Description: As part of the SUK (Swiss Conference of Universities) Program P-2: “Scientific information: access, processing and backup,” for the past four years the Swiss Rectors’ Conference supported and aided e–codices in establishing a Swiss Centre of Competence. The overall project consisted of various subprojects, among them “Call for collaboration 2013” and “Call for collaboration 2015”, “Treasures from small collections”, “Autographs of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.“ The overall project also supported further development of the web application e-codices v2.0, which went online in December 2014.
All Libraries and Collections
Bern, Burgerbibliothek, Cod. 219
Parchment · 2 + 77 + 2 ff. · 30.5 x 23 cm · France: Fleury; Reims? · 699
Eusebius-Hieronymus: Chronicon
The manuscript contains the second part of the Chronicle of Eusebius in the Latin translation and continuation of Jerome. The tables, generally laid out as double pages, are in the majority of cases condensed onto a single page. The book decoration is a superb example of pre-Carolingian manuscript illustration from the Frankish Empire and Northern Italy. From the detailed information on the title page, one can deduce that the text was written in 699; the Bernese Chronicle of Eusebius therefore is Switzerland’s oldest dated manuscript. (mit)
This 9th century manuscript is dedicated to the Artes; it consists of two parts, the first of which was written in Fulda around the second quarter of the 9th century. It contains the second book of Cassiodorus’ Institutiones, which is devoted to secular knowledge; since the 9th century, it has been preserved in several manuscripts in an interpolated version that contains Cassiodorus’ remarks on grammar, rhetoric, dialectic, arithmetic, music, geometry and astronomy, supplemented with excerpts from Quintilian, Boethius, Augustine and others. The second part was created a little earlier or simultaneously during the first third of the 9th century in Western France; it contains Alcuin’s Dialectica and excerpts from Audax Grammaticus. The two parts were already combined in the 9th century and were held in France. (stb)
Parchment · 28 ff. · I: 28.5-29 x 22.5-23 cm / II: 27.5-28 x 23 cm · Part I (ff. 1-12): Germany: Seligenstadt; Part II (ff. 13-28): France: Fleury · Part I (f. 1-12): around 836; Part II (f. 13-28): around 1000
The manuscript consists of two parts. The first, Carolingian (fol. 1–12) with its original texts (fol. 1v–11v), reflects a meeting between Einhard and Lupus of Ferrières that occurred in June of 836 in Seligenstadt. Lupus received the arithmetic book (Calculus) by Victorius of Aquitaine along with a now widely known model alphabet for Ancient Capitals. Around 1000, texts by Abbo of Fleury on the ‘computus’ (reckoning the date for Easter) were then added at the abbot’s home monastery on the Loire (fol. 12–28), along with an abacus table (fol. 1r). The resulting collection of documents contains key items for and from Abbo's technical scholarship and offers a slightly divergent counterpart to the contemporaneous Floriacensis, Berlin, Staatsbibl., Phill. 1833. (all)
Parchment · 192 ff. · 27.5 x 19.5-20 cm · France · second half of the 9th century
Glossae biblicae; Glossaria latina, lat.
This manuscript, which was probably produced in Fleury, consists of two independent parts. The first part (f. 1-47) comprises three commentaries on the Old and the New Testament; the second part (f. 48-192) consists of a total of 14 glossaries containing a total of about 25,000 lemmas. A particularity of this manuscript is that it shows different stages in the development of glossaries side by side. The first part represents an earlier stage with definitions of words in the order of the source text, also containing glosses in Old English and Old High German. In the second part the glossaries are already more developed with entries on individual authors or certain topics, ordered alphabetically by keywords. (mit)
Parchment · 145 pp. · 27.3/28.3 x 21.5/22 cm · region of Lake Constance · around 900
Prudentius, Carmina
The richly illustrated Prudentius manuscript, created around 900 in the region of Lake Constance, is counted among the outstanding examples of Carolingian book art. It contains all seven poems published by Prudentius in the year 405 as well as a later added eighth work. The codex was given to the episcopal church of Strasbourg by Bishop Erchenbald of Strasbourg (965-991) and later came into the possession of Jacques Bongars. (mit)
The manuscript consists of a single quaternio formerly bound with the present Cod. 250 of the Burgerbibliothek Bern. The quire continues the computistic content of the latter, here with Easter tables whose margins hold the Annales Floriacenses. The last page received a copy of Abbo’s second letter to Giraldus and Vitalis. (all)
Parchment · 159 ff. · 24.5-25.5 x 17-18 cm · first quarter of the 9th century
Isidor von Sevilla: Sententiae, lat.
