Medieval Latin Translation Research Articles

How Should We Read Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed? Clues From Al-Harizi’s Translation

The objective of this scholarly article is to undertake a comparative analysis of three distinct medieval translations of the introduction to Maimonides’ “Guide of the Perplexed.” Specifically, we will examine the translations provided by Shmuel ibn Tibbon and Yehuda Al-Harizi, as well as the Latin translation. The focus of our analysis will be on two particular passages that play a crucial role in comprehending Maimonides’ intended approach to reading his work. Within the scope of this article, we will demonstrate that Ibn-Tibbon’s translation successfully preserves the essence of the original Judeo-Arabic text, thereby allowing for the interpretation of Maimonides as a radical (naturalist) philosopher. In contrast, Al-Harizi’s translation negates this potential interpretation, thereby excluding the possibility of viewing Maimonides in such a light. Notably, the medieval Latin translation aligns itself with Al-Harizi’s position and translation choices. By critically examining these translations and their respective implications, we aim to shed light on the significant impact that translation choices can have on the interpretation and understanding of philosophical texts. Ultimately, this investigation contributes to a broader understanding of Maimonides’ philosophical outlook and the challenges posed by different translations of his seminal work. The different ways of reading Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed is the subject of a very important and impassioned debate which has been raging from the time of the Guide’s publication until today.1 Was Maimonides a naturalist thinker who believed that religion is only needed for social and pedagogical reasons, and who based all his metaphysical opinions on philosophical argumentation? Was he a true believer who affirmed the main monotheistic and biblical positions such as creation,2 and argued for these positions against the philosophers, especially Aristotle?3 Or, perhaps he was a skeptic who doubted the possibility of humans having access to irrefutable truth?4 In seeking to answer these questions, the debate concerning the Guide condenses its focus to two major questions: 1. Is it justified for the philosophical interpreter to assume that Maimonides’ philosophical opinion is actually radical, i.e., naturalist, despite Maimonides’ explicit rejection of naturalism in the Guide (for example II:29)? 2. Does Maimonides think that humans can reach an unassailable knowledge of the secrets of religion and nature?

Avicenna's Theory of Science: Logic, Metaphysics, Epistemology by Riccardo Strobino

