Medieval Manuscripts Research Articles

‘How to make a ring jump in the manner of a locust’: recipes to animate small objects in late medieval European manuscripts

Abstract In his late thirteenth-century collection of playful and amusing recipes, which this article calls magic tricks, Richard de Grimhill, a low-ranking Worcester noble, collected a trick ‘to make a ring jump in the manner of a locust’, alongside other instructions to animate domestic objects such as eggs, loaves of bread and spit-roasting chickens. Using a source base of 100 late medieval manuscripts, this article demonstrates that rings and other domestic objects were animated in various ways: through sleight of hand, by exploiting the chemical properties of mercury, or with a mixture of mercury, sulphur, and saltpetre. Placing these three methods in their manuscript and cultural contexts, I underscore that late medieval European people experienced magic tricks as a form of both cognitive play and playful experimentation with chemical knowledge. They thus have broader implications for late medieval European approaches to the possibilities and limitations of the human mind and physical matter.

Kakui’s Hakase-Shi-Kuden-no-Koto in Modern English Translation

The present work is a modern English-language translation and annotation of Kakui’s (1237-?)Hakase-Shi-Kuden-no-Koto, the earliest dated medieval Japanese manuscript to give specific detailsregarding the design and function of the go-in bakase, itself a system of diastematic neumes prevalentin Shingon-sect Japanese esoteric Buddhist circles from as early as the thirteenth century usedfor recording, as well as recalling, their hymnody. Hakase-Shi-Kuden-no-Koto has the secondary distinctionof being the earliest dated treatise on Shingon-sect Shōmyō oral transmission of any kind,and it has the tertiary distinction of being, to the translator’s knowledge, the only extant medievalJapanese manuscript to provide a comprehensive table of medieval Japanese neumes. The treatisehas been preserved in a manuscript in the hand of the eighteenth-century Shingon priest Reizui(ca. 1756). Rezui’s copy is currently housed at the Koyasan University Library in Wakayama prefecture,and it is upon this version of Kakui’s text that the current translation is based. This translationis intended to provide both a point of entry into the world of Japanese, and indeed East Asian,neume studies for musicologists, and a point of reference in the necessarily collaborative endeavorof internationalizing the field of comparative liturgy. With that in mind, the footnotes include referencesto neumes from the notational systems of the Latin and Byzantine Christian churches oflate antiquity and medieval times that are, to the translator, obvious graphic equivalents to neumesgiven by Kakui. This is done not to suggest any particular historical interpretation, but rather toidentify phenomenological similarities that beckon to be explored for their historico-musicologicalsignificance.

About the Miscellany of Charms from the Collection of V. M. Undolsky

The article deals with a collection of handwritten charms of the second half of the 17th century from the collection of V. M. Undolsky (Russian State Library. F. 310. No. 1179). The manuscript was published twice by L. I. Sazonova and A. L. Toporkov (in 2000 and 2002) with a commentary, but it has not yet been the subject of textual and linguistic investigations, which are necessary in the study of texts circulating in the handwritten sphere. These purposes make possible to draw conclusions about the origin of the collection, the pecularities of its creation and sources. The article presents the results of the study manuscript de visu. The special attention is paid to the peculiarities of handwriting, scribe’s mistakes and reflections of live pronunciation which is considered in the context of the handwritten culture of Old Rus’. In present article the observations is based on the textual, linguistic and comparative research methods that are relevant in the study of medieval manuscripts. The investigation allowed to propose several commented refinements to the edition based on a detailed study of paleography, textual features, and language, as well as the involvement of other manuscript and printed texts, historical and dialect dictionaries. The scribe’s errors in the manuscript from the collection of V. M. Undolsky are related to the existence of the antigraph, which does not allow us to agree with the publishers’ assumption that the collection was recorded from an oral source. The dialectal features of the charms leads to the conclusion about the Central or Middle Russian dialect of the scribe. It is possible that the owner of the manuscript, Vasily Volotsky, is the podyachy Vasily Volotsky, who is mentioned in the documents of 1699 and 1701 years of the Arzamas clerk’s izba.