A very interesting, completely edited and corrected manuscript of the three books of the Sententiae by Isidore of Seville. Compared to the main tradition, the form of the text is substantially different and contains numerous transpositions and additions. The manuscript was written at the Abbey of Saint-Mesmin, Micy, as evidenced by ownership labels (ex libris) written along the text area of each quire. In the middle there is a subsequently inserted binion (11th century), which contains, among others, parts of the Sermones by Fulbert of Chartres. (mit)
Parchment · 46 ff. · 24–24.5 x 22.5–23 cm · second half of the 9th century
Composite manuscript: Orthography and etymology, Latin
This manuscript is part of a substantial Carolingian composite manuscript, the surviving parts of which today are held in the Burgerbibliothek Bern (Cod. 330, 347, 357), the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris (Ms. Lat. 7665), and in the Universitätsbibliothek Leiden (Voss. Lat. Q 30). Cod. 330 contains the last part of the volume with works on orthography by Cassiodorus, Alcuin-Bede, Caper, Terentius Scaurus, Agroetius, as well as several other texts. (mit)
Parchment · 143 ff. · 24.5 x 22.5 cm · France: probably Auxerre · end of the 9th / beginning of the 10th century
Florus Lugdunensis: Sententiae epistolarum beati Pauli apostoli a sancto Hieronimo presbitero, denique a beato papa Gregorio expositae
Florus of Lyon († around 860) specialized in compiling patristic commentaries on the Epistles of Paul. This manuscript was written in France, probably in Auxerre, at the beginning of the 10th century, and is devoted exclusively to the compilation of the commentaries of Jerome and Gregory the Great. These two compilations are currently unpublished; however, the other two known texts have been digitized: Paris, BnF, lat. 1764 ff. 28r–97v and Paris, BnF, n.a.l. 1460 ff. 82r–169v. (cha)
Parchment · 41 ff. · 24–24.5 x 22.5–23 cm · second half of the 9th century
Composite manuscript: Macrobius, Plinius, Nonius Marcellus: excerpts, Latin
This manuscript is part of a substantial Carolingian composite manuscript, the surviving parts of which today are held in the Burgerbibliothek Bern (Cod. 330, 347, 357), the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris (Ms. Lat. 7665), and in the Universitätsbibliothek Leiden (Voss. Lat. Q 30). Cod. 347 contains the first part of the volume with astronomical excerpts and diagrams from Macrobius and Pliny, as well as the beginning of Nonius Marcellus. (mit)
Parchment · 219 ff. · 25 x 20 cm · Fleury · around 820
Biblia Latina (Vulgata): Evangelia
Evangelary from Fleury, with the texts of the four Gospels, each preceded by two chapter indexes. Attached to the beginning is a quaternio with letters from Jerome to Pope Damasus and from Eusebius to Cyprian. The artistic decoration includes 15 canon tables as well as a picture of the hand of God with the symbols of the evangelists. (mit)
Parchment · 274 ff. · 23.5-24 x 16.5-17 cm · Northeastern France · middle of the 13th century
Composite Manuscript: Dits et fabliaux, Sept sages de Rome, Perceval, French
This manuscript is famous primarily for its rich collection of Old French Fabliaux, a considerable number of which survive only in this manuscript; it also is considered among the most important textual witnesses for the fragment of the Sept sages de Rome and for Perceval. Because of its great importance to French poetry, it was lent to Paris at the beginning of the 19th century, was temporarily lost, and had to be re-bought by the municipal library of Bern at great expense in 1836. (mit)
Parchment · 43 ff. · 24–24.5 x 22.5–23 cm · second half of the 9th century
Composite manuscript: Glossaries; excerpts from classic texts; fragment from Petronius, Latin
This manuscript is part of a substantial Carolingian composite manuscript, the surviving parts of which today are held in the Burgerbibliothek Bern (Cod. 330, 347, 357), the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris (Ms. Lat. 7665), and in the Universitätsbibliothek Leiden (Voss. Lat. Q 30). Cod. 357 contains: on ff. 1–32, the second to last part of the volume with various glossaries and excerpts from Sallust; on ff. 33–41, the rest of Nonius Marcellus (continuation from Cod. 347), the oldest surviving textual witness of Petronius’ Satyricon, as well as a fragment of a poem about weights and measures. (mit)
