Seventeen Medieval Manuscript Fragments Discovered in Guernsey Archives

Researchers report that seventeen medieval manuscript fragments have been discovered in Guernsey. The items were identified within the collections of the Island Archives and records stored in His Majesty’s Greffier’s Strongroom. The discovery process began when archival assistant Callum Tostevin-Hall researched a sixteenth-century copy of Edward III’s 1331 Extente of Guernsey. He noticed a historical reference to a vellum cover with Latin text that had been removed during earlier conservation work.

The research team included archival staff, manuscript expert Dr. David Rundle from the University of Kent, and book historian Professor Tamara Atkin from the University of Oxford. They determined that the fragments date between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the vellum sheets were reused as covers for notebooks and administrative record bindings relating to feudal holdings on the island. Most fragments are written in Latin, while six are in French. Notably, one French fragment contains a rare version of the poem L’Estoire de Griseldis, which is otherwise preserved in only one other manuscript and two later printed editions.