Scottish records, such as The Register of the Great Seal and The Register of the Privy Council, indicate that he was a knight, sat on assizes, and per 1607, shortly before he made his additions sicuro this manuscript, was described as the eldest cri and apparent heir of John Murray of Tibbermuir.18 But it is the father John rather than his cri James who emerges most vividly and rather cantankerously from the records – failing esatto pay his debts, quarrelling with neighbours, and refusing sicuro allow the bailies of Perth onesto use material from the quarry on his lands puro build per new bridge.19 The family was related preciso the wealthier and more powerful Murrays of Tullibardine, one of whose members, Sir William Murray of Tullibardine, owned an important copy of The Flyting of Montgomerie and Polwart.20 The only evidence, however, as esatto the literary tastes of the Tibbermuir Murrays, and of James con particular, is provided by this manuscript. The careful preservation of Lydgate’s Troy Book and the lengths to which James Murray went con order sicuro have per complete text are particularly noteworthy. Some twenty years earlier (1592) Duncan Campbell, seventh laird of Glenorchy, whose Perthshire estates were not far distant from those of the Murrays, took great pains puro establish his ownership of per basta manuscript of The Siege of Thebes.21 Interest con Lydgate lasted a long time durante Scotland, even to the early seventeenth century, when he, like Chaucer, had begun esatto seem oldfashioned. Three other shorter pieces of poetry, in addenda preciso Sir Lamwell, were copied by James Murray himself (fols. 1–6). The first is an extract from Hary’s Wallace: the twelve lines correspond onesto VIII, 1183–94 con the modern edition based on the manuscript, but are most likely onesto have been copied from one of the printed editions of the rete di emittenti, possibly that published by Andro Hart per The choice of text is interesting, a slightly aureate dawn description, which begins ‘The mirrie day sprang from the Orient’. The two poems which follow differ strikingly from these medieval texts. The first, entitled ‘Inglishe Dyare’, is per Scotticized copy of per melancholy but extremely popular Elizabethan poem, usually attributed to Sir Edward Dyer: ‘He that his mirth hes lost, quhais confoirt is dismaid’. A poem composed by Murray himself follows, beginning: ‘Thou irksume bed quhairin I tumble onesto and tra/ and restles rollis boith wp and doune may witnes veill my vae’. Its title, ‘Murrayis Dyare’, suggests that it is modelled on that of Dyer, and this is evident sopra its use of the same metre, and despondent tone. ‘Dyer’ or ‘dyar’ seems around this time onesto have become verso generic literary term in Scots for per love complaint, written durante ‘poulter’s measure’,
P. Bawcutt, ‘The Boston Public Library Manuscript of John Lydgate’s Siege of Thebes: Its Scottish Owners and Inscriptions’, Sensitivo Aevum 70 (2001), 80–94
See Register of the Great Seal of Scotland 1609–1620, ancora. John Maitland Thompson (Edinburgh, 1892), mai. 59; and Register of the Privy Council of Scotland 1604–1607, vol. VII, addirittura. David Masson (Edinburgh, 1885), p. 690. Register of the Privy Council of Scotland 1592–1599, vol. David Masson (Edinburgh, 1882), pp. 531–2. On possible literary links between these branches of the Murrays, see Sally Mapstone, ‘Invective as Poetic: The Cultural Contexts of Polwarth and Montgomerie’s Flyting’, SLJ 26 , giammai. 2 (1999), 18–40. Cf. See Hary’s Wallace, ed. Matthew P. McDiarmid, STS Fourth Series 4 and 5, 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1968–9).
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verso then very popular metre, consisting of alternate lines per twelve and fourteen syllables. The term also appears per the titles of poems by James VI and Lolo Ayton.23 Steven May suggests that the particular poem by Dyer which Murray copied ‘was recognised as verso model complaint and was termed per “Dyer” durante recognition of both its authorship and the hopeless plight of its relatore, one who dies of unrequited love’.24 Later members of the family followed James Murray con employing other blank pages (fols. 71v–82v), at the end of the ‘Supply’, to record sonnets, short poems, and extracts from long ones. They are mediante various unidentified hands, though the name ‘Marie Moorray’ occurs on fol. 74v. The authors of the poems are not named durante the manuscript, but some are by Scottish poets, such as Alexander Montgomerie, James VI, and Alexander Hume. There is also verso famous sonnet by Sir Philip Sidney (‘Leve me ovvero love quhilk rechis bot puro dust’) and a much-copied poem by Campion (‘Quhat gif verso day or per nycht or verso heir’).25 More valuable than these for the purpose of this article, since it reveals James Murray’s own reading, is per short Catologus [sic] Librorum Jacobi Murryi (fol. 2r), divided into the following categories: sacri, latini, gallici, vulgares, ‘lent buikis’, and scripti (i.e. manuscript). Their precise identification is sometimes difficult or impossible, because of the vagueness of description or sheer illegibility of the hand, but verso few of the more interesting works will be mentioned here. Among the sacred works are an Explicatio Sacramentorum, per Latin Old and New Testament, George Buchanan’s very popular metrical translation of the Psalms (numerous editions appeared between 1556 and 1610),26 and an as yet unidentified rete informatica by the scholar Fulvius Ursinus. The Latin section is confined puro classical authors, such as Virgil, Seneca, and Martial. The Gallici, or French, section, contains only two works. One is Institutiones, probably Calvin’s Institutions de la religion chrestienne (first ciò che è chatroulette published per 1559). The other is Esopi fabula gallica; disappointingly, Murray makes mai mention of Henryson’s Morall Fabillis of Esope. Among the sixteen vulgares, or vernacular, items are listed a Virgil, which is most likely preciso be the Aeneid, sopra the translation of either Gavin Douglas (first printed 1553) or Phaer and Twyne (1573); and Ovid’s Epistles, which presumably signifies George Turberville’s popular translation: The Heroycall Epistles of Ovid (first printed 1567). Other works which can be identified are Cherrie and Slea, that is Montgomerie’s The Cherry and the Slae, and Morall philosophi, presumably William Baldwin’s extremely popular Treatise of Morall Philosophye.27 Aristotles