This volume of 25 leaves was produced between 1910-1916 to preserve eight fragments from five Greek parchment manuscripts. The fragments, almost all palimpsests, had been found around 1896 in the binding of an unidentified Syrian gospel from Harput (Anatolia). A: Fragm. 1-2 (4th century ex / 7th century in): parts of ch. 15 of Didascalia apostolorum; B: Fragm. 3-4 (6th century): parts of ch. 3-4 of First Epistle of Paul to Timothy; C: Fragm. 5, in extremely poor state of preservation: contents and dating unknown; D: Fragm. 6 (7th century): parts of the prologue and the beginning of the scholia on book 24 of the Iliad; E: Fragm. 7-8 (7th century): parts of Psalms 108, 114 and 115. The content of the writing on the lower parts of the palimpsests is neither known nor dated.
Online Since: 12/10/2020
This Carolingian manuscript from the period before 850 comes from the Cloister of Fulda. It contains the sole extant copy of the Latin version of a text falsely attributed to Hippocrates: "De victus ratione", which sets forth the foundations of dietetics and emphasizes the antagonism between the elements of fire and water within the body. Numerous scholars and physicians have relied on this text throughout history.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This manuscript contains a Latin translation in pre-Carolingian script of the "Antiquitates Judaicae", originally written in Greek by the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the first century. CB 98 was produced in the Benedictine abbey of San Silvestro di Nonantola (Province of Modena), as was Ms. CB 99, which also contains texts by Flavius Josephus.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
This codex contains the Jewish War, originally written by the historian Flavius Josephus in the 1st century. The 7 books of De bello Judaico present an account of the Jewish rebellion from the year 66 until the overthrow of Masada in the year 73. CB 99, like Ms. CB 98, was produced in the Benedictine abbey of San Silvestro di Nonantola (Province of Modena), though later than CB 98 and by different scribes.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
Carolingian reform efforts responded to a desire to regularize religious orders by creating a unified rule for monastic life, the Concordia regularum of Benedict of Aniane. In the resulting course of events, an effort was made during the turn from the 9th to the 10th century to dinstinguish the monastic status from the canonical. In 816 Ludwig the Pious made the results of the Council of Aix public; the first part of the Institutio canonicorum presents the statutes of the church fathers and the previous councils, the second part explains the resolutions of the council. The task of putting this work into writing was long attributed to Amalarius of Metz, a student of Alcuin and advisor of Charlemagne; however, another author must be acknowledged for this work, which totals 118 chapters, some of which are extremely comprehensive: Benedict of Aniane is also supposed to have been a contributor. The manuscript held by the Fondation Martin Bodmer was copied only a few years after the original publication of the text (in the first half of the 9th century) in a very fine Carolingian script, and it belonged to the Benedictine Abbey of St. Jacob in Mainz. A full-page drawing portraying the crucifixion was added in the 12th or 13th century at the end of the book.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This large, incomplete manuscript in folio format contains the summer portion and the Commune sanctorum of the homiliary by Paulus Diaconus. It was written by various hands in a 9th century Carolingian minuscule; in addition to initials drawn in ink and decorated with red scrolls which indicate an Irish influence, there are even several elegant incipits in capital script. The manuscript probably comes from Reichenau, certainly from the area of Lake Constance. It belonged to the Phillipps collection, later to Chester Beatty; it was bought in 1968 by Martin Bodmer.
Online Since: 06/23/2014
This exciting small manuscript from (northeastern) France was produced in the 9th century in the region of Paris-Reims and is notable for its fine script and rubricated title in Capitalis Rustica. In various places, individual alterations in a careful 12th century script are noticeable, such as on ff. 32-32v, as well as the additions of a few words (corrections?) on ff. 52v-53.
Online Since: 03/22/2012
A legal manuscript, probably incomplete, which contains an extensive collection of texts. Among the most important are four laws, the Lex Salica, Lex Ribuaria, Lex Alamannorum and Lex Baiuvariorum; a short and fragmentary collection of capitularies issued by Charlemagne; excerpts from De legibus, from Isidore of Seville's Sententiae, from the Codex Theodosianum and from the Rule of Saint Benedict. The text of the Lex Baiuvariorum also contains legal terms in Old High German. In 1789 the codex was acquired by Count Johann-Christian Solms, who resided in Klitschdorf Castle near Bunzlau (Silesia) - his coat of arms can be found on f. 1r - which is why the codex is known in the literature as the "Codex Klitschdorf" or "Codex Solmsianus.” In 1960 Martin Bodmer purchased this codex from the New York antiquarian book dealer H. P. Kraus.
Online Since: 06/25/2015
10th century manuscript of Italian origin, which contains numerous works of rhetoric: the Ars rhetorica by Fortunatianus, the Principia rhetorices by Augustine, the Praecepta artis rhetoricae by Julius Severianus and the Partitiones oratoriae by Cicero. In the 14th century, it became the property of Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca), who, at various times of his life, added numerous marginal notes. The manuscript demonstrates the humanist's interest in the Oratores latini minores (minor Latin orators), which contributed to their rediscovery and proliferation.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
This 10th century parchment manuscript contains a commentary on the Somnium Scipionis by Macrobius, followed by excerpts from the Naturalis historia of Pliny the Elder and from De institutione musica by Boethius. The codex also includes diagrams which portray, for example, the Earth and the constellations.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
Manuscript in three parts. The first part (f. 1r-20v) contains the oldest version of Gunzo's Epistola ad Augienses and can be dated to the 10th century. The second part (f. 21r-27v) probably is the original core of the codex, to which the other two pieces were added; it contains the autograph of Lambert of Hersfeld's Vita s. Lulli episcopi Moguntini and dates to the 11th century. The third part (f. 28r-43v) is from the 13th century and contains the transcripts of the Constitutiones of the Fourth Council of the Lateran (1215). This codex is from the Benedictine Tegernsee Abbey (the first part is mentioned in the monastery's library catalog); later it became part of the collection of the Princes of Oettingen-Wallerstein and in 1948 the antiquarian book dealers Rosenthal sold it to Martin Bodmer. The old guard-leaves are fragments of a liturgical manuscript from the Diocese of Freising.
