SHORTER CONTRIBUTIONS

THE 'TREGIAN' MANUSCRIPTS: A STUDY OF THEIR

COMPILATION
Ruby Reid Thompson
1609 and 1619, during his confinetnent in the Fleet Prison, in London,
Francis Tregian the younger, a Cornish Roman
Catholic recusant, has hitherto been thought to
have compiled an important group of music
anthologies. These comprise the Fitzwilliam
Virginal Book: Cambridge, Fitzwiiliam Museum Mus. MS. 168;^ British Library, Egerton
MS. 3665; New York Public Library, Drexel
MS. 4302; and the second part of Oxford,
Christ Church, Mus. MSS. 510-514. This
attribution was derived from references to
members of the Tregian family which appear
in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, and from the
presence of compositions attributed to Francis
Tregian in that manuscript and in Eg. 3665.
BETWEEN

In 1951 Elizabeth Cole compared Tregian's

signature on a legal document with a hand in
which titles and composers' names are copied
in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book and Eg. 3665.
She concluded that all the samples were written
by the same person and that both music
manuscripts were, therefore, Tregian's work."
At about the same time, photographs of Drexel
MS. 4302 were compared with Eg. 3665,
leading to the conclusion that it was the
continuation of Eg. 3665.^ In the early 1960s
Pamela Willetts discovered that within the
bindings of the Christ Church Manuscripts
there were fragments of a second set of
madrigals, copied in a different hand, which
she identified as Tregian's because it was
202

reminiscent of that in the Fitzwilliam Virginal

Book.^
It has thus been assumed that the 'Tregian'
manuscripts constitute a homogeneous group
of copied music. This theory is loosely based
on a shared visual style and on the characteristic
fashion in which the copied material is presented on the page. Because no thorough
survey has previously been undertaken, the
theory that these manuscripts are the work of a
single person, who supposedly assembled them
during a specific period of time, has not
properly been tested. It is this attribution to
Tregian that I wish to challenge here. Because
I have found insufficient evidence to identify
him with the entire project, the name Tregian
has been placed in inverted commas, when
referring to the manuscripts.
My object has been to consider the ' Tregian'
manuscripts for the first time as a single corpus
of historical information. The form in which
the music is represented on the page and the
choice of repertoire are clearly separate issues,
which each provide clues regarding the identity
of both copyist and compiler. I concentrate
here primarily on the physical characteristics of
the various volumes, believing that consideration of this should precede the investigation of
the music they contain.
A detailed study of the 1100 folios which
comprise the 'Tregian' manuscripts, and a full
recording of the watermarks, discloses that

throughout these volumes only two types of scribes working together under the supervision
continental paper were used. The paper is of of a head craftsman. He appears to have been
excellent quality and was made in Basel and responsible for regulating the standard of
Strasbourg. On the one hand, the watermark copying and for organizing the copied material
record of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book indi- and making sure all the copied material
cates a perfect sequence of conjtigate leaves and followed a set style. Moreover, once all
that no original folios are missing from this corrections and annotations in the manuscripts
manuscript. The Christ Church volumes also are examined, it becomes clear that the final
consist of regular and perfect gatherings of revision of the volumes was overseen by a
uniform paper. On the other hand, the paper professional musician of some distinction.
content of both Eg. 3665 and Drexel 4302 is
An inventory of the music they contain
not consistent throughout either manuscript, shows that the 'Tregian' manuscripts were
and they can be described as aggregate volumes compiled from a mixture of manuscript and
which consist of separate units. These, most of printed exemplars. The Fitzwilliam Virginal
which are made up of a uniform paper type, Book was mainly copied from earlier keyboard
appear to have been bound together in their manuscripts. The vocal repertoire mostly
present bindings as an afterthought. A search comes from printed Continental madrigal
for examples of the same Continental paper in books, while for a number of the instrumental
contemporary musical and other manuscripts compositions these anthologies are the unique
suggests a link with the work of Inigo Jones, source. None of the volumes contains original
which in turn helps to identify a possible musical autographs.
source of importation for the paper.
At this point, it is necessary to consider the
A variety of questions about the physical possible involvement of a single individual,
process of assembling the volumes had to be other than Tregian, in the creation of these
answered before any conclusions could be volumes. Only someone well-connected and of
reached on the identity of the original compiler. high status would have had access to the
These concerned the way in which the blank considerable resources necessary to assemble
paper was prepared for copying, how that these four anthologies. It seems likely that the
copying was organized, and how the written instigator of the project came from the ranks of
elements were distributed on the 2200 pages of the English aristocracy, and indeed much of
these manuscripts. To uncover the distinct the evidence now assembled points very
strata of scribal activity it was necessary to precisely in this direction.
undertake a detailed study of them. This
However, no evidence survives to indicate
involved measuring the writing area and its that the four manuscripts ever had the kind of
surrounding margins and al! rulings; the high-quality binding that might be expected
recording of all remaining prickings; the from component volumes of a great aristocratic
breaking down into categories of both music library. The Christ Church manuscripts were
and literary scripts; and noting every change of bound for Henry Aldrich in the latter part of
ink colour and the tools used for drawing and the seventeenth century to match the rest of his
writing. The completed copied page appears to books. Eg. 3665 arrived in the British Museum
bave resulted from the systematic application, with a simple eighteenth-century leather bindin successive layers, of specialized workman- ing, and now has a modern British Library
ship which can now be identified. The evidence binding. The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book was
indicates that the compilation of the 'Tregian' bound using an early seventeenth-century
manuscripts may be the product of a group of gold-tooled leather which had been used
203

