Hill Monastic Library, St. John's University: Descriptive Inventories of ManuscriptsMicrofilmed for the Hill Monastic Manuscript Library (Portuguese Libraries): Vol. 1: TheFundo Alcobaça of the Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon: Vol. 1: Manuscripts 1-150 by Thomas L.AmosReview by: William Vernon JacksonThe Library Quarterly, Vol. 59, No. 4 (Oct., 1989), pp. 371-372Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4308421 .

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REVIEWS 371

graved and sterotype plates, and musical copyrights in the course of those years, and that we can trace at least some of these items to see what became of them. He who would trace provenances (rarely done for amusement) often has to leaf through generations of dealers' catalogs and is therefore bound to be grateful for even the faintest trace left by some treasure. And faint they most frequently are, since only rarely-to use the 1,650 surviving Puttick and Simpson catalogs as example-are descriptions detailed enough to constitute hard evidence. What Professor Coover has done is to give us a catalog of these catalogs with a brief description of each. What he was not able to do, of course, was to print each catalog in its entirety; instead, he gives us some tantalizing facsimiles of many individual pages. (Incidentally, he tells us which U.S. libraries own catalogs; a surprising number are to be found on these shores.)

This sort of information belongs in every rare books library and of course in every large music collection whether concerned with the music trade or not. But when it comes to information about the music trade, not very much is known about it, and Coover's introductory material, about 120 pages, represents a major addition to what we know. It need not be said that statistical studies (of which this is decidedly not an example) will eventually provide realistic insights into taste and the history of musical reception. And speaking of taste, it is hard to believe the low sums at which one could have picked up autograph copies of Mozart's "Haydn Quartets." While such treasures are now insanely overpriced, it seems just as crazy that they went for very little in the nineteenth century, even though Beethoven already gave his landlord a manuscript now and then when he had cash-flow problems.

A special bonus added to all this is Coover's relaxed style. One reads his narrative without being aware of how dry this sort of thing is supposed to be.

Hans Lenneberg, University of Chicago Libraries

HiU Monastic Library, St. John's University: Descriptive Inventories of Manuscripts Microfilmed for the Hill Monastic Manuscript Library (Portuguese Libraries): Vol. 1: The Fundo Akobafa of the Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon: Vol. 1: Manuscripts 1-150. Compiled by THOMAS L. AMOS. Collegeville, Minn.: Hill Monastic Manuscript Library, 1988. Pp. xlix+307. $50.00 (cloth). ISBN 0-940250-18-7.

This volume (along with two others not yet issued) represents the initial publica- tion in a new subseries (devoted to holdings of Portuguese libraries) in the descriptive inventories sponsored by the Hill Monastic Manuscript Library as a part of its program "of preserving on microfilm and making available to scholars the contents of collections of medieval manuscript books" (p. x).

The Fundo AlcobaCa, now at the Biblioteca Nacional in Lisbon, once consisted of 483 codices; twenty-one manuscripts had disappeared by the time the collec- tion arrived at the library in the nineteenth century, eight were placed in the Arquivo Nacional da Torre de Tombo, and two were added, making a present total of 456 items. In addition, information on three of them is quite limited, since they were missing at the time of the filming.

Description of each manuscript (based on the microfilm) consists of three elements: (1) the heading, (2) codicological data, and (3) contents. The first of these consists of the number in the Fundo AlcobaCa's double shelfmark system (for example, Codex Alcobacensis, XCIII/2), the running number ("Portugal 1," etc.) in the Hill Project, and the author and/or title.

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372 THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY

The codicological paragraph "begins with place of origin and date on a separate line. The individual categories of information . . . are material; size of folia (in millimeters); foliation (endleaves in small Romans); numeration; written space (in millimeters); number of lines; use of long lines or number of columns; framing and ruling system; headlines; quire signatures (includes quire signa- tures and catchwords); collation; script; hands; illuminations, decorations and initials; marginalia; colophon and name of scribe (if present); ownership marks; general comments about the manuscript; references in preceding catalogues and secundo folio reference" (p. xxxi).

The contents portion identifies, in order, each work in the manuscript and consists of "author and title of work; the litulus or rubric (Tit); incipit (Inc); explicit (Expl); Colophon (Coloph); edition(s) (Ed); other manuscripts (Omss) and comments (Com)" (p. xxxiii).

Although previous publications provide some of this information, especially A. F. de Ataide e Melo's Inventdrio dos C6dices Alcobacenses (5 fascicles [Lisbon, 1930-32]), the value of the present work rests, in my opinion, on three elements: (1) the fuller indication of the contents of each manuscript, (2) references to published editions, and (3) a very useful series of indices.

There are no fewer than seven indices: general index, Latin incipits, Spanish and Portuguese incipits, secundo folio index, dated and undated manuscripts (in two parts: manuscripts with specific dates and manuscripts dated only by cen- tury), scribes, and origins. The general index deserves mention because it con- tains not only authors, titles, and subjects (for example, Cistercian Order, Mary, Portugal), but also a number of form entries (for example, calendars, canticles, languages of works, ownership) to help those concerned with particular types of manuscripts.

Within the introduction (pp. xiii-xlvi) one finds a "History of Alcobasa" and a short "History of the Library and Scriptorium."

Although the book is accompanied by one sheet of addenda and corrigenda, I found some additional typographical errors-all of them of a minor nature. The volume is well printed and bound, but the five illustrations at the end are disappointing. Presumably enlargements made from the microfilm copies, either they did not come out well or this is all one could expect, given the present physical state of the manuscripts. In any case, there is no indication of whether they represent random selections or whether they were specifically chosen.

Those interested in Portuguese manuscripts will certainly hope for an early appearance of volumes 2 and 3. It would be time-saving for users if the indices in the last volume were fully cumulated to provide, in one listing, references to all 456 manuscripts.

William Vernon Jackson, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Texas at Austin

Hope Emily Allen: Medieval Scholarship and Feminism. By JOHN C. HIRSH. Norman, Okla.: Pilgrim Books, 1988. Pp. xiv+ 181. $33.95. ISBN 0-937664-80-4.

This study of Hope Emily Allen (1883-1960) is, as its subtitle suggests, a survey of her work as a scholar of Middle English literature rather than a personal history. Allen never emerges as an individual, despite Hirsh's reference to her throughout as Hope.

The book is less valuable than it might be because of the author's failure to

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