Textmanuscripts - Les Enluminures
16 parchment leaves, foliated 1-16 in arabic numerals upper right corner rectos, presumably complete but possibly lacking an undetermined number of leaves at the end (i-ii4 iii8), 40 horizontal lines and 2 full-height vertical lines lightly ruled in lead (justification 145 x 100 mm.), 40 long lines written in tiny gothic script by a single hand, rubrics in red, red initial letters entered in left margins, natural flaws to a few blank margins, blank outer margin to f. 3 cut away, lower margins of ff. 3, 5, 7-10, 13, 14 cut away and mended with later parchment without loss of text, dark stains to text area of ff. 1-3 (text still legible), several leaves creased and rubbed, some marginal initials rubbed, text on f. 16v darkened to the point of impairing legibility, but likely recoverable using modern techniques of enlargement and digital enhancement. Text block resewn and recased in eighteenth-century binding of brown leather over pasteboards, spine repaired, endleaves renewed with modern parchment. Dimensions 170 x 130 mm.
Unpublished and heretofore unstudied, this manuscript offers extensive possibilities for literary and historical research. A collection of over 200 model letters attributed to the noted dictator Bernard of Meung, who taught in the renowned cathedral school of Orléans, it provides a window into the practice of the discipline of dictamen, i.e., rules for composing letters. Copied and modified repeatedly in Northern Europe between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, this example is relatively early in the transmission of the text and furnishes an opportunity to study more closely the social, political, and religious issues of the day.
1. Changes to manuscripts of Bernard's text provide valuable evidence for the dating and localization of specific versions of the letters. For example, if a particular version of the collection refers to Popes Clement III (1187-1191), to Celestine III (1191-1198), or to later popes, these names indicate that the collection in question was formed no later than the time of the papacy in question. The present manuscript, although it reduces most proper names to initials, begins by quoting a letter from Pope Gregory VIII (f. 1r), who ruled for only two months in 1187, indicating that the version of the collection found in this codex was compiled in or soon after his time. The only earlier pope to be named in some copies of this compilation was Urban III (ruled 1185-1187), thus providing an approximate date for the original compilation. Furthermore, although there are references to the archbishops of Mainz and Cologne, the emperor of the Romans (Holy Roman Emperor), and the Duke of Saxony, the great majority of geographical references relate to France, to the see of Orléans, to the Dukes of Aquitaine, Brittany, and Berry, the Bishop of Chartres, the Counts of Toulouse, Poitou, and Limousin, and to students studying in Paris, whereas manuscripts copied later, especially in German-speaking areas, tend to substitute local names of persons and places. Thus, the evidence for probable date, together with the predominant geographical references, indicate that the collection from which this copy was derived was compiled at a time and place when the French references predominated, in other words c. 1280-1300. Script and physical features corroborate this dating.
2. Deep erasure to top margin, f. 1, presumably obliterating a previous ownership mark.
3. Occasional contemporary corrections in margins (sometimes cropped) and in text.
4. Early scribbled notes in a few margins, ff. 1rv, 2, 4.
5. Perhaps the manuscript sold at Antiquariat Dr. Helmut Tenner, Heidelberg, Auktion 100-101, October 23-24, 1974, no. 1 (Vulliez 1977, p. 150, n. 3).
6. Sold at Hartung & Karl, Munich, Auktion 53, 1986, no. 406.
7. Private collection of Dr. Hablitzl, Ansbach, Germany (Worstbrock 1990, p. 61, no. 9.38).
ff. 1-16v, incipit, "Gloriosum habent qui recte sapiunt ad communem non ad suum solummodo suspirare profectum. Isto siquidem ductus intuitu sociorum crebris impulsus precibus presens opus quasi quoddam exemplar in dictandi sciencia profectum querentibus ex magistri nostri saporatis et splendore rethorico coloratis dictaminibus prius tamen dispersis et scriptorum corruptis vicio secundum diversos gradus tam ecclesiasticarum quam secularium personarum compilare proposui … Ordo dictiminis magistri Bernardi secundum ordinem tam ecclesiasticarum quam secularium personarum primum ergo papa ecclesiasticis personis … Gregorius episcopus servus servorum dei venerabii fratri .G. sacre sancte ecclesiastice romane cardinali maguntino sedis archiepiscopo salutem et apostolicam benedictionem. Ad honorem cedit … [f. 16] Clericus clerico ut de statu suo faciat eum certiorum"[text continues in damaged form on f. 16v].
