.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Composite volume comprising four parts: (1) Pope Innocent III (d. 1216), Canons of the Fourth Lateran Council; (2) Petrus Riga (d. 1209), Aurora; (3) Guillaume Durand (d. 1296) (?), Opus aureum sive memoriale omnium sacerdotum; and (4) Laurentius Hispanus(?) (d. 1248), Apparatus in tractatum de poenitentia; in Latin, decorated manuscripts on vellum [Austria (archdiocese of Salzburg), c.1220 - c.1350]
Details
A compendium of legal and biblical texts
Composite volume comprising four parts: (1) Pope Innocent III (d. 1216), Canons of the Fourth Lateran Council; (2) Petrus Riga (d. 1209), Aurora; (3) Guillaume Durand (d. 1296) (?), Opus aureum sive memoriale omnium sacerdotum; and (4) Laurentius Hispanus(?) (d. 1248), Apparatus in tractatum de poenitentia; in Latin, decorated manuscripts on vellum [Austria (archdiocese of Salzburg), c.1220 - c.1350]
An interesting compendium of legal and biblical texts, each written probably for a house of Augustinian canons in Austria, in a medieval binding by a canon who records his name and the date.
c.160 x 185mm. 153 leaves, complete, collation [Part 1:] 18, 28 (the 3rd and 6th are singletons), 38, 46 (the 2nd and 5th are singletons) [Part 2:] 5–108, 119 (of 8, ix inserted, fol. 87) [Part 3:] 1212, 13–148 [Part 4:] 1510, 1612 (the 1st and last are singletons), 1712, 184 (of 8, v–viii cancelled, probably blank); Part 1 ruled in leadpoint and written in late Romanesque script in a single column of 30 lines, above top line, c.210 × 135mm., preserving prickings in the outer margins; Part 2 ruled in leadpoint and written in early Gothic script in 2 columns of 46 lines, below top line, c.210 × 130mm., preserving prickings in all three margins; Part 3 written in Gothic script in 2 columns of 48 lines, c.200 × 135mm., preserving prickings in all three margins; Part 4 ruled in ink and written in Gothic script, the main text in 2 columns of 39 lines, c.170 × 105mm., surrounded by gloss c.250 × 180mm as far as f.127 (some natural flaws and some thumbing, but overall in very good condition).
Binding:
Bound and signed by Leonard Hämerl, canon of Steinz, in 1470; sewn on three wide bands laced into wood boards covered with brown leather, each cover with a frame and saltire cross formed of triple blind fillets, the interstices with various blind-stamps including a small scroll lettered ‘Maria’(?), a larger scroll, and a large rectangle with a three-leaf flower or fleur-de-lis between addorsed birds; vestiges of two clasps at the fore-edge (sound but somewhat scuffed, stained, and battered, the joints with old repairs).
The four originally-separate parts were bound together in 1470 by Leonard Hämerl of ‘Supronio’ (presumably Sopron, approximately 85 miles or 140km north-east of Stainz), professed canon of Stainz, as the first book he bound after receiving instruction; he recorded these facts as follows: ‘Codicem illum illigavit dominus Leonardus Hämerl de Supronio monasterii huius professus Anno domini incarnationis 1470 & est primus liber quem idem illigavit post informacionem’ (back pastedown).
Pastedowns:
The pastedowns are formed of parts of at least three different medieval manuscripts, which presumably had all become obsolete at Stainz by 1470, including:
(a) an incomplete bifolium of a 14th-century alphabetical list of medicines, comprising parts of the letters ‘C’, ‘E’, and ‘P’; written in two columns of at least 30 lines, with initials in red.
(b) an incomplete bifolium of a 13th-century copy of Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Book 3.73–118 and 517–72); written as verse in single columns of at least 45 lines. Copies of classical texts are relatively rare before the 15th century; no complete copy of the Metamorphoses survives from before about 1050.
Provenance:
(1) Part 1 must have been written after 1218 (although the script looks earlier), surely for use in a house of Augustinian canons in the archdiocese of Salzburg (see Contents), perhaps Stainz (see below), which was founded in 1229. The four parts were written over the course of more than a century; each was probably too short to warrant a separate binding, and the presence of two ownership inscriptions of Stainz suggest that they were still in at least two parts until 1470.
