from 687 onwards has been printed with some inaccuracies in Pertz, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, this edition being cited as no. 1686 in Gross, Sources and Literature of English History, p. 262. The volume is decorated with a large panel and a number of diagrams, &c., most of which are in elaborate architectural frames, the work being characteristically English and of good quality. This MS. has also been purchased out of the Egerton fund, and is numbered Egerton MS. 3088. It is note- worthy that all three volumes were obtained privately from the Phillipps Collection by the late owner. E. G. M. 20. A REGISTER OF DEEDS FROM SHAFTESBURY ABBEY. THAT great possessions entail great responsibilities is a sentiment which would have been cordially echoed in any of the wealthier 18 medieval monasteries, whose estates were often scattered through many counties and formed the subject of numerous title-deeds. The object of the monastic chartulary was to collect copies of at least the more important of such deeds in one volume or series of volumes and in an order which facilitated reference. But a transcript was not a satisfactory substitute for the original; nor did its mere presence make the task of finding the latter any easier. This was the sad experience of Shaftesbury Abbey in Dorset, a house of Benedictine nuns, whose possessions were so extensive that a popular saying arose to the effect that if its abbess were to marry the abbot of Glastonbury their heir would hold more land than the king himself, but which had occasion more than once to realize the deceitfulness of riches. Alike for the proper management of its property and for the not infrequent law- suits in which the abbey was involved, a proper supervision of its muniments was requisite, but this was by no means always exercised; and at length Margery Twynyho, who was abbess from 1496 to 1505, gave orders for the compilation of a proper register, which has recently been acquired by the Department of Manuscripts (Egerton MS. 3098). The preface to this work throws so instructive a light on the method (or lack of method) employed in the preserva- tion and use of monastic muniments that it is worth while to quote the greater part of it: 'This book was compiled for the profit and advantage of this monastery by order of the lady Margery Twynyho, late its abbess, in the year of our Lord 1 500 and the third year of her abbacy. To this step she was specially moved because she realized by true rela- tion of others and by her own judgement that several controversies and pleas and many matters of doubt as well for as against the profit and advantage of the monastery had often been set on foot in the times of the abbesses her predecessors and even her own, and might probably come to be set on foot in the future, and that to the no small prejudice and hurt of this monastery, since at that time there was none who had any eff^ectual knowledge of the liberties, privileges, and muniments of this most noble monastery. Therefore on occasion, nay oftentimes, the monastery, through ignorance, by not claiming that which was its own, lost its right; sometimes, too, by not defend- 19 ing its right when it was impleaded or molested by others, owing to failure to produce its liberties, privileges, and muniments, it similarly lost what was its own, because it did not know what it was able to produce and prove. For all the liberties, privileges, and muniments of this aforesaid noble monastery had been preserved in the treasury not arranged by manors, according to their order as it is clearly shown below, but very confusedly, in diverse chests and boxes, in such manner that if search had to be made for any liberty, privilege, or muniment, great or small, which was required for the good of the monastery, none knew for certain whether such muniment could be produced or no, and, if it could, in which chest or box it was to be found; whence it was needful to begin the search with one chest or box and to examine all the chests and boxes in turn, reading diligently with great care and labour the single liberties, privileges, and muni- ments until that one for which search was being made should be reached, if it was there; a task which required not one day but several and was exceedingly tedious to the searcher or searchers; insomuch that the officers on whom by reason of their office this duty fell neglected it and thus, as aforesaid, the truth oftentimes remained unknown, whence many disadvantages were daily more and more feared, for the future, for this most noble monastery.* The worthy Margery took this state of affairs much to heart and pondered over it daily and in the watches of the night, till she bethought her to refer the matter to her brother, Christopher Twynyho, who was the steward of the abbey. On his advice 'she required and earnestly and heartily desired Alexander Katour, bachelor of both laws, at that time sacristan of this monastery, assuring him of a worthy recompense for his labour, to search into all the aforesaid chests and boxes, diligently inspect and read and effectually consider and note all liberties, privileges, and muniments, and distinctly and separately place the single muniments, according to the manors whereto they appertained, in the single chests or boxes; and to make a table or calendar of all and singular the afore- said thus seen by him and as aforesaid arranged by manors, whereby he could easily find whatever might be sought.' Such was the origin of the volume which is the subject of this article. 20 That Egerton MS. 3098 is a copy and not the original is suggested by the fact that the preface dates the compilation in 1 500 but speaks of Margery Twynyho as 'late' abbess; she died in 1 505. The volume was written, then, after her death but is obviously not much later. There is reason to think that it may have been a copy made for the abbess's brother Christopher in his capacity as steward of the abbey. J. Hutchins in his History of the County of Dorset^ iii (1868), pp. 86- 8, publishing extracts from this very MS., states that it was formerly the property of 'the reverend Mr Twyniho*. In the pedigree of Twinyhoe of Turn worth which he prints on p. 468 we find that the Rev. Christopher Twinyhoe (i 689-1 773) was of the same family as the abbess Margery. His daughter Sarah married Walter Erie of Blandford, and on the brown paper wrapper is a note with the initials of the latter's great-grandson, Twinyhoe William Erie (d. 1908). The volume has therefore a continuous pedigree for four centuries; and it has now joined in the Department of Manuscripts the chartu- lary of Shaftesbury, Harley MS. 61, which dates from the early fifteenth century. It might be expected that many, if not most, of the deeds there transcribed would appear in the calendar, but so far as a somewhat hasty search has revealed there is no discoverable connexion between the two. We may perhaps infer either that many deeds had disappeared before 1 500 or that the sacristan's researches were less thorough than duty required. Little space remains to describe the calendar in detail. The entries, which are brief, are, as stated in the preface, arranged under manors, whose order is not alphabetical but roughly topographical. There is, except in one case ('Magna carta cum tribus folijs in magna et longa piscide'), no attempt to indicate in which 'chests or boxes' the deeds were stored. Towards the end is a list of 'cantarie' (chantries), with mention of some of the saints in whose honour they were dedicated, followed by a section headed 'Pro Abbatissa', in which are some interesting entries, such as 'De festo Translacionis sancti Edwardi solempniter obseruando per archidiachonum Dorsett', 'De festo Translacionis Sancti Edwardi obseruando ab omnibus in Comitatu Dorsett et de Indulgencia concessa obseruantibus idem festum', &c. Farther on we find mention of various inventories, 21 e.g. 'Inuentarium de Beddyng et Napre', *Inuentarium off y" plate of dame Margarete Stourton'. The whole volume would well repay study. H. I. B. 21. TWO NEW LITURGICAL MANUSCRIPTS. EVERY pious layman in the later Middle Ages must have been brought into contact with three liturgical books. The Missal provided him with his means of public worship; the Ritual or Manual with the services connected with such landmarks in his life as baptism, marriage, and the last Offices of the Church; while the Book of Hours formed a basis for his private devotions. By the generosity of Sir George Warner, formerly Keeper of MSS., the Museum has become possessed of two further specimens of the second and third classes in this trio. They are numbered Additional MSS. 43472 and 43473 respectively, and both formerly belonged to the Rev. E. S. Dewick, a noted liturgist and benefactor of the Museum. The Ritual, a well-written quarto of the fourteenth century, with some decoration, comes from a church in the diocese of Chalons-sur- Marne. This origin is indicated by the presence of SS. Lupentius, Memmius, Alpinus, and Poma in the litany for the blessing of the fonts on Holy Saturday and the eve of Pentecost. As for the con- tents, they are of the usual type and cannot be better summarized than by quoting from Lyndwood's Provinciale: 'Omnia quae spectant ad sacramentorum et sacramentalium ministrationem. Item benedictiones tarn fontium quam aliorum, secundum usum ec- clesiasticum benedicendorum.* It is gratifying to record that this gift fills a gap in the Museum collection, the only other French Ritual being Add. MS. 22007, a Paris book of later date and inferior execution. 'They all attend Mass every day, and say many Paternosters in public, the women carrying long rosaries in their hands, and any who can read taking the Office of Our Lady with them, and with some companion reciting it in the church verse by verse.* So, about 1 500, a Venetian visitor describes the religious life of the laymen of this country. Sir George Warner's second MS., a Book of Hours of Sarum use, is a good example of the books used by the devout and 22 literate people mentioned above. Certainly written after the death of Henry IV in 141 3 — his obit is entered by the original scribe in the calendar — ^it is probably not much later in date. Besides such formal contents as the Office of Our Lady, the Penitential and Gradual psalms with the litany, and the Office of the Dead, a con- siderable number of prayers and pious exercises in Latin and French are found. Though the majority of these are fairly well-known, an interesting devotion affording protection against thunder-storms may be singled out for mention. It is preceded by a tale relating how it was revealed to Edward the Confessor by the Holy Spirit during Mass, and is probably the same as a prayer mentioned by the Abb^ V. Leroquais [Les Livres (THeures MSS. de la Btbliotheque Nationale, i, p. 149), in Paris Bib. Nat. lat. 1328, an Arras MS. The book is illuminated in gold and colours, with one historiated initial, in a fairly good fifteenth-century English style. Though the origin of the MS. is not known, a note recording the birth of Mary Fitzhugh of Wavendon in Buckinghamshire in 1564, coupled with an obit (1462) of Sir Thomas Green of Greens Norton, a great landowner in Wavendon, argues an early home in Buckinghamshire. From the sixteenth to the nineteenth century there is no evidence of the vicissitudes of the book. Then, probably before 1821, a note was added at the end by Mr John Symonds Breedon, of Bere Court, Pangbourne, to the effect that he had found it in the china closet of that house, and supposed it (without any foundation) to have lain there from the time of Hugh Faringdon, the last abbot of Reading. F.W. 22. SIMPSON DOCUMENTS. SIXTY-SIX miscellaneous documents have been selected from a large collection of family and other papers offered for presenta- tion by P. W. Simpson, Esq. These date from 141 7 to 1788, and include four leases by Queen Henrietta Maria, with her sign-manual; two leases by Queen Catherine of Braganza, with her signature stamp and sign-manual respectively; and an illuminated grant of arms of 1695. This last has been numbered Add. MS. 43464, and a number of paper documents will be bound into a volume, to which the number Add. MS. 43465 has been given; the remainder have 23 been incorporated among the charters and rolls, and are numbered Add. Ch. 70740-70788. The bulk of the family papers, largely concerned with property in Mitcham, have been presented by Mr Simpson to the Central Library, Croydon, one of the authorized repositories for the county of Surrey, and a number of other charters relating to other counties have been transferred to the British Record Association for distribu- tion to the appropriate centres. E. G. M. 23. ON AN ANSWER TO THE ARTICLES OF THE REBELS OF CORNWALL AND DEVONSHIRE (ROYAL MS. 18 B. XI) J IT has been supposed that Royal MS. 18 B. XI was Nicholas Udall's reply to the articles the Rebels of Cornwall and Devon- shire sent to the Privy Council in 1 549. The title on the first folio of the text (now numbered f. 3) runs: An answer to the articles / of the commoners of Devonsheir / and Cornewall. declaring to / the same, howe they haue ben / seduced by Evell persons. And / howe their conscyences may be / satysfyed and stayed; consernyng / the said artycles, sette jorth \ by a Countryman of theirs, much tenderyng the welth bothe of their j bodyes and solles. The words in italic have been added in the space originally left between the title and the text. This answer to the rebels has been attributed to N. Udall on account of some notes on the parchment fly-leaves that originally protected the manuscript and that now are numbered as ff. i and 2. On the top of f. I recto has been written: An aunswer to y' commons of Devonshire and Cornewall with the words by Vdall above the line after the second word; at the foot of f. 2 verso the MS. is described as Vdairs answer to the Devon men. These indications are wrong and cannot stand when checked with internal evidences. * I am happy to tender my keenest gratitude to the Director of the British Museum, who has kindly granted me permission to state my view with regard to Royal MS. 1 8 B. XI in the British Museum Quarterly, although that periodical has not published hitherto articles by persons other than members of the Museum staff. In consequence, there is no need to make it clear that my article has not any official character. H The author is a countryman of the rebels; he is described as your countreyman borne\^ he addresses them as good countrymen oj Deuon- sheir and Cornewall^ good countrymen ^^ my symple and play n meanyng countrymen ^^ my countrymen.^ Moreover the title informs us that the author was a native of the country, but the clause in which that information is given must not be held as a genuine evidence, as it has been added later. Besides, the author is not an inhabitant of Cornwall but of Devon- shire; he is really a Devonian, for when he addresses the Cornish people, he calls them good neighbours, ye Cornlshmen,^ Now Udall was not connected with Devonshire; hence this answer to the rebels is not his; it is Philip Nichol's, who according to Bishop Bale w2LSpatria Devonius and who composed an answer to the articles of the same rebels.^ G. Scheurweghs. Schilde (Belgium), May 1933. 24. THE GARRAWAY RICE GENEALOGICAL COLLEC- TIONS. IN accordance with the will of the late Robert Garraway Rice, J.P., F.S.A.,there has been presented to the Department of Manuscripts a series of volumes (now numbered Add. MSS. 43444-43456) connected with Surrey and Sussex, for the most part transcripts and extracts from parish registers and similar sources. One original parish register, that of Fairlight in Sussex for the years 1716-65, is included. The large and important copy of Mitcham parish register has been deposited for six months with the Society of Genealogists by the terms of the bequest. Other registers transcribed or extracted are those of Lyminster, Burton-cum-Coates, and Funtington, all in Sussex, and Reigate in Surrey. Add. MS. 43453 is a copy of the ^ MS. f. 40 a (line 1 5). These words are above the line and take the place of these cancelled ones: as your ffreind and countryman. 2 MS. ff. 3 a (11. 1-2); 37 a (28-9). 3 MS. a. 3 b (23); 4 b (26); 6 a (16-17}; 7 a (27-8); 7 b (6-7); 8 a (31-2); 14 a (14-15); 17 a (26-7); 22 b (22); 22 b (33); 29 b (20); 30 b (3); 35 a (27); 37 b (24). 4 MS. 3 a (7).^ 5 MS. 7 a (11). 6 MS. 24 a (17-18). 7 J. Bale, Scriptorum lllustrium . . . Catalogus. Basileae, 1557-9, vol. ii, p. 122; Index Brittaniae Scriptorum (ed. by R. L. Poole and M. Bateson, Oxford, 1902), p. 324. Udall's answer is referred to in the Catalogus, vol. i, p. 717, in the Index, p. 310. E 25 burial-ground register of the Quakers at Pleystowe in Capel, co. Surrey. Horsham occupies two volumes— one of monumental inscriptions in the parish church, the other of extracts from the Churchwardens' Accounts, and there are two general volumes of monumental inscriptions, one for Sussex and one for Surrey. Finally, two volumes are devoted to collections about the compiler's own family name, that of Rice, in Sussex. H. J. M. M. 25. A DERING MANUSCRIPT. THE debt which students of the present day owe to scholars of the past, and specially to those of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, is a great one, and one which has not yet received the systematic study which it deserves. It was fortunate that the age which followed the break-up of the great monastic libraries produced a succession of keen antiquaries and private collectors, who provided a home for some at least of the scattered treasures. Most eminent of all, of course, was Sir Robert Cotton, the tercentenary of whose death the Museum celebrated two years ago by an exhibition of selected manuscripts from his collection. Not the least interesting of the exhibits on that occasion was a large folio volume, lent for the purpose by its owner, F. W. Cock, Esq., M.D., F.S.A. By a further act of generosity on his part the loan has been converted into a gift, and the manuscript is now definitely part of the Museum collections (Add. MS. 43471). The bulk of the volume consists of transcripts of charters of Anglo-Saxon Kings of Kent, made by another seventeenth-century antiquary. Sir Edward Dering, ist Bart. Annotations by these old collectors in manuscripts which have passed through their hands have provided many a clue to their vicissitudes. In this volume, for example, the feature of greatest interest is perhaps the marginal notes made by Dering him- self. Against a charter of Coenuulf we find 'Hanc Cartam ipse dono dedi CI: V: dno. Robto Cotton mil: et Bar^° A°dni. 1623°'— the original referred to being Cotton Charter Augustus ii. 98. Another document he records to have been presented by himself to Sir Thomas Finch, Bart., afterwards 2nd Earl of Winchilsea. Many of the documents copied into the book are also noted as in Cotton's 26 possession. They were borrowed for the purpose of transcription, and in an extant letter of lo May 1630 (Cotton MS. Julius C. iii, f. 143), Dering promised to return them *as fast as I can coppy them*. The manuscript passed from the Surrenden library through that of the celebrated nineteenth-century collector. Sir Thomas Phillipps, before its acquisition by the present donor. It is appropriate that a volume with so many associations with Sir Robert Cotton should find a permanent abode in the British Museum. B. S. 26. THE SKINNER MANUSCRIPTS. DURING the spring of the year 1800, the parishioners of Camerton, co. Somerset, received as their rector the Rev. John Skinner, M.A., with whom they were destined to pass an uneasy existence of nearly forty years' duration, and from whose efforts to prove the place to be the site of the Roman Camulodunum their village was to derive a wholly unexpected, and perhaps unjustified, importance. Skinner was one of those individuals who admirably exemplify the virtues and failings of the typical English antiquary of the end of the eighteenth century. Devoid of real critical acumen, he was neverthe- less enthusiastic and persevering, and was prepared to undertake almost unlimited labour when seeking after what he fondly believed to be a pearl of great price. Moreover he was firmly convinced that it was his bounden duty as an Englishman to compile and preserve a record of all the objects of antiquarian interest to be found within these islands, before time and other destructive agencies should have obliterated them, and so that *my country men' should 'know how to value such a territory as this as it ought to be valued'. With this laud- able object in view. Skinner made a number of excursions, chiefly through the southern counties, and recorded his progresses (together with many other things) in a series of journals which he compiled with the purpose of bequeathing them to the British Museum. John's handwriting was somewhat illegible, and he therefore pre- vailed upon his brother Russell to transcribe the manuscripts for him; and then, after the compiler had finished the numerous charm- ing water-colour drawings with which his pages are so profusely 27 illustrated (and which form, perhaps, the most valuable items from these records of the days before the ^restorer' had commenced in business), the volumes were handsomely bound up and numbered. Russell Skinner died in 1832, and from then until John's death in 1839 the manuscripts were allowed to remain in their original state. In addition to antiquarian matters, the journals contain references to the rector's frequent disputes with his parishioners and others, including the members of his own family, and Skinner therefore stated in his will that although he bequeathed his treasures to the Museum, yet he preferred that the chests in which they were con- tained should remain unopened for fifty years after his death. This wish the Trustees respected, and the collection was not catalogued until 1889, when the discovery was made that instead of one hundred and fifty volumes, as specified, no more than ninety-eight were avail- able to the Department of Manuscripts. These were incorporated into the Museum collections as Add. MSS. 33633-33730, and con- sisted of Russell's transcripts (which ended at the year 1832) together with two volumes of John's miscellaneous memoranda, including his catalogue. The series of journals covering the period from the death of Russell in 1832 to that of John in 1839 remained hidden from sight until May of this year, when the Museum was offered twenty-one volumes of John Skinner's original holograph manuscripts, comprising the years 1832-6, together with four volumes of transcripts by Russell relating to the rector's disputes with his neighbours, and containing some of his unpublished verses. Such an opportunity was not to be missed, and the wanderers are now reunited with the manuscripts already in the Museum and are numbered Egerton MSS. 3099- 3123. The remainder of the Skinner collection is still untraced, but it is to be hoped that the missing volumes will eventually join their fellows on the shelves. H. R. A. 27. THE KEENE PAPERS. THE lives of the British statesmen to whom was entrusted the conduct of the nation's foreign policy during the second quarter of the eighteenth century were, indeed, never free from doubts and 28 trials, and amidst all the manifold difficulties with which they were afflicted one ever-present stumbling block could always be relied upon to cause trouble even when other sources of discord were temporarily quiescent, namely, the Family Compact between France and Spain. It was fortunate, therefore, that during this period England was served at Madrid by one of the ablest ministers whom she has ever sent to the Spanish capital, and who attained a considerable measure of success in his endeavours to neutralize French influence in the Peninsula. Sir Benjamin Keene, K.B., was born in 1697, and after having acted as Agent in Spain to the South Sea Company became, in 1727, British Minister at Madrid, holding this post until the outbreak of the war of 1739. In 1745 he was appointed to Lisbon, and from thence he returned to Madrid in 1 749 and died at his post in Although Keene's activities have hitherto been well represented in the Department of Manuscripts, particularly amongst the Newcastle Papers, it is with great pleasure that we chronicle the gift by Mrs Ruck Keene (through the Friends of the National Libraries) of a very welcome supplement and addition to the Museum collections in the shape of those papers of Sir Benjamin which came into the possession of his brother Edmund, Bishop of Chester, and later of Ely, as sole executor and residuary legatee of the diplomatist. These papers, which have been arranged into thirty-two volumes as Add. MSS. 43412-43443, fall naturally into three series. The first consists merely of copies of Keene's despatches to the various English Secretaries of State from 1 730 to 1 73 6, the originals of many of which are already in public collections. The second group is more valuable, and contains the original despatches received during the important period 1748-57; whilst the final section comprises three volumes of private letters (1740-56) from Keene to Abraham Castres, British Minister at Lisbon. The official despatches were extensively used by Archdeacon Coxe for his history of the Bourbon kings of Spain; but the letters to Castres remained practically unknown until their inclusion by Sir Richard Lodge in his recently published Private Correspondence oj Sir Benjamin Keene, K.B. H. R. A. 29 28. PAPERS OF THE LATE F. G. EDWARDS. JUST over five years ago the Department of Manuscripts had the good fortune to acquire a selection of the papers and correspon- dence of Frederick George Edwards, Editor of the Musical Times from 1897 until his death in 1909 (Add. MSS. 41570-4). Their contents amply illustrated the veneration which he had for the life and works of Mendelssohn, in contrast with the disparagement to which the latter was already exposed in some quarters. Most note- worthy of the autographs in the collection is a sheet in the hand of the composer containing a list of alterations to be made to the manu- script of the anthem *Hear my prayer* (now in the Victoria and Albert Museum), which was specially written at the request of William Bartholomew for one of the Crosby Hall concerts given by his future wife. Miss A. S. Mounsey. There is also an original letter, concerning the libretto of 'Elijah', from Mendelssohn to Bartholo- mew, who is famed as the English translator and adaptor of the words of most of his songs and oratorios. A History of Mendelssohn^ s Oratorio Elijah, published in 1896, was one of the fruits of Edwards's interest, and for information on many points connected therewith, as, indeed, on particular details of that composer's career and works, he was indebted, among others, to Mrs Bartholomew's sister. Miss Elizabeth Mounsey, and to Mendelssohn's daughter, Mrs Victor Benecke. Many of their letters are to be found in Add. MSS. 41 572 and 41573. More recently, by means of the Farnborough Fund, a further portion of the Edwards papers has been added to the Department's collections, where they now bear the numbers Egerton MSS. 3090- 3097. The Mendelssohn interest, though relatively not so important as in the earlier acquisition, is maintained in a further volume (Egerton MS. 3094) of letters from Miss Mounsey and the Benecke family. Five volumes of correspondence, on matters of musical history and antiquities, with Sir George Grove, J. A. Fuller-Mait- land. Sir John Stainer, J. S. Bumpus, William Cowan, and others bear witness to Edwards's keenness for accuracy of detail and in- defatigable research. But the chief value of this portion of the papers lies in some fifty letters of Sir Edward Elgar, and this eminent 30 English composer is further represented by an autograph score of the part-song 'How calmly the ev'ning once more is descending'. In addition, a number of letters of Sir Hubert Parry, Sir C. V. Stan- ford, Sir A. C. Mackenzie, Edward German, Coleridge Taylor, Granville Bantock, and others make the collection well representa- tive of English music and musical interest at the close of the nine- teenth and beginning of the twentieth century. B. S. 29. AN AUTOGRAPH OF BORODIN. Among the large collection of music in the Department of JL\. Manuscripts, scarcely anything is to be found of nineteenth- century Russian music, so that the recent acquisition of an autograph collection of pieces by Alexander Porfirevich Borodin is specially welcome. In 1885-6 this distinguished member of the 'New Russian School', in company with Cesar Cui, paid two visits to Belgium at the suggestion of the Comtesse de Mercy- Argenteau, whose interest in the school had been awakened by a Belgian pianist Theodore Jadoul. Among the works of Borodin which date from this period are the well-known 'Petite Suite' for pianoforte and the Scherzo in A flat for orchestra, the former dedicated to the Comtesse, the latter to Jadoul, who himself made an arrangement of the same work for pianoforte duet. The manuscript which has now been acquired by the Museum from the resources of the Farnborough Fund is a happy souvenir of these Belgian visits and friendships. It consists of twenty- five leaves, measuring 8| by 7 inches, and has received the number Egerton MS. 3087. They contain, written on one side only, six of the seven pieces which compose the 'Petite Suite', the first and most popular of the numbers 'Au Couvent' being omitted. On the other side of the leaves, except the second, the composer has copied his own pianoforte arrangement of the A flat Scherzo. They are now bound in dark purple crushed morocco in such wise that the latter work appears in correct order on f. i verso and the recto of ff. 2-1 2, with the result that the pieces of the Petite Suite do not follow con- secutively, nor does the order in which they occur correspond with that of the printed edition. The Intermezzo, the second of the printed pieces, called in the manuscript 'Menuetto', is to be found on fF. 9^, 31 lo'', 12^; the first Mazurka (here 'Mazurka 2') on fF. 7^, 8^; the second Mazurka (here 'Mazurka i') on fF. i'", 3^; the Reverie on fF. 2'" and 2^; the Serenade on fF. 4"^, 5^, and 6^. The last of the printed pieces, the Nocturne, here called 'Berceuse', occupies f. 1 1'', but has been completely cancelled. The manuscript is written throughout in pencil, and the numerous alterations and erasures serve to show the stages by which the compositions reached their final form. B. S. 30. THE LITHUANIAN NEW TESTAMENT. THE discovery of the New Testament portion of Chylinski's translation makes it possible to re-examine an old problem, namely the source of the Lithuanian version of the Lord's Prayer printed by John Wilkins in his Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language^ 1668, pp. 435-9. A persistent tradition connects this version with the London bible. Wilkins was Warden of Wadham College, Oxford, 1648-59, and his philological interests were likely to bring him into contact with Chylinski, who was at Oxford 1657-9. Anyhow, the two versions are remarkably alike, the following being the more notable differences. In the 'on earth as in heaven' clause Chylinski's has danguy, Wilkins and dangaus\ in the 'daily bread' clause Chylinski keeps the order of the Latin vulgate; for 'temptation' and 'evil' Chylinski writes pagundimg. and pikta, Wilkins pagundynima and pikto. Wilkins's scheme omits the doxology, which runs in Chylinski: Nes tawo est Karaliste, ir galibe, ir gar be and amziu. Amen.^ {amzynuju).^ Galibe is a later correction from macis. The figures give the proper order of the last two words. Another vexed question is the date to be assigned to the printed text, which, never having been published, bears no imprint in the three surviving specimens. The early references speak of 1660, and, for all we know, that year may have seen the printers start work. Lack of funds certainly dragged out the process. The Brief of 12 July 1 66 1, authorizing a public collection for the Lithuanian churches, declares that about one-half was already printed. This, if true, may mean that so much had been set up and proofs taken for revision. On 19 December 1661 two hundred reams of paper were delivered to Tyler the printer. By May 1662 the printed portion had reached the Psalms and was destined to get no farther. An altered plan was instituted by the Synod of Vilna in June 1663, dis- pensing with Chylinski and substituting new translators. The notes of expenses, September 1663-September 1664, on f. 219 must refer to the new project. Further details of these matters will be found in articles by H. Reinhold in Mitte'tlungen der Litauischen liter arischen Gesellschaft, Heft 20, 1895, pp. 105-63, and by R. Steele in The Library, 1907, pp. 57-62. H. J. M. M. 31. AN EARLY PRINTED BOOK OF HOURS FOR SARUM USE. ON the completion of fifty years since his entering the service of the Trustees Mr A. W. Pollard, formerly Keeper of Printed Books, has presented to the Library an early printed Horae B. Virginis ad usum Sarum 'as a thank-offering for the happiness which my work in the Museum, both on the staff and as a reader, has brought me\ There are no indications of the date or printer of this book and the edition to which it belongs may be unrecorded, but it must have been printed at Paris for the English market somewhere about the year 1 500. It is a small octavo of 92 leaves and 25 lines to the page and contains 1 5 full-page woodcuts, besides a number of smaller cuts, each page being also surrounded by a decorative border. A leaf at the beginning, containing the calendar for January, is wanting. Many of the cuts, as well as the type (a variety of the lettre bdtarde usual in this class of work), originally formed part of the stock of Philippe Pigouchet, by whom books of Hours printed in this style were first introduced, but the same material is also found in the hands of Jean Poitevin, Etienne Jehannot, and others, making precise identification of unsigned and undated work very difficult. On the verso of leaf 28, however, there occurs a cut of the Visitation, the border of which has breaks not visible when the same block was used by Poitevin in an edition of the Hours for Paris use of 1 5 May 1498 (I A. 40904), and this date therefore presumably forms a terminus post quern. The borders of human and animal grotesques ^ 33 and fleurs-de-lys on backgrounds in the mantere criblee have not been discovered elsewhere in the Museum collection, but in style they closely resemble those in an undated Sarum Horae assigned to the same printer, Poitevin, by Proctor (lA. 40910). A noticeable feature in the make-up is the presence of two quires signed b, each comprising eight leaves. The second of these, con- taining *sequentiae* or extracts from the Gospels relating to the Nativity, the Resurrection, and the Passion, is fitted into the middle of the first and bears on its last page a cut of the Tree of Jesse which combines with a cut of the Trinity in glory on the next following page, belonging to the other quire, to form a pictorial opening of unusually fine effect. On a fly-leaf an unnamed English owner has written: *This Book I picked up on a Stall at Venice in 1741 & had it bound there' — evidently in the dress of white vellum with a few gold stamps which it still retains. V. S. 32. AN EARLY LATIN COMEDY WRITTEN IN LONDON. THE Department of Printed Books has acquired by purchase a copy of the Paris edition of the Palamedes of Remaclus Arduenne, a Latin poet of whom nothing personal is known save that he was a native of Florennes, studied at Cologne University, was a *jurisconsultus* at Luxemburg, and secretary to a Spanish prince. He must have come to England on some occasion, for he dates the dedicatory epistle of Palamedes — addressed to Petrus Gryphus, Papal Legate in England — *ex museo nostro exiguo London.', 1 5 1 2/ 1 3. The work is a Latin prose comedy in five short acts, with an allegorical plot and characters. Usus is offering for sale two slaves of Fortune, Chrysus and Sophia. A youth, Palamedes, after hearing a lengthy speech from each of the two, prefers to buy Chrysus, but Fortune refuses to part with him alone. By the advice of a friend, the young man apologizes to Sophia and takes both slaves together to his home. This play is followed in the latter part of the volume by a series of poems on the Gospel history in Latin elegiacs. The present edition, an undated quarto, is probably a reprint (by Gilles de 34 Gourmont, whose mark appears on the title-page) of the folio printed by Pynson in March 1 5 1 2/ 1 3 , of which the only known copy was sold at Sotheby's in 1926 to Dr Rosenbach for ^^560, being part of the Britwell, and previously of the Heber, collection. The Paris edition is also exceedingly rare, no sale being recorded in Book-Prices Current, though there was a copy in the Heber sale. H. S. 33. THREE EARLY PRINTED SPANISH BOOKS. TAKING advantage of the one market in which conditions are still very favourable to this country, the Department of Printed Books has recently acquired three rare early Spanish books. The earliest in date is a Tarragona Ritual, Ordinar'tu sacrametoru secudum ritu ? cosuetudtne sct'e metropolis eccrie Tarracon, printed by Johann Rosembach at Barcelona in 1530. This book has two crucifixion cuts, woodcut borders on the title-page, and a much larger amount of text than usual in the vernacular (Catalan). It is the last produc- tion of Rosembach's press. The next in date is a book of Spanish emblems, Juan de Borja's Empresas morales, printed at Prague in 1581, while the author was Spanish ambassador at the court of the Emperor Rudolph. It con- tains one hundred engraved plates of emblems, with mottoes, and printed explanations of each. A second edition with the emblems printed from the same plates as before, and with a second part added — of which there is a copy in the King's Library — ^was printed at Brussels in 1680 for a descendant of the author. The third book is a copy of Cervantes's pastoral novel. La Galatea, here called La Discreta Galatea, printed at Lisbon (for the second time) in 16 18. Thanks largely to the Grenville Library, the Museum is particularly rich in early editions of Cervantes's works in the original language. In the case of the Galatea, while it still lacks two early editions, it is now slightly better off than the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid and the Biblioteca de Catalunya in Barcelona. 34. TWO TRACTS IN VERSE BY WILLIAM SAMUEL. MAINLY through the Friends of the National Libraries, with contributions also from the Drapers' and the Grocers' 35 Companies, the Department of Printed Books has acquired two unique EngHsh verse tracts by William Samuel, printed in London by Humphrey Powell for Hugh Singleton about 1550. Both tracts are Protestant polemics, and both were unknown to the author's biographer in the Dictionary of National Biography. One of them, 'The Practice practiced by the Pope and his prelates, which they haue vsed synce they came to their estates', is written in rhyme- royal. It deals with the suppression of the monasteries and the abolition of the Pope's supremacy in England, and is in the form of a lament by the Pope himself, whereby he is naturally brought to confess religious and secular abuses by the clergy. The other tract, 'A Warning for the cittie of London. That the Dwellers there in may Repent their euyll lyues for fears of Goddes Plages', is in a more archaic type of verse. This contains more direct attacks on religious and secular abuses, such as the deceits of tradespeople, the painting of women's faces, and other obsolete practices. It also mentions by name King Edward VI, and two Protestant martyrs, Anne Askew and Richard Hunne, a merchant tailor of London, who is quoted as an example of 'hanging the true man and letting the thief go'. As specimens of English verse of the formative and experimental period between middle and modern English, as well as for their topical and historical interest, these two tracts are a valuable addition to the Museum collections. H. T. 35. A NEWS-SHEET OF 1621. SHORTLY before the outbreak of the Great War the Depart- ment of Printed Books acquired a collection of twenty-four unique English news-sheets printed in 1620 and 1621. These are earlier in date than any previously known, and as the first eighteen were printed in Holland, they appear to place the origins of the English newspaper in a foreign country. These eighteen numbers were deemed of sujfficient importance to be reproduced in facsimile, but in spite of the attention thus drawn to them, so far as is known no other example has been brought to light until quite recently, when the Department was fortunate enough to acquire by purchase a Corrant out oj Italy ^ Germany, ^c, 'Imprinted at Amsterdam by 36 George Veseler, Ao. 1621. The 4 of Januari*. The eariiest numbers in the existing collection in the Department were printed by this same printer. The first two are dated respectively 2 December and 23 December 1620, while the third number is dated 21 January 1621. The newly acquired number therefore fills a gap between the second and third numbers of the collection. H. T. 36. BUNYAN'S PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. THE Department of Printed Books has received as a gift from Sir Leicester Harmsworth, Bart., a copy of the ninth edition of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, London, 1684. This is the second ninth edition, as the Museum already possesses a copy of the ninth edition dated 1683. While no merit attaches to this particular edition, Mr F. M. Harrison's Bibliography oj the Works of John Bunyan, published by the Bibliographical Society in 1932, gives the impression that it is rare. Except for the seventeenth edition, which also appears to be rare, the Museum now has a complete run of editions down to the thirty-second, printed in 177 1. H. T. 37. EARLY ENGLISH AND WELSH SCHOOL-BOOKS. THE Department of Printed Books has been allowed to select, from Mr David Salmon's extensive library of School-Books, one hundred and nine works not already in the Museum collection. These consist mainly of English and Welsh educational works of the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. They cover the subjects taught in elementary schools, with some additional subjects, such as shorthand, both English and Welsh, and fill many gaps in the material available for the study of the history of elementary educa- tion in England and Wales. H. T. 38. A COBDEN-S ANDERSON BINDING. AN important acquisition by the Department of Printed Books jljL is a fine example of the bookbinding of T. J. Cobden-Sander- son, bequeathed by Mrs Caroline B. Poole, of Pasadena, California. This binding, which encloses a copy of Ruskin's TJnto this Last, is of red levant morocco richly tooled with a design of roses, rose-leaves, 37 and stars, the gilded sides of the book being gauffered with a similar pattern. The book carries, in Cobden-Sanderson's handwriting, two dedications to his daughter Stella, the first recording that he was engaged upon the binding on the day of her birth ( 1 9 March 1886), the second rededicating it to her on the occasion of her marriage (30 July 19 10). It has thus the added interest of a peculiar personal history, the details of which can be pieced together from entries in Cobden-Sanderson's published Journals, Under various dates he records making drawings for the rose and rose-leaf tools, working upon the binding of this copy, with the circumstances of the two dedications, and sending it for exhibition at the Society of Arts, with the resulting award. It is evident that TJnto this Last was a favourite with him. The yournals show that later in the same year he bound another copy of the book, in a fellow binding to this, which he presented to Ruskin; and he included the work among the elect company of books subsequently printed at the 'Doves Press'. By this welcome bequest Unto this Last joins the little group of Cobden-Sanderson's bookbindings in the British Museum, begun in the binder's lifetime with his gift of Adonais, and substantiated by Mrs Cobden-Sanderson, who in 1922 presented five bindings by his own hand and six executed under his direction at the 'Doves Press'. W.A.M. 39. AN EARLY PAINTED VASE FROM KHAFAJI. KHAFAJI is the modern name for two low mounds on the Diyalah river due east of Baghdad, of which the smaller has proved a fruitful source of antiquities both before and since the 'Iraq Expedition of the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, commenced work there. The ancient name of this site, which appears to have been abandoned at the end of the archaic Sumerian period for the larger mound on the river bank, is not known, but it must have been an important town in the province Ashnunnak, called by the Elamites Tupliash. The painted pot from there, illustrated on PI. VIII, is hand-made, the striation that may be seen on the inside being due to the wood or fibre scraper used. The ware is of coarse quality, buff in colour, and thin. The decoration is 38 ' MLSrUM 14 SEP 3?. NATURAL HISTORY. '^^^:- -jl.