Tatty Endpapers

The Vatican Library contains some immaculate manuscripts in mint condition, which leaves one to wonder if they were ever opened, and some battered items that have obviously been loved half to death. The last week's new digitizations includes what started out as the former, a costly Renaissance manuscript of Boethius with fine illuminations, and ended up as the latter after going through multiple hands.

Vat.lat.2982 has annotations galore, tatty endpapers, a worn binding and looks, frankly, grubby. It not only contains Boethius, De Interpretatione, and his translations of  De Sophisticis Elenchis and Topica by Aristotle, but also neat diagrams including his famous arbor porphyriana:

This is not included in my handlist of the medieval Boethius arbor manuscripts as it is apparently too modern. I wonder what model it was copied from.

Here is the full list of 38 new manuscripts:

1. Reg.lat.945,
2. Vat.lat.2191 (Upgraded to HQ),
3. Vat.lat.2198,
4. Vat.lat.2365,
5. Vat.lat.2836 (Upgraded to HQ),
6. Vat.lat.2837 (Upgraded to HQ),
7. Vat.lat.2839, astrology (?) notes by the humanist poet Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503), hence the listing in the eTK index of science manuscripts with the incipit Aristoteles rerum nature indagator solertissimus
8. Vat.lat.2844,
9. Vat.lat.2855,
10. Vat.lat.2864,
11. Vat.lat.2867,
12. Vat.lat.2896,
13. Vat.lat.2898,
14. Vat.lat.2899,
15. Vat.lat.2906 (Upgraded to HQ), 15th-century humanist compilation with Pseudo-Cicero, Livy, Antonio Beccadelli, Leonardo Bruni, Lucio da Visso, four letters of Bartolomeo Facio, etc. With an incipit that runs right around the page,
16. Vat.lat.2911,
17. Vat.lat.2913,
18. Vat.lat.2915 (Upgraded to HQ),
19. Vat.lat.2919,
20. Vat.lat.2922,
21. Vat.lat.2925,
22. Vat.lat.2933,
23. Vat.lat.2935,
24. Vat.lat.2939 (Upgraded to HQ),
25. Vat.lat.2941,
26. Vat.lat.2942,
27. Vat.lat.2960,
28. Vat.lat.2964,
29. Vat.lat.2968 (Upgraded to HQ),
30. Vat.lat.2969 (Upgraded to HQ),
31. Vat.lat.2974 (Upgraded to HQ), Latin translation by Jacopo Angelo of Ptolemy's Cosmographia (8 books), sadly without maps
32. Vat.lat.2975 (Upgraded to HQ), a 16th-century translation of works of the Arab scientist Ibn al-Haytham or Al Hazen. eTK has the incipit Ostendam quid sit crepusculum. With drawings of his optics:
     
33. Vat.lat.2982 (Upgraded to HQ), a well-worn and much-annotated Boethius (above)
34. Vat.lat.2984,

    Aristotle, De somno et vigilia, translatio vetus. Nice initial: she is sleeping while he lies wide awake! From the newest images @DigitaVaticana, as always listed by @JBPiggin, to whom we are truly thankful!https://t.co/XXL0LhC4oR pic.twitter.com/6n6U8Yj6Qt

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) April 17, 2018

35. Vat.lat.2987,

    Coming back to the Aristotelians in last week's @DigitaVaticana listed by @JBPiggin. Translation of the Physica by Andrea Biglia, Augustinian hermit (+ 1435).https://t.co/TBLHuTE0ks pic.twitter.com/eCp8GNTHus

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) April 22, 2018

36. Vat.lat.3120,
37. Vat.lat.3125,
38. Vat.lat.3128,

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 158. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

The Red Hat Man

My favourite subject of Renaissance/Early Modern painting in art museums is Jerome of Stridon, who you always recognize instantly from the red hat that he either wears or has hanging on a hat peg. Reklams Lexikon der Heiligen says it was only in the 15th century that the legend arose that Jerome had been a cardinal no less of the Holy Roman Church. From then on, that cardinal's hat was a must.

An illumination in a 15th-century (?) Vatican manuscript digitized in the past week, Vat.lat.2277, gives Jerome the full hat treatment, plus a messy desk covered with his codices and scrolls to translate the Bible into Latin, a fanciful 5th century Holy Land scene outside and a golden halo:

An older legend, first documented in 615 according to Reklams Lexikon, has it that Jerome helped a raging and distressed lion by removing a thorn from its paw. The illumination shows a remarkably calm lion accepting a fix from Jerome's manuscript knife, while the monastery donkey pops its head around the corner to bray. Look up the donkey's story if you haven't read it before. It's quite baroque.

There are 23 new manuscripts on the Digita Vaticana site:

1. Chig.H.VIII.248, Cicero, Rhetorica de Oratore
2. Vat.lat.2175, Petri de Ebano, Problemata Aristotlensis

   One day after my visit to Padova, its famous son Pietro d'Abano turns up in @JBPiggin's list of MSS @DigitaVaticana. MS of his expositio of the pseudo-Aristotelian Problemata.https://t.co/vS5UwleDIj pic.twitter.com/UVwZcj2qGU

   — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) April 9, 2018

3. Vat.lat.2232, 14th century manuscript of Iohannes Andreae, c.1270-1348 Novella on the Decretals of Gregory
4. Vat.lat.2234, ditto
5. Vat.lat.2277, Johannes de Imola on the Decretals of Gregory (above)
6. Vat.lat.2306 (Upgraded to HQ), Gulielmi Rayotis, Compendium Summae Confessorum
7. Vat.lat.2765, Horace
8. Vat.lat.2832, Andria, a comedy by Terence adapted from a Greek play by Menander. Explicit: "valete et plaudite Caliopius recensui". Bibliography (as of 2018-04-09) mistakenly points to a work dealing with Vat.lat.2382.
9. Vat.lat.2838, poetry by Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503), humanist and poet from the Duchy of Spoleto: autograph from the library of Angelo Colocci
10. Vat.lat.2847, Latin poetry, first item by Jacopo Sannazaro
11. Vat.lat.2854 (Upgraded to HQ),
12. Vat.lat.2860 (Upgraded to HQ),
13. Vat.lat.2870, poetry of Antonio Flaminio, see tweet below
14. Vat.lat.2886 (Upgraded to HQ), Cicero, De officiis
15. Vat.lat.2888, Cicero, De officiis, heavily annotated in the 14th century. The endpapers are from a 12th or 13th century manuscript of the Institutions of Justinian

    Studying can be boring... until you meet a "Smiley-Q" looking at you!
    
    Vat. lat. 2888, 14th C., Marcus Tullius Cicero, De officiis lib. I-III; Vat. lat. 2870, 15th-16th C., Antonio Biaxander (Antonio Flaminio or Flaminio Siculo), collection of poems. #LatestDigitizedManuscripts pic.twitter.com/4kNU2pXjzy

    — Digita Vaticana (@DigitaVaticana) April 9, 2018

16. Vat.lat.2907, Cicero, Philippic Orations, also with old lawbooks as endpapers, and this wild overblown initial A:
    
17. Vat.lat.2914, on rhetoric
18. Vat.lat.2923 (Upgraded to HQ), Juan de Segovia
19. Vat.lat.2931,
20. Vat.lat.2932, Philodoxeos fabulae
21. Vat.lat.2965, Tacitus
22. Vat.lat.2966,
23. Vat.lat.2980, Boethius: Latin translation of Aristotle's Categoriae (?), plus Boethius De Interpretatione, according to Nils Galindo-Sjöberg's list. Heavily annotated by a previous owner who also did stemmatic drawings at the front.
    

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 157. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Gore in Church

Book of hours were commercial products, where the illuminators aimed to attract buyers with miniatures of either beauty or excitement. An interesting aspect of these prayerbooks is that some contain the most gory images. This week's list of digitizations features Ott.lat.548, which is a book of hours in the Flemish style.

Savour its images which include a butcher about to catch and kill a pig and a scary scene where the king of England's thugs are about to kill Thomas Becket in the cathedral at Canterbury:

According to Morello, that BoH is Use of Sarum and Calendar of Lincoln, though made in Flanders

— AaronM (@gundormr) April 3, 2018

Book of Hours (end of 15th C.) illuminated in Flanders for the English trade. The illustration of the Calendar includes the signs of the zodiac arranged in medallions, and agricultural scenes depicting the activities of the individual months. #April 🌷🌼🌸 https://t.co/CKsvXLXbx1 pic.twitter.com/MDQZCGnQa2

— Digita Vaticana (@DigitaVaticana) April 4, 2018

@DigitaVaticana https://t.co/W2BGudBDck.165 is the newest BoH added, Use of Sarum but calendar for Lincoln. Messy calendar, versos of July and Sept. are wrong by a day. In Aug. Vigil but no feast for Assumption. July also missing 27th (f.10v)#medievaltwitter (h/t @JBPiggin ) pic.twitter.com/p8yoy7q2fN

— CoKL Database (@cokldb) April 4, 2018

In all, we have 23 new items to enjoy:

1. Ott.lat.548, a book of hours (above)
2. Vat.lat.519.pt.2,
3. Vat.lat.1951.pt.2, Plinii Naturalis Historiae in a Renaissance codex of high value. This part starts Liber XII. I. Animalium omnium
4. Vat.lat.2233, 14th century, finely illuminated Apparatus in Sextum Bonifatii VIII of
   Iohannes Andreae, c.1270-1348
   
5. Vat.lat.2333,
6. Vat.lat.2760,
7. Vat.lat.2842, Giovanni Pontano
8. Vat.lat.2861,
9. Vat.lat.2880 (Upgraded to HQ), a 15th-century mixture of Cicero, various Quaestiones on Aristotle and a text by John of Saxony, incipit "Istam propositionem scribit Ptolomeus in sapientiis Almagesti..." Here is an astrological diagram:
   
   

   Also in @JBPiggin's list of freshly digitized MSS @DigitaVaticana, this collection of commentaries on Aristotle's Parva Naturalia (here the opening of the section on the Physiognomia).https://t.co/7pqh0yk0hB pic.twitter.com/6N21sZfpN8

   — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) April 3, 2018

10. Vat.lat.2890, 15th century Cicero, De officiis
11. Vat.lat.2900, Rhetoricam ad Herennium, heavily glossed, 14th century
12. Vat.lat.2910, Cicero and Leonardi Bruni translation of Plato
13. Vat.lat.2912 (Upgraded to HQ), an album of classic writers in a peculiar high-oblong format
14. Vat.lat.2916,
15. Vat.lat.2918 (Upgraded to HQ), Giovanni Gatti of Messina
16. Vat.lat.2921 (Upgraded to HQ),
17. Vat.lat.2926 (Upgraded to HQ), George of Trebizond, translations of Plato, etc.