(2) The Augustinian monastery of St Katherine, Stainz, Styria, southeastern Austria, approximately 200 km or 120 miles south-east of Salzburg, with two ownership inscriptions: ‘Iste liber est monasterij sancte Katherine in Stencz’ (ff.1, 88); bound as a single volume in 1470 by Leonard Hämerl, a canon, as recorded by him. The monastery was dissolved in 1785, and now houses museums and the residence of the Counts of Meran.
(3) Heribert Tenschert: his Katalog XXI, Leuchtendes Mittelalter: 89 libri manu scripti 89 illuminati vom 10. bis zum 16. Jahrhundert (1989), no. 5 pp. 28–33; bought by:
(4) Joost R. Ritman (b. 1941), of Amsterdam, Dutch businessman and bibliophile, founder of the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica; his sale at Sotheby's, A selection of illuminated manuscripts from the 13th to the 16th centuries, 6 July 2000, lot 1; bought for £100,000 hammer by Sam Fogg (with his pencil stock number, f.1), from whom it was bought by:
(5) Anthony d’Offay (b. 1941), British collector, contemporary art dealer, and curator; sold by Bernard Quaritch Ltd, From Carolingian to Gothic: Four Centuries of Medieval Manuscripts from an English Private Collection (London, 2005), no 13.
(6) Dr Jörn Günther Antiquariat, Brochure No 11: Passion of Collecting: A Selection of Illuminated Manuscripts, Miniatures, Early Printed Books (Hamburg, 2009), no 2.
(7) Les Enluminures, 2010, their TM440 (inscribed in pencil, back pastedown).
Contents:
Part 1
Pope Innocent III, Canons of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, followed by decrees for the reform of the Augustinian Order adopted at Salzburg in 1218: ‘Incipit liber constitutionum domini Innocentii pape III. Firmiter credimus & simpliciter confitemur […]’, each canon with a rubric, ‘De essentia trinitatis’, ‘De excommunicatione hereticorum’, etc., ending ‘ut digne proficiant ad salutem. Amen.’ ff.1v–26v; ‘Incipit reformatio vite regularis. Quia regularis nostri ordinis observantia […] omnes prelatos nostri ordinis citans ad proximum capitulum Salzp(ur)c habendum proxima die post festum S. Martini Anno ab incarnatione domini M. cc. xxiii. [i.e. 12 November 1218] (f.29, lines 19–21) […]’ ff.26v–30; blank f.30v.
The Fourth Lateran Council was held partly in response to a perceived threat of heresy; it is primarily significant for the fact that it called for a new Crusade and sweeping reform of the Church, including a requirement for all Christians to make Confession at least once a year (see Part 3 below), under threat of excommunication, and has been described as ‘perhaps the most important legislative act in the history of the Church’. The Canons also define transubstantiation for the first time. On the additional chapters at the end, see G. G. Meersseman, ‘Die Reform der Salzburger Augustinerstifte (1218) eine Folge des IV. Laterankonzils (1215)’, Zeitschrift für schweizerische Kirchengeschichte, 48 (1954) pp.81–95; the present text differs from that printed by Meersseman.
The first page, originally left blank, was used in the 15th century (presumably after being bound together with Part 4 in 1470) to add a list of abbreviations used in legal texts, in alphabetical order A–V, plus one more out of sequence: ‘Incipiunt breviature(?) viti(?) secundum alphabete. Ala (id est) Alanus; Ap re (id est) Appellacione remota […] De fo compe (id est) de foro competenti’ f.1.
