Gospel lectionary, Benedictine use; Germany, late 11th century

Title

Gospel lectionary, Benedictine use; Germany, late 11th century

Shelfmark

MS. Canon. Bibl. Lat. 43

Place of origin

German, south-west

Date

11th century, late

Language

Latin

Contents

Form

codex

Support

parchment

Physical extent

i (19th century(?) paper) + 116 + i (18th century(?) paper)

Hands

Late Caroline bookhand.

Decoration

One four-line pen-drawn initial (fol. 1r), with coiling foliate forms and buds in brown ink, and red dots. (Pächt and Alexander i. 47)

A space left blank for one other large initial (fol. 113r).

Other initials throughout in plain red.

Musical notation

Occasional neums above the text; the genealogies of Christ (fol. 5r-v, 94v-95r) with notation.

Binding

Sewn on four bands and bound with 18th/19th-century Italian(?) three-quarter leather over brown paper-covered pasteboards; the spine with a title-piece lettered in gilt capitals ‘Evang. per totum annum MS Sec. X’

Acquisition

Purchased by the Bodleian in 1817. Former Bodleian shelfmark ‘Can Bibl. 43.’ (front pastedown) A list in pencil of some of the saints in the sanctorale is initialled H.C. (front pastedown).

Provenance

Van Dijk noted that the sanctorale is very similar to that of the Epistle & Gospel Book, MS. Canon. liturg. 324, which he suggested was from Hirsau Abbey, partly due to the presence of its patron, St Aurelius, whose relics there were elevated by Pope Leo IX in 1049. MS. Canon. Liturg. 324 was later at Moggio, a house of the Hirsau congregation: Felix Heinzer, Klosterreform und mittelalterliche Buchkultur im deutschen Südwesten (2008) 88 n. 16 rejects a direct connection with Hirsau. St Aurelius is included in the present volume (fol. 95v), as is the rare St Pirminus, who was venerated at Strasbourg, Chur, Freiburg, St Gall, and Speyer, supporting an origin in south-western Germany.

Matteo Luigi Canonici, 1727–1805 (uncertain how acquired: not from Trevisan/Soranzo)

Giuseppe Canonici, -1807

Title

Gospel lectionary, Benedictine use

Shelfmark

MS. Canon. Bibl. Lat. 43

Date

11th century, end

Language

Latin

Physical extent

1 volume