    Autograph copy of a letter by humanist scholar & translator Georges of Trebizond to Guarino Veronese. HT @JBPiggin https://t.co/z1QmRib9HV pic.twitter.com/sSdWRJc3ww

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) April 3, 2018

18. Vat.lat.2929, Marsilio Ficino, commentary on Plato
19. Vat.lat.2934.pt.1, Ficino and others, Plato etc.
20. Vat.lat.2944,
21. Vat.lat.2959, chronica, including list of French kings on last folio
22. Vat.lat.3393, LQ
23. Vat.lat.8171 (Upgraded to HQ), a catalog of the Reginensis collection by Vatican librarian Lucas Holstenius (1596-1661)

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 156. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Cicero Codex , Key to Roman Idea of Cognition

Graeco-Roman science was often contrary to experimental science, but its landmark observations on visual memory were mostly right. We know this thanks to an ancient codex which contained the barely legible but complete text of De Oratore by the Roman orator Cicero and was discovered in 1421 in Lodi, Italy, lent out to humanists and-- incredibly-- had vanished forever by 1425.

Only one direct copy of this lost Codex Laudensis (L) made during those four years exists. As our Easter present, the Vatican Library has just digitized Vat.lat.2901 (V) and placed it online.

Cicero mentions the science of visual perception while introducing the palace-of-memory method of memorizing what to say whenever you are speaking without notes. He starts by quoting the generally correct view of cognitive science of his own day that the keenest of all our senses is the sense of sight (acerrimum autem ex omnibus nostris sensibus esse sensum videndi -- Cicero, De Oratore II, 357.)

He develops from this the method to leverage your visual memory, a method of which he was not the inventor, but becomes a precious witness. It starts with the observation that:

... perceptions received by the ears or by reflection can be most easily retained in the mind if they are also conveyed to our minds by the mediation of the eyes ... (2.357: qua re facillime animo teneri posse ea, quae perciperentur auribus aut cogitatione, si etiam commendatione oculorum animis traderentur).

He then describes what we would now call gist memory:

... with the result that things not seen and not lying in the field of visual discernment are earmarked by a sort of outline and image and shape so that we keep hold of (as it were by an act of sight) things that we can scarcely embrace by an act of thought. (Ut res caecas et ab aspectus iudicio remotas conformatio quaedam et imago et figura ita notaret, ut ea, quae cogitando complecti vix possemus, intuendo quasi teneremus).

And then segues over to what we would call spatial perception and memory, pointing out its role in combination with the somewhat different visual memory.

But these forms and bodies, like all the things that come under our view require an abode, inasmuch as a material object without a locality is inconceivable. (2.358:  His autem formis atque corporibus, sicut omnibus, quae sub aspectum veniunt, [admonetur memoria nostra atque excitatur;] sede opus est, etenim corpus intellegi sine loco non potest.

The method of memorizing, which he attributes to the legendary Greek orator Simonides, is to imagine a familiar place and stock it in your imagination with visual marker tags for things you want to remember. The technique is still being taught nowadays. Here's the place, folio 53v, where it is set out:

The above text was also preserved in a lost Carolingian manuscript, known as M, but none of the copies of M existing today is a direct one, which is to say they are copies of copies (of copies).

V is one of 63 manuscripts just released online. Here is the full list:

1. Barb.lat.298,
2. Ott.lat.3368,
3. Reg.lat.846 (Upgraded to HQ), 9th century, from France, possibly theTours region; provenance Paris, St. Sulpice. One of the codices containing (fols. 106v-107r) a fascinating little text on the origin of the name Adam: it says that Adam was created from earth brought by the four archangels from the four corners of the world, sprinkled with water from the four rivers of Paradise, inspired by the four winds, and named after the four stars. Hence the four letters of his name. Charles Wright, creator of wonderful medieval manuscript surveys, has just published an article about this in The Embroidered Bible: Studies in Biblical Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in Honour of Michael E. Stone, eds Lorenzo DiTommaso, Matthias Henze, William Adler (ISBN: 9789004355880).
   
4. Reg.lat.2123,
5. Urb.lat.1251 (Upgraded to HQ),
6. Vat.lat.858.pt.1,
7. Vat.lat.858.pt.2,
8. Vat.lat.936,
9. Vat.lat.1473.pt.1,
10. Vat.lat.1473.pt.2,
11. Vat.lat.2169,

    Relative drought of Aristotelian material in @JBPiggin's latest list of MS @DigitaVaticana. Sententia on the Ethics by Henry of Friemar (Henricus de Alemania), an Augustinian hermit from the first part of the 14th c.https://t.co/yuDaHlbWSK pic.twitter.com/U7dN2SbMjY

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) March 25, 2018

12. Vat.lat.2212,
13. Vat.lat.2231,
14. Vat.lat.2244,
15. Vat.lat.2325,
16. Vat.lat.2330,
17. Vat.lat.2413,
18. Vat.lat.2517,
19. Vat.lat.2666 (Upgraded to HQ),
20. Vat.lat.2683,
21. Vat.lat.2688,
22. Vat.lat.2738,
23. Vat.lat.2739,
24. Vat.lat.2747,
25. Vat.lat.2749,
26. Vat.lat.2769,
27. Vat.lat.2775,
28. Vat.lat.2782 (Upgraded to HQ),
29. Vat.lat.2788,
30. Vat.lat.2798,
31. Vat.lat.2799,
32. Vat.lat.2801,
33. Vat.lat.2802,
34. Vat.lat.2807,
35. Vat.lat.2811,
36. Vat.lat.2812,
37. Vat.lat.2813,
38. Vat.lat.2814,
39. Vat.lat.2817,
40. Vat.lat.2819,
41. Vat.lat.2820,
42. Vat.lat.2824,
43. Vat.lat.2825,

    Not simply is this one of the earliest copies of the pseudo-#MacerFloridus, but it has a bonus: a list of medical texts. "Hi sunt libri medicinȩ. Panthechin. M[a]gategn. Liber febrium. Liber aureus. Passionarius. Antidotarius. Liber oculorum. Liber coitus. Liber urinarum. ... pic.twitter.com/tLRj2V2P8Z