-^ 'SBl VIII. SUMERIAN VASE FROM KHAFAJI carried out in a matt red and black on a bufF engobe, and covered the whole surface of the vase from the top of the rim, of which nothing now remains, to the rim-base. The prime element in the decoration is the division of the surface into panels by red bands, without attention to symmetry. The shoulder is entirely occupied by geometrical patterns of the net type. The figure designs in the panels on the body of the vase are illustrated in black and white. Figs. 1-3. It must be understood that many details are extremely doubtful owing to the fading of the lustrous black paint and the washing out of the matt red, represented in the figures by shading. In certain cases it is fairly certain that details which would produce a normally balanced design should be restored, as in the panel of the hero with goats, where a second kid is missing owing to the accidents of time. The object held by the seated man before the boar (?) in Fig. 2 is not so certainly a harpoon as the drawing suggests, and the hole is due to a loss of paint rather than to intention. The interesting point about these figure paintings, which are charac- terized by free brush-work, is that their character as *Sumerian' cannot be questioned. Some scenes, e.g. the drinking scene, the bull in front of a harp, the hero with animals, in Fig. 3, are well known on archaic cylinder seals. On the other hand, the pot cannot well belong to the archaic Sumerian period, though it resembles in shape pots from Cemetery *A* at Kish, for no pottery painted in this style has ever been found connected with archaic Sumerian remains of the period First Dynasty of Ur — Sargon of Agade. The matt red paint is used on a ware often found with the very different Jamdat Nasr ware at Ur and Erech, and the shape would not be impossible in the painted pottery period. The vase then most prob- ably belongs to the period when the Jamdat Nasr pottery was made, but even so is at present an isolated example, without true parallels. The vase then is an historical document of some importance. Additional interest attaches to it on account of the chariot scene. Fig. I. The details of this picture, such as the shape of the chariot, or the saw-edged wheels, which may represent the effect of wear on wooden bands, are found on other monuments of the archaic 40 IX. ANTIQUITIES FROM 'IRAQ NATUF.AL HISTORY. Sumerian period, though the ornament in front of the quiver is not known elsewhere; but the presence of a 'reserve' behind the four harnessed animals should prove that these cannot be asses, since they could hardly be so trained. Either the horse (Przewalski's horse ) or the mule may be intended; in that case much that has been written about the introduction of the horse into Babylonia requires revision. It is interesting to note that on this vase, as on the 'standard* from Ur {B.M.Q., Vol. Ill, PI. XXXIII) scenes of war and banqueting are juxtaposed. S. S. 40. SUMERIAN AND BABYLONIAN ANTIQUITIES. THE small Sumerian head. No. 123285, illustrated on PI. IX A, a and b, is known to have been found at Khafaji, a site on the Diyalah River in the ancient province Ashnunnak marked by two mounds; of these the older, not apparently inhabited after the archaic Sumerian period which ends about 2500 B.C., is being excavated by the 'Iraq expedition of the Oriental Institute, Univer- sity of Chicago. The head is a good example of many heads found at this site; the noticeable peculiarities as compared with other heads at present in the collection are the treatment of the ear, and the exaggerated nose, fortunately complete. The two terracotta plaques, PI. X, are of peculiar interest owing to their subjects. No. 123287 {a) shows a human figure holding weapons, with weapons standing beside him, in a chariot drawn by four lions, themselves driven or led by a charioteer. The extreme sides of the chariot are apparently decorated with two demon's heads, of a well-known type. Chariot and lions stand on a pedestal, presumably of brick-work, at either end of which is a figure bearing the holy water-pot from which two streams flow.^ Apparently the plaque depicts a colossal group-statue on a raised platform; the chariot group from Carchemish will serve as the type. It would be natural to suppose that the principal figure was intended for a god, but in the present instance he does not wear the usual horned head- dress of the Babylonian deity, though he appears to do so on less ^ Recently discussed by Mrs E. Douglas van Buren, The Flowing Vase and the God with Streams^ Berlin, 1933. G 41 well-preserved examples in the Baghdad Museum. The plaque is probably not much later in date than the Third Dynasty of Ur, about 2300-2150 B.C., and is certainly not much earlier. The explanation of plaque No. 123286 (S) must be very doubtful. It may be that a truss of reeds, bound round at intervals, with a conically rounded top, is intended; out of this there peers a bearded god, with long hair that runs round the lower face and beard like a halo; the two hands once held objects modelled in relief, now broken away. The six cylinder seals of which impressions are published on PI. IX, c-h, are all finely cut. No. 123280 (g) is very early, possibly as old as any seal in the collection, and is of special interest as illustrating the reed hut construction recently discussed by Dr Andrae.^ No. 123279 (c) is also an archaic seal, with a clear representation of a god whose hands and feet are shackled, while the man approaching him is carrying a net; the scene may refer to the Babylonian myth which describes the murder of a rebellious god from whose blood mankind was created. No. 123 281 (e) is a fine specimen of the Third Dynasty of Ur period; the goddess to whom the suppliant is introduced is probably Ba-u or Ba-ba, whose sacred birds below in this case most resemble swans swimming in celestial waters (compare B.M.Q., Vol. I, PL XXI b). No. 123284 {d) is a product of the 'mixed' art of Syria. Two figures wearing the atef crown and a kilt like that of a Pharaoh, stand with crossed legs, after the fashion of Akhnaten, holding what should be a was sceptre but has grown into a flower; between these twins is a human figure wearing a Hittite cap, with a cerastes head taking the place of the ordinary cobra-head uraeus, and a fringed garment. The female figure in a long skirt also has a uraeus, and appears to be wearing rings round her waist, like the figures with the atef crown — a Cretan fashion. The date is uncertain; '14th to 1 2th century B.C.* is an approximation, 'Amarna period' a reason- able guess. No. 123283 (/) contains some interesting magical figures, winged gryphons, 'running' female sphinxes, and the twined-cord pattern. ' W. Andrae, Gotteshaus^ Berlin, 1931. 42 < Q ID w O < Pi w h I— I < o X 14 SEP 37. NATUFvAL HISTORY. XII. GARRAWAY RICE BEQUEST Date uncertain, probably second half of second millennium, say 1 500-1 200 B.C. The enigmatical seal no. 123282 [h) may be either archaic or provincial; the archer wears an unusual skirt, and the subject recalls Assyrian seals of the late second millennium. S. S. 41. GRANITE RAM FROM THE SUDAN. THE purchase of objects from Professor Griffith's Oxford Excavations in Nubia 1 930-1 has been completed^ this year by the acquisition of the colossal granite ram (PI. XI) ^ of which the pair is at the Ashmolean. It is an imposing monument in grey granite. The ram is lying full- length, in the traditional position with forelegs doubled under, and protects a figure of the pharaoh Taharqa, who stands upright between the ram's knees and under his chin. Despite the rather clumsy cutting of the figure of the king, his face, if not a good portrait, yet shows a marked resemblance to that of his (smaller) granite sphinx, acquired from the same source last year, and now on exhibition in the Egyptian Sculpture Gallery (No. 1770; see B.M.Q., Vol. VII, PL XIX 6), The monumental proportions of the ram itself are suited to the simple treatment of its sculpture, so that there is a finished appearance about the whole figure; and its excel- lent state of preservation makes it generally superior to the familiar series of rams at Karnak. A corner of the right front knee and a fragment of the tail, together with the parts of the plinth adjacent in each case, have been broken off; and the gilded disk which fitted, with a socket, into the hole in the top of the ram's head has been lost. But the surface of the object is unimpaired. The ram is one of four, found in front of the first and second pylons respectively of the stone temple which Taharqa began to build for Amen at Kawa in 683 B.C. An inscription in duplicate runs round the sides of the plinth from front to back and proclaims Taharqa as the son of Amen and Mut, Lady of Heaven, 'who fully satisfies the heart of his father Amen'. S. R. K. G. 1 See B.M.Q., Vol. VII, p. 45 f. 2 No. 1779. Plinth 5 ft. 4 in. by 2 ft. i in.; greatest height of monument 3 ft. 5J in.; height of figure of king i ft. 9I in. 43 42. THE GARRAWAY RICE BEQUEST OF PREHISTORIC OBJECTS. /iPART from some specific bequests, Mr R. Garraway Rice, xjL J.P., F.S.A., left to the Museum the first choice of his extensive and miscellaneous collection; and the chief specimens selected for the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities are here briefly described in chronological order (PI. XII). Two unusually large palaeoliths come from Reculver and Gillingham, Kent, and may be dated early St Acheul. There are six hand-axes from various sites in London, but the largest selection came from the gravel pits on the loo-feet contour at Yiewsley, two miles south of Uxbridge. Here the ancient Thames gravel is exceptionally prolific, and both St Acheul and Le Moustier periods are well represented, the latter by flake-implements of Levallois or Northfleet type, rather smaller than those from the type-station near Swanscombe (also represented in the Bequest). Flakes and implements probably of middle Palaeolithic date from Broom, near Axminster, are all made of the local chert; and some interesting flakes of somewhat later appearance come from Ospringe, near Faversham (Proc. Soc, Ant'tq.^ xxiii. 450). A bronze spear-head of the late Bronze Age from Sutton End, near Petworth, Sussex, has been described in Archaeologta^ Ixix, fig. 13, p. 15, and is peculiar in having six circular holes in two lines along the central rib of the blade. Several examples of the 'bucket* urn of pottery, used to contain cremated remains, have been restored from pieces found in the soil at Yiewsley, and belong to the Ashford type now recognized as a phase of the late Bronze Age, and connected with the Urnfield culture of the Continent. With these urns are some tile- like slabs of clay with many perforations, perhaps used for cooking. A bronze bowl from Mitcham is a late Roman type which goes back to the Hallstatt period, with hemispherical bosses round the hori- zontal lip. It may have come from an Anglo-Saxon grave, as there is a cemetery of that date in the vicinity; but in any case it is a rarity in England. The freedom of choice allowed in Mr Rice's will is much appreciated, and several other museums will absorb the out- standing specimens of a remarkable collection. In addition to the spear-head and clay grid the following are selected for illustration; 44 ^2^ if' XIII. CESENA TREASURE I BRITISH ! TviLSFUM 14 SEP 3?; NATUF->AL HISTORY. 1 -^9^ XIV. KESZTHELY ORNAMENTS a patinated flake-implement from Yiewsley of Levallois type; a skinning knife of flint with polished edges from Thetford, Norfolk; and a neolithic celt with pointed butt from Harlington, Middlesex, made of hornblende-gneiss, probably a glacial erratic in the gravel. R. A. S. 43. THE CESENA TREASURE. THE belated discovery that the Cesena treasure was not found in Hungary, as originally stated, has induced the National Museum of Hungary to part with the portion of it secured by Buda-Pest to the British Museum, the cost being shared by the Trustees and the National Art-Collections Fund. There is a jewelled eagle from the hoard in private hands (figured in colours on the frontispiece of the Catalogue of the Dark Ages Exhibition at the Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1930), and other items in Nuremberg Museum (briefly des- cribed by Nils Aberg in Die Goten und Langobarden in Itaiien, p. 29); but the present purchase includes most of the types, and may be regarded as a product of Ostrogothic Italy early in the sixth century, just before the death of Theodoric the Great in 526. The treasure is now known to have been found at Cesena, 20 miles south of Ravenna, where the imperial tradition was strong but subjected to barbarian pressure, and it is at present difficult to distinguish the Roman and Gothic elements. The Ostrogoths were Arian heretics, and it is inter- esting to find in the two principal pieces of the hoard (PI. XIII, Figs. 4 and 6) a Latin cross inlaid with garnet, raised on a background of similar garnet cell-work and flanked by fishes, which are early Christian symbols, the letters of the Greek word for fish being the initials of the Christian confession of faith. Among the Lombards, who entered Italy in 568, the equal-armed or Greek cross was in common use; and an early limit of date is given by the second Szilagy-Somlyo (early fifth century) hoard which has the beginnings of S scrolls in filigree on a brooch, evidently earlier than the hairpin from Cesena (Fig. 5). The bee or cicada pattern, well seen in the treasure from Child eric's tomb at Tournai (d. 48 1), is much debased in the pendants of a necklace (Fig. 2); and the elaborate ear-ring (Fig. 3), with garnet cell-work and pearl drops, is removed by several generations from those in the late Roman treasure described by the 45 late Professor Walter Dennison, PI. XLI. The massive gold finger- ring (Fig. 7) with octagonal hoop and flight of steps below a pyra- midal garnet, is of a rare type represented in the Museum by No. 176 a of the Catalogue of Finger Rings, Early Christian, Medieval and Later-, and the pair of gold casings (Fig. i), with open filigree on one face, are more likely to be the chapes of knife-sheaths than strap- ends, as the projecting border and rivets would hamper their passage through a buckle. All the pieces are presumably of the same date, and the fine quality of the garnet inlay on Figs. 4 and 6 recalls the jewellery connected with Theodoric at Ravenna {Archaeologia, xlvi, 237, PI. VII). A hint as to their place of manufacture is given in the latest work on Byzantine art (Hayford Peirce and Royall Tyler, UArt Byzantin, tome i, p. 32): 'We do not know any garnet cell-work that can be said to be Byzantine, but the character of the ornament is too like that on jewels represented on Byzantine objects for them to be passed over. Would the jewellery called barbarian, with its violent contrasts of red and gold, have been repugnant to them?' R. A. S. 44. ORNAMENTS OF KESZTHELY TYPE. IN 1878-9 a cemetery was discovered at Keszthely, Com. Zala, at the west end of Lake Balaton in Hungary and produced a large quantity of grave-furniture, strange in appearance and of uncertain origin. It is perhaps best known from Joseph Hampel's illustrations in AlterthUmer desjriihen Mittelalters in TJngarn, and the most com- mon form is a girdle-end in bronze with scrolls in openwork and low relief. Some of these are already in the Museum, but the rarer ornaments are included in the purchase from Buda-Pest Museum, towards which the National Art-Collections Fund has generously contributed (PL XIV). The distribution of this type in Hungary is now seen to cover a rectangular area including the middle courses of the Danube and Theiss, Keszthely itself being the western limit (P. Reinecke in Germania, xii. 91); and most authorities agree in explaining it by an invasion from the east, whether of the Sarma- tians, Huns, or Alans. The tendency now is to identify this type with the Avars, who were in control from late in the sixth century 46 XV a. BYZANTINE COIN-PENDANT b, ROMAN GOLD COINS NA'rUF X BRITISH 14 SEP 37. NATURAL HISTORY. tl't*^- ■^^^ '«%=^ vii >^ «^r""^i^ ar-ii ^^ ^^.'•f' ?!»' XVIII. INFRA-RED PHOTOGRAPHY OF ILLEGIBLE MSS. (Scale I) plates, and in fewer still can the camera be said to be more efficient than the eye. The result of using infra-red plates for some Egyptian leather documents, on which writing in black ink can only just be discerned but not deciphered, has, on the other hand, been conspicuously successful. In certain cases this leather has turned a dark brownish red, and the surface has a 'bubbled' appearance due to partial liquefaction owing to exposure to damp or some other atmospheric condition. PL XVIII, Fig. a from a panchromatic plate shows, in the case of one specimen, what the normal eye can see. Fig. b, from a panchromatic plate with red screen, brings out fairly clearly the writing in red ink which constitutes the 'rubrics' of a copy of the 'Book of the Dead'; this could be deciphered directly from the document. Fig. f, from an infra-red plate, shows the writing in black ink with a clarity that can be little inferior to its original state apart from rents and damage to the surface. The specimen is a fragment of a document. No. 1 028 1 , in 13 pieces, which can now be deciphered. It is written in a good hieratic hand, and appears, so far as the study has yet proceeded, to present a very sound text, free from the corruptions which abound in many copies. The photo- graphs prove that at least five joins of separate fragments should be effected, and that the average number of lines to a 'page' was 16. There are not many of these leather documents in the collection, and most of them are legible. The other documents previously considered illegible are some Coptic magical texts, chiefly of the love potion type, and some fragments of secular hieratic texts. Though the discovery of the efficacy of infra-red photographs for this kind of material will not result in the discovery of any unusual texts so far as the collection in this museum is concerned, the official photographer's experiment has a technical interest and may lead to noteworthy results. S. S. 52. CORRECTIONS. IN the notice on p. 65 of Vol. VII (December 1 93 2) of the copy of Blake's Songs of Innocence and oj Experience given by Miss Carey, some slight inaccuracies should be corrected. The book came to 53 Miss Carey from her mother Lady Carey, to whom it was given by her aunt (not mother) Mrs Charles Warren, who may well have got it direct from Blake, but of this there is no actual evidence. The Muchelney Breviary (p. 109 of Vol. VII) was presented by the anonymous donor through the Friends of the National Libraries. 53. OTHER GIFTS. POEMS on Domestic Circumstances. Fare thee well! A Sketch from Private Life. By Lord Byron. With the Star of the Legion of Honour, and other poems. London: printed for J. Bumpus, 1 8 1 6. Presented by Miss M. S, Ho/gate through the Friends of the National Libraries. The Barges of the Merchant Taylors* Company. By R. T. D. Sayle. Printed for private circulation, 1933. Presented by the Master and Wardens of the Merchant Taylors^ Company. The Wisdom of Jesus the son of Sirach, commonly called Ecclesias- ticus. The Ashendene Press, Chelsea, 1932. Presented by Mr C. H. St John Hornby. The History of the Finch Family. By Bryan I'Anson. Janson & Co., London, 1933. Presented by the author. Vilh. Gronbech: William Blake, kunstner, digter, mystiker. Kobenhavn, 1933. Presented by the author. Pomes Penyeach. By James Joyce. Initial letters designed and illuminated by Lucia Joyce. The Obelisk Press, Paris; Desmond Harmsworth Ltd., London, 1932. Presented by the author. Rhymes and Roundelayes in praise of a country life. London, 1857. In a handsome green morocco binding signed: N. M. Holloway, London. Presented by Mr E. Zaehnsdorf. A Check List of Fifteenth-Century Books in the Newberry Library and in other libraries of Chicago. Compiled by Pierce Butler. Chicago, 1933. Presented by the Trustees of the Newberry Li- brary. Schloss Hallwil. II. Die Ausgrabungen. Ill: i. Die Fund- gegenstande. Von Nils Lithberg. Stockholm, 1932. Presented by Professor Nils Lithberg. J. W. Power. Elements de la construction picturale. Apergu des 54 methodes des maitres anciens et des maitres modernes. Paris, 1933. Presented by Mr y. JV. Power. Heroic Statues in Bronze of Abraham Lincoln. Introducing the Hoosier Youth of Paul Manship. By Franklin B. Mead. The Lincoln National Life Foundation, Fort Wayne, Indiana, 1932. Presented by the author, Le College de France (i 530-1930). Livre jubilaire compost a I'occasion de son quatrieme centenaire. Paris, 1932. Le IV* Centenaire du College de France (i 530-1 930). Relation des fetes commemoratives donnees ^ Paris au mois de Juin 193 1. Paris, 1932. Presented by the College de France, Three children's books, published in London about the year 1800: The Entertaining History of Little Goody Goosecap. The Histories of More Children than One. Waters*s Poetical Flower Garden. Presented by Mr Percy Z, Round, The Story of Kalaka. Texts, history, legends, and miniature paintings of the Svetambara Jain hagiographical work The Kala- kacaryakatha. With 15 plates. By W. Norman Brown. The Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 1933. Presented by the Smithsonian Institution, English Catalogue of Treasures in the Imperial Repository, Shosoin. By Jiro Harada. Tokyo, 1932. Presented by the Imperial Household Museum, Tokyo, Pocket note-book of an English surgeon, c. 1609 (Add. MS. 43408). Presented by Dr Maurice Ernest, Glossary of Cornish English, by Dr William Pryce in preparation for his Miner alogia Cornubiensis, 1778 (Add. MS. 43409). Presented by Mr Richard Bevan, L.R.C.P, Lond,, &c, Commonplace-Book of Charles Caesar, 1705 (Add. MS. 43410). Presented by Mr Stonewall Jackson, Letters from Sir H. M. Stanley to John Bolton, 1878-99, and an autograph article by Gen. Gordon on India (Add. MS. 4341 1). Presented by Mr P, C, Bolton, Score of Weber's *Der Freyschutz' (selection), by L. A. Jullia and compositions of H. Vogels (Add. MSS. 43468-43470). Presented by Miss Mapleson, 55 Two letters and copy of will of Charles Fitz-Charles, Earl of Ply- mouth ('Don Carlos'), natural son of Charles II, and letter of Thomas Hickman Windsor, Earl of Plymouth. Presented by Mr A. Francis Steuart through the Friends of the National Libraries. Three letters of Thomas Castle, the antiquary, concerning the Act for making deductions of sixpence in the pound from payments from the Crown, 1798-9. Presented by Mr Warren R. Dawson through the Friends oj the National Libraries. Copy (10 Dec. 1 501) of an agreement, 17 June 1428, between the towns of Guadalcanal and Azuaga regarding water rights in the rivers Sotillo and Guaditoca; Spanish (Add. Ch. 70789). Presented by Mr G. A, Keen. A manuscript of Cherita Chekil Wanang Pati, a Malay heroic tale belonging to the Javanese cycle of legend. Eighteenth century (?). 4°. Presented by Tengku Khalid ibni Bendahara Tengku Chik Abdullah, of Kelantan. Charles Conder: Portrait of Mrs A. A. Humphrey; proof of original lithograph, CD. 12. Presented by Mr T, B, Layton through the National Art-Collections Fund. Six prints from the Print Collectors* Club, 1932 and 1933. Presented by Mr Martin Hardie, R.E. Six etchings by Mr Anton Lock. Presented by the artist. Fine painted jug, beak spout, from a Luristan grave. Presented by Mr 0. C. Raphael. Egyptian gold ring. Presented by Mr Howard C. Back. Stone fragment with Egyptian inscription and a clay tablet with New Babylonian inscription. Presented by Dr Sherborn. Funerary box with mummified remains in miniature human form. Presented by the Committee oj the Public Library, Museum, and Art Gallery, Herejord. A Chinese white porcelain bowl with Hsiian Te mark (1426-35). Presented by Mrs Walter Sedgwick. A Chinese blue and white bowl with Hsiian Te mark, but probably of eighteenth-century date. Presented by Mr Ernest Thornhill. A Chinese porcelain vase with ying ch'ing glaze: Sung or Yiian 56 Dynasty. Presented by Mr H. Eric Miller through the National Art-Collections Fund. A Chinese blue and white porcelain vase, sixteenth century. Presented by Sir Percival David, Bart. A Sung pottery bowl of Ting type. Presented by Mr F. D. Samuel. Five Chinese porcelain dishes with jamille verte decoration, a Canton carved ivory tray, and three reticulated ivory boxes. Pre- sented by Mr G. Abercromby. Tortoise-core of flint from Yiewsley, Middlesex; and flakes of Clacton type from Swanscombe, Kent. Presented by Mr y, P, T, Burchell. Collection of flint graving tools from Puy-de-Lacan, near Brive, Correze. Presented by Mr H. H. Kidder. Twenty-seven flint knives of plano-convex type. Presented by Mr G. y. Buscall Fox. A selection of flint implements; a bronze bowl from Mitcham, fifth century; a late Bronze Age spear-head from Petworth, Sussex; Early Iron Age urns from Yiewsley, Middlesex; and other anti- quities. Bequeathed by Mr R. Garraway Rice. Two Early British urns from Wing, Leighton Buzzard. Presented by Mrs H. G. Goold. Pottery fragments, bone spools, &c. from Saxon huts at Sutton Courtenay, Berks. Presented by Mr E. Thurlow heeds. Cone-knop spoon of latten, fifteenth century. Presented by Mr and Mrs Norman Gask. Two ivory reliefs, with portrait busts from the antique, French, eighteenth century. Presented by the Director, Mystery clock made by McNab of Perth about 1 8 1 6. Presented by Miss Isabel N. Napier. Two fibre dresses with shell pendants and three convicts' identity discs, from the Andaman Islands. Presented by Mrs W. H. Burt. Three pottery pipe bowls from Uganda, collected about 1870 by the Rev. C. T. Wilson. Presented by Mrs C. T. Wilson. Swaddling clothes with Hebrew inscription embroidered in colours. Anonymous donation. Large series of beadwork and a few ethnographical specimens I S7 from the neighbourhood of Tsolo, East Griqualand, S. Africa. Presented by Mr Frank Corner, Flax woven cloak, with embroidered borders, from New Zealand. Presented by Miss M. E. Ashby, Cylindrical stone, possibly a pounder, grooved at one end. Pre^ sented by Mr Clarence Elliott, A pair of chank-shell trumpets, with gilt metal mounts showing Buddhist emblems in relief, and silk streamers; a painted double skull-drum; and an ivory plaque, representing Garuda, in gilt-copper setting. Lamaistic Buddhism, Tibet. Presented by Mr H.Eric Miller. A stone polished axe, grooved at the butt, from Dominica. Pre^ sented by Mr A. H. L. Thomas, M.R.C.S. An old pottery vase and potsherds, excavated on Government Hill, Tarkwa, Gold Coast. Presented by Mr R. P. Wild. A guinea of William III, two shillings of James I, a Scots quarter merk of James VI, and four specimens of the Irish gun-money of James II, all rare variants. Presented by Miss Helen Farquhar. Fifty-seven silver, 1 2 nickel, and 43 bronze English, European and Oriental coins of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Presented by Mr Henry Garside. Eight Constantinian bronze coins and a 40-nummi piece of Justinian I. Presented by Brigadier-Gen. W. E. Clark, CM. G., D.S. O. Ten silver Anglo-Saxon sceattas found during the Whitby exca- vations. Presented by the Hon. Mrs Tatton Willoughby. Six silver and 1 3 bronze Roman coins of the fourth and second century. Presented by Monsieur Paul Tinchant. RECENT PUBLICATIONS SEVERAL years ago the Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts had the good fortune to secure 74 large and closely written vellum folios containing portions of the huge Arabic lexicon of al-Kall, celebrated as the founder of philological studies in Moslem Spain. Of this work nothing was previously known to exist save some short fragments preserved in the Biblioth^que Nationale. The British Museum MS. provides a fine example of old 58 Andalusian writing, not particularly elegant, but executed with that extreme accuracy and completeness of vocalization so vital to a text whose subject matter is an exact science, and dating probably not more than fifty years after the author's death, which took place in A.D. 967. Those surviving portions enable us to realize the vast scope of the complete work, embracing the whole treasure of the Arabic language and packed with copious citations from the ancient Arabian poetry. In order that such an important text might be made avail- able to students, a facsimile has been published by order of the Trustees, with an introduction containing a description of the manuscript, an account of the author and his writings, an examina- tion of the peculiar plan of the lexicon, and an index of all the Arabic roots dealt with in the text. The price is los. 6d. The fifth volume of the new edition of the General Catalogue of Printed Books in the British Museum was published in April of this year. This instalment carries the letter A from the heading Anne, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, to that of Aristias, in 1004 columns as against 596 columns in the corresponding section of the previous edition. The Catalogue of the Greek, 'Etruscan, and Roman Paintings and Mosaics in the British Museum, by R. P. Hinks, describes the material from Egypt, Cyprus, Crete, Greece, Asia Minor, North Africa, Italy, France, and England in the Departments of Greek and Roman Antiquities and British and Medieval Antiquities. Thirty- two collotype plates and 168 half-tone blocks illustrate almost every piece described; and the catalogue is preceded by an introduction dealing with the history and technical development of ancient pictorial and ornamental art. (Price \os,) Reproductions issued since the last appearance of the Quarterly are: Saxton's map of Yorkshire, double sheet, loj. Two letters of Queen Elizabeth: (i) to her brother Edward VI {c, 1550-3); (2) to James VI of Scotland (1603). 9^/. each. 59 THE DEPARTMENT OF ORIENTAL ANTIQUITIES AND OF ETHNOGRAPHY UNDER this name has been constituted a new Department, combining portions of the existing Departments of Ceramics and Ethnography, and of Prints and Drawings. It comprises: (a) Antiquities and Objects of Art of the Near, Middle, and Far East and India, other than those which are already included in the Departments of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities and of Greek and Roman Antiquities. (S) Oriental Paintings, Drawings, and Prints, which were hitherto included as a Sub-Department of Prints and Drawings. (f) As a Sub-Department, the Ethnographical Collections. The Department of Ceramics as such ceases to exist; but the Western Ceramics and Glass for the present remain under the charge of the Keeper of the new Department. Later they will be returned to the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities. The galleries hitherto devoted to illustration of the Religions of the East will serve for series illustrating the development of Asiatic sculpture, metal-work, and other allied arts. Other minor modifications will probably be made, as trial shows them to be desirable. The staff will for the present consist of: Keeper: Mr R. L. Hobson, C.B. Assistant-Keepers: Mr William King (Western Ceramics and Glass); Mr Basil Gray; Mr R. S. Jenyns. Sub-Department of Ethnography. Deputy-Keeper: Mr T. A. Joyce. Assistant-Keepers: Mr H. J. Braunholtz; Mr Adrian Digby. For the most part the objects constituting the collections affected will not for the present be moved from their locations; for instance, the oriental paintings, drawings, and prints, will remain in the Print Room; the Western Ceramics and Glass in the Medieval and Ceramics Gallery of the King Edward VII Building. The prospect of the installation of all the Oriental Collections in one wing of the Museum, or possibly in a Central Museum of Asiatic Art and Antiquities, and the creation of an independent Department or 60 Museum of Ethnology, may be remote; but the newly constituted Department is a first step in that direction, and brings the collections affected into line with the other collections of antiquities, which, in accordance with the policy of the Museum, are normally arranged on a geographical and historical, not on a technical basis. APPOINTMENTS MR ARTHUR MAYGER HIND, O.B.E.,has been appointed by the Principal Trustees to succeed Mr Laurence Binyon, C.H., as Keeper of the Department of Prints and Drawings, from lo September 1933. Mr Arthur Ewart Popham has been appointed to be Deputy- Keeper of the same Department from the same date. 61 \ BRITISH 14 SEP 37. NATUFvAL . .HISTORY. RECENT PUBLICATIONS CATALOGUE OF THE KING'S MUSIC LIBRARY By William Barclay Squire, M.V.O., M.A., F.S.A., F.R.C.M. Part IL THE MISCELLANEOUS MANUSCRIPTS. By Hilda Andrews, Mus.Bac. Pp. X4-278. 1929. los. PartIIL printed music AND musical LITERATURE. Pp. iv + 384. 1929. 15s. CATALOGUE OF THE MONTAGUE GUEST COLLECTION OF BADGES, TOKENS, AND PASSES. Pp. x4- 206, with 8 plates. 1930. 13s. SHORT GUIDE TO THE SCULPTURES OF THE PARTHENON. Third edition. 1930. Pp. 40, with 39 illustrations. 6d. A GENERAL INTRODUCTORY GUIDE TO THE EGYPTIAN COL- LECTIONS. New edition. 1930. Pp. 460, with 233 illustrations. 2s. 6d. A CORPUS OF ITALIAN MEDALS OF THE RENAISSANCE BEFORE CELLINI, by G. F. Hill. Two vols.: text, pp. xvii+371, and 201 plates. 1930. CATALOGUE OF BOOKS PRINTED IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY NOW IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. PartVL Italy: Foligno, Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Bologna, Naples, Perugia, and Treviso. Pp. 1 + 301 (599-899), with 31 plates of facsimiles (XLII*-LXXII»). 1930. ;^3 3s. COINS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Vol. II: Vespasian to Domitian. With an introduction and 83 plates. By Harold Mattingly, M.A. 1930. 8vo. i^ 3s. SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD, 1577-80. Two contemporary maps. Second edition, revised. 1931. 4to. 3s. 6d CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF GREEK AND ROMAN ANTIQUITIES: By F.N.Pryce,M.A.,F.S.A. Vol. I, Part L Prehcllenic and Early Greek. Pp. viii+214, with 43 plates and 246 figures in text. 1928. i8s. Part II. Cypriote and Etruscan. Pp. viii+ 261, with 6 plates and 132 figures in text. 1931. ;^i. CODEX ALEXANDRINUS in reduced photographic facsimile. Old Testament, Part II. I Samuel — II Chronicles. 232 plates. 1931. ;^2 2s. CATALOGUE OF DRAWINGS BY DUTCH AND FLEMISH ARTISTS PRESERVED IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PRINTS AND DRAWINGS, BRITISH MUSEUM. By Arthur M. Hind, M.A., F.S.A. Vol. IV. Dutch Drawingsof the 17th Century (N-Z and Anonymous). 1931. 8vo. ;^2 los. THE STURGE COLLECTION: An Illustrated Selection of Flints from Britain bequeathed in 1919 by William Allen Sturge, M.V.O., M.D., F.R.C.P. By Reginald A. Smith, F.S.A. 1931. 8vo. With 11 plates and numerous illustrations in the text. £1 5s. CUNEIFORM TEXTS FROM BABYLONIAN TABLETS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Part XLI (50 plates), by C. J. Gadd, M.A., F.S.A. 1931. Folio. 1 6s. ^.J CATALOGUE OF PAINTINGS RECOVERED FROM TUN-HUANG BY SIR AUREL STEIN. By Arthur Waley. Pp. Hi + 328. 1931. 8vo. £2. SUPPLEMENTARY CATALOGUE OF THE TAMIL BOOKS. By L. D. Barnett. Pp. 695. 193 1. ;^3 3s. GENERAL CATALOGUE OF PRINTED BOOKS. Vol. I, A-Aegidius. 1004 cols. 1931. Vol. II, Aegidius-AIeu. 996 cols. 1931. Vol. III. Alevra- America. 10,04 cols. 1932. Vol. IV, America-Anne. 988 cols. 1932. Vol. V, Anne-Aristias. 1004 cols. 1933. Each j[^ (to original subscribers ^^3). THE PRISMS OF ESARHADDON AND OF ASHURBANIPAL. By Dr. R. Campbell Thompson. Pp. 36, with 18 plates. 1931. los. BABYLONIAN LEGENDS OF THE CREATION. By Sir E. A. Wallis Budge. New edition. Pp.76. 1931. is. 6d. THELUTTRELL PSALTER. 183 Plates,withan Introduction by E.G.Millar. A GUIDE TO THE ISLAMIC POTTERY OF THE NEAR EAST. By R. L. HOBSON. 2S. CORPUS VASORUM ANTIQUORUM (Great Britain fasc. X, British Museum VII}. Edited by F. N. Pryce. 48 plates. 15^. CASTS OF PERSIAN SCULPTURES OF THE ACHAEMENID PERIOD. 1 2 Plates. 6^. (with portfolio ys.) or 6d. each. CATALOGUE OF DUTCH AND FLEMISH DRAWINGS OF THE XV AND XVI CENTURIES. By A. E. Popham. 83 plates. £2 7s. 6d. GUIDE TO THE PRINCIPAL COINS OF THE GREEKS from circa 700 B.C. to A.D. 270, based on the work of Barclay V. Head. 50 plates. 1932. 15/. CATALOGUE OF ADDITIONS TO THE MANUSCRIPTS 1916-1920. 1933- ;^3 lOJ. FLINTS. An illustrated manual of the Stone Age for Beginners. By R. A. Smith. Reprint. 1932. bd. CATALOGUE OF THE GREEK ETRUSCAN AND ROMAN PAINT- INGS AND MOSAICS. By R. P. Hinks. Pp. Ixxi +157, with 168 figs, and 32 plates. 1933. £2. FACSIMILE OF THE MS. OF AL-KITAB AL-BARI' FI 'L-LUGHAH, by Al-Kali, Edited by A. S. Fulton. Pp. 16, with 148 plates. 1933. los. 6d. SAXTON'S MAPS OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES, reproduced in colour. Single sheets, 5^. each. In progress. REPLICAS AND CASTS of the finest objects from Ur can be supplied to order List and prices will be sent on application to the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. FULL LISTS OF THE PUBLICATIONS, PICTORIAL POSTCARDS, PHOTOGRAVURES and other Reproductions issued by the British Museum can be had on application to the Director, British Museum, London, W.C. i. THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-^voL.viiLNO. 2 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1933 THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY FOUR PARTS ARE PUBLISHED ANNUALLY, each dealing with the principal acquisitions of the previous quarter. The descriptions are intended to be not too technical for the layman, and to give the expert part at least of what he needs to know. Notice is also given of the temporary exhibitions periodically installed in the galleries, the results of excavations, and additions to the publications of the Museum. Crown j\.to, averaging 22 pages + 16 pages oj plates. Price 2s. 6d, : 2s, 9^. postjree, los, {postJree)Jor Jour parts. It would help the Trustees if those intend- ing to subscribe would do so for five-year periods at a cost, post free, of ^2 i oj. Cases and title-pages for the annual volumes can be obtained from the Oxford University Press at a charge of 3s. 3d. for case and binding or is. 6d. for case alone (packing and postage in the British Isles included). The price of back parts has been raised to 2j. 6d. each as from the issue of Vol. VI, No. i. PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME Vin. NUMBER 2. OCTOBER, 1933 BRr; JSH MUSFUM 12 DEC 3S NATURAL HISTORY. .^5^-'--jJBW»?»»a»T»*«. *, .,•..,■*. XIX. DRAWING OF THE EARLY DUTCH SCHOOL THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-. VOL. VIII. N0.2 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1933 Sold at THE BRITISH MUSEUM and by BERNARD QUARITCH ii Grafton Street London W.\ HUMPHREY MILFORD Oxford University Press London E.C.^ KEGAN PAUL, TRUBNER & Co. Ltd. 38 Great Russell Street London W.C.i PXINTKD IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THK UNIVERSITY PRE8B, OXFORD BY JOHN JOHNSON, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY CONTENTS 54. A Dutch Drawing of the first half of the Sixteenth Century 55. A Drawing by Gentile Bellini . . . 56. A Sheet of Studies by Jacopo Pontormo 57. Drawings from the Selwyn Image Collection 58. A Drawing by Philippe Mercier 59. Sporting Prints and Drawings . 60. Ceramic Documents from Honan 61. A Nepalese Painting of the early Sixteenth Century 62. A Woodcut by Okumura Masanobu . 6 2' Two Italic Girdles ..... 64. A new Kushan Coin .... 