Reviewed by: Avicenna's Theory of Science: Logic, Metaphysics, Epistemology by Riccardo Strobino Thérèse-Anne Druart Riccardo Strobino. Avicenna's Theory of Science: Logic, Metaphysics, Epistemology. Oakland: University of California Press, 2021. Pp. xvi + 428. Hardback, $95.00. Strobino's remarkable book does not simply present Avicenna's theory of science; it also highlights the importance of demonstration not only for logic but also for metaphysics and epistemology. Hence, Strobino's work is essential to appreciate and better understand Avicenna's philosophy as a whole. Strobino grounds his research on Avicenna's theory of science in his Book of Demonstration in the Shifā', which focuses on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics. Taking into account the lack of any translation into English or any other main modern language as well as the lack of a full medieval Latin translation (only chapter 7 of book 3 exists in a medieval Latin version) of Avicenna's text, Strobino kindly provides in appendix C (357–71) a detailed "map" of this text, useful not only to readers who cannot handle Arabic but even to those who can, as the [End Page 326] text is so rich and complex. A simple but careful look at this map confirms what Strobino makes clear and insists upon: Avicenna greatly develops, enriches, completes, and even outgrows some of Aristotle's views. The Book of Demonstration is far more than a commentary on the Posterior Analytics; it is a complete reworking of it. Strobino shows that Avicenna grounds his theory of demonstration and science on two basic notions—conception (tasawwur) and assertion (tasdīq, which some other scholars translate as "assent")—and so gives a unified approach to his theory. Scientific conceptions require better understanding of definition and description. Avicenna builds definitions and descriptions on essentialism and, therefore, grounds them in metaphysics. As for scientific assertions, in contradistinction to nonscientific ones, they must be necessary and give the cause. Therefore, Avicenna places great importance on modality and develops modal syllogisms, whereas Aristotle focused on categorical syllogisms and neglected hypothetical and disjunctive syllogisms. Avicenna also elaborates a sophisticated account of modality and its metaphysical implications. Furthermore, he broadens and enriches the appreciation of causality and explanation. These developments, according to Strobino, lead Avicenna to set forth an intricate division and hierarchy of the sciences under metaphysics, which provides their ultimate principles and allows for a unified understanding of the sciences while respecting their particularities. According to Strobino, Avicenna is keen to develop a theory of science that gives a good account of science as it is practiced. Strobino carefully shows how Avicenna's theory better reflects this practice than does Aristotle's. Strobino does not simply highlight how much Avicenna distances himself from Aristotle and goes far beyond what the Posterior Analytics yields, but also shows how much Avicenna relies on points adumbrated by his predecessor al-Fārābī in his own Book of Demonstration. The way Strobino through his analysis of demonstration links Avicenna's understanding of logic, epistemology, and metaphysics underscores the coherence and unity of Avicenna's philosophy. Scholars were aware of the importance of demonstration for Avicenna in various philosophical fields, but until the release of this book, they seemed not to have fully grasped the centrality and essential role played by the Avicennian understanding and focus on demonstration. Of course, Strobino does not limit himself to an analysis of passages in the Book of Demonstration. He has an encompassing knowledge of Avicenna's texts and uses them well to flesh out and enrich what remains terse in the Book of Demonstration. He even takes into account the way one of his successors, al-Tūsī, reads him. He also shows an extensive and wide-ranging knowledge of Aristotle's texts and of Aristotelian scholarship, as well as an interest in the Greek commentators and Galen and their relevance for interpreting Avicenna. Avicenna's Theory of Science is not an easy book to read, as it is often very technical, particularly when dealing with purely logical points or issues, but reading it is rewarding if one does so slowly and meditatively. The author, in fact, illuminates difficult matters but does not waste words. From...

A Newly Discovered Manuscript of Pseudo-Aristotle’s Physiognomonica

The “Minor Manuscript Collections” cataloguing project based at Leipzig University Library has brought to light a hitherto unrecognized manuscript containing the medieval Latin translation of pseudo-Aristotle’s Physiognomonica: Muhlhausen, Stadtarchiv, 60/13. Within the context of the recently published critical edition of this treatise, I examine the main text in order to assess its value in the manuscript tradition of the Physiognomonica, as well as the interlinear and marginal annotations of this manuscript. For both the main text and its marginalia, the Muhlhausen manuscript bears great similarities with another manuscript containing the Physiognomonica: Wolfenbuttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Cod. Guelf. 17.21 Aug. 4°. At the end of the article, some questions are raised concerning the origin of these annotations.

Hostili praedo ditetur lingua latina: Conceptual Narratives of Translation in the Latin Middle Ages

This article is an experiment: it attempts to look at medieval Latin translation practices through the lenses of a modern sociological theory of narrative. It argues that topoi found in translation prefaces are key elements of narratives that explain why the act of translation is necessary at all. The article identifies three such narratives, and elaborates in particular on one of them, which describes translation with the help of bellic metaphors.

Persecution and the Art of Translation: Some New Evidence Concerning the Latin Translation of Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed

The ongoing work on a critical edition of Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed in its medieval Latin translation, and the recently published detailed studies of the Latin manuscripts provide us with a unique opportunity to reconsider a field of study which, after more than 150 years of intensive scholarly engagement, still presents us with some remarkable lacunae. In confronting the new material evidence, this paper raises some basic questions regarding the unique nature of Maimonides’ work itself and the way it is reflected through its reception among European readers, Jews and Christians alike. My two main goals here are, first, to emphasize the unique character of the early Latin reception of the Guide, which was less philosophically oriented and more Hebraistic in nature, and, second, to emphasize its close ties to a set of persecutional acts that took place in the very same period.

