Inside This Issue the Queen's College Library
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The Queen’s College Library Insight Issue 2, Trinity Term 2012 Inside this issue MS 194 and Bishop Barlow's grudge against the episcopal bench Dan Paltzer Nicholas Hawksmoor, William Lancaster and the Queen’s College designs Eleonora Pistis Heraldic manuscripts in the Library of The Queen’s College Nigel Ramsay Pulsilogium to pulse watch Denis Gibbs Modern swimming instruction begins in style: the contribution of the influential Everard Digby (ca. 1551-1605) Paul Ivanovic Refurbishment of medieval manuscripts for Henry VII: Part two, Queen’s College MS 303 Jane Eagan 2 THE QUEEN'S COLLEGE LIBRARY NEWSLETTER elcome to the second issue of Insight, the annual publication which seeks to highlight some of W the treasures of the Queen’s Library, both to members of the College and to a wider audience at home and further afield. In this issue we again have a variety of articles on printed book and manuscript collections in the Library, both from regular readers of the collec- tions and from members of the Library team. These include an article on the Library’s large collection of heraldic manuscripts by Nigel Ramsay of University College London, and an Fig. 2: p. 125 and facing plate showing an illustration of account of Thomas Barlow’s grudge against the Queen’s Chapel, from Ackermann’s A history of the Episcopal bench by Dan Paltzer, who spent several University of Oxford, recently bequeathed to the Library by weeks in the Library last summer researching old member Mr J. A. Colmer. (Sel.c.200a) Barlow for his PhD thesis. Denis Gibbs, who has been visiting the Library to consult our early J. A. Colmer in late 2011, we received a bequest of medical collection since the 1960s, has written 23 early printed books. Many of the volumes are about Sir John Floyer, whose collection in the extremely rare including a copy of Anthony Library formed the basis of a successful catalogu- Wood’s 1674 Historia et antiquitates universitatis ing and conservation project funded by the Oxoniensis bound in two volumes interleaved with Wellcome Trust some years ago. Paul Ivanovic, Loggan’s 1675 Oxonia illustrate (fig. 1). Another our rare books cataloguer, has contributed an wonderful addition to our collection of antiquarian article about his favourite printed book in the material relating to Oxford is Ackermann’s 1814 Library, Everard Digby’s De arte natandi, while two volume History of the University of Oxford Jane Eagan, our head conservator, has written the (fig. 2) containing exquisite prints of College and second in her series on the refurbishment of our University buildings which, rather surprisingly, we Henrician medieval did not have in the collection previously. One of manuscripts. the most interesting parts of the collection are the five volumes of East India tracts including a Over the last year we number of items not held by the British Library have received several until Mr Colmer provided copies of some of them. visits from groups interested in our The collection as a whole is an extremely welcome fascinating collection of addition to the College Library and I am most original Hawksmoor grateful to Mr Colmer for remembering us in this propositions for the re- particularly generous way. building of the College in the early eighteenth As last year I am most grateful to all the contribu- century, and I am tors to this issue of Insight and in particular to particularly pleased to Lynette Dobson who has produced the Newsletter be able to include in for us. this issue an article Fig. 1: Frontispiece about Hawksmoor’s If you have ideas for future articles or indeed depicting Charles II, from designs for Queen’s by would like to contribute, please contact me at the first volume of Wood’s Eleonora Pistis of [email protected] Historia et antiquitates Worcester College, Universitatis Oxoniensis , recently bequeathed to the Oxford. Amanda Saville Library by old member Mr Librarian J. A. Colmer. The Sheldo- It is not often that we June 2012 nian Theatre can be seen in add to our historic the background. (Sel.b.281a) collections but this year, Cover image: Section of illustration of High as a result of the sad Street, Oxford from Ackermann’s A history of the death of old member Mr University of Oxford. MS 194 and Bishop Barlow's grudge against the episcopal bench 3 MS 194 and Bishop Barlow's grudge would expect from an Anglican bishop. Shaftes- against the episcopal bench bury had delivered a speech to the House of Lords on 20 Oct 1675 in which he claimed the doctrine of the divine right of kings was the most dangerous and destructive doctrine there had ever been to Dan Paltzer English government and law. Furthermore, it was University of Minnesota a relatively new error introduced