Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 304: Iuuencus, Euangelia metrica
Abstract/Contents
- Summary
- CCCC MS 304 is a very important early copy of Juvencus, Euangelia metrica, a metrical paraphrase of the gospels in Virgilian language composed in the fourth century by this aristocratic Spanish priest. It also contains the earliest known version of some verses by Isidore of Seville (c. 560-636). This manuscript was written in the first half of the eighth century in Uncial script. E. A. Lowe changed his mind about this manuscript between the two editions of the second volume of his Codices Latini Antiquiores: in the first he considered it to be Spanish, in the second Italian. It seems to have reached England by the tenth century, perhaps at Christ Church, Canterbury or Malmesbury, and may be identifiable with an item in the Christ Church library catalogue.
- Contents
- Euangelia metrica
Description
| Alternative title | Iuvencus |
|---|---|
| Type of resource | mixed material |
| Extent | ff. 1 + 115 |
| Date created | [ca. 600 CE - 699 CE] |
| Language | Latin |
| Material | Vellum |
| Layout | 21 and 20 lines to a page |
| Height (mm) | 250 |
| Width (mm) | 170 |
| Collation | 1 flyleaf, A (three) I(8)-XIIII(8). |
| Writing | in large uncials on lines deeply ruled with a dry point. Two scribes have been employed |
| Foliation | ff. a-b + i + 1-115 + c-d |
| Provenance | To this some remarks may be added. As to the owners of the manuscript in medieval times. There is, as is stated above, an erasure at the top of f. 1r. It is of one word only, of ten or twelve capital letters, apparently. The first letter might be A and the last S. On the margin of f. 72v is neatly written (x?) the word sugga. On f. 75v at top in pale ink (as noted by Marold) is the name Engelberga (in a German hand according to Traube). Traube, O roma nobilis p. 57, compares the marginal reference in the Berne MS. 363 to Angelberga wife of Louis II. A note in the College Library copy of Nasmith's Catalogue records an opinion (possibly that of Traube) that the ornamentation of this MS. is Hispano-Gothic. The book has evidently been long in England. There are a good many marginal notes in an English hand of cent. viii or ix, rather rough. There are also a few interlinear glosses (all apparently in Latin) in a neater hand of cent. x (?). I incline to identify it with the Juvencus in Romana scriptura which is mentioned in our oldest catalogue (xii) of Christ Church, Canterbury (Ancient Libraries, p. 11, no. 152). This had the mark HL, not now traceable in the manuscript. Two features might suggest the possibility that the book has a connexion with Spain. These are (1) the occurrence of Saracenic arches in the ornament of the preliminary leaves, (2) the passages from Isidore of Seville inscribed thereon. But though pages framed in horse-shoe arches do occur in early Spanish MSS. (e.g. those of Beatus on the Apocalypse) they also occur in Italian art: see for instance a Monte Cassino martyrology of cent. xii in Mr H. Y. Thompson's collection (Fifty MSS. I, p. 37). And the popularity of Isidore was early and wide-spread. Nor is there any clear indication of Spanish habits of orthography in the text. On the whole, it is probably safer to regard the book as of Italian origin. |
| Research | The description furnished by Mr Bradshaw for Zangemeister in Sitzungsberichte d. k. k. Akad. d. Wissenschaften in Wien LXXXIV 553, and reprinted in Huemer's Juvencus (Vienna Corpus), p. xxiv, may be given here: MS. 304 in uncial letters probably of the viith century, consisting of three separate preliminary leaves, followed by 14 4-sheet quires, numbered in the centre of the lower margin of the last page of each quire. There was probably a 15th quire of 2 sheets, now lost, at the end of the volume. The pages contain 21 lines in the 1st, 13th and 14th quires, and 20 lines through the rest of the volume. The measurement is 10 inches by 6.75 or 7 inches in breadth. The text is written continuously (not in verses), with punctuation at the end of each verse, and a larger and blacker letter at the beginning of each verse. The three preliminary leaves are ornamentally written in large capitals (11 lines to a page), within borders, the first and last pages being enclosed in an arch, the rest within rectangular borders. They contain the verses known in connexion with St Isidore and his Library Sunt hic plura sacra etc., but differing from those in the editions both in order and matter (note that this is the earliest known copy of these verses) and containing only the Bible, Origines, Hilarius, Augustinus, Theodosius, ending up with ecce Iuuencus adest tibi, and on the opposite page the text of Iuuencus begins without any rubric, the first preface being written in the same fancy capitals as the verses of St Isidore thus (4a 4r); Mattheus instituit ... the first preface ends (4b 4v) Iohannis fremit - misteria uitae | caluetii : || aquilini : | : siue iuuenci : so far in large fancy capitals, then immediately in ordinary uncials: Immortale nihil - then on leaf 5b (5v) canentis, Dulcis iordanes ut xpo digna loquamur : ~ Rex fuit - leaf 36a (36r) tetigit seruator ihs. sana ministerium praebebat femina mensis: ~~ then at once in larger capitals: sapientissimi uiri Iuuenci: xpiani : euangeliorum liber primus: explicit Incipit liber secundus caluetii ~ aquilini ~ Inde philippus ait >>> these last words are in red but in ordinary uncials, over leaf (36b 36v) it proceeds: cernes dubitare quiesce et proprios huc saepe greges ad pocula duxit. Progrediens uide na oculis tueri licebit ad hoc seruator talia dicta detulit. Iamque dies - the 2nd book ends, and the 3rd begins thus (67a 67r): turbasque reliquit. Explt Incpt liber tertius (in red) Fuderat - the 3rd book ends, and the 4th book begins (93b 93v): hominum seletio fiet: Euangeliorum liber tertius explct (in red) Incpt eiusdem liber . . (in black) quartus ? feliciter ? (in red). Talia - The MS. breaks off book IV, verse 733, thus (115b 115v) nunc meminisse decet qm planus ille solebat. The remaining lines, here wanting, would occupy nearly 3 leaves of the next quire, which probably consisted of four leaves only. There is no trace in the volume of the Library to which it belonged before the Reformation; the only entry which seems to have given this information on the first page has been carefully erased. |
Bibliographic information
| M.R. James Date | vii |
|---|---|
| Downloadable James Catalogue Record | |
| Superseded Interim Catalogue Record | |
| Contains |
|
| TJames | 186 |
| Stanley | N. 22 |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/cb007dq5327 |
| Location | MS 304 |
| Repository | UK, Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, Parker Library |
Access conditions
- Use and reproduction
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- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC).
Collection
Parker Manuscripts
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