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The glosses on Bede's De temporum ratione attributed to Byrhtferth of Ramsey

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Michael Gorman
Michael Gorman
Affiliation:
Milan, Italy
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Extract

The editio princeps of the works of the Venerable Bede was published in 1563 by Johann Herwagen the Younger († 1564) in Basel; the edition had been begun by his father, the well-known printer and publisher, Johann Herwagen (†1557), who was active first in Strasbourg, then in Basel, and was a friend and associate of Johann Froben. In his edition of Bede's De temporum ratione and De natura rerum, Herwagen printed glosses on these two works under the name of Byrhtferth of Ramsey along with Bede's texts. To date, no manuscript of these glosses has ever been found, so our knowledge of them depends entirely upon Herwagen's edition.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 25 , December 1996 , pp. 209 - 232
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

1 Opera Bedae Venerabilis presbyteri anglosaxonis, uiri in diuinis atque humanis literis exercitatissimi, omnia in octo tomos distincta, 8 vols. (Basel, 1563).Google Scholar

2 For further information on Johann Herwagen and his family, see Benzing, J., Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts in deutschen Sprachgebiet (Wiesbaden, 1982), pp. 36, 40–1 and 441.Google Scholar

3 Byrhtferth's Enchiridion, ed. Baker, P. S. and Lapidge, M., EETS ss 15 (Oxford, 1995).Google Scholar

4 Henel, H., ‘Byrhtferth's Preface: The Epilogue of his Manual?’, Speculum 18 (1943), 288–302, at 297.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 See the edition of Baker, and Lapidge, , Byrhtferth's Enchiridion, Appendix A, pp. 373–427.Google Scholar

6 On Byrhtferth and his works, see the articles by Lapidge, Michael, ‘The Hermeneutic Style in Tenth-Century Anglo-Latin Literature’, ASE 4 (1975), 67–111, at 90–5Google Scholar, repr. in his Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066 (London, 1993), pp. 128–33Google Scholar; ‘Byrhtferth and the Vita S. Ecgwini’, MS 41 (1979), 331–53Google Scholar, repr. Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, pp. 293–315Google Scholar; and ‘Byrhtferth of Ramsey and the Early Sections of the Historia Regum attributed to Symeon of Durham’, ASE 10 (1981), 97–122Google Scholar, repr. Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, pp. 317–42Google Scholar; and Baker, Peter, ‘The Old English Canon of Byrhtferth of Ramsey’, Speculum 55 (1980), 22–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar, ‘Byrhtferth's Enchiridion and the Computus in Oxford, St John's College 17’, ASE 10 (1982), 123–42Google Scholar, and ‘Byrhtferth of Ramsey and the Renaissance Scholars’, Anglo-Saxon Scholarship: the First Three Centuries, ed. Berkhout, C. T. and Gatch, M. McC. (Boston, 1982), pp. 69–77.Google Scholar

7 For his work, Über das Leben und die Schriften Byrhtferths, eines angelsächsischcn Gelchrten und Schriftstellers urn das Jahr 1000 (Dresden, 1896)Google Scholar, see Jones, C. W., ‘The Byrhtferth Glosses’, MÆ 7 (1938), 81–97, at 83.Google Scholar

8 Manitius, M., Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters, 3 vols. (Munich, 1911–1931) II, 700.Google Scholar

9 Baker, , ‘The Old English Canon’, p. 22.Google Scholar

10 Hart, C. R., ‘The Ramsey Computus’, EHR 85 (1970), 29–44, at 30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 It would be useful to attempt to identify which works were printed from manuscripts for the first time by Herwagen and which were simply reprinted from earlier editions.

12 See my article, ‘The Commentary on the Pentateuch attributed to Bede in PL 91.189–394’, RB 106 (1996), forthcoming.Google Scholar

13 Bischoff, B., ‘Zur Kritik der Heerwagenschen Ausgabe von Bedas Werken (Basel, 1563)’, in his Mittelalterliche Studien, 3 vols. (Stuttgart, 1966–1981) I, 112–17Google Scholar, first published in 1933. See also Weisweiler, H., ‘Die handschriftlichen Vorlagen zum Erstdruck von pseudo-Beda, In Psalmorum librum exegesis’, Biblica 18 (1937), 197–204.Google Scholar

14 Jones seems to quote the studies of Bischoff and Weisweiler for the first time in his 1967 edition of Bede's commentary on Genesis (CCSL 118A, iv, n. 4).