Online Since: 03/22/2017
A remarkable manuscript from the end of the 10th century, undoubtedly produced in either Constantinople or Smyrna, CB 25 presents all four Gospels together in Greek. The biblical text is accompanied by commentaries by Peter of Laodiceia (an exegetical chain) written in cursive. The volume is decorated with two valuable full-page miniatures representing Luke and Mark against gold backgrounds.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Manuscript CB 88, which combines the Odes, the Epodes, and the Carmen saeculare, a piece interpreted by children's choirs of the Roman nobility during secular performances, is an unusual example of a Horace manuscript from the turn of the 10th to the 11th century. Its many marginal and interlinear glosses, which frequently consist of scholii by Pseudo-Acro, explain the verses and praise their metrical accuracy and verbal virtuosity. The alphabetical tables and the title were added in the 14th century at the end of the volume.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Two contiguous fragments from the same leaf, which used to be part of a luxury-lectionary of the New Testament, probably copied in Constantinople in the 11th century. The two pieces were later also used for numerous clumsy drawings, graffiti and arithmetic exercises.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
The plays of Terence were highly appreciated throughout the entire Middle Ages, as attested by this 11th century manuscript written in Carolingian script, which preserves fragments from two of his six comedies, Andria and Eunuchus. The fragments are of different sizes; between the 15th and 16th century, they were used as binding for registers, as evidenced by certain signs of use and of folds, as well as by dates written beside invocations of the Virgin, of Christ or of St. Thomas.
Online Since: 10/10/2019
These fragments of Ovid's Fasti were discovered around 1700 in the monastery school of Ilfeld and have since been known as "Fragmentum Ilfeldense". In 1956 they became part of the collection of Martin Bodmer, after they had been used as endpapers or in a book binding. The Fasti is a poem in elegiac couplets, the theme of which is the Roman calendar – only the first six months – as well as the changes introduced at the beginning of the Empire with the feast days in memory of Augustus.
Online Since: 10/08/2020
This manuscript contains the Adnotationes super Lucanum, preceded by the Vita Lucani by Vacca, a grammarian from late antiquity whom some date to the 6th-century. The codex probably was created in the Benedictine Abbey Tegernsee in Bavaria and later was part of the library of the Princes of Oettingen-Wallerstein. As codex Wallersteinensis I.2, this text, together with four other textual witnesses, is the basis for the 1909 edition by Johannes Endt, which is still considered the reference edition today.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
This manuscript, which was copied in Norman Sicily, contains Origen's Commentary on the Song of Songs in the version translated from Greek into Latin by Rufinus of Aquileia (about 345-about 411). The text comprises the first four of the ten books of which Origen's original text must have consisted. It is preceded by a prologue by Jerome and is followed by short prayer by Gregory of Nazianzus, also translated into Latin by Rufinus of Aquileia. Origen's commentary, which presents Christ as the bridegroom and the Church, or also the individual soul, as the bride, influenced spiritual interpretations of the Song of Songs for centuries.
Online Since: 09/26/2017
A precursor to the rediscovery of Statius during the Renaissance of the 12th century this manuscript of the Thebaid (sometimes Thebiad) from the 11th century was certainly copied in Germany. It contains some marginal glosses that originate in part in the commentary of Lactance, and is distinguished above all by its neumes, which stand above the verses on fols. 46v, 80r and 81r. The notation indicates the rhythem of the text and underscore the importance of some passages that have a pathetic tone: the mourning of Hypsipyle over the body of the child Archemorus, the prayer of Tydeus shortly before death, the pain of Polyneikes before the body of Tydeus.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This manuscript fragment, which was used as binding for an edition of the De quattuor virtutibus by Domenico Mancini (London, R. Dexter, 1601), contains an excerpt from a sermon by Aelfric (around 950 - around 1010), who was one of the most important Anglo-Saxon authors of the High Middle Ages. The section of this sermon, which is intended for Septuagesima Sunday and which has survived in full in 9 manuscripts, contains Aelfric's almost complete English translation of the parable of the sower (Matthew 20:1-16), followed by a few lines of explanation. According to N. Ker, this fragment, which can be dated to the 2nd half of the 11th century, presents various interesting linguistic variations on the original text by Aelfric. It is the oldest Anglo-Saxon manuscript owned by the Fondation Martin Bodmer.
Online Since: 06/18/2020
This Gradual was produced in 1071 by the archpresbyter of the Church of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere; it contains the musical scores for assorted liturgical songs. These melodies set down in written form make CB 74 the oldest record of Roman song.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
In the foreword to CB 142, Prudentius underscores his desire to please God through the work he does, or at least though his poems. The most important works of this Latin-Christian poet, born in the 4th century in Tarragona, have been collected in this manuscript from the end of the 11th or the beginning of the 12th century, and they reflect the light of the word of God. One may read here, among other things, the famous Psychomachia, which portrays the struggle between the allegorical figures of vice and virtue, a lesson that had a profound influence upon medieval art and poetry.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This medical handbook by Gariopontus, who flourished in the mid-11th century in Salerno, systematically assembled in head-to-foot order writings already long known in the Latin speaking world (Galen's Ad Glauconem de medendi methodo I-II with a Liber tercius by a pseudo-Galen, the Aurelius and Esculapius derived ultimately from the texts of Soranus of Ephesus, and an extract from the Therapeutica by Alexander of Tralles) in seven books. The work exercised a strong influence on the School of Salerno. It survives in more than 65 manuscripts, and three print issues were produced as early as the 16th century. The Bodmer manuscript from the early 12th century, like many other versions of this text, features numerous glosses.
