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An Anonymous Twelfth-Century ‘De Natura Deorum’ in the Bodleian Library

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Judson Boyce Allen
Judson Boyce Allen*
Affiliation:
Marquette University
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Extract

When A. E. Housman edited Lucan, he dealt with the ‘confections’ of his predecessors with such high-handed savagery that his introduction is a delight even to non-classical essay-readers. ‘I touch with reluctance …,’ he says, ‘and dispatch with impatience an idle yet pretentious game in which Lucan's less serious critics find amusement, and which they call Ueber lieferungsgeschichte, because that is a longer and nobler name than fudge.’

Type
Miscellany
Information
Traditio , Volume 26 , 1970 , pp. 352 - 364
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 M. Annaei Lucani Belli civilis libri decem (Cambridge, Mass. 1950), xiii.Google Scholar

2 Bodleian MS Digby 221, fol. 100r .Google Scholar

3 Alexander's commentary is also preserved in Cambridge MS Trinity College R. 14. 29 (884), fols. 38–63. An edition by Van Kluyve, R. A. and myself is in progress.Google Scholar

4 Silverstein, Th., ‘Liber Hermetis Mercurii Triplicis de VI rerum principiis,’ Archives d'histoire doctrinale et littéraire du Moyen Age 22 [30eme année] (1955) 217–302.Google Scholar

5 Pope Alexander and his successors in the twelfth century had a great deal of trouble with the German emperors, and with the Saracens, but so far as I can tell, none with the decrees of previous popes. The third Lateran Council (1179) was concerned, in part, with the problem of antipopes, but I find no dealing with the problem of dispensations there, nor in the letters of Alexander (PL 200). Doubtless the Digby author was referring to a principle, and not to a particular event. For a study of Alexander III, see Pacaut, Marcel, Alexandre III, Étude sur la conception du pouvoir pontifical dans son œuvre (Paris 1956).Google Scholar

6 Berchorius, Petrus, De formis figurisque deorum, ed. Engels, J., Werkmateriaal (3) uitgegeven door het Instituut voor Laat Latijn der Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht (Utrecht 1966) 2–3.Google Scholar

7 Ymaginaciones Fulgencii, Trier, Stadtbibliothek MS 2250a/2193a, fol. 18v .Google Scholar

8 This study is continuing. For partial results, see my ‘The Library of a Classicizer: The Sources of Robert Holkot's Mythographic Learning,’ Arts libéraux et philosophie au Moyen Âge (Actes du Quatrième Congrès International de Philosophie Médiévale, Université de Montreal, Canada, 27 août - 2 septembre 1967), 721–29.Google Scholar

9 ‘Saturnus Caeli vel Polluris filius, Opis maritus deae, senior, velato capite, falcem ferens pingitur’: ed. Bode, G. H., Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini tres Romae nuper reperti (Cellis 1834) 74.Google Scholar

10 Bode, , 153.Google Scholar

11 Liebeschütz, Hans, Fulgentius Metaforalis: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der antiken Mythologie im Mittelalter (Studien der Bibliothek Warburg 4; Leipzig-Berlin 1926) 73.Google Scholar

12 Van Kluyve, R. A., Thomae Walsingham De archana deorum (Durham 1968) xiv: ‘He has, however, ignored every scriptural allusion and all his moral, allegorical, and spiritual comments … it is possible that he worked from an abridged copy of Bersuire's text which contained only the introductory treatise and the paraphrases with some few marginalia‘; [ibid., note] ’Such a text of Bersuire has recently been discovered in the Trent Collection of the Duke University Medical Library, and is now Duke U. MS lat. 37.’ Google Scholar

13 Smalley, Beryl, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (repr. New York 1952) 242: ‘For almost every book of Langton's glosses, one of the reportationes has been found in three forms; we have (i) the complete form … and also (ii) the literal, and (iii) the spiritual, disentangled and each copied out separately.’ Google Scholar

