Sub-project: Call for Collaboration 2013
Start: January 2013
Status: Completed
Financed by: swissuniversities
Description: In mid-January 2013, e-codices published its second “Call for Collaboration”. This call, published jointly with our Swiss partner libraries, once more invited scholars to suggest Swiss manuscripts for digitization. As with the first such call, interest among international manuscript researchers was impressive; in fact, considerably more proposals were submitted this time than for the first call in June 2009. The number of researchers who submitted proposals rose from 33 to 55. Many researchers suggested several manuscripts at once, so that we received no fewer than 134 individual proposals. Three years before, the total number of proposals was 97. Altogether manuscripts from 22 collections were recommended, among these several Swiss manuscripts which are held today in foreign libraries, as well as a newly discovered and previously completely unknown manuscript from a private collection in Geneva.
All Libraries and Collections
This manuscript (third quarter of the 15th century), a collection of theological texts, consists of two parts; it originated in the Carthusian Monastery in Basel, where it was probably also created. This is certain for the second part of the manuscript, which, in addition to the Vita et revelationes by Agnes Blannbekin (Chapters 1-23), also contains extensive excerpts from Lux divinitatis, the Latin translation of Das fließende Licht der Gottheit by Mechthild of Magdeburg, which became the basis for further copies made in the monastery. The model for most of the texts contained in the second part of Cod. A VIII 6 was the manuscript Basel, university library, Cod. B IX 11.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
15th century paper manuscript: During his university studies in theology, the Dominican Wernher von Selden near Aarau — and subsequently the prior of the Basel monastery — in 1487/88 transcribed the lectures of two Dominicans on Peter Lombard, including the Lectura super sententiarum libros by Hieronymus Raynerii.
Online Since: 12/20/2016
This manuscript, a collection of theological texts, from the Dominican Monastery of Basel, consists of various parts; it alone transmits the complete Latin translation of Fließenden Lichts der Gottheit by Mechthild of Magdeburg. The manuscript is remarkable not only because of its age (around or shortly before 1350), but also because of the numerous marginal notes, which reveal knowledge of the German version of the text, with which this copy of the Latin translation of Das fließende Licht was being compared.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
This precious book of hours was made in Florence around 1470-1480. Its rich and elegant illumination is due to the close circle of the most famous florentine miniaturist of his time, Francesco d’Antonio del Chierico. The same hand is responsible for the major illuminations at the beginning of the various sections as well the initials in the text. The flourished initials are of great elegance. A partly erased coat of arms on the opening leaf indicates that the book of hours was made for the wedding of a male member of the Serristori family. The manuscript entered in the collection of the present owner in 1970 and it was deposited at the Bibliothèque de Genève as part of Comites Latentes.
Online Since: 06/23/2014
One of the earliest manuscript exemplars of the version of the Tanhuma midrash text known among scholars as the "printed text" (first printed in Constantinople, 1520-22), as distinguished from the version first edited and printed by Solomon Buber in Vilnius, 1885. Copied probably somewhere in the Orient around the 14th century, the Hebrewscript is Oriental semi-cursive.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
This text contains an adaptation of several narrative parts of the Bible in Old French. The poem in alexandrine verse (en laisses d’alexandrins) was composed in the 12th century by an author of the continent and became one of the most successful religious works in Old French. This manuscript preserves one of the oldest and most complete exemplars of this work; it is the only one to contain almost the entire text from the Anglo-Norman branch of the text tradition. Because the text probably is of insular origin, this manuscript proves the almost simultaneous dissemination of the text in England.
Online Since: 06/23/2014
One of the Isidore codices from the Monastery of Fulda; the codex escaped destruction because it reached Basel during the 16th century, before the abduction and destruction of the library during the Thirty Years' War. There it apparently was to serve as a textual source for a planned edition of Isidore’s works. This codex was created in Fulda at the end of the 9th century and still retains its Carolingian binding in a parchment cover. In addition to the works of Isidore, it contains the oldest catalog of the Fulda library, the so-called Basel recipes in Old High German, and an astronomic-computistic cycle of illustrations.
Online Since: 06/22/2017
One of the Isidore codices from the Monastery of Fulda; the codex escaped destruction because it reached Basel during the 16th century, before the abduction and destruction of the library during the Thirty Years' War. There it apparently was to serve as a textual source for a planned edition of Isidore’s works. In Fulda, it originated by merging an 8th century Northern English manuscript with a continental-insular text from the first half of the 9th century, probably written in Fulda. The codex retains its Carolingian binding in a parchment cover. To the extent that the texts contained therein are critically edited, the codex is considered among important textual witnesses.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
One of the Isidore codices from the Monastery of Fulda; it survived because it reached Basel in the 16th century, before the library’s destruction in the Thirty Years' War. There it apparently served as a possible textual source for a planned edition of Isidore’s works. The codex consists of several parts. A German Anglo-Saxon manuscript from the second half of the 8th century containing the second book of Isidore’s Synonyma was supplemented in the first third of the 9th century, probably in Fulda, with the first book of the same work by Isidore. Very early already, this was bound together with another item containing Admonitio ad filium spiritualem by Pseudo-Basilius as well as various excerpts, which probably were also written in Fulda around 800.