Hvem var opænbarligh gen guth i Jyske Lovs Fortale? Et studie i Lovbogens teksthistorie

One sentence in the Prologue of the Law of Jutland (1241) has caused much scholarlydiscussion since the nineteenth century. Did it say that “the law which the king givesand the land adopts, he [i.e. the king] may not change or abolish without the consentof the land, unless he [i.e. the king] is manifestly contrary to God” – or “unless it [i.e.the law] is manifestly contrary to God”? In this article it is argued that scholarly conjectures about the original sense of the text at this point have paid insufficient attentionto the textual history of the law-book.On the basis of Per Andersen’s recent study of the early manuscripts of the Lawof Jutland, it is shown that the two earliest surviving manuscripts both have a readingthat leaves little doubt that the original text stated that the king could not change thelaw without the consent of the land unless the law was manifestly contrary to God. Theequivocal reading that has caused the scholarly controversy was introduced by a conservativerevision of the law-book (known as the AB text), which is likely to have originatedin the aftermath of the great charter of 1282, which sealed the defeat of the jurisdictionalpretensions of King Erik V. A more radical reading, leaving no doubt that the kingwould be acting contrary to God in changing the law without consent, occurs in an earlyfourteenth-century manuscript and sporadically throughout the fifteenth century, butit never became the generally accepted text. On the contrary, an official revision of thelaw-book (the I text), probably from the first decade of the fourteenth century, sought toeliminate the ambiguity by adding “and he may still not do it against the will of the land”,thus making it clear that it was the law that might be contrary to God.Due to the collapse of the Danish monarchy in the second quarter of the fourteenthcentury, the I text never superseded the AB text. The two versions coexistedthroughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and soon produced a number ofhybrid versions. One of these gained particular importance, since it was the text thatwas used for the first printed editions of the Law of Jutland in 1504 and 1508. Thus itbecame the standard text of the law-book in the sixteenth century. The early printededitions also included the medieval Latin translation of the Law of Jutland and theLatin glosses to the text. The glosses are known to be the work of Knud Mikkelsen,bishop of Viborg from 1451 to 1478. Based on a close comparison of the three texts, itis argued here that Bishop Knud was also the author of the revised Danish and Latintexts of the law-book that are included in the early printed editions, and that the wholework was probably finished in or shortly after 1466. Bishop Knud included the I text’saddition to the sentence about the king’s legislative powers.An effort to distribute Bishop Knud’s work as a new authoritative text seems tohave been made in 1488, but rather than replacing the earlier versions of the Lawof Jutland, this effort appears to have triggered a spate of new versions of the medievaltext, each of them based upon critical collation of several different manuscripts.In some of these new versions, a further development in the sentence on the king’slegislative power brought the sentence in line with the political realities of the late fifteenthcentury. Instead of having “he” [i.e. the king] as the agent of legal change, theyattribute the initiative to the indefinite personal pronoun man: at the time, any suchinitiative would require the agreement of the Council of the Realm.Only the printing press brought this phase of creative confusion to an end in theearly sixteenth century.Finally, it is argued that the present article’s interpretation of the original senseof this particular passage in the Prologue is in accordance with the nature of Danishlegislation in the period from c.1170 to the 1240s, when most major legislation happenedin response to papal decretals and changes in canon law.

Renaissance Averroism and Its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe ed. by Anna Akasoy and Guido Giglioni (review)