Ritratti di mercanti armeni nelle miniature dei Vangeli medievali (secoli IX-XIV) Preview di una ricerca

This article aims to present part of the research I conducted within the ERC project, Armenia Entangled: Connectivity and Cultural Encounters in Medieval Eurasia 9th - 14th Centuries at the University of Florence. My topic of investigation for the ArmEn project is to analyse the portraits of Armenian merchants in the miniatures of medieval manuscripts and to place them in a broader Eurasian context. A focal point of the research is devoted to the analysis of the clothes worn by these merchants, which are investigated through an iconographic study and comparison with Byzantine and Arab illuminations with the same subject. The aim of the article will therefore be to outline the ongoing research by showing some examples of manuscripts containing fascinating portraits of Armenian merchants.

Roman Catholic Church and Cautious Embrace of Modern Communication Media

The Catholic Church has a complex history in its appropriation and use of modern means of communication. It has at various times sought to adapt and pushed back. Almost with equal measure, it has variously churned out instructions and guidelines and even condemnations on the heels of inventions and innovations that pushed the boundaries of traditional means of communication. For instance, the church transitioned from colourful medieval manuscripts to printed books with the invention of the printing press in the middle of the fifteenth century. Interestingly, whenever the church has been able to embrace any invention, it has almost always done so through the purviews of its mission of evangelisation. In contemporary times, Inter Mirifica (promulgated on 4 December 1963 by the Second Vatican Council) and Communio et progressio (23 May 1971) are two documents that signalled the church’s preparedness to accept the reality and phenomenon of the new frontiers ushered in by contemporary means of communication. The objective of this article is firstly to make a historical excursus of the Catholic Church’s embrace of the means of communication, characterised by caution and wariness, eagerness and enthusiasm. Secondly, it apportions a space to the Catholic Church in some African countries. It also highlights the importance attached to means of communication, especially the radio apostolate, by the local churches in those places. It does so by situating the media consciousness among local church hierarchies on the continent within the injunction of Pope John Paul II in Ecclesia in Africa.

Mandatum rite in the 14th century “Ceremoniale et Pontificale Episcoporum” (AKKK, Ms. 11) from the Archives and Library of the Krakow Cathedral Chapter

The study of history and content of medieval liturgical manuscripts can reveal the ways of formation and transmission of liturgy and particular liturgical traditions existing in the Western Church before the Council of Trent. The purpose of this article is to present the formulary of Mandatum rite recorded in the 14th century pontifical Ms.11 located in the Archives of the Krakow Cathedral Chapter, and to attempt to identify its sources. The article provides the edition of the text of the rubrics and orations as well as melodic transcriptions of the chants.

The Intentional Alteration of Jewish Manuscripts and the Houston Mahzor

Abstract Books are living forms that must be understood not simply as they were at the moment and place of their creation, but also as they changed through time and space. This article focuses on a little-known medieval mahzor from the Rhineland, currently in Houston, which has been published in only three catalogue entries. It begins by introducing the manuscript and then goes on to focus on what is perhaps its most remarkable aspect: its extensive mutilation. After examining how and why other medieval Jewish manuscripts were intentionally altered, this essay explores the various campaigns that modified the Houston Mahzor and what can be known about the manuscript’s missing texts and images. Reimagining the Mahzor as it once was reveals a richly illuminated manuscript with strikingly unusual images. Studying how it was intentionally altered over time uncovers a range of reactions from its varied audience, Jewish and Christian, German and Italian, medieval and modern.