Online Since: 03/22/2012
While Cicero is regarded today mainly as a philosopher and politician, he was regarded during the middle ages mainly as a teacher of public rhetoric. This is demonstrated by CB 52, most likely of French origin, which consists of copies of "De inventione" and a work long attributed to Cicero, "Rhetorica ad Herennium". The manuscript dates from the beginning of the 12th century.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
This 12th century manuscript from central Italy contains works of music theory by three Latin authors. Among these is Guido Aretinus, a Tuscan monk of the 10th century who is regarded as the inventor of solmisation. Some passages of text in the codex are based on the Institutio musica by Boethius.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This French manuscript, probably incomplete, contains the commentary on the Psalms (Ps. 101-117, f. 1r-110v and 113r-136v) by Augustine of Hippo. De meditatione by Hugh of Saint Victor was inserted between Ps. 108 (f. 110v) and Ps. 109 (f. 113v). This manuscript probably comes from the manuscript collection of Hautecombe Abbey in Savoy, which was acquired by Archbishop Giacinto della Torre of Turin (1747-1814) for thearchdiocese's seminary library, which was later dispersed. The manuscript was acquired in 1957 from the book dealer Hoepli in Milan by Martin Bodmer.
Online Since: 06/23/2014
This manuscript was created in the German area in the 12th century. It contains the Venerable Bede's († 735) commentary on the Gospel of Mark. The codex belongs to the libray of the Benedictine Abbey of Gladbach near Cologne.
Online Since: 10/07/2013
The countless marginal and interlinear glosses in CB 89 are evidence of the rediscovery of the works of Horace during the 12th century. This copy was produced in France.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
Contains Juvenal's Satires (I-XVI) with glosses which are probably from the commentary by Pseudo-Cornutus. Glued onto both inside covers are fragments from a 14th-century manuscript written in Dutch which contain part of the poetic work Martijn by Jacob van Maerlant, one of the greatest Flemish poets of the Middle Ages.
Online Since: 04/23/2013
During the entire middle ages in the occident, the texts of Aristotle and Boethius were well circulated and inspired a large number of thinkers. These two great philosophers are brought together in this volume, written in a variety of different hands. The first portion, which can be dated sometime in the 11th or 12th century, contains the works of Aristotle. It also includes an extremely interesting schema (fol. 27) and initials accented in green and decorated with scrollwork. The text of Boethius, which is dated somewhat later, was copied during the 12th century. In this text one also finds some contemporaneous corrections as well as glosses from the 14th century.
Online Since: 06/02/2010
This manuscript contains the Song of Songs with a lacuna (6.5-8) due to the loss of a sheet. The Glossa ordinaria is written on the first sheet (1r-1v); it contains a heretofore unknown commentary. Placed alongside this is the first part of the Song of Songs (f. 2r-29r. until Ct 6.8), which in the beginning (f. 2r-v) is surrounded by another unknown commentary. The last sheets (f. 29v-30) contain excerpts from the prologue to the interpretation of the Song of Songs by Rupert of Deutz. The beginning of the Song of Songs is adorned with an initial depicting Solomon and the Shulamite.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
This copy of the Lives of the Saints, produced during the 12th century, possibly in the German Cloister of Weissenau, is decorated with ornately detailed and illustrated initial capitals, including one notable initial in which the illuminator, "Fr. Ruffilus" includes himself (fol. 244r).
Online Since: 05/20/2009
This 12th century French manuscript contains the first six books of Virgil's Aeneid, along with the Argumenta attributed to Pseudo-Ovid. Among the famous previous owners of this codex is Charles de Montesquieu (1689-1755), whose ex-libris is on f. 1r. Later the manuscript was owned by Sir Thomas Philipps (1792-1872). Martin Bodmer acquired this manuscript in 1966, during one of the auctions of the Philipps collection.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
The handscroll of Daihannya-haramitta-kyō, the Sutra of Great Wisdom, chapter five hundred and forty, consists of a simple sheet of paper without mounting. The complete version of the sutra encompasses six-hundred chapters. It was introduced to China from India by the monk, scholar and translator Xuanzang, who translated the sutra into Chinese in the 7th century before it was imported into Japan. The sutra is written in black ink on high-quality paper, very likely kōzo-shi, which is made using the fibre of Broussonetia papyrifera or paper mulberry tree, especially treasured and used for important documents during the early periods of Japanese history such as the Nara and Heian periods. There is a circular red seal placed over the top of the first four lines of the text, stating “Yakushi-ji-in” (seal of the temple Yakushi-ji). The sutra was written in Japan within the context of the religious rites of reproducing holy scripture to benefit the karma.
Online Since: 06/23/2016
This codex from Italy contains Gregory the Great's Homiliae in Ezechielem. The anathema Quicumque eum vendiderit vel alienaverit vel hanc scripturam raserit anathema sit is on f. 1r, as well as a partially erased ex libris that mentions a Convent of St. Agnes. The codex was purchased by Martin Bodmer in 1962; earlier perhaps it belonged to the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice and then to Abbot Celotti, to the library of Thomas Phillips, and to Sir Sydney Cocherell.
Online Since: 03/22/2017
This manuscript, probably of French origin, contains Eusebius of Caesarea's Historia ecclesiastica in the translation of Rufinus, as well as Books I-II of Rufinus' continuation thereof.
