the ms. Selden Supra 30 is a medieval manuscript, a copy of the Old Testament Acts of the Apostles. The text was written, in Latin, in the 8th century and remains stored in the collection of the Bodleian Library, one of the oldest in Europe and the main research library of the University of Oxford.
The book is a small volume measuring just 229 by 176 millimeters, only slightly larger than an A5 sheet of paper. The interesting thing, however, is not its measurements, but what was hidden inside, almost invisible to the naked eye. It took state-of-the-art analysis to uncover some startling inscriptions hidden in the margins…written by a woman named Eadburg.
Like most of the manuscripts of the time, this document does not present any note indicating when, where and by whom it was made. But some features, including its style of uncial script (with capital letters), show that it was produced in England, most likely somewhere in the kingdom of Kent, probably between 700 and 750.
the ms. Selden Supra 30 does present, however, a mark on the first page indicates that, in the fourteenth century, it was part of the library of the monastery of Saint Augustine in Canterbury. Later on, on page 70, which was originally left blank, there are signs that suggest the book belonged to a woman.
Researchers at the Bodleian Library claim that there are sentences copied with the same type of writing as the rest of the manuscript but made by a different scribe than the two responsible for copying the main text. The first sentence is a petition to God made by an anonymous woman, described as God's “unworthy servant” (indignam famulam).
In 1935, Oxford professor of paleography Elias Avery Lowe first recorded that the manuscript featured the letters EADB and E engraved in the bottom margin of page 47. These had been forcefully cut into the parchment, apparently using a knife, cutting the upper surface of the membrane.
Lowe suggested that these letters were shortened forms of the female name Eadburh/Eadburg. This year 2022, PhD student Jessica Hodgkinson saw another inscription in the bottom margin of page 18. It was very small, almost invisible, but it seemed to contain the full written name.
Advances in 3D technology applied in this research have not only confirmed this marking, but also revealed that up to five full Eadburgs (plus 10 other abbreviated forms including E, EAD, or EADB) appear along with many more additions in the margins. , and some had a depth equivalent to less than a fifth of the width of a human hair.
The woman's name was copied using common letterforms. The A is represented by an oblique line with an oval arc to the left and the angular U and G are distinctive. This suggests that the same scribe may have made all of these additions. "It is possible that the scribe was Eadburg herself," experts say.
“Early medieval readers and owners of manuscripts, both male and female, sometimes added their names to the books, usually in ink, but occasionally, as here, in drypoint. Another example from the early eighth century is the ink inscription recording, in Old English, that Abbess Cuthswitha possessed a copy of Jerome's commentary on the Old Testament Book of Ecclesiastes.
On some occasions, Eadburg is preceded by a cross ( ). That the first time it appears either on page 1 suggests, say the specialists, a deliberate action to show a connection from the beginning between the name and the biblical text of the work.
Along with the woman's name, several intriguing drawings have also been discovered. Some are clearly human figures, though Bodleian Library experts say more research is needed to establish exactly who or what they represent. All the figures are very small and several appear to have been made by cutting a line around a thumb or finger to form the outline of the figure.
The question is, right now, to find out who Eadburg was. Nine females named so are known to have lived in England sometime between the seventh and tenth centuries. One of them was the abbess of a female religious community at Minster-in-Thanet in Kent from at least 733 until her death in sometime between 748 and 761.
This abbess may be the woman who corresponded with Boniface, the West Saxon missionary bishop and Church reformer who became Archbishop of Mainz in 732 and was martyred by pagans in Frisia in 754. Letters between the two show that Boniface held Eadburg in high esteem and that she sent him books to France.