Reviewed by: Renaissance Averroism and Its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe ed. by Anna Akasoy and Guido Giglioni Steven Harvey Anna Akasoy and Guido Giglioni, editors. Renaissance Averroism and Its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe. International Archives of the History of Ideas, 211. Dordrecht: Springer, 2013. Pp. viii + 405. Cloth, $179.00. This rich volume of fifteen papers comprises the proceedings of a conference held at the Warburg Institute in 2008, with three additional papers. It begins with a learned introduction by one of the two editors, Guido Giglioni, that maps out the volume, outlines its main themes, and points to the care the editors have taken “in this volume” to distinguish Ibn Rushd, the twelfth-century historical figure, from Averroes, his literary incarnation in the Latin West, and to distinguish “between ‘Averroan’ [‘any philosophical view that belongs directly to Ibn Rushd’], ‘Averroist’ [any opinion held by a follower of Ibn Rushd in the medieval Latin West] and ‘Averroistic’ [‘the general cultural label denoting a pronounced [End Page 612] (vaguely Aristotelian) rationalistic attitude’]” (1–2). While scholars have long recognized the need to distinguish between Ibn Rushd’s teachings and those attributed to him by later thinkers, the pedantic distinction between Ibn Rushd’s teachings and those of Averroes seems misplaced and even misleading (and is not followed consistently in this book). Scholars of Ibn Rushd today who read him in the Arabic original do not always agree on his personal views (see, on this point, Anna Akasoy’s essay), particularly regarding philosophical problems such as God’s knowledge of particulars and the creation/eternity of the world. On the other hand, those who seek to understand Ibn Rushd through reading the medieval Latin translations are often able to do so. The key questions here concerning the medieval Latin readers are not semantic, but rather simply, did X read Averroes? Does he cite him approvingly? Does he seem to understand him? To what purpose does he use him? All too often in this volume, we are left to wonder in what ways Averroes parts from Ibn Rushd (and an Averroist teaching from an Averroan one), for example, Averroes’s view of supreme happiness (although curiously there is no reference in this volume to his commentary on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics). The opening paper, one of my favorites, is Amos Bertolacci’s account of the critique of Averroes (=Ibn Rushd) against Avicenna on human spontaneous generation. For Bertolacci, who elsewhere has surveyed such criticisms by Ibn Rushd, Avicenna, “albeit negatively … is one of the most important sources of Averroes’s system”(39). Here he deftly traces Ibn Rushd’s various critiques in different places of Avicenna’s position on this topic—most interestingly, that it violates the principle of the necessary inherence of complex forms, like that of man, in specific matters; argues they are “representative of Averroes’s overall anti-Avicennian position” (41); and shows they do not present Avicenna’s views accurately. It may be noted that the highlighted inconsistencies here between Averroes’s Tahāfut and his long commentaries may be attributed to their different intentions and his considering only the latter demonstrative books. Charles Burnett’s short but sweet paper on the mid-sixteenth-century Latin editions of Aristotle’s corpus with Averroes’s commentaries spells out what is little known about the editors of these editions and their editorial policies and interests. Notwithstanding, his conclusion that the changes from edition to edition reflect “the developments in the academic circles in Padua and can hint at not only the academic discussions going on there, but also at the tensions, loyalties, and passions of the personalities involved” (64)seems a bit grandiose for the paper. Craig Martin’s suggestive chapter on the Latin commentaries on Averroes and, in particular, the sixteenth-century Latin supercommentaries on his Aristotelian commentaries, points to reasons for Averroes’s growing popularity during that century. The Latins turned to Averroes not only for his remarkably reliable philosophical expositions, but also because of his agreement with the Greek commentators, and his being a reliable source for their teachings (Dag Hasse would add for his philosophically attractive unicity of the intellect thesis...

Averroes’ Middle Commentary on Book I of the Nicomachean Ethics

The conventional view of the previous century that Averroes’ middle commentaries (talāḫīṣ) on Aristotle are all of the same form and style is no longer tenable. A full and accurate account of the similarities and differences among Averroes’ talāḫīṣ on Aristotle must consider all of them. Perhaps the least studied and least known of these middle commentaries is the one on the Nicomachean Ethics, a text which is extant today only in a critically edited medieval Hebrew translation and an as yet unedited medieval Latin translation. The two authors of the present article have each studied chapters of this commentary independently of each other and have reached different conclusions concerning its value. In this article they present a careful examination of the first book of Averroes’ commentary via its Hebrew translation and Latin translation (primarily through the two oldest and most reliable manuscripts of it) in comparison with the medieval Arabic translation of the Nicomachean Ethics that was used by Averroes (and in light of Aristotle’s Greek text). This study shows an Averroean middle commentary that is not very original and not particularly helpful, especially, for example, when compared to the quite different middle commentaries on Aristotle’s books on natural science. Indeed, he often seems to do little more than copy—not even paraphrase—the Arabic translation. On the other hand, Averroes does not hesitate to insert words as he copies in order to make the text clearer and easier to understand. Where lengthier explanations are needed, they too are attempted, at times in response to problematic translations in the Arabic text before him.