previously on a smaller book. The earlier

ornate leather was made to accommodate the
larger format of the music manuscript: further
ornamental gold tooling was applied to the
stretched and joined leather in order to cover
the new seams and complete the elaborate and
rich overall appearance of the book. These
alterations indicate that a later owner was
endeavouring to give the volume an authentic
'antique' appearance, confirming that the book
and its binding are not contemporary. Only the
elegant binding of Drexel 4302, with corner
tools and central gold-stamped medallions used
by one of James Fs bookbinders, appears truly
to be contemporary; and even this has, as an
apparent addition, the blind stamped initials
' FS', for a late seventeenth-century owner
Francis Sambrooke.
As has been noted, the assumption that
Francis Tregian the younger was the copyist,
compiler and owner of these music anthologies
is based on a comparison of the calligraphic
style used in the copied titles of the manuscripts
with Tregian's signature on a Cornish legal
document. It is difficult to prove the identity of
an individual from such a small sample of
handwriting, especially if the script is formal
and stylized. There are also problems in
establishing that the musical and literary scripts
are the products of a single hand.
The consequent doubts regarding Tregian's
involvement with these volumes necessarily led
to a re-examination of archival material relating
to Tregian and his family. Primary sources
neither confirm tbe dates of his imprisonment
nor corroborate his date of death as 1619,
though they are consonant with his having
undergone a shorter period of imprisonment
during the second decade of the century. The
period between 1609 and 1619, when Tregian

204

is supposed to have copied the four music

anthologies in the Fleet Prison, should, therefore, no longer be considered a constraint when
dating the compositions they contain.
All that is clear is that the ' Tregian'
manuscripts bave a singular and distinct
identity as a collection of copied music. The
uniform style of their presentation and contents
strongly suggests the work of professional
scribes, ratber than of an individual amateur.
The degree of expertise employed in their
production leads to speculation that many
other manuscripts, by no means all of them
musical, may have originated from the same
source. It is possible that a large number of
specially copied volumes could have been
produced for the private library of a London
resident during the first half of the seventeenth
century. The fact that the 'Tregian' manuscripts were left unfinished, and perhaps
unbound, suggests that they are part, at least,
of a collection of music intended for, but which
did not in the event fully take its place in, a
particular library. If the manuscripts had been
finished and properly bound they would have
been previously identified and accounted for in
their proper context.
This article is a summary of the forthcoming
Doctoral dissertation, 'The "Tregian" Manuscripts, A Study of their Compilation', to be
submitted to the University of Cambridge.
1 A facsimile edition of the Fitzwilliam Virginal
Book, to be edited by the author and Dr Iain
Fenlon, is planned.
2 Elizabeth Cole, 'In search of Francis Tregian',
Music and Letters, xxxiii (1952), pp. 28-31.
3 B. Schofield and T. Dart, 'Tregian's Anthology', Music and Letters, xxxii (1951), pp205-16.
4 Pamela Willetts, The Musical Times, civ (1963),
PP- 334-5-