by the Laudian clergy. Barlow dismissed this idea on three counts. Divine right was neither new, nor danger- hen I came to the Library at ous, nor destructive. The doctrine had a strong Queen’s College last summer, I basis in Scripture, and had even been revealed to was searching for the answer to a pagans through the use of natural reason. There- deceptively simple question. Why fore, the King of England (and, by implication, all W other legitimate monarchs) held his crown by the would a seventeenth-century Anglican bishop write a pamphlet arguing that none of the bishops will of God, and not from the Pope, the people, or should be allowed to participate in the Earl of laws of England. Danby’s impeachment before the House of Lords? Such a pamphlet contradicts everything which one The dilemma which brought me to Queen’s was would expect of a bishop from that day. Yet this how to explain the position in the pamphlet was exactly the position that Thomas Barlow, the concerning bishops and cases of blood, because Bishop of Lincoln, took in his pamphlet A dis- this publication supported the political machina- course of the peerage & jurisdiction of the lords tions of a man whose ideology Barlow generally spiritual in Parliament (1679). This pamphlet was opposed. In the manuscript described above, as Barlow’s intervention in an ongoing debate about well as his other publications from the 1670s and whether the bishops could participate in the early 1680s, Barlow consistently supported the impeachment trial or attainder of Charles II’s chief political positions associated with the Tory side of minister. From the evidence he found in legal the Popish Plot and Exclusion Crisis. He re- records, Barlow concluded that the bishops were mained a steadfast proponent of the established, legally banned from such proceedings. episcopal Church of England and a firm supporter of the Stuart dynasty until just before the Glorious This was a very strange position for Barlow to Revolution. So what would cause a bishop to take, and one which seemingly violated his usual argue a position which would effectively weaken political convictions as a staunch royalist. Danby the political position of bishops by removing them was under attack by the Earl of Shaftesbury, who from important matters which came before the therefore wanted to prevent the bishops from House of Lords? voting to acquit Danby in this capital trial. Shaftesbury therefore unburied an old custom that As it turns out, Barlow’s position was conditioned had roots in canon law which prevented clergymen by ongoing disagreements between himself and from judging “cases of blood”. the rest of the episcopal bench. In The state of the controversy between the Rt. Revd John Ld Bishop Oddly enough, Barlow agreed with Shaftesbury of Oxon and ye Bishop of Lincolne about ordina- and argued that the bishops should withdraw from tion in Q. Coll. Chappell. 1676 (MS 194 - fig. 1 all cases of blood. I find this position odd, because overleaf), Barlow described his side of an argu- it contradicts the theological and political posi- ment between himself and John Fell, the afore- tions which Barlow defended in all of his other mentioned Bishop of Oxford. The conflict Barlow publications as well as most of the manuscript described was simultaneously based on his treatises he left in the Queen’s College Library. personal preference to remain in the congenial For the sake of comparison, consider De Jure habitations at Queen’s College and his ideological Regio Monarchiae Anglicanae (MS 194), where commitment to maintaining Oxford University Barlow proved himself to be a firm supporter of and its constituent colleges’ rights to autonomy. the divine right of kings. This short treatise was actually written to contradict Shaftesbury, even Barlow’s account of the spat focused primarily on though a few years later he would take the Earl’s the legality of his actions under English law, with side on the issue of bishops during capital trials. occasional claims that he did not act against This piece proclaimed an ideology which one Christian doctrine and insults for his opponent thrown in for good measure. The difficulties 4 THE QUEEN'S COLLEGE LIBRARY NEWSLETTER outside of them but still within English society, such as Presbyterians or leaders of the political opposition to the Crown (such as Shaftesbury in the example above). The task of writing this defence against Fell combined both institutional allegiances and personal preference, and it therefore contrasted with the way he wrote in other pamphlets or treatises. MS 194 reveals a different kind of conflict, because it was between different factions of institutional insiders. Barlow’s conflict with the other bishops stemmed from his refusal to leave Queen’s College and take up residence at Lincoln.