    — Constantinus Africanus (@EgoConstantinus) March 25, 2018

44. Vat.lat.2826,
45. Vat.lat.2827,
46. Vat.lat.2829 (Upgraded to HQ),
47. Vat.lat.2831,
48. Vat.lat.2843 (Upgraded to HQ),
49. Vat.lat.2845, With incipit: Plato tria arbitratur esse rerum initia; author: Laurentius Miniatensis Bonincontri. See eTK
50. Vat.lat.2850 (Upgraded to HQ),
51. Vat.lat.2852,
52. Vat.lat.2862 (Upgraded to HQ),
53. Vat.lat.2865,
54. Vat.lat.2874 (Upgraded to HQ),
55. Vat.lat.2875,
56. Vat.lat.2881,
57. Vat.lat.2885,
58. Vat.lat.2892,
59. Vat.lat.2897,
60. Vat.lat.2901, key source of Cicero, De Oratore, manuscript V(above)
61. Vat.lat.2903 (Upgraded to HQ),
62. Vat.lat.2905 (Upgraded to HQ),
63. Vat.lat.2937,
64. Vat.lat.2943,
65. Vat.lat.2948,
66. Vat.lat.2949 (Upgraded to HQ),
67. Vat.lat.3024 (Upgraded to HQ),
68. Vat.lat.3077,

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 155. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Bruges Book of Hours in Color

The Bruges Book of Hours, Ross. 94 at the Vatican Library, has just arrived online in color, after previously only being accessible in indistinct black and white. It is so exquisite that Belser Verlag of Zurich printed a facsimile of it in 1983. It is thought to have been illuminated by three separate artists because of stylistic differences, but neither they nor their customer have been identified.

One of the early 16th-century artists worked on the full-page miniatures. Here is an image of the Massacre of the Innocents with gold leaf in the margins:

The other two worked on the initials and on the bordures, such as the fanciful bird and the young of a wild boar snatching green acorns below:

The Vatican Library digital portal seems to have only three new items this week, all upgrades from black and white. The list:

1. Reg.gr.107 (Upgraded to HQ), Porphyry and the philosophical works of Aristotle in the original Greek. See Pinakes
2. Reg.gr.116 (Upgraded to HQ), see Pinakes. Contains a logical diagram in a discussion of Aristotle. The Cambridge Intellectual History of Byzantium (eds Anthony Kaldellis, Niketas Siniossoglou) says the explanation of the diagram (first below) in the Prior Analytics is attributed to an otherwise Alousianos:
   
   
   
   
3. Ross.94 (Upgraded to HQ), above

   Ross 94 appears to be liturgical Use of Rome with a calendar for Bruges

   — AaronM (@gundormr) March 18, 2018

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 154. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Man is an Animal

On the frontispiece of his Latin translation of Aristotle's Historia animalium, Theodore Gaza asked the miniaturist to paint Aristotle as scriba naturae, the scribe of nature.

We see the great Greek philosopher seated at a desk as many species wait to tell him their history. Foremost are a specimen man and woman, along with a monkey, dog, ass, deer, pair of sheep, dragon, bear, camel, ox, lion, horse and elephant plus sundry fish and small animals in the foreground.

The manuscript, Vat.lat.2094, was presented to Pope Sixtus IV, probably in 1473 according to John Monfasani in a wonderful article about the philosophical discord surrounding it. The codex has just arrived online in full color at the Vatican Library's digital portal after previously being only accessible in muddy grey.

Gaza was supposedly appalled to be given the miserly papal fee of 50 ducats for his translation and allegedly threw the money in the Tiber in rage, then departed to Greek-speaking Apulia to die. But (see pages 498-503) ...

[QT] ... Theodore Gaza's presentation copy of Aristotle's zoological works in Latin (Vat. lat. 2094). Allan Gotthelf [and] I wrote an article in which we showed the story of the 50 ducats to be a myth! https://t.co/3IPueJWlD2
— Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) March 11, 2018

I doubt if the couple in the picture are Adam and Eve as sometimes claimed. The notion of man as an animal species goes back long before before Darwin. Aristotle had no doubt about this matter, uncomfortable as it is for some people. The History of Animals explicitly treats humans as part of the subject and the miniaturist (several candidates are mentioned by Monfasani) puts this front and centre.

The dedication shows Gaza hard at work, sitting at what looks somewhat like the prisoner-made tubular steel desks that I remember from my school days. Whether the skinny legs of desks in the Quattrocento were in fact of turned wood or wrought iron is a matter beyond my ken.

For more about this celebrated manuscript, see the Rome Reborn catalog, where Anthony Grafton draws attention to the medal depicting the Ponte Sisto, a Rome bridge to be put up as part of Sixtus's construction program. The codex also contains De partibus animalium and De generatione animalium by Aristotle. The dedication also features in John Murdoch's Album of Science as image number 159.

One more subject of interest is a unicorn lurking in the picture. It is the shaggy thing behind the horse and the elephant's tusks. For a most interesting account by a zoologist of what a unicorn might have been, read the article by Chris Lavers (PDF download at Duke), 'The Ancients' One-Horned Ass'.

