A composite manuscript containing a collection of sermons in English called the Mirror, and two other collections of sermons, one in English, the other Latin, together with a table of contents for the entire volume, added in the early 16th century. Eight leaves have been separated from this manuscript and now form Norwich Cathedral MS 5, deposited in the Norfolk Record Office (see below). These leaves follow ff. 51, 74 and 122 in the Rylands manuscript.
Contents: (1) ff. 4-17r (1-14 in the old foliation): Eight sermons of the temporal in English. The first, 'In omni tempore benedic deum', begins imperfectly on f. 4v: 'hert when þu kepes it clene fro syne and so þu schalt se god almighty'. f. 17v, left blank, contains seventeen lines in two mid-15th century hands, 'yo might \and yo through/ of ye fader almighte of heuen... is madde of noȝt'.
(2) ff. 18v-36v (15-31 in the old foliation, wrongly): Seven sermons of the temporal in Latin, for the first four Sundays in Advent, Christmas Eve, Septuagesima and Sexagesima. 'Dominica prima aduentus domini. Cum appropinquasset... Appropinquacio cristi versus hierusalem significat... in altitudine multipli-' (ending imperfectly).
(3) Rylands ff. 54, 37-51; Norwich ff. 5-7; Rylands ff. 52-53, 55-74; Norwich ff. 1-4; Rylands ff. 75-122; Norwich f. 8; Rylands ff. 123-6: A collection of sermons in English called the Mirror, a translation of the Miroir of Robert de Gretham. This and five other copies are noted by T.G. Duncan, p. 204 (see Bibliography below). f. 54r is headed 'Assit principio sancta maria meo'. 'M[any more ther ben that] haue will' to here rede romance and iestes... ne eigh of wordely man se. Amen. Explicit iste liber'. The text within square brackets was supplied by Ker from Magdalene College, Cambridge, Pepys 2498. About twenty leaves are missing and ff. 59-60 are damaged. The text is a series of temporal sermons from Advent to the 24th Sunday after Pentecost, preceded by a preface and followed as in Bodleian Library, Holkham misc. 40, etc. by a miscellaneous tail (ff. 102-126v: cf. James, Catalogue, p. 306). The first scribe finished his work on f. 78v, 'but þei lost non fisshe and þt' at the foot of the first column, and left the second column blank. The second scribe began f. 79 with the same seven words, 'bot þei loste no fysshe. And þt'. f. 101v ends 'ne for \no/ noþer letting' and f. 102 begins a new sermon 'Missus est gabriel...'. In Bodleian, Holkham misc. 40, these words come on f. 103v at lines 8 and 28 respectively, so the leaf which is presumably missing after f. 101 may have been mostly blank.
The eight leaves now in Norwich contain the sermons for Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima (ff. 5-7), for Trinity and the two Sundays after Trinity (ff. 1-4) and on the Creed and Pater Noster (f. 8). The Quinquagesima, Trinity and Pater Noster sermons are now divided between Norwich and Rylands (Norwich f. 7, Rylands ff. 52-3; Rylands ff. 73-4, Norwich f. 1; Norwich f. 8, Rylands f. 123).
(4) ff. 1-2v, A table of items 1-3 in an early 16th-century hand, with leaf numbers running from 1 to 144. It begins 'In omni tempore Benedic deum. fo 1'. f. 3r-v blank.
Script: Gothic current anglicana; items 1 and 2 are in different hands, and item 3 is in two further hands, changing at f. 79. Written space: c.215 x 155 mm at first, increasing to 232 x 175 mm on f. 126. 40-54 long lines (40 lines throughout quires 3-8).
Secundo folio: hert when þu (f. 4r).
Decoration: Numerous crudely drawn 2-line initials in red ink.
Other features: In item 1 the scribe wrote a catchword on each verso and on some rectos. Ruling with a hard point in quires 3-7: frame ruling in ink in quires 9-12. Manicules on ff. 29v, 32r, 32v, 33v, 34v, 35v, 36v, 37v.
Description derived from N.R. Ker, Medieval manuscripts in British libraries, vol. III, Lampeter-Oxford (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983), pp. 418-20. By permission of Oxford University Press.