15 See my article, ‘The Manuscripts of the Commentaries on the Psalms attributed to Bede in PL 93.477–1098’, RB 107 (1997), forthcoming.Google Scholar

16 See my article, ‘The Commentary on Genesis prepared for Charlemagne by Wigbod’, Recherches Augustiniennes 17 (1982), 173–201, at 199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17 It is hard to understand why Jones adopted such a harsh attitude towards Herwagen's edition that he was driven to assert: ‘The singularly inept and even dishonest editing of Hervagius forced me to publish my Bedae Pseudepigrapha in order that his falsifications might be cleared away …’ (Jones, C. W., Bedae Opera de Temporibus (Cambridge, MA, 1943), p. VII).Google Scholar

18 PL 90, col. 207.

19 Jones, ‘The Byrhtferth Glosses’.

20 Ibid. p. 82.

21 Ibid. p. 88.

22 Ibid. p. 90.

23 See Contreni, J. J., The Cathedral School of Laon from 850 to 930: its Manuscripts and Masters, Münchener Beiträge zur Mediävistik und Renaissance-Forschung 29 (Munich, 1978), 124–30Google Scholar. About Martin's glosses in the Berlin manuscript (published in CCSL 123B), Contreni states: ‘I have compared these glosses with the published B glosses. The general tenor of the two sets of glosses is quite different. Those of Martin and his colleague are more technical, less discursive than those of the compiler. Martin and his colleague glossed many more words, but their glosses on the whole tend to be shorter than those of the compiler of B who sometimes quoted several authorities within a gloss. The Laon glossators cite authorities but rarely. Despite these differences, there is an obvious dependency of the B glossator upon Martin and his colleague. Many of the Laon glosses appear verbatim in the B glosses, although sometimes in a truncated version.' (p. 126) In the Byrhtferth glosses on ch. 5, edited here, only three glosses are shared by Martin and B; see Appendix, pp. 229–30. ‘As far as can be seen at present, the glosses of Heiric [in Melk 412] and Martin [in Berlin Phillipps 1832] are independent. Yet both served as primary sources for the compiler behind the so-called B glosses.’ (p. 151) When the full story of the Byrhtferth glosses comes out, we will probably discover that Contreni was correct.

Another copy of Bede's computistical works, known as the Horblit Bede, now Ludwig XII. 13 in Trier, was at Laon where it was annotated by Manno, a student of Martin; see Contreni, , The Cathedral School of Laon, pp. 139 and 150.Google Scholar The Horblit Bede was once bound together with another ninth-century manuscript, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Library, Houghton fMS Typ 495; see my article, ‘Harvard's Oldest Latin Manuscript (Houghton Library, fMS Typ 495): a Patristic Miscellany from the Predestinarian Controversy of the Ninth Century’, Scriptorium 39 (1985), 185–96, at 186, n. 8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24 Bischoff, B., Die südostdeutschen Schreibschulen und Bibliotheken in der Karolingerzeit, II: Die vorwiegend österreichischen Diözesen (Wiesbaden, 1980), p. 45.Google Scholar For the historical vicissitudes of this famous manuscript, see Bischoff, B., ‘Palaeography and the Transmission of Classical Texts in the Early Middle Ages’, Manuscripts and Libraries in the Age of Charlemagne, trans. Gorman, M. (Cambridge, 1994), p. 126Google Scholar; ‘Paläographie und frühmittelalterliche Klassikerüberlieferung’, Mittelalterliche Studien III, 66.Google Scholar

25 ‘The Byrhtferth Glosses’, p. 90.Google Scholar

26 Ibid. pp. 94–6. Peter Baker has explained in detail how Bale's knowledge of these works may derive from John Leland's De scriptoribus britannicis; see his article, ‘Byrhtferth of Ramsey and the Renaissance Scholars’, p. 71.Google Scholar

27 Jones, C. W., Bedae Pseudepigrapha: Scientific Writings Falsely Attributed to Bede (Ithaca, NY, 1939), pp. 21–38.Google Scholar

28 Ibid. p.21.

29 Ibid. p. 29.

30 Ibid. p.25.

31 Ibid.

32 Ibid. p. 26.

33 Ibid. p. 27.

34 Ibid. pp. 95–102.

35 Ibid. p. 28.

36 Ibid. p. 31.

37 Ibid. pp. 31–4.

38 Ibid. p. 36.

39 Ibid. p. 37.

40 Jones, , Bedae Opera de Temporibus, esp. pp. 332, 350, 351 and 352.Google Scholar

41 CCSL123B, 257–61.

42 The shelfmark of this Melk manuscript was still given incorrectly by Jones as late as 1976.

43 Jones, C. W., ‘Bede's Place in Medieval Schools’, Famulus Christi: Essays in Commemoration of the Thirteenth Centenary of the Birth of the Venerable Bede, ed. Bonner, G. (London, 1976), pp. 261–85, at 273, where Jones speculates on the identity of the glossator, and mentions Martin by name.Google Scholar

44 On this chapter of Bede's work, see Jones, , Bedae Opera de Temporibus, pp. 335–7Google Scholar, where he refers to the ‘Auxerre Glosses’, meaning those printed in PL 90 under the name of Byrhtferth.

