Tag: Manuscripts

From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

A CD arrived today from a kind correspondent, containing photos of the entire unpublished study and translation of the 6th century Jewish medical text by Asaph.  I confess that Jewish literature is not something I know anything about; but it seems clear that this item is not otherwise translated.  The translation is public domain, but OCR’ing it would be quite an effort.  Not sure what to do with this, if anything.  I think my correspondent may do something.

Meanwhile my commission for a translation of further parts of John the Lydian On the Roman months, has been accepted, so this should happen.  The result will be made public domain and placed online, as ever.

Another correspondent kindly pointed out that a PDF online contains an electronic text of the Greek of this work.  This professes to be from Migne; but I have my doubts.  I don’t know if De mensibus is in the TLG, but if so, I would guess that this is the text in question.

I spent a little time reading the introduction of the Wunsch 1898 edition, but not really enough to master it properly.  But it seems that only a single manuscript, from the 9th or 10th century, preserves the text.  There are lacunas later on, indeed.  The work was known to Photius, who mentions it in his Bibliotheca, so the surviving manuscript, Caseolinus Parisinus supplementi graeci 257 (=O), is contemporary with him.  This seems to have been discovered during the 19th century, for I found a publication on Google books from the 1820’s, which contained only excerpts.  Wunsch, indeed, lists a bunch of manuscripts containing extracts, as well as a group of manuscripts containing a ‘recension’ by Planudes, and another group containing a ‘recension’ found in the Vatican Barberini manuscript and its relations.  Both recensions, I would guess, are really collections of extracts.  So this is a text that only just survived in something like its complete form.

I also found that there are quite a few snippets about John and his career in Google Books, in previews.  John the Lydian seems to have been a contemporary of the historian Procopius, although nothing links the two except that both pursued a career in the imperial civil service in the same period, the early to middle 6th century.

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Notes on Libanius, his manuscripts etc

Posted on by Roger Pearse

In his panegyric oration on Antioch, Libanius tells us that he has delivered more orations and declamations “than anyone”.  The extent of his surviving work tends to bear this out.  He was very popular as a stylist during the Byzantine period, and more than 250 manuscripts of his collection of letters (or portions of it) survive.  The three best copies date from the 11th century: Vaticanus gr. 83 (V), the most complete of the three, Vaticanus gr. 85 (Va) and Leidensis Vossianus gr. 77 (Vo).

1544 letters have reached us, all composed between 355-365, and 388-393.  The gap in the middle marks the reign of Valens, whose suspicions of everyone made it too dangerous, most likely, for Libanius as a pagan and friend of Julian to preserve copies of his correspondence.  The rate of survival is one letter every three days for that period!  Nor were these casual compositions — many were written to be read out.

But much that Libanius wrote is unreadable today.  Partly this is because his rhetorical style is out of fashion, and the personal details that might allow us to use his letters as a window onto his life, or the historical details that would make the orations and declamations of historical interest, are few and allusive.  Since I bought two TTH volumes at the conference last week, I have been unable to read into them.  Indeed I have resorted to the last ploy of the desperate — leaving a copy of the selected letters in the bathroom, to read while washing my hands!

The critical edition of Libanius’ works is that by R. Foerster in the Teubner series, between 1903 and 1927, in 12 volumes.  I have been able to find some of these on Google books, and a few more on Archive.org.  I have vols.1-7, 9 and 10.  The others I could not locate, although they should be out of copyright.

There is a two volume Loeb edition of his autobiography and selected letters, by the late A. F. Norman, but this I have not seen.

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Manuscript stolen in Spain

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The 12th codex Calixtinus, an illuminated guide for pilgrims going to the shrine of Compostela in Spain, has been stolen from the cathedral library. Reports suggest that it was a professional job.  More at eChurch blog.  It sounds as if it was stolen to order and is perhaps now in some private collection.  If so, it will reappear.

More important is the question of whether the library had photographed it or not.  If a set of colour digital photographs exist — and ought to be online — then the loss is less worrying.

Bet they haven’t tho.

