152

BERNARD J. MUIR

The Database (see Table)

It should be borne in mind when making calculations from the following data that a
considerable amount of text has been lost from the manuscript. By the time the first
foliation was done in the sixteenth century there were ten single folios missing, and
perhaps three (or more) complete gatherings. Of course, the beginning of the
manuscript has been lost, and there may have been more texts following the riddle
which ends at the bottom of folio 130 v (see below). The table includes a consider¬
able amount of data already available elsewhere, but puts it into a unique
configuration which allows readers to use it easily in conjunction with the data
tabulated by Conner.

Discussion of the database

The folio numbers of the manuscript appear down the left hand side of the page
(with recto and verso treated individually). A group of two Xs in this column
(corresponding to the recto and verso) indicates the position of a lost folio. Each
column across the page is labelled at the top to identify the type of data it contains.
This data has been organized into six sections: codicological data (Columns 1-11),
distribution of large and medium sized initials (12-13), methods of correcting the
texts (14-16), presence of Latin or runic writing (17-18), use of punctuation
(19-22), and distribution of specific letter forms (23-28). A series of dashes runs
across the chart where a folio is missing. Where appropriate in the following
analysis, the columns are labelled either logical (with T(rue) or F(alse) values) or
numeric (with the value in a numeric field recording the quantity or number of
occurrences of a specified type of data on each folio). Subtotals for the three
hypothetical booklets are given before the overall totals at the end of the table, and a
solid line appears before folios 53r and 98 r in the table to mark the booklet boun¬
daries.

Gathering Preparation, Collation and Text Layout

There are 17 extant gatherings, the first 16 of which are regularly composed of 8
folios (giving 16 pages), though some gatherings contain singletons (2, 6, 15, 16);
the seventeenth may have had as few as six folios or as many as ten, but the unifor¬
mity of the first 16 suggests that the last one also had 8 folios, in which case three
folios have been lost (one before the present f. 126 and two after f. 130). However,
if gathering seventeen was originally in final position, then the scribe may have
needed only six folios to finish copying his exemplar (Riddle 95 finishes at the very
end of the verso of f. 130), in which case, the only loss would be of a single folio at
the end of the manuscript.

I agree with Conner’s observation that the text of Partridge has been lost after
one and a half lines, and that the text beginning on the top of the present f. 98r is the
end of a different poem whose beginning has been lost.8 In addition to the gathering

8 Conner designates this fragment Homiletic Fragment III (p. 234). It might also be noted that it

would be exceptional for a Physiologus poem to contain dialogue, as does the text beginning at the top

EDITING THE EXETER BOOK

153

lost here, Pope argues—rightly, I believe—that another is wanting, that which con¬
tained the ending of Guthlac and the beginning of Azarias?

In summary, at present the Exeter Book contains 123 folios. One folio has
been lost before folio 8, and 12 more single folios thoughout the text (or 10, if the
17th gathering had only 6 folios). Two gatherings (probably of the usual 8 folios)
have also been lost. Thus the manuscript would have comprised 152 (or 150) folios
when it was described as an mycel Englisc boc be gehwilcum pingum on leoöwisan
geworht in the Leofric donation list in the eleventh century.10

Column 1 lists the numbers of the extant gatherings. [According to Conner’s
thesis, Booklet 1 comprises gatherings 1-6 (written last), Booklet 2 gatherings 7-12
(written first), and Booklet 3 gatherings 13-17 (written second).]

Column 2 indicates the number of each folio’s conjugate.

Column 3 (logical) indicates which folios are singletons. [There are no single¬
tons in Conner’s second booklet.]

Column 4 (logical) indicates which side of the folio is the hair side of the
parchment. With some of the poorly prepared, darker sheets of parchment it is
sometimes difficult to establish by appearance alone which is the hair side; in some
such instances, the texture of the surface can be of help in determining this. It will
be seen that the scribe has not always been careful to match hair and flesh sides in a
regular pattern; of course, this is impossible in gatherings containing singletons.
[From the data in Columns 1-4 the complete collation of the manuscript can be
determined.]

Column 5 (numerical) shows how many lines of text normally appear in a
gathering (sometimes lines are left blank—see Columns 7 and S); and Column 6
(logical) indicates where the prickmarks or rulings equal the number of lines of text.

Twenty-two lines per page is the norm, though gatherings 1 and 6 have 23, and
gathering 11 has 21 throughout. Gathering 12 is ruled for 22 lines of text, but the
scribe has written just 21 lines on its first five folios (91 r-93 r ) before reverting to
22 (though he spread them out over the total area of the writing grid). He may have
done this so that the first page of the gathering matched the last of the previous one
(90 y). He reverted to the proper 22 lines at the top of a verso (93 v) where the shift
would not be quite so obvious.

Column 7 (numeric) shows where blank lines have been left between texts or
sections of poems (but not at the bottom of a folio), and Column 8 (numeric)

of 98r.

9 “Palaeography and Poetry: some solved and unsolved problems of the Exeter Book,” Medieval
Scribes, Manuscripts and Libraries: Essays presented to N.R. Ker, eds. M.B. Parkes and A.G. Watson
(London: Scolar Press, 1978) 40. Of course, it is possible to argue that two gatherings are missing at
this point, depending on how much of each poem is thought to be wanting.

10 “one great English book on various subjects composed in verse.” The most recent edition and
study of the inventory of books left to Exeter Cathedral by Leofric is by Michael Lapidge, “Surviving
booklists from Anglo-Saxon England,” Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England, eds. M. La¬
pidge and H. Gneuss (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 1985) 64-69; the most detailed description of the
complete donation is the one by Förster, “The Donations of Leofric to Exeter,” in the 1933 facsimile,
pp. 10-32.