A total of 53 digitizations have appeared this week. Here is the full list:

1. Barb.lat.2711,
2. Chig.H.VIII.250 (Upgraded to HQ),
3. Ott.lat.441 (Upgraded to HQ),
4. Ott.lat.1400,
5. Ott.lat.1662 (Upgraded to HQ),
6. Ott.lat.1777 (Upgraded to HQ),
7. Ott.lat.1787 (Upgraded to HQ),
8. Ott.lat.2041 (Upgraded to HQ),
9. Ott.lat.2110 (Upgraded to HQ),
10. Ott.lat.3091 (Upgraded to HQ),

    Also seen in @JBPiggin's list: is this a handwritten prototype of Cappelli's Dizionario? Look for the τελωσ on f. 7r! https://t.co/U0Fp8LHSuj
    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) March 11, 2018

11. Reg.lat.27 (Upgraded to HQ),
12. Reg.lat.453 (Upgraded to HQ),
13. Reg.lat.612 (Upgraded to HQ),
14. Reg.lat.703.pt.1 (Upgraded to HQ),
15. Reg.lat.809,
16. Reg.lat.1249,
17. Reg.lat.1479 (Upgraded to HQ),
18. Reg.lat.1958 (Upgraded to HQ),

    Latin version of Avicenna's commentary on Aristotle's Physica @DigitaVaticana
    HT @JBPiggin https://t.co/BZeIe5vtzF pic.twitter.com/CpvS67S0fj
    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) March 11, 2018

19. Vat.lat.454.pt.1,
20. Vat.lat.937,
21. Vat.lat.2094 (Upgraded to HQ), Historia animalium, De partibus animalium, De generatione animalium by Aristotle in the Theodore Gaza translation (above). Richly decorated, as in this fine initial M:
    
    
22. Vat.lat.2274 (Upgraded to HQ),
23. Vat.lat.2328,
24. Vat.lat.2334,
25. Vat.lat.2366 (Upgraded to HQ), a 15th-century medical manuscript including Avicenna: Lectura super I at ff. 94ra-132vb.
26. Vat.lat.2434 (Upgraded to HQ),
27. Vat.lat.2435,

    Latin version of Averroes' commentary on Aristotle's Physica @DigitaVaticana
    Spot the difference with the previous tweet!
    HT @JBPiggin https://t.co/j7rdLFxqib pic.twitter.com/LGH9TX5aVA

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) March 11, 2018

28. Vat.lat.2737,
29. Vat.lat.2741,
30. Vat.lat.2742 (Upgraded to HQ),
31. Vat.lat.2744,
32. Vat.lat.2750,
33. Vat.lat.2753,
34. Vat.lat.2755,
35. Vat.lat.2756,
36. Vat.lat.2757,
37. Vat.lat.2758,
38. Vat.lat.2776,
39. Vat.lat.2792,
40. Vat.lat.2794 (Upgraded to HQ),
41. Vat.lat.2805,
42. Vat.lat.2810,
43. Vat.lat.2815,
44. Vat.lat.2816,
45. Vat.lat.2823,
46. Vat.lat.2841,
47. Vat.lat.2859,
48. Vat.lat.2866,
49. Vat.lat.2872,
50. Vat.lat.2877 (Upgraded to HQ),
51. Vat.lat.2891,
52. Vat.lat.2894,
53. Vat.lat.6214,

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 153. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Beullens, Pieter, and Allan Gotthelf. "Theodore Gaza’s translation of Aristotle’s De Animalibus: content, influence, and date." Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 47, no. 4 (2007): 469-513. http://openpublishing.library.duke.edu/index.php/grbs/article/viewFile/761/841

Monfasani, John. "Aristotle as Scribe of Nature: The Title-Page of MS Vat. Lat. 2094." Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 69 (2006): 193-205. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40025844.

Rescue Archaeology

Pirro Ligorio (1512-1582), an Italian architect, painter and garden designer during the Renaissance, made a lasting contribution to history by recording what we might now call "rescue archaeology," the quick and dirty examination of earthed remains before they are scoured out for construction and dumped.

Copies of books 3 and 4 of his antiquarian notes, Ott.lat.3366 and Ott.lat.3367, have just come online at the Vatican Library portal. He was accused in his day of faking records, though controversy continues about whether this was fair. His records are hugely important, since much of what he recorded was later swept away. Here are images of how to armour a fist and of a palace:

This week there are a total of 18 new items:

1. Ott.lat.3366, notes by Pirro Ligorio (above)
2. Ott.lat.3367, Ligorio, book 4
3. Vat.lat.2302, Summa of Raymond of Peñafort
4. Vat.lat.2398, medical, translated from the Arabic of Razi, with this fine presentation initial:
   
5. Vat.lat.2714 (Upgraded to HQ), Orthographia of Gasparino Barzizza
6. Vat.lat.2715, massively annotated Priscian
7. Vat.lat.2754,
8. Vat.lat.2763,
9. Vat.lat.2764,
10. Vat.lat.2767,
11. Vat.lat.2787 (Upgraded to HQ), Ovid
12. Vat.lat.2790,
13. Vat.lat.2795 (Upgraded to HQ), Claudianus, 15th-century codex
14. Vat.lat.2800,
15. Vat.lat.2808,
16. Vat.lat.2809,
17. Vat.lat.2828,
18. Vat.lat.2936, Leonardo Bruni

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 152. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Latin and Visualization

In Latin, the classic justification for visualization usually argues that verbalization may not be enough to explain complex topics. One of these texts has just shown up on the Vatican Library online portal in connection with an arbor juris diagram in a law textbook, Vat.lat.2707:

Quod si non fuerint aures tibi sufficientes
Aspiciant oculi sic designata legentes.

The idea on this bit of doggerel is that what won't go in your ears might well reach your understanding via your eyes. The oldest mention of this idea goes back to Cassiodorus (see my webpage about him). The verse is written in this 12th century manuscript of the Decretum abbreviatum at the head of a page to introduce a diagram of kinship:

The diagram is of considerable interest in itself. Its layout is classified as Schadt Type 5 (see my handbook to the types) and it is notable for having a double "self" (the little busts at the centre: perhaps implying the legal subject may sometimes be female) and for eliminating one degree of lateral kinship (it leaves the ultimate cousin squares blank).