Part 2
Peter Riga (d. 1209), Aurora: ‘Incipit prologus in Pentateuco Moisi. Frequens sodalium meorum peticio […] Incipit primus liber de vi diebus. Hic incipit Aurora liber Petri [...] Dat finem Petrus finit et ipse suum. Explicit Aurora’ ff.31–85v; followed, as usual in the second version of Peter’s text, by the Recapitulationes, written as a lipogram (i.e. the first section avoids using the letter ‘a’, the second avoids ‘b’, and so on), ‘Sine a. Principio rerum post .v. dies homo primus [...] Sine b. […] Sine z. […] Barnabis [sic] et Tytus hii docuere fidem’ ff.85v–87v; ending with a rhyming verse scribal colophon, ‘Finis adest operis / scriptori laus sit honoris Non videat christum / qui librum subtrahat istum’.
The Aurora is a comparatively short paraphrase of, and commentary on, the Bible, in verse; it has been described as ‘the best-known poem of the Middle Ages’. It is edited by Paul Beichner, Aurora: Petri Rigae Biblia Versificata, 2 vols (Notre Dame, 1965), but the edition represents an idealised version, not one that appears in any known manuscript. More than 400 manuscripts of the text are recorded, which might suggest that the text is ‘common’ and that most manuscripts are unremarkable, but as Greti Dinkova-Bruun has recently noted, ‘the manuscript copies of the poem often vary considerably from one another […] each manuscript of Riga’s composition might and often does contain a unique version of the poem’ (‘A new manuscript of Peter Riga’s Aurora at PIMS and its unusual contents’, Mediaeval Studies 83 (2021), pp.291–301).
Part 3
Gulielmus Durandus (d. 1296)(?), ‘Incipit opus aureum, sive memoriale omnium sacerdotum seu confessorum. Cum sit ars arcium regimen animarum ut extra, De etate & quali(tate) [Decretals, 1.14.14]. Cum sit ignominiosum fore coniungitur electos ad hoc regimen causus ipsius regiminis penitus ignorare […] popularibus de hoc extra eo extuarum.’ ff.88–110v; ‘Casus totius iuris in quibus est aliquam ipso facto excomunicatus. Sciendum est quod duplex est excomunicatio […] in rubrica casus in quibus aliquis est ipso iure excommunicatus infi.’ ff.110v–115v.
The anonymous first text is attributed to Gulielmus Durandus in some manuscripts, and was printed under his name as Aureum confessorium et memoriale sacerdotum (Ulrich Zel, Cologne, c.1474). It concerns Confession, including analysis of legal texts that deal with this sacrament; it is here followed by chapters on excommunication (see Part 1). There is no modern edition.
Part 4
Gratian’s Decretum, Pars 2, Causa 33, Quaestio 3, i.e. ‘De penitentia’; a cropped rubric at the beginning reads ‘Incipit […] decreto ca. xxxiij. questione .iij.’, and there are headings ‘D(istinctio) I. [–VII]’: ‘Hiis breviter expeditis in quibus extra negocii finem […] non valent in irritum deduci’, surrounded by the glosses of Laurentius Hispanus (d.1248), ‘Quia formavit quasdam incidentes questiones et solvit. Io. G. de penitencia. […] amonere ideo hic tractat de ea vel ideo cum matrimonium principaliter sit sacramentum laicorum licet in minoribus ordinibus licite contrahitur […]’ ff.116–153v.
Gratian’s De penitentia is edited by Emil Friedberg, Corpus iuris canonici (Graz, 1959), I, cols. 1159–1256. The gloss is unpublished, but is discussed by Antonio García y García, Laurentius Hispanus; datos biográficos y estudio crítico de sus obras (Rome, 1956). It cites Ambrose, Augustine, Bede, Cyprian, Leo, et al., and was composed by the Bolognese canon lawyer Lawrence of Spain.
The process by which this copy was written could make an interesting study. It seems that the main text was written first, and then the margins were ruled for the glosses as far as f.128, but glosses are absent at ff.122v–125 and from f.127v to the end, which suggests that they were added in a non-linear fashion, and/or perhaps from an incomplete exemplar.
Decoration:
The Aurora opens with a fine foliate initial, pen-drawn in red ink, and the lower margin of the same page has finely drawn human heads from whose mouths emerges ornament; other sections begin with a fine dragon initial, a foliate initial, etc. (ff.50v, 73). The lower margin of the following page has a version of a well known paradox drawing, in which three hares appear to have two ears each, yet there are only three ears in total (f.31v). The passage concerning The Flood has two marginal variant diagrams of the layout of Noah’s Ark, showing the separate sections for humans, domesticated animals, wild animals, food storage, etc. (f.34).
