Mary Prescott Parsons

Mary Prescott Parsons (1885-1971) graduated in 1913 from the New York State Library School. In the 1920s she worked at the American Library in Paris, and studied thereafter for a doctorate at the University of Vienna. She worked in the USA during the war, but after the war worked first in New Zealand and then again in Paris, setting up the US Information Service library (1948-52). See Mary Niles Maack, ‘Exporting American Print Culture: The Role of Bookwomen in Paris during the 1920s’, Libraries & Culture: Essays in Honor of Donald G. Davis Jr (2005), available online.

Her Vienna dissertation (Beiträge z. angelsächsischen Urkundenwesen bis z. Ausgang d. 9. Jahrhunderts) was completed in 1937, and remains unpublished. She had evidently decided to focus attention on the charters of the earlier Anglo-Saxon period (to the end of the ninth century), and perhaps in particular on those charters preserved in single-sheet form. Her ground-breaking article 'Some scribal memoranda for Anglo-Saxon charters of the 8th and 9th centuries', published in 1939 (reference below), and based directly on her dissertation, is important for three reasons: first, because it approaches Anglo-Saxon charters in the light of an understanding of diplomatic practices on the continent (represented by the charters of St Gall); secondly, because it involves the close examination of the palaeographical features of charters preserved in single-sheet form, which bear on stages in the production or writing of the documents; and thirdly, because it demonstrated the role of the scriptorium of Christ Church, Canterbury, in the production of royal charters in the early period. It complements Drögereit's study of the charters of the tenth century, and is the forerunner of Pierre Chaplais' article, 'Some Early Anglo-Saxon Diplomas on Single Sheets: Originals or Copies?' (see under Chaplais).

Miss Parsons was primarily concerned to identify the physical or palaeographical features of a given charter which threw light on stages in the preparation of the document, for use in a ceremony of conveyance, as opposed to features (such as archival endorsements) which reflect what became of it after the event. She distinguishes between three types of dorsal or marginal notes: (1) lists of names written on separate slips of parchment, which might be regarded as scribal memoranda for witness-lists (notably S 163 and S 293); (2) notes which convey a brief indication of content, seemingly prepared in advance of the main text; and (3) notes which provide a fuller summary of content. It is not easy to appreciate the details of her argument without access to images of the charters themselves, all of which will be found in the database of single sheets. In some respects, MPP’s work has been overtaken by more recent work, by Pierre Chaplais and others. Detailed descriptions of several of the charters she discusses will be found in Charters of Christ Church, Canterbury, ed. N. P. Brooks and S. E. Kelly (forthcoming).

Bibliography

• 'Some scribal memoranda for Anglo-Saxon charters of the 8th and 9th centuries', published in Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Instituts für Geschichtsforschung, Erg. Bd. 14 (1939), pp. 13-32

• ‘Recruitment and Education for Medical Librarians’, Bulletin of the Medical Library Association 43.3 (1955), pp. 397-401 [PDF online]