Title
Breviary
Generic classification
Manuscripts and illuminationsObject
ManuscriptDate
ca. 1000Century
11th c.Cultural context / style
VisigothicDimensions
12,7 x 8,1 inTechnique
IlluminationProvenance
Monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos (Santo Domingo de Silos, Burgos, Spain)Current location
The British Library (London, United Kingdom)Inventory Number in Current Collection
Add MS 30849Object history
The origin of the library of the monastery of San Sebastián de Silos, later called Santo Domingo de Silos, can be found in the reconstruction carried out by the Castilian Count Fernán González in the middle of the 10th century. In the year 954 the count donated numerous lands and possessions to the monastery, as well as some books relevant to the cult (Senra, 2002). However, the peak of the monastery took place with the abbot Domingo Manso, who had been a monk of San Millán de la Cogolla. In 1041 Fernando I put him in charge of San Sebastián de Silos and under his mandate the monastic complex grew considerably. The library increased thanks to the donations received and the productions of the scriptorium itself (Castro, 2020), reaching its peak at the end of the eleventh and beginning of the twelfth century (Sánchez Mariana, 1984; Boylan, 1992).
Precisely, this Breviary was one of the volumes produced in the 11th century (Férotin, 1912; Vivancos, 2007). The Silense library suffered great losses throughout its history, such as this copy. Rodrigo Echevarría, the last abbot of the monastery before the exclaustration of 1835, was in charge of jealously preserving the manuscripts that were still treasured in Silos. According to Besse (1897), he was a man of "uncommon prudence and firmness, combined with an extensive knowledge, a great knowledge of the world and noble and distinguished manners". There is no doubt that his decision to protect the manuscripts helped to prevent them from being dispersed at first. However, their fate changed when he was appointed bishop of Segovia in 1857. Echevarría had to leave the monastery, and from then on the codices fell into disrepair.
Anastasio Rodrigo y Yusto, archbishop of Burgos, was impressed when he visited the Monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos. Its dilapidated state led him to appeal to the former monks of the abbey. It was at that moment that Sebastián Fernández, one of the exclaustrated monks and vicar of the church of San Martín (Madrid), intervened. Although he was responsible for protecting the manuscripts in the capital, he failed to appreciate their true value, which led him to contact a marquis in Madrid "plus ou moins authentique" who worked with Aunt Jesusa, a woman well known for selling antiquities (Besse, 1897; Ruiz and Gonzalez de Linares, 1978). Thus it was that in 1877 she sold 69 manuscripts for 16,000 pesetas, a figure that undoubtedly pleased the parish priest.
The Breviary was among these codices sold in Madrid. It was acquired by Antoine Bachelin-Deflorenne, an antiquarian specializing in the sale of antique and rare books. Although his main store was located in Paris, at 10 Boulevard des Capucines, he had branches in London and Madrid. That is how he learned that Sebastian Fernandez was selling the Silensian manuscripts. The Breviary was offered for sale in Paris on June 1, 1878 at the Hotel des Commissaires-Priseurs (Paris) and was purchased on the 15th by Bernard Quritch for the British Museum (Whitehill, 1976; Fernández de la Cuesta, 1985). In the Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1876-1881 it is mentioned as follows:
Mozarabic Breviary for the year; preceded by a calendar. Latin. Imperfect, beginning in the middle of the service for the first Sunday in Advent. The musical notation is found only in the last two quires. Vellum; ff. 308. XIIth cent. Folio.
Finally, in 1973 the Breviary became part of the British Library (London), where it is still preserved today.
Description
This manuscript consists of 308 folios, each divided into two columns of 29-34 lines. It was made by several copyists. According to Vivancos (2007), on folio 232r appears on the recto of the folio "MCa XXa IIIIa", which alludes to the year 1086. Therefore, if that date was noted on that folio, it would be logical to think that it was written earlier. The musical notation of the Breviary is found in an appendix that was added in the middle of the 12th century in Carolingian script.
