Item genre: Calligraphic writing

Bodleian Library: MS Ashmole 51
Commonplace book containing sententious rhyming couplets, six poems, an inscription from a gravestone, notes on colours, and handwriting exercises (c.1590-1617)
(scribe)

Item 12 (Notes, Sententia, Display alphabet, Calligraphic writing), fols 12 rev.-20v rev.

Calligraphic exercises, including alphabets, proverbial sayings, epistolary salutations, and punctuation symbols.

[For this final section, the manuscript has been reversed so that the end of the volume forms a new beginning. I believe that the main hand is Hand A, but it is so much neater than the rest of Hand A's entries that it is open to debate. First appears a list of punctuation symbols (fol. 19v rev.), then on fol. 19r the alphabet has been written eight times and the name " Ann Bowyr" appears at the bottom of the page. On fol. 18v a proverbial saying about the evils of wine has been transcribed six times, and the name "Ann Bowyr" appears again at the bottom of the page. On fol. 18r the alphabet appears four times, and on fol. 17v the salutation of a letter, addressing a sister, has been written four times, in at least two different hands (Hand A and C). Hand C, making its only appearance here, may be a sibling, given the subject matter. Fol. 17r contains one copy of the alphabet, and fol. 16v a proverbial saying on never comitting your honour to fortune. That proverb is signed "Ann Bowyr". Fol. 16r contains the letters A through M followed by lower case m's, and fol. 15v a proverbial saying on the virtue of charitable deeds. Fol. 15r contains the rest of the alphabet begun on fol. 16r (N through Z), again followed by lower case m's, and fol. 14v contains an incomplete proverb on the folly of quarreling with a mighty man. On fol. 14r is one copy of the alphabet, and on fol. 13v a proverb on the just man fearing nothing. On fol. 13r we have one copy of the alphabet, and on fol. 12v simply two lower case a's, each followed by a colon. On fol. 12r is a final copy of the alphabet.]


(scribe)Hand A
(scribe)Hand B

[Fols 20r-v are blank.]