45 The extracts presented in conjunction with ch. 5 of De temporum ratione are not reused in the brief commentary on the opening words of Genesis which is inserted in the glosses on ch. 2 of De natura rerum, ‘De mundi formatione’ (PL 90, cols. 190B–191D).

46 The text as found in Patrologia Latina was corrected against the Herwagen edition of 1563; errors in Migne were few.

47 Another long passage from the same commentary attributed to Remigius (PL 90, cols. 478D–479B) comes in Haimo's commentary (PL 131, cols. 60C–D, 61C–62A).

48 Edwards, Burton Van Narne, ‘In Search of the Authentic Commentary on Genesis by Remigius of Auxerre’, L'école carolingienne d'auxerre de Murethach à Remi 830–908, ed. Iogna-Prat, D. et al. (Paris, 1989), p. 403.Google Scholar

49 See the Appendix, below, p. 228. On this homily, see Barré, H., Les homéliaires carolingiens de l'école d'auxerre, Studi e Testi 225 (Vatican City, 1962), 299. Riccardo Quadri, the expert in these matters, kindly identified the excerpts from Haimo's homiliary for me. Here I record my gratitude to him for his assistance.Google Scholar

50 See Appendix, pp. 229–30.

51 These are indicated in the Appendix, lines 202–10 and 211–13.

52 Byrhtferth's Manual, ed. Crawford, S. J., EETS os 177 (London, 1929), 2 and 9. From his notes on these passages, it seems that Crawford did not doubt Byrhtferth's authorship of the glosses.Google Scholar

53 For example, Remigius's name is consistendy applied to the commentary on Genesis of Haimo.

54 PL 90, 190B and 200C.

55 PL 90, col. 191A.

56 PL 90, col. 202D.

57 PL 90, col. 205D.

58 PL 90, col. 205C.

59 PL 90, col. 232C.

60 PL 90, col. 234D.

61 PL 90, cols. 236B and 241B.

62 ‘Byrhtferth was, as far as I know, the only Anglo-Saxon author ever to have studied Macrobius' commentary In somnium Scipionis’: Lapidge, M., ‘Abbot Germanus, Winchcombe, Ramsey and the Cambridge Psalter’, Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, p. 396.Google Scholar

63 The use of Martianus in the glosses was noted by Laistner, M. L. W., ‘Martianus Capella and his Ninth-Century Commentators’, Bull. of the John Rylands Lib. 9 (1925), 130–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

64 PL 90, col. 418B.

65 See my article, ‘The Commentary on the Pentateuch’.

66 The use of this work in the Byrhtferth glosses was noted by Diazy Diaz, M. C., Liber de ordine creaturarum: Un anónimo irlandés del sigh vii (Santiago de Compostella, 1972), pp. 23, n. 2, and 117.Google Scholar

67 See McKitterick, R., ‘Knowledge of Plato's Timaeus in the Ninth Century: the Implications of Valenciennes 293’, in From Athens to Chartres: Neoplatonism and Medieval Thought, ed. Westra, H. J. (Leiden, 1992), pp. 85–95Google Scholar; repr. in her Books, Scribes and Learning in the Frankish Kingdoms, 6th–9th Centuries (Aldershot, 1994), ch. X.Google Scholar

68 This author was known to and used by Byrhtferth: see Lapidge, , ‘Byrhtferth and the Early Sections’, Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, p. 334.Google Scholar

69 Bedae, Pseudepigrapha, p. 23.Google Scholar

70 PL 90, col. 300C.

71 PL 90, col. 323D.

72 PL 90, col. 329B.

73 PL 90, col. 330C.

74 PL 90, col. 342D.

75 PL 90, col. 344C.

76 PL 90, col. 387B.

77 PL 90, col. 390D.

78 PL 90, col. 399B.

79 PL 90, col. 424A.

80 PL 90.466D. On the use of pleniter by Byrhtferth, a word which is found here in three cross-references, see Lapidge, , ‘Byrhtferth and the Early Sections’, Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, pp. 322–3.Google Scholar

81 ‘The Byrhtferth Glosses’, p. 86.Google Scholar

82 ‘In libro de ciuitate dei decimo sexto, capite non’: PL 90, col. 453D.