6^, A Hieratic Papyrus .... 66. An early British Spoon .... 67. Bequest of the late Dame Clarissa Reid, D.B.E. 68. Townshend Papers .... 69. A 'Private View* of the Museum in 1756 70. Nelson's Log-Book .... 71. The George Smith Memorial Bequest 72. A Tract by St Augustine 73. A Spanish Writing-Book 74. Three Sixteenth-Century English Pamphlets 75. Some Hindustani Poems 76. Other Gifts Recent Publications .... Appointments ..... Erratum ...... PAGE 63 63 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 72 73 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 81 82 83 87 88 88 PLATES XIX. Drawing of the early Dutch School XX. Drawing by Gentile Bellini XXI. Drawing by Jacopo Pontormo . XXII. Drawing by Philippe Mercier . XXIII. Coloured Etching by Thomas Rowlandson XXIV. Details from Nepalese Painting XXViZ,^. Italic Girdles .... c. Gold Coin of Wima Kadphises ( T) XXVI. Early British Bronze Spoon. XXVII. Peruvian Gold Beaker XXVIII. Page from Nelson's Log-Book (reduced) Frontispiece To jace page 64 68 69 72 73 73 74 75 78 vu ; i3!ir;]SH MUSEUM L 12 DEC 33 NATURAL HISTORY. 54. A DUTCH PORTRAIT DRAWING OF THE FIRST HALF OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. TO the beautiful red-chalk portrait drawing, which appears as the frontispiece in the present number of the Quarterly^ it seems impossible to assign a name with certainty. Jan van Scorel is the most obvious attribution to put forward, but claims might equally well be made in favour of Marten van Heemskerck or of Antonio Mor as young men. It is certainly not by the same hand as the equally pro- blematical half-length portrait of a young woman from the Mal- colm Collection attributed to Scorel {Catalogue of Dutch and Flemish Drawings, v, p. 40, No. 3), the handling of which is more force- ful. The chalk used in the present drawing is much browner in tone than that of the Malcolm drawing, except for some retouching along the line of the cap by the left cheek which is in redder chalk. The paper has for watermark a Gothic p (visible through the draw- ing in a rather unsightly way even in the reproduction). This is of some importance as confirming the Northern origin of the drawing. The sheet is said to have been bought at an auction in Tonbridge Wells, but nothing further is known of its provenance. It measures 7^x 5I inches (20-2 x 14 cm.). AFP x,^, DRAWING BY GENTILE BELLINL THE Department of Prints and Drawings has acquired a docu- ment of particular interest to the student of Venetian painting and drawing. This is a composition sketch apparently by Gentile Bellini for the large picture in the Venice Academy (No. 567) of the Procession in the Piazza of St. Mark's. The drawing, in pen and ink over red chalk, measuring 5^ x 7I inches (13 x I9'6 cm.), is schematic in the extreme, but the place, the point of view, the rela- tion of the groups of figures to the processional relic, correspond in the main so closely with those of the picture that there can be little doubt of the connexion between the two. The picture is signed and dated 1496, and the drawing may be supposed to have preceded it by some time. The salient points of difference between the sketch and the picture are that in the former the frontage of St Mark's K 63 has only four bays, while in the latter (and in reality) it has five; in the drawing the procession is nearer to the church and more sky is visible above. In the collection of the Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth is a drawing of exactly the same type, undoubtedly by the same hand (reproduced in Detlev Freiherr von Hadeln's Venezianische Zeich- nungen des Quattrocento^ Berlin, 1928, PI. 8). It also represents a procession, and was at one time supposed to be a preliminary sketch for the same picture. But the scene is quite obviously not the Piazza of St Mark's, though it is as certainly some actual square in Venice, the Campanile and one of the domes of St Mark's being visible in the distance to the left. But to return to the British Museum drawing. This was purchased at a sale at Sotheby's (August 2 1933, lot 58), and was formerly in the collections of Padre Resta, Lord Somers, and perhaps one of the Richardsons (it does not bear either of the Richardsons' stamps, but the handwriting on the mount is apparently that of one of them). It has in the right-hand bottom corner the mark g 34 written in the manner characteristic of the Resta-Somers drawings. In the catalogue of that collection written in Padre Resta's hand, which is in the Department of Manuscripts (Lansdowne 802), ^5^ is ascribed to Giovanni Bellini and described as *p[er] I'istesse istorie d'Alessandro 3° in Sala del maggior Consiglio'. This statement, that the drawing was the sketch for one of the series of paintings on canvas, partly by Giovanni, and partly by Gentile, Bellini, representing the struggle between Frederick Barbarossa and the Pope Alexander III, is one which needs examination. The paintings themselves were destroyed in the fire of 1577, and our knowledge of their contents rests on the descriptions of Vasari and Sansovino and on the rather doubtful evidence of one drawing in the British Museum (published by the late Sir Sidney Colvin in the Prussian yahrbuch, xiii (1892), p. 23). But the events depicted in them took place for the most part in Venice, and St Mark's formed the background of at least one of them. The Chatsworth drawing, referred to already, which comes from the same source, is more precisely described in the Resta Catalogue {g32) as follows, 'Aless" 3° riconosciuto nella Carit^, e condotto proces- 64 t ^tw L w^. — 3p^' A 7f' ■ »t ,- ,^^^^^^' -vi -^ '■"\i JI> DEC 3? NATURAL HISTORY. 1/ ^ «♦• '^ " ' XXI. DRAWING BY JACOPO PONTORMO sionalmente in S. Marco', again a quite plausible interpretation of the subject. But our confidence in Padre Resta is somewhat shaken by his identification of other drawings. He possessed no less than six sketches which he ascribed to Giovanni Bellini and connected with the paintings in the Sala del Gran Consiglio, g2y, g3i, g32t i33f g 34 ^^^ gS^' Of these, g32 and g34 have already been ac- counted for: g2y and g33 have not been identified: ^ jj is a sheet of studies of Orientals by Vittore Carpaccio in the Louvre (Hadeln, op. cit., pi. 22): and g36 described as *Porto d'Ancona dove smon- tarono I'lmp" e si trovo il Doge p[er] la Pace d'Aless.** 3° ut Supra* is in the British Museum (Hadeln, op. cit., PI. 14). It does not represent Ancona nor is it by Giovanni Bellini but certainly also by Carpaccio. I think, therefore, that Padre Resta's interpretations need not be taken too seriously. They are rather guesses based on the descriptions in Ridolfi (whom he quotes), than well founded traditional identifications. The connexion between the recently acquired drawing and Carpaccio which is raised by their juxtaposition in Padre Resta's collection is a question which is not so easily resolved. Though the relation of the drawing to the picture by Gentile is unequivocal and seems to confirm Hadeln 's previous attribution of the companion Chatsworth drawing to Gentile, the difference in style which separates these two drawings on the one hand from drawings by Carpaccio on the other is imperceptible. Place the former beside such a drawing as the landscape in the British Museum referred to above: the style, the ink, the red chalk, the colour, and the look of the paper, all are the same. Hadeln finds in the Chatsworth drawing the expression of a temperament different to Carpaccio's; the tech- nique and the shorthand for expressing the figures might, he says, be employed by any one. But they are employed by Carpaccio and not, as far as is known, by another artist in quite the same way^ If the procession sketches are indeed by Gentile there seems no reason why other 'Carpaccio' drawings should not be his. A criterion by which the works of the two can be separated will have to be found. It should be added that the editors of the Catalogue of Italian 6s Drawings exhibited at Burlington House came to the conclusion that the Chatsworth Drawing (No. 169) was in fact by Carpaccio. A. E. P. [A note by Tancred Borenius on the drawing appeared in Pantheon for September I933> P- 296.] 56. A SHEET OF STUDIES BY JACOPO PONTORMO. THE Department of Prints and Drawings acquired at the same sale in which the Bellini sketch appeared, a fine drawing by Pontormo (Sotheby's, August 2 1933, lot 59). It is a study in red chalk on white paper of a seated female figure, measures i if x 8 inches (28*9 x 20*3 cm.), and has on it the collector's marks of Sir Joshua Reynolds and Nathaniel Hone. The figure shows all the strength and most of the characteristic mannerisms which distinguish Pontormo as a draughtsman. It seems to be that of a mourning Virgin at a Crucifixion or an Entombment, but it does not apparently occur in any picture by the artist. The pose of the head and the slightly indicated features are reminiscent of those in the study for a portrait of a young girl in the Uffizi (No. 449). The date of the present sheet is fixed by the drawings on the verso (which were covered at the time of its acquisition). These disjointed but individually powerful studies are for The Deposition in the Capponi Chapel in Santa Felicita, Florence. They are for the torso (two studies across the sheet) and for the head and shoulders (one study at right angles to the others) of Christ in this picture. Another very slight outline sketch made in the same direction as, and subse- quent to, the torso studies is for the hips and thighs of the same figure. The number of studies for the Capponi Deposition which are known is considerable. F. M. Clapp (hes Dessins de Pontormo^ Paris, 19 14) enumerates ten certainly, and five less definitely, connected with this composition, all except one being in the Uffizi. Of the six drawings already in the Department attributed to this last of the great Florentine draughtsmen only three can be con- sidered authentic, only two of first class importance. The present sheet is therefore an addition of a value to the Museum beyond its considerable intrinsic merits as a work of art. A. E, P. 66 57. DRAWINGS PRESENTED BY MRS. SELWYN IMAGE. MRS SELWYN IMAGE generously offered the Museum a selection of the Old Master Drawings collected by the late Mr Selwyn Image, sometime Slade Professor of Fine Art in the University of Oxford. The ten drawings accepted are as follows: 1. Luca Signorelli. Study of a naked Man seen from the Back. Black chalk. Reproduced by the Vasari Society, ist Series, vi. p. 8, under the name of Timoteo Viti, and apparently accepted as such by Fischel in his Zeichnungen der Umbrer, Berlin 19 17, p. 240, No. 195. In a recent article, however, Berenson has shown convincingly that the drawing is connected with Signorelli {Gazette des Beaux Arts, vii, p. 1 86). In the Uffizi is a drawing of the same figure in practically the same position but seen from the front, and in the Louvre two figures, one seated and one kneel- ing on the ground. Curiously enough, the two Louvre figures and the Uffizi figure are copied in an elaborate allegorical drawing in the Albertina formerly attributed to Francesco Francia, but more probably by Jacopo Ripanda. Other drawings belonging to the same group as the Selwyn Image drawing are in the collection of the late Henry Oppenheimer and in the ficole des Beaux-Arts, Paris. They are probably all studies for the Orvieto frescoes, though none of them are translated literally into the wall-paintings. 2. School of Michelangelo, The Body of Christ, with indication of twC) other figures. Study for a Descent from the Cross. Black chalk: squared for enlargement. Attributed to Daniele da Volterra, no doubt on the ground that his most famous work was of this subject. The figures bear no particular resemblance to those of the fresco in SS. Trinity de' Monti, but the style of the drawing points to some close follower of Michelangelo. 3. North Italian: Sixteenth Century. Adoration of the Magi. Pen and ink. A mannered drawing of secondary importance. 4. German: SixteenthCentury. Study of aWoman's Head. Red chalk. 5. Probably German about 1600 (Adam Elsheimer?), Small Study for a Christ on the Cross. Pen and ink. 6. Rembrandt (or his School). The Infant Moses brought by his Mother to Pharaoh's Daughter. Pen and bistre with blue, yellow, 67 and rose water-colour tints, and touches of red chalk. A very interesting drawing by Rembrandt, or one of his pupils, in the middle period of his life (about 1645-55). Its variety of colour inclines one to think of some painter of the school rather than Rembrandt. But the draughtsmanship is powerful, and very near Rembrandt's style of about 1650, in which he had a close follower in Nicolaas Maes. The subject is a little uncertain, but it might be a pendant to the study of the Finding of Moses (W. R. Valentiner, Rembrandt: Des Meisters Handzeichnungen, Klassiker der Kunst, p. 1 24, from the Muller Sale, Amsterdam, 22-3 June 1 9 10, No. 302), to which it is clearly related in style. If this interpretation is correct, the episode would be illustrated in the later stage described in Exodus ii. 10. 7. Anonymous: Seventeenth Century, A Funeral Procession in the Forum, Rome, with the Basilica of Constantine in the back- ground. Black and red chalk and bistre wash. Probably by some Northern artist in Rome, in a style somewhat akin to Callot. 8. Attributed to Jean Cousin. Study of a Saint, holding a cup and standing in flames. Pen and blue wash. 9. French: Eighteenth Century, Head of Mercury. Red chalk. Attributed to Boucher, but possibly by Carle Vanloo or some other French artist of the first half of the eighteenth century under Boucher's influence. 10. Thomas Rowlandson. Mars and Venus. Pen and ink. Copy of an engraving by Chiari (1635) after Nicolas Poussin described by Andresen, No. 349. A. M. H., A. E. P., K. T. P. 58. A DRAWING BY PHILIPPE MERCIER. THROUGH the generosity of Mr Philip Hofer, of the New York Public Library, the Department of Prints and Drawings has acquired a charming pencil sketch of a young woman seated which has been most plausibly attributed to Philippe Mercier. It was formerly in the Bellingham Smith Collection, but did not figure in the Amsterdam Sale of 1927, at which the bulk of the drawings brought together by that discriminating collector was dispersed. Mercier, by birth a German, though of purely French extraction, 68 XXII. DRAWING BY PHILIPPE MERCIER 12 DEC 3?i NATURAL HISTORY. was a pupil of Antoine Pesne, but later settled in England as the Court painter of Frederick, Prince of Wales. He seems to have belonged to the circle of Watteau's familiars during the latter's period of residence in London, in 1719/20, and it is entirely under Watteau's influence that Mercier's earlier productions are seen to stand. A drawing in the British Museum, obviously imitating Watteau's manner and formerly classified with the works of Pater, has lately been shown to belong definitely to the earlier phase of Mercier's development. Later, however, his style underwent marked changes and acquired a strongly anglicized appearance. To this phase belong his many figure subjects, reproduced and popularized in the mezzotints of McArdell, Houston, Faber, and others; and also the attractive sketch which is the welcome gift of Mr Hofer. There are many close, indeed unmistakable, analogies between the draw- ing and such prints as Domestic Employment, The Seamstress, Sweet pleasing Sleep, &c. The Department has nothing of equal charm by the master in pencil technique, indeed it should be mentioned that two of the more important pencil drawings hitherto thought to be Mercier's, have now been shown fairly conclusively to be the work of Peter Angillis. K. T. P. 59. SPORTING PRINTS AND DRAWINGS. A LEADER in The Times on the 8 February last regretted the poor representation of English Sporting Art in the National Collec- tions. The British Museum must plead guilty, and efforts are being made to add to the collection of prints and drawings in this field. Some fine examples had been presented to the Museum in 1 9 1 7 by Lady Lucas in memory of her brother, including a perfect copy of Howitt's British Field Sports, and there are some good coaching prints in the Grace Collection of London Views, but the number of separate impressions of the best colour-aquatints of the earlier nine- teenth century, after such painters and draughtsmen as Henry Aiken, James Pollard, and Dean Wolstenholme, is still extremely limited. Even if their artistic value is not of the highest, there is social and historical interest in these prints which demands their place in the National Collections. 69 Recent donations include: The Vale oj Aylesbury Steeplechase^ from colour-aquatints by C. and G. Hunt after F. C. Turner, 1 836, from the National Art-Collec- tions Fund; Fox-hunting, four colour-aquatints by Clerk and Dubourg after Henry Aiken, 18 13, from Mr Herbert W. Hollebone (through theN.A.-C.F.); Samuel Howitt's Oriental Field Sports, 1807, from Arthur Acker- mann & Son, Ltd. (through the N.A.-C.F.); The Death of Tom Moody, colour-aquatint by Dean Wolstenholme, 1829, from Sir Robert Mond, F.R.S. (through the N.A.-C.F.); Fox-hunting, a set of six coloured etchings by Thomas Rowlandson, 1787-8 (in which appears George IV as Prince of Wales), from the National Art-Collections Fund (see Plate XXIII). Parts I and III of The Hunter's Annual, 1836 and 1839, by R. B. Davis (of which the Museum already possessed Part II), a rare series of coloured lithographs, purchased out of the Florence Fund with the aid of a donation from Lord Wakefield; A remarkable series of 1 90 sketches by James and Robert Pollard of sporting and kindred subjects, many of them the studies for their prints, from Mr Arthur Du Cane (through the N.A.-C.F.); And a fine set of six colour-aquatints of Epsom Races, by C. Hunt after James Pollard (for which the original studies are in Mr Du Cane's gift), from Mr C. F. G. R. Schwerdt. A selection of these and other sporting subjects is now displayed in a revolving stand in the Prints and Drawings Gallery, and other ex- amples may be seen on application in the Print Room. It is hoped that the collection will gradually become more representative if the in- terest indicated in the gifts already received is continued. A. M. H. 60. CERAMIC DOCUMENTS FROM HONAN. AN interesting series of moulds, stamps, trial pieces, and speci- JLJL mens of various kinds of porcelain and stoneware found in a valley called Tang Yang Yu near the Peking Syndicate's Mines at Chiaotso, Honan, was given to the Museum in July. The purchase 70 price was generously subscribed by Mr and Mrs Walter Sedgwick, and Messrs G. Eumorfopoulos, O. C. Raphael, H. J. Oppenheim, and Eustace Hoare. The series included: (i) moulds for making small figures and orna- ments and toy vessels together with actual specimens of similarly moulded objects in a white porcellanous ware; (2) A number of coarse dishes and bowls with reddish body dressed with white slip and partially covered with creamy white glaze: one dish is clearly a spoilt piece, or waster, rejected from the kiln; (3) A mould for an elegant bowl with fluted sides and relief ornament on the bottom; (4) Eleven trial pieces, for testing glazes in the kiln, made of greyish buff stoneware with opalescent glazes of Chiin type. With these last were several fragments and a complete bowl of similar ware. The importance of the gift lies in the kiln-site evidence which it supplies, the moulds, waster, and trial pieces all pointing to a local industry of considerable extent and variety. Hitherto nothing has been recorded about pottery in this part of Honan which lies north of the Yellow River. It is, however, only about 80 or 100 miles north of the famous ceramic centres of Ju Chou and Yii Chou, the latter of which was the original home of the Sung Chiin wares. R. L. H. 61. A NEPALESE PAINTING OF THE EARLY SIX- TEENTH CENTURY. SIR HERBERT THOMPSON, Bart., and Mr Louis Clarke have presented to the Sub-Department of Oriental Prints and Drawings (since incorporated in the Department of Oriental Antiquities) a Nepalese painting which is of particular interest and importance because it bears a date corresponding to the year 1 504 A.D, The picture is designed in a formal scheme; the centre is occupied by a figure which is probably Amogha-pasa, a form of the great Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, having the attributes of the noose (pasa), the book, and the lotus. Eight smaller figures surround him. This forms the centre of a square, which is set within a richly ornamented circle. The top and bottom of the picture, and the angles at the four corners outside the circle, are occupied with hori- zontal panels filled with votaries, scenes from legend, &c., and with L 71 small square or circular spaces containing beatified beings. The colour-scheme is composed of deep red, dark green, and yellow, and the general effect is that of a carpet-pattern: but at a closer view the drawing of the small scenes is seen to be full of life and not merely the repetition of a formula. Details of two of these scenes are shown in Plate XXIV. No painting of this type has hitherto been acquired for the Museum, and its comparatively early date adds greatly to its value for purposes of study. L. B. 62. A WOODCUT BY OKUMURA MASANOBU. THE Oriental section of the Department of Prints and Drawings (since incorporated in the Department of Oriental Antiquities) has acquired a hand-coloured Japanese woodcut, formerly in a German collection, which is an important addition to the Museum series. The least adequate part of the collection is the representation of the Primitives'; that is, the artists who worked before the complete colour-print was invented: * Primitive' is a relative term, and in this case connotes no insufficiency of technical mastery. Of these earlier designers, Okumura Masanobu is the most genial and varied. The new acquisition is one of his tall upright prints called Kakemono-ye, measuring 24J x 9 inches. The subject is a woman sitting on a veranda and confiding a love-letter to her little maid, as she lays one arm about her shoulder. The motive, which makes a charming group, was re- peated later by Harunobu. The woodcut, which is hand-coloured, mainly in yellow ochre and light red, is an excellent example of Masa- nobu's art at its ripest, when with all his grace a certain grandeur of style is retained. It dates from about 1 740, the artist having adopted the title Hogetsudo in his signature, as here, in 1 739. L. B. 63. TWO ITALIC GIRDLES. THE two bronze 'girdles' illustrated on Plate XXV a, b are not new acquisitions, but their present appearance will be unfamiliar. The longer of the two is No. 2855 of the Catalogue of Bronzes, where it is described as decorated with studs and bosses; recently the surface incrustation has been removed, when further ornament, in faint incision, came to light; bands of key-pattern, rays, and birds. This decoration in itself calls for no comment, but the execution is 72 XXIV. DETAILS FROM NEPALESE PAINTING 2 DLC 33i CO W Q < C>4 O O u Q O o C/3 w Q l-H o O I— H < > X of unusual quality. The girdle is complete and illustrates the method of attachment to the waist-belt below it; one end is grooved to slide along the belt, the other has a hook which engaged in the clasp. Similar 'girdles' are familiar objects in Italian graves of the early Iron Age. Those decorated only with embossed ornament are rare and early; the Museum possesses an example from the Towneley Collection. More often incised patterns are added, either spirals or vertical bands as on the present example, which is one of the best extant. Its date is the late Geometric period, in the second half of the eighth century B.C.; when acquired in 1857 it was described as Etruscan, from which it is reasonable to suppose that it was found in Etruria, where girdles have been repeatedly found in Villanovan cemeteries. The second girdle has been recently reconstructed from fragments stored amongst the 'old collections'; there is no clue to its finding-place, but it is later in date than the first; the vertical lozenge chains are subsequent to the vogue of the key-pattern, and the relief-work is less prominent — the bosses are flatter and the studded border has gone, to be replaced by incised herring-bone. The one remaining bird is executed in the crude style typical of the majority of girdles, and demonstrates the exceptional excellence of the first girdle. F. N. P. 64. A NEW KUSHAN COIN. THE Museum has acquired an Indian coin of considerable historical interest (PI. XXV c). It is a gold stater of the great Kushan conqueror Wima Kadphises, who was the first of his line to cross the Hindu Kush and establish an empire in north-west India in the middle of the first century a.d. The coin differs from his usual type which has a bust on the obverse in that Kadphises is represented riding on an elephant. This type, which was hitherto unknown, commemorates the conquest of India, and represents the Central Asian monarch as an Indian ruler. J. A. 65. A HIERATIC PAPYRUS. THE Museum has recently received, as a gift from Dr Alan Gardiner, a hieratic papyrus older than any hitherto existing in our collection. It was one of three stated to come from Sakkarah, 73 of which the second largest has been presented to the Oriental Institute, while the destination of the smallest is not yet decided. The texts are to be published by Dr de Buck in the edition of the Coffin Texts which he is preparing. The papyrus which has thus come into the Museum's possession dates from the period inter- mediate between the Sixth and the Eleventh Dynasties, the writing recalling that of the earlier of these two limits. It was originally of great length, no less than lo metres, by a height of 21 cm. Unfortunately the outer folds have suffered badly from the white ant, and it is only the second half that is relatively complete; there are, however, a number of perfectly preserved pages fully inscribed on both sides, with many rubrics and mainly in vertical columns. The texture of the papyrus is finer than became usual at a later date, and a unique trait is the great size of the individual sheets of which it is composed. In no less than five cases these sheets show a length of 140 cm. or over. The maker has evidently tried to use as much of his individual papyrus-stems as possible, and in several instances he has not possessed enough stems of sufficient length to carry the same join vertically through the entire height of the papyrus. Consequently we find the strange phenomenon of a join extending for only two-thirds of the height, while the join of the remaining third occurs a few centimetres further back. The texts belong to the three early collections known respectively as the Pyramid Texts, the Coffin Texts, and the Book of the Dead, and contain many interesting variations, or earliest versions of, religious spells of the familiar kind. There is a particularly valuable copy of the rare spell. Book of the Dead, ch. 69, first part, and a unique early example of ch. 76, second part. Among the texts of the verso is a very long spell comparable to ch. 153, that in which parts of the net are identified with different gods; here many mythological allusions occur. There is also a spell resembling, but not identical with, the well-known 'cannibalistic* spell of the Pyramid Texts. A. H. G. 66. AN EARLY BRITISH SPOON. A RECENT discovery at Andover, Hants, has added another to the long list of spoon-shaped bronzes from the British Isles, 74 \^t■ O o w N •;^ o Pi PQ X CO I— I Pi PQ >^ Pi < > X NATURAL HISTORY. XXVII. PERUVIAN GOLD BEAKER and the specimen on PL XXVI has been presented by the Christy Trustees. It is complete and in good order, though of thin metal and somewhat worn on the handle. Casting was the method adopted, and the bowl is thinner towards the edge, with crossed lines extending the whole length. This cruciform pattern is normally found on one of a pair, the other having a small round hole near one of the side edges but otherwise plain. The present example was ploughed up, and there is no chance of investigating the spot in order to decide if it accompanied another in a burial, as was the case at Upper Walmer, Kent [Archaeoiogia Cantiana, xxvi, 9, PI. IV). It is of average length, 4-6 inches with a maximum breadth of 2-8 inches, and the weight is just over i J oz. avdp. When found it had a fine green patina, but this has unfortunately been removed, and cleaning has further obscured the ornamentation of the openwork handle; but at least the two innermost triangular spaces had a kind of basket- pattern, like that on several of the contemporary bronze mirrors. As may be seen in the sketches accompanying Mr J. H. Craw's article on the type in Proc, Soc, Antiq. Scot.^ Iviii (1923-4), p. 147, the rosette handle is not uncommon, but more characteristic is the eccentric scroll pattern for which the ancient Britons are famous. This seems to be the ninth specimen found in England, against four from Wales, two from Scotland, five from Ireland, and two from France. A pre- Roman date is indicated, and the decoration is mostly La T^ne III, but the skeleton with the Upper Walmer pair does not agree with the Belgic and early-Roman practice of cremation. The use of these 'spoons* is still conjectural, but they were clearly meant for something better than table use, and their burial on three occasions with the dead points to some religious or ceremonial meaning that may some day be revealed. The jewelled spoons with perforated bowls found in several Jutish graves in Kent are about six centuries later, but may belong to the same order of ideas. R. A. S. 67. BEQUEST OF THE LATE DAME CLARISSA REID, D.B.E. BY the wishes of the late Dame Clarissa Reid, an important series of Peruvian antiquities has come to the British Museum. These 7S were originally collected by the late James Guthrie Reid (Manager of Messrs Duncan Fox in Peru), whose personal estates covered part of the important prehistoric cemetery of Nasca (in the south of the Republic), which was discovered shortly before the War. The collec- tion embraces some very fine examples of the polychrome pottery of the Nasca and Yea valleys, as well as gold and silver objects from coastal sites farther north. Among the more remarkable is the gold beaker of the Chimu Period, from the Truxillo Region, illustrated in PI. XXVII. Textiles, in admirable preservation, are also repre- sented, as well as certain types of wood-carving which are very poorly represented in the British Museum. There are also a few specimens of stone- and copper-work. The collection is not only a valuable supplement to the series in the British Museum, but will fill many gaps in the National Collection. T. A. J. 68. TOWNSHEND PAPERS. THE complicated nature of English politics during the opening years of the reign of George I is well exemplified by the series of State Papers belonging to the Department of Manuscripts. There are, however, gaps in the Museum collections, and it is therefore gratifying to record the partial filling of one of these by the recent acquisition of a number of original documents selected from the papers of Charles, 2nd Viscount Townshend, as one of the two Secretaries of State. These papers (Eg. MS. 3124) relate almost entirely to the diplomatic transactions of the year 171 6 (a period hitherto unrepresented in the Museum Townshend collections), and illustrate the eff^orts made by the British Government to isolate the Pretender. The most important section consists of Townshend*s private and confidential correspondence with his colleague James (afterwards ist Earl) Stanhope, who accompanied George I to Hanover during a most critical period in the negotiations for the Triple Alliance, whilst Townshend remained in England with the Prince of Wales, who was acting as Regent. The Museum already possesses Stanhope's letter-book (Add. MS. 22510) containing copies of the official despatches which passed between the two Secretaries on this occasion, but this cannot compare in interest and 76 value with the holograph private letters from Stanhope which form such a welcome feature of the new acquisition. H. R. A. 69. A TRIVATE VIEW OF THE MUSEUM IN 1756. THE British Museum was not opened to the public till 1 5 January 1759, so that, if its foundation be dated from the purchase of the Sloane Collection in April 1753, nearly six years were spent in the preliminary arrangement of the books, manuscripts, &c., in their new home at Montague House. A glimpse of the Museum at this period of its infancy is afforded us by Miss Catherine Talbot (1721-70) in a letter to Mrs Anne Berkeley (the widow of Bishop Berkeley, the philosopher, who had died in 1753), dated from St. Paul's Deanery, 9 August {continued 12, 15, 17), 1756 (the portion printed here was written on 15 August). Miss Talbot (for an account of whom see the D.N.B.) and her mother were for over forty years members of the household and family of Archbishop Seeker, consequently attending him in all the changes of residence due to his successive preferments. At the time of this letter Seeker held simultaneously the bishopric of Oxford and the deanery of St. Paul's, and his family had but just quitted Cuddesdon with its Voses and honeysuckles' for London in August, which however Miss Talbot finds 'not only more tolerable than we expected, but really not unpleasant, & S* Pauls at this Season quite delightful'. (For a letter written by Miss Talbot three days earlier (12 August) to Miss Elizabeth Carter (d. 1806) see Miss Carter's Letters, 1809, ii, pp. 236-8.) In the earlier part of her letter Miss Talbot describes visits paid at Fulham and at Lambeth, and her visit to Montague House was probably made with Dr Seeker himself, possibly at the invitation of Lord Royston (2nd Earl of Hardwicke, 1764), who was an 'Original Trustee', and whom she mention selsewhere in this letter. (Further on she describes a visit to Samuel Richardson at Parson's Green.) The letter itself (Add. MS. 393 11, f. 82) was acquired by the Museum, as part of the 'Berkeley Papers', in 19 16. The portion of the letter relating to the visit to Montague House is as follows: — 'One Evening we spent at Montague House, henceforth to be 77 known by the name of the British Museum. I was delighted to see Science in this Town so Magnificently & Elegantly lodged; perhaps You have seen that fine House & Pleasant Garden: I never did before, but thought I liked it much better now, inhabited by Valuable MP, Silent Pictures, & Ancient Mummies, than I should have done when it was filled with Miserable Fine People, a Seat of Gayety on the inside, & a place of Duels without. Indeed in another Reverie I looked upon the Books in a different View, & consider'd them (some persons in whose hands I saw them suggested the thought) as a Storehouse of Arms open to every Rebel Hand, a Shelf of Sweetmeats mixed with Poison, set in the reach of tall overgrown Children. Nothing is yet ranged but two or three rooms of Mr. Three & Thirty Rooms in all are to be filled with Curiosities of every kind. A Number of Learned & Deserving Persons are made happy by the places bestowed on them to {)reserve & show this fine Collection: These have Comfortable Apartments in the Wings, & a Philosophic Grove & Physick Garden open to the view of a delightful Country, where at leisure hours they may improve their health & their Studies together.' G. T. H. 70. NELSON'S LOG-BOOK. THE munificence of Lord Wakefield has recently enriched the already extensive collection of Nelson material in the Depart- ment of Manuscripts with a new relic of great importance, the auto- graph log-book of Nelson himself on his last voyage. This is a modest exercise-book of twenty-four paper leaves with a back of stiff marbled paper. The watermark is for the year 1801. At the top of the first page a clerk's hand has written * State of the Weather by the Barometer 1805', and has then ruled the page into columns, with the proper headings, for the date, time of observation, *Rise and fair [of the barometer], and state of the weather and wind. These rulings and headings are continued by the same hand on each page to f. 13 (= p. 25), but Nelson's entries end on f. 10 with Sunday, 20 October, the day before the Battle of Trafalgar (see 78 \Vv^^-Wm I ^ 4 A^t^^^ c/Vy' h^'^^ «x ^*\ -^ ^ \.,,^am^, \^ m ^^ ^^ ^ /«.„ AV ^ r i% u c? m5^v\,v\^} ^ ^ > r^ A^' t "--1^ >"' J jvv^^'^ ^3 1 (^^U'v ^^ ' (3 >.^i.:pp^ ^^^ XXVIII. PAGE FROM NELSON'S LOG-BOOK (reduced) I BRTI !SH I MUSFUM 12 DEC 33 NATURAL HISTORY. Plate XXVIII). On fF. 13 S-14. has been added later an account relating to 'The residuary Estate of Lord Viscount Nelson with Mrs. Matcham'. The first entry in the log, which is in Nelson *s own hand throughout, is for Tuesday, 14 May 1 805, though, by a curious slip of the pen. Nelson has written 1785 instead of the proper date. The entries are very brief and indicate merely the date, time, readings of the barometer (normally three times a day, at 7 a.m., 3 p.m., and 8 p.m. respectively, though the times and numbers of entries vary), and the direction and strength of the wind, with occasional notes of rain. The log of Thomas Atkinson, the sailing-master of the 'Victory' (Add. MS. 39862), which was presented to the Department in 191 9 by Lord Woolavington, is, as is natural, a good deal fuller, recording not only such details but also the principal events of the official routine. The chief value of the new acquisition lies, in fact, in its 'association interest* rather than in the addition of new historical evidence for the campaign of Trafalgar; but even from the former point of view alone it is an exceptionally important gift, and Lord Wakefield's public-spirited action in acquiring it for the nation and in enabling it to be placed along with Atkinson's log, where the two can be compared, calls for the fullest recognition and warmest thanks. Grateful acknowledgement must also be made to Mr J. L. Douth- waite, the Librarian of the Guildhall, who played no small part in arranging for the acquisition. The new manuscript has been numbered Add. MS. 43504. H. I. B. 71. THE GEORGE SMITH MEMORIAL BEQUEST. THE Department of Manuscripts, despite some regrettable lacunae, is notably rich in autograph manuscripts of works of English literature, and it owes many of its treasures to the generosity of private benefactors. At the present day indeed, when important manuscripts of this class are apt to fetch very high prices in the sale- room, the Museum can hardly hope to acquire works of outstanding interest by its unaided resources. Few, if any, of its acquisitions of literary material can vie with one made recently. The late Mrs Elizabeth Smith, the widow of the well-known publisher, Mr George Smith, by her will left certain autographs of literary works published M 79 by the firm to her Trustees upon trust for her five children during their lives and on the death of the last survivor to the Trustees of the British Museum as a memorial of her husband. In the early summer of 1933 the three surviving children, in the exercise of a right given them by the will, very self-sacrificingly decided forthwith to present these manuscripts to the Museum; and the collection was accordingly received and at once placed on exhibition. The manuscripts are at present shown temporarily in one of the cases reserved for recent acquisitions, but they will eventually be transferred to a special case which is being made for them, and will become, as the exceptional importance of the gift demands, a permanent part of the exhibition. The manuscripts in question are: Charlotte Bronte's three great novels, 'Jane Eyre, Shirley, and Villette, each in three volumes; a volume of Emily Bronte's poems; Mrs Browning's Sonnets Jrom the Portuguese, including the additional sonnet appended to the series later, and with a letter and presentation inscription from R. Barrett Browning; Robert Browning's The Ring and the Book, in two volumes, together with four holograph letters; and Thackeray's The Wolves and the Lamb, a particularly valuable autograph, since it contains specimens of both the styles of hand which Thackeray employed and will therefore be extremely useful in identifying manuscripts attributed to him. H. I. B. 72. A TRACT BY ST AUGUSTINE. THE Department of Printed Books has received from the Bodleian Library, through the Friends of the National Libraries, the gift of an excellent copy of Augustinus, Sermo de verbis evan- gelicis: N on potest filius a se jacere quidquam, &c, [John v. 19]. This book, a small quarto of eight leaves, belongs to the class of anonymous early quartos, reputed of Cologne origin, which has long had a special interest for bibliographers but the true provenance of which is not yet satisfactorily settled. It was included by Proctor among the output of the * Printer of Dictys', a craftsman who neither signed nor dated any of his tracts but who is proved by a rubricator's date to have been at work not later than 1471. The location of his press at Cologne depends on the close resemblance of his fount of 80 heavy gothic to that undoubtedly used in that city by Arnold ther Hoernen, but it also resembles just as closely the type of another anonymous group of quartos, that of the 'Printer of Dares*, which has latterly fallen under the strong suspicion of having been printed at Basel, not Cologne. Any addition to the body of evidence on these matters available at the Museum is therefore specially welcome. The present tract forms a companion volume to that containing two other sermons of St Augustine (those on the resurrection of the dead) produced by the same 'Printer of Dictys', which is already in the Library (lA. 3315). Both tracts have the same measurements and typographical characteristics, and both, incidentally, constitute the first editions of their respective texts. The press-mark of the new-comer is lA. 3 3 20, and the bibliographical references to it are: Proctor t98ij Hain 1993 a, Gesamtkatalog 2918. V. S. 73. A SPANISH WRITING-BOOK. THE Department has acquired by purchase a copy of a very rare edition of Juan de Yciar's Libro subtilisstmo por el cual se ensena a escreuir perfetamete, printed at Seville in 1596. Yciar is the most famous of all Spanish writing-masters, and his book the most famous of all Spanish writing-books. The Museum possesses a fine copy of the first edition of 1548. This was printed in Saragossa, where Yciar worked, as were all the later editions except the present, which is the last known. The original blocks for the different alphabets were taken from Saragossa to Seville for printing the 1596 edition, which shows that the influence of Yciar*s book spread beyond the district and period hitherto generally assigned to it. The Seville edition was recorded in a note by Gagangos, but no copy is known to Escudero y Perosso*s Ttpograjia Hispalense, or to Cotarelo y Mori's Diccionario de Caligrafos Espanoles, unless an imperfect copy described in the latter agrees with the newly acquired copy. H. T. 74. THREE 16TH-CENTURY ENGLISH PAMPHLETS. THE Department has also received as a gift, from Dr A. S. W. Rosenbach of New York, three sixteenth-century English pamphlets which are apparently unrecorded in the Bibliographical M2 81 Society's Short-title Catalogue oj 'English Books printed bejore 1641, One, printed in London by John Wolfe in 1 591, is entitled Newes sent out oj Britayn, and other places on the third of jfune 1391. to a Gentleman oj account. Another, 'imprinted at London for lohn Kid', but with part of the imprint cropped, is entitled Newes out oj France jor the Gentleman oj England. Both these are patriotic pamphlets relating to the exploits of the English forces sent to Brittany in 1591 to help Henry IV of France against the League, the English being under the command of Sir John Norris, who had distinguished himself as a military leader in Ireland and the Nether- lands, and had conducted, along with Sir Francis Drake, the great expedition dispatched against Spain and Portugal the year after the Armada. The third pamphlet lacks the title-page, but the second leaf is headed A most wonderjull^ and true report^ the like neuer hearde oj bejore^ oj diuerse vnknowne Foules: hauing the Fethers about their heads ^ and neckes, like to the jry sled jore-tops^ Lockes, and great RuJ^es, now in vse among men, and JVemen: I ate lie taken at Crowley in the Countie oj Lyncolne, 1586. A colophon gives the printer and place of printing as Robert Robinson, London. There is no date, but the printing is contemporary with the event described. The Depart- ment possesses two contemporary German versions of the pamphlet. These three pamphlets were formerly in the Library of York Minster. H. T. 7S' SOME HINDUSTANI POEMS. A MANUSCRIPT recently incorporated in the Department of Oriental Printed Books and MSS. (Or. 1 1, 368) merits special mention. It contains three poems in Dakhani Hindustani, sc. the Nur-namah, a mystical religious poem by ""Inayat Shah, the Tusuj 0 Zulaikhd, a masnawt poem on the favourite topic of the loves of Yusuf and his mistress, by Shah Hashim, called Hashimi, of Bijapur, and the Kissah La^l 0 Gauhar, another masnawt poem, by '"Ajiz. All three are in the handwriting of Muhyi ad-Din, Khan of Honawar, who wrote them for Muhammad Yusuf Naik; the second is dated II Shawwal of 1355 a.h. (an error for 1255, corresponding to December 1839). 