Hand: Main Hand, BL Additional Ch. 19793

Stokes, English Vernacular Script, ca 990–ca 1035, Vol. 2 (PhD Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2006)

Although a boundary-clause, the vernacular script has relatively square proportions and was written with a medium-width pen. The base-line and cue-height are somewhat uneven, and the script is somewhat irregular. Ascenders are as long as or slightly shorter than minims and have small wedges, and descenders are straight and often slightly longer than minims. Minims are short and have prominent wedges and horizontal ticks or feet which have been added as separate strokes. Single-compartment a was used, the back of which is upright, the right shoulder very pointed, and the top-stroke usually angled down and curving into a teardrop-shape but sometimes more flat-topped form. A more rounded version of the flat-topped form was used for æ, the tongue of which is thin and rising and the hook rounded and sometimes turned in slightly. The back of c is very angled and broken as for Style-III Anglo-Caroline, although the effect is slightly less apparent in the smaller script. The back of d is short and vertical-tipped. Horned e is found throughout, the back of which is sometimes vertical and sometimes angled like the Latin script; the tongue is long and turned down at the tip when final, and the hook often turns in slightly. Tall e is also found before m, n, or r, in which case the hook forms a wide rounded loop and the tongue is horizontal at cue-height. The tongue of f is flat, on the base-line, and either shorter or slightly longer than the hook. The top of g is very long and has very slight hooks at either end, and the mid-section hangs from the centre of the top-stroke and is rounded and very narrow but quite long, and the tail is closed in a round loop. The shoulders of h, m, and n are all quite rounded, but that of r is very angular, the down-stroke of which is straight and angled slightly inwards, and the foot turns out sharply. Round s was used almost exclusively, although low s is found sometimes after tall e at the ends of words and was used four times in the last eleven words of the bounds, and a single Caroline s+t ligature is found (strate, line 13). The scribe used þ exclusively in preference to ð except for an enlarged capital Ð at the start of the bounds. Straight-limbed dotted y was used throughout, the right branch of which is hooked left and the tail hooked right. The top of 7 is slightly concave up and can have a small hook on the left, and the descender is straight but angled very slightly to the left. Latin was written in Style-III Anglo-Caroline but with single-compartment a.