In all 63 new manuscripts came online in the past week:

1. Barb.lat.2161,
2. Barb.lat.3981,
3. Chig.C.IV.109, a beautiful book of hours
   

   Chig.C.IV.109 is almost certainly mid 15th C from Paris.

   — AaronM (@gundormr) February 25, 2018

4. Ott.lat.2453.pt.A, a newspaper-style news-of-the-past-year summary from 1644: Diario Venentiano Sopra L'Anno. Not great journalism though: the reporter often notes just the weather:
   
5. Vat.lat.2179,
6. Vat.lat.2332,
7. Vat.lat.2396 (Upgraded to HQ),
8. Vat.lat.2422,
9. Vat.lat.2494 (Upgraded to HQ),
10. Vat.lat.2501,
11. Vat.lat.2565,
12. Vat.lat.2575,
13. Vat.lat.2577,
14. Vat.lat.2614,
15. Vat.lat.2643,
16. Vat.lat.2647,
17. Vat.lat.2648 (Upgraded to HQ),
18. Vat.lat.2654,
19. Vat.lat.2660 (Upgraded to HQ),
20. Vat.lat.2661,
21. Vat.lat.2665,
22. Vat.lat.2677,
23. Vat.lat.2685,
24. Vat.lat.2687 (Upgraded to HQ),
25. Vat.lat.2689,
26. Vat.lat.2691 (Upgraded to HQ),
27. Vat.lat.2693 (Upgraded to HQ),
28. Vat.lat.2699,
29. Vat.lat.2701,
30. Vat.lat.2706,
31. Vat.lat.2707, a law book (above). See Schadt, Hermann, Die Darstellung der Arbores Consanguinatis, pp 148, 150, 192

    In this list figures Val. Lat. 2707, a manuscript with the Decretum Gratiani, has been digitized, not just "a law book", but influential from the mid-twelfth century up to 1917 https://t.co/QK2J0SnQzX

    — GlossaeIuris (@GlossaeIuris) February 27, 2018

32. Vat.lat.2708,
33. Vat.lat.2709,
34. Vat.lat.2710 (Upgraded to HQ),
35. Vat.lat.2713 (Upgraded to HQ),
36. Vat.lat.2716,
37. Vat.lat.2717,
38. Vat.lat.2718,
39. Vat.lat.2723,
40. Vat.lat.2727 (Upgraded to HQ),
41. Vat.lat.2728,
42. Vat.lat.2729,
43. Vat.lat.2732,
44. Vat.lat.2736,
45. Vat.lat.2740 (Upgraded to HQ),
46. Vat.lat.2743,
47. Vat.lat.2746,
48. Vat.lat.2748,
49. Vat.lat.2751,
50. Vat.lat.2762,
51. Vat.lat.2768,
52. Vat.lat.2770,
53. Vat.lat.2771,
54. Vat.lat.2773,
55. Vat.lat.2778,
56. Vat.lat.2779,
57. Vat.lat.2786,
58. Vat.lat.2796,
59. Vat.lat.2797,
60. Vat.lat.2887,
61. Vat.lat.2938,
62. Vat.lat.2986,

    Aristotle, Physica, tr. Georgius Trapezuntius. Seeing double? H/T @JBPiggin https://t.co/qaqa2ln5F9https://t.co/7I6jZkxP6c pic.twitter.com/OyBCGi5O2D

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) February 26, 2018

63. Vat.turc.218,

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 151. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Dead Monk Tweets

One of the more charming features of Twitter is its voices of the past, and a favorite of mine is Constantinus Africanus, who introduces himself thus: "Native Tunisian. Merchant-turned-monk. Medical translator (from Arabic) and editor. Cultural influencer. Died 22 Dec., before 1098/99."

To expand on that a little, Constantine was a Christian from Tunisia who spent the final part of his life as a Benedictine at Monte Cassino Abbey in Italy. As a translator of the medical greats, he helped change the course of primitive western medicine. So he does have an affinity with today's social media hepcats.

I can't understand how Constantine is still writing 920 years after his death, but it's possible he is getting social-media coaching from a digital humanities hero, Professor Monica H. Green of Arizona State University. So far Constantine has just 188 Twitter followers and he really needs a boost, considering all the hard work he put into making people well. So hop over to Twitter and follow him.

Incidentally, Constantine's work shows up in at least two of the seven codices digitized by the Vatican Library this week:

1. Vat.lat.649, a 12th-century Haymo of Halberstadt: In Epistolas Pauli omnes on the epistles. Here's an initial for De Virginibus praeceptum:
   
2. Vat.lat.2132 (Upgraded to HQ), Paul of Venice on logic
3. Vat.lat.2416 (Upgraded to HQ), a densely written 14th-century compendium of mainly Arab medicine, including fols. 51v-55v: Constantinus Africanus, De stomachi affectionibus liber, cap. 1-25. eTK lists incipits: Abaseph id est puncti III; Alasef id est puncti rubei
4. Vat.lat.2424, the Brevarium, a medical work, by Yahya ibn Sarafyun (9th century) a Syriac physician, known in Europe as Johannes Serapion
5. Vat.lat.2441, medicines
6. Vat.lat.2454, 14th-century compilation of translations by Constantine Africanus
7. Vat.lat.2940, a 15th-century student's compendium with everything from Cicero and Pliny to Boccaccio

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 150. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

William of Moerbeke

William of Moerbeke (Wikipedia), a Flemish Dominican, translated many Greek classics into Latin in the 13th century. His work, essential to Europe's appreciation of Aristotle, is well represented in the Vatican Library. Reader @LatinAristotle has pointed out many of these in recent months.

