Robert of Leicester’s Treatise on the Hebrew Calendar (1294)

Abstract

This chapter discusses the work of Franciscan Robert of Leicester, whose work shows a number of striking affinities to that of Roger Bacon, which will be worth pointing to one further example of rabbinic sources being studied for chronological purposes in mid-thirteenth-century England. The evidence comes from MS Oxford, Corpus Christi College, which contains the Hebrew text of Rashi's commentaries on the Prophets and Hagiographa. It was later furnished with corrections and vowel points by a Christian scholar, who also added Latin superscriptio translations and marginal glosses. The programme of rectifying biblical chronology on the basis of the Hebrew calendar, which is already hinted at in Roger Bacon's writings, was put into full practice at the end of the century by the Franciscan Robert of Leicester, author of the lengthiest and most sophisticated medieval Latin treatise on the Jewish calendar that has come down to us.Keywords: biblical chronology; Franciscan Robert of Leicester; Hagiographa; Hebrew Calendar; medieval Latin treatise