The Production and Use of MS Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 383 in the Late Eleventh and First Half of the Twelfth Centuries

MS Cambridge Corpus Christi College 383 (CCCC 383) is a collection of Anglo-Saxon law-codes and related texts copied in Old English dated to the beginning of the twelfth century. The manuscript is written throughout by a single scribe in a clear, subtly decorated and easy to read English Vernacular Minuscule and decorated throughout with red pen-drawn initials. Rubrics have been supplied in the first half of the twelfth century, as well as numerous additions and emendations dating from the first half of the twelfth century through to the sixteenth century. I have conducted an extensive codicological and contextual examination of the production and use of CCCC 383. I investigated a number of significant areas: the direct evidence for the materials and methods employed in the production of the manuscript and for its storage and use throughout the period; evidence for scribal behaviour and interaction with the manuscript in the writing, miniaturing, emendation and rubrication of the manuscript; analysis of the mise-en-page and the ways in which that can be used to assess the intentions of producers and users of the manuscript; and consideration of the continued roles of the Old English language and Anglo-Saxon law in the late eleventh and first half of the twelfth century. I argue that the production of the manuscript represented a significant and meaningful endeavour on the part of its producers and users and indicates the continued applicability and of Old English and Anglo-Saxon law-codes in the historical context of the late eleventh and first half of the twelfth centuries.