Fragments from a Beneventan homiliary : in Latin

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Item Information

Title:
Fragments from a Beneventan homiliary : in Latin
Description:
Fragments of two leaves, formerly reused as waste, but originally from a homiliary or other collection of sermons. The larger fragment is essentially complete, missing only approximately half of its lower margin, with no loss to text. This larger leaf contains a portion of Pseudo-Augustine's Sermones suppositii de Scripturis, Sermo I (Patrologia Latina, XXXIX, col. 1738), which continues into the smaller leaf, where it is followed by St. Ambrose's Homily on Luke (18:35) (Patrologia Latina, XV, col. 1790). The smaller of the two fragments comprises the lower half of a leaf and retains 15 of its original 31 lines.
Former owner:
Boehlen, Ernst
Auctioneer:
Sotheby's (Firm)
Former owner:
Stephen Butler Rare Books & Manuscripts
Date:
[1000?–1125?]
Format:
Manuscripts
Genre:
Manuscripts, Italian--Italy
Manuscripts, Medieval--Italy
Manuscript waste
Inscriptions
Homiliaries
Location:
Boston Public Library
Rare Books Department
Collection (local):
Medieval and Early Renaissance Manuscripts (Collection of Distinction)
Subjects:
Early manuscript fragments
Places:
Italy
Extent:
2 leaves : parchment ; 210-390 x 270 (285 x 205) mm
Permalink:
https://ark.digitalcommonwealth.org/ark:/50959/rv048r64h
Terms of Use:
No Copyright - United States icon No Copyright - United States
No known copyright restrictions.
No known restrictions on use.
Place of origin:
[Italy]
Language:
Latin
Notes:
Ms. leaves.
Title devised by cataloger.
Origin: Copied in southern Italy or Dalmatia in the 11th or early 12th century (see Lowe).
Notes (ownership):
Provenance: Removed from an original codex as early as the Middle Ages, when an inscription, in Italian, was added to one of the leaves. Both fragments show tack holes with signs of corrosion. On the verso of the smaller fragment, a (19th-century?) paper tag with the letter "B" is affixed. According to Sotheby's, these fragments were once part of a collection in Ireland, possibly from the 19th century, where they were mistaken for examples of Irish insular minuscule and framed together and kept with a circa 6th-century English cruciform brooch. This brooch was sold at Sotheby's, London, in 2017 (Old Master Sculpture and Works of Art, 5 December, lot 1). The present fragments were then sold at Sotheby's, London, in 2018 (Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts and Continental and Russian Books, 3 July, lot 1) to Ernst Boehlen, of Bern, Switzerland. Offered again by Sotheby's in 2024 (Important Medieval Manuscripts From the Collection of the Late Ernst Boehlen, 2 July, lot 20) to Stephen Butler Rare Books & Manuscripts.
Notes (acquisition):
Immediate source of acquisition: Purchased from Stephen Butler Rare Books & Manuscripts in August, 2024.
Purchase; Stephen Butler Rare Books & Manuscripts; 20240805; 2024.61.
Notes (object):
Layout: Two columns, 31 lines; bounding and writing lines ruled in drypoint.
Script: Written in brown ink a Beneventan minuscule of the Bari type. Shows most of the characteristic letterforms, ligatures, and markings described by E.A. Lowe in "The Beneventan script," including the so-called line and dot abbreviation sign.
Decoration: Two zoomorphic initials in red, blue, gray, and yellow: a five-line "D" in "[D]ebitum de quo supra ..." and an eleven-line "F" in "[F]actum est autem ..." Capitals rubricated and heightened in blue and yellow.
Notes (language):
In Latin.
Identifier:
06_01_019583
Call #:
RARE BKS MS pb Med.301
Barcode:
39999092211638