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Arrian’s lost work on “After Alexander” and what survives of it

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The second century writer Arrian is our best source for the life of Alexander the Great, using impeccable sources then extant but now lost.  A number of his other works are extant, and indeed his work On hunting even exists in English, and can be found on Archive.org. 

But equally interesting to us is his Τα μετὰ Αλέξανδρον, After Alexander.  This work in ten books is lost, but we know of it from Photius, who, in his Bibliotheca, also gives us a long summary of its contents.  This 9th century epitome, made casually as part of this enormous work, is one of our major sources for the early years of the Succcessor period, from the death of Alexander in 323 to the summer of 319.  The work clearly existed in a complete form when Photius read it, which makes it a pity that it did not survive the next few centuries. 

However I learn that we do have a little more.  For it seems that some leaves from one or more copies were reused, and these palimpsest leaves have reached us. 

The first of these is a Vatican palimpsest, ms. Vaticanus 495, which contains two leaves — a single bifolium — which appear as folios 230, and 235.  This was discovered in 1886 by Reitzenstein, and published in 1888.(1)  The leaves seem to be 10th century.  The pages contain a portion of the account of the doomed Egyptian campaign of Perdiccas, which ended in his death, the destruction of the central authority, and the foundation of the power and prestige of the Ptolemaic dynasty.  The editor believed the extract to be from book 7 of the work. 

The second survival was discovered much more recently by Jacques Noret in 1977 at Göteborg, ms. Graecus 1, folios 72 and 73, and was published by him with diplomatic transcription,  a “normal” text, and a French translation.(2)  This has a portion of book 10.  A discussion with images of the pages was published by B. Dreyer in 1999, and I think this is online.(3) The manuscript contains Dionysius Periegetes (f. 1-40) and then the commentary of Eustathius upon it (f. 48-142).  The first was written in the 14th century, the commentary 14-15th c.

 There is also a papyrus of the 2nd century, so very close to the date of composition, published by V. Bartoletti in 1951, which contains a portion of the struggle between Eumenes, Craterus and Neoptolemus. 

So it looks as if at least one 10th century manuscript existed down to the renaissance, when it was dismembered for use as raw materials!

1. Reitzenstein, Arriani τῶν μετὰ Αλέξανδρον libri septimi fragmenta e codice Vaticano rescripto nuper iteratis curis lecto, Breslauer philologische Abhandlungen Bd. 3, H. 3, Breslau 1888, S. 1–36.
2. Noret, Analecta Bollandia 95, 1977, 269–73. Noret, Ant. Class. 52, 1982, 235–242.
3. Boris Dreyer, Zum ersten Diadochenkrieg: Der Göteborger Arrian-Palimpsest (ms Graec 1), Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 125 (1999) 39–60. This contains colour images of the Göteborg leaves and monochrome ones — rather poor — of the Vatican leaves. 

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The fate of the manuscripts in Rodosto

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I have now located E. Bratke’s article in Theologisches Literaturblatt 15 (1894), cols.65-67.  Here is a translation, with the German at the end.  “Rodosto” is also known as Raidestos, modern Tekirdag, and its inhabitants now live in Nea Raidestos, in Greece.

I must admit my confidence that any such manuscript as the Eusebius Against Porphyry exists takes quite a dive, once I learn that it is associated with such a mythical being as the 16th century Hegesippus.  The latter seems to be a fingerprint for several forged booklists, compiled by some unscrupulous Greek as part of a bait-and-switch scam on Western manuscript hunters.  But here’s the article.

The fate of the manuscripts in Rodosto near Constantinople.

In this journal for 1893, no. 43, Th. Zahn published an interesting article “The Greek Irenaeus and the complete Hegesippus in the 16th and 17th Century” in which he opposed a skeptical remark by A. Harnack [Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius, ed. under the direction of E. Preuschen by A. Harnack. Vol. 1. 1893, p. 485] to his earlier assertion that Hegesippus had still existed in manuscript in the 16th century, supported in part by new material.  One of his pieces of evidence was something edited by K. Forster [De libris et antiquitatibus manuscriptis Constantinopolitanis Commentatio. Rostochii, 1877] from a Vienna codex, written between 1565-1575, a catalogue of manuscripts which were to be found in that time in and around Constantinople. In this we read, from among many profane and Christian works of literature, housed in the library at Rodosto, a town a few miles west of Byzantium on the sea of Marmara, which in antiquity had the name of Rhaedeste:  Ἡγησίππω ἱστορία and Εὐσεβίου τοῦ Παμφίλου κατὰ Πορφυρίου.

