Excerpts from Jacobus de Vorgaine's Legenda aura and Sermones de tempore
Regis sponsum et sponsam benedixit da inquiens domine
Jacobus, de Voragine, approximately 1229-1298
A personal collection of excerpts from the Legenda aurea and seven sermons from the Sermones de tempore, unbound until modern times and protected by a few leaves from another manuscript (see MS 161). The text begins at the chapter Historia De Sancto Thoma Apostolo. The excerpts from the Legenda aurea (the Golden Legend) reference the Maggioni edition. The "Golden Legend" or the "Legend of the Saints" was said to have been the most frequently copied text during the Middle Ages apart from the Bible due to its production at University centers, and its use as a standard text in Dominican houses of study. The Sermones de tempore was one of three collections of model sermons based on the liturgical year by Jacobus, and used as sources for sermons by preachers across Europe.
From dealer description: Based on evidence of the script, manuscript was likely copied at the end of the 13th century or early fourteenth century on paleographical grounds. Both scribes, use the reversed "c" to abbreviate "con" and a quick form of the abbreviation for "est" (Latin for "is") which suggest an origin in Germany, possibly South Germany. Regensberg, for example, was a major center of copying the Legenda aureum and the two features mentioned above can be seen in a manuscript copied in Southern Germany (1279 in Thomson, 1969, pl. 40). The first scribe varies his layout (justification, number of lines, and ruling pattern), which is a characteristic of an informal, perhaps owner-produced manuscript. Purchased by Joseph Pope (1921-2010) of Toronto from Sam Fogg in 1993. Purchased by Western Michigan University Special Collections from Les Enluminures (TM 579).
Once wrapped in the four leaves from a Breviary (see MS 161).
Christian saints--Biography--Early works to 1800
Christian saints--Legends--Early works to 1800
ff. iii (modern paper) + 40 + iii (modern paper)
Bound in modern red leather in 1993 by Donald Taylor of Toronto, spine lettered in gilt on a black leather label, "Excerpta Legendae Aureae, s. XIII". Gatherings interleaved by paper stubs, with modern cloth slipcase. Previously "loosely wrapped" in the four folios from a Breviary, removed by the Bergendal Collection and bound separately as MS 161. First and last flyleaves are modern paper.
Parchment is soft, and soiled, especially in the lower corners. Original imperfections include uneven lower margins, ff. 4, 14, and 24, and small holes in the lower margins of f. 20, and in the outer margin, f. 26 and 35. Majuscules within the text stroked with red. Red paragraph marks throughout text. Two-line and one-line red initials throughout: f. 38, two-line red initial, highlighted in yellowish-gold. Ruled in ink throughout both texts with single vertical bounding lines inside, outside and between the columns, horizontal rulings vary: ff. 1-8, with the top, third and bottom two rules full across on most folios, ff. 8v-14v, with the top, third, bottom and fourth from the bottom rules full across, ff. 15-27, with the bottom and penultimate rules full across; ff. 27v-end, with the bottom rule full across, prickings in the three outer margins, with a double row of prickings in the outer margin on ff. 8-14, ff. 1-6v, (justification, 123 x 90-87 mm.), written below the top ruled line in two columns of thirty-eight lines, ff. 7-8, (justification, 130 x 98 mm.), copied below the top line in two columns of twenty-eight lines, ff. 8v-end, (justification, 137-134 x 98-97 mm.), with ff. 8v-30, written in two columns of thirty-three lines and ff. 31-end, in two columns, thirty-two lines.
The manuscript includes two texts, each copied by a different scribe using different scripts. The first scribe copied 1-26v in a quick upright Gothic noting script; the second scribe copied 26v-40v in a quick, heavily abbreviated Gothic bookhand. A later hand (fifteenth century?) has added the notation (possibly a shelf mark) "S.de.3." in bold gothic script, black ink, to the bottom margin of fol. 1r.
Manuscript 160, Western Michigan University Special Collections
Manuscript 161, Western Michigan University Special Collections
Fleith, Barbara and Franco Morenzoni, eds. De la saintete a l'hagiographie: genese et usage de la Legende doree, Geneva, Droz, 2001.
Fleith, Barbara. Studien zur Oberlieferungsgeschichte der lateinischen Legenda Aurea, Subsidia hagiographica 72, Brussels, Societe des Bollandistes, 1991.
Maggioni, Giovanni Paolo. Ricerche sulfa composizione e sulfa trasmissione def/a Legenda Aurea, Spoleto, Centro italiano di studi sull'alto medioevo, 1995.
Murano, Giovanna. Opere diffuse per exemplar e pecia, Turnhout, Brepols, 2005.
Pope, Joseph. One Hundred and Twenty-Five Manuscripts. Bergendal Collection Catalogue, Toronto, 1999.
Pope, Joseph. "The Library that Father Boyle Built," in A Distinct Voice: Medieval Studies in Honor of Leonard Boyle, O.P., ed. Jacqueline Brown and William P. Stoneman, Notre Dame, University of Notre DamePress, 1997, pp.157-162.
Seybold, R. F. "Fifteenth Century Editons of the 'Legenda aurea'," Speculum 21 (1946) 327-28.
Digital reproduction published by Western Michigan University and made available for private study, scholarship or research use under applicable U.S. Law. Access to digital reproductions provided by Special Collections at Zhang Legacy Collections Center, Western Michigan University.