St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek
The Abbey Library of St. Gall is one of the oldest monastic libraries in the world; it is the most important part of St. Gall’s Abbey district UNESCO world heritage site. The library’s valuable holdings illustrate the development of European culture and document the cultural achievements of the Monastery of St. Gall from the 7th century until the dissolution of the Abbey in the year 1805. The core of the library is its manuscript collection with its preeminent corpus of Carolingian-Ottonian manuscripts (8th to 11th century), a significant collection of incunabula and an accumulated store of printed works from the 16th century to the present day. The Abbey Library of St. Gall was a co-founder of the project e-codices. With its famous Baroque hall, where temporary exhibitions are hosted, the Abbey Library of St. Gall is one of the most visited museums in Switzerland.
Completed in 1338, Bartholomew of Pisa’s Summa de casibus conscientiae is one of the most widespread late-medieval confessors’ manuals. Its success is due to its practical orientation and the alphabetical organization of keywords from canon law and moral doctrine. This copy from the second quarter of the fifteenth century likely belonged to the books that the secular priest Matthias Bürer agreed in 1470 to give to the Abbey of St. Gall, and which were transferred after his death in 1485.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The confessors’ manual of Magister Simon borrows extensively from Raymond of Peñafort’s Summa de poenitentia and Summa de matrimonio. The text contains an indictment that suggests an origin in the Diocese of Paris around 1250 or a little later. According to the ownership note on p. 1, the manuscript, written in two hands in the second half of the thirteenth century or the first half of the fourteenth century, entered the Abbey library of St. Gall by 1478 at the latest.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The manuscript begins with the important summa of confession by the Dominican Raymond of Peñafort († 1275), the Summa de poenitentia together with its fourth book, finished in 1235 with the title Summa de matrimonio. According to the colophon on p. 246b, Johannes Meyer von Diessenhofen copied the text from 26 August to 8 November 1395. Immediately, or shortly, thereafter, the same hand copied two confessors’ manuals of the Dominican John of Fribourg († 1304) along with a few small additions. The Libellus quaestionum casualium concerns cases that are not treated or only summarily discussed in Raymond of Peñafort’s Summa de poenitentia. The concise Confessionale was tailored to the practical needs of confessors.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This manuscript from the 2nd half of the 12th century preserves the Abbreviatio Decreti "Quoniam egestas", an abridged version of the Decretum Gratiani, complete with glosses. The text represents the oldest datable record of the study of the Decretum Gratiani in France. The script and book decoration indicate that the manuscript was probably produced in Engelberg during the time of Frowin. Since 1461, it has been at the monastery of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
This extensive manuscript miscellany was written by the secular priest Matthias Bürer. According to the numerous colophons, he finished the copies of the texts in the period from ca. 1448 to 1463 in Kenzingen (Baden-Württemberg) and in many places in Tyrol. The manuscript transmits among other things several theological treatises, a confessors' manual, two mirrors of confession, an ars moriendi (“the art of dying”), the Acts of the Apostles with the Glossa ordinaria, sermons, as well as Books II–IV of Pope Gregory the Great’s Dialogues. After the death of Matthias Bürer in 1485, the manuscript went, along with other books, to the Abbey of St. Gall, in accordance with a 1470 agreement.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This ecclesiastical law manuscript contains a collection of papal decretals generally known as the Breviarium extravagantium or Compilatio prima, compiled by Bernhard of Pavia, the first decretalist, in about 1189-1190. In addition to older glosses of unspecified origin, on some pages next to the two columns of the Textus inclusus there are extracts taken from the first review of a set of glosses by Tankred of Bologna, which he issued in about 1210-1215. The text, the initials, and the glosses date from the end of the 12th century or possibly the beginning of the 13th century in France.
Online Since: 12/19/2011
The manuscript was written at the turn of the fourteenth to fifteenth century. It transmits a collection of charters and formularies for the ecclesiastical benefice and courts system, secular money transactions and sales, the feudal system, and so on. The notes at the end of the manuscript identify its owner as Johannes Pfister of Gossau († 1433?), imperial notary and cleric of the bishopric of Constance, who was in the service of the city and abbey of St. Gall. The manuscript subsequently belonged to the city clerk of St. Gall Johannes Widembach († c. 1456), who placed his coat of arms on the inside of the back cover.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This manuscript, probably written in Italy in the second quarter of the 15th century, contains the canonist Wilhelm Horborch’s († 1384) collection of judicial decisions of the Rota Romana. The manuscript probably reached the library of the monastery of St. Gall along with other codices from the estate of St. Gall Abbott Kaspar von Breitenlandenberg (1442–1463), who had studied canon law in Bologna from 1439 until 1442 under Johannes de Anania.