Online Since: 03/22/2017
At an unknown date, this late 12th century parchment bifolium was used as binding, as attested by traces of folding in the lower margin. It contains an excerpt of the Tristia, a collection of letters in elegiac couplets written by Ovid during his exile. The text is continuous, which indicates that the bifolium came from the middle of a quire; only a few verses are missing due to a cut in the upper part of the leaf. It was purchased by Martin Bodmer in 1958 from the bookseller Kraus in New York.
Online Since: 06/13/2019
This manuscript, which was probably created in the St. Matthias-Eucharius Abbey in Trier, clearly belonged to the Benedictine abbey, as the ex libris on f. 1r declares. It contains, among others, the Liber antiquitatum biblicarum, which recounts Biblical history from Adam to King Saul, i.e., from the Book of Genesis to the Book of Samuel. This work was falsely attributed to Philo of Alexandria (1st century AD), the Hellenistic philosopher of Jewish culture. It also contains excerpts from the Carmina by the poet and Bishop of Tours Hildebert of Lavardin (1056-1133).
Online Since: 12/18/2014
This codex from southern Germany is composed of two parts bound together in one German binding in 1569. The first part of the manuscript contains about a hundred leaves from the 12th and 13th centuries. It begins with a calendar featuring numerous constellations and full page illustrations. Following are prayers and liturgical songs. The second part consists of thirty leaves containing a series of Latin prayers in carefully wrought late 14th century Gothic script.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
Four fragments of parchment, separated from a binding, contain parts of the account of the so-called Navigatio sancti Brandani, the sea voyage of St. Brendan, an Irish monk of the fifth and sixth centuries. The work in Latin prose, handed down anonymously, is considered a classic of medieval hagiography and travel literature; since the 10th century, it has been preserved in numerous manuscripts. This version is an Anglo-Norman translation by the monk Benedeit (about 1120).
Online Since: 12/13/2013
Copied in the 13th century, probably in the north of France, this Latin Bible unifies in one volume the books of the Old- and New Testaments, most of them preceded by prologues. It transmits the standard Vulgate text, called the Paris version, with the chapter divisions attributed to Stephen Langton, and its last thirty pages provide a glossary of Hebrew names. Historiated initials open the various biblical books and give the volume its structure. A smaller script than usual in this volume has been used on fol. 1 for the Commentary on the Tree of Consanguinity, a text usually transmitted in juridical works, augmented here by an illustration of such a tree.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This text by Lucan is accompanied by marginal and interlinear glosses in various hands, which are partly contemporaneous, partly later; the most recent in an Italian hand that can be dated to the 14th/15th century. In the margin of f. 69v is a simple drawing of the mappa mundi. At least until the end of the 18th century, the manuscript belonged to the Carmelites of S. Paolo in Ferrara.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
The Hebrew text of the Old Testament in CB 21 originated in Moorish Spain: Al-Andalus. Unlike most similar surviving manuscripts, it does not belong to the Ashkenazic tradition, but is instead an artifact of the Sephardic book culture of the 13th century. The ornamentation is strongly influenced by calligraphic art.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
Manuscript CB 10 was probably intended for educational use, it contains works of Aristotle, Avicenna, Nicolaus Damascenus, Qusta Ibn-Luca and Alexander Aphrodisiensis. This manuscript, written on parchment during the 13th century, presumably belonged to a student of the Faculty of Arts in Leipzig, as may be concluded from a list of lectures attended during the year 1439 which is included in the codex. The list contains the names of the professors, titles of the texts covered, lecturers' fees, and starting and ending dates for the lecture periods.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
The Estoire de la guerre sainte, attributed to Ambroise d'Evreux, informs us that the Chanson d'Aspremont was read aloud during the winter of 1190 to entertain the soldiers of Richard the Lionhearted and Philip Augustus, who were stationed in Sicily. This heroic epic (chanson de geste) in rhymed decimeter and Alexandrines tells of the campaign of Charlemagne in Italy against the pagan king Agolant and his son Helmont. The Anglo-Norman manuscript held by the Fondation Martin Bodmer was produced in the 13th century and contains interlinear and marginal corrections, added in a second hand at a slightly later date than that in which the text was written. Because the additions were doubtless made with the help of a proofing manuscript, we can thus measure the complex effort that was required for the dissemination of this text.
Online Since: 10/04/2011
CB 85, a manuscript of the Iliad on paper, was copied during the 13th century in Terra d'Otranto, a famous center of Greek culture in southern Italy. The text by Homer is accompanied by interlinear and marginal scholii and commentaries by the Byzantine scholar John Tzetzes.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This 13th century manuscript is from Italy and contains the first four books of the work De fide orthodoxa, written in Greek by John of Damascus. As the title (f. 1r) indicates, this text was translated into Latin at the request of Pope Eugene III (1145-1153) by the jurist and prolific translator Burgundio of Pisa. Numerous marginal glosses, for the most part contemporaneous with the creation of this copy of the manuscript, are sprinkled throughout the text.
Online Since: 09/26/2017
This manuscript containing legal materials from the 13th or early 14th century demonstrates the high regard in which the "Decretum Gratiani", often considered the foundation of modern canon law, was held during the middle ages. The text is bordered by the "Glossa Ordinaria" of Johannes Teutonicus, in the first revision by Barthomeus of Brescia (before 1245). The manuscript features numerous ornately illustrated initials.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This manuscript contains the Dragmaticon, a work by the scholar Wilhelm de Conches, a member of the School of Chartres. It is possible that the codex was produced in about 1230 in the area of Cologne in a scholastic circle and that it is among the oldest surviving texts of the Dragmaticon, which is transmitted in a total of about 70 medieval manuscripts. The portable format, assorted schemata and tables provided, and the script used (Gothic cursive) indicate that the manuscript was intended for university use. The first section of the manuscript contains a computus for determining when movable feast days should fall.