Parchment · II + 159 ff. · 22.5-23.5 x 20.5-21 cm · second third of the 9th century
Valerius Maximus: Facta et dicta memorabilia
One of the earliest and most famous manuscripts of Valerius Maximus; its importance lies in the autograph reworkings by Lupus of Ferrières. Lupus himself wrote the Exempla and the comment on the sometime "flyleaves" (f. II-III), repeatedly collated the main text, added supplements from the parallel transmission of Iulius Paris (an abbreviator of Valerius Maximus) and also its accompanying text (Gaius Titius Probus: De praenominibus; f. 158va-159r). In making the fresh description a hitherto unnoticed letter- or charter-like text was discovered on the last page (f. 159v). (all/mit)
Parchment · 153 ff. · 18-19 x 14-14.5 cm · France: Bourges · first third of the 8th century (Palimpsests 5th and 7th century)
Composite manuscript: Merovingian excerpts from grammatical, patristic, computistic and medical works
This Merovingian composite manuscript, which was created in Bourges, originally consisted of six independent parts, which were written by different, often not very practiced hands in various phases. Most of the close to thirty individual pieces are texts from grammatical, patristic, computistic and medical works. The longer pieces are interspersed with further excerpts, partly written in Tironian notes. One quaternio from the only partially preserved third part is today held in Paris (BN lat. 10756). Noteworthy is the palimpsest in the fifth part, whose undertexts were probably written in Italy in the 7th century and in the second half of the 5th century respectively. (mit)
Parchment · 2 ff. · 33 x 22 cm · France/Germany (?) · 10th / 11th century
Annales Fuldenses (fragment)
10th/11th century fragment of unknown origin, containing parts of the Mainz continuation (up to the year 887) of the so-called Annales Fuldenses with entries for the years 871, 872 and 876. Based on the reading of the text, this exemplar belongs to a group of manuscripts that also contain the so-called Bavarian continuation of the Annals for the years 882 to 901. (stb)
Parchment · 2 ff. · 21.5 x 17.5 cm · Fulda · second quarter of the 9th century
Cetius Faventinus: Artis architectonicae privatis usibus adbreviatus liber (fragment)
Fragment of a manuscript that originated in Fulda around the second quarter of the 9th century, containing Cetius Faventinus’ (late 3rd/early 4th century) extracts from Vitruvius’ De Architectura. It cannot be determined when the codex left Fulda. Two Fulda library catalogs from the beginning and the middle of the 16th century still list a Faventinus manuscript. (stb)
French notarial document (manuscript waste as binding of Cod. 172)
This fragment was removed from Cod. 172 during the restoration of the previous binding; presumably it originated in the legal office of Pierre Daniels in Orléans, as attested by the fact that his name is on the document. (mit)
Parchment · 2 ff. · 37 x 24.5 cm; 34.5 x 25 cm · 15th century
Plenarium (Fragment)
The two fragments come from the previous binding of Cod. 125, from which they were removed during restoration; presumably they contain parts of a plenarium with musical notation. (mit)
Parchment · 1 f. · 597 x 13-13.5 cm · Alsace: probably Murbach Abbey · end of the 11th / beginning of the 12th century
Rotulus von Mülinen: Recipes, incantations, blessings, De taxone liber; alphabetical glossary of plants
This manuscript is probably from Murbach Abbey; it is an example of the transmission of texts by the medium of the medieval scroll. The Rotulus von Mülinen contains more than 460 recipes, incantations and blessings in Latin, with selective interlinear glosses in Old High German. In addition there is an isolated recipe purely in Old High German Contra paralysin theutonice. The verso side contains an extensive glossary with over 1500 lemmas from the field of medicine, partly provided with Latin and Old High German explanations. (koe)