2. Les translittérations dans la version latine du Commentaire moyen à l’Éthique à Nicomaque d’Averroès

The present discussion derives from a larger research project that concerns the medieval Latin translation of Averroes’ Middle Commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics. The translation was carried out by Hermann the German in Toledo in 1240. I am concerned here specifically with nine passages that are distributed over three chapters of the Commentary (II.7; IV.1-3) in which the Latin translation is sprinkled with transliterations based on Greek and Arabic terms. These transliterations, which are not glosses, can be understood on several levels, and these, in turn, raise questions about the boundary between transliteration proper and translation that borrows from the source language a term which is then integrated into the Latin lexicon in the form of a calque or ‘loan translation’. Examining these transliterations makes it possible, first, to show that the translator does not follow a uniform method throughout the text, which could imply the existence of several translators or several collaborators with distinct and exclusive areas of expertise, and second, to advance the hypothesis that a Greek copy of the Nicomachean Ethics was available at the time the translation was being executed in 1240. Finally, the discussion of transliterations makes it possible to confirm certain emendations proposed by Ullman in the Arabic edition of the Nicomachean Ethics published by Akasoy and Fidora, as well as to suggest a primary classification of the surviving manuscripts of the Latin version of the Middle Commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics.

Indirect Evidence for Establishing the Text of the Shifā

Indirect sources of the text of Avicenna's Shifā' include the medieval Latin translations, parallel passages in other works by Avicenna, lemmata in subsequent Shifā' commentaries, and verbatim quotations in later authors' works. Future editors of the Shifā' can consult these indirect sources in order to uncover and resolve major textual discrepancies. The present article reviews one such textual discrepancy in light of a sample of direct and indirect witnesses to the tradition of the Shifā'. Some tentative conclusions are drawn about the use of different types of indirect sources, and about the relative priority of each type.

(D.) Gutas Theophrastus On First Principles (known as his Metaphysics): Greek Text and Medieval Arabic Translation, Edited and Translated with Introduction, Commentaries and Glossaries, as well as the Medieval Latin Translation, and with an Excursus on Graeco-Arabic Editorial Technique (Philosophia Antiqua 119). Leiden: Brill, 2010. Pp. xxiii + 506. €114. 9789004179035.

(D.) Gutas Theophrastus On First Principles (known as his Metaphysics): Greek Text and Medieval Arabic Translation, Edited and Translated with Introduction, Commentaries and Glossaries, as well as the Medieval Latin Translation, and with an Excursus on Graeco-Arabic Editorial Technique (Philosophia Antiqua 119). Leiden: Brill, 2010. Pp. xxiii + 506. €114. 9789004179035. - Volume 132

Book Review: The Spherics of Theodosius, Theodosius, Sphaerica: Arabic and Medieval Latin Translations

