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0415 Eblj RAW Artticle 1, 2004 A New Parallel to the Prayer ‘De tenebris’ in the Book of Nunnaminster (British Library, Harl. MS. 2965, f. 28rv) Barbara Raw As is well known, many of the prayers in the Book of Nunnaminster are related to prayers in the Book of Cerne and an alphabetical series of prayers in the Royal Prayerbook, though the precise nature of the relationship between Royal and Nunnaminster is unclear.1 Jennifer Morrish considered that the prayers in the two manuscripts were derived from a common source which had been adapted differently in the two manuscripts but she also argued that the prayers in the Nunnaminster manuscript lack the thematic element present in the prayers of the Royal manuscript and therefore represent an earlier stage in the development of collections of prayers for private use.2 Michelle Brown, on the other hand, finds no compelling argument for giving precedence to one or the other.3 The twenty-six prayers common to the Book of Nunnaminster and the Royal Prayerbook occur in virtually the same order in the two manuscripts, suggesting that they derive from an existing collection.4 However, the Nunnaminster series interweaves prayers found in the Royal manuscript with others, some of which occur also in the Book of Cerne, while the alphabetical series of prayers in the Royal manuscript includes one prayer (Te fortissime)5 which does not occur in the Nunnaminster collection. The sixteen prayers found in the Book of Nunnaminster and in the Book of Cerne are identical or nearly so 1 BL, Harley MS. 2965, ff. 18v-32v (Book of Nunnaminster) and BL, Royal MS. 2 A. xx, ff. 29r-38v (Royal Prayerbook). For a complete list of the parallels between Nunnaminster, Cerne and Royal, see Barbara Raw, ‘Alfredian Piety: the Book of Nunnaminster’ in J. Roberts, J. L. Nelson and M. Godden (eds.), Alfred the Wise: Studies in Honour of Janet Bately on the Occasion of her Sixty-fifth Birthday (Cambridge, 1997), pp. 145-53, at pp. 151-3. For editions of the prayers see W.de G. Birch (ed.), An Ancient Manuscript of the Eighth or Ninth Century Formerly Belonging to St Mary’s Abbey,or Nunnaminster,Winchester, Hampshire Record Society (London, 1889), pp. 61-81, and A. B. Kuypers (ed.), The Prayerbook of Aedeluald the Bishop, Commonly Called the Book of Cerne (Cambridge, 1902), which includes Royal’s alphabetical series of prayers at pp. 213-17. 2 Jennifer Morrish, ‘An Examination of Literacy and Learning in England in the Ninth Century’, unpubl. D.Phil. dissertation (Oxford, 1982), pp. 201-18; Jennifer Morrish,‘Dated and Datable Manuscripts Copied in England During the Ninth Century: A Preliminary List’, Mediaeval Studies,i (1988), pp. 512-38, at p. 521. 3 M. P.Brown, The Book of Cerne: Prayer, Patronage and Power in Ninth-Century England (London, 1998), p. 153. See also Leslie Webster and Janet Backhouse (eds.), The Making of England: Anglo-Saxon Art and Culture AD 600-900 (London, 1991), pp. 208-11, nos. 163 and 164. 4 The differences are as follows: Nunnaminster 23 (De iudicio presidis) and 24 (De diversis passionibus Domini) correspond to Royal F and E; Nunnaminster 29 (Oratio de collo) corresponds to Royal P; Nunnaminster 33 (De tenebris) corresponds to Royal O. 5 Royal MS. 2 A. xx, f. 36rv, Kuypers, p. 216 1 eBLJ 2004,Article 1 A New Parallel to the Prayer ‘De tenebris’ in the Book of Nunnaminster in both manuscripts; the prayers found in the Book of Nunnaminster and the Royal Prayerbook, by contrast, sometimes vary considerably and it is clear that the relationship between the two series is not a matter of one manuscript having been copied from the other or of both manuscripts deriving in a straightforward way from a single exemplar. In some cases the difference amounts merely to odd words, but in other cases one version or the other is considerably longer, raising the question of whether one or the other text has combined material from more than one source. In the case of the Nunnaminster prayer De tenebris it is now possible to say what this source was. The text of the Nunnaminster prayer is as follows: O misericordia simul et potentia, qui es in omnibus honorifice laudandus, Quia in tua passione cuncta commota sunt, et eventum dominici vulneris elimenta tremuerunt, Expavit dies non solita nocte, et suas tenebras mundus invenit, Etiam lux ipsa visa est mori tecum, ne a sacrilegis cernere videris, Clauserat enim suos oculos caelum ne te in cruce aspiceret, Propter ea gratias agendo tuamque pietatem deposco, Et obsecro te salvator mundi per passionem tuam et per redemptionem salutiferae crucis tuae, Ut quandocumque iuseris me ab hac lutea corporis habitatione exire, dirigas angelum pacis et consolationis, Qui me ab adversariorum