Marks of usage: discerning information literacy practices from medieval European manuscripts

PurposeThis study aims to discern medieval information literacy (IL) practices through scrutiny of medieval manuscripts: both the content and the “marks of usage” evident therein.Design/methodology/approachAnalysis of the writing of scribes. Engagement with selected primary texts (manuscripts) and prior scholarly investigations.FindingsAmple evidence exists of the practice of IL in the medieval era, and how it was transmitted and negotiated across time and space. Popular guides for scholars, including Hugh of St. Victor's Didascalicon, and the marks of usage left on manuscripts by readers/scribes, are evidence of how members of scholarly communities engaged in collaborative metacognitive work, helping each other with tasks such as understanding the ordinatio (organisation) of texts; cross-referencing; locating information; and making judgments about relevance, amongst others. New practices were stimulated by key historical transitions, particularly the shift from ecclesiastical to secular settings for learning.Research limitations/implicationsThis is a preliminary study only, intended to lay foundations and suggest directions for more detailed future investigations of primary texts. The scope is Eurocentric, and similar work might be undertaken with the records of practice available elsewhere, e.g. the Arab world, South and East Asia.Originality/valueSome previous work (e.g. Long, 2017) has investigated medieval scholarly communities by retrospectively applying notions from practice theory, but no prior work has specifically focused upon IL as the practice under investigation.

Generic HTR Models for Medieval Manuscripts. The CREMMALab Project

In the Humanities, the emergence of digital methods has opened up research questions to quantitative analysis. This is why HTR technology is increasingly involved in humanities research projects following precursors such as the Himanis project. However, many research teams have limited resources, either financially or in terms of their expertise in artificial intelligence. It may therefore be difficult to integrate handwritten text recognition into their project pipeline if they need to train a model or to create data from scratch. The goal here is not to explain how to build or improve a new HTR engine, nor to find a way to automatically align a preexisting corpus with an image to quickly create ground truths for training. This paper aims to help humanists easily develop an HTR model for medieval manuscripts, create and gather training data by knowing the issues underlying their choices. The objective is also to show the importance of the constitution of consistent data as a prerequisite to allow their gathering and to train efficient HTR models. We will present an overview of our work and experiment in the CREMMALab project (2021-2022), showing first how we ensure the consistency of the data and then how we have developed a generic model for medieval French manuscripts from the 13 th to the 15 th century, ready to be shared (more than 94% accuracy) and/or fine-tuned by other projects.

Działalność Pracowni Wiedzy o Dawnej Książce Instytutu Historii Nauki PAN w 2022 r.

Research Activity of the Old and Rare Book Studies Research Unit at the Institute for the History of Science PAS in 2022 The article presents the achievements of the Old and Rare Book Studies Research Unit in 2022 in the scope of documentation, scientific, and popularization activities. The research conducted by the Unit members primarily focused on the Manuscripta.pl project, which led to new and significant discoveries concerning medieval manuscripts, the history of book collections and individual codices. In addition to the work related to the implementation of the NPRH project, team members also participated in other scientific projects and carried out individual research activities, resulting in the publication of scientific articles and presentations at academic conferences. Significant efforts were also made in the area of science popularization.

Veiled Reading, Reading Veils: Textile Curtains and the Experiences of Medieval French Manuscripts, 1200–1325

Abstract: Building on groundbreaking studies by Christine Sciacca and Morgan Simms Adams, this article addresses an understudied phenomenon of medieval French manuscript culture: the sewing of textile curtains—fabric pieces made of silk, linen, or cotton gauze—above or beside illuminations to protect and veil them. Presenting a corpus of forty-six manuscripts of medieval French texts that once contained curtains, I demonstrate how this practice extended beyond the realm of Latin and devotional books to some of the most popular vernacular illuminated book traditions of the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. Through a series of examples, the different performative potentialities of the veil—its affordances—are shown to far exceed its presumed protective function. Indeed, I argue that the textile curtain, operating at the intersection of touch and sight, should be considered an important part of how certain French books were experienced in the Middle Ages.

The Effect of Unfolding Scientific Discoveries on Visual Images of the Beginning of the Universe

Explanations of ‘The Beginning’ or ‘Creation’ have varied from primitive accounts to complex theological, philosophical and scientific arguments. Myths and ideas providing answers to the great questions of how the universe was created, and where we all came from, have circulated in the near east and the Mediterranean since ancient times, from early legends to ancient, medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, to modern scientific theory. Such ideas have also been expressed in visual images ranging from the great Creation cycles in St Mark's Venice and Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling, to the works of William Blake, Brancusi's 'egg' or technical and scientific diagrams, such as the famous NASA image ‘The Big Bang and the Expansion of the Universe’ of 2012. Visual representations of the Beginning have changed over time and may be either in line with or contrary to contemporary scientific thought.