THE SPHERICS OF THEODOSIUS Theodosius, Sphaerica: Arabic and Medieval Latin Translations. Edited by Paul Kunitzsch and Richard Lorch (Boethius, lxii; Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart, 2010). Pp. 431. euro64. ISBN 978-3-515-09288-3.Theodosius's classic treatise on the geometry of circles on the surface of a sphere, The Spherics, offered its Greek readers a systematic, logical development of all the basic theorems in spherical geometry as well as a number of theorems applicable mainly to spherical astronomy. Theodosius wrote the work, probably, in the first part of the first century b.c., and its adoption as a teaching text by Alexandrian scholars ensured its survival into the Islamic, and then Latin, Middle Ages. The numerous references to Arabic manuscripts of all or part of the work in vol. ? of F. Sezgin's Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums testify to its continuing study in the Islamic world well into the eighteenth century.In 2000, Claire Czinczenheim produced a definitive edition of the Greek text, together with French translation and commentary. Now, two noted scholars and long-time collaborators have combined their efforts to produce editions of Arabic and medieval Latin texts of Theodosius's Sphaerica. As a result, we now have reliable editions of a major scientific work in all languages in which it appeared while it was still of scientific importance.The editors begin with an account of the still-murky history of the Arabic translation of the Spherics. They point out that there were two different translations into Arabic, one represented by three mss (A, N, and H - the last-mentioned being Arabic written in Hebrew script) and the other represented by manuscripts F and C (both of these also in Hebrew script). FC specifically ascribes the translation to Qusta ibn Luqa, but this simple ascription is qualified, or contradicted, by other versions of the text. Other than giving what evidence there is, Kunitzsch and Lorch take no definite position on this matter.For reasons that they do not explain, the editors chose to edit the Arabic text represented by three manuscripts, denoted collectively as ANH, which was done by comparing manuscripts A (Istanbul) with N (private library) and, in doubtful cases, with the Greek text. (Only in such cases - most of which, it seems, occur early in Book I - have the editors recorded the reading of H.) The editorial work has been very carefully done. With the text and its critical notes it is possible to know exactly the readings of texts of A and N.The Latin text presented here is a transcription of the text found in one manuscript, P (Paris), the shorter of two that circulated in medieval times. It is an indication of the scholarly care that has gone into the production of this work that the authors collated P with ten other manuscripts. The editors note that P is clearly a translation of the ANH text, and they argue on stylistic grounds that it was done by Gerard of Cremona who, in any case, is known to have done a translation.As the editors point out (p. …

Theophrastus - (D.) Gutas (ed., trans.) Theophrastus On First Principles (known as his Metaphysics). Greek Text and Medieval Arabic Translation, Edited and Translated with Introduction, Commentaries and Glossaries, as well as the Medieval Latin Translation, and with an Excursus on Graeco-Arabic Editorial Technique. (Philosophia Antiqua 119.) Pp. xxiv + 506. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010. Cased, €114, US$169. ISBN: 978-90-04-17903-5.

Theophrastus - (D.) Gutas (ed., trans.) Theophrastus On First Principles (known as his Metaphysics). Greek Text and Medieval Arabic Translation, Edited and Translated with Introduction, Commentaries and Glossaries, as well as the Medieval Latin Translation, and with an Excursus on Graeco-Arabic Editorial Technique. (Philosophia Antiqua 119.) Pp. xxiv + 506. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010. Cased, €114, US$169. ISBN: 978-90-04-17903-5.

Hagar Banished:

The Aldine edition of Galen’s works, prepared by humanists anxious to replace the medieval Latin translations with a purely Greek text, certainly represents an advance in scholarship. However, widespread anti-Arabic prejudices of the time precluded most humanists, including the Aldine editors, from perceiving anything of value in the Latin Galenic textual tradition, which was characterized as representing a Galen that had passed through the corrupting influence of Arabic. This paper considers the cost to the medical tradition of ignoring Arabic in the Aldine edition of 1525, and thereafter. Several examples of passages from the Arabo-Latin Galen are compared with the Aldine, and their differences are considered and evaluated with regard to their impact on medical knowledge. The conclusion is drawn that, although there were some real corruptions in the Arabo-Latin tradition, in the main it contained useful variant readings, which might have been used to the profit of Greek philology, as well as to the advancement of Galenic scholarship.

