Sir David Lindsay (c.1486–1555)

Verse

The Complaynt of Schir Dauid Lindesay (‘Schir, I beseik thyne Excellence’)

First published [in Edinburgh, 1529-30?]. Hamer, I, 39-53.

LiD 1

Copy, in the cursive secretary hand of David Anderson of Aberdeen. c.1563-6.

In: A folio composite volume of Scottish verse, chiefly in three secretary hands, with rubrication, written from both ends (Part I: ff. 1-367; Part II: ff. 1-146, a title-page dated ‘1566’), in contemporary calf on wooden boards gilt.

Inscribed (f. 2r) ‘W. hay. 1527’; (f. 1r) ‘This buik partinis to david andersone burger of abirdene, be gift of Mr Wm hay person of turrest. 1563.’; and (f. 2r) a record of the gift of the MS to Edinburgh College by John Aikman, son of William Aikman.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 8-11.

Edinburgh University Library, MS Dk. 7. 49, Part II, ff. 118r-24r .

The Deploratioun of the Deith of Quene Magdalene (‘O Cruell Deith, to greit is thy puissance’)

First published [Edinburgh, 1537]. Hamer, I, 105-12.

LiD 2

Copy, in the cursive secretary hand of David Anderson of Aberdeen. c.1563-6.

In: the MS described under LiD 1.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 8-11.

Edinburgh University Library, MS Dk. 7. 49, Part II, ff. 125r-7v.

LiD 3

Copy, as the XXVIII Chapter of the Cronicle.

In: A copy of the verse Historie and Cronicles of Scotland by Robert Lindesay of Pitscottie, in a single professional secretary hand, x + 175 folio leaves, in contemporary reversed calf. c.1598.

Bookplate of Viscount Cholmondeley. Phillipps MS 3107. Owned in 1896 by John Scott, CB, of Halkshill. Among the muniments of the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, formerly in the John Rylands University Library of Manchester.

Edited from this MS in Pitscottie's Chronicles of Scotland, ed. A.J.G. Mackay, I, STS 42 (Edinburgh & London, 1899), 370-6, and described pp. lxxx-lxxxiv. Collated in Hamer, III, 119.

National Library of Scotland, MS Acc. 9769 84/1/1, ff. 83v-5r.

Ane Descriptioun of Peder Coffeis having na Ragaird till honestie in thair vocatioun (‘It is my purpoiss to discryve’)

First published in Allan Ramsay, The Ever Green (Edinburgh, 1724), II, 219-22. Hamer, I, 389-92.

LiD 4

Copy, subscribed ‘ffinis [p Lindsay in a different hand]’.

In: A formal anthology of Scottish poetry, including 51 poems presently attributed to William Dunbar, largely in a single secretary hand, with a few later additions in other hands, in two tall folio volumes, with differing series of pagination and foliation, vol. I comprising 192 leaves (paginated 1-385), vol. II comprising 205 leaves (paginated 387-795), all leaves now mounted separately in window mounts, each volume in 19th-century green morocco elaborately gilt. Compiled by George Bannatyne (b.1545), student of St Andrews and merchant burgess of Edinburgh. Subscribed on the last page ‘finis. / 1568’ but probably written over a period of some years. c.1568.

Descending to Bannatyne's son-in-law George Foulis. Later (c.1712) inscribed (p. 60) ‘This book is gifted to Mr William Carmichael Be me James Foulis’. Some annotations by Allan Ramsay (1684-1758), poet and editor, and by Thomas Percy (1729-1811), Bishop of Dromore, writer and literary editor. Presented in 1772 by John Carmichael, fourth Earl of Hyndford.

Generally cited as the Bannatyne MS. Complete facsimile, introduced by Denton Fox and William A. Ringler, published by the Scolar Press, 1980. Complete text edited in Murdoch and in Ritchie. Discussed in Priscilla Bawcutt, ‘The Contents of the Bannatyne Manuscript: New Sources and Analogues’, Journal of the Edinburgh Bibliographical Society, 3 (2008), 95-133. A facsimile page in The National Library of Scotland Advocates' Library Notable Accessions up to 1925 (Edinburgh, 1965), Plate 43.

Edited from this MS in Ramsay and in Hamer.

National Library of Scotland, Adv. MS 1.1.6, Vol. I, f. 162r-v (pp. 383-4).

Ane Dialog betuix Experience and Ane Courteour of the Miserabyll Estait of the Warls (The Monarche) (‘Into that Park I sawe appeir’)

First published [in St Andrews or Edinburgh, c.1554]. Hamer, I, 197-386.

LiD 5

Copy, complete with the Epistle to the Reader and Prologue, in the cursive secretary hands of William Hay and David Anderson of Aberdeen, probably transcribed, from a printed edition. c.1563-6.

In: the MS described under LiD 1.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 8-11.

Edinburgh University Library, MS Dk. 7. 49, Part II, ff. 1r-99r.

LiD 6

Copy, in a professional angular secretary hand, with some rubrication, with a title-page or introductory rubric ‘Heir begynnis ane liill dialog betuixt experience and ane Courteoure of the miserabill estait of ye Warld compilit be Schir dauid lindesay of the mont knicht, Lionn king of armis Quhilk is diuidit in foure partis as estir followis begun on thurisday ye 11 of Junij 1556’, including (ff. 1r-3r) ‘The Epistill’ and (ff. 3r-7r) ‘The Prolog’, i + 132 small folio leaves, in old calf (rebacked). 1556.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 5-8, and partly collated, III, 233 et seq.

Lambeth Palace Library, MS 332.

The Dreme of Schir Dauid Lyndesay (‘Me thocht ane lady, of portratour perfyte’)

First published [in Edinburgh, 1528-30?]. Hamer, I, 3-38.

LiD 7

Copy, complete with the Epistle and Prologue, in the cursive secretary hand of David Anderson of Aberdeen. c.1563-6.

In: the MS described under LiD 1.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 8-11.

Edinburgh University Library, MS Dk. 7. 49, Part II, ff. 99v-118r.

The Historie of Squyer Meldrum (‘Quho that Antique Stories reidis’)

First published [in Edinburgh, 1579-80?]. Hamer, I, 145-96. Edited by James Kinsley (London & Edinburgh, 1959).

LiD 8

Copy, transcribed from a printed edition by one James Clark of Glasgow. 1631.

Later owned by John Pinkerton (1758-1826), by Richard Heber (1774-1833), book collector, and (in 1836) by J. Bohn.

Recorded in Hamer, IV, 12, and in Kinsley, p. 2.

Untraced, [Clark MS].

The Testament and Complaynt of the Papyngo (‘Suppose I had Ingyne Angelicall’)

First published [in Edinburgh, 1530]. Hamer, I, 55-90.

LiD 9

Copy, in the cursive secretary hand of David Anderson of Aberdeen, subscribed (f. 144v) with his signature and (f. 145v) his inscription ‘Dauid andersone burges of Aberdene 1563’, before verses on f. 146r-v in other hands. c.1563-6.

In: the MS described under LiD 1.

This MS described in Hamer, IV, 8-11.

Edinburgh University Library, MS Dk. 7. 49, Part II, ff. 128r-44v.

Dramatic works

Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis

First published (in Hamer's ‘Version III’) in Edinburgh, 1602. Edited by James Kinsley (London, 1954).

The different versions of the play discussed in Anna J. Mill, ‘Representations of Lyndsay's Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis’, PMLA, 47. i (1932), 636-51, with corrigenda in PMLA, 48 (1933), 315-16; in Raymond A. Houk, ‘Versions of Lindsay's Satire of the Three Estates’, PMLA, 55. i (1940), 396-405; in John MacQueen, ‘Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis’, SSL, 3 (1965-6), 129-43; and in Anna Jean Mill, ‘The Original Version of Lindsay's Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis’, SSL, 6 (1968-9), 67-75.

LiD 10

Extracts, headed ‘Heir begynis the Ploenuratrony of the play, maid be Dauid Lynsayis, of the month Knicht in the Playfeild in the moneth of [space] the yeir of god 155 yeryis’, comprising seven long passages (called ‘Interludes’), here beginning ‘Richt famous pepill ye sall vnderstand...’, in an irregular order, together with the prefatory ‘banns’, from a version performed on the Castle Hill, Cupar, Fifeshire, on 7 June 1552.

In: the MS described under LiD 4. c.1568.

Edited from this MS (Hamer's ‘Version II’), in a parallel text with the 1602 edition, in Hamer, Vol. II; ed. James Kinsley (London, 1954). Also Edited from this MS in The Bannatyne Manuscript, Hunterian Club (Glasgow, 1896), iii, 463-597; The Bannatyne Manuscript, ed. W. Tod Ritchie, III, STS NS 23 (1928), 87-238. Discussed in J. Derrick McClure, ‘A Comparison of the Bannatyne MS and the Quarto Texts of Lyndsay's Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis’, Scottish Studies, 4 (Frankfurt am Main, 1986), 409-22. Facsimile of f. 168r in The British Inheritance: A Treasury of Historic Documents, ed. Elizabeth Hallam and Andrew Prescott (London, 1999), p. 30.

National Library of Scotland, Adv. MS 1.1.6, Vol. II, ff. 164r-210r (pp. 387-479).

LiD 11

A prose summary of the version performed in the Banquetting Hall in the Palace at Linlithgow before James V and Marie de Lorraine on 6 January 1539/40 (Hamer's ‘Version I’), as written by a Protestant Scotsman: (f. 138r-v) a copy, in a secretary hand, headed ‘The copie of the nootes of the interluyde...’, together with (f. 137r-v) a covering letter signed by Sir William Eure, to Thomas Cromwell, dated from Berwick Castle, 26 January [1539/40].

In: A folio composite volume of state papers, in various hands, 268 leaves, in half red morocco.

Edited from this MS in Hamer, II, 1-6.

British Library, Royal MS 7 C. XVI, f. 137r-8v.

LiD 12

A MS of ‘Sir Dauid Lindesay A Satyre of the three Estates’. 16th century?

Owned in 1627 by William Drummond of Hawthornden, whose main books and MSS are in Edinburgh University Library and the National Library of Scotland, but the rest dispersed.

Recorded in Drummond's catalogue of his library, Auctarium Bibliothecae Edinburgenae (Edinburgh, 1627), p. 22. See Hamer, IV, 12, and Robert H. MacDonald, The Library of Drummond of Hawthornden (Edinburgh, 1971), No. 1371.

Untraced, [Drummond MS].

Letters

Letter(s)

*LiD 13

Autograph letter signed, to the Scottish Secretary, from Antwerp, 23 August 1531. 1531.

In: A folio composite volume of state correspondence, in various hands, c.350 leaves.

Edited in Hamer, IV, 255, and, with a facsimile of the signature, in The Poetical Works of Sir David Lyndsay of the Mount, ed. David Laing, 2 vols (Edinburgh, 1879), I, xxiv-xxvi. Edited and discussed in Janet Hadley Williams, ‘“Of officiaris serving thy senyeorie”: David Lyndsay's diplomatic letter of 1531’, in A Palace in the Wild: Essays on Vernacular Culture and Humanism in Late-Medieval and Renaissance Scotland (Leuven, 2000), pp. 125-40. Facsimile also in IELM, I.ii, Facsimile XXIV (p. 312).

British Library, Cotton MS Caligula B. 1, f. 313r.