14 Ghisalberti, Fausto, ‘Arnolfo d'Orleans, un cultore di Ovidio nel secolo XII,’ Memorie Istit. Lombardo 24 (1932) 216.Google Scholar

15 Fol. 109v .Google Scholar

16 Ridevall, John discovered that chronology made it impossible for Aeneas to have ever met Dido — apparently anticipating Petrarch's proud discovery of the same fact. Smalley, Beryl, English Friars and Antiquity in the Early Fourteenth Century (Oxford 1960) 130.Google Scholar

17 Fol. 107v .Google Scholar

18 Foll. 100v–101r .Google Scholar

19 The Romance of the Rose, tr. Robbins, Harry W., ed. Dunn, Charles W. (New York 1962) 362–363.Google Scholar

20 del Virgilio, Giovanni, Allegorie Ovidiane , in Ghisalberti, F., ‘Giovanni del Virgilio, espositore delle Metamorfosi,’ Il giornale Dantesco 34 (1933) 23.Google Scholar

21 Fol. 107r .Google Scholar

22 ‘… ex Jove et Junone, Mars.’ Fabulae , in Auctores Mythographi Latini, ed. van Staveren, A. (Leyden and Amsterdam 1742) 12.Google Scholar

23 ‘A Junone eum [Martem] sine patris admixtione natum dici suspicor’ (Bode, 234).Google Scholar

24 Raschke, Robert, De Alberico Mythologo (Breslau 1913) 111 and note. Alberic's usual practice is to quote verbatim; very little of his book is his own, even in paraphrase and summary.Google Scholar

25 ‘Dicunt … percusso flore Martem [concepisse]’: Genealogie deorum gentilium libri, ed. Romano, Vincenzo (Bari 1951) 437.Google Scholar

26 ‘Tempore Saturni aurea etas fuit, postea argentea, et ita usque ad ferrum, que quarta fuit similitudo. Quia primo fuerunt boni homines, sicut aurum prevalet ceteris metallis, postea ceperunt deteriorari, de gradu in gradum, sicud cetera metalla a precio descendunt post aurum’ (fol. 100v).Google Scholar

27 ‘Filia Tyresie fuit Mancho, adeo in divinando perita, quod a nomine eius dicta est machesis, idest ars divinatoria mantice, et quelibet eius species sicud cinomancia, a cinos grece, quod est canis latine, et est divinacio facta per sacrificium de cane; et orinmancia [sic] ab ornix grece, quod est gallina latine, divinacio scilicet facta per sacrificium de gallina; et pedomancia idest divinacio facta per sacrificium de puero. Nam pedos grece, puer latine; et nicromancia, idest divinacio facta per sacrificium de homine mortuo. Nicros enim grece, mortuus vel mors latine’ (fol. 106r).Google Scholar

28 ‘Tempore Saturni prime fuerunt nimphe. Sicut driades nemorum, amadriades arborum, napee foncium, oreades moncium, himnides pratorum, naiades fluviorum, nereides maris’ (fol. 100v).Google Scholar

29 ‘Tempore huius, invente sunt artes. Dyalectica, ut veritatem inquirendo deciperet sophismatibus. Grammatica, ut sermonem dirigeret. Rethorica, ut blandiretur. Musica, ut tonis et semitonis delectaret. Geometria, ut mensuraret. Arismetica, ut computaret. Astrologia, que in celo signa notaret. Astronomia, per quam de signis in celo operaremur. Nicromancia, per quam fructum cognicionis astronomice participemus’ (fol. 103r).Google Scholar