The possibility that these two, until now, lost jewels of early Christian literature, the 5 books of Ὑπομνήματα of the 2nd century from the early Christian tradition by Hegesippus, and the polemic of the Church historian Eusebius against Porphyry, the most brilliant opponent of Christianity in the ancient world, still existed at the end of the 16th Century in Rodosto, cannot be absolutely denied, given the documents produced by Th. Zahn.  His communication must be very appealing to those interested in ancient church history.  But the question is whether there has ever existed a collection of Greek manuscripts in Rodosto, and whether it still exists; and so far hardly anyone has come to grips with it.  Even R. Förster (p. 10, note 1) says only, that a short time after the composition of that catalogue, the traveler Sponius has seen the city, and for the rest, admits (p. 13):  Rhaedesti utrum adhuc bibliotheca extet comperire non potui. Also in the above mentioned Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur by Harnack and Preuschen vol. 1, p. 985 the name of Rhaedeste is provided with a question mark.

I was inclined to take part in answering that question myself, as I had become aware of it just before the publication of Zahn’s article, as part of my studies on the Byzantine chroniclers, by a note of Krumbacher [Geschichte der byzantinischen Literatur, 1891, p. 191] on the publication of R. Förster, and had recognized its value for research into early Christian literature.  I tried to learn, from manuscript catalogues and directories of libraries, whether in Rodosto there was once a collection of books, or still is, but in vain.  As well as the scientific travelogues available in the local Royal University, through European Turkey, especially Constantinople, together with the neighborhood, I found, apart from Sponius, which also says nothing of a library, Rodosto mentioned in Dallaway (1797, p. 368), Lechevalier (deutsch. 1801, p. 5) von Moltke (1841, p.51) and Boue (1854, I, p. 145).  But the brevity of their data shows that these travelers did not have the intention or the time, to carry out an investigation in that humble place about past or present antiquities.  I was not surprised, therefore, to find in them no comment on local manuscript treasures, even if such existed in Rodosto.  Von Hammer (1818, p. 198-200, see also p. 158) reports some modern inscriptions of the 18th century from the Catholic Church at Rodosto, but nothing more.

To obtain the most reliable information about the facts, on 2 December last year I wrote to the Imperial German embassy in Constantinople with a request for a preliminary reconnaissance on whether currently in Rodosto a manuscript collection is preserved, and with the intent, in the case of an affirmative answer, to look on the spot myself for the manuscript of Hegesippus, Eusebius and other important authors given in that catalogue.  The Imperial German Legation, in a most helpful manner, which deserves the greatest thanks, undertook to answer my enquiry.  In a letter of 3 January this year I received a communication, because of the happenstance that a German consular agency is located in Rodosto, and that the current manager of it, Mr P. Asla, in addition to his specific knowledge of the place and its people, has the necessary education and skill to perform the required job, so the gentleman replied to me himself in French.

According to this man, there were, in the local bishop’s residence until 1838, valuable manuscript documents, which had been assembled into a library long before from monastery and private owners by members of a family named Lerei, originating from the island of Leros. But a fire broke out in that year, and the entire collection was destroyed, and such Rodosto manuscripts as remained in the hands of private individuals have already found other buyers.  Currently, in Rodosto only a single old manuscript is still available.  It belongs to the local Greek club [Σόλλογος], bears neither a date nor the name of the author and is, according to an unnamed Russian archaeologist who studied it several years ago, has geographic / historical content.

This certificate of the destruction of the Library of Rodosto can only be read with sadness by theologians and classical philologists. But my investigation is not without positive elements. The credibility of the Vienna catalogue is considerably increased from this.  If the list is not an empty collection of book titles, but a real directory of manuscripts, then it is worth while to look more thoroughly into the whereabouts of the other libraries inventorised in it than has yet been done.