Composite volume comprising four parts: (1) Pope Innocent III (d. 1216), Canons of the Fourth Lateran Council; (2) Petrus Riga (d. 1209), Aurora; (3) Guillaume Durand (d. 1296) (?), Opus aureum sive memoriale omnium sacerdotum; and (4) Laurentius Hispanus(?) (d. 1248), Apparatus in tractatum de poenitentia; in Latin, decorated manuscripts on vellum [Austria (archdiocese of Salzburg), c.1220 - c.1350]
An interesting compendium of legal and biblical texts, each written probably for a house of Augustinian canons in Austria, in a medieval binding by a canon who records his name and the date.
c.160 x 185mm. 153 leaves, complete, collation [Part 1:] 18, 28 (the 3rd and 6th are singletons), 38, 46 (the 2nd and 5th are singletons) [Part 2:] 5–108, 119 (of 8, ix inserted, fol. 87) [Part 3:] 1212, 13–148 [Part 4:] 1510, 1612 (the 1st and last are singletons), 1712, 184 (of 8, v–viii cancelled, probably blank); Part 1 ruled in leadpoint and written in late Romanesque script in a single column of 30 lines, above top line, c.210 × 135mm., preserving prickings in the outer margins; Part 2 ruled in leadpoint and written in early Gothic script in 2 columns of 46 lines, below top line, c.210 × 130mm., preserving prickings in all three margins; Part 3 written in Gothic script in 2 columns of 48 lines, c.200 × 135mm., preserving prickings in all three margins; Part 4 ruled in ink and written in Gothic script, the main text in 2 columns of 39 lines, c.170 × 105mm., surrounded by gloss c.250 × 180mm as far as f.127 (some natural flaws and some thumbing, but overall in very good condition).
Binding:
Bound and signed by Leonard Hämerl, canon of Steinz, in 1470; sewn on three wide bands laced into wood boards covered with brown leather, each cover with a frame and saltire cross formed of triple blind fillets, the interstices with various blind-stamps including a small scroll lettered ‘Maria’(?), a larger scroll, and a large rectangle with a three-leaf flower or fleur-de-lis between addorsed birds; vestiges of two clasps at the fore-edge (sound but somewhat scuffed, stained, and battered, the joints with old repairs).
The four originally-separate parts were bound together in 1470 by Leonard Hämerl of ‘Supronio’ (presumably Sopron, approximately 85 miles or 140km north-east of Stainz), professed canon of Stainz, as the first book he bound after receiving instruction; he recorded these facts as follows: ‘Codicem illum illigavit dominus Leonardus Hämerl de Supronio monasterii huius professus Anno domini incarnationis 1470 & est primus liber quem idem illigavit post informacionem’ (back pastedown).
Pastedowns:
The pastedowns are formed of parts of at least three different medieval manuscripts, which presumably had all become obsolete at Stainz by 1470, including:
(a) an incomplete bifolium of a 14th-century alphabetical list of medicines, comprising parts of the letters ‘C’, ‘E’, and ‘P’; written in two columns of at least 30 lines, with initials in red.
(b) an incomplete bifolium of a 13th-century copy of Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Book 3.73–118 and 517–72); written as verse in single columns of at least 45 lines. Copies of classical texts are relatively rare before the 15th century; no complete copy of the Metamorphoses survives from before about 1050.
Provenance:
(1) Part 1 must have been written after 1218 (although the script looks earlier), surely for use in a house of Augustinian canons in the archdiocese of Salzburg (see Contents), perhaps Stainz (see below), which was founded in 1229. The four parts were written over the course of more than a century; each was probably too short to warrant a separate binding, and the presence of two ownership inscriptions of Stainz suggest that they were still in at least two parts until 1470.