Online Since: 06/25/2015
The eighteenth- or nineteenth-century cardboard binding contains four roughly contemporary manuscript parts from the second half of the fifteenth century. Parts I and III are written in the same hand and transmit instructions and examples for the correct composition of Latin letters and charters and for the use of rhetorical figures. Part II contains a textbook of procedural law by Johannes Urbach; Part IV is a collection of Latin letters composed in the years 1465–1480 and addressed to the Einsiedeln monk and early humanist Albrecht von Bonstetten.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The manuscript chiefly transmits a 1481 Landgerichtsordnung (procedural and penal ordinances) for the Abbey-Principality of Kempten, which was possibly copied before the end of the fifteenth century. The manuscript was used by Ulrich Degelin, Chancellor under Abbot Johann Erhard Blarer von Wartensee (1587–1594) and author of a new Landgerichtsordnung for Kempten. Thereafter, the manuscript passed successively into the possession of the Lindau legal scholars Johannes Andreas Heider († 1719) and Johann Reinhard Wegelin († 1764), before Johann Nepomuk Hauntinger acquired it for St. Gall Abbey between 1780 and 1792.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
An important legal manuscript from Raetia: the Lex Romana Curiensis with the Capitula of Bishop Remedius of Chur which are only preserved here, dating from around 800.
Online Since: 12/31/2005
Universal chronicle from Saturn of Crete to Brenno, legendary Duke of Swabia (col. 3a-17a). This is followed by the Schwabenspiegel (mirror of the Swabians) with common law according to the first systematic order, in 79 sections up to article 343 (col. 17a-264b); and feudal law up to article 158 (col. 264b-347a). A table of contents for the entire manuscript can be found at the end (pp. 350-361).
Online Since: 12/18/2014
Schwabenspiegel (mirror of the Swabians), common law, articles 1-86 (col. 7a-58a), articles 155-219 (col. 59a-100b), and articles 220-377 (col. 101a-187b); after article 40, common law article 40§1 (col. 33a) from the Deutschenspiegel is inserted; the common law is followed by feudal law, articles 1-120 and 122-154 (col. 187b-284a) and article 159 (col. 284a-285a).
Online Since: 12/18/2014
Impressive law manuscript from the Carolingian period, produced in the third quarter of the 9th century, presumably in Reims. It contains the Capitular document collection of Abbot Ansegis of Fontenelle († 833) as well as the forged Capitularies of a certain Benedict Levita. The manuscript was loaned to Etienne Baluze in Paris in 1673/74.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
The earliest manuscript catalogue of the monastery of St. Gall from the middle of the 9th century, followed by a collection of important law texts (capitularies of Ansegis, Lex Salica, Lex Ribuaria).
Online Since: 12/31/2005
Carolingian collection of statutes produced in western France in Latin in the first quarter of the 9th century, includes the Lex Romana Visigothorum (collection of Roman laws enacted by the west Gothic King Alarich II.), the Lex Salica (book of Germanic law of Chlodwig, founder of the Frankish kingdom), and the Lex Alamannorum (foundation law of the Alamanni from the beginning of the 8th century). This item reached the monastery of St. Gall early on, was later removed, and was recorded as being in the possession of the scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505-1572) during the 16th century. It was sold by his heirs in 1768 to the Abbey Library of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
The incompletely preserved Edictum Rothari is the oldest extant copy of the early medieval law of the Lombards as decreed by King Rothari (636-652) in 643. This earliest known copy, dating from 670/680 and originating in Bobbio (?) has been preserved only as fragments divided between the Abbey Library of St. Gall, the Badische Landesbibliothek Karlsruhe, the Zentralbibliothek in Zurich and the Zurich cantonal archives. The largest portion of the fragments, which were bound together in the present volume by Abbey Librarian Ildefons von Arx in 1822, is found at the Abbey Library of St. Gall. In 1972, the fragmental parchment leaves of the Edictum Rothari owned by the Abbey Library of St. Gall were rebound into a new volume, in a fashion that does not exactly follow conservational guidelines, together with black and white photos of the fragments that are in Karlsruhe and Zurich. The photos were then removed from this by restorer Martin Strebel in 2008. At the same time, this manuscript, which is significant to the history of law, was rebound using the latest book restoration techniques, thanks to the Friends of the Abbey Library of St. Gall, which covered the costs of the work.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
The Wandalgarius manuscript containing copies of the so-called Lex Romana Visigothorum, the Lex Salica and the Lex Alamannorum. This important legal manuscript, was written in Lyon in 793 and was decorated by the cleric Wandalgarius with numerous colored initials and a miniature of a crowned lawgiver. This is the oldest precisely dated manuscript in the Abbey Library of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/12/2006
Manuscript compilation from the first quarter of the 9th century, possibly written in Bavaria. The codex contains, among other items, a copy of the Lex Alamannorum (foundation law of the Alamanni), a historically important collection of early accounts of pilgrimages to Jerusalem, including the Itinerarium Burdigalense, which describes a pilgrimage from Bordeaux to Rome in the years 333/34, a treatise on the Assumption of Mary, a table of the Frankish peoples, explications of the Profession of Faith, and the so-called Annales Sancti Galli breves (Brief History of St. Gallen) covering the years 703 through 869.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
Small format manuscript for regular use with a Capitular document collection from the time of Charlemagne. It contains numerous regulations enacted by Charlemagne between 779 and 789, in good, excellent, and sometimes unique surviving versions. It contains, among other items, the Capitularies of Herstal from 779 and the famous Admonitio generalis of Charlemagne from 789. Excellently conserved original Carolingian binding.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
The two-part paper manuscript transmits two theological works that, according to the colophons, were copied in 1392 and 1393. The works are Johannes Müntzinger’s commentary on Rudolf von Liebegg’s Pastorale novellum, a handbook of sacramental doctrine, and Konrad von Soltau’s systematic explanation of the foundations of Christian belief, written in the form of a commentary on the decretal “Firmiter credimus”.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The manuscript, rebound in the seventeenth or eighteenth century, transmits in its first part a commentary on the second book of the Decretales Gregorii IX (Liber Extra). The second part of the manuscript comprises just two quires, with a commentary on Title 26 of the same second book of the decretals. The manuscript belonged to the St. Gall monk Johannes Bischoff († 1495), who studied Canon Law in 1474–1476 at the University of Pavia. He wrote the commentary in the first part of the manuscript in his own hand.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The flexible binding contains four manuscript parts, each of which transmits a commentary on selected Titles and Chapters of the first book of the Decretales Gregorii IX (Liber Extra). Parts I, III and IV are written in the hand of the St. Gall Monk Johannes Bischoff († 1495), who studied Canon Law at the University of Pavia in 1474–1476. He likely obtained Part II during his studies in Pavia.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The flexible binding covers ten codicological units containing texts that the St. Gall monk Johannes Bischoff († 1495) for the most part copied in his own hand or, for a smaller number, obtained during his studies of Canon Law at Pavia in 1474–1476. They include commentaries on individual Titles of the Decretales Gregorii IX (Liber Extra), the Liber Sextus and the Clementinae, discussions of legal procedure, torture, hereditary law, and other themes, an alphabetically-organized reference work on moral doctrine, as well as the public disputation of Johannes Bischoff.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
A representative copy of the decretals of Pope Gregory IX (Pope 1227-1241) in a Gothic-rotunda script from Italy. The text of the decretals is surrounded on each page by the so-called Glossa Ordinaria, a juridical commentary by the canon law specialist Bernardus de Botone of Parma († 1266), which has been written to encircle the main text. The commentary in turn has been extensively edited and glossed at a later time. Each of the five parts is decorated with a scene portraying its content.
Online Since: 03/31/2011
This parchment manuscript contains the Institutiones Iustiniani (pp. 3a–91a), that is, the manual of Roman Law produced in 533 under the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian, as well as the Libri feudorum (pp. 91b–125b), that is, Lombard feudal law, each of which accompanied by the Glossa ordinaria, the standard apparatus, compiled by Accursius. The texts and their surrounding glosses were produced in the 14th century, and probably in France. Based on the annotations of the legal scholar Johannes Bischoff († 1495), a conventual of the Abbey of St. Gall, this manuscript was in the Abbey of St. Gall since at least the last quarter of the fifteenth century.
Online Since: 04/25/2023
This two-part manuscript was written in Italy in the period between the middle of the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century. It preserves writings concerning procedural law, among them the little known Ordo iudiciarius Quoniam ut ait apostolus, as well as finding aids and surveys on decretal law. The manuscript probably came into the possession of the St. Gall citizen Johannes Widembach († 1456) from a Canon from Zurich, and has been held by the Abbey Library at least since the 16th century.
Online Since: 12/18/2014
This manuscript, decorated with fleuronné initials and occasional pen drawings, was written in Italy in the second half of the 13th century or at the latest at the beginning of the 14th century. It preserves the Codex Justinianus (Books 1–9), the Great Gloss of Accursius associated with it, as well as many more glosses in the margins. The manuscript came to the Abbey Library at the latest in the 16th century via the two St. Gall citizens Conrad Särri and Johannes Widembach († around 1456).
Online Since: 12/18/2014
This parchment manuscript essentially contains Summae of most parts of the Corpus iuris civilis, namely books 1–9 of the Codex, the Institutions and the Digest. The vast majority of these textbook-like summaries have been ascribed to the Bologna jurist Azo Portius († 1220). The manuscript, produced in Northern Italy in the thirteenth or fourteenth century, presents at the beginning, on p. 7a, two larger painted initials, one of which features a dragon, and then follows numerous smaller pen-flourished initials.
Online Since: 04/25/2023
The paper manuscript contains three adaptations of the Libri feudorum, Lombard feudal law, and is composed of two parts. The first part, with Dullius Gambarinus’s Margarita feudorum (pp. 1a–28a), was probably written in France in the first half of the fifteenth century. The second half contains Odofredus de Denariis’s Summa feudorum (pp. 29a–60b) and Jacobus de Belvisio’s Lectura super usibus feudorum (pp. 60b–144b) and was produced either in Italy or France in the fourteenth century. The second part of the manuscript contains annotations by the legal scholar Johannes Bischoff († 1495), a conventual of the Abbey of St. Gall.
Online Since: 04/25/2023
This four-part manuscript was written primarily in the second half of the 13th century or in the first half of the 14th century in Italy and perhaps partly in France. It preserves the Tres libri Codicis (Books 10–12 of the Codex Justinianus) including the glosses, the Libri feudorum, the corresponding Glossa ordinaria , as well as other lesser writings. Particularly valuable are the pre-Accursian glosses to the Tres libri Codicis, which have been preserved partly in their original form. The manuscript came to the Abbey Library at the latest in the 16th century via the St. Gall citizen Johannes Widembach († around 1456).
Online Since: 12/18/2014
A compendium of 39 medical texts by known and unknown authors, produced in the second half of the 9th century, most likely in northern Italy, already obtained at an early date by the Abbey Library of St. Gall. This codex includes—sometimes in unique exemplars—an alphabetically ordered Greek-Latin herbal glossary, the treatise De re medica by one Pseudo-Plinius (Physica Plinii), and a longer medical tract entitled Liber Esculapii.
Online Since: 12/23/2008
Collection of medical manuscripts from the monastery of St. Gall, written in about 900, with five longer and several shorter medical-pharmaceutical treatises, representing in some cases the best, or even the only surviving copies worldwide. Among these may be found, for example, Pliny the Younger's chapter on medicine, the Medicinae ex oleribus et pomis (Medicines from vegetables and fruits) by the Roman agrarian and medical author Gargilius Martialis (3rd century), and the treatise Oxea et chronia passiones Yppocratis, Gallieni et Urani, which is found in very few manuscript copies. This manuscript also includes (on page 82) a magic sphere for predicting life and death.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
Collection of German medical texts. The beginning is missing, then the Ordnung der Gesundheit for Rudolf von Hohenberg (pp. 3-60); various recipes for medicine, magic and food (pp. 63-101), among them a treatise on vultures and verbena from the Bartholomäus (pp. 64-69); “Verworfene Tage” (pp. 69-71); a recipe for vinegar (pp. 73-76); an excerpt from the Buch der Natur by Conrad of Megenberg (pp. 82-85); recipes making use of “Schwalbenstein” (pp. 89-90); prognostics for the new year and for thunder (pp. 90-94); recipes for wine (pp. 95-101). Herbal book with excerpts from the Macer Floridus by Odo von Meung (pp. 101-146); medical recipes (pp. 146-147); applications for medicines according to the Macer Floridus (pp. 147-161); recipe against the ritten (p. 162). At the end on p. 164 there is a colored sketch of Agrimonia (Odermennig). The manuscript, originally from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 117), is related to the 2° Cod. 572 of the Staats- und Stadtbibliothek Augsburg.
Online Since: 09/23/2014
Collection of German medical texts. Recipes for medicines (pp. 1-148) with an index (pp. 149-157), more recipes added later (pp. 158-168), instructions for bloodletting (pp. 169-184), German and Latin incantations (pp. 185-186), excerpts from De pestilentia by Theobaldus Loneti (pp. 187-188). The manuscript is from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 118).
Online Since: 09/23/2014
Composite manuscript in Latin and German. The texts, which are presented in no systematic order, can be grouped as follows. Geomancy: Latin treatise with schematic drawings (pp. 1-152, 163-169); other geomantic schemata (185, 236, 263 [incorrectly paginated as 262]). Medicine: recipes, in German (pp. 153-162 and 197-198); examination of the blood after bloodletting and instructions for bloodletting, in German (pp. 193-196, 255-261). Iatromathematics: lunarium, in Latin (pp. 169-172); planets and the attributes of their corresponding hours / of the persons born under their sign, in German, partly in rhymed verse (pp. 173-175, 178-179, 218, 240); tables for determining which planets govern which hours (p. 200, 240); signs of the zodiac, their characteristics and their influence on the people born under them, in Latin (pp. 180-185, 186 [hexameter]) and German (pp. 187-192), directions and tables for calculating the position of the moon in the zodiac (pp. 177-178, 213-214, [215b]-216 [for the years 1406-1480]); diagram of the zodiac (p. 262); drawing of the parts of the fingers correlated with signs of the zodiac, temperaments and elements (p. 264 [incorrectly paginated as 263]); monthly rules, in Latin (p. 215-[215a]). Astronomy: calendar (pp. 201-212); tables for calendar calculations (pp. 237, 241-242, 254); table of lunar eclipses for the years 1422-1462, with drawings of the respective degree of coverage (pp. 238-239 and 243). Prognostication: prognostics for thunder, in German (p.199); prognostics for the new year, in Latin (p. 217). Alchemy: recipes for alchemy, in Latin (pp. 219-220) and in German (pp. 221-228). Treatise on chiromancy, in German, commencing with a colored pen drawing of two hands with the lines of the hands (pp. 244-254). Other items: incantations, in German (p. 156) and in Latin (p.219); four hexameters about the quality of wine, in Latin (p. 264 [incorrectly paginated as 263]). The manuscript, written in various hands, is from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 104).
Online Since: 09/23/2014
This miscellany begins with a few short medical texts: pp. 5–6 Johannicius (Hunain ibn Ishāq), Isagoge ad Techne Galieni (a reworking of Galen’s Ars Parva, in the Latin translation of Constantinus Africanus), § 1–9; pp. 6–7 and 8 have a few verses from the Regimen sanitatis salernitanum, a didactic poem in hexameter on medicine; pp. 7–8 contains a short text on the proportions of combined medicatons, inc. Gradus est sedecupla proporcio; pp. 9–10 a text on bloodletting, with the title in red De flebotomia, inc. In flebotomia quedam generales condiciones sunt; pp. 10–11 a Latin-German glossary of plant names, with the rubric title Nomina herbarum, inc. Plantago Wegerich; pp. 11–12 a text on uroscopy, the beginning of which a later hand in the margin indicates with in the margin with the title De urinis, inc. Si urina alba fuerit. Pages 12–14 are written in a later hand and contain, contrary to Scherrer, not further medical material, but rather an exemplum or exempla from the Vitaspatrum (In vitas patrum legitur quod quidam interrogavit senem quare cogitaciones prave inpedirent oraciones [?]). After the medical part comes on pp. 15–89 a Latin version of the Lumen animae, a collection of natural history exempla for preaching. On the margins of the page appear small diagrams concerning the contents of the chapter as well as additions to the authorities named in the text. The Lumen animae is the only text in the manuscript to begin with a larger red initial and ends on p. 89 with the rubric colophon Finito libro sit laus et gloriae Christo. The next two pages (pp. 90–91) contain, among other things, calendar verses and a text on the planets. Pages 92–97 have a Latin version of the “Letter from Heaven” or the “Sunday Letter”, a letter supposedly that fell from heaven concerning the celebration of Sunday, inc. Incipit epistola dei de celo vere missa petro apostolo ab omnibus diebus dominicis qualiter sit colendus dies dominicus. A prayer follows on pp. 97–98, inc. O dilecte Iesu Christus, felix est qui te amat. The final pages (pp. 98–101) contain further exempla written in the same later hand as pp. 12–14, inc. Legitur quod quedam mulier […] venisset ad beatum Hillarionem pro sterilitate tollenda. The manuscript is bound in a grey cardboard binding from the eighteenth century; the earlier parchment binding with a spine label bearing the shelfmark 758 survives, but it has been cut apart and stapled to the first and last quires, respectively (p. 3 and between p. 24-25; p. 102 and between p. 88-89).
Online Since: 12/20/2023
A collection of ten assorted medical tracts, written in the first half of the 9th century in an Insular, likely Celtic, script with continental influences. Among the prescriptions (on page 91) is a blessing with the cross to be used as “Schutzbrief gegen die Versuchungen des Teufels und gegen Fieber” (insurance against temptations by the Devil and against fever). The manuscript also contains, for example, extracts from the Conspectus ad Eustathium filium by Oribasius (4th century AD), a physician of late antiquity, the Epistula de febribus by the Greek physician Galen († 216 AD), and a Liber medicinalis by an unknown author.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This manuscript, illustrated with numerous colored pen drawings, originated in a secular environment in Southern Germany or in Switzerland around the middle of the 15th century. It describes the signs of the zodiac, the planets, the four temperaments, and the four seasons regarding their influence on human health. This is followed by dietary guidelines primarily regarding bloodletting, but also regarding eating, drinking, sleeping, waking, resting and moving, as well as, in concrete terms, regarding bathing (illustration p. 101) or defecating (illustration p. 120). Most likely an amateur doctor with an interest in astronomy, from the Southern region of Germany, wrote the original text around 1400 and assembled it into a compendium. Later the text was repeatedly supplemented and modified. The last part (from p. 128 on) contains a prose and a poem version of the so-called letter from Pseudo-Aristotle to Alexander the Great, in which the Greek universal scholar advises the king on maintaining good health.
Online Since: 09/23/2014
A collection of medical texts in a small-sized manuscript with selections from works by the ancient Greek physicians and authors Hippocrates (about 460-370 BC), Galen (about 129-about 216) and Oribasius (about 320-400), written in Insular (?) minuscule script in about 800, not at the abbey of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
A small-format compendium of ten different medical texts, produced shortly after 800 in an unknown scriptorium, probably in Italy. The contents also include a treatise by the Greek physician Anthimus in the form of a letter to the king of the Franks Theoderich "On the diet" (De observatione ciborum), through which we gain insight to the nutritional habits of one Germanic people.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
This manuscript is predominantly written in one hand, but with different layouts (lines per page). It chiefly contains excerpts that an anonymous Cistercian gathered together from theological and philosophical works, as stated by the rubric on p. 7 (Incipit libellus exceptionum collectarum de diversis operibus cuiusdam fratris ordinis Cysterciensis). The text begins on page 7 with Omnes naturaliter scire protestante philosopho. The rubrics in the margin and in the text indicate themes such as intercession (De suffragiis ecclesie, p. 19), christology (De nativitate domini, p. 25; De plenitudine gratie Christi, p. 27; De voluntate Christi, p. 31; De passione Christi, p. 33), purgatory (De acerbitate purgatorii, p. 88), memory and reason (De memoria, p. 124; De dignitatibus rationalis creature, p. 135), and virginity (De virginitate, p. 372). The chapters come at least in part from Ps.-Albertus Magnus, Compendium theologicae veritatis. The first pages (pp. 1–6) contain a text on free will, clearly connected to Peter Lombard’s Sententiae, Book 2, inc. Liberum arbitrium est facultas rationis et voluntatis, qua bonum eligitur gratia assistente vel malum eadem desistente. The library stamp of Abbot Diethelm Blarer, from 1553–1564, appears on p. 422. The binding is made of a dark leather cover, over which a lighter leather sleeve with overhanging edges has been placed to protect the bookblock.
Online Since: 12/20/2023
This manuscript, for the most part carefully written by a single hand, contains on pp. 3-282 the Compendium theologicae veritatis in seven books, which in early prints was ascribed to Albertus Magnus, but more recent research has identified this work as inauthentic. At the beginning of each book is a list of chapters (pp. 3, 37–38, 90–91, 126–127, 159–160, 215, 254). On pp. 283-344 follows the Confessionale by Johannes de Friburgo OP (ca. 1250–1314) (Bloomfield, Incipits of Latin works on the virtues and vices, Nr. 5755). On the front inside board can be seen the offset of a manuscript page, which probably was written in half-uncial, and possibly comes from a fragment of the Vulgate (Cod. Sang. 1395, pp. 7–327). The inside back cover also shows traces of an offset.
Online Since: 12/20/2023
The manuscript is composed of various fascicules, of which many carry at the end the ownership mark of Johannes Engler, canon of St. Leonhard (p. 140, 168, 304). After a calendar (pp. 4–24) comes the Summa rudium (pp. 25-140). The next quire (pp. 143–168) contains the synodal decrees of Marquart von Randeck, bishop of Constance (the decrees, and not the copy, date from 1407, p. 165). The remaining quires contain observations, sermons, a Latin-German vocabulary (pp. 290–304), recipes and calendar-related texts, as well as various spiritual and lay short texts. Among the latter are two collections of fables (pp. 141–144 and 266–275). The quires frequently start at the beginning of a text and often have blank pages at the end, a phenomenon that, along with the multiple ownership marks and worn outer leaves of quires, points to the individual quires being used for some time without a binding. Fifteenth-century leather binding, containing several bosses. On the pastedowns, the offset of a German-language charter can be seen.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This codex contains the Opuscula sacra by Boethius on pp. 59–111, that is I. De trinitate (pp. 59–70), II. De divinitate (Utrum pater et filius et spiritus sanctus; pp. 70–72), III. De hebdomadibus (Quomodo substantiae; pp. 72–77), IV. De fide catholica (pp. 77–84), V. Contra Eutychen et Nestorium (pp. 84–111), partly with glosses. Possibly parts were added in the 11th/12th century. Before that, on pp. 7–58, is a commentary on the Opuscula sacra I–III and V, attributed to John Scotus Eriugena or Remigius of Auxerre. On pp. 4–6, probably written by a 13th century hand, is the Planctus beati Galli, Inc. Quis dabit cineres, a lament about the theft of the treasure of St. Gall Abbey by the bishop of Constance. On p. 112, there is the De septem miraculis mundi by Pseudo-Bede. The mostly undecorated manuscript has an ichthyomorphic initial on p. 26 and an I-initial corresponding to 8 lines on p. 59.
Online Since: 06/22/2017
The volume brings together two codicological units copied independently from each other in different periods. The first part (pp. 1-158) includes the first three books of the Sentences by Magister Bandinus (pp. 1-154), the author of an abridged version of the eponymous work by Peter Lombard (Libri quatuor sententiarum). Here taking the place of the fourth book is a short treatise on women, De muliere forti (pp. 154-158). Several fourteenth-century hands produced this copy. The second part (pp. 159-234) of this codex contains a treatise on baptism, dating from the twelfth century (pp. 160-234). On the basis of the stamp of the Abbot Diethelm Blarer (p. 158), the first part was present in the library of St. Gall since at least the middle of the sixteenth century. This two-part manuscript received its current cardboard binding probably towards the end of the eighteenth century or at the beginning of the nineteenth century, when Ildefons von Arx wrote the table of contents (p. V1).
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This volume contains Alain of Lille’s Regulae de sacra theologia. The two-column text is written in a precise textualis, which, doubled in height, is used as an emphasis script for the rules. Only the incipit (p. 3a), the first initials, and the explicit (p. 81b) are in rubric. The cowhide cover was decorated, probably in Paris as early as 1200, with ten different round and rectangular blind stamps. They depict birds, geometric patterns, lions, interlace, and a kneeing man with a crown and a pot (EBDB m002201). The spine was later covered with light pigskin. On the verso of the flyleaf (p. 2) is written, probably in a fourteenth-century hand, Liber sancti Galli; on the back pastedown, in a fifteenth-century hand, Liber monasterii sancti Galli 1451. On p. 82 is the 1553-1564 library stamp of Abbot Diethelm Blarer of St. Gall.
Online Since: 09/06/2023
This theological miscellany is composed of four parts (I: pp. 3–122; II: pp. 123–215; III: pp. 216–231; IV: pp. 232–243) and is written by multiple hands in a gothic book cursive. Only the first initial has been executed. The first four gatherings, written in a single column, contain Marquard von Lindau’s treatise De reparatione hominis (pp. 3–122). On the last page of this part (p. 122) appears the 1553–1564 library stamp of Abbot Diethelm Blarer of St. Gall. On the next four gatherings is Henry of Friemar’s commentary Expositio decem praeceptorum, written in two columns (pp. 123a–213b). The next quire contains the 1398 report Determinatio magistrorum sacrae theologiae sanctae universitatis studii Pragensis concerning the theses of the Ulm master Johannes Münzinger (p. 216-230). The last gathering contains a text that begins Vas electionis est non plus sapere quam opportet… (pp. 232–238). Except for the last gathering, all parts have marginalia or manicules (p. 134), which have been trimmed. On the back of the endpaper (p. 245) is written and drawn with pen: the ownership mark, Liber monasterii sancti Galli, a face and the purchase statement, Anno domini MCCCCX [the X is crossed out?] XXII [1422 or 1432] […] emi Henricus Lútenrieter hunc librum a domino Nycolao … Hallensium. The cover is wrapped in parchment reused from a will, the inside of which is lined with linen cloth in a coarse plain weave, and has now partially detached in front. The will, written in early New High German, the front half can be read: Ich phaff Berhtolt der horiden [?] von Ehingen […] und der darnach in dem acht und súbentzigesten iar […]. The gatherings are directly chain-stitched to the thick leather spine lining. On the front of the wrapper is written in a contemporary hand a table of contents. The St. Gallen librarian Jodokus Metzler produced another table of contents, which he glued to the front flyleaf (p. 1). The pagination (pp. 1–245) has an error: there are two p. 143s.
Online Since: 09/06/2023
This manuscript of predominantly scholastic texts from the area of the University of Paris is bound in a well-preserved original Kopert (limp vellum) binding. Among others it contains an alphabetical register of the Sentences of Peter Lombard; the 14th century library catalog of the Cistercian Abbey of Heiligenkreuz in Lower Austria, preserved only in this manuscript (pp. 107-112); the work Quaestiones parvorum librorum naturalium by the French philosopher and logician Jean Buridan (Johannes Buridanus; † shortly after 1358), completed in August 1374 and correspondent to Aristotle’s writings (Parva naturalia) (pp. 121-253); as well as the text Collectio errorum in Anglia et Parisiis condemnatorum (pp. 254-264).
Online Since: 12/20/2012
This paper manuscript contains first of all a series of draft sermons dated by the colophon to 1381 (p. 80). There then follows, in the same hand as before, a partial copy of Defensor of Ligugé’s Liber scintillarum (pp. 80-96), miracles (pp. 96-108) and an index (pp. 108-110). A different hand copied book IV of Augustine’s De doctrina christiana and makes numerous marginal annotations (pp. 113-162). Next comes, probably in the hand of the wandering monk Gall Kemli († 1481), Aileranus Sapiens’ interpretation of the ancestors of Christ (pp. 163-168), as well as excerpts from theological texts, including the Mammotrectus by the Franciscan Johannes Marchesinus.
Online Since: 09/22/2022