Das Schicksal der Handschriften in Rodosto bei Konstantinopel.

In diesem Blatt, Jahrg. 1893, Nr. 43, hat Th. Zahn einen interessanten Artikel „Der griechische Irenaeus und der ganze Hegesippus im 16. und im 17. Jahrhundert” erscheinen lassen, in welchem er gegenüber einer zweifelnden Bemerkung A. Harnack’s [Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius, hrsg. unter Mitwirkung von E. Preuschen von A. Harnack. I. 1893, S. 485] seine frühere Behauptung, dass Hegesipp im 16. Jahrhundert handschriftlich noch existirt habe, wiederholt und durch zum Theil neues Material stützt. Zu seinen Beweisstücken gehört der von K. Förster [De antiquitatibus et libris manuscriptis Constantinopolitanis commentatio. Rostochii, 1877] aus einem Wiener Kodex herausgegebene, zwischen 1565 und 1575 verfasste Katalog von Handschriften, welche sich seiner Zeit in und bei Konstantinopel befunden haben sollen. In diesem liest man nämlich, dass zu den vielen profanen und christlichen Literaturwerken, welche die Bibliothek zu Rodosto beherbergte, jenes wenige Meilen westlich von Byzanz am Marmarameer gelegene Städtchen, das im Alterthum den Namen Rhaedeste führte, auch gehörten:  Ἡγησίππω ἱστορία und Εὐσεβίου τοῦ Παμφίλου κατὰ Πορφυρίου..

Die Möglichkeit, dass diese zwei für uns bisher verlorenen Kleinodien der altchristlichen Literatur, die dem 2. Jahrhundert angehörenden 5 Bücher Ὑπομνήματα des noch aus urchristlicher Ueberlieferung schöpfenden Hegesipp und die Streitschrift des Kirchenhistorikers Eusebius gegen Porphyrius, den geistreichsten Gegner des Christenthums in der alten Welt, noch am Ende des 16. Jahrhunderts in Rodosto existirten, lässt sich angesichts des von Th. Zahn beigebrachten Materials schlechterdings nicht bestreiten. Und seine Mittheilung muss auf die Freunde der alten Kirchengeschichte um so reizvoller wirken, als der Frage, ob in Rodosto jemals eine Sammlung griechischer Handschriften existirt hat und noch existirt, bisher schwerlich jemand näher getreten ist. Selbst R. Förster (S. 10, Anmerk. 1) sagt nur, dass kurze Zeit nach der Abfassung jenes Katalogs der Reisende Sponius die Stadt gesehen hat, und gesteht im Uebrigen (S. 13): Rhaedesti utrum adhuc bibliotheca extet comperire non potui. Auch in der oben genannten Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur von Harnack und Preuschen I, S. 985 gehört Rhaedeste zu den mit einem Fragezeichen versehenen Namen.

An der Beantwortung jener Frage mich zu betheiligen, war ich um so geneigter, als ich kurz vor dem Erscheinen des Zahn’schen Artikels bei meinen Studien in den byzantinischen Chronisten durch eine Notiz Krumbacher’s [Geschichte der byzantinischen Literatur. 1891, S. 191] auf die Publikation von R. Förster aufmerksam geworden war und ihren Werth für die Forschung in der altchristlichen Literatur erkannt hatte. Ich habe mich bemüht, aus Handschriftenkatalogen und Bibliothekenverzeichnissen mich darüber zu unterrichten, ob in Rodosto einst eine Büchersammlung war oder noch ist, aber vergeblich. Unter den auf der hiesigen Königl. Universitäts bibliothek vorhandenen wissenschaftlichen Reisebeschreibungen, der europäischen Türkei, speziell Konstantinopels nebst Umgegend fand ich, abgesehen von Sponius, der ebenfalls von einer Bibliothek nichts sagt, bei Dallaway (1797, S. 368), Lechevalier (deutsch. 1801, S. 5), v. Moltke (1841, S. 51) und Boue (1854, I, S. 145) Rodosto erwähnt. Aber die Kürze ihrer Angaben zeigt, dass diese Reisenden nicht die Absicht oder nicht die Zeit gehabt haben, über die an jenem bescheidenen Ort etwa vorhandenen oder vorhanden gewesenen Alterthümer Nachforschungen anzustellen. Ich brauchte mich daher nicht zu wundern, dass ich bei ihnen keine Bemerkung über dortige Handschriftenschätze fand, selbst wenn solche in Rodosto existirten. v. Hammer (1818, S. 198—200, vgl. auch S. 158) theilt zwar einige moderne Inschriften des 18. Jahrhunderts aus der katholischen Kirche zu Rodosto mit, aber eben auch weiter nichts.