Online Since: 05/20/2009
This manuscript contains the Satires by the Roman poet Persius – Aulus Persius Flaccus (34-62). Except for the prologue, the satires are written in hexameter; there are a modest number of verses (about 650). The satires were very popular in the Middle Ages and beyond, as even Jean-Jacques Rousseau borrowed some words from them - intus et in cute (Satire III, v. 30 - fol. 5v) - to place at the beginning of his Confessions. The addition of a paragraph in French from the Gospel of Luke on the last page of the manuscript suggests that this copy of the Satires, which goes back to the 12th century, might have been copied in France.
Online Since: 06/14/2018
The historical-biblical compilation by Peter of Poitiers (around 1130-1205), the Compendium historiae in genealogia Christi, was very widely used during the last centuries of the Middle Ages. Like many other examplars of this text, this copy was written on a parchment scroll, but at an unknown date it was cut into 7 parts. Figurative medallions and schemata, most of them genealogical, cover the entire work and thus represent a continuous line of world history, from the Fall of Man (f. 1) to the Christmas story (f. 5).
Online Since: 10/08/2020
Exemplar of the so-called Parisian Bible, a pocket Bible which contains the entire text of the Old and the New Testaments in a relatively small format in two columns in small script. The codex was produced around the middle or in the second half of the 13th century in Central or Eastern France. It is distinguished and made luxurious by no fewer than 82 historiated initials and 66 ornamental initials. Noteworthy is the fact that the biblical text shows signs of careful correction and that the psalms are divided into smaller sections according to a scheme, which rules out that it was commissioned by a monastery, but suggests instead that it was commissioned by a secular priest or a layperson. An erased note of ownership suggests that in 1338 this manuscript belonged to the Celestine Monastery Notre-Dame of Ternes (Limoges), perhaps a gift from its founder Roger le Fort, who was the son of the Lord of Ternes and was Archbishop of Bourges in 1343. Before this Bible became part of the collection of Martin Bodmer, it belonged to the collection of Baron Edmond de Rothschild (1845-1935), hence the name “Rothschild-Bibel.”
Online Since: 12/17/2015
This 13th century manuscript offers a selection of texts from the legend-filled history of Great Britain: the knightly romance "Gui de Warewic" (Guy of Warwick) and the Anglo-Norman rhyming chronicle the "Roman de Brut" (History of the Britons) by Wace, which recounts the conquest of the British Isles by a great grandson of Aeneas, the returned hero of Troy. A translation of the "Prophéties de Merlin" (Prophesies of Merlin) by Helias follows. The volume closes with "Florence de Rome", a text that may be characterized as half "chanson de geste" and half adventure romance.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
This manuscript contains a collection of letters exchanged in the court circle of Friedrich II., assembled in about 1270 at the papal Curia as a collection, which is generally attributed to Petrus de Vinea (Chancellor of Friedrich II.; ca. 1200-1249). This collection has been reproduced in over 230 manuscripts and was long regarded as a model for writers because of the elegant language used in the letters. The role of the collection as a model is enhanced in CB 132 by the inclusion of a copy of the "Ars dictaminis" by Bovilius Aretinus.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
Jean Bodel, who was a member of the Brotherhood of Buskers and a bourgeois (middle-class resident) of Arras, wrote his Chanson des Saisnes (Song of the Saxons) during the last third of the 12th century. This epic in Alexandrine verse tells of the war prosecuted by Charlemagne against the Saxon King Guiteclin. The Chanson exists today in three manuscripts (a fourth was completely destroyed in the fire at the library of Turin) which present different versions of the text. The long version held by the Fondation Martin Bodmer is in a small-format manuscrit de jongleur or performer's script. It was probably produced around the end of the 13th century and is a simple piece of work, without miniatures, written on parchment, much of which was poorly cut, and it is roughly sewn together.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
In the middle of the 12th century the Latin works of Statius and Virgil as well as adaptations of Homer were translated into the vernacular. At the same time these Latin texts were being brought into the “romance” language (French), the first examples of the French poetic form called the “Roman” or Romance were being written. CB 18, a parchment manuscript, contains two such works, the Roman de Troie by Benoît de Sainte-Maure and the anonymously authored Roman de Thèbes.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
This manuscript produced at the end of the 13th century contains a copy of the Arthurian romance tales in prose: "Estoire del Graal", "Merlin", "Suite Merlin", "Queste del saint Graal", and "Mort le roi Artu". The interpolations used in CB 147 make it a particularly unusual manuscript: the heroes of the Arthurian tales are made to utter translations of the Gospels, Genesis, and various other biblical texts as well as sermons by Maurice de Sully. The manuscript also contains the "Faits de Romains", and a prose version of the "Roman de Troie" not found elsewhere. The plentiful illuminations are executed in a highly unusual style.
Online Since: 07/25/2006
Cleomadés, a poem in octosyllabic verse, is considered the masterpiece of the 13th century French poet Adenes le Roi. He lived at the courts of Brabant, France, and Flanders and composed various chansons de geste and courtly romances.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
Carefully copied by a single scribe at the end of the 13th century in England, this manuscript was given to Sir Thomas Phillipps by Sir Robert Benson (1797-1844). Benson claimed it had belonged to Wilton Abbey, in Wiltshire, where its readership would have been noble women and nuns. Bound by Phillipps, the Lai d'Haveloc was placed first and its title appeared on the spine. The Donnei des amants, a unica, is a scholarly debate between two lovers who exchange exempla : The Tristan Rossignol, Didon, the Lai de l'oiselet, and L'Homme et le Serpent.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
The Schwabenspiegel (mirror of the Swabians) contains a collection of national and feudal laws; during the late Middle Ages it was used in Southern Germany, but it was also widely used in Bohemia and in present-day Switzerland up to the German-French language border. The manuscript was edited in the second half of the 13th century and thus belongs to the oldest of altogether more than 350 textual witnesses.