Bernardus de Magduno, Ordo dictamenis [collection of 286 model letters], a part of his Flores dictaminum (see below). Unpublished in this version. The letter collection from which this text derives is also unpublished except for miscellaneous excerpts transcribed from various manuscripts (Auvray, 1892; Redlich, 1894; Cartellieri, 1898; Delisle, 1899).
Relatively little is known about the life and career of Bernardus de Magduno (Bernard of Meung). He is named in a number of manuscripts, including the present one, as the author of works on dictamen (Worstbrock, 1990, pp. 43-62; Polak, 1993, 1994, 2015). Despite the speculations of nineteenth-century scholars, he is now generally recognized as the Bernardus de Magduno who was active in the late twelfth century, when he was attested as a canon of St. Lifar (Liphard) at Meung-sur-Loire, a village near Orléans, where the bishops of Orléans had a castle and where there was a renowned school (Vulliez, 1993). He is presumed to have taught in the school, and he may have worked in the bishop's chancery (Worstbrock, 1990, p. 46; Vulliez, 2015, p. 152, n.3).
The discipline of dictamen (ars dictaminis, ars dictandi), that is, the rules for prose composition, especially for letters, had its origin in Italy, where it was developed primarily in Bologna during the twelfth century (Haskins, 1927; Schmale, 1957; Klaes, 1990). From there it spread to France, where it was cultivated principally at Tours and Orleans. Of the dictatores associated with these centers, Bernard, whose works were assembled by his students (see prologue above) is considered to be the one whose works were most frequently copied or modified and who exercised the greatest influence on contemporaries and posterity (Schmale, 1958, p. 2; Worstbrock, 1990, p. 45; Schaller, 2000, cols. 2000-2001).
Bernard's works on dictamen were widely circulated but often copied separately. In the manuscripts they are variously referred to as Summa magistri Bernardi, Summa Bernardina, or Summa dictaminis, but in modern scholarship are usually subsumed under the title Flores dictaminum which is attested in two manuscripts of German origin now in Munich (Worstbrock, 1990, p. 52, nos. 9.15, 9.16; Polak, vol. 3, p. 52).
Bernard's treatise on the composition of letters identifies five parts of a letter: salutation (salutatio), introduction (proverbium or exordium), narration (narratio), petition (petitio), and conclusion (conclusio). In addition, he composed a treatise on the composition of documents (privilegia), which may include comments on the cursus (rules for the rhythmical termination of sentences), and the indiction (a method of reckoning time inherited from antiquity); this section is sometimes accompanied by sample documents. Most pertinent to the present discussion are two collections of model letters, a shorter one, sometimes designated minor compilatio, and a longer one, identified in some manuscripts as, maior compilatio, (Koller, 1951; Schmale, 1958; Auer, 1970). It is the latter that is found in the present manuscript.
Manuscripts such as this one provide valuable evidence for dating and localizing the different versions of this popular and influential letter collection, as well as representing the wider cultural context embodied in each iteration or modification of the collection. In his treatise on the composition of letters (not included in this manuscript) Bernard placed special emphasis on the correct forms of salutations, which were to be organized according the ranks of ecclesiastical persons and then of secular dignitaries, ranging from naming persons of higher rank first - letters from the pope to cardinals and archbishops, from cardinals and archbishops to bishops, from bishops to clergy of various ranks, and among persons of each rank communicating among themselves; for secular persons, the hierarchy ranged from emperor to princes, from kings to nobles and soldiers, and down to simple laymen (Constable, 1977; Patt 1978; Vulliez 1984, Vulliez, 2015). The organization of the letters in this manuscript to a great extent reflects this hierarchy, and the rubric introducing each letter gives a precis of the subject matter, ranging from ecclesiastical concerns to matters of secular governance to letters from students to their teachers and families (Haskins 1927; Vulliez, 2015). As Bernard's collection of model letters was copied and recopied, especially in England, the Rhineland, Bavaria, and Austria, it was regularly updated with deletions of letters, insertion of new letters, whether historical or fictive, and changes of names for senders or recipients, as well as the updating of geographical references.
No portion of any of Bernard's works has been published in edited form, and the manuscript tradition has never been fully analyzed. Worstbrock lists thirty-eight manuscripts, including the present one, that contain versions of these texts, to which Vulliez adds six or seven more codices (Worstbrock, 1990, pp. 43-62; Vulliez, 2015, p. 145, n. 3); Polak identifies at least forty manuscripts containing works by Bernard or influenced by him (Polak, 1993, 1994, 2015). Significant holdings are those now in European libraries: in Germany, France, Austria, Great Britain, the Vatican, and Spain. Only one manuscript, and that containing the present letter collection, is found in an American institution, Getty Museum, Cod. XII 6, formerly from the Ludwig collection (Worstbrock, 1990, p. 52, no. 9.13).