Um eine möglichst zuverlässige Auskunft über den Thatbestand zu erhalten, wandte ich mich am 2. Dezember vorigen Jahres brieflich an die Kaiserl. deutsche Gesandtschaft in Konstantinopel mit der Bitte um vorläufige Rekognoszirung, ob zur Zeit in Rodosto eine Manuskriptensammlung aufbewahrt liegt, und mit dem Vorsatz, im Falle einer bejahenden Antwort, an Ort und Stelle selbst nach der Handschrift des Hegesipp, Eusebius und anderer in dem genannten Katalog angeführter hervorragender Autoren zu suchen. Die Kaiserl. deutsche Gesandtschaft hat in entgegenkommender Weise, welche den grössten Dank verdient, es sich angelegen sein lassen, mich zu befriedigen. In einem Schreiben von 3. Januar d. J. erhielt ich die Mittheilung von dem glücklichen Umstand, dass in Rodosto sich eine deutsche Konsular-Agentur befindet, sowie dass der jetzige Verwalter derselben, Herr P. Asla, neben genauer Kenntniss des Ortes und seiner Bewohner die nöthige Bildung und Umsicht besitzt, um den gewünschten Auftrag auszuführen, und dazu den französisch geschriebenen Bericht des genannten Herrn selbst.

Gemäss demselben haben sich thatsächlich in der dortigen bischöflichen Residenz bis zum Jahre 1838 werthvolle handschriftliche Dokumente befunden, welche vor langer Zeit durch Mitglieder einer von der Insel Leros stammenden Familie Namens Lerei aus den Klöstern und aus den Händen von Privaten zu einer Bibliothek zusammengestellt worden sind. Aber durch eine in dem genannten Jahre ausgebrochene Feuersbrunst ist der ganze Bestand derselben zerstört worden, und der noch etwa in Händen von Privaten verbliebene Rest Rodosto’er Handschriften hat bereits anderweitige Käufer gefunden. Gegenwärtig ist in Rodosto nur noch eine einzige alte Handschrift vorhanden. Sie gehört dem dortigen griechischen Verein [Σόλλογος], trägt weder ein Datum noch den Namen des Verfassers und ist nach Angabe eines ungenannten russischen Archäologen, der sie vor einigen Jahren studirt hat, geographischhistorischen Inhaltes.

Mit Bedanern werden die Theologen und klassischen Philologen diese Bescheinigung des Unterganges der Bibliothek von Rodosto lesen. Doch ist meine Nachforschung nicht ganz ohne positiven Gewinn. Denn durch sie wird die Glaubwürdigkeit des Wiener Katalogs erheblich gesteigert. Wenn aber derselbe keine leere Büchertitelsammlung, sondern ein wirkliches Handschriftenverzeichniss ist, dann verlohnt es sich, nach dem Verbleib der übrigen durch ihn inventarisirte’n Bibliotheken noch gründlicher, als es bisher geschehen konnte, zu suchen.

Bonn. – Bratke.

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Manuscripts of Rodosto / Tekirdag

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Last year I wrote about the manuscripts of Rodosto, now modern Tekirdag, which once contained a copy of Eusebius’ work against Porphyry, now lost.  There is a statement in Harnack’s edition of the fragments of Porphyry’s Against the Christians, p.30:

A listing of manuscripts in Rodosto, written between 1565 and 1575, on p.30b: Eusebiou tou Pamphilou Kata Porphuriou (s. Forster, De antiquitatibus et libris ms. Constantinopolitanis, Rostochii, 1877; cf. Neumann in Theol. Lit. Ztg. 1899, col. 299).  In 1838 a great fire broke out in Rodosto.

