Poppleton manuscript
Encyclopedia
The Poppleton Manuscript is the name given to the fourteenth century codex
likely compiled by Robert of Poppleton
, a Carmelite friar who was the Prior of Hulne
, near Alnwick
. The manuscript contains numerous works, such as a map of the world (with index), and works by Orosius, Geoffrey of Monmouth
and Gerald of Wales. It is now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris (Ms Latin 4126).
The manuscript is famous because it contains seven consecutive documents concerning medieval Scotland
, some of which are unique to the manuscript, and regarded as important sources. The first six, at least, had probably been compiled previously in Scotland, in the early thirteenth century. They comprise:
The value of the manuscript has been shown in the publications of William Forbes Skene
, Alan Orr Anderson, and his wife Marjory Anderson. Dozens of articles have been written in the last half-century about various aspects of the Scottish content, although studies of the whole manuscript have been rarer.
Codex
A codex is a book in the format used for modern books, with multiple quires or gatherings typically bound together and given a cover.Developed by the Romans from wooden writing tablets, its gradual replacement...
likely compiled by Robert of Poppleton
Poppleton
Poppleton may refer to:* Upper Poppleton, England* Nether Poppleton, England* Poppleton Township, Minnesota, USA* Poppleton manuscript* Poppleton University* Poppleton: The Children's Book...
, a Carmelite friar who was the Prior of Hulne
Hulne Priory
Hulne Priory is a monastery founded in the 13th century by the Carmelites, or "White Friars" which was one of the Orders of Mendicants, bound by their rule to live in extreme poverty. It is said that the Northumberland site, quite close to Alnwick, was chosen for some slight resemblance to Mount...
, near Alnwick
Alnwick
Alnwick is a small market town in north Northumberland, England. The town's population was just over 8000 at the time of the 2001 census and Alnwick's district population was 31,029....
. The manuscript contains numerous works, such as a map of the world (with index), and works by Orosius, Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth was a cleric and one of the major figures in the development of British historiography and the popularity of tales of King Arthur...
and Gerald of Wales. It is now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris (Ms Latin 4126).
The manuscript is famous because it contains seven consecutive documents concerning medieval Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, some of which are unique to the manuscript, and regarded as important sources. The first six, at least, had probably been compiled previously in Scotland, in the early thirteenth century. They comprise:
- de Situ AlbanieDe Situ AlbanieDe Situ Albanie is the name given to the first of seven Scottish documents found in the so-called Poppleton Manuscript, now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris...
; which appears to be an introduction to the following five or six texts. The Poppleton MS preserves the only copy of this. - Cronica de origine antiquorum Pictorum (i.e. Chronicle on the Origins of the Ancient Picts); part of the Pictish ChroniclePictish ChronicleThe Pictish Chronicle is a name often given by historians to a list of the kings of the Picts beginning many thousand years before history was recorded in Pictavia and ending after Pictavia had been enveloped by Scotland...
, this is largely a pastichePasticheA pastiche is a literary or other artistic genre or technique that is a "hodge-podge" or imitation. The word is also a linguistic term used to describe an early stage in the development of a pidgin language.-Hodge-podge:...
of wider Latin learning regarding the PictsPictsThe Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
and ScotsScotiScoti or Scotti was the generic name used by the Romans to describe those who sailed from Ireland to conduct raids on Roman Britain. It was thus synonymous with the modern term Gaels...
. It contains extracts from the Etymologiae of Isidore of SevilleIsidore of SevilleSaint Isidore of Seville served as Archbishop of Seville for more than three decades and is considered, as the historian Montalembert put it in an oft-quoted phrase, "le dernier savant du monde ancien"...
and NenniusNenniusNennius was a Welsh monk of the 9th century.He has traditionally been attributed with the authorship of the Historia Brittonum, based on the prologue affixed to that work, This attribution is widely considered a secondary tradition....