Commission II: The Latin Aristotle and Medieval Latin Commentaries on Aristotle (2007-2012)

This report is divided into two main parts, devoted (1) to the Aristoteles Latinus and (2) to the Editions of Latin Commentaries on Aristotle. The report on the Aristoteles Latinus sheds light on recent research on medieval Latin translations of Aristotle's works. Among other things, it discusses the editions published in the context of the Aristoteles Latinus (Meteorologica, translations of Aristippus and William of Moerbeke; the anonymous translation of De motu animalium; De motu animalium-De progressu animalium, translated by William of Moerbeke), and some recent studies and collective volumes on individual texts and translators. The report on Editions of Latin Commentaries on Aristotle gives information for each edition of a commentary on Aristotle that has been published in the last five years (2007-2012) and on those editions that are about to be published or are in preparation or are planned to start within the next five years.

Aristotle Transmitted: Reflections on the Transmission of Aristotelian Scientific Thought in the Middle Ages

This article focuses on the relation between translations and the transmission of scientific thought in the Middle Ages, and proposes a means to evaluate the degree of this transmission. It shows by examples that translations, on the one hand, and the reception of these translations, on the other hand, are intrinsically related phases of one and the same process of transmission. Both phases must be combined to measure whether or not transmission of scientific knowledge has actually taken place. This also requires insight into the social and intellectual contexts in which the translations were made, read, and used. Moreover, the article shows how the comprehensibility of texts and translations could be impeded by textual variants and discusses some strategies that medieval writers developed to solve the resulting problems. Throughout the article, examples are taken from Medieval Latin and vernacular translations of and commentaries on the works of the Corpus Aristotelicum.

The needle in the haystack. In search of the model of Peter of Abano's Expositio problematum

This paper intends to set up a procedure by which one can identify adequately and/or locate the model of the medieval (literal) commentary known as the Expositio Problematum Aristotelis (1310) by the Paduan physician Peter of Abano. The search for a model is highly relevant to modern editors and readers of medieval commentaries, because it accounts for the deviations from the original interpretation of the commented text and hence contributes to a fuller understanding of the medieval commentary. Peter of Abano's Expositio was susceptible to the errors of the medieval verbum de verbo Latin translation of the pseudo-Aristotelian Problemata Physica by Bartholomew of Messina (made around 1260) and to the particularities of its textual tradition. The attempt to identify a model on the basis of a selection of significant variants is complicated by several methodological issues. In addition, Peter of Abano apparently consulted more than one manuscript when composing his commentary.

Véronique Boudon-Millot (ed. and trans.), Galien: Introduction générale; Sur l'ordre de ses propres livres; Sur ses propres livres; Que l'excellent médecin est aussi philosophe, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2007, pp. ccxxxviii, 315, €75.00 (paperback 978-2-251-00536-2).

Véronique Boudon-Millot (ed. and trans.), Galien: Introduction générale; Sur l'ordre de ses propres livres; Sur ses propres livres; Que l'excellent médecin est aussi philosophe, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2007, pp. ccxxxviii, 315, €75.00 (paperback 978-2-251-00536-2). - Volume 52 Issue 1

Renaissance notions of number and magnitude

In the 16th and 17th centuries the classical Greek notions of (discrete) number and (continuous) magnitude (preserved in medieval Latin translations of Euclid's Elements) underwent a major transformation that turned them into continuous but measurable magnitudes. This article studies the changes introduced in the classical notions of number and magnitude by three influential Renaissance editions of Euclid's Elements. Besides providing evidence of earlier discussions preparing notions and arguments eventually introduced in Simon Stevin's Arithmétique of 1585, these editions document the role abacus algebra and Renaissance views on the history of mathematics played in bridging the gulf between discrete numbers and continuous magnitudes.