(2) The Augustinian monastery of St Katherine, Stainz, Styria, southeastern Austria, approximately 200 km or 120 miles south-east of Salzburg, with two ownership inscriptions: ‘Iste liber est monasterij sancte Katherine in Stencz’ (ff.1, 88); bound as a single volume in 1470 by Leonard Hämerl, a canon, as recorded by him. The monastery was dissolved in 1785, and now houses museums and the residence of the Counts of Meran.
(3) Heribert Tenschert: his Katalog XXI, Leuchtendes Mittelalter: 89 libri manu scripti 89 illuminati vom 10. bis zum 16. Jahrhundert (1989), no. 5 pp. 28–33; bought by:
(4) Joost R. Ritman (b. 1941), of Amsterdam, Dutch businessman and bibliophile, founder of the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica; his sale at Sotheby's, A selection of illuminated manuscripts from the 13th to the 16th centuries, 6 July 2000, lot 1; bought for £100,000 hammer by Sam Fogg (with his pencil stock number, f.1), from whom it was bought by:
(5) Anthony d’Offay (b. 1941), British collector, contemporary art dealer, and curator; sold by Bernard Quaritch Ltd, From Carolingian to Gothic: Four Centuries of Medieval Manuscripts from an English Private Collection (London, 2005), no 13.
(6) Dr Jörn Günther Antiquariat, Brochure No 11: Passion of Collecting: A Selection of Illuminated Manuscripts, Miniatures, Early Printed Books (Hamburg, 2009), no 2.
(7) Les Enluminures, 2010, their TM440 (inscribed in pencil, back pastedown).
Contents:
Part 1
Pope Innocent III, Canons of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, followed by decrees for the reform of the Augustinian Order adopted at Salzburg in 1218: ‘Incipit liber constitutionum domini Innocentii pape III. Firmiter credimus & simpliciter confitemur […]’, each canon with a rubric, ‘De essentia trinitatis’, ‘De excommunicatione hereticorum’, etc., ending ‘ut digne proficiant ad salutem. Amen.’ ff.1v–26v; ‘Incipit reformatio vite regularis. Quia regularis nostri ordinis observantia […] omnes prelatos nostri ordinis citans ad proximum capitulum Salzp(ur)c habendum proxima die post festum S. Martini Anno ab incarnatione domini M. cc. xxiii. [i.e. 12 November 1218] (f.29, lines 19–21) […]’ ff.26v–30; blank f.30v.
The Fourth Lateran Council was held partly in response to a perceived threat of heresy; it is primarily significant for the fact that it called for a new Crusade and sweeping reform of the Church, including a requirement for all Christians to make Confession at least once a year (see Part 3 below), under threat of excommunication, and has been described as ‘perhaps the most important legislative act in the history of the Church’. The Canons also define transubstantiation for the first time. On the additional chapters at the end, see G. G. Meersseman, ‘Die Reform der Salzburger Augustinerstifte (1218) eine Folge des IV. Laterankonzils (1215)’, Zeitschrift für schweizerische Kirchengeschichte, 48 (1954) pp.81–95; the present text differs from that printed by Meersseman.
The first page, originally left blank, was used in the 15th century (presumably after being bound together with Part 4 in 1470) to add a list of abbreviations used in legal texts, in alphabetical order A–V, plus one more out of sequence: ‘Incipiunt breviature(?) viti(?) secundum alphabete. Ala (id est) Alanus; Ap re (id est) Appellacione remota […] De fo compe (id est) de foro competenti’ f.1.
Part 2
Peter Riga (d. 1209), Aurora: ‘Incipit prologus in Pentateuco Moisi. Frequens sodalium meorum peticio […] Incipit primus liber de vi diebus. Hic incipit Aurora liber Petri [...] Dat finem Petrus finit et ipse suum. Explicit Aurora’ ff.31–85v; followed, as usual in the second version of Peter’s text, by the Recapitulationes, written as a lipogram (i.e. the first section avoids using the letter ‘a’, the second avoids ‘b’, and so on), ‘Sine a. Principio rerum post .v. dies homo primus [...] Sine b. […] Sine z. […] Barnabis [sic] et Tytus hii docuere fidem’ ff.85v–87v; ending with a rhyming verse scribal colophon, ‘Finis adest operis / scriptori laus sit honoris Non videat christum / qui librum subtrahat istum’.
