November 2019 – Bibliotheca Philadelphiensis

Nau, Naulet, Noël: Part I (a poem by Olivier Maillard)

November 29, 2019December 16, 2019 by Nicholas Herman

Fifty-two discoveries from the BiblioPhilly project, No. 36/52

Noels (Book of Christmas Carols in French), Philadelphia, Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E 211, fols. 17v (detail).

As the holiday season approaches, it seems appropriate to devote a pair of posts to a lovely, if little-known gem of the Free Library of Philadelphia’s collection of manuscripts. This charming and well-used manuscript on paper contains an anthology of lyrics for Christmas carols, or Noels, written principally in French and dating to the 1520s.

Who was Michele Zopello?

November 22, 2019February 22, 2022 by Nicholas Herman

Fifty-two discoveries from the BiblioPhilly project, No. 35/52

Michele Zopello, Litterarum simulationis liber; University of Pennsylvania, Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection, LJS 225, fol. 1r

One of the masterpieces of the Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection at the University of Pennsylvania is the presentation copy of a work on cryptography made for Alfonso da Borgia (1378–1458) during his three-year reign as Pope Callixtus III. The text is fascinating, as it provides an unpublished and otherwise unknown insight into Renaissance systems of cyphers.

Which Dr. Wickersham?

November 15, 2019December 8, 2020 by Nicholas Herman

Fifty-two discoveries from the BiblioPhilly project, No. 34/52

Antiphonal, Philadelphia, The Library Company of Philadelphia, MS 19, front cover and fol. 150v

The Library Company of Philadelphia possesses a small collection of about twenty Medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, which are interesting on account of their diverse provenance histories. These manuscripts entered the institution at different times and through a variety of local collectors. Because the Library Company predates the establishment of the Free Library of Philadelphia by 160 years, many of these donations were made relatively early in the history of manuscript collecting in the United States.

That’s a Bullarium

November 8, 2019December 16, 2019 by Nicholas Herman

Fifty-two discoveries from the BiblioPhilly project, No. 33/52

Bullarium Augustinianum (Collection of Augustinian Bulls); University of Pennsylvania, Ms. Codex 85, fol. 1r, with border here attributed to the workshop of Giovanni Pietro da Cemmo (doc. 1474–1507)

The manuscript we are looking at today—another University of Pennsylvania manuscript—is a collection of papal decrees and bulls pertaining to the Augustinians, a mendicant order that expanded alongside the Franciscans and Dominicans from the thirteenth century onward. The compilation begins with a series of older texts combined into a sprawling bull outlining privileges for friars of the order, the Dum fructus uberes.

A Quire of “Better” Angels (No Pun Intended)

November 1, 2019December 16, 2019 by Nicholas Herman

Fifty-two discoveries from the BiblioPhilly project, No. 32/52

Book of Hours, Use of Bourges, Philadelphia, Free Library of Philadelphia, Lewis E 87, fol. 9r (detail)

A few weeks ago, we looked at a Book of Hours at the Free Library of Philadelphia (Lewis E 87) that bears an ownership inscription by Jean Lallemant dated to 1544, but which is fact a noticeably older book, produced around the turn of the sixteenth century. Today, we will inspect the book’s unusual border decoration more closely in an attempt to determine the identity of its illuminator. While the book is missing its eight large miniatures, the cherubs and seraphs in the margins contain just enough stylistic information to allow for an attribution. Or at least, a partial one.