Eventful Palaeography: Oxford Bodleian Library MS, Tanner 10 and Writing as a Social Practice

Abstract Although Oxford, Bodleian Library, Tanner 10 has been studied extensively, unresolved questions remain regarding its localization, its repair, the contemporaneity of the scribes, and the variations between their work. Framing an approach via eventful palaeography and writing as a social practice, this essay raises questions about the use of evolutionary metaphors and systems of classification borrowed from the natural sciences to describe manuscripts. It argues that a complete understanding of Tanner 10 has been hampered by the limited treatment of scribes three, four and five. This essay re-examines Tanner 10 thoroughly – with equal attention to the work of all five scribes – to argue that Scribes 1, 2, 4 and 5 were working contemporaneously, and that some similarities between Scribes 1 and 5 have been overlooked. It then provides arguments for dating Scribe 3’s intervention to the second half of the tenth century, possibly in Dorchester or Abingdon.