Aurora

Item Information

Title:
Aurora
Title (uniform):
Aurora. Selections
Description:
Riga (d. ca. 1209) composed the Aurora over the span of two decades, between 1180 and 1200; Aegidius of Paris redacted the poem in the author's lifetime, but the present manuscript does not include any of the emendations made by Aegidius. The fourteenth-century additions on fol. 130, however, include supplementary texts of Aegidius that are sometimes found appendixed to the Aurora.
Author:
Peter Riga, approximately 1140-1209
Contributor:
Aegidius Parisiensis, approximately 1160-1223 or 1224
Former owner:
Barrois, Joseph, approximately 1785-1855
Former owner:
Ashburnham, Bertram Ashburnham, Earl of, 1797-1878
Former owner:
Cockerell, Sydney Carlyle, Sir, 1867-1962
Auctioneer:
Sotheby's (Firm)
Date:
[1225–1275]
Format:
Manuscripts
Books
Genre:
Manuscripts, Latin (Medieval and modern)--France
Manuscripts, Medieval--France
Marginalia
Inscriptions
Poetry
Location:
Boston Public Library
Rare Books Department
Collection (local):
Medieval and Early Renaissance Manuscripts (Collection of Distinction)
Subjects:
Christian poetry, Latin (Medieval and modern)--Early works to 1800
Bible as literature--Early works to 1800
Christian literature, Latin--Early works to 1800
Christian poetry, Latin--Early works to 1800
Latin literature, Medieval and modern--Early works to 1800
Latin poetry, Medieval and modern--Early works to 1800
Literature, Medieval
Bible--Commentaries--Early works to 1800
Bible--Paraphrases
Bible--Versification--Early works to 1800
Places:
France
Extent:
133 leaves : parchment ; 243 x 165 (175 x 65) mm bound to 26 x 17 cm
Permalink:
https://ark.digitalcommonwealth.org/ark:/50959/ng454j495
Terms of Use:
No known copyright restrictions.
No known restrictions on use.
Place of origin:
[France?]
Language:
Latin
Table of Contents:
1. fol. 1: Peter Riga's prologue to Aurora (the Bible in verse)
2. fol. 1-96 (except fol. 93 which is misbound and should precede f. 97): Old Testament.
3. fol. 93, 97-127v: Evangelists.
4. fol. 127v-133:13: Recapitulones.
5. fol. 133:14-end: Acts.
6. fol. 133r: 15th-century additions (Acts (first 11 lines only); [Oratio Petri Rigae])
7. fol. 133v: 15th-century additions (Aegidius of Paris, De numero librorum utriusquo Testamenti e modo legendi and Aegidius of Paris, De penis inferni)
Notes:
Ms. codex.
Bibliographic record created by BPL staff based on description by Dr. Lisa Fagin Davis.
Origin: Written in France in the mid-13th century.
Notes (ownership):
Provenance: Marginal annotations throughout, contemporary and somewhat later. Ex libris from the fifteenth or sixteenth century on fol. 1r, read by de Ricci as "Desideratus Theres." The inscription is partially effaced: "Ex libris d. di[?]id. bati [?]orast [?]tigrosi." Owned by Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Barrois (1784-1855); his 1849 sale (no. 149) to Bertram, the Fourth Earl of Ashburnham (1797-1878).
Notes (acquisition):
Immediate source of acquisition: Purchased at the Ashburnham sale Sotheby's London, 10 June 1901, lot 469 to Sydney Cockerell for the Boston Public Library (Cockerell's notes on front flyleaf).
Notes (date):
This date is inferred.
Notes (citation):
Ricci, S. de. Census of medieval and Renaissance manuscripts in the United States and Canada, 1, 920
Notes (object):
Secundo folio: Nomen designant flumina...
Collation: Parchment, fol. 133 ; 1-14⁸ 15⁶ 16⁸ 17⁸⁻¹ (final leaf cancelled). Folios 58/63, 66/71, 91/94, and 98/103 originally conjugate, now sewn- or tipped-in singletons. The bifolia of quire 12 (fol. 89-96) are bound out of order. The two leaves that had originally been been the outermost leaves (fol. 89/96 and fol. 90/95) have been rebound as the innermost leaves of this quire and the leaves that had been the inner most leaves of the quire (fol. 91/94 and fol. 92/93) are now the outermost leaves in the current arrangement of this quire; catchwords partially preserved, outlined in red and brown, lower center, final verso of each quire. Modern arabic pencil foliation, upper outer corner of each page (e.g. 1r, 1v, etc.).
Layout: One column, 48-53 lines. Ruled in light plummet.
Script: Written in an early gothic bookhand in black ink with red rubrics.
Decoration: 2-line chapter initials throughout alternating red with blue filigree or vice versa; 11-line initial [F] on fol. 1r as a dragon in red and blue, tail extending down the outer margin; dragon in lower margin fol. 1r in blue and red with blue and red filigree "flames" extending the width of the lower margin. Biblical genealogical diagrams in outer margins of most fol. from 3-20, the descent of Jesus from Adam and Eve, taken from Peter of Poitiers' Compendium in Genealogia Christi, including his diagram of the Hebrew's desert encampment (fol. 9) and the Gates of Jerusalem (fol. 16), in black.
Binding: 18th century brown calf over pasteboard, calf partially red-rotted, spine in compartments, title gilt "Petrus de Riga," green Barrois spine label "14[9]," edges spackled red.
Notes (bibliography):
Bibliography: P. Beichner, Aurora: Petri Rigae Biblia versificata (Notre Dame, 1965); G. Dinkova-Bruun, "Additions to Peter Riga's Aurora in paris, Bibliotheque Nationale de France Lat. 13050," Medieval studies 69 (2007): 1-58; Zoltan Haraszti, "Medieval manuscripts in the library," More Books III (1928): 63.
Notes (language):
In Latin.
Identifier:
06_01_018639
Call #:
RARE BKS MS q Med.16
MS G.31.76 (no longer used)
Barcode:
39999091846285