From ?16th century to 1970 this was the outer cover of Adv.MS.72.1.27.

The text, written in Latin in two columns in a current book-hand tending towards rotunda, appears to be a commentary on a legal treatise. The quoted words and phrases are underlined in red, and spaces have been left (unfilled) for coloured initials. Ownership and other notes in Gaelic are written in a later hand in some of the margins. The following notes were added in some of the spaces on the recto, clearly after the leaf’s adaptation.

(a) 'amen / fecain glesa' (scored out).

(b) 'Me fein leobhar Ghillanndrias duibh ⁊ ni maith an litir so agam'.

(c) 'Fechain glesa an pinn pig so amen dico vobis'.

(d) Medical notes beginning 'Nullus sensus sencitur .i. ni hairigter aon cedfadh'.

The hand of (a)-(c) also appears at Adv.MS.72.1.27, folio 5 recto, column b; although it states that Giolla Ainndreis Dubh is possessor of the book, this seems more likely to be the identity of hand 1 of Adv.MS.84.1.18 than of this one. Its chief characteristic is the absence of even a notional base-line, so that the writing jumps up and down. The hand of (d) is cruder still.

With the manuscript are the remains of the thongs with which Adv.MSS.84.1.16-84.1.17 were bound together, some bearing a script which indicates that they were cut from Adv.MSS.84.1.17-84.1.18.