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The Medieval Allegorization of the ‘Aeneid’: MS Cambridge, Peterhouse 158

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Christopher Baswell
Christopher Baswell*
Affiliation:
Barnard College
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Extract

The development of sophisticated and complex techniques of literary interpretation was among the greatest achievements of those twelfth-century thinkers who have come loosely to be called ‘Chartrian.’ Chartrian literary allegoresis grew from a reawakened interest in the natural sciences, and a spiritual optimism about man's rational capacity to understand the Creator through his creation. These literary commentators made a habit of encyclopedic digression, using single words or brief passages from their texts to introduce whole chunks of allegorically or literally relevant information from the trivium, the quadrivium, mythology, and natural philosophy. They thus sought to find in their books the whole world of knowledge and the course of spiritual development, even as they had learned to see their world itself as a book. Intimately connected to this was the idea of the arts as a discipline for regaining lost knowledge of divine truths, and education as part of a symbolic spiritual pilgrimage.

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Articles
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Traditio , Volume 41 , 1985 , pp. 181 - 237
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Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 The central exponent of this attitude was William of Conches. See De philosophia mundi libri quatuor, PL 172.100d: ‘Quippe cum per cognitionem creaturae ad cognitionem Creatoris perveniamus.’ See the similar argument, part of a justification for the study of physics in a twelfth-century treatise, ed. Dales, Richard C., ‘Anonymi De elementis: From a Twelfth-Century Collection of Scientific Works in British Museum MS Cotton Galba E.IV,’ Isis 56 (1965) 181. Peter Dronke writes with energy and insight on this idea in Guillaume de Conches in his Fabula: Explorations into the Uses of Myth in Medieval Platonism (Mittellateinische Studien und Texte 11; Leiden 1974) 32–36.Google Scholar

Two relevant articles have come to hand since my completion of this piece. Working from different evidence, Rodney M. Thomson argues for a widespread interest in classical Latin literature in twelfth-century England, especially in the southwest. See ‘England and the Twelfth-Century Renaissance,’ Past and Present 101 (1983) 3–21, especially 11–15. E. R. Smits uses a reference to the allegorization of the Virgilian underworld in Helinand of Froidmont's early thirteenth-century Chronicon to propose Bernard of Chartres as the genuine author of the Aeneid commentary. As Smits notes, however, the summary offered by Helinand is far closer to John of Salisbury's version than to that of ‘B. Silv.’ This early reference to the commentary thus still points to England. See ‘New Evidence for the Authorship of the Commentary on the First Six Books of Virgil's Eneid Commonly Attributed to Bernardus Silvestris?’ in Non nova, sed nove: Mélanges de civilisation médiévale dédiés à Willem Noomen, edd. GosmanMartin and Van OsJaap (Mediaevalia Groningana 5; Groningen 1984) 239–46.

2 Consider for example Alexander Neckam's justification for his De naturis rerum: ‘Mundus ergo ipse, calamo Dei inscriptus, littera quaedam intelligenti repraesentans artificis potentiam cum sapientia eiusdem et benignitate. Sic autem totus mundus inscriptus est, ita totus littera est, sed intelligenti et naturas rerum investiganti, ad cognitionem et laudem Creatoris.’ Ed. Thomas Wright (Rolls Series; London 1863) 125; cited by Viarre, S., ‘Le Commentaire ordonné du monde dans quelques sommes scientifiques des xiie et xiiie siècles,’ in Bolgar, R. R., ed., Classical Influences on European Culture, A.D. 500–1500 (Cambridge 1971) 210. Mme Viarre explores the application of this notion in a wide range of encyclopedic texts.Google Scholar

3 John of Salisbury's De septem septenis describes the seven-fold way of the soul to heaven, the first step of which is the study of the arts: PL 199.948a–b. Adelard of Bath makes the liberal arts even more important, and links them explicitly to the idea of the body as a prison house of the soul: ‘His igitur anima in corporis carcere vinculis oppressa unum inter universa remedium est, quo eadem se sibi reddit domumque reducit: doctrinae videlicet huius philosophiae artesque, quas vocant, liberales…. Quibus attente relictis ipsa se recognoscens non tantum a sarcina rerum premente exoneratur, verum etiam omnia corporea, quantum natura patitur, perosa despectat, omnia beatudine [sic] referta, dum se auctoremque suum contemplando cognoscit.’ De eodem et diverso , ed. Willner, H., Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters 4.1 (1906) 16–17. For word play on liberaus/liberare , see Bultot, Robert, ‘Grammatica, ethica, et contemptus mundi aux xiie et xiiie siècles,’ Arts libéraux et philosophie au moyen âge (Actes du quatrième congrès international de philosophie médiévale; Montréal 1969) 815–27 (hereafter Arts libéraux).Google Scholar

4 See Crouse, Robert Darwin, ‘Honorius Augustodunensis: The Arts as Via ad patriam,’ Arts libéraux 531–39.Google Scholar

5 See for example the title of the recent edition, The Commentary on the First Six Books of the Aeneid Commonly Attributed to Bernard Silvestris, edd. Jones, Julian Ward and Jones, Elizabeth Frances (Lincoln, Nebr. 1977), and discussion of attribution pp. ix–xi; henceforth cited as ‘Jones and Jones.’ The following sections of this article should cast yet more doubt on an already shaky attribution; but the text is widely associated with Bernard Silvestris, and ‘B Silv’ seems a reasonable graph to help avoid undue periphrasis. There is a translation of the commentary with introduction and notes, by Earl Schreiber and Thomas E. Maresca (Lincoln, Nebr. 1979); but it is unreliable (see the review by Burnett, Charles, Notes and Queries, n.s. 28 [1981] 329–31), and, preferring my own errors, I provide my own rather more literal translations throughout the article.Google Scholar

6 Chenu, M.-D., ‘Involucrum: Le mythe selon les théologiens médiévaux,’ Archives d'histoire doctrinale et littéraire du Moyen Age (hereafter AHDLMA) 22 (1956) 75–79. Jeauneau, Édouard, ‘L'usage de la notion d'integumentum à travers les gloses de Guillaume de Conches,’ AHDLMA 24 (1957) 35–100. Dronke, , Fabula, passim. Stock, Brian, Myth and Science in the Twelfth Century (Princeton 1972) 31–62. Wetherbee, Winthrop, Platonism and Poetry in the Twelfth Century: The Literary Influence of the School of Chartres (Princeton 1972) 36–48 and 104–25.Google Scholar

7 Ed. Helm, Rudolph, Fabii Planciadis Fulgentii V. C. Opera, rev. Jean Préaux (1898; rpt. Stuttgart 1970) 81–107. Trans. Whitbread, Leslie G., Fulgentius the Mythographer (Columbus, Ohio 1971) 105–53.Google Scholar

8 Grateful acknowledgment is made to the Dean and Fellows of Peterhouse for permission to publish sections of this manuscript.Google Scholar

9 See James, M. R., A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Peterhouse (Cambridge 1899) 17. For James's description of the manuscript, see pp. 186–87.Google Scholar

10 There is a commentary written on the Aeneid by the late eleventh-century schoolmaster Anselm of Laon. It was available in England at least as early as ca. 1200, the date of MS London, British Library Add. 16380.Google Scholar

11 ‘Arma id est bella: metonomia, efficiens pro effecto. Vel arma et virum id est armatum virum: et est endiadys. Vel isteron proteron id est preposteras ordo. Vel etiam arma preponuntur quia deus Vulcanus fecerat illa. Vel continuate ad supradicta, arma martis id est digna ipso marte, quia omnia bona arma dicata sunt marti.’ Google Scholar

12 ‘Hic Virgilius materiam suam in duo partitur: in errorem, et in laborem, quos passus est eneas terra et mari….’ Google Scholar

13 Ad 1.8: ‘NUMINE id est potestate iunonis, vel QUO NUMINE id est quo deo, vel neptuno, vel pallade, qui omnes vexabant troianos.’ Google Scholar

14 Ad 1.8: ‘MEMORA deprecative, a minore ad maiorem; vocative, quando socius ad socium; imperative, quando maior ad minorem.’ Ad 1.64: ‘nominat eum ut maior debet loqui a[d] minorem.’ Google Scholar

15 This is a tricky point, as so much widespread medieval mythography has Servius as a radical source. Usually the phrasing of these entries is distant enough from Serivius to suggest an intermediate source.Google Scholar

16 ‘Neptuno assignatur tridens, quia mare a quibusdam dicitur tercia pars mundi, vel quia tria genera aquarum sunt — maris, fluminum, fluviorum — quibus preesse neptunus dicitur.’ Google Scholar

17 The rhetorical terminology is frequent and well-informed: ‘afferesis’ (1.35), ‘istrologia’ (1.88), ‘eneletica oratio’ (1.135), ‘antitesis’ (1.254), ‘paradigma’ (1.242), ‘anastrophe’ (1.348), ‘perifrasis’ (1.546), ‘anafora’ (1.664), ‘ypallage’ (1.707) are all found in Book 1 alone. This continues in the later books, though less frequently. A non-Servian explanation of Mercury is at 1.297, the ‘good’ Juno at 1.734, the death of Hercules at 2.13, and Janus at 7.180.Google Scholar

18 ‘Iste poeta proprietates multum observat, nam primum eneam utpote iuvenem et nondum adversitatibus exercitatum timidum, et quasi extasi oppressum. Virtutem tamen quo-dammodo intuentem, inducit. Deinde tantam animi perfectionem ei exhibet ut at infernum eum descendisse ostendat. Quod autem eum primum timidum, deinde aliquantulum confor-tatum dicit. Naturale est virtuoso, nam inopinas adversitates primum pavet, deinde virtute roboratus resistit,’ Google Scholar

19 ‘Dii vero dicebantur preesse unicuique elementorum: iupiter igni, iuno aeri, neptunus aque, pluto terre.’ Google Scholar

20 ‘deos id est bonas leges.’ Google Scholar

21 Ad 1.587: ‘Quod autor poetice scribens dicit eneam circumdatum a nube. Significat curas quas habebat in corde, que cure recedunt receptis sociis et adepta amicitia didonis.’ Google Scholar

22 Ad 6.406: ‘Ramus iste significat virtutes quibus homines liberantur de inferno huius vite, et feruntur ad celum. Vel per ramum intelliguntur divicie que multos precipitaverunt in infernum. In silvis dicitur latere, quia re vera in […] huius vite confusio est et maiore parte viciorum. Virtus et integritas latet.’ For the last sentence, cf. Servius ad Aeneid 6.136: ‘ergo per ramum virtutes dicit esse sectandas, qui est Y litterae imitatio: quem ideo in silvis dicit latere, quia re vera in huius vitae confusione et maiore parte vitiorum virtus et integritas latet.’ All citations of Servius are from Georg Thilo and Hermann Hagen, edd. Servii Grammatici qui feruntur in Vergilii carmina commentarii (Leipzig 1881–1884) 3 vols. This is a typical example of the Peterhouse marginalia adapting Servius toward a more overtly allegorical statement. Cf. MS Cambridge, Pembroke College 260 ad loc.; and MS British Library Add. 32319a ad loc., which is slightly closer to Servius.Google Scholar

23 The periochae are the questions which an accessus, or even a whole commentary, undertakes to answer. The lists of questions vary, but tend to be consistent in any one period or intellectual milieu. Servius‘ list was always the most influential: ‘In exponendis auctoribus haec consideranda sunt: poetae vita, titulus operis, qualitas carminis, scribentis intentio, numerus librorum, ordo librorum, explanatio’ (Servius I 1).Google Scholar

24 See Brummer, J., ed. Vitae Vergilianae (Leipzig 1912) 66–67 (Bernensis), 54–55 (Noricensis), 1–19 (Donatiana).Google Scholar

25 Servius I 1.13–2.12.Google Scholar

26 Ed. Brummer, 14 lines 242–249.Google Scholar

27 Servius I 4.10–11 Google Scholar

28 The humanist Zono de Magnalis, for example, frequently echoes ‘B Silv’ in his Aeneid commentary. Professor Mary Louise Lord is currently engaged in a study of Zono. Later, Cristoforo Landino also makes considerable use of ‘B Silv’ in his ‘Platonist’ Virgil commentary. See Phillip Russell Hardie's University of London (Warburg Institute) M.Phil, thesis, ‘Humanist Exegesis of Poetry in Fifteenth-Century Italy and the Medieval Tradition of Commentary’ (1976) ch. 3.Google Scholar

29 Policraticus 8.24, ed. Webb, C. C. J. (Oxford 1909) II 415–16.Google Scholar

30 The entire contents-list of this fascinating lost manuscript is given by Padoan, Giorgio, ‘Tradizione e fortuna del commento all' ‘Eneide’ di Bernardo Silvestre,’ Italia Medioevale e Umanistica 3 (1960) 234.Google Scholar

31 I have found extensive traces of the ‘B Silv’ commentary in the marginalia of MS Oxford Bodleian Auct. F.4.22, a manuscript probably of French origin from the later twelfth century, and also in several Italian manuscripts of the thirteenth to fifteenth centuries, such as Perugia, Bibl. Comunale Auguste C.57. A separate text of ‘B Silv,’ unknown to Jones and Jones, is also to be found in Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August Bibl., MS Guelf. 7.10 Gud. lat. 155 4° (4459) fols. 83v–95, s. xiii-xiv. I will be publishing on this manuscript and the continental fortuna of ‘B Silv’ in the near future.Google Scholar

32 Jones, and Jones, 1.8–11: ‘Intendit itaque casus Enee aliorumque Troianorum errantium labores evolvere atque hoc non usque secundum historie veritatem, quod Frigius describit; sed ubique ut Augusti Cesaris gratiam lucraretur, Enee facta fugamque ficmentis extollit.’ Google Scholar

33 ‘Saturni et Opis quattuor fuisse filios legimus qui morsus patris evaserunt, cum alios pater omnes devorasset. Hii autem sunt Jupiter deus aliorum, Juno coniux Jovis et soror et dea partus et Neptunus deus aquarum et Pluto deus Herebi…. Deus omnium mundanorum dicitur Jupiter, id est ignis superior, qui et omnibus celsior et omnia complectitur. Deus aquarum dicitur Neptunus quia de mari omnes aque exeunt. Deus Herebi dicitur Pluto, id est terra, quia in regione caducorum gravedo, id est terra dominatur. Horum soror Juno, id est aer, dicitur, quia ex eadem materia constat; coniux Jovis quia ab eo calorem et accipit et eidem subditur.’ Jones and Jones 4.9–19.Google Scholar

34 Ad 1.47: ‘ET SOROR ET CONIUNX physici Iovem aetherem, id est ignem volunt intelligi, Iunonem vero aerem, et quoniam tenuitate haec elementa paria sunt, dixerunt esse germana, sed quoniam Iuno, hoc est aer subiectus est igni, id est Iovi, iure superposito elemento mariti traditum nomen est.’ Google Scholar

35 Ad 4.638: ‘et sciendum Stoicos dicere unum esse deum, cui nomina variantur pro actibus et officiis. unde etiam duplicis sexus numina esse dicuntur, ut cum in actu sunt, mares sint; feminae, cum patiendi habent naturam…’ Google Scholar

36 Ed. Helm, 18–19.Google Scholar

37 Remigii Autissiodorensis Commentum in Martianum Capellam, ed. Lutz, Cora E. (Leiden 1962–65) I 114.9–22: ‘Sciendum autem quia philosophi unum dicunt esse deum caeli et terrae et rerum omnium creatorem, qui pro multiplici dispositione qua mundum variis modis regit diversis appellatur vocabulis. Dicitur enim Vitomnus quod vitam praestet, Sentinus quod sensum; vocatur Iovis in aethere, Iuno in aere, Diana in terra. Plerumque etiam unus idemque non solum diversis nominibus sed et vario sexu appellatur…. Ita etiam Deus cum unus idemque sit, multis tamen pro dispensationis suae diversitate censetur vocabulis.’ Google Scholar

38 Elliott, Kathleen O. and Elder, J. P., ‘A Critical Edition of the Vatican Mythographers,’ Transactions of the American Philological Association 78 (1947) 202.Google Scholar

39 Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini tres Romae nuper reperti, ed. Bode, G. H. (Celle 1834; rpt. Hildesheim 1968) 75.14–76.40. (The so-called Second and Third Vatican Mythographers, hereafter VMii and VMiii.) Google Scholar

40 de Conches, Guillaume, Glosae super Platonem, ed. Jeauneau, Édouard (Textes philosophiques du Moyen Age 13; Paris 1965) 201–202.Google Scholar

41 This is the manuscript reading. The context would suggest an emendation to ‘unum quod agit’: ‘there is one which acts, the other which suffers.’ But the scribe is otherwise reliable in this section of the text.Google Scholar

42 Timaeus a Calcidio translatus commentarioque instructus 31b–32c, ed. Waszink, J. H. (London 1962) 24–25. For an excellent summary of classical element theory and its medieval developments, see McKeon, Richard, ‘Medicine and Philosophy in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries: The Problem of Elements,’ The Thomist 24 (1961) 211–56.Google Scholar

48 McKeon, 239–40 n. 49.Google Scholar

44 Macrobius, , Commentary on the Dream of Scipio 1.6.23–33, trans. Stahl, William Harris (New York 1952) 104–106.Google Scholar

45 Ed. Jeauneau, 131–37; De philosophia mundi libri quattuor (PL 172.51–53).Google Scholar

46 Serv. ad 4.638. Quoted above, note 32.Google Scholar

47 Ed. Lutz I 68.24–28.Google Scholar

48 Of course it is always possible to bend the allegoresis instead of the element theory. Isidore of Seville does this when he identifies Jupiter with fire and air, and Juno with water and earth. See Macfarlane, Katherine N., ‘Isidore of Seville on the Pagan Gods,’ Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 70 (1980) 27.Google Scholar

49 See articles by Chenu and Jeauneau, cited note 6 above.Google Scholar

50 Cicero, , Ad Qu. fr. 1.1.5: ‘Multis simulationum involucris et quasi velis quibusdam obtenditur uniuscuiusque natura.’ Jeauneau, Édouard, 'Glane Chartrain dans un manuscrit de Rouen, Lectio philosophorum: Recherches sur l'école de Chartres (Amsterdam 1973) 109. Jeauneau traces the use of velamen here back to the Hierarchia celestia of pseudo-Dionysius, as translated by Hilduin. Macrobius, , In Somnium Scipionis 1.2.11, ed. Willis, J. (Leipzig 1963) 6: ‘… sacrarum rerum notio sub pio figmentorum velamine honestis et tecta rebus et vestita nominibus enuntiatur.’ Google Scholar

51 It is only barely possible that the leaf containing the accessus might have been copied on the Continent, then attached much later to the Peterhouse manuscript; it is a separate gathering.Google Scholar

52 For bibliography on the work of VMiii and for discussion of recently-raised doubts about its English origin, see the section following.Google Scholar

53 VMiii 152.18–23. Google Scholar

54 VMiii 160.12–26. Google Scholar

55 Ed. Helm, 18.8–22.Google Scholar

56 VMiii 165.6–27. For a very full treatment of the sources of VMiii, see Raschke, Robert, De Alberico mythologo (Breslauer philologische Abhandlungen 45; Breslau 1913).Google Scholar

67 VMiii 165.10–12: ‘Hanc tamen considerationem poetae negligentes 'alterum marem, alteram feminam praedicant.’ Google Scholar

58 See Jones, and Jones, xiv–xv.Google Scholar

59 Jones, and Jones, xxi.Google Scholar

60 Theodore Silverstein, rev. of Jones, and Jones, , Speculum 54 (1979) 155.Google Scholar

61 Jones, and Jones, xvi–xviii.Google Scholar

62 Jones, and Jones, xv–xvi.Google Scholar

63 Jones, and Jones, xviii–xx.Google Scholar

64 Padoan, 234.Google Scholar

65 The same manuscript also contained the Continentia Virgiliana of Fulgentius, Aeneid commentary by Guillaume de Conches, and two other anonymous commentaries on the Aeneid. A contents-list like this gives us a sense of the great gaps in our knowledge of the medieval commentary tradition.Google Scholar

66 The commentary was first announced by Jeaneau, Édouard, ‘Note sur l'École de Chartres,’ Studi Medievali ser. 3, 5.2 (1964) 844–47; brief selections are printed in an appendix, 855–64. Passages are also printed in an appendix to Wetherbee, Platonism and Poetry 267–72; discussion, selected passages, and translations are in Stock, Myth and Science 33–62.Google Scholar

67 James, , A Descriptive Catalogue. Google Scholar

68 Ker, Neil R., English Manuscripts in the Century after the Norman Conquest (Oxford 1960) 35. Ker notes that de ‘biting’ begins to occur in England around 1180 (p. 38). I find no occurrences of this in the leaves under discussion; they are probably not very much later than this date. I am grateful to Professor T. Julian Brown, Professor of Palaeography in the University of London, who kindly examined the hands and confirmed my impression of them. The hands are similar to those of two English manuscripts written at the end of the century; see Warner, G. F. and Gilson, J. P., Catalogue of Royal and King's Manuscripts in the British Museum (London 1931) IV. Plate 47 shows a manuscript from Rievaulx Abbey, dated s. xiiex. by the editors; the notularis hand giving chapter contents is very similar to those of the Peterhouse commentary, although the Rievaulx hand is better executed. Plate 60d is also similar, although markedly more angular than the Peterhouse hands. It is dated ca. 1200, and would seem to be later than Peterhouse fols, 171–74.Google Scholar

69 Silverstein, 157,Google Scholar

70 As at 1, 5, 8 (‘communis omnibus’ / ‘omnibus communis’), 10 (‘futura et colloquium’ / ‘colloquium eosque de futura’), 14 (‘petiit colloquium’ / ‘colloquium petiit’), 18 (where the two summaries of Aeneid 1 differ only in that one text uses indirect and the other direct discourse), 31 (‘seculi interitus’ / ‘seculi interitus’), 54 (‘mercatorum cura’ / ‘mercatorum cura’), etc.Google Scholar

71 Of course even memorial transmission can be of two kinds. A text so transmitted can reflect the memory of a text read, or of a text heard. The classic instance of the latter case is the quarto text of some plays of Shakespeare, in which corruptions enter through the double means of poor hearing and poor recall. But the distinction I wish to make here is between faulty memory of a text once read (‘memorial transmission’) and faulty reception of a text being heard (‘oral transmission’). As we will see, the case here is complicated by the fact that we do not seem to possess the hearer's own writing, but rather a bad copy of it.Google Scholar

72 Jones, and Jones, 3.20–22,Google Scholar

73 See, e.g., ‘notandum est’ at Jones and Jones 1.15, 9.16. ‘B Silv’ uses the second singular at, e.g., 9.19 (‘accipis’), 10.4–7 (‘invenies … intellige … leges … intellige’).Google Scholar

74 Quoted in Jeauneau, , ‘L'Usage de la notion d'integumentum’ 42.Google Scholar

75 Jeaneau, , ‘L'Usage’ 42.Google Scholar

76 For the most recent treatment of ‘B Silv’ in the context of scientific study, see Newell, John, ‘Rationalism at the School of Chartres,’ Vivarium 21 (1983) 108–26.Google Scholar

77 VMiii 175.30–35.Google Scholar

78 See Serv. ad 6.149, and apparatus in Thilo–Hagen. Isidore does, however, give the etymology for necromancy: Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX, ed. Lindsay, W. M. (Oxford 1911; rpt. 1962) 8.9.11. One wonders whether one of the minor manuscript traditions might have had the other etymology as well. The word is also found in the earliest manuscripts of a Latin-Greek glossary, wrongly attributed to Philoxenus. The ninth-century manuscript has a few etymologies added in a hand of the eleventh or twelfth century: ‘Sceomantia. Mortuorum evocatio. quia grece scea umbra est.’ This witness is important because it shows us how the spelling of the Greek developed toward the form found in the Peterhouse text. See Corpus glossariorum Latinorum , ed. Goetz, Georg (Leipzig 1888–1923) II xii. Google Scholar

79 See Appendix II, 34–36.Google Scholar

80 Ed. Jeauneau, 226–27, and especially 231.Google Scholar

81 Timaeus a Calcidio translatus 43b, ed. Waszinck, 231.Google Scholar

82 At 41, for example, the Peterhouse text says that Aeneas comes to Carthage covered by a cloud because in the state of boyhood a man ‘sees other boys and doesn't know how to speak to them.’ This explanation, absent from ‘B Silv,’ is very close to Fulgentius’ Continentia Virgiliana, ed. Helm 92.10–11. The confused line at 47, explaining the cyclops — the manuscript reads ‘scidos circulus interpretatur’ — has been resolved by reference to Fulgentius 93.23: ‘ciclos Grece circulus interpretatur.’ Given the putative oral transmission of the Peterhouse text, and the incompetence of its copyist, it seems not at all a far journey from ciclos (especially with the first c pronounced soft) to (s)cidos. (One can easily imagine a hastily written cl being resolved as d.) In this case, we have another close derivation from Fulgentius, which disappears in ‘B Silv.’ Again, at 51, ‘fereus,’ not found in ‘B Silv,’ seems to come from Fulgentius' ‘feriatus’ (94.16). There are other less certain instances which appear to reflect the same process.Google Scholar

83 Peterhouse, at 54, calls Mercury ‘medius currens,’ because he is the god of eloquence and ‘speech is common to all men.’ This is identical to Remigius, ed. Lutz, 66.20; the same phrase is also in VMii (89.13–14), who uses Remigius; it has changed to ‘medium currentem’ in VMiii (213.26) simply because of case; but in ‘B Silv’ it has suffered a slightly greater change to ‘medius discurrens.’ Isidore offers the same explanations for Mercury, but Remigius' phrasing is closer to that of Peterhouse. See Macfarlane 30. At the same point, Peter-house's ‘deus astucie et facundie’ appears to echo Remigius' ‘in similitudine facundiae’ (66.23); but again cf. the identical phrase in VMiii 213.41–42. There is no close parallel in ‘B Silv.’ Google Scholar

84 VMiii 160.12–14.Google Scholar

85 The most interesting of these untraced additions is at 129ff. At 133–139, the Peterhouse text tells the story of the death of Achilles at the hands of Paris. This part is fairly close to ‘B Silv,’ and both versions derive closely from Dares Phrygius, De excidio Troiae historia 27, 34, ed. Meister, Ferdinand (Leipzig 1873) 32–35, 40–42. Peterhouse seems closer to the source in some minor points, but they are inconclusive. In the Peterhouse text, however, this story is preceded by the narrative of Hector's death, in a version which derives from neither Dares nor Dictys (129–132). See also the description of Apollo at 112–115, which corresponds closely to none of the major mythographers, and has no parallels in ‘B Silv.’ See as well the allegorization of Hecate at 81.Google Scholar

86 Vernet, A., ‘Un remaniement de la “Philosophia” de Guillaume de Conches,’ Scriptorium 1 (1947) 243–59. de Conches, Guillaume, Glosae super Platonem, ed. Jeauneau, 45–46; Glosae in Juvenalem, ed. Wilson, Bradford (Paris 1980) 22–30. Google Scholar

87 ‘Note’ 844–49; selected passages edited pp. 855–64. The Commentary on Martianus Capella's De Nuptiis Attributed to Bernard Silvestris: A Critical Edition (Diss., University of Toronto, 1979). Dr. Westra's important edition will appear soon in the Texts and Studies of the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies. The sources and analogues established in Dr. Westra's apparatus have been very helpful in preparing this article. I am grateful to Dr. Westra for permission to quote from his edition.Google Scholar

88 Stock, , Myth and Science 36–37 n. 42.Google Scholar

89 Jeauneau, , ‘Note’ 844.Google Scholar

90 Haskins, Charles Homer, ‘A List of Text-books from the Close of the Twelfth Century,’ Studies in the History of Medieval Science (Cambridge, Mass. 1924) 365. Haskins points out that Neckam twice uses this geographical reference to describe a two-day journey. Not everyone in England would understand the point, for one copyist changed ‘Orléans’ to ‘England.’ The second occurrence of the word is in Neckam's Corrogationes Promethei ; see Meyer, Paul, ‘Notice sur les Corrogationes Promethei d'Alexandre Neckam,’ Notices et extraits des manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Nationale 35 (1896) 667. One wonders whether the distance between two such important intellectual centers might have been almost a topos for twelfth-century schoolmen.Google Scholar

91 Westra ed. 1069. I retain the manuscript reading valent. Westra emends to volent, ‘they wish to twist this passage….’ Google Scholar

92 See Stock 36–37 n. 42. The text was edited by Arthur Landgraf in Écrits théologiques de l'école d'Abelard (Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense 14 [1934]).Google Scholar

93 This is discussed and edited by Stock, Brian, ‘Hugh of St. Victor, Bernard Silvester, and MS Trinity College Cambridge 0.7.7,’ Medieval Studies 34 (1972) 152–73. This text will be referred to by its incipit, Plato ad ostendendum. Google Scholar

94 Policraticus 8.24. For more on John of Salisbury and Virgil, see Lehrer, Seth, ‘John of Salisbury's Virgil,’ Vivarium 20 (1982) 24–39.Google Scholar

95 Westra 5.Google Scholar

96 Luscombe, David, ‘The Authorship of the Ysagoge in Theologiam,’ AHDLMA 35 (1968) 7–16. The text was edited by Landgraf, Arthur, Écrits théologique de l'école d' Abelard (Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense 14 [1934]) 61–289. Landgraf edited from Cambridge, Trinity College B.XIV.33; regrettably he did not include all the diagrams in the manuscript. Luscombe mentions two other English manuscripts of the Ysagoge (p. 16), and recently Dr. Michael Evans has discovered a diagrammatic epitome of the Ysagoge in MS Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 461. The text, then, had a solid English tradition.Google Scholar

97 Mm. 1.18 fol. 5vab (Westra 335), Ysagoge 73 (B.XIV.33 fol. 10v).Google Scholar

98 Ysagoge 75 (B.XIV.33 fol. 10' lower margin).Google Scholar

99 Ysagoge 75 (B.XIV.33 fol. 10v); Mm.1.18 fol. 5vab (Westra 335).Google Scholar

100 Mm.1.18 fol. 25vb (Westra 1203); B.XIV.33 fol. 111v, omitted by Landgraf.Google Scholar

101 Ysagoge 241 (B.XIV.33 fol. 92v); Mm.1.18 fol. 9ra (Westra 487).Google Scholar

102 Edited by Stock, , see n. 93, above. For a description of the manuscript (Cambridge, Trinity College 0.7.7) and its English ownership, see James, M. R., The Western Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College Cambridge (Cambridge 1900–1904) III 348–50.Google Scholar

103 Stock, ed. 161–73; cf. Westra, 481–513 and Ysagoge 235.26–241.9. Only the very beginning and end of the Plato ad ostendendum are independent.Google Scholar

104 See Luscombe, , cited above, n. 96.Google Scholar

106 See Luscombe, , pp. 9–10; and Morey, Dom A. and Brooke, C. N. L., ‘The Cerne Letters of Gilbert Foliot,’ English Historical Review 63 (1948) 523–26. Another possible if less likely candidate is ‘Bernardus Brito.’ In his Historia (ca. 1181–82), Guillaume de Tyr says that he spent his adolescence in voluntary poverty, dedicating himself to literary studies among eminent doctors of the liberal arts. All these doctors had studied with the most learned (literatissimus) Thierry of Chartres; they included Petrus Helias, Ivo of Chartres, and ‘master Bernardus Brito, who later was bishop in that land where he had been born, Cornwall’ (Jeauneau, , ‘Note’ 823). Jones and Jones's apparatus shows us several points where Thierry's teaching seems to have influenced the commentary.Google Scholar

106 Southern, Richard W., ‘The Place of England in the Twelfth Century Renaissance,’ Medieval Humanism (New York 1970) 158–80.Google Scholar

107 Southern, 158.Google Scholar

108 Jeauneau's MS O in his edition of Guillaume de Conches's Glosae super Platonem 43–44 is an Oxford manuscript copied in 1423. Courcelle, Pierre, La Consolation de Philosophie dans la tradition littéraire (Études Augustiniennes; Paris 1967) 409, cites several manuscripts of Guillaume's Consolation commentary now in England. Peter Dronke bases his edition of the Cosmographia of Bernard Silvestris (Leiden 1978) on Oxford Laud. misc. 515, an early thirteenth-century manuscript from Waltham in Essex; he lists fourteen other manuscripts now in England, see 64–66. A very interesting study could be made of English consumption of Chartrian texts, based on manuscripts of English origin.Google Scholar

109 Gibson, Margaret, Lanfranc of Bec (Oxford 1978) 175–77. Southern, Richard, St. Anselm and his Biographer (Cambridge 1963) passim. The list of Becket's eruditi is edited in Robertson, J. C. and Sheppard, J. B., Materials for the History of Archbishop Thomas Becket (Rolls Series; London 1875–83) III 362–63.Google Scholar

110 ‘The Place of England’ 160–71.Google Scholar

111 Dorothée, Metlitzki, The Matter of Araby in Medieval England (New Haven 1977) ch. 1–3.Google Scholar

112 Poole, Austin Lane, From Domesday Book to Magna Carta (Oxford History of England 3; Oxford 1955) 161.Google Scholar

113 I think, however, that Jones and Jones do not take sufficient account of possible English influences on the scientific content in the commentary.Google Scholar

114 I will be publishing elsewhere a complete handlist of medieval English Virgil manuscripts.Google Scholar

115 On Peter of Blois, see Jeauneau, , ‘Nani gigantum humeris insidentes: Essai d'interprétation de Bernard de Chartres,’ Lectio philosophorum: Recherches sur l'école de Chartres (Amsterdam 1973) 65–67. For a far less flattering view of Peter, see Southern, , ‘Peter of Blois: A Twelfth Century Humanist?’ Medieval Humanism 105–32. See also Dronke, Peter, ‘Peter of Blois and Poetry at the Court of Henry II,’ Medieval Studies 39 (1976) 185–235.Google Scholar

116 The Metalogicon of John of Salisbury, trans. McGarry, Daniel D. (Berkeley 1962) ‘Prologue’ 3–7.Google Scholar

117 Saint Dunstan's Classbook from Glastonbury, intro. Hunt, R. W. (Umbrae codicum occidentalium 4; Amsterdam 1961).Google Scholar

118 Now MS Vatican, Reg. Lat. 1671.Google Scholar

119 Metlitzki 40. For more on Alfred, see Ott, James K., ‘The Life and Writings of Alfredus Anglicus,’ Viator 3 (1972) 275–91.Google Scholar

120 Now MSS Oxford Jesus College 26, and Hereford Cathedral 0.2.iv. Whoever Magister Alured was, this beautifully balanced (if surely fragmentary) collection exemplifies the continuing concentration of interest in Chartrian texts in later twelfth-century England.Google Scholar

121 Silverstein, Theodore, ‘Daniel of Morley, English Cosmogonist and Student of Arabic Science,’ Medieval Studies 10 (1948) 179–96.Google Scholar

122 See Smalley, Beryl, The Becket Conflict and the Schools (Oxford 1973) 51–58; and Morey, Dom A. and Brooke, C. N. L., Gilbert Foliot and his Letters (Cambridge 1965) especially ch. 4.Google Scholar

128 Russell, J. C., ‘Hereford and Arabic Science in England about 1175–1200,’ Isis 18 (1932) 18–19.Google Scholar

124 De naturis rerum, ed. Wright, .Google Scholar

126 Discussed in Jeauneau, ‘Note’ 830–39. Virginia Brown plans an edition of this commentary.Google Scholar

126 Les Œuvres de Simund de Freine, ed. Matzke, John E. (SATF; Paris 1909) i–xi.Google Scholar

127 ‘… in qua proprius est trivii quadriviique locus.’ Hunt, R. W., ‘English Learning in the Twelfth Century.’ Transactions of the Royal Historical Society ser. 4 19 (1936) 36 lines 34–35. Hunt prints important lines left out of the standard edition, as his Appendix I.Google Scholar

128 Giraldi Cambrensis Opera, ed. Brewer, J. S. (Rolls Series; London 1861) I 341–49.Google Scholar

129 Gerald: ‘Instaurare solent solatia sera dolorem, / Et renovare magis quam removere malum.’ Aeneid 2.3–5: ‘Infandum, regina, iubes renovare dolorem, / Troianas ut opes et lamentabile regnum / eruerint Danai…’ Google Scholar

130 Elliott, and Elder, , cited above.Google Scholar

131 Rathbone, Eleanor, ‘Master Alberic of London, “Mythographus Vaticanus Tertius,”’ Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies 1 (1941) 35–38.Google Scholar

132 2 VMiii 167.4–17 (on Juno, Aeolus, and Deiopea, based on Fulgentius); 170.19–171.7 (on Juno and her nymphs, deriving from Servius); 180.34–181.19 (Palinurus, Dido, and the return of souls, deriving from Servius); 183.41–184.32 (Aeneid 6 and the purgation of souls, deriving from Servius); 185.26–186.18 (Virgil's nine circles of hell as the sins of the world, citing Fulgentius); 230.13–231.34 (an astrological allegory of the events following the shipwreck on the coast of Libya, citing Fulgentius).Google Scholar

133 ‘A Note on the Origins of the Third Vatican Mythographer,’ Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 44 (1981) 160–66. Burnett's arguments regarding the common origin of DMC (below) and the parallel passage in VMiii seem irrefutable. His implication that this should be extended to other parts of the text seems less convincing, since it is based on the use by both DMC and VMiii of very common sources like Remigius, Servius, and Fulgentius. VMiii does indeed borrow from many sources, and often at great length; but he is unusually open about acknowledging his sources where he knows them, and it seems at first sight unlikely that he would borrow the bulk of his work from one source without making any reference to it. There are cases, however, where a medieval writer makes many ‘learned’ references to his sources, merely in order to hide virtual plagiarism.Google Scholar