I’ve had an email about this, in connection with medical mss., and I have done a search back in my inbox.  I found this in an email from 2006, after a query on LT-ANTIQ:

To track down Greek manuscripts, the principal reference is Jean-Marie Olivier, Repertoire des Bibliotheques et des Catalogue des Manuscrits Grecs, 3 ed. (Turnhout: Brepols, 1995).  Theologische Literaturzeitung

Tekirdag is listed on pp. 78-79. Briefly, what is says is that a number of mss. derived from the Metropolitan see of Heraclea were stored at the Metropolitan see of Rodosto together with 5 mss. from the school of Rodosto. There was a fire in which some mss. were destroyed in 1842 and during the course of the nineteenth century the collection was dispersed; the location of 3 mss. is known today.

Again, I need to see if I can find out more.  How do we know all this, for instance?

UPDATE: Forster’s work is De antiquitatibus et libris manuscriptis Constantinopolitanis commentatio. In: Vorlesungsverzeichnis der Universität Rostock. Rostock 1877, pp. 8–10.  But it doesn’t seem to be online.  The Theologische Literaturzeitung article is one I can’t find either.  Anyone any ideas?

UPDATE: The ThLZ 1899 is here (search for editions:HwYoAQAAIAAJ).  He says:

Verlorene Widerlegungsschriften antichristlicher Polemik mögen, ganz oder in Fragmenten, noch sehr wohl verborgen sein und wiederaufgefunden werden. Ein von R. Foerster, De antiquitatibus et libris manuscriptis Constantinopolitanis, Rostochii 1877 veröffentlichtes, zwischen 1565 und 1575 (nicht 1465—1475) geschriebenes Verzeichnis von Handschriften in Rodosto nennt p. 30b Eu)sebi/ou tou~ pamfi/lou kata\ porfuri/ou. Vielleicht ist diese Handschrift erst 1838 bei dem Brande in Rodosto untergegangen, über den man im Theol. Literaturblatt XV, 1894, S. 65—67 Auskunft findet; dieser Brand hat wirklich stattgefunden, was ich mit Rücksicht auf Texte und Untersuchungen VI 1 S. 5 bemerke.

I.e.

The lost refutations of anti-Christian polemics may still exist, in whole or in fragments, hidden away somewhere, and be retrieved.  An index of manuscripts at Rodosto, published by R. Forster, De antiquitatibus et libris manuscriptis Constantinopolitanis, Rostochii 1877, and written between 1565 und 1575 (not 1465—1475), lists on p. 30b a Eu)sebi/ou tou~ pamfi/lou kata\ porfuri/ou. Perhaps this manuscript perished in the fire of 1838 at Rodosto, discussed in Theol. Literaturblatt XV, 1894, pp. 65—67.  This fire really did happen, as I learn from Texte und Untersuchungen VI 1 p. 5.

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How the lost “Peri Alupias” by Galen was found

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I have received an email from Veronique Boudon-Millot telling the story of how this lost work was found.  I have made an English translation of what she says, and, by permission, give the relevant portion here.

Hello,

Thank you for your email, your encouragement and enthusiasm, which Greek studies need now more than ever.

Since you ask me about the circumstances of the discovery, I can tell you that it was one of my PhD students, Antoine Pietrobelli (now a lecturer at the university of Reims) who started it.  In January 2005 I sent him, in preparation for his thesis — an edition of the commentary of Galen on Hippocrates’  Treatment for acute illnesses — to the library of the monastery of the Vlatades at Thessalonica to consult the microfilms of the manuscripts of Mount Athos which are kept there, and which concern his text.

While waiting for the microfilms to be brought to him, he had the idea of consulting the catalogue of the manuscripts of Vlatadon published by Eustratiades in 1918, which had a very limited circulation.  This catalogue only contains a single medical manuscript (our Vlatadon 14 of Galen) and the remainder are exclusively patristic manuscripts.  The catalogue of Eustratiades has thus remained unknown to medical specialists.  In this catalogue, the Vlatadon 14 is very rapidly described: none of the treatises of Galen present in the manuscript are described, and in particular the Do not be grieved has been omitted.