Online Since: 12/18/2014
"Even as it is better to enlighten than merely to shine, so is it better to give to others the fruits of one's contemplation than merely to contemplate." The greatest work of Thomas Aquinas, the Summa Theologica, is the emblematic work of Christian scholasticism. This work, written near the end of the life of the great Dominican is incomplete, as its compositon was broken off by the death of the author. Organized in the form of questions (quaestiones) and subdivided into articles, the work presents theology in an organic form. Manuscript CB161 was produced in France, certainly in Paris, only a short time after the philosopher's death; it has been preserved in its original binding. The inscription from the end of the 13th century which can be found on the lower portion of the back cover shows that the manuscript was deposited as collateral by Jean de Paris against the loan of another work.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The first three books of the principal work of the Bishop of Seville, the Etymologiae, written at the beginning of the 7th century, provide the earliest medieval instance of division of scholarly study into the trivium (grammar, rhetoric and dialectic) and the quadrivium (mathematics, geometry, music and astronomy). Relying heavily on the--often unreliable--etymologies of the words, Isidore collected in his work the whole of ancient knowledge, in order to prevent it from being forgotten. This manuscript was produced about the end of the 13th century, possibly in the area of the University at Paris and is a witness to the enormous success of this extensive encyclopedia.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The manuscript held by the Fondation Martin Bodmer contains the only exemplar of the long Anglo-Norman roman lignager (family history tale) Waldef. This text, originally written at the beginning of the 13th century, consists of some 22,300 octosyllabic couplets celebrating the lives of its hero and his sons; after a long preamble going back to the Roman occupation of England, the tale recounts love and separation, travels and battles using conventional imagery. This manuscript was copied near the end of the 13th century or the beginning of the 14th century and is decorated with pen drawings in the margins; it also contains a second roman lignager, Gui de Warewic and a chanson de geste, Otinel.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This manuscript is one of four known textual witnesses (not counting a fragment) of the Roman de Jules César attributed to Jean de Thuin, a poem of about 9,500 alexandrines that is an adaptation of Lucan's epic poem the Pharsalia. The beginning and the end of the text of the Roman are missing in this manuscript, where the main divisions in the poem are signaled by alternating blue and red initials placed at the beginning of each stanza and accompanied by filigree in the opposite color.
Online Since: 09/26/2017
In about 1310 the Bishop of Liège, Thibaut de Bar, commissioned Jacques de Longuyon to write the Vœux du paon, which extends the tradition of the Alexander romance. Thirteen miniatures and a number of filigreed initials adorn the alexandrine monorhyme stanzas of the poem.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
The so called "Kalocsa-Kodex" contains more than two hundred texts from the time between the and of the 12th century and the beginning of the 14th centuries. It is a wide-ranging written record of German lyric poetry in the middle ages. In its approximately 330 parchment leaves, it preserves poetry by Walter von der Vogelweide, Konrad von Würzburg, Hartman von Aue, Reinmar von Zweter, and the Stricker as well as texts in the tradition of "Fuchsdictung" (Fox Tales) and a series of anonymous works. CB 72 is closely related to another manuscript written in the same hand, a partial copy of the same material, which is held by the University Library of Heidelberg (Cod. Pal. Germ. 341).
Online Since: 12/20/2007
At least three scribes shared the work of copying this imposing manuscripts of over 650 leaves in the early years of the 14th century. The Roman de Tristan en prose that it contains, a revised version of the myth of Tristan in the style of Lancelot en prose, is however, incomplete at both the beginning and the end. This work, originally written at the beginning of the 13th century, was repeatedly reproduced during the middle ages; it is found in over 80 manuscripts, which transmit at least four different versions.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Of all the 19 surviving manuscripts and fragments containing the Prophesies de Merlin, only CB 116 transmits the entire text. The manuscript thus clarifies which episodes from the Arthurian tales comprise the complete body of the work.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
This early 14th century manuscript was copied in Italy; it brings together Ovid's Ars amatoria (The Art of Love), two books of Priscian's grammar, excerpts from the Secretum secretorum, an incomplete book on physiognomy by an unknown author, as well as a series of hymns attributed to, among others, Gregory the Great, St. Ambrose or Sedulius. The manuscript, which is missing two leaves at the beginning, shows old signs of use, with commentaries and maniculae added in the margins. This copy has no decoration with the exception of several red and mauve pen-flourish initials, highlighted in gold and framed.
Online Since: 10/04/2018
The "Codex Guarneri" was written on paper fewer than twenty years after the death of Dante. The poetic form used in the textual layout, the tercet or "terza rima", which was introduced by Dante, is enhanced by the graphic design: the first letter in the first line of each three-line stanza is highlighted in red ink. The manuscript contains Latin glosses.
Online Since: 03/25/2009
The Laudi by the Italian Franciscan Jacopone da Todi are religious-inspired poems, written as ballads with varying metrical forms, often set in dialog form. This codex was produced in the second half of the 14th century by four different scribes.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
This 14th century parchment manuscript preserves the "Historia destructionis Troiae" by Guido de Columnis for posterity. Its 187 miniatures crafted by Giustino da Forlì portray the most important scenes of the Trojan War against a background of the Gothic architecture of Venice. The margins of the manuscript reveal written traces of the collaborative efforts of the copyist and the illuminator: the scribe made notes in Venetian dialect indicating the plan for incorporating a series of miniature illustrations, which were then duly added by the illuminator.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This manuscript from Italy contains Ovid's Metamorphoses. The text is annotated with marginal and interlinear glosses by various contemporaneous and Italian hands from the 15th century. Four types of notes can be discerned: structuring, lexical and philological, intertextual and commenting, which testify to the vitality of Ovid's text in the 14th century and up to the beginning of the modern era. The frontispiece is decorated with a letter surrounding a portrait of the author during the composition of his work, as well as a side border bearing an angel with red wings.