83 ‘Isidorus in libro Etymologiarum tertio, capite uigesimo secundo’: PL 90, col. 452B.

84 This list would have been almost anyone's, but it may be of interest to note that, as C. R. Hart pointed out, Byrhtferth mentions the same four authors in his Epilogus (‘Byrhtferth and his Manual’, p. 101)Google Scholar; see the text of the Epilogusm Byrhtferth's Enchiridion, ed. Baker, and Lapidge, , pp. 375–9.Google Scholar

85 PL 90, col. 326C.

86 PL 90, col. 336C.

87 PL 90, col. 339C.

88 PL 90, col. 356D.

89 PL 90, col. 478C.

90 PL 90, col. 685. This incipit is given in order to facilitate the identification of a manuscript containing the glosses in question – evidently a vain hope.

91 PL 90, cols. 195–6 (Opera Bedae, ed. Herwagen, II, 5Google Scholar; explained in the glosses and based on Isidore's Etymotogiae), 363–4 (86; from Macrobius), 365–6 (87; explained in the glosses), 439–40 (126; explained in the glosses), 443–4 (127; from Macrobius), 451–2 (133; a figura from Isidore's Etymologiae).

92 Michael Lapidge has pointed out that many passages from Bede's computistical works were copied by Byrhtferth into the Historia regum; see ‘Byrhtferth and the Early Sections’, Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, p. 329.Google Scholar

93 Yet another clue about the origin of the Byrhtferth glosses might be offered by the comment about Britain in the glosses on De natura rerum, PL 90, col. 205C.

94 Jones edited De natura rerum (CCSL 123A) and De temporum ratione (CCSL 123B). Martin's glosses on each work in Berlin Phillipps 1832 are included in these editions. For additional notes on the manuscripts, see Jones, C. W., ‘Manuscripts of Bede's De natura rerum’, Isis 27 (1937), 430–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Lipp, Frances Randall, ‘The Carolingian Commentaries on Bede's De natura rerum’ (unpubl. PhD dissertation, Yale Univ., 1961)Google Scholar. Neither Jones nor Lipp worked out the manuscript tradition of either work. A previous list of manuscripts is found in Laistner, M. L. W., A Hand-List of Bede Manuscripts (Ithaca, NY, 1943), pp. 148–51.Google Scholar

95 Bedae Pseudepigrapha, p. 27.Google Scholar

96 At one point Vatican Reg. lat. 755, ‘saec. ix/x, Sens’, is mentioned (Bedae Pseudepigrapba, p. 29)Google Scholar. Two pages later (p. 31), Paris lat 5239, ‘saec. ix2, once at St Martian [sic], Limoges’, is cited and Jones says that it ‘might possibly be a copy’ of Vatican Reg. lat. 755, the manuscript just stated to have been written some decades later! In cases such as these, Jones's method of argumentation leaves the reader wondering: what exactly might he have meant to say?

97 See his comment on Montpellier 137 in Bedae Opera de Temporibus, p. 160.Google Scholar

98 One may hope that it will soon be possible to consult the Bischoff archives in Munich and to report Bischoff's dates for the manuscripts included in his unpublished catalogue.

99 On the dating of this manuscript, see Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar from Ramsey’, repr. Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, pp. 365–6. I have not examined the manuscript, nor did I attempt to collate the glosses on Bede's works in it, and I was unable to consult the 1985 Toronto PhD dissertation of Faith Wallis, ‘MS Oxford St John's College 17: a Medieval Manuscript in its Context’.Google Scholar

100 A gloss on De temporum ratione cited by Baker, Peter, ‘Byrhtferth's Enchiridion and the Computus in Oxford St John's College 17’, p. 126, n. 19, is found in the glosses attributed to Byrhtferth: ‘Iubilaeus etiam dicitur remissionis annus’ (PL 90, col. 300A). Since the gloss in question is merely a topos that derives from Isidore (Etym. V. xxxvii.3; PL 82, col. 222C) and Bede (De temporum ratione, ch. 8; CCSL 123B, 304, lines 96–7), it cannot by itself prove a connection between the Byrhtferth glosses and the glosses on De temporum ratione in J. But it is remarkable, as Lapidge has pointed out, that the gloss ‘recalls wording both in the Vita S. Oswaldi and in Byrhtferth's portion of the Historia Regum’ (pers. comm.).Google Scholar