82 Hashimrs Tusuf o Zuiaikhdis, an exceedingly rare work, though the author was a prominent poet in his time. He flourished under ""All ^Adil Shah II (1070-83 a.h.) and later; and although he was blind from birth, he was celebrated for his acute intellect. He is credited with the invention of the style of poetical composition known as rekhtt. He died in 1 109 a.h. (a.d. 1697-8), ten years after writing his Yusuj 0 Zulaikha, the text of which contains its date of composi- tion, 1099.^ The Kissah La^l 0 Gauhar in our manuscript is illustrated by fifty- four drawings in colour. Though these are of no great artistic merit, and are sometimes ludicrously crude, they are interesting because of their marked affinity with the so-called Jain painting of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. J. V. S. W. ^t, OTHER GIFTS. THREE seventeenth-century French tortoise-shell bindings, all stamped with the same pattern, one signed Xemol, Dieppe'. Presented by Her Majesty the Queen, M. A. Pardee: Autour des masques de Napoleon. Privately printed, 1933. Presented by Mr and Mrs Alfred Day Pardee, Two Madrid periodicals: Crisol, Nos. 1-202, and its continuation, Luz, Nos. 1-309, 4 April 193 1-3 i December 1932. Presented by Mr A. Carreras. Montaigne, 153 3- 1933. Album tir^ ^ I'occasion du IV" cente- naire de la naissance de Montaigne. Bordeaux, 1933. Presented by Monsieur Adrien Marquet^ Deputy^ and Mayor oj Bordeaux. The Parochial Churches of Sir Christopher Wren. (The tenth volume of the Wren Society, Part II.) Oxford, 1933. Presented by the Wren Society, Bibliotheque de Madame G. Whitney HofF. Catalogue des manu- scrits, incunables, editions rares, reliures anciennes et modernes. 2 vols. Paris, 1933. Presented by Madame Whitney Hof, I See the notice of him in rAbd al-Jabbar Khan's Mahbub al-zaman tazkirah i shucard i Dakan (Hyderabad, 1 329 a.h.), p. 1 202 (where, however, the date of his death is given wrongly as 11 90 a.h.}, also Nasir ad-Din Hashiml's Dakan-men Urdu (Hyderabad, 1926), p. 44, and Ram Babu Saksena's History of Urdu Literature^ pp. 15, 40, 94. 83 Cuadro de la Corte de Espana en 1722, por el Duque de Saint- Simon. Madrid, 1933. Manuel Serrano Sanz: Expedici6n de Hernando de Soto a la Florida. Madrid, 1933. Presented by the Duke of Berwick and Alba. Charlotte Bronte (Currer Bell): Jane Eyre. With lithographs by Ethel Gabain. Paris, 1933. Presented by Monsieur Edmond Paix. Fran9ois Rabelais: Le tiers livre des faits et diets de Pantagruel. Illustrations de J. Stall. Socidt^ des Amis des Livres, Paris, 1933. Presented by the Societe des Amis des Livres. History of the Dorsetshire Regiment, 19 14-19. Published by Henry Ling Ltd., Dorchester [1933]. Presented by the Officers of the Dorsetshire Regiment and the Publishers. Papyri from Tebtunis. Part I. By Arthur E. R. Boak. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1933. Presented by the University of Michigan. An Elegy written in a Country Churchyard. By Thomas Gray. The three manuscripts. Printed by Edward Walters and Geoffrey Miller at Primrose Hill, 1933. Presented by Mr Edward Walters. The Torch. Number one. A journal produced by students of the City of Birmingham School of Printing. General Editor, Leonard Jay. 1933. Presented by the Birmingham Central School oj Arts and Crajts. Facsimile edition of the works of Bishop Mikael Agricola. 3 vols. Helsinki, 1 93 1 . Presented by the Committee Jor Publishing the Works of Mikael Agricola. Catalogue of the Pictures, Miniatures, and Art Books, collected by Henry George Bohn. Privately printed, London, 1884. Presented by the Corporation Art Gallery and Museum^ Cartwright Memorial Hall, Bradford. Sir Charles Tennant, his forbears and descendants. By H. J. T. Privately printed, 1932. Presented by the Rt. Hon. H. j. Tennant. The Prophetic Times. By Philip Henry Gosse. Printed for private circulation, 1871. Notes by Mr Edmund Gosse on the Pictures and Drawings of Mr Alfred W. Hunt, 1884. Together with four other works by 84 or with prefaces by Sir Edmund Gosse. Presented by Mr Philip Gosse through the Friends of the National Libraries. (i) A proclamation in Marathi issued by Mountstuart Elphinstone on 1 1 February 1 8 1 8 and signed by him, reciting the misdeeds of the Peshwa Bajl Rao and the measures taken by the East India Company to remove him and reduce the Maratha country to order; in manu- script, on a paper strip 14 feet 19 inches long and 6 inches wide. (2) A proclamation in Persian, Marathi, and Telugu containing Regulations by Major Pitman for the settlement of territory ceded by Baji Rao, dated 2 1 December 1 8 1 8 ; in manuscript, on paper 3 feet I J inches long and 8 J inches wide. (3) A Telugu kaijlyat or local history of Kondavidu from ancient times to modern; in manuscript, on paper, copied about i8oo a.d. Presented by Mr G. H. Bedford. T'ui pei t'u, an illustrated work on prophecy ascribed to Yiian T'ien-kang of the T'ang Dynasty: a manuscript copy. Presented by Mr Paul King. A commentary by Tsai Chen on Tzu Yiian and a chronological biography of Shao Erh-yiin by Huang Yiin-mei. Presented by the Director ojthe Institute of Chinese Cultural Studies, Nanking University, 'Kentiana*: compiled by Percy Ramsey-Kent. 4 vols. (Add. MSS. 43492-5). Bequeathed by the Compiler. Six royal documents, James III of Scotland — James II of England. (Add. MS. 43496). Bequeathed by Mr Richard Henry Bath. Copies (autograph) of correspondence of Charles Godfrey Woide concerning the reading 6c in i Timothy iii. 16 in the Codex Alexandrinus. (Add. MS. 43497.) Presented by Mr A. M, Goodhart. Papers relating to mines in Jamaica, 1720, and the South Sea Bubble. 2 vols. (Add. MSS. 43498, 43499.) Presented by Major H. R. M. Howard. Gerald Brockhurst: Casper; etching. Presented by Messrs P. and D. Colnaghi & Co. Dresses of the York Hussars: eight coloured drawings. Presented by Major H. R. M. Howard. Rockwell Kent: one wood-engraving and one lithograph. Presented anonymously. 8s Cicely Hay (Mrs R. R. Tatlock): Portrait of D. S. MacColl. Presented by Mr, R, R. Tatlock, Jules de Bruycker: three etchings. Presented by the Artist, John Vanderbank: two studies for portrait groups. Pencil. Presented by Mr E, Francklin, G. R. Schjelderup: Portrait of Sir George Hill, K.C.B. Etching. Presented by Sir George Hill. Edmond X. Kapp: Portrait of H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. Lithograph. Presented by the Artist, Edmond X. Kapp: Portrait of Delius (drawing), and eight litho- graph portraits. Presented anonymously, Philippe Mercier: Study of a Young Woman Seated. Drawing. Presented by Mr Philip Hojer, Ludwig Michalek: sixteen etchings. Presented by the Artist, J. Walter West, R.W.S.: Energy; lithograph. Presented by Miss Cicely West, Nine miscellaneous prints. Presented by Mr H, Simmonds. The Hon. Booth Grey: five etchings; G. B. Piranesi, Book-plate of the Earl of Aylesford. Presented by the Countess of Aylesjord, Edith Grace Wheatley (Mrs John Wheatley): three drawings of animals. Presented by the Artist, Jacques Bellange, Une Jardiniere; etching. Presented by Mr A, E, Popham, Portrait of Fernando Autori, operatic singer: drawing, by himself. Presented by the Artist. Isabel Codrington: four etchings. Presented anonymously, Charles Grignion, the elder: Portrait of Richard Tyrrell, Rear- Admiral of the White: drawing. Presented by Mr E, Croft Murray. A purple glass mug, late seventeenth century, perhaps English. Presented by Mr C, F, Bell, A series of stone implements collected in Madras by Mr L. A. Cammiade and described in Antiquity^ ^930> 3^7. Presented by the Christy . Trustees, Ten hand-axes, flake tools, and arrow-heads from various sites in the Sahara. Presented by M, Maurice Reygasse, 86 Jadeite celt and prehistoric strike-a-light from Hopton, Suffolk. Presented by Dr y, C. Hawks/ey, Pre- Roman and Romano-British pottery fragments from a settle- ment site at Runcton Holme, King's Lynn. Presented by Mr Ivan y, Thatcher through the Fenland Research Committee, Four sard intaglios of the eighteenth century. Presented by Mrs Ormerod, Corpus Nummorum Italicorum, Vol. XIV. Presented by His Majesty the King of Italy, Over 2,000 plaster casts of rare Greek and Roman coins. Presented by Dr yacob Hirsch, One specimen of each of the two types of the exceedingly rare gold coins ( 1 00 piastres) issued by the Mahdi at Khartum. Presented by Mr G, W, Grabham, Eight silver, and five bronze coins of Tibet and Nepal. Presented by Sir Charles Bell, K.CLK, C,M,G, RECENT PUBLICATIONS THE sixth volume of the new edition of the General Catalogue oj Printed Books in the British Museum was published in October of this year. This instalment carries the letter a from the heading Aristide, pseud, to that of Asmondo (Bartolomeo d') in 1,004 columns, a section spanned in the previous edition within the space of 606 columns. The outstanding headings in this volume are those of Aristo- phanes and Aristotle. Of these it is proposed to print a limited number of off-prints, which will be put on sale separately; and it is the intention of the Trustees to issue separately, as the new edition of the General Catalogue progresses, excerpts of headings of similar importance and extent. THE Guide to Processes and Schools of Engraving has been issued in a third edition; price 6d. The following reproductions have been issued: Saxton's Atlas of England and Wales, 1579: Dorsetshire and Lancashire, ^s, each. 87 Frontispiece Portrait of Queen Elizabeth as Patron of Geography and Astronomy, 'js, 6d. Coloured reproductions of illuminated manuscripts., each is.: Beatus Page from the Psalter of the St Omer Family: East Anglian, early fourteenth century. The Virgin and Child from the Psalter of Robert de Lisle: East Anglian, early fourteenth century. The States of Good Souls (Penitence, Devotion, Contemplation). From the Sainte Abbaye. French, about a.d. 1300. Christ in Majesty. English (School of Peterborough). Thirteenth century. Coloured postcard sets of 6 cards, is. per set; by post, is. 2d,: B 66. Miniatures of the Life of Christ. Twelfth century. (Cotton MS. Caligula A VII). B 67. Miniatures of the Life of Christ. Thirteenth century. (Additional MS. 17868). B. 68. Society Pastimes. Fifteenth century. (Harley MS. 443 1). Monochrome postcard set (No. 99) of 15 cards, u.; by post, I J. 2d: Portraits of Christ. Third to sixteenth centuries. APPOINTMENTS THE Principal Trustees, on 6 September 1933, appointed as Assistant Keepers of the Second Class: Mr Edward Frederick Croft-Murray, formerly of Magdalen College, Oxford (to the Department of Prints and Drawings). Mr Cyril Ernest Wright, formerly of Edinburgh and Cambridge Universities (to the Department of Manuscripts), V ERRATUM OL. VIII, No. I, p. 56,1. 5. For Thomas Castle read Thomas Astle 88 MUSEUM 12, DEC 33 NArURAL HISTORY. RECENT PUBLICATIONS CATALOGUE OF THE KING'S MUSIC LIBRARY By William Barclay Squire, M.V.O., M.A., F.S.A., F.R.C.M. Part IL THE MISCELLANEOUS MANUSCRIPTS. By Hilda Andrews, Mus.Bac. Pp. x+278. 1929. I OS. PartIII: PRINTED MUSIC and musical LITERATURE. Pp. iv + 384. 1929. 15s. SHORT GUIDE TO THE SCULPTURES OF THE PARTHENON. Third edition. 1930. Pp. 40, with 39 illustrations. 6d. A GENERAL INTRODUCTORY GUIDE TO THE EGYPTIAN COL- LECTIONS. New edition, 1930. Pp. 460, with 233 illustrations. 2S. 6d. A CORPUS OF ITALIAN MEDALS OF THE RENAISSANCE BEFORE CELLINI, by G. F. Hill. Two vols.: text, pp. xvii+371, and 201 plates. 1930. CATALOGUE OF BOOKS PRINTED IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY NOW IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. PartVL Italy: Foligno, Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Bologna, Naples, Perugia, and Treviso. Pp. I + 301 (599-899}, with 31 plates of facsimiles (XLII*-LXXII*). 1930. ^^3 3s. COINS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Vol. II: Vespasian to Domitian. With an introduction and 83 plates. By Harold Mattingly, M.A. 1930. 8vo. I2 3s- SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD, 1577-80. Two contemporary maps. Second edition, revised. 1931. 4to. 3s. 6d CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF GREEK AND ROMAN ANTIQUITIES: By F.N.Pryce, M.A.,F.S.A. Vol.I,PartL Prehellenic and Early Greek. Pp. viii + 214, with 43 plates and 246 figures in text. 1928. i8s. Part II. Cypriote and Etruscan. Pp. viii4- 261, with 6 plates and 132 figures in text. 1931. j^i. CODEX ALEXANDRINUS in reduced photographic facsimile. Old Testament, Part II. I Samuel — II Chronicles. 232 plates. 1931. ;^2 2s. CATALOGUE OF DRAWINGS BY DUTCH AND FLEMISH ARTISTS PRESERVED IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PRINTS AND DRAWINGS, BRITISH MUSEUM. By Arthur M. Hind, M.A., F.S.A. Vol. IV. Dutch Drawings of the 17th Century (N-Z and Anonymous}. 1931. 8vo. ;^2 los. THE STURGE COLLECTION: An Illustrated Seleaion of Flints from Britain bequeathed in 1919 by William Allen Sturge, M.V.O., M.D., F.R.C.P. By Reginald A. Smith, F.S.A. 1931. 8vo. With 11 plates and numerous illustrations in the text ;Ci 5s. CUNEIFORM TEXTS FROM BABYLONIAN TABLETS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Part XLI (50 plates}, by C. J. Gadd M.A., F.S.A. 1931. Folio. 1 6s. CATALOGUE OF PAINTINGS RECOVERED FROM TUN-HUANG BYSIRAURELSTEIN. By Arthur Waley. Pp. Hi +328. 1931. 8vo. ^2. SUPPLEMENTARY CATALOGUE OF THE TAMIL BOOKS. By L. D. Barnett. Pp. 695. 1931. ^1 3s. GENERAL CATALOGUE OF PRINTED BOOKS. Vol. I, A-Aegidius. 1004 cols. 1931. Vol. II, Aegidius-Aleu. 996 cols. 1931. Vol. III. Alevra- America. 1004 cols. 1932. Vol. IV, America-Anne. 988 cols. 1932. Vol. V, Anne-Aristias. 1004 cols. 1933. Each j^4 (to original subscribers ;^3). THE PRISMS OF ESARHADDON AND OF ASHURBANIPAL. By Dr. R. Campbell Thompson. Pp. 36, with 18 plates. 1931. los. BABYLONIAN LEGENDS OF THE CREATION. By Sir E. A. Wallis Budge. New edition. Pp.76. 1931. is. 6d. THE LUTTRELL PSALTER. 1 83 Plates,with an Introduction by E.G.Millar. A GUIDE TO THE ISLAMIC POTTERY OF THE NEAR EAST. By R. L. HoBSON. 2s: CORPUS VASORUM ANTIQUORUM (Great Britain fasc. X, British Museum VII). Edited by F. _N. Pryce. 48 plates. 15J. CASTS OF PERSIAN SCULPTURES OF THE ACHAEMENID PERIOD. 1 2 Plates. 6s. (with portfolio js.) or 6d. each. CATALOGUE OF DUTCH AND FLEMISH DRAWINGS OF THE XV AND XVI CENTURIES. By A. E. Popham. 83 plates. £2 ys. bd. GUIDE TO THE PRINCIPAL COINS OF THE GREEKS from circa 700 B.C. to A.D. 270, based on the work of Barclay V. Head. 50 plates. 1932. 15^. CATALOGUE OF ADDITIONS TO THE MANUSCRIPTS 1916-1920. 1933- £>Z lOJ- FLINTS. An illustrated manual of the Stone Age for Beginners. By R. A. Smith. Reprint. 1932. 6d. CATALOGUE OF THE GREEK ETRUSCAN AND ROMAN PAINT- INGS AND MOSAICS. By R. P. Hinks. Pp. Ixxi +157, with 168 figs, and 32 plates. 1933. £2. FACSIMILE OF THE MS. OF AL-KITAB AL-BARI' FI 'L-LUGHAH, by Al-Kal!. Edited by A. S. Fulton. Pp. 16, with 148 plates. 1933. los. 6d, GUIDE TO PROCESSES AND SCHOOLS OF ENGRAVING, 3rd edition. 6d. SAXTON'S ATLAS OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES, reproduced in colour. Frontispiece portrait of Queen Elizabeth, ys. 6d. Single sheets, 5^. each. In progress. REPLICAS AND CASTS of the finest objects from Ur can be supplied to order. List and prices will be sent on application to the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. FULL LISTS OF THE PUBLICATIONS, PICTORIAL POSTCARDS, PHOTOGRAVURES and other Reproductions issued by the British Museum can be had on application to the Director, British Museum, London, W.C. i. THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-.voL.viiL no. 3 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1934 THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY FOUR PARTS ARE PUBLISHED ANNUALLY, each dealing with the principal acquisitions of the previous quarter. The descriptions are intended to be not too technical for the layman, and to give the expert part at least of what he needs to know. Notice is also given of the temporary exhibitions periodically installed in the galleries, the results of excavations, and additions to the publications of the Museum. ''•■'•e-»>>»»>«^0-«> v»\ »->>!;-»>>•> ij-«>9«> »«»»-•, C-^^iV"-* >■%!>»» »«»r-»>a»»v»»» Crown ^to, averaging 3 2 pages + 16 pages of plates. Price 2s, 6d,: 2s, ()d,postJree, lOJ. {post Jree) Jor Jour parts. It would help the Trustees if those intend- ing to subscribe would do so for five-year periods at a cost, post free, of ^2 i os. Cases and title-pages for the annual volumes can be obtained from the Oxford University Press at a charge of 3s. 3d. for case and binding or is. 6d. for case alone (packing and postage in the British Isles included). The price of back parts has been raised to is. 6d. each as from the issue of Vol. VI, No. i. PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME VIII. NUMBER 3. FEBRUARY, 1934 ■<-f<< c-?i< X X X ID CO o H I— I < X Q O U X X X h THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY^ VOL. VIII. N0.3 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1934 Sold at THE BRITISH MUSEUM and by BERNARD QUARITCH 1 1 Grafton Street London W.\ HUMPHREY MILFORD Oxford University Press London £.C.^ KEGAN PAUL, TRUBNER & Co. Ltd. 38 Gregt Russell Street London W.C.i PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, OXFORD BY JOHN JOHNSON, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY CONTENTS 77. The Codex Sinaittcus . . . , 78. An Early MS. of Greek Canon Law 79. Seals of Evesham Abbey 80. The Whalley Chartulary 8 1. A Religious Tract of Charles II 82. Letters of Talleyrand . 83. The Coventry Mysteries 84. The Papers of Richard Cobden 85. Two Persian Manuscripts 86. Prints acquired at the Boerner Sale, Nov. 1933 87. Drawing by Jacopo Ripanda 88. Two Head-rests and other Egyptian Antiquities 89. A Cycladic Idol 90. Geometric Bronzes from Potidaea 9 1 . A New Corinthian Aryballos 92. An Archaic Greek Gem 93. The Elgin Athena 94. A Han Pottery Group 95. A T'ang Bronze Mirror 96. A Persian Pottery Box 97. A Seventh-Century Chinese Painting 98. A Wooden Figurine from Easter Island 99. Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection 100. Three Cologne Aristotle Incunabula 10 1. Three Early-printed English Books 102. Other Gifts ..... A Catalogue of Bronze Age Metal Objects Recent Publications .... Exhibition of English Art . PAGE 89 92 93 94 95 97 98 [OO [02 [03 :o4 [05 [08 [08 [09 :o9 10 II 13 13 13 14 15 16 17 19 23 23 PLATES XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. XXXIII. XXXIV. XXXV a-e, XXXVI. XXXVII a, b, XXXVIII. XXXIX. XL. XLI. The Codex Sinaiticus. Luke xix. 13— xx. 34 The Codex Sinaiticus, Luke xxii. 36—52 Engraving by Benedetto Montagna Drawing by Jacopo Ripanda Egyptian Limestone Head-rest Egyptian Limestone Head-rest Geometric Bronzes. /. Archaic Greek Gem. g. Corinthian Oil-bottle The Elgin Athena T'ang Bronze Mirror Han Pottery Group . A Seventh-Century Chinese Painting Wooden Figure from Easter Island Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection Italian Medals from the Whitcombe Greene Collection . Frontispiece To face page 90 104 105 106 107 108 109 112 112 113 114 115 116 vu ^^. THE CODEX SINAITICUS. NEVER before in the course of its long history can the British Museum have witnessed an apparently unending stream of visitors waiting patiently to file past a manuscript the austere and unadorned pages of which make no clamorous appeal to the eye, a volume, moreover, which can be read by very few of those who come to do homage. What then is this venerable book which, it is to be hoped, will soon find a permanent resting-place beside the Codex Alexandrinus, that fifth-century manuscript which has been hitherto the oldest copy of the Bible, as a whole, in the posses- sion of the British people ? In its original state the Codex Sinaiticus comprised the entire text of the Bible in Greek, but owing, in part at any rate, to adventures which will be recounted later, it has reached the Museum in a sadly mutilated condition. As received, the volume consists of 347 leaves, embracing: (i) fragments of Genesis, Numbers, i Chronicles, Tobit and Jeremiah, and the com- plete books of Judith, i Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, Isaiah, Joel, Obadiah, Jonah, Nahum to Malachi, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus and Job, from the Old Testament; (2) the whole of the New Testament; and (3) two apo- cryphal works which narrowly missed a place in the Canon, namely the Epistle of Barnabas and the 'Shepherd* of Hermas (the latter imperfect at the end). In point of age it rivals the fourth-century Codex Vaticanus, which is claimed to be the earliest of the three most famous codices of the Greek Bible and has been in the Vatican Library certainly since the fifteenth century. By general consent the Codex Sinaiticus is assigned to the middle or second half of the fourth cen- tury. It can, indeed, hardly be earlier than the middle of the century, for the Eusebian sections are indicated by a hand coeval with the text. These sections or divisions, which serve as a Harmony of the four Gospels, were devised by Eusebius of Caesarea, who died in or about A.D. 340. The work of at least three scribes, and written in bold uncial characters upon pages of fine vellum, each measuring 15 inches by 13J inches, the text is set out in four narrow columns, except in the poetical books. Psalms — Job, where two columns are used. To quote the words of Sir Frederic Kenyon, the open book, N 89 with its eight columns in sequence, suggests 'the succession of columns in a papyrus roll; and it is not at all impossible that it was actually copied from such a roll'. Egypt has claims to be regarded as the birthplace of the manuscript, and it may even have originated from the same scriptorium as the Codex Vaticanus. But although these ancient codices unite to preserve some good readings rejected by many later manuscripts and concur in the omission of a few important passages, as, for instance, the last twelve verses of St Mark, they were not copied from a common exemplar; so that, to borrow the words of Sir Frederic Kenyon once more, 'the independence of their testimony is not seriously impaired*. Hardly had the Codex Sinaiticus been completed when the first of its many correctors set to work. The pages at present displayed in the show-case afford a striking illustra- tion of the importance of these corrections for the textual criticism of the Bible. The book lies open at St Luke's Gospel (PI. XXIX, Frontispiece, and, on a larger scale, two columns on PI. XXX). On the latter, in ch. xxii. 43, 44, we read of the appearance of the Angel to Christ in the Garden and of the Bloody Sweat. This pass- age of surpassing pathos, one universally held in deep reverence, is omitted from several of the best manuscripts. Rows of dots, a device indicative of cancellation, mark the passage in the Codex Sinaiticus, signifying that some corrector, who had failed to find the verses in the copy that lay before him, doubted their authenticity. The famous German scholar, Constantine Tischendorf, to whom the initial discovery of the manuscript was due, has maintained that the marks were the work of the first corrector, who made his collation with a very good and ancient copy, and whose testimony is entitled to grave respect. It is at such moments that the value of the original manuscript becomes most apparent. Certainly, a photographic repro- duction of every extant portion of the manuscript has been made, but no facsimile, however perfect, can be of the least service to the student or critic who may wish to form his own judgement upon so delicate a matter. Nor is this all. Hampered though he needs must be by the show-case, the visitor should have little difficulty in satis- fying himself that at some time an attempt has been made to erase the marks of cancellation. Whether a detailed study of the text 90 1 HI >AMCX/ CO rO I MM lONXY rt)yK>M fAsN At rem ApYMJNon ll>Y nvi Of c r pXMM^ N O N A c r f iPACrC^ f » KiMc NC-MOI rOKKI xo r I cor I KAI f A j'T- T I e f » t'M C>T7,^A<^^ ^*^*' o I Keen iXNiAoy M XXA» ftcLDKeJ^fa Dxeci r 1 eNXYTOi' IKXNoNecriN KXi e > t- xo ci ) N tf r r o f eyo n KX r X rc>e«— ei croof oc r^i>N€ XXKON H KOXOY e h r cxN xexy Ta)K>j OlMXOH'J^l f eN 1 1 M t H^^icxc en i TOY'i or I oyt n k nxi rx> I en poet YxecoM M M ei cexoei N e k lllfXCM ON KXIXY lOCXMCCIlXc OMXnXY ru)NU)-^i XroO YK OXH N KXI ee I CI XI o NX ixnj^' HYXXroxeiuJN rr xjepei KicTyAn lAfe Nei Kxiroyroro iiornfioNYoy [- XT leM oyr I XM N MH TO OeAH M AM oyxK Xxroco N re/ n t? ^«- cuk)>o h xexy TCI >xr r exocxr 1 oy /'XN-T eN rcxyai n xy |on KXI I c N XM eN oc<5 NArcoNiXt Kft^N* c re {'O hinf ooiy xe I t^KXi ereisier- I A pc o cxy TOY*-i> *"' O J'O M KO I XI M XI <^i^' KX' I A RXI M O N TO'* firniNrHN KXlXNXCrrXCXI lO ni^i \ puceyxnc exocDNi ipoofoy^ M xo r 1 1 xcx~ Yi'tTN KOfMcUHeNOyc XYToycxi ro iMor rrMCKXitu fCNxr Toic I I KXoeyxcrp Ai\l Xc I AN' I 'cc 1 1 p»' e yxecoxi im ami eiceAenTAieid II fXCMON t rixyToyAXXoyN ' foai Aoyoxxo ci^ o AeroM eNocitJT XXcei C IXO N AUJ A* KXT r poM I'xeToXT KXI MiriceN Konr «4>ixncAi AyroN h xt-.e I r I en AyicuVovAA vpiAMMXr IIONYN loyAN o pel >n oynx pxxiAa)c ei Ao N recxJBOf ri«= p I Ay TO M roecoxi* N o N ei n XN Kee; r I XTAXO M C N e N M XXXI pn KXI en A ■ I A> e- H e I C I I C C- 5,Nf TeoH I oyApx I e p*- iOe I OM AOyAON K Ai Avh I Ae M r ooy- Ay I c 1 V roxe i. i o n A M O K p I oe I oAeoF en fc~NeAT«rc-cni- Toy TOY KXiA^XMe^Nocrr-y ci > ri oy I A CA'f oxT TON eii leNxercripo^- ToyeiiAPXr ^ NO M e N o Yc 1 1 p o c^xy roNApxitpeic^KXi c I pxii iroY<^^i<->T'* poyKXif ipt cRy r^ j^ayocairt-i 1 1 KH-m XXX. CODEX SINAITICUS. LUKE XXIL 36-52 (Reduced by one-fifth) holds more important surprises in store it is, of course, impossible to guess. In its relation to the New Testament, the manuscript, known to scholars as Aleph^ is summed up by Sir Frederic Kenyon thus: 'Besides being one of the most ancient, the Codex Sinaiticus is also one of the most valuable texts.* It has been argued from certain of the corrections that at a very early period the Codex Sinaiticus made its home in the great Christian library at Caesarea. Nothing definite can be said of its history, however, until the year 1 844. In that year Tischendorf, in quest of ancient texts for a pro- jected critical edition of the New Testament, visited the monastery of St Catherine on Mount Sinai. Among a basketful of fragments from manuscripts he was fortunate enough to find forty-three leaves from a copy of the Septuagint, which he at once recognized as being in an extremely ancient hand. Other basket-loads of similar waste material, he was told, had previously been destroyed. These forty- three leaves, containing portions of i Chronicles, Ezra, Tobit, Jeremiah and Lamentations, with Nehemiah and Esther complete, he was suffered to retain; but although he discovered some eighty more leaves of the Old Testament, he was denied an opportunity to study them. His travels at an end, Tischendorf presented his treasure to Frederick Augustus, King of Saxony, publishing its contents under the title of the 'Codex Friderico- Augustan us'. At Leipzig the leaves still remain. A second visit to Sinai in 1853 proved fruitless, but in 1 859 Tischendorf returned to the monastery, this time under the aegis of the Czar. Towards the end of his stay the steward produced for his inspection a pile of loose leaves which were soon to be known as the Codex Sinaiticus. Negotiations, the subject of much subsequent controversy, resulted in the dispatch of the manuscript to Cairo, where Tischendorf transcribed it, and thence to the Imperial Library at St. Petersburg. This then is the Codex Sinaiticus which now lies within our grasp. Like most famous men and objects, it has not wanted detractors. Let one be mentioned, Constantine Simonides. Tischendorf had lent his aid in the exposure of the frauds of Simonides, and the forger sought revenge by claiming that the Codex was the product of his own pen. It only remains once more to remind every friend of the British 91 Museum that a great sum is still required to secure this priceless manuscript, and that all subscriptions, however small, will be welcome. They should be sent to the Director, British Museum, London, W.C. I. A.J.Collins. 78. AN EARLY MS. OF GREEK CANON LAW. THE Department of Manuscripts possesses many manuscripts dealing, wholly or in part, with the canon law of the Greek Church, but nothing so early as a fragment (Egerton MS. 3125) recently acquired by private purchase. It is therefore to be regretted that this fragment is but a small one, consisting of two quires only, each of eight leaves, the first numbered k (20), the second Ka (21; by a slip of the pen the scribe has continued the numeration of the first quire on to the first two leaves of the second). The hand suggests a date not far removed from a.d. iooo; and since nineteen quires are lost, the portion here described would seem to come from the later part of the volume, as indeed the contents suggest. The corpus of Greek canon law was fixed, in almost its present extent, by the Council 'in Trullo' in a.d. 692. Its elements consisted of (a) the 85 so-called 'Apostolic Canons'; (if) the canons of various councils; {c) certain canonical letters, decisions, and extracts from the works of early Fathers, from Dionysius of Alexandria to Gennadius of Constantinople. Commentaries on this body of legal matter were written from time to time, and arrangements of it, no longer chrono- logical but under subject headings, were made by Johannes Scho- lasticus in the sixth and by Photius in the ninth century. By the addition of the Imperial laws relating to church matters was formed the 'Nomocanon', of which the earliest example is that passing under the name of Johannes Scholasticus and the best known that issued by Photius, Patriarch of Constantinople. Egerton 3125 shows an early stage in the history of the manuscript transmission of the corpus. Its arrangement is by sources, not by subjects, and it lacks the commentary. Presumably the Apostolic Canons and those of councils came first; the portion remaining begins in the middle of the series of extracts from Basil, followed by the Canonical Epistle of Gregory of Nyssa to Letoius, the usual extract from the poem on 92 the canon of scripture by Gregory of Nazianzus, and the iambics on the same subject commonly attributed to Amphilochius. Thus it belongs to the class of work represented by William Beveridge's IxjvoT^iKov she Pandecta Canonum (Oxonii, 1672) and Cardinal J. B. Pitra's luris Ecclesiastici Graecorum Historia et Monument a (Romae, 1 864-1 868); but the former includes the commentaries. Among the manuscripts in the British Museum the nearest analogy is with Add. MS. 28823, which, however, like Beveridge's work, contains the commentaries or §piir|veTai. So far as the fragment extends, the choice and order of letters and extracts are identical with those seen in 28823 and in the printed works named above, ^ except that the extracts from Timothy, Theophil us, and Cyril of Alexandria, which in all of them occur between Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory of Nazianzus, are here wanting. Whether this points to derivation from an earlier form of the compilation, in which these particular Fathers were not yet represented, or merely to a different arrange- ment, it is, in the present state of the manuscript, impossible to decide. H. I. Bell. 79. SEALS OF EVESHAM ABBEY. THE Department of Manuscripts has acquired three fine examples of the well-known thirteenth-century seal of the Abbey of Evesham. All three are attached to leases granted by the last abbot, Philip Hawford or Ballard, and dated between 4 November 1538 and 8 April 1539. They are now numbered Egerton Charters 2175-7. E. J. Rudge in his Short Account of the History and Antiquities of 'Evesham^ pp. 1 24-3 i , while treating of the Abbey seal, describes three leases to which impressions of it were attached. There can be little doubt that two of these documents form part of the present acquisition. Egerton Charter 2177, dated 16 December 1538, is evidently the second lease described by Rudge, it being then, 1820, in his own possession. At some time previous to 1 8 1 9 he appears to have communicated an account of it to the editors of Dugdale's ^ There are some minor differences between Egerton 3125 and the other three, and between 28823 and Beveridge on the one side and Pitra on the other, but these can be neglected here, as not affecting the general agreement. 93 Monasticon^ who mention it in vol. ii, p. 13, of that work. Egerton Charter 2176 is equally certainly the third of the leases noted by Rudge, in whose time it was owned by a Mr W. Hamper of Birmingham. The seal attached to it may therefore be identified with one of the two in Hamper*s possession, which were used by him for his notes on the Evesham seal published in Archaeologia^ xix (1821), pp. 66-9. Both the seals attached to the two leases mentioned above, though good examples, are somewhat damaged. Egerton Charter 2175 is> however, quite perfect and remarkably well preserved. Thus, although the Museum already has three other specimens (Detached Seals XXXV, 58, 59, and Add. Ch. 42601, the latter attached to another lease of Abbot Philip, none of them quite complete), the new ones are very welcome and useful additions to the national collection. F. Wormald. 80. THE WHALLEY CHARTULARY. FIRST at Stanlow, in Cheshire, later farther north, at Whalley, a chequered existence of four centuries, culminating in the execution of the last abbot for treason, was the portion of the Cistercian house named by its founder 'Locus Benedictus*. In this retreat litigation, the bugbear (or was it the relaxation ?) of English monasticism, was chronic and called for systematic record-keeping. After the Dissolution, so the evidence would suggest, there remained three registers or coucher-books which passed, along with the abbey site, into the possession of Richard Assheton, of Whalley. In the course of the seventeenth century these books were consulted by several well-known antiquaries, and extracts taken by Roger Dods- worth, Christopher Towneley, and the youngest Randle Holme have long stood upon the shelves of the Bodleian Library and the British Museum. Attention of a less enlightened kind was destined to come their way. It was the uncomeliness of their rough monastic bindings, no doubt, that prompted house-proud owners to clothe the oaken boards of two at least of the books in velvet: in the case of the volume recently acquired (and the later to receive this treat- ment) a silver-gilt clasp, bearing the hall-mark for 1824-5, was 94 added. A century ago the Museum became possessed, in Add. MS. 10374, of what may be identified from external evidence^ as 'the lesser coucher booke of Whalley Abbey, in the Keepeing of Richard Ashton of Downham 1658'. The second of the series, a mere frag- ment, was secured through the Bridgewater Fund (Egerton MS. 2600) in 188 1. Finally, the decision of Earl Howe, a descendant of the first lay owner of Whalley, to part with the chartulary remaining in his hands has led to the acquisition of the last, the latest and the most important of the group, the 'major liber de Whalleye et Stanlawe', drawn up in the time of Abbot John de Lindelay [circa 1 342-77). As the 'registrum de Whalley penes Radulphum Ashton militem et bar. a. 1627' it served the compilers of Dugdale*s Monastkon Anglic anum, and the entire text has since been published in the Chetham Society's four-volume Coucher Book oj Whalley. It may be of interest to mention that the handful of Whalley deeds which have from time to time found their way to the Museum are endorsed with press-masks corresponding to the disposition of the deeds in the new register. Once again the benefaction of the eighth Earl of Bridgewater has stood the Department of Manuscripts in good stead, and the book will bear the number Egerton MS. 3 1 26. A.J. Collins. 81. A RELIGIOUS TRACT OF CHARLES IL SHORTLY after the death of King Charles II there appeared in print two tracts concerning the authority of the Roman Catholic Church said to have been written by the late monarch and found among his papers after his decease. The following year they were reprinted with a third tract written by James IFs first wife, Anne Hyde, Duchess of York, and a copy was sent by the new King to his daughter the Princess of Orange. Various translations were immediately published on the Continent. Referring to these pamph- lets later, Halifax, in his Character of King Charles II, commented: 'As to his writing those Papers, he might do it. Though neither his Temper nor Education made him very fit to be an Author, yet in this case, (a known Topick so very often repeated) he might write ^ Harley MS. 2064, f. 8 1 b, quoting from 'the 23 page' of the manuscript. 95 it all himself, and yet not one word of it his own, ... he might, by the Effect chiefly of his Memory, put together a few Lines with his own Hand, without any help at the time; in which there was nothing extraordinary, but that one so little inclined to write at all, should prevail with himself to do it with the Solemnity of a Casuist*. Though the tracts created a stir at the time nothing is known of the whereabouts or of the history of Charles's own manuscript. A few years ago, however, there came to light a copy of the first of them, dif- fering in a few minor particulars from the printed version, in the hand of James II himself. 'The discourse we had the other day*, it begins, *I hope satisfyd you in the maine that Christ can have but one church here upon Earth' and, after arguments in favour of the view that Christ left His authority to this Church, it concludes: Tf they had this power then, I desire to know how they came to loose it, and by what authority men seperat them selvs from that church. The only pretence I ever heard of was, because that the church had failed in wresting and interpreting the Scripturs contrary to the true sence and meaning of it, and that they have imposed articles of faith upon us, w*=** is not to be warrented by Gods word; I do desire to know who is to be the jude (jf. judge) of that, whether the whole Church, the succession where of has continud to this day without inturuption or parti- cular men who have raised shismes for their owne advantage.* There follows a note: 'this is a true copy of a paper writen by the late King my brother, w*=^ I found in one of his strongboxes, after his deceasse*. Such material from such a source was obvious food for the controversialists. Nor were they slow to grasp their opportunity. Among others, Stillingfleet, afterwards Bishop of Worcester, and Gilbert Burnet, later Bishop of Salisbury, assailed the views expressed in the royal pamphlets. Dryden, himself but recently converted to the Roman Catholic faith, was employed by the King in their defence, and a bitter controversy ensued. The documents were obviously intended to play a part in the effort of the later Stuarts to bring about a reconciliation with Rome. This recently found copy of James II has, therefore, a strong historical interest apart from its value as a royal autograph; and the Museum is thus greatly indebted to the late Captain T. B. A. Haggard, who presented it. B. Schofield. 