Online Since: 04/23/2013
Manuscript from Italy with the widely disseminated and successful collection of Medieval Latin fables in elegiac couplets called Esopus. These were initially anonymously published in 1610 by Isaac Nevelet and were therefore attributed to the Anonymus Neveleti. The editor Léopold Hervieux in 1884 attributed them to a Gualterus Anglicus, who lived in Palermo during the 12th century. However, this attribution has in recent years been called into question by various specialists. The fables have as their protagonists various animals and end with a moral in the form of a couplet.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
Raimundus Lullus, who established Catalan as a literary and scholarly language, was born in Majorca, where Christian, Muslim and Jewish cultures are mingled. Manuscript CB 109, produced by several different copyists in the 14th century, collects philosophical and theological works by Catalonian thinkers. It is decorated with pictures and diagrams.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The Ilias Latina, copied on paper during the 14th century, is a Latin adaptation of the great epic by Homer, one of the foundational texts of ancient Greece. It was written in Gothic quasi-cursive script by a single scribe in the region of Naples in Italy. One should take note of some of the decorated initials, some of which incorporate figures, especially that of a muse, clad in a dress covered with stars and holding a sword in her hand.
Online Since: 06/02/2010
This manuscript from the 14th century unites four disquisitions on medicine. The rounded Gothic script is the product of several different hands and the principal incipits are set off with Gothic capitals elaborately decorated with penwork filigree. At the end of the manuscript is an assortment of formulas for medical preparations.
Online Since: 06/02/2010
"De Balneis Puteolanis", a didactic poem by the Salerno physician Petrus de Ebulo, describes the health benefits of about thirty healing springs found in the region around Pozzuoli and Baia, Italy. This work was widely disseminated in Latin as well as in Italian and French translations. It describes baths that were destroyed by an earthquake in 1538. The manuscript is decorated with full-page illustrations and was probably produced in the artistic circle of Robert d'Anjou.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This Latin parchment manuscript from the 14th century contains a comprehensive commentary by jurists of Bologna on the "Corpus Iuris Civilis" as well as on others, such as the "Codex Justinianus" and the "Digests".
Online Since: 07/31/2007
This 14th century Italian manuscript, probably from Bologna, contains the Digestum Vetus, a fundamental work which attests to the 14th century's interest in the history of Roman law. It comprises various reference texts, which are systematically accompanied by the Glossa ordinaria, the so-called "Magna glossa" by Franciscus Accursius, an interlinear gloss and the gloss of the Gloss, which are works of explanation and instruction for the use of the text. Many manicules or fists (lat manicula, ae: small hands) testify to the assiduous labor which a large number of readers have performed on this dry text. This manuscript contains numerous pecia marks. A detached page (f. 37bis) contains a poem to the reader by the Italian jurist Angelus Boncambius (about 1450).
Online Since: 04/23/2013
The Historiae de preliis Alexandri Magni forms a part of the vast body of Latin literature devoted to Alexander the Great during the middle ages in the occident. This manuscript, written on parchment during the 14th or 15th century (perhaps around 1400), is most likely of English origin, judging by its extremely rounded Gothic script. The titles are rubricated, and contemporaneous glosses and corrections have been added in the margins.
Online Since: 04/15/2010
Guillaume de Loris and Jean de Meung (Meun) are the authors of the Roman de la Rose, one of the masterpieces of medieval courtly literature. In a phantasmagoric and allegorical setting, the lover seeks entry to a locked garden which conceals a rose, the image of his beloved. The second part, written by Jean de Meung, provides a philosophical and moral lesson. This manuscript, written on parchment in the 14th century, contains many golden and gold-accented illustrations and borders as well as initials with blue and red extensions.
Online Since: 06/02/2010
This 14th century manuscript produced in southern Germany contains 68 poems in rhyming couplets by the Stricker, followed by the parable "Barlaam and Josaphat" by Rudolf von Ems.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
This paper manuscript from the second half of the 14th century contains Gregorius by Hartman von Aue, Marienleich by Frauenlob, and the Rossarzneibuch (Horse Medicine) by Meister Albrant.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
Boethius' De consolatione Philosophiae knew continuous success during the Middle Ages. This 14th century manuscript offers a complete copy of the Latin text with some interlinear glosses. The book decoration consists of a historiated initial with a half-length frontal portrait of the author as he points to his book (f. 1). From this initial sprouts a short leaf scroll. In addition there are very beautiful decorated initials placed at the beginning of the various books of the Consolatione (f. 8, 17, 30 and 41). Their style indicates that the manuscript was made in northern Italy, perhaps Bologna.
Online Since: 12/12/2019
The Comedia delle ninfe fiorentine or Ameto, an early work (around 1341) by Boccaccio, recounts the transformation of the rough shepherd Ameto into a virtuous man after overhearing the stories told by seven nymphs, allegories of the virtues. The text is written as a prosimetrum — alternating prose and verse — as is immediately obvious from the single column page-design of the manuscript. Copied on paper without watermark, the manuscript opens with a single initial in watercolor that contains the coats of arms of the Almerici family (f. 2r), the owner of this copy who probably also commissioned it.