30 Fol. 117r .Google Scholar

31 ‘Ovid: Rex superum Phrygii quondam Ganymedis amore arsit, et inventum est aliquid, quod Iuppiter esse, quam quod erat, mallet. Nulla tamen alite verti dignatur, nisi quae posset sua fulmina ferre. Nec mora, percusso mendacibus aere pennis abripit Iliaden; qui nunc quoque pocula miscet invitaque Iovi nectar Iunone ministrat‘ (Metam. 10.155–61). Remigius: ’Ganymedes, Troili regis Trojanorum et Callirrhoae filius, propter corporis pulchritudinem, ne infamiam connubii masculini subiret, dum in Ida silva venaretur, ab aquila in caelum raptus, est constitutus pincerna deorum, remota Hebe, Junonis filia’ (Bode, , p. 139).Google Scholar

32 ‘Utque volans alte raptum cum fulva draconem / fert aquila.’ (11. 751–752) Google Scholar

33 In Aen. 1.394 (DS): ‘propter aquilum colorem, qui ater est… per hanc etiam Ganymedes cum amaretur a Iove dicitur raptus’: ed. Rand, E. K. et al., Servianorum in Vergilii carmina commentariorum editio Harvardiana II (Lancaster, Pa. 1946) 192.Google Scholar

34 Metam. 11.413–14.Google Scholar

35 The specific details are not to be found in Servius, Lactantius Placidus in Statius, nor the Vatican mythographers.Google Scholar

36 Concerning Liber: ‘nam et lac docuit extrahi de mamma et mel de brica [lege brisca], quod asserit Ovidius de Fastis’ (fol. 105v). ‘Lothos sive Lothis ista fuit quedam virgo, de qua habetur in Ovidius de Fastis’ (fol. 115v; cf. Fasti 1.416ff. Bode, 244).Google Scholar

37 On Aristeus and how he got his bees back: ‘Unde Virgilium habemus testem in secundo libro Georgicon’ (fol. 105v, cf. Geo. 4.281ff.). On the Golden Apples of the Hesperides: ‘Ideo dicitur rapuisse aurea poma, quia sapientia aurea est. Unde Virgilius: Aurea mala. x. iaisis. [lege misi] cras altera mittam scilicet x eglogas aureo eloquio conscriptas’ (fol. 115r; cf. Ecl. 3.71).Google Scholar

38 Flegias: ‘Sed ab Apolline sagittatus et ad inferos detrusus est. Unde Stacius: Subter cava regna iacentem eterno premit accubitu’ (fol. 101r; cf. Theb. 1.713–714). Hercules was Greek on his father's side, and Theban on his Mother's. ‘Unde Stacius inducit eum dubitantem an faveat Grecis an Thebanis dicens: Intento dubitat Tirincius arcu (cf. Theb. 10.891). Iuxta hiis Menon fratrem Asopi. fluvii qui ex theba. v. natas habuit, nutritus est. unde in Stacio: Ad hunc repressit Tirincius ampnem’ (fol. 109r, cf. Silv. 4.6.17).Google Scholar

39 ‘Quia indissolubiles esse Gratias docet Oracius dicens: Segnesque non dum [lege nodum] solvere Gratie’ (fol. 103v: cf. Carm. 3.21.22).Google Scholar

40 References to the nona aetas and to the third Cato, already quoted (above at n. 26).Google Scholar

41 ‘Sunt enim tres capitis celule. fantastica. logistica. memorialis. quarta similior eloquenciae. et matrimonium verborum signat. de qua tullius dixit. quia sapientia parum valet sine eloquencia’ (fol. 115r).Google Scholar

42 ‘Quidam asserunt eum [Saturnum] fuisse primum deorum. nec habuisse patrem, unde Theodorus dicit: Nullus ei genitor, nec quisquam tempore maior’ (fol. 100v).Google Scholar

43 Concerning the eagle of Jupiter. ‘De hac aquila plura dicit Eginus’ (fol. 103r). For this ‘plura,’ cf. Hygini Poeticon Astronomicon. Van Stav., 458–9).Google Scholar