This week they have been joined by Vat lat 2083, an illuminated full-price manuscript dated 1284 and thus scribed during William's lifetime. It contains various Aristotle texts, including On Coming to Be and Passing Away, with this thoroughly appropriate couple in bed as the opening initial.

This week's digitization effort seems to have been rather feeble, with just 17 new items:

1. Ott.lat.3364,
2. Ott.lat.3365,
3. Patetta.1749,
4. Vat.lat.2083, a William of Moerbeke translation of Aristotle (above), dated 1284

   Although the MS was written less than two decades after the completion of the translations, it already has the composition and the order of the "Corpus recentius", which would be the standard text book to teach Aristotle for two centuries!

   — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) February 11, 2018

5. Vat.lat.2160,
6. Vat.lat.2343 (Upgraded to HQ), law commentaries
7. Vat.lat.2458,

   And another newMS of @EgoConstantinus from @DigitaVaticana. (And again, h/t to @JBPiggin.) This is Constantine's translation of Hunayn ibn Ishaq'd treatise on the eyes. Here, Constantine's original prologue is missing. Vatican, BAV, Vat. lat. 2458, f. 1r: https://t.co/atSt0P58d7 pic.twitter.com/XqN1iEbB0e

   — Constantinus Africanus (@EgoConstantinus) February 12, 2018

8. Vat.lat.2461, Galen and Hippocrates in Latin (14th century). One text inc. Intentiones habemus in presenti conscriptione; see eTK

   More @EgoConstantinus from @DigitaVaticana, w/ thanks to @JBPiggin for notice. This week, another #Articella collection, this one from 14thC and very, very densely annotated. Citation: Vatican, BAV Vat. lat. 2461, f. 1r, opening of Johannitius, Isagoge: https://t.co/JS4wO1wzKc pic.twitter.com/HnKWmE5T1k

   — Constantinus Africanus (@EgoConstantinus) February 12, 2018

9. Vat.lat.2508,
10. Vat.lat.2573,
11. Vat.lat.2642,
12. Vat.lat.2664,
13. Vat.lat.2711,
14. Vat.lat.2712 (Upgraded to HQ), Servius Grammaticus on Vergil. Odd: a page from a printed Greek book has been used to stiffen the front board of the binding.
15. Vat.lat.2726 (Upgraded to HQ), Leonardo Bruni
16. Vat.lat.2884,
17. Vat.lat.2909, a 13th-century Cicero

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 149. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Wellness Database

Health tips for laypeople have been one of my minor journalistic lines of business, so I was delighted to see a manuscript of the Tacuinum Sanitatis arrive online in full color this week on the Vatican Library portal. Vat.lat.2427 could be described as a wellness database, with a 380-row lookup table to check compatibility between foods and ailments.

It did not serve to educate doctors, but rather to inform wealthy patients who desired to second-guess their doctors. It is based on the Taqwīm as‑siḥḥah تقويم الصحة ("Maintenance of Health"), an 11th-century Arab medical treatise by a Christian doctor of Baghdad, Ibn Butlan. See Wikipedia.

This and its companion codex Vat.lat.2426 (both date from the 14th century) arrange all this tabular material in pretty red-and-blue lattices:

This presentation seems to pre-date the absolute de-luxe versions that started coming out in Italy in about 1380 with lushly painted miniatures of country life, gardens and stately homes, the lifestyle edition so to speak.

In all there are 41 new manuscripts at the Library portal:

1. Barb.lat.2653,
2. Barb.lat.2814, diary 1582-89
3. Reg.lat.77,
4. Reg.lat.78,
5. Reg.lat.104, Petrus Lombardus, Glossae continuae. eTK makes a mistake in indicating this codex contains Gynaecia, incipit Cum in Alexandria sum certatus cum auctoritatibus, at ff. 94v-99v. Reader @monicaMedHist says this is probably an error in eTK for Reg. lat. 1004, which does indeed have a text on women's medicine (Genecia) attributed to "Actius Justius."
6. Reg.lat.1561,
7. Reg.lat.1636,
8. Urb.lat.122,
9. Urb.lat.190,

   New in the list of @DigitaVaticana by @JBPiggin: works of the Dominican author Albert the Great. The copyist adds his own name in the colophon: "noua ec(c)l(es)ia".https://t.co/Nk3W4LbLGM pic.twitter.com/JX7XYkUqSD

   — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) February 5, 2018

10. Vat.lat.1136,
11. Vat.lat.1313,
12. Vat.lat.2079,
13. Vat.lat.2216,
14. Vat.lat.2318,
15. Vat.lat.2319,
16. Vat.lat.2384 (Upgraded to HQ), medieval Latin Galen. Note the much earlier ms used for an endpaper
17. Vat.lat.2390,

    Never particularly lovely to begin with, and now rather sad in its present state, this latest among the digitized collections of Galenica in @DigitaVaticana gives us a sense of the value of such a compendium of ancient authority. Here is the opening of @EgoConstantinus's .. 1/n pic.twitter.com/CuSRoI0CP3

    — Constantinus Africanus (@EgoConstantinus) February 9, 2018

18. Vat.lat.2417, Creavit deus ex concavitatibus cordis sinistram; by Avicenna. See eTK
19. Vat.lat.2427 (Upgraded to HQ), Tacuinum Sanitatis, popular medieval health guide (above).
20. Vat.lat.2433,
21. Vat.lat.2438,