Online Since: 09/26/2017
This 14th century codex is one of seven surviving manuscripts that preserve in its entirety the Eneasroman (Romance of Aeneas) by Heinrich von Veldeke, one of the most important pioneers of Middle High German poetry. This work by Veldeke is the first courtly romance written in Middle High German and is an adaptation of the Old French Roman d'Eneas, originally written in about 1160.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
During the Middle Ages, Seneca was the most popular and most read of the ancient playwrights. The manuscripts of his tragedies, of which almost 400 copies are known today, are mostly from the 14th and 15th century, as is this copy, owned by the Fondation Bodmer. At the beginning of each of Seneca's dramas, this version has a historiated initial that summarizes the plot of the drama, such as the suicide of Jocasta and the blinding of Oedipus at the beginning of the eponymous drama (f. 46v). The rather modest execution of these initials was most likely carried out in Northern Italy, where most of the illuminated copies of this text (about 50) were produced.
Online Since: 10/10/2019
The "Codex Ricasoli Firidolfi", written on paper at the end of the 14th century, provides important evidence of the dissemination of Dante Alighieri's Commedia. The initial of the opening verse of the Inferno shows the famous profile of the author, surrounded by flowers.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
This manuscript unites two different collections of Italian poetry: a collection of 380 poems by Petrarch and a collection of works by the preceding generation of poets, especially Dante. In this mysterious "libro de la mia Comare" (Book of my Godmother), the poems of Petrarch are recorded in an archaic script, augmented here and there with individual glosses which are not found elsewhere, apparently in an effort to introduce these texts to a female readership.
Online Since: 05/20/2009
This parchment manuscript from the time around 1400 contains a work by the Dominican sermonist Jacques de Cessoles, using the game of chess as the allegorical basis for a lesson in morals. The same theme is carried out in 16 accompanying illustrations as well.
Online Since: 12/20/2007
An exceptional testimony of the "Renaissance" that rediscovered Platonism, as opposed to the medieval Thomism based on Aristotle, CB 136 was copied by the hand of the great Florentine humanist Leonardo Bruni, also called Aretino. This manuscript on parchment, written in a regular calligraphy, contains many philosophical dialogues, and it served as the basis for the Latin translation made by Aretino.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Copied in 1378 by Francesco di maestro Tura of Cesena, who included both a date and a signature at the end of the volume, the Codex Severoli opens each of the three sections of the Commedia with an historiated initial. A number of interlinear glosses explicate the verses of the Paradiso.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The two originally independent parts of this manuscript were bound together probably in the last third of the 15th century (after 1469, cf. Index p. Iv). The first part, written in a single column (pp. 1r-272), contains the Buch der Natur (Prologfassung) by Conrad of Megenberg. This part of the manuscript features marginal corrections and glosses (especially for medically relevant parts of the text), which may be by the original owner of the manuscript (Hayer 1998, p. 162). Especially parts I, III, IV, and V of the Buch der Natur contain marginal notes and interlinear glosses in a 15th century hand which reworks the natural history texts allegorically for preaching. Numerous smaller and larger marginal illustrations. The second part, written in two columns (pp. 274ra-307rb) contains a medical compendium in six parts (childhood illnesses – illnesses due to the imbalance of the humores – diseases of the eyes – the plague, skin diseases, fever – surgery and wound care – venereal diseases, bone injuries, burns), Latin and German recipes and prescriptions, as well as a German table of contents. On p. 284ra is a drawing of surgical instruments. Formerly privately owned by the antiquarian Hans P. Kraus, New York, Nr. 1958/13; prior to that Maihingen, Fürstl. Öttingen-Wallersteinsche Bibl., Cod. III.1.2° 3.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
The Sachenspiegel by Eike von Repgow is one of the oldest books of law in the German language. This parchment manuscript, CB 61, was produced at the beginning of the 15th century and contains codes of common and feudal law.
Online Since: 07/31/2007
There is only a single medieval Italian translation of Augustine's De civitate Dei (City of God), an impressive apologetic work in twenty-two books; the translation was prepared at the end of the 14th or the beginning of the 15th century. It is usually attributed to the Florentine Dominican Jacopo Passavanti (ca. 1302 – 1357); however, this attribution is without basis. The frontispiece of this manuscript is richly decorated with foliage in all four margins and initials with vine scroll ornamentation at the beginning of each book.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
Written in two columns in bastarda script with a decoration of fleuronné initials, from the first quarter of the 15th century (Wetzel), with two astrological tables added already in the 15th century (Wetzel) on the old flyleaf (f. 1r). The text of the Psalter, in the dialect of Rhenish Franconia (Hessen?), is closely related to the Psalter Göttingen, Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. Ms. theol. 214 v from the beginning of the 15th century. Wetzel assumes at least one common model. Thus the translation is part of Schöndorf's group 9, subgroup c) around München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Cgm 182 or Walter's Psalter 18.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
In this work from Plato's most productive period, Phaedo tells of the death of Socrates from a witness's point of view and relates the last words of the great philosopher in the form of a last dialogue with Cebes and Simmias. This manuscript, which contains a number of attractive decorative initials, was written during the 15th century on parchment. The round humanistic script is that of a single scribe, who identifies himself in red thus, "Marcus Speegnimbergensis scripsit" (fol. 76)
Online Since: 06/02/2010
This Hebrew manuscript from the 15th century combines liturgical texts and contains commentaries on the rites that provide the framework for the observation of the Passover. This Pesach Haggadah, adorned with miniatures and rich illustrations, contains the complete liturgical version of the Exodus story. The first part of the manuscript contains the text of the Italian rite, the second part that of the Ashkenazi. The manuscript was written and illuminated by Joël ben Siméon, who signed his work with a colophon (f. 34r): I am Joel ben Simeon, called Veibusch Ashkenazi – blessed be his memory – and I am from Cologne, which is on the banks of the Rhine.
Online Since: 04/23/2013
This 15th century paper manuscript in four volumes brings together the prose texts Lancelot Propre, La Queste del saint Graal, and La Mort le roi Artu. The first volume contains 42 aquarelle tinted pen drawings, the fourth volume features two full-page illustrations on inserted parchment leaves.
Online Since: 12/20/2007