Gripla - 20.12.2018, Page 293

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SILVIA HUFNAGEL
“HELGa Á ÞESSa LÖGBÓK”
A Dry Point Ownership Statement
in Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Boreal 911
during a visit to the Bodleian Library in oxford in December 2015
I examined MS Boreal 91, a paper manuscript from c. 1700 containing
the law book Jónsbók and comprising 132 leaves measuring 70x120 mm;
fols. 1–3 are later additions, perhaps by Eggert Ólafsson, as well as the
blank fols. 108–132.2 It is bound in brown embossed leather with two
metal clasps; the book block is dyed blue. By 1832, finnur Magnússon
(1781–1847) had sold the manuscript to the Bodleian library;3 alas, no more
information on the origins or provenance of the manuscript is available.
although fol. 83v seems to be like any other page in the manuscript, it
contains a marginal ownership statement (see figure 1) that is noteworthy
for two reasons. firstly, the statement is written in dry point, i.e. with a
stylus instead of with quill and ink. Secondly, the name in the ownership
statement is female, and female ownership of law manuscripts is rare.
In this article, after a short description of the ownership statement,
I will contextualise this finding, focusing on the occurrence of dry point
writing in Iceland and Europe, as well as on female ownership of legal
manuscripts.
ownership Statement
the ownership statement consists of two parts. the first part is incised
into the outer margin of fol. 83v from top to bottom (see figures 1, 3a
1 Isabella Buben enhanced the images of oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Boreal 91 digitally,
for which I thank her.
2 Ólafur Halldórsson, “Íslensk handrit í Bodleian Library, oxford” (typewritten catalogue),
100. Jónsbók is on fols 4r–106v; fols 2–3 contain title pages and fol. 107 contains a list of
fines and some legal paragraphs.
3 the manuscript is listed as no. 91 in finnur Magnússon (ed.), Catalogus criticus et historico-
literarius codicum CLIII. manuscriptorum borealium præcipue islandicæ originis, qui nun in
Bibliotheca Bodleiana adservantur (oxford: 1832), 33.
Gripla XXIX (2018): 293–308