The Set of Alfonsine Tables Underlying Giovanni Bianchini’s Planetary Tables

The analysis of astronomical tables has proven to be a powerful tool to understand the transmission of astronomical knowledge. Further, the study of the major sets of tables compiled or in circulation in the Middle Ages has contributed significantly to mapping the thousands of tables preserved in medieval manuscripts. The present paper focuses on the relationship between two specific sets of tables, both in the framework of Alfonsine astronomy: one of hitherto uncertain authorship and a much larger one compiled by the Ferrarese astronomer Giovanni Bianchini (d. after 1469).

Mityczny potwór Kampe w „Fasti” Owidiusza

The paper discusses Greek and Roman literary sources describing Campe or Kampe (Gk. Κάμπη), a mythical female monster killed by the god Dionysus (Diodorus, Bibl. III 72) or by Zeus (Ps.-Apollodorus, Bibl. I 2,1; Nonnos, D. XVIII 233–264). Campe was a large monster who guarded the Cyclopes and Hundred-Handers prisoned in Tartarus (according to Pseudo-Apollodorus and Nonnos). The same mythical monster seems to be attested in Ovid’s Fasti (III 793–808). The Roman poet presents an unknown version of the Greek myth, describing a wondrous monster (line 799: monstrum mirabile), born of Mother Earth (l. 799: Matre satus Terra). She is portrayed with the upper body of a bull and the tail of a serpent in place of legs (l. 799–800: taurus parte sui serpens posteriore fuit). Ovid does not mention the Greek or Latinized name of this mythical monster but introduces the acrostic CAMPH (= Gk. Κάμπη) in his description (Ov., Fast. III 797–801). Unfortunately, the Ovidian acrostic in question is preserved in the corrupted form CQMPH in most medieval manuscripts. It is suggested that the ancient editor, who prepared the final version of the six books of the Fasti after Ovid’s death (18 AD), failed to notice the Ovidian acrostic and introduced his own improvement in line 798 (quaeque instead of atque or the like).

An Illustrated Haggadah for Sefardi Exiles in Istanbul

The first illustrated haggadah of the print era was published around 1505 by David and Samuel ibn Nahmias in Istanbul (henceforth “Istanbul Haggadah”). It was embellished with woodcuts that had been commissioned in 1492 in Naples. This paper approaches the Istanbul Haggadah as a cultural product of the early Sefardi Diaspora. A comparative iconographic method reveals idiosyncrasies in relation to the tradition of medieval manuscript haggadot, which are then contextualized within the cultural ambience of the early Sefardi Diaspora in Naples, where Don Isaac Abarbanel played a central role as a spiritual and communal leader. My analysis is based on three types of information and sources: Abarbanel’s post-expulsion writings, among others a commentary on the haggadah; book-historical data on the early phases of printing; and historical information on the lives of the refugees. Most Sefardi printing projects from the post-expulsion years were aimed at meeting the spiritual needs of the community of exiles. The Istanbul Haggadah, and particularly its illustration program, was a fitting compliment to these endeavors.

The Transmedial Knights of the Round Table: Character-Based Worldbuilding in the Manuscripts of Chrétien de Troyes

Abstract The five Arthurian romances of Chrétien de Troyes were hugely influential in establishing King Arthur’s world as one that could easily expand to include the adventures of a seemingly endless group of chivalric heroes. Chrétien’s use of character details to connect his romances and suggest a shared fictional world inspired other romance writers as well as medieval translators, illustrators, and manuscript copyists and compilers. The result was a multimedia Arthurian universe akin to the modern narratological concept of the transmedial storyworld. This storyworld relied on the recognisability of the Arthurian knights as characters and existed in many different forms across written and visual media, including the unique combinations of text and image that appear in different manuscript witnesses of Chrétien’s romances. Emphasising the utility of both individual manuscripts and modern narratology, this article investigates three manuscripts that contain romances by Chrétien: Paris, BNF fr. 1450, Paris, BNF fr. 1433, and Montpellier, Bibliothèque interuniversitaire, H 249. Through examining the distinct arrangement, editing, and decorative choices in these manuscripts, I argue that they illustrate the potential of character as a means of worldbuilding, not only for medieval authors but also for other creators and audiences.