The Aurora is a comparatively short paraphrase of, and commentary on, the Bible, in verse; it has been described as ‘the best-known poem of the Middle Ages’. It is edited by Paul Beichner, Aurora: Petri Rigae Biblia Versificata, 2 vols (Notre Dame, 1965), but the edition represents an idealised version, not one that appears in any known manuscript. More than 400 manuscripts of the text are recorded, which might suggest that the text is ‘common’ and that most manuscripts are unremarkable, but as Greti Dinkova-Bruun has recently noted, ‘the manuscript copies of the poem often vary considerably from one another […] each manuscript of Riga’s composition might and often does contain a unique version of the poem’ (‘A new manuscript of Peter Riga’s Aurora at PIMS and its unusual contents’, Mediaeval Studies 83 (2021), pp.291–301).
Part 3
Gulielmus Durandus (d. 1296)(?), ‘Incipit opus aureum, sive memoriale omnium sacerdotum seu confessorum. Cum sit ars arcium regimen animarum ut extra, De etate & quali(tate) [Decretals, 1.14.14]. Cum sit ignominiosum fore coniungitur electos ad hoc regimen causus ipsius regiminis penitus ignorare […] popularibus de hoc extra eo extuarum.’ ff.88–110v; ‘Casus totius iuris in quibus est aliquam ipso facto excomunicatus. Sciendum est quod duplex est excomunicatio […] in rubrica casus in quibus aliquis est ipso iure excommunicatus infi.’ ff.110v–115v.
The anonymous first text is attributed to Gulielmus Durandus in some manuscripts, and was printed under his name as Aureum confessorium et memoriale sacerdotum (Ulrich Zel, Cologne, c.1474). It concerns Confession, including analysis of legal texts that deal with this sacrament; it is here followed by chapters on excommunication (see Part 1). There is no modern edition.
Part 4
Gratian’s Decretum, Pars 2, Causa 33, Quaestio 3, i.e. ‘De penitentia’; a cropped rubric at the beginning reads ‘Incipit […] decreto ca. xxxiij. questione .iij.’, and there are headings ‘D(istinctio) I. [–VII]’: ‘Hiis breviter expeditis in quibus extra negocii finem […] non valent in irritum deduci’, surrounded by the glosses of Laurentius Hispanus (d.1248), ‘Quia formavit quasdam incidentes questiones et solvit. Io. G. de penitencia. […] amonere ideo hic tractat de ea vel ideo cum matrimonium principaliter sit sacramentum laicorum licet in minoribus ordinibus licite contrahitur […]’ ff.116–153v.
Gratian’s De penitentia is edited by Emil Friedberg, Corpus iuris canonici (Graz, 1959), I, cols. 1159–1256. The gloss is unpublished, but is discussed by Antonio García y García, Laurentius Hispanus; datos biográficos y estudio crítico de sus obras (Rome, 1956). It cites Ambrose, Augustine, Bede, Cyprian, Leo, et al., and was composed by the Bolognese canon lawyer Lawrence of Spain.
The process by which this copy was written could make an interesting study. It seems that the main text was written first, and then the margins were ruled for the glosses as far as f.128, but glosses are absent at ff.122v–125 and from f.127v to the end, which suggests that they were added in a non-linear fashion, and/or perhaps from an incomplete exemplar.
Decoration:
The Aurora opens with a fine foliate initial, pen-drawn in red ink, and the lower margin of the same page has finely drawn human heads from whose mouths emerges ornament; other sections begin with a fine dragon initial, a foliate initial, etc. (ff.50v, 73). The lower margin of the following page has a version of a well known paradox drawing, in which three hares appear to have two ears each, yet there are only three ears in total (f.31v). The passage concerning The Flood has two marginal variant diagrams of the layout of Noah’s Ark, showing the separate sections for humans, domesticated animals, wild animals, food storage, etc. (f.34).
Brought to you by
Eugenio Donadoni
Senior Specialist, Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts