CCCC 303

CCCC 303
Ælfric's Catholic Homilies, Lives of Saints; anonymous sermons and hagiographies
Localization
Uncertain
Date
12th century

This manuscript’s layout is single column. There are no litterae notabiliores, as such, but the frequent enlarged capitals come in a variety of sizes and are offset into a separate thin column on the left of the writing grid, a feature typical of Christ Church, Canterbury, and Rochester manuscripts in the first-half of the twelfth century. All the capitals are red and unembellished. At the start of the manuscript, there are four lines which were erased by Archbishop Matthew Parker's circle of scholars, to make the beginning of the acephelous manuscript tidier. Apart from this deliberate erasure, most other white space occurs around rubrics and enlarged capitals, particularly in places where it appears the rubric did not take up as much space as was allotted for it. The rubricator is also the miniator and the major corrector in the manuscript. Treharne (2000) has identified him as the third scribe, present only sporadically within the manuscript. In addition to the red initials and rubrics, there are, on occasion, sections of text in which letters are filled with red, which act as instantly visible textual navigation for the reader.