    Another important Moerbeke MS in @JBPiggin's list: one of only three copies of his partial translation of John Philoponus' lost commentary on Aristotle's "De anima" III,4-8. (1/4)https://t.co/P0bOSvUSAf pic.twitter.com/7FpWpFYwEC

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) February 7, 2018

22. Vat.lat.2447,
23. Vat.lat.2449, Cum quidem iam pervenimus ad expositionem egritudinum (14c); De egritudinibus. See eTK
24. Vat.lat.2495,
25. Vat.lat.2548 (Upgraded to HQ), Bernardus Compostelanus, m. 1267 Apparatus in Decretales, 14th-century copy
26. Vat.lat.2572,
27. Vat.lat.2576,
28. Vat.lat.2581,
29. Vat.lat.2584,
30. Vat.lat.2585,
31. Vat.lat.2586,
32. Vat.lat.2588,
33. Vat.lat.2590,
34. Vat.lat.2615,
35. Vat.lat.2625 (Upgraded to HQ), Bartolus de Saxoferrato
36. Vat.lat.2673,
37. Vat.lat.2676,
38. Vat.lat.2692, 13th-century law textbook which contains an analysis of the Iuris Canonici. For diagram history this is interesting, as fol. 50r includes a passage explaining the use of an arbor juris in working out degrees of kinship. Mentioned by Schadt in his Darstellungen der Arbores Consanguinatis.
39. Vat.lat.2733,
40. Vat.lat.5256 (Upgraded to HQ), Odorico da Pordonone, in Italian
41. Vat.lat.13358,

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 148. Thanks to @gundormr for harvesting. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.

Exultet Roll

The Vatican Collection's Exultet Roll, one of the great treasures of medieval southern Italian illumination, has just been digitized and placed online. Vat.lat.3784 was made at the Abbey of Monte Cassino in the period 1058-87 for use in the Easter Vigil liturgy under Abbot Desiderius.

It's not the only one - half a dozen Cassinese rolls have survived - but it is celebrated for the magnificence of its text and its drawings of angels and the rising of Christ.

Digitization programs tend to pass over scrolls because they are difficult to scan, so I am pleased the Vatican librarians chose this one and hope they bring out more rolls for the digitizers in the next few months. You will notice that the text is inverted with respect to the pictures. The digitization shows the images right side up. I have inverted one image with "Gaudeat et tantis tellus irradiata fulgoribus..." where you can see an angel standing on his head:

Examine the roll closely, and you'll find the explanation why. As the deacon reads from the roll, he slides its top end over the edge of the lectern to hang down for the congregation to see:

This blog post would not have been complete without heroic help from a reader, Aaron Macks (@gundormr on Twitter), who responded to my cry for help a week ago. I monitor the Vatican Library website with Distill, a simple scraper that is an extension to the Firefox ESR browser. The huge size of the Vat.lat index now defeats it, so @gundormr offered to write a script/program that would do the job.

This custom script not only works like a charm. It also picks up items that have been upgraded from low quality microfilm to high-quality (HQ) color scans. The report is generated as an HTML list. In good weeks, posts on this blog attract 1,000 readers and we all owe a big debt to @gundormr (an expert on books of hours) for keeping this service going.

1. Reg.lat.37 (Upgraded to HQ),
2. Reg.lat.43,
3. Reg.lat.46,
4. Reg.lat.47,
5. Reg.lat.48,
6. Reg.lat.56,
7. Reg.lat.63,
8. Reg.lat.102,
9. Reg.lat.105,
10. Reg.lat.108,
11. Reg.lat.110,
12. Reg.lat.143,
13. Reg.lat.161,
14. Reg.lat.164,
15. Reg.lat.171,
16. Reg.lat.176,
17. Reg.lat.186,
18. Reg.lat.195 (Upgraded to HQ), 9th century
19. Reg.lat.666 (Upgraded to HQ),
20. Reg.lat.1364 (Upgraded to HQ),
21. Reg.lat.1481 (Upgraded to HQ),
22. Reg.lat.1496 (Upgraded to HQ),
23. Reg.lat.1573 (Upgraded to HQ),
24. Reg.lat.1596,
25. Reg.lat.1618,
26. Reg.lat.1622,
27. Reg.lat.1631,
28. Reg.lat.1642 (Upgraded to HQ),
29. Reg.lat.1653,
30. Reg.lat.1666 (Upgraded to HQ),
31. Reg.lat.1669 (Upgraded to HQ),
32. Reg.lat.1685,
33. Reg.lat.1689,
34. Reg.lat.1692,
35. Reg.lat.1695,
36. Reg.lat.1699,
37. Urb.lat.87,
38. Urb.lat.105,
39. Urb.lat.115,
40. Urb.lat.146,
41. Urb.lat.149,
42. Vat.lat.427.pt.2,
43. Vat.lat.585,
44. Vat.lat.1984.pt.A,
45. Vat.lat.2074 (Upgraded to HQ),
46. Vat.lat.2104,
47. Vat.lat.2150,
48. Vat.lat.2183,
49. Vat.lat.2370, Intentiones habemus in presenti conscriptione (13c-14c); see eTK
50. Vat.lat.2412,
51. Vat.lat.2448,
52. Vat.lat.2453,
53. Vat.lat.2456,
54. Vat.lat.2459, Cura omnium egritudinum que accidunt a sumitate capitis; possibly by Pontius de S. Egidius; see eTK
55. Vat.lat.2460, Cause difficultatis scientie pulsuum sunt; by Aegidius; see eTK
56. Vat.lat.2507,
57. Vat.lat.2520,
58. Vat.lat.2583,
59. Vat.lat.2618,
60. Vat.lat.2663,
61. Vat.lat.2690,
62. Vat.lat.3784, Exultet Roll. See above.

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 147. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.