(1) ad Aen. 1.1 Google Scholar

(2) ad Aen. 1.2 Google Scholar

(3) ad 1.2 Google Scholar

(4) ad 1.2 Google Scholar

(5) cf. Servius ad 1.1 Google Scholar

(6) ad 1.3, 1.4 Google Scholar

(7) cf. Servius ad 1.6 Google Scholar

(11) ad 1.14 Google Scholar

(23) ad 1.18 Google Scholar

(24) ad 1.30 Google Scholar

(25) ad 1.30 Google Scholar

(1) ad Aen. 6.1.Google Scholar

(6) This sentence is grammatically incomplete, although its sense is not difficult in context. The original writer or copyist seems to have been defeated by the word he writes as lixer. This is only one of serveral points where a Greek etymology results in scribal confusion. The reference is probably to a common etymological explanation for the Elysian fields. VMiii, citing Servius, explains that the word comes from the Greek λvσις, meaning resolutio, ‘quod videlicet illic animae, maculis carnis resolutae, beatitudine perfrui putantur’ (VMiii 176.37–39). The word lesia is defined in several glossaries as paradisian, see Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum, ed. Goetz, Georg (Leipzig 1888–1923) IV 533.37; V 306.60 and 370.23. Servius (ad Aen. 5.735) explains elysium as ἀπò τς λvσ∊ως ab absolutione; the varying latinized versions of the Greek in the Thilo–Hagen apparatus show how a copyist could end up with lixer: they include liserios and lyserios. Google Scholar

(8) descensus: decentus MS Google Scholar

(11) nigris: nigri MS vocatur: vocantur MS Google Scholar

(13) animabus: animalibus MS anime: ? ut vid. umbre: imbre MS Google Scholar

(14) se ei: sexi MS Google Scholar

(15) sexto: quinto MS Google Scholar

(18) ostenderret: ostenderat MS iunonem: iuno non MS deiopeam: driopeam MS iope: ope MS dominam: domine MS Google Scholar

(21) drepani: diepani MS Google Scholar

(24) celebrat: scelerat MS navibus: manibus MS et equis: et [[in]] equis MS Google Scholar

(26) gubernacula: gubemaculam MS Google Scholar

(29) partui: par[[a]]tui MS Google Scholar

(33) deiopeam: dreiopeam MS Google Scholar

(34) haberet: aberet MS resistere: [[a]]resistere MS Google Scholar

(38) opinione: opinionem MS Google Scholar

(47) sciclos: scidos MS Google Scholar

(51) acerbitas puerilis: acepes MS Google Scholar

(54) mercatorum: mercator MS currens: curens MS Google Scholar

(55) virilibus: vilibus MS duxerat navem: dixeratnave MS Google Scholar

(58) aplicuit suam navim: aplicuit navi suam navim MS trivii: trivi MS Google Scholar

(59) emittitur: amittit MS Google Scholar

(62) mactato: mactito MS Google Scholar

(63) intelliguntur: intelligitur MS Google Scholar

(66) retorica: retoria MS dicuntur: di[[s]]cuntur MS Google Scholar

(68) propter tres: p petres MS Google Scholar

(71) erebo: erabo MS Google Scholar

(72) terra: terre MS Google Scholar

(75) AUREA TECTA: testa aurea MS Google Scholar

(81) consuescendo: consuedendo MS Google Scholar

(84) rei: re MS alii et: alii [[a]] et MS Google Scholar

(87) libros: filios MS Google Scholar

(88) adducit: ad hunc MS Google Scholar

(89) Micenus: micenum MS Google Scholar

(91) intellectu: intellectum MS Google Scholar

(92) qua: quam MS eam: ea MS Google Scholar

(93) ut: fit MS Google Scholar

(94) aliquo: aliqua MS Google Scholar

(95) memoria: memorie MS ea: eam MS Google Scholar

(98) ANCHORA: anchoras MS Google Scholar

(99) accipitur: accipit MS Google Scholar

(100) SEMINA FL[AMMAE] semina el MS obstrusas: obstrusa MS Google Scholar

(101) aere: arte MS Google Scholar

(98) ad Aen. 6.4. Google Scholar

(100) ad Aen. 6.6, Google Scholar

(102) vacat: vocat MS Google Scholar

(105) solet: soli MS Google Scholar

(106) ANTRUM IMMANE: aurum inmane MS Google Scholar

(107) ARCES: artes MS pallas: sic MS Google Scholar

(106) ad Aen. 6.11. Google Scholar

(107) ad Aen. 6.9. Google Scholar

(112) Depingitur: ? [[di]] de pell it MS Google Scholar

(113) cirurgiam: cirugiam MS cirurgia: ciruagia MS Google Scholar

(114) cyrurgia: cyrugia MS Google Scholar

(117) mecanicis: mecancis MS Google Scholar

(120) exercitum: ercitum MS Google Scholar

(116) ad Aen. 6.14. Google Scholar

(120) ad Aen. 6.33, Google Scholar

(122) ADDITUS CENTUM OSTIA: additus. et contra hostia MS Google Scholar

(123) causam: eam MS alii: ali MS Google Scholar

(124) VIRGO: virga MS habet: habetur MS Google Scholar

(127) refutatur: reputatur MS Google Scholar

(128) autem antequam: ? au ce MS Google Scholar

(134) aniversarium: universerium MS adessent: adesse MS Google Scholar

(122) ad Aen. 6.43. Google Scholar

(124) ad Aen. 6.45. Google Scholar

(125) ad Aen. 6.46. Google Scholar

(126) ad Aen. 6.47. Google Scholar

(127) ad Aen. 6.49. Google Scholar

(139) Ita: quia MS Google Scholar

(140) DI[QUE DEEQUE OMNES,] QUIBUS: dii quibus et quorum MS obstiterunt: obstitit MS Google Scholar

(141) fovebat: ferebat MS troianos: traianos MS Google Scholar

(142) habebant: habebat MS postposuerunt: proposuerunt MS Google Scholar

(143) quas: qn MS (lege: quando?) Google Scholar

(146) mater deorum: mater deorum [[dicitur]] MS Google Scholar

(140) ad Aen, 6.64. Google Scholar

(143) ad Aen. 6.68. Google Scholar

(147) in ea: in [[a]] ea MS Google Scholar

(148) sapientiam: sapientia MS probitatem: probitate MS Google Scholar