96 82. LETTERS OF TALLEYRAND, FROM THE LIBRARY OF THE EARL OF ROSEBERY. *TT 7E are persuaded that, had Napoleon been able to retain and V V work with Talleyrand, his fall would not have taken place.' So it seemed to the late Lord Rosebery, weighing in his Napoleon: the Last Phase the causes of the collapse of the First Empire. In his library, rich in Napoleonic treasures, were eight letters addressed by Talleyrand to the Emperor between 20 August 1804 and 15 July 1808. Recently, when the library came under the auctioneer's hammer, the present Earl purchased these letters for presentation to the Museum in commemoration of his father's long services as a Trustee. The gift (Add. MS. 43503) brings to the Department of Manuscripts a sheaf of the minister's informal day-to-day reports upon foreign affairs, more than three hundred of which, preserved in the archives of the French Foreign Office, have long been avail- able in print. If few in number, the new letters are apparently un- published^, and would seem to be carefully selected specimens, reflecting many traits of this most adroit and unscrupulous dip- lomatist. On 13 December 1805 the Austrians, lately crushed at Austerlitz, sought to mitigate the sacrifices demanded of them by a suggestion that Hanover should be conferred upon one of the Archdukes. The idea intrigued Talleyrand, and he passed it on thus: *La verite est que I'electorat d'Hanovre donn6 \ un archiduc auroit I'avantage de detacher pour jamais I'Autriche de I'Angleterre et d'augmenter la rivalite qui subsiste entre I'Autriche et la Prusse; cela produiroit aussi de la mesintelligence entre les cours de Peters- bourg et de Vienne; ce qui mettroit I'Autriche dans I'obligation de vivre en bonne intelligence et de s'entendre avec la France. Mais il est possible que cette proposition ait ete faite uniquement pour savoir si le Hanovre etoit donne ou promis \ la Prusse. Je n'ai rien repondu qui ait pue claircir \ leurs yeux cette question.' The denouement followed with dramatic swiftness. Next day, upon the receipt of this dispatch. Napoleon made known the Austrian proposal to the waver- ^ The letter of 1 3 December 1 805 is printed from a divergent copy, said to derive from the minute of a Foreign Office official, in P. Bertrand's Lettres inedites de Talleyrand h Napolion^ p. 213. o 97 ing Prussian envoy, who was at once brought to his knees. By the Treaty of Vienna, signed on 1 5 December, Hanover was bartered to Prussia in exchange for territories demanded by the French. In another letter Talleyrand naively confesses to one of his many besetting sins. 'J'avoue,' runs an interlined afterthought to the letter of 20 August 1 804, 'que je trouve ma note [to the Russian charge d'affaires at Paris] un peu dure, surtout par I'ironie qui y regne.* He knew something of the art of flattery also, greeting detailed news of the battle of Jena with the remark: 'Votre Majestd a depuis longtems ^puis^ I'admiration; notre amour et notre reconnaissance pour Elle sont seules in^puisables' (letter of 1 8 October 1 806). The most intimate glimpse is reserved until the end. Upon retirement from office Talleyrand withdrew to his villa at Valen9ay, in Touraine. Here Ferdinand VII of Spain became his unwilling guest, and it fell to Talleyrand to provide the kidnapped monarch with soothingly bucolic occupations — fishing, gardening, hunting. 'J'esp^re*, he wrote on 15 July 1808, *que I'ignorance absolue dans laquelle j'ai ddsir^ qu'on fut a Valen9ay pendant toute la Junte, et Toubli des affaires qui en a et^ la suite, aura rempli les vues de Votre Majeste.* For himself he adds: 'Cet ^tat de mort convenoit a la disposition de tristesse dans laquelle je suis personnellement.* Hitherto this fascinating correspondence has been represented in the British Museum by a single letter, Add. MS. 26053, ^* ^7* A. J. Collins. 83. THE COVENTRY MYSTERIES. IN 1825 the Coventry antiquary, Thomas Sharp, published his Dissertation on the Pageants or Dramatic Mysteries anciently per- jormed at Coventry^ in which he discussed with full and interesting illustrative detail the craft plays of Coventry and printed as an example the pageant of the Company of Shearman and Taylors. The book has considerable importance in the study of the religious plays of medieval England, and the gift by the Hon. John W. Leslie of the proof sheets of the volume, accompanied by certain original documents quoted in it and correspondence connected with it, is therefore very welcome. The volume is now numbered Add. MS. 98 43645' The contents include some excellent drawings made for the engraved illustrations by David Jee, a young Coventry artist employed by Sharp, and various states of the engravings themselves. Among the original documents are two interesting papers of the early seventeenth century relating to Thomas Massie, who acted as a contractor for the Drapers' Company to furnish performers and play this Pageant. These statements of his case show Massie at odds with the Municipal authorities of the city where he produced his shows. In one he tells how *Mr. Page Maior did buffitt me w*^ both his clutch ffists, manny blowes, and spitt filthily in my face, for telling hym, I heard saye. The Lady Elizabeth's grace was desirous to see Coventrie'; in the other he states that in March 1603 he 'intimated to the Maior and his brethren then in Councell that his intent was to make a shew uppon the Kinges dale, and to that purpose craued allowance, who receiued answere thence, that such toyes (as he would sett abroad) deserued noe Contribucon. But seconding his request and making offers to perform yt uppon his own Charges . . . his Proiect and Speaches were referred to the view of two Preachers, who mislyking many thinges both in subject and forme, there was an order prescribed for his proceeding, and he confirmed in his shews.' These records of a producer's trials refer to the visit of the Princess Elizabeth to Coventry on 1 3 April 1 604 and to the accession of James I. Another document of the early seventeenth century gives an account of the times of performance of the city 'waits'. The letters addressed to Sharp by his fellow antiquaries are a useful addition to the documentation of English literary scholarship. The most copious writers are Francis Douce, Dawson Turner, and Robert Pitcairn. Douce, in particular, to whom Sharp's book is dedicated, discusses at length many of the problems there treated. He sets out at length, for example, the reasons for denying to Coventry the plays in Cotton MS. Vespasian D. VIII, which Sharp did not admit, but which modern scholarship has confirmed. But the most interest- ing items of this correspondence are two letters from Sir Walter Scott, dated 7 March and 7 September 1 826, in which he records his rnemories of the folk-plays of his youth in Scotland, tells how he himself used to play the part of Judas bearing the bag, and quotes 99 a fragment which he and his father before him had been wont to repeat. This is an attractive amplification of his note on the subject in *Marmion\ These two letters, which in their composition show some evidence of the stress of mind under which Scott was labouring at the time — it was the year of the Ballantyne failure and of Lady Scott's death — are a welcome addition to the Museum collection of his autographs. R. Flower. 84. THE PAPERS OF RICHARD COBDEN. THE gift to the Museum early in 1933 of the papers of John Bright (by the generosity of Mrs Darbishire and Mr J. A. Bright) is now rounded off and completed (as it were) by the acquisi- tion of the papers of one whose name will always be linked with that of John Bright — his close friend and companion-in-arms, Richard Cobden. These papers, which have been received by the Museum in eight separate instalments (beginning in 1924), have been gener- ously presented by Cobden's last surviving daughter, Mrs Jane Cobden Unwin, in her own name and in those of her late four sisters. Great use has already been made of the collection (correspondence and diaries alike) by Lord Morley in his Life, 1 88 1 (Jubilee edition, 1896), who refers in the Preface to its partial arrangement by Mr Henry Richard, M.P. (for Cobden's letters to whom see below). The papers have been arranged so as to form thirty-two volumes (Add. MSS. 43647-43678), and contain what must be an unrivalled collection of Cobden autographs — consisting, not merely, as is usually the case with political correspondence, of drafts of letters in reply, but, for the most part, of the original letters dispatched by Cobden (returned, doubtless, by the recipients to Cobden himself or members of his family). These letters written by Cobden (with the other side of the correspondence included, where it is available) constitute more than half of the collection (eighteen volumes out of the thirty-two). The first two volumes contain the correspondence with Henry Ashworth, a founder of the Anti-Corn Law League, the next four Cobden's letters to John Bright (for Bright's letters to Cobden — in two volumes — see the Bright Papers, described in the British Museum Quarterly for May 1933, Vol. VII, No. 4, p. 119). The next two 100 volumes consist of the correspondence with George Combe of Edinburgh, the writer on education and social ethics, while in Vol. IX are letters addressed to William Hargreaves. Volumes X- XII contain Cobden's extensive series of letters to Henry Richard, Secretary of the Peace Society, and Vol. XIII his letters to Joseph Sturge, the Birmingham philanthropist. Those recipients of letters from Cobden whose letters bulk less largely (Vols. XIV-XVI) are (a) J. B. Arles-Dufour, the Lyons silk manufacturer and economist (one of the negotiators of the Treaty of Commerce of i860); (6) Joseph Parkes, the Birmingham politician; (c) William Tait, the Edinburgh publisher; (^) Edward Baines (knighted 1880), the journalist and economist; (e) John Roberton, the Manchester surgeon; (f) Charles Pelham Villiers, M.P.; (g) Col. (afterwards Gen.) J. W. Fitzmayer (K.C.B. 1871); and {/i) A. W. Paulton, lecturer and editor for the Anti-Corn Law League. To conclude the series of letters in Cobden's autograph are two volumes (Vols. XVII, XVIII) of letters written by Cobden to various correspondents — none of the series being of sufficient bulk to form a separate group. We now come to the letters addressed to Cobden by others, where Cobden's letters to them are not forthcoming. Of these the largest is the series from Michel Chevalier, the French economist (one of the negotiators of the Treaty of Commerce of i860), whose letters occupy Vols. XIX and XX. Volume XXI comprises the letters from (a) Earl Cowley, British Ambassador at Paris; (6) Sir Louis Mallet (knighted 1868), of the Board of Trade; and (c) George Wilson, Chairman of the Anti-Corn Law League, and Volume XXII the letters from (a) Thomas Milner-Gibson, President of the Board of Trade; (^) Goldwin Smith (before, of course, his migration to America); and (c) General Thomas Perronet Thompson, M.P., author of the Catechism on the Corn Laws, Volumes XXIII-XXV contain miscellaneous letters addressed to Cobden, and to Vol. XXVI are allotted all letters and papers of folio-size or upwards, which are too large to be conveniently included in the preceding volumes. The third section of the Cobden Papers consists of the statesman's diaries of his tours and of his residence at Paris in connection with the Commercial Treaty of i860. Vol. XXVII (A and B), the lOI Mediterranean tour, extends from 1 7 October 1 836 to 1 5 April 1837 (Morley, Jubilee edn. I, 43-88). Vol. XXVIII (A and B), the tour in Germany, extends from 25 August to 26 October 1838 (Morley, I. 1 28-34). Vol. XXIX (A-E), the fourteen-months European tour (5 August 1846 to 12 October 1847), begins shortly after Cobden's great triumph in the repeal of the Corn Laws by Sir Robert Peel's Government (Morley, I, ch. xviii). The last volume occupied by the account of this tour contains also Cobden's diary to, at, and back from Paris, where he attended — unofficially — the Congress of the Peace Society, 1 6 to 3 i August 1 849 (Morley, II, 46-49). The latest diary (Vol. XXX A-C) covers the period 18 October 1859 to 18 May 1 8 6 1 , the period of the negotiation of the famous Treaty of Commerce of 1 860 between England and France (Morley, II, chs. xi-xiii). Con- sequently most of the entries are during Cobden's residence at Paris. Included are (a) a visit to the Riviera, 3 February to 24 March 1 860, and (^) a long stay in Algiers, 13 December i860 to 23 April 1861 (Cobden visited Marseilles, Avignon, and Lyons on his way back to Paris); also copies of three letters from Cobden to Lord Palmerston. The fourth, and last, section of the Cobden Papers (Vols. XXXI, XXXII) consists of type-written and other copies of letters from Cobden. The whole, collected and preserved with loving filial care, and now so generously presented to the national library, is a worthy memorial to a great Englishman. G. T. Hales. 85. TWO PERSIAN MANUSCRIPTS. A FRIEND whose generosity has laid the Department of Oriental .Printed Books and Manuscripts under frequent obligation has added to our debt by enriching it with two interesting Persian manuscripts. The first of these is a copy of the Divan or collected poems of the famous Salman Savajl, who was born circa a.d. i 290 and died circa 1376; as this manuscript is dated a.h. 796, corre- sponding to November 1393 — October 1394, it appears to be the earliest copy in existence. The poet, whose full name was Jamal ul- Dln Salman ibn 'Ala ul-Din Muhammad, was a native of Savah, whence his surname Savajl, and flourished at the courts of Hasan 102 Buzurg, the founder of the Ilkhani dynasty (a.h. 72^- 5?)^ his wife Dilshad, his son Uvais (a.h. 7S7-7^)i ^^^ his grandson Husain (a.h. 776-84). His works include two masnavJ romances, kasatd or longer odes, for which he was particularly famous, tarjT-band or refrain-poems, rnardsi or dirges, mukatta^dt or miscellaneous verses, ghazaliyydt or shorter odes, and quatrains {rubd'tyydt). The present manuscript, which is bound in a cover of stamped leather measuring io|- by 7 inches, contains the Kasa'id and miscellaneous verses, and is written in a neat but scholarly handwriting midway between naskht and nasta'lik. It is illustrated by eight miniatures of good quality, which seem to be somewhat later than the text, but are certainly earlier than the Safavl period. The other manuscript is contained in a fine painted and lacquered binding of ctrca a.d. 1800, which measures 6J by 4 inches, and is decorated outside with floral designs and inside with figures of women. The manuscript itself consists of various mu'ammd or riddles in verse, quatrains, and other short poems, which were compiled by an unknown man of letters for 'Abbas Kuli Shamlu, Beglerbegi of Herat and son of Hasan Beg Shamlu, Beglerbegi of Khurasan, in the latter half of the seventeenth century. It is an exquisite specimen of delicate calligraphy and illumination, being written in a small fine nasta'lik with floral designs in colours on a gold ground, while the first and last pages are decorated with a beautiful 'unvdn and shamsiyyahs or medallions, &c. E. Edwards. 86. PRINTS ACQUIRED AT THE BOERNER SALE, LEIPZIG, NOVEMBER 1933. THE exchange of a duplicate print from the Malcolm Collection enabled the Museum to purchase a certain number of engravings at the recent sale at Leipzig, which came largely from the Friedrich August II collection at Dresden. The most important is the beautiful engraving of St Francis receiving the Stigmata^ by Benedetto Montagna, P. V, 15, 44, of which the only other impression known is at Bassano. The Bassano impression is cut along the upper margin, and its condition is other- wise inferior to the Museum print (see PL XXXI). Benedetto 103 Montagna was the son of Bartolommeo Montagna, the leading painter of the School of Vicenza, and was probably working in Vicenza between 1500 and 1540. It is in the broadly engraved manner of his earlier works, immediately inspired by Bartolommeo, and probably engraved about 1 500. The other prints acquired are as follows: Abraham Bosse^ La Noblesse frangaise b. I'^glise. A set of 13 costume prints. Blum, 926-38. Herman Brekervelt^ Landscape with Abraham and Isaac. Etching. Only known to Burchard ('Die holland. Radierer vor Rembrandt' 19 1 7, p. 46) in the present impression. Pieter Brueghel, the elder. Large Alpine landscape etching. Van Bastelaar, 1 8. A fine impression. Abraham Casembrot, Shipwreck. Etching. Undescribed. Jeremias Falck. Seven portrait engravings (Bl. 207, 215, 229, 249, 257, 274, and 286). Jacob de Gheyn. Set of six landscape etchings. Rare. A. M. Hind. 87. DRAWING BY JACOPO RIPANDA. IN 1 899 the late Franz WickhofF published in the Vienna Jahrbuch an article with the title 'Marcantons Eintritt in den Kreis Romi- scher Kuenstler'. In this article Wickhoff connected a number of drawings with the frescoes representing the Punic Wars in the Palazzo de' Conservatori in Rome which were then believed to be by Baldassare Peruzzi but have since been shown by Fiocco {JO Arte, XXIII (1920), p. 27) to be the work of Jacopo Ripanda. The con- nexion between the group of drawings and the frescoes established by WickhofF remains valid. The drawings, as well as the frescoes, are by Ripanda. The drawings described and illustrated by Wick- hofF and subsequently by Fiocco included two in the Louvre, the one an allegorical representation of the third Punic War, the other a subject connected with Cleopatra, and a third drawing also repre- senting a scene in the life of Cleopatra. This third drawing was reproduced by WickhofF (Tafel XIII) from a photograph in the collection of Raphael material formed by the Prince Consort and 104 XXXI. ENGRAVING BY BENEDETTO MONTAGNA XXXII. DRAWING BY JACOPO RIPANDA preserved in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle. The whereabouts of this drawing, which was photographed when in the Heubel Collection in Berlin, was not known to Wickhoff and remained un- known until the drawing itself was brought to the British Museum a few months ago on behalf of its actual owner, from whom it has since been purchased. The drawing which is reproduced on Plate XXXII is carefully finished in pen and brown ink and measures I2j^ by 8| inches. The subject, according to Wickhoff, represents Mark Antony interrupting Furnius, who was pleading before him, to accompany Cleopatra, as related by Plutarch. Mark Antony is seated on a throne to the right, Cleopatra holding a child by the hand is behind in the centre; Furnius is presumably the man who stands in front to the left, holding a scroll. In subject, in style, and in size the drawing is closely connected with the second drawing in the Louvre already referred to. The interest to the department of Jacopo Ripanda has lately been increased by his probable identification with the engraver I B with the bird. Mr J. Byam Shaw, in a recent series of articles in the Print Collectors^ Quarterly (1933), has brought together a great deal of evidence towards this identification, which may be regarded as established. The department already possessed a fine series of the artist's engravings and woodcuts but no authenticated drawing. A. E. POPHAM. 88. TWO HEAD-RESTS AND OTHER EGYPTIAN AN- TIQUITIES. A SMALL collection, recently acquired, contains pieces, which, though damaged, are all of exceptional interest. A limestone head-rest, reported to have come from Dair Mawas, on the other side of the river from Al ' Amarnah, is remarkable both for its form and for its decoration (Plate XXXIII). It is clearly adapted from the type with octagonal fluted shaft, found commonly in the XVIIIth Dynasty and more rarely in the XlXth. But in deference to the material of which it is made the space between the horns of the rest proper and the base has been only partially cut P 105 away, so as to leave a panel of stone on either side of the shaft, and thus minimize the chance of breaking off the tips of the rest. These panels have been subsequently decorated with four figures in low relief, one on each side of the shaft, back and front. One horn of the rest and part of the corresponding panel, and the ends of the base have been broken ofl^, but comparatively little detail has been lost from the decoration. On the front (probably) of the head-rest, two figures of Bes face in to the support. The figure to the right brandishes a serpent in his left hand and carries a spear in the other. Two more snakes are held between his teeth. He wears the lotus flower often shown on the head of Bes and Taurt in the XVIIIth Dynasty. Of the other figure, little is left but the snake in his left hand balancing the spear of his vis-a-vis. An inscription in hieroglyphs down the centre of the shaft between the figures expresses a hope for 'Good sleeping in the West, the Land of Righteousness, by the royal scribe Qenherk- hepeshef, justified*. On the back of the head-rest a griffin, on the left, with lotus flower head-dress, faces a lioness ( ?) eating a snake. Both rest their forefeet on conical supports and are armed with knives. Between them on the shaft a complementary inscription asks for good sleep *at the hand of Amen' for Qenherkhepeshef. Two more inscriptions ran down the edges of the two panels, of which one survives, repeating the title and name of the owner with his affiliation. Unfortunately the stone is broken away where the father's name begins. The amplified title 'True scribe of the King whom he loves' (for simple 'royal scribe') is written with the seated ape for ^ and the seated King wearing both crowns and holding a crook for ^, in that order, and is followed by a seated goddess with feather and ^ (for w/*) mr-J. The four figures are all reminiscent of the designs on carved ivory wands of the Xllth-XVIIIth Dynasties, the use of which is still debated. Their presence, therefore, confirms the general impres- sion, made by the form of the head-rest and the name of its owner, that the object should be dated to the XVIIIth or XlXth Dynasties. If so this figure of Bes with a spear is one of the earliest to give him a warlike character. io6 XXXIII. EGYPTIAN LIMESTONE HEAD-REST XXXIV. EGYPTIAN LIMESTONE HEAD-REST The head-rest for daily use would not be made of stone. This was part of Qenherkhepeshef's tomb furniture, as is proved by the magical character of the figures and by the funerary inscriptions. Height 7i inches; length 8 J inches. A second head -rest, also broken at one end, is either funerary or for use in ritual (Plate XXXIV). It is made of glazed composition, and is of the early form derived from a plain block of wood with sloping sides and slightly curved top. But the nature of the glaze and the style of the decoration incised in it show that the object is of late Ptolemaic if not Roman date. Its most unexpected feature is the hollowing out and carving of the ends to represent shrines. Of one practically nothing is left; but the other displays a double cornice with sun disk and uraei between, over the doorway to a small cham- ber. The sides show, on the one side the Gods Maahes, Haroeris, and Shu advancing towards a seated lion, on the other Amen-Re*, ram-headed, and another god of whom only legs and staff remain, approaching a loaded altar. The four angles above, caused by the dip in the top of the pillow, were filled with the fore-parts of sphinxes. Two remain, one hawk-headed, the other ram-headed. The object is all the more interesting in that its purpose is uncertain. Height 5I inches; length SJ inches. The tail end of a blue glass fish (length 4! inches) with fins of yellow glass, though incomplete and never so fine a piece of work as the variegated fish from Al 'Amarnah already in the Museum, is a splendid example of XVIIIth Dynasty glass technique. Some frag- ments of variegated blue glass with the decorative strips of white, yellow, and mauve make it possible to reconstruct what must have been one of the loveliest and largest vases of the best period of the art. The rims of both lip and foot of this vase were finished off with a narrow strip of coiled white and brown glass. A third, blue glass, vase is of the same quality of material, but undecorated. Com- paratively few examples, however, of this shape have survived in so complete a state. Height 3} inches. A finely carved carnelian figure of Amen-Re* wears the conven- tional ostrich plumes, and has a suspension ring on the back of the head and a minute plinth. 107 In addition the collection contains part of a document written in Demotic. It is the right hand half of a contract for sale of a house dated on the 20th Mesore of the i ith year of Ptolemy VI Philo- metor (19 September 170 B.C.). The names of the parties are lost and the legal contents unimportant. But no other document of this year has so far come to light, and a lacuna in the list of eponymous priests, the most valuable means of precise dating of Ptolemaic records, is thus partly filled. The name of the priest of Alexander is ilgsntrws ('AAe^cxv^^pos) son oiipygrts (. . . Kpdrris). The name of the Athlophoros is lost; that of the Canephoros is Strtngse (Stpoctovikti ?) daughter oiiwtnws son of T/iwgrs. S. R. K. Glanville. 89. A CYCLADIC IDOL. A MARBLE idol of Early Cycladic date (about 2500 B.C.) has been bought by Sir Arthur Evans for the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities. It represents a woman in pregnancy. This condition has been noted in other examples of the class, but it is not so definitely expressed in them. Such representations may help to indicate the purpose for which these images were made. A pregnant woman is not likely to have been chosen for a ushabti in the grave, nor even, in this pose, to have represented a Mother Goddess. The feet show, as in many other instances, that the figure is recumbent, and the folded arms seem to belong to the same pose. It probably represents an ordinary woman, perhaps with magical or religious reference to sexual functions. E. J. Forsdyke. 90. GEOMETRIC BRONZES FROM POTIDAEA AN addition to the material of the Early Iron Age in Macedonia xX described in B.M.Q., VI, p. 82, has been acquired by the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities. The new group includes, besides bronze ornaments, some beads of amber, bone, cornelian, and glass. These evidently come from irregular excava- tions in a cemetery, and it is not certain that they all belonged to Geometric burials. Noteworthy pieces among the bronzes are illustrated in Plate XXXV a-e. There are a pair of linked rings with triple bosses, apparently representing heads of dogs or bulls; 108 XXXV. a~e. GEOMETRIC BRONZES, i : 2. /. ARCHAIC GREEK GEM. 2:1. g. CORINTHIAN OIL-BOTTLE, i : i vO w > X X X a large lobed rosette which is shown by a bronze hook and remains of an iron pin on its back to be a fibula-plate; and spiral armlets of single and multiple coils with moulded ends and simple linear engraving. The fibula-plate is decorated with finely incised circles. E. J. FORSDYKE. 91. A NEW CORINTHIAN ARYBALLOS. AN archaic Greek oil-bottle, bought from the J. R. Vallentin xV Fund, is a new and important document in the history of Corin- thian pottery (Plate XXXV^). It belongs to the middle period, about 590 B.C., and is by the same hand as the well-known aryballos with the boar-hunt in the Louvre (E 612), and three with heroic battles in Vienna (Payne, Necrocorinthia, p. 304, nos. 807-9). The Austrian battle-scenes are very similar to this, and one has a com- batant distinguished by his name, Aineas, so that they may all be taken to represent Homeric incidents. Other points of similarity in the group are key-patterns on the rims, chequered handles, and the ornaments in the field, particularly the formal flowers springing from the ground. But the portraits of the two Corinthian ladies in the tondo underneath this vase are unique. Single heads are not un- common on the backs of handles, as on the aryballos in this Museum with the lady's name inscribed beside it, Aineta, and below, the long list of her male admirers. There is no record of the provenience of the new vase. It had been in private possession in London for many years. E. J. Forsdyke. 92. AN ARCHAIC GREEK GEM. A FINE Greek intaglio of about 500 B.C. has been given by Mrs Ormerod, of Harrogate. The stone is a chalcedony cut scarab. Its surface has been worn so that the ladder border is only partly visible, but the engraved design is perfectly preserved (Plate XXXVy). It shows a sphinx seizing a young Greek, who defends himself with a sword. This evidently refers to the Theban legend. Sphinxes are often represented seizing men, but the men are usually dead, and the sphinx may then be a creature of death in general. Other variants have a griffin instead of a sphinx. By a strange coincidence the closest parallel to the subject of the new archaic gem, 109 in which the victim fights with a sword, is on one of the latest gems in the collection, an amethyst from the Arras Treasure, found in 1922 with medallions of Constantius Chlorus {Cat. Gems, 191 8*). E. J. FoRSDYKE. 93. THE ELGIN ATHENA. THE Earl of Elgin and Kincardine has generously deposited on loan his bronze statuette of Athena flying her owl (Plate XXXVI). This rare and beautiful piece belonged to the original Elgin Collection, and has been known for many years; but it has not previously appeared in public, or even in a photograph. Alexander Conze saw it at Broomhall in 1889 and published a note on it in Festschrift Jiir Benndorf, illustrated with a drawing which is re- produced in Reinach's Repertoire, The bronze is in extremely fine condition. The slender but robust forms, the lively pose and the severe drapery, belong to the second quarter of the fifth century b.c, and the technique of engraved hair and sharply cut features, and the sketchy finish of the owl and raised hand, point to the same time. The figure can therefore be identified as an original Greek work contemporary with the sculpture of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia. It was probably acquired in Athens by Lusieri, Lord Elgin's Nea- politan agent, and it seems likely that it was made there. The motive of flying the owl, like a carrier-pigeon, occurs on Athenian bronze coins of the time of Hadrian (Imhoof-Gardner, Numismatic Commentary, pi. A A, iv); but Athena there has an Attic helmet and stands in a later fifth-century pose. The only other record of the type, an archaistic marble relief in the Lanckoroiiski Collection in Vienna (Schrader, Pheidias, 76), follows the Elgin statuette so closely that both must be derived from the same model at Athens, a monumental statue or relief or perhaps a painting. A curious point is that the shaft of the spear in the Lanckoroiiski relief, held in the left hand, passes under the arm. The hand of the statuette is pierced for a shaft which would similarly go under the arm; but there has been a later adaptation, leaving its marks in a deep groove outside the fingers and a shallow one inside the forearm, in which the spear was fixed so as to lean on the shoulder in the ordinary position, which is shown in the statue on the coins. The goddess is 1 10 evidently represented in one of her familiar Athenian aspects, but her title has not been identified. Beule suggested, for the coins, Athena Archegetis of the Birds of Aristophanes, because the scholiast says that she held an owl in her hand. E. J. Forsdyke. 94. A HAN POTTERY GROUP. THE Han group illustrated on Plate XXXVII b was acquired for the Museum by subscriptions organized by Mr Peter Sparks. The names of the subscribers are: Mr and Mrs Alfred Clark; Mr Anthony de Rothschild; Mr H. J. Oppenheim; Mr C. E. Russell; Mrs Meyer Sassoon; Mr C. T. Loo; Sir Louis and Lady Baron; Mr J. H.Jones; Mr Oscar Raphael; Major the Hon. Sir John Ward, K.C.V.O.; Mr and Mrs Cedric Lane-Roberts; Maj.-Gen. Sir Neill Malcolm, K.C.B., D.S.O.; Sir Percival David, Bart.; Mr R. H. Palmer; Mr George Eumorfopoulos; Prof. C. G. Seligman; Lord Alington; Mr Cecil E. Byas; Lord Edward Hay; Mr J. A. Barlow, C.B.; Sir Philip Sassoon, Bart.; Mr Victor Rienaecker; Mrs James V. Rank; Mrs Julius Spier; Mrs Baldwin Bantock; Mr W. Llewellyn Jones; Miss Edith M.Jones; Mrs John Sparks; Mr Peter Sparks. It is a group which has given rise to much discussion and it cannot be said that any definite conclusions have yet been reached as to its meaning. All we know of its history is that it is reputed to have been found near Loyang, and, according to the original Chinese vendor, with the component parts in the positions indicated by our reproduc- tion. The only real confirmation we have of this statement is in the material and the surface condition of the various pieces. They are all of a similar red ware and with a green glaze which is encrusted with silvery iridescence; and they are so alike in condition as to warrant the belief that they were found together. It cannot be denied at any rate that thus posed they make a fascinating tableau. As shown, the two principal figures are squatting on their heels beside a low table on which is a board fitted with certain intriguing appliances. A jar and a standing figure complete the composition. The main discussion centres round the board, which is rectangular, with six transverse strips at the right end and two notched strips along the sides at the left end, the rest of the surface being level except for III two disks which appear like flat buttons mid-way between the notched strips, and some shallow L-shaped depressions in the corners which the glaze has almost filled up. So far two suggestions as to its meaning have been explored. The first supposes that the scene represents a game played by the two seated figures with the standing figure as spectator, the vase being used for holding counters or perhaps refreshment. Unfortunately the only table game which we know to have been played in the Han dynasty (206 b.c.-a.d. 220) is the game of 'checkers*, which could not by any stretch of imagination be represented here. The second suggestion is that the board is a musical instrument, in two parts, the right end with six transverse strips being played on, perhaps with a hammer, by one of the figures, while the notched strips on the left held five strings on which the other figure per- formed. The attitude of the two persons would suggest that one has just finished his piece and the other is applauding. The only pictorial relics of the Han dynasty to which we can refer are the stone bas-reliefs in Shantung, and only on two of these have we been able to find any analogous scene. In one^ two figures are seen similarly seated with a rectangular board or low table between them, but unluckily the stone is so worn that there is nothing left to show the purpose of the table. It is, however, significant that this picture appears in a series of groups representing musicians. The other^ scene includes a wine jar, a table with food vessels, and a square table on which are inscribed L-shaped lines, four disks and a square; but there is nothing in the attached inscriptions or in the context to explain the meaning of these diagrams. With regard to the standing figure, the two-pronged fork which he carries stamps him as an agricultural worker.^ Assuming that he actually has some connexion with the 'musicians*, it can only be in the role of listener; and we must infer that the scene was set, quite conformably with Chinese habits, out of doors. The table is 1 1*5 inches long and 8*8 inches wide and the seated figures are 7*8 inches high. R. L. HoBSON. * See Chavannes, Mission Archiologique dans la Chine Septentrionale^ Part I, fig. 158. * Chavannes, op. cit., fig. 104. 3 Chavannes, op. cit.y fig. 75- I 12 XXXVII tf. T'ANG MIRROR XXXVII ^. HAN POTTERY GROUP ■Ui ■t ■m /J *.¥■ ^■- ']''., 4 XXXVIII. SEVENTH-CENTURY CHINESE PAINTING 95. A T'ANG BRONZE MIRROR. THE T'ang mirror, illustrated on Plate XXXVII a^ was ac- quired by purchase. It is made of whitish bronze, the normal Chinese mirror metal. It is polished on one side, and ornamented on the other with mother-of-pearl bedded in black lacquer. The mother-of-pearl design represents two flying phoenixes with heads converging on a jewel which is enclosed in a ring bound with fillets. In the spaces are a knot and detached feathers and the whole design is enclosed by a double border which consists of an inner ring of feather ornaments and a plain outer ring. The lacquer bed is much decayed and crackled, and parts of the inlay show signs of decay. Some segments have fallen out and been lost, but not enough to destroy the general effect of the design. The style of the composition bespeaks T * an g workman ship; and the technique is that of the inlaid, eighth-century mirrors which are pre- served in the Shoso-in at Nara, though the latter are rather more sump- tuous and elaborate, being inlaid with amber as well as mother-of-pearl. Examples of mirrors with shell inlay are extremely scarce and no specimens with the dimensions of the present example (i i*55 inches in diameter) have been recorded outside Japan. R. L. Hobson. 96. A PERSIAN POTTERY BOX. THE Museum has also acquired by purchase a Persian pottery box which appears to have been used to carry weighing scales. It is made of the sandy, white ware with lettuce-white glaze which is known in the antique trade as lakabl\ and its borders and reliefs are coloured with cobalt blue. Apart from the mouldings which follow the contours of the box, the chief ornament consists of two bands of formalized and illegible Cufic characters. The place of its origin may be conjectured to have been Rayy (Rhages) and its date of manu- facture the twelfth century. The width of the box is 8*8 inches. R. L. HoBSON. 97. A SEVENTH-CENTURY CHINESE PAINTING. MR A. W. BAHR has lately presented to the Department of Oriental Antiquities a Buddhist painting of very considerable interest. On paper measuring 12 by i if inches this painting shows Q 113 the Buddha between two attendant Bodhisattvas (Plate XXXVIII). Though it is only a rough sketch, the line is so free and the move- ment of the figures so well expressed that it is clearly the product of an advanced and vigorous school. An inscription below the paint- ing, in black ink on a prepared blue ground, states that it was made in the 4th moon of the 3rd year of Ta-yeh (a.d. 607) by Chih-Kuo, a monk of the Ta-chuang-yen Monastery, on behalf of Ya-ya Ling-hu, military Governor of Tun-huang. Practically no Chinese painting of the seventh century survives. The date is as much as two hundred and fifty years earlier than the earliest dated example among the paintings recovered from Tun-huang by Sir Aurel Stein, which range between a.d. 864 and 983. But among the manuscripts of the Stein Collection are found documents going back to a.d. 406, so that there is no reason to reject the suggestion of Tun-huang as the provenance of the new painting. The colouring, red, green, ochre, and purple, suggests some influence from the West, and only in such a place as the walled library at Tun-huang could the paper have survived so long with comparatively little damage. The acquisition of so early a dated example is clearly a matter of im- portance to the Department. B. Gray. 98. A WOODEN FIGURINE FROM EASTER ISLAND. THE Sub-Department of Ethnography, through the Vallentin Fund, has secured a paramount specimen of the so-called 'ancestral* wooden figures from Easter Island (Plate XXXIX). The Museum already possesses the finest series of these peculiar objects in the world, but the present example is equal to any of the specimens in the British Museum, far surpassing any of the few which have been available during the last thirty years. A particular interest attaches to this acquisition, because it bears a label, signed Hugh Cuming, and marked as No. 3. Hugh Cuming, in the early half of last century, presented to the British Museum an Ethnographical series of over one hundred objects, collected from the Pacific and America. This series included two similar figures from Easter Island. The records for the period are defective, but the list of the Cuming Collection is preserved in the Sub-Department of 114 p XXXIX. WOODEN FIGURE FROM EASTER ISLAND m m XL. ITALIAN MEDALS FROM THE WHITCOMBE GREENE COLLECTION Ethnography on paper which bears the dated water-mark of 1 8 3 1 . The label attached to the figure under discussion is in the same hand- writing as the British Museum record; the figurine is obviously the companion of the two which have been in the National Collection since the early nineteenth century. The figurine was in the possession of Lord Hothfield, who how- ever can give no information as to how it came into the possession of his family. The label attached by Hugh Cuming to this specimen calls atten- tion to the fact that in every case the right eye is missing. This is a coincidence. The previous Cuming figures also lack the right eye (which is a 'surround' of bird-bone, inlaid with obsidian) but purely by accident, as can be proved by other examples of earliest date. Examples of pre-European Polynesian art are rare, and this example of wood-carving, produced by a people living under stone-age condi- tions, is worthy of record ; especially as it is connected with a collection presented to the British Museum about a century ago. T. A. Joyce. 99. ITALIAN MEDALS FROM THE WHITCOMBE GREENE COLLECTION. THE sale of the well-known collection of Renaissance Medals formed by the late Thomas Whitcombe Greene took place on the 30th October. The low prices, due to the prevailing depres- sion, furnished an opportunity which was not missed by the Museum, which acquired all but two or three of such Italian medals as were not already adequately represented in the national collection. A few of these acquisitions are illustrated in Plates XL, XLI. Mr Whit- combe Greene had in previous years parted with many fine pieces from his cabinet, but there remained a number of unique specimens, and a few very fine examples of medals otherwise known. Of the latter class, the Museum secured the charming little piece of F. Francina, of the Mantuan School (PI. XL e); the perfect specimen of Francesco Roseti, attributed to Mafl?"eo Olivieri; the fine Francois I by Pomedelli (PI. XL/); the Dante, with the Mountain of Pur- gatory on the reverse; Valerio Belli's Pietro Bembo; Antonio Abondio's Niccolo Madruzzo, the only known specimen with the 115 original reverse (PI. XL a), and also his Jacopo da Trezzo; Andrea Cambi's charming portrait of his wife Leonora (PL XL^); and an admirable example of Pastorino, the Giulia Barattieri Baiardi (PI. XL ^). Of the unique pieces which fell to the Museum, the most important is the fine portrait of Beraud Stuart d'Aubigny, Chevalier de Saint Michel, one of the suite of Charles VIII on his Italian ex- pedition, a characteristic work of Niccolo Fiorentino (PI. XLI a). Next, perhaps, comes a Florentine work of the early sixteenth century, the portrait of the unknown Catalan, Rafael Martin (PI. XLI ^), which has, however, suffered somewhat from tooling. The early sixteenth-century Scipione Buzzacarini of Padua, and the Venetian Scipione Clusona dated 1554 ( ?), who is also known from a portrait by Tintoretto dated 1561, are important pieces, if not attractive. Finally, three wax-models (a valuable addition to the miscellaneous series from the same collection acquired at a previous sale) were secured. One of them, in wax on slate (PL XL c), repre- sents Alessandro de' Medici, and may be by Francesco dal Prato or Domenico di Polo, although it is greatly superior to the medallic work of either of these artists. George Hill. 100. THREE COLOGNE ARISTOTLE INCUNABULA. AMONG recent acquisitions by the Department of Printed xTLBooks is a volume of fifteenth-century printing which is interest- ing for several reasons. It contains, in what is doubtless the original binding of half leather over boards, texts of Aristotle's De anima and Parva naturalia^ with commentaries by two luminaries of Cologne University, printed at Cologne by Heinrich Quentell in June 1497, and September 1498, respectively. The fact that they are small folios renders them somewhat exceptional among the work of Quentell, the overwhelming majority of whose four hundred or more editions are quartos; generally it required the stimulus of a commission for an academic text-book, as here, to reconcile him to a larger size. A much more remarkable feature, however, is the appearance on the title-page of the De anima of a large woodcut, about 195 X 181 mm., representing a scholar in his study, with an angel holding a scroll above his lectern and a dog gnawing a bone on 116 XLI. ITALIAN MEDALS FROM THE WHTTCOMRF Orffxtf the floor, which is obviously French work and seems in point of fact to be printed from a block used by Gilles Couteau and Jean Menard at Paris in their edition of the Danse macabre of 1492; a facsimile of this may be found in Claudin, Histoire de rimprimerie en France, &c.y vol. ii, p. 1 76. Instances of the westward migration of decorative material in printed books of the early period have long been on record, but the transference of such material from France to Ger- many is much more noticeable and must indeed be almost unique. The title-cut of the De anima is so far our only positive evidence of the closeness of QuentelFs connexion with the Parisian book-trade, but further light might be thrown on it if it should prove possible to identify three smaller blocks, measuring about 86x 61 mm., of which weakly inked impressions appear on different pages of the present book. One of them represents two men conversing in a narrow room, another shows Death standing over a coffin, a scroll with an unfortunately quite illegible inscription above his head ; the third, which is oblong, is of a man paddling in the stern of a boat, with two others apparently standing on the bank behind. These cuts are clearly contemporary work, but beyond this all is uncertain. The press-mark of the T)e anima is IB. 46 5 8 and that of the Parva Naturalia IB. 4670; the bibliographical references are: Voulli^me, Buchdruck Kolns, nos. 142 and 160; Gesamtkatalog, nos. 2348 and 2429. The Department has further acquired a copy of Johannes Versor, Quaestiones super logicam Aristoteiis, completed at Cologne in June i486 by Conrad (Welker) of Boppard, and the only recorded book containing his signature (press-mark: IB. 5040). Of the printers known by name who worked at Cologne during the fifteenth century only two now remain unrepresented by signed work in the Museum collection — Gerardus ten Raem and Peter ther Hoernen. V. SCHOLDERER. loi. THREE EARLY-PRINTED ENGLISH BOOKS. AN important acquisition recently made by the Department of jljL Printed Books is one of the only two known copies of the original edition of yohn Bon and Mast person [i.e. Master Parson], a dialogue in verse between a husbandman and a priest, described by 117 the Dictionary of National Biography (in its account of the author, Luke Shepherd) as *an extremely powerful satire directed against the Real Presence'. The first page bears a woodcut representing the Corpus Christi procession. The interest of the work may be partly judged from the fact that it was twice reprinted in the nineteenth century. The book is undated, but the date is established by the summoning of John Day, one of the printers (the other was William Seres) before the Lord Mayor in 1 548 to answer for the publication. Sir John Gresham, then Mayor, had a sense of humour, and after perusing "John Bon decided that it was *bothe pythie and mery' and dismissed the printer. Shepherd was, however, imprisoned in Mary's reign. He was the author of several other anonymous pamphlets on the side of the Reformers. Two other books acquired at the same time are distinctly deserving of mention. One is a fragment of a hitherto unknown poem entitled A breje apologye or answere to a certen craftye cloynar, or popyshe parasyte, called Thomas smythe, written by William Gray of Reading about 1540, for on 4 January 1541 Gray and Thomas Smyth, 'clerk of the council to the queen', were committed to the Fleet prison 'for writing invectives against one another'. The Museum possesses nine- teenth-century reprints of several of these invectives, but hitherto none of the original editions, which are all exceedingly rare. In the present poem Gray is defending 'TroUe awaye' and 'Trolle in', two of his known pamphlets, against Smyth's attacks in his 'Lytell treatyse agaynst sedicyous persons'. Of William Muggins's Londons Mourning garment^ or Funerall Teares: worm and shedjor the death of her wealthy Cittizens [in the plague], 1603, two other copies are known, at the Bodleian and Huntington libraries. It is a poem in rhyme-royal stanzas lamenting the plague and its resultant evils. *But most of all my sorrowing heart doth grieue For such as worke and take exceeding care And by their labour knowe not how to Hue, Going poore soules in garments thinne and bare.' This is followed by a prayer and a list of burials in the different parishes from 14 July to 17 November 1603. H. Sellers. 118 I02. OTHER GIFTS. AMONG other gifts received during the last quarter may be jLjL mentioned: The Architectural Work of Graham Anderson, Probst, & White, Chicago, and their predecessors. 2 vols. Privately published. London, 1933. Presented by Mr Ernest R, Graham. Comus, a Mask. By John Milton. With a frontispiece and the six characters in costume designed and engraved on wood by Blair Hughes-Stanton. The Gregynog Press, 193 1. Presented by the Misses G, E. and M. S, Davies. A. Gavrilovic: Znameniti Srbi xix. veka. 3 vols. Zagreb, 190 1-4. Presented by the Royal Serbian Legation. J. and J. A. Venn: Alumni Cantabrigienses. Vols. 1-4. Cambridge, 1922-7. Presented by the Rev. Dr G. R. Woodward. A Collection of Dissertations published by the University of Chicago. 920 numbers. Chicago, 1 894-1 928. Presented by the University oj Chicago, M. A. Pardee: Le Masque authentique de Napoleon. Son Strange histoire de 1821 a nos jours. Edition privee. 1933. Presented by Mr and Mrs Alfred Day Pardee. A Collection of Documents and Letters forming a history of the Imperial Maritime League, brought together by Mr L. G. H. Horton-Smith, joint founder of the League and for some years joint Hon. Secretary. 18 vols. 1908-15. Presented by Mr L. G. H, Horton-Smith. Hallwylska Samlingen. Beskrifvande forteckning. Grupp XLII. Silfver. Grupperna I^LV. Brons-Skulpturer. Text and plates. 5 vols. Stockholm, 1932-3. Presented by the Board of the Hallwyl Museum. Copies of the records of the distribution of the Royal Bounty to French Protestant Refugees in England. London, 1708-10, 1725, 1728, 1729. Presented by the Secretary of the French Hospital, Victoria Park Road^ London. Autograph MS. of Mrs Humphry Ward's 'Bessie Costrell' (Add. MS. 43505). Presented by Mrs Reginald J. Smith. James Albery's play, 'Jingle', proof sheets, 1887, with corrections 119 and additions by Henry Irving (Add. MS. 43506). Bequeathed by Richard Henry Bath, Papers of the Dukes of Cleveland, 1 756-1 9th cent. (Add. MS. 43 507). Presented by Mr H, C. Price, Genealogy, with evidences, of the Oznobishin family (Russia); Add. MS. 43508. Presented by Mrs L. J, de Rochejort. Letters of 'Zion* Ward to the Nottingham connection, 1829-31 (Add. MS. 43 509). Presented by the executors of C. B. Holinsworth, Notes of cases made by Sir Samuel Martin, Baron of the Exchequer, on the Western Circuit, Spring '1864, and Home Circuit, Summer 1864 (Add. MS. 43646). Presented by the Rt Hon. Sir Frederick Maugham. Account-book of Francis Bedwell, locksmith, ijji-6 (Add. MS. 43679). Presented by Mr E. H. JV. Meyer stein through the Friends of the National Libraries. Letters of literary men to A. R. Waller, Secretary to the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press (Add. MSS. 43680, 43681). Presented by Mrs A. R. Waller and Mr Harold Child. A fourteenth-century volume of Franciscan sermons. Presented by Dr Robert Steele. Two autograph poems of Lionel Johnson, written at Winchester. Presented by Mr Campbell Dodgson, C.B.E. Autograph letters of Madame D'Arblay (Fanny Burney), S. T. Coleridge, Sir Thomas Lawrence, &c. Presented by Mrs E. Hugh N. Wilde through the Friends oj the National Libraries. Three letters of R. D. Blackmore and a letter of Kenneth Graham. Presented by Miss M. Fedden as a thank-ofering for pleasure and instruction received by her from the official guide-lecturers. Three foreign passports. Presented by Mr H. M. Paull through the National Art-Collections Fund. Letter of O. W. Holmes, 29 December 1890. Presented by Mr F. D. Flory. Letter of J. G. Wille, the engraver, to Chretien de Mechel, 28 May 1775. Presented by Dr J. S. Pearson. A collection of American literary autographs. Presented by Dr Thomas Ollive Mabbott. 120 Three fourteenth-century charters (Add. Ch. 70792-70794). Presented by Major H, R. M. Howard, Two deeds relating to the Tresham family (Add. Ch. 70795, 70796). Presented 6y Mr H. R. Moulton. Charter of Robert, Earl of Orkney, 1591, &c. (Add. Ch. 70797 A-C). Presented by Mr Allan Pea. Rental of Tiverton, co. Devon, 1596 (Add. Roll 70798). Pre- sented by Dr E. G. Millar. Compotus roll of Okehampton, co. Devon, ijz-ili Philip and Mary (Add. Roll 70799) Presented by Miss B. Herapath, The Mishnah of Rabbi Eliezer. Edited by Dr H. G. Enelow. New York, 1933. Presented by the Editor, Nan-Shan-Li: Brick Tombs of the Han Dynasty at the foot of Mount Lao-t'ieh, Manchuria. 1933. Presented by Marquis Mori- tatsu Hosokawa. Miles Birket Foster: Two drawings. Presented by Mr C. R. Rudolf, G. B. Castifflione: Six small etchings) „ 7 / 7- ; tt^-j T ^ r> !:> • .^ } Presented by Lady IVtlson. J. C Baquoy: r our vignettes j ^ •' William Evans: Portrait drawings of Richard Payne Knight and Joseph Planta. Presented by Mr George A. Simonson through the National Art-Collections Fund. Mahogany fitting for the exhibition of prints and drawings. Presented by Messrs Ellis and Smith. Attributed to G. B. Tiepolo: Design for a wall-painting. Presented by Captain George Fenwick Owen. Noach van der Meer and R. Vinkeles: Unfinished proof of the engraving 'L'Auditoire dans Tedifice de la Societe Felix Meritis', 1 794. Presented by Mr W. H. White. Five drawings by Old Masters. Presented by Mr A. P. Rudolf, Five Rumanian drawings. Presented by Professor G. Oprescu, Luigi Servolini: Six woodcuts. Presented by the artist. Ronald Gray: Two water-colours. Presented by the artist. C. F. G. R. Schwerdt: Catalogue of Books, MSS., Prints, and Drawings (Hunting, Hawking, Shooting). 3 vols. 1928. Privately printed. Presented by the author, R 121 Campbell Dodgson: 'Los Desastres dela Guerra' (Roxburghe Club Publication). Presented by Sir yohn Stirling Maxwell^ Bart. A stone vase in the form of a duck, a sculptor's trial piece, and a scarab of the Second Intermediate Period. From the excavations at al Amarnah. Presented by the Egypt Exploration Society. Inscribed half-mina weight, of pebble shape, from the city of Ashur. Presented by Mr J. W. A. Cooper. The Llewellyn Phillips collection of Arab glass weights. Given by Mrs Phillips. Replicas of a bronze 'arrow vase' and a ewer in the Shoso-in at Nara; and four boxes of ying ch'ing porcelain with inscriptions. Given by Sir Percival David ^ Bart. A Chinese pottery covered jar of the Han Dynasty (206 b.c- A.D. 220). Given by Mr O. C. Raphael. Chinese porcelain vase. Sixteenth century. Given by Mr G. Eumorjopoulos, Japanese lacquered helmet box decorated in Tosa style. Seven- teenth century. Given by Mr G. Fenwick Owen. Pair of bronze knockers from a gate in Peking. Given by Col, G. H. W. O'Sullivan, R.E. Flint core and flakes from the estuarine clay. Island Magee, N. Ireland, and pre-Crag implements from Suffolk and the Norfolk coast. Presented by Mr J. P. T. Burchell. Series of microlithic flints from a site below peat at Brox- bourne, Herts. Presented by Mr S. Hazzledine Warren and Mr O. RickoJ. Flint arrow-head, pygmy implements and flakes from sand-hills near Boulogne-sur-Mer. Presented by M. Seymour de Ricci. Pewter spoon, pied-de-biche type, with crowned head of William III. Presented by Mr and Mrs Norman Gash Crystal seal with intaglios of the Colosseum, Baths of Caracalla, and the Pantheon. Presented by Mr James R. Ogden. Seven bronze portrait medals of English men of letters by T. Spicer-Simson. Presented by the Director, Portrait medals of Mrs Anna P. Taft and Mrs Eleanor Ashley Bach by T. Spicer-Simson. Presented by the artist, 122 A portrait plaque of Sir George Hill, K.C.B., F.B.A., by Frank Bowcher. Presented by the artist. Forty-six silver, 43 bronze, and 32 nickel, &c., British, Colonial and European coins. Presented by Mr Henry Garside, Twenty-one denarii and 2 bronze coins of the early Roman Empire. Presented by Monsieur Paul Tinchant. Eighty-five varieties of Irish seventeenth-century tokens to be added to the Lionel Fletcher collection. Presented by the Executors of the late Lionel L. Fletcher, Five early Abbasid bronze coins from the Oxford University ex- cavations at Hira, Presented by Mr Gerald Reitlinger, A bronze coin, apparently unpublished, of Xerxes, King of Armenia (f. 170 B.C.). Presented by Dr y. Prendergast. NOTE A CATALOGUE OF BRONZE AGE METAL OBJECTS. THE elaborate catalogue of all known implements of the Bronze Age in England and Wales was undertaken by a Committee of the British Association some years ago and has been completed to date under the chairmanship of Professor Myres, with Mr Harold Peake as Secretary. By arrangement with the Trustees the card-index has now been removed from Burlington House and accommodated in one of the Sturge Bequest rooms in the basement of the White Wing, where it can be consulted by students under the same conditions as the Sturge collection. The departmental staff will enter any further finds brought to the notice of the Museum, and it is hoped that new specimens will be submitted to the Keeper of British and Medieval Antiquities for registration, as drawings and exact measurements are required. RECENT PUBLICATIONS THE recently issued quinquennial volume of the Subject Index of Modern Books acquired by the British Museum since 1880 carries the work forward over the years 1925 to 1930. The preceding eight volumes include entries amounting to rather less than 123 45o>ooo; ^i^d the present volume being estimated to contain 77,400 entries, students have now at their disposal a classified list of more than half a million references to books representing the recent litera- ture of all countries of European and Western civilization, including new editions of books originally published at earlier dates. The whole inventory now covers a range of half a century. Con- trived originally by its first editor, Dr G. K. Fortescue, to meet the domestic needs of the Reading Room of the British Museum and intended to be used as a supplement to the General Catalogue of Printed Books, which is an *Author Index*, the Subject Index is not an exhaustive bibliography of the literature of the period which it embraces. It has its definite limitations: only books which are in the British Museum are entered; and no analytical index of periodical publica- tions is attempted. But despite these limitations the British Museum Subject Index supplies to the general public a need which nothing else meets, and has become an indispensable work of reference in most of the libraries of the Western World. It may be hoped that in the future it will be possible to carry the Index backwards so far as to include the literature of the whole of the nineteenth century — though not, in this form, further backwards into regions where it is very doubtful whether the existing structure would be suitable. It becomes ever more obvious, as Dr Fortescue foresaw, and as this procession of portly volumes makes clear, that the idea of combining the whole into a cumulative index is impracticable. To be of real service the index must continue to be issued in volumes of manage- able size; the alternative would be an impenetrable and overwhelm- ing mass of entries, in which the student would grope and flounder helplessly. The price of the present volume is ^5 ^s. Off-prints of the headings Aristophanes (23 double-columned pages) and aristotle (86 pages) from the new edition of the General Catalogue of Printed Books are now on sale at the price of 2s. 6d, and js, 6d. respectively. A new reprint of the pamphlet The Book of the Dead^ with 24 124 illustrations, has been issued (is.). The reproductions of the Saxton Maps have been continued with Suffolk, Somerset, Hampshire, and Cornwall (5^. each). In connexion with the Mt Sinai Manuscript of the Bible, a post- card showing one opening (end of St Luke and beginning of St John) has been issued at 2^. ; also a full-size collotype reproduction of the same opening at is.; and a pamphlet (with four illustrations) giving the main facts of interest concerning the Manuscript at 6^. A penny leaflet giving the facsimile, transliteration, and A.V. and R.V. versions of the Lord's Prayer according to St Luke, is in preparation. Those who wish to dispose of large quantities of these publications are reminded that a discount of 3 2^ per cent, is given on orders of 1 00 or more. EXHIBITION OF ENGLISH ART AN Exhibition of English Art, gathered from various depart- JLjL ments, is being held in the Prints and Drawings Gallery. It supplements the exhibition of the Royal Academy in showing prints as well as drawings, and by admitting work produced by foreigners on English soil. The work of Holbein and Van Dyck could hardly be omitted in any attempt to show the development of native art, and any picture of England in the seventeenth century would be incomplete without the illustration of Hollar. The period of the exhibition is roughly the same as that of the Royal Academy, i.e. from Anglo-Saxon times to about 1 860: it includes a few examples of later date, but nothing by contemporary artists. Four departments have combined to bring together outstanding examples of English art from various parts of the Museum: the Mediaeval Antiquities (with the wall-paintings from St Stephen's Chapel, and examples of ivory carvings, seal-matrices, and em- broidery), the Coins and Medals, the Manuscripts (with an un- rivalled series of illuminations), and the Prints and Drawings. The exhibition may give some visitors a fresh view, if not a first sight, of objects which may have escaped their notice in the various corners of a vast building, and the amateur may be enabled to assess the 125 qualities of draughtsmanship and design which have characterized English creation throughout the ages. The exhibition is inevitably only a small selection from the rich variety of the Museum collections, and the visitor may be directed to certain parts of the building where other branches of English art are represented: to Anglo-Saxon antiquities in the Iron Age Gallery; to alabaster carvings, to pottery and porcelain, and other antiquities in the west end of the ground-floor of the King Edward VII Galleries; to the illustrations in early printed books shown in the King's Library, and notably to a special exhibition of English book- bindings in the same gallery. A Guide to the Exhibition has been printed, and is on sale at the price of is. 6d, PRESENTED 2MAR19341 126 RECENT PUBLICATIONS CATALOGUE OF THE KING'S MUSIC LIBRARY By William Barclay Squire, M.V.O., M.A., F.S.A., F.R.C.M. Part IL THE MISCELLANEOUS MANUSCRIPTS. By Hilda Andrews, Mus.Bac. Pp. X4-278. 1929. los. Part in. PRINTED MUSIC AND MUSICAL LITERATURE. Pp. iv4- 384. 1929. 15s. A CORPUS OF ITALIAN MEDALS OF THE RENAISSANCE BEFORE CELLINI, by G. F. Hill. Two vols.: text, pp. xvii4-37i> and 201 plates. 1930. CATALOGUE OF BOOKS PRINTED IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY NOW IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM PartVL Italy: FoHgno, Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Bologna, Naples, Perugia, and Treviso. Pp. I + 301 (599-899}, with 31 plates of facsimiles (XLII*-LXXII*). 1930. ;^3 3s. COINS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Vol. II: Vespasian to Domitian. With an introduction and 83 plates. By Harold Mattingly, M.A. 1930. 8vo. ^2 3s- CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF GREEK AND ROMAN ANTIQUITIES: By F.N.Pryce,M.A.,F.S.A. Vol. I,PartL Prehellenic and Early Greek. Pp. viii + 214, with 43 plates and 246 figures in text. 1928. 1 8s. Part II. Cypriote and Etruscan, Pp. viii+ 261, with 6 plates and 132 figures in text. 1931. £1. CODEX ALEXANDRINUS in reduced photographic facsimile. Old Testament, Pan II. I Samuel — II Chronicles. 232 plates. 1931. ;^2 2s. CATALOGUE OF DRAWINGS BY DUTCH AND FLEMISH ARTISTS PRESERVED IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PRINTS AND DRAWINGS, BRITISH MUSEUM. By Arthur M. Hind, M.A., F.S.A. Vol. IV. Dutch Drawings of the 1 7th Century (N-Z and Anonymous). 1931. 8vo. ;^2 los. THE STURGE COLLECTION: An Illustrated Selection of Flints from Britain bequeathed in 1919 by William Allen Sturge, M.V.O., M.D., F.R.C.P. By Reginald A. Smith,F.S.A. 1931. 8vo. With 11 plates and numerous illustrations in the text, ^i p. CUNEIFORM TEXTS FROM BABYLONIAN TABLETS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Part XLI (50 plates), by C. J. Gadd M.A., F.S.A. 1931. Folio. 1 6s. CATALOGUE OF PAINTINGS RECOVERED FROM TUN-HUANG BY SIR AUREL STEIN. By Arthur Waley. Pp. lii+328. 1931. 8vo. £2. SUPPLEMENTARY CATALOGUE OF THE TAMIL BOOKS. By L. D. Barnett. Pp. 695. 1 93 1. £2 3^' GENERAL CATALOGUE OF PRINTED BOOKS. Vol. I, A-Aegidius. 1004 cols. 1931. Vol. II, Aegidius-Aleu. 996 cols. 1931. Vol. III. Alevra- America. 1004 cols. 1932. Vol. IV, America-Anne. 988 cols. 1932. Vol. V, Anne-Aristias. 1004 cols. 1933. Each £4. (to original subscribers £2). THE PRISMS OF ESARHADDON AND OF ASHURBANIPAL. By Dr. R. Campbell Thompson. Pp. 36, with 18 plates. 1931. los. THE LUTTRELL PSALTER. 183 Plates, with an Introduction by E.G.Millar. A GUIDE TO THE ISLAMIC POTTERY OF THE NEAR EAST. By R. L. HOBSON. 2S. CORPUS VASORUM ANTIQUORUM (Great Britain fasc. X, British Museum VII). Edited by F. N. Pryce. 48 plates. 15^. CASTS OF PERSIAN SCULPTURES OF THE ACHAEMENID PERIOD. 1 2 Plates. 6s. (with portfolio ys.) or 6d. each. CATALOGUE OF DUTCH AND FLEMISH DRAWINGS OF THE XV AND XVI CENTURIES. By A. E. Popham. 83 plates. £2 7s. bd, GUIDE TO THE PRINCIPAL COINS OF THE GREEKS from circa 700 B.C. to A.D. 270, based on the work of Barclay V. Head. 50 plates. 1932. 15*. CATALOGUE OF ADDITIONS TO THE MANUSCRIPTS 1916-1920. 1933- I2 10^- FLINTS. An illustrated manual of the Stone Age for Beginners. Bv R. A. Smith. Reprint. 1932. bd. CATALOGUE OF THE GREEK ETRUSCAN AND ROMAN PAINT- INGS AND MOSAICS. By R. P. Hinks. Pp. Ixxi + 157, with 168 figs, and 32 plates. 1933. £2. FACSIMILE OF THE MS. OF AL-KITAB AL-BARP FI 'L-LUGHAH, by Al-Kali. Edited by A. S. Fulton. Pp. 16, with 148 plates. 1933. los. bd, GUIDE TO PROCESSES AND SCHOOLS OF ENGRAVING, 3rd edition, bd. GUIDE TO THE EXHIBITION OF ENGLISH ART. u. bd. SUBJECT INDEX OF MODERN BOOKS ACQUIRED BY THE BRITISH MUSEUM from 1925 to 1930. Pp. 1,759. 1933. ^^5 5^. THE BOOK OF THE DEAD. Reprint. With 25 illustrations, is. SAXTON'S ATLAS OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES, reproduced in colour. Frontispiece portrait of Queen Elizabeth, ys. bd. Single sheete, 5^. each. In progress. REPLICAS AND CASTS of the finest objects from Ur can be supplied to order. List and prices will be sent on application to the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. FULL LISTS OF THE PUBLICATIONS, PICTORIAL POSTCARDS, PHOTOGRAVURES and other Reproductions issued by the British Museum can be had on application to the Director, British Museum, London, W.C. i. THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY-^voL.viiLNO.4 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1934 THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY FOUR PARTS ARE PUBLISHED ANNUALLY, each dealing with the principal acquisitions of the previous quarter. The descriptions are intended to be not too technical for the layman, and to give the expert part at least of what he needs to know. Notice is also given of the temporary exhibitions periodically installed in the galleries, the results of excavations, and additions to the publications of the Museum. V O-** ^"^ J"*^ |>*^ """^ ^"^ '"•^ '^"^ °^'' *** "■'"^ "^ , >«-,(v«-wO-»» 0""M!-«% !■--•■» IK"-! O-^* Crown Acto, averaging 3 2 pages + 1 6 pages of plates. Price 2s,6d,: 2s.()d,postJree. los, {post Jree) for four parts. It would help the Trustees if those intend- ing to subscribe would do so for five-year periods at a cost, post free, of ^2 los. Cases and title-pages for the annual volumes can be obtained from the Oxford University Press at a charge of 3s, 3d. for case and binding or is. 6d. for case alone (packing and postage in the British Isles included). The price of back parts has been raised to is. bd. each as from the issue of Vol. VI, No. i. PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY VOLUME VIII. NUMBER 4. MAY, 1934 xkfitmmnMiptotf^^ ■tfi^Blg^iig dtaexttAmne tdv&t&ntn^ ^^ A»V^)l»t« «1W# «^ fettT" XLII. MINIATURE FROM THE BOOK OF "FHE MONK OF HY£RES' THE BRITISH MUSEUM QUARTERLY— VOL. VIII. N0.4 LONDON PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES 1934 Sold at THE BRITISH MUSEUM and by BERNARD QUARITCH 1 1 Grafton Street London W.\ HUMPHREY MILFORD Oxford University Press London E.C.i, KEGAN PAUL, TRUBNER & Co. Ltd. 38 Great Russell Street London W.C.i PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, OXFORD BY JOHN JOHNSON, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY CONTENTS 103. An Irish Library . . . . 104. English Bookbindings ..... 105. Two Leaves from the Book of 'the Monk of Hy^res' 106. Laurence Nowell and a recovered Anglo-Saxon Poem 107. A Collection of Autographs and Charters . 108. A Letter in Slavonic .... 109. A Katharine Adams Binding no. New Letters of John Wesley 111. Charles Dickens's Letters to his Wife 112. Some Oriental Manuscripts 113. Drawing by John Crome .... 114. The Elgin Marbles in an Idealized Setting 115. Engraving after Andrea Mantegna . 116. Contemporary Prints and Drawings . 117. Three Antiquities from Syria . 118. Mycenaean and Greek Gems 119. Early Greek Bronzes .... 120. A Cameo Portrait of a Roman General 121. Examples of Mesolithic Art 122. English Glass . . . . . . 123. A Persian Pottery Jug .... 124. Inlaid Bronzes of the Han Dynasty . 125. A Glass Pall from Chin-ts'un . 126. An Early Mughal Illuminated Page . 127. The 'Charles Beving' Collection of Textiles 128. An Ethnographical Series from the Sudan . 129. Carved Shields and Spears from Dutch New Guinea 130. Two Rare Greek Coins .... 131. Greek and Roman Coins .... 132. A Rare Italian Medal .... PAGE 127 127 128 130 132 "^33 134 ^35 137 138 139 140 140 141 141 142 143 143 144 145 146 146 148 149 151 152 ^53 ^55 156 133- Other Gifts . Supply of Casts Loan Series of Drawings and Water-colours from the Turner Bequest . Recent Publications Exhibitions Appointments 162 162 163 167 169 VI PLATES XLII. Miniature from the Book of 'the Monk of Hyeres' ...... Frontispiece XLII I. Drawing by John Crome . . . To face page i "t^^ XLIV. The Elgin Marbles in an Idealized Setting „ 140 XLV. Mycenaean and Greek Gems. Syrian Seals. Roman Cameo. Greek Geometric Bronzes ...... „ 142 XLVI. Engraved Deer-antler from Romsey and Ox-bone Implement from the Thames . „ 144 XLVII. Inlaid Bronze Finials from Chin-ts'un . „ 147 XLVI 1 1. Glass Tesserae from Chin-ts'un . . „ 148 XLIX. Page from the Ta*rikh-i Alfi ... „ 150 L. Helmet worn in Funeral Dances, Latuka Tribe. Pottery Vase, Azande Tribe. Pottery Lion, Shilluk Tribe ... „ 152 LI. Carved and Painted Wood Shields from Dutch New Guinea . ... „ 153 LI I. Carved Wood 'Paddle-spears' from Dutch New Guinea ..... „ 154 LIII. «. Medal of Francesco de' Girardenghi. b. Greek Coins ..... „ 155 vu 103. AN IRISH LIBRARY. THE Department of Printed Books has received as a gift from Lord Moyne a small library of some two thousand volumes, of Irish interest, and for the most part printed in Ireland, collected by Mr Mathew Dorey of Dublin. Two-thirds of the books are dupli- cates of copies already in the Museum collection, but upwards of seven hundred volumes and pamphlets form new additions to the Library. These new additions date from the sixteenth to the nine- teenth century, but the great majority belong to the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century, and so go to strengthen the Museum collection at a point where it is probably weakest. The volumes not required by the Museum are to be distributed among other libraries, in accordance with Lord Moyne's wishes, by the Friends of the National Libraries. H. Thomas. 104. ENGLISH BOOKBINDINGS. THE modern section of the Exhibition of English Bookbindings installed in the King's Library has been enriched by two new specimens as a result of the continued interest of Mr Julian Moore in the Museum's collection of bookbindings. Mr Moore has presented to the Museum a copy of the 1892 Kelmscott Press edition of Wilfrid Scawen Blunt's The Love Lyrics and Songs oj Proteus^ bound by Messrs Birdsall of Northampton in a green morocco binding decorated in the style of Mr Douglas Cockerell. He has also been responsible for the presentation to the Museum of a large-paper copy of the 1 8 2 1 Chiswick Press edition of Sir Thomas More's The History oj King Richard the Third, bound by F. Bedford in a dark brown morocco binding decorated in a style reminiscent of the French binders of the sixteenth century. This copy was shown at the Burlington Fine Arts Club's Exhibition of Bookbindings in 189 1. It was later acquired by Lt.-Col. W. E. Moss and was shown again at a recent bookbinding exhibition, where it was seen by Mr Moore. As a result, the book was presented to the Museum as a joint gift from Mr Moore and Lt.-Col. Moss. The Museum now has worthy specimens of two English bookbinding firms hitherto badly represented in its collections. H. Thomas. s 127 I05. TWO LEAVES FROM THE BOOK OF 'THE MONK OF HY6RES'. AMONG the illuminated manuscripts of Italian provenance in XjLthe Museum two remarkable fragments of a late fourteenth- century MS., acquired at different times, Add. MS. 27695 in 1867 and Add. MS. 28841 in 1871, have always occupied a position of their own in virtue of the marked originality of their decoration. Internal evidence suggests that they were executed in Genoa or its neighbourhood and they have usually been attributed to a certain Cybo, 'the monk of Hy^res', no doubt a member of the well-known Cibo family of Genoa, surviving descriptions of whose work would certainly apply very well to some of the features of these fragments (see J. W. Bradley, Dictionary of Miniaturists, I, p. 268). The monk is, however, a somewhat shadowy figure, and the attribution cannot be considered as certain, particularly as it is possible that more than one hand was employed on the book represented by these fragments (cf. P. Toesca, La pittura e la miniatura nella Lombardia, p. 41 1, note). The fragments have a particular interest as representing the work of a school of miniature painters of the Ligurian district which does not appear to be elsewhere attested. It is therefore a matter for con- gratulation that two more leaves, one of them of exceptional beauty, which originally belonged to the same book, have been recently acquired for the Museum (Egerton MS. 3 1 27). A brief description of the two fragments already in the collection will serve to place the two new leaves in their proper setting. The original book contained two Latin texts, analogous in subject, though different in form, the one being in prose and the other in loose rhythmical verse. The prose text is a treatise on the vices by a member of the Cocharelli family of Genoa, who states that he compiled it for his children, in particular his son John, and illustrated the theme with tales derived from his grandfather, Pelegrino Cocharelli. This same authority is referred to in the verse treatise, which deals with the history of Sicily in the time of Frederick II (1298-13 37), as *de Cocharellis vir nobilis nomine dictus Pelegrinus'. There is some interesting historical matter in those passages of the two treatises which derive from the author's grandfather. As the form of the two texts differs, so does the 128 scheme of decoration. The most marked feature of Add. MS. 27695 is a series of full-page paintings in illustration of the text. Certain of these, it has often been remarked, have a decided oriental character both in the handling and, in some cases, in the types depicted.^ The text pages of this section are for the most part framed in borders of decorative work, usually sharply divided off from the text by a gold line and inset with roundels containing figures and little scenes, animals, insects, birds, and grotesques, and here again oriental influence is to be observed. Minute studies of animals, birds, and insects are used for line-fillings. One leaf of this series has strayed into the other fragment (Add. MS. 28841, fol. i). The decora- tion of this other text is conceived very diff^erently. The border is not contained within a formal frame, but consists of branching sprays with their leafage and fruit (more rarely of grass or of water), which break in between the lines of the text at irregular intervals, extending across the whole breadth of the column. Careful naturalistic studies of insects, shells, and animals (in this order of preference in the surviving fragment) are interspersed throughout these borders. No birds occur here. Similar details, though generally on a smaller scale, are used for line-fillings.^ The two new leaves belong to that part of the book represented by the fragments in Add. MS. 27695, as is immediately clear from the subject of the text (two prose passages on Usury and Treachery) and the style both of the miniatures and the border work. The first minia- ture (fol. I b, see Plate XLII) is a delightful picture of a hawking party, showing marked oriental influence. In general plan it most nearly resembles Add. MS. 27695, fol. 13 b, the lower half of the page being occupied with the figure subject, while, above, flights of birds enliven the borders and the space between the two columns of text, which, however, is not separated off by any formal division. The figures are drawn with a clean, decisive line upon the plain vellum and tinted with colours and gold paint. The birds are depicted with ^ Cf. particularly the representation of a Tartar Khan in illustration of the vice of Gluttony, fol. 6, reproduced in British Museum, Reproductions from Illuminated MSS.y Series IV, PL XXXI. 2 For a reproduction of one of these pages see Reprod. from III. MSS., Series IV, PI. XXXII. 129 great spirit and the characteristics of the different species are minutely observed. In the upper margin there is a scene of carrion birds tear- ing at a dead horse, which recalls the insistence on details of cruelty thatisamarkedfeatureof some of the miniatures in Add. MS. 27695. This characteristic comes out even more strongly in the drawings of scenes of slaughter and mutilation in the border of the first page of the second leaf, a choice of subject appropriate to the text, which illustrates the theme of treachery by an interesting account of the dynastic history of Cyprus in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. The borders to the other two pages closely resemble other examples in Add. MS. 27695, having running patterns of a rather oriental type round the three sides and roundels enclosing insects in the base. R. Flower. 106. LAURENCE NOWELL AND A RECOVERED ANGLO-SAXON POEM. BY the generosity of Lord Howard de Walden the Museum has come into the possession of eight transcripts by the Elizabethan scholar, Laurence Nowell, Dean of Lichfield (d, 1576), and twenty- eight printed books of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the original vellum wrappers, twelve of which have the inscription of ownership of William Lambarde and five that of Nowell. In- cluded among these are copies of John Speidell's New Logarithmes, 16 ig, A Collection oj the Lawes concerning Liueries of Companies, 1 571 , King 'James's Daemonologie, Edinburgh, 1 597, R. Hitchcock*s Pollitique Piatt Jor the honour of the Prince, 1580, and J. Proctor*s Historic of Wyates rebellion, 1 595. Nowell was active in the revival of Anglo-Saxon studies in England, in concert with Archbishop Parker and his secretary John Joscelin, in the sixties of the sixteenth cen- tury. The interest of the scholars of that period was mainly in ecclesiastical, historical, and legal texts. Nowell, however, owned the manuscript of Beowulf and it has been shown recently that his was the hand which glossed certain passages in the famous Exeter Book of Anglo-Saxon poetry. ^ It is therefore appropriate that we should ^ See the introduction to the facsimile published by the Dean and Chapter of Exeter, 1933, p. 91- 130 owe to him the recovery of a long-lost Anglo-Saxon poem, which is among these transcripts. The most important manuscript included in the gift is a copy (Add. MS. 43703) of the Cotton MS. Otho B. XI, made while it was in the collection of Sir William Cecil in 1562. The manuscript suffered badly in the fire of 1 73 1 and this transcript, which apparently repre- sents the greater part of its original, is therefore of high value. Otho B. XI contained texts of the translation of Bede's Historia Eccle- siastica attributed to King Alfred, a version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a collection of laws, a poem on fasting, and a number of leechdoms. The two historical texts had been used by Abraham Wheelock while the manuscript was intact. Fragments only of these and of the laws now remain, the poem and the leechdoms having entirely disappeared. This poem, now restored to us in what appears to be a reasonably accurate transcript, is of considerable interest. Its metrical form is unique, for the alliterative lines in which it is com- posed are divided into twenty-nine stanzas normally of eight lines. The subject is fasting, particularly the Ember Days and the Lenten fast. The periods assigned to the Ember Days (in the first week of Lent, the week after Pentecost, the week before the equinox in September, and the week before Christmas) agree with the state- ment of St Egbert in his dialogue De Institutione Catholica, Migne, Pair. Lat., Ixxxix, col. 440, where, as in the poem, the introduction of the practice into England is ascribed to Pope Gregory. The poem, which ends with exhortations to priests to avoid gluttony, ends incom- pletely. It has hitherto been known only through the quotation by Humfrey Wanley of the opening passage ('Wass in ealddagum* Israheala folc', &c.). There is no evidence as to the date of composi- tion, but it does not appear to be earlier than the tenth century. Of the other transcripts most are of a historical nature. There is a copy (Add. MS. 43704) of a large part of the version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle known as the Peterborough Chronicle (now Bodleian MS. Laud Misc. 636); of part of the history of Florence of Worcester (Add. MS. 43705); and of the Descriptio and Itine- rarium Walliae of Giraldus Cambrensis (Add. MS. 43706), two works which appear to have possessed great interest for sixteenth- 131 century scholars. Another volume (Add. MS. 43707) contains extracts from William of Malmesbury's De Antiquitate Glastoniensis Ecclesiae and a copy of Thomas de la More*s Vita et Mors Edwardi Secundi. There has been some controversy about this last tract, which in this independent form only exists in sixteenth-century copies of which this appears to be the earliest (it was copied in 1566), but it seems probable that it is merely an excerpt from the chronicle of Geoffrey le Baker. Another small manuscript (Add. MS. 43708) contains what appears to be a compilation from various historical sources, Higden's Polychronicon, Henry of Huntingdon, &c. Two other small volumes (Add. MSS. 43709, 43710) contain copies of deeds of the hospital of St Katherine's near the Tower and of Andrew Boorde*s Itinerary (printed by Hearne in 1735). These manuscripts seem to have passed with many other of No- well's manuscripts and printed books to his pupil William Lambarde, who published the first edition of the Anglo-Saxon Laws in 1568. A number of the printed books included in the present gift would appear to have come the same way. Even apart from the great importance of the recovery of the greater part of the burnt MS. Otho B. XI this collection is valuable for the light it may be expected to throw, when studied in conjunc- tion with other books and manuscripts of Nowell and Lambarde in the Museum and elsewhere, on the beginnings of Anglo-Saxon scholarship in England. R. Flower. 107. A COLLECTION OF AUTOGRAPHS AND CHARTERS. A COLLECTION of ten documents and seven charters pre- sented to the Museum by the Rev. E. A. Dentith, F.R.G.S., contains some interesting items. One of these, a letter in Slavonic, is dealt with elsewhere in this number. The documents, which range from 1528 to 1 83-, include a Privy Council warrant to pay monies for the wars in Ireland, 1607, a letter from — Mazel to Arnaud, secretary of Louis XIV, 1677, a letter in Modern Greek from Zachaeus, Ka6r|you|Ji£vos of the monastery of Mega Spelaion, Morea, Greece, 1689, an order for the payment of salary to J. B. H. 132 Dugazon, the French actor, 1776, and others. A short note which throws some light on the methods used in the famous Westminster Election of 1775 ^^J ^^ quoted in full. *Mr Griffiths' respects to the Duke of Northumberland & sends his Grace a parcel of Papers. He met with some scurrilous ones yesterday of the other side, & thought this the best way of answering them. They have been given out last night to a number of Ballad Singers & News Hawkers. Mr. G does not own himself the author, as it might offend some of his friends in Ireland. Hyde Street, Tuesday Morn.* It is not surprising that Thomas Percy, editor of the Reliques^ as chaplain to the duke came into possession of this note, as is attested by the following annotation which is written in a hand identifiable as his: 'N.B. The Above is the Mr. Henry Griffiths; whose wife Frances corresponded with him etc. & afterwards published their epistles under the Title of Letters of Henry & Francis etc. in several Vols. 12'"°.' The charters (Add. Ch. 70802-70808) range from 1350 to 1783. The two most interesting of these are the earliest in date, one (Add. Ch. 70802) relating to a suit of homage between Guillaume Roger and Jean Comte d'Armagnac concerning the moiety of the castle of Aurella held by the former in right of his wife, 28 December 1 3 50, the other (Add. Ch. 70803) an inventory of goods surrendered by Godfrey son of Walter Mynninck to Sir Gerard tSerclaes, the names of many of the goods being given in Flemish, Brussels, 6 August 1 4 1 8. The others have all some point of interest. R. Flower. 108. A LETTER IN SLAVONIC. AMONG the papers presented by the Rev. E. A. Dentith there is an -^ljL unusual item, without parallel in the Department of Manuscripts, namely, a letter in Serbo-Croatian, written in a cursive Cyrillic hand and dating from 1 528. We know from an Italian note of receipt that the letter emanates from the chancery of the Sanjak of Bosnia. That province was now entirely in the hands of the Turks as a result of their overwhelming victory at Mohacsin 1 526, and much of Dalmatia itself 133 had been wrested from the Serenissima. The writer tells us who he is in the subscription: Pisa sluga vas dragoman i jazacija basin za lubav — *Writes your servant, interpreter, and head clerk* (presuming that basin derives from the Turkish word meaning 'head* and not from Basha = Pasha). The letter is addressed to the Proweditore of Dalmatia, and requests his good offices with his Lady in behalf of a delinquent servant, the writer*s brother, a weaver of the name Djura Djurasinovic Opastovic. Though of purely domestic interest, the letter gives a glimpse of the essential solidarity among the Slav common folk beneath the surface variety of alien governments. H. J. M. Milne. 109. A KATHARINE ADAMS BINDING. BY bequest of the late Sir Emery Walker the Department of Manuscripts has acquired a charming example of the work of the well-known binder Miss Katharine Adams (Mrs Webb). Her art is always prized for its delicacy and fine workmanship, and in the present case we have a rather more elaborate design than is found on the few examples of her bindings already in the Museum. The material is red niger morocco, and conventionally treated flowers, in pointille, form the main scheme of the decoration. A green silk cover, embroidered with a rose tree and the late owner*s initials, protects this little book, which measures 3I x 2| inches. The manuscript (Add. MS. 43694) thus bound is a Book of Hours of Roman use written in Italy in the second half of the fifteenth century. Its contents are the usual ones: Calendar, Hours of the Virgin, the Penitential Psalms with the Litany, the Office of the Dead, and the Hours of the Holy Cross. Certain saints, viz. Eupuria, virgin and martyr ( 1 6 May), Herasmus, bishop and martyr (2 June), and Marcianus, bishop and martyr (14 June), written in red in the calendar, seem to indicate that the original home of the book was in the neighbourhood of Gaeta near Naples. A mysterious feast of a St Ambrose, abbot, also in red, on 3 i October has defied identi- fication. Three illuminated initials of the conventional white vine type are found before the Penitential Psalms, the Office of the Dead, and the Hours of the Cross. The manuscript may be seen in the 134 special exhibition of English bookbinding at present in the King's Library. F. Wormald. I lo. NEW LETTERS OF JOHN WESLEY. A PARTICULARLY valuable addition to the Wesley material in the Department of Manuscripts is due to the kindness of Mr C. Tindall, CLE., who, in fulfilment of the wishes of his late father, John Tindall of Cotmaton House, Sidmouth, has presented a series of thirty-six holograph letters of John Wesley to Miss Ann Tindall of Scarborough (i 747-1 806). They range in date from 6 July 1774 to 23 February 1790, the last showing only too clearly, in its shaky and uncertain characters, the influence of increasing age and infirmity. They are accompanied by typewritten transcripts (not always impeccably accurate) both of the letters themselves and of poems by Ann Tindall and others, from the originals at Sidmouth, and by useful notes on biographical and other points. With them is an original poem by Ann Tindall, sent to Wesley in August 1775, on his recovery from his illness in Ireland, and referred to by him in a letter of 19 January 1776 (T did not disapprove of the Verses you sent me at the Conference; much less blame [you] for sending them'), besides contemporary copies of two hymns by John Cennick (1718-55) and of one by Charles Wesley. So substantial an addition to the letters of John Wesley in the Department would in any case be notable; but the value of the gift is increased by the facts that these letters are all unpublished and that they are intrinsically of considerable interest. They are written in ah intimate and aff^ectionate and at times in a playful tone which gives them a real charm; and though some are brief and concerned with business affairs, others touch on matters of a wider appeal. Miss Tindall had literary leanings and wrote both hymns and other poems, though judging from the specimens of her work here repre- sented she can claim no exalted rank among even the lesser lights of eighteenth-century poetry. Probably this was Wesley's own feel- ing, though he contrived, with much tact, to give her encourage- ment and more than once begged her not to 'bury your talent in y earth'. T 135 The first letter of the series deals mainly with Miss Tindall's verses and gives her some sound advice: *I have read over your Verses. There is a great difference between them: Some are far better than others. GOD has intrusted you with a dangerous talent: For who can bear Applause? * As to the construction of Verses, I w'^ give you a few little Advices; I. Beware oi jalse Rhymes\ such as GOD — Word; Woes — Cause; Choirs — Powers; Vain — Name, and a few others: 2. Take care always to end an Iriyninjull^ as you commonly do: D"" Watts often end's flat. 3. Do not write toojast: Finish one thing as well as you can, & then go on to another. 4. You will write best, when yoMJeel most: I love Pathos above all. Therefore I am most pleased with y* 39^ Hymn, "O give me the wings of a Dove" ! and w^ y* 6o*^ 61. & 62. If you please, write me a Letter, either in that measure, or in All Eights (whether four or 6 lines in a Stanza) expressing just your present Feelings and Desires.' In a letter dated 29 November 1776 he writes that he has asked Mr Fletcher (i.e. John Fletcher, Vicar of Madeley, d, 1785) to look at a poem of hers: 'We altogether agreed in our opinion. That the Sentiments are just throughout; That the Diction is generally not to be blamed, & that many of the lines are good. Yet we are clearly persuaded, it is not advisable to commit them to the press. We know y* taste of the World pretty well.' The letters contain several references to Calvinism and the troubles occasioned by it in the Methodist societies. *That bane of all vital Religion. Calvinism, has much hindered the work of GOD at Scarborough', he writes on 1 1 August 1776. 'But I hope, our Friends are now guarded against it, & will be carefull to warn others. You sh** particularly watch over them y* are just setting out, that they fall not into y' deadly snare.' His attachment to the Church of England is more than once expressed: *I am in hopes,' he writes on 16 August 1777, 'you will see a considerable increase of the work of GOD, both in Scarborough & the other parts of the Circuit; Especially if our Brethren can be prevailed upon, Not to leave the Church. It is highly probable, if we continue therein, a little leaven will leaven the whole lump.' And on 26 November 1785 he de- 136 dares: *I think the Doctor must be in a dream, or out of his Senses, to talk of the Methodists* Separating from the Church! Stay till I am in a better place. It will hardly be while I live.* The letters have received the number Add. MSS. 43695, 43696. The Rev. John Telford, editor of The Letters of yohn Wesley, A,M, (London, 193 1, 8 vols.), has kindly supplied some notes on this correspondence. H. I. Bell. 1 1 1. CHARLES DICKENS'S LETTERS TO HIS WIFE. MRS KATE PERUGINI, daughter of Charles Dickens, pre- sented to the Museum in 1 899 the letters which her father had written to his wife before and after marriage, attaching the condition that they should be reserved for twenty-five years, a period which she afterwards extended for the lives of herself and her brother, the late Sir Henry Fielding Dickens. The recent death of the latter released the letters and they have now been incorporated in the collections as Add. MS. 43689. The letters are 136 in number and range between 1835 and 1867. The first sixty bear dates previous to the marriage and, with trifling exceptions, have never been pub- lished. They relate to the health and love affair of the parties and to the publication of * Pickwick'. The remainder were written at irregular intervals during Dickens's absences from his family on pro- fessional and other business. The most interesting of them have been published in The Letters of Charles Dickens, 1882, most of those not included being in the main of an unimportant nature. This series ends in 1856 and contains nothing directly bearing on the differ- ences between Dickens and his wife which led to their separation in 1858. Four letters written after the separation are of a more or less formal character. A prayer for family use, in Dickens's hand, is in- cluded in the collection. A statement in Mrs Perugini's hand records that the letters were given to her by her mother to be preserved and ultimately published as evidence that Dickens 'had once loved her' and that the separation was not owing to any fault on her side. By an arrangement with the Dickens family the administration of the copyright, both for periodical and book publication, has been vested in the Trustees. R. Flower. 112. SOME ORIENTAL MANUSCRIPTS. AMONG the manuscripts recently acquired by the Department xJLof Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts there are three which merit especial mention. In his History of Ottoman Poetry, vol. I, pp. 428fF., Mr Gibb gives an account of a Turkish romantic poem variously entitled by biblio- graphers 'Ferrukh-Name', 'Khurshid u Ferrukh-Shad', and 'Khur- shid-Ndme', which was composed by Shaikh Oghlu. The poem is extremely rare, and no copy had been seen by Gibb, whose informa- tion was wholly derived from second hand. By a happy chance a fine manuscript of it has been secured by the Department of Oriental Books and Manuscripts. It contains 235 folios, written in a very good hand, apparently of the fifteenth century, and measures 10 by 6\ inches. As soon as we open it we observe that the first two titles mentioned above as given to it by bibliographers are wrong: the names here authenticated are Farah-ndmah and Khur- shtd u Farah-Shdd, with an alternative Kissah i Khurshtd-Bdnu given on the flyleaf. The theme of the poem is a romantic tale of the love and adventures of Khurshid, daughter of King Siyavush, and Farah- Shad, son of the king of the Western Land (Maghrib). The King of Cathay, enamoured of Khurshid, made war upon Siyavush, but was slain by Farah-Shad; and then Farah-Shad, returning home to the Western Land, was cast into prison, from which, however, he was soon released on the death of the king, and thereupon he ascended the throne and wedded Khurshid, everything ending happily in orthodox fashion. Two Persian manuscripts also deserve notice, as they are apparently unique, no copies being on record as far as can be ascertained. Both are treatises on Sufic mysticism. One of them is entitled Kttdb ul- tasjiyah Ji ahvdl il-mutasarrtjat, and its author was Amir Kutb ul- Dln Abu '1-Muzaffar Mansur ibn Ardashir al-'Ibadl. The date of copying is a.h. 707 (a.d. 1307-8), and the number of folios 131. The other work is Hadlkat ul-haklkat, and it was composed in A.H. 641 by a scholar who gives his name and pedigree as Abu '1-Fath Muhammad ibn Shaikh il-Islam Abi '1-Ma'ali il-Mutahhar ibn Shaikh il-Islam Abi Nasr Ahmad ibn Abi '1-Hasan ibn Ahmad 138 XLIII. DRAWING BY JOHN CROME ibn Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Jarlr ibn 'Abd Illah ibn Lai§ al- Balkhi al-Jami al-Namaki. The preface is in Arabic. The date of copying is a.h. 706 (a.d. 1306-7), and the book contains 113 foHos. Both manuscripts measure 10 by 7 inches, and are in ex- cellent handwriting of the period. L. D. Barnett. 113. DRAWING BY JOHN CROME. A BEAUTIFUL drawing of trees overhanging water was re- cently purchased from the Florence Fund from Sotheby's sale, 1 9 December 193 3, lot 88. The drawing, which is in black chalk and water-colour, was in its original frame, and the blue and greens have faded to a somewhat uniform brown. The reproduction here given shows quite clearly the darker unfaded portion which was beneath the blackened border on the glass of the frame (Plate XLIII). The drawing is also reproduced as frontispiece to the Guide to the Ex- hibition of English Art which is open in the Prints and Drawings Gallery throughout 1934. The latter reproduction only gives the part which was exposed in the frame, and in its present mount. The fading, which is the fate of so much of the indigo used by English water-colour painters, by no means impairs the beauty of the design. The drawing was originally given by Crome to Madame de Rouillon, who with her two sisters, the Misses Silke, established a ladies' school at the Chantry, Norwich, after their father's death in 1 795. Crome taught at the school, and was their personal friend. It had remained in thefamily and was putinto Sotheby's auction by adirect descendant of one of the Misses Silke who married a Mr John Oakley. The drawing certainly dates between 1800 and 1807. The back- board of the old frame was inscribed outside in ink, possibly in the artist's hand, Caistor Castle, John Crome, and inside in white chalk M^^ De Rouillon Chantry, In the Norwich Society's Exhibition of 1807 were three views of Caister Castle (near Yarmouth) 'coloured on the spot' (see Collins-Baker, yohn Crome, 1921, p. 125). These had not been identified, and the present drawing is possibly one of them. The title might only imply that they were drawings done near the castle, of which only small remains were in existence. A. M. Hind. 139 114. THE ELGIN MARBLES IN AN IDEALIZED SETTING. A LARGE water-colour painting by James Stephanoff, dated 1833, representing the Elgin Marbles and other antiquities in the British Museum, has been presented by Mr George A. Simonson through the National Art-Collections Fund (Plate XLIV). The drawing was shown in the Old Water-colour Society's ex- hibition of 1833 under the title of 'The Virtuoso*, with a description as follows: 'the surrounding antiquities are a selection from the Elgin Marbles, the Hamilton Vase, and the Mosaic pavements in the British Museum; on the walls are the metopes, representing the battle of the Centaurs and Lapithae; underneath is the celebrated frieze; on the left of the picture is the mutilated group of the Fates; opposite to which are the remains of the statues of Ceres and Proserpine; and on the table stands the marble bust of Pericles, under whose direction the Parthenon was erected.' The drawing is a composition, based in part on the arrangement in the temporary Elgin Room (18 17-3 1), but not showing the collec- tion as it ever actually appeared. For the history of the collection and its placing in the Museum reference should be made to Ancient Marbles in the British Museum^ VII ( 1 8 3 5), p. 35 and pis. 1 8 and 1 9, and A. H. Smith, 'Lord Elgin and his Collection', 'Journal oj Hellenic Studies^ 1 9 1 6, p. 3 50. The artist may have intended to represent Lord Elgin in his 'Virtuoso'. This is at least more probable than identification with Edward Hawkins, Keeper of Antiquities in 1833, while Sir Henry Ellis, the Principal Librarian, in no way resembles the figure. A. M. Hind. 1 1 5. ENG RAVING AFTE R AND RE A M ANTEGN A. AN undescribed early state of one of the contemporary versions ■L\.oi Mantegna's Kisen Christ between St Andrew and St Longinus has been presented by Messrs P. and D. Colnaghi & Co. The Museum already possesses a later state, with added shading, and lacking the quality of the impression now acquired. The engraving has been attributed to Giovanni Antonio da Brescia (Bartsch, XIII, 140 I— I h h Q N I— ( < Q I— I W PQ < O w > X 3 1 8, 3, and Hind, Catalogue of Early Italian Engravings in the British Museum, p. 343, 7*). A. M. Hind. 116. CONTEMPORARY PRINTS AND DRAWINGS. SIXTEEN etchings by Eugene Bejot have been presented by the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. They form a most acceptable supplement to the series by Bejot already in the Department of Prints and Drawings. A series of forty-one prints by English and foreign artists, selected by Mr Campbell Dodgson, has been presented by the Committee of the Contemporary Art Society. Other gifts include a splendid series of twelve drawings and water-colours by Sir George Clausen, R. A., twenty-one etchings and one mezzotint, largely animal subjects, by Herbert Dicksee, R.A., water-colours by Sir D. Y. Cameron, R.A., and Willy Eisenschitz, presented in each case by the artist, and two water-colour drawings by Charles Ginner, presented anonymously. Among Clausen's drawings are portraits of Sir Emery Walker, Henry Festing Jones, and Dr Thomas Ashby. A. M. Hind. 117. THREE ANTIQUITIES FROM SYRIA. THE two seals illustrated on Plate XLV, 10 and 1 1, are said to have been found at Carchemish. The larger is a bead of soft blackish brown stone, a little more than one inch long and slightly less than one inch across, of more or less lentoid shape and pierced lengthwise. The subject represents an oryx giving milk to her young and turning her head back to touch its hind-quarters. Above are three drilled circles. The young animal is no more than a series of drilled holes joined together; the mother's legs are similar but her body and head are most carefully carved. The lentoid shape and the subject both suggest the strong influence of Mycenaean art, or the similar group of a goat and kid on a plaque of glazed composition from Knossos. This example is probably a Syrian imitation of a Mycenaean type, made about 1 400-1 200 B.C., and the motif survives to reappear in the groups of cow and calf among the ivories of Arslan Tash and Nimrud. The central figure on the scaraboid is probably intended for a lizard. 141 The two opposed bird-headed winged monsters are balanced by two bulls kneeling with heads turned back. A reasonable date for this object is about the ninth century B.C. A bronze seated figure, which is also certainly from North Syria, once had arms fitted separately and eyes inlaid in the Sumerian manner, and was covered with gold or silver foil pinned down along lead-filled grooves which remain at the back. The fringed straps across the chest seem to be a misunderstanding of the cloak with a thick border in which one of the Syrian deities is com- monly wrapped. This figure was fastened to its throne by a hook under the lap and prongs projecting from the feet. If the forelegs were perpendicular, the trunk sloped backwards at an angle of about 75 degrees. Height 4 J inches. R. D. Barnett. 1 1 8. MYCENAEAN AND GREEK GEMS. THE most important pieces in a series of Mycenaean and Archaic Greek intaglios, recently acquired through the J. R. Vallentin Fund, are illustrated from impressions in Plate XLV. A rock-crystal lentoid (i) has a bull with head turned back in front of a branch or tree which stands apparently on an altar; underneath the bull is a shield. In subject and material this resembles the L.M.I gem from a Mycenaean tomb at lalysos (B.M. Gems, 71), but its style is not so free. Two cornelian lentoids (2 and 3) have animal subjects which occur elsewhere: a calf falling and kicking at an arrow-wound, and two galloping calves. Another (4) has a dog wearing a collar. An agate lentoid (5) bears a curious design of a deer standing with a bird above and in front and a cuttlefish underneath. These are all L.M. Ill in date, about 1 300 B.C. The Greek stones are green steatite. An amygdaloid (6) of very early style, about 700 B.C., has two goats beside a tree. A thick disk (7) has devices on both faces and a ribbed edge, like an ivory seal. On one side is a sphinx, on the other a radiating figure composed of two horse protomes, two griffin heads, and two serpents. This and a heavy pyramidal seal with a lion on its base (8) are to be dated about 600 B.C., and a scaraboid with an eagle (9) about 500. E. J. Forsdyke. 142 XLV. 1-9, MYCENAEAN AND GREEK GEMS (i : i) 10, II, SYRIAN SEALS (i : i). 12, ROMAN CAMEO (2 : i) 13-16, GREEK GEOMETRIC BRONZES (4. : <) 119. EARLY GREEK BRONZES. FOUR particularly fine bronze figures of the class that is generally called Geometric have been acquired through the J. R. Vallentin Fund for the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities (Plate XLV, 13-16). The largest of these is a purely decorative piece, a fantastic horned bird supported on a knobbed pole from a rectangular cusped base. There is a suggestion of a horse about this creature's head, but it can hardly be an anticipation of the archaic cock-horse. A slanting hole pierced from the breast to the middle of the back is so accurately adjusted that the figure hangs vertically from a string. The underside of the base is moulded with reduplicated out- lines, apparently for use as a seal, as is common with such figures. The bases of the long-legged bird and the lamb are also made for sealing, the one rectangular with a simple key pattern, the other trefoil with four pellets in each of three rings. The short-legged crested bird seems to be meant for a farmyard cock. Its comb and tail are decorated with small rings containing central points. This is also evenly balanced from the ring on its back. The formal design of the large seal is in the Geometric tradition, but the freedom of the other representations is nearer to the Protocorinthian style. They should probably be dated about 700 B.C. E. J. Forsdyke. 120. A CAMEO PORTRAIT OF A ROMAN GENERAL. THE Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities has acquired through the J. R. Vallentin Fund a steatite cameo bearing the bust-portrait of a bearded man in the dress of a Roman general (Plate XLV, 1 2). Over his cuirass he wears a military cloak fastened with a plain circular brooch on his right shoulder and falling in zig- zag folds over his left; his pleated tunic is visible at the neck. He has thick curly hair, beard, and moustache; his nose is broad and flat; and his eyes are large and almond-shaped. The head is turned slightly to the left. The stone is 24 mm. (|f inch) high, and its greatest thickness is 1 1 mm. (^ inch); it is dark greyish brown in colour. The oval background is broken away for some distance along the right edge, but the bust and head are perfectly preserved. ^ 143 The cameo is believed to come from Greece. The features and dress suggest, in their general type, a portrait of the late second or early third century a.d.; the uniform is of the classical, not the post- Constantinian, kind, and the manner of wearing the hair and beard is that in fashion under the Antonines. But the style differs from that of cameos made about a.d. 200. The workmanship is careful, even minute; and the flattening and simplification of the planes are evi- dently deliberate. This does not seem to be explained by the exi- gencies of the medium; it would rather suggest the formal sense of a later period. During the fourth century there was a revival of interest in the types and fashions, and to some extent the style, of earlier Roman imperial art; and this cameo may perhaps be a product of this archaizing phase of late antique taste. R. P. Hinks. 121. EXAMPLES OF MESOLITHIC ART. RECENT discoveries have stimulated interest in the middle ■Stone Age, between the Palaeolithic and the use of polished stone; and an example of primitive art from Romsey belonging to the period in question has been deposited on loan by the Rev. S. T. Percival. It is the tine of a red deer engraved with rows of chevrons, evidently something more than a mining pick (Plate XLVI). About two years ago an excavation was made for a septic tank near the point where the Salisbury road leaves Romsey, and about J mile from the main channel of the Test. The surface is here about 70 feet above sea-level, and near the river about 42 feet. The tine lay isolated in a greenish muddy sand mixed with gravel 20 feet from the surface (8 feet above the river bank and 50 feet above the sea). It is natural to turn to Denmark for parallels, as the harpoon of Maglemose type found 25 miles off the Norfolk coast in moorlog suggests a land bridge across the North Sea at that date; and several engraved bones of the period are published, mostly with patterns in dotted lines. Detached tines are also frequent, but one fragment from Svaerdborg is engraved with groups of chevrons much like the Romsey specimen, and is declared unique in Denmark [Mem. Soc. Antiq. du Nord, 1926-7, p. 113, Fig. 61). The site is one of the best known in the Ancylus (Boreal) period, and contemporary 144 XLVL ENGRAVED DEER-ANTLER FROM ROMSEY AND OX- BONE IMPLEMENT FROM THE THAMES (5 : 6) decoration is well illustrated in Sophus Miiller's Oldtidens Kunst i Danmark: Stenalderen, Opportunity is taken to put on record an engraved bone adze- head which was acquired in 1927 (Plate XLVI). It came from the Thames, and like several from a lake-dwelling in Holderness [Archaeologia^ Ixii, 599) is the distal end of the radius of an ox, the bone being cut transversely to give a cutting edge (as Journ. R. Anth, Inst.^ Ixi, 327, Plate XXXIX, Fig. 3), or socketed for a stone im- plement. But the present example was evidently not for any ordin- ary purpose; and the unusual decoration is clearly akin to that of the Romsey tine. Reginald A. Smith. 122. ENGLISH GLASS. A NOTABLE gap in the Museum collections has been filled by the generosity of Mr Rennie Manderson, who has presented eighty-three specimens of glass, mainly English work of the eigh- teenth century. The Museum contains a number of pieces of English glass of capital importance, but the ordinary domestic glass of the period has hitherto been scantily represented, although a bequest of twenty-one examples from Dr H. R. Hall, Keeper of the Depart- ment of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, who died in 1930, did something to make up the deficiency. Mr Manderson's gift includes a comprehensive collection of small and medium-sized drinking-glasses, beginning with the baluster period and extending to the close of the eighteenth century, the ordinary tavern glasses and finer wine and cordial glasses being equally well represented. Three of these pieces deserve a special note. The first is an early baluster of the late seventeenth century, with an irregular tear and a narrow fold on the foot, showing the Venetian influence common to all early specimens. The second, a rare fine incised twist of about 1750, has an unusual trumpet bowl with a collar beneath it. The third is a cordial glass which exhibits the exceptional feature of a tinted opaque twist and which can be dated at about 1780. Among other vessels connected with wine and spirits may be mentioned a glass of about 1765, made in the form of a boot with a canting allusion to the unpopular prime minister. Lord H5 Bute, as well as an unusually fine toddy-ladle and a comport for holding punch-glasses. There are also some unusual pieces which do not come under the category of drinking-glasses and which include sweetmeat-dishes, patch-stands, a mortar for grinding face-powder, and a knob for calendering linen. A rare example is an early candlestick with two tears in the knop and true baluster of the stem, which latter sur- mounts a fine domed and folded foot. The collection further con- tains one example each of the Bristol opaque and Nailsea marbled types, and there are a few pieces of continental origin which are not without their interest. William King. 123. A PERSIAN POTTERY JUG. APE RSI AN jug acquired through the Vallentin Fund is the only addition to the Near Eastern Ceramic Collections for January. It is almost devoid of ornament but distinguished by its graceful form and delightful material. It has suffered the usual fate of buried Persian pottery and is now a mosaic of repairs; but the beauty of the lettuce-white glaze set off by discreet touches of blue on the edges is still apparent and has indeed acquired a further attraction in the silvery iridescence which burial has added to parts of the surface. The form is simplicity itself, a globular body and cylindrical neck, but it is redeemed from commonplace by a slight contraction below the lip. This deft touch of the potter's hand is a stroke of genius. The ware is similar to that of a lakabi box described in the last number of the Quarterly and it was probably made at Rayy (Rhages) in the twelfth century. R. L. Hobson. 124. INLAID BRONZES OF THE HAN DYNASTY. ONE of the most important archaeological finds made in China in recent years was at Chin-ts'un, near old Loyang, in Honan. Here a group of graves, excavated, unfortunately, in the usual un- scientific manner, have yielded a remarkable series of objects in bronze, jade, pottery, and lacquer, which evidently formed the furni- ture of princely interments. Some idea of their variety and quality 146 XLVII. INLAID BRONZE FINIALS FROM CHIN-TS'UN has been given by Bishop White in two articles in the Illustrated London News (28 Oct. and 4 Nov. 1933) and sinologues were astonished to learn that the whole series was assigned to a period in the Chou dynasty variously calculated as in the sixth or fourth cen- tury B.C. The evidence for this attribution is a historical reference in an inscription on a bronze bell which formed part of the find; and the conclusion was astonishing because most of the objects were of types which have hitherto, with very good reasons, been regarded as of the Han dynasty (206 b.c.-a.d. 220). There seems to be no doubt about the Chou date of the bell; but that it necessarily carries with it all the other things found in this group of tombs is not so apparent; and until we are given convincing proof that all the objects in all graves must have been of the same date, or alternatively that the bell could not have been an 'antique* at the time of burial, it will be premature to revise our well-established ideas of the nature of Han art. We shall therefore continue for the present to describe as Han the three remarkable examples of inlaid bronze work which are illus- trated in PI. XLVIL They are a part of the Chin-ts'un treasures and in themselves are evidence that we have here to do with a princely interment. The splendour of the equipment indicated by these three items of chariot furniture could hardly have become any but a royal personage. One is apparently the finial of a central chariot pole. It takes the form of a water-buffalo's head, powerfully modelled in naturalistic style and heavily gilt where it is not inlaid with gold and silver. The eyes are made of a black lacquer-like composition. The pole-socket at the back is rectangular. The two other pieces appear to be ends of two side shafts and they are fitted with rests for a cross-bar. The design of these two pieces is superb. It is highly conventional, the hinder and upper part representing a dragon's head with gaping jaws of which the lower tapers off into the cross-bar support. The curious bird-head terminal is quite in keeping with the idioms of Chinese bronze composition at this time. It is frequently seen on the small bronze ornaments found in Northern China, especially those which have a flavour of Siberian art. The series of thread holes ^^7 along the lower jaw were probably used to attach a strip of leather on which the cross-bar would ride. The three pieces match in their decoration. On top of the buffalo head is gold plating broken by circles in which are silver rings and by bands of inlaid silver striping. On the ears and under the muzzle are inlaid spiral scrolls in gold and silver similar to those seen on fig. 2. The patina in places has taken on a deep brownish red colour. The length of this object from back to front is 6*5 inches. The detail of the two shaft-ends is sufficiently clearly seen in the reproduction, and the ornament consists chiefly of inlaid spiral scrolls in gold and silver. The length of this pair of finials is iO'75 inches. The artistic merit of these objects is self-evident; and representing as they must do the best craftsmanship of the period, they are of inestimable value to the student of early Chinese art. They were acquired by purchase through the Vallentin Fund with very gener- ous help from the National Art-Collections Fund. R. L. Hobson. 125. A GLASS PALL FROM CHIN-TS'UN. ANOTHER extremely rare and interesting object acquired -/jLthrough the Vallentin Fund is a set of 3 70 glass tesserae found in the same princely tombs at Chin-ts'un which produced the inlaid bronze finials. They are shown in Plate XLVIII laid out as they are believed to have been arranged in the tomb, and it is thought that they were applied to the coffin cover which was of some textile material. Each of the pieces which make up the main body of the pall is pierced at the four corners so that it could be attached with thread or wire. The tesserae are of semi-opaque, pale honey-coloured glass, the surface of which has in most cases disintegrated in the earth into a powdery white. The interior tesserae are quite plain and the border pieces are deeply incised with designs of dragon, tiger, red bird, and tortoise and snake, the emblems of the Four Quarters of the Universe. Alongside the main body is arranged a fringe of disks alternating with lozenges, also incised, the former with dragons and the latter with quatrefoils. The incised ornament has been inlaid with gold, but only traces of this now remain; and it is possible that leaf gilding was also applied to other parts of the tesserae. Plate XLVIII shows 148 .r0 104,.. '7 .•Vi "s:^ .^ . / 1 r XLVIII. GLASS TESSERAE FROM CHIN-TS'UN examples of the decorated tesserae. The whole as laid out measures 67 inches in length. While there is no reason to doubt that this important object comes from the tombs at Chin-ts'un, near Loyang, the scheme by which it is said to have been arranged and the use to which it is said to have been put, though likely enough in themselves, can only be accepted with the necessary reservations which apply to most excavated material in China. So long as these excavations are carried out in secret and the descriptions of them rest on hearsay, all statements regarding them must be subject to revision. It is in any case certain that the glass of the pall is not complete. One of the plain pieces, for instance, is missing and has been replaced by an engraved tessera which should belong to the border. No doubt there was originally more of it, perhaps another row or two, which have been broken or lost. But, complete or not, it is a truly remarkable object, the like of which has been found nowhere else in China. If our dating of the inlaid bronzes is correct, it belongs to the Han dynasty, as indeed one would expect from the style of the decorated pieces. As glass it is of much interest, for no one could reasonably suggest such objects as these were made anywhere but in China. In the absence of any written evidence of glass-making in China before the fifth century a.d., it was for a long time assumed that all glass of earlier date in China was imported. But proofs of a native glass manufacture at least as early as the Han dynasty have been accumulating, and when the history of Chinese glass, which is long overdue, is written, this glass pall from Chin-ts'un will be one of the important witnesses. R. L. Hobson, 126. AN EARLY MUGHAL ILLUMINATED PAGE. A YEAR or two ago a discovery, at once exciting and sad, was announced by Mr Mahfuzul Haq. There had come to light in India a portion of a manuscript of the Ta'rlkh-i Alfi, which seemed from its magnificence to have been the Imperial copy made for the library of the Emperor Akbar. But it was no more than a fragment of the work. An opportunity has since occurred for the Museum to 149 acquire a fine leaf from it with a miniature on each side. Owing to a substantial contribution from the National Art-Collections Fund it was possible to take advantage of the opportunity. The Ta'rikh-i Alfl owes its origin to Akbar who, in the year 990 of the Hijra, ordered the preparation of a history of the world down to 1 000 to commemorate the arrival of the millennium. It was carried down to 997 by the year looi which corresponds to a.d. 1592-3. Several unillustrated manuscripts, one continued to the year 974, are in the Department of Oriental Manuscripts. The text of the portion recovered is of little importance, for it deals with the history of the 'Abbasid house during the ninth century, at which point it is merely a compilation from earlier surviving sources. The illustra- tions, however, are as fine as any that survive from the period of Akbar. The great page, now without any margins, measures 1 6J X 10 inches and is only equalled by the famous Jaipur Razmnama and the Timurnama at Bankipur. The enormous Hamzanama painted on cotton alone exceeds it in size. The names of the painters were originally recorded below the miniatures, but, as so often, most of them have been cut away in binding. Five alone survive: Sur Das and his son Shankar of Gujarat, Sarwan, Tiriyya, and Brihaspat. These names, except the last, occur in other famous manuscripts of the period, especially the Darabnama and the Baburnama in the Museum collection. These manuscripts are generally supposed to have been finished about 1575-80. The new page from the Ta'rikh-i Alfl may be placed with confidence about ten years later, both on the grounds of style and of historical evidence of the composition of the work. It thus marks the complete maturity of the first Mughal style. The scene represented on the recto of the Museum leaf (PI. XLIX) is the destruction of the tomb of Husain at Kerbala by the orthodox Caliph Mutawakkil (a.d. 847-61). By his order the building was not only razed but the site ploughed up. The artist has made skilful use of the division of the page between text and illustration. The main lines of the composition seem all to diverge from a point outside it on the left, thereby giving an impression of directed action to the whole. The treatment of the man on the harrow shows a familiarity 150 ' I^^^^V'"''.' .1^ XLIX. PAGE FROM THE TA'RiKH-I ALFl with European art much commoner under Jahanglr than under Akbar. Basawan, alone of the painters of the period, seems to have acquired so much knowledge and mastery of the European style from the engravings introduced by the Jesuits; and so, though there is no ascription on the page, it is possible to hazard an attribution to his hand. On the reverse, three separate scenes are represented; at the top, the murder of Yusuf, wall of Armenia, by insurgents; in the middle, the execution of the insurgents by Bogha, general of Mutawakkil; and at the bottom, the mosques of Egypt burned and the inhabitants drowned by Prankish invaders. B. Gray. 127. THE 'CHARLES BEVING* COLLECTION OF TEXTILES. ALARGE and important collection of (i) West African textiles and (2) Javanese 'batiks* has been presented to the Sub-Depart- ment of Ethnography by Mr C. A. Beving, on behalf of Messrs Beving & Co., Ltd, of Manchester. (i) These specimens of native-woven and native-dyed cloth, more than 200 in number, were collected in various parts of West Africa, more particularly in Nigeria, the Gold Coast, Dahomey, Mendi- land, Gambia, and Senegal, during the latter part of the nineteenth century, in order to provide samples for imitation by the Manchester export trade. A series such as this could probably no longer be obtained, since West African native industries have been seriously affected by Euro- pean influence. Of particular interest are the variety of designs, often very effective, produced by the so-called 'tie-dyeing* process. The effects are achieved by protecting parts of the cloth from the dye, generally indigo, (a) by embroidering, and picking out the embroidery after dyeing, (6) by 'stitch-tying*, (c) by 'rope-tying*, or crimping, (^) by tying up in small bunches before dyeing. Each of these processes is illustrated in detail by samples of cloth in all the different stages of manufacture — a most instructive technological series. In addition there are cloths dyed by a kind of 'batik* process, with the use of a wax or rice-paste 'resist*. X 151 A number of finely embroidered tobes and caps, wooden fans and carved gourds are also included in this West African series. (2) There are about 100 Javanese 'sarongs' and 'slendangs' in 'batik' work, whereby the designs are reserved by painting with a wax resist before dyeing, and subsequently boiling the wax out. Some of these show the influence of Western ideas; in one specimen the all-over design is composed of representations of umbrellas, bicycles, and gramophones — an interesting example of culture-contact! The donor has requested that this collection be known as the 'Charles Beving Collection' in memory of his father, who formed it originally. Part of this collection was exhibited temporarily in the Manchester City Art Galleries last year, where it aroused consider- able interest. H. J. Braunholtz. 