After locating the Vlatadon 14 in the catalogue, my student Antione Pietrobelli sent me an email the same evening asking whether this manuscript was known, or whether he had made a discovery.  But as the manuscript did not contain his treatise, the Commentary of Galen on the treatment of acute illnesses, and as he had to return soon to France, he did not have time to see it.

On this news I went myself to Thessalonica to see the manuscript.  Unfortunately I was only allowed to see the microfilm, and, so far, despite much effort, several requests, and two visits to the site, I have not been permitted to examine the manuscript directly … <snip>

So I began to read the microfilm, and noted that the catalogue of Eustratiades is very incomplete, and that manuscript contains many more treatises than are indicated by Eustratiades in his catalogue.  And above all, I discovered the entirely new treatise Do not be grieved, the title of which was already well known to me thanks to Galen’s treatise On his own books, which I was editing at that time and where the physician of Pergamum mentions it.

I should add that the Vlatadon 14 likewise preserves for us the complete text of the two bibliographic treatises by Galen, On the order of his own books, and On his own books, of which I have since also prepared an edition in the CUF series (2007), because the only Greek manuscript available hitherto (the Ambrosianus Q 3 sup.) is very seriously lacunose for those treatises.  The Vlatadon 14 also contains the complete Greek text of Galen’s On his own opinions (De propriis placitis) which Nutton edited in the CMG series from the Arab-Latin translation, all that was known hitherto.  The Vlatadon 14 is thus a new and very important witness for 4 texts of Galen which were either thought lost, or known only in a very lacunose form.

There!  You know everything!

Thank you for your interest and your attention.

Very cordially,

Véronique Boudon-Millot

That is very interesting indeed, and I am grateful to Dr. Boudon-Millot for permission to give that information here.

It is a reminder that, when we are in any little-known library, we must always see if there is anything we can find in the catalogue that might be interesting.  There are treasures to be had, it seems.  We have only to look!

UPDATE: Dr Boudon-Millot added a postscript which clarifies a couple of things:

There is one thing to correct, and the error is mine.  The Vlatadon 14, contrary to what I wrote, does indeed contain the Treatment of serious illnesses by Galen.  But it isn’t an important witness for the edition of the text, and wasn’t significant for A. Pietrobelli for his thesis.  In fact Pietrobelli’s stay at Thessalonica was complete, he was obliged to leave the next day, and didn’t have the time to examine the manuscript in detail.

Thank you again!

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A list of the new manuscripts online at the British Library site

Posted on by Roger Pearse

At the British Library manuscripts blog, Julian Harrison is paying attention, and well done to him.  In response to comments like those here, he’s today posted a list of the 25 newly uploaded manuscripts.  Here it is, with extra text by me.