Online Since: 03/19/2015
One of the Isidore codices (or Pseudo-Isidore) from the Monastery of Fulda; the codex escaped destruction because it reached Basel during the 16th century, before the abduction and destruction of the library during the Thirty Years' War. There it apparently was to serve as a textual source for a planned edition of Isidore’s works. The codex originated in Ireland in the 8th century and apparently retains its original Irish binding in a parchment cover. The grammar manuscript presents as its main text De vitiis (linguae), which it attributes to a Isidorus iunior, the Codex unicus. According to the editor, the text might have orginated around 500, perhaps in Spain, and is one of the sources used by Isidore for the first book of his Etymologiae; for the other texts contained herein as well, it is among one of the exceedingly rare remaining textual witnesses.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
A composite manuscript from Fulda with texts primarily on the topic of repentance and asceticism. Similar to a series of Isidore-codices from Fulda, it reached Basel in the 16th century - possibly because one of the texts contained therein also survived under Isidore’s name; thus it escaped the abduction and destruction of the Fulda library during the Thirty Years’ War. The various parts and texts are written in Anglo-Saxon and Carolingian minuscule and originated in Fulda and its surroundings, up to Mainz. The leather binding, presumably still Carolingian, was much changed at a later time, especially due to the removal of the covers. Apparently in Basel, what had formerly been the first quire (Paenitentiale Theodori), in a markedlay smaller format, was removed from the collection. Today it bears the shelf mark N I 1: 3c.
Online Since: 03/17/2016
One of the Isidore codices from the Monastery of Fulda; the codex escaped destruction because it reached Basel during the 16th century, before the abduction and destruction of the library during the Thirty Years' War. There it apparently was to serve as a textual source for a planned edition of Isidore’s works. The codex originated in England in the 8th century and retains its binding from the 8th or 9th century in a parchment cover. It is considered one of the most important textual witnesses of Isidore’s De natura rerum.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
This fascicle contains the version of the Paenitentiale Theodori named for this textual witness the ‘Canones Basilienses;’ it was written by two hands from Fulda in an Anglo-Saxon minuscule of the first quarter of the 9th century. Around 1500, this quire was part of the current manuscript F III 15e. This explains the title de conflictu viciorum et virtutum on 1r, which does not fit with the content of the quire. As evidenced by the lost text at the beginning and at the end, N I 1: 3c had previously been part of another codex.
Online Since: 03/17/2016
This composite manuscript of theological content originally belonged to the patrician family Gossembrot of Augsburg (late 15th century); via Johannes Oporin († 1568), Eusebius Merz († 1616) and Remigius Faesch († 1667), it finally became part of the university library of Basel in 1823. Except for a single remaining woodcut, various miniatures and woodcuts pasted into the manuscript have been torn out.
Online Since: 06/22/2017
This manuscript, which originated in the Benedictine Abbey St. Trinité de Fécamp, contains various works by Augustine: De opere monachorum; De fide et operibus; Contra Donatistas; De bono virginitatis; De bono conjugali; De bono viduitatis; De symbolo bono (sermo 215); De oratione dominica (sermo 56). The manuscript is significant as important testimony of French manuscript illumination of the 11th century as well as, due to its history, of the exchange of manuscripts among Norman monasteries.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
This magnificent complete edition of the works of Virgil (Bucolics, Georgics, Aeneid) was given to the Benedictine Monastery of St. Martin in Tours by the Levite Berno (note and book curse on f. 1v). Virgil’s text is interspersed with numerous commentaries (scholia) from late antiquity by Servius and Donatus, which have been transmitted in this form almost exclusively in manuscripts from the Bongarsiana collection. However, Cod. 165 does not present the true Scholia Bernensia as in Cod. 167 und Cod. 172, but rather a collection by various scholiasts which was compiled in Tours — hence the name Scholia Turonensia.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
This complete edition of the works of Virgil (Bucolics, Georgics, Aeneid) is connected to Auxerre. In the beginning the manuscript contains numerous paratexts to Virgil, such as the vitae, Argumenta, etc.; beginning on f. 6v, the inner column is reserved for the text, the outer one for the scholia. Virgil’s text is interspersed with numerous commentaries (scholia) from late antiquity by Servius and Donatus, which in this form have been transmitted almost exclusively in manuscripts from the Bongarsiana collection. Cod. 167 presents the true Scholia Bernensia, but only the left column, not the right column of Cod. 172; whether it was copied from the latter remains in dispute.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
This complete edition of the works of Virgil is from Fleury. This manuscript contains only the Bucolics, the Georgics and the first five books of the Aeneid; the second part with books VI to XII is now in Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale, lat. 7929). In the beginning the manuscript contains the so-called Vita Donatiana and various slightly later texts. It is made with great calligraphic care so that the central column is always bordered on the right and on the left by a column of scholia. Cod. 172 is the principal textual witness of the scholia (commentaries) by Servius and Donatus, which have been transmitted in this form almost exclusively in manuscripts from the Bongarsiana collection.
Online Since: 12/17/2015
This manuscript contains the complete hagiographic works of Gregory of Tours, consisting of eight books of hagiographies. The manuscript is very close to Gregory’s autograph (class 1a); it originated in the circles of the Reims scriptorium in the 9th century. Two pages of a Gospel of John in Merovingian script as well as a Vita of Paul of Thebes were bound into the volume.
Online Since: 04/09/2014
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.
Online Since: 09/23/2014