's Historia Brittonum. - A Pictish King List; part of the Pictish Chroncle, this is a largely un-Gaelicized list of Pictish Kings, containing an opening mythological section not present in many other Pictish king lists. Unlike related Pictish king-lists, it gets cut off at the accession of Cináed mac AilpínKenneth I of ScotlandCináed mac Ailpín , commonly Anglicised as Kenneth MacAlpin and known in most modern regnal lists as Kenneth I was king of the Picts and, according to national myth, first king of Scots, earning him the posthumous nickname of An Ferbasach, "The Conqueror"...
. It reveals its origins at Abernethy by preserving a spurious foundation "charter" for the monastery there, reputedly granted by King NechtanNechtan II of the PictsNechtan grandson of Uerb, was king of the Picts from 597 to around 620. It has been suggested that this Nechtan is the same person as the Neithon who ruled the kingdom of Alt Clut.According to the Pictish Chronicle, Nechtan reigned for 20 or 21 years...
(fl. early seventh century), whom it calls Nectonius magnus filius Uuirp. - Chronicle of the Kings of AlbaChronicle of the Kings of AlbaThe Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, or Scottish Chronicle, is a short written chronicle of the Kings of Alba, covering the period from the time of Kenneth MacAlpin until the reign of Kenneth II . W.F...
; it is a short chronicle of the Kings of AlbaAlbaAlba is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland. It is cognate to Alba in Irish and Nalbin in Manx, the two other Goidelic Insular Celtic languages, as well as similar words in the Brythonic Insular Celtic languages of Cornish and Welsh also meaning Scotland.- Etymology :The term first appears in...
, from the period of King Cináed mac AilpínKenneth I of ScotlandCináed mac Ailpín , commonly Anglicised as Kenneth MacAlpin and known in most modern regnal lists as Kenneth I was king of the Picts and, according to national myth, first king of Scots, earning him the posthumous nickname of An Ferbasach, "The Conqueror"...
(d. 858) until the reign of King Cináed mac Maíl ColuimKenneth III of ScotlandCináed mac Duib anglicised as Kenneth III, and nicknamed An Donn, "the Chief" or "the Brown", was King of Scots from 997 to 1005. He was the son of Dub...
(r. d. 995). As for the de Situ Albanie, the Poppleton MS preserves the only copy. - A List of Dál RiataDál RiataDál Riata was a Gaelic overkingdom on the western coast of Scotland with some territory on the northeast coast of Ireland...
n and Scottish monarchs; this joined pair of king-lists starts from the legendary Fergus Mór mac Eirc, and ends with William IWilliam I of ScotlandWilliam the Lion , sometimes styled William I, also known by the nickname Garbh, "the Rough", reigned as King of the Scots from 1165 to 1214...
. - A genealogyGenealogyGenealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigrees of its members...
of William I; this genealogy goes all the way back to Adam, via Gaidhel Glas. It is just a record or partial translation of a Gaelic genealogy, in which mac and meic have been replaced with filius and filii. Virtually all ancestors before David IDavid I of ScotlandDavid I or Dabíd mac Maíl Choluim was a 12th-century ruler who was Prince of the Cumbrians and later King of the Scots...
have their names in the Middle IrishMiddle Irish languageMiddle Irish is the name given by historical philologists to the Goidelic language spoken in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man from the 10th to 12th centuries; it is therefore a contemporary of late Old English and early Middle English...
genitive formGenitive caseIn grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...
. - A foundation legend of St AndrewsSt AndrewsSt Andrews is a university town and former royal burgh on the east coast of Fife in Scotland. The town is named after Saint Andrew the Apostle.St Andrews has a population of 16,680, making this the fifth largest settlement in Fife....
; it may not have been compiled by the author of de Situ Albanie in the thirteenth century, simply because it does not fit in with the logic presented by documents one to six, and is unrelated to the legend or topic is mentioned in de Situ Albanie.
The value of the manuscript has been shown in the publications of William Forbes Skene
William Forbes Skene
William Forbes Skene , Scottish historian and antiquary, was the second son of Sir Walter Scott's friend, James Skene , of Rubislaw, near Aberdeen....
, Alan Orr Anderson, and his wife Marjory Anderson. Dozens of articles have been written in the last half-century about various aspects of the Scottish content, although studies of the whole manuscript have been rarer.