44 Eunicius seems to be Euhemerus. Digby: ‘Vel ut ait Eunicius Egle uxor Panis genuit Egipanum. de quo Iubiter in celo fecit Capricornum’ (fol. 103r); Hyginus: ‘Euhemerus ait Aegam quamdam fuisse Panos uxorem: eam ab Jove compressam peperisse, quem viri sui Panos diceret filium. Itaque puerum Aegipana, Jovem. vero Aegiochum dictum: qui, quod eum diligebat plurimum, inter astra caprae figura memoriae cause conlocavit’ (Van Stav., 449–50).Google Scholar

45 Digby: ‘Aglostes philosophus non fabulose, sed historice, dicit ut Iovem a coete surreptum ad Naxon insulam fuisse delatum, et ibidem nutritum’ (fol. 103r); Hyginus: ‘Hanc Aglaosthenes qui Naxica conscripsit, ait Cynosuram esse unam de Iovis nutricibus ex Idaeis nymphis … ’(Van Stav., 421).Google Scholar

46 ‘Duces troianorum. xlix naves mille centum. xxxa secundum homerum’ (fol. 119r).Google Scholar

47 ‘Huius simulacrum ubique diffusum est, et demone in statua incluso, responsum dabat de futuris. Singulos autem errores de diis, Augustinus in libro de civitate Dei exponit’ (fol. 103r).Google Scholar

48 ‘Notati [sunt] venti qui quatuor sunt cardinales et oppositi scilicet eurus orientalis, zephirus occidentalis, boreas septentrionalis, auster meridionalis. Quibus istorum quatuor duos habent collaterales. De illis in philosophia magistri Guillesmi de Conchis require’ (fol. 103r).Google Scholar

49 Cf. notes 44 and 45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

50 Cf. note 48.Google Scholar

51 Cf. note 46.Google Scholar

52 Cf. note 47.Google Scholar

53 Cf. note 42.Google Scholar

54 Genealogie deorum, 10.10 (p. 495 Romano [cit. supra n. 25]).Google Scholar

55 Bell. civ. 9.646.Google Scholar

56 The text at this point is unreliable, and Van Staveren has proposed emendation to harmonize with the Theogony of Hesiod: ‘Ex Phorco et Ceto Memphede, Enyo, Graeae: et Gorgones Stheno, Eurarem, Medusa’ (p. 9).Google Scholar

57 Genealogie deorum 7.14 (349 Romano).Google Scholar

58 Ibid. 4.68 (233).Google Scholar

59 Seznec, Jean, The Survival of the Pagan Gods, tr. Barbara, F. Sessions (New York 1953) 222. I am grateful to Hankey, Teresa Dr. for telling me, just as I was reading proof for this article, that this relation to Theodontius is complicated by the fact that Boccaccio owes his Theodontian material to the Collectionum of Paolo of Perugia, a work later lost through the carelessness of Paolo's widow (Genealogie deorum [pp. 761–762 Romano]). The extracts from this work preserved in Boccaccio's Zibaldone, edited by Hortis, Attilio, Studi sulle Opere Latine del Boccaccio (Trieste 1879) 525–536, do not fully account for the Theodontian material which Digby and Boccaccio have in common, but the incipit of the Zibaldone condensation of Paolo does repeat, almost verbatim, some of the material in Digby's self-advertising introduction, and some of the information in Digby's early pages also appears in Paolo. It would appear that the Digby mythography, or some work derived from it, also found readers in Italy.Google Scholar

59 a Trevet's commentary on the Consolation of Philosophy of Boethius was Holkot's basic source for this Hercules material. See above note 8.Google Scholar

60 Postilla super duodecim prophetas, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodl. 722, foll. 130v–131r .Google Scholar

61 Ibid., fol. 133r .Google Scholar

62 Commentary on Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Rawl. G. 187, fol. 46r .Google Scholar

63 See his introduction, ed. cit. (supra n. 12) xvii–xviii.Google Scholar

64 Oxford, MS St. John's College 127, foll. 146v, 148v .Google Scholar