Algazel on the Soul: A Critical Edition

ALGAZEL ON THE SOUL: A CRITICAL EDITION By EVA ST. CLAIR Modern scholars of medieval philosophy have had access to the work of Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghâzalï (1058-1111) since 1933, when Joseph T. Muckle published an edition of the great Muslim theologian's Maqäsid alfal äsifa ("The Opinions of the Philosophers"). In this work, al-Ghäzall (known to the West as Algazel) summarized ideas proposed by Avicenna (940-1036) in his Danesh Nameh. Algazel's Maqäsid al-faläsifa was composed of three parts, the Metaphysics, Physics, and Logic; medieval authors read and referred to Algazel's work accordingly, as three separate works.1 Muckle's 1933 edition, Algazel's Metaphysics, furnished modern scholars with the medieval Latin translations of Algazel's Metaphysics and Physics as they were prepared by Dominicus Gundissalinus and his collaborator in Toledo in the latter half of the twelfth century.2 Muckle's edition is a lightly corrected transcription of a single manuscript, Vatican Latinus 4481 (V), which is, fortunately, the best of the tradition. However, the manuscript influenced not only Muckle's preparation of the text but also the punctuation and mis en page of his edition. Muckle's decision to reproduce Vs punctuation was not felicitous for a modern reader, who may be unaccustomed to paragraphs that go on for pages or lengthy sentences bound together with semicolons. The Latin text printed below is more accessible than Muckle's work since it delineates ideas using modern punctuation and paragraph/sentence layout. Finally, Muckle made several errors in reading his base text. Most obviously , he read omnis instead of ovis when describing the stock medieval philosophical example of a sheep apprehending the intentions of a wolf.3 Earlier Indeed, the Metaphysics, Physics, and Logic were not always copied together, and were always presented as three different, complete works in the manuscripts in which they survive . The editor is greatly indebted to Bega Wood, Neil Lewis, and Jennifer Ottman for their contributions to the preparation of this article and edition. The edition has particularly benefited from Neil Lewis's critical acumen. " Notes in the manuscripts and elsewhere designate Gundissalinus's collaborator as "Master John," whom Charles Lohr states was not John of Spain. John of Spain was indeed involved in the translation project at Toledo under Bishop Raimond through which many important works came to the West, but he would have been a very old man by the time Gundissalinus was translating Algazel's works. Charles H. Lohr, "Lógica Algazelis: Introduction and Critical Text," Traditio 21 (1965): 223-90, at 228. ' Algazel, Physics 4.2.3. 48traditio in the same section, Muckle misread conservation! as conservatoria changing the meaning of that word from an abstract to a concrete noun. A few other mistakes worth mentioning include several readings of quod for qui0 and one repercussionem rather than percussionem .b On occasion, he omitted words or did not correctly expand abbreviations. The text also contains typographical errors that do not obscure meaning but are, nevertheless, a distraction. The study conducted here suggests that, indebted as we are to Muckle and the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies for his edition, it would be useful to have a critical edition of Algazel's popular and influential work. There are more than thirty surviving manuscripts from the medieval tradition . The following list, not meant to be exhaustive, has been compiled from the work of Charles Lohr and Marie-Thérèse d'Alverny.7 Assisi, Biblioteca communale, 663, fol. 146-186 (Metaphysics and Physics) Basel, Öffentliche Bibliothek der Universität, D. III. 7, fol. 95r-166v (Metaphysics and Physics) Bernkastel-Kues, St. Nikolaus Hospital, 205, fol. 126r-133v (Metaphysics and Physics) Edinburgh, University Library 134 (D.b.II.7), fol. 6v-20v (Metaphysics), 20v-30r (Physics) Erfurt, Universitäts- und Forschungsbibliothek, CA. F. 331, fol. 82r-96r (Metaphysics), 96r-103v (Physics) Erfurt, Universitäts- und Forschungsbibliothek CA. Q. 291, fol. 63r-90r (Metaphysics) Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Magliab. Cl. V. 45, fol. 15v-52v (Metaphysics), fol. 52v-72r (Physics) Göteborg, Universitätsbibliothek, lat. 8, fol. 189?—203v (Metaphysics, imperf.), 203v-207r (Physics, imperf.) Graz, Universitätsbibliothek, 482, fol. 141v-159r (Metaphysics...