128. AN ETHNOGRAPHICAL SERIES FROM THE SUDAN. ALARGE and valuable Ethnographical Series, comprising about 250 pieces, collected from various tribes of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, has been presented to the Ethnographical Sub-Department by Major and Mrs P. H. G. Powell-Cotton. These specimens were obtained during the donors' expedition in 1933, and are all carefully documented. The chief tribes represented are the Dinka, Latuka, Jur, Lango, Bari, and Azande, and the objects range from spears and shields to personal ornaments and objects of domestic use. It is im- possible to do justice to such a collection in a short note, and it is perhaps invidious to single out particular pieces from a collection, the importance of which consists chiefly in its range and compre- hensive character. A few pieces are illustrated in PI. L. The vase with human head from the Azande is an excellent piece of realistic modelling in which racial character is clearly expressed (Fig. 2). The helmet, from the Latuka tribe, is worn by men in iFuneral dances. It is covered with brass plates and ornamented with red and black clipped feather plumes, and white ostrich feathers (Fig. i). Some of the portable wooden stools contain hollowed-out receptacles for tobacco and other small articles. Perhaps the most ingenious combination of uses is seen in the ambatch wood shield from the Dinka, covered 152 L. I, HELMET WORN IN FUNERAL DANCES, LATUKA TRIBE {Ht. 2, ft. io\in.). 2, POTTERY VASE, AZANDE TRIBE {Ht. 12^ in.). 3, POTTERY LION, SHILLUK TRIBE {L. 7 in.) I {Heights ft.) 2 {Height 6 ft. 4. in.) 2 {Height S ft. sin.) LI. CARVED AND PAINTED WOOD SHIELDS FROM DUTCH NEW GUINEA with skin and provided with four little wooden feet. This, though primarily a parrying shield, can also be used as a stool or pillow by being placed on its feet, or as a float when swimming; moreover it contains 'pockets' for tobacco, tinder, &c. — a very useful provision for a people that goes practically naked. Two sets of potter's tools, from the Latuka and Lango tribes, are included in this collection, which is also accompanied by photographs showing the actual use of some of the specimens. H. J. Braunholtz. 129. CARVED SHIELDS AND SPEARS FROM DUTCH NEW GUINEA. THE Ethnographical Collections have been enriched by a gift from Lord Moyne, D.S.O., of a very interesting group of objects from an almost unknown region of South-Eastern Dutch New Guinea, inhabited by warlike and truculent members of the Papuan race, who are still living in the Stone Age. These objects were collected by the donor in 1929 from two villages about 60 miles up the Eilanden River, and its tributary the Kampong (approx. 139° E. long., 5° 30' S. lat.). They comprise elaborately carved shields, spears, and canoe prows, bows and arrows, cassowary bone daggers, fishing nets and other objects. A selection of the shields and spears is shown in Plates LI and LII. In spite of their size the shields (Plate LI) are very thin and light, the handles being cut from the solid. ^ They may possibly have had a ceremonial purpose, like some of the painted boards in other parts of New Guinea; but the fact that several of them have been penetrated, apparently, by spear-thrusts, seems to indicate a practical function. ^ The designs, carved all over the frontal surface, are outlined by pairs * Only three out of the series often shields are illustrated here. 2 The view of the Dutch authorities on similar shields from the neighbouring Lorentz River is that they were only used in dances, or as objects of exchange. Similar shields have been seen used in fighting dances on the Mimika River. The carved spears are also presumed to have been used in dances or other ceremonies. In that case the carved expansion may have been intended to prevent the spear from penetrating the shield far enough to inflict a wound. Since the length from spear-point to expansion is about 1 1 feet, the point could have been prevented from touching the body by holding the shield out at arm's length. of narrow and more or less parallel ridges, enclosing broad grooves or channels, which are invariably painted red, the remainder of the sunk background being whitened with lime, and certain details added in black. A bold and distinctive effect, suggestive of cloisonne work, is produced by this ' rid ge-and -groove' style. All the principal designs appear to be derived from the human form, and, when arranged in a series, illustrate in an admirable way the principle of degeneration from zoomorphic to geometric forms. The facial features are gradually lost until only a mouth or nose remains (Fig. 3) and these may in turn be reiterated, so that in one case there are three mouths, and in others the nose has a perforated septum repeated a number of times, with the characteristic grass nose- ornament in each perforation (Figs. 2 and 3). Only one of the shields (Fig. i) shows the human body in a clearly recognizable form, the limbs terminating in obvious fingers and toes, although they are stylized into a symmetrical pattern. This shield supplies the clue to the more highly geometrized forms (Figs. 2 and 3), whose origin would hardly be demonstrable without it. Some of the shields have subsidiary 'arabesques' traversing the background as seen in Fig. 2; these have almost the appearance of a kind of cursive script, though they are more probably to be explained as zoomorphic derivatives. The spears (Plate LII) are cut from a single piece of hard wood, tipped with a cassowary's claw (one of them being also decorated with feathers and seeds at the butt end) and expanding, about a quarter of their length from the point, into a kind of paddle-blade carved in open-work. Similar types of spears and shields are found in Flamingo (East) Bay, at the mouth of the Lorentz River about 50 miles to the north-west,^ and there are evident affinities between the decorative art of this region and the better-known Utakwa and Mimika Rivers, extending at least 1 50 miles in a westerly direction.* * See H. A. Lorentz: Nova Guinea, vol. VII, Ethnographic, Li v. I (Leiden, 191 3), pp. 126, 134 fF., PI. XX, XXIII; and R. P. Meyjes, E. J. de Rochemont, J. W. R. Koch, &c. : De Zuidwest Nieuw-Guinea Expeditie 1904-5 (Leiden, 1 908), Pis. IV and X. 2 See A. C. Haddon and J. W. Layard: Report on the Ethnographical Collections from the Utakwa River, in Reports on the British Ornithologists' Union Expedition and the Wollaston Expedition in Dutch New Guinea, igio-13 (London, 1916}, and A. F. R. Wollaston : Pygmies and Papuans (London, 1 9 1 2}. LII. CARVED WOOD 'PADDLE-SPEARS' FROM DUTCH NEW GUINEA LIIIa. medal of FRANCESCO DE' GIRARDENGHI '■•mji:^':.:.'9-'3 LIIIb. GREEK COINS Unfortunately the natives* own account of the significance of their designs is not yet forthcoming. H. J. Braunholtz. 130. TWO RARE GREEK COINS. THE Department of Coins and Medals has recently acquired two fine Greek coins, purchased from the Vallentin Fund. The first is a bronze litra of Sicily (weight 33*83 grammes) struck about 340 B.C., when the native Sicel cities banded themselves together under Timoleon to repel the Carthaginian invader. The types are appropriate to the occasion: Zeus Eleutherios on the obverse to stand for freedom, and on the reverse a pattern of torch and ears of corn for Demeter of Enna, the representative goddess of the island, with the legend 'Alliance (coinage)'. This identical piece was in the Alessi Collection in 1828, as an engraving shows. The reverse has been twice struck so that the type is repeated at an acute angle to itself. This repetition of the legend is perhaps the cause of a variant reading which has gained currency, SupiJiocxiKov AAaiaivcov 'Alliance coinage of Alaesa', but for which the only other specimen that can be traced offers no support. If the mint was not Alaesa it may well have been Enna (PI. LIII, 2). The other coin is a silver stater of Abdera (weight 10-99 grammes) of the first decade of the fourth century B.C. Only one other speci- men of this beautiful coin is known. One side shows a griffin, the badge of Abdera, the other a cult statue of Artemis, holding bow and branch, with a stag behind her, and the magistrate's name Poly- crates (PI. LIII, i). E. S. G. Robinson. 131. GREEK AND ROMAN COINS. AN important gift of a series of two electrum, 39 silver, and 42 xjLbronze Greek and Roman coins has been received from Mr E. S. G. Robinson, F.S.A. Among these may be mentioned: a third stater (PL LIII, 3) in electrum of the seventh century B.C. (weight 4-71 grammes) with a bee on the obverse and plain punch-marks on the reverse; although the bee is in profile the coin is probably of Ephesus; a fourth-century silver stater of Ephesus (PI. LIII, 4), ^5S obverse a bee seen from above, reverse the forepart of a stag and a palm-tree, with the magistrate's name Phocylus; a didrachm of Calymna (weight 5*56 grammes) with the usual types, helmeted heroic head and lyre, but with the unique addition of a magistrate's name Cleuphanes (PI. LIII, 5). The other Greek coins are an electrum stater of Carthage, silver pieces of Cos, and a series of Imperial bronze from Asia Minor. Among the Roman coins, in addition to three fine didrachms of the Romano-Campanian series, special mention should be made of a sextans or two-ounce piece of the Italian cast bronze series {aes grave) (weight 25-45 grammes) (PI. LIII, 7) the types of which reproduce those of the well-known Carthaginian silver coin of Hasdrubal or Hannibal, struck in Spain just before the Second Punic War, which is also illustrated for com- parison (PI. LIII, 6). The types, head of Melkarth with club on shoulder and African elephant with driver, are reproduced reversed. Possibly the mould was made by direct cutting, without allowance being made for the fact that casting would reverse them. This crude document is of considerable historical importance as showing that the reduction to its weight standard had not at the time of the Second Punic War reached a point hitherto thought to have been reached half a century earlier. J. Allan. 132. A RARE ITALIAN MEDAL. THE Department of Coins and Medals has acquired through the Vallentin Fund an important Italian medal (Plate LIII). This is a portrait of Francesco de' Girardenghi, a printer of Pavia and Venice of the end of the fifteenth century. The obverse bears his portrait and is dated 1504; the reverse type is an allegory of the attainment of fame with a motto from Ovid. The medal, which is Milanese work, is not only a singularly attractive piece in itself but is also of considerable historical interest to the bibliographer. It has hitherto only been known from a specimen in Milan in very poor condition {Corp, Ital. Med, no. 700). The specimen now acquired by the Museum is in an unusually beautiful state of preservation. J. Allan. 156 133. OTHER GIFTS. AMONG other gifts received during the last quarter may be Jl\ mentioned : The Reconstruction of Tokyo. Tokyo Municipal Office, 1933. Presented by the Mayor of Tokyo, Records of the Skinners of London. Edward I to James I. Com- piled and edited by John James Lambert. 1933. Presented by the Master and Wardens of the Skinners' Company. Modruvallabok (Codex Modruvallensis). MS. No. i32fol. inthe Arnamagnsean Collection in the University Library of Copen- hagen. With an introduction by Einar Ol. Sveinsson. Levin and Munksgaard: Copenhagen, MCMXXXIIL Presented by Mr Ejnar Munksgaard. Ode on the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude. Left unfinished by Mr Gray, and since completed. With an introduction by Leonard Whibley. Printed for William Andrews Clark, Jr, by John Henry Nash: San Francisco, 1933. Presented by Mr William Andrews Clark, yr. The Visionary Gentleman Don Quijote de la Mancha. By Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. Translated into English by Robinson Smith. 2 vols. New York, 1932. Presented by the Hispanic Society of America. Private Papers of James Boswell from Malahide Castle. In the Col- lection of Lt.-Colonel Ralph Heyward Isham. Prepared for the Press by Geoffrey Scott and Frederick A. Pottle. Vols. 17, 18. Privately printed, 1933, 34. Presented by Lt.-Col. Ralph Heyward Isham. A Collection of Orders of Service, Programmes of Festivals, &c. Printed for private use at Gregynog. Presented by the Misses G. E. and M. S. Davies. The Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington. Published for the Trustees of Amherst College, 1933. Presented by the Trustees of Amherst College. C6dices indigenas de algunos pueblos del Marquesado del Valle de Oaxaca, publicados par el Archivo General de la Nacion. Mexico, 1933. Presented by Sr D. Rafael Lopez. Fra Luca de Pacioli of Borgo S. Sepolcro. By Stanley Morison. ^S7 The Grolier Club: New York; printed by Bruce Rogers at the University Press, Cambridge, England, 1933. Presented by the Grolier Club. My Adventures with General William Booth, Founder of the Salvation Army. By Henry Edmonds, his first A.D.C. 3 vols. For private circulation only. Presented by the Author. Papeio prepared for the Fifth Biennial Conference of the Institute of Pacific Relations, 1933. 15 vols. Presented by the Royal Institute oj International Affairs. Further diaries of George Sturt (see B.M.g., VII, pp. 73 f.), sup- plementary to those in Add. MSS. 43359-74, 43466, 43467 (Add. MSS. 43690-3). Presented by Miss S. Sturt. A collection of transcripts of Dutch State Papers from the archives at The Hague, relating to the First Dutch War, covering the period October 1652-December 1653 (Add. MSS. 4371 1-14). Presented by the Navy Records Society, A notebook of Sir Frederick Morton Eden, containing political poems by himself and others (Add. MS. 43702). Presented anonymously. A translation by the late Walter Farrell of Captain Nerger's S. M. S. Wolf, with notes, appendices and corrections (Add. MSS. 43697-701). Presented, under the terms of the translator s will, by his brother Mr Richard Farrell. Deed relating to the Tresham family and the manor of White Notley, CO. Essex, 1594 (Add. Ch. 70800). Presented by the late Mr T. B. Clarke-Thornhill. Four documents relating to Olive, Duchess of Cumberland. Pre- sented by Mr y. Lightbody. Six foreign charters, 1 402-1 702, including two Papal Bulls (Boni- face IX and Paul III) (Add. Ch. 70810-15). Presented by Mr Arthur Hawley. Inscriptions of Burma, portfolio I. Rangoon, 1933. Fol. Pre- sented by the University oj Rangoon. Sepher Hammaggidh, pt iii of an edition of the Old Testament in Hebrew containing the Hagiographa, &c. Frankfort on the Oder, 1725. 8°. Presented by Miss K. Herbert. 158 A Tibetan manuscript containing coloured pictures of saints, deities, &c., with appropriate devotions; sixteenth or seventeenth century, and a Tamil book of stories, on palm-leaf; c. 1800. Presented by Rev, E. A. Dentith, F.R.G.S. Six engravings of various schools. Bequeathed by Alfred W. Rich, through the National Art-Collections Fund. Ten aquatints by Alfred Hartley, R.E. Bequeathed by the artist, A. Dauzats: Convent of St Catherine on Mount Sinai. Lithograph. Presented by Mr Frank L. Emanuel. P. L. Parizeau: Two water-colour drawings. Presented by Mr E. y. Dent. The Nettlefold Collection (Vol. I, A-C): Catalogue by C. Regi- nald Grundy, with separate impressions of the plates. Presented by the author. Charles Shannon, R.A.: Three lithographs, completing the Museum Collection. Presented by Mr Cecil French. Alfred W. Hunt: Sonning-on-Thames. Water-colours. Presented by Mr C, F. Bell, F.S.A. One hundred and forty-three prints of miscellaneous schools. Presented by Sir John Stirling-Maxwell, Bart, K, T, Two modern impressions from either side of a fifteenth-century Italian copper plate. Probably Ferrarese, about 1 470. Presented by Mr John Hunt. John Bacon: Design for a monument to Captain James Montagu. Presented by Mr Edward Crojt Murray, S. R. Badmin: Two etchings. Presented by the artist. Three stone fragments and a terra-cotta pot, of the Achaemenean period. Presented by Brigadier-General Sir Percy Sykes. A small bronze lion from the rim of a bowl; archaic Greek. Presented by Mr R. H. Bulmer, A Corinthian oinochoe painted with two friezes of animals. Be- queathed by the late Mr J. H. Picard. Two Cretan neolithic idols of clay and one of marble. Presented by Sir Arthur Evans. A plaster reconstruction of a model house or temple of the Greek Geometric period, cast from terra-cotta fragments excavated at the Heraion of Perachora. Presented by the British School oj Archaeology at Athens. A marble statuette (headless) of a draped woman, from Athens, of Hellenistic style. Presented by the Misses E. and P. MacLeod Carey. A Campanian lepaste. Presented by the Earl oj Perth, Series of worked and patinated flints with fossil bones, found below the Suffolk Crag. Presented by Mr J. Reid Moir, Flint implements from Ash and Swanscombe, Kent; from below the Crag at Ipswich; and from below the Estuarine clay on Island Magee, co. Antrim. Presented by Mr J. P. T. Burchell. Series of palaeoliths from various terrace-gravels at Farnham, Surrey. Presented by Major A. G. Wade. Half a bronze tore from Hazelbury Bryan, Dorset, to complete the group acquired in 1892. Deposited on loan by the Dorset Natural History Society, Bronze Age spear-head found at Tower Bridge, London. Pre- sented by the Christy Trustees, Two pottery vessels of Swiss-Lakes type (950-750 b.c.) possibly found in Surrey. Presented by the Parochial Council of St PauFs^ Wimbledon {Rev, Neville Robertson, Vicar), Bronze ornament of tore form and Picene origin, probably sixth century b.c. Presented by Dr C, Davies Sherborn, Bronze armlet of Hallstatt type found near Scarborough Castle, Yorks. Presented by Mr Reginald A, Smith, Part of Roman gravestone inscribed with the name Goban(nia), from Ford, Kent. Presented by Mr E, W, Turner, Roman pottery found with a coin of Caligula on the site of a kiln at Corfe Mullen, Dorset. Presented by Mr J, B, Calkin. Roman pottery found together at Boughton near Worcester, late first century. Presented by Mr E. D, Rickard. Eighteen loose garnets probably from Vandal jewellery, found at Mount Carmel. Presented by Mr G. F, Lawrence. Oval sandstone, engraved and 'tracked' on one face, from Lowes- toft. Presented by Mr E. L, Arnold, Bronze seal-die of Hamon Baniard, from Castle Acre priory, thirteenth century. Presented by Mr Herbert Smith. 160 Bronze stirrup, probably German, seventeenth century. Pre- sented by Mr A, G. Gordon. Gold icon pendant, eighteenth century, probably from one of the Greek Islands. Presented by Mr y. R, Ogden. Four blue and white Chinese porcelain cups with the Ch'eng Hua mark. Presented by Mr F, C, Harrison, Pottery jug with handle, from the Shirati area of Musoma, Tanganyika; made by a M'Girango (Jaluo-BaKuria crossbreed); also two water gourds with engraved designs, from Ushashi area, Musoma District, Tanganyika Territory. Presented by Mr E. C. Baker, Alabaster figure of seated Buddha, from Burma; formerly in King Mindon's Palace at Mandalay, and afterwards in the possession of King Thibaw, until the British occupation of Mandalay in 1885. Presented by Miss E, Mason. White marble figure of a Jain Tirthankara (Saint), from India. Presented by Mr C, F, Woodbridge. Series of brass goldweights, from Ashanti (collected at Kumasi at the time of the Second Ashanti Expedition, 1895); also a large spear from Somaliland. Presented by Mrs Bertha Stan Arthur. Ivory and shell spoons and other objects from the Upper Congo, iron sweat-scraper from the ANgoni, Nyasaland, and soapstone pipe, from the Sudan. Presented by Professor A. Werner. A series of flaked stone implements, including microlithic types, from a coastal kitchen-midden, at Windang, about 65 miles south of Sydney, New South Wales. Presented by Mr R. Turner. A series of stone arrow-heads, and wood and bone objects, exca- vated from a depth oi c. 15 feet in guano deposits at Punta Pichala, south of Pisagua, Chile. Presented by Capt. Sir David W. Barker^ R.D., R.N.R, A collection of 400 photographic negatives in cabinet, illustrating the Veddas of Ceylon (cf. donors' book: 'The Veddas', Cambridge, 1 9 1 1 ). Presented by ProJ, and Mrs C, G, Seligman, Old pottery vase with roulette-marked surface, excavated at a depth of 26 feet in Kassa tin mine, Jos, Northern Nigeria; also a grooved grinding stone, bronze bell and key, and three stone and Y 2 161 glass beads, excavated at various sites in Ashanti, Gold Coast. Pre- sented by Captain R. P. Wild. Twelve portrait medals by Mr Theodore Spicer-Simson. Presented by the artist, A very rare bronze coin of the Bruttii of the third century B.C. Presented by Mr H. M. Hake, C.B.E, A very rare Roman tessera of the second century a.d. Presented by Mr Percy H, Webb, M.B.E, A rare gold coin of the emperor Arcadius and two sestertii of Vespasian restruck by the Vandals. Presented by Mr J. W. E. Pearce, F.S.A, Silver medals on the quincentenary of Winchester College (1893) and on the extension of Merchant Taylors' School (1875) ^^^ ^^^ other coins and medals. Presented by Mr H. Gordon Clark, SUPPLY OF CASTS THE production and sale of plaster casts from sculpture in the Departments of Antiquities in the British Museum, which has been managed since 1 9 1 9 by the Department for the Sale of Casts in the Victoria and Albert Museum, has been taken over by the British Museum since the beginning of this year. A revised Price List is being prepared and will be published by the Trustees shortly. It is pro- posed to return to the prices which were current in 1 9 1 o, when the last List was printed. LOAN SERIES OF DRAWINGS AND WATER-COLOURS FROM THE TURNER BEQUEST FOUR series of loan collections are now available. Two of these include twenty-five drawings each, the other two include eleven drawings each. A framed notice on Turner's Drawings and Water- colours is included in each series. Each series represents Turner's work in pencil and water-colour at various periods. Applications for loans should be made to the Keeper of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, under the conditions set forth in the 162 official * Regulations for the Loan of Works of Art by the Trustees of the British Museum to Museums and Art Galleries', with special conditions made for the drawings of the Turner Bequest, as follows: ( i) That loans are not made for longer periods than three months, nor, as a general rule, in the months of April, May, June, July, and August, owing to the strength of light at that time of year. (2) That the rooms in which the drawings are exhibited shall be perfectly dry and well ventilated. (3) That the drawings should in no case be exhibited on walls which are at any time exposed to direct sunlight. (4) That, outside the British Museum, no drawing shall be taken out of its frame. (5) That frames must only be hung by the brass plates attached, and in their countersunk positions; that holes must not be bored in the frames. RECENT PUBLICATIONS Codex Sinaiticus, To meet the popular demand for some account of the Mount Sinai manuscript and for reproductions of specimen pages several publications have been issued. A pamphlet, entitled The Mount Sinai Manuscript oj the Bible (22 pp., with four illustra- tions), published at the price of sixpence, is in its second edition. It contains some account of the discovery and of the manuscript itself, rebuts the reports that the manuscript was wrongfully obtained by the Russian Government and that it is a forgery, and gives some typical instances of textually interesting passages in the New Testa- ment. One of these passages, the Lord's Prayer in St Luke's version, is the subject of a leaflet (The hordes Prayer in St Luke's Gospel according to the Codex Sinaiticus^ 4 pp., i penny), which repro- duces the passage, with a transliteration into modern Greek charac- ters and the English of the Authorized and Revised Versions. A collotype facsimile, showing two pages (Luke xxiv. 23-John i. 39), full size, has been issued at a price of one shilling, and postcards showing respectively the same opening and a view of the Monastery 163 of St Catherine are on sale at twopence each. The following photo- graphs can be supplied from official negatives at the prices shown below: 4083. Ps. cxviii. 1 3 2-cxxiii. 1 . 2oin. xi6in. 5/. 4084. Ps. cxviii. 169-cxxiii. I. 20 in. X 16 in. 5/. 4085. Luke xix. 13-xx. 34. 24 in. x 20 in. yj. 6d. 4086. Luke xxii. 20-52. 2oin. xi6in. 5^. 4087. Luke xxii. 20-52. 10 in. x 8 in. 2s. 3^. 4088. Luke xxii. 20-xxiii. 14. 20 in. x 16 in. 5J. 4089. Luke xxii. 36-52. 10 in. x 8 in. 2j. 3^. 4090. John i. 1-39. 2oin. X 16 in. ^s. The second volume of the Publications of the Joint Expedition of the British Museum and of the Museum of the University of Pennsyl- vania to Mesopotamia is published for the Trustees of the two Museums, by the aid of a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The volume is entitled The Royal Cemetery, and con- tains Dr C. L. Woolley's report on the 'pre-dynastic' and Sargonid graves excavated between 1926 and 1931; the Rev. Dr Ldon Le- grain, of the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania, has con- tributed a general description and a catalogue of the seals, the Rev. Father E. R. Burrows, S.J., a chapter on the inscriptions, Prof. Sir Arthur Keith a discussion of the skeletal material, and Dr H. J. Plenderleith some notes on the chemical analyses of the metals and on the possible provenance. The volume is in two parts, the first of text, pp. XX and 604, and 83 figs., a coloured frontispiece and a map, the second consisting of 274 plates, of which 37 are in colour and 173 collotype. The subscription price is three guineas, the list to be closed on 30 April 1934; the price thereafter is fixed at four guineas. Dr Woolley gives a detailed description of the excavations of the cemetery, which he divides into 'royal tombs' and 'private graves* of the pre-dynastic period, 'Second Dynasty' graves, and Sargonid graves, and then discusses separately, with full descriptions, the classes of objects found, e.g. musical instruments, shell inlay, metal objects. Both the excavations and the objects are very amply illus- 164 trated, and the coloured plates provide a useful record of antiquities many of which are now well known, such as the gold vessels of Mes- kalam-dug, the harps with golden bull's heads, the gold helmet, the rein-rings, and the mosaic 'standard'. A valuable feature of the publication for students is the catalogue of objects, arranged by excavation numbers, with the present location and number, where identified, either in the Baghdad Museum, the Museum of the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania, or the British Museum. The cheapness of this publication is due to the munificence of the Carnegie Cor- poration. The seventh volume of the new edition of the General Catalogue of Printed Books in the British Museum was published in March of this year. This instalment carries the work to within sight of completion of the letter A, from the heading Asmund to that of Auszuge, in 986 columns as against 592 columns in the corresponding section of the previous edition. The Trustees have now published a facsimile reproduction of their unique manuscript containing the Persian poems of Zu '1-Fakar ShirwanI (Or. 9777). This poet, who flourished in the thirteenth century a.d., was one of the most brilliant figures in literary circles of his age, and was particularly admired for his skill in the composi- tion of the artificial kastdah, for which he found patronage in the courts of the Atabeks of Luristan and the Kutlugh Khans of Kirman. The immense success which he won in his own day, however, did not last long: after his death his writings fell into neglect, and although his reputation survived in the schools of literature, and some of his verses were occasionally quoted, fewer and fewer scholars studied his poems at first hand, and copies of them became rarer and rarer, until at last they seem to have disappeared, with the exception of the manuscript now in the Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts, which has just been published by the Trustees. This contains about 10,000 couplets of various kinds of verse (kasaid^ kita\ ghazaliyyat, and rubaiyyat) ; it may be mentioned that hitherto only about fifty of our poet's couplets have been preserved in quota- tions, and none in independent manuscripts. The reproduction has been edited by Mr E. Edwards, who has contributed a short preface, 16s in which he thoroughly discusses all the historical data available for the poet's life. The price is i ^s. The first volume of reproductions of the Woodcuts of the XVth Century in the Department oj Prints and Drawings^ with text by Mr Campbell Dodgson, late Keeper of the Department, contains i88 subjects on 73 plates, including a frontispiece printed in colours. The complete publication will consist of three volumes, two reproducing woodcuts, and the third metal-cuts, including numerous examples of the maniere criblee. The contents are chiefly of German or Nether- landish origin, but a few fine examples of the Italian and French Schools are also included. The selection is limited to prints issued separately, book illustration being on principle omitted. The British Museum collection of such prints is one of the five large collections that exist, the others being at Berlin, Munich, Paris, and Vienna. It is the only collection of which till now no complete set of reproductions was available. The text is purposely brief; more detailed descriptions of the majority of the prints are to be found in Mr Dodgson's Catalogue, Vol. I, 1903, though numerous acquisi- tions have been made since then. The price of the First Volume of the publication, which is limited to 300 copies, is ^2 los, A short monograph on The Assyrian Sculptures by C. J. Gadd contains eighteen half-tone illustrations and is sold at is. 6d, It gives a brief account of the discovery of the slabs, the development of Assyrian art and some explanation of the content and meaning of the scenes. A detailed list gives a description of individual slabs in the chronological order under kings' reigns, and the index of sculptures by galleries enables the visitor to use this book in the Museum. A fourth edition of the Guide to the Department of Coins and Medals has been issued. The chief changes are that the Greek section has been revised in keeping with the recently published detailed Guide to the Principal Coins of the Greeks and that important addi- tions and alterations have been made in the English section. 166 EXHIBITIONS Lantern Lectures on the Sinai Manuscript, Lantern lectures on the Codex Sinaiticus can be given, on application (three days' notice is requested), at the British Museum by members of the staff on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays at 1 1 a.m. and 2.45 p.m., to parties of not less than 1 5 and not more than 60 persons. In special cases, lectures on other days or at other hours may be arranged. No charge will be made for admission, but it is hoped that those who avail themselves of these facilities will contribute as liberally as possible to the purchase fund. Two lectures have been prepared, one of a more advanced kind specially intended for students and adults, one for a less instructed audience, particularly for children. Arpachiyah Expedition, The share of duplicate antiquities allotted to the expedition to Arpachiyah, near Nineveh, by the Department of Antiquities in Iraq, is now exhibited, so far as complete or nearly complete and typical specimens are concerned, in the Nineveh Gallery. This expedition, which was financed by the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, the Percy Sladen Memorial Fund, Sir Charles Marston, and other generous subscribers, and directed by Mr M. E. L. Mallowan, M. A., F.S.A., aimed at investigating a small site of great antiquity to establish such sequence datings for early types of painted pottery in Assyria as might be possible. This pur- pose has been satisfactorily achieved, and in broad terms the prin- cipal result of the excavation was to show that the early black on buff wares from Babylonia are preceded in the north by a polished polychrome ware of the type already known from Tall Halaf on the Habur River in Syria, and elsewhere. This polychrome ware is hand-made, thin, and of finely levigated clay. The geometrical designs are carried out in various colours in lustrous paint. Several examples which were broken in antiquity and are now rejoined show remarkable differences in colour due to accidental circumstances, but in general orange, red, brown, black, or white is fairly clear. The shapes are as characteristic as the beauti- ful designs, and do not occur afterwards. The finds connected with this pottery show that the stone weapons and tools are all of the 167 *chalcolithic' period, and the fortunate find of a copper axe blade side by side with polished stone axes leaves no doubt on the subject. The amulets are of some interest in that they present true antecedents for later amulet forms, and the naked female figures with pinched heads, or no heads at all, show the prevalence of these magical figurines in Western Asia in very early times, which has been doubted. A point of some interest is the fine polish of the obsidian cores found and the skill with which this substance is worked. The curious pebble causeways and the associated small buildings of this early settlement, which yet await explanation, are illustrated by the plans of Mr Cruikshank Rose, and some idea of the rich collection at Baghdad from this site is given by the water-colour drawings of objects there. The finds of the later period, though much less spectacular, have their value in co-ordinating finds from such sites as Samarra and Ur. The exhibition closes on 14 April, but the greater number of objects will be exhibited in the new Babylonian Room, when reopened. Drawings by George Du Maurier. A selection of Du Maurier's drawings are on exhibition in the Prints and Drawings Gallery to mark the centenary of the artist's birth (6 March 1834). The depart- ment possesses in all twenty-one drawings by Du Maurier. Prehistoric Antiquities. The increasing interest taken by the public in prehistoric research is reflected in a series of special exhibitions arranged in the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities; and two table-cases are set aside for the purpose at the head of the main staircase. The first subject illustrated was the sequence of flint imple- ments from Swanscombe and Northfleet in Kent as revealed by Mr J. P. T. Burchell's excavations. This was followed by an exhibit provided by Mr Hazzledine Warren and Mr O. Rickof of mesolithic flints from a sealed deposit on the Pleistocene gravel at Broxbourne, Herts. A selection from Dr L. S. B. Leakey's finds in Kenya included skeletal remains of Homo sapiens from a surprisingly early deposit; and in January Mr J. Reid Moir demonstrated the variety of patina- tion in pre-Crag flints, suggesting at least four periods of Pliocene man ; while Mr J. B. Calkin exhibited the results of his excavations 168 at Slindon Park, Sussex, with a view to dating the raised beach and Coombe-rock. These were followed by a display of the culture- sequence discovered by Miss Dorothy Garrod in caves on Mount Carmel, with portions of palaeolithic and mesolithic (Natufian) skeletons. It is proposed to continue these temporary exhibits of topical interest; and the collaboration of several collectors has been promised, to amplify material already in the Museum. An oppor- tunity will thus be afforded for the public to study what might otherwise be difficult of access in private possession. APPOINTMENTS THE Principal Trustees have made the following appointments: 6 February. To be an Assistant Keeper, Second Class, in the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, Mr lorwerth Eiddon Stephen Edwards, B.A. (Gonville and Caius College, Cam- bridge), John Stewart of Rannoch University Scholar (1928), Tyr- whitt University Scholar, Wright University Student, and Mason University Prizeman (1932); 19 April. To be an Assistant Keeper, Second Class, in the Department of Prints and Drawings, Miss Elizabeth Senior, B.A. (Newnham College, Cambridge, and Courtauld Institute, London). To be Assistant Cataloguers in the Department of Printed Books: 30 January. Mr George Lisle Glutton, B.A. (Merton College, Oxford); 6 February. Mr Gordon Harold Spinney, B.A. (St John's College, Oxford); Mr Alexander Hyatt King, B.A. (King's College, Cam- bridge), Jebb Travelling Student; Mr Richard William Ladborough, B.A. (Magdalene College, Cambridge). 169 t.* PRESENTED ■4JULld34 RECENT PUBLICATIONS CATALOGUE OF BOOKS PRINTED IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY NOW IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Part VI. Italy: Foligno, Ferrara, Florence, Milan, Bologna, Naples, Perugia, and Treviso. Pp. I + 301 (599-899), with 31 plates of facsimiles (XLII*-LXXI I*). 1930. ;^3 3s. COINS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Vol. II: Vespasian to Domitian. With an introduction and 83 plates. By Harold Mattingly, M.A. 1930. 8vo. £2 3s- CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF GREEK AND ROMAN ANTIQUITIES: By F. N. Pryce, M.A., F.S. A. Vol. I, Part L Prehellenic and Early Greek. Pp. viii + 214, with 43 plates and 246 figures in text. 1928. 1 8s. Part II. Cypriote and Etruscan. Pp. viii4- 261, with 6 plates and 132 figures in text. 1931- ;^i. CODEX ALEXANDRINUS in reduced photographic facsimile. Old Testament, Part II. I Samuel — II Chronicles. 232 plates. 1931. j[,2 2s. CATALOGUE OF DRAWINGS BY DUTCH AND FLEMISH ARTISTS PRESERVED IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PRINTS AND DRAWINGS, BRITISH MUSEUM. By Arthur M. Hind, M.A., F.S.A. Vol. IV. Dutch Drawings of the 1 7th Century (N-Z and Anonymous). 1931. 8vo. ^^2 los. THE STURGE COLLECTION: An Illustrated Selection of Flints from Britain bequeathed in 1919 by William Allen Sturge, M.V.O., M.D., F.R.C.P. By Reginald A. Smith, F.S.A. 1931. 8vo. With 11 plates and numerous illustrations in the text. ;^i 5^. CUNEIFORM TEXTS FROM BABYLONIAN TABLETS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. Part XLI (50 plates), by C. J. Gadd, M.A., F.S.A. 1931. Folio. 1 6s. CATALOGUE OF PAINTINGS RECOVERED FROM TUN-HUANG BY SIR AUREL STEIN. By Arthur Waley. Pp. lii+328. 1931. 8vo. £2. SUPPLEMENTARY CATALOGUE OF THE TAMIL BOOKS. By L. D. Barnett. Pp. 695. 1 93 1. £2 3^' GENERAL CATALOGUE OF PRINTED BOOKS. Vol. I, A-Aegidius. 1004 cols. 1931. Vol. II, Aegidius-Aleu. 996 cols. 1931. Vol. III. Alevra- America. 1004 cols. 1932. Vol. IV, America-Anne. 988 cols. 1932. Vol. V, Anne-Aristias. 1004 cols. 1933. Vol. VI, Aristide-Asmondo. 1004 cols. 1933. Vol. VII, Asmund-Auszuge. 986 cols. 1934. Each £4. (to original subscribers £2)- THE PRISMS OF ESARHADDON AND OF ASHURBANIPAL. By Dr. R. Campbell Thompson. Pp. 36, with 18 plates. 1931. los. THE LUTTRELL PSALTER. 183 Plates, with an Introduction by E. G. Millar. A GUIDE TO THE ISLAMIC POTTERY OF THE NEAR EAST. By R. L. HOBSON. 2S. CORPUS VASORUM ANTIQUORUM (Great Britain fasc. X, British Museum VII). Edited by F. N. Pryce. 48 plates. 15J. CASTS OF PERSIAN SCULPTURES OF THE ACHAEMENID PERIOD. 1 2 Plates. 6s. (with portfolio ys.) or 6^. each. CATALOGUE OF DUTCH AND FLEMISH DRAWINGS OF THE XV AND XVI CENTURIES. By A. E. Popham. 83 plates. £2 7s. 6c/. GUIDE TO THE PRINCIPAL COINS OF THE GREEKS from area 700 B.C. to A.D. 270, based on the work of Barclay V. Head. 50 plates. 1932. 15^. CATALOGUE OF ADDITIONS TO THE MANUSCRIPTS 1016-1020 1933- ;^3 IO:f. FLINTS. An illustrated manual of the Stone Age for Beginners. By R. A. Smith Reprint. 1932. 6d. CATALOGUE OF THE GREEK ETRUSCAN AND ROMAN PAINT- INGS AND MOSAICS. By R. P. Hinks. Pp. Ixxi + 157, with 168 figs, and 32 plates. 1933. £2. FACSIMILE OF THE MS. OF AL-KITAB AL-BARP FI 'L-LUGHAH by Al-Kali. Edited by A. S. Fulton. Pp. 16, with 148 plates. 1933. ^os. 6d. GUIDE TO PROCESSES AND SCHOOLS OF ENGRAVING, 3rd edition. 6d. GUIDE TO THE EXHIBITION OF ENGLISH ART. u. 6d. SUBJECT INDEX OF MODERN BOOKS ACQUIRED BY THE BRITISH MUSEUM from 1925 to 1930. Pp. 1759. 1933. ^5 5^. THE BOOK OF THE DEAD. Reprint. With 25 illustrations, ix. SAXTON'S ATLAS OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES, reproduced in colour. Frontispiece portrait of Queen Elizabeth, ns 6d Single sheets, 5^. each. /„ progresi REPLICAS AND CASTS of the finest objects from Ur can be supplied to order. List and prices will be sent on application to the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. WOODCUTS OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. Edited by Campbell DoDGSON. Vol. I. Pp. 28. Frontispiece and 68 plates. £2 los. FACSIMILE OF THE MS. OF DIwAN I ZU'L-FAKAR, the collected poems of Zu'l-Fakar Shi rwanl. Edited by E. Edwards. Pp.466. \$s. THE ASSYRIAN SCULPTURES. By C. J. Gadd. Pp. 77, with 18 illustrations. \s. 6d. EXCAVATIONS AT UR : THE ROYAL CEMETERY, by C. L. Woolley and others. Two volumes. I. Pp. xx + 64, with coloured frontispiece and map ; II. Plates 274 (37 in colour). Price l^^ 4s. FULL LISTS OF THE PUBLICATIONS, PICTORIAL POSTCARDS, PHOTOGRAVURES and other Reproductions issued by the British Museum can be had on application to the Director, British Museum, London, W.C. i. 4