The five parchment end-leaves of Royal 17. C. XVII in the British Library (fols. 2–3 and 163–6) are all that remains of what was apparently once a complete liturgical book containing biblical readings, prayers, and chants for the eight daily services of the Divine Office as it was sung in an Anglo-Saxon church. It has received very little attention from scholars. Appearing as number 498 in Helmut Gneuss's Handlist, it is described as a fragmentary breviary dating from the end of the tenth century or the first half of the eleventh. The British Library's catalogue entry for Royal 17. C. XVII offers slightly more information:

It is easy to see why this source has not been the subject of deeper investigation. Apart from several simple initials, it lacks any decoration. Its chants are not provided with musical notation. The text is so badly worn as to be illegible in places, and whole lines have been trimmed off. On first inspection, the fragment thus presents little interest to the art historian or the musicologist, and the palaeographer faces obstacles from the outset.