Locations
XIth c. - ca. 1857
Mid XIXth c. - 1877
parish priest
Sebastián Fernández, Madrid (Spain)
ca. 1877 - ca. 1878
dealer/antiquarian
"Aunt Jesusa", Madrid (Spain) *
ca. 1878
dealer/antiquarian
Antoine Bachelin-Deflorenne, Paris (France) *
ca. 1878
dealer/antiquarian
Bernard Quaritch, London (United Kingdom) *
1878 - ca. 1973
ca. 1973 - present
study center
The British Library, London (United Kingdom)
Bibliography
- BACHELIN-DEFLORENNE, Antoine (1878): Catalogue de libres rares parmi lesquels on remarque la Bible Mazarine premier livre imprimé par Gutenberg et des manuscrits du XIe au XVIIIe siècle rédigé par M. Bachelin-Deflorenne, Librairie Bachelin-Deflorenne, París.
- BESSE, Jean-Martial (1897): "Histoire d'un dépot litteraire. L'abbaye de Silos", nº 14, Revue bénédictine.
- BOYLAN, Ann (1992): "The Library at Santo Domingo de Silos and Its Catalogues (XIth–XVIIIth Centuries)", nº 3, Revue Mabillon.
- BOYLAN, Ann (2002): "The Silos Beatus and the Silos Scriptorium", en Church, State, Vellum, and Stone: Essays on Medieval Spain in Honor of John Williams, Brill, Leiden.
- BRITISH MUSEUM (ed.) (1882): Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1876-1881, The Trustees of the British Museum, Londres, p. 120.
- CASTRO CORREA, Ainoa (2020): "The Scribes of the Silos Apocalypse (London, British Library, Add. MS 11695) and the Scriptorium of Silos in the Late Eleventh Century", vol. 95, nº 2, Speculum. A journal of Medieval Studies.
- DOMÍNGUEZ BORDONA, Jesús (1935): "Una carta sobre la venta de libros en Silos", vol. 11, nº 33, Archivo español de arte y arqueología.
- FÉROTIN, Marius (1912): Le Liber Mozarabicus Sacramentorum et les manuscrits mozarabes, vol. 6, en Monumenta Ecclesiae Liturgica, Librairie de Firmin-Didot et Cie., París.
- FÉROTIN, Marius (1897): Histoire de l'Abbaye de Silos, Léroux, París.
- HAGGH, Barbara (2007): "The Historia for St. Dominic of Silos in British Library Add. ms. 30850", en Hispania Vetus: Musical-Liturgical Manuscripts from Visigothic Origins to the Franco/Roman Transition (9th-12th Centuries), editado por Susana Zapke, Fundación BBVA, Bilbao.
- RUIZ Y GONZÁLEZ DE LINARES, Ernesto (1978): "Burgos ante el Milenario de la Lengua Castellana escrita", nº 190, Boletín de la Institución Fernán González.
- SÁNCHEZ MARIANA, Manuel (1984): "Los códices del Monasterio de Silos", vol. 63, nº 203, Boletín de la Institución Fernán González.
- SENRA GABRIEL Y GALÁN, José Luis (2002): "Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos", en Enciclopedia del románico en Castilla y León, Fundación Santa María la Real, Aguilar de Campoo.
- VIVANCOS, Miguel (2007): "Breviary. British Library, London, Add. ms. 30849", en Hispania Vetus. Musical-liturgical manuscripts: from Visigothic Origins to the Franco-Roman Transition (9th-12th Centuries), editado por Susana Zapke, BBVA, Bilbao, pp. 426-427.
- WHITEHILL, Walter Muir (1976): "The manuscripts of Santo Domingo de Silos", en Homenaje a fray Justo Pérez de Urbel I, Abadía de Silos, Burgos.
- WHITEHILL, Walter Muir y PÉREZ DE URBEL, Justo (1929): "Los manuscritos del Real Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos", nº 95, Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia.
Record manager
Isabel Escalera FernándezCitation:
Isabel Escalera Fernández, "Breviary" in Nostra et Mundi. Cultural Heritage from Castile and Leon around the world, Fundación Castilla y León, 2025. https://inventario.nostraetmundi.com/en/work/405
f. 294r
Zapke (2007): 427.
Zapke (2007): 427.