Medieval Manuscripts at Loyola University Chicago

Abstract: This article provides a summary overview of the collection of pre-1600 western European manuscripts in Loyola University Chicago Archives & Special Collections. The collection presently comprises four manuscript codices, at least thirty-eight fragments, and four documents. The codices are a thirteenth-century book of hours from German-speaking lands; a fifteenth-century Dutch prayer book; a preacher's compilation written probably in southern Germany in the 1440s; and two fifteenth-century Italian humanist booklets, bound together since the nineteenth century, transmitting Donatus's commentary on the Eunuchus (incomplete) and an anthology of theological excerpts, respectively. The fragments consist of thirteen leaves from books dismembered by modern booksellers (most are from fifteenth-century books of hours) and a larger number of binding fragments, all but two of which remain in situ. These represent the remains of ten manuscript books: four Latin liturgical books, two texts of Roman civil law, one large-format thirteenth-century Italian Bible, one thirteenth-century copy of Ptolemy's Almagest in the translation of Gerard of Cremona, one late fourteenth-century copy of the Ockhamist Tractatus de principiis theologiae , and one fifteenth-century Dutch book of hours in the translation of Geert Grote. Many of these materials have remained unidentified until now.

“Encyclopaedia Slavica Sanctorum” Ten Years Later: Main Trends and Questions

The paper discusses users’ activities in the period 2011-2022, mostly types of searches, in an electronic encyclopaedia on saints. The e-product contains information in Bulgarian on orthodox church calendar and texts dedicated to saints as preserved in medieval Slavonic manuscripts and in popular Bulgarian culture (as represented in fieldwork interviews). The most frequently used options are “view object” and “view date”. Most often articles on popular saints amongst Bulgarians were read, such as St. Basil the Great, St. Kliment of Ohrid, St. George, and St. Petka of Tarnovo. Less often are searches by combined parameters and an increase of their frequency is observable in 2019-2021.

Manuscripts in "Fly-Over" States: An Assembly of Essays Highlighting Medieval Manuscripts around the American Midwest

Abstract: Thousands of manuscript fragments and intact codices reside in collections across the American Midwest, but most remain largely unknown to and unexplored by the scholarly community because of their perceived remoteness from more traditional centers of book collecting on the East and West Coasts. This essay introduces a special collection of ten articles highlighting various individual manuscripts and library collections in so-called fly-over states. From broken Bibles to Near Eastern masterpieces, and from small assemblies of manuscripts to large-scale digital collaborations that aim to expose the Midwest's rich manuscript resources, the topics of each article represent remarkable opportunities for scholarship, teaching, outreach, and collaboration across the manuscript studies field.

"Deathless fragments within the reach of many …": Tracing Four Decades of Manuscript Fragmentation via the Lima (OH) Public Library Staff Loan Fund Association Archive

Abstract: The breaking and dispersal of Otto Ege's manuscripts have been the subject of focused scholarly inquiry for nearly three decades, with new discoveries and insights emerging with regularity as more scholars and collectors work to uncover previously unrecognized and unrecorded Ege manuscript fragments in an attempt to reconstruct their original codicological and historical contexts. But the historical records of Ege's biblioclasm are just as fragmentary as the manuscripts he broke, and much remains unknown about the business practices, partnerships, and processes that facilitated the distribution of his manuscripts' pages. Drawing upon a new cache of archival documentation discovered by the author, this article sheds new light on one of Ege's most important commercial partnerships, highlighting his decades-long enterprise with the Lima (OH) Public Library to market and sell fragments to their mutual financial benefit and for the first time revealing the full statistical and financial extent of the Ege-Lima partnership—and its lasting impact on the distribution of medieval manuscripts across North America (and beyond).