potestate et innumerosa caterva inimicorum animas iugulare cupientium te iubente defendat, Et custodiat animam meam et pertransire faciat intrepidam principatus et potestates, Et ad sedes lucidas quas per meritum meum non requiro sed per tuam misericordiam adipisci non dispero te protegente perducat, Domine Ihesu Christe,Amen. [O simultaneous mercy and might, you who are to be praised honourably in all things because in your passion all things were disturbed and the elements quaked at the event of their lord’s wound, the day became afraid at the unaccustomed night and the world discovered its shadows, even light itself seemed to die with you lest you should be discerned by the sacrilegious, indeed heaven had closed its eyes lest it should see you on the cross, in rendering thanks on account of those things I earnestly ask for your mercy and beseech you, saviour of the world, through your passion and through the redemption of your cross which brings salvation that, whenever you will have ordered me to depart from this mean habitation of the body,you may direct an angel of peace and consolation who, under your protection, may conduct me to the shining seats which I do not request through my merit but do not despair of attaining through your mercy, O Lord Jesus Christ, amen.]6 The format of the prayer is similar to that of many of Nunnaminster’s prayers: recall of some event or characteristic, followed by a petition related to it. The phrase,‘propter ea gratias agendo tuamque pietatem deposco’ is typical of the Nunnaminster prayers, in which phrases such as ‘gratias tibi reffero’,‘gratias et laudes tibi dico’,‘gratias tibi ago ac per hoc deprecor’, ‘gratias tibi ago et per hoc adiuro’,‘gratias tibi ago et per hoc piissime peto’ appear regularly at the division between the two parts of the prayers. Phrases of this kind are not specific to the Nunnaminster series, however. The prayer of St Augustine, Deus dilecti et benedicti filii tui, found also in one of the Carolingian prayerbooks,7 includes such a phrase, as do three prayers in the Book of Cerne, two of which also appear in the Book of Nunnaminster.8 6 Harl. MS. 2965, f. 28rv, Birch, p. 74; translation taken from Peter Clemoes, ‘King and Creation at the Crucifixion: the Contribution of Native Tradition to The Dream of the Rood 50-6a’, in L. Carruthers (ed.), Heroes and Heroines in Medieval English Literature: A Festschrift Presented to André Crépin on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 31-43, at pp. 34-5. 7 Harl. MS. 2965, ff.18v-19r, Birch, p. 61; A.Wilmart (ed.), Precum libelli quattuor aevi Karolini (Rome, 1940), p. 59, no. vii.2. 8 Cambridge, UL, Ll.1.10, ff. 69v-70r, Kuypers, pp. 138-9, nos. 39, 40 and 41; Harl. MS. 2965, ff. 20v-21r (De natale Domini) and 21v-22r (De epiphania), Birch, pp. 63-4. 2 eBLJ 2004,Article 1 A New Parallel to the Prayer ‘De tenebris’ in the Book of Nunnaminster A similar phrase occurs in Royal’s Altus auctor,a prayer which combines part of Nunnaminster’s Deus dilecti with parts of two prayers from later in the Nunnaminster series, though this is the only example of such a phrase in Royal’s alphabetical series.9 The second part of the Nunnaminster prayer, from ‘Et obsecro’ onwards, is close to the prayer beginning O unigenitus in the Royal manuscript,10 though each of the two includes phrases not in the other. The first part of the prayer is very different, however. The image of the elements trembling at Christ’s death, light itself seeming to die, and heaven closing its eyes lest it should see Christ hanging on the cross, has been compared several times to a passage in the Old English poem The Dream of the Rood,which describes the created world as joining in Christ’s sufferings: pp ystro hæfdon bewrigen mid wolcnum wealdendes hræw, scirne sciman, sceadu foroeode, wann under wolcnum. Weop eal gesceaft, cwiodon cyninges fyll. Crist wæs on rode. (Dream of the Rood 52-6) [Darkness had covered with clouds the Lord’s corpse, the shining light, a shadow went forth, black beneath the clouds. All creation wept, lamented the king’s death. Christ was on the cross.]11 The theme is not specifically Anglo-Saxon, however, for the belief that the created world acknowledged Christ’s kingship by sharing in his sufferings is common in early mediaeval writings. Pope Gregory the Great listed the signs of Christ’s dominion over creation: the star which announced his birth, the sea over which he walked, the earth which hid its light and the rocks torn apart at his death.12 Tenth- and eleventh-century representations of the crucifixion sometimes included figures hiding their faces to symbolize the darkness mentioned in the gospel accounts of Christ’s death (Matt.
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