  • Additional MS 4949  – 12th c. four gospels
  • Additional MS 4950 – 13th c. Matthew, Mark, a summary of Luke, and a page of stuff from Eusebius on Jesus and the Evangelists “Ex Eusebio Chronicis”.   Anyone able to read any of the last?
  • Additional MS 4951 – 13th c. Luke, John, Menologion, plus a colophon.
  • Additional MS 5107  – 1159 AD.  Eusebius, letter to Carpianus, with a bit of a canon table, then the 4 gospels.
  • Additional MS 5111  – 6-12th century.  Eusebius to Carpianus, canons, plus Matthew and Mark.
  • Additional MS 5112  – 12th c.  Luke, John, and 3 leaves of a patristic florilegium.  Clearly written, this one!  But I can’t make out any names.
  • Additional MS 5117 – 1326-1457.  4 gospels, Eusebius to Carpianus, and a couple of other late things.
  • Additional MS 10057 – 14-16th c.  Euripedes!!! — 3 plays: the Hecuba, Orestes, and Phoenissae, plus scholia!
  • Additional MS 11870  – 11th c. Metaphrastes, Saints’ Lives for September.
  • Additional MS 14771  – 10th c. Gregory Nazianzen!!! — a bunch of his orations (1, 45, 44, 41, 21, 15, 38, 43, 39, 40, 11, 14, 42, 16), including the funeral oration for Basil the Great.  The ms. starts with a table of contents in red uncial.  I was once told such tables of contents were rare!  This manuscript once belonged to Niccolo Niccoli in Florence, then to the monastery of St. Mark, where Niccoli’s books went after his death.  Evidently someone stole it and sold it on.
  • Additional MS 18231 — 972 AD.  Dionysius the Areopagite, Gregory Nazianzen’s orations (again with table of contents): 2, 12, 9, 10, 11, 3, 19, 17, 16, 7, 8, 18, 6, 23, 22, 38, 39, 40, 1, 45, 44, 41, 33 against the Arians, 27 against the Eunomians, 29, 30, 31, 20, 28, 34, 14, 36, 26, 25, 24, 21, 15, 42, 43, 4 & 5 against Julian the Apostate, 37, 13, ; letters 101 and 102 and 202; a couple of Carmina; a vita of Gregory; ps.Nonnus’ Scholia mythologica (I wonder what these are).
  • Additional MS 18277 – (modern papers)
  • Additional MS 19387 – 13th c. 4 gospels.
  • Additional MS 20002 – 10th c.  Old Testament; Judges, with bits of Joshua and Ruth.  This was acquired by Tischendorff from Sinai.
  • Additional MS 20186 – (modern papers)
  • Additional MS 21030 – 13th c. Psalter.  Acquired in Maloula in Syria.
  • Additional MS 21061 – 15th c. Anastasius the Sinaite on the Hexameron, followed by ps.Caesarius, Quaestiones et Responsiones.
  • Additional MS 21165 – 15th c. Iamblichus! Life of Pythagoras, Protrepicus, De communi mathematica scientia, In Nicomachi arithmeticam introductionem.
  • Additional MS 21261 – 14th c. Gospel lectionary.
  • Additional MS 22733 – 11th c. Metaphrastes, more saints’ lives.
  • Additional MS 22750 – 14th c.  Hagiography: “Fragments of sermons and services in honour of the Archangel Michael, including that of Pantaleon the Deacon”, from a burned volume.
  • Additional MS 22909 – 1680 AD.  Some very late Byzantine writers.
  • Additional MS 23895 – 16th c. Onasander, Strategicus!
  • Additional MS 23927 – 16th c. Aristotle, Problemata.
  • Additional MS 35021 – (modern)

I was a bit afraid after the opening section that it would all be gospel mss.!  But thankfully not — there are some gems in there.  But what does smack you in the face is the need for a course in Greek paleography in order to make much of them.

Do add that blog to your RSS feeder.  They don’t post that often, but all the posts are interesting and useful, and usually illustrated with some precious page image.

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British Library to digitise all its Greek manuscripts

Posted on by Roger Pearse

An announcement on the British Library manuscripts blog here tells us:

Phase two of the British Library’s project to digitise all of its ca. 1,000 Greek manuscripts is now well under way. This phase — also generously funded by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation) — will digitise and make publicly available a further 250 manuscripts, adding to the 284 manuscripts digitised in phase one. We are currently about half way through this second phase and plan to publish the digitised manuscripts in batches during the rest of this year on our Digitised Manuscripts viewer.

A new batch of manuscripts has now been published online, and contains 24 manuscripts ranging in date from the tenth to the nineteenth centuries.

Most of us would rather have PDF’s, of course, than this awkward “viewer”.

But it is excellent news indeed that the BL has decided to digitise all its Greek manuscripts, and SNF deserve considerable thanks for making it possible.

There doesn’t seem to be a list of the new mss available, tho.

Another interesting announcement of the same kind is that medieval and early modern “scientific” mss will be digitised:

… the British Library has embarked on a project to digitise some of its most prestigious medieval and early modern scientific manuscripts. Funded by a generous private donation, the project will supply complete coverage of selected items from the Harley collection, augmented by revised catalogue records for the books in question.

Medieval and early modern manuscripts are vital for transmitting ancient scientific thought to the modern world.

Evidently not by the same donor, but this too is welcome.  For many ancient technical works remain unpublished and inaccessible.  This may help quite a bit.

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