Auer, Leopold. "Eine bisher unbekannte Handschrift des Briefsteller Bernhards von Meung," Deutsches Archiv 26 (1970), pp. 230-240. [also online]
Auvray, L. "Documents Orléanais du XIIe et du XIIIe siècle extraits du Formulaire de Bernard de Meung," Mémoires de la société archéologique et histoirque de l' Orléanais 23 (1892), pp. 393-413.
Beyer, Heinz-Jürgen. "ie Frühphase der 'Ars dictandi'," Studi medievali ser.3, 18/2 (1977), pp. 19-43.
Camargo, Martin. Ars dictaminis, arts dictandi. Typologie des sources du moyen âge occidental, fasc. 60, Turnhout, 1991.
Camargo, Martin. "The English Manuscripts of Bernard of Meung's 'Flores dictaminum'," Viator 12 (1981), pp. 197-219; reprinted in Camargo, Essays on Medieval Rhetoric, Farnham, Surrey, England, 2012, article XIII and Addenda, p. 3.
Cartellieri, Alexander. Ein Donaueschinger Briefsteller: Lateinsiche Stilübungen des XII. Jahrhunderts aus der orléanis'schen Schule, Innsbruck, 1898.
Constable, Giles. "The Structure of Medieval Society According to the Dictatores of the Twelfth Century," in Law, Church, and Society: Essays in Honor of Stephan Kuttner, ed. Kenneth Pennington and Robert Somerville, Philadelphia, PA, 1977, pp. 253-267.
Delisle, Léopold. "Notice sur une 'Summa dictaminis' jadis conservée à Beauvais,"Notices et extraits tirés des manuscrits de la Bibliothèque nationale et autres bibliothèques, 36/1 (1899), pp. 171-205.
Felisi. Claudio, and Anne-Marie Turcan-Verkerk. "Les artes dictandi latines de la fin du XIe à la fin du XIVe siècle: Un état des sources," in Grévin, 2015, pp. 417-541.
Grévin, Benoît. "Bibliographie des études sur la théorie et la pratique de l'ars dictaminis (XIe-XVe siècle," in Grévin, 2015, pp. 545-595.
Grévin, Benoît, and Anne-Marie Turcan-Verkerk, edd. Le dictamen dans tous ses états: Perspectives de recherche sur la théorie et la pratique de l'ars dictaminis (XIe-XVe siècles), Turnhout, 2015.
Haskins, Charles Homer. "The Early Artes Dictandi in Italy," in Haskins, Studies in Mediaeval Culture, Oxford, 1929, pp. 170-192.
Haskins, Charles Homer. "An Italian Master Bernard," in Essays in History Presented to Reginald Lane Poole, ed. H. W. C. Davis, Oxford, 1927, pp. 211-226.
Haskins, Charles Homer. "The Life of Mediaeval Students as Illustrated by Their Letters," in Haskins, Studies in Mediaeval Culture, Oxford, 1929, pp. 1-35.
Klaes, Monika. "Die 'Summa" des Magister Bernardus: Zur Überlieferung und Textgeschichte einer zentralen Ars dictandi des 12. Jahrhunderts," Frühmittelalterliche Studien 24 (1990), pp. 198-234.
Koller, Heinrich. "Zwei Pariser Briefsammlungen," Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung 59 (1951), pp. 299-327. [also online]
Langlois, Charles-Victor. "Questions d'histoire littéraire: Maître Bernard," Bibliothèque de l'école des chartes 54 (1893), pp. 225-250. [also online]
Lanham, Carol Dana. Salutatio Formulas in Latin Letters to 1200: Syntax, Style, and Theory, Munich, 1975.
Meisenzahl, Johannes. "Ars notaria und Ars dictandi als Schulfächer des Mittelalters," in Lebendige Tradition: 400 Jahre Humanistische Gymnasium in Würzburg: Festschrift, Würzburg, 1961, pp. 127-151. [not available for consultation]
Meisenzahl, Johannes. "Die Bedeutung des Bernhards von Meung für das mittelalterliche Notariats- und Schulwesen, seine Urkundenlehre, und deren Überlieferung im Rahmen seines Gesamtwerkes," Unpublished dissertation, Würzburg, 1960. [not available for consultation]
Murphy, James J. Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: A History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance, Berkeley, 1974.
Murphy, James J., ed. Rhetoric in the Middle Ages (1974): A Bibliographic Supplement to 2016, Tempe, AZ. 2019.
Patt, William D. "The Early 'Ars dictaminis' as Response to a Changing Society," Viator 9 (1978), pp. 133-155.
Polak, Emil J. "Dictamen," Dictionary of the Middle Ages, vol. 4 (1984), pp. 173-177.
Polak, Emil J. Medieval and Renaissance Letter Treatises and Form Letters: A Census of Manuscripts Found in Eastern Europe and the Former U.S.S.R., Leiden, 1993.
Polak, Emil J. Medieval and Renaissance Letter Treatises and Form Letters: A Census of Manuscripts Found in Part of Western Europe, Japan, and the United States of America. The Works on Letter Writing from the Eleventh through the Seventeenth Century Found in Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Japan, and the United States of America, Leiden, 1994.
Polak, Emil J. Medieval and Renaissance Letter Treatises and Form Letters: A Census of Manuscripts Found in Part of Europe. The Works on Letter Writing from the Eleventh through the Seventeenth Century Found in Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, France, Germany, and Italy, Leiden, 2015.
Redlich, Oswald. "Eine Wiener Briefsammlung zur Geschichte des Deutschen Reiches und der Österreichischen Länder in der Zweiten Hälfte des XIII. Jahrhunderts ," Mittheilungen aus dem Vaticanischen Archive 2 (1894), pp. 336-367.
Schaller, H. M. "Ars dictaminis, ars dictandi," Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 1 (1980), cols. 1034-1039.
Schaller. H. M. "B[ernhardus] von Meung (Bernardus Magdunensis, B. de Magduno)," Lexikon des Mitttelalters, vol. 1 (1980), cols. 2000-2001.
Schmale, Franz-Josef. "Die Bologneser Schule der Ars dictandi," Deutsches Archiv 13, 1957, pp. 16-34. [also online]
Schmale, Franz-Josef. "Die Briefsteller Bernhards von Meung," Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung 66 (1958), pp. 1-28. [also online]
Tichenor, Morris. "Ars dictaminis: The Art of Letter-Writing," in Murphy, 2019, pp. 81-135.
Vulliez, Charles. "De la théorie à la pratique: les recueils de lettres rattachés au nom de Bernard de Meung," in Grévin, 2015, pp. 145-160.
Vulliez, Charles. "Des écoles de l'Orléanais à l'Université d'Orléans (Xe-début XIVe siècles), Unpublished dissertation, Université de Paris X-Nanterre, 1993. [see also online resources]
Vulliez, Charles. "L'évêque au miroir de l'Ars dictaminis: l'example de la Maior compilatio de Bernard de Meung," Revue d'histoire de l'Église de France 70 (1984), pp. 277-304. [also online]
Vulliez, Charles. "Un nouveau manuscrit 'parisien' de la summa dictaminis de Bernard de Meung et sa place dans la tradition manuscrite du texte," Revue d'histoire des textes 7 (1977), pp. 133-151. [also online]
Vulliez, Charles. "Un témoin de l'ars dictaminis français du XIIe siècle, le manuscrit Additional 18382 de la British Library," Bulletin de la Société nationale des antiquaires de France, 1990, pp. 218-231.
Worstbrock, Franz Josef. "Die Anfänge der mittelalterlichen Ars dictandi," Frühmittelalterliche Studien 23 (1989), pp. 1-42.
Worstbrock, Franz Josef. "Die Frühzeit der Ars dictandi in Frankreich," in Pragmatische Schriftlichkeit im Mittelalter: Erscheinungsformen und Entwickungstufen, ed. Hagen Keller, Klaus Grubmuller und Nikolaus Staubach, Munich, 1992, pp. 131-156.
Worstbrock, Franz Josef, Monika Klaes, and Jutta Lütten. Repertorium der Artes dictandi des Mittelalters: Teil I, Von den Anfängen bis um 1200, Munich, 1992.
Zöllner, Walter. "Eine neue Bearbeitung der 'Flores dictaminum' des Bernhard von Meung," Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg: Gesellschafts- und Sprachwissenschaftliche Reihe 13 (1964), pp. 335-342. [not available for consultation]
Dictamina: dictamina.hypotheses.org
Vulliez, Charles. Des écoles de l'Orléanais à l'Université d'Orléans (10e-début 14e siècles), Unpublished dissertation, Université de Paris X-Nanterre, 1994: https://hal.science/tel-02495940
TM1408
