The Sherborne Missal

Portraits of John Whas, the scribe, and John Siferwas, the artist, on the page for Easter Day: British Library Add MS 74236, p. 216 (detail)

This British Library has announced today that a digitised version of the Sherborne Missal (Add MS 74236) is now available to view in full as a pilot project through the Library’s Universal Viewer.

The missal is a large manuscript service book that was produced for Sherborne Abbey (Dorset) in the early-fifteenth-century, probably commissioned by the Robert Brunyng, who was the abbot between 1385 and 1415. The missal is famous for its rich illustration, which includes many marginal depictions of British birds (the British Library blog mentions that there are 48 of them). The main illustrator was John Siferwas, a Dominican friar, while the scribe was a monk of Sherborne named John Whas.

If you are interested further, please do read the British Library blog by Eleanor Jackson at: https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2020/08/digitisation-of-the-sherborne-missal.html

Or view the manuscript itself: British Library Add MS 74236 Missal (‘The Sherborne Missal’), available at:
http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100104060212.0x000001?_ga=2.1341425.1378883895.1598524681-262534759.1580828173

Portraits of Richard Mitford, Bishop of Salisbury, with his personal arms, and Robert Brunyng, the abbot of Sherborne, with the arms of Sherborne Abbey, on the page